role of soviets in russian revolution

[jaycee]

How Effective Were The Soviets in Achieving and Maintaining The Aims of The Communists in Russia

The Soviets certainly were effective in many ways, they achieved the aim of the communists with regards to the working class taking and temporarily as it was exercising political and economic power. The stated aims of the communists included ‘the abolition of landlord tyranny, immediate check of the capitalists, immediate proposal of a just peace. Then the land is assured to the peasants, control of industry is assured to the workers, then bread is assured to the hungry, then the end of this nonsensical war’. (Ten days that shook the World, John Reid). The long term aims of the communists was the establishment of a classless, moneyless, and stateless society, this was clearly not achieved.


This for the communists required an international proletarian revolution, as Rosa Luxemburg argued, ‘the problem could only be posed in Russia… it could not be solved in Russia.’ This was a central part of Marxist argument since Engles had written in 1847: ‘Will it be possible for this revolution to take place in one country alone? No. by creating a world market big industry has already brought all peoples…into such close relation with one another that none is independent of what happens to others.’ The main fear that the communists in Russia had was that in one country alone they would be overthrown by as Lenin put it a ‘deal between the imperialists.’ This was a major aspect of Russia’s isolation as Russia was surrounded and suffocated by the ‘great powers’ which lead to massive economic crisis to an already ruined economy. The civil war was also a major catalyst for the loss of Soviet and workers power it not only drained their resources as many workers fled to fight it also worsened the economic crisis. However there is also the fact that in a world dominated by the economic laws of capitalism the workers in one country will not be able to hold on to economic and political power because they must necessarily follow certain aspects of it’s laws, such as commodity production and the essential social relations based on wage labour.


This is not the view followed by the majority of Historians especially since the ‘death of communism.’ Historians many of whom like Orlando Figes seem to deny the importance of what he calls ‘abstract social forces(Orlando Figes: A Peoples Tradgedy, preface xix).’ This view supports the idea that the Bolsheviks were merely interested in power and that the October revolution was a mere coup d’Etat. The most common view of the Russian Revolution is as follows: The February revolution as an authentic ‘peoples’ revolution betrayed by the Machiavellian Bolsheviks. This view overlooks the importance of the Soviets as central to the events, especially in terms of their wider social nature.


The February revolution as Trotsky said was ‘begun from below’ (Trotsky: History of the Russian Revolutionpage 110) however it was stopped from above. The government was violently opposed to the Soviets as Kerensky had said ‘we will make the Soviets die.’ They also carried on the war and did not follow through on promised reforms such as giving land to the peasants. This reflected their class nature as a bourgeois government. However the Bolsheviks despite their many faults were a party who promised ‘peace, bread and land’ and all power to the soviets,’ this reflected their class nature as a workers party.


How effective were the soviets? 1917-23
THE ROLE OF THE SOVIETS IN THE MARCH REVOLUTION

The March revolution was definitely started largely by the workers, it was started as Oskar Anweiler claimed on ‘February 18th with a strike by the workers of the Putilov Works of Petrograd’(pg 101 The Soviets Oskar Anweiler). However to understand the Soviets role in this revolution it is important to understand the dynamics of it, it was not a simple bourgeois revolution as some Marxist historians suggest, this is clear for two main reasons, the sheer scale of Soviet and working class involvement, ‘The Soviet decides to occupy the state bank’ (pg 160 Trotsky History of the Russian Revolution) and most importantly the fact was that capitalism was already the dominant economic force in the world and now constituted a world market, this meant any ‘bourgeois’ revolutions had lost their progressive nature and could now only open the way for working class revolutions.

The soviets had organised the general strike and had developed further and further to produce a state of dual power between the ‘bourgeois’ Constituent Assembly and the ‘proletarian’ soviets. It is significant how they seemed to develop from direct economic considerations into more overtly political organs. As Oskar Anweiler stated ‘soviets were founded because workers desired unity …not because they wanted to seize political power.’ Most workers and socialists ‘took it for granted that power ought to pass to the bourgeoisie’ (page 160 History of the Russian Revolution Trotsky). The February revolution was started as a spontaneous uprising, developing ‘from strike through street demonstrations to insurrection,’ (page102 The Soviets, Oskar Anweiler). The political parties of the left could be said to have been swept along by the revolutions and certainly did not orchestrate it to any great deal, ‘There was no sign of directives from party headquarters,’ (Trotsky quoting Kairov). The Petrograd soviet had been set up as early as February 24, however on February 25 the day of the first real elections of the ‘Petrograd society of Workers Cooperatives’ most participants were arrested. However the massive involvement of workers and soviets does not necessarily point towards the real social nature of the February revolution because as Trotsky stated, ‘in all past revolutions (of the bourgeoisie) those who fought on the barricades were workers, apprentices and students’ (Trotsky, History of the Russian Revolution, vol 1, page 163 para1).However the point is that although the February revolution resulted in the taking of political power of the ‘bourgeois’ provisional government, it immediately paved the way for the possibility of a working class revolution, also the sheer scale of the self organisation of the workers was something that had never happened before.


The question of dual power is very important, principles such as ‘Order No. 1’ which established soviet control of the rank and file soldiers undermined the entire basis of the power of the state. This document stated that, ‘elective committees shall be formed in all military regiments; soldiers deputies shall be elected to the soviet; in all political acts the soldiers shall submit to the soviet and its committees’(Trotsky, History of the Russian Revolution, vol 1,pg 263). A state cannot be maintained without control over its armed forces especially at times of massive civil unrest such as this was. This depicts clearly why the two pillars of power (the soviets and the provisional government) were automatically mutually opposed, as well as the fact that they represented opposing social classes.




2 Role of the Soviets under the Provisional Government

The relationship between the soviet and the provisional government was very complex because while some strands of the soviet’s political spectrum supported the provisional government it became more and more clear as time progressed that the interests of the two groups were widely different. The Provisional Government was supported by groups in the soviets which Lenin described as ‘social traitors’ such as the Mensheviks and the ‘Right Social-Revolutionaries.’ This idea seemed to have weight to it because of the fact that both supported involvement in the First World War. The continuation of the war and its consequent hardships were major reasons for the loss of trust in the Provisional Government many workers felt. However the attitudes and actions of the provisional government towards the Soviets were just as important.


The workers saw the Soviets as ‘their organs’ and resented attempts of the bourgeoisie to abolish them especially when elements used such crude tactics as General Kornilov’s coup in September, which aimed both to overthrow the provisional Government and destroy the soviets. The Provisional Government also tried to replace the Soviets with ‘democratic’ organs set up under the Czar called ‘Zemstvos’. These organisations were much more easily influenced by such groups as nobles, the military, old black hundreds (an anti-Semitic extreme right-wing group) and the Kadets, all of whom supported Kornilov’s coup. This was clearly an attempt of the provisional government to bring the soviets under their control and part of Kerensky’s plan of making ‘the Soviets die a natural death.’ Soviets which were led by the Bolsheviks were under especially strong pressure, “Cossaks attacked them crying ‘this is what we will do to all the Bolshevik Soviets (10 Days That Shook the World-John Read).” The state of dual power forced the two organisations (the soviets and the provisional government) into conflict because they represented opposing classes, this is because increasingly the workers would answer only to the soviets and not the government; this, especially with regards to the soldiers, took away the provisional governments ability to rule. This shows that what Figes calls ‘abstract social forces’ played a major roll in this, and all the events of the Russian Revolution. This is something he fails to take into account when he writes ‘the soviets….might have served …a new and different type of democratic order,… provided the soviets were somehow combined with the broader representative bodies (e.g. the city Dumas, the Zemstvos and the Constituent Assembly).’ Figes fails to see that this was impossible. It was impossible because of the fact that the workers and soldiers would increasingly answer only to the soviets took away the states entire basis of political power, which these organisations represnted. These organisations were also under the influence of bourgeois groups and were therefore diametrically opposed to the interests of the Soviets which represnted an increasingly revolutionary working class.


Parties such as the Mensheviks believed that the two organisations could exist together and actively worked with the provisional government, many Bolsheviks including Lenin saw this as evidence that the Mensheviks were no longer a workers party and now served the bourgeoisie. Lenin himself stated that ‘whenever a bourgeois minister could not appear in defence of the government… some other ‘socialist’ minister appeared and faithfully performed their assignment’ (Lenin Selected Works, Lessons of the Russian Revolution page163). The Mensheviks not only supported the war effort but they also repeatedly told the workers not to mobilise against the provisional government. Some members of the Bolsheviks such as Stalin, Kamenev and Muranov had similar ideas. However it was the workers themselves through the soviets who increasingly were opposed to the provisional government. The Soviets demanded, ‘Either give us food or stop the war,’ the government did not and probably could not do either.

The Role Of The Soviets in The July Days

During June and July 1917 the workers repeatedly proposed the overthrow of the provisional government. The Soviets organised many armed demonstrations including in Petrograd on 18th June. Workers were increasingly opposed to the ‘socialists’ who were part of the Provisional Government and also increasingly with the parties who supported it. This is shown by the fact that during the 17th July riot Kronstadt sailors and workers from the Putilov factory kidnapped (briefly) a ‘socialist’ member of the Provisional Government. It is also significant that it was Trotsky who calmed the crowd down as it shows that the workers respect and trust in the Bolsheviks was growing.


Despite the fact that the workers were calling for a seizure of power the Bolsheviks believed that any insurrection would be premature and dangerous for the revolution. This was partly due to a lack of a sound majority in the soviets. John Robottom in his book ‘Modern Russia’ claims that the Bolsheviks saw that ‘if the government did fall …it would be a Menshevik or Social Revolutionary group that took over.’ While this is true, the reason the Bolsheviks saw this as a danger was deeper than simple greed for power. The Bolsheviks saw that the Mensheviks and much of the Social Revolutionaries were no longer a ‘workers party.’ This coincided with a growing shift towards this view by many workers themselves as these parties had become linked with the Provisional Government and the First World War. The later rise in Bolshevik support was also accompanied by what the Bolsheviks called ‘the most gigantic slander in history.’ This involved massive attempts to discredit Lenin as a German spy, these accusations are now known to be massively exaggerated, it is most likely that Lenin used German support to get into Russia but he did not work for them once he was inside Russia, as can be seen by the fact that Germany along with Britain and France all sent troops to fight the Bolsheviks once they took power.


Therefore the soviets throughout July reflected a growing discontent of the workers with the Provisional Government and growing support for the Bolsheviks. In this way they effectively corresponded with the workers views, they effectively carried out the aims of the Bolsheviks in that despite many workers aims a premature insurrection was avoided.

The Soviets role in the October uprising

Many historians including David Shub and Orlando Figes view the October revolution as a simple coup d’etat. David Shub argues this, in fact he names his chapter on the October revolution ‘Lenin Seizes Power’ while Orlando Figes calls it a ‘revolution of his (Lenin’s) own.’ However these accounts neglect the issue of the Soviets, from the middle of September there had been a tide of resolutions calling for the taking of power flooding in from local and regional Soviets. On the 11th -13th October a Congress of Soviets of the Northern Region openly called for insurrection. One worker shouted at a Bolshevik member ‘take power you sons of *****es, take power when we give it to you.’ Insurrection was decided ‘openly and publicly’ by the soviets, persuaded by the Bolsheviks but not behind the ‘workers back’ as the Mensheviks later claimed. The overthrow of the Provisional Government was not simply an attack on democracy, it was an attack on bourgeois democracy in favour of a working class democracy.


The arming of the workers was organised by the Revolutionary Military Committee (RMC). This was a body set up by the workers themselves through the soviets. The workers were themselves becoming more impatient with the Provisional Government and were becoming increasingly militant, ‘we will go into the street when we deem it advisable.’ The Bolsheviks by October had a clear majority in the soviets, especially in the major cities, for example in Petrograd the Bolshevik candidates received 443 votes while the second highest was 162 votes for the Social Revolutionaries (all of whom were left Social Revolutionaries who tended towards the Bolsheviks main principles). Although the Soviets nationwide were not monolithic and were only loosely centralised under the All Russian Central Congress of Soviets, the Bolsheviks were also gaining popularity among the peasants, largely due to the support they had given to the peasant revolts. Lenin at the time declared that ‘it would be sheer treachery to the peasants, to allow the peasant revolts to be suppressed when we control the soviets in both capitals.’


Despite the fact that the insurrection was decided upon ‘publicly and openly’ in the major soviets, the Mensheviks and many historians still claim that October was a ‘revolution behind the workers back.’ Orlando Figes, although seeing that the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks was ‘amidst a social revolution,’ still calls it a ‘coup d’etat.’ He also sees Lenin’s real aim as ‘all power to the party,’ this is a distortion of the truth. It is true that Lenin, like the majority of communists of the time, viewed the role of the party with the majority in the soviets, as the taking of power along side the soviets. Nevertheless the aims of the communists were always workers control over the economy and proletarian power through the soviets.


Trotsky argues convincingly in volume 3 of his ‘History of The Russian Revolution’ that, the Bolsheviks could only take power as relatively easily as they did because ‘they had behind them in the workers districts… an overwhelming majority.’ This is because as Trotsky showed, ‘at the end of October the main part of the game was already in the past. The ruling class was in many ways defenceless because of the massive scale of co-operation between the workers and the soldiers which meant they did not have the means to effectively put down an insurrection. However it would have been impossible for the Bolsheviks to stage a simple coup d’etat , they also did not have the capability. The red guards and the RMC with the support of the workers and soviets were the only groups able to carry it out. The role of the Party is shown clearly through the events of the storming of the Winter Palace, the workers carried out the action whilst being persuaded and aided in organisational matters, by the Bolsheviks.


Therefore it is clear that the October revolution was not a coup d’etat carried out by a revolutionary minority but was carried out by the workers of the major cities alongside the Bolsheviks and the peasants. This is of central importance as it shows what the relationship between the soviets and the communists was. The aims of the communists and of the soviets therefore cannot be so easily separated as the question suggests.


The Soviets Under the Bolsheviks and the Civil War

Despite the massive problems which the Bolsheviks faced after the October revolution such as a ruined economy, being part of a war which they had no interest in and keeping down counter revolution, the immediate period after October was not one of a party dictatorship as some historians claim. While it is true that the Bolsheviks shut down many critical news papers there was also a massive explosion of experimentation in music, theatre, art, politics and the economy. The massive repression and terror certainly were not characteristic of this early period, on many occasions they were too lenient, for example they let numerous White Generals such as General Krasnov free on the promise that they would not fight against the Bolsheviks. Also at this point there were massive debates within the party and workers control of production and politics was also much more important than is often realised. Workers on many occasions took over factories and demanded nationalisation, while others embraced the localised factory committees. This shows that while the Bolsheviks were immediately faced with massive problems and their actions were at times repressive, the early period of Bolshevik power was also one of experimentation and debate.


During this period the Soviets did have a great deal of power and economic control. This is shown by the massive expansion of soviet principles into production with ‘workers control of management…decreed on November 27 1917’(The Soviets Oskar Anweiler pg 221). The soviets also ‘thoroughly imposed’(Oskar Anweiler The Soviets pg221) in the army and in the judicial system in which for a time all judges were elected. However the democratisation of the economy did often exasperate the already chronic economic crisis, and as Oskar Anweiler says many factory committees tended to make decisions with ‘little consideration for the national economy.’ However these problems could probably have been dealt with without loosing the fundamental principles of soviet rule and there was much debate within the Bolshevik Party and the workers movement at large about the best way to do this. The Civil war however subordinated all experimentation and other issues to the task of maintaining power against the counter revolution.


As soon as the Bolsheviks took political power they were immediately forced into opposition with the soviets (and the factory committees) on many questions such as management of the factories. This was because they could not escape the idea that the success of the revolution depended on them holding onto state power. The problem was that with all the pressures coming from the capitalist world outside, and the still capitalist economy inside, the state very quickly began to detach itself from the control of the soviets and become a force standing above them; and though some Bolsheviks began to see this danger straight away (for example the Left Communist group around Ossinsky) the party as a whole became more and more fused with the new state. This tendency was greatly accelerated by the Civil War.

The Civil War

The Civil war was a major reason for the degeneration of Soviet power and the emergence the party dictatorship. It drained the resources of the soviets because so many workers fled the cities to go and fight as did many peasants in rural areas. It also subordinated a lot of the debate and experimentation in order to further the war effort. This also further ruined the economy and the resulting famines (also caused by the ‘democracies’ embargo on the country) sapped the morale of the population.


The demands of the civil war lead to the formation of the Red Army and with it the eradication of the red guards, this took away a very important weapon of the Soviets as the red guards were the armed wing of the Soviets. The idea was, at first to use the Soviet principle in the Red Army, however this was increasingly abandoned under the pressures of winning the military victory. Trotsky in particular became almost obsessed with installing order, even if that meant dismantling a large degree of workers democracy and power. Firstly in the army, where traditional military set ups were increasingly used, so much so that they even used old Czarist officers in some cases. Trotsky later posed the possibility of doing similar things in industry, which Lenin greatly opposed. This shows how the Civil War increased the fusion with the Bolsheviks and the state, above the Soviets. The left communists in the Bolshevik party would later go on to actually consider giving up power as they realised they had become too closely entwined with the state.


While it was increasingly necessary to use capitalist methods of exploitation, as Trotsky said, ‘the workers must increase productivity’(The Soviets, Oskar Anweiler) they also faced the problem a general lack of resources. They were under a massive trade embargo, they had lost massive areas of land and resources under the German ‘peace’ agreement and were losing workers to the war effort and the wars effects. The number of workers in Petrograd was 50% of those at the end of 1916 and by the end of the civil war, the birthplace of the revolution had lost 58% of it’s population. The new capital of Moscow had also depopulated by 45%.

The End Of the Soviets

Therefore the interests of the Soviets and the Bolshevik leadership which had once been so closely converged were increasingly opposed, this reached a culmination with the bloody repression of the Kronstadt revolt. The Kronstadt revolt was organised by a soviet type organisation and demanded new elections to the Soviets. While Trotsky and other leading Bolsheviks claimed it was a ‘White conspiracy’ it exemplified the antagonism between the party-state and the workers and the Soviets. However many Bolsheviks such as Miasnikov opposed the repression and many Bolsheviks in Kronstadt itself took part in the rebellion, this shows that the party had not yet lost all working class characteristics. However the Soviets had ceased to exorcise any real power by 1921 and any resistance within the Bolsheviks was defined to internal debates within the party.
The Bolsheviks believed that by suppressing the Kronstadt rebellion they were saving the revolution from the White counter-revolution. In fact, they helped to pave the way for an internal counter-revolution which was to overwhelm them all. In the last years of his life, Lenin realised that things were not going in the direction he had hoped and that the revolution was being swamped by bureaucracy. In 1922 he wrote ‘it (the state) did not operate in the way we wanted…The machine refused to obey the hand that guided it…as if it were driven by some mysterious, lawless hand’(this ‘mysterious hand’ was the economic laws of capitalism). By 1923 Trotsky had moved into opposition against Stalin, who personified this bureaucratic power, while the left communists made even more radical criticisms of the regime and were the first to describe the Stalinist state as a form of State Capitalism.

Conclusion

In Conclusion, the Soviets were effective in achieving the immediate aims of the Bolsheviks, such as the taking of workers political and economic power. However the Soviets aims became increasingly opposed to those of the Bolsheviks as a result of the isolation of Russia. This isolation not only lead to a ‘suffocation’ of the economy by the great powers but also lead to the Civil War, which drained the Soviets resources and lead the Bolsheviks to become increasingly bound up with the state. This meant that the Party went from being a party of the dictatorship of the proletariat to a dictatorship over it. The Soviets had lost all real power by 1921 and the party itself lost all remnants of its working class nature by the time the rise of Stalinism had culminated. Rosa Luxermburgs claim that ‘the problem could only be posed in Russia… it could not be solved in Russia,’ was very important because the failure of the revolution to spread spelt the death of Soviet power. Stalinism and its ideas of ‘socialism in one country’ was the complete negation of proletarian internationalism and represented an internal counter revolution through the degeneration of the Soviets and the rise of bureaucracy. This was largely down to the degeneration of Soviet power which in turn was brought about by isolation.

[Monty Cantsin]

Could you formate that so there's paragraph breaks rather then huge blocks of text?

[gilhyle]

It seems to me this article is unclear on the fundamental issue. That issue is this: was there a logic of events which led to the degeneration of the Russian Revolution notwithstanding the generally correct policies of the Bolsheviks (including Kronstadt), or was there a pursuit of authoritarian policies by the Bolsheviks which caused the degeneration of the Russian Revolution, which could have stayed healthy.

Of course some combination of the two is possible as a balaned assessment. But the alternatives must be set out to map the space.

Kronstadt is the critical issue in this regard. Given the critical danger to the State, could Kronstadt be allowed ?

The tension in the article is that while acknowledging the severely damaging effects on the health of the revolutionary regime as a result of policies REQUIRED by civil war, it nevertheless sees the Governmental response to Kronstadt (which is one of those policies required by civil war) as a policy error that caused degeneration.

Thus rather than combine the two alternatives set out above (which would be legitimate, if articulated clearly), it confuses them irrationally.

The critical point against even reasonable critics on this issue, such as Victor Serge, is what else could have been done, in the circumstances. Most responses to this kind of question are of the 'be nice and hope for the best' type.

Whtaever the author's conclusions, the issues should be brought out more clearly.

BTW the subsequent degeneration of the party, it should be recognised, requires its own narrative (relating to the 'Lenin Levy' etc) and not treated as having been completed in 1923. Arguably, it wasn't completed until 1937.

[jaycee]

the point is that kronstadt was a danger to the state which was already degenerated and loosing its working class character and becoming increasingly a party dictatorship over the workers. THe kronstadt rebellion was a response by a section of the working class and even supported by the left wing of the Bolshevik party. THey wanted a regeneration of the soviets as autonomous workers organs, It was not a counter revolutionary plot by the whites it was an attempt of some workers to save a dying revolution. This is why i say Kronstadt was in some ways a sign of things to come becuase it was the first time the BOlsheviks acted in a repressive manner towards the working class.

[stevensen]

i dont think kronstadt was a rebellion by a section of the working class....somehow these sailors had got it inot their heads that they were the most important body.....it is a clear case of millitary chauvinism...had to be tackled like the way it was...if u see the use of force was not the immediate response by the bolsheviks......it was a last resort....

[jaycee]

why were they such an important section of the workers during the revolution then. Also what were their demands, new elections to the soviets, that sounds resonable and quite clearly a working class demand

[Morpheus]

Originally posted by stevensen@Jan 14 2006, 02:40 PM
i dont think kronstadt was a rebellion by a section of the working class....somehow these sailors had got it inot their heads that they were the most important body.....it is a clear case of millitary chauvinism

No it wasn't. Their revolt was inspired by a strike in Petrograd against the Bolsheviks and was part of a wider period of unrest that followed the end of the civil war. Workers, peasants & soldiers revolted across the country, calling for a return to soviet democracy. Kronstadt was a center of revolutionary activism in 1917 and a major source of support for October. The fact that they revolted and claimed the Bolsheviks had betrayed the revolution is strong evidence against the Bolsheviks. Their demands were:

"(I) In view of the fact that the present Soviets do not express the will of the workers and peasants, immediately to hold new elections by secret ballot, the pre-election campaign to have full freedom of agitation among the workers and peasants;

(2) To establish freedom of speech and press for workers and peasants, for Anarchists and Left Socialist parties;

(3) To secure freedom of assembly for labor unions and peasant organizations;

(4) To call a non-partisan Conference of the workers, Red Army soldiers and sailors of Petrograd, Kronstadt, and of Petrograd Province, no later than March 19, 1921;

(5) To liberate all political prisoners of Socialist parties, as well as all workers, peasants, soldiers, and sailors imprisoned in connection with the labor and peasant movements;

(6) To elect a Commission to review the cases of those held in prison and concentration camps;

(7) To abolish all politodeli (political bureaus) because no party should be given special privileges in the propagation of its ideas or receive the financial support of the Government for such purposes. Instead there should be established educational and cultural commissions, locally elected and financed by the Government;

(8) To abolish immediately all zagraditelniye otryadi (Armed units organized by the Bolsheviki for the purpose of suppressing traffic and confiscating foodstuffs and other products. The irresponsibility and arbitrariness of their methods were proverbial throughout the country).

(9) To equalize the rations of all who work, with the exception of those employed in trades detrimental to health;

(10) To abolish the Communist fighting detachments in all branches of the Army, as well as the Communist guards kept on duty in mills and factories. Should such guards or military detachments be found necessary, they are to be appointed in the Army from the ranks, and in the factories according to the judgment of the workers;

(11) To give the peasants full freedom of action in regard to their land, and also the right to keep cattle, on condition that the peasants manage with their own means; that is, without employing hired labor;

(12) To request all branches of the Army, as well as our comrades, the military kursanti, to concur in our resolutions [to endorse this resolution];

(13) To demand for the latter publicity in the press;

(14) To appoint a Traveling Commission of Control;

(15) To permit free kustarnoye (individual small scale) production by one's own efforts."

Those are hardly the demands of "military chauvinism."

[ernesto]

Thank you for such an article. Whatever points of argument people have taken up with it , it allows someone like me, an educator, and students in my intro to socialism class to gain some benefit of understanding from it.

Thank you Ernesto

[jaycee]

you are very welcome ernesto, i have to tell you that i find it funny that you could use this article for a class because i actually was failed for this in an exam . i got 27/90 when my teacher had earlier told me it would be an A.

[jaycee]

also, ernesto i wud be interested to hear how it goes if you do decide to use my peice in a class