Today millions of workers are squaring ap to the Tory Government in the fight against Phase 3 and tens of millions more are being dispatched by Heath & Co, for a two-day a week holidayon the dole queue. In the debate on how to deal with this new attack the past experience of the workers" movement in its struggle against capitalist dass rule can allow us to subject various plans and theories to the soundest test of all -that of practical experience.
That is why the last two issues of Red Weekly have looked in some detail at an important phase of British working class history - the the powerful Triple Industrial Alliance of the railway workers, miners, and transport Many changes have taken place in capitalism between the 1920's and 1970'%. The economic an after World War Il was-on a far larger scale and lasted much longer than any of its pedecesson. But just as the most dressed up adle remains at heart a dog, so British ciety continues to follow the fundamental ras of capitalism, The boom is over, and i British ruling class once again finds itself particularly disadvantageous economic so it a cra-ridden world economy. in 1921 it has one solution attack the won by the working class in a more crous era. Once again a showdown with wotkers" movement is on the cards.
at all big battles are preceded by smaller skirmishes as the opposing sides jockey for position and tactical advantage, Many of the concessions to the miners and the imposition of the 3-day woek-suggests that the Tories may have decided to make 1974 their version of Lloyd George's 1921. This makes it all the more urgent for us to study and understand the experience of the Triple Alliance. Right-wing bureaucrat J.H. Thomas...
the river. in the land. Of course, like all bureaucrats, to his policies would have been stimulated. Instead he stayed, taking a deft left turn"
class unity as in 1919, it meant selling the miners down From the very beginning the Triple Alliance was caught in the dilemma of being a powerful instrument for "direct action" which counted among its leaders the most dedicated enemies of the direct expression of working class might Thomas was crafty: If he had just walked out of the Triple Alliance his influence would have been weakened and opposition within the NUR whenever necessary, to carry, out his tundamental role of wrecking and destroying working But the left-wing leaders of the Triple Alliance VS - men like Ernest Bevin and the miners' leaders were in no position to undermine Thomas" influence, because they did not fundamentally disagree with him. They were more prepared than he to use their industrial power for limited objectives-to alter a particular Government policy or win economic demands -but they were equally reluctant to challenge the power of the Government as a whole-to threaten its right to govern. Thus when Thomas condemned the threat of general strike action as a challenge to the Government and Parliament, rather than replying "That it is-and that is how we can best advance the interests of the working class', the "lefts" hung their heads and tried to deny that any such challenge was intended Nor is the situation any different with today's
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orate worker no mer, when the struggles the workers" movement were dominated by