Last Wednesday, I picked up on the Daily Workers reaction to the Fleet Street reporting of the early stages of the London Blitz, publishing as a "taster" a copy of a cartoon which commented on the the game being played by the press.

In this, there is an allusion to the untold story of how, as a matter of deliberate policy, the government refused to provide the people of the East End adequate protection from air raids. But the point of the barb was to draw attention to the fact that the media then actively colluding in suppressing the consequences of that policy, presenting a distorted and entirely untrue picture of events.



Read here...

http://www.eureferendum....ogview.aspx?blogno=83210

When they put their minds to it ... extremely well ...

http://commons.wikimedia...lt&search=hochbunker

http://www.hojobeck.de/hochbunker01.html


Originally, protection was extended to women and children only ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air-raid_shelter

And, of course, Jews were not allowed entry.

There is an interesting gap in that account, and the events leading up to January 1941, where a "People's Convention", sought a "people's peace with the working people of all countries". It was shortly after than that the Daily Worker was banned, the reason for that being to then permit the banning of Communist Party leaflets. The convention itself had been launched on the back of the "shelter war", capitalising on the success of the tubes rebellion.

Undoubtedly, the shelter campaign was quite genuine in its objectives. It stemmed from the Spanish Civil War, and in particular the bombing of Barcelona ...

http://iberianature.com/...he-bombing-of-barcelona/

While the city was used by the Italians and later the Germans as a test-bed for bombing civilian populations, it also became the test-bed for shelter, the city becoming the first ever to provide deep shelters. Since they worked in practice, the British Communists who had seen them in use knew that many of the theoretical objections raised by Anderson and his advisers were wrong-headed.

However, after the Communists had won the battle to occupy the tubes, they then used their success as a platform for more and greater things. That's where the People's Convention of January 1941 came in, one of the objectives being to bring the war to a stop. That much was opportunism. But that worked both ways ... it gave the government the opportunity to restrict the activities of the Communists.

The CPGB was an interesting beast. Scuppered by its dogged compliance with the Third International -- i.e. Stalin's foreign policy -- but yet imbued with that same nonconformist English awkward squad independence so eloquently embodied by our own Dr North. As a long-time lurker at this blog, and a Marxist to boot, I'm a little bit pleased that Richard has discovered this particular strand of convergence.

I'm aware that most readers and commentators here would regard themselves as right wing. However, there's a direct line of descent from William Cobbett to Orwell via Engels which expresses the same rage against plutocracy which informs much of the EUReferendum output.

So, count me as an unlikely fellow traveller.

That would figure as many would have fought in the Spanish Civil War and had first hand experience of being bombed also explains why they had the heads up on the UK government...they knew what was coming.

Perversely enough by trying to stop the war they were actually playing into Hitler's objective of regime change,and a suing for peace.

Orwell, was a remarkable fellow and his penmanship was not half bad either.

Plus, there is a saying which goes, the enemy of my enemy, is my friend.

Welcome friend.

Just had a terrible thought.....in 200 years time when some dicatator has massacred millions in the name of referism,will Dr Richard North be denegrated(or venerated depending on your view) similar to the way Marx or even Mao is today.

Maybe should keep my thoughts to myself.

Edited by user 07 October 2012 18:27:39(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Well I am pretty sure Marx would of been of the same opinion at the time......he'd no doubt be horrified at what has been done in his name.Us humans are pretty good at distorting the message and getting a tad zealous about things whether it be political or religious.

PS Are we giving out badges now?..where can I get one???

The best possible outcome is that Referism is adopted, and no one can remember who started it all.