Hands Off Russia


The Hands Off Russia campaign was an international political initiative first launched by British Socialists in 1919 to organise opposition to the British intervention on the side of the White armies in the Russian Civil War. The movement was encouraged by the fledgling Communist International and ultimately emulated in several other countries, including the United States, Canada, and Australia.

History

The National Committee for the Hands off Russia Movement was elected at a conference in London in January 1919. Socialists like William Paul, W. P. Coates, Harry Pollitt, David Ramsay and Alfred Comrie were active in the campaign.
In 1920 East London dockers refused to load the freighter with arms headed for Russia.
The initial committee members were: Mary Bamber, Isaac Brassington, John Bromley, Alexander Gordon Cameron, Rhys Davies, Robert Dunstan, William Gallacher, W. T. Goode, Alex Gossip, Harold Granville Grenfell, David Kirkwood, George Lansbury, Cecil L'Estrange Malone, Ernest Mander, Tom Mann, John Edmund Mills, Tom Myers, George Peet, Fred Shaw, Robert Smillie, Ben Spoor, and James Winstone.
In 1919, William Paul published Hands off Russia which claimed:
Sylvia Pankhurst reported in August 1919 that:
Many of those who were active in the Hands off Russia Campaign would go on to found the Communist Party of Great Britain.
In 1924, Ramsay MacDonald's Labour government established diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union, and in light of this the committee was renamed as the Anglo-Russian Parliamentary Committee.

Footnotes

Publications