Leslie Goonewardene

Rise And Fall Of The Comintern

The Toll Of The Popular Front

Chapter Eight

SOVIET FOREIGN POLICY AND THE 7TH CONGRESS

The victory of Hitler in Germany led to a decisive change in the orientation of the foreign policy of the Soviet Union. Hitherto, in the West, it has been Anglo-French intervention that Stalin had feared. With the advent of Hitler to power and the resulting threat to Anglo-French imperialism, this particular danger receded at least temporarily, into the background. But in its place there arose the more formidable and more imminent danger of German intervention itself. The fulminations of Hitler against Communism and his open threats against the Soviet Union only emphasised the danger.

What counter measures did Stalin take? In September 1934 Russia joined the League of Nations. In May 1935 the Franco-Soviet Pact—a military alliance was signed in which each party promised to come to the aid of the other in the event of German aggression. In the same month Stalin declared to the French Premier Laval that he “understood and approved completely the policy of National Defence of France”. Though constituting a temporary check to Hitler, the Franco-Soviet Pact was of little value, since the military intervention of France against Germany was subject to the approval of Great Britain. Stalin therefore aimed at an Anglo-Franco-Soviet pact to achieve his purpose. The formation of the Rome-Berlin Axis in 1936 and of the Anti-Comintern Pact of Germany, Italy and Japan soon after, made Stalin redouble his efforts to secure an alliance of the “democratic” countries with Russia against the fascist countries.

No one can question the right of the Soviet Union to take advantage of divisions among the imperialist nations and to conclude even military pacts for the purpose of its own defence. But it is short-sighted folly to imagine that pacts with capitalist governments can serve as a reliable basis for securing the defence of the Soviet Union. It is sheer chicanery to deceive the workers of the world into believing that the class character and policies of a capitalist state alters one whit by the fact that its government is prepared, for its own imperialist purposes, to make an alliance with the Soviet Union. And above all, it is base treachery to subordinate the needs of the international movement to the interests of Soviet foreign policy. But this is precisely what the degenerated Comintern did, in callous and blatant fashion, in the decade that has followed the victory of fascism in Germany. Having long since abandoned faith in world revolution, the Soviet bureaucrats saw in the Comintern only an instrument for securing support for their foreign policies, and did not hesitate to use it to ‘placate’ the bourgeoisie of the “democratic” countries.

The Seventh World Congress of the 3rd International, meeting in August 1935 after a lapse of seven years, officially set the party on the new line. The world was divided into peace-loving democratic capitalisms like Britain, France, and Czechoslovakia (with whom Russia desired alliance), and war-loving capitalisms like Germany and Japan (who constituted a war threat to Russia). The victory of Socialism in the Soviet Union was declared to have been finally and irrevocably achieved. But the most infamous of all was the new tactic of the Popular Front which was prescribed as the method of defeating fascism.

We have stated earlier that the rise of fascism is the inevitable consequence of the inability of the bourgeoisie to maintain its class rule through bourgeois parliamentarism in conditions of capitalist decline. In other words the growth of the fascist danger in a particular country means that bourgeois-democracy has become incompatible with the existence of bourgeois class rule. Henceforth in that country only one of two solutions is possible. Either the proletarian revolution which overthrows the class rule of the bourgeoisie and substitutes thereof the class rule of the proletariat, or the fascist reaction which gives another lease of life to capitalism. The former alternative demands the formation of a united front of the working class against fascism as the first step in the struggle for the overthrow of capitalism. This means in practice a united front of the revolutionary party with other working class parties (notably the Social Democrats).

The tactic of the united front consists in an agreement for joint action between different parties and organisations having different programmes. A correct application of this tactic demands that the revolutionary party does not give up its own programme for a common political programme with other parties; that it preserves its full independence and that it reserves the right to criticise its allies. Such a united front between the revolutionary party and other working class parties, coupled with a bold and resolute leadership that will not hesitate to break openly when necessary, with the vacillating Social Democratic allies in order to carry the working class forward to the final assault, is the only way to defeat fascism. In Germany basing itself on Soviet Union foreign policy considerations, the Comintern rejected the path of a united front of the working class parties and condemned the German working class to the penal servitude of fascism. Now, corresponding to the demand of Soviet foreign policy, it advocated the policy of class collaboration disguised under the specious term of Popular Front.

Fascism was declared to be the “open terrorist dictatorship not of finance capital, but only of the most reactionary, most chauvinistic and most imperialist elements of finance capital”.[1] From this was deduced the Popular Front policy of winning over the liberal bourgeois elements. The means proposed to defeat fascism was therefore not only an alliance with the Social Democrats but also with their masters, the liberal bourgeoisie; not united action of the working class for carrying the class struggle forward to revolution, but abandonment of the proletarian programme in favour of a common political programme with the liberals to maintain the tottering bourgeois democracy.

The ‘obedient fools’ saw what was required of them. The struggle for the overthrow of capitalism was replaced by the struggle to maintain bourgeois democracy, where necessary, against the proletarian vanguard. The tirades against the fascists of one’s own country were extended to tirades against German Fascism. For, says Dimitrov, “The most reactionary variety of Fascism is the German type of fascism ... German fascism is acting as the spearhead of international counter-revolution, as the chief incendiary of imperialist war, as the initiator of a crusade against the Soviet Union.” (Ibid.)

In country after country of the democracies, the Stalinists demanded, in exchange for their willingness to defend the fatherland, only one price from the bourgeoisie. That is, that the foreign policy of the particular country should not be directed against the Soviet Union, They were prepared to “suspend” the class struggle at home and transform themselves into the recruiting sergeants of the imperialists for the coming Imperialist World War. The Sixth World Congress of 1928 meeting after the expulsion of the Opposition, had signified the transformation of the Comintern from a revolutionary organisation into an instrument of the Soviet bureaucracy. Internationalism, however, continued to exist for it, if only as a facade. But even this facade had now become an obstruction in the path of the bureaucrats, and had therefore to be dispensed with. The Seventh World Congress accomplished this task and signified the break with the last remnants of Comintern traditions.

THE ROLE OF THE POPULAR FRONT IN FRANCE

The world economic depression which commenced in 1919 reached France late. It was from 1932 onwards that France began to feel the full effects of the crisis. And following the crisis there began to appear in France precisely that process that had proceeded apace in Germany from 1929 onwards and, had ended in the victory of Hitler. Fascism began to rear its head. Slowly, but none the less surely, the nation commenced to divide into two camps, the masses beginning to move either to the Right—to the Fascists, or to the Left—to the Socialists and Communists.

On February 6, 1934, gangs of fascists staged an unsuccessful attack on the Chamber of Deputies in an attempt not merely to drive out the Radical Government of Daladier that was in office at the time, but to break the parliament altogether. The Stalinists, still following the ultra-leftist line of Social Fascism, at first supported the Fascists, demanding the arrest of Daladier for shooting the fascists (!), but were soon compelled by the situation itself to alter their course. On the 12th there occurred a vast general strike of protest by the workers called by the Socialists and Communists, which showed that the workers were alive to the danger. This constituted a set-back to the fascists. But the Communist Party soon turned back to the official line of Social Fascism. In the middle of the year a “united front” was indeed formed between the Socialists and Communists, but the proviso, that there should be no criticism by the two parties of each other was included in the terms, on the suggestion of the Communists! But after the Franco-Soviet Pact of September, a special drive was made to rope in the Radicals too. By the middle of 1935, the Popular Front of the Communist, Socialist and Radical Socialist Parties had come into being.

The Radical Socialist Party was pre-eminently the party of the petty bourgeoisie, with a leadership completely subservient to the bourgeoisie. But it was the most profound mistake to suppose that by winning over the Radical leaders one could win over their petty bourgeois following. We have pointed out earlier that in the advanced countries, fascism finds it necessary to utilise the petty bourgeoisie in order to come into power. The decomposition of the centre parties of the vacillating petty bourgeoisie of town and country is, consequently, generally the first sign of the advent of the fascist danger. So long as capitalism had been able to grant certain sops to the petty bourgeoisie, Radicalism in France had been able to maintain its hold over the petty bourgeois masses. But after the crisis it became clear that even such sops were now out of question. The petty bourgeois masses began to cease to believe in the possibility of ordered progress under bourgeois democracy. It is precisely in these conditions that they fall an easy prey to fascism. In France the petty bourgeoisie, no longer satisfied with the democratic shibboleths of the Radicals, were increasingly looking elsewhere for a solution of their problems, and were beginning to turn to the fascist organisations, the Jeunesses, Patriots, the Croix-de-Feu, the Solidarite Francaise, etc. The problem of winning the petty bourgeois masses to the side of the fight against fascism was none other than the problem of winning them away from the Radical Party. A bold and independent class policy on the part of the proletarian parties, secured on the basis of a united front, would certainly have broken away the bulk of the lower strata of the petty bourgeoisie from the historically exhausted Radical shell, and prepared the way for the next stage, the proletarian seizure of power. But the Popular Front with the Radicals, adopting the Radical programme of the defence of democracy, served only to bolster up artificially the disintegrating Radical Party, thanks to the prestige that association with the working class parties gave it. The Popular Front meant the utilisation of the on-coming mass wave only to reinforce and to reimpose on the masses their democratic illusions, until such time as, cruelly deceived again, they would turn in desperation to the Fascists.

Determined to fight Fascism, the French workers, trusting the Communist Party, increasingly joined its ranks swelling its membership to 150,000 in the middle of 1936 (excluding 100,000 members of the Young Communist League). The elections in the middle of 1936 resulted in an overwhelming victory for the Popular Front. Immediately after the elections, there occurred in June a vast general strike throughout France, involving 6 million workers and employees of all kinds. The workers gaining new confidence from the election results, but at the same time instinctively sensing that independent action on their part was necessary if only to “push on” their leaders, entered the factories and refused to come out till their demands were satisfied. In many factories the managers were imprisoned as hostages. The “stay in” strikes constituted a threat to the foundations of the bourgeois order, for they constituted a virtual occupation of the factories of the capitalists.

The situation was pregnant with tremendous possibilities. On the slogans of “Disarm the Fascists” and “Form Armed Workers’ Defence Guards” the workers could themselves have disarmed the armed Fascist bands, and with the arms seized from them formed the first detachments of a regular workers’ militia. From then on to the formation of Soviets would have been but a step. The Communist Party was in a position thus to carry forward the movement to revolution. All France knew its leaders, the party had a real following among the industrial workers, it had considerable influence in the trade unions, and in the developing situation an ever-increasing number of workers were looking to it for leadership. But far from carrying the movement forward, the C.P. of France was, together with the Social Democrats, responsible for stemming the strike wave. Concerned no longer with revolution, but rather dreading it, together with the Socialists they led the workers back to work in the interests of maintaining the Popular Front Government and the good relations of the Soviet Union with capitalist France.

The Popular Front Government of the Socialist Premier Blum hastily passed bills through parliament, granting several concessions to the workers, notably the 40 hour week, holidays with pay, and provisions for increased wages. Needless to add, with the inevitable ebb in the mass movement that followed in the course of time, these economic concessions were wrung back one by one, by the capitalists, directly as well as in an indirect manner through the increased cost of living resulting from devaluation and other inflationary measures which the Government was forced by the pressure of the banks to carry out. The 40 hour week, the last of the gains, was abrogated in 1938.

Only the International Workers’ Party (POI), the French section of the Fourth International, raised the slogan of Soviets in the critical days of the general strike, and attempted to develop the movement towards the revolution. They were, of course, immediately subjected to the united attack of the Stalinists, Socialists and the bourgeoisie. Few in numbers, and unknown as yet to the majority of the workers, they were not in a position to influence the course of events.

The mass movement, though stemmed, was yet far from defeated. All eyes were soon centered on Spain, where the Spanish revolution had begun following on the armed revolt of the Fascists. The Spanish workers and peasants had the active sympathy of the overwhelming majority of the workers in France. The policy of non-intervention agreed on between the governments of France, Britain and the Soviet Union, wherein it was agreed not to supply arms to either side in the Spanish civil war, incurred the greatest disfavour among the masses. Here again was an opportunity for the C.P. of France. If it had given the call, it was entirely possible for the French workers themselves to have transported arms across the frontier into Spain, in spite of the orders of the Government. So deep and widespread was their feeling on Spain, that the Blum Government would not have dared to prevent it; and in the alternative if it did, this would immediately have brought about an acute crisis in France. But the C.P. of France confined itself to holding meetings asking the Blum Government to “lift the embargo,” and even this propaganda was carried on with an anxious eye on the Right Radicals, who continually threatened to secede from the Popular Front.

By the end of 1936 the Communists came forward with their new proposal for widening the Popular Front still further into a “French Front,” which in fact meant an alliance of all sections (including the most reactionary bourgeois) against Germany.

The mass movement continued to ebb. The Right began to gain at the expense of the Left. The disappointed petty bourgeois elements began to turn to the Fascists; workers disappointed in the Communists, to the Socialists. In early 1937 Right Wing Radicals took important portfolios in the Blum Ministry. The shift to the Right continued, the Blum Ministry giving place to the Chautemps Ministry, and finally to the Daladier Ministry. The Popular Front was at an end. A huge armaments programme was set in motion, wages reduced and social services cut clown, and the rights of meeting and press restricted. DaIadier declared that attempts to enforce the 40 hour week in the munitions industry would be considered as a crime against the State. The Communist Party supported the armaments programme and became the most active social patriots in France. Its leader Thorez openly joined the French army, a fact which was greeted with acclamation in the Communist press. The stage was being set for the advent of Fascism. If Fascism did not arrive, it was only because of the imminence of the imperialist war demanding “national unity,” which unity was being freely secured by the bourgeoisie, thanks to the treachery of the Communists in particular.

THE POPULAR FRONT COMES TO SPAIN

The experience of Spain is rich in lessons for the international proletariat. But there are two main lessons that stand out above all others. Firstly, Spain proved once again (as it had earlier been proved in Russia and China) that in the present era of declining capitalism, there can be no “peaceful” period of bourgeois-democratic development for backward countries. It proved that a backward country like Spain could accomplish its bourgeois democratic revolution only through the dictatorship of the proletariat, thus bearing out once again the correctness of Trotsky’s theory of permanent revolution. In the second place, the tragic experience of Spain provided the final and conclusive proof of the impotence of the Popular Front as an instrument for defeating Fascism. It testified to the correctness of the analysis of the Left Opposition and the 4th International after it, which pointed out that the only way to defeat Fascism was by the united class action, of the workers, leading to the overthrow of capitalist rule and the proletarian seizure of power.

Only one third of the land in Spain was owned by the peasants, the majority of whom performed day labour on the big estates to eke out an existence. The rapid growth of agricultural workers’ unions and peasants’ organisations since 1931 under the republic struck deep at the interests of landed capitalism in Spain. The ascendancy of the workers’ organisations created the same problem for the capitalists in the cities. The city capitalists and the landlords were closely bound to one another not only by family ties but also through mortgages. To solve the problems of the capitalists by dividing the land, creating a prosperous peasant proprietor class and thus expanding the internal market, was therefore out of question. Nor could Spanish capitalism expand externally. On account of its belated development it found all these avenues closed to it by the great imperialist powers. Consequently, the Spanish bourgeoisie, in alliance with their partners, the landlords, were compelled to turn to Fascism with its destruction of all independent organisations of the workers, in order to solve their problems.

Ever since the flight of Alfonso in 1931 and the institution of the republican regime, the increasing sharpness of political relations and the widening chasm between Right and Left into which the nation was being divided, provided evidence that the republic could only be of short duration before it was swept away by one or other of the gathering class forces. All this, however, was perceived and foretold only by Trotsky and the Left Opposition. The 1934 rising of the Asturian miners on the one hand, and its brutal suppression accompanied by the imprisonment of thirty thousand workers and their leaders on the other, were unmistakable signs of the approaching storm.

The majority of workers in Spain followed the Anarchists (FAI—Anarchist Federation of Spain) with their trade union organisation, the CNT (National Confederation of Labour). They represented the school of Bakunin who broke away from the First International of Marx. A petty bourgeois deviation from Marxism, Anarchism had taken root in countries where capitalism had developed late and the working class was young, and reflected the ideology that the masses of ruined handicraftsmen, thrown into the working class, had brought with them into the workers’ movement. The Anarchists were exceedingly militant in carrying on the day to day struggles of the workers, but they believed that the emancipation of the working class could be secured by universal strike action and the assumption of control by the workers in each factory. Opponents of government or coercion of any kind from above, they were opposed to the Marxian concept of the dictatorship of the proletariat, and declared “libertarian communism” to be their immediate aim. Purists in this field, they eschewed participation in elections or use of parliaments, declaring that these things had only a corrupting influence on the movement. When the theoretical edifices of Anarchism crumbled one by one in face of the hard realities of the revolutionary struggle in Spain, the Anarchists, for all their revolutionary phrases, were shown up as contemptible compromisers in practice, in no way superior to their social democratic rivals.

The Socialist Party also had a large following, with its trade union organisation the UGT (General Workers Union). However, even the leader of the left socialists Largo Caballero, though he grumbled and complained, followed the path of coalition with the bourgeoisie, till he was swept away by the reaction he himself had permitted to grow. The POUM (Workers Party of Marxist Unity), though a comparatively small party, had a splendid opportunity of leading the Spanish revolution. But its centrist and vacillating policy precluded it from doing so, although this did not save it, together with the Trotskyists and Left Anarchists, from bearing the full brunt of the Stalinist-bourgeois terror long before the victory of the Fascists. At first opposed to coalition with the bourgeoisie, the POUM suddenly supported the Popular Front in the elections of February 1936. It renounced the coalition after the elections, but called for an authentic Popular Front Government on the eve of the Fascist uprising (July, 17th). And it entered the Catalan Coalition Government in September, supporting by that action all the reactionary acts perpetrated by the government. The small group of Bolshevik-Leninists alone showed a recognition of what the situation demanded of a revolutionary party. But although they made not inconsiderable gains, particularly from among the ranks of the CNT under whose banner the more important sections of the proletariat were gathered, none the less, time is required before the working class can be weaned away from its traditional organisations. But before this could happen reaction had regained its grip while disillusionment and despair had set in among the workers.

The Popular Front in Spain was composed of a bloc of the Socialist and Communist Parties with the liberal bourgeois Republicans, the Catalan Left of Companys and the Basque Nationalists, with the tacit support of the Anarchists, who voted for the Popular Front candidates in the elections of February 16, 1936. These elections resulted in the defeat of the Fascists and a victory for the Popular Front, and a government of the Republican Azana was formed. However, as happened in France four months later, the masses did not wait for the Popular Front Government to fulfil its promises, but went on strike in a vast wave spreading throughout the country. Political prisoners were released by tearing open the jails, and those dismissed after the 1934 revolt were forcibly reinstated in employment by the workers.

The Azana Government did nothing except legalise the measures already carried out by the masses. It did nothing to solve the land problem. It showed no signs of giving up imperialist aims in Spanish Morocco (the only means by which it could have cut the ground under the feet of the Fascist General commanding the Moroccan troops). It did not even make a serious attempt to purge the army of its Fascist officers. As a matter of fact, the Azana Government was aware of the preparations for the impending coup d’etat of the Fascists, but only suppressed the news and lulled the masses into a false sense of security. It is not surprising, therefore, that when the army revolted under the leadership of General Franco on July 17th, 1936, the Government not only suppressed the news at the start and made no effort at resistance, but even attempted to come to a compromise with the Fascist Generals. The Socialist and Communist Parties declared their confidence in the Government. In a joint manifesto of July 18th, they stated “The Government commands and the Popular Front obeys”. If matters had been left to the Government or these worker-allies of the bourgeoisie, the Fascist revolt would surely have succeeded in the very first days. Fortunately, the Spanish proletariat acted.

THE SPANISH REVOLUTION BEGINS

On July 19th the Barcelona proletariat, seizing what arms they could find, stormed the garrisons and prevented the capitulation of the republic to the fascists. Soon all Catalonia, industrially the most highly developed province in Spain, was in their hands. The Madrid proletariat saved Madrid. It was the same in Valencia and Malaga. The workers rose spontaneously to action. Franco’s revolt acted as a spur and enabled the workers to overcome the limitations imposed on them by leaders who had entirely failed to read the signs of the times. The army was almost entirely with the Fascists. The Popular Front Government had practically no armed forces behind them. A new army was required, and the workers’ organisations built their militias, equipped them and sent them to the front. Workers, police and militiamen took over police functions. Sailors shot their officers, elected sailors’ committees, took over the Loyalist fleet and established contact with workers’ committees. The Spanish Revolution had begun!

This process went furthest in Catalonia, where within a week practically all transport and industry was in the hands of workers’ committees, predominantly of the CNT. Here, a period of dual power ensued. Of the numerous committees that sprang up the most important organ of power was the “Central Committee of Anti-Fascist Militias of Catalonia”, the decrees of which were the only law in Catalonia. In the villages, the peasants seized the land, in many areas forming collectives. The Militias of the “Central Committee” conquered the province of Aragon as an army of social liberation, expropriating the landlords and organising production generally on a collective basis!

The big bourgeoisie were behind Franco from the start. The Republican leaders, representing the bourgeois liberal and professional elements, whose income and position are based on the institutions of bourgeois democracy, had already demonstrated their impotence at the commencement of the fascist revolt. The masses, one the other hand, had shown the way to defeat Fascism. It was precisely where revolutionary means had been adopted that the first important victories had been scored. For the defeat of Fascism it was essential that the fighters in the army should realise that they were fighting for their full social liberation and not for the re-establishment of the old “democratic” forms of exploitation. The workers and peasants in the rear of both armies should be made to realise this. In other words, the fight against fascism could attain victory only as proletarian revolution, giving the land to the peasants and the factories to the workers and leading to the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The first and most vitally necessary step on this path was to create soviets. The existing organs of workers’ power were scattered in numerous militia and factory committees. The membership of these committees, moreover, was based not on election but on mutual agreement between the various parties. Revolution to go forward needs constantly to draw fresh strength from the masses. For this, a centralised organ of struggle and power is needed, freely elected by the workers (and soldiers), in which the various working class parties can freely contend for leadership of the masses. This need could only be supplied by soviets. The POUM rejected this course. So did the Anarchists, who controlled the already existing committees. Their theories prevented them from using their predominant position in the working class movement to build up the organs of the future workers’ state but did not prevent them from co-operating with the bourgeois state. In other words, in a crisis the Anarchists proved that they were prepared to abandon their false theories in favour not of the proletariat but of the bourgeoisie.

In a situation where a revolutionary upsurge has released powerful mass forces, the reaction finds it necessary to advance at first under cover of parties in which the masses still have faith. In Spain this cover was provided principally by the Communists, Socialists and Anarchists. And of these the Communists were indubitably the most active and conscious agency of the reaction. They stood for subservience to the bourgeosie not only for the period of the war but afterwards as well. Their paper Mundo Obrero declared, “It is absolutely false that the present workers’ movement has for its object the establishment of a proletarian dictatorship after the war has been terminated. It cannot be said, we have a social motive for our participation in the war. We communists are the first to repudiate this supposition. We are motivated exclusively by a desire to defend the democratic republic” (August 6, 1936). A comparatively small and insignificant party till 1936, due principally to their ultra-leftist policies in the past, the Stalinists expanded swiftly after the Franco revolt. The expansion in their membership, however, was largely from petty bourgeois elements, and their influence was derived principally from the fact that Russia supplied the Spanish Government with arms. The proposals of the C.P. of Spain were always linked with threats that Stalin would stop supplies. When the POUM called for granting Trotsky asylum in Spain, the Soviet Consul General declared to the press “if Trotsky were permitted to enter Catalonia, the Soviet Government would cut off all aid to Spain!” (La Prensa report—see Morrow, Revolution and Counter-Revolution in Spain ).

In September 1936 was formed the Coalition Government led by the Socialist leader Caballero, consisting of Socialist, Communist and Republican ministers, and joined in November by the Anarchists. This Government proved little better than that of Azana. On the pressing land question it merely sanctioned division of estates belonging to known Fascists. The bourgeois state gradually came back into its own. Decrees were passed dissolving the revolutionary committees of the July days. Several papers of the POUM and CNT were suppressed. The Government Assault Guards were prohibited from taking any part in politics The regular police took back its functions from the worker patrols. The workers were disarmed step by step while the rebuilt police forces were re-armed with Russian material. A centralised army on the bourgeois model gradually took the place of the militias. The persecution of Trotskyists, POUM and Left Anarchists commenced.

Even in the sphere of military operations the Popular Front displayed its inefficiency and impotence. In the early stages of the war the seizure of Algeciras, the principal landing point of Franco’s Moors and legionaires from Spanish North Africa, could easily have been accomplished by the Loyalist navy. But the Government made no attempt to do so. It failed to organise Bilbao and the industrial areas of the North for the production of munitions. This area could have become the chief centre of Spain’s munition supplies. The Aragon Front provided a strategic point from which to strike a crippling blow at Franco’s forces. But this front was starved of arms because it was manned by POUM and Anarchist militias. Clearly, the Popular Front Government feared revolution more than Franco.

THE SABOTAGE OF THE REVOLUTION

The advance of the counter-revolution alarmed the masses. On May 3, 1937, Assault Guards of the Government in Barcelona under the command of a Stalinist, seized the Central Telephone Exchange which the CNT had captured and controlled since July 19th. The workers’ guards on the spot were forcibly disarmed. This action was the last straw to the exasperated workers and led to the second uprising of the Barcelona proletariat. The barricades went up. The Barcelona proletariat rushed to the defence of the CNT-FAI and POUM headquarters. Armed workers in Tarragona and Gerona came out in the same way. The masses of Catalonia were ranged overwhelmingly under the banner of the CNT. This was a splendid opportunity to retrieve the lost position and to go forward. The Fourth Internationalists, as well as the Friends of Durruti and the Libertarian Youth among the Anarchists, put forward the slogan of soviets. But the CNT and POUM leaders gave no lead. Instead, they persuaded the masses to leave the barricades. The result was calamitous. The government lost no time in disarming the workers, and brutal reprisals followed the shameful capitulation.

The Anarchists and Socialists have sought to justify their capitulation in Spain by putting forward the plea that concessions were necessary in order to obtain arms from the Soviet Union. But not only were the Russian supplies meagre, in proportion to the issues at stake in Spain, but there could have been no excuse for yielding to such pressure. In the words of Trotsky, “If the leaders of the Anarchists had resembled revolutionists at all, they would have answered the first blackmail from Moscow not only by continuing he socialist advance but by disclosing Stalin’s counter-revolutionary conditions before the working class of the world. Thus they would have forced the Moscow bureaucracy to choose openly between socialist revolution and the dictatorship of Franco. And what if Moscow, in the absence of People’s Front, should in general refuse to give arms? And what, we answer to this, if the Soviet Union in general did not exist in the world? Revolutions have been victorious up to this time not at all thanks to great foreign patrons who supplied them with arms. Usually the counter-revolution enjoyed foreign patronage ... If at the head of the armed workers and peasants, i.e., at the head of the so-called “republican” Spain there were revolutionists and not cowardly agents of the bourgeoisie, the problem of arming would in general not have played a paramount role. The army of Franco including the colonial Riffs and the soldiers of Mussolini are not at all immune to revolutionary contagion. Surrounded from all sides by the fire of the socialist uprising, the soldiers of Fascism would have proved to be an insignificant quantity. Not arms and not military "geniuses" were lacking in Madrid and Barcelona; what was lacking was a revolutionary party!” (“Conditions for Victory in Spain,” FIGHT , June, 1938.)

Up to the May events, the reaction had developed under cover of Socialist and Anarchist Collaboration. But the scene was now set for an acute swing to the Right under the aegis of a Communist-Republican bloc. The Socialist Caballero’s aim had been the impossible one of a bourgeois-democratic republic victorious over Franco—of course, together with some kind of workers’ control of production coexisting with private property. To the Stalinists, however, the struggle for preserving bourgeois democracy was itself subordinate to the needs of Soviet Union foreign policy, namely, that of keeping the goodwill of the French and British Imperialists. Thus their aim in Spain was to accept the dictates of Anglo-French imperialism which demanded a stabilised bourgeois regime based on the participation not only of the liberal bourgeoisie, but also of the big bourgeois and landlord forces behind Franco! With this end in view the Stalinists placed themselves openly on the side of the reactionary forces in the Republican camp, pursued a conciliationist policy towards Fascists in an attempt to ‘win them over’, and became the most ruthless exterminators of the revolution.

The Negrin Cabinet, succeeding that of Caballero, signified the formation of the bourgeois-Stalinist bloc. Reaction now got under way with a vengeance. Fascists imprisoned by the popular tribunals were released in increasing numbers, while on the other hand criticism of the government was made treason. The denouncing of priests or of citizens as Fascists or anti-revolutionaries “unreasonably” or “without sufficient foundation” was made a penal offence, although the Stalinists, freely continued to slander the POUM as Fascists. Under a Stalinist police head the police force was purged of all worker elements. Under the Stalinist Minister of Agriculture, Uribe, the peasant collectives, which were fairly widespread were dissolved with the aid of Assault Guards and the land given back to the landlords and kulaks. In Aragon this was accomplished only after a campaign of ruthless suppression by military forces led by General Pozas, a member of the Communist Party. Under pretext of the needs of defence, the management of factories was taken over one by one by the Government and workers’ control ended.

The POUM was suppressed. Its entire executive including its leader Nin were arrested and jailed. Nin himself was removed to a Stalinist controlled prison where he was foully murdered by the Stalinists without any kind of trial whatsoever. The hounding and persecution of all revolutionaries including large numbers of CNT militants became a feature of the Stalinist-bourgeois regime. The Spanish workers had risen twice with arms in their hands, first to make the revolution and then to defend it. But their leadership had cruelly betrayed them. Now disheartened, disillusioned, apathetic, they watched their conquests being wiped away one by one.

Ten years before, in China, the Stalinists had betrayed the revolution. In Spain, however, they directly assumed the role of its executioners. The entire proletarian revolutionary vanguard was liquidated by them long before this could be done by Franco. Thus the Stalinists, by their criminal policy not only paved the way for the victory of Fascism, but executed in advance a goodly share of its labours.

The purely military struggle against Franco dragged on to its now inevitable conclusion. Town after town fell to the Fascists, generally without resistance, the Government commanders withdrawing without a struggle. The masses were not even given the opportunity to die fighting, but were left to be massacred by Franco’s execution squads. In 1938 Barcelona, the last stronghold, fell without a struggle, ringing down the last curtain on the tragedy of Spain.

“The crushing of Barcelona deals a terrible blow to the world proletariat, but also teaches a great lesson. The mechanics of the Spanish ‘People’s Front’ as an organised system of deceit and treachery of the exploited masses has been completely exposed. The slogan of ‘defence of democracy’ has once again revealed its reactionary essence, and at the same time, its hollowness. The bourgeoisie wants to perpetuate its rule of exploitation. The workers want to free themselves from exploitation. These are the real tasks of FUNDAMENTAL classes in modern society.

“Miserable cliques of petty bourgeois middlemen, having lost the confidence and the subsidies of the bourgeoisie, sought to salvage the past without giving any concessions to the coming day. Under the label of the ‘People’s Front’ they set up a joint stock company. Under the leadership of Stalin they have assured the most terrible defeat when all the conditions for victory were at hand.

“The Spanish proletariat gave proof of extraordinary capacity for initiative and revolutionary heroism. The revolution was brought to ruin by petty despicable and utterly corrupted ‘leaders.’ The downfall of Barcelona signifies above all the downfall of the Second and Third Internationals, as well as of Anarchism, rotten to its core. Forward to a new road, workers! Forward to the road of the international Socialist revolution!” (Trotsky, The Tragedy of Spain ).

NATIONAL FRONT IN THE COLONIAL COUNTRIES

We noted earlier that the Communists and militant workers fleeing from the Kuomintang terror went into the peasant areas, where they were able form to a Red Army by gathering round themselves the revolting peasants. In 1931 the creation of the “Chinese Socialist Republic” was proclaimed. This consisted of six widely separated areas spread across Central China, with constantly fluctuating boundaries. The only stable area held from 1930-34 was the “Central Soviet District” with a population of 3 millions. For more than five years the Reds defeated five successive Kuomintang campaigns against them, a feat made possible against forces several times superior in armaments, principally because of the support they received from the population and the disintegration their propaganda caused among the Kuomintang soldiers.

None the less, a peasant war, however, heroic and sustained it may be, cannot succeed on its own. The C.P. of China had completely abandoned its tasks in the cities. The Trotskyists who were functioning as the Left Opposition of the party strove in vain to get the party to lead the workers in struggles for partial demands in the cities and to put forward a programme of democratic demands which would provide a starting point for rallying the dispersed and demoralised city workers. For, revival of the workers movement alone could provide the peasant revolt with the leadership that was indispensable for its success. In 1934 the Chinese Red Army was finally compelled to abandon Central China and to march into the North West, still farther away from the political and economic centres of the country.

After the 7th Congress of the Comintern in 1935, the Moscow bureaucrats, fearing Japanese invasion of the U.S.S.R. and desiring to swing the Chinese bourgeoisie into an anti-Japanese position, reversed its instructions to the Communist Party of China. In 1936 Mao Tse Tung publicly offered the “hand of friendship to Chiang” if he would fight Japan. A new national united front, called the “anti-imperialists united people’s front” now became the goal. The bloc between the Chinese C.P. and the Kuomintang was made in 1937. The Kuomintang terms were (1) Abolition of the Red Army, and its incorporation into the Government armies under the direct control of the Military Affairs Commission. (2) Dissolution of the “Soviet Republic”. (3) Cessation of all Communist propaganda. (4) Suspension of the class struggle. To all these terms the Communists formally acceded, protesting at the same time that they had in fact already carried out the most important of them. And thus, by completing a full historical cycle the Communists had returned again to the “national united front”, only on an infinitely lower and more shameful level.

In course of time the Communists openly renounced their radical agrarian programme; and made even no pretence of attempting to establish the “hegemony of the proletariat" in the anti-imperialist struggle.

Meanwhile Chiang Kai-shek conducted the war against Japanese imperialism half-heartedly and as a purely military struggle, placing his faith not in the support of the masses but in hopes of Anglo-American intervention. With the outbreak of the Imperialist War in 1939 these hopes were revived. From 1942, with the entry of Japan into the imperialist war, Chiang placed himself at the service of Anglo-American imperialism. After the conclusion of the imperialist war, China finds that she has got rid of Japanese imperialism only to become a semi-colony of American imperialism—thus bearing out the correctness of the Trotskyist analysis that the bourgeoisie of the colonial and semi-conlonial countries is incapable of leading a genuine struggle against imperialism, and that even when it does enter into a military struggle against one imperialism it is only to enter into the service of another.

In India too, the change from ultra-leftism to a policy of capitulation to the bourgeoisie was commenced in 1936. The Communist Party of India adopted the policy of “National Front”, counterpart of the Popular Front in the West. The Congress, yesterday the party of the counter-revolutionary bourgeoisie, was suddenly credited with a revolutionary role. Communists donned Khaddar and became loyal Congressmen, even preaching Ahimsa and propagating the Gandhist “constructive programme” of charka and humanitarian rural uplift. They blunted the growing class consciousness of the workers and deceived the petty bourgeois intelligentsia moving to the left with a diluted and distorted species of Marxism.

The Communist Party of India has prove itself to be as abject an instrument of the foreign policy of the Soviet bureaucracy as any other section of the Comintern, with local bureaucrats as cynical and dishonest as anywhere else. The Russo-German Pact in 1939 enabled them without difficulty to characterise the war that British Imperialism was waging at that time as an imperialist war. But Hitler’s attack on the Soviet Union in June 1941 made them turn a complete somersault in December of the same year, when, according to them, the whole war became transformed into a people’s war against fascism. They openly advocated support of the imperialist war, called on workers to speed up production in the interests of the war effort, embarked on the most shameful racial attacks on the Japanese, opposed the mass struggle against British Imperialism that commenced in August 1942, and attempted to divert and disrupt the movement by advancing the deceitful slogans of “Release the Leaders”, “Congress-League Unity” and “National Government” (under imperialism).

The Fourth International movement in India is still young. The Bolshevik Leninist Party of India, section of the 4th International was formed only in 1942. It opposed the imperialist war and supported the mass struggle against imperialism, but without confounding its organisation or programme with the Congress of the bourgeoisie. The Fourth International movement in India can face the future with real hope and confidence. For, unlike in China, Germany and Spain, the Stalinists have not yet had the opportunity of leading the working class to any major defeat. The Indian working class, young and vigorous, has suffered no serious disaster to demoralise it and sap its faith in itself and its future.


Endnotes

[1] [1] From the main report by Dimitrov to the 7th World Congress of the 3rd International. See Dimitrov, “United Front .”