Contributed in 11th Aug 2018 for the internal debate
We are defending the tradition of Lenin and Trotsky
not of Seymour
The main ground of the 21 June, 2018 letter replying to EA, and endorsed
by the comrades is that our argument is not in accord with the tradition which
was established in iSt in 1970s and “Seymour’s Marxism.” The tradition you comrades strongly uphold against us was not only used at
that time, but also raised since the 2013 Egyptian and 2016 Turkish coups. It was
a main basis against the position that “we should have been in a military bloc
against the coups” by some comrades, to argue that neutralist position should
have been taken in those coups. And the tradition was a main argument in the last conference as well,
but fortunately the risky neutralist position based on the ‘tradition’ was
rejected by the conference. Besides the stronghold of the tradition, the ICL, also are reexamining
the tradition established in 1970, labeling it “chauvinist.” The tradition has been challenged by the various historical events,
including recent developments with Iran. (Khomeini and the Islamic republic is a
political barrier which should be overthrown by the working class but not by
imperialism. I do not think the knowledge of it, as Leninist-Trotskyist, can be such a great pride, like the knowledge
that we should bloc with Kerensky and Chiang Kai-shek.) Then, why shouldn’t we be critical of the iSt-Seymour tradition? Why
should it be a golden rule? We are proud of and respect the positive contributions of the iSt,
especially the degenerated/deformed workers’ state theory and rather principled
position against imperialism against opportunists. We fully agree with “Imperialist
War & Socialist Pretenders: Following the Line of Least Resistance” (2003),
while we are critical of opportunist holes on imperialism. We have studied Lenin and Trotsky’s tradition on national question
seriously and could not find any contradictions with them. Trotsky’s “On Sino-Japanese
War” is vividly clear. We suggest you read it carefully, and other articles of
Lenin some of which we quote at the end of this letter. * * * Tom’s “On Dual Defeatism” After the last conference, Tom sent me a document, “On Dual Defeatism”.
I guess comrade Roxy meant it in her 26 June comment. It was an explanation
that Lenin did not ‘always’ take a side with in a national conflict. It was on
my mistaken argument from over generalization at the last conference that
“apart from inter-imperialist conflicts, Lenin and Trotsky ever took a
dual-defeatist position.” My comment at the conference went too far but I roughly
tried to convey the danger of a ‘neutral’ position against imperialism, in line
with Trotsky’s view: "The
struggle against war and its social source, capitalism, presupposes direct,
active, unequivocal support to the oppressed colonial peoples in their
struggles and wars against imperialism. A ‘neutral’ position is tantamount to
support of imperialism." —Leon Trotsky,
"Resolution on the Antiwar Congress of the London Bureau," July 1936/
Imperialist War & Socialist Pretenders, 2003 The document sent to me was not only to correct my comment, but also to
defend his ‘neutral’ position in Egypt and Turkey and various others with
quotations from Lenin, arguing there have been various “middle courses”. We discussed it with Hape and Roxy. At the time, I very cautiously said “I
guess, Tom perhaps misread Lenin’s ‘A Caricature of Marxism and Imperialist
Economism’.” At almost same time I came across the very quotation from a Korean
ORO leftist too. It was not only accidental. So, we studied and discussed it in
subsequent days. Of course, we agree that “we are not obliged to automatically support
every resistance against imperialism.” And we would not support a ‘national
uprising’ which is being used as a tool of imperialist division and redivision. However, we think that with his interpretation of the quotation, Tom
suggests “conditional” support in the conflict between the force for national
liberation and imperialism. In “On Dual Defeatism”, Tom said quoting Lenin: In the same
article Lenin went as far as to argue that while Marxists support struggles for
liberation, this does not translate into automatic support for any and all
struggles in the colonies: “Imperialism is
as much our ‘mortal’ enemy as is capitalism. That is so. No Marxist will forget,
however, that capitalism is progressive compared with feudalism, and that
imperialism is progressive compared with pre-monopoly capitalism. Hence, it is
not every struggle against imperialism that we should support. We will not
support a struggle of the reactionary classes against imperialism; we will not support an uprising of the
reactionary classes against imperialism and capitalism. “Consequently,
once the author admits the need to support an uprising of an oppressed nation
(‘actively resisting’ suppression means supporting the uprising), he also
admits that a national uprising is progressive, that the establishment of a
separate and new state, of new frontiers, etc., resulting from a successful
uprising, is progressive.” <p63> —Ibid., bolded
emphasis added Lenin was
perhaps bending the stick a bit with this formulation, but it is clear that he
considered it necessary for revolutionaries to make a careful estimate of what
is at stake in every particular situation, and only take sides when the workers
and oppressed have a stake in the outcome. Tom reads that there is “a struggle of the reactionary classes against
imperialism” “in colonies” and then he uses this as a premise for the argument that
we do not give support to a movement when it is led by a “reactionary class”,
even for national liberation against imperialism. He then implicitly suggests
our support should be ‘conditional’. If a leading group is not progressive but
reactionary, we should not give support, or ‘at least’ we should choose whether
or not to give support to the colonial uprising against imperialism. This position might be and has been an excuse to deny the duty to take the
side of the colonial forces against imperialism, opening the back door to
social chauvinism. When Lenin talks of “reactionary classes” in the passage “We will not
support a struggle of the reactionary classes against imperialism; we will not
support an uprising of the reactionary classes against imperialism and
capitalism,” he does not mean we will not support the struggle of reactionary
classes for national liberation in the colonies. That is a misreading. First of all, if we give the passage that reading it contradicts the
whole article and takes the same position as Kievsky who denied ‘the
significance of the struggle of national self-determination against imperialism,’
which Lenin ferociously criticized through the whole article. Secondly, it contradicts the very next paragraph in which Lenin clearly
confirms that “national uprising is progressive… resulting from a successful
uprising, is progressive.” Thirdly, there is this undeniable proposition. “Capitalism is
progressive compared with feudalism, and that imperialism is progressive
compared with pre-monopoly capitalism.” Almost all forces leading the
resistance against imperialism have not been able to be progressive but
reactionary. Therefore, we should not support almost all of struggle in
colonies against imperialism. Perhaps we should judge the ‘progressiveness’ of
the national uprising as like a charity giver. Tom put an excuse after that, “Lenin was perhaps bending the stick a bit
with this formulation.” But we do not think so. Lenin is not a Marxist ‘magician’
but one of the Marxist scientists, even though one of the most brilliant. We
should not fetishize him. I guess Lenin would have answered to Tom like this:
“According to the Polish Marxists, Marx was simply a muddlehead who “in one
breath” said contradictory things! (The Discussion on Self-Determination Summed
Up)” * * * Then, what does Lenin exactly mean? We have to guess because he did not explain further in this article. But
we guess that Lenin did not mean “a struggle of the reactionary classes against
imperialism” is “in colonies”, and that it is not for national liberation. That
is consistent with the preceding paragraph, the very next paragraph, the whole
article and Lenin’s other articles on the issue. Lenin was trying to rebut Kievsky’s argument that “...we shall thereby
be combating imperialism, our mortal enemy.” Lenin said “it is not every
struggle against imperialism that we should support.” Lenin tried to criticize
Kievsky’s argument that “every struggle against imperialism” is imperative. There have been struggles of reactionary classes against imperialism and
capitalism denying their progressiveness against feudalism and pre-monopoly
capitalism (imperialism). In the “Communist Manifesto” and “Imperialism: Highest Stage of
Capitalism” there are examples of that kind of reactionary struggle. “Communist Manifesto” ―The lower
middle class, the small manufacturer, the shopkeeper, the artisan, the peasant,
all these fight against the bourgeoisie, to save from extinction their
existence as fractions of the middle class. They are therefore not
revolutionary, but conservative. Nay more, they are reactionary, for they try
to roll back the wheel of history. ―1. Reactionary
Socialism/ A. Feudal Socialism: Owing to their historical position, it became
the vocation of the aristocracies of France and England to write pamphlets
against modern bourgeois society.…For the rest, so little do they conceal the
reactionary character of their criticism that their chief accusation against
the bourgeois amounts to this, that under the bourgeois régime a class is being
developed which is destined to cut up root and branch the old order of society. ―B.
Petty-Bourgeois Socialism: In its positive aims, however, this form of
Socialism aspires either to restoring the old means of production and of
exchange, and with them the old property relations, and the old society, or to
cramping the modern means of production and of exchange within the framework of
the old property relations that have been, and were bound to be, exploded by
those means. In either case, it is both reactionary and Utopian. ―C. German or
“True” Socialism: While this “True” Socialism thus served the government as a
weapon for fighting the German bourgeoisie, it, at the same time, directly
represented a reactionary interest, the interest of German Philistines. In
Germany, the petty-bourgeois class, a relic of the sixteenth century, and since
then constantly cropping up again under the various forms, is the real social
basis of the existing state of things. ―3.
Critical-Utopian Socialism and Communism: By degrees, they sink into the
category of the reactionary [or] conservative Socialists depicted above,
differing from these only by more systematic pedantry, and by their fanatical
and superstitious belief in the miraculous effects of their social science. “Imperialism” ―We shall see
later how “on these grounds” reactionary, petty-bourgeois critics of capitalist
imperialism dream of going back to “free”, “peaceful”, and “honest”
competition. CGs EA Appendix: quotations from Lenin on national question related with our
argument “Socialism and War”/1915 ―From the
liberator of nations that capitalism was in the struggle against feudalism,
imperialist capitalism has become the greatest oppressor of nations. Formerly
progressive, capitalism has become reactionary ―In particular,
the policy of both Austria and Russia peace-time as well as in war, is a policy
of enslaving and not of liberating nations. In China, Persia. India and other
dependent countries, on the contrary, we have seen during the past decades a
policy of rousing tens and hundreds of millions of people to national life, of
liberating them from the oppression of the reactionary “great” powers. A war on
such a historical ground can even today be a bourgeois-progressive,
national-liberation war. “A Caricature of Marxism and Imperialist Economism” 1916 ―National
self-determination is but one of the democratic demands and does not, in
principle, differ from other democratic demands. “World domination” is, to put
it briefly, the substance of imperialist policy, of which imperialist war is
the continuation. Rejection of “defence of the father land” in a democratic
war, i.e., rejecting participation in such a war, is an absurdity that has
nothing in common with Marxism. ―Where, is the
national liberation movement a false phrase and where is it a living and
progressive reality? Kievsky reveals no understanding on any of these points. ―Why does
he[Kievsky] not do so directly? Why does he not openly and precisely formulate
his proposition: “self-determination, while achievable in the sense that it is
economically possible under capitalism, contradicts development and is
therefore either reactionary or merely an exception”? ―The social
revolution can come only in the form of an epoch in which are combined civil
war by the proletariat against the bourgeoisie in the advanced countries and a
whole series of democratic and revolutionary movements, including the national
liberation movement, in the undeveloped, backward and oppressed nations. ―All national oppression
calls forth the resistance of the broad masses of the people; and the
resistance of a nationally oppressed population always tends to national
revolt. Not infrequently (notably in Austria and Russia) we find the
bourgeoisie of the oppressed nations talking of national revolt, while in
practice it enters into reactionary compacts with the bourgeoisie of the
oppressor nation behind the backs of, and against, its own people. In such
cases the criticism of revolutionary Marxists should be directed not against
the national movement, but against its degradation, vulgarisation, against the
tendency to reduce it to a petty squabble. Incidentally, very many Austrian and
Russian Social-Democrats overlook this and in their legitimate hatred of the
petty, vulgar and sordid national squabbles—disputes and scuffles over the
question, for instance, of which language shall have precedence in two-language
street signs—refuse to support the national struggle. We shall not “support” a
republican farce in, say, the principality of Monaco, or the “republican”
adventurism of “generals” in the small states of South America or some Pacific
island. But that does not mean it would be permissible to abandon the
republican slogan for serious democratic and socialist movements. We should,
and do, ridicule the sordid national squabbles and haggling in Russia and
Austria. But that does not mean that it would be permissible to deny support to
a national uprising or a serious popular struggle against national oppression. ―Consequently,
once the author admits the need to support an uprising of an oppressed nation
(“actively resisting” suppression means supporting the uprising), he also
admits that a national uprising is progressive, that the establishment of a
separate and new state, of new frontiers, etc., resulting from a successful
uprising, is progressive. ―Liberation of
the colonies, we stated in our theses, means self-determination of nations.
Europeans often forget that colonial peoples too are nations, but to tolerate
this “forgetfulness” is to tolerate chauvinism. ―But even with
regard to colonial countries where there are no workers, only slave-owners and
slaves, etc., the demand for “self-determination”, far from being absurd, is
obligatory hit every Marxist. “The Discussion On Self-Determination Summed Up” 1916 ―If Belgium,
let us say, is annexed by Germany in 1917, and in 1918 revolts to secure her
liberation, the Polish comrades will be against her revolt on the grounds that
the Belgian bourgeoisie possess “the right to oppress foreign peoples”! There is
nothing Marxist or even revolutionary in this argument. If we do not want to
betray socialism we must support every revolt against our chief enemy, the
bourgeoisie of the big states, provided it is not the revolt of a reactionary
class. By refusing to support the revolt of annexed regions we become,
objectively, annexationists. It is precisely in the “era of imperialism”, which
is the era of nascent social revolution, that the proletariat will today give
especially vigorous support to any revolt of the annexed regions so that
tomorrow, or simultaneously, it may attack the bourgeoisie of the “great” power
that is weakened by the revolt. ―What is their
objection? References to Marx’s position from 1848 to 1871, they say, are “not
of the slightest value”. The argument advanced in support of this unusually
irate and peremptory assertion is that “at one and the same time” Marx opposed
the strivings far independence of the “Czechs, South Slavs. etc.” The argument is
so very irate because it is so very unsound. According to the Polish Marxists,
Marx was simply a muddlehead who “in one breath” said contradictory things!
This is altogether untrue, and it is certainly not Marxism. ―In the
internationalist education of the workers of the oppressor countries, emphasis
must necessarily he laid on their advocating freedom for the oppressed
countries to secede and their fighting for it. Without this there can be no
internationalism. It is our right and duty to treat every Social-Democrat of an
oppressor nation who fails to conduct such propaganda as a scoundrel and an
imperialist. This is an absolute demand, even where the chance of secession
being possible and “practicable” before the introduction of socialism is only
one in a thousand. ―It is to be
hoped that, in accordance with the adage, “it’s an ill wind that blows nobody
any good”, many comrades, who were not aware of the morass they were sinking
into by repudiating “self-determination” and by treating the national movements
of small nations with disdain, will have their eyes opened by the “accidental”
coincidence of opinion held by a Social-Democrat and a representative of the
imperialist bourgeoisie!! ―To imagine
that social revolution is conceivable without revolts by small nations in the
colonies and in Europe, without revolutionary outbursts by a section of the
petty bourgeoisie with all its prejudices, without a movement of the
politically non-conscious proletarian and semi-proletarian masses against
oppression by the landowners, the church, and the monarchy, against national
oppression, etc.-to imagine all this is to repudiate social revolution. ―The socialist
revolution in Europe cannot be anything other than an outburst of mass struggle
on the part of all and sundry oppressed and discontented elements. Inevitably,
sections of tile petty bourgeoisie and of the backward workers will participate
in it—without such participation, mass struggle is impossible, without it no
revolution is possible—and just as inevitably will they bring into the movement
their prejudices, their reactionary fantasies, their weaknesses slid errors.
But objectively they will attack capital, and the class-conscious vanguard of
the revolution, the advanced proletariat, expressing this objective truth of a
variegated and discordant, motley and outwardly fragmented, mass struggle, will
he able to unite and direct it, capture power, seize the banks, expropriate the
trusts which all hate (though for difficult reasons!), and introduce other
dictatorial measures which in their totality will amount to the overthrow of
the bourgeoisie and the victory of socialism, which, however, will by no means
immediately “purge” itself of petty-bourgeois slag. ―The dialectics
of history are such that small nations, powerless as an independent factor in
the struggle against imperialism, play a part as one of the ferments, one of
the bacilli, which help the real anti-imperialist force, the socialist
proletariat, to make its appearance on the scene. ―A serious war
would not be treated seriously if advantage were not taken of the enemy’s
slightest weakness and if every opportunity that presented itself were not
seized upon, the more, so since it is impossible to know beforehand at what
moment, whore, and with what force some powder magazine will “explode”. We
would be very poor revolutionaries if, in the proletariat’s great war of
Liberation for socialism, we did not know how to utilise every popular movement
against every single disaster imperialism brings in order to intensify and extend
the crisis.