Page:Solomon Abramovich Lozovsky - The World's Trade Union Movement (1924).pdf/104

 100 beginning of war and if the war does start may end it in the interest of the working class.

In order to struggle against war it is necessary to conduct a systematic, steady agitational and propagandist work within the army. At the Peace Congress at the Hague, our proposal to conduct anti-military propaganda among the soldiers called forth a sharp protest from the reformist leaders of the Congress.

Such an attitude toward our proposal is quite clear, for the reformists consider the army as a necessary organization for the defense of "the fatherland." Therefore, the disintegration of the army is the disintegration of the defensive and offensive forces of their "fatherland" itself.

The propaganda in the army, open or secret, at the present time plays a great role, because, the bourgeoisie feels less and less assurance of starting a new war and hurling the workers of one country against the workers of another. But in connection with that, in the struggle against war, there appears a new problem. On what, at present, are based the forces of the imperialist countries?

They are based on the exploitation of the colonies, and the colonial armies which already have played some role in the last war and are now becoming of new significance as a powerful tool in the hands of the bourgeoisie for crushing internal "disturbances." Not without reason does the French bourgeois press discuss the question of establishing compulsory military service for the colonies. A part of these colonial troops are at present participating in the French occupation of the Ruhr, and another part of them are within France itself.

As long as these military units are composed of the most backward elements (all the colored soldiers are illiterate) the bourgeoisie is sure that in case of trouble they will be a good tool in its hands.

Out of this, we can see that the question of fighting against war is related to the question of fighting against the imperialist colonial policy. Work within the colonies, the creation within the colonial countries of labor unions, appears as a practical question because the colonial power of the bourgeoisie threatens us with death, giving the bourgeoisie the opportunity in case of necessity to hurl these colored armies into mild military action, and then onto the internal front in case of a civil war.

Within the last few years the question of fighting against war, arose before us—not as a theoretical task, but as a practical one. We had to give an answer to the wide working masses, and to show how to conduct this struggle in an organized way. In connection with this, at the Frankfort Conference and at the Berlin Conference of the Transport Workers, we advocated practical slogans. We advocated the idea of creating at all the border points, Control Committees for the control of all shipments of military equipment from one country into another