Published: Cooperative Publishing Society of Foreign Workers in the USSR, Moscow, 1937
Source: pamphlet
Transcription: Tim Davenport
HTML: Mike B.
Public Domain: Marxists Internet Archive (2005). You may freely copy, distribute, display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet Archive” as your source.
Transcriber's Note: This March 3 speech, along with "Concluding Words to the Plenum of the Central Committee" of March 5, together comprise two of the most historically important political writings by Iosif Stalin. The speeches are, in short, a public revelation of the center's thinking leading into the period of mass paranoia and spy-hunting which enveloped the Communist Party and economic administrative apparatus in particular (and all of society in general) in 1936-1938. The underutilization of these two published speeches to the February-March plenum is unfortunate, although perhaps not inexplicable.
The Ezhovshchina was a historically brief-albeit bloody-interlude in the history of Soviet Russia. While the speeches were published in the press at the time and have been reissued in a reference book by the Hoover Institution, they remain rather obscure in the minds of many anglophonic historians. The Soviet state propaganda machine simply did not reproduce Stalin's 1937 speeches to the plenum in the English language in any great numbers, nor did Stalin's American Communist followers. Even the 1940 Moscow edition of Stalin's Selected Works in English (revised to include material dated as late as 1939 and thereafter republished unchanged save for typography through 1953) neatly avoids the material.
The February-March 1937 plenum of the CC was originally scheduled for Feb. 19, 1937, on the heels of the January public trial of Piatakov, Radek, and Sokolnikov and was slated to consider the question of Bukharin, who had been accused of complicity in subversion by V.N. Astrov, a detainee of the NKVD. The Feb. 19 meeting had to be postponed due to the suicide of Orjonikidze one day before the scheduled opening of the meeting, however.
It is interesting and perhaps significant that over three weeks passed between Stalin's two speeches to the March plenum of the Central Committee and the publication of the speeches in Pravda. Typically speeches by the most prominent party leaders made print within a day or two of their delivery.
The translation which follows is new synthesis, based upon the two previously existing English language translations (W.P. Coates' London translation of 1937 and the Moscow-originated Co-operative Publishing Society of Foreign Workers in the USSR pamphlet translation of that same year). Both translations were closely compared to the published Russian version of the speech (compiled by Robert H. McNeal in Vol. 1 [XIV] of I.V. Stalin: Works).
The same material was reissued in 1938 under the innocuous title "Mastering Bolshevism" — a title which was reissued in the United States in 1945 and reprinted again in 1946.
— Tim Davenport
Comrades!
From the reports and the debates on these reports heard at this plenum, it is evident that we are dealing with the following three main facts.
First, the wrecking and diversionist-espionage work of agents of foreign countries, among whom a rather active role was played by the Trotskyists, affected more or less all, or nearly all, of our organizations-economic, administrative, and Party.
Second, agents of foreign countries, among them the Trotskyites, penetrated not only into lower organizations, but also into certain responsible posts.
Third, some of our leading comrades, both at the center and at the periphery, not only failed to discern the face of these wreckers, diversionists, spies, and killers, but proved to be so careless, complacent,and naive that at times they themselves assisted in promoting agents of foreign states to responsible posts.
These are the three incontrovertible facts which naturally emerge from the reports and the discussions on them.
How are we to explain the fact that our leading comrades, having a rich experience in the struggle against all sorts of anti-Party and anti-Soviet currents, proved in the present case to be so naive and blind that they were unable to discern the real face of the enemies of the people, that they failed to recognize the wolves in sheep's clothing and were unable to tear away their masks?
Can it be claimed that the wrecking and diversionist-espionage work of the agents of foreign states operating in the territory of the USSR can be anything unexpected and unprecedented for us? No, it is impossible to claim this. This is demonstrated by the wrecking acts in various branches of the national economy during the past ten years, beginning in the Shakhty period, as recorded in official documents.
Can it be claimed that in this past period there were no precautionary signals or warnings about the wrecking, spying, or terrorist activities of the Trotskyist-Zinovievist agents of fascism? No, it is impossible to claim this. We had such signals, and Bolsheviks have no right to forget about them.
The foul murder of Comrade Kirov was the first serious warning which indicated that enemies of the people would resort to double-dealing and that they would mask themselves as Bolsheviks, as Party members, in order to worm their way into our confidence and to thus open access for themselves into our organizations.
The trial of the "Leningrad Center," as well as the "Zinoviev-Kamenev" trial, gave new grounds for the lessons following from the foul murder of Comrade Kirov.
The trial of the "Zinovievist-Trotskyist Bloc" broadened the lessons of the preceding trials and demonstrated before our eyes that the Zinovievites and Trotskyites had united around themselves every hostile bourgeois element; that they had turned into an espionage, diversionist-terrorist agency of the German secret police; that double-dealing and masking themselves are the only means by which the Zinovievites and Trotskyites can penetrate into our organizations; that vigilance and political insight are the surest means of preventing such penetration and for liquidation of the Zinovievist-Trotskyist gang.
The Central Committee of the RKP(b) in its January 18, 1935 confidential letter on the foul killing of Comrade Kirov, emphatically warned Party organizations against political complacency and narrow-minded empty-headedness. That confidential letter stated:
"We must put a stop to the opportunistic complacency which arises from the mistaken assumption that as we grow in the strength of our forces, our enemies become ever more tame and harmless. Such an assumption is fundamentally wrong. It is an echo of the the Right deviation, which assured all and sundry that the enemies would quietly creep into Socialism, that they would become real Socialists in the end. Bolsheviks must not rest on their laurels and become empty-headed. We do not need complacency, but vigilance, real Bolshevik, revolutionary vigilance. We must remember that the more hopeless the position of the enemies becomes, the more readily they will clutch at extreme measures as the only measures of the doomed in their struggle against Soviet power. One must remember this and be vigilant."
In its confidential letter of July 29, 1936, on the espionage-terrorist activities of the Trotskyist-Zinovievist bloc, the Central Committee of the RKP(b) once again called upon Party organizations to display the utmost vigilance, the ability to discern enemies of the people, no matter how well masked they may be. The confidential letter stated:
"Now that it has been proved that the Trotskyist-Zinovievist fiends are uniting in the struggle against Soviet power all the most infuriated and vicious enemies of the toilers of our country-the spies, provocateurs, diversionists, whiteguards, kulaks, and so on; when all boundaries have been obliterated between these elements on the one hand and the Trotskyists and Zinovievists on the other; all of our Party organizations and all members of the Party must understand that vigilance on the part of Communists is imperative on every sector and under all circumstances. The inalienable quality of every Bolshevik under present conditions must be the ability to discern an enemy of the Party, no matter how well masked he may be."
And so there were signals and warnings.
What did these signals and warnings call for?
They called for the elimination of the weakness of Party organizational work and for the transformation of the Party into an impregnable fortress into which not a single double-dealer could penetrate.
They called upon us to put a stop to the underestimation of Party-political work and to make an emphatic turn towards the utmost strengthening of such work, towards the strengthening of political vigilance.
And what happened? The facts show that the signals and warnings were heeded very slowly by our comrades.
This was eloquently demonstrated by the well-known facts revealed in the course of the campaign for the verification and exchange of Party documents.
How are we to explain the fact that these warnings and signals did not have their proper effect?
How are we to explain that our Party comrades, despite their experience in the struggle against anti-Soviet elements, despite the numerous warning signals and precautionary signs, proved to be politically short-sighted in the face of the wrecking, espionage-diversionist work of the enemies of the people?
Perhaps our Party comrades have become worse than they were previously, less conscious and less disciplined? No, of course not!
Perhaps they have begun to degenerate? Once again, no! Such an assumption would be totally unfounded.
Then what is the matter? From where does this empty-headedness, carelessness, complacency, and blindness come?
The fact of the matter is that our Party comrades, carried away by economic campaigns and colossal successes on the economic construction front, simply forgot about certain very important facts which Bolsheviks have no right to forget. They forgot about the one basic fact connected with the international position of the USSR and did not notice two very important facts which have a direct relationship regarding the present-day wreckers, spies, diversionists, and killers who shield themselves behind the Party membership card and mask themselves as Bolsheviks.
What are the facts which our Party comrades have forgotten about or which they simply have not noticed?
They have forgotten that Soviet power was victorious in only one-sixth of the world, that five-sixths of the world are in the possession of the capitalist states. They have forgotten that the Soviet Union finds itself encircled by capitalist states. We have an accepted habit of chattering about capitalist encirclement, but people don't want to ponder about what this thing is-capitalist encirclement. Capitalist encirclement-it is not an empty phrase, it is a very real and unpleasant phenomenon. Capitalist encirclement-it means that there is one country, the Soviet Union, which has established at home a Socialist order, and that there are, besides, many countries, bourgeois countries, which continue to carry on the capitalist form of life and which encircle the Soviet Union, waiting for the opportunity to attack it, to crush it, or, in any case-to undermine its might and to weaken it.
It is this main fact that our comrades have forgotten. But it is precisely this fact which determines the basis of the relations between the capitalist encirclement and the Soviet Union.
Take, for example, the bourgeois states. Naive people might think that exceptionally good relations exist between them as states of the same type. But only naive people can think like that. In actual fact, far from neighborly relations exist between them. It has been proved as surely as two times two is four that the bourgeois states send to each other's rear [ask] spies, wreckers, diversionists, and sometimes also killers, who are given the task of penetrating into the institutions and enterprises of these states, of setting up their agencies and "in case of necessity," of disrupting their rear in order to weaken them and to undermine their might. So is the case at the present time. So also was the case in the past. Take, for example, the states in Europe at the time of Napoleon I. France was then swarming with spies and diversionists from the camps of the Russians, Germans, Austrians, and English. And, on the other hand, England, the German states, Austria, and Russia had at that time in their rear no fewer spies and diversionists from the French camp. Agents of England twice made an attempt on the life of Napoleon and several times roused the Vendee peasants in France against the government of Napoleon. And what was the Napoleonic government? A bourgeois government which strangled the French Revolution and retained only those results of the revolution which were advantageous to the big bourgeoisie. Needless to say, the Napoleonic government did not remain in debt to its neighbors and also undertook diversionist measures. So it was in the past, 130 years ago. So the matter stands today, 130 years after Napoleon I. Now France and England are swarming with German spies and diversionists and, on the other hand, Anglo-French spies and diversionists are active in turn in Germany. America is swarming with Japanese spies and diversionists and Japan with American.
Such is the law of the interrelations between bourgeois states.
The question arises, why should the bourgeois states treat the Soviet Socialist state more gently and in a more neighborly manner than towards bourgeois states of the same type? Why should they send to the rear of the Soviet Union fewer spies, wreckers, diversionists, and killers than they send to the rear of the bourgeois states akin to them? From where did this assumption come? Would it not be more true, from the point of view of Marxism, to assume that the bourgeois states would send to the rear of the Soviet Union two and three times more wreckers, spies, diversionists, and killers than to the rear of any bourgeois state?
Is it not clear that for as long as we have capitalist encirclement, we shall have wreckers, spies, diversionists, and killers sent to our rear by agents of foreign states?
All this was forgotten by our Party comrades and, having forgotten about this, they were taken unawares.
That is why the espionage-diversionist work of the Trotskyist agents of the Japano-German secret police was for some of our comrades a complete surprise.
Further. In waging the struggle against Trotskyist agents, our Party comrades failed to notice, overlooked, that present-day Trotskyism is not what it was, let us say, seven or eight years ago; that Trotskyism and the Trotskyists have, during this time, undergone a serious evolution which has radically altered the face of Trotskyism; that in view of this in the struggle against Trotskyism the methods of struggle likewise must be radically altered. Our Party comrades have failed to notice that Trotskyism has ceased to be a political tendency within the working class, that from that political tendency within the working class which it was seven or eight years ago, Trotskyism has transformed into a frenzied and unprincipled band of wreckers, diversionists, spies, and killers, acting upon the instructions of the intelligence service organs of foreign states.
What is a political tendency within the working class? A political tendency within the working class is a group or party which has its own definite political physiognomy, a platform, a program; which does not hide and can not hide its views from the working class but, on the contrary, propagates its views openly and honestly before the eyes of the working class; which is not afraid to show its political face before the working class, not afraid to demonstrate its real aims and tasks before the working class but, on the contrary, it frankly goes to the working class in order to convince it of the correctness of its views. Trotskyism in the past, seven or eight years ago, was such a political tendency within the working class-anti-Leninist and therefore profoundly mistaken, it is true-nevertheless, a political tendency.
Can it be said that present-day Trotskyism, the Trotskyism, let us say, of 1936, is a political tendency in the working class? No, it is impossible to say this. Why? Because the present-day Trotskyists are afraid to show their real face before the working class, afraid to reveal to it their real aims and tasks; they assiduously conceal from the working class their political physiognomy, afraid that if the working class finds out their real intentions it will swear at them as people alien from the working class and will drive them away. This, in fact, explains why the basic method of Trotskyist work is not now open and honest propaganda of its views before the working class, but rather the masking of its views: the servile and groveling praise of the views of their opponents, the pharisaical and false trampling of their own views in the mud.
At the trial in 1936, if you remember, Kamenev and Zinoviev flatly denied that they had any kind of political platform. They had a full opportunity to unfold their political platform at the trial. Nevertheless, they did not do so, declaring that they had no political platform whatsoever. There can be no doubt that they both lied in denying that they had a platform. Now even the blind can see that they had a political platform. But why did they deny the existence of any political platform? Because they were afraid to disclose their real political face, they were afraid to demonstrate their real political platform of restoring Capitalism in the USSR; they were afraid that such a platform would arouse revulsion in the working class.
At the trial in 1937, Piatakov, Radek, and Sokolnikov took a different course. They did not deny that the Trotskyists and Zinovievists had a political platform. They admitted they had a definite political platform, admitted it and unfolded in their testimony. But they unfolded it not in order to rally the working class, to rally the people to support the Trotskyist platform, but rather to damn it and brand it as an anti-people and anti-proletarian platform. The restoration of capitalism, the liquidation of the collective farms and state-farms, the re-establishment of a system of exploitation, alliance with the Fascist forces of Germany and Japan to bring nearer a war with the Soviet Union, a struggle for war and against the policy of peace, the territorial dismemberment of the Soviet Union with the Ukraine to the Germans and the Maritime Province to the Japanese, the scheming for the military defeat of the Soviet Union in the event of an attack on it by hostile states and, as a means for achieving these aims: wrecking, diversionism, industrial terror against the leaders of Soviet power, espionage on behalf of Japano-German Fascist forces-such was the political platform of present-day Trotskyism as unfolded by Piatakov, Radek, and Sokolnikov. Naturally the Trotskyists could not but conceal such a platform from the people, from the working class. And they concealed it not only from the working class, but also from the Trotskyist rank and file as well, and not only from the Trotskyist rank and file, but even from the upper Trotskyist leadership, comprised of a small group of 30 or 40 people. When Radek and Piatakov demanded permission from Trotsky to convene a small conference of 30 or 40 Trotskyists in order to provide information on the character of this platform, Trotsky forbade them to do so, saying that it was inexpedient to speak of the true character of this platform even to a small group of Trotskyists, since such an "operation" might lead to a split.
"Political figures" concealing their views and their platform not only from the working class but also from the Trotskyist rank and file, and not only from the Trotskyist rank and file, but also from the upper leadership of the Trotskyists — such is the physiognomy of contemporary Trotskyism.
But from this it follows that contemporary Trotskyism can no longer be called a political tendency within the working class.
Contemporary Trotskyism is not a political trend within the working class, but an unprincipled and intellectually devoid band of wreckers, diversionists, intelligence agents, spies, and killers; a band of sworn enemies of the working class in the hire of the intelligence service organs of foreign states.
Such is the indisputable result of the evolution of Trotskyism in the past seven or eight years.
Such is the difference between Trotskyism in the past and Trotskyism in the present.
The mistake our Party comrades made lies in the fact they failed to notice this profound difference between Trotskyism in the past and Trotskyism in the present day. They failed to notice that the Trotskyists have long since transformed into highway robbers capable of any villainy, capable of all that is disgusting down to espionage and straight betrayal of their motherland in order to injure the Soviet state and Soviet power. They failed to notice this and were therefore unable to adapt themselves in time to wage a struggle against the Troskyists in a new way, more decisively.
That is why the abominations of the Trotskyists in recent years were for some of our Party comrades such a total surprise.
Further. Finally, our Party comrades failed to notice that there is an important difference between the present-day wreckers and diversionists on the one hand, among whom the Trotskyist agents of Fascism play a rather active role, and the wreckers and diversionists of the time of the Shakhty case, on the other.
Firstly. The Shakhty people and Promparty people were people openly alien to us. They were for the most part former owners of enterprises, former managers under the old employers, former shareholders in joint stock companies, or simply old bourgeois specialists who were openly hostile to us politically. None of our people doubted the authentic political face of these gentlemen. And the Shakhty people themselves did not conceal their dislike for the Soviet system. One can not say the same about the present-day wreckers and diversionists, about the Trotskyists. The present-day wreckers and diversionists, the Trotskyists-these are for the mostly Party people, with Party membership cards in their pockets, people who are formally not alien to us. While the old wreckers came out against our people, the new wreckers, on the contrary, fawn upon our people, praise our people, toady to them in order to worm their way into confidence. The difference is, as you see, vital.
Secondly. The strength of the Shakhty people and the Promparty people lay in the fact that they, more or less, possessed the necessary technical knowledge at a time when our people, lacking such knowledge, were compelled to learn from them. This circumstance gave the wreckers of the Shakhty period a great advantage; it gave them the opportunity to wreck freely and unhindered, gave them the opportunity to deceive our people technically. Not so with the present-day wreckers, with the Trotskyists. The present-day wreckers are not superior in technical knowledge to our people. On the contrary, our people are better trained technically than the present-day wreckers, than the Trotskyists. From the time of the Shakhty period to our day, tens of thousands of real, technically well-versed Bolshevik cadres have grown up among us. One could name thousands and tens of thousands of technically educated Bolshevik leaders, in comparison with whom all these Piatakovs and Livshitses, Shestovs and Boguslavskiis, Muralovs and Drobnises are mere chatterboxes and schoolboys from the standpoint of technical training. Wherein then lies the strength of the contemporary wreckers, the Trotskyists? Their strength lies in the Party card, in their possession of a Party card. Their strength like in the fact that the Party card gains for them political confidence and opens to them all our institutions and organizations. Their advantage lies in the fact that by possessing Party cards and pretending to be friends of Soviet power, they have deceived our people politically, abused confidence, wrecked on the sly, and revealed our state secrets to the enemies of the Soviet Union. The "advantage" is doubtful in its political and moral value, but it is nevertheless an "advantage." This "advantage" explains, substantially, why the Trotskyist wreckers, as people with Party cards and having access to all places in our institutions and organizations, proved such a godsend for the intelligence service organs of foreign states.
The mistake made by some of our Party comrades is that they failed to notice and did not understand this difference between the old and new wreckers, between the Shakhty people and the Trotskyists, and, not noticing this, they were unable to adapt themselves in time to fight with the new wreckers in a new way.
Comrades, in my report I dealt with the main problems of the subject we are discussing. The debate has shown that there is now complete clarity among us, that we understand the tasks and that we are ready to remove the defects in our work. But the debate has also shown that there are several definite questions of our organizational and political practice on which there is not yet complete and clear understanding.
I have counted seven such questions.
Permit me to say a few words about these questions.
1) We must assume that everybody now understands and realises that excessive absorption in economic campaigns and allowing ourselves to be carried away by economic successes while Party political problems are underestimated and forgotten, lead into a culde- sac. Consequently, the attention of Party workers must be turned in the direction of Party political problems so that economic successes may be combined and march side by side with successes in Party political work.
How, practically, can the task of reinforcing Party political work, the task of freeing Party organizations from minor economic details, be carried out? As is evident from the debate, some comrades are inclined to draw from this the wrong conclusion that economic work must now be abandoned entirely, At all events, there were voices which said in effect :
Well, now, thank god, we shall be free from economic affairs, now we shall be able to devote our attention to Party political work. Is this conclusion correct?
No, it is not correct. When our Party comrades who were carried away by economic successes abandoned politics, it meant going to the extreme, for which we had to pay dearly. If, now, some comrades, in setting to work to reinforce Party political work, think of abandoning economic work, this will be going to the other extreme, for which we shall pay no less dearly. You must not rush from one extreme to the other. Politics cannot be separated from economics.
We can no more abandon economics than we can abandon politics. For convenience of study people usually, methodologically separate problems of economy from problems of politics. But this is only done methodologically, artificially, only for convenience of study.
In real life, however, in practice, politics are inseparable from economics. They exist together and operate together. And whoever thinks of separating economics from politics in our practical work, of reinforcing economic work at the expense of political work, or, on the contrary, of reinforcing political work at the expense of economic work, will inevitably find himself in a cul-de-sac.
The meaning of the point in the draft resolution on freeing Party organizations from minor economic details and increasing Party political work is not that we must abandon economic work and economic leadership, but merely that we must no longer permit our Party organizations to supersede the business organizations, particularly the land departments, and deprive them of personal responsibility. Consequently, we must learn the Bolshevik method of leading business organizations, which is, systematically to help these organizations, systematically to strengthen them and to guide economy, not over the heads of these organizations, but through the medium of them. We must give the business organizations, and primarily the land departments, the best people, we must fill the staffs of these organizations with fresh workers of the best type who are capable of carrying out the duties entrusted to them. Only after this has been done can we count on the Party organizations being quite free from minor economic details. Of course, this is a serious matter and requires a certain amount of time. But until it is done the Party organizations will have to continue for a short period to deal very closely with agricultural affairs, with all the details of ploughing, sowing, harvesting, etc.
2 ) Two word s about wreckers, diversionists, spies, etc. I think it is clear to everybody now that the present-day wreckers and diversionists, no matter what disguise they may adopt, either Trotskyite or Bukharinite, have long ceased to be a political trend in the labour movement, that they have become transformed into a gang of professional wreckers, diversionists, spies and assassins, without principles and without ideals. Of course, these gentlemen must be ruthlessly smashed and uprooted as the enemies of the working class, as betrayers of our country.
This is clear and requires no further explanation.
But the question arises : how is this task of smashing and uprooting the Japano-German Trotskyite agents to be carried out in practice? Does that mean that we must strike at and uproot, not only real Trotskyites, but also those who at some time or other wavered in the direction of Trotskyism and then, long ago, abandoned Trotskyism; not only those who are really Trotskyite wrecking agents, but also those who, at some time or other, had occasion to walk down a street through which some Trotskyite had passed? At all events, such voices were heard at this Plenum. Can such an interpretation of the resolution be regarded as correct? No, it cannot be regarded as correct. In this matter, as in all others, an individual, discriminate approach is required. You cannot measure everybody with the same yardstick.
Such a wholesale approach can only hinder the fight against the real Trotskyite wreckers and spies.
Among our responsible comrades there are a number of former Trotskyites who abandoned Trotskyism long ago and are fighting Trotskyism not less and perhaps more effectively than some of our respected comrades who have never wavered in the direction of Trotskyism. It would be foolish to cast a slur upon such comrades now.
Among our comrades there are some who ideologically were always opposed to Trotskyism, but who, notwithstanding this, maintained personal connections with individual Trotskyites which they did not hesitate to dissolve as soon as the practical features of Trotskyism became clear to them. Of course, it would have been better had they broken off their personal friendly connections with individual Trotskyites at once, and not only after some delay.
But it would be foolish to lump such comrades with the Trotskyites.
3) What does choosing the right people and putting them in the right place mean?
It means, firstly, choosing workers according to political principle, i.e., whether they are worthy of political confidence, and secondly, according to business principle, i.e., whether they are fit for such and such a definite job. This means that the business approach must not be transformed into a narrow business approach, when people interest themselves in the business qualifications of a worker but do not interest themselves in his political face.
It means that the political approach must not be transformed into the sole and exclusive approach, when people interest themselves in the political face of the worker but do not interest themselves in his business qualifications.
Can it be said that this Bolshevik rule is adhered to by our Party comrades? Unfortunately, this cannot be said. Reference was made to this at this Plenum.
But not everything was said about it. The point is that this tried and tested rule is frequently violated in our practical work, and violated in the most flagrant manner. Most often, workers are not chosen for objective reasons, but for casual, subjective, philistine, petty-bourgeois reasons. Most often, so-called acquaintances, friends, fellow-townsmen, personally devoted people, masters in the art of praising their chiefs are chosen without regard for their political and business fitness.
Naturally, instead of a leading group of responsible workers we get a little family of intimate people, an artel, the members of which try to live in peace, try not to offend each other, not to wash dirty linen in public, to praise each other, and from time to time send vapid and sickening reports to the centre about successes.
It is not difficult to understand that in such a family atmosphere there can be no place for criticism of defects in the work, or for self-criticism by leaders of the work.
Of course, such a family atmosphere creates a favourable medium for the cultivation of toadies, of people who lack a sense of self - respect, and therefore, have nothing in common with Bolshevism.
Take for example Comrades Mirzoyan and Vainov.
The first is the secretary of the Kazakhstan Territorial Party Organization, and the second is the secretary of the Yaroslavl Regional Party Organization.
These people are not the worst in our midst.
But how do they choose workers? The first dragged with him to Kazakhstan from Azerbaidjan and the Urals, where he had worked formerly, thirty to forty of his "own" people and placed them in responsible positions in Kazakhstan. The second dragged with him to Yaroslavl from the Donetz Basin, where he had worked formerly, over a dozen of his "own" people and also placed them in responsible positions. And so Comrade Mirzoyan has his own artel. And Comrade Vainov also has his own artel. Guided by the Bolshevik method of choosing and placing people, could they not choose workers from among the local people? Of course they could. Why, then, did they not do so?
Because the Bolshevik method of choosing workers precludes the possibility of a philistine petty-bourgeois approach, precludes the possibility of choosing workers on the family and artel principle. Moreover, in choosing as workers people who were personally devoted to them these comrades evidently wanted to make themselves, to some extent, independent of the local people and independent of the Central Committee of the Party. Let us assume that Comrades Mirzoyan and Vainov, owing to some circumstance or other, are transferred from their present place of work to some other place. What, in such a case, will they do with their "tails"? Will they drag them again to the new places where they are going to work?
This is the absurd position to which the violation of the Bolshevik rule of properly choosing and placing people leads.
4) What does testing workers, verifying the fulfilment of tasks mean?
Testing workers means testing them, not by their promises and declarations, but by the results of of their work, Verifying the fulfilment of tasks means verifying and testing, not only in offices and only by means of formal reports, but primarily at the place of work, according to actual results.
Is such testing and verification required at all?
Undoubtedly it is required. It is required, firstly, because only such testing and verification enables us to get to know the worker, to determine his real qualifications. It is required, secondly, because only such testing and verification enables us to determine the virtues and defects of the executive apparatus.
It is required, thirdly, because only such testing and verification enables us to determine the virtues and defects of the tasks that are set.
Some comrades think that people can be tested only from above, when leaders test those who are led by the results of their work. That is not true.
Of course, testing from above is needed as one of the effective measures for testing people and verifying the fulfilment of tasks. But testing from above far from exhausts the whole business of testing. There is another kind of test, the test from below, when the masses, when those who are led, test the leaders, draw attention to their mistakes and indicate the way in which these mistakes may be rectified. This sort of testing is one of the most effective methods of testing people.
The Party membership tests its leaders at meetings of Party actives, at conferences and at congresses by hearing their reports, by criticising defects and, finally, by electing or not electing this or that leading comrade to leading bodies. The strict adherence to democratic centralism in the Party, as the rules of our Party demand, the obligatory election of Party bodies, the right to nominate and to object to candidates, secret ballot, freedom of criticism and selfcriticism - all these and similar measures must be carried out in order, among other things, to facilitate the testing and control of Party leaders by the Party membership.
The non-Party masses test their business, trade union and other leaders at meetings of non-Party actives, at mass conferences of all kinds, at which they hear the reports of their leaders, criticise defects and indicate the way in which these defects may be removed.
Finally, the people test the leaders of the country during elections of the government bodies of the Soviet Union by means of universal, equal, direct and secret suffrage.
The task is to combine testing from above with testing from below.
5) What does educating cadres on their own mistakes mean?
Lenin taught that conscientiously exposing the mistakes of the Party, studying the causes which gave rise to these mistakes and indicating the way in which these mistakes may be rectified are one of the surest means of properly training and educating Party cadres, of properly training and educating the working class and the toiling masses. Lenin says :
"The attitude of a political party toward its own mistakes is one of the most important and surest criteria of the seriousness of the party and of how it fulfils in practice its obligations toward its class and toward the toiling masses. To admit a mistake openly, to disclose its reasons, to analyse the conditions which gave rise to it, to study attentively the means of correcting it - these are the signs of a serious party; this means the performance of its duties, this means educating and training the class, and then the masses."
This means that it is the duty of Bolsheviks, not to gloss over their mistakes, not to wriggle out of admitting their mistakes, as often happens among us, but honestly and openly to admit their mistakes, honestly and openly to indicate the way in which these mistakes may be rectified, honestly and openly to rectify their mistakes.
I would not say that many of our comrades would cheerfully agree to do this. But Bolsheviks, if they really want to be Bolsheviks, must have the courage openly to admit their mistakes, to reveal their causes, indicate the way in which they may be rectified, and in that way help the Party to give the cadres a proper training and proper political education. For only in this way, only in an atmosphere of open and honest self - criticism, is it possible to educate real Bolshevik cadres, is it possible to educate real Bolshevik leaders.
Two examples to demonstrate the correctness of Lenin's thesis.
Take, for example, our mistakes in collective farm construction. You, no doubt, remember 1930, when our Party comrades thought they could solve the very complicated problem of transferring the peasantry to collective farm construction in a matter of three or four months, and when the Central Committee of the Party found itself obliged to curb these over-zealous comrades. This was one of the most dangerous periods in the life of our Party. The mistake was that our Party comrades forgot about the voluntary nature of collective farm construction, forgot that the peasants could not be transferred to the collective farm path by administrative pressure, they forgot that collective farm construction required, not several months, but several years of careful and thoughtful work. They forgot about this and did not want to admit their mistakes. You, no doubt, remember that the Central Committee's reference to comrades being dizzy with success and its warning to our comrades in the districts not to run too far ahead and ignore the real situation were met with hostility. But this did not restrain the Central Committee from going against the stream and turning our Party comrades to the right path.
Well? It is now clear to everybody that the Party achieved its aim by turning our Party comrades to the right path. Now we have tens of thousands of excellent peasant cadres for collective farm construction and for collective farm leadership. These cadres were educated and trained on the mistakes of 1930. But we would not have had these cadres today had not the Party realised its mistakes then, and had it not rectified them in time.
The other example is taken from the sphere of industrial construction. I have in mind our mistakes in the period of the Shakhti wrecking. Our mistakes were that we did not fully appreciate the danger of the technical backwardness of our cadres in industry, we were reconciled to this backwardness and thought that we could develop extensive socialist industrial construction with the aid of specialists who were hostile to us, dooming our own business cadres to the role of bad commissars attached to bourgeois specialists. You, no doubt, remember how unwillingly our business cadres admitted their mistakes at that time, how unwillingly they admitted their technical backwardness, and how slowly they assimilated the slogan "master technique." Well? The facts show that the slogan "master technique" had good effects and produced good results. Now we have tens and hundreds of thousands of excellent Bolshevik business cadres who have already mastered technique and are advancing our industry. But we would not have had these cadres now had the Party yielded to the stubbornness of the business leaders who would not admit their technical backwardness, had not the Party realised its mistakes then, and had it not rectified them in time.
Some comrades say that it is inexpedient to talk openly about our mistakes, as the open admission of our mistakes may be construed by our enemies as our weakness and may be utilised by them. That is nonsense, comrades, sheer nonsense. On the contrary, the open admission of our mistakes and their honest rectification can only strengthen our Party, raise the prestige of our Party in the eyes of the workers, peasants and working intelligentsia, increase the strength and might of our state. And that is the main thing. If only the workers, peasants and working intelligentsia are with us, all the rest will come.
Other comrades say that the open admission of our mistakes may lead, not to the training and strengthening of our cadres, but to their becoming weaker and disturbed, that we must spare and take care of our cadres, that we must spare their self-esteem and peace of mind. And so they propose that we gloss over the mistakes of our comrades, relax criticism, and still better, ignore these mistakes. Such a line is not only radically wrong but extremely dangerous, dangerous first of all for the cadres whom they want to "spare" and "take care of." To spare and take care of cadres by glossing over their mistakes means killing these very cadres for certain. We would certainly have killed our collective farm Bolshevik cadres had we not exposed the mistakes of 1930, and had we not educated them on these mistakes. We would certainly have killed our industrial Bolshevik cadres had we not exposed the mistakes of our comrades in the period of the Shakhti wrecking, and had we not educated our industrial cadres on these mistakes. Whoever thinks of sparing the self-esteem of our cadres by glossing over their mistakes is killing the cadres and the self - esteem of cadres, for by glossing over their mistakes he helps them to make fresh and perhaps even more serious mistakes, which, we may assume, will lead to the complete breakdown of the cadres, to the detriment of their "self-esteem" and "peace of mind."
6) Lenin taught us not only to teach the masses, but also to learn from the masses.
What does that mean?
It means that we, the leaders, must not get swelled heads, must not think that because we are members of the Central Committee, or People's Commissars, we possess all the knowledge necessary to lead properly.
Rank alone does not give knowledge and experience.
Still less does title. It means that our experience alone, the experience of the leaders, is not sufficient to enable us to lead properly, that, consequently, we must supplement our experience, the experience of the leaders, with the experience of the masses, the experience of the Party membership, the experience of the working class, the experience of the people.
It means that we must not for a moment relax, let alone sever our ties with the masses.
And finally, it means that we must listen attentively to the voice of the masses, to the voice of the rankand- file members of the Party, to the voice of the so-called "little people," to the voice of the people.
What does leading properly mean?
It does not in the least mean sitting in offices and writing instructions.
Leading properly means :
Firstly, finding the proper solution to a problem; but it is impossible to find the proper solution to a problem without taking into account the experience of the masses who feel the results of our leadership on their own backs; Secondly, organizing the application of the correct solution, which, however, cannot be done without the direct assistance of the masses; Thirdly, organizing the verification of the fulfilment of this solution, which again cannot be done without the direct assistance of the masses.
We, the leaders, see things, events and people only from one side, I would say, from above; consequently, our field of vision is more or less limited.
The masses, on the other hand, see things, events and people from the other side, I would say, from below; consequently, their field of vision is also to some extent limited. In order to find the proper solution to a problem these two experiences must be combined. Only then will the leadership be correct.
This is what not only teaching the masses but also learning from the masses means.
Two examples to demonstrate the correctness of Lenin's thesis.
This happened several years ago. We, the members of the Central Committee, were discussing the question of improving the situation in the Donetz Basin. The measures proposed by the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry were obviously unsatisfactory. Three times we sent the proposals back to the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry. And three times we got different proposals from the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry. But even then we could not regard them as satisfactory. Finally, we decided to call several workers and lower business and trade union officials from the Donetz Basin. For three days we discussed matters with these comrades. And all of us members of the Central Committee had to admit that only these ordinary workers, these "little people," were able to suggest the proper solution to us. You no doubt remember the decision of the Central Committee and of the Council of People's Commissars on measures for increasing coal output in the Donetz Basin. Well, this decision of the Central Committee and the Council of People's Commissars, which all our comrades admitted was a correct and even a remarkable one, was suggested to us by simple people from the ranks.
The other example. I have in mind the case of Comrade Nikolayenko. Who is Nikolayenko? Nikolayenko is a rank-and-file member of the Party. She is an ordinary "little person." For a whole year she had been giving signals that all was not well in the Party organization in Kiev; she exposed the family spirit, the philistine petty-bourgeois approach to workers, the suppression of self-criticism, the prevalence of Trotskyite wreckers. But she was constantly brushed aside as if she were a pestiferous fly. Finally, in order to get rid of her they expelled her from the Party. Neither the Kiev organization nor the Central Committee of the C.P. of the Ukraine helped her to bring the truth to light. The intervention of the Central Committee of the Party alone helped to unravel the knot. And what transpired after the case was investigated?
It transpired that Nikolayenko was right and the Kiev organization was wrong. Neither more nor less. And yet, who is Nikolayenko? Of course, she is not a member of the Central Committee, she is not a People's Commissar, she is not the secretary of the Kiev Regional Organization, she is not even the secretary of a Party cell, she is only a simple rank-and-file member of the Party, As you see, simple people sometimes prove to be much nearer to the truth than some high institutions.
I could quote scores and hundreds of similar examples. Thus you see that our experience alone, the experience of the leaders, is far from enough for the leadership of our cause. In order to lead properly the experience of the leaders must be supplemented by the experience of the Party membership, the experience of the working class, the experience of the toilers, the experience of the so-called "little people."
But when is it possible to do that?
It is possible to do that only when the leaders are most closely connected with the masses, when they are connected with the Party membership, with the working class, with the peasantry, with the working intelligentsia.
Connection with the masses, strengthening this connection, readiness to heed the voice of the masses - herein lies the strength and invincibility of Bolshevik leadership.
We may take it as the rule that as long as the Bolsheviks maintain connection with the broad masses of the people they will be invincible. And, on the contrary, as soon as the Bolsheviks become severed from the masses and lose their connection with them, as soon as they become covered with bureaucratic rust, they will lose all their strength and become a mere squib.
In the mythology of the ancient Greeks there is the celebrated hero Antaeus who, so the legend goes, was the son of Poseidon, god of the seas, and Gaea, goddess of the earth. Antaeus was particularly attached to his mother who gave birth to him, suckled him and reared him. There was not a hero whom this Antaeus did not vanquish. He was regarded as an invincible hero, Wherein lay his strength? It lay in the fact that every time he was hard pressed in the fight against his adversary he touched the earth, his mother, who gave birth to him and suckled him, and that gave him new strength.
But he had a vulnerable spot - the danger of being detached from the earth in some way or other. His enemies took this into account and watched for it.
One day an enemy appeared who took advantage of this vulnerable spot and vanquished Antaeus. This was Hercules. How did Hercules vanquish Antaeus? He lifted him off the ground, kept him suspended, prevented him from touching the ground and throttled him.
I think that the Bolsheviks remind us of the hero of Greek mythology, Antaeus. They, like Antaeus, are strong because they maintain connection with their mother, the masses who gave birth to them, suckled them and reared them. And as long as they maintain connection with their mother, with the people, they have every chance of remaining invincible.
This is the key to the invincibility of Bolshevik leadership.
7) Lastly, one more question. I have in mind the question of the formal and heartlessly bureaucratic attitude of some of our Party comrades towards the fate of individual members of the Party, to the question of expelling members from the Party, or the question of reinstating expelled members of the Party. The point is that some of our Party leaders suffer from a lack of concern for people, for members of the Party, for workers. More than that, they do not study members of the Party, do not know what interests they have, how they are developing; generally, they do not know the workers. That is why they have no individual approach to Party members and Party workers. And because they have no individual approach in appraising Party members and Party workers they usually act in a haphazard way : either they praise them wholesale, without measure, or roundly abuse them, also wholesale and without measure, and expel thousands and tens of thousands of members from the Party. Such leaders generally try to think in tens of thousands, not caring about "units," about individual members of the Party, about their fate.
They regard the expulsion of thousands and tens of thousands of people from the Party as a mere trifle and console themselves with the thought that our Party has two million members and that the expulsion of tens of thousands cannot in any way affect the Party's position. But only those who are in fact profoundly anti-Party can have such an approach to members of the Party.
As a result of this heartless attitude towards people, towards members of the Party and Party workers, discontent and bitterness is artificially created among a section of the Party, and the Trotskyite double-dealers cunningly hook on to such embittered comrades and skilfully drag them into the bog of Trotskyite wrecking.
Taken by themselves, the Trotskyites never represented a big force in our Party. Recall the last discussion in our Party in 1927. That was a real Party referendum. Of a total of 854,000 members of the Party, 730,000 took part in the voting. Of these, 724,000 members of the Party voted for the Bolsheviks, for the Central Committee of the Party and against the Trotskyites, while 4,000 members of the Party, i.e., about one-half per cent, voted for the Trotskyites, and 2,600 members of the Party abstained from voting. One hundred and twenty-three thousand members of the Party did not take part in the voting. They did not take part in the voting either because they were away, or because they were working on night shift. If to the 4,000 who voted for the Trotskyites we add all those who abstained from voting on the assumption that they, too, sympathised with the Trotskyites, and if to this number we add, not half per cent of those who did not take part in the voting, as we should do by right, but five per cent, i.e., about 6,000 Party members, we will get about 12,000 Party members who, in one way or another, sympathised with Trotskyism. This is the whole strength of Messieurs the Trotskyites. Add to this the fact that many of them became disillusioned with Trotskyism and left it, and you will get an idea of the insignificance of the Trotskyite forces. And if in spite of this the Trotskyite wreckers have some reserves around our Party it is because the wrong policy of some of our comrades on the question of expelling and reinstating members of the Party, the heartless attitude of some of our comrades towards the fate of individual members of the Party and individual workers, artificially creates a number of discontented and embittered people, and thus creates these reserves for the Trotskyites.
For the most part people are expelled for socalled passivity. What is passivity? It transpires that if a member of the Party has not thoroughly mastered the Party program he is regarded as passive and subject to expulsion. But that is wrong, comrades. You cannot interpret the rules of our Party in such a pedantic fashion. In order to thoroughly master the Party program one must be a real Marxist, a tried and theoretically trained Marxist. I do not know whether we have many members of our Party who have thoroughly mastered our program, who have become real Marxists, theoretically trained and tried.
If we continued further along this path we would have to leave only intellectuals and learned people generally in our Party. Who wants such a Party? We have Lenin's thoroughly tried and tested formula defining a member of the Party. According to this formula a member of the Party is one who accepts the program of the Party, pays membership dues and works in one of its organizations. Please note :
Lenin's formula does not speak about thoroughly mastering the program, but about accepting the program.
These are two very different things. It is not necessary to prove that Lenin is right here and not our Party comrades who chatter idly about thoroughly mastering the program. That should be clear. If the Party had proceeded from the assumption that only those comrades who have thoroughly mastered the program and have become theoretically trained Marxists could be members of the Party it would not have created thousands of Party circles, hundreds of Party schools where the members of the Party are taught Marxism, and where they are assisted to master our program. It is quite clear that if our Party organizes such schools and circles for the members of the Party it is because it knows that the members of the Party have not yet thoroughly mastered the Party program, have not yet become theoretically trained Marxists.
Consequently, in order to rectify our policy on the question of Party membership and on expulsion from the Party we must put a stop to the present blockhead interpretation of the question of passivity.
But there is another error in this sphere. It is that our comrades recognise no mean between two extremes. It is enough for a worker, a member of the Party, to commit a slight offence, to come late to a Party meeting once or twice, or to fail to pay membership dues for some reason or other, to be kicked out of the Party in a trice. No interest is taken in the degree to which he is to blame, the reason why he failed to attend a meeting, the reason why he did not pay membership dues. The bureaucratic approach displayed on these questions is positively unprecedented. It is not difficult to understand that it is precisely the result of this heartless policy that excellent, skilled workers, excellent Stakhanovites, found themselves expelled from the Party. Was it not possible to caution them before expelling them from the Party, or if that had no effect, to reprove or reprimand them, and if that had no effect, to put them on probation for a certain period, or, as an extreme measure, to reduce them to the position of candidates, but not expel them from the Party at one stroke? Of course it was. But this calls for concern for people, for the members of the Party, for the fate of members of the Party. And this is what some of our comrades lack.
It is time, comrades, high time, to put a stop to this disgraceful state of affairs. (Applause.)
Pravda
1 April 1937