"Stalin abandoned world revolution"

[Marxach-Léinínach]

I hear this said a lot round here and I don't quite understand it. What was supposed to happen when the revolution had only occurred in the Russian Empire and nowhere else? Are you guys saying that Stalin should've just started going on a big military conquest around the globe?

[Return to the Source]

Don't expect good answers. Stalin's position on world revolution was Lenin's position: it's foolish--Lenin even calls it "going over to the side of the bourgeoisie"--to not build socialism in countries that had successful proletarian revolutions.

On August 23, 1915, Lenin harshly criticized the erroneous position that a country could not build socialism without international [read: permanent] revolution. In On the Slogan for a United States of Europe, he writes:


"A United States of the World (not of Europe alone) is the state form of the unification and freedom of nations which we associate with socialism—about the total disappearance of the state, including the democratic. As a separate slogan, however, the slogan of a United States of the World would hardly be a correct one, first, because it merges with socialism; second, because it may be wrongly interpreted to mean that the victory of socialism in a single country is impossible, and it may also create misconceptions as to the relations of such a country to the others.

Uneven economic and political development is an absolute law of capitalism. Hence, the victory of socialism is possible first in several or even in one capitalist country alone. After expropriating the capitalists and organising their own socialist production, the victorious proletariat of that country will arise against the rest of the world—the capitalist world—attracting to its cause the oppressed classes of other countries, stirring uprisings in those countries against the capitalists, and in case of need using even armed force against the exploiting classes and their states. The political form of a society wherein the proletariat is victorious in overthrowing the bourgeoisie will be a democratic republic, which will more and more concentrate the forces of the proletariat of a given nation or nations, in the struggle against states that have not yet gone over to socialism. The abolition of classes is impossible without a dictatorship of the oppressed class, of the proletariat. A free union of nations in socialism is impossible without a more or less prolonged and stubborn struggle of the socialist republics against the backward states."

[Kléber]

Howard : May there not be an element of danger in the genuine fear existent in what you term capitalistic countries of an intent on the part of the Soviet Union to force its political theories on other nations?

Stalin : There is no justification whatever for such fears. If you think that Soviet people want to change the face of surrounding states, and by forcible means at that, you are entirely mistaken. Of course, Soviet people would like to see the face of surrounding states changed, but that is the business of the surrounding states. I fail to see what danger the surrounding states can perceive in the ideas of the Soviet people if these states are really sitting firmly in the saddle.

Howard : Does this, your statement, mean that the Soviet Union has to any degree abandoned its plans and intentions for bringing about world revolution?

Stalin : We never had such plans and intentions.

Howard : You appreciate, no doubt, Mr. Stalin, that much of the world has long entertained a different impression.

Stalin : This is the product of a misunderstanding.

Howard : A tragic misunderstanding?

Stalin : No, a comical one. Or, perhaps, tragicomic.

http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1936/03/01.htm

[Kléber]

Don't expect good answers. Stalin's position on world revolution was Lenin's position: it's foolish--Lenin even calls it "going over to the side of the bourgeoisie"--to not build socialism in countries that had successful proletarian revolutions.

On August 23, 1915, Lenin harshly criticized the erroneous position that a country could not build socialism without international [read: permanent] revolution. In On the Slogan for a United States of Europe, he writes:
"A United States of the World (not of Europe alone) is the state form of the unification and freedom of nations which we associate with socialism—about the total disappearance of the state, including the democratic. As a separate slogan, however, the slogan of a United States of the World would hardly be a correct one, first, because it merges with socialism; second, because it may be wrongly interpreted to mean that the victory of socialism in a single country is impossible, and it may also create misconceptions as to the relations of such a country to the others.

Uneven economic and political development is an absolute law of capitalism. Hence, the victory of socialism is possible first in several or even in one capitalist country alone. After expropriating the capitalists and organising their own socialist production, the victorious proletariat of that country will arise against the rest of the world—the capitalist world—attracting to its cause the oppressed classes of other countries, stirring uprisings in those countries against the capitalists, and in case of need using even armed force against the exploiting classes and their states. The political form of a society wherein the proletariat is victorious in overthrowing the bourgeoisie will be a democratic republic, which will more and more concentrate the forces of the proletariat of a given nation or nations, in the struggle against states that have not yet gone over to socialism. The abolition of classes is impossible without a dictatorship of the oppressed class, of the proletariat. A free union of nations in socialism is impossible without a more or less prolonged and stubborn struggle of the socialist republics against the backward states."
The Soviet bureaucracy didn't "build socialism" anywhere. Let's look at more Lenin quotes and see where the man really stood, based on a skewed interpretation of that one quote from 1915 (which hardly justifies the pact with Hitler or dissolution of Comintern), or all these?

1906:

I went on to say that from the point of view of restoration, the position of the Russian revolution may be ex pressed in the following thesis: the Russian revolution is strong enough to achieve victory by its own efforts; but it is not strong enough to retain the fruits of victory. It can achieve victory because the proletariat jointly with the revolutionary peasantry can constitute an invincible force. But it cannot retain its victory, because in a country where small production is vastly developed, the small commodity producers (including the peasants) will inevitably turn against the proletarians when they pass from freedom to socialism. To be able to retain its victory, to be able to prevent restoration, the Russian revolution will need non-Russian reserves, will need outside assistance. Are there such reserves? Jes, there are: the socialist proletariat in the West.http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...rucong/iii.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1906/rucong/iii.htm)

1908:

It is not on liberal allies that the Russian proletariat should count. It must . follow its own independent path to the complete victory of the revolution, basing itself on the need for a forcible solution of the agrarian question in Russia by the peasant masses themselves, helping them to overthrow the rule of the Black- Hundred landlords and the Black-Hundred autocracy, setting itself the task of establishing a. democratic dictator ship of the proletariat and the peasantry in Russia, and remembering that its struggle and its victories are inseparable from the international revolutionary movement. Less illusions about the liberalism of the counter-revolutionary bourgeoisie (counter-revolutionary both in Russia and the world over). More attention to the growth of the international revolutionary proletariat!http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...908/jul/23.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1908/jul/23.htm)

1909:

The revolution and counter-revolution have shown us the alliance of autocracy and the bourgeoisie, the alliance of the Russian and international bourgeoisie—we must educate, rally and organise in three times greater numbers than in 1905 the masses of the proletariat, which alone, led by an independent Social-Democratic Party and marching hand in hand with the proletariat of the advanced countries, is capable of winning freedom for Russia.http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...909/dec/24.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1909/dec/24.htm)

1915:

It follows that if the demand for the freedom of nations is not to be a false phrase covering up the imperialism and the nationalism of certain individual countries, it must be extended to all peoples and to all colonies. Such a demand, however, is obviously meaningless unless it is accompanied by a series of revolutions in all the advanced countries. Moreover, it cannot be accomplished without a successful socialist revolution. http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...15/jul/x02.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1915/jul/x02.htm)


The imperialist war has linked up the Russian revolutionary crisis, which stems from a bourgeois-democratic revolution, with the growing crisis of the proletarian socialist revolution in the West. This link is so direct that no individual solution of revolutionary [problems] is possible in any single country—the Russian bourgeois-democratic revolution is now not only a prologue to, but an indivisible and integral part of, the socialist revolution in the West. ... Life is advancing, through the defeat of Russia, towards a revolution in Russia and, through that revolution and in connection with it, towards a civil war in Europe. http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...15/sep/x01.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1915/sep/x01.htm)


The proletariat will at once utilise this ridding of bourgeois Russia of tsarism and the rule of the landowners, not to aid the rich peasants in their struggle against the rural workers, but to bring about the socialist revolution in alliance with the proletarians of Europe. http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...915/nov/20.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1915/nov/20.htm)

1916:

The social revolution cannot be the united action of the proletarians of all countries for the simple reason that most of the countries and the majority of the world’s population have not even reached, or have only just reached, the capitalist stage of development. We stated this in section six of our theses, but P. Kievsky, because of lack of attention, or inability to think, did “not notice” that we included this section for a definite purpose, namely, to refute caricature distortions of Marxism. Only the advanced countries of Western Europe and North America have matured for socialism, and ii Engels’s letter to Kautsky (Sbornik Sotsial-Demokrata)[5] (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/carimarx/5.htm#fwV23E029) Kievsky will find a concrete illustration of the real and not merely promised “idea” that to dream of the “united action of the proletarians of all countries” means postponing socialism to the Greek calends, i.e., for ever.
Socialism will be achieved by the united action of the proletarians, not of all, but of a minority of countries, those that have reached the advanced capitalist stage of development. The cause of Kievsky’s error lies in failure to understand that. In these advanced countries (England, France, Germany, etc.) the national problem was solved long ago; national unity outlived its purpose long ago; objectively, there are no “general national tasks” to be accomplished. Hence, only in these countries is it possible now to “blow up” national unity and establish class unity.
The undeveloped countries are a different matter. They embrace the whole of Eastern Europe and all the colonies and semi-colonies and are dealt with in section six of the theses (second- and third-type countries). In those areas, as a rule, there still exist oppressed and capitalistically undeveloped nations. Objectively, these nations still have general national tasks to accomplish, namely, democratic tasks, the tasks of overthrowing foreign oppression. http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...carimarx/5.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1916/carimarx/5.htm)

1917:

Upon the strength of the revolutionary movement, in the event of its being entirely successful, will depend the victory of socialism in Europe and the achievement not of an imperialist armistice in Germany’s struggle against Russia and England, or in Russia’s and Germany’s struggle against England, or the United States’ struggle against Germany and England, etc., but of a really lasting and really democratic peace. http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...917/jan/31.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/jan/31.htm)


I now pass on to the third question, namely, the analysis of the current situation with reference to the position of the international working-class movement and that of international capitalism. From the point of view of Marxism, in discussing imperialism it is absurd to restrict oneself to conditions in one country alone, since all capitalist countries are closely bound together. Now, in time of war, this bond has grown immeasurably stronger. All humanity is thrown into a tangled bloody heap from which no nation can extricate itself on its own. Though there are more and less advanced countries, this war has bound them all together by so many threads that escape from this tangle for any single country acting on its own is inconceivable.
We are all agreed that power must be wielded by the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies. But what can and should they do if power passes to them, i. e., if power is in the hands of the proletarians and semi-proletarians? This is an involved and difficult situation. Speaking of the transfer of power, there is a danger—one that played a big part in previous revolutions, too—namely, the danger that the revolutionary class will not know what to do with state power when it has won it. The history of revolutions gives us examples of revolutions that failed for this very reason. http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...thconf/24c.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/7thconf/24c.htm)


The urgency of the struggle against this evil, against the most deep-rooted petty-bourgeois national prejudices, looms ever larger with the mounting exigency of the task of converting the dictatorship of the proletariat from a national dictatorship (i.e., existing in a single country and incapable of determining world politics) into an international one (i.e., a dictatorship of the proletariat involving at least several advanced countries, and capable of exercising a decisive influence upon world politics as a whole). Petty-bourgeois nationalism proclaims as internationalism the mere recognition of the equality of nations, and nothing more. Quite apart from the fact that this recognition is purely verbal, petty-bourgeois nationalism preserves national self-interest intact, whereas proletarian internationalism demands, first, that the interests of the proletarian struggle in any one country should be subordinated to the interests of that struggle on a world-wide scale, and, second, that a nation which is achieving victory over the bourgeoisie should be able and willing to make the greatest national sacrifices for the overthrow of international capital.
...
Under present-day international conditions there is no salvation for dependent and weak nations except in a union of Soviet republics. http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...920/jun/05.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/jun/05.htm)


Not only should we create independent contingents of fighters and party organisations in the colonies and the backward countries, not only at once launch propaganda for the organisation of peasants’ Soviets and strive to adapt them to the pre-capitalist conditions, but the Communist International should advance the proposition, with the appropriate theoretical grounding, that with the aid of the proletariat of the advanced countries, backward countries can go over to the Soviet system and, through certain stages of development, to communism, without having to pass through the capitalist stage. http://marxists.anu.edu.au/archive/l...20/jul/x03.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://marxists.anu.edu.au/archive/lenin/works/1920/jul/x03.htm)

1921:

The result is a state of equilibrium which, although highly unstable and precarious, enables the Socialist Republic to exist—not for long, of course—within the capitalist encirclement.
...
We admit quite openly, and do not conceal the fact, that concessions in the system of state capitalism mean paying tribute to capitalism. But we gain time, and gaining time means gaining everything, particularly in the period of equilibrium, when our foreign comrades are preparing thoroughly for their revolution. The more thorough their preparations, the more certain will the victory be. Meanwhile, however, we shall have to pay the tribute." http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...921/jun/12.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1921/jun/12.htm)

1922:

But we have not finished building even the foundations of socialist economy and the hostile powers of moribund capitalism can still deprive us of that. We must clearly appreciate this and frankly admit it; for there is nothing more dangerous than illusions (and vertigo, particularly at high altitudes). And there is absolutely nothing terrible, nothing that should give legitimate grounds for the slightest despondency, in admitting this bitter truth; for we have always urged and reiterated the elementary truth of Marxism—that the joint efforts of the workers of several advanced countries are needed for the victory of socialism. http://www.marxists.org/archive/leni...22/feb/x01.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1922/feb/x01.htm)

[caramelpence]

What was supposed to happen when the revolution had only occurred in the Russian Empire and nowhere else?

The argument is that Stalin supported Comintern policies that prevented revolutionaries from taking advantage of revolutionary upsurges when and where they emerged in the late 1920s and 30s. China is the most important case in point, as Stalin supported the "bloc within" policy and its implications for the political independence of the CPC and the Chinese working class.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

There is a difference between allowing Socialism to be built from below - by the workers - and being built by a mixture of technocrats, bureaucrats and managers. There really is.

I don't quite go with the Trot position on this, though the USSRs actions in Spain were quite suspect. However, the main point on Socialism in One Country is that it should not have been carried out as it was.

But then, I quite believe that the moment the Bolsheviks turned the Socialist revolution into a Marxist-Leninist only revolution, it was in trouble. Lack of democracy generally doesn't end well.

[caramelpence]

There is a difference between allowing Socialism to be built from below - by the workers - and being built by a mixture of technocrats, bureaucrats and managers. There really is.

I don't quite go with the Trot position on this, though the USSRs actions in Spain were quite suspect. However, the main point on Socialism in One Country is that it should not have been carried out as it was.

But then, I quite believe that the moment the Bolsheviks turned the Socialist revolution into a Marxist-Leninist only revolution, it was in trouble. Lack of democracy generally doesn't end well.

As a Trotskyist, the point is not Socialism in One Country was carried out "in the wrong way" - it's that it couldn't have been carried out any other way. The repression of working-class living standards and brutalization of the peasantry wasn't carried out because Stalin and his clique had some kind of subjective hatred of the producers, rather, it was made necessary by the fact that the Soviet Union found itself isolated and surrounded by hostile states and that it needed to pursue policies that facilitated the accumulation process, especially in the areas of heavy industry and defense. SiOC itself was not a coherent ideological alternative that encountered Trotsky's program of permanent revolution in an idealized discursive space without any broader social and political context, it was an ad-hoc rationalization of the international situation and the emerging interests of the bureaucracy.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

But seriously, what were the Socialists to do, after the failure of revolution in the rest of Europe? Simply go to the working class and say 'hey, the revolutions have failed, let's give power back to the bourgeoisie'?

I mean, c'mon. What should have happened was an acknowledgement that communism in one country cannot occur. Thus, the USSR should have been a Soviet/Council-led, multi-tendency driven Socialist nation that made a small-scale model for world revolution. If that would have happened, then when China, Eastern Europe and Latin America fell to Socialism, they could have formed a bloc opposition to the Capitalist world in the spirit of proletarian internationalism, rather than the imperialism the USSR eventually showed, due to its centralised, Leninist doctrine.

[caramelpence]

But seriously, what were the Socialists to do, after the failure of revolution in the rest of Europe? Simply go to the working class and say 'hey, the revolutions have failed, let's give power back to the bourgeoisie'?

It's not as if Trotsky simply thought the game was up as soon as Luxemburg and Liebknecht were murdered in Berlin in 1919. He put forward an extensive program of democratic reform in the form of The New Course (1923/4) in which he drew attention to the problems of bureaucracy as they existed in Soviet Russia at that point in time, including the social composition of the party organization, and also called for a correct relationship between agriculture and industry in order to preserve the alliance between the peasantry and working class - there were also important weaknesses with the text in that Trotsky did not challenge the ban on factions within the party and there is overall a lack of specific demands and proposals as opposed to theoretical and sociological analysis, but the point is that Trotsky also carried out the fight for democracy inside the party and inside the Soviet state rather than orientating himself solely towards international questions.

In a way, you are right, however, because Trotsky did ultimately view the international dimension of the revolution as the key to the advance or retreat of the revolution in Russia, but here again it would have been wrong to assume, in 1919, that, because there were no immediate prospects for revolution after the defeat in Germany, there was nothing more that could have been done and that revolutionaries in Russia should have given up - the key for Trotsky was maintaining a revolutionary line inside the Comintern in order to prepare Communist Parties for the opportunities that were to emerge during the course of the 1920s, and here too he found himself coming up against the forces of the bureaucracy, who sought to use the Comintern as a tool for the protection of the Soviet state and the conduct of its foreign policy rather than as a party of world revolution. This was why he was so outspoken when it came to events in China, for example, which served as the basis for his extension of the theory of permanent revolution to cover underdeveloped societies in general, rather than just Russia.


If that would have happened, then when China, Eastern Europe and Latin America fell to Socialism

I don't think these countries ever did "fall to socialism" (if you're talking in a historical rather than hypothetical sense) but either way the issue is that the degeneration of the Comintern served to undermine the possibility of revolution elsewhere, such that there emerged a downwards spiral as far as the prospects for the revitalization of democracy and socialism in the USSR was concerned.

[Omsk]

If that would have happened, then when China, Eastern Europe and Latin America fell to Socialism, they could have formed a bloc opposition to the Capitalist world in the spirit of proletarian internationalism, rather than the imperialism the USSR eventually showed, due to its centralised, Leninist doctrine.


How do you know that? Prove something like that would happen.
Oh and yes,that actually did happen with the solidarity of the socialist nations led by the Soviet Union.After Stalins deaths,the revisionists made sure that the alliance would not last,and that the bloc is split into various little-weaker socialist states.


The repression of working-class living standards and brutalization of the peasantry
Do you realise that the living standards were much higher than in the Tsarist Russia?

On the account of the foreign policies of the SU:



SU REPEATEDLY SEEKS TO UNITE ANTI-FASCIST NATIONS

In face of the growing war threat, the Soviet government repeatedly called for united action by all countries menaced by fascist aggression.
Sayers and Kahn. The Great Conspiracy. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1946, p. 270

The verdict of the record is unmistakable and obvious: responsibility for the breakdown of collective security rests on the Western democracies, not on the Soviet Union.
The melancholy details of the record need no restatement, except as they bear upon the situation in which the USSR found itself by 1939. Eight times during the preceding eight years the aggressors posed to the Western democracies a test of their willingness to organize and enforce peace. Eight times the Soviet Union called for collective action against aggression. Eight times the Western power evaded their responsibilities and blessed the aggressors.
The first test was posed by the Japanese seizure of Manchuria in September 1931. The second test was posed by Hitler's repudiation of the disarmament clauses of Versailles in March 1935. The third test was posed by the fascist invasion of Ethiopia in October 1935. The fourth test was posed by Hitler's remilitarization of the Rhineland in March 1936. The fifth test was posed by the fascist attack of the Spanish Republic. The sixth test was posed by the resumption of the Japanese attack on China in July 1937. The seventh test was posed by the nazi seizure of Austria in March 1938. The eighth test was posed by the unleasheding, through propaganda, diplomacy, and terrorism, of the nazi campaign against Prague in the summer 1938.
Chamberlain flew three times to Germany on the principal that "if you don't concede the first time, fly, fly, again.
Schuman, Frederick L. Soviet Politics. New York: A.A. Knopf, 1946, p. 275-80

On May 3, 1939, Litvinov resigned as Commissar for Foreign Affairs. He was the incarnation of collective security.
Schuman, Frederick L. Soviet Politics. New York: A.A. Knopf, 1946, p. 366

By March 1938 there was a ample reason for Soviet leaders to fear war. Japanese aggression in the Soviet Far East and in China, the Spanish fascists' victories over the army of the Spanish Republic and the International Brigades, Germany's increasingly menacing policies and its occupation of Austria, and the anemic reaction of Western powers to these events and their reticence in supporting Soviet collective security efforts provided sufficient cause for concern in Moscow.
Chase, William J., Enemies Within the Gates? translated by Vadim A. Staklo, New Haven: Yale University Press, c2001, p. 294.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

It's not as if Trotsky simply thought the game was up as soon as Luxemburg and Liebknecht were murdered in Berlin in 1919. He put forward an extensive program of democratic reform in the form of The New Course (1923/4) in which he drew attention to the problems of bureaucracy as they existed in Soviet Russia at that point in time, including the social composition of the party organization, and also called for a correct relationship between agriculture and industry in order to preserve the alliance between the peasantry and working class - there were also important weaknesses with the text in that Trotsky did not challenge the ban on factions within the party and there is overall a lack of specific demands and proposals as opposed to theoretical and sociological analysis, but the point is that Trotsky also carried out the fight for democracy inside the party and inside the Soviet state rather than orientating himself solely towards international questions.

In a way, you are right, however, because Trotsky did ultimately view the international dimension of the revolution as the key to the advance or retreat of the revolution in Russia, but here again it would have been wrong to assume, in 1919, that, because there were no immediate prospects for revolution after the defeat in Germany, there was nothing more that could have been done and that revolutionaries in Russia should have given up - the key for Trotsky was maintaining a revolutionary line inside the Comintern in order to prepare Communist Parties for the opportunities that were to emerge during the course of the 1920s, and here too he found himself coming up against the forces of the bureaucracy, who sought to use the Comintern as a tool for the protection of the Soviet state and the conduct of its foreign policy rather than as a party of world revolution. This was why he was so outspoken when it came to events in China, for example, which served as the basis for his extension of the theory of permanent revolution to cover underdeveloped societies in general, rather than just Russia.



I don't think these countries ever did "fall to socialism" (if you're talking in a historical rather than hypothetical sense) but either way the issue is that the degeneration of the Comintern served to undermine the possibility of revolution elsewhere, such that there emerged a downwards spiral as far as the prospects for the revitalization of democracy and socialism in the USSR was concerned.

The problem, as you allude to somewhat, is that Trotsky challenged Stalin and co. from a Leninist position. It is fair enough to point out the excesses in terms of bureaucracy and purges from the outside, but, if I am right in thinking, Trotsky had similar positions to Stalin on topics such as factionalism, collectivisation and so on.

The problem by the eve of the failure of the German revolution was not that proletarian internationalism was a lost cause for the Russian revolutionaries, but that Russia itself had succumbed to something of a power grab by the Bolshevik-Leninists/Marxist-Leninists. Personally, I believe that by excluding the vast array of pro-leftist groupings, the Bolsheviks preceded to build the grave of revolution itself. What hope did non-MLs on the left in Russia have after the failures in Western Europe, given that they were largely excluded from the political process at home in Russia? It would (and history proved so) be practically impossible to build a genuine Socialist entity by solely entrusting political power to one ideology on the left and excluding those who deviated from that ideology, even from a leftist perspective.

[pranabjyoti]

Actually, the real problem is, every kind of internationalism was just eurocentric then. The people of Asia, Africa and Latin America were just asleep and imperialists just used them without much resistance AND THAT IS THE ROOT CAUSE OF THE WHOLE PROBLEM.
Internationalism can not exist at that time because the world i.e. most of the people of the world wasn't ready for it.

[Rooster]

Actually, the real problem is, every kind of internationalism was just eurocentric then. The people of Asia, Africa and Latin America were just asleep and imperialists just used them without much resistance AND THAT IS THE ROOT CAUSE OF THE WHOLE PROBLEM.
Internationalism can not exist at that time because the world i.e. most of the people of the world wasn't ready for it.

The root of what problem? What has that got to do with anything in this thread?

[Thirsty Crow]

Actually, the real problem is, every kind of internationalism was just eurocentric then. The people of Asia, Africa and Latin America were just asleep and imperialists just used them without much resistance AND THAT IS THE ROOT CAUSE OF THE WHOLE PROBLEM.
Internationalism can not exist at that time because the world i.e. most of the people of the world wasn't ready for it.
Proletarian internationalism was eurocentric?
Please, can you back up that claim with some evidence? Since, you know, you didn't provide any besides vague claims regarding "sleeping people of Asia, Africa and Latin America".
And by concluding that most of the Earth' populace wasn't ready for internationalism, you effectively claim they weren't ready for communism. Is this how you would argue?

[Rjevan]

http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1936/03/01.htm
I'm pretty sure Ismail explained Stalin's statement in this interview just recently but anyway...

Note how Howard speaks of "force its political theories on other nations". Stalin replies: "If you think that Soviet people want to change the face of surrounding states, and by forcible means at that, you are entirely mistaken. Of course, Soviet people would like to see the face of surrounding states changed, but that is the business of the surrounding states."

It takes some bad will to interpret this very simple statement in a way which makes Stalin admit that he abandoned internationalism and the goal of world revolution in favour of isolationist "national socialism". Stalin simply states that the USSR never planned to invade other countries in order to make them "socialist by force", that is implementing puppet regimes and forcing socialism upon the people, whether they want it and/or are ready for it or not. Stalin speaks against "exporting socialism" and correctly holds that it's not the Soviet Union's task to "bring about world revolution" but the socialist revolution must be carried out by the working class of each country themselves. This doesn't exclude internationalist support and the goal of world revolution.

No matter what he says, it's never good enough. Bet if he said that the Comintern is actively supporting communist forces his opponents would quote this interview as evidence that Stalin ruthlessly used the communist movement to further his imperialist goals and sought to force his system on the international proletariat...

[Sword and Shield]

No matter what he says, it's never good enough. Bet if he said that the Komintern is actively supporting communist forces his opponents would quote this interview as evidence that Stalin ruthlessly used the communist movement to further his imperialist goals and sought to force his system on the international proletariat...

And that's the bottom line.

[pranabjyoti]

The root of what problem? What has that got to do with anything in this thread?
The ROOT problem is IMPERIALISM WAS MUCH STRONGER AND PROLETARIAT IS VERY MUCH WEAK. And to defend others, you have to defend yourself first.

[pranabjyoti]

Proletarian internationalism was eurocentric?
YES, the rest of the world is just NOT ready for it. They lagged behind.

Please, can you back up that claim with some evidence? Since, you know, you didn't provide any besides vague claims regarding "sleeping people of Asia, Africa and Latin America".
Well, one proof is, soldiers of many colonized countries fought on behalf of their masters. I think you don't like this fact, but it's true and I am helpless.

And by concluding that most of the Earth' populace wasn't ready for internationalism, you effectively claim they weren't ready for communism. Is this how you would argue?
At that time certainly were? Even today, many poor village living people of India, just become spell-bound by hearing "everyone can be equal". That's beyond their imagination still today.
A huge part of the world colonized, standard of education is very poor and feudal and other backward mentality reigning strongly on the minds of large share of humanity and YOU ARE ASKING ME WHY THEY ARE NOT READY FOR COMMUNISM? I can expect such question only from an alien.

[Red_Struggle]

It seems that Trots are forgetting their own theory, while ignoring military tactics and logistics all the while. How is a country that is supposed to be as hopelessly backwards as the USSR export revolutions all over the globe; especially revolutions in the West, which is where economic aid was supposed to come from in the first place so the Soviets could build socialism?

They criticize the USSR for supporting the Republic in the civil war and not doing enough at that, which ignores the fact that the majority of the USSR's resources were going towards actually industrializing their own economy in the event of an invasion. Even in 1941, they were barely ready and they were planning on war around 1942. Ironically, German planners initially didn't want to go to war till 1943 or so. Bottom line, an offensive consumes way more resources than an invasion. How would this massive army and the country be fed without collectivization, and the industrialization necessary to improve the efficiency of agricultural production, for example tractors and chemicals?

But because everything is Stalin's fault, it's also the Comintern that helped the Nazis rise to power. Ignore the fact the SPD had their hand in favoring the Nazis over the Communists and the fact that they had no problem putting down the Spartacist uprising as well. After the NSDAP took over parliamant, the KPD did in fact urge a united left front with the SPD to take them down, which the SPD prompty denied. But we're talking about Stalin here, so that's his fault too.

[Kléber]

It takes some bad will to interpret this very simple statement in a way which makes Stalin admit that he abandoned internationalism and the goal of world revolution in favour of isolationist "national socialism".
More like it takes blindness to ignore a clear admission of guilt, backed up by the factual evidence of what happened to the Comintern and a generation of internationalist revolutionaries.


Stalin simply states that the USSR never planned to invade other countries in order to make them "socialist by force", that is implementing puppet regimes and forcing socialism upon the people, whether they want it and/or are ready for it or not. How nice of Stalin not to set up Soviet puppet regimes that turn into revisionist comprador fascist states the moment he dies.


Stalin speaks against "exporting socialism" and correctly holds that it's not the Soviet Union's task to "bring about world revolution"If the Soviet Union's task wasn't to bring about world revolution then it ceased to be a revolutionary state.


but the socialist revolution must be carried out by the working class of each country themselves.He says "states" not "working classes" of each country. It's not a mistake, given the concurrent attempt to come to power in Spain by taking over the bourgeois police and army.


Bet if he said that the Comintern is actively supporting communist forces his opponents would quote this interview as evidence that Stalin ruthlessly used the communist movement to further his imperialist goals and sought to force his system on the international proletariat...Marxists don't take some banal view of the USSR as becoming imperialist, capitalist and fascist after the death of some leader. And getting rid of the Comintern wasn't a solution to the problem.

Perhaps you've handily forgotten the entire Hoxhaist polemic against Khrushchev, Castro etc. Was it also okay for them to hide their political views and talk about peaceful coexistence?

[red cat]

How is a country that is supposed to be as hopelessly backwards as the USSR export revolutions all over the globe; especially revolutions in the West, which is where economic aid was supposed to come from in the first place so the Soviets could build socialism?



How is a country supposed to export revolutions at all? If the communist party of a country is not strong enough to at least secure a substantial mass support and launch some kind of armed struggle, then what guarantees that a socialist intervention won't be treated as a foreign invasion of conquest and the masses won't turn against it?

[Thirsty Crow]

Well, one proof is, soldiers of many colonized countries fought on behalf of their masters. I think you don't like this fact, but it's true and I am helpless.

So, let me se if I got it straight: proletarian internationalism is eurocentric, as a revolutionary theory aiming at the global emancipation of labour, because imperialists managed to conscript colonized people to fight for their interests (or offer some kind of material security in the face of destitution caused by colonization and capitalist combined and uneven development in the first place)?
Or do you mean that proletarian internationalism is "eurocentric" since it couldn't mobilize people facing extreme destitution and outright colonization?
But in that case, you have no idea whatsoever what "eurocentrism" is.

[pranabjyoti]

How is a country supposed to export revolutions at all? If the communist party of a country is not strong enough to at least secure a substantial mass support and launch some kind of armed struggle, then what guarantees that a socialist intervention won't be treated as a foreign invasion of conquest and the masses won't turn against it?
There was a very good example in India. In 1962, Indian rulers made the Indo-China war as a tool to spread anti-communist hysteria and even today, there are MF's even today, who are shouting at communists as "agents of China". This is an example of how sensitive the issue is and with a country, though poor, but full of backward, feudal mentality can turn even "poor" people against revolutionaries.

[Red_Struggle]

How is a country supposed to export revolutions at all?

It shouldn't. My post was a jab at Trotsky's "Permanent Revolution" and what modern day Trots expected of the USSR.

[caramelpence]

It shouldn't. My post was a jab at Trotsky's "Permanent Revolution" and what modern day Trots expected of the USSR.

No, it was a further indication of your laughable ignorance, because no Trotskyist thinks an international revolution could have been carried out through Soviet bayonets - it could only have been carried out through the action of workers in their respective countries under the leadership of revolutionary parties, but the point is that it was the purpose of the Comintern to help those parties in their goals, by supporting their establishment where they did not emerge of their own accord, by providing material resources, as well as strategic and tactical direction, and so the degeneration of the Comintern meant that the Soviet Union and its associated bodies were no longer revolutionary and actively served to undermine the prospects for revolution in other countries. If you think that the Comintern had a revolutionary role under Stalin then you should explain why it was correct for the young CPC to be forcibly pressed into an alliance with the KMT in which it had a subordinate role, starting in 1922, and why Stalin continued to support the CPC subordinating itself to a party of the landlords and petty-bourgeoisie right up to and even beyond the events of April 1927 - not to mention why it was correct for Stalin to support the admission of the KMT to the Comintern and a KMT delegate to the ECCI. Of course, you can't give an opinion on these events, because you're an ignorant Stalinist.


But because everything is Stalin's fault, it's also the Comintern that helped the Nazis rise to power. Ignore the fact the SPD had their hand in favoring the Nazis over the Communists

Of course the SPD also had a role in supporting the Nazi rise to power - this very fact made it all the more necessary for the KPD to propose a united front because if the SPD had declined it would have served to undermine the illusions of the SPD's working-class support base. The entire point of Trotsky's support for a united front was that it was designed to cater for different possibilities, in that it would have been beneficial for the KPD regardless of whether it had been accepted by the SPD or not. The very fact that the KPD did, as you say, propose an alliance with the SPD at a very late stage in the game only serves to expose the Comintern's Third Period rhetoric about the SPD being "social-fascists" as meaningless and reactionary nonsense. Unless, of course, you think the class character of the SPD dramatically changed as the Nazis came closer to power, or that the electoral success of the Nazis made it fine to work with fascists of the "social-" kind but not the vanilla kind.


The people of Asia, Africa and Latin America were just asleep and imperialists just used them without much resistance

This is reactionary drivel that sounds like the worst of Second International racism. The Chinese workers and peasants who fought in the ranks of the KMT and CPC armies, along with the Trotskyists who found themselves hunted down by just about every other combatant during the War of Resistance, were not "asleep" or being used by imperialists, and nor were the Japanese socialists and POWs who joined the side of the Chinese.


And to defend others, you have to defend yourself first.

Who do the words "others" and "yourself" refer to here? Surely "ourselves" is the whole of the international working class, not British workers, or Chinese workers, or German workers.

[Marxach-Léinínach]

No, it was a further indication of your laughable ignorance, because no Trotskyist thinks an international revolution could have been carried out through Soviet bayonets - it could only have been carried out through the action of workers in their respective countries under the leadership of revolutionary parties, but the point is that it was the purpose of the Comintern to help those parties in their goals, by supporting their establishment where they did not emerge of their own accord, by providing material resources, as well as strategic and tactical direction, and so the degeneration of the Comintern meant that the Soviet Union and its associated bodies were no longer revolutionary and actively served to undermine the prospects for revolution in other countries. If you think that the Comintern had a revolutionary role under Stalin then you should explain why it was correct for the young CPC to be forcibly pressed into an alliance with the KMT in which it had a subordinate role, starting in 1922, and why Stalin continued to support the CPC subordinating itself to a party of the landlords and petty-bourgeoisie right up to and even beyond the events of April 1927 - not to mention why it was correct for Stalin to support the admission of the KMT to the Comintern and a KMT delegate to the ECCI. Of course, you can't give an opinion on these events, because you're an ignorant Stalinist.
The comintern did indeed have issues of overcentralisation which was why Stalin supported its dissolution. Stalin and the Comintern made mistakes with the Chinese Revolution at various times but you can't blame 1927 entirely on them. Internal rightism in the CCP definitely played its role as well. Stalin considered CCP rightism to have been the main cause which was why he never really trusted them until the Korean War. In actuality the defeats were probably due to both Comintern overcentralisation and CCP rightism, rather than one or the other.

[caramelpence]

The comintern did indeed have issues of overcentralisation which was why Stalin supported its dissolution.

No, overcentralization couldn't have been the reason behind its dissolution, because even after its dissolution, the Soviet Union retained a capacity to direct the policies and positions of national parties - for example, in the Middle East, it forced parties like the ICP to adopt a pro-Zionist line following Soviet support for partition in the UN, whereas the parties had initially opted for an anti-Zionist line under their own initiative.


at various times

When did Stalin and the Comintern support a correct line for the CPC, then?


but you can't blame 1927 entirely on them

So you agree they were partly responsible?


Internal rightism in the CCP definitely played its role as well

Care to give any substance to this notion? And please don't say Chen Duxiu was a "right-opportunist" or I'll cry. Looking at CPC history after the defeat of Li Lisan and Chen Duxiu, it wasn't really the case that the Comintern gave support to the "left" instead of to the "rightists" inside the CPC - on the one hand, the Returned Bolsheviks did support radical redistribution in the Jiangxi Soviet, which ended in disaster, but the most distinguishing feature of Wang Ming was that he supported an anti-Japanese united front with the KMT that would embody Jiang Jieshi as well as the rest of the party organization, whereas Mao initially supported an united front excluding Jiang Jieshi, so on the issue of Japan and imperialism, it was the Comintern, through Wang Ming, who were on the right, in the sense of having a more conciliatory posture, at least for that particular (though very important) issue.

[pranabjyoti]

So, let me se if I got it straight: proletarian internationalism is eurocentric, as a revolutionary theory aiming at the global emancipation of labour, because imperialists managed to conscript colonized people to fight for their interests (or offer some kind of material security in the face of destitution caused by colonization and capitalist combined and uneven development in the first place)?
Or do you mean that proletarian internationalism is "eurocentric" since it couldn't mobilize people facing extreme destitution and outright colonization?
But in that case, you have no idea whatsoever what "eurocentrism" is.
I have said "was", not "is" and for good reason. I don't want to repeat. And by "eurocentric", I want to mean centered in Europe. The participation from working class (actually, by proper Marxist terminology, working class is just a small marginal faction in Asia, Africa, Latin America then) from Asia, Africa and Latin America is very small.