Page Wour PEOPLE’S ADVOCATE The Steps To China’s Marching .... HE key question in the struggle for the unity of China is the “remarriage,” as it is termed in the Chinese press, of the Kuomintang and the Com- munist party. The Koumintang is the politi cal apparatus and governmental power of the Chinese national bourgeoisie — industrial, banking, merchant, and landlord; the Communist party is the party of the proletariat and the poorest peasantry. National unity would mean the agreement of September 24, | BOOKS 2 WORTH STAGE AND .- READING 40,000 -AGAINST THE ARCTIC——-H. P. Smolka. Morrow. $3.50. Reviewed by Edwin Seaver in The Sunday Worker, New York 7HVHE Polar explorer, Stef- ansson, once called the far north, “the friendly Arc- tic.” This seemed a pleasant, but rather vague phrase to me when I first came across it. But I have just finished H. P- Smolka’s 40,000 Against the Arctic and now I begin to realize what Stefansson meant. The Soviet Union has learned how to woo the vast frozen stretches that were enee thought uninhabitable and barren, and how to win the now fertile Arctic as an ally of the great Socialist commonwealth of peoples. The USSR has iInade Stefansson’s vivid phrase a living reality. Here, under Socialism, all is planned, thoughtful, scientific; all is accomplished, not at the expense of the natives, but for their benefit and with their full co-operation; all is won, not by warring against man, but by taming nature. it is the proud claim of Socialism that it brings not death and a sword, but life and the light of humanity, and nowhere, better than in the Soviet Arctic, can we see how this is accomplished. e MOKA is a London journalist. One day in 1935 he received an invitation from the Soviet Am- pbassador to meet Professor Otto Wulievitech Schmidt, chairman of the Northern Sea Route Admini- stration at the Council of People's Gommissars. “Schmidt spoke of the Arctic,” he writes, “as Rhodes would have spoken of South Africa or as an eighteenth-century pioneer of Am- erica, as a land of promise. ‘We held out to us a prospect of wealth and beauty beyond dream —a prospect that, he said, was to - bea reality, waiting at last to yield its virgin pride to man, now that he has armed himself with the Jatest technical inventions.” Afterward, Smolka said to Schmidt: “Do you think, Profes- sor, that an unbiased observer without party tickets, and a lay- man as far as Polar science is concerned, would find the same picture if he were to visit your realm?” “Why don’t you go and sce for yourself?” answered Professor Schmidt. e © Smolka went and 40,000 Against the Arctic is the _glowing, enthusiastic, immensely readable and thrilling story he has prought back. What excellent and salutary reading his report makes in this day of Fascist pirates and murderers. What he saw on nis trip, and what he writes about with human keen observation and excellent good humor, was previewed that afternoon at the Soviet Embassy by Professor Schmidt's informal tall. The whole northern coast of Asia belongs to the USSR. “We own half the Polar basin, half of 4ll the shores of the World’s Arc- tic Sea, 6,000 miles of it- There is coal, oil, gold, silver, platinum, nickel and plenty of other valu- able metals underneath the ice, precious tin, delicious fish and excelient timber. “Our largest rivers flow north jnto the icebound sea. --- “They are the longest rivers of Asia. We are going to take products up and down these rivers, change them over to ocean vessels at their mouths, and thereby establish communication from Europe and America, the Pacific and Atlantic to Siberia, which was formerly regarded 4s the backyard of Asia.” e BANWHLLE the Polar towns are growing rapidly. Igarka has 20,000 inhabitants in summer, 12,000 the year around. As in other Soviet cities, the people have their cinemas and their theatres, dance- halls, restaurants, ixindergartens and clubs. And the Polar settle- ments are linked by air lines—a fleet of over one hundred Arctic planes, 10,000 miles of regular pas- senger service. A million pioneers now live in this great region. Probably an- other million will go to live and work there. ' We are greatly concerned with cultural work for the Arctic natives,” Professor Schmidt said. “before the revolution they were on the verge of dying out. Now their birth-rate increases again. We shall save them. Their eultural Jevel will rise as we give them modern methods and instruments of production. They will be the future masters of this great do- main.” Compare this last statement with the brutal truth of capitalist imperialist exploitation, where modern methods and instruments of production have been used to rob the natives of their heritage and eventually to stamp them out. Smolka was persuaded by what Professor Schmidt told him to go and see for himself. He went, he saw, and he was conquered by the truth, and beauty, and grandeur of what the Soviet peoples are ac- eomplishing in the Arctic. And out of his experiences he has writ ten one grand little book. all these class forces for the definite goa] of achieving China’s sovereignty in the face of the country’s danger of complete In China it is no longer asked: Will the Kuomintang and the Communist party form 2 united front? The issue is put more speci- fically: When will they unite, un- der what terms, and with what consequences? The first phases of ycuomintang-Communist collabora- tion began soon after the events at Sian. The future must witness further cooperation, affecting, as it does, 450,000,000 people. Collaboration of the Communists and the Kuomintang cannot be a formal organizational move- Based en fundamental political objec- tives, it has a definite goal. Joint action of the two great political groups of Ghina will strengthen China as a nation, will imcerease its power of defense and offense against its main enemy, and will raise the potentiality of its social progress, Such national unification would be an important stage in the real- ization of the democratic revolu- tion. All efforts that would make China strong, independent and pro- sressive harmonize with the ob- jective of Chinese national unity. Ultimately the. purpose of uni- fication must be the preparation of China to oust the Japanese in- vader and to free the conquered territory. WE terms and conditions or Kuomintang-Communist wun- derstanding” will not develop sche- matically, without difficulties, zg- zags, and partial failures. Unity is not based on capitulation of the Communists toe an unchanged pol- icy of the Fquomintang. Lhe co- operation of national-minded Chi- nese for the common goal of pre-_ serving China’s integrity assumed two-sided concessions. : The Kuomintang, because of its historical war against the Commu- nists, wanted publicly to have these concessions, at least in the jnitial stages, appear as face-saving as possible. The Communists did not make any mystery about their willingness to make concessions for the objective of attaining na: tional unity. ‘ To the Communists, gauging their present program of land re- form, Sovietization, and immediate prosecution of the class struggle jn China to the main anti-imperial— ist goal of national unification is not a surrender of their revolution- ary goal; rather, they see it as the shortest road to the attainment of the Gommunist party program at the present historical stage of the Chinese revolution. * ISCUSSING the concessions made by the Chinese Commu- mists to achieve national unity, Wang Ming, Chinese representa- tive on the Executive Committee of the Communist International], wrote: “Jn agreeing to transferm the Red Army into a Wational Revo- jutionary army, and the Soviets into widely democratic organs of government, in agreeing to give up the confiscation of the Jandowners’ estates, ete., the Communist party: of China took as its starting-point the estimate of the actual situa- tion which had come about in China—that is, the fact of the erowing activity of Japanese miuli- farism and its agents jn China and the real danger of the Ghinese peo- ple becoming subjected to complets colonial enslavement.” National unity, with the defeat of Japanese aggression, would re- move the most reactionary Ppres- sure against China’s progressive development. There can be 10 dis- cussion, the Chinese Communists maintain, of the future develop- ment of the Chinese revolution, without the solution first of the problem of Japanese invasion. De- feat of the greatest and most threatening jmperialist invader would, in fact, put China in the strongest position in her history. Tt would mark the end of the cycle of foreign invasion- China would then treat on @ vastly dif- ferent level with all other powers. Moreover, the very Process of the struggle for the achievement of national integrity would be ac- companied by the necessary denio- cratic awakening of the people to arouse China to that degree of self-sacrifice and heroism MNeces- sary to wrest the victory from Japan- The majority of China’s popu- Jace, comprising workers, peasants, small Jandlords and merchants, would put their indelible stamp on all social reform that would in- evitably accompany the achieyve- ment of national unification. With national unity, the whole question ef China’s social problems—demo- eratic, agraria, labor, national eco- nomic—would be more urgently the order of the day. Since an inseparable condition of national unification, agreed to A Woman's HE controversy caused by the new Divorce Bill in England is not over yet. Changes affected Divorce Bill by, the new law C troy 2 include divorce ontreversy obtainable on the grounds of cruelty, desertion and insanity. Demands that habitual drunkenness and life imprison- ment be accepted as grounds are being heard, and the Divorce Law Reform Union is asking for “addi- tional facilities for reasonable and equitable divorce.” The Church of England refuses to accept the new divorce laws by. both Gommunists and the most progressive sections of China’s na- tionalists, is the adoption of a democratic constitution, the estab- lishment of a parliament and dem- ocratic safeguards, all the press- ine agrarian and labor questions would of necessity be brought to the fore. ‘ Weither is there a Chinese Wall between the ultimate achieveinent of national liberation, democracy and economic and cultural progress in China and the question of Ghina’s development towards So- Cialism. * UCH confusion and misunder- standins have been created by publication of the Kuomintange’s terms for collaboration with the Communists in the national united front. The proposals adopted by the Kuomintang after the Sian events were as follows: 1. Abolition of the* Red Army and its incorporation into the command under Nanking author- ity. 2. Unification of state power in the bands of the Central govern- ment and the dissolution of the so-called Chinese Soviet Republic and other organizations detri- mental to government unity. 8. Cessation of the Communist propaganda, and 4. Stoppage of the class struggle. The Communist response to points 1 and 2 was made unmis- takably clear. The reply is well summarized by Edgar Snow, Am-— erican newspaper correspondent, in his interview ‘with Mao Tse- tune. “In Conversation with various Soviet functionaries,’ writes Snow, “T was assured that the Soviet government might agree to change the name of the Soviets, as well as that of the Red Army. On the Jatter’s banners already the in- scription has been altered from Workers: and Peasants’ Red Army to ‘Chinese People’s Anti- Japanese’ Vanguard Red Army.’ “Tt has been suggested in in- formal ‘Red-White’ talks that the Soviet districts might change their name to ‘Experimental Area’ or ‘Special Administrative Districts.’ Generally there seems to be a will- ineness among the Communists to make such changes in nomen- clature as might facilitate an agreement, but not fundamentally affect the independent role of the Communist party and the Red Army.” K ie a united nation the Chinese Communists have declared they would abide by the democratic jaws and the will of the people, giving their support to a parlia- mentary form of representative government and its recognized civil and military authorities. The Chinese Soviets would become an integral part of such a central gov- ernment. The Red Army would be subordinated to the command of the central government authorities for the aims of national unifica- tion. The fate of the Soviet revolution- ary land laws would be settled on the basis of local rights of a con- stitutional mature and by negotia- tion and discussion with the central government. So far as attacks upon the Kuo0- mintange are concerned, after na- tinal unity there would be a ces- sation of Communist propaganda in this sense; but under the demo- eratie rights of free speech, free press and iree assemblage all Chi- nese political groups, would re- tain the right independently to ad- voeate political {transformation along the line of their program, and is fighting vigorously against any further changes. Tt is) BALTIC DEPUTY: Fine Soviet Picture about an old professor. of plant physiology, ostracized by his old friends, who found his great- est happiness ‘teaching the revo- lutionary workers and peasants. STAGE DOOR: Rewrite of Broadway show by Edna Ferber and George S. Kaufman. Has some good points, chiefly Ginger Rogers, Katherine Hepburn and Adolphe Menjou. Bright dialogue. PRISONERS — Globe The- atre, Sept. 27 for One Week. 7QNHE much talked-of GPU 2 eo —the Soviet secret police—has been described as all things by all men. Now, for the first time on any screen, the methods of the GPU are to be seen in “Prisoners.” Based on materials supplied by the prisoners themselves, this un- usual screen drama tells the story of the thousands of criminals who built the great White Sea-Baltic Canal while in the prison camps of the GPU. The GPU pfisons, the picture reveals, have neither cells nor bars. The prisoners live in bar- racks, and wear ordinary clothes. Men and women prisoners are di- vided into separate barracks, of course, but they may and do mingle freely while at work and while resting. The prisoners are placed on their honor, and may, as in the case of Engineer Sadov- ski, a convicted suboteur, bring their wives or mothers to the camp to live with them. The camp was established by the GPU on the White Sea during the White Sea-Baltic Canal con- struction, described in ‘Prison- ers,” had an enviable record in the field of human rePabilitation. Scores of former criminals, work-— ing on the construction project when their terms ended, remained at work as volunteer workers with regular pay. Many of the outstanding workers, convict and regular worker alike, received bonuses and awards from the Soviet government for their ef- forts. The particular prison camp which “Prisoners” deals with, Belomor, was the subject of a book written: by a group of thirty-four writers led by Maxim Gorky. The writers interviewed the prisoners, wrote them up, and then combined their results in one large report. The Soviet dramatist WN. Pogodin, wrote the play “Aristo- erats,’ on materials taken from this report on Belomor. The play ran for over three years. and was then turned into the picture, “Prisoners” by its author. Also on the program will be a 10-minute travellogue of modern Russia, “USSR on the Screen.” THE ROAD BACK—Beacon Theatre, Sept. 24; One Week. ee NIVERSAL has 5 changed the ending, so that Ernest (John King) is re-united with the girl he loved before the war, who, in the first version, turned him down. They vow to forget war and bring up their children to know nothing but peace. The film closes with flashes of men march- ing, and war budgets increasing all over the world. Despite an end- ing which is still weak, the picture is moving and well worth seeing.” This is how the New Film Al- liance sums of *‘The Road Back,” stirring sequel to Remarque’s “All Quiet on the Western Front.” A powerful indictment of war, “The Road Back” has received the praise of critics everywhere. Tt shows the bitter disillusionment of millions of German soldiers who believed the armistice to be the end of war, only to find otherwise. Filmed with a cast running into +housands, there are some strik- ing mass Scenes. Through it runs the story of a young soldier who, “had his youth been peaceful and without interruption, then he would have bad many things fa- miliar and dear to him that would have grown up with him. .-- and that now would have sustained and kept him. “But all that was broken into pieces and when he returned he had nothing; his repressed youth, his pagged desires, his hunger for home and affection then cast him blindly upon this one human being he supposed he loved. And when that was all shattered he knew of nothing but to shoot; he had been taught nothing else.” “The Road Back” will be shown in conjunction with 27> excellent stage show featuring five all-star acts of Hastern circuit vaudeville. BR ees