THE H.B. TRIBUNE. SATURDAY, JANUARY 3, 1920. SOVIETISM IN BRITAIN.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume X, Issue 17, 3 January 1920, Page 4

THE H.B. TRIBUNE. SATURDAY, JANUARY 3, 1920. SOVIETISM IN BRITAIN.

The question as to how far the propanganda of the Russan Soviet Government —which is much wider spread and more insidious than most folks imagine—has been successful in Great Britain is discussed by Dr. C; H. Wright in a contribution to a London daily of late date. So far back as the autumn of 1916 the Independent Labour Party and the British Socialist Party hdld a conference at which the terms of pem>o were discussed. As an immediate outcome there was then formed a “United Socialist Council,” on which all the pro-German and Pacifist organisations in Britain and abroad were to be represented. This Council summoned what itchose to call a “National Conference,” with regard to which, however, the heads of trade union bodies had not been consulted. But it was not until June, 1917, that this conference actually took place, something like 120 P delegates,, along with some two thousand “visitors” attending, and Mr. .Robert Smillie, whose name has since become so prominent as an advocate of “direct action,” occupying the chair. The idea of the Soviet method of government had by this time captured the imagination of many people among the extremists of Europe, and- the principal resolution before the conference was directed towards plYhning for the establishment in Britain of Soviets on the Russian plan Proposed by Mr. W. C. Andersen, M.P., since deceased, and secohled by Mr. Robert Williams, whose name was made familiar to us during the big railway strike last year, the resolution was .carried with only one or two dissentients. In their enthusiasm for this proposal the .subject of a “democratic peace”' was for the moment' neglected, the framers and supporters of the resolution being quite convinced thav they had found a short and,easy cut to bringing about a revolution in the governmental system of the country, one speaker declaring with complete: confidence that “the hour of social revolution had arrived and they dare not fail.” The intention was to establish forthwith branch Soviets covering all the industrial centres of Great Britain, which were to join in “restoring peace, dethroning militarism, .and ' establishing freedom.” Among the better known names appearing in the list of the provisional committee, set up to see the proposals carried -through we find, besides the- three Labour leaders already mentioned, those, of llessrs. Ramsay MacDonald, Philip Snowden, George Landsbury, F. H. J owe tt and Tom Quelch. The charter of the British Soviets-to-be was a pretty thorough-going, if somewhat hazy, affair, including as it did “conscription of- wealth and' equality of income, the organization of the workers against war; a complete democracy, the opportunity to. enjoy life, and the building of a new world with a pound a day as the worker’s pay.” The Older Labour leaders, like Will Thorne, took but little heed of this conference and its resolutions, declaring it to be composed of delegates from specially selected organizations and to be in no way representative of Labour, while others who regarded it more seriously declared it to mean nothing but disaster for the country were its proposals put into force. However, it appears that it was not the opposition of the more conservative elements in the. labour ranks that produced the chief disappointment for the British apostles of Sovietism. . Their main hope ot securing effective converts lay in the ranks of the fighting armies. _ The fall of Kerensky in Russia and the rise of Lenin and Trotsky, acicompanieff by the complete, demoralisation of the Russian military forces, lent colour to the hope that like results would follow like, appeals to the British soldiery. Still, though a good deal of Bolshevist propaganda was spread among the rank and file, the army was kept too busy, first defending itself, and then chasing the Boches out of France, to pay much attention to anything bu>> the main matter in hand. When the Armistice came, however, the Sovietiste thought their opportunity had come also in the comparative idleness of the men in tbe field and the unrest caused by delays in demobilization. The refusal bf some leave-men in London to re-embark for the front was magnified into ... “Great Mutiny” in the hope that it might provide the. spark that would set the conflagration raging. Russian example was followed even to the extent of setting up a miniature Soviet under the title of the “Sailors’, Soldiers’, and Airmen’s Union,” and a not inconsiderable number of names was entered on its roll, including many still serving in the Navy and Army. However, a<demobilization’ proceeded. and the men, re-absorbed into civil life, got Scattered about, what was hoped to be the nucleus of a spectacular revolution itself became diffused and virtually disappeared. The only reGb that is left of it now, so Dr. Wright tells us, is a curious little body in Glasgow, consisting of a central committee and several subcommittees bent on the introauciron of active sabotage whenever occasion offers, and dreaming of raids on the banks and public offices during the next big strike, their present efforts being specially ceqfcred on the capture of the shop-steward movement and displacing and breaking up the trade unions.

Dr. Wright does not by any means make light of the Bolshevist peril, which he says reached its climax in Great Britain in February of last year, when occurred the. most dangerous state of unrest in the . last twenty years. From this .culminating point, however, “the line of the temperature chart has. rapidly declined, because.the British working man seldom makes a mistake . once he knows the facta, and in spite ot ail the British- correspondents who have been, spoon-fed in "Petrograd apd -elsewhere ter Litvirioff, hd does understand the facts about Bolshevism in practice.” Our authority does not fully accept - the - stones about lirge * slims of '-Bolshevist money coming into Britain -for propaganda purposes, although he m

satisfied that a fair amount of foreign revolutionary money has been expended in subsidising press organs. At the present moment the enthusiasts who were sanguine of bringing off a fundamental revolution are nbt in very good spirits, complaining bitterly of the “apathy- of the. British working man. Even the Petrograd Bolshevist propaganda agent is said openly to deplore the fact that Britain appears to be proof against his art, and gives himself chiefly to the entertainment of newspaper, correspondents and members of Parliament who are susceptible to window dressing. But it is not to be assumed that he is not still working through other channels. There is, without doubt, a well-organisea and widespread system of what Dr. Wright calls ‘‘nocturnal agencies,” which have a footing in most countries and. maintain international communications by cipher messages carried by carriers, and which employ all the devices of secrecy and mystery which have been so loudly denounced when resorted to by ImSerialist Governments. So far they ave not had recourse to methods of actual violence in Great Britain, but only because they are satisfied that it would not pay. As publicity is essential to a successful propaganda, it is thought that the Bolshevist agencies which certainly exist there are not at present a serious menace to the safety of the Old Country.