Trotskyism: Product and Agent of Counterrevolution

Internationalist Communist Group

1980

Likely a translation of “Trotskysme, produit et agent de la contre-révolution” from Le Communiste no. 8, November 1980. Some minor corrections to spelling and punctuation have been made for this red texts version. From https://web.archive.org/web/20181115071320/http://www.gci-icg.org/english/trotskyism.htm.

Trotskyism: Product and Agent of Counterrevolution

Trotsky is often considered as Stalin’s enemy. In fact he was Stalin’s competitor. Let’s explain:

The opposition (that will later become Trotskyist) appears in 26-27 as a (quite late) reaction to the counterrevolutionary position of “socialism in one country.” But this position of Trotsky will only be a theoretical position in so far as Trotsky will always defend capitalism in Russia and everywhere else in the world. Trotskyists will defend the participation to the so-called “second” world war and to all the following ones. If in ’27, Trotsky’s reaction to the Canton and Shanghai massacre of the insurrected proletarians is correct, in total antagonism with this position, he will support the massacres of the proletarians in Spain and critically support all the left bourgeoisie initiatives.

Inside the Third International he attacks the Left, calling them “anarchists” or “adventurous,” he led the crushing of the proletarian insurrection in Kronstadt, he impulsed the militarisation of labour, and praised the Taylor system (increasing of exploitation of human labour)… In two words: Trotsky always supported the development of capitalism. He never realised/understood the transformation/liquidation of the proletarian organs of 1917 into organs of management of capital. He was blind to the capitalist nature of the relations of production in Russia.

The communist revolution means the destruction of production, value, the abolition of wage labour, total suppression of democracy, be it called popular, direct, liberal or libertarian.

Trotsky fights against the participation of the communists to the Kuomintang (1923) and against the policy of the Third International which praised the alliance with the Chinese bourgeoisie against the insurrected proletarians. Correct! But he does not makes a principle out of this position, he does not consider this position as something true always and everywhere, as an important point of the communist programme: anti-frontism.

In 1933, he wants that all the groups of the Trotskyist “opposition” enter the bourgeois social-democrat parties (the same he condemned in 1920) to make “entryism.” That is equivalent to trying to wake up a dead body. We consider entryism is trying to conquest a cadaver from the inside! Trotskyist organisations made entryism inside the organisations created under the Vichy regime in France in order to “organize revolutionary nucleus”!!!

Our criticisms globally concern the critical support to parliament, ministries, elections… the participation to imperialist conflicts supporting the “weakest” imperialism (Russia, Tito, Ben Bella, Khomeyni, Allende, Ho Chi Min…) supporting national liberation struggles.

We denounce the theory defending the existence of “degenerated worker states.” According to this point of view, in those states, the means of production are “fair,” and the means of distribution are “unfair.” We consider this as total bullshit! The production determines the essence, the very nature of the distribution and all the ideological forms that justify the latter. In Russia as well as everywhere in the world economy is based on the law of value, therefore, what is the difference? Nationalisation? State property? No, because it does not attack property. On the one hand, the bourgeois property of the means of production is reinforced and more centralised, on the other hand there is no change in the essence of the relations of production.

We also denounce the theory of the permanent revolution according to which “the accomplishment of democratic tasks in bourgeois backward countries ‘directly’ leads them to the dictatorship of the proletariat which puts the socialist tasks on the agenda.” So making the bourgeois revolution would automatically lead to making the proletarian revolution that would put the finishing touches to the bourgeois revolution. That is how the bourgeois revolution could “permanently” give birth to the proletarian revolution, just as if the latter was a simple and more or less mechanical extension, continuation of the first.

Proletarian revolution will destroy democracy, impose the proletarian class power in order to abolish all classes and all powers. The fact that capital always developed by poles of concentration that moved along the centuries does [not] contradict the fact that it is a worldwide relation of production and that the proletarians have no country to defend, no homeland to die for. National liberation, the “oppressed nations,” the “socialist countries” are bourgeois ideologies to prevent class war!

And last point of the Trotskyist theory we denounce: the transitional programme.

For Trotsky there are two programs: a minimum programme (economical demands, immediate interests) and a maximum programme (political demands, historical interests), and between them, there is a bridge: the transitional program, the “preparation to the taking of the power.” This transitional program is the basis of the 4th International. It says that the productive forces of humanity have stopped growing and that the objective basis of capital is ready for revolution. What is missing is the subjective factor, i.e: the revolutionary leadership. That is the role of the 4th International. Separation between immediate and historical interests of the proletariat, separation between the “masses” and the “leaders,” the bellies and the heads, the oppressed and the imperialist countries, the subjective and the objective conditions, these counterrevolutionary theories serve as lifeguard for capital.

For us the transition between capital and communism will be the dictatorship of the proletariat, and the transitional programme can only be the tasks necessary to dictatorially destroy capital.