Propitious Propinquity

Both the Communists and the Nationalists (Monarchists) have a common enemy--the Socialists. It has been common knowledge for years that the two parties were slowly drifting together. Nevertheless all Berlin was startled to read in Die Rote Fahne, Communist daily, articles from Karl Radek, Soviet Government's able propagandist, and Count von Reventlow, apostle of the ex-All Highest.

The alarm felt, particularly in Socialist circles, was undoubtedly accentuated by memories of the Spartacan Rebellion of 1919 and the Kapp Putsch of 1920, the one Communist, the other Monarchist. With both parties stronger than ever they have been since the War, their proposed temporary fusion is indeed food for serious thought.

Karl Radek, "after Lenin the ablest head among the Russian Rulers," said that the German bourgeoisie has lost its second war and that it will capitulate rather than precipitate the further fall of the mark and an uprising of the proletariat.

Radek then went on to say that there really is little difference between the Communist and Nationalist program. He also printed out that the Bolshevik coup d'etat was effected with 70,000 men, whereas the strength of the Communist party is more than 300,000.

Radek concluded: "A million members of the Communist Party in Germany must be the objective reached in the immediate future. The time for a general attack is not yet here, but it is ripening. . . .The strategic task of German Communism, therefore, is to further the ripening of revolution through organization work."

Count von Reventlow, naval officer and noted exponent of ruthless submarine attacks during the War, recalled with regret the failure of German and Bolshevik arms to join forces against Poland in 1920. He complained of "the ruthless opposition of the Communists against the Nationalists," a fact which precluded the possibility of an alliance. He discussed in an approving vein a plan that Nationalist and Communists should march together "for a part of their way." After the defeat of the "common opponent" they--the Communists and the Nationalists--will be able to settle their differences.

Whatever the real significance of the mooted Bolshevik-Royalist party, it cannot be denied that when a paper like Die Rote Fahne offers and Count Reventlow accepts the hospitality of its columns, there is an a priori case for something rotten in the German state.