the increasing crystallization of Marxism-Leninism—already a harsh
and regimented code—into an even more rigid, static, and often sterile
body of doctrine. Like a shrinking garment, communist doctrine pressed
ever more tightly on communists everywhere. Every action now had to
be “justified” by theory. If the theory didn’t fit, then it had to be
reinterpreted. To deviate was to court disaster. Stalin, though not so
good a theorist as Lenin, liked to pose as Marxism-Leninism’s “expert”
interpreter.
This ossification of communist doctrine, under which the individual
was afraid to take any initiative, contributed largely to the violent
reaction against Stalin after his death. His successors realized that
_some_ breathing room was absolutely essential, although during Stalin’s
reign they were content to serve, without protest so far as the record
shows, as the executors of his policies.
Stalin also identified communism with nationalism and imperialism:
_Russian_ nationalism and _Russian_ imperialism.
To him, communism seemed an ideal vehicle for Russian world conquest,
and so, once communism was firmly entrenched in Russia, he embarked on a
policy curiously similar to that of Czarist imperialists like Peter the
Great and Catherine the Great.
Aided by disturbed world conditions between 1939 and 1953, Stalin started
the Soviet chariot of conquest. He directly annexed a number of areas,
such as eastern Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, part of Finland,
eastern Czechoslovakia, part of Roumania. Then, using communism as an
ideological adhesive, Stalin created a Soviet orbit: Yugoslavia, China,
Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria, North Korea, Czechoslovakia, Roumania, East
Germany, Albania, Tibet, Outer Mongolia, and North Indochina (where
bloody fighting was in progress at the time of his death). No wonder
William Z. Foster in February, 1956, could boast that seventeen countries
were “actually building Socialism or are definitely orientating in that
direction,” having a total population of 900,000,000! He adds: “They
constitute the beginning of the new Socialist world.” Note the use of the
word “beginning.”
Native communist parties, aided by Moscow, were often the instruments
of subjugation, Trojan horses of the twentieth century. At other times
Russian military power paved the way. Peoples with long traditions of
freedom were betrayed into slavery. Significantly, no entire country has
ever gone communist and become a satellite by the free choice of election.
This grandiose conquest was abetted by Stalin’s inheritance of the tools
of Marxism-Leninism, a way of life that is imperialistic, overbearing,
and dictatorial. Some individuals may accuse Stalin, alone of the
communist “Big Four,” of being responsible for the terror of modern-day
communism. Marx, Engels, and Lenin, however, are also fully accountable,
and so are Stalin’s henchmen, who still rule in the Soviet Union. Stalin
may have been the active agent of conquest in our generation, but his
knives were sharpened on the diabolical teachings of his communist
predecessors.
Even in Stalin’s time cracks had begun to appear in the communist empire.
In 1948 a terrific fissure, the break with Tito’s Yugoslavia, rocked
Moscow. Currents of discontent, leading to national communism, spread
through the European satellite nations. (National communism holds that
nations can find their own way to communism and need not slavishly copy
Moscow, yet also implies full confidence in the aims and doctrines of
Marxism-Leninism, whose application will result in world communism.)
“Treason trials” sprouted in many places: Vladimir Clementis and Rudolf
Slansky in Czechoslovakia; Laszlo Rajk in Hungary; Traicho Kostov in
Bulgaria. These high Party officials, all old-time communists, along with
others, were executed. In Poland, Wladyslaw Gomulka, a deputy premier,
was expelled from the Party and imprisoned. Stalin’s tyranny became even
more strongly entrenched.
Few observers, even in Russia, however, could have guessed the intensity
of hatred that lay under Russian tyranny. Less than four years after
Stalin’s death the power of freedom was to erupt in Hungary. Poland
swayed on the verge of revolt; unrest swept other satellites. Ironically,
Gomulka, expelled as a traitor, now became Party boss of Poland; Rajk,
along with others, was “rehabilitated.” The “sorrowing” communists even
dug up his body, staged a giant funeral, and buried him again, this time
with honors. Stalin left a precarious legacy for his successors.
But in barely a generation Russia had moved swiftly forward in its
campaign of world conquest. In the name of Karl Marx (who, in his
day, had roundly denounced the imperialism of the Czars) and by the
application of his doctrines, Stalin had created a dictatorial empire far
beyond the dreams of any Czar. Such a dictatorial empire grows out of the
very nature of Marxist thought and is inevitable wherever it is applied.
In the Kremlin the dream of world conquest still persists. It threatens
free peoples everywhere.
This Russian conquest was made possible, in large measure, by the
tremendous strengthening of the Soviet state. In 1928 the first of a
series of Five Year Plans, designed to strengthen heavy industry and
collectivize agriculture, was launched. Step by step the New Economic
Policy, adopted by Lenin in 1921, disappeared.
The government now undertook to control everything. Production quotas,
which had to be met, were set. Compulsory labor increased. Private
trade disappeared. A system of rationing was introduced. Consumer goods
virtually disappeared.
In rural areas small farms were abolished. Peasants were compelled to
live in giant cooperatives. Many of the more well-to-do farmers, called
kulaks, were dispossessed and shipped to Siberia. Entire families were
liquidated. The secret police became more active.
As under Lenin’s “war communism,” the Five Year Plan brought untold human
misery. The forced collectivization of agriculture caused a shortage of
food. Transportation broke down in many areas. In the Ukraine, the food
basket of Russia, famine reappeared. Millions of people died. Disease
stalked the land.
But Stalin held firm. Heavy industry must be expanded—steel mills,
automobile and tractor factories, railroads. Coal mines must be operated.
Armaments must be expedited. Stalin was preparing the base for world
conquest. The price in human suffering and privation was incalculable,
and unimportant.
At the same time Stalin was furthering a communist society. Art,
literature, education, and the press were harnessed to the struggle. A
new generation dedicated to following Stalin’s will was being created.
No opposition was tolerated. In 1936 Stalin brought forth a Soviet
constitution, a document glittering with supposed “rights” for the people
but actually a mask for ever-increasing tyranny.
From 1934 to 1938 was a period of great purges. The world witnessed the
spectacle of gigantic public trials of old Bolsheviks such as Grigori
Zinoviev and Nikolai Bukharin, both former presidents of the Communist
International, and A. I. Rykov, a former Premier, all accused of
treason. Even Yagoda, former head of the secret police, was brought to
court. Many, as comrades of Lenin, had fought to create the Bolshevik
revolution. Now they were denounced as arch traitors. Nobody knows how
many thousands were killed in these blood purges. But one thing was
obvious: Stalin was liquidating all possible opposition.
Inevitably Stalin became, in communist eyes, a virtual god on earth. He
was pictured as the world’s greatest military genius, scientist, author,
critic, statesman, popular hero, thinker and engineer.
Here are some of the accolades:
Long live the wise leader of our Party and people, the inspirer
and organizer of all our victories, Comrade Stalin! (N. S.
Khrushchev, October, 1952)
... Stalin’s work will live through the ages, and grateful
posterity will, like us, glorify his name. (G. M. Malenkov,
March, 1953, who in 1957 was junked like Stalin)
... During those hard and grim days for our Motherland, the
greatness of our leader and teacher, Comrade Stalin, was
revealed in all its magnificence. (N. A. Bulganin, December,
1949)
On March 5, 1953, Stalin died. The communist world went into mourning.
His funeral was a state spectacle. His body, like Lenin’s, was entombed
in Moscow. Speeches extolled his “greatness.”
The whole world wondered, What next? First a triumvirate, Malenkov,
Molotov, and Beria, assumed control. Less than a year later Beria,
head of the secret police, was executed as a “traitor.” Then Malenkov,
generally regarded as the Number One leader, was deposed as Premier.
Later, Molotov, the old-time Bolshevik, was ousted from the Foreign
Ministry, as was his successor, Dmitri T. Shepilov, former editor of
_Pravda_. All three were denounced in 1957 as “enemies” of the Party.
(Still later, Marshal Georgi Zhukov, Red Army hero, was ousted as Soviet
Defense Minister.)
Gradually new faces began to appear, especially that of Nikita S.
Khrushchev, a Politburo member, who became First Secretary of the Central
Committee of the Communist Party, a powerful position. N. A. Bulganin,
one of Stalin’s “political” generals, assumed the job of Premier. These
two, referred to as “B and K,” became the most prominently known leaders.
Significant changes, both in foreign and domestic policies, appeared.
But underneath, as the suppression of the Hungarian revolt was to prove,
lay the ruthless policies of Stalin. Under Malenkov, attempts were made
to encourage the production of consumer items, but with his fall, stress
reverted to the old Stalinist emphasis on heavy industry. In the foreign
field, “B and K” made a widely heralded trip to Yugoslavia, there to woo
Tito back into the Moscow camp. The “Big Smile” was radiant at the Geneva
Conference of July, 1955, attended by heads of state of France, England,
the United States, and Russia, and during highly publicized visits of “B
and K” to India and Great Britain.
The cult of Stalin, which had reached nauseating proportions, was toned
down. Emphasis was laid on collective leadership. Then, on the night
of February 24-25, 1956, came the bombshell that shook and shocked
communists around the world—the bitter denunciation of Stalin by
Khrushchev at the Twentieth Congress of the Russian Communist Party. It
was as devastating a speech as was ever delivered by one man against
another. Copies of the speech, not made public in Russia, found their way
to the West and in June, 1956, were released by our own Department of
State.
Khrushchev denounced Stalin, the “great Stalin” who had been idolized
by all communists as a man who could do no wrong, as a murderer,
pathological liar, and perverter of Marxism-Leninism. In fiery language
and with specific names and dates, Khrushchev accused Stalin of mass
terror, deporting whole populations, forging false evidence against
alleged enemies, being a coward during World War II, and possessing a
vanity that led him to believe he was a god. Khrushchev in his systematic
destruction of Stalin dealt with such matters as:
_1. Mass terror:_
Stalin acted not through persuasion, explanation, and patient
cooperation with people, but by imposing his concepts and
demanding absolute submission to his opinion. Whoever opposed
this concept or tried to prove his viewpoint, and the
correctness of his position—was doomed to ... subsequent moral
and physical annihilation.
* * * * *
Stalin put the Party and the NKVD [secret police] up to the use
of mass terror....
* * * * *
Mass arrests of Party, Soviet, economic and military workers
caused tremendous harm to our country and to the cause of
Socialist advancement.
_2. Suspicion and distrust:_
Stalin was a very distrustful man, sickly suspicious; we knew
this from our work with him. He could look at a man and say:
“Why are your eyes so shifty today,” or “Why are you turning so
much today and avoiding to look me directly in the eyes?” The
sickly suspicion created in him a general distrust even toward
eminent Party workers whom he had known for years. Everywhere
and in everything he saw “enemies,” “two-facers” and “spies.”
* * * * *
“It has happened sometimes that a man goes to Stalin on his
invitation as a friend. And when he sits with Stalin, he does
not know where he will be sent next, home or to jail.”
* * * * *
... after the war ... Stalin became even more capricious,
irritable and brutal; in particular his suspicion grew. His
persecution mania reached unbelievable dimensions. Many
workers were becoming enemies before his very eyes. After the
war Stalin separated himself from the collective even more.
Everything was decided by him alone without any consideration
for anyone or anything.
_3. Illegal arrests:_
[In one case, Stalin curtly told an official:] “If you do not
obtain confessions from the doctors we will shorten you by a
head.”
* * * * *
When Stalin said that one or another should be arrested, it
was necessary to accept on faith that he was an “enemy of the
people”.... And how is it possible that a person confesses to
crimes which he has not committed? Only in one way—because of
application of physical methods of pressuring him, tortures,
bringing him to a state of unconsciousness, deprivation of his
judgment, taking away of his human dignity. In this manner were
“confessions” acquired.
_4. Abuse of power:_
It is clear that here Stalin showed in a whole series of
cases his intolerance, his brutality and his abuse of power.
Instead of proving his political correctness and mobilizing the
masses, he often chose the path of repression and physical
annihilation, not only against actual enemies, but also against
individuals who had not committed any crimes against the Party
and the Soviet government.
_5. Isolation from people:_
Stalin separated himself from the people and never went
anywhere. This lasted tens of years. The last time he visited
a village was in January 1928 when he visited Siberia in
connection with grain deliveries. How then could he have known
the situation in the provinces?
_6. Love of self:_
You should have seen Stalin’s fury! How could it be admitted
that he, Stalin, had not been right! He is after all a
“genius,” and a genius cannot help but be right! Everyone can
err, but Stalin considered that he never erred, that he was
always right. He never acknowledged to anyone that he made any
mistake, large or small, despite the fact that he made not
a few mistakes in the matter of theory and in his practical
activity.
* * * * *
The cult of the individual acquired such monstrous size
chiefly because Stalin himself, using all conceivable methods,
supported the glorification of his own person....
Khrushchev, telling how Stalin, in his own hand, wrote flattering
statements about himself for his own biography, said: “This book is
an expression of the most dissolute flattery, an example of making a
man into a godhead, of transforming him into an infallible sage, ‘the
greatest leader,’ ‘sublime strategist of all times and nations.’ Finally
no other words could be found with which to lift Stalin up to the
heavens.”
And then Khrushchev says, Stalin even had the audacity to add, again with
his own pen, “... Stalin never allowed his work to be marred by the
slightest hint of vanity, conceit or self-adulation.”
No mention was made by Khrushchev of any anti-Semitic crimes committed
by Stalin. However, on April 4, 1956, an article entitled “Our Pain
and Our Solace” appeared in the Warsaw Yiddish-language newspaper
_Folks-Shtimme_, which charged that Jewish culture had been largely
liquidated under Stalin and many Jewish leaders executed. To date these
allegations have never been denied by the Kremlin and American communists
have reluctantly accepted them as true. On April 13, 1956, the East Coast
communist paper, the _Daily Worker_, in an editorial entitled “Grievous
Deeds,” made mention of the earlier Polish “disclosures ... that a large
number of Jewish writers and other Jewish leaders were framed up and
executed and that Jewish culture was virtually wiped out” in the Soviet
Union. These monstrous deeds of anti-Semitism in Russia have had profound
repercussions among communists in the United States.
No single event in Party history so unnerved communists abroad—and inside
Russia too—as did the Khrushchev attack. Where did it leave communist
leaders who year after year had fawned upon Stalin as the greatest of all
leaders? Weren’t they also responsible for such terrible perversions?
What was this system called communism, represented as noble, when its
chief exponent was a murderer, falsifier, and bigot?
History alone can tell the reasons for, and the ultimate effects of, this
violent denunciation. We know about the growing unrest within Russia and
the eagerness of the government to appease demands for a higher standard
of living. We know how communists like to find scapegoats on whom they
can place the people’s hate and distrust, especially if the scapegoat is
dead. We know of the jealous jockeying for power that is inevitable in
any communist hierarchy.
Moreover, there also appeared to be an effort to rid communism of
the growing “dead hand” of Stalin who, in his old age, had become
capriciously tyrannical and personally maniacal. His successors saw
how this crust of sludge, through fear, terror, and ossification of
communist doctrine, was crushing initiative.
But the essential elements of Stalinism, brutality, illegality,
ruthlessness, remain. In October, 1956, the Hungarians revolted against
their puppet government, only to be violently attacked by Soviet tanks
and troops. Nothing could illustrate better the unrepentant Soviet
heart. Moscow still firmly controls her satellite empire. Nowhere in
a communist country have truly free elections been held. Communist
subversion against the free world continues. Atheism remains a dominant
doctrine. Unremitting support for Moscow is still demanded of communists
everywhere. Speaking before the East German Parliament, Khrushchev made
this point clear by stressing the “holy duty” of every communist to help
strengthen the communist world.
Apparently realizing he had gone too far in criticizing Stalin,
Khrushchev backed up and started to praise the late dictator, showing
that in actual fact Khrushchevism was actually Stalinism in a different
dress. At a diplomatic reception in Moscow in early 1957, Khrushchev
commented boldly:
As a Communist fighting for the interest of the working class,
Stalin was a model Communist.... We have criticized Stalin,
we still criticize him, and if necessary we will do it again.
But we do not criticize Stalin as a bad Communist as far as
the interests of the working classes are concerned.... God
grant that every Communist should fight for the interest of the
working class as Stalin did.
What can we expect in the future? Let Khrushchev himself answer: “Those
who expect us to abandon communism will have to wait until a shrimp
learns to whistle.”
“What will the [Soviet] policy be like?... We will do the same, but with
more emphasis.”
This is the enemy we face today.
4.
_How U.S. Communism Began, 1919-21_
The world-wide dangers of the communist conspiracy started with the
Russian revolution in 1917. There and then, for the first time, a
communist party seized control of a nation. Almost immediately this
conspiracy spread to the United States, seeking to take root by
undermining our institutions and traditions.
The Communist Party, USA, first emerged in Chicago, Illinois, in 1919. In
the beginning it seemed little more than a freak. Yet in the intervening
years that freak has grown into a powerful monster endangering us all.
Here is the story:
An emergency convention of the Socialist Party was scheduled to begin in
Machinists’ Hall, 113 South Ashland Boulevard, Chicago, on August 30,
1919. The air was charged with tension. The socialists were badly split.
The left wing, thrilled by the Russian October Revolution, wanted to
establish a Communist Party. The rightists opposed.
The procommunist left-wingers, however, could not agree on a program of
action. One group wanted to use the emergency convention to take over the
Socialist Party. Another group objected, wanting to set up a Communist
Party right away.
A battle quickly developed. Men famous in the history of American
communism—Benjamin Gitlow, John Reed, Charles Ruthenberg, Alfred
Wagenknecht—were present. Each was trying to assemble followers for his
point of view.
One group, the Reed-Gitlow group, refused entrance to the Socialist
Convention, retired to another room in Machinists’ Hall (later to the IWW
Hall, 129 Throop Street), and on August 31, 1919, founded the _Communist
Labor Party of America_ (CLP). Wagenknecht was named Executive Secretary.
(John Reed, incidentally, was to become the Party’s first “martyr.” An
American, well-educated, a poet, writer and newspaperman, Reed was in
Russia during the October Revolution. Completely captivated, he wrote
a book, _Ten Days That Shook the World_. He later returned to Moscow,
participated in Comintern meetings, and died there in 1920. Reed was
buried in the Kremlin.)
A rival group, together with a number of foreign-language federations,
met at Smolny Hall, headquarters of the Russian Federation, 1221 Blue
Island Avenue, Chicago. Its members criticized the Communist Labor Party
as not being truly communistic. The CLP returned the retort, and all
attempts at reconciliation failed. On September 1, 1919, this rival group
formed the _Communist Party of America_ (CP). Split off was a group from
Michigan that was later to form the Proletarian Party. Ruthenberg was
chosen as Executive Secretary of the CP.
Not one but two Parties, the CLP and the CP, each claiming to be the true
representative of communism and bitterly maligning the other, came out
of the Chicago turmoil. The CLP set up headquarters in Cleveland, the
CP in Chicago. The Communist Party was born in America amid confusion,
bickering, and partisanship, a condition that was to haunt it for years.
The communists of 1919 were a motley lot, vastly different from the
highly disciplined, efficiently operating Party of recent years. Though
not lacking zeal or fanaticism, they had little Party training or
discipline. They varied in extremes from bitter die-hards, who were
ready to do anything for the “cause,” even throw a bomb or lead a riot,
to comical show-offs, attracted by violent language and subversive
possibilities. Many believed revolution in the United States was imminent.
The great majority were foreign-born. Many had difficulty speaking
English. _The Communist_ (June 12, 1920) states: “The Communist Party,
from the very beginning of its existence, found its work hampered because
it had in its ranks only a few men capable of expressing Communist
principles in the English language.” The comrades lacked a practical
understanding of American affairs, especially in the trade union field.
Soon all kinds of wild-eyed plans arose. Each leader became his own
interpreter of Marx and Lenin. Cliques, quarrels, and personal rivalries
were rife.
The Russians (those who had been born in the “home of the revolution”)
thought they should play the predominant role. They argued: Wasn’t
Lenin a Russian? Didn’t the revolution start in Russia? Hence they, the
Russian-born, obviously had an “insight” denied all the others. They
should be the leaders.
On one point, however, all agreed: obedience to Soviet Russia. Every
communist considered Lenin a god and the Russian Bolsheviks models of
perfection. These were the men who had made the October Revolution. They
were the teachers; the Americans, the learners. Soviet Russia, at this
time, was assuming an authority over communists in this nation that it
has never relinquished. This control was to become ever more pronounced,
inescapable, and dangerous.