Marxists must study the history of the class struggle, so that we can apply the lessons in the struggle for communism today. Here, you can find our most recent historical articles. For theoretical articles, click here.
You can also visit our education hub to find a selection of articles, books, talks and reading guides.
On April 26th 1937 General Franco commissioned from the German High
Command, against Republican Spain, the aerial bombardment of the small
and defenceless Basque town of Guernica,
visiting a hell on earth in the form of bombs weighing up to 1000lbs
across the town of 10, 000 people. Two months later, seventy years
ago, Pablo Picasso unveiled Guernica. Despite his enormous prestige the
establishment rarely tell us that Picasso was a man of the left.
In his article (The significance of Lenin’s April Theses
1917 ) Darrall Cozens explained how Lenin rearmed the Bolshevik Party
in 1917. Continuing our series on the Russian Revolution, he tells how the
revolutionaries developed from being a small group when the
February Revolution broke
out, to become the main alternative to the new
establishment by June of that year.
How the West Was Stolen, by Hopalong Harry Whittaker, is a rip-roaring
polemic from an old gunslinger and former UCATT shop steward now living
south of the river, but hailing originally from Glasagae way. We hope
readers enjoy the gallop as he ranges from historical polemic to cinephile
opinionation.
In order to understand the partition of the
sub-continent and the terrible conditions it had to face it is necessary to
identify the role of imperialism in India and cover certain historical ground. In the year of the 60th anniversary of India’s
independence here is first of a series of articles marking this event.
As armaments were piled up in preparation for the Second World War Ted Grant explained that, "This war machine is for the defence of the trading interests and the colonial loot of British imperialism, for what is making for war is the intensified and sharpened struggle for markets between the different countries of the world."
This month marks 90 years since Lenin returned to Russia from exile. He immediately embarked on the task of convincing not only the mass of workers, but also the Bolshevik leadership, that the tasks of the revolution were socialist, that what was needed was for power to pass to the hands of the Soviets.
At the end of the Second World War the Labour Party was elected into office, a clear rejection of Churchill and his anti-working class policies. But the statements of the Labour leaders revealed that they intended to continue with capitalism. The British ruling class understood they could use these leaders, discredit them and then bring back the Tories. Ted Grant warned the Labour leaders that this is what would happen.
Contrary to the official mythology about Churchill, by 1944 he was already losing support among the people of Britain. This article by Ted Grant, written at the time and based on local election results, shows that the workers were becoming radicalised. This was to be confirmed in a dramatic way just after the war when Labour won a landslide victory.
In 1945 Churchill justified the brutal repression of the Greek workers at the hands of British troops. The then leaders of the Labour Party and the Communist Party in Britain hid the real meaning of the Greek events from the British workers. Ted Grant exposed this terrible betrayal in this article that appeared in the Mid-February 1945 edition of the Socialist Appeal.
Towards the end of the Second World War the coalition government in Britain was pushing through the Town and Country Planning Bill in such a way that it guaranteed the property rights of the big landowners. In this article Ted Grant called on Labour to break the coalition and nationalise the land without compensation to the big landowners!
The titantic events in Germany between 1917 and 1923 constitute a tragic and bitter chapter in the international workers' movement. Golden opportunities, in which the German working class could have repeatedly taken power, were lost, eventually ending up in the ghastly victory of the Nazis in 1933 and the obliteration of the workers' movement. A book review by Rob Sewell.
Today, November 7th, we celebrate the 89th anniversary of the 1917
Russian Revolution by republishing an article written by Ted Grant,
originally published in 1967 on the revolution's 50th anniversary. Even
at a time when the bureaucracy seemed almighty and irremovable this
article confidently predicts the downfall of the Stalinist regime.
Then, the political revolution, i.e. the workers coming to power,
seemed a concrete possibility, especially in the light of the 1956
Hungarian events. Unfortunately, because there was no party capable of
leading the workers, the collapse of the Stalinist regime led to the
capitalist counter-revolution. However, this article clearly
demonstrates that the genuine Marxists, the Trotskyists, never had any
illusions in Stalinism and always struggled for its overthrow and for
the workers to take back the power they had briefly held after the 1917
revolution.