Trotsky

by Dmitri Volkogonov

  The OGPU, however, had intercepted these contacts and informed Stalin. At the same time, Menzhinsky reported that the ‘Bukharinites’ had established contact with Trotsky, and Stalin now brought forward a decision he had taken long before. According to Ivan Vrachev—a veteran political commissar of the 1920s and former Trotskyist who was finally expelled from the Party and exiled in 1936, and who was almost certainly informed by Bukharin—in the middle of January 1929, Stalin spoke for the first time at the Politburo of the need to isolate Trotsky. Bukharin objected, and Rykov and Tomsky expressed their doubt over the wisdom of such a move. Others supported Stalin, but with reservations. Stalin then took from his desk-drawer a note from Menzhinsky giving the quantity of oppositional correspondence being sent to Alma-Ata, and details of the couriers who came monthly to Trotsky, and he read several extracts from Trotsky’s letters, commenting angrily: ‘The degenerate was kicked out of the Central Committee and the Party, but he hasn’t learnt his lesson. What, are we going to sit and wait for him to start organizing terror or a rebellion?’ The rest fell silent. Stalin announced his decision: ‘I propose we deport him abroad.’ Then, after a pause: ‘If he changes his mind, the way back will not be closed.’139

  The other members of the Politburo were thinking more of themselves than of Trotsky. They were all aware that their positions depended increasingly on Stalin’s favour, and were contradicting him less and less. He always had a cast-iron argument: ‘Would Lenin have been sentimental?’, ‘Doesn’t the Party govern through the dictatorship of the proletariat?’, ‘What are personal relations compared to the interests of the revolution?’ Bukharin was no longer arguing with him. Soon, in April 1929, he would hear Stalin accuse him—‘this scholastic theorist’—of becoming ‘a pupil of Trotsky … [Yesterday] he was still trying to form a bloc with the Trotskyists against the Leninists by the back door!’140

  Stalin had acquired vast power, but he was not yet a dictator. He stood on the threshold of the most appalling ‘revolution’ to be unleashed from above. Under the guise of bringing socialism to the countryside he would bring back serfdom or, more accurately, Stalinist bondage, which would enslave tens of millions of people. He wanted no one to get under his feet during this huge and ominous operation, but he could not yet bring himself either to kill Trotsky or throw him into prison. Instead, Trotsky must be banished. Efforts were made on Stalin’s orders to find somewhere to send him, but without success. Germany, Norway, France and England were among the countries that would not admit the legendary rebel. Finally, Turkey agreed.

  Trotsky was still awaiting a reply to his protest about the postal blockade when on the evening of 16 December 1928 a special messenger arrived from Moscow. Accompanied by two OGPU agents, V. Volynsky entered Trotsky’s apartment and delivered his message from the Centre: ‘The work of your political sympathizers throughout the country has lately assumed a definitely counter-revolutionary character; the conditions in which you are placed in Alma-Ata give you full opportunity to direct this work; in view of this, the collegium of the OGPU has decided to demand from you a categorical promise to discontinue your activity; failing this, the collegium will be obliged to alter the conditions of your existence to the extent of completely isolating you from political life. In this connection, the question of changing your place of residence will arise.’141

  To Trotsky it seemed obvious that he was about to be sent somewhere more remote, probably Siberia above the Arctic Circle, but the notion that he might be deported beyond the Soviet border did not enter his head. He at once wrote a long and detailed letter to the Central Committee and ECCI, explaining why he could not accept the ultimatum, citing in particular his lifelong commitment to the world revolution. A month later, on 20 January 1929, Volynsky reappeared with a large detachment of armed OGPU agents and handed ‘Citizen Trotsky’ the order for his deportation outside Soviet territory. Having read the order, Trotsky acknowledged its receipt by writing: ‘The decision of the GPU, criminal in substance and illegal in form, has been announced to me, January 20, 1929. Trotsky.’142 When he asked Volynsky where he was being deported, the messenger could only tell him that further orders were awaited.

  Again the packing had to be done, this time only with the assistance of his elder son, but together they ensured that all of his papers and books were packed. They were both surprised the OGPU had not confiscated them. Within a year or two, when Trotsky’s written output was unceasing and prolific, Stalin would rant and rage against those who had let him take his precious collection with him. Several people were arrested, notably the Chekists Volynsky, Bulanov and Fokin. It was as if Stalin himself had not realized that in his totalitarian system a directive from above had to be carried out to the letter, and the order for Trotsky’s deportation had said nothing about his books and archives. Since the authorities had not expressly banned their removal from the USSR, any functionary would assume it must mean they were permitting it.

  Almost one year after arriving in Alma-Ata, the Trotsky family left their nondescript, one-storey brick house and boarded the railcar that had been set aside for them and departed for the unknown, with their guards. Every day of the journey Trotsky asked to be given some explanation, and demanded to see his children in Moscow, Sergei and Zina. He also demanded a guarantee of safety, being only too aware that there were countless White Guard men in the countries to which he felt he might be exiled—Finland, the Baltic republics, Poland, Germany, France and Bulgaria—men whom the Red Army that he had created and led had thrown out of their native land, made homeless and miserable and vengeful. They would not let him forget their misfortunes. Every morning began with Trotsky’s demanding to know where he was being taken. Finally, he declared a hunger-strike. The train pulled into an out-of-the-way halt on a single track, the car was detached and shunted into a siding. Trotsky was of course not allowed to go to Moscow, but Sergei and his wife were brought to say goodbye. A day or two later, on 7 February, Trotsky was informed that he was being deported to Constantinople in Turkey.

  Again he wrote a protest to the Central Committee, the government and ECCI:

  1. The GPU representative reported that the German Social Democratic government has refused me a visa. This means Mueller and Stalin agree on their political evaluation of the opposition.

  2. The GPU representative reported that I will be handed over to Kemal* against my will. This means that Stalin has arranged for Kemal (a killer of Communists) to deal with the opposition as their common enemy.

  3. [Trotsky deleted the following point when the statement was issued to the press in Constantinople.] The GPU representative refused to discuss minimal guarantees against White Guardists—Russian, Turkish or any other—for my forced deportation. Behind this lies Stalin’s obvious expectation of cooperation from White Guards, which is essentially the same as the already secured cooperation of Kemal. The statement by the GPU representative to the effect that a ‘security warrant’ has been issued by Kemal for my possessions in exchange for my weapons, i.e. my revolvers, means I shall be unarmed while taking my first steps in front of the White Guards …

  I report the above so that responsibility may be reinforced in good time and as the basis for the steps I regard it as necessary to take against this purely Thermidorean breach of faith.143

  Moscow was unmoved: it must be Turkey. The train moved inexorably southwards, uncoupled and recoupled along the way. The family was not allowed to leave the train at any point. They reached Odessa on 10 February, where they took their farewell of Sergei and his wife. They would never see each other again. As he embraced his son, Trotsky said: ‘Don’t be sad, my son. Everything changes in life. Much will change even in Moscow. We’ll be back … We’ll definitely be back!’ Chekist agent Fedor Pavlovich Fokin hurried them: ‘Citizen Trotsky, it’s time.’

  Fokin, head of the passport section of the Chief Board of Militia, had the job of accompanying Trotsky from Alma-Ata to Constantinople. He regarded his charge with mixed feelings. Onl
y recently, Trotsky’s name had been spoken in awe, yet in the last two or three years the term ‘Trotskyist’ had become one of abuse at Party meetings. Fokin received the OGPU agents’ report that Trotsky’s luggage had been loaded, the trunks put in his cabin and the documentation completed. Trotsky donned an old topcoat over his worn-out sweater, picked up an attaché case with his most precious things, embraced Sergei and his wife once more, and set off towards the exit ahead of Natalya and Lev. Through the gloom of the unusually frosty night, they could discern the lights of Odessa, a city which had figured so large in his life. Holding his wife’s hand, he went aboard the ship, just managing to make out the name painted on its hull, Ilyich.

  As Trotsky took in the scene, he saw only a dense circle of soldiers. Sergei and his wife could not be seen; they had been whisked away at once. The steamer shuddered and moved slowly away from the quay. After nearly a day at sea, Trotsky sent Lev to invite Fokin to his cabin. Trotsky handed him an unsealed letter, suggesting he read it before passing it on to his superiors, and then added, ‘I will not detain you.’ Fokin went back to his cabin and looked at the letter. It was addressed to him, ‘GPU Plenipotentiary Comrade Fokin’, and read:

  According to GPU representative Bulatov, you are under strict orders, despite my protests, to put me ashore by force in Constantinople, that is, to hand me over to Kemal and his agents. You are able to carry out this order because the GPU (i.e. Stalin) has an agreement with Kemal for the forced settlement of a proletarian revolutionary in Turkey by the combined efforts of the GPU and the Turkish National-Fascist police. If at this moment I am compelled to submit to this violence, at the basis of which lies an unprecedented breach of faith by former pupils of Lenin (Stalin and Co.), I nevertheless think it necessary to warn you that the inevitable and, I hope, not too distant, rebirth of the October revolution, the Bolshevik Party and Comintern on genuinely Bolshevik foundations, will enable me sooner or later to bring to account both the organizers of this Thermidorean crime, and its executors.144

  The letter was signed ‘12 February 1929, aboard the steamship Ilyich on the approach to Constantinople.’

  On returning to Moscow, Fokin handed over Trotsky’s statement to his superiors, but for some reason made a copy for himself, a fact he revealed to one of his colleagues at work. During the nightmare years of denunciation and counter-denunciation, this colleague informed on the ‘Trotskyist document’ that Fokin was harbouring, and in 1938 Fokin was arrested on Yezhov’s personal order. He was chief of the Rostov militia at the time and was interrogated by Abakumov, then chief of the Rostov NKVD. The price Fokin paid for having kept Trotsky’s warning was many years in the labour camps.

  As the ship approached Constantinople, Trotsky drew up a chronology of the past year, beginning with the notice of his exile, supposedly to Astrakhan, and ending with his arrival in Constantinople.145 It was a sad catalogue of his last year in his homeland, and the beginning of the last, eleven-year, chapter of his life. The man who with Lenin had laid the foundations of a mighty and sinister state system had been definitively rejected by it. Not because he was unsuitable, but because there was room only for one at the summit of the system. He was the first not to accept Stalin and his dictatorship. He was also the first to create and defend that dictatorship. Turkey would be the next place from which he would continue the struggle against the man who had betrayed the revolution and introduced the Russian Thermidore.

  * In 1922 Stalin, Dzerzhinsky and Ordzhonikidze had offended Lenin by using violent bullying tactics to bring the Georgian Bolshevik government into line.

  * The Turkish president Mustapha Kemal, or Kemal Ataturk as he became known.

  6

  The Wanderer Without a Visa

  As the Ilyich manoeuvred slowly alongside the quay, Trotsky had good reason to fear a trap. They could throw him into prison or send him on to a yet more distant country, but he was above all afraid that he would be a target for the White Guards who had settled in Constantinople after their evacuation by the Allies from the Crimea at the end of the civil war. Stalin may even have sent him to Turkey with that in mind. After all, since 1921 the Bolsheviks had been sending money to Constantinople for the purpose of spreading propaganda among these soldiers, and the mood among them was rabidly anti-Soviet and rife with the desire for revenge.1

  Turkish authorities boarded the ship as soon as she docked on 12 February 1929. They found only the crew, Trotsky, his wife and son and four OGPU agents. Trotsky handed the senior Turkish officer a statement addressed to President Kemal:

  Sir,

  At the gates of Constantinople, I have the honour to inform you that I have arrived at the Turkish border not by choice and that I shall cross this border only under duress. Please accept my appropriate sentiments, Mr President.2

  The officer folded the document and put it into his briefcase. On the quayside, Trotsky found an automobile and two surprisingly friendly representatives from the Soviet Consulate awaiting him. They installed his family in two rooms, brought in their luggage and generally displayed the marks of respect reserved for a high state official.

  The future seemed uncertain. Trotsky at once started sending letters and telegrams to his many acquaintances in Paris, Berlin, Sofia,Warsaw, Prague and London. He needed to know how he stood in the Consulate, how long he would be kept there, and what his family would live on. Just before the disembarkation, Fokin had handed him an envelope which turned out to contain fifteen hundred US dollars. Trotsky had been reluctant to accept it, but his pockets were empty and there was the family to think of.

  They remained in the Consulate for about two weeks, at the beginning very much the honoured guests of its staff. But the atmosphere changed sharply for the worse once Trotsky’s friends in Paris, Marguerite and Alfred Rosmer and Magdeleine and Maurice Paz, put the world’s press onto him and his articles started appearing with an account of his deportation from the USSR. Soviet envoys in Paris, New York and Berlin now had to send a daily report to Moscow on what writings of Trotsky were being published, and what public and government opinion was saying about him.

  Prinkipo Island and the Planet

  As soon as Moscow heard about Trotsky’s articles in the Western press, the Consul in Constantinople was instructed to suggest Trotsky find other accommodation, adding that he could remain for a few more days. Natalya and Lev starting looking for rooms, while Trotsky went on writing, meeting journalists and seeking channels of contact with his supporters in other countries. Messages of support and offers of help came from Rosmer and Paz in Paris, the critic Edmund Wilson in the USA, Sidney and Beatrice Webb, H.G. Wells and Herbert Samuel in England, among others. He felt much encouraged.

  A few days later, however, the Consul asked him to leave and even threatened the use of physical force. On 5 March 1929 Trotsky issued a written statement to the effect that Constantinople was alive with White Guards and that he was being made an easy target for them. Sermuks and Poznansky had not been allowed to join him, and he accused the Central Committee of ‘liquidating security for my family in the expectation that White Russians will take revenge on them.’3 The Consul declined to accept this statement, as he was himself confused by the threatening telegrams coming from Moscow: he could not understand why there was so much anger and why Stalin was in such a hurry to deport a man who was better known to the world than the new master in the Kremlin.

  Stalin was particularly irked by two articles which appeared in Paris at the end of February 1929. In one, entitled ‘The Course of Events is Thus’, Trotsky wrote: ‘… our attitude to the October revolution, to the Soviet regime, to Marxist doctrine and Bolshevism remains unchanged. We do not measure the historical process by the short yardstick of an individual life … I do not regard my expulsion from the Soviet Union as the last word in history. The issue is of course not about a personal fate. The paths of historical revenge are winding …’ He then reproduced a long list of oppositionists who had been exiled and added: ‘… what is more
important, however, is the politically indisputable fact that the services rendered by these exiles to the Soviet Republic are immeasurably higher than the services rendered by those who have exiled them.’4

  The second article roused Stalin to even greater anger. Entitled ‘How Could This Happen?’, it represented the most savage criticism of Stalin yet published. Opening with the question ‘What is Stalin?’, Trotsky replied: ‘This is the most outstanding mediocrity in our Party … His political horizon is extremely narrow. His theoretical level is equally primitive. His little book of compilations, The Foundations of Leninism, in which he tries to pay tribute to the Party’s theoretical traditions, teems with schoolboy errors … He has the mentality of a dogged empiricist, devoid of creative imagination … His attitude to facts and to people is distinguished by an exceptional disregard. It is never hard for him to call white what yesterday he was calling black … Stalinism is above all the automatic work of an organization.’5 Stalin summoned Yaroslavsky, a member of the presidium of the Central Control Commission of the Party, and thrust Trotsky’s article at him with, ‘Read that and think of a way of replying to the swine.’

  Trotsky meanwhile was looking for somewhere to live. One of the Consulate staff, who had served under him in the civil war, found an opportunity to let him know that the safest place to be was on one of the islands in the Sea of Marmora. The idea appealed to Trotsky, and by the evening of the following day the island of Prinkipo—Prince’s Island—had been found, one and a half hours by sea from the capital. It contained a tiny fishing village at which once a day a small steamer called to deposit two or three passengers and collect fish. With the help of two supporters from Germany, Trotsky found a suitable old house in which the family could live and he could work, although he had no intention of remaining there long, and had already sent applications for permission to reside either in Paris or Berlin. In fact, the sojourn on Prinkipo would last four years.