January 31st, 1950
Dear Comrade Burns.
I enclose my reasons for stating that the Party during the recent war reduced the class struggle to one of agitation for the opening of a second front–Stalin stated that the war against fascism from its very outset was a war for democracy, but few class conscious workers in either Britain or U.S. regarded it as such. Today it is obvious that Stalin was pointing to the qualitative differences which exist between a fascist State –open dictatorship by monopoly capitalism –and a democratic State–the hidden dictatorship of monopoly capitalism. Bourgeois democracy reflects a stage in capitalist social development wherein the people in general and the working class in particular have certain historically developed rights, rights which cannot be taken away from them without forcible repression. History, when we look back, seems always rather simple, its millions of winding curves have been wiped out, we are confronted with a broad highway, easy to travel on.
Within the top leadership of the British and U.S. Communist Parties a great deal of confusion prevailed at the outbreak of hostilities. Even those who came out most strongly in support of the war against Hitler-Germany did so not from a clear understanding of Marxist theory as from a national, chauvinist point of view. But if this was so in Britain and U.S., and I think it is stated correctly, was it also true for all other Communist Parties? No, that cannot be said to be so. History develops in a particular fashion and is time-conditioned. The French working class–from the view-point of political awareness–were products of a richer background, their leader, the Communist Party, was thus able to analyse the situation in a more concrete fashion, for them practice and theory were more deeply fused, the result of much greater experience.
From its opening day the struggle for them was a struggle for national independence, against Hitler and against their own traitors, with Vichy already in their soul. For the French bourgeois, in the interest of class hegemony, their deadly fear of Communism, had already, prior to the war’s outbreak, shown that they were prepared to betray their own country, France, and had left a gap in the Maginot Line through which the German armies poured. The betrayal of the Generals came as no surprise to our French comrades. The French comrades combined the struggle for national independence with a struggle for the return of stolen democratic rights, and waged a struggle to broaden these rights as much as possible under capitalism. No illusions about a ’peaceful road to socialism’ was allowed to dominate the Central Committee of the French Party. How well they fought, how timely their exposure of de Gaulle, their thunder against the Monnet “plan.”
The French Party fought a many-sided battle, neither following the road of reducing the whole to a question of components, nor on the other hand of elevating the whole and forgetting that it is made of many parts, each with its own property. For example, their attitude to the question of Nationalisation was far different from that put forward by Varga, who ’overlooked’ the question of the State and its relationship to classes in society.
From the outset of the Soviet Union entering the war it should have been evident that victory would rest with her, that the new qualities inherent in the Soviet State, developed through its own inner struggles for Socialism, has developed quantitatively to the point where its decisive features could more than outmatch the enemy. First and foremost was its cadres. The Soviet Union, a developed Socialist State, was in a position to subordinate everything to the job of smashing the enemy. Could this be said of the Fascist States? No. Bitter rivalry between monopolies, between them and ’free business,’ parasitic demands of the ruling class, of the ruling bureaucracy, all the evils which wrack capitalist society are not done away with at the outbreak of war, in fact they become sharply accentuated. And what was true for the Fascist States was also true for the ’democratic’ States.
It should have been foreseen–from an analysis of Marx’s General Laws–that with the passing of Hitler-Germany the leadership of the capitalist world, at least temporarily would pass to the U.S. It should have been apparent that as a result of the war world socialism would emerge greatly strengthened. It should have been apparent that, remembering Marx’s words, “A class must be driven off the historical stage,” no toleration of gradualist notions should have been allowed to exist, let alone flourish and dominate the life of our Party. What a disgrace, how true that we are still representatives of a rotten bourgeoisie! It should have been apparent, even to the blind, that capitalism after the war was in desperate need of the cloak of social democracy, that the Labour Party, and not Mosely’s scum, would be the main force used against the working class.
The only course open to the British Communist Party during the war was to conduct the struggle in such a fashion as would result to its credit among the working class after the war. This meant, above all else, a leadership in the shops and factories as would ensure to the working class as great a share of the increased flood of surplus value as was possible for us to obtain. Not wanting to interrupt this golden flood the capitalist class as a whole would have given in to determined pressure–nor would such a policy have weakened our demand for the opening of a second front. On the contrary, it should be obvious that the greater our influence among the working class because of the zeal with which we pushed forward their demands for better conditions and increased pay-packets, the more readily would they follow us on the political front. Instead of seeing the actual life-relationship which exists between these two fronts we isolate the one, the political front, and concentrate all our attention upon it. The very fact that conditions did improve on the economic front was due to elementary reaction of workers to protect and advance themselves as much as possible, not to the guidance of the Party.
What prevented our seeing things as outlined above? First, a petty bourgeois lack of belief in the ability of a developed Socialist State to defend itself. It should have been apparent that such a State could not have maintained itself, grown and developed, unless it was stronger than its enemies. Secondly, a belief in gradualism in general, and in a British form in particular–believing that socialism would be introduced to Britain through the Party’s influence on the Labour Party.
Opportunism, with its lack of stamina, its readiness to see things in the light of the moment, its cow-towing to the accents of the upper classes, completely ruled the Party during the war years and still does. An examination of theoretical works covering this period easily proves this. Comrade Pollitt’s “Looking Ahead,” with its playing up of the role of the individual, its emphasis on back-room manoeuvre, its deplorable lack of theoretical understanding, is one such work. Or take Maurice Dobb’s “Studies in the Development of Capitalism,” a work hailed by the Party as an outstanding English contribution to Marxism, although, in reality, it has nothing in common with Marxism, or, for that matter, with such as Ricardo, who was a brilliant and honest man. Or take Christopher Hill, as muddled an historian as it is possible to find. And such a work as Christopher Caudwell’s “Illusion and Reality,” a work cloudy with mysticism, yet treated with shameful reverence by the Party.
These works are only the most typical, but they are proof of the fact that we have not as yet learned to love and respect theory, that we still carry those faults of character complained of so truthfully by Engels so many years ago. We have a deeply rooted love of drifting, a fear of sharp breaks.
I have given you some of the reasons for my statement to you that our Party reduced, ’levelled down,’ the class struggle during the war, to one of pure agitation. You yourself are fully aware that my criticism is not new. I criticised Comrade Pollitt’s book when it appeared, I did the same for the work of Dobb in ’46. I literally begged the Party to examine the work of this Cambridge teacher, but to no avail. You raised the question with me: “How can one comrade be right, all the rest wrong?” The question was put wrongly, it should have been: “Do the views of Comrade Evans correspond more closely to history than the views we have published, which are the views of Comrade Pollitt, of Maurice Dobb, of Caudwell?” Since the Party accepted responsibility for printing these works and popularising them I am correct in stating that they expressed the views of the Party for this period. I pointed out that during the years I spent in U.S. voices were raised against Browderism. But they were timid and hesitant, they were silenced by the same argument you brought against me: “How can you be right, all the rest of us wrong?” so we, who opposed Browder, remained silent. That battle was not fought, never written into history, as this is being written. Men learn by experience.
Finally, you asked yourself the question–although you did not put it to me: “If we are so wrong why haven’t we been approached by others?” It is an honest question–as simple and as honest as your admission to me that the world of literature and poetry was unknown to you. It is my opinion that the right elements in the Party, and they control it, would not have accepted criticism. Then what? In my opinion it would not have taken them long to have contacted Tito. Degeneration would have set in and once that disease gets a foothold where does it stop? We have thus far limited the breaks from our ranks to Tito, a National Chauvinist, whose break with true Socialism is complete. That is why nobody so far has offered you advice, you will never accept it. Did Browder?
I have spoken as bluntly and as clearly as I know how, I hope you take no personal offence. I represent my class, the working class into which I was born, to whom I owe everything, whom I know like the back of my hand. As Gorki said: ”We must show our enemies that the life of drudgery they have saddled on us doesn’t keep us from being their intellectual equals and even superiors!” It is a matter of life and death to us. Should we fail, the working class as we know it will vanish, another form of outright slave society will come into being.
I am regarded by the top leadership of the Party as an irritant, with dislike and fear. I am glad of it. The liking of fools is an insult, the fear of your enemies gladens the heart. I loath cringers, and people incapable of objective thought are a burden not to be tolerated. Our Party, unfortunately, has more than its share of both, they must be buried, a grave is of no use without a body, life cannot flourish without death.
Yours fraternally,
ARTHUR EVANS.