Burning Questions

Trotsky wasn't evil, just misguided.

Thank you for your questions Comrade, they are all of extreme importance. I won't pretend to speak for all Marxist-Leninists, but here are my answers, I hope other Comrades will contribute theirs if they disagree with me.

Lenin closing the soviets in 1918. Why? Corruption since they lost consciouss workers in the wars with the reactionaries?

This is a difficult one, since Lenin didn't close the Soviets in 1918. Indeed, chapter four of the 1918 Constitution reads "The power must belong entirely to the toiling masses and to their plenipotentiary representatives- the Soviets of Workers', Soldiers', and Peasants' Deputies." What happened in 1918 was that the Constituent Assembly was dissolved and power was given to the Soviets, so they were not dissolved in any way.

The reason for the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly was simply one of democratic principles. The election to this assembly had taken place before the split in the Socialist Revolutionary party which was at the time the most popular party among the peasantry. The left of the party supported the October revolution (they later changed their minds and took up arms against it) while the right opposed it. By the time the assembly convened, the split had happened. This created a problem since the members elected to the assembly were mostly Right SRs while the supporters of the party who voted for them (before the split) mostly sided with the Left SRs. This meant that the SR members of the assembly no longer represented the will of the SR supporters. This meant that, for democracy to prevail, one of two things had to happen (1) a new Constituent Assembly elections or (2) a transfer of the powers of the assembly to the Soviets where voters could recall members who they felt weren't representing them. Lenin and the Bolsheviks chose the latter, and it was a popular choice. There is a decent account of this in Leninism Under Lenin by Marcel Liebman, but as I got it out of the library years ago, I don't have the page number. That doesn't mean you have to take my word for it blindly, even the counter-revolutionary Trotsky will tell you the same in his chapter "Breaking Up the Constituent Assembly" from his book Lenin.

Agricultural collectivization -
I'm aware of the Nazi lies spread by Goebbels and his american butt buddies(and the kulaks/nazis burning crops, etc), but I want to read what you've got to say about it, since even in the soviet paper thingies there are ~ 1 million dead people during this period. Why exactly?

It sounds like you may have already read Douglas Tottle's book Fraud, Famine, and Fascism since you know that most of the "starvation" in the Soviet Union is fascist propaganda. If you haven't read the book, Tottle gives a frank and evenhanded analysis from pages 91-102 of the causes of starvation in the Ukraine and the Caucases. To summarize, he points to three main elements: (1) bad weather, (2) kulak sabotage, and (3) amateurish Soviet planning.

The third element, while tragic, is understandable given that such a transformation of agriculture had never been attempted before in human history; there was no guidebook to collectivization, they were figuring it out as they went. It is a testament to the wisdom of this policy that despite short term failures, in the long term the Soviet Union was able to abolish starvation from the period of 1935-1991. Indeed, the starvation in the Soviet Union in the early 30s is only a small fraction of the starvation in capitalist countries which continues to the present day. To give but one example, bourgeois economist Amartya Sen estimated that in the 1980s 40 million human beings died of starvation in India alone (caused not by weather and bad harvests but because they could afford food). You can read about it Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen's book Hunger and Public Action, pages 205-214. While contemptible in purely human terms, the starvation in the Soviet Union in the early 30s was a small price to pay for the abolition of starvation itself.

Stalins "purge" in 1937. Corruption inside the party, since they needed people in the party but didn't really "check" at the ones joining, since they were in dire need of people?
Were the purged people killed? Kicked out? Prisons?

I'll quote to you from another post in this forum where I laid out my analysis of the purges (I've edited it slightly because it was orginially addressed quite particularly to another poster; also I've fixed the atrocious spelling of the original):

Certainly, no Leninist denies the need for periodic re-registrations of party members (i.e. purges). Lenin put this policy in place in 1921 in order to ensure that old Tsarists, SRs, and Mensheviks who had come over to the Bolsheviks for opportunistic reasons were excluded from the party.

This 1921 purge was successful in ensuring that the party could successfully undertake collectivization, the first five years plan, etc. In 1937, after two five year plans and the effective smashing of kulak power, the party needed to be purged once more, this time of opportunistic kulaks and their supporters who came over to the Bolsheviks, like so many entryists before them, when they realized who was winning.

It's not a surprise that these Kulak elements would link up with party rightists who had opposed the five year plans. Therefore, this element needed to be eliminated from the party membership.

With hindsight we might say that expulsion would have been enough, that these people did not have to be killed. However, put yourself in the Bolshevik's shoes. You have a rightist, pro-Kulak tendency in the party. You have reason to believe that this clique is linking up with Trotsky internationally who was calling for open counter-revolution in the USSR. Add to that the growing wave of European fascism preparing to unleash the blackest terror that working people had ever seen. We should not forget that Mussolini was a self-described "apostate to socialism" who was once a member of a rightist faction of Italian Socialist Party.

Whether they were incipient fascists or not, the Rightists in the Bolshevik CP were a threat of some sort. That Stalin and the majority acted with caution, ended these people, and saved Soviet socialism is proof enough that their actions were both understandable and justifiable.

The American ambassador to the Soviet Union at the time, a bourgeois lawyer called Joseph Davies, published his diaries as Mission to Moscow and you can read his take on the purges (he takes the same line as I do on the purged members being possible fascists, albeit without the Marxist analysis) in chapters 3, 5, 6, and 8. Grover Furr and Vladimir Bobrov also has a good article about Bukharin specifically called "Bukharin's 'Last Plea'."

And why do you hate trots so much? And anarchists? Sure, one doesn't have to very smart to see the anarchists trying to downplay leninism because "it's fascism! One oppressor exchanged by another!!11" but really, why don't you take the opportunity and try to communicate?

I'm extremely new to this forum, so I've not actually engaged much with the anarchists here as none has taken to arguing with me yet. However, in the physical world I've worked with a lot of anarchists in the anti-war movement and the Palestinian solidarity movement. I have no problems with anarchists except that (1) they are terrible politicians, and (2) a lot of them oppose socialists states which have improved the lives of working people immeasurably.

As to the first point, if you haven't read Lenin's Left Wing Communism you should; its one of his finest works. There is one important thing we often don't notice reading it because its not really a theoretical or historical point, viz. one of the main arguments running through the book is that the political leadership of the proletariat owe it to the proletariat to be good at politics. In my experience anarchist often take a "more revolutionary than thou" position, refusing crucial alliances with groups and even classes because of political disagreements.

On the second point, I think the correct attitude towards socialist states is critical and comradely support. To openly oppose a socialist state can do nothing but strengthen the forces of counter-revolution. Anyone who reads about the fall of the USSR must realize that it was an immense human tragedy which ought never to be repeated.

As Stalin once predicted, "What would happen if capital succeeded in smashing the Republic of Soviets? There would set in an era of the blackest reaction in all the capitalist and colonial countries, the working class and the oppressed peoples would be seized by the throat, the positions of international communism would be lost." All of this has undoubtedly happened in the 20 years since capitalist restoration in the USSR, and yet the most famous anarchist in America (although many anarchists here take a "more revolutionary than thou position towards him) Noam Chomsky called this event "a small victory for socialism". That, comrade, can be called nothing else but sheer insanity.

As to engaging with anarchists politically, I try not to start sectarian arguments, but if anarchists argue with me, I fight strongly to show these comrades that Marxism-Leninism is the best path forward for the proletariat. I've convinced of few of these comrades in my time, although not as many as I would have liked.

On the issue of Trots, I've worked with some of these comrades as well. In my experience, they tend to be better politicians than the anarchists; however, they almost always take a condescending attitude towards workers which is extremely destructive. Of course, they take the same counter-revolutionary line on socialist states and I treat them as I would any anarchist on that score.

Both these groups have strange and mistaken ideas history and on how to win a revolution. I, unlike many M-L comrades, don't much mind at the moment. Of course we must expose their lies and their political failures so that workers know where we stand, but I have no desire to eject these people from the revolutionary movement. When the time comes for revolution, any workers who've been taken in by these comrades will abandon them just as Russian proletarians completely abandoned the Mensheviks in 1917. This will happen for one simple reason: an anarchist or trot revolution could never succeed, which is the principal reason why none ever has.

Was Trotsky that much of an evil fellow? Why?

I don't like the concepts of good and evil. These are religious concepts and belong where all other religious ideas belong: in the dusty annals of human history. So no, Trotsky wasn't evil. He was, between 1903 and 1917 an anti-Leninist intellectual, he was wrong, but no more contemptible than Martov.

He joined the Bolsheviks during the revolution and fought well; he kept to Lenin's line and was a worthy comrade. As soon as Lenin died, he reverted to his old anti-Leninism. The Bolsheviks responded by expelling him from the party. He later went into exile and decided that since the party had picked Stalin as its leader and not him, something must be terribly wrong with the Soviet Union. At this point he took to calling for political "revolution" in the Soviet Union. Now, in a socialist state where the working class is in power, what class is there to make a revolution? The answer: the bourgeoisie and petty bourgeoisie, i.e. a revolution in the Soviet Union can only mean counter-revolution. Trotsky and a couple hundred of his followers set up an "International" in 1938 dedicated to accomplishing this task. The Trots got their wish in the early 1990s in the greatest political catastrophe of my lifetime.

Trotsky was, in the final analysis, nothing more than an egoist who called for counter-revolution because he couldn't imagine that the working class would ever make a revolution without him.

Well first, Marxism-Leninism isn't about the Soviet Union, the soviet union was the first workers state and many lessons, mistakes and shining examples can be learned from it.

This is exactly right. If you're interested in Marxism Leninism, these questions, while important, should only be a small part of your research. I'd recommend at a very minimum reading the following theoretical works, if you haven't already, before you worry too much about in depth historical matters about the Soviet Union or anything else:

The Communist Manifesto by Marx and Engels, The Critique of the Gotha Program by Marx, Socialism: Utopia and Scientific by Engels, and What is to be Done, The State and the Revolution, and Left-Wing Communism by Lenin.

We don't hate anarchists or Trotskyists, we just hate crazy people who attack us in our organizing work over sectarian interests, rather then say, "Well at least we agree with this, lets work together and make it happen." We do take the time to communicate but remember many of us have busy lives and don't have all the time in the world to engage in internet debates when we are busy with real world problems. Revleft for me is a small hobby not a serious place for organizing work.

[FONT=Verdana]I don't speak for everyone here, but I don't like the anarchists and the Trotskyists. They attack us calling us counter revolutionaries, and state capitalist. Crazy one thing, but they just plain out right hate us. [/FONT]