My comments weren’t aimed at you, David, but apply to all of us who took sides in the Trotsky-Stalin debate. In retrospect, it’s been a purely theoretical exercise for our generation without any real political consequence.
The differences between the two factions were urgent and immediate in the interwar years. I now think I would have struggled much more with the issue then, as so many did, weighing the size and influence of the CP's in the rising industrial unions and in the fight against fascism and racism against their undemocratic internal regimes, the cult of personality surrounding Stalin, and the transparent fabrications against the Old Bolsheviks. I might have suppressed any possible doubts about the Stalinists' forced industrialization drive and related effort to forge an anti-Hitler alliance with the Western powers at the expense of the world revolution. But that’s all said with the benefit of hindsight, of course. I can also understand why Trotsky and other Communist intellectuals and working class leaders in that turbulent period might have thought that the world revolution and the ascendancy of the Fourth International were imminent. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#32096): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/32096 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/108305074/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. #4 Do not exceed five posts a day. -=-=- Group Owner: marxmail+ow...@groups.io Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [arch...@mail-archive.com] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
