Vasiliy Yefanov, An Unforgettable Meeting, 1937

Stalin and the Will of the People

Never before has a man carried so high the aspiration for freedom, for the peace and self-determination of the oppressed peoples than Joseph Stalin. His unconditional devotion to the emancipation of the mankind, his ability to mobilise an entire nation to advance towards modernity and to stand up against the odious beast of fascism make him one of the greatest leaders in human history.

Anna Louise Strong perfectly describes this ability in her brilliant book The Stalin Era :

“He had a deep sense of what I can only call the will of the people, he had matchless technique in releasing that will in action. Finally, he had the conviction and was able to give it to others, that his action carried mankind forward to a better day.” Continue reading “Stalin and the Will of the People”

Know your history …Or the ruling class will teach their own version of it

This month in History Today four eminent historians have given their verdict on a counterfactual that should be familiar enough to students of modern history: ‘Could the Soviet Union have survived?’

Flimsy reasons for collapse are offered up. James Rodgers pointing to the under-pricing of records featuring the Soviet national anthem, or Gorbachev cracking down on workplace drunkenness, does little to persuade. Continue reading “Know your history …Or the ruling class will teach their own version of it”

Socialised healthcare or private pharma barbarism, that is the question

Trump: “I consider myself, in a way, a wartime president. This is a war we are waging; this is a very, very difficult situation. “

Merkel: “The situation is serious and the outcome is open”

Macron: “We are at war. In a war for public health of course, but the enemy is there, invisible, inconceivable. France has never made such a decision in peacetime. “

War sermons are a common choice for the ruling class in describing the difficulty of the situation but also in preparing the people to welcome the new harsh anti-labour measures. In all capitalist countries, developed and underdeveloped, confessions are raining down: health systems are collapsing. Continue reading “Socialised healthcare or private pharma barbarism, that is the question”

Agent Sonya

The spy who baked scones

Ursula Kuczynski, better and more infamously known as Ruth Werner, led a truly remarkable life. Born into a Jewish family in Berlin in 1907 to a well to do middle class household, during the 1920’s she pursued an education first in book dealing then as librarian. In 1924 she joined the youth wing of the German communist party before joining the party itself in 1926 at the age of nineteen.

In 1930 with her first husband and fellow communist Rudolf Hamburger the pair moved to Shanghai Continue reading “The spy who baked scones”

Resurrecting anti-soviet sentiment – The crusade of the Western media

You may have thought that in 2020 in the midst of a pandemic the practice of western imperialism through all its media outlets of still trying to kill and bury the Soviet Union in general and JV Stalin in particular might have abated, but no.

Articles throughout the year by the New York Times, Reuters and others regarding a mass grave found in the forest at Sandarmokh in the north-western Russian region of Karelia 20 years ago have become their latest ‘proof’ of Stalin’s ruthlessness. Continue reading “Resurrecting anti-soviet sentiment – The crusade of the Western media”

Anti-Soviet Lies: Did Stalin Pluck A Live Chicken To ‘Prove How Easy It Is To Rule People’?

The absurd lie that Stalin plucked a live chicken to an audience to demonstrate his supposed dictatorial power has been doing the rounds on many platforms of social media lately. It has taken the form of a poorly executed meme. This sloppy piece of propaganda has been resurrected and is supposed to teach us something about the ‘lockdown’.

Of course the story is a complete fabrication, even in the words of its author, but that hasn’t stopped it being passed off as truth.

For many sites, and publications would like to propel this story into the stratosphere for all the world to see. They would use it as an example of a megalomaniac, crazed tyrant intent on showing his power of control, the extent of his evil. Therefore, we take a moment to deal with this crazed, ludicrous rumour, scraped truly from the bottom of the barrel. 

What is it that Stalin supposedly did?

The tale follows as thus:

“Stalin once ripped all the feathers off a live chicken as a lesson to his followers. He then set the chicken on the floor a short distance away. The chicken was bloodied and suffering immensely, yet, when Stalin began to toss bits of wheat toward the chicken it followed him around. He said to his followers “This is how you govern stupid people, they will follow you no matter how much pain you cause them, as long as you throw them a little worthless treat once in a while”. 

Where does this story come from?

The tale can be traced back to the pen of anti-Stalin, revisionist scribbler Chingiz Aitmatov. Aitmatov is well remembered for his literary works, as well his role in helping Mikhail Gorbachev in the passing of ‘Perestroika’. Aitmatov was known for his particular “style” of writing that combined fact with fiction and in the preface to his most famous work wrote:  

“As in previous works, here I also draw on legends and myths [Ed: unsubstantiated slander] handed down to us from former generations; together with these, for the first time in my writing career I also use fantasy to form part of the story. But, for me, neither is an end in itself, simply a method of expressing thoughts, a means of identifying and interpreting realities.”

The Truth

From such a literary “style” comes this tale of Stalin plucking a chicken alive is exactly an example of Aitmatov’s writing that blends very little fact with a heap of fiction, indeed in this case there is no fact to be found!  The tale is part of the tradition of anti-Stalin slander that was brought in under Khrushchev in the Soviet Union, as part of the ‘de-Stalinization’ [asnti-communist] process. Apart from Aitmatov’s confession to passing off fantasy as fact, this fable has no further evidence or source for being true and if we are bearing into mind that this type of tale was typical of Aitmatov, and there are no other original sources for the tale other than Aitmatov, then we discover that the tale can be categorically ruled out as false, a cheap flight of fancy paid for by the Gorbachev era press. All other sources for this tale come from bourgeois and Christian newspapers, repeating with minor variations this ludicrous garbage. All in all, the tale reeks of falsity and is found from time to time, to be found bobbing along in the sewage of the revisionists and bourgeois press. 

Conclusion 

Usually, debunking myths around Stalin can be a more serious affair. However, this tale is so laughable and so easily uncovered as a categorical lie that it merely requires a scratch and the obvious falsity is revealed. Here we have a tale from a revisionist writer adding to the canon of anti-Stalin propaganda no more, no less. 

Communist Party of Britain’s General Secretary: “communism is unsustainable”

On the occasion of the centenary of the Great Socialist October Revolution, on the 6 November on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, CPB General Secretary Robert Griffiths was invited to speak amongst a barrage of anti-communist propaganda. Rather than countering the inevitable and obvious attack with a defense of communism and the Soviet Union, he merely added that “we have had to make a very serious analysis of what went wrong in the Soviet Union… we have to take seriously the reasons as to why in the end that system was not sustainable.” He then goes on to say that we need to replace British capitalism with a “fairer society”. Having just described communism, which was immensely successful in the Soviet Union, as “unsustainable” Rob now leaves us wondering what British capitalism could be replaced with?

Continue reading “Communist Party of Britain’s General Secretary: “communism is unsustainable””

100th Anniversary of the October Revolution: Join us in Southall on Saturday 4th November!

On the 100th anniversary of the great Socialist October Revolution, join us to celebrate the victorious struggles of the mass working class. We will come together to celebrate this working-class revolution, which literally shook the world, and still indicates the path we must take to shatter all exploitation of man by man and nation by nation! We will be holding THE centenary celebration of this festival of progressive humanity in Southall, west London, on Saturday 4th November, at 4.30pm.

Venue: The Dominion Centre, 112 The Green, Southall UB2 4BQ

Map

Get your ticket here

Read more about the October Revolution here

At this meeting, we will bring together members and supporters from around the country and mark the continued development and growth of our organisation, while reminding ourselves of just what it is we are working towards.

Lenin and 1917: a new era

Over the years, the speakers at our meetings have examined in great detail all the most important aspects of the October Revolution. They have paid tribute to the men and women workers who carried out the revolution, and to the leading role of the Bolshevik party – the revolutionary organisation in whose footsteps we hope to follow, which enabled the workers to understand their enemy and to organise themselves to defeat it.

Importantly, in the present climate, our speakers have repeatedly stressed the vital role played by revolutionary theory – especially the immense theoretical contribution of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, who advanced Marxist science by adding to it a precise definition of imperialism (the final stage of decaying capitalism) and who detailed the ways in which imperialism affects the struggle of workers and peasants of all countries for their liberation and social emancipation.

It was Comrade Lenin who created the template for a revolutionary party, working out in the furnace of intense class struggle the essential elements of communist organisation that enabled workers to make their efforts effective. All parties that are serious about overthrowing capitalism and building socialism still follow these organisational tenets today.

Lenin was also a master of strategy and tactics. He solved many important questions, such as the peasant question and the national question, by clearly and precisely explaining their relationship to the socialist revolution. He demonstrated the need for the proletariat to maximise its forces by galvanising as many allies for each phase of the struggle as possible, and showed how it was both possible and necessary to take on the various enemies of socialism one at a time rather than all together.

Unlike Trotsky and his modern-day followers, Lenin did not play at revolution, and was not at all interested in heroic failures. He understood that what was at stake was nothing less than the future of humanity, and he taught the working class how to think and act so it could win.

Read more!

Red Youth visit Stalin’s dacha on the eve of the 100th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution

 

After a busy week meeting with communist youth from around the world, Red Youth took a short trip to visit Stalin’s dacha on the coast of the Black Sea on Friday.

The site is well maintained with renovations to several rooms ongoing, and it attracted a continuous stream of visitors from across the former territories of the once glorious Soviet Union, and from father afield.

Continue reading “Red Youth visit Stalin’s dacha on the eve of the 100th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution”

Celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Great Socialist October Revolution

Harpal Brar gives a message of greeting message on the significance of the 100th anniversary of the Great Socialist October Revolution.

We will be holding a centenary celebration of this festival of progressive humanity in Southall, west London, on Saturday 4th November, at 4.30pm.

Get your ticket here.

Continue reading “Celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Great Socialist October Revolution”