My Life

My Life - Oswald MosleyThe opponents of communism have a further strength in that their policies can beopenly declared, because in due season of proved facts they are acceptable toEuropean society, while the objectives of communism are not. This is the basis of mybelief that in the end we can only do great things in the great way of declaring thetruth, and that government by small tricks fails in great periods; it will then succumbto the larger and more practised villainies of communism. Meanwhile, let us notdelude ourselves that communism has changed, or will easily change, its character. Itwas a long march from Siberia to the Kremlin, and it is an insult to communistleaders—with whom I am confident we can at least work out a system of competitiveco-existence—to suggest they will sell the birthright won by that sacrifice for a messof pottage prepared by corruption.The great weakness of communism in the West is that it is obviously a partycontrolled and directed from abroad, and subject to influences which in some respectsare Asiatic rather than European. We, on the other hand, were to any close observerclearly in whole essence and character a British movement, and it was this qualitywhich attracted to us some genuine but patriotic revolutionaries who had previouslybeen drawn to communism. We always felt ourselves European as well as British, butwe have seen that our relationship with fascist movements in foreign countries wastoo slight to keep the peace rather than strong enough to jeopardise our own country;the truth was once again the opposite of imputation. We need lose no time indiscussing the suggestion that we were in some mysterious way responsible for theatrocities committed in German concentration camps at the very time we ourselveswere held in prisons or British concentration camps; this idea is confined to themoronic substratum of politics.Our British movement achieved so much in face of steadily declining unemploymentfigures that it cannot be doubted we should have won in Britain if the crisis haddeepened. Such conditions would have arisen when the effect of Roosevelt's doublingof the price of gold was exhausted, and unemployment began to rise in 1938, but forthe hectic rearmament boom, followed by a world war. This was certainly the opinionof men well placed to answer this question. For instance, a leading journalist of theLeft, Hannen Swaffer, wrote in World Press News on August 5, 1943, under theheading 'Saved by the War', that it was 'left to the war and 18B' (imprisonmentwithout trial) 'to deal effectively with Mosley and his movement,' and concluded: 'Yes,but for the war we might today have been a Fascist country'.The question remains, how in face of declining unemployment and improvingeconomic conditions, we nevertheless made progress which appeared so spectacular.The evidence of membership figures I cannot disclose, for it was our rule never topublish them. It seemed to me that fluctuations were inevitable, and in a struggle ofsuch intensity it would be an error to notify the opponent either of weakness or ofstrength; in real politics as in war it is better to keep him guessing. The overt evidenceof progress between 1934 and 1939 is sufficiently shown in the difference betweenthe Olympia and Earls Court meetings. This visual evidence controverted theassertion that we declined after the Public Order Act in 1936, for this was clearly notthe case. At that time we were no doubt strengthened by the temporary decline in theeconomic situation reflected in the unemployment figures of 1938, but after thatopposition to the war became the main issue and thrust even economics into thebackground. The rise of our movement continued throughout the full seven years until259 of 424