Lev Kamenev
[The following is a written version of the speech given by
me on the 18th November at the session held by the Moscow
Committee, enlarged by the active Party functionaries, and
repeated on 19th November at the session of the Communist
fraction of the Trade Union Council, and on 21st November at
the conference of military functionaries.—L.K.]
Comrades! The subject of my speech will be Comrade Trotsky’s
latest publication, the article which appeared on the eve of
the seventh anniversary of the October revolution, and
entitled by its author “The Lessons of October.”
Trotsky presents the Party with books fairly frequently.
Hitherto we have not thought it necessary to pay much
attention to these books, although it
is not difficult to find in many of them various deviations
from Bolshevism, from the official ideology of our Party. But
this book must be accorded special attention, and subjected
to a thorough analysis, the more that Comrade Trotsky has
selected the theme of the “Lessons of October” for his last
publication.
As our whole Party, the whole Communist International, the
whole international Labour movement and the whole working
youth, are learning the lessons taught by the October
revolution, and will continue to learn theirs, it is not
possible to consider the interpretation of these lessons as
the private affair of this or that writer. As the “Lessons
of October” appears with the countenance of the Party, and
as it has been written by a member of the C.C. and the
political bureau of our Party, which—and this is no
secret—is the leading Party in the Comintern, then it is
perfectly clear that we are threatened by the danger of
having such proclamations, such “lessons,” accepted as text
book by not only our youthful members, but also by the whole
Comintern. And the form assumed by Comrade Trotsky’s work
shows it to aim at being a text book for the Comintern.
All who have read the article are bound to see that it
appeals not only to our Party, but the international
proletariat as well, and to the Communist Parties of all
countries. And thus it
is not a matter of private opinion, but a political conflict
concerning the whole Party. Should any comrades maintain
that the conflict aroused by Comrade Trotsky’s book is
merely a conflict between Trotsky, Bucharin, Zinoviev,
Stalin, and Kamenev, a difference of opinion between
literates, these comrades would prove that they are unable
to grasp the real interests of the Party. Comrades holding
such an opinion can only do so because they would like to
utilise the Party conflicts for the purpose of forming some
third group based on the slogan: “The literates are
quarrelling among themselves, but it has nothing to do with
us.”
No one has a right to stand aside in this conflict. It
concerns one of the most far-reaching questions of our inner
life, and of the life of the Comintern. The question is: Can
the Party recommend the proletariat to accept the lessons as
taught by Comrade Trotsky’s book, or should the Party
exercise the whole of its authority in warning the
proletariat against the teaching of the “Lessons of
October?”
I am not desirous of here entering into a long controversy
with this article of Comrade Trotsky’s Comrade Trotsky is an
excellent writer, and his gifted pen has done for the Party
much valuable service. But here it
serves interests hostile to the Party, here it does not
serve Bolshevism, but the cause of those seeking
to disintegrate and discredit Bolshevism—both the
Bolshevism embodying the ideology of the proletarian
revolution and the Bolshevism organising the fighting force
of the proletariat. And Comrade Trotsky does this by means
of an exceedingly artistic, but essentially incorrect, and
inaccurate description of the whole of the events between
February and October. I have no doubt but that the Party
will call upon a number of its writers, among those who
participated in the events of this period and took immediate
part in the struggle leading up to the October revolution,
and that these will refute the various misrepresentations
made by Comrade Trotsky with reference to decisive moments
in the history of our Party during this epoch.
The April demonstration is misrepresented, the April
conference is misrepresented, the events in June and July
are misrepresented, the events in connection with the
preliminary parliament are misrepresented, and finally the
course taken by events in October itself are misrepresented.
Here I cannot dwell upon the details required for the
restoration of historical truth, or on the confronting of
Comrade Trotsky’s assertions by documentary evidence. What I
want to deal with here is the general question of the social
and political import of the attitude adopted by Comrade
Trotsky, and the significance of this attitude when
considered in the light of the previous positions taken up
by Comrade Trotsky, and of the role played by Comrade
Trotsky.
We have hitherto abstained from putting this question, for
easily comprehensible reasons. But now we can avoid it no
longer, for Comrade Trotsky, in thus raising the question of
October, the question of the role played by our Party, and
by Lenin in the creation of the ideology underlying the
October revolution, himself forces us to deal with the
question from all the standpoints which have been adopted by
Comrade Trotsky during the history of the Bolshevist Party.
I am thus obliged to deal
with the concrete question of Trotskyism and Bolshevism, and
in doing this I refer to Comrade Trotsky’s latest utterance
merely as one of the clearest and most
instructive examples of the general line pursued by
Comrade Trotsky.
We must first of all ask ourselves: Does any general line
really exist. What
do we understand under the term “Trotskyism”? Is it a
question of Comrade Trotsky’s personality, or of general and
by no means personal phenomena pertaining to the history of
the Labour movement in Russia during the last twenty years?
What have we to deal with here? With a personality, with an
individuality, or with some generalisation, some trend
called into being by the general conditions of the evolution
of the labour movement in a petty bourgeois country? With an
accidental phenomenon, or with a phenomenon based upon a
past which we cannot forget? If you turn to Comrade Lenin’s
works for a reply to this question, you will find that up to
the time of the February revolution, and again, with a brief
interruption, after
the year 1918, scarcely a work appeared from Comrade Lenin’s
pen in which Trotskyism was not dealt with systematically. Why?
Trotskyism and the Party Before the Revolution of 1917
Our Party originated in a petty bourgeois capitalistically
backward country. Our proletariat existed under more
backward conditions than any other proletariat in Europe. It
was surrounded by more agrarian and petty-bourgeois elements
than any other proletariat. And the question of how this
proletariat succeeded in the midst of Tsarist despotism, in
creating and welding together a Party destined to lead the
whole international labour movement, this is the main
question of the self-knowledge essential to the Party.
This question of our origin and development has frequently
been raised in the Party itself, and the Party has made it
clear to itself why and in what manner the proletariat of
Russia (to use the old word), in a backward agrarian
country, and under the despotism of the Tsar, has been
enabled to create that Leninism which is to-day the guiding
star of the whole international proletariat, of the
proletariat of countries much further developed in
capitalism and much further advanced in economics than
Russia. One thing is certain: Under these conditions the
Party of the revolutionary proletariat, the Party of the
Bolsheviki, could only originate in the form of constant, systematic,
and unceasing struggle against the petty bourgeois element
striving to subordinate the working class. Bolshevism in
its innermost essence signifies a struggle, in the sense
that it originated, grew and attained its firm foothold in
the midst of an uninterrupted and constant
struggle against every influence exercised by the
bourgeoisie on the proletariat.
The most concentrated expression of the policy of bourgeois
influence on the proletariat is afforded by Menshevism. The
thirty years of the history of Bolshevism is the history of
thirty years of struggle against Menshevism. Leninism is
the teaching of the struggle of the proletariat against the
bourgeoisie. Precisely for this reason Leninism is,
therefore, at the same time the teaching of the struggle
against Menshevism.
The forms in which the bourgeoisie has exercised its
influence over the proletariat leave changed with the
changes of the historical epoch. And the forms and methods
of Menshevism have changed accordingly. What has remained
unchanged is the “wild” Leninist struggle against Menshevism,
Lenin’s ability to distinguish the true character of
Menshevism in every changing form, and to recognise the
essential hostility of Menshevism against the Bolshevist
ideology and the development of the Bolshevist Party.
Everyone knows this, or at least it may be assumed that
everyone ought to know it. Everyone comprehends that those
who are not fully conscious that Bolshevism signifies a
systematic struggle against Menshevism, understand nothing
whatever of Bolshevism, nothing of the reasons why
Bolshevism has been victorious. But everyone does not know,
though it has been assumed till recently that everyone was
bound to know it, that precisely as Leninism originated,
grew and conquered, in a constant and systematic struggle
against Menshevism, it originated, grew and conquered in a
constant and systematic struggle against Trotskyism.
Why? Because
Trotskyism, during the whole of the period in which our
Party was preparing for the decisive class struggle of the
proletariat against the bourgeoisie, and in which Leninism
was the source of the teaching of the proletarian revolution
and welded the Party together as leader of the
revolution—during the whole of this time Trotskyism played
no other role than that of an agent of Menshevism, a
glossing over of Menshevism, a masking of Menshevism.
Everyone who studies the history of the Party in the works
of the Party in the works of Lenin—and we have not, nor
shall we ever have, a better and profounder textbook on the
history of the Party and the revolution, or one richer in
matter and the conclusions to be drawn from it—will be
inevitably convinced that during the whole of his struggle
for the Party and for the revolution, and during the whole
of his struggle against the Mensheviki, Lenin
regarded Trotsky (taking the line followed by him for
decades in its totality, and his separate actions) exclusively
as an agent of Menshevism, as a servant of Menshevism, as a
tool employed by Menshevism for the purpose of gaining
influence in this or that section of the working class. To
Lenin, Trotsky and Trotskyism
were characteristic and not accidental phenomena, caused
by the pressure exercised by the bourgeoisie, in precisely
the same manner as the other phenomena hostile to the really
proletarian Party, the many other groups and sub-groups,
fractions and sub-fractions, whole and semi-tendencies,
which the working class have had to combat when creating
their own Party.
To Lenin, Trotsky was entirely uninteresting as a
personality after the year 1903. For Lenin and for the
Party he has been the
typical embodiment of one of these historical currents which
have run counter to the creation of the Bolshevist Party,
and to the development of Bolshevist ideology, the
ideology of proletarian revolution and Bolshevist
proletarian organisation. To Lenin, Trotsky was the wordy
embodiment of an element hostile to the proletariat, an
element showing talent at times, again simply the embodiment
of certain social phenomena. This systematic struggle
against Trotskyism
as an anti-Bolshevist current is to be found in every
volume of Lenin’s works up to the time when Trotsky joined
our Party. At this point there is an interruption, followed
by the resumption of this struggle—in another form.
The Period of the First Revolution (1905)
Up to the time of the Second Party Congress, up to the split
between Bolsheviki and Mensheviki, Comrade Trotsky worked
for the Leninist Iskra, like Martov, Potressov, and other
Mensheviki. Comrade Trotsky’s zeal for the execution of
Lenin’s plans even led to his receiving the nickname of
“Lenin’s cudgel,” at the first meetings of the Party
Congress. An honourable role! But for Comrade Trotsky’s
political history this role is less characteristic than the
fact that he immediately changed roles as soon as the
Mensheviki appeared on the scene at the later sessions of
this same Congress.
The organisatory rupture between the Mensheviki and the
Bolsheviki took place at the Party Congress on the question
of the election of the Central Committee of the Party.
Three members had to be elected to the C.C. With respect to
two members the Mensheviki and the Bolsheviki were in
agreement. As third member the Mensheviki wanted the
“Lenin’s cudgel” of yesterday, but Lenin would not agree at
any price. The Mensheviki would not give way at any price.
It is probable that Lenin and Martov had both formed a
correct estimate of the degree in which the “cudgel” was
“Lenin’s.” Lenin had the majority at the Congress, and
Trotsky was not elected. Upon this Comrade Trotsky,
in collaboration with Martov, Dan, Axelrod, and others,
formed the fraction of the Mensheviki, broke the
decisions of the Party Congress, headed the boycott against
the central authorities of the Party under Lenin’s
leadership, and wrote a political pamphlet against Lenin-one
of the most arrogant and offensive productions in Menshevist
literature in which Lenin’s whole policy is explained as
mere greed of power on the part of a “candidate for the post
of dictator.” The whole set of Mensheviki, headed by Martov,
Dan and others, recommend the press to propagate this
pamphlet as far as possible. This
was the beginning of the history of Menshevism, and of the
history of Comrade Trotsky in the Party.
Trotsky, now became sword-bearer to Martov and Axelrod, lost
all interest as a political figure in the eyes of Lenin.
Lenin entered into lengthy and systematic conflicts with the
Mensheviki, with Plechanov, Martov, Axelrod, Martinov; he
explained and revealed their standpoint to the workers; but
he held it to be superfluous to lose time in contentions
with their co-worker Trotsky.
“Plechanov must be combatted, Martov’s arguments must be
refuted, and we can contend against the extreme opportunist
Martinov, but it is not worth while to lose time in
contending against Trotsky”—so said Lenin at that time to
his fellow workers. But when, in the summer of 1905, Comrade
Trotsky tried to draw himself out of the Menshevist bog by
presenting the ideas of Parvus on “permanent revolution” in
his own wording, then Lenin entered into a detailed
discussion on the ideas and slogans brought out by Parvus,
and rejected them. With reference to Trotsky’s pamphlet he
merely expressed his regret that the “revolutionary social
democrat” Parvus should deem it possible to concur “with
Trotsky” and his “Revolutionary phrases.” Lenin had not
another word to say about Comrade Trotsky and his “original”
theory. (See Lenin, complete works, Russian edition, vol. 7,
p. 130.)
And now Comrade Trotsky is endeavouring to lay precisely
this pamphlet before the Party as certificate of his
revolutionary past, and is trying to prove that Lenin
was only right in so far as he shared the standpoint of
Trotsky’s pamphlet. We shall deal with this in detail
later on.
During the whole period of the first revolution, when the
working masses had for the first time the opportunity of
testing in action the various theories of the Russian
revolution, and their resultant tactical methods, and when
Lenin defended the Bolshevist scheme of revolution in
desperate battle, he did not think it once necessary to add
anything to his characterisation of Trotsky’s principles, or
to the designation of “revolutionary phrases.”
Lenin knew that Trotsky’s
“Left phrases” on the “permanent revolution” would
certainly have no effect upon the actual course taken by the
labour movement revolution, and would not in the least
prevent Comrade Trotsky from remaining in the Menshevist
organisation, co-operating in the Menshevist central organ,
and collaborating politically with the Mensheviki. Lenin had
the Marxist habit of judging people, parties and fractions
according to their deeds, and not according to their words.
During the whole epoch of the first revolution (1905 till
1907), which gave the proletariat its first opportunity of
appearing in the arena as mass force, and of expressing its
class policy and relations to other classes by actual
action, there was a bitter struggle between two tactics
only, between two political trends only, between two schemes
of Russian revolution only, between Menshevism, which
under-estimated or neglected the peasantry and aimed at an
understanding between the working class and the bourgeoisie,
and Bolshevism, which called upon the peasantry to support
the working class, both in its struggle against Tsarism, and
in its struggle against the bourgeoisie on behalf of the
dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry. This
struggle between Bolsheviki and Mensheviki during the first
revolution, essentially a struggle for the direction to be
assumed by the revolution, as also the whole of the first
revolution itself, contained all the elements of the
struggle ended in the second revolution in 1917. The
Parvus-Trotsky theory played no part whatever in either the
first or the second revolution. It remained the empty
phrase foreseen by Lenin, and had nothing to do with the
actual course taken by the class struggle. It has not been
preserved in the living events of the actual struggle, but
solely in the dusty files of old Menshevist newspapers.
Therefore, Lenin never lost a word, during the revolution,
in the refutation of this theory.
The Period of Counter-Revolution
The tide of revolution ebbed. The Party reorganised for
difficult and tedious work in the atmosphere of counter
revolution. The “Left phrases” entirely lost effect. The
foundations for new tactics had to be laid, and every effort
had to be made to save all that was to be saved-the banner
of the revolutionary tactics of the proletariat and the
principles of their illegal organisations—from the
counter-revolutionary pogroms, the destruction of
proletarian organisations, the orgies of apostasy, the
atmosphere of exhaustion in the working class, and the
treachery and malicious joy at the failure of the
revolution. The banner of the revolutionary policy of the
working class, derided and trodden in the dust by all the
Mensheviki, had to be defended. At this moment, the most
difficult of all for the Bolshevist Party, since the whole
atmosphere engendered by the crushing of the revolution took
effect against the Bolsheviki, and aid was given on all
sides to Menshevist and liquidatory tendencies (liquidatory
both with regard to the Party and the revolution)—at this
moment Comrade Trotsky, who at the time of the rising
revolution combined with Parvus in
wanting “to be absolutely more revolutionary than the
others,” should obviously have rushed to the help of the
Bolsheviki. At least this was the course taken by Plechanov,
who had been our opponent in principle from 1905 till 1907;
the old revolutionist could not bear to stand aside, and in
the face of general apostasy he rushed into the fight side
by side with the Bolsheviki, under the slogan of “General
Differentiation,” that is, a general separation of
proletarian revolutionists from the Menshevist
liquidators[1] Trotsky acted differently.
During this period of the beginning of the counter
revolution, Comrade Trotsky stepped forward for the first
time at the London Party Congress. At this Congress, the
Bolsheviki were fighting against the Menshevist liquidators,
especially against the fraction of the second Duma, headed
by men now well known to us, Dan and Zeretelli. The
Bolsheviki criticised this Duma fraction as a fraction
which, representing the Menshevist standpoint, was
attempting to tread the path of West European
social-democratic parliamentarism. We are only too well
aware that this is a hothouse in which the most poisonous
fruits of treachery against the working class find the most
fertile soil. The Bolsheviki criticised severely the very
first step being taken in this direction.
Comrade Trotsky,
of course, defended the Menshevist fraction against the
attacks of the Bolsheviki. Lenin characterised his
standpoint as follows:
“Trotsky spoke on behalf of the Centre; he expressed the views of the ‘federation.’ (The federation is the most opportunist and unprincipled organisation which has ever existed in the Party; lack of principle is even more characteristic of it than opportunism. It was the organisation of the artisans, and reflected their unproletarian spirit). He attacked us for submitting the draft of an ‘unacceptable’ resolution. He threatened with an actual split. Is this not monstrous. . . ? The fact that it is possible for a question to be put in such a manner shows in itself that our Party contains something foreign to it. . . This is not a standpoint based on principles, it is the lack of principle characteristic of the ‘Centre’—and at the same time, naturally, of its defender, Trotsky.” (See Lenin, complete works, vol. viii., pp. 387 to 388.)
Comrade Lenin found equally trenchant terms in which to
characterise Comrade Trotsky s standpoint at the time when
our Party summed up its experiences won in 1905, and
established on this basis the foundation for the whole
future of the Party. The words uttered by Lenin at this time
reached into the future, and foresaw the role which Comrade
Trotsky was destined to play in our Party during the next
decade.
This was Comrade Trotsky’s first deed after the revolution
of 1905. From this time onwards until the year 1917 Comrade
Trotsky acted unceasingly as defender of the Mensheviki
against the Bolsheviki, as adversary of the Bolshevist Party
steeling itself in the struggle of that time; and he was
invariably regarded by the Party as an adversary. Let us
follow Lenin still further, and see how he characterised the
role played by Comrade Trotsky during the difficult process
of creating a Bolshevist Party, that is, during the process
of creating the theory and organisation for the leadership
of the proletarian revolution.
May, 1910. This is the date of the formal separation of the
Bolsheviki, the final mental and organisatory withdrawal of
the Bolsheviki from the supporters of bourgeois influence
upon the proletariat, from the Menshevist liquidators headed
by Martov and Axelrod, and from the “Otsovists,” led by the
subsequent renegade Alexinsky. Lenin writes (Complete works,
XI./2, pp. 49 to 53):
“The representatives of the two extreme tendencies, both of which are subject to bourgeois ideology, and both of which are equally hostile to the Party, agree with one another in their contest against the Bolsheviki. . . The resolution proposed by Trotsky differs in form only from the effusions of Axelrod and Alexinsky. Its terms are exceedingly ‘cautious’ and aim at expressing a ‘super-fractional’ justice. But what is its actual import? The ‘Bolshevist leaders’ are to blame for everything—this ‘philosophy of history’ does not differ in any way from that of Axelrod and Alexinsky. . . .”
“It is not difficult to see,” continues Lenin, “how the
empty, hollow phrases of Trotsky’s resolution serve for
the defence of the same standpoint as that adopted by
Axelrod and Co. and Alexinsky and Co. Here lies the great
and abysmal difference between the conciliatory pose of
Trotsky and Co., in reality the most faithful servants of
the liquidators and Otsovists, and forming the more
dangerous evil for the Party that they are skilled at
concealing their true character behind clever and artificial
phrases, and behind apparently anti-fractional and pro-Party
declarations, and between that really Party standpoint which
stands for the purging of the Party from all liquidators and
Otsovists.”
The irreconcilable struggle for the principles of Bolshevism
continued. All the enemies of Bolshevism joined hands and
attacked the Bolsheviki, the Party, and its central
authorities. Lenin, dealing with the significance of this
struggle and Trotsky’s part in it, wrote as follows at the
end of 1910 (XI/2, pp. 182, 183, 187):
“Martov’s article and Trotsky’s resolution are backed up by certain practical actions directed against the Party. Martov’s article is merely a literary form clothing the campaign undertaken by the Mensheviki for the purpose of causing schism in our C.C. Trotsky’s resolution pursues the same Menshevist aims: the destruction of the central authorities (of the Bolsheviki) so hated by the liquidators, and with this the destruction of the Party as an organisation. It is not sufficient merely to expose these anti-Party actions on the part of the Mensheviki and Trotsky; they must be combatted.”
You will see, comrades, that many things have happened in
our Party and many of the things which may appear new to our
younger comrades are by no means so new to older ones, or to
the younger comrades who have studied Lenin’s works
attentively. “There
is nothing new under the sun.”
Lenin continues:
“We, therefore, declare on behalf of the whole Party, that Trotsky is carrying on an anti-Party policy, that he is undermining the legality of the Party, and entering on a path of adventure and schism. . . Comrade Trotsky preserves silence on this incontestable truth (about the anti-Party groups), because the real aims of his policy cannot stand the truth. These real aims are: an anti-Party bloc. Such a bloc is being supported and organised by Trotsky. . . . It goes without saying that Trotsky supports this bloc, for the anti-Party elements here get everything they require: liberty for their fractions, glorification and concealment of their activity, skilful advocacy defending them before the working class. It is precisely from the standpoint of ‘fundamental principles’ that we have to regard this bloc as adventurism in the exactest meaning of the word. Trotsky does not venture to assert that he finds in the Mensheviki . . . in the Otsovists, real Marxists, real defenders of the established principles of social democracy. But it is just this necessity of continual dodging which is characteristic of the adventurer. The bloc formed by Trotsky with Potressov and the group round the Vperjod (“Forward”) is just an adventure, judged from the viewpoint of ‘fundamental principles.’ This assertion is no less important from the standpoint of the tasks of Party politics . . . The experience of a year has shown that in reality it is precisely the Potressov group, precisely the Vperjod set, who incorporate the influence exercised by the bourgeoisie on the proletariat. . . Thirdly and finally, Trotsky’s policy is an adventure in an organisatory sense.” 1911
The struggle for the Party and its ideas continued. Trotsky
continued his anti-Party policy. Lenin supplemented his
characterisation. In June, 1911 Lenin writes as follows
(XI/2, p. 322):
“All Bolsheviki must now gather more closely together, strengthen their fraction, determine their Party line with greater accuracy and clarity, collect all scattered forces, and take up the fight for the R. S. D. L. P. (Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party) purged of the supporters of bourgeois influence upon the proletariat.”
And he immediately adds:
“Such people as Trotsky, with his puffed-up phrases on the R.S.D.L.P., with his kowtowing to the liquidators who have nothing whatever, in common with the R.S.D.L.P., are now the ‘disease of the age.’ In reality they are the bearers of capitulation to the liquidators, who are anxious to form a labour party on Stolipin’s lines.”
After the lapse of a few months, Lenin wrote as follows in a
special circular addressed “to all Party organisations,
groups and circles”:
“Let us merely mention one feature, the most characteristic and general one, in the utterances of Trotsky’s little group: In the question of tactics, and of differences of opinion on principles within the Party, Trotsky’s arsenal can only supply weapons against the left-wing of the Party. It need not be said that such a policy is grist to the mill of the adherents of the Golos(the Menshevist newspaper, the ‘Voice’) and to all the other various degrees of opportunists.” (XI/2, pp. 335/38.)
Trotsky continued his policy, and Lenin continued his
characterization:
“The real liquidators conceal themselves behind their phraseology, and make every endeavour to frustrate the work being done by the anti-liquidators, that is, the Bolsheviki . . . Trotsky and the Trotskyists and opportunists like him, are more harmful than all the liquidators, for the convinced liquidators state their views openly, and it is easy for the workers to recognise the errors of these views. But Trotsky and those similar to him deceive the workers, conceal the evil, and make 1t impossible to expose. and remedy it. Everyone who supports Trotsky’s group supports the policy of lies and deception of the workers, the policy concealing liquidatory aims. Full liberty of action for Messrs. Potressov and Co. in Russia, and the clothing of their actions in ‘revolutionary’ phrases for abroad—this is the essential character of Trotsky’s policy.” (XI/2, pp. 359/60.)
This characterisation: the
disguise of Right actions in Left pseudo-revolutionary
phrases, was for Lenin the distinguishing feature of
Trotskyism, repeating itself from year to year in
different and progressive forms. And Lenin was never weary
of pointing out this feature to the Party as the most
important and characteristic, and at the same time most
dangerous feature of Trotskyism. A few months after writing
the characterisation here quoted, Lenin wrote as follows on
Trotsky:
“One trifle has been overlooked by this poor hero of phraseology: A social democrat (in our present terminology a Communist) is not a revolutionist unless he recognises the harmfulness of antirevolutionary, pseudo-socialism in a given country at a given time, that is, unless he is able to recognise that liquidatory and Otsovist aims are harmful in Russia, and unless he knows how to combat similar unsocial democratic tendencies.”
A few months after this (December, 1911) Lenin wrote:
“Trotsky calls himself an adherent of the Party principles, but on the basis of almost total disregard of the Russian Party central, which was called into existence by the overwhelming majority of the Russian social democratic organisation . . . The revolutionary phrase serves to conceal the tendency of liquidation, to justify it, and thus to confuse the consciousness of the workers. . . It is Trotsky’s special task to veil the aims of the liquidators, and to throw sand into the eyes of the workers. . . It is not possible to discuss essentials with Trotsky, for he has no views. It is only possible to contend with convinced liquidators and otsovists; but we do not care to enter into discussion with a man who plays at concealing the errors of either group: we merely expose him as a diplomatist of the meanest description.” (XI/2, pp. 446, 448.)
It is not difficult to prophesy that these Party historical
documents here quoted will presently be explained away in
the most convenient and Philistine manner, by references to:
Anger, heat of the contest, accidental collisions, etc. I
thus consider it to be my duty, though a disagreeable
one—since Comrade Trotsky
has now forced the Party to occupy itself with the history
of the relations between Trotskyism and Bolshevism—to
follow Lenin’s utterances, and the characterisation made by
Lenin of the relations between the Party and Trotskyism, not
only for a single year, not only with regard to any single
question, but systematically during the whole period of
fifteen years which have passed since the Party became
acquainted with Trotskyism.
If a definite relation has existed between Trotskyism and
our Party for a number of years, cropping up systematically
at every turning point of Party history, and not merely
becoming apparent on one
single question or on one single occasion, then even the
most Philistine and sluggish mentality cannot explain away
this circumstance by references to momentary anger,
accidental conflicts, and the like. Even the most sluggish
mind must recognise that if
Lenin continued for fifteen years to enlighten the Party on
Trotskyism, and his characterisation proved correct at
every turning point of Party history, whether the tide of
revolution was rising, falling or rising again, then it is
not a case of animosity, of personal opinion, but it
is perfectly obvious that Trotskyism represents a trend of
policy which reappears systematically, and that the
foundation of Bolshevism as the theory and practice of
the proletarian Communist revolution can only be laid down
by fighting against this trend of policy.
Comrade Trotsky confined himself to defending to the Russian
workers the standpoint which I have above characterised in
Lenin’s words. The position held by the Bolsheviki in the
Second International is well known. Even at that time the
Bolsheviki, especially Lenin, were hated by the leaders of
the Second International. Even at that time these leaders
felt that Bolshevism, and again especially Lenin,
represented some new force destined to supplant them, and,
therefore, the press organs of the Second International
opened their pages to every slander against the Bolsheviki
and Bolshevism. But during the whole period of Lenin’s
exile, during the whole period of the revolution and
counter-revolution, Lenin was never given even one single
opportunity of appealing to the workers from the tribune of
the press organs of the Second International, and of telling
the German, French or Austrian workers the truth about
Bolshevism.
In actual fact, we were boycotted by the Second
International. But on the other hand Lenin’s opponents, Martov,
Dan, and Trotsky, were given every opportunity of
expressing their views, and these were able to spread abroad
any amount of lies
and slanders, since they were assured in advance that
Lenin would not be permitted to reply. Trotsky availed
himself of this opportunity to lay the “philosophy” of
Bolshevism before the international labour movement in
something like the following form: The
Leninists were a clique of intellectuals who, under the
leadership of Lenin, a man who shrank at nothing, were
holding the Russian proletarian movement in their hands in
some obscure manner, whilst it was only the ignorance and
backwardness of the Russian proletariat which made it trust
the Bolsheviki. The most important task was to rescue the
proletariat of Russia from the power of this clique and its
leader, Lenin.
This is the conception of Bolshevism which Comrade Trotsky
forced upon the International at that time. This is the
manner in which he represented the historical victory of the
inner Party struggle in Russia, the import of the struggle
between the Bolsheviki and the Mensheviki, to the socialist
workers of Europe. With reference to the article sent on
this subject to the International by Martov and Trotsky,
Lenin wrote the following in the year 1911:
“Martov expresses the view of the Menshevists; Trotsky clings to the Menshevsk, and hides behind particularly sounding and hollow phrases. For Martov the ‘Russian experience’ meant that the ‘Blanquist’ and anarchist unculture had won the victory over Marxist culture (read: Bolshevism over Menshevism). Russian social democracy had been too zealously Russian (that is, revolutionary—L.K.) as differentiated from the ‘general European’ (that is, parliamentary) methods of tactics. We find Trotsky representing the same ‘Historical philosophy.’ The ‘sectarian spirit, intellectual individualism, ideological fetishism’ are placed in the foreground. ‘The struggle for influence over the politically immature proletariat’—that is the core of the matter to him.”
After describing the views thus presented to the German
workers by Comrade Trotsky, Lenin continues:
“The theory that the struggle between Bolshevism and Menshevism is a struggle for influence over an immature proletariat is by no means new. We find it in innumerable books, pamphlets and articles published by the liberal press since the year 1905 (if not since 1903). Martov and Trotsky lay liberal views, trimmed with Marxism, before the German comrades . . .
“‘It is an illusion to believe’ declares Trotsky, “that Bolshevism and Menshevism have struck deep roots in the proletariat.’ This is a typical example of the sounding but empty phrases of which our Trotsky is master. It is not in the ‘depths of the proletariat’ that the differences lie between Bolshevism and Menshevism, but in the economic conditions of the Russian revolution. Martov and Trotsky, by ignoring these conditions, have deprived themselves of the possibility of comprehending the historical import of the internal party conflict in Russia. . . To talk about various trends in the Russian revolution, and to label these ‘sectarianism,’ ‘unculture,’ etc., (the terms employed by Trotsky against the Bolsheviki, with the idea of alarming the German Philistines.—L.K), without according a single word to the most important economic interests of the proletariat, the liberal bourgeoisie, and the democratic peasantry, is to sink to the level of the most vulgar journalism.”
Comrade Lenin explained the matter to Comrade Trotsky:
“Martov defends the education of the peasantry (who are carrying on a revolutionary struggle against the aristocracy) by the liberals (who betrayed the peasantry to the aristocracy). This is nothing else than the substitution of liberalism for Marxism, it is nothing more nor less than liberalism disguised in Marxist phrases. . . The struggle between Menshevism and Bolshevism is indissolubly bound up with this actuality, for it is here the struggle between the support lent to the liberals (on the part of the Mensheviki) and the overthrow of the hegemony of the liberals over the peasantry (by the Bolsheviki). Thus the attempt to explain away our dissensions by the influence of the intelligentsia, the immaturity of the proletariat, etc., is merely a naive and childish repetition of liberal fairy tales.”
We see that “Trotsky came to Lenin” by means of telling the
international proletariat liberal
fairy tales on Leninism.
“A chasm lies between our standpoint and Martov’s standpoint, and this chasm between the views of various ‘intellectuals’ merely reflects, despite Trotsky’s opinions to the contrary, the chasm which actually existed in the year 1905 between two classes, that is, between the revolutionary fighting proletariat and the treacherous bourgeoisie.”
This is what Comrade Trotsky, according to Lenin, did not
comprehend about Bolshevism. But if he did not comprehend
this, did
he comprehend anything about it at all?
“Trotsky distorts Bolshevism, for he has never been able to form any definite views on the role played by the proletariat in the Russian bourgeois revolution.”
Comrade Lenin, after characterising Trotsky’s whole
representation of Bolshevism to the uninformed German
workers as a “refined breach of faith,” closed his
characterisation with the following words:
“In 1903, Trotsky was a Menshevist, he left the Mensheviki in 1904, returned to the Mensheviki in 1905, brandishing ultra-revolutionary phrases on the whole, and again turned his back upon the Mensheviki in 1906: at the end of 1906 he defended the election alliance with the cadets (thus actually siding with the Mensheviki again), and in the spring of 1907 he declared at the London congress that ‘the difference between him and Rosa Luxemburg was rather a difference of individual shading than of political tendency.’ Trotsky plagiarises to-day from the ideas of one fraction, to-morrow from those of the other, and thus he regards himself as a being superior to both fractions. Theoretically, Trotsky does not agree with the liquidators and Otsovists on any single question, but in actual practice he is entirely in agreement with the Golos and Vperjod group (that is, with the supporters of bourgeois influence over the proletariat.—L.K.). I must declare that Trotsky represents his fraction only, and enjoys a certain amount of faith exclusively on the part of the Otsovists and liquidators.” (Complete works XI/2 pp. 292, 293, 296, 307, 308.) 1912
The year 1912 was a year of changes. In January the
Bolsheviki broke off the last remains of organisatory
connections with the Mensheviki, and formed their own purely
Bolshevist Central Committee at their own Bolshevist
conference (at Prague). They excluded the liquidators from
the Party, and proclaimed a programme of revolutionary
action. After the blood-bath on the Lena, a stormy wave of
proletarian movement arose, for the first time since 1905.
This movement appropriated the programme and tactics of the
Bolsheviki in their entirety. The “Bolshevist epidemic” (to
use the malicious term coined by the Mensheviki at the time)
began to spread, and presently gained the final victory. The
awakening labour movement removed the liquidators
systematically from every position which they had contrived
to gain during the previous sorrowful years of
counter-revolution. This was the beginning of the
revolutionary attack under the slogans of the Bolsheviki,
under the leadership of the Bolsheviki—an attack which led
to barricade fighting in Leningrad as early as the middle of
1914.
What was the attitude adopted by Comrade Trotsky with regard
to these decisive events? Did this wave of revolutionary
uplift, this strengthening of the labour movement, perhaps
induce Comrade Trotsky to abandon the standpoint of an agent
of Menshevism, held by him during the preceding years of
disintegration and decay? Did his ultra-left theory of
“permanent revolution” after lying unused for years in his
drawer, perhaps aid him to break the bonds fettering him to
counterrevolutionary Menshevism?
No: Comrade Trotsky remained true to himself and—to the
Menshevist liquidators.
He replied to the organisatory development and establishment
of the Bolshevist Party by a closer
alliance with the Mensheviki in their struggle against
Bolshevism. It was due to his endeavours that the
so-called “August
bloc” came into being; this bloc was the alliance and
organisatory mustering of every non-Bolshevist and
anti-Bolshevist group and sub-group.
“This bloc,” writes Lenin, “is
composed of lacy of principle, hypocrisy, and empty phrases.
. . . The basis of this bloc is evident: the liquidators
receive full liberty to proceed as before, and Comrade Trotsky
covers them by the revolutionary phrase, which costs him
nothing and binds him to nothing.” (Complete works, XII/4,
p. 94, April, 1912.)
On the orders of this bloc, Comrade Trotsky spread abroad
even more slanders than before against the Bolsheviki, as
leaders of the proletarian advance then beginning. Comrade
Lenin characterised Trotsky’s writings at that time as
“deceiving and misleading the whole working class.” With
regard to an article written by Trotsky for the German
workers, Lenin wrote that it represented
“such a compilation of unconsidered self-praise and sententious lies that there can be no doubt but that the liquidatory commission to write this article was placed in competent hands.” (Ibid. p. 93.)
But perhaps Comrade Trotsky
was only in agreement with the enemies of the Bolsheviki as
far as the Bolshevist organisation was concerned, perhaps
there was still some difference between him and the
Mensheviki, the servants of the liberals, in questions
referring to the tasks, the aims, and the tactics of the
rising proletarian movement, in questions referring to the
tasks, aims and tactics of the new revolution? Let us ask
Lenin again:
“Trotsky abused the Conference in every key, and assured the good people that ‘the struggle for the right of combination’ was the basis of the events on the Lena and their after-effects, that ‘this demand stands, and will continue to stand, as the control point of the revolutionary mobilisation of the proletariat.’ Scarcely had a week passed away, and these miserable phrases, ground out of the same machine which supplies the liquidators with their phrases, were blown away like dust.”
“It is only
the liberal chatterboxes and the liberal labour politicians”—continues
Lenin—“who are capable of placing the right of combination
in ‘ the centre of revolutionary mobilisation.’”
Lenin then compares the policy pursued by the liquidators
and by Comrade Trotsky with the revolutionary Bolshevist
policy of the Petersburg proletariat:
“The proletariat of Petersburg”—writes Lenin—“has grasped that the new revolutionary struggle is not to be carried on for the sake of one single right (the right of combination.—L.K.), but for the liberty of the whole people. The proletariat of Petersburg has grasped that the evil must be attacked at its centre, at its source, that the whole system of Tsarist reactionary Russia must be destroyed. The proletariat of Petersburg has grasped that it is a piece of ridiculous stupidity to make this demand for the right of combination. . . There is no greater lie than the liberal invention, repeated by the liquidators and immediately afterwards by Trotsky, that the “struggle for the right of combination” lay at the root of the tragedy on the Lena, and of the mighty echoes awakened by this event all over the country.” (Complete works, XII/1, pp. 183, 185.)
The difference is very obvious between the Bolshevist
conception of fundamental tasks and that of the Mensheviki
and Comrade Trotsky. But Lenin explains again and again the
counter’ trend of Comrade Trotsky’s conception of these
tasks.
Trotsky followed Axelrod. He found himself superior to
the “uncultured,” “barbaric,” “sectarian,” “Asiatic,”
Bolsheviki in that he, Trotsky is a “European” and fights
“beneath the tactical flag of European social democracy.”
But what is the meaning of this confrontation of
“Europeanise” and “European tactics” with Bolshevism? It
means one thing only: renunciation of the fulfilment of the
immediate revolutionary tasks in the Russia of the Tsar and
the great landowners, and all for the sake of the
parliamentary tactics of the European socialists.
“This famous “Europeanisation”—writes Lenin—“is being
talked about by Dan and Martov, Trotsky and Levitzky, and by
the other liquidators, in every possible key. It
is one of the main rivets securing their opportunism. Their
opportunism lies in the fact that the moment which they
choose for imparting a “European,” parliamentary
propagandist character to the Party is precisely the moment
when the Party is not faced by European tasks, but by an
immediate struggle on the spot. Their idea is thus to avoid
the task of revolution, and to substitute revolutionary
tactics by parliamentary tactics.”
The little word “Europeanism,” on the lips of the
liquidators and Trotsky during the period between 1910 and
1914, further supplemented by the little word “barbarism”
(of the Bolsheviki) served to conceal the renunciation
of the revolutionary tasks and revolutionary tactics of the
proletariat of Russia. Let us read what Lenin wrote in reply
to such a “European” article from Comrade Trotsky’s pen:
“This is the daydream of an opportunist intellectual who, in the midst of the difficult and non-European conditions facing the labour movement in Russia (Lenin wrote this article for the legal Svesda and, therefore, employed legal terms; here we should read: under the conditions imposed by the revolutionary tasks facing the labour movement in Russia.—L.K.) has worked out an excellent European plan, and, because he has done this, boasts of his ‘Europeanise’ to the whole world.” (Complete Works, XII/1, pp. 222, 223, July, 1924.)
These tactics, actually implying approbation of the
transition of the Party from the path of revolution to the
path of the then peaceful European socialists, were
proclaimed at the time when the new wave of revolution
following the blood-bath on the Lena demanded an expressly
revolutionary leadership. It is possible that someone will
submit the question: “How is it possible that the theory of
“permanent revolution” did not restrain Comrade Trotsky from
such unrevolutionary tactics? How could he, the
representative of this ultra-left theory, lend his support
to such anti-revolutionary tactics, side by side with the
Mensheviki, during the obviously revolutionary situation
from 1912 to 1914?”
But anyone putting this question would only prove that he
has not yet comprehended Lenin’s
characterisation of Trotskyism: “Right politics disguised in
Left phraseology.”
“Examine the standpoint of the liquidators”—Lenin continued
to explain to the naive in the year 1913—the
essential character of their liquidatory standpoint is
artificially disguised beneath Trotsky’s revolutionary
phrases. The naive and entirely inexperienced are still
often deceived by this disguise. . . . But the slightest
closer examination immediately disperses this
self-deception.” 1914
Then came the year 1914. The revolutionary movement in the
proletariat made rapid strides forward, the waves of the
tempest of revolution rose higher and higher. Trotsky’s
viewpoint remained unchanged in the questions of the
principles of revolution and the tactics of the proletarian
movement. Let us read what Lenin wrote about him in the
year 1914:
“Comrade Trotsky has never yet possessed a definite opinion on any single earnest Marx’ question: he has always) crept into the breach made by this or that difference, and has oscillated from one side to another.” (Complete Works, XII/2, pp. 536, 537.)
“The liquidators have their own viewpoint-a liberal and not a Marxian one. Everyone familiar with the writings of Dan, Martov, Potressov and Co., knows this viewpoint. But Trotsky has no viewpoint, never has had one; he has merely transitions and flittings from the liberals to the Marxists and back again, fragments of words and sounding phrases, swing here and there. . . In reality, Trotsky’s resounding, confused, and empty phrases, so misleading to the untrained worker, serve solely for the defence of the liquidators; Trotsky accomplishes this by preserving silence on the question of illegality (that is, of the revolutionary organisation and policy of the working class.—L.K.), by endeavouring to convince us that a liberal labour policy does not exist amongst us at all (that is, no endeavour on the part of the Mensheviki to subordinate the labour movement to the cadets, etc.—L.K.) Comrade Trotsky addresses a special and lengthy sermon to the seven deputies, headed by Tscheidse, instructing them as to the cleverest methods of carrying out the policy of rejection of illegality and of the Party.” (Lenin, XII/ 2, pp. 410 to 413.)
Then came the tempestuous months of the year 1914. The
labour movement advanced from political and economic strikes
to armed demonstrations, only interrupted by the
mobilisation of the army. In July, the workers of Petersburg
were already at the barricades. It was necessary to strike a
balance, it was necessary to show to the working class the
political currents and tendencies emerging from illegality
and from the influence of the refugees from abroad, in order
that they might carry on their movement further. Lenin wrote
a comprehensive article and had it published in May, 1914,
in the Bolshevist periodical Prosweschtschenje
(“Enlightenment”). Here he drew the balance of the ten years
of struggle between Bolshevism and Trotskyism, the struggle
which we have followed in its various stages:
“The
old participators in Russia’s Marxist movement know
Trotsky’s figure very well; there is no need to say
anything about him to them. But the younger generation of
workers does not know him, for he represents a certain type.
At the time of the old Iskra (1901 to 1903) people
of this type oscillated between the “Economists” and the
Iskra group. . . .
When we speak of the liquidators, we so designate a certain
ideological tendency rooted in “Menshevism” and “Economism”
. . . a
tendency closely bound up with the policy and ideology of a
certain class, the liberal bourgeoisie.
These people “explain” that they are above the fractions,
but the
sole basis for this assertion is that they take their ideas
from one fraction today, from another to-morrow.”
“Trotsky was an open adherent of the Iskra from 1901 till
1903, and Rjasanov named the role played by Trotsky at the
Party Congress in 1903 that of a “Lenin’s cudgel.” By the
end of 1903, Trotsky was an open Menshevist, he had deserted
from the Iskra to the “Economists.” He proclaimed that “a
deep chasm yawned between the old and the new Iskra.” In the
years 1904-05 he left the Mensheviki and maintained an
irresolute attitude; at one time he co-operated with
Martinov (an “economist”), at another time he dished up his
left “permanent revolution” again. In 1906-07 he approached
the Bolsheviki, and in the spring of 1907 he declared
himself in full agreement with Rosa Luxemburg.
During the epoch of the decline he turned to the right again
after lengthy “anti-fractional” vacillations, and in August,
1912, he joined the bloc of the liquidators. Now he leaves
them again, but in all essentials he repeats their ideas.
Such types are characteristic of the crumbling away of
the historical formations of yesterday, when the mass labour
movement in Russia was not fully awakened.
The younger generation of workers must learn to recognise
this type of person, who, without concerning himself
about Party decisions or . . . about the experience won in
the present labour movement in Russia, simply step forward
with the most unheard of claims.” (XII/2, p. 462.)
Lenin deemed it necessary to say this to the younger
generation of workers on the eve of a fresh advance of the
revolutionary movement in the working class; he here drew
the balance of the ten
years’ struggle carried on by Bolshevism not only against
Menshevism, but also against Trotskyism.
It is comprehensible to everyone that when a
characterisation of this kind is repeated from year to year,
and not merely with reference to this or that error, but
with reference to the whole course pursued by Comrade
Trotsky, it is not done for any superficial reason. Comrade
Lenin saw in Trotsky the embodiment of a current, of a
political tendency, harmful to Bolshevism. For this reason
and for this reason only, Lenin
considered it necessary to warn the Party against
Trotskyism.
The War Period
Then came the war, rightly designated by Lenin as an event
of world historical importance in the life of humanity, and
as the greatest test of international socialism, rendering
apparent the impassable chasm between opportunism and
revolutionary Communism. The moment came when everyone had
to show his colours. The moment came when all vacillation
had to cease once and for all, and when a definite end had
to be put to what Lenin termed inferior diplomacy, the
diplomacy of having one foot in each camp.
But did this really come about? Did the war induce Comrade
Trotsky to break once and for all with opportunism and
support of the Right, and to renounce the role of defender
and disguise
for the Mensheviki, in which role he had been exposed for
ten years by Comrade Lenin?
Since the time when Comrade Trotsky entered our Party,
serving it well, and thereby adding many glorious pages to
the history of his own life and to the history of the Party,
we have not considered it possible to enter into this
question. But when he takes it upon himself to falsify the
history and the ideas of Bolshevism, when he attempts to
appropriate to himself the ideology of the Party, when he
endeavours to supplant Leninism by Trotskyism in the
ideology of the Russian and international proletariat, then he
himself forces us to put this question.
Did the war actually separate Trotsky from the opportunists? Did
the “inferior diplomacy” cease in the face of these great
events? Not at all. Just as Comrade Trotsky contrived to
combine an arch-revolutionary “left” phrase with
co-operation with the Mensheviki in 1905, in the same manner
he managed to combine his internationalism during the war
with the support of opportunism. 1915
As early as the summer of 1915, Lenin wrote as follows:
”In a reactionary war, the revolutionary class is bound to desire the defeat of its government. This is an axiom, contested only by the conscious adherents or unskilled assistants of social democracy. . . Trotsky belongs to these last.
“Trotsky, who as usual does not agree in principle with the social democrats on any single question, coincides with them in every question in actual practice. . . .
“Martov and Trotsky are anxious to combine the Platonic defence of internationalism with the unconditional demand for unity with the Nasha Sarja (“Our Dawn”), with the organisation committee (central committee of the Mensheviki), or with the Tscheidze fraction.”
At the end of 1915, Lenin wrote:
“In reality Trotsky is supporting the liberal politicians of Russia, who, by their disavowal of the role played by the peasantry, really mean that they do not wish to raise the peasantry to revolution.”
Again:
“Trotsky, and the company of foreign flunkeys of opportunism, are doing their utmost to patch up the differences, and to save the opportunism of Nascha Sarja group by the defence and praise of the Tscheidze fraction.” 1916
At the beginning of 1916:
“The powerless diplomatists, and such preachers of compromise as Kautsky in Germany, Longuet in France, and Martov in Russia, are most harmful to the labour movement, for they defend the fiction of unity and thus prevent the real and matured alliance of the opposition of all countries, the founding of the Third International.”
In March, 1916:
“And Trotsky? He is entirely in favour of the right of self-determination, but for him this is merely an empty phrase, since he does not demand separation of the nation oppressed by the ‘Fatherland’ of the socialists in any given case. He preserves silence on the hypocrisy of Kautsky and his followers.”
In October, 1916, just twelve months before our October:
“However good the intentions of Martov and Trotsky may be subjectively, they are none the less aiding Russian social imperialism by their complaisance.”
In December, 1916:
“As early as the year 1902 Hobson recognised not only the significance of the ‘United States of Europe’ (Kautsky’s disciple, Trotsky, may take cognisance of this) but also the significance of a fact which the sanctimonious followers of Kautsky in every country are anxious to conceal: ‘that the opportunists (social chauvinists) are co-operating with the imperialist bourgeoisie for the creation of an imperialist Europe supported on the shoulders of Asia and Africa. . .’ One of the conclusions which we have drawn from this is the necessity of separation from social chauvinism.” 1917
On 17th February, 1917 (February, 1917!!):
“The name of Trotsky signifies: Left phraseology and bloc with the Right against the aim of the Left!”
Six weeks after the February revolution, on 7th March,
1917, Lenin wrote:
“In my opinion, the matter of the greatest importance at the present juncture is not foolish attempts at a ‘coming to an understanding,’ on the lines projected by Trotsky and Co., ‘with the social patriots or with the even more dangerous elements of the organisation committee type (Mensheviki), but to continue the work of our Party in a logical international spirit.’”
There is one important. point which must not be omitted
here: During
the whole of this period Comrade Trotsky was a decided
adversary of the “Zimmerwald Left,” whose leader was Lenin, and
which formed the germ of the Third International. The Third
International was not born only of the struggle against
Scheidemann, Vandervelde, and their like, it
originated and grew in strength at the same time in the
struggle against the Zimmerwald “Centre,” against Kautsky
and Trotsky. The practical policy of this Centre was as
follows: no final rupture with the Second International, no
founding of the Third International, the aims striven for by
Lenin as head of the Zimmerwald Left.
Lenin never altered his characterisation and opinion of
the line taken by Comrade Trotsky, either
at the time when the tide of revolution was at its highest,
or at the time of its lowest ebb.
No Leninist taking the name seriously can admit even the
thought that Comrade Lenin, in thus systematically revealing
Comrade Trotsky’s standpoint for so many years in
succession, was influenced by any individual motives. In
his systematic and impassioned fight against Trotskyism, Comrade
Lenin was solely influenced by
the fact that he saw in Trotskyism a certain current hostile
to the ideology and the organisation of the Bolshevist
Party; a
current which in actual practice served the ends of
Menshevism.
As Comrade Lenin
would say, it is comparatively easy
to combat Menshevism, for its open and consistent
anti-proletarian character, obviously liberal in essentials, is
at once comprehended by only slightly experienced workers,
and is thus rejected by the workers. It
is more needful to combat the concealed forms of Menshevism, those
forms which clothe opportunist policy in
Left revolutionary phraseology, the form which adapts
Menshevism to the revolutionary feeling of the masses.
Those who fight
against us with open visor are not our sole enemies, we
have another foe in that group which
disguises the efforts of open enemies by means of
revolutionary phrases, and furthers the cause of the
enemies of the Party by
exploiting the confidence felt in these phrases.
Lenin merely formulated the relations to Trotskyism,
characteristic for the whole Bolshevist Party, although
Comrade Trotsky succeeded at times, in especially difficult
moments in the life of the Party, in drawing some few
Bolsheviki over to him, if only for a brief period, by means
of his phrases and inferior diplomacy.
II
Comrade Trotsky Enters the Party
The above described relations between Bolshevism and
Trotskyism were characterised by Comrade Trotsky
himself in the words: “I
came to Lenin fighting,” This phrase not only evidences
a desire to win approbation, but it is very well expressed.
Comrade Trotsky
is a master of elegant phraseology. But the matter in
question is unfortunately much too serious in character to
be settled by a well turned sentence.
In the first place this
phrase is not strictly accurate, and in the second place
it is calculated to carry away the reader by its beauty and to
conceal Comrade Trotsky’s real thoughts. This elegant
phrase is a piece of hypocrisy.
Is it then really true that the
whole history of Trotsky’s attitude, as we have followed
it here from 1903 to 1907, can be characterised by these
words of his: “I came to Lenin fighting?” Trotsky
is apparently extremely satisfied with the history of his
relations to Bolshevism; at least he wrote in his book,
“The New Course,” which appeared a few months ago: “I do not
consider that the road by which I reached Lenin is any less
suitable or certain than other roads.” For Trotsky this is
very reassuring. But is
it possible for the Party, without deceiving itself, to
regard the road upon which Trotsky reached our Party as
suitable and certain? If this road really was a “road to
Lenin,” then every one-time Menshevik and social
revolutionist, of whom there are not few in our Party, can make
use of Trotsky’s words and declare: “In reality I was
not a Menshevik or social revolutionist, I was merely making
my, way, fighting, to Bolshevism.”
One thing at least is evident: the Party cannot recommend
anybody to take Trotsky’s road to Bolshevism.
The comrades
who have come over to us from other parties have generally
declared that they have been mistaken, that they have
had a different conception of the interests of the working
class, and had thought to serve these interests in a
different manner, but that they
are now convinced that they have been on the wrong road.
The Party
did not demand any such avowal from Comrade Trotsky, and
was quite right in not doing so. Comrade Trotsky stood the
test, and stood it excellently. But this does not by any
means signify that the Party
can permit Comrade Trotsky to designate his fifteen years of
fighting against Bolshevism and Lenin as a suitable and
sure path to Leninism. I maintain that Trotsky sees the road
by which he approached Lenin from an entirely opposite
standpoint to ours; that he
does not believe Bolshevism to have proved right and
Trotskyism wrong.
Trotsky came to the Party with the conviction, not that he
was going to learn anything from Bolshevism, but that he was
going to teach the Party Trotskyism, and substitute Leninism
by Trotskyism. In Trotsky’s book “War and Revolution” we
read:
“There were three points in which the newspaper Nasche Slovo (Trotsky’s organ—L.K.) had not yet arrived at an agreement with the Social Democrat (organ of the C.C. of the Bolsheviki, conducted by Lenin and Zinoviev—L.K.), even after the former had finally passed into the hands of the left-wing of the editorial staff. These points referred to defeatism, to the struggle for peace, and to the character of the approaching Russian revolutions. Nasche Slovo rejected defeatism (which Lenin had held from the beginning of the war to be the fundamental principle of really revolutionary internationalism—L. K). The Social Democrat rejected the slogan of the struggle for peace . . . and opposed it by the slogan of civil war (rejected by Trotsky—L.K). Nasche Slovo, finally, supported the view that it must be made the task of our Party to conquer power in the name of socialist revolution. The Social Democrat maintained the standpoint of the democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry.”
A few lines before Trotsky informs us that the “differences”
existing between the Social Democrat and the Nasche Slovo,
considerable at first, “had diminished . . . ” Not only
Trotsky, but Martov, was at one time a member of the
editorial staff of the Nasche Slovo; Martov, however,
resigned his post later on account of the remorseless
criticism exercised by Comrade Lenin, and of the increase of
revolutionary Communist elements among the editors. After
the paper had finally passed into the hands of the left-wing
of the editorial staff, that is, into Trotsky’s hands, these
three points of dispute remained; the question of defeatism,
the question of civil war or peace, and the question of the
character of the impending Russian revolution.
Lenin stood
for the defeat of the national bourgeoisie, he impressed
upon the workers the necessity of the defeat of their “own”
bourgeoisie—Trotsky
was opposed to this!
Lenin stood for civil war—Trotsky opposed
it!
Lenin stood for the democratic dictatorship of the
proletariat and peasantry—Trotsky
opposed it!
Here, as Lenin pointed out, he
caused great confusion with his left phrase on “permanent
revolution.” In this last point Trotsky gave the
impression of being more left than Lenin. He was not content
with the mere dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry,
but demanded permanent revolution. Here we have merely a
further example of what Lenin impressed upon us for so many
years with regard to Trotsky: a
right policy with regard to daily questions of actual
practice, but skilfully disguised in the phraseology of the
Left.
A fourth
difference must, however, be added to these three, one
not mentioned by Comrade Trotsky: the difference in the
question of the Second and Third Internationals. Lenin, at
the head of the Zimmerwald Left, stood for immediate
rupture with the Second International and with Kautsky, and
for the founding of the Third International. Trotsky,
and the pro-Kautsky Centre were against this.
But only a few months after the existence of these
differences had been definitely ascertained, Trotsky joined
the Bolshevist Party.
“The March revolution,” he writes, “has
wiped out all these differences.”
Truly? All of them? And how? Trotsky
does not say. Yet the Party has a right to put this
question, since Comrade Trotsky
has obliged us to occupy ourselves with his history. Are
we to understand the declaration that the revolution has
erased all differences in such manner that we may assume
Comrade Trotsky
to have become convinced of his having been mistaken on all
these important points? That he has
adopted the viewpoint of the Bolsheviki? Comrade Martinov, one
of the best of the Menshevist theoreticians, declared
candidly: “I have served the working class for thirty years
in the way which I held to be the best. To-day I see that I
have been in the wrong. History
confirms the correctness of Lenin’s standpoint with regard
to the Russian revolution, and I join Levin.” But Comrade
Trotsky has given the Party no such answer.
Trotsky on Himself and Leninism
Trotsky, in his book “1905” (pp. 4-5) writes as follows:
“In the period between 9th January and the strike in October, 1905, I formed those views of the character of the revolutionary development in Russia which have received the designation of ‘permanent revolution. . .’ Despite the interval of twelve years, this estimate has been fully confirmed.” (This was written in the year 1922!—L.K.)
But during
the whole of these twelve years this theory was opposed by another
theory, Lenin’s theory expressed in the formula:
“Revolutionary democratic dictatorship of the proletariat
and peasantry.”
“This idea”—so wrote Comrade Trotsky in 1918, and wrote
it again in 1922 without the slightest reservation-“this
idea has been repeated unwearingly by
Lenin since 1904. But that does not make it correct.”
In this book (“1905”) Trotsky
describes Lenin’s fundamental idea as an empty abstraction, and
writes that the Bolsheviki “arrive at the idea of a
bourgeois-democratic self-limitation of the proletariat
possessing state power.”
He continues: “Whilst the anti-revolutionary features of
Menshevism are already visible to their full extent, the
anti-revolutionary features of Bolshevism (I
italicise these words on account of their importance—L.K.) threaten
to appear as a mighty danger only in the case of a
revolutionary victory.”
Comrade Trotsky,
who caused this phrase on the dangers of the
anti-revolutionary features of Bolshevism to be re-published
and confirmed in the year of 1922, adds the following:
“As is already well known, this did not happen, for Bolshevism, under Comrade Lenin’s leadership, changed its ideological equipment in this most important question in the spring of 1917, that is, before the conquest of power.” ( Trotsky “1905,” Russian edition, p. 285.)
Trotsky’s idea is now clear. The standpoint held by
Lenin and by the Bolshevist Party on the character of the
revolution, as developed between 1904 and the spring of
1917, had
not only been wrong, but even counter-revolutionary with
respect to the socialist revolution. Lenin and the
Bolsheviki were thus obliged to “change their equipment” in
the spring of 1917, before the conquest of power, for the
purpose of accomplishing the conquest of power. That is,
they found themselves obliged to substitute the
counter-revolutionary equipment of Bolshevism by the really
revolutionary equipment which Trotsky had kept ready on hand
for twelve years. It
is Trotsky’s conviction that Lenin came over to Trotsky after
first building up the Party for fifteen years on
“anti-revolutionary” ideas.
Trotsky has proved to be in the right during the whole
course of his intellectual conflicts with Bolshevism and
with Lenin up to the year 1917—that is the import of all
Trotsky’s latest books (“1905” and “1917.”)
But if this is so, then we must state it openly. If
Bolshevism contains anti-revolutionary features, if we
have to change our equipment before a decisive battle, then
what right have we to teach uncorrected Bolshevism to our
proletariat and to the proletariats of all countries?
Why do we not say anywhere, not in one single text book read
by the proletariat of our country and of the whole world
Comrades, we teach you Bolshevism, but do not forget that
Bolshevism contains anti-revolutionary features, and as soon
as the fight begins, then you will not be able to manage
with the equipment of Bolshevism, but will have to replace
it by another, the equipment of Trotskyism.
We must either teach Bolshevism, Leninism, as it is,
without correction, as the real theory of proletarian
revolution, or, if
there is anyone who believes that this theory is not the
true theory of proletarian revolution, but that it has
to be supplemented by Trotskyism in order to become
such, then he must state openly and straightforwardly what
alterations he thinks should be made. Is there really
something anti-revolutionary in the teachings of Bolshevism
on the revolution? Then the works issued by Lenin before the
spring of 1917 must not be made the scientific authority on
proletarian struggle and proletarian strategy against the
bourgeoisie. Or
we must at least say: But the art of realising proletarian
revolution is not to be learnt from Lenin’s works up to
1917, but from Trotsky’s works since 1905.
The October
revolution was either accomplished beneath the banner of
uncorrected Leninism,
or it was accomplished beneath the banner of Trotskyism and
its correction of Leninism. Here we are at a parting of the
ways.
It was to be expected that Comrade Trotsky, in order to
grant a certain amount of satisfaction to the Party which he
has thus benefitted, should
willingly admit that he has committed certain organisatory
errors in the past. What does such an acknowledgment
cost, when it serves as a cloak for the unpunished assertion
that Bolshevism, Leninism, contains anti-revolutionary
features? Paris is worth a mass. If one can appropriate the
role of intellectual and theoretical leader of Bolshevism
and the October revolution, it is worth while to admit to
even considerable errors in the past.
Trotsky, in his “Lessons
of October” actually does make such a confession to the
Party. “I
have acknowledged my real and great organisatory mistakes,” he
writes. But was the fifteen years’ conflict between Lenin
and the Bolsheviki on the one side, and Trotskyism on the
other, concerned
with organisatory questions? This is nonsense, an
enaeavour to distract from the point. The
conflict was directly concerned with the fundamental
questions of the revolution, with the mutual relations
of the different classes during the revolution with the
question of “permanent revolution” of Comrade Lenin’s theory
and this is the question of the role played by the peasantry
in the revolution, the question of the paths leading to
socialism in an agrarian country, the question of the
methods and conditions for the realisation of the
proletarian dictatorship in a country in which the peasant
population preponderates. This
is no contention on abstract formulas. The theory of
permanent revolution is based upon a complete
underestimation of the role played by the peasantry; it
replies to one question only: it tells us how power cannot
be seized or maintained under these conditions.
Trotsky’s viewpoint, summed up from a study of the “Lessons
of October,” may be expressed as follows: “On the eve of the
events of 1905, Lenin imparted a peculiar character to the
Russian revolution by the formula: Democratic
dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry. But, as
later developments showed, this formula had only
significance for one stage on the way.” This is followed by
a literary dissertation to the effect that this stage was a
stage on the way to Trotsky’s formula. And this is the
actual intellectual kernel of all Trotsky’s latest
writings. Trotsky
shuffles his Trotskyism beneath Leninism with the whole of
the literary art and talent peculiar to him. This last
book of his is not written for the whole Party, but for the
younger generation now growing up, for the youth who within
a year or two will have to determine the destiny of the
Party.
The aim of Trotsky’s book “1917” is to take revenge for the
twelve years in which Lenin exposed Trotsky’s wretched
policy, to prove that the revolution confirms his
(Trotsky’s) theory, and to
poison the minds of the future leaders of the Party, now
studying in the Communist universities, workers’ faculties,
colleges, etc., by this shuffling of Trotskyism into
Leninism. We cannot permit this aim to be realised.
In this book (“1917”) Trotsky inveighs against Zinoviev,
Kamenev, Rykov, and others, I shall deal further with this,
and with my own errors, but am of the opinion that the
reproaches made in this book are not intended for us only.
The names of Kamenev and Zinoviev are given, but Lenin is
meant. The question of the fate of Bolshevism may be put in
the following form: Lenin had an excellent theory, but the
disciples of Lenin did not know how to apply it, they did
not recognise the needs of the concrete situation. The
formula was right, but it has been badly carried out by this
or that Bolshevik. It is possible to put the question in
this manner, but it can also be stated as follows: If we
draw all the logical conclusions from the Leninist formula,
we are bound to land in a bog. The formula itself is wrong,
and this wrong formula has been employed logically
correctly. In the first case we have a justification of the
Bolshevist theory and an indication of the errors of
individual Bolsheviki, but in the second case, if we are
told that Lenin’s nearest disciples accepted his formula and
landed in a bog through applying it literally, then we
see—enlightened as we already are by Trotsky’s assertion as
to the anti-revolutionary features of Leninism and by his
statement that Trotsky’s theory, and not Lenin’s, has been
“completely confirmed”—then we see that the blows struck are
not directed against Kamenev and Zinoviev alone, but through
them at Lenin’s main formula.
Lenin in April, 1917
Is it true that Bolshevism, in order to solve the problems
of the revolution, was obliged to withdraw from its past? Is
it true that the theory of the revolutionary democratic
dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry proved
inadequate? What were the actual facts and how were these
regarded by Lenin?
What really happened—as seen by Lenin as well as by us—was
that the
Bolshevist idea of the “revolutionary democratic
dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry” was fully
and completely realised in the Russian revolution, and,
after its realisation, began to develop into the Bolshevist
idea of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
I here take the opportunity of referring to one of the works
in which Lenin laid down his principles at that time:
“Letters on Tactics,” in which he comments on and explains
to the Party his famous theses of 4th April. Lenin writes:
“The revolutionary democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry has already been realised in the Russian revolution. . . The workers’ and soldiers’ Soviets are the revolutionary democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry as realised in actual life. We are still in the minority; we recognise the necessity of gaining the majority (in these organs of the dictatorship).” (Complete Works, Russian edition, vol. xiv /1, p. 29.)
If our theory has been realised, we must stride forward.
How? In such manner that we gather together the proletarian
elements of town and country against the petty-bourgeois
elements, on the basis of the realised dictatorship of the
proletariat and peasantry. This means the mustering and
organisation of the proletarian elements on the basis of
this dictatorship, in order to proceed from the
revolutionary democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and
peasantry to the dictatorship of the proletariat, to the
purely socialist revolution. For this reason Lenin
invariably adapted his tactics to the development of the
mass movement in the peasantry, and he studied the
“peculiarity” of the realisation of the dictatorship of the
proletariat and the peasantry, which consisted of the fact
that the latter, at the given stage of the revolution
(April, 1917) retained their confidence in the bourgeois
government in the form of “defence of native country.” After
describing the views of the Bolsheviki contending against
him (I
was one of these), and after a sharp attack upon us,
Lenin writes:
“A Marxist must never quit the firm ground of analysis of class relations. The bourgeoisie is in power. And is the mass of the peasantry not another bourgeoisie belonging to another stratum, of another description and character? Does it follow that this stratum may not seize power by the “consummation” of bourgeois democratic revolution? Why should this not be possible? Old Bolsheviki frequently judge in this manner.”
I replied: “This is perfectly possible. . . it is possible
that the peasantry seizes the whole of the land and at the
same time the whole power. . .”
Lenin continues: “If the peasantry ceases to support the
government in the social revolutionary and Menshevist
Soviets, if the peasantry, having deserted the bourgeoisie,
seize the land and power in spite of the bourgeoisie, then
we shall have a new stage in the bourgeois democratic
revolution, and one which will occupy us greatly.”
This is much more complicated than Trotsky’s theory,
straight as
the line which the crow flies. For Trotsky, with his
slogan of: “Off with the Tsar and on with the labour
government,” the
matter was much simple. He simply ignored
the whole peasantry and the conditions pre-requisite to
the realisation of the dictatorship of the proletariat in a
capitalistically backward agrarian country.
The greatness of Lenin lies in the fact that he began to
carry out the dictatorship
of the proletariat under the given conditions of a given
agrarian country, and actually did carry this out by
means of constantly keeping in sight those real elements
upon whose fundation this dictatorship can
not only be proclaimed, but built up.
As a matter of fact, even in April it was not possible to
judge whether there might not be a moment in the Russian
revolution in which the peasantry would leave the social
revolutionary and Menshevist Soviets in the lurch and turn
against the Provisional Government, before it could attain
to the dictatorship of the proletariat. Lenin, as real
politician and mass leader, knowing that we pursued the
policy of the proletariat under the peculiar conditions of
an agrarian country, arranged his tactics for both
possibilities.
Lenin would not have been Lenin, that is, he would not
have been the practical leader of millions in class war, if
he had really taken over Trotsky’s equipment, for Trotsky’s
theory would have inevitably led to the breakdown of the
proletariat, and of the peasantry as well. In
its pure form, the line taken by Trotsky is simply the
ignoring of the peasantry, the ignoring of that
transition stage during which the peasantry still places its
confidence in the ruling bourgeoisie at first, is
disappointed and turns against the bourgeoisie, but still
does not join the proletariat; this transitional stage which
ends by the proletariat taking over the leadership of the
peasantry in the form of peasant’s risings, realising the
dictatorship, and endeavouring to bring about an alliance
between workers and peasants in various and changing forms.
Lenin, in the same pamphlet in which he wrote against the
old Bolsheviki, states:
“In my theses I have secured myself against any leaps over agrarian or petty bourgeois movements which have not yet been overcome, against any playing with ‘seizure of power’ by a labour government . . . ‘Trotskyism, down with the Tsar, up with the labour government’—is wrong. The petty bourgeoisie (that is, the peasantry—L.K.) exists, and cannot be ignored.”
Is this not the literal repetition, in the heat of
revolution, of all that Lenin had long warned the Party
against? In 1910 Lenin had already said that: “Trotsky’s
fundamental error . . . is
the lack of the smallest thought about the question of
the transition from this (the bourgeois) revolution to a
socialist revolution.”
Trotsky’s “original” theory takes from the Bolsheviki the
demand for decisive revolutionary struggle on the part of
the proletariat and the demand for the seizure of political
power, from the Mensheviki, it takes the
“denial” of the role played by the peasantry . . .
Trotsky did not, however, reflect that when the proletariat
induces the non-proletarian masses of the peasantry to
confiscate the land of the landowners and to overthrow the
monarchy, the “national bourgeois revolution” in Russia is
achieved and that this becomes a revolutionary democratic
dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry.
Lenin criticised severely those comrades (including me) who
had not observed that the revolution had already passed from
one phase to another. He
feared most that progress would be hindered by the Party’s
falling into the rut of Trotsky’s abstract theory, and
again he accuses it of wanting to spring over the peasants’
movement before this was in our hands.
There was no need for Lenin to change his equipment. The old
Leninist theory, the old Leninist, Bolshevist conception of
the character of the Russian revolution, and of the
relations between proletariat and peasantry, were seen
by Lenin to have proved fully correct. And now we had to
advance further on the same lines. But the greatest care
must be taken, in this advance, not
to fall into Trotsky’s mistaken footsteps. Twelve years
before 1917 Lenin had prophesied that, after the
revolutionary democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and
peasantry had been realised, we should have to advance to
the dictatorship of the proletariat, but that
this advance must take the peasantry into consideration, and
must create conditions under which the peasantry cooperate
with the proletariat, without
simply ignoring the peasantry as Trotsky proposes.
Bolshevism does not need to borrow weapons from the arsenal
of Trotskyism.
At the same time, there were some Bolsheviki who did not
advance so rapidly from stage to stage as was required by
the tremendous acceleration of the revolution caused by the
enormous pressure of the war. But this does not in the least
signify that Bolshevism was on the wrong track, that it led
into a bog instead of to victory or that it had to be
altered during the revolution. And this is just what Trotsky
is trying to prove.
Trotsky has never grasped the essentials of the Leninist
theory on the relations between the working class and
the peasantry in the Russian revolution. Even
after October he did not grasp it, and he did not grasp
it when our Party applied it in fresh ways, or when our
Party successfully manœuvred for the realisation of the
dictatorship of the proletariat without separation from the
peasantry. His
own theory, which in his opinion has proved entirely right,
has prevented him from grasping the Bolshevist position.
If Trotsky’s theory had proved correct, this would signify
that the Soviet power would long since have ceased to exist.
This theory of “permanent revolution,” which does not
trouble about the peasantry or provide any solution for the
question of the alliance between the proletariat and the
peasantry, renders the labour government in Russia
absolutely dependent upon the immediate proletarian
revolution in the West. According to this theory the
proletariat, after having taken over power, is plunged into
the most hopeless contradictions. Its power is limited by
objective social difficulties:
“Their solution is prevented by the economic backwardness of
the country. Within the confines of a national revolution
there is no means of escape from this contradiction.”
(Trotsky, “1905,” Russian edition, p. 286.)
Under such conditions a delay or postponement of the
proletarian world revolution would have inevitably caused
the immediate collapse of the workers’ dictatorship in
Russia. Thus the adherents of the “permanent revolution” are
bound to pass through stages of despair and profoundest
pessimism to attempts at overcoming the economic
backwardness of the country by force, with the aid of
military commands.
Real Bolshevist policy, as pursued by Lenin from February to
October, has nothing in common with either this policy or
this psychology.
How did matters really stand in October and immediately
afterwards? Seen
from the standpoint of Marxism, from the standpoint of the
analysis of the class forces of the revolution, was not
the acceptance of the social revolutionary decree on landed
property, the supplementation of the Soviet government by
the left S.R., the designation of the government created by
the October revolution as “Workers’ and Peasants’
Government,” all proposals of Lenin, was all this not a
growing development of the dictatorship of the proletariat
and peasantry into a system whose actual essence was already
the dictatorship of the proletariat?
It is possible to omit some of these facts of the October
revolution; but their we do not arrive at any scientific
analysis of Lenin’s policy. And what abort, the transition
from war Communism to the new economic policy, from the
committees for the impoverished peasantry to Lenin’s speech
on the “medium farmers?” How can this be brought into
harmony with that theory of permanent revolution which has
proved so “perfectly correct?”
In 1916 Lenin wrote that life was already a decade ahead of
Trotsky’s magnificent theory. Now we can add another
eight years. Does the circumstance that life has passed
Trotsky’s theory by for eight years justify Trotsky in
claiming to be able to correct Leninism by Trotskyism?
Since life has passed Trotsky’s theory by Trotsky
attempts in his books to not only correct Leninism, but life
as well, and to prove by every art of which he is master
that life follows Trotsky after all.
It is incumbent on the Party to show precisely the contrary,
and to prove to not only Trotsky, but every new member the
necessity of “Bolshevising Trotsky.” How far has the
Party succeeded in this?
III
Trotsky in the Party. Our Errors. October According to
Trotsky
We must differentiate between two aspects of Trotsky’s
activity. The one aspect is Comrade Trotsky as he carried
out the instructions of the Party strictly and accurately,
leaning with the other members of the Party on the totality
of common political experience in the Party and on the whole
Party mass organisation, and carrying out this or that task
or command of the Party. At this time Comrade Trotsky’s
deeds were splendid, and added many brilliant pages to his
own history, and that of the Party. But since Comrade
Trotsky has come forward as an individualist, believing
that he
and not the Party is in the right in the fundamental
questions of revolution, and that Leninism
must be improved by Trotskyism, we are obliged to see
that other aspect of Comrade Trotsky which
shows him to be no Bolshevik.
Four Attempts made by Comrade Trotsky at Improving the
Party
The Party remembers four occasions upon which Comrade
Trotsky has treed to instruct the Party, and to
force upon it his own Trotskyist deviations. The first
occasion was a
few months after Comrade Trotsky entered the Party. It
was at the time of Brest-Litovsk. The Party is adequately
and accurately informed as to Comrade Trotsky’s attitude at
that time. He under-estimated the role played by the
peasantry, and covered
this over by revolutionary phraseology. This was the
road to the defeat of the proletariat and the revolution. if
we recollect the evidence brought at this time against
Comrade Trotsky by Comrade Lenin, we see that Comrade Lenin
brought no other evidence than the substantiation
with which he had rejected Comrade Trotsky’s general
attitude during the course of the preceding decade.
Comrade Lenin reproached him with two political sins: Lack
of comprehension for the relations between proletariat
and peasantry, and liability to be carried away by
apparently Left, apparently revolutionary phrases. These
two errors, typical of Comrade Trotsky whilst outside of
our Party, were
repeated by him within it.
Then came the civil war, the epoch of war communism.
Comrade Trotsky executed the task allotted to him. His
participation in the direction of the general policy of
the Party was
less than before. But now the revolution reached a fresh
turning point. The relations between the classes shifted.
The Party anticipated, in the form of a discussion on trade
unions, the question submitted a few weeks later at
Cronstadt; the question of the transition from war Communism
to the new economic policy. What was Comrade
Lenin seeking for at that time? He was seeking new forms for
an alliance between the proletariat and the peasantry, new
forms for leading the working masses by means of gaining
their convinced adherence rather than by force.
To what
did Comrade Trotsky look for salvation at that time? He
advised us to tighten
the screws of war Communism. This was again and again an
under-estimate of the peasantry, the liability to be carried
away by externals, by
methods of “pressure” and “administration from above.”
And comrade Trotsky’s further attempts—even
during Comrade Lenin’s lifetime—the question of the
“plan” according to his peculiar conception, his “formulas”
on the “dictatorship
of industry,” were not these again attempts to force
petty bourgeois mentality upon us from above with bonds of
iron, did they not once more show that lack of comprehension
of those concrete conditions under which it is alone
possible to realise a dictatorship in an agrarian country
with undermined industries at a time when
the international revolution is retarded?
Beneath Comrade Trotsky’s effective formulas we can here
easily distinguish the feelings inevitably involved by his
original theory: On the one hand despair, pessimism,
disbelief, and on the other hand exaggerated
hopes in the methods of supreme administration (a term
of Lenin’s), in the competent subjection of economic
difficulties from above.
The last discussion is still fresh in our memories. It
gave the Party a graphic survey of the totality of Comrade
Trotsky’s errors, as dealt with above. But it also
showed with special clearness another error, another
feature of Trotskyism, and one far from being new. This
is the
attempt to undermine and weaken the main framework of the
dictatorship, the Party. The same object was aimed at by
the discrediting of the “cadres” of the Party, by the
resurrected Menshevist conception of the Party as a
collection of “groups and currents,” and the essentially
liquidatory undermining of the authority of the leading
institutions (“they are leading the country to
destruction”). And has it not been under Comrade Trotsky’s
banner that the idea of greater freedom from Party influence
for extra-Party organizations has flourished? Has not
all this, taken together, led to a weakening of the
dictatorship of the proletariat, and has it not all been
based upon an under-estimation of the conditions under which
we—in an agrarian country—have to realise the dictatorship? Is
it not a petty bourgeois deviation?
So long as the Party is perfectly sound and everything goes
well, Comrade Trotsky quietly performs every task which
falls to him: but as soon as the Party encounters any
obstacle, as soon as it has to adjust its rudder, then
Comrade Trotsky at once springs forward in the role of
saviour and teacher of the Party, but
invariably points out the wrong way, since he has not
absorbed the principles of Bolshevism.
Our Errors
Comrade Trotsky
has another trump in his hand against Bolshevism. This
trump consists of certain errors committed by some few
Bolsheviki (above all by
me and Zinoviev, then those of Rykov and Nogin) in
October, 1917. The errors of the Bolsheviks are
naturally invariably exploited by our enemies. Comrade
Trotsky did not resort to this trump so long as
he hoped to induce the Party to deviate to the path of
Trotskyism by means of the discussion of this or that
practical question. But after four attempts—Brest, trade
unions, discussion on the economic plan, and the last
discussion—had shown
him that he cannot persuade the Bolshevist Party to deviate
from its path, after he lead learnt from the Party at
the Thirteenth Party Conference that we, the Leninists, do
not require our theory to be corrected by Trotskyism, then
he brought
forward this last trump.
He is of course not the first to do this. These errors
have been exploited often enough already by our enemies,
but both errors and exploitation were simply buried beneath
the thunders of the proletarian revolution. At the time
neither the errors themselves nor their being made use of by
hostile quarters resulted in any practical consequences. It
is only since then that these errors have been raked
up again maliciously by those who had deserted Communism: Levi,
Frossard, Balabanova. Levi
and Frossard are now being followed by Trotsky.
Vacillations were unallowable. Lenin armed himself
against there with all the power and passion of a leader who
sees that his co-workers are liable to carry confusion into
their own ranks by vacillation at decisive moments. He
exposed every vacillation relentlessly, and in critical and
decisive moments he did not shrink from the severest words
or propositions. And he was right, right to the end, without
reservation.
But when the moment for calm discussion arrived, the moment
for the avoidance of the repetition of similar errors in
other Communist Parties, then Lenin characterised these
errors very accurately. When Serrati attempted to cloak his
withdrawal from Communism by these errors
of Zinoviev and Kamenev, Comrade Lenin wrote: “Before
the October revolution in Russia, and immediately after it,
a number of excellent Communists committed errors which we
do not like to remember now. Why do we not like to
remember them? Because
it is wrong to call to mind errors which have been made
perfectly good, unless theme is some special reason for
doing so.”
Special attention must be accorded to the manner in which
Lenin formulated our errors “In the period of which I speak
they vacillated, fearing that the Bolsheviks were isolating
themselves, were rushing too recklessly into a rising, were
too unwilling to meet the advances of a certain section of
the “Mensheviki” and “social revolutionists.” The conflict
went so far that the comrades named resigned demonstratively
from all responsible positions both in the party and in
Soviet work, to
the great joy of the enemies of the Soviet revolution. The
affair culminated in a very severe criticism in the press,
on the part of the C.C. of our Party, against the resigning
comrades. And after a few weeks, at latest after a few
months, all these comrades recognised their error and
returned to their responsible Party and Soviet positions.”
Is this description of Lenin in any way similar to the malicious
attempt made by Trotsky —ridiculous in its malice—to
twist this “right” wing into an actually “Menshevist” wing
in the Bolshevist Party? But
this appears to be Comrade Trotsky’s fate: In order to
attain his objects he is invariably obliged to “overcome”
Lenin, Leninism and the Leninists.
Trotsky Writes again about Himself and Lenin
Were we the only ones, in Trotsky’s opinion, who made
mistakes at the time of the October revolution? No,
we were not the only ones. This book contains many
sensations. But the most sensational sentence in the book is
one referring to the October revolution. On page 50 of his
“Lessons” Trotsky writes: “The rising on the 25th of October
was of
supplementary character only.” There are probably many
here present who took part in the October events, and these
will be surprised to learn, eight years after the 25th
October, 1917, that the rising on the 25th October was
merely of a “supplementary character.” What did it
supplement? We learn that it “supplemented” the events which
had taken place on 9th October.
The main data of the revolution are familiar to us. But when
I mention events which occurred on 9th October, many
will ask what happened on that date to which the October
rising was nothing more than a supplement. On 9th October,
says Comrade Trotsky’s book, a resolution was passed in the
Petrograd Soviet, on the motion of Comrade Trotsky, ending
with the sentence: “The Petrograd Workers’ and Soldiers’
Soviet cannot be responsible to the army for such strategy
on the part of the Provisional Government, and especially
for the removal of troops from Petrograd.”
It need not be said that this was an important resolution;
it united the garrison, which did not want to go to the
front, with the Petrograd Soviet. But
listen to how Trotsky describes and estimates this event
on the 9th October: “From this moment (9th October), onwards
we were actually in a state of armed insurrection . . . The
issue of the rising on the 25th October was already
three-parts pre-determined at this moment. . . In all
essentials an armed insurrection had already been brought
about. . . Here we had a “quiet” and “almost” legal “armed
insurrection, one which was two-thirds, if not nine-tenths,
an accomplished fact. . . From this moment onwards we had a
victorious rising in the capital City.”
Thus it appears that the 25th
October was not more than a slight supplement to the great
9th. But now the question arises: If the “victorious”
insurrection was already an accomplished fact to the extent
of nine-tenths on the 9th October, what
are we to think of the mental capacity of those who sat in
the Bolshevist C.C. and decided in a heated debate, on
10th October, whether we should proceed to an insurrection
or not, and if so, what then? What are we to think of people
who on 15th October gathered together as Plenary Session of
the C.C. together with the functionaries and co-workers from
the military organisations, and still deliberated on the
prospects of the insurrection, on the forces of the
insurrection, and on the date of the insurrection. Had it
not been all arranged on the 9th quietly and legally? So
quietly that neither the Party nor the C.C. heard anything
about it.
But this is merely a side issue. What
is the Party, what is the Petrograd Committee, or the C.C.
when Trotsky writes a history of the October revolution? In
this history neither the C.C. not the Party exist
at all as real living powers, as collective organisers
of the mass movement. And there is not a word to be learnt
from the “Lessons of October” with regard to what took place
in Moscow, that not only in Petrograd, but in Moscow and
Ivanovo Vosnessensk there was a proletariat which was also
doing something. And with
reference to Lenin the book informs us: “Lenin who was
not in Petrograd, did not fully estimate the importance of
this fact. . . Lenin,
living illegally, had no possibility of estimating the
thorough upheaval,” etc. We see that not
one of us really knew anything about the October revolution. We
had thought that it was precisely Lenin who led the October
revolution, and that the C.C., the Party, and the military
organisations of the Party organised it. But
it appears that they did not appear on the scene at all.
In order to throw even more light on the part played by
Lenin, Trotsky
reports as follows: “If the insurrection had begun in
Moscow (in accordance with Lenin’s advice—L.K.), before the
revolution in Petrograd, it would inevitably have dragged
much more and the issue would have been very doubtful) and a
failure in Moscow would have had a very severe effect upon
Petrograd.”
Whilst Lenin is engaged in imparting such “advice” Trotsky,
with his “quiet” but “victorious insurrection” already in
his pocket, is executing “an extensive manœuvre.” “We
succeeded” he writes triumphantly, “in luring our enemies
into the trap of Soviet legality.” Lenin, calculating much
more upon the workers, sailors and soldiers than upon
Comrade Trotsky’s “manœuvres,” wrote at this time: “It is a
cringe to hesitate, it is a piece of childishness and
formality to wait for the Soviet Congress, a betrayal of the
revolution.” But Trotsky
refutes Lenin’s words with an air of victory at the
close of his description of the roles played by him and by
Lenin in October. “It is one thing to organise an armed
insurrection under the bare slogan of seizure of power by
the Party,” Trotsky instructs Lenin, “but it is something
very different to prepare and realise an insurrection under
the slogan of the defence of the rights of the Soviet
Congress.”
Here the figures are shifted from their actual positions. Lenin is
illegal, unable to make a correct estimate of the situation,
omits to observe that nine-tenths of the insurrection has
already been accomplished, advises that the rising be
commenced in Moscow, although this obviously condemns the
revolution to failure. Trotsky, on
the other hand, brings about a “victorious insurrection” by
the 9th October, carries out a definite but cautious
manœuvre by which he “lured the enemy into a trap,” and
“prepares and realises the victory” under a slogan
comprehensible to the broad masses, the slogan of “defence
of the rights of the Soviet Congress.”
What do these “Lessons of October” endeavour to teach us? That
in the spring Lenin was obliged to alter his attitude, to
abandon his old theory, and to borrow weapons from Trotsky;
equipment. And that in October Lenin endeavoured
unsuccessfully to lead the insurrection which Comrade
Trotsky was destined to lead to victory.
We have to choose what we are to learn and to teach. Either
this history of October, this history of Trotsky’s or the
history as given in the works of Lenin.
In the question of the Constituent Assembly, Comrade Trotsky
quotes my and Zinoviev’s letter of 11th October, in
which we wrote: “The Constituent Assembly will be able to
lean upon the Soviets only for aid in its revolutionary
work. The Constituent Assembly and the Soviet form the
combined type of state institutions towards which we are
advancing.”
Trotsky comments as follows: “It is extremely interesting
for the characterisation of the whole line adopted by the
Right to note that the theory of “combined” state
institutions uniting the Constituent Assembly with the
Soviets, is one which was repeated one or two years later in
Germany by Rudolf Hilferding, an opponent of seizure of
power by the proletariat.”
Zinoviev’s and my letter was written on 11th October; and I
take Lenin’s article written on 6th October. Lenin writes as
follows: “During
the transition from old to new combined types are possible
at times (as the Workers’ Path rightly pointed out a few
days ago), for instance Soviet Republic and Constituent
Assembly.”
What does this imply? It implies that in the case before us
Lenin resembled Hilferding. Historical
truth is of little importance to Trotsky. The alteration
of tactics at moments when the situation alters from day to
day is of no interest to him; what
interests him is to discredit Bolshevism by every possible
means.
A final example, again in two words. In this same letter of
October, 1917 we wrote: “These masses of the soldiery are
not supporting us for the sake of the slogan of war, but for
the slogan of peace. . . Should we find ourselves in a
position, after seizing power, in which the international
situation obliges us to resort to a revolutionary war, the
soldiery will turn away from us. The best of the youth among
the soldiers will remain true to us, but the great mass will
leave us.” The historian may judge in how far this estimate
was justified. But
what does Comrade Trotsky do? He writes: “Here we see
fundamental arguments in favour of the signing of the
Brest-Litovsk peace.”
Thus it
appears that the Brest-Litovsk peace, signed by the
Party on the urging and iron pressure of Lenin, against
Trotsky, was substantiated by “fundamental
arguments” supplied by us, the “Right,” the followers of
Hilferding. It is not to be wondered at when our enemies,
who have a very fine feeling for anything wrong, comment
on such books about Lenin by remarking that it is
difficult to distinguish whether they have been written by a
co-worker or a rival of Lenin.
Leninism against Trotskyism
The results may now be summed up. We are the monopoly Party
in our country. We gather together in our ranks every
organised worker in the country; but we must not forget for
a moment that we
are surrounded by elements foreign to our class, and
that these elementary forces do not diminish, but will
multiply and become politically more enlightened. They do
not possess the form of legal organisation. Petty
bourgeois intelligence will also grow on the soil provided
by the development of industry, of the works and
factories, and of trade. All these petty bourgeois elements,
finding no open means of expression in any social
organisation, are naturally endeavouring to further their
aims through the medium of our Party itself. The petty
bourgeois elements, in exercising this pressure upon our
Party, naturally
seek the weakest link in the chain, and as naturally
they find this weakest link where people have entered the
Party without being assimilated to it, and are possessed by
a secret conviction, leaving them no peace, that they are
more in the right than the Party, and that it is mere
narrow-mindedness on the part of the Party, mere
conservatism, tradition and adherence to this or that clique
in leading positions, which prevents the Party from learning
from its real saviours, such as Comrade Trotsky.
It is with great regret that I state this, and the whole
Party will echo this regret, but it has to be said: Comrade Trotsky
has become the channel through which the elementary forces
of the petty bourgeoisie find their way into our Party. The
whole character of his advances, and his whole historical
past, show this to be the case. In his contentions against
the Party he leas already become a symbol, all over the
country, for everything directed against our Party. This is
a fact which it is most important for Comrade Trotsky to
grasp. If he will grasp this and draw the necessary
conclusions, then everything can be made good again. Whether
he wants it or not (and assuredly he does not want it) he
has become, for all who regard Communism as their greatest
enemy, a symbol for emancipation from the thrall of the
Communist Party. This is the regrettable but perfectly
inevitable conclusion of all who are accustomed to judge
political events from
the standpoint of actual analysis of class relations, and
not from the standpoint of mere words.
I am aware that in
Moscow, a city particularly receptive for all manner of rumours, “perfectly
reliable” information is already being
spread abroad to the effect that, firstly, Comrade
Trotsky’s book has been prohibited, and secondly, that
Trotsky’s exclusion from the Party is contemplated and
Trotsky himself is no longer in Moscow. All
this is naturally mere gossip. It has not occurred to
anybody to prohibit Comrade Trotsky’s book; no single member
of the C.C. has raised the question of any reprisals against
Comrade Trotsky. Reprisals, expulsion, and the like would
not enlighten anybody; but would on the contrary render
enlightenment more difficult and at the same time give
opportunities to those brewers of confusion who would like
to sow the seeds of schism in the Party, and prevent the
real fundamentals of Bolshevism being explained in their
differentiation from Trotskyism; and it is this explanation
which is of fundamental importance at present.
It must be perfectly clear to every conscious member of the
Party that for us, the Bolsheviki, and for the international
proletariat marching forward to victory. Leninism
is sufficient, and that it is not necessary to substitute or
improve Leninism by Trotskyism. (Enthusiastic applause.)
Notes
1. Plechanov’s revolutionary enthusiasm was, however, not
maintained for very long.—L.K.
From; The Errors of Trotskyism, May 1925
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