Marx and Engels lived in a historic period, when the possibility of a socialist revolution in one country had not fully matured. They predicted that a socialist revolution would occur simultaneously in a number of countries, where capitalism was highly developed.    In conditions where the bourgeoisie of every country, who were to be overthrown by the working class, posed as defenders of national interests, the revolutionary cause of the proletariat throughout the world might have been spoiled, if the proletariat of all countries had been deceived by the honeyed words of "nationalism" or "patriotism" advocated by the bourgeois class of their own country. For the proletariat of every country, their homeland under bourgeois rule can never be their fatherland; therefore, the proletariat had to back unfailingly internationalism and socialism in the choices between chauvinism and internationalism and nationalism and socialism.

Proceeding from this point of view, the classics of Marxism warned the working class against so-called patriotic illusions and instructed them to discard at all times the nationalist bias between patriotism and socialism and defend socialism. Analyzing the causes behind the failure of the Paris Commune, Marx asserted that the participants of the Commune had not attacked Versailles, the den of reactionaries, as they thought mistakenly that the launching of a civil war would constitute an anti-patriotic act, when the foreign enemy, the Prussian army, was encircling Paris.    Lenin branded it a treachery to the socialist cause that, following the outbreak of the World War I, the revisionists of the Second International abandoned the revolutionary principle of the working class and sided with the bourgeoisie of their own countries, under the slogan of "defense of the fatherland".    To help, under the pretext of "defense of the fatherland", the bourgeoisie obtain colonies, who madly display a readiness to increase their own wealth at the cost of their whole nation, constitutes a betrayal of one's own nation and, at the same time, of socialism. Therefore, if the proletariat of an imperialist country are loyal to the socialist cause, they should not hold up the sign of "defense of the fatherland" but instead should hoist the banner of "opposing war" and launch a campaign to boycott war. However, the situation is completely different in colonial and dependent countries. For the communists of these countries, raising the banner of national liberation and patriotism is tantamount to opposing the bourgeoisie in the suzerain states; by doing so, they make an equal contribution to the national and class revolution, as well as to the international revolutionary cause.

Pseudo-communists and would-be Marxists made a theoretical and practical mistake: Failing to understand this plain truth, they regarded patriotism and nationalism as the enemy of communism and rejected them unconditionally, absolutizing the proposition "The proletariat has no fatherland."    In the new historical situation in which the socialist revolution takes place with the nation-state as a unit, there can be said to be no major difference between genuine nationalism and genuine communism in colonies. The former lays a little more stress on the national character, the latter on the class character. Their patriotic stands should be regarded as the same in that they both champion the nation's interests against foreign forces.    My invariable belief is that a true communist is a true patriot and that a true nationalist, too, is a true patriot.    Therefore, we consistently attached great importance to cooperation with true, patriotic nationalists and devoted all our efforts to strengthening our alliance with them. (Volume 4, Chapter 12 To Hasten the Liberation of the Country, 5. The Association for the Restoration of the Fatherland)