SOCIALIST APPEAL APRIL 20, 1940 On the Defense of the The Struggle for a Proletarian Party (Continued from Page 2)
would resist ineffectively, if at all. Under such conditions the national freedom movement which may develop among the resistance to capitalist restoration would require mobilization of Byelo Russian and other nationalities in the Soviet Union.
the Soviet masses in revolutionary struggle against capitalist Defense of the Soviet Union restoration and its agents within the Soviet Union. Such a mo27. We have always stood the unconditional defense of the bilization could have as its object only a political revolution for Soviet Union against the capitalist world or Internal attempts at the regeneration of the Soviet state.
capitalist restoration. Never was it more necessary to reiterate The difference between this political revolution and a social this principle than today. when the unfolding of the Second revolution in an imperialist country, apart from the obvious fact World War demonstrates that inherent in it is an attempt by the that the former would not have as its task the overturn of private imperialists to restore capitalism in the Defense of the property, is that, whereas in the imperialist country we continue Soviet Union is a class duty, as it is a class duty to defend any the class struggle without considering the effect on the military section of the labor movement against the capitalist world. We front, in the Soviet Union the political revolution would have to defend the Soviet Union against capitalist blows, irrespective of be carried on with one of its objects being to safeguard the borders at all times against imperialist invasion. In this sense, the Defense and immediate causes of the conflict.
28.
of the is the logical corollary of our and only in this sense, our aim of political revolution is subanalysis of the first workers state. All kinds of democratie, ordinated to the task of defending the state property against Idealistic, ultra left, anarchistic theories, Ignoring the character imperialist attack.
of Soviet property relations or the class contradiction between the Soviet state and the bourgeois states, lead logically, especially They Bow To Democrats in case of war, to counter revolutionary conclusions.
36. The attempt of the democratic patriots (Norman Thomas, 29. Our conception of the defense of the remains in Lovestone, etc. to characterize our poliey as a capitulation to Its basic fundamentals the conception which the revolutionary Stalinism is a conscious and deliberate falsification. They had to movement held at the very birth of the Soviet state. The defense go over bodily to the camp of the democratic imperialists of the Soviet Union was always conceived of as an integral part (American Labor Party resolutions) before they had the efof the international revolution. The defense of the Soviet Union frontery to so characterize the same policy which in former was conceived of as subordinated to the world revolution, in the years (when they were tail ending the Stalinists) they slandered specific sense that a part is subordinated to the whole. The Bolas anti Soviet. No less contemptible is the attempt to draw sheviks in 1918 were prepared to risk the existence of poletarian from our position the implication that we will join Stalin in power in the Soviet Union for the sake of the Geman revolution, crushing proletarian movements in the Soviet Union or elseby virtue of the criterion that the success of the German revoluwhere. Our struggle against Stalin armed forces in Loyalist tion one of the major advanced countries was more important Spain should be sufficient refutation of the charge. We defend than the Russian revolution. Likewise today, if the were the nationalized property of the Soviet Union against the imperallied with Germany in the war, the German revolution would ialists. Successful proletarian revolutions, in the Soviet Union or unquestionably menace the immediate interests of the defense of elsewhere, would constitute the best possible defense of the Soviet the nevertheless we, like the Bolsheviks in 1918, would Union. Hence we would defend those revolutions, arms in hand, if be for the most decisive measures to assure the success of the necessary against Stalin armed forces. That is the obvious German revolution. This in no wise signifies the negation of the meaning of our specific slogans for an independent Soviet defense of the Soviet Union or a conflict between it and world revolution; for the world revolution, or any part of it more sig.
Ukraine, an independent Soviet Finland, and a political revolution for the regeneration of the Soviet state.
nificant than the Soviet Union, such as the German revolution 37. The fundamental difference between our conception of de would constitute in the end the most decisive defense of the fense of the and that of the Stalinists is today especially Soviet Union.
30. Since the triumph of the Soviet bureaucracy (1928. the sharply posed. On the question of the German revolution Stalin is defense of the Soviet Union has involved a clear distinction bewhitewashing Hitler, presenting his peace policy as good coin, tween the needs of the Soviet Union and the needs of the bureaucalling the masses to struggle only against those opposed to cracy. Since 1923 defense of the Soviet Union, for revolutionists, Hitler policy. The Comintern press indignantly repeats Goebhas in no way signified political support of the rulers of the Soviet bels charges against the British as responsible for the attempted bombing of Hitler, and utilizes the occasion to warn the workers state. In 1920 we supported the Red Army march into Poland as motivated by the interests of the revolution, likewise the aid that Hitler replacement would most likely take the form of a given by the Red Army to the revolutionists in Georgia in wrestmonarchist restoration aimed against the ergo, Hitler should remain. We, on the contrary, insist that the hostility of ing it from a puppet government of the imperialists. Those were acts dictated by revolutionary considerations to the revolutionarythe German working class against the Nazi regime must in the internationalist government of the Soviet Union. The Stalinist course of the war find the way to destroying the Nazi regime. Not bureaucracy, however, represents interests and ideas almost the merely because the Nazi regime is an unstable, treacherous ally of the but above all because a German revolution would opposite of the interests and Ideas of the October Revolution and we can therefore give no support to its politics, including its far outweigh in importance the Russian Revolution.
military politics (invasion of Poland, Finland, etc. The specific weight of the German revolution and its success ful prosecution are in no way impeded, however, if the vanguard Not Defense of Bureaucracy of the German working class gives due consideration to the needs 31. Since 1927 our movement has proclaimed that the needs of the its real needs and not those asserted by the of the defense of the Soviet Union as a workers state is funda bureaucracy. If, for example, Hitler finds himself constrained by mentally separated from the bureaucracy defense of the the logic of the situation to send military supplies to the Soviet It was then stated that, in the interests of the genuine Union, the German workers would have no reason, In that condefense of the Soviet Union, the proletarian vanguard can be crete instance, to resort to strike or sabotage. The development of obliged to eliminate the Stalin government and replace with the German revolution would find sufficient soope while facilitata revolutionary internationalist government which would coor ing whatever material aid the Soviet Union would be receiving dinate the defense of the with the furthering of the from its imperialist ally.
world revolution. The change of government was then conceived 38. In the imperialist countries fighting against the to be possible by the reform of the Communist party. In 1933 in a war, also, the proletariat must not lose sight of the interests the Bankruptcy of the Communist International became evident of the In cases of real necessity, the workers must rewhen the great German party was ordered to go down before sort to the most decisive action in order to hinder the sending of Hitler without striking a blow. We abandoned the perspective of soldiers and supplies against the reform of the Communist parties, including the Communist Party The practical differences dictated to the workers on each side of the Sovet Union. The necessary change of government could, in connection with the defense of the in no way modify consequently, take place only by building a new revolutionary the fundamental principle that, in all imperialist countries, Indeparty capable of taking over the government (the new party pendent of the fact as to whether or not they are in alliance with was of course illegal by fiat of the Stalin government. By 1936 the the proletariat must develop the class struggle with the complete extirpation of the former power of the Soviets made the purpose of seizing power as soon as possible.
clear that the political revolution would take place only in the form of armed overthrow of the Soviet bureaucracy. The development of our program for the regeneration of the Soviet state, as thus outlined, was always, however, and remains so today, predicated on the conception that the task of regeneration was the best and most decisive way of defending the first workers 39. For the revolutionary vanguard in the democratic imperialist countries, where their voices are being drowned out by the state anti Soviet thunder, the real danger now is not the danger of 32. Our abandonment (1933) of the perspective of regener confusion between our concept of what is worthy of defense in ating the Communist International anl its parties did not funthe and that of the Stalinists, but the danger that we damentally affect our perspective of regenerating the Soviet may give direct or indirect help to the dominant political current state. party and a state are not objects of the same order. which tries to identify the R, with the Fascist states. In party is a selection of people on the basis of certain ideas and order to inspire the workers to defend the Soviet Union, it is methods. This selection, in the Third International, became so fundamentally opposed to Marxism that we were obliged to abanvitally important to make clear to them what we defend (nationdon all hope of regenerating it. But the Soviet state differs from alized property. against whom (the imperialists and the bureaua party in that it is a complex of social institutions which concracy. and how (by revolutionary means. This work of developing clear and inspiring slogans will not produce miraculous retinues to persist in spite of the fact that the ideas of the bureausults, for we are working amid the thunderous din of democraticcracy are now almost the of the ideas of the October Revolution. Above all, the nat property in the means of REJECTED BY CONVENTION Soviet Union. That is why wo do not renounce the possibility of regenerating the Soviet state. That dictates to us its defense against the capitalist world.
33. Defense of the Soviet Union against imperialism includes, of course, the newly occupied territories which, with the nation(REJECTED BY CONVENTION)
alization of their means of production, have become identical in class character with other parts of the The present war, which began with the invasion of Poland 34. Our slogan for an independent Soviet Ukraine is the ap by the German army on September 1st of last year, is a new plication to the field of the national question of our general struggle among the great powers for a re division of the earth; slogan for the revolutionary overthrow of the bureaucracy. In for the hegemony on the European continent, and in particular the same sense that the revolutionary overthrow of the bureaufor rule over the majority of oppressed mankind, living in the colcracy does not conflict with the defense of the Soviet Union, but onies and semi colonies of Africa, Asia, Oceania, and Latin Ameron the contrary, best serves that defense, so the independence ica. Thus, in its decisive aspects, the present war is of the same of the Soviet Ukraine wll facilitate the defense of the Soviet general character as the war of 1914 18, this time occurring on a Union. The same considerations motivate our slogan for an in foundation of far more acute and desperate conflict and social dependent Soviet Finland.
degeneration. All attempts describe the war, from the point of What Unconditional Defense Means view of any of the participants, as being fought for the rights of national self determination (Poland, Finland. for the sake of 35. Our defense of the Soviet Union is an unconditional duty. democracy against fascism (Britain, France. to break the It is unconditional in two senses. a) We do not demand that the Soviet bureaucracy, prior hold of capitalist plutocracy (Germany. for socialist liberation or defense of the Russian proletarian revolution (Soviet Union)
to our participation in the defense of the make any agreement or concessions. Indeed, defense can have meaning are only social patriotic devices for hiding the true character of only in this sense. For if we demanded that the bureaucracy first the war from the masses, and enlisting the support of the masses for one or another participant or group of participants.
comply with certain conditions, or that the circumstances under there From the socially reactionary character of the which we would defend a workers state against imperialism be of a certain character, that would not be defense at all but, follows the strategy which revolutionary socialists are obligated rather, defeatism. For is it not a fact that we are ready to defend to adopt with respect to The revolutionary orientation may be the United States, for example, under certain conditions e.
summed up as THE STRATEGY OF THE THIRD CAMP. This control of the country by the working class. Conditional de strategy envisages the struggle on a world scale against the war, fense is a misuse of terms. One is either a defensist or a against all the belligerent governments and belligerent armies, defeatist.
and for the international socialist revolution. The troops of the To require nothing of the bureaucracy as a condition for our potential army of the third camp are to be found in the ranks of defense of the Soviet Union that signifies also that our defense the workers and poor farmers, the women and the youth, in all has nothing in common with that of the bureaucracy.
countries, in the enslaved populations of the colonies, semi col(b) We do not shelve our aim of a political revolution in the onies, subject nations, throughout the world, all of whom have during the war. Recognizing that the overthrow of the only sorrow, starvation and death in prospect from the war, and bureaucracy would immensely strengthen the in confor whom socialist revolt against the war alone can offer solution.
ducting the war, our objective of a political revolution remains The ranks of the army of the third camp will be forged by the in the period of the war and, indeed, becomes absolutely imrejection of any support of any of the warring governments or perative. number of considerations should make this obvious.
mies, the resolute pursuance of the class struggle in all counIf the course of the war should push Stalin into a complete militries, irrespective of its influence upon the fortunes at the military tary alliance with Hitler, pressure for capitalist restoration would fronts, and the fight for liberation by the peoples of the colonies in all likelihood come most immediately from ally Hitler and and semi colonies. The guiding slogans of the third camp are the compradore wing of the bureaucracy. Hitler would de summarized by: AGAINST THE WAR! PEACE THROUGH SOmand entry into the country for German technology to facilitate CIALISM! FOR THE NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE OF THE war production but in the form of capitalist concessions, and OPPRESSED PEOPLES THROUGH THE SOCIALIST UNITED he would be supported in his demands by the compradore wing STATES OF EUROPE! FOR SOCIALIST UNITED STATES of the bureaucracy. Enmeshed in the alliance, the bureaucracy OF THE AMERICAS! FOR FREE AFRICA! FOR FREE By JAMES CANNON National Secretary, The following article is the first chapter of a pamphlet Shachtman was paraphrasing Trotsky and not Burnham, he himwritten by comrade Cannon to sum up the seven months self wrote: discussion in the party on the question of the Soviet Union At bottoni, the ultra leftists position on the Soviet Union, lished in the Internal Bulletin. Now that the Third National which denkes it any claim whatsoever to being a workers state, reflects the vacillations of the petty bourgeois, their inability to Convention of the party has settled the disputes by a do make a firm choice between the camps of the proletariat and the cisive majority, this article will acquaint our readers with bourgeoisie, of revolution and imperialism.
the party estimate of the dispute. In the next Issues of the This quotation, from an article written in the New International APPEAL we shall publish other chapters of comrade Can by Shachtman two years ago, can be accepted as a srientific non pamphlet Editors. definition of the opposition combination and its present position, with only one sma 15 hardly correct to describe their position as What the Discussion Has Revealed The leaders of the opposition in the past have written and Political struggles in general, including serious factional strug spoken a great deal along the lines of the above quotation. Year in gles in a party, do not take place in a vacuum. They are carried and year out in innumerable articles, documents, theses and on under the pressure of social forces, and reflect the class struggle speeches the leaders of the opposition have been promising and to one degree or another. This law is demonstrated in the most even threatening to defend the Soviet Union. In the hour of danstriking manner in the development of the present discussion ger we will be at our posts. but when ihe hour drew near, when within our party.
the Soviet Union almost began to need this defense, they welched At the present time the pressure of alien class forces upon the on their promise.
So proletarian vanguard is exceptionally heavy. We must understand the program in general, with the doctrine, the methods this first of all. Only then can we approach an understanding of and the tradition of Marxism. When all this ceased to be the subthe present crisis in the party. It is the most severe and profound ject for literary exercises in times of tranquility and had to be taken as a guide to action in time of war, they forgot everything crisis our movement has ever known on an international scale. The unprecedented tension in the ranks signalizes a conflict of printhat had been said and written and started a frantic search for new and fresh ideas. In the first half serious test they revealed cipled positions which is obviously irreconcilable. Two camps in the party fight for different programs, different methods and differthemselves as peace time Trotskyists.
ent traditions.
And this shameful performance, this betrayal of Marxism, has What has brought the party to this situation in such a short taken place in the American section of the Fourth International even before the formal entry of American imperialism into the space of time? Obviously it is not a suddenly discovered personal war. In the bible of the opposition, their document on The War incompatibility of the individual leaders involved; such trifles are symptoms of the conflict, not causes. Nor can a conflict of this and Bureaucratic Conservatism, we are assured that the party depth and scope be plausibly explained by the faring up of ola crisis was provoked by the war. That is not precisely accurate differences of opinion on the organization question. In order to America has not yet formally entered into the war, and thus far we have only a faint intimation of the moral and material pressure understand the real significance of the crisis it is necessary to look for profounder causes.
which will be brought to bear against the proletarian vanguard For those who understand politics as an expression of the class under war conditions. Not the war, but merely the shadow of the struggle and that is the way we Marxista understand it the approaching war was enough to send Burnham, Shachtman and basic cause of the crisis in the party is not hard to find. The crisis Abern on their mad atampede.
signifies the reaction in our ranks to external social pressure. That Gratuitously attributing to the party their own panic, these is the way we have defined it from the outset of the crisis last comrades who read their document on the party regime will draw philosophers of retreat and capitulation express the opinion that September, immediately following the signing of the Soviet Nazi pact and the beginning of the German invasion of Poland. More The future is dark. And Burnham, who bared his petty bourgeois from it cynical or discouraged or defeatist conclusions. They add: precisely, we say the crisis is the result of the pressure of bourgeois democratic public opinion upon section of the party leadersoul in a special document entitled, Science and Style, proclaims with malicious satisfaction the wish is father to the thought the ship. That is our class analysis of the unrestrained struggle between the proletarian and the petty bourgeols tendencies in our downfall of the Fourth International. The reality is diametrically party.
opposite to these lugubrious observations.
We define the contending factions not by such abstract general In the proletarian majority of the party there is not a trace of pessimism. On the contrary, there is universal satisfaction that terms as conservative and progressive. We judge the factions not by the psychologie traits of individuals, but by the programs the defection of a section of the party leadership revealed itself in time, before the war, and under conditions where it could be comthey defend. The discussion has revealed not a difference of opinbatted openly and in free discussion and beaten down. The virtual ion about the application of the program such differences frounanimity with which the proletarian cadres have rallied to the quently occur and usually have a transitory significance but an attempt to counterpose one program to another. This is what has defense of the party and the Fourth International, the militancy divided the party into two camps. Naturally, these terms, which and irreconcilability with which they have met the attack of we have used from the beginning of the discussion to characterize Burnham, Abern and Shachtman is living proof of the vitality and the two tendencies in the party, are meant as definitions and not indestructibility of our movement. That is a good omen for the epithets. It is necessary to repeat this in every debate between future. It gives us confidence that it will stand up against the real test of war when it comes. It gives grounds for the most Marxists and petty bourgeois politicians of all types; the one thing optimistic calculation that the Fourth International will not only they cannot tolerate is to be called by their right name. survive, but conquer in struggle.
The leaders of the opposition consider it outrageous, a malicious faction invention, for us to place this class signboard above their We Do Not Fear the Future faction, when their only offense consists in the simple fact that As for the hard tuture the Bolshevik Marxists never exthey turn their backs on the Soviet Union and deny it defense in pected that the period of the death agony of capitalism could prothe struggle against world imperialism. But our definition and duce anything but crises and war with their inevitable reperdescription of such an attitude is not new. Back in the days when cussions in workers organizations, including the party of the workers vanguard. From these hard circumstances, the Fourth imperialist propaganda. Our voices may very well be drowned Internationalists only drew the conclusion that the grandiose out for a time by the first waves of patriotism: We are going to social convulsions, which we foresaw and analyzed in advance, day against the stream. He who argues against our program from create the conditions out of which the oppressed masses, impelled the standpoint that it is difficult to make it persuasive to the by iron necessity, must carry through the social revolution and workers, is thereby yielding to the democratic pressure; if logical, the reorganization of the world on a socialist basis. Only one thing he will end up in the patriotic camp.
is needed: a genuine Bolshevik party of the vanguard. Only Marx40. We are not a government party; we are the party of ism can be the program of such a party. Burnham and his sorry Irreconcilable opposition, not only in capitalist countries but also disciples, the ex Marxists, ex Trotskyists, offer a program that has in the Our tasks, among them the defense of the nothing in common with Marxism or the proletarian revolution. we realize not through the medium of bourgeois gov From this arises the fundamental conflict between the majority ernments and not even through the government of the and the opposition, conflict which is manifestly irreconcilable but exclusively through the education of the masses, through and to which all other questions, however important, are never agitation, through explaining to the workers what they should theless subordinate.
defend and what they should overthrow. Such a defense cannot In the course of a few months discussion the differences begive immediate miraculous results. Our work must be directed so tween the majority and the opposition have reached such depth that the workers on whom we have influence should correctly and scope as to completely overshadow all questions of party appraise events, not permit themselves to be caught unawares, regime. If all the alleged faults of the regime were true, and then and prepare the general sentiment of their own class, for the multiplied ten times over, the whole question would pale into inrevolutionary solution of the tasks confronting us.
significance bealde the principled differences which now clearly This kind of defense of the naturally differs, as night separate the two contending factions. The struggle of the opposition from day, from the official defense which the Stalinists conduct. ostensibly began as a struggle against the Cannon regime, and The difference is summed up in these slogans. The Stalinists say: as a defense, or at any rate as an anticipation of the changing For the Fatherland! For Stalin! The defense waged by the position of Trotsky. But in a short time it unfolded as a fundaFourth International is carried on under the slogan: For Social mental conflict with the Fourth International over all the questions ism! For the world revolution! Against Stalin!
of our program, our method and our tradition.
THE MAIN DANGER Minority Resolution On On The ASIA! FOR WORLD FEDERATION OF SOCIALIST REPUBLICS!
Puts In Imperialist Camp The Soviet Union is participating integrally in the world imperialist war for the re division of the earth. The Russian revolutionists and the Russian masses generally neither desired nor welcomed Stalin war. The Soviet workers and peasants and the nationally oppressed peoples of the will express their discontent and hatred of the counter revolutionary bureaucracy and its predatory war as an anti war opposition movement the only real basis for the revolutionary overthrow of Stalin in the present war. The reactionary character of its participation is demonstrated equally by: the policy and aims of the Soviet government and army bureaucratic expansionism which in no way advance or defend the interests of the Russian or the world proletariat, but on the contrary are solely in the interests of the preservation and extension of the power, privileges and revenues of the bureaucracy; the character of the alliance with Germany; and by the effects of its participation, which are in no way to advance the pre requisites of the socialist revolution above all the independent struggle of the proletariat and the colonial peoples for power, freedom, and socialism. but on the contrary to wipe out those pre requisites. Stalin present war is no more a war in defense of nationalized property than Daladter is a defense of democ4. Revolutionary socialists are obligated therefore to revise the former conception of unconditional defense of the Soviet Union, which, under the circumstances of the present war, leads to a strategy which is in direct opposition to the interests of the world socialist revolution. The general strategy of the third camp applies to the Soviet government and armies as to the other belligerent powers. In certain concrete cases, as, for example, in the invasion of Finland, we raise such slogans as, Withdraw the Red Army from Finland. Stop the war. etc. The slogans FOR FREE SOVIET UKRAINE! and for freedom of the other nonRussian nationalities within the Soviet Union who may wish it, FOR WORKERS CONTROL OF INDUSTRY! FOR WORKERS DEMOCRACY! DOWN WITH PRIVILEGE! FOR THE OVERTHROW OF THE BUREAUCRACY. and the struggle for these and for the other economic and social demands of the workers and peasants, irrespective of the effect of this struggle upon the military front, together with the international orientation proposed in the general slogans applicable to the war, these alone answer the needs of the Russian masses, including the genuine defense of nationalized property and its utilization for socialist development, and will fuge their struggle with that of the masses of the entire world for PEACE THROUGH SOCIALISM.
Poses Various Possibilities It is not possible to give in advance a detailed reply to all hypothetical variants of future developments of the war. But, for example, if the present enemies of Germany were to engage the Red Army on Russian or non Russian soil, as an extension of their opposition to Russian aid to Germany and conflict with Stalinist bureaucratic expansion that is, if the character of Russia participation in the war would remain the same (as described in point our present position would remain unchanged. However, if the character of the war changes from one of inter imperialist conflict, in which the Red Army acts as a pawn of one imperialist power and as an instrument of bureaucratic expansion, into a war determined by the capitalist imperialist politics of destruction of Soviet state property and the reduction of Russia to a colony that is, is determined by the world antagonism of capitalist imperialism and Soviet nationalized economy our position would change corresponding to the change in the character of the war. In such a war, the Stalinist bureaucracy, despite the fact that it continues to defend, in its own way, its power and revenue, would be conducting a progressive war. The revolutionary working class would in this case adopt the position of defense of the Soviet Union. Our position would be dictated by the interests of the world proletariat which coincide with the struggle to defend Soviet nationalized property from liquidation by any imperialist power or powers. The defense of the Soviet Union would be conducted by us independently, without for a moment abandoning the political struggle against the counterrevolutionary bureaucracy. In the United States, our main enemy remains at home.
The special task of the Socialist Workers Party is resistance to all attempts of the bourgeoisie and its government, and of the labor bureaucracy and social patriots, to exploit the crimes of Stalinism for the purpose of identifying it with revolutionary socialism, and for the purpose of whipping up an imperialist prowar spirit among the masses and of dragging the country into war.
racy.