Which Book Are You Reading Now? Volume XII

[yung.carl.jung]

How was Discipline and Punish? I still got to read that one.

Very enjoyable read. Lays out Foucaults entire philosophy of power dynamics and the punishment of "the body" in the first few chapters. Probably the most essential Foucault read after Archaeology of Knowledge?

I picked up The Archaeology of Knowledge over the summer, haven't started reading it yet. But I'm reading Economy and Society by Weber for the first time (in translation of course), and I'm rereading Maurice Dobb's Studies in the Development of Capitalism.

How are you liking Weber? I wonder how he reads in translation, pretty happy to be able to read him in his native tongue.

Ironic. When I was in high school, I devoured everything by him I could get my hands on. You're spot on re Animal Farm. Orwell had fought for the communists in the Spanish Civil War, and they were on the verge of winning when Stalin betrayed them. Orwell was crazy-anti-communist after that.

I almost got through Inferno, but the unceasing tortures finally wore me out.,

I'm a fan of torture, personally Looking forward to Inferno

No. The Communists were never close to winning in Spain. They did manage to almost completely take over the Republican side, which on one hand made the red scare Fascists right but at the same time was made possible because the democracies bought the scare in the first place.

Ironically enough Stalin disn't intend to take over the Republic, as it was trying to take the Soviet Union out of pariah-statehood and saw support for the Republic as a tool for that. It was the Spanish communists that purged the Trotskyists that Orwell fought with as well as the anarchists.

I personally found Animal Farm masterful satire, though I could reconsider upon rereading.

Nah, that just sounds bizarre. Stalin had nothing to do with the "May Events" as they are called, whereby the Communists with full support of the Spanish government gutted the Trotskyist and anarchist militias that autonomously held power in Catalonia alongside its government: it was Madrid and its Communists cracking down on autonomies to unify the war effort.

I understand that the full picture is hard to see from Orwell because he was in the middle of it, but I seem to remember it captures the stalemate in Aragon and the infighting, without any sense of impending victory.

I think you're wrong here. Infact, Stalin played perhaps the most important role in the dismemberment of the republican forces. I wrote a paper on this a year ago, let me dig it up..

As you may know, it was mostly the anarchist factions that, at the beginning of the civil war, surprisingly won lots of skirmishes, thereby encapturing momentum for the republican forces and beating the fascists both at an operational and a psychological level.

Stalin, with the motive of delaying the German invasion by keeping them busy with Spain, noticed the tensions not only between the communists, anarchists and republicans, but also inside of each respective ideological group: CNT and FAI were direct targets of his. He had his agents infiltrate every politically relevant party on the republican side, had many dissidents killed or simply disappear.

Furthermore, Stalin via his advisors offered "military expertise" to the clueless communists, which was the final nail in the coffin. His alternative plans were poorly worked out, they were constructed to fail of course, he knowingly sent his comrades running into a knife because to him they were useful idiots.

If you want to delve a little deeper try Heleno Sana (2001): The Libertarian Revolution for a detailed account of the role of the anarchist forces and Stalinist intervention. For the rest my sources are Hobsbawm, 1977 (who is revered, but I dislike him due to his obvious ideological bias) and Borkenau 1988 (a relatively neutral source imho).

Of course there are hundreds of possible reasons one could pinpoint the republican loss towards: German, Italian and American (!) intervention on the side of the fascists, the fact that the republican govt. ignored repeated warnings about a coup.. But I still think that without Stalins intervention, this conflict would have seen a different end.

>It was the Spanish communists that purged the Trotskyists that Orwell fought with as well as the anarchists.

Yes, it was indeed the Spanish communists that commited these atrocities, but who rallied them up? Who split them up, divided them, pitted them against each other, made them hate their ideological brothers? Who has interested in the fall of Troskyism, who had the means to achieve this?

I am not saying the Spanish have no agency, or that all communists were merely playing Stalin's puppets, but I think at this point there is no doubt about who started the fire.

Another interesting point that Sano makes is that Stalin specifically also targeted the anarchists, because he was well aware that his meddling would not work should the anarchists be the majority among all republicans. As it turned out, all the relevant anarchist leaders either died, were assasinated or left the movement, so as you said already, the republican forces ended up under communist lead, which is another reason why this conflict went sour really quick.

 

[Lexicus]

How are you liking Weber? I wonder how he reads in translation, pretty happy to be able to read him in his native tongue.

Well, I've only just made it out of the foreword (over 100 pages), into the "terminological" part, which I'm enjoying decently. I have read The Protestant Ethic twice, and found the translation I have of that to be pretty well-written and not too dense.

 

[JohannaK]

I think you're wrong here. Infact, Stalin played perhaps the most important role in the dismemberment of the republican forces. I wrote a paper on this a year ago, let me dig it up..

As you may know, it was mostly the anarchist factions that, at the beginning of the civil war, surprisingly won lots of skirmishes, thereby encapturing momentum for the republican forces and beating the fascists both at an operational and a psychological level.

Stalin, with the motive of delaying the German invasion by keeping them busy with Spain, noticed the tensions not only between the communists, anarchists and republicans, but also inside of each respective ideological group: CNT and FAI were direct targets of his. He had his agents infiltrate every politically relevant party on the republican side, had many dissidents killed or simply disappear.

Furthermore, Stalin via his advisors offered "military expertise" to the clueless communists, which was the final nail in the coffin. His alternative plans were poorly worked out, they were constructed to fail of course, he knowingly sent his comrades running into a knife because to him they were useful idiots.

If you want to delve a little deeper try Heleno Sana (2001): The Libertarian Revolution for a detailed account of the role of the anarchist forces and Stalinist intervention. For the rest my sources are Hobsbawm, 1977 (who is revered, but I dislike him due to his obvious ideological bias) and Borkenau 1988 (a relatively neutral source imho).

Of course there are hundreds of possible reasons one could pinpoint the republican loss towards: German, Italian and American (!) intervention on the side of the fascists, the fact that the republican govt. ignored repeated warnings about a coup.. But I still think that without Stalins intervention, this conflict would have seen a different end.

>It was the Spanish communists that purged the Trotskyists that Orwell fought with as well as the anarchists.

Yes, it was indeed the Spanish communists that commited these atrocities, but who rallied them up? Who split them up, divided them, pitted them against each other, made them hate their ideological brothers? Who has interested in the fall of Troskyism, who had the means to achieve this?

I am not saying the Spanish have no agency, or that all communists were merely playing Stalin's puppets, but I think at this point there is no doubt about who started the fire.

Another interesting point that Sano makes is that Stalin specifically also targeted the anarchists, because he was well aware that his meddling would not work should the anarchists be the majority among all republicans. As it turned out, all the relevant anarchist leaders either died, were assasinated or left the movement, so as you said already, the republican forces ended up under communist lead, which is another reason why this conflict went sour really quick.

How does this theory of Stalin puppet communists hijacking the war effort deal with the fact that chief of staff Vicente Rojo Lluch was in fact a career officer, not a Communist, and also responsible for the planning of every major operation, disastrous as they were?

 

[yung.carl.jung]

How does this theory of Stalin puppet communists hijacking the war effort deal with the fact that chief of staff Vicente Rojo Lluch was in fact a career officer, not a Communist, and also responsible for the planning of every major operation, disastrous as they were?

Can you source this, please? It is impossible that he was part of every major operation, especially if you account for the fact that the republican forces were split up geographically and ideologically, often only in sporadic contact with each other and often (especially on behalf of the anarchists) engaged in combat spontaneously when needed.

Afaik Vicente Rojo Lluch was partially responsible for the defense of Madrid (at this point Stalin had little to no influence yet), as well as Teruel and Ebro.

This source sheds some light on the backstabbing and political meddling of the COMINTERN (and Stalin personally) in both Spanish politics and war efforts. From Radosh & Habeck, 2001:

Who was primarily in charge in the Republican government? The Spanish Fifth Regiment in Madrid? The general staff in Valencia? The Prime Minister of the Spanish cabinet? Various Spanish leaders in Barcelona? The union militias of the Socialist UGT, the anarchist CNT, the Central Committee of the Spanish Communist Party, Marty in Albacete with the International Brigades, or the Soviet Military Attache? What authority did Comintern and military men, sent by Moscow, have over the Spanish operation? Those questions were never decided from July 1936 to March 1939. What happened is that too much time was wasted stabbing others in the back, missing orders, stealing equipment, placing battalions in reserve, not understanding the basic languages of the operations (Spanish, French, Russian) and committing a dozen other errors. The Spanish parties and Soviet agents also spent too much time spying on one another. Incompetence was confused with subversion by spies, provocateurs, wreckers, and saboteurs.

Looking at the five documents signed by Marty (Appendix 2) as a whole, it emerges that this French Communist and Comintern agent could be considered the de facto ambassador of Stalin to the Spanish Republic. His knowledge of the Spanish personalities inside the cabinet, inside the CNT and UGT unions and Spanish Socialist Party, the Fifth Regiment and the PCE was outstanding. To see him as only the first commander of the IB base at Albacete would downplay his importance, for he reported in person to the Communist International.

Did the Republicans eventually lose through incompetence, or sabotage, or the ideological fixations of half dozen tendencies? Who in the CNT or the UGT or the Republican Left were secret party communists or Trokskyists? Did it make any difference by 1939? It is well known that the Socialist Party was badly divided in July 1936 between the revolutionary faction and the reformist faction. What the Soviet documents show is that the Socialist problem was only the tip of an iceberg.

Anglo-American historians occasionally have suggested that Juan Negrin, Prime Minister of Republican Spain from May 1937 to March 1939, was either a puppet of Moscow or a secret Soviet agent. One tidbit of information from "Kleber" (Doc. 60) about Negrin, which partly explains his puzzle, is that the Socialist doctor from the Canary Islands had a Russian wife (p.326). The Soviet documents indicate that he was trapped by his situation. Surrender to Franco meant execution. Fleeing to France meant cowardice and charges of fascist sympathies. Staying in office offered an ever-diminishing chance that the Republic and his own life could be spared by a twist of international diplomacy. Doc. 45, written by a Soviet GRU agent[5] best describes Negrin's problem. He tried to be a smooth vacillating healer in a split cabinet. He tried to negotiate between the anti-communist Largo's UGT, the CNT unions and the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Spain (PCE). Yet the PCE through its ties to Moscow eventually assumed the power of rationing military supplies bought and paid for in advance by the Spanish since September 1936.[6] Negrin also was quite sensitive to French politics and wanted the Soviets to go slow in pressuring the French Popular Front to the left, for fear of forcing the Radical Socialists to move to the right (Doc.79). The USSR was fighting for the Popular Front, so worked to keep Socialists, both Largo and later Negrin, in office as long as possible.

A Communist coup would have meant open repudiation of the democratic Republic, and probably an early recognition of Franco in Washington, London and Paris and an early end of the Spanish War. When the war was over, Negrin fled to France and later Britain, not the USSR.

The major enemy of the Communists within the Popular Front coalition, both Spanish and foreign, was General Jose Asensio. After the fall of Malaga in February 1937 the Soviets were convinced he was a secret agent of Franco sabotaging the Popular Front (Docs. 39, 60).

The Soviet Military Attache was suspicious of him as early as 16 October 1936 (Doc. 17). Louis Fischer, American journalist and Popular Front sympathizer who helped at the International Brigades base at Albacete in the fall of 1936, agreed with the Soviets that Asensio's loyalty was in question (Doc. 30). The Soviets could not openly expose Asensio, because Premier Largo Caballero leaned on him for military advice. Largo needed Asensio to protect him from the PCE.

As a 67-year-old union boss, Largo thought he was for revolution in July 1936. He had no military experience, but by observing the battles and the shifting political pressures within the parties, unions and militias by 1937, he came to the conclusion that if the Popular Front won the war, he would be dumped as leader of the UGT union. So he stepped down in May 1937 as Premier, after considerable pressure from the Republican military units, in order to protect his position as leader of the UGT union. (Docs 30, 31, 34, 36, 37, 39, 40, 42, 46). Voroshilov noted about 15 April 1937 that Largo "does not want defeat, but he is afraid of victory," because it would strengthen the communists (p. 192).

It is well-known that Stalin's paranoia led to a curtailing of the influence of the party with Trotskyist tendencies, the POUM, in May 1937. Soviet Ambassador Marcel Rosenberg on 30 September 1936 charged the POUM as "provocateurs" (Doc. 13). It is noteworthy that as early as 22 July 1936, the Comintern Agent Codovilla (Argentinean, p. 4) reported together with Jose Diaz, who headed the Spanish Communist Party (Doc. 2).

The title Spain Betrayed creates many ambiguities. It is vital to identify and date the charges. The complex reality was that many were betraying many others. Franco betrayed the constitution and the liberal government in July 1936. Communists betrayed Prime Minister Largo Caballero in 1937, socialist Prieto betrayed the anarchists, the CNT union anarchists betrayed the political FAI, Spanish Communists betrayed Comintern officials and vice versa, French comrades betrayed German comrades in the International Brigades, etc. What this generation needs to know is, what were the Soviets trying to do in Spain? Spain Betrayed sheds real new light, but not enough, on this question.

Still though, I have one much better source I named you earlier. It is, to be precise, chapter 9 of Heleno Sana's book "The libertarian Revolution", where he deals exclusively with Stalin's meddling, what effect it had on the communist, anarchist and republican militia and how he influenced strategic planning. I only have this source in German and really do not have the time for translating right now, sorry.

 

[JohannaK]

Sorry, I should have been more precise: he was the planner of every major offensive operation from May 1937 on, on top of managing some defensive actions prior to that. At this point the Francoists were advancing on the isolated North and the anarchists had already been crushed, so his authority as overall chief of staff was indisputable. He was responsible for the debacle at the Ebro, and in Belchite and Teruel, as well as Brunete. Though some of these might have achieved some of its objectives it's hard to qualify them as anything other than bloody failures, all of them, and I am at a loss as to why he was the most prestigious officer of the war.

Your text here does not signal at any direct meddling of Stalin in anything other than the May Events.

As much as I've read, I must admit my knowledge of the war is not very scholarly, and it might be infuenced by a somewhat inevitable local Spanish perspective on its events, that emphasises the people on the ground and the agency of Spanish Communists and intermediate commanders. I would love if you could take the time, over time, to translate that fragment, unless you can assure me it's available in English, Spanish, or Catalan.

 

[Kyriakos]

Is there any consensus on whether the outcome would be very different if Germany and Italy didn't give full support (and weapons) to Franco?

Furthermore, if in such a hypothetical Franco was losing, would France side with Franco given that fascism was strong in France as well at the time (going by the ever-present Celine ), and they (it seems) would stand to risk independence movements in their south border with Spain as well (catalan and basque?)?

 

[Traitorfish]

Furthermore, if in such a hypothetical Franco was losing, would France side with Franco given that fascism was strong in France as well at the time (going by the ever-present Celine ), and they (it seems) would stand to risk independence movements in their south border with Spain as well (catalan and basque?)?

French fascism was on the retreat after the 1936 victory of the Popular Front; its strength at the decade's end was in part a result of Franco's triumph. Italy and Germany withholding support would only be likely if fascism was on a weaker footing across Europe, which is unlikely to produce a pro-fascist government in France.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

Is there any consensus on whether the outcome would be very different if Germany and Italy didn't give full support (and weapons) to Franco?

Furthermore, if in such a hypothetical Franco was losing, would France side with Franco given that fascism was strong in France as well at the time (going by the ever-present Celine ), and they (it seems) would stand to risk independence movements in their south border with Spain as well (catalan and basque?)?

the single most significant factor here would be franco himself and consequently all the troops that the fascists had in morocco would not have been able to cross. they used (iirc) british airplanes to get them to mainland spain

from wiki

On 12 June, Prime Minister Casares Quiroga met General Juan Yagüe, who falsely convinced Casares of his loyalty to the republic.[54] Mola began serious planning in the spring.[52] Franco was a key player because of his prestige as a former director of the military academy and as the man who suppressed the Asturian miners' strike of 1934.[52] He was well respected in the Army of Africa, the Army's toughest troops.[55] He wrote a cryptic letter to Casares on 23 June, suggesting that the military was disloyal, but could be restrained if he were put in charge. Casares did nothing, failing to arrest or buy off Franco.[55] British sympathizers with the rebels (who were associated with the British Secret Intelligence Service) chartered a Dragon Rapide aircraft to transport Franco from the Canary Islands to Spanish Morocco.[56] The plane flew to the Canaries on 11 July, and Franco arrived in Morocco on 19 July.[57]

The english wiki is **** and doesnt have anything about the crucial troop transports, so I took the time to translate from German:

"Operation Feuerzauber, led by Hermann Göring himself and named after a Wagner piece, was an airbridge between spanish-morocco and cadiz aswell as malaga." (shorter version, translated from: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanischer_Bürgerkrieg#Unternehmen_Feuerzauber)

So, to conclude I'd say both the British and the German support (aswell as Italian and American, people forget about murrica for some reason..) was absolutely crucial to the fascist victory. There were few (no) planes available to the putshists, especially not the transporting kind, and without British assistance Franco would have never reached mainland as fast as he did. The support from the foreign legions aswell as the spanish-morrocan troups was also key in winning the civil war, imo

 

[JollyRoger]

 

[Stephanie Harmon]

The Speed of Trust - Stephen Covey. It's about self trust, organizational trust, relationship...etc.

 

[Cutlass]

 

[JollyRoger]

 

[Traitorfish]

It's nice to know that they had awkward driving license pictures in the 16th century.

 

[sophie]

Whoo boy, just back from the library with an enormous pile of books. The good news is I'm pretty sure I have a firm research topic in place. See if you can guess what it is

Werner Danckert, Unehrliche Leute. Die Verfemten Berufe
Bernd Roeck, Außenseiter, Randgruppen, Minderheiten. Fremde im Deutschland der frühen Neuzeit
Richard van Dülmen, Der Ehrlose Mensch. Unehrlichkeit und soziale Ausgrenzung in der Frühen Neuzeit
Winfried Schulze hrsg., Ständische Gesellschaft und soziale Mobilität
Jutta Nowosadtko, Scharfrichter und Abdecker. Der Alltag zweier "unehrlicher Berufe" in der Frühen Neuzeit
Karl Härter hrsg., Policey und frühneuzeitliche Gesellschaft

 

[yung.carl.jung]

something about social stigmatization of (perceived) lower class people? or, more generally speaking, something about the estate-system (dk the correct English word, in German: "Ständegesellschaft") in Europe? Arguably Europe had a very firm caste-like sequence until way into the 18th and 19th century with people like Abdecker (they deal with human waste..) being our equivalent of "untouchables" in India. Pretty cool looking list.

I'm almost done with Emile Durkheim's study on Suicide, halfway through Discipline and Punish and at around half with Thus Spoke Zarathustra; hope I can finish some of them up so I can go back to reading some sweet, sweet fiction. Thinking of reading some Arno Schmidt next.

 

[sophie]

The plan is to look at the "Unehrliche Berufe" (dishonorable professions), specifically the unreiniges Volk (unclean people), so Abdecker (knacker - someone who strips the hide/breaks down animals no longer able to work), Henker/Scharfrichter (executioner/hangman; also expected to perform the investigation/torture process in uncovering guilt), Totengräber (gravedigger), (maybe Gassenkehrer - the person responsible for cleaning out the streets of a town - too). I'm looking to see if there was any renegotiation or alteration of their socio-political position in the first 50 years of the Reformation (a time when death became extremely common in everyday life). I may expand it to a broader social perception thing, in which case I may also look at the Herrenlos, but that's much better-trodden ground, so I don't know so much about that.

 

[Arakhor]

At the risk of being boring, some translations of those titles would be nice.

 

[Gen.Mannerheim]

Just picked up a new release of a non Lord of the Rings- Tolkien work, The Lay of Aotrou and Itroun.
Its supposed to be an update of a medieval Breton tale. Having read his works on Finn and Hengest, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and The Story of Kullervo I am intrigued by the thought process of Tolkien the academic.

Two observations gleaned from recently reading some of Tolkien's academic and epic poetry works:
1) Tolkien would have never survived in modern academia, with his atrocious release schedule and his over-reliance on his own translation style without properly going into the issues with other academics translations. Many of this recent (since the 80's) Tolkien material is either created by converting a lecture series into book form or from loose collections of notes in various states of polish that he intended to publish. The problem comes in that much of the references in his publish works are to material of his that hadn't released.
2)I kinda feel bad for his son Christopher Tolkien, because it seems like his life's work has been dominated by finishing up all of his fathers unfinished business, and he's still nowhere near done!

 

[sophie]

At the risk of being boring, some translations of those titles would be nice.

Whoo boy, just back from the library with an enormous pile of books. The good news is I'm pretty sure I have a firm research topic in place. See if you can guess what it is

Werner Danckert, Unehrliche Leute. Die Verfemten Berufe
Bernd Roeck, Außenseiter, Randgruppen, Minderheiten. Fremde im Deutschland der frühen Neuzeit
Richard van Dülmen, Der Ehrlose Mensch. Unehrlichkeit und soziale Ausgrenzung in der Frühen Neuzeit
Winfried Schulze hrsg., Ständische Gesellschaft und soziale Mobilität
Jutta Nowosadtko, Scharfrichter und Abdecker. Der Alltag zweier "unehrlicher Berufe" in der Frühen Neuzeit
Karl Härter hrsg., Policey und frühneuzeitliche Gesellschaft

Ok, just a quick note - hrsg. stands for "herausgegeben von", which means "edited by" (or ed. in English abbreviation)

1) Dishonorable People: The Ostracized Professions
2) Outsiders, Fringe Groups, Minorities (Marginalized, perhaps): Strangers (Outsiders) in the Germany of the Early Modern Period
3) The Honorless Man: Dishonorablity and Social Ostracism in the Early Modern Period
4) (a difficult to translate term, but, as yung.carl said it...) ~The Estate Class System and Social Mobility
5) Executioners and Knackers: The two everyday "Dishonorable Careers" in the Early Modern Period
6) "Policey" and Early Modern Society (haven't read the book yet, but presumably "policey" refers to the original/early meaning of police in the sense of policer which was less about a literal enforcement of the law and more about a general providing for the communal civilized-ness (e.g. police were originally also responsible for *literally* keeping the streets clean)

 

[Gen.Mannerheim]

If you're interested in reading what are most likely Machiavelli's actual thoughts on politics and the order of society, rather than a super short commission piece of generalities which only served to reinforce the actions of powerful jerks and has been taken wildly out of context through the centuries; then might I suggest...