reviewed by MC5, March 5, 2001

Although reactionaries edited and promoted this book, MIM has no major objections to it at this time. With a book like this containing documents released from ex-Soviet archives, we are concerned that there could be tampering, selection of documents and hidden agendas. Yet to our knowledge, there is nothing too out of line with what we would expect, so we do not think these documents are political forgeries and there is nothing beyond ordinary garden-variety Menshevik tricks that Dallin and Firsov try to pull over on the reader.

One of the reasons we did suspect the book was that on the back cover it boasted a recommendation from ultra-reactionary Robert Conquest. MIM has always found itself amazed to the extent that the journalistic public ate up everything Conquest said on Stalin and the Cold War; even though it is public knowledge that Conquest was a British government agent. "After the war, he joined the British Foreign Service, and received postings in Bulgaria and New York, the latter as part of the British delegation to the United Nations."(1) Anyone who had seen that resume should have read between the lines and known he was a spook.

Why a poet working as a government agent became viewed as a "scholar" in Russian studies is beyond us here at MIM to begin with. It is perhaps Conquest's participation in the English government since the 1940s that gives him the right to write history based on Nazi and Nazi-sympathizer sources and get away with it. The post-modernist reasoning may go that since Conquest and his people suffered under German war blows, it is "cool" for him to write Nazi-sympathizer accounts of history.(2) In any case, it also came out in the open in 1978 that Conquest worked for the British disinformation services--and how much easier it was to disinform just by recycling Nazi propaganda against the USSR! It was his job to spread selective propaganda, and yet, the bourgeois media lapped up his every word.

Anyway, now based at the ultra-reactionary Hoover Institution, Conquest promoted this book, but we see only slight possibilities of distortion arising from it at this time. Alexander Allin is of the same reactionary ilk as Conquest, working at Stanford University, which should just be renamed an extension of the U.S. Government as far as people like Conquest working for it. The other editor Firsov "is former head of the Comintern research group at the Russian State Archive of Social and Political History (RGASPI) in Moscow" according to the book jacket.

There were few major surprises from the book, and the old Cold Warriors even admitted that the picture that arises is nothing like a Comintern highly organized and dictated from the top with a long reach around the world. Quite the contrary, one easily obtains the impression that Stalin was "hands off," that Dimitrov did not have much by way of resources and that burning questions to Stalin and other top Soviet leaders went unanswered all the time, largely because Stalin had always had the opinion that communist parties had to figure things out for themselves. In fact, one possible area of distortion that may arise is to see Dimitrov as responsible for many victorious aspects of World War II through his connection to communist parties around the world while Stalin played no role.

The social-fascism thesis in Germany of the early 1930s

It has become a schematized way of looking at things that Dimitrov represented the victory of a new approach to the united front, especially with European social-democracy and that his rise coincided with the decline of the influence of Zinoviev and Dutt. Currently, the popular Menshevik view is that Dimitrov represented the rise of commonsense while the fall of Zinoviev and decline of Dutt's influence meant the end to "left sectarianism." The standard and overly rehashed claptrap on this from Menshevik intellectuals is that the "third period" (1928-1934) or Zinoviev/Dutt line may have contributed to Hitler's victory in Germany by failing to cause German communists to unite with the social-democrats against Hitler.

A key concept in this struggle involves the "social-fascism" thesis applied by Bolsheviks to Western Europe's social-democracy of the late 1920s and early 1930s. Behind this thesis was MIM's understanding of social-democracy as not always based in a politically foggy sector of the proletariat but usually in the super-profit bribed petty-bourgeoisie known as the "labor aristocracy"--at least in the imperialist countries, especially those long-established imperialist countries with colonies or neo-colonies. The "social-fascist" term applied to social-democrats who appeared socialist on the outside while serving fascism in content. MIM applies this term to all those today who appeal to the economic nationalism of the imperialist country labor aristocracy. Those calling for closing the borders, import restrictions etc. and calling themselves "socialist" or even "communist"--these are the social-fascists of the year 2001.

It turns out that Stalin's last interventions on this question before the 7th Congress of the Comintern on the united front where Dimitrov won actually came down closer to the Dutt approach. The way the editors present this, Stalin stood firmly against social-democracy but let Dimitrov take over international proceedings anyway. In fact, some wishing to give Dimitrov the most credit would say that Stalin never actually endorsed the 7th Congress! (p. 12) Thus Dimitrov had his own political space in which to operate and a colossal leadership role sanctioned by Stalin.

Letters in this book confirm that Stalin had a more fluid view than just opposing "left sectarianism." In the early 1930s, the communists saw their vote totals increase at the expense of social-democracy in Germany thanks to clear separation from social-democracy. At the same time, German social-democrats were going to be less than worthless in fighting Hitler in the streets and the social-democrats favored attacking the Soviet Union even more than Hitler did at first. This is something that the Menshevik intellectuals all leave out when talking about how the German communists should have sided with the German social-democrats to prevent Hitler from coming to power. What they are talking about would have started a German invasion of the USSR much earlier than 1941, much before the USSR had had enough chance to industrialize. Meanwhile, in France in the later 1930s, there was much more basis for uniting with social-democrats who did not want to attack the Soviet Union. It is not that Stalin "changed his mind" about the class pedigree of the united front. The conditions changed and were different depending on the country involved.

Stalin's comments on Dimitrov's work prior to the 7th Congress of the Comintern included some short notes. While the new element of what Dimitrov was saying was a willingness to unite with social- democratic leaders of social-democratic parties from the tops of the social-democratic parties down to the rank-and-file of the social-democratic parties, Stalin edited Dimitrov to say that united front from below was the foundation of united front political work.(p. 14) He also agreed with Dimitrov's remarks that it is not just the social-democratic leaders to blame, because the workers following social-democrats need to take responsibility themselves to work with the communists.(p. 14)

Early seeds of dissolution of Comintern

At the 7th Congress of the Comintern, Dimitrov himself planted the seeds for the dissolution of the Comintern by saying that individual countries differed considerably and it was not possible to have communists lead movements from one international command center.(p. 18) In major practical decisions, including what communists in France in 1939 should do and China in 1940, Stalin simply said to Dimitrov and the foreign comrades "decide for yourselves."(pp. 39, 122) In 1941, Dimitrov stressed in the May Day message that communist parties must be creative in working on their own conditions. Stalin had already raised the subject of dissolving the Comintern as well, at least as early as 1941. (p. 188)

Dimitrov's notes say Stalin toasted him in 1941 in the following way:

"Dimitrov is losing his parties. That's not bad. On the contrary, it would be good to make the Com[munist] parties entirely independent instead of being sections of the CI. They must be transformed into national Com. parties under various names--Labor Party, Marxist Party, etc. The name doesn't matter. What is important is that they take root in their own people and concentrate on their own special tasks. The situation and tasks vary greatly from country to country, for instance in England and Germany, they are not all the same. When the Com. parties get stronger in this fashion, then you'll reestablish their international organizations."(p. 227)

Lest people think Stalin was for a quick turn-around because of that last sentence, the Comintern voted for a permanent dissolution and made that explicit in its discussions. Meanwhile, Stalin said the following: "Experience has shown that one must not have an intern[ational] directing center for all countries. This became clear under Marx, under Lenin, and now again. Possibly one ought to shift to regional clusters, e.g., South America, the United States and Canada, some European countries, etc., but one must not rush with this."(pp. 228-9) In contrast, the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (RIM) which stole our name has repeatedly had documents calling itself or the Co-RIM the "emerging international center." It was not Stalin's opinion or Mao's opinion that there had to be one, but Trotsky did repeatedly ask for one and attacked Stalin on the question. Yet, this does not stop the ignorant and crypto-Trotskyists from attacking MIM on the question while calling themselves Maoist.

In their final remarks on the subject, Comintern members like Stalin himself, contrasted the Comintern with the Soviet Red Army. The obvious point is that the Soviet Red Army was doing more to spread world revolution than the Comintern was. Defeat of German and Italian imperialism was opening up some space for the people and the deals that the British and Amerikans made with Stalin also opened up further room. In 1940, Dimitrov's notes say Stalin told him: "World revolution as a single act is nonsense. It takes place at different times in different countries. The actions of the Red Army also serve the cause of world revolution."(pp. 190-1)

One note we will make on the final dissolution of the Comintern is the slight protest of the German delegate. The position of the German delegate is most like that of the United $tates today. After all, he was in a position, where the Red Army was about to occupy his country in two years. Wilhelm Pieck said, "It is hard to say whether all the parties are mature enough to be able to solve all their tasks independently. In his opinion, some form of ideological support to the Germany party from the more experienced Soviet friends is necessary."(p. 235)

In actual fact, the Allies occupied Germany and dictated the terms of the new government, as did U.$. occupation forces in Japan. MIM believes there will be a Maoist party in the imperialist countries, including the world's principal oppressor, the United $tates, when the oppressed nations finally occupy it; however, MIM does not believe this party will be large enough to conduct all the business that a communist party needs to conduct inside a large imperialist country like the U$A. Nor will the basic exploited and oppressed masses be enough within U.$. borders to keep U.$. imperialism down. That is why we call for a dictatorship of the international proletariat, principally of the oppressed nations, over the U.$. bourgeoisie.

Though dated, the occupation of eastern Germany is our best and most recent model. In the 21st century, the meaning of self-reliance to oppressed Third World nations includes seeing to it that U.$. imperialism cannot subvert socialism when it arises in the Third World, and to do that means taking the revolution directly to the United $tates. The revolution will and should not stop within Third World and ex-socialist borders.

A side note on the German invasion

In passing the editors tell us that according to Dimitrov's notes, both Stalin and Dimitrov were active giving political direction the day of the Hitler invasion of the USSR, June 22, 1941.(p. 189) This would not be important except that so many pulp fiction novels masquerading as history in recent years have said Stalin was napping when the Germans invaded.

Alliance with Chiang Kai-shek

The Comintern steadily pushed Mao to ally with the Nationalists of China led by Chiang Kai-shek. Chiang Kai-shek was the reactionary leader who massacred thousands of communists in 1927 in Shanghai and other places throughout China. When Trotskyists talk about China, it is frequent that they speak only of 1927, as if alliance did not occur --and with success--for years after 1927. The Trotskyists also twist numerous other points: 1) The communication speed at that time not being high enough for "direction" to come from the Comintern anyway 2) Trotsky's alternative line being no better with its focus on urban workers, which would have led to even more 1927-type slaughters had it not been for Mao's line on People's War. 3) There is nothing in Marxist principles that prevent such alliances, and in fact, Trotsky had earlier signed off on statements of the Comintern that it was possible to ally with the national bourgeoisie. To see a statement on the possibility of allying even with feudal lords, see, http://www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/classics/turkey.txt

The Comintern opposed the capture of Chiang Kai-shek in the "Xian Incident" on December 12, 1936. At that time, the communists and reactionaries were supposed to be cooperating to oust the Japanese invaders. Dimitrov believed all possible should be done to create such an alliance.

Dallin and Firsov believe Mao would have sent Chiang Kai-shek to trial by the people if it were not for the Comintern's intervention. It appears that the Comintern also advised Mao against attacking Chiang Kai- shek at several other points as well. These interventions appear to have become quite timely as opposed to earlier interventions in the 1920s. In 1940, the Comintern not only managed to advise Mao, but they appear to have put pressure on some anti-communist Chinese lackeys through diplomacy with England, as they did later in Yugoslavia as well.(p. 127) The English imperialists were in a war with the Axis imperialists after all.

After the Xian Incident, in July, 1937, the Japanese stepped up their invasion and Chiang Kai-shek followed through on some of his promises to the communists in regard to his release. Specifically Chiang Kai-shek recognized a territory as Mao's and also the communist 8th Army, which was the bulk of the communist fighting force.(p. 109) He also sent Mao a regular sum of money, 770,000 Chinese dollars a month, 650,000 for the 8th Army.(p. 124)

Chiang Kai-shek attacked Mao's 4th Army of 30,000 and wiped it out in January 1941, while Chiang Kai- shek was supposed to be an ally still. Dimitrov urged maintenance of the alliance with Chiang Kai-shek and Mao eventually agreed. Thanks to the U.$. entry into the war later in 1941, Chiang Kai-shek faced new problems--which imperialists to toady up to. The Amerikans and British had less interest in his fighting the communists before the Japanese were gone. Furthermore, Chiang Kai-shek was friendly with the USSR, so the German attack on the USSR changed his calculations on that front as well. As a result of the ongoing changes of World War II, Chiang Kai-shek had to appear to fall more firmly in the Allied camp. The communists kept the united front with him and Mao's main forces did not have to fight Chiang Kai-shek before the Japanese left. Thus the appearance of the documents in this book is that Dimitrov was right to urge a steady course.

Break with social-democrats in 1939

From 1934 to 1939, Dimitrov was the symbol of unity with European social-democracy including its leaders. The accomplishments of this alliance were 1) the alliance of socialists and communists in Spain against fascist Franco and his forces 2) the prevention of fascism in France but not the prevention of capitulation to Hitler in Munich in 1938 or failure to give aid to the Spanish republicans.

Attacking the social-democrats, it became the duty of the communists everywhere to see what they could do to prevent war or overthrow the governments conducting the war. It is probably unknown to common Menshevik opinion that while Dimitrov was still leading, the Comintern was now calling the social- democrats "traitorous" in 1939.(p. 152)

As time goes on, Stalin's "social-fascist" thesis only receives further vindication. As we reported in MIM Notes 93, it turns out that social-democratic president of France for 14 years Francois Mitterand served as an official in the Nazi collaborator Vichy government, received a medal for it in 1943 and stayed friends with the police chief of that regime till the bitter end. It goes to show what kind of material these social- democrats are.

In MIM Notes 209, we explained how the Wall Street Journal reported the Austrian Social-Democratic Party's first-ever admission of ties to the Nazi party during the war and even after it. This was April, 2000. It took till the year 2000 for the social-democrats and bourgeois press to admit it, but Stalin was correct already from 1928-1934 (on how worthless the social-democrats were in fighting fascism) and also in 1939 for breaking with them. Unfortunately, with how the bourgeois politicians attempt to maneuver and fool the masses and take advantage of the masses' political inexperience and naivete, the role of leaders like Stalin becomes magnified. Those waiting for literal confirmation from the social-democrats of what Stalin said would have been waiting till the year 2000 in the case of Austrian social-democracy's infiltration by Nazism. In contrast, one could follow Dutt and Stalin and get to the meat of the question as it happened, at the expense of not knowing every last literal detail. Such choices of leadership happen all the time. There are many instances where comrades are asked to understand the overall theoretical situation and more-or- less predict what is going on. Since a large portion of the masses has no aptitude for theory at all, the communists are at a disadvantage and many things have to be learned in practice and sometimes in literal detail. The failure of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist theory to penetrate and take hold with the masses sets back the cause, perhaps fatally since time is of the essence in preventing species self-annihilation.

It was only useful to be friendly with social-democrats in countries where the national bourgeoisie had a self-interest to be friendly with the USSR. The French bourgeoisie needed its alliance with the Russian rulers, whether communist or tzarist; hence the social-democrats ever attached to their national bourgeoisie were a possibility for alliance in France as long as Germany threatened France. Likewise in Spain, since a military leader Franco was waging a treasonous civil war against an elected mushy government of democrats, radicals and social-democrats, the swamp also had a self-interest in allying with the USSR--to accept weapons for instance. Franco received his weapons from Germany and Italy. Thus the Spanish social-democrats--never as soggy as their counterparts in top-dog imperialist countries England and France --had no where to turn but the USSR.

Since there were no completed revolutions in the midst of war from 1939 to 1941, the USSR was right to judge that the foreign communists had failed in important ways. The break with the social-democrats prepared people for sharp struggle including against the traitors of the Mitterand sort. The notion that the Comintern did nothing to prepare people ideologically for struggle is pure manure. The social-fascist thesis prepared the people for the fact that problems would end up being resolved in war and revolution, not through constitutional maneuvers against fascists.

In 1939, Comintern notes read: "By camouflaging the exploitation of the subdued countries and peoples with the forms of so-called bourgeois democracy, it is all the easier for [this bourgeoisie] to defraud the masses and keep them in subjection. [The bourgeoisie] uses the excess profits pumped out of the colonies to fatten the 'labor aristocracy,' to bribe and corrupt it, to maintain, through the power of its state apparatus, its influence in the workers' movement, and thus to weaken the working class. The ruling classes of these states have built their power on the bones of Indians, Chinese, Negroes, Malays, Arabs, and [American] Indians. These states are the backbone of the entire capitalist system." (last sentence underlining removed, p. 155)

Comintern notes explained the 1939 break with the social-democrats: "This tactic is no longer applicable; first, because the leaders of social democracy and of the petty-bourgeois 'democratic' parties have completely gone over to the side of the bourgeois governments. . . . The attempts by Communists to organize common action with social democracy were disrupted before the European war started. They were disrupted by the refusal of social democracy to struggle for the basic rights and liberties of workers, for the improvement of their living conditions under capitalism; they were disrupted by Blum's 'non-intervention' policy [with regard to the Spanish civil war--MC5] and by support of the Munich deal by French social democracy; they were disrupted by the capitulationist betrayal of Prieto by Caballero; they were disrupted by systematic rejection of the Comintern's proposals to organize common action against the reaction and war by the Executive Committee of the Second International, and primarily, by the English Labourites; they were disrupted by the participation of social democracy in the preparation and unleashing of the current war; they were disrupted by the its policy of inciting the war against the Soviet country."(p. 161) From the late 1930s into 1940, French public opinion favored a war against the Soviet Union.

After the British and French entered the war against Germany in 1939, the French imperialists still hoped to unite with Hitler to attack the Soviet Union. In a period of 8 months referred to as the "phony war," Germany did not launch its expected attack on France. The French Communist Party explained what happened at that time: "The French bourgeoisie and its General Staff had eight months [at their disposal], a sufficient time to catch up and organize a genuine defense of the country. But they could not and did not want to use this time to accelerate the production of tanks and airplanes. They did not even build fortifications or continue the Maginot Line up to Dunkirk, although it was easy to foresee that the German offensive would be directed through the Netherlands and Belgium. During these eight months, the French bourgeoisie did not undertake a single military operation against its adversary. It was too busy organizing a perfidious strike against the Soviet Union, which was not at war with France. For this purpose, it armed and hounded Finnish White-Guardists [at the Soviet Union], it sent an expeditionary corps to Syria in preparation for an attack on Baku and the Soviet Black sea coast."(p. 171)

Again, it is fortunate that Stalin never reasoned as the Trotskyists and academic Mensheviks do. It is not the class pedigree of the united front that is above all else or if the class pedigree is important, then it has to be pointed out that the social-democrats base themselves in the labor aristocracy, the petty-bourgeoisie. The German social-democrats were worthless allies because they wanted to attack the Soviet Union and detracted from battle in the streets, where Hitler proved revolution was possible in Germany in the early 1930s and the Great Depression of that time. Once German social-democrats were out of the picture with Hitler in power, the French, British and other European social-democrats became a potential positive factor in the balance of forces. It should come as no surprise, because it basically means that the communists split the imperialist country petty-bourgeoisie with the reactionaries.

In ordinary times, and without a great power state in the communist camp such as Russia, it is not possible to offer the social-democrats anything to ally with. Social-democrats are about the alliance of the labor aristocracy with the national bourgeoisie. If the communists have nothing to offer the national bourgeoisie, they have nothing to offer to the social-democrats except under fascist conditions. When the USSR was existing, that geopolitical calculation had to enter into the social-democratic leaders' thoughts. In contrast, at this time, social-democrats have nothing to offer communists but a chance to corrupt ourselves to become like them. If fascists attack the social-democrats in the open and militarily, we may hear from them about alliance again, but even then they will be rushing off to work out collaboration with the fascists, as they did in the "United Left" in Peru in the 1990s and in the Spanish Civil War's capitulation to Franco in the 1930s.

Foreign communists also offered little

As the 1930s wore on, the communists in Germany faced a revolutionary situation and lost out to Hitler. In France, the communists could not stop appeasement of Hitler in Munich, 1938 and also could not pressure the government sufficiently to aid the Spanish Republicans in their civil war with the Franco fascists. This is not to mention the failure of the Anglo-Amerikan communists, who only occasionally exerted influence through longshore strikes or boycotts of sensitive shipments.

From the point of view of some of the ordinary rank-and-file Russian Bolshevik or Soviet masses, "'one tractor is worth more than 10 foreign communists.'"(p. 223) Obviously this sentiment heads in a dangerous nationalist direction. On the other hand, it reflects truth about the uneven nature of revolution. It is possible that some comrades with a tractor in the USSR could supply food to soldiers who would do more to defeat the reactionaries than the 10 foreign communists with no people's liberation army--especially in the short run.

Without a scientific understanding of the global revolutionary situation, the most advanced are likely to start doubting themselves, and wondering why they are so much more advanced. The futile chase after the pampered labor aristocracy in the Western imperialist countries by the phony communists has had several damaging effects 1) to lower the sights of the masses to the questions the typical Archie Bunker labor aristocrat wants addressed and thereby set a bad example of the whole international communist movement 2) to raise false hopes about revolution imminently around the corner 3) give rise to nationalist theories in the USSR for why these supposed proletarians in the West have not launched revolution yet.

Mao's approach of protracted people's war and the global countryside surrounding the global cities does more to alleviate these concerns. No one can doubt the many armed struggles launched in the Third World. Still, we think we owe it to the ex-Soviet peoples struggling since 1917 and before to give them a truthful answer about what happened in the West--the rise of the labor aristocracy and its line fed by the superprofits of imperialism. These super-profits can be cut off at the Third World source through People's Wars.

Notes:
1. http://www.independent.org/tii/forums/000119ipfTrans.html#Anchor1
2. For details on Conquest's use of sources, see Ludo Marten's book, "Another View of Stalin," http://www.tiac.net/users/knut/Stalin/node75.html#SECTION00800700000000000000

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