Letter to Alfonso Leonetti, March 13, 1931

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To Preserve Our Politics from Degeneration

Dear Comrade Torino:

Thank you very much for your friendly letter concerning our philistine “catastrophe.” The situation is very worrisome, but over a period of a few months it could be corrected, I hope — apart from a few irreparable losses.

Even the position of the League, though thoroughly compromised by the politics of the Naville-Gourget bloc, could be restored, given the will to do so. Unfortunately, Naville only adds bad feelings. His last letter shows me that he has learned nothing. On the contrary, he is more Souvarinist, more anti-Marxist than ever. I am not replying to him for the moment, so as not to have to tell him some too bitter truths, because in spite of everything I do not want to give up hope.

In your last letters you drew my attention to the errors of La Vérité. Some of them are real, some are exaggerated, some are imaginary. I would be quite prepared to analyze each of La Vérité’s mistakes with you. But what makes this analysis very difficult for me is that it could be constructive only on the common ground of Marxism. Take for example the trade union question. Now, Gourget is an avowed syndicalist and non-Marxist, and Naville is only his journalistic lieutenant. I read the minutes of the Executive Committee meeting with Gourget and Company. That would have been enough for me even if I didn’t know everything that had gone on before, and even if I had not tried to win Gourget and Naville to the Marxist conception over more than a year. To tolerate Gourgetism would mean to allow gangrene to set into the League. Do you think that we broke with Tomsky in order to fraternize with the French syndicalists? Oh no!

The elementary duty of Marxists in the League and in the International Opposition is to tell Gourget that his theory, like his practice, is equivalent to a betrayal of Marxism, and that a great chasm separates him from us. That is perhaps the last hope of still saving Gourget himself and his group. But that is our secondary concern. The first consideration is to preserve our politics from degeneration, the most dangerous form of which in France is “good-natured” syndicalism. The IS should make a unanimous statement on that. Everything you have told me about the errors of La Vérité is incomparably less important than the crimes of Gourget and the errors of Naville.

By the way, I am going to have a talk with Molinier — he should be coming in one or two days — on all the questions you raised in your last letters.

I leave aside the German question, which is no less important. There, also, Naville’s position is equivocal. It is well known that behind the scenes he marches with Landau. But he does not dare speak openly in favor of his ally. Is that a revolutionary attitude?

No doubt at the last moment, when the confused void of Landau’s politics has been shown to the world, Naville will vote for the final resolution. Alas, such proceedings do not attest to a revolutionary character.

My thanks and my most sincere greetings.

Yours,

L. Trotsky