Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 09:18:21 -0500 (EST)
From: Gerald Levy <glevy-AT-pratt.edu>
Subject: Re: AUT: Stalin/Trotsky


George Pennefather wrote:

> There is no essential difference between the politics of Trotsky and
> Stalin.

> Both equally supported the suppression of democracy both outside and
> inside the Bolshevik party.

That depends on what period of time one is talking about.

> They both supported the abandonment of war communism and its indefinite
> replacement by NEP. 

That is wrong. Trotsky (like Lenin) viewed the NEP as a necessary but
*temporary* retreat from War Communism.

> They both supported fast track industrialisation and
> forced collectivisation of farming --even if the form on which it was to
> be done was to vary slightly in the case of each of these Bolshevik
> figures.

Again, you are factually incorrect. Trotsky *never* supported forced
collectivisation. 

> Essentially they both supported what has been termed "socialism in one
> country".

Wrong again. Trotsky *never* supported "socialism in a single country".

> In the indefinite
> absence of European or world revolution Trotsky would have had to
> essentially pursue the same domestic policies as Stalin did. 

But in *fact* Trotsky did oppose most all of the "domestic policies"
instituted by Stalin.

> But as we all know socialism
> in one country is a contradiction in terms.

And Trotsky was the one who most strongly made this point.

> Essentially Trotskyism and Stalinism, as they are called, are merely
> different forms of Leninism <snip>

That depends on how you define Leninism.

I am not a Trotskyist, but I am appalled by the plethora of false  
statements in your post. I understand the anarchist critique of
Leninism and am not entirely unsympathetic to that perspective, but we
must attempt to establish the facts rather than bend those facts in either
or any direction. The "falsification of history" was a tactic well-tried
and employed by Stalin; "revisionist history" is the historical
perspective the the Far Right and Neo-Liberalism. We should not copy
either Stalin or the Neo-Liberal idealogues.

In studying history, truth must be sought before propaganda.

Jerry



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