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such as Otto Wolff and Mannesmann. (Apart from the Jewish case, there
is a definite trend away from any thought of genuine nationalization.) The
power of such industrial combines has also been au_gmented by the "Ger–
manization" of business in conquered territories. The "Continental Oil
Corporation" of Berlin is predominantly composed of the most important
German banks and oil corporations. Heavy industry in Lorraine was
equitably distributed-among 5 German combines. More important than
these processes has been the industrial revolution in chemistry, subsidized
by the State, but deriving its dynamic from capitalism, and rendering
power to giant combines in the same way that all property in the means of
production confers power, but more brutally. The hard outlines of the
cartel powers are further confirmed by the near assimilation of finance
capital by the monopolists of industrial capital.
Neumann has
~hown
that profit motives ·hold the economic machinery
of the Reich together. But given its present monopoly form, capitalism
demands the stabilizing support of a total political power. Having full
access to and grip upon such power is the distinctive advantage of German
capitalism. Profits in a situation of great demand and with plant expan–
sion improving the competitive position and thereby profits-this is the
motivating force of the set-up. Gottfried Feder is quite dead. Those who,
in the face of NeUJl!ann's documentation, would accept Feder's "anti-capi·
talist" mumbling as a true characteristization of Germany have many
facts to deny.
And they must give an explanation of her belated imperialist war:
Any thesis about Germany which does not explain her adventurous role
in
the war is inadequate. . Such explanation cannot be performed by modern
curse words (outmoded psychiatry), nor by the finger smugly pointed at
bad gangs out for "power," nor by reference to the merely fomial growth
of "bureaucraciies." It requires attention to the economic structure and
its political apparatus that lead dynamically into war. Neumann has not
resolved this problem with the subtlety which he undoubtedly commands,
hut the type of characterization he offers of Germany seems to me the only
one so far available which not only allows an explanation hut which
already has the job three-quarters done. Germany's expansion is the result
of the dynamics of a younger monopolized capitalism in a world situation
where trade and investments can only he conquered by political means.
Neumann has established in detail that this imperialism is primarily the
policy of industrial leadership and the outcome of the internal antagon·
isms of the Germany capitalist economy. "It is the aggressive, imperalist,
expansionist spirit of German big business unhampered by consideration
for small competitors, for the middle classes, free from control by the
hanks, aelivered from the pressure of trade unions, which is the motivating
force of the economic system." This does not mean, however, that every
element in Germany is a "tool" of industrial .magnates.
III: For the problem of elites is not identical with that of the socio–
economic structure, however much the two are linked in a going concern.
There are 4 elite elements dominating Gerniany today. Monopoly of the
