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Correspondence: Stalinism & the Colonies, The New International, Vol. XII No. 7, September 1947, pp. 218.
Transcribed by Ted Crawford.
Marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.
In the November 1946 number of the New International, theoretical organ of the Workers’ Party (of America), Comrade Henry Judd in his review of the Lanka Sama Samaj Party – Ceylon unit of the Bolshevik-Leninist Party of India, Section of the Fourth International, accuses the LSSP of having “gone far along the road leading to capitulation to Stalinism.” He states further that the LSSP “claims to be a Trotskyist and Fourth International Party.”
In support of his charge of capitulation to Stalinism Comrade Judd quotes the Editorial Note we wrote on Persia in the July 24 1946 Number of Samasamajist. But the quotation is so torn out of its context that the reader is likely to believe what Comrade Judd states, despite the fact most revolutionaries never take seriously the articles and pamphlets of Comrade Judd; because Comrade Judd has a capacity for allowing his imagination to run riot when he has gathered a few unverified facts on the problems of the colonial and semi-colonial revolutionary movement. Recently he has indulged in this customary past-time of his in his articles on the European Revolution.
We wish to reproduce the relevant portions of our Editorial Notes on Persia, to enable the reader to judge whether we have “gone far along the road leading to capitulation to Stalinism.”
“The struggle between the forces of democracy and semi-feudal reaction in Persia is sweeping the entire country. It is no longer confined to the Northern Provinces of Persia. Isaphan is no longer the centre of activities of the Tudeh Party. Teheran the capital of Persia and the seat of the Central Government has become the hub from which radiate the activities of the forces of democracy and the working-class movement at present under the patronage of the Tudeh Party and the Soviet Union. The drive for influence in Persia between the Soviet Union and Anglo-American finance-capital is today a phase of the development of democratic and working-class forces which are struggling to liberate themselves from authoritarian religious mullahs and obscurantist semi-feudal landlords. Britain is on the side of reaction and conservatism, whilst the Soviet Union is encouraging the democratic and working-class forces to organize themselves to overthrow feudal reaction and end British imperialist domination of the land of Iran.
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“The Soviet Union is adopting the pattern that she experimented with in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe. An independent working-class organization is not encouraged; working-class organizations are made subordinate to capitalist parties. The safety of the Soviet Union and Soviet influence in the lands of the Near East are the guiding motives of Soviet foreign policy in these lands. Incidentally the democratic and working-class forces receive support in their struggle against feudal reaction and British imperialist domination. The Near East and the countries of the Middle East are likely to witness an intense conflict between the Soviet Union and British imperialism in the near future.” (Samasamajist, July 24, 1946.)
We like to ask Comrade Judd what is wrong with this analysis. The LSSP has never travelled on the road to capitulation to Stalinism. It has been true to the principles and programme of Trotskyism. It has a greater right not merely to claim but to proclaim that it is more a Trotskyist and Fourth International Party than the Workers Party (of America). The LSSP accepts fully Comrade Leon Trotsky’s characterization of the Soviet Union as a “degenerated workers’ state.” It has refused to accept the pseudo-Marxism of the theoretical leaders of the Minority. The LSSP is capable of drawing a distinction between the policy of expansionism of the Soviet Union and the policy of imperialism of Anglo-American finance-capital. In the above note we have attempted to draw that distinction whilst indicating the limitations and the dangers to the proletariat in that policy of expansionism of the Soviet Union. The essential conflict of this post-war epoch, the conflict between the degenerated workers’ state – the Soviet Union – and the world of capitalism, of Anglo-American finance-capital, must be kept in view. Comrade Judd and some of his colleagues see no difference between the “totalitarianism” of fascism and that of Stalinism. We cannot subscribe to that school of thought. The LSSP sees no reason to reject Trotsky’s characterization of the Soviet Union. The LSSP is not convinced that capitalism has been restored in the Soviet Union.
The LSSP is painfully conscious of the harm done to Trotskyism and the Fourth International movement by the highly colored and exaggerated articles and brochures of Comrade Judd on the Trotskyist movement in the colonies. Comrade Judd has an infinite capacity for mixing facts with fiction. Today no serious minded colonial revolutionary pays any attention to Comrade Judd’s scribblings in the New International. As a matter of fact we are amazed at the ignorance of the problems of the colonial revolution displayed by American and European Trotskyists. Our appeal to Comrade Judd and his colleagues in the Workers’ Party is that they should take every possible precaution to prevent the Trotskyist movement degenerating in the manner the Communist International degenerated in the twenties.
Rejoinder by Henry Judd
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