LETTERS TO TIM EDITOR
(Correspondents are requested to keep their letters as brief as is reasonably possible. The most suitable length is that of one of our " News of the Week" paragraphs. Signed letters are given a preference over those bearing a pseudanym.—Ed. THE SPECTATOR.] -
FASCISM -UNVEILED
[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.]
Sia,—Mr. Fortescue-Brickdale refers me to the 1933 report of the Commercial Counsellor to the British Embassy in Ronie. I wonder if he has read it. I cannot think so. He may have read the introduction, which, as was noted at the time, de-; parted from the tradition of political neutrality by approving the Fascist 'system. But he can hardly have got further than this. If he did, he is not at all wise to recommend the report to critics of that system.
For what is the talc it has to tell ? One of lamentable decline. Workers' wages have fallen, employers' bank- ruptcies have increased in number (there are now 2,000 a month), unemployment has risen. Foreign trade has been halved since 1930. The Public Debt is larger than it was before Mussolini seized power. The 'Budget shows huge deficits (though this, being due to the expenditure on public works, is not important).
That all this is due to Fascism no sane person would con- tend. But it does show that Fascism is far from doing all that is claimed for it by its chief and by his supporters in Britain. As to the Corporate State, Mr. Fortescue-Brickdale confuses the arrangements to prohibit strikes and lock-outs, to abolish workers' freedom, to subsidize industry in some directions (for instance, shipping and shipbuilding) with the bringing to birth of a new economic system.. All these things are familiar ; there is in them nothing significant or new. And if the Corporate State were eight years old already, as Mr. Forteseue-Brickdale claims, why did Signor Mussolini issue about a week ago a decree that it was to start work ?
The statement that " Sir Oswald Mosley includes the British Empire in his Fascist' programme " betrays the total Jack of realism which vitiates the British Fascist argument. Apart from the certainty-that the Dominions and colonies and possessions will have a word-to say,: what proportion of our present export trade does Mr. Brickdale suppose they could provide for ?
They will not supply us with wheat and meat and fruit and tinned salmon and tobacco and the -other commodities on which we so heavily depend, unless we can offer goods that they require in exchange. Is Sir Oswald going to dictate to them as to what they shall accept ? And can he force them to send us their produce ? If not, then my forecast of " a return to eating and clothing ourselves as our ancestors did in the remote past " still holds good.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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