Viewing page 25 of 35

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

46
must show that only this step made possible the tremendous economic and cutural development of the numerous nationalities once held in slavery by Czarism.

Japanese Imperialism as "Champion of the Darker Races"

Perhaps the most dangerous of all of these petty-bourgeois nationalist movements is the so-called Pacific Movement of the Eastern World, with its slogan of "United Front of Darker Races Under Leadership of Japan". Japan is here presented as the "champion of the Dark Races" against the white imperialist nations. This movement is developing directly in connection with the growing threat of war between Japanese and American imperialisms. Thus, in the last period we witnessed the rapid spread of this movement among Negroes and the development of mass organization in a number of cities-Chicago, St. Louis, Detroit, Kansas City, Cincinnati, etc.,-and the spread of the propaganda of this movement to all centers. This movement represents an attempt on the part of Japanese imperialism in alliance with certain sections of the Negro petty-bourgeois intellectuals for the purpose of exploiting the growing national liberation movement among the Negroes and to divert it into counter-revolutionary channels of support of Japanese imperialism, not only against its American imperialist rival, but also in support of its counter-revolutionary plans for intervention in the Soviet Union.

It is not at all surprising that Japan in preparation for the approaching struggle with American imperialism for the domination of the Pacific would seek to use the Negro question in the U.S.A. in the interest of strengthening its own position. During the World War, in his article "The Irish Uprising", in which he polemized against Comrade Radek on the appraisal of the Irish rebellion, Comrade Lenin said:

47
"All the general army headquarters are making strenuous efforts during the present war to utilize each and every kind of national and revolutionary movement in the camp of their enemies: Germans-the Irish rebellion, the French-the Czech movement, etc. And the act correctly from their own point of view. You cannot take seriously the very serious problem of war without utilizing even the smallest weakness of your adversary...."

We cannot doubt that Japanese imperialism is acting precisely on this basis in regard to the Negro question in the United States. It could not be expected that the Japanese militarist would be so foolish as to overlook the national liberation movement of twelve million Negroes and its potentialities for weakening American imperialism in case of war.
It is clear, however, that this "Pacific Movement of the Eastern World" is hostile to the interest of the Negro masses and the revolutionary movement in general.

I. Its program of race unity as against working class unity and the unity of toilers of all races against imperialism, fosters a sort of "darker race chauvinism", which is but the reverse side of white chauvinist race theories. It there-fore tends to strengthen petty-bourgeois nationalism. In this manner, it fosters divisions in the ranks of the Negro and white working class, hinders working class unity, and hence weakens the struggle against American imperialist oppression of the Negro people. Thus, the slogan of "united front of the darker races under the leadership of Japan" while supposedly directed against American imperialism, objectively strengthens American imperialism in its oppression of the Negro people. The utilization of this movement also as an active agent of American capitalist reaction against the liberation struggles of the Negro peoples, can be confirmed by the experiences of many local comrades here, who have found this movement an obstacle in the organization of struggles for the immediate demands of the Negro masses.

An outstanding example is St. Louis, where the petty-bourgeois

Transcription Notes:
Fixed many typos and removed all the unneeded hyphens showing word breaks, also "page" indicators that aren't needed. "bourgeois" is completed on this page.