CPGB/WW: Never Stalinist?

Submitted by martin on 22 October, 2002 - 7:54

Before responding at any length, best wait until Mark Fischer gets further in his promised series of articles. By then WW readers should have an idea of his substantive arguments, and, with luck, sight of the "substantial piece" by Sean Matgamna which he is "centrally" responding to, Sean's "Critical Notes" , rather than just quotations filleted so as to "prove" that the AWL misrepresents CPGB/WW politics.
One point, however, cries out for immediate comment: Stalinism.
In WW 403 (11/10/01) Mark himself proudly introduced a reprint of an article published in 1982 on the April 1978 Stalinist coup in Afghanistan. Mark admitted some "flaws, reflecting the illusions and theoretical errors characteristic of the extreme left wing of 'official communism'", in the article, but did not find it necessary to specify those "flaws" further, and on the whole praised the article as excellent proof that the Stalinist PDPA had led "a genuine democratic revolution". The article itself compared the April 1978 coup at length and without disfavour to October 1917 in Russia.
Sean was "astounded... that you still hold to the line on Afghanistan while you held when you were Stalinists". Mark responds: "We were not 'Stalinists' in 1981, when we begun publishing... our previous stance [before the early 1990s, when the CPGB/WW broke from the idea of the Stalinist USSR having been any sort of workers' state] had far more of 'Trotskyism' about it than 'Stalinism'..."
I turn to From October to August, a book published by the CPGB in 1992. "For all his faults, his mistakes, his championing of bureaucratic socialism, nothing should be allowed to detract from the positive developments in the Soviet Union during the years when Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin led the USSR...
"The conditions were established for a string of socialist states in Eastern Europe and the emergence of the Soviet Union as the second most powerful country on earth. To say the least, this achievement owed not a little to Stalin...
"Against Gorbachev we obviously defend the Stalin of the five year plans, the Stalin of collectivisation, the Stalin of industrialisation, the Stalin of World War II and the Stalin of the spread of socialism into Eastern Europe. We proudly and unhesitatingly defend the forward march of socialism over which Stalin presided..."
"The Soviet Republic's war against Poland [in 1920]... was no different in essence from its war against Nazi Germany, except that the war against Poland failed and that against Nazi Germany succeeded. They were both revolutionary wars which from being defensive became offensive. Being an international continuation of the Soviet state's policy by violent means, the victories of the Red Army of 1944 and 1945 created extremely favourable conditions for the creation of socialist states in Eastern Europe. This is as clear an example as one could want of the class struggle conducted on an international scale by the Soviet Union".
The book also contained criticism of "bureaucratic socialism" and even of the great Joseph Vissarionovich himself. In 1955, say, that criticism would have got you expelled from the (real) CPGB as "Trotskyites". By 1992 it was commonplace.
You didn't see any "Trotskyism" in your views then! "Because of their worship of anti-bureaucratic spontaneity [i.e. their support for elemental working-class resistance to Stalinism] the Trotskyites have always in practice been calling for counter-revolution in the socialist countries".
That the SWP, in particular, espoused "the most reactionary conclusions" was "clear from its response to the August [1991] counter-revolution [in the USSR]: 'Communism has collapsed' it headlined, and this supposed 'fact' should 'have every socialist rejoicing'. The SWP is simply the most explicit anti-communist group on the revolutionary left".
"There can be no playing 'Neither Washington nor Moscow' games when it comes to counter-revolution", you insisted. "What the SWP indulges in is typical of most of the left in Britain - workerism and a worship of abstract democracy".
You also denounced the SWP for another of its more creditable activities, its money-raising for an attempted independent socialist-oriented trade union movement in the USSR in 1990. "Communists should guard the unity of the trade union movement in the USSR".
You took pride in your slogan of "unconditional defence of the socialist countries" - against the working class if necessary. "Tony Chater, the editor of the Morning Star - whom the ignorant bourgeois media dubs a 'tankie' - says tanks don't solve anything. Well, that's not true. Under certain circumstances tanks do solve things. Ask Stalin. He solved the problem of German invasion with tanks".
Retrospectively you endorsed the Russian invasions of Hungary (1956) and Czechoslovakia (1968). "The only way to save the situation for socialism in Hungary was... a call by the new government, led by Kadar, for Soviet intervention". "What was posed in 1968 was defending existing bureaucratic socialism or the Dubcek capitalist road. For genuine communists the interests of the world revolution demanded the former and we must have the courage to say that faced with such a choice Czech and Slovak national rights had to take second place".
You "supported the banning of Solidarnosc in 1981 because of the imminent danger of counter-revolution". You "support[ed] the presence of Soviet forces in Afghanistan". You semi-supported the attempted conservative coup in the USSR in August 1991. "The road to counter-revolution in the USSR will not after all be paved with Gorbachevite good intentions. The State Emergency Committee has seen to that. For communists, for all genuine partisans of the working class, anything that, even momentarily, stays the hand of counter-revolution is good!"
You thought that by 1991 the power of bureaucratic tanks to "solve things" for socialism was reaching its limits. "You can only keep the masses passive with tanks if, after you have sent them [tanks, not the masses] onto the streets, you give the population steadily increasing living standards. Yes, that might have been a crude bureaucratic way to handle problems, but as long as bureaucratic socialism was only a relative fetter, it could do it".
Nevertheless, your chief pride was that even at the last, "genuine Leninists never wavered in our pro-Soviet stance". Right up to the end, you defended the USSR as "the world revolutionary centre".
In previous discussions with the AWL, you conceded frankly that you used to be "left Stalinists". There is no shame in coming to think that one started off at the wrong place in politics, and that one has learned many things since - so long as one's previous errors are unsparingly recognised and analysed. But how can you learn the lessons of your break from Stalinism if you deny that it ever had to take place?
Martin Thomas

Comments

Submitted by martin on Wed, 23/10/2002 - 00:47

By Mark Fischer, from the RCNBritain list

Martin,

What was the substance of our political approach to the USSR and eastern Europe?

1. In 'The Leninist' No2 (I think, certainly very early) we explicitly rejected the theory of socialism in one country. We rejected popular fronts. We condemned the class collaboration of WWII, etc. We pointed to the bureacratisation of what we termed the "socialist countries" and speculated that the bureaucracy was so alienated from the working class that these countries could move in the direction of capitalist restoration without civil war. Not really a set of views characteristic of mainstream 'Stalinism', I would suggest.

2. We regarded these countries as workers' states of some sort primarily because of things like 'socialised property forms', 'the monopoly of foriegn trade', 'the planned economy' - the usual Trot nonsense, in other words. And you really should look at what we wrote about the USSR as the "world's revolutionary centre", rather than just frighten your readers with the phrase. We said this is an objective fact, not a subjective one. Regardless of the leadership of the USSR, this was the largest, most powerful workers' state, the one that allowed the other to exist in that sense. The term actually implied no political endorsement of the content of the politics of the CPSU - something we explained time and time again to critics. (And it's there in From October to August, Martin. Page 11 if the index confuses you).

3. As individuals, we came from "left Stalinism". 'The Leninist' was not left-Stalinist, however. That's what we said to you, just to be clear.

4. Now it's good to see you quoting so extensively from From October to August. And yes, that did come out in 1992. But it is actually composed of journalism, internal documents, etc dating back to the early 1980s - as it makes clear. Jack Conrad's personal introduction, for example, states that "with the advantage of hindsight the limitations, mistakes and unrealised hopes are easy to detect. No matter - the reader must judge warts and all". The material was written "written in the heat of the moment", as momentous events unfolded. So your implication that this was - in that sense - the considered opinion of the CPGB in 1992 is a little wide of the mark.

5. As for your 'shock-horror' quote culling from our past material, it really doesn't work does it? Again, if you strip most of it of its 'official communist-speak' and you look at the substance of what we were writing, I could provide you with quotes from Deutscher (or the Sparts when it comes to Poland) that say more or less the same stuff. It was wrong. But was it 'Stalinist'? No, I think the picture was more complex than that.

6. By the way, when will 'Solidarity' be printing Sean's 10,000 word burblings? Oh yes, silly me! You told me that it "would not be appropriate" for your paper - but you are demanding that we print it. No, comrade. We will not be taking up six or so pages of our paper with Sean's ill-thought out, unreferenced stream of consciousness about our organisation. (At least, I think it's meant to be about us - I really had some difficulty in recognising the CPGB from Sean's nonsense). Just to make it clear for you, Martin. We think it is 'appropriate' that you have put this rather shoddy document up on your website. (As the polemical material appears in the WW, we will probably be putting it up on ours). We will reply to some of the more serious parts of it and refer people to your website to read the whole thing if they feel moved to do so. If you think this is not good enough given its high quality, can I suggest that you reconsider your decision not to print? What d'you think? 7. You seem to have moved on since you were confidently informing our readers that the CPGB believed that the Afghan revolution was the only other genuine revolution in the 20th century apart from the Russian. We don't. We have never written anything like this. We do believe that the Kalq wing of the party led a revolution, but as we make clear in my article in the current issue, not a proletarian revolution. It is an unfortunate feature of leading AWLers polemical style that you make totally unsubstantiated, wildly inaccurate, mildly scurrilous accusations, then simply scurry on to the next one. You appear to substitute quantity for quality in your polemics - the tactic seems to be to slow opponents down by creating a rather expansive lake of shite for them to wade through. I look forward to rather more considered material from you as the polemic develops in our paper.

Submitted by martin on Wed, 23/10/2002 - 00:51

In reply to by martin

By Martin Thomas

Mark:

"As individuals, we came from 'left Stalinism'. 'The Leninist' was not left-Stalinist, however". You're claiming that you had broken from Stalinism by the time you launched 'The Leninist'? I repeat my point:

"There is no shame in coming to think that one started off at the wrong place in politics, and that one has learned many things since - so long as one's previous errors are unsparingly recognised and analysed. But how can you learn the lessons of your break from Stalinism if you deny that it ever had to take place?"

Or if you think that disavowal of a few particular Stalinist tenets is enough to constitute a comprehensive break from Stalinism?

1. Yes, "From October to August", which I quoted to show you were still Stalinist in 1992, was a selection of stuff written over years up to 1991. But the selection was endorsed in the Introduction - with only the sort of critical reserve that virtually anyone would append to a collection of reprints about a fast-moving situation - as having expounded a "true" "substantive analysis, polemic and prognosis". The blurb further endorses the book's contents as having shown how you "never wavered" etc. A stance you "never waver" from has to be reckoned as a "considered opinion", doesn't it?

2. I never said your Stalinism was "mainstream". Yes, it was quirky, and yes, I remember early issues of "The Leninist" rejecting popular fronts.

3. It's not true on the evidence of "From October to August" that you based your idea that the Stalinist states were socialist on the "economic base" in Grantite style. For example, on page 221 you mock the idea that nationalised property equals socialism in order to conclude that the USSR post-August had ceased to be socialist, not because of any denationalisations, but because the CPSU no longer ruled.

4. Yes, you criticised the CPSU - but while considering it your party, and arguing that the Soviet Union was "the country where the proletarian struggle finds its highest expression".

5. Were Deutscher and the Spartacists on similar lines to yours? Only in so far as they were Stalinoids. (Deutscher never claimed to be a Trotskyist after around 1940; in his "Prophet Outcast", he forthrightly rejected the "new Trotskyism" which he considers Trotsky to have developed after going over to the idea of a new "political" revolution against the autocracy in the USSR).

6. Afghanistan. Your latest article says that you "have written" that April 1978 was not a proletarian revolution. Good, except that, so far as I can tell, that is the first time you have actually written that down.

Your introduction in October 2001 glowingly endorsed an article which claimed that April 1978 was a proletarian revolution. You qualified the endorsement only by minor and unspecified reference to "flaws" in the article. Your introduction (not the article) praised April 1978 as a "genuine democratic revolution". In that introduction (and in other material in WW around that time) you declared that the Taliban counter-revolution was the opposite of the April 1978 revolution, and that the answer to the Taliban counter-revolution was the opposite again, i.e., so you spelled it out, democratic, secular, working-class revolution. That was identifying April 1978 with "democratic, secular, working-class revolution", wasn't it?

OK, so now you say it was only a "genuine democratic revolution", not proletarian. Good. Of what class character? What other successful revolutions beside the Russian in the 20th century rank above it as "genuine democratic revolutions"?

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