My Life

My Life - Oswald Mosleythat at some point the past should be buried. In The Alternative (1947) I wrote:'Revenge will follow vengeance until some generation is found great enough todisrupt the circle of fatality, and to break "the bondage of the gods" '.The clash with some Jewish interests on the specific question of the coming warcomplicated the work of our movement in several ways and gave me much trouble. Itwas not only that we were up against some powerful elements in the world of financeand industry, as well as skilfully led meeting and street attacks, but this situationtended to attract to our party a minority of members who were simply a nuisance. Ittook some time and trouble to get rid of them; some of them were even around for abrief period after the war. If you are in a fight for a clear reason—a temporary fightwhich will end with the cause of it—you tend to be joined or supported by peoplewho hate your opponent for quite different, permanent reasons of their own, and willdo anything which they can to challenge him. In this case they were the men whowanted to get into any fight with a Jew whatever the reason; the hard core of hardboiledanti-semites, to whom our struggle to avert the war presented an opportunity toget into an altogether larger affair, a bigger and better fight.In general principle I make no apology for having accepted the support of some suchmen in a struggle Jews began. If Britain for war purposes could later accept alliancewith Soviet Russia—after all its crimes—it would have been folly for me to refuse thesupport of fellow-countrymen who in normal times would differ from me in policyand character. Certainly foolish, abusive and violent things were said and written onboth sides when tempers were up in a bitter controversy. Party journals were in otherhands, because I was often absent from London, and I do not accept responsibilitywithout effective authority. Nevertheless, it will be found that I soon eliminated thesemen from the party, if after due warning they persisted in attitudes and utterancescontrary to party policy.These are the people who believe in a world conspiracy run by the Jews, whichalways seems to me the most complete nonsense. The basic reason for my disbelief inany such possibility is simply that from long experience I know men are not nearlyclever or determined enough to organise anything of the kind. Anyone who knowshow difficult it is to keep a secret among three men— particularly if they aremarried—knows how absurd is the idea of a world-wide secret conspiracyconsciously controlling all mankind by its financial power; in real, clear analysis thesedeep plots are seldom anything more sinister than the usual vast muddle.A man of some ability joined our party after the war who was possessed of this beliefin extreme degree and in a very rationalised form; I was soon rid of him. During hisbrief sojourn among us, he encountered a young Italian, a man in the mid-thirties, oflucid and powerful intellect, who happened to be staying with me in London, and likemost Italians had no feeling about Jews one way or the other and little experience ofthem. After their discussion, the Italian said to me with a logic at once simple andconclusive: 'If the Jews were as clever as that, they would be gods; and men are notgods'. Yet I have known men, honest but stupid, who really believed that all-powerfulJews possess the world and that any opposition to their desires on any point ishopeless; immediately after the war the instinct of these cases was to find the nearestrabbit-hole and to hide in it, which is the logic of their nonsense.James de Rothschild once put to me a view of the opposite extreme. I first met him in285 of 424