Plentywood herald. [volume] (Plentywood, Mont.) 1908-current, 1932-01-28
ADDRESS OF JAMES H. WATT
BEFORE THE CHICAGO BAR
ASSOCIATION

ASSOCIATION
Today all eyes i fixed upon the
Russian Soviet Union. The interest
expressed by everyone in anything
concerning the USSR-the Union of
Socialistic Soviet Republics, is
NOUS Everyone wants to know what
it is all about, what is the real OBJ
ject of the scheme; what is the five
year plan; will it be a success? How
many are the questions concerning
the land which was once the Tsar's!
Till some two years ago, l knew
little about the whole affair. Amer
ica engineers r busy men and as a
rule but casually concerned with pol
itics. We knew that under the Tsar
the people had been terribly oppress-
ed and exploited. We learned that the
Russian church was corrupt and hand
in glove with the government to bleed
people. We felt that the revolution
was a good thing.
Why / Went
/ accepted work in the Soviet I'm
ion for the following easons love of
adventure; and attractive salary,
rs percent of which was paid in gold;
and a desire to "a for myself and
form my own opinion of the thing.
When my friends urged me not to go,
said the thing was a menace to our
country, that the Russian people
were being exploited, that a govern
ment based on atheism was all wrong,
/ laughed, refued to listen, and de-
parted with my wife for the USSR.
First -Four Months
We arrived in Kharkov, the capital
of the Ukraine, in late January, 1880.
For the FIRST four months we were
veritable babes in the wood. We were
taken here, we were taken there;
shown the nurseries, the homes for
the Wild boys, the new factories, the
new apartment and office buildings;
invited to concerts in the various
Red Corners; Wined and dined and
much fused over-we American
specialists who were here to help
make the five year plan q success to
help build up the great Soviet Union
the Americans who approved of
communism and were here to help
to help the USSR in its plans for
World Revolution This, Of course
was in Russian, so far at first none
of US understood just Why everyone
cheered us so.
Seeing the Light
But after the first four months
things began to take on a color, a
meaning. We knew we had been
treated as alert tourists realize they
are handled More engineers coming
and the attention of the officials di-
rected elsewhere, we began to lool
around by ourselves. | bent every eff
fort to learn the Russian language
This enabled me to learn many things
! was not supposed to hear or learn
We made friends who in turn inform
ed us | talked to bricklayers, tt
plumbers, to carpenters, to peasants
to bank employees, to clerks, to eng
meers. / was amazed to find that not
one of them is in sympathy with the
present regime. | found that only the
youth and the communist backed up
the government when questioned pri-
vately. DisillusioDed in some part, al
least, | made directed effort to gair
a w~eil-rounded picture of the situa
ton and to ascertain the real objects
Of the five year plan.
s Year Plan
And what is the five year plan?
thought it was a plan to build III
Russia for the Russian people, q plai
TO industrialize an agricultural ma
tion. What / have seen does not beal
!. that out. The primary and ultimat'
object of the five year plan is work
revolution. This is the principal aim
| not of the great masses Of RUSSIA
people, but of the small group wh'
today rule Russia with despotism un
paralleled by the Tsar. This is BORN
out by many statements of soviet of
| ficials themselves and an editoria
| from Pravda states in part. "The fiv'
: year plan is a great plan of world re
volution.'
A phase of the plan put out as on
merely TO industrialize Russia is tn
! attempt to establish huge credit
with the leading nations Of the world
a huge scheme to inveigle the indus
| trial and financial institutions of thes
nations, the one into sales Of mach
e merry and equipment on long-tim
k credit, the other into great loans
Likely Stain and his associates hav
t in mind TO get everyone SO deeply in
n volved as to preclude the possibilits
of withdrawal Of aid or declaration
t of war by any of the leading nations
but at the same time, and of out
5 standing significance, they look t
the ultimate destruction of FINANCES
; and industrial institutions of othe
nations and this as part of the prt
0 dominating purpose and intent, won
S revolution And on their own admis
sion, without foreign aid they coul
8 EA-A-