Mac,
Comrade, you seem to miss the point. It was the nature of the Soviet Union
- i.e. a deeply degenerate and corrupt workers' state ruled by a privileged
caste of bureaucrats - that made the restoration of capitalism inevitable
unless the bureaucratic rot was cut out with the knife of a workers'
political revolution. Of course it was not "capitalist", but rather it was a
society stuck in transition between capitalism and socialism - sharing
features of each - that could have gone either way. However, the regimes of
Josef Stalin and Adolf Hitler were essentially identical, and the
distinctions we draw between Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany are between the
property relations of both, that made the former a workers' state and the
latter a capitalist state (ruled by a fascist bureaucracy which served as a
hireling of the bourgeoisie, but had usurped political power from them).
Of course, Trotsky's predictions were not entirely accurate despite perhaps
the claims of some of his more devout followers. He believed that the Second
World War would trigger the fall of the Soviet bureaucracy. Quite to the
contrary, this caste emerged strengthened with domination of half of the
European continent. However, the bureaucracy did undertake capitalist
restoration in order to form the new bourgeoisie - a conversion from a
"social" caste to a property-owning class - though fifty or so years after
he thought this possibility would be confronted. And indeed the restoration
of capitalism did not plunge the former bureaucratically deformed workers'
states into civil war with the working classes on the barricades defending
the social conquests of their revolution, but either they were passive or
indeed supportive of counterrevolution. But clearly this would not have
happened were it not for the fact they were so tortured by the rule of the
bureaucracy. One has to wonder what drove half the Polish working class to
their knees at the feet of the Pope.
The Soviet Union was not part of the world capitalist system, no, and
indeed it paid a heavy price indeed for isolation and the abandonment of
international revolution, particularly in the advanced capitalist states.
However it could be argued that the foreign policy of the Soviet Union after
the death of Stalin was the most progressive in human history, with its
support of national liberation and progressives movements the world over.
The restoration of capitalism in the USSR - something we place solely at
the feet of the former Stalinist bureaucracy whom now make up the bourgeois
"oligarchs" of Russia, rather than its working class who were largely
passive around 1991 - has indeed caused ruin that even the wildest, most
extreme commentator a decade ago could not have foreseen. Its workers and
peasants have been plunged into the deepest levels of impoverishment, gains
of decades have been reversed, the means of production have been shattered,
and life expectancy, living standards and population are in free fall.
"Socialism or barbarism" has rarely had more resonance than today. The very
existence of the masses depends on a working class seizure of power. So
atomised and ruined are the proletariat and systematically raped by
imperialism, this may not come for a long time, but I am entirely confident
that it is a certainty in the not too distant future - indeed all that is
really required is a genuine revolutionary leadership of some kind, and the
complete implosion of that disgusting, reactionary movement they call the
"Communist Party of the Russian Federation". And I doubt a revolution will
come unless things start to suddenly get better - a sudden improvement of
the conditions of the masses during dire crisis was the fertile soil in
which all revolutions grew in the past.
But none of the watery-eyed nostalgia of unrepentant Stalinist dears in the
world is going to bring the Soviet Union back. The USSR is gone, dead,
finished, and lies on the scrap heap of history. The resurrection of
Stalinism - of the very structure of the old USSR - is impossible, given the
fact its social basis, the bureaucracy, is no more. To call for the
reconstruction of its former land empire is deeply reactionary, and
tantamount to chauvinist pan-Slavic nationalism. A new Russian workers'
state will be nothing to do with that horrible regime which existed before.
Other than that, I think that your analysis again sorely misses class
analysis. We did not support the fall of Suharto / Apartheid South Africa
for a rather general, liberal reason that it would cause an improvement in
living standards. In fact, in both cases the situation of the masses has got
much much worse since both events. But anyway, I'm short of time so I'll
wrap up here.
Cheers
Owen
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