ABSTRACT
Many strands of the Marxist theory of war, and of the Soviet practice of that theory, are very strange to the ordinary Western reader. In the Soviet view, however, an even more important consideration flows from this particular concept; for the Russians believe that the size of the political objective determines the size of the war. In Marx's, Engels' and Lenin's opinion, the chief of the benefits that can be derived from war is the speeding-up of the revolutionary process. The 'revolutionary process' is a concept of Marx and his followers which is based upon their conviction that all human societies are destined to become communist; and that this destiny is to be welcomed. The Bolshevik leaders had no doubt that, right from the October Revolution to the outbreak of the Second World War, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was extremely weak compared with the forces of capitalism taken as a whole.
