Spain 1936, revolution and civil-war

[Entrails Konfetti]

Instead of fragments of the Spain 1936 that keep popping up in learning by empassioned members, and unitentionally derail threads, post here and discuss endlessly!

[Kilroy Was Here]

'The persecution of the POUM and the anarchists by the PSUC was a major factor in the defeat of the Republic.' Discuss.

[Y Chwyldro Comiwnyddol Cymraeg]

Yes, instead of a unity between the afctions to fight the real enemy we fought between ourself and effecctivley lost the war. This is a leson we must learn for future revolutions, beating the common enemy first and debating the apropriate steps next.

[Lamanov]

Originally posted by Y Chwildro Comiwnyddol [email protected] 25, 2007 05:35 pm
Yes, instead of a unity between the afctions to fight the real enemy we fought between ourself and effecctivley lost the war. This is a leson we must learn for future revolutions, beating the common enemy first and debating the apropriate steps next.

PSUC was the enemy, the "red" bourgeoisie. Agents of imperialist and state-capitalist Soviet Union were not a thing we could identify as a part of "ourself".

Capitalist class and the working class do not have, and they never had, a "common enemy". In Spain, the only solution was precisely a break between the "fractions", and what the 'Friends of Durutti' called "a revolutionary junta": POUM, militias, factory commities, rank and file union working class membership, revolutionary members of FAI, taking down PSUC - UGT bureaucrats and CNT "anarchist" reformists, and replacing them with an armed workers' elected council.

Stop *****ing about the lack of unity, and work on comprehension, since clarity is what "we" miss - obviously.

[syndicat]

the issue wasn't really the defeat of the "Republic". the issue was the defeat of the revolution. as Durruti said on a nation-wide radio address in Oct 1936: "Spain's workers are not fighting and dying to defend the bourgeois republic. they are fighting for the factories and the fields, for a different way of life."

the Republican state had collapsed in July of 1936. it's military and police forces had revolted in order to suppress the country's massive revolutionary labor movement, which was a huge threat to the industrial and agricultural capitalist elite. prior to July of 1936 the workers had defeated the right wing in the elections of Feb. 1936 and then launched a huge strike wave, many city-wide general strikes, and occupations of hundreds of huge landed estates by farm laborers. that is what provoked the attempted military takeover. the unions had weapons as they knew a coup was coming. the Republican politicans didn't trust the old police, so they created a special new police force in 1931, the Republican Assautl Guard. many were socialists. many members of the Republican Assault Guard sided with the armed workers in July of 1936, and the army was defeated in most of the country. many sailors in the Spanish navy had previously worked in the merchant shipping and had been members of CNT or UGT unions. they hated their officers who were bluebloods from the landed oligarchy. the nite of the military coup the ships crews held secret meetings and then shot or arrested their officers, taking cotnrol of the Spanish warships.

the CNT union federation built its own army from scratch to fight the fascist army. the CNT built a war industry, to make armored vehicles and ammo. in Catalonia the unions held de facto armed power. Catalonia had 70% of Spain's manufacturing and the workers there expropriated the factories. 18,000 enterprises were expropriated and the workers created their own organization to manage them, based on assemblies and elected workplace councils. 14 million acres of agricultural land was expropriated and villages were collectivized.

doctors and nurses created the country's first socialized health care system, managed by the CNT health workers union. the railway workers created the Revolutionary Railway Federation to take over management of the railways, controlled by biweekly assemblies in the terminals and an elected Revolutionary Committee.

the problem was that the Communists started beating the drum to rebuild the Republican state, by creating a hierarchical army and police. their aim was to gain control of the officer positions. revolutionaries in the CNT countered this with the proposal for a unified miltitia, controlled by committees elcted by the worker unions, and replacing the old Republican government with a system of regional and national worker congresses and elected regional and national Defense Councils (revolutionary juntas). The Left Socialists wavered between the positions of the Communists and the anarchists, and then ultimately sided with the Communists.

The Communists organized the middle strata of society -- lawyers, landowning farmers, shopkeepers, cops, managers, etc. All the people who feared and hated the prolertarian revolution. by the spring of 1937 they had gained control of much of the police and military command posts and were strong enough to counter-attack the revolution. in may 1937 a coordinted Communist-controlled police attack on the worker-managed telephone system resulted in several days of general strike and street fighting in Barcelona. by that time some of the leading anarchists were in the government and no longer had the stomach for an allout fight for control. The Communists then consolidated their hold on the government.

The Communist hold on the army meant that any officer who wouldn't take a party card would be undermined. the Communists' hold on the army undermined morale in the army and among the working class, who saw their gains beaten back. this contributed to the defeat.

also, the fascist powers, Germany and Italy, provided huge amounts of military aid, such as aircraft, to the fascist side. meanwhile, the USSR systematically cheated the Republic on its sales of weapons to Spain. the mistake of sending Spain's gold reserves to Moscow totally undermined the value of the Spanish currency, cutting its value in half, making it harder to buy weapons and supplies. although the CNT had built a large part of the anti-fascist miliia force, anarchsit units were starved for weapons. anarchist-controlled war industries were starved for funds to buy equipment. these things also contributed to the defeat.

the longterm aim of the Communists was to establish a nationalized economy not controlled by the workers but controlled by a professional/managerial bureaucracy, as in the Soviet Union. the class they recruited were the people whose interests would be served by that direction, the middle strata of Spanish society. only 40% of the members of the Communist party were workers.

http://www.workersolidarity.org/spain.pdf

[Random Precision]

I have some favors to ask of anyone knowladgable about the Spanish Anarchist movement and their revolution, as I'm currently doing research in that area. It would be immensely helpful if I could get some reading material reccomended, especially with data on the revolution as it occured in industry, specifically that of Catalonia. I am also in desperate need of material concerning the specific aims of the CNT in the revolution, I have seen mention of a "Zaragoza Platform" in which they ennumerated their revolutionary goals, but have been unable to find it or any related primary source material. Thanks in advance!

[syndicat]

Excerpts from the CNT's "libertarian communist" program adopted at the Zargaoza Congress of May 1936 are available in English in Robert Alexander's two-volume history, "Anarchists and the Spanish Civil War." But this is not the whole document.

Burnett Bolleten's book on the Spanish revolution has a good summary on the extent of expropriation of industry. There is also the classic "The Collectives in the Spanish Revolution" by Gaston Leval.

There are also some interviews with Spanish anarchists in "Blood of Spain" (an oral history) that discuss expropriation of industry.

[Y Chwyldro Comiwnyddol Cymraeg]

Originally posted by DJ-[email protected] 25, 2007 08:46 pm
PSUC was the enemy, the "red" bourgeoisie. Agents of imperialist and state-capitalist Soviet Union were not a thing we could identify as a part of "ourself".

Capitalist class and the working class do not have, and they never had, a "common enemy". In Spain, the only solution was precisely a break between the "fractions", and what the 'Friends of Durutti' called "a revolutionary junta": POUM, militias, factory commities, rank and file union working class membership, revolutionary members of FAI, taking down PSUC - UGT bureaucrats and CNT "anarchist" reformists, and replacing them with an armed workers' elected council.

Stop *****ing about the lack of unity, and work on comprehension, since clarity is what "we" miss - obviously.
I agree wit the "red bourguoise" statment but if we alienate every faction you dont agree with (you mentioned the a few) capitalism will never be toppled.

As much as I hate Stalinists sectarianism wont get us any where

[Tower of Bebel]

Question: is the creation of the "anarchist leadership" a creation of the need for leadership or what is it? Is it because there was a lack of democracy in the CNT?

[Entrails Konfetti]

Syndicat:

prior to July of 1936 the workers had defeated the right wing in the elections of Feb. 1936

Which workers parties were in the government?


revolutionaries in the CNT countered this with the proposal for a unified miltitia

This unified militia was to unite UGT and CNT, correct?

Howcome the more revolutionary CNT didn't urge the more revolutionary members of the UGT to join the CNT, if I recall the UGT had members of all sorts.


in may 1937 a coordinted Communist-controlled police attack on the worker-managed telephone system resulted in several days of general strike and street fighting in Barcelona. by that time some of the leading anarchists were in the government and no longer had the stomach for an allout fight for control. The Communists then consolidated their hold on the government.

How and why did these anarchists get into the government? Were these the CNT members who were there and left over from the Anarcho-Syndicalist tactics of boaring holes into the unions?


anarchist-controlled war industries were starved for funds to buy equipment. these things also contributed to the defeat.

And so they tried to get arms from the Moscow-Fascists?

[syndicat]

me: "prior to July of 1936 the workers had defeated the right wing in the elections of Feb. 1936 "



Which workers parties were in the government?

a coalition of middle class liberal Republican parties and the Socialist and Communist Parties. in Catalonia the populist Catalan nationalist Left Republicans won. this was not a working class party tho it got significant working class votes as a "lesser evil" in that election. the CNT didn't endorse anyone but the members voted for the liberal Republican parties to defeat the right and because the Popular Front proposed to free 30,000 union members held in prison.

me: "revolutionaries in the CNT countered this with the proposal for a unified miltitia "



This unified militia was to unite UGT and CNT, correct?

yes. but there were also separate Communist and Socialist and Republican party militias. This created a huge problem.


Howcome the more revolutionary CNT didn't urge the more revolutionary members of the UGT to join the CNT, if I recall the UGT had members of all sorts.

because of the weight of history and ideology. the more revolutionary wing of the UGT were aligned politically with the Left Socialists. historically there had been a lot of animosity between the Socialists and the anarchists in Spain, as competitors. in the early '30s the UGT scabbed on CNT strikes.

me: "in may 1937 a coordinted Communist-controlled police attack on the worker-managed telephone system resulted in several days of general strike and street fighting in Barcelona. by that time some of the leading anarchists were in the government and no longer had the stomach for an allout fight for control. The Communists then consolidated their hold on the government. "


How and why did these anarchists get into the government? Were these the CNT members who were there and left over from the Anarcho-Syndicalist tactics of boaring holes into the unions?

there was a moderate tendency in the CNT called the treintistas. they were in favor of the CNT being a part of the Popular Front. they were a minority but after the UGT refused the CNT proposal to replace the Republican state with a unified workers defense council, the treintistas argued that joining the Popular Front government was the best bet to get resources for their militias and self-managed industries. so the national committee of the CNT agreed to join the government in Nov 1936.


me: "anarchist-controlled war industries were starved for funds to buy equipment. these things also contributed to the defeat. "



And so they tried to get arms from the Moscow-Fascists?

no. the anarchists wanted to get money from the state to buy weapons on the international arms market or buy equipment to make their own weapons. but the Socialists made a back-stabbing deal to send the country's gold reserves to Moscow, which gave the Stalinists a lock on the flow of arms.

[ComradeOm]

Originally posted by [email protected] 28, 2007 01:57 am
but the Socialists made a back-stabbing deal to send the country's gold reserves to Moscow, which gave the Stalinists a lock on the flow of arms.
Eh... no. The gold reserves going to Moscow was a canny bit of business on Stalin's part but it was the only way for the Popular Front to secure arms. As for the anarchists... you think that Stalin would have sold arms to anarchists if they had had the cash? If not then just where would the anarchists buy the weapons given the British blockade?

Furthermore there were very few nations, of which the USSR was one, that could have supplied the advanced arms (armour and planes) needed to hold off the well equipped Nationalist armies. The idea that these could have been manufactured on site, without an existing industrial base geared towards arms production, is of course ludicrious.

There's also the small matter that the anarchists never had the gold or any input into how it was managed. This is because the anarchists only formed a single, and not particularly influential, facet of the Popular Front.

[Random Precision]

Originally posted by Kilroy Was [email protected] 25, 2007 05:07 pm
'The persecution of the POUM and the anarchists by the PSUC was a major factor in the defeat of the Republic.' Discuss.
Indeed. The persecution of the anarchists and POUM was, in essence, a supression of their revolutionary gains and goals. Without the revolution, there was nothing for the large population supporting it to fight for. They were certainly not the eager defenders of Republican burgeois democracy, much less its domination by Communists that emerged during the conflict.

[syndicat]

me: "but the Socialists made a back-stabbing deal to send the country's gold reserves to Moscow, which gave the Stalinists a lock on the flow of arms. "

Comrade Om:

Eh... no. The gold reserves going to Moscow was a canny bit of business on Stalin's part but it was the only way for the Popular Front to secure arms. As for the anarchists... you think that Stalin would have sold arms to anarchists if they had had the cash? If not then just where would the anarchists buy the weapons given the British blockade?

You don't show that there was no backstabbing. In fact in Sept. a delegation from Catalonia including Durruti and Luis Compantys secured an agreement from Largo Caballero, the head of the Left Socialists and prime minister, to supply a substatinal portion of the gold reserves to Catalonia. when Caballero allowed Negrin to send 70% of the gold reserves to Spain, he stabbed them in back.

Secondly, the fact is, there were a number of countries other than the USSR who sold weapons to the Spanish Republic.

Third, sending the gold to Russia is a separate question of buying the weapons from the USSR. By sending the gold out of the country, this destroyed the value of the Spanish currency on world currency markets, cutting its value in half. If they had kept the gold they still could have bought weapons from the USSR, and they would have had more controls on Stalin's cheating because they could seek other sources for weapons.


Furthermore there were very few nations, of which the USSR was one, that could have supplied the advanced arms (armour and planes) needed to hold off the well equipped Nationalist armies. The idea that these could have been manufactured on site, without an existing industrial base geared towards arms production, is of course ludicrious.

Catalonia was an industrial region. Within weeks of the defeat of the army the CNT had created 24 factories manufacturing armored vehicles and ammo. One of the companies expropriated by the CNT in Barcelona was Hispano-Suiza. Before the civil war Hispano-Suiza made high performance aircraft engines. If Catalonia had not been starved of money, they could have acquired the necessary equipment to build their own arms industry, including an aircraft industry.

Moreover, it's not clear why Stalin would not have still sold weapons to Spain if a joint UGT-CNT working class government had been in control. It was just a business deal from his point of view after all.


There's also the small matter that the anarchists never had the gold or any input into how it was managed. This is because the anarchists only formed a single, and not particularly influential, facet of the Popular Front.

Had the CNT been able to successfully pressure the UGT into agreeing to the proposed National Defense Council, they would have had joint control over the gold with the UGT.

The CNT was the majority labor union in Spain in 1936. The CNT was the main organization respoonsible for the expropriation of most of Spain's economy, 18,000 enterprises and 14 million acres of land. During the latter half of 1936 most of the forces under arms fighting the fascist army were controlled by the CNT.

The CNT was not a supporter of the Popular Front, that's true. But the Popular Front had little to do with the revolution, other than as it's gravedigger.

[ComradeOm]

Originally posted by [email protected] 29, 2007 04:18 am
You don't show that there was no backstabbing. In fact in Sept. a delegation from Catalonia including Durruti and Luis Compantys secured an agreement from Largo Caballero, the head of the Left Socialists and prime minister, to supply a substatinal portion of the gold reserves to Catalonia. when Caballero allowed Negrin to send 70% of the gold reserves to Spain, he stabbed them in back
I wasn't aware that the anarchists had been promised gold. If so then it was indeed a "backstabbing". I assume that you have a source?


Secondly, the fact is, there were a number of countries other than the USSR who sold weapons to the Spanish Republic.Such as? Mexico set a sizeable contingent of rifles to the Republic but they, aside from Russia, were the only nations to ignore the non-intervention agreements in order to aid the Republic.


Catalonia was an industrial region. Within weeks of the defeat of the army the CNT had created 24 factories manufacturing armored vehicles and ammo.So was the CNT manufacturing its own weapons or not? Were they starved of capital or were they "manufacturing armored vehicles and ammo"? I'd also like a source on the numbers of armoured vehicle produced - I'm sure that we're not talking about BT-5's here.


If Catalonia had not been starved of money, they could have acquired the necessary equipment to build their own arms industry, including an aircraft industry.No. The idea that an entire arms industry, producing everything from planes to rifles, could be established in a mere year or two is ludicrious. Not only did the CNT lack capital, they also lacked the technical expertise and knowledge required to design and manufacture advanced arms.


Moreover, it's not clear why Stalin would not have still sold weapons to Spain if a joint UGT-CNT working class government had been in control. It was just a business deal from his point of view after all.You expect Stalin to supply a movement where the PCE was not influential? The USSR was not an export economy and Stalin was not interested solely in making a profit.


During the latter half of 1936 most of the forces under arms fighting the fascist army were controlled by the CNT.You seem to be forgetting the UGT. Not that the performance of the militias in the months following the rebellion was particularly admirable.

[syndicat]

me: "Secondly, the fact is, there were a number of countries other than the USSR who sold weapons to the Spanish Republic. "


Such as? Mexico set a sizeable contingent of rifles to the Republic but they, aside from Russia, were the only nations to ignore the non-intervention agreements in order to aid the Republic.

Poland among others. The weapons purchased by the Republic are listed in exhaustive detail in "Arms for Spain" by Gerald Howson.


So was the CNT manufacturing its own weapons or not? Were they starved of capital or were they "manufacturing armored vehicles and ammo"? I'd also like a source on the numbers of armoured vehicle produced - I'm sure that we're not talking about BT-5's here.

They set up 24 factories to make shells, small arms ammo, and armored vehicles within weeks of the defeat of the army. The CNT converted the Hispano-Suiza auto factory into a factory making armored cars, and the Vulcano truck factory made armored trucks. but they needed more equipment to make these in larger number.

to be able to manufacture aircraft and make their own guns and other munitions, they needed to buy equipment and materials. It would have been easier for them to buy equipment and raw materials for an arms industry than to buy weapons given the existence of the Non-intervention Pact. the Spanish republic did eventually set up a factory to make armored vehicles in Cartagena. the Republic did attempt to set up an aircraft factory towards the end of the civil war but they didn't begin on these projects soon enough.


Not only did the CNT lack capital, they also lacked the technical expertise and knowledge required to design and manufacture advanced arms.

Catalonia had a motor vehicle manufacturing industry. Why couldn't they make tanks? In fact they did make armored cars. Why couldn't they make rifles and machine guns if they had the necessary equipment? They had skilled metal workers. Hispano-Suiza made high performance aircraft engines before the civil war. With gold they could have hired needed experts to work for them.


You expect Stalin to supply a movement where the PCE was not influential? The USSR was not an export economy and Stalin was not interested solely in making a profit.

USSR exported a significant share of its grain to gain earnings to buy equipment. So apparently they were more export-oriented than you suggest.

Under the CNT's proposed joint CNT-UGT National Defense Council, the PCE would have been represented via their trade union cadres in the UGT. The PCE controlled close to a third of the UGT by the end of 1936 which means they would have been represented as a minority in the workers' defense council. Because the petit bourgeois parties, who were allies of the Communists, would have been excluded, the PCE would not be able to block the revolutionaries, but they would still be represented, and this would give them a foothold they would hope to expand.

The Soviet Union was making money on selling old junk to Spain so they could modernize their army, just as Poland did. If doing that could also help build the prestige and influence of the PCE, why wouldn't they do it? When the Soviet Union began selling weapons to Spain at the end of Sept 1936, the PCE did not have anything like the hegemony they attained a year later, but they did so. they didn't know whether the PCE's game plan for gaining state power would work or not. And if Catalonia had been able to begin acquiring equipment to build a native arms industry in Sept 1936 as the anarchists proposed, if the USSR stopped selling arms to Spain a year or two later, at least by then a Catalan arms industry would have been developed.

[Entrails Konfetti]

Syndicat:

How did the election of the left-republicans lead to the mass appriopriations of the CNT? Would it have really mattered who won, since the state was bankrupt in control anyways?


there was a moderate tendency in the CNT called the treintistas.

So this was a tendency of old-labour democrats left-over after the Anarchists boared holes into the CNT?


they were a minority but after the UGT refused the CNT proposal to replace the Republican state with a unified workers defense council, the treintistas argued that joining the Popular Front government was the best bet to get resources for their militias and self-managed industries. so the national committee of the CNT agreed to join the government in Nov 1936.

I'm really not trying to come across as a wize-ass, but it seems no one looked at the history of the German Revolution, and saw that when workers join a collaborationist government, all classes are organized against them under the facade of workers having a voice.

What do you think about this excerpt?

Originally posted by Paul [email protected] The Barricades Must Be Torn Down
There are many possible excuses for the position the anarchists have taken, but there is none for their program of falsification which beclouded the whole labor movement and worked to the advance of the Moscow-Fascists. Trying to make believe that socialism was on the march in Catalonia and that this was possible without a break with the People’s Front Government meant the strengthening of the People’s Front forces till they were able to dictate also to the Spanish anarchist workers. Anarchism in Spain accepted one form of fascism, disguised as a democratic movement to help to crush Franco-Fascism. It is not true, as the anarchist today try to make their followers believe that there was no other alternative, and hence that all criticism directed against the CNT is unjustified. The anarchists could have tried, after July 19, l936, to establish worker’s power in Catalonia, they could also have tried to crush the Government forces in Barcelona in May 1937. They could have marched against both the Franco-Fascists and the Moscow-Fascists. Most probably they would have been defeated; possibly Franco would have won and smashed the anarchists as well as his competitors of the “People’s Front.” Open capitalist intervention might have set in at once. But there was also another possibility, though much less likely. The French workers might have gone farther than to a mere stay-in strike; open intervention might have led to a war in which all the powers would have been involved. The struggle would have at once have turned on clear issues, between Capitalism and Communism.
Fulll Article (http://www.marxists.org/archive/mattick-paul/1937/spain.htm)


no. the anarchists wanted to get money from the state to buy weapons on the international arms market or buy equipment to make their own weapons. but the Socialists made a back-stabbing deal to send the country's gold reserves to Moscow, which gave the Stalinists a lock on the flow of arms.

None of us should ever be that gulable again to trust a deal with the state, when they know we are making a deal in order to smash the state in the future.

Maybe as Mattick suggested if the CNT continued to fight against both Fascisms-- yeah a vast amount of workers would die, but this could have caused international capitalist intervention, while at the same time could have organized the international working-class against Fascism, Stalinism, and Capitalism. More likely the workers would have had more resources at their disposal and could have fueled revolution through the west.

We have to be courageous despite material circumstances, and apear to be maniacs when we laugh at death.

[syndicat]

How did the election of the left-republicans lead to the mass appriopriations of the CNT? Would it have really mattered who won, since the state was bankrupt in control anyways?

The previous government was very repressive. It had crushed a worker rebellion in Asturias, where the workers seized the region for two weeks, slaughtered 3,000 people, raped and mutilated wives and daughters of the rebels. by end of 1935 there were 30,000 union members in prison. winning the election meant that a group of liberals were in office. they didn't support the workers' demands for seizure of the big agricultural estates and so on, but they were not as likely to be repressive. so workers took advantage of the breathing space to launch a huge, aggressive strike wave. also the freeing of the prisoners was really forced on the liberals by the radical labor movemet as huge crowds surrounded the prisons. so the liberals winning made a difference in terms of an opening for the workers to go on the offensive.

me: "there was a moderate tendency in the CNT called the treintistas. "



So this was a tendency of old-labour democrats left-over after the Anarchists boared holes into the CNT?

no. the CNT had been formed by anarchists and had from the beginning an anarchist platform. the treintistas were anarchists, but they were long-time activists and officials in the unions who wanted to lower the level of confrontation with the state in the hopes of avoiding being declared illegal. very often in the '20s and the early '30s the UGT had cooperated with the state to put the CNT activists beyond the law. the treintistas hoped to make the situation less repressive by making deals with politicians, UGT leaders, and building alliances with left parties.
the FAI was formed in 1927 partly in order to fight the treintistas and Leninists (the POUM) for control of the CNT.

In regard to the quote from Mattick, I think Mattick is right.

me: "the anarchists wanted to get money from the state to buy weapons on the international arms market or buy equipment to make their own weapons. but the Socialists made a back-stabbing deal to send the country's gold reserves to Moscow, which gave the Stalinists a lock on the flow of arms. "




None of us should ever be that gulable again to trust a deal with the state, when they know we are making a deal in order to smash the state in the future.

well, it's not a mistake to make demands against the state. the head of the national government at that point in time was Largo Cabllero, a left socialist, who claimed to be a revolutionary, and he was head of the UGT labor federation.

but they needed to push him to set up a joint CNT-UGT workers council. they tried to do that in Sept 1936 but they didn't stick to it consistently.

also, when Caballero initially refused their proposal of a workers council to replace the Popular Front government, the FAI came up with a secret plan to expropriate half the gold (the CNT's share, leaving the rest for the UGT). i think they should have carried out that plan. but Abad Diego de Santillan, a writer on the national committee of the FAI, got cold feet. it would have been another tactic to force Caballero to take them seriously and work out a joint CNT-UGT government, freezing out the middle class politicians.

many of the anarchist activists in the CNT were too cautious, they lacked audacity, as the Friends of Durruti put it.

[Intelligitimate]

We know the POUM collaborated with the Nazis. See my posts in this thread:

http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic=59468&hl=POUM

[syndicat]

We know the POUM collaborated with the Nazis. See my posts in this thread:

http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic=59468&hl=POUM

We don't "know" any such thing. Your quotes in that other thread were from Soviet government officials in the Stalin era. But it is well known that Stalin and his apparatchiks practiced intentional falsification, i.e. lying as a political method. As Stalin once said cynically, "Paper will take anything that is printed on it."

[Intelligitimate]

Originally posted by [email protected] 31, 2007 04:21 am

We know the POUM collaborated with the Nazis. See my posts in this thread:

http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic=59468&hl=POUM

We don't "know" any such thing. Your quotes in that other thread were from Soviet government officials in the Stalin era. But it is well known that Stalin and his apparatchiks practiced intentional falsification, i.e. lying as a political method. As Stalin once said cynically, "Paper will take anything that is printed on it."
Like Teis, you didn't read anything. I think he didn't actually bother even reading the evidence until around his tenth reply or so (and then came up with the most idiotic evasions he could). I mean, it's quite obvious you didn't read anything, because otherwise you wouldn't say something so incredibly false and stupid.

And prove Stalin ever said any such thing.

[RGacky3]

I'd like to ask those that know, I'm looking for a good, modern Authoritative book about the Spanish Revolution/Civil War (A book that gives the Anarchists a fair share).

[syndicat]

This apparatchik with a long history in the Stalinist secret police writes a book. So you think his word should be taken at face value? This is your quote from him:

Intellegitimate:


“In the interests of the political situation the activities of Trotsky and his supporters abroad in the 1930s are said to have been propaganda only. But this is not so. The Trotskyists were also involved in actions. Making us of the support of persons with ties to German military intelligence [the ‘Abwehr’] they organized a revolt against the Republican government in Barcelona in 1937. From Trotskyist circles in the French and German special intelligence services came “indicative” information concerning the actions of the Communist Parties in supporting the Soviet Union. Concerning the connections of the leaders of the Trotskyist revolt in Barcelona in 1937 we were informed by Schuze-Boysen… Afterward, after his arrest, the Gestapo accused him of transmitting this information to us, and this fact figured in his death sentence by the Hitlerite court in his case.”



Here he's saying the Trotskyists organized a revolt in Barcelona in May 1937. Anyone with even the least familiarity with events would know this is ridiculous. First of all the Trotskyist group had all of 150 members. The POUM were not "Trotskyists" tho they were dissident Leninists...and that is why they were considered such a threat. But if you look at the documents from the Soviet archives in "Spain Betrayed", what you'll see there is that the Communist International intended to crush the anarcho-syndicalists and others to the PCE's left (POUM, Left Socialists) just as they had done in Russia. that is what they say their intention was. ("Spain Betrayed" was edited by Ron Radash and a couple of other people, but it is English translations of documents from the Soviet archives including letters to the Stalinist leadership from Soviet agents in Spain, as well as minutes from meetings of the Communist International.)

The revolution in Barcelona was organized mainly through the CNT -- the anarcho-syndicalist union -- which had the support of the masses. In the documents translated in "Spain Betrayed" there is a letter to the mother ship from one of Stalin's key agents in Spain in Mar 1937 who says there are several big roadblocks to the Communists gaining power in Catalonia: (1) "anarchism has immense historic weight in Spain", (2) the working class supports the anarchists, (3) the anarchists and their allies (POUM) have twice as many people under arms as the Communists (PSUC) and its allies (petit bourgeois Republicans), (4) "the cohesion and discipline of the anarchist cadres".

Those documents from the soviet archives show that the game plan of the Communists was to first get the old Republican state rebuilt (under the slogan of "defending the democratic Republic") and then use their control over the arms flow to gain control of the officer corps in the new hierarchical army and police.

by May 1937 the Communists had succeeded in gaining control of the police and that is when they decided to make their move. they selected as their target the telephone system that was controlled by the CNT (anarcho-syndicalist union).

the Communist-controlled police launched a coordinated assault on the telephone exhcnages throughout Catalonia, not just in Barcelona. the workers fought back. this led to the CNT unions declaring a general strike and mobilizing their armed worker defense organization, to attack the police. after three days of fighting the working class forces had gained control of all of Barcelona and its suburbs -- they had the support of the working class -- except for a few buildings downtown held by the Communist police.

that is your so-called "Trotskyist uprising." the POUM were allies of the CNT and came to their aid. the fighting was orchestrated by the CNT neighborhood defense committees. They were the organizations that had the people behind them and had the arms for self-defense.

the business about some fascist inspired plot is complete bullshit.

the May Days in Barcelona was a particularly explosive moment in the ongoing power struggle between the working class organizations and the organizations of the middle strata of society (small business people, landowners, managers, shop keepers), organized by the Communists, who feared their own loss of power in a proletarian revolution. The Communists aimed to use this to build a nationalized, state-controlled economy where these middle elements would be in charge, and the worker self-management built by the workers at the beginning of the revolutin

[Raúl Duke]

wow, syndicat

You seem to know alot of the Spanish Civil War...

Which books did you read? (mention those that you consider the most important sources of info)

[syndicat]

well, the problem is, you sort of have to piece things together. i've got an essay here:

http://www.workersolidarity.org/spain.pdf

here are some sources:

Abel Paz, Durruti (huge biography, new edition by AK Press)

Ron Fraser, Blood of Spain (an oral history based on interviews of Spanish participants of all viewpoints)

Jose Peirats, Anarchists in the Spanish revolution

Burnett Bolleten, The Spanish Revolution

Gaston Leval, The Spanish Collectives

Gerald Howson, Arms for Spain (well documented on sources of arms to all sides)

Ron Radosh, et al, Spain Betrayed (translations of documents from the Soviet archives)

Martha Ackelsberg, Free Women of Spain (oral history based on interviews, about the anarchist women's organization in the revolution)

Friends of Durruti, Towards a Fresh Revolution

Juan Garcia Oliver "Wrong Steps" (translation of an excerpt from his memoirs)

Robert Alexander, Anarchists in the Spanish Civil War (not always accurate but it has a translation of most of the CNT's libertarian communist program)

Antony Beevor, The Battle for Spain (new military history of the civil war)

George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia (not always accurate about things he didn't witness himself)

[Intelligitimate]

This apparatchik with a long history in the Stalinist secret police writes a book. So you think his word should be taken at face value?

Apparently, like Teis, it will take you several posts to actually get around to even reading the evidence.

Once again, the evidence is not the word of Sudoplatov alone. We have in fact the Nazi trial transcripts of Boysen. Boysen, running his independent anti-Nazi resistance cell and working in his official capacity as a Nazi intelligence officer, gave the Soviets the information. The Nazis admitted to in their indictment of Boysen.

We have the Nazi admission. Game over, you lose.

Given that none of the rest of your bullshit even deals with the evidence presented, I will refrain from commenting on it, except for this one piece:


But if you look at the documents from the Soviet archives in "Spain Betrayed"

Yes, I highly suggest looking at the documents in this highly dishonest piece of shit work. In fact, I would recommend skipping Radosh's commentary all together, and going straight to the primary source documents.

Here is an excellent review of this book that masquerades as serious scholarship:

Anatomy of a Fraudulent Scholarly Work: Ronald Radosh's Spain Betrayed (http://clogic.eserver.org/2003/furr.html)

[syndicat]

Let's look at your supposed "evidence":

Concerning the connections of the leaders of the Trotskyist revolt in Barcelona in 1937 we were informed by Schuze-Boysen… Afterward, after his arrest, the Gestapo accused him of transmitting this information to us, and this fact figured in his death sentence by the Hitlerite court in his case.”

All you have here is that a certain Soviet double-agent sent a claim about something to his superiors. This doesn't show that what the agent sent was true. It may be that certain Nazi agents were present in Barcelona and involved in something. That is the most one can reasonably infer. It does NOT follow that they were responsible for the May Days uprising...tho they may have wanted to puff up their credentials with their superiors by claiming they had something to do with it. but to know what they had to do with it would require actual concrete evidence, which you don't provide. all you provide essentially is hearsay.


“At the beginning of 1938, during the Spanish Civil War, the accused learned in his official capacity that a rebellion against the local red government in the territory of Barcelona was being prepared with the co-operation of the German Secret Service. This information, together with that of Pöllnitz, was transmitted by him to the Soviet Russian embassy in Paris.”

“Pöllnitz” was Gisella von Pöllnitz, a recent recruit to the “Red Orchestra” (Rote Kapelle) anti-Nazi Soviet spy ring who worked for United Press and who “shoved the report through the mailbox of the Soviet embassy” (Brysac, Resisting Hitler: Mildred Harnack and the Red Orchestra. Oxford University Press, 2000, p. 237).
Now notice that in the first paragraph it says a rebellion was being prepared "at the beginning of 1938." But the May Days events occurred in 1937. You apparently didn't notice this little discrepancy. Agents have reason to inflate their importance to their superiors. So even if this is a typo and said "begining of 1937" it would prove nothing.

Now, in regard to the cheating of the Spanish Republic by Stalin, I did not rely on the Radosh edited documents but Gerald Howson's book "Arms for Spain" which relies on documents from the Soviet archives on arms dealings with the Spanish Republic. Howson shows that Stalin systematically cheated the Spaniards of tens of millions of dollars -- they were cheated out of $50 million on the transaction in regard to one aircraft alone.

Further, your reviewer claims the anthology of documents is "fradulent" but if you can make your way thru his review you find that his attacks are directed not at the documents themselves but Radosh's comments, plus some minor quibbles about translation. However, nothing in what I have said in my various posts here on revleft relies on Radosh's comments, or any of the other things this reviewer finds problematic as far as I can see.

Further, the reviewer says:


Radosh does not bother to tell us what would have been wrong with the communists' seizing the telephone exchange from the anarchists. After all, the government, not one of the various parties, should have been in control of the exchange. And the assault was led by the Police Chief of Barcelona who, though a communist, was also a government official.

The reviewer apparently doesn't believe in workers managing the industries. That just shows that reviewer is not an advocate of worker liberation but is a defender of the elitist view that workers should be subordinate to bosses. In fact the working class of Spain expropriated 18,000 enterprises and took over direct management of these ventures, and expropriated 14 million acres of farm land. That's why it was a proletarian revolution. Your reviewer on the other hand thinks tht building back up the bourgeois state and using it to take back worker managed industries is just fine and dandy...but that shows the reviewer is not a supporter of working class power.



26. The anarchists had clearly been prepared for such an attack for a long time -- after all, they had a machine-gun nest in the first floor which prevented the police from seizing the building at once. What justification did the anarchists -- not the government, but one of the political parties in Barcelona -- have controlling the telephone exchange in the first place?

first of all, it was not a "political party" that was controlling the telephone exchange. the entire telephone system was being managed by the union of the telephone workers, 80% of the telephone system workers belonged to the CNT (the anarchosyndicalist union).

secondly, the machine gun was there to protect the workes' expropriation of this industry against attempts by elements defending elite class interests trying to take it back.



Radosh admits that the anarchists took this attitude towards the army. Yet how could the Fascists -- who certainly had "a regular, disciplined army" -- ever be defeated unless the Republic had one too? Guerrilla warfare -- what Mao Tse-tung and Vo Nguyen Giap later refined into the doctrine of "People's War" -- is very important. But no theoretician of guerrilla or people's war ever suggested that a war could be won without "a regular, disciplined army."

Here he puts forward the usual Stalinist misinformation. Again, it wasn't a question of "the anarchists" but the mass CNT union -- the majority union in Spain. this organization built the workers militia to fight the army. It is false to say they were not for a disciplined force. in Sept the CNT advocated the replacement of the Republican state by a National Defense Council and workers congress, and to replace the various party militias (such as the Communist party militia) with a unified people's militia under a unified command. the issue wasn't "discipline" but control. The CNT proposed control by the labor organizations over the armed forces fighting army, so that they would be the basis of proletarian power. The Communists wanted to built a topdown conventional army, rebuilding the old Republican state, because this was the best shot they had of getting their own people into control of the army and police. in Aragon in Sept. the Communsit unit refused to be subject to the common command of all the militias in Aragon because the CNT was in the majority,even tho the CNT proposed a non-anarchist as commander. so much for Communist belief in "discipline." (This is discussed in Abel Paz's biography of Durruti).

[Random Precision]

The reviewer apparently doesn't believe in workers managing the industries. That just shows that reviewer is not an advocate of worker liberation but is a defender of the elitist view that workers should be subordinate to bosses. In fact the working class of Spain expropriated 18,000 enterprises and took over direct management of these ventures, and expropriated 14 million acres of farm land. That's why it was a proletarian revolution. Your reviewer on the other hand thinks tht building back up the bourgeois state and using it to take back worker managed industries is just fine and dandy...but that shows the reviewer is not a supporter of working class power.

Not many Stalinists are!

Nice post, btw.

[Raúl Duke]

Thanks for the list of books, and the essay, syndicat.

[Intelligitimate]

All you have here is that a certain Soviet double-agent sent a claim about something to his superiors.

It appears you are even more ignorant than Teis. Boysen was not a Soviet agent. The Red Orchestra, as the Nazis called it, was composed of two separate groups. One was the Trepper group, which was in Soviet control, the other was run by Harnack and Boysen, which was not under Soviet control. Boysen communicated Nazi secrets to many different countries, only one of which was the Soviet Union. One of these secrets was the Nazi-POUM collaboration for the Barcelona revolt.


It may be that certain Nazi agents were present in Barcelona and involved in something.

In collaboration with the POUM!


It does NOT follow that they were responsible for the May Days uprising

No one said that. What was said was the POUM collaborated with the Nazis, which they did.


tho they may have wanted to puff up their credentials with their superiors by claiming they had something to do with it.

Your evasions are more interesting than Teis, but still unpersuasive. The Nazi court admitted to their involvement in Boysen's trial.


Now notice that in the first paragraph it says a rebellion was being prepared "at the beginning of 1938." But the May Days events occurred in 1937. You apparently didn't notice this little discrepancy. Agents have reason to inflate their importance to their superiors. So even if this is a typo and said "begining of 1937" it would prove nothing.

I might have to get back with you on that.


Now, in regard to the cheating of the Spanish Republic by Stalin, I did not rely on the Radosh edited documents but Gerald Howson's book "Arms for Spain" which relies on documents from the Soviet archives on arms dealings with the Spanish Republic. Howson shows that Stalin systematically cheated the Spaniards of tens of millions of dollars -- they were cheated out of $50 million on the transaction in regard to one aircraft alone.

This myth is debunked in Daniel Kowalsky's Stalin and the Spanish Civil War, which is one of the most recent works on the subject. To quote Kowalsky:


How do these adjustments alter the final tally? Even if we subtract Howson's $51 million in overcharges, acknowledge only the unpaid loan of $70 million, (rather than the potential $155 million), and subtract the cost of three DC-3s (roughly $360,000), the total value of the Soviet assistance provided to the Republic comes to approximately $525 million, or $7 million more than their gold should have bought. Of course, the question of the gold's numismatic value effectively throws into doubt the estimated value of $518 million. In any case, the debate over the financing of the Republican war effort is likely to rage on for years to come. Tentatively, however, we may conclude this section with a qualified assertion that, even if an allowance is made for Russian overcharging for weaponry and the initial undervaluing of the gold, it does not appear that the Republic received an exceptionally unfair financial arrangement from the USSR.

Most of the rest of your bullshit isn't worth responding to. The same usual anarchist idiocy that a revolution can be brought about in the midst of a civil war with fascist powers. Of course, as the the reviewer states toward the end of the review, that is not to say the strategy the Soviet Union adopted was necessarily the best one. But your bullshit about the communists “defending elite class interests” is just complete and utter garbage.

[syndicat]

The point is that Boysen was a double-agent, who worked, at least sometimes, for the soviets.

Because the Nazis caught him, this suggests that had suspicions. if they had suspiciaions about him, one way to test those suspicisions is to set up a trap. one type of trap would be to have one of their agents in Spain send in something that would be of high interest to the Soviet authorities, to see if Boysen would pass it on to them. Thus the report from Spain could have been a fake. In order to rule out this possibility that it was a fake, you'd need to have concrete evidence of "Nazi collaboration with the POUM" which of course you haven't provided.

Revoluitonary groups have always tended to attract police spies. It is very likely that all the major groups in the Spanish revolution had some -- PCE, POUM, CNT, whatever. From the fact that one of these agents is working within one of these organizations, as a secret spy for some external agency such as Franco, and maybe moonlighting on the side for the Germans, it does NOT follow that the sponsors of this spy are "collaborating" with the revolutionary group in question. On that basis we'd have to say the American Communist Party "collaborated" with the FBI because of course the American CP was riddled with FBI agents.

So, again, even if the report of an agent working within the POUM was authentic, it doesn't follow the Nazis were "collaborating" with the POUM, nor more so than that the American CP was "collaborating" with the FBI.

I haven't read Kowalski but the alleged cheating on the one airplane is only the tip of the iceberg. There is the fact that by removing 70% of Spain's gold reserves to Russia, the value of the peseta was cut in half. that means that Spain could buy only half as much of anything -- food, weapons, machinery. That can't be overcome by Kowalski's hand-waving. the peseta is Spain's currency. if you take away the gold that backs it, in an era of the gold standard, and word of this gets out, you destroy the value of that currency on the world currency markets. the stalinists insisted that the gold be transferred to Russia "for safekeeping." "You can always get it back" they reassured them. After the gold arrived in Moscow, Stalin said "The Spaniards will never see their gold again, just as a man cannot see his ears."

the rest of what you say is just blah blah.

[Random Precision]

Most of the rest of your bullshit isn't worth responding to. The same usual anarchist idiocy that a revolution can be brought about in the midst of a civil war with fascist powers.

The only thing that matters in the timing of the Revolution is when the masses desire to make it. When the fascists attempted to seize power in Spain, the people rose against it and began a revolution that was in fact inextricable from the war against fascism. The Spanish Communist movement made the wrong choice by siding against the masses in that conflict, and maybe if they had made the right choice we would have both a victory against fascism and for socialism.

[syndicat]

Most of the rest of your bullshit isn't worth responding to. The same usual anarchist idiocy that a revolution can be brought about in the midst of a civil war with fascist powers.

what this person doesn't seem to realize is what fascism is. fascism is a social movement to crush the working class in a period when it is driving towards revolution, or has become a major threat to the continued existence of the capitalist system. the Spanish revolution was already in process, it was the product a social crisis that had been deepening since at least the first world war. There was for example a revolutionary national general strike in Spain in 1917 after the Russian revolution of Feb. 1917. There was an abortive revolutionary national general strike in 1934, when the workers rose up and seized the region of Asturias and held it off against the army for two weeks.

The way fascism is defeated is thru the mass movement of the working class, and the destruction of the institutions of capitalism that give rise to fascism to begin with. it was precisely because had a vast revolutionary labor movement, a movement that was already seizing land by Mar 1937, that the army revolted in July 1936. they revolted as part of a movement was the mass support of the clerical-fascist parties whose mass bass was the middle strata in the provincial cities and landowning farmers of the more religious small holding region of the north. that population had moved towards fascism in reaction to the increasing moblization and revolutionary tendencies of the working masses.

the mass expropriation of the capitalists and the building of democratic worker militias was an expression of the sense of moving to a different way of life that inspired people to give their all. by trying to throw a wet blanket on the revolution, trying to take back the workers' revolutionary gains, the Communists merely undermined morale both of the troops and in the communities.

[Intelligitimate]

Because the Nazis caught him, this suggests that had suspicions. if they had suspiciaions about him, one way to test those suspicisions is to set up a trap. one type of trap would be to have one of their agents in Spain send in something that would be of high interest to the Soviet authorities, to see if Boysen would pass it on to them. Thus the report from Spain could have been a fake. In order to rule out this possibility that it was a fake, you'd need to have concrete evidence of "Nazi collaboration with the POUM" which of course you haven't provided.

Now syndicat enters the realm of pure fantasy, and demands I prove some bizarre conspiracy he pulls out of his ass didn't actually happen. I can already see it would a waste of time to discuss anything further in this thread. Even Teis wasn't this stupid.

[syndicat]

me: "Because the Nazis caught him, this suggests that had suspicions. if they had suspiciaions about him, one way to test those suspicisions is to set up a trap. one type of trap would be to have one of their agents in Spain send in something that would be of high interest to the Soviet authorities, to see if Boysen would pass it on to them. Thus the report from Spain could have been a fake. In order to rule out this possibility that it was a fake, you'd need to have concrete evidence of "Nazi collaboration with the POUM" which of course you haven't provided."



Now syndicat enters the realm of pure fantasy, and demands I prove some bizarre conspiracy he pulls out of his ass didn't actually happen. I can already see it would a waste of time to discuss anything further in this thread. Even Teis wasn't this stupid.

You're proposing a hypothesis to explain the document about the May Days sent from a German agent in Spain that Boysen passed on to the Soviets. your proposed explanation is "the POUM were consciously collaborating with Nazis for a revolt". I offer a different possible explanation above. If your explanation is the true explanation, you have to come up with evidence to rule out my possible scenario. But you can't do that.

That means in fact you can't show there was any collaboration of the POUM with the Nazis. All you could show is that there was some document claiming Nazi help for some rebellion in Catalonia in 1938 (not even the right date). What was the nature of this help? Why would the leadership of a revolutionary communist organization work with fascists? None of this is explained. Your alleged "collaboration" is extremely implausible on its face, and when i point out that there are a couple other possible explanations for the documents that got this guy Boysen caught by the Nazis, you simply refuse to answer. The most your evidence suggests is that there were some fascist agents inside some radical left organizations in Spain. that is hardly surprising and doesn't prove any conscious collaboration of the POUM as an organization, or of its leading activists, with facists.

[Tower of Bebel]

I read that Trotsky complained about the fact that there were almost no worker's councils.

Can someone elaborate this. Where there almost no councils and if it's right, then why?

[RevSouth]

Syndicat, why did Mexico sell the Republicans arms? Was it purely monetary?

[co-op]

I have not been posting here lately, sorry, its due to my sporadic access to the internet. I hope to remedy this in the near future and get more involved in the debates.

This little book by Murray Bookchin is a good quick read about the anarchist history of the Spanish civil war and what the working class struggle achieved.

http://www.spunk.org/texts/writers/bookchi...1642/fifty.html (http://www.spunk.org/texts/writers/bookchin/sp001642/fifty.html)

This is a fantastic documentary worth its weight in gold. It has with interviews with many CNT members who were involved in the building and protection of the libertarian communist revolution. Its subtitled and in many parts but its well worth watching.

Vivir la Utopia

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGBnAPKN9Oo...related&search= (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGBnAPKN9Oo&mode=related&search=)

[syndicat]

raccoon:
I read that Trotsky complained about the fact that there were almost no worker's councils.

Can someone elaborate this. Where there almost no councils and if it's right, then why?

I think Trotsky was using the Russian term "soviet" and was referring to that type of body. Soviets emerged in Russia in a situation of a czarist police state where workers had not had the freedom to form unions. Workers also held assemblies in workplaces and organized factory committees in 1917. these were a kind of workplace unionism independent of the official unions, which were small, and largely appendages of the parties.

The Spanish working class had a different tradition. The mass industrial unions of the CNT were formed in a manner somewhat analogous to the factory committee movement in the Russian revolution. they were controlled by assemblies and there were elected delegates. but there was also a longer history of this very rank-and-file controlled type of unionism being federated on a larger scale. so there were community wide labor councils. because the CNT had labor councils in places like Barcelona, these were the means of coordination between the workplace assemblies. this may have made for less motivation to form a soviet.

Now, as to a regional body independent of the particular political tendencies and unions, and thus somewhat analogous to the Russian soviets, the CNT did propose the creation of regional and national worker congresses, to be the basis of the governing structure. but only one of these was actually created, in the region of Aragon. this may be what Trotsky is referring to: a local and regional unitary working class body to replace the old state.

[Djehuti]

Gilles Dauvé has a very good text on the subject, called "When Insurrections Die".
http://prole.info/articles/insurrectionsdie.html