AMERICAN BUSINESS
57
he always acts, under the instruction, precisely, of the Politburo and
its chief, Stalin.
(If
he had not so acted, there would no longer be
any Gromyko.) He visited his businessmen not at all to "sound them
out" but to manipulate their greed and ignorance and timidity. Sta–
lin, well pleased apparently by the response, did not "change his
mind"
in
the least-as if, at this point in his career, he is going to
go to school to Gromyko for first lessons in Marxism-but advanced
the playa stage further, and secured for the game a world audience.
He is simply holding up a big, juicy sugarplum before the eyes of
the sweet-toothed political children of the business community: now
you see it, now you don't. And what a chuckle for
him
and Gromyko
.as they watch the mouths water!
Just here is the danger, perhaps the greatest danger, for the en–
tire world struggle against communism. The businessmen are shrewd
in their own eyes, and fancy themselves shrewd bargainers. They be–
lieve that a deal can always be made, and they want a deal. What
Stalin is doing is to encourage them to keep that belief and that hope.
Communists, however, do not make deals; they make traps: an oath
to an infidel does not bind. By such tricks as these articles (and
whatever confidental discussions have accompanied them), the com–
munists are tempting the businessmen to look upon the American
"policy of containment" as a bargaining maneuver leading to a gen–
eral deal, a "settlement," instead of as a bridge to the offensive. Come
unto me, Stalin is calling, and you will have abundance of profits,
and peace of political mind. In public he does not add: give me the
time, the materials, and the lack of interference which I need, and
you won't have to worry any longer about a "general settlement."
According to Marxism, these characteristics of businessmen upon
which I have been commenting are, as they put it, "not accidental."
The greed, ignorance, timidity and lack of vision-in short, the in–
effectuality-are, in the Marxian analysis, "inevitable expressions of
the decadence of capitalism." The actions of the business class, the
"capitalists," are determined not by individual choice but by economic
necessities.
Maybe so. Perhaps Marxism is right about the capitalists, or
about most of them.
If
so, and if the businessmen are the predominant
