Re: [Marxism] Council communism

[Christopher Hutchinson <christopher.hutch@xxxxxxxxx>]

"Trotsky, former chief of the Red Army, was all in favour of the
"complete militarization of the workforce". He thought workers should be
subjected to military discipline, thus showing his own bourgeois fear of
the proletariat."

To address this point that Daniel makes...

Yes, Trotsky was the architect of the militarization of the workforce but I
don't think it
was a petite bourgeois fear of the proletariat that lead him to this
conclusion.
I think it was the dramatic effect that the civil war, millions of lives
lost, and
imperialist onslaught that threatened to destabilize the Revolution that
lead him
to believe  "militarization" of the workforce was the best policy.

Trotsky did see the effect that war communism, (especially the requisition
of the peasants crops)
was having all throughout the land. According to the Duestcher Bio he
witnessed this first
hand as he went to inspect a section of the military in the Urals who had
been converted
to labor in timber, mining, etc. So he proposed to restore some economic
freedom to the
peasantry which he felt would diminish their animosity toward the
Bolsheviks.  However, he was
rejected by the Central Committee only to see this policy put into action 2
years later.  (Even the
Central Committee had a good reason for rejecting his idea as the
requistions were yeilding major
returns).

The one thing I've learned about Trotsky is that he fought like hell for
what he believed in
but if it turned out that his initial hypothesis was wrong he was not afraid
of self-criticism
and to search for a better solution.

Christopher



On Mon, Jun 22, 2009 at 2:55 PM, Andrew Pollack <acpollack2@xxxxxxxxx>wrote:

> re the charge below: while the LCR is certainly capable of opportunist
> errors (calling for a lesser bourgeois vote against Le Pen, then dissolving
> themselves), the accusation below really needs to be documented. Otherwise
> I
> could just as easily assume the council communists were calling for
> something ultraleft.
> Andy P.
>
> On Sat, Jun 20, 2009 at 4:56 PM, Daniel Koechlin <d.koechlin@xxxxxxxxxx
> >wrote:
>
> > Hi everbody,
> >
> > For the last 8 years, I have tried to get union members to
> > criticize the deals made by the union leadership with the government.
> > All my attempts have been met by opposition from the Trotskyist (French
> > LCR)/"Stalinist" (ex-PCF, French Commmunist Party)  leadership  who
> > argue that  compromise with  capitalism  is inevitable, given the
> > current weakness of organized labour, and that  voting for
> > Trotskyist/PCF candidates will  one day bring about a better world.
> >
> >
> >
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