Ludo Martens: Trotsky’s role on the eve of the Second World War

by Ludo Martens
 
During the thirties, Trotsky literally became the world’s expert on anti-Communism. Even today, right-wing ideologues peruse Trotsky’s works in search of weapons against the Soviet Union under Stalin.

In 1982, when Reagan was again preaching the anti-Communist crusade, Henri Bernard, Professor Emeritus at the Royal Military School of Belgium, published a book to spread the following urgent message:

`The Communists of 1982 are the Nazis of 1939. We are weaker in front of Moscow than we were in August 1939 in front of Hitler.’

Bernard, op. cit. , p. 9.

All of the standard clichés of Le Pen , the fascist French Front National leader, are there:

`Terrorism is not the act of a few crazies. The basis of everything is the Soviet Union and the clandestine network of international terrorism.’

Ibid. , p. 121.

`Christian leftism is a Western wound.
`The synchronicity of `pacifist’ demonstrations shows how they were inspired by Moscow.’

Ibid. , p. 123.

`The British commandos who went to die in the Falklands showed that there still exist moral values in the West.’

Ibid. , p. 11.

But the tactics used by such an avowed anti-Communist as Bernard are very interesting. Here is how a man who,despite despising a `leftist Christian’, will ally himself with Trotsky.

`The private Lenin was, like Trotsky, a human being …. His personal life was full of nuance ….`Trotsky should normally have succeeded Lenin … he was the main architect of the October Revolution, the victor of the Civil War, the creator of the Red Army ….

`Lenin had much respect for Trotsky. He thought of him as successor. He thought Stalin was too brutal ….

`Within the Soviet Union, Trotsky rose up against the imposing bureaucracy that was paralysing the Communist machine ….

`Artist, educated, non-conformist and often prophet, he could not get along with the main dogmatists in the Party ….

`Stalin was nationalist, a sentiment that did not exist either in Lenin or Trotsky …. With Trotsky, the foreign Communist Parties could consider themselves as a force whose sole purpose was to impose a social order. With Stalin, they worked for the Kremlin and to further its imperialist politics.’

Ibid. , pp. 48–50.

We present here a few of the main theses that Trotsky put forward during the years 1937–1940, and that illustrate the nature of his absolute anti-Communist struggle. They allow one to understand why people in the Western security services, such as Henri Bernard, use Trotsky to fight Communists. They also shed some light on the class struggle between Bolsheviks and opportunists and on some aspects of the Purge of 1937–1938.

The enemy is the new aristocracy, the new Bolshevik bourgeoisie

For Trotsky, the main enemy was at the head of the Soviet State: it was the `new Bolshevik aristocracy’, the most anti-Socialist and anti-democratic layer of the society, a social layer that lived like `the well-to-do bourgeois of the United States’! Here is how he phrased it.

`The privileged bureaucracy … now represents the most antisocialist and the most antidemocratic sector of Soviet society.’

Trotsky, Thermidor et l’antisémitisme (22 February 1937). La lutte, pp. 143–144.

`We accuse the ruling clique of having transformed itself into a new aristocracy, oppressing and robbing the masses …. The higher layer of the bureaucracy lives approximately the same kind of life as the well-to-do bourgeois of the United States and other capitalist countries.’

Trotsky, The World Situation and Perspectives (14 February 1940). Writings, vol. 12, pp. 148–149.

This language makes Trotsky indistinguishable from the Menshevik leaders when they were leading the counter-revolutionary armed struggle, alongside the White and interventionist armies. Also indistinguishable from the language of the classical Right of the imperialist countries.

Compare Trotsky with the main anti-Communist ideologue in the International Confederation of Christian Unions (CISC), P. J. S. Serrarens, writing in 1948:

`There are thanks to Stalin, once again `classes’ and rich people …. Just like in a capitalist society, the élite is rewarded with money and power. There is what `Force Ouvrière’ (France) calls a `Soviet aristocracy’. This weekly compares it to the aristocracy created by Napoleon.’

P. J. S. Serrarens, La Russie et l’Occident (Utrecht: Confédération Internationale des Syndicats Chrétiens, n.d.), pp. 33, 37.

After World War II, the French union Force Ouvrière to which Serrarens was referring was directly created and financed by the CIA. The `Lambertist’ Trotskyist group worked, and still works, inside it. At that time, the CISC, be it in Italy or Belgium, worked directly for the CIA for the defence of the capitalist system in Europe. To mobilize the workers against Communism, it used a revolting `anti-capitalist’ demagoguery that it borrowed from the social-democrats and the Trotskyists: in the Soviet Union, there was a `new class of rich people’, a `Soviet aristocracy’.

Confronting this `new aristocracy, oppressing and robbing the masses’,

Trotsky, The World Situation, p. 148.

there were, in Trotsky’s eyes, `one hundred and sixty millions who are profoundly discontented’.

Ibid. , p. 149.

These `people’ were protecting the collectivization of the means of production and the planned economy against the `ignorant and despotic Stalinist thieves’. In other words, apart from the `Stalinists’, the rest of the society was clean and led just struggles! Listen to Trotsky:

`Twelve to fifteen millions of the privileged — there are the “people” who organize the parades, demonstrations, and ovations …. But apart from this “pays légal” as was once said in France, there exist one hundred and sixty millions who are profoundly discontented ….

`Antagonism between the bureaucracy and the people is measured by the increasing severity of the totalitarian rule ….
`The bureaucracy can be crushed only by a new political revolution.’

Ibid. , p. 149.

`(T)he economy is planned on the basis of nationalization and collectivization of the means of production. This state economy has its own laws that are less and less tolerant of the despotism, ignorance and banditry of the Stalinist bureaucracy.’

Trotsky, La capitulation de Staline (11 March 1939). La lutte, p. 216.

Since the re-establishment of capitalism was impossible in Trotsky’s eyes, any opposition, be it social-democratic, revisionist, bourgeois or counter-revolutionary, became legitimate. It was the voice of `one hundred and sixty millions who were profoundly discontented’ and aimed to `protect’ the collectivization of the means of production against the `new aristocracy’. Trotsky became the spokesperson for all the retrograde forces, anti-socialist and fascist.

Bolshevism and fascism

Trotsky was one of the first to put forward the line that Bolshevism and fascism were twins. This thesis was quite popular, during the thirties, in the reactionary Catholic parties. The Communist Party was their sworn enemy, the fascist party their most important bourgeois opponent. Once again, here is Trotsky:

`Fascism is winning victory after victory and its best ally, the one that is clearing its path throughout the world, is Stalinism.’

Trotsky, Caïn Dugachvili va jusqu’au bout (April 1938). L’appareil, p. 238.

`In fact, nothing distinguishes Stalin’s political methods from Hitler’s. But the difference in results on the international scale is remarkable.’

Trotsky, La capitulation de Staline, p. 216.

`An important part, which becomes more and more important, of the Soviet apparatus is formed of fascists who have yet to recognize themselves as such. To equate the Soviet régime with fascism is a gross historic error …. But the symmetry of the political superstructures and the similarity of totalitarian methods and of psychological profiles are striking ….
`(T)he agony of Stalinism is the most horrible and most odious spectacle on Earth.’

Trotsky, Nouvelles défections (17 March 1938). La lutte, pp. 161–162.

Trotsky here presented one of the first versions of the essential theme of CIA and fascist propaganda during the fifties, that of `red fascism’. By using the word `fascism’, Trotsky tried to redirect the hatred that the masses felt towards the terrorist dictatorship of big capital, against socialism. After 1944–1945, all the German, Hungarian, Croatian and Ukrainian fascist leaders that fled to the West put on their `democratic’ mask; they praised U.S. `democracy’, the new hegemonic force and the main source of support for retrograde and fascist forces in the world. These `old’ fascists, faithful to their criminal past, all developed the same theme: `Bolshevism is fascism, but even worse’.

Note further that at the time that European fascism had already started its war (wars in Ethiopia and Spain, annexation of Austria and Czechoslovakia), Trotsky was affirming that the `most horrible and most odious spectable’ on Earth was the `agony of socialism’!

Defeatism and capitulation in front of Nazi Germany

Trotsky became the main propagandist for defeatism and capitulationism in the Soviet Union. His demagogic `world revolution’ served to better stifle the Soviet revolution. Trotsky spread the idea that in case of fascist aggression against the Soviet Union, Stalin and the Bolsheviks would `betray’ and that under their leadership, the defeat of the Soviet Union was inevitable. Here are his ideas on this subject:

`The military … status of Soviet Russia, is contradictory. On one side we have a population of 170,000,000 awakened by the greatest revolution in history … with a more or less developed war industry. On the other side we have a political regime paralyzing all of the forces of the new society …. One thing I am sure: the political regime will not survive the war. The social regime, which is the nationalized property of production, is incomparably more powerful than the political regime, which has a despotic character …. The representatives of the political regime, or the bureaucracy, are afraid of the prospect of a war, because they know better than we that they will not survive the war as a regime.’

Trotsky, On the Eve of World War II (23 July 1939). Writings, vol. 12, p. 18.

Once again, there were, on one side, `the 170 million’, the `good’ citizens who were awoken by the Revolution. One might wonder by whom, if it was not by the Bolshevik Party and Stalin: the great peasant masses were certainly not `awoken’ during the years 1921–1928. These `170 million’ had a `developed war industry’. As if it was not Stalin’s collectivization and industrialization policies, implemented thanks to his strong will, that allowed the creation of an arms industry in record time! Thanks to his correct line, to his will, to his capacity to organize, the Bolshevik régime awoke the popular forces that had been kept in ignorance, superstition and primitive individual work. According to the provocateur Trotsky’s rantings, the Bolshevik régime paralyzed that society’s forces! And Trotsky made all sorts of absurd predictions: it was certain that the Bolshevik régime would not survive the war! Hence, two propaganda themes dear to the Nazis can be found in Trotsky’s writings: anti-Bolshevism and defeatism.

`Berlin knows to what extent the Kremlin clique has demoralized the country’s army and population through its struggle for self-preservation ….
`Stalin continues to sap the moral force and the general level of resistance of the country. Careerists with no honor, nor conscience, upon whom Stalin is forced to rely, will betray the country in difficult times.’

Trotsky, Staline et Hitler (12 March 1938). L’appareil, p. 234.

In his hatred of Communism, Trotsky incited the Nazis to wage war against the Soviet Union. He, the `eminent expert’ on the affairs of the Soviet Union, told the Nazis that they had every chance of winning the war against Stalin: the army and the population were demoralized (false!), Stalin was destroying the resistance (false!) and the Stalinists would capitulate at the beginning of the war (false!).

In the Soviet Union, this Trotskyist propaganda had two effects. It encouraged defeatism and capitulationism, through the idea that fascism was assured victory given that the USSR had such a rotten and incompetent leadership. It also encouraged `insurrections’ and assassination attempts to eliminate Bolshevik leaders `who would betray in difficult times’. A leadership that was categorically destined to fall during the war might well fall at the beginning of the war. Anti-Soviet and opportunistic groups could therefore make their attempts.

In both cases, Trotsky’s provocations directly helped the Nazis.

Ecuador: the PCMLE in the face of the proclamation of Moreno

A scandalous electoral fraud is under way to ignore the popular will expressed today at the polls. The CNE, a few minutes ago, officially gave the victory to the candidacy of Lenin Moreno with 51.07% of votes.

We DO NOT RECOGNIZE these results, they are the result of a fraudulent action. It is not possible to proclaim official results with “94% of the ballots counted” but, above all, this scrutiny has been done without transparency: the citizenship has not been able to keep track of that process because they hid the information by disabling their website. Other elements, such as the exit poll of Citizen Participation, were already raised in the previous communiqué.

In addition to not recognizing these results, we must demand that a vote-by-vote count be produced for each of the polls.

We insist on mobilizing all our forces to respect the popular will and to reject fraud.

Quito, April 2, 2017.

Central Committee Secretariat

Source

Statement of the Party of Labour of Iran (Toufan) on criminal aggression against Syria

We condemn the attack on Syria in the strongest terms!

Finally, after several days of false propaganda of western imperialist’s media about the use of “chemical weapons” by the Syrian regime and shedding crocodile tears for “innocent children of Syria” the U.S launched an air strike against Alshariat airfield. As a comment to the attack, the Zionist criminal Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, said “Donald Trump both in word and in action sent a clear message to the effect that the use of chemical weapons will not be tolerated.” Netanyahu defended the aggression against Syria, saying “Israel hopes that the message indicates a firm determination to face the horrific actions of the Assad regime, not only in Damascus but also in Tehran, Pyongyang ( North Korean capital), and other places to be heard.”

Interference of U.S. imperialism and the Zionist intelligence services
and media in Syria has taken very direct, vicious, and barbaric form, bullying and hypocrisy and deception covers it. Vampires have become humanitarians overnight, and their teeth are sharpened for sucking the blood of the Syrian people.
 
Our party strongly condemns the military attack against Syria and considers it as a flagrant violation of the rights of nations and the territorial integrity of Syria. We call upon every progressive organization and individual to expose and condemn the conspiracies that are plotted against the people of Syria.
Party of Labour of Iran (Toufan)

Notes on the history of the Communist Party of Colombia (M-L)

The founding of the Communist Party of Colombia Marxist-Leninist was the culmination of a process of political differentiation that allowed a significant contingent of principled revolutionaries, in the early 1960s, to draw lines of demarcation with reformism, pacifism and Khrushchevite revisionism, which were dominant in those years as the main lines of political action of the organizations that, at that time, made up the people’s camp.

It was a time of great economic, social and political tensions. At that time, in the world, the inter-imperialist confrontation between the US and the so-called Soviet Union resulted in a “Cold War” of great dimensions that was devastating for the life of continents. At the same time, the revolutionary struggles raging in Vietnam,* in the Congo** and in different countries, and the revolutions in China (1949) and Cuba (1959) had a great influence on us. And in 1948, our country was the scene of a tragedy: after the assassination of Jorge Eliecer Gaitan on April 9, 1948, the Liberals and Conservatives unleashed a civil war, which they used to try to bury the democratic aspirations of the people. In 1958, they pushed though a referendum by which the two parties would alternate in the government for a period of 12 years, with a strictly equal distribution of public offices, including ministries, institutes, elected bodies and the judicial system.

* The military coup fostered by the U.S. against Ngo Dinh Diem, President of South Vietnam, in 1963, and the massive bombing subsequently ordered by U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson against North Vietnam in 1964, were the beginning of a long period of war in that country that lasted until 1975, when the United States was decisively defeated by the anti-imperialist forces and forced to leave the country.

** The world will not forget the assassination of Patrice Lumumba, Prime Minister and independence leader of the Congo, on January 17, 1961, in an action carried out by the CIA and putschist Colonel Joseph Mobutu to further the interests of U.S. multinationals in that country.

This was how the so-called “National Front” was born, that the traditional parties imposed as a strategy: on the one hand, to make the guerrilla forces surrender, forces that had evolved from liberalism to the defense of anti-imperialist ideas, and that were expanding strongly throughout the country, thus endangering the power of the bourgeoisie and landlords. On the other hand, to impose a bipartisan system of government and political control that excluded the constitutional and legal possibility that other political forces would arise or that parties other than the Liberals and Conservatives could take office even if they obtained the majority votes as required by law. The widespread repression, the constant bombardment of the guerrilla zones*, the assassination of trade union, social and political leaders marked a regime of terror that also spared no effort to use the carrot of populism to re-legitimize the ruling classes in the country.

* Also called “Red Zones”.

From the economic point of view, this urge to re-legitimize the ruling classes was in clear accordance with a model that called for protecting the prices in the coffee industry from collapse, promoting the export of non-traditional products, especially industrial products, improving productivity, expanding industry, expanding State capital through the construction of infrastructure in roads, energy and public services.

The main political discussions

The future of the country, amidst a rather complex economic, political and social reality, as well as the program and role of the various political organizations, were the topics of great controversy that galvanized the revolutionaries of that time. But to be able to move from such debates to transformative political actions necessitated an ideological and political unity and/or identity that could only be built by deepening the ideological struggle and practical commitment.

In the Communist Party of Colombia*, especially since its 5th Congress held in 1947, the target of the ideological struggle included the theses of Browderism, defended first by Augusto Duran**, the leader of the port workers and until then General Secretary of the Party, and then by Mr. Gilberto Vieira White*** who, like his predecessor, did not hesitate to propose a rapprochement and unity with those sectors of the bourgeoisie that they considered democratic and/or progressive, as a condition to advance and defeat the reactionary sectors present in the State and government. That line was initially the perfect excuse invented by these gentlemen to adopt a policy of collaboration with the bourgeois governments of that time, in effect making the Communist Party an appendage of the tactics and strategy of the traditional parties. It is undeniable that they laid bare the true content of the calls for coexistence and cohabitation with the establishment that this organization had promoted since the 1940s.

* In 1979 the party changed its name, coming to be called the Colombian Communist Party.

** Augusto Duran was elected General Secretary at the 3rd Congress of the PCC held in 1938; like Browder he promoted changing the name of the party, calling it the Democratic Socialist Party (PSD). The PSD was characterized by a reformist political line that supported the government policies of that time. So backward was the policy promoted by this political leader that he even opposed the entry of intellectuals into the Party. 

*** Gilberto Vieira White was elected General Secretary of the PCC at its 5th Congress in 1947.

It should be noted that the consistent leaders promptly rejected that line of conduct of the leading clique of the Communist Party of Colombia, and maintained the clear idea of transcending and demarcating lines with Browderism, making a great effort to provide the Colombian working class and people with a really Marxist-Leninist organization. This would really confront imperialism and the bourgeoisie, which are truly responsible for the dependence, backwardness, marginalization, poverty and lack of rights existing in the country.

The ideological struggle also targeted the Bernsteinian theses that promoted parliamentarism and electoral participation as the only way to achieve power. Both imperialism and the bourgeoisie knew that these positions, promoted by the agents of revisionism and social democracy internationally, were an immense support for them. In that sense, they did not hesitate to protect and provide advantages to the organizations and leaders who defended those positions, claiming at the same time how anti-historical and counterproductive for democracy and the development of countries are revolutions through violent means. Our history knows of the shameless work that most of the leaders of the CTC* and UTC** developed. Together and in very close collaboration with the various factions of the Liberal and Conservative parties, as well as the Catholic Church, they maintained that evolution by means of trade unionism and peaceful political action were among the most consistent actions to eliminate class privileges and ensure equality among individuals.

* CTC: Federation of Colombian Workers.

** UTC: Union of Workers of Colombia.

To these positions, one must add those of the Declaration of Havana of 1960. The Communist Party of Colombia, a signatory and promoter of that declaration, accepted its positions as a general line on the struggle for world peace, the coexistence between capitalism and the countries of the socialist camp, the peaceful transition from capitalism to socialism and the seizure of power by the parliamentary road. Revolutionaries both inside and outside the party made many criticisms of it, insisting on pointing out the relevance of combining all forms of struggle, the role of violence as the midwife of history, and the leading role of the masses in social change, principles that are broadly expounded by Marxism-Leninism.

The ideological struggle also targeted the internal life and its rules. Matters of great importance did not escape the debates, such as the character of the organizations, the admission requirements, the organizational principles and the role of different organizations. Democratic centralism had been adopted as a principle and backbone of the Communist Party of Colombia since it was founded, in 1930 as a section of the Third International (Comintern). But this had become notoriously only a formal matter in the party, since the latter had become a debating society, deprived of any revolutionary spirit. In many of its documents, “freedom of criticism” was confused with “ideological and political pluralism” and was advocated by those who supported the coexistence of various points of view within the party. In this scenario, we could point out many other aspects of the political discussion of that time, about which it is important to remember many other points of view. Besides the above-mentioned discussion, we cannot ignore the state of the forces of the Communist Party in the late 1950s and early 1960s, which was characterized by its unquestionable anachronism and state of decay.

Motivated by the need to advance in the building of a vanguard organization, cadres and members of different organizations held wide discussions, in which they examined many proposals and projects of important sectors of the working class, the organized workers, peasants, students , intellectuals, youth and women, who were interested in achieving an accurate assessment of the national and international situation, of Colombian society, the State, the mass movement, the revolutionary movement and its perspective. All these aspects were analyzed without forgetting to stress the most important role to be performed by the real revolutionary forces, both at the national and international levels.

Khrushchevism

The building of the Party was preceded by events that would be crucial to strengthen its ideological and political positions. In 1956, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) held its 20th Congress in Moscow under the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev, at which fundamental changes were introduced to the policies that were supposed to guide the International Communist Movement. In a period in which imperialism, headed by the United States, rigorously imposed the policy and practices of the Cold War, the leadership of the CPSU decided that, due to advances of the Soviet Union, it was correct to transform the State of the working class into the “State of the whole people” and to convert the Communist Party into a “party of the whole people”. In accordance with these changes, peaceful coexistence, peaceful competition and peaceful transition were established as valid, thus invalidating at one stroke the practice of the class struggle. To promote these policies and practices, which were contrary to Marxism-Leninism, the leadership of the CPSU focused its efforts on sullying the contributions and work of Stalin in the building of socialism. For this reason, they accused him of fostering a “cult of personality,” trying to discredit him before public opinion. Some important documents of the 20th Congress against Stalin were dealt with in secret, which showed that the leaders of the CPSU intended to renounce the highest interests of the working class and to abandon the path of proletarian revolution.

The conclusions of the 20th Congress of the CPSU caused a huge shock within the International Communist Movement and the Communist Parties; they stimulated debates on issues of great relevance, such as the prospect of the revolution and the role of the communists in the struggle for the achievement of the objectives of the working class. The depth of the contradictions caused an inevitable split, while various parties and leaders of the time waged an unwavering and courageous defense of the principles of scientific theory taught by teachers of the proletariat. As a result of the inevitable demarcation, the foundations for the building of the new International Marxist-Leninist Communist Movement and for the rise of Marxist- Leninist organizations in various countries were laid.

The Founding of the Party

In Colombia, the debate was pushed forward in order to clarify the true nature of the Party, the objective of the revolution and the role that communists must fulfill to realize it. During this period, some of the cadres and members arose who made possible the building of the new Party. Pedro Vasquez Rendon had been a member of the Communist Party since the early 1950s and also a fighter with the guerrillas who were formed to defend themselves from the offensive that the government had unleashed against the people. Incidentally, it was comrade Pedro Vasquez Rendon who gave Pedro Antonio Marin the name of Manuel Marulanda, after a course given at the School of the Communist Party in 1952. Other cadres of that period were Pedro Leon Arboleda, a philosopher and journalist; Francisco Garnica, a prominent leader of the Communist Youth, as well as Ricardo Torres and Carlos Alberto Morales, who were killed by the national army in Cali, after having been captured in Guacari, in the Department of Valle del Cauca. Libardo Mora Toro, a labor lawyer and also an outstanding athletic champion, was killed in combat as a leader of the EPL (Popular Liberation Army). It should be noted that other leaders of the Communist Party, and especially of the Communist Youth, more than 70% of whose members went over to the new Party, had been expelled by the revisionist clique of Gilberto Vieira White in 1962.

These bases were fundamental in building the pillars of what would be the organization of the Party, which became a reality with the contributions and efforts of cadres who arose from the revolutionary struggle in different organizations. It is correct to state that leaders, cadres and selected members of almost all the forces interested in building a new society came together into the Party under the impulse of the working class and the leadership of the Party as its vanguard. It is of course impossible to mention them all, but it is worth remembering Elohim Grajales, a renowned economist and a socialist leader; Francisco Caraballo, a leader of the National Command of the JMRL (Youths of the Liberal Revolutionary Movement), Aldemar Londono, a doctor and social leader in the coffee zone, Bernardo Ferreira Grandet, among others.

In the early 1960s, Colombia experienced a great revolutionary fervor resulting from the violence that affected society in the 1950s, the imposition of exclusive norms of the National Front and the need to fight for changes in the reality of the country. The objective conditions were ripe to present proposals, to go to the grassroots, to organize and mobilize them to participate in the different forms of the struggle.

The subjective conditions for building the organizational structure were ripe to move forward. Therefore the decision was made to coordinate activities among the cadres who were able to build the new Marxist-Leninist party. In order to accomplish this task, in early 1964 a Committee of Integration of the Colombian Revolutionary Movements (CIMREC) was established, with a commitment to first hold the Constitutive Conference and then organize the Congress of the Party which, according to the plans, should be held within one year.* The Constitutive Conference was held in the municipality of La Ceja, in Antioquia, between March 5 and 8, 1964, with the presence of a great majority of delegates who reaffirmed their commitment to advance the building of the Party. At the Conference a central leadership of 23 members was elected, the drawing up of the central documents was agreed on in order to organize meetings in different regions of the country and to promote discussion as well as the rules for the election of delegates to the Founding Congress.

* Conclusions of the 10th Congress of the CP of C (M-L). July 17, 1965.

The steps achieved made possible the consolidation of relations with other parties that were advancing in the same direction. In the first place it is worth recalling the Communist Party of Spain Marxist-Leninist, with the unforgettable presence of comrades Raul Marco and Elena Odena; the Marxist Leninist Communist Party of Ecuador; and of course the Communist Party of China which, in that period, was in the forefront of the struggle against revisionism.

The Communist Party of Colombia Marxist-Leninist was founded on July 17, 1965, at the 10th Congress held near Bogota. It took up the principles of Marxism- Leninism as a guide for its revolutionary action, reaffirmed the class character of the Party as the vanguard of the proletariat, proposed as objectives of its struggles the patriotic, popular, anti-imperialist revolution on the road toward socialism and, as the way toward it, the armed revolutionary struggle, with the participation of the masses and under the political leadership of the Party. Consistent with this decision, the Party also took up the task of promoting the building of a Patriotic Liberation Front, looking to open the way to the unity of the people, that is, the worker, peasant and popular alliance. It is also decided to work for the building of its armed wing, the Popular Liberation Army, as an instrument to especially promote the armed struggle of the people and enable the Party to prepare the popular armed insurrection.

Regarding the ideological struggle with the revisionists, the 10th Congress decided to raise the ideological and political struggle against this opportunist current, unmasking its collaborationist and conciliatory work with U.S. imperialism and the local bourgeoisie.

Faced with the discussion of whether to declare the Congress as the 1st or the 10th, the Organization Bulletin adopted at the event clearly stated the following:

“The battle against revisionism is not just one more task but a key part of our action. Today we are in a position to strike a severe blow against this traitorous clique that, two years ago, maneuvered to have the 10th Congress rigged with an absolutely unconditional representation. This Congress is the Congress of the Colombian communists. This Congress has to be the 10th Congress of the CP, which the Vieira clique had not been able to hold despite having called it for this year, 1964. This Congress should announce to the country that the Colombian communists have abandoned the opportunist leadership in order to take up the revolutionary path; it must prevent and hinder the revisionist attempt to further deceive the masses by taking the glorious communist name with impunity. This Congress will radically change the situation in the fight against revisionism; the explanations, rectifications, the desperate cries, will be of those who would try to prove the illegitimacy of our meeting, but those laments will find in front of them the formidable barrier of the revolutionary conclusions of our Congress.

“To go against our Congress will mean to go against its revolutionary conclusions, and so the only thing that they would fully prove would be the kind of the cowardly traitors they are.

“This Congress is also part of the struggle between Marxism-Leninism and right opportunism and has to be useful to that struggle. All this will be done better if we declare this Congress to be the 10th Congress of the Communist Party of Colombia Marxist-Leninist.”*

* Conclusions of the 10th Congress of the Communist Party of Colombia Marxist-Leninist. July 17, 1965.

Comrade Raul Marco, delegate of the Communist Party of Spain Marxist-Leninist who attended this event, contributed his lessons on this important discussion, saying:

“The problem of whether to call this the 1st or the 10th Congress is not a minor one. If we state that this is the first congress, they will call us splitters. If we are the 10th Congress, the splitters will be those who try to call for another Congress over the heads of the majority of the party. The Party does not belong to those who, for a long time, took over its leadership to stifle its ability to fight, but to those who preserve and develop the revolutionary spirit of Marxism-Leninism.”*

* Ibid.

The relevance of our project

Today, just as yesterday, those who insist on saying that Marxism-Leninism has lost its relevance and that those of us who defend it are behind the times and lack a vision of the future are wrong; they have lost sight of the fact that what really failed was a false model of socialism that served as a step to follow a path toward capitalism, as the reality of present-day imperialist Russia has clearly shown.

This project of the party, created over 50 years ago, still preserves its political relevance and today we have the honor of carrying the communist banner that the heirs of Khrushchev have lowered worldwide.

For the communists today, the defense of Marxism-Leninism as the fundamental guide for the revolutionary struggle of the working class remains a task of the highest order, without which the perspective of building genuine socialism is obscured. This is why we will continue as a Party to strive to steel our forces, strengthen our unity, grow and participate actively, without hesitation, in the different forms of the class struggle.

At times when the social contradictions are being exacerbated and capitalism is showing its agony and inability to create development, well-being, social equality and freedom, the world bourgeoisie is reinforcing its offensive, opposing any change that threatens its interests and profits. That is why it insists on attacking Marxism-Leninism, ridiculing the socialist project and the communist future. The principal target of the bourgeois theorists and those who converted to their side at the last moment includes proletarian partisanship, which they are fiercely attacking, seeking its total elimination. There is no doubt that imperialism is pushing forward a multifaceted offensive, which combines strong ideological, political, organizational and military structures aimed at containing and defeating the resistance and struggle of the working class and peoples for their independence and self-determination. In this regard, we will continue to state that today, just as yesterday, we continue to take up the challenge of disrupting the offensive of imperialism and the bourgeoisie, of defeating their plans, a matter that calls on us to strengthen our parties, to show their importance and their historical and political relevance.

In that vein, we Party members fully take up the commitment to hold firm the banners that gave origin to our Party. We are and remain staunch defenders of Marxism-Leninism, of its historical and political relevance, of the interests of the proletariat and the Colombian people. It is obvious that the policies adopted by the Party at its 10th Congress have undergone substantial changes; in fact, the reality that we face is not the same as that of the 1960s, but the political foundations that support our organization are intact and much stronger as a result of our combat and loyalty to the interests of the working class and the people.

In December of 2011 we held our 17th Congress, and now we are preparing to hold our 18th Congress. What guides us is a current and relevant political line and program, subject to constant testing in the class struggle that highlights the important accumulated experience achieved by the Party.

We face the challenge of accelerating the upward path, winning new positions in the class struggle, and therefore we see the need to strengthen our unity, steel our role, raise the initiative and link ourselves better to the masses with an approach that allows us to grow qualitatively and quantitatively. To rationalize our experiences and the experiences of our fraternal parties and of the revolutionaries of the world will undoubtedly contribute to the objectives undertaken that, rather than deny, will reaffirm our banners, our basic tenets, principles and the historical legacy that we communists of the world have in various spheres.

We cannot ignore the fact that these have been 50 years of hard and tenacious struggle in all spheres, with important contributions to our revolutionary process, with a brilliant history of participation in the various scenarios of the national and international class struggle that are our heritage. Our history is based on the strength and conviction of the justness of our cause. This is the way the most outstanding leaders of our organizations have acted. Hundreds of leading cadres, members, fighters and supporters have stained the banner of the Party with blood in the struggle to crystallize its ideals. Many have gone and will go through harsh conditions of life and work in the prisons of the reactionary regime to keep unsullied their high communist aspirations.

Without Messianism of any kind, but with deep convictions, the best tribute that we can pay to those martyrs and heroes, to those selfless fighters, is to stay firm on course to consolidate and develop the Party and the organizations that it leads.

Communist thought maintains its solid foundations, and the world situation of today demolishes all the speeches that the bourgeoisie has advanced to bury its hated enemy and thus deprive the proletariat and the revolutionary classes of the weapon they need to destroy the capitalist system and “storm heaven by assault,” as Marx stated in regard to the Paris Commune. Marxism-Leninism is a theory able to achieve its own development, to assimilate the scientific advances, to renew itself without abandoning its nature and, on this theoretical basis, the members of our Party are convinced that the history of 50 years of struggle is not in its final chapter.

To the delight of the bourgeoisie, many converts have tried to write the requiem for our organizations, with great shows of scientism, but the facts are more stubborn than the vain aspirations of the deserters. Here we are immersed in the class struggle and with our heads high we are defending the ideals of communism, of scientific socialism and of revolution.

Many times they have given us up for dead and wanted to attend our funeral. However, despite our limitations, we are here. We represent a worthy and revolutionary point of view in the country. We have a structure and an influence in the mass movement. In contrast, all the factions that have attacked our Party have disappeared as political projects. The “Hopefuls*,” who sold out the majority of the EPL, are now gone, dissolved organizationally and politically; they abandoned their base and cadres to their fate, they joined social democratic organizations or parties of the bourgeoisie, they did not come up with a different alternative for change in the country, as they had touted, and some of their members bear the shame of having gone over to the ranks of the enemies of the revolution. The “Rectifiers”, as the faction headed by Danilo Trujillo and Gabriela Londono is known, who were expelled from our party in 1998, underwent the same fate and were even unable to design a serious political project for the country and the masses. Today we find them in the ranks of the bourgeoisie, collaborating with its projects.

* This is the term by which the members of the organization Hope, Peace and Freedom are known, a faction of the Party and the EPL in the years 1989 and 1990.

In defending the ideological, political and organizational integrity of the Party, we have undoubtedly made mistakes. But we have not lost the proletarian path and that is the essential point. Many valiant people who are not with us today have passed through our Party; there are various reasons for this. We want to increase our membership, as well as the environment surrounding the organization and its presence in the political life and among the various popular sectors.

The situation we have experienced, from the time of our restructuring based on Marxism-Leninism in 1965 until today, is rich in experience. It provides fundamental ideological, political and methodological elements. Many things have changed in the national environment and in the world context. Looking at things from that perspective, we must say that much remains to be corrected, that it is necessary to make updates and advances, and that the challenge today is different. It is no longer a matter of just reaffirming ourselves, or proclaiming that we exist, but of consolidating our ideological make-up, developing our ranks qualitatively and quantitatively, placing ourselves in a better and more scientific way among the masses and in the general political struggle and, finally, sharpening our tools to better confront imperialism and the bourgeoisie, revisionism and all sorts of enemies that are trying to halt the march of history. Our great challenge is still to be an alternative of power.

To enhance the struggle for popular power, we need the revolutionary historical memory of our people. To grow and strengthen the quality of our party we need to recover its true history, the life and struggles of those who forged it, the battles won and the setbacks we have had to face. In this way we will unmask the false histories that are told and written about us. In this way we paint the Marxist Leninist picture that is the reason for our existence and the pillar in order to win our objectives.

To mark these 50 years of communist life we want to salute the Parties and Organizations that claim this ideology and commit our efforts together with them to develop the current of thought that characterizes us. Similarly, we say to all the democrats and revolutionaries of Colombia and the world that they can count on us in the fight against the common enemy. To all the cadres and members suffering in the prisons of the regime, we bring our message of solidarity and commitment to honor in combat the history of 50 years of relentless struggle.

Long live the Communist Party of Colombia Marxist-Leninist!!

Long live, long live, long live!!

Fifty years of fighting together with the working class and the people!!

For Democracy and Socialism!!

Communist Party of Colombia (M-L)
Central Executive Committee
pcdcml@yahoo.com 
March 31, 2015

Source

Revisionism in Russia: Trotsky Against the Bolsheviks – Part Two: 1914-1917

This is the second part of a study of the development of revisionism in Russia, and covers the period from the outbreak of World War I in 1914 to the victory of the socialist revolution in November 1917.

Read part one here.

The First Imperialist War

In August 1914, the First Imperialist War began.

Almost from the outset, three trends manifested themselves in the labour movements of the belligerent countries:

“In the course of the two and half years of war the international Socialist and labour movement in every country has evolved three tendencies.

The three tendencies are:

1) The social-chauvinists, i.e., Socialists in words and chauvinists in action, people who are in favour of ‘national defence’ in an imperialist war. . .These people are our class enemies. They have gone over to the bourgeoisie…

2) The second tendency is what is known as the ‘Centre’, consisting of people who vacillate between the social-chauvinists and the true internationalists.
All those who belong to the ‘Centre’ swear that they are Marxists and internationalists, that they are in favour of peace, of bringing every kind of ‘pressure’ to bear upon the governments, of ‘demanding’ that their own governments should ‘ascertain’ the will of the people for peace’, that they favour all sorts of peace campaigns, that they are for a peace without annexations, etc., etc. — and for peace with the social-chauvinists.
The ‘Centre’ is for ‘unity’, the ‘Centre’ is opposed to a split.
The ‘Centre’ is a realm of honeyed petty-bourgeois phrases of internationalism in word and cowardly opportunism and fawning on the social-chauvinists in deed.
The fact of the matter is that the ‘Centre’ does not preach revolution; it does not carry on a wholehearted revolutionary struggle; and in order to evade such a struggle it resorts to the tritest ultra-‘Marxist’ excuses….

3) The third tendency, the true internationalists, is most closely represented by the ‘Zimmerwald Left’….

It is characterised mainly by its complete break with both social-chauvinism and ‘Centrism’, and by its relentless war against its own imperialist government and against its own imperialist bourgeoisie.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Tasks of the Proletariat in Our Revolution” in: “Selected Works’, Volume 6; London; l946; p. 63, 64, 65-66).

Trotsky’s “The War and the International”

On the outbreak of war, Trotsky was forced to leave Vienna and for two months he settled in Zurich, where he wrote “The War and the International,” which was published in November in “Golos” (The Voice), a Menshevik paper published in Paris.

In this work Trotsky put forward the view that “the main obstacle to economic development’ was the existence the national state”:

“The old national state .. has outlived itself, and is now an intolerable hindrance to economic development. . . .The outlived and antiquated national ‘fatherland’ has become the main obstacle to economic development . . . .The national states have become a hindrance to the development of the forces of production.”

(L. Trotsky: Preface to “The War and the International”; London; 1971; p. vii, x, xii).

Thus, declared Trotsky, the aim of the working class should be the creation of a ‘republican United States of Europe”:

“The task of the proletariat is to create a far more powerful fatherland, with far greater power of resistance – the republican United States of Europe.”

Lenin at first (in one document only) accepted the slogan of a “United States of Europe”:

“The immediate political slogan of the Social-Democrats of Europe must be the formation of a republican United States of Europe.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘The War and Russian Social-Democracy’ in: “Selected Works;’ Volume 5; Moscow; 1935; p. 129).

By August 1915, however, the Bolsheviks, on Lenin’s initiative had decisively rejected this slogan, firstly, because it could, under capitalist society, only be reactionary:

“From the point of view of the economic conditions of imperialism, . . the United States of Europe is either impossible or reactionary under capitalism. A United States of Europe under capitalism is equivalent to an agreement to divide up the colonies. Under capitalism, however, . . no other principle of division . . . . is possible except force. . . Division cannot take place except ‘in proportion to strength’, And strength changes in the course of economic development.
Of course, temporary agreements between capitalists and between the powers are possible. In this sense, the United States of Europe is possible as an agreement between the European capitalists. . but what for? Only for the purpose of jointly suppressing socialism in Europe, of jointly protecting colonial booty against Japan and America. . . Under capitalism, the United States of Europe would mean the organisation of reaction to retard the more rapid development of America.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘The United States of Europe Slogan’, in: “Selected Works,” Volume 5; London 1935; p. 139, 140, 141).

and secondly because if regarded as a socialist slogan, it suggests that the victory of socialism was possible only on an all European scale:

“Uneven economic and political development is an absolute law of capitalism. Hence, the victory of socialism is possible, first in a few or even in one single capitalist country.”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p.141).

Lenin concludes:

“It is for those reasons and after repeated debates that the editors of the central organ have come to the conclusion that the United States of Europe slogan is incorrect.'”

(V.I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 141).

That Trotsky did, in fact, link the Slogan of “a United States of Europe” with the concept, inherent in his “theory of permanent revolution,” that proletarian revolution could only be successful an an international scale, is shown by his reply to Lenin’s article:

“The only more or less concrete historical argument advanced against the slogan of a United States of Europe was formulated in the Swiss ‘Sotsial-Demokrat’ in the following sentence:

‘Uneven economic and political development is an absolute law of capitalism’.

From this the ‘Sotsial-Domokrat’ draws the conclusion that the victory of socialism is possible in one country, and that therefore there is no reason to make the dictatorship of the proletariat in each separate country contingent upon the establishment of a United States of Europe. That capitalist development in different countries is uneven is an absolutely incontrovertible argument. But this unevenness is itself extremely uneven. The capitalist level of Britain, Austria, Germany or France is not identical. But in comparison with Africa and Asia all these countries represent capitalist ‘Europe’, which has grown ripe for the social revolution. That no country in its struggle must ‘wait’ for others, is an elementary thought which it is useful and necessary to reiterate in order that he idea of concurrent international action may not be replaced by the idea of temporising international inaction.

Without waiting for the others, we begin and continue the struggle nationally, in the full confidence that our initiative will give an impetus to the struggle in other countries; but if this should not occur, it would be hopeless to think — as historical experience and theoretical considerations testify — that, for example, a revolutionary Russia could hold out in the face of a conservative Europe.”

(L. Trotsky: Article in “Nashe Slovo” (Our Word), No. 87; April 12th., 1916, cited in: J. V. Stalin: “The October Revolution and the Tactics of the Russian Communists,” in: ‘Works”, Volume 6; Moscow; 1953; p. 390-1).

In the autumn of 1916 Lenin reiterated his opposition to Trotsky’s slogan of a United States of Europe:

“As early as 1902, he (i.e., the British economist John Hobson — Ed.) had an excellent insight into the meaning and significance of a ‘United States of Europe” (be it said for the benefit of Trotsky the Kautskyian!) and of all that is now being glossed over by the hypocritical Kautskyians of various countries, namely, that the opportunists (social-chauvinists) are working hand in hand with the imperialist bourgeoisie precisely towards creating an imperialist Europe on the backs of Asia and Africa.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘Imperialism and the Split in Socialism”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 11; London; 1943; p. 752).

Trotsky, however, continued — even after the Russian October Revolution of 1917 — to hold that the construction of socialism in Europe was possible only on an all-European basis. In the postscript to a collection of articles published in 1922 under the title of “A Peace Programme,” he wrote:

“The assertion reiterated several times in the ‘Peace Programme’ that a proletarian revolution cannot culminate victoriously within national bounds may perhaps seem to some readers to have been refuted by the nearly five years’ experience of our Soviet Republic. But such a conclusion would be unwarranted. . . We have not arrived, or even begun to arrive, at tho creation of a socialist society. . . Real progress of a socialist economy in Russia will become possible only after the victory of the proletariat in the major European countries.”

(L. Trotsky: Postscript to ‘A Peace Programme , cited by: J. V. Stalin: “The Social-Democratic Deviation in our Party; in: “Works”, Volume 8; Moscow; 1954; p. 271-2).

“Our Word”

In November 1914, Trotsky left Switzerland for Paris to take up the post of war correspondent of the newspaper “Kievskaya Mysl” (Kievan Thought), which supported the war effort of the tsarist government.

Settled in Paris, he joined the editorial staff of “Golos” (The Voice) , a newspaper published by a group of Mensheviks headed by Yuli Martov who, unlike the official Menshevik leadership which supported the war effort of the tsarist government, had adopted an attitude of verbal opposition to the war without seeking to organise active revolutionary struggle against the tsarist regime. “Golos” had commenced publication in September l914, and, when it was suppressed by the French government in January l9l5, it was replaced by “Nashe Slovo” (Our Word), on the editorial staff of which Trotsky continued to serve.

The chief organiser of the paper was Vladimir Antonov-Ovseenko (a former tsarist officer who after the October Revolution became Director of the Political Administration of the Red Army) . Its Paris staff included, in addition to Trotsky, Anatoly Lunacharsky (who later became Commissar for Education), David Ryazanov (later director of the Marx-Engels Institute), Solomon Lozovsky (later head of the Red International of Labour Unions), Dmitri Manuilsky (later head of the Communist International) Grigori Sokolnikov (later Commissar for Finance), and the historian Mikhail Pokrovsky (later director of the Soviet State Archives). Its foreign correspondents included Grigori Chicherin (later Commissar for Foreign Affairs), Aleksandra Kollontai (later Commissar of Social Welfare), Karl Radek (later to hold a leading position in the Communist International), Moissei Uritsky, Khristian Rakovsky (the son of a Bulgarian landlord, later to become Prime Minister of the Soviet Ukraine), Ivan Maisky (later Soviet Ambassador to Britain), and the Anglo-Russian historian Theodore Rothstein (later Soviet Ambassador to Persia).

1915 – 1916: The Three Trends in the Russian Labour Movement

The three trends described in an earlier section were represented in the Russian labour movement as follows:

1) The social-chauvinist trend was represented by:

a) a group of Mensheviks headed by Aleksandr Potresov, around the journal “Nasha Zarya” (Our Dawn), published in St. Petersburg. “Nasha Zaraya” was suppressed by the tsarist government in October 1914, and its place was taken in January 1915 by “Nashe Dyolo” (Our Cause).

“In Russia the fundamental nucleus of opportunism, the Liquidationist ‘Nasha Zarya’, became the fundamental nucleus of chauvinism.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Collapse of the Second International,” in: ‘Collected Works’, Volume 18; London; n.d.; p. 308).

b) a group of Mensheviks headed by Grigori Plekhanov and Grigori Alexinsky around the journal “Prizyv” (The Call) published in Paris.

“The main theories of the social-chauvinists. . . are represented by Plekhanov.”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 282).

“Plekhanov has sunk into-nationalism, hiding his Russian chauvinism under Francophilism; so has Alexinsky.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Position and Tasks of the Socialist International”, in: ibid.; p. 85-86).

2) The “Centrist” trend was represented by:

a) The Menshevik “Organisation Committee” (O.C), headed by Pavel Axelrod, which in February 1915 began publication of “Izvestia” (News) of the Foreign Secretariat of the Organisation Committee.

“This Centrist tendency includes . . the party of the Organisation Committee . . and others in Russia.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Tasks of the Proletariat in Our Revolution,” in: “Selected Works,” Volume 6; London; 1935; p. 65).

“Take . .the . manifesto of the 0.C (Organisation Committee-Alliance Editor). . . .
1) The manifesto does not contain a single statement which in principle repudiates national defence in the present war;
2) there is absolutely nothing in the manifesto which in principle would be inacceptible to the ‘defencists’ or social chauvinists;
3) there are a number of statements in the manifesto which are completely’identical’ with ‘defencism’: ‘The proletariat cannot remain indifferent to the impending defeat’; . . ‘the proletariat is vitally interested in the self-preservation of the country.'”

(V. I. Lenin: “Have the O.C. and the Chkheidze Fraction a Policy of Their Own?”, in “Collected Works,” Viume 19; London; l942; p. 36, 37).

“To cover up this political reality (i.e., social-chauvinism — Ed.) by Left phrases and quasi-Social-Democratic-ideology, is the actual political meaning of the . . activities of the Organisation-Committee. In the realm of ideology — the ‘Neither- victory nor defeat’ slogan; in the realm of practice — an anti-‘split’ struggle — this is the business-like . . programme of ‘peace’, with the ‘Nashe Dyelo’ and Plekhanov.”

(V. I. Lenin: State of Affairs within Russian Social Democracy’, in: Collected Works”, Volume 18; London; n.d.; p. 204.)

b) the Menshevik Duma fraction, headed by Nikolai Chkheidze.

“This Centrist tendency includes . . Chkheidze and others in Russia.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Tasks of the Proletariat in Our Revolution,” in: “Selected Works’, Volume 6; London; 1946; p. 65).

“Chkheidze’s group confined itself to the parliamentary field. It did not vote appropriations, since it would have roused a storm of indignation among the workers. . . Neither did it protest against social-chauvinism.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Socialism and War,” in: ibid.; p. 240).

“Chkheidze uses the same chauvinist phrases about the ‘danger of defeat’, stands for . . ‘the struggle for peace’, etc., etc.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Have the 0.C. and the Chkheidze Fraction a Policy of Their Own?”, in ‘Collected Works”, Volume 19; London; 19~2; p. 39).

“(1) The ‘save the country” formula employed by Chkhejdze differs in no material respect from defencism;
2) the Chkheidze fraction never opposed Nr. Potresov and Co. .
3) the decisive fact: the fraction has never opposed participation in the War Industries Committees’.

(V. I. Lenin: “The Chkheidze Fraction and its Role’, in: ibid.; p. 325).

“To cover up this political reality (i.e., social-chauvinism — Ed.) by ‘Left ‘phrases and quasi-Social-Democratic ideology, is the actual political meaning of the legal activities of Chkheidze’s fraction.”

(V. I. Lenin: “State of affairs within Russian Social-Democracy, in: “Collected “Works”, Volume 18; London; n.d.; p. 204).

c) the group, headed by Trotsky, around “Nashe Slovo,” the policy of which will be discussed in the next sections.

3) The revolutionary, international trend was represented by the Central Committee of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party, headed by Lenin.

The theses which Lenin put forward in September 1914 from Berne (Switzerland), on the other hand, called on the work in classes of all belligerent countries actively to oppose the war and to seek to transform it into a civil war against ” their own” imperialists.

“Transform the present imperialist war into civil war — is the only correct proletarian slogan.”‘

(V. I. Lenin: “The War and Russian Social Democracy,”‘ in: “Selected Works,” Volume 5; London; 1935; p. 130).

The “Peace” Slogan-The First of Trotsky’s Two Slogans

The policy put forward by Trotsky in the pages of “Nashe Slovo” in relation to the imperialist war may be summarised in two slogans:

firstly, that of “revolutionary struggle for peace” (or “revolutionary struggle against the war,” called by Lenin the “peace slogan”:

“Phrase-mongers like Trotsky (See No. 105 of the ‘Nashe Slovo’) defend, in opposition to us, the peace slogan.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘The ‘Peace’ Slogan Appraised,” in: “Collected Works,'” Volume 18; London; n.d.; p. 262).

‘Revolutionary struggle against the war ‘ . . is an example of the high-flown phraseology with which Trotsky always justifies opportunism.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Defeat of One’s Own Government in the Imperialist War”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 5; London 1935; p. 3142).

Lenin opposed the “peace” slogan throughout the war:

“The peace slogan is in my judgment incorrect at the present moment. This is a philistine’s, a preacher’s, slogan. The proletarian slogan must be civil war.”

(V. I. Lenin: Letter to A. G. Shlyapnikov, October 17th., 1914, in: “Collected Works’, Volume 18; n.d.; p. 75).

“Propaganda of peace at the present time, if not accompanied by a call for revolutionary mass action, is only capable of spreading illusions, of demoralising the proletariat by imbuing it with belief in the humanitarianism of the bourgeoisie, and of making it a plaything in the hands of the secret diplomacy of the belligerent countries. In particular, the ilea that a so-called democratic peace is possible without a series of revolutions is profoundly mistaken.”

(V. I. Lenin: Conference of the Sections of the RSDLP Abroad,” in: “Selected Works”, Volume 5; London 1935; p. 135).

“To accept the peace slogan per Se, and to repeat it, would be encouraging the ‘pompous air of powerless (what is worse hypocritical) phrasemongers’; that would mean deceiving the people with the illusion that the present governments, the present ruling ‘classes, are capable before they are . . eliminated by a number of revolutions of granting a peace even half way satisfactory to democracy and the working class. Nothing is more harmful than such a deception.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘The Peace Question’, in: ‘Collected Works’, Volume 18; London; n.d.; p. 266).

In September 1915 Trotsky carried forward his opposition to the Leninist policy towards the war at the International Socialist Conference at Zimmerwald (Switzerland). The Bolshevik resolution was rejected by a majority of the delegates, including Trotsky. As he expresses it himself:

“Lenin was on the extreme left at the Conference. In many questions he was in a minority of one, even within the Zimmerwald left wing, to which I did not formally belong.”

(L. Trotsky: “My Life”; New York; 1970; p. 250).

In these circumstances, the Bolsheviks agreed to sign a compromise manifesto drafted by Trotsky:

“The revolutionary wing, led by Lenin, and the pacifist wing, which comprised the majority of the delegates, agreed with difficulty on a conmon manifesto of which I had prpared the draft”.

(L. Trotsky: ibid p. 250).

The central point of this manifesto was “the struggle for peace”:

“It is necessary to take up this struggle for peace, for a peace without annexations or war indemnities. . . .It is the task and the duty of the Socialists of the belligerent countries to take up this struggle with full force.”

Manifesto Of the International Specialist Conference, Zimmerwald, cited in: V. I Lenin: Collected Works’, Vo1ume 18; London; Ibid.; p. 475).

Lenin commented on this manifests after the conference:

“Passing to ‘the struggle for peace’…here also we find inconsistency, timidity, failure to say everything that ought to be said. . . It does not name directly, openly and clearly the revolutionary methods of struggle.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘The First Step’, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 18; London; n.d.; p. 343).

“Neither Victory nor Defeat”- Trotsky’s Second Slogan

Secondly, in opposition to Lenin’s declaration that a revolutionary struggle against “one’s own imperialists in wartime was facilitated by, and facilitated, the military defeat of “one’s own” imperialists in the war, Trotsky put forward the slogan of “Neither victory nor defeat!”:

“‘Bukvoyed (i.e., Ryazonov — Ed.) and Trotsky defend the slogan ‘Neither victery nor defeat!”

(V. I. Lenin: “Defeat Of One’s Own Governrnent in the Imperialist War”, in: Selected Works’, Volume 5; London 1935; p. 145-6).

In an Open Letter addressed to the Bolsheviks in “Nashe Slovo” in the summer of l9l5, Trotsky denounced Lenin’s policy of “revolutionary defeatism” as:

“An uncalled-for and unjustifiable concession to the political methodology of social-patriotism which substitutes for the revolutionary struggle against the war and the conditions that cause it, what, under present conditions, is an extremely arbitrary orientation towards the lesser evil.”

(L. Trotsky: in: “Nashe Slovo”, No. 105, cited in V. I. Lenin: “Defeat of One’s Own Government in the Imperialist War”, in: ‘Selected Works”, Volume 5; London; l935; p. 142).

Lenin replied to Trotsky’s Open Letter in August l9l5, in his article “Defeat of One’s Government in the Imperialist War”:

“This is an example of the high-flown phraseology with which Trotsky always justifies opportunism.

Making shift with phrases, Trotsky has lost his way amidst three pine trees. It seems to him that to desire Russia’s defeat means desiring Germany’s victory. . .
To help people who are unable to think, the Berne resolution made it clear that in all imperialist ceuntries the proletariat must now desire the defeat of its own government. Bukvoyed and Trotsky preferred to evade this truth. . Had Bukvoyed and Trotsky thought a little, they would have realised that they adopt the point ‘of view of a war of governments and the bourgeoisie, i.e., that they cringe before the ‘political methodology of ‘social-patriotism’, to use Trotsky’s affected language.

Revolution in wartime is civil war; and the transformation of war between governments into civil war is, on the one hand, facilitated by military reverses (‘defeats’) of governments; on the other hand, it is impossible really to strive for such a transformation without thereby facilitating defeat.

The very reason the chauvinists. . .repudiate the ‘slogan’ of defeat is that this slogan alone implies a consistent appeal for revolutionary action against one’s own government in wartime. Without such action, millions of the r-r-revolutionary phrases like war against ‘war and the conditions, and so forth’ are not worth a penny. . . .

To repudiate the ‘defeat’ slogan means reducing one’s revolutionary actions to an empty phrase or to mere hypocrisy. .. .

The slogan “Neither victory nor defeat” . . is nothing but a paraphrase of the ‘defence of the fatherland’ slogan. . . . .

On closer examination, this slogan will be found to mean ‘civil peace’, renunciation of the class struggle by the oppressed classes in all belligerent ‘countries, since class struggle is impossible without . . facilitating the defeat of one’s own country. Those who accept the slogan ‘Neither victory nor defeat’, can only hypocritically be in favour of the class struggle, of ‘breaking civil peace’; those in practice, renounce an independent proletarian policy because they subordinate the proletariat of all belligerent countries to the absolutely bourgeois task of safeguarding imperialist governments against defeat. .

Those who are in favour of the slogan ‘Neither victory nor defeat’ are consciously or unconsciusly chauvinists, at best they are conciliatory petty bourgeois; at all events they are enemies of proletarian policy, partisans of the present governments, of the present ruling classes. . . .

Those who stand for the slogan ‘Neither victory nor defeat’ are in fact on the side of the bourgeoisie and the opportunists, for they ‘do not believe’ in the possibility of international revolutionary action of the working class against its own governments, and they do not wish to help the development of such action which, though no easy task, it is true, is the only task worthy of a proletarian, the only socialist task.'”

(V. I. Lenin: “Defeat of One’s Own Government in the Imperialist War”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 5; London; 1935; p. 142-3, 145, 146-7).

In April 1915 Rosa Luxemburg, in prison, wrote, under the pseudonym “Junius”, a pamphlet entitled ‘The Crisis of German Social Democracy.” It was published a year later, in April 1916. Rosa Luxemburg, like Trotsky opposed Lenin’s policy of “revolutionary defeatism“:

“What shall be the practical attitude of social democracy in the present war? Shall it declare: since this is an imperialist war, since we do not enjoy in our country any socialist self-determination, its existence or non-existence is of no consequence to us, and we will surrender it to the enemy? Passive fatalism can never be the role of a revolutionary party like social democracy. . . .
Yes, socialists should defend their country in great historical crises.”

(R. Luxemburg: “The Crisis of German Social Democracy”, in: “Rosa Luxemburg Speaks’; Now York; 1970; p. 311, 314,).

and like Trotsky, she put forward the slogan of “Neither victory nor defeat”:

“Here lies the great fault of German social democracy….. . . It was their duty . to proclaim to the people of Germany that in this war victory and defeat would be equally fatal.”

(R. Luxemburg: ibid.; p. 314).

suggesting that the defence of the country “against defeat” should be carried on under the slogan she had consistently opposed as a leader of the Social-Democratic Party of the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania, the Slogan of “national self-determination”:

“Instead of covering this imperialist war with a lying mantle of national self-defence, social democracy should have demanded the right of national self-determination seriously,”

(R. Luxemburg: ibid.; p. 311-12).

Lenin replied to Rosa Luxemburg’s pamphlet in his article “The Pamphlet by Junius”, published in August 1916:

“We find the same error in Junius’ arguments about which is better, victory or defeat? His conclusion is that both are equally bad. . . This is the point of view not of the revolutionary proletariat, but of the pacifist petty bourgeois.. . . Another fallacious argument advanced by Junius is in connection with the question of defence of the fatherland. Junius . . falls into the very strange error of trying to drag a national programme into the present non-national war. It sounds almost incredible, but it is true.

He proposes to ‘oppose’ the imperialist war with a national programme.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Pamphlet by Junius”; in: “Collected ‘Works’, Volume 19; London; 1942; p. 212, 207, 209).

True, Rosa Luxemburg, unlike the open social-chauvinists, supported the concept of class struggle against one’s own government during the war, not, however, in relation to the slogan of “turn the imperialist war into civil war”, but as “the best defence against a foreign enemy”:

“The centuries have proven that not the state of siege, but relentless class struggle . . is the best protection and the best defence against a foreign enemy.”

(R. Luxemburg: ibid.; p. 304).

Lenin commented:

“In saying that class struggle is the best means of defence against invasian, Junius applied Marxian dialectics only half way, taking one step on the right road and immediately deviating from it. . . Civil war against the bourgeoisie is also a form of class struggle, and only this form of class struggle would have saved Europe (the whole of Europe, not only one country) from the peril of invasion.

Junius came very close to the correct solution of the problem and to the correct slogan: civil war against the bourgeoisi for socialism; but, as if afraid to speak the whole truth, he turned back to the phantasy of a ‘national war’ in 1914, 1915 and 1916. . ..

Junius has not completely rid himself of the ‘environment’ of the German Social-Democrats, even the Lefts, who are afraid to follow revolutionary slogans to their logical conclusion.”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 210, 212).

The Struggle against National Self-Determination

The manifesto drafted by Trotsky which was adopted by the International Socialist Conference at Zimmerwald (Switzerland) in September 1915, recognised the right of self-determination of nations as an “indestructible principle”:

“The right of self-determination of nations must be the indestructible principle in the system of national relationships of peoples.”

(Manifesto of the International Socialist Conference at Zimmerwald, September 1915, in: V. I. Lenin: “Collective Works” , Volume 18, London; n .d.; p. 475)

The Polish delegation at the conference (consisting of Karl Radek, Adolf Warski and Jacob Ganetsky) opposed recognition of the right of self determination of nations, but submitted a declaration on the national question which, in fact, recognised the right of self-determination of Poland, since it declared that the international working class:

“Will break the fetters of national oppression and abolish all forms of foreign domination, and secure for the Polish people the possibility of all-sided, free development as an equal member in a League of Nations.”

(Bulletin of the International Socialist Committee in Berne, No. 2; September 27th., 1915; p. 15).

Lenin commented on this declaration:

“There is no material difference between these postulates and the recognition of the right of nations to self-determination, except that their political formulation is still more diffuse and vague than the majority of the programmes and resolutions of the Second International. Any attempt to express these ideas in precise political formulae . . will prove still more strikingly the error committed by the Polish Social-Democrats in repudiating the self-determination of nations”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Socialist Revolution and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination”; in: “Selected Works’, Volume 5; London; 1935; p. 279-80).

In October 1915 Karl Radek (under the pseudonym “Parabellum” wrote an article in the “Berner Tagwacht” (Berne Morning Watch entitled “Annexations and Social-Democracy,” in which, on behalf of the leadership of the Social-Democratic Party of the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania, he declared that:

“We are opposed to annexations.”

(K. Radek: “Annexations and Social-Democracy; cited in: V. I. Lenin: “The Revolutionary Proletariat and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 5; London; 1935; p. 282).

but denounced the:

“Struggle for the non-existent right to self-determination.”

(K. Radek: ibid; p. 282).

Lenin replied to Radek in November 1915 in his article “The Revolutionary Proletariat and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination”:

“Our ‘struggle against annexations’ will be meaningless and not at all terrifying to the social-patriots if we do not declare that the Socialist of an oppressing nation who does not conduct propaganda, both in peace time and war time, in favour of the freedom of secession for the oppressed nations is not a Socialist and not an internationalist, but a chauvinist.”‘

(V. I. Lenin: “The Revolutionary Proletariat and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination”, in: ‘Selected Works, Volume 5; London; 1935; p. 287).

In November 1915 Nikolai Bukharin and Grigori Pyatakov sent to the Central Committee of the RSDLP the theses, “The Slogan of the Right of Nations to Self-Determination,” written by Bukharin. The theses concluded:

“We do not under any circumstances support the government of the Great Power that suppresses the rebellion or the outburst of indignatien of an oppressed nation; but at the same time, we ourselves do not mobilise the proletarian forces under the slogan ‘right of nations to self-determination’. In such a case, our task is to mobilise the forces of the proletariat of both nations (jointly with others) under the slogan ‘civil class war for socialism’, and conduct propaganda against the mobilisation of the forces under the slogan ‘right of nations to self-determination.'”

(N. Bukharin: “The slogan of the Right of Nations to Self-Determination”, cited in: V.I. Lenin: ‘Selected Works’, Volume 5; London; 1935; p. 379-80).

Lenin replied to Bukharin’s theses in March 1916 with theses of his own, entitled “The Socialist Revolution and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination”;

“Victorious socialism must achieve complete democracy and, consequently, not only bring about the complete equality of nations, but also give effect to the right of oppressed nations to self-determination, i.e. the right to free political secession. Socialist Parties which fail to prove by all their activities now, as well as during the revolution and after its victory, that they will free the enslaved nations and establish relations with them on the basis of free union — a free union is a lying phrase without right to secession — such parties are committing treachery to socialism”.

(V. I. Lenin: “The Socialist Revolution and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination”, in: ‘Selected Works’, Volume 5; London; 1935 p. 267).

Rosa Luxemburg, writing under the psedonym “Junius” in the pamphlet, “The Crisis of German Social-Democracy,” published in April 1916, declared that wars of national liberation were impossible under imperialism:

“In the present imperialistic milieu there can be no wars of national self-defence.”

(R. Luxemburg: ‘The Crisis of German Social-Democracy,” in: “Rosa Luxemburg Speaks”; New York; 1970; p. 305).

Lenin commented in “The Pamphlet by Junius,” published in August 1916:

“National wars waged by colonial and semi-eolonial countries are not only possible but inevitable in the epoch of imperialism.

National wars must not be regarded as impossible in the epoch of imperialism even in Europe.

The postulate that ‘there can be no more national wars’ is obviously fallacious in theory. . . But this fallacy is also very harmful in a practical political sense; it gives rise to the stupid propaganda for ‘disarmament’, as if no other war but reactionary wars are possible; it is the cause of the still more stupid and downright reactionary indifference towards national movements. Such indifference becomes chauvinism when members of ‘Great’ European nations, i.e., nations which oppress a mass of small and colonial peoples, declare with a learned air that ‘there can be no more national wars.”’

(V. I. Lenin: “The Pamphlet by Junius”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 19; London 1942; p. 204, 205, 206).

In August 1916 Grigori Pyatakov wrote, under the pseudonyn “P. Kievsky,” an article entitled: “The Proletariat and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination.” In this article, which was not published, Pyatakov denounced the slogan of the right of nations to self-determination on the grounds that:

“This demand leads directly to social-patriotism.”

(G. Pyatakov: “The Proletariat and the Right of Nations to Self Determination, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “A Caricature of Marxism and ‘Imperialist Economism’” in Ibid; “Collected Works”, Volume 19; London 1942; p. 216).

Lenin replied to Pyatakov’s argument in a long article “A Caricature of Marxism and ‘lmperialist Economics,’” written in October 1916 but not published until 1924:

“In the present imperialist war, . . phrases about defence of the fatherland are deception of the people, for this war is not a national war. In a truly national war the words ‘defence of the fatherland’ are deception, and we are not opposed to such a war.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Caricature of Marxism and ‘Imperialist Economism”, in ibid.; p. 217).

Pyatakov insisted:

“With regard to the colonies, we confine ourselves to a negative slogan, i.e., . . “Get out of the colonies.'”

(G. Pyatakov: ibid.; p. 251)

And Lenin replied:

“Both the political and the economic content of the slogan ‘Get out of the colonies!” amounts to one thing. . Only: freedom of secession for the colonial nations; freedom to establish a separate state.”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid; p. 252).

The theoretical basis of Pyatakov’s opposition to national self-determination is summarised in his declaration that:

“. . dualistic propaganda is substituted for the monistic action of the International.”

(G. Pyatakov: ibid.; p. 241).

To which Lenin replied:

“Is the actual condition of the workers in the oppressing nations the same as that of the workers in the oppressed nations from the standpoint of the national problem? No, they are not the same. . .That being the case, what is to be said about P. Kievsky’s phrase: the ‘monistic’ action of the International?

It is an empty, sonorous phrase, and nothing more.

In order that the action of the International, which in real life consists of workers who are divided into those belonging to oppressing nations and those belonging to oppressing nations, may be monistic action, propaganda must be carried on differently in each case.”

(V. I. Lenin: Ibid; p. 242-3)

This “dualistic propaganda” had already been described by Lenin:

“The Social-Democrats of the oppressing notions must demand the freedom of secession for the oppressed notions,. . The Social-Democrats of the oppressed nations, however, must put in the forefront the unity and the fusion of the workers of the oppressed nations with the workers of the oppressing nations.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Revolutionary Proletariat And the Right of Nations to Self-Determination”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 5; London 1935; p. 284)

Lenin’s summary of Pyatakov’s article was devastating:

“P. Kievsky. . totally fails to understand Marxism.
Kievsky does not advance a single correct argument. The only thing that is correct in his article, that is, if there are no mistakes in the figures, is the footnote in which he quotes some statistics about banks.”

(V. I. Lenin: A Caricature of Marxism and ‘Imperialist Economism'”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 19; London; 1942; p. 218, 262).

In this struggle between the advocates of the right of self-determination of nations and its opponents, Trotsky adopted a characteristically centrist position: hypocritical support for the slogan but without support for its essential content, the right of secession:

“Trotsky . . is body and soul for self-determination, but in his case too it is an idle phrase, for he does not demand freedom of secession for nations oppressed by the “fatherland” of the socialist of the given nationality.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The ‘Peace Programme”, in “Collected Works”, Volume 19 London 1942; p. 66).

“The Kautskyists hypocritically recognise self-determination – -in Russia this is the road taken by Trotsky and Martov. In words, both declare that they are in favour of self-determination, as Kautsky does. But in practice? Trotsky engages in his customary eclecticism. . . The prevailing hypocrisy remains unexposed, . .. namely, the attitude to be adopted towards the nation that is oppressed by ‘my’ nation. . . .

A Russian Social-Democrat who ‘recognises’ self-determination of nations . . without fighting for freedom of Secession for the notions oppressed by tsarism is really an imperialist and a lackey of tsarism.

Whatever the subjective ‘well-meaning’ intentions of Trotsky and Martov may be, they, by their evasions, objectively support Russian social-imperialism.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘The Discussion on Self-Determination Summed Up’, in: ‘Collected Works’, Volume 19; London; 1942; p. 305)

Trotsky’s Conciliationism

Lenin stood firmly for the organisational separation of revolutionary internationalism from both open and concealed (ie. Centrist) social-chauvinism:

“To keep united with opportunism at the present time means precisely to subjugate the working class to ‘its’ bourgeoisie, to make an alliance with it for the oppression of other nations and for the struggle for the privileges of a great nation; at the same time it means splitting the revolutionary proletariat of all countries.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘Socialism and War’, in: ‘Collected Works’, Volume 18; London; n.d.; p. 230-1).

“We must declare the idea of unity with the Organisation Committee an illusion detrimental to the workers’ cause.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘And Now What?”, in: ibid.; p. 109).

“We shall not be for unity with Chkheidze’s fraction (as desired both by Trotsky, by the 0rgansation Committee, and by Plekhanov and Co.; . for this would mean to cover up and defend the ‘Nashe Dyelo.”

(V. I. Lenin: Letter to Aleksendro Kollontai, summer 1915, in: ibid.; p. 208).

In contrast to Lenin, Trotsky stood consistently for the unity of what he termed the “internationalist” groups, a category which included the concealed social-chauvinists of the Centre (the Organisation Committee, the Menshevik Duma fraction and the group around Trotsky).

At the beginning of 1915, “Nashe Slovo” addressed an appeal to the Bolshevik Central Committee and to the Menshevik Organisation Committee proposing a conference of all the groups which took a “negative attitude’ towards social-chauvinism. In its reply, dated March 1915, the Organisation Committee said:

‘To the conference must be invited the foreign representatives of all those party centres and groups which were . . present at the Brussels Conference of the International Socialist Bureau before the war.’

(Letter of Organisation Committee, March 12th., 1915, cited in: V. I. Lenin: The Question of the Unity of Internationalists”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 18; London; n.d.; p. 177).

Lenin commented:

“Thus, the Organisation Committee declines on principle to confer with the internationalists, since it wishes to confer also with the social-patriots (it is known that Plekhanov’s and Alexinsky’s policies were represented at Brussels).

We must not confer, it says, without the social-patriots, we must confer with them!”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 177, 178).

Nevertheless, Trotsky continued his efforts to bring about organisational unity between the Bolsheviks end the concealed social-chauvinists of the Centre. In June 1915 Trotsky wrote an Open Letter to the editors of the Bolshevik magazine “Kommunist”: published in No. 105 of “Nashe Slovo” in which he said:

“I am proud of the conduct of our Duma members (the Chkheidze group); I regard them as the most important agency of internationalist education of the proletariat in Russia, and for that very reason I deem it the task of every revolutionary Social-Democrat to extend to them every support and to raise their authority in the International.”

(L. Trotsky: Open Letter to the Editors of “Kommunist”, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 18; London; n.d., p. 435)

Lenin commented on Trotsky’s unprincipled conciliationism in various articles:

“The elements that are grouped around the ‘Nashe Slovo’ are vacillating between platonic sympathy for internationalism and a tendency for unity at any price with the “Nasha Zarya” and the Organisation Committee.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Conference of the Foreign Sections of the RSDLP”, in: Collected Works, Volume 18; London; n .d.; p.150).

“‘Nashe Slovo’ . . raises a revolt against social-nationalism while standing on its knees before it, since it fails to unmask the most dangerous defenders of the bourgeois current (like Kautsky); it does not declare war against opportunism but, on the contrary, passes it over in silence; it does not undertake, and does not point out, any real steps towards liberating socialism from its shameful patriotic captivity. By saying that neither unity nor a split with those who joined the bourgeoisie is imperative, the ‘Nashe Slovo’ practically surrenders to the opportunists.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Collapse of Platonic Internationalism”, in: ibid.; p.183).

“Trotsky always, entirely disagrees with the social-chauvinists in principle, but agrees with them in everything in practice.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘State of Affairs within Russian Social-Democracy”, in: Ibid.; p. 205-6).

“We shall not be for unity with Chkheidze’s fraction (As desired . .by Trotsky . .) for this would mean to cover up and defend the ‘Nashe Dyelo’…
Roland-Holst, as well as Rakovsky . .and Trotsky too, are in my judgment all most harmful ‘Kautskyists’, inasmuch as they are all, in one form or another, for unity with the opportunists, . . are embellishing opportunism, they all (each in his way) advance eclecticism instead of revolutionary Marxism.”

(V. I. Lenin: Letters to Aleksandra Kollontai, summer 1915, in: ibid.; p. 208, 209).

“In Russia Trotsky . . fights for unity with the opportunist and chauvinist group “Nashe Zarya.'”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘Socialism and War”, in: ibid.; p.232).

“Martov and Trotsky in Russia are causing the greatest harm to the labour movement by their insistence upon a fictitious unity, thus hindering, the now ripened imminent unification of the opposition in all countries and the creation of the Third International.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘The Tasks of the Opposition in France”, in: ‘Collected Works”, Volume 19; London; 1942; p. 32).

“What are our differences with Trotsky?. . In brief — he is a Kautskyite, that is, he stands for unity with the Kautskyites in the International and with Chkheidze’s parliamentary group in Russia. We are absolutely against such unity.”

(V. I. Lenin: Letter to Henrietta Roland-Holst, Morch 8th., 1916, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 43; Moscow; 1969; p. 515-16).

“What a swine this Trotsky is — Left phrases and a bloc with the Right. . . He ought to be exposed.”

(V. I. Lenin: Letter to Aleksendra Kollontai, February 17th., 1917, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 35; Moscow, 1966; p. 285).

Kamenev’s Defence

In November 1915 eleven leading members of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party, including five deputies, were arrested at a conference near Petrograd and charged with being members of an organisation aiming at the overthrow of the existing political order.

At their trial Lev Kamenev and two of the deputies declared in their defence that they did not accept the policy of the Party in so for as it enjoined members to work for the defeat of Russia in the war.

Lenin commented:

“The trial of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Fraction . . has proven first, that this advanced detachment of revolutionary Social-Democracy in Russia did not show sufficient firmness at the trial. . To attempt to show solidarity with the social-patriot, Mr. Yordansky, as did Comrade Rosenfeld (i.e., Kamenev –Ed.) or to point out one’s disagreement with the Central Committee, is an incorrect method; this is impermissible from the standpoint of revolutionary Social-Democracy.”

(V. I. Lenin: “What has the Trial of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Fraction Proven?”, in: “Works”, Volume 18; Moscow; n.d.; p. 151)

1916: The Attempt to Introduce Anarchist Ideas into the Party

In 1916 Nikolai Bukharin wrote, under the pseudonym “Nota Bene,” an article entitled ‘The Imperialist Predatory State” in the magazine “The Youth International” (organ of the Bureau of the International League of Socialist Youth Organisations) , in which he said:

“It is quite a mistake to seek the difference between Socialists and anarchists in the fact that the former are in favour of the state while the latter are against it. The real difference is that revolutionary Social-Democracy desires to organise social production on new lines, centralised, . . whereas decentralised, anarchist production would mean retrogression. . . .Social-Democracy. . must now more than ever emphasise its hostility to the state in principle.”

(N. Bukharin: “The Imperialist Predatory State”, cited in: V. I. Lenin; ‘The Youth International”, in: Selected Works”, Volume 5; London; 1935; p. 243, 244).

To which Lenin replied:

“This is wrong. The author raises the question of the difference in the attitude of Socialists and anarchists towards the state, But he does not answer this question, but another, namely the difference in the attitude of Socialists and anarchists towards the economic foundation of future society. . . The Socialists are in favour of utilising the present state and its institutions in the struggle for the emancipation of the working class, and they also urge the necessity of utilising the State for the peculiar form of transition from capitalism to socialism. This transitional form is the dictatorship of the proletariat, which is also a state.
The anarchists want to ‘abolish’ the state, to ‘blow it up’.

The Socialists . . hold that the state will die out.
Comrade Nota-Bene’s . . remark about the ‘state idea’ is entirely muddled. It is un-Marxian and un-socialistic.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Youth International’, in: ibid.; p. 243, 244).

In April 1929 Stalin commented:

“The well-known theoretical controversy which flared up in 1916 between Lenin and Bukharin on the question of the state . . is important in order to reveal Bukharin’s inordinate pretensions to teach Lenin, as well as the roots of his theoretical unsoundness on such important questions as the dictatorship of the proletariat. . . .Bukharin landed in a semi-Anarchist puddle.

In Bukharin’s opinion the working class should be hostile in principle to the state as such, including the working-class state.”

(J.V. Stalin: “The Right Deviation in the CPSU (B.)”, in: “Leninism”; London; 1942; p. 276, 277).

1916-1917: Trotsky Goes to America

In September 1916 the French authorities, at the request of the tsarist government, banned “Nashe Slovo” and deported Trotsky to Spain. Although he did not participate in any political activity in Spain, after a few days he was arrested by the Spanish police and, in December, deported to the United States. He arrived in New York in January 1917.

The Assassination of Rasputin

During the war great influence was exercised over the tsar and tsarina by the monk Grigori Rasputin. In December 1916 a group of nobles, headed by the Grand Duke Dimitri Pavlovich, organised the assassination of Rasputin, believing that his influence was being used against the war effort.

1917: Trotsky in America

In January 1917 Trotsky landed in New York, and joined the staff of a Russian magazine published there under the editorship of Nikolai Bukharin and Aleksandra Kollontai, -“Novy Nir” (New World). Typically, he formed a bloc with the right-wing members of the staff against the Left:

“Trotsky arrived, and this scoundrel at once ganged up with the Right wing of ‘Novy Mir’ against the Left Zimmerwaldists!! That’s it!! That’s Trotsky for you!! Always true to himself – twists, swindles, poses as a Left, helps the Right, so long as he can.”

(V. I. Lenin: Letter to Inessa Armand, February 19th., 1917, in: ‘Collected Works’, Volume 35; Moscow; 1966; p.288)

In “Navy Mir,” Trotsky continued to put forward his theory of “permanent revolution,” arguing that if the German working class failed to rise along with the Russian working class, the workers’ government of a revolutionary Russia must wage war against the German ruling class:

“If the conservative social-patriotic organisation should prevent the German working class from rising against its ruling classes in the coming epoch, then of course the Russian working class would defend its revolution with arms in its hands. The revolutionary workers’ government would wage war against the Hohenzollerns, summoning the brother proletariat of Germany to rise against the common enemy.”

(L. Trotsky: Article in “Novy Mir”, March 21st., 1917, cited in: L. Trotsky: “History of the Russian Revolution”; Volume 1; London; 1967; p. 438).

The “February Revolution”

From the first days of 1917 strikes spread throughout the main cities of tsarist Russia. By March 10th; these had developed in Petrograd into a political general strike, with the demonstrating workers carrying Bolshevik slogans: “‘Down with the tsar!,” “Down with the war!” and “Bread!”

The practical work of the Bolshevik Party in Russia at this time was directed by the Bureau of the Central Committee, headed by Vyacheslav Molotov. On March 11th. the Bureau issued a manifesto calling for an armed uprising against tsarism and the formation of a Provisional-Government.

On March 12th; an elected Soviet of Workers’ Deputies came into being in Petrograd as an action committee to carry out the uprising and in the following days Soviets were established in Moscow and other cities. On March 13th, the Petrograd Soviet revived its “Izvestia” (“News”).

When the tsar ordered troops to suppress the rising by force, the soldiers — mostly peasant in uniform — refused to obey the orders of their officers and joined the revolutionary workers, thus bringing into being a revolutionary alliance of workers and peasants. The workers and soldiers now began to disarm the police and to arm themselves with their weapons. On March 14th, the Petrograd Soviet was expanded into a “Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies.”

On March 15th. the tsar, Nicholas II, abdicated.

The revolution of March 1917 (known as the “February Revolution” under the old-style calendar) had been accomplished by the workers and peasants. Its character was that of a bourgeois-democratic revolution directed against the tsarist autocracy.

The Formation of the Provisional Government

As soon as the capitalist class realised that the bourgeois-democratic revolution was unavoidable, they proceeded to manoeuvre in an effort to minimise its scope — and above all to prevent its development into a socialist revolution.

On March 12th., the day after the tsar had dissolved the Fourth State Duma, its liberal capitalist members set up an “Executive Committee of the Imperial Duma,” headed by the President of the Duma, the monarchist landlord Mikhail Rodzyanko.

On March 15th, this Executive Committee set up a “Provisional-Government,” headed by Prince Georgi Lvov as Prime Minister and including among its Ministers Pavel Miliukov (leader of the Constitutional Democrats) as Minister of Foreign Affairs, Aleksendr Guchkov (leader of the Octobrists) as Minister of War, and Aleksandr Karensky (a prominent Socialist-Revolutionary) as Minister of Justice.

The capitalist class endeavoured for a few days to save the monarchy, by persuading the tsar to abdicate in favour of his brother Mikhail. But this proved untenable in view of popular feeling against the monarchy, and Mikhail abdicated on the following day, March 16th.

The capitalists then turned their efforts to attempting to turn Russia into a capitalist parliamentary republic.

On March 17th. the new government issued a manifesto “To the Citizens”; setting out its programme:

“1. Complete and immediate amnesty for all political and religious offences, including terrorist acts, military revolts, agrarian insurrections, etc.

2.Freedom of speech, press, assembly, union, strikes, and the extension of all political liberties to persons in the military service within the limits required by considerations of technical military necessity.

3. Abolition of all feudal estate and national restrictions.

4. Immediate preparation for the convocation of a Constituent Assembly on the basis of universal, equal, direct and secret suffrage. This Constituent Assembly shall determine the form of State and the constitution of the country.

5. Formation of a people’s militia with elected officers subordinated to the organs of local self-government and taking the place of the police.

6. Elections to the local organs of self-government on the basis of universal, equal, direct and secret suffrage.

7. The troops who participated in the revolutionary movement are not to be disarmed and are to remain in Petrograd.

8. While maintaining a rigid military discipline in the service, all obstacles are to be eliminated preventing soldiers from exercising the public rights enjoyed by other citizens.”

(Manifesto of Provisional Government, May 17th., 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin: Collected Works, Volume 20, Book 1; London; 1929; p. 348)

Lenin commented:

“In its first proclamation to the people (March 17), the government uttered not a word about the main and basic question of the present moment, peace. It keeps secret the predatory treaties made by tsarism with England, France, Italy, Japan, etc. It wishes to conceal from the people the truth about its war programme, and the fact that it is for war, for victory over Germany. . . . The new government cannot give the people bread. And no amount of freedom will satisfy masses suffering hunger…

The entire Manifesto of the new government . . .inspires me with the greatest distrust, for it consists only of promises, and does not carry into life any of the most essential measures that could and should be fully realised right now”

(V. I. Lenin: Theses of March 17th, 1917; in ibid; p.24, 25).

The Role of the Petrograd Soviet

Although there was a large spontaneous element in the “February Revolution,” the Bolsheviks, played a leading role in the uprising itself. Despite this, in the majority of cases a majority of the members of the Soviets and of their Executive Committees were Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries; the Bolsheviks were, in the period following the “February Revolution” in a small minority in most of the Soviets, including those of Petrograd and Moscow.

A number of factors were responsible for this position: the industrial working class had been diluted during the war by large numbers of peasants from the villages, while Bolshevik leaders such as Lenin and Stalin were in exile.

As a result of this, on March 18th. the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet issued a proclamation calling upon the workers to support the capitalist Provisional Government. Lenin commented:

“The proclamation issued by the Soviet of Workers’ Deputies … is a most remarkable document. It proves that the Petrograd proletariat, at the time it issued its proclamation, at any rate, was under the preponderant influence of the petty-bourgeois politicians.

The proclamation declares that every democrat must ‘support’ the new government and that the Soviet of Workers’ Deputies requests and authorises Kerensky to participate in the Provisional Government. . .These steps are a classic example of betrayal of the cause of the revolution and the cause of the proletariat.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Letters from Afar”‘, in: ibid.; p. 41, 42).

At the same time the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet set up a “Contact Commission,” headed by Aleksandr Skobolev, the official aim of which was to maintain contact with, and “control”, the Provisional Government.

Lenin summed up the political situation resulting from the February Revolution in the following words:

“The first stage of the revolution . . , owing to the insufficient class consciousness and organisation of the proletariat, led to the assumption of power by the bourgeoisie.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Tasks of the Proletariat in the Present Revolution”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 6; London; 1946; p. 22).

The Political Line Of the Party in March 1917

The victory of the “February Revolution” created a new political situation in Russia which called for a new political line on the part of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party.

As Stalin expressed it in November 1924:

“This was the greatest turning point in the history of Russia and an unprecedented turning point in the history Of our Party. The old, pre-revolutionary platform Of direct overthrow of the government was clear and definite, but it was no longer suitable for the new conditions of struggle . . Under the now conditions of the struggle, the Party hod to adopt a new orientation. The Party (its majority) groped its way towards this new orientation.”

(J. V. Stalin “Trotskyism or Leninism?”; in Works Volume 6; Moscow; 1953); p. 347, 348).

At the time of the “February Revolution” the Bureau of the Control Committee of the RSDLP, centred in Petrograd, was led by Vyacheslav Molotov.

On March 18th., 1917 the Bureau issued, in the name of the Central Committee, a manifesto to “All Citizens of Russia,” calling for the formation of a Provisional Revolutionary Government.

“Citizens! The fortresses of Russian tsarism have.. fallen. . . . It is the task of the working class and the revolutionary army to create a Provisional Revolutionary Government which is to head the new republican order now in the process of birth.

The Provisional Revolutionary Government must take it upon itself to create temporary laws defending all the rights and liberties of the people, to confiscate the lands of the monasteries and the landowners, the crown lands and the appanages, to introduce the 8-hour working day and to convoke a Constituent Assembly on the basis a universal, direct and equal suffrage, with no discrimination as to sex, nationality or religion, and with the secret ballot.
The Provisional Revolutionary Government must take it upon itself to secure provisions for the population and the army; for this purpose it must confiscate all the stores prepared by the former government and the municipalities…..
It is the task of the people and its revolutionary government to suppress all counter-revolutionary plots against the people.

It is the immediate and urgent task of the Provisional Revolutionary Government to establish relations with the proletariat of the belligerent countries for the purpose 0f . . terminating the bloody war carnage imposed upon the enslaved peoples against their will.

The workers of shops and factories, also the rising troops, must immediately elect their representatives to the Provisional Revolutionary Government. . .
Forward under the red banner of the revolution!

Long live the Democratic Republic!
Long live the revolutionary working class!
Long live the revolutionary people and the insurgent army!”

(Manifesto of CC, RSDLP, March 18th., 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”; Volume 20, Book 2; London; 1929; p. 378-79).

The manifesto was published in the first issue of “Pravda,” which reappeared on the same day.

Among the Bolsheviks liberated from exile in Siberia by the “February Revolution” were Josef Stalin and Lev Kamenev, both of whom returned to Petrograd. Kamenev joined the editorial board of “Pravda” on March 23rd., Stalin two days later on March 28th.

Kamenev immediately upheld a chauvinist line on the war, contending like the Menshevik leaders that with the victory of the “February Revolution” the working class should adopt a position of “revolutionary defencism.” He wrote in “Pravda” of March 28th:

“The soldiers, the peasants and the workers of Russia who went to war obeying the pull of the now overthrown Tsar. . have freed themselves; the Tsar’s banners have been replaced by the red banners of the revolution!. . .

When an army faces an army, it would be the most absurd policy to propose to one of them to lay down arms and go home. This . .would be a policy of slavery which a free people would repudiate with scorn. No, we will firmly hold our posts, we will answer a bullet by a bullet and a shell with a shell. . . .

A revolutionary soldier or officer, having overthrown the yoke of tsarism, will not vacate a trench to leave it to a German soldier or officer who has not mustered up courage to overthrow the yoke of his own government. We must not allow any disorganisation of the military forces of the revolution! ….

Russia is bound by alliances to England, France and other countries. It cannot act on the questions of peace without them.”

(L. Kamenev: “Without Secret Diplomacy”; cited in “Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 2; London; 1929, p. 379; 380).

Stalin rejected this policy of chauvinist “revolutionary defencism.” He wrote in “Pravda” on the following day, March 29th :

“The present war is an imperialist war. Its principal aim is the seizure (annexation) of foreign, chiefly agrarian, territories by capitalistically developed states.. . .

It would be deplorable if the Russian revolutionary democracy, which was able to overthrow the detested tsarist regime, were to succumb to the false alarm raised by the imperialist bourgeoisie”.

(J. V. Stalin: “The War”, in: “Works”; Volume 3; Moscow; 1953; p.5; 7).

The majority of the Bureau, headed by Stalin and Molotov, correctly saw the Provisional Government as an organ of the capitalist class, and the Soviets as the embryo of a Provisional Government. A resolution of the Bureau published in “Pravda” on April 8th declared:

“The Provisional Government set up by the moderate bourgeois classes of society and associated in interests with Anglo-French capital is incapable of solving the problems raised by the revolution. Its resistance to the further extension and deepening of the revolution is being paralysed only by the growth of the revolutionary forces themselves and by their organisation. Their rallying centre must be the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies in the cities and the Soviets of Peasants’ and Agricultural Workers’ Deputies in the countryside as the embryo of a revolutionary government, prepared in the further process of development, at a definite moment of the revolution, to establish the full power of the proletariat in alliance with the revolutionary democracy.”

(Resolution of Bureau of CC, RSDLP; cited in: N. Popov: “Outline History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union”‘, Part 1; London; n .d.; p. 353-54).

However, in “groping” towards a correct political line in the new situation, the majority of the Bureau made a tactical error. Instead of putting forward the clear slogan of “All power to the Soviets!’, they adopted a policy of “putting pressure on the Provisional Government” to perform actions which, as an organ of the capital class, it was incapable of doing:

“The solution is to bring pressure on the Provisional Government to make it declare its consent to start peace negotiations irnmediately.

The workers, soldiers and peasants must arrange meetings and demonstrations and demand that the Provisional Government shall come out openly and publicly in an effort to induce all the belligerent powers to start peace negotiations immediately, on the basis of recognition of the right of nations to self-determination.”

(J. V. Stalin: ibid.; p. 8).

On which Lenin commented forthrightly the day after his return to Russia:

“The “Pravda” demands that the government renounce annexations. To demand that a government of capitalists renounce annexations is balderdash.”

(V. I. Lenin Speech at a Caucus of the Bolshevik Members of the All-Russian Conference of the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, April 17, 1917, in Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 1; London; 1929; p. 98).

This incorrect tactical line corresponded closely with the tactical line of Kamenev, who said:

“Our slogan is — pressure on the Provisional Government with the aim of forcing it openly, before world democracy, and immediately to come forth with an attempt to induce all the belligerent countries forthwith to start negotiations concerning the means of stopping the World War.”

(L. Kamenev: “Without Secret Diplomacy”, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”; Volume 20, Book 2; London; 1929; p. 380).

Stalin himself analysed this mistaken tactical policy in November 1924:

“The Party (its majority) groped its way towards this new orientation. It adopted the policy of pressure on the Provisional Government through the Soviets on the question of peace and did not venture to step forward at once from the old slogan of the dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry to the new slogan of power to the Soviets. The aim of this halfway policy was to enable the Soviets to discern the actual imperialist nature of the Provisional Government on the basis of the concrete questions of peace and in this way to wrest the Soviets from the Provisional Government. But this was a profoundly mistaken position, for it gave rise to pacifist illusions, brought grist to the mill of defencism, and hindered the revolutionary education of the masses. At that time I shared this mistaken position with the Party comrades and fully abandoned it only in the middle of April, when I associated myself with Lenin’s theses.”

(J. V. Stalin: “Trotskyism or Leninism” , in: Works”, Volume 3; Moscow; 1953; p. 348).

Lenin Returns to Russia

As soon as the “February Revolution” broke out, Lenin began attempts to return to Russia. The governments of the Allied powers refused him permission to travel through their countries but eventually, as a result of negotiations between Fritz Platten, Secretary of the Swiss Socialist Party, and the German government, 32 Russian political emigres (19 of which were Bolsheviks, among them Lenin) were permitted to travel through Germany in a sealed railway carriage accorded extra-territorial rights. The German government, of course, calculated that the return of these revolutionaries to Russia would be detrimental to the Russian war effort.

Lenin arrived in Petrograd on the evening of April 16th; and was greeted by an enthusiastic crowd of workers and soldiers.

On the following day he reported to the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet on the circumstances of his journey through Germany.

Lenin’s “April Theses”

Later on April 17th., Lenin spoke at a meeting of the Bolshevik delegates to the First Congress of Soviets, presenting his theses on the new situation in Russia following the “February Revolution” — the “April Theses.” The main points of these theses were as follows:

1. The “February Revolution” has brought into being the democratic dictatorship of the working class and peasantry in the shape of the Soviets of Workers’and Soldiers’ Deputies.

“The Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies’ — here you have ‘revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry’ already realised in life.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Letters on Tactics”; in ‘Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 1; London; 1929; p. 120).

2. But alongside the Soviets there came into being out of the “February Revolution” the Provisional Government, representing the interests of the capitalist class.

‘The Provisional Government of Lvov and Co. is a dictatorship . . based . . on seizure by force accomplished by a definite class, namely, the bourgeoisie.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Tasks of the Proletariat in Our Revolution”., in: ibid.; p. 133).

3. Thus, out of the “February Revolution” has arisen a temporary condition of dual power, of two rival governments.

“What has made our revolution so strikingly unique is that it has established dual power . . . What constitutes dual power? The fact that by the side of the Provisional Government, the government of the bourgeoisie, there has developed another, as yet weak; embryonic, but undoubtedly real and growing government — the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies.”

(V. I. Lenin: “On Dual Power”, in: ibid.; p. 115).

“There is not the slightest doubt but that such a combination cannot last long. There can be no two powers in a state. One of them is bound to dwindle to nothing, and the entire Russian bourgeoisie is already straining all its energies everywhere and in every possible way in an endeavour to weaken, to set aside, to reduce to nothing the Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, to create one single power for the bourgeoisie.'”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Tasks of the Proletariat in Our Revolution”; in: ibid.;p. 133)

4. Despite its weakness, it is the democratic dictatorship of the working class and peasantry (the Soviet embryonic government) which alone at present possesses effective machinery of force (in the shape of the armed workers and revolutionary soldiers).

“In Petrograd the power is actually in the hands of the workers and soldiers; the new government does not use violence against them, and cannot do so because there is no police, there is no army seperated from the people, there is no all-powerful officialdom placed above the people.”

(V. I. Lenin “‘Letters on Tactics”, in ibid.; p. 121).

5. Nevertheless, the leaders of the Soviets are placing this machinery of force at the disposal of the Provisional Government, and seeking to liquidate the democratic dictatorship of the working-class and peasantry.

“By direct agreements with the bourgeois Provisional Government and by a series of actual concessions to the latter, the Soviet power has surrendered and is surrendering its position to the bourgeoisie.”

(V. I. Lenin “On Dual Power, in ibid.; p. 116).

6. This has been possible because of the inadequate class consciousness and organisation of the workers and peasants, which has been influenced by petty-bourgeois ideological pressure:

“The reason (i.e., for the surrender of power to the capitalist class — Ed.) is in the lack of organisation and class consciousness among the workers and peasants.”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 116).

“Russia is now in a state of ebullition. Millions of people, politically asleep for ten years, politically crushed by the terrible pressure of tsarism and slave labour for landowners and manufacturers, have awakened and thrown themselves into politics. Who are these millions of people? Mostly small proprietors, petty bourgeois. . . .A gigantic petty-bourgeois wave has swept over everything, has overwhelmed the class-conscious proletariat not only numerically but also ideologically.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘The Tasks of the Proletariat in Our Revolution”, in: ibid.; p. 1321).

7. After the “February Revolution” the war remains an imperialist war, and the effort of the Provisional Government remains a reactionary one which the Party must continue to oppose.

“Under the new government of Lvov and Co., owing to the capitalist nature of this government, the war on Russia’s part remains a predatory imperialist war.”

(V. I. Lenin: Speech at a Caucus of the Bolshevik Members of the All-Russian Conference of the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, April 17, 1917, in Ibid; p. 95).

8. The Party must not, therefore, make the slightest concession to “revolutionary defencism” and must dissociate itself from all who foster revolutionary defencism.”

“In our attitude towards the war not the slightest concession must be made to ‘revolutionary defencism.'”

(V. I. Lenin; ibid.; p. 95).

9. The capitalist Provisional Government is incapable of solving the fundamental social problems of the workers and poor peasantry.

‘The government of the Octobrists and Cadets, of the Guchkovs and Miliukovs, could give neither peace nor bread, nor freedom, even if it were sincere in its desire to do so.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Letters from Afar”, in: ibid., p. 34)

10. Therefore the revolution must be carried forward to a new stage by the working class in alliance with, and leading, the poor peasantry.

“The present situation in Russia . . represents transition from the first stage of the revolution . . to its second stage which is to place power in the hands of the proletariat and the poorest strata of the peasantry.”

(V. I. Lenin: Speech at a Caucus of the Bolshevik Members of the All-Russian Conference of the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies,.April 17, 1917, in Ibid.; p. 97).

11. The Provisional Government needs to be overthrown, but it cannot be overthrown at present.

“The Provisional Government . . should be overthrown, for it is an oligarchical, bourgeois, and not a people’s government. . it cannot be overthrown now; . . generally speaking, it cannot be ‘overthrown’ by any ordinary method, for it rests on the ‘support’ given to the bourgeoisie by the second government — the Soviet of ‘Workers ‘ Deputies, which is the only possible revolutionary government directly expressing the mind and the will of the majority of workers and peasants.”

(V. I. Lenin: “On Dual Power”, in: ibid; p. 116-17).

12. The next step in the revolution is, therefore, to convince the working class and poor peasantry to throw off the domination of the Soviets by the compromising petty bourgeois elements and to transform them into their organs of power.

“Any one who, right now, immediately and irrevocably, separates the proletarian elements of the Soviets . . from the petty bourgeois elements, provides a correct expression of the interests of the movement.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Letters on Tactics’, in: ibid.; p. 126).

“It must be explained to the masses that the Soviet of Workers’ Deputies is the only possible form of revolutionary government and that, therefore, our task is, while this government is submitting to the influence of the bourgeoisie, to present a patient, systematic, and persistent analysis of its errors and tactics, an analysis especially adapted to the practical needs of the masses.

While we are in the minority, we carry on the work of criticism and of exposing errors, advocating all along the necessity of transferring the entire power of state to the Soviets of Workers’ Deputies.”

(V. I. Lenin: Speech at a Caucus of the Bolshevik Members of the All-Russian Conference of the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, April 17, 1917, in: ibid; p. 99).

13. So long as the Soviets control an effective machinery of force and the Proviosional Government does not, this process of transferring all power to the Soviets may be accomplished peacefully.

“The essence of the situation (i.e., from March 12th. to July 17th., 1917 — Ed.) was that the arms were in the hands of the people, and that no coercion was exercised over the people from without. That is what opened up and ensured a peaceful path for the development of the revolution. The slogan ‘All power to the Soviets’ was a slogan for a peaceful development of the revolution, which was possible between March 12 and July 17.”

(V. I. Lenin: “On Slogans”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 6; London; 19216; p. 167-68).

14. Thus, the former slogan ‘Turn the imperialist war into civil war” is now for the time being incorrect:

“We advocated the transformation of the imperialist war into a civil war — are we not going back on ourselves? But the first civil war in Russia has ended.
. . In this transitional period, as long as the armed force is in the hands of the soldiers, as long as Miliukov and Guchkov have not resorted to violence, this civil war, as far as we are concerned, turns into peaceful, prolonged and patient class propaganda. We discard this slogan for the time being, but only for the time being.”

(V. I. Lenin: Report on the Current Situation”, in: ibid.; p. 95, 96).

15. The aim of transferring all power to the Soviets is to set up a Russian Soviet Republic, a state of the working class and peasantry.

“Not a parliamentary republic – a return to it from the Soviet of Workers’ Deputies would be a step backward – but a republic of Soviets of Workers’, Agricultural Labourers’ and Peasants’ Deputies througout the land, from top to bottom.”

(V. I. Lenin: Speech at a Caucus of the Bolshevik Members of the All-Russian Conference of the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, April 17th., 1917, in: “Collected Works”, Volume. 20, Book 1; London; 1929; p. 99).

16. The formation of this Soviet Republic will be a major step in the direction of socialism: however, its immediate programme will not be the introduction of socialism, but the establishment of control by the Soviets over production and distribution:

“The Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies must seize power not for the purpose of building an ordinary bourgeois republic, nor for the purpose of introducing Socialism immediately. The letter could not be accomplished.
. . They must seize power in order to take the first concrete steps towards introducing Socialism.”

(V. I. Lenin: Report On the Political Situation, 7th. Conference of RSDLP, in: ibid.; p. 283)

“Not the ‘introduction’ of Socialism as an immediate task, but the immediate placing of the Soviet of Workers’ Deputies in control of social production and distribution of goods.”

(V. I. Lenin: Speech at a Caucus of Bolshevik Members of the All-Russian Conference of the Soviets of Workers’ end Soldiers’ Deputies, April 17th., 1917,in: ibid.; p. 101).

together with:

“Abolition of the police, the army, the bureaucracy.
All officers to be elected and to be subject to recall at any time, their salaries not to exceed the average wage of a competent worker. .
Confiscation of all private lands.
Nationalisation of all lands in the country, and management of such lands by local Soviets of Agricultural Labourers’ and Peasants’ Deputies. A separate organisation of Soviets of Deputies of the poorest peasants. Creation of model agricultural establishments out of large estates. . . . . .
Immediate merger of all the banks in the country into one general national bank, over which the Soviet of Workers’ Deputies should have control.”

(V. I. Lenin: “On the Tasks of the Proletariat in the Present Revolution”, in: ibid.; p. 108).

17. The term “social-democratic” has been so brought into disrepute by the social-chauvinists that the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party should change its name to the Russian Communist Party.

“We must call ourselves the Communist Party — just as Marx and Engels called themselves Communists….
The majority . . of the Social-Democratic leaders are betraying Socialism…..
The masses are distracted, baffled, deceived by their leaders…..
Should we aid and abet that deception by retaining the old and worn-out party name, which is as decayed as the Second International? . .
It is high time to cast off the soiled shirt, it is high time to put on clean linen.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Tasks of the Proletariat in Our Revolution”, in: ibid.; p. 154, 156, 157).

18. The “Zimmerwald International”‘ has already broken down as a result of its persistent centrism; the Party must withdraw from it (except for purposes of information) and found a new revolutionary Third International.

‘The chief fault of the Zimmerwald International, the cause of its breakdown (for from a political and ideological viewpoint it has already broken down), was its vacillation, its indecision, when it came to the most important practical end all-determining question of breaking completely with the social-chauvinists and the old social-chauvinist International. . .

We must break with this International immediately. We ought to remain in Zimmerwald only to gather information.

It is precisely we who must found, right now, without delay, a new, revolutionary proletarian International.”

(V. I. Lenin ibid.; p. 151, 152).

To sum up, Lenin held that, politically, the “February Revolution” was a bourgeois-democratic revolution which transferred power from the tsarist autocracy to the dual power of the democratic dictatorship of the working class and peasantry (in the shape of the Soviets) and of the capitalist class (in the shape of the Provisional Government). Politically, therefore, the ‘February Revolution” represented the completion of the bourgeois-democratic revolution:

“Before the March revolution of 1917, state power in Russia was in the hands of one old class, namely, the feudal noble landlord class, headed by Nicholas Romanov.
After that revolution, state power is in the hands of another class, a new one, namely, the bourgeoisie….
The passing of state power from one class to another is the first, the main, the basic principle of a revolution, both in the strictly scientific and in the practical meaning of that term.
To that extent, the bourgeois or the bourgeois democratic, revolution in Russia is completed.
But at this point we hear the noise of objectors, who readily call themselves ‘old Bolsheviks’ : Haven’t we always maintained, they say, that a bourgeois-democratic revolution is culminated only in a ‘revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry’? . . . .
The Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies’ –here you have ‘revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry’ already realised in life.”

(V. I Lenin: ‘Letters on Tactics’ in: ibid.; p. 119, 120)

Economically and socially, however, particularly in so far as the agrarian revolution (the transfer of the land to the working peasantry) is concerned, the “February Revolution” did not complete the bourgeois-democratic revolution, Economically and socially, the bourgeois-democratic revolution was not completed until the “October Revolution”, the political content of which was proletarian-socialist.

“Is the agrarian revolution, which is a phase of the bourgeois-democratic revolution, completed? On the contrary, is it not a fact that it has not yet been?”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 119-120).

“The bourgeois-democratic content of the revolution means purging the social relations (systems and institutions) of the country of mediavalism, serfdom, feudalism. . . .
‘We solved the problems (i.e., economic and social problems — Ed.) of the bourgeois-democratic revolution in passing, as a ‘by-product’ of the main and real proletarian-revolutionary socialist work.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Fourth Anniversary of the October Revolution”; in: “Selected Works”; Volume 6; London; 1946; p. 501; 503.

Lenin thus maintained that the Bolshevik strategy and tactics relating to the first, bourgeois-democratic stage of the revolutionary process in Russia had been confirmed by the “February Revolution”, but in a “more multicoloured” Way than could have been anticipated:

“The Bolsheviks’ slogans and ideas have been generally confirmed by history; but as to the concrete situation, things have turned out to be different, more original, more unique, more multicoloured than could have been anticipated by any one.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Letters on Tactics”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 1; London; 1929; p. 120).

Trotsky and the “Ideological Rearmament” of the Bolshevik Party

After the “October Revolution” the question naturally arose among Trotsky’s disciples as to how it had come about that the socialist revolution in Russia had been brought about in accordance with a political line advanced by Lenin, who had consistently opposed Trotsky’s theory of “permanent revolution.”

Trotsky’s answer was simple, if completely mythical: in May 1917 the Bolshevik Party, on Lenin’s initiative, had “rearmed itself” ideologically by accepting Trotsky’s theory of “permanent revolution”; thus history had “confirmed” the correctness of Trotsky’s theory of “permanent revolution”:

“Bolshevism under the leadership of Lenin (though not without internal struggle) accomplished its ideological rearmanent on this most important question in the spring of 1917, that is, before the seizure of power.”

(L. Trotsky: Note in “The Year 1905;”(January 1922), cited in: L. Trotsky: ‘The Permanent Revolution”; New York; 1970; p. 236).

“Precisely in the period between January 9 and the October strike (in 1905 — Ed.) the author formed those opinions, which later received the name: ‘theory of the permanent revolution’ . . . . .
This appraisal was confirmed as completely correct, though after a lapse of twelve years.”

(L. Trotsky: Forward to “The Year 1905” (January 1922), cited in: L. Trotsky: ibid.; p. 235).

“I by no means consider that in my disagreements with the Bolsheviks I was wrong on all points.. . .
I consider that my assessment of the motive forces of the revolution was absolutely right.. . .
My polemical articles against the Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks . . devoted to an analysis of the internal forces of the revolution and its prospects . . I could republish even now without amendment, since they fully and completely coincide with the position of our Party, beginning with 1917.”

(L. Trotsky: Letter to N.S. Olminsky, December 1921 cited in: N. S. Olminsky: Foreword to “Lenin on Trotsky” (1925), cited in: J. V. Stalin: Reply to the Discussion on the Report an “The Social–Democratic Deviation in Our Party’, l5th Conference of CPSU (B.), November 3rd., 1926; in “Works”;, Volume 3; Moscow; 1954;p. 349-50).

In fact, of course, Lenin took pains to dissociate himself from Trotsky’s theory of “permanent revolution” after his return to Russia in April 1917:

“Trotskyism: ‘No Tsar but a workers’ government’. This, surely is wrong.”

(V. I. Lenin: Report on the Political Situation, Petrograd City Conference of the RSDLP, April 27th, 1917, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 1; London;
1929, p. 207).

“Had we said: ‘No Tsar, but a Dictatorship of the Proletariat’ — it would have meant a leap over the petty bourgeoisie.”

(V.I. Lenin: Concluding Remarks in Connection with the Report on the Political Situation, 7th. Conference of the RSDLP, May 7th., 1917, in: ibid.; p. 287).

Lenin did not put forward in April 1917 the strategy of direct advance to the dictatorship of the working class (in alliance with the poor peasantry) as a corrected strategy for the realisation of the bourgeois-democratic revolution.

On the contrary, the bourgeois-democratic revolution, as the first stage of the revolutionary process in Russia, had already been realised, politically, in the “February Revolution.” The strategy of direct advance to the dictatorship of the working class (in alliance with the poor peasantry) was put forward as a new strategy for the new situation following the “February Revolution,” a new strategy for the second stage of the revolutionary process.

As Lenin expressed it in his “April Theses”:

“The present situation in Russia. . .represents a transition from the first stage of the revolution to its second stage which is to place power in the hands of the proletariat and the poorest strata of the peasantry.”

(V. I. Lenin: Speech at a Caucus of the Bolshevik Members of the All-Russian Conference of the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, April 17th., 1917, in: ibid.; p. 97).

Trotsky’s myth — that Lenin put forward in April 1917 a “corrected” strategy for the realisation of the bourgeois–democratic revolution similar to that embodied in Trotsky’s theory of “permanent revolution” — is based on a denial of the fact that the ‘February Revolution” constituted, politically, a bourgeois-democratic revolution.

In his “History of the Russian Revolution,” Trotsky admits this fact:

‘The insurrection triumphed. But to whom did it hand over the power snatched from the monarchy? We come here to the central problem of the February revolution. Why and how did the power turn up in the hands of the liberal bourgeoisie?”

(L. Trotsky: “History of the Russian Revolution”, Volume 1; London; 1967; p. 155).

But in his “The Permanent Revolution,” Trotsky deliberately confuses the political bourgeois-democratic revolution of March with the bourgeois-democratic revolutionary economic and social changes that followed the revolution of November in order to present the latter as a “bourgeois-democratic revolution” which resulted in the dictatorship of the proletariat:

‘The bourgeois-democratic revolution was realised during the first period after October. . But, as we know, it was not realised in the form of a democratic dictator-ship (i.e., of the working class and peasantry –but in the form of the dictatorship of the proletariat.. . . .The two lines, the ‘permanent’ and Lenin’s . . were completely fused by the October Revolution.”

(L. Trotsky: “The Permanent Revolution”; New York; 1970; p. 229, 234).

In November 1926 Stalin was justifiably sarcastic about Trotsky’s claim that in May 1917 the Party had “rearmed itself” with Trotsky’s theory of ‘permanent revolution”:

‘Trotsky cannot but know that Lenin fought against the theory of permanent revolution to the end of his life. But that does not worry Trotsky.
It turns out . . that the theory of permanent revolution ‘fully and completely coincided with the position of our Party, beginning with 1917’. . ..
But …how could Trotsky’s theory of permanent revolution have coincided with the position of our Party when it is known that our Party, in the person of Lenin, combated this theory all the time? . .
Either our Party did not have a theory of its own, and was later compelled by the course of events to accept Trotsky’s theory of permanent revolution; or it did have a theory of its own, but that theory was imperceptibly ousted by Trotsky’s theory of permanent revolution, ‘beginning with 1917’. . . .
Surely the Bolsheviks had some theory, some estimate of the revolution, some estimate of its motive forces. etc?. . . .
What happened to Leninism, to the theory of Bolshevism, to the Bolshevik estimate of our revolution and its motive forces, etc.?…….
And so, once upon a time there were people known as the Bolsheviks who somehow managed, ‘beginning’ with 1903, to ‘weld’ together a party, but who had no revolutionary theory. So they drifted and drifted, ‘beginning’ with 1903, until somehow they managed to reach the year 1917. Then, having espied Trotsky with his theory of permanent revolution,’ they decided to ‘rearm themselves’ and ‘having rearmed themselves’, they lost the last remnants of Leninism, of Lenin’s theory of revolution, thus bringing about the ‘full coincidence’ of the theory of permanent revolution with the ‘position’ of our Party.
That is a very interesting fairy-tale, comrades. It, if you like, is one of the splendid conjuring tricks you may see at the circus. But this is not a circus; it is a conference of our Party. Nor, after all, have we hired Trotsky as a circus artist.”

(J. V. Stalin: Reply to the Discussion on the Report “The Social-Democratic Deviation in our Party”, l5th. Conference of CPSU (B.), November 3rd., 1926, in:
“Works”, Volume 3; Moscow; 1954; p. 350, 351, 353-54).

The Opposition to Lenin’s Theses

Within the Party the principal opposition to Lenin’s “April Theses” was led by Trotsky’s brother-in-law Lev Kamenev.

On April 21st, 1917, Kamenev published in “Pravda” an article– entitled “Our Differences” in which he denounced Lenin’s “personal opinion” as “unacceptable” on the grounds that he was advocating an immediate socialist revolution before the bourgeois-democratic revolution had been completed.

“In yesterday’s issue of the ‘Pravda’ Comrade Lenin published his ‘theses’. They represent the personal opinion of Comrade Lenin. . . The policy of the “Pravda” was clearly formulated in the resolutions prepared by the Bureau of the Central Committee. . . .
Pending new decisions of the Central Committee and of the All-Russian Conference of our Party, those resolutions remain our platform which we will defend . . against Comrade Lenin’s criticism.. .
As regards Comrade Lenin’s general line, it appears to us unacceptable inasmuch, as it proceeds from the assumption that the bourgeois-democratic revolution has been completed and it builds on the immediate transformation of this revolution into a socialist revolution. . . .
In a broad discussion we hope to carry our point of view as the only possible one for revolutionary Social-Democracy in so far as it wishes to be and must remain to the very end the one and only party of the revolutionary masses of the proletariat without turning into a group of Communist propagandists.”

(L. Kamenev: “Our Differences”; cited in: V. I. Lenin: Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 1; London; 1929; p. 380-81)

Lenin replied:

“There are two major errors in this.
1. The question of a ‘completed bourgeois-democratic revolution is stated wrongly. . . . .
Reality shows us both the passing of the power into the hands of the bourgeoisie (a ‘completed’ bourgeois-democratic revolution of the ordinary type) and, by the side of the actual government, the existence of a parallel government which represents the ‘revolutionary- democratic-dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry’. . .
Is this reality embraced in the old Bolshevik formula of Comrade Kamenev which says that ‘the bourgeois democratic revolution is not completed’?
No, the formula . . is dead. . . .
Anyone who is guided in his activities by the simple formula ‘the bourgeois-democratic revolution is not completed’ vouchsafes, as it were, the certainty of the petty bourgeoisie being independent of the bourgeoisie….
In doing so, he at once helplessly surrenders to the-petty bourgeoisie. . . .
The mistake made by Comrade Kamenev is that in 1917 he only sees the past of the revolutionary democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry. In reality, however, its future has already begun, for the interests and the policy of the wage earners and the petty proprietors have already taken different lines.. . . .
This brings me to the second mistake in the remarks of Comrade Kamenev quoted above: He reproaches me, saying that my line ‘builds’ on the immediate transformation of this bourgeois-democratic revolution into a socialist revolution.
This is not true. . . .
I declared in plain language that in this respect I only build on ‘patient’ explaining (is it necessary to be patient to bring about a change which can be realised ‘immediately’).”

(V. I. Lenin: “Letters on Tactics”; in: “Collected Works”, Volume 20 , Book 1 London; 1929; p. 125, 126, 127).

An opposition group in the Moscow City Committee, headed Aleksei Rykov and Viktor Nogin, opposed the basis of Lenin’s theses on the grounds that Russia was too industrially undeveloped for socialist construction:

Lenin replied:

“Comrade Rykov says that Socialism must first come from other countries with greater industrial development. But this is not so. It is hard to tell who will begin and who will end. This is not Marxism, but a parody on Marxism.”

(V. I. Lenin: Concluding Remarks in Connection with the Report on the Political Situation, May 7th. Conference of RSDLP, May 7th., 1917, in: ibid.; p. 287).

Another group of members of the Party – including I. P. Goldenberg, V. Bazarov, B. V. Avilov and Y N. Steklov, — left the Bolshevik Party altogether in protest against Lenin’s theses and founded the paper “Novaya Zhizn” (New Life), which supported the unification of Bolsheviks, Mensheviks and “Novaya Zhizn”-ists into a single party based on the openly Menshevik view that the Socialist revolution “Must be preceded by a more or less prolonged period of capitalism.”

At the Petrograd City Conference of the Party, held from April 27th; to May 5th; 1917, a resolution in support of the political line laid down in Lenin’s “April Theses” was carried.

The “April Days”

On May 1st., 1917 (April 18th ; under the old style calendar) Foreign Minister Pavel Miliukov sent a note to the Allied Governments emphasising the determination of the Provisional Government to carry the war to a victorious conclusion and to remain loyal to the tsarist government’s treaties with the Allies.

‘The declarations of the Provisional Government naturally cannot offer the slightest cause to assume that the accomplished upheaval will result in a weakening of Russia’s role in the common struggle of the Allies. Quite the contrary. The effort of the whole people to carry the World War through to a decisive victory has only been strengthened. . Naturally, the Provisional Government. . . in protecting the rights of our fatherland, will hold faithfully to the obligations which we have assumed towards our allies. . The government is now, as before, firmly convinced, that the present war will be victoriously concluded in complete accord with the Allies.”

(Provisional Government, Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Note to Allied Governments of May 1st., 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 1; London; 1929; p. 371).

The publication of the note within Russia gave rise to mass demonstrations in Petrograd over the next four days, in which armed soldiers took a prominent part — attempting at times to occupy public buildings. Among the demonstrators the slogans “Down with Miliukov” and “Down with Guchkov” were raised everywhere.

The Central Committee of the Party was concerned that this spontaneous movement might develop along insurrectionary lines which, in the existing situation, could only harm the revolutionary movement; on May 4th., therefore, it adopted a resolution drafted by Lenin calling upon all Party members to exert every effort to keep the demonstrations peaceful:

“Party agitators and speakers must refute the despicable lies that we threaten with civil war. . . At the present moment, when the capitalists and their government cannot and dare not use violence against the masses . . any thought of civil war is naive, senseless, monstrous. . . .
All Party agitators, in factories, in regiments, in the streets, etc. must advocate these views and this proposition (i.e., withdrawal of support by the Soviets from the Provisional Government — Ed.) by means of peaceful discussions and peaceful demonstrations, as well as meetings everywhere.”

(V. I. Lenin: Resolution of CC, RSDLP, May 4th., 1917, in: ibid.; p. 245, 246).

These demonstrations proved sufficient to force the resignation of Guchkov as Minister of War May 13th; and of Miliukov as Minister of Foreign Affairs on May 15th.

On May 14th the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet voted in favour of a coalition Provisional Government, in which the Menshevik and Socialist-Revolutionary parties would be formally represented.

The First Coalition Provisional Government came into being on May 18th with Prince Georgi Lvov continuing as Prime Minister. Aleksandr Tereshchenko replaced Miliukov as Minister of Foreign Affairs; Aleksandr Kerensky and Viktor Chernov (of the Socialist Revolutionaries) became Minister of War and Minister of Agriculture respectively; Aleksandr Skobelev and Iraklii Tseretelli (of the Mensheviks) became Minister of Labour and Minister of Posts and Telegraphs respectively.

In the following month Lenin commented on the formal entry of the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries into the Provisional Government:

‘The entrance of Tseretelli, Chernov and Co. into the cabinet has changed to an insignificant degree only the form of the compact between the Petrograd Soviet and the government of the capitalists. ..
Day by day it becomes ever clearer that Tseretelli, Chernov and Co. are simply hostages of the capitalists, have become the sides of the capitalists who are actually stifling the revolution; Kerensky has sunk to the point where he uses violence against the masses. . .The Coalition Cabinet represents only a transition period in the development of the basic class contradictions in our revolution. . . This cannot last very long.”

(V. I. Lenin: Postcript to Pamphlet ‘The Tasks of the Proletariat in Our Revolution”, in: ibid.; p. 159, 160).

The Seventh Conference of the RSDLP

The Seventh Conference of the Russian Social-Democrotic Labour Party (the “April Conference”) was held in Petrograd from May 7th. to 12th., 1917, attended by 133 voting delegates representing 80,000 Party members.

The Report on the Political Situation was given by Lenin, and the opposition to Lenin’s political line was led by Lev Kamenev and Aleksei Rykov.

Kamenev directed his main attack against the slogan ‘Down with the Provisional Government!'”, implying that this was a Leninist slogan whereas it had been put forward during the “April Days” by the Petrograd Committee of the Party in violation of the line of the Central Committee. In place of this (for the moment) incorrect slogan, Kamenev urged that the Party should put forward the completely unrealistic demand for control of the Provisional Government by the Soviets.

Lenin replied:

“We say that the slogan ‘Down with the Provisional Government’ is an adventurer’s slogan. That is why we have advocated peaceful demonstrations. . . The Petrograd Committee, however, turned a trifle to the Left. In a case of this sort, such a step was a grave crime.

Now about control. . . . . .Comrade Kamenev . . views control as a political act. . . We do not accept control… The Provisional Government must be overthrown, but not now, and not in the ordinary way.”

(V. I. Lenin: Concluding Remarks in connection with the Report on the Political Situation, 7th. Conference RSDLP, May 7th., 1917, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 1; London; 1929; p. 285-86, 287).

Rykov opposed Lenin’s political line on the grounds that Russia was too industrially undeveloped to move towards a socialist revolution.
Lenin replied:

“Comrade Rykov. . . . says that Socialism must come first from other countries with greater industrial development. But this is not so. It is hard to tell who will begin and who will end. This is not Marxism, but a parody on Marxism.”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 287).

By a majority the congress approved a series of resolutions endorsing the Leninist line.

The Leninist political line on the national question in particular, that the Party must advocate the right of oppressed nations to self-determination to the point of secession — was presented in the Report on the National Question given by Stalin. This slogan was opposed by Felix Dzherzhinsky and Yuri Piatakov, the latter demanding:

“The only effective method of solving it (i.e., the national question — Ed.) is the method of a socialist revolution under the slogan ‘Down with boundaries.’ for only thus can one do away with imperialism –this new factor leading to a sharpening of national oppression.
Whereas (1) ‘the right of nations to self-determination’ . . is a mere phrase without any definite meaning; ….
and whereas (2) this phrase is interpreted as meaning much more than is thought of in the ranks of revolutionary Social-Democracy,. . . .
the Conference . . assumes that paragraph 9 of our programme (i.e., support for the right of nations to self-determination — Ed.) should be eliminated.”

(Y. Piatakov: Resolution on National Question submitted to 7th. Conference, RSDLF; cited in: V. I.Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 2; London; 1929; p.411, 412).

Lenin replied:

“Ever since 1903, when our Party adopted its programme, we have been encountering the desperate opposition of the Poles. . . And the position of the Polish Social-Democracy is as strange and monstrous an error now as it was then. These people wish to reduce the stand of our Party to that of the chauvinists.. . .

In Russia we must stress the right of separation for the subject nations, while in Poland we must stress the right of such nations to unite. The right to unite implies the right to separate. . . .

Comrade Piatakov’s standpoint is a repetition of Rosa Luxemburg’s standpoint . . Theoretically he is against the right of separation. . What Comrade Piatakov says is incredible confusion.. . .When one says that the national question has been settled, one speaks of Western Europe. Comrade Piatakov applies this where it does not belong, to Eastern Europe, and we find ourselves in a ridiculous position. . . .

Comrade Piatakov simply rejects our slogan. The method of accomplishing a socialist revolution under the slogan ‘Down with the boundaries’ is an utter absurdity. . . We maintain that the state is necessary, and the existence of a state presupposes boundaries. Even the Soviets are confronted with the question of boundaries . . .What does it mean, ‘Down with the boundaries’? This is the beginning of anarchy . . .
He who does not accept this point of view is an annexationist, a chauvinist.”

(V. I. Lenin: Speech on the National Question, 7th. Conference RSDLP, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 1; London; 1929; p. 310, 312, 313, 314).

The conference discussed the question of the Party’s participation in the Third (and last) “Zimmerwald Conference,” due to be held in Stockholm (Sweden) in May 1917 (but later postponed until September).

In his “April Theses” Lenin had already demanded a break with the “Zimmerwald International”, proposing that the Party should remain within it only for purposes of information. At the conference, however, this policy was opposed by a considerable body of delegates headed by Grigori Zinoviev, who proposed:

“Our party remains in the Zimmerwald bloc with the aim of defending the tactics of the Zimmerwald Left Wing there. . . .The conference decides to take part in the international conference of the Zimmerwaldists scheduled for May 31 and authorises the Central Committee to organise a delegation to that conference.”

(Resolution on “The Situation within the International and the Tasks of the RSDLP”, 7th. Conference RSDLP, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 2; London; 1929; p. 407).

Zinoviev’s resolution was carried by the conference against the opposition of Lenin, who described Zinoviev’s tactics as:

“..arch-opportunist and pernicious.”

(V. I. Lenin: Speech at 7th. Conference, RSDLP, cited in: “History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks)”; Moscow; 1941; p. 189)

The conference also discussed the question of the Party’s participation in an “international socialist conference” to discuss “peace terms”, also scheduled for Stockholm in May. On May 6th, the Danish Social-Democrat Frederik Bergjberg had personally addressed the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet on the “Stockholm Conference”. The Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries had accepted the invitation to participate in the conference; the Bolsheviks had rejected the invitation.

The question was placed on the agenda of the conference at the request of Viktor Nogin, who proposed that a Bolshevik delegation should attend the “Stockholm Conference.”

Lenin replied:

“I cannot agree with Comrade Nogin . . Back of this whole comedy of a would-be Socialist congress there are actually the political maneuvers of German imperialism. The German capitalists use the German social-chauvinists for the purpose of inviting the social-chauvinists of all countries to the conference. because they want to fool the working masses. . . . .Borgjberg is an agent of the German government.. . .We must expose this whole comedy of the Socialist conference, expose all these congresses as comedies intended to cover up the deals made by the diplomats behind the backs of the masses.”

(V. I. Lenin: Speech on the Proposed Calling of an International Socialist Conference, 7th. Conference RSDLP, May 8 1917, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 20, Book 1; London; 1929; p. 287, 288, 290).

The conference adopted a resolution along these lines.

The conference adopted a series of resolutions in accordance with Lenin’s political line:

  • “On the War”,
  • ”On the Attitude towards the Provisional Government”;
  • “On the Agrarian Question”;
  • “’On a Coalition Cabinet”,
  • “’On Uniting the Internationalists against the Petty-bourgeois Defencist Bloc’”,
  • “On the Present Political Situation” ;
  • and “On the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies.”

The Conference elected a new Central Committee, consisting of Lenin, Stalin, Kamenev, Zinoviev, Nilyutin, Nogin, Sverdlov, Smilga and Fedorov, and instructed it to bring up to date the programme of the Party adopted in 1903.

The First Congress of Soviets

The First All-Russian Congress of Soviets was held in Petrograd from June l6th to July 6th., 1917. Of the 790 delegates, only 103 (13%) were Bolsheviks, and the congress was dominated by the Mensheviks and Social-Revolutionaries. The congress, against Bolshevik opposition, adopted resolutions in favour of:

  • participation in the Provisional Government,
  • “defence of the fatherland” in the imperialist war;
  • the military offensive at the front demanded by the Allied powers;
  • and the war loan (“Liberty Loan”).

On June 21st; the Central Committee of the RSDLP decided to call a peaceful demonstration for June 23rd; under the slogans: ‘Down with the Capitalist Ministers!'” and “All Power to the Soviets!”. The Congress of Soviets, on the initiative of the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries, immediately adopted a resolution prohibiting the demonstration on the pretext that:

“We know that the hidden counter-revolutionaries are making ready to take advantage of your demonstration.”

(Resolution of First Congress of Soviets, June 21st., 1917, cited by V. I, Lenin: ‘Disquieting Rumours”, in: ‘Collected Works’, Volume 20, Book 2 London; 1929; p. 41).

In the early hours of the morning of June 22nd; the Central Committee, on Lenin’s initiative, called off the planned demonstration.

On June 24th, Lenin explained the reasons for this decision to a meeting of the Petrograd Committee of The Party:

“The dissatisfaction of the majority of the comrades with the calling off of the demonstration is quite legitimate, but the Central Committee could not act otherwise for two reasons: First, we received a formal prohibition of all demonstrations from our semi-official government : second, a plausible reason was given for this prohibition. . . . .
Even in simple warfare it sometimes happens that for strategic reasons it is necessary to postpone an offensive fixed for a certain date.. . . .
It was absolutely necessary for us to cancel our arrangements. This has been proved by subsequent events.'”

(V. I. Lenin: Speech at the Session of the Petrograd Committee of the RSDLP, June 24th., 1917, in: ibid.: p.245).

The “subsequent events,” referred to by Lenin were the holding, earlier on the same day, of a united session of the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet, the Presidium of the Congress of Soviets and the Fraction Committees of the parties represented at the Congress.

Iraklii Tseretelli, Menshevik Minister of Posts and Telegraphs in the Provisional Government, denounced the Bolshevik demonstration that had been planned for June 23rd. as “a plot to overthrow the Provisional Government by force”; he demanded that the Bolsheviks be expelled from the Soviets and that the arms in the hands of the workers be taken from them.

The Bolshevik delegates walked out of the congress in protest at Tseretelli’s speech, and issued a declaration in which they declared:

“We have not renounced for a single moment in favour of a hostile majority of the Soviet our right, independently and freely, to utilise all liberties for the purpose of mobilising the working masses under the banner of our proletarian class party. . .
What is planned is the disarming of the revolutionary vanguard — a measure that has always been resorted to by the bourgeois counter-revolution. . . .
Citizen Tseretelli and those who direct him are hardly ignorant of the fact that never in history have the working masses given up without struggle the arms they had received at the hand of the revolution. Consequently, the ruling bourgeoisie and its ‘Socialist’ Ministers are provoking civil war. . and they are aware of what they are doing. . . .
We expose before the All-Russian Congress and the masses of the people . . this attack on the revolution that is now being prepared. . . .
The revolution is passing through a moment of supreme danger. We call upon the workers to be firm and watchful.”

(Declaration of Bolshevik Fraction to All-Russian Congress of Soviets, June 24th., 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin: ibid.: p. 416).

However, rank-and-file pressure compelled the Menshevik and Socialist-Revolutionary leaders of the Soviet on June 25th. to call a demonstration for July 1st. in the name of the Congress of Soviets. About 400,000 workers and soldiers took part in the demonstration in Petrograd on this day, and, to the horror of the compromising leaders of the Soviets, 90% of the banners bore the slogans put forward by the Bolsheviks: “Down with the Ten Capitalist Ministers!, and “All Power to the Soviets!’

The Congress elected a Central Executive Committee and instructed it to convene a new congress within three months.

Trotsky Returns to Russia

When news of the “February Revolution” reached America, Trotsky made inmediate arrangements to return to Russia. Sailing from New York in a Norwegian ship at the end of March, he was taken off the ship at Halifax (Canada) by British naval police and confined for a month in an internment camp for German prisoners of war at Amherst.

At the end of April he was released from internment, and resumed his journey. Landing in Norway, he crossed Scandinavia to reach Petrograd on May 17th., 1917.

He went almost immediately to the Smolny Institute, a former private school for girls which was now the head-quarters of the Petrograd Soviet. In view of his leading role in the Soviet of 1905, he was made an associate member of the Executive of the Soviet, without the right to vote.

He joined a group called the “Inter-Regional Organisation” (Mezhrayontsi), which had been founded in 1913 and to the publications of which he had contributed from abroad. The Inter-Regional Organisation was a centrist group, which prided itself on being neither Bolshevik nor Menshevik, and its influence was confined to a few working-class districts of Petrograd. In the early summer of 1917 its leading members included Anatoly Lunacharsky, David Riazanov, Dmitri Manuilsky, Mikhail Pokrovsky, Adolphe Joffe and Lev Karahkhan.

Now Trotsky took a leading role in the organisation, and in founding its organ ‘Vperyod’ (Forward).

According to Trotsky,

“Whoever lived through the year 1917 as a member of the central kernel of the Bolsheviks knows that there was never a hint of any disagreement between Lenin and me from the very first day. . . .

From the earliest days of my arrival, I stated . . . . . that I was ready to join the Bolshevik organisation immediately in view of the absence of any disagreements whatever but that it was necessary to decide the question of the quickest possible way of attracting the ‘Mezhrayontsi’ organisation into the party. . . .

Among the membership of the “Mezhrayontsi” organisation there were elements which tried to impede the fusion, advancing this or that condition, etc.”

(L. Trotsky: “The Stalin School of Falsification”; New York; 1972; p. 5, 6).

According to Lenin, however, Trotsky himself was precisely one of the ‘elements which tried to impede fusion.’

On May 23rd., a meeting took place between representatives of the Bolsheviks (including Lenin) and representatives of the Inter-Regional Organisation (including Trotsky) to explore the possibility of fusion.

As Trotsky’s biographer puts it:

“At the meeting of 23 May he (i.e., Lenin — Ed.) asked Trotsky and Trotsky’s friends to join the Bolshevik party immediately. He offered them positions on the leading bodies and on the editorial staff of ‘Pravda’. He put no conditions to them. He did not ask Trotsky to renounce anything of his past; he did not even mention past controversies. . . .

Trotsky would have had to be much more free from pride than he was to accept Lenin’s proposals immediately. He and his friends should not be asked to call themselves Bolsheviks. . . They ought to join hands in a new party, with a new name, at a joint congress of their organisations.”

(I. Deutscher: “The Prophet Armed: Trotsky; 1879-1921”; London; 1970; p. 257-8).

Lenin’s own notes of the meeting say:

“Trotsky (who took the floor out of turn immediately after me) . . . .
I cannot call myself a Bolshevik. . . .
We cannot be asked to recognise Bolshevism. . .
The old factional name is undesirable.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Leniniskii Sbornik” (Lenin Miscellany) Volume 4; Moscow; 1925; p. 303).

The meeting, therefore, broke up without reaching any agreement.

Not until August, three months before the October Revolution, did the Inter-Regional Organisaion join the Bolshevik Party, while Trotsky was in prison!

The Resignation of the Cadet Ministers

On July 16th, 1917, the Ministers belonging to the Constitutional-Democratic Party (the ‘Cadets”) resigned from the Government.

Lenin pointed out that:

“. . by leaving, they say, we present an ultimatum. . . . To be without the Cadets, they aver, means to be without the ‘aid’ of world-wide Anglo-American capital.”

(V. I. Lenin: “What could the Cadets Count on when leaving the Cabinet?”, in: ‘Collected Works’, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n.d.; p. 16).

The effect of this ultimatum was to face the Menshevik Ministers in the Provisional Government with the choice of either participating in the attempted suppression of the working class and poor peasantry or of allying themselves with the revolutionary working class and peasantry – which their whole political outlook would make them fear to do:

“Either suppress such a class by force — as the Cadets have been preaching since May 19 — or entrust yourself to its leadership. . . The Tsteretellis and Chernovs, they think would not do that, they would not dare.’ They will yield to us.’ . . .
The calculation is correct.”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 15, 16).

The “July Days”

The resignation of the Cadet Ministers from the government on July 16th. stimulated on the following day mass demonstrations of armed workers and soldiers outside the headquarters of the Petrograd Soviet, under the slogans “All Power to the Soviets.”

In the evening of July 17th a Bolshevik revolution in the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of the Soviets calling for the transfer of all power to the Soviets was rejected.

On the next day, July 18th., “Pravda” published an appeal from the Bolsheviks calling for an end to the demonstrations:

“For the present political crisis, our aim has been accomplished. We have therefore decided to end the demonstration. Let each and every one peacefully and in an organised manner bring the strike and the demonstration to a close.”

(Proclamation of the CC of the RSDLP July 18th.,. 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 2; London; n.d., p. 300).

Later, in September 1917, Lenin analysed the reasons why it would have been incorrect to have attempted to turn the armed demonstration of the ‘July Days’ into an insurrection:

“On July 16-17 . . there were still lacking the objective conditions for a victorious uprising.

1. ‘We did not yet have behind us the class that is the vanguard of the revolution. We did not yet have a majority among the workers and soldiers of the capitals. . . 

2. At that time there was no general revolutionary upsurge of the people . . .

3. At that time there were no vacillations on a serious, general, political scale among our enemies and among the undecided petty bourgeoisie. . . ..

4. This is why an uprising on July 16-17 would have been an error; we would not have retained power either physically or politically.. . . .

Before the Kornilov affair, the army and the provinces could and would have marched against Petrograd.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Marxism and Uprising”, in: “Collected Works “, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n.d.; p. 225-226).

The Order for the Arrest of Lenin

On July 18th., 1917 the newspaper “‘Zhivoye Slovo” (Living Word) published a statement from Grigori Alexnsky asserting that he had documentary evidence that Lenin was “a spy in the pay of German imperialism.” On the same day military cadets wrecked the printing plant and editorial offices of “Pravda,” preventing the publication of Lenin’s reply to the slander.

On July 19th government troops occupied the headquarters of the Central Committee of the Party, and the government issued an order for the arrest of Lenin, Zinoviev and Kameonev.

A movement demanding that Lenin surrender to the arrest order was led by Trotsky.

As Trotsky’s sympathetic biographer Isaac Deutscher expresses it:

“Lenin . . made up his mind that he would not allow himself to be imprisoned but would go into hiding… Trotsky took a less grave view and Lenin’s decision seemed to him unfortunate. . . he thought that Lenin had every interest in laying his record before the public, and that in this way he could serve his cause better than by flight, which would merely add to any adverse appearances by which people might judge him.”

(I. Deutscher: “The Prophet Armed: Trotsky: 1879-1921”; London; 1970; p. 274).

To this demand Lenin replied:

“Comrades yielding to the ‘Soviet atmosphere’ are, often inclined towards appearing before the courts.
Those who are closer to the working masses apparently incline towards not appearing.. .
The court is an organ of power. . . .
The power that is active is the military dictatorship. Under such conditions it is ridiculous even to speak of ‘the courts’. It is not a question of ‘courts’, but of an episode in the civil war. This is what those in favour of appearing before the courts unfortunately do not want to understand. . . .
Not a trial but a campaign of persecution against the internationalists, this is what the authorities need. . Let the internationalists work underground as far as it is in their power, but let them not commit the folly of voluntarily appearing before the courts’.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Question of the Bolshevik Leaders appearing before the Courts”, in ibid.; p. 34, 35).

The Bolshevik viewpoint on the question of the attitude to be adopted towards the warrant of arrest issued for the Bolshevik leaders was put at the Sixth Congress of the Party in August by Stalin:

“There is no guarantee that if they do appear they will not be subjected to brutal violence. If the court were democratically organised and if a guarantee were given that violence would not be committed it would be a different matter.”

(J. V. Stalin: Speech in Reply to the Discussion on the Report of the Central Cornittee, 6th. Congress RSDLP, in: “Works”, Volume 3; Moscow; 193; p. 182).

Feeling that his political reputation was suffering because no warrant had been issued for his own arrest, Trotsky wrote an Open Letter to the Provisional Government pleading that he too should be made liable to arrest:

“On 23 July, four days after Lenin had gone into hiding, Trotsky therefore addressed the following Open Letter to the Provisional Government:
‘Citizen Ministers —
You can have no logical grounds for exempting me from the effect of the decree by dint of which Lenin, Zinoviev and Kamenev are subject to arrest. . . You can have no reason to doubt that I am just as irreconcilable an opponent of the general policy of the Provisional Government as the above-mentioned Comrades’.”

(I. Deutscher: ibid.; p. 276-77).

The Provisional Government obliged Trotsky by arresting him on August 5th, and incarcerating him in the Kresty prison from which he was released on bail on September 17th.

The New Political Situation following the “July Days”

On July 20th, 1917 Prince Lvov resigned as Prime Minister of the Provisional Government, and on the following day his place was taken by Aleksandr Kerensky (Socialist-Revolutionary).

On July 22nd, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of the Soviets, against Bolshevik opposition, adopted a resolution of confidence in the Provisional Government as a government of defence of the revolution.

At this time Lenin analysed the new political situation following the “July Days” as follows:

1. As a result of the treachery of the Menshevik and Socialist-Revolutionary leaders, dual power had ceased to exist; effective state power passed into the hands of a military dictatorship of the counter-revolutionary capitalist class:

“‘The counter-revolution has become organised and consolidated, and has actually taken state power into its hands. . . .The leaders of the Soviets as well as of the Socialist-Revolutionary and Menshevik Parties, with Tseretelli and Chernov at their head, have definitely betrayed the cause of the revolution by placing it in the hands of the counter-revolutionists and transforming themselves, their parties end the Soviets into fig-leaves of the counter-revolution. . . . .Having sanctioned the disarming of the workers and the revolutionary regiments, they have deprived themselves of all real power.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Political Situation”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n.d.; p. 36-37).

“The turning point of July 17 consisted in just this, that after it the objective situation changed abruptly. Thc fluctuating state of power ceased, the power having passed at a decisive point into the hands of the counter-revolution. . . After July 17, the counter-revolutionary bourgeoisie, hand in hand with the monarchists and the Black Hundreds,, has attached to itself the petty-bourgeois Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks, partly by intimidating them, and has given over actual state power . . into the hands of a military clique.”

(V. I. Lenin: “‘On Slogans”, in: ibid.; p. 44-45.)

2. Thus, the possibility of the peaceful development of the revolution by the winning of a majority for revolutionary socialism in the Soviets no longer exists:

“The struggle for the passing of power to the Soviets in due time, is finished. The peaceful course of development has been rendered impossible.. . . . .
At present power can no longer be seized peacefully. It can be obtained only after a victory in a decisive struggle against the real holders of power at the present moment, namely, the military clique.. . . .This power must be overthrown.”

(V. I. Lenin: “On Slogans”, in: ibid.; p. 44, 45-46, 47).

3. Thus, the slogan of “All Power to the Soviets”, which was correct in the period when the peaceful development of the revolution, is no longer correct and should be abandoned:

“The slogan of all power passing to the Soviets was a slogan of a peaceful development of the revolution, possible in April, May, June and up to July 18-22, i.e., up to the time when actual power passed into, the hands of the military dictatorship. Now this slogan is no longer correct.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Political Situation, in: ibid.; p. 37).

“This slogan would be a deception of the people. It would spread among it the illusion that to seize power, the Soviets even now have only to wish or to decree it.”

(V. I Lenin: “On Slogans”, in: ibid.; p. 45)

4. Even if slogans were given a clear revolutionary content, it would be an incorrect call for “All Power To the Soviets!” – because after the overthrow of the capitalist military dictatorship power, power will not pass to the present impotent and treacherous Soviets, but to revolutionary Soviets, which do not as yet exist:

“Soviets can and must appear in this now revolution, but not the present Soviets, not organs of compromise with the bourgeoisie, but organs of a revolutionary struggle against it. . . .

The present Soviets . . resemble a flock of sheep brought to the slaughter-house, pitifully bleating when placed under the knife. . . The slogan of the power passing to the Soviets might be construed as a ‘simple’ call to let power pass into the hands of the present Soviets, and to say so, to appeal for this, would at present mean to deccive the people. Nothing is more dangerous than deception.”

(V. I. Lenin: “On Slogans”, in: ibid.; p. 49).

The Second Coalition Provisional Government

On July 25th, 1917 Kerensky issued a decree reintroducing capital punishment at the front, and three days later ordered the suppression of ‘Pravda” and other Bolshevik papers.

On July 29th, General Lavr Kornilov was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the army, replacing General Aleksel Brusilov.

On July 31st, Kerensky issued a decree dissolving the Finnish Sejm (Parliament), which had on July 19th, passed a bill for the autonomy of Finland.

On August 6th., the second coalition Provisional Government was formed, with Aleksandr Kerensky as Prime Minister and Minister of War and including Ministers from the Cadets, the Mensheviks and the Socialist-Revolutionaries.

Lenin commented on the formation of the new government as follows:

“Let the Party loudly and clearly proclaim to the people the whole truth: that we are experiencing the beginnings of Bonapartism; that the ‘new’ government is merely a screen to conceal the counter-revolutionary Cadets and military clique which have power in their hands; that the people will not get peace, the peasants will not get the land, the workers will not get the eight-hour day, the hungry will not get bread, without complete liquidation of the counter-revolution.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Beginning of Bonapartism”, in “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n.d; p. 78-79).

The Sixth Congress of the Party

The Sixth Congress of the RSDLP took place secretly in Petrograd from August 8th – 16th, 1917, attended by 157 voting delegates representing 40,000 members.

In Lenin’s absence, both the Report of the Central Committee and the Report on the Political Situation were given by Stalin. In the latter, Stalin said:

“Some comrades say that since capitalism is poorly developed in our country, it would be utopian to raise the question of a socialist revolution.. . It would be rank pedantry to demand that Russia should ‘wait’ with socialist changes until Europe ‘begins’. That country “begins” which has the greater opportunities. . . .Overthrow of the dictatorship of the imperialist bourgeoisie — that is what the immediate slogan of the Party must be.

The peaceful period of the revolution has ended. A period of clashes and explosions has begun.. . .

The characteristic feature of the moment is that the counter-revolutionary measures are being implemented through the agency of ‘Socialists’. It is only because it has created such a screen that the counter-revolution may continue to exist for another month or two. But since the forces of revolution are developing, explosions are bound to occur, and the moment will come when the workers will raise and rally around them the poorer strata of the peasantry, will raise the standard of workers’ revolution and usher in an era of socialist revolution in Europe.”

(J. V. Stalin: Report on the Political Situation, Sixth Congress RSDLP, in: ‘Works”, Volume 3; Moscow; 1953; p. 185, 186, 189, 190).

Nikolai Bukharin put forward in the discussion on the Report on the Political Situation a theory of the further development of the revolution based on Trotsky’s theory of “permanent revolution.” Bukharin held that the revolution in its further development, would consist of two phases, the first phase being essentially a peasant revolution, the second phase that of a revolution of the working class in which the peasant would not be the ally of the working class, in which the only ally of the Russian working class would be the working classes of Western Europe, that is:

“The first phase, with the participation of thc peasantry anxious to obtain land; the second phase, after the satiated peasantry has fallen away, the phase of the proletarian revolution, when the Russian proletariat will be supported only by proletarian elements and by the proletariat of Western Europe.'”

(N. Bukharin: Speech at 6th. Congress, RSDLP, cited in: N. Popov: “Outline History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Part 1; London; n.d.; p. 383).

Stalin opposed Bukharin’s theory as “not properly thought out” and “fundamentally wrong”:

“What is the prospect Bukharin held out? His analysis is fundamentally wrong. In his opinion, in the first stage we are moving towards a peasant revolution. But it is bound to concur, to coincide with a workers’ revolution. It cannot be that the working class, which constitutes the vanguard of the revolution, will not at the same time fight for its own demands. I therefore consider that Bukharin’s scheme has not been properly thought out.

The second stage, according to Bukharin, will be a proletarian revolution supported by Western Europe, without the peasants, who will have received land and will be satisfied. But against whom would this revolution be directed? Bukharin’s gimcrack scheme furnishes no reply to this question”.

(J. V. Stalin: Reply to the Discussion on the Report on the Political Situation, 6th. Congress, RSDLP; in ibid.; p. 196).

Evgenii Preobrazhensky moved an amendment to the congress resolution on the political situation, an amendment also based on an aspect of Trotsky’s theory of “permanent revolution.” He proposed that the seizure of power should be undertaken:

“For the purpose of directing it towards peace and, in the event of a proletarian revolution in the West, towards socialism.”

(E. Preobrazhensky: Amendment to Resolution on the Political Situation, 6th. Congress RSDLP, cited in H. Popov: ibid.; p. 381).

Stalin strongly opposed this amendment:

“I am against such an amendment. The possibility is not excluded that Russia will be the country that will lay the road to socialism. . . We must discard the antiquated idea that only Europe can show us the way.”

(J. V. Stalin: Reply to Preobrazhensky on Clause 9 of the Resolution “On the Political Situation”, 6th. Congress RSDLP, in: ibid.; p. 199, 200).

Preobrazhensky’s amendment was rejected, and the resolution adopted by the congress declared:

“The correct slogan at the present time can be only complete liquidation of the dictatorship of the counter-revolutionary bourgeoisie. Only the revolutionary proletariat, provided it is supported by the poorest peasantry, is strong enough to carry out this task. . . .

The task of those revolutionary classes will then be to strain every effort to take state power into their own hands and direct it, in alliance with the revolutionary proletariat of the advanced countries, towards peace and the Socialist reconstruction of society.”

(Resolution on the Political Situation, 6th. Congress RSDLP, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 2; London; n.d.; p. 304).

The congress approved a resolution on the economic situation, the main points of which were the confiscation of the landed estates, the nationalisation of the land, the nationalisation of the banks and large-scale industrial enterprises, and workers’ control over production and distribution.

It also approved resolutions on the trade union movement and on youth leagues, setting out the aim that the Party should win the leading influence in all these bodies. It also endorsed Lenin’s decision not to appear for trial:

“Considering that the present methods of persecution by the police and secret service and the activities of the public prosecutor are re-establishing the practices of the Shcheglovitov regime, . . and feeling that under such conditions there is absolutely no guarantee either of the impartiality of the court procedure, or even of the elementary safety of those summoned before the court.”

(Resolution on the Failure of Lenin to Appear in Court, 6th. Congress RSDLP, cited in: V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 312).

The congress also adopted new Party Rules, based on the principles of democratic centralism, and admitted the Mezhrayontsi (the Inter-Regional Organisation) into the Party. In this way Trotsky, as a member of the Inter-Regional Organisation, became a member of the Bolshevik Party while himself in prison, less than three months before the “October Revolution.”

Finally, the congress issued a Manifesto to all the workers, soldiers and peasants of Russia, which ended:

“Firmly, courageously and calmly, without giving in to provocations, gather strength and form fighting columns! Under the banner of the Party, proletarians and soldiers! Under our banner, oppressed of the villages!

“Long live the revolutionary proletariat!”

“Long live the alliance of the workers and Down with the counter-revolution and its ‘Moscow Conference’ !”

“Long live the workers’ world revolution!”

“Long live Socialism!”

“Long Live the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party (Bolsheviks)!””

(Manifesto of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party, Sixth Congress, cited in ibid.; p. 316-317).

The “Stockholm Conference”

As has been said, the 7th Conference of the Party in May had resolved that the Party should not participate in the “international socialist conference in Stockholm (scheduled originally for May but postponed till the autumn) but should expose it as a manoeuvre of the German social-chauvinists.

On August 19th , however, Lev Kamenev said in the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets:

“Now when our revolution has retreated to the second line of trenches, it is fitting to support this conference. Now, when the Stockholm Conference has become the banner of the struggle of the proletariat against imperialism, . . we naturally must support it.”

L. Kamenev: Speech to CEC, August 19th., 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 1; London; nd; p. 290).

Lenin denounced Kamenev’s statement with indignation:

“What right had Comrade Kamenev to forget that there is a decision of the Central Committee of the Party against participating at Stockholm? If this decision has not been abrogated by a congress or by a new decision of the Central Committee, it is law for the Party. . . .

Not only had Kamenev no right to make this speech, but . . he directly violated the decision of the Party; he spoke directly against the Party. . . . Kamenev . . did not mention that the Stockholm Conference will include social-imperialists, that it is shameful for a revolutionary-Social-Democrat to have anything to do with such people. . . .To go to confer with social-imperialists, with Ministers, with hangmen’s sides in Russia — this is a shame and a betrayal. . . . .

Not a revolutionary banner, but a banner of deals, compromises, forgiveness for social-imperialism, bankers’ negotiations concerning the division of annexations — this is the banner which is really beginning to wave over Stockholm. . . .

We have decided to build the Third International. We must accomplish this in spite of all difficulties, Not a step backward to deals with social-imperialists and renegades from Socialism.'”

(V. I. Lenin: “On Kamenev’s Speech in the Central Executive Committee concerning the Stockholm Conference”, in: ibid.; p94; 95, 96).

The following month, Lenin returned to his attack upon the Stockholm Conference:

“The Stockholm Conference . . failed. Its failure was caused by the fact that the Anglo-French imperialists at present are unwilling to conduct peace negotiations, while the German imperialists are willing.. . .

The Stockholm Conference is known to have been called and to be supported by persons who support their governments. . ..

The ‘Novaya Zhizn’ deceives the workers when it imbues them with confidence ~ the social-chauvinists. . .

We, on the other hand, turn away from the comedy enacted at Stockholm by the social-chauvinists and among the social-chauvinists, in order to open the eyes of the masses, in order to express their interests, to call them to revolution, . . for a struggle on the basis of principles and for a complete brook with social-chauvinism. . . .

The Stockholm Conference, even if it takes place, which is very unlikely, will be an attempt on the part of the German imperialists to sound out the ground as to the feasibility of a certain exchange of annexations.”

(V. I. Lenin: “On the Stockholm Conference”, in: ibid; p. 121, 123, 124, 125).

In fact, the “Stockholm Conference” never took place, owing to the refusal of the British and French Governments to allow their social-chauvinists to attend.

The Moscow State Conference

On the initiative of Aleksandr Kerensky, a “State Conference” was held in the Bolshoi Theatre, Moscow, from August 25th to 28th, 1917. The conference was dominated by representatives of the landlords and bourgeoisie, including a number of prominent generals, with a minority of Soviet representatives in the shape of Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries. The Petrograd Soviet and provincial Soviets were not invited to send delegates.

The conference was opened by Kerensky, who declared that the fundamental tasks of the Provisional Government were the continuation of the war, the restoration of order in the army and the country, and the organisation of a stable power.

The principal speech was made by General Lavr Kornilov, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, while General Aleksei Kaledin, speaking in the name of the Don Cossacks, put forward the following programme:

1) politics to be forbidden in the army;
2) all Soviets and army committees to be abolished;
3) the Declaration of the Rights of the soldiers to be abolished;
4) full authority to be restored to the officers.

Prior to the opening of the conference, Stalin had characterised it as follows:

“The counter-revolution needs a parliament of its own, a centre of its own; and it is creating it.. . .
The conference to be convened in Moscow on August 25 will inevitably be transformed into an organ of counter-revolutionary conspiracy against the workers, . . against the peasants, . . and against the soldiers . .. into an organ of conspiracy camouflaged by the ‘socialist talk’ of the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks, who are supporting the conference.”

(J. V. Stalin: “Against the Moscow Conference”, in: “Works”, Volume 3; Moscow; 1953, p. 208, 209).

A resolution of the Central Committee of the RSDLP, published on August 21st called on all Party organisations:

“First, to expose the conference convening in Moscow as an organ of the conspiracy of the counterrevolutionary bourgeoisie against the revolution; second, to expose the counter-revolutionary policy of the S-R’s, and Mensheviks who are supporting this conference; third, to organise mass protests of workers, peasants and soldiers against the conference.”

(Resolution of CC of RSDLP on the Moscow Conference, cited in V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 2; London; n.d.; p. 318).

The Moscow Trade Union Council, under Bolshevik leadership, called a successful one-day general strike in the city in protest at the convening of the conference.

The Kornilov Revolt

On September 3rd , the Latvian capital Riga was surrendered to the German armies.

A powerful campaign was then launched in all the media controlled by the counter-revolutionary capitalist class blaming the fall of Riga on the demoralisation of the soldiers brought about by Bolshevik propaganda and agitation.

The Bolsheviks replied that this was not the reason for the fall of Riga, but that the city had been deliberately surrendered to the German armies in order to provide a pretext for a counter-revolutionary conspiracy:

“After the Moscow Conference came the surrender of Riga and the demand for repressive measures….The counter-revolution needed a ‘Bolshevik plot’ in order to clear the way for Kornilov. . . .The counter-revolutionary higher army officers surrendered . . Riga in August in order to exploit the ‘defeats’ at the front for the purpose of achieving the ‘complete’ triumph of counter-revolution.”

(J. V. Stalin: “We Demand!”, in: “Works”, Volume 3; Moscow; 1953; p. 277, 278).

On September 5th negotiations took place at army headquarters at the front between Commander-in-Chief General Lavr Kornilov and Boris Savinkoy, Deputy Minister of War in the Provisional Government, at which, on Kerensky’s instructions, Savinkov requested Kornilov to despatch army units to Petrograd:

“On the instructions of the Prime Minister, I requested you (Kornilov) to send the Cavalry Corps to ensure the establishment of martial law in Petrograd and the suppression of any attempt at revolt.”

(B. Savinkov: Statement cited in J. V. Stalin: “The Plot against the Revolution”, in: ibid.; p. 367).

On September 7th. General Kornilov ordered an army corps, some Cossack detachments and the so-called ‘savage Division’ to move on Petrograd. The orders given to the commander of this force, General Krymov, were to occupy the city, disarm the units of the Petrograd garrison which joined the Bolshevik movement, disarm the population of Petrograd and disperse the Soviets.

“Occupy the city, disarm the units of the Petrograd garrison which joined the Bolshevik movement, disarm the population of Petrograd and disperse the Soviets.. . . . On the execution of this mission General Krymov was to send a brigade reinforced with artillery to Oranienbaum, which on its arrival was to call upon the Kronstadt garrison to dismantle the fortress and to cross to the mainland.”

(L. Kornilov: Explanatory Memorandum, cited in: J. V. Stalin: ibid.;p. 367).

The aim of the military coup was to set up a dictatorial government headed by Kornilov, with the participation of Aleksandr Kerensky (as Vice-Chairman), Boris Savinkov, Generel Mikhail Alekseev, and Admiral Aleksandr Kolchak. (Ibid.; p. 370)

As Stalin commented later:

“A compact was concluded (i.e., between the Provisional Government and General Kornilov — Ed.) to organise a conspiracy against the Bolsheviks, that is, against the working class, against the revolutionary army and the peasantry. It was a compact for conspiracy against the revolution!

That is what we have been saying from the very first day of the Kornilov revolt”.

(J. V. Stalin: “Comments”, in: ibid.; p. 350).

“The Kerensky Government not only knew of this diabolical plan, but itself took part in elaborating it and, together with Kornilov, was preparing to carry it out. .  The ‘Kornilov affair’ was not a ‘revolt’ against the Provisional Government, . . but a regular conspiracy against the revolution, an organised and thoroughly planned conspiracy. . . .

Its organisers and instigators were the counter-revolutionary elements among the generals, representatives of the Cadet Party, representatives of the ‘public men’ in Moscow, the more ‘initiated’ members of the Provisional Government, and — last but not least! — certain representatives of certain embassies. . . .Kornilov had the support of the Russian and the British and French imperialist bourgeoisie.”

(J. V. Stalin: ‘The Plot against the Revolution”, in: ibid.; p. 367, 373, 379).

On September 8th, “demand” was sent to Kerensky in the name of Kornilov demanding that the former hand over dictatorial powers to the General. On the same day the “Cadet” Ministers resigned from the Provisional Government.

On the following day Kerensky — compelled for political reasons to keep his participation in the plot secret –issued an “appeal” to the population for “resistance” to Kornilov, and appointed Savinkov as Governor-General of Petrograd under a state of siege.

On September 10th , on the initiative of the Bolsheviks a broad Committee for Struggle against Counter-Revolution was set up in the capital. Detachments of armed workers (“Red Guards”) were formed for the defence of the city, and agitators (mostly Bolshevik soldiers) were sent to meet the advancing troops. The work of these agitators, in the existing circumstances, proved so successful that by September 12th, virtually all the rank-and-file soldiers had deserted Kornilov.

The political line put forward by Lenin in connection with the Kornilov “revolt” was to organise active struggle against the main enemy, the Kornilov forces, while on a campaign of exposure of the Kerensky government:

“We will fight, we are fighting against Kornilov, even as Kerensky’s troops do, but we do not support Kerensky. On the contrary, we expose his weakness. There is the difference. . . .

We are changing the form of our struggle against Kerensky. . . We shall not overthrow Kerensky right now; we shall approach the task of struggling against him in a different way, namely, we shall point out to the people (which struggles against Kornilov) the weakness and vacillation of Kerensky.”

(V. I. Lenin “Letter to the Central Committee of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, September 12th., 1917 in “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n .d., p. 137, 138).

On September l4th, General Krymov committed suicide, and, on the initiative of Kerensky, a five-man government called a “Directory” was set up as a new Provisional Government.

As Stalin commented:

“A Directory was the political form the Kornilov-Kerensky ‘collective dictatorship’ was to have been clothed in.

It should now be clear to everyone that in creating a Directory after the failure of the Kornilov ‘revolt’ Kerensky was establishing this same Kornilov dictatorship by other means.”

(J. V. Stalin: ‘The Plot against the Revolution”, in: ibid.; p. 370).

The Kornilov revolt, together with the completely successful struggle led by the Bolsheviks against it, gave a great stimulus to the development of the socialist revolutionary forces.

“The Kornilov revolt was an attempt on the very life of the revolution. That is unquestionable. But in attempting to kill the revolution and stirring all the forces of society into motion, it thereby, on the one hand, gave a spur to the revolution, stimulated it to greater activity and organisation, and, on the other hand, revealed the true nature of the classes and parties, tore the mask from their faces and gave us a glimpse of their true countenances.

We owe it to the Kornilov revolt that the almost defunct Soviets in the rear and the Committees at the front instantaneously sprang to life and became active.

It is a fact that even the five-man ‘Directory’ set up by Kerensky had to dispense with official representatives of the Cadets.”

(J. V. Stalin: “The Break with the Cadets, in: ibid.; p. 296, 297)

The Political Situation Following the Kornilov “Revolt”

As a result of the collapse of the Kornilov “revolt”, the Provisional Government found itself for the moment virtually without any state machinery of force at its disposal. In those circumstances Lenin declared on September 4th , that for a short time — perhaps only for a few days– the revolution could advance peacefully by the formation (under the revived slogan of “All Power to the Soviets”) of a Menshevik and Socialist Revolutionary Soviet Government.

“There has now arrived such a sharp and original turn in the Russian revolution that we, as a party, can offer a voluntary compromise — true, not to the bourgeoisie, our direct and main class enemy, but to our nearest adversaries, the ‘ruling’ petty-bourgeois democratic parties, the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks. . . . . .

The compromise on our part is our return to the pre-July demand of all power to the Soviets, a government of S-Rs and Mensheviks responsible to the Soviets.

Now, and only now, perhaps only for a few days or for a week or two, such a government could be created and established in a perfectly peaceful way. In all probability it could secure a peaceful forward march of the whole Russian Revolution, and unusually good chances for big strides forward by the world movement towards peace and towards the victory of Socialism.

Only for the sake of this peaceful development of the revolution — a possibility that is extremely rare in history and extremely valuable . . — can and must the Bolsheviks, partisans of a world revolution, partisans of revolutionary methods, agree to such a compromise, in my opinion.

The compromise would consist in this that the Bolsheviks .. . would refrain from immediately advancing the demand for the passing, of power to the proletariat and the poorest peasants, from revolutionary methods of struggle for the realisation of this demand. The condition which is self-evident . . would be full freedom of propaganda and the convocation of the Constituent Assembly without any new procrastination.”

(V. I. Lenin: “On Compromises”. in: ‘Collected Works’, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n.d.; p. 153-4).

Two days later, on September 16th Lenin concluded that the time in which a peaceful development of the revolution might occur had probably already passed:

“Perhaps those few days during which a peaceful development was still possible, have already passed. Yes, to all appearances they have already passed.”

(V. I. Lenin; ibid.; p. 157).

With the defeat of the Kornilov “revolt,” the political situation changed rapidly, as has been said.

The incident had exposed completely the counter-revolutionary character of the Provisional Government and of the Menshevik and Socialist-Revolutionary leaders. The masses of workers and peasants swung overwhelmingly behind the Bolsheviks. A section of the Mensheviks (the so-called “Internationalists”) and a section of the Socialist-Revolutionaries (the so-called ‘Left-Socialist-Revolutionaries”) departed the open counter-revolutionary leaders and forged a practical bloc with the Bolsheviks.

The incident also brought a great revival to the Soviets, and their bolshevisation. On September 13th the Petrograd Soviet adopted a revolutionary resolution moved by the Moscow Soviet followed suit on September 18th. In these circumstances, the Party revived the slogan of “All Power to the Soviets!”

“‘All Power to the Soviets!’ – such is the slogan of the new movement.”

(J. V. Stalin “All Power to the Soviets!'” ; in: “Works”, Volume 2 Moscow; 1953; p. 320).

On September 22nd, the Mensheviks, Socialist-Revolutionary Presidium of the Petrograd Soviet, headed by Nicholas Chkheidze, resigned, and on September 24th, Trotsky was elected chairman of the Petrograd Soviet.

Trotsky’s “Proportional Representation’

In his presidential address to the Petrograd Soviet on September 24th, Trotsky said:

“We shall conduct the work of the Petrograd Soviet in a spirit of lawfulness and of full freedom for all parties. The hand of the Presidium will never lend itself to the suppression of a minority.”

(L. Trotsky: Presidential Address to Petrograd Soviet, September 24th , 1917, cited in: I. Deutscher: “The Prophet Armed: Trotsky: 1879-1921”; London; 1970; p. 287).

Thus, in the name of “protecting the rights of the minorities” under ‘proportional representation’, on the initiative of Trotsky the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries, now in a minority in the Soviet, were voted back on to the Presidium,

“Despite Lenin’s objections, all parties were represented in the new Presidium of the Soviet in proportion to their strength.”

(I. Deutscher: ibid.; p. 287).

Lenin denounced with indignation:

“such glaring errors of the Bolsheviks as giving seats to the Mensheviks in the Presidium of the Soviets, etc.”

(V. I. Lenin “The Crisis Has Matured”, in ‘Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n.d. ; p. 278) .

Lenin Calls for Insurrection

At the end of September Lenin wrote to the Central Committee, the Petrograd Committee and the Moscow Committee of the Party demanding the immediate preparation of a revolutionary insurrection:

“Having obtained a majority in the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies of both capitals, the Bolsheviks can and must take power into their hands. … The majority of the people is with us. . .. Why must the Bolsheviks assume power right now? Because the impending surrender of Petrograd will make our chances a hundred times worse. . . What we are concerned with is not the ‘day’ of the uprising….

What matters is that we must make the task clear to the Party, place on the order of the day the armed uprising in Petrograd and Moscow (including their regions) . . .

No apparatus? There is an apparatus: the Soviets and democratic organisations. . . It is precisely now that to offer peace to the people means to win.
Assume power at once in Moscow and in Petrograd. . we will win absolutely and unquestionably”.

(V. I. Lenin: “The Bolsheviks Must Assume Power”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n.d.; p. 221, 222, 223).

A day or so later Lenin followed the above letter with a further letter to the Central Committee:

“We have back of us the majority of a class that is the vanguard of the revolution, the vanguard of the people, and is capable of drawing the masses along.
We have back of us a majority of the people.. . . .
We have the advantageous position of a party which knows its road perfectly well. . . . . .

Victory is assured to us, for the people are now very close to desperation, and we are showing the whole people a sure way out. . .

We have before us all, the objective prerequisites for a successful uprising. .

Delay is impossible. The revolution is perishing.
Having put the question this way, having concentrated our entire fraction in the factories and barracks, we shall correctly estimate the best moment to begin the uprising.

And in order to treat uprising in that Marxist way, i.e., as an art, we must at the same time, without losing a single moment, organise the staff of the insurrectionary detachment; designate the forces; move the loyal regiments to the most important points; surround the Aleksandrinsky Theatre; occupy Peter and Paul Fortress; arrest the general staff and the government; move against the military cadets, the Savage Division, etc., such detachments as will die rather than allow the enemy to move to the centre of the city; we must mobilise the armed workers, call them to a last desperate bottle, occupy at once the telegraph and telephone stations, place our staff of the uprising at the central telephone station, connect it by wire with all the factories, the regiments, the points of armed fighting, etc,”

(V. I. Lenin: “Marxism and Uprising”, in: ibid.; p. 226, 227, 228-9).

The Central Committee Meeting of October 28th

The two letters of Lenin discussed in the last section were debated at a meeting of the Central Committee of the Party on October 28th.

The Committee took a hesitant attitude towards Lenin’s demand that an insurrection be placed on the immediate order of the day. Stalin’s motion that the letters should be sent to the most important organisations for discussion by them was held over until the next meeting. Kamenev’s motion that:

“The Central Committee, having considered the letters of Lenin, rejects the practical propositions contained in them.”

(Minutes of CC, RSDLP, September 28th., 1917, cited in V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n.d.; p. 300).

Was, however, rejected.

The Question of the Zimmerwald Conference

The Seventh Conference of the RSDLP, in May 1917, had decided in favour of the representation of the Party at the Third Zimmerwald Conference in Stockholm planned for the end of May but postponed until September.

In September Lenin pressed the view that the decision to continue further participation in “rotten Zimmerwald” had been a mistake and urged that the Party’s delegation should not take part in the conference but should call a conference of the left Zimmerwaldists, without the Centrists:

“It is now perfectly clear that it was a mistake not to leave it (i.e., Zimmerwald — Ed.) . . .We must leave Zimmerwald immediately. . ..When we leave rotten Zimmerwald, we must decide immediately, at the plenary session of September 16, 1917, to call a conference of the Lefts.”

(V. I. Lenin: “On The Zimmerwald Question”; in: “Collected Works”, Volume 2, Book 1; London; n.d.; p. 150).

The “Democratic Conference”‘

From September 27th to October 5th , 1917 the Provisional Government convoked a “Democratic Conference” in the Aleksandrinsky Theatre, Petrograd. Its aim was to try to provide a basis of support for the government in the new situation following the defeat of the Kornilov “revolt.”

It was, of course, completely unrepresentative. As Lenin pointed out:

“The Democratic Conference does not represent the majority of the revolutionary people, but only the conciliatory petty-bourgeois top layer.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Bolsheviks Must Assume Power”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n.d.; p. 221).

The Bolsheviks were represented at the conference, and on October lst, submitted a long declaration calling for the formation of a revolutionary Soviet government with the following programme:

“1. The abolition of private property in landowners’ land without compensation and its transfer to the management of peasant committees….

2. The introduction of workers’ control over both production and distribution on a state-wide scale, the centralisation of banking, control over the banks and the nationalisation of the most important industries, such as oil, coal, and metals; universal labour duty; immediate measures to demobilise industry; and organisation of supplying the village with industrial products at fixed prices. The merciless taxation of large capital accumulations and properties and the confiscation of war profits for the purpose of saving the country from economic ruin.

3. Declaring secret agreements to be void, and the immediate offer of a universal democratic peace to all the peoples of the belligerent nations.

4. Safeguarding the rights of all nationalities inhabiting Russia to self-determination. The immediate abolition of all repressive measures against Finland and the Ukraine.”

(Declaration of Bolshevik Fraction at Democratic Conference, cited in V. I. Lenin “Collected Works”;, Volume 21, Book 2;London; n.d.; p. 321-22).

and demanding the following immediate measures:

“1. Stopping all repressions directed against the working class and its organisations. Abolition of capital punishment at the front and the re-establishment of full freedom of agitation and of all democratic organisations within the army. Cleansing the army of counter-revolutionary elements.

2. Commissars and other officials to be elected by local organisations.

3. General arming of the workers and the organisation of a Red Guard.

4. Dissolution of the State Council and the State Duma. The immediate convening of the Constituent Assembly.

5. Abolition of all the privileges of the estates (of the nobility, etc.), c)mplete equa1~ty of rights for all citizens.

6. Introduction of the eight-hour day and of a comprehensive system of social insurance.”

(Ibid; p. 322).

After repeated inconclusive votes, the conference declared in favour of a coalition government but without participation of the Cadets. Kerensky, however, declined to abide by the decision of the conference he had himself organised, and on October 8th, formed a new coalition government which included several individual members of the Cadet Party.

The most important act of the conference was to set up a “Provisional Council of the Republic,” known as the “Pre-Parliament,” by which the capitalist class aimed to divert the less politically developed workers and poor peasants from the path of revolution to the path of parliamentary democracy.” The Pre-parliament was intended to substitute itself for the Soviets.

In an article published on October 7th, two days after the conference ended, Lenin summed it up as follows:

“In the Soviets, the S-Rs and Mensheviks have lost their majority. They therefore have had to resort to a fraud: to violate their pledge to call a new congress of the Soviets after three months; . . to fix up a ‘Democratic’ Conference. . . .The leaders are basing themselves on a minority, in defiance of the principles of democracy. Hence the inevitability of their frauds.”

(V.I. Lenin: “Heroes or Frauds”; in: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n.d.; p. 244, 245).

The Boycott of the Pro-parliament

Already by the last day of the “Democratic Conference”, October 5th , Lenin had become convinced that, in view of the development of the revolution, it had been a mistake for the Bolsheviks to participate in this “hideous fraud”:

“The more one reflects on the meaning of the so-called Democratic Conference,…the more firmly convinced one becomes that our Party has committed a mistake by participating in it. . . .A new revolution is obviously growing in the country, a revolution . . of the proletariat and the majority of the peasants, the poorest peasantry, against the bourgeoisie, against its ally, Anglo-French finance capital, against its governmental apparatus headed by the Bonapartist Kerensky. We should have boycotted the Democratic Conference; we all erred by not doing so.”

(V. I. Lenin: “From a Publicist’s Diary”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 1;. London; n.d. p. 249, 253).

On this basis, Lenin proceeded to fight for a policy of boycotting the new fraud, the Pre-parliament:

“This pre-parliament . . is in substance a Bonapartist fraud. . . . The tactics of participating in the pre-parliament., are incorrect. They do not correspond to the objective interrelation of classes, to the objective conditions of the moment.. We must boycott the pre-parliament. We must leave it and go to the Soviets of Workers’, Soldiers’ and Peasants’ Deputies, to the trade unions, to the masses in general . . .We must give them a correct and clear slogan to disperse the Bonapartist gang of Kerensky with his forged pre-parliament.”

(V.I. Lenin ibid.; p. 252–253).

However, before Lenin’s letter had been received, on October 3rd the Central Committee of the Party had convened a meeting of the Central Committee extended to include members of the Petrograd Committee and the Bolshevik delegates to the Democratic Conference. Stalin and Trotsky reported in favour of boycotting the Pre-parliament, while Lev Kamenev and Viktor Nogin reported in favour of participation, and were supported by David Riazanov and Aleksei Rykov. The conference adopted a resolution in favour of participation by 77 votes to 50.

On October 6th , Lenin demanded a reversal of this decision:

“Trotsky was for the boycott. Bravo, Comrade Trotsky!
Boycottism was defeated in the fraction of the Bolsheviks who came to the Democratic Conference.
Long live the boycott!
We cannot and must not reconcile ourselves to participation under any condition.
We must at all costs strive to have the boycott question solved in the plenum of the Central Committee and at an extraordinary party congress. .
There is not the slightest doubt that in the ‘top’ of our Party we note vacillations that may become ruinous, because the struggle is developing.”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 254).

The Central Committee of the Party did, in fact, convene a Party Congress for October 30th., 1917. In his theses intended for this congress, Lenin wrote:

“The participation of our Party in the ‘preparliament’ . . is an obvious error and a deviation from the proletarian-revolutionary road. . . .
When the revolution is thus rising, to go to a make-believe parliament, concocted to deceive the people, means to facilitate this deception, to make the cause of preparing the revolution more difficult. . . .
The Party congress, therefore, must recall, the members of our Party from the pre-parliament, declare a boycott against it.”‘

(V. I. Lenin: ‘Theses . . for a Resolution and Instructions to Those Elected to the Party Congress”, in: ‘Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 2; London; nd.; p. 61).

However, the convocation of the congress proved unnecessary, and was cancelled by the Central Committee. On October 18th, the Central Committee adopted a resolution to boycott the pre-parliament, against only one dissentient vote. The dissentient, Lev Kamenev, asked that a statement by him be attached to the minutes of the meeting:

“I think that your decision to withdraw from the very first session of the ‘Soviet of the Russian Republic’ predetermines the tactics of the Party during the next period in a direction which I personally consider quite dangerous for the Party.”

(L. Kamenev: Statement to CC, RSDLP, October 18th., 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin: in: “Collected Works”; Volume 21; Book 1; London; n.d.; p. 302).

On the opening day of the Pre-parliament, October 20th., Trotsky read a declaration on behalf of the Bolsheviks:

“We, the fraction of Social-Democrats-Bolsheviks, declare: with this government of traitors to the people and with this council of counter-revolutionary connivance we have-nothing in common. We do not wish to cover up, directly or indirectly, not even for a single day, that work which is being carried out behind the official screen and which is fatal to the people. . .
In withdrawing from the Provisional Council we appeal to the vigilance and courage of the workers, soldiers and peasants of all Russia.
We appeal to the people.
All power to the Soviets!
All the land to the people!
Long live the immediate, honourable, democratic peace!
Long live the Constituent Assembly! “

(Declaration of the Bolshevik Fraction Read in the Pre-parliament, October 20th 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 2; London n.d.; p. 324).

The Bolsheviks then walked out of the Pre-parliament.

The Central Committee Meeting of October 23rd

Two days after the Bolsheviks walked out of the Pre-parliament, there took place, on October 23rd, the famous session of the Central Committee of the Russian Social-Democratic Party at which the decision to launch the insurrection was taken.

Twelve of the twenty-one members of the CC were present, including Lenin disguised in wig and spectacles.

The minutes of the meeting recorded the main points only of Lenin’s statement:

“Lenin states that since the beginning of September a certain indifference towards the question has been noted. He says that this is inadmissible, if we earnestly raise the slogan of seizure of power by the Soviets. It is, therefore, high time to turn attention to the technical side of the question. Much time has obviously been lost.

Nevertheless, the question is very urgent and the decisive moment is near. . . .
The absenteeism and the indifference of the masses can be explained by the fact that the masses are tired of words and resolutions.

The majority is now with us. Politically, the situation has become entirely ripe for the transfer of power.”

(Minutes of the Central Committee of the RSDLP, October 23, 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, B k 2; London; n.d.; p. 106).

Lenin then moved a resolution which ended:

“Recognising thus that an armed uprising is inevitable and the time perfectly ripe, the Central Committee proposes to all the organisations of the Party to act accordingly and to discuss and decide from this point of view all the practical questions.”

(Resolution of Central Committee, RSDLP, October 23rd 1917, cited in: ibid; p; 107).

The resolution was carried by ten votes to two – the dissentients being Grigori Zinoviev and Lev Kamenev.

The Campaign of Kamenev and Zinoviev against the Central Committee’s Decision on the Insurrection

On October 24th, Lev Kamenev and Grigori Zinoviev sent a joint memorandum to the principal organisations of the Party attacking the Central Committee’s decision of the previous day to launch an insurrection:

“The Congress of Soviets has been called for November 2. . . It must become the centre of the consolidation around the Soviets of all proletarian and demi-proletarian organisations. . . As yet there is no firm organisational connection between these organisations and the Soviets. . . But such a connection is in any case a preliminary condition for the actual carrying out of the slogan “All power to the Soviets?. . . .

Under these conditions it would be a serious historical untruth to formulate the question of the transfer of power into the hands of the proletarian party in the terms: either now or never.

No. The party of the proletariat will grow.. . . And there is only one way in which the proletarian party can interrupt its successes, and that is if under present conditions it takes upon itself to initiate an uprising and thus expose the proletarians to the blows of the entire consolidated counter-revolution, supported by the petty-bourgeois democracy.

Against this pernicious policy we raise our voices in warning.”

(G. Zinoviev & L. Kamenev Statement to Party Organisations October 24th, 1917, cited in V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 2; London; nd.; p. 332).

A few days later the statement was distributed in leaflet form in Petrograd.

Trotsky’s “Soviet Constitutionalism”

Trotsky’s opposition to Lenin’s call to insurrection was more subtle than that of Kamenev and Zinoviev.

Whereas the latter openly opposed Lenin’s demands for immediate preparations for insurrection, Trotsky supported these demands in words. He insisted however, in the name of “Soviet constitutionalism” that the actual call to insurrection should be issued not by the Petrograd Soviet, and certainly not by the Party, but by the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets.

As Trotsky’s sympathetic biographer Isaac Deutscher expresses it:

“Trotsky was approaching the problem from his new point of vantage as President of the Petrograd Soviet. He agreed with Lenin on the chances and the urgency of insurrection. But he disagreed with him over method, especially over the idea that the party should stage the insurrection in its own name and on its own responsibility. He took less seriously than Lenin the threat of an immediate counter-revolution. Unlike Lenin, he was confident that the pressure of the Bolshevik majority in the Soviets would not allow the old Central Executive to delay much longer the All-Russian Congress. . . . . .

Lenin . . refused to let insurrection wait until the Congress convened, because he was convinced that the Menshevik Executive would delay the Congress to the Greek Calends, and that the insurrection would never take place as it would be forestalled by a successful counter-revolution.. . .

The difference between Lenin and Trotsky centred on whether the rising itself ought to be conceived in terms of Soviet constitutionalism. The tactical risk inherent in Trotsky’s attitude was that it imposed certain delays upon the whole plan of action…

Lenin . . viewed Trotsky’s attitude in the matter of insurrection with uneasiness, and even suspicion. He wondered whether, by insisting that the rising should be linked with the Congress of the Soviets, Trotsky was not biding his time and delaying action until it would be too late. If this had been the case, then Trotsky would have been, from Lenin’s viewpoint, an even more dangerous opponent than Kamenev and Zinoviev, whose attitude had at least the negative merit that it was unequivocal and that it flatly contradicted the whole trend of Bolshevik policy. Trotsky’s attitude, on the contrary, seemed to follow from the party’s policy and therefore carried more conviction with the Bolsheviks; the Central Committee was in fact inclined to adopt it. In his letters, Lenin therefore sometimes controverted Trotsky’s view almost as strongly as Zinoviev’s and Kamencv’s, without, however, mentioning Trotsky by name. To wait for the rising until the Congress of Soviets, he wrote, was just as treasonable as to wait for Kerensky to convoke the Constituent Assembly, as Zinoviev and Kamenev wanted to do.”

(I. Deutscher: “The Prophet Armed Trotsky: 1879-1921”; London; 1970; pp. 290-291, 294-95).

Lenin’s objections to Trotsky’s line on this question were twofold:

Firstly: it would mean dangerous delay in calling the insurrection;

Secondly: since the calling of the Second Congress of Soviets was constitutionally in the hands of the Central Executive Committee (C.E.C) – elected at the First Congress of Soviets in June and dominated by Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries — it would mean permitting counterrevolutionaries, and not the revolutionary vanguard Party, to “fix the date of the insurrection,” or even to postpone it indefinitely.

In this connection, it must be remembered that the First Congress of Soviets had instructed the C.E.C. to summon a new congress “within three months”, i.e. not later than September. The C.E.C however, justifiably fearing that the Bolsheviks would have a majority at the congress, violated this instruction. Only under the extreme pressure of the Bolsheviks at the time of the Democratic Conference did the C.E.C. reluctantly agree to convoke the congress for November 2nd . On October 31st, however, it postponed the congress to November 7th.

Lenin saw Trotsky’s line as either — and he left the question open – “absolute idiocy” or “complete betrayal”, and he attacked it continuously up to the moment of the insurrection itself:

On October 10th:

“The general political situation causes me great anxiety . . The government has an army, and is preparing itself systematically.

And what do we do? We only pass resolutions. We lose time. We set ‘dates’ (November 2, the Soviet Congress – is it not ridiculous to put it off so long? Is it not ridiculous to rely on that?”

(V. I. Lenin: Letter to I.T. Smilga, October 10th., 1917; in: ‘Collected Works’, Volume 21, Book 1; London; n.d.; p. 265).

On October 12th:

“Yes, the leaders of the Central Executive Committee are pursuing tactics whose sole logic is the defence of the bourgeoisie and the landowners. And there is not the slightest doubt that the Bolsheviks, were they to allow themselves to be caught in the trap of constitutional illusions, of ‘faith’ in the Congress of Soviets. . . . of waiting’ for the Congress of Soviets, etc. — that such Bolsheviks would prove miserable traitors to the proletarian cause. . . .

The crisis has matured. The whole future of the Russian Revolution is at stake. The whole honour of the Bolshevik Party is in question…We must . . admit the truth, that in our Central Committee and at the top of our Party there is a tendency in favour of awaiting the Congress of Soviets, against the immediate seizure of power, against an immediate uprising. We must overcome this tendency or opinion.

Otherwise the Bolsheviks would cover themselves with shame forever; they would be reduced to nothing as a party. For to miss such a moment and to ‘await’ the Congress of Soviets is either absolute idiocy or complete betrayal.. . . To ‘await’ the Congress of Soviets is absolute idiocy, for this means losing weeks, whereas weeks and even days now decide everything. . . To ‘await’ the Congress of Soviets is idiocy, for the Congress will give nothing, it can give nothing!. . .
First vanquish Kerensky, then call the Congress.

The victory of the uprising is now secure for the Bolsheviks . . if we do not ‘await’ the Soviet Congress. . . . To refrain from seizing power at present, to ‘wait’, to ‘chatter’ in the Centra1 Committee, to confine ourselves . . to ‘fighting for the Congress’ means to ruin the revolution.”

(V. I. Lenin: ‘The Crisis has Matured”, in: ibid.; p. 275, 276, 277, 278).

Only when Lenin took the extreme step of resigning from the Central Committee in order to fight for his line in the lower organs of the Party (on October 12th) did a majority accept Lenin’s line on this question:

“I am compelled to tender my resignation from the Central Committee which I hereby do, leaving myself the freedom of propaganda in the lower ranks of the Party and at the Party Congress.

For it is my deepest conviction that if we ‘await’ the Congress of Soviets and let the present moment pass, we ruin the revolution.”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 278).

Although Lenin withdrew his resignation when the Central Committee voted for a boycott of the Pre-parliament, Trotsky continued to fight for his line and Lenin continued to fight against it:

On October 16-20:

“Events indicate our task so clearly to us that hesitation actually becomes a crime.. . . To ‘wait’ under such conditions is a crime.

The Bolsheviks have no right to wait for the Congress of Soviets; they must take power immediately.

To wait for the Congress of Soviets means to play a childish game of formality, a shameful game of formality; it means to betray the revolution.”

(V. I. Lenin: Letter to the Central Committee, Moscow Committee, Petrograd Committee, and the Bolshevik Members of the Petrograd and Moscow Soviets, October 16-20, 1917; in: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 2; London; n.d.; p. 69).

On October 21st:

“We must not wait for the All-Russian Congress of Soviets, which the Central Executive Committee may postpone till November; we must not tarry.. . .
Near Petrograd and in Petrograd — this is where this uprising can and must be decided upon and carried out . . as quickly as possible….Delay means death.”

(V. I. Lenin: Letter to Bolshevik Comrades Participating in the Regional Congress of the Soviets of the Northern Region, October 21st., 1917,in: ibid.; p. 91).

On November 6th.; (i.e, on the eve of the insurrection):

“The situation is extremely critical. It is as clear as can be that delaying the uprising now really means death.

With all my power I wish to persuade the comrades that now everything hangs on a hair, that on the order of the day are questions that are not solved by conferences, by congresses (even by Congresses of Soviets), but only . . by the struggle of armed masses.

The bourgeois onslaught of the Kornilovists, the removal of Verkhovsky, show that we must not wait. We must at any price, this evening, tonight, arrest the Minister, having disarmed (defeated if they offer resistance) the military cadets, etc.

We must not wait! We may lose everything!. . . History will not forgive delay by revolutionists who could be victorious today (and will surely be victorious today!), while they risk losing much tomorrow, they risk losing all.

If we seize power today, we seize it not against the Soviets but for them.

It would be a disaster or formalism to wait for the uncertain voting of November 7. The people have a right and a duty to decide such questions not by voting but by force.. . . .

The government is tottering. We must deal it the death blow at any cost. To delay action is the same as death.”

(V. I. Lenin: Letter to the Members of the Central Committee, November 6th., 1917, in: ibid.; p. 144-145).

Trotsky later felt it expedient to deny the charge that he had sought to accommodate the insurrection to the Second Congress of Soviets:

“We should search in vain among the minutes or among any memoirs whatever, for any indication of a proposal of Trotsky to ‘accommodate the insurrection necessarily to the Second Congress of Soviets.'”

(L. Trotsky: “History of the Russian Revolution”, Volume 3; London; 1967; p. 332).

Elsewhere in the same work, however, Trotsky makes his own position at the time quite clear. He reports his declaration ‘In the name of the Petrograd Soviet” on November 1st:

“I declare in the name of the Soviet that no armed actions have been settled upon by us….The Petrograd Soviet is going to propose to the Congress of Soviets that they seize the power.”

(L. Trotsky: Speech to Petrograd Soviet, November 1st., 1917; cited in: L. Trotsky: ibid.; p. 102, 103).

and comments:

“The Soviet was sufficiently powerful to announce openly its programme of state revolution and even set the date.”

(L. Trotsky: ibid.; p. 103).

Trotsky also reports his speech at an emergency session of the Petrograd Soviet on November 6th., 1917 (the day before the insurrection began):

“An armed conflict today or tomorrow is not included in our plan — on the threshold of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets. We think that the Congress will carry out our slogan with greater power and authority'”

(L. Trotsky: Speech in Petrograd Soviet, November 6th., 1917, cited in: L. Trotsky: ibid.; p. 331-2).

Stalin later referred to:

“the mistake made by the Petrograd Soviet in openly fixing and announcing the date of the uprising. (November 7).”

(J.V. Stalin: “Trotskyism or Leninism? , in: “Works”, Volume 6; Moscow, 1953; p. 362).

To which Trotsky replied:

“Where, and when, and from which side, did the Soviet publish abroad the date of the insurrection?”

(L. Trotsky: ibid.; p. 333).

and answers himself:

“It was not the insurrection, but the opening of the Congress of Soviets, which was publicly and in advance set for the 7th. . . ‘It flowed from the logic of things’, we wrote subsequently, ‘that we appointed the insurrection for November 7th.’ ..On the second anniversary of the revolution the author of this book, referring, in the sense just explained, to the fact that: ‘the October insurrection was, so to speak, appointed in advance for a definite date, for November 7th., and was accomplished upon exactly that date’, added: “We should seek in vain in history for another example of an insurrection which was accommodated in advance by the course of things to a definite date.”

(L. Trotsky: ibid.; p. 333-34).

Thus Trotsky, here was admitting the justice of Lenin’s comment:

“To ‘call’ the Congress of Soviets for November 2, in order to decide upon the seizure of power — is there any difference between this and a foolishly “appointed” uprising?”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Crisis has Matured”, in: ‘Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book l, London; n.d.; p. 277).

According to Trotsky, Lenin’s original plan for the insurrection (to which he adhered up to November 6th.) was that it should be called “‘in the name of the Party,” and endorsed by the Congress of Soviets when this met:

Lenin’s plan, he says:

“presupposed that the preparation and completion of the revolution were to be carried out through party channels and in the name of the party, and afterwards the seal of sanction was to be placed on the victory by the Congress of Soviets.”

(L. Trotsky: “Lessons of October”; London; 1971; p. 45).

“In the first weeks he (i.e. Lenin — Ed.) was decidedly in favour of the independent initiative of the Party.”

(L. Trotsky: “History of the Russian Revolution”;, Volume 3; London; 1967; p.265-6).

And Trotsky complains, for example, of the resolution drafted by Lenin which was also approved by the Central Committee at its meeting on October 23rd:

“The task of insurrection he presented directly as the task of the party. The difficult task of bringing its preparation into accord with the Soviets is as yet not touched upon. The All-Russian Congress of Soviets does not get a word.”

(L. Trotsky: ibid; p. 143).

Trotsky “kindly” attributes Lenin’s “wrong estimates” to his absence from Petrograd”:

“Lenin, who was not in Petrograd, could not appraise the full significance of this fact (i.e., the invalidation by the Petrograd Soviet of Kerensky’s order transferring two-thirds of the garrison to the front –Ed.) . . . . Lenin’s counsel . . flowed precisely from the fact that in his underground refuge he had no opportunity to estimate the radical turn.”

(L. Trotsky: “Lessons of October” London; 1971; p. 47-48).

“Lenin’s isolation . . deprived him of the possibility of making timely estimates of episodic factors and temporary changes.. . . If Lenin had been in Petrograd and had carried through at the beginning of October his decision in favour of an immediate insurrection without reference to the Congress of Soviets, he could undoubtedly have given the carrying out of his own plan a political setting which would have reduced its disadvantageous features to a minimum. But it is at least equally probable that he would himself in that case have come round to the plan actually carried out.”

(L. Trotsky: “History of the Russian Revolution”, Volume 3; London; 1967; p. 327-8).

In fact, Lenin’s basic plan was that the insurrection should be planned, timed and led by the Party, through either the Petrograd or the Moscow Soviet — both of which were now led by the Party — but not through the Second Congess of Soviets, the calling of which was dependent upon the Central Executive Committee led by Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries. As Stalin comments:

“According to Trotsky, it appears that Lenin’s view was that the Party should take power in October ‘independently’ of and behind the back of the Soviet’.
Later in, criticising this nonsense, which he ascribes to Lenin, Trotsky ‘cuts capers’ and finally delivers the following condescending utterance:
“That would have been a mistake”.
Trotsky is here uttering a falsehood about Lenin, he is misrepresenting Lenin’s views on the role of the Soviets in the uprising. A pile of documents can be cited showing that Lenin proposed that power be taken through the Soviets, either the Petrograd or the Moscow Soviets, and not behind the back of the Soviets.”

(J.V. Stalin: “Trotskyism or Leninism?”, in: ‘Works’, Volume 6; Moscow; 1953; p. 359-60).

Trotsky’s myth goes on to say that the Central Committee “rejected Lenin’s plan for the insurrection” and “adopted Trotsky’s plan that the insurrection should be called by the Second Congress of Soviets. Only on the evening of November 6th , according to Trotsky was Lenin convinced of the “incorrectness” of his “conspiratorial plan”;

“The Central Committee did not adopt this (i.e., Lenin’s — Ed.) proposal the insurrection was led into Soviet channels.”

(L. Trotsky: ‘Lessons October; London 1971; p. 45).

“When he (i.e., Lenin — Ed ) arrived in Smolny (i.e., on the evening November 6th , the day before the insurrection — Ed.) . . I understood that only at that moment had he finally become reconciled to the fact that we had refused the seizure of power by way of a conspirative plan.”

(L. Trotsky: “History of the Russian Revolution”, Volume 3; London,.1967; P. 345)

As Stalin points out, however, the Central Committee of the Party did not adopt Trotsky’s plan that the insurrection should be called by the Second Congress of Soviets. In fact, the insurrection had been carried through before the Congress met.

“Lenin proposed that power be taken before November 7th, for two reasons.

Firstly, because the counter-revolutionaries might have surrendered Petrograd (i.e., to the German armies — Ed ) at any moment, which would have drained the blood of the developing uprising.

Secondly, because the mistake made by the Petrograd Soviet in openly fixing and announcing the day of the uprising (November 7) could not be rectified in any other way than by actually launching the uprising before the legal date set for it. The fact of the matter is that Lenin regarded insurrection as an art, and he could not help knowing that the enemy, informed about the date of the uprising (owing to the carelessness of the Petrograd Soviet) would certainly try to prepare for that day.

Consequently, it was necessary to forestall the enemy, i.e., without fail to launch the uprising before the legal date. This is the chief explanation for the passion with which Lenin in his letters scourged those who made a fetish of the date — November 7. Events show that Lenin was absolutely right. It is well known that the uprising was launched prior to the All Russian Congress of Soviets. It is well known that power was actually taken before the opening of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets, and it was taken not by the Congress of Soviets, but by the Petrograd Soviet, by the Revolutionary Military Committee. The Congress of Soviets merely took over power from the Petrograd Soviet. That is why Trotsky’s lengthy arguments about the importance of Soviet legality are quite beside the point.”

(J. V. Stalin: ibid; p. 362).

The Extended Central Committee Meeting of October 29th

On October 29th., 1917 an extended session of the Central Committee of the RSDLP was held, in which participated representatives of the Petrograd Committee, the Petrograd Regional Committee, the Military Organisation, the Bolshevik Fraction of the Petrograd Soviet, trade unions and factory committees.

Lenin reported on the Central Committee meeting of October 23rd, and read the resolution on insurrection adapted by that meeting.

Representatives then reported on the situation existing, in their particular sectors.

In the discussion on the present situation, the resolution was strongly opposed by Lev Kamenev and Grigori Zinoviev.

Kamenev said:

“This resolution . . shows how not to carry out an uprising: during this week nothing has been done.. . .

The results for the week indicate that there are no factors favouring a rising. . We have no apparatus for an uprising; our enemies have a much stronger apparatus, and it has probably further increased during this week. . . In preparing for the Constituent Assembly we do not at all embrace the road of parliamentarism. . . Two tactics are fighting here: the tactic of conspiracy and the tactic of faith in the moving forces of the Russian Revolution.”

(L. Kamenev: Speech at Extended Meeting of CC, RSDLP, October 29th., 1917; in: Minutes, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 2: London; n.d.; p. 337).

Zinoviev said:

“The Constituent Assembly will take place in an atmosphere that is revolutionary to the highest degree. Meanwhile, we shall strengthen our forces. The possibility is not eliminated that we, together with the Left S-Rs, shall be in the majority there. ….We have no right to risk, to stake everything on one card.. . . .

If the congress takes place on the 2nd, we must propose that it should not disband until the constituent assembly convenes. There must be a defensive, waiting tactic. . . It is necessary to reconsider, if possible, the resolution of the CC. . We must definitely tell ourselves that we do not plan an uprising within the next five years.”

(G. Zinoviev: Speech at Extended Meeting of CC, RSDLP, October 29th., 1917, in Ibid; p. 36, 337).

Stalin spoke strongly in favour of confirmation of the Central Committee resolution of October 23rd., and this was finally done by 19 votes against 2 — the dissentients again being Kamenev and Zinoviev.

The Central Committee then continued in session alone, and set up a Military Centre of the Central Committee consisting of Stalin, Sverdlov, Bubnov, Dzerzhinsky and Uritsky.

After the meeting had concluded, Kamenev sent a letter to the Central Committee tendering his resignation from it:

“Not being able to support the point of view expressed in the latest decisions of the CC which define the character of its work, and considering that this position is leading the party of the proletariat to defeat, I ask the CC to recognise that I am no longer a member of the CC.”

(L. Kamenev: Letter to CC, RSDLP, October 29th., 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin: Ibid. ; p. 260).

The Congress of Soviets of the Northern Region

From October 24-26th , 1917 the Congress of Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies of the Northern Region took place in Petrograd. Since the overwhelming majority of the delegates were Bolsheviks and Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets — still dominated by Mensheviks and Right Socialist-Revolutionaries — declared the congress unofficial, and the small Menshevik fraction declared themselves present “for purposes of information only.”

The congress declared itself in favour of the immediate transfer of power to the Soviets, the immediate transfer of land to the peasants, an immediate offer of peace and the convening of the Constituent Assembly at the appointed time.

On October 29-30th Lenin – wrote a long, “Letter to Comrades” in which he refuted point by point the arguments of Kamenev and Zinoviev against the immediate launching of an insurrection.

On October 31st, Kamenev, on behalf of Zinoviev and himself, published a statement in the newspaper “Novaya Zhizn” (New Life) in which he declared that they felt themselves obliged:

“To declare themselves against any attempt to take the initiative of an armed uprising which would be doomed to defeat and which would have the most dangerous effect on the party, the proletariat, the fate of the revolution. To stake everything on the card of an uprising within the next few days would be tantamount to making a step of desperation”;

(L. Kamenev: “L. Kamenev About the Uprising”, in “Novaya Zhizn”, October 31st., 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p. 261).

Lenin thundered immediately at the treachery of the “strikebreakers of the Revolution”:

“On the eve of the critical day . . two ‘outstanding Bolsheviks’ attack an unpublished decision of the Party centre in the non-Party press, in a paper which as far as this given problem is concerned goes hand in hand with the bourgeoisie against the workers’ party. . . .

I will fight with all my power both in the Central Committee and at the congress to expel them both from the Party.

I cannot judge from afar how much damage was done to the cause by the strike-breaking action in the non-Party press. Very great practical damage has undoubtedly been caused. To remedy the situation, it is first of all necessary to re-establish the unity of the Bolshevik front by excluding the strike-breakers.”

(V. I. Lenin: Letter to the Members of the Bolshevik Party, October 31st., 1917, in: ibid.; p. 129-30, 131).

On the following day he wrote to the Central Committee of the Party:

“A self-respecting Party cannot tolerate strike-breaking and strike-breakers in its midst. This is obvious. The more we think about Zinoviev’s and Kamenev’s appearance in the non-Party press, the more obvious it becomes that their action has all the elements of strike-breaking in it.

We cannot refute the gossipy lie of Zinoviev and Kamenev without doing the cause still more harm. Therein lies the boundless meanness, the absolute treacherousness of these two persons, that in the face of the capitalists they have betrayed the strikers’ plans. For once we keep silent in the press, everybody will guess how things stand. . . . .

There can be and must be only one answer to this: an immediate decision of the Central Committee saying that:

‘Recognising in Zinoviev’s and Kamenev’s appearance in the non-Party press all the elements of strikebreaking, the Central Committee expels both from the Party’. . . .

The more ‘outstanding’ the strike-breakers, the more imperative it is to punish them immediately with expulsion.”

(V. I. Lenin: Letter to the Central Committee of the RSDLP, November 1st, 1917; in ibid. p. 133, 135, 136).

The Central Committee Meeting of November 2nd. At its meeting on November 2nd., the Central Committee accepted Kamenev’s resignation from the CC. It adopted a resolution to the effect:

“that no member of the CC shall have the right to speak against the adopted decisions of the CC,”

(Minutes of Meeting of CC, RSDLP, November 2nd., 1917, cited in: V. I. Lenin: “Collected Works”, Volume 21, Book 2; London; n.d.; p. 261).

and a more specific resolution imposing:

“Upon Kamenev and Zinoviev the obligation not to make any statements against the decisions of the CC and the line of work laid out by it.”

(Ibid.; p. 261).

The Insurrection

On November 5th , the Military Revolutionary Committee of the Petrograd Soviet appointed commissars for all the military detachments under its command. On the same day the Peter and Paul fortress, the last important obstacle to insurrection, declared for the Petrograd Soviet.

In the early morning of November 6th, the Provisional Government attempted to launch a counter-offensive against the revolutionary forces by issuing orders for the arrest of the members of the Revolutionary Military Committee and for the suppression of the central organ of the Bolsheviks, “Rabochy Put” (Workers Path).

By 10 a.m. detachments of Red Guards had placed a guard on the printing plant and editorial offices of the newspaper, and at 11 a.m. the paper came out with a call for the immediate overthrow of the Provisional Government.

In the late evening of November 6th, Lenin arrived at the Smolny which, as the headquarters both of the Petrograd Soviet and of the Bolshevik Party, had become the directing centre of the insurrection. Throughout the night, revolutionary soldiers and workers came to the Smolny and were armed with weapons supplied by the army units from the city’s arsenals.

From dawn on November 7th revolutionary troops and Red Guards occupied the Petrograd railway stations, post offices, telegraph offices, telephone exchanges, government offices and the state bank The Pre-Parliament was dispersed. The cruiser “Aurora,” controlled by revolutionary sailors, trained its guns on the Winter Palace, the only territory remaining to the Provisional Government.

During the day the Revolutionary Military Committee issued a manifesto: “To the Citizens of Russia” drafted by Lenin:

“The Provisional Government has been overthrown. The power of state has passed into the hands of the organ of the Petrograd Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, the Revolutionary Military Committee, which stands at the head of the Petrograd Proletariat and garrison.

The cause for which the people have fought – the immediate proposal of a democratic peace, the abolition of landed proprietorship, workers’ control over production and the creation of a Soviet government — is assured.

Long live the revolution of the workers, soldiers, and peasants!”

(V. I. Lenin: “Manifesto of Revolutionary Military Committee of the Petrograd Soviet, November 7th , 1917, in: V. I. Lenin & J. V. Stalin: “‘1917: Selected Writings and Speeches”; Moscow; 1938; p. 613).

In one respect the manifesto was slightly premature, for it was not until the evening of November 7th. that revolutionary workers, soldiers and sailors took the Winter Palace by storm and arrested those members of the Provisional Government who had not fled (Kerensky had escaped earlier in the day by car, accompanied by a U.S. Embassy car flying the Stars and Stripes).

At 11 p.m. on November 7th the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets opened in the Smolny.

As Stalin points out:

“It is well known that the uprising was launched prior to the All-Russian Congress of Soviets. It is well known that power was actually taken before the opening of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets, and it was taken not by the Congress of Soviets, but by the Petrograd Soviet, by the Revolutionary Military Committee. The Congress of Soviets merely took over power from the Petrograd Soviet.”

(J. V. Stalin: “Trotskyism Or Leninism?”, in: “Works”, Volume 6; Moscow; 1953; p. 362).

The Role of Trotsky in the October Revolution

As Stalin points out, Trotsky, as President of the Petrograd Soviet and of its Revolutionary Military Committee, played an important role in thc”October Revolution”:

“I am far from denying Trotsky’s undoubtedly important role in the uprising.. . . .It cannot be denied that Trotsky fought well in the period of October . . But Trotsky was not the only one who fought well in the period of October. Even people like the Left Socialist revolutionaries, who then stood side by side with the Bolsheviks, also fought well.”

(J. V. Stalin: “Trotskyism or Leninism?”, in: “Works’, Volume 6; Moscow; 1933; p. 342, 344).

In his myth about the “October Revolution,” however, Trotsky was concerned to underestimate the leading role of the Party in the revolution, to underestimate the role of Lenin (whose tactics for the insurrection were, he alleges, incorrect), and to overestimate the role of the Military Revolutionary Committee Of the Petrograd Soviet and of himself as Chairman of that Committee.

Thus, Trotsky quotes with obvious approval one of the earlier editions of Lenin’s “Collected Works,” in which the editors say in a note on Trotsky:

“After the Petrograd Soviet went Bolshevik he was elected its President and in that capacity organised and led the insurrection of November 7th.”

(Cited by: L. Trotsky “History of the Russian Revolution”, Volume 3; London; 1967; p. 344).

The amendment of this estimation is, alleges Trotsky, due to the fact that:

“The bureaucratic revision of history of the party and the revolution is taking place under Stalin’s direct supervision.”

(L. Trotsky. Ibid.; p. 343).

Stalin certainly denied the “special role” of Trotsky in the “October Revolution” claimed by Trotsky and his supporters:

“The Trotskyites are vigorously spreading rumours that Trotsky inspired and was the sole leader of the October uprising. . Trotsky himself, by consistently avoiding mention of the Party, the Central Committee and the Petrograd Committee of the Party, by saying nothing about the leading role of these organisations in the uprising and vigorously pushing himself forward as the central figure in the October uprising, voluntarily or involuntarily helps to spread the rumours about the special role he is supposed to have played in the uprising….

…I must say, however, that Trotsky did not play any special role in the October uprising, nor could he do so; being chairman of the Petrograd Soviet, he merely carried out the will of the approrpiate Party bodies, which directed every step that Trotsky took.

On October 29 (at a meeting of the Central Committee of the Party — Ed.) a practical centre was elected for the organisational leadership of the uprising. Who was elected to this centre?

The following five: Sverdlov, Stalin, Dzerzhinzky, Bubnov, Uritsky.

The functions of this practica1 centre: to direct all the practical organs of the uprising in conformity with the directives of the Central Committee. Thus, as you see, something ‘terrible’ happened at the meeting of the Central Committee, i.e , ‘strange to relate’ the ‘inspirer’, the ‘chief figure’, the ‘sole 1eader’ of the uprising, Trotsky, was not elected to the practica1 centre, which was called upon to direct the uprising. . . And yet, strictly speaking, there is nothing strange about it, for neither in the party, nor in the October uprising, did Trotsky play any special role, nor could he do so, for he was a relatively new man in our Party in the period of October… He, like all the responsible workers, merely carried out the will of the Central Committee and of its organs. . . This talk about Trotsky’s special role is a legend that is being spread by obliging ‘Party’ gossips.

This of course, does not mean that the October uprising did not have its inspirer. It did have its inspirer and leader, but his was Lenin, and none other than Lenin, that same Lenin whose resolutions the Central Committee adopted when deciding the question of the uprising, that same Lenin who, in spite of what Trotsky says, was not prevented by being in hiding from being the actual inspirer of the uprising. . . .

What sort of a ‘history’ of October is it that begins and ends with attempts to discredit the chief leader of the October uprising, to discredit the Party, which organised and carried out the uprising? Trotsky by his literary pronouncements is making another (yet another!) attempt to create the conditions for substituting Trotskyism for Leninism.”

(J. V. Stalin: ‘Trotskyism or Leninism?”, in: “Works,” Volume 6; Moscow; 1953; p. 341-3, 363, 364).

Trotsky, in his reply, confirms Stalin’s charge that he is concerned to underestimate the leading role of the Party in the insurrection. He admits that “the practical centre” of the Central Committee was set up:

“at Lenin’s suggestion”

(L. Trotsky: ‘History of the Russian Revo1ution;”, Volume 3; London; 1967 p. 339).

But he denies that it or any other party organ guided the insurrection. The insurrection, he declares, was guided by the Revolutionary Committee of the Petrograd Soviet, with Trotsky as its chairman, alone:

“The Military Revolutionary Committee from the moment of its birth had the direct leadership not only of the garrison, but of the Red Guard. . .. No place remained for any other directing centre….There was but one revolutionary centre, that affiliated with the Soviet — that is, the Military Revolutionary Committee.”

(L. Trotsky: ibid.) p. 340, 341).

The Character of the “October Revolution”

Lenin characterised the “October Revolution” as a proletarian-socialist revolution in its main, political content — since by it the working class in alliance with, and leading, the peasantry seized political poor from the capitalist class. But he characterised it as a bourgeois-democratic revolution in its’ economic content — since it completed the bourgeois-democratic revolutionary tasks which the “February Revolution” did not carry out.

“The immediate and direct aim of the revolution in Russia was a bourgeois-democratic aim, namely to destroy the relics of medievalism and abolish them completely….We brought the bourgeois-democratic revolution to completion has done before.

We are progressing towards the socialist revolution, consciously, deliberately and undeviatingly, knowing that no Chinese wall separates it from the bourgeois-democratic revolution….

But…we solved the problems of the bourgeois-democratic revolution in passing, as a “by-product” of the main and real proletarian-revolutionary socialist work.”

(V. I. Lenin: “The Fourth Anniversary of the October Revolution”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 6; London; 1946; p. 500; 501; 503.)

“The October Revolution overthrew the bourgeoisie and transferred power to the proletariat but did not immediately lead to:
the completion of the bourgeois revolution, in general and: the isolation of the kulaks in the countryside, in particular –
these were spread over a certain period of time but this does not mean that our fundamenta1 slogan at the second stage of the revolution – “together with the poor peasantry, against capitalism in town and country, while neutralising the middle peasantry, for the power of the proletariat” –
— was wrong . . . .
The strategic slogans of the Party can be appraised only from the point of view of a Marxist analysis of the class forces and of the correct disposition of the revolutionary forces. . . . .
Is it possible for the overthrow of the power of the bourgoisie and the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat to be effected within the framework of the bourgeois revolution? . . .
How can it be asserted that the kulaks (who, of course, are also peasants) could support the overthrow of the bourgoisie and the transfer of power to the proletariat’? . .. . .
One of the main tasks of the October Revolution was to complete the bourgeois revolution. . . .and since the October Revolution did complete the bourgeois revolution it was bound to meet with the sympathy of all the peasants . . But can it be asserted on these grounds that the completion of the bourgeois revolution was not a derivative phenomenon in the course of the October Revolution but its essence or its principal aim? . . .
And if the main theme of a strategic slogan is the question of the transfer of power from one class to another, is it not clear from this that the question of the completion of the bourgeois revolution by the proletarian power must not be confused with the question of overthrowing the bourgeoisie and achieving this proletarian power, i.e., with the question that is the main theme at the second stage of the revolution? .
In order to complete the bourgeois revolution it was necessary in October:
first to overthrow the power of the bourgeoisie and to set up the power of the proletariat, for only such a power is capable of completing the bourgeois revolution. But in order to set up the power of the proletariat in October it was essential to prepare and organise for October the appropriate political army, an army capable of overthrowing the bourgeoisie and of establishing the power of the proletariat, and there is no need to prove that such a political army could be prepared and organised by us only under the slogan:
Alliance of the proletariat with the poor peasantry against the bourgeoisie, for the dictatorship of the proletariat.”

(J. V. Stalin: “The Party’s Three Fundamental Slogans on the Peasant Question”, in “Works”; Volume 9; Moscow; 1954; p. 208-09; 210, 211-12).

For the autumn of 1913, however, the continuing revolution developed uninterruptedly into a proletarian-socialist revolution in its economic content.

“Until the organisation of the Committees of Poor Peasants, i.e., down to the summer and even the autumn of 1918, our revolution was to a large extent a bourgeois revolution . . . But from the moment the Committees of Poor Peasants began to be organised, our revolution became a proletarian revolution. . It was only when the October revolution in the countryside began and was accomplished in the summer of 1913 that we found our real proletarian base; it was only then that our revolution became a proletarian revolution in fact, and not merely by virtue of proclamations, promises and declarations.”

(V. I. Lenin: Report of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist (Bolsheviks) at the Eighth Party Congress, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 3; London; 1943; 10. 37, 33).

“In November 1917 we seized power together with the peasantry as a whole. This was a bourgeois revolution in as much as the class war in the rural districts had not yet developed.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Work in the Rural Districts”, in: ibid.; p. 171).

CONCLUSION

From the foundation of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party to November 1917, the efforts of the revisionists in Russia were directed towards preventing the socialist revolution from taking place, making use in the main of open political opposition, couched in pseudo-Marxist phraseology, either to the revolution itself or to the policies necessary to bring the revolution about. These efforts of the revisionists, dealt with in this report, met with failure. The socialist revolution took place in November 1917.

From the socialist revolution in November 1917 to the summer of 1932, the efforts of the revisionists in Soviet Russia were directed towards preventing the construction of socialism from being brought about, making use in the main of open political opposition, couched in pseudo-Marxist-Leninist phraseology, either to the construction of socialism itself or to the policies necessary to bring about the construction of socialism. These efforts of the revisionists, to be dealt with in a later report, met with failure.

A socialist society was completely — though not completely securely for all time – constructed in the Soviet Union.

In the period from the summer of 1932 to the mid-1960s, the efforts of the revisionists in the Soviet Union were directed towards restoring a capitalist society, making use in the main of conspiratorial methods of political opposition. These efforts of the revisionists, to be dealt with in a later report, met with success. Today in the Soviet Union the dictatorship of the working class has been liquidated and all the essentials of a state capitalist economic system, based on profit as the motive of production and on the exploitation of the Soviet working class by the new class of state capitalists, have been brought into being.

The Soviet Union has become a neo–imperialist state, pursuing essentially similar aims to those of the older imperialist states, and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union has been transformed by its revisionist leaders from the vanguard party of the Soviet working class to a fascist-type political instrument of the Soviet neo- imperialists.

An analysis of the way in which the revisionists succeeded in dominating, and bringing about the degeneration of, the international communist movement is essential to the task of building a Marxist-Leninist International free of all revisionist trends. The series of reports on “The Origins of Revisionism”, of which the preceding report forms one, is an attempt to make such an analysis.

THE END

Andy Beckett: The Forgotten Story of Chile’s ‘Socialist Internet’

The Operations Room (or Opsroom): a physical location where economic information was to be received, stored, and made available for speedy decision-making. It was designed in accordance with Gestalt principles in order to give users a platform that would enable them to absorb information in a simple but comprehensive way.

When Pinochet’s military overthrew the Chilean government 30 years ago, they discovered a revolutionary communication system, a ‘socialist internet’ connecting the whole country. Its creator? An eccentric scientist from Surrey. Andy Beckett on the forgotten story of Stafford Beer

During the early 70s, in the wealthy commuter backwater of West Byfleet in Surrey, a small but rather remarkable experiment took place. In the potting shed of a house called Firkins, a teenager named Simon Beer, using bits of radios and pieces of pink and green cardboard, built a series of electrical meters for measuring public opinion. His concept – users of his meters would turn a dial to indicate how happy or unhappy they were with any political proposal – was strange and ambitious enough. And it worked. Yet what was even more jolting was his intended market: not Britain, but Chile.

Unlike West Byfleet, Chile was in revolutionary ferment. In the capital Santiago, the beleaguered but radical marxist government of Salvador Allende, hungry for innovations of all kinds, was employing Simon Beer’s father, Stafford, to conduct a much larger technological experiment of which the meters were only a part. This was known as Project Cybersyn, and nothing like it had been tried before, or has been tried since.

Stafford Beer attempted, in his words, to “implant” an electronic “nervous system” in Chilean society. Voters, workplaces and the government were to be linked together by a new, interactive national communications network, which would transform their relationship into something profoundly more equal and responsive than before – a sort of socialist internet, decades ahead of its time.

When the Allende administration was deposed in a military coup, the 30th anniversary of which falls this Thursday, exactly how far Beer and his British and Chilean collaborators had got in constructing their hi-tech utopia was soon forgotten. In the many histories of the endlessly debated, frequently mythologised Allende period, Project Cybersyn hardly gets a footnote. Yet the personalities involved, the amount they achieved, the scheme’s optimism and ambition and perhaps, in the end, its impracticality, contain important truths about the most tantalising leftwing government of the late 20th century.

Stafford Beer, who died last year, was a restless and idealistic British adventurer who had long been drawn to Chile. Part scientist, part management guru, part social and political theorist, he had grown rich but increasingly frustrated in Britain during the 50s and 60s. His ideas about the similarities between biological and man-made systems, most famously expressed in his later book, The Brain of the Firm, made him an in-demand consultant with British businesses and politicians. Yet these clients did not adopt the solutions he recommended as often as he would have liked, so Beer began taking more contracts abroad.

In the early 60s, his company did some work for the Chilean railways. Beer did not go there himself, but one of the Chileans involved, an engineering student called Fernando Flores, began reading Beer’s books and was captivated by their originality and energy. By the time the Allende government was elected in 1970, a group of Beer disciples had formed in Chile. Flores became a minister in the new administration, with responsibility for nationalising great swathes of industry. As in many areas, the Allende government wanted to do things differently from traditional marxist regimes. “I was very much against the Soviet model of centralisation,” says Raul Espejo, one of Flores’s senior advisers and another Beer disciple. “My gut feeling was that it was unviable.”

But how should the Chilean economy be run instead? By 1971, the initial euphoria of Allende’s democratic, non-authoritarian revolution was beginning to fade; Flores and Espejo realised that their ministry had acquired a disorganised empire of mines and factories, some occupied by their employees, others still controlled by their original managers, few of them operating with complete efficiency. In July, they wrote to Beer for help.

They knew that he had leftwing sympathies, but also that he was very busy. “Our expectation was to hire someone from his team,” says Espejo. But after getting the letter, Beer quickly grew fascinated by the Chilean situation. He decided to drop his other contracts and fly there. In West Byfleet, the reaction was mixed: “We thought, ‘Stafford’s going mad again,’ ” says Simon Beer.

When Stafford arrived in Santiago, the Chileans were more impressed. “He was huge,” Espejo remembers, “and extraordinarily exuberant. From every pore of his skin you knew he was thinking big.” Beer asked for a daily fee of $500 – less than he usually charged, but an enormous sum for a government being starved of US dollars by its enemies in Washington – and a constant supply of chocolate, wine and cigars.

For the next two years, as subordinates searched for these amid the food shortages, and the local press compared him to Orson Welles and Socrates, Beer worked in Chile in frenetic bursts, returning every few months to England, where a British team was also labouring over Cybersyn. What this collaboration produced was startling: a new communications system reaching the whole spindly length of Chile, from the deserts of the north to the icy grasslands of the south, carrying daily information about the output of individual factories, about the flow of important raw materials, about rates of absenteeism and other economic problems.

Until now, obtaining and processing such valuable information – even in richer, more stable countries – had taken governments at least six months. But Project Cybersyn found ways round the technical obstacles. In a forgotten warehouse, 500 telex machines were discovered which had been bought by the previous Chilean government but left unused because nobody knew what to do with them. These were distributed to factories, and linked to two control rooms in Santiago. There a small staff gathered the economic statistics as they arrived, officially at five o’clock every afternoon, and boiled them down using a single precious computer into a briefing that was dropped off daily at La Moneda, the presidential palace.

Allende himself was enthusiastic about the scheme. Beer explained it to him on scraps of paper. Allende had once been a doctor and, Beer felt, instinctively understood his notions about the biological characteristics of networks and institutions. Just as significantly, the two men shared a belief that Cybersyn was not about the government spying on and controlling people. On the contrary, it was hoped that the system would allow workers to manage, or at least take part in the management of their workplaces, and that the daily exchange of information between the shop floor and Santiago would create trust and genuine cooperation – and the combination of individual freedom and collective achievement that had always been the political holy grail for many leftwing thinkers.

It did not always work out like that. “Some people I’ve talked to,” says Eden Miller, an American who is writing a PhD thesis partly about Cybersyn, “said it was like pulling teeth getting the factories to send these statistics.” In the feverish Chile of 1972 and 1973, with its shortages and strikes and jostling government initiatives, there were often other priorities. And often the workers were not willing or able to run their plants: “The people Beer’s scientists dealt with,” says Miller, “were primarily management.”

But there were successes. In many factories, Espejo says, “Workers started to allocate a space on their own shop floor to have the same kind of graphics that we had in Santiago.” Factories used their telexes to send requests and complaints back to the government, as well as vice versa. And in October 1972, when Allende faced his biggest crisis so far, Beer’s invention became vital.

Across Chile, with secret support from the CIA, conservative small businessmen went on strike. Food and fuel supplies threatened to run out. Then the government realised that Cybersyn offered a way of outflanking the strikers. The telexes could be used to obtain intelligence about where scarcities were worst, and where people were still working who could alleviate them. The control rooms in Santiago were staffed day and night. People slept in them – even government ministers. “The rooms came alive in the most extraordinary way,” says Espejo. “We felt that we were in the centre of the universe.” The strike failed to bring down Allende.

In some ways, this was the high point for Cybersyn. The following year, like the government in general, it began to encounter insoluble problems. By 1973, the sheer size of the project, involving somewhere between a quarter and half of the entire nationalised economy, meant that Beer’s original band of disciples had been diluted by other, less idealistic scientists. There was constant friction between the two groups. Meanwhile, Beer himself started to focus on other schemes: using painters and folk singers to publicise the principles of high-tech socialism; testing his son’s electrical public-opinion meters, which never actually saw service; and even organising anchovy-fishing expeditions to earn the government some desperately needed foreign currency.

All the while, the rightwing plotting against Allende grew more blatant and the economy began to suffocate as other countries, encouraged by the Americans, cut off aid and investment. Beer was accused in parts of the international press of creating a Big Brother-style system of administration in South America. “There was plenty of stress in Chile,” he wrote afterwards. “I could have pulled out at any time, and often considered doing so.”

In June 1973, after being advised to leave Santiago, he rented an anonymous house on the coast from a relative of Espejo. For a few weeks, he wrote and stared at the sea and travelled to government meetings under cover of darkness. On September 10, a room was measured in La Moneda for the installation of an updated Cybersyn control centre, complete with futuristic control panels in the arms of chairs and walls of winking screens. The next day, the palace was bombed by the coup’s plotters. Beer was in London, lobbying for the Chilean government, when he left his final meeting before intending to fly back to Santiago and saw a newspaper billboard that read, “Allende assassinated.”

The Chilean military found the Cybersyn network intact, and called in Espejo and others to explain it to them. But they found the open, egalitarian aspects of the system unattractive and destroyed it. Espejo fled. Some of his colleagues were not so lucky. Soon after the coup, Beer left West Byfleet, his wife, and most of his possessions to live in a cottage in Wales. “He had survivor guilt, unquestionably,” says Simon.

Cybersyn and Stafford’s subsequent, more esoteric inventions live on in obscure socialist websites and, more surprisingly, modern business school teachings about the importance of economic information and informal working practices. David Bowie, Brian Eno and Tony Blair’s new head of policy, Geoff Mulgan, have all cited Beer as an influence.

But perhaps more importantly, his work in Chile affected those who participated. Espejo has made a good career since as an inter- national management consultant. He has been settled in Britain for decades. He chuckles urbanely at the mention of Pinochet’s arrest in London five years ago. Yet when, after a long lunch in a pub near his home in Lincoln, I ask whether Cybersyn changed him, his playful, slightly professorial gaze turns quite serious. “Oh yes,” he says. “Completely.”

· Andy Beckett’s book Pinochet in Piccadilly is published by Faber.

Source

Grover Furr: The Ukrainian Famine: Only Evidence Can Disclose the Truth

USFSP_Korotzer9

No detective can solve a crime without carefully and objectively studying the evidence. Likewise, no one can know what actually occurred in history without studying, in an objective manner, the relevant primary sources – the evidence. I have spent decades in studying the primary sources concerning many specific events of the Stalin period. Mark Tauger has studied the primary sources on Soviet agriculture for more than 25 years.

Louis Proyect has not done this. Consequently he has no chance of discovering the truth, or of recognizing it when he sees it. He is inevitably doomed to “believe” whatever fits his preconceived ideological bias, and to reject everything else. This is fatal to any attempt to learn what really happened.

Louis Proyect’s attack on me and on Mark Tauger (“What Caused the Holodomor?” Cp March 24, 1971) is ideology masquerading as history. It is replete with falsehoods. I’ll concentrate on the lies Proyect tells about me and my research. I hope that Mark Tauger will respond to Proyect’s ignorant accusations against his research.

Proyect begins his article by stating: “Furr’s political life revolves around celebrating Stalin’s greatest achievements—such as they were.” This is false. My goal is not to “celebrate” Stalin, or anyone or anything. In my research I aim to discover the truth about Soviet history of the 1930s, using the best primary-source evidence and maintaining scrupulous objectivity.

I agree with historian Geoffrey Roberts when he says:

In the last 15 years or so an enormous amount of new material on Stalin … has become available from Russian archives. I should make clear that as a historian I have a strong orientation to telling the truth about the past, no matter how uncomfortable or unpalatable the conclusions may be. … I don’t think there is a dilemma: you just tell the truth as you see it.

(“Stalin’s Wars”, Frontpagemag.com February 12, 2007. At http://hnn.us/roundup/entries/35305.html )

The common or “mainstream” view of Stalin as a bloodthirsty tyrant is a product of two sources: Trotsky’s writings of the 1930s and Nikita Khrushchev’s “Secret Speech” to the XX Party Congress in February, 1956. This canonical history of the Stalin period – the version we have all learned — is completely false. We can see this now thanks mainly to two sets of archival discoveries: the gradual publication of thousands of archival documents from formerly secret Soviet archives since the end of the USSR in 1991; and the opening of the Leon Trotsky Archive at Harvard in 1980 and, secondarily, of the Trotsky Archive at the Hoover Institution (from where I have just returned).

Khrushchev Lied

In its impact on world history Khrushchev’s “Secret Speech” is the most influential speech of the 20th century. In it Khrushchev painted Stalin as a bloodthirsty tyrant guilty of a reign of terror lasting more than two decades.

After the 22nd Party Congress of 1961, where Khrushchev and his men attacked Stalin with even more venom, many Soviet historians elaborated Khrushchev’s lies. These falsehoods were repeated by Cold War anticommunists like Robert Conquest. They also entered “left” discourse through the works of Trotskyists and anarchists and of “pro-Moscow” communists.

Khrushchev’s lies were amplified during Mikhail Gorbachev’s and Boris Eltsin’s time by professional Soviet, then Russian, historians. Gorbachev orchestrated an avalanche of anticommunist falsehoods that provided the ideological smokescreen for the return to exploitative practices within the USSR and ultimately for the abandonment of socialist reforms and a return to predatory capitalism.

During 2005-2006 I researched and wrote the book Khrushchev Lied. In my book I identify 61 accusations that Khrushchev made against either Stalin or, in a few cases, Beria. I then studied each one of them in the light of evidence available from former Soviet archives. To my own surprise I found that 60 of the 61 accusations are provably, demonstrably false.

The fact that Khrushchev could falsify everything and get away with it for over 50 years suggests that we should look carefully at other supposed “crimes” of Stalin and of the USSR during his time.

Trotsky’s ‘Amalgams’

From 1980 till the early 1990s Pierre Broué, the foremost Trotskyist historian of his day, and Arch Getty, a prominent American expert in Soviet history, discovered that Trotsky had lied, repeatedly and about many issues, in his public statements and writings in the 1930s. In my book Trotsky’s ‘Amalgams’ (2015) I discussed the implications of these lies by Trotsky and of some additional lies of his that I discovered myself. They completely invalidate the “Dewey Commission,” to whom Trotsky lied shamelessly and repeatedly, as well as Trotsky’s denials in the Red Book and elsewhere of the charges leveled against him in the First and Second Moscow Trials.

Challenging the “Anti-Stalin Paradigm”

I have not reached these conclusions out of any desire to “apologize” for – let alone “celebrate” — the policies of Stalin or the Soviet government. I believe these to be the only objective conclusions possible based on the available evidence.

The conclusions I have reached about the history of the Soviet Union during the Stalin period are unacceptable to people who, like Proyect, are motivated by prior ideological commitments rather than by a determination to discover the truth “and let the chips fall where they will.”

The “anti-Stalin paradigm” is hegemonic in the field of Soviet history, where it is literally “taboo” to question, let alone disprove as I do, the Trotsky-Khrushchev-Cold War falsehoods about Stalin and the Stalin period. Those in this field who do not cut their research to fit the Procrustean bed of the “anti-Stalin paradigm” will find it hard if not impossible to publish in “mainstream” journals and by academic publishers. I am fortunate:  I teach English literature and do not need to publish in these “authoritative” but ideologically compromised vehicles.

Those who, like Proyect, are motivated not to discover the truth but to shore up their ideological prejudices think that everybody must be doing likewise. Therefore Proyect argues not from evidence, but by guilt by association, name-dropping, insult, and lies.

A few examples:

Guilt by association: Proyect claims that I am “like” Roland Boer, Roger Annis, and Sigizmund Mironin.

Name-dropping: Davies and Wheatcroft are well-known and disagree with Tauger, so – somehow – they are “the most authoritative,”  “right” while Tauger is “wrong.”

Insult: Tauger is complicit in “turning a victim into a criminal.”

Proyect: “…it seems reasonable that Stalin was forced to unleash a brutal repression in the early 30s to prevent Hitler from invading Russia—or something like that.” In reality neither I nor Tauger say anything of the kind.

Lies: Proyect quotes a passage from Tauger’s research about the Irish potato famine and then accuses Tauger of wanting to exculpate the British:

“The British government responsible? No, we can’t have that.”

But the very next sentence in Tauger’s article reads:

“Without denying that the British government mishandled the crisis…”

Proyect is a prisoner of the historical paradigm that controls his view of Soviet history. A few examples:

* Proyect persists in using the term “Holodomor.” He does not inform Cp readers that Davies and Wheatcroft, whose work he recommends, reject both the term “Holodomor” and the concept in the very book Proyect recommends!

* Proyect: “…no matter that Lenin called for his [Stalin’s] removal from party leadership from his death-bed.”

But, thanks to careful research by Valentin Sakharov of Moscow State University, even “mainstream” researchers know that this note, like “Lenin’s Testament,” is probably a forgery:

There is no stenographic original of the “Ilich letter about the [general] secretary.” In the journal of Lenin’s activities kept by the secretarial staff there is no mention of any such “Ilich letter.” … not a single source corroborates the content of the January 4 dictation. Also curious is the fact that Zinoviev had not been made privy to the “Ilich letter about the [general] secretary” in late May, along with the evaluations of six regime personnel. The new typescript emerged only in June. (Stephen Kotkin, Stalin 505)

* Proyect: “Largely because of his bureaucratic control and the rapid influx of self-seeking elements into the party, Stalin could crush the opposition…”

However, in his 1973 work Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution Stephen Cohen wrote:

But machine politics alone did not account for Stalin’s triumph. … within this select oligarchy, Stalin’s bureaucratic power was considerably less imposing…. By April 1929, these influentials had chosen Stalin and formed his essential majority in the high leadership. They did so, it seems clear, less because of his bureaucratic power than because they preferred his leadership and politics. (327)

* Proyect: “Stalin’s forced march did not discriminate between rich and poor peasants.”

But in 1983 James Mace, a champion of the Ukrainian Nationalist fascist collaborators, wrote about the role of “committees of poor peasants,” komitety nezamozhnykh selian, in supporting collectivization. There is much other evidence of peasant support for collectivization.

Conclusion

Correctly understood, history is the attempt to use well-known methods of primary-source research in an objective manner, in order to arrive at accurate – truthful — statements about the past. Very often the result is disillusioning to those who cling to false ideological constructs, even when those constructs constitute the “mainstream” of politicized historiography.

No one who does not try to discover the truth and then tell it without fear or favor, is worthy to be called a historian, regardless of how famous, honored, or “authoritative” he or she may appear to be.

Distortions and lies about Soviet history of the Stalin period predominate everywhere, including Ukraine, Russia, and in the West. These lies mainly consist in repeating Trotskyist and Khrushchevite lies, in defiance or in willful ignorance of the primary-source evidence now available.

The newly-available evidence from archival sources necessitates a complete rewriting of Soviet history of the Stalin period and a complete revision of Stalin’s own role. This exciting yet demanding prospect is of great importance to all who wish to learn from the errors, as well as from the successes, of the Bolsheviks, the pioneers of the communist movement of the 20th century.

Notes

Information about my published books, in all languages, is on my Home Page. There too you can find links to all of my published articles, some in Russian only, on Soviet history.

Filipino Communists Reaffirm ‘People’s War’ on US Imperialism

The statement comes almost two months after Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte shut down peace talks with the insurgents.

The Communist Party of the Philippines released a statement Wednesday reaffirming its commitment to fighting U.S. imperialism in the Southeast Asian country.

Recapping its recently-held Second Congress, the CPP said it will continue to wage armed struggle against the imperialist country and its local supporters. Criticizing the Filipino government for bowing to the demands of the U.S., the militant group called for “people’s war towards complete victory.”

Since its 1968 founding, the CPP has fought to eradicate foreign domination in the Philippines and implement a socialist, worker-run economy.

“The Party program reaffirms the necessity of waging armed revolution in order to counter the armed violence employed by the U.S. imperialists and the local reactionary ruling classes and end the oppressive and exploitative semi-colonial and semifeudal system,” the CPP said.

The statement comes almost two months after Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte shut down peace talks with the communist insurgents, ending 27 years of peace negotiations. Labeling the rebels “terrorists,” Duterte has promised a “long war” against the CPP and its armed wing, the New People’s Army.

“Drawing lessons from the party’s rich history, the Second Congress presented a clearer picture of the strategy and tactics for taking advantage of the insoluble and worsening crisis of the world capitalist system, the strategic decline of U.S. imperialism and the chronic crisis of the domestic ruling system in order to advance the protracted people’s war towards complete victory.”

The CPP and the NPA began fighting the Filipino government in the late 1960s after right-wing Filipino dictator Ferdinand Marcos took power. A staunch anti-communist, Marcos was responsible for the deaths of thousands of human rights activists and, supported by the U.S., the former dictator pocketed billions of dollars for his own personal wealth.

Though the CPP and the NPA continued fighting the Filipino government after Marcos died in 1989, they agreed to reconciliation talks with succeeding governments. Those talks have since been rescinded.

Today, the armed communist militants are continuing to organize the country’s impoverished peasants against the status quo.

“The Second Congress presented an updated critique of the … social system, giving particular attention to the post-Marcos succession of pseudo-democratic regimes, the worsening forms of oppression and exploitation of the broad masses of workers and peasants and the deteriorating socio-economic conditions of the Filipino people in almost four decades under the neoliberal regime,” the CPP said.

“The Party’s general program calls on all Filipino communists to ‘be ready to sacrifice their lives if necessary in the struggle to bring about a new Philippines that is completely independent, democratic, united, just and prosperous.’”

Source

U.S. Hands Off North Korea!

No To The Imperialist War Drive!

Resistance Editorial

The so-called “America First” budget put forward by Trump includes a 10% increase in military spending. This increases what is already the world’s largest military budget by $56 billion. The cost of this increase will be balanced on the backs of the most vulnerable sections of U.S. society — children, seniors, and those suffering from illness — as the increases are offset with slashed social spending. Long-term vital programs like “Meals on Wheels” are in the crosshairs in favor of yet more spending on an already bloated military.

Trump has already engaged in military action from the failed raid in Yemen, which killed 30 civilians, to the drone strike on a Mosque in Aleppo, Syria, killing 46 worshipers. The administration claimed to have struck a meeting of al Qaida militants, an assertion that is contradicted by sources in Syria. U.S. troops are already on the ground acting as “advisers” in Syria — a program that was begun by Obama.

Trump rode to the White House on a wave of saber rattling, reaction, immigrant bashing, and racism. This war drive is coupled with an all out attack on democratic rights and programs for the relief of the poor at home — medicaid, school lunch programs, meals on wheels. More tax breaks to the rich guarantee that the cost will be borne by working class people, the poor and oppressed communities.

Tillerson’s threat toward North Korea

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson signaled the end of U.S. “strategic patience” with North Korea, stating that a “preemptive strike” against North Korea is possible. An attack on North Korea is a high-risk scenario that raises the very real danger of a regional conflict involving China and North Korean retaliatory attacks on both South Korea and Japan. North Korea has the capability to strike back with conventional and nuclear weapons. North Korea’s heavy artillery could flatten South Korea with disastrous results.

Millions would perish from such an ill-conceived U.S. adventure.  A war with North Korea would create a refugee crisis, starvation, and billions of dollars in property destruction. The effect on world financial markets could be devastating. Trump’s bellicose threats towards China during the campaign, and since taking office, increase the possibility of China’s involvement as an ally of the North Koreans. For the time being, Beijing has indicated their willingness to cooperate with the U.S. on the question of the North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. However, tensions have been high, with China pressing its claims on islands in the South China Sea, and Trump’s missteps on Taiwan and the US’s “One China Policy” all helping make the region a powder keg.

From 1950-1953, the U.S. fought a bloody war in Korea as the first violent engagement of the Cold War between the USSR and the West. More than 33,000 U.S troops perished in the war as well as more than a half million combined combat and civilian deaths of South Koreans. North Korea suffered more than 200,000 killed in action and an additional 300,000 wounded. Chinese military losses were also high with more than 130,000 dead and 340,000 wounded. The Korean War was fought to a stalemate and there was never a peace accord between the involved parties. The combat death toll for all sides is estimated by some experts at more than 1.2 million. During the war, the South Korean regime murdered tens of thousands of suspected communist sympathizers and their families.

Mass Antiwar Movement Needed

During the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, sections of the antiwar movement consciously de-mobilized themselves in order to provide cover for the Democrats. It remains to be seen whether the scattered antiwar forces will find their voice in time to mount opposition to a U.S. attack on North Korea. While Trump and Tillerson’s rhetoric has turned the region into a powderkeg, prominent Democrats have remained silent.

To stop the drive towards war a  united front mass action oriented movement is needed. The test for the U.S. left and antiwar movement is to create the broadest possible mobilizations against Trump’s grotesque militarism and aggression around the world, while demanding the funding of human needs at home.  

Going forward, we need to build a non-exclusionary, democratic movement that is independent from ruling class political parties. This is independent of positions about the character of North Korea. The first priority, regardless of attitude toward the Kim regime, is to prevent another imperialist war. That means turning the anti-Trump struggle into a fight to oppose war and re-orient the US economy to serve human need.

U.S. Hands Off North Korea!

Money for jobs, education and healthcare, not for war! 

Feed children and seniors, not the Pentagon!

Source

The Great Soviet Encyclopedia on Napoleon Bonaparte

Napoleon I

(Napoleon Bonaparte). Born Aug. 15, 1769, in Ajaccio, Corsica; died May 5, 1821, on the island of St. Helena. French statesman and general. First consul of the French Republic (1799–1804); emperor (1804–14 and March-June 1815).

Napoleon was the son of Carlo Buonaparte, a Corsican noble and lawyer of modest means. At the age of ten he was sent to the College d’Autun (France) and later in the same year (1779) was transferred to the military school at Brienne, where he was supported by a government stipend. In 1784 he graduated from Brienne and went to the Ecole Militaire in Paris (1784–85). He entered the army in October 1785 as a second lieutenant of artillery. Brought up on the progressive ideas of the French Enlightenment, Bonaparte, a follower of J.-J. Rousseau and G.-T. Raynal, greeted the Great French Revolution with enthusiasm. In 1792 he became a member of the Jacobin club. At this point in his career he was active primarily on Corsica, where he came into conflict with Corsican separatists led by Paoli. In 1793 he was forced to flee from Corsica. During the republican army’s long unsuccessful siege of Toulon, which had been seized by monarchist rebels and British interventionists, Bonaparte proposed a plan for capturing the city. On Dec. 17, 1793, Toulon was taken by storm. The 24-year-old Captain Bonaparte was promoted to the rank of brigadier general for his role in the capture of the city. This marked the beginning of his precipitous rise to power. Because of his friendship with A. de Robespierre, Napoleon fell from grace for a short time and was even arrested during the Thermidorian reaction. But he soon drew attention to himself again, this time in Paris, by his energy and decisiveness in suppressing the monarchist revolt of 13 Vendémiaire (Oct. 5), 1795. Subsequently, he was appointed commander of the Paris garrison and, in 1796, commander in chief of an army that had been created for operations in Italy.

The Italian campaign of 1796–97 revealed Bonaparte’s military talent and his understanding of the social aspect of war, for he attempted to raise antifeudal forces against powerful Austria and to obtain for France an ally in the Italian national liberation movement. Although the first Italian campaign was accompanied by requisitions and the plundering of the countryside, its progressive nature won the French army the support of the Italian people. The Treaty of Campo Formio (1797) revealed Napoleon’s diplomatic capabilities. In Napoleon’s subsequent military campaigns his taste for conquest became stronger.

Returning to Paris in triumph, Napoleon easily persuaded the Directory to pass a resolution organizing a campaign for the conquest of Egypt. Despite Napoleon’s victories in a number of battles, the Egyptian campaign (1798–1801) was doomed to defeat after the British destroyed the French fleet at Aboukir, cutting off the French army in Egypt from France, and after the French undertook an unsuccessful campaign in Syria. On the pretext of news that had reached him concerning the defeat of the Directory’s army and the victories of A. V. Suvorov, Napoleon arbitrarily left the expeditionary army and returned to Paris in October 1799, at the peak of the crisis of the Directory. The weakness of the Directory and its constant vacillations, which impelled the bourgeoisie to seek a “firm authority,” contributed to Napoleon’s success in carrying out his personally ambitious plans. Relying on influential circles of the bourgeoisie, he staged a coup d’etat on Nov. 9–10, 1799 (18–19 Brumaire, Year VIII), establishing a consulate under which he, in fact (although not immediately), held full authority.

This dictatorial power, which was concealed until 1804 by a “screen” of republicanism, was exercised by Napoleon for the defense of the interests of the bourgeoisie and rich peasants and, on the whole, for the strengthening of the bourgeois state. He abolished national representation, even in the restricted form that had survived under the Directory, and he did away with electoral self-government, replacing it with a bureaucratic police system of prefects, mayors, and subordinate officials, all of whom were appointed by the central government. He also eliminated the free press, and he suppressed other vestiges of the Revolution’s democratic conquests. In 1801 he concluded a concordat with the pope, thus guaranteeing himself the support of the Roman Catholic Church. The civil, commercial, and criminal codes drawn up under his supervision established the legal norms for a bourgeois society.

Strengthening and protecting the principal economic gains of the bourgeois revolution, particularly the promulgated redistribution of property, Napoleon decisively suppressed attempts from the left as well as from the right to change the new regime. He dealt blows to both the Jacobins and the militant royalists. His regime’s economic policy concentrated on developing industry and trade. In 1800 the Bank of France was founded. Industry enjoyed Napoleon’s special protection, because he viewed industrial development as a means of strengthening the power of the state. Fearing disturbances by the workers, Napoleon tried to avert them by organizing public works projects to prevent unemployment and by retaining the Le Chapelier Law (1791), which prohibited workers from forming associations. In addition, a decree issued in 1803 obliged the workers to carry passbooks, or labor permits.

In 1802, Napoleon had himself appointed consul for life, and in 1804 he was proclaimed emperor. To strengthen the new bourgeois monarchy and give it superficial splendor, he created a new imperial nobility and a luxurious imperial court. After divorcing his first wife, Josephine, in 1810, he married Marie Louise, the daughter of the Austrian emperor Francis I.

Napoleon I owed his extraordinary fame to his victorious wars against the coalition powers; to his brilliant victories at Marengo (1800), Austerlitz (1805), Jena and Auerstadt (1806), and Wa-gram (1809); to the enormous expansion of the Empire; and to his own transformation from emperor of France into de facto ruler of Central Europe and all of Western Europe, excluding Great Britain. The destiny of Napoleon I, who had achieved unprecedented power in only ten years and who had compelled the monarchs of Europe to reckon with his will, seemed inexplicable to many of his contemporaries and gave rise to various Napoleonic legends. A man of enormous personal endowments, with an exceptional capacity for work, a powerful, sober mind, and an unbending will, he was ruthless in attaining his objectives. Napoleon I was an outstanding representative of the young, rising bourgeoisie, the most complete embodiment of its strong points, as well as of its vices and shortcomings—aggressiveness, profit seeking, and adventurism.

In the art of war Napoleon I developed and perfected the innovations of the armies of revolutionary France. His chief merit was his ability to find the most effective tactical and strategic use for vast armed masses for that time. The emergence of the mass army had been made possible by the Revolution. Napoleon proved himself a master of strategy and of the tactics of maneuver. When fighting against a numerically superior foe, he endeavored to disperse the enemy’s forces and destroy them unit by unit. In such situations his principle was to “compensate for numerical weakness by rapidity of movements.” On the march he led his troops in dispersed order but with such control that they could be assembled at the necessary moment at any point. This was the origin of the principle of “moving separately but fighting together.” Napoleon I perfected a new maneuver using the column in conjunction with an extended order and based on the precise interaction of different types of troops. He made extensive use of the rapid maneuver to establish superiority in decisive axes, and he knew how to make surprise attacks, how to carry out turning and enveloping movements, and how to augment his forces at decisive sectors during a battle. Considering the destruction of the enemy’s forces to be the principal strategic goal, he always tried to take the strategic initiative. His chief method of routing an enemy was to give general battle, and he always endeavored to exploit the success achieved in general battle by organizing a pressing pursuit of the enemy.

Napoleon I gave broad opportunities for initiative to the commanders of units and groups. He knew how to discover and promote capable, talented people. However, the sudden rise of Napoleonic France and the victories of French arms are attributable less to the personal qualities of Napoleon I and his marshals than to the fact that in its clash with feudal absolutist Europe, Napoleonic France represented the historically more progressive bourgeois social system. Militarily, this assertion is supported by the unquestionable superiority of Napoleon I’s generalship to the backward, routine strategy and tactics of the armies of feudal Europe. In addition, the bourgeois system of social relations that was boldly introduced throughout Western Europe by Napoleonic legislation was superior to the backward, feudal patriarchal social relations.

Nevertheless, the Napoleonic wars gradually lost the progressive elements that had characterized them even though they were wars of conquest. They became purely predatory wars. Consequently, Napoleon’s personal qualities and efforts were doomed to failure. His powerlessness against the forces of history was revealed for the first time during the war in Spain (1808), when the people rose up against the French invaders. It was revealed again and fully confirmed by the campaign of 1812 in Russia, the consequences of which were catastrophic for the Napoleonic Empire.

As Napoleon himself acknowledged, the war against Russia was a fatal error. The first French statesman to comprehend the significance for France of an alliance with Russia, he directed his efforts toward attaining this goal. In negotiations with Paul I he came very close to concluding an alliance, but the assassination of the Russian emperor in March 1801 postponed this possibility for a long time. The Tilsit negotiations with Alexander I (1807) led to the creation of a Franco-Russian alliance that was very highly valued by Napoleon. However, at the time of the Erfurt meeting between the French and Russian emperors (1808), Franco-Russian clashes sharpened, particularly over the continental blockade and the Polish question. Napoleon I’s decision to go to war against Russia is evidence that, blinded by his successes and by his attempt to establish his rule over Europe, he had begun to lose the sense of reality that had once been his inherent strength.

The Patriotic War of 1812 destroyed Napoleon I’s Grand Army and gave great impetus to the national liberation struggle against the Napoleonic yoke in Europe. In the campaign of 1813, Napoleon was compelled to fight against the armies of the anti-Napoleonic coalition and against an unbreakable force—the insurgent peoples of Europe. Under these conditions, his defeat was inevitable. It was sealed by the allied entry into Paris in March 1814. Napoleon I was forced to abdicate on Apr. 6, 1814. The victorious allies allowed him to retain the title of “emperor” and gave him the island of Elba as a possession.

Napoleon I’s landing in France (Mar. 1, 1815) and the Hundred Days (Mar. 20-June 22, 1815) of his second reign demonstrated not only his talent but also, to a greater degree than any previous event in his career, the importance of the social forces supporting him. His unparalleled “conquest” of France in three weeks and without a single shot was possible only because the people considered him capable of expelling the Bourbons and other aristocrats from France. Napoleon I’s tragedy lay in his failure to rely fully on the people who supported him. This led to his defeat at Waterloo and to his second abdication (June 22, 1815). Exiled to the island of St. Helena, he died six years later, a prisoner of the British. In 1840 his remains were brought to Paris and entombed at the Hotel des Invalides.

WORKS

Corresponda nee publ. par ordre de L ’Empereur Napoleon III. . . , 32 vols. Paris, 1858–70.
Lettres inédites …. 2 vols. Paris, 1897.
Correspondance inédite. . . , 3 vols. Paris, 1912–13.
In Russian translation:
Izbr. proizv. Moscow, 1956.

REFERENCES

Marx, K., and F. Engels. Soch. 2nd ed., vol. 1, p. 374; vol. 2, p. 563; vol. 3, p. 184; vol. 7, pp. 510–13; vol. 11, pp. 134–37; vol. 14, pp. 38, 309–10, 322–23, 377; vol. 22, p. 30.
Marx, K., and F. Engels. Izbr. pis’ma. Moscow, 1953.
Engels, F. Izbr. voen. proizvedeniia. Moscow, 1956. (See Index of Names.)
Lenin, V. I. Poln. sobr. soch., 5th ed., vol. 30, pp. 5–6; vol. 34, p. 83; vol. 35, pp. 382–83.
Tarle, E. V. “Napoleon.” Soch., vol. 7. Moscow, 1959.
Manfred, A. Z. Napoleon Bonapart. Moscow, 1971.
Levitskii, N. A. Polkovodcheskoe iskusstvo Napoleona. Moscow, 1938.
Sorel, A. Evropa i frantsuzskaia revoliutsiia, vols. 5–8. St. Petersburg, 1906–08. (Translated from French.)
Vandal, A. Vozvyshenie Bonaparta. St. Petersburg, 1905. (Translated from French.)
Lefebvre, G. Napoléon. Paris, 1935.
Madelin, L. Histoire de Consultat et del’Empire, 16 vols. Paris, 1932–54.

A. Z. MANFRED

The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition (1970-1979). © 2010 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.

CPGB: The People’s Republic of Mongolia

The Mongol question has suddenly become of first-rate world importance. The Mongols, an ancient but little-known people who once ruled the whole of Asia, are now divided between four states. Many of them live in the Soviet Union, citizens of the Buryat-Mongol republic in Siberia or of the Kalmyk Autonomous Region on the lower Volga. Others, more numerous, are Chinese subjects inhabiting the provinces outside the Great Wall, Jehol, Chahar, Kan-su, etc. Others again, living in so-called Inner Mongolia, are divided between China and the Japanese vassal state of Manchukuo. But over the traditional home lands of the Mongols, the steppes, mountains and rivers north of the Gobi and stretching almost to Lake Baikal, so-called Outer Mongolia, flies the red flag of the Independent People’s Republic of Mongolia.

It is Japanese policy to gather the Mongols living outside the People’s Republic, those in Inner Mongolia and Manchukuo, and launch them in an attack on the People’s Republic. In this way, the Japanese hope to turn the line of Soviet defences in Siberia under the cloak of a struggle for Mongol “freedom.”

Every worker has, therefore, good reason for wanting to know what is the People’s Republic. Though Outer Mongolia did not become a republic until 1924 it won its final independence in 1921, when the Russian White Guardists led by Ungern-Sternberg, and paid by the Japanese, were defeated and broken up by a national rising organized and led by the Mongolian People’s Party, now called the Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party.

The revolution was a Mongolian one, its chief forces the Mongolian Red Army, only small Soviet Red Army forces giving help. As soon as the country was freed from invaders the Soviet forces withdrew and from that day to this have never crossed the Mongolian frontier.

A number of brilliant fighters and revolutionaries arose from the Mongols, mostly from the poorer Arats (nomad working people), though the first great Mongol leader, Sukhebatoz, who died in 1923, was from the former ruling classes.

From the heroes of those days, however, were formed the present leaders of the People’s Republic, Amer, the president; Gendun, the Prime Minister, a poor nomad by origin, whose name is already immortal among the Mongols; )cmid, the present commander-in-chief of the Red Army; rind Choibalsan, former heroic soldier, now Minister for Cattle-raising and Agriculture.

The Mongols are nomads, and before their revolution were under the domination of feudal chiefs, both lay and clerical. The revolution destroyed the power of the feudal nobility and Buddhist lamas, as well as driving out the Chinese and Russian merchants who were rapidly enslaving the people to foreign capital. A great democratic revolution placed power in the hands of the people (Arats), nationalized the land, minerals, forests and water, annulled debts, separated church and state, gave the people their own army, nationalized foreign trade, abolished all titles and introduced complete equality—national, religious, racial and sex—for all the working people.

The constitution adopted by the Republic in 1924 contained this important phrase: “In view of the fact that the real people all over the world aim at fundamentally destroying present capitalism and reaching socialism and communism, the foreign policy of our People’s Republic must correspond to the interests of the revolutionary masses and main tasks of the oppressed small nations and really revolutionary nations of the whole world.”

The People’s Republic, though not itself a socialist republic, has, therefore, always maintained the closest friendship with the peoples of the Soviet Union.

The path of the new Republic has not always been smooth, and many mistakes have been made. In 1927 the leadership in the Government and People’s Party had passed to the right wing, who held up the anti-feudal revolution and aimed at a capitalist development with Japanese and American help. Thanks to the energy of Gendun, then secretary of the People’s Party, and a small group of comrades, they were defeated and leadership passed to the left wing in the Party. The left also made mistakes, thinking it would be possible to bring the nomad Mongols directly to socialism, to destroy the power of the monasteries, and so on.

The clerical question in Mongolia is of great importance. Out of a population of just over 700,000, more than 90,000 live in the Buddhist monasteries, each of which is the centre of a so-called commune (djassa). The attempt to make the monks return to secular life by force, the mechanical formation of collective farms and ranches among people who could not understand them, led finally to the Government losing the confidence of many of the people.

Comrade Gendun again fought bitterly and almost alone for sanity. At the end of 1932 he was victorious and a new leadership in the Government and People’s Party was elected. The collective farms and compulsion in religious questions were abandoned, and the policy of gradually preparing the transition to a non-capitalist development replaced the attempt to emplant socialism by force.

Tremendous progress in education, health and general culture has now been made. Co-operation in marketing and distribution extends throughout the country and the Government has also a special commercial organization for dealing with private traders. The first factories have begun working at the capital, Ulan-Bator-Khoto, and there is now a small, well-organized Mongol working class, which may become a guarantee of the eventual triumph of non-capitalist development. There is an efficient motor transport system throughout the country, and much work has been done towards eliminating cattle disease.

The Red Army of the People’s Republic is now a highly disciplined, mechanized force, able to conduct extensive combined operations of motorized forces, cavalry, artillery and aeroplanes. Its leadership is excellent and should the Japanese either themselves invade the country or send in mercenaries led by the princes and monks of Inner Mongolia, they will find that no “walk-over” such as they experienced in Manchuria will be possible. They will be faced by a whole people ready and eager to fight for its national existence.

The Mongolian People’s Republic is a democratic state, a dictatorship of the people against the parasites and feudal hangers-on. It is creating prosperity for its people and is a fact of great significance in the history of Eastern peoples.

Source

American Party of Labor (APL): Let Us Build The People’s Movement On International Women’s Day!

“The entire party and country should hurl into the fire and break the neck of anyone who dared trample underfoot the sacred edict of the party on the defense of women’s rights.”
– Enver Hoxha, 1967

Possibly the first example of class stratification and exploitation in human history was the subjugation of women. In primitive communist society, there were no class distinctions, and women typically enjoyed the same respect and rights as men. The dawn of agriculture led to the subjugation of women and the rise of patriarchal society. Along with this came the division of humanity into classes, exploitation, and class struggle. For thousands of years, and in many parts of the world today, women have been, and often are, considered to be property. Even in some of the most progressive bourgeois nations, women face discrimination, super-exploitation, and objectification. Whether we speak of arranged marriage in those countries still languishing in near-feudal relations, or sexism in the most advanced nations, one fact remains, a fact which stands as an indictment of capitalist society for its utter failure to bring about equality and justice. That fact is simply that in almost any part of the world, being born female is to be born at a disadvantage, not a disadvantage decreed by nature, but by society.

Those who live in the liberal democracies of the West have often been guilty of focusing on the sexism which occurs in developing countries while ignoring their own faults, and apologists for some of the stricter varieties of Islam have often pointed out that the West does not respect women, instead it strips them of their dignity and turns them into commodities. In reality, both of these arguments are true.

In the West, open sexism seems even more prevalent than instances of open racism, and what is worse is that it is more likely to be tolerated. There are many people fighting and even risking their lives to bring about female equality in their own countries, and while we express solidarity with many of them, we Americans must also look to our own society and root out sexism wherever we may find it. Should we fail to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with our working sisters, we will have given up at least half of our strength.

In the interests of creating an environment of gender equality within the Party, the American Party of Labor has issued the following statement:

1. The Party strongly condemns discrimination against women in any form.

2. The Party also strongly condemns misogyny and the use of misogynistic language in reference to women.

3. The Party recognizes International Women’s Day, the 8th of March, and seeks to have it recognized as a national holiday of a socialist America.

4. We demand women’s right to organize militant feminist caucuses in the trade union movement, for the right of all our working class sisters to defend our interests as a class and as women.

5. We demand that women’s right to organized self-defense be respected and strengthened in the light of the rise of fascist paramilitarism.

6. We demand that all attacks on women community leaders cease immediately and that all political prisoners be freed, including, but not limited to, the cases of Chelsea Manning, Assata Shakur and Rasmea Odeh.

7. We fully support the movement to defend and expand access to women’s healthcare, including, but not limited to, the defense of Planned Parenthood, maternity rights and LGBT health centers.

8. We demand an end to police violence against queer women and oppressed nationality women; we support the defense and extension of democratic gains including, but not limited to, the defense of the Civil Rights Act and the struggle for community control of the police which has its roots in the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense.

9. We demand a withdrawal of all U.S. military bases in foreign countries in the interests of all peace-loving women of the world. We stand in unconditional solidarity with the revolutionary women of Palestine, Colombia, the Philippines and all other communities besieged by U.S. imperialism. We demand the liquidation of all “visiting forces agreements,” “labor export policies” and all other policies that facilitate imperialism, occupation, human trafficking and the domination of monopoly capital over the working women of the world.

10. The American Party of Labor wholeheartedly reaches out to working women from all over the world to join us in the struggle for the liberation of all humanity. The struggle for justice is inherently bound up with the struggle for gender equality. Our goal is a world in which we can stand shoulder-to-shoulder in equality, working for the common good of humanity.

Long Live International Women’s Day!

Source

100th Anniversary of the February Bourgeois-democratic Revolution in Russia

Draft Theses, March 4 (17), 1917

Information reaching Zurich from Russia at this moment, March 17, 1917 [1], is so scanty, and events in our country are developing so rapidly, that any judgement of the situation must of needs be very cautious.

Yesterday’s dispatches indicated that the tsar had already abdicated and that the new, Octobrist-Cadet government [2] had already made an agreement with other representatives of the Romanov dynasty. Today there are reports from England that the tsar has not yet abdicated, and that his whereabouts are unknown. This suggests that he is trying to put up resistance, organise a party, perhaps even an armed force, in an attempt to restore the monarchy. If he succeeds in fleeing from Russia or winning over part of the armed forces, the tsar might, to mislead the people, issue a manifesto announcing immediate conclusion of a separate peace with Germany!

That being the position, the proletariat’s task is a pretty complex one. There can be no doubt that it must organise itself in the most efficient way, rally all its forces, arm, strengthen and extend its alliance with all sections of the working masses of town and country in order to put up a stubborn resistance to tsarist reaction and crush the tsarist monarchy once and for all.

Another factor to bear in mind is that the new government that has seized power in St. Petersburg, or, more correctly, wrested it from the proletariat, which has waged a victorious, heroic and fierce struggle, consists of liberal bourgeois and landlords whose lead is being followed by Kerensky, the spokesman of the democratic peasants and, possibly, of that part of the workers who have forgotten their internationalism and have been led on to the bourgeois path. The new government is composed of avowed advocates and sup porters of the imperialist war with Germany, i.e., a war in alliance with the English and French imperialist governments, a war for the plunder and conquest of foreign lands—Armenia, Galicia, Constantinople, etc.

The new government cannot give the peoples of Russia (and the nations tied to us by the war) either peace, bread, or full freedom. The working class must therefore continue its fight for socialism and peace, utilising for this purpose the new situation and explaining it as widely as possible among the masses.

The new government cannot give the people peace, because it represents the capitalists and landlords and because it is tied to the English and French capitalists by treaties and financial commitments. Russian Social-Democracy must therefore, while remaining true to internationalism, first and foremost explain to the people who long for peace that it cannot be won under the present government. Its first appeal to the people (March 17) does not as much as mention the chief and basic issue of the time, peace. It is keeping secret the predatory treaties tsarism concluded with England, France, Italy, Japan, etc. It wants to conceal from the people the truth about its war programme, the fact that it stands for continuation of the war, for victory over Germany. It is not in a position to do what the people so vitally need: directly and frankly propose to all belligerent countries an immediate ceasefire, to be followed by peace based on complete liberation of all the colonies and dependent and unequal nations. That requires a workers’ government acting in alliance with, first, the poorest section of the rural population, and, second, the revolutionary workers of all countries in the war.

The new government cannot give the people bread. And no freedom can satisfy the masses suffering from hunger due to shortages and inefficient distribution of available stocks, and, most important, to the seizure of these stocks by the landlords and capitalists. It requires revolutionary measures against the landlords and capitalists to give the people bread, and such measures can be carried out only by a workers’ government.

Lastly, the new government is not, in a position to give the people full freedom, though in its March 17 manifesto it speaks of nothing but political freedom and is silent on other, no less important, issues. The new government has already endeavoured to reach agreement with the Romanov dynasty, for it has suggested recognising the Romanovs, in defiance of the people’s will, on the understanding that Nicholas II would abdicate in favour of his son, with a member of the Romanov family appointed regent. In its manifesto, the new government promises every kind of freedom, but has failed in its direct and unconditional duty immediately to implement such freedoms as election of officers, etc., by the soldiers, elections to the St. Petersburg, Moscow and other City Councils on a basis of genuinely universal, and not merely male, suffrage, make all government and public buildings available for public meetings, appoint elections to all local institutions and Zemstvos, likewise on the basis of genuinely universal suffrage, repeal all restrictions on the rights of local government bodies, dismiss all officials appointed to supervise local government bodies, introduce not only freedom of religion, but also freedom from religion, immediately separate the school from the church and free it of control by government officials, etc.

The new government’s March 17 manifesto arouses the deepest distrust, for it consists entirely of promises and does not provide for the immediate carrying out of a single one of the vital measures that can and should be carried out right now.

The new government’s programme does not contain a single word on the eight-hour day or on any other economic measure to improve the worker’s position. It contains not a single word about land for the peasants, about the uncompensated transfer to the peasants of all the estates. By its silence on these vital issues the new government reveals its capitalist and landlord nature.

Only a workers’ government that relies, first, on the overwhelming majority of the peasant population, the farm labourers and poor peasants, and, second, on an alliance with the revolutionary workers of all countries in the war, can give the people peace, bread and full freedom.

The revolutionary proletariat can therefore only regard the revolution of March 1 (14) as its initial, and by no means complete, victory on its momentous path. It cannot but set itself the task of continuing the fight for a democratic republic and socialism.

To do that, the proletariat and the R.S.D.L.P. must above all utilise the relative and partial freedom the new government is introducing, and which can be guaranteed and extended only by continued, persistent and persevering revolutionary struggle.

The truth about the present government and its real attitude on pressing issues must be made known to all working people in town and country, and also to the army. Soviets of Workers’ Deputies must be organised, the workers must be armed. Proletarian organisations must be extended to the army (which the new government has likewise promised political rights) and to the rural areas. In particular there must be a separate class organisation for farm labourers.

Only by making the truth known to the widest masses of the population, only by organising them, can we guarantee full victory in the next stage of the revolution and the winning of power by a workers’ government.

Fulfilment of this task, which in revolutionary times and under the impact of the severe lessons of the war can be brought home to the people in an immeasurably shorter time than under ordinary conditions, requires the revolutionary proletarian party to be ideologically and organisation ally independent. It must remain true to internationalism and not succumb to the false bourgeois phraseology meant to dupe the people by talk of “defending the fatherland” in the present imperialist and predatory war.

Not only this government, but even a democratic bourgeois republican government, were it to consist exclusively of Kerensky and other Narodnik and “Marxist” social-patriots, cannot lead the people out of the imperialist war and guarantee peace.

For that reason we cannot consent to any blocs, or alliances, or even agreements with the defencists among the workers, nor with the Gvozdyov-Potresov-Chkhenkeli Kerensky, etc., trend, nor with men who, like Chkheidze and others, have taken a vacillating and indefinite stand on this   crucial issue. Those agreements would not only inject an element of falseness in the minds of the masses, making them dependent on the Russian imperialist bourgeoisie, but would also weaken and undermine the leading role of the proletariat in ridding the people of imperialist war and guaranteeing a genuinely durable peace between the workers’ governments of all countries.

 

 

Notes

[1] The first news of the February bourgeois-democratic revolution in Russia reached Lenin on March 2 (15), 1917. Reports of the victory of the revolution and the advent to power of an Octobrist-Cadet government of capitalists and landlords appeared in the Zürcher Post and Neue Zürcher Zeitung by the evening of March 4 (17). Lenin had drawn up a rough draft of theses, not meant for publication, on the tasks of the protetariat in the revolution. The theses were immediately sent via Stockholm to Oslo for the Bolsheviks leaving for Russia.

[2] Lenin uses the appellation Octobrist-Cadet to describe the bourgeois Provisional Government formed at 3 p.m. on March 2 (15), 1917 by agreement between the Provisional Committee of the State Duma and the Socialist-Revolutionary and Menshevik leaders of the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies. The government was made up of Prince G. Y. Lvov (Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior), the Cadet leader P. N. Milyukov (Minister of Foreign Affairs), the Octobrist leader A. I. Guchkov (Minister of War and Acting Minister of the Navy) and other representatives of the big bourgeoisie and landlords. It also included A. F. Kerensky, of the Trudovik group, who was appointed Minister of Justice.

The manifesto of March 4 (17) mentioned by Lenin later on was originally drawn up by Menshevik members of the Petrograd Soviet Executive Committee. It set out the terms on which the Executive was prepared to support the Provisional Government. In the course of negotiations with the Duma Committee, it was revised by P. N. Milyukov and became the basis of the Provisional Government’s first appeal to the people.

Source

Communist League: On Terrorism

REPRINT FROM COMBAT – Journal of the Communist League – March 1975.

TERRORISM OR REVOLUTION?

The last decade has witnessed the emergence of a number of terrorist groups in various countries, together with the adoption of terrorist tactics by a number of national liberation groups. Britain for example, has experienced the bombing campaigns of the “Angry Brigade,” purporting to be a protest against corporatist and racist legislation and of the Provisional Irish Republican Army, purporting to form part of the Irish struggle for national liberation. In some countries, such as India, even groups claiming to be “Marxist-Leninist” pursue terrorist tactics.

IT IS THEREFORE IMPORTANT THAT WE SHOULD BE CLEAR ON THE MARXIST-LENINIST ATTITUDE TOWARDS TERRORISM.

A “Punishment for Opportunism”

The victory of revisionism in the international communist movement has transformed the Communist Parties of most countries into parties which objectively serve the interests of monopoly capital by preaching the illusion of “peaceful, parliamentary transition to socialism.” These parties are seen ever more clearly by those who have become rebels against the evils of modern capitalist society to have become “left-wing” opportunist parties, drawn more and more into the political machinery of the capitalist state as instruments of deception of the working people.

In the absence of scientific parties of socialist revolution, it is inevitable that rebelliousness should manifest itself to a certain extent in the form of unscientific “leftist” activity such as terrorism.

In speaking of anarchism of which terrorism is one of the two fundamental concepts (the other being repudiation of the state in all its forms), Lenin made precisely this point when he described it as “a sort of punishment for opportunism” in the working class movement:

“Anarchism was often a sort of punishment for the opportunist sins of the working class movement. Both monstrosities mutually supplemented each other.”

(V. I. Lenin: “’Left-wing Communism’, An Infantile Disorder”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 10; London; 1946; p. 71).

Petty-bourgeois Rebelliousness

The rebelliousness which manifests itself in the form of terrorism is essentially that of persons drawn from, or with the outlook of, the petty-bourgeoisie:

“Petty-bourgeois revolutionariness, which smacks of, or borrows something from anarchism . . in all essentials falls short of the conditions and requirements of sustained proletarian class struggle. . . The small proprietor, the small master, (a social type that is represented in many European countries on a wide mass scale) . . easily becomes extremely revolutionary, but is incapable of displaying perseverance, discipline and staunchness. The petty bourgeois in a ‘frenzy’ over the horrors of capitalism is a social phenomenon which, like anarchism, is characteristics of all capitalist countries. The instability of such revolutionariness, its barrenness, its liability to become swiftly transformed into submission, apathy, something fantastic, and even into a ‘mad’ infatuation with one or another bourgeois ‘fad’ — all this is a matter of common knowledge.”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid; p. 70-71).

The petty bourgeoisie is a class which is in process of rapid destruction by monopoly capital – so that, anarchism must be seen as a political reflection of the desperate and futile striving of the petty bourgeois to retain his individual freedom:

“The philosophy of the anarchists is bourgeois philosophy turned inside out. Their individualistic theories and their individualistic ideal are the very opposite of socialism. Their views express, not the future of bourgeois society, which is striding with irresistible force towards the socialisation of labour, but the present and even the past of that society, the domination of blind chance over the scattered and isolated small producer.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Socialism and Anarchism”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 10; Moscow; 1962; p. 73).

“The point is that Marxism and anarchism are built up on entirely different principles in spite of the fact that both come into the arena of struggle under the flag of socialism. The cornerstone of anarchism is the individual, whose emancipation, according to its tenets, is the principal condition for the emancipation of the masses, the collective body. According to the tenets of anarchism, the emancipation of the masses is impossible until the individual is emancipated. Accordingly, its slogan is: ‘Everything for the individual’. The cornerstone of Marxism, however, is the masses, whose emancipation, according to its tenets, is the principal condition for the emancipation of the individual. That is to say, according to the tenets of Marxism, the emancipation of the individual is impossible until the masses are emancipated. Accordingly, its slogan is: “Everything for the masses!”

(J. V. Stalin: “Anarchism or Socialism?”, in: “Works”,’ Volume 1; Moscow; 1952; p. 299).

Terrorism and economism (the theory that the working class can be expected to engage only in economic, and not political, struggles) have common, roots in the “theory of spontaneity” — which rejects the possibility of elevating the working class to socialist consciousness through the propaganda and day-to-day leadership of a vanguard party:

“The Economists and the modern terrorists spring from a common root, namely, subservience to spontaneity… At first sight, our assertion may appear paradoxical, for the difference between these two appears to be so enormous: one stresses the ‘drab everyday struggle’ and the other calls for the most self-sacrificing struggle of individuals. But this is not a paradox. The Economists and terrorists merely bow to different poles of spontaneity: the Economists bow to the spontaneity of the ‘pure and simple’ labour movements while the terrorists bow to the spontaneity of the passionate indignation of the intellectuals, who are either incapable of linking up the revolutionary struggle with the labour movement, or lack the opportunity to do so. It is very difficult indeed for those who have lost their belief, or who have never believed that this is possible, to find some other outlet for their indignation and revolutionary energy than terror.”

(V. I. Lenin: “What Is to be Done?”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 2; London; 1944; p. 94).

“The present-day terrorists are really ‘economists’ turned inside out, going to the equally foolish but opposite extreme.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Revolutionary Adventurism in Collected Works”, Volume 6 Moscow; 1961; p. 192.

Thus terrorism — like economism — reflects the lack of faith of the petty bourgeoisie in the masses of the working people. Reviewing a leaflet issued by the Socialist-Revolutionaries in 1902, Lenin remarks:

“The April 3 leaflet follows the pattern of the terrorists’ latest arguments with remarkable accuracy. The first thing that strike’s the eye is the words: ‘we advocate terrorism, not in place of work among the masses, but precisely for and simultaneously with that work’. They strike the eye particularly because these words are printed in letters three times as large as the rest of the text. But just read the whole leaflet and you will see that the protestation in bold type takes the name of the masses in vain. The day “when the working people will emerge from the shadows’ and ‘the mighty popular wave will shatter the iron gates to smithereens’ ‘alas’ (literally, ‘alas!’) ‘is still a long way off, and it is frightful to think of the future toll of victims!’ Do not these words ‘alas, still a long way off’ – reflect an utter failure to understand the mass movement and a lack of faith in it?”

(V. I. Lenin: ibid.; p.190-91).

“Individual” Terrorism

In repudiating terrorism, Marxist-Leninists are speaking, of course, of what is generally termed “individual terrorism”, such acts as the assassination of a reactionary judge or the planting of a car-bomb outside the office of a government department.

In the sense of “attempting to strike terror into an enemy” Marxist-Leninists by no means reject the use of terrorism.

The socialist revolution can be brought about only against the armed men who form the core of the machinery of force of the capitalist state, and one of the aims of armed struggle is to strike terror into the enemy and so facilitate his defeat.

Again, one of the functions of a state is to strike terror into those who might attempt to overthrow it. Thus, the dictatorship of the working class which must be installed on the victory of the socialist revolution has as one of its aims to strike terror into the overthrown capitalist class, and its active supporters, so as to restrain their desire to overthrow the power of the working class.

Marxist-Leninists, therefore, repudiate individual terrorism not on the grounds that terrorism — in the sense of striking terror into the enemy – is unethical, but because acts of individual terrorism harm the cause they purport to serve:

“In principle we have never rejected, and cannot reject terror. Terror is one of the forms of military action that may ..be perfectly suitable and even essential at a definite juncture in the battle, given a definite state of the troops and the existence of definite conditions. But the important point is that terror, at the present time, is by no means suggested as an operation for the army in the field, an operation closely connected with and integrated into the entire system of struggle. Without a central body and with weakness of local revolutionary organsations, this in fact, is all that terror can be. We, therefore, declare emphatically that under the present conditions such a means of struggle is inopportune and unsuitable; that it diverts the most active fighters from their real task, the task which is most important from the standpoint of the interests of the. movement as a whole, it disorganises the forces not of the government, but of the revolution.”

(V. I.,Lenin: “Where to Begin”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 5;
Moscow; 1961; p. 19).

“Of course, we reject individual terrorism only out of considerations of expediency; upon those who ‘on principle’ were capable of condemning the terror of the Great French Revolution, or the terror in general employed by a victorious revolutionary party which is besieged by the bourgeoisie of the whole-world – upon such people even Plekhanov in 1900-0, when he was a Marxist, and a revolutionary, heaped ridicule and scorn.”

(V. I. Lenin: “‘Left-wing’ Communism, an Infantile Disorder”, in: ‘Selected Works”, Volume 10; London; 1946;.p.72).

While no one individual is generally capable of planning and carrying out a series of terrorist acts, such acts constitute “individual terrorism” in so far as the organisations involved in them are extremely small, composed of a few skilled persons (usually petty bourgeois intellectuals), and secret (to the working class if not to the police).

The Spurious Arguments for Terrorism

The advocates of terrorism argue that terrorist acts weaken the capitalist state machine and so assist the revolutionary process.

But if a judge is assassinated, there are a dozen reactionary barristers waiting to step into his shoes; if a courthouse is destroyed, it can be rebuilt at the cost of the working people. The strength of the state relative to that of a small terrorist group, and the protective measures which the state has the power to take when a threat of terrorist acts becomes apparent, causes terrorism to be directed increasingly against the less well defended — because less important — aspects of the state. Indeed, this process often results in the activity of terrorist groups, in an effort to evade the defences erected by the state degenerating into mere indiscriminate acts of destruction in which working people are killed and maimed.

Reviewing the leaflet of the Socialist-Revolutionaries already mentioned, Lenin poured scorn on the illusion that the state, could be significantly weakened by acts of terrorism:

“Just listen to what follows: ‘every terrorist blow, as it were, takes away part of the strength of the autocracy and transfers (!) all this strength (!) to the side of the fighters for freedom’ . ‘And if terrorism is practised systematically (!) it is obvious that the scales of the balance will finally weigh down on our side’. Yes, indeed, it is obvious to all that we have here in its grossest form one of the greatest prejudices of the terrorists: political assassination of itself ‘transfers strength.”

(V.I.Lenin “Revolutionary Adventurism”, In: “Collected Works”, Volume 6, Moscow; 1961; p. 191).

The advocates of terrorism also argue that terrorist acts “excite” the masses to greater revolutionary enthusiasm.

This theory too was discussed by Lenin:

“It would be interesting to note here the specific arguments that ‘Svoboda’ (a terrorist group– Ed.) advanced in defence of terrorism. It . . . stresses its excitative significance. . . . .It is difficult to imagine an argument that disproves itself more than this one does! Are there not enough outrages committed in Russian life that a special ‘stimulant’ has to be invented? On the other hand, is it not obvious that those who are not, and cannot be aroused to excitement even by Russian tyranny will stand by ‘twiddling their thumbs’ –even while a handful of terrorists are engaged in a single combat with the government? The fact is, however, that that the masses of the workers are roused to a high pitch of excitement by the outrages committed in Russian life, but we are unable to collect, if one may put it that way, and concentrate all these drops and streamlets of popular excitement, which are called forth by the conditions of Russian life to a far larger extent than we imagine, but which it is precisely necessary to combine into a single gigantic-flood.. . Calls for terror . . are merely forms of evading the most pressing duty that now rests upon Russian revolutionaries, namely, to organise all-sided political agitation. ‘Svoboda’ desires to substitute terror for agitation, openly admitting that ‘as soon as intensified and strenuous agitation is commenced among the masses its excitative function will be finished”‘

(V I Lenin: “What Is. to be Done?.”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 2. London; 1944; p. 96-97).

“Nor does the leaflet eschew the theory of excitative terrorism. ‘Each time a hero engages in single combat, this arouses in us all a spirit of struggle and courage’, we are told. But . . . single combat has the immediate effect of simply creating a short-lived sensation, while indirectly it even leads to apathy and passive waiting for the next bout, We are further assured that ‘every flash of terrorism lights up the mind’ which unfortunately, we have not noticed to be the case with the terrorism preaching party of the Socialist-Revolutionaries.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Revolutionary Adventurism” in: “Collected Works”; Volume 6; Moscow; 1961; p. 193).

A Pretext for Repression

The Marxist-Leninist case against terrorism is not merely that it amounts
to a repudiation of the need for the political mobilisation of the masses
of the working class — the force which alone is capable of smashing the
state machinery of force of monopoly capital:

‘Their tactics (i.e., of the anarchists — Ed.) . . . amount to a repudiation of the political struggle, disunite the proletarians and convert them in fact into passive participators in one bourgeois policy, or another.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Socialism and Anarchism”; “Collected Works”; ‘Volume 10, Moscow; 1963; p. 73).

In fact, far from weakening the state, acts of terrorism provide the pretext for the strengthening of the state machinery of force and for the imposition of repressive measures against the genuine progressive movement — measures which, without that pretext, would arouse much more vigorous opposition from the working people. In this respect, terrorist groups, whatever their intentions, objectively assist monopoly capital.

Thus, the counter-productive hi-jacking of civilian airliners by Arab terrorists was, used by King Hussein of Jordan as the pretext for a war of extermination in September 1970 against the Palestine liberation forces in Jordan, an act necessary to the new policy of US imperialism in the Middle East.

And in Britain terrorist acts have provided the pretext for the strengthening of Special Branch., for police raids on the homes of-anti-fascists and the offices of anti-fascist organisations, for pressure to reduce the rights of defendants in political trials, for the repeated army/police manoeuvres at London Airport, and for the “draconic” powers given to the police by the Labour government.

Agents Provocateurs

An agent of the class enemy who succeeds in entering a revolutionary, or pseudo-revolutionary, organisation is generally an agent of the state intelligence service. His aim, in doing so may simply be to collect information about the members, leaders, strength, etc.; of the organisation for the benefit of the state (that is, to act as a spy), or it may also be to seek to incite the members of the Organisation to commit a terrorist act which would provide a pretext- — a pretext that would seem a reasonable one to wide sections of working people — for some repressive measure or measures on the part of the state (that is, to act as an agent provocateur).

Where it is not possible to incite a terrorist group to commit a terrorist act desired by the state, this may be performed directly by the intelligence service itself. And where one or more terrorist groups exist, it is difficult or impossible for an outsider to know whether a particular act of terrorism has been carried out by such a group or by the intelligence service. In either case, however, the act may provide the pretext for some repressive measure or measures on the part of the state directed at the genuine progressive movement.

The most notorious example of such a terrorist act carried but by the state itself is, of course, the burning of the Reichstag in 1933 to provide the pretext for the repression of the Communist Party of Germany, even though that party was completely opposed to the carrying out of such acts of terrorism.

Within a genuine revolutionary organisation, it, is difficult to distinguish an agent provocateur from an honest, but misguided, exponent of “left” adventurism; indeed this distinction can be made, not on the basis of political analysis, but only by means of counter-intelligence activity which reveals the agent’s connection with the state.

But an agent provocateur is powerless to incite an act of terrorism on the part of a genuine revolutionary organisation unless there is support for such acts on the part of a majority of the members. The cardinal task, therefore, is to expose terrorism politically to its honest, but misguided, supporters, thus isolating the agent provocateur and opening the way to his exposure to the members and supporters of the organisation and his expulsion from it:

“We must get the workers to understand that while the killing of spies, agents provocateurs and traitors may sometimes of course, be absolutely unavoidable, it is highly undesirable and mistaken to make a system of it, and that we must strive to create an organisation which will be able to render spies innocuous by exposing them and tracking them down. It is impossible to do away with all spies, but to create an organisation which will ferret them out and educate the working class masses is both possible and necessary.“

(V. I. Lenin. Footnote to: ‘ Letter to a Comrade on Our Organisational Tasks”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 6; Moscow; 1961; p. 245).

And, of course, given a partially clandestine organisation with adequate security measures and tight discipline, the harm which agents may do to a Marxist-Leninist Party may be limited, and they can even be compelled to do positive Party work – as Lenin pointed out in the case of the tsarist police agent Roman Malinovsky:

“In 1912 … an agent provacateur, Malinovsy got into the Central Committee, of the Bolsheviks. He betrayed scores and scores of the best and msot loyal comrades, caused them to be sent to penal servitude and hastened the death of many of them. If he did not cause even more harm than he did, it was because we had established proper coordination between our legal and illegal work. As a member of the Central Committee of the Party and a deputy in the Duma, Malinovsky was forced, in order to gain our confidence, to aid us in establishing legal daily paper. While with one hand Malinovsky sent scores and scores of the best Bolsheviks to penal servitude, and to death, with the other he was compelled to assist in the education of scores and scores of thousands of new Bolsheviks through the medium of the legal press.”

(V.I. Lenin: ‘Left-wing’ Communism, an Infantile Disorder”, in: “Selected Works”, Volume 10; London; 1946; p. 85).

Guerrilla Warfare

Socialist revolution involves armed struggle — that is civil war – between, on the one hand, the machinery of force under the leadership of it’s Marxist-Leninist vanguard party, and on the other hand – the machinery of force of the capitalist state.

Guerrilla warfare is a form of armed struggle waged by relatively small
units of armed men against a considerably stronger armed force – in the
case of revolutionary guerrilla warfare against the armed force of a
reactionary state. The essence of guerrilla military tactics is to make
localised “hit-and-run” attacks on the weakest and most exposed sectors of the enemy’s forces, so nibbling away at his strength without the losses to one’s own forces that would result from a direct confrontation with his main forces.
Thus, revolutionary guerrilla warfare must be seen as a development of the struggle for socialist revolution — when this has reached the stage of armed struggle:

Firstly, before this armed struggle has reached the stage of a country-wide armed uprising, and

Secondly, when it has reached the stage of a country-wide armed uprising in the intervals between major engagements:

“The phenomenon in which we are interested (i.e., guerrilla warfare – Ed.) – is the armed struggle. It is conducted by individuals and by small groups […] Guerrilla warfare is an inevitable form of` struggle at a time when the mass movement has actually reached the point of an uprising and when fairly large intervals occur between the ‘big engagements’ in the civil war [….] An uprising cannot assume the old form of individual acts restricted to a very short time and to a very small area. It is absolutely natural and inevitable that the uprising should assume the higher and more complex form of a prolonged civil war embracing the whole country […] Such a war cannot be conceived otherwise than as a series of a few big engagements at comparatively long intervals and a large number of small encounters during these intervals. That being so — and it is undoubtedly so – the Social-Democrats (i.e., Marxist Leninists – Ed.) must absolutely make it their duty to create organisations best adapted to lead, the masses in these big engagements and, as far as possible, in these small encounters as well.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Guerrilla Warfare”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 11; Moscow; 1962; p. 216, 219, 222-23).

Revolutionary guerrilla warfare has three principal aims:

Firstly, to weaken the military and para-military armed forces of the capitalist state (and of fascist militia) by killing their officers and men:

“The Party must regard the fighting guerrilla operations of the squads affiliated or associated with it as being, in principle, permissible and advisable in the present period; [….] the paramount immediate object of these operations is to destroy the government, police and military machinery, and to wage a relentless struggle against the active Black Hundred Organisations (i.e. rural fascist-type organisations — Ed.) which are using violence against the population and intimidating it.”

(V. I. Lenin: Draft Resolution for Unity Congress of RSDLP, 1906, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 10; Moscow; 1962; p. 154).

“In the first place, this (guerrilla – Ed.) struggle aims at assassinating individuals, chiefs or subordinates, in the army and police.”

(V.I. Lenin: “Guerrilla Warfare”,- in: “Collected Works”, Volume 11; Moscow; 1962; p. 216).

Secondly, to give practical military training to working class leaders:

“The character of these fighting guerrilla operations must be adjusted to the task of training leaders of the masses of the workers at a time of insurrection, and of acquiring experience in conducting offensive and surprise military operations.”

(V. I. Lenin: Draft Resolution for Unity Congress of RSDLP, 1906, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 10; Moscow; 1962; p.154).

Thirdly, to confiscate funds in the possession of the capitalist
class for the use of the revolutionary movement:

“In the second place, it (i.e., guerrilla warfare — Ed.) aims at the confiscation of monetary funds both from the government and from private persons. The confiscated funds go into the treasury of the Party, partly for the special purpose of arming and preparing for an uprising, and partly for the maintenance of the persons engaged in the struggle we are describing.”

(V. I. Lenin: “Guerrilla Warfare”, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 11; Moscow; 1962; p. 216).

“Fighting operations are also permissible for the purpose of seizing funds belonging to the enemies, i.e., the autocratic government, to meet the needs of insurrection, particular care being taken so that the interests of the people are infringed as little as possible.”

(V. I. Lenin: Draft Resolution for Unity Congress of RSDLP, l906, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 10; Moscow; 1962; p.154).

(So deep was the respect for private property inculcated in the minds of a majority of the delegates to the 1906 Congress of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party, that the congress approved guerrilla warfare for the purpose of killing soldiers and police, but rejected Lenin’s clause approving it for the purpose of confiscating funds from the ruling class for the financing of the revolutionary movement).

At first glance, the distinction between terrorism (which Marxist-Leninists oppose), and revolutionary guerrilla warfare (which Marxist-Leninists support) seems blurred. In fact, however, the distinction is quite clear.

In the first place, guerrilla warfare becomes a correct revolutionary tactic only when it has the support of the mass of the working people in the locality in which it is carried out:

“Fighting guerrilla organisations must be conducted ….. such a way as . .to ensure that the state of the working class movement and the mood of the broad masses of the given locality are taken into account.”

(V. I.. Lenin: Draft Resolution to Unity Congress of RSDLP 1906, In “Collected Works”; Volume l0; Moscow; 1961; p. 154).

In the second place, and following from the above, guerrilla war becomes a
revolutionary tactic only when the class struggle has been elevated, as a result of correct day-to-day leadership by the Marxist-Leninist Party, to the stage where the mass of the working people have come to see the armed-forces of the capitalist state and the fascist bands as their irreconcilable enemies who must be fought — for only then will this guerrilla warfare have the support of the mass of the working people in the locality in which it is carried out. Terrorist acts, on the other hand, are carried out before this stage has been reached and in isolation from the class struggle of the working people:

“This act (i.e., the assassination of Sipyagin –Ed) was in no way connected with the masses, and moreover could, not have been by reason of the very way in which it was carried out –that the persons who committed this terrorist act neither counted on nor hoped for any definitive action nor support on the part of the masses. In their naivete, the Socialist-Revolutionaries do not realise that their predilection for terrorism is most intimately linked with the fact that, from the very outset, they have always kept, and still keep, aloof from the working class movement, without even attempting to become a party of the revolutionary class which is waging the class struggle.”

(Lenin: “Revolutionary Adventurism”; In “Collected Works” Volume 6; Moscow; 1961; p. 189).

In the third place, guerrilla warfare becomes a correct revolutionary tactic in the special circumstance that it is conducted under the control of the Marxist-Leninist Party:

“Fighting guerrilla organisations must be conducted under the control of the Party.”

(V. I. Lenin: Draft Resolution for the Unity Congress of RSDLP, l906, in: “Collected Works”, Volume 10; Moscow, 1961; p. 154).

The principles of guerrilla warfare advocated by “Che” Guevara are,thus completely opposed to the principles of Marxism-Leninism:

“The revolutionary guerrilla force is clandestine. It is born and develops secretly […] The guerrilla force is independent of the civilian population in action as well as in military organisation; consequently it need not assume the direct defence of the peasant population […] Eventually the future People’s Army will beget the party […] The people’s army will be the nucleus of the party, not vice versa. The guerrilla force is the political vanguard in nuce, and from its development a real party can arise […] That is why, at the present juncture, the principal stress must be laid on the development of guerrilla warfare and not on the strengthening of existing parties or the creation of new parties’,”

(R. Debray: “Revolution in the Revolution?”; London; 1968; p.41, 105, 115).

The castroite principles of guerrilla warfare form part of an anti-Marxist
Leninist revolutionary strategy which serves the interests of the national
bourgeoisie of a colonial-type country with a weak state machinery of
force. (This question is analysed in more detail in “The Theory of the
in: RED VANGUARD,. No. l; p.83f).

Contemporary Lessons

The Provisional Irish Republican Army is an armed force of the Irish national-liberation movement. It is, however, not led by a Marxist-Leninist Party of the working class, which does not at present exist in Ireland, but by representatives of the Irish national bourgeoisie, who wish for independence from Britain in order to develop the country as an independent capitalist state.

As long as the Provisional IRA was seen by the people of the Catholic areas of Northern Ireland as their defence against the armed forces and police of the colonial regime, and the fascist bands which had the “open support of the police, it had their enthusiastic support. To the extent however, that the IRA has turned to tactics of terrorism, often of an indiscriminate character in which working people have been killed and maimed, this support has been whittled away — and this has tended to make terrorism, increasingly the only form of activity which it is physically able to undertake.

In Britain, too, the effect of indiscriminate bombing by the Provisional IRA has been to alienate sympathy from the Irish national-liberation struggle among the British working class, which is, objectively, the ally of the Irish people in the struggle against their common enemy British imperialism.

The use that British imperialism can make of a movement whose activity is predominantly of a terrorist character was pointed out in a recent issue of CLASS AGAINST CLASS on the plan under consideration by the British imperialists for the creation of a united neo-colonial Ireland by creating the pretext for the military intervention in Northern Ireland of the army of the Republic of Ireland:

“The aim is, under the slogan of ‘allowing the people of Northern Ireland to settle their own problems’, to permit the restoration of a fascist-type of state machine in Northern Ireland dominated by the right-wing Protestant leaders. These leaders are already pledging themselves to the pogroms against the ‘Catholic population which will inevitably follow — that, is, they are pledging themselves not to carry out such pogroms unless the Provisional IRA renews its campaign.”

(“Ireland: New Tactics of British Imperialism”; in: CLASS AGAINST CLASS, No. 6; June 1974; p. 8).

The British imperialists calculate that the Provisional IRA, as a result of its turn to tactics of terrorism, has lost too much strength and support to be capable of defending the Catholic population, so that the call for the “protective” intervention of the armed forces of the Republic will come from the Catholic working people of Northern Ireland themselves.

Again, one of the most important tasks facing the British working class is the organisation of an anti-fascist united front, properly organised and with a correct tactical programme. Even at this early stage of the anti-fascist movement, certain maoist groups (such as the “Communist Party of England (Marxist-Leninist) and trotskyite groups (such as the International Marxist Group) have begun to launch assaults upon the police during anti-National Front demonstrations. But an assault upon the armed forces of the state becomes a correct tactic of revolutionary guerrilla warfare in a developed capitalist country only when the class struggle has reached a much higher level of development and when it is directed by a Marxist-Leninist Party, which does not yet exist in Britain.

Such assaults on the police as that which took place in Red Lion Square
in 1974, being completely premature, constitute mere terrorism, which tends to disorganise the embryo anti-fascist movement and provide the pretext for police violence and repressive measures on the part of the state against genuine anti-fascists “Leftist” groups which carry out such actions at the present time are objectively assisting fascism.

Conclusion

Terrorism, whatever the motives of the terrorists, objectively serves the interests of the forces opposed to social and national liberation. It is necessary for Marxist-Leninists, therefore, to expose terrorism for what it is, and to wage a principled and consistent struggle against this ideology, in line with Lenin’s formula:

“Bolshevism grew, took shape and became hardened, in long years of struggle against petty-bourgeois revolutionariness, which smacks of, or borrows something from, anarchism, and which in all essentials falls short, of the conditions and, requirements of the sustained proletarian class struggle.”

(V. I. Lenin.: ‘”Left-wing’ Communism”, an Infantile Disorder”, in: “Selected Works Volume .10; London; 1946; p.70).

Source

Fidel Castro on the Character of the Cuban Revolution

“At any rate, you wish to write that this is a socialist revolution, right? And write it, then… Yes, not only did we destroy a tyrannical system. We also destroyed the philoimperialistic bourgeois state apparatus, the bureaucracy, the police, and a mercenary army. We abolished privileges, annihilated the great landowners, threw out foreign monopolies for good, nationalized almost every industry, and collectivized the land. We are fighting now to liquidate once and for all the exploitation of man over man, and to build a completely new society, with a new class contents. The Americans (Cubans say just that, los americanos, to mean the United States) the Americans and the priests say that this is communism. We know very well that it is not. At any rates, the word does not frighten us. They can say whatever they wish. There is a song, which is popular among our peasants, that goes more or less like this: ‘Bird of ill omen — of treason and cowardice — that are throwing at my joy — the word: communism! — I know nothing about these ‘isms’ — Yet, if such a great welfare conquest — which can be been by my own eyes — is communism, then — you can even call me a communist!”

– Fidel Castro, “L’Unita Interview with Fidel Castro: The Nature of Cuban Socialism”