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From International Socialist Review, Vol.22 No.4, Fall 1961, p.127.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.
The new doctrine proclaims that socialism can be built on the basis of a national state if only there is no intervention. From this there can and must follow (notwithstanding all pompous declarations in the draft program) a collaborationist policy towards the foreign bourgeoisie with the object of averting intervention, as this will guarantee the construction of socialism, that is to say, will solve the main historical question. The task of the parties in the Comintern assumes, therefore, an auxiliary character; their mission is to protect the USSR from intervention and not to fight for the conquest of power. It is, of course, not a question of the subjective intentions but of the objective logic of political thought.
“The difference in views lies in the fact,” says Stalin, “that the party considers that these [internal] contradictions and possible conflicts can be entirely overcome on the basis of the inner forces of our revolution, whereas comrade Trotsky and the Opposition think that these contradictions and conflicts can be overcome only on an international scale, on the arena of the world-wide proletarian revolution.” (Pravda, No.262, Nov. 12, 1926)
Yes, this is precisely the difference.
— Leon Trotsky, The Criticism of the Draft Program of the Communist International,
reprinted in The Third International After Lenin
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Last updated on 22 May 2009