*The ideas of Trotsky are also being debated in Venezuela, where president Chávez has quoted him on several occasions and has recommended the reading of the Transitional Programme. The Venezuelan Revolution, which has not been completed, is in itself a brilliant confirmation of his Theory of the Permanent Revolution, i.e. the impossibility of the national bourgeoisie carrying through an agrarian reform and an industrialization of the country. This task falls upon the shoulders of the Venezuelan proletariat, which is currently organizing a big movement for workers' control in the basic industries and the state oil company.* * http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4.htm *
Trotsky and the struggle for a Revolutionary International (1933-1946) - Part four <http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4.htm> Written by Patrick Larsen Thursday, 01 March 2012 [image: Print]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#> *In this fourth and final part of Patrick Larsens account of the struggle of Trotsky and his followers for a genuine revolutionary international, he looks at the revolutionary situations that opened up in Europe between 1943 and 1945. He demonstrates how these were hijacked and diverted by the dominant forces within the labour movement, i.e. the Stalinists and the reformists. This historic betrayal in turn opened up a new situation on a world scale which the majority of Trotsky's followers were unable to understand.* The central perspective of Trotsky was that the Second World War, just as the First, would end with a revolutionary wave in the main capitalist countries. Remembering that the Third International had been founded in practice on the basis of the revolutionary post-war movement in countries like Germany, France, Italy and so on, the Old Man anticipated that in the space of a decade, not one stone would be left upon another of the old Internationals (the Second, reformist, International and the Third, Stalinist, International), and that the Fourth International would be transformed into the dominant revolutionary force on the entire planet. The events in Europe, and also in the colonial world, confirmed in part this perspective, although we also saw contradictory elements, rooted in the very outcome of the war, which rendered the work of the Bolshevik-Leninists extremely difficult. Greece the strangled revolution The Greek Civil War was an event which totally unmasked the misleading propaganda of the imperialists about a so-called war for democracy. For years the Greek workers' movement had been severely oppressed by the Metaxas dictatorship. This repression was reinforced by the Italian-German occupation of Greece from 1940. But towards the end of 1941, several strikes and even workers' demonstrations began in the streets. In the underground, the Greek resistance movement, the EAM, was founded, with ELAS (National Liberation Army) as its armed wing. The Greek Communist Party, the KKE, without regular contact with Moscow, played an enormous role in this movement and correctly raised the slogan of a Constituent Assembly to decide the future of the country without foreign intervention, be it German-Italian or British Imperialism. Nevertheless, the EAM was founded on a Popular-Front basis of national unity, rejecting any differentiation between the classes and any firm connection of democratic demands with the emancipation of the Greek working class. Despite all this, the heroic resistance of the Greek workers and peasants began to make its voice heard throughout the country. The partisans of ELAS took over one city after another and when the British arrived in Greece the country had effectively been taken over by the resistance movement. The working class also played a decisive role in defeating the occupation; on July 25 of 1943 a huge general strike erupted in Athens which prevented the executions of the workers' leaders of the tram-system who had been jailed and condemned to death for organizing a previous strike. In Moscow, Stalin was extremely worried about the situation. *He wanted to avoid revolution in Greece at all costs*, as it would not only put into danger his alliance with the British and American imperialists, but also because just one single successful revolution in a European country could trigger a powerful movement in the whole continent, destabilizing the entire situation. That was why he chose to send a special emissary, Popov, who arrived in Greece just before the end of the occupying regime in October 1944. His first act was to demand that the Communists abandon every pretension of class struggle and that they obey the new coalition government of Georgios Papandreou. But on December 3, 1944, it came to direct confrontation between the British liberators and the followers of EAM, when the former attacked an unarmed demonstration of the latter in Athens, killing 28 protesters and wounding another 148. This represented the beginning of the events known as *Dekemvriana. *The key question in dispute was over the possession of arms. The members of ELAS refused to surrender their guns to the British forces and consequently the EAM ministers abandoned the coalition government. Curiously, Churchill defined the EAM-ELAS rebels in Greece who in their majority were members of the Greek CP as Trotskyists. In a speech given to the House of Commons, he said the following: I think Trotskyists' is a better definition of the Greek Communists and of certain other sects than the normal word, and it has the advantage of being equally hated in Russia. (Laughter and cheers).[i]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn1> The same Churchill, with the explicit acceptance of Stalin, travelled to Greece during Christmas of 1944, in order to lead the repression against the Greek revolution. In his memoirs, the British Prime Minister explained how he and Stalin cynically decided the division of Europe on a sheet of paper in the course of a few minutes[ii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn2>. He also tells how the USSR maintained complete silence about the violent smashing of the Greek Revolution: Stalin, however, adhered strictly and faithfully to our agreement of October, and during all the long weeks of fighting the Communists in the streets of Athens, not one word of reproach came from *Pravda *or *Izvestia* [iii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn3> The agreements of reconciliation that were signed in Varkiza on February the 15, 1945, with the support of the KKE, included the disarming of the ELAS. Although some sections refused, the bulk of the forces of ELAS disarmed. The counter-revolution, thus emboldened, went on the offensive, provoking another guerrilla war that ended with the victory of the counter-revolution in 1949. Italy: The partisan movement and Stalinism The fall of Fascist dictator Mussolini in 1943, when Marshall Badoglio ousted him in a coup following on from the mass strikes,opened a new phase in the Italian revolution. The partisan movement, in its majority led by the Italian Communist Party, consisted of more than 100,000 armed men and managed to take big parts of the country without the help of the Allied forces. Even CP leaders such as Luigi Longo admitted that a situation of dual power existed with entire cities controlled by the forces of the resistance movement. Mass strikes took place in Milan, Genoa, Bologna, Turin and other big cities. The train system in the North was paralyzed for days because of the workers' strike action. The masses assaulted the fascist prisons and liberated the political prisoners by their own strength. The old fascist headquarters were looted and the big printing press was taken over by the workers in Milan and elsewhere. Every person who was seen with a fascist uniform or wearing such symbols was attacked in the streets.[iv]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn4> The landing of Allied troops in Sicily was in reality another desperate measure to control the situation. The Allies tried to impose a coalition government, but at first they tried to do it under the Fascist Marshall Badoglio, and with the simultaneous reestablishment of the monarchy. This clearly exposes the lying propaganda about a war for democracy! But pressurized by the masses,within a year,they had to take a step back and propose a new government led by Bonomi with the direct participation of the Italian CP. Although the fascist regime at that moment was clearly collapsing, the Allies began to bomb Milan between August 12 and 15. Why? Milan had been the centre of strikes and mass demonstrations and the working class was clearly striving for power. In this situation, the Allies wanted to weaken the militant mood of the proletariat with the destruction of the Milanese workers' neighbourhoods. The situation had become serious for the Italian bourgeoisie, and it was only with the arrival of Togliatti, the CP General Secretary, that a more or less stable coalition government could be formed. The Rome Protocol was signed and the partisan movement agreed to obey the orders of the Anglo-American troops. In the British Stalinist paper *Daily Worker, *its North Italian correspondent, James S. Allen, called the armies of British and American Imperialism friends of the Italian people[v]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn5> *.* Years later, the same Togliatti explained the line of the Italian CP during the failed Italian Revolution: If anyone reproaches us for not having taken power or having let ourselves be excluded from government, I would say to them that we could not transform Italy into a new Greece; not only because of our own interest, but also because of the interest of the Soviets[vi]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn6> Denmark The revolutionary general strike and the insurrection in Copenhagen Largely unknown, but in reality very symptomatic of the situation which prevailed throughout Europe at that time, were the events in Denmark between 1943 and 1945. Located to the north of Germany, and with the effective control of the traffic between the Baltic Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, the occupation of this small country became a necessity for Hitler. >From the beginning of the occupation, on April 9th 1941, the Social-Democrats made a pact with the German army, destroying its own defence and surrendering the country to the Nazis without firing a single shot. It was a repetition of Petain's cowardice in France, a development that Trotsky had brilliantly predicted. Just as in other occupied zones, the exploitation of the working class increased as the country functioned as the German rearguard, forced to provide food, arms and logistics to the army of the *Wehrmacht*. In clandestine conditions, hundreds of resistance circles were formed, many of them organized by the Danish Communist Party, which had been illegalized and whose main leaders had been jailed from June 1941, except for a few who had been able to escape and go into hiding. During the four years of German occupation, 2,674 acts of industrial sabotage were committed (bombs against railroads and armament transport, etc). But much more important than that was the marvellous movement of the working class which began with the regional general strikes of July-August 1943 against the presence of a German war boat in the harbour of Odense. The movement was quickly extended to important cities such as Esbjerg, Kolding and Vejle and later on there were also demonstrations in the capital, Copenhagen. Although the German Army, helped by the Social-Democrats, managed to put an end to this movement through repression, the anger of the working class did not cease. One year later, towards the end of July 1944, the famous popular strikes erupted, beginning as a protest of the workers at B&W in the port of Copenhagen, against the curfew imposed by the German invaders. Very rapidly this movement was transformed into a real insurrection in the workers' neighbourhoods, barricades were set up all over the city and bloody clashes took place for days. Only after having given concessions to all the demands of the protests, could a temporary cease-fire be established. When the end of Hitler's occupation was imminent, towards March of 1945, a power vacuum emerged in Denmark. The resistance committees, most of them led by the Communist Party, were armed; it was only through their collaboration that it was possible for the British to control the situation. The most militant sectors of the Danish working class were breaking with the Social-Democratic Party and passing over *en masse *to the Communist Party, which before the occupation had been a miniscule group with just one Member of Parliament. The slogans of the workers were not only of a democratic character, but had above all a social character: they demanded that all the purchasing-power of the workers lost during the occupation should be restored and also called for the expropriation of those capitalists who had collaborated with the invaders (including Mærsk, a huge Danish capital owner). These demands were present in the historic march of 4th of July 1945, with 100,000 workers in Christiansborg Square in front of the National Parliament. It was only after the appearance of the Communist Members of Parliament, who managed to convince the masses, that the workers abandoned the square. Stalinism had betrayed another revolution[vii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn7> . Repercussions in the Colonial World The same phenomena which we described in the cases of Italy, Greece and Denmark were reflected in countries like Finland, Belgium and also by the defeat of the conservative government of Great Britain in the polls and the huge electoral victory of the Labour Party. But the revolutionary wave that followed the end of the war was not limited to Europe. In the countries under the domination of imperialism a truly unprecedented movement took place. As we mentioned in the previous part of this article, this was the case in India, where British Imperialism was confronted with the biggest mutiny in the history of its navy. On February 18th of 1946, the sailors of the huge warship HMS Talwaar, located in the harbour of Bombay, went on strike to protest the bad food conditions. The strike quickly spread to the territorial patrols in Bombay and the soldiers took over various garrisons and raised red flags. Within 48 hours, this episode was repeated in one division after another in 74 warships, 20 fleets and 22 marine units, including the troops at Calcutta, Karachi, Madras, Cochin and Vishakapatam [viii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn8> . However, the political collaboration with imperialism on the part of the Stalinists of the CP of India and also on the part of Ghandi and the bourgeois nationalists meant the isolation of the sailors' rebellion. The rebellion was therefore unable to connect with the great strikes that took place in the textile sector. Once the British imperialists began to repress the movement in cold blood, killing 228 sailors and leaving 1,046 wounded, the movement had no other alternative but to surrender. In spite of all this, there were huge movements of India's workers, among those the strike of 60,000 railroad workers and later on 100,000 postal workers. There was also a big regional strike in Bombay, organized by the CPI. British Imperialism was very worried and decided to send a special commission to try and exploit religious antagonisms with the purpose of avoiding a socialist revolution at all costs. This was the background to the criminal division of India, with the creation of a Muslim state (Pakistan) in August 1947 and the subsequent massacre which took place. In this way, the revolution was annihilated on the Indian sub-continent with the explicit acceptance of Stalinism. In other parts of the Colonial World, the same ferment caused revolutionary upheavals. In Argentina, the workers of Buenos Aires defeated an attempted coup d'état against the Nationalist government of Juan Domingo Perón, thus radicalizing the class struggle in that country and seriously weakening British imperialism. In China we saw the peasant war of the forces of Mao Zedong which put an end to the rule of Chang-Kai-Shek in 1949. The emancipation of China from the chains of imperialism, in spite of the Stalinist regime that Mao implemented, was an absolutely progressive event and must be considered part of the same revolutionary wave. Africa was also affected by the revolutionary mood with a remarkable growth of the independence movement, among others in Algeria against the French and in Egypt where a nationalist-revolutionary wing within the army was organized around Nasser, preparing his way to power in 1952. Stalinism and reformism weakened or strengthened? To sum up, we can say that the perspective of Trotsky of an enormous revolutionary wave after the war was confirmed by the development of events. But this did not result, except in very special cases, in an explosive growth of Trotskyism. The Fourth International did not become the dominant force on the planet and neither Stalinism nor social-democratic reformism collapsed as tendencies within the labour movement. Evidently, this requires some explanation. It is important to remember that every perspective is conditional and that its prognosis depends on a whole series of factors. If these factors change, then the end result must inevitably also change. To understand this, it is necessary to analyze the military results of the war, which surprised everyone; even the most advanced military strategists and the president of the United States and rulers of Great Britain. In reality, almost the entire war against Hitler took place on the Eastern front, on Russian soil. The British imperialists were struggling for their own interests in the North of Africa and the Americans for the control of the Pacific in their war against Japan. All the decisive battles took place in Russia and Germany, the most important ones being those of Stalingrad and Kursk in 1942-43. After that, the Red Army advanced and forced the Germans to retreat rapidly. The imperialists had been waiting for Russia and Germany to mutually destroy each other and thus secure the conditions for a total domination of Europe on the part of the Allies. But the war developed differently, first and foremost because of the two great Soviet advantages: the planned economy and the heroic resistance of the masses. This enabled the Russians to regroup their forces and defeat the German invaders. The so-called D-Day with the landing of Allied troops in Northern France in July 1944, was not an act to liberate the people of Europe from fascism but rather a desperate measure by the imperialists to avoid the whole of Europe falling into Soviet hands. Nevertheless, it was the Russians who entered Berlin first and gave the order to raise the red flag above the Reichstag. Far from weakening Stalinism, the historic advance of the Red Army, liberating the whole of Eastern Europe from German occupation, reinforced it as a political tendency within the workers' movement. Many rank and file workers thought that the Red Army was sowing the seeds of socialism in each liberated country. The situation caused tremendous confusion, even in the ranks of Trotskyism, and gave many activists illusions in Stalinism. On the other hand, the economic help of American imperialism, the so-called Marshall Plan, played a big role in reinforcing the authority of social-democratic reformism. The leaders of the Social-democracy promised huge reforms in Western Europe and in some countries, like Great Britain, the working masses swung towards them, hoping for a radical change in society. It was in this way, on the basis of the strengthening of Stalinism and reformism and their capacity to betray the revolutions that Capitalism was able to consolidate itself for the time being. This was the political precondition for the great economic boom which followed the Second World War. The catastrophist thesis of Cannon and co. How did Trotsky's supporters, now without the presence of the Old Man, face up this new reality? Far from recognizing the changed situation and changing tactics accordingly, the main leaders of the Fourth International maintained their old perspective and repeated the old phrases. In the first place, James Cannon, the main SWP leader, even denied that the war was over. In the second place, he insisted, together with Belgian leader Ernest Mandel, on the impossibility of a new boom of capitalism on a world scale. In his document Perspectives for the American Revolution, written in 1946, Cannon was predicting an immediate recession in the North American economy: US imperialism which proved incapable of recovering from its crisis and stabilising itself in the 10-year period preceding the outbreak of the Second World War is heading for an even more catastrophic explosion in the current postwar era. [ix]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn9> . The same ideas were repeated in the writings of the main leaders of the Fourth International, with very few exceptions. In the main resolution of the World Conference of the Fourth International, held in Paris in 1946, the same erroneous perspective was present. Furthermore, that document contained other fundamental mistakes. In the original draft it said that the USSR had emerged weakened by the war and that it could be overthrown"in the near future, even without military intervention, through the sole fact of economic, political and diplomatic pressure of American and British imperialism, and its military threats"[x]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn10> We believe that these lines speak for themselves! In a moment where the armed forces of the USSR had won what could be argued to be the biggest military victory in the history of war, these gentlemen thought that the Stalinist regime could fall by diplomatic pressure and military threats! As if these errors were not enough, Cannon, Frank, Pablo, Mandel and the other main leaders also declared that the bourgeoisie was only capable of ruling in Europe through Bonapartist military dictatorships![xi]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn11> The only base for such an argument was that the Allied powers had tried to reach a deal to install a dictatorship headed by Badoglio in Italy in 1943-44 after the fall of Mussolini. This conception clashed again with the reality that existed in Europe. Far from being able to install dictatorships, the bourgeoisie was in fact in a position where it had to govern through bourgeois democracy, for the simple reason that *it did not have the strength to destroy the powerful organizations of the working class*. In this situation it decided to use another tactic, the old method of class collaboration in the form of Popular Front governments. Counter-revolution in a democratic form All those questions did not have a mere academic meaning but were of great importance at the time, for elaborating the correct revolutionary slogans and tactics. As Ted Grant explained on numerous occasions, in times of advance the quality of the generals is essential in a war. But in times of difficulty and retreat, the role of the leadership becomes even more decisive. With good generals it is possible to make a successful retreat in order to reorganize the soldiers and prepare the next battle. But with bad soldiers, a temporary retreat is transformed into a defeat. There were of course some people in the Fourth International who drew a much more sober-minded balance-sheet of the correlation of forces and who opposed the ultra-left tendencies of the majority. In the United States, a minority of the SWP, led by Albert Goldman (Trotsky's lawyer), Felix Morrow (the author of the famous book on the Spanish Revolution) and Jean Van Heijenoort (Trotsky's personal secretary for seven years), began in 1943 to analyze the changes taking place, starting with Italy[xii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn12>. They drew a whole number of correct conclusions, especially on the need to connect the democratic struggles with the social struggle, on the need to participate actively in the armed resistance movements, the impossibility of military dictatorships in Europe in the near future, etc. However, they also made a number of mistakes, including a failed attempt at unity with Max Shactmann's Workers' Party. Subsequently, almost all of the members of the Morrow-Goldman group became disillusioned and abandoned politics. The most consistent opposition, and politically the most far-sighted, came from the RCP, the British section led by Jock Haston and Ted Grant. In their documents we see a careful defence of Trotsky's method applied to the new reality in post-war Europe. In a March 1945 document, they explained that Europe was passing through *a period of counter-revolution in a democratic form*[xiii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn13>. They emphasized that historically, the bourgeoisie had not only been able to liquidate revolutions with the installation of dictatorial regimes but also through bourgeois democracy. With crushing clarity they made an analogy with the abortion of the first German revolution of 1918-19 and the regime of Noske-Sheidemann. Another great sign of political wisdom contained in the document was how the RCP understood the dual and contradictory nature of the advance of the USSR. They stressed that, on the one hand the victory of the Red Army made the masses remember the Russian October Revolution, but at the same time, the military triumph allowed the Soviet bureaucracy to strangle the proletarian revolution in Europe. They concluded that it was perfectly possible that Stalinism could survive for a substantial period of time. They even managed to anticipate how Stalin, three years afterwards, in 1948, would implement planned economies in Eastern Europe, controlled from above, Bonapartist-style.[xiv]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn14> Although Ted Grant and the RCP could not foresee the magnitude of the post-war boom (a phenomenon that would influence all of politics in Europe until 1973), they did understand that there would not be an immediate recession but rather an economic upturn of capitalism. In the pre-conference of the Fourth International in April of 1946, they presented a whole number of amendments to the majority document. They speak for themselves: In opposition to the reformists and Stalinists, who seek to lull the masses with a perspective of a new renaissance of capitalism and a great future for democracy,* the resolution of the International Pre-Conference is one hundred per cent correct in emphasizing the epoch of decline and collapse of world capitalist economy. But in a resolution that seeks to orientate our own cadres on immediate economic perspectives from which the next stage of the class struggle will largely flow, and thus our immediate propaganda and tactics the perspective is clearly false.*(...) The theory of spontaneous collapse of capitalism is entirely alien to the conceptions of Bolshevism. Lenin and Trotsky emphasized again and again that capitalism will always find a way out if it is not destroyed by the conscious intervention of the revolutionary party which, at the head of the masses, takes advantage of the difficulties and crises of capitalism to overthrow it. The experience of World War II emphasizes the profound correctness of these conceptions of Lenin and Trotsky. Given the prostration of the proletariat through the betrayal of its mass organisations, the cyclical upswing of the productive forces, the wearing out of machinery, the slashing of wages, leads to an absorption of surplus stocks and the restoration, or partial restoration of the rate of profit. Thus, the way is prepared for a new cyclical upswing which in its turn lays the basis for an even greater slump. (...) No matter how devastating the slump, if the workers fail, capitalism will always find a way out of its economic impasse at the cost of the toilers and the preparation of new contradictions. The world crisis of the capitalist system does not end the economic cycle but gives it a different character. The theory of the Stalinists put forward in the last world crisis that this was *the last* crisis of capitalism from which it would never recover, has been revealed to have been entirely unMarxian. There is a grave danger that this theory will be revived in our own ranks today. . [xv]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_edn15> The majority of the leaders of the Fourth International did not listen to the arguments of the RCP. Their lack of understanding caused an incredible amount of confusion in the Trotskyist movement and the whole subsequent history and evolution of the Fourth International was marked by this fact. The destructive line of subordination to petit-bourgeois movements the adaptation to guerillaism and its tragic consequences in Argentina and Peru, its flirting with Stalinism in Yugoslavia and China, the invention of the students as a new revolutionary factor, the fatal approving of the POR's adaptation to nationalism during the Bolivian revolution of 1952 all this was the result of an inability to understand the period that opened up after WW2 and as a consequence, they began the search for magic solutions to the real problems in the building of the revolutionary party. The legacy of Trotsky The Old Man could not have anticipated in a detailed manner all the events or the way in which the Second World War would end. However, his writings do provide the key, the dialectical method, to understanding, not only the new situation, but also the tasks of the revolutionaries. Despite the historical failure of the leaders of the Fourth International, which effectively destroyed the organization founded by Trotsky, his struggle for a revolutionary International was not in vain. Although the Marxist movement went through a major setback after the war, especially after the dissolution of the RCP in 1949, the unbroken thread was maintained through the tireless work of Ted Grant. The writings of Ted are the direct continuation of Trotsky and his continued analysis of the world situation helped a new generation understand a complex reality and keep up the struggle against all odds. The unbroken thread between Ted (who died only five years ago, 2006) and Trotsky is what unites the cadres of the International Marxist Tendency with the best traditions of Trotsky. Seventy-one years after his death, many of Lev Davidovich's perspectives are being vindicated by events. The fall of the USSR, the possibility of which was denied for decades by the Stalinists, revealed the impossibility of building Socialism in one country. Today, many communists, among them Cubans, are reading the writings of Trotsky for the first time, discovering how he anticipated the collapse of real socialism almost sixty years ago. *The ideas of Trotsky are also being debated in Venezuela, where president Chávez has quoted him on several occasions and has recommended the reading of the Transitional Programme. The Venezuelan Revolution, which has not been completed, is in itself a brilliant confirmation of his Theory of the Permanent Revolution, i.e. the impossibility of the national bourgeoisie carrying through an agrarian reform and an industrialization of the country. This task falls upon the shoulders of the Venezuelan proletariat, which is currently organizing a big movement for workers' control in the basic industries and the state oil company.* In this article we have tried to show Trotsky's method in the building of the revolutionary party. We think that the struggle for a revolutionary international was neither a waste of time nor a utopian project, but an audacious and courageous attempt to arm a new generation with the theoretical tools that can provide the final victory. The present crisis of capitalism, described even by the bourgeois commentators as the worst recession since the Great Depression of 1929, compels us to re-study the method of Trotsky. If this article has served to assist in this respect, it has been worthwhile. *[End]* ------------------------------ [i]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref1> Quoted in *Guerra y revolución. Una interpretación alternativa de la Segunda Guerra Mundial*, CEIP, Buenos Aires, 2004. page 24. [ii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref2> Winston S. Churchill: Triumph and Tragedy, page.228-29 [iii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref3> Ibid. page. 262 [iv]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref4> Information taken from: Ted Grant: The Italian revolution and the tasks of the British workers<http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/grant/works/4/3/italian_revolution.html>, Workers International News, Vol.5 No.12, August 1943: [v]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref5> Quoted in Felix Morrow: The Italian Revolution, *Fourth International,* New York, September 1943, Vol.4 No.9, pp.263-73. [vi]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref6> Quoted in *Guerra y revolución. Una interpretación alternativa de la Segunda Guerra Mundial*, CEIP, Buenos Aires, 2004. Page 28. [vii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref7> In spite of the treacherous policy of its leaders, the Danish CP grew from 4,000 to 60,000 members just after the end of the war. On the electoral plane it went from 2.4% to 12.5% of the vote in October 1945. But once the party had revealed its reformist intentions it was abandoned and lost nine MPs in the October 1947 elections. [viii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref8> For a detailed analysis: Lal Khan: *Pakistan's Other Story*, Aakar Books, Delhi, 2009. page. 72-83 [ix]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref9> James P. Cannon: Theses on the American Revolution<http://www.marxists.org/archive/cannon/works/1946/thesis.htm> [x]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref10> Quoted in Ted Grant: *History of British Trotskyism*, Wellred, London, 2002, page. 130 [xi]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref11> The position of the Majority on the inevitability of a period of Bonapartism in Europe is reflected in many of their, writings, among others the articles of Pierre Frank: Democracy or Bonapartism in Europe?<http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/frank/1945/11/demobonapart.htm>and Bonapartism in Europe<http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/frank/1945/11/bonapart2.htm> [xii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref12> The documents oft the Morrow-Goldman fraction can be found in the following archives: Félix Morrow<http://www.marxists.org/archive/morrow-felix/index.htm>, Albert Goldman<http://www.marxist.com/%20http:/www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/goldman/index.htm%20>, Jean Van Heijenoort<http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/heijen/index.htm> : [xiii]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref13> *The changed relation of forces in Europe and the role of the Fourth International*, published in: Ted Grant: *The Unbroken Thread*, Fortress Books, London, 1989, page.83-110. [xiv]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref14> * Ibid*. page, 92-93 [xv]<http://www.marxist.com/trotsky-and-struggle-for-revolutionary-international-4/print.htm#_ednref15> Proposed line of amendment to International Conference Resolution New Imperialist Peace and the Building of the Parties of the Fourth International<http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/newspape/win/vol06/no10/amendment2.htm>. 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