The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1931-01-02
.LENIN CORNER
Defeating the Gown" Govt

Revolution in war time is civil war. Trans
war is, on the one hand, facilitated by military
reverSeS ("defeats'o of the governments; on the
other Rand, it is impossible to strive in practice
towards such a transformation without at the
same time working towards military defeat
The slogan" of defeat is so vehemently repu-
dated by the chauviniStS Qncluding the Organ
ization Committee, including the Chkheidze
fraction) for the very reason that this slogan
aIone means consistent appeal to revolutionary
action against ones own government in war time
without such action, millions of the most rev.
dictionary phrases concerning "war against war
and conditions etc." are not worth penny.
He who wishes earnestly to dispute the ~slog
an" calling for the defeat of ones own govern
ment in the imperialist war, would have to prove
one of three things: either % thatst the war of
1914-1915 is not reactionary; or 20 that a rev.
olution in connection with it is impossible, or
90 that coordination and mutual aid of the
revolutionary movement in all beligerent coun-
tries is impossible The last is particularly
important for Russia, because this is the most
backward country, where an immediate Socialist
revolution is impossible. This is why the Rus.
sian Social-Democrats had to be the first to adj
vance the theory and the practice of the defeat
slogan" The, czarist government was perfectly
right when it asserted that the propaganda of
the Russian Social-Democratic Labor Fraction
was the only example in the International of not
only parliamentary opposition but of real rev.
dictionary propaganda in the masses against
their government that this propaganda weakened
the military power of Russia and aided its del
feat. This is fact 1t is not clever to hid
from it.
The opponents of the defeat slogan are simply
afraid of themselves when they do not wish to
IF
connection between revolutionary propaganda
against the government and actions leading to its
defeat.
Is it possible to have coordination and mutual
aid between the Russian movement, which is
revolutionary in the bourgeois democratic sense
of the word, and the Socialist movement in the
West? This has not been doubted by any one of
the Socialists who, in the last decade, expressed
themselves publicly, and the movement of the
Austrian proletarat after october IT, 1905, proved
such possibility by the fact of real life.
The Socialists have always condemned wars
between peoples as barbarous and bestial. Our
attitude towards war, however, differs in princi-
pie from that of the bourgeois pacifsts and
anarchists. We differ from the first in that we
understand the inseparable connection between
wars on the one hand and class struggles inside
of country on the other, we understand the
impossibilty of eliminating wars without elimin-
ating classes and creating Socialism and III that
we fully recognize the justice, the progressivism
and the necessity of civil wars, j. e., wars of an
oppressed class against the oppressors, of slaves
against the shareholders, Of serfs against the
landowners of wage-workers against the bour-
geoisie We, Marxists, differ both from pacifsts
and anarchists in that we recognize the necessity
of an historical study Of each war individually,
from the point of view of Marks diaectical
materalism There have been many wars in
history which, notwithstanding all the horrors,
cruelties, miseries and tortures, inevitably con-
nected with every war, had progressive char
acter, l. e., they served the development of man
kind aiding in the destruction of extremely per-
ncious and reactionary institutions (as for in
stance, absolutism or serfdom). or helping to re-
move the most barbarous despotisms in Europe
chat of Turkey and Russia). 1t is therefore ne
cessary to examine the historic characteristics
Of the present war taken by itself
j Socialism and the War q. iel<ilt.- 4"