Another group of parties composed of those who were once socialists constitutes the so-called 'Centre'. Persons of this trend are said to form the 'Centre' because they waver between the communists on one side and the jingo socialists on the other. Of this complexion are: in Russia, the left mensheviks under the leadership of Martov ; in Germany, the ' independents' (the Independent Social Democratic Party), under the leadership of Kautsky and Haase; in France, the group led by Jean Longuet; in the USA, the Socialist Party of America, under the leadership of Hilquit; in Great Britain, part of the British Socialist Party, the Independent Labour Party; and so on.
At the outset of the war the centrists advocated the defence of the fatherland (making common cause in this matter with the traitors to socialism), and they opposed the idea of revolution. Kautsky wrote that the 'enemy invasion' was the most terrible thing in the world, and that the class struggle must be postponed until everything was over. In Kautsky's opinion, as long as the war lasted, there was nothing whatever for the International to do. After the conclusion of 'peace', Kautsky began to write that everything was now in a state of such great confusion that it was no use dreaming about socialism. The reasoning amounts to this. While the war was on, we must drop the class struggle, for it would be useless, and we must wait until after the war; when peace has come, there is no use thinking about the class war, for the imperialist war has entailed general exhaustion. It is plain that Kautsky's theory is an avowal of absolute impotence, that it is calculated to lead the proletariat utterly astray, and that it is closely akin to rank treason. Worse still, when we were in the very throes of revolution, Kautsky could find nothing better to do than to raise the hunt against the bolsheviks. Forgetting Marx's teaching, he persisted in a campaign against the proletarian dictatorship, the Terror, etc., ignoring the fact that in this way he was himself assisting the White Terror of the bourgeoisie. His own hopes would appear to be now those of the ordinary pacifist; he wants courts of arbitration, and things of that sort. Thus he has come to resemble any bourgeois pacifist you care to name.
Although Kautsky's position is to the right of the Centre, we choose him as an example rather than another because his theory is typical of the centrist outlook.
The chief characteristic of centrist policy is the way in which it wobbles between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. The Centre is unsteady on its legs; wants to reconcile irreconcilables; and at the critical moment betrays the proletariat. During the Russian November Revolution, the Russian Centre (Martov & Co.) vociferated against the use of force by the bolsheviks; it endeavoured to 'reconcile' everybody, thus actually helping the White Guards, and reducing the energy of the proletariat in the hour of struggle. The mensheviks did not even exclude from their party those who had acted as spies and plotters for the military caste. In the crisis of the proletarian struggle, the Centre advocated a strike in the name of the Constituent Assembly against the dictatorship of the proletariat. During Kolchak's onslaught, some of these mensheviks, solidarizing themselves with the bourgeois plotters, raised the slogan, 'Stop the civil war' (the menshevik Pleskov). In Germany the 'independents' played a treacherous part at the time of the rising of the Berlin workers, for they practised their policy of 'concilation' while the fight was actually in progress, and thus contributed to the defeat. Among the independents there are many advocates of collaboration with the Seheidemannites. But the gravest charge against them is that they refrain from the advocacy of a mass rising against the bourgeoisie, and that they wish to drug the proletariat with pacifist hopes. In France and Britain, the Centre 'condemns' the counter-revolution; it 'protests' in words against the crushing of the revolution; but it displays utter incapacity for mass action.
At the present time the centrist group does quite as much harm as do the jingo socialists. The centrists, sometimes spoken of as the Kautskyites, are attempting, like the jingo socialists, to reanimate the corpse of the Second International and to 'reconcile' it with the communists. Unquestionably, a victory over the counter- revolution is impossible without a definite breach, and without a decisive struggle against them.
The attempts to revive the Second International took place under the benevolent patronage of the robber League of Nations. For, in fact, the jingo socialists are faithful supporters of the decaying capitalist order, and are its very last props. The imperialist war could never have continued to rage for five years but for the treachery of the socialist parties. Directly the period of revolution began, the bourgeoisie looked to the socialist traitors for help in crushing the proletarian movement. The sometime socialist parties were the chief obstacle in the way of the struggle of the working class for the overthrow of capitalism. Throughout the war, every one of the traitor socialist parties echoed all that the bourgeoisie said. After the peace of Versailles, when the League of Nations was founded, the remnants of the Second International (the Centre as well as the jingo socialists) began to re-echo all the slogans uttered by the League of Nations. The League accused the bolsheviks of terrorism, of violating democracy, of Red imperialism. The Second International repeated the accusations. Instead of engaging in a decisive struggle against the imperialists, it voiced the imperialist war-cries. Just as the various parties of socialist traitors had supported the respective bourgeois administrations, so did the Second International support the League of Nations.