George Orwell and the IRD

In their recent history of the Information Research Department (IRD), Paul Lashmar and James Oliver discuss George Orwell’s decision to collaborate with that organisation’s anti-Communist propaganda operations. They write that

‘George Orwell’s reputation as a left-wing icon took a body blow from which it may never recover when it was revealed in 1996 that he had cooperated closely with the IRD’s Cold Warriors, even offering his own blacklist of eighty-six Communist fellow-travellers…'(1)

This echoed the newspaper coverage of the revelations which were originally sensationalised by Richard Norton-Taylor and Seumas Milne in their article, ‘Orwell Offered Writers Blacklist to Anti-Soviet Propaganda Unit’ which appeared in the Guardian on 11 July 1996. A much more considered treatment was to appear in the Daily Telegraph, of all places, on 22 June 1998 in response to the publication of Orwell’s twenty volume Collected Works. What seems to inform every account, however, is the contrast between Orwell’s supposed status as a ‘socialist icon’ and his informing on other left-wing writers to a department of the secret state. Both sides of this equation need examination.

Part of the problem is the notion of Orwell as a ‘socialist icon’, some sort of left-wing ‘St George’, casting a crystal gaze over our troubled century. This does not really contribute much to our understanding of either Orwell or his times.(2) What we have to consider instead is the way that his political views developed over the years and place his notorious list in that context. Once we have established how Orwell had got to where he was politically in 1949, we can consider what he thought the IRD was about and what he believed he was doing when he handed over his list of alleged fellow travellers.

Orwell as Revolutionary

Orwell’s background is well-known. The son of an official in the Indian civil service, after prep school and Eton, he joined the Indian Police and served in Burma between 1922 and 1927. His experience in Burma radicalised him. He had been ‘part of the actual machinery of despotism’ and he had seen and taken part in ‘the dirty work of Empire at close quarters’. When he eventually returned to Britain, it was as a committed opponent of it:

‘I felt I had got to escape not merely from imperialism, but from every form of man’s dominion over man. I wanted to submerge myself, to get right down among the oppressed, to be one of them and on their side against their tyrants.'(3)

His intention was to make the middle class aware of how the people at the bottom of society were forced to live, of the exploitation and oppression that was their everyday experience. This was the purpose behind Down and Out in Paris and London, published in 1933 and The Road To Wigan Pier, published in 1937. In between these two volumes, he published his anti-imperialist novel, Burmese Days.

By the time he came to write The Road To Wigan Pier, Orwell felt competent not just to expose the realities of poverty and oppression in the north of England, to celebrate the miners and memorialise their hard lives, to dissect British snobbery and class prejudice, but also to account for the failure of the British Left. His discussion of this theme in The Road is ill-informed, prejudiced, opinionated, on occasions almost comically one-sided, and contributes very little to any serious consideration of the reasons for the failure of the Left and the triumph of Conservatism in the 1930s. Nevertheless, it does make clear that Orwell had publicly identified himself as a socialist concerned to make the socialist movement more effective. He rejected the Labour Party as hopelessly compromised and the Communist Party as in thrall to Moscow, calling instead for the emergence of a new Socialist Party. The last paragraph of The Road is a powerful statement of his position:

‘In the next few years we shall either get that effective Socialist party that we need, or we shall not get it. If we do not get it, then Fascism is coming; probably a slimy Anglicised form of Fascism, with cultured policeman instead of Nazi gorillas and the lion and the unicorn instead of the swastika. But if we do get it there will be a struggle, conceivably a physical one, for our plutocracy will not sit quiet under a genuinely revolutionary government. And when the widely separate classes who, necessarily, would form any real Socialist party have fought side by side, they may feel differently about one another. And then perhaps this misery of class-prejudice will fade away, and we of the sinking middle class……….may sink without further struggles into the working class where we belong, and probably when we get there it will not be so dreadful as we feared, for, after all, we have nothing to lose but our aitches.(4)

Orwell in Spain

By the time The Road was published, Orwell was in Spain fighting in the POUM militia against Franco. His experiences here were to be the second great turning point in his life. First of all, his experience of revolutionary Barcelona convinced him that socialism really was possible. He later recalled in Homage To Catalonia that ‘one was experiencing a foretaste of Socialism…… the prevailing mental atmosphere was that of Socialism.’ For Orwell, socialism did not mean nationalisation and state control, instead, he argued that ‘to the vast majority of people Socialism means a classless society, or it means nothing at all.’ Moreover, the POUM militia was ‘a sort of microcosm of a classless society……. The effect was to make my desire to see Socialism established much more actual than it had been before.'(5)

What Orwell found, however, was that this revolution was suppressed, not by Franco, but by the Communists. Much to his surprise, it was the Communists who were restoring bourgeois order behind the Republican lines, dismantling the institutions of popular power and workers control, and repressing the revolutionary left. The moment of realisation occurred in May 1937 in Barcelona when the Communists staged their coup against anarchist control of the city. Up to then Orwell had been determined to transfer from the POUM militia to the Communist-controlled International Brigades. Now he saw them sacrificing the revolution in the interests of Soviet foreign policy.(6)

In the aftermath of the May fighting, the POUM was banned and many of its members and supporters were arrested and thrown into prison. A number of its militants were ‘disappeared’ by the Communist secret police, among them, its leader, Andres Nin, who died under torture. This repression was masked by an extremely effective propaganda campaign, slandering the POUM as Trotskyist-Fascist agents in league with Franco. Orwell and his wife, Eileen, only just escaped arrest, but other foreign volunteers with the POUM militia were captured, including his friends Bob Smillie and Georges Kopp.(7) Once he was back in Britain and attempted, in his own words, to ‘spill the Spanish beans’, he found that the Left, in the main, did not want to know. Victor Gollancz, his publisher and the founder of the Left Book Club, rejected Homage To Catalonia unseen, merely because Orwell had fought with the POUM.

It cannot be emphasised enough that Orwell’s personal experience of the terror that the Communists visited upon the revolutionary left in Spain and the propaganda smokescreen that effectively obscured it for forty-odd years was absolutely crucial in determining his attitude towards Stalinism and the Soviet Union. After these events he was never to have any of the illusions about the Soviet Union that were to characterise so much of the British Left. Moreover, he was concerned to understand why the Communists had behaved in the way that they had and looked for the explanation in the class nature of the Soviet Union. Orwell concluded that the Stalinist regime in Russia had nothing whatsoever to do with socialism. A new bureaucratic ruling class had taken power and was committing the most terrible crimes in the name of socialism; but, as far as he was concerned, a more accurate description of Soviet-type societies was bureaucratic or oligarchic collectivism.(8) Orwell believed that it was absolutely essential for socialists to fight the influence of ‘the Soviet myth’ on the Left. He was to spend the rest of his life trying to do just that. Orwell never defected to the right or embraced the cause of reaction. He saw himself as a man of the left, fighting Communist influence within the Left, a battle that, he believed, had to be won if there was to be a revival of the socialist movement.

Orwell as Tribune Socialist

Orwell returned from Spain a revolutionary socialist. The outbreak of war in September 1939 and the Nazi victories in the summer of the following year convinced him that a revolution was both imminent and essential if Britain was to survive and win the war. He became the advocate of what can best be described as ‘revolutionary patriotism’, advocating the overthrow of the ruling class and the establishment of a socialist society but as an act of patriotism, necessary to save the country from defeat and occupation. The war had made the emergence of a new Socialist Party that meant business all the more urgent. The Labour Party was in coalition with the Conservatives while the Communists remained apologists for Soviet foreign policy, even when Stalin had allied himself with Hitler. Orwell hoped that out of the unrest caused by hardship and defeat would emerge a new Socialist movement, uniting working class and middle class, in the transformation of Britain into a socialist commonwealth. Interestingly, by 1941, while he contemptuously dismissed Labour Party reformism, he also rejected insurrectionary tactics as unsuitable for a country like Britain. He certainly did not rule out force to coerce the diehard elements of the ruling class, but thought it would be possible to find a third way to carry through the socialist transformation.(9)

His hopes for socialist transformation in Britain were to be dispelled in the course of 1942. British suppression of the ‘Quit India’ movement was the turning point, the moment when the forces of reaction regained control and the revolutionary opportunity had finally passed. Orwell remained a socialist, but, however reluctantly, came to the conclusion that socialism was not on the agenda. He gave up the belief that a new Socialist Party would emerge and instead reconciled himself to the Labour Party’s reformism as the most that could be realistically hoped for in the foreseeable future. Orwell threw in his lot with the Labour Left, joining the staff of the Tribune newspaper.

The classic account of Orwell as ‘Tribune Socialist’ is in Bernard Crick’s indispensable biography. Here, Orwell’s earlier revolutionary politics are portrayed as an exotic aberration, all a bit embarrassing, before he settled down as a decent British left reformist. This neglects Orwell’s continued engagement with revolutionary politics, both Trotskyist and Anarchist, an engagement that, for example, informs both Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four. Orwell remained a socialist, committed to the overthrow of capitalism and the abolition of class society, influenced by the ideas of the revolutionary left, even if he rejected their organisational prescriptions as sectarian and dogmatic. He never seriously believed that the Labour Party would try to introduce socialism; indeed it is interesting that his post-war pessimism about the prospects for socialism coincided with a Labour Government with a huge majority. Nevertheless, the Labour Government was the best that could be hoped for, the most that was possible, and he gave it his critical support.(10)

His support for the Labour Government is the first step in understanding his relationship with the IRD. The second step is recognition of his continued hostility to Stalinism. Just as Crick found his revolutionary politics embarrassing, so he finds his anti-Stalinism embarrassing and seriously plays it down in his biography. To some extent it is this that has made Orwell’s IRD connection come as such a surprise. Once one appreciates the ferocity of his anti-Stalinism it seems almost inevitable.

As we have already seen, Orwell had no illusions about Communism and the Soviet Union. As far as he was concerned they had nothing to do with socialism, but were a menace corrupting the socialist cause from within. He continued throughout the 1940s to do everything he could to fight against Communist influence; against the belief that Soviet Russia was in some way progressive. Both Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four were written to that end, along with a considerable body of journalism and political polemic. Moreover, it was clear to Orwell that this was a losing battle, that the Communists were growing stronger, increasing their influence and power, if not in Britain, then on the Continent and throughout the Third World. Instead of the popular radicalism of the post-war period leading to the emergence of new Socialist parties, it was captured by the Communists and used to strengthen movements that were committed to the establishment of totalitarian dictatorships. It is worth remembering that at the time Orwell was writing Nineteen Eighty-Four, the British Communist Party was giving its full support to the Stalinist purges engulfing Eastern Europe and was celebrating Stalin’s contribution to world peace. His hostility to the Communists even led him to make clear that in the event of war between Russia and the USA, he would support the Americans.

As far as Orwell was concerned his support for the Labour Government, together with his long-standing fight against Stalinism, meant that he had no problem when he was approached by the IRD. It was, he believed, a propaganda organisation established by the Labour Government to advocate a social democratic-reformist alternative to Stalinism and to expose the real nature of the Communist regimes; and as such he welcomed it. While his judgement can be seriously criticised, there is no evidence at all to support the argument that the IRD connection indicates that he had, at best, defected to the right or, at worst, knowingly collaborated with the secret state.

Orwell and the Cold War

In their account of the IRD, Lashmar and Oliver acknowledge the organisation’s concern to recruit from the left, hiring staff ‘with leftish credentials’ such as Celia Kirwan and Tosco Fyvel, both friends of Orwell’s. The organisation attempted to find a compliant publisher with left-wing credentials to give credibility to its propaganda. Orwell suggested they approach Gollancz, but instead they approached Odhams, urging the need to project ‘social democracy as a successful rival to Communism.’ The IRD apparently even distributed Tribune to British Embassies as part of its propaganda campaign against Communism. All this, Lashmar and Oliver remark, ‘suited the mood of the times’.(11) It is the necessary context for understanding Orwell’s involvement. He believed that he was getting involved with a propaganda outfit committed to championing Labour reformism and anti-Communism. He would not have given his support to an openly right-wing organisation, to the sort of organisation that the IRD quickly became after the Labour Government lost power in 1951. When he had earlier been asked to support the League of European Freedom that was opposing the Communist takeover in Eastern Europe, he had refused because while it denounced Soviet rule in Poland, it remained silent on British rule in India. Orwell believed that, as a socialist, he had to oppose both. From this point of view, his relationship with the IRD can be seen as deriving from naivete regarding the character of Labour Governments rather than from any deliberate political apostasy.

The approach to Orwell from the IRD was made by Celia Kirwan who had worked for the journal Polemic, which specifically set out to counter Communist influence among the British intelligentsia. Orwell had been heavily involved with this journal after the war. It seems extremely likely that Orwell would have seen the IRD as an extension of this earlier enterprise. Moreover, she remained a friend – indeed he had once proposed to her. The presence of his old friend, Tosco Fyvel, working for the organisation would also have reassured him. Fyvel had not only worked with Orwell on Tribune, succeeding him as literary editor, but had in 1940-41 co-edited the ‘Searchlight’ series of books, published by Frederic Warburg. Lashmar and Oliver refer to the series as ‘pamphlets on war aims produced for the British Army’. This is a serious mistake. They had no connection with the Army or the government whatever, but were an attempt to contribute to what Orwell believed was a revolutionary situation brought about by military defeat. The ‘Searchlight’ series called for the transformation of British society and for the waging of a revolutionary war.(12)

The great strength of Lashmar and Oliver’s discussion of Orwell is the attention they direct to the IRD’s sponsorship of Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four as novels damaging to the Communist cause. The conclusions they draw from this are not tenable however. They write: ‘For many years after his death some in the left had often argued that Orwell had never meant Animal Farm or 1984 as anti-Soviet parables and claimed that the books had been hijacked by Cold War Warriors of the right. These files show that this was not the case.'(13) What Lashmar and Oliver do here is conflate two different arguments. They argue correctly that Orwell’s two novels were indeed anti-Soviet parables and conclude from this that therefore they were not hijacked by the right but were written for the right. Not only does this not follow, it is also just plain wrong. Orwell wrote the books, part of his great ‘literary Trotskyist trilogy’ (Homage To Catalonia is the third) to combat Communist influence on the left, to convince the left that the Soviet Union had nothing at all to do with socialism, indeed was a negation of socialism; that recognition of this was a prerequisite for the revival of the Socialist movement. Despite this intention, the books were indeed to be hijacked by the right, something Orwell was already beginning to complain about just before he died. If he had lived, even for only a few more years – and it is worth remembering, he was only forty-six when he died – then he would certainly made it absolutely clear that the books were an attack on Stalinism from the left. It is worth making the point here that one reason why Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four were so easily hijacked by the right was that so much of the left continued to regard the Soviet Union and its satellites as some sort of socialism, as some sort of workers’ state. It was this that handed Orwell’s works over to the right once he was no longer around to make clear where he stood.

This brings us to the list, the most convincing piece of evidence regarding Orwell’s apostasy. There can be no excusing Orwell’s action in handing over a list of ‘suspect’ names to the IRD no matter what he thought was the character of the organisation. Nevertheless what we have to establish is the exact nature of what it was that he did and to put it into the context of his political stance at the time of his death. Lashmar and Oliver assert that he handed over his notebook with 86 names of ‘fellow-travellers’, apologists and generally unreliable people. According to Peter Davison, he handed over a list of 35 names extracted from the notebook. This list has not yet appeared. What was the purpose of the list? It was specifically to identify people who could not be relied on to take a stand against Soviet Communism and who were consequently not worth being approached by the IRD. Orwell was not proposing a McCarthyite witch-hunt: indeed we know that he was against any such anti-Communist purge. He had earlier urged the Freedom Defence Committee, of which he was a member, to oppose the Labour Government’s proposed purge of the civil service. The Freedom Defence Committee had been set up because the National Council for Civil Liberties at this time was Communist-controlled and refused to assist Trotskyists or Anarchists who fell foul of the State. Indeed, during the Second World War the Communist Party had actually called for the imprisonment of such dissidents. Despite his fierce hostility to Stalinism, Orwell never responded in kind to this sectarianism.(14)

Conclusion

Has the IRD connection inflicted a blow on Orwell’s reputation as a left-wing icon from which it will never recover? Maybe – if one regarded Orwell as an icon rather than as a socialist trying to negotiate terrible times. When one places the episode in the context of his political life and times, however, the picture is very different. At worst, he can be accused of naivete regarding the Labour Government, the IRD and the secret state. At best he remains a socialist who took a determined stand against the Communist perversion of everything that socialism stood for.

Notes

1. Paul Lashmar and James Oliver, Britain’s Secret Propaganda War 1948-1977 (Stroud: Alan Sutton 1998), p. 95. Despite my disagreements with the authors over their discussion of Orwell, nevertheless this remains an indispensable book for students of post 1945 Britain. [This was reviewed in Lobster 37 – ed.]
2. For a recent discussion of Orwell’s political development see my Orwell’s Politics (London: Macmillan 1999). [ Newsinger received a considerable accolade when the Spectator published a two-page assault on his book by one of the major intellectual figures on the British Right in the past 25 years, Maurice Cowling – ed.]
3. George Orwell, The Road To Wigan Pier (London: Penguin 1986), pp. 129-130.
4. Ibid, p. 215
5. George Orwell, Homage To Catalonia (London: Penguin 1985), pp. 8-9.
6. For the best account of Communist policy in Spain see Burnett Bolloten, The Spanish Revolution (Chapel Hill,
7. There is still controversy surrounding the death of Bob Smillie. Did he die of medical neglect or under torture? Certainly Orwell received reliable information that he had been beaten to death by his Communist interrogators, but the case has never been conclusively proven. See my ‘The Death of Bob Smillie’, Historical Journal 41, 2 (June 1998)
8. Orwell’s Politics op cit, pp. 124-130.
9. Ibid, pp. 72-77. Orwell’s third way must not, of course, be confused with New Labour’s third way as advocated by Orwell’s conservative namesake, Tony Blair. New Labour’s third way is committed not to the socialist but to the capitalist transformation of British society.
10. For Orwell as Tribune Socialist see Bernard Crick, George Orwell: A Life (London: Penguin 1992), pp. 444-449.
11. Lashmar and Oliver, op cit, pp. 99, 118.
12. Orwell’s Politics op cit, pp. 70-72.
13. Lashmar and Oliver, op cit, p. 98. For the film Animal Farm and its CIA connection see Nick Cohen, ‘Cold War comfort for Orwell’, Observer 26 April 1998.
14. Orwell’s Politics op cit, pp. 146-147.