Warning to the West

by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

  On our crowded planet there are no longer any “internal affairs.” The Communist leaders say, “Don’t interfere in our internal affairs. Let us strangle our citizens in peace and quiet.” But I tell you: Interfere more and more. Interfere as much as you can. We beg you to come and interfere.

  Understanding my own task in the same way, I have perhaps interfered today in your internal affairs, or at least touched upon them, and I apologize for it.

  I have traveled around the United States and this has been added to my earlier understanding of it—what I have heard from listening to the radio, from talking to men of experience.

  For me and my friends, for people who think the way I do over there, for all ordinary Soviet citizens, America evokes a mixture of admiration and compassion. Admiration for your own tremendous forces which perhaps you don’t even recognize yourselves. You’re a country of the future, a young country, with yet untapped possibilities, enormous territory, great breadth of spirit, generosity, magnanimity. But these qualities—strength, generosity, and magnanimity—are usually combined in a man and even in a whole country with trustfulness. And this has already done you a disservice several times.

  I would like to call upon America to be more careful with its trust to prevent those pundits who are attempting to establish fine degrees of justice and even finer legal shades of equality (some because of their distorted outlook, others because of shortsightedness, still others out of self-interest), to prevent them from using the struggle for peace and for social justice to lead you down a false road. They are trying to weaken you; they are trying to disarm your strong and magnificent country in the face of this fearful threat—one which has never before been seen in the history of the world. Not only in the history of your country, but in the history of the world.

  I call upon you: Ordinary working men of America, represented here by your trade-union movement, do not let yourselves become weak. Do not let yourselves be led in the wrong direction. Let us try to slow down the process of concessions and help the process of liberation!

  May I express our deep appreciation to Alexander Solzhenitsyn for his inspiring address, for the thoughts that he left with us at a time when, God knows, the world needs to think more about human freedom. The world needs to think more about those who are losing their freedom every day.

  America must, in my opinion, shape up to this challenge as the leader of the free world, because if America doesn’t lead the free world, the free world, I’m afraid, has no leader.

  GEORGE MEANY

  Mr. Solzhenitsyn delivered this speech in Washington, D.C., at a dinner which was given in his honor by the AFL-CIO and hosted by George Meany, the union’s president.

  [JULY 9, 1975]

  INTRODUCTION BY LANE KIRKLAND

  A principle of mechanics tells us that, given a long-enough lever, one man can move the entire world. Alexander Solzhenitsyn is a living test of that principle.

  His lever is his pen, extended far beyond his reach by his mind, his talent, his courage, and his unshakable integrity.

  He seeks to move a world that today seems far gone in madness and in cowardice. A world where terror, murder, and oppression are welcomed and are exalted in the glass and marble temples of universal peace and justice that were built by a highly optimistic generation after World War II.

  He stands as a living, monumental reproach to all of those statesmen and leaders who today raise the practice of abstention on basic moral issues to the level of high national policy and who flee from any test of the good will, the graces, and the kindly disposition of the most deadly enemies of mankind.

  His work is not devoted to the advancement of any political doctrine or fashion in political discourse or any passing notion of expediency—but to the most elemental values of human dignity, human justice, and human freedom.

  The AFL-CIO is proud and honored to stand with him in that cause. I am privileged now to introduce Alexander Solzhenitsyn.

  IS IT POSSIBLE or impossible to transmit the experience of those who have suffered to those who have yet to suffer? Can one part of humanity learn from the bitter experience of another or can it not? Is it possible or impossible to warn someone of danger?

  How many witnesses have been sent to the West in the last sixty years? How many waves of immigrants? How many millions of persons? They are all here. You meet them every day. You know who they are: if not by their spiritual disorientation, their grief, their melancholy, then you can distinguish them by their accents or their external appearance. Coming from different countries, without consulting with one another, they have brought out exactly the same experience; they tell you exactly the same thing: they warn you of what is now taking place and, of what has taken place in the past. But the proud skyscrapers stand on, jut into the sky, and say: It will never happen here. This will never come to us. It is not possible here.

  It can happen. It is possible. As a Russian proverb says: “When it happens to you, you’ll know it’s true.”

  But do we really have to wait for the moment when the knife is at our throat? Couldn’t it be possible, ahead of time, to assess soberly the worldwide menace that threatens to swallow the whole world? I was swallowed myself. I have been in the dragon’s belly, in its red-hot innards. It was unable to digest me and threw me up. I have come to you as a witness to what it is like there, in the dragon’s belly.

  It is astonishing that Communism has been writing about itself in the most open way, in black and white, for 125 years, and even more openly, more candidly in the beginning. The Communist Manifesto, for instance, which everyone knows by name, and which almost no one ever takes the trouble to read, contains even more terrible things than what has actually been done. It is perfectly amazing. The whole world can read, everyone is literate, yet somehow no one wants to understand. Humanity acts as if it does not understand what Communism is, as if it does not want to understand, is not capable of understanding.

  I think it is not only a question of the disguises that Communism has assumed in the last decades. It is rather that the essence of Communism is quite beyond the limits of human understanding. It is hard to believe that people could actually plan such things and carry them out. And it is precisely because its essence is beyond comprehension, perhaps, that Communism is so difficult to understand.

  In my last address in Washington I spoke a great deal about the Soviet state system, how it was created and what it is today. But it is perhaps more important to discuss with you the ideology that inspired the system, created it, and still governs it. It is much more important to understand the essence, and above all the legacy, of this ideology which has not changed at all in 125 years. It has not changed since the day it was created.

  That Marxism is not a science is entirely clear to intelligent people in the Soviet Union. One would even feel awkward to refer to it as a science. Leaving aside the exact sciences, such as physics, mathematics, and the natural sciences, even the social sciences can predict an event—when, in what way, and how an event might occur. Communism has never made any such forecasts. It has never said where, when, and precisely what is going to happen. Nothing but declamations. Rhetoric to the effect that the world proletariat will overthrow the world bourgeoisie and the most happy and radiant society will then arise. The fantasies of Marx, Engels, and Lenin break off at this point, not one of them goes any further to describe what this society would be like. They simply said: the most radiant, most happy society. Everything for the sake of man.

  I wouldn’t want to enumerate for you all the unsuccessful predictions of Marxism, but I can give you a few. For example, it was claimed that the conditions of the working class in the West would deteriorate steadily, get more and more unbearable, until the workers would be reduced to total poverty. (If only in our country we could feed and clothe our working class, provide it with everything, and give it as much leisure as you do!)

  Or the famous prediction that Communist revolutions would begin in such advanced industrial c
ountries as England, France, America, Germany. (But it worked out exactly the other way, as you know.) Or the prediction that socialist states would not even exist. As soon as capitalism was overthrown, the state would at once wither away. (Look about you: where can you see states as powerful as in the so-called socialist or Communist countries?) Or the prediction that wars are inherent only to capitalism; as soon as Communism is introduced, all wars will come to an end. (We have also seen enough of this: in Budapest, in Prague, on the Soviet-Chinese border, in the occupation of the Baltic countries, and when Poland was stabbed in the back. We have seen enough of this already, and we will surely see more yet.)

  Communism is as crude an attempt to explain society and the individual as if a surgeon were to perform his delicate operations with a meat ax. All that is subtle in human psychology and in the structure of society (which is even more complex), all of this is reduced to crude economic processes. This whole created being—man-—is reduced to matter. It is characteristic that Communism is so devoid of arguments that it has none to advance against its opponents in our Communist countries. It lacks arguments and hence there is the club, the prison, the concentration camp, and insane asylums with forced confinement.

  Marxism has always opposed freedom. I will quote just a few words from the founding fathers of Communism, Marx and Engels (I quote from the first Soviet edition of 1929): “Reforms are a sign of weakness” (vol. 23, p. 339); “Democracy is more to be feared than monarchy and aristocracy” (vol. 2, p. 369); “Political liberty is a false liberty, worse than the most abject slavery” (vol. 2, p. 394). In their correspondence Marx and Engels frequently stated that terror would be indispensable after achieving power, that “it will be necessary to repeat the year 1793. After achieving power, we’ll be considered monsters, but we couldn’t care less” (vol. 25, p. 187).

  Communism has never concealed the fact that it rejects all absolute concepts of morality. It scoffs at any consideration of “good” and “evil” as indisputable categories. Communism considers morality to be relative, to be a class matter. Depending upon circumstances and the political situation, any act, including murder, even the killing of hundreds of thousands, could be good or could be bad. It all depends upon class ideology. And who defines this ideology? The whole class cannot get together to pass judgment. A handful of people determine what is good and what is bad. But I must say that in this very respect Communism has been most successful. It has infected the whole world with the belief in the relativity of good and evil. Today, many people apart from the Communists are carried away by this idea. Among progressive people, it is considered rather awkward to use seriously such words as “good” and “evil.” Communism has managed to persuade all of us that these concepts are old-fashioned and laughable. But if we are to be deprived of the concepts of good and evil, what will be left? Nothing but the manipulation of one another. We will sink to the status of animals.

  Both the theory and the practice of Communism are completely inhuman for that reason. There is a word very commonly used these days: “anti-Communism.” That is a poor, tasteless locution. It makes it appear as though Communism were something original, fundamental. Therefore, it is taken as the point of departure, and anti-Communism is defined in relation to Communism. I say that this word was poorly selected, that it was put together by people who do not understand etymology. The primary, the eternal concept is humanity, and Communism is anti-humanity. Whoever says “anti-Communism” is saying, in effect, anti-anti-humanity. A poor construction. So we should say: That which is against Communism is for humanity. Not to accept, but to reject this inhuman Communist ideology is simply to be a human being. Such a rejection is more than a political act. It is a protest of our souls against those who would have us forget the concepts of good and evil.

  But what is amazing is that apart from all its writings, Communism has offered a multitude of examples for modern man to see. The tanks have rumbled through Budapest. This is nothing. The tanks roar into Czechoslovakia. This is nothing. No one else would have been forgiven, but Communism can be excused. With some kind of strange deliberation, as though God decided to punish them by taking away their reason, the Communists erected the Berlin Wall. It is indeed a monstrous symbol that demonstrates the true meaning of Communism. For fourteen years people have been machine-gunned there, and not only those who wanted to leave the happy Communist society. Recently some foreign boy from the Western side fell into the Spree River. Some people wanted to pull him out, but the East German border guards opened fire. “No, no, don’t save him.” And so this innocent boy drowned.

  Has the Berlin Wall convinced anyone? No again. It is ignored. It’s there, but it doesn’t affect us: we’ll never have a wall like that, and the tanks from Budapest and Prague won’t come here either. On all the borders of the Communist countries, the European ones at least, you can find electronic devices for killing anyone who goes across. But people say: “That doesn’t threaten us either, we are not afraid of that.” In the Communist countries they have developed a system of forced treatment in insane asylums. That’s nothing. We’re living quietly. Three times a day—right at this very moment—the doctors are making their rounds and injecting substances that destroy the brain. Pay no attention to it. We’ll continue to live in peace and quiet here.

  There’s a certain woman here named Angela Davis. I don’t know if you are familiar with her in this country, but in our country, literally, for an entire year, we heard of nothing at all except Angela Davis. There was only Angela Davis in the whole world and she was suffering. We had our ears stuffed with Angela Davis. Little children in school were told to sign petitions in defense of Angela Davis. Little boys and girls, eight and nine years old, were asked to do this. She was set free, as you know. Although she didn’t have too difficult a time in this country’s jails, she came to recuperate in Soviet resorts. Some Soviet dissidents—but more important, a group of Czech dissidents—addressed an appeal to her: “Comrade Davis, you were in prison. You know how unpleasant it is to sit in prison, especially when you consider yourself innocent. You have such great authority now. Could you help our Czech prisoners? Could you stand up for those people in Czechoslovakia who are being persecuted by the state?” Angela Davis answered: “They deserve what they get. Let them remain in prison.” That is the face of Communism. That is the heart of Communism for you.

  I would particularly like to remind you today that Communism develops in a straight line and as a single entity, without altering, as people now like to say. Lenin did indeed develop Marxism, but primarily along the lines of ideological intolerance. If you read Lenin, you will be astonished at how much hatred there was in him for the least deviation, whenever some view differed from his even by a hair’s breadth. Lenin also developed Marxism in the direction of inhumanity. Before the October Revolution in Russia, Lenin wrote a book called The Lessons of the Paris Commune. There he analyzed why the Paris Commune was defeated in 1871. His principal conclusion was that the Commune had not shot, had not killed enough of its enemies. It had destroyed too few people, at a time when it was necessary to kill entire classes and groups. And when he came to power, Lenin did just this.

  And then the word “Stalinism” was thought up. This is a term that became very popular. Even in the West they often say now: “If only the Soviet Union doesn’t return to Stalinism.” But there was never any such thing as Stalinism. It was contrived by Khrushchev and his group in order to blame all the characteristic traits and principal defects of Communism on Stalin—it was a very effective move. But in reality Lenin had managed to give shape to all the main features before Stalin came to power. It is Lenin who deceived the peasants about their land, and the workers about self-management. He is the one who turned the trade unions into organs of oppression. He is the one who created the Cheka, the secret police, and the concentration camps. It is he who sent troops out to the border areas to crush any national movements for liberation and to set up an empire.

  The only
new thing that Stalin did was based on distrust. When it would have been enough—in order to instill general fear—to jail two people, he arrested a hundred. And those who succeeded Stalin merely returned to the previous tactic: if it is necessary to send two off to jail, then send two, not a hundred. In the eyes of the party, Stalin’s entire guilt lay elsewhere: he did not trust his own Communist Party. Due to this alone, the concept of Stalinism was devised. But Stalin had never deviated from the same basic line. They used to sculpt a bas-relief of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin all together; to this one could add Mao Tse-tung, Kim II Sung, Ho Chi Minh; they are all in the same line of development.

  The following theory is also accepted in the West. It is said that China is a sort of purified, puritanical type of Communism, one which has not degenerated. But China is simply a delayed phase of that so-called War Communism established by Lenin in Russia but which remained in force only until 1921. Lenin established it not at all because the military situation required it but because this is how he envisioned the future of their society. But when economic pressure required him to retreat, he introduced the so-called New Economic Policy and he retreated. In China this initial phase has simply lasted longer. China is characterized by all the same traits: massive compulsory labor which is not paid in accordance with its value; work on holidays; forced living in communes; and the incessant dinning of slogans and dogmas that abolish the human essence and deny all individuality to man.