Lenins' "Oppression of The Kulaks"

[CrimsonTide]

Hello, Comrades, I started reading this forum last month, and just decided to post now.

During my arguments for Communism, many Capitalists like to drag out Lenins' "oppression of the Kulaks". It usually stalls me for a moment because I know little about the specific incidents involving the Kulaks. If they're on a Forum, they like to drag out this letter from Lenin, too:

"Send to Penza To Comrades Kuraev, Send to Penza To Comrades Kuraev, Bosh, Minkin and other Penza communists Comrades! The revolt by the five kulak volost's must be suppressed without mercy. The interest of the entire revolution demands this, because we have now before us our final decisive battle "with the kulaks." We need to set an example. 1) You need to hang (hang without fail, so that the public sees) at least 100 notorious kulaks, the rich, and the bloodsuckers. 2) Publish their names. 3) Take away all of their grain. 4) Execute the hostages - in accordance with yesterday's telegram. This needs to be accomplished in such a way, that people for hundreds of miles around will see, tremble, know and scream out: let's choke and strangle those blood-sucking kulaks. Telegraph us acknowledging receipt and execution of this. Yours, Lenin P.S. Use your toughest people for this."


Can some of you enlighten me as to how exactly this "Oppression" was carried out, by whom, and exactly why?

Links to good sources would be good too, since I debate in Forums allot.

[Vargha Poralli]

It is true but they take it totally out of context.It was given during the Russian Civil War and during the implementation of War Communism.Even the Americans suppressed the dissent voices of Eugene V Debs and Emma Goldman when they opposed recruiting people for war. It was ended somewhat lately after the Kronsdat rebellion and Lenin introduced NEP to restore faith on new governments among peasants.


Can some of you enlighten me as to how exactly this "Oppression" was carried out, by whom, and exactly why?

Total oppression of Kulaks was carried out during Stalin's regime. Stalin intended to rapidly industrialise USSR at that time and the phase of NEP was rather slow. So Stalin decided to collectivise which was initially resented by Kulaks.So Stalin forced them to do it .Here Oppression doest not meant Stalin rounded them up and killed them but annexed their property and made them a common peasants.

[CrimsonTide]

I have seen some sources say that the Kulaks actively attacked, killed, and destroyed collectivized workers, animals, and property. Is it true? If so this could be used to demonstrate they were'nt all that innocent.

[Vargha Poralli]

Originally posted by [email protected] 23, 2007 12:56 pm
I have seen some sources say that the Kulaks actively attacked, killed, and destroyed collectivized workers, animals, and property. Is it true? If so this could be used to demonstrate they were'nt all that innocent.
Of course they were not innocent as they were portrayed by Capitalists.They even burnt a significant amount of harvest creating an artificial famine in Ukraine which is blamed today entirely on Stalin.

May be this source should help. (http://www.plp.org/books/Stalin/node67.html)

[Severian]

One thing to keep in mind: what was a kulak? Aka "rich peasant".

These were exploiters, the rural face of capitalism. They squeezed their hired laborers and tenant farmers tightly - the slang term "kulak" literally means "fist". And no, that term wasn't a Bolshevik invention - you can find it in Gogol's classic novel "Dead Souls" for example.

Small bosses usually pay the least and drive people the hardest. And sometimes they fight the hardest against any attempt to change that.

It wasn't practical for the revolutionary government to redistribute all their land, but it was necessary to carry out a fight against them. Partly this involved organizing poor peasants committees. So yeah, Lenin did oppress them. Whether all these orders were carried out I don't know.

There was an early problem that the Bolsheviks were amazingly merciful. During the October 1917 insurrection, people who were captured fighting for the Provisional Government were released if they promised not to do it again! So later they may have erred in the opposite direction - in any case it was necessary for them to learn ruthlessness in order to survive and that's why Lenin was pushing so hard for more ruthlessness.

[Joseph Ball]

Thank God! Sevarin has finally admitted that revolutions require toughness! And by the way anything that's happened in Nepal is a dinner party compared to the awful sufferings people had to endure during the Russian Civil War. And anything endured by the Russian people during collectivisation and forced industrialisation-while I would not want to dimiss the very significant suffering that did occur at this time-was nothing compared to the price that would have been paid if Hitler had defeated Stalin. 27 million Soviet citizens died in the war, despite the fact that the USSR was victorious.

[chimx]

I don't know about Lenin's interpretation of a "kulak", but during Stalin's reign, kulak wasn't solely in reference to the higher echelon of peasantry and included most "middle" peasants as well. Whether or not Lenin applied this view I don't know.


I have seen some sources say that the Kulaks actively attacked, killed, and destroyed collectivized workers, animals, and property. Is it true? If so this could be used to demonstrate they were'nt all that innocent.

During the peasant revolution of 1917, that resulted partially in the downfall of the february government, peasants had been actively seizing land from landlords. Many of these landlords, being Kulaks, destroyed their own property (harvesting tools etc.) and animals in retaliation, if I remember correctly.

[Mikhail Frunze]

"Send to Penza To Comrades Kuraev, Send to Penza To Comrades Kuraev, Bosh, Minkin and other Penza communists Comrades! The revolt by the five kulak volost's must be suppressed without mercy.

This is spitefully misinterpreted by right wing authors as Lenin calling for terror. In fact, Lenin simply called for a menacing insurrection to be suppressed. This was in August of 1918 when the counter-revolution was at its peak. If it was acceptable for kulaks to unleash violence against the soviets then in order for one to be consistent one would have to say that it was justified for the Bolsheviks to react with violence. Usually, these kulak peasant rebels behaved in a brutal manner. In the Tambov province, kulaks cut off the southeast rail line, plundered 60 state farms, interrupted shipping of grain to starving consumer central regions, and murdered 2000 soviet activists.

There are those who try to negate the existence of class struggle and class gaps in Russia. But the facts show otherwise:

Ten and a half million peasant households in European Russia own 75,000,000 dessiatins of land. Thirty thousand, chiefly noble, but partly also upstart, landlords each own over 500 dessiatins— altogether 70,000,000 dessiatins. Such is the main background of the picture. Such are the main reasons for the predominance of feudal landlords in the agricultural system of Russia and, consequently, in the Russian state generally, and in the whole of Russian life.
http://www.marx.org/archive/lenin/works/19...progr/concl.htm (http://www.marx.org/archive/lenin/works/1907/agrprogr/concl.htm)

Plus, the term kulak had been around long before the soviets seized power. This pamhplet by the nihilist anarchist Nechayev was written in 1869:
Therefore, in drawing closer to the people, we must above all make common cause with those elements of the masses which, since the foundation of the state of Muscovy, have never ceased to protest, not only in words but in deeds, against everything directly or indirectly connected with the state: against the nobility, the bureaucracy, the clergy, the traders, and the parasitic kulaks. We must unite with the adventurous tribes of brigands, who are the only genuine revolutionaries in Russia.
http://www.marxists.org/subject/anarchism/...v/catechism.htm (http://www.marxists.org/subject/anarchism/nechayev/catechism.htm)

[Severian]

Originally posted by chimx+January 24, 2007 03:34 pm--> (chimx @ January 24, 2007 03:34 pm) I don't know about Lenin's interpretation of a "kulak", but during Stalin's reign, kulak wasn't solely in reference to the higher echelon of peasantry and included most "middle" peasants as well. Whether or not Lenin applied this view I don't know. [/b]
He didn't. The forced collectivization of the 30s was a break with all past practice of all factions of the Russian/Soviet CP.


Originally posted by [email protected]
I have seen some sources say that the Kulaks actively attacked, killed, and destroyed collectivized workers, animals, and property.

Anachronism in talking about 1919: there wasn't much collectivization going on then. In relation to the 1930s, many peasants but especially kulaks slaughtered animals rather than have 'em taken away to become collective property. This is not exactly an argument in favor of the forced collectivization policy.


Chimx
During the peasant revolution of 1917, that resulted partially in the downfall of the february government, peasants had been actively seizing land from landlords. Many of these landlords, being Kulaks, destroyed their own property (harvesting tools etc.) and animals in retaliation, if I remember correctly.

What? Jumbled. The February Revolution had little peasant participation, other than soldiers from peasant backgrounds. Most of the action was in the city of Petrograd.

There was little land seizure in February 1917. And landlords and kulaks were not the same thing; landlords were a more feudal and often absentee layer.

Later in 1917, Kulaks, along with the rest of the peasantry, often participated in the land seizure from landlords. That seizure was generally conducted by organizations of the whole village - the mir. The only kulaks it might sometimes be directed at would be the "separatists" - those who'd separated their property entirely from the ancient communalism of the village.

The struggle against the kulaks mostly developed later, beginning 1918. And as I mentioned earlier, didn't proceed to the complete confiscation of their land and property.

[chimx]

What? Jumbled.

I say "peasant revolution" in reference to the popular idea in histories of Russia, that along with the political revolutions of February and October, there were corresponding social revolutions in the country side, as well as in the military. These revolutions overlapped at times, but at other times were quite distinct. I spoke of February because what I was speaking to, ie. land seizures, had began prior to October.

I agree that landlords were not necessarily Kulaks, but keep in mind the Stolypin reforms of the turn of the century. Large scale capitalism within the agrarian sector was beginning at this time to be introduced, and a Kulak could act as a landlord due to these Czarist reforms.

[Mikhail Frunze]

[QUOTE]In relation to the 1930s, many peasants but especially kulaks slaughtered animals rather than have 'em taken away to become collective property. This is not exactly an argument in favor of the forced collectivization policy.[QUOTE]

This is a misunderstanding. The process of dekulakization had spanned 1930-31. The famine which affected the proletariat, peasantry, and farm animals alike primarily occurred during the months February-July 1933 before the successful harvest. The kulak class had been effectively eliminated by 1932. Peasants had no motivation to kill their farm animals because this would have been detrimental to their own interests. Class struggle did not contribute to the famine. If peasants indeed refuse to work on the harvest, then total agricultural production in the disastrous year of 1932 would have totalled 5 million tons instead of 55 million tons. The factors which led to the drop in agricultural production were poor weather, drought, rust, and the lack of horses and tractors.

[chimx]

That is an opinion held by only one group of Russian historians. There is a pinned thread on "Stalin's Crimes" that goes into it. For the present, it would be highly unwise to state anything as fact in regards to the famine.

[Spirit of Spartacus]

Thank God! Sevarin has finally admitted that revolutions require toughness!

Praise the Lord!

All guidance cometh from him alone, and He leadeth all comrades to the path of communist righteousness.

[Spirit of Spartacus]

During my arguments for Communism, many Capitalists like to drag out Lenins' "oppression of the Kulaks". It usually stalls me for a moment because I know little about the specific incidents involving the Kulaks. If they're on a Forum, they like to drag out this letter from Lenin, too:

Know what?

Write a letter to your communist friends, asking them to disembowel the capitalists you were debating, and serve their innards on a platter.
Then show it to the cappies.That ought to quiten the capitalists down.

I suggest that you take an approach depending on who you're debating. If you're debating a convinced reactionary, take a hardline stance and do as I said above. :D

If you're debating a student or a left-leaning person, then you should take a softer approach, and to to the trouble of explaining what a class war is, and why it is sometimes necessary to use severe means of dealing with the class enemy.

With convinced reactionaries, however, there is no need to be politically correct.

Put it before them, clear and concise. The kulaks were reactionaries, their crimes against the landless peasantry were this, this and this, and therefore they were shot as criminals.

[Esselbei]

I know the OP was talking about Lenin, but I had my own question concerning the Kulaks and it seems a bit wasteful to create another thread entirely.

This is from one of my school textbooks: Access to History: Bolshevik and Stalinist Russia 1918-56 by Michael Lynch (2005)


“The concept of a Kulak class has been shown by scholars to have been a Stalinist myth. The so-called Kulaks were really only those industrious peasants who, by their own efforts, had proved more efficient farmers than their neighbours. In no sense did they constitute the class of exploiting land-owners described in Stalin’s propaganda campaign against them. Nonetheless, given the tradition of landlord oppression going back to tsarist times, the notion of a Kulak class proved a very potent one and provided the grounds for a coercion of the peasantry as a whole – middle and poor peasants, as well as Kulaks.”

…And this is (obviously I know!) from: The Revolution Betrayed by Leon Trotsky (1936)


“A small commodity economy inevitably produces exploiters. In proportion as the villages recovered, the differentiation within the peasant mass began to grow. This development fell into the old well-trodden ruts. The growth of the kulak [well-off peasant, employing labor] far outstripped the general growth of agriculture. The policy of the government under the slogan "face to the country" was actually a turning of its face to the kulak. Agricultural taxes fell upon the poor far more heavily than upon the well-to-do, who moreover skimmed the cream of the state credits. The surplus grain, chiefly in possession of the upper strata of the village, was used to enslave the poor and for speculative selling to the bourgeois elements of the cities. Bukharin, the theoretician of the ruling faction at that time, tossed to the peasantry his famous slogan, "Get rich!" In the language of theory that was supposed to mean a gradual growing of the kulaks into socialism. In practice it meant the enrichment of the minority at the expense of the overwhelming majority.”

I was wondering about people’s thoughts on the worth of the first extract. How accurate is that? Does it contradict Trotsky’s statement? How much is Trotsky’s opinion worth considering the fact it was written so long ago and (apparently) a lot of new information has come to light since then?

I know nothing, so, please help enlighten me!

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 30, 2007 06:05 am
I was wondering about people’s thoughts on the worth of the first extract. How accurate is that? Does it contradict Trotsky’s statement?
Nope, not factually. It's just the standard pro-capitalist value judgement that rich people are rich because they're hard-working and there's no such thing as exploitation or class in capitalist society.

That value judgement has some factual basis when you're looking at the early stages of capital accumulation through differentiation of the peasantry. Yes, the most efficient farmers will become richer, others become their employees and tenants. This is not a revelation or "new information" to any Marxist. I could probably find some old stuff where one of the Bolshevik leaders explicity states this is the origin of class differentiation among the peasantry, but it's not really necessary.

Like a lot of anti-Marxist pundits, this guy hasn't bothered to try to understand what he's arguing against. He doesn't have to, since this kind of pro-capitalist screed gets a lot wider circulation than what it's "refuting". It's purpose isn't so much refutation as trying to prejudice people before they come in contact with Marxism.