HOW FASCISM CAME IN AUSTRIA ΠHARD on the heels of
the victory of Fascism in Germany came the establishment
of the Fascist dictatorship of Dollfuss in Austria
during 1933-4. The rising of the Austrian workers in
February 1934, against this Fascist dictatorship, opened
a new stage in the struggle of the international working
class against Fascism, at the same time as it finally
completed the German experience in exposing the
illusions of "democratic socialism." The lesson of
Austria is even clearer and sharper in many respects
than that of Germany. 1. The Significance of the
Austrian Experience. In the first place, Austria
revealed a conflict between two rival forces of Fascism,
the Heimwehr and the Nazis, openly reflecting the battle
for domination of rival imperialist and Fascist Powers
over the living body of the Austrian people. There could
be no more striking demonstration of the real role of
Fascism as the chauvinist predatory policy of particular
groupings of finance-capital, belying all the
"national," "popular" and "pacific" pretences. The
battle of Fascist Germany and Fascist Italy over the
body of Fascist Austria provides a foretaste of the
"majestic peace of World Fascism." Both these forces
were in fact equally united against the working class,
but sharply in conflict between themselves for the
dominant position. In the initial stage the
ClericalFascism of Dollfuss, subordinate to Italian
Fascism, has conquered; but the further development of
events may still bring a change of combinations and the
possible ultimate dominance of the Nazis and Pan-German
Fascism. In this situation the fatal policy of the
working-class organisations under Social Democratic
leadership was to endeavour to support one Fascist group
against the other, Dollfuss against the Nazis, as the
"lesser evil," and thus to smooth the way at every stage
for the advance and victory of Fascism.
154. FASCISM AND SOCIAL REVOLUTION
Second, the Fascist dictatorship of Dollfuss grew
directly out of bourgeois democracy under Dollfuss, even
more clearly than the parallel Hindenburg-Hitler process
in Germany. Dollfuss was acclaimed throughout Western
Europe as the "champion of democracy against Fascism"
(i.e., against the German Nazi menace), and on this
basis was supported and tolerated by Social Democracy,
at the same time as in fact he was carrying through the
transition to Fascism. Up to the last, on the very eve
of the workers' rising, Social Democracy was offering to
accept and support an emergency dictatorship of
Dollfuss, the suspension of the parliamentary regime,
and institution of a form of Corporate State, on
condition of being permitted to exist under these
conditions-the clearest, most conscious expression of
the line of Social Fascism. The policy of Social
Democracy, of the "lesser evil," here receives its
crushing exposure no less heavily than in Germany.
Third, the Austrian working class was the most highly
organised in the capitalist world. In a population of
six millions the paying membership of the Social
Democratic Party numbered six hundred thousand, and the
voting strength one and a half millions, or 70 per cent.
of the Πelectorate in Vienna and 40 per cent. of the
electorate in the whole country. There was no question
of a "split" in Organisation. The Communist Party,
although playing a role of great significance in the
fight (it alone gave the call for the general strike on
February 10, which was forced by the workers on the
reformist leadership on the I 11th), and in the actual
launching of the fight (Linz, where the united front of
the Communist and Social Democratic workers had been
established in defiance of the reformist leadership, and
the fight was opened against the express orders of the
reformist leadership), was nevertheless extremely weak
in numbers. The attempt to explain the advance and
victory of Fascism by the "split" in the working class
through the existence of Communism is thus exploded once
and for all by the example of Austria. Social Democracy
boasted of its sole complete control of the working
class, and thereby admits its sole responsibility for
the outcome. "There was no split in the Austrian Labour
Movement; the Communists were merely an insignificant
minority. The fact that so powerful a party should have
been completely smashed is now naturally engaging the
attention of Socialists in all
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE AUSTRIAN EXPERIENCE 155
countries" (Otto Bauer on "Tactical Lessons of the
Austrian Catastrophe"). In reality, the Austrian workers
were split, and therefore defeated; but the split was
within Social Democracy, between the workers and the
leadership, and through the action of the leadership.
The real question of the split in the working class
through the existence of a Social Fascist leadership is
thus laid bare beyond the possibility of concealment.
Fourth, Austrian Social Democracy was, despite the
smallness of the country, in its theoretical role and in
the high degree of organisation and supposed "practical
results," the leading party and the "model party" of
international Social Democracy, and in particular of
Left Social Democracy. Where German Social Democracy or
British Labourism was far more glaring and shameless in
its virtual or specific repudiation of Marxism and
acceptance of capitalism, the corruption of the Austrian
Social Democratic leadership was covered under the
subtle sophistries of "Austro-Marxism." Further, many of
the leaders were obviously "sincere" in their
democratic-pacifist betrayal of the struggle; even
though by their policy they did everything to assist the
strengthening of capitalism and the advance of Fascism,
even though by their policy they made the defeat of the
struggle certain, though they failed to prepare it, to
organise it or to lead it, and did everything to prevent
it, nevertheless, when the workers launched it in spite
of them, some of them took part and suffered. This is
commonly accounted to the Austrian Social Democratic
leadership for virtue and for rebuttal of the charge of
"Social Fascism." On the contrary, just this makes the
real role of political treachery of the whole line of
Social Democracy far more clear and unmistakable. The
question of politics is not a simple question of
subjective "sincerity." Long ago, at the Second Congress
of the Communist International, when Serrati endeavoured
to defend the reformist Turati as "sincere," and argued
Πagainst the Twentyone Conditions on the grounds that
it was impossible to produce a "since to meter " or test
of sincerity, Lenin replied: "We have no need of such an
instrument as a 'sincerometer'; what we have is an
instrument to test political directions." And it is in
this sense that the role of Austrian Social Democracy is
revealed with unexampled clearness, with a completeness
and relative absence of complicating factors unequalled
elsewhere, as a role of direct service and assistance to
the victory of Fascism.
156. FASCISM AND SOCIAL REVOLUTION
Fifth, the armed rising of the Austrian workers, both
in its strength and in its weaknesses, has marked out
and lit up the future line of the fight of the
international working class against Fascism. To the
experiences and lessons of this struggle, alike
political, strategic and tactical, it will be constantly
necessary to recur in every country in the further
development of the struggle against Fascism. The Second
International endeavours to draw two lessons from the
Austrian events. On the one hand, they endeavour to
exploit the fight of the Austrian workers, launched in
the face of the express warnings and prohibitions of the
Social Democratic leadership, as a vindication of the
"honour" of Social Democracy after the German exposure,
and a proof that Social Democracy can and does fight. On
the other hand, they endeavour simultaneously to prove
that the Austrian outcome has shown the policy of armed
struggle to be impossible and foredoomed to failure;
that against modern artillery nothing can avail, and
that the Austrian rising was only a "heroic gesture,"
nothing more ("No one doubted that the military forces
of the Government were much stronger than the power of
the workers, and that the workers could not succeed in
struggle against the Government."-Bauer). Thus Social
Democracy seeks to prove two opposite conclusions. They
wish simultaneously to cover their real policy of
surrender with the stolen glory of the rising which they
prohibited, and in the next breath to prove the
correctness of their policy of surrender, that struggle
is impossible, and that the victory of Fascism is
consequently inevitable. Both conclusions are false. The
Austrian workers fought, not through the initiative and
leadership of Social Democracy, but against the express
instructions of Social Democracy. The victory of the
workers is not impossible. The lesson of Austria shows
the exact opposite, how closely victory was within reach
of the workers, had there been leadership and
Organisation, had the full forces of the working class
been brought into play, had there not been division and
chaos at every strategic point of the leadership, and
had the struggle been entered on at the right time, with
clear political aims and with the tactics of the
offensive. Victory was only made impossible by the
policy of Social Democracy. It can be, and will be,
achieved under revolutionary leadership.
157. THE BETRAYAL OF THE CENTRAL-EUROPEAN REVOLUTION
2. The Betrayal of the Central-European Revolution. As
in Germany, so in Austria the issue of the workers'
struggle cannot be judged solely on the basis of the
final stage of the Fascist Πcoup, of the days of
February 1934, but must be seen in relation to the whole
line of development of 1918-1934. just as the strangling
of the 1918 revolution in Germany by Social Democracy
laid the basis for the ultimate victory of Fascism, so
also in Austria. The victory of the proletarian
revolution in Austria was fully in the grasp of the
workers in 1918-19, and was only prevented by Social
Democracy. This is common ground, and is admitted by the
Social Democratic leaders themselves. Otto Bauer
describes the situation at the end of the war in his
book The Austrian Revolution of 1918: There was deep
ferment in the barracks of the people's army. The
people's army felt that it was the bearer of the
revolution, the vanguard of the proletariat. . . . The
soldiers with arms in hand hoped for a victory of the
proletariat . . . . .. Dictatorship of the proletariat!"
"All Power to the Soviets!" was all that could be beard
in the streets. He continues: No bourgeois government
could have coped with such a task. It would have been
disarmed by the distrust and contempt of the masses. It
would have been overthrown in a week by a street
uprising and disarmed by its own soldiers. Only the
Social Democrats could have safely handled such an
unprecedentedly difficult situation, because they
enjoyed the confidence of the working masses. . . . Only
the Social Democrats could have stopped peacefully the
stormy demonstrations by negotiation and persuasion.
Only the Social Democrats could have guided the people's
army and curbed the revolutionary adventures of the
working masses. . . . The profound shake-up of the
bourgeois social order was expressed in that a bourgeois
government, a government without the participation in it
of the Social Democrats, had simply become unthinkable.
The role of Austrian Social Democracy was thus in fact
exactly parallel to that of the German. The power of the
workers' revolution was deliberately destroyed by Social
Democracy in the name of bourgeois "democracy." The
bourgeois order was only saved by the Coalition
Government f rom 1918 to 192 0 of Austrian Social
Democracy and the bourgeois parties, with
158. FASCISM AND SOCIAL REVOLUTION
Bauer as Foreign Minister and Deutsch as Minister for
War. This is the background which lies behind the
victory of Fascism.* Austrian Social Democracy argued at
the time in defence of its policy that, although the
proletarian revolution was certainly and easily possible
in Austria in 1918-19, it could not hope to maintain
itself in so small, dependent and isolated a state, in
the face of the forces of imperialism. Yet in fact the
Soviet Republic was achieved in Hungary and Bavaria; the
drive was strong throughout Germany and Italy. Had
Soviet Austria stood in with Soviet Hungary and Bavaria,
an unshakable power could have been built up in Central
Europe; the whole history of post-war Europe would have
been different. Instead, Austrian Social Democracy
abandoned Soviet Hungary to its fate, and then, when the
White Terror raged in Hungary, pointed to it to prove
the fate from which it claimed to have saved the
Austrian workers. To-day the event has proved that the
Austrian workers were not saved from White ΠTerror;
they were only robbed of the possibility of victory when
it was in their grasp. But at the time Austrian Social
Democracy held out before the workers, not the real
alternative which events were to demonstrate, but an
imaginary golden alternative of peaceful * The British
Labour spokesman, Laski, writes of the role of Otto
Bauer in his "Salute to Vienna's Martyrs" (Daily Herald,
February 17, 1934): "Austrians themselves acknowledge
that without his influence there would have been civil
war in Vienna when the peace of 1919 came. That there
was half a generation of peace in this troubled country
Austria owes to him more than to any man. "The
privileged class has rewarded him not only by bombarding
his accompIishment to pieces, but by making certain in
the years that lie ahead the bloody revolution he strove
with all his great powers to avert." The "ingratitude"
of the bourgeoisie to Social Democracy for having saved
it is the only lesson that the Labour publicist is able
to draw even after this demonstration of the iron logic
of the class struggle. That the first events, the
refusal and active preventing of the path of the
proletarian revolution and of civil war, when it could
have been achieved with the greatest success and the
minimum of suffering, is the cause of the second, the
subsequent crushing, after capitalism has recovered its
strength and prepared its armed forces, of the workers
in blood, he is unable to see. He admits that the path
of "bloody revolution" now becomes inevitable-after
fifteen years of suffering, after the maximum
strengthening of the class enemy, and therefore now
involving far heavier sacrifice and bloodshed, that the
so-called "peaceful" path is thus proved to involve in
the end, not the avoidance of bloodshed, but the maximum
of bloodshed. But he refuses to recognise I he plain
conclusion that the whole Labour and Social Democratic
theory is thereby exploded.
159. THE BETRAYAL OF THE CENTRAL-EUROPEAN REVOLUTION
advance to socialism through "democracy." Bauer wrote
in his Bolshevism or Social Democracy? (1921): In a
modem highly-civilised society, where all classes take
part in public life, no other form of class-rule is any
longer durably possible Πsave one which permits the
subject classes freedom to influence "public opinion,"
participation in the formation of the collective will of
the State, and control over its working: a class-rule,
therefore, whose basis rests on the social factors of
influence of the ruling class, and not on the use of
mechanical instruments of force" (p. 1 16). Such was the
bourgeois-liberal wisdom of "Austro-Marxism," now
mercilessly exposed by the event, when Bauer and Deutsch
have themselves had the opportunity to make the
acquaintance at first hand of the "mechanical
instruments of force" of the ruling class. In this way,
while the Austrian workers suffered and went short under
the "democratic republic," the magnificent apartment
buildings erected in Vienna for a portion of their
numbers became the "symbol" of reformist "achievement,"
of the supposed "alternative" to Bolshevism-in reality,
of the temporary buying off of the workers' revolt,
while the bourgeoisie was not yet strong enough to
defeat them, preliminary to smashing them. The Second
International Manifesto on the Austrian events declares:
The fate of the wonderful municipal houses of Vienna is
a symbol. The constructive work of the Socialists
created them; the guns of Fascism have reduced them to
smoking ruins. The "symbol" goes very much further than
the Second International appears to realise. It was not
only the apartment buildings that were struck by the
guns; it was the illusions of reformism, of the
"alternative" path to Bolshevism. The Russian
journalist, Ilya Ehrenburg,* has related how in 1928 be
visited these municipal buildings in all their glory,
conducted by a proud representative of Social Democracy.
He admired these buildings, their planning, their
construction, their beauty, their Organisation, even
though he could not fail to see alongside the playing
fountain in the beautiful garden an unemployed worker,
weak with hunger. But he asked his guide: "You have
indeed constructed wonderful houses. . . . But have you
not the feeling that these houses are built on the land
of another? Has not the example of our country taught
that the worker must pay with his blood for every foot
of ground *A Soviet Writer Looks at Vienna, London,
1934.
160. FASCISM AND SOCIAL REVOLUTION
that he conquers? We had to destroy much-to destroy
in order after victory to construct. You have begun, not
with the machine-gun, but with the compass and the rule.
With what will you end?" His companion smiled and
replied: "We shall end with the pacific victory of
socialism. Do not forget that at the last elections
seventy per cent. of the population of Vienna voted for
us. That was in 1928. In February 1934, Ilya Ehrenburg
revisited these buildings. He saw the battered walls,
the gaping holes, the debris under which people said
corpses still lay, the trembling, cowering women and
children, hunger and misery, and the flags of the
Heimwehr flying from the towers. He had witnessed the
"pacific victory" of socialism. Out of the conditions of
bourgeois democracy, in Austria as everywhere, Fascism
was bred. The bourgeoisie, under the protecting aegis of
Social Democracy, under cover of the magnificent
apartment buildings, built up its strength anew and
prepared its armed forces for Πthe struggle. But
Fascism was not born in a night. It took fifteen years
for it to grow to full strength. The workers, seeing
what was afoot, insisted on the organisation of their
Defence Corps. The leaders promised that if democracy
should once be threatened, they would act; they
developed their famous "defensive theory of violence,"
that violence should only be used by the workers in
defence of democracy. Meanwhile they took no action.
Fascism grew unchallenged. In 1927 the anger of the
workers at the growth of Fascism and open connivance of
the State authorities broke all bounds. Following the
acquittal of a Fascist who bad murdered a worker, they
rose and stormed the lawcourts of Vienna; Vienna was in
their hands, if their leaders had been ready to lead.
But their leadership, in control of the municipal
administration of Vienna, sided with the bourgeoisie,
with the police, with the State authorities, and thus in
fact with Fascism, against the workers. The workers'
rising was crushed in blood, with the connivance of
Social Democracy. Dr. Deutsch, the commander of the
Republican Defence Corps, has reminded the world that at
the time of the Vienna disorders of 1927, when an
excited mob burned down the Palace of justice, not one
military weapon of the many thousands at their command
wits issued to the Republican Defence Corps. There are
photograph,; on record showing that Burgermeister Seitz
and other Socialist leaders
161. THE BETRAYAL OF THE CENTRAL-EUROPEAN REVOLUTION
at the risk of their own lives went out into the
midst of the angry mob to calm them. Ninety-five men and
women were killed by police bullets on that occasion,
and only five police-figures which speak for themselves.
Why did not these bloodthirsty revolutionaries seize
their opportunity, when the Heimwehr were in their
infancy, the army largely socialist, democracy
unchallenged in Europe, and the Clerical Party
comparatively weak? . . . It is that the Austrian Social
Democratic Party has established by its whole history
the right to the description of democratic and pacific"
( New Statesman and Nation, February 24, 1934). Thus the
approval of the bourgeois-liberal journal. The working
class will take a different view of 192 7, when Austrian
Fascism could have been wiped out in its infancy. The
cost of this bourgeois-liberal approval for the
"democratic" "pacific" Social Democratic leadership has
been the sacrifice of the lives of the best of the
Austrian workers, the suppression of the organised
working-class movement and the victory of Fascism.
Meanwhile Austrian Social Democracy held out to the
workers the illusory prospect of the defeat of Fascism
by "democracy." After the 1930 elections had returned
the Social Demo ratic. Party as the largest party, with
72 representatives, against only 8 representatives for
the Heimwehr, the party leadership triumphantly
reported: Democracy has inflicted a crushing defeat on
the Heimwehr and its promoters. . . . The Heimwehr
movement, which until recently believed itself to be on
the eve of the final victory, is in a state of rapid
decline. . . . The purely political problems have ended
with the complete victory of the working class. Œ
(Report of the Austrian Social Democratic Party to the
Vienna Congress of the Second International, July 1931.)
Such was the degree of prevision of the Social
Democratic leadership, reposing peacefully in the
supposed security of paper ballots, while paralysing the
real struggle of the workers. The illusions of the
Italian reformist leadership, after the success of the
elections of May 192 1, as having "submerged the Fascist
reaction under an avalanche of Red votes, or of the
German reformist leadership after the elections of
November 1932, as marking the "final annihilation of
Hitler," were thus exactly paralleled in Austria. In
reality Fascism was preparing its final coup, when the
issue would depend, not on paper ballots, but solely on
the mass struggle and the organisation of class force.
162. FASCISM AND SOCIAL REVOLUTION
3. The Fascist Dictatorship and the February Rising.
It was only as the sequel of the whole above chain of
development that came the culminating stage since March
7, 1933, when Dollfuss finally threw aside the mask and
proclaimed open dictatorship and the suspension of
parliament. Now, if ever, was the time to act even for
the "democrats." Now was the time for the famous
"defensive theory of violence" to demonstrate its
meaning in practice. But the Social Democratic
leadership still found reasons to put off action. Social
Democracy was engaged in the policy of the "toleration"
of Dollfuss as the "lesser evil" against German Nazism,
and was seeking to negotiate an agreement with Dollfuss.
The Social Democratic Party did not reply with forcible
resistance. On the contrary, right down to the last it
made every effort to enter into negotiations with the
Dollfuss Government. . . . This peaceful and waiting
attitude of the Social Democratic Party only encouraged
the Dollfuss-Fey Government to adopt more and more
antagonistic measures against the working class and
against the Social Democratic Party. ("International
Information," bulletin of the Second International,
February 18, 1934.) Why, after all the loudly repeated
declarations over many years concerning the action that
would be taken "if" democracy were once attacked, was no
action taken when on March 7, 1933, Dollfuss carried
through his coup d'etat and suspended democratic
institutions? Basically, because all these typical
Social Democratic asseverations of future action "if"
democracy is attacked, "if" the bourgeoisie attempt,
etc., are inherently and inevitably valueless, and worse
than valueless, when the present policy is the policy of
class-co- operation. The present policy determines the
future action. It is not possible, even if there were
the will (and in f act there was not the will) at a
moment's notice to transform a deeply enroutined machine
and large-scale organisation of class-co-operation,
pacifism and legalism within twenty-four hours into an
organ of class struggle and revolution. Only when the
united front of struggle has been effectively
established in the preceding period, when the leadership
and training and practice and Organisation of struggle
and militancy on all issues has been already
established, only then can there be readiness when the
Fascist coup strikes. Otherwise inevitably, Π163. THE
FASCIST DICTATORSHIP AND THE FEBRUARY RISING
whatever the previous promises and threats and
boasts, when the time comes, there will be enormous
hesitation, sense of overwhelming "difficulties,"
yearnings for a "peaceful" settlement, prudent counsels
to postpone the struggle, to save what can be saved of
the Organisation and not hazard all upon a single
battle, desperate efforts for some "way out" without a
struggle, hopes against hopes that it is not yet the
final issue. This is what happened to Austrian Social
Democracy. Bauer writes of March 7, 1933, and the
following eleven months: What was to be done now? The
Social Democrats knew very well that it would be very
difficult for a general strike to succeed in a period of
unprecedentedly severe and prolonged unemployment. The
Social Democrats made every imaginable effort to avert a
violent issue. Over a period of eleven months we tried
again and again to establish negotiations with Dollfuss.
. . . Again and again we offered to agree to extensive
constitutional reforms and to the granting of
extraordinary powers to the Government for a period of
two years, all that we asked in return being the most
elementary legal freedom of action for the Party and the
trade unions. . . . We over-estimated the possibility of
reaching a peaceful settlement. (Bauer, "Tactical
Lessons of the Austrian Catastrophe," International
Information, March 8, 1934.) Thus "democracy" went by
the board. just as German Social Democracy supported the
Bruning emergency dictatorship, and sought to come to
terms with the Hitler dictatorship, so Austrian Social
Democracy was fully prepared to support a Dollfuss
emergency dictatorship, in return for a permitted
existence of its Organisation under the dictatorship
(while the Communist Party was suppressed). Such was the
humiliation of "Austro-Marxism" humiliation which did
not even attain its object. The Social Democratic
leadership at the party conference in October 1933, had
laid down four conditions in the event of any one of
which to launch the struggle against the Fascist
dictatorship: (I) if a Fascist constitution were
proclaimed without consulting parliament; (2) if the
Vienna municipal administration were superseded; (3) if
the Party were suppressed; (4) if the trade unions were
suppressed. In fact this widely advertised strategy of
the four conditions never came
164. FASCISM AND SOCIAL REVOLUTION
into operation in practice to launch the struggle.
The Fascist dictatorship was steadily engaged in
consolidating its position, in disarming the workers, in
arresting the local leaders, in arming its forces, and
in sapping the workers' positions in detail, until at
last the Πworkers found themselves compelled to resist
if they were not to be already completely wiped out
before the four conditions came into operation. Thus the
four conditions were not a method to prepare the
struggle, but in reality a mechanism to paralyse the
struggle. What was the consequence of this whole line of
successive surrender and protracted attempts at
negotiation? Did it succeed even in "averting a violent
issue"? On the contrary. It only ensured that that
violent issue should develop under the conditions most
favourable to Fascism and most unfavourable to the
proletariat. Fascism was able to sit engthen and prepare
its forces, while the workers were weakened. Bauer
continues, in the statement already quoted: But during
the eleven months that we were trying to secure a
peaceful denouement, the military strength of the
Government considerably increased, the Heimwehr was
supplied with arms, and on the other hand, large
sections of the working class-especially the
railwaymen-were discouraged, crushed and robbed of their
fighting spirit by the oppressive tactics of the
Government. He is accordingly compelled to make the
significant admission (italics added): If we had
launched our attack at an earlier stage, our action
would have been on a greater and more universal scale,
and the prospects of victory would have been brighter.
Consequently, if we did make a mistake, our mistake
consisted in unduly prolonging our efforts for a
peaceful settlement and in unduly postponing the
decisive struggle. There is no need for us to feel
ashamed of this mistake! We made it because we wanted to
spare the country and the working class the disaster of
a bloody civil war." Similarly in his pamphlet "Der
Aufstand der Oesterreichischen Arbeiter," published in
English under the title "Austrian Democracy Under Fire,"
Bauer writes of the critical days of March, 1933: The
masses of the workers were awaiting the signal for
battle. The railwaymen were not yet so crushed as they
were eleven months later. The Government's military
organisation was far weaker than in February 1934. At
that time we might have won. But we shrank
165. THE FASCIST DICTATORSHIP AND THE FEBRUARY RISING
dismayed from the battle. We still believed that we
should be able to reach a peaceful settlement by
negotiation. Dollfuss had promised to negotiate with us
at an early date-by the end of March or the beginning of
April- concerning a reform of the Constitution and of
the Parliamentary agenda, and we were still fools enough
to trust a promise of Dollfuss. We postponed the fight,
because we wanted to spare the country the disaster of a
bloody civil war. The civil war, nevertheless, broke out
eleven months later, but under conditions that were
considerably less favourable to ourselves, It was a
mistakethe most fatal of all our mistakes. Did they
"spare the working class a bloody civil war"? No; they
only ensured its defeat. He admits that "the prospects
of victory would have been brighter," "we might have
won," if they had only acted in March 1933, just as 1927
would have been more favourable than 1933, and 1918-19
than 1927. The "pacific" policy did not avert civil war
in the end: it only made the conditions the most
unfavourable for the working class and ensured the
heaviest defeat in place of victory. Π"Austro-Marxism"
stands condemned out of its own mouth. The waiting
policy meant that Fascism was step by step able to
prepare its positions. The Defence Corps was declared
illegal. The Communist Party was declared illegal. The
Heimwehr was strengthened and fully equipped with arms.
Arms of the workers were searched for and seized
wherever they could be found. Local leaders were
arrested. At strategic points, particularly among the
railwaymen, militants were removed and "patriotic"
agents installed. All this, of decisive importance for
the future struggle, went forward without resistance.
The workers pressed more and more for resistance, but
the Social Democratic leadership held them back, thus
performing its indispensable service to Fascism. The
"First Report" of "a Leader of the Austrian Social
Democratic Party," published in the Second International
bulletin on February 18, 1934, declares: The
embitterment of the working class regarding the
Government's policy continually increased. . . . The
embitterment of the workers was directed more and more
against the policy of the Party Executive, which was to
wait and be prepared for agreement. Growing numbers of
members of the Party demanded with increasing force that
the offensive should be taken. . . . For months past it
has been increasingly difficult for the Party Executive
to make the
166 . FASCISM AND SOCIAL REVOLUTION
embittered workers understand the necessity for this
waiting Policy. Here is seen the real split in the
Austrian working classbetween the workers (the united
front between the Social Democratic and Communist
workers was growing in the localities) and the Social
Fascist leadership. When the final struggle at last
broke out on February 11, 1934, it broke out in spite of
and against the orders of the Social Democratic
leadership. The official "Report" already quoted makes
this clear: During the last week there were growing
signs that the Government was preparing for the decisive
blow. These events caused the workers to take the
following view: In this situation we can no longer allow
ourselves to be disorganised by the arrests of
Schutzbund leaders and by the confiscation of stores of
arms, unless we are to confront a Fascist coup d'etat
defenceless and unable to fight within a very few days."
In spite of this the Party Executive still adhered to
its line. It considered it to be necessary for the
workers to wait for the results of the negotiations
between the Federal Chancellor and the Provincial
Governments with regard to the demands of the Heimwehr,
and that they should not take the offensive until one of
the four cases should arise in which a defensive
struggle for the defence of the Constitutional order
would according to the decision of the Party be
unavoidable. On Sunday (February, 10) officers of the
Party Executive gave instructions on these lines to
comrades who reported on the agitation among the
workers, and urgently warned them against taking the
initiative on their own account. But the agitation among
the masses had reached such a pitch that these warnings
from the Party Executive were not heeded. Thus the
honour of the Austrian rising rests wholly with the
workers, and not with the Social Democratic leadership.
The role of the Πleadership was only to disorganise the
struggle at every stage. The struggle of the Austrian
workers was not defeated by the superior forces of the
enemy. It was defeated by the disorganising role of the
Social Democratic leadership. This was clear in all the
events leading up to the struggle. It was no less clear
in the actual struggle. Instead of being able to enter
the struggle with the full strength of their organised
force on a strategic plan, with the maximum mobilisation
of the masses, and with a clear political,
THE FASCIST DICTATORSHIP AND THE FEBRUARY RISING 167.
lead the workers had to enter the struggle by local
initiative from below, sporadically, partially, against
hampering opposition from above, losing the possibility
of the initiative, losing the possibility of the
offensive, and thus yielding all the strategic advantage
to the enemy. Many people believe that the Socialists
would have won control in Austria if all sections of the
working class had supported them. In many places the
workers were split among themselves and reached
decisions too late. Several leading trade unions refused
to give instructions to strike to the factories they
controlled. (Daily Herald, February 16, 1934.) The
general strike was first vetoed, and, even when the
workers compelled the call to be given, after the
struggle had already begun, the call never reached the
majority of the workers, and a great part of the trade
union machine made no attempt to make it effective. The
railwaymen continued to carry the Government troops,
thus giving to them full liberty of movement and
concentration. The struggle of the Defence Corps was
fatally cut off from the masses, instead of being
developed as a mass struggle, and even the majority of
the Defence Corps were never mobilised or brought into
the struggle. There was Do political mass lead to
positive aims of the struggle, but only halting
apologetic explanations of "defence of the
Constitution." Because the initiative was lost through
disorganisation, through the absence of any central
leadership beginning and organising the struggle, the
possibility of the offensive and of seizing the main
public buildings of the centre at the outset was lost;
the Government was able to complete its cordon of the
inner city and artillery preparations before the
struggle began; the fight was turned from the first into
a defensive fight. Yet even under all these heaviest
disadvantages a position was achieved by the second day
in which the Government forces weakened and the issue
was in doubt: On the Government side the troops are
reported to be exhausted and disheartened. According to
the Vienna correspondent of the Berliner Tageblatt,
sections of the Fifth Infantry Regiment have deserted to
the Socialists. Deprived of a bully's "walkover," the
Fascist Heimwehr showed they had little stomach for a
real fight. Many have flung down their arms, and the
rest may be withdrawn to barracks (Daily Herald,
February 14, 1934).
168. FASCISM AND SOCIAL REVOLUTION ΠBauer himself is
compelled to admit that, despite all the Government's
artillery, the victory could have been won by the
working class, had the struggle been developed as a mass
struggle: After four days' fighting the workers of
Vienna were defeated. Was this, result inevitable? Could
they conceivably have won? After the experience of those
four days we can say, that if the railways had stopped
running, if the general strike had spread throughout the
country, if the Schutzbund had carried with it the great
mass of the workers throughout the country, the
Government could hardly have succeeded in suppressing
the rising. (Otto Bauer: Austrian Democracy Under Fire,
P. 34.) The closer the analysis of the tactical
conditions and Organisation of the struggle, no less
than of the conditions leading up to the struggle, the
clearer stands out the conclusion that the Austrian
rising, the greatest battle of the workers in the
postwar period, has not shown the impossibility of the
victory of the workers in armed struggle under modern
conditions, as the Social Democratic leaders in all
countries now endeavour to argue. On the contrary, it
has shown the certainty of future victory, once the
united front is built up, once revolutionary leadership
has replaced Social Democratic treachery, once the
poison of pacifist-democratic reformism has been
replaced by the revolutionary aims, tactics and
Organisation of the workingclass fight.