V. I.

Lenin

The bourgeoisie and its supporters in the labour movement,
the Grütlians, usually pose the question thus:

Either we recognise in principle our duty to defend the fatherland, or
we leave our country defenceless.

That presentation is fundamentally wrong.

This is how the question stands in reality:

Either we allow ourselves to be killed in the interests of the
imperialist bourgeoisie, or we systematically prepare the majority of the
exploited, and ourselves, for seizure—at the price of less sacrifice—of
the banks and expropriation of the bourgeoisie in order to put an end to
the high cost of living and war.

*     * *
The first presentation of the question is thoroughly bourgeois, not
socialist. It disregards the fact that we are living in the imperialist
era, that the present war is an imperialist war, that in this war
Switzerland will under no circumstances be ranged against
imperialism, but on the side of one or the other imperialist
coalition, i. e., will in fact become an accomplice of one or another group
of the big robber powers, that the Swiss bourgeoisie has long been tied to
imperialist interests by thousands of threads. It is of ho concern whether
this is implemented by a system of inter-relationships and “mutual
participation” of the big banks through export of capital, or through the
tourist trade, which thrives on the patronage of foreign millionaires, or
through unscrupulous exploitation of disfranchised foreign workers, etc.

In short, all the fundamental tenets of socialism, all the socialist
ideas, have been forgotten. The predatory nature of the imperialist war is
being embellished. One’s “own” bourgeoisie is being depicted as an
innocent lamb and the case-hardened bank directors of present-day
Switzerland as heroic William Tells, and, furthermore, the secret
agreements between Swiss and foreign banks and between Swiss and foreign
diplomats are overlooked. And this incredible hotchpotch of bourgeois lies
is covered up by a fine-sounding and “popular” phrase meant to deceive
the people: “defence of the fatherland!”

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