The Daily Worker Newspaper, January 10, 1925, Page 5

aS KS ena einer eek ———— “The idea becomes power when it pene- . trates the. masses.” —Karl Marx. Bolshevism or Trotskyism? Some Facts Regarding Brest and the First Party Conference After Octo ber. The Differences of Opinion in October and My Mistake at That Time. ~ 'O replace Leninism by Trotskyism. that is the task which Comrade ' Trotsky has set out to accomplish. In this respect he had already in 1922 in his book “1905,” attempted “to at- tain something by allusions.” So jong as Comrade Lenin held the threads in his hand, Comrade Trotsky decided not to undertake a direct at- tack. Comrade Trotsky has now ob- viously decided that “the moment has arrived.” According to all the rules of strategy, before one strikes the decisive blow, one must prepare the way by artillery fire. The attack upon the so-called right wing of Bol. shevism is intended as a smoke- screen, particularly regarding th¢) October failures of the writer of these lines. It is an actual fact that at the be- ginning of November, 1917, I or was| ted a great error. -This error was freely’ admitted by me and made good in the course of a few days. As, how. ever, these days were not ordinary days but. very fateful days, as this | Was a time of extreme tension the: ‘error was highly dangerous. In any event I will not minimize iraction and the right wing, never-| . the extent of this error. It was precisely because of the ex-,; traordinary tension of these times, ‘that Vladimir Ilyitch so energetically ‘opposed our error. All these extreme- ly draconic punitive measures, which he at that time proposed against us, all the passionate chastising which he inflicted; were of course thoroly justi- fied. In the shortest time after these events, some weeks afterward, at the commencement of the disputes over the Brest peace, Vladimir Ilyitch, as the whole ©. C. and all the leading circles of the party are aware, re- garded these differences of opinion as completély liquidated. In his speech on “Trotskyism or Leniaism,” Comrade Stalin very right. ly remarks that in the Sep%mber-Oc- tober period as a result of a number of circumstances, the revolution en- deavored to carry out every step un- der the form of defence. This was to be understood after all the shilly shal. lying connected with the Kornilov period. I, who at that time, was liv- ing illegally, fell a victim to my fail- ure precisely owing to this peculiarity of that phase of October. When Comrade Lenin reverted to our error, three years after it had been committed, he wrote as follows: “Immediately before the Octobe: revolution, and soon afterwards, a number of excellent Communists in Russia committed errors, of which one does not like to be reminded. Why not? Because it is not right except on a special occasion, to refer to such errors, which have been com- pletely made good. They showed hesitations in the period in question in that they feared that the Bolshev- iki would isolate themselves and un- dertake too great a risk in holding aloof too much from a certain section o the mensheviki and of the social revolutionaries. The conflict went so far that the comrades in question, as as a demonstration, resined from all responsible posts, both in the party and in the Soviets, to the greatest joy of the ‘enemies of the social revolu- tion. The matter led to the most bit- ter polemics in the press on the part of the CG; C, of our party against those who had resigned. And after some weeks, at the most after some months, all these comrades perceivéd their _ SPECIAL MAGAZINE SUPPLEMENT THE DAILY WORKER. January 10, 1925. SECOND SECTION This magazine suppie- ment will appear every Saturday in The Daily Worker. errors and returned to their respon- difference of opinion was noticed by sible posts in the party and the Sov-|me at the beginning of October, after iets.” (Lenin, Collected Works, Vol-|ithe liquidation of the Kornilov period, ume XVII, Page 373.) Comrade Lenin makes no reference whatever to a “right” wing. For myself, I endeavored more than once, before the party and before the whole Comintern, to deal with my er- ror. I spoke of it, for example at the opening of the Fourth World Congress of the Comintern, which took place on the fourth anniversary of October, as follows: “Allow me to say a word regarding a personal matter. It seems to me that I, particularly now on the fourth anniversary of the revolution, am called.upon to say that which I am about to say. You are aware com- rades that five years ago I, along with some other comrades, made a great. mistake, which, as I believe, was the greatest mistake I have ever made-in my life. At that time I failed to es- timate correctly the whole counter- revolutionary nature of the menshe- viki. Therein lies the nature of our mistake before October, 1017. Al- though we had fought against the mensheviki for over ten years, never- theless, I, as well as many other comrades, could not at the decisive moment get rid of the idea that the mensheviki and social-revolutionists, alihough they were only the right theiess formed a portion of the work- ing class. As a matter of fact they were and are the ‘left,’ extremely skillful, pliable and therefore especial. ly dangerous wing of the international bourgeoisie. I therefore believe, com- rades, that it is our duty to remind all our comrades . . . etc.” I_spoke of our error in the most widely circulated book from my peu, in the “History of the Russian Com. munist Party,” and on numerous ear- lier occasions. To consider the writer of these lines as beloning to the “right wing” of the Bolsheviki, is simply absurd. The whole of the Bolshevik party is aware that I, working hand in hand with Comrade Lenin in the course of near- ly 20 years, never once had even a sharp difference of opinion with him, except ia the one case mentioned. The epoch of the years 1914-1917, from the commencement of the imperialist war up to the commencement of the prole- tarian revolution in our country, was a not unimportant epoch. Precisely in these years there took place the de- cisive regrouping in the camp of the international labor movement. The books “Socialism and War” (1915) and “Against the Stream” are sufficient witness that during that time I in no way came forward as representative ot a right wing of bolshevism. At the April conference of 1917, the importance of which Comrade ‘Protsky misrepresents, I had not the smallest difference of opinion with Comrade Lenin. In the dispute between Com- trade Trotsky on the one side and comrades Kamenev, Nogin and Rykov on the other side, I was wholly on the side of Comrade Lenin, as was to be seen from a number of my reports and speeches at the April conference. The whole dispute was naturally con- fined within the limits of bolshevism —as Comrade Lenin and the party regarded it—and only under the pen of Comrade Trotsky does it assume the form of a struggle of a “right wing” against the party. Not the least differences of opinion occured between myself and Comrade Lenin during and after the July days. We had the opportunity to test this at our leisure in the course of several weeks as long as I lived together with Viadimir [lyitch in hiding. The first after the article of Comrade Lenin “On Compromises.” (in this article Lenin proposes, under certain condi- tions, an agreement with the men- sheviki and the social revolutionists.) My error cousisted in the fact that I endeavored to continue the line of the article “On Compromiscs” some days later. In all only a few days, but the days at that time counted as months. In the famous sitting of the Central Committee of the 10th of October, at which the revolt was decided on, and at which for the first time differences of opinion regarding the time to be fixed for the revolt and as to judging the prospects in the Constitutional As- jsembly arose between me and Kamen- |ev on the one side and the rest of the 'members of the C. C. on the other ‘side, the first political bureau of the iC. C. for the leadership of the revolt was created. The seven following |comrades were elected to this political jbureau: Lenin, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Trotsky, Staiin, Sokoinikov and Bub- nov. In the no less important joint meeting of the Central Committee and a number of Petrograd funtionaries on the 16th of October, after the debates |between Comrade Lenin and our- | selves, 19 votes were cast for the motion of Comrade Lenin in its final jform; 2 were against and 4 neutral; while my motion was introduced by Comrade Volodarsky as an amend- ment to the motion of Comrade Lenin. My amendment read that “in the next five days before meeting our comrades and before discussion we must not ar- range any revolt.” My written motion, which was submitted to the vote at this meeting, read: ‘Without post- poning the measures for investigation and preparation, it is decided that no action be permitted before consulta- tion with the bolshevist section of the Soviet congress.” It was at this time that Comfade Lenin wrote his famous articles against us. I continued to work dili- gently for the Pravda. When the action was finally decided on, in order to silence the exaggerated rumours which had appeared in the press re- garding our differences I wrote a short letter to the editor which was pub- lished by the central organ with a comment of the editor that the dis- pute was ended and that in essentials we were and remained of one mind. (“Pravda,” 21st November, 1917.) The unsigned leading article which appeared in our central organ “Ra- botshi Put” (The Path of the Work- ers), which appeared in place of Pravada, om the day of the revolt October 25, was written by me. The second article was likewise written by me and was signed by me. In this last article we read: | “It is a great task which confronts the second Soviet congress. The events of history are followed each other with breathless speed. The fina! hour is approaching. The least further hesitation brings the danger of im- mediate collapse... .” “The last hopes for a peaceful solu- tion of the crisis are past. The last peaceful hopes which—I must confess —up to the last days were cherished by the writer of these lines have been dispelled by facts.” “All Power to the Soviets.—It is here that everything is being concentrated at the present historical moment.” In the nuntber of our central organ “Rabotshi Put” which appeared on October 26, a short report was pub- lished of my first speech after the period of illegality in the sitting of the Petrograd Soviet of October 25, the day of the revolt. Here we read as By G. Zinoviev follows: The Speech of Zinoviev. “Comrades, we are now in the per- iod of revolt, I believe however that no doubt can exist regarding the out- come of the revolt—we shail be vic- torious! “T am convinced that the overwhel- ming portion of the peasantry will come over to our side as soon as they become acqainted with our proposals regarding the land question. “Long live the social revolution which is now beginning. Long live the Petrograd working class who still achieve the final victory! “Today we have paid our debt to the international proletariat and delivered a terrible blow to the war, a blow at the breast of all imperialists, the greatest blow at the breast of the hangman Wilhelnx ““Down with the war: Long live in- ternational peace!” Sharp differences arose in our circle again in the first days of November (according to old calendar) at the mo- ment when the right social-revolution- ists and mensheviki were already shattered and when it was the ques- tion whether we would not succeed in bringing over the left social-revolu- tionists and the best section of the mensheviki to the side of the Soviet power. In these days I had to take part with other comrades in the fa- mous negotiations with the then exist- ing organization of the railwaymen. These negotiations led to a complete agreement of the “central committee of our party with the then central executive committee of the workers’ and peasants’ councils. These differ- ences lasted actually from two to three days, but during this time they were exceedingly heated. On the 2nd of November, 1917, the central committee of our party, in the presence of Comrade Lenin, adopted a resolution which, among other things, stated: : “The central committee confirms that, without having excluded anybody from the Second Soviet Congress-it is even now fully prepared to note the return of the Soviet members who have resigned (as is known the right social-revolutionhists and the menshe- viki withdrew from the Second Soviet Congress) and to recognize the coali- tion with those whe have withdrawn from the Soviets, that therefore the assertions that the Bolsheviki will not share power with anybody are abso- lutely devoid of all foundation. “The central committee confirms that on the day of the formation of the present government, a few hours be- fore its formation, it invited to its session three representatives of the left social-revolutionists and formally invited them to participate in the gov- ernment, The refusal of the left so- vial-revolutionists, even tho it was only limited to a certain time and subject to certain conditions, places on them the full responsibility for the agreement not being arrived at.”— (Pravda, No. 180 v. 4-17 Nov., 1917.) This paragraph of the resolution, which was doubtless written by Com- rade Lenin, must be specially noted by the reader in order the better to understand that which follows: In the Pravda (the central organ of our party was on the 30th of Octo- ber again named the Pravda),. we read in No, 189 of Nov. 4 the following extract from my speech which I de- livered at the session of the central executive committee of the social- revolutionists and of the social-demo- crats on Nov. 2, 1917: “In the name of the central ¢om- mittee of the Russian social-demo- cratic labor party (at that time our (Continued on page 6)