Idid not wish to vote the war loan because they thought that Germany had been attacked and because they were, as yet, unaware of the fact that Bismarck had himself contrived the war. The other Social Democrats in the Reichstag voted in its favor.

The case of 1870 repeats itself. The German nation has forgotten Bismarck's imposition in 1870. Yet the imposition projected by the government at present is much greater and much more gross. In the Reichstag the Chancellor declared: "Russia is applying the torch to our door." This is the lie under the influence of which the German people entered upon their war of offense. It is a sudden war which is the natural result of what the ruling classes of Germany have upon their conscience in the way of nationalistic and capitalistic trespass; a war in which the word of honor given Luxemburg as to neutrality is broken without scruple, in which Belgium's independence is trampled under foot; a war of offense against France, where Jaurès, as his last act, constrained the government to maintain peace. Our German comrades seem indeed to be of the opinion also that the war is being waged against Russian Czarism. This is the single explanation we have for their conduct.

A special importance was given to the Swiss Party Congress on November 1st by the presence of Troelstra of Amsterdam, who brought the greetings of the Dutch comrades.

His talk was a brotherly offer of the hand in all directions, a mild pardon for errors of the past, but a bitter sentence of guilt against the political and economic powers which have caused the war, and not least worthy of mention was his hearty warning in these difficult times not to make attacks against the comrade parties of other countries, but to seek and understand their thinking and action.

Troelstra said that nationalism is not opposed to internationalism, but internationalism is the organization of the nations, especially in proportion as each nation is won for Socialism. Because we know this we shall find our way for the first time when the comrades of the warring countries are no longer obliged to listen to their generals. Because

they must do this to-day, and murder one another without being enemies, is the reason why we have not yet conquered the nations. Therefore we do not call the comrades of other countries to account for their conduct. We do not blame them, but consider how in the future we can more effectively break the chains of capitalism in common with them all.

Van Vliegen, Chairman of the Party, and Van Kol, one of the two Socialist members of the Dutch Senate, took a far different view. Van Vliegen went so far as to advocate the cause of the Allies, and was rebuked by the Party. From a close contact with German and Belgian Socialists, Van Kol reached the following conclusions (in an interview in the New York Volkszeitung, April 15, 1915):

Three days after the declaration of war [August 3d], as you know, Hermann Müller of the German Party Executive was present at Paris, where a conference was called to reach an understanding. Huysmans [Secretary of the International Socialist Bureau] pleaded that the Germans should abstain from voting the war loan [on August 4th]: "We understand the difficulty of your situation, the French on one side [towards whom no German Socialist hostility had been expressed] and the Russians on the other; don't vote at all, abstain." Müller answered that they had decided to vote against all war credits. Soon there came the unanimous affirmative vote. The French, on the other hand, declared at once [on August 3d] that they must vote in favor of the war credits if they were to be attacked.

It is not the [German] vote in favor of the war loan that makes the international Socialist situation so critical, it is rather their silent consent to the violation of Belgium. If, after they had learned the whole truth, they had published a public protest, all would have been forgotten. But nothing happened, no protest came, "military necessity" had also conquered the Social Democracy of Germany.

SWITZERLAND

We are able to give a good account of Swiss Socialist 'opinion because of the Party Congress held on November 1st. This is particularly illuminating because of the close contact of the Swiss with the French and German Socialists. It will be noted that, as in the case of the Dutch, the opinion of November is much more friendly toward the position of the German Socialist majority than that of August (see Chapter XVIII).

According to the Bern Tagwacht of August 31st, the Socialists of the neutral countries are of the opinion that the German Government, well knowing that a war against the resistance of the Social Democracy is an impossibility, had loosened somewhat the fetters it had bound upon the labor movement. This was the probable cause for the desertion of the German comrades from the old standards of our movement.

Comrades in Switzerland, the Bern Party paper goes on to say, cannot understand the attitude of our German comrades and feel that "the situation was too big for the leaders of the German movement, that the diplomacy of the German Government had caught our comrades napping. We might understand, had our German comrades hesitated to vote against the budget, but we fail to see the reason for the decidedly nationalistic fervor which emanates from the German movement. Nor does it make the situation clearer that Bernstein, in an attempt to justify himself and his colleagues, quotes extracts which Marx and Engels wrote in reference to entirely different political situations."

The leading Swiss Socialist paper, the Zurich Volksrecht, which defended the German Party for some weeks, finally accused the Germans of not having done what they should have done in the course of the war to distinguish their position from that of the military Junker caste. It continues:

"Or was it the will of the German Social Democrats that Belgium should be attacked, that the chief attack of German military power should be directed against France? As international Socialists, did they also wish to declare themselves

in favor of this plan-so long ago openly prepared for and adopted by the German General Staff-in spite of the fact that they claim to be fighting against Russia and Czarism?

"We have already seen from the way in which Comrade Fischer, in the Volksrecht, has tried to explain and excuse the violation of the neutrality of Belgium, that the eyes of the leading comrades of Germany are remarkably blinded." [Richard Fischer, Reichstag Member for Berlin, had just visited Switzerland for political purposes.]

On October 26th, the Socialist Party meeting of Zurich took place to discuss the Congress of the following week. John Sigg, of the Party Executive, spoke in defense of the German Socialists:

To make attacks was not at all the purpose of the Swiss comrades, since they would have done the same thing as the German Reichstag group had done, and with an equally complete conviction. The German group had been brought to their position by events, by the attack of the Czarism, and further, the German Socialist Reichstag members were only defending their fatherland, just as the Swiss comrades in the national parliament had done when they voted for mobilization and the war loan. But the Party Executive would bring forward a resolution which declared against the violation of Belgian neutrality by German militarism; in this matter there were no differences of opinion in Switzerland, so that this resolution would undoubtedly be accepted unanimously.

After the report of Sigg, which was opposed in certain points by Trotsky (a prominent Russian exile, formerly chairman of the St. Petersburg council of Labor Deputies), and a member of the Party Executive, a resolution was passed which demanded a conference with the comrades of other countries, including the countries at war. (Our italics.) [See Chapter XXIX.]

The Swiss Congress, when it met, followed the policy proposed by Sigg.

The Congress refused to investigate the problem of

how the Socialists of the warring nations ought to have acted, and whether they were right or not. The Congress refused to attack the violation of the neutrality of Belgium in a separate resolution. It contented itself by using the laying waste of Belgium, and the invasion of any army in a neutral country, as an illustration, in the general resolution on war and the International, of the undesirability and horror of war.

The principal subject of discussion was: Our Party, the War, and the International. The official speaker, Otto Lang of Zurich, said:

It is senseless to raise the question who is the aggressor in this war-we hold now, as before, by the declarations of the International. The war is a violent quarrel of capitalist imperialism; therefore, we do not understand the conduct of the German labor press, which appears to us in many things both partisan and short-sighted. Undoubtedly the argument about the Czarism is the strongest of all, but Germans should not forget that Russia will remain the enemy of all of us after the war, the same as before, even if it is conquered! And Russia will lose more by the victory of the Allies than by that of Germany.

This war is at no point a question of civilization or freedom, but only of the profit of capitalists; the end of the war will be a strengthening of militarism. . . . Nowhere are we a single people. Not even in Switzerland, not even here. For we are a number of classes among whom the conflict of interests cannot be bridged. Therefore we do not understand the frequently Chauvinistic attitude of the German Party press, we do not understand why it pictures the dum-dum bullets, but does not picture the soldiers torn to pieces by bombs. Therefore we do not understand the position of the Wahre Jakob and of the Simplicissimus. We know the frightful situation in which they find themselves, which partially excuses them. So we will not be unamiable towards our German brothers, but will appeal out of a full heart to their proletarian and Socialistic feeling. We will hope that the comrades coming back from the war will make great demands upon life, we confidently trust in the German