Daniël "Daan" Goulooze (28 April 1901 – 10 September 1965) was a Dutch Jewish construction worker who was a committed communist and resistance fighter. In 1925, he became a member of the Communist Party of the Netherlands (CPN) and by 1930 had become an executive member of the organisation. In 1934, he formed Pegasus, a publisher of many left-wing writers and intellectuals in the Netherlands, some for the first time. In 1935–1936, Goulooze formed the Dutch Information Service (DIS), an organisation that supplied information to the Soviet Union. Goulooze became the liaison between the organisation and the CPN. In 1937, he went to the Soviet Union, where he received intelligence training at the Marx–Engels–Lenin Institute in Moscow. Upon returning, he became the liaison officer of Communist International (Comintern) in the Netherlands, his main duty being to maintain on-going radio contact with Soviet intelligence.
Goulooze used the DIS organisation from early 1937 to help establish Soviet Red Orchestra agents in the Netherlands, France and the Low Countries. After the start of the war and the occupation of the Netherlands, Goulooze helped to reestablish the KPD in Germany in 1940. As the war progressed, the Comintern, the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and the French Communist Party were progressively destroyed in Europe, the DIS became increasingly important to Soviet intelligence as the only organisation in Western Europe that could maintain contact with Soviet agents on the ground.
Such was the level of communication that Goulooze conducted with Soviet intelligence, that he maintained four separate and active wireless telegraphy sets and one in reserve. His signals were eventually detected by the German Funkabwehr and he was arrested along with many members of the DIS. Goulooze was sent to Sachsenhausen concentration camp but managed to survive the war. In 1948, he was expelled from the CPN after a smear campaign about his role in the war that lasted more than a decade. He then worked for the "De Republiek der Letteren" (The Republic of Arts), a left-wing publishing house. In 1951 he had a heart attack. He died in 1965.
Life
Goulooze was the son of Daniël Goulooze, a blacksmith, and Baukje Goulooze (née Visser), a housemaid, and was the oldest of six children, who grew up in Amsterdam in a working-class family. His grandparents on his father's side came from Zeeland in the south, and on his mother's side from Friesland, in the northern part of the Netherlands. His father was a member of the National Federation of Metal Workers union that was affiliated with the National Labor Secretariat (NAS, Nationaal Arbeids-Secretariaat) trade union federation. He was an admirer of the Dutch politician and later social anarchist Ferdinand Domela Nieuwenhuis. After the German invasion of the Netherlands in May 1940, his father was interred at the Herzogenbusch concentration camp and died, aged 70, in 1943.
In March 1929, Goulooze entered into a common-law marriage with Lydia Wolters. In October 1938, Goulooze and Wolters split. Goulooze entered into his common-law marriage, this time to Petronella Alida van de Plaats (1911-1949), who suffered from poor health. The couple had a son, Zane, born in 1939, to whom the couple were devoted. To protect them, Goulooze moved them to Gooi at the start of the war.
Anarchism
After leaving school, Goulooze was apprenticed to a carpenter and attended an evening school to supplement his knowledge of carpentry. Politically, as a youth, Goulooze was leftist and this was visible by his youth membership of the National Labor Secretariat (NLR, Nationaal Arbeids-Secretariaat). He subsequently worked in the drawing school of the Dutch shipbuilding company, Nederlandsche Scheepsbouw Maatschappij in construction.
In 1916, Goulooze joined the Social-Anarchist Youth Organisation (SAJO, Sociaal-Anarchistische Jeugd Organisatie). his was an organisation that was established in several cities including Amsterdam, that consisted of several dozen young rebellious people who refused to do their military service, instead, spending their time going on rambles, and making music as well as planning bombings.
In 1919, Goulooze was elected treasurer. In September 1920, Goulooze took over administration for publishing the organisations magazine, De Opstandeling (The Insurgent). Around this time, Goulooze became part of a group of young men and women, that formed around Dutch communist and chemigrapher .
Postma would go camping with the group, and they would hold discussions and debate politics, communism, trade unionionism and the Russian Revolution. Postma strongly supported trade unionism, the soviet revolution, dictatorship for the proletariat and the group initially shared his enthusiasm, but some eventually rejected his views. Goulooze for the most part, found himself in agreement with Postma and this, in turn, developed into a lifelong friendship. The heated debates eventually led to a group withdrawing from the SAJO that included Goulooze, leaving to join the Federation of Social Anarchists of which Postma was a member. On 22 July 1922, Goulooze became the administrator for the Social Anarchists magazine, De Toekomst.
Nomad The first real decision he made was whether to accept military service during conscription or refuse it. As an anarchist, Goulooze was anti-militaristic and while it was accepted for members of his peer group to refuse the service and wait to be arrested by the Military police, he decided to ignore the conscription order and evade arrest. Goulooze became a nomad, living on his wits, constantly on his guard. During this period, he worked in Antwerp, among other places. For several years he managed to avoid being arrested. In 1929, when he moved into his own apartment with his wife, he refused to be added to the Electoral roll.
However, it became expedient in the early 1930s for Goulooze to rebuild his legal existence and he was finally arrested. However, when he was undergoing his medical examination for conscription, he was rejected due to a minor foot disorder, making the whole exercise moot.
Living a nomadic life did not prevent Goulooze from taking part in a number of political actions in the 1920s and early 1930s. In 1923, Goulooze was responsible for the transportation and distribution of the special newspaper De Spelbreker, not only in Amsterdam, but in the rest of the country.
The De Spelbreker newspaper was created by the Committee of Action, a group of the Dutch labour movement, made up of Communists, Syndicalists and Anarchists, who wanted to protest the 1923 Fleet Act and the 25th anniversary of Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands. During this period, Goulooze was also working for the NAS. His name appeared in De Arbeid, the legal body of trade union on 17 November 1923.
In the same year, the NAS split into two groups. On one side were 8,000 members who left to found the IWA-affiliated Dutch Syndicalist Trade Union Federation (NSV, ) that was chaired by Bernard Lansink. On the other was a group who wanted to join the Red International of Labour Unions (RILU), although many in the federation favoured the anarcho-syndicalist International Workers' Association (IWA). Goulooze sided with the NSV and became the organiser of a youth recruitment office at a Local Labour Secretariat (PAS, Plaatselijke Arbeids Secretariaten) in Amsterdam.
Communist Party of Netherlands In June 1924, the Federation of Social Anarchists group came to an end. At the time, Goulooze rejected anarchism, along with the Postma group. He became fully Communist, as it was the only political alternative that suited his worldview. Goulooze believed that the anarchists were incapable of an effective struggle against capitalism. Unwilling to join the CPN, he, along with Postma, instead joined the BKSP on 24 January 1925. Postma went on to become editor of De Kommunist, the magazine of the BKSP.
Six months later, the BKSP party leadership split, David Wijnkoop along with most of the leadership was forced to resign and a large sector of BKSP opted to rejoin the Communist Party of Holland ("Communistisch Party Holland") (CPH). By 1925, Goulooze had become an active communist and in 1926, became a member of the CPH. Due to his age, Goulooze became an active member of the Young Communist League (CJB, 'Communistische Jongeren Beweging). Goulooze became a popular and later important member of the CJB. Under Goulooze and in agreement with the political line take by the Young Communist International (KJI, Kommunist Jeugd Internationale) the CJB decided to take direct action, instead of the usual discussion of politics.
Under orders from Moscow, it was rearranged into business divisions and the magazine De Jonge Communist (The Young Communist) was renamed to De Jonge Arbeider (The Young Worker). As the CJB was a small organisation, Goulooze tried to create a leadership role that resulted in him negotiating with several companies during spontaneous youth strikes. At the same time, a plan grew to send a delegation to the Soviet Union. Seven young people were delegated from suitable companies and the delegation left at the end of August 1926. When the group returned, a detailed brochure, What did 7 young workers in Soviet Russia see?, was published that described their impressions. This was the first of many trips to the Soviet Union he would take.
A new academy When he returned, Goulooze established a new academy that offered a three-week course to train a cadre of CJB communists. The leaders of the academy were made up of Henriette Roland Holst, Gerrit Mannoury, and Henk Sneevliet and its initial enrollment consisted of sixteen students, aged sixteen to twenty-five. When the academy came to public notice, Goulooze defended it existence, but also took an active part in running the different CJB departments that included canvassing, leafletting, pasting up posters and demonstrating.
In June 1928 in Amsterdam at the CPH party congress, the congress erupted in open warfare. Goulooze was immediately elected as secretary of the board, where he represented the CJB. On 17 August 1928, Goulooze attended the World Youth Peace Congress as a representative of the CJB, that was hosted in Eerde.
Propaganda efforts During this period Goulooze acted to ensure that communist propaganda in the form of the newspapers Op de bon and Het Panster reached every part of the Royal Netherlands Army. A special propaganda stunt was the publication of military booklet by the officer Jan Zonderland, that contained a worker's oath. The case gained national attention, due the commotion from baggage searches in barracks to remove it; that it came to the notice of the national press, the daily newspaper Het Leven.
Reforming the International Workers Aid In 1930, the International Workers Aid (IAH, Internationale Arbeiders hulp) that existed to provide aid to strikers and strengthen cultural ties with the Soviet Union, became embroiled in a disagreement amongst its members, that degenerated into a fight. Goulooze was ordered to take over the reconstruction of the IAH and oversee the election of a new board.
CPN Board member