EPILOGUE 34/7

proletarian dictatorship and fascist dictatorship ', and the
German communists who in 1932 gave the order for a war
on two fronts: 'Against Weimar and against Potsdam',
ended by fighting neither fascism nor the state.1 The
struggle against fascism is three-cornered—the anti-fascist
front,, which must be on as broad a base as possible, the
fascist bloc, which has to be broken up, and the state, whose
resources must be mobilized for the defence of democracy.
Victory is only possible through a political strategy that
takes these three elements into account and aligns them in
such a way that force is on the side of democracy.

To complete this analysis of the nature of fascism we must
study the fruit it bears : its consequences, not only inside
each country, but also on an international scale, which are
closely inter-connectecl.
Wherever fascism is established the most important
consequence, on which all the others depend, is the elimina-
tion of the people fxx>m all share in political activity. c Con-
stitutional reform5, the suppression of parliament, and the
totalitarian character of the regime cannot be judged by
themselves, but only In relation to their aims and their
results. Fascism is not merely the substitution of one
political regime for another ; it is the disappearance of
political life itself, since this becomes a state function and
monopoly. Political doctrines circulate, are abandoned or
modified, but the people have nothing to do with their
adoption or their fluctuations. Even when syndicates, or
even a party, continue to exist, they are mere instruments,
subordinate branches of the state. By becoming part of
the machinery of state their nature does not undergo any
change ; they merely become instruments in the second
degree, the instruments of instruments. With the removal
of all freedom and independence from their institutions the
people are reduced to a malleable raw material whose
properties of resistance and yield caa be calculated and
1 Working-class unity is one condition for victory over fascism. But this
depends on another condition, namely, that unity must not impair power for
political manoeuvre. For the value of working-class unity eventually boils
down to the value of the policy it lays down and carries out.