Source of the text: Originally published in the
September 1940 edition of Red Front, the English-language journal of
the Revolutionary Communist Party of India.
Digital Version: Provided by the
Revolutionary Communist Party of
India, April 2020.
Leon Trotsky is no more. The man who with Lenin led the November Revolution dies at the hand of the assassin. After Lenin, the greatest leader of the world proletariat, the greatest revolutionary orator and writer of our times, the most brilliant ideological guide of the international revolutionary movement, Trotsky is removed from the world by the enemies of revolution at a moment when he would have been the most dynamic guide for the revolutionary movement of the world. The world is certainly poorer today by the tragic end of perhaps the profoundest revolutionary genius of history.
This dastardly crime has shocked the entire world. Coming almost immediately after the Soviet-German Pact, itself the logical conclusion of the treacherous policy of betrayal of the revolutionary movement, this criminal murder of Trotsky is the climax of the cruel methods of G.P.U. terror. It is not an accident that this cruel murder is perpetrated with the background of the sinister Soviet-German Pact. The series of judicial murders of old and tried Bolshevik revolutionaries, accused of pro-Hitler conspiracy against the Soviet State have inevitably ended in this shockingly brutal murder of Leon Trotsky, the best and the most capable world revolutionary leader, opposing, fighting, and successfully counteracting the utterly degenerated and defunct leadership of the Soviet State and the Comintern.
The present leadership of the Communist Party of U.S.S.R., and consequently of the Comintern have been, with ruthless violence, throttling all democratic opposition within the Party and the International. In the name of purging, old and tried revolutionaries have been murdered. In the name of discipline the Red Army has been decapitated. The trend is remarkably uniform throughout the world.
Ideological retreats and betrayals of revolution have weakened the Party and International. The purges produced a serious crisis in the revolutionary leadership, and discontent and distrust among the proletarian masses have emerged. Desertion from the path of revolutionary internationalism prepared grounds for Soviet patriotism to flourish. Cultural retrogression, economic disasters and political blunders led the Soviet leadership to bankruptcy. Overwhelmed by its own mistakes and betrayals, the present Soviet leadership staked the defence and integrity of the Soviet Union only on the diplomatic and military pacts with Fascist imperialism. The pacifist masquerade of Soviet leadership through its foreign policy and that of the Third International through the policy of collective security and Democratic Peace Front and the Popular Front were transformed into the neutrality for German Fascism.
The Soviet leadership stands unmasked in its supply of raw materials for the colossal German war machine. The effect is overwhelming. The revolutionary world proletarian movement is thrown into utter confusion. The crisis of revolutionary leadership has baffled the world proletariat. The demoralisation of the entire working class movement throughout the world is complete. The Soviet-German Pact is the historical expression of the blackest treachery to the cause of the revolutionary proletarian movement in the world.
Trotsky indicated and fought this dangerous drift of the Soviet and the Comintern leadership and prophesied the Soviet-German Pact as far back as 1933. Trotsky was, as a result, becoming, in spite of his wrong steps in the past, the hope and a centre of the world revolutionary forces. And he was murdered with inhuman brutality. The GPU-Gestapo pact is producing results.
It is not an insignificant matter that the Congress-communists in India, as the paid sub-agents of the Comintern, have not failed in the routine duty of praising the Soviet-German Pact and in justifying the murder of Trotsky. In that they have only justified their place amongst the international chorus-singers, singing to the Soviet-German tune.
On our side, we record our strongest condemnation of the criminal murder of Leon Trotsky and express our deep sorrow at his shocking death and sympathy for the unfortunate widow, Natalia Trotsky. We solemnly proclaim our deep solidarity with international proletarian revolutionaries throughout the world who have fallen under the cruel axe of the assassin and with all those who have suffered and are still suffering the pains and horrors of dungeons and death in their struggle for the cause of the world socialist revolution. We doubt not that the red banner of revolution has assumed a richer hue and has become still more glorious by their suffering and death. The international proletariat will vindicate the sufferings of those countless revolutionaries throughout the world in its final victory in the struggle for the World Revolution.