Author Topic: National Socialists were socialists  (Read 4188 times)

Zea_mays

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Re: National Socialists were socialists
« Reply #30 on: February 10, 2022, 01:41:23 am »
Continuing from the previous post.

A month later, Engels published two follow-up articles titled "Democratic Pan-Slavism".
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We have often enough pointed out that the romantic dreams which came into being after the revolutions of February and March, such as ardent fantasies about the universal fraternal union of peoples, a European federative republic, and eternal world peace, were basically nothing but screens hiding the immeasurable perplexity and inactivity of the leading spokesmen of that time. People did not see, or did not want to see, what had to be done to safeguard the revolution; they were unable or unwilling to carry out any really revolutionary measures; the narrow-mindedness of some and the counter-revolutionary intrigues of others resulted in the people getting only sentimental phrases instead of revolutionary deeds.
[...]
People have learned by bitter experience that the "European fraternal union of peoples" cannot be achieved by mere phrases and pious wishes, but only by profound revolutions and bloody struggles; they have learned that the question is not that of a fraternal union of all European peoples under a single republican flag, but of an alliance of the revolutionary peoples against the counter-revolutionary peoples, an alliance which comes into being not on paper, but on the battlefield.

He is not mincing words about what needs to happen to the "counter-revolutionary peoples"...

In this article, he says the spirit of the revolution is weakly kept alive by democratic pan-Slavists, but these democratic pan-Slavists do not have the martial spirit necessary to bring the goals of a revolution into reality by whatever means necessary. Engels strongly criticizes an article by Mikhail Bakunin, who praises the democratic pan-Slavists and thinks they will be able to accomplish something. (Engels also praises how the US conquered large amounts of Mexico, declaring the US was more "civilized" and would bring "progress" to the regions, yikes.)
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We repeat: apart from the Poles, the Russians, and at most the Turkish Slavs, no Slav people has a future, for the simple reason that all the other Slavs lack the primary historical geographical, political and industrial conditions for independence and viability.

Peoples which have never had a history of their own, which from the time when they achieved the first, most elementary stage of civilisation already came under foreign sway, or which were forced to attain the first stage of civilisation only by means of a foreign yoke, are not viable and will never be able to achieve any kind of independence.

And that has been the fate of the Austrian Slavs.

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Of course, matters of this kind cannot be accomplished without many a tender national blossom being forcibly broken. But in history nothing is achieved without violence and implacable ruthlessness, and if Alexander, Caesar and Napoleon had been capable of being moved by the same sort of appeal as that which pan-Slavism now makes on behalf of its ruined clients, what would have become of history!
[...]
In short, it turns out these "crimes" of the Germans and Magyars against said Slavs are among the best and most praiseworthy deeds which our and the Magyar people can boast of in their hostory.

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If at any epoch while they were oppressed the Slavs had begun a new revolutionary history, that by itself would have proved their viability. From that moment the revolution would have had an interest in their liberation, and the special interest of the Germans and Magyars would have given way to the greater interest of the European revolution.

Precisely that, however, never happened. The Slavs--once again we remind our readers here we always exclude the Poles--were always the main instruments of the counter-revolutionaries. Oppressed at home, outside their country, wherever Slav influence extended to, they were the oppressors of all revolutionary nations.

Let no one object that we speak here on behalf of German national prejudices. In German, French, Belgian and English periodicals, the proofs are to be found that it was precisely the editors of the Neue Rheinische Zeitung who already long before the revolution most decisively opposed all manifestations of German narrow-mindedness. ... they have always recognized the superiority of the great historical nations of the west, the English and the French, compared with the backward Germans. But precisely for that reason we should be permitted not to share the fantastic illusion of the Slavs and allowed to judge other peoples as severely as we have judged our own nation.

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But, once again, what was the composition of the armies which best let themselves be used for oppression and for whose savage acts the Germans were blamed? Once again, they consisted of Slavs. Go to Italy and asked who suppressed the Milan revolution; people will no longer say: the Tedeschi [Germans]--since the Tedeschi made a revolution in Vienna they are no longer hated--but the Croati. That is the word which Italians now apply to the whole Austrian army, i.e. to all that is most deeply hated by them: i Croati!
See also:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katyn_massacre

See also:
Even Himmler was dismayed with the barbarity of the Croatian state during WWII, and from the beginning of this Croatian state's existence a German general said German troops had to frequently intervene against criminal acts by Croatian forces. ...But their crimes remain broadly blamed on the "Axis" and Germany in particular:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independent_State_of_Croatia#Influence_of_Nazi_Germany

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Nevertheless, these reproaches would be superfluous and unjustified if the Slavs had anywhere seriously participated in the movement of 1848, if they had hastened to join the ranks of the revolutionary peoples.
[...]
The revolution of 1848 compelled all European peoples to declare themselves for or against it. In the course of a month all the peoples ripe for revolution had made their revolution, and all those which were not ripe had allied themselves against the revolution. At that time it was a matter of disentangling the confused tangle of peoples of Eastern Europe. The question was which nation would seize the revolutionary initiative here, and which nation would develop the greatest revolutionary energy and thereby safeguard its future. The Slavs remained silent, the Germans and Magyars, faithful to their previous historical position, took the lead. As a result, the Slavs were thrown completely into the arms of the counter-revolution.

But what about the Slav Congress in Prague?

We repeat: the so-called democrats among the Austrian Slavs are either scoundrels or fantasts, and the latter, who do not find any fertile soil among their people for the ideas imported from abroad, have been continually led by the nose by the scoundrels.
That last paragraph sounds similar to how Hitler describes "Judeo-Bolshevism" leading the Russians and other Slavs astray from authentic Socialist revolution.
https://trueleft.createaforum.com/colonial-era/national-socialism-is-revolutionary-not-reactionary/msg10718/#msg10718

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But let us not harbour any illusions. Among all the pan-Slavists, nationality, i.e. imaginary common Slav nationality, takes precedence over the revolution. The pan-Slavists want to join the revolution on the condition that they will be allowed to constitute all Slavs without exception, regardless of material necessities, into independent Slav states. ... But the revolution does not allow of any conditions being imposed upon it. Either one is a revolutionary and accepts the consequences of the revolution, whatever they are, or one is driven into the arms of the counter-revolution ...
[...]
The demand is put to us and the other revolutionary nations of Europe that the hotbeds of counter-revolution at our very door should be guaranteed an unhindered existence and the free right to conspire and take up arms against the revolution; it is demanded that we should establish a counter-revolutionary Czech state in the very heart of Germany ...

We have no intention of doing that. To the sentimental phrases about brotherhood which are being offered here on behalf of the most counter-revolutionary nations of Europe, we reply that hatred of Russians was and still is the primary revolutionary passion among Germans; that since the revolution hatred of Czechs and Croats has been added, and that only by the most determined use of terror against these Slav peoples can we, jointly with the Poles and Magyars, safeguard the revolution. We know where the enemies of the revolution are concentrated, viz. in Russia and the Slav regions of Austria, and no fine phrases, no allusions to an undefined democratic future for these countries can deter us from treating our enemies as enemies.

And if Bakunin finally exclaims:
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Truly, the Slav should not lose anything, he should win! Truly, he should live! And we shall live. As long as the smallest part of our rights is contested, as long as a single member is cut off from our whole body, so long will we fight to the end, inexorably wage a life-and-death struggle, until the Slavs have their place in the world, great and free and independent--

if revolutionary pan-Slavism means this passage to be taken seriously, and in its concern for imaginary Slav nationality leaves the revolution entirely out of account, then we too know what we have to do.

Then there will be a struggle, an "inexorable life-and-death struggle", against those Slavs who betray the revolution; an annihilating fight and ruthless terror--not in the interests of Germany, but in the interests of the revolution!
Frederick Engels. (February 15, 1849). Democratic Pan-Slavism. Neue Rheinische Zeitung, No. 222. page 362-371.
Frederick Engels. (February 16, 1849). Democratic Pan-Slavism. Neue Rheinische Zeitung, No. 223. page 371-378.
Republished in Karl Marx, Frederick Engels: Collected Works. (1977). Volume 8: 1848-49. Progress Publishers, Lawrence & Wishart Ltd., and International Publishers Co. Inc.
https://archive.org/details/karlmarxfrederic0008marx/page/362/mode/2up


Wow. Those final two paragraphs...

I would not be surprised if Hitler had read these articles by Engels. Note the obvious parallels between Hitler's emphasis on the concept of struggle in history, and obviously on what had to be done to safeguard the National Socialist revolution against reactionary "Judeo-Bolshevik"-following Slavs. (And Hitler obviously allied with Slavic nations willing to embrace the revolution, e.g. Romania, Slovakia, Bulgaria.)


...I will also point out how we outlined in a different thread how the Communist USSR engaged in settler-colonialism and ethnic cleansing of many ethnic groups:
https://trueleft.createaforum.com/colonial-era/western-revisionism-of-wwi-and-wwii/msg6582/#msg6582

I'll let someone else figure out if they were all "counter-revolutionaries" who deserved that or not...