Trotsky and Popular Front

[tolstoyevski]

Hi,

My questions are,

1. what is the trotskyist attitude towards popular fronts, united fronts and national fronts established in especially the colonized, neo-colonized countries?

2. how do the trotskyists see the people's war & guerilla movements in such countries?

3. what are the main writings of trotsky concerning his position about this subject?

thanks very much..
tols.

[Anarch_Mesa]

I'm nost sure if Trotsky ever wrote what he thought on these issues. I could be wrong, I'm not a huge Trotsky reader.

[Yehuda Stern]

Trotsky never wrote on the subject? That's like saying that Lenin never wrote about Kautsky. Trotsky wrote extensively on the united front and the people's front.


1. what is the trotskyist attitude towards popular fronts, united fronts and national fronts established in especially the colonized, neo-colonized countries?


Well, you should know by now that when you say "Trotskyist attitude" you are going to get many different answers. Trotsky's attitude was that united fronts could be made with anyone on the right matter - it was a question of tactics, not of principle. Trotsky criticized the Stalinists for not making a united front with the Social-Democrats against the Nazis, for example, and he also criticized those who said that revolutionaries should not fight against imperialist China with the butcher Chiang Kai-chek. He also, however, criticized the Stalinists for making a political bloc with the bourgeoisie in the Spanish revolution, an act which was crucial in the destruction of the revolution and which was one of the causes for the fascists' victory.


2. how do the trotskyists see the people's war & guerilla movements in such countries?

Trotsky never opposed guerilla in principle, but history shows that these movements can rarely win a fight against the bourgeois state, and when they do, they set up dictatorial anti-working class regimes, although usually covered by socialist and even Marxist rhetoric (China, Cuba, etc.)



3. what are the main writings of trotsky concerning his position about this subject?

You can find much, especially on the Spanish revolution, in the Marxists Internet Archives.