This year is the 60th anniversary of the Kronstadt revolt, which took place in March 1921. We are not amongst those who are celebrating the "myth" of Kronstadt, but neither do we undervalue the deep significance of the revolt. As with other issues, we have a clear position on this question, which does not merely interest us as an historical or cultural problem. On the contrary, it is an opportunity for us to deal once again with important topical problems: problems which must concern all revolutionaries involved in the enormous and urgent task of reconstructing the party of the class.

The class party is not born out of confusion. Confusion only produces further confusion and inevitable defeat for the working class. What the class needs is a political programme and a strategy which eliminates the un-Marxist dross which has accumulated and polluted revolutionary Marxism over the years.

So, what is the point of re-examining Kronstadt today? First of all it concerns the famous transition period. That is, the problems revolutionaries face after the defeat of the bourgeoisie when, step by step, society and the economy will undergo a socialist transformation. At the same time the "semi-state" is destined to disappear as classes themselves disappear with the passage of time.

It is also significant for understanding the relationship which must lie between the state, as the synthesis of the maximum centralisation of workers' power, and the specific forms of the proletarian dictatorship (the soviets) as instances of the exercise of the same power of the class at a particular local level. (The two are dialectically linked. Soviet power is realised by means of rigorous political centralisation in the workers' state; the workers' state is the expression of the soviets, but controls them by meeting the wishes of the base, in the framework of a reciprocal relationship based on democratic centralism and in harmony with society' s general interests.)

But above all it is significant for understanding the thorny problem of the party-class, party-soviet and finally party-workers' state relationship. What will be the role of the party which has brought the proletariat to victory, after the seizure of power? The replies from the various revolutionary organisations contradict each other. Dictatorship of the class? Dictatorship of the Party as the direct expression of the genuine will of the class? Maybe it is the state, in so far as it is account- able to the party, or vice-versa, is it the party which must be identified with the state and the organs of revolutionary management?

We can list an endless series of problems, all of which are subsumed in the process which culminated with the rebellion of the Kronstadt sailors. By analysing the facts of the situation, we can give an exhaustive reply which confirms the complex organic unity of positions which are the historic legacy of the theory elaborated by the Italian left communists. It also enables us — though this is less interesting — to give an exhaustive reply to those who accuse us of embarrassment, reticence, or self-proclaimed Leninist authoritarianism when faced with the question of Kronstadt.

No other historical event has been discussed by revolutionaries as much as Kronstadt. It has produced deep divisions in the international workers' movement. The complexity of the problem cannot be reduced to the idealist level of good or bad, concepts which lie outside of the framework for posing the question.

Thus Kronstadt has come to symbolise different positions—that of a pure revolutionary (though such a thing has yet to be seen), as opposed to the authoritarianism supposedly more or less congenital to Leninism. Or in contrast to this, Kronstadt is seen by some as the symbol of the counter-revolution (not even this is true), opposed to the movement towards socialism, which was trying to overcome a grave crisis, in the middle of mounting difficulties. Reality is much more complex and therefore we have to examine the objective situation in Russia during the upheavals of the civil war and the period of "war communism", and during the normalisation period, which culminated in the New Economic Policy (NEP).

In the autumn of 1920 the civil war in Russia ended with the defeat of Wrangel, the last of the White generals. The Bolsheviks had won a mighty trial of strength which left them in control of the core of the immense territory of Russia. However, in that very period, hope for an extension of the revolution internationally began to die. The experience of revolution had been initiated with October, and continued with bitter class movements in various European countries such as Italy, Germany Hungary etc.

The Russian Revolution, already dramatically isolated, and completely encircled by boycotting capitalist powers, experienced a long period of civil war which prevented the development of the productive forces and impeded moves towards the socialist transformation of the economy which was now under the weight of an unprecedented economic crisis. Although it had won on the military level, Soviet Russia was really on the brink of economic collapse. The scars of the civil war against the White Guards were visible throughout the country. The damage resulted in serious famine and epidemics, greatly increasing the millions of dead which had accumulated in the course of the fighting. At the same time agricultural production had drastically diminished, while industry and transport were more shattered and disrupted than ever.

The end of the civil war also brought the problem of ending the so-called "war communism" policy, which had been an emergency programme implemented by the Bolsheviks when confronted with the civil war. Imposed as a result of economic and military necessity, it marked the extreme centralisation of government control over all aspects of social life and brought with it the full weight of the harshest of discipline imposed by militarisation and repression. Its most characteristic feature was the system of forced requisitions of grain, horses etc, from the peasants. In particular, forced requisitioning of grain was crucial. Armed detachments were sent into the countryside to withdraw the surplus product to provide food for the cities and the Red Army of 5 million men.

The overwhelming majority of the peasants refused to accept such a system, so that a rupture with the Bolsheviks was inevitable. They preferred to boycott the government, and burnt the small surpluses they had managed to accumulate. Moreover, they began to cultivate only enough ground for their own needs. The result was that towards the end of 1920 the area under seed was only three-fifths of 1913, the last normal year before the outbreak of the imperialist world war. In 1921 total production had declined to less than half, livestock to less than two thirds, and production of flax and sugar beet to less than 10% of pre-war levels.

The problem of the peasantry had existed almost since the day of the October insurrection. The Bolsheviks' attempts to push forward their socialisation programme were undermined and made difficult in a country where the proletariat was a tiny island in an ever-present sea of the peasantry. Lenin well understood the danger the newborn proletarian dictatorship faced, and thus had thought of a tactical alliance. If only to secure the support, or at least the neutrality of the peasants, he had recourse to innumerable expedients — such as the formation of the coalition government with the Left Social Revolutionaries in December 1917, to the general distribution of land initiated by the Land Decrees of October 1917 and February 1918. The latter provided for the abolition of large and medium landed properties, and imposed an equal sub-division amongst all who worked the land without employing wage labour.

It is obvious that such a programme, which in many ways was linked to that of the SR's (the party closest to the interests of the peasants), had little to do with the spirit or content of what had moved the Bolsheviks up to 1917. But they were aware of the contradictions, and justified them to themselves, on the basis of the real situation between the classes, and the difficulty of the working class holding power in a country like Russia at the beginning of the century.

Lenin himself had certainly recognised the essentially "petty-bourgeois" content of the slogan, "The land to those who work it". He later saw the extremely dangerous content also, from the point of view of the alliance between the workers and the peasants, of the war communism programme, which could be summed up as, "Taking away the surplus is taking away from the peasants". Necessity was the only alibi the Bolsheviks could hide behind to justify their actions. But with the end of the civil war the policy of requisitioning was not halted immediately because "the state of emergency had not immediately halted". Huge peasant rebellions broke out all through rural Russia. Violent revolts took place in the province of Tambov, in the mid Volga area, in the Ukraine, in the northern Caucasus, in western Siberia. In this period, as Lenin observed, tens of thousands of soldiers were demobilised, almost half the troops in the Red Army. They returned to their villages, and reinforced the ranks of the guerillas. In February 1921, on the eve of the Kronstadt revolt, the Cheka referred to the existence of 118 different peasant rebellions in various parts of the country (amongst them was that of Antonov, a former SR, who counted on the support of 50,000 insurgents.)

No less dramatic was the effect of war communism in the cities. Towards the end of 1920 total industrial production had fallen to around a fifth of the 1913 levels. There were also enormous difficulties in the field of food supplies and raw materials. The Baku oilfields and the Don coalfields had been reconquered, but were very badly damaged. Total coal production was only a quarter, and oil production a third, of the pre-war level. Production of cast iron was only 3%, while that of copper had stopped completely. These problems meant that factories operated on reduced hours, and there was an enormous reduction in the number of workers employed. In the consumer goods sector total production dropped to a quarter of 1913 levels. The critical effects of the Allied blockade, which had been imposed since the Treaty of Brest Litovsk in 1918 aggravated this disastrous situation, as did the complete disorganisation of the tertiary sector, including transport.

The food crisis now extended throughout Russia. With war communism, every private dealer had been abolished, and normal market exchange between city and country had ceased to exist. The black market replaced it, and developed in such a way that it ousted official distribution channels. At the same time inflation rose to dizzy heights; one gold rouble which in 1917 was worth almost eight paper roubles, three years later was valued at ten thousand. The real wage of a Petrograd factory worker had fallen to 8.6% of pre-war levels and, as the value of money disintegrated, workers were increasingly paid their wages in kind. There was a massive return to the countryside and for the Bolshevik Party, as the party of the working class par excellence, this process involved dangerous implications. In fact it made the Soviet power basis less solid, while increased contact between workers and peasants helped to increase the tension. The result was an increasing wave of rural movements, of industrial unrest, and of serious unrest amongst the military (this process has direct bearings on the explosion of Kronstadt in March 1921).

There were many reasons for the discontent of the working class, and this obviously poses the question, amongst others, of whether things could possibly have been otherwise. It is our belief that, even given the enormous difficulties, the options open to the Bolsheviks were not always strictly determined by the "situation of danger" constantly invoked. Although it is true that nothing could have changed the increasingly difficult objective situation, serious mistakes were still made. Were not policies of the militarisation of labour, advocated and applied by Trotsky under war communism, the result of a period of progressive degeneration? Before it was advocated as the result of human will, wasn't it already the result of a specific objective situation? An objective situation which shortly afterwards accommodated itself to the course of the NEP which was tactically justified for as long as possible.

In fact, the signs of degeneration were everywhere. The factories, which had been nationalised, not socialised, were initially under the iron control of the working class. In less than two years this control weakened and one man management, plus rigorous work discipline came to take its place. By 1920 four fifths of big firms were once again directed according to the principle of one man management; the bourgeois specialists had been restored to their posts. A new bureaucracy had begun to flourish and gave more and more executive functions to a section of the party.

The dream of the proletarian dictatorship, temporarily realised at the end of 1917, was being slowly extinguished. In its place was being installed a dictatorship certainly, but a dictatorship which less and less respected the interests of the working class. The coercive and bureaucratic methods of capitalism were being restored and spreading though all points of the revolution — soviets and unions included. In the factories the odious methods of Taylorism were returning in order to increase efficiency and productivity. The tragedy of the Russian working class began under the watchful gaze of armed squads ready to enforce the will of the business directors and resolute in obtaining "iron discipline" (theorised as something to boast about for revolutionaries). This was the tragedy of those proletarians who had succeeded for the first time in overthrowing the power of capitalism. This situation could not fail to disturb a revolutionary like Lenin, who, in February 1921, expressed himself thus:

The situation preceding the Kronstadt insurrection was characterised by the abysmal gulf which existed between what had been the hopes for the revolution, and the harsh situation which was deteriorating progressively at an objective level. As a direct consequence of this came the progressive degeneration of the political, state and administrative apparatus (party; soviet organs, unions etc.) This gulf, experienced by a generation which had not absolutely lost the sense of its rights acquired during the revolution, was the essential psychological basis for the revolt.

In fact, the revolt of the Kronstadt sailors was linked to a secondary conflict. Even though, as we shall see, they were falling under the influence of counter-revolutionary ideology, the basic causes had been maturing during long years of profound disillusion. After the peace of Brest Litovsk the government began a total reorganisation of the army, based on rigid discipline: the very problem which had been at the centre of all the revolts of the sailors of the Baltic Fleet since 1905. This was considered incompatible with the principle of election of officials from the rank and file. Thus, a hierarchical order was reinstalled, annulling the revolutionary spirit which the Bolsheviks had been responsible for introducing.

In the Navy, partly because of a shortage of new recruits, a similar reorganisation proved difficult, especially at Kronstadt, where the old revolutionary traditions were still alive, and where the sailors could enjoy those gains which remained after 1917. This state of affairs led to a deep divergence between the naval base and the supreme command of the Red Army, a divergence that was to become even deeper, especially with the dissolution of the

civil war fronts of European Russia. The attempts to discipline the Navy by introducing Army traditions met with fierce resistance, which was shown during the preparations for the elections to the 8th. Congress of Soviets in December 1920. (What had become of Lenin's postulate that the working class would have to exercise its dictatorship by means of insurrectionary based organisations, and never on that of a permanent Army?)

On l5th February 1921, the 2nd Communist conference of the Baltic Fleet voted this severe resolution:

Clearly, there were still no obvious reasons for a breakaway. What was demanded was simply a change in the way the specialist organs of the political sections of the fleet were run. Even so, the sailors were drawing attention to an important political factor which governed the relationship between the class and political power, between the class and its leadership role, a role which was being increasingly distorted by the organs of power which progressively substituted themselves for the class itself, producing the political aberration of an iron party dictatorship. But this was a party which was beginning to agree to actions that diverged from both the historic and immediate interests of the proletariat as a whole.

Thus, if there are not obvious signs here of a rupture, there are alarming signs of a mood which had by now become generalised. We have to remember that the document is referring to the Conference of a particular stratum of the sailors; to the communists who were more politically discerning and conscious than those outside the Party,

who were directly or indirectly influenced by the Mensheviks, Anarchists and Social Revolutionaries. In spite of that, the ranks of the Communist Party were beginning to suffer the loss of many workers, sailors and peasants, and were instead being polluted by support from classes outside the revolutionary proletariat (technicians, petty bourgeois and careerist officials.) Conversely, the document and decisions of the Party, and many of its leaders, reveal indifference towards the reasons for the great discontent of the workers, and approval of the use of methods criticised by the resolution of the sailors we have just quoted.

These signs of the mood which was running through the communists of the Baltic Fleet were being transformed into open dissent which manifested itself at elections for the lOth Party Congress where, almost unanimously, they voted against Trotsky (People's Commissar for War and the Navy) and Raskolnikov (Head of the Baltic Fleet), who were both in agreement about the militarisation of the unions. At the same time the sailors protested against the situation by abandoning the Communist Party en masse. According to the Commissar for Petrograd, 5,000 left the Party in January 1921. The reference to Petrograd is not an accident. An examination of the situation in the Russian capital and, moreover, the city which lay within firing distance of Kronstadt, allows us to better understand not only the reasons for the revolution itself, but also the reasons behind its strategy. For if this strategy was to be successful, the rebellious sailors would be obliged to make contact with the working class of Petrograd, which was exceptionally worn out by the great crisis which immediately followed the war against the White Guards.

The population of Petrograd had been reduced by about two thirds. Workers who were returning to the countryside, following upon the ruin of the industrial apparatus comprised a good proportion of this reduction. The city suffered from a chronic shortage of food supplies, and thus hunger and starvation were the order of the day. The winter of 1921 was also exceptionally severe. Hundreds of people froze to death. State rations for industrial workers were limited to a piece of black bread a day; 800 grams for continuous processing industries, 600 grams for the workers of the assault groups, and 400 grams for white collar workers. The vast majority of food shops were closed, and people resorted to the black market to get something to eat.

In this dire situation many workers began to grumble, and they took up the classic weapon of the class struggle: the strike. The first strike broke out at the Trubochny factory

on the 23rd of February. It was extended to the Baltisky and Laferne factories, and then to a series of other work places. On 28th February the shop floor and dock workers at the Putilov works also joined the strike. The strikers' demands called for the reorganisation of supplies, and criticised the militias whose checkpoints prevented the workers taking home what they had obtained on the black market. But alongside this economic slogan, many factories formulated political demands, such as freedom of speech and the press, and the freeing of political prisoners.

The local Party Committee and Zinoviev could find no other response to this initiative, born of desperation, than military measures,

The quote is from Puchov, the official historian of the revolt, who doesn't explain who "the section of the least conscious proletariat" was, at a time when the strikers comprised the biggest concentrations of workers in Petrograd; the same workers who a short time before had unconditionally supported Bolshevik policies.

A Committee for the Defence of the Fortified Zone of Petrograd was formed, which proclaimed a state of siege, and stuck up a notice of February 24th which read as follows:

The most active strikers were arrested. The Kronstadt sailors were naturally very interested in what was going on in the capital. On February 26th delegates were sent to get information about the strike, while the crew of the battleship Petropavlovsk voted the following resolution, which would subsequently constitute the programme of the insurgents,

Perhaps with the exception of point 11, which is directly connected with the SRs programme, this resolution is largely in the spirit of the political strategy and slogans of the Bolsheviks at the time of the seizure of power. Libertarian sentiments are perhaps an outstanding feature, but there is nothing important here which can be associated with the sort of "counter-revolutionary strategy" denounced during the rebellion by Bolshevik-controlled organs of state power.

Meanwhile the explosive effects of the revolt were beginning to be felt. The Kronstadt Soviet should have been renewed on March 2nd. On 1st March a preliminary meeting of the 1st and 2nd Brigades of the ships of the line was called. It was to decide the attitude to take towards these elections. 16,000 people attended the meeting, which was chaired by the Communist Vassiliev, president of the local soviet. The resolution of the Petrovlovsk was tabled, and accepted by a majority of the assembly. The next day, there was a meeting of the delegates nominated by the sailors who were insisting on the necessity to hold regular and non-rigged elections. Vassiliev and Kuzmin (political commissar of the Baltic Fleet) were there, and, seeing the way the meeting was going, gave very tough speeches. For this reason the assembly forced them to abandon the meeting, and put them under arrest. The resolution of the Petropavlovsk was again adopted by a large majority, after which the assembly went on to examine details of the elections to the new Soviet. At this juncture the assembly was disrupted by dissenting voices, and — on this point all historians of Kronstadt, whatever their political persuasion, are agreed — the communists prepared an armed attack on the meeting. At that moment the officer cadets (Kursanti) of the Political School were leaving Kronstadt in the direction of the Krasnaja Gorka fort.

A Provisional Revolutionary Committee was created, with Petrichenko as President. He was a character with a shady past, who later became fully committed to the counter revolution. Under the aegis of this Committee, the sailors occupied the strategic points of the city and took over state buildings. "Committees of Three" (the famous troika) were organised at every military building, and in every armed corp. They also occupied the print shop for Izvestia, so that the next day, March 3rd, the first edition was produced under the control of the Provisional Revolutionary Committee and read thus,

Far from seeing the degeneration of the Party as being the result of an objective process, it is considered as the result of the thirst for power of some "leaders". The Kronstadt sailors were unable to go beyond this limited framework. Throughout Kronstadt the idea was that authority had prevailed over its opposite, liberty, the victory of evil over good. The same day Radio Moscow put out this call to the country:

The Bolsheviks' accusation was an exaggeration, but nevertheless, it contained incontestable truths, which we will discuss before going on to deal with the relationship between Kronstadt and the international counter-revolution embodied in the organisational capacity (or incapacity) of the Russian refugees even more than the "Entente spies".

One thing can be said straightaway. Though Kozlovsky (whom the official radio pretended was the leader of the insurrection) played an important role, his position was politically ambiguous. General of the Artillery, he had passed over to the communists for reasons of political convenience. At the time of the insurrection, he was in command of the Kronstadt artillery. According to the regulations, since the Commander of the Fortress had fled, Kozlovsky should have stood in for him. It seems certain that he refused, because he

did not want to recognise the authority of the Revolutionary Committee. But he remained at Kronstadt as a technician and artillery specialist. But this role was no different from that of the old officials of the Tsarist regime who were used as technicians by the Bolsheviks, including during the repression of the insurrection of the Kronstadt sailors.

We now come to the revolt itself. This was preceded by many twists and turns in events which we don't have space to go into here. On 5th March the Committee for the Defence of Petrograd put out a call to the insurgents, inviting them, not too politely, to put themselves under the direction of the central authority. The title of the appeal was, "This Is The Point You Have Reached". Its contents are summed up in the following:

This was the truth. In Petrograd the insurgents had neither the workers nor the sailors support. The Party had brought the full weight of its negative propaganda to bear. The appeal continued:

The Provisional revolutionary Committee replied with an address, "To All..." The gist of the message being hurled against "a group of crazy communists" was certainly revolutionary, but at the same time it cannot claim to be part of a communist strategy in the Leninist

sense of the term, that is the strategy of the period before and after October, which Kronstadt had agreed with at that time.

Against a "degenerated communist party" it might have seemed almost too obvious to demand the right to expel the corrupting germs of the careerist bureaucrats coming from the ranks of the petty bourgeoisie. But the protest went beyond a straightforward revolutionary approach, and instead took a libertarian course which saw parties as such as the incarnation of all evil. This reflected the incapacity already mentioned, to draw correct conclusions about the process underway in the difficult situation of Russia at that time. But this is not enough to explain which aspects of the revolt inspired the circles of antiBolshevik reactionaries abroad, who, as we documented above, had knowledge of the event at least one month before it happened. Had the reactionaries who were apologising for the revolt become converted to the Leninist watchword of "All Power to the Soviets"? No: So had there been connivance between the leaders of the revolt and the international revolution? The fact is that the Kronstadt naval base was certainly animated by a sincere revolutionary spirit; slogans opposed to this would have been rejected outright. This would explain the astute attitude of the leaders of the revolt, who, though to the left of the communist party in words, took refuge in Finland once the revolt was suppressed, and fell into (or more accurately re-entered) the arms of the counter-revolution, with which they shared ideas and positions. These ranged from a vaguely reformist nationalism, to the practice of terror against the "red power".

On March 7th, after futile negotiations between the Petrograd Soviet and the Provisional Revolutionary Committee and after the surrender telegram sent from Trotsky (president of the Military Revolutionary Council of the Soviet Republic) to the insurgent garrisons, the Red Army launched the assault on the Kronstadt fortress. The fighting was very fierce, and besides the morale of the Red Army called upon to fight their brothers did not encourage a hasty solution of the conflict. Some elements displayed indecision, while others (the 560th) passed over to the insurgents. The Party sent its best cadres to improve the morale of the badly clad and shod troops, who were an easy target for the machine guns of the Kronstadt fort.

The Red Army losses were very high; one estimate of dead and wounded is 25,000, but the American Consul cuts the figure to 10,000. The insurgents' losses were less. There are no reliable figures, but there were probably 1,600 dead and wounded, and 2,500 sentenced by the military tribunals. The fighting lasted till March l8th. On the evening of the l7th, the central leaders of the revolt (11 members of the revolutionary Committee, including Petrichenko, Kozlovsky and Solovianov) took refuge in Finland, as the Bolsheviks had predicted. With the news of the flight of their own leaders the men let the Soviet command know that they were about to surrender. Thus a revolutionary dream had been transformed into a bloody nightmare.

The Kronstadt revolt is a crucial moment in the history of Soviet Russia. This explosion coincided with the crisis in the revolutionary institutions, itself the reflection of a crisis which grew with the capitalist encirclement and the failure of the international revolution. How can the experience of the Kronstadt sailors and soldiers be judged overall? From a political viewpoint judgement cannot be categorical. Because the revolt was linked to a complex and contradictory reality, it is both a moment in the repression of the revolutionary instinct of the masses, and a moment in the degeneration of that instinct, since it was entangled with many aspects of counter-revolutionary ideology. It was an experience of confused rebelliousness which had more than one point in common with various widely divergent political programmes.

It is a mistake to think that, had the NEP been launched earlier, the spilling of so much blood could have been avoided. Nevertheless, the Bolsheviks resorted to the NEP to deal with the dire situation produced by the effects of the crisis, which itself produced Kronstadt. So what was the NEP? A solution to the political degeneration which had objective causes, which was being felt in all ranks of the party? Not at all: With hindsight we can see today that the NEP was the coup de grace to the last remaining gains

of 1917. Yet many of the demands of the Kronstadt communards coincided with the measures of NEP. If the objective situation could not be reversed, the NEP was the consolidation of a process which would lead inexorably towards a new form of capitalism. Lenin clearly recognised this, and urged that NEP should not lose its temporary character. However, from reaching this modus vivendi, Russia passed uninterruptedly via Stalinism to become the imperialist power that we are familiar with today.

But let's take our analysis further, and examine the political currents inside the revolt. Not so much to connect them to the people who led the revolt (Petrichenko was clearly a Social Revolutionary, Valk and Romanenko Mensheviks, Orescin Populist and Lamanov Maximalist), but to deduce the extent of their incompatibility with the regime led by the Bolsheviks. It is clear that the demands of the sailors were not dictated by any group or political party directly. But it is equally true that the ideas of different currents had spread within the revolt, leading to contradictory effects.

For example, let's consider the Mensheviks. Now would they have been able to reconcile their demands for free Soviets, with their self-proclaimed gradualist parliamentarism, as the means of evolution towards a "higher form of democracy"? Such a programme stands for the return of the situation which existed in the aftermath of February 1917, i.e. the maintenance of the capitalist state, deemed necessary for the creation of the conditions most favourable to socialism. From a revolutionary standpoint the Bolsheviks' accusation of counter-revolution is well-founded and more than justified.

However, the Mensheviks scarcely influenced Kronstadt, and wavered a lot over what position to take up. The majority stood aside from events, and imagined that after the disorder, they would be able to impose some sort of democratising influence on the institutions of Soviet power. A large branch of dissidents, however, opposed the view of the central committee, and signed the following leaflet,

The Right SR's made the most active attempt to ride the tiger of the revolt. Their main slogan "Find a way of ousting the Bolshevik dictatorship's repugnant and bloody regime", was combined with a direct appeal to "those of all political shades who want to tread the path of liberty and democracy which has the Constituent Assembly as its crowning glory". Such watchwords would have found short shrift in the naval base and amongst the Kronstadt workers.

In spite of this Chernov, ex-president of the dissolved Constituent Assembly and recognised leader of those who saw the Soviets as a support for it, thought that the Kronstadters' scorn for the Assembly was due to a survival from the previous influence of the Bolsheviks. For this reason a message was sent via an ordinary sailor, to the Provisional Revolutionary Committee, from which we quote:

The Revolutionary Committee sent this reply in a radio message:

Petrichenko hadn't accepted the offer of help because he knew that it would have been difficult to tolerate such a heavy external intervention in a movement which, if confused, was authentically revolutionary. In fact he had not refused Chernov's proposal outright, but had personally communicated to him to wait 12 days, at the end of which the situation might have changed making it possible to launch the slogans requested by the SR's. Given the drastic situation, it would not have been impossible to starve the sailors in order to finally open the door to the forces of bourgeois democracy and with it the counter-revolution including Chernov and Co, who were doing their best to hatch dark plots. All this is doubly confirmed by one of the members of the Revolutionary Committee — Perepletkin — who fell into Bolshevik hands, and confirmed that Petrichenko had secretly sent Chernov

a positive reply.

On the other hand the Left SR's, without having taken an active part in the revolt, are perhaps the most recognisable political element in the Kronstadt programme (resolutions of the Petropavlovsk). While the SR's were the most consistent political expression of the peasants, it is also true that the Kronstadt events were strongly influenced by their programme. Anarchist ideas also influenced events. For example, Perepletkin, himself a member of the Provisional Revolutionary Committee professed, "There is no need for power, what's needed is Anarchy." The deep disillusioning experiences which the sailors had been through from Red October onwards, led many to a similar way of thinking. The Anarchists in Russia could only add to the confusion, by trying to reinvent a revolution which was already failing.

They saw the party as an organ destined to wield power in an absolutist and dictatorial way. The party's degeneration is viewed without taking into account the underlying causes of the degenerative process which together led to the failure of the Russian revolution as a whole. Instead the anarchists saw it as irrefutable confirmation of their traditional analysis. In this scenario social conflict, rather than being seen as a struggle between classes, is depicted as a dispute between two opposing tendencies: authority on the one hand and liberty on the other. The fact that the first is a universal characteristic of the ruling class cannot be explained plausibly by anarchism.

According to the soviet press at the time, the sailors were influenced by the Mensheviks and SRs in their ranks. On top of this, Pravda added: "the ex-Tsarist generals were laughing". This supports those who see it as a plot, carefully organised by Russian emigres, with the collusion of the French counter-espionage service and the imperialist forces of the Entente.

A network of Red Cross organisations was accused of supporting the plot: the International Red Cross, the American Red Cross and the Russian which was based in Finland. As proof that the uprising had been organised by anti-Soviet groups in Paris, the Bolsheviks relied on the news of a revolt at Kronstadt which had flooded the French press two weeks before it actually happened. The New York Times also reported similar news and went so far as to state that the 'rebels' had assumed total control of Petrograd, even clashing with troops sent by Trotsky to 'dislodge' them. In reality nothing of the kind took place in February 1921, neither at Kronstadt nor any other Baltic base.

These sorts of rumours were not unusual. International capitalism was trying every way to discredit the soviet regime: the only regime in the world which, despite the thousands of internal difficulties it had been through, remained the only reference point for the world proletariat. But by strange co-incidence such rumours foresaw what would really happen a short time later. All this is in the context of the Russian ex-patriots who were organised in various groups. Amongst these was a well-known one with the name of National Centre (or National Union), a heterogenous coalition of Cadets (Constitutional Democrats) and numerous other species and sub-species of moderates and reactionaries, with a central office in Paris. Its aim was to "overthrow Bolshevik power". The National Centre had actually drawn up plans for an uprising at Kronstadt where the core of its forces were concentrated (apart from those at Moscow, Petrograd and in the fortress of Krasnaya Gorka). This kind of initiative was not new: in 1919 it had been involved in the attempt by General Yudenich, aided by the British and with naval support, to conquer Petrograd. In the archives of this organisation there is a manuscript headed "top secret" and entitled "Memorandum On The Organisation Of A Revolt At Kronstadt".

The Memorandum proposes a detailed emergency plan for instigating the revolt and from its content can be dated to January, or at the latest, the beginning of February 1921. The

author is well informed about the situation at Kronstadt and describes its fortifications:

The author of the document has been identified as Tseidler, a Russian ex-patriot and Director of the Russian Red Cross in Finland. He was closely linked to Daniel Grimm, principle agent of the National Centre in Helsingfor, and official representative of the notorious General Wrangel in Finland. The National centre was working with other emigre organisations, including an organisation of emigre journalists, the Russian Union.

But who belonged to the "extremely compact" group at Kronstadt, on which

the memorandum placed its hopes? Many historians, including those who cannot be accused of sympathy towards the Bolsheviks, have pointed to Petrichenko and his collaborators. The agreement between the Centre and the Kronstadt ex-Revolutionary Committee would seem to prove it. (In May 192I Petrichenko and several of his comrades enlisted in General Wrangel's army.) Moreover, many of its members, 11 out of I5, found safe refuge in Finland, and this could be the sign of a longstanding relationship. However, it should not be forgotten that the Revolutionary Committee had accepted the Red Cross offer, as this was "a philanthropic and not a political organisation". Moreover, the fact that reinforcements had not appeared was unquestionably due to the indecision of the Entente states, who did not want to rule out the possibility of developing commercial relations with Russia which, after the victory over the White Guards, was forced to open its doors

to foreign markets for obvious reasons. A successful revolt must have seemed almost impossible to the Entente. In the eyes of the imperialists the Bolshevik government would have been the "legitimate" side to talk to.

And this, sadly, was the prelude to a state of things awaited for by the capitalists: the failure of the Russian Revolution, the gradual but inexorable re-opening to the capitalist market, and subsequent capitalist development of the entire economic structure of that Russia which, like the Paris Commune fifty years previously, had dared to "assault the heavens".

The theory that the Bolsheviks considered the Kronstadt uprising to be simply a conspiracy by the Entente spies is definitely true. Innumerable government documents of the time also prove it. But while Lenin's detractors use this to point to the biased nature of such theories, it should be added that, propaganda apart, the real nature of the situation was well understood by the representatives of the Party. On l5th March Lenin himself stated peremptorily "at Kronstadt they wanted neither the White Guards nor our power". Also it should be pointed out that the spontaneity of the sailors, once the "honour and glory of the Russian Revolution"(Trotsky) was taken advantage of by skilful international centres of counter-revolution, which nurtured a swarm of lie mongers at Kronstadt. This opinion was shared by Victor Serge, witness to the events, of which he wrote in 1937:

In July 1921, at the 3rd Congress of the Communist International, Bukharin also repeated the argument:

This interpretation was fairly widespread inside the Party; above all amongst the leadership. Perhaps the fiercest opposition to the attempts to recuperate the mood behind Kronstadt (which, although confused, was nevertheless revolutionary) came from Trotsky.

There are two reasons for this. The first is linked to the entire policy preceding the uprising (regimentation of work, militarisation of the unions, etc) of which Trotsky was one of the principal promoters and towards which was directed the harshest criticism of the Kronstadt sailors and workers. The second reason clearly reflects the fact that Trotsky himself was the most determined advocate of the necessity for repression; repression which was carried out under his direct responsibility in his capacity as representative of the highest office in the military hierarchy. Thus he wrote in 1938 from his Mexican exile:

This analysis correctly points out that "consciousness" was undoubtedly in the hands of the "elements of the Right which were acting behind the scenes" and which had no other aim than the "restoration of the bourgeois regime". Naturally there were different interpretations amongst the insurgents. An opposite view was expressed in the following terms:

"At Kronstadt the foundation stone of the third revolution has been laid which will break the last chains binding the working masses and will open. up a new road for the creation of socialism." (Isvestia, 8th March 1921)

What exactly was the Kronstadt revolt? Was it a counter-revolutionary insurrection aimed at bringing back capitalism to Russia? Or was it rather a "purely motivated" event which tried to rectify an already compromised situation from a revolutionary point of view? Or was it a revolutionary attempt which would nevertheless have irremediably opened the way for national and international reaction? Kronstadt was a popular insurrection, strongly marked by a genuine revolutionary mood but. containing confused elements which in themselves were very harmful. The revolt initiated a systematic repressive and authoritarian policy, at both the political and economic level, which daily undermined the revolutionary conquests of Red October. Bolshevik policies, in their turn, were a direct consequence of this process of degeneration which undermined the whole possibility of the socialist transformation of society. This degenerative process could not avoid hitting the Communist Party itself, making it unable to prevent a historic course which was already dramatically defined (by the isolation of Russia, the failure of the revolution to expand internationally). Nonetheless, the Bolsheviks' policy contained serious errors which, as we have seen, accelerated the process of revolutionary degeneration. In this sense, Kronstadt is both the response to the degeneration and at the same time the product of this same process. Kronstadt forgets the lessons of Marxism and sets out from a social dialectic characterised by a vaguely democratic perspective stemming from anarchistic influence. The spontaneous forces of the revolt were even more incapable of doing what the Communist Party was unable to do. The regressive process could not have been halted simply by splendid acts of will but only by an objective change in the international situation. That situation, however, showed that the class was already in a period of retreat, of progressive and inexorable defeat, and amongst the bourgeois imperialist forces there was a tendency towards disturbing forms of militarism and an openly reactionary settlement. And reactionary forces were indeed present at Kronstadt. The Russian emigres, indirectly supported by the imperialist forces of the Entente, were plotting. Plotting and scheming too were the provocateurs inside the revolt. Given these last two points, the repression of the revolt — even if it opened up a chapter of deep agony in the workers' movement, had more than enough reasons to justify itself. Any other solution would have allowed an even more rapid consolidation of the counter-revolution in a historical period where the motive force for a revival of the international revolution was not completely spent. An expansion of the revolution would have been able to give life and breath to agonising Russian socialism (remember that the last gasps of the world proletariat included the German revolution of 1923 and the Chinese in 1927 which definitively closes the chapter of revolutionary initiatives by the class). But these are the immediate responses which spring directly from events at Kronstadt. They pose ideological and, more specifically, political problems.

At the beginning of this article we posed precise questions regarding the state of relations between the party and demands, both central and peripheral, made on it, and consequently the state of relations between the party itself and the proletarian masses. Above all, this involves understanding how far the party had already changed, or was being changed, with regard to the original Leninist precepts on the nature and function of the class party.

It is easy to explain the process of progressive degeneration of the party in terms of it succumbing to the process of retreat away from the revolutionary experience begun with October. Clearly, objective processes end up gaining the upper hand over subjective ones and over all other movements at every level of society. But such a formulation would be a poor substitute for dialectical materialism and would reduce determinism to the worst sort: the mechanical kind.

The party, as the concretisation and realisation of communist consciousness, must have adequate weapons to resist such a process. If its cadres cannot, by pure acts of will, inverse historical tendencies which are determined by structural changes, they can prevent the revolutionary organ being one of the degenerative elements and part of the very causes of the degeneration.

Yes, the party is an expression of the class struggle, above all in its unitary political platform of the working class. But organisationally it is the product of human will, as expressed by its militants and its own leading organs whose aim is to fulfil the communist programme by overthrowing the existing order, which is to say, in the words of Damen, "the return of human will over things" .

The old tale of the inevitability of the party's degeneration is one which stinks of opportunism a mile away and is linked to mechanical anti-Marxist analyses. The party will undoubtedly be influenced by external factors but it is not mechanically linked to these by an immediate cause-effect relationship. Here we have to take into account the difficulties encountered by the Bolshevik comrades. Faced with thousands of different pressures and counter pressures a correct course not only became difficult, it is doubtful whether it was possible. Very often tactical concessions were made in order to buy time to deal with the enormous problems which loomed with overpowering urgency, and any other stance than that adopted would have also meant immediate defeat.

There is no quick and easy solution. Perhaps the only guarantee we can point to (apart from the certainty that there will be objective difficulties) is the non-interruption of that dialectical relationship which must exist inside the party. Put simply, this relationship is democratic centralism and apart from being a method for regulating the internal life of the party, it also incorporates the way society is run in the period of transition.

Democratic centralism exists outside of the party and has mutual implications for the relationship between the party and the class. Even in the transition period democratic centralism governs the party and the workers' state and synthesises the demands of the revolutionary power: the Soviets.

What was the state of relations between the party and the class at the time the Kronstadt revolt broke out? And the relationship between party and soviets? The communist Party was already well advanced in its detachment from the masses. Detached as a consequence of the break in the ever precarious equilibrium between communist consciousness and the spontaneity of the class. Thus on one side consciousness (in the Marxist sense of the term which always relates to the class struggle, to direct participation in the revolutionary power) was no longer provided with an appropriate supply of creative demands brought forward by the masses. (In this specific case we are talking about masses who had been the bearers of a victorious proletarian revolution).

The dialectical relationship which would have had to continue to involve both sides no longer existed. This only assisted the growth of divergent needs between them. The party's reference point began no longer to be the class and the class began no longer to identify with the party. The symbiosis between spontaneity and realised capacity, between realised potential and revolutionary science, suffered a very hard blow and a separation which became more and more distinct.

But if the party's reference point was no longer the class, what did it refer to, this party which had been the most efficient revolutionary organ the proletariat had ever produced? Unfortunately the latter does not guarantee that the party will remain revolutionary. When one speaks of the dictatorship of the proletariat it must have a precise meaning in reality. It must refer to a class which, organised in its own state, directly tends to transform capitalist society into an associated community of "free and equals". This is a fundamental concept of Marx and Lenin. However, it is only half digested by many self-styled revolutionaries who, by the following reason provide us with a clear example of rigorous formal logic which is a thousand miles away from a revolutionary Marxist conception. According to this logic the communist party has no interests apart from those of the working class and is also, very correctly, the most advanced part of the class; therefore, what else can the dictatorship of the proletariat be but the dictatorship of the party? This is ideological ground which it is a compliment to define as opportunist. Perhaps the identification of the Russian Communist Party with proletarian power has had the degeneration of both as its epilogue?

The problem is not one of establishing what might have happened if the party had had a different relationship to the class and to the organs of its dictatorship. It is rather one of considering, in the light of experience, what methods should have been used to preserve the party in the context of the historic course which was progressively underway. In other words, the failure of the revolution, which is to say the capitalist changes to the economic structure of Russia, above all with the implementation of the NEP, could only be followed by the party, in its capacity as "embodiment of a specific situation" attracting to itself all the demands of the various forces in civil society. (In the absence of a revival of the international class movement, which unfortunately was not to be.)

What was there left for the Party to do? Comply with the process of degeneration which had occurred, or summon all the courage which revolutionary communists must possess, and "pass over to the opposition"? That is, cut itself off from all relations to a power whose objectives were no longer in line with the historical perspective of socialism, and instead consider the possibility of re-arming the Party, with a strategy and tactic towards a new perspective of struggle. In other words, to pose before both the party and the state of the bureaucrats, the Kulaks and the peasants, the fundamental irreconcilability of opposing interests, and to explain that the objective situation was resolving the problem of which social strata were becoming the dominant class, which would have to exercise the most iron dictatorship over the proletariat of the Soviet Union.

Instead the situation in Russia took the opposite course. The Soviets were exhausted and, far from becoming revolutionary instruments of power, organised and run from below under the guide of the working class party, they became appendages of the latter. They were decision making organs separate from the party only in purely formal terms. Between party and soviet there cannot and must not be any confusion, either in the pre-revolutionary, or in the transition period. In the same way there must not be confusion between party and class. No party, being dragged into the counter-revolution, can keep its ideological and political integrity.

At what point did the Bolshevik Party assume responsibility for the development of the forces of counter-revolution? The discussion can be divided into two parts. In the first period, the Party would have been able to reject these tendencies, and still have had room for political action. This became more difficult with War Communism, where profound errors were committed which influenced the whole future course of the counter-revolution. An example of this is the blocking of any proletarian initiative in the life of the class, in the form of the forced militarisation of labour. In the second period, which is linked to the first, the term "error" is no longer justified and the party comes closer and closer into harmony with the forces of the counter-revolution, which extends into the party, the soviets and every aspect of Bolshevik power (the period of the consolidation of the NEP). Thus begins the historical course towards Stalinism, until the Russian state reaches a modus vivendi with the international counter-revolution.

In conclusion, we can state that this analysis is the most satisfactory treatment, from a theoretical and political standpoint, of that problematic issue, the relationship between party and class. This relationship is the basis for correctly posing the problem of power in the period of transition towards socialism. The problem itself is concretised in the position taken by the party at the time it links itself to the dictatorship of the class and to the organs of revolutionary power. In the final analysis we are concerned with the relationship which must exist between the class party and the working class state. As it says in the Platform of our Party,

At no time, and for no reason, does the proletariat abandon its combative role. It does not delegate to others its historical mission, and it does not delegate its power away by proxy, even to its political party."

(Platform of the PCInt. p4,6.)

This is the lesson which comes to us from the Italian Communist Left, which has counted within its ranks different generations of highly valued comrades. They have left us these theoretical acquisitions which spring from living struggles, and which are verified by the continual clashes of classes, resulting from the internal contradictions of the capitalist mode of production. Leaving aside partisan evaluations, and its use to support "correct analyses" of a sectarian nature, the Kronstadt episode was a result of objective causes, and of the failure to resolve the above mentioned problems of party, class and state relationships, which lay behind the revolt itself. Kronstadt is the consequence of the class struggle which is always present, and will be till communism exists; a class struggle carried to extremes. "But the main point", as Trotsky said, " is that excesses spring from the very nature of the revolution, which is itself none other than an excess of history".