Włodzimierz Bączkowski

The Warring State

The USSR’s attitude to foreign countries is unique, totally unprecedented in more recent history. While divergent interests of states have always been the reason for fighting between enemy states, either through open war or economic and political struggle, now there is a new factor in the relations between the USSR and the abroad, aside the aforementioned factor of natural competition. This new factor is born out of Bolshevism and bases on systemic extremism — it is an ideological factor.

This is why the leadership of the powerful All-Union Communist Party cultivates the idea of Bolshevism taking over the entire world,* and its fantastic sense of cowardice makes it feel the sword of Damocles in the form of capitalism’s incessant encirclement of the “socialist homeland.”

These two characteristics set an important direction for the USSR’s foreign and internal policy, and they transformed the state’s entire organism into the organism of a warring state, whose strategic means include factors such as psychology of the masses and the reaction of the broadest social strata to slogans of post-war pseudo-pacifism. Besides, the war itself is multiform, mainly due to the frequent shifting of the object of the struggle from land (once, practically the only co-producer of exchange values) to modern economy, transformed and de-located under the influence of the enormous growth of foreign trade.**

There is plenty of evidence to confirm this thesis. To the total military character of the USSR testify not the official armed forces, though they are numerous and properly equipped, but the militarization of the population and the civil-military cooperation, which facilitate waging a long war.

When attempting to give examples of the significance of civil-military organizations and their impact on the military system, to the foreground comes the multitude of forms and methods of work and the great effort made in that way.

1. Osoaviakhim (the LOPP’s equivalent)1 has about 5,000,000 members. This number is expected to reach 17,000,000 by the end of the 5-year plan. Osoaviakhim has greatly contributed to the aviation propaganda and the expansion of the air fleet, in some cases offering as many as about a dozen aircraft at once to the Air Force authorities.***

2. Parallel to Osoaviakhim, there are numerous autonomous funds for construction of aircraft, airships, or tanks, set up is connection with some events, such as Kliment Voroshilov’s jubilee, the German zeppelin’s visit to the USSR, etc.

3. Autonomous air defense circles, chemistry clubs, rifle clubs, and sports clubs.*

4. One of the Red Cross’ objectives is conducting military training (!).

5. Pro-conscription societies are to make it easier for draft boards to get to know the conscripts’ moral and class values. Moreover, pre-draft training is being popularized. It is to be carried out one or two months before conscription into the army, with main emphasis laid on the conscript’s psychological preparation. At the seats of many draft boards there are reading rooms or “soldiers’ corners” for the conscripts awaiting their turn.

6. The Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army Horse Fund raises the best horses for the army in agricultural collectives.

7. The campaign for motorization of the border troops from funds collected “voluntarily” by the population and civil organizations has been hugely successful. A number of trusts and city councils have voted to donate to this goal from 20,000 to 100,000 rubles or even more.

8. A campaign for social inspection of the barracks has been conducted under the slogan “Let us transform the barracks into cultural homes for their residents”.

Moreover, the military training in the border zones is currently being carried out by means of an unprecedented precaution aimed at combating the enemy in potentia — perspektivnogo vraga — and the establishment of agricultural collectives consisting of demobilized soldiers. At the same time, the press is constantly conducting psychological militarization of the population of the border zone.**

The Bolsheviks are perfectly aware that without properly preparing the masses for war they cannot expect a victory…*** Consequently, they are carrying out large-scale ideological-military training of both the troops and civilians using propaganda of communist messianism and of the alleged danger coming from the “capitalist world.” The scale of this campaign is incomparably greater than abroad.

This threat**** (along with the hope for universal victory — basic factors stimulating humanity’s collective efforts) is promoted, implemented, and ingrained into the Soviet citizen’s consciousness and subconscious also thanks to mobilized art, special exhibitions, the cinema, and coordination of the work of members of the Literary Association of the Army and the Fleet.*

The need to take into account the major and practically positive results of mobilizing the widest sectors of the population to working for the state, the division of the population into organized and unorganized, and the constant efforts to enlarge the former at the expense of the latter, increases the gravity of the above argument.

The USSR cares primarily for the military. When ones compares the standard of living of the civilian population and the military, one can clearly see that the military is privileged and enjoys a higher position. Soviet newspapers report on a strong desire to join the army even among the Soviet pariahs — the lishentsy — and that many conscripts renounce their right to military benefits. Undoubtedly, due to the higher standard of living of military men and the propaganda of communist messianism, of which the army is to be one of the main implementers, the attitude to obligatory military service is changing among the Russian masses. The old disrespect or contempt for soldiery and the treatment of military service as a misfortune is likely to disappear. Instead there is an emerging desire, and if not a desire than a sense of some solemnity associated with carrying out duties of a member of the “avant-garde of world revolution” and a “fighter of the army of the entire world proletariat.” In military policy there is a tendency to transform the army into a militia modeled on the Swiss one, coupled with engaging the entire population of the Soviet Union in military work.**

All of this clearly proves that the USSR is moving toward highest forms of militarization, concealed on the outside with pacifist propaganda and the necessity to create “defense forces” against the “ever-increasing danger” at home.

Moving on to the economic and industrial structure of the Soviet Union, one can see predominantly that it too is being adapted to the struggle. At the same time, it is as much a strategic factor as the military and it contributes most to the Soviet state’s militant character.

The very implementation of the principle of planned economy as it is understood by the communists is tantamount to an actual imposition of martial law in industry. The total and ever-increasing centralization of economic life, expressed in the liquidation of industrial commissariats in the Union’s republics or their conversion into auxiliary posts (which, in line with the communist economy’s principles, is called a “struggle against anarchy in manufacturing”), in fact facilitates exertion of pressure on the local population. First and foremost, this system puts the population increasingly at the mercy of Moscow in terms of food supplies, and, secondly, allows for the planning of attacks on foreign markets through a kind of dumping. The difference between this and non-Bolshevik dumping is that the Bolsheviks do not expect to compensate for their economic losses in the future. Instead, their sole purpose is a temporary political advantage in the imperialist-military sense. Whether these measures should be defined as socialization, mobilization or militarization of production — the goals, opportunities, and effects of these efforts and their organization shall remain unchanged.

The subordination of the workers’ organizations to the state and its authority, the bottom-up subordination conducted under the slogan of organizing the state as a dictatorship of the proletariat and of organizing the state authority as authority of workers and peasant have all deprived the working class of any freedom of movement. For the masses consider every strike or similar action a crime of sabotage.

Moreover, the substantial use of the forced labor of workers and civilians is done under resolutions of local and central authorities and it is manifested in mobilizing civilians to public works, also at vulnerable frontal areas*** for a period of several days or weeks, and, last but not least, the prevention of free movement from one factory to another completes the picture of the Soviet economy within the framework of military organization and discipline.*

A characteristic feature of Soviet industry is that it greatly promotes development of certain branches of the industry, namely the metal, machine-building, oil and coal industries, which are indispensable to the state’s military and political-economic efficiency.

The harmoniousness and the entirety of the outline of the warring state is complemented by the great burden of personal services and the financial burdens laid on the population. The principle that says that the population of a waring state must suffer is one hundred percent true in the Soviet Union. Food supply is the weakest point of the Soviet state’s organism. The extremely poor organization of food cooperatives, the constant clashes between sales and production centers, the existence of “deficit goods,” the low quality and the high prices result from deep sociological laws governing the state at time of struggle.**

The tax burden imposed on the population is great, but even more burdensome than the taxes are the semi-compulsory non-taxation fees, which take the form of forcing people to purchase government bonds; to make “donations” for the motorization of the border troops; to pay Aviakhim2 membership fees, party contributions, or payments for the benefit of trade unions; to subscribe to paid periodicals... The list goes on.

Looking at the whole economic-industrial life of the USSR, one has to mention one more characteristic, namely the unnatural, accelerated pace of economic life imposed from the top down onto the properly prepared ground. The five-year plan, which is to be carried out in four years, is being realized at the price of weakening and neglecting auxiliary and secondary spheres, such as food supply or transport. One might draw an analogy between this plan and, on the one hand, the era of Peter the Great and his imperialist activity, and, on the other hand, the accelerated production in the war industry in the countries that fought during 1914‒1918. A deep understanding of the new conditions of life as well as taking into account the importance of the factors mentioned at the beginning are key to drawing an important analogy between the development of heavy industry in the USSR and the intensification of production in Krupp’s factories during the first months of the World War.

The Bolsheviks brag about fighting unemployment at home. This is not entirely true, because the USSR has many lishentsy — people deprived of voting rights, the clergy of all denominations, as well as “former people” left on the margin, unemployed or exploited by the state. Treated as a morituri, the lishents is exploited by the state in a more ruthless way than the prisoner of war in less developed countries.*

Reported by the Soviet press, the shortage of workers is a natural phenomenon resulting from the state’s structure. It is a result of the abnegation of members of agricultural collectives (a kind of ennoblement of the proletarian) and the state’s campaign of proletarianization of the more prosperous peasants (rozkurkulennie), who are disinclined to go to towns or cities. But the main reason for that is laborers’ low wages, which enable the centralized Soviet economy to accumulate large financial means and employ the working-class masses. Also in this respect, only workers deeply excited by the atmosphere in the militant state can accept the low standard of living.

The USSR’s ethnic policy is no exception to the rule either. When the Bolsheviks comprehended how difficult it would be to overcome the great movement of the rebirth of the peoples of the East (the Tatars, Turkestani, and others) and the great state-forming capacities of nations such as Georgians, they began to pursue a policy of stealing up to the “Union’s backward nations” through the back door in their own homes, namely through propaganda and implementation of Marxist-Leninist ideology under the ethnic guise.

The form of the slogan of national culture (the content of which was essentially international) and the simultaneous complete non-renunciation of the ideal of melting all the nations into one whole (as a condition for Bolshevik progress) were the starting point in the days when the Soviet authorities were struggling with internal difficulties, when Lenin was alive, and when the NEP was implemented. But the struggle against the major internal difficulties allowed the Soviet authorities to begin to slowly revoke all of the republican autonomies and liberties that had been gradually granted. But the form remained. The great concessions granted to six republics, and within them (aside the core, that is, the Russian Federal Republic) to a number of autonomous districts and states, continue.

The fear of the external enemy, and above all the desire to use the ethnic “minorities” to penetrate and attract kindred ethnic groups inhabiting the countries surrounding the USSR — this is the offensive-defensive military factor that does not allow for the consistent (though according to Lenin, premature) “merging” of nations into one Russian whole.

The history of the Polish-Russian relations makes it much easier to understand the methods used by the Bolsheviks in their ethnic policy. During tsarism, the 1905 revolutionary outbreaks resulted in concessions to Poles, after which came a period of calm and relative stabilization of the relations and of withdrawal from the granted concessions. The year 1914, the year of the war, generated new demands for concessions.

The profound influence of the Marxist-Leninist dogma of class struggle and the atmosphere of the waring state on the Bolshevik society’s subconscious is evidenced by the militarization of the Russian language. In contrast to the pre-war times, it contains a multitude of abbreviations and adapted concepts and words originating from everyday political and economic life. The cotton industry is called “the cotton front” and the coal industry is “the front of the fight for coal.” Every sphere of activity, whether social, economic, or scientific, is called a “struggle.” There is the “struggle against the kulaks” and “the struggle for the Leninist style at work.” “The struggle against religion” is carried out by the League of Militant Atheists,3 etc.

Last but not least, there is the issue of the Comintern and the communist parties of Europe and America. Viewed through the lens of the USSR as a militant state, their nature becomes clear without losing anything of their absolute moral value.

The communist parties represent a different system which exists not on paper, like the socialist parties’ ideal of the state. Instead, it is an existing, real, and aggressive state organism. The parties’ goal is revolution and introduction of communism. The Comintern is their headquarters in Moscow, officially independent of the USSR authorities, while in fact the two of them make up an indivisible whole. Judging from the activity of the communist parties in Europe, the Comintern’s budget finances predominantly communists in the countries surrounding the USSR, which means that it pays for offensive-defensive and military actions. This clearly proves that the communist parties are the centers for infiltrating and loosening the foreign state’s nodes for the benefit of the Soviets. It is clear that the infiltration of a state for the benefit of another state organism is espionage, and that the loosening of the state nodes is subversion.

In addition to these ideological penetration outposts, the USSR has numerous “official” espionage outposts, which wedge themselves mainly into places where there is any ongoing opposition struggle, disorder, or strike. Hence, one can see the last, main feature of the waring state — the breaking up of neighboring states carried out cheaply from within and which rules out defeat in a classical, armed war.

And there is one more aspect that makes it easier to see certain things, namely the peculiar nature of the minds directing the USSR policy, minds doomed to being stuck in their own past of their underground fight. These minds are guided by a kind of Wallenrodism, rooted in the noble soil of the Decembrists or even deeper. The previous kind of struggle and the all-absolving character of the doctrine of materialistic Bolshevism enabled these minds to surpass not only the theorizing Kauṭilya, but also Machiavelli, who is closer to our times, and Frederick the Great, who is fully relevant to today.

To always be the third and to be nobly indignant — this is the essence of the mode of operation of the greatest masters of intentionalism. Only a Westerner, imbued with the spirit of Christian benevolence, can never properly understand a complete justification of means, or, with full certainty of logic and reason, sense the underground currents and the depth of the springs that occasioned the death of Tadeusz Hołówko, Noe Ramishvili, and Simon Petlura, and have thwarted many known and unknown plans or great deeds... An old maxim — inter bellum silent leges — contains and summarizes the sociological law or principle on which this unnaturally exaggerated intentionalism is founded. During war, all humanitarian slogans remind of their existence in a barely audible voice, just like inaudible during the last world war became the naive resolutions of the Hague Conferences on poisonous gases and the Red Cross.

The goddess of war, who snatches nourishing morsels from the mouth of a citizen poor in spirit and body for the benefit of the social effort of building the enormous fortress/factory — this is the symbol of today’s Red Russia. In the content of this symbol lies the genesis of the Dneprostroi Dam and Turksib, the Kharkiv Tractor Factory and the Kuznetsk Basin, the shock workers and saboteurs, and, last but not least, the Solovetsky Islands, the colonization of Siberia, Aviakhim, and the fashion for leather jackets. And this is what we should pay our attention to and be vigilant of, for here lies the main external factor a proper attitude to which shall determine the potency and steadfast permanence of our independent existence — the initial condition for the achievement of freedom by the oppressed peoples of the Soviet Union.

Source: Wschód-Orient 12 (1932).