Partial online archive of Direct Action, a paper produced by the Anarchist Federation of Britain.
Direct Action: Paper of the Anarchist Federation of Britain (1945-1950)
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PDFs courtesy of the excellent collection at the Sparrow's Nest Archive, Nottingham.
Many of the members of the Anarchist Federation of Britain went on to form the Syndicalist Workers Federation in 1950. The SWF continued production of Direct Action and our archive of this version can be found here.
There is a useful chronology of events leading up to The 1945 split in British anarchism by Kate Sharpley Library.
Direct Action (AFB) May 1945
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The first issue of the newsletter of the Anarchist Federation of Britain. Including: British establishment's whitewashing of the holocaust, "Redundancy" - a new buzzword for unemployment, Tom Brown on factory committees, 35,000 Spanish anarcho-syndicalists hold conference in France.
Undated but almost certainly May: e.g. "Ten years ago; May 1955."
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Direct Action (AFB) June 1945
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Undated issue of Direct Action, including: IWMA against war, news, Spanish and Swedish syndicalists, Stalin's puppet government in Austria, Don Coventry obituary, etc.
Undated but refers to May in the past tense, including "700 workers, labourers, storekeepers, chasers and inspectors employed by Handley Page Aircraft, London, struck work at 10 o’clock on Monday, May 28, for a wage increase."
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Direct Action (AFB) June 1945 (2)
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Including: post-war conditions of working class people, sedition prisoner T.W. Brown gets extended sentence, 5,000 Napier engineers sacked, report on exiled Spanish anarcho-syndicalists conference in France, etc.
Undated but refers to events in May - and "In our last issue we published an appeal by the International Working Men’s Association" refers to previous June issue.
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Direct Action (AFB) July 1945
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Undated issue of Direct Action, including: ex-servicemen squatting in Brighton, demobilisation and post-war conditions for workers, July 19th - anniversary of the Spanish revolution, etc
Direct Action (AFB) August 1945
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Including: Labour Party in power, transport workers in struggle, prisoners in Spain, atomic annihilation, anarchist miner Robert Lyle wins legal case, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) October 1945
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Including: post-war austerity, transport workers in struggle part two, critiques of Labour and Communist parties, International Working Men's Association, etc.
NB: dated August 1945 on the masthead, but reports on a meeting from September 23rd. So probably dated late September or more likely October.
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Direct Action (AFB) Vol 1 #02 Oct 1945
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Including: threat of nuclear war, revolutionary violence redefined, first Anarchist Federation national congress, Kropotkin on law and authority, industrial notes, an American view on the Labour Party in power, etc.
Undated but reviews events in September 1945.
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Direct Action (AFB) Vol 1 #05 March 1946
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Including: Down with Franco, treatment of anti-fascist prisoners in the UK, resolutions of first national congress, union scabs on anarchist miner, IWMA international news, unions in Russia, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 1 #07 May 1946
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Including: Gandhi urges workers control in India, repression in Russia, austerity in the UK, fascism in Spain, etc.
NB: "May Supplement". Possibly implies another May 1946 issue?
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Random selection of quotes from this issue of Direct Action, Organ of the Anarchist Federation of Britain, May Supplement 1946:
After the War is over,
After the slaughter’s done,
After the people are ruined,
After the victory’s won,
Labour will go on drudging
Wondering what it was for,
Paying for generations.
After the war.
At school we were told that, happily, the days of religious persecution were passed; that the horrible story of deportation, torture, imprisonment and execution was ended with the passing of the middle ages. The rise of Fascism and Communism [and Democracy, Islamism and Anarchism], however, created political persecution on a scale undreamt of by any medieval fanatics.
Finally a word about thorium. This mineral, most extensively used in the manufacture of atomic explosives, has recently been discovered in Ceylon—the largest thorium field in the world. The prevalent feeling here is that this thorium should be used exclusively for industrial and humanitarian purposes. Free India will resist all attempts to use it to help manufacture a material designed to destroy human life.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 1 #08 June 1946
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Including: post-war austerity, IRA hunger strike death, war in Palestine, Tom Brown on the social and general strike, feudalism in Jersey, Stalinism and the British Communist Party, disavowal of Freedom Press, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 1 #09 July 1946
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Including: bosses attack engineering workers, Irish protestors jailed, anti-Franco protest in London, miners black-listed, syndicalist union formed in France, famine in Europe, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 1 #10 Aug 1946
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Including: prospects for WWIII, Spanish anarchists on the rise, James Connolly and the unions, Japanese chemical workers lock out bosses, poverty in Malta, death of anarchist William Wess, international news, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 1 #11 Sept 1946
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Including: post-war squatting movement, anarchist Ernest Silverman jailed for fraud, against nationalisation in Australia, nuclear weapons, Trotksyism, ageism, world congress of anarchist youth, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 2 #1 Oct 1946
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Including: Kildare farmers strike, aircraft health & safety, Communist Party kills squatter movement, IWMA secretary interviewed, royal family, international news, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 2 #2 Nov 1946
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Including: resistance to Franco, austerity in Belgium, thousands of anarchist and syndicalists jailed in Bulgaria, London busmens' strike 1937, socialism and the state by Tom Brown, Nuremburg trials, unions collaborate with bosses in Norway and Finland, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 2 #3 Feb 1947
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Including: Labour Party sets army on strikers, Tom Brown on anarchists and private property, German P.O.W.s in England, Bulgarian state suppresses anarchists, Franco, Victor Kravchenko on Russia, Ret Marut / B Traven, German syndicalists and the Nazis, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 2 #4 March 1947
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Including: UK crisis, surviving Polish syndicalists regroup, conditions in the catering industry, Tom Brown on the middle class and the labour movement, syphilis, fascism in Austria, racism and the Communist Party, conscription, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 2 #5 May 1947
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Including: Glasgow dockers strike, transport and electric workers strike in Bombay, potential for war with Russia, Labour govt's "Work or Want" campaign, catering workers organise, John J Humphrey obituary, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 2 #6 July 1947
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Including: cold war, Daily Worker finances, the communist dictatorship in the Balkans, 11th anniversary of outbreak of Spanish civil war, UK govt supports fascist Portugal, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 2 #7 September 1947
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Including: anarchists arrested at communist meeting on Spain, catering industry, Mussolini bomb attempt, Stalin, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 2 #8 November 1947
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Including: miners vs the Coal Board, Labour govt vs workers, fascists in Dalston and France, London doss houses, anarchism in Germany, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 3 #01 January 1948
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Including: cold war, Franco's political prisoners, Grimethorpe UK strike updates, Anarchist Federation of Britain congress and new aims and principles, anarchist economic structure, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 3 #02 February 1948
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Including: Communist Party acts for Russian imperialism, crisis in World Trade Union Federation, repression against resistance movement in Spain, Durham miners, London dockers, Consumers' Co-operatives, Glasgow canteen workers, Bulgaria concentration camps, anarchism in Ukraine 1917-21, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 3 #03 March 1948
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Including: Labour government and cost of living crisis, fascist paper sellers flee Piccadilly, South Wales miners "stay in strikes", nuclear threat, the producers co-operative, history of Makhnovist movement pt 2, prisoners, Spain, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 3 #04 April 1948
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Including: USA vs Russia - aeronautics, Buckingham Palace strike, Civil Service purge of "subversives", Stalinists maintain Buchenwald for anti-fascist prisoners, Spanish anarchists receive death sentence, Makhnovist movement part 3, Portugal: colony of Anglo-American imperialism, distribution in the free society, KKK threatens black people and trade unionists, etc.
NB: This issue includes some archaic language which may now be considered racist. This is in the context of an anti-racist article about the Ku Klux Klan.
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Very much appreciating read these AFB "Direct Action" edition. Post WW-2 pieces of value.
Yes it's interesting to see the developments as the months roll by...
In regards to the anti-racism of the Left, readers may be interested in reading Gilles Dauvé on anti-fascism and its flaws.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 3 #05 May 1948
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Including: IWMA May Day manifesto, Russia and nuclear weapons, police repression in Northern Ireland, USA defends Italian ruling class, racism in southern USA, agricultural collectives in a free society, planned scarcity as social control, critique of Freedom Group article, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 3 #06 June 1948
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Including: USA strikewave, fascists in the UK, Palestine, "on direct action", the free commune, etc.
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We hold no brief for Zionism or for the Jewish State. We see no solution to the problem of the Jewish people in the creation of a new and virulent nationalism; we are just as much opposed to a Jewish politician as we are to any other politician.
...
But we recognise the right of the Jewish people to live in peace. We have nothing but admiration for the achievements of the collectivist pioneers in Palestine. Those of us who have had the chance of seeing the collective settlements at first hand know that we have seen social living of an advanced kind.
For "collective settlement" read capitalist accumulation; "social living", social-democracy. There is no capitalist accumulation without the capitalist—in this case "Jewish"—state.
In this situation we should be hypocrites if, as Anarchists, we did not affirm our sympathy with the workers on the Jewish collective settlements, refugees from pogrom and massacre, who are now involved in a war that was not of their seeking.
Better to be hypocrites, then, than a party to murder and theft.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 3 #07 July 1948
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Including: cold war, anti-semitism in eastern Europe, London and Liverpool dockers strike, the downfall of Tito, co-operative farming in Iowa, Bill Borland obituary, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 3 #08 Sept 1948
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Including: America vs Russia, behind the iron curtain, international anarchist news, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 4 #01 Jan 1949
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Including: warmongering, workers control and trade unions, new Nazi paper supported by Russia, difficulties producing "Direct Action", strike news, education, film industry, international anarchist news, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 4 #02 April 1949
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Including: May Day, anarchists on trial in Bulgaria, "redeployment" management slang decoded, miners vs Coal Board, Donald Rooum on anarchist struggle, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 4 #05 Oct 1949
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Including: Labour govt cuts, sorry state of the Amalgamated Engineering Union, quotes from the press, new trade union international, Bakunin and Marx book review, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 4 #07 Dec 1949
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Including: Workers' apathy, unemployment, nationalised transport industries, Australia elections, economics and imperialism, etc.
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Revolutionary workers in Britain are appalled by the seeming apathy of the workers.
In the immediate aftermath of the greatest slaughter of the working class in human history, and faced by a horrific new tool of destruction unleashed on workers' centres by the bourgeoisie, it would be surprising, astounding, if the working class had been anything but apathetic about its historic revolutionary role. The apathy was long lived; not until the late Fifties did we summon our strength to again challenge the capitalist order.
In 1948, as in 1949, Not the AFB's finest hour, for sure.
Nagging people about apathy on your front page isn't exactly a productive tactic either... here come the moany anarchists wagging their fingers at us...
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 5 #01 Jan 1950
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Including: don't vote in the election, workers' control not nationalisation, direct action not the TUC, "something rotten in cotton" - textile industry, migrant cotton pickers in America, IWMA news, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 5 #02 Mar 1950
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Including: Labour government under pressure, wages and unemployment, report from Nigeria on miners' strike, Russian trade with Franco, Labour government and war, George Orwell obituary, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 5 #03 Apr 1950
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Including: wages suppressed and prices up, South Africa, National Passenger Workers Union, government spending, syndicalism in Norway, international news, etc.
Direct Action (AFB) Vol 5 #04 May 1950
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Including: Canadian shipowners and seamen's wages, UK govt budget is payout to the rich, rationing and austerity, striking London portworkers sold out by Stalinists, Grigor Maximoff obituary, etc.
Comments
Great stuff!
Great stuff!