Saturday, December 21, 1929 THE MILITANT Page The Russian Opposition Replies to the Capitulators The departure of the capitulators from By Christian Rakovsky corruption of Leninism in which the major the Opposition served as an impetus to the ity is engaged. Instead of a Marxist discus.
formation of a crisis, which was ripening the form of an eruption of capitulatory. cumstances, something altogether different sion of the concrete changes that took within the Opposition (mass arrests, prov The bifting out of those who did not think Which to believe? But even if we accept place in the Soviet state during its exocations everywhere, solitary confinement, the Platform through to the end, who the first hypothesis, does it not follow from istence (its corpamo political and juridthe hard material conditions of the exiles dream of quiet comfort, naively hiding it that, that we must encrifice Leninism to ical institutions and in the relationships of as a result of the reduction of the allowance under the desire to take part in grandi Centrist opportunism? Of course not! classes in eu. the capitulators by hall, the banishment of Trotsky, etc. ose fights was inevitable. Moreover, this In the brief periods of his intellectual began a metaphysical argument about the and on the other hard a certain division in Bifting out may have a salutary effect on enlightment, Radek understood this per nature and the essence of the prolethe Opposition caused by the Left course the ranks of the Opposition. Those will fectly. Last year, after the July plenum of tarism dictatorship in general. They imiof the Centrist Leadership. Without the stay in who do not regard the Platform as a the Central Committee, he wrote to Ra tate the chaff threshing netaphysicians, severe persecutions, the Left course would sort of restaurant menu from which any kovsky in Astrachan that Stalin had com scholiasts and sophists against whom every have pushed new sympathizers into the one can pick out a dish according to his pletely surrendered his position, that the page and line of the works of Marx, Engels ranks of the Opposition because it would own taste. The Platform was and remains Rights will seize power, that Thermidor is and Lenin rebel. This, from the standpoint signify the intellectual bankruptcy of Cen the war banner of Leninism, and only its on the threshold, that what the Leninist of historical materialism, good for nothing trism. But it is just as true to say that complete realization can lead the Party and Opposition has got to do ja to preserve the argument has nevertheless pursued a defiwithout the new course the persecutions the proletarian land out of the blind alley theoretical heritage of Leninism. po nite practical goal, Uncermoniously diswould not have had the same effect, which into which they were herded by the Cen litical person must take into considera torting the texts taken from the documents tley have now achieved. The Left course trist leadership.
tion the posible variations of events in the of their adversaries, replacing the terms played the part of fig leaf for a Centrist Those who understand that precisely fututre, but his tactics would become risky Centrism and Centrist leadership with decay and opportunism.
the fight of the Opposition is that grand adventurism if he were to base them only the terme Soviet government and proBetween Two Fires fose fight on the issue of which depends upon confused suppositions. The following letarian dictatorship. the capitulators inIt is superfluous to characterize the the future of socialist construction, the small example shows how impermissable it tended to approach, step by step, to the methods of persecution. We ll note only point where they could call Centrism one that it manifested itself not in open viohundred percent Leninism. To call such lence alone but also in depriving the Oppo Concurrently with the drawing up of their declaration, Rakovsky, Okudjava and methods of polemics anything but theoretsition of the elementary rights of corres Kosslor drew up an extensive principle thesis in which they characterize the conditions ical forgery, is impossible.
pondence, and in the technical aid of its in the country and in the Party, define the meaning and tasks of the declaration of What Radek Co. Overloked own particular kind which the ex July 22. These theses, in manuscript form, received a wide dstribution among the In their document, the capitulators tended to the capitulators, reaching the exiles and in the country. After a considerable delay, the two copies of the concluding write: We overlooked. the fact that the point where the apparatus itself, at least chapter of the thesis reached us. In view of its size we can only give extracts from policy of the was and remains Leninin certain localities, distributed the docu it here.
ist. How does it happen that it was ments of the capitulators. Some of the Since some very radical critics saw in the declaration of Rakovsky almost a Leninist, when it was one halt enected capitulators, staying with the Opposition, capitulation, we present here first of all that part of the theses in which Rakovsky by the Rights, against whom the capituacted according to the instructions of the characterizes the capitulators (Radek, Preobrazhensky, Smilga) and the tendency to. lators call for a struggle in the same doapparatus (Istchenko) or according to the wards capitulation in general.
cument? But you cannot demand from preliminary agreement with it, negotiations people who have acepted the road of intelbetween Preobrazhensky and Yaroslavsky, lectual capitulation to be logical. Even be or Preobrazhensky and Ordjonikidze)
fate of the Soviet power, of the world revo is: Smirnov supposed that the fore the actual presentation of their decle that the bombardment of the Opposition lution those will not desert their posts. In view of the difficult conditions in the ration, the trio were getting the comradea will proceed from two shores: the CenAs a leit motif in the theses of the cap country, would not demand from the trinity in exile ready for their evolution. Altrist and the Oppositionists. The Oppoitulators, the same thought was repeated a capitulatory document. But seeing the ready in a letter from Radek to Barnaoul, sition was caught between two fires. The again and again: We must return to the negotiations slow up. Smirnow wrote a on May 21, the word Centrism disappearg famous freedom of correspondence actuParty. One who does not know the story postal card on July 12: think, that the and in its place appears Stalinist ally amounted to a real freedom for the of our expulsion from the Party might alleviation of the crisis (the harvest) play nucleus, which proves to be more Left capitulators alone, and to an abstract think that we left it ourselves and volun ed a definite part in it. The capitulators than the workers sector of the party. In freedom for the Leninist Opposition. It tarily went into exile. To put the question themselves, by the way, spread rumors the document Questions and Answer must be noticed also that even here specthat way means to transfer the responsi about the conciliatory moods of the Cena commentary on the draft of the declaraial differentiated postal policy was applied: bility for our being in exile and out of the trist leadership towards the Rights, in contion with which Preobrazhensky had left the documents of the capitulators were not Party from the Right Centrist leadership to nection with the above mentioned harvest.
for Moscow the term Centrism is alallowed to reach those comrades from the Opposition.
It is doubtful if even those moods are last ready put in quotation marks. But whilo whom a definite resistance could have been We were in the Party and we wished ing The liquidation the Right leaders, wearing out the front steps of the expected. Answer to the capitulatbrs to stay in it even when the Right Centrist their removal from leading posts, seems to Preobrazhensky lost the quotation inarks documents were suppressed entirely.
leadership denied the very necessity of be a settled question.
The intellectual crisis had begun alas well as the term itself, together with his draft of the declaration. Some people as drawing up any kind of a five year plan, Radek is Always Ready!
ready a year ago last April. Preobrazhensert that there never was but one copy of and calmly encouraged the Kulaks growsky and Radek were the inciters of the reThe Centrist leadership cleared the way ing into socialism. Still more do we wish that draft made. Probably Preobrazhensky valuation of values. The first with a certain to the Left and to the right 80 as did not want to leave any material traces consistency, the second, as usual, wriggling to be in the Party now, when even if maneuver itselt. If it makes up its mind to of the swift metamorphoses to which his only in one part of it a Left turn is taking and making Jumps from the very extreme a new swing to the Right, the removal of sociological nature was doomed. Neither Left position to the very extreme Right and place, and when it has gigantic tasks before the Right leaders will insure it against the was anything left of the heroic pose which it to fulfill. But the question before us is back again. Radek, by the way, reproached loss of power, Exactly in the same way, it Smilga, on the trip from Minusinnsk Preobrazhensky for his negotiations with of an entirely different order: is indispensable for it to remove the Left Moscow, assumed against Centrism.
Yaroslavsky.
agree to go off the Leninist line to please Opposition: to remove a political group The basic issue between the capitulaPreobrazhensky was writing and sayCentrist Opportunism? The greatest enemy which could stand at the head of the ing approximately the following: The Cenof the proletarian dictatorship Is a distors and the Leninist Opposition was and Left current in the party, and which 19 remains Centrism. To those whose memory trists leadership is beginning to fulfill one honest attitude towards one convictions. now fighting particularly against bureauis short, it is necessary to recall how Cenpart of the Platform, its economic part; If the Party leadership, imitating the Cathcratic methods of rationalization at the ex trism was defined by the Platform. Centras far as the political part of the Platform olic church, which at his death bed compels pense of the working class. In answer to an atheist to be converted to Catholicism, ism, as its name testifies, represents a tengoes it will be realized by life Itself. The a question about Trotsky, Radek said at dency to sit on the fence. It does not extorts from the Oppositionists a recogniOpposition has fulfilled its historical misIsbim: We may have to make concessions consistently reflect either the interests of sion, it has exhausted its values. It ought tion of imaginary mistakes and a denial of to the peasants, and Trotsky will accuse us the proletariat or the interests of the bourto come back to the Party and rely on the their own Leninist convictions, it loses, by of Thermidorianism. Does this mean that geoisie. Centrism 18 distinguished by its natural course of events.
this very fact, every right to be respected. some kind of rumor has already reached eclecticism. It introduced into Communism Thus the question of the interpretation The Oppositionist who changes his convic Radek trained ear, or is it that, wishing tions over night deserves only complete its own intellectual substitutes, like the of the Platform created two camps: the to please the hidden desires ofthe Centrist scorn. This practise developes clamorbuilding of socialism in one country, the revolutionary Leninist camp fighting for the leadership, this political Communist development without conflict of socialist realization of its whole Platform, as forous, light minded sceptical attitude towards youth shouts in advance: Always ready! economy, making middle peasants out of merly the Party fought for the whole proLeninism, the typical representative of No one can guarantee that in case of a new which Radek has again become, generthe whole peasantry, and similar inventions gram, and the opportunist capitulatory grain strike, the Centrist leadership will The Platform regarded as the basis of ously scattering to the Right and to the camp, which expressed its readiness to be not jump from Article 107. against the satisfied with the industrialization and Left his philistine aphorisms about modCentrism the upravientzy. the party and Kulak to the Neo Nep. On the contrary, it Soviet bureaucracy, breaking away more the collective farming policy, not giving a eration. The types of Shchedrin are eter is very probable that they will and more from the working class and nal. They are reproduced by each epoch thought to the fact that without the realizaaspiring of social political relations, with only their to life Jobs, or according to tion of the political part of the Platform the historical costumes changed.
The declaration of the trio on July 13, Preobrazhensky in Questions and Answhole socialist construction might fly up is a false and opportunist document, One wers hereditary ones.
in the air.
Arguments of the Capitolators part of it is a continuation of the work The third peculiarity of the apparatusDefects in the Opposition One of the favorite methods of the which the three have been conducted al Centrist group consists, according to the The Opposition, which came out of the capitulators is to sow panic by representready last year, and especially in the latest Platform, in its desire to substitute itselt Party, is not free, in certain of its sections, ing the present conditions in the country months, spreading false notions about the for the party in seizing more and more from the defects and habits cultivated by AS pre Kronstadt conditions (Preobraopinions prevalent among the Opposition. power in its hands, in a haughty and scornthe apparatus year after year. It is not zhensky expression. On his way to MosBy bringing the accusation against Trotsky ful attitude towards the masses especially free, first of all, from a certain dose of cow, at the Ishim station, Radek repre and the Opposition, pretending that they towards the unskilled workers and farm philistinism. The bureacratic atavism is sented the struggle between the Rights assert that power is not in the hands of the hands, in intolerance of discussions and especially hard to kill in those Opposition and Centrists as similar to that which took working class, that Trotsky is revising persecution of the Left Opposition Fire to Ists who used to stand closest to the lead place in the Convention on the eve of the Leninism and that the Opposition as the Left. ership of the Party or the Soviet apparatus, 9th of Thermidor (French revolution. He whole is going towards the creation of a The Capitulators Turn to Slander It is infected partly with the fetichism of said: They are preparing arrests for each new party, the three capitulators furnish, Powerless to fight the Leninist Opyoslthe Party book in contrast to loyalty to the other. Radek pointed out also that the by this very fact, a new weapon to the tion with the aid of the Platform, seeing Party itself, to its ideals, it historical task Rights might get hold of the majority in party leadership for the further persecu that it is impossible to acquire any con loyalty inherent only in those who still the Centrel Committee and the Central tion of the Opposition. In its second part, siderable number of sympathizers by metawant to fight further for the reformation of Control Commission, although out of thedeclaration of July 13 tries to rehabill physical tight rope walking around the the Party. Finally, it is not free from that approximately 300 members and candidates tate not only the majority of the but essence of power, the capitulators turnmost injurious psychology of the falsifiers in the last Plenum, the Rights did not get also the whole past policy of the Right ed to slander a favorite method of every of Leninism, which was cultivated by the more than a dozen votes. The same people Center bloc. The policy of the Right Center theoretically beaten movement. They acsame apparatus. That is why each cap who, in their declaration of July 13, assert bloc, which promoted the strengthening of cused Trotsky of playig with the idea of itulator, running away from the Opposition, that the Centrist leadership has completely the class enemy, is now being presented as a revolt and the idea of a bloc with the will not miss a chance to kick Trotsky with prevented the back sliding or the rolling Leninist rolics: the policy of the Le Rights. It is a double hypocrisy when his small hoot, shod with the nails of the (as they delicately express themselves so ninist Opposition, on the contrary, under such accusations come from people who Yaroslavsky Radek factory. In different as to save the virginal modesty of the the direct influence of which the line of know the complete and enduring loyalty conditione. this inheritance of the appar. leadership) are now saying. In other cir the party, it even but partially, was straight of Trotsky not only to the Soviet governates would be easily outgrown. In the ened out presenteil on ment but also to his enemies inthe par y rosent conditions of heavy repression it famous Russian satirist of the late With their declaration or An their part, accusations of this sort are sort on the body of the Opposition in 1890 trio openly ant!
Continued Page to to Will we