Date: Sat, 1 Mar 1997 02:16:07 -0500
From: malecki-AT-algonet.se (Robert Malecki)
Subject: M-G: Re: M-I: "Third-world" Stalinism?


Z writes;

>I think there is something important that many first-world anti-Stalinists
>do not understand.

As usual a very thoughtful and polite political analisis on a new term which 
appears to being coined on this list "Third World Stalinism". Unfortunately 
I believe Z is wrong on all counts in this. The first part of her analisisis 
I think is something along the lines of dialectics from the heart instead of 
dialectical materialism. And the second part of her analisis is in fact 
bowing to exactly what the clone versions of Stalinism love. And that is 
mainly that all of these old fights should be thrown into the grave so that 
we can together fight for a Socialist future of some sorts. Unfortunately my 
answer can not be as polite and put in nice words. But I will do my best to 
keep it on a political level. I should mention here that I use "Z" because I 
intend to put this in a future issue of Cockroach because the whole issue is 
in fact extremely important for the youthful Communists who will be coming 
in back of us... 
>
>For the record, I'm no fan of Stalin himself, although I must admit that I
>can visualize how such a regime came to power in a place like Russia, and
>also think if it wasn't Stalin himself, there'd be many others to lead the
>country in such a manner. So, not a personality issue.

Extremely imteresting beginning by Z. However one will see very soon that Z 
is being very pretentious and pasting her own pipedream on *real* historical 
events and naturally neglecting to mention the both great and huge 
historical struggle that has been going on since Lenin and his followers 
became the "Bolsheviks" and most of what happened afterwards...
>
>The problem is multi-dimensional.
>
>1) Nobody here thinks what most people in the west think regarding what
>*really* happened during Stalin era. The same bourgeois press that tells
>them that their lives are improving, that child-labour does not exist, that
>no official case of cholera was recorded in the past year, that we are a
>democracy, that there are no Kurds (only mountain Turks) are telling them
>that Stalin was a terrible, terrible dictator. Wanna guess what the
>inference is?

Yes, the above is true! And so does this mean that we can excuse ourselves 
>from responsibility of the political mistakes of the Stalinists? THe 
political mistakes which led to great historical feats, drowning poor and 
working class people in blood of a world war and the crushing of many 
revolutionary uppsurges into bloody defeat just because the Stalinists on 
orders from Moscow took the path they did. China,Spain,Germany, 
Vietnam,Indonesia just to name a few...Now it certainly was not the 
bougeoisie that was responisible for the many defeats which historically 
places us in the position that we find ourselves today--it was and is the 
poltics of the Social Democracy and the Stalinists..
>
>2) Your workmate lost a hand today, your children are constantly underfed,
>in fact, you've lost a small one to a disease that was easily curable, the
>boss shouted that you were a stupid worm and half days wage would be cut for
>being ten minutes late. Someone tells you that Stalin killed the bosses and
>made sure everybody had a job. That's more or less all you know. Does it
>sound too bad? I personally think the more blood a revolution has on its
>hands, the less likely it is to survive. This is not just humane instinct,
>it is very hard to build a new world after a bloodbath (even if it can be
>understood and even even justified on the argument that otherwise
>capitalism's more murderous regime would continue). 

I oppose this view of poor and working class people. Not only is it wrong 
but completely undialectical. I doubt very much that Z can even prove that 
this is true. But is unfortunately using this arguement to become an 
apoligist for Stalinism. In fact conditions in the Russia prior to the 
October Revolution certainly could be seen as one of the most backward 
countries in the world did not stop Lenin and the Bolsheviks from applying a 
correct policy and winning the Proletarian Vanguard to its banners to point 
the way forward. In fact what you are denying here is what Trotsky wrote in 
his "Results and Prospects which layed the basis for his theroy of "The 
Permanent Revolution".. Which basically opposes this apoligetic point of 
view coming in your case from the heart with basically a scientific 
dialectical theroy to confront the problems of the so called "backward" 
masses in the third world..In fact it is the Proletariat in the Third World 
which is the Revolutionary force which can change society just as it is the 
Proletariat in the first world!!
>
>For the working class to support this, they'd need a different kind of
>consciousness and involvement in the revolution. Neither condemnation (nor
>flattery) of something that is so far away from their immediate concerns
>will bring this about.

Nor will raising a program with minumal demands to confront the poor and 
working classes plight either do that. Nor by hiding the crimes and 
political line of the Stalinists under the bed for the sake of unity. 
Because it was just this kind of unity which led to some of those horrible 
historical defeats in the third world. And you polite apoligist kind of line 
will not help the plight of the masses dip shit. In fact it will only point 
them down the road to new defeats...
>
>3) The working class in most of the third world is trained and raised to be
>servile, unquestioning before authority, not-thinking, not-evaluating.
>That's one of the main causes that many revolutionary organisations
>completely lack internal democracy. While one may say that they theorise
>such non-democratic structure, I agree that the process is, ahem,
>dialectical and the cause-to-effect starts from the fact that there really
>is not too much demand for democracy. In fact, just trying to force
>democracy often backfires. You can't expect people to start expressing
>themselves one hour after they've contacted revolutionaries after they've
>spent a lifetime of being trained and threatened and punished not to express
>themselves. 

The above is a complete falsification of history. The Russian Revolution is 
proof that what you say above is just soft sympathetic garbage. In fact 
Russia proved exactly the opposite in that "backward" Russia proved to be 
the "weakest" link in the imperialist chain after the first world war and 
with the leadership of Lenin and the Bolsheviks a successful Proletarian 
rising and siezure of poiwer was accomplished.
In the 20ties it was the Shanghi proletariat which led the way. 
Unfortunately the Shangi Hai Proletariat was sold down the drain by the 
Stalinists who were then consolidating their power and determining political 
line in the COMINTERN. In this case "Socialism in One Country" was connected 
to the Chinese Popular Front "The block of Four Classes" . The above two 
examples being the positive and the negative poles of Revolutionary Marxism. 

And this stuff about "you can't expect people to start expressing themselves 
one hour after contacting revolutionaries" is appalling coming from someone 
claiming to be a marxist. It is turning marxism upside down and in fact I 
think probably one of the classical thoughts of a Stalinist Bureacrat!  
Shang Hai being a good example of the backward masses being far ahead of the 
Stalinist leadership and in fact betrayed by that very same leadership. 
Because in the final analisis it is just those simple and elementry thoughts 
of poor and working class people arouind bread which is one of the driving 
forces of Revolution. Just as the Bolshevik Party is the ideological 
locomotive.. 
>
>That would be an interesting issue to discuss, and I think much more
>fruitful than "Stalin was good, was not, was too".

No! You line is nothing interesting to discuss but a complete lack of faith 
in the role of a Leninist Vanguard Party and those horrible "backward" 
masses where you see yourself as some "Florence NightingGale" at best riding 
in on her white horse to lift the masses from their horrible situation 
albeit with some pedagogogical nonsense. The masses do not need this kind of 
top down sinking to their level garbage. The masses must base their struggle 
on the concrete conditions that they find themselves in in respective 
countries. The masses must build a Proletarian Vanguard Party which can show 
the way forward because it is only the Proletariat with its position in 
society that makes it the revolutionary class that it is! However this 
certainly does not mean sinking to the classical version of minimum programs 
which Lenin argued against. Nor does it mean we should deny the neccessity 
of a vanguard party as the tool to intervene in the struggle..
>
>Now, I'd really pause a long time before passing judgement on say the
>Shining Path, the PKK, the IRA, or any other such movement without really
>understanding what's going on in that country, and how the people perceive
>their own organisation, their own past, the US, the Soviet Union.

More apoligies for so called "Third World Stalinism". In the first place 
Third World Stalinism does not exist. It is a product of your imagination 
linked to the rather particular despicable view that you have on the 
backward masses. In fact this fake Third World Stalinism derives from the 
COMINTERN under the leadership of Stalin and was based on the theroy of 
Socialism in One Country and the turn towards the tactic of the Popular 
Front. In fact the very same point where Stalin left far behind anything to 
do with Leninism or Marxism which in fact means fighting for the 
dictatorship of the Proletariat as a transitional society in the march 
towards Communism for a line of making the historic compromise with the 
capitalist and imperialist deadly enemies of the Proletariat. And THIS STEP 
was the first step towards the DOOM of the Soviet Union and the prospects of 
World Revolution for a long time to come.

In fact your defense of the Stalinists in Peru today and elsewhere under the 
cover of not knowing what is going on is in fact a continuation of giving 
support to a political line which started in the 1920ties around the Chinese 
Revolution and led it to a blood bath and that is the politics of the stage 
theroy of revolution and the popular front which are the main pillars of 
Stalinism. So instead of helping things along to find clarity on what went 
wrong you are helping to cover up the trail of the Stalinists who want to 
forget about all those horrible crimes and politically continue down the 
disastrous political path that as led to so many defeats. The latest being 
the Nicaraguan Revolution. Just as in Turkey today their are myriads of 
organisations who politically encompass the fundemental political line of 
Stalinism and are dead wrong --which will lead to new defats in Turket as 
well. And acting like a unity momgering Miss NightGale will certainly not 
help poor and working class people one bit.  
>
>Just the fact alone that the Soviets were the enemy of the US was a cause in
>many third world countries to think that Soviet Union must be very very
>good. We can be critical of the Shining Path from where we stand, but that
>movement has the hearts and minds of many Peruvian peasants and workers as
>an organisation fighting the Fujimori regime. Since the ascension of the
>PKK, Kurds are no longer "Mountain Turks". Just as it would be incorrect to
>say squatters don't deserve our support because so many of them are in the
>informal economy or in the reserve proletariat, it is equally ignorant to
>condemn any movement in the third-world because of its views regarding the
>Soviet Union. There are too many decent, fighting organisations and people
>in the world that have views on Stalin that would be unacceptable to many
>first-world revolutionaries.

That the PCP hads the hearts and minds of some of the peasants is not enough 
to give them a blank check. Nor the fact that sometimes they point the guns 
in the right direction. The point being is that the PCP is a party which 
bases itself on the personal cult of Gonzalo as being a fucking god and the 
stage theroy of revolution, the popular front and the ideas od peasant 
gurella warfare leading to the dictatorship of the Proletariat. All their 
political positions are in fact not heading one tiny bit in that direction 
of a real proletarian revolution and hardly can be and example for 
Revolutionary Marxism in Latin America. In fact you are copping out and 
using the "backwardness" of the masses to capitulate and be soft on a 
political line that has proved historically to be disastrous to poor and 
working class people time and again . Starting with the Shang Hai 
Proletariat which was butchered just because of some of the very same 
theories that the PCP are fighting for. And already numerous times Aldolfo 
has claimed he is ready to make the deal with the liberal wing of the 
bougeoisie! In fact and alliance between the PCP and the liberal bougeousie 
in Peru is a betrayal of the poor and working class people in Peru. Just as 
Stalinist politics in other parts of the world under existing circumstances 
is a betrayal because it does not lead the masses to victory but political 
defeat time and again...
>
>As far as I know, there are really no movements left in the first-world left
>count and that are pro-Stalin. Is there any big (well, sizable) first world
>movement that I don't know of, in this regard?

You are beginning to sound like Proyect here. if its big enough then who 
cares what the political line is! Appalling Z just appalling..And No i doubt 
that any hardline Stalinist party exists in the first world. Although Gus 
Hall's party is about as closest one can get. But what is more interesting 
and vital is that the Stalinists have done a hattrick and now call 
themselves "EuroCommunists". But the fundemental line of Stalinist politics 
is the same in regards to the popular front and stage theory of revolution. 
So what difference does it make if they now can say well Stalin was a pretty 
horrible guy and then stand politcally for Stalinist politics today and are 
preparing new betrayals...
>
>That's why, this striving-to-be-international list, should not shut out any
>movement, and should not continue sterile debates, and definitely not
>provoke such debates. If the aim is to sincerely help revolutionaries from
>many countries talk, discuss and hopefully, one day, act together, such
>provacation and/or repetition serves no one.

This is a figment of your imagination. These debates are hardly sterile but 
vital to the success or failure of any future revolution. Because if you do 
not learn anything from the mistakes and successes of the past then you 
certainly will not be going anywhere in the future. And you ideas of a 
family of revolutionaries is wrong also. Lenin, Marx, Trotsky (in his later 
days), certainly did not ever try to put "unity" before political clarity. 
And in fact you are doing exactly the opposite. You are trying to tell us 
that all this old stuff is sterile. Bullshit. Only the Stalinists with the 
exception of Aldolfo want to forget about the old and build a "new" on 
exactly the same fundemental political foundations of the past! That is what 
is going on with all of this talk about putting things in the past. 
>
>By the way, if anybody wants to draw up a list of Stalin FAQ and put their
>answers to it, and perhaps if everyone interested does it, I promise to make
>it known on our info sheet for new subscribers that such a FAQ is available.
>That way, anybody really interested in anyone's views about Stalin can learn
>them. The FAQs should not be too long. And, we'll be spared the repetition.

No matter what kind of manovres or lists or FAQs that you creat Z will not 
change the fundemental political dialectics that exist in the present 
period. No bleeding heart the poor masses shit, nor being soft on the 
Stalinists, nor the cry for "Unity" which will explode in your face at the 
first sign of serious class struggle will help you. The political 
contradictions of the past linked to the Social Democracy, The Bolsheviks, 
The Stalinists, and the Trotskyists are based on the gigantic struggle that 
has been taking place since the beginning of the workers movement and the 
victory of the first and ONLY Proletarian Revolution on this Planet. Out of 
this clear political lines must be drawn up and fought out. Nothing in the 
world can change that except perhaps a scenario like in the recent film 
"Independence Day" which would change the dialectical map considerably. 
Nothing is new at present that you can present to this list. Your unity 
mongering and apoligies for the politics of the Stalinists is in fact a step 
in the wrong direction and a step away from poor and working class people 
whom I honestly thing you really care for..

Warm regards
Bob Malecki



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