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British Labor and the Soviets

By Louis Fischer
January 1930
Article Summary and Author Biography

LOUIS FISCHER, for several years correspondent in Russia of The Nation

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POST-REVOLUTIONARY relations between the Kremlin and Downing Street are a composite of Anglo-Russian and Anglo-Soviet relations. There is much that is old and the product of geography; there is as much that is new and the product of opposing social philosophies and economic systems. In the east and in the west, understanding between Great Britain and Russia has become less likely than under Tsarism.

The Labor cabinet headed by Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 made a sincere effort to bridge the financial and political chasm between the two states. Yet the good results were not at all proportional to the good will shown on both sides. Today, after the resumption of relations agreed upon by Arthur Henderson, the British Foreign Secretary, and Valerian Dovgalevsky, the Soviet Ambassador to France, the two nations face exactly the same problems that they faced in 1924, and although the same good will actuates both Downing Street and the Kremlin, the chances of settlement in 1930 seem to be more remote than they were six years ago...

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