Background: This pamphlet was originally published early in 1931 and was intended for members of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD). It presents ordinary communists as well-meaning and honest workers who have been deceived by corrupt Jewish leaders and betrayed by Stalin, who the pamphlet says has deserted communist principles and returned to a capitalism even worse than that found in Germany. It is one of a series of pamphlets from the period I am translating as examples of the ways the Nazis adopted their propaganda to various audiences.
The source: Heinz Franke, Der Schwindel des Bolschewismus (Munich: Franz Eher, 1932). I’m using the second printing, which got the print total to 100,000.
The Bolshevist Swindle
Broschürenreihe der Reichspropaganda-Leitung der NSDAP, Heft 2
“The proletariat of the Soviet Union controls all important economic positions.”
That is what the program of the Communist Internationale says, adopted at the 6th World Congress in Moscow on 1 September 1928.
And that is what the program on national and social liberation of the German people says, as published by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Germany on 24 August 1930.
With these lying phrases, Communist leaders attempt to lure German workers who are disgusted by the miserable betrayal of the workers by the part of the Socialist bigwigs of the SPD.
Jewish scribblers from the Rote Fahne point to the Soviet Union and paint a glowing picture of the Soviet paradise. Milk and honey flow in Soviet Russia, the “workers’ paradise on earth,” according to Communist leaders. Everyone who has a human face enjoys absolute freedom.
Jewish puppeteers in the KPD attempt to win over the masses by lying promises of total equality, social improvement, and the betterment of the individual’s condition. By putting promises of economic and social advantage of every sort in the foreground, they simultaneously attempt to divert the German worker from Bolshevism’s true goal, a
that will destroy the peoples.
The ultimate goal of communist Jews is not realizing genuine socialism, but rather world revolution. In the program of the Communist Internationale mentioned above, it says that the program is
Well, how are things in Russia, the much-praised Soviet paradise? What is the social condition of workers in this land ruled absolutely by communism?
The Communist dictator Stalin gave clear information in his speech of 23 June 1931.
Here are the most important points of his speech literally translated from the 5 July issue of Pravda, the official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Russia.
That is a betrayal of the fundamental principle of communism, which even today asserts
absolute equality for everyone.
It is significant that Stalin bases this departure from the communist ideal not on the general inequality of human beings, but rather from a purely capitalist perspective.
Russian workers are in a catastrophic economic situation. The working masses flee factories in droves to find new jobs in the hopes of bettering their miserable situation. To an unprecedented degree, constant job shifting is part of life in the “Soviet paradise.” Stalin himself estimates that 40% change jobs each quarter.
Why this enormous job turnover?
Because in Soviet Russia pay is worse than in any “capitalist” country in the world. Stalin himself says it is because of:
the wrong pay schedule.
The skilled worker is paid too badly, which also means that the unskilled worker has no prospect of earning more pay.
The communist dictatorship has not deserted the principles of communism because of the misery, hunger, and poverty of the Russian worker — no, the only reason is the economic viability of factories, the concern for carrying out of the Five Year Plan.
That is Stalin’s betrayal of socialism!
The Red Tsar thinks no more about the good of Russian workers than did the White Tsar. For the one as well as the other, the Russian worker is only a way to build power. The White Tsar Nicholas’s desire was Pan-Slavism, uniting all the Slav peoples. For the Red Tsar Stalin, the goal is world revolution. World revolution and the resulting world dictatorship, however, have nothing at all to do with socialism or the good of the working class. The idea of world domination is the sick idea of Jewish world domination.
The Five Year Plan for the communist puppeteers is only a step along the way to world domination. The fact that this world domination is not the “dictatorship of the proletariat,” but rather the domination of entirely different powers, is clear from Stalin’s words against
with regards to pay.”
The wretched dishonesty of Stalin’s perspective is clearly seen in the following words:
Stalin thereby contradicts himself. If he says that “the difference will vanish under communism,” but simultaneously calls for restoring this difference that had been abolished, he turns against the idea of communism.
The surrendering of communist principle is further clearly evident in Stalin’s call for an
aristocracy of labor.
In calling for this, Stalin advocates a concept that communism until now has bitterly opposed.
Stalin’s speech continues:
This makes it absolutely clear that the oft-praised model factories in Soviet Russia are
hopelessly in ruins.
According to Stalin’s own words, labor organization is “wretched,” “disorder and complete chaos” prevail, and there is “total carelessness and irresponsibility.”
Stalin has to know best!
The supreme principle here is the success of the Five Year Plan as a step toward world revolution. Stalin, therefore, does not advocate the good of the workers, but rather makes the purely capitalist demand for “modern factory management.”
The “irresponsibility” that Stalin complains about is an inevitable result of Marxism, which as one knows demands the same rights and responsibilities, which means the same irresponsibility, from every one.
In Germany, Thälmann and his comrades loudly call for the five day week. Stalin demands “the end of the five-day week and a return to the six-day week.” That clearly proves the mendacity of the communist Jewish press in Germany that advocates the five-day week.
This is further proof that the communist dictatorship is not interested in socialism, but only the realization of its capitalist plans desire for power.
The economic viability of the factory comes ahead of the interests of the workers. And Stalin makes the interesting admission that the tractor factory in Stalingrad has already secretly returned to the six-day workweek.
Stalin’s words display a complete about face from communism. That is not because he has realized the impracticality of communist slogans, but rather from purely capitalist thinking. Stalin calls for
colleagues “with ambition.”
He demands that they should
“receive leadership posts,”
meaning that they should lead the communists. Stalin further demands that the “old school technical intelligentsia” (the “bourgeois” intelligentsia who have previously been alienated and persecuted) should be put at the top again
That is an admission of the total bankruptcy of communist ideals, in particular the false idea of class struggle and the union of all productive people’s comrades, a principle National Socialism has always maintained. Stalin bases his demand, however, for purely capitalist reasons, for reasons of economic viability. In Germany the Jewish scribblers from the Rote Fahne call every industrialist an “exploiter,” in Russia Stalin wants to put these people “in leadership positions.”
At the same time Stalin openly mocks all those who speak about intervention in Russia. That applies most of all to German communists, who spread fantasies in every meeting, every newspaper, and every leaflet about a war of intervention against Russia.
This proves those communist slogans to be blatant bare-faced lies.
This makes clear Stalin’s purely capitalist way of thinking. There is no sign here of a communism that shouts “Down with capitalism!” and “Down with the exploiters!”
“Capital accumulation!” “Economic viability!” “Reducing unproductive costs!” “Nationalization of operations!”
These are old and familiar capitalist slogans of western managers to whom profit is everything, the well-being of workers nothing.
That is the true face of Bolshevism. Now that it has taken power in Russia it no longer needs to play the role of “worker-friendly” communists. It has thrown off the mask of friendship with workers and now appears as a racially greedy profit-seeking exploiter that thinks of nothing but profit.
Stalin bases his purely capitalist demands on the fact that “manufacturing costs have begun to rise recently in a whole range of factories.” The only reason for Stalin’s reforms is the capitalist drive for the greatest possible economic viability. Stalin says not a word about the workers and their miserable conditions. The course of the Soviet republic is determined not by the welfare of Russian workers, but rather by capitalist lust for profit. “Capital accumulation” is the newest communist slogan. That is why Stalin demands “the mobilization of ways to build capital,” “adoption of sound accounting,” and “systematic cost reduction.”
This last slogan is familiar enough.
What does “reduction in costs” mean?
Under current conditions in Russian industry, reducing costs means
At an earlier speech to the Party Congress of the Communist Party of Russia, Stalin said that the Soviet state took a third of the entire income of the working population for its purposes in 1931. Any worker can figure out for himself what a further reduction in pay for the purpose of increasing economic viability means.
In conclusion Stalin said:
Stalin’s conclusion openly reveals the
of communism’s leadership of Russian industry. The unbelievable conditions in Soviet factories are not the result of inadequate abilities of Russian workers, but rather —as Stalin openly says — because
of the incompetent system of communist leadership.
The communist system of economic management has existed Soviet Russia for 14 years. Stalin has finally come to the realization that this communist system is entirely inadequate.
The Red tsar comes to this realization not because he is concerned with the welfare of workers, but rather from purely capitalist ways of thinking. The decisive factor in Soviet Russia is the economic viability of the factory, or as the communists prefer to say, the exploiter’s lust for profits.
Stalin does not even hold back from discarding the most holy communist ideal, collectivism, in his capitalist reforms. He demands the end of “collective administration.” The Red dictator denies everything that the communists have previously held out to the betrayed masses as Bolshevism’s successes.
Soviet Russia has discarded the mask of friendship with the workers and now reveals with brutal nakedness the crassest, most ruthless Soviet capitalism.
The latest slogan of mendacious Bolshevism is now:
“Down with collectivism!”
That means economic dictatorship, or in the Bolshevist-capitalist sense the dictatorship of the economy over the workers. That is Bolshevist forced labor.
The idea that a single person must have leadership responsibility also comes from National Socialism, although Stalin reaches this realization not by recognizing the leadership principle that is anchored in National Socialism. He also does not apply it to communist state leadership in every area, but rather only to leaders in industry who are to have dictatorial power over the workers. Here, too, Stalin is interested only in a purely economic perspective Costs should be reduced and economic viability increased. That means: reducing pay to that the lust for profit of Russian exploiters can be satisfied.
Soviet capitalism triumphs over the Russian worker!
Stalin clearly shows his capitalistic approach when he contemptuously tosses aside the workers who are part of collective administration in factories, saying that they only “sit around writing documents and talking”! He cynically demands that these workers “be sent back to the concerns and factories” and mockingly adds that “that would be far better for them.”
That is the most insolent possible contempt for Russian workers. Stalin thereby proves that he was never a real leader of workers. The capitalist lust for profit is more important to him that the good of workers. No American capitalist would dare to say what the Red tsar cold-bloodedly announces: “Down with the worker!”
It is very interesting to compare Stalin’s “reforms” with the demands Lenin made in April 1918, and which were adopted on 29 April 1918 by resolution of the All Russian Central Committee of Worker, Soldier, Peasant, and Cossack Deputies.
Lenin demanded in his report “On the Next Tasks of Soviet Power” everything that the big capitalist Stalin is eliminating today.
Lenin and the Bourgeoisie
Lenin first of all noted that the bourgeoisie in Russia had been defeated, but not yet pulled up by the roots, not destroyed, or even finally defeated. As the next task Lenin demanded:
The task Lenin sets here has failed utterly. The Soviets have not succeeded in creating “conditions under which the bourgeoisie cannot exist.” This fiasco in meeting Lenin’s communist task is absolutely clear in Stalin’s demand to bring the bourgeoisie back into “leadership positions.” Lenin, however, said that socialism was impossible without solving this problem. This is yet further proof that socialism does not rule in Russia, that the goal has not been achieved.
Stalin’s advocacy of the bourgeoisie, which Lenin so firmly fought, results from a purely capitalist way of thinking. Concern about "economic viability” had led the Soviets to drop their hypocritical slogans about the socialism they never achieved.
Lenin and Equal Pay
Lenin did say in the above report that Soviet power must use one bourgeois method and pay bourgeois experts well.
Lenin, however, said that this could only be a transitional measure and added:
Stalin has now set aside Lenin’s call for absolute equality in pay. And — something we always have to repeat — for purely capitalist reasons of “economic viability.” Lenin saw higher pay for experts only as a compromise that should be eliminated as soon as possible. He said:
Lenin said that in April 1918. Today, 13 years afterwards the “advance guard,” i.e., the shock troops of Soviet exploiters, have still not finished with organization, labor discipline, etc. Stalin orders that the bourgeois intelligentsia “be given more attention,” that they be “treated well,” that “their work must be made attractive for them.”
If one compares these new directives from Stalin with Lenin’s promises from 1918 one clearly sees the Bolshevist fiasco all across the field.
In 1918 Lenin demanded: “Organization, ‘strong’ labor discipline, unity.”
In 1931 Stalin admits: “The organization of labor is wretched. Disorder and complete chaos prevail.”
That is a declaration of bankruptcy for communist ideology.
Lenin and the Control of Factories
Lenin viewed direction and control in factories by communists as the most important part of Soviet power. He said:
Lenin demanded that in April 1918.
In June 1931, 13 years later, Stalin said that it was necessary to reduce the size of major industrial organizations and eliminate collective administration in these factories. Administrative control should be transferred to a single person. Stalin is curtly abolishing control of factories — because it is not economically viable. The humanitarian Stalin is sending the previous communist managers back down to the factories.
Away with such troublesome supervision that could stand in the way of the exploitive ideas of the Red tsars. Thus administrative control will be transferred to individuals who will naturally be Stalin’s willing puppets.
Meanwhile, the dumb Russian worker works day and night, believing that the Five Year Plan will be accomplished and will bring him the promised mountain of gold.
Lenin and Exploitation
The harshest form of the capitalist system exists in Soviet Russia — the American Taylor System. Communists everywhere vehemently attack the Taylor System as the worst form of exploitation. Lenin himself called Taylor’s system “the most terrible form of bourgeois exploitation.”
Lenin described this terrible form of exploitation in this way:
According to a resolution of the All-Russian Central Committee of Worker, Soldiers, Peasant and Cossack Deputies of 29 April 1918:
The Taylor System uses a stopwatch. The KPD has raged against stopwatch measures on the part of the German railway system. The Rote Fahne wrote on 20 October 1931:
Soviet capitalism in Russia, however, uses this system that Lenin called “the most terrible form of bourgeois exploitation,” the Taylor System.
The Taylor System is based on the idea of maximum productivity. The maximum is the norm. Maximum productivity is that of the best workers in the best time (the shortest time). Encouragement for high productivity is provided by piecework pay and bonuses. The communist press in other countries calls piecework “murderous pay.” That, however, does not prevent the Bolshevists from using in the Soviet paradise what they call a method of exploitation.
Perhaps a worker will believe that a method of capitalist exploitation ceases to be exploitation only because it is used by the Soviet state.
Exploitation is exploitation! Nowhere is exploitation more shamelessly practiced than in the Soviet Union.
Advance guards, shock troops, drive workers to feverish labor.
Stalin needs money, money, and still more money. He needs money to implement the Bolshevist idea of transforming agricultural Russia into an industrial state; there is, after all, still too little industry in the world.
There is nothing left over for social purposes. The public kitchens in which workers eat are in an unbelievable condition, as the following report proves:
“Moscow ( via Kowno), 21 August
That is the real state of things in the much-praised Soviet paradise.
Hunger, poverty, and misery prevail instead of the promised socialism.
Woe to him, however, who dares to say anything against Soviet capitalism and Stalin, who betrays workers.
Banishment and death threaten him, Siberia and the Cheka!
A report from the head steward (head waiter) of an English steamer tells us what happens to the unfortunates who dare to rebel against the capitalist methods of exploitation used in “socialist” Russia:
In Germany, however, Thälmann promises: “Our class struggle means a better future. The victory of Soviet Germany will guarantee work, land, food, and freedom for all workers!”
“Where?” asks the German worker. “In Bolshevist forced labor camps,” answer hundreds of thousands of those condemned to die.
Despite terror, despite forced labor, despite the lash and Siberia, terrible conditions prevail in Soviet factories, which recently even the Soviet press had to admit.
One recently heard of scandalous conditions at the new tractor factory in the Volga city of Stalingrad (formerly Zarizyn), one of the most important regions for the Soviet economy. The huge factory was built by Americans last year and equipped exclusively with American machinery. It was the pride and joy of the Five Year Plan and was to produce at least 25,000 tractors in the first half of 1931, with production increasing each month.
In reality, in March, for example, it produced only 419 tractors instead of the 3500 planned, and they at “the unbelievable production cost of 4000 rubles.” Only 22 tractors were produced during the first part of April!
Over 70% of the several thousand workers have worked for less than a year in their specialty, not to mention the fact that they constantly change jobs. The result is countless accidents, because of which hundreds of machines are out of production for days or weeks. According to Pravda on 18 April, within four months there were 2788 machine breakdowns that were the result of technical ignorance. “American machines fail, too, if they are not used properly,” writes the official Soviet newspaper. “900 accidents a month, that is response of the machines to wrong usage...”
Production costs are rising every month in the metallurgy and cutting departments in the factory. In the ironworks, waste production has reached 90%. There is, by the way, also a shortage of metal. Chaotic conditions in the “biggest factory in the world,” as the Bolshevists call it, are so bad that in March management had no idea how many workers were employed by the concern.
The Pravda regretfully reported that the American workers who were there to train workers once they had put the machinery together were not used. In fact, since their contracts are finished they are returning to the United States without having given their Russian colleagues the minimum level of necessary training.
“Because of our carelessness and attitude toward labor, we cannot dream of an American pace” — that was the ironic comment from Pravda about the miserable failure of the “most promising part” of the Five Year Plan.
Communism in Soviet Russia has absolutely failed!
Your leaders who have told you about the wonderful conditions in the Soviet paradise hare revealed by Stalin’s speech to be miserable liars.
Stalin himself must admit that
“the organization of labor is wretched”
“disorder and total chaos”
Stalin himself, not the enemies of Bolshevism, say that that workers in the Soviet paradise suffer
poverty and misery
to an enormous degree.
Stalin himself is turning away from communism, he is abolishing the five day week that your communist functionaries have praised for years as the
greatest communist achievement.
Even more, Stalin is now turning back to the
that he wants to bring back to
For years your functionaries have been sending you into the streets with the slogan “Down with the bourgeoisie!” and “Fight capitalism!”, yet today the supreme communist leader is for the bourgeoisie and for capitalism.
The only thing that is important to him is
That is Soviet capitalism!
“Capital accumulation” — “Economic management” — “Reduction of nonproductive costs” — “Nationalization of operations” — “Systematic reduction in production costs” — These are the newest Soviet slogans!
To implement these capitalist principles Stalin wants to “eliminate collective management” and introduce “individual leadership.”
It is almost a slap in the face of every honest communist when Stalin demands:
“Down with the worker!”
This is the most brutal lust for profit, the most miserable money-grubbing, that recognizes only “economic viability” as the supreme law.
The hypocritical mask of friendship with the workers conceals the devilish hat of profit-hungry capitalism.
The fundamental principle in Soviet Russia is not the good of the workers, but rather the unrestrained rule of Soviet capitalism. It is a capitalism that puts all previous forms of capitalist exploitation in the shadows. It dictates forced labor, and uses the death penalty and banishment against any attempt at a strike by exploited workers. For the worker, Soviet capitalism is hell on earth.
Send to the Devil those swindlers who want to tell you about the Soviet paradise. Jewish scribblers for communist agitation newspapers only want to misuse the poverty of exploited workers for their own greedy purposes. If they gain power, just like Stalin they will throw off the mask of friendship with workers and introduce the most brutal form of capitalism, Soviet capitalism, to Germany.
Soviet capitalism is forced labor. Shut up and keep working is the slogan of these Red exploiters. Every attempt to strike by the betrayed masses will drown in blood.
Is that what you want? Do you want the most brutal Soviet capitalism, the system of forced labor, to victory in Germany?
Or do you want jobs and prosperity in a free Germany?
You belong in the
National Socialist German Workers’ Party!
The National Socialist slogan is:
“The common good before the individual good!”
The right to live of each individual German worker is a thousand times as important to us as the lust for profit of any sort of capitalist. Down with the lust for profit and Stalin, the swindler of workers!
We do not want “economic viability,” but rather
jobs and prosperity
for each German people’s comrade. That is the supreme National Socialist law. Over against Stalin’s capitalist tendencies, we demand
from a united front of blue and white collar workers in a National Socialist corporate state.
We do not want the capitalist exploiter Stalin’s slogan
“Down with the worker!”
but rather a system in which each worker can rise to the highest position his abilities allow.
The life interests of the German people can be realized only in a
that is today represented by the National Socialist German Workers’ Party under its Führer Adolf Hitler.
Therefore, join the front of the German workers’ movement. Fight with us for a true German socialism!
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