The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1929-05-08
Marty on French Naval Mutiny
By Fred Ellis

was no harmonious guidance and no
connection between the separate
groups. On the "Waldeck-Rousseau"
alone an organization existed which
included over the half of the crew
and had been formed with view
to economic demands. This was the
Brotherhood of the Mariners" from
whose midst a secret committee had
arisen. This also explains how it
came about that the revolt broke
out on the said cruiser only four
days after | had been confined there.
This absence of organization and
of connection between the revolu
tionary elements of the fleet made
it possible for the government to
shatter easily a movement of such
extent.
The Consequences.
1.-French Imperialism was forced
to relax the grasp with which it was
throttling the October revolution.
1t could not set it's own troops
against the Russian revolution and
had to resort to mercenaries, the
Wrangels, Denikins and their gang.
Only in this way was it in a posi-
ton to continue its work in favor of
international capitalism. These
White Guardist troops, however,
were by no means a match for the
Red Army.
This then is a decisive result of
the Black Sea revolt. In this way
the workers and peasants of France
gave very active support to the Oc-
tober revolution. They rendered an
extremely valuable service to their
brothers who were engaged in a NOR
tai combat for power, in that they
disabled the powerful military ap-
paratus of France.
1.-THE Black Sea revolt made
the October revolution known among
broad strata of the French popula-
ton.
The court martials of the army
and navy passed sentences of many
hundreds of years Imprisonment for
mutiny. AS early as at the end
of 1919, a group of ex-sailors formed
Committee for the Defense of
the Sailors" in Paris, which engi-
neered powerful campaign of agi-
tation. From 1922 EDWARDS, the
Communist Party took the lead in
this campaign and impaired to it so
much impetus that the government
was finally compelled to release one
mutineer after the other from
prison. (Since the summer of 1929.
Concrete Success of Anti-War Work.
3.-The Black Sea revolt was a
concrete example proving that it is
possible to check an imperialist war
or at least to delay it. In France,
where anti-militarism is extremely
popular among broad strata of the
workers and peasants, the revolt
was concrete example of how it
is possible to conduct the various
currents of anti-militarism into one
revolutionary chanNel. The workers
and peasants can learn from it how
it is possible, by combining mass
movements with the activity of mo-
bilized soldiers, to prevent an often
sive war against the Soviet Union
and, in certain circumstances, to turn
it into civil war against the bour-
geoisie of their own country.
4.-The revolt of the Black Sea
fleet created a really revolutionary
movement in the French navy.
The eleven demonstrations which
took place in 1925 in the Mediter-
ranean fleet against the Morocco
war, the revolts on July 18th and
10th, and on August 9Th, 1927 in
the military prison of Toulon, in
which many sailors were imprisoned
on account of their political attitude
these and other events bear wit
ness to the fact that the revolution
airy spirit, the spirit of Kronstadt is
living and will continue to live in
the hearts of the young proletarian
sailors.
Jeanne Labourbe and the other
proletarian heroes who fell in
Odessa and Sebastopol, did not sac
rifice their lives in vain. I.t