The battle of cable street

The following article was originally written for the Xekinima website

Today marks the 85th anniversary of what became known as the “Battle of Cable Street”, and is a very apt time to revisit the history and learn the vital lessons from this. Britain first, the far-right organisation have recently re-registered as a political party. Throughout much of the world we have seen both fascist and far right populist organisations emboldened and confident to act often with violence.

[ 23 October 2021 09:28 ] ⁨Glyn Matthews⁩: What became known as the Battle of Cable Street was an attempt by Oswald Mosely and his British Union of Fascists (BUF) to solidify their position by marching through the east end of London in full fascist uniform (the British fascists were known as the blackshirts). This was also a deliberate act of provocation and intimidation. It was estimated that there were 350,000 Jewish people living in Britain at the time with roughly half living in the east end of London. Yiddish was often the lingua franca in many east end communities.

This was in 1936, a time when Hitler was already in power in Germany and where it was already official policy to persecute Jews. Mussolini was in power in Italy and the Spanish Civil war was underway. It was only a few years prior to the outbreak of World War two.

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At the time the Blackshirts had been gaining significant momentum. Two years prior they held a notorious rally in London Olympia with 12,000 in attendance including 2,000 in full uniform ready to attack any opposition which dared to turn up. They claimed to have 40,000 members and had the active support of the Daily Mail, a national daily newspaper.

Had they been able to successfully march through the east end of London unopposed it would have been disastrous for the Jewish community in the east end as well as many other ethnic or religious groups, and also all socialists and trade unionists.

In the lead up to the march the BUF held a series of meetings throughout the east end to whip up hatred towards the Jewish community. There was an immediate response from the community the Jewish Peoples’ Council which started a petition to ban the march, which gained over 100,000 signatures within only two days.

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However, the feeling of the community and rank and file activists was not matched by the leadership. The Jewish hierarchy organised sports day events to try an ensure that Jewish youth were out of the east end on the day of the march. The Labour Party’s George Lansbury, the hero of Poplar council who was jailed for resisting cuts to the poor, wrote: 

“What I want is to maintain peace and order, and I advise people who are opposed to fascism to keep away from the demonstration.”

The Communist Party leadership played an incredibly cynical role. They were in an very powerful position, having a very strong base of support and membership within the east end. Phil Piratin, who later became a CP member of parliament said: 

“If Mosley decides to march, let him. Don’t attempt disorder”. 

The Young Communist League had organised on the same day a rally in Trafalgar Square (central London) in solidarity with the Spanish republic, without the sense of irony that the best possible support for the Spanish republic in the civil war against the fascists was to oppose the fascists on their doorstep.

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Fortunately, opposition from below grew from within the rank and file of the CP, Jewish groups and others like the Independent Labour Party. As a result, on the day of the march 300,000 emptied onto the streets to confront the blackshirts and the police who attempted to escort them. It was a real show of working-class defiance from all sections of the working class. Barricades were erected by Irish Catholic dockers around Commercial Road and Cable Street. Children were seen throwing marbles, preventing the advance of police horses, who were unable to navigate their hooves around the marbles. Chamber pots emptied overhead of the fascists, the streets erupted with Communists, trade unionists, Jews, Irish and all nationalities of all ages and genders. 

It was an embarrassing defeat for Mosely and the BUF. They were forced to retreat, even with the police attempting to aid them. The working-class communities had shown that not only were they not welcomed, but they would be prevented from being there at all. The BUF never recovered from this and every time far right groups like this have attempted to march throughout Britain, the spectre of Cable Street hangs over them and they always meet resistance.

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Had many particularly in the CP listened to the leadership instead of organising a united front campaign of all sections of the working class in their communities to build mass resistance to ensure the fascists could not pass, then events could had turned out very differently than they had. That is the real legacy of the heroes of Cable Street.

Letter of resignation from Socialist Alternative

 Below is a copy of the resignation letter I co-signed from Socialist Alternative which should be read in conjunction with the announcement  of disaffiliation by the Greek, Cypriot and Turkish sections from International Socialist Alternative. 

Comrades,

The signatories to this letter are clear in their commitment to building a revolutionary Marxist international organisation, but have lost confidence that ISA and the sections in EWS can play a correctly orientated role in that struggle.  

Our reasons for leaving Socialist Alternative (EWS) and ISA can be summarised as follows.

A misguided approach from SA / ISA to democratic centralism, which has produced a top-down approach to decision making and political perspectives. 

A lack of communication with and support for comrades. 

Communication with branch comrades who challenge the orthodoxy of the leadership being conducted in formal and bureaucratic ways eg, the PC, as a body, emailing individual comrades demanding a written response to issues raised, rather than by a personal telephone contact in the first instance.

Institutional bullying of comrades eg, a comrade being criticised in a PC meeting, without the comrade’s knowledge or the right to reply. The criticisms were later to be proved to be completely fabricated.

Repeated mis-characterisation and distortion of TIDU comrades’ ideas. 

Repeated misrepresentation, or even concealing of events concerning international sections, especially relating to Australia and Taiwan. 

The adoption by SA of ISA policies on neoliberalism, deglobilisation, decoupling, China etc without any involvement of branch comrades.

A low level of debate and scrutiny by the NC of the PC even in instances where their actions have been proven to be wrong.

Totally inadequate minute taking of NC and PC meetings where branch comrades would have no way of knowing which comrades were making different points. This hinders branch comrades’ ability to see where new ideas and insights are coming from.

Re-writing history. Describing the reasons for the collapse of the old CWI as around political differences, rather than as a product of over-centralised authoritarian leadership. The emphasis on political differences was clearly the CWIs position and the minority comrades in EWS, generally denied significant political differences and pointed to structural problems and the authoritarian approach of the CWI leadership in particular. 

A mis-use of power in the organisation eg, a blocking of material from publication on the website. For example, comrade Vlad Bortun from the Spanish state was denied access to the international website for articles on neoliberalism, there are many other examples of individuals or sections being denied access to the website and this has also happened with the SA EWS website.

All content on the ISA website being decided on by a small editorial team. No place on the website for discussion of different perspectives. 

Leading comrades closing down discussions on Facebook without the authority to do so.

A leading comrade claiming to speak for the International Executive when having no authority to do so, as comrade EB did in the debate over Taiwan.

The inability to admit any mistakes or to listen in a constructive way to criticism.

An emphasis on training, rather than education in the development of cadre. 

An inflated view of ideas coming from the leadership and an assumption that they are correct on all matters.

Senior comrades behaving as managers, rather than leaders. Leadership is about a fluid dialectical dialogue with the comrades.   

A lack of understanding that many of our methods around structures and building are adopted from a neo-liberal / Stalinist framework, rather than a Marxist framework.

Some of the differences between the comrades who belong to TIDU and the majority comrades have been debated within the EWS section as well as internationally. What has been lacking from all of them is any attempt from the majority comrades to find a way to really consider the ideas of the minority comrades in a way that would avoid polarisation. This debate method, rather than a more discursive approach, is a method inherited from the CWI. It was not successful in avoiding polarisation under the CWI and has proved to be equally ineffective in avoiding polarisation under the ISA. 

We believe that there has been a complete failure to learn the lessons of the CWI, a failure to learn these lessons has resulted in a repetition of the same mistakes with regards to democratic accountability and henceforth perspectives, we reject the idea that a higher quantity of meetings translates to a higher quality of democracy, it’s how you control the apparatus that counts.

We have deliberately kept this letter of resignation brief because we have become increasingly aware that the differences between us and the majority have become too great to reconcile. We had hoped that this would not be the case. It is our view that the current structures of Socialist Alternative and ISA produce loyal members rather than revolutionary cadre as was also the case in the Socialist Party.

We stand in solidarity with the comrades from the Greek, Turkish, Cyprus and Spanish sections as well as many other comrades internationally who are leaving ISA in order to build an organisation that is Marxist, reflective and democratic. An organisation that agrees with the principles of democratic centralism, but finds a balance between democracy with centralism, rather than an organisation where most of the politics come from a small centralised grouping.

If any comrade would like greater detail, please feel free to contact us at our temporary email address.