Polemic on General Line of International ... - From Marx to Mao

Lenin made the pointed comment that Kautsky’s parliamentaryroad “is nothing but the purest and the most vulgaropportunism: repudiating revolution in deeds, while acceptingit in word”. 1 He said:By so “interpreting” the concept “revolutionary dictatorshipof the proletariat” as to expunge the revolutionaryviolence of the oppressed class against its oppressors,Kautsky beat the world record in the liberal distortion ofMarx. 2Here, we have quoted Khrushchov as well as Bernstein andKautsky and Lenin’s criticism of these two worthies at somelength in order to show that Khrushchov’s revisionism ismodern Bernsteinism and Kautskyism, pure and simple. Aswith Bernstein and Kautsky, Khrushchov’s betrayal of Marxismis most sharply manifested in his opposition to revolutionaryviolence, in what he does “to expunge revolutionaryviolence”. In this respect, Kautsky and Bernstein have nowclearly lost their title to Khrushchov who has set a new worldrecord. Khrushchov, the worthy disciple of Bernstein andKautsky, has excelled his masters.VIOLENT REVOLUTION IS A UNIVERSAL LAWOF PROLETARIAN REVOLUTIONThe entire history of the working-class movement tells usthat the acknowledgement or non-acknowledgement of violentrevolution as a universal law of proletarian revolution, of thenecessity of smashing the old state machine, and of the necessityof replacing the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie by the1V. I. Lenin, “The State and Revolution”, Selected Works, Eng. ed.,FLPH, Moscow, 1952, Vol. II, Part 1, p. 323.2V. I. Lenin, “The Proletarian Revolution and the RenegadeKautsky”, Selected Works, Eng. ed., FLPH, Moscow, 1952, Vol. II,Part 2, pp. 47-48.366