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Special pages :
Yes or No? (1938)
| Author(s) | Leon Trotsky |
|---|---|
| Written | 14 September 1938 |
On September 8, the well-known Chicago attorney, Albert Goldman, informed the press of a GPU plot in connection with the congresses in Mexico. The heart of the plot, according to Goldman, was New York, where the leader of the Mexican Stalinist party, Hernan Laborde, was summoned under greatest secrecy. In order better to hide his participation in the plot against Trotsky and his friends, Hernan Laborde spread the rumor that he was leaving for several months in the USSR.
In reality, however, he remained during this entire time in New York in close contact with the most important representatives of the GPU in the United States. Under their direction Laborde worked out a campaign of persecution and slander against Trotsky and his friends. The practical aim of this campaign was either to achieve the expulsion of Trotsky from Mexico – that is, his actual deliverance into the hands of the hangmen of the GPU – or the creation of a favorable atmosphere for doing away with him in Mexico itself. This was Moscow's order.
Goldman is a very experienced and responsible attorney and if he gave this information to the press it means that it emanates from an irreproachable source.
At any rate, at the same time Goldman made these revelations, Laborde suddenly appeared in Mexico. I say "suddenly" since the press did not carry a single word about his return. Where did Laborde come from? Had he really been in the USSR? This is not difficult to prove by passport visas. Or did Laborde, as Goldman's source states, remain secretly in the United States? What did he do there? No one will suspect Laborde of preparing a coup d'état against the regime of the U.S. What did he do there? And why did he return with the utmost secrecy at the very moment of the opening of the congress?
Mr. Laborde has full opportunity to refute Albert Goldman's statement. He only needs to answer clearly where he has been in the last months. In Moscow or in New York? No subterfuges will help. Silence will help just as little. Public opinion will force the plotters to give a clear and precise answer to the question: Did Laborde hide in the United States? Yes or no? If yes, then for what purposes?