barista.marxista
24th February 2006, 18:53
Originally posted by
[email protected] 21 2006, 02:13 AM
Well with this logic, fascism is a natural outgrowth of bourgoise democracy, not a reaction of the ruling class to workers power and various other historical sitiations that led to fascism in Europe. I mean Hitler, was democratically elected in a social-democratic country.
It's true that stalinism had its roots in bolshivism but it is idiotic to ignore all historical events and developents to find out whay this happened.
Revolutions are not grown in petrie dishes in labs. THe trend of substituting the party for the class began early in the revolution even before Stalin took power. If the bolshiviks has been a German party and there had been a german revolution, then Stalinism probably would never have happened because the German working class was stronger numerically and so on.
What happened in Russia after the revolution was horrible, but honestly, I do not see a sinerio where an isolated Russian Workeing class could have held out against either internal (Stalin) or external (White army/imperilaist powers) counterrevolutions.
Would an anarchist collective in the Ukrane have been able to defeat the white army? Then what? Without industrialization and a strong working class, an isolated anarchist collective could survive for how long?
As capitalism will always fall into crisis, thus forcing the proletariat to realize themselves as a class, then yes, fascism is a natural outgrowth of bourgeois democracy. So we agree.
I know revolutions aren't born in labs. Pre-1917 Leninism depended entirely on the theory of permanent revolution -- that the first world would follow the neocolonial world in revolution. You cannot build socialism in an undeveloped country, and when the industrialized states' revolutions failed, the Bolsheviks had to either take totalitarian control or else give up their power. And obviously they weren't going to do the latter. So your advocacy of Leninism is based on best-case scenarios, where everyone in the first-world suddenly revolts, and there is no capitalist resistance (as the Russian Civil War was the context that created the historical conditions that helped lead to Stalin's rise). As it is based on idealist conditions that cannot be realized (unless you concede that the bourgeoisie won't resist, and everyone will revolt at once), not only is Leninism idealistic, and thus useless, but it is also going to inevitably lead to the totalitarian state we have seen with Russia, China, and the others.
The Makhnovischina in the Ukraine fought very successfully against the White Army for years, until the Bolsheviks betrayed them and crushed all their forces. The Cartagena region of Spain was run by autonomist workers' councils for nearly twenty years, from around 1880-1900, and then rose again in the Spanish Civil War, only to be crushed, again, by the Bolsheviks. Leninists have been as merciless an enemy of actual working-class and peasant organization as the capitalists have. I'm not arguing that anarchist collectives in the unindustrialized world can survive against advanced capitalism, because obviously that would be a-historical and idealistic. But they're examples of workers organizing themselves, not petty bourgeoisie organizing "for the workers". I'm firmly a communist, but I support all worker self-organization, regardless of whether it's under a red flag or a black one.
Xanthus
11th March 2006, 11:36
Originally posted by
[email protected] 20 2006, 06:04 PM
Trotskyists complain that Stalin broke with Leninism, despite the fact that Stalin was elected democratically within the Party, and Stalin expelled him both for being a threat, and for breaking the centralism of the party (an important Leninist tenet). Trotsky was just as authoritarian as Stalin was -- any look as his suppression of the anarchist collectives in the Ukraine and Russia during the Civil War will show you this. "Stalinism" is nothing but the natural outgrowth of Leninism with the failure of permanent revolution -- Trotskyists just ***** that it didn't go their way.
That is the biggest load of bull I've read today, which is saying quite a bit.
Here's a nice little quote from the famous communist leader (and ex-Stalinist) Leopold Trepper, who wrote in his memoirs:
All those who did not rise up against the Stalinist machine are responsible, collectively responsible. I am no exception to this verdict. But who did protest at the time? Who rose up to voice his outrage? The Trotskyites can lay claim to this honour. Following the example of their leader, who was rewarded for his obstinacy with the end of an ice-axe, they fought Stalinism to the death, and they were the only ones who did.
By the time of the great purges, they could only shout their rebellion in the freezing wastelands where they had been dragged in order to be exterminated. In the camps, their conduct was admirable. But their voices were lost in the tundra.
Today, the Trotskyites have a right to accuse those who once howled along with the wolves. Let them not forget, however, that they had the enormous advantage over us of having a coherent political system capable of replacing Stalinism. They had something to cling to in the midst of their profound distress at seeing the revolution betrayed. They did not 'confess', for they knew that their confession would server neither the party nor socialism.
If you want an accurate answer to the question of Trotsky vs Stalin, I'd point you first and foremost to two places.
First, to understand Trotsky, check out Lenin and Trotsky: What they really stood for (http://www.marxist.com/LeninAndTrotsky/).
It is an quick and easy read, which was written in reply to Stalinist lies similar to the one I quote at the top of this post.
Second, to understand Stalin, check out Revolution Betrayed (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/works/1936-rev/index.htm).
It is not so quick or easy, but is considered the best and most complete exposition of Stalin's role in destroying all the gains of the Soviet revolution... up until when it was written in 1936 anyway.
Comrade Marcel
16th March 2006, 21:02
I aksed a comrade of mine about this, and here is the reply:
My reply,
This nonsense has been floating around for years. He is referring to
some propaganda surrounding the Feb. 1934 17th Party Congress in which,
in fact, virtually everyone commended the excellent results of the 5
year plans and acknowledged the obvious vindication of Stalin's
policies. It was known as the Congress of Victors. One oppositionist
after another rallied to Stalin's side.
A Central Committee was elected that included not only Stalin
supporters but a sizable number of people who had been opposing Stalin
and supporting Trotsky for years.
"[At the 17th Party Congress in January 1934] a Central Committee was
elected, consisting almost solely of Stalinist veterans of the
intra-Party struggle, but including Pyatakov [a strong Trotskyist] among
its full members and Sokolnikov, Bukharin, Rykov, and Tomsky [open
Rightists] among its candidates."
Conquest, Robert. The Great Terror. New York: Oxford University Press,
1990, p. 33
"At this Congress, however, there is nothing to prove and, it seems, no
one to fight. Everyone sees that the line of the party has
triumphed--Stalin, 1934."
Getty & Naumov, The Road to Terror. New Haven, Conn.: Yale Univ. Press,
c1999, p. 103
"In consequence the 17th Congress of the Communist Party, held in
January 1934 with 2000 delegates representing almost 3 million members
and candidates, was an all-round triumph for Stalin. With the exception
of Trotsky, impotent in exile, all the old Oppositionists had now
returned to the Party fold, and to make the occasion complete, the later
Opposition Troika--Bukharin, Rykov, and Tomsky-- ate humble pie once
more in the most abject terms. The Congress was informed that the gap
between the First and Second Plans had been bridged, and that it was now
proposed to make a capital investment of 133 billion rubles--as compared
with 60 billion for the First Plan--in the Second Five-Year program.
Small wonder that the Moscow press called this the "Congress of Victors"
and proudly proclaimed that the Soviet ship of state had come at last to
fair water after many perils and storms."
Duranty, Walter. Story of Soviet Russia. Philadelphia, N. Y.: JB
Lippincott Co. 1944, p. 208
"The Congress that took place in February 1934 became known... as the
"Congress of Victors"....
He [Stalin] laid special emphasis on the fact that, in the three years
or so since the previous congress, industrial output had doubled. New
branches of industry had been created: machine-tool construction,
automobiles, tractors, chemicals. Engines, aircraft, combines,
synthetic rubber, nitrate, artificial fibers were now being manufactured
in the USSR. He announced proudly that thousands of new enterprises had
been commissioned, including such to gigantic projects as the Dnieper
Hydroelectric project, the Magnitogorsk and Kuznets sites, the Urals
truck-building plant, the Chelyabinsk tractor plant, the Kramatorsk auto
plant and so on. No previous report of his had ever contained so many
facts and figures, tables and plans. He had something to tell the Congress."
Volkogonov, Dmitri. Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy. New York: Grove
Weidenfeld, 1991, p. 193
CHUEV: I have a question about the 17th Party Congress. Is it true
that Stalin received fewer votes than Kirov at the elections to the
Central Committee?
MOLOTOV: No. How can they say such things?...
...I am sure that at every election to the Central Committee, one our
two votes went against Stalin. Enemies were always present.... Kirov
was unsuitable as a speaker of the highest rank. He was one of several
secretaries, a tremendous speaker at mass meetings, but that's it.
Kirov reported everything to Stalin, in detail. I believe that Kirov
acted correctly.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov Remembers. Chicago: I. R. Dee, 1993, p. 218
"Similarly, the belief that 282 delegates (or sometimes 123 or 125 or
2-4 or 5-6 or 3, depending on the rumor) voted against Stalin at the
17th Party Congress in 1934 has been questioned by recent research. A
special investigation by Central Committee staff in 1989 concluded that
166 ballots were indeed missing, but because the numbers of ballots
printed and delegates voting are unknown, "it is impossible definitely
to confirm" how many, if any, voted against Stalin. A 1960
investigation concluded that 166 delegates simply "did not take part in
the voting."
[Footnote]: The whole story about votes against Stalin comes from a
single testimony, that of Verkhovykh in 1960. Other 1934 congress
participants have contradicted his claim. Anastas Mikoyan's
"confirmation" of the rigged voting is hardly that; he reports rumors he
heard in the 1950s, although he was present at the 1934 Congress.
...Continued release of documents from the 1930s may also weaken the
tradition of writing history by anecdote."
Nove, Alec, Ed. The Stalin Phenomenon. New York: St. Martin's Press,
1993, p. 141
"The victory of the General Line at the 17th Congress was demonstrated
by the return of defeated oppositionists to party life, provided they
publicly accepted the Stalin line. Many of them, including Zinoviev,
Kamenev, Preobrazhensky, Pyatakov, and Bukharin, addressed the congress
itself. Although several of them were greeted with catcalls and
interruptions from the floor, the fact that they spoke at the congress
at all indicated a relatively "soft" attitude on the part of the regime
toward the oppositionists, at least in early 1934."
Getty, A. Origins of the Great Purges. Cambridge, N. Y.: Cambridge
Univ. Press, 1985, p. 17
"I can at least answer for myself. I spent two years in the Pioneers,
six years in the Komsomol, 16 years in the Party. For 15 years I
belonged to the Corps of Officers of the armed forces, for ten of them I
was a leading Party member and a senior reader of a Moscow Academy of
the highest rank.... The sense of insecurity of the Party man is far
greater than that of the non-Party man.
I attended the [1934 17th Party] Congress as a visitor. I recall how
Postyshev, the Chairman, called on Bukharin to speak, and how Stalin
stared at Bukharin with parted lips as if wondering what he would say....
All the outstanding oppositionists were prevailed upon to attend.
Bukharin, Rykov, Tomsky, Preobrazhensky, Lominadze, Kamenev--all were there."
Tokaev, Grigori. Betrayal of an Ideal. Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana
University Press, 1955, p. 231
"And in fact all his former opponents spoke [at the 17th Party Congress
in February 1934], admitting they had been wrong, praising him
enthusiastically, and promising total support for the party line:
Zinoviev and Kamenev; Bukharin, Rykov and Tomsky; Pyatakov, Radek,
Lominadze... Kamenev, in the typical tone of the defeated factions,
spoke of the Ryutinites as 'kulak scum' who had needed 'more tangible'
rebuttal than mere ideological argument."
Conquest, Robert. Stalin: Breaker of Nations. New York, New York:
Viking, 1991, p. 177
"In January 1934 the 17th Party Congress was held in Moscow. There
Bukharin finally capitulated completely to Stalin. His lengthy speech
included the following statements:
"It is clear that the "Rights," of whom I was one, had a different
political line, a line opposed to the all-out socialist offensive,
opposed to the attack by storm on the capitalist elements that our party
was beginning. It is clear that this line proposed a different pace of
development, that it was in fact opposed to accelerated
industrialization, that it was opposed to...the liquidation of the
kulaks as a class, that it was opposed to the reorganization of small
peasant agriculture...that it was opposed to the entire new stage of a
broad socialist offensive, completely failing to understand the
historical necessity of that offensive and drawing political conclusions
that could not have been interpreted in any way other than as
anti-Leninist.... It is clear, further, that the victory of this
deviation inevitably would have unleashed a third force and that it
would have weakened the position of the working-class.... It would have
led to intervention before we were ready...and, consequently, to the
restoration of capitalism as the combined result of the aggravated
domestic and international situation, with the forces of the proletariat
weakened and the unleashing of anti-proletarian, counter-revolutionary
forces.... It is clear, further, that Comrade Stalin was completely
right when he brilliantly applied Marxist-Leninist dialectics to
thoroughly smash a whole series of theoretical postulates advanced by
the right deviation and formulated mostly by myself."
This capitulation did not go unnoticed. Although Bukharin was chosen
at the Congress only as a candidate member of the Central Committee,
this demotion was accompanied by a return to active political and
journalistic activity. In February 1934 Bukharin was appointed
editor-in-chief of Izvestia, the second most important Soviet newspaper."
Medvedev, Roy. Let History Judge. New York: Columbia University Press,
1989, p. 320
"Still worse blows to the opposition were dealt by Zinoviev, a man who
had been twice or thrice already in exile and who had recently dubbed
Stalin "a traitor to the cause of Lenin." Here was Zinoviev whose
slavish conduct later enabled the Stalinists to catch hundreds, if not
thousands, of brave oppositionists, the Zinoviev of whom since then no
normal anti-Stalinist can think without scorn and loathing. Why, it was
only two months earlier that, shaking his clenched fists before his
face, he had preached to others on the vital need to struggle with
courage against Stalin, Molotov, and Kirov, and here he was, a pitiable
sight, all fear and trembling, doing his very utmost to please the
master. "Comrades," he said, "if I have decided to mount the tribune of
the 17th Congress of the Party--this world tribune in the truest sense,
the tribune of the world proletariat--and it the Comrades had allowed me
to do so, I trust it is because I have ended completely, utterly, with
the anti-Party period of my life, the period of my alienation from the
Party in which I spent many years. I have, as I trust and believe,
understood to the full and to the utmost the tremendous errors I have
made. I actually had the arrogance to try to foist my own particular
view of Leninism on the Party, my own particular understanding of what I
call the philosophy of the period.... However, I now see that this was
a chain of errors, and that had the Party not shown due resistance to
these errors, we would have brought the country to the very edge of
catastrophe and destruction..." This renegade then proceeded to glorify
his enemy Stalin.... Comrades, what countless attacks on Comrade Stalin
were made by myself and by other former oppositionists! Comrades, I
have understood that this was all the most profound of errors."
Tokaev, Grigori. Betrayal of an Ideal. Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana
University Press, 1955, p. 232
"Still worse was the capitulation of Kamenev, one of Lenin's closest
associates, a member of the Politburo and second only to Zinoviev as the
leader of the opposition. "While Comrade Stalin," declared Kamenev "the
most deserving of Lenin's pupils, took over his work, and with set
teeth, rejecting all hesitation, bore aloft the banner wrenched by death
from Lenin's hands, the group to which I belonged immediately gave in,
was shaken in its fate, and thereafter stubbornly and insistently tried
to force its own erroneous views on the Party. We then started on a
course which was bound to bring us to counter-revolution.... But the
Orthodox intolerance and the perspicacious sense of ideals of Comrade
Stalin saved both Party and country. From this tribune I wish to
declare that I consider the Kamenev who from 1925 to 1933 struggled
against the Party and the Party leadership to be a political corpse, and
that I wish to go forward without dragging its old hide behind me."
Tokaev, Grigori. Betrayal of an Ideal. Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana
University Press, 1955, p. 233
"Yet another opposition leader, Preobrazhensky, the principal
theoretician of the Trotskyists, who in 1927 had organized an
anti-Stalin demonstration in Moscow and shouted such slogans as
"long-live Trotsky, down was Stalin!," made literally the following
Declaration from the tribune: "Now that I have sufficiently recognized
all my errors, I tell myself: Vote with Comrade Stalin and you will not
be wrong!"
And Rykov, who had succeeded Lenin as Chairman of the Council of
People's Commissars, and who in 1928, together with Bukharin and Tomsky,
had headed the Right-wing Deviation, the one of all the inner -Party
deviations which was the most dangerous to Stalin, Rykov mounted the
tribune and said: "The rout of the Right-wing Deviation, which was
headed by myself and Bukharin, was absolutely essential for the
Leninist-Stalinist rallying of the Party.... The rout of the Right-wing
Deviation, achieved by Comrade Stalin, constitutes a part of the great
deed that brought us to those triumphs of which their organizer, the
leader of our Party, Comrade Stalin, has given us a survey.... After the
death of Lenin, Comrade Stalin, immediately and without any delay, stood
out as the leader, as an organizer of enormous power..."
Even Bukharin, the most consistent and stubborn of the oppositionists,
actually went so far as to call a toast in honor of the "Glorious
Field-Marshal of the forces of the proletariat, the finest among the
finest, Comrade Stalin."
There was only one of the principal leaders of the Right-wing
Deviation-- Smirnov, an old Bolshevik--who had stood up to the
preliminary processing. He alone continued to charge Stalin, Kirov, and
Molotov with the creation of a "barrack regime, worse than the regime of
Nicholas the First." He alone remained true to the end and not only did
not capitulate at the Congress of the Reactionaries, but even refused to
be present,...
The considerable "Army" of rank and file Party members who disagreed
with Stalin suddenly found itself abandoned by its officers; worse than
this, the officers had crossed over to the other side. Declarations of
loyalty to Stalin became the order of the day.
...By the summer of 1934,... my friends brought messages from our
comrades in Leningrad, the center of the strongest underground movement,
urging us to continue the struggle. Our Moscow comrades, however, were
pessimistic and inclined to panic; they wished all branches to dissolve
it once and wait for "better times."
Tokaev, Grigori. Betrayal of an Ideal. Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana
University Press, 1955, p. 234-235
"By now the old men of the opposition had long been not only defeated
but spiritually broken. Even the indomitable Rakovsky, former Ukrainian
Premier and Ambassador in London and Paris, who had held out in exile
and prison longer than the others, surrendered and returned to Moscow in
1934. Like all the other penitents he, too, signed a statement
containing as much flattery of Stalin as self-accusation. The gist of
all such statements was that Stalin's conduct of policy was the only
correct one, and that any of the courses advocated by the oppositions
would inevitably have brought disaster. The 'capitulators' did not
admit yet that they had striven towards a restoration of capitalism.
Nor were admissions to that effect demanded from them. The gravamen of
their self-accusations was that their policies, if adopted, would have,
against their best intentions, exposed the country to the danger of
capitalist restoration.
...Their recantations were therefore neither wholly sincere nor wholly
insincere. On returning from the places of their exile they cultivated
their old political friendships and contacts, but carefully refrained
from any political action against Stalin. Almost till the middle of the
30s nearly all of them kept in touch with the members of his new
Politburo. Some of the penitents, Bukharin, Rykov, Pyatakov, Radek, and
others, were either Stalin's personal advisers or members of the Government."
Deutscher, Isaac. Stalin; A Political Biography. New York: Oxford Univ.
Press, 1967, p. 351
"[At the 17th Party Congress in January 1934] former oppositionists
were allowed to speak: Zinoviev, Kamenev, Bukharin, Rykov, Tomsky,
Preobrazhensky, Pyatakov, Radek, and Lominadze."
Conquest, Robert. The Great Terror. New York: Oxford University Press,
1990, p. 31
Originally posted by ComTom
soon many representives were killed who had strong opposition to Stalin.
My reply,
This is nonsense as well. There was virtually no opposition to Stalin
at the Congress and those who were later executed had been found guilty
by an overwhelming amount of evidence in a court trial of trying to
assassinate soviet leaders and working in collaboration with fascist
powers to overthrow the Soviet government via espionage, sabotage,
wrecking and dismemberment. It had nothing to do with votes at the
Congress as our benighted friend implies.
for the cause,
Klo
Wow, looks like ComTom got pwn3d and Trotskyism and it's cohorts are exposed as a practice of betrayal and opportunism yet again. As comrade Stalin said:
"After I die, many bukets of mud will be thrown on my face. But after some time, the winds of truth will come and wash it away."
YKTMX
17th March 2006, 13:51
He confessed (read the transcript I provided links to (from a Trotskite ran site BTW)), and also wrote a written confession (don't the bourgeois "scholars" and Trots alike argue they found his blood on it, proving he was "forced" to write it?).
Why Bukharin confessed is no mystery. It has nothing to do with fanatical beliefs in the Revolution. Rather it is explicable in mundane terms of physical torture, continual interrogation for weeks on end and summary executions. For surviving Bolsheviks, the account provided in "Darkness at Noon" "would have been the subject of a gay mockery," according to Cohen.
More to the point, Bukharin held out against these threats inside prison "with remarkable vigor" for 3 months. On around June 2, 1937 he finally relented, "only after the investigators threatened to kill his wife and newborn son." (Roy Medvedev, "Let History Judge)
Once Bukharin had made the decision to confess, he decided to make a mockery of the proceedings by using all sorts of bizarre rhetorical devices. He would confess that he was "politically responsible" for everything, so as to save his wife and child, but at the same time flatly deny any complicity in an actual crime. As Vishinsky and Stalin grow increasingly impatient with this tactic, they begin to harangue Bukharin. The gullible Zizek cites their remonstrations, but does not have a clue as to their significance:
Bukharin: I won't shoot myself because then people will say that I killed myself so as to harm the party. But if I die, as it were, from an illness, then what will you lose by it? [Laughter]
Voices: Blackmailer!
Vorishilov: You scoundrel! Keep your trap shut! How vile! How dare you speak like that!
Bukharin: But you must understand--it's very hard for me to go on living.
Perhaps the best way to understand this exchange is in terms of the scene in Costa-Gavras's wonderful 1970 film "The Confession", based on the Slansky show trials in Czechoslovakia in the 1950s. During the testimony of one old Communist, who speaks while standing as is customary, he begins to recite a long, obviously rehearsed confession to a number of trumped-up charges. All of a sudden, the courtroom begins to erupt in laughter. During his confession, the old Communist has unbuckled his pants and they have dropped to his ankles. This was his way of saying that the trial was a farce. Bukharin was doing something similar when he made ironic quips like, " But if I die, as it were, from an illness, then what will you lose by it?"
http://www.columbia.edu/~lnp3/mydocs/modernism/Zizek.htm
And, as I've said, he did admit to the "being a part of the right-Trotskyite bloc", but even in his "confession", never admitted to being a fascist.
How then can it be asserted that the bloc was organized on the instructions of fascist intelligence services? Why, this was in l928! By the way, at that time I narrowly missed death at the hands of an agent of the Polish ”Defensiva,” a fact very well known to everybody who stood close to the Party leadership.
Thirdly, I categorically deny that I was connected with foreign intelligence services, that they were my masters and that I acted in accordance with their wishes.
more on it, here
click (http://lincoln.pps.k12.or.us/jcurry/20thcent/lastbolshevik.html)
On a more general note, comrade, let me just say this to you.
Obviously you have an affinity to the Soviet Union. I find it, in the first instance, admirable. It surely can't be easy to be a defender of Stalin today.
However, the problem with the old Communists, and yourself, is that you think that a defence of the historical role of the Soviet Union means you have use some tortuous logic (no pub intended) for explaining its every act. The Moscow trials are a good example here.
As I said, the idea that Bukharin, Kamenev, Zinoviev, Rykov etc etc, were involved in some great fascist plot, organised by Trotsky, of course, to bring down the Soviet Union was, and is, silly.
It's a joke.
Now, that poses the question, why was it done, then?
If I were you, and I wouldn't presume to know your thinking on the matter, I'd have no problem defending the trials as, yes, patently a nonsense, but in some wider sense, who knows what, "worth it".
To stick to this notion that they WERE REAL just implies that you're not intelligent, or that you're dishonest. Which I doubt is the case.
Cheers
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