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Stalin School of Falsification - Chapter 5 trying to cover him with mud?" Such is the real work of Stalin and his agents in their effort to invent a new biography for him after the events. The party mass cannot possibly check upon the greater part of Stalin's "revelations."Instead they become firmly imbued with a loss of confidence in the leadership of the party, past, present and future. We shall have to win this anew-this confidence of the party-against Stalin and Stalinism. 43. As is known, Gusev has devoted special energy to the literary revision of our war history. He has even written a brochure entitled Our Military Disagreements. In this brochure, it seems, the poisonous gossip first appeared about shooting communists (not deserters, not traitors, even though with party cards, but communists). Gusev's misfortune, like that of many others, is that he has written twice about one and the same fact and question: once in Lenin's tim once in Stalin's. Here is what Gusev wrote the first time: "The arrival of comrade Trotsky [near Kazan] produced a decisive change in the situation. The arrival of Trotsky's train at the wayside station, Sviazhsk, brought a firm will to victory, initiative and momentum for all sides of the work of the army. From the very first day, in that station crowded with the wagon trains of the innumerable regiments, where were the headquarters of the political department and the commissary, as well as among the army troops deployed over a distance of fifteen versts, everybody felt that a great turn mg point had arrived. "This made itself felt first of all in the sphere of discipline. The stern methods of comrade Trotsky in that epoch of guerrilla warfare, in discipline and provincial egotisms, were especially and above all expedient and necessary. You could do nothing with persuasion. And, moreover, there was no time for it. In the course of those twenty-five days that comrade Trotsky spent in Sviazhsk an enormous work was accomplished. The disorganized and degenerated regiments of the Fifth Army were converted into fighting troops and prepared for the capture of Kazan."(Proletarskaya Revolutsia, No. 2 [25], 1924.) Every member of the party who lived through the experience of the Civil War and has not lost his memory will say, at least to himself, if he is afraid to say it out loud, that you could quote by the score, if not by the hundred, such printed testimonials as this testimonial written by Gusev. 44. I limit myself here to testimonials of the most authoritative character. In his recollections of Lenin, Gorky says: "Striking his fist on the table, he [Lenin] exclaimed: 'Show me another man who would be able in a year to organize almost a model army; yes, and win the esteem of the military specialists. We have such a man. We have everything, and you'll see miracles!' "(Maxim Gorky, Vladimir Lenin, Leningrad, 1924, p.28.) In the same conversation, Lenin said, according to Gorky: "Yes, yes, I know. They lie a lot about my relations with him. They lie a great deal, it seems, especially about Trotsky and me."(Ibid., p.28.) Yes, they lied a lot about the relations of Lenin and Trotsky. But can you compare the amateurish lying of those days with the properly organized, All-Russian and international lying of today? In those days the http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/works/1937-st2/sf05.htm (15 of 20) [06/06/2002 15:06:23]
Stalin School of Falsification - Chapter 5 liars were the Black Hundreds, the White Guards, in part also the Social Revolutionists and Mensheviks. Now it is the Stalin faction that has seized this weapon. 45. In the Bolshevik fraction of the All-Russian Central Council of Trade Unions, January 12, 1920, Lenin said: "If we defeated Denikin and Kolchak, it was because our discipline was higher than that of all the capitalist countries of the world. Comrade Trotsky has introduced the death penalty and we will support him. He has introduced it by means of conscious organization and agitation on the part of communists." 46. I have not at hand the many other speeches of Lenin in defense of the military policy which I carried out in full accord with him. In particular, the minutes of the conference of delegates to the Eighth Congress on Military Affairs remain unpublished. Why are those minutes unpublished? Because Lenin in that conference opposed with all his energy the colleagues of Stalin who are now so industriously falsifying the past. 47. But I have at hand one document which is worth a hundred. I spoke of this document in the Presidium of the Central Control Commission when Yaroslavsky started a poisonous intrigue against me, under protest from Ordjonikidze. I quoted it at the last joint Plenum, August 1927, when Voroshilov followed in the footsteps of Yaroslavsky. Lenin gave me, on his own initiative, a blank sheet of paper with the following lines written at the bottom: "Comrades, knowing the harsh character of comrade Trotsky's orders, I am so convinced, so absolutely convinced, of the correctness, expedience and necessity for the good of our cause, of orders issued by comrade Trotsky, that I give them my full support. "V. Ulianov (Lenin)." The purpose of this blank I explained to the Presidium of the Central Control Commission in the following words: "When he [Lenin] handed me that sheet of paper with these lines written at the bottom of a clean page, I was perplexed. He said: 'I have been informed that rumors are being started against you that you are shooting communists. I give you this blank and I will give you as many of them as you want, stating that I support your decisions. Above it you can write any decision you want to and my signature will be ready.' That was in July 1919. Since much gossip is now abroad about my relations with Vladimir Ilyich, and what is far more important, his attitude toward me, I would suggest that somebody else show me such a blank page with his signature, where Lenin says that he endorses beforehand every decision that I might make. Upon these decisions depended not only the fate of individual communists but often a far greater thing." NOTES: 18. The onerous conditions of peace which the Germans, threaten ing a constantly deeper invasion of the Ukraine and Russia itself, sought to impose at Brest-Litovsk upon the young Soviet repub lic, created a violent dispute in the leading circles of the Bol shevik party and in the ranks. Emphasizing the exhaustion http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/works/1937-st2/sf05.htm (16 of 20) [06/06/2002 15:06:23]
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