Page 108 - Berkshire Encyclopedia Of World History Vol I - Abraham to Coal

tfw-48 berkshire encyclopedia of world history

Extract from All Quiet on

the Western Front

Since its publication in 1929, All Quiet on the
Western Front has remained a classic novel about conquest. Fascism also took hold in Italy, the birthplace
the personal anguish of soldiers in war. German of fascism’s founder, Benito Mussolini (1883–1945), as
writer Erich Maria Remarque (1898–1970) well as in Spain, Brazil, and elsewhere. Fascism and
based the novel on his own experiences as a sol- socialism both reflected a deep disillusionment with the
dier during World War I. Below is one of the most liberal capitalist ideologies of the late nineteenth century,
profound quotes from the book. but whereas fascists anticipated an era of national and
racial conflict, in which the fittest and most powerful
But now, for the first time, I see you are a man
would triumph, revolutionary socialists framed the con-
like me. I thought of your hand-grenades, of
flict in terms of class war that would pit capitalism
your bayonet, of your rifle; now I see your wife
against socialism.
and your face and our fellowship. Forgive me,
The appearance in Russia of a Marxist-inspired state
comrade.We always see it too late.Why do they
determined to overthrow capitalism was another appar-
never tell us that you are poor devils like us, that
ent sign of the breakdown of nineteenth-century capital-
your mothers are just as anxious as ours, and that
ism. Russia’s czarist government had encouraged indus-
we have the same fear of death, and the same
trial growth but had failed (unlike the Meiji government
dying and the same agony—Forgive me, com-
in Japan) to incorporate within its ruling structures the
rade; how could you be my enemy?
entrepreneurs who would be needed to make a success of
Source: Remarque, E. M. (1929). All Quiet on the Western Front (A. W. Wheen, industrialization. Eventually the rapid growth of an urban
Trans., p. 223). New York. Fawcett Crest.
proletariat (working class) and the impoverishment of
increasing numbers of peasants generated a social crisis
even more powerfully the appalling scale and destruc- that, when combined with military defeat during the
tiveness of industrialized warfare, and it was the first truly Russo-Japanese War and the huge costs of participation
global war of the modern era. in World War I, led to the collapse of the Russian impe-
rial state.Traditional elites reacted too passively to the cri-
Global Upheaval sis, which allowed the Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin
A punitive peace treaty negotiated in Versailles, France, (1870–1924), to seize power and hold on to it during a
and the failure of the newly created League of Nations brutal civil war (1918–1920).
ensured that the rivalries that had caused World War I The Bolsheviks were radical Marxists, committed to
did not go away. In 1929 the international trading and the overthrow of world capitalism and its replacement by
banking system finally collapsed, leading to a depression a society in which productive resources such as the land,
that affected all the major capitalist powers, as well as banks, and all large enterprises would be owned collec-
the Asian, Latin American, and African countries that tively. Under Lenin’s successor, Joseph Stalin (1879–
supplied them with raw materials.The Great Depression 1953), the Soviet government took decisive and brutal
seemed to confirm the socialist prediction that the cap- steps to build up a noncapitalist industrial society capa-
italist system would eventually break down. Many gov- ble of challenging the might of its capitalist rivals. Em-
ernments retreated even further into autarchy (national ploying methods of state management pioneered during
economic self-sufficiency and independence) as they saw World War I, the Soviet government began to manage
themselves competing for a dwindling share of world re- and coordinate the entire Soviet economy, leaving no
sources and markets. significant role to market forces.To manage rapid indus-
In 1933 in Germany a fascist government emerged led trialization and rearmament, the Soviet government cre-
by Adolf Hitler (1889–1945). Hitler was determined to ated a huge, powerful, and coercive state apparatus,
reverse the losses of World War I, if necessary through willing and capable of acting with extreme brutality