Page THE MILITANT October 1, 1929 Who Is Leading the Comintern To day?
10th Plenum of the Communist International CONTINUED FROM LAST ISSUE By TROTSKY letariat from the peasantry with the result that the The native element of the Petrovskys, the Rafeses Bolshevik Party was obliged to beat a great retreat.
and the Guralskys is the bustle behind the scenes, gos(Krasnaia Nov, Nr. 2, 1923, page 262. My emphasis. sip and combinations, diplomatic tricks around the An forth and so on, Martinov came to the conclusion in Martinov relates here, in all frankness, what it was glo Russian Committee the Kuo Min Tang, in brief, 1923 that the time had come to relight the torch of that reconciled him to the October: the great retreat the intrigues around the revolution. The flexibility reason in the Russian Communist Party.
He began of the rendered necessary by the retardation and adaptability of these people have a fatal limit: they where he had left off in the period of the Stolypinist of the world revolution. Profoundly convinced that are organically incapable. either of testing revolu reaction. In Krasnaia Nov, he wrote: the first three years of the October revolution were tionary initiative in action or of defending their views nothing but the expression of the historic error of as a minority. And yet it is just two qualities, which In 1905 Trotsky reasoned much more logically Trotskyism. Martinov entered the Party and, without complement each other, that make a real revolutionary. and consistently than the Bolsheviks and the Menshe waiting for a moment, took the place of the heavy arWithout the ability to stand obstinately in the minori viks. But the defect in his reasoning was the Trotsky tillery in the struggle against the Opposition. This ty, it is impossible to gather a confident, firm and cour was too consistent. The picture that he painted gave fact alone illustrates more eloquently than many theoageous revolutionary majority. On the other hand, in anticipation a very precise, charming idea of the retical discussions the profound evolution that has a revolutionary majority, even when once conquered, Bolshevik dictatorship of the first three years of the taken place in the upper circles of the Party leaderby no means become a permanent and irrevocable pa October revolution, which as is well known, ended by ship in these last years.
trimony. The proletarian revolution marches over landing in a blind alley, after having detached the proTO BE CONTINUED great heights and depths, over beaten paths, through tunnels, and down steep declivities. There are still enough these heights and depths for a decade. That is why the continual selection of revolutionaries, tempering them not only in the struggle of the masses The Tenth Plenum of the Executive Committee of lies. According to the theses of the International, the against the enemy but also in the ideolgical struggle the Communist International will ecorded in hist Communist Parties are now on the very verge of capwithin the Party, testing them in the great events and ory as the most fruitless and superficial world gath turing the majority of the working class, and in many at brusque turning points, is of decisive importance for ering of a revolutionary movement that ever assembled cases, of entering into acute revolutionary battle for the Party. Goethe has said that once a thing is acto solve the burning problems with which it is confront power, the streets, on barricades. sober review quired, it must always be won again in order to possess ed and to diagnose the diseases corroding its vitals. of Piatnitsky report shows in what position the sceit in reality.
tions of the International are today with regard to During the first Party cleansing, Lenin recommend Characteristic of the gathering was the monotonous mediocrity of its spokesmen and their auditors. The their organizational strength. Exaggerated though ed that ninety nine percent of the former Mensheviks sessions of the Communist International, once illumimost of his figures still are, they nevertheless give be thrown out. He had in mind Menshevism not so shocking proof of the tremendous decline of the memmuch as a conciliatory political line but rather the nated by the genius Lenin and Trotsky, flanked bership of the world Party. They are a striking repsychological type of adaptability seeking a protective by Zinoviev, Radek, Rakovsky, Bucharin and a host coloration and ready to camouflage itself as Bolshevik of others, were graced this time by such fourth rate futation of all the sickeningly bombastic claims of the functionaries as Kuusinen and Manuilsky, the main daily arty press. only so as not to swim against the stream. While His report is worth reading. We give a small excerpt from it here, summarized and tabLenin recommended the pitiless cleansing of the Party political reporters, droning out their platitudinous ulated. wisdom to an audience of officials. The importance atfrom those who adapt themselves, after his death these tributed to this Plenum can perhaps best be estimated MEMBERSHIP IN elements began to play a great role in the Party, and by the fact that Stalin, the present leader of the In PARTY 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 in the International, a decisive role. Guralski crowned 1929 Czechoslovakia 138. 996 93, 220 92. 818 138. 000 150. 000 44. 32 and uncrowned the leaders of the French, the German ternational, its spokesman and theorist save the Great Britain 000 10. 730 000 5, 536 mark. did not even bother to attend a single session, and other Parties; Petroysky and Pepper directed the 3, 500 France 8, 191 X3. 326 65, 30 56, 010 52. 526 46, 000 Anglo Saxon world; Rafes taught the Chinese people much less to make an address.
Tremendous drop reported by secretary since new Party crisis.
revolutionary strategy; Borodin was the state counOf the political reports, the less said the kinder in October, at the time of the great strikes.
cilor of the national revolution. All are variations of one is to the reporters. Very few even of the Party one and the same basic type: parasites of the revo members today pay much attention to what a Kuusi highly colored is clear from Piatnitsky report that the These figures are typical, and that even they are lution nen or a Manuilsky have to say; even fewer read it.
American Party has between and 11 thousand memIt is needless to say that the present Left course Manuilsky may repeat a hundred times that he conbers, when the real gure is oser to or thousand.
of Stalin has in no sense disquieted this public. On siders the capture of the majority of the working And in every case, the perspective for the next future the contrary, all the Petrovskys joyously enter into this class to be a burning task of the political moment is an additional decline. The picture Piatnitsky gives Loft course today, and the Rafeses fight against the today confronting the mass Communist Parties of Euof the trade union work of the various parties, of the Right danger. In this Left Centrist campaign, which rope. but everyone knows that there are no mass virtual liquidation of the shop nuclei, of the general is three fourths inflated and purely formal, the adaptCommunist Parties in Europe and that Manuilsky passivity and indifference of the membership as a ers feel themselves like fish in the water, demonstrat took four hours to fail to tell his inattentive audience whole, is one of the blackest yet painted in our moveing cheaply to themselves and to others what re how to remedy the defect.
ment. Piatnitsky only remedy is an appeal that new markable revolutionaries they are. At the same time, As for the dry as dust professor, Kuusinen, with his members must be recruited, that more work must be they remain, more than ever before, true to themselves.
ABC class lecture on economics, he reached the height done, that all resources must be utilized, e. a comIf anything can kill the International, it is this course, of his directive genius in the Comintern at the 10th monplace; and yet no one else had any thing else to this regime, this spirit, incarnate in the Petrovskys.
Plenum in a bloodless battle of quotations from Marx propose for this alarming loss of blood in the CominMARTINOV and Lenin with Varga. When he had no quotations One of the inspirers and determined educators of left to fire, he simply stated. am not quite certhe International after Lenin is Martinov a wholly tain if a Red professor would not be able to ferret out These generals who talked so loudly of the approachsymbolic figure in the history of the revolutionary some sentence in Marx works as a proof that Marx ing revolution never looked back once to see that their armies are melting away or dying of political malnuhad even taken the effect of the conveyor system into movement. The most consistent, and consequently the most stupid, theoretician of Menshevism, Martinov re consideration. In the face of the sharp defeats of trition. Not a moment was wasted on the really burnmained patiently sheltered from the revolution and the the Comintern in half a dozen countries, of its decline ing questions before the revolutionary movement; the civil war in a comfortable refuge, like a traveler shel in every section, of the advancing strength of the soThermidorian danger in the Soviet Union and the platters himself from bad weather.
form of the Opposition; the two class worker and peasHe ventured forth cial democracy internationally, of splits and degenerainto the light of day only in the sixth year of the tion in the International, we have this pitiful Punchant Parties sponsored by the Comintern which still October. In 1923, Martinov suddenly unbosomed him and Judy battle of words occupying half the Plenum exist in India, Japan and Mexico; the new situation time.
self by publishing an article in the Moscow review, and consequently the new problems of the Chinese revolution; the danger of corruption and decay of the Krusnzia Nou. At a session of the Political Bureau, One gets the same impression of senility from the re Communist Parties; the destructive ultra Left somin the spring of 1923, said in passing, half in jest, marks of most of the speakers, chewing over again, ersaults that are discrediting the movement in Europe half in earnest, but at any rate as bearer of ill omen: like old men, the cud of infantile theories on the offen and America and alienating the masses of the workers. Watch out that Martinov doesn worm his way into sive, on social democracy, on fascism, on trade union and numerous other vital questions.
the Party. Lenin, his two hands around his mouth work, for which better men than they were whipped like a trumpet, whispered to me so that he was heard by Lenin and Trotsky almost a decade a ago.
If there is such a thing as a Third Period in the throughout the room: Everyone knows very well that International then surely it is the period of the ideo.
he is a block head. had no reason to contest this At this Plenum the Third Period. probably be logical and organizational decline of the Parties. The brief characterization made in a tone of absolute con cause Bucharin was its co parent with Stalin did not echo of its hollow rattle is a warning sound to all viction. merely observed that it is evidently impos occupy the center of the stage. That place of honor conscientious Communists.
sible to build a large Party only out of intelligent peo was reserved for the new theory of social fascism. ple and that Martinov could belong to another cate and it was mauled about by one speaker after another. How Not to Build New Unions gory. Now the pleasantry has taken a serious turn. Bear in mind that it has become one of the mainMartinov has not only wormed his way into the Party, springs of Comintern policy today. It appears in The Daily Worker (9 17 29) carries a story from but he has become one of the principal inspirers of the every manifesto, every thesis, every article and news North Carolina which says in part: Ten thousand International. He has been brought closer and he has story in the Party press. Yet, after all of its phases leaflets calling for a one day protest strike. have been elevated, or rather, they have come closer to had been exhausted even Bela Kun theory of the been issued. Every mill worker into the National him and they have stooped to him. solely because of possibility, nay, even the necessity of the transformaTextile Workers Union, and Every class conscious his struggle against Trotskyism. In this respect, tion of democracy into fascism. it remained for Marworker into the Communist Party, are the slogans of he had no need to begin his education anew. He tinov to admit that although the question of social fasthe leaflet, which signed by Hugo Oehler, southern continues to fight the permanent revolution just like cism is now tremendous and fundamental importorganizer of the National Textile Workers Union, and in the past twenty years. Formerly, he spoke of my ance, yet no definition of social fascism has been given Bill Dunne, organizer for the Communist Party.
under estimation of bourgeois liberalism and bour in the theses or in the main reports. As to Kola We cannot think of a more harmful and incorrect geois democracy. He has not changed the cliche. He rov, who probably had no other answer to Varga conhas only inserted the peasantry.
tentions, it remained for this oyster to shed a pearl of act yet taken by the Party in the Gastonia fight than the issuance of this joint leaflet with those slogans.
in the Menshevik journals of the period of the truly classic luster: As a matter of fact, bourgeois It is one thing for the Communist Party to urge workreaction, one could find not a few articles by Marti statistics have now entered into the period of their ers to join the It is entirely senseless for nov designed to bring proof that Trotskyism tri fascization, becoming transformed into fascist statisthe to sign its name jointly with the umphed for the moment in October, November and De tics. This is a fact which comrade Varga overlooks!
cember 1905 (sic) when the elements ran riot and ex Had Kolarov produced nothing else in his career, he Communist Party urging workers to join the latter organization particularly in the present situation in tinguished all the torches of Menshevik reason. The would achieve eternal fame by that alone.
North Carolina. That is not the way to build the new high point of the revolution. October, November and The same wearying blabbler in a vacuum featured unions. It is the way to politicalize them December 1905 was designated by Martinov as its a sec Trotskyist decline.
tarian death, to Communize them out of existence For jhim the genuine jhigh Serra was denounced, Humbert Droz and Ewert were the struggle against the Rights and the Conciliators.
as a mass organization. The whole of the Communist point began only with the Imperial Duma, with the denounced, Weisert was threatened. Bucharin was bloc with the Cadets, and so forth, that is, with the problem, said Lenin, is to be able to convince the beginning of the counter revolution.
openly attacked. But only one of them was present backward, to work in their midst, and not to set up a and none spoke. The Right wing is not yet ready bdrrier between us and them, a barrier of artificial Having tarried in his refuge for the end of a new to play its full hand of cards. When it does, Manuilsky childishly Left slogans. That is precisely what tho play, infinitely more terrible, of the unfettered eleand Kuusinen may have a different song to sing.
leaflet does. It is incomphensible how comrades like ments. the October revolution, the civil war, the revoOehler and Dunne can be got to endorse such ridiclution in Germany and Austro Hungary, the Soviet But it is with Piatnitsky, head of the organization ulousness. Neither Communists nor unionists will he overthrow in Hungary, the events in Italy, and so al section of the Comintern, that the greatest interest made that way.
tern,