Bolshevism: A Curse & Danger to the WorkersLee, H. W. (Henry William)
History
Bolshevism: A Curse & Danger to the Workers
Lee, H. W. (Henry William)
Communism; Soviet Union -- History -- Revolution, 1917-1921
It is necessary to refer also to Leo Trotzky. Some who are convinced
of Lenin's honesty of purpose do not hold the same view of Trotzky.
Lenin is the implacable theorist in whose nostrils compromise of any
sort stinks. Trotzky is not of that character. He is much more
adaptable. And he has changed opinions on war issues more than once
during the war. In the autumn of 1914 or the beginning of 1915,
Trotzky wrote a brilliant pamphlet, "Der Krieg und die Internationale"
("The War and the International"). In that pamphlet he boldly declared
that the break-up of the Austro-Hungarian Empire was a necessity.
While ridiculing defensive wars, he nevertheless wrote: "The more
obstinate the resistance of France--and now, truly, it is her duty to
protect her territory and her independence against the German
attack--the more surely does she hold, and will hold, the German army
on the Western front." Again: "The victory of Germany over France--a
very regrettable strategic necessity in the opinion of German
Social-Democracy--would signify first of all not merely the defeat of
the permanent army under a democratic republican regime, but the
victory of the feudal and monarchical constitution over the
democratic and republican constitution." Thus wrote Trotzky while
still a Social-Democrat, before he became a Bolshevist dictator. How,
then, can he denounce France for fighting an "imperialist war," or
Britain for helping her to prevent a "victory of the feudal and
monarchical constitution over the democratic and republican
constitution"?
The "Dictatorship of the Proletariat."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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