Date: Mon, 8 Jul 1996 11:19:43 -0700 (PDT)
From: Vladimir Bilenkin <azarov-AT-igc.apc.org>
Subject: Re: vanguards, lenin's mummy & the trotsky cults




>>Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, et. al. share a common tradition: the 
>>establishment of warfare state socialism in a semi-peripheral country. 

>>The mummification of Lenin by his bolshevik comrades - an ancient 
>>death rite associated with absolute power - reveals the degree of 
>>mystification surrounding bolshevik rule during Lenin's lifetime. 
>>By the time of his death, the bolshevik interpretation of marxism 
>>was well on the way to becoming soviet religion.

>>The sectarian nature of trotskyism - which Louis P. is willing to 
>>view through the prism of religio-political analogy - developed 
>>within and against the soviet religion at the moment of stalinist 
>>inquisition. 

>>Neither Stalin nor the Trotsky cults fell out of the sky. 

>>Michael Luftmensch

>Louis: This post is so reductionist that I wouldn't even know where to 
>start in trying to reply. So I won't.

I would rather say this post is mystificatory and remarkably similar to 
the most hackneyed cliches of anti-communist propaganda in Russia and 
elsewhere. It deserves a reply precisely because it is so 
characteristic of the ideological "elective affinity" between the 
"democratic left" and openly bourgeois ideologists of both liberal and 
neoliberal persuasions. (Another fresh example of this sort can be 
found in the latest posts on the Russian election by Kagarlitsky, 
Buzgalin, and Kolganov).

The brevity of this post - in stark contrast to the scope of its 
generalizations - makes any involved argumentation inappropriate at 
this point, so I'll make just a few short comments and ask a few 
questions in hope that Mr. Luftmensch will elucidate for us the 
research, the analysis, and its methodology which have led him to his 
conclusions.

There is little or no connection between the paragraphs of the post, so 
I'll comment on them separately.

>>Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, et. al. share a common tradition: the 
>>establishment of warfare state socialism in a semi-peripheral country.

"Warfare state socialism" sounds like a new definition to me. Is "state 
socialism" possible?  Is "warfare" socialism possible?  For a Marxist 
these are oxymorons. Are you a Marxist, Mr. Luftmensch?  And who are 
those mysterious "et al."?  Is there any socialist revolutionary who 
actually led the masses in their armed struggle in this century who 
would be blessed by you?  Or the only sort of revolutionaries that you 
can stomach is a "pacifist revolutionary" - another neat oxymoron and a 
petty-bourgeois 'poshlost'?  

The early Soviet Union was indeed a semi-peripheral, backward, 
underdeveloped country in relation to the advanced capitalist countries 
of the West. Above all, it is the latter who were and are the "warfare" 
imperialist countries. And one of them actually created the warfare 
national-socialist state. You could not find more "central,"  more 
"cultured" country than that one. It was defeated by the "warfare" 
Soviet state, created by Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin. To me, this fact 
alone - even without any elementary discerment between the three and 
their parts in the "common tradition" - is enough to put these people 
far outside the range of the petty moralisms on which the "democratic 
left" culture thrives.

>>The mummification of Lenin by his bolshevik comrades - an ancient 
>>death rite associated with absolute power - reveals the degree of 
>>mystification surrounding bolshevik rule during Lenin's lifetime. 
>>By the time of his death, the bolshevik interpretation of marxism 
>>was well on the way to becoming soviet religion.

It is well known that Trotsky, Krupskaya, and many other leading 
"bolshevik comrades" were against the mummification of Lenin's body. 
Would Lenin himself approve it? A rhetorical question!  What does THIS 
"reveal" to Mr. Luftmensch?  And since Lenin during his "lifetime" was 
imporant part of the "bolshevik rule" can he give us examples of this 
"mystification" from Lenin's books, articles, speeches to the workers, etc?

Let us say that there is such mysterious "bolshevik interpretation of 
marxism" equally shared and acted upon by "Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, et 
al." And let us agree for a moment that it had indeed become "soviet 
religion."  Is it the worst of all modern religions, including that of 
"democracy" pure and simple? Let us say that millions of Soviet people 
lacked the critical abilities of Mr. Luftmensch and that they 
"religiously" believed in the fundamental ideals of social existence 
proclaimed by the October Revolution.  They also tried to make these 
ideals a reality in a collective effort unprecedented in the history of 
mankind. They had their accomplishments and failures, victories and 
tragedies, mass heroism and mass repressions, blood and tears, 
happiness and love -  the stuff history made of, only hundred times 
more intense and full of drama, in comparison to which Shakespeare's 
tragedies may seem vaudevilles. What historical accomplishments give 
right the tradition and the collective for which Mr. Luftmensch speaks 
out to high-handedly judge the Soviet people and their historical 
record?   The only tribunal of history is that of the revolutionary 
class itself who knows how to love and to hate. It is up to this class, 
not to the philistines of the world to pronounce the final verdict on 
the first workers' state.

>>Neither Stalin nor the Trotsky cults fell out of the sky. 

Nor did the "democratic" critics of both.  The first obvious step of 
those who pride on and call others to "critical thinking and critical 
feeling" is to subject their own political and social provenance to the 
scrutiny by these faculties, and, above all, to account for the 
scandalous similarity between their "critique" of the Bolsheviks and 
Soviet history, and the ideological platitudes of the triumphant reaction.

Vladimir 




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