Anarcho-Syndicalism and the Catalan Federation

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As far as I can judge, the anarcho-syndicalists are following a policy of conciliation toward the despicable regime of Colonel Marcia, the Barcelonese agent of the Madrid imperialists. The anarcho-syndicalist leaders have become the sub-lieutenants, and in fact the agents, of national civil peace in Catalonia.

The Catalan Federation, as far as I can tell, has adopted a conciliatory position toward the anarcho-syndicalists; that is to say, it has replaced the revolutionary policy of the united front with the opportunist policy of defending and flattering the anarcho-syndicalists and thereby the Marcia regime. It is precisely in this that I see one of the sources of explosion that can be so dangerous at a certain stage.

It is not the task of the trade unions to hold back the workers, but on the contrary to mobilize and organize them for the offensive. Above all, the unions must arouse the workers of the backward regions of Catalonia and the rest of Spain. The task of the Catalan Federation does not consist of building up the prestige of the anarcho-syndicalist confederation but rather of carrying out a constant step-by-step criticism, and of denouncing to the workers its tacit bloc with the petty-bourgeois counter-revolution of Marcia

So that the restraining of actions that are premature and unreasonable cannot be transformed into a Menshevik suffocation of the revolution, we must have a clear strategic line, and the advanced workers must understand it well so that they can tirelessly explain it to the broad masses. The Catalan Federation obviously has no strategic line. Its leaders are afraid to ponder on the fundamental problems of the revolution; otherwise they would not have that infantile and stupid fear of "Trotskyism," which expresses the entire extent of their political thought. …