Subject: Re: Who won in Vietnam? / Trotskyist orthodoxy?
Date: Tue, 9 Apr 1996 02:36:01 +-200



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Robert:
>What,s Trotskyist orthodoxy?

Rahul:
>I'm no expert here. Lou Proyect could probably give you an earful. But here
>goes. The theory of permanent revolution
Right this one

>the obsession with the potential
>of minuscule "vanguard" sects (viz. Trotsky's statement to a tiny group of
>American communists he addressed in the 1920's that "you are the vanguard
>of the vanguard.").
True, Trotsky's forces in the 30's were small. If by "vanguard" you mean the
minority, which at that time wanted to fight for socialism as the self-eman-
cipation of the working class against reformism and stalinism, - then yes.

>I would add the constant invocation of Trotsky as some
>kind of figure who stood for freedom and justice against the ogre Stalin.
And you don't think so?

>True, Stalin was a paranoid monster who killed *everybody* he got his hands
>on, but they were both absolutely dictatorial.
True, the leader of the Red Army - which necessarily needed to use ex-zarist
officers - was dictatorial in the war against white armies, from inside Russia
and from abroad.
Was there another way? Or should they just have given up? I think no.

>To me, the biggest
>difference between them is that Trotsky lost; only after he was removed
>from the prospect of power could he abandon the ways of a petty tyrant.
It, of course, is a hypothetical question what would have happened if
Trotsky had won. One possible scenario is that Trotsky would have followed
the line, that Stalin did. But such an assumption has the weakness that
it presumes that Trotsky would have abandonded his internationalism, would
have sided with another class.

I don't know if he would have done so - and that's not the point, is it?
I think the point is that in *real* history Trotsky looked to the elements that
would bring world socialism closer.
Whether we would have had world socialism now if Trotsky had not lost is
open for debate. What we know is that with Stalin we got the opposite.

>His
>first break with Stalin over policy was that he wanted to murder the kulaks
>and force collectivization at a time when Stalin was still following a
>policy of appeasing the right. Later, Stalin did exactly what Trotsky had
>suggested, which resulted in a bloodbath and the persistent failure of
>Soviet agriculture to develop in any reasonable way.
I am with Walter Daum on this one.

>Still, in his later years Trotsky wrote a great deal that was worth reading.
So his role in history was that he wrote good stories? Come on. Was that
what he was killed for?

I think Trotsky was a revolutionary socialist. He had his strengths and his
weaknesses - like Marx, Engels, Luxemburg, Lenin and others.

The -isms of Marx, Lenin etc. come from times of *historical splits*.
Marxism came about when socialism was given a scientific ground.
Leninism came about when reformists chose to send workers to
the trenches of WW 1 instead of leading them towards revolution.
Trotskyism came about when Stalin smashed the russian revolution
and with it the hope for world revolution.

An older and more experienced comrade once explained to me the
importance of these past revolutionaries: "We shouldn't lick their boots
- we should stand on their shoulders".
(He probably stole this image from someone - I dont know whom?)

A critical examination of the experiences from the works and life
of Trotsky IMO enable us to look farther than if we hadn't had
Trotsky's shoulders to stand on.

PS:
Marxist *orthodoxy* won't help anybody - but his main ideas certainly
will. The same goes for Trotsky. IMHO.


Yours

Jorn Andersen

IS
Denmark


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