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ARTISAN REVIEW
order throughout the country, and thereafter protect these from both
left and right.
Schleicher miscalculated, for on that Sunday the KPD yielded the
Biilowplatz to the SA and the SS. While the eyes of everyone in Ger–
many were on that square in those hours, the Nazi formations were able
to parade unscathed with their flags and show the world that they had
nothing to fear from the present and everything to expect from the im–
mediate future - namely, complete control of Germany.
The KP had not only refrained from mobilizing, let alone deploy–
ing, the armed units of the red front-line veterans' association, but it had
also strictly prohibited Communists from doing anything that might
teach the Nazis that they were unwelcome intruders in that residential
neighborhood. The Party had forced its members and sympathizers to
play dead.
It must be borne in mind that even in periods of great calm, during
the years of prosperity and political tranquility, the KPD had continually
requested its members, and in fact all German workers, to be ready for an
uprising that might not break out immediately but would come by the
day after tomorrow. In 1929, when the May Day parade was prohibited,
the KP engaged in bloody fights, erected barricades in the Neukolln and
Wedding districts, and thoughtlessly and unsuccessfully proclaimed a gen–
eral strike. However, the closer the aCid test came, the more frequently
the Party contented itself with politically meaningless defensive actions
and acts of violence. To be sure, the capitulation of January 22 could
hardly have been justified even if it had been an episode in the bloody
clashes between the Nazis and the Communists, but as it was, no one
could doubt that the capitulation of the KP was a political fact of the
greatest significance.
A few days later, on Wednesday, January 25, a protest demonstra–
tion organized by the Party took place in which not only Communists
but also Social Democrats and politically unaffiliated people participated.
There were thousands of us who slowly moved through the streets on
that dark-gray afternoon. There should have been tens or hundreds of
thousands, but this time, after Sunday's capitulation, many stayed home
because they could not believe that such a demonstration was meaningful
or useful. There was no lack of aggressive slogans that were vociferously
repeated, particularly at street corners, and directed against all enemies -
Schleicher, the police, all traitors, the henchmen of the brown murderers,
and so forth.
The wind blew harder and harder and took the breath of the
screamers away, which decreased the volume rather than the frequency of
their shouts. There were fewer young people among us than usual; the
