V. I.

Lenin

In a number of countries, mostly small and not involved in
the present war—Sweden, Norway, Holland and Switzerland, for
example—there have been voices in favour of re placing the old
Social-Democratic minimum-programme demand for a “militia”, or the
“armed nation” by a new demand: “disarmament”. An editorial article in
favour of disarmament appeared in No. 3 of Jugend-Internationale
(The Youth International), organ of the international youth
organisation. In R. Grimm’s “theses” on the military question drawn up
for the Swiss Social-Democratic Party Congress we find a concession to the
“disarmament” idea. In the Swiss magazine Neues Leben (New Life)
for 1915, Roland-Hoist, while ostensibly advocating “conciliation”
between the two demands, actually makes the same concession. Issue No. 2 of
Vorbote (The Herald), organ of the International Left, carried an
article by the Dutch Marxist Wijnkoop in defence of the old armed-nation
demand. The Scandinavian Lefts, as is evident from the articles printed
below, accept “disarmament”, though at times they admit that it contains
an element of pacifism. [4]

Let us take a closer look at the position of the disarmament advocates.

I

One of the principal premises advanced, although not always definitely
expressed, in favour of disarmament is this: we are opposed to war, to all
war in general, and the demand for disarmament, is the most definite, clear
and unambiguous expression of this point of view.

We showed the fallacy of that idea in our review of Junius’s pamphlet , to which we refer the
reader. [1]

Socialists cannot be opposed to all war in general without ceasing to be
socialists. We must not allow ourselves to be blinded by the present
imperialist war. Such wars between “Great” Powers are typical of the
imperialist epoch; but democratic wars and rebellions, for instance, of
oppressed nations against their oppressors to free themselves from
oppression, are by no means impossible. Civil wars of the proletariat
against the bourgeoisie for socialism are inevitable. Wars are possible
between one country in which socialism has been victorious and other,
bourgeois or reactionary, countries.

Disarmament is the ideal of socialism. There will be no wars in
socialist society; consequently, disarmament will be achieved But whoever
expects that socialism will be achieved without a social
revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat is not a
socialist. Dictatorship is state power based directly on
violence . And in the twentieth century—as in the age of
civilisation generally—violence means neither a fist nor a club, but
troops . To put “disarmament” in the programme is tantamount to
making the general declaration: We are opposed to the use of arms. There is
as little Marxism in this as there would be if we were to say: We are
opposed to violence!

It should be observed that the international discussion of this
question was conducted mainly, if not exclusively, in the German
language. The Germans, however, use two words, the difference between which
is not easily rendered in Russian. One, strictly speaking, means
“disarmament”, [2] and is used by Kautsky and the Kautskyites, for instance, in the sense of
reduction of armaments. The other, strictly speaking, means
“disarming”, [3] and is used mainly by the Lefts in the sense of abolishing militarism,
abolishing all militarist systems. In this article we speak of the
latter demand, which is current among certain revolutionary Social-Democrats.

The Kautskyite advocacy of “disarmament”, which is addressed to the
present governments of the imperialist Great Powers, is the most vulgar
opportunism, it is bourgeois pacifism, which actually —in spite
of the “good intentions” of the sentimental Kautskyites—serves to
distract the workers from the revolutionary struggle. For this advocacy
seeks to instil in the workers the idea that the present bourgeois
governments of the imperialist powers are not bound to each other
by thousands of threads of finance capital and by scores or hundreds of
corresponding secret treaties (i.e., predatory, plundering
treaties, preparing the way for imperialist war).

II

An oppressed class which does not strive to learn to use arms, to
acquire arms, only deserves to be treated like slaves. We cannot, unless we
have become bourgeois pacifists or opportunists, forget that we are living
in a class society from which there is no way out, nor can there be, save
through the class struggle and the overthrow of the power of the ruling
class.

In every class society, whether based on slavery, serfdom, or, as at
present, on wage-labour, the oppressor class is always armed. Not only the
modern standing army, but even the modern militia—and even in the most
democratic bourgeois republics, Switzerland, for instance—represent the
bourgeoisie armed against the proletariat. That is such an
elementary truth that it is hardly necessary to dwell upon it. Suffice it
to recall that in all capitalist countries without exception troops
(including the republican-democratic militia) are used against strikers. A
bourgeoisie armed against the proletariat is one of the biggest,
fundamental and cardinal facts of modern capitalist society.

And in face of this fact, revolutionary Social-Democrats are urged to
“demand” “disarmament”! That is tantamount to complete abandonment of
the class-struggle point of view, to renunciation of all thought of
revolution. Our slogan must be: arming of the proletariat to defeat,
expropriate and disarm the bourgeoisie. These are the only tactics possible for a revolutionary class, tactics that follow logically
from, and are dictated by, the whole objective development of
capitalist militarism. Only after the proletariat has disarmed the
bourgeoisie will it be able, without betraying its world-historic mission,
to consign all armaments to the scrap-heap. And the proletariat will
undoubtedly do this, but only when this condition has been fulfilled,
certainly not before.

If the present war arouses among the reactionary Christian socialists,
among the whimpering petty bourgeoisie, only horror and fright,
only aversion to all use of arms, to bloodshed, death, etc., then we must
say: Capitalist society is and has always been horror without end . And if this most reactionary of all wars is now preparing for
that society an end in horror , we have no reason to fall into
despair. But the disarmament “demand”, or more correctly, the dream of
disarmament, is, objectively, nothing but an expression of despair at a
time when, as everyone can see, the bourgeoisie itself is paving the way
for the only legitimate and revolutionary war—civil war against the
imperialist bourgeoisie.

A lifeless theory, some might say, but we would remind them of two
world-historical facts: the role of the trusts and the employment of women
in industry, on the one hand, and the Paris Commune of 1871 and the
December 1905 uprising in Russia, on the other.

The bourgeoisie makes it its business to promote trusts, drive women
and children into the factories, subject them to corruption and suffering,
condemn them to extreme poverty. We do not “demand” such development, we
do not “support” it. We fight it. But how do we fight? We
explain that trusts and the employment of women iii industry are
progressive. We do not want a return to the handicraft system, pre-monopoly
capitalism, domestic drudgery for women. Forward through the trusts, etc.,
and beyond them to socialism!

That argument takes account of objective development and, with
the necessary changes, applies also to the present militarisation of the
population. Today the imperialist bourgeoisie militarises the youth as well
as the adults; tomorrow it may begin militarising the women. Our attitude should be: All the better! Full speed ahead! For the faster we
move, the nearer shall we be to the armed uprising against capitalism. How
can Social-Democrats give way to fear of the militarisation of the youth,
etc., if they have not forgotten the example of the Pasis Commune? This is not a “lifeless theory” or a
dream. It is a fact. And it would be a sorry state of affairs indeed if,
all the economic and political facts notwithstanding, Social-Democrats
began to doubt that the imperialist era and imperialist wars must
inevitably bring about a repetition of such facts.

A certain bourgeois observer of the Paris Commune, writing to an
English newspaper in May 1871, said: “If the French nation consisted
entirely of women, what a terrible nation it would be!” Women and
teen-age children fought in the Paris Commune side by side with the men. It
will be no different in the coming battles for the over throw of the
bourgeoisie. Proletarian women will not look on passively as poorly armed
or unarmed workers are shot down by the well-armed forces of the
bourgeoisie. They will take to arms, as they did in 1871, and from the
cowed nations of today—or more correctly, from the present-day labour
movement, disorganised more by the opportunists than by the
governments—there will undoubtedly arise, sooner or later, but with
absolute certainty, an international league of the “terrible nations” of
the revolutionary proletariat.

The whole of social life is now being militarised. Imperialism is a
fierce struggle of the Great Powers for the division and redivision of the
world. It is therefore bound to lead to further militarisation in all
countries, even in neutral and small ones. How will proletarian women
oppose this? Only by cursing all war and everything military, only by
demanding disarmament? The women of an oppressed and really revolutionary
class will never accept that shameful role. They will say to their sons:

“ You will soon be grown up. You will be given a gun. Take it and learn
the military art properly. The proletarians need this knowledge not to
shoot your brothers, the workers of other countries, as is being done in
the present war, and as the traitors to socialism are telling you to
do. They need it to fight the bourgeoisie of their own country, to put an end to
exploitation, poverty and war, and not by pious wishes, but by defeating
and disarming the bourgeoisie .”

If we are to shun such propaganda, precisely such propaganda, in
connection with the present war, then we had better stop using fine words
about international revolutionary Social-Democracy, the socialist
revolution and war against war.

III

The disarmament advocates object to the “armed nation” clause in the
programme also because it more easily leads, they allege, to concessions to
opportunism. The cardinal point, namely, the relation of disarmament to the
class struggle and to the social revolution, we have examined above. We
shall now examine the relation between the disarmament demand and
opportunism. One of the chief reasons why it is unacceptable is precisely
that, together with the illusions it creates, it inevitably weakens and
devitalises our struggle against opportunism.

Undoubtedly, this struggle is the main, immediate question now
confronting the International. Struggle against imperialism that is not
closely linked with the struggle against opportunism is either an empty
phrase or a fraud. One of the main defects of Zimmerwald and Kienthal—one
of the main reasons why these embryos of the Third International may
possibly end in a fiasco—is that the question of fighting opportunism was
not even raised openly, let alone solved in the sense of proclaiming the
need to break with the opportunists. Opportunism has triumphed—temporarily—in the European labour movement. Its two main
shades are apparent in all the big countries: first, the avowed, cynical,
and therefore less dangerous social-imperialism of Messrs. Plekhanov,
Scheidemann, Legien, Albert Thomas and Sembat, Vandervelde, Hyndman,
Henderson, et al.; second, the concealed, Kautskyite opportunism:
Kautsky-Haase and the Social-Democratic Labour Group in Germany; Longuet,
Pressemane, Mayéras et al., in France; Ramsay MacDonald and the other
leaders of the Independent Labour Party in England; Martov, Chkheidze, et al., in Russia; Treves and the other so-called Left
reformists in Italy.

Avowed opportunism is openly and directly opposed to revolution and to
incipient revolutionary movements and outbursts. It is in direct alliance
with the governments, varied as the forms of this alliance may be—from
accepting ministerial posts to participation in the war industries
committees. The masked opportunists, the Kautskyites, are much more harmful
and dangerous to the labour movement, because they hide their advocacy of
alliance with the former under a cloak of plausible, pseudo-“Marxist”
catchwords and pacifist slogans. The fight against both these forms of
prevailing opportunism must be conducted in all fields of
proletarian politics: parliament, the trade unions, strikes, the armed
forces, etc.

What is the main distinguishing feature of both these forms of
prevailing opportunism?

It is that the concrete question of the connection between the present war and revolution, and the other concrete questions of revolution , are hushed up, concealed, or treat ed with an eye to
police prohibitions. And this despite the fact that before the war the
connection between this impending war and the proletarian
revolution was emphasised innumerable times, both unofficially, and
officially in the Basle Manifesto.

The main defect of the disarmament demand is its evasion of all the
concrete questions of revolution. Or do the advocates of disarmament stand
for an altogether new kind of revolution, unarmed revolution?

IV

To proceed. We are by no means opposed to the fight for reforms. And we
do not wish to ignore the sad possibility—if the worst comes to the
worst—of mankind going through a second imperialist war, if revolution
does not come out of the present war, in spite of the numerous out bursts
of mass unrest and mass discontent and in spite of our efforts. We favour a
programme of reforms directed also against the opportunists. They
would be only too glad if we left the struggle for reforms entirely to them
and sought escape from sad reality in a nebulous “disarmament”
fantasy. “Disarmament” means simply running away from unpleasant reality,
not fighting it.

Incidentally, certain Lefts fail to give a sufficiently concrete answer
on the defence of the fatherland issue, and that is a major defect of their
attitude. Theoretically, it is much more correct, and in practice
immeasurably more important, to say that in the present
imperialist war defence of the fatherland is a bourgeois-reactionary
deception, than to take a “general” stand against defence of the father
land under “all” circumstances. That is wrong and, besides, does not
“strike” at the opportunists, those direct enemies of the workers in the
labour parties.

In working out a concrete and practically necessary answer on the
question of a militia we should say: We are not in favour of a bourgeois
militia; we are in favour only of a proletarian militia. Therefore, “not a
penny, not a man”, not only for a standing army, but even for a bourgeois
militia, even in countries like the United States, or Switzerland, Norway,
etc. The more so that in the freest republican countries (e. g.,
Switzerland) we see that the militia is being increasingly Prussianised,
and prostituted by being used against strikers. We can demand popular
election of officers, abolition of all military law, equal rights for
foreign and native-born workers (a point particularly important for those
imperialist states which, like Switzerland, are more and more blatantly
exploiting larger numbers of foreign workers, while denying them all
rights). Further, we can demand the right of every hundred, say, in
habitants of a given country to form voluntary military- training
associations, with free election of instructors paid by the state,
etc. Only under these conditions could the proletariat acquire military
training for itself and not for its slave-owners; and the need for
such training is imperatively dictated by the interests of the
proletariat. The Russian revolution showed that every success of the
revolutionary movement, even a partial success like the seizure of a
certain city, a certain factory town, or winning over a certain section of
the army, inevitably compels the victorious proletariat to carry
out just such a programme.

Lastly, it stands to reason that opportunism can never be defeated by
mere programmes; it can only be defeated by deeds. The greatest, and fatal,
error of the bankrupt Second International was that its words did not
correspond to its deeds, that it cultivated the habit of unscrupulous
revolutionary phrase-mongering (note the present attitude of Kautsky and
Co. towards the Basle Manifesto). In approaching the demand for disarmament
from this aspect we must first of all raise the question of its
objective significance. Disarmament as a social idea, i. e., an
idea that springs from, and can affect, a certain social environment, and
is not the invention of some crackpot or group, springs, evidently, from
the peculiar “tranquil” conditions prevailing, by way of exception, in
certain small states which have for a fairly long time stood aside from the
world’s path of war and bloodshed, and hope to remain that way. To be
convinced of this, we have only to consider the arguments advanced, for
instance, by the Norwegian advocates of disarmament. “We are a small
country,” they say. “Our army is small; there is nothing we can do
against the Great Powers (and, consequently, nothing we can do to resist
forcible involvement in an imperialist alliance with one or the
other Great-Power group!). We want to be left in peace in our backwoods and
continue our backwoods politics, demand disarmament, compulsory
arbitration, permanent neutrality, etc.” (“permanent” after the Belgian
fashion, no doubt?).

The petty striving of petty states to hold aloof, the petty-bourgeois
desire to keep as far away as possible from the great battles of world
history, to take advantage of one’s relatively monopolistic position in
order to remain in hidebound passivity—this is the objective
social environment which may ensure the disarmament idea a certain degree
of success and a certain degree of popularity in some of the small
states. That striving is, of course, reactionary and is based entirely on
illusions, for, in one way or another, imperialism draws the small states
into the vortex of world economy and world politics.

Let us cite the case of Switzerland. Her imperialist environment
objectively prescribes two courses to the labour movement. The
opportunists, in alliance with the bourgeoisie, are seeking to turn the country into a republican-democratic
monopolistic federation that would thrive on profits from imperialist
bourgeois tourists, and to make this “tranquil” monopolistic position as
profitable and as tranquil as possible. Actually, this is a pol icy of
alliance between a small privileged stratum of the workers of a small
privileged country and the bourgeoisie of that country against the
mass of the proletariat. The genuine Swiss Social-Democrats are striving to
use Switzerland’s relative freedom, her “international” position
(proximity to the most cultured countries, the fact that Switzerland, thank
God, does not have “a separate language of her own”, but uses three world
languages) to extend, consolidate arid strengthen the revolutionary alliance of the revolutionary elements of the
proletariat of the whole of Europe. Let’s help our own bourgeoisie retain
as long as possible its monopoly of the supertranquil trade in the charms
of the Alps; perhaps a penny or two will fall to our share—such is the
objective content of the Swiss opportunists’ policy. Let us help
weld the alliance of the revolutionary sections of the French, German and
Italian proletariat for the overthrow of the bourgeoisie—such is the
objective content of the Swiss revolutionary Social-Democrats’
policy. Unfortunately, it is still being carried out far from adequately by
the Swiss “Lefts”, and the splendid decision of the 1915 Aarau Party
Congress (acceptance of the revolutionary mass struggle) is still largely a
dead letter. But that is not the point we are discussing at the moment.

The question that interests us now is: Does the disarmament demand
correspond to this revolutionary trend among the Swiss Social-Democrats? It
obviously does not. Objectively, the “demand” for disarmament corresponds
to the opportunist, narrow national line of a labour movement, a line that
is restricted by the outlook of a small state. Objectively, “disarmament”
is an extremely national, specifically national programme of small states;
it is certainly not the international programme of international
revolutionary Social-Democracy.

P. S. In the last issue of the English Socialist Review [5] (September 1916), organ of the opportunist Independent
Labour Party, we find, on page 287, the resolution of the party’s Newcastle
Conference—refusal to support any war waged by any government even if “nominally” it is a war of “defence”. And in an
editorial on page 205 of the same issue we read the following declaration:
“In no degree do we approve the Sinn Fein rebellion [the Irish Rebellion
of 1916]. We do not approve armed rebellion at all, any more than any other
form of militarism and war.”

Is there any need to prove that these “anti-militarists”,
that such advocates of disarmament, not in a small, but in a big
country, are the most pernicious opportunists? And yet, theoretically, they
are quite right in regarding insurrection as one “form” of militarism and
war.

---
Notes:
[1]

 — Lenin

[2]
Abrüstung.— Ed .

[3]
Entwaffnung.— Ed .

[4]

This refers to Karl Kilbom’s article “Swedish Social-Democracy and the
World War” and Arvid Hansen’s “Certain Features of the Con temporary
Labour Movement in Norway”, both of which appeared in Sbornik Sotsial-Demokrata No. 2, December 1916.

[5]