Page:Imperialism (Lenin).djvu/147

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IMPERIALISM
139

products of the combines, etc. To make a simple comparison between colonies and non-colonies, one imperialism and another imperialism, one semi-colony or colony (Egypt) and all other countries is to obscure the very basis of the question.

Kautsky's theoretical critique of imperialism has nothing in common with Marxism and serves no other purpose than as a preamble to propaganda for peace and unity with the opportunists and the jingo Socialists, just because this critique avoids and obscures precisely the most profound and essential inherent contradictions of imperialism: the contradiction of monopolies existing side by side with free competition; the contradiction between the immense "operations" (and immense profits) of finance-capital and "honest" trade on the open market; the contradiction between combines and trusts on the one hand and non-trusted production on the other, etc.

We have seen previously that the notorious theory of "ultra-imperialism," born of Kautsky's imagination, bears quite as much a backward character.

Indeed, it is quite enough to compare facts which are well-known and indisputable, to become convinced of the entire falsity of the prospects which Kautsky presents to the German workers and the workers of all lands. Let us consider India, Indo-China and China. It is known that these three colonial and semi-colonial countries, inhabited by six to seven hundred million human beings, are subjected to the exploitation of the finance-capital of several imperialist States: Britain, France, Japan, the U.S.A., etc.

Admitting that these imperialist countries form alliances amongst and against one another in order