ABSTRACT
No one who wanted to resist Fascist aggression could really be in doubt any longer that more armaments were necessary, even if the policy behind rearmament were to be one of “pooled security” with such other powers as were prepared to come in. In January, 1937, the Communist Party, the I.L.P., and the Socialist League, having reached agreement for common action, issued a jointly signed “Unity Manifesto” calling for “Unity in the struggle against Fascism, Reaction and War, and against the National Government”. Shortly after the Munich crisis, the Labour Party issued a Manifesto, under the title Labour’s Claim to Government, calling for the replacement of the “National” Government by a Labour Government as an urgent necessity if the country’s resources were to be mobilised in the democratic cause. The Government, assured of Labour’s vote for its rearmament programme, would be in a position simply to ignore Labour pressure for a better foreign policy.
