The Stalin school of falsification - Marxists Internet Archive

Stalin School of Falsification -- Chapter 9
will otherwise undermine all the conquests of the October Revolution. Back in the reign of the Czar there
were patriots who used to confound the fatherland with the ruling administration. We have nothing in
common with them. We will continue to criticize the Stalinist regime as a worthless regime, a regime of
back-sliding, an ideologically emasculated, narrow-minded and short-sighted regime.
For one year we tried to hammer into your heads the meaning of the Anglo-Russian Committee.[50] We
told you that it was ruining the developing revolutionary movement of the English proletariat. In the
meantime, all your authority, the entire accumulated experience of Bolshevism, the authority of Leninism
-- all this you threw on the scales in support of Purcell. You will say, "But we criticize him!" This is
nothing else than a new form of support to opportunism by back sliding Bolsheviks. You "criticize"
Purcell -- ever more mildly, ever more rarely-and you remain tied to him. But what is he enabled to say
in reply to revolutionists in his own country when they brand him as the agent of Chamberlain? He is
able to say, "Now look here! Tomsky himself, a member of the Political Bureau and Chairman of the
All-Russian Central Council of the Trade Unions who sent money to the English strikers, has made
criticisms of me but nevertheless we are working hand in hand. How dare you call me the agent of
imperialism?" Would he be right or wrong? He would be right. In a devious way you have placed the
entire machinery of Bolshevism at the disposal of Purcell. That is what we accuse you of. This is a very
grave accusation-far graver than bidding Smilga farewell at the Yaroslav station. What have you done to
Bolshevism? What have you done in the space of a few years to all the authority of Bolshevism, all its
experience, and the entire theory of Marx and Lenin? You have told the workers of the world, and above
all our Moscow workers, that in the event of war the Anglo-Russian Committee would be the organizing
center of the struggle against imperialism. But we have said and still say that in the event of war the
Anglo-Russian Committee will be a ready-made trench for all the turn-coats of the breed of the false,
half-way friends of the Soviet Union, and for all the deserters to the camp of the enemies of the Soviet
Union. Thomas gives open support to Chamberlain. But Purcell supports Thomas, and that is the main
thing. Thomas maintains himself upon the support of the capitalists. Purcell maintains himself by
deceiving the masses and lends Thomas his support. And you are lending support to Purcell. You accuse
us of giving support to Chamberlain. No! It is you yourselves who are linked up with Chamberlain
through your Right wing. It is you who stand in a common front with Purcell who supports Thomas and,
together with the latter, Chamberlain. That is the verdict of a political analysis and not a charge based on
calumny.
The devil only knows what is already being said about the Opposition at meetings, particularly at
meetings of workers' and peasants' nuclei. Questions are raised as to the "resources" used by the
Opposition to carry on its "work." It may be that illiterate and unconscious workers, or your own plants,
are sending up such questions as are worthy of the Black Hundred.[51]. . . And there are scoundrels
acting as reporters who have the audacity to give evasive answers to such written questions. If you were
really a Central Control Commission, you would be duty-bound to put an end to this dirty, abominable,
contemptible and purely Stalinist campaign against the Opposition. We, on the other hand, are not
preoccupied with spreading calumny. We present an open political declaration: Chamberlain and Thomas
are in a common front; they are supported by Purcell, without whose support they are ciphers; but you
are supporting Purcell and thereby weakening the U.S.S.R. and strengthening imperialism. This is an
honest political declaration! And you yourselves are feeling the weight of it at this very moment.
If you were seriously mindful of the war danger, as you claim, how could there possibly have been the
wild internal party repressions which are now becoming more and more unbridled? How can you at the
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