EDUCATION FOR SOCIALISTS
ISSUED BY THE NATIONAL EDUCATION DEPARTMENT SOQAUST WORKERS RARTY 14 CHARLES LANF NEW YORK, N.Y 10014
Towards a History of the Fourth International, Part 3 ——v
Struggle in the Fourth International
INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE DOCUMENTS 1951-1954
Volume 3 of 4 volumes     $1.00 March 1974

INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE DOCUMENTS, 1951-1954

Contents, Volume III
Introductory Note	131
Glossary of Pseudonyms and Pen Names Used
by Key Figures	131
Section X: Declaring an International Public
Faction	132
 1.	A Letter to Trotskyists Throughout the World	132
 2.	Against Pabloist Revisionism	13S
 3.	Resolution Forming the International Committee	153
 4.	The Successive Stages of Pabloite Revisionism	153
 5.	Fourth International Rallies Against Pablo (Militant editorial, December 21, 1953)	155
 6.	Letter from Farrell Dobbs to Cothinkers
in England and France	156
Section XI: The Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Plenum
of the SWP, by James P. Cannon	156
Section XII: The Chinese Experience with Pabloite Revisionism and Bureaucratism (A Letter to James P. Cannon), by Peng Shu-Tse    165

Section XIII: Pablo Declares a "Split*	173 ;
1.	Report on a Meeting of the French
Pabloite Group	173
 2.	Letter from Gerry Healy to the British Section	175.
 3.	Letter from Gerry Healy to the British Section	176 j
 4.	Letter from Gerry Healy to the British Section	176;
 5.	Letter from Gerry Healy to Leslie Goonewardene	177
 6.	Letter of the Chinese Section to the "International Secretariat of the Pabloites"	179
Section XIV: The Struggle in Canada	182;
 1.	Statement of Three Canadian Leaders	182'
 2.	Letter from Ross Dowson to Farrell Dobbs	182
 3.	Letter from V. Olsen to Gerry Healy	183
 4.	Minutes of Canadian Political Committee, January 31, 1954	184i
 5.	Letter from Murry Weiss to Farrell Dobbs	185:
 6.	Letter from Farrell Dobbs to Ross Dowson	186?
 7.	Letter from Ross Dowson to Farrell Dobbs	188
 8.	Letter from Ross Dowson to the Canadian
Section	190
9.	Pabloite Minority Split in Canada, by
Ross Dowson	191

Contents of Other Volumes
Volume I
Section I: Before the Third World Congress
Section II: The Split in the French Section
Section III: The SWP Majority Position on Stalinism
in the Cochran Fight Section IV: Pablo's Role in the Cochran Fight
Volume II
Section IV: Pablo's Role in the Cochran Fight
(Continued) Section V: The Deepening Differences on Stalinism Section VI: Four Supporters of Cochran-Clarke-
Bartell "Graduate" from the SWP Section VII: Pablo Attacks the British Section Section VIII: Is World War III Inevitable? by
Joseph Hansen Section LX: Preparing an International Struggle
Volume IV
Section XV: Correspondence Between Ernest
Germain and George Breitman Section XVI: Correspondence Between James P.
Cannon and Leslie Goonewardene Section XVII: The Struggle Over the "Fourth
World Congress"

Introductory Note

In 1953, sharp differences over Stalinism and organizational matters divided the Fourth International into two public factions, the International Committee of the Fourth International and the International Secretariat of the Fourth International. TJiis division lasted until the Re-unification Congress of the Fourth International held in 1963.
The articles, documents, correspondence, and circulars published in these Education for Socialists bulletins are presented as an aid in tracing the evolution of this dispute. The material is divided into two parts. The first (Part Three of Towards a History of the Fourth International) is composed of four bulletins and contains materials from the International Committee. The second (Part Four of Towards a History of the Fourth International) consists of four bulletins containing material from the International Secretariat faction.
Both sets of bulletins begin with the discussion prior to the Third World Congress of the Fourth International held in 1951. They are divided into sections dealing with key stages in the development of the dispute. Each section opens with a brief introductory note. To the extent that these notes include historical interpretations or conclusions, the views expressed are my own.
The documents, correspondence, articles, and circulars have been subjected to minimal editing. In general the style, grammar, etc., have been retained as in the originals. Additions to the text for explanatory purposes appear in brackets.
The term "section" appears frequently in these documents. This word was used in two different senses within the world Trotskyist movement. On the one hand, it refers to those groups which are affiliated to the Fourth International. Secondly, it is used in reference to organizations that are barred from membership in the Fourth International by reactionary legislation, such as the SWP, but are in full political solidarity with the world Trotskyist movement and represent the continuity of Trotskyism in their countries.
The faction struggle in the world Trotskyist movement

occurred when the McCarthyite witch-hunt was at its height in the United States. Similar manifestations of political repression appeared in other capitalist countries, as the ruling class sought to whip up anticommunist hysteria. In view of these shfcrp attacks on democratic rights, many radicals found it necessary to use pseudonyms or pen-names in carrying out their political activity. This was true of the Trotskyist movement as well. In line with a policy of printing this material as it originally appeared, these have generally not been changed. Instead, a glossary of these pen-names is included in each volume. Note that some individuals used more than one pen-name on occasion.
The 1953-54 dispute was worldwide in its scope and repercussions. Many parts of the Trotskyist movement that participated in the struggle are not represented in this collection. An instance of this is the lack of documentation from Latin America. Material from the dispute in the Latin American Trotskyist organizations is now being translated and will appear in a future volume.
This selection is based on the documents and correspondence presently available to the National Education Department of the Socialist Workers Party. Because of the speed with which the dispute developed, once the differences had become apparent to both sides, many aspects of the struggle are not fully dealt with in official documents. Therefore, it was necessary to include a considerable amount of correspondence to allow maximum clarity for the reader.
Hopefully, the publication of these bulletins will inspire others who were involved in the dispute to make available the relevant materials in their possession. Special thanks are owed to James P. Cannon, National Chairman Emeritus of the Socialist Workers Party, and Tom Kerry and Karolyn Kerry for making their personal archives available for this project
Fred   Feldman February 1974

Glossary of Pseudonyms and Pen Names Used by Key Figures
The   individuals'   names   appear   on   the left, with  the pseudonyms following in italics.
Harry Braverman: Harry Frankel
James P. Cannon: Walter, Martin
George Clarke: Campbell, Livingstone, Livingston
Colvin R. DaSilva: Roy
Farrell Dobbs: Smith, Barr
Ross Dowson: Kane
Leslie Goonewardene: Tilak

Sam Gordon: Tom, Harry, Burton, Joe
Joseph Hansen: Herrick
Gerry Healy: Burns, Mason, Jerry
John Lawrence: Collins
Ernest Mandel: Ernest Germain, Albert, Jeb
Sherry Mangan: Patrice, Terrence Phelan, Patrick O'Daniel
George Novack: Manuel, William F. Warde
Michel Raptis: Michel Pablo, Gabe
David Weiss: Stevens
Milton Zaslow: Mike Bartell

131

SECTION X: DECLARING AN INTERNATIONAL PUBLIC FACTION

[The issuance by the SWP National Committee of the "Letter to Trotskyists Throughout the World" in the November 16, 1953issue of The Militant marked the beginning of the public faction fight This document, together with "Against Pabloite Revisionism," which appeared in the September-October issue of Fourth International, described the profound political and organizational cleavage that had developed. The International Committee of the Fourth International was formally declared by the English, French,

and Swiss sections, with the SWP participating as observers. The document, "The Successive Stages of Pabloite Revisionism," written by French Trotskyists, is reprinted from SWP Discussion Bulletin A-17, 1954. It originally appeared in International Committee Bulletin No. 1, December 28, 1953. The editorial, "Fourth International Rallies Against Pablo," appeared in the December 21, 1953 issue of The Militant]

1. "A Letter to Trotskyists Throughout the World"
From the 25th Anniversary Plenum of the National Committee of the Socialist Workers Party
To All Trotskyists: Dear Comrades:
On the twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding of the Trotskyist movement in the United States, the Plenum of, the National Committee of the Socialist Workers Party sends its revolutionary socialist greetings to orfhodoxTrot-skyists throughout the world.
Although the Socialist Workers Party, because of undemocratic laws passed by the Democrats and Republicans, is "no longer affiliated to the Fourth International — the World Party of Socialist Revolution founded by Leon Trotsky to carry on and fulfill the program betrayed by the Second International of the Social Democrats and the Third International of the Stalinists —we take interest in the welfare of the world-wide organization created under the guidance of our martyred leader.
As is well know, the pioneer American Trotskyists 25 years ago brought the program of Trotsky, suppressed by the Kremlin, to the attention of world public opinion. This act proved decisive in breaching the isolation imposed by the Stalinist bureaucracy on Trotsky and in laying the foundation for the Fourth International. With his exile shortly thereafter, Trotsky began an intimate and trusted collaboration with the leadership of the SWP mat lasted to the day of his death.
The collaboration included joint efforts to organize revolutionary socialist parties in a number of countries. This culminated, as you know, in the launching of the Fourth International in 1938. The Transitional Program, which remains the keystone of today's program of the world Trotskyist movement, was written by Trotsky in collaboration with the leaders of the SWP and at his request was submitted by them for adoption at the founding Congress.
The intimacy and thoroughness of the collaboration between Trotsky and the leadership of the SWP can be judged from the record of struggle in defense of orthodox Trotskyist principles in 1939-40 against the Petty-Bourgeois Opposition headed by Burnham and Shachtman. That record has had profound influence in shaping the Fourth International in the past 13 years.

After the murder of Trotsky by an agent of Stalin's secret police, the SWP took the lead in defending and advocating his teachings. We took the lead not from choice but from necessity — the second world war forced the orthodox Trotskyists underground in many countries, especially in Europe under the Nazis. Together with Trotskyists in Latin America, Canada, England, Ceylon, India, Australia and elsewhere we did what we could to uphold the banner of orthodox Trotskyism through the difficult war years.
With the end of the war, we were gratified at the appearance in Europe of Trotskyists from the underground who undertook the organizational reconstitution of the Fourth International. Since we were barred from belonging to the Fourth International by reactionary laws, we placed all the greater hope in the emergence of a leadership capable of continuing the great tradition bequeathed to our world movement by Trotsky. We felt that the young new leadership of the Fourth International in Europe must be given full confidence and support When self-corrections Of serious errors were made on the initiative of the. comrades themselves, we felt that our course was proving justified.
However, we must now admit that the very freedom from sharp criticism which we together with others accorded this leadership helped open the way for the consolidation of an uncontrolled, secret personal faction in the administration of the Fourth International which has abandoned the basic program of Trotskyism.
This faction, centered around Pablo, is now working consciously and deliberately to disrupt, split, and break up the historically created cadres of Trotskyism in the various countries and to liquidate the Fourth International.
The Program of Trotskyism
To show precisely what is involved, let us restate the fundamental principles on which the world Trotskyist movement is built:
(1) The death agony of the capitalist system threatens the destruction of civilization through worsening depressions, world wars and barbaric manifestations like fascism. The development of atomic weapons today underlines the danger in the gravest possible way.

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 (2)	The descent into the abyss can be avoided only by replacing capitalism with the planned economy of socialism on a world scale and thus resuming the spiral of progress opened up by capitalism in its early days.
 (3)	This can be accomplished only under the leadership of the working class as the only truly revolutionary class in society. But the working class itself faces a crisis of leadership although the world relationship of social forces was never so favorable as today for the workers to take the road to power.
 (4)	To organize itself for carrying out this world-historic aim the working class in each country must construct a revolutionary socialist party in the pattern developed by Lenin; that is, a combat party capable of dialectically combining democracy and centralism—democracy in arriving at decisions, centralism in carrying them out; a leadership controlled by the ranks, ranks able to carry forward under fire in disciplined fashion.
 (5)	The main obstacle to this is Stalinism, which attracts workers through exploiting the prestige of the October 1917 Revolution in Russia, only later, as it betrays their confidence, to hurl them either into the arms of the Social Democracy, into apathy, or back to illusions in capitalism. The penalty for these betrayals is paid by the working people in the form of consolidation of fascist and monarchist forces, and new outbreaks of wars fostered and prepared by capitalism. From its inception, the Fourth International set as one of its major tasks the revolutionary overthrow of Stalinism inside and outside the USSR.
 (6)	The need for flexible tactics facing many sections of the Fourth International, and parties or groups sympathetic to its program, makes it all the more imperative that they know how to fight imperialism and all of its petty-bourgeois agencies (such as nationalist formations or trade-union bureaucracies) without capitulation to Stalinism; and, conversely, know how to fight Stalinism (which in the final analysis is a petty-bourgeois agency of imperialism) without capitulating to imperialism.
These fundamental principles established by Leon Trotsky retain full validity in the increasingly complex and fluid politics of the world today. In fact the revolutionary situations opening up on every hand as Trotsky foresaw, have only now brought full concreteness to what at one time may have appeared to be somewhat remote abstractions not intimately bound up with the living reality of the time. The truth is that these principles now hold with increasing force both in political analysis and in the determination of the course of practical action.
Pablo's Revisionism
These principles have been abandoned by Pablo. In place of emphasizing the danger of a new barbarism, he sees the drive toward socialism as "irreversible"; yet he does not see socialism coming within our generation or some generations to come. Instead he has advanced the concept of an "engulfing" wave of revolutions that give birth to nothing but "deformed," that is, Stalin-type workers states which are to last for "centuries."
This reveals the utmost pessimism about the capacities of the working class, which is wholly in keeping with the ridicule he has lately voiced of the struggle to build independent revolutionary socialist parties. In place of holding to the main course of building independent revo-

lutionary socialist parties by all tactical means, he looks to the Stalinist bureaucracy, or a decisive section of it, to so change itself under mass pressure as to accept the "ideas" and "program" of Trotskyism. Under guise of the diplomacy required in tactical maneuvers needed to approach workers in the camp of Stalinism in such countries as France, he now covers up the betrayals of Stalinism.
This course has already led to serious defections from the ranks of Trotskyism to the camp of Stalinism. The pro-Stalinist split in the Ceylon party is a warning to all Trotskyists everywhere of the tragic consequences of the illusions about Stalinism which Pabloism fosters.
In another document, we are submitting a detailed analysis of Pablo's revisionism. In this letter we will confine ourselves to some recent tests that show in the decisive field of action how far Pablo has gone in conciliationism to Stalinism and how grave the danger is to the existence of the Fourth International.
With the death of Stalin, the Kremlin announced a series of concessions in the USSR, none of them political in character. In place of characterizing these as nothing but part of a maneuver aimed at further entrenchment of the usurping bureaucracy and part of the preparation for a leading bureaucrat to assume the mantle of Stalin, the Pabloite faction took the concessions as good coin, painted them up as political concessions, and even projected the possibility of the "sharing of power" by the Stalinist bureaucracy with the workers. ( Fourth International, January-February, 1953, p. 13.)
The "sharing of power" concept, promulgated most bluntly by Clarke, a high priest of the Pablo cult, was indirectly sanctioned as dogma by Pablo himself in an unanswered but obviously leading question: Will the liquidation of the Stalinist regime take the form, Pablo asks, "of violent interbureaucratic struggles between elements who will fight for the status quo, if not for turning back, and the more and more numerous elements drawn by the powerful pressure of the masses?" {Fourth International, March-April, 1953, p. 39.)
This line fills the orthodox Trotskyist program of political revolution against the Kremlin bureaucracy with a new content; namely, the revisionist position that the "ideas" and "program" of Trotskyism will filter into and permeate the bureaucracy, or a decisive section of it, thus "overthrowing" Stalinism in an unforeseen way.
In East Germany in June the workers rose against the Stalinist-dominated government in one of the greatest demonstrations in the history of Germany. This was the first proletarian mass uprising against Stalinism since it usurped and consolidated power in the Soviet Union. How did Pablo respond to this epochal event?
Instead of clearly voicing the revolutionary political aspirations of the insurgent East German workers, Pablo covered up the counter-revolutionary Stalinist satraps who mobilized Soviet troops to put down the uprising (" . . . the Soviet leaders and those of the various 'People's Democracies' and the Communist Parties could no longer falsify or ignore the profound meaning of these events. They have been obliged to continue along the road of still more ample and genuine concessions to avoid risking alienating themselves forever from support by the masses and from provoking still stronger explosions. From now on they will not be able to stop halfway. They will be obliged to dole out concessions to avoid more serious explosions in

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the immediate future and if possible to effect a transition 'in a cold fashion' from the present situation to a situation more tolerable for the masses.") (Statement of the International Secretariat of the Fourth International published in The Militant, July 6.)
Instead of demanding the withdrawal of Soviet troops — the sole force upholding the Stalinist government — Pablo fostered the illusion that "more ample and genuine concessions" would be forthcoming from the Kremlin's gauleiters. Could Moscow have asked for better assistance as it proceeded to monstrously falsify the profound meaning of those events, branding the workers in revolt as "fascists" and "agents of American imperialism," and opening a wave of savage repression against them?
The French General Strike
In France in August the greatest general strike in the history of the country broke out. Put in motion by the workers themselves against the will of their official leadership, it presented one of the most favorable openings in working-class history for the development of a real struggle for power. Besides the workers, the farmers of France followed with demonstrations, indicating their strong dissatisfaction with the capitalist government.
The official leadership, both Social Democrats and Stalinists, betrayed this movement, doing their utmost to restrain it and avert the danger to French capitalism. In the history of betrayals it would be difficult to find a more abominable one if it is measured against the opportunity that was present.
How did the Pablo faction respond to this colossal event?
They labelled the action of the Social Democrats a betrayal—but for the wrong reasons. The betrayal, they said, consisted of negotiating with the government behind the backs of the Stalinists. This betrayal, however, was a secondary one, deriving from their main crime, their refusal to set out on the road to taking power.
As for the Stalinists, the Pabloites covered up their betrayal. By that action they shared in the Stalinist betrayal. The sharpest criticism they found themselves capable of uttering against the counter-revolutionary course of the Stalinists, was to accuse them of "lack" of policy.
This was a lie. The Stalinists had no "lack" of policy. Their policy was to maintain the status quo in the interests of Kremlin foreign policy and thereby to help bolster tottering French capitalism.
But this was not all. Even for the internal party education of the French Trotskyists Pablo refused to characterize the Stalinist role as a betrayal. He noted "the role of brake played, to one degree or another, by the leadership of the traditional organizations" — a betrayal is a mere "brake"! — "but also their capacity —especially of the Stalinist leadership—to yield to the pressure of the masses when this pressure becomes powerful as was the case during these strikes." ("Political Note No. 1")
One might expect this to be sufficient conciliation to Stalinism from a leader who has abandoned orthodox Trotskyism, but still seeks the cover of the Fourth International. However, Pablo went still further.
An Infamous Leaflet
A leaflet of his followers addressed to the workers at the Renault plant in Paris declared that in the general strike

the Stalinist leadership of the CGT (main French trade-union federation) "was correct in not introducing demands other than those wanted by the workers." This in face of the fact that workers by their actions were demanding a Workers and Farmers Government!
Arbitrarily separating the Stalinist-headed unions from the Communist Party — evidence of the most mechanical thinking or evidence of deliberate design in covering up the Stalinists?—the Pabloites declared in their leaflet that so far as the significance of the strike and its perspectives were concerned "this point only concerned the trade union secondarily. The criticism to make on this point does not apply to the CGT which is a trade union organization, which must first and foremost act as such, but to the parties whose role it was to point out the deep political significance of this movement and its consequences." (Leaflet "To the Workers' Organizations and to the Workers of Renault," dated Sept. 3, 1953. Signed by Frank, Mestre, and Privas.)
In these statements we see the complete abandonment of everything Trotsky taught us about the role and the responsibilities of the trade unions in the epoch of the death agony of capitalism.
Then the Pabloite leaflet "criticizes" the French Communist Party for its "absence of line," for simply placing itself "on the level of the trade union movement instead of explaining to the workers that this strike was an important stage (!) in the crisis of French society, the prelude (!) to a vast class struggle, where the problem of workers' power would be posed in order to save the country from capitalist swindling and open the way to socialism."
If the Renault workers were to believe the Pabloites, all that the perfidious French Stalinist bureaucrats were guilty of was a trace of syndicalism instead of a deliberate betrayal of the biggest general strike in the history of France.
Pablo's approval of the policy of the CGT leadership seems scarcely credible, yet there is the inescapable fact staring one in the face. In the biggest general strike ever seen in France, Pablo blandly puts as "correct," a French version of Gompers' bourgeois policy of keeping the unions out of politics. And this in  1953!
If it is incorrect for the CGT leadership to advance political demands in consonance with objective needs, including formation of a Workers and Farmers Government, then why is the Socialist Workers Party demanding of the present-day Gompers' of the American trade-union movement that they organize a Labor Party? A Labor Party that would aim at putting a Workers and Farmers Government in power in the United States?
Pablo's rubber-stamp OK appears in a still stranger light
when we remind ourselves that the CGT leadership happens to be highly political. At the slightest gesture from the Kremlin, it is prepared to call the workers out on no matter what wild political adventure. Recall, for instance, its role in the events initiated by the anti-Ridgway demonstrations last year. These Stalinist trade-union figures did not hesitate to call for strikes to protest the arrest of Duclos, a leader of the Communist Party.
The fact is that the CGT leadership revealed its highly political character once again in the general strikes. With all the skill of years of perfidy and double dealing, it deliberately tried to head off the workers, to stifle their initiative, to prevent the workers' political demands from

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breaking through. The Stalinist trade-union leadership consciously betrayed. And it is this course of betrayal that Pablo calls "correct"!
But even this does not complete the account. One of the principal aims of the Pabloite leaflet is to denounce French Trotskyists who conducted themselves in the Renault plant during the strike as genuine revolutionists. It specifically names two comrades who have "been expelled from the Fourth International and its French Section for more than a year." It states that this "group has been expelled for reasons of indiscipline; and the orientation which it has followed, especially in the course of the last strike movement, is opposed to that actually defended by the PCI (French Section of the Fourth International)." The reference to the "group" is actually to the majority of the French Section of the Fourth International which was arbitrarily and unjustly expelled by Pablo.
Has the world Trotskyist movement ever before heard of such a scandal as officially denouncing Trotskyist militants to Stalinists and providing rationalizations to the workers for an abominable Stalinist betrayal?
It should be noted that the Pabloite denunciation of these comrades before the Stalinists follows the verdict of a workers' tribunal acquitting the Trotskyists in the Renault plant of slanders levelled at them by the Stalinists.
The American Pabloites
The test of these world events is sufficient, in our opinion, to indicate the depth of Pabloite conciliationism toward Stalinism. But we would like to submit for public inspection of the world Trotskyist movement some additional facts.
For over a year and a half the Socialist Workers Party has been engaged in a struggle against a revisionist tendency headed by Cochran and Clarke. The struggle with this tendency has been one of the most severe in the history of our party. At bottom it is over the same fundamental questions that divided us from the Burnham-Shachtman group and the Morrow-Goldman group at the beginning and end of World War II. It is another attempt to revise and abandon our basic program. It has involved the perspective of the American revolution, the character and role of the revolutionary party and its method of organization, and the perspectives for the world Trotskyist movement
During the post-war period a powerful bureaucracy consolidated itself in the American labor movement This bureaucracy rests on a large layer of privileged, conservative workers who have been "softened" by the conditions of war prosperity. This new privileged layer was recruited in large measure from the ranks of former militant sectors of the working class, from the same generation that founded the CIO.
The relative security and stability of their living conditions have temporarily paralyzed the initiative and fighting spirit of these workers who previously were in the forefront of all militant class actions.
Cochranism is the manifestation of the pressure of this new labor aristocracy, with its petty-bourgeois ideology, upon the proletarian vanguard. The moods and tendencies of the passive, relatively satisfied layer of workers act as a powerful mechanism transmitting alien pressures

into our own movement. The slogan of the Cochranites, "Junk the Old Trotskyism," expresses this mood.
The Cochranite tendency sees the powerful revolutionary potential of the American working class as some far-off prospect. They denounce as "sectarian" the Marxist analysis which reveals the molecular processes creating new fighting regiments in the American proletariat.
Insofar as there are any progressive tendencies within the working class of the United States they see them only in the ranks or periphery of Stalinism and among "sophisticated" union politicians — the rest of the class they consider so hopelessly dormant that they can be awakened only by the impact of atomic war.
Briefly, their position reveals: Loss of confidence in the perspective of the American revolution; loss of confidence in the role of the revolutionary party in general and the Socialist Workers Party in particular.
Features of Cochranism
As all the sections of the world movement well know from their own hard and difficult experiences, pressures exist far greater than prolonged war prosperity and the sweep of reaction such as has been bearing down upon us in the United States. But the factor that sustains cadres under the most difficult circumstances is the burning conviction of the theoretical correctness of our movement, the knowledge that they are the living means for advancing the historic mission of the working class, the understanding that to one degree or another the fate of humanity depends on what they do, the firm belief that whatever the momentary circumstances may be, the main line of historic development demands the creation of Leninist combat parties that will resolve the crisis of humanity through a victorious socialist revolution.
Cochranism is the substitution of skepticism and theoretical improvisations and journalistic speculation for this orthodox Trotskyist world outlook. It is this that has made the struggle in the SWP irreconcilable in the same sense that the struggle with the Petty-Bourgeois Opposition in 1939-40 was irreconcilable.
The Cochranites have minifested the following features in the course of the struggle:
 (1)	Disrespect for party tradition and the historic mission of the party. Hardly an opportunity is lost by the Cochranites to denigrate, ridicule and preach contempt for the 25-year tradition of American Trotskyism.
 (2)	A tendency to replace principled Marxist politics with unprincipled combinations against the party "regime." Thus the Cochranite faction is composed of a bloc of contradictory elements. One group, centered mainly in New York, favors a kind of "entry" tactic in the American Stalinist movement.
Another group, composed of conservatized union elements, centered primarily in Detroit, sees little to be gained by turning to the Stalinists. It bases its revisionist outlook on an over-estimation of the stability and lasting power of the new labor bureaucracy.
Also attracted to Cochranism are individuals grown tired, who can no longer stand the pressures of the present adverse conditions and who are looking for a plausible rationalization with which to retire into inactivity.
The cement binding this unprincipled bloc is common hostility to orthodox Trotskyism.
(3)	A tendency to shift the party away from what our

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main arena must be in America, the politically unawakened workers of the mass production industries. The Coch-ranites, in effect, dropped the program of transitional slogans and demands which the SWP has used as a bridge toward these workers and argued that the majority in continuing this course was adapting itself to the backwardness of the workers.
 (4)	A conviction that all possibility of the American working class coming forward in radical opposition to American imperialism before the Third World War is ruled out.
 (5)	Gross experimental theorizing with left" Stalinism that boils down to the extravagant belief that the Stalinists "can no longer betray," that Stalinism includes a revolutionary side which makes it possible for the Stalinists to lead a revolution in the United States, in the process of which they would absorb Trotskyist "ideas" so that the revolution would eventually "right itself."
 (6)	Adaptation to Stalinism in the face of new events. They support and defend the conciliation to Stalinism found in Pablo's interpretation of the downfall of Beria and the subsequent sweeping purges in the USSR. They repeat all the Pabloite arguments covering the counterrevolutionary role of Stalinism in the great uprising of the East German workers and the French general strike. They even interpret the turn of American Stalinism toward the Democratic Party a mere "right oscillation" within a "left turn."
 (7)	Contempt for the traditions of Leninism in questions of organization. For a time they attempted to set up "dual power" in the party. When they were rebuffed by the overwhelming majority of the party at the May 1953 Plenum, they agreed in writing to abide by the rule of the majority and the political line as decided by the Plenum. Subsequently, they broke their agreement, renewing their factional sabotage of party activities on a more feverish and hysterical basis than ever.
Cochranism, whose main features we have indicated above, was never more than a weak minority in the party. It would never have amounted to more than the most feeble and sickly expression of pessimism had it not been for the aid and encouragement it received from Pablo behind the backs of the party leadership.
Pablo's secret encouragement and support was exposed soon after our May Plenum, and since then Pablo has been openly collaborating wife the revisionist faction in our party and inspiring them in their campaign of sabotage of party finances, disruption of party work and preparations for a split.
The Pablo-Cochran faction finally culminated this disloyal course with an organized boycott in New York of the Twenty-fifth Anniversary Celebration of the party, which was combined with a wind-up rally in the New York municipal election campaign.
This treacherous, strikebreaking action constituted, in effect, an organized demonstration against the 25-year struggle of American Trotskyism, and, at the same time, an act of objective aid to the Stalinists who expelled the initiating nucleus of American Trotskyism in October 1928.
The organized boycott of this meeting was, in effect, a demonstration against the campaign of the Socialist Workers Party in the New York municipal election.
All who participated in this treacherous, anti-party action

obviously consummated the split which they had long been preparing, and forfeited all right to membership in our party.
Formally recording this fact, the Twenty-fifth Anniversary Plenum of the SWP suspended the National Committee members who organized the boycott and declared that all members of the Pablo-Cochran faction who participated in this treacherous, strikebreaking action or who refuse to disavow it have by that fact placed themselves outside the ranks of the SWP.
Methods of the Comintern
Pablo's duplicity in presenting one face to the leadership of the SWP while secretly collaborating with the revisionist Cochranite tendency is a method that is alien to the tradition of Trotskyism. But there is a tradition to which it does belong— Stalinism. Such devices, used by the Kremlin, were instrumental in corrupting the Communist International. Many of us had personal experience with all this in the 1923-28 period.
The evidence is now decisive that this way of operating is not an isolated aberration on the part of Pablo. A consistent pattern is apparent.
For instance, in one of the leading European sections of the Fourth International, an outstanding party leader recently received an order from Pablo, directing him to conduct himself as one "who defends until the Fourth World Congress the majority line and the discipline of the International." Along with the ultimatum Pablo threatened reprisals if his orders were not obeyed.
The "majority" to which Pablo refers here is simply the modest label he places on himself and the small minority hypnotized by his revisionist novelties. Pablo's new line is in violent contradiction to the basic program of Trotskyism. It is only beginning to be discussed in many parts of the world Trotskyist movement. Not having been backed by a single Trotskyist organization, it does not constitute the approved official line of the Fourth International.
The first reports we have received indicate outrage at his high-handed attempt to foist his revisionist views on the worldwide organization without waiting for either discussion or a vote. We already have enough information to state that the Fourth International is certain to reject Pablo's line by an overwhelming majority.
Pablo's autocratic demand to a leader of a section of the Fourth International to refrain from criticizing Pablo's revisionist political line is bad enough. But Pablo did not stop there. While trying to gag this leader and prevent him from participating in a free discussion in which the rank and file might benefit from his experience, knowledge and insight, Pablo proceeded to intervene organizationally, attempting to crystallize a minority revisionist faction to conduct war on the leadership of the section.
This procedure is out of the foul tradition of the Comintern as it underwent degeneration under the influence of Stalinism. If there were no other issue than this, it would be necessary to fight Pabloism to a finish to save the Fourth International from internal corruption.
Such tactics have an obvious purpose. They are part of the preparation for a coup by the Pabloite minority. Utilizing Pablo's administrative control, they hope to im-

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pose his revisionist line on the Fourth International and wherever it is resisted to reply by splits and expulsions.
This Stalinist organizational course began, as is now quite clear, with Pablo's brutal abuse of administrative control in his disruptive campaign against the majority of the French section of the Fourth International more than a year and a half ago.
By fiat of the International Secretariat, the elected majority of the French section was forbidden to exercise its rights to lead the political and propaganda work of the party. Instead, the Political Bureau and the press were put under the control of a minority through the Cominternist device of a "parity commission."
At the time, we deeply disapproved this arbitrary action by which a minority was used to arbitrarily overturn a majority. As soon as we heard about it, we communicated our protest to Pablo. However, we must admit that we made an error in not taking more vigorous action. This error was due to insufficient appreciation on our part of the real issues involved. We thought the differences between Pablo and the French section were tactical and this led us to side with Pablo, despite our misgivings about his organizational procedure, when, after months of disruptive factional struggle, the majority was expelled.
But at bottom the differences were programmatic in character. The fact is that the French comrades of the majority saw what was happening more clearly than we did. The Eighth Congress of their party declared that "a grave danger menaces the future and even the existence of the Fourth International. . . . Revisionist conceptions, born of cowardice and petty-bourgeois impressionism have appeared within its leadership. The still great weakness of the International, cut off from the life of the sections, has momentarily facilitated the installation of a system of personal rule, basing itself and its anti-democratic methods on revisionism of the Trotskyist program and abandonment of the Marxist method." (La Verite, Sept 18, 1952.)
The whole French situation must be re-examined in the light of subsequent developments. The role of the majority of the French section played in the recent general strike demonstrated in the most decisive way that they know how to uphold the fundamental principles of orthodox Trotskyism. The French section of the Fourth International was unjustly expelled. The French majority, grouped around the paper La Verite, are the real Trotskyists of France and are so openly recognized by the SWP.
Particularly revolting is the slanderous misrepresentation Pablo has fostered of the political position of the Chinese section of the Fourth International. They have been pictured by the Pablo faction as "sectarians," as "fugitives from a revolution."

Contrary to the impression deliberately created by the Pablo faction, the Chinese Trotskyists acted as genuine revolutionary representatives of the Chinese proletariat. Through no fault of theirs they have been singled out as victims by the Mao regime in the way that Stalin singled out for execution the entire generation of Lenin's Bolsheviks in the USSR, emulating the Noskes and Scheide-manns of Germany who singled out the Luxemburgs and Liebknechts of the 1918 revolution for execution. But Pablo's line of conciliationism toward Stalinism leads him inexorably to touch up to the Mao regime couleur de rose while putting gray tints on the firm, principled stand of our Chinese comrades.
What to Do
To sum up: The lines of cleavage between Pablo's revisionism and orthodox Trotskyism are so deep that no compromise is possible either politically or organizationally. The Pablo faction has demonstrated that it will not permit democratic decisions truly reflecting majority opinion to be reached. They demand complete submission to their criminal policy. They are determined to drive all orthodox Trotskyists out of the Fourth International or to muzzle and handcuff them.
Their scheme has been to inject their Stalinist conciliationism piecemeal and likewise in piecemeal fashion, get rid of those who come to see what is happening and raise objections. That is the explanation for the strange ambiguity about many of the Pabloite formulations and diplomatic evasions.
Up to now the Pablo faction has had a certain success with this unprincipled and Machiavellian maneuverism. But the qualitative point of change has been reached. The political issues have broken through the maneuvers and the fight is now a showdown.
If we may offer advice to the sections of the Fourth International from our enforced position outside the ranks, we think the time has come to act and to act decisively. The time has come for the orthodox Trotskyist majority of the Fourth International to assert their will against Pablo's usurpation of authority.
They should in addition safeguard the administration of the affairs of the Fourth International by removing Pablo and his agents from office and replacing them with cadres who have proved in action that they know how to uphold orthodox Trotskyism and keep the movement on a correct course both politically and organizationally.
With fraternal Trotskyist greetings,
National Committee of the SWP

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2. AgainstPabloist Revisionism

This document, adopted by the 25th Anniversary Plenum of the Socialist Workers Party, November 1953, is submitted as a contribution for international discussion among Trotskyists.
*    *    *
The draft resolution of the International Secretariat of the Fourth International on "The Rise and Decline of Stalinism" sets out to bring up-to-date the Trotskyist appraisal of the Soviet Union, the Kremlin bureaucracy and the Stalinist world movement especially in the light of the events following Stalin's death. However, its method, of analysis misrepresents the real state of affairs and leads to political conclusions diverging from traditional Trotskyist views.
I. Three Periods of the World Revolution
This can be seen, first of all, in its manner of breaking up world historical developments since 1917 into three main periods: the period of revolutionary rise from 1917 to 1923; the period of revolutionary ebb jfrom 1923-43; and the period of revolutionary resurgence on a higher level since 1943. This division provides the fundamental framework for the resolution, and serves as the starting point for a revision of our conceptions 6n the nature and role of the Stalinist bureaucracy.
According to the resolution, the third period has created a relationship of class forces on a world scale and in the Soviet Union which requires a new appraisal and approach to Stalinism. This period has already had two phases. The years from 1943 to 1947 represent a transition, from the second to the third period, partaking of the features of both.
This was the time when the Soviet bureaucracy ap-

peared to reach the peak of its power. The world revolutionary rise was still not powerful enough to permit the bypassing and engulfing of Stalinism. The Kremlin and its agencies were able to restrict and control the revolution, except for Yugoslavia. The deals with imperialism, the right turns, the betrayal of the revolution continued the former era; the Yugoslav revolution prefigured the new.
But since 1947 the old equilibria have been definitively broken and cannot be regained. The new international revolutionary rise disrupted the equilibrium between the world working class and imperialism. The aggravation of the crisis of the capitalist system and the crushing supremacy of American imperialism has upset the equilibrium between the different imperialist powers. These international changes combined with the domestic changes have broken the equilibrium of social forces in the Soviet Union and undermined the objective foundations of the ruling caste.
The victory of the Chinese revolution marked the turning point in this world transformation and ushered in a new and higher stage, "basically marked by a relation of international forces favorable to the revolution and evolving on a global scale more and more favorably for the revolution. The revolutionary wave spreads from country to country, from continent to continent. It has recently reached the Soviet Union itself and the buffer zone." (p. 33)
This revolutionary wave of global dimensions and unlimited duration, will continue to mount higher, despite minor refluxes, up to the war. The war itself "will coincide not with an ebb but with a new leap forward of the world revolution." (p.  19) This will continue until

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the end of the Third World War. Nothing can long withstand this all-engulfing revolutionary torrent. It will sweep all established forces into its vortex; both imperialism and Stalinism will crack up and perish in the process. The victorv of the world revolution is henceforth assured. Such 'is the line of development projected in the resolution.
If this is really so, it will have to be recognized that we have entered upon a qualitatively different epoch in which all previous political values would have to be reevaluated. The political ideas, revolutionary strategy and organizational perspectives of the vanguard, would have to be revised to bring them into line with the qualitatively transformed world reality and its main trends of development.
II. Changes in Stalinism
The resolution undertakes to do this in connection with Stalinism and draws some extremely far-reaching conclusions in respect to it. Let us summarize them.
The fundamental historical, world and national conditions for Stalinism have disappeared. It "has irretrievably entered upon its period of decline.
 1.	The dynamic of the world relationship of forces evolving favorably to the revolution has now struck the Soviet Union, undermined the positions of the bureaucracy, upset its stability and already promoted the disintegration of Stalinism in a number of unforeseen ways.
 2.	"The objective foundations of the dictatorship are in the process of rapidly disappearing." The relationship of forces between the Bonapartist bureaucracy and the masses is shifting in favor of the latter. The pressures exerted by these changing conditions and by the demands of the masses is more and more determining the Kremlin's course and policies.
3. The post-Stalin regime is no longer able to rule as before; it is instead obliged to liberalize itself and make more and more concessions to save its rule. This tends toward the liquidation of the heritage of Stalinism.
 4.	These developments release centrifugal forces which differentiate and split up the ruling caste.
 5.	The changes in the Soviet Union since Stalin's death constitute the relaxation of the Kremlin's brake upon the Communist parties. Its tight hold over the buffer countries and upon the Communist parties in capitalist countries is being loosened. These are developing new relations with the Kremlin in the direction of greater independence from it while oppositional ideas and anti-Stalinist tendencies more and more manifest themselves.
 6.	"Caught between the imperialist threat and the colonial revolution, the Soviet bureaucracy found itself obliged to ally itself with the second against the first." This enforced alliance with the colonial revolution is mediated through Mao's regime with whom it must share direction of Asian  Communism.
 7.	The Kremlin is less and less able to conclude deals with imperialism at the expense of the revolution. Its room for maneuvers with imperialism and against the

revolution is diminishing all the time. "This new situation restricts more and more the capacity of counter-revolutionary maneuvers by the bureaucracy." Not only are its capacities for sell-outs decreasing, despite its intentions, but the practical effects of its diplomatic maneuvers and Popular-Front experiments with certain sections of the colonial bourgeoisie are more and more restricted and ephemeral. Moreover, "the revolutionary tide which the Soviet bureaucracy is no longer capable of smashing and arresting is even being nourishsed by the methods of self-defense applied by the bureaucracy ..." (p. 20)
 8.	The Kremlin's capacity for repressive measures likewise grows more restricted. It is less able to proceed to repressions and purges at home, or to stamp out opposition in the buffer countries, because of the drastic shift in the relation of forces.
 9.	Just as the bureaucracy must liberalize its dictatorship, so the Communist parties, despite right oscillations here and there and now and then, tend to radicalize their policies. This is the dominant tendency. In countries where the CP's are a majority in the working class, they can under pressure of the masses be led to project a revolutionary orientation counter to the Kremlin's  directives.
III. To What Degree Have the Fundamental Conditions for Stalinism Disappeared?
To arrive at these far-reaching conclusions on Stalinism the resolution has to present a picture of the world situation which is not in accord with reality and to take partial and limited changes for decisive and fundamental ones. Thus the resolution states on page 3: "The fundamental conditions under which the Soviet bureaucracy and its tight hold over the Communist Parties developed, namely, the ebb of the revolution, the isolation of the Soviet Union, and the backward conditions of its economy — these conditions have disappeared."
Let us examine the post-war world and see to what degree these sweeping assertions conform to the real state of affairs .We are here dealing with matters of Tact. Let us analyze each one of these three fundamental conditions to see to what extent they have vanished.
1. The Development of the World Revolution
The international revolution has undoubtedly experienced a considerable resurgence since 1943. The Second World War generated a revolutionary wave of greater scope, intensity and persistence than the First World War. The Soviet victory over Nazism, the revolutionary victories in Yugoslavia and China, the extension of nationalized property into the buffer states by bureaucratic-military means, the spread of the colonial revolution have all dealt hard blows to world capitalism and enormously strengthened the anti-capitalist camp.
However, this trend in the world situation has been combined and criss-crossed with another. The immense

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revolutionary movement which has produced such transformations in Eastern and Central Europe and in Asia, came to grief in Western Europe during this very same period. The Soviet bureaucracy was chiefly responsible for this reversal and betrayal of the European revolution.
This has generated a series of opposite effects in the unfoldment of the world revolution. The proletarian offensive was curbed, the working class became weaker, Western European capitalism was rescued, and became relatively stabilized for a period of years. This has enabled the imperialist counter-revolution directed by the U.S. to take hold of these countries and use them as drill grounds and springboards for its war preparations and prospective attacks upon the anti-capitalist countries and revolutionary forces.
Thus the revolutionary process since World War II has experienced an uneven and contradictory development. While the revolution moved forward' in a number of backward countries, triumphed in Yugoslavia and China, it has undergone set-backs in a number of the more advanced countries. The victories for the revolution represent gains for the working class and oppressed peoples. But they must be considered in connection with the recession of the revolution in Western Europe and its effects in order to arrive at a more balanced and accurate reckoning of the progress of the revolution.
Had the revolution succeeded in one or more of the highly developed industrial countries, from Germany to Italy, along with these victories in certain backward countries, that would have sealed the fate of capitalism in Europe and Asia and pressed the Soviet bureaucracy to the wall.
The Kremlin is well aware of the threat to its dominance implicit in the European revolution. That motivated its efforts to block and crush that development which continues up to this very day (French General Strike).
The prevention of an independent socialist workers power arising in Western Europe is an indispensable condition for preserving the rule of the Soviet bureaucracy. The Kremlin can, up to a certain point, tolerate and maneuver with revolutions in the colonies and the backward countries. But it dreads the extension of the proletarian revolution into Western Europe because that means the sentence of death for it.
A rounded review and realistic resume of the net result of the march of the international revolution from 1943 to 1953 leads to this conclusion. With all its great achievements and greater potentialities the failure of the revolution to conquer in one of the major industrialized countries has thus far prevented the revolutionary forces of the working class from growing strong enough to overwhelm the Kremlin oligarchy and give irresistible impetus to the disintegration of Stalinism. There has not yet been such a qualitative alteration in the world relationship of class forces.
Up to date the counter-revolutionary intervention of the bureaucracy itself in world politics has forestalled the objective conditions for such a consummation. It caused

the revolution to recede in Western Europe, weakened the working class in relation to its class enemy, and facilitated the mobilization of the world counter-revolution. The struggle between the forces of revolution and counterrevolution is still inconclusive, and far from being settled. This very inconclusiveness, which it strives to maintain, at the present time works to the advantage of the Kremlin.
2. The Isolation of the Soviet Union
This first factor is directly connected with the second: the encirclement of the Soviet Union by world imperialism. The post-war development certainly succeeded in loosening and unsettling the imperialist encirclement to a certain extent and breaking through the previous tight isolation of the Soviet Union. The linking together of the countries from the Elbe to the Pacific, however much they many be bureaucratically governed and oppressed, is a strong bulwark to the USSR. The anti-capitalist states now embrace one-third of mankind but they confront a combine of imperialist powers centralized under U.S. hegemony being openly mobilized against them.
The failure of the revolution1 to break through to victory in Western Europe, which would have radically altered the balance of class forces throughout Europe and Asia, has permitted imperialism to reassert its encirclement and intensify its pressures against the Soviet Union on all planes.
This isolation is felt in the economic, political and military fields in varying degrees.
Despite all their achievements, the industrial capacities of the states in the Soviet bloc is far below that of the capitalist states. This unfavorable balance could be rectified only with the inclusion of the industrial complex of Western Europe. But this is now cut off in large part by the economic blockade which is ah element in the isolation of the S.U.
The moves being made by the Kremlin to curry favor with the bourgeois governments of France and Italy, and, its maneuvers around the German question, testify to its attempts to overcome its isolation.
Instead of attracting workers in the advanced countries, the Kremlin's policy helps to repel them and thus aggravates the social isolation of the S.U. from the class forces which alone can guarantee its defense.
Finally, the U.S. is engaged in forging a military ring around the periphery of the Kremlin-dominated territories, and exerts unremitting pressures from all directions upon it.
The Soviet bureaucracy must reckon with this at all times both in its domestic and foreign policies. The looming menace of A and H bomb attack determines its plan of production. This takes first place in the strategical plans of the Soviet General Staff. The menace of imperialist encirclement and aggression determines the policies of those Communist parties under the Kremlin's control.
Before the last World War the Soviet bureaucracy could and did maneuver between two opposing blocs of

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imperialist powers. Today its capacity to exploit the inter-imperialist contradictions is extremely restricted. The Soviet Union won in the Second World War through an alliance with the strongest sector of world imperialism. In a new war the Soviet Union, its satellites and China would have to fight against a coalition of all the imperialist states.
How, then, can it be so unqualifiedly asserted in the resolution that the isolation of the S.U. has disappeared? The isolation has been modified and mitigated, but not at all removed. The pressures of the imperialist environment weigh upon the entire life of the Soviet peoples. The Soviet workers, with memories still fresh of the last war, fear the outbreak of a new one. This is still a potent factor in restraining them from open conflict with the bureaucracy for fear of aiding imperialism. Thus, the very encirclement of the S.U. which the policies of the Kremlin serve to sustain, and even augment, remains one of the factors in maintaining its group upon power.
3. The Development of Soviet Economy
Marked advances have been made in Soviet economy, especially since 1947. However these have been extremely uneven. Agriculture lags far behind industry, far behind the needs of the mass of the Soviet people.
Soviet advances have led to an improvement in the living conditions of its citizens, especially in urban centers. They have still greater hopes and expectations of betterment in their material conditions, which the pbst-Stalin regime has had to take into account. The new rulers have made certain concessions in the sphere of consumption and promised still more.
But the question at issue is this: has there been so drastic a change in the Soviet economy as to eliminate the objective material basis for the bureaucracy? That would entail the production of consumers' goods and food in sufficient abundance to guarantee necessities to everyone, satisfy the demands of the working people, and thus eliminate any need for bureaucratic arbiters to decide the distribution of the available products.
Has Soviet economy, with all its indubitable successes, reached that point, or even approached it? The citing of general production figures and their global comparison with those of other countries will not help here. The decisive point is not how much more is being produced than before, but is enough being produced now to take care of the basic demands of the people?
The facts are that the rise in the economy has sufficed to provide a minimum for most workers, to eliminate famine conditions, and ease some economic tensions in the sphere of consumption. But side by side with the general improvement, there have been considerable increases in consumption for the more favored layers. From the aristocrats of labor up to the tops of the bureaucracy there is .-an Inclination to grasp for more. Malenkov is compelled to give a bit more bread and other articles to the masses. But at the same time the 'Kremlin makes sure to provide more new cars, refrigerators, television sets, etc

which are exclusively within the reach of the upper jayers of Soviet society.
All this accentuates the contradiction between the rulers and the ruled, heightens social inequalities, and makes the situation more intolerable to the workers. There is a sharpening conflict between the working class growing in numbers and skills and the bureaucratic guardians of privilege.
The economic and cultural backwardness is in the process of being overcome. But to assert that this has already taken place is to falsify the real state of Soviet economy today.
This does not at all mean that the bureaucracy can or will perpetuate itself in power indefinitely. That depends upon further developments of the world revolution which can definitively remove the hostile pressures of world imperialism, and not simply temporarily ease them, and overcome the scarcity of consumers goods by placing the industrial resources of more advanced countries at the disposal of Soviet economy. It depends even more upon the development of the deepening conflict between the bureaucracy and the masses. The Soviet people will not wait for the elimination of the economic roots of the totalitarian bureaucracy in order to embark upon a mortal struggle against it. As Trotsky pointed out, the social conflict can explode into political revolution as a result of the intensification of antagonisms to the boiling point. "Economic contradictions produce social antagonisms, which in turn develop their own logic, not awaking the further growth of the productive forces." (The Revolution Betrayed, p. 48).
Thus a sober analysis of the world situation and'its' development during the past decade discloses that the three major objective factors responsible for the rise of the Soviet bureaucracy have not been changed in a fundamental sense but only to a certain extent. The Kremlin bureaucracy has to operate today under new but not decisively different circumstances. Its further life-span will depend upon the struggle of the living forces in the world arena and in the Soviet Union over the next period and the emergence in this struggle of a Trotskyist party capable of leading the Soviet masses in insurrection against the ruling caste.
IV. The New Relations and Role of the Soviet Bureaucracy
Proceeding from its wrong and one-sided estimation of the fundamental conditions in which the bureaucracy finds itself, the resolution says that the bureaucracy has acquired such new relations with imperialism, the world working class, the colonial revolution, the buffer countries and its own people that these substantially change its policies and activities and their results. The Soviet bureaucracy is objectively playing a different role than in its pasti
a.   The Kremlin, Imperialism and the World Revolution
This is purportedly to be seen in respect to imperiail-

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ism. The resolution correctly affirms that "the global balance of the Soviet bureaucracy's international -policy is a reformist one, because the bureaucracy aims not to overthrow world capitalism, but simply to maintain the framework of the status quo." It has played this role of an agency of imperialism not only from 1923 to 1943 but from 1943 to the present. "It is more correct than ever to say today that the domination of imperialism subsists over half of the globe only thanks to the role played by the bureaucracy and its agencies."
However, the resolution contends, the victory of the Chinese revolution "marked the opening of a new phase in the worlld situation in which the Soviet bureaucracy finds itself." (p. 10) This new situation has the following features. It "restricts more and more the capacity of counterrevolutionary maneuvers by the bureaucracy." And "the practical effects of these attempts (to utilize the inter-im-periartist contradictions, to gain the support of certain bourgeoisies in colonial and semi-colonial countries, to arrive at a temporary and partial agreement with imperialism) become more and more tfimited and ephemeral ..."
The actual relations between the bureacracy and imperialism are highly contradictory. On one hand, the Krem-flin has to take the necessary measures to safeguard its own positions and domain from imperialist penetration, aggressions and  attack.
But the policies and methods it employs to achieve this *nd serve to aid imperialism and weaken and discourage the working masses, thereby undermining the defense of the anti-capitalist countries and the Soviet Union.
Neither the counter-revolutionary imperialist nor the revolutionary forces fundamentally aim to preserve the existing state of affairs. Both of these irreconcilable antagonists, for opposing reasons, are driving toward a showdown which brings them into ever sharper collision.
Moscow comes forward in this contest of class forces as the foremost defender of the international status quo, and therewith a key conservatizing factor in the world situation. It does not aim to aid the revolution or to overthrow imperialist rule. It is anxious to maintain the present division of the world between its own power and that of imperialism and to arrive at a new deal on that basis.
This is consciously formulated in the conception of "peaceful co-existence between socialism and capitalism" repeated by the new Kremlin leaders and echoed by the Stalinist parties. This is more than a theory; it provides the main guiding line of an active policy which predominates the diplomacy of the Kremlin and the conduct of its agencies.
The Kremlin exerts it's utmost influence to preserve even the prevailing cold war status quo as a lesser evil. It aims to uphold this by acting simultaneously on two fronts: against further aggression by imperialists on the one side and against any disruption of the present equilibrium by eruptions and expansion of the revolutionary movement. For fear of provoking retaliation from im-perialism and becoming involved directly in war, the bureaucracy will hamstring revolutions and permit them

to bleed to death. The cases of North Korea, Iran, and Malaya are instructive in this respect.
Moscow gave the North Koreans supplies enough to drag out the war but not enough to win, even when its armies were sweeping the invaders toward the sea. Whereas Washington did not hesitate to intervene with full force and openly in Korea, Moscow stayed discreetly within its own preserve. Then when MacArthur approached the Yalu, the Chinese were forced to enter the war even though they had just come out of a prolonged civil war. The narrow caste interests and protective fears of the Soviet rulers obliged the Asian revolutionists to bear the brunt of the anti-imperialist fight.
As the pressures from imperialism mount, the Kremlin's disposition is to gain time for itself at the expense of the world working class and the struggles of the colonial peoples. This explains the conduct of the Tudeh Party in Iran which refrained from launching a fight for power at the peak of its mass support and\ thereby permitted the military coup d'etat which overthrew Mossadegh and restored the Shah. The Kremlin's anxiety to prevent the upsetting of the equilibrium in this sensitive spot and avert the risk of precipitating war accounted for this triumph of the counter-revolution in Iran.
The supposition that the cold war between Western imperialism and the Soviet Union plus the mounting pressures of the mass movement restrains or prevents the bureaucracy from committing deadly treachery is not confirmed by recent events. Quite the contrary. The French CP's behavior in the August 1953 General Strike shows how the Kremlin's agents will let a revolutionary opportunity pass by and ruin it. The Kremlin can stab the workers in the back, not only when it is in open alliance with the imperialists ,but also when it is seeking an alliance with them. The treachery may be more devious but its effects are as real and disastrous.
The inevitable outcome of all this maneuvering with imperialism and against the revolution will be the same as before the Second World War. The maneuvers will not avert the war. But the imperialists will be helped to strengthen their positions and make advances while the revolution is crippled and the workers are thrust back and disoriented. Unless the workers in the advanced capitalist countries undertake a revolutionary offensive of powerful proportions, the imperialists will be enabled to unleash the war at a time and under conditions most advantageous for them.
The bureaucracy hates and fears the world revolution and strives to head it off, restrict, control, subvert and strangle it. But it is not omnipotent. It cannot do what it wants, in the way it wants, when it wants.
But this does not mean that the Kremlin has abated its hostility toward the world revolution or altered its treacherous attitude toward it. This can be seen even in the victories of the revolution in Yugoslavia and China. These occurred against the Kremlin's advice and in defiance of it. The Kremlin was obliged to accommodate itself to the accomplished fact.

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The 'limits, to this accommodation depend upon'how closely the development of the revolutions touches 'its most vital interests. The Kremlin went along with the Yugoslav revolution up to the point where Yugoslav influence over the Balkan countries threatened to create an alternative pole of attraction. Then the Kremlin turned mercilessly upon it.
To what degree can it be maintained, as the resolution does, that the Kremlin is now obliged to ally itself with the colonial revolution against imperialism? It ha* had to, back up China and North Korea up to a pointy The victories for the revolution in Asia have so far been no direct threat to the Kremlin's domination, even though it has bad to acquiesce in the co-direction of the Asian Communist movement with Mao. On the whole they haye^ worked to the immediate advantage of the Kremlin,. China has broken the imperialist encirclement in the Far, East and kept the VS. forces tangled in the Korean war. This drained China and tied up the United Statesat minimum cost to Moscow.
So long as the Kremlin can use this or that sector of the colonial movement for its own ends, it will do so; But it remains a very perfidious ally in the best ciream-stances. It has already been pointed out that it deliberately withheld military deliveries that could enable the North Koreans to win. The current: seven-year chriLwar in Indo-China stems back to the Stalinist coalition politics in 1945-46 which handed French imperialism the positions for fighting the national independence raovementifMost recently, the Kremlin sabotaged the revolution in Iran.
It is true that world conditions militate against ,the
Kremlin's consummation of any lasting deals with>tmJ-
perialism or its bargains with the national bourgeoisie.
But the objective consequences of its attempts, to maintain
thestatus quo or arrive at such agreements have? much
more than "limited and ephemeral" practical Effects. Its
maneuvers help block the advance of the revolutionary
movement and adversely affect the world relationship of
forces.' -   ■	:	'	■■ • ■■ :*-.~>
The bureaucracy together with its agencies is riot simply a passive reflector and acted-upori object Of the world relationship of forces; the bureaucracy acts and reacts on the international arena as a potent factor in shaping" the latter. For example, the Kremlin's whole postwar policy' toward Germany, the key country in Europe ^W'parti-cipaiion in the division, its regime over East Germahyv its diplomatic maneuvers regarding West Germany), aid capitalist reaction and facilitate the imperialist objectives. Can the effects of its attitude toward this'one country "be* classified as "limited" and "ephemeral" whether these1 are assessed from the angle of the European revolutioft; the German workers, the march toward war or the defense of the afttf-capitalist States?
Nidt bhly is the vanguard rnisedueated by this minim
izing of the pernicious results of the Kremlin's tourte but
it is disarmed in the struggle to dispel illtisiohs about
Stalinism afhbng^ the workers in order to break them from
Stalinist infitoeftce.	i1;;   -

The re'solutiort says on page 20: "the revolutionary tide which the Soviet bureaucracy is no longer capable of smashing and arresting is even being nourished by the methods of self-defense applied by the bureaucracy..." Both parts of this statement are one-sided and misleading.. The :fact that the Soviet bureaucracy couldn't "smash and arrest" the Yugoslav and Chinese revolutions where the revolutionary tide broke through its dikes, doesn't wipe out the fact that.elsewhere, by and large, the bureaucracy succeeded in turning the. revolutionary tide in the opposite direction., This has (influenced; the relationship of forces for an entire period.
Nor do its "methods of self-defense" necessarily "nourish" "the revolutionary tide," even where the revolution has come to power. The Kremlin's "methods of self-defense" drove Yugoslavia into the embrace of imperialism and has made China more and more dependent economically upon it. I* is not clear just what is specifically meant by "methods of self-defense" which can nourish the revolutionary tide. Does that refer to supplying arms to China and North Korea? Or to.its action in defense of the Soviet Union in case of attack? But even in these instances "its methods of self-defense" do not in-all respects coincide with the self-defense of the workers' movement and can even go counter to it.   ,_.,..-.,
s,. .We have always recognized that when the bureaucracy defends the Soviet Union against imperialist attack, it can under certain conditions give an impulsion to, revolutionary struggles in capitalist countries. Jt will be obliged to do this still more in the event of the Third, WorldWar. But now when it is seeking a modus vivendi with imperialism or trying to create rifts amongst the capitalist nations, its "methods of self-defense" do far more to drain than to swell the revolutionary wave.
In several places, there is the implication that the bureaucracy, faced with the war-danger, will have to be more tolerant of independent revolutionary developments and refrain from proceeding against them. For example, this resolution says that the Kremlin's preparations for World War ll "was accompanied by a halt of mass purges. -' Actually,,the purges were part of Stalin's preparations for war. He aimed to eliminate all potential centers of op-pcsitjon to the regime. The beheading of the Soviet General, Staff, which led to the military fiasco in Finland* showed* to what lengths the bureaucracy, ian go in preventive,, measures against even potentially independent forces precisely when war loomed.
Later, the resolution attempts to explain the campaign, against Yugoslavia oh the ground that "it was above all able to indulge in such a counter-revolutionary attitude because the preparations for the capitalist war were only in thei^ preliminary stages . . . " etc. This will not hotel water. The Break took place at a time of high tension 1be-tween the USRR and the capitalist world. But the overriding taste interests of the Kremlin took precedence, over tfife practical heed of defending the USSR although; that meant arienating the one country with morale and' armed fdites reliable' arid powerful "enough to furnish; genuine aid for that purpose.

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b. Hie Significance of the Events in the Soviet Union Since Stalin's Death
The Kremlin regime has been characterized by our
movement as a regime of crisis. The parasitism of the
bureaucratic caste continuously conflicts with the pro
ductive relations established by the October-Revolution.
As the product of a political counter-revolution arising
from the delay of the World revolution and the back
wardness of Russian economy and culture, the totalitarian
bureaucracy could maintain its power drily; by^repres
sive measures directed against the Soviet masses. The
extension of the Kremlin's rule over the buffer zone
countries, the Yugoslav and Chinese revolutions'/ and the
growth Of Soviet economy and culture have confronted
the "bureaucracy with many new acute ^rofelerrtS.' As a
result the objective factors for a mass Uprising against
the bureaucratic power are ripening in the Soviet Uniion.-
The working class especially, which has grown' consider-
ably in numbers, culture, skill, and social' power, is be5-
coming impatient with insistent demands" for continual
exertions and sacrifices, enforced by the bureaucratic
apparatus and its agencies. The privileges of the bureau
cracy appear ever more monstrous, unjustified and in
tolerable in their eyes.	-
The bureaucracy is extremely sensitive to this developing danger. The new rulers face oh ;a higher level, and under different and more difficult circumstances; tHfe' resistance and resentment of the miiiei agaMst the relentless pressures exerted upon them ^hich ^Stalin periodically encountered. Stalin coped with' triesi situations not by purges alone. He resorted also to temporary ris-^ taxations arid propaganda campaigns/ce^ered'around promises of concessions, improved' living conditions, arid a happier life. As Trotsky pointed ■'but;'''''Stalin is compelled frorh time to time to take the side of 'trie people' against the bureaucracy —'of ■course,' wrth its tacit consent:"  {The Revolution Betrayed, p. 271) '<"    -;
Stalin's death unquestionably released a flood, of hope
among the people that with the death of' the dictator
they would get a hew deal. The bureaucracy had the
twofold problem of reestablishing the Hierarchy of the
top command,, white preventing the masses from inter-
venitig fli the situation with their own demands' and in
dependent actibrts: The inheritors of power hastened to
create the: inipr/esSibn that the masses would get a gen'
uine new deal 'is a gift from' the top. They promised' a
series of political and economic concessions: a broad
amnesty, the revision of, the criminal code in 30 days, no
more purges, more consumers1 goods, etc.	'
It would seem that the political concessions would be easiest to make since unlike improved Hying conditions, tr\iey do not require large-scale economic' reorganizations. However, the^e have yet to materiaiize.*T^§re has been another large reduction in prices, the sixth since the war, #ut a genuine | improvement in living si^andards. first necessitates a drastic readjustment of the economy, and, above all, a tremendous increase in agricultural production, which has regained stagnant for many years.

The bureaucracy is aiming to do this by raising the incentives of the individual peasant and the well-to-do members of the collectives.
At the same time the bureaucracy had to decide quickly who wou}d assume the role of principal arbiter and purger-in-chief to .remove all ambiguity on that score and forestall any moves by the masses to take advantage of fissures in the bureaucratic apparatus. Tnis was the meaning Of Beria's downfall Which has been followed by a purge of his associates in the various Republics.
These developments proved that the bureaucracy cannot devise new methods of rule. It may make concessions but must maintain intact at all times the mechanism of repression Which guarantees its regime. Between the totalitarian methods of bureaucracy and the democratic methods of working-class power there will be no intermediate methods of: rule. A new power and new methods of rule can corrte into being only through forces outside the bu reaucracyf and' in opposition to it, th rough the overthrow of Bonapartist rule by the masses.
The Trotskyists base their revolutionary perspectives upon the maturing: contradictions between the bureaucratic set-up and the working masses which will lead the latter toward a forthright challenge to the totalitarian dictatorship: The East> German events prefigure the developments' within the) Soviet Uhion in this respect. We must' analyze 'the concessions in! the light of the nature and'position of the Stalinist bureaucracy and the developing contradictions within Soviet society.
The resolution, however; exaggerates the changes in the objective situation, endowingithem with an automatic propulsion which obliges , the bureaucracy to. liberalize itself, introduce new methods of rule, liquidate the her-itagexrf Stalinism, suppress: jts most hideous and■■.characteristic, features* and; deliver more and more concessions.
T:berresolution; states: "That regime (Malenkov's) can now maintain itself-only by. suppressing — temporarily or definitively — >the most hideous aspects,^ that is to say, the most characteristic ones of the regime." It does not specify which one of these "hideous aspects" has been eliminated or -i^fbout to be! The privileges?, The police regime? The relentless squeeze, on the workers in production? The nat^na| , oppression? Concentration camps? Purges? The* if&pUjcation is that "the terror of Stalin's epoch" is on iis:iw^.y out. But there were fluctuations, in the. application,jof this terror during Stalin's day too. The difference;now seems to be that the diminution of terror under the^alenkov era is, a growng trend, the most distinctive: fe^frcpf "the decline of the Bonapartist dictatorship," :i,.n- .,.;,
,The essential .liberalityr.qf .the new regime is only
underscored by %;. next prognosis that "It is not ex
cluded that before t'fai^i>g» ,,the Bonapartist dictatorship
will suddenly once again have recourse to the Woodiest
terror." This sigpifies fjtfjat. terror, has become not an es
sential but an exceptiojja|,' episodic and incidental ex
pression of the^ buresucf:^iC5fule,	.,,,,
, To reinforce its,contentipn'that the post-Stalin,,regime is compelled not only to do away with the most terrible

144

traits of Stalinism, but to placate the masses to an ever-increasing degree, the resolution exaggerates the scope of the concessions. It refers to a broad amnesty which seems to have died a-borning since it was not mentioned at the last session of the Supreme Soviet in the decrees submitted for approval. It speaks of the revision of the penal code which was promised within 30 days and still remains to be promulgated seven months after.
The liberation of the doctors was originally inter
preted as an irreparable blow to the system of frameup
trials and purges. But since then Beria's purge and trial
has been announced. It takes the condemnations of. po
lice arbitrariness for good coin, setting aside the fact
that verbal criticism of police excesses were not unknown
under Stalin. Indeed, the GPU was purged several times
duriagj Statin!s regime.   ."•■■■.''■-.	'     k
Jt regards the. stress upon collective decision as a definitive dismissal of the. culjt of the chief. But this is only a transitional stage between the demise of the former chief and the elevation of a prospective replacement. During his rise to power, Statin likewise counterposed the collectivity of the Central Committee against the "aristocrats," that is, the Bolshevik leaders most popular amongst the masses.
As we have pointed out, this does not mean that no concessions have been made or that they amount to nothr ing. They are largely economic in character. What Ma-lehkov has done is to dramatize the gradual improvement in living standards since 1947 and even expedite them. But even in the sphere of consumption, the Kremlin will be unable to satisfy the demands of the masses, ft -will give to one section pf the population at the expense of another.While offering''new incentives to.the peasants, it does not increase "the general IeveJ of workers' wages, and it takes care to increase the privileges of the-bureaucracy itself.;
How should the concessions be judged? Concessions are of genuine value if they open opportunities to the masses for self-action which can then be used to further their own aims. The new regime has not yet offefed the slightest opening of that kind and it is hot difficult to understand why. The totalitarian government cannot tolerate* the least freedom of action for the workers which would weaken its stranglehold upon them.
The resolution occupies itself with dubious speculations about the centrifugal forces which are cracking the monolithism of the ruling group and generating differentiations within the party and its leading circles. It says that the monolithism of the Bonapartist type is being ruptured beyond repair under pressure from other segments of the bureaucracy and the masses: The Beria purge is adduced as evidence of this growing disunity. !o There is-no doubt that the death of Stalin upset the regime's stability, set a swarm of centrifugal forces into motion, and provoked a crisis which has still to be overcome. >The transfer of power in a tyranny is always a delicate operation containing dangers. Having lost its ojd ipersoftal center, the bureaucracy as a whole is impelled to seek, create ,and rally around a new one as the

principal point of support to safeguard its privileges and regulate its internal conflicts.-That is the principal reason for the elevation --of; Malferikov and the speedy removal of Beria.
The resolution makes much of the heterogeneity of interests amongst the various layers of the bureaucracy as the material ground-work for its growing differentiation and conflicts. It refers in addition to the ageing top layer of the bureaucracy as presumably not so much concerned with increasing privileges as conserving them. This overlooks the fact that even at the top the bureaucracy steadily renews its personnel; and at all levels its appetite1 for privileges grows with eating, especially in a country which has far from reached the living standards of the Western world.
The bureaucracy as a social layer is stratified according to its conditions of life, its positions of poweiV scope of privileges, etc. which give rise to jealousies; rivalries and clique contests of many kinds. But as the sole commanding and favored stratum, it is united against •the bulk of the population by common bonds of material interest. It is the sole force in the Soviet Union and buffer countries which is armed and organized.
The bureaucratic caste cannot tolerate any deep divisions of policy within its ruling circles for any length of time or permit any crack in its repressive apparatus which the masses may utilize for their own purposes. It hides therra and hastens1 to cement them as promptly as possible. Since it has no constitutional or democratic ways of resolving internal1 conflicts, it resorts to the method of purges. The purge is a weapon directed against the bureaucracy itself from on high as well as against the people; It is an indispensable mechanism of Bonapartist rule-Will the'purge method be more and more shelved as the liquidation of Stalinism proceeds) as the resolution implies? Apart from a vague reference to the changing relationship, of forces, the resolution brings forward ho evidence for this. In fact, the opposite would be indicated. If antagonisms within the bureaucracy deepen, it would seem that purges to resolve them would be in order. If opposition is growing among the people, it would seem that the commanding caste "would be obliged to resort to its time-honored methods of repression. Trotsky observed that "the more the course of NdeveIop-ment goes against it, the more ruthless it becomes toward the advanced elements of the population." (TS« Revolution Betrayed;■ pi-277)
Now it. appears; according ctp the resolution, that the more the course of development goes against it/the more lenient and conciliatory the regime must become.
The resolution revises Trotsky's basic concept of the Soviet Thermidor which viewed the Stalinist bureaucracy as representing the first stage of bourgeois restoration. The privileged castei viewed qualitatively in the4 structure of Soviet society, is a bourgeois-minded formation still confined "Within the integument of the remaining, conquests of the 1917 Revolution, nationalized property, planned economy* By its position in Soviet society, thfc

146

inherent tendency of. the caste ;a$ such is anti-Soviet; restorationist. This orthodox Hfotskyist- view has been dumped by the authors of "The Rise and Decline of Stalinism." The concept of the counter-revolutionary stage of Soviet Thermidor has been liquidated, surviving in the document only as a vestigial -.phrase — a "reduced" number of Tbermidorians, "old revolutionary militants of the pre-1917 vintage." (Section 11) As a substitute for Trotsky'? basic sociological;; concept* we are given aa impressionistic view of the psychology of the "tops of the bureaucracy," who, we are assured, "are in their majority no longer a young and rapacious social layer, striving to conquer privileges jn the field of consumption in the midst of prevailing poverty, the majority constitutes a layer of men of mature years or heading into old age, attempting to conserve the best possible living standards for. themselves.4" (Section \\) In line with this superficial view, the document sees "reflexes of capitulation and desertion to the bourgeois camp" (under the impact of "signs of proletarian awakening") confined to "very limited layers; jpf^he bureaucracy."
By dumping the orthodox Trotskyist concept. of the caste as in essence representative :Of the tendency toward capitalist restoration, 'the development of which, can be followed in a wealth of forms in Soviet,life,, the, Pabloites open the road to the completely revisionist, concept that the bureaucracy can right itself. This is,not explicitly stated, but certain conclusions in the resolutionflow from this revisionist premise. For example,! that ;in3|-place of, the "reinforcement of restoratjonjsr. tendencies-within the peasantry and the bureaucracy" trie opposite, development "is Jhe more likely ... , ".(Section, 15-) ,T|ie. document emphasizes the new revisionist position-, (and also its confusion): "The coining decisive battle $)iibin the So? viet Union,will not be waged between tkejfestorationist forces aiming to restore private property and ,the forces-defending the conquests of October.,-lit- will be, on #* contrary, waged between the forces defending the privileges and administration of t]%e bureaucracy and the revolutionary' workingrclass forces fighting to reMore Soviet democracy upo% a higher level." (Section 15)-
In* opposition, tp this view, which opens the road to
capitulation to the bureaucracy^ we emphasize the ortho
dox Trotskyist position: The coming decisive battle with
in the Soviet Union wiM be waged between the restora-
tionist, tendencies in the country represented by the
Stalinist bureaucracy as such and the regenerative ten
dency represented by the revolutionary working-class
forces. On one side will appear the bulk of the bureau-
ifacy, 'defending its privileges\ and police rule and there-'
by the tendency to restore private property; on the other,.
tke proletarian vanguard leading a political revolution
that will sweep out the usurping bureaucracy^ restore
■Soviet,democracy upon a higher levek and :thereby di
rectly align the Soviet regime once again with &he world
socialist revolution.    ,,	■■;<.-,-■
The proposition that no significant segment of the bureaucracy will align itself with the masses against its: own material interests does sot mean that the bureaucracy

would not manifest, deep cleavages under the impact of an uprising. Such disorganization, disintegration and demoralization was observable in East Germany. But the function of a revolutionary policy is to organize, mobilize and help lead the masses in their struggles, not to look for and even less to bank upon any breaks in the bureaucracy.
In its whole treatment of1 the events since Stalin's death and the new course of this Malenkpv regime, the resolution lays down the' political premises for a reappraisal of the nature of the Stalinist bureaucracy and the kind of action the workers must take to overthrow it. While it does not spell out these revisions, if opens the door for others to do so; as we shall see later.
c.  The Kremlin and the Communist Parties
The resolution states that the Kremlin's rigid grip on the mass Communist parties is weakening. It gives three reasons for this deduction: the growing power of the mass movement exerted on these" parties, the loosening of their relations with Moscow, and uncertainty about the Kremlin's authority and policy in recent months. No specific evidence is cited to substantiate this speculation, although the development cannot be ruled out in advance in specific cases. Such has certainly been the case with the Yugoslav and Chinese CP's. But there are no overt signs of a similar occurrence elsewhere yet.
To buttress this point the resolution cites the Kremlin's inability to reestablish Any International since 1943. Actually Moscow finds any International more of a liability than an asset. It wisnest to. keep the CP's sep-> arated aricj to control them by other means.
This alleged relaxation of Kremlin control is associated with "the penetration, of ideas opposed to the interests of the Kremlin bureaucracy within these organizations; , and. a process s of modification in the hierarchical, .bureaucratic relations, previously established." That is Ijpwthe disintegration of: Stalinism, is beginning. Vague a^ ;thj^ pbservationsi4^>f tendencies are, they seem to point .to, the .growth of new idieological currents and organizational relations within, the shell of the CP's which will apparently continue inside them until the reformed and rebellious parties becptne strong and independent enough to,, throw off the Kremlin's stranglehold. Does this not pjpject the perspective of such reformed Stalinist, parties^ escaping; the Kremlin's clutches and proceed' ing on the road to revolution?
Thfe conclusion receives reinforcement from the assertion that the mass Communist parties are forced to radicalize their policies more and more. This is the fundamental: and inescapable course of their policies.
The resolution grudgingly admits "the possibility of the mass Communist parties to carry through temporary turns to the right within given conditions, so long as the mass pressure has not reached its culminating point." (p; 35) The direction of Stalinist policy in such parties isrthuss made to depend in the last analysis on the degree of mass pressure exerted upon them.

146

Up to now there has been no such direct correlation. The history of the French CP is instructive. From 1929-1933 when the workers were not yet energetic it pursued an ultra-left line. In 1936 when the mass movement reached its height the CP took a People's Front line. In 1944-47 at the crest of the revolutionary waye generated by the war the Stalinist leaders disarmed the workers and helped de Gaulle restore the capitalist regime. In 1952, when the workers had relapsed into passivity thanks in large measure to the previous gyrations of Stalinist policy, it summoned the Paris workers into the adventure of the anti-Ridgway demonstration. Finally, in August 1953 during the General Strike the CP remained passive and maintained its "National Front" mixture of opportunism and sectarianism without radicalizing its policy an iota.
This record shows that, far from coordinating their line with the rise in mass pressure, this mass CP ran counter to it. The diplomatic needs of the Kremlin got the upper hand over the demands of the masses. This does not mean that the CP can get away with anything at any time. It too must adjust itself, itike other mass parties, to the radicalization of the masses, more in words than in deeds. But in and of itself the pressure of the masses does not suffice to push the CP closer to the revolutionary road.
The conception that a mass CP will take the road to power if only sufficient mass pressure is brought to bear is false. It shifts the responsibility for revolutionary setbacks from the leadership to the mass, according to the following reasoning: if only there had been more pressure, the CP could have been forced to drive for power. The interaction between the insurgent masses and the leadership is thus reduced to the simple equation: maximum mass pressure equals revolutionary performances, however inadequate, from the CP leadership.
Actually, the pressure of the workers in the 1953 French General Strike was formidable enough to start the offensive for power. But it was precisely the momentum of this mass power and its implications that caused the CP leadership to leap away in fright from it and prevent its organization. In this not unimportant case, instead of radicalizing Stalinist policy, the heightened mass pressure had a different effect. Obviously, there is not a direct but a dialectical relationship between the two factors.
Yugoslavia and China show that under certain exceptional conditions the leadership of a Stalinist party, caught between extermination by the counter-revolution and an extremely powerful revolutionary offensive of the masses, can push forward to power. This can be repeated elsewhere under comparable conditions, especially in the event of a new world war.
But it would be unwarranted to generalize too broadly and hastily on this point. It should be remembered that while the Yugoslavs marched to power, the CP's in other countries remained subordinate to the Kremlin and facilitated the work of the counter-revolution. Two Communist parties, the Yugoslav and Chinese, met the test in one way; the others in a directly opposite manner.

The specific conditions which forced the Yugoslav and Chinese CP's onto the revolutionary road must be analyzed and understood. Both parties had been in conflict with the existing regimes and operated illegally for long years. Both fought prolonged civil wars during which the leadership and cadres were selected, tested and hardened and their forces organized. The Chinese CP had armed forces of its own for years before launching the struggle for power. The domestic capitalist regimes were exceptionally weak and imperialism was unable to intervene with any effectiviness.
In any case, as the Manifesto issued by the Third World Congress declared: "The transformations which the Stalinist parties might undergo in the course of the most acute revolutionary crises may oblige the Leninist vanguard to readjust its tactics toward these parties. But this in no way relieves the proletariat from, the task of building a new revolutionary leadership. What is on the agenda today, is not so much the question of a projection of a struggle for power under exceptional conditions in this or that isolated country, but the overthrow of imperialism in all countries as rapidly as possible. Stalinism remains obstacle number one, within the international labor movement, to the successful conclusion of that task."
d.   The Kremlin and the Buffer Zone
The exposition of the contradictions inherent in the postwar expansion of Stalinist domination over the buffer zone countries: the resistance of the native CP's which have acquired their own state interests and material base against the dictates of the Kremlin; the clash between the regime and the peasants; the conflict between the regime and the workers — this is in general correctly delineated.
There are, however, three main points of difference to be noted.
1. The National Question
First is the neglect of any treatment of the national question in the resolution, although this is one of the most exiplosive issues in the Kremlin-subjugated: domains. There has long been bitter resistance to the autocratic Russification of the Ukrainians and other minorities. The extension of Moscow's rule, its plundering, overlordship and Russification has provoked no less intense national feelings in the buffer zone.
The political revolution against the Moscow despotism can not be visualized without the rekindling of the national independence movement in these areas. This demand will be one of the keenest weapons against the Kremlin overlords. Yugoslavia has already shown how powerful a factor of rebellion this resistance to national oppression can be.
The program for the political revolution must therefore include slogans for a free and independent Socialist Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, etc:, just as we continue to call for an independent Socialist Ukraine.  In

147

East Germany, split by joint agreement of the Big Three, this demand takes the form of the reunification of the German nation on a Socialist basis. The unity of the German people, and above all its working class, is indispensable for the promotion of the European revolution. Even-though this demand was raised by the demonstrators themselves and was called for by the entire situation, it was missing from the IS declaration on the East German events.
The omission of such a slogan in both the resolution and the IS statement requires explanation. Is the present bloc of anti-capitalist states under Kremlin dictatorship to be regarded as a solid and untouchable entity which the demand for independence disintegrates? Actually the struggle for socialist independence undermines the grip of the Kremlin, helps unify the revolutionary forces, increasing their striking power against imperialism.
Thjs omission is all the more glaring in the light of its inclusion in the Third World Congress Manifesto. "Long live the independent Socialist Republics of Poland, of Czechoslovakia, of Hungary, of Rumania, of Bulgaria and of the Ukraine! Down with the Stalinist dictatorship."
2. The East German Events
Second, in place of the dubious hypotheses advanced in the resolution on possible variants of development, the revolutionary perspectives for the buffer zone countries should be based upon concrete events from which lessons can be drawn and applied. This means that the treatment of the overthrow of the Kremlin autocracy and the disintegration of Stalinism must take the East German uprising as its point of departure.
This uprising demonstrated in life how the political revolution against Stalinism originates and unfolds. A correct appraisal of the East German events has the utmost importance for our movement because it provides the opportunity to check our program with the actual events and see whether and in what respects it was verified and wherein it requires correction and amplification. Important divergences in appraisal are equally significant.
Briefly, what did the East German uprising reveal?
 1.	It showed that the working class was the initiating and decisive force in leading the people to revolt.
 2.	It disclosed the colossal power and potentialities of the workers' movement which united all currents of labor opinion in massive protest. Virtually the entire Working class opposed itself to the regime and all its agencies, beginning with the SED.
 3.	The unpopular government was sprung into midair without any support amongst the people. Its main props, the party, the police and the top bureaucracy, crumbled and collapsed under the impact of the uprising.
 4.	The advanced workers broke in action with the government party, the SED.
 5.	They evinced determination to overthrow the regime, not to reform it This repudiation iand rejection

was implicit in the demand for "a metal-workers government." The sum total of the other demands were incompatible with the continuance of the dictatorship.
 6.	The general mass political strike, sparked by immediate economic demands and directed against the government, became the means for mobilizing the masses and pitting them against the regime.
 7.	The Trotskyist program of the necessity of political revolution against Stalinism by a mass uprising was vindicated and adopted in action by the insurgent workers.
 8.	The unarmed and unsupported masses had to fall back. They felt the need for the formation of a revolutionary leadership and a party to organize the next stages and link it up with the struggles in the West and the  buffer zone countries.
 9.	The events exposed and underscored the utterly counter-revolutionary nature of Stalinism.
a.	It required a series of repressive measures, mixed
with minor concessions, to save and prop up the bat
tered regime. Armed force and police actions against
the most militant and conscious elements had to be Used
to subdue the insurgents.
b.	The occupying Soviet troops rescued the regime
and pushed back the revolution.
c.	The Stalinists launched a despicable slander cam
paign against the workers as "fascists."
d.	The SED undertook a purge of its personnel who
proved weak and conciliatory.
Contrast the above appraisal with the aspects. stressed in the IS resolution written after the East German uprising. The resolution singles out three points. \.
a.	Special economic conditions caused the resistance
of the masses to culminate in open revolt. (Actually, they
touched off the rebellion which had profounder causes.)
b.	This revolt accentuated "the new course" which
includes an improvement in economic conditions for all
layers Of the people and a softening of the atmosphere
of extreme tension in the rriass organizations.
c.	This new course is designed to strengthen the grip
of the Stalinist parties by making them more flexible,
less rigid.
This is the sum total of the principal lessons drawn by the resolution from the East German uprising!
3.  Entrism Into the CP in the Buffer Zone Countries
Third, the resolution recommends art application of the entrist tactic toward the Communist Parties in the buffer zone countries. In these countries, "our forces must seek to realize their tasks, which are; in general similar to those we have in the Soviet Union, through an entrist tactic toward the CP, while remaining prepared to join quickly any other mass organization which may appear at the beginning of the upsurge." (p. 28)
The question naturally arises why the resolution does not make a specific entrist proposal for the CP of the Soviet Union, if the tasks are '"in general similar." This

148

becomes still more puzzling when we are given as one of the motivations for entrism in the buffer zone countries, that "the more the outbreak of the revolutionary rise is retarded,' the more will the young generation awaken t6 political life. This generation will have known no form of political organization other than the CP and the latter will tend to become the natural arena in which the leadership of the new revolutionary rise will develop."
Several young generations have already awakened to political life in the S.U. knowing no other party than the CP. If this becomes a decisive criterion, the entrist tactic should be applied there above all places. Why doesn't the resolution call for it? Why is such a glaring contradiction permitted?
Can it be because the Transitional Program opens no door for an entrist tactic toward the CP USSR? It insists on the contrary that the Soviet masses must be mobilized to rise up against the bureaucracy under the leadership of the Soviet section of the Fourth International.
But the way is being paved to get around this in stages. In quoting the Transitional Program the resolution drops out the above clearly-stated programmatic conclusions. It substitutes the vaguer proposition that "the conditions are being created for the reconstitution and the upsurge of the Bolshevik-Leninist Party." There is no explicit reference to entry but it is not excluded.
In addition, the resolution prescribes an entrist tactic for the buffer zone countries which is so motivated as to apply with greater force to the USSR. Such an entrist proposal is fundamentally different from any other adopted by our movement in the past.
Up to now the Trotskyist movement has practiced three types of entry. The first involved reformist or centrist parties which, under the impact of events, gave rise to a significant leftward-moving tendency. A Trotskyist grouping or party may temporarily give up its organizational independence to enter such a movement to promote the crystallization of a principled revolutionary tendency and augment its own forces in the process. The size of the party is not of decisive consideration in an entry of this kind, which is a temporary detour on the road to the construction of the revolutionary party. It serves the two-fold purpose of gathering forces and if possible, disposing of a centrist rival on the arena of the class struggle. This was the sort of entry the Trotskyists carried through in the Socialist Party of the United States in 1936.
The second type of entrism involves parties enjoying the allegiance of the working class in its entirety, like the British Labor Party. Trotskyists enter such a movement because within it is concentrated the political life and development of the decisive elements of the class. Basing themselves in their activity on the contradiction between the socialist aspirations of the working class and the capitalist-minded party bureaucracy, the Trotskyists articulate the fundamental interests of the ranks, give them leadership and programmatic expression, and

collect the forces for the revolutionary party in subsequent stages of the struggle for socialism.
The third type of entrism has been developed since the Third World Congress. It essentially represents an extension of the second type to the Stalinist parties enjoying a considerable mass base in the capitalist countries, such as France or Italy, or fighting a civil war for power as in  Indo-China.
Here the Trotskyists base themselves upon the contradiction between the urge of the masses for the conquest of power and a fundamental social change and the policies of the CP bureaucracies subservient to the Kremlin, with the aim of directing the movement into revolutionary channels. Because of the monolithic character and bureaucratic regime of these parties which does not permit opposition tendencies to operate, this entrism encounters great difficulties and complications and must be of a special kind. This tactic remains in the experimental stage and must be carefully checked at every point to assess the results.
The entrist proposal so lightly introduced into the resolution for the buffer zone countries is of an altogether different type. It involves entering a party that holds state power and is the direct and principal oppressor of the working masses. The fundamental antagonism within these countries, as in the Soviet Union, is between the organized and armed bureaucracy, ruling through the CP, and the unorganized and disarmed working class. To go into the CP is not to acquire closer contact with the best elements of the working class but to become identified with the bureaucracy in the eyes of the most militant workers. A party member is forced to become an instrument of oppression in the day-to-day friction between the bureaucratic regime and the working class.
A revolutionary worker would seek to make contact with the discontented workers repelled by and from the CP in as prudent a manner as possible.
The resolution does not proceed from the existing antagonisms between the workers and the Stalinist regime and the revolutionary impact the development of these antagonisms is bound to have, proposing organizational forms in preparation for that day. Instead it bases itself on the static concept that Stalinist workers will continue to remain in the CP while the Social Democrats will remain in the Social Democracy. Or on the conservative concept that the youth will flock into the sole party they see at hand. The revolutionary wave which, according to the resolution, is spreading from country to country and continent to continent will evidently engulf everything except the traditional parties. It will engulf Stalinism, but leave the CP"s intact. There is something wrong here. One effect of powerful revolutionary uprisings is to break the ties of the workers to their traditional organizations, disrupt the old parties, and lift up from obscurity the most revolutionary elements.
The East German uprising did not reinforce the SED or bring workers closer to it. It dug an unbridgeable gulf

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between the rebellious advanced workers and the SED. It prepared the conditions for creating a new leadership and bringing forth a new party which alone could guarantee the victory in the succeeding stages.
It is wrong to prescribe a blanket policy of entry in general. An entrist proposal for any country has to be justified by a concrete analysis and appraisal of the specific combination of circumstances in the given country (the party to be entered, its relation to the working class, the Trotskyist forces available, the real possibilities, etc.).
The resolution, however, motivates its general prescription for entry by the conciliationist concept that the leadership of the workers' insurgence in the buffer zone countries will necessarily come out of the CP's. This notion that the parties of the ruling bureaucracy will produce the leadership to overthrow the regime directs the workers away from reliance on their own forces and the formation of their own instruments of struggle. Since entry is a tactical, not a principled question, a Trotskyist group might enter a given CP in the buffer zone to take advantage of a serious crisis within it. But its decision would be predicated on the specific favorable conjuncture for such intervention, and not on illusory general characteristics of these parties.
An entrist tactic may be dictated in regard to the Yugoslav and Chinese CP's which led revolutions. To this day the leaderships have to lean to some extent upon the masses and appeal to their self-action to undertake some of the uncompleted- tasks of the revolution. The bureaucratic stratum is not yet petrified and is not regarded by the workers as an instrument of foreign domination. They still believe the CP's can be the vehicle for their revolutionary aspirations.
It should be noted that the Third Congress Manifesto explicitly calls for the formation of new parties in the USRR and the "Peoples' Democracies." "At the same time the Fourth International resolutely supports all proletarian movements of opposition to the police dictatorship of the Soviet bureaucracy and fights for the constitution of new Bolshevik-Leninist parties in these countries, parties which will take the leadership of the necessary political revolution for freeing socialist development from its bureaucratic shell." There is no such call in the present resolution. A shift in position has been introduced without explanation.
V. How the Line Is Being Applied
The recent writings by Pablo and Clarke on the East German uprising arid the events in the Soviet Union since Stalin's death show how the line of the resolution is being applied; how it distorts the real situation, disarms jthe FI and would disorient its ranks.
As the first proletarian revolt directed at the overthrow of the Stalinist bureaucracy and its agents, the East German uprising possesses immense significance for the entile world working class, and especially for its Trotskyist vanguard which alone heralded and worked

for this line of action. What does the declaration issued by the International Secretariat during this gigantic mass movement do and propose?
 1.	Instead of exposing and denouncing the Kremlin and East German Stalinist leaders as mortal foes of the workers and heads of the counter-revolution, the IS statement plays up their concessions and assures that these will continue. "They have been obliged to continue along the road of still more ample and genuine concessions to avoid risking alienating themselves forever from support by the masses and from provoking still stronger explosions. From now on they will not be able to stop halfway . . . They will be obliged to dole out more concessions ..." This is tantamount to telling the workers that they can expect ever-greater concessions from their oppressors, not that these will be limited to the minimum, and withdrawn unless the workers exert their full powers of resistance and follow through to the end.
 2.	Instead of warning that the Stalinist apparatus will inflict repressions and stop at nothing to defend their dictatorship, the IS statement promises a general and growing attitude of appeasement of the masses by the Stalinists.
 3.	There is no clear call for the overthrow of the Stalinist bureaucracy through the organization, strengthening and consummation of the uprising.
 4.	Instead of a program specifically adapted to the conditions and needs of the East German workers, a general program for the political revolution in the Soviet Union and all the "Peoples' Democracies" is put forward.
 5.	This program raises the slogan for "real democratization of the Communist Parties" as though these organs of the police regime could and should be transformed into vehicles for the revolutionary actions and aspirations of the masses. At the very time they are breaking in action with this party, the Stalinist workers are directed to seek its reform.
 6.	By implication, since this program is presented as applying to the Soviet Union as well, the slogan to democratize the Communist party Would be on the order of the day for the CP USSR too. This would be a direct break with the established position calling for the formation of a Trotskyist Party in the Soviet Union.
 7.	On the other hand, while there is a demand for the legalization of other working class parties, there is none for the formation of a new revolutionary party around the Trotskyist program.
 8.	There is no call for the withdrawal of the Soviet occupying troops which shot down workers and served as the ultimate prop of the shattered regime.
9.	Although demonstrators themselves put forward
the demand, there is no slogan for the reunification of
Germany on a Socialist basis. The • need for unity is
concentrated instead upon the solidarity of the Soviet
Union and the "Peoples' Democracies" as a bloc. The
resolution concludes with acclamation for "the socialist
rebirth of the Soviet Union, the 'Peoples' Democracies'

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and the international working class movement." Wouldn't the German workers also care to hear acclamation for the socialist reunification of their own divided country?
10. While the Stalinists slander the workers as "fascist hirelings," the statement cavalierly observes: "The Soviet leaders and those of the various 'Peoples' Democracies' and the CP could no longer falsify or ignore the profound meaning of these events."
Where is the revolutionary spirit of irreconcilable combat to topple a powerful and perfidious enemy in such a line? It is not designed to focus the attention of the masses upon the need for a new revolutionary leadership. At the very time when the workers are in revolt, it is permeated with a conciliatory attitude toward the bureaucracy.
Clarke's article on the East German events in the March-April issue displays equally conciliatory features. He plays down the counter-revolutionary intervention of the Kremlin as well as of its puppet regime. He takes careful note of the moderate conduct of the occupying fortes but fails to point out their counter-revolutionary function in rescuing the regime and blocking the workers' bid for power. He does not bring forward the inescapable necessity for the mass uprising to get rid of the Stalinist bureaucracy. Nor does he assert the need of a revolutionary party in order to lead such a mass uprising to victory.
Much is made of the split in the bureaucracy, although no definite conclusions are drawn from this development. It is clear that the SED bureaucracy became panic-stricken and differences set in on how best to handle the situation and that the movement found sympathy and support among certain elements in its lower ranks. This happens in every revolutionary uprising and it would be wrong to deny or ignore such developments.
But the question is: what place and significance do they have in the process of the revolution? They are not and cannot be the decisive factor or the central line of the struggle. The IS preoccupation with these subordinate aspects of the struggle tends to shift the axis of revolutionary strategy from the mobilization of the workers as an independent class force relying on their own1 strength and organs toward reliance for leadership from elements within the bureaucracy. The excessive attention given to the differentiations and splits within the bureaucracy,, the embellishment of their concessions, the failure to stress their repressive and counter-revolutionary role, can be explained only by illusions that, under pressure from below, a section of the Stalinist leadership will head the movement for the liquidation of Stalinism, at least in its earlier stages.
There is a sharp break with the traditional Trotskyist concept of the decisive role of the independent mass movement under its own revolutionary leadership.
Pablo's article on "The Post-Stalin 'New Course*" in the March-April issue proceeds along similar lines. He grossly exaggerates the scope and significance of the Malenkov concessions. He says that in addition to meas-

ures effecting an improvement of working conditions there has likewise been an extension of "the democratic rights of the masses," with less labor discipline and speedup for the workers under the dictatorship.
He does not prescribe any limits to the concessions. On the contrary, the bureaucracy will have to quicken and extend- them. "In reality events will oblige them, as is being demonstrated in Eastern Germany, and partly in Czechoslovakia, to quicken and extend the concessions to keep the impatient masses in the other buffer zone countries and in the USSR itself, from taking the road of action."
This is leading to the liquidation of the entire Stalinist heritage. "The dynamic of their concessions is in reality liquidatory of the entire Stalinist heritage in the USSR itself, as well as in its relations with the satellite countries, with China and the Communist Parties. It will no longer be easy to turn back . . . once the concessions are broadened, the march toward a real liquidation of the Stalinist regime threatens to become irresistible."
He thereupon raises the question: "what form will it (the march toward a real liquidation of the Stalinist regime) then take?" "Will it be that of an acute crisis and of violent inter-bureaucratic struggles between the elements who will fight for the status quo, if not for turning back, and the more and more numerous elements drawn by the powerful pressure of the masses?"
Pablo does not answer the question but the very posing of the question in this tendentious manner implies the answer.
In his article in the January-February issue Clarke introduces other variants. He writes: "Will the process take the form of a violent upheaval against bureaucratic rule in the USSR? Or will concessions to the masses and sharing of power — as was the long course in the English bourgeois revolution in the political relationship between the rising bourgeoisie and the declining nobility — gradually undermine the base of the bureaucracy? Or will the evolution be a combination of both forms? That we cannot now foresee,"
The inherent and unavoidable need for the mass uprising against the Kremlin bureaucracy, he offers simply as one of several variants of development of a "political revolution." That is not all. He then counterposes the diametrically opposite variant of the progressive reform of the bureaucracy. These are two mutually exclusive variants of "political revolution." The one insists upon the political expropriation of the bureaucratic rulers by the Soviet masses; the other, as Clarke tells us, envisages the "sharing of power."
The idea advanced by Clarke that the Kremlin bureaucracy is capable of "sharing power" with the Soviet people challenges both the program of political revolution for the Soviet Upioh as well as the Trotskyist* concept of the nature and role of this parasitic caste. This idea runs counter to reality.
The bureaucracy needs its totalitarian apparatus of terror and repressions precisely because it cannot share

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the power required to maintain its privileges, income and unbridled rule. Its police regime acts to oppress the masses, keep them politically expropriated, and deprive them of the slightest chance of intervening in political life. It leaves the masses no alternative but to take the road pointed out by the Transitional Program.
Clarke does not say by what ways and means the Kremlin despots will "share power" with the masses. Through what existing governmental and party institutions can the bureaucrats share power? Through the completely bureaucratized party? Through the secret police or the Army? The masses will gain a say in the country, again only through the revival of their own mass organizations which will signalize, not the "sharing of power" with the Kremlin gang, but the inception of the political uprising against it.
Pablo and Clarke see in both the German uprising and the post-Stalin developments the emergence of a deepening conflict between the stand-patters and a leftward-moving wing within the bureaucracy which tends to tear it apart into contending factions. In the showdown the reform elements appeal to and lean upon the masses; the masses in turn, it is implied, should back them up and look to them for leadership. This is presumably the beginning of the path to socialist regeneration, which is already discernible in "the New Course."
This shifts the axis of the development of the political revolution away from the self-action of the masses and focuses it upon the rifts inside the bureaucracy. Thereby the Trotskyist concept that the extension of the world revolution will inspire the Russian workers to rise up on their own account and overthrow the Stalinist bureaucracy gives way to a different concept. The changed international and internal situation, coupled with mounting pressure from the masses, unlooses forces within the bureaucracy itself which work toward the liquidation of Stalinism. The transformations emanate from on top as an outcome of the mass pressure from below.
The working class is transformed into a pressure group, and the Trotskyists into a pressure grouping along with it which pushes a section of the bureaucracy leftward toward the revolution. In this way, the bureaucracy is transformed from a block and a betrayer of the revolution into an auxiliary motor force of it.
Such sweeping conclusions on the changing characteristics of the Kremlin dictatorship and the dissolution of world Stalinism have a logic which is bound to assert itself. If the objective processes are marching along so fast and so far, then an equivalent reorientation must be effected by the revolutionary vanguard if it is to be on top of the unfolding events. A general turn would have to be made toward the Communist parties and into the Communist parties to help along the disintegration already proceeding at an accelerated rate and take full advantage of the transformation and impending breakup of Stalinism.
The conclusion of Pablo's article on "The Post-Stalin 'New Course'" envisages such a perspective for the immediate future. Pablo writes: "What is now clear is that

the decline of Stalinism in the form of the iron grip of the Soviet bureaucracy over the Soviet masses, the buffer zone countries, the Communist parties, is henceforth speeded up, and that the renovation of socialist democracy in all these countries, as in China, as well as the renaissance of the international workers' movement is now on the order of the day." How is this to be accomplished? "In the years visible ahead, the junction of the ideas and forces of the Fourth International with the revolutionary elements until now organized or influenced by Stalinism will realize in part this first stage of this renovation."
Isn't this a signpost toward a general entry into the Stalinist movement?
The recent writings by Pablo and Clarke go beyond the stated positions of the resolution on "The Rise and Decline of Stalinism." But the point to be emphasized is that the resolution contains, or at least indicates, the political premises for their more extreme conclusions. These premises are not clearly and fully expressed in all respects. But they are there.
Tendencies conciliatory toward Stalinism have begun to emerge in several Trotskyist organizations. These have recently culminated in splits in the United States and Ceylon. A resolution on Stalinism must take cognizance of this dangerous development and guard against any ambiguities from which it can draw sustenance. For example, the question of the political revolution against the Kremlin bureaucracy is now in dispute. How does the resolution treat this problem?
In citing the Transitional Program for the political revolution in the Soviet Union, the resolution stops short \>f the following: "Only the victorious revolutionary uprising of the oppressed masses can revive the Soviet regime and guarantee its further development toward socialism. There is but one party capable of leading the Soviet masses to insurrection — the party of the Fourth International!"
These categorical statements leave no room whatsoever for different interpretations of what is meant. However, they are replaced in the text of the resolution by two vaguer propositions that: "The conditions are being created for the reconstitution and the upsurge of the Bolshevik-Leninist party in the Soviet Union" and later on: "The task of smashing the dictatorship and the privileges of the bureaucracy, the task of a new political revolution in the Soviet Union remains more burning than ever."
This may well have gone unnoticed and uncriticized if an attempt had not already been made by Clarke to substitute new concepts of the political revolution for the established positions. The ambiguities in the resolution lend themselves to such revisions whereas the clear and unmistakable terms of the Transitional Program preclude them.
Complete clarity and precision on all these questions are indispensable to arm the movement for effective revolutionary intervention in the mounting crisis of world Stalinism.
November 1953

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3. Resolution Forming the International Committee
The English, French, New Zealand and Swiss sections of the Fourth International have decided as follows:
1. We affirm our solidarity with the fundamental line of the appeal of the National Committee of the Socialist Workers Party to the Trotskyists throughout the world, and particularly with the definition therein of the programmatic bases of Trotskyism:
"(1) The death agony of the capitalist system threatens the destruction of civilization through worsening depressions, world wars and barbaric manifestations like fascism. The development of atomic weapons today underlines the danger in the gravest possible way.
"(2) The descent into the abyss can be avoided only by replacing capitalism with the planned economy of socialism on a world scale and thus resuming the spiral of progress opened up by capitalism in its early days.
"(3) This can be accomplished only under the leadership of the working class as the one truly revolutionary class in society. But the working class itself faces a crisis in leadership although the world relationship of social forces was never so favorable as today for the workers to take the road to power.
"(4) To organize itself for carrying out this world-historic aim the working class in each country must construct a revolutionary socialist party in the pattern developed by Lenin; that is, a combat party capable of dialectically combining democracy and centralism — democracy in arriving at decisions, centralism in carrying them out; a leadership controlled by the ranks, ranks able to carry forward under fire in disciplined fashion.
"(5) The main obstacle to this is Stalinism, which attracts workers through exploiting the prestige of the October 1917 Revolution in Russia, only later, as it betrays their confidence, to hurl them either into the arms of the Social Democracy, into apathy, or back to illusions in capitalism. The penalty for these betrayals is paid by the working people in the form of consolidation of fascist and monarchist forces, and new outbreaks of wars fostered and prepared by capitalism. From its inception, the Fourth International set as one of its major tasks the revolutionary overthrow of Stalinism inside and outside the USSR.
"(6) The need for flexible tactics facing many sections of the Fourth International, and parties or groups sympa-

thetic to its program, makes it all the more imperative that they know how to fight imperialism and all of its petty-bourgeois agencies (such as nationalist formations or trade-union bureaucracies) without capitulation to Stalinism; and, conversely, know how to fight Stalinism (which in the final analysis is a petty-bourgeois agency of imperialism) without capitulating to imperialism.
"These fundamental principles established by Leon Trotsky retain full validity in the increasingly complex and fluid politics of the world today. In fact the revolutionary situations opening up on every hand as Trotsky foresaw, have only now brought full concreteness to what at one time may have appeared to be somewhat remote abstractions not intimately bound up with the living reality of the time. The truth is that these principles now hold with increasing force both in political analysis and in the determination of the course of practical action."
 2.	We consider as having forfeited its power the International Secretariat of the Pabloist usurpers, which is devoting its activity to the revisionism of Trotskyism, the liquidation of the International and the destruction of its cadres.
 3.	Representing the vast majority of the Trotskyist forces of the International, we decide to constitute an INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE OF THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL.
 4.	We call on the leadership of all the sections of the Fourth International to establish relations with the leadership which represents the Trotskyist program and the majority of the forces of the International. Every responsible cadre, every Trotskyist militant concerned with the unity of the International and the future of his national section, must clearly and swiftly take a position as between the revisionist and liquidationist center of the Pabloist usurpers, and the International Committee of the Fourth International.
Paris
Nov. 23, 1953
For the English Section: Burns For the French Section: Bleibtreu For the New Zealand Section: Smith For the Swiss Section: Jacques

4.  The Successive Stages of Pabloite Revisionism

 1.	With the Third World Congress the Fourth International entered upon a crisis which has steadily worsened and today threatens its very existence. The root of this crisis is to be found in the inculcation within the leadership of the International of an ideology alien to Trotskyism: revisionist and liquidationist Pablism.
 2.	The principal theoretical ideas of Pablism were formulated by Pablo as a personal contribution during the course of the discussion on the buffer zone (1949-50). Dazzled by the transformation of the productive relations in   the buffer zone countries,  attributing in addition the

victory of the revolution in Yugoslavia and China under the leadership of centrist parties of Stalinist origin to the resources of Stalinism itself, Pablo, using the sectarian errors of the Chinese Trotskyists as a pretext, began a fundamental revision of our historical perspectives. In place of the conception of proletarian revolution he substituted that of centuries of transition between capitalism and socialism under bureaucratic rule; he introduced military-bureaucratic action by the Stalinist bureaucracy as an independent historical force, capable of taking the place of action by the exploited masses in accomplishing

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their historical tasks, he declared that Stalinism was objectively struggling for the proletarian revolution in capitalist countries and that in the USSR and buffer zone countries, it could only be reproached for causing suffering for the masses which was historically unnecessary; whereas the historical necessity of the Fourth International lies in the fact that Stalinism has "definitively passed over to the side of bourgeois order" in the capitalist countries (that is to say, the Stalinist bureaucracy fights neither consciously nor "unconsciously" for the proletarian revolution but seeks primarily to maintain the status quo in all spheres), and will lead the workers' states to ruin in the USSR and in the buffer zone if it is not overthrown by the masses.
 3.	It is in "Where Are We Going?" that Pablo develops these theoretical premises to their final conclusions and begins to draw the political and tactical conclusions from them. The revolutionary action of the exploited masses from here on are for him nothing more than a supplementary force to be added to the military and technical forces of the Stalinist bureaucracy whose nature and historical function have changed radically; history for him is no longer one of class struggle but that of the struggle of blocs, between the capitalist regime and the Stalinist world. He denies that the character of the period separating us from war (considered by him as imminent, anyway) is a distinct historical period involving specific tasks for Trotskyists, and under the designation "war-revolution" proclaims the identity of a war conducted by the Kremlin bureaucracy with the proletarian revolution; he substitutes for the Trotskyist perspective of revolutionary overthrow of the bureaucracy that of an "objective" leadership of the world revolution by the bureaucracy, and of a subsequent and gradual withering away of the bureaucracy with the development of the productive forces. Within .such a perspective, the Fourth International loses all historical necessity, and even all meaning.
 4.	Thanks to his tactic of bureaucratic manipulation, accompanied by a clever camouflage, Pablo succeeded in introducing his basic ideas in a thinly veiled form into the theses of the Ninth Plenum of the International Executive Committee (subsequently adopted by the Third World Congress) and thus achieved this eclectic and contradictory mess. Strengthened by the majority he thus secured, he was able at the Tenth Plenum of the I.E.C. to develop the tactical conclusions of his liquidationist orientation. He predicted that the policy of the Kremlin bureaucracy and that of the Stalinist parties would increasingly develop leftward, while the masses would flock about them; from this he deduced an entrist tactic into the Stalinist parties with political capitulation by the Trotskyists, entrism "sui generis": these ideas and this liquidationist tactic were subsequently extended to the reformist parties and to all mass organizations under petty-bourgeois leadership (the Bolivian M.N.R., the Peronist movement in Argentina, the Ibanistin Chile, etc. . . .).
 5.	However, events brought refutation after refutation to the Pablist predictions. Following the 19th Congress of the C.P. of the USSR, the Stalinist parties throughout the world oriented their policies not toward the left as Pablo had predicted but toward the right. With the policy

of the United National Front, the present position of the Stalinist parties such as the French C.P. and the Italian C.P. is far more rightist than at any time in the past. The revolutionary upsurge of the masses, of which the general strike of August 1953 in France has been the most startling manifestation up to now, has under these conditions swept the crisis of Stalinism to a higher level, setting the communist militants in direct conflict with their leaders, while for the first time in history, the radicaliza-tion of the masses in France is not passing into the channels of Stalinist organizations, which are continuing to lose their members. The decisive role of the independent revolutionary party as a pole for attracting and organizing communist militants who are in conflict with the Stalinist leadership thus shows up in a striking fashion.
In an equally striking fashion does it appear that the revolutionary upsurge in the capitalist countries, far from provoking the outbreak of a "suicide-war" by imperialism, serves to delay the effective unleashing of the war.
Finally, the Kremlin bureaucracy, caught in a vise between imperialism marching toward counter-revolutionary war and the pressure of the proletarian masses, which have been stimulated by the progress of soviet economy and the worldwide revolutionary upsurge, and seeing the class equilibrium on a world scale broken, the equilibrium from which it was born and upon which its power in the USSR was founded, has entered a stage of convulsive agony which is tearing it into opposing tendencies; for, contrary to the declarations of Pablo, it is incapable as a whole of basing itself on the masses as against imperialism and the potentially restorationist tendencies in the USSR (Beria's orientation); and it is no less incapable as a whole of basing itself on the potentially restorationist tendencies as against the masses (Malenkov-Khrushchev orientation). Finally, it is more ready than ever to sacrifice the interests of the masses in countries like France and Italy, for example, as a price for even limited concessions of the bourgeoisie in foreign policy.
6. In the face of such a complete failure of his perspectives, Pablo has begun a large-scale operation of camouflage and political swindling, abandoning some of his fundamental positions and deliberately back-tracking, in order the better to hold on to the basic element: liquidation of the political independence of Trotskyism vis a vis the Kremlin bureaucracy and bureaucratic apparatuses in general.
"Objective conditions" yesterday imposed deformed workers' states for centuries. Today Pablo declares that nothing must interfere in the near future with establishing the. widest proletarian democracy. War was imminent at the Third World Congress and the revolutionary upsurge could only precipitate imperialism into a "suicide-war." Today Pablo has the audacity to write that war has become "possible at any time now" (so it wasn't yesterday?), either immediately or in "several years"; that the revolutionary upsurge is delaying the war and may even prevent it! And he coldly concludes from this that "our tactic" (outlined at the Third World Congress and at the Tenth Plenum of the I.E. C.) "remains (!!!) valid."
Whereas he refused, as the French majority especially demanded, to inscribe among the slogans of the Third World Congress the traditional Trotskyist slogan for the overthrow of Stalin, today he correctly declares that the

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struggle for the approaching overturn of the bureaucracy is one of the basic tasks of the International and speaks with tears in his voice of "our Soviet brothers," a subject which was taboo two years previously. Yesterday the victory of Mao Tse-Tung "was not exactly a victory of Stalinism"; today Pablo correctly indicates what the majority of the I.C.P. has stressed for three years, that it is only the break of the Chinese Communist Party with the Kremlin which permitted the victory of the Chinese revolution.
7. At the same time, Pablo is reaffirming and developing his liquidationist orientation: insistence upon an objective revolutionary process which is automatic and irresistible, and which subordinates the reformist and Stalinist bureaucratic apparatuses to itself, changes their nature and function before our eyes and is ever increasingly transforming them into instruments of the revolutionary will of the masses. The analysis of Pablo winds up by considering the problem of revolutionary leadership as "objectively resolved," and ignores the unequal development of the revolution in the backward countries and in the advanced countries, whereas it is precisely the delay of the proletarian revolution in the advanced countries which underscores the importance, historically more decisive today than ever before, of the conscious factor for the victory of the world revolution.
He ignores the pressure exerted by imperialism on the Kremlin bureaucracy, and above all, ignores the fact that the pressure exerted by the Soviet masses, far from transforming the role of the bureaucracy and compelling it to enter upon an irreversible course of ever increasing concessions to the masses, is, on the contrary, strength-

ening its counter-revolutionary vigilance in self-defense. He foresees, contrary to the factual evidence and counter to principles, a co-direction of the world revolutionary movement by the Kremlin and the masses during the entire transitional epoch. He does not understand that the policy of the Kremlin will continue to oscillate right up to the end, up to its disappearance, and pastes the same label on the Beria course, during which the leading oligarchy had attempted to find a support in the masses against the restorationist forces and imperialism, and upon the Khrushchev-Malenkov course, during which the leading oligarchy is searching for a support in the restorationist forces against the masses.
For Pablo the historical mission of the Fourth International has lost all meaning. The "objective revolutionary process," under the aegis of the Kremlin, allied with the masses, is taking its place very well indeed. That is why he is mercilessly bent upon liquidating the Trotskyist forces, under the pretext of integrating them into the "movement of the masses as it exists."
The salvation of the Fourth International imperatively demands the immediate eviction of the liquidationist leadership. A democratic discussion must then be opened within the world-wide Trotskyist movement on all problems left suspended, befogged or falsified by the Pabloist leadership during three years. Within this framework, it will be indispensable for the health of the International that the greatest self-criticism be carried through on all phases and causes of the development of the Pabloist gangrene.
October 1953

5.   Fourth International Rallies Against Pablo (Militant editorial, December 21, 1953.)

The Fourth International, the World Party of the Socialist Revolution founded by Leon Trotsky, has recently been affected by an internal crisis. The power and mass influence of Stalinism in the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, Asia and Western Europe overwhelmed a small faction in the leading committee led by Pablo and caused it to veer in the direction of becoming a "leff wing of Stalinism.
Such a political symptom is extremely dangerous. If it engulfed the International it would mean its certain death as a revolutionary force. But the Fourth International can not easily be derailed. The genuine Trotsky-ists are now meeting Pabloite revisionism in a struggle that has every promise of success.
We are pleased to report that the Fourth International is moving ahead with sure and firm steps to assert the will of the overwhelming majority of the world Trotskyist movement against the usurpation of the Pablo faction.
The French, British, Swiss and New Zealand sections have formed an International Committee of the Fourth International. They have issued a declaration to all sections reaffirming the basic Trotskyist program and calling on the cadres of the world movement to struggle for the life of the Fourth International against ruin at the hands of the Pabloites.
The International Committee charges the Pabloites with the crime of covering up the current betrayals of Stalinism

and  attempting to foist a dictatorial rule on the International   in   the interest of   the   new   revisionist   doctrine of Pablo.
The International Committee condemns the Pabloites for having dared to speak to the East German workers in the name of Trotsky's Fourth International as nothing but luke-warm "critics" of the Stalinist counter-revolutionaries, and for having refused to demand the withdrawal of the Kremlin's troops from East Germany although Moscow used these troops to suppress the East German workers.
The International Committee condemns the Pabloites for covering up the betrayal of the Stalinists in the French general strike of last August, and the betrayal of the Stalinists in Iran in the same month.
The organization of the International Committee signifies that the Fourth International has once again proved its historic viability. It shows that no force on earth external or internal, can destroy it
Reactionary enemies and cynics may try to gain comfort from this struggle within the Fourth International. These people cannot understand that the International is a living revolutionary organism that can mature and measure up to its historic responsibility precisely through such internal struggles. They are part of the hard school

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of  preparation   for   the   greatest step forward humanity has yet taken — the world socialist revolution.
We hail the formation of the International Committee of the Fourth International. Because we are compelled to remain outside the International organization due to the   reactionary   Voorhis   Law   of   1940,   we are all the

more interested and concerned with the development of the Fourth International. The International Committee insures the line of revolutionary continuity that extends from Lenin, through Trotsky and into the future victory of socialist mankind.

6.   Letter from  Farrell Dobbs  to  Cothinkers in England and France

New York, N.Y. December 3, 1953 Dear Comrades,
We note that the November 22 conference of representatives of the British, French, New Zealand, and Swiss sections proposed an Emergency International Conference within two or three months. So far as we can determine, the motivation for this conference appears to be that it is necessary in order to give authority to the International Committee of the Fourth International (Trotskyist) and in order to save some of the weaker sections in Europe from demoralization at the hands of the Pabloites.
In our opinion, the International Committee already has all the authority it needs, representing as it does an initiating group of four important sections, and it will gain further authority as additional sections rally to its support. An Emergency Conference instead of giving authority to the International Committee could have the opposite result. Such a conference would confront people with the necessity of making organizational decisions when the central need is for discussion of political ideas. It could open the way for Pabloite organizational maneuvers when the task is to hit the Pabloites with political polemics.
It would be incorrect in our view to determine the question of an international gathering on the basis of Europe alone or on the basis of areas where the struggle is now most acute or has already been concluded. It is important to think in the broadest world terms in connection with any contemplated international gathering.
A hasty conference would not be likely to influence weak sections, except perhaps the wrong way. Waverers who could in time be won by us through political polemic would be considered Pablo supporters. Similarly, any section that for whatever reason could not be represented at the conference or would not be in a position to express itself in connection with the conference would be counted in the Pablo camp. Given time, however, we can present such a solid front against Pablo that it will destroy any pretense on his part of representing anything at all.
We note also that reference is made to the "provisional" character of the International Committee. We think this concept should be dropped.   There is nothing at all pro-

visional about the participation of the sections that have already initiated the International Committee. Nor will there be anything provisional about the action of the sections who will later come to support the Committee.
The term "provisional" implies that we concede Pablo a majority in the International. It conflicts with the need to make clear that the International is composed, not of Pablo's rigged majority on the IS and IEC, but of the functioning parties and groups throughout the world who base themselves on the Trotskyist program. From its start the International Committee constitutes the coordinating body whose task is to mobilize these genuine Trotskyists for a finish fight with Pablo.
The immediate functions of the International Committee, as we see it, should be to: develop contacts everywhere in the world; publish an internal bulletin in the name of the Committee for a democratic discussion among genuine Trotskyists; conduct public polemics against the Pabloites in the press of the sections; and provide supplementary information to the genuine Trotskyists everywhere on developments in the different sections.
We believe this fight will be decided, not by an Emergency Conference, but by a showdown that will take place section by section. In this showdown the International Committee should appeal in its name for allegiance to genuine Trotskyism as against the revisionist-liquidationist IS of Pablo. Thus the central task of the International Committee in the next period would be to enlarge, country by country, the circle of its adherents. As further forces come to its support the Committee can be expanded in order to increase its influence and authority.
Once all the sections have declared themselves, the time will have come to take up concretely the convening on a democratic basis, not of an Emergency Conference, but of the Fourth Congress of the Fourth International.
The views set forth in this letter represent the collective opinion of the leading comrades here. If you find yourself in disagreement with these views, we hope you will write us as soon as possible so we can reach a common understanding and coordinate our actions accordingly.
Fraternally, Sm|th

SECTION XI: BY JAMES P.

"THE TWENTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY PLENUM OF THE SWP"
CANNON

[This  report on the evolution of the faction fight was given to the Los Angeles branch of the SWP on December

5,   1953.   It is reprinted  from   SWP Discussion Bulletin, Volume XVI, A-13, 1954.]

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Our 25th Anniversary Plenum, November 7-8, reviewed the developments of the internal situation since the May Plenum and based its decisions upon them.
The May Plenum had followed five months of discussion on a national plane. It was quite an extensive discussion, as you know; more Internal Bulletins were published than even in the great fight with the Petty Bourgeois Opposition in 1939-40. This discussion had already shown quite clearly, we thought, the revisionist positions of the Cochranite minority on the most basic questions of the American movement—on the perspectives of this country, of the labor movement, and of the party.
The minority had shown a revisionist position on the crucial question of the role of the party; a tendency to transform our organization, which from the very beginning had striven to become a revolutionary action party of the masses, into a propaganda group of critics, renouncing all aspiration to be the future party of the working class.
The discussion had already shown at that time, that although the careful formulations of the minority could not then be justly called pro-Stalinist or Stalinist conciliationist, the leaders of this faction had nevertheless recklessly encouraged a sentiment of Stalinist conciliationism in the ranks, and did nothing to restrain it or oppose it They permitted people of their caucus to state openly in branch debates, their conviction that the Stalinists "could no longer betray." In one of my letters published in the Internal Bulletin, I stated that this sentiment of Stalinist conciliationism had been most glaringly illustrated in Seattle. That was before the May Plenum, and before the Seattle development of later months, when four members of the branch passed over from the minority faction to the camp of Stalinism.
Finally, before the May Plenum, the minority had shown a revisionist position on the organizational principles upon which we have built our party. The minority faction attempted to set up a "dual power" in the leadership, exercising veto power over the majority, and denying the right of the majority to do anything without their consent and approval.
That's what the discussion had shown politically at the time of the May Plenum. At that time we also had a clear indication of the relation of forces in the party. It was demonstrated, both at the Plenum and in the reports from the branches, that the minority was a quite small minority — it could make no pretension that it was a leadership enjoying the support of me majority of the party. That's the way things stood — both as to the development of political positions and as to the relation of forces in the party at the time of the May Plenum.
Now, the relation of forces is a very important question, although there is a certain school of literary politicians who maintain that it doesn't count. For us it counts a great deal, because the relation of forces, determined after a thorough discussion, is nothing less than the expression of the opinions of the rank and file in the party. That's democracy in action. And when the relation of forces shows a very strong majority in favor of one group, and a very small minority in favor of another, the "relation of forces" is just another way of saying that the rank and file is talking, and expressing its will in the discussion.

Why We Saw No Need of Split
We were of the opinion at that time that the positions of the minority were not fully developed. They had started on a certain course but it remained to be seen whether they would draw back, or develop their positions to their logical conclusions. We wanted to give them time to do the one or the other; and we wanted to give the party an opportunity to see more clearly what the line of development would be. For that reason we saw no need of split at the time of the May Plenum. Despite all the talk of the minority about the majority desiring a split, our position at the May Plenum showed the contrary. We had not advocated a split and had no intention of taking the initiative to bring it about.
We wanted to test things out in the course of further discussion and experience in the party activity. While the minority was half disposed for a split, or half expected that they were going to be thrown out of the party, we took no such position. On the contrary, on the basis of our political position and our organizational strength, as demonstrated at the Plenum and the reports from the branches, we made our truce proposal.
That proposal, which we offered to them and which they finally accepted, was nothing new, as I've explained here before. It was exactly the same proposal we made to the Musteite minority in the 1936 Convention after we had settled the fight in the party ranks over the question of entry into the SP. (This proposal —accepted by the Muste-ites at the time—secured the unity of our organization during the entire period of our work in the Socialist Party.)
Our truce resolution at the May Plenum was almost identical with the proposal we offered to the Burnham-Shachtman minority at the 1940 Convention —that is, that they remain in the party and retain all normal rights; they could have a limited discussion after the Convention in the magazine; they could have representation on the leading bodies, according to their strength —on the condition that they accept the decisions of the Convention and remain loyal.
The resolution adopted at the Plenum in May was even broader than that, because it placed no restrictions on further discussion. The Internal Bulletin would be open, and they could write anything they pleased. We have a peculiar bureaucracy in the party — I don't know whether anyone ever encountered such a bureaucracy in any other movement— which does not suppress discussion, but on the contrary extends it and insists upon it, so that everything will become clear in the minds of the party members before the final decision is taken.
Was It Correct?
Was the Plenum Resolution, which embodied these proposals, correct? It can be answered in two ways. I would say, the Plenum Resolution was absolutely correct and would have secured peace in the party, as I predicted in my concluding speech, under certain conditions which could not be judged in advance. I might say, in parentheses, that the prediction I made at the, Plenum was also intended as a suggestion to the minority. I predicted that they would work loyally; that they would conduct a friendly struggle of rivalry to show that they were better party

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builders than we were; and that wewouldhave a free, calm and objective discussion. It was not merely a prophecy; it was also a suggestion to the minority as to what the best course would be.
The resolution would have worked out on the following conditions, as we see it now in retrospect:
First, that the issues in dispute between the majority and the minority were only national issues, and that the factions were only national factions. We had discussed, up till then, only on a national plane. We, for our part, had not raised any international questions. We tried, for five months, to confine the discussion to the problems of the American SWP, which are fairly important in themselves and well worth a discussion.
The second condition for the resolution to work out successfully was that the minority was, asweurged them to be, and predicted that they would be, a loyal minority. That is, that they would be content with their democratic rights of discussion and their representation in the leading bodies, and that they would do their share of the party work and conduct themselves in general as a loyal minority. I believe it was correct for us to assume that that would be the case and to give the minority the benefit of the doubt.
We never considered ourselves merely as the leaders of a faction. As leaders of the party, it was certainly correct to give the minority the benefit of every doubt and every opportunity to conduct themselves in a loyal manner, to develop their positions fully and freely in a democratic discussion, and to let the members finally decide. I don't know where or when or how a minority of any party could be offered a better proposition than that which the resolution of the Plenum gave them — the right to continue the discussion in the Internal Bulletin and in the branches; the right to representation approximately according to their strength; no harsh characterizations of their position, which we had written into our original draft resolutions and later deliberately took out, in order not to exacerbate the situation.
Everything that a minority could legitimately ask was provided for in the Plenum Resolution. If we should be a minority in some other party or organization at any time, or in our own party; if we should sit down to compile a list of demands of what a loyal minority wants — we couldn't include more than we gave freely to the minority at the May Plenum.
Why The Truce Didn't Workd Out
But still the truce didn't work out. Both assumptions, upon which the resolution of the Plenum wasbased, proved in further development to be false. The minority, as we know now, and as it was clearly revealed in the period from May to November, was not simply a national faction. It was the emanation of an international revisionist tendency, which we know now, as we didn't know then, has been organized in a secret international faction for a long time. The minority had been a part of that secret international revisionist faction from the very beginning.
We began to suspect this toward the end of the discussion before the May Plenum. But we didn't know it; and we did not act, as one should not act, merely on suspicion. We noted  the extraordinary  assurance of the minority, their

repeated insistence that they were Pabloites, and that they represented the real thought of Pablo. In the beginning we thought this was absurd. We saw absolutely no justification in the documents of the Third Congress for the revisionist policy they developed in this country. But the more their claims were repeated, the more we heard about it, the more we began to have premonitions that there might be something to it.
A couple of weeks before the Plenum we received a statement from Comrade Stone in New York, who had belonged to the minority caucus, and had changed his position and joined the majority. He gave us a statement that one of the main themes of discussion in the minority caucus, upon which the caucus had been recruited and held together, was the assertion that Clarke was the real agent and representative of Pablo. He wrote this statement for us and signed it. I sent a letter to Pablo under the date of May 22, a week before the Plenum, in which I quoted this statement of Comrade Stone, a statement that the minority in our party, fighting to overthrow the leadership, was claiming to represent him.
At the Plenum I took the floor after Clarke had spoken and asked him a number of questions: whether he had received any instructions in Paris to begin a factional struggle against the majority of our party; whether he had been told that if he organized a faction against the leadership he would receive the support of the International Secretariat. I asked him a half a dozen questions on this theme from various angles. And what do you think Clarke answered? He stood on his Constitutional Rights and said, "I decline to answer."
I didn't press him. I said, "That's your privilege." But we took his evasiveness into account; that, confronted with this frank interrogation as to whether he was acting independently or whether he was an agent of an international faction, he declined to answer.
At this same Plenum, Clarke in the course of his speech, admitted that a series of amendments which our National Committee had sent to him prior to the Third World Congress, never reached their intended destination. He said he did not bring them to the attention of the Congress, but on the contrary, had burned them. That was admitted by Clarke at the Plenum.
Right after the Plenum, on June 4, I wrote a letter to Comrade Tom in England, which has been widely commented on. In the course of this letter I told him our conviction, putting all things together, that the SWP had been the guinea pig for some experiments in duplicity and intrigue; that the minority faction in our party was receiving clandestine support, and that we didn't like that. In that letter I referred to the "answer" of Pablo to my letter of May 22, which we received a day after the Plenum. The answer evaded the question raised by the statement of Comrade Stone. That put the finishing touch on the mysterious business; it transformed our suspicions about the role of Pablo in our American faction fight into a conviction.
My letter was a wide open invitation to Pablo to openly repudiate the claims of the minority or anybody else to represent him in a factional way. Instead of that he hummed and hawed and evaded the question. That convinced us that he was in reality acting in collusion with this  faction  all the time.   This was further confirmed by

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his admission in his letter, that he had been corresponding with the minority faction behind the backs of the official leadership for a long time before.
The Experience in England
Then, after the Plenum, the majority of the National Committee began to feel that it was accumulating overwhelming proof that our revisionist minority in the SWP, which we haij tried to debate on national grounds, and prevent it spreading into the International, was in reality the America^ extension of an international revisionist faction. The Pabloite operations in England gave a striking demonstration • of that The British movement has scored magnificent successes in recent years, after a long, hard faction struggle to separate the Trotskyists from the charlatans and adventurers of the Haston gang. When Burns, uie foremost builder and leader, took an outspoken position in sympathy with the majority in our party, Pablo responded by organizing a faction against him in England.
That's not all. He promised Burns, if he would withdraw his support for the majority in our party, that he would let him alone. At the same time he threatened Burns, that if he supported the majority in the SWP, they would make trouble for him in his own party. This"crooked and Cynical procedure, right out of the Comintern book, finally culminated in an ultimatum which Pablo sent to Burns in England, demanding that he act in the British Party, before his own National Committee, as a disciplined member of the IS in Paris; that his criticism of the draft resolution prepared for the Fourth Congress should not, be made known to the members of his own National Committee, to say nothing of the members of his party; that he remain under discipline of the IS and present only the IS position.
Well mat, of course, caused us to explode, because that's precisely the device the Stalinists used to corrupt the Communist International. To impose committee discipline on members before their own rank and file; to take a majority vote in a committee and then bind all the members to it— not, as is quite correct, against the outside world, but in discussion with one's own members —that absolutely deprives the rank and file of the party of any real information and discussion. The leaders are more informed on the questions in dispute; they discuss them in committee; and if a minority in the committee is bound by committee discipline during a discussion, that means the absolute stifling of any real democracy. We told Burns our opinion about that; that we, for our parti, would throw any such instructions into the wastebasket.
All these things, taken together one after another, convinced every single member of our national leadership in New York, and the Plenum members throughout the country, that the minority in our party had been secretly inspired by Pablo from the beginning. We had been fighting in the dark up to the time of the May Plenum. It was only between May and November that we got the real store.
"Junk the Old Trotskyism"
The picture became clearer to us as a result of the dis-r?y^COurseof the minority after the May Henum, a course which could hot be otherwise explained. We couldn't understand why the minority so soon, within two weeks after

the Plenum, had immediately resumed the most violent factional attitude. In Clarke's speech on the Plenum at the New York membership meeting—I thinly you heard it on the tape recording — he brought forward the slogan: "Junk the Old Trotskyism." That was a much bolder assertion than we had eyer heard before. All the "old Trotskyists" began lifting up their ears when they heard mat, because they don't want to "junk" any part of Trotskyism.
Then we heard about the Plenum reports at the Detroit and Cleveland meetings. There the minority, instead of reporting in the spirit of the Plenum Resolution, as Myra did here in Los Angeles, made completely factional re--ports, as if nothing had happened and no resolution had been signed. The same thing took place in San Francisco. The San Francisco minority got the word from New York and erupted in a factional manner very shortiy after the Plenum. Then factionalism began rolling like a snowball.
The Plenum Resolution, signed by both sides, provided explicitly that majority rule, whichever side had the majority locally,, should prevail in (he branches in relation to local administration, and that on the other hand the minority must be guaranteed its democratic rights. In New York we had the majority, and our comrades proposed to have a calm convention, where that majority would be, formally registered and a new executive committee elected accordingly. The minority objected violently to this simple, normal and necessary execution of the Plenum Resolution.
It was a sin and a shame, they said, for the majority to "dump Bartell"—as if Bar tell was organizer of the New, York Local by divine riglit That isn't our opinion. Our opinion is that the organizer of a Local holds office by virtue of the wishes of the majority of his local organization. If they want to change organizers or change execu-i tive committees that's no offense at all; that's merely the exercise of their democratic rights, which was specifically reiterated in the Plenum Resolution —that the right of majority rule in branches and locals should be respected.
The Sin Against the Holy Cow
Then, at the City Convention in New York, they sprang their big "sensation.* The method of "stampeding* a meeting of party comrades by "sensations" —the method of "exposing" something they have never heard about and have no means of verifying at the moment; the tendentious quotation from letters and document they have never read and have no chance to study in their entirety—that is the method of demagogues; and Lenin said, "a demagogue is the worst enemy of the working class."
It seems that Pablo, in addition to, or rather as a part of his general Stalinist methods of organization —when I say Stalinist, I don't mean that as a factional exaggeration; I mean pure and simple Stalinist organization methods, without any trimmings or reservations; mat's what fhey are —it seems that in addition to that, as a part of all that, he has a sort of stool pigeon and spy service to intercept private letters and purloin documents circulated privately among the leaders of the majority faction. One of Pablo's spies and letter thieves, in pursuit of his grimy assignment, picked up my caucus speech on "Internationalism and the SWP and my letter to Tom in England.

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Th'fs notorious "Tphi'.'by the way, whom the Pabloites have tried to cast out as a pariah, happens tb be one of my best friends, a comrade whom I esteem highly, in whom I have complete confidence. He is one of me oldest Trot-skyists, one who haS done more than any of us'to help the intertaational movement during arid aftetfthe' war. Bar tell, the great sensation-monger, "exposed* my letter to Tom at the New York Local Convention' last August, as though a great crime had been commuted:5 He offered the letter as definitive proof lhat mis CiinrioH, who is not satisfied with his long record of crimiri^f'&ctivity, has committed riow the urimeritionable cfiiiie—the Sm against the Holy Ghost. And what do you mink-thatWas^ I'criticized Pablo. I took the name of the Holy Cow iif vainr. I said, openly, in a letter and in a speech, mat f didn't Consider PaWb my: Pbpej lhar'a'sentence from'him does'not settle any question forme. Thatwas;me crime.    •   »'     ■■»'■
The significant thing about the big exposure mat Bar-
tell waved before the New York City Cbriventibri was not
the merit of my' particular criticism —thai couldire de
bated—but that Triad criticized. And everybody began
to wonder: What kind of eerie world* have we wandered
into? It's as'though -wle have a cult attd< a Messiah here,
arid me1 question is riot whether me ariticUiri is just or
unjust but the fact of me cHticismi&elf." ; ; '
'' They expected to stampede the Whole party Organization
around me' slogan of defending Pablo's: uritouchability. Of
cbtirseV they got a big'surprise titere: Instead of stampeding
the party, they siihply aroused Me'%ri^er%li&rei party mem
ber's' in New York, whodon'twarittbbe pMiriitiit# category
0? cult followers of anybody. Moreover,' when ih'ey got a
chance to read the whole text they di&n*tus'ee anything
wrbrig in the &rticisriis I riad made riof Irf'tfie^fact that I
had made them.   -•■••■■'■-■■•••■	•"<'''" v.-.n:-
"Our■ FabOoh Comes Fitst"	; >; -	*   21.
Coincident with this development of a Pablo cultist at
titude in the party, you heard repeated reports that the
minority began an almost total abstention from party
activity, and that they were defaulting in' a'bb'd^ on their
financial pledges. I suppose I don't have to explain that
tb "me delegation here from Sari Francisco who had ex-
perience: with it. Tlie minority sabotage"was no problem
here "'Ui, this Local Taecause Cpchranites dbn't seem tp/'grbw
ini me "Lbs Angeles sunshine. We had, to hear about it
here, , and we heard ple'rity from New York arid bther
places^	"_  "'	.'   ."  ,""..'
The" Cbchranites did something iihat I personally had never seen in the riioverrient before —never; mat is, a minority faction going on a sit-down strike agauist the parry. In my time I've seen' alT kinds of factions and faction fights, but I rieyer saw a minority undertake to sabotage party work; and not only that; party finances too.' Their participation in the activities of the New York Local dwindled down to "token" participation. Right after the Plenum they had made pledges to our Party-Building Furid, similar to the pledges they had made in the past. This snowed that at1 flje'inomerit they had accepjfed the truce and were gbfrig'along as, a loyal minority. They never paid their pledges, When-they were called" to account for that, they answered brazenly: "Our factiori comes first."
In the New  York  Bureau of the Executive Committee,

the great Bartell was taxed with the conduct of the minority: "Your people are not paying their pledges and mat looks tike' factional sab otageJ ^ Can't you do something about it?" He answered: "We dpn't tell them not to pay their pledges to the party. All we tell them js that their pledges to the faction come first." That's the kind of cynical answers that were given.
In the branch meetings when it came to finances and the roll was called, each meriiber would come forward with his payment on his pledge — according to me established custom. The minority members would come up with "token" payments. If they were due to give ten dollars they would give fifty cents or something like that, to add insult to injury. And if they were asked, "What goes this mean?" they would say, "We have to support pur faction."
I said, I never saw that before in pe history, of our movement The reason is, that every niiriprity lever knew was always struggling to get a hearing, to win oyer the others and to becpme a majority — to,win over the party. Every minority that has any sense knows that if you sabotage party wprk and parry funds you only antagonize the loyal party members and destroy all chance to get a hearing from them. The Pablpite minority didn't seem to care about that. They acted for months as people whp were already outside our ranks.
AnColdSpUr
The comrades kept writing to me from New York, as they wrote to the other ^C members in the field, and they called it a "cold split." Even Breitman, who is the most restrained and moderate of all our people, referred to it in a personal letter as "a de facto semi-split" And I, out here in the halcyon land of the Sundown Sea, with the smug objectivity of one who is not involved in the immediate faction fight kept counselling the leaders in New York to be patient: "Don't crowd them too hard; give them a chance to straighten out" and so on.
But they, didn't straighten put at all.,;They,.,went from bad ;to worse in that respect until the party members throughput the! country'began...to asjf the national leadership; "How long is this to go on? Hpw long must we nptrpnly do all the party work and contribute all the funds, but then have to come to the branch meeting and have it thrown in outfaces that they are supporting their faction before they supportthe party?" ..We puzzled over the reasons for such unprecedented conr duct What had caused this sharp turn of the minority, from the stand they took on the last day of the Plenum when they signed the truce resolution? It was. not any provocation from tiie majority, because we had no interest whatever in stimulating a factional atmosphere. Then we heard of the same kind of disloyal-conduct by the Pablo faction in England. Finally, everybody had to conclude that there was only one explanation. It was absolutely clear that this was part of the international policy — the international policy of disrupting and breaking up the old Trotskyist cadres, the old Trotskyist parties, and getting them out of the road.
That's what has been shown not only in this party but in other parts of the world too,, especially since the May Plenum. Arjd the reason is, that the old Trotskyist cadres are strictly orthodox, not only here, but all over the world.   They are firmly educated in the program just

160

''"W

as we are, find they are just as stiff-necked about it as we are. Everywhere the revisionists,' who have been'aiming to overthrow the Trotskyist prdgram, ran up against the resistance of the old cadres of Trotskyism, and they set out to break them up.
Pabloite "Successes"
My God, they write about the wonderful "successes" they've been having on the international field. These successes consist, sinee\ the Third World Congress, of the following: There has been a split in France in which the majority was thrown out of the International. In Ceylon there has been a split of\ outright Stalinists who took a large section of the party w^th them. (Imagine this, in the year 1953, in the movement founded by Trotsky! A faction developed in the Ceylon pirty, beginning with Stalinist conciliation-ism, as in Seattle,\then becoming pro-Stalinist, then making a split and combining the next day with the Stalinists to fight our party!)
Now you have a consummated split in England along the same lines, and a split in the United States.
Anybody with half an eye can see that you've got a pattern here —you've got the pattern of a deliberate program to break up the old cadres, a deliberate program to convert the Trotskyist movement into a left cover for Stalinism. That's the way it looked to us at the 25th Anniversary Plenum.
The design was concealed for a long time by double talk and ambiguous sections of resolutions which could be interpreted two ways. That deceived us for a long while. We noted some ambiguous formulations in the draft resolutions for the Third Congress. We tried to correct them by amendments, which as I've told you, never even reached the Congress, But we did not begin with suspicions. We said; "Well, if the necessary qualifications are not here is this paragraph they are some place else; we don't want to begin with suspicions; we have confidence in the people with whom we have worked so long. We formed our alliance with them in the first place because they stood on orthodox positions as we did, and we give the benefit of every doubt."
The Test of Events
But since the Plenum the proof of the revisionist line Was revealed by events and their reaction to them. These events, which crowded one on top of another, obliged people to take positions and show what they meant by the resolutions. The first jolt came from an article by Clarke on the developments .in the Soviet Union since the death of Stalin. This was published in Fourth Inter-national' magazine soon after the May Plenum. The article envisaged a possible self-reform of the Stalinist bureaucracy and the gradual reestablishment of Soviet democracy without a revolutionary uprising of the masses led by a revolutionary party. This is directly contrary to the program of the Fourth International.
This article, which raised great alarm here and throughout the world, because it appeared in such an authoritative magazine, was sneaked into print without the knowledge of the other two editors who were supposed to edit everything published in the magazine and control the policy. The; Teal Pabloites combine treacherous policy with a certain treacherous method of working. The other

two editors, and all the rest of the party leaders, found out about the article only after it appeared in print in the magazine. You should recall that when you hear accusations that we started the controversy in public. Fourth international magazine, which is sold on the newsstands, is as "public" as the Post Office.
Next came the attempt to cover up the counter-revolutionary course of the Stalinists in East Germany. Then the whitewash of the Stalinist betrayal in the French General Strike. All this is documented in our "Letter to All Trot-skyists" issued by our 25th Anniversary Plenum. {Militant, Nov. 16, 1953.)
It was on the basis of these three concrete events and the line taken by them, that our National Committee made up its mind definitively about the real policy of the Pablo faction. We didn't try to read something into a resolution which might not possibly be there. We didn't interpret doubtful paragraphs out of proportion. We judged the Pabloites by the way they conducted themselves in action; on the events in Russia, in East Germany and in France. And on that basis we say the Pabloites revealed an anti-Trotskyist position in the most important questions of external politics.
Cadre-Wrecking Expedition
Parallel with that, we saw them speeding up their in* ternal program of disrupting the Trotskyist cadre formations in the different countries one by one. That may seem like an utterly fantastic accusation to make; that people in the central leadership of the International would set out deliberately to break up the historically created cadres who are the living carriers of the ■ doctrine, our sole link to the past and the sole forces capable of leading us into the future. But that's exactly the way it looks to us:
It is now clear that the cadre-wrecking expedition of the Pablo faction began, not in our party, but more than two. years ago in the French party. It appeared to us then, that the fight in France was merely a fight over tactics, as to what extent and how deeply the Trotsky-ists should penetrate into the workers movement controlled by the Stalinists, including the Stalinist party. Now, as you know, we have no sectarianism in our bones at all: We may be convicted of other faults but never of that. We are mass workers by instinct, experience and training, as well as by theory. We're in favor of getting into the mass movement no matter who leads it; or what country it is.
It appeared to us, taking it merely as a tactical question, that the majority of the French party was a little hesitant in this respect, and we stated so in the letter I wrote to Comrade Renard. It is clear to us now, as it was clear to the French already then, that what was involved was far more than tactics. The majority of the French parry was stubbornly resisting the liquidationist course, and for that reason there was a deliberate, sustained, factional campaign to break up that cadre We became convinced of that later; especially after the French general strike, in which the expelled majority showed themselves to be revolutionists in action, and the Pabloite faction acted as apologists for the Stalinists. That's why we changed our position on the French question, and did it openly,   unambiguously   and straightforwardly.   Tactical

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questions are important only after questions of principle are settled. We will not even discuss tactics with anybody until we first come to agreement on principles.
In England, a real Trotskyist cadre was finally consolidated in a long internal struggle. After long stagnation of the movement there, a cadre organized by Burns finally broke out of the Haston jungle of unprincipled clique politics. They got into the Labor Party in England and began doing mass work on a scale never done by any Trotskyist party in the world, possibly outside of Ceylon. Great progress has been made there — England has been the pride of the Fourth International now, for years.
We in America have never even approximated what the Trotskyists have been able to do in England in recent years; we never had so favorable an opportunity. They got into the real mass movement just when the left swing was taking place, and found opportunities opening up on every side. They soon became an effective part of a big left-wing movement of semi-revolutionists and centrist elements turning to the left.
Right in the midst of this tremendous work Pablo hurled a destructive faction against the leadership, for the crime of sympathizing with the American majority. All of a sudden, without previous notice or warning, Burns was confronted with a hostile faction. This faction, pronouncing themselves 100% Pabloites, demanded that Burns obey the "Discipline of the IS" in internal party discussion, and keep his mouth shut when the draft resolutions for the Fourth Congress were up for consideration.
The majority of the National Committee in England told them: "We don't like this business at all. We don't like the fact that you, coming up here all of a sudden with a secret faction, have an accidental majority in the Editorial Board. We are going to reorganize that Board."
That's something, I think, they may have learned from the history of the SWP. The minute the Plenum of our National Committee finds that the Political Committee, or the Editorial Board or any other subcommittee is not reflecting its will—it simply reorganizes it. That's the invariable rule recorded in the history of our party. That's what we did at the October Plenum in 1939, at the beginning of the fight with the Petty Bourgeois Opposition. They had a majority in the Political Committee, but at the Plenum they were a minority.
The Plenum said: "That won't work very well, will it? If the majority in the Political Committee is against the majority in the Plenum, the conflict of authority has to be resolved one way or another. And since the Political Committee has no authority to reorganize the Plenum, then the Plenum has to reorganize the Political Committee. So some of you boys are out." Oh, they hollered, "Blue Murder! Bureaucracy!" But we said, "No, that's democratic centralism. You'll have to get used to that. The majority has to rule. That's democracy isn't it? At least, that's the first principle of it."
The British majority seemed to have the same idea. So they reorganized the Editorial Board and made a few shifts to bring subcommittees into line with the NC majority. Then, what do you think happened there? A comrade, who had been dropped from the sub-committee, as we dropped several of the Burnhamite minority from our Political  Committee in  1939,  challenged the right of the

elected majority of the National Committee to remove him. He said: "I am going over to Paris and see what my position is." And he wasn't laughing.
So he goes to Paris, and comes back, and announces that he can't be removed, that the IS says he should stay. This monstrosity was justified on the ground that the Fourth International is a world party with international discipline, and IS discipline is higher than national discipline. This great principle of international organization is prostituted in the present faction fight to mean, in practice, that Pablo's factional agents have special rights in the national sections; that they can run wnd and the Nation Committee can't discipline them. The National Committee, which is elected by a Conference and is responsible to the rank and file, is deprived of all ptower and might as well resign.
And then came Pablo's ultimatum to Burns that he himself had to obey the higher discipline of the IS and that he defend the line of its majority "until the Fourth Congress." Simultaneously with that, within recent weeks, the Pabloite minority in the British section began to openly violate the discipline of their National Committee in the mass movement.
Now, if there's one unpardonable crime, it's that. I surely don't have to explain that to a Trotskyist trade unionist. Open violation of discipline in the mass movement creates an absolutely impossible situation; it is the most disruptive thing imaginable. It can blow up all your mass work in a short time.
That's precisely what the British Pabloites undertook to do, and this brought the struggle in the British section to a head very quickly. Confronted by open and provocative violations of discipline, the leadership had to decide: Either the National Committee must abdicate, or it can remain in office only as a puppet of a madman in Paris, and say "We have no rights." Or, as a third alternate, it can throw the disrupters out of the organization for violation of discipline.
That's what was done in England, and we heartily applaud the action of the British majority. The split, made unavoidable by these provocations, was consummated in England in about two weeks from the time of the first violation. A large majority of the party rose up in arms against the disruption in England, as they did in the United States, and supported the majority of the National Committee.
The Pabloite Formula
You knew that for months the Cochranites were violating discipline in the essence of the matter, that is, by neglecting to participate in party activity and by sabotaging party funds. They have not done this simply out of stupidity. It has been a deliberate program, carried out on the theory, assiduously cultivated by the Pablo faction, that international discipline is higher than national discipline. Now, formally, that's right—if the IS is a really representative body, and there is some control over it, some way of checking it. But as the Pabloites employ it, it is the perfect formula to disrupt any section of the Fourth International before the discussion gets a good start
Under that formula, as the Pabloites invoke it, no matter how big a majority you have in the National Committee, elected   by   your   membership, under observation of the

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membership, subject to control and recall by the membership, its authority is cancelled out immediately. The Pab-loite cultists are under no obligation to obey the Political Committee, or the Plenum, in New York or London, because they have received a special license from Paris. They can do as they please. At least they thought they could. And they did —until they finally came to the high point of our 25-year struggle; not only the high point of this year's work, the point to which we were building for six months, but the 25th Anniversary of our struggle in this country, against all obstacles and difficulties.
The celebration of our 25th Anniversary coincided in New York with the wind-up rally in our election campaign—the best we ever had. The Cochranites organized a boycott of this Anniversary Celebration and campaign meeting. They deliberately organized it. They put their supporters under discipline to boycott the meeting. They even tried to induce sympathizers to remain away. When that happened we said: "This is a public demonstration against the party's 25-year struggle. In effect, if not in actual design, it is a demonstration of solidarity with the Stalinists who expelled us 25 years ago."
That's what we were celebrating, among other things. We were celebrating the action of the original nucleus of American Trotskyism which raised the banner in the Central Committee of the Communist Party and were expelled 25 years ago, almost to the day of the meeting. We took that boycott as a demonstration against the party, and a demonstration against our candidates in the election campaign.
And we said: "This is enough! These people are no longer comrades of ours. They are a gang of strikebreakers. By walking out and boycotting our 25th Anniversary celebration they have consummated a definitive split in our party!" That was the opinion all the National Committee members expressed as they assembled for the 25th Anniversary Plenum. We said that the task of the Plenum was simply to recognize the fact, and to act accordingly; to recognize that the internal debate was ended and that no more compromises are possible. You can compromise with people in a union in a discussion and debate as to whether to go out on strike or not. But you can't compromise with anybody who walks through the picket line after the strike has started.
That's the way we felt about these "people. Our whole attitude changed when they boycotted that meeting. We said: "No more internal debates with these people. The rights of a minority in our party are very many and they are carefully guarded, and always have been. But nobody has the right to be disloyal, no matter who sponsors him." That was the sentiment of the Plenum; and on that basis, as you know, it adopted a motion to suspend the NC members who organized the boycott.
A constitutional provision gives the National Committee the right to suspend members of the National Committee for cause, by a two-thirds vote. And that's what we did — we didn't expel them, we suspended them. They have the right of appeal under the party constitution. They, and others who solidarized with their strikebreaking action, have the right to ask for reinstatement. The Plenum attached only one condition: The boycott of our 25th Anniversary celebration must be disavowed. Anyone, anywhere, who objects to this conditon brands himself there-

by as an enemy of our party and has no right to remain in our party.
One may ask: "Why such a drastic sweeping action? Why, in one blow, bring the whole thing to an end, stop the debate and suspend them from the party? Why not merely warn them?" The answer is: They were warned. We warned them at the May Plenum. And we gave them another chance, a wide-open chance, after the May Plenum. They were warned at every meeting in New York —"You are not doing your party duty; you are sabotaging party funds; you know the party cannot tolerate that." They paid no attention; the warnings were all disregarded.
Our Tradition
As a matter of fact, they were warned by the whole 25-year history of the party. All anyone would have needed, to know what the Plenum was going to do about this boycott of our 25th Anniversary, would have been to read the party history. It is all written down in the precedents of the past. This is the most democratic and easygoing party in the world. It lets its members do any damned thing they please. It never invokes any rigorous formal-istic discipline; never drives people too hard —at least I've never seen anybody driven too hard. But this same party, from the very beginning, never permitted anybody to challenge the party in a public action. No matter how big they were nor how big they thought they were. Never once.
That issue of real, not formalistic, discipline, came to a head first in the Hotel Strike in New York in 1934. B.J. Field and a group of party members in charge of that strike, with a big mass movement in their hands, thought they could lay down the law to this little Trotsky-ist group that didn't even have a telephone in the National Office, as they reminded us tauntingly. They refused to carry out party policy, and we expelled the whole bunch, just like that. The same thing with the Oehlerites. And similarly with the Shachtmanites, when they refused to accept the Convention decision. We didn't hesitate to expel them although they had nearly half the party with them. The Cochranites had plenty of warning—at the May Plenum, and in the New York meetings, and in the history of the party.
The boycott, and this is the way you have to look at it —was not an individual dereliction; it was an organized public action. I believe the party should be patient and careful and go slow when an individual comrade gets out of line. We shouldn't be in a hurry to expel an individual the first time he stubs his toe or does some things he shouldn't do. We've never been in a hurry in that respect. But this boycott was not a case of individual indiscipline which could be handled in a leisurely fashion by the Control Commission. This was an open insurrection against the party, an act of war. Debate ends when the shooting begins. The party had to shoot back; that is, if it wanted to survive. We considered this boycott a deliberate split, part of an international conspiracy, and it had to be met as such.
If we had not acted at the Plenum, if we had let the boycott of our 25th Anniversary go by as a mere pecadillo, we would have condemned the party to months of chaos while the Cochranites prepared a formal split at their leisure,   without   paying   any  attention to  any discipline

whatever. If they could get away with a public boycott of such a meeting, the Cochranites would have concluded that they had a license for anything. They would have run wild, internally and externally, and there would have been no way to restrain them.
The Political Committee would have been powerless. Between Plenums the Political Committee — under the Constitution—has no right to suspend NC members. The Constitution gives that right only to the National Committee as a whole. A mere censure and a warning, after all that had been done, would have been a betrayal of the responsibility of the Plenum, which would have been greatly resented by the party members.
The Party Showed Its Trotskyist Caliber
This fight, as I see it, has been a big test of the party; hemmed in as it is by all the spears of reaction, under all the pressures of the most powerful imperialism in the world. The SWP is the only revolutionary party in this country, and it has to meet the full weight of opposition from every corner. It is simply an objective statement of fact to say the party stood up under this test and showed its Trotskyist caliber. That's the basic fact, and we have to proceed from that.
From that standpoint—at the moment of concluding the internal struggle and facing the revisionist splitters as a rival and enemy organization externally, and simultaneously opening a struggle for Trotskyism on the international field — at this time, in the face of these circumstances, I think it would be out of order to divert attention with a carping criticism of the leadership, or any section of it. The party ranks are in no mood to welcome such an attitude at the present moment. There will be plenty of time and opportunity to review everything later on. Right now we want complete solidarity in the fight to protect the Trotskyist heritage in this country and throughout the world. This fight is being led by our National Committee as a whole. It would be a disservice to the party to divert attention from that main fact, and seize the opportunity to pick a flaw here and there in the way things were done by one individual or another. The important thing to remember now is that the overwhelming majority of the leading cadre of the party saw the situation before it was too late. It doesn't matter if some were a little too fast or others were a little too slow.
The important thing is that the overwhelming majority saw the situation in time, that they led the fight against the revisionists to a successful conclusion in our own party, and are now joining the fight on the international field. What is also important now, to notice and remember, is the remarkable demonstration of the party ranks in this fight. They showed the results of their long training in the school of Trotskyism. They not only supported the leaders; they even pushed them forward in the fight. The whole party has been reeducated and rearmed in the political and ideological fight New leaders have come forward from the ranks, and they will find their rightful places on the National Committee at the next Convention.
Now as to how the split left the party: This split, like others we have gone through in the past, was thoroughly prepared and motivated. For that reason, like the other splits in the past, it caused no demoralization whatever, as far as I know. On the contrary the party is bounding

forward with intensified activity and stronger confidence than ever in its great historic mission. I witnessed that personally in New York, at the first membership meeting after the Plenum. There was no moaning or whimpering, no disloyal complaints or carping criticisms; nothing but a confident, matter-of-fact discussion of plans and proposals to develop the party work.
It was the same all over the country, according to reports. I didn't visit any other sections, but such were the reports received by the National Office in New York. The party members, who had gone through the long struggle with the Cochranites, all thought the time had come to bring things to a head. When they heard about the boycott they were sure it was time to call a halt, and they were fully ready for the Plenum decision.
There was no opposition, no trace of complaint, from one end of the country to another, when the Plenum decision came out. On the contrary, there was immediate approval from the rank and file of the party. They had had enough of the "cold splif and the "sit-down strike." The formal split in all the branches was carried through with precision, without the slightest hesitation, within one week after the Plenum. That wouldn't have been possible without thorough preparation, because our party members, like any other rank and file, are not anxious to have splits.
Our hands are now free to help the orthodox Trotsky-ists in the other parties, in the struggle against revisionism on the international field. The National Committee is now turning its attention to this responsibility. The Open Letter of our 25th Anniversary Plenum — addressed to all Trot-skyists throughout the world —presents our indictment of Pabloism for its pro-Stalinist policy, as revealed in action in great events since the May Plenum. The Plenum's Letter also indicts the Stalinist organizational methods of Pabloism. This letter signifies a definitive break with Pabloism and there will be no turning back.
The Rebirth of Trotskyism
It may be charged against us that we were late in discerning the revisionist character of Pabloism. That is only partly true. We characterized and fought the American manifestations of revisionism from the very beginning. We were late, it must be admitted, in tracing the revisionist faction in our party to its fountainhead in Paris. We were late also, a quarter of a century ago, in getting a clear picture of Stalinist revisionism in the Comintern.
We didn't catch up with the real meaning of Stalinism until 1928 —five years after the fight first broke out in the Russian Party. But even at that, we were earlier than some others. The fight of 1928, out of which our party was created, evolved in about the same way as the present one, from the national field to the international. And in my opinion, the Plenum's Letter has no less historic significance than our declaration against Stalinism on October 27, 1928.
The reason for our delay in joining the international fight this time, as I have said before, was the deceptive, two-faced methods, the treacherous double talk, by which the Pablo cult, like all other revisionists in the past, concealed its real program. The Third Congress Resolutions — as written — gave no sanction for the policy actually carried out in recent months on events in the Soviet Union, East

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Germany and France. They gave no sanction to disrupt and split all the old cadres. In my opinion, the most that can be said against the Third Congress Resolutions is that they contain some ambiguous formulations which can be "interpreted" in different ways.
That was the trick. The ambiguous formulations were put in the resolutions on purpose. The Pabloites showed us what they meant by them in their policy on the Soviet Union, East Germany and France in the past six months, and by their attempts to split and break up the old Trot-skyist cadres.
It certainly must be admitted that we did not see what was really going on too soon. We were a bit late, as in 1928. But not too late. We are caught up now and we are going to stay caught up, as we did after 1928. It is our duty to help the international struggle because we have the strongest organization, the strongest cadres, which have had the most benefit of direct collaboration with Trotsky,

and probably the most collective experience.
The revisionists have turned out to be a small minority in every party where the fight has come to a showdown. We have reason to believe that it will be the same in the other sections, now that the fight is brought out into the open by the Open Letter of our 25th Anniversary Plenum.
The aims of our Letter are quite simple and clear for all to see. It calls, not for a split but for the unity of all Trotskyists on the basis of their common programmatic principles. It proposes an honest, democratic discussion among Trotskyists — to prepare an honest, representative democratic Congress of Trotskyists. That will be accomplished.
Morris Stein aptly characterized the open struggle against revisionism as the "rebirth of Trotskyism." The international fight will not be the "funeral" of Trotskyism — as our wish-thinking enemies say —but its triumphant resurrection.

SECTION XII: "THE CHINESE EXPERIENCE WITH PABLOITE REVISIONISM AND BUREAUCRATISM (A LETTER TO JAMES P. CANNON)," BY PENG SHU-TSE

[This open letter to James P. Cannon by the veteran leader of Chinese Trotskyism followed the decision of the Chinese Trotskyist organization to adhere to the Inter-

national Committee. The letter, dated December 30, 1953, is reprinted from SWP Discussion Bulletin A-15 in 1954.]

December 30, 1953 Dear Comrade Cannon,
Quite early this year I intended to write to you about the events and things which I have experienced and observed in person since my participation in the IS, and about the serious bureaucratic organizational tendency and revisionist political tendency represented by Pablo which, I was afraid, would eventually bring a crisis in our International. But out of "prudence" (this was also what Manuel advised me at that time) this letter was continuously postponed. Now the crisis has actually exploded with ferocity. I am therefore obliged to write this already retarded letter.
The reason for my writing to you is not only because you are the founder and leader of the SWP, the leading section of the world Trotskyist movement, but also because you closely collaborated with Trotsky in completing the Transitional Program and in founding our International, and led several victorious struggles over a long period of time against opportunism, sectarianism and revisionism. No less important is the fact that you fought through the whole epoch of the Comintern, in its ascendancy under the leadership of Lenin and Trotsky and in the subsequent period of initial degeneration under the control of Stalin, and have thus obtained rich and profound experiences, which have since become a part of the most precious lessons in safeguarding and advancing our movement I believe that with your rich experience and the capacities of the SWP, and your collaboration with the genuine Trotskyists of other countries, it is possible to overcome the present crisis.

The "Letter to Trotskyists Throughout the World" recently published by the SWP, though quite exceptional and unprecedented, is nevertheless necessary for saving the International from the extremely grave immediate danger. This "exceptional action" can be proved necessary and justified here too by the painful experiences of my personal participation in the IS during these two years.
Despite the fact that I became responsible for activity in the Trotskyist movement in China more than twenty years ago, it was hardly possible to maintain an intimate relation with the International and to participate in its activities because of the particular conditions in which I was placed: constant oppression and extreme persecution by all kinds of reactionary forces, often resulting in a state of isolation. When Mao's party came to power, I was obliged to leave China and come abroad. I then cherished great hopes that on the one hand, I could submit to the International a detailed report of the events which had occurred in China in recent years to facilitate a common discussion that would result in a correct resolution and general orientation for the Trotskyist movement in China and the other backward countries of the Orient. On the other hand, I was prepared to contribute within the limits of my capacity my own experiences to the leadership of the International to help it in advancing our movement. But the experiences of these two and a half years have shown that the reality is completely different from my original aspirations, for I saw with my own eyes a frightful crisis brewing, growing, spreading and penetrating more and more into the different sections of the International.   This has greatly disturbed and pained me

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and made it difficult for me to remain silent.
Now let me relate in a chronological order what I witnessed and experienced in person during this whole period, as follows:
At the Third World Congress, a "Far East Commission" was set up with the aim of holding a more or less penetrating discussion of the Chinese question and proposing a resolution on this important question to the World Congress to proceed on a broader discussion and eventual adoption of a more fully and correctly elaborated resolution. I was then designated as the reporter on this question. But before my report had gone half-way, the representative of the IS, Comrade A. of India, who was in charge of the Commission, suddenly made a motion interrupting my report on the pretext of "security," and demanded that this Commission proceed to vote for the adoption of the two previous resolutions on the Chinese question, i.e., the two adopted by the 7th and 8th Plenums of the IEC. I was quite surprised and expressed my indignation and protest. I declared that the Far East Commission was created by the Congress which stood above all the other organisms, and therefore could not simply submit itself to any instructions to cease functioning that were issued by the IS which was itself to be reelected. If the Far East Commission had the task of merely proceeding to vote the previous resolutions, then it was completely superfluous. And I reminded them that it was constituted for the purpose of reaching a more correct decision after an all-round discussion according to the development of the events and new realities. At the same time, I stated that since I was requested to make the report, I had the responsibility and right not only to complete my report but to listen furthermore to the opinions of the delegates present (whether or not they agreed with or were against my report) and thus to obtain a conclusion endorsed by the majority of the Commission to submit to the Congress. Thanks to my protest and the objection of the great majority of the Commission regarding A's intervention, I was reluctantly allowed to finish my report. But without passing to any discussion, the Far East Commission was terminated; in reality, it was aborted.
The inconclusiveness of the Far East Commission was mainly due to the fact that the representative of the IS, hearing my report in the first session, feeling that my views did not conform to theirs, and being afraid that my views would influence the comrades present, did not hesitate to interrupt me in the midst of the report in a domineering manner. This was later revealed in the "explanation" of Livingstone who attended the second session in place of A. He said, "The IS had not expected such a development of the Commission." In other words, they had not expected me to express in my report views different from theirs. To the representative Of the IS, it seemed that the Commissions created by the Congress had the sole task of justifying or proving the correctness of the IS's previous resolutions or views by employing new facts and arguments. Otherwise, they would not hesitate to hand down orders to stop Commission proceedings.
To adopt such an arbitrary attitude toward important political problems (since all the delegates of the Congress considered the Chinese question as the most important immediate   problem)   and   to exercise such control over

the Commissions created by the Congress are practices far removed from the tradition of Bolshevism. This was my first unpleasant impression after coming here.
My discontent about the Far East Commission was of course sensed by Pablo. His explanations were made through Burns and the responsibility was attributed to A. in the explanations. Besides, Burns said that Pablo was willing to accept the opinions of others and hoped that I would participate in the IS to collaborate with him, especially to undertake more responsibility on the colonial and semi-colonial questions in the Orient. Although I was not quite satisfied with Burns' explanations, I was still prepared in all sincerity to collaborate with Pablo and others in order to serve the development of our movement.
Immediately after the Congress there exploded once again the divergences and conflict between the majority and minority in the French party. The crisis involved in this conflict culminated at the beginning of 1952. During the two meetings of the IS when the French question was discussed, Pablo always stressed the incorrigibility of the bad tendency of the majority leaders and the necessity of adopting severe measures. The opinion I expressed invariably was that because the majority represented the overwhelming majority of the party, among whom there were a large number of industrial workers in important sectors, we should still do our best and utmost to convince the majority of the comrades, especially the worker comrades, even though certain leaders at the top had manifested bad tendencies. (At that time, I also had certain bad impressions about a few leaders of the majority. But I must admit now that my bad impressions were formulated chiefly as the result of my excessive confidence and trust in Pablo and the minority in their portrayal of the majority leaders.) For this purpose, I said, it was necessary to carry out a universal and thorough political discussion in the French party, and if necessary to extend this discussion to the other sections of the International. In this manner, it would not only be possible to find the demarcation of different political views of both sides, but also to exploit this occasion for elevating the political level of the members as a whole. This opinion did not meet with any objection. Pablo, however, proceeded entirely according to his own plan.
It then happened that Pablo attended the Plenum of the Executive Committee of the French party last January (1952) and announced on the spot the suspension of the 16 majority members of the EC from their function. The fact is that the IS had not made any decision of this kind. Among the five members of the IS, three were completely ignorant of this decision: Germain and Manuel were both outside of the country, and I was not informed beforehand, although I was in Paris. Besides, only the IEC is entitled to sanction or suspend the function of the members of the executive committee of a section formally elected, even if they had committed grave political errors, and even violated discipline in action, while the IS is not at all entitled to this right. Moreover the IS did not make such a decision! Pablo's suspension of the 16 members of the EC of the French party from their function by borrowing the name and authority of the IS fully exposed his unrestrained personal dictatorial conduct in abusing   authority   and  in violating our organizational

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tradition.
After Pablo's suspension of the majority leaders, Germain returned to Paris; he came to see me and asked my opinions about this event. The gist of what I told him was about as follows: The political views of the majority of the French party were still limited to divergences on tactics, and had not yet passed over to a general discussion. To take an organizational measure at that moment was entirely inappropriate. Besides, the measure employed by Pablo had not been approved by all leading members of the International and was therefore nothing but an arbitrary action in violation of our organizational tradition. Expressing his complete agreement with my position, he told me in addition that the leaders of the majority were all very active, and Pablo, etc., had previously praised them highly; and now they were suddenly described as not worth a penny, and even threatened with being completely thrown out of the movement! In saying this, Germain was not able to restrain his indignation.
In order to discuss the aggravated situation produced by this act of suspension adopted by Pablo, the IS called an enlarged IS meeting (which could be considered as the preparatory conference of the January 1952 Plenum of the IEC). At this meeting, Germain, J. of the German section, L. of the Italian section and I were all against the measure taken by Pablo. But the latter still tried obstinately to defend himself, saying, "The previous session of the IS decided on the necessity of adopting a severe measure, and the members who were present at that session should all be responsible for it." But what was the real content of this so-called "severe measure"? Under what conditions should it be applied? About these Pablo had never said a word and of course we could not have made any formal decision on them, and in reality we had not at all made such a decision. But Pablo utilized the "severe measure" mentioned before as an "algebraic formula" and he pretended he had obtained everyone's agreement to fill this formula himself with the "arithmetical figures," that is, the suspension from their function of the 16 majority members of the EC of the French party. This further exposed Pablo as a deliberate and systematic intriguer.
This enlarged IS meeting should have seriously examined the mistake of Pablo's act of suspending the EC members of the French party and should have challenged his authority to do so, in order to open the road for a reasonable solution of the question of the French majority. But Pablo exerted his strongest pressure by threatening and maneuvering to prevent any discussion of this problem, and turned round to propose negotiation with the French majority in another attempt for compromise. That was nothing else than to nullify in effect the suspension of the majority EC members, and to form a leading Committee containing both the factions, with Germain, representing the IS, as the arbitrator. This was the sole result of the February session of the IEC. Here, again, it was evident that Pablo was playing intrigues to cover up for the moment his absurd conduct toward the leadership of a section and to prepare the way for his revenge. Thus the question of the French majority became more and more involved in confusion and could not be solved correctly —which is proved by the outcome later.

Having seen Pablo's arbitrary action on the question of the majority in the French party and his intrigues, I strongly felt that frightful consequences would result if the IS were to submit completely to the handling and control of Pablo. With this apprehension, on a trip to the south of France I had a formal conversation with Manuel, who was already there. I pointed out to him that Pablo's suspension of the 16 members of the EC of the French party from their function all by himself disclosed very serious weaknesses in the IS itself, which deserved our serious observation and attention; since we have lost Trotsky, only the formation of a collective leadership could avoid internal crises and confront external events. At that time, I still considered that Pablo was indispensable for the leadership but that he should not be permitted to act arbitrarily on his own will. Moreover, I believed that as far as important political and organizational questions were concerned, not only was the IS not competent to make certain decisions, but that even the IEC was also not adequate (since the members who could be present at IEC meetings were limited), and that the IS should seek the opinions of responsible and experienced leaders and co-thinkers throughout the world.
After I had expressed these views as stated above, Manuel said that he agreed with the fundamental idea expressed by me on collective leadership and would reexamine the question of the French majority, and that he intended to have a sincere conversation with Pablo the next day. But before Manuel could talk to Pablo, the latter started a violent and brutal attack on me in Manuel's presence. Perhaps this was why Manuel cancelled his intended talk with Pablo.
When I returned from the south to Paris (in the middle of May, 1952), Pablo had framed up two charges to launch a fierce attack on me — "attempting to injure the prestige of the International" and "liberal action" (which meant violation of discipline). The "facts" he enumerated were: we (my wife and I) had slandered the International in front of an Australian couple; after returning to Paris, we had again slandered the International before the Vietnamese comrades; and we had moved from one hotel to another lodging without giving him notice beforehand. When I first heard about these ungrounded charges, though extremely enraged, I still restrained myself and requested Pablo to meet me in order to clarify the misunderstandings. But he was so arbitrary as to refuse my request, and declared that the "stories mentioned by him were true and facts." Hence I realized that Pablo was deliberately and systematically attempting to trap me by slanders in order to discredit me and further to exclude me from the IS. I was therefore obliged to request the IS to discuss the matter of all these calumnies against me by Pablo.
At the IS meeting I proved with indisputable facts that all the charges made by Pablo against me, such as hurting the prestige of the International, etc., were completely false, and could be disproved by the testimony of the Australian couple and the Vietnamese comrades. As to the charge on my "liberal action," it was still more absurd. The explanation is very simple: as I was not able to pay high rent in the hotel, I was forced to seek help from the Vietnamese comrades to get a cheaper lodging, and it was not at all necessary to give a notice to Pablo beforehand. I asked him to make a reply and explain his calumnies against me with concrete facts. He was not

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only not able to explain but started to shout and declared, "I am the General Secretary, I have my rule about things!" I told him, "The General Secretary has no privileges, and our rule is democratic centralism. Nobody is entitled to be dictator, to slander and constrain others." Finally a resolution was proposed by Germain on the dispute between Pablo and me, which was generally as follows: there were no facts to prove that I had attempted to discredit the International and to violate discipline, but also that Pablo had not slandered me. This was a clever resolution to please both sides without any justice done to the truth. My statement was: I would not accept such a kind of a resolution and I reserved my right to appeal to the conference of a higher body.
I consider that when the General Secretary of the IS slanders another secretary at his will with the charges of "discrediting the International" and "violating discipline," it is not at all an ordinary "personal dispute" nor "trivial" but a serious phenomenon within the leading apparatus concerning the question of organization and functioning of its component members. In other words, this is a most naked expression of base bureaucratic methods to exclude personal opponents. This kind of phenomenon was quite frequently seen in the Stalinist parties, but was unprecedented in our own movement.
Afterwards, Burns told our daughter that through the independent observation of the Australian couple he learned the details of how Pablo's wife treated us, especially my wife, tyrannically, and that was not less than madness, and he was sympathetic with us. But he said that it was by mistake that Pablo accepted his wife's account as the truth, and he urged us not to insist on an "appeal." Meanwhile, Manuel also did his best to dissuade me from doing so, saying that if I made this matter public, Pablo would not be able to continue his function, but who then was to replace him? In short, he persuaded me to leave it alone. For the sake of "preserving the integrity of the movement in general" I refrained from making any further protest. Nevertheless, I have always thought that the calumnies made by Pablo are not only inexcusable but express a dangerous tendency considering the position he holds. If he were in power, he would very probably have committed all those persecutions Stalin had done in the past.
During a whole year, from my arrival in Europe until the 11th Plenum of the IEC in June 1952, I was allowed to make a report on the Chinese question only at the Third World Congress and the Far East Commission, and there was never any exchange of views or discussion of this question in the IS. Even when the draft resolution was submitted to discussion in the IS, I was not invited to express my views. Besides, I had not heard in person what position was adopted by Pablo before he expressed his views at the 11th Plenum. Only indirectly I learned that Pablo assumed that Mao Tse-tung had completed all the fundamental theses of the Permanent Revolution, that the Chinese CP had already become a centrist party, and that Mao's regime was a proletarian dictatorship. Frank's position was entirely unknown to me then. Only Germain had exchanged some views with me, but he declared that on the Chinese question his position was the most moderate. Thus on a question as important as China, the IS leadership had not even exchanged views with me, or had deliberately avoided doing

so beforehand. It was not at all intended to have a collective discussion in order to arrive at agreement on a correct position as the basis for the resolution to be submitted to the IEC for discussion and adoption. On the contrary the IS leadership launched a sudden attack at the IEC meeting against the views which they considered to be erroneous, with the sole aim of gaining a majority to adopt their own draft resolution, and hastily made an end to the whole discussion on this question. In this way I discovered that the leading members of the IS were not prepared for a sincere discussion and mutual consultation to facilitate collaboration, but deliberately struck blows by all means against divergent views. This was particularly noticeable in Pablo who openly stressed at the IEC session that there existed a sectarian faction in the Chinese section which must be got rid of. (These words were not included in the published remarks of Pablo in the special issue of the International Bulletin on "The Report and Discussion on the Third Chinese Revolution.") The sectarian he referred to was obviously me, and the reference was a threat and prelude to pushing me out of the International. I was not overawed by his bureaucratic threat, but once more it was demonstrated that Pablo was prepared to deal with the Chinese comrades with the same methods that were employed against the majority of the French section.
I believe that you already know the content of the resolution of the Third Chinese Revolution; my criticisms of this resolution, e.g., "A Few Remarks to Serve as Amendments to the Draft Resolution on the Third Chinese Revolution," were sent to you two months ago, so it is not necessary to repeat them here. I have only one more point to make on this. When this resolution arrived in China, it not only failed to clarify the original divided views but enhanced the confusion and bewilderment. Aside from the comrades who oppose the resolution with theoretical arguments and facts, even those who are in agreement with it have quite diverse interpretations among themselves. Consequently, it has not been possible for them to elaborate a program of action with majority agreement on the basis of this resolution. The worst thing is that nobody can find a perspective for the Chinese Trotskyists in this resolution. For instance, a responsible comrade, F., who is completely in agreement with this resolution said, "We must dissolve our organization in order to participate effectively in mass activities led by Mao's party." This is evidently a liq-uidationist attitude. Another comrade, Y., said more frankly, "The Resolution of the International is correct, but there is no perspective for us Trotskyists." This is pessimism through and through. Thus, the whole organization was politically disarmed and disoriented, and hence involved in endless organizational disputes, and was more and more approaching the edge of disintegration.
Naturally I do not intend to say that the resolution of the IS is entirely responsible for such a dangerous state into which the Chinese organization was led. I would say rather that this is the result mainly of the objective situation — the victory of Mao's party, its persecutions, and the incomparable pressure weighing down upon us. But it is an undeniable fact that the resolution of the International did not make a reasonable and correct analysis and explanation of this objective situation nor did it point out  a convincing perspective and orientation for

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the Chinese organization.
First of all, this resolution is a mixture of Pablo's revisionism and Germain's conciliationism (i.e., conciliation with Pablo), filled with theoretical fallacies, factual errors and self-contradictions. These together with its idealization of Mao's regime and illusions on its perspective, make it a strong expression of the tendency of conciliation with Stalinism. The liquidationism and pessimism which prevailed among the Chinese comrades was originated from here. Therefore I can say that Pablo's revisionism, that is, his conciliation towards Stalinism, has already caused frightful consequences in the Chinese organization. This deserves serious concern among all comrades.
At the 12th Plenum of the IEC, November 1952, the IS let me report on the organizational situation in the Chinese section for the first time. When I reported the news of the incessant and systematic persecution of Chinese Trotskyists by Mao's regime during these recent years, the whole meeting was greatly shaken. The Italian, L., rose and questioned why the IS did not give the sections the information about the persecutions of the Chinese comrades. In the midst of this tense atmosphere, Pablo, evidently embarrassed, stood up to defend himself, saying that the massacre of Trotskyists by Mao's regime was not a deliberate action but a mistake, that is, the Trotskyists had been mistaken as Kuomintang agents; and that even if Mao's persecution of Trotskyists were a fact, this could only be considered as an exception. Then Germain posed another question: under what conditions were the Trotskyists massacred? I cited all the facts and "conditions" to demonstrate that the persecution of Trotskyists by Mao's regime originated from a deep-rooted tradition of Stalinist hostility towards Trotskyists, and was a systematic and deliberate attempt to exterminate the Trotskyists. I also pointed out that this persecution was not at all an "exception." Not long ago, Ho Chi Minh slaughtered the entire Trotskyist leadership in Vietnam, and in the Spanish Civil War the GPU of the Stalinist party brutally persecuted innumerable Trotskyists — all these are iron proofs. But Pablo turned to inquire of me, "So you have annulled the tactic of entrism into the Stalinist party and the mass organizations under its control, which you approved?' I replied, "This tactic of entrism into the Stalinist party was started by us four years ago, that is, since 1949. But precisely because of the severe persecutions Mao inflicts on the Trotskyists, we have to be particularly cautious and serious in carrying out this tactic, and should not have the slightest illusion about the Stalinists." I urged the French and Italian sections to examine the lessons of the Chinese section and to organize very seriously in applying this tactic. Otherwise, the danger of ruin would be incurred, and in this case the IEC would be responsible. In short, from this illustration of Pablo's defense for Stalinist persecution of Chinese Trotskyists, you can see the extent of his idealization and illusions toward Mao's regime.
In the meantime, I received the English version of the special issue of the International Bulletin containing the report and discussion on the Third Chinese Revolution, and I discovered that my document criticizing the draft resolution on the Third Chinese Revolution did not appear in it.   I therefore pointed this out at the meeting of

the enlarged IS and questioned Pablo about the reason for not publishing my document The reply was that the document was published in another issue of the International Bulletin. But I later looked through all the International Bulletins and could not find my critique of the draft resolution. It was obvious that Pablo had deliberately suppressed this document, as my critique pointed out with irrefutable facts several fundamental errors in the draft resolution: the revision of the theory of the Permanent Revolution, distortion of the "Workers and Peasants Government," the fiction of the alleged "violation of the intentions of the Kremlin by Mao's party," and the illusion of the "transformation of the entire party of Mao Tse-tung into a centrist party." None of these criticisms was refuted or rejected either by the reporter or the participants of the discussion with theoretical argumentation or facts. Precisely for that reason, Pablo was resolved to conceal my criticism of the draft resolution from the comrades by keeping it in the dark. This is a typical manifestation of the bureaucratic methods of Stalinism, and was precisely what we resolutely combatted within the Comintern in the initial stage of its degeneration 25 years ago, and one of the main causes for constituting the Left Opposition. But Pablo did not stop there. When I asked him why he had not published my document, he openly lied that it was published in another issue of the International Bulletin. This added lying and cheating, on top of arbitrary bureaucratic methods.
Here I must mention that particularly since the beginning of 1952 when I opposed Pablo's arbitrary measure on the French question, Pablo, for the period of a whole year, not only employed various bureaucratic methods to attack me, but he also informally deprived me of the right to participate in all meetings of the IS; that is, during this whole year, Pablo never called on me to attend any meeting of the IS itself. The members of the IS were officially elected by the IEC. But without going through a formal discussion and decision in an IEC meeting, he privately deprived me the right to participate in the IS meetings. This is clearly another manifestation of the most arbitrary and insolent bureaucratism!
Around the same period, I found out that Manuel was excluded from the IS meetings by another method: he was sent to another country in the name of helping the work there, thus being in effect informally deprived of his right to attend and work in the IS. But everyone knew that Manuel came with the sole purpose of participating in the activities of the IS. This fully proves that in order to monopolize the IS, Pablo did not halt at any bureaucratic methods and intrigues to gradually exclude representatives of the Western Hemisphere and Asia from the IS.
On the other hand, I became generally acquainted with the fact that Clarke had started a factional struggle in the SWP and launched attacks on the party leadership in an attempt to seize the leadership of the party. This was evidently instigated by Pablo behind the scenes. I heard very often from the entourage of Pablo that "Clarke is the best leader in the U.S." which was tantamount to saying that the SWP should be led by him. At the same time, a Chinese comrade, H., who was studying here told me personally that since last spring (1952) Pablo had acted particularly friendly and confidential toward him,   and had  offered  several times to send him back to

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China to "reorganize the party." This comrade replied, "I do not have authority and prestige in the Chinese organization." Then Pablo encouraged him by saying, "Don't be afraid, our International will support you. You have just to proceed boldly." From these words uttered by Pablo, H. clearly understood that not only Pablo did not trust me at all but was hostile toward me, and therefore wanted to give him this special mission to start factional work in the Chinese organization. Naturally, he was not at all willing to engage in such an affair, and consequently frankly told us.
From the facts enumerated above, I deeply felt that Pablo had manifested a revisionist tendency, and especially that he was employing terrible bureaucratic methods to exercise control over the IS and had started to build up his own factions in different sections in an attempt to dominate the whole international movement. For this reason, when Manuel was leaving here and came to bid farewell to us, I enumerated a few of these facts and told him frankly that a serious danger was hidden in the leading apparatus of the International, and was developing at an accelerating speed. I expressed the hope that he would find a way to make this opinion known to the leadership of the SWP and especially to you, so that you would be alerted in time and try to mend the situation. Though Manuel did not express any reaction toward my words, he promised to forward my opinions to you and some other leaders of the party.
On the Plenum of the IEC in May 1953, there are two things worth mentioning:
 1.	In the discussion of the resolution on the problem of the USSR after Stalin's death, a considerable dispute was aroused. In this dispute, Burns first pointed out the spirit of the resolution was too optimistic; he warned that from the failure to fully grasp the significance of the Yugoslav events, which resulted from a too-optimistic appreciation, we should have learned certain lessons. He also stated that the Stalinist parties remained Stalinist parties, and we should not have too many illusions about them. But Pablo made a threatening attack against his remarks. The sum of his words was that as a responsible leader, Burns should refrain from expressing views in violation of the line of the International. According to him, all the resolutions drafted by the IS conform to the "line of the International" and no doubt or objection is allowed. Hence the members of the IEC have simply to raise then-hands in adopting any resolution concerning any newly occurred events or any important problems. Any doubts or views opposing the draft resolution of the IS are considered to "violate the line of the International." Is this different from the bureaucratic attitude in the CP's regarding Stalin's "general line" which it was forbidden to criticize?
 2.	At this Plenum, Pablo proposed the election of a new IS. The reason was that there were not enough efficient members to participate in the activities of the IS, so two members from the British and Italian sections were added as permanent members of the IS. In this manner, representatives from the Western Hemisphere and Asia were formally eliminated, and the IS has virtually become an ES (European Secretariat). Since then, Pablo has "legally" modified the composition of the IS to enable himself to freely control and manipulate it, and to proceed "legally"  with   his   design   of  excluding   and eliminating

his opponents and his plot of usurping the International.
At the May Plenum of the IEC, I submitted two documents—"An Appeal for Aid from the Chinese Trotskyists" and my "Open Letter to the Leadership of the Chinese CP" protesting the persecution of Trotskyists, in the hope that the Plenum would discuss and comment on them and decide to publish them in the public organs of different sections, in order to carry on a broad campaign to aid the persecuted Trotskyists in China. But Pablo told me through Germain that these documents should be discussed and decided only in the IS. At the IS meeting (this time only Pablo and Frank were present), I stated that I hoped that both these documents would be transmitted to the sections for publication, and would be made the occasion for a campaign to rescue the persecuted comrades. Both Pablo and Frank agreed to publish the "Appeal from the Chinese Trotskyists," but said that they could not agree on several points contained in my letter of protest, and would consult with me in order to make a final decision.
From May to September, four months had elapsed, but I still did not see the appearance of the "Appeal from Chinese Trotskyists." Then I began to suspect that Pablo had again suppressed a document. At the beginning of September I sent a copy of this document to the United States, asking that it be sent to the Militant, and inquiring if it had already reached there from the IS. The reply I received was, "Not received at all." Once again I discovered that Pablo was playing tricks to deceive me. On his motive for resorting to such tricks to suppress this document: Firstly, he always idealizes Mao's regime. The publication of this appeal would have exposed the reality contradicting his illusions and idealization. Secondly, he had for a long time been propagating in different sections the notion that the Chinese Trotskyists were sectarians, fugitives from the revolution, etc. The publication of this document would have categorically unmasked his lies and calumnies. Thirdly, Pablo was afraid that the publication of this document would interfere with his most strongly advocated ideal of "entrism," that is, he feared that on seeing the cruel persecution of Chinese comrades by Mao's party, as revealed in this appeal, the French, Italian, and Vietnamese comrades would start to doubt about the idealized "entrist tactic," and would demand a new discussion.
By suppressing this document, Pablo not only deliberately deceived me and the Chinese comrades, but also committed two inexcusable crimes: (1) Objectively he helped the Chinese CP to conceal before the masses the most concrete and horrible facts of its persecution of the Chinese Trotskyists. (2) He has made it impossible for the comrades of different countries, applying or about to apply the "entrist tactic," to learn lessons from the brutal persecutions afflicted on the Chinese comrades. This is like putting them to work in a danger zone without letting them know about the danger. A veritable ostrich policy! Let me cite another incident to illustrate this attitude. When the Vietnamese comrades were ready to return to their country to apply the "entrist policy," and called a meeting in which I was invited to make a speech, the chairman of this meeting made a request of me not to mention before the comrades the recent persecutions experienced by the Chinese comrades. I knew quite wel that it was  an instruction or suggestion from Pablo. Al

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though I observed the request of the chairman, I still warned him personally that the "ostrich policy" was the most dangerous.
My Open Letter was written as the result of a proposal by Manuel at the November Plenum of the IEC, 1952, which was then approved unanimously and decided by all the members. Its aim was to make public internationally the facts about the persecutions afflicted on the Chinese Trotskyists in order to arouse the sympathy of the world working class and progressive groups and to exercise pressure on Mao's party to restrain it from continuing to persecute the Chinese Trotskyists and other revolutionary elements. Because of a desire to collect the most reliable data, this letter was finished only in April. It was already somewhat late. But under the pretext of sending somebody to consult me about the content of this letter, Pablo again succeeded in holding it up for two months more (during these two months, Frank discussed with me twice, pointing out a few not very important places to argue about with me, and of course, there was no conclusion whatever). Finally, at the beginning of July, Germain came to talk with me about it. He started by criticizing the form of the letter as completely wrong, and asked that it be written over again. According to their ideas, I should have opened the letter by first expressing a total support for the movement under the leadership of Mao's party, praising its revolutionary achievements, and then at last come to the point of enumerating the facts of their persecutions and made the protest. Secondly, Germain remarked that the views expressed in this letter diverged considerably from the line of the resolution of the International, and for this reason he denounced me as a "hopeless sectarian." At last he said that the IS could not undertake the responsibility of sending this document to the different sections for publication. If I insisted on having it published, I myself was to be responsible for any step taken concerning it.
It was quite a surprise for me to see how greatly Germain's attitude had changed from his previous "moderate" and conciliatory one toward me. This time it was Pablo-ite through and through. I already understood that Pablo was absolutely unwilling to have this letter published; the reasons were generally the same as those in regard to the "Appeal of the Chinese Trotskyists." As to whether or not this letter was written "completely in the wrong way" in its "form" and is "hopeless sectarianism" in its content, since it is now published in the Militant, those who have read it can make an open judgment. It is least of all my intention to defend myself. Nevertheless, from the above views expressed by Germain as representative of the IS, one can see clearly that they expected me to submit a panegyric to Mao's party in order to seek conciliation with it. The conciliationist tendency toward Stalinism is again indirectly reflected here.
At this point, I would like to make a brief comment on the modification of Germain's attitude during these two years, which might be of some help to you in understanding his role in the IS and in the present struggle.
I can say that ever since my first contact with Germain after coming here, I have always had the warmest sympathy toward him. This feeling derived from my observation of his seriousness and devotion in his work, his sincerity and warmth toward comrades, his consider-

able political maturity and respect for our tradition in organizational matters, and I once deemed him to be one of the most promising new leaders of our movement. Although I had also noticed his lack of penetrating analysis in observing various problems, his impressionist temperament, wavering and conciliationist spirit manifested very often on important problems, and his facility in modifying his own positions, I still trusted that he would be able to overcome these weaknesses through the experiences in the movement as it develops. So when I heard among the entourage of Pablo all kinds of unfavorable propaganda about him over a long period, picturing him as lacking any independent views, or even as simply "a secretary with the function of collecting materials for Pablo" (in the words of A.), I felt quite indignant for the injustice done on his worth. When the crisis of the French party exploded anew, Germain openly opposed the arbitrary measure taken by Pablo. I saw myself how he was violently attacked by Pablo and the French minority, and often felt very bad for him. I had sent him sympathetic regard through my daughter, and he said that without the support of the German and Italian sections, he would have been beaten down long before. Precisely because he had this support, Pablo made special compromises toward him and promoted him as the representative of the IS to participate in the "coalition leadership" of the French majority and minority, and made him the "arbitrator." Henceforth, Germain was placed in the forefront of direct conflict with the French majority, and executed for Pablo the preconceived design which he had once been violently against. Around the same time, Pablo assigned him the task of drafting the resolution on the Chinese question, to put him in opposition to me. Ever since then, under Pablo's "compromises" and "promotions" (almost raised to the height only next to Pablo himself), Germain gradually abandoned his conciliationary position, and more and more involved himself in the trap of Pablo's bureaucratism.
Today his taking a position completely on the side of Pabloism in opposition to the struggle led by the SWP against revisionism and bureaucratism indicates how unconsciously he has fallen into Pablo's trap. I am still very sorrowful over his degeneration. If Pablo did not have Germain's support this time, that is, the support through him of the German and Italian leaderships, he would not be able to continue along his path all by himself, and a split might be avoided. From this point of view, the criminal role Germain played in this struggle is of decisive nature. In sum, I have to make the following conclusion from my observations and experiences with Germain during these two years: In many respects, especially in his temperament, he resembles Bukharin. He often wavers between revolutionary conscience and the momentary consideration of power. When the latter is satisfied for a time, the former is cast aside. For him to return to orthodox Trotskyism will be possible only when his revolutionary conscience is awakened by discovering Pablo's entire conspiracy, and when he realizes that he is already involved in a terrible trap.
I have learned that the conflict in your party between the majority and the minority had proceeded for more than a year and a half, was accentuated after the May Plenum and then came closer and closer to the brink of a   split.   If  the secretary of the  IS had really been con-

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cerned with the interest of our movement, he would have called in time an extraordinary session of the IEC, to discuss and examine the divergences of both sides, and to adopt a correct position in order to help the victory of the correct side. Even if this could not have been the case, at least the IS should have sent to the members of the IEC and to the leaderships of the different sections the documents of dispute in your party to enable them to study, discuss and express their opinions and criticisms, to indirectly help the conflict in your party to proceed objectively. Yet the IS under Pablo's control concealed completely the news of your struggle and all documents of discussion from the members of the IEC and the leaderships of different sections. For instance, in my case, it was only in the beginning of September that I learned vaguely about the principal arguments of both sides through a friend. Without this source I would have remained completely in the dark until the time when you published the Open Letter. The fact is simply that the responsible members of the IS had never informed me about the situation of the internal struggle in your party. Pablo & Co. adopted bureaucratic methods to keep the information from us because they had a design they wanted kept hidden. And now it is all quite clear: The minority in your party is not only the advocator, defender and elaborator of Pablo's revisionism, but they were inspired and directed behind the scenes by Pablo in the struggle, as is fully revealed by the methods they adopted and their conduct of sabotage. In other words, the degree and the consequence of split attained by the conflict in your party is caused directly by Pablo's conduct in the interest of his own faction.
From all these facts stated above, which I witnessed and personally experienced, a general conclusion can be drawn as follows: Politically Pablo's revisionist tendency in conciliation with Stalinism is totally unveiled by his idealization of Mao's party and its present regime and the illusions cherished toward it, and especially by his excusing and defending Mao's party for its persecution of Trotskyists. This conciliationism has already involved the Chinese section in extreme confusion, and even brought it to the edge of disintegration through liquidationism and pessimism derived from Pablo's theses. Organizationally, the astonishing and dangerQus point reached by Pablo's bureaucratism has been demonstrated by these facts —that he freely abused the name of the IS in privately suspending the majority members of the EC of the French party and in excluding his opponents at his will; that he monopolized the IS and controlled the IEC through the IS; that he attempted to and did create a personal clique, conspiring to seize the leadership of the sections, that he suppressed the documents which should have been published, and even those he promised to publish; and that he isolated and disrupted the normal relations among leading comrades, and he slanders, calumniates, lies about and deceives them. All these crimes that I personally saw and encountered 25 years ago in the degenerated Comintern under Stalin's control I now saw performed once again in the leading organ of the International under Pablo's control! The splitting of parties conducted by the minorities in America and Britain in the recent time, and Pablo's accelerated conspiratory activities to split the whole International right now were the logical developments of his personal ambition to usurp the whole International and of

his bureaucratism.
The facts enumerated above and their conclusions have sufficiently justified the exceptional action adopted by the SWP as necessary and correct
Recently a responsible comrade of the Chinese section (who politically agrees with your position) wrote to me and asked, "Why didn't the SWP proceed according to democratic centralism, trying through the international discussion to win the support of the majority, instead of issuing first of all an open letter (referring to the Letter to Trotskyists Throughout the World) appealing to all sections to throw Pablo out?" Comrades like him, who do not understand the true state of affairs and still cherish innocent legalistic conceptions, are not of very small number. It is precisely in an attempt to exploit this situation that Pablo and his supporters are making a great hue and cry, "The open letter published by Cannon is completely in violation of Trotskyist organizational tradition, and in violation of the discipline of democratic centralism"— hoping thereby to confuse and deceive comrades, and to cover up Pablo's own conspiracy to usurp the authority of the International by bureaucratic methods, of his own trampling on organizational tradition and of his own violations of the discipline of democratic centralism. Therefore, I made the following reply on the 8th of this month to the Chinese section on the question posed above:
"Although there are such serious divergences between the political views of both sides (referring to yours and those represented by Pablo) yet, if the IS could have maintained its normal and reasonable procedure, there might be and ought to be the possibility for a full internal discussion, and to arrive at a solution through democratic centralism. But the extremely unfortunate thing is that the IS has been entirely controlled and usurped by Pablo who utilizes this "legal apparatus" to arrogantly proceed with the organizing of his conspiracy by arbitrarily excluding his opponents from the IS and secretly setting up his own clique or faction with the aim of seizing the leadership of a section or splitting the organization. This has rendered impossible any normal discussion according to the principle of democratic centralism, and thus obliged the SWP, led by Cannon, to adopt this exceptional action of today, to publish the Open Letter demanding the expulsion of Pablo and his agents from the International's leading organ. This is really unprecedented in the history of our international movement, and is an action of revolutionary nature. This action has become necessary not only to crush Pablo's attempt at usurpation, but also to gain time in which to rescue the movement, and to reorganize and co-ordinate it in time to confront the approaching new world war and revolution. If the mobilization of this struggle should be prolonged until the explosion of the Third World War, it would be too late."
I also have to point out that Pablo's conspiracy of usurping the leading organ of the International during these recent years, and all kinds of bureaucratic methods of extremely arbitrary and absurd nature, have more or less been revealed on many sides. The fact is that our International as a whole and the responsible leaders of the different sections have not been vigilant enough, and did not exercise early enough severe surveillance, criticism, intervention and restraint. The result—this extremely dangerous and uncontrolled situation — deserves our   special examination and review.   Every responsible

172

member and every orthodox Trotskyist should derive a serious lesson from this Pablo affair. (About this, if you wish, I can offer some materials and views for discussion with you.)
As a last point, I want to tell you in passing that since the Chinese organization received the open letter of the SWP, its leading organ, the National Committee, immediately held a series of meetings devoted to a most serious discussion. As a result, almost all unanimously (with only one abstention) approved the views and positions contained in your Open Letter, and expressed a resolute will to participate in this struggle led by you against revisionism and bureaucratism. Having gone through this

discussion, they have recovered their original confidence, and are beginning to disentangle themselves from the confusions, conflicts and bewilderment of recent years. They are now initiating a general discussion in the rank and file in the attempt to re-examine all fundamental political questions according to the orthodox Trotskyist tradition, and to obtain unanimity and unity to march forward on a revolutionary party. I consider this as the first most optimistic sign in the process of the struggle against revisionism.
Fraternally yours, S.T. Peng

SECTION XIII: PABLO DECLARES A "SPLIT"

[Before the Open Letter was issued, Pablo moved to exclude his factional opponents from the world Trotskyist movement. A November 15 letter from the Bureau of the International Secretariat (Frank, Germain, and Pablo) warned that they would "never permit" the SWP to expel the Cochran-Clarke-Bartell grouping for their disloyal acts. Such disciplinary measures, they warned, would "place them [the SWP] outside our movement." This letter appears in Part 4 of this collection.
[With the appearance of the Open Letter, Pablo's supporters simply declared all supporters of the public faction to be "expelled" without awaiting a meeting of any official body. In Britain, the minority around John Lawrence announced the "expulsion" of Gerry Healy, and declared itself the "official section." This document also appears in a coming volume of International Secretariat materials. Lawrence's minority was expelled by the majority of the British Trotskyists for deliberately violating the discipline of the section.

[The December 25-28 meeting of the International Executive Committee, which was attended only by Pablo supporters and the representatives of a few straddlers like the Ceylonese section, "suspended" all supporters of the "Letter to Trotskyists Throughout the World" from the Fourth International. It declared that the pro-Pablo minorities in England and the United States were the continuators of Trotskyism in those countries. The decisions of this plenum will also be found in Part 4 of this collection.
[By these measures, Pablo made sure that his faction would dominate the "Fourth World Congress." The price of this "success" was the ten-year division of the world Trotskyist movement into two contending factions.
[Despite Pablo's threat that solidarity with the International Committee meant expulsion from the International, the orthodox Trotskyists were successful in winning a large proportion of the Trotskyist forces to their public faction. ]

1. Report on a Meeting of the French Pabloite Group
(A meeting of "sympathizers" called together through their paper.)
Wednesday, December 9, 1953 witnessed a meeting of sympathizers of the French Pabloite group (Frank-Mestre-Privas), an information meeting on the recent rupture of the SWP majority with the Pabloite International Secretariat.
Eighteen persons, including myself, were present at the meeting, which was gloomy and dejected from beginning to end.
Privas was the first to take the floor, dwelling on the "painful" character of this split. Many people smiled, said he, saying that the Trotskyists are in a perpetual crisis. . . But one must be serious in dealing with a question of this importance. And, no doubt by way of making a serious analysis, Privas explained that the bourgeois parties and the Stalinist parties were experiencing crises in comparison to which the crisis of Trotskyism was of the least moment —"the crisis in the USSR is far greater than that in the Fourth International." He had, however, to get to the bottom of the subject and try to justify the Pabloite policy. As painful as this crisis was — explained

Privas —it was not a defeat, it was only a stage in the building of the Fourth International: Junking left sectarianism, Stalinophobia of impotent grouplets. We have taken our place foursquare in the camp of the Revolution. Since the Third World Congress we have clear perspectives, we have a political line adapted to the new situation. Today, and since the Second World War, a shift in the relationship of forces on an international scale has taken form to the benefit of the proletariat. "The Revolution will be made utilizing the apparatuses bequeathed from the past." That is why we "must carry out a non-sectarian penetration into the mass movement as it is," the Stalinist leaderships must be pushed onto the road of revolution. Only thus can the revolutionary party be built.
There being nothing but generalities in all this, Michelle Mestre thereupon took the floor to develop a whole series of questions.
To begin, she stated that it was not entirely exact to speak as Privas did of the crises of the bourgeois parties and of the Stalinist parties on the same plane as the

173

Trotskyist crisis. For, she said, the Trotskyist party, the world party of revolution, ought not to meet up with crises inasmuch as it defends the common program of revolutionary workers of the whole world. Now it is facing a crisis, that is indisputable. Why? Because certain sections are abandoning internationalism for nationalist positions. This is verified particularly in the case of the SWP split. "Obviously it is easier to be a Trotskyist in Belgium than in the USA. In Belgium, there is no McCarthy-ism." In the United States, there is a terrible pressure against the workers, a McCarthyite repression. And the betrayal — for "we shall not mince words, we are dealing here with nothing short of a betrayal"—the betrayal of the Cannonites traces back to their falling into anti-Stalinism, an easy thing to do, of course, in the US. They have given away to bourgeois pressure. They have denounced the minority loyal to the International, the minority which is for the united front with the Stalinists. That, in the USA, is equivalent to a denunciation to the police.
But this minority which includes in its ranks "a third" of the party takes with it all the workers in the SWP. It represents the future whereas the Cannonites represent nothing more than the dead past They vulgarize Trotskyism in the USA; they have thus played out their role. Their task is now finished and they will be swept from the scene. Their abrupt turn in relation to the Lambert-Bleibtreu clique only reveals to the full their ignominy.
In their only internal political text document, one of unusual poverty, all their discussions completely ignore the war now in preparation. It is certainly easy to do this in the USA, but one cannot have a Trotskyist position without some appreciation of the totally new situation flowing from the war question.
Moreover, the Cannonites evade this problem by putting a question mark over centralism, in favor of federalism. They substitute for the International some notion of an axis allegedly formed by the SWP and Leon Trotsky which is supposed to have constituted the pivot of the International. In itself, this is not incorrect, but the SWP was no more Trotsky's chosen party any more than any other party in the International. They go so far as to criticize the Comintern for its centralism, in what was its good period. "How can one discuss on that level?"
Subsequently analyzing the SWP document published by La Verite (Bleibtreu-Lambert tendency) Michele Mestre violently criticized the "subjectivist" conception the SWP allegedly has of the revolutionary party, saying: "It is not true that there can be no revolution without a party. Quite a few revolutions have taken place without a revolutionary party, the (Paris) Commune, the Spanish revolution, the Greek revolution." That is all the more true as at the present time revolution is on the agenda and the bourgeoisie is incapable of pushing it back. Even in Greece there is no truly fascist regime. Fascism is a product of the period between the two world wars and can no longer take place. And we must not forget that it is the masses who make the revolution and not the party.
Going on further then to the passage in the SWP declaration entitled, "An Infamous Leaflet," Mestre said: "The Bleibtreu group gave out leaflets saying that the general strike was the revolution. This, about the August 1953 strike in France. That is not true, it was not the revolution. It wasn't even a general strike." It is absurd to attack the Stalinists during the August strikes. One has to be "mad,"

"sectarian," "utopian" to do that It is not possible at the present juncture to build a revolutionary party as the war is too near. Besides it is wrong to put on the same footing the betrayal of the Stalinists and that of the Social-Democrats. "To accuse the CP leadership at Renault, as did the people of the Bleibtreu-Lambert group, that is abominable." "That means throwing the workers back into the arms of the CP and the Stalinist bureaucracy. Besides, following up on this leaflet, the CGT bureaucrats could afford themselves the luxury of getting approved an excellent resolution on democracy* against two votes, those of the ' Trotskyists' of the Lambert-Bleibtreu splinter. We didn't denounce those people, we simply stated that they had been expelled from the Fourth, and that is a statement we will make again and again."
Finally Michele Mestre ended on the revolutionary upsurge reaching the USSR itself and forcing concessions from the bureaucrats, and reaffirmed her faith in the victory of Trotskyism.
With the discussion opened, I took the floor as a "sympathizer" to pose several questions:
 1.	The relationship of forces which has shifted in favor of the proletariat, what will be the reaction of the bureaucracy in such a situation, more and more difficult for it?
 2.	M. Mestre wrote in Verite des Travailleurs: "The masses are ahead of their leaderships." Isn't it precisely the role of revolutionary leaderships to accelerate this advance of the masses in showing them in action the betrayal of their leadership?
 3.	Privas said: "The revolution will be made utilizing the apparatuses of the past." Does this mean that the revolutionary mass movement will not turn against their treacherous leaderships?
 4.	"We must carry out a non-sectarian penetration in the mass movement as it is." Does this mean that the mass consciousness will not change in the course of the movement, more precisely that it will remain unchanged, the way it was?
 5.	Won't the Stalinist and reformist leaderships more and more brutally apply the brake to mass actions to the degree that the revolutionary upsurge becomes concretized? More precisely, won't they in the course of the revolutionary upsurge be led to unmask their reactionary role more and more clearly to the eyes of the masses?
 6.	If the CP leadership can, under pressure from the masses, play a revolutionary role, what need then is there for a Fourth International? One need only join the CP.
 7.	Is the war fatally doomed to break out before the revolution, or rather cannot the Stalinist bureaucracy, through concessions, delay the outbreak of war to a certain point, the revolution then breaking out before war preparations are completed?
To these questions, M. Mestre answered by justifying the policies of the CP and the bureaucracy, explaining that before the "true" revolution, we would see a whole series
* The resolution which M. Mestre regards as "excellent" is a resolution which censures our comrades (and a communist militant, cosigner with them of the motion) for having submitted to the Renault CGT Convention a motion on orientation without having previously submitted it to the union bureau. This resolution in defense of the bureaucrats is naturally entitled: "Resolution on Union Democracy."

174

of deformed states (such as China) which would rise up in the course of the war, which would be a war of classes. Above all we must not let ourselves be cut off from the revolutionary mass movement represented by the CP.
Finally, a woman comrade sympathizer, former member of the International, intervened to reaffirm the role of revolutionary leaderships, the role of the revolutionary

party in the revolution. It is, she said, precisely because there was no reliable revolutionary leadership that the Spanish revolution misfired.
Michele Mestre closed this hardly lively debate answering that, of course, the revolutionary party must be built, but the moment for that was not yet at hand, that the main task for the time being was to not get cut off from the masses.

2. Letter from Gerry Healy to the British Section

London Dec. 15, 1953
Dear Comrades,
The End of the Road
Just over four weeks ago Collins and Romney united publicly with centrists and launched an attack on our group. They denounced leading members as "anti-Soviet" elements before a non-group audience. This startling degeneration now drives its victims pell mell down the slope to further revisionist actions.
We publish for your information their "rallying call" for a "Conference." In doing so, we confess that it is almost incredible that after only four short weeks they should be capable to producing a document on so low a political level.
They shout, hurl personal abuse, shriek threats and of course wind up with a funeral oration on the majority comrades. Who is this supposed to convince?—certainly nobody in this country. It is for international consumption, designed to mislead those who have no knowledge of what has actually happened in England.
To begin with, where is this so-called majority of members? We are informed that they have a 58% support— percentage of what? Everyone knows this is a complete lie. Not only is the basic cadre intact and mobilized for the struggles ahead, but it has the full support of the decisive worker militants. For instance our Merseyside docks group sent the following statement to our N. C. of Dec. 12:
"We the members of the group in the docks on the Merseyside fully endorse the resolution that Collins and .those who supported him should be suspended and we wholeheartedly support the majority."
The representative of Pablo who attended their so-called conference, agreed without hesitation that the basic group was with the majority.
Revolutionary parties can be constructed only on the basis of great principles. These are embodied in the teaching of Comrade Trotsky in the founding conferences of our movement and in the 2nd and 3rd conferences.
Our group since its inception has loyally adhered to these principles. Yet without the slightest proof or explanation, without charges and a meeting of the LE.C, the General Secretary is expelled, together, we now learn, with Comrade Sinclair.
They made no public statements against the International, no rules were broken, yet they are expelled without trial or opportunity for a declaration.
If there was one single act which condemns the unprincipled basis of the Pablo clique, it is this. Pablo breaks the   statutes   of the   F.I.   in a manner only comparable

to the practices in the Stalinist movement. And these people talk in the name of the F. I.
In Britain, Collins and Co. join forces with centrists to attack the loyal internationalists. This action is endorsed by Pablo.
In the name of the F. L, Pablo and his clique expel leading members without explanation, violate the Statutes and then, in company with centrists, support a public attack on the comrades defending the line of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Congresses.
Such unprincipled conduct is therefore incorporated in the history of our movement as part of the basic education of future cadres.
We say in all sincerity that these actions can never build a movement and will never defeat the loyal Trotsky-ists in this country.
Contrast these methods with the treatment of Collins and Romney by the N.C. majority. They broke the discipline publicly after being warned three times. They were then charged separately in writing, provided with facilities to retract without reprisals and in addition guaranteed a conference in eight weeks. This is Trotskyist procedure. Need more be said to condemn Pablo and his followers in this country?
We are informed that the majority who finance, produce and sell the overwhelming bulk of the papers have now been deprived of control of "the paper." Behind the backs of the militants it has been stolen by the Pablo clique. This was the real meaning of their conspiracy all along. That was why they would not agree to Romney being replaced by Sinclair. Far from the fine principles of democratic centralism being involved, it was just an act of amateur thievery.
We use the word "amateur" because the strategic positions they occupy were not won as a result of group to group struggle. They obtained these as members of the section with its full support.
The fact that they now choose to combine with centrists and rat on their comrades who placed confidence in them, provides a certain temporary advantage, but it is not the last word.
We are sure that all our comrades will be incensed with this treachery; but let us be patient.
Loyal Trotskyists throughout the world are now gathering around the banner of orthodox Trotskyism. The Appeal of the International Committee issued to all sections is the beginning of a real world mobilization of revolutionary forces for the coming showdown with imperialism, its Stalinist and social-democratic agencies.
With fraternal greetings, Mason

175

^mmmm*

3. Letter from Gerry Healy to the British Section
London Dec. 28, 1&53 Dear Comrades,
Collins, Romney and their four supporters who were suspended from bur N.C. for uniting publicly with centrists against the section, have issued a call from "what they describe as "a conference of the British Section."
The origin of this "section" is about the most unprincipled organizational sleight of hand trick which has ever been inflicted upon our movement in this country. It is a fraud from beginning to end. Briefly its history is as follows:
 1)	On Thursday, November 12th, Collins attended M faction meeting called by Pablo in Paris and there agreement was reached to split the British section and recognize the Collins minority as "official."
 2)	Monday, November 16th, Collins announces at 11:30 a;m. approx. that he will no longer accept 'Q& discipline of the section. He is cautioned about theserioul implication of this, but he maintains his position.
That afternnon together with Romney they publicly break discipline. They claim that Pablo has given his authority fdr their action.
3)	On Nov. 20th they were charged in writing bef#e
a special meeting of the N.C. and offered the opjidrnSnity
of retracting provided they undertook to accept the Q*isct
pline, until a special conference of the groiip was WM
in 8 weeks from that time.
They refused to do this and were suspended until tbii*
conference.	'    ,;
 4)	The next day, Nov. 21st, Collins and Rx>mney call a meeting in London and announce that Burns Is ex7-pelled and they are the official section. They again quote Pablo ats their authority.	)3i
 5)	They proceed to call a "conference" on Dec. 12th, to which were invited people who had been expelled for mactiyifyi and others who were financially lapsed;'
This absolutely unrepresentative mindrity men proceeded
to elect a "National Committee" on the basis of which th^y
issued/ a statement explained by G. of Birmingham as
follows:    '	'.,.■"''.', '-.'.".  .'.!.''
*THe decision of the*"I was that Mason and Sinclair are suspended, and their expulsion wfll be moved! at the W. Cong, the members of the NC who supported them are suspended from holding office in the section, and the rank and file are free to join the official section which still continues,  under the leadership of the loyal supporters1

of the Irit"
Pablo and his "bureau" clique flagrantly violating the Statutes of the movement, provided "official recognition" for this farce.
Comrades may well rub their eyes after reviewing this unprincipled record. In the name of the International, Pablo supported a public attack on the British section, organized a split by instructing his minority to refuse to accept discipline of the section. He then expelled leading members of the majority, and constituted the rump minority as "a section" of the International After this is done and the "section" is secure for Pablo—all can join individually except those who are expelled.
Such conduct finds a parallel only in the "reorganizing" policies of the Stalinists and Transport House. A provocation is created to justify "official" intervention; the old organization < is disbanded—a new one set up which ail can join except the leaders of the old.
Pablo next claims he has 58% of the membership. Let us start with the N.C. This body included the leading militants in the group. The voting figures which suspended the Pabloites were: 11 and 2 alternates for, 6 against The two N.C members from Merseyside who were unable to be present at this meeting, have since agreed with the decision—so the majority is.now 13 and 2 alternates in favor, 6 against This is the main leadership of the Trotskyist movement in Britain.
; It is composed of comrades who come from Edinburgh, Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Nottingham, Birmingham. The Pabloites had only one N.C. member in the provinces (Birmingham). Leading industrial militants from the docks, engineering, electricians, railways are included in this majority. The Pabloites were completely routed on the docks and in the provincial areas. In the whole of the provinces they represent 6 people (two of these were financially lapsed members before the fight). Out of the Council group; 7 have remained with the majority—only two, including Collins, have gone to P&Mo.
line Jalse claim of the Pabloites of 58% is designed for international consumption and is a lie from beginning to end—nobody treats it seriously in England.
That is why we say that the so-called conference was
a complete fraud.'	; rfe  r•-.;.•■.	;
'.:i	•'.!:-. -Fraternally,
■ ■:-.'■-< '-v- ■■:'■■ •; .■<*■	Mason

4. Letter from Gerry Healy to ihe British Section
London
'   \' ■''	Jan. 1, 1954
Dear Comrades,
It is claimed by me British Pabloites and their sponsors in Paris that by some miracle or other they acquired a majority in our Party.
In  England this claim is regarded as a joke hatched up for International* consumption. We would like'to present some facts for our International friends so that they

should be fully informed about the situation here. These are intended only for the leadership of sections and are
strictly confidential.
National Committee
Majority 13 plus 2 alternates — Pabloites 6 (6 plus 2 alt London) '      —(5 London 1 province) 7 provinces Membership— (Fabioite)

176

6 only in the provinces (3 lapsed in dues before discus
sion)  ..'/'.,	" ' \ ',,..
24 in London (6 lapsed i& jLondon before discussion) Qojijwit group
Major|ry — 7 Labor counsellors Pabloites —2 Labor counsellors Industrial publications
Porrworkers Clarion (Mqnthly) complete majority control
Textile Machinery Worker (Monthly) complete majority
control .   ■	■ ■ .   v,%!   : ...:,i;.
Ttye "weekly paper"	.•,
Management Committee —Majority 5; non-party 4; Pablo
ites 2	"... " .','.",.',.   '.'.-...
Editorial B. — Majority 1 rPata^Ue&J,; non-party 2.
General publications dept A^.P^P.^td, complete majority
The suspension of the Pabloites arose because they combined with non-party centrists piv flie, Editorial Board and Managements committee against the section. They denounced the orthodox Trotskyists as. "anti-soviet" elements. One of the Pabloites,: Romney, draws money unofficially as wages from one of the centrists whom they are using as a spearhead in the public fight against us.
It should be understood, in the first place, that the Pabloites did not acquire these positions as a result of a group to group fight They were placed there originally last May by us. Because these are public bodies it takes a little time to remove them«but It will be done before long. The great crime of Pabloismi in Britain is feat it took treacherous advantage of fee difficulties of the section in its mass work to stab the orfeodox Trotskyist Organization in the back. This, Of course/p&ys some dividends in

the  beginning  because of our setup, but these are temporary.
The big centres for our paper's circulation, Birkenhead,
Manchester, Edinburgh, Leeds, Birmingham, Nottingham,
and London are firm majority strongholds. This goes
for the main shareholders group. It is just a matter of
time before we clear them out of the present posts which
they hold under false pretenses.	,
Under present conditions our comrades are forced to work with great restraint
The "conference" called by the Pabloites from which they claimed 58% of the membership was organized as follows. Besides invitations sent out to their followers, they invited people who had been expelled for inactivity over the past 6 years and others who had lapsed activity and had not been heard of for some time. Having reinforced their membership with these ghost fighters, they then expelled leaders of the majority and calculated from then strictly by percentages, taking great care not to mention upon what these are based. It was a fraud from beginning to end as any overseas comrade who knows our section will be able to verify.
We shall to very pleased to hear from you as soon as you can write to us.
Fraternally,
Mason
General Secretary BSFI
P.S.  Germain's reports on Britain are about as accurate as some of his past "facts" about Yugoslavia and U.S.S.R.

isr"
5,'Leiier'frbm QerriJ HSaly to t^t^^bn\warderuiu

Dear Comrade Leslie,	'    ,   i    /
I want to draw your attention once again to tbe.situation
in Britain in the struggle against Pabloism.	.!,
Yoiu are aware from my previous letter of jthf. background to the dispute. Under orders from Pablo, Lawrence joined hands with Braddock and other centrists and attacked our group publicly, for this act of indiscipline he was suspended. Pablo then organized a split and in twenty-four hours, without consulting' anybody, He christened a rump group of demoralized people his "section." A few days leter he published a public attack on myself in his *La Verite des Trayailleurs'r (December) and all we had done was to protect our work in the L. P.
That was in November of last year. Since then there has been a constant struggle under the worst possible conditions. Pablo's split was timed as a strategic blow against pur* six and a half years of entry; The Editorial Board consisted of Lawrence, myself, Braddock and S. (both confused politically on the question of Stalinism). For several months now I have been a minority of one on that Board in a constant struggle against an organized attempt to push the paper toward Stalinism.During that time I and our comrades have had to sit back and watch open Stalinist agents such as Human. Levy (the defender of Lysenko and the Moscow Trials) monopolise our paper

— not only^.that but Mrs. Goffe, a close personal friend of, Lawrence wrote into the paper specially congratulating Mr. Levy, Just think what the Old Man's reaction would havebeeh to this type of thing. You know, how. he estiV mated the intellectual apologists of the .Moscow Trials"; you know mat. £*vy was for years their chief man at ttje London School of Economics, and now we have Pablo's "chosen people" opening up the pages of a paper constructed out of great sacrifice by bur comrades and your comrades (Mike and Tony)' to be denied by Stalinists. And not only that Mr. Levy today under King Street instructions runs a book club, Lawrence permitted h$n to write ahiio'st half a page boosting this club — and why? you may ask. Very simple. The orthodox Trotekyists also run New Park Publications for the purpose of boosting and selling the works of the Old Man and our movement Lawrence gave .Levy a boost to counteract our influence. Just check your Outlook files on this.
Now this sort of thing was not only confined to the paper. It extended into the printshop. Here, Lawrence and Braddock and myself were the directors and once again; we were in a minority. Having joined forces with the centrists, the Pabloites then began to drive the shop into bankruptcy. They kept their people (three in all) full time on the paper doing* nothing except factional work  against us. As a result, a debt of £900 accumu-

177

lated at the shop and we were steadily going broke. They didn't give a damn because it was the money of our comrades which purchased the machinery and general equipment.
Right from the start therefore, Pabloism in Britain emerged as a sabotaging unit working to objectively aid Stalinism. ' Our ^per sales went down from 6,000 to 4,500 a week. By temporarily isolating myself on the Editorial Board and in the printshop they thought they would smash orthodox Trotskyism; Their whole strategy was part of carefully prepared plan. Having been completely repudiated by the overwhelming majority of the group, they struck at the nerve centres of our work at the points where we had alliances with centrists, and it was precisely these alliances which were a big obstacle for Stalinist work inside the L. P. left wing.
The British Pabloistswere not really interested in the fight inside our group. This only lasted a few weeks. Right from the word go they meant to cut loose and blast the work we were doing in the L.P., and Pablo, Clarke, and their Germainist dupes backed this to the hilt.
We set out to unravel this treachery in two stages.; Firstly we concentrated in a real campaign of reeruiting new forces from around the paper. We have now made 28 new members, and there is at least 12 more being prepared at the moment This almost offset the 35 which went to Pablo and placed us in a very favourable numerical group to group position. Alongside this we went tq work in a more open than previously TrD**kyist way to swing the readers groups of the paper in iqur direction. We used Comrade Cannon's "America's Road to Socialism" to good effect here, as well as circulating Fourth Internationals and Militants amongst key people. This brought excellent results. In Leeds the largest readers group in the country, the Pabloists wound up with one of themselves and one Stalinist out of 30 shareholders. Lawrence went there and informed some left wing youth that we were working on dollars supplied by American Imperialism (note again the familiar Stalinist technique). We went there arid routed him politically, as a result we raised' qiir membership from 8id 14." Edinburgh, Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, and Nottingham reader groups.all followed Leeds and Pabloism became completely isolated. The same held true in London.
Whilst ihi$ was going on we opened up negotiations with BraddOck and Lawrence over the business. This was only possible' because S. the trade union General Secretary gradually wbke up to what was going on around him, especially the business questions, and he backed a settlement which would place the ownership of the shop definitely in our hands. These negotiations lasted over 10 weeks and on two occasions after Lawrence saw Pablo in Paris they almost broke down. In fact they stood up because of one fact alone and that was we were forced to repay Braddock most of the money he had put into the business originally. Like all centrists, politics may be all right, and Pabloism not so bad, but the pocket book is considerably more substantial
During these 10 weeks they continued to provoke us oh such questions as the Levy issue. We refused to be provoked and restrained our people everywhere. Our group worked silently but at top pressure. Issue after issue of the paper went from bad to worse, but we held our sales  in   the localities   knowing that it was a matter of

time before we took over. We are very proud of our people here. As Doric can tell you they disciplined themselves to first of all taking the printshOp and then preparing for the paper struggle. At last we got the legal agreement giving us full control of the shop and so ended stage one.
We now opened up the struggle for the paper. In a group
to group contest for new shareholders and votes, our peo
ple romped home with 155 hew shares valued at £1
each—the Pabloites produced 20 and 58 transfers from
previous holdings. We smashed them here by almost two
to one. When the management Committee of the paper met,
we had six and they had five. With bur majority which
was only possible because S. came over to us, we blocked
every move they made, and set the date for the Annual
Shareholders meeting which is on May 15. The Pablo
ites at last were driven into a corner and then began the
most vicious stage of the fight	. ■'■
Immediately following this management committee Lawrence went to S. and told him that he was being "taken for a ride by the Trotskyists." He immediately informed us, and then it became clear to all what we were really dealing with. When a man with 14 years in our movement made such a declaration you can only come to one conclusion and that is that you are dealing with a traitor.
Lawrence then proceeded to suppress letters from our comrades attacking the Stalinists for attacking the paper.
Last Wednesday morning at 8 o'clock he turned up at the printshop with one .of his followers who worked for us as a machine minder. When I drew attention to the fact that he was not complying with decisions of the Editorial Board, without warning he swung a blow at my face bursting blood from my nose. His henchman started to interfere, but by then Mike came to the rescue, and pulled a knife on Lawrence. I immediately took it from him and Lawrence was ^put out of the office by the other printers. This terrible incident could have been serious, as it was all that happened was a,bleeding nose for me and a black eye for Lawrence's assistant We can produce a signed affidavit by noh group printers describing the incident as above.       ,
Lawrence then sent his man 'to the'Printers trade union
of which he is a member, and he denounced young Mike
as a mah "who pulled a.knife.> .'Aft this5 was done in ah
effort to get Mike's ticket StaKen^away from him At the
moment this matter h	id" Mike has*been
summoned before the union coi
Side by side with these ( incidents Braddock publicly
resigned from the Editorial Boa	ind the backs
of the board his letter and,,'bne,'. from Lawrence is published in a desperate"'attemjgt |o scuttle the paper.'All this coincides with/an attack on "die paper by the Stalinists. Braddock stops all 'financial..support for the paper. He^goes to the bank behind bur backs and tries to withdraw his security for a ''"£500 overdraft with which we run the" shop. In other wordsi_"we have one conscious act after another helpingtheStalinists;1; ,
You are aware that we are not weaklings in our group. We have had many faction fights in the past, but never acts of physical violence. The only 'pfebple we had these with were Stalinists —nobody else, and it is not an accident that the Pabloites run true tb form. I would like to say One word about violence. In our group we have some hard people—we have only to say the word and

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many things can happen, but we won't because we are Trotskyists. However, we will defend ourselves in the future and steps have been taken along these lines. Pabloite Stalinist scum will no longer stalk around using their fists and rushing to right wing union leaders.
Now in the midst of this "civil war" along comes Germain's proposals for a "commission" to investigate us all —to see if we are "bona fide" Please Comrade Leslie, forgive me if I speak with a little feeling about this political trickery and duplicity. If there is going to be commissions set up we've got some ideas. Let us set one up to investigate Pablo and Lawrence. For our part we will submit absolutely cast iron proof on the matter I have just mentioned.
The members of our section know all about Pabloism and its logical end Stalinism, and we will have no truck with Pablo committee traps. We have only one answer to make to Pabloism in Britain and that is to smash them politically and organizationally, and nobody is going to talk us out of this.
This "commission" proposed by Germain does not answer any of the proposals contained in Jim's letter and your request for the Congress to be postponed. It seeks

to involve you and Colvin in a scurvy attempt to involve us in sidetracking maneuvers. All the while Germain figures this thing out, the British Trotskyists are engaged in a life and death struggle with Pabloism for existence. This has been the same two-faced policy which has been characterised this treacherous tendency from the beginning. They talk about democratic centralism and discussion, and at the same time stab you in the back.
We look to Ceylon comrades in this critical stage of the fight to provide real leadership. Your paper and internal material receives the widest circulation here. It is read with great interest by all comrades, because you are a vital part of the world orthodox Trotskyist movement. We know that you will stick by your original proposals and not be sidetracked into fake commissions. We stand by Cannon's proposals contained in his letter to'you. We will act on these in conjunction with our comrades everywhere.
We know, and sincerely hope you will stand firm with us in this matter.
Fraternally, Burns

6. Letter  of  Chinese Section  to the "International Secretariat of the Pabloites"

March 7, 1954
The I.S. of the Pabloites,
Your letter dated Feb. 5th, together with a letter from the United States with the signature of K. were all received on March 2nd. We have discussed your letter and a number of questions in relation to this international dispute and hence decided to make you this reply.
Our Fundamental Attitude
Concerning the serious revisionist errors you have committed politically and bureaucratic abuses in organisational field, we maintain the same position which was expressed in our "Response to the Appeal of the SWF.
The reason is as follows: your revisionist positions are not only in contradiction with the fundamental spirit of the Third World Congress; moreover, it is in violation of the basic principles of Trotskyism. If you had presented your views only in the internal discussion, you had naturally the right to maintain your different views within the framework of our movement But it was not so: not having waited or gone through an internal discussion, and without being endorsed by any of the international conferences, you openly published these views in the name of the International leadership and in the international organ as if you fully represented our International, and applied them to analysing all events occurring after Stalin's death, on the East German Event and the French General Strike, and thus openly spoiled the standard of the Fourth International in front of the working class and toiling masses all over the world. This is absolutely inadmissable.
You  did not even stop there. With the facility of con-

trolling the international leading organ, you manipulated with organisational maneuvers to suppress and conceal the divergent views existing within the movement, to exclude your own opponents, and to create successively splits in a few important sections, and arbitrarily sanctioned several leaderships and rank and file militants of national sections who opposed your views, in order or in the attempt to secure your "majority." Besides, alone or united with Stalinists, you openly attack the comrades holding the different opinions than yours among the masses. . . . All these facts (just as exposed in-the "Letter of the SWP to World Trotskyists" and Peng's Letter to Cannon which have not been replied precisely and concretely by you) prove that you did not at all observe the attitude of "welcoming a discussion with facts and argument" as assured by you in your letter.
Therefore, as a leadership, you were the first to violate the party discipline, strangle internal democracy of our movement, and render all attempts of solving all divergences through the channel of a democratic internal discussion unrealisable. Under these concrete circumstances, it became absolutely necessary to give an opening to this struggle which had been suffering from your suppression, and to declare an intransigent war against you. Whoever still looks at this crisis confronting our International as simply a normal party dispute and would insist on the normal procedure of solving internal divergences in the present crisis is the most pedantic fetishist of democratic centralism. This fetishism can never resolve crises, but would prolong the spasmodic agony engendered by this crisis.
When we first read the Open Letter of the SWP we did not yet fully comprehend the depth of bureaucratism ex-

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ercised by Pablo and his faction, hence in our "Response" we advocated for following a normal procedure in dismissing Pablo and reorganising the I.S. Since we learned that the Pabloite faction, having expelled the majority of the French Party all by itself, proceeded with its arbitrary and bureaucratic practices in successively outlawing the majorities of the New Zealand and British Trotsky-ists, and fabricated fictitious majorities, and excluded a number of IEC members from this international leadership by this procedure. Consequently the International Committee inaugurated and organised by the British, French, Swiss and New Zealand Trotskyists as the means to rally all forces in the International against Pabloism, to prepare for the convention of the coming congress on a genuine democratic basis, has become absolutely necessary. We fully approve the constitution of this International Committee. We had previously entrusted Comrade Peng with full power as the representative to engage in common emergency action together with the other sections in the struggle against Pablo; now as Comrade Peng has participated in this organism as representative of the Chinese Section, we completely rectify this measure.
We have considered that the IS Bureau under Pablo's control has completely lost its role as an international leadership. Recently after we learned the real state in which the 14th Plenum of the IEC was held, we are further convinced that Pablo's bureaucratism has completely destroyed the IEC, and the IEC created by the Third World Congress does no longer exist as an official leading body of the FI. Henceforward, we shall stand on the side of the IC and unite ourselves with all sections who fight for the defense of Trotskyist tradition and against Pabloism in a common effort for safeguarding the Fourth International.
A Few Criticisms and Refutations in Regard to Your Letter
As to your letter, we judge that you are not able to justify yourselves on many questions.
It is true that we have made a very general criticism in our "Response" on your political thought as follows: "You assume that in the 'new world reality', Stalinism will gradually transform itself and adopt the Trotskyist program under the pressure of the masses . . . cover up in many ways the criminal betrayals of Stalinism. . . ." At that time, we grasped the main line of your thought principally through the criticisms made in the Letter of the SWP. Today, when we have read several of your principal documents (such as "Rise and Decline of Stalinism," Declaration on the East German Insurrection, and the articles written by Pablo: "The Post-Stalin New Course" and "Where Are We Going?" etc.) we further realise that your revision starts with Trotsky's fundamental conception on the Soviet Thermidor and the conception of Stalinist bureaucracy in the USSR as the first phase of bourgeois restoration, and you proceed on to reconcile the unreconciliable antagonism between the Stalinist bureaucracy and the masses; all that with the addition of your hardly convincing analysis of the evolution of the world situation, you derive an assertion that the basic conditions of the existence of Stalinism have disappeared, and thus open the way for the following conception: that in this present phase of the revival and mounting of the world

revolution, the Stalinist bureaucracy will reform itself under the pressure of the masses. Although you have never written categorically in your documents this formula: "Stalinism will gradually transform itself under the pressure of the masses and adopt the Trotskyist program and ideas," you have however emphasized constantly on the mass pressure which becomes more and more decisive in determining the policy of the Kremlin, that the Malen-kov era is tending towards the liquidation of Stalinist heritage, and that Malenkov is obliged to liberalise the internal regime, loosen its grip over the national CPs, and is obliged more and more to seek alliance with the colonial revolutions, and that its capacity for counterrevolution has become more and more limited.
Besides, you have stressed that under the pressure of the masses, the national CPs have not only yielded to the penetration of a trend of thought against the Kremlin, but have entered upon a process of transforming its own hierarchical bureaucratic relations formerly established, and you go on further: you place your hope and perspective of the socialist renaissance in the USSR and the leading role to be played in the coming world revolution on the evolution of the policy of the Stalinist parties and their disintegration. The formula as we stated above and with which we reproached you is evidently involved in all your make-believe assertions and analyses, and is the logical conclusion which you will inevitably arrive at with all your revisions of Trotskyist conceptions in your conciliation to Stalinism.
It is not possible to treat in more detail on this question within the limit of this brief letter. We are preparing another resolution on all the important political and organisational problems involved in this present international dispute in order to express more fully our opinions. But here we have to insist on one point beforehand that your attempt of placing China and Yugoslavia on the same level, and your assertion that Mao's regime is a deformed workers state, and the Chinese CP has already become a centrist party are all completely unjustified, false and contradictory to the reality.
In your letter you declare that another fundamental divergence between you and Cannon is organisational. You quoted from the speech made by Cannon on May 18, 1953, and denounced him of abandoning the principles of a centralized world party. We have not yet read this document of Cannon's, but from all we have read about the opinions or ideas expressed by Cannon in the past as well as in the present on organisational matters, we cannot find out this idea as you denounced. On the contrary, in this present struggle, the same as the enormous contributions he has made on the organisation conception in the previous struggle of 1939-1940 with Burnham and Shachtman and later with Abern, Cannon understands extremely well how to defend the genuine democratic centralism, and knows how to engage in an intransigent struggle against bureaucratism camouflaged under the coat of "democratic centralism." Democratic centralism is no longer a fetishist schema in his mind but contains the same spirit when Lenin fought against Mensheviks and Social Patriots, and when Trotsky engaged in the battle against Stalinists.
You made the claim for authority of a leadership, but the authority of a party leadership resides entirely in the   correctness in applying political and organisational

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principles. Authority cannot be maintained by organisational enforcement, by excluding the opponents, by means of intrigues and trickery. History has demonstrated by numerous examples that the factional conspirators in the attempt of establishing their "authority" are in fact merely usurping power, and fail eventually in confronting real tests. We consider that since Comrade Trotsky's death, the authority of the international leadership of the FI can only be built on the principle of a genuine collective leadership. This collective leadership should manifest itself not only in the mutual cooperation within the leading apparatus, but also necessarily in the intimate collaboration between this leading organ and the most outstanding militants of the older generations in the International and the leaderships of the various national sections (at least the most important ones). This collaboration is not at all contradictory to the principle of a centralized world party, but the real source of the authority of this centralized world party. The facts have proved that you are going in directly opposite way in seeking for authority; you are in reality demanding an "authority" which enables you to violate at your will the internal party democracy. This kind of "centralism" can trace its origin only in the tradition of Stalinism.
Besides, we have to point out two facts mentioned in your letter but which you are not able to refute and explain:
You say that the reason of your not having submitted the dispute in the SWP to the discussion in the IEC was that the divergences on the American question in this dispute were not "clearly formulated"; and you felt that what Cannon wanted was "nothing else than a pure and simple approval of his tendency and of the measures of expulsion he wanted to take against the minority." This sort of argument cannot be justified in any way. Whether the dispute in the SWP had arrived to the point that political divergences were "clearly formulated" or not, but the fact that the whole party had been divided into two different tendencies was quite evident; their divergences did not stop at political issues, but had already created serious organisational antagonisms. Towards such a serious conflict, the IS Bureau had no reason whatever to conceal it, to refrain from presenting it to the IEC for discussion in order to arrive at a decision, to participate in the discussion in the qualification of the International leadership, to refute and reject the wrong position "with facts and argument." And, even if Cannon were really like what you conceived to be, who had desired the simple approval of his own tendency and his "expulsion" of the minority, it would have been more necessary for you to present the dispute before the IEC for discussion and to formally expose and reject him according to the principle of a centralised world party.
You say that you did invite Comrade Peng to the 14th Plenum of the IEC. About this we have received formal report from Comrade Peng. He pointed out in his letter that among you, Pablo had once told him that his "Few remarks on the Draft Resolution on the Third Chinese Revolution to serve as Amendments," had been published in the internal bulletin, and that the "Appeal of the Five Chinese Trotskyists" sent by us was transmitted to the organs of different sections for publication; but the facts have revealed that all these words are not true. And further,   in  fact, during the past one year you had not at

all convoked him to any meeting of the IS itself (see Peng's letter to Cannon), thence it is clear that today you do not let him participate in the 14th Plenum of the IEC is not due to any accidental technical obstacle, but simply a step in advance from your preventing him from attending the meetings of the IS. Meanwhile, we know also that those IEC members who were eliminated or excluded from the 14th Plenum of the IEC are not limited to Peng only. According to the article "Struggle for Safeguarding the FI" appeared in the Militant, there are altogether 9 members of the IEC either being suspended or expelled. We can no longer believe that the other members could not participate in this conference also because of accidental technical reasons.
Comrade Peng represented our Chinese Section to participate in the Third World Congress, was elected by this Congress as one of the members of the IEC, and then again elected by the IEC to join in the activities of the IS, therefore his participation in the meetings and activities of the international leading organ is not only his personal right but also the right of the Chinese Section. We are deeply indignated by your deliberate attempt of excluding him from these international organs!
Statement on the Question of our Contacts in the Past On the question of our past contacts with you, what Comrade Peng asserted that we did not have a safe address is the truth. This is due to our bad conditions and our feeble material basis. Comrade Peng's letters addressed to us in the past, except through the methods of secret correspondence, by using an insecure address for a few times, were generally transmitted to us through our comrade in xx. All the recent documents concerning the International dispute (among which many are the principal documents representing your political views, are published as soon as they are received for the convenience of a general discussion among the rank and file of our party) have been sent to us by this same comrade, and this possibility of carrying through communications was obtained only a few months ago.
We have profound understanding about Comrade Peng. His greatest merit is his constant insistence on principles and his serious and upright attitude in conducting organisational matters. It is precisely so that he has become an unique personality remaining from the older generations of our Chinese section, who exerts steadily his efforts for our movement (those among our older generations who were not able to stick firmly on principles or were not serious in their attitude to our movement have almost all left our movement). According to the record of more than 20 years of his consistent, honest and upright conduct, and taking account of the facts of practical difficulties in our contacts, we deem any prejudice or suspicion on your part towards Comrade Peng not only unnecessary but unjustified.
Now we have decided to give you an address, and if you have any letter to communicate to the CC of our section, instead of sending to the last one which was no longer available, please send to: xxxx. And besides, send a copy of any letter you address to us in future to Comrade Peng in order to save us the trouble of mailing it back to him.
Central Committee of the Chinese Revolutionary Communist   Party.

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SECTION XIV: THE STRUGGLE IN CANADA

[The central leaders of the Canadian section were at first shocked by the issuance of the "Letter to Trotskyists Throughout the World." However, the open declaration of a faction had the effect of encouraging the leadership, especially Koss Dowson, to seriously consider and ultimately support the criticisms of Pablo's line made by the International Committee.
[Supporters of Pablo in Canada then sought to endorse the decision of the Pabloist IEC suspending from the Fourth International all who expressed support for the International Committee. This would have meant suspending Dowson from membership in the section before the membership had a chance to discuss the issues involved.

The Pablo faction, on the other hand, made it clear that a decision to support the International Committee by the section would be regarded as a "split" from the Fourth International.
[Despite these pressures, the majority of the leaders and ranks of the Canadian section demanded a full discussion. As a result, the majority were won to support the policies of the International Committee. At this point, the minority split and declared itself the "section."
[The article, "Pabloite Minority Split in Canada," by Ross Dowson is taken from SWP Discussion Bulletin A-17, 1954.]

1. Statement of Three Canadian Leaders
November 29, 1953
The center read the letter published in the November 16 issue of the Southern press with no prior knowledge of its essential contents. Since then we have received no communications either from the party (majority) or the suspended minority. The only other avaUable material is a document from the international center which includes a resolution that had been presented by the minority to the November Southern plenum and the resolution adopted by the majority suspending the minority.
On November 23 the international sent us a note which read in part: "The Cannon faction which has just publicly split our movement in such a revolting manner has passed the word around that they have your (Canada's) support in this unprincipled struggle against the organization and principles of the international. We refuse to accept such a claim without verification. We have always considered your group to be a principled organization and not just an annex of the Cannon group."
In order to clarify its position on these developments, on the basis of the information at its disposal at this time, the tops at a meeting on November 29 unanimously adopted the following statement:
The tops affirms the affiliation of the Canadian group to the international. We recognize the present leadership as being the duly elected leadership of the movement We recognize its authority and its directives until such time as a world meeting sees fit to replace this leadership. We fully intend to have representation ftt the coming

world meeting. We stand by the right and the authority of the world leadership to intercede in the affairs of all affiliated bodies to see that the openly arrived at and agreed upon line of the world meeting is implemented. Such actions are obviously to be constantly subject to the scrutiny and the critical advice of all affiliates and, should it be deemed necessary, complete reconsideration at a world meeting.
We strongly disapprove of the publication- of the November 16 letter which makes public property of the party's (majority's) differences with the international leadership. We consider this to be a breach of international discipline. We strongly disapprove of the majority's failure to advance its opinions through the regular channels provided by the international.
In the light of the information at its disposal the tops is not prepared to take a stand on the merits of the respective positions or to identify itself with the minority or the majority of the southern group.
We recognize both the majority and the minority as legitimate tendencies in the world movement —until such times as the majority breaks from the world movement (which we do not understand it to have done) or the international formally recognizes the minority as the official group in the south.
Kane
Fitzgerald
McAlpine

2. Letter from Ross Dowson to Farrell Dobbs

December 2, 1953 Dear Farrell,
Following the drawing up of the enclosed document we received your note of the 27th. This enclosed statement was drawn up to be circulated in our own group with a

copy going to Europe and one to yourselves. This document was our opinion as of November 29. At that time we had not received "Against Pabloist Revisionism" nor had we received your revelations as to Quatrieme Internationale's comments on Iran.

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Your Open Letter was like a bolt from the blue. Our connections have always been very poor with the International and the various sections. Our relations with Pablo have been most fraternal—they have amounted to our sending the odd report, their making some general favorable comment and our sending them whatever help we could scrape together. We had no complaints and since we have had poor connections with the sections were totally unaware that anyone else had any. Some of us have occasionally noted tendencies in the movement with which they disagreed, however we have never had any experiences which could be pulled together into anything meaningful. So as I say your Open Letter came as a shock. In everyone's opinion an unprecedented and unjustifiable act. We are at a loss to understand why your differences are not being expressed through other channels — particularly when we are so close to a world gathering. It is my opinion that you have prejudiced your getting a proper hearing on the political issues at stake by this utilization of the press, by this taking of the dispute to the public. The international to most of us here is a very precious thing.   We   are  not  at  all  prepared to toss it aside but

should it need to be reshaped are prepared to reshape it
Its reform does not appear to be your position and not just from your taking this dispute to the public but from your defiant recognition of the French majority. We assume the whole affair there will be up for examination when the gathering takes place —and in the light of subsequent developments it may be that we have to reconsider the whole thing. But I myself do not feel that any principle was violated by the leadership's intervention in France as your letter suggests. We intend to be at the gathering and will line up with any forces that we think it advisable to do so. I have not yet read your "Against Pabloist Revisionism." I have received your copy and hastily flicked through it before loaning it to one who at the time was in a better position to examine it. But even a casual glance through it tells me that you take up several aspects of the document that I disapproved of. Off hand it appears that we see eye to eye on the political aspects of the question. Should this prove to be the base we will present these views to the world gathering.
Fraternally, Ross Dowson

3. Letter from V. Olsen to Gerry Healy
Canada Jan. 10, 1954 Dear Comrade Healy,
I received your letter and document as well as two from comrade Mason. Thanks for your correspondence and for placing us on your mailing list. We were very much in need here of the information you sent. As I wrote to Lloyd, we were corrtpletely in the dark here when the news broke in The Militant We are over the shock now and in the process of coming to a position here on the events in the International
You are probably in possession of a statement from our P.C. regarding the matter. As I recall the document, we gave organizational support to the I.S. but did not take a position on the political questions. This statement was the immediate response to the "Open Letter" and I would like to say, a correct one on the basis of our knowledge at that time. The reaction of the comrades here was immediate and unanimous. The statement of the P.C. was adopted with one abstention by the Toronto group. It might be argued that we were hasty in making a decision but I don't think anyone here would react differently if the whole thing were repeated.
However much has passed since that time and if the same statement were presented to the Toronto group now I doubt if it would pass. We are at present in the middle of a discussion of the political issues and I don't think the present division in our ranks is definitive. Those who support the I.S. document are still not aware of the organizational questions other than what appeared in The Militant Your documents are now circulating in the party. They should have some effect
Personally, I have made up my mind. While I wholeheartedly supported our P. C.'s statement at that time, on

the basis of the knowledge we have now, my sympathies are solidly with the British and SWP majorities as their political position is expressed in the SWP plenum document on Pablo revisionism. I am assuming that the British section supports this resolution in its main line. Organizationally, I also support the majority of the two parties.
I just read a letter from our Western comrades and they are overwhelmingly in support of the SWP "Open Letter" in all respects. They of course were in a better position to know all the facts than we were.
They are in constant touch with one of the SWP branches and experienced first hand the operation of the minority there. This information has just come to us. Due to the distance between us, approximately 3,000 miles and for security reasons, correspondence has been kept to a minimum.
The party as a whole has not taken a position yet We have not been interested in pushing the question, due partly to the fact that we do not want a sharp division on this question at this time. We believe the question can be settled here in the cause of the struggle without any serious consequences. There are no differences on our work here.
We will be pleased to get documents from the British section on the political issues.
Your latest document on the history of the differences is very interesting. It sheds some light on the revisionism of the Pablo group.
We will be watching events closely over here. What do you think will come of the 4th WC? Is the majority going to be allowed by Pablo to attend?
Comradely Greetings V. Olson

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4. Minutes of Canadian Political Committee, January 31, 1954

Present: Williams, McAlpine, Fitzgerald, Kane.
Resolutions and documents of the 14th plenum read. Among the various decisions of the plenum was the following:
"To suspend from membership in the International all the members of the IEC who subscribed to the split appeal which appeared in The Militant of November 16, 1953, as well as the appeal of the Committee of the Fourth International or who approved it and are trying to rally on this basis the sections of the International.
"To suspend from their posts of leadership in the sections all those who signed these appeals, or approved them and are trying to rally on this basis the sections of the International.
"To refer the final decision on these cases to the Fourth World Congress."
The national secretary noted that these resolutions are immediately operative against Comrade Kane who supports the Letter and the Committee, is a member of the IEC, national secretary of the group and member of the national committee. They are also immediately operative against Comrade Thorne, a national committee member who cast his vote along with his branch which went on record in support of both the letter and the committee. These directives suspend Kane from membership in the international and both Kane and Blake from their posts in the Canadian group.
A vote was called on the IEC directive to the Canadian group:
Opposed: Kane, Williams.
For: None
Abstained: Fitzgerald, McAlpine
ALL NC MEMBERS ARE ASKED TO CAST THEIR VOTE ON THE ABOVE MOTION AND TO APPROVE OF ONE OR THE OTHER STATEMENT SUBMITTED TO THEM BELOW, or SHOULD THEY DESIRE, TO SUBMIT A STATEMENT OF THEIR OWN.
Fitzgerald, McAlpine statement:
We the PC of the Canadian section of the Fourth International have received the official report of the 14th Plenum of the IEC which includes a resolution to suspend all those who support the "Open Letter of the SWP" and the "Committee of the Fourth International."
We recognize that the IEC was completely justified in taking this action against the SWP and other members of the "Committee" who broke the discipline of the International and launched a public struggle against the duly elected bodies of the International during a pre-Congress discussion period.
We agree along with the majority of the sections of the international that this was a splitting tactic and we call upon all those who want to maintain the World Party of Trotskyism to repudiate the "open letter" and the "Committee" and participate in the pre-Congress discussion with the rest of the international with whatever political ideas they now hold.
We further urge any members of the NC of the Canadian section who have supported the "committee" and/or the "open letter" without realizing the splitting character of this stand, to cease to do so and unite with us in continuing the discussion, which has just begun in our section, with

the assurance that this discussion will be carried on in the spirit of democratic centralism and bolshevism. In asking them to cease to support the "open letter" and/or the "committee" we recognize their right to advocate the political ideas they now hold. And we further appeal to the Vancouver comrades who have signed the document now being circulated in the party, to withdraw this document which calls for support of the "committee" and in its place submit whatever political differences they have with the main documents of the IS in proper form, or any other documents, for discussion in the section.
The PC of the Canadian section which is now working in the hostile atmosphere of reformism (the real movement of the masses) in Canada which with the USA form the last bastion of reactionary imperialistic capitalism realizes the need, even more than other supporters of the International, to continue to support a disciplined world party of Bolshevism in order to remain firm against capitalist and reformist pressures.
Kane, Williams statement:
The national committee of the Canadian section most vigorously protests the decision of the IEC, refuses to implement the decision, and demands that the IEC repeal this decision immediately.
The Canadian group, along with all other sections of the world movement, is in the midst of a pre-World Congress discussion. The Open Letter is part of this world discussion. The International Committee from its declaration and from all the statements of its-Swiss, New Zealand and French supporters, is an international fraction. Its Canadian supporters are loyal members of our party and our International who look upon it as a rallying point for certain ideas now part of the discussion.
This decision of the IEC prohibits the free development of the discussion not only in the Canadian party but in the entire international. It not only removes leading comrades from the posts that the Canadian party in convention elected them to, but is a monstrous threat held over the heads of all leading members should they gravitate to the ideas expressed in the Open Letter and by the International Committee. The IEC by this decision decrees — CONFORM OR ELSE!
This decision excludes leading cadres of the movement from being delegates to the World Congress — their status is to be determined, following the opening of the World Congress, by persons who have ordered their suspension — persons who obviously hold the view that these comrades are splitters and anti-Fourth International elements. If lhis decision were to be enacted it would only affirm fears that have already been expressed that the coming World Congress will be a rump World Congress.
In the interest of clarifying the dispute that is taking place in our movement and the entire movement's Trot-skyist re-arming we demand that the IEC immediately repeal this decision.
Secretary's note — We had intended to attempt to present the essence of the discussion that flowed around the presentation of these statements; however this would be very difficult, raising  all kinds of questions of interpretation, etc We

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think it correct to note however for the information of the NC that Comrade Kane stated that he could reply right now to the McAlpine, Fitzgerald appeal—that he had not the slightest intention of submitting to an IEC ukase or the McAlpine-Fitzgerald appeal to repudiate his statements of support of the Open Letter or the International Committee. He expressed the opinion that the Fitzgerald and McAlpine appeal would only result in delaying decision for a week or so until we heard from those to whom it appeals— that we were going to have to take a stand on the IEC decisions.

Discussion on organization continued — General agreement that it would be highly desirable to hold a convention—if from the point of view of representation this proved impractical we should hold regional conferences. McAlpine expressed opinion that convention might be held before WC to elect delegate and conferences follow up afterwards. Counter opinion expressed that election of delegate must represent wind-up of discussion so that the delegate elected represented view of majority. Congress is being held at such a time that it would be necessary to hold Canadian convention prior to May 1.

5. Letter from Murry Weiss to Farrell Dobbs

Feb. 18,1954 Dear Farrell,
I spent two days in Toronto and had four meetings. At night I went home with two waverers and talked (that was not one of the meetings).
My general impression of the situation: The section is now right in the middle of the crisis. A national Pablo-ite faction has developed. We have a nose-counting majority in the whole section but it is just barely getting into fighting shape, forming an organized caucus and acting like a majority. Leaving aside the picture in B.C. branch internally, the national majority is not consolidated, working together or exerting its majority through the national committee.
The lineup in the Toronto branch when I left, after winning over the two waverers, is 8 declared and fairly solid majority; 5 minority, 3 neutral (hard to determine on which side).
During the last few weeks the shift took place toward the Pabloites.
I think my visit was timely and helped them along somewhat. I walked right into a full branch meeting without any chance to meet with our own people. I spoke for over an hour and seemed to make a strong impression. At first it looked like Murray [Dowson]andthe other Pabloites wouldn't speak at all but they finally made some weak statements and asked a few questions. They use almost exclusively the Germain line and formulations.
I hammered away on the political issues and kept coming back to them every time they raised some of Germain's formulas. Then I sailed into the organization question. One of the Pabloites accused me of bringing an ultimatum to the section because I said the principled issues were irreconcilable. I replied by demonstrating who is using ultimatums and edicts. Here they are sitting with a ukase suspending the three leading members of their organization. The suspension comes on the eve of the full discussion the section was launching. It gives us an indication of what Pablo means by a Fourth World Congress. I didn't have to present proof of my contentions regarding Pablo's intrigues against the British section, they could judge from their own experience, etc.
After the meeting I met with the majority people and took up the business you talked to me about I think all the corrections were made satisfactorially. We also discussed the strategy of the fight

Before I go into that, I better finish up on the matter of Ross' letter. He will send the letter to Ceylon but has no Bolivian address. He will have to use the Samasama-jist address for Ceylon. Gerry and you will get copies at once. You can use them in any way you wish.
At the meeting of the majority it was decided to set up an organized faction and go to work in military style to smash the Pabloite split.
We will get a convention call issued. This will put all questions into the branches and offers us a good backstop for any variant that occurs in the Toronto branch. Up to now the fight has been bottled up in the NC except for some very general discussion in the branch. In the meantime the Pabloites were building a faction and talking peace in the branch. It was agreed to cut out this farce and open up on them in the branch on all issues. The convention strategy does not mean the branch cannot go on record for the International Committee or anything else. As soon as they have themajority in the branch they will put it to a vote.
In the meantime they will bring into the branch the issue of the suspensions. The Pabloites are trying to straddle it In some ways it's a godsend, these suspensions can be used as an object lesson everywhere and in Canada they can force the Pabloites to the wall.
They consulted me on whether to send money to Pablo! You can imagine what I told them.
I advised them to answer all organizational tricks and questions with the simple statement: referred to the convention. In the meantime not one ounce of cooperation with a phony committee which wants the Canadian section to open its discussion by throwing out the leaders of the opposition to Pablo.
It is clear to me from this visit that we in no way could maneuver with the Canadians. They are going through a major fight which will end in victory for us. But the fight must be carried through and everything subordinated to its victory.
I talked with the Buffalo comrades who have a lot of standing in Toronto and we agreed that they would pay close attention to the situation and work with Ross to help out in every way they can.. I had talked to Ross about this previously and he was in full agreement. The best service the Buffalo people can do is to go to work on the undecided and the weaker Pabloites and see how far they can be whittled down.

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It seems that Cochran was invited to come up there. Now the leading comrades are agreed that we shouldn't permit such a meeting. I urged them to block it on the grounds that Cochran is representing the Pabloite expellers and is there to organize a factional split and not a discussion. Also that he led the disloyal walkout from the American party and thereby walked out of the genuine Trotskyist movement everywhere.
The two waverers I stayed with drove me down to Buffalo. It is indicative of how far things had gone that these two were on the verge of joining up with Joe Rose, who is now conniving with the Cochranites.
One final impression, which perhaps will explain the background of these developments. I am convinced that Pabloism, that is real Pabloism, has taken a deep hold in the whole organization up there. They don't fully realize it. They think they are all united in the work in the CCF [Canadian Commonwealth Federation]. And they are, but on a Pabloite line I'm afraid. They have become infected with this terrible disease of thinking mat everything can be solved with fancy endless maneuvers in the CCF, with "deep" entry conceptions.
In my opinion the Canadians will not get out of the woods fundamentally until they begin to publish a Marxist periodical of some kind and begin again the fight for Trotskyism in Canada. Ross told me he had been thinking along these lines. All their good work in the CCF could be utterly wasted and turn into the opposite of what was intended without a drastic reorientation in the direction of building a Trotskyist cadre.
In a sense I first got the idea of this international fight after this visit. We are really saving the world movement,

hot simply from some false resolutions and a clique domination, but from utter liquidation through Pabloist politics in each section. Just imagine if Cochranism had taken over in America by a creeping method, imperceptible, without a faction fight, and you can get something of a picture  I believe of what happened to many sections.
In the light of such an appreciation the Open Letter tactic appears in an altogether different light. It was a life or death necessity and not one out of many variants.
I am on my way to Pittsburgh in a few minutes. I will write soon about the tour. It's going great guns. The meeting in Buffalo was very fine. The branch here is really something. I've become very fond of the comrades here in a short time. It feels like I've known them for years. I think the feeling is mutual.
A carload of comrades are going to drive me to Pittsburgh as soon as they get out of the plants and we will eat on the road. Some of them will stay over in Pittsburgh for the meeting tomorrow.
Regards to all comrades.
Fraternally, M.
P.S. The convention method I proposed they use instead of two regional conferences — a national convention has more authority, in the world movement, and what is important is not how they hold the convention, but the vote on resolutions and delegates and the conclusive settlement of the fight, election of new Committee, etc.
They will be conscious of giving the most authoritative support to the I. C. in the shortest possible time.
M.

6. Letter from Farrell Dobbs to Ross Dowson

New York, N.Y. March 24, 1954 Dear Comrade Kane:
The IS letter of February 22 to the Canadian section and a similar letter they sent on February 15 to the Chinese Party are patent frauds. These letters attempt to paint the Pablo-rigged IS as a group of injured innocents in the international faction fight. They represent themselves as "Honest Johns" who want only to help the comrades "resist pressure from alien forces" and carry on "efficient work among the masses of your country." A simple statement of the facts will explode these hypocritical Pabloite pretensions and reveal that the IS letters signify the following:
1. An attempt to camouflage the real Pabloite political line. The letters deny the IS has taken the position that Stalinism will gradually transform itself and adopt the Trotskyist program under pressure of the masses. The real position of the IS on the "disintegration" of Stalinism, it is said, will be found in "The Rise and Decline of Stalinism." As in the case of every other Pabloite document, these remarks are designed to put over a revisionist line piecemeal while trying to conceal its true revisionist character.
In  "The   Rise and  Decline of Stalinism," the Pabloites

see the Kremlin bureaucracy obliged to liberalize itself and relax its hold on the Communist parties in other countries. Despite occasional right oscillations, they predict, these parties must radicalize their policies under the pressure of the masses. In his document, "From the Third to the Fourth World Congress," Pablo goes farther. He sees the ideological breaking up of Stalinism and assigns to the Communist parties a revolutionary vanguard role. For the Trotskyist parties he prescribes a more or less prolonged and a more or less total entrism into the Stalinist milieu.
Pablo goes still farther in La Verite des Travailleurs of December 1953 when he says the perspectives of the 1938 transitional program have been overturned from top to bottom. Such an overturn "from top to bottom" must of necessity include abandonment of the perspective of building independent parties of the Fourth International. Any doubt of this intent is removed by a resolution adopted at the recent Pabloite rump plenum, which predicts that for America the revolutionary mass party will be formed in a process of fusion with "left" tendencies through a series of phases and forms as yet "unforeseeable."
These piecemeal injections of a revisionist policy clearly add up to the following: Stalinism will gradually transform itself and adopt the  Trotskyist program under the

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pressure of the masses, hence the perspective of building independent parties of the Fourth International has been overturned from top to bottom.
2.	An attempt to falsify the political views of the ortho
dox Trotskyists. Opponents of the Pabloite revisionist-
liquidationist line are described by the IS as people who
live on past schemas and show signs of succumbing to
the pressure of alien forces. They are indicted for general
confusionism and pessimism. Then comes the real political
booby trap in the form of a charge that opponents of
Pabloism are attempting the "revision of the dual and
contradictory nature of Stalinism."
Pabloism discards the traditional Trotskyist analysis of Stalinism as basically counter-revolutionary. Stalinist maneuvers actually designed to head revolutionary movements in order to behead them are pictured by the Pabloites as signs of the transformation of Stalinism into a revolutionary vanguard force. This represents a revision in crassest form of the "dual and contradictory" nature of Stalinism. Stalinism becomes absolved of its fundamentally reactionary character and becomes instead increasingly revolutionary. Yet those who challenge this crude whitewashing of counter-revolutionary Stalinism are accused of ignoring the "revolutionary" side of Stalinism and therefore of violating the Trotskyist conception of its "dual and contradictory" nature.
Stated briefly, the following is the orthodox Trotskyist concept on this question: The Kremlin bureaucracy doesn't aim to aid the world revolution or overthrow imperialism. It wants to contain both imperialist aggression and revolutionary expansion, hoping to maintain the general status quo and become the balance of power between the imperialists and the revolutionary forces. This guiding line of the Kremlin accounts for the Stalinist betrayal of the French General Strike. Suppression by the Kremlin of the workers' uprising in East Germany explodes the myth that the Soviet bureaucracy is liberalizing itself, as does the Beria purge in the Soviet Union.
Recent political events in France, East Germany and the Soviet Union confirm the Trotskyist program of the necessity of political revolution to overthrow Stalinism where it holds the power and of the need to isolate Stalinism everywhere in the revolutionary movement. These events also confirm the perspectives of the 1938 Transitional Program, including the necessity to build independent parties of the Fourth International everywhere in theworld.
3.	An attempt to prohibit factions. The Pabloites falsely
charge that the orthodox Trotskyist faction led by the In
ternational Committee has split from the International. They
manufacture from the whole cloth the fraudulent accusa
tion that the International Committee is organizing its
own world congress. On the basis of these trumped-up
charges, the Pabloites claim that the orthodox Trotsky
ists are not acting as a faction. The object of this frameup
is to prohibit the organization of a faction in the Inter-
nation by anybody but Pablo. Those who desire to sup
port the orthodox Trotskyist faction are warned by the
Pabloites that to do so means to "leave the International"
and that "sanctions" will be taken against them by the
Pablo-rigged IEC because they have "split"
This Pabloite frameup for the purpose of prohibiting factions is exploded by the declarations of the International Committee. The IC has constituted itself as the coordinating body for the organization of an orthodox

Trotskyist faction. It has announced it will fight to conduct a full and democratic discussion of all issues in dispute, so that all the sections may familiarize themselves with the issues and take a political position before decisions are made at a democratically organized congress. The IC has stated its basic aims to be: Defense of the Trotskyist program and organization against the Pabloite revision-ist-liquidationist attack; and removal of the Pabloite u-surpers from the central apparatus of the world organization in order to restore internal democracy and carry out a genuine Trotskyist policy. The IC has made clear that it has not split from the Internatonal and has no need to split. It already has the support of the majority of the basic Trotskyist cadres and is sure of an even bigger majority in a democratic discussion. In fact, the International Committee is today the truly representative leadership of the Fourth International.
 4.	An attempt to paralyze decision in the sections. The Pabloites warn the comrades not to take a position against the IS before all the IS documents against the orthodox Trotskyists have been made known to them or before there has been full discussion at their projected rump congress. .No political views are to be decided by the sections until they have first sent delegates to the Pabloite rump congress and then received the report of their delegates about the decisions of that rump gathering. Baldly stated, this injunction to the sections means: If you can't make up your mind now to support Pablo, don't make any decision at all until he has made it impossible for you to oppose him without being thrown out of the International under the "discipline" of his rump congress.
 5.	An attempt to impose minority rule over the International. If anybody wants to remove Pablo from office, the IS states, the proposal should be brought to the Pablo-rigged IEC from which Pablo has succeeded in purging all opposition. The IS letter adds that it would be better still to come to Pablo's jerry-rigged rump congress in order to seek his removal.
With the introduction of this slick argument the Pabloite intrigue against orthodox Trotskyism begins to emerge in rounded form. Political confusion is sown by attempting to camouflage the real Pabloite political line and falsify the political views of the orthodox Trotskyists. An attempt is made to prohibit factions other than Pablo's by accusing the opposition of "split" and reading them out of the movement An effort is made to paralyze all political decision in the sections, except approval of Pablo's line, until he has put over his line at a rump congress. To rig a fake majority at his rump congress Pablo has sought to cut down his opposition by suspensions and removals in the leadership, by minority splits and expulsions of majorities in the sections. The delegates at Pablo's rump congress would be instructed to go home and lay down the law, ordering everybody to carry out Pablo's line in obedience of "International discipline" or face expulsion. These are the Comintern-like methods employed by Pablo in an attempt to impose minority rule over the International and carry out his revisionist-liqui-dationist line in defiance of the opposition of the orthodox Trotskyist majority.
From these facts it is plain to see that it is the Pabloites who are trying to stampede the movement into an international split at their rump congress. Fortunately they appear to have been caught up with in time to pre-

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vent them from causing a disabling rupture of the Fourth International.
In opposition to the Pabloite split drive the orthodox Trotskyists have raised the following demands: (1) Beginning with the reinstatement of the French majority, cancel unconditionally all suspensions, removals and expulsions; (2) cease issuing public statements not in accord with fundamental Trotskyist principles and previous congress decisions; (3) cancel the announced Pabloite decision to hold a congress next May or June, which would only be a rump gathering to formalize an international split; (4) cancel the special conditions attached by the Pabloites to participation in a congress by their political opponents; (5) withhold the scheduling of a congress un-

til after a democratic discussion has been held, instead of scheduling a congress before there has been full discussion. These demands for a democratic discussion and decision in the political dispute help to expose the Pabloite intrigue and save comrades from Pablo's trap of organizational fetishism. Most important of all, however, is the need for the Trotskyists to carry the political battle to the Pabloites. The main task is to make certain everybody has full knowledge of the fundamental political issues in dispute and thus reduce Pabloism down to its hard revisionist-liquidationist core.
Fraternally, Smith

7. Letter from Ross Dowson to Farrell Dobbs
April 5, 1954
Dear Smith:
am enclosing a copy of a statement that our minority here gave us at our meeting last Wednesday. Appended to it is a short comment that went with it to members of our tops.
We are approaching a showdown here. Upon the presentation of this statement I am confident that the minority expected that we would expel them. I have never thought that they would go through a convention and thus give formal recognition to the fact that they are the minority and on the basis of full discussion. But we are strangling them with democracy. The get-together is planned for next weekend. If we had a formal statement of break from them we would be in favor of its postponement. In fact there is a bit of a mix-up here with our Western friends ... it doesn't look like we are going to get much representation. Tonight I am hoping to get some definite word from our minority so that we can call off the convention and can arrange it more to the satisfaction of ourselves. We will go through with it however no matter what inconvenience should they appear to be going to stick along with us right up to and into the convention. We think this necessary from the point of view of the international.
The majority is solid and overwhelming. We have been winning the fence sitters slowly and steadily till now the lines are very hard drawn. The minority is down to a hard core of 5 here in Toronto, a couple in Windsor and one in Montreal. The majority has Toronto two to one, Vancouver unanimously, and all the outside points that we have heard from. The only important point that may still be on the fence is Prince Rupert but last correspondence showed him swinging our way. Of course it is always a tendency to write off persons you lose, they were no good anyway, and usually this is true when the lines have been drawn clearly in discussion as they have in this dispute. But there is no question that we have come out of this well. The majority comrades have grown considerably. You would have been pleased to have heard how they handled Ernie Mazey. Somewhile back  we had agreed to hear Murray and some one of

the Cochranites. As time went on I was for saying to hell with it but the majority of the comrades thought in the interest of winning the one waverer left in Toronto that we should go through with it . . . and we did. Mazey left here pretty well squashed.
The maximum strength of the minority is 8 and it is by no means a homogeneous group. On the whole it is composed of the weakest elements that we had. One of them is a non-political type who formally speaking should be on a leave of absence but he has been resurrected by the minority. The Windsor duo are a husband and wife combination, very demoralized, persons who have had practically no contact with the center and who also wouldn't be on the 'books if we had operated in a more formal basis. These two have long been friends of Joe Rose, long after the rest of the minority condemned him utterly. Another is a new comrade who is with the minority solely on a personal basis. McAlpine is the only real Pabloite. Fitzgerald and Wilson are the only two with any real ability and do represent a loss to our movement—however one that despite all our efforts could not be prevented. Fitzgerald will be deserting them within the next few weeks by going to Europe for a year or so. Wilson has long been a Stalinist conciliator — Clarke called him one not long ago to his face —Pablo with his trick formulations has really disoriented this comrade and he doesn't know what he knows. At a recent disr cussion they suggested to one of us that they had 48 percent of the Eastern part of the party. They have developed the happy faculty of just writing off the West where they have no one. The other day another one of them told a comrade that they had more than that . . . and he started to enumerate a couple of sympathizers in Montreal and added into it Joe Rose and a couple of friends that he has. When they pull the pin it may well be that Pablo will be circulating information to the effect that they are the majority of the Eastern section if not the entire section. But there will not be the slightest truth in such claims. They are a splinter of a splinter. The only effect that their defection will have will be a certain financial loss. However we have more contacts around us at this juncture than we have had for years and not only will completely recover in short order but

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go forward.
The Canadian experience has been a sort of test tube experiment Our minority never tired of telling us how the Italian International Committee supporters remained in the Italian group despite the fact that the majority came out for the Pabloite I EC. We agreed to go through a long serious detailed discussion with our minority which would be resolved at a convention. As the discussion proceeded they attempted to keep it on the organizational plane; we finally forced it on the political plane. As we proceeded to clear the air and win the majority of the party they commenced to balk at a convention. When the convention was inevitable and they were faced with a clear and indisputable rejection of their line they announced their decision to refuse to be a part, even as an objecting minority, of the decisions of the convention. The whole process should be of considerable interest to other sections which are still going through the experience. At our last Toronto meeting one of the comrades took time to patiently demonstrate through a liberal use of quotations that the Pabloite line was not at all the line adopted by the Illrd World Congress. They had always been hammering that our views were a rejection of the Illrd World Congress, representing its decisions as something engraved in stone as imperishable guides for evermore. But at this meeting they turned around — proclaiming that the Illrd WC decisions were not sacred, that they were necessarily revised by subsequent plenums.
Should we be faced with the formal split within the next few days I will certainly write you all the details — in fact in such a way as to be suitable for publication. If we have to go through with the convention to get it I will send you a detailed report of the concention. I hope you received a copy of the document, "Two Years of Entry." I would be interested in knowing what you comrades think of it Of course it could do us irremediable harm should it fall into the wrong hands.
Fraternally, Kane
I might add that we here are in complete agreement with the tactical demands that you make on Pablo. We have been following this line since Germain opened the door for them and JPC developed this line in his excellent letter to Leslie Goonewardene. We were also highly satisfied with the way you handled the Kane letter and are-agreeable to it appearing in an IB. I will inform everyone of the excellent developments you report in your letter to us. I assume from your Lora letter that you now have a  suitable address.
The attached statement was presented to the Toronto group meeting Wednesday, March 31, 1954. It was presented on behalf of 8 persons in the Canadian group (Fitzgerald, McAlpine, Ford, Dale, Houston, Wilson and D and J).
Immediately following presentation of the statement the Toronto group passed a motion designating the action of the minority as profoundly disloyal —the vote was 8 for, 4 against
The majority referred to in the statement is the entire

membership of the Vancouver group and a two to one majority in the Toronto group plus strong support in the membership at large. The minority is composed of 5 persons in the Toronto group and three persons in other Eastern points.
This statement that the minority refuses "to be a part, even as an objecting minority," to what forces in the Canadian group have stated they intend to press for at our convention to be held next week is probably without precedent in the annals of the socialist movement It is a crude attempt on the part of a minority to blackmail the convention into submitting to its will with the threat that it will split the party.
It goes without saying that no Bolshevik group would submit to such an outrageous threat Speaking on behalf of the minority Fitzgerald stated that should the convention decide to commit the Canadian group to the International Committee, which the majority considers contains the forces in the Fourth International that are fighting against Pabloite revision of our doctrine, the minority would immediately constitute itself the Canadian section of the Fourth International.
STA TEMENT OF POLICY
The faction that has been organized by the Canadian supporters of the International Executive Committee of the Fourth International, to defend the unity of the Trot-skyist movement against the Cannonite splitters and the political program of our movement as expressed by the Third World Congress and the main line of the documents submitted by the International Secretariat of the Fourth International for discussion at the Fourth World Congress, and is presently called "the Minority Faction of the Canadian Section wishes to make the following announcement of a decision taken by our Fraction.
Despite every effort on our part to keep the party on the correct road politically and loyal to the Fourth International and to persuade it to send delegates to the forthcoming Fourth World Congress it is now painfully apparent that the Canadian Cannonites presently called the Majority Faction are determined at all costs to deepen the split initiated by the Cannonite section of the New Zealand leadership.
This is clearly revealed by two motions before a convention called for early in April, one from Vancouver the other from Toronto, which call for affiliation to the so-called "International Committee" and the steps taken by the Canadian Cannonites to cut-off financial support to the IEC and the decision they have taken not to raise the levy for the World Congress.
Our Faction remains loyal to the principles of revolutionary Marxist internationalism — the fundamental concepts of Trotskyism. We refuse to be a part even as an objecting minority to any actions which would strengthen the hand of Cannonism in its struggle to destroy the Fourth International around which are rallied the overwhelming majority of the forces of world Trotskyism.
March 29,1954

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8. Letter from  Ross  Dowson   to   the   Canadian Section

April 9, 1954
Dear Comrades,
At its meeting of April 7 the Toronto group passed a motion that the national convention called for April 10, 11, 12 be temporarily postponed and a letter to this effect be circulated immediately throughout the movement.
At that meeting the Pabloite minority split from the party in the persons of all of its active supporters in the Toronto branch —Fitzgerald, McAlpine, Ford and Houston.
First item on the agenda of the April 7 meeting, held just three days before the convention date, was a letter from the so-called Committee for the Socialist Regroup-ment of Canada applying for membership in the branch. This is the group that Kelly (Rose) took out of the party some 9 or 10 months ago. Fitzgerald immediately moved a motion of acceptance. Prior to the vote being taken on this motion Comrade Kane read a motion that he said he would present should the meeting turn down the Fitzgerald proposal. His motion read: "In view of the fact that the leaders of the minority and majority had jointly agreed to freeze the membership of the party until after the convention which would actually prohibit acceptance of this application until then, and in view of the past relations that these comrades have had with the movement— only two months ago they called for a split from our movement to their Committee for the Socialist Re-groupment of Canada —with Comrade Kelly in particular having a long record of disruption of the Canadian section and its work; that we refuse this application at this time with the understanding that following the convention should these comrades still signify their wish to become part of the Toronto branch that we are prepared to go through a series of experiences to test their adherence to a discipline of an organization based on the principles of orthodox Trotskyism."
Immediately upon the defeat of his motion, Fitzgerald, in defiance of the chair that he speak on the motion now confronting the meeting, announced that the four supporters of his motion were leaving the meeting. When asked about the convention and their delegates, they answered that they would let us know, and that anyway, the convention was our worry, not theirs. With this they walked out of the meeting about 30 minutes after it had started.
This development comes as no surprise following the finalization of their whole previous conduct at the March 31 meeting. At that meeting they presented a statement to the branch which said that "We refuse to be a part, even as an objecting minority to any actions'' that would commit the Canadian section to what they call the Cannon-ite International Committee. This crude attempt on the part of the Canadian Pabloites to blackmail the party into submitting to its will with the threat that it will split the party is probably without precedent in the history of the Bolshevik movement. Despite this extreme provocation the Toronto branch continued on in its preparatory work for the convention. At this same meeting Fitzgerald replied to a question as to what the minority would do should the convention come out for support of the International Committee with a statement that the minority

would immediately reconstitute itself the Canadian section of the F.I.
Even this scandalous statement was merely a summarization of a whole series of previous attempts to frustrate the democratic processes of the movement which they commenced as soon as they became aware that they were a pitifully small minority —one that, as the discussions were proceeding on the political issues at dispute, was moving from weakness to weakness. As time went on they openly opposed the convention, attempting to take advantage of the difficulties that confront us due to lack of finance, distances separating us, etc. When the majority finally met all its terms —even that of holding the convention in Toronto and assuring them at the March 31 meeting that despite the fact that their strength did warrant it we were prepared to give them 2 of the 5 delegates apportioned to Toronto — two days prior to the convention they used the ruse of a membership application of the Kelly clique to split from the party.
The Toronto branch, what with the split of the Pabloites, feels that it is justified in asking for postponement of the convention. The irreconcilable hostility of the Canadian party to Pabloite revisionism of orthodox Trotskyism has been clearly established in the process of the pre-convention discussion. Through their split the Pabloites have removed the pressure upon the party to formally establish it through a convention at this time. We are of the opinion that the party can now digest this last, final lesson of the incompatibility of Pablism with Trotskyism and go about the business of making more rounded preparations for its 3rd convention. The April date as you know was set entirely to meet the schedule of Fitzgerald's leaving the country and the date of the Pabloite rump Fourth World Congress. We suggest that following close consultation of all sections of the party a new date for the convention be arrived at.
The Toronto branch, the only place in the party where the Pabloites had any real strength, comes out of this dispute with higher spirits, increased confidence in itself and increased strength. The defection of the 5 Pabloites will have no deteriorating effect on the branch other than for a short period of financial difficulties. The branch is firm and has developed in political stature considerably. At this juncture it has more contacts around it than it has had for years. In only a few months it should be back again at its previous numerical strength and with a considerable addition to its hitting power.
We warn the party to take no heed of the grandiose claims that the Pablists will no doubt be making of their strength. They are a miserable and demoralized handful. They will probably be claiming, as their British counter-parts did, to be in some way the majority of our party. They will possibly be claiming the support of two persons in Windsor who have been nothing more than sym-athizers for several years, three persons in Montreal (2 who themselves recognize their status as merely sympathizers of the movement) the Kelly group (4) which Fitzgerald-McAlpine themselves declared in a PC letter dated February 6 (2 months ago) to be sectarian opponents to our entry into the mass movement and disrupters of our work in the unions and mass movement who  have merely "seized upon the dispute in the Inter-

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national  to further disrupt the Canadian party and its work."
This unprincipled combination is without perspective and doomed in short order to blow apart. The Canadian section of the Fourth International moves forward going

about its task of building the forces for the mass party of the Canadian proletarian revolution.
Fraternally, Kane

9. "Pabloiie Minority Split in Canada,"by Ross Dowson
The supporters of Pablo have splintered from the Canadian section of the Fourth International. They pulled out two days prior to a national convention scheduled to formally determine the position of the Canadian section on the struggle that the international forces of Trotskyism have been waging against Pabloist liquidationism.
Immediately following their walkout they announced a farcical reconstitution of the Canadian section of the Fourth International under their auspices, and their intention to endorse a person, to masquerade as a delegate from the Canadian section to the Pabloite rump Fourth World Congress.
The Pabloists claim to represent the majority of Trot-skyists in the most highly industrialized section of the country and 35 percent of the movement nationally. The mechanics behind the trick of setting themselves up as THE Canadian section of the Fourth International, while only1 claiming to have a minority of 35 percent of the Trotskyists in Canada, are: that to support the International Committee (which is an international faction already speaking for the basic cadres of Leon Trotsky's Fourth International), is to have split from the Fourth International. Pablo—who had been entrusted by the Third World Congress to carry its line and who has completely revised it, at the same time high-handedly purging from its continuing bodies all those who opposed his traitorous course—he says so, and It is therefore so.
White the Pabloists remained in the Canadian section, that is up until last week, they recognized that the forces Of Orthodox Trotskyism were the overwhelming majority, and not just 65 percent either. The West, representing one half of the numerical strength of the movement, was almost 100 percent in support of the International Committee. The Pabloists were never able to rally more than one-third of the forces in the main Eastern concentration.
Now, having deserted the party, the Pabloists suddenly claim to have 35 percent of the Canadian Trotskyists. But like the earlier reports of Mark Twain's death, this is an exaggeration--in fact it is a lie of the whole cloth.
Their .splintering off from the movement was heralded on April 7 by a pitiful handful walking out of the only party group where they had influence. This miserable little group is attempting to deceive itself, probably more than anyone else who might be interested, by going through the motions of adding to itself a scattering of persons who are more or less sympathizers of the movement, a handful of disreputable elements who walked out of the section 10 months ago after almost three years of sectarian disruption of the party's work, and then, through a series of arithmetical manipulations, turning up with the total of 35 percent. The bulk of them are persons who have become demoralized and defeated under the difficulties of attempting

to build the revolutionary party.
The Canadian section remains solid and confident of its capacity to build the mass Marxist party of the Canadian revolution. Its cadre, in the process of coming to grips with the revisionist concepts of the Pabloists, has tremendously matured, developing a clearer concept of its tasks and in short order will more than make up for whatever it lost through the Pabloist desertion.
The Canadian section's experience with Pabloism has been a rich one. Last November the Socialist Workers Party, in an open letter to Trotskyists throughout the world warned against Pablo's international faction which was revising Trotskyist fundamentals and purging its opponents from the movement The Canadian Political Committee, admitting inadequacy of information, made the mistake of disapproving the act of an open statement, while declaring its neutrality on the political issues at dispute. Pablo and his aides quickly circulated the International to the effect that Canada supported his politics as against the views of his opponents.
Immediately, in keeping with its democratic traditions, a wide open discussion developed within the Canadian section. Very shortly some of the party's main concentrations, along with the majority of its national committee, made known their political support of the SWP Open Letter and of the International Committee that had been organized by the French, British, Swiss, New Zealand and Chinese sections. No sooner was this a fact than did Pablo, through a rump meeting of the International Executive Committee, suspend, along with all other IEC members who took similar positions, the Canadian national secretary who had been elected to the IEC by the Third World Congress. At the same time the Pabloite IEC suspended the majority of the leadership of the Canadian section from the posts that the Canadian section in convention had elected them to.
The two leading Canadian Pabloists expressed their complete agreement with Pablo's Stalin-like attempt to decapitate the Canadian section with the astounding comment that, due to the nature and the political level of the Canadian section, this instruction was inoperative here. The Canadian section of course refused out-of-hand to submit to the Pablo ukase.
With the refusal of the Canadian section to be stampeded by him and his pitiful handful of supporters through false accusations of split, Pablo made a slight tack in his course. Ignoring the refusal to implement his orders, he wrote, "Take the time to know and discuss all the documents of the International on the crisis . . . adjourn your final decision until you have heard the reports of your representatives to the World Congress."
This tactical shift from plying the axe to an attempt to

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seduce sections into not taking positions on documents up for discussion, urging them to send along delegates chosen by undetermined means on undetermined views to vote an international policy and international leadership — which would be discussed and approved later by national sections when everything is sealed, signed and delivered — resulted in a sudden veer on the part of his Canadian supporters to get out from under a national convention which they themselves had proposed be held to determine the position of the Canadian section.
Early in the dispute, when it had already become apparent that the overwhelming majority of the section supported the International Committee, one of the leading Pabloites stated that he would never submit to the Canadian section supporting the IC without a full-fledged convention. As this was agreeable to all, plans for such a convention were immediately made.
During the pre-convention discussion it was only with the greatest difficulty that the party was able to force the discussion from the organizational plane onto the. political issues at dispute. The Pabloites at first claimed that there were no real political differences. But once the discussion got underway, on the East German uprising, the French General Strike, the political revolution in the USSR, Stalinism, and finally the orientation of the Canadian section itself, their deep-going differences were brought out.
All this time the documents of the Pabloist International
Executive Committee were freely circulated. A leading
spokesman of Pablo's Cochranite suppprters was even
permitted to address one of the main party groups. But,
the Pabloites were strangling on this democracy. Tne
Trotskyist cadres of the movement rallied to the defense
of their doctrine, and the Pabloites moved from weakness
to weakness.	0	>,,. .
As the convention approached* and in receipt of Pablo's instructions, the Pabloites commenced to desperately attempt to get out from under it. One week before their walkout the minority presented a statement bewailing the apparent fact that the convention was going to ally the Canadian section with the International Committee. The statement flung in the face of the party the challenge that the Pabloists "refuse to be a part, even as an objecting minority," to such an action.
Despite the disloyal statements of leading minorityites and this outrageous attempt to blackmail the party into not carrying put its democratic will, the majority remained unprovoked. Their very failure to provoke the majority into any disciplinary actions against their disloyal conduct only goaded the Pabloists into greater fury.
They revealed that they were collaborating with a hand; ful of sectarian disrupters who had walked put of the party,   along with   some  party property, some  10 months

previously, and who, when the international dispute erup- ? ted, had come to life again only in order to announce their ] enthusiastic support of Pablo and call for a split from the party to their soTcalled Committee for Socialist Regroup-ment At the time of this split appeal the Pabloists sharply dissociated themselves from this Committee, labelling them disrupters of the party "who have seized upon the dispute in the International to further disrupt the party and its work."
At a meeting two days prior to the convention, in collusion with these disrupters, the Pabloites presented their applications for re-admission to the party. The majority, in view of the pre-convention agreement to freeze the membership, voted that the applications be held over until after the convention arid further experience could be had with these persons. With this the minority stomped out
The next day the Pabloists circulated a statement over the name of three leading members which bore the, return address of the so-called Committee for the Socialist Re-groupment. In the statement the Pabloites label the party convention a rump convention without authority .They condemn the convention for lack of documentation although the minority presented no documentation whatsoever, not even a statement on its own behalf all during the discussion, other than its infamous threat that it would not be a minprity, even an objecting minority.
They, condemn the convention for its alleged non-representative character^its failure to represent "the real relationship of forces." Part of the evidence to back up this charge is that the basis of representation to which they had previously agreed does not allow voting representation to- a point where the party had one member, and that the split-calling deserters, the so-called Committee for Socialist Re-groupmer«t» do not have representation at the convention of the Canadian section of the Fourth, International
The Canadian experience demonstrates, that Pabloism
considers itself to be completely incompatible with orthodox
Trotskyism; that Pabloism is tptally unprepared, to accept
a position of a loyal minority within th& ranks of .any
of the parties of the, Fourth International The Canadian
experience confirms to,the hilt the charge that Pabloism is
attempting to liquidate the Fourth International, to wreck
and disperse the precious cadres pi,international Trotsky
ism,	.-      ■ ■,,. , ■
The solidity of the Canadian section, now in alliance with
its co-thinkers in the International Committee of the Fourth
International, who already encompass the overwhelming
majority of the forces of the Fourth International, is strik
ing testimony to the indestructible temper of Leon Trotsky's
world movement, against its enemies from within as well
as its class enemy without	,i:    v,
April 9, 1954

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