Declaration to the Sixth Comintern Congress

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The congress now convening is taking place after an interval of more than four years marked by international events of the greatest importance and by cruel errors of leadership. The Bolshevik-Leninist Opposition, to which the undersigned belongs, has expressed its opinion on these events and errors many times in a number of documents, articles, and speeches. The course of events has already confirmed or increasingly tends to confirm the outlook of the Opposition in all its fundamental and essential aspects (its assessment of the 1923 defeat in Germany and the prospect of a stabilization of capitalism; its views concerning an "era of democracy and pacifism," the evolution of fascism and Social Democracy, and the relations between America and Europe; the slogan of a Soviet United States of Europe; the strategic problems of the Chinese revolution and the Anglo-Russian Committee; questions relating to the economic development of the USSR; the question of building socialism in one country; etc.).

It is neither possible nor necessary, within the limits of this declaration, to go back over these questions, which we have already clarified sufficiently elsewhere. It is enough to repeat that all the errors of principle committed by the leadership are the result of their backsliding from a Marxist and Bolshevik line to a centrist line, which, until very recently, has been veering more and more to the right.

The incorrect orientation followed so stubbornly for several years has since 1923 been inextricably bound up with the degeneration of the internal regime in the Comintern and in a number of its sections, especially the AUCP. During this period, bureaucratization has acquired absolutely unheard-of dimensions and forms, which menace the very foundations of the party of the international proletariat. The bureaucratic spirit and arbitrariness of the party apparatus may be seen most obviously and incontestably in the fact that for more than four years the leadership dealt with world events of the greatest importance without convening a Comintern congress. During this time, the Executive Committee elected at the Fifth Congress underwent total internal reorganization, without authorization by any congress and with the total removal of the leadership group elected at the Fifth Congress.

The consequences of this mistaken course, as well as the painful defeats it has occasioned, are: delay in the growth of the Comintern and in the spread of its influence; weakening of the USSR's position internationally; and a slowing of the pace of economic development and socialist construction in the first workers' state.

The leftward movement of the masses which is now beginning in Europe, and which is still going through its first stages, poses problems of the greatest importance for the Comintern, requiring a radical change in its course and a regroupment of forces internally. Equally pressing demands are being placed upon the AUCP by the political and economic situation in the Soviet Republic.

The Sixth Congress is meeting at a time when the total collapse of the line followed by the leadership for the last few years is already becoming evident under the pressure of events; a shift to the left has been projected, both in a series of resolutions and in practical measures adopted by the Central Committee of the AUCP, and in certain decisions of the February plenum of the ECCI.

Some elements of this contradictory shift to the left are reflected in the draft program presented to the Sixth Congress. For that very reason the document has an extremely eclectic character and cannot in any way or to any degree serve as a guide for the international proletarian vanguard.

In two long documents written for the Sixth Congress, the undersigned attempted to present an assessment of the draft program, examined in the light of changes that have occurred in the international political situation (particularly in the last five years), as well as an assessment of the recent shift by the Central Committee of the AUCP, and by the February plenum of the ECCI, in connection with the situation in the USSR and in the Comintern. One of these documents has already been sent; the second will be sent to the Sixth Congress at the same time as the present declaration.

The aim of this declaration is to pose before the highest body of the Communist International the question of the readmission of the Bolshevik-Leninists (Opposition) to the party, on the basis of a clear and precise exposition of our views on the present situation and the tasks facing the Comintern.

The isolation forcibly imposed on the supporters of the "Platform of the Bolshevik-Leninists (Opposition)," removed from the capital and separated from each other by hundreds or thousands of kilometers (deported to Siberia, Central Asia, etc.), totally prevents them from drawing up a collective declaration. Letters addressed to the exiled Oppositionists (even by registered mail) arrive only in exceptional cases: one letter in three or four arrives, and that after intervals of one, two, or three months. Under these conditions I am obliged to sign only my name to the present declaration. It is quite likely, even certain, that if there had been a collective discussion, essential modifications would have been made in this text. However, my correspondence with co-thinkers – even in its present truncated, strangulated form – permits me to state with full certainty that, in all essentials, this letter expresses the views of at least the overwhelming majority, if not all, of the supporters of the Platform of the Opposition, especially the many hundreds of deportees.

A correct domestic policy in the USSR is inconceivable without a correct policy for the Comintern. Therefore, for us, the question of the Comintern's line, that is, the strategic line of the international revolution, stands above all other questions. However, a situation has developed historically in which the key to the Comintern's policy is the policy of the AUCP.

There is no point here in speaking of the conditions and causes that justifiably gave the AUCP the role of the leading party in the Comintern. It was entirely due to the leadership exercised by the AUCP that the Comintern made truly colossal gains in the first few years of its existence. But subsequently, the mistaken policies pursued by the leaders of the AUCP and the bureaucratization of its internal regime, have meant that the fertile influence of Bolshevism on the Comintern in the areas of doctrine and politics has more and more been replaced and eliminated by "combinations" concocted by the functionaries and administrators.

This explains both the lack of any congress for four years and the vote at the February plenum of the ECCI in favor of a resolution stating that "the Opposition in the AUCP is banking on the downfall of Soviet power"; this allegation discredits only those who inspired it in the Executive Committee and those who voted for it; in no way does it tarnish the revolutionary honor of the Bolshevik-Leninists (Opposition).

The present task is to preserve – or more precisely to bring about the rebirth of – the decisive influence of Bolshevik ideas and politics on the young parties of the Communist International, at the same time freeing them from the system of bureaucratic command. This task is inseparably connected with the task of changing the orientation and internal regime of the AUCP itself.

Basing ourselves in this way on an international perspective and on the fundamental interests of the Communist International, we shall focus our attention in the present declaration on the crisis of the AUCP, the groupings inside it, and the consequent duties of the Opposition, as we see them.

★ ★ ★

Only a superficial mind would fail to see the immense objective difficulties that exist, and that would confront any leadership of the AUCP, in the present situation. These difficulties are above all the result of fundamental causes such as the country's petty-bourgeois character and its capitalist encirclement. In addition to that, the errors committed by the leadership for the past five years have meant a persistent slowing of the pace, which in turn has meant a cumulative piling up of ever new difficulties. Placing the blame for errors does not eliminate their results, which in turn become an objective condition. Any leadership would have to take as its point of departure the present difficult objective situation, which is complicated to the extreme by the continued, stubborn piling up of error upon error.

This means that there is no simple and quick solution. We can even grant, up to a certain point, that a resolute rightward solution, widening the boundaries of the NEP and narrowing those of the monopoly of foreign trade, would bring quicker and more immediate results than a leftward course. But these results would lead in a quite different direction. Heavy imports of foreign goods and capital – following the abolition or limitation of the monopoly of foreign trade – lower prices for the products of [state] industry, the expansion of exports, etc., would all lead in the period immediately following to an attenuation of the disproportion, a narrowing of the "scissors," a certain regularization of the market, "enrichment" of the village (that is, of its upper layers), and even a temporary reduction of unemployment. But those would be successes along the road of capitalist restoration, which would integrate the USSR into the imperialist chain after several short stages. "Russia no. 2" would once again become imperialism's weakest link; the result would be a semi-colonial existence. But before it became evident that the course to the right was a course toward a backward and dependent capitalist society – a society of horrible exploitation of the workers and new wars in the service of world imperialist masters – the immediate results of the right-wing policy might be accepted by a considerable part of the population of the countryside and even the cities, as a way out of the dead end that the economy now finds itself in, with constant shortages, waiting lines for bread, and mounting unemployment. It is just here that we find the political danger of the rightist orientation: after the painful experience of the centrist policies, a rightward course could produce deceptively "alluring" results during the first stage of the path leading directly into the abyss of capitalism.

There is not and there cannot be a simple left recipe making it possible simultaneously to emerge from these difficulties and to progress toward socialism. In general, within the boundaries of a single nation, it is impossible to completely overcome the difficulties resulting from the delay in the world revolution. This should be said clearly, firmly, and honestly, in a Marxist and Leninist way.

It is poor logic, however, to draw pessimistic conclusions for the USSR just because socialist construction is inseparably dependent on the international revolution. It is just as poor logic as to draw pessimistic conclusions about the German revolution from the fact that it depends directly on the successes of the dictatorship in the USSR. The very idea that pessimism flows logically from the fact that our socialist construction is dependent on international relations – that is shameful for a Marxist.

But although the fate of the revolution is a function of its international character, it does not at all follow that the party in each country is relieved of the duty to do the maximum in all areas. On the contrary, this obligation only increases, because the economic errors made in the USSR not only retard the building of socialism in our country, but strike in the most direct way at the world revolution.

If at the right time, that is, at the Twelfth Congress, a firm economic course had been taken, aimed at overcoming the disproportion through a correct policy of distributing the national income and stepped-up industrialization, our situation now would be immeasurably more favorable. Even in that case, of course, fundamental difficulties would still face us. But in the worldwide struggle that we are waging, timing is decisive. If economic development had been more rapid, and if as a result the relationship of forces between classes inside the country were more favorable to us, we would be moving much more certainly toward victories by the proletariat in the more advanced countries.

A [genuine] left course could not promise to build "full socialism" by our efforts alone. It could not even promise a complete triumph over the contradictions within the country, as long as world contradictions exist. But it could gradually establish more correct control over the domestic class contradictions – more correct from the standpoint of socialism under construction. It could quicken the rate of growth, through a more correct policy of distributing the national income. It could consolidate in a more systematic and serious way the proletariat's hold on the commanding heights of the economy. It could establish a clearer and firmer class line in all policies, it could develop closer ties with the work of the Comintern, and finally it could ensure the application of Marxist foresight and leadership to the fundamental problems of the world proletarian revolution. Taken all together, this is precisely what is needed for victory on a world scale.

A true left course would require an economic plan extending over a period of years, a plan that was well thought out, audacious, and far-reaching, which would not lurch from one extreme to the other, driven by maneuverist policies geared to conjunctural changes. Such maneuvering is absolutely necessary, but it can never be decisive. A left course would also require tremendous tenacity on the part of the leadership, the ability to swim against the stream, to maintain an overall strategic line through all the twists and turns imposed by tactics. But this requires genuine optimism on questions of the international proletarian revolution and – based on that unshakable foundation – a profound faith in the possibility of successful socialist construction in our country.

All that can be accomplished by the issuing of circulars from on high is a zigzag to the left. But it is impossible to carry out a true left course by issuing circulars. To carry out a left, proletarian course, a Leninist course, our party must have a new orientation, from top to bottom, and a realignment of forces. Those are processes that would have to develop in a serious way over a long period. The party must be allowed once again to have its own free, collective thinking, its own powerful and resilient will. The party must stop being afraid of the apparatus. We must achieve conditions such that the apparatus could not and would not dare try to intimidate the party. The party must once again become – the party.

A right-wing policy is possible, leading to obvious and relatively quick "gains" – for capitalism. A left policy is equally possible, a systematic policy of proletarian dictatorship, socialist construction, and international revolution. What is not possible as a durable and successful policy (much less as a Bolshevik policy) is a so-called "left course" employing the methods of centrist "combinationism," while keeping the party suppressed and continuing to smash away at its left wing. This kind of left-centrist zigzag, unless the party forces it to "grow over" into a genuine left course, will inevitably collapse; that will occur, moreover, long before practical results of any importance become evident. At that moment, all the cards may prove to be in the hands of the right wing, which would immediately win reinforcements at the expense of the present center, perhaps even finding its leaders among those who are now with the center.

Whoever thinks that the present left shift by the party apparatus has canceled out the right danger is radically wrong. On the contrary, never has this danger been so great, so threatening, and so imminent as it is now. The most dangerous moment for a wagon near the peak of a steep mountain road is when the front wheels have already gone over the top but most of the wagon, with the heavy load and the passengers, has not yet gone over. That is precisely when maximum efforts by the horses and the driver are required; but, most importantly, the "passengers" themselves must get out, grab the spokes of the wheels, and push with all their might. Trouble comes if the passengers are drowsing or hesitate uncertainly, or if the driver turns around and, using the whip of Article 58, drives away those who with their bare hands are moving the wheels forward or who have placed their backs against the rear of the wagon to act as brakes. It is at a moment like this that the wagon, with all its weight, can slip back and go crashing down the mountain. Never has the danger from the right been so great, so threatening, and so imminent as it is now.

What does the right danger signify in the present period? It is less the danger of an open, full-fledged bourgeois counterrevolution than that of a Thermidor, that is, a partial counterrevolutionary shift or upheaval which, precisely because it was partial, could for a fairly long time continue to disguise itself in revolutionary forms, but which in essence would already have a decisively bourgeois character, so that a return from Thermidor to the dictatorship of the proletariat could only be effected through a new revolution.

We have argued repeatedly, in particular at the plenum of the Central Committee in February 1927, that the centrist leadership, in striking at the left, would inevitably draw along behind it a longer and longer right-wing tail, both inside the party and far beyond its boundaries, ending with conscious and militant Thermidorians. We predicted that this weighty tail would inevitably strike at the head and that such a blow could become the starting point for a profound regroupment within the party, that is, more and more insolent self-assertion by the right wing, a sharper and more audacious shift to the left by the proletarian core of the party, and a more feverish lurching back and forth by the centrist apparatus faction, which would lose its forces little by little. The bloodless kulak revolt of 1927-28, which occurred with the assistance of members of the party who desired to "live in peace with all classes," is precisely a blow struck by the tail at the head.

Pravda itself has now officially admitted (in an editorial of February 15, 1928) that an influential Thermidorian or semi-Thermidorian wing exists in our party. And no subsequent qualifications can plaster over that admission. For, in a proletarian party, what else can people be but Thermidorians if they are ready at any moment to smash away at the Left Opposition but then want to live in peace with the kulak, who is drawing the middle peasant behind him in opposition to Soviet power? We do not mean by this that everyone who promotes this policy wants consciously to go all the way to Thermidor. No, the Thermidorians, and even more the semi-Thermidorians, have never been distinguished by a broad historical awareness; only that fact permits a great number of them to fulfill their role in the service of another class.

So then, a blow has been dealt by the tail to the head, a serious one but one that up to the present has had only the significance of a signal and a warning. Regroupments have begun in the party, though as yet they are very unclear and very insufficient. One of the expressions of this process is the tendency for the "left" maneuver executed from on high to become a serious zigzag to the left. Thus the two front wheels of the party – or perhaps only one of them – already seem to be over the top, but the wagon as a whole, with its heavy load, is still on an incline, which could become for it a terrible downward plunge.

★ ★ ★

What is the duty of the Opposition toward the party in this exceptionally critical situation? (Obviously, here we are talking about the true Leninist Opposition, and not those occasional fellow-travelers who are always ready to abandon their opinions if that is firmly demanded of them, preferring other ideas that are easier to defend.)

To respond more clearly to the question of the duty of the Opposition, one must begin with the worst variant: that is, the hypothesis that, by taking advantage of the errors committed year after year by the leadership, the chronic disorganization of the market, the high cost of living, unemployment, the way everything is yanked back and forth by fiat from above, and so on, the Thermidorian, kulak, bourgeois, bureaucratic tail may try, at the peak of some future hill, at a time of even greater difficulties, to strike a really serious blow at the head; that is, try to move from the present semi legal forms of capitalist sabotage to direct civil war.

Is this possibility excluded a priori? No. Unfortunately not. Especially if international complications arise. Anyone who would say that it is excluded would be treacherously lulling the party to sleep.

Might we have reason to fear that at the hour of danger a fairly large percentage of the stalwarts of false party monolithism in such places as Smolensk, Artemovsk, Shakhty, and even in Leningrad, even in Moscow, would waver, step aside, or commit outright treason? Not only might we have reason; we must fear it. The recent revelations barely lift the edge of the bureaucratic curtain. In this domain, the party must expect great dangers.

On the other hand, can anyone imagine an Oppositionist who would say: "They have created this situation with their policies; let them disentangle themselves!"? No, it's impossible to imagine such an Oppositionist, unless it were a White Guard agent, a provocateur who had penetrated the Opposition for destructive purposes. Oppositionists will fight for the party, for the dictatorship, for the October Revolution, as would be expected of the selflessly devoted revolutionaries they have shown themselves to be in defending the banner of Bolshevism under the most difficult historical circumstances, while persecutions and repressions fall on them thick as hail. The cadres of the Opposition have stood the test. If the bureaucratic stupidity of the party apparatus should prevent the Oppositionists from occupying their places in the ranks of the regular army at the moment of extreme peril, they would fight the class enemy as guerrillas, because a revolutionary defends the revolution when it is in need without waiting for an order. There would be no need to speak of this, if not for the vicious and hysterical shouting about the alleged defeatism of the Opposition, which "is banking on the downfall of Soviet power."

The claim that the conduct of the Oppositionists has no importance for the defense of the dictatorship because of their "weakness," is an especially bankrupt one now. If the Opposition is so weak, why have the apparatus, the press, the official orators, the professors of the party schools for five years, and the GPU in the last period taken up the fight against the Opposition as their principal task? Why do all the speeches, articles, circulars, instructions, and books take this fight as their starting point and return to it again and again? Whatever the strength of the Opposition's influence, actual and potential, present and future, one thing is incontestable: the party of the dictatorship of the proletariat can count on this detachment, which belongs to it, under all circumstances, completely and entirely.

However, another question of more burning immediacy remains: What can and should the Opposition do in the present crisis? Here too we want to pose all the questions squarely, to leave no room for any confusion or misunderstanding.

Can the Opposition support the right against the centrists, who formally hold power – in order to help overthrow them, to "avenge ourselves" on them for the odious persecution, the rudeness and disloyalty, the "Wrangel officer," Article 58, and other deliberately vicious deeds? There have been such combinations between the right and the left in [past] revolutions. Such combinations have also ruined revolutions. In our party the right represents the link which the bourgeois classes secretly hold onto, to drag the revolution onto the path of Thermidor. At the present moment, the center is trying to resist, or half-resist.. It is clear: the Opposition cannot have anything in common with such combinationist adventurism, counting on the aid of the right to overthrow the center.

The Opposition supports every step, even a hesitant one, toward the proletarian line, every attempt, even an indecisive one, to resist the Thermidorian elements. The Opposition does so and will do so completely independently of whether the center, which continues to look to the right, wants it or not. The Opposition of course does not set any prior conditions for this, demands no agreements, concessions, etc. It simply takes account of the fact that the center's current zigzag runs parallel, though at a certain distance, to the strategic line of Bolshevik policy.

We have already said (most recently in our declaration, read by Comrade Smilga at the Fifteenth Congress) that the Opposition, even if expelled from the party, does not consider itself released from its party duties, nor from responsibility to the country for the party as a whole. We can only repeat here entirely what we said before. This means in particular that, despite the persecutions, expulsions, Article 58, etc., each Oppositionist is ready as before to carry out the missions that the party entrusts to him, independently of his attitude toward its leadership and of the regime that this leadership maintains.

However, from the political point of view, can the Opposition be responsible to the party for the sudden turns currently carried out in the name of a correct Leninist course? No, it cannot. The Opposition's support for every correct move, even a half-hearted one, toward a proletarian line, will never be the mere yea-saying of the party philistine to the centrism of the apparatus (even if it is left centrism); the Opposition will never pass over in silence the centrists' inclination to do things only halfway, their incoherence, the errors they continue to commit, and will never hypocritically ignore their revisionist theories, which pave the way for new, even greater mistakes. While supporting against the right every step of the center toward the left, the Opposition should (and will) criticize the complete insufficiency of such steps and the lack of guarantees in the entire present turn, since it continues to be carried out on the basis of orders from on high and does not really emanate from the party. The Opposition will uncompromisingly continue to reveal to the party the immense dangers resulting from the inconsistency, the lack of theoretical reflection, and the political contradictoriness of the present course, which is still based on the bloc of the center with the right against the left wing.

Under these conditions, can the Opposition renounce its Platform? Now less than ever. To do that would be equivalent to renouncing the thoroughly thought-out, generalized, and systematic basis for a true left course; it would render the best service to the right, whose hopes and plans can only be based on the zigzags and incoherence of the centrist course. A continued fight for the ideas and proposals expressed in the Platform is the only correct, serious, and honest way to support every step by the center that is at all progressive. It is only on this condition that one can have any serious hope of seeing the party succeed, through internal reform, in transforming the left-centrist zigzag of the leadership into a true Leninist course.

Is this fight for the Opposition Platform compatible with party unity? Under a bureaucratic – that is, an unjust and unhealthy-regime, such a fight may prove temporarily to be incompatible with unity, as the expulsion of the Opposition from the party showed. But the circular issued by the Central Committee on June 3 is above all an open (though forced) admission of the unhealthy and insupportable character of the regime that has been created in our party over the last five years and which still must be radically changed. Under a healthy regime the most rigorous criticism of errors of principle committed by the Central Committee is perfectly compatible with party unity and iron discipline in action. The actual differences of opinion (now that they have undergone a gigantic testing by events) could be fairly easily overcome by the party, if it reconquered its elementary rights. All questions come together around this question [of party democracy].

Is fighting for the convictions laid out in the Platform of the Bolshevik-Leninists (Opposition) compatible with renouncing the factional methods used to defend these opinions? Under a regime which, according to the expression used by this same circular of June 3, is infected with "the most vicious bureaucratism," all criticism of the opinions of the Central Committee or of a provincial committee, a district committee, or a cell secretary, is branded as "factionalism," and often the critics were forcibly driven down the road to factionalism. Under a regime that was truly based on "self-criticism" – or, stated more correctly, on party democracy – the fight for the views expressed in the Platform would be entirely possible. The Opposition is totally willing to defend its views using only the strictly regulated norms of party procedure, as long as these are firmly based on the two closely interrelated resolutions of the Tenth Congress, the one banning factions and the one on party democracy.

Even now, after the recent manifestos and circulars, the Opposition has no illusions about the party regime. A simple-minded credulity, mistaking words for actions and contradictory manifestos for a consistent and firmly guaranteed left course, is a quality that never was and never will be found in a proletarian revolutionary, especially one who has gone through the experience, and seriously reflected on the history, of the last five years.

Never has factionalism eaten away at the party so much as now, after the attempt to mechanically amputate the Opposition. The right, the buffer group, the center, the two "repentant" halves of the leadership of the Leningrad Opposition, the Bolshevik-Leninists (Opposition) – these are the principal groups now existing in the party, without counting the sub-factions. The centrism of the leading faction, because of its formlessness and the contradictory character of its ideas and policy, is a real breeding ground for all kinds of factionalism, both left and right. Superficial measures – manifestos, plus arrests – will not deliver us from this situation. Only a correct course, elaborated and carried out by the party as a whole, can triumph over the factionalism devouring the party.

A correct course can be achieved only by the methods of party criticism, focusing on the basic shifts in line and defects in the party regime that have appeared in the last five years. We must condemn a false policy in order to pave the way for a correct one. As for the "self-criticism" announced in manifestos and articles, up to now this is nothing but a way of venting rank-and-file discontent by denouncing errors of secondary importance and sacrificing one or two hundred bureaucrats as scapegoats. Criticism of the way policy is carried out is presented as good, healthy, and "businesslike." Criticism of the leadership is said to be destructive, pernicious, oppositional. If the "self-criticism" does not surpass these limits, the entire left-centrist zigzag will be nothing but a harmful fiasco.

To bring bureaucratically legalized "self-criticism" out of this dead end and onto the road of party democracy is the task of the party itself. On the success of this task depends the success of the deep reform without which the party will not lead the revolution out of the crisis it is in. To resolve this double problem – to restore the health of its own ranks and of the Soviet state – the party first of all and most of all needs clarity in its ideas.

Thus the duty of the Opposition is to raise its voice as part of the "self-criticism" which certain very influential centrist bureaucrats regard as only a safety valve for the accumulated dissatisfaction, but which in reality should become an integral part of the system of party democracy. Above all, the Opposition must help the party ranks (not only in the AUCP, but in the entire Comintern) to resist the bureaucratic desire to keep "self-criticism" from touching the fundamental problems of political line and of party leadership.

The experience with the quality of economic policy in the USSR, the experience of the German revolutionary movement in 1923-28, the experiences of the Chinese revolution and the Anglo-Russian Committee, must be illuminated, examined, and studied in every aspect. Without this there is no way forward.

At the same time, the Opposition has the duty to watch vigilantly, so that "self-criticism" (which, if it continues to develop, will inevitably run into more and more bureaucratic obstacles) does not turn in an anti-party direction and bring grist to the anarchists' and Mensheviks' mill. The opportunist policies and the bureaucratic regime unavoidably produce malignant reactions of this kind among the working masses. Only the Opposition can protect the party against this evil, or at least reduce this reaction to a minimum, by recreating, reinforcing the confidence of the workers in the party, by pitilessly rejecting all equivocation or apparatus-style adaptationism, by fighting openly for its full program – in a word, by steadfastly following the Leninist line.

So stated, our principled orientation saves us the trouble of refuting the idea attributed to us that the party has become Thermidorian, or that Thermidor, i.e., a counterrevolutionary coup d'etat, is already an accomplished fact. The hysterical persistence with which this "idea" is propagated, although it has nothing in common with our position and benefits only our class enemies, merely testifies to the impotence of our adversaries in the struggle of ideas, born of the general inability of centrists to seize and to understand the living dialectic of the historical process.

On the same level are the attempts to attribute to us the view that the Comintern has ceased to be the vanguard of the world proletariat and needs to be replaced by some new international association.

We have stated all along, and we repeat, that we cannot take even a shadow of responsibility for those who think that the process of backsliding from the class line by the leadership of the AUCP and the Comintern (a process which unquestionably has taken place in the last few years) is an irreparable and irreversible process; or for those who do not see or who deny any revolutionary tendencies or forces in the AUCP or the Comintern and who, therefore, directly or indirectly turn their backs on those organizations.

In the same manner we decline all responsibility for the policy of running Opposition candidates parallel to those of the Communist Party, a policy which we condemned in advance and against which we warned in a letter sent abroad. Since this letter was published in Pravda (on January 15, 1928), the continuing allegations that we are in solidarity with the policy of parallel candidates merely represent one more of the many attempts [by the leadership] to rudely deceive its own party in order to justify, somehow or other, the use of repression.

We base all of our calculations on the fact that there exist within the AUCP, the Comintern, and the USSR enormous internal revolutionary forces, which now are suppressed by the false leadership and the onerous regime, but which, with experience, criticism, and the advance of the class struggle throughout the world, are perfectly capable of correcting the line of the leadership and assuring a correct proletarian course.

The current attempts by the leadership to escape the consequences of its own policies by taking a road to the left instead of to the right, repeating and in part using the ideas and the slogans of the Opposition, are carried out under pressure, as yet vague and unformed, from the proletarian core of the party; they constitute one of the proofs of the correctness of our general analysis and our calculations.

With all our strength we will help see to it that the internal forces of the party and the class bring about a rectification of policy with the fewest possible convulsions within the AUCP, the workers' state, and the International.

We totally reject the accusation that our previous declarations on stopping factional work were not sincere. Those declarations always assumed a minimum of good will on the part of the official majority, so that a party regime would be ensured under which it would be possible to defend one's point of view by the normal methods worked out during the entire past history of the party. It is always possible for the all-powerful bureaucratic apparatus, fighting for its inviolability and its permanence, to mechanically close to party members all paths except those of factional work. In formulating our declarations announcing our intention of renouncing factional methods, we always referred to the teaching of Lenin on the proletarian party, and on the fundamental conditions of its healthy existence. We referred in particular to the resolution of December 5, 1923, which said that bureaucratism pushes the best members of the party onto the path of isolation and factionalism [see "The New Course Resolution," in Challenge 1923-25]. For us this declaration was not, and is not, a mere formality. It expresses the essence of the question.

Even more inappropriate and vile are the accusations that the Opposition, even after the Fifteenth Congress, despite its declaration that it would submit to the resolutions of the party and stop factional work, in reality continued. The promise we made at the congress presupposed our continued membership in the party;and consequently the possibility of fighting for our views within its ranks. Otherwise this commitment would only mean a renunciation of all political activity in general, a commitment to stop serving the party and the international revolution. Only completely corrupted bureaucrats could demand such a renunciation from revolutionaries. Only contemptible renegades could give such a promise.

Basing ourselves on these principled positions, we can have nothing to do with so-called Leninists who deceive the party, try to use diplomacy on the class struggle, play hide-and-seek with history, pretend to admit their errors while secretly claiming to have been right, create the myth of "Trotskyism," demolish it, then try to reconstitute it – in a word, apply to the party the policy of a "Brest-Litovsk," that is, of a temporary, insincere capitulation made in the hope of revenge. Such a policy is admissible toward a class enemy; but it is totally adventurist in relation to one's own party.

We feel repugnance toward the Byzantine philosophy of recantation, according to which concern for party unity would mean that, in our day and age, in the epoch of the proletarian dictatorship, one must renounce one's opinions or abandon the defense of those opinions if today's leaders consider them inadmissible, for reasons of prestige, or decide to use the resources of the state to victimize those who hold such opinions. We would consider ourselves criminal if we had carried out a bitter fight within the party for five years in the name of principles so elastic that we could renounce them on command or under threat of expulsion from the party. Serving the party is inseparable from fighting for a correct political line. Only a contemptible pseudo-member of the party would allow the fear of temporarily losing his party card, however painful that may be, to outweigh the duty to fight for the fundamental traditions of the party and for its future.

There are speeches to the effect that the current attitude of the Opposition (faithful to its convictions, fighting for them) is incompatible with its declarations on party unity. These speeches reek of duplicity. If we thought that the development of the party was completed at the Fifteenth Congress, there would then be no historical alternative to the creation of a second party. But we have already said that we have nothing in common with this evaluation. If in connection with the grain hoarding crisis, in passing and as if by chance, it became evident that within the party there exists a strong and influential faction that wants "to live in peace" with all classes; if, within a short time, the affairs of Shakhty, Artemovsk, Smolensk, and many others, came to light – this shows that the inevitable process of differentiation in the party, of self-clarification and self-purification, is yet to be accomplished; the genuine proletarian core of the party will still have sufficient opportunities to realize that our evaluation of party policy, of its composition, of the general tendencies of its development are confirmed by facts of decisive importance. Temporarily placed outside the party by a lying and unhealthy regime, we continue to live with the party, to work for its future. Because our line of conduct and our perspectives are correct, because our methods of fighting for the Leninist convictions have a true party character, no force in the world can tear us away from this party or oppose us to the international proletarian vanguard and the Communist revolution. Least of all can this be achieved by using Article 58, which dishonors only those who stoop to employing it against us.

The contradiction that obliges us to remain formally outside the party, while fighting on its behalf against those who disorganize and undermine it from within, is a contradiction formed by life itself in the course of history. It cannot be escaped by a juridical sophism leading only to the despicable repudiation of ideas. The contradiction that is imposed upon us is only a particular manifestation of deeper, more general contradictions; it cannot really be resolved except by applying Leninist methods to the fundamental problems facing the Comintern and the AUCP. Until then, the question of the Opposition will remain the touchstone by which to judge the party's political line and its regime.

The reprisals against the Opposition for its criticism of the Central Committee, a criticism completely confirmed by the facts and now unintentionally corroborated by the recent partial measures and decisions of the Central Committee itself, are the most flagrant examples of the worst methods of the apparatus regime and the worst aspects of the leadership of the party. New expulsions and deportations of Oppositionists still continue to terrorize the party, despite the reassuring circulars. The question of readmitting the Oppositionists to the party, returning the deportees, freeing the prisoners, becomes the essential proof, the infallible means of verification, and the first indicator of the seriousness and depth of all the recent moves toward the left. The party and the working class will judge not at all by words, but by deeds. This was the lesson of Marx, it was that of Lenin, it is that of the Opposition.

The Sixth Congress of the Comintern can, in large measure, facilitate the reestablishment of party unity by firmly advising the central institutions of the AUCP to immediately abrogate the application of Article 58 to the Opposition, an application based on rude political disloyalty and on a perfidious abuse of power. The reinstatement of the Bolshevik-Leninists (Opposition) in the party is an indispensable and inevitable condition for a genuine turn toward the Leninist road. This of course applies not only to the AUCP but also to all other sections of the Comintern.

Every Oppositionist, in retaking the place that is rightfully his in the party – from which, we repeat, no force nor any resolution can separate him – will do everything he can to help the party get out of the current crisis, and to overcome factionalism. There can be no doubt that such a commitment will have the unanimous support of all the Bolshevik-Leninists (Opposition).