Letter to Ferdinand Lassalle, April 6, 1854

Author(s) Karl Marx
Written 6 April 1854


First published in: F. Lassalle. Nachgelassene Briefe und Schriften, Bd. III, Stuttgart-Berlin 1922
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 39


MARX TO FERDINAND LASSALLE

IN DÜSSELDORF

London, 6 April 1854 (You know the address)

Dear Lassalle,

Your letter of 7 March safely received. I should like to make a few comments, firstly on your military, and secondly on your diplomatic, VIEWS.

ad 1. To my comment[1] regarding Enos and Rodosto, you reply—agreeing in this with the English ministerial papers—that Constantinople must be protected.[2] If the two fleets in the Black Sea and the Army of the Danube cannot protect it, then neither can 100,000 French and English. I do not, of course, deny that, if they are to be launched against Sevastopol or Odessa, they are closer to hand at Rodosto than in Malta or Toulon.

The notion that a move into Serbia would place the Austrians 'in the rear of the Turkish Army of the Danube' does not seem to me quite correct. The Austrians must make their crossing at Belgrade or not very far below it, or else enter Wallachia via Mehadia along the left bank of the Danube. In the first case they would find themselves in the extension of the Turkish left wing, in the second to the front of it. That this would mean the immediate sacrifice of Kalafat and Vidin, with the exception of the garrison which would remain there, is evident—but not that this Turkish left wing would be lost and its remnants compelled to fall back on the Shumla line. Au contraire[3] , the correct tactics for the Austrians would be to march immediately on Sofia via Nissa, hence the correct tactics for the Turks would be to withdraw from Vidin, likewise to Sofia. Not having so far to go, they would be there before the Austrians and could either make a stand in the Balkans or withdraw towards Adrianople.

Should the Austrians allow themselves to be enticed into marching on Vidin, the Turks would still make for Sofia. This division of Omer Pasha's principal corps would not involve the fragmentation of his forces, since the new enemy would necessitate a new Adrianople-Sofia-Belgrade-Vidin operational line. Thus the Turkish left wing would become an independent army.

Should the strategy you postulate be adopted in spite of all this, no amount of falling back on the Shumla line would avail, for the latter, having already been outflanked as a result of the sacrifice of the highway from Belgrade to Constantinople, would have to be abandoned all the more precipitately in order to assemble all available reserves at Adrianople and advance against the first enemy to pass through the Balkans.

ad 2. Ad vocem[4] Palmerston. Your view of Palmerston is the one prevailing on the Continent and among the liberal majority of the English public.[5] As for myself, I am of the unalterable opinion that Palmerston—en passant Princess Lieven paid his debts for him in 1827, Prince Lieven got him into the FOREIGN OFFICE in 1830 and Canning, on his deathbed, told people to beware of him—is a Russian agent. I came to this conclusion after the most conscientious and painstaking scrutiny of the whole of his career and, indeed, of the 'Blue Books', the 'Parliamentary Debates' and the pronouncements of his own diplomatic agents.[6] Though far from amusing and very time-consuming to boot, the work has proved rewarding in so far as it provides the key to the secret diplomatic history of the past 30 years.—(En passant. Some of my Tribune articles on Palmerston have again been reprinted in London as separate pamphlets in 50,000 copies.[7] )

Palmerston is no genius, a genius would not lend himself to such a role. But he is a most talented man and a consummate tactician. His artistry does not lie in serving Russia, but rather in contriving to maintain the role of a 'TRULY ENGLISH MINISTER' while so engaged. The only difference between him and Aberdeen is that Aberdeen serves Russia because he doesn't understand her, while Palmerston serves her although he does. Hence the first is Russia's avowed partisan, the second her secret agent, the first gratis, the second in return for fees received. Even if he himself now wished to do so, he could not turn against Russia because he is at her mercy and must live in constant fear of being immolated in Petersburg. This is the man who in 1829 condemned Aberdeen's policy as not pro-Russian enough,[8] who was told by Robert Peel in the House of Commons[9] that he didn't know whose representative he was, who sacrificed the Poles in 1831, who imposed the Treaty of Unkiar-Skelessi on the Porte in 1833,[10] who abandoned the Caucasus and the Danube estuary to Russia in 1836, who engineered the treaties of 1840 and 1841[11] and a new Holy Alliance against France, who conducted the Afghan War in the Russian interest,[12] who, in 1831, 1836 and 1840, paved the way for the incorporation of Cracow, only to protest against it in 1846, etc.[13] No matter what he engaged in, he worked against his country's commercial interests on the pretext of protecting them. E.g., in the matter of Neapolitan sulphur.[14] He frustrated advantageous trade agreements which were about to be ratified with France. This is the man who delivered up Italy and Hungary.[15] Had he merely worked against revolutionary peoples, it would have been understandable. But in questions involving exclusively British interests, he invariably contrived in the most subtle manner to betray these to Russia. Incidentally, people here are beginning to understand him. Looking forward to hearing from you soon,

Your

K. M.

  1. ↑ Marx's reply to Lassalle written between 10 February and 7 March has not been found
  2. ↑ See also this volume, p. 419
  3. ↑ On the contrary
  4. ↑ as for
  5. ↑ Marx refers to Lassalle's letter of 7 March 1854 (on it see this volume, p. 419). On Palmerston Lassalle wrote in particular: 'True, Palmerston never deserved—not by a long shot—the totally usurped reputation which he enjoys, and has lately been even more primitive than before; but neither is he a Russian agent, at least not consciously. His attitude I can best describe to you in the words he said to a friend of his as early as December: Je veux la Russie, je ne dis pas ruiner, mais lui donner un soufflet pour toute sa vie! [I want—I don't say to destroy Russia—but to give it a slap in the face that it would remember for ever!] 'It is a fact that he pressed for war from December, etc., and answered every objection that Russia could not concede this or that with "Tant mieux!" ["All the better!"]' (F. Lassalle. Nachgelassene Briefe und Schriften herausgegeben von Gustav Mayer. Band III. Der Briefwechsel zwischen Lassalle und Marx. Stuttgart-Berlin, 1922, S. 73)
  6. ↑ K. Marx, 'Lord Palmerston'.
  7. ↑ About 16 December 1853 the London publisher Tucker published anonymously the pamphlet Palmerston and Russia in Tucker's Political Fly-Sheets, No. 1 (a reprint from the Glasgow Sentinel) (see Note 541). The pamphlet reproduced the article of the same title published in the New-York Daily Tribune on 4 November 1853, the second in this newspaper's publication of Lord Palmerston. The second edition of Palmerston and Russia, referred to here, was issued with Marx's participation in early February 1854. Marx made some amendments and additions on the basis of the People's Paper publication. On how the whole series of articles Lord Palmerston was written and published see this volume, Note 436, and present edition, Vol. 12
  8. ↑ Palmerston, [Speech in the House of Commons on 1 June 1829,] G. H. Francis, Opinions and Policy of the Right Viscount Palmerston, London, 1852, pp. 123-26.
  9. ↑ Probably Robert Peel's Speech in the House of Commons on 16 February 1830, ibid., p. 138.
  10. ↑ The Unkiar-Skelessi treaty of defensive alliance was concluded by Russia and Turkey on 8 July (26 June) 1833. It provided for mutual aid in the event of war with a third power. A secret article of the treaty freed Turkey from the obligation to give military aid to Russia in return for an undertaking to close the Straits to all foreign men-of-war on Russia's demand
  11. ↑ London Convention of 15 July 1840 on support for the Turkish Sultan against the Egyptian Pasha Mohammed Ali and to the London Convention of 13 July 1841 which laid down that in peacetime the Straits would be closed to warships of all powers
  12. ↑ The First Anglo-Afghan war (1838-42) was launched by Britain with the aim of colonising Afghanistan but ended in Britain's defeat
  13. ↑ This refers to the stand taken by Palmerston as Foreign Secretary on the problem of Cracow which, according to the Vienna Treaty of 1815, was considered a free city. In Parliament and the press Palmerston passed himself off as 'a friend of Poland' but in fact betrayed its interests when in 1840 the population of Cracow protested against the unlawful occupation of that city by Austrian troops since February 1836 and when in November 1846, after the suppression of the national liberation uprising in Cracow, Austria, Prussia and Russia signed an agreement on the annexation of Cracow to the Austrian Empire. Marx exposed Palmerston's actions in his pamphlet Lord Palmerston (see present edition, Vol. 12, pp. 358-70)
  14. ↑ In 1838 the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies granted a French company a concession to extract sulphur in Sicily. In April 1840 the British Government, referring to the treaty of 1816 which forbade Naples to grant other countries commercial privileges infringing British interests, ordered its Mediterranean fleet to open hostilities and compelled Naples to cancel its agreement with the French company
  15. ↑ Marx refers to the attitude of the Whig Government, in which Palmerston held the post of Foreign Secretary, towards Italy and Hungary during the 1848-49 revolution