The Daily Worker Newspaper, May 9, 1925, Page 13

oe ql (Continued from page 2) to the land,” or “by the land and for the land,” or “land for peasant fam- ilies,” etc. A-whole literature has de- veloped on this theme. The discussion contains something that is of interest. There is a ten- dency, for example, which says more output. We must have large indus- trial farms. This is one of the orien- tations of the bourgeoisie. But, the overwhelming majority of the agrar- ians, say: “No! That’s all very well from the standpoint of the immediate increase of output; but from our class standpoint, we must not advocate this. We must not permit such proletarians to be produced in large masses. From the social standpoint, we are on the contrary, for settling larger numbers of peasants.” In France, numerous at- tempts were made to substitute the large number of agricujtural workers who have been attracted from the land to the towns by foreigners: Poles, Czechs, Italians, etc., who very fre- quently obtain small grants of land, in- order at the same time to extend agriculture and to secure a firmer so- cial foundation, N Germany also, an analogous con- troversy is going on between one wing, which has a strong agrarian col- or, and another which is less agrarian in character. I quote these facts in order to show that the bourgeoisie is conducting the united front tactics consciously and deliberately, not merely by means of fine phrases, as we often do. A very precise formulation of the united front tactics as conducted by the bourgeoisie, is given in an Ameri- can financial newspaper. This paper says to the farmers:* “The dema- gogues (ie, the Communists), pro- pose that you adopt united front tac- tics with the working class. The idea of united front tactics is a good one, the farmers stand in need of such tactics, of political assistance, but they should seek this with the big banks, with Big Business.” This is a very ‘precise formulation of the idea sof the united front tactics with the peasantry, against the proletariat. How did they carry these tactics out? The tactics are expressed in various concession madé by the bourgeoisie to the peasantry and take various forms. First of all there are the agrarian re- forms in backward countries. These reforms are not very extensive, we must fight against them and advocate greater and more extensive revolu- tionary demands, but. these re- forms exist and sometimes are very cleverly introduced, For ex- ample, the-peasants in the border dis- tricts are first given small grants of land intended for distribution; then another small section of the peasantry and then a third, and by this means the expectations and the hopes of the entire peasantry that their position will improve, are kept alive. That is how they keep the peasantry in hand. The situation is different in Roumania, where these reforms are not carried out so cleverly. Nevertheless, the bourgeoisie has managed to win over a section of the peasantry to its side. The second question arising out of these tactics, is that of agricultural credits for co-operative societies. In the formal aspect we have the same problem in Russia, but, from the stand- point of the class character and his- torical aims, the position is somewhat different. The whole weight is placed on the agricultural credits. The or- ganizational form is the agricultural society, WILL give you a small example: the agrarian and peasant organiza- tions in Germany have their own banks which are closely connected with the biggest banks in the coun- try. In Finland the co-operative so- cteties are concentrated in two private banks. In the United States of Amer- fea, the farmers on the one hand, are ruined by the trusts and by the fin- anciers. On the other hand the latter give considerable financial ald to the farmers and in this way, hold them fn power. Another form of united front tactics on the economie field is the demand for protective tariffs, by * Re-translated from the German. which during the agrarian crisis, the landlords were able to draw the peas- antry into their sphere of influence. I spoke here of the methods of the united front tactics of the bourgeoisie towards the peasantry. If we do not shut our eyes to this danger, we must realize that a new orientation is need- ed in the Communist Parties. The main error of Trotskyism consists in the under-estimation of the peasant question. When many comrades who raise a hue and cry against Trotsky- ism still hold to their wrong stand- point in this question, I say that this is an impossible attitude. E of the Russian Communist Party = have tried to find the right stand- point and we have found it, That is one of our main reasons for fighting against Trotskyism, and that is why the other parties must do the same if they say that they want to oppose Trotskyism. Their foremost task is then to adopt the right attitude towards the peasant question, and what is more, not to swerve from the right political line of policy. What then are the prejudices which exist in the Communist Parties against the right attitude? I think that these prejudices are mainly based on nar- row guild ideology of the workers in The Role of the City and almost everything to us. But in the epoch when we are confronted by. the task of conquering political power, the question of allies is one of the main questions of the entire policy. In the epoch of conquest of political power, there is nothing more damn- able than this narrow psychology. No matter how we embellish it, objective- ly it is opportunism. OMRADES, in what does Trotsky- ism consist? Among other things it consists of: “More proletarian,” “more industrial,” “not too much turn- ing one’s face to the villages.” And this implies the risk of breaking up the workers’ and peasants’ bloc, con- sequently, the risk of destroying pro- letarian dictatorship. It is just the viewpoint: “Why. should I bother about these villagers?” which is the essence of Trotskyist op- portunism, even if it flies proletarian colors. In my. draft theses all the great questions,.of the agrarian and peas- ant policy are considered from three main viewpoints. 1. Long before the conquest of pol- itical power. 2. Immediately before the conquest of political power. 3. After the conquest of political Imperialist Democracy in the Balkans Bayonets and Bullets for the Workers. the industrial countries. Thus, for in- stance some time ago, I had a con- versation with a very fine German comrade, and in the course of the con- versation he said to me: “What do you expect to achieve with this work- ors’ and peasants’ government. No one will have anything to do with this slogan.” Now what does such a say- ing mean from the viewpoint of our prognosis? It means that we must concentrate all our energies on over- coming this ideology. ENIN said once that most of the mistakes made during struggles and in the revolution arose because slogans and devices, as well as the whole orientation which suited one epoch, are mechanically transferred to another epoch. In the earlier epoch of capitalism, the main question of our prognosis was: how will capital- ism develop? Who will get the upper hand, big or small industries? What will be the process of differentiation among the former peasantry? How long will capitalism continue to de- velop in this way? The role of the fight was: whatever hinders the devel- opment of capitalism must cease to exist. We must do away with all the obstacles in the way of the proleta- riat. This was the general orlenta- tion, But today when we are con- fronted with utterly different tasks: conquest of political power, overthrow of capitalism, when we no longer pay attention to the prognosis, such an orientation is utterly wrong. Formerly, the principle of organiza- tion was: the establishment of one’s own class is the main task, This was power. HE failure to understand these changes was the main error of the preceding period. We have always asserted against the views of the re- formists—and our assertion was right then and is now right—that industry and agriculture on a large scale is economically more rational. We would be reactionaries if we hindered its de- velopment. But if for instance, be- fore the conquest and immediately after the conquest of power we point blank refuse to break up big agricul- tural concerns to divide part of them among the peasantry for the only reason that they are economically more profitable, we lose the entira revolution. In this conection, I will mention the most striking of this, namely the examples of the Hungarian revolution. I maintain that we have not made the fullest possible use of this example given us by the Hungarian comrades. It would be very useful for all Com- munist Parties to read the books, doc- uments and declarations referring to it and to try to understand what hap- pened there, One is justified in say- ing that the main cause of the defeat of the Hungarian revolution was the agrarian question, the utterly inadmis- sable policy of our Hungarian com- rades in this question. position in Hungary was such that 72 per cent of all owners— peasants and big agrarians possessed only 15 per cent of the total amount of land. To set free large territories was absolutely necessary under such circumstances, Instead of winning 7 Land Workers over the peasantry socially, bringing it over to the side of the proletariat, creating thus a strong base in the midst of the peasantry and arousing enthusiasm within the Red Army for the purpose of overcoming the resist- ance of the peasants, a different pol- icy was indulged fn. No land was parcelled out on the plea that big agricultural concerns are technically more rational. A very interesting declaration was issued which was laid down before the meeting of the workers’ councils by the Communist Party. The peasantry had revolted, the proletariat stood in need of an ally and now comes the Communist Party and says in this declaration that it would be utterly wrong to divide the big estates, as this would only strengthen private ownership. With such a policy, proletarian dictatorship was supported in a way to allow the former big landowners to be again in full possession of their former prop- erty. Even if'we admit that the forces were inadequate and that were other reasons for the loss of power we would now have a strong reserve in the peasantry, if our action had been different at that time. The peasants would say: after all the Communists gave us the land, it is true that the landowners took it away from us, but the Communists are fine fellows never- theless. This would be of course a great argument for us. But the recol- lection of such a declaration is a great disadvantage. Under such difficult circumstances, a proletariat without alliance was deemed to be the loser. But it is an interesting fact that some Hungarian comrades fail to wunder- stand this even today. In 1919, name- ly, about five years ago even Comrade Varga failed to understand what he of course understands today. But Comrade Hevesi does not understand it even now. We have statements from him in the organ of our Peasant International which are supposed to be a justification of that policy. He says that the situation in Russia is utterly different from the situation in Hungary. In Hungary it was a case of a small country with a higher in- dustrial development than in Russia, and the small industrial workers had to live. A big revenue from agricul- ture was required, and this could only be achieved thru big agricultural con- cerns. He writes as follows: “Our mistake consisted only in not doing our utmost to impress social con- sciousness and especially the con- sciousness of the peasants with the correctness of this viewpoint.” “(NONSCIOUSNESS” so to speak in the Hegelian sense, is rather good for Hungarian peasants. But the main thing is that they give nothing to the peasants, and we know that to give nothing or very little weighs heavier in the scales of history than some kind of consciousness. This ap- plies of course in a much fuller meas- ure to the peasantry. The Hungarian Soviet government is really a great lesson to us. We have spoken at our congress about Italy and Poland, and I think it would be as well to publish all documents from the history of Hungary as well as from the history of the revolutionary developments in Italy and Poland and also in Russia. Comrades, we must not forget the situation here previous to the October revolution: enormous revolutionary ferment ‘among the peasantry. Two hundred and forty-two peasant de- mands formulated at various meetings were sent to Moscow and Petersburg from different parts of Russia. They included many stupid utopian de- mands, which of course we saw at once. But nevertheless we declared to the peasantry that immediately af- ter the conquest of political power we would put their demands into law. We supported these demands and as soon as political power was in our hands we passed them into law. $ far as production and technique g0, we probably lost by it, but this was the price we paid for victory and thru which we consolidated the dictatorship and achieved the bloc be- tween the peasantry and the working class. Thus, we must study the nega- tive experiences of the Hungarian rev- olution, the negative Italian experi- (Continued on page 8)