On Straw in General and Lozovsky in Particular

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Here is what Lozovsky said about France at the Sixteenth Congress of the Communist Party:

"… in France several trade unions … have set up a so-called unitary opposition with its own platform and with its own evaluation of the present situation and the immediate perspectives."

What is the most remarkable thing?

"The most remarkable thing about this 'Unitary Opposition' consists in the fact that it is a bloc of the right wing and the Trotskyists, and that this platform is also the platform of Trotsky's organ in France, La Vérité, at the head of which is Rosmer, the faithful follower of Trotskyism. The 'Unitary Opposition' is a creation of Trotskyists and shameless [!] right-wingers [!!]. That is how the 'left [?] Bolshevik' line of Trotsky and Company looks in practice. An organized opposition exists only in France."

"The most remarkable thing" is that in the above there is about 49 percent truth. The Left Opposition is in fact having great success in the French trade-union movement. But then there comes the other 51 percent, for in fact the Unitary Opposition, which follows the banner of the Communist Left, wages an irreconcilable struggle against the right-wing, semi-reformist opposition which covers itself with slogans of trade-union autonomy (Monatte, Chambelland) or directly supports the "Workers and Peasants Party" of Sellier and Company. There are no points of contact, whether political or organizational, between these two oppositions.

What in the world is "characteristic"?

"It is characteristic" — according to Lozovsky — "that wherever the Trotskyists have even the slightest influence, they come out together with the Amsterdamers against the Communists."

It is "characteristic" that there is not even 1 percent truth here.

Is there not perhaps something else "characteristic" ?

"The Trotskyists assert that at a time of crisis economic struggle is impossible."

Who are these "Trotskyists"? Where did they assert this? When? But let us not hold up the inspired Lozovsky:

"The 'left' Trotskyist Neurath found nothing better than …" etc. But doesn't Neurath belong to the Right Opposition in Czechoslovakia? Well.

What is Lozovsky short of?

"What we are short of in the independent revolutionary trade unions and trade-union oppositions is the ability to attract new layers of workers into struggle, to bind them with strong bonds to our organizations, to implant ourselves in the factories" (from the same speech).

In a word, everything would be fine for Lozovsky except that he is short of a few trifles: the ability to attract the masses, to organize them, and to penetrate into the factories.

Lozovsky is short of something else too, but from modesty he did not tell us.

Can you imagine a revolutionary straw man in action? And moreover in the role of a leader? You can't imagine it? That means you haven't seen or heard Lozovsky. Here is an inimitable passage from the same speech of his to the Sixteenth Congress, with our modest additions in brackets:

"The main thing now is to free the workers' movement of the colonial and semicolonial countries from the slightest influence of the bourgeoisie [even from the 'slightest'!], to introduce a sharp differentiation between the classes [just try and hide it!], to raise a wave of proletarian distrust in politicos of the type of Gandhi, Nehru, Patel, Wang Ching-wei, etc. [but who has been raising a wave of trust in them?]. The most important thing [aren't there too many 'most important things'?] is not to let the Menshevik-Trotskyist ideas of Roy [but isn't Roy a disciple of Stalin and Lozovsky?] and Ch'en Tu-hsiu [it was Lozovsky who gave him his Menshevik ideas!] get a hold among the working masses, but to organize the masses in the bold Bolshevik way [but isn't that just 'what we are short of' ?], realizing that the revolutionary-democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and peasantry [precisely!] is a step on the road to the socialist revolution."

Straw is a very useful thing on a farm. But as a leader — well, need more be said?