On Leading Role of Working Class in the National Liberation Movement of the Colonial Peoples
by V. M. Maslennikov
* Revised stenogram of a report delivered on June 8, 1949 at a joint
meeting of the Scholars’ Council of the Institution of Economics and
the Pacific Institute of the Academic of Sciences, USSR, devoted to the
problems of the national-colonial movement after the Second World War.
Lenin and Stalin elaborated a complete teaching on the Socialist and
the national and colonial revolutions. One of its cornerstones is the
teaching on the leading role of the proletariat in these revolutions.
Lenin wrote:
“Only the proletariat can be a consistent fighter for
democracy. It may become a victorious fighter for democracy only if the
peasant masses join its revolutionary struggle.” (Lenin, Selected Works, Eng. Ed., Moscow, 1947, Vol. I, p. 376)
The Great October Socialist Revolution was victorious because at its
head stood the revolutionary working class of Russia with its vanguard,
the Bolshevik Party, tempered in political battles. It was victorious
because the working class of Russia possessed such as important ally in
the revolution as the poor peasantry, comprising the vast majority of
the peasant population in the country, The experience of the
revolutionary struggle in Russia was and still is of tremendous
significance for the national liberation movement of the peoples of the
colonies, the semi-colonies and the dependent countries.
The successes of the national liberation movement in the postwar period
and above all the historic victory of the Chinese people, who have
smashed the Kuomintang clique and created the People’s Republic of
China, are the most striking demonstrations of the triumph of the
Leninist-Stalinist teachings on the national-colonial revolution and on
the leading role of the proletariat in this revolution.
Comrade Stalin has pointed out that after the Great October Revolution
the era of undisturbed exploitation and oppression of the colonies and
dependent countries has passed away and the era of revolutions for
emancipation in the colonies and dependent countries, the era of the
awakening of the proletariat in these countries, the era of its
hegemony in the revolution has begun.
“The October Revolution has ushered in a new era, the era of colonial revolutions which are being conducted in the oppressed countries of the world in alliance with the proletariat and under the leadership of the proletariat.” (Stalin, Problems of Leninism, Moscow, 1947, p. 201)
The Great October Socialist Revolution has broken the chains of
national and colonial oppression in Tsarist Russia and freed from it,
without exception, all the oppressed nations of our State.
“It is precisely because the national-colonial revolutions
took place in our country under the leadership of the proletariat and
under the banner of internationalism that pariah nations, slave
nations, have for the first time in the history of mankind risen to the position of nations which are really free and really equal, thereby setting a contagious example for the oppressed nations of the whole world” (Stalin, Problems of Leninism, Moscow, 1947, pp 200-201)
The oppressed peoples of the colonial and semi-colonial countries found
in the Soviet Union a support, a loyal friend in the struggle against
imperialism.
After the Great October Socialist Revolution the national liberation
movement of the oppressed peoples grew more and more intense,
constantly undermining the rear of imperialism. In giving his classical
definition of the general crisis of capitalism, Comrade Stalin pointed
out as one of its basic symptoms the fact
“that the imperialist war and the victory of the revolution in the USSR had undermined the basis of imperialism in colonial and dependent
countries, that the authority of imperialism in these countries was
already shattered and that it was not able to rule as of old through
force in these countries”. (Lenin and Stalin, Collection of Writings for the Study of the History of the CPSU (B), Russ Ed., Party Publishing Press, 1936, Vol. III. p. 428)
The struggle of the peoples of the colonial and dependent countries of
East and South-East Asia, of the Middle East and Africa for freedom and
independence and against the imperialist oppressors is characterised by
a diversity of forms and of sweep in various countries. This difference
is determined by the correlation of class forces in these countries, by
the extent of their industrial development, by the level of the
revolutionary consciousness and organisation of the proletariat, the
successes of its struggle for hegemony in the national liberation
movement, for allies, and, in the first instance, for the peasantry
which comprises the majority of the population of the colonies and
semi-colonies.
China occupied the leading position in the revolutionary movement of
the oppressed peoples in the period between the First and Second World
Wars.
Comrade Stalin paid great attention to the problems of the Chinese
revolution. He pointed out that the characteristic features of the
Chinese revolution is the struggle between two paths – the path of the
national bourgeoisie which wants to crush the proletariat, enter into a
compact with imperialism and, with it, launch a campaign against the
revolution in order to suppress it and establish the rule of
capitalism, and the other path – the path of the proletariat which
pursues the aim of pushing aside the national bourgeoisie and
consolidating its hegemony and winning the following of the toiling
millions in the town and countryside in order to overcome the
resistance of the national bourgeoisie, secure the complete victory of
the bourgeois-democratic revolution and then gradually switch it to the
path of Socialist revolution. (As quoted by E. Zhukov, “The Great
October Socialist Revolution and China”, New Times, No. 46, November 7, 1949)
The accomplishment of the tasks through the conquest and the
consolidation of the hegemony of the proletariat, through the carrying
out of the democratic revolution and through the creation of conditions
for Socialist construction necessitates a prolonged and stubborn
struggle.
In this struggle the Communist Party of China based itself on the great
teachings of Marx-Engels-Lenin-Stalin, on the great historical
experience of the CPSU (B). In his article, On the Dictatorship of People’s Democracy,
written on July 1, 1949, the occasion of the twenty-eighth anniversary
of the Chinese Communist Party, the Chairman of the Central Committee
of the Communist Party of China, Mao Tse-tung wrote:
“We had to fight internal enemies and enemies from without,
enemies inside the Party and outside its ranks. We are indebted to
Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin for giving us a weapon to fight with.
This weapon is not the machinegun but Marxism-Leninism.... The Chinese
acquired Marxism as a result of its application by the Russians. Before
the October Revolution the Chinese did not know who Lenin and Stalin
were; neither did they know of Marx and Engels. The salvoes of the
October Revolution brought us Marxism-Leninism. The October Revolution
helped the progressive elements of the world and of China as well to
apply the proletarian world outlook in determining the fate of the
country and in reviewing their own problem. The conclusion reached was
that we must advance along the path taken by the Russians.” (Mao
Tse-tung, “Dictatorship of People’s Democracy”, For A Lasting Peace, For A People’s Democracy, July 15, 1949)
The feudal-militarist groups were the main support of foreign
imperialism in China. The foreign imperialists waged a struggle for the
extension of their spheres of influence in China by utilising one or
another set of militarist cliques. Feudal survivals were predominant
inside the country and they were aggravated by the oppression of
militarism and arbitrary rule of the bureaucracy. In order to gratify
foreign capital the reactionary Government stifled national industry.
The Chinese industrial bourgeoisie which had multiplied its capital
considerably and increased its production in the years of the First
World War found itself in opposition to the foreign imperialists, who
at that time preferred to utilise the compradore trading bourgeoisie
for its operations. Under these circumstances, the national bourgeoisie
stood in the ranks of the united front for a struggle for its own
interests against imperialism and the feudal-militarist cliques.
In China the revolutionary fight of the workers and peasants against
the feudal-bureaucratic oppression, against militarism and imperialism
began immediately after the October Revolution in Russia and after the
termination of the First World War. In 1921, the Communist Party was
formed in China and already in the following year it led the strike
struggle of the workers. This struggle was of tremendous political
importance. The hegemony of the proletariat in the Chinese revolution
would have been impossible if the Communist Party of China had not from
the very beginning of its activities created powerful mass proletarian
organisations, if these organisations, and above all the trade unions,
had not been under the leadership of the Communist Party and if the
Communist Party had not succeeded in leading the working class movement
and leading it along the revolutionary path, the path of uniting it
with Socialism. In June 1923, at the Third Congress of the Communist
Party the decision to join the Kuomintang was taken. By this time the
Communist Party already had the solid experience of revolutionary
leadership of the working class movement. After the Kuomintang Congress
had adopted in 1924 the resolution proposed by Sun Yat-sen to accept
peasants and workers as members of the Kuomintang a base was created in
China for the formation of a united front against foreign imperialism
and the reactionary militarists.
Comrade Stalin points out that a united front with the national
bourgeoisie in the first stage of the colonial revolution does not at
all mean that the Communists must not intensify the struggle of the
workers and peasants against the landlords and the national
bourgeoisie, that the proletariat must sacrifice its independence in
the slightest degree or for a single moment.
“A united front can have revolutionary significance only if
and when it does not hinder the Communist Party from conducting its
independent political and organisational work, only if it does not
prevent it from organising the proletariat into an independent
political force, rousing the peasantry against the landlords, openly
organising a revolution of workers and peasants and thus preparing the
conditions necessary for the hegemony of the proletariat.” (Stalin, Marxism and the National and Colonial Question, London, Lawrence and Wishart. p 237)
The Chinese, proletariat by consolidating its ranks and by being
tempered in the strike struggle against foreign capital at the same
time fought to extend its influence among the broad working masses. The
Party of the proletariat, its foremost and organised detachment, grew
and strengthened. While in 1925 the Communist Party of China had only
two thousand members, in 1927 the membership of the Communist Party had
already risen to sixty thousand. In these years the Communist Party led
the biggest strike battles and it succeeded in increasing considerably
the membership of the trade unions. While at the First Congress of the
Trade Unions of China which was called in 1925 on the initiative of the
Communist Party, representatives of 230,000 organised workers were
present, in 1927 the number of workers organised in trade unions were
already three million. The revolutionary movement embraced tens of
millions of toiling peasants of China. Finally the Communist Party
succeeded in drawing to its side whole regiments and divisions of the
nationalist troops.
“....the Chinese Communist Party has succeeded during this
period in converting the idea of the hegemony of the proletariat from a
wish into a fact,” wrote Stalin. (Stalin, Ibid., p. 252)
The successes attained by the Communist Party in the struggle for the
hegemony of the proletariat in the national liberation movement was to
a considerable extent facilitated by the fact that in China the
bourgeoisie was weak and unorganised. The big national bourgeoisie,
apprehending the sweep of the revolutionary movement of the working
people crossed over to the camp of counter-revolution. Relying on the
support of the foreign imperialists the bourgeoisie attempted to halt
the revolution at the “first step” in order to stifle it later.
However, the bourgeois nationalists who had usurped State power in
China with the help of foreign imperialists did not succeed in halting
the Chinese revolution.
“While the first stage was distinguished by the fact that
the edge of revolution was directed mainly against foreign imperialism,
the distinguishing feature of the second stage is that the edge of
revolution is now directed mainly against the internal enemies and
primarily against the feudal lords and the feudal regime.” (Stalin Ibid., p. 244)
The exposure of the big compradore national bourgeoisie as an agent of
British and American imperialism and a relentless struggle against it
were the most important tasks of the working class of China during the
second stage of the revolution. The Chinese revolution now entered into
a higher phase of its development – the phase of the agrarian
revolution. The agrarian revolution assumed broad dimensions and
seriously frightened even the petty-bourgeois intelligentsia which in
the person of the Wuhan leadership of the Kuomintang also went over to
the camp of counter-revolution. This meant that the revolution suffered
a temporary defeat.
“But,” as Comrade Stalin pointed out, “it rallied the broad
masses of the peasantry and the urban poor more closely around the
proletariat, preparing soil for the proletarian hegemony.” (Stalin, Collected Works, Russ. Ed. Vol. X, p. 25).
Basing on the peasant partisan movement led by the Communist Party of
China the thousand-strong Red Army was created and the first seats of
democratic power arose in the country. In November 1931, at the First
All-China Congress of Soviets representing sixty million members, the
new democratic power in China – Soviet Power – was created. The new
organs of revolutionary power were organs of uprising against the
existing Kuomintang power, organs of struggle for a new democratic
power. At the same time they were organs for the carrying out in China
of the agrarian bourgeois-democratic revolution, which was far from
being completed. The new democratic power was a powerful revolutionary
centre attracting all the progressive elements inside the country in
their struggle against the counter-revolutionary Kuomintang. After the
Japanese invasion of China, with the aim of creating and strengthening
the united national front, the Chinese Red Army was reorganised into a
People’s Liberation Army and became the principal force in the struggle
against the Japanese usurpers.
The democratic power, created in the regions liberated from the
Japanese invaders by the People’s Liberation Army and the partisan
detachments of China during the Sino-Japanese war (1937-45) was an
all-people’s power. It enjoyed the confidence and the support of not
only the population of the democratic regions but of the whole of
China. The industrial enterprises in the liberated regions passed into
the ownership of the entire people, the peasants received land; the
power of the capitalists, the landlords and foreign capital was
liquidated, the bloc of toiling strata of the population headed by the
working class under the leadership of the Communist Party, became the
principal leading force. For the first time, the Chinese people had the
possibility of being convinced through their own experience of what a
genuinely People’s Democratic power means.
At the end of the Second World War the influence of the Communist Party
of China as a leading force had spread to eighteen liberated areas with
a population of 140 million people. The Communist Party won tremendous
authority and the respect of the majority of the population of the
entire country. The hegemony of the entire working class of China, its
leading influence on the peasantry was thus not only won but passed the
test of historical experience.
In the course of the agrarian revolution that was unfolding under the
leadership of the Communist Party over a considerable part of the
territory of China the leading role of the proletariat in the national
liberation struggle increased and its influence grew among the peasant
masses. At this stage of the Chinese revolution the Communist Party won
over in the struggle for democratisation of the country not only the
proletariat and the peasantry but also democratic sections of the
national bourgeoisie.
In the period between the First and Second World Wars China occupied
the position of the vanguard in the revolutionary movement of the
peoples of the colonies and semi-colonies. But in this period in the
colonial front many other weak links in the imperialist chain had been
formed creating a serious threat to imperialist rule. In this period
the national liberation movement of the Indian people rose to great
heights.
India occupies one of the first places among colonial countries in the
numerical strength of its proletariat. While according to the figures
of the Chinese census, the total number of factory workers in China in
1927, did not exceed one-and-a-half million, in India in that very same
year the urban proletariat exceeded three-and-a-half million. In India
as in China it was not only the factory proletariat which participated
in the revolutionary national liberation struggle. Tens of millions of
peasants, millions of artisans workers in small manufacturing
enterprises, port workers, coolies, rickshaw drivers and other urban
poor were active participants in the mass revolutionary struggle, whose
leaders undoubtedly were the more organised and disciplined factory
workers.
The Indian proletariat by the end of the nineteenth century, i.e.,
considerably earlier than the Chinese proletariat had already begun to
participate actively in the strike struggle, which often passed over
into political struggle. In 1905, the Indian textile workers conducted
a strike directed against the attempts of capitalists to lengthen the
working day. In 1906, a general political strike of the Bengal railway
workers broke out. In May 1907 the railway workers of the Punjab
refused to transport troops sent by the British imperialists to crush a
peasant uprising. In 1908, Lenin wrote in connection with the general
political strike of the Indian textile workers:
“In India the proletariat has already matured sufficiently to wage a class conscious and political mass struggle.” (Lenin. Selected Works, Lawrence and Wishart, London, 1936. Vol. IV, p. 300)
The working class movement in India assumed a broad sweep in 1918-22.
Along with powerful strikes unprecedented till then in the history of
India, there took place mass demonstrations and meetings of workers.
After the bloody shootings of the workers’ demonstrations in Amritsar
in 1919 the national liberation movement embraced the whole country. In
the period of revolutionary advance of 1930-32 and also on the eve of
the Second World War the Indian proletariat for the first time emerged
as an independent political force. In India the peasant movement too
assumed a broad sweep both in 1919-22 as well as in 1930-32 and in a
number of places it passed over into armed uprisings, into burning of
landlords’ estates, confiscation of landlords’ grain. The Indian people
dealt forceful blows at the rear of the capitalist system and by
shattering the positions of imperialism their fight helped the
international proletariat.
Nevertheless in its scope and results the revolutionary movement in
India greatly lagged behind the revolutionary movement in China. The
struggle of the Indian working class for hegemony in the national
liberation movement was not crowned with such successes as in China.
The Indian working class in its struggle for hegemony in the
revolutionary movement met such an exceedingly powerful opponent in•
the person of British imperialism, who with all the means at its
disposal crushed and disrupted the national liberation movement.
British imperialism employed ruthless and bloody terror and all kinds
of repressive measures against the national liberation movement of the
peoples of the colonies and semi-colonies, and at the same time it
extensively utilised bourgeois national reformism. National reformism,
whose leader in the colonies and semi-colonies is the national
bourgeoisie, like all reformism rejects the revolutionary path of
emancipating the country from imperialist oppression. The national
reformists, while duping the workers, affirm that it is possible to
achieve freedom and independence through the path of gradual attainment
of reforms.
The Chinese Communist Party succeeded in the course of many years’
struggle in smashing national reformism and isolating its bearers, the
national bourgeoisie and the petty-bourgeoisie in the towns from the
masses of the working-class and the peasantry. Mao Tse-tung wrote in
the article quoted above:
“The national bourgeoisie cannot be the leader of the
revolution nor for that matter can it occupy a leading position in the
State for its social and economic position determines its weakness, its
lack of foresight, courage and the fear of the masses displayed by many
of its representatives. Sun Yat-sen called for ‘awakening the masses’
or for ‘rendering assistance to the peasants and workers’. Who intends
to awaken them and help them? According to Sun Yat-sen it was to be the
petty-bourgeoisie and national bourgeoisie. But this cannot be realised
in practice. Sun Yat-sen’s revolutionary work of 40 years ended in
failure. Why? Because in the epoch of imperialism the petty-bourgeoisie
cannot successfully lead any real revolution. Our experience of 28
years is quite different. We have acquired invaluable experience and
the essence of this experience consists in the following three factors:
a disciplined Party equipped with the theory of Marx, Engels, Lenin and
Stalin using the method of self-criticism and closely linked with the
masses, an army led by this Party, a united front of different
revolutionary sections of society and groups led by this Party.
“This makes us different from our predecessors. Basing ourselves on
these three factors we won the main victory traversed a difficult Path
and waged a struggle against the Right and Left opportunist tendencies
in the Party.” (Mao Tse-tung, “Dictatorship of People’s Democracy”,
from For a Lasting Peace, For a People’s Democracy, July 15, 1949)
In China national reformism never had such a strong influence as in
India. The influence of the Chinese big bourgeoisie increased in the
period of the Northern Expedition and of the collaboration between the
Kuomintang and the Communist Party of China. But it swiftly lost this
influence after it betrayed the national revolution and openly became a
counter-revolutionary agent of the Anglo-American imperialists. At the
same time considerable sections of the petty and middle bourgeoisie
oppressed by foreign imperialism and big bureaucratic capital became
more and more closely linked with the united revolutionary front led by
the Communist Party of China.
National reformism began to consolidate and extend its influence in
India after the founding of the Indian National Congress in 1885. The
Indian bourgeoisie, formed a bloc with the liberal section of the
landlords and attempted by gradual reforms within the framework of the
regime of colonial oppression to consolidate its economic positions and
persuade the masses about ‘the unsuitability’ of the revolutionary
struggle. By spreading illusions about the possibility of a reformist
path of achieving independence and about “the decolonisation at the
hands of the imperialists”, the national bourgeoisie of India retained
its influence on the masses of Indian workers.
Already in 1925 Comrade Stalin had pointed out that the Indian national
bourgeoisie had split into a revolutionary Party and a compromising
party and that the compromising section of this bourgeoisie had already
managed in the main to come to an agreement with imperialism. Comrade
Stalin emphasised in this connection that the compromising section of
the Indian bourgeoisie had entered into a bloc with imperialism against
the workers and peasants of its own country.
“The victory of the revolution cannot be achieved unless
this bloc is smashed. But in order to break this bloc fire must be
concentrated on the compromising national bourgeoisie: its treachery
must be exposed, the toiling masses must be emancipated from its
influence and the conditions necessary for the hegemony of the
proletariat must be systematically prepared. In other words, it is a
question of preparing the proletariat of such colonies as India for the
role of leader in the liberation movement and of dislodging, step by
step, the bourgeoisie and its spokesmen from this honourable position.
The task is to create a revolutionary anti-imperialist bloc and to
ensure the hegemony of the proletariat within this bloc.” (Stalin, Marxism and the National and Colonial Question, p. 217)
Comrade Stalin teaches that the independence of the Communist Party
“must be the basic slogan of the advanced elements of Communism, for
the way for the hegemony of the proletariat can be prepared and the
latter can be achieved only by the Communist Party” (Stalin, Ibid.,
p. 218). Till that time no Communist Party had been organised in India.
The Workers’ and Peasants’ Party, formed in November 1925, was the
first organisation unifying the scattered Communist groups inside the
country, but in its composition it included even representatives of the
petty-bourgeois intelligentsia, among whom there were also Left
social-reformists. Social-reformists penetrated into the working class
as agents of the national bourgeoisie and by indulging in democratic
and Socialist phraseology they attempted to subordinate the working
class to the influence of the national bourgeoisie. The influence of
social-reformism made itself felt in the activities of the Communist
organisations of India in the formation of trade unions and in the
policy of their leadership. A factional struggle went on in the
different groups who had joined the Workers’ and Peasants’ Party. In
1928 the expulsion of the renegade Roy, who was instigating factional
struggle within the Party, improved the situation. But the survivals or
social-reformism made themselves felt even further. Immediately after
their foundation in 1918-20 the leadership of the trade union
organisations in India was in the hands of bourgeois elements which
included the social-reformists who pursued a compromising policy. In
1929 a split took place within the Indian trade union movement and by
1931 three leading trade union centres were formed inside the country –
the All India Federation of Trade Unions, led by Right reformists, the
All India Trade Union Congress under the leadership of the “Lefts” and
the Red Trade Union Congress which united the revolutionary
organisations of the Indian proletariat. The split within the working
class movement in India had a negative influence on the further
development of the anti-imperialist struggle of the Indian toilers,
which bore an insufficiently organised character.
At the end of 1933 there took place the organisational unification into
a single Communist Party of the Communist groups that were scattered
till then. From this time the Indian working class under the leadership
of the Communist Party began to emerge in the political arena of the
country as an independent force and for the first time waged a struggle
against the bourgeoisie and for hegemony in the national liberation
movement.
In 1935 a united Trade Union Congress of India was formed by merging
the Red Trade Union Congress and the All-India Trade Union Congress,
and the force and the sweep of the trade union movement inside the
country increased sharply. The growth in the influence of the Communist
Party among the masses alarmed the British imperialists and their
rotégés, from amidst the Indian bourgeoisie. In 1934 the
Communist Party of India was declared illegal.
The revolutionary struggle in India grew again in strength on the eve
of the Second World War. The strike movement embraced the vast masses
of workers and the capitalists were often forced to give concessions.
The workers of the jute industry in Bengal, the textile workers of
Kanpur, the railway workers, etc., all went on strike. The working
class that was steeled in struggle became the most organised and
powerful detachment of the anti-imperialist forces of India. The
Communist conception of the formation of a united anti-imperialist
front found a broad response and the approval of the overwhelming
majority of the toilers. In 1936 new peasant unions (kisan sabhas)
emerged, which were in the main led by the Communists.
In 1942 after eight years of illegal existence, the Communist Party was
legalised. The emergence of the Party from underground and the
strengthening of its ties with the masses led to the growth and the
organisational consolidation of the Party. The membership rose from
four thousand members in 1942 to sixteen thousand in 1943. In June 1943
the First Congress of the Communist Party of India was held and it
noted that the influence of the Party had increased considerably not
only among the workers but also among the peasants and the
intelligentsia.
The old leadership of the Communist Party was nevertheless not free
from the reformist influence which left its mark on the policy of the
Party in the period of the Second World War. “The Mountbatten Plan” for
the partitioning of India and the granting of Dominion status to India
and Pakistan which was nothing but a deal between British imperialism
and the Indian bourgeois top strata, a new form of the economic and
political dependence of these Dominions on British imperialism, was
evaluated by the former leadership of the Communist Party of India as
some kind of ‘step forward’ and not as a new form of attack of British
imperialism on the Indian people. After the partition of India into two
Dominions the leadership of the Communist Party took the decision to
support the bourgeois Nehru Government and decided on the “expediency”
of forming a united national front from Gandhi to the Communists. This
reformist line was strongly criticised and condemned at the Second
Congress of the Communist Party of India which took place in
February-March 1948.
It was thus that in the two biggest countries of the East the struggle
of the working class for the leading role in the national liberation
struggle developed in the period between the First World War and the
termination of the Second World War.
Guided by the teachings of Lenin and Stalin on the national colonial
revolution the working class led by the Communist Parties has become in
China and in India the leading force in the struggle for national
independence and the freedom of the many millions of peoples of these
countries.
* * *
The might and the international authority of the Soviet Union grew
immeasurably after the Second World War. The great victory of the
Soviet people in the patriotic war demonstrated with new force to the
whole world the superiority of Socialism over capitalism. As a result
of the war and the victory of the Soviet Army, the breach in the world
system of imperialism was widened, a number of countries of Central and
South-East Europe – the countries of People’s Democracy – dropped out
of this system and today stand on the path of building the foundations
of Socialism. The revolutionary anti-imperialist front of the oppressed
masses acquired an even more powerful support than before.
The support and assistance of the Soviet Union which exposes before the
whole world the aggressive policy and the criminal designs of the
Anglo-American bloc is of inestimable importance for the successful
development of the national liberation movement in the colonies and
dependent countries. The Soviet army by vanquishing the Japanese
occupiers of Manchuria and North Korea averted imperialist intervention
in these regions and prevented the counter-revolutionary forces from
seizing power there. Thus the Soviet people not only liberated the
peoples of China and Korea from the yoke of Japanese usurpers but also
created in China and North Korea conditions favourable for the
organisation and consolidation of the People’s Democratic regime.
“Had there been no Soviet Union, had there been no victory
in the anti-fascist Second World War, had Japanese imperialism not been
defeated (which is particularly important for us), had there been no
growing struggle of the oppressed countries of the East. had there been
no struggle of the masses in the United States, Britain, France,
Germany, Italy, Japan, and other capitalist countries against the
ruling reactionary cliques – had none of these factors existed then the
pressure of the international reactionary forces would of course, have
been much stronger than it is today. Would we have been able to achieve
victory in these circumstances? Of course not. So it would have been
impossible to consolidate victory after it had been achieved.” (Mao
Tse-tung, Ibid.)
After the Second World War the sharp intensification of the uneven
development of the imperialist States, the inevitable emergence of new
sharp contradictions, differences and conflicts between them is of
tremendous importance for the national liberation movement in the
colonies and semi-colonies. American imperialism, which has fattened on
the war and on the blood of the people is attempting to redivide the
world after the Second World War in conformity with the changed
correlation of imperialist forces. In its struggle for the
establishment of .world domination American monopoly capital is
constantly coming into conflict with the interests of the imperialist
robbers who have been weakened after the war. The main contradiction in
the imperialist camp – the Anglo-American contradiction – has been
sharply aggravated.
During the war Britain’s ties with her colonies were weakened. She
found herself militarily and economically dependent on the supply of
American foodstuffs and manufactured goods. In spite of the fact that
the British imperialists recovered their colonies after the war they
met with the increasing influence of the USA there. American capital is
more and more extending its penetration into the countries of the
British empire; at present it occupies almost the same place as Britain
in their trade. The USA is not releasing Britain from the clutches of
financial and economic dependence and is gradually taking away its
control over the colonies. It is dislodging Britain from the former
spheres of influence and subordinating it to the position of its
vassal. The positions or France, Belgium, and Holland are being more
and more undermined in their colonial empires. The Marshallisation of
the main European imperialist metropolitan countries is converting them
more and more into satellites of the USA. In spite of this the British,
the French, the Dutch and the Belgian imperialists are opposed to the
growing penetration of American capital in their colonies and are
attempting to consolidate their own positions there. All this gives
rise to extraordinary instability and extreme weakening of the general
front of imperialism in the colonies. Nevertheless, the imperialists of
different countries under the aegis of the American imperialists join
together when it is a question of crushing the national liberation
movement of the oppressed peoples.
The Second World War gave an impetus to the development of national
industry in the colonies the semi-colonies and dependent countries.
During the war the extension of industrial production in the colonial
world was conditioned on the one hand by the step page in the imports
from the metropolitan countries of essential foodstuffs and goods for
wide consumption and on the other hand by an increase in the
requirements of the metropolis of the military strategic raw materials
and various other materials necessary for the conduct of war
operations. In the colonies this facilitated the development of the
mining and raw material industry, the building of war factories and
plants owned by the imperialists on an indigenous raw material base and
also to an increase in the number of small industrial enterprises of a
manufacturing type, the growth of domestic industry and trade. However,
in spite of a certain industrial development in a number of colonies
and dependent countries they have maintained their former colonial
status.
“It is imperialism’s special method to develop industry in
the colonies in such a way that it is chained to the imperialist
metropolis.” (J. V. Stalin, Collected Works, Vol. VIII, page 128.)
The development of industry in the colonies and semi-colonies assumed
distorted forms and a one-sided character. Moreover, it led to the
growth of a national proletariat. The Indian proletariat increased
almost by one million. In the colonies there took place simultaneously
an intensified differentiation amongst the peasantry and the number of
the agricultural proletariat increased.
In the war period the imperialists drained the wealth from colonies and
semi-colonies in great quantities; the colonial population was doomed
to hunger and slow death.
The intensification of the plunder and exploitation of the colonies by
the imperialist metropolitan powers extremely aggravated the
contradiction in the colonies and semi-colonies themselves. The
imperialists attempted to extend their social base in the colonial
countries and increasingly drew over to their side the national big
bourgeoisie which served them as a weapon for pumping out the wealth of
the colonial countries and for the still greater enslavement of the
colonial peoples. With the assistance of the imperialists the ruling
groups of the local bourgeoisie became centres of the anti-democratic
struggle in the colonies and semi-colonies. In certain countries, as
for example India and China, these groups of the national bourgeoisie
have become converted through imperialist support into big monopolist
compradore amalgamations.
The “Four Families” in China – Chiang Kai-shek, Chen Li-fu, Sun and
Kun-Syan-Si – were a clear example of such monopolist associations. All
political and economic power in Kuomintang China belonged to them. With
the help of the American imperialists they concentrated in their hands
tremendous capital and the natural riches of the country.
They employed not only capitalist but pre-capitalist methods or
exploitation and emerged as the most typical representatives of big
finance capital which merged both with the State apparatus and foreign
capital.
In exactly the same manner as the Chinese, the Indian monopolist
amalgamations made tremendous profits during the war period and this
substantially increased their economic strength. The Directors of the
Birla, Tata, Dalmia and other companies had no objection to the passing
of anti-British resolutions by the Congress. But they in essence were
and continue to remain agents and allies of British capital in India.
The rule of foreign imperialists in India is advantageous to the Indian
big bourgeoisie. It is interested in the assistance of British
imperialism for a struggle against the people’s movement. It betrayed
the national liberation movement for the sake of its class interests.
The Indian big bourgeoisie has assisted the British imperialists to
establish in India after the war a regime which under the outer form of
‘independence’ has preserved intact the colonial exploitation of the
population by British monopoly capital.
A close merging of the national big bourgeoisie with foreign
imperialism was also taking place in other colonial and dependent
countries. The groups of compromising bourgeoisie are the enemies and
stranglers of the national liberation movement of the oppressed peoples
and along with the imperialists they are organising civil war against
the progressive democratic forces of their own countries.
After the Second World War the proletariat of many colonies and semi-colonies became the acknowledged leader of the national liberation movement.
The emancipation of the labouring peasantry and the urban
petty-bourgeoisie from the influence of the big bourgeoisie has been
and is proceeding at a very rapid pace in the colonies and dependent
countries. At present the Communist Parties in many semi-colonial and
colonial countries – Viet Nam, Burma, Malaya, Indonesia, etc., – have
unified broad sections of the people under their leadership in the
democratic anti- imperialist front.
In the first ranks of the revolutionary national liberation movement in
the East are the millions of Chinese people – a victorious people.
Immediately after the termination of the Second World War the
reactionary feudal-bourgeois clique of Chiang Kai-shek supported by the
American imperialists subjected China to a sanguinary civil war. The
Kuomintang Government rejected the popular demands for a
democratisation of China, that were put forth by the Chinese Communist
Party and other democratic organisations, representing the interests of
the proletariat, the toiling peasantry and the patriotic groups of the
petty and middle national bourgeoisie. It launched an attack on the
working class, on its leader the Communist Party and on the defenders
of its interests, the People’s Liberation Army of China.
In 1946 the Kuomintang troops that were equipped by the Americans
exceeded twice the number of the People’s Liberation Army. But even
before two years had passed, the main forces of Chiang Kai-shek were
smashed and by June 1949 the Kuomintang troops lost more than
four-and-a-half million men and almost 60 per cent of the population of
China was freed from the rule of the feudal-bourgeois-reactionary
Kuomintang Government. By October 1949, the overwhelming majority of
the Chinese population was liberated and on October 1, the People’s
Republic of China was proclaimed and a Central People’s Government was
elected with Mao Tse-tung, the leader of the Communist Party, at its
head. The prolonged struggle of the Chinese peoples under the
leadership of the working class culminated in a great historical
victory. Four hundred and seventy-five million people of the world’s
population, liberated from imperialist oppression, stood on the path of
development towards Socialism.
A decisive factor in these victories of the Chinese people is the
leading role of the Communist Party of China which is steeled in
battles, which is following the great teachings of
Marx-Engels-Lenin-Stalin, which had succeeded in rallying the Chinese
people around the working class, around the revolutionary People’s
liberation Army and which has exposed the anti-popular, anti-national,
treacherous policy of the Kuomintang clique.
The Communist Party of China and the People’s Liberation Army of China
earned the respect, recognition and love of all the people. A single
united front unprecedented in breadth and depth and unifying the
workers, the peasants, the urban petty-bourgeoisie, the national
minorities and certain sections of the middle industrial and trading
bourgeoisie was created inside the country. The petty and the middle
bourgeoisie in China suffered oppression and persecution at the hands
of the reactionary big bourgeoisie, the landlord class and the
Kuomintang power (which was in the hands of monopoly capital). The
petty and middle bourgeoisie is not or very little connected with
imperialism. That is why this bourgeoisie, according to the definition
of Mao Tse-tung “a real national bourgeoisie”, enters into a united
front of struggle against internal reaction and foreign imperialism. The
basis of this united national front is the alliance of the working
class and the labouring peasantry under the leading role of the working
class.
“Imperialism and the Kuomintang reactionary clique were
overthrown primarily by the force of the working class and the
peasantry. The transition from the New Democracy to Socialism depends,
on the main, on the alliance of these two c1asses. The working class
must lead the dictatorship of the People’s Democracy, for only the
working class is the most far-sighted, just and unselfish and
consistently revolutionary class. The history of all revolutions shows
that without the leadership of the working class the revolution is
doomed to failure. But under the leadership of the working class the
revolution will be victorious. No other class in any country in the
epoch of imperialism can lead a real revolution to victory. This has
been clearly proved by the fact that the Chinese petty bourgeoisie and
national bourgeoisie led the revolution on many occasions – but always
they met with failure.” (Mao Tse-tung, “The Dictatorship of People’s
Democracy.” For A Lasting Peace, For A People’s Democracy, July 15, 1949)
The victory of the Chinese Revolution has once again confirmed the
brilliance of the teachings of Lenin and Stalin on the national and
colonial revolution and on the necessity of the hegemony of the
proletariat in this revolution.
The advance of the national liberation movement in India in the postwar
period is also proceeding on the basis of the proletariat attaining a
more and more leading role in the national liberation movement.
After the Second World War the influence of the national bourgeoisie
among the masses in India decreased decisively and the strength and
influence of the working class increased considerably. The membership
of the Communist Party of India rose to ninety thousand; the Communists
strengthened their position and authority among the workers, the
peasants and the urban petty bourgeoisie. The All-India Trade Union
Congress comprising nearly 800,000 members, the All India Kisan Sabha
with also a membership of nearly 800,000 members, the All-India
Students’ Federation and many other progressive unions and
organisations in the country are under the influence of the Communists.
In the course of 1948 more than 1,600 strikes took place in India and a
considerable number of these strikes bore a political character. The
strikes and mass actions of the workers were directed against the
attacks of the bourgeoisie on the living standard and political rights
of the working class, anti-working crass legislations, against the
lifting of price-control, and against the assumption of extraordinary
powers by the Government against the persecution of the Communist Party
of India, etc.
Thanks to the leading role of the working class and its leaders – the
Communist Parties – successes have also been achieved in the national
liberation movement in Viet Nam whose people are waging a heroic
struggle against French imperialism which is egged on and supported by
the ruling circles in USA. A partisan army is also operating in Burma,
a partisan war is being waged against the American colonisers in the
Philippines and an armed struggle for independence of the peoples is on
in Indonesia and Malaya. All these are not accidental, spontaneous
outbursts but an organised and conscious struggle of the popular masses
led by the working class and the Communist Parties against the
imperialists and internal reaction.
The national liberation movement in Indonesia is taking place under
complicated conditions. Under the leadership of the Communist Party the
Indonesian partisans are waging a dogged armed struggle against the
Dutch troops not only in Java and Sumatra but also in the other islands
of Indonesia.
* * *
The consolidation of the leading role of the proletariat in the
national liberation movement of the peoples of the colonies and the
semi-colonies during the war and after its termination was the factor
which determined the gigantic sweep of this movement and its decisive
victories.
In all the countries of the colonial world the peasantry, the
intelligentsia, the urban petty bourgeoisie, and that section of the
national bourgeoisie which is coming forth against imperialism are
rallying around the proletariat for emancipation from colonial
oppression, for national freedom and independence. Moreover, the
Communist Parties are waging a determined and irreconcilable struggle
against the national reformist agents of the imperialists who are
trying to drive a wedge between the various detachments of the national
liberation movement in the different countries and also between the
national liberation movement of the colonies and semi-colonies on the
one hand, and the international camp of democracy and Socialism as a
whole on the other. The servitors of American imperialism – the Bevins
and Blums – are trying to poison the consciousness of the fighting
peoples of the colonies by dissemination of the treacherous slogan of
the “third path”, for the sake of rescuing the colonial empires from
final destruction. Mao Tse-tung writes, “Not only in China, but
throughout the world without exception, it is either support for
imperialism or Socialism. Neutrality is a camouflage and no third path
exists.” The Communist Parties of the colonial and semi-colonial
countries are exposing these attempts and are carrying on an
irreconcilable struggle against them.
In the course of a prolonged struggle the Chinese people came to the conclusion that the most important condition of success is
“unity in the common struggle with the countries of the
world which regard us as an equal nation and with the peoples of all
countries. This means alliance with the USSR and the People’s
Democracies in Europe and alliance with the proletariat and the masses
of the peoples of the other countries to form an international united
front.” (Mao Tse-tung, Ibid.)
True to the traditions of internationalism, the Communist Party of
China and Communist Parties of other colonial and semi-colonial and
dependent countries branded with shame the Tito fascist clique, that
gang of provocateurs and paid spies of foreign imperialist secret
services, which has established a regime or terror, espionage and
diversion inside the country.
The Soviet people see in the tremendous victories of Chinese democracy
the triumph of the all-conquering power of Marxism-Leninism. They
welcome the formation of the People’s Republic of China as a historical
culmination of the great and prolonged struggle of the Chinese people
under the leadership of the working class. The Soviet Government was
the first to grant recognition to the new Government of Democratic
China.
The further rallying of the peoples of the colonies and semi-colonies
around the working class led by the Communist Parties under the banner
of Lenin and Stalin is the guarantee of success of the struggle for the
liquidation of the imperialist system of colonial slavery and
oppression.
From Problems of Economics, No.9, 1949
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