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N all the current discussions

of Britain’s:crisis, two funda-
mental factors are always left
out. < :

The first is that at bottom it

_ js a erisis of the British Empire,
_of that parasitic structure whose
very existence is being challeng-
ed by- the Colonial Liberation
Movement. ae

The second is that this crisis
is being enormously ageravat-
ed by the policies which Britain,
as a member of the American-
controlled Atlantic alliance, 1s
being compelled to follow.

There can be no realistic long-
term or short-term policy for
Britain if these facts continue
to be ignored.

It is one thing to stress its
long-term character, however.
and quite another to show that
it is a crisis of imperialism,
growing ever more murderous in
the period of its degay.

To describe British imperial-
ist economy as parasitic is not
to indulge in abuse but to state
an irrefutable fact.

The extent of the parasitism
was almost unbelievable in the
past and is a most significant
factor today.

+ Before the First World
War three-fifths of Britain’s im-
ports were paid for by exports,
and two-fifths by ihcome from

overseas investments — partic- -

mlarly ‘in the Dominions and
Colonies—and by the earnings
of the shipping trade. ;

+ Britain had a surplus of
£125 million per year for invest-
ment overseas with a view to
further exploitation.

+ It was the undeviating aim
of (British capitalism between
the wars to develop its: exploita-
tion of the Colonies and to earn
thereby a large surplus for fur-
ther investment,

The return from British in-
vestments overseas fell as a
consequence of the . Second
World War. ;

In 1951 a little under ‘four-
fifths (78 percent). of British
imports were paid for by British
exports, which was an advance
on the three-fifths before the
First World War. :

One-fifth could not, however,
be met out of exports.

So British policy since the war
has attempted, by means of in-

tensified exploitation, not only
to fill this gap but to create a
further surplus for annual in
vestment,

The fact that the imperialists
had somewhat to.relax their
hold on India and Pakistan made
them desire all the more to hang
on to the remaining Colonies
and client States. -

V They aimed to. extract
more tribute from Malaya, from
Persia, Iraq and Egypt, and from
all the far-flung Colonies still
remaining in their possession.

VY Not a gradual freeing of
the Colonies and satellite States,
but their intensified exploita-

tion is the basis of British col-

onial policy.
&

In Malaya, Persia, Iraq and
Egypt, and in the African Col-
onies, however, this policy comes
up against the fierce resistance
of the peoples. :

The Liberation Movement is
at different stages of develop-
ment in the various areas, but
everywhere it is active.

+ Never has British imperi-
alism been challenged in~so
many areas at the same time.

+ Never before has it been
compelled to mobilize so many
troops and expend so much
money to defend the whole
structure of imperialist robbery.

In the economic debate in the
House of Commons on July 29,
Butler. said:

“Our overseas military and
political commitments which
cost us only a few million (per
year) in the thirties, came to
nearly $200, million in 1951 and
now’ cost even more, and that
represents the efforts of our far-
flung: forces in Korea, Egypt,
Malaya, and elsewhere.”’

Yet the Tory party, the Labor
party and the Trades Union Con-
gress have the audacity to de-
scribe Britain’s economic crisis
without making it clear that
V the attempt to maintain im-

perialist exploitation puts

$200 million a year on the
debit side of Britain’s balance
of payment accounts; and that
V this huge drain was virtually
non-existent before the war.

The second feature of Brit-
ain’s crisis is the policy of being
pursued by the United States—
the overlord of the capitalist

if

Continued from page 9

The great conspiracy to. rebuild a German army

Dulles added that the U.S.
should integrate Germany’s eco-
momy with that of Western Eu-
rope. That was one of the aims
of the Marshall Plan. And the
Americans quickly set about it.

That year a constitution for a
West German State was drawn
up at Bonn. In 1949, an “Inter-
national Authority” for the Ruhr
was set up. Its purpose was
said to be the control of the
German cartels. It gave con-
trol of the Ruhr to the U.S.,
with German capitalists acting
as managers,

While these moves were being
made the Americans had been
telling us how “dangerous” the
Russians were. It was the
Russians, they said, who were
“aggressive” and had to be
“contained.” \

The louder they shouted about
the “dangerous” Russians the

more dangerous the Americans
in fact became,

Having taken control of the

Ruhr, Europe’s great arsenal,
they engineered the Western
Union “defense’’ pact. The

North Atlantic Pact followed and
the new German Army is to be
part of thiS set-up.

German -troops being
brought into the alliance because:
the U.S. cannot go to war with
Russia without using Germany
as a base and without a German
army.

e

are

These preparations for war
sometimes become so clear in
spite of the propaganda fog that
people in all countries. and es-
pecially in France and in Ger-
many herself, become alanmed.

. new diversions are arranged. The

“air lift” is a classic of its kind,

CRM

Crisis of the E

MTEL eee U LOOP MMM eM ee Mt Me Mn en nner nT

British Empire

world.

Never has a single State been
so economically powerful in re-
lation to its contemporaries as
the U.S. is in relation to the
rest of the capitalist world.

% The U.S. is the undisputed
boss of the ,capitalist war alli-
ance.

+ It would be wrong to re-
gard this as purely a military
alliance, where’ a number of in-
dependent’ States concert their
military strategy, with a poten-
tial enemy and a possible war
in view, while on other ques-
tions ‘they go their own sweet
way.

+ It is not an alliance of the
type of Holland and Britain in
the 17th and 18th centuries} or
Britain, France and Russia in
the First World War,

The relations of the U.S. to
its allies is a relation of a mas-
ter to his satellites. ‘

The “allies”? of America are
rather in the position of those
German princelings of the 18th

It lasted from June 26. 1948, to
September 30, 1949.

In June 1948 the Americans
introduced a new currency in
Western Germany and the West-
ern sector of Berlin. This was
the death blow to any idea of
German, unity. }

The, Russians suggested that
since currency reform was need-
ed it should be applied to the
whole of Germany, which should
have one currency, :

To stop a traffic in black’
market currency, ‘the Russians
imposed transport restrictions.
This was made the excuse for
the air-lift. :

The British people were told
that the Russians were trying to
“starve’’ Western Berlin, In fact
the Russians offered to supply
Western [Berlin with all the food
it needed while the restrictions
were in force.
es

century who hired out their
soldiers, at so much a ‘head, to
fight Britain’s battles),

The Atlantic alliance is also
an economic and political group-
ing. ‘The boss nation regularly
interferes in the political and
economic affairs of its subord-
inates. |

It prescribes with whom they
shall trade and- what they
shall trade in.

It forces them into an econo-
mie war with Eastern Europe
and ‘China, a war which is
against their best interests.

It mobilizes them as its obed-
ient satellites so that it can
make the United Nations its ser-
vile tool,

Some of the capitalist and
tight-wing Labor leaders have
lost all taste for national inde-
pendence.

They want America to play
its boss role more thoroughly.

V The whole world, they tell
the U.S. bosses, is dependent on
U.S. capitalism financing a vast

But the air-lift had a double
use for the Americans. It masked
their real purpose of splitting
Germany and served as “‘terror’’
propaganda against the Rus-
sians.

The real issue—over currency
—was scarcely mentioned by the
American propaganda machine.

Now we have reached what
the Americans hope will be the
final stage in Germany short of
the actual war they plan.

In Bonn the West German big
businessmen and their political
stooges have signed a ‘‘contract’’
with the Western Powers, In
Paris a European Defense Treaty
thas been signed.

These treaties have been
framed by the Americans. They
will provide the West’ German
government with an army and
an arms, industry.

Under the treaties the Ruhr
“International Authority’ will

® A British Roya] Marine
mando smiles as he poses
the severed heads of Mal
patriots. In his right hand ae

with

holds the head of a Malaya
The British governmen”

girl,
has admitted .the authentic
of this picture. ~

development plan in the pack
ward and even the advance
capitalist countries in the Wor

V The idea is 5
spread—notably by the Lab?
party and the TUC in their T
cent statements—that if an 6°”
nomic crisis breaks out in

United States ordinary mortal
elsewhere can do very litt
about it.

V The United States is San

Claus. You mustn’t shoot 1”
or even criticize him. :

‘BUBNEEEL

Com
ayan

sedulously «

the

These are the two aspects oF

Britain’s crisis — the decayi®
Empire and American domin®
tion.

And no policy *is worth its salf,

that does not deal with both. —

, We

go. With it will-go all preteae?

of any limiting of the ste)

German arms industry.

De-Nazification long ago he

abolished in fact if not in name —

Now Nazis will be even mor?

openly recruited by the Ameri
cans,

+ Who wants all this? The.

British and Canadian people

don’t want it. iy
+ The German people are P
testing against it,
+ The French fear it.
The men of Wall Street
Washington, with the assistane”
of British Right Wing P
ians' in the Tory and L@
parties, have thrust the 2°”
danger upon the world. see
But it is not too late to stoP
the Yanks and their creatures”
The people can prevent
ratification of these treaties:
They can prevent the Fr.
tion of these suicide pacts.

pot

PACIFIC TRIBUNE — SEPTEMBER 5, 1952 — PAGE 1°
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10°. f

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