Contents Preface 9 Chronology 12 The uprising of November 7, 1927 (January 2, 1932) 15 A letter to the Politburo (January 4, 1932) 18 The Left Opposition and the Right Opposition (Published January 1932) 22 Internal polemics and the party press (January 5, 1932) 26 Reply to the Jewish group in the Communist League of France (January 15, 1932) 28 No deal with German government (January 23, 1932) 34 Is Stalin weakening or the Soviets? (January 1932) 35 For collaboration despite differences (February 10, 1932) 49 Answers to questions by the New York Times (February 15, 1932) 50 From a letter to Simon and Schuster (February 26, 1932) 57 Interview by the Associated Press (February 26, 1932) 58 Interview by the United Press (February 29, 1932) 64 On being deprived of Soviet citizenship (March 1, 1932) 69 A correction on Rakovsky (March 15, 1932) 81 A word of welcome to Osvobozhdenie (March 29, 1932) 83 I see war with Germany (Published April 1932) 85 The left Social Democrats (April 12, 1932) 93 On a political novel (April 13, 1932) 94 Answers to questions by the Chicago Daily News (April 23, 1932) 96 The foundations of socialism (May 1932) 99 A reply to May Day greetings (May 4, 1932) 104 Blocs and absurdities (May 6, 1932) 106 The labor party question in the United States (May 19, 1932) 108 International and national questions (May 19, 1932) 113
Who should attend the international conference? (May 22, 1932) 114 To the Communist League of Struggle (May 22, 1932) 120 To a Bulgarian worker in the U.S. (May 24, 1932) 127 Closer to the proletarians of the colored races! (June 13, 1932) 128 The coming congress against war (June 13, 1932) 131 Why I signed Radek s theses on Germany (June 14, 1932) 137 The Stalin bureaucracy in straits (June 16, 1932) 140 A letter to the workers of Zurich (June 25, 1932) 147 Hands off Rosa Luxemburg! (June 28, 1932) 152 An appeal for the Biulleten (July 1932) 165 On Demyan Bedny (July 1932) 167 Declaration to the antiwar congress at Amsterdam (July 25, 1932) 172 Pilsudskism, fascism, and the character of our epoch (August 4, 1932) 181 Intensify the offensive! (August 6, 1932) 192 Three letters to Lazar Kling (February 9 August 7, 1932) 195 Perspectives of the upturn (August 18, 1932) 200 A conversation with Trotsky (August 25, 1932) 204 Greetings to the Polish Left Opposition (August 31, 1932) 209 Fourteen questions on Soviet life and morality (September 17, 1932) 212 Peasant war in China and the proletariat (September 22, 1932) 223 Do not ask so long (September 22, 1932) 234 From the archives (September 1932) 236 A proposal to an American editor (Published October 1932) 244 For a strategy of action, not speculation (October 3, 1932) 246 Preface to the Polish edition of Lenin s Left-Wing Communism, an Infantile Disorder (October 6, 1932) 256 Zigzags and eclectic nonsense (October 7, 1932) 264 Fifteen years! (October 13, 1932) 267 The Twelfth Plenum of the Comintern (October 13, 1932) 269 A letter to Weisbord (October 13, 1932) 272 Mill as a Stalinist agent (October 1932) 274 The lesson of Mill s treachery (October 13, 1932) 277 The expulsion of Zinoviev and Kamenev (October 19, 1932) 283
On Field and Weisbord (October 20, 1932) 296 The Soviet economy in danger (October 22, 1932) 300 Leninism and Stalinism (October 1932) 331 Greetings to The Militant (November 1, 1932) 338 Perspectives of American Marxism (November 4, 1932) 341 To friends in Frankfurt (November 5, 1932) 350 Field s future role (November 13, 1932) 352 Stalin again testifies against Stalin (Autumn 1932) 354 A suppressed speech of Lenin (Autumn 1932) 359 To Greek friends en route to Copenhagen (November 19, 1932) 366 Press statement at Marseilles (November 21, 1932) 367 Press statement on leaving Dunkirk (November 22, 1932) 369 Press statement on reaching Esbjerg (November 23, 1932) 370 An interview by Social-Demokraten (November 23, 1932) 371 An interview by Politiken (November 23, 1932) 375 Radio message to the United States (November 27, 1932) 378 Questions for Communists (November 1932) 384 To an unknown comrade (November 1932) 387 Literary projects and political considerations (November 1932) 388 On students and intellectuals (November 1932) 391 A Bolshevik-Leninist declaration on Comrade Trotsky s journey (November 1932) 395 Answers to journalists questions (December 3, 1932) 398 An open letter to Vandervelde (December 5, 1932) 401 A telegram to Herriot (December 7, 1932) 405 Press statement at Brindisi (December 8, 1932) 407 Press statement at Istanbul (December 11, 1932) 410 Appendix Interview on proletarian literature by Maurice Parijanine (April 1932) 411 Notes and acknowledgments 423 Other writings of 1932 481 Works of Leon Trotsky published by Pathfinder 482 Index 483
Preface Exiled from the Soviet Union in 1929, Leon Trotsky spent the next four and a half years in Turkey, except for a month in 1932 when he went to Copenhagen to make a speech. The present volume deals with his writings during the fourth year of his stay in Turkey, including the Copenhagen month (November December), or, to be more precise, all of 1932 except its last half-month. It was a year of acute ferment and instability. The Soviet Union had not yet recovered from the severe economic dislocations resulting from the bureaucratic collectivization of agriculture, and its workers carried the full brunt of the sacrifices demanded by accelerated industrialization; political dissent was brutally repressed. Trotsky s analysis of these developments in The Soviet Economy in Danger and The Expulsion of Zinoviev and Kamenev remains superior to that made by anyone else at that time. His own victimization in February, when the Kremlin deprived him of his Soviet citizenship, was answered in a stinging Open Letter to the Central Executive Committee of the USSR, in which he called on the members of that body to carry out Lenin s last appeal and remove Stalin from the Soviet leadership. In the major capitalist countries, staggering under the highest level of unemployment in history, political shifts reflected the radicalization of the masses and the polarization of society. In May, parliamentary elections in France led to the replacement of a conservative government by a liberal one; in November, a similar result was obtained when Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected president of the United States. In Austria, on the other hand, a right-wing coalition took over in May, and in Germany three different chancellors tried to rule as the Nazis gained strength at the ballot box and prepared for their takeover of the German government, which came early in 1933. Trotsky s major writings of 1932 on the Ger- 9
10 / writings of leon trotsky (1932) man crisis are collected in The Struggle Against Fascism in Germany (Pathfinder Press, 1971), but important aspects of his views are represented here in such essays as I See War with Germany, written around a year before the Nazi victory. In the Far East the Japanese militarists, who had invaded Northeast China in September 1931, consolidated their position in Manchuria and established the puppet state of Manchukuo ; the League of Nations, sponsor of numerous disarmament and peace conferences, did not take long to reveal its total impotence. Trotsky discussed these events and their relation to world politics in his answers to journalists. In addition, he turned his attention to the Chinese Communist Party s latest activities in letters to his Chinese comrades entitled Peasant War in China and the Proletariat and For a Strategy of Action, Not Speculation. During the first half of the year Trotsky was busy finishing his monumental History of the Russian Revolution, but in the midst of that task, as well as after, his interests remained very broad. He wrote also about disarmament, pacifism, and the ultraleftism then being practiced by the Comintern, answers to falsifications about the history of the Marxist movement, on proletarian literature, the perspectives of American Marxism, the revolutionary future of the oppressed colored races, morality and the family in the Soviet Union, problems of representation at a coming international conference of the Left Opposition, and a radio speech to the United States from Copenhagen (his first speech in English). Included here are interviews by the Associated Press, United Press, the New York Times, the Chicago Daily News, journalists and students in Denmark, a German journal, and his French translator. Letters printed here went to Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, China, France, Germany, Greece, Poland, Switzerland, the USA, and the USSR. Trotsky s major aim in 1932 remained the building of the International Left Opposition (Bolshevik-Leninists). The reader should bear in mind throughout this volume that while Trotsky regarded the policies of the Stalinized Communist International as criminally wrong, his strategy was not to replace the Comintern by the ILO but to reform it to regenerate it along Leninist lines and revive it as a force capable of leading the world revolution. It was
preface / 11 not until the middle of 1933, after Stalinist theory and practice had helped Hitler seize power in Germany, that the Left Opposition renounced its reform policy and set out to build the Fourth International (see Writings 1932 33). Almost half of the selections in this volume are translated into English for the first time or have appeared in English previously only in internal bulletins with restricted circulation; two of them, originally published incomplete, are in print here without deletions for the first time, thanks to the Harvard College Library. Several of the articles here were signed by pen names or were unsigned when first published. Leaving aside those that were written during the trip to Denmark and back, all the articles in this volume were written at Prinkipo, except for those before the end of January, which were written at Kadikoy. Translations originally done in the 1930s have been revised to correct obvious errors and achieve uniformity in spelling of names, punctuation, etc. Acknowledgments about the articles and translations, and explanatory material about the persons and events mentioned in them, will be found in the section entitled Notes and Acknowledgments. Other Writings of 1932 lists the books, pamphlets, and articles from that period which are not included in this volume because they are in print and available elsewhere. The comprehensiveness of this volume could not have been achieved without the help of Louis Sinclair s Leon Trotsky: A Bibliography (Hoover Institution Press, 1972), which will be essential reading for all serious students of Trotsky s work. The Editors april 1972
Chronology 1932 January 1 The last year of the first five-year plan begins in the Soviet Union and the capitalist world enters probably the worst year of the Great Depression. January 4 In a secret letter to the Soviet Political Bureau Trotsky warns that it will be held responsible for acts of repression that Stalin is preparing against the Left Opposition. January 27 Trotsky completes his short book, What Next? Vital Questions for the German Proletariat. January 30 February 4 The Seventeenth Conference of the Soviet Communist Party is held in Moscow. February 2 A world disarmament conference sponsored by the League of Nations opens in Geneva. February 18 The Japanese imperialists set up a puppet regime in the Manchurian territory seized from China. February 20 Trotsky s Soviet citizenship is revoked by a decree of the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets. March 1 Trotsky answers the Central Executive Committee. March April Hindenburg falls just short of a majority in the German presidential election on March 13, even though he is supported by the Social Democrats. In the April 10 runoff election, he is reelected with 53 percent of the vote, while Hitler gets 36 percent and Thaelmann of the Communist Party gets 10 percent. April 30 The League of Nations calls on Japan to withdraw from Shanghai in the near future. May 1 and 8 Parties of the French left gain around a hundred seats in parliamentary elections; a month later Herriot of the Radical Socialists becomes premier, replacing the right-winger Tardieu. May 20 Dollfuss is chosen chancellor of Austria by a right-wing coa- 12
chronology / 13 lition led by the Christian Social Party. May 30 June 1 Bruening, who has been ruling as German chancellor without a parliamentary majority, is removed by Hindenburg and replaced by Papen, who also lacks a majority in the Reichstag. June 13 Trotsky writes on the role of the colored races and a Stalinist-pacifist congress against war soon to be held in Amsterdam. He also finishes The History of the Russian Revolution in June. June 28 Trotsky writes Hands Off Rosa Luxemburg! July 20 Papen uses a presidential decree to dismiss the Social Democratic government of Prussia and to take over political and police control of that key state. July 31 In the German Reichstag elections the Nazis get 37 percent of the vote, becoming the largest party in the parliament for the first time. August 27 29 A congress against war is held in Amsterdam, solidly controlled by the Stalinists. The Left Oppositionists are unable to even get a vote on their proposals. August 27 September 15 The Twelfth Plenum of the Executive Committee of the Communist International is held in Moscow. September 14 Trotsky completes another pamphlet on the German crisis, The Only Road. October 9 Zinoviev and Kamenev are again expelled from the Soviet Communist Party. November 6 Another Reichstag election is held, in which the Nazis lose two million votes but remain the largest party. Thirteen days later Papen and his cabinet resign. November 8 Franklin D. Roosevelt is elected to his first term as president of the U.S. November 14 Trotsky leaves Turkey to give a speech in Copenhagen. December 2 Hindenburg appoints General Schleicher as chancellor less than two months before he appoints Hitler. December 11 Trotsky returns to Turkey.