Stalin
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The Fourteenth Party Conference from April 27 to 29, 1925, discussed agricultural policy at length. Stalin did not address the conference, leaving Bukharin and Rykov to present the right-wing policy. There was general agreement on appeasement of the peasantry, and little opposition was heard. The conference emphasized that the economic revival of the country depended on “the marketability of agricultural production” and the promotion of industrial productivity. To gain the support of the peasantry, the overall tax on them was sharply reduced by 25 percent. The conference also legalized the practice, already widespread, of allowing peasants to hire labor and to lease further land, which benefited the kulaks.
The obstacles to increased marketability were well known. The great estates had been broken up and there were 24 to 25 million small holdings, cultivated by peasant households, living near subsistence level. It was an uneconomic method of cultivating the vast agricultural lands of Russia. The peasants had all known hunger, and now they consumed most of the grain, leaving only small amounts for the market. The acute shortage of manufactured goods gave no incentives for marketing produce. Moreover, they were suspicious of the communist government and greedy for higher prices, and for these reasons, too, many held back their grain.
Zinoviev was silent during the Fourteenth Conference. He was on the defensive and biding his time. Stalin had already, early in February 1925, made moves to undermine his authority in the Comintern. But the Leningrad party organization showed a sturdy independence in resisting attempts by Stalin to insinuate his men into key posts. Zinoviev’s supporters began to counter Moscow’s pressure by promoting left-wing policies in the Leningradskaya Pravda and by other means.
During the summer of 1925, the rivalry came into the open. Zinoviev and Kamenev had supported the right-wing pro-peasant policy so long as they felt secure in their places in the Politburo, but under attack from Stalin, they adopted the radical left-wing position. The left-wing view laid great stress on the danger that the kulaks would rapidly grow in economic strength, and by withholding their grain, would soon be able to force the Soviets to submit to their demands. They would then revive capitalism. The correct policy was to introduce large-scale collective farms not by compulsion, but by persuasion and by offering such inducements as the supply of fertilizers, seed, and tractors. Once settled on these collective farms the peasants would readily appreciate their advantages. The left-wing policy also called for greater emphasis on industrial expansion, especially to provide for the mechanization of agriculture and, more broadly, to create a balanced socialist economy.
Zinoviev pressed his attack against the right-wing further by arguing that NEP was not a development of true Leninism, but a “strategic retreat” into capitalism. Stalin at once countered by accusing him and his supporters of pessimism. In alleging that the revolution had taken a backward step, they showed a lack of faith in the capacity of the Soviet people, who had in the glorious October Revolution shown the way to the proletariat of the world. It was an argument which kept the opposition on the defensive.
The Fourteenth Party Congress, which had been much delayed, was finally arranged to open on December 18, 1925. As part of the preparations, the Central Committee met from October 3 to 10, and the opposition members - Zinoviev, Kamenev, Sokolnikov, then kommissar for Finance, and Krupskaya - showed at once that they intended to press their policies. It was a bold and desperate move, for they knew they would be overwhelmed by Stalin’s majority in the Congress. In the Central Committee, they charged that they had been obstructed in making criticisms of the official policy. Stalin was prepared to be conciliatory at this stage. Their protest was discussed and resulted in a compromise resolution which emphasized both the threat posed by the kulaks and the need to encourage the peasants. It seemed that a direct confrontation between the supporters of the two policies might be avoided.
Shortly before the Congress was to open, however, the party organizations in Moscow, Leningrad, and other parts of the country held local conferences to discuss policy and particularly to elect their delegates. The Leningrad conference rejected all the candidates whom Moscow sought to have included in their delegation. Stalin was angered by this display of independence. The Moscow conference passed a resolution severely criticizing the Leningradtsi, who responded in the same spirit. Pravda and the Leningradskaya Pravda engaged in a bitter exchange of abuse. Belatedly, Zinoviev tried to make a deal that the Leningradtsi would halt their open opposition to the official policy line if they had a guarantee that no reprisals would be taken against them after the Congress. The Central Committee rejected his proposal.
The Congress opened quietly. Stalin delivered the main political report and did not mention the opposition. He acknowledged that the kulak was a danger, but warned against exaggerating it. Any policy that antagonized the peasantry would hinder the economic progress which, as all knew, was outstanding and encouraging. But tension soon mounted, Mikhail Lashevich, the first opposition speaker, could hardly make himself heard above the jeers and catcalls. Zinoviev tried to present a reasoned case, but he made a mistake in attacking Bukharin, especially for the latter’s appeal to the peasants to enrich themselves. Bukharin was popular, and the attack brought delegates to his aid. Zinoviev’s speech was drowned at times by noisy interruptions. Krupskaya made an appeal for party unity, but her counsels were unheeded. When Lashevich spoke strongly against “cutting off” Zinoviev and Kamenev from the party leadership, Mikoyan replied sharply that it was not a matter of “cutting off,” but of Zinoviev and Kamenev submitting “to the iron will of the majority of the Central Committee.”
Kamenev dominated the proceedings on the fourth day. In a mood of desperation, he delivered one of the most forceful speeches of his career. He expounded the opposition policy. Then, toward the end of his speech, he astounded the Congress by making a personal attack on Stalin. “We are against creating the theory of a leader!” he declared. “We are against making a leader! We are against having the Secretariat combine in practice both politics and organization and place itself above the political organ.”
A storm of protest drowned his speech, but Kamenev was not to be silenced. “I must say what I have to say to the end!” he shouted. “Because I have more than once said it to Comrade Stalin personally, because I have more than once said it to a group of party delegates, I repeat it to the Congress. I have reached the conviction that Comrade Stalin cannot perform the function of uniting the Bolshevik general staff!”
Kamenev spoke in a fury of temper, as when he had made his vicious denunciations of Trotsky. But his attack on Stalin miscarried. He was not demanding more democracy, but the continuance of the Politburo of which he was a member. His speech, inspired by jealousy and malice, had the effect of rallying the Congress in support of Stalin, who represented party unity. Tomsky, as official spokesman, attacked the speech angrily. Kamenev had demonstrated, he said, the true nature of the opposition, which was inspired not by policies and principles, but by personal jealousies. At the same time, he was at pains to deny that there was an individual leader or that there could be one. It was still too soon after Lenin’s death to admit that he could have a successor. Tomsky closed with an appeal to Kamenev and Zinoviev to “apply to yourselves the lesson which you taught Comrade Trotsky” and “bow your heads before the will of the party!”
On the following day, Kamenev returned to the attack, but this time plaintively objecting to the fact that Stalin’s wishes usually prevailed. “Comrade Stalin is evidently destined,” he said, “by nature or by fate to formulate propositions rather more successfully than any other member of the Politburo. Comrade Stalin is, I affirm, the leading member of the Politburo without, however, claiming priority; he takes the most active part in the settlement of questions; his proposals are carried more often than anyone’s, and these proposals are carried unanimously.” It sounded more like a tribute to Stalin’s industry, judgment, and modesty than an attack, as was intended.
The three rapporteu
rs of the congress - Stalin, Molotov, and Zinoviev - wound up the proceedings. Stalin was restrained. He denied any intention of “cutting off” Zinoviev and Kamenev but demanded that they respect the cause of party unity. He denied any claims to personal leadership. “It is impossible,” he concluded, “to lead the party otherwise than collectively. It is stupid to think about any other way after Lenin; it is stupid to talk about it.” His speech was received “with applause turning into an ovation.” The final resolution, endorsing the official policy, was carried by 559 votes to sixty-five. It was an overwhelming personal victory for Stalin.
Stalin made no attempt at this time to dispose of Zinoviev, Kamenev, and the other oppositionists. Perhaps he was confident that they would dig their own graves. In the elections to the Central Committee, all of the opposition leaders were re-elected. Subsequently, the existing members of the Politburo - Stalin, Zinoviev, Bukharin, Rykov, Tomsky, and Trotsky - were reappointed, but Kamenev was reduced to candidate membership. The Politburo was increased from six to nine members, and Molotov, Voroshilov, and Kalinin, all Stalin’s men, were the additional members. The Central Committee was increased to 106 and the Central Control Commission to 163 members. No major changes took place in either body, but the additional members strengthened Stalin’s control over them.
The real blow which Stalin struck against Zinoviev was to remove him from the Leningrad party organization. A new editor took over Leningradskaya Pravda, and it at once ceased publicizing opposition views and faithfully reflected official policy. Then, early in January 1926, Molotov led a strong delegation to Leningrad to report to workers’ groups on the Congress. Ignoring local party leaders, members of the delegation appealed directly to the rank and file, addressing 63,000 workers and securing more than 60,000 votes in support of the official policy. In a brief, intensive campaign, Molotov’s team brought about a massive swing of Leningrad members away from their leaders, whom they had empowered only a few weeks earlier to oppose the central authority in Moscow. The change was a further demonstration of the power of the appeal for party unity; it reflected also the inadequacy and unpopularity of Zinoviev as leader.
During 1925, Trotsky held himself aloof from party politics. He did not speak at the Fourteenth Party Congress and watched with apparent contempt the efforts of Zinoviev and Kamenev to oppose Stalin. The savaging he had suffered in the previous year had hurt him deeply, and he had retreated behind a wall of silence. His one public statement, made in September 1925, was mendacious. In a book entitled Since Lenin Died, the American writer Max Eastman, who was a close friend of Trotsky’s, published some extracts from Lenin’s “Testament” and an account of the struggles within the party since Lenin’s death. He had obtained this information from knowledgeable foreign communists, from party members close to Trotsky, and possibly from Krupskaya or even from Trotsky himself. In an article, Trotsky denounced the book and its inside information as false. It was “a slander” to suggest that documents had been concealed from the Central Committee, and “a malicious invention” to allege that Lenin’s “Testament” had been violated.
Trotsky later claimed he had written the article under threat from Stalin. It is more probable that Trotsky, unthreatened, had lied in the hope of saving his position as a member of the inner party organs. But in publishing this denial, he was throwing away his most useful weapon against Stalin. The Lenin cult had developed to the point where every word of the dead leader was law. A skillful use of the “Testament” might have damaged Stalin’s position, but now Trotsky was prevented from using it.
The opposition groups remained small minorities within the party. Their leaders were motivated mainly by resentment of Stalin’s towering position, by the instinct for survival, and to a limited extent, by concern about the official policy, which favored the peasants. The opposition leaders were, moreover, filled with malice and hatred toward each other. Zinoviev and Kamenev had attacked Trotsky with equal virulence. Trotsky had never disguised his contempt for his opponents and had been brutally outspoken in attacking them.
It was remarkable then that the opposition leaders managed in the spring of 1926 to unite. They acted out of desperation. They knew they could not defeat Stalin’s party apparatus. They knew, too, that the OGPU, successor to the GPU, was active against rank-and-file oppositionists, although as yet, police methods were not used against senior members.
To Stalin, this coalition of the opposition leaders was a sinister attack on party unity, made at a time when the party’s hold on the country was still precarious. He denounced the agreement reached between Zinoviev and Trotsky as “an open, straightforward, and unprincipled deal.” It was, indeed, a sordid exchange in which Trotsky withdrew his criticisms of Zinoviev, who, in turn, conceded that Trotsky’s stand against “bureaucratism” had been justified.
Trotsky was mainly responsible for drafting the opposition platform. He took care to avoid any suggestion of an attack on party unity or of the formation of a new faction. He attributed the failings of the existing party management to antagonism between the bureaucracy and the proletariat. This was the reason for repressive measures and for the decline of party democracy, a concept for which Trotsky, when in power, had shown scant respect. The opposition proposed policies which would accelerate industrial growth, improve the grim conditions of the true industrial proletariat, and counter the threats of the kulaks and middle peasants.
The opposition presented their program in part to the Plenum of the Central Committee on April 6–9, 1926, and in full to the meeting on July 14–23, 1926. They were stirred to action by the collapse of the general strike in Britain, for which they blamed the party leaders’ failure to give guidance and leadership to the British workers. Stalin countered by removing opposition supporters from positions of authority.
Stalin also set about discrediting the opposition, alleging with dubious evidence that it was not really left-wing, but a right-wing bourgeois deviation. Then the opposition leaders played into his hands. They organized demonstrations in factories, demanding full party discussion of their proposals. This was a flagrant breach of discipline and an affront to party unity. Appalled by their own temerity and recklessness, the six leaders - Trotsky, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Pyatakov, Sokolnikov, and Yefim Evdokimov - confessed their guilt in a public declaration and swore not to pursue factional activity in future. They also denounced their own left-wing supporters in the Comintern and the Workers’ Opposition group. Apparently their confession was voluntary and an attempt to salve their consciences. They had sought, they admitted naïvely, only to retain some influence within the party. Their pusillanimous conduct exposed them and their few supporters to reprisals.
In October 1926, the Plenum of the Central Committee, sitting jointly with the Central Control Commission, gave a severe warning to the opposition leaders. Trotsky was dismissed from the Politburo and Kamenev from his candidate membership, and Zinoviev was removed from the Comintern. The opposition demand to be allowed to circulate their policy statement to delegates attending the forthcoming Fifteenth Party Conference was rejected. A further factor, damaging to the opposition, was the defection of Krupskaya, announced at the conference by Stalin. She had signed the original declaration of policy of the united opposition but had been antagonized by the conduct of Trotsky, Zinoviev, and the others. In a letter to Pravda, she expressed her disgust circumspectly. The opposition “went too far . . . comradely criticism became factionalism . . . the broad mass of the workers and peasants understood the statements of the opposition as statements against the basic principles of the party and Soviet power.” She closed with a demand for “maximum unity in action.”
Krupskaya had become a pathetic figure, and her influence had declined sharply. A woman of integrity, she was dedicated to Lenin’s memory and to the service of the revolutionary cause. But she had no understanding of politics, and she was constantly outmaneuvered by Stalin. She had loathed him since their first meeting in 1913. She had found, however, that even
with her great prestige as Lenin’s widow, she was powerless. Stalin watched her closely, knowing that she would harm him whenever opportunity offered. Indeed, in 1926, she managed to smuggle further extracts of Lenin’s “Testament” to Boris Souvarine, the French communist. He passed them to Max Eastman, who arranged for their publication in The New York Times on October 18, 1926. It was a vindictive and futile gesture which failed to affect Stalin’s position. But now, in defecting from the opposition, she demonstrated, as she had done on previous occasions, that the sanctity of the party of Lenin and of its unity mattered to her above all else.
At the Fifteenth Party Conference, Trotsky and Zinoviev finally destroyed themselves politically. Trotsky made a lengthy speech and had to ask repeatedly for more time. He was interrupted constantly by ridicule and laughter. Zinoviev groveled and begged forgiveness for his errors. He, too, was heckled and ridiculed. Both had been arrogant in power and now they were humiliated and defeated. It was left to Bukharin to make the final savage attack on them; the delegates, thirsting for blood, applauded loudly.
The main discussion at the conference was not the opposition, but Stalin’s new theory of “socialism in one country.” It bore the stamp of his mind and outlook, and it marked the beginning of the Stalinist era. The Russian revolutionary drive had been losing momentum since the end of the Civil War, and the process had accelerated after Lenin’s death. A new policy was needed that would inspire the Russian people to undertake the superhuman task of carrying their country on from the October Revolution toward socialism and communism. That policy was “socialism in one country.” Its emotional appeal was overwhelming. It aroused a new fervor in the party, and pride in the revolution spread beyond the party ranks. It was a declaration of independence from the West and of faith in the capacity of their country to forge ahead, creating its own future alone and unsupported. Backward Russia, for so long treated as lagging on the outskirts of Western civilization, would show itself to be advanced and at the center of civilization in the coming millennium.