January 15, 2015

Trotsky on Trotskyites


Trotsky on Trotskyites

On January 15, 1935, Grigory Zinovyev, Lev Kamenev, and 16 others were tried in relation to the murder of Leningrad party boss Sergei Kirov. After they were convicted on the sixteenth, Leon Trotsky weighed in on the absurdity of it all. Yet in those absurd times, just one trial was not enough. One year later, many of the same people, including Zinovyev and Kamenev, were again tried, convicted, and executed for their alleged participation in a massive conspiracy masterminded by Trotsky himself.

“Everything Gradually Becomes Clear” (excerpt)

A letter to American friends, January 26, 1935

After the Moscow group of old Bolsheviks were arrested, the first government announcements and official articles claimed that Zinovyev, Kamenev, and Co. had set “the restoration of the capitalist regime” as their objective, and aimed to cause a foreign “military intervention” (by way of… the Latvian consul!). Of course, not a single person seriously believed that.

And yet Stalin’s lackeys, appearing to us in the guise of Comintern “leaders,” do not tire of repeating that Zinovyev, Kamenev, et al. “themselves admitted to their crimes.” What crimes? Preparing the restoration of capitalism? Preparing a military intervention? Preparing the murders of Kirov and Stalin? No, not quite. Faced with the barrel of a gun, they admitted: 1) that they had been very critical of collectivization methods; 2) that they did not sympathize with Stalin or Kaganovich; 3) and that they had not kept these thoughts and feelings from their closest friends. Just that! All of this was in 1932. For these heinous crimes, the most serious of which was their lack of love for Stalin, they were once excluded from the Party. Afterwards, however, they repented and were reinstituted. So what crime have they committed since repenting? Out of the avalanche of empty words and lackey’s curses we could extract only a single concrete incident: in December 1934, Zinovyev told his friends that the Comintern was managing the single-front policy incorrectly, and that the initiative was being practically handed over to the social democrats.

The sheer fact that this kind of critical review of Stalin and Bela Kun’s most recent policy is being cited in court as a criminal act and officially quoted as evidence of a counter-revolutionary conspiracy shows what unheard-of indignity has been visited upon the Party by the unbridled excesses of the Thermidorean-Bonapartist bureaucracy!

Let us assume that Zinovyev’s criticism is mistaken. Let us even allow the lackeys their right to call any criticism directed against them “criminal.” But then what is the relevance of “restoring capitalism” and “military intervention”? What is the connection between demanding a more revolutionary policy against the bourgeoisie and a plan to restore the bourgeois regime? Where is the common sense in this? It has been completely buried by monstrous eruptions of base vileness!

Source: http://www.magister.msk.ru/library/trotsky/trotm380.htm

You can read more about Kirov's assassination and the source of the accusations here and here.

Image credit: Wikimedia Commons (artist: Yuri Annenkov)

Like this post? Get a weekly email digest + member-only deals

Some of Our Books

Maria's War: A Soldier's Autobiography

Maria's War: A Soldier's Autobiography

This astonishingly gripping autobiography by the founder of the Russian Women’s Death Battallion in World War I is an eye-opening documentary of life before, during and after the Bolshevik Revolution.
How Russia Got That Way

How Russia Got That Way

A fast-paced crash course in Russian history, from Norsemen to Navalny, that explores the ways the Kremlin uses history to achieve its ends.
Moscow and Muscovites

Moscow and Muscovites

Vladimir Gilyarovsky's classic portrait of the Russian capital is one of Russians’ most beloved books. Yet it has never before been translated into English. Until now! It is a spectactular verbal pastiche: conversation, from gutter gibberish to the drawing room; oratory, from illiterates to aristocrats; prose, from boilerplate to Tolstoy; poetry, from earthy humor to Pushkin. 
Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka

Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka

In this comprehensive, quixotic and addictive book, Edwin Trommelen explores all facets of the Russian obsession with vodka. Peering chiefly through the lenses of history and literature, Trommelen offers up an appropriately complex, rich and bittersweet portrait, based on great respect for Russian culture.
The Frogs Who Begged for a Tsar (bilingual)

The Frogs Who Begged for a Tsar (bilingual)

The fables of Ivan Krylov are rich fonts of Russian cultural wisdom and experience – reading and understanding them is vital to grasping the Russian worldview. This new edition of 62 of Krylov’s tales presents them side-by-side in English and Russian. The wonderfully lyrical translations by Lydia Razran Stone are accompanied by original, whimsical color illustrations by Katya Korobkina.
The Moscow Eccentric

The Moscow Eccentric

Advance reviewers are calling this new translation "a coup" and "a remarkable achievement." This rediscovered gem of a novel by one of Russia's finest writers explores some of the thorniest issues of the early twentieth century.
Driving Down Russia's Spine

Driving Down Russia's Spine

The story of the epic Spine of Russia trip, intertwining fascinating subject profiles with digressions into historical and cultural themes relevant to understanding modern Russia. 
White Magic

White Magic

The thirteen tales in this volume – all written by Russian émigrés, writers who fled their native country in the early twentieth century – contain a fair dose of magic and mysticism, of terror and the supernatural. There are Petersburg revenants, grief-stricken avengers, Lithuanian vampires, flying skeletons, murders and duels, and even a ghostly Edgar Allen Poe.
Fearful Majesty

Fearful Majesty

This acclaimed biography of one of Russia’s most important and tyrannical rulers is not only a rich, readable biography, it is also surprisingly timely, revealing how many of the issues Russia faces today have their roots in Ivan’s reign.
Stargorod: A Novel in Many Voices

Stargorod: A Novel in Many Voices

Stargorod is a mid-sized provincial city that exists only in Russian metaphorical space. It has its roots in Gogol, and Ilf and Petrov, and is a place far from Moscow, but close to Russian hearts. It is a place of mystery and normality, of provincial innocence and Black Earth wisdom. Strange, inexplicable things happen in Stargorod. So do good things. And bad things. A lot like life everywhere, one might say. Only with a heavy dose of vodka, longing and mystery.

About Us

Russian Life is a publication of a 30-year-young, award-winning publishing house that creates a bimonthly magazine, books, maps, and other products for Russophiles the world over.

Latest Posts

Our Contacts

Russian Life
73 Main Street, Suite 402
Montpelier VT 05602

802-223-4955