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It has become almost a tradition that at least once a year the leading editorials in the ethnic Estonian newspapers-in-exile have been asking the same unanswered question all over: why are and have been the Western governments, the banks, and the industrial and business corporations steadily supporting the communist Soviet Union, while totally ignoring the complete lack of freedom, as well as the existence of the numberless forced labor and death camps in that huge country? Are the Western leaders and decision makers publicly declaring themselves to be the protectors of freedom and human dignity, yet at the same time ignoring completely, or pretending to be unaware of what is going on in the Soviet Union, i.e. the mass arrests and murders, the imprisonment for tens of years in the distant slave labor camps? Instead of an answer, the Western press has been carrying warnings from leading personalities, like “Lets not do or say this or that against the Russians, they might get mad!” (For who knows, what they might do to us!) And once very popular political slogan, especially in Canada, also warned us: “Better Red, than dead!” This at a time, when the Soviet military strength was at a low point, compared to the West’s. If the Soviets had started a war, they would have had no chance of winning.
Hiding behind such deceptive reasoning, the Western governments and corporations, if there is too much difference between them, carried on “business as usual” with the Soviets, always very favorable to the Soviet side, including large loans and technical assistance. The ethnic press occasionally has listed some concrete samples of how we had been helping the Soviet Union to build its industrial and even military strength of this potential enemy of ours. Some day we may know, was this due to plain ignorance of the facts, or naivety, or simply stupidity by the Western decision makers.
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Enter Professor A.C. Sutton
In the midsummer of 1949 I met in Toronto a young Englishman named A.C. Sutton, while he was making a stopover in Toronto on his way from England to California, to continue his studies at the California State University. We met on two or three evenings at one of the Yonge Street taverns, which had the reputation of being a meeting place for politicians, news reporters and important personalities. I have forgotten its name, it was a place where a bottle of beer then cost 80 cents, while downtown at Ford Hotel the same bottle was still 15 cents. We met there on two or three evenings. During very lengthy conversations, this young Englishman surprised me again and again with his detailed knowledge of communism, and of everything connected with communism, although he was actually a year younger than myself.
Many years later I met him again briefly, while attending one of his lectures. By that time, he had not only earned himself the title of professor, but he had also been named Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, for his mammoth 3-volume work titled “Western Technology and Soviet Economic Development”, covering in detail the years 1917 to 1965. Arlington House published his book “National Suicide: Military Aid to the Soviet Union” in 1973. In later years his two books, “Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution” and “Wall Street and the Rise of Hitler” were published, which did not please certain bankers and certain industrialists, which Prof. Sutton had named in these books, who in turn tried to cause him difficulties, including the withdrawal of his Research Fellow title — regardless that all of his exhaustive studies had resulted in thoroughly documented data and irrefutable facts. As indicated by the titles of these two books, in these works Prof. Sutton for the first time has shed light on the secret dealings by the bankers of New York, and also on the surprisingly huge investments by the major American industrial corporations into the expected results of the bolshevik revolution in Russia. Also to ensure the success of the communist system during the postrevolutionary years, including its transformation into a great military power.
The suppressed truth
Professor Sutton has also appeared as a lecturer at numerous public gatherings, and from one such occasion I am presenting the following recorded information. We are already living in a socialistic society, stated Prof. Sutton in his introduction. Further, this can be easily discerned by the concealment of the truth, which is an essential component of a socialistic system. Before restraining freedom it is always necessary to restrain truth.
We can set apart three different forms of truth. The first and the dominant form of “truth” is dispersed by the ruling fraction, dominant simply because it is the first, which consists exclusively of that, which our rulers have decided is safe enough to be disseminated to the people, or which they want us to know. The second and popular form of truth consists of revisionism, as disseminated to us through newspapers and other media; which in theory ought to view the first “truth” with criticism, but which in practice is very little different from the first. Thus only the third form of truth is the truthful truth, which ought to be seen as the strongest, but which actually is the weakest. The weakest because it is the last. The people having become disappointed with the first two tend to disbelieve even less the third form.
USA supporting the Bolsheviks
During the year 1917 Russia underwent two revolutions. The first, the March revolution resulted in the overthrow of the then existing czarist regime, and replaced it, for the first time in Russian history, with a constitutional form of government, which however was not given enough time to become fully functional, for this new government was in turn overthrown by the bolsheviks in November of the same year. Documented proof exists that instead of supporting the new constitutional government in Russia in 1917, USA had been supporting the bolshevik revolution, the destroyers of freedom in Russia, whatever little had there existed even under the Czar
In March of 1917 Lenin was in Switzerland, Trotsky in New York. They were the two top operators in the bolshevik revolution. Lenin arrived in Russia with the assistance of the German High Command. The German emperor (Kaiser Wilhelm) was kept unaware of these goings-on. The highest German authority approving this operation was the chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg from a wealthy bankers’ family in Frankfurt.
Trotsky was as good as penniless, but somehow he obtained ten thousand dollars in gold and an American passport, with which he then went aboard the ship “Kristianiafjord” in New York harbour, which was ready to leave for Russia. The ship was detained in Halifax by Canadian naval authorities, and Trotsky together with his retinue was removed from shipboard. Trotsky was declared to be a prisoner of war.
But almost right away this was followed by interference by high officials from Washington and London, and the Canadian authorities were forced to return Trotsky with his retinue back aboard the ship, with apologies. Together with Trotsky the well-known American “red” Lincoln Steffens sailed to Russia, as well as Charles Crane from “Westinghouse Co.”, who was the chairman of the finance-committee of the Democratic Party of USA, and also a personal friend of President Wilson.
The mission from Wall Street
In July of 1917 a certain colonel named William Boyce Thompson, the first permanent director of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, on his own initiative formed a group of select individuals, with himself being the leader of the group, with the stated purpose of going to Russia, as representatives of American Red Cross. In truth, however, the American Red Cross was in no way represented, nor in the least interested in this Thompson’s group. Nor had the Russian government been asking for any assistance from the American Red Cross. But Thompson went ahead, and financed and organized everything by himself.
His group consisted of 30 individuals, but only 6 of them were really doctors. The rest of his group was Wall Street financiers and lawyers. The objective of this group was purely political, its purpose to ensure the success of the revolution, to secure the final victory of bolshevism in Russia. Thompson himself gave the bolsheviks one million dollars from his own pocket for the same purpose. All members of this group had awarded themselves with false military ranks of high officers.
At the same time the American International Corporation, one of the mammoth Wall Street organizations under the control of J.P. Morgan, intervened constantly to hinder any aid shipments to the enemies of bolshevism. According to certain documents in the archives of the British Foreign Office, Thompson and Lamont, the latter from Morgan’s firm, together visited the Prime Minister Lloyd George of Britain. During this just one visit they were able to change the direction of British foreign policy from the former anti-bolshevist line now to a pro-bolshevist direction.
The czar was not murdered?
By the beginning of the year 1918 the bolsheviks had conquered only a fraction of the Russian land, and that mainly around Moscow and Petrograd. These “reds” had been fighting both the “whites” and the “greens”. Not one history book has ever mentioned the “greens”, but all together there were about 70 000 of them, who were actually the original bolsheviks, who had come to the recognition that both Lenin and Trotsky had betrayed their revolution to the great capitalists’ interests. Thereafter these “green” bolsheviks had made an about-turn, and had then, together with the “whites” joined the common fight against t he “reds”. Yet, on account of the constant material support and other assistance from the USA to the “reds”, the latter were finally able to occupy entire Russia.
The myth that the czar and his family had been murdered is nothing but a baseless fabrication, which has been served to us as “the truth”, for certain purposes for decades. This has been proven by the author of a book titled “The Rescue of the Romanoffs” - Guy Richards.
Enter the Soviet Union
In all history books it is attempted to show that on account of the civil war, the entire Russian industry had been brought to ruins. Nothing could be farther from the truth, said Professor Sutton. With the exception of some destroyed factories in Petrograd, the rest of the Russian industry had been merely shut down. The reason having been that from the former middle class of Russia now remained only some remnants. The rest, which had included the industrial management, the engineers, the technical experts and the technicians, the actual operators of the industry, who had wanted no part of bolshevism, had simply fled abroad. So the factories had remained at standstill, with no one left to keep them in operation.
Then, beginning with the 1920’s, foreign firms began to enter Russia offering technical assistance in return for 300-400 various concessions from Russia. These were mostly American and German firms, the latter having been closely connected with the American corporations anyway. From this time onward a base had been established for the further economic and industrial development of Russia, now officially known as the Soviet Union, by the foreign corporations.
The most prominent firms included in the building of the Soviet industry were “Westinghouse”, “General Electric”, “Ford”, and “Standard Oil Corporation”, whose mutual assistance agreements with the bolsheviks earned to these and other Western capitalist corporations many and varied concessions in Russia.
During that period the U.S. State Department actually stood in opposition to such supporting of a potentially future enemy, and wished that the Soviet Union be left alone to find its own way into the future. Quite correctly, it was understood that the Soviet Union in the future could evolve into a great and hostile military power, so why help it along now? — But regardless o any such sober appraisals of the existing possibilities, the American big businessmen were allowed to proceed without obstruction, and to continue building up the Soviet strength.
As the years went by, by the year 1928 the Soviet Union, with the constant help and support of the American businessmen, had reached a level of productivity equal to that existing in 1913 under the czarist government. The Soviet planners now began to devise their so-called Five-Year Plan.
At the same time a massive propaganda-campaign began in America, especially around 1930, praising the supposed “progress” in the Soviet Union highly. This “great socialistic experiment in Russia” was recommended in the media as a “wonderful example” for the rest of the world and — especially for President Roosevelt to follow in his “New Deal” program. It was often described in the newspapers of the time, how a socialist society would be able to carry out all kinds of wonderful accomplishments, far beyond the capabilities of or present free enterprise system, which simply had been unworkable, and its days should be over…
(This reminds me of an article in the “New York Times” on August 10, 1973, wherein none other than David Rockefeller almost in the same words described his impressions during his first visit to Mao Zedong’s communist China, even suggesting that that the economic and the political system over there could be a wonderful example for all other nations to follow. Also, somewhat similar thoughts are known to have been occasionally expressed by Canada’s former Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau. And I recall having seen a certain CBC TV program twice many years ago, wherein the onetime leader of Canada’s NDP Party Tommy Douglas described his visit, also during Mao Zedong’s period in communist China. But when I was expecting to hear some little criticism of that political system, absolutely none was forthcoming. The TV viewer/listener was left with the impression, that everything was just fine inside the communist China. — H.K.)
The Five-Year Plan
It seemed that the Soviet Union had suddenly achieved an amazing industrial capacity during the First and the Second Five-Year Plans at the end of the year 1920, and during the entire following decade to 1930. What the history books do not tell us is just how had all this fantastic result been achieved. It is simply in no way possible; that a backward country, far behind any modern methods and equipment, suddenly begins to construct the most advanced steel mills and automobile factories. The newspapers of the time were full of praise for the Soviet achievements, but they failed to explain how all this had been accomplished.
It really is amazing, how for many years it had been possible to keep it a total secret worldwide, that all this new construction in Russia, including the design, had not been done by the Russians themselves, and certainly not by the bolsheviks or communists, but by the foreign capitalist corporations. Instead, the newspapers reported that the Russians had indeed accomplished everything by themselves, according to them “under the wise guidance of the communist party”. And, of course, Stalin!
This went on during the First Five-Year plan, completed very nearly all by American corporations: General Electric, Ford, Dupont, Foster-Wheeler, Douglas Aircraft, Universal Oil, Badger, Coppers, RCA, Pratt&Whitney, Hercules, United Engineering, McKee Corporation, MacDonald Engineering — and still many other great enterprises were active between the years 1928 and 1933 in building practically the entire Soviet Union… Furthermore, the factories, which they had constructed in Soviet Union, were of much greater industrial capacity, and also technically more advanced, than any which they had constructed elsewhere in the world.
The Second Five-Year Plan, during the second half of the 1930’s decade, was intended for the purpose of bringing all the new industry into full production. By the way, even the entire First Five-Year Plan, as designed by the Russians themselves, turned out useless, so a new Plan had to be designed, this time by Albert Kahn’s industrial architectural firm in Detroit.
The American firm United Engineering constructed a factory capable of producing the longest aluminum plates in the world of airplane quality in Russia early in the 1930’s. This was obviously a very important product at the time, when the all-metal construction of airplanes was just beginning. General Electric constructed a turbine factory for the Russians, which was 2½ times greater than their own factory in Schenectady, USA. Also constructed in Russia were three gigantic tractor (or tank) factories, all together capable of producing more “Caterpillars” and more “Internationals”, than the same firm could have turned out back in USA. Interestingly, the entire world still believes that the Russians were capable of producing all of this by themselves. It is for us to try to figure out, just why did the actual builders, the Western corporations, feel it so necessary to keep such activities a top secret…
The Russians’ own participation in the projects had been minimal, such as manual labour. But never a word about the Western engineering and assistance to the outside world! — And while all this activity was taking place, at the same time millions of Russians were dying in the Siberian concentration and death camps. Were the American firms and corporations in Russia aware of this? Yes, they were, said Professor Sutton. When their engineers and technicians and other employees complained about this, they were told to keep their mouths shut, not to say anything back home, if they wanted to keep their well-paying jobs. So the latter obeyed, for there was depression in America and any kind of jobs hard to find while their bosses were lying to the outside world, saying there were no slave labor camps in Russia.
But such are our manners in this world of ours. There are always the Harrimans, the Hammers, the Morgans and Rockefellers, who are being admired and applauded. But those of us, who strive for human rights for the suppressed, and who present the factual truth over dictatorship, these rare individuals are being insulted and accused. And the academics are running over each other, spreading the same myth and falsehood.
Roosevelt’s “New Deal”
In the early 1930s Bernard Baruch and General Electric’s president Gerhard Swope and their sympathizers were occupied with the completion of the Soviet Five-Year Plan. But at the same time they were also busy elsewhere. Roosevelt’s “New Deal” was not his own, nor his advisers’ idea. It, too, originated with Gerhard Swope. Herbert Hoover was quite correct, when he named it “fascism”, for Roosevelt’s New Deal really was not anything else but fascism, following the same line as Mussolini’s Incorporated State.
Baruch and Swope were both quite busy building up the Soviet Union, while at the same time busily promoting and even financing Roosevelt. And at the same time they were also promoting the rise of Adolf Hitler of Germany. Roosevelt and Hitler both came to power in the early part of the year 1933. Still in existence are certain documents, which prove beyond doubt that large sums of money were being donated by certain corporations to ensure that Hitler would be elected in Germany. It is quite certain, that part of the donated monies was directed into a special “political expense” fund, which was under the control of Rudolf Hess. (Could that be the reason, why after the war Rudolf Hess was held incommunicado in prison, in strictest isolation, until the day when he died? — H.K.) For instance, there is documented proof, that a sum of 60 000 German Reichsmarks had been mailed into the special fund controlled by Hess through the German General Electric Co. At that time, two of the directors of German Electric Co. were Gerhard Swope, and a director of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Owen Young. In 1933 such monetary support had great importance to the National Socialist (Nazi) movement in Germany. For one thing, their street gangs needed to be paid.
Taking a look behind the scenes of history reveals how these gentlemen were promoting the three different forms of socialism at the same time. They were completing the Five-Year Plan in communist Russia. And they were the authors of Roosevelt’s “New Deal”. And they were attempting to boost into power Adolf Hitler in Germany. All three at the same time!
The Lend-Lease
During the entire World War II there was a constant shipping of military supplies and equipment from the West, nearly all American, to the Soviet Union. The operation was known as “lend-lease”, which even included a crooked smoking-pipe for “Uncle Joe Stalin” himself. Altogether the entire losses of their military equipment and material during the war were replaced by the West. Looking from the side of the Soviets, the fact that thereby they had gained an entirely new to them technical horizon had even greater importance. By the year 1946 they had learned to modernize their technical and industrial methods, and were able to construct ordinary machinery, but they still needed foreign technology in order to advance further. This remains so, because every socialist community depending on a preplanned economy is not capable of technological development on their own, and any genuine progress can only arrive from outside.
And so then once again the Western businessmen were ready and willing to go and assist the Soviet Union right away. Such activity began once again in 1950s, and even more in the 1960s. It climaxed during Henry Kissinger’s time. From mining equipment to oil drilling machinery to computers, all were moving steadily into the Soviet Union. Chemical products or equipment was the specialty of Armand Hammer. All motor vehicle factories received their entire installations from the West. And with regard to the atomic energy production in Russia it is well known, that the plans and instructions were stolen and taken to Russia by several Soviet agents. But even more important is the question of how did the Soviets get hold of the necessary technology, especially the highly specialized and a sizable quantity of critical components, without which all the plan and instructions would have been absolutely useless?
All this could have originated only in the USA, or in Switzerland, or in England.
Everything from the West!
General Electric locomotives became standard in Soviet Union. The MIG fighters had Rolls –Royce engines in them, when they were in use during the Korean War. And 67% of the hulls of the Soviet merchant ships had been built in the West. And 80% of the Soviet marine Diesel engines were also built in the West. The other 20% were constructed in Russia, but only under the assistance of the technical assistance agreement. There was no such thing, as a marine Diesel engine built by the Soviets themselves!
The computer technology in Soviet-Union derived from IBM and RCA. A British firm - International Computers - turned over to the Soviets their most advanced computer technology. Why? When the Americans do it, why could not the English also do so? Dunlop tire manufacturers gave their tire manufacturing technology to the Russians. When questioned, why, the answer was, because it is business!
Shortly, all Soviet technology from the year 1917 to the present (i.e. to 1981 — H.K.) had been taken to Russia from the West. This conclusion is the result of a very exacting and highly technical analysis. This work has been criticized, but not a single fact presented here has been disproved.
(Please note again: all of Prof. Sutton’s statements presented in this work originated in the year 1981. H.K.)
Hidden leadership
While Henry Kissinger was still the Secretary of State of USA under presidents Nixon and Ford, a fundamentally new technological horizon was opened up for the Soviet Union, including new economic and other advantages for the communist state. For instance, the loans granted to the Soviet Union carried only a 6 percent rate of interest, while at the same time an ordinary American citizen had to pay 10 to 12 percent. But the greatest nonsensical undertaking, according to Prof. Sutton, was the fact that now USA had become active in building up the military strength of the Soviet Union, knowingly and willingly.
Professor Sutton had observed this phenomenon in the second half of the 1960s, and he named it “the X-factor”, this in the sense that someone somewhere must have been in control of major operations for several decades, always strictly in favor of the Soviet Union. Every attempt to shed light on such hidden power has always met immediately with some form of counteraction from behind the scenes. Instead, there has been a continuous pressure from somewhere to keep on supporting the Soviets at every opportunity. It is most important that we stop turning over our military secrets and sensitive materials over the Soviets.
In the year 1972 Professor Sutton presented the same facts at the Republican Party Committee meeting in Miami Beach, during a short and absolutely factual presentation. And yet the response by the listeners remained hostile. It was intimated that of such things we do not talk, period!
His presentation was kept out from newspapers and other media. Commented Prof. Sutton later: “According to Wall Street Journal, Armand Hammer. (the communist American millionaire-businessman) had donated 100 000 dollars to the Republican Party at the same meeting in Miami Beach.” “As for me,” Sutton had said, “I could not donate anywhere near to that sum…” It does make a difference!
Western technology
It is beyond any doubt that the Soviet Union’s military strength was based on Western technology. And it is obvious, that for the production of military equipment alone, a private enterprise system is not needed. Under the Soviet system, the production follows the predetermined specifications and quantities, regardless of the cost factor. Our industrial output, however, depends first of all on the cost of production, for we have to keep up with our competition. The Soviets have been successful in determining the specifications they need, but then, to complete the project, they have been obtaining the necessary components from the West. With the result that the Soviet warships, the cannons and much else, thanks to Western assistance, have turned out quite effective.
The American pilots returning from Vietnam war swore that the transport columns of the Viet Cong had been put together from Ford trucks. They were right. The trucks had arrived from Russia, from the automobile factory, complete with all equipment built by Ford Co. of USA.
Socialist world government
Beginning in the year 1917 until the present, the Western side has been striving to increase the strength of the Soviet Union, with the objective of turning it into a superior enemy of such strength, that by then very much weaker USA would be forced to surrender completely, giving up any remnant of independence; and furthermore, that it would let itself to be wrapped into a net of economic and financial relations in subjection to a worldwide dictatorship. Such attempts have remained outside the awareness of the American public, having been well hidden. But the planners have met with difficulties. In the April 1974 issue of the “Foreign Affairs” publication an article appeared titled “The Hard Road to a New World Order”, describing some problems around the United Nations organization, the planned centre of the coming socialistic World Government. Other problems seem to increase. The all-out plans seem to have been temporarily halted in favor of smaller regional unit first, which then could be gradually welded together into a large, single World Government… To achieve this result, various means would be put into practice. Such as worldwide propaganda, of course. The increasing worry over the environment and over the world’s resources, reserves. The surplus population, etc. The monetary changeover from the former gold base to paper currency was considered necessary, to allow free fluctuations in inflation, in the value of currency. For hard currency based on gold would not allow the formation of a world government. Unlike paper currency, numbers cannot be printed on gold, and then changed at will.
And, too, it is known that the people and nations do not wish to join very large communities voluntarily.
An early attempt to form a world government was the so-called Marburg Plan in the early years of the twentieth century, “a plan to enforce world peace”. The plan was financed from Andrew Carnegie’s ample financial legacy. The governments of the world, according to this Marburg Plan, were to be socialized, while the ultimate power would remain in the hands of the international financiers “to control its councils and to enforce peace, and to provide a specific for all the political ills of mankind”. But fortunately this plan never materialized.
Russian gold to New York
Estonian readers in particular may be interested to know the following excerpt from Professor Sutton’s book “Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution”, page 159*:
“… Simultaneously it was reported that three ships had left Reval (Tallinn) on the Baltic Sea with Soviet gold destined for the U.S. The “S.S. Gauthod” had loaded 216 boxes of gold under the supervision of Professor Lomonossoff, who was now returning to the United States. The “S.S. Carl Line” had loaded also 216 boxes of gold, under the supervision of three Russian (bolshevik) agents. The “S.S. Ruheleva” was loaded with 108 boxes of gold. Each box contained three poods of gold valued at sixty thousand roubles in gold each. This was still followed by a shipment on the “S.S. Wheeling Mold.”
The “pood” was an old popular measure of weight equal to 16 kilograms, or to 36.13 pounds. Much of the “Soviet” gold was being shipped al to Holland, to Germany and to Norway. This was the gold the bolsheviks had robbed from the Russians arrested and sent to the Siberian Gulags, or simply murdered. Also the gold collected from the banks and from the churches, during and after the bolshevik revolution. The three shiploads of gold that left from the port of Tallinn ended up in New York harbor under the care of the Guaranty Trust Company of New York City.
(*Sutton, Anthony C. “Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution.” Arlington House Publishers, 1981. ISBNO-9594631.)
Postscript
This much from Antony C. Sutton’s lecture. Here are still a couple of notes borrowed from one of his books.
Professor Sutton presents an interesting observation, claiming that both the leftist and the rightist extremists are in reality of the same mentality, namely collectivists, whose common objective is absolute political power over the entire community, and over every individual in that community —meaning a consummate monopoly over everything.
Near the end of the 19th century the Wall Street super-capitalists had already arrived at the conviction that the best of all businesses was the business of politics. Only by means of politics is it possible to ensure absolute monopoly over others. Only by means of politics is it possible to urge everyone else to work for benefit and profit of the monopolist, accompanied by high-sounding phrases promising progress and wellbeing to the entire community…
A major difficulty in understanding correctly the events in recent history is the result of our inveterate habit of accepting without a thought such prejudicial statements, as “antagonism must always stand between the capitalists and the socialists/marxists”. The author of this false doctrine was Karl Marx, and it has fulfilled certain intentions, but the idea itself is in reality absurd. Quite the opposite is true. Between the international political capitalists and the international revolutionary socialists there has always remained a permanent alliance, equally useful to both and well protected from publicity. Both are monopolistically inclined. And both are the bitterest enemies of free enterprise.
As a final thought, as the years have gone by since this was written, the Soviet Union, at least supposedly, no longer exists; but instead we now are dealing with a different “Red” colossus, the communist China. Which seems to fit in very nicely into the same frame, albeit the painting itself is slightly different. — History repeats itself?
H. KORB
(Postscript written in March 2007, added to translation of the original Meie Elu article.)