News in Review
Japan, tough competitor
The products of Japanese industry have always been strong competitors in the markets of the world.
In many cases, they have beaten British goods by sheer superiority in delivery, price and quality. Because many British workers regard the Japanese as inferior people, their economic victories have always been difficult to explain away. The solution to this was to popularise three stories, all of them designed to illustrate that the Japanese were treacherous little Oriental monkeys. This impression stirred up a lot of feelings which were successfully exploited after Pearl Harbour.
Briefly, the stories were: That all Japanese worker also gets a lot of what a time when British miners were continuously fighting against enforced cuts in their pay); That the Japanese were incapable of giving birth to an original idea and made up for this by simply pirating the designs of other countries (as if this was confined to the industries of only one country—international patents actions are going on all the time); That Japan was a country where only light industry could flourish—the heavier stuff had to be left to the sturdy Europeans (unemployed shipyard and steel mill workers could be excused for not appreciating the force of this point).
If there was ever any truth in these stories, there is very little in them today. Wages in Japan now compare with those in most other industrial countries; the Japanese worker also gets a lot of what are called fringe benefits—cheap housing, holidays, food and so on.
Japanese products are now becoming known for the originality of their design. They pioneered the mass production of the portable transistor radio (blast them). The Honda motor cycle now commands sixty per cent of the United States market. They have recently introduced a new car—the Daihatsu Compagno Berlina—to the British market which is notable for the number of “extras” (fog lamps, stainless steel bumpers, etc.) it has, all included in the near competitive price.
Other countries, in fact, are now stealing Japanese ideas. The plague of transistor radios is now being fed by British products. A Dutch shipbuilding firm has defied the patent on a Japanese-designed liner bow and American and West German firms have recently bought a new steel-making process from Japan.
Finally, Japanese heavy industry is booming ahead. This year, the steel industry there expects to produce thirty-nine million tons of crude steel (in 1949 production was nil—the British industry’s capacity of crude steel for 1965 was estimated in the recent White Paper at about thirty million tons.) Japanese shipyards expect to lay down the keels of two and a half million tons of shipping in 1965.
All of this means that, even after the pre-war methods have been discarded, Japan remains a strong rival in the world of capitalism. Indeed, under a powerful central control from the government, she is probably now a tougher proposition than ever.
In this process, several favourite myths have been laid low. This is not to say that, if at some time in the future Japan once more becomes involved in an international dispute, other myths, equally false, will not be concocted to explain away the immovable fact that the nations of capitalism are perpetually in dispute over the division of the spoils of exploitation.
For Queen and country
It would be better for everyone, including the young people themselves, if the antics of university students were not taken so seriously.
Universities are often among the most active units of what Peter Simple calls the Protest Industry. But when the undergraduates leave their youth behind them they usually forget the restless days of protest and fall into line with capitalism’s requirements of docility.
This is the background to the recent Queen and Country debate at the Oxford Union, which aroused such a lot of criticism, most of it based on the incorrect assumption that the motion was going to be carried.
It would be interesting to know what all those indignant letter-writers think about the Oxford students, now that they have signified that they will fight for Queen and Country.
In any case, the indignation was always misplaced. It is not uncommon for university unions to debate—and sometimes to pass—motions which sound very daring. In 1914, the Oxford Union voted against Britain being a member of the Triple Entente; in 1927 the Cambridge Union was in favour of pacifism; a few years later Oxford said that they preferred the Red Flag to the Union Jack.
And, of course, in 1933 Oxford decided that in no circumstances would they fight for King and Country.
Well, what happened? Among the supporters of that famous decision were at least two members of the present government whose present policy, as we all know, is to persuade other people to fight for Queen and Country in Malaysia, Arabia and other points East of Suez. These two are Anthony Greenwood and Michael Stewart.
It is difficult to trace what happened to most of the other 275 young people who voted for the motion. According to the proposer of this year’s motion, in 1939 they were “first in the fight against fascism.”
In other words, they did fight for King and Country after all, although perhaps under the deception that it was for some other, more worthy, motive. Apparently, they did not expect the British ruling class to try to mislead anyone about the causes of the Second World War.
In the event, the rebellious students of 1933 were as easy to deceive as any mental clodhopper who had never got within sight of the dreaming spires.
It is said that many statesmen—Hitler, Joseph Kennedy—accepted the 1933 motion as proof that the British working class would not fight in another war. If this is true, it only goes to show how badly capitalist politicians can misjudge a situation.
The 1965 debate, then, should not be given undue significance. Perhaps it was a publicity stunt, aimed at needling exactly the sort of people whose hostility was provoked. There is no reason to suppose that, if a war came, the rebellious students will not once again consign their university days to an embarrassed memory, and go dutifully out to fight for the interests of British capitalism. (Perhaps it will be in alliance with Nasser and Nkrumah, as Sir Richard Acland, who supported the motion, would like.)
Whatever the Queen and Country debate may suggest, of one thing it is innocent. It had no hint of enlightenment about the cause of capitalism’s wars, nor of determination to oppose them.
For university students and for the rest of the working class, that enlightenment is in the future.
China in Africa
An unexpected result of nuclear weapons in the hands of great powers, and the precarious Balance of Terror that has resulted, has been to increase rather than decrease the bargaining power of small nations.
Contrary to what might have been expected a decade or so ago, we have witnessed many cheeky acts of defiance by small and industrially backward nations towards great powers, which could probably overrun them in half a day without even using their nuclear weapons.
Attacking embassies and burning flags on the one hand, and nationalising the assets of some vast combine on the other, have become quite common place.
The smaller powers bank on the presumption that any move against them by one block, will bring the others hot foot to their rescue. Not, needless to say, because of any love towards the nation in question, but because they fear that an advantage may be gained by their opponents. While the giants manoeuvre for position, the little fellows nip about between their feet.
This is risky, as there is always a danger of getting trodden on. If the issue is really big enough the great powers will go ahead, and the small country is liable to become a graveyard. But in this jungle of Capitalism all methods must be used to forward the interest of the ruling class. One of the most successful ways of doing this is for a small power to try to milk a large power, or several if possible, for economic aid while committing themselves to as little as possible.
This position has been spotlighted again by the visit of the Chinese Prime Minister Chou En-lai to Africa, and his concentration on small and weak Tanzania. After all China is one of the world’s great powers and Chou En-lai is one of their top politicians. Palmerston or Bismark did not trail around, personally, to out of the way places, but times have changed and the struggle has become much more acute. No advantage, however small, can be passed over and so the visits of Heads of States, all over the place, goes on.
Chou En-lai appears to have had a rather mixed reception, as illustrated by President Kenyatta’s attack. Chou En-lai’s statement, on his last visit that “revolutionary prospects in Africa are excellent,” did not go down very well with the new African leaders.
After all having just pulled off one upheaval, which has put them in the saddle, they are not likely to welcome another, which would probably put them out of it.
German visit
If it is true that history repeats itself, this is only another way of saying that capitalism’s problems are as persistent and repetitive as the ruling classes’ methods of dealing with them.
In 1904 Edward VII paid his famous visit to France, which sealed the alliance known as the Entente Cordiale, bringing to a close a century of enmity between Britain and France.
The visit was hailed as a great step towards peace—some especially wretched commentators actually went so far as to call the lewd and gluttonous King Edward the Peacemaker.
They probably were aware that the Franco-British alliance was made not in the cause of peace but as a shield against a greater and more immediate threat than the two countries offered to each other.
In 1904 the expansive menace of Germany was taking definite shape and the future was unmistakeable to the diplomats and the politicians. So the Entente was sealed, and the King packed off to France to give public, if vulgar, evidence of it.
Since then, there has been fifty years of persistent enmity between the British and German ruling classes. This situation had to end sometime, as the power line-up changed, as new markets were developed, as new weapons came on to the scene, as new threats emerged.
Both Britain and Germany are now united against the threat of Soviet Russia; both countries want to see Russian imperialism in Europe contained.
At the same time, both countries are now at odds with French ambitions, personified so aptly in the massive figure of de Gaulle, to see Europe united against both Russian and American encroachments—but under French domination.
The British ruling class are still wooing the Common Market; Germany is by no means hostile to these advances but once again the obstruction comes from Paris. (Britain is currently investigating the back alleys into Europe; witness Wilson’s recent visit to Vienna, where he pleaded for closer relations between E.E.C. and E.F.T.A.)
Thus the interests of the German and British ruling classes coincide at several important points. In addition, Germany has shown over the past twenty years that the expansionist ambitions of the first half of this century are laid to rest.
However powerful a competitor Germany may be, there is no sign of a resurgence of the explosive nationalism of 1914 and 1939. The time is ripe for another Entente Cordiale to be sealed— this time between Germany and Britain, directed partly against France. Thus history repeats itself, although the principal actors have changed their places.
This was the symbolism of last May’s visit by the Queen to Germany. She was doing there the same sordid job as her great-grandfather did in France in 1904.
Some German newspapers complained that the Queen did not smile enough at the welcoming crowds. Perhaps she was tired, or bored, or fed up with her well-paid job as the figurehead of British capitalism. But any politician could have told her (and for all we know one or two have) that she was making a serious mistake.
Capitalism’s diplomacy demands that no matter how devious the bargaining, how ruthless the treachery, the leading public actors do not give way to any human feelings, but all the time smile, darn you, smile.