Submitted by Alan Rockman, Apr 3, 2007 17:39

William Herrick was a friend of mine, an honored friend, though I did not ever have the opportunity to meet him in person.

My college thesis was on Jews who fought with the Lincolns and the Internationals. While the "official" (CPUSA) line is that 30-35% of the Lincolns were Jews, closer studies made by Herrick, by Robert Gladnick, Yale Stuart and other Lincoln vets was that the actual number was closer to 50%. The CPUSA in their "all peoples of the world unite" shtick kept that real figure under wraps and even anglicized some names - example Solly Regenstreif became Johnny Gates. Part of this was due to the heavy Anti-Semitism prevalant in American society in those days - especially from the Bund, the Coughlinites, and other native fascists. Ironically, many of the Lincolns, including my late friends Gates and Herrick would be turning over in their graves if they knew about how the Left, especially the MoveOn.Org Democratic Party Left were so willing to appease Iran - and applaud the destruction of Israel.

Then again, in some cases, maybe not, as many Jewish battalion members applauded the Hitler-Stalin Pact. When they found out how Stalin was no better than Hitler, and that the Pact was responsible for the deaths of millions of people, including fellow IB'ers and their own relatives, their tears would be genuine. Many including Stuart, chose to work for Jewish causes, some like Gates and Herrick spoke out bravely against the Left, even if it meant alienating old comrades.

One of these old comrades was Harry Fisher who wrote a book called "Comrades". It would have been a brave, brilliant book if it wasn't for the fact that Harry Fisher never learned much after the SCW. He went to work for TASS, and remained with TASS almost till the end of his life. I do not know if Fisher remained a Party member till the day that he died. What I do know is that he chose to go to an Anti-Iraq War rally, never mind Saddam's missile attacks on Israel, his funding of Hamas, his ties to Al Qaeda, the poison gassing of the Kurds - Fisher didn't want to know, and he suffered a fatal heart attack at that rally.

To go to war to free the Kurds was as noble as volunteering to help the Spanish Republic, but those close to the party, or still owing allegiance to the Jew-baiting Josif Vissionovich Stalin will never get that in a million years.

In closing I will mention that while part of me wishes that I had fought in Spain, the other part of me wishes that people like Milt Wolff and others would have dumped the Party in disgust, denounced the Pact, and the subsequent events like the Slansky Trials and the Doctors Plot, and gone to Israel to volunteer for the Haganah. That is, after serving, as many of them did, in the uniform of the true Anti-Fascist Armed Forces - those of the United States of America.

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