London, 24 October 1891

Dear Bebel, Many thanks for the postcards and packages without which it would have been difficult for us to follow the course of events in Erfurt.2' Things really went off quite capitally-— you, Auer, Singer and Fischer covered yourselves with glory, and the wretchedness of the opposition was the only thing you had to complain of, it being no pleasure to do battle with such small fry. At all events the gentlemen will now have to show what they are capable of outside the party, where they are innocuous, and the better elements amongst the youthful rowdies will now be accorded time for reflection. The fact that Mr von Vollmar has seen fit to reject the new course in the arms of Caprivi, if without ‘personal spite’, may provide temporary alleviation, but you are very far from being quit of the chap, and the more tense the situation becomes, the closer a watch you will have to keep upon him. However, every big party has one intriguer-in-chief and if you were to get rid of this one, another would take his place.

We were pleased that there should have been so much merriment on your side, and it made us laugh a lot——the sorry opposition and the worthy Vollmar are almost enough to send one to sleep.

On the first reading the programme makes an excellent impression, with the exception of a few weak spots to which I had already

Monday, 26 October.—-In the meantime another letter arrived from you this morning.?3 That Fischer had made enemies I am ready to believe, for it’s something I know from my own experience. In my younger days I was just as inclined to be uppish at the wrong time and in the wrong place as he is, and in the same way I seldom detect a failing in the younger generation which I myself did not possess to a greater or lesser degree. It gradually wears off, provided one occasionally gets a slap in the eye which one has to admit is deserved.

I don’t know whether you will in future be able to avoid settling such matters in public. I think it’s better that you should, despite minor disadvantages and much personal unpleasantness. But there’s no doubt that, unless your central organ‘ changes, you would be welladvised to hand it over entirely to the Berlin party and to acquire a national weekly advertiser which, however, should and would have to be properly edited.

It was most sensible to expend the 400 marks on Lafargue’s election. This will come in very handy for the second ballot. Since unions and party are distinct in your case, it is perfectly all right if French and other srrikrs receive support direct from the trades unions in Germany, leaving the party funds free for political purposes. ‘This being so, however, you should see to it that the unions do something for the glassworkers.??' Quite a lot has been done for them from over here.

Lafargue is in a good position. He obtained 5,005 votes, the Opportunist and government candidate Depasse 2,928, the second Opportunist Bere (Beer or Bear, as you choose) 1,246, and the Radical Roche 2,272. The latter is stepping down in favour of Lafargue. That means that Depasse, his real competitor in the second ballot, could only get in if all Roche’s voters were to abstain and if he were to poll, say, another 1,000 votes amongst the reserve of abstainers in the monarchist camp, or if 3,000 or more votes from that reserve were to more than outweigh the 5,005 + 2,272. I don’t know how many registered electors there are and therefore am unable to judge; at all events the position is better than we had dared to hope.

Gilles is doing well for himself. The fellow must be living in clover at police expense. He has bought nearly everyone in the Communist Society by lending them money and they durst not chuck him out. Since the fellow claims that, as a member of that society, he is ipse facto a member of the German party, it may be asked whether you people are prepared to put up with this particular ‘comrade’. The funds available to him for his loans and his circulars — that sort of thing costs a pretty penny over here — can only emanate from the Embassy.

I have not yet seen anything about the Magdeburg meeting eiI am sending you an article by the great Paul Brousse from which you will see how that chief of all quarrel-pickers, mischief-mongers and authoritarians, now that he’s been thoroughly trounced and reduced to a cipher, is holding forth to you people, whom he has combatted for years as his arch-enemies on the Continent, about peace and federation.

Hamburger Echo

Herewith a few cuttings about the Russian famine which is spreading even farther west than I thought. Such things are to be found daily in the British press. The position is indeed a serious one and still more troops, or so Mendelson assured me yesterday, are being sent to the west simply in order that they may be fed. It would be madness for the Russians to go to war, but militarist parties always are mad and the Russian bourgeoisie is blinkered, stupid, ignorant, chauvinist and grasping in the extreme. If war there must be, then the sooner the better, for in that case the Russians would be treated to a rude awakening.

Since I thought it necessary to let the French know exactly what our position would be in case of war—-a damned difficult task, mind you-—I have written an article in French and sent it to Laura.3 Today she writes to say that both she and Paul are absolutely delighted with the article and that it was exactly what was wanted for the French, etc. If Guesde is also of that opinion—he is still at Lille crushed. So, have at ’em, if Russia goes to war, have at the Russians and their allies, whoever they may be. We should then have to ensure that the war be prosecuted with all available revolutionary means and that the existence of any government refusing to use those means be made impossible; alternatively that we ourselves take the lead at the crucial moment. We have not yet forgotten the glorious example set by the French in 1793 and, if our hand is forced, we might in fact celebrate the centenary of 1793 by showing that the German working men of 1893 are not unworthy of their predecessors the Sansculottes, in which case, should French soldiers cross our frontier, they will be welcomed with the cry: Quoi ces cohortes étrangéres Feraient la loi dans nos foyers? (Marseillaise)

That is the gist of the thing. As soon as the text has been finally decided on (I naturally anticipate that one or two minor amendments will be suggested) and printing has begun, I shall translate the article into German and we shall see what can be done with it. I’m not sure whether the conditions governing your press are such as to permit its publication in Germany; maybe if you qualified it a bit it might do — itll be managed somehow. My articles are not in any case binding on the party, which is a great piece of luck for both of us, although Liebknecht supposes I regard it as a personal misfortune though this would never have occurred to me.

The reports quote you as saying that I had prognosticated the collapse of bourgeois society in 1898. There must have been a little mistake somewhere. All I said was that by 98 we might possibly have come to the helm. Should this not happen, bourgeois society might continue to potter along as it is for a bit, until such time as an impulse from without causes the whole rotten structure to come crashing down. In still air a dilapidated old wreck of that sort can survive for a couple of decades even when it is to all intents and purposes defunct. So I should have been exceedingly careful about making predictions of this nature. On the other hand, the possibility of our coming to power is merely a calculation of probability in accordance with mathematical laws.

Nevertheless, I hope that peace will prevail. Our position is such that we have no need to take a gamble — and war would compel us to do so. And again, ten years from now we shall be far better prepared. Vovct pourquoi."

If we are to take over and operate the means of production, we need people who are technically trained and plenty of them. These we have not got, and have even been pretty glad hitherto to have been largely spared the company of the ‘educated’. Now things have changed. Now we are strong enough to absorb and digest any quantity of educated riff-raff and I would predict that in the next 8 or 10 years we shall recruit enough young technicians, doctors, jurists and schoolmasters for the factories and large estates to be managed for the nation by party members. In which case our accession to power will take place quite naturally and will run a—relatively — smooth course. If, on the other hand, we come to the helm prematurely and as a result of war, the technicians will be our principal opponents and will deceive and betray us at every turn; we should have to inaugurate a reign of terror against them and would lose out all the same. This is what always happened to the French revolutionaries, if on a smaller scale; even in everyday administration they had to leave the subordinate, really operative, posts to their former reactionary incumbents~—- men who hampered and paralysed everything. I therefore hope and pray that this splendid, unerring progress of ours, evolving with the impassivity and inexorability of a natural process, will continue along its appointed course.

Warm regards to your wife? and yourself.

Your F.E.