Politics in the modern world is increasingly divisive. In the US political system labels matter, and it can be the death knell for a political career to be called “socialist” in reference to your ideas. Putting aside the fact that all federal and state-wide policies are by definition socialist, funded centrally from tax revenues, there is a reason the political right wield this word like a weapon. It has its roots in the key differentiator the US, and the western world, espoused as the difference between them and their great enemy the Soviets: capitalism vs communism. Of course, calling someone a communist is a much harder sell these days since the fall of the Soviet Union, and no longer carries the direct accusations of treachery. Those labelled with any suggestion of left-wing politics are now traitors to US ideals, rather than directly working with the enemy. But for the western world capitalism is and remains king. The ideas behind communism are so poisonous that it doesn’t really matter where those ideas come from, or what they mean. Better for the demagogues if their followers don’t actually understand them, far easier if they just hear the dog whistle and respond as they need to. But a moment to look at the conditions that gave rise to communism might give them pause. Wealth inequality in the US at present is far wider than it was when Karl Marx, whose critique of capitalism laid the foundations for communism, was inspired to pick up his pen. We would not suggest that Marx was entirely right in his assessment of capitalism, nor would we agree with his conclusions. But if you bypass the content in favor of being told what to think you risk being misguided, and indeed many politicians nowadays rely on just that. The Bible is often used in this way too, with selective distorted interpretations bypassing the message. So, what then was Marx trying to say. What was behind his assessment of capitalism, and why did he reach the conclusions that he did? The Thief of Time Marx only lived to see the publication of the first volume of the three which make up Das Kapital in 1867. The other two were only published after his death, in 1885 and 1894. Together they formed his life’s work. Nor are these particularly radical assessments of the growing prominence of capitalism, or at least Marx did not appear to think so. However his view of what capitalism actually was cannot be argued to be a fundamental shift. Nor was Marx wholly against capitalism, although he recognized its flaws with a clarity few before had offered. His genius was not to simply see capitalism as an economic model, but as something wider which came out of our society. This has far-reaching implications. For a start, it means that capitalism came out of what came before: it is not a concept which stands on its own but an evolution of pre-existing market interactions, with all the imbalances already baked into the system. His argument, in brief, is that capitalism divides society into two, those who have the capital and those who do not. His conclusion was that the former exploit the latter to enrich themselves, and that the method they use is the exploitation of their labor. Marx’s essential central point was that, to put it bluntly, the capitalists do not generate profit but rely on their workforce to do so. Therefore, any profit that capitalists keep for themselves has come from the labor of the workforce: they did all the work and kept only some of the money. Of course capitalists would argue that they provide the capital without which the workforce cannot generate such profits, the “means of production” as he termed it. In real terms these can be seen as the factories and warehouses, the raw materials and the like which the workforce turn into finished goods to be sold for profit. The capitalist is taking the chance, and so should get the reward. Marx was not even the first to recognize this idea of “surplus value” whereby the workforce earn money for the capitalists. The Irish philosopher William Thompson wrote about it as early as 1824, although in a much more general fashion. What Marx did do was to apply this idea to the world he saw around him. His conclusions, at least in terms of the endgame for capitalism, were based on an extrapolation of this trend. He saw capitalism, crucially, not as a cycle of boom and bust but as a spiral, an increasing imbalance in the system. Even taking into account the fact that capitalists could be ruined by unwise investment of their capital, they would as a class grow richer, and the workforce grow poorer. This would become more and more acute until the system collapsed. Marx’s famous cry that workers should “seize the means of production” or rather work for themselves collectively and remove the parasitic capitalism who took from them, turned out to be one of the bloodiest in history. Human society was gripped with destructive revolution as half the world was gripped by his idea. There is much to regret about the history of the 20th century, and much of that can be laid at the feet of Das Kapital. It is this outcome, rather than the ideas behind it, which has increasingly led to Marx being demonized in the Western world. But that doesn’t mean his observations were wrong. With wealth inequality in the United States at its highest in history, with millions starving while a handful own more than they can possibly use, it does seem that his idea that capitalism is a worsening cycle has merit. Maybe, at some point in the future, his ideas may merit a reassessment, if not his violent conclusions. But it seems increasingly likely that something extreme may have to happen for that to occur. Does Marxism have a role in our future? Perhaps not, but
Operation Tamarisk: You Flush It, We Flaunt It
The 20th century saw the concept of warfare evolve to a horrifying new level. With the advent of globalization, automation and mechanization the art of war was refined to an almost obsessive extent, and perpetual warfare on a global scale became the new normal. Alongside the two World Wars and the two decades the US fought in Vietnam, there were myriad conflicts scattered across the globe. And, from Afghanistan to Cuba, many of these wars were a consequence of the ultimate war which dominated the last century: the Cold War. For 50 years the US and the USSR, the two superpowers dedicated to global domination and bringing their version of humanity to everyone, whether they wanted it or not, jockeyed for position. They could not fight each other: direct conflict was simply too destructive, we had become too good at it. But it was a war, nonetheless. It is often said that conflict breeds innovation, and this was certainly the case for these two, and their allies. Espionage and spycraft in particular was advanced to a fine art. Knowing what your enemy is going to do, after all, is half the battle. This was an era of wild invention, of inflatable planes and toxic shellfish bullets, of moles and traitors, microfilm and stolen secrets. This was a war where reliable information, from any source, was treasure. Flaws were found in each side’s security, and exploited. If the information was reliable, that was all that mattered, and such information could come from the unlikeliest of sources. This is the genesis of Operation Tamarisk, which saw the US and her allies sifting through used toilet paper. A Dirty Operation Operation Tamarisk was, in effect, brilliant. The west had identified a flaw in Soviet information security, specifically regarding the disposal of sensitive documents, and sought to exploit it. Documents in Soviet countries were not handled with sufficient care. Steve Gibson, author of BRIXMISS: The Last Cold War Mission, sums up the situation as follows: “In large towns and cities the disposal of rubbish was crudely organized….The Soviets were no exception to this carefree disposal of waste, quite often simply dumping their rubbish outside the back door of their barracks.” What rubbish, you might ask? Gibson here was referring to a wide variety of detritus and discarded waste from the Soviet authorities, but in essence what he was talking about was toilet paper, or rather the lack thereof. This was a problem born of a logistical failure. Soviet soldiers were not provided with toilet paper and were forced to make do with whatever paper or other material was available. This included any documents lying around, and the soldiers were not concerned with what was contained within these documents. Once used the paper was not flushed. Instead it was disposed of in large bins kept near the latrines or toilet facilities. The need to keep these bins secure was not considered important by the Soviets, but they had missed that there was more than fecal matter held inside. The west did not miss this however, and the US, UK and France were aware that sensitive documentation was there for the taking. These countries routinely sent military liaison missions to East Germany, and these missions were given a clandestine, and filthy, role. The western spies were tasked with ransacking these bins, sorting through the waste and trying to ascertain if a Soviet soldier had wiped his ass with official secrets. In truth any documentation from a Soviet source, secret or not, was valuable, and much could be learned in this way. In the event it turned out the bins were even nastier than you might think. They were used for all kinds of foul waste, and the spies tasked with searching them would complain about what else they had to come into contact within their fetid depths. In the case of hospital bins this could be particularly grueling. But the spymasters saw an opportunity here, too. There was more to be learned from these bins than the information written on the ersatz toilet paper. The spies may have complained about having to sift through amputated limbs and body parts, but these held their own secrets. Spies were tasked with recovering the body parts and bringing them to their handlers alongside any documentation they found. These amputated limbs could then be studied for damage, particularly regarding weaponry. Of particular interest were shrapnel wounds, which told the west much about what type of shrapnel they were using. Operation Tamarisk produced some real results, as well. In 1981 information derived from these sources discovered that Soviet troops in Afghanistan with the most extreme wounds, including horrifying injuries from chemical warfare, were being evacuated to East Germany for treatment. This allowed the west to estimate Soviet capacity for continuing to fight their proxy war against the US. There were other advantages to this source of information, too. It seems the Soviets never ever considered the possibility of a large scale operation to retrieve documentation in this manner, and this oversight was beneficial for the spies in a number of ways. The bins were unguarded, obviously, making retrieval a largely straightforward affair. But because the Soviets never saw this vulnerability, they were never likely to seek to exploit it to plant misinformation and therefore Operation Tamarisk material was often seem as highly reliable. It may have been disgusting and abhorrent, but the information gathered in this way allowed the west to build up a wide ranging picture of Soviet activities and their operational structure. In fact the Soviets seemed so lax with their document disposal that sometimes entire notebooks would be found in the trash, filled with technical information and discarded without care. Operation Tamarisk has been described as one of the most successful espionage operations of the Cold War. Soviet oversight and a strong stomach was all that was needed for the west to access a steady stream of useful information, building a picture of life behind the Iron
Wet Work: The Story of Buster Crabb
In early 1956 Nikita Khrushchev, First Secretary of the Communist Party, and the Soviet Premier Nikolai Bulganin arrived on a diplomatic mission to Britain aboard the Soviet cruiser Ordzhonikidze. For the duration of the mission the cruiser was docked in Her Majesty’s Navala Base, Portsmouth. The mission came at a delicate time. Stalin had been dead for four years and while his successor Khrushchev was by now firmly established as the Soviet leader, he was still very much an unknown quantity to Western analysts. This was the height of the early Cold War. The mission, in the end, could reasonably be called a success. Pleasantries were exchanged along with gifts, Khrushchev toured London and other sites of interest, discussions were held and then the Ordzhonikidze sailed off into the night, back to Russia, her stay an uneventful one. Or at least, that was how it seemed. In the weeks following a diplomatic furor erupted surrounding the visit. Not for anything which happened to the Soviet leader or his party, to be sure, but for strange rumors which swirled around the Ordzhonikidze. It seemed that the Russians had become convinced that something was up. They were convinced that the Royal Navy had attempted something during the warship’s stay at Portsmouth, and they cried foul to anyone who would listen. The Royal Navy was outraged, of course. The very suggestion that such a thing could occur when a warship was visiting during peacetime, especially one with so valuable a passenger as Khrushchev, was unthinkable. But things, as always, were not so simple. The Russians believed that a diver had attempted to approach the Ordzhonikidze undetected. And the Royal Navy were, indeed, missing that diver. This is the story of Lionel “Buster” Crabb. A Scandal Beneath the Waves Lionel Crabb was born into a lower class family in south London in 1909. Crabb would grow up unsure of his calling in life, but it can be said that he truly found it in his twenties abord the Royal Navy training ship HMS Conway. Crabb would prove to be a fine sailor. Joining the Royal Navy Reserve shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War, Crabb would be initially called up to the Royal Artillery as a gunner. However in 1941 he joined the Royal Navy, finding much work removing limpet mines attached to Navy ships in the Mediterranean by Italian divers. Crabb may have been a reasonable sailor but he proved to be an exceptional diver. The Royal Navy had none of the sophisticated modern equipment, and Crabb and his fellow frogmen would retrieve the live mines without fins and with only a primitive rebreather to rely on for oxygen. Recognized for his bravery, by 1943 Crabb would be a Lieutenant Commander and the recipient of the George Medal, one of the highest non-military awards in Britain. Becoming diving coordinator for the entire area around northern Italy, he would go on to receive an OBE for his work. After the war Crabb went into business for himself as a civilian diver, exploring wrecks and looking for salvage. However, his work for the British Government was not entirely in the past. In 1955, he was tasked along with another frogman to investigate a Soviet Sverdlov-class cruiser. He discovered an unexpected opening at the bow of the hull, one he believed could house a propellor mounted perpendicular to the hull, allowing for exceptional maneuverability. The Ordzhonikidze was also a Sverdlov-class cruiser, and Crabb’s observations about the bow may have caught the interest of the British authorities. A year after this investigation in 1956 Crabb was recruited by MI6 in an unknown function. And in April of that year the Ordzhonikidze arrived at Portsmouth. The first signs that something was afoot came from the British. On 29th April British newspapers ran articles detailing that Crabb had been lost during an underwater mission. This was supported by an announcement, not from MI6 but from the Navy, that Crabb had been lost during a trial of new underwater apparatus. However something more was clearly going on behind the scenes. In response to the announcement by the Royal Navy, the Russians claimed to have seen a frogman near the Ordzhonikidze during its stay in Britain. The strong insinuation was that this was Crabb. The press speculated that Crabb had been tasked with some kind of underwater espionage mission, and had been captured by the Russians and taken back behind the Iron Curtain. Further rumors swirled: Crabb was investigating the same mysterious propellor, Crabb was attempting to sabotage the ship, Crabb was secretly a Soviet agent, Crabb was dead. The scandal forced the UK Prime Minister Sir Anthony Eden to address the issue publicly. While it became clear that MI6 was involved, very much out of its jurisdiction (domestic espionage is the preserve of MI5), he told the House of Commons that publicly revealing the fate of Crabb was “not in the public interest”. Many theories had come to light in the years since. Soviet sources claimed that Crabb was intercepted and drowned as he approached the ship, or that he was shot by a sniper while on the surface, or that he had fallen foul of underwater Soviet sentries stationed around Ordzhonikidze and taken captive. UK officials became concerned that Crabb had defected to the Soviets, either as a result of torture and brainwashing or, worse, willingly. Some believed that he had disappeared into Soviet Russia forever, others that MI5 had him pre-emptively killed to prevent this. 14 months after Crabb disappeared, a body in a diving suit was found in Chichester harbor. The suit and equipment matched those Crabb used, but formal identification was not possible as the body had no head or hands. Investigators were divided as to whether this body could be Crabb. On the one hand, it did not seem to have a distinctive scar behind the knee which should rule out an identification. On the other, there was no other diver missing
