Lenin CW-Vol. 23.pdf - From Marx to Mao

TEN “SOCIALIST” MINISTERS!135The formation of a national state in Denmark datesback to the sixteenth century. The masses of the Danishpeople passed through the bourgeois liberation movementlong ago. More than 96 per cent of the population are Danes.The number of Danes in Germany is less than two hundredthousand. (The population of Denmark is 2,900,000.)This alone proves what a crude bourgeois deception isthe talk of the Danish bourgeoisie about an “independentnational state” being the task of the day! This is beingsaid in the twentieth century by the bourgeoisie and themonarchists of Denmark, who possess colonies with apopulation nearly equal to the number of Danes in Germany,and over which the Danish Government is trying to strike abargain.Who says that in our day there is no trade in humanbeings? There is quite a brisk trade. Denmark is sellingto America for so many millions (not yet agreed upon) threeislands, all populated, of course.In addition, a specific feature of Danish imperialismis the superprofits it obtains from its monopolisticallyadvantageous position in the meat and dairy producemarket: using cheap maritime transport, she suppliesthe world’s biggest market, London. As a result, theDanish bourgeoisie and the rich Danish peasants (bourgeoisof the purest type, in spite of the fables of the RussianNarodniks) have become “prosperous” satellites of theBritish imperialist bourgeoisie, sharing their particularlyeasy and particularly fat profits.The Danish “Social-Democratic” Party completely succumbedto this international situation, and staunchly supportedand supports the Right wing, the opportunists in theGerman Social-Democratic Party. The Danish Social-Democratsvoted credits for the bourgeois-monarchist governmentto “preserve neutrality”—that was the euphemistic formula.At the Congress of September 30, 1916, there was a ninetenths’majority in favour of joining the Cabinet, in favourof a deal with the government! The correspondent of the Bernesocialist paper reports that the opposition to ministerialismin Denmark was represented by Gerson Trier and theeditor J. P. Sundbo. Trier defended revolutionary Marxistviews in a splendid speech, and when the party decided to