On this day in 1940, Leon Trotsky – the great Russian revolutionary and Marxist theoretician – was struck down by a blow from a Stalinist assassin. He fell into a coma and died the following day.
To commemorate Trotsky’s life and ideas, we republish an abridged version of an article by Rob Sewell – originally written on the 65th anniversary of Trotsky’s death, and featured in the latest issue of The Communist – describing his battle to keep the unblemished banner of Marxism aloft.
Trotsky’s final words were “Go forward!”. We take this message to heart, remembering his tireless efforts, inspiring contribution, and lifelong struggle, and preserving this legacy by building the forces of genuine communism today.
Click here to read the full version of this article. We also recommend Alan Woods’ pamphlet ‘In Memory of Leon Trotsky’, available here, which was originally written in 2000.
Trotsky’s murder was not wholly unexpected.
Ever since he took up the defence of Lenin’s ideas in 1923, with the formation of the Left Opposition, he had become the mortal enemy of Stalin – the figurehead of the Russian bureaucracy and gravedigger of the revolution.
In 1924, Stalin came out with the ‘theory of socialism in one country’. This reflected the interests of the bureaucracy, which wanted to shift away from the turmoil of revolution and consolidate its own ruling position.
After Lenin died, Stalin proceeded to move against Trotsky. He defeated the Left Opposition in 1927. Trotsky was expelled from the party, stripped of all official functions, and deported on a charge of “counter-revolutionary activity”.
Role of the individual
As Marx explained, men and women make history, but they do so under conditions not of their making. The driving forces of history are fundamentally the objective factors in society.
Only a change in the objective conditions that led to the rise of Stalinism could change the process towards greater bureaucratisation.
That is why Trotsky and the Left Opposition were hoping for a break-through internationally, to help regenerate the Soviet Union and bring the Communist International back to the programme of Lenin.
This failure was the fundamental reason for the defeat of the Left Opposition – not any ‘cleverness’ and ‘cunning’ of Stalin over Trotsky.
Stalinist zigzags
From 1929 onwards, amidst a torrent of slander and falsification against him from Moscow, Trotsky set about gathering together on a world scale all those who supported the programme of the Left Opposition.
Stalin’s repression ramped up with a vengeance. Thousands of oppositionists were sacked, arrested, and deported. Alongside this, Stalinist policy continued to zigzag from one mistake to another.
Starting from the opportunism of 1924-27, the betrayal of the British general strike in 1926, and the Chinese Revolution, the Stalinist leaders now veered towards ultra-leftism. By characterising social democracy as ‘social fascism’, Hitler was allowed to come to power without any resistance.
Out of the experience of this debacle, Trotsky rejected his initial policy of reforming the Communist International, and also changed his view about the potential for political reform of the Soviet Union.
Revolution Betrayed
During the following years, Trotsky examined and analysed Stalinism in depth. In 1936, he published his famous masterpiece Revolution Betrayed.
In this book, Trotsky provides the most comprehensive study of Stalinism, defining it as a form of proletarian Bonapartism, where the rule of the working class had been usurped by a bureaucracy.
Trotsky advocated a new political revolution to restore genuine workers’ democracy, lest the bureaucracy seek to preserve its privileges through a capitalist counter-revolution – as it ultimately did in the 1990s.
Moscow Trials
From 1936, with a Hitler victory and the Spanish revolution brewing, the nervous Soviet bureaucracy started playing an openly counter-revolutionary role.
Stalin pushed the disastrous policy of ‘Popular Frontism’ against fascism, while entering diplomatic agreements for ‘peaceful coexistence’ with different imperialist powers.
It is no accident that the infamous Moscow Trials began in that year, ensnaring millions. Nearly all the remaining Old Bolsheviks were arrested, charged as counter-revolutionary Trotskyists, and shot.
In 1938, Trotsky – now in Mexico – organised the Fourth International to rally the forces of socialist revolution. Unfortunately, the strength of the old organisations and the Second World War cut across this perspective.
By 1939, Stalin had signed a pact with Hitler – the very thing that the Old Bolsheviks were accused of before they were shot!
You cannot kill ideas
Trotsky went on the offensive to expose Stalin and his twists and turns in his biography Stalin.
This enraged Stalin. He was obsessed with eliminating Trotsky, assigning a special section of the GPU to this task.
After an unsuccessful first attempt, Stalin’s agents managed to get an agent, Ramón Mercader, into Trotsky’s house, pretending to be a sympathiser.
On 20 August, he concealed a sawed-down ice axe, arranged to see Trotsky in his study, and within four minutes, had buried the axe into Trotsky’s head, fatally wounding him.
A day later Leon Trotsky died in a Mexican hospital.
While Trotsky’s death was a colossal loss, Stalin never understood that you cannot kill ideas.
Trotsky’s writings constitute a profound contribution to Marxist theory – a revolutionary heritage for a new generation. They are an invaluable source of knowledge and understanding.
Trotsky himself is a martyr for our cause: the world socialist revolution.
On this anniversary, we once again pay homage to this inspiring revolutionary, and pledge ourselves to carry on the greatest task on earth: the liberation of humankind through the proletarian revolution.
