THE LENINIST MYTH OF IMPERIALISM
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domestic market as regards peaceful consumption. The need for
outside purchase of supplies for the people and for the plants, the
wish to include in the plan a territory as vast as possible, would have
persisted. In short, the contradiction between the essence of modern
economy and
national
socialism, between political nationalism and
the industrial system, would not have been overcome, and this
contradiction is the ultimate cause of the suicide of Europe.
This contradiction, as we have seen, is not the source of the
First World War; it emerged only during the struggle. A traditional
conflict was amplified into a superwar because of the weapons that
industry put at the disposal of the combatants. In the years preceding
1939, the contradiction became more acute. The disturbances that
followed the war, the depression of 1929, had thrown the states back
upon the expedients of controlled trade, of planning in isolation from
world economy. National Socialism marked the extreme form of this
falling back on intranational resources. This structure was not based
on peaceful international trade, nor on the peaceful coexistence of
empires. Although the motives of the protagonists were political,
although the conqueror was inspired by will to power, Europe, be–
fore the Hitlerian adventure, was torn by an absurd status. The
European nations are not a rational framework for planned economy.
Modern industry and militarism have always been associated
throughout the centuries of their simultaneous flowering. Although
none of the fundamental discoveries that made the industrial revolu–
tion possible seems to have been occasioned by military needs, such
discoveries have often accelerated progress or given rise to improve–
ments in manufacturing methods. Assembly-line production in metal–
lurgy and textiles was partly the effect of military requirements, and
at the same time it determined the character of the battles.
Current expressions emphasize the analogies between the style
of modern industry and that of the army. Armies tear away thou–
sands, hundreds of thousands, and finally millions of men from a
communal, organic mode of life, and subject them to a hierarchy
organized in accordance with the sole imperative of collective ac–
tion and performance. Industry gives rise to a similar process. Factory
discipline is not the same as the discipline of the barracks; the worker,
outside his shop, continues to have a family life. Nevertheless there is
