To the Editor:

As a young student of history, I must respectfully take issue with the thrust of Theodore Draper’s “The Ghost of Social-Fascism” [February] which seems to me to have been misleadingly unhistorical: first, in its anachronistic treatment of the concept of social-fascism and second, in its moralistic drawing of a questionable contemporary parallel. I by no means wish to quarrel with Mr. Draper’s exposition of the origins and evolution of the theory of social-fascism—I am not at all qualified to do so. Nor do I even disagree with his conclusions concerning the tragic consequences of that theory, especially as it was applied to the German Social-Democrats. But merely “to show how truly perverse and pertinacious it was,” bolstered by the hindsight of over thirty years, does not add to understanding. To treat it only as the creation of Communist theoreticians and the Comintern avoids the far more interesting question of why so many leftists of the late 20’s and early 30’s—they were not all party hacks and some, at least, must have had a bit of intelligence—were willing to accept the theory. The answer lies in the radicals’ world view during the period, a view which was rooted in a sincere belief that economic development would have to lead to increased centralization of industrial organization.

In the American context (which I know best), there is no reason for a man with such a view, hardly a sinister or stupid one, to have seen Franklin Roosevelt, with his rhetoric emphasizing the return to power of the little “forgotten” man, as progressive. And given the corporate domination of the NRA and the military-like organization of the ccc, it is not unreasonable for such a man to have viewed the New Deal as the beginning of a dangerous trend. After all, the ultimate character of fascism was hardly clear in the early 30’s—even for liberals. This is not to explain away imprecision in language and irresponsibility in charges, but to put them in perspective. What Mr. Draper seems to be saying is that given what we know today, it would have been better if the Marxists had acted more like liberals. Maybe so, but then they would not have been Marxists. Such “if” questions in history are useless.

Furthermore, the parallel which Mr. Draper attempts to draw is misleading. The New Left of today is not ideologically oriented, not governed by any organization such as the Comintern, not organized to serve the interests of a foreign power. The Social-Democrats of the early 30’s are not the same as the Democratic party liberals of the late 60’s. To dismiss emotionally the criticisms of contemporary liberalism which radicals have made as the resurgence of the theory of social-fascism is to dodge the issues being raised. Lyndon Johnson is responsible for the Battle of Khe Sanh; Richard Daley is responsible for the Battle of Chicago. They are both liberals. There is empirical evidence for the bankruptcy of liberalism. Mr. Draper, in “The Ghost of Social-Fascism” has truly conjured up a ghost, a mere apparition without form or substance.

Stefan A. Ostrach
Brown University
Providence, Rhode Island

_____________

To the Editor:

Theodore Draper’s article was most interesting and timely. However, I wonder why Mr. Draper considers it so surprising that the German Communists viewed Social-Democracy as their main enemy during the years prior to Hitler’s assumption of power. Any movement which aims at the overthrow of an existing social order would, inevitably, regard as its main obstacle those who want to reform that social order by “legal means.” Communists have traditionally used their most violent epithets for “reformists.” . . .

The present-day situation really does present some startling analogies. Those black and white dissidents who want to overthrow the existing social structure often consider liberals their main enemies, the very liberals who want to make our present society better, who want to reform the universities and the economy, and who want to build a truly integrated society. Many liberals naturally symphathize with the aims of these “dissidents” and thus do not oppose them very effectively. But the dissidents have no such qualms, they direct much of their antagonism against liberals whom they brand racist, and worse. And, as Mr. Draper surely wishes to imply, these dissidents may bring about a hideous, repressive reaction. But I fear it will take a disaster, such as Hitler’s coming to power, to make our “revolutionaries” see this. I hope it will not be too late then.

Robert Koch
Palos Verdes Estates, California

_____________

To the Editor:

. . . It is certainly true that some of the ideological roots of the theory of social-fascism have not yet completely disappeared from the life of the world Communist movement and that some of the New Left currents are in danger of being trapped by various versions of that same theory. Mr. Draper is also right in saying that “Historically, the so-called theory of social-facism and the practice based on it constituted one of the chief factors contributing to the victory of German fascism in January 1933.” However, it is to be deeply regretted that Mr. Draper did not deal adequately with some of the other chief factors, particularly the role of German Social-Democracy and the role of the German liberal bourgeosie.

It can be demonstrated, it seems to me, that Hitler’s fascism might never have come to power had German Social-Democracy and bourgeois liberalism, allied with a German Communism freed of the theory of social-fascism, resisted by all possible means the advance of reactionary forces in the Weimar Republic. But—and here lies the tragedy—German Social-Democracy played a decisive role in suppressing the German socialist revolution which looked so promising in 1918. This suppression opened the road to the Junker and monopoly-capital reaction which was soon followed by the victory of fascism. The total failure of the various bourgeois liberal and Social-Democratic coalition governments to relieve the suffering of the German people during the postwar crisis also played directly into the hands of the Nazis who successfully exploited the anger and frustration of the people in order to seize power. . . .

But none of the foregoing could or should minimize the responsibility of the theory of social-fascism for the eventual victory of the Nazis. Rereading the official record of the Thirteenth Plenum of the Executive Committee of the Communist International, held in December 1933, one finds that even at that late date, when Hitler was already in power, the world Communist leadership found it possible to say that “Social Democracy continues to play the role of the main social prop of the bourgeoisie also in the countries of open fascist dictatorship.”

Mr. Draper is undoubtedly correct in tracing the theory of social-fascism to such earlier Bolshevik concepts as “social patriotism” and “social chauvinism.” But he fails to track these earlier concepts to their original source: the Bolshevik struggle against those Social-Democratic parties which supported their respective national governments in World War I. The Bolsheviks proposed to fight the imperialist war by organizing and leading socialist revolutions. Hence, they attacked the attitudes of Social-Democracy as a betrayal of the socialist revolution. . . .

In retrospect, one would be justified in saying that if the Sixth World Congress held in 1928 had adopted . . . the strategic line projected by the Seventh Congress (in 1935), the German Communist party in the late 20’s and early 30’s would have fought, not under the slogan of “class against class” . . . but under the slogan of “the German people against fascism and war.” . . . With such a Communist orientation, the dominant leadership of the German Social-Democratic party, notwithstanding its unbending opposition to an anti-fascist alliance, might have been compelled by the pressures of its own membership to join with the Communist party in a united front against Hitler.

What all of this should mean to us today is the need to recognize the crucial importance of finding the road to world peace, meaningful social progress, and true democracy. And for American believers in socialism, the additional problem is to find . . . the particular historical stage at which to begin the transition to a socialist transformation of American society.

Alexander Bittelman
Croton-on-Hudson, New York

_____________

Mr. Draper writes:

I do not know what gave Mr. Koch the idea that the German Communists’ view of Social-Democracy as the main enemy was “so surprising” to me. I thought I had made clear that the idea was deeply ingrained in Communist or Bolshevik tradition, though it had never and need not have been driven so far as the theory of “social-fascism” and the practice based on it.

As an old warrior on these political battlefields, Mr. Bittelman’s reflections are particularly interesting. I am afraid that I did not deal “adequately” with the role of German Social-Democracy and of the German liberal bourgeoisie because that would have required a book; I did not even deal adequately with the role of German Communism as a whole. My subject, after all, was the rather more narrow one of the theory of social-fascism. Nor would I telescope as he seems to do the period from 1918 to the victory of fascism in 1933; the postwar years did not represent such a “total failure” to relieve the suffering of the German people; they were not suffering so much from 1924 to 1929. And I am going to resist going even farther back into World War I.

In any event, we can agree that none of this past “could or should minimize in any way the responsibility of the theory of social-fascism for the eventual victory of the Nazis.” And I am also inclined to agree that the Popular Front line of 1935 might well have succeeded in building a successful anti-Nazi united front if it had been put into effect seven years earlier. On the main issue, it is good to have Mr. Bittelman’s confirmation.

At least two misprints crept into the article. On page 30, column 2, line 26, “There were opportunists” should read “They were opportunists, etc.” On page 31, column 1, line 12 from bottom, the second word in Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold was misspelled. I would also like to clarify one point on page 33, column 1, about the May Day 1929 demonstration in Berlin. In accordance with the official ban, the Social-Democratic party and its allied trade unions agreed not to hold a public demonstration or march. This gave the Communists the opportunity to defy the ban and go ahead with their own demonstration. The Communists, therefore, did not have to take the initiative to break with the Social-Democrats on the matter of a common demonstration. We can only speculate whether the Communists would have agreed on a common demonstration, if the ban had been lifted, in view of the theory of social-fascism which was just then beginning to operate on a world scale. The Communist decision and its aftermath were more the effect than the cause of the new line that German Social-Democracy “had developed into social-fascism.” That line would have gone into effect whatever might have happened that May Day, but the special circumstances in Berlin certainly lent themselves to a bloody dramatization of the theory.