[IN PLAUEN NEAR DRESDEN] 

London, 13-14 September 1886 

Dear Bebel, 

What I find odd about this whole Bulgarian and oriental busi- 
ness **° is the Russians having only just realised that, as a result of the 
annexation of Alsace, etc., they have become the arbiters of Europe, 
as indeed was pointed out to the members of the International by 
Marx as long ago as 1870.* The only possible explanation for this is 
the universal adoption since the war (in Russia in 1874) of the Prus- 
sian Landwehr system which takes between 10 and 12 years to produce 
a commensurately powerful army.*’* Russia and France now also 
possess such an army, hence the fun can now begin. And that is pre- 
cisely why the Russian army, which supplies the hard core of Pan- 
Slavism, is now exerting such tremendous pressure on the govern- 
ment that the Tsar” is faced with only two possibilities — he must ei- 
ther overcome his old animosity to the French Republic and enter 
into alliance with it, or he must persuade Bismarck to endorse Rus- 
sia’s oriental policy. For Bismarck and William,° the alternatives 
were, either resistance to Russia and the prospect of a Franco- 
Russian alliance and world war, or the certainty of a Russian revolu- 
tion as a result of an alliance between the Pan-Slavs and the Nihi- 

4 K. Marx, ‘Second Address of the General Council of the International Working 
Men’s Association on the Franco-Prussian War’. -" Alexander IIIT-‘ William I 

lists, or again submission to Russia, i.e. betrayal of Austria. That 
from their own standpoint Bismarck and William could not have act- 
ed otherwise, seems obvious to me, and this represents a great leap 
forward, in that the incompatibility of the Hohenzollerns’ interests 
and those of Germany has now been made plainly and overwhelm- 
ingly manifest. The very existence of the German Empire is being 
imperilled by its Prussian foundations. 

Temporarily — until after the winter, that is,— the affair will prob- 
ably be glossed over, but the Pan-Slavs’ appetite grows with eating, 
and they will never have such a favourable opportunity again. If the 
Russians succeed in occupying Bulgaria, they will also go on to attack 
Constantinople, unless insuperable obstacles—say an Austro- 
German-British alliance—intervene. Hence Bismarck’s desperate 
plea for an actively anti-Russian policy on Britain’s part, a plea he 
now gets The Standard to re-echo almost daily in the hope that Britain 
will avert a world war. 

At all events, Austrian and Russian rivalry in the Balkan Peninsula 
is becoming so acute that war is more likely than the preservation of 
peace. And that will be the end of localised warfare. But what the 
outcome will be — who will win — we cannot say. The German army 
is certainly the best and the best-led, but is only one amongst many. 
The Austrians are an unknown quantity, both numerically and mili- 
tarily, especially as regards leadership, and have always been dab- 
hands at getting their best troops beaten. The Russians, as always, 
are deluding themselves as to their strength which, on paper, is 
enormous; though exceedingly weak in attack, they are strong in the 
defence of their own country. Their weakest point, aside from the 
high command, is a lack of suitable material to officer the vast masses; 
the country does not produce the required number of educated peo- 
ple. The Turks are the best soldiers, but the high command is invari- 
ably execrable, if not suborned. Finally, the French are also short of 
officers, because too politically advanced to tolerate an institution 
such as that of one-year volunteers; also because the French bourgeois 
is (personally) utterly unwarlike. Lastly, the new organisation has 
never been put to the test anywhere save in Germany. Hence these 
quantities are very difficult to estimate, either numerically or qualita- 
tively. Of the Italians, it may be said with certainty that, given equal 
numbers, they would be beaten by any other army. But how these var- 
ious quantities will group themselves, either with or against each 
other, in a world war is equally incalculable. Britain’s importance — 

that of her Navy and that of her vast resources— will grow as the 
war goes on and, if she withholds her troops at the start, it may, in 
the end, be a British corps of 60,000 men which finally turns the 
scales. 

All this presupposes that nothing happens inside the countries con- 
cerned. But in France a war might well bring revolutionary elements 
to the helm, while in Germany a defeat or the death of the Old Man’ 
might result in a violent change of régime, which in turn might lead 
to a regrouping of the belligerents. In short, there will be chaos of 
which the only certain outcome will be wholesale slaughter on a hith- 
erto unprecedented scale, the exhaustion of the whole of Europe to 
a hitherto unprecedented degree and, finally, the complete collapse of 
the old system. 

Immediate victory for ourselves could only be produced by a revo- 
lution in France, which would confer on the French the role of libera- 
tors of the European proletariat. I do not know whether this would be 
the best thing for the latter; however it would raise zdeal French 
chauvinism to the nth degree. A revolution in Germany follow- 
ing a defeat would be of use only if it led to peace with France. Best 
of all would be a Russian revolution which, however, can only be 
expected after severe defeats have been inflicted on the Russian 
army. 

This much is certain: A war would above all retard our movement 
all over Europe, completely disrupt it in many countries, stir up 
chauvinism and xenophobia and leave us with the certain prospect, 
amongst many other uncertain ones, of having to begin all over 
again after the war, albeit on a basis far more favourable even than 
today. 

Whether or not there is war, this much has been gained. Your Ger- 
man philistine has been shocked out of his lethargy and at last finds 
himself compelled to intervene actively in politics. Since numerous 
intermediary stages will have to be gone through between today’s 
Prussian Bonapartism with its semi-feudal foundations and the social- 
ist republic which will be our first stage, it can only be to our advan- 
tage that your German citizen should at last be forced to resume his 
political responsibilities and oppose the present régime, if only to 

4 William I 

make it get some sort of move-on. And so I look forward keenly to see- 
ing what happens during the coming session of the Reichstag. Since 
I do not get any German papers at the moment, I should be greatly 
obliged if you would send me some from time to time, when they 
carry reports of important sittings, particularly those concerned with 
foreign policy. 

Liebknecht, too, had a great deal to say about the indignation pro- 
voked in Germany by Bismarck’s kow-towing to the Russians.?° He 
spent several days with me at the seaside in Eastbourne, was in 
very good spirits and, as always, ‘everything was going swimmingly’. 
Since the gentlemen of the right wing are no longer stirring up any 
trouble to speak of and have had to knuckle under, Liebknecht could 
again give vent to quite revolutionary utterances and do his best to 
pass himself off as the most resolute of men. I intimated pretty plainly 
that I knew more about these goings-on than he might, perhaps, care 
for but, since he was completely on the right track, there was abso- 
lutely no reason why our intercourse should be other than exceedingly 
cordial. I am unaware of, and hence not responsible for, anything he 
may have told you in his letters about the matters he and I discussed. 

14 September 

Having again been interrupted, I must make sure that I finish this 
in time for the evening post so that you get this letter by Thursday * 
morning at the latest. The Hungarian parliament will also be con- 
vening in the near future when the Bulgarian affair **° is sure to be 
brought up. The best thing for us would be for Russia to be peacefully 
or forcibly repulsed, in which case the stage would be set for revolu- 
tion there. The Pan-Slavs would join in, only to find next morning 
that they had been duped. This was a point upon which Marx always 
expressed himself with the greatest conviction— and I know of no 
one who understood Russia, both as regards internal and external 
matters, as well as he. He maintained that, as soon as the old régime 
had been destroyed in Russia, no matter by whom, and a representa- 
tive assembly had convened, no matter of what kind, Russia’s policy 
of aggression would cease and domestic questions take precedence 
over everything else.” And the repercussions on Europe, once this last 

* 16 September -° See K. Marx, ‘The Question of the Abolition of Serfdom in Russia’, 
present edition, Vol. 16, pp. 51-53. 

stronghold of reaction had been destroyed, would, he said, be tre- 
mendous; we in Germany would be the first to feel them. 

Liebknecht’s ship arrived in New York yesterday morning at 
3 o'clock, that of the Avelings several days earlier.°°° If it’s as hot 
there as it is here—now, at 4 in the afternoon it’s 25 degrees Centi- 
grade* here in my room—their tub-thumping is going to make them 
sweat a bit. 

In France the good work still goes on. The method of agitation that 
was tried out at Decazeville is now being repeated at Vierzon 
where there is a strike on.°'9 Vaillant, whose home it is, is taking 
a leading part there. In Paris, the Radicals 47° are working for us, as 
is Bismarck in Germany. They have got themselves into a frightful 
mess over the bucket-shops, and Clemenceau, though he had no need 
to do so, has nevertheless become too deeply involved with that crew 
to be able to keep out of it altogether. Thus the rift between him and 
the erstwhile radical working men yawns ever wider, and his loss is 
our gain. Our people are behaving with great address and I am sur- 
prised at the amount of discipline shown by the French. It was just 
what they lacked, and now they are acquiring it, but against a back- 
ground of a wholly revolutionary tradition which, in France, is taken 
for granted and is innocent of all those philistine misgivings which are 
the bane of our Geisers and Vierecks. Next time, even with the scruiin 
de liste,?>’7° we shall score considerable successes in France. And it is 
precisely because everything’s going so marvellously, both there and 
in Germany, and because a couple of years of uninterrupted internal 
development, helped along by the events inevitable in the circum- 
stances, would contribute so enormously to our progress —it is pre- 
cisely because of all this that I wouldn’t exactly wish for a world war — 
but history recks little of that! It pursues its course and we have to 
take it as it comes. 

There’s one thing you people should learn from the French. For 50 
years all revolutionaries there have subscribed to the rule that the ac- 
cused should refuse to give the examining magistrate any information 
whatsoever. The latter has the right to ask, the accused has the right 
not to answer, not to incriminate himself and his comrades. This — 
once it has been generally accepted to the extent that any deviation 
from it ranks as quasi betrayal—-is of enormous advantage in all 
trials. One is still free to say what one likes at the public proceedings. 

* 77 degrees Fahrenheit 

But at the preliminary investigation all records are so worded as to 
falsify the statements made by the accused who is browbeaten into 
signing by all manner of subterfuges. You should see for yourselves 
sometime. 

Your 
FE.