Trot/Bolsheviks(sp?) defense of Kronstadt rebellion?

[Stephen Colbert]

Seems to me doing a bit of research on the event has me sympathizing with the rebels who wanted soviets to be removed from party control and wanted to stop the deportation of people to gulags. Perhaps I am just ignorant or ill-informed, but what sort of justification do authoritarian socialists have for the suppression of this uprising?

[Q]

Trotsky, contrary to common belief, was never actually at Kronstadt when the events unfolded, but as leader of the Red Army took full responsibility. Years later, in 1938, he wrote a piece about it to defend the suppression: Hue and Cry Over Kronstadt (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1938/01/kronstadt.htm).

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Kronstadt 1921: Bolshevism vs. Counterrevolution (http://www.icl-fi.org/english/esp/59/kronstadt.html)

[Zanthorus]

Seems to me doing a bit of research on the event has me sympathizing with the rebels who wanted soviets to be removed from party control and wanted to stop the deportation of people to gulags.

I didn't know that the Kronstadt rebels had the power to see eight years into the future.

[BOZG]

Kronstadt 1921: Bolshevism vs. Counterrevolution (http://www.revleft.com/vb/Kronstadt%201921:%20Bolshevism%20vs.%20Counterrevo lution)

Assume this (http://www.icl-fi.org/english/esp/59/kronstadt.html) is what you meant to link to?

[BOZG]

Seems to me doing a bit of research on the event has me sympathizing with the rebels who wanted soviets to be removed from party control and wanted to stop the deportation of people to gulags. Perhaps I am just ignorant or ill-informed, but what sort of justification do authoritarian socialists have for the suppression of this uprising?

Take a step back and view what happened in Kronstadt not as an isolated event but in what it would have meant for the revolution as a whole. Whether the rank-and-file sailors intended or didn't intend to open the doors of Kronstadt to White Counter-Revolution is largely irrelevant. The issue is that the Whites would not have allowed such an opportunity to pass. The military suppression of Kronstadt was absolutely necessary and absolutely justified. Was it a nice event? Probably not. But we're revolutionaries, not moralists.

[Dave B]

An alternative view;

http://www2.cddc.vt.edu/marxists/reference/archive/goldman/works/1920s/disillusionment/ch27.htm


http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/goldman/works/1938/trotsky-protests.htm


...

[Paulappaul]

But we're revolutionaries, not moralists.

The latter implies the earlier.

Some other good stuff,

Anarchist response to Trotsky on the Kronstadt,

http://libcom.org/library/thekronstadtcommuneidamett9

Cajo Brendel, a Council Communist, pamphelt on the Kronstadt,

http://libcom.org/library/1921-kronstadt-proletarian-spin-russian-revolution-cajo-brendel

Another good pamphlet on the subject,

http://libcom.org/library/-kronstadt-uprising-1921-thorndycraft

[IllicitPopsicle]

Also good:

http://theanarchistlibrary.org/HTML/Alexander_Berkman__The_Kronstadt_Rebellion.html

[Enragé]

the most interesting point about the kronstadt rebellion is that AFTER the repression of the rebellion ALL demands were met, plus the right for bosses to have like 20 people working under them (which wasnt part of the demands), i.e the New Economic Programme.

Interesting to see them first crush a rebellion based on just demands, then meeting all demands, plus one basicly restoring capitalism (or at least the petty-bourgeoisie).

And yes, we should see this in the broader context of what was happening. One of those things was the introduction of one-man-management of means of production (yes.. ONE-MAN-MANAGEMENT) by the bolsheviks and the disbanding of a number of soviets in early 1918 because they were no longer majority bolshevik (but menshevik and SR).

This is what you get when you have one party seeing itself as the only bearer of 'the' revolution. Anything happening outside of that party is then seen as counter-revolutionary, because if it were revolutionary, then it would be done by the party.

[BOZG]

The latter implies the earlier.

No, it implies making decisions that aren't very nice or welcome but are necessary to safeguard the class as a whole and the revolution as a whole.

Bourgeois liberals are made by moralism, not revolutionaries.

[ContrarianLemming]

Take a step back and view what happened in Kronstadt not as an isolated event but in what it would have meant for the revolution as a whole. Whether the rank-and-file sailors intended or didn't intend to open the doors of Kronstadt to White Counter-Revolution is largely irrelevant. The issue is that the Whites would not have allowed such an opportunity to pass. The military suppression of Kronstadt was absolutely necessary and absolutely justified. Was it a nice event? Probably not. But we're revolutionaries, not moralists.

This is the kind of thinking we should be most wary of in our ideals, in our musings of the past. This idea that suppression of liberty is justified for the greater good.

[Zanthorus]

One of those things was the introduction of one-man-management of means of production (yes.. ONE-MAN-MANAGEMENT) by the bolsheviks

The one-man management demand was a lot of hot air by Lenin and Trotsky which was ignored on the ground. The actual management of the factories was performed by a triumvirate of management, the local party cell and the trade unions.


This is what you get when you have one party seeing itself as the only bearer of 'the' revolution.

I hope you're not seriously suggesting that the Mensheviks, who argued that attempting to socialism was a fantasy and that Russia could only have a bourgeois revolution at the time, or the SR's, with their social base in the peasantry, were revolutionary.

The idea that the Bolsheviks were revolutionary isn't based on the idea that only one party can be revolutionary, for the simple reason that no Leninist believes that. It's just your own caricature that you've created.,

[Stranger Than Paradise]

I have heard arguments that the civil war had just ended.

Here's a good piece on Kronstadt:
http://libcom.org/library/the-kronstadt-uprising-ida-mett

[Enragé]

The one-man management demand was a lot of hot air by Lenin and Trotsky which was ignored on the ground. The actual management of the factories was performed by a triumvirate of management, the local party cell and the trade unions.

that might be true but it suggests the ideological climate in the upper upper ranks of the party. Also 3-man-management is only a bit better than 1-man-management, the unions were being used to discipline the labour force, and yes, local PARTY cells had power (resulting from the idea that the party had recruited all the 'good' elements of the working class).


I hope you're not seriously suggesting that the Mensheviks, who argued that attempting to socialism was a fantasy and that Russia could only have a bourgeois revolution at the time, or the SR's, with their social base in the peasantry, were revolutionary.

far from it. Im suggesting that when the workers and peasants vote out Party X and replace it with Y and Z that party X shouldnt cling to power and suppress the workers and peasants' democracy which IS the revolution ('factories to the workers, land to the peasants!' not factories and land to the party regardless what the workers and peasants think!)


I have heard arguments that the civil war had just ended

yup, there was a simultaenous strike wave in st. petersburg by workers who thought 'ok, so we had to take all this shit 'because of the civil war', well now its over!'

[Lenina Rosenweg]

Victor Serge (anarchist who joined the Bolsheviks but became disillusioned w/the rise of Stalinism) wrote a very honest account of what was going on at that time in "Memoirs of A Revolutionary". He called the crushing of the Kronstadt rebellion a "necessary tragedy".

The Bolsheviks made mistakes. It was the first time the working class had taken state power and they were in a horrible situation. The attitude of "party patriotism", banning other worker's parties was a result of this. This is understandable of course-the Mensheviks helping the enemy, the attempted coup by the left SRs, Fanya Kaplan, etc. The result of this though was that something like Kronstadt was inevitable.

Even Kollontai and the Worker's Opposition supported the suppression. Trotsky gave the orders but he wasn't there. He got a lot of shit for this in the late 30s, decades after the events. This basically disguised the "retreat of the intellectuals" back towards safe liberalism on the eve of WW II.

Its a bit murky but there may have been more than a little White involvement. A newspaper in Paris announced the uprising a day before it happened.

[chegitz guevara]

If the Kronstadt rebellion had succeeded, capitalism would have been restored in Russia about sixty years earlier than it was, not because that was what the anarchists wanted or were trying to accomplish, but simply because they would have destroyed the only force powerful enough to keep the Whites from coming back.

[mountainfire]

the only force powerful enough to keep the Whites from coming back.

I think this is the most important point. The Kronstadt rebels raised the slogan of "Soviets without Bolsheviks", and in doing so they left open the question of which other political organization with roots in the working class would ever have been able to defend the Soviet republic against the forces of reaction. The Bolsheviks were ultimately the one force with the experience and discipline to preserve the gains of the revolution at a time when the international and domestic situation was still one of intense hostility and danger. To suggest that the rebels themselves or any other force would have been able to carry the civil war to its successful conclusion and establish anything like a stable government is fantasy. The Kronstadt experience carries lasting lessons for the task of socialist construction - namely that the most important objective during the initial stages of any revolutionary process must be for the working class, as represented by its most advanced section, to hold on to power by any means possible, even when this means having to defy the objections of moralists by taking difficult decisions.

[danyboy27]

If the Kronstadt rebellion had succeeded, capitalism would have been restored in Russia about sixty years earlier than it was, not because that was what the anarchists wanted or were trying to accomplish, but simply because they would have destroyed the only force powerful enough to keep the Whites from coming back.

i dont agree, the ressources mobilized for kronstad could have been mobilzed to fight the white guard, but still they won the war.

ideologicly the people of kronstad where not capitalist neither they where sympatetic to capitalism, all they wanted was the end to opression, they would have fought the white guard and worked side by side the the bolsheviks.

militarly, and politicly, they where not a threat to the revolution.

[Paulappaul]

No, it implies making decisions that aren't very nice or welcome but are necessary to safeguard the class as a whole and the revolution as a whole.

Bourgeois liberals are made by moralism, not revolutionaries.

Liberals are framed by liberty, not morality. Liberty can imply economic, Social, political, etc. all which could be moral, but not necessarily. For instance a Liberal could say "I want to privatize Healthcare in the UK" of which could imply liberty to the insurance company, but in the long run it wouldn't be moral, that is, it wouldn't be just.

Socialists are made by their Morality, that is to say, their ethics. Morality implies in essence, what is right, and what is wrong. For instance a Socialist would say "No Nationalize Healthcare, even if it's in a Capitalist system, it's right for everyone to have Universal Healthcare" - "it's wrong for people to be denied healthcare"

Whereas a Liberal views it from a moral perspective, a Socialist views it from moral perspective regardless of the exploitative system.


I didn't know that the Kronstadt rebels had the power to see eight years into the future.

He meant the concentration camps. See point 6 of the list of demands by the Kronstadt rebels.

[Devrim]

I think this is the most important point. The Kronstadt rebels raised the slogan of "Soviets without Bolsheviks", and in doing so they left open the question of which other political organization with roots in the working class would ever have been able to defend the Soviet republic against the forces of reaction.

This is actually untrue. It was never a slogan raised by the Krondstadt sailors. I'd like to see you try and provide a source for that one.

Devrim

[Lenina Rosenweg]

How does the ICC feel about Kronstadt?

[Dave B]

The Demands of the Kronstadt ;




1. immediate new elections to the Soviets. The present Soviets no longer express the wishes of the workers and peasants. The new elections should be by secret ballot, and should be preceded by free electoral propaganda.
2. Freedom of speech and of the press for workers and peasants, for the Anarchists, and for the Left Socialist parties.
3. The right of assembly, and freedom for trade union and peasant organisations.
4. The organisation, at the latest on 10th March 1921, of a Conference of non-Party workers, solders and sailors of Petrograd, Kronstadt and the Petrograd District.
5. The liberation of all political prisoners of the Socialist parties, and of all imprisoned workers and peasants, soldiers and sailors belonging to working class and peasant organisations.
6. The election of a commission to look into the dossiers of all those detained in prisons and concentration camps.
7. The abolition of all political sections in the armed forces. No political party should have privileges for the propagation of its ideas, or receive State subsidies to this end. In the place of the political sections various cultural groups should be set up, deriving resources from the State.
8. The immediate abolition of the militia detachments set up between towns and countryside.
9. The equalisation of rations for all workers, except those engaged in dangerous or unhealthy jobs.
10. The abolition of Party combat detachments in all military groups. The abolition of Party guards in factories and enterprises. If guards are required, they should be nominated, taking into account the views of the workers.
11. The granting to the peasants of freedom of action on their own soil, and of the right to own cattle, provided they look after them themselves and do not employ hired labour.
12. We request that all military units and officer trainee groups associate themselves with this resolution. 13. We demand that the Press give proper publicity to this resolution.
14. We demand the institution of mobile workers' control groups.
15. We demand that handicraft production be authorised provided it does not utilise wage labour.


http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/russia/mett/petro_eve.html (http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/russia/mett/petro_eve.html)



Apart from point 11 and the ‘the right to own cattle, provided they look after them themselves’ .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFBOQzSk14c (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFBOQzSk14c)

..

[Madvillainy]

If the Kronstadt rebellion had succeeded, capitalism would have been restored in Russia about sixty years earlier than it was, not because that was what the anarchists wanted or were trying to accomplish, but simply because they would have destroyed the only force powerful enough to keep the Whites from coming back.

What does the Kronstadt rebellion got to do with Anarchism? It wasn't an anarchist revolt it was a revolt by workers, the same workers whom in 1917 were described as the cream of the revolution.

[robbo203]

If the Kronstadt rebellion had succeeded, capitalism would have been restored in Russia about sixty years earlier than it was, not because that was what the anarchists wanted or were trying to accomplish, but simply because they would have destroyed the only force powerful enough to keep the Whites from coming back.

Capitalism wasnt "restored" 60 years later. It was clearly being well and truly developed and entrenched under the Bolsheviks in the form of state capitalism. Lenin himself said state capitalism would be a step forward and chided his critics who thought otherwise

[Os Cangaceiros]

There was a really good debate on this subject between Random Precision (who has sadly left us...or was banned, I can't remember which) and Devrim. I can't seem to find it, though.

[Madvillainy]

There was a really good debate on this subject between Random Precision (who has sadly left us...or was banned, I can't remember which) and Devrim. I can't seem to find it, though.

Here it is =)
http://www.revleft.com/vb/kronstadt-t80959/index.html?t=80959&highlight=kronstadt

[Alf]

Lenina asked: How does the ICC feel about Kronstadt?


We think it was a proletarian revolt provoked by the isolation and internal degeneration of the revolution. The Bolshevik suppression of the rebellion was a catastrophic error which hastened the victory of the Stalinist counter-revolution and Bolshevism's own demise. There's an article about it here:
http://en.internationalism.org/specialtexts/IR003_kron.htm

[Blackscare]

If the Kronstadt rebellion had succeeded, capitalism would have been restored in Russia about sixty years earlier than it was, not because that was what the anarchists wanted or were trying to accomplish, but simply because they would have destroyed the only force powerful enough to keep the Whites from coming back.

That is, assuming that the Sailors of Krondstadt would have refused to cooperate militarily were their sovereignty been acknowledged. I honestly don't know whether intentions to this effect were indicated in any documents, I'm just pointing out that this does rest on an assumption.

The Makhnovists cooperated with the Reds in three different campaigns, so it would not have been unprecedented. I understand that there is some debate regarding their authenticity in these agreements, but A. Skirda argues pretty convincingly that the Makhnovists had been forced into the position intentionally.

[S.Artesian]

The Kronstadt rebellion certainly represented a threat to the Bolshevik monopoly of state power. It certainly did not represent a threat of restoring capitalism to Russia.

Capitalism was not going to be restored, given the overwhelmingly rural, subsistence nature of production in Russia, and the palpable hostility of the peasantry to the landlords.

As much as we might and do support the role of the Bolsheviks in the October Revolution, in the civil war, we cannot isolate the Bolsheviks' actions against Kronstadt from other actions which, while perhaps being a necessity imposed on the Bolsheviks by the destruction of the civil war, the Bolsheviks themselves had turned into a virtue-- namely war communism, attempts at the militarization of labor, the institution of penal labor, forced requisition of grain without the ability to compensate by providing support for agricultural production.. etc.

We also cannot isolate the Kronstadt and the Bolshevik reaction from their, the Bolsheviks', simultaneous fear of another assault from the combined capitalist power and attempts at rapprochement with Britain, the US etc.

This itself cannot be isolated from decisions made to sacrifice, quite literally, communist and revolutionary organizations to nationalist forces, specifically in Turkey, and to the hopes of achieving some sort of truce with Britain in Asia-Russia-- Afghanistan etc..

Those were the "things"-- actually relations-- that made the suppression of Kronstadt a necessity. So if somebody wants to argue that suppressing Kronstadt meant preserving the dictatorship of the proletariat, then he or she better examine exactly what the content was of that dictatorship because the restoration of capitalism was not at all underlying, or derivative, of the Kronstadt sailors, soldiers, and workers revolt.

We might also look to the conduct of the Kronstadt rebels vs. that of the Bolsheviks. How many Bolsheviks were arrested and then slaughtered by the rebels when they held power?

How many of the rebels were simply slaughtered after they were militarily defeated?

I know I'm prejudiced, but that means a lot-- it means one side had the revolutionary discipline, and the other side, the Bolsheviks, DID NOT.

[LaRiposte]

What does the Kronstadt rebellion got to do with Anarchism? It wasn't an anarchist revolt it was a revolt by workers, the same workers whom in 1917 were described as the cream of the revolution.

The workers and sailors at Krondstadt during the rebellion were not the same ones who were there in 1917. Same place, different people.

[Devrim]

The workers and sailors at Krondstadt during the rebellion were not the same ones who were there in 1917. Same place, different people.

Unfortunately for your argument this isn't at all true. Soveit fleet records say otherwise:

To quote from the thread referred to above:


In ‘Kronstadt, 1917-1921: The Fate of a Soviet Democracy’ , the academic, Israel Getzler, who had access to previous unavailable Soviet Military sources analysed much of the data about Kronstadt. On the two major battleships the Petropavlovsk, where the revolt started, and the Sevastopol, over 90% of sailors for whom the data is available had joined the navy either before or during the revolution.

“... that the veteran politicized Red sailor still predominated at Kronstadt at the end of 1920 is borne out by the hard statistical data available regarding the crews of the two major battleships, the Petropavlovsk and the Sevastopol, both renowned since 1917 for their revolutionary zeal and Bolshevik allegiance. Of 2,028 sailors whose years of enlistment are known, no less than 1,904 or 93.9% were recruited into the navy before and during the 1917 revolution, the largest group, 1,195, having joined in the years 1914-16. Only some 137 sailors or 6.8% were recruited in the years 1918-21, including three who were conscripted in 1921, and they were the only ones who had not been there during the 1917 revolution. As for the sailors of the Baltic Fleet in general (and that included the Petropavlovsk and Sevastopol), of those serving on 1 January 1921 at least 75.5% are likely to have been drafted into the fleet before 1918. Over 80% were drawn from Great Russian areas (mainly central Russia and the Volga area), some 10% from the Ukraine, and 9% from Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Poland.
...
Nor, as has so often been claimed, did new recruits, some 400 of whom Yasinsky had interviewed, arrive in numbers large enough to dilute or even 'demoralize' Kronstadt's Red sailors. As Evan Mawdsley has found, 'only 1,313 of a planned total of 10,384 recruits had arrived' by 1 December 1920 and even they seem to have been stationed in the barracks of the Second Baltic Crew in Petrograd.”

Devrim

[S.Artesian]

The workers and sailors at Krondstadt during the rebellion were not the same ones who were there in 1917. Same place, different people.

Actually, it is more historically accurate to say that that Bolsheviks who suppressed the workers and sailors at Kronstadt were not the same Bolsheviks who had made "All Power to the Soviets" a reality, however briefly it was.

[Devrim]

Actually, it is more historically accurate to say that that Bolsheviks who suppressed the workers and sailors at Kronstadt were not the same Bolsheviks who had made "All Power to the Soviets" a reality, however briefly it was.

That is quite possible much closer to the truth.

Devrim

[Paulappaul]

The workers and sailors at Krondstadt during the rebellion were not the same ones who were there in 1917. Same place, different people.

Trotskyist rubbish.

An Anarchist FAQ has a whole appendix on the Kronstadt rebellion (http://anarchism.pageabode.com/afaq/append42.html). It addresses this issue (and others like it);
Quote:
Academic Israel Getzler investigated this issue and demonstrated that of those serving in the Baltic fleet on 1st January 1921 at least 75.5% were drafted before 1918. Over 80% were from Great Russian areas, 10% from the Ukraine and 9% from Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Poland. He argues that the "veteran politicised Red sailor still predominated in Kronstadt at the end of 1920" and presents more "hard statistical data" like that just quoted. He investigated the crews of the two major battleships, the Petropavlovsk and the Sevastopol . . . His findings are conclusive, showing that of the 2,028 sailors where years of enlistment are known, 93.9% were recruited into the navy before and during the 1917 revolution (the largest group, 1,195, joined in the years 1914-16). Only 6.8% of the sailors were recruited in the years 1918-21 (including three who were conscripted in 1921) and they were the only ones who had not been there during the 1917 revolution. [Getzler, Kronstadt 1917-1921, pp. 207-8] So no, it was the same Kronstadt, with basically the same people.

[Aesop]

It was necessary, otherwise the it would have been plain sailing for the whites to have capture Petrograd.

Also the sailors were primarily revolting for 'free trade'(The irony) in a time of privation and destitution. In addition, the global bourgeoisie were making plans to supply the sailors with food and ammo.

On a sidenote how come there is never mention of the anarchist joining the popular front in Spain and colluding in the smashing of the revolutionary Marxists.

[S.Artesian]

It was necessary, otherwise the it would have been plain sailing for the whites to have capture Petrograd.

Also the sailors were primarily revolting for 'free trade'(The irony) in a time of privation and destitution. In addition, the global bourgeoisie were making plans to supply the sailors with food and ammo.

On a sidenote how come there is never mention of the anarchist joining the popular front in Spain and colluding in the smashing of the revolutionary Marxists.

By the time of Kronstadt, the whites had been defeated and were in disarray-- they weren't sailing anywhere.

I don't know what you've read, but if you read the program of the rebels, and what they published "free trade" does not exactly jump from the page as their main demand.

Look, everytime workers take an action against a popular front government, what's the first thing the popular front government claims? The workers are being funded, supported by imperialism. That was the claim made by supporters of the UP govt. in Chile against the workers there who took matters into their own hands; that is the claim made today by the MAS government in Bolivia... that's the same sort of reasoning that says "The British, the French, the US were going to resupply the rebels at Kronstadt."

It's the same bullshit that was spewed out when it was claimed that the Whites had actually organized and were leading the rebellion at Kronstadt.

Put the events in their historical context-- the suppression of the soviets, the militarization of labor, the forced requisitions, the collapse of the Russian economy. And let's not forget the other context-- the desire of the Bolsheviks to "trade off" revolution for a bit of international security, and perhaps a bit of "normalization" of economic relations with the capitalist West.

[LaRiposte]

Unfortunately for your argument this isn't at all true. Soveit fleet records say otherwise:


Not so fast, comrade.

First of all most of the crews of the ships at Kronstadt either declared neutrality in the dispute or actively resisted the planned coup. Those same sailors that so enthusiastically supported the revolution in 1917 enthusiastically defended it against the counter-revolutionary coup in 1921.

Secondly most of the participants in the coup were not sailors but had been sent to Kronstadt to train in the elite military camps there only recently. Many of them became infected by the counter-revolutionary anarchists (not to be confused with the pro-revolutionary anarchists, of which there were very very many), and bourgeois officers who had established links with the imperialist nations who actually led the insurrection.


The first myth about Kronstadt is that it was a rebellion of the very same soldiers who were heroes of the October revolution. While it is true that many of the Kronstadt sailors were anarchists in 1917, they nevertheless loyally served Soviet power. During the Civil War, Kronstadt training camps provided elite and thoroughly revolutionary troops to the fight to maintain Soviet power. However, as more and more of the revolutionary sailors had to be sent to the front lines, green conscripts began to flood in, replacing the revolutionaries. By 1920, the Kronstadt garrison had been swamped with more than 10,000 fresh recruits. That brought the total number of soldiers and sailors at Kronstadt to 18,707. Most of these came from Southern Russia and the Ukraine, areas strongly influenced by Makhno. (3) Shetinov U. A., Krondshtadsky miatez i melkoburzuaznie partii. Kandidatskaia disertazia MGU, Moskva, 1974, p. 91-98. Only 5000 out of this number took part in the uprising.


These figures prove that the old revolutionary sailors were in a clear minority by 1921. Remarkably, however, the revolutionary sailors still made a bold stand. On March 8, a number of them published a pamphlet titled “Stop Immediately the Counter-Revolutionary Putsch in the City.” (4) Krondshtadskaia tragedia 1921 goda. Dokumenti v dvuch knigach., Moskva, ROSPEN, 1999, p. 320-321. On March 15, the RevCom of Kronstadt ordered the arrest of all of the old sailors as they refused to “obey orders”. (5) Ibid, doc. 423, p. 445. This order, however, wasn’t carried out fully. On March 24, a group of old sailors prevented the explosion of the battleship “Petropavlovsk”, arrested officers, and surrendered to the approaching Soviet forces. (6) Ibid, doc 480, p. 494-496.


The other legend about Kronstadt is that the leaders of the putsch had a revolutionary motive. Some authors have even written that the mutineers died with the slogan of “Long live communism!” on their lips! But this is a lie. The honest facts demolish this myth. General Elvengern, a member of a counter-revolutionary organization led by Boris Savinikov, revealed his role in the leadership of the rebellion with a report on the events in Petersburg-Kronstadt written in February and March of 1921.


This report was written while he was in Paris: “...from a tactical point of view they [RevCom] declared themselves fanatical supporters of the Soviet power, and said that they only oppose the Communist party dictatorship, with the hope that with such a platform, it would become difficult for the Communists to mobilize Soviet defenders, Soviet units to crush them.” (7) Ibid. Vol. 2, doc. 535, p. 61. The same was written by the cadet G. Zeidler, in a private letter. (8) Ibid, p. 322-323. Pavel Milukov, possibly the best Russian liberal mind of his day and the leader of the Constitutional Democrats Party (the notorious “Cadets”), summarized these reports in a Paris newspaper with, “Soviet power without Bolsheviks will be temporary.”


But what of the ordinary participants of the Kronstadt rebellion? Were these sailors really ready to die for “communism without Bolsheviks”? Sailor Dmitry Urin wrote on March 5, in a letter to his father in the Herson province of Ukraine, “We dismissed the commune, we have Commune no more, now we have only Soviet power. We in Kronstadt made a resolution to send all the Jews to Palestine, in order not to have in Russia such filth, all sailors shouted: ‘Jews Out’...” (9) Ibid, vol. 1, doc. 58, p. 119. If anyone had any doubts about the “real revolutionary” content of this letter this phrase is sufficient to dispel that. It is so stark that it needs no further comment.


From the very beginning of the rebellion, the Communists suffered repression. On the third of March, 170 Communists in Kronstadt were arrested. (10) Ibid, vol. 1, p. 15. Then, on the 15th of March, many old revolutionary sailors were arrested. (11) Ibid, vol 2, doc. 423, p. 445. But it was not only Communists who were repressed. A 17-year-old boy was sent to prison for asking why members of the RevCom received better food and bigger portions than ordinary workers. (12) Ibid., Vol 2, p. 632.

[Devrim]

First of all most of the crews of the ships at Kronstadt either declared neutrality in the dispute or actively resisted the planned coup.

Please source this. As far as I am aware at a meeting of the first and second Battleship sections attended by 16,000 people only two voted against the Petropavlovsk resolution:


A meeting of the First and Second Battleship Sections had been planned for 1st. March. The notification had been published in the official journal of the city of Kronstadt. The speakers were to include Kalinin, President of the All Russian Executive of Soviets, and Kouzmin, political commissar to the Baltic Fleet. When Kalinin arrived, he was received with music and flags. All military honours were accorded him.
Sixteen thousand people attended the meeting. Party member Vassiliev, president of the local soviet, took the chair. The delegates who had visited Petrograd the previous day gave their reports. The resolution adopted on 28th. February by the crew of the battleship 'Petropavlovsk' was distributed. Kalinin and Kouzmin opposed the resolution. They proclaimed that 'Kronstadt did not represent the whole of Russia.'
Nevertheless, the mass assembly adopted the Petropavlovsk resolution. In fact only two people voted against it: Kalinin and Kouzmin!



Those same sailors that so enthusiastically supported the revolution in 1917 enthusiastically defended it against the counter-revolutionary coup in 1921.

Yet the data quoted above, which comes from the two battleships at the heart of the revolt disproves this.


Secondly most of the participants in the coup were not sailors but had been sent to Kronstadt to train in the elite military camps there only recently.

Again the data shows that this is untrue:


that the veteran politicized Red sailor still predominated at Kronstadt at the end of 1920 is borne out by the hard statistical data available regarding the crews of the two major battleships, the Petropavlovsk and the Sevastopol, both renowned since 1917 for their revolutionary zeal and Bolshevik allegiance. Of 2,028 sailors whose years of enlistment are known, no less than 1,904 or 93.9% were recruited into the navy before and during the 1917 revolution, the largest group, 1,195, having joined in the years 1914-16. Only some 137 sailors or 6.8% were recruited in the years 1918-21, including three who were conscripted in 1921, and they were the only ones who had not been there during the 1917 revolution. As for the sailors of the Baltic Fleet in general (and that included the Petropavlovsk and Sevastopol), of those serving on 1 January 1921 at least 75.5% are likely to have been drafted into the fleet before 1918. Over 80% were drawn from Great Russian areas (mainly central Russia and the Volga area), some 10% from the Ukraine, and 9% from Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Poland.
...
Nor, as has so often been claimed, did new recruits, some 400 of whom Yasinsky had interviewed, arrive in numbers large enough to dilute or even 'demoralize' Kronstadt's Red sailors. As Evan Mawdsley has found, 'only 1,313 of a planned total of 10,384 recruits had arrived' by 1 December 1920 and even they seem to have been stationed in the barracks of the Second Baltic Crew in Petrograd.”


Many of them became infected by the counter-revolutionary anarchists (not to be confused with the pro-revolutionary anarchists, of which there were very very many), and bourgeois officers who had established links with the imperialist nations who actually led the insurrection.

There were no organised anarchists at Kronstadt. As for the leadership of the rebellion, take a look at its composition:


The leading body of the assembly of delegates all became members of the Provisional Revolutionary Committee. They were:
* Petritchenko, chief quartermaster of the battleship 'Petropavlovsk',
* Yakovenko, liaison telephonist to the Kronstadt section,
* Ossossov, boiler man in the battleship 'Sebastopol',
* Arkhipov, chief engineer,
* Perepelkin, electrician in the battleship 'Sebastopol',
* Patrouchev, chief electrician in the 'Petropavlovsk',
* Koupolov, head male nurse,
* Verchinin, sailor in the 'Sebastopol',
* Toukin, worker in the 'Electrotechnical' factory,
* Romanenko, docks maintenance worker,
* Orechin, headmaster of the Third labour School,
* Valk, sawmill worker,
* Pavlov, worker in a marine mining shop,
* Boikev, head of the building section of the Kronstadt fortress,
* Kilgast, harbour pilot.
The majority of the members of the Provisional Revolutionary Committee were sailors with a long service. This contradicts the official version of the Kronstadt events, which seeks to attribute the leadership of the revolt to elements recently joining the Navy and having nothing in common with the heroic sailors of 1917-1919.


As for the bourgeois officers, there was one ex-Tsarist General at Kronstadt:


Lenin, Trotsky, and the whole Party leadership knew quite well that this was no mere 'generals' revolt'. Why then invent this legend about General Kozlovsky, leader of the mutiny? The answer lies in the Bolshevik outlook, an outlook at times so blind that it could not see that lies were as likely to prove nefarious as to prove helpful. The legend of General Kozlovsky opened the path to another legend: that of the Wrangel officer allegedly conspiring with Trotsky in 1928-29. It in fact opened the path to the massive lying of the whole Stalin era.
Anyway, who was this General Kozlovsky, denounced by the official radio as the leader of the insurrection? He was an artillery general, and had been one of the first to defect to the Bolsheviks. He seemed devoid of any capacity as a leader. At the time of the insurrection he happened to be in command of the artillery at Kronstadt. The communist commander of the fortress had defected. Kozlovsky, according to the rules prevailing in the fortress, had to replace him. He, in fact, refused, claiming that as the fortress was now under the jurisdiction of the Provisional Revolutionary Committee, the old rules no longer applied. Kozlovsky remained, it is true, in Kronstadt, but only as an artillery specialist. Moreover, after the fall of Kronstadt, in certain interviews granted to the Finnish press, Kozlovsky accused the sailors of having wasted precious time on issues other than the defence of the fortress. He explained this in terms of their reluctance to resort to bloodshed. Later, other officers of the garrison were also to accuse the sailors of military incompetence, and of complete lack of confidence in their technical advisers. Kozlovsky was the only general to have been present at Kronstadt. This was enough for the Government to make use of his name.
The men of Kronstadt did, up to a point, make use of the military know how of certain officers in the fortress at the time. Some of these officers may have given the men advice out of sheer hostility to the Bolsheviks. But in their attack on Kronstadt, the Government forces were also making use of ex Tsarist officers. On the one side there were Kozlovsky, Salomianov, and Arkannihov; On the other, ex Tsarist officers and specialists of the old regime, such as Toukhatchevsky. Kamenev, and Avrov. On neither side were these officers an independent force.


As to the points in the long quote you provide, but incidentally don't mention the source of:


The first myth about Kronstadt is that it was a rebellion of the very same soldiers who were heroes of the October revolution. While it is true that many of the Kronstadt sailors were anarchists in 1917, they nevertheless loyally served Soviet power. During the Civil War, Kronstadt training camps provided elite and thoroughly revolutionary troops to the fight to maintain Soviet power. However, as more and more of the revolutionary sailors had to be sent to the front lines, green conscripts began to flood in, replacing the revolutionaries. By 1920, the Kronstadt garrison had been swamped with more than 10,000 fresh recruits. That brought the total number of soldiers and sailors at Kronstadt to 18,707. Most of these came from Southern Russia and the Ukraine, areas strongly influenced by Makhno. (3) Shetinov U. A., Krondshtadsky miatez i melkoburzuaznie partii. Kandidatskaia disertazia MGU, Moskva, 1974, p. 91-98. Only 5000 out of this number took part in the uprising.

Of these 10,000 new recruits, in fact 10,384, only 1,313 had even turned up:


Nor, as has so often been claimed, did new recruits, some 400 of whom Yasinsky had interviewed, arrive in numbers large enough to dilute or even 'demoralize' Kronstadt's Red sailors. As Evan Mawdsley has found, 'only 1,313 of a planned total of 10,384 recruits had arrived' by 1 December 1920 and even they seem to have been stationed in the barracks of the Second Baltic Crew in Petrograd.

As for the rest, an argument that relies on the letters of white fantasists in Paris and a reactionary comment in a personal letter from one sailor is very clear in its weakness.

Devrim

[Krav]

The anti-Soviet revolt at Kronstadt, organized and supported by the SRs, Mensheviks, and anarchists, was the last, desperate attempt by the counter-revolution to destroy the Soviet Republic. But such forces were discredited ever since the July Days of 1917, which was why the workers and peasants rallied in defense of the Soviet Republic.

The best source on Kronstadt is:

The elimination of the anti-Soviet Kronstadt rebellion in 1921, S.N. Semanov, Academy of Sciences, 1973:

The author points out that the 1921 mutiny in Kronstadt broke out in a very complicated situation for the young Soviet state when, after the hardships and privations of the civil war, the petty bourgeoisie manifested political vacillation and wavering. The Kronstadt mutiny was a graphic reflection of this petty-bourgeois wavering. Despite the fact that its organizers and leaders emphatically stressed their non-partisanship, the article convincingly shows that actually the mutiny had a clearly expressed anti-Soviet character. This is graphically confirmed by the attitude of Whiteguard emigres towards the mutiny. The counter-revolutionary elements abroad promptly established secret contacts with the leaders of the mutiny. In conclusion the author gives a detailed description of the careful preparations made by the Red Army for carrying out a swift military operation as a. result of which the Red Flag was again hoisted over Kronstadt.



This is actually untrue. It was never a slogan raised by the Krondstadt sailors. I'd like to see you try and provide a source for that one.The anti-Soviet slogans raised in Kronstadt confirmed the movement's counter-revolutionary orientation.

It was Lenin who wrote:


The vacillation of the petty-bourgeois element was the most characteristic feature of the Kronstadt events. There was very little that was clear, definite and fully shaped. We heard nebulous slogans about “freedom”, “freedom of trade”, “emancipation”, “Soviets without the Bolsheviks”, or new elections to the Soviets, or relief from “Party dictatorship”, and so on and so forth. Both the Mensheviks and the Socialist-Revolutionaries declared the Kronstadt movement to be “their own”. Victor Chernov sent a messenger to Kronstadt. On the latter’s proposal, the Menshevik Valk, one of the Kronstadt leaders, voted for the Constituent Assembly. In a flash, with lightning speed, you might say, the whiteguards mobilised all their forces “for Kronstadt “. Their military experts in Kronstadt, a number of experts, and not Kozlovsky alone, drew up a plan for a landing at Oranienbaum, which scared the vacillating mass of Mensheviks, Socialist-Revolutionaries and non-party elements. More than fifty Russian whiteguard newspapers published abroad conducted a rabid campaign “for Kronstadt ”. The big banks, all the forces of finance capital, collected funds to assist Kronstadt. That shrewd leader of the bourgeoisie and the landowners, the Cadet Milyukov, patiently explained to the simpleton Victor Chernov directly (and to the Mensheviks Dan and Rozhkov, who are in jail in Petrograd for their connection with the Kronstadt events, indirectly) that that there is no need to hurry with the Constituent Assembly, and that Soviet power can and must be supported—only without the Bolsheviks.glgl

[Devrim]

The anti-Soviet slogans raised in Kronstadt confirmed the movement's counter-revolutionary orientation.

It was Lenin who wrote:
glgl

I'd like to see it sourced from the original material i.e. that published by the Kronstadt Soviet all of which can be found on line nowadays. I don't think that the Lenin quote you provide can really be taken seriously as source material. He is obviously just attributing 'slogans' to them. In fact he doesn't even say that these we the slogans but that they 'heard' slogans 'about' these issues.

Devrim

[Krav]

From Semanov's book, which is available online in Russian (I can't post links yet)

Семанов С.Н. Ликвидация антисоветского Кронштадского мятежа 1921 года. — М.: Наука, 1973.



The ideology of the rebels was mundane and expressed the petty-bourgeois nature of their movement. There are numerous documents describing the ideological characteristics of the insurgency, leaving us with suficient material for analysis. In short, the whole ideological platform of the Kronstadt Revolutionary committee is placed in the notorious slogan "Soviets without Communists." However, in the proceedings of the Kronstadt RMC and in other surviving documents there is not a direct mention of this slogan. The rebels expressed themselves more cautiously: "Power to the Soviets, not to the parties", "Long live the third Revolution, "Down with the counter-revolution of the right and left".

A characteristic feature of the ideology of the rebels from the first to the last day of their existence is vicious anti-communism. In issue after issue of the Izvestia of the Kronstadt RMC was repeated the most coarse and vulgar language against the Communist Party. The terminology here was no different than the White Guard. The Kronstadt RMC talk of a "Third Revolution" was expressed in the language and style of Denikin's Osvag. The only absence of the White Guard anti-communist propaganda among the Kronstadters was official anti-Semitism, but this was not the case with the rank and file. During the searches in the apartments of communists, the rebels destroyed portraits of Marx, Lunacharsky, and some other well-known figures of the international revolutionary movement, leading to anti-Semitic propaganda.
The rebels also terrorized Communists in ways similar to the White Guard:


Communist Party members who had not managed to escape and who did not renounce their beliefs were thrown in prison. The number of arrested Communists "on the state of affairs" for March 1 can be judged by a very interesting source. On that first day, the official organ of the rebels placed a small note under the mocking headline on "The arrested Communists will not be distributed shoes. Let them wear sandals. So it should be" The message is revealing. Apologists for the "Third Revolution", screaming about freedom and democracy, were very shy about their own repressive measures: mockery of defenseless people ("Let them wear sandals") This small document very distinctly characterizes the mode of action of the rebellious "Revolutionary Committee" and the moral character of its members.

N. Kuzmin, who was in prison during all 16 days of the "Third Revolution" recounted this episode: "One day they came, and we were lined up in ranks: "'Take off his boots. We need them for the front.' We were promised a thick coat, we can make ourselves sandals, but we didn't receive them. One friend had galoshes, and we took turns wearing the galoshes in jail." Meanwhile, Petrichenko at the meeting of the "Delegates" announced "the confiscation of footwear of the prisoners as a major political event: "The report on the requisition of boots from the arrested in Communists in favor of the Red Army was met with thunderous applause and shouts"

[Devrim]

From Semanov's book, which is available online in Russian (I can't post links yet)

I don't think that there is any doubt that the Kronstdat Soviet raising the slogan 'Soviet's without Communists' was part of the hysterical propoganda campaign waged against them.

What I am questioning is whether they actually raised the slogan themselves. To prove that you need to quote from their own sources, not from apologists for their suppresion.

The innacuracies in your quotation are very easy to see:


Communist Party members who had not managed to escape and who did not renounce their beliefs were thrown in prison. The number of arrested Communists "on the state of affairs" for March 1 can be judged by a very interesting source. On that first day, the official organ of the rebels placed a small note under the mocking headline on "The arrested Communists will not be distributed shoes. Let them wear sandals. So it should be" The message is revealing. Apologists for the "Third Revolution", screaming about freedom and democracy, were very shy about their own repressive measures: mockery of defenseless people ("Let them wear sandals") This small document very distinctly characterizes the mode of action of the rebellious "Revolutionary Committee" and the moral character of its members.

N. Kuzmin, who was in prison during all 16 days of the "Third Revolution" recounted this episode: "One day they came, and we were lined up in ranks: "'Take off his boots. We need them for the front.' We were promised a thick coat, we can make ourselves sandals, but we didn't receive them. One friend had galoshes, and we took turns wearing the galoshes in jail." Meanwhile, Petrichenko at the meeting of the "Delegates" announced "the confiscation of footwear of the prisoners as a major political event: "The report on the requisition of boots from the arrested in Communists in favor of the Red Army was met with thunderous applause and shouts"

The first issue of the official organ of the rebels 'Kronstadt Izvestia' appeared on Wednesday March 3rd, not the 1st, and contained nothing of the sort. The full text in English can be found here (http://www-personal.umich.edu/%7Emhuey/TOC/IZV.frame.html).

On the general treatment of arrested CP member's, Serge a party member who supported the suppresion of the Kronstadt uprising gives a very different view:


Little by little, the truth broke through the smoke screen laid down by the press, whose mendacity now knew no bounds. And that was our press, the press of our revolution, the first socialist press in history, therefore the first incorruptible, unbiased press in history. Even in the past, to be sure, it had now and then laid itself open, to some extent, to the charge of demagogy (of a warm, sincere kind, however) and had used violent language about its opponents. But in doing so it had stayed within the rules of the game, and had, in any case, acted understandably. Now, however, lying was its settled policy. The Petrograd Pravda informed its readers that Kouzmin, Commissar for the navy and the army, had been manhandled during his imprisonment at Kronstadt, and had narrowly escaped summary execution - on written orders from the counter-revolutionaries. I knew Kouzmin, an energetic, hard-working soldier, a teacher of military science, grey from tip to toe; his uniform, even his wrinkled face were grey. He 'escaped' from Kronstadt and turned up at Smollny.
'It is hard to believe.' I said to him , 'that they intended to shoot you. Did you really see any such order?'
He looked embarrassed, and did not answer for a moment.
'Oh, one always exaggerates a bit. There was a threatening note.'
In short, he had let his tongue run away with him. That was the whole story. The Kronstadt rebels had spilledd not a single drop of blond, had gone no further than to arrest a few Communist officials, all of whom had been well treated. Most of the Communists, several hundred in all, had gone over to the rebels, which showed clearly enough how weak the party had become at its base. Nevertheless, someone had cooked up this story about hairbreadth escapes from the firing squad!


Devrim