A CRIMINAL HISTORY OF MANKIND

oppressed and the oppressors. And anyone with the slightest knowledge of history knows this to be
untrue. When the oppressed are given the opportunity, they become the oppressors. For the real
problem lies in human nature itself. Governments are oppressive only because they behave exactly
like individuals. When an individual is offended, he thinks in terms of ‘getting his own back’. So
do governments. According to the anarchists and socialists, the ordinary people love peace; it is the
rulers who want war. In fact, when national pride is hurt, everybody wants war, and the common
people are more belligerent than most. This is the cause of international conflict, and it is also the
cause of crime. Man is a creature who easily works himself up into a state of righteous indignation,
and his indignation places him at the mercy of negative emotions. His rational self is tossed around
like a small aeroplane in a storm. Suddenly, nothing matters but soothing the outraged feelings, the
bruised ego. If he is successful, and the offender is suitably humiliated, the storm subsides and he is
once again capable of kindliness and reason. But while the fury lasts he is, in effect, mildly insane.
We might say that a person who behaves in this way was ‘possessed’. But the behaviour could be
compared to another medical condition that is rather less rare: hypnosis. Hypnosis consists of a
narrowing of the field of attention until the subject is ‘locked’ in a state of narrowness, unaware of
anything beyond it. This is precisely what happens to human beings when they are gripped by rage
or indignation. The problem is that the effect of that rage, when directed against other people, is to
produce in them the same state of ‘hypnosis’. The two combatants are then likely to remain locked
in this state of mutual-provocation until the original cause of the quarrel has ceased to be important.
The hypnosis has become a self-propagating condition, which may continue until both are
exhausted or one is destroyed.
The history of the twentieth century may be seen as a continuous illustration of this process. We
may take as a convenient starting point an event that occurred shortly after the accession of the tsar
Nicholas II in 1894. Rumour had spread that the new tsar was anxious to modernise Russia and
permit his subjects more liberty. He was, in fact, a gentle and charming person, totally unlike his
autocratic father, who had the temper of a bull. Local councils (known as zemstvos) were told that
the new tsar would be glad to receive deputations. A deputation from Tver arrived in St Petersburg
and presented the tsar with expensive presents and with an address expressing their loyalty. It
contained the innocuous phrase: ‘We expect, gracious sovereign, that these local councils will be
allowed to express their opinions in matters which concern them...’ The result startled them. The
writer of the address was dismissed from the public service with ignominy, and an official reproof
was sent to the governor of Tver, who knew nothing about the matter. A few days later, the tsar
addressed the assembled deputations, and told them sternly that it had come to his knowledge that
some local councils were indulging in ‘the senseless dream that they might participate in the
government of the country’. ‘I want everyone to know,’ shrieked the tsar, ‘that I intend to maintain
the principle of autocracy, like my father,’ and he raised his hand as if shaking his fist. The
audience went out looking shaken and cowed. And Nicholas’s wife, the tsarina Alexandra, looked
at him with adoring admiration.
The tsar’s reaction to revolutionary ferment was to order his chief of police, von Plehve, to arrest
anyone suspected of leftist sympathies. Plehve, who had organised the mass executions after the
assassination of Alexander II, approached his task with enthusiasm. One of these arrested was a
beautiful young student named Marie Vietrov - a few ‘forbidden books’ had been found in her
room. Instead of being merely suspended from the university - the usual punishment - she was
incarcerated in the Peter and Paul fortress. What took place during the next two months is not
certain, although both torture and rape have been suggested. On 10 February 1897, Marie Vietrov