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Commentary on the article of the International Department of the CC of the KKE “On the position of the RCWP in relation to the imperialist war in Ukraine”

Understand the assessment of modern warfare and modern politics

FROM THE EDITORS: We have already written a lot about the range of opinions among the communists on the issue of assessing the ongoing hostilities of the Russian Armed Forces and the Donbass militia in the Donbass and Ukraine. Various, sometimes contradictory, opinions, the fervent fervor of some and even the hysterical outbursts of some comrades are certainly worthy of attention and consideration. But still, we are primarily interested in a scientific approach to assessing events. Vladimir Ilyich Lenin himself in the preface to the post-revolutionary edition of the work Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism wrote: “I should like to hope that my pamphlet will help to understand the fundamental economic question, without the study of which nothing can be understood in the appraisal of modern war and modern politics, namely, the question of the economic essence of imperialism.”Of our allied parties, the deepest and most heated discussion took place between the RCWP and the Communist Party of Greece. The comrades of the KKE did not agree with our assessment of the current situation on a number of issues, and the RCWP did not sign the joint statement of a number of parties initiated by them. The International Department of the CC of the KKE published a critical article in the newspaper Rizospastis regarding our position. The International Commission of the Central Committee of our Party responded to the criticism of the comrades and put forward arguments in favour of our analysis.

The Central Committee of the RCWP expresses confidence that the ongoing discussion will help not only the disputing parties, but also the entire communist movement in the formation of a revolutionary communist pole.

On April 29, 2022, the newspaper “Rizospastis”, the central organ of the Communist Party of Greece, published an article by the International Department of the CC of the KKE “On the position of the RCWP in relation to the imperialist war in Ukraine“.

The article evaluates the actions of the RCWP in connection with the special operation carried out by Russia in Ukraine, expresses extreme resentment for our disagreement with the position of the KKE and argues that the approach of the RCWP is eclectic and that it descends into serious theoretical and political errors, even to the “borrowing“ of bourgeois concepts.

We openly say that we categorically disagree with such assessments, considering them unscientific, but we even more disagree with the method of conducting discussions on the part of the party, with which we have long-standing friendly relations. At the request of the International Department of the CC of the KKE of 28.04.2022, we discussed the situation especially at the meeting of the Political Council and answered the questions asked. However, it turned out that no one was particularly waiting for our arguments, and on 29.04.2022, the above-mentioned article was published in the newspaper “Rizospastis”.

Since we have already verified the main arguments and submitted them to the comrades in the CC of the KKE, we are submitting them for publication on the Solidet website, trying to adhere to the structure of the article in Rizospastis for the better orientation of the Greek readers.

A Few Words on the Relationship between the RCWP and the KKE

The Political Council of the Central Committee of our Party carefully examined and discussed the letter of the International Department of the CC of the KKE of 28. 04. 2022 on serious differences in our positions on a number of issues, primarily on the assessment of the situation in connection with the hostilities in Ukraine and Donbas.

We also believe that the time has come to clarify our relations, which have a long history and have mostly been fruitful and comradely in nature.

We remember well and appreciate the fact that the KKE was one of the first foreign communist parties to establish bilateral relations with the RCWP. Our parties have always treated Marxism as a science in the same way, and our positions on the analysis of the causes of the defeat of socialism in the USSR have practically coincided. At the International Meeting in Leningrad in 1997 in honor of the 80th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution, we, together with 30 parties, signed the October-80 declaration. We can say that we worked together in theory. For example, at the request of our Greek comrades, we selected relevant literature on economic discussions in the USSR, and our specialists shared their knowledge. A group of scientists, political economists and philosophers (Assoc. Prof. Yabrova, Prof. Popov, Prof. Elmeev, Prof. Volovich) traveled to Greece to give lectures and participate in scientific discussions. We also recall with gratitude the organization of a group of our trade union activists to study in Greece. In 1998 our party immediately supported the initiative of the KKE to hold regular International Meetings of Communist and Workers’ Parties and participated in all meetings as a member of the Working Group of Solid Workers. Together, our parties laid the foundations for the publication of the journal International Communist Review (CIE) and the creation of the European Communist Initiative Movement (ECI).

The RCWP viewed these forms of interaction as concrete steps to create a communist pole in the international communist movement, which, in our opinion, has had a strong opportunist bias since Gorbachev’s time. As you know, our party contributed to overcoming this deviation, organized international conferences of orthodox parties: “100 Years of October” in Leningrad, “100 Years of the Comintern” and “140 Years of J. V. Stalin” in Moscow, “70 Years of Victory” in Donbass, in which the KPD participated.

Unfortunately, despite these long-standing comradely relations between our parties, we have indeed encountered serious differences in positions in recent years.

How did it come about? We, too, sincerely experience this fact and analyze the previous history. We think it should be said frankly that certain discrepancies appeared much earlier than the military operations of the Russian armed forces in Ukraine began. Previously, there were differences on the issue of the scientific understanding of fascism and the assessment of manifestations of fascism in the foreign policy of the United States (i.e. the initiation and support of terrorist forms of domination of capital in the “victim” country) and its NATO allies, today it is “fascism for export.” Significant differences were also evident in the assessment of the activities of the Comintern.

But even more significant, from our point of view, is the fact that gradually divergences have been accumulating in our parties’ vision of the method of forming a communist pole. We certainly recognize the merits of the KKE in initiating and creating the CIE and then the ECI, but we have to point out that these organizational forms have never been developed as effective forms of collective struggle against opportunism and revisionism. They limited themselves to exchanging the views of the parties among themselves, but they did not find a continuation in practical joint work – they did not ensure even the most elementary joint coordinated actions of the parties of the pole to the outside, for example, at such forums as general meetings of the solids. In order to ensure the appearance of unity and prevent a split in the system, the The KKE has always held back attempts to organize a common front against the opportunism of the Euro-Left and other right-wing parties, although it has expressed itself on questions of theory and current politics in the main correctly, from a revolutionary Marxist standpoint.

To this we must add that, from our point of view, the comrades leaders of the KKE from the time of their first meetings became somewhat arrogant, as they say in Russia, became bronzed, began to present their opinion as the ultimate truth or even in the form of lectures, and the CIE and the EKI began to be transformed into organs for the support of the KKE line. We think that this is the reason for the recent decision of the Presidium of the Hungarian Workers’ Party to terminate the party’s participation in the Secretariat of the European Communist Initiative, since the comrades can no longer assume responsibility for the various political documents adopted in the name of the Secretariat.

It is with a heavy heart that we have to have this conversation. As V.I. Lenin said: “… There are moments that oblige us to put the question point-blank and call things by their true name, under the threat of causing irreparable harm to both the Party and the revolution.”

Report of the CC of the RCWP and the Objections of the Comrades of the International Department of the CC of the KKE

The comrades of the KKE have indeed studied the report of the Central Committee of the RCWP and rightly point out that we assert that “capitalism brought the war to the land of the Soviet Union”. We assess the nature of the war as imperialist – that “the true source of the conflict in Ukraine is the inter-imperialist contradictions of the US, the EU and Russia, in which Ukraine is involved.” The RCWP also believes that Ukraine is a fascist state and that fascism in this country “is Ukrainian only in the place of manifestation, in language, in historical continuity and in personnel, and in terms of its origins it is quite American.”

After that, the comrades state that they do not agree with the RCWP’s understanding of Lenin’s theory of imperialism, they do not agree with the theory of “fascism in foreign policy”, they do not share the conclusion of the RCWP, which believes that what is happening in Ukraine has a positive side – helping the people of Donbass in the fight against American fascism in foreign policy, and therefore it supports it. The theoreticians of the KKE claim that it is the eclecticism of the position of the RCWP, which in the end leads it to support the imperialist war. They say that this is why the RCWP supported Russia’s imperialist invasion of Ukraine and did not sign the Joint Statement supported by 42 Communist and Workers’ Parties and 30 Communist Youth Organizations from all over the world, issued on the initiative of the KKE, the Communist Party of the Workers of Spain, The Communist Party of Mexico and the Communist Party of Turkey, in contrast to their youth organization, the Revolutionary Communist Youth League (Bolsheviks), which maintains bilateral relations with the KMG.

The comrades of the KKE regret that the RCWP is not among the 42 Communist and Workers’ Parties that have signed the Joint Statement against the imperialist war in Ukraine. We, too, regret and worry. At the same time, however, we are compelled to note that there was also a certain arrogance and disregard for the opinions of the comrades. The statement was initiated by the Communist Party of Greece, the Communist Party of the Workers of Spain, the Communist Party of Mexico and the Communist Party of Turkey. We respect these parties, but we consider it simply indecent that the authors did not consult with the communists of Donbass, Russia and Ukraine before submitting the draft for general review. In 2015, we held an international conference in Donbass on the fight against fascism in honour of the 70th anniversary of Victory in the Great Patriotic War. How could one act so tactlessly, knowing that the war against Donbass has been going on for 8 years and has already claimed 15,000 lives, mostly civilians? The comrades of the KKE and the other signatories rightly pointed out that the Russian bourgeoisie is not engaged in denazification for ideological reasons, that it does not intend to uproot the capitalist roots that give rise to fascism. But, we ask them, what should have been done – to wait and endure further? You know that we (the RCWP, the KRO LPR and the RFD) have always not only admitted, but also persistently demanded greater assistance to bourgeois Russia, but in the statement under consideration you did not even mention that the war on the part of the working people and communists of the Donbass has a just anti-fascist character. Or do you disagree with that?

Instead, you speak very ironically about the character of the so-called “People’s Republics” of Donbass, which has nothing to do with the character of the People’s Republics that emerged after World War II in Europe.

Yes, that’s right. We, and the Communists of the Donbass, know this, and in our agitation we speak in sufficient detail and directly about the loss of elements of nationality in the administration of the republics. But let me tell you that the nationality of these republics was born of and conditioned by the unwillingness of the people to submit to the dictates of the fascists, the unwillingness to repeat the fate of the burned House of Trade Unions in Odessa. At the referendums in May 2014, the people of Donbass said their “OHI” to the fascist punishers in Kiev. This is the basis for what you think is the wrong nationality of these republics.

The fact that it is impossible for the Donbass republics to survive in this struggle without the help of bourgeois Russia has been absolutely clear since 2014, especially since they are confronting the united forces of world imperialist capital. But this does not mean at all that the republics should refuse this assistance from the Russian Federation. The RCWP, we repeat, has always not only allowed, but always demanded more assistance from the authorities, including military assistance. For some reason, you didn’t mind before. Do you think today that the fight against American fascism should not have been helped in foreign policy? We believe that the fascists should be beaten with any weapon, always, with the use of all allies and fellow travelers.

A Mistaken Approach to the Consideration of the Modern World and Russia by the RCWP or the KKE?

The comrades of the KKE in Rizospastis write: “It is evident that, unlike the CPRF, the RCWP is trying to approach the events from a class standpoint, but it is slipping into serious theoretical and political errors, even into ‘borrowing’ bourgeois concepts from those forces which it calls opportunist. Such blunders lead to the justification of an unacceptable Russian military invasion, which, as it itself admits, is being carried out for imperialist purposes under the pretext of saving the people of Donbass.”

The claims are really serious. The discrepancy in assessments of the character of the imperialist war must be dealt with seriously, because it is a question of science and theory.

We have already expressed our opinion to you earlier, in the course of working on the articles for the CIE, that the Ideological Department and the leadership of the KKE, from our point of view, somewhat misinterpret Lenin’s theory of imperialism in relation to today’s reality. You present the matter in such a way that today the whole world is imperialist, all countries are dominated by monopolies, and only a kind of pyramid of imperialists of the highest category, of the second and third levels, etc., should be considered.

At the same time, you seem to forget Lenin’s conclusion that capitalism has now singled out a handful (less than one-tenth of the world’s population, less than one-fifth in the most “generous” and exaggerated calculations) of particularly rich and powerful states, which are plundering the whole world by simply “cutting coupons.” This objective situation has even found its reflection, albeit in a distorted form, in the bourgeois conception of the “golden billion”. named after the total number of those “prosperous people” who live in the “robber states”.

You are somehow modestly hushing up this point and considering this Leninist thesis to be obsolete. You write that on the basis of this distorted understanding of the modern world, the RCWP interprets Lenin’s statement about “a handful of countries“ at its own discretion, written when three-quarters of the planet were still colonies.

You justify this by the fact that it is possible to reduce the question of the struggle against imperialism to exclusively anti-Americanism, which is characteristic of many national bourgeois states and the corresponding political forces. This, of course, should not be done, we agree with you. But the core of Lenin’s theory of imperialism, along with its economic basis, the monopolisation of production, is the proposition that a handful of leading imperialist powers, which have carried out the division of the world and are fighting for its redivision, are plundering all the other bourgeois countries under imperialism. Today, the essence of imperialism has not changed. The importance of the “handful” and its influence in today’s world has definitely increased in comparison with Lenin’s time.

Now this handful is headed by the United States of America. The rest play the role of squatters. Do you disagree? Is Greece an imperialist country? Or even the much more powerful EU countries? By and large, none of these countries today can disobey the United States, cannot show independence, which is remarkably confirmed by the entire practice of imposing sanctions against the Russian Federation. And even clearly to their own detriment! Don’t you see it? From our point of view, it is a very big mistake not to see that today a handful of the most powerful predators, led by the United States and NATO, are forming “a solid basis for the imperialist oppression and exploitation of the majority of nations and countries of the world, the capitalist parasitism of a handful of the richest countries!” The political practice of the behavior of the EU countries and other leading imperialist powers in connection with the conflict in Ukraine has shown that there is almost no independent policy of the EU countries, there is the fact that these countries are dancing to the tune of the United States, even to the detriment of their economies for the sake of the hope of continuing to rob the rest of the world in the future. The U.S. is carrying out the most advantageous operation: it is crediting, ideologically and politically formalizing fascism that is hanging over the peoples of the world, hostile to them and destroying even bourgeois democracy. At the same time, it significantly weakens the EU countries, at least in the short term, and strengthens their presence in this market.

An analysis of events suggests that if Russia did not possess nuclear weapons, it is quite possible that it could have suffered the same fate as Yugoslavia, Iraq and Libya. But given the power of the defense potential of the Russian Federation, inherited from the USSR, the imperialists of the United States and the EU have chosen the tactics of reviving fascism in Ukraine and setting it against Donbass and the Russian Federation. Their pumping of weapons and the political aggravation of the situation on the line with Donbass, as many countries and parties admit, if not forced, then pushed the Russian authorities to start preventive military operations.

A flawed theory of “fascism for export”?

It must be said that some of our and foreign comrades are embarrassed by the very term “fascism for export.” It reminds some of the concept of “exporting revolutions,” which the Communists do not support. Someone primitively interprets it as a real export, i.e. the export of fascism. Moreover, after being translated from the great figurative Russian language, the essence may be difficult to grasp for foreign comrades. We do not hold on to the term, for us it was born as a journalistic image. More important is the very essence of the phenomenon – fascism in foreign policy. Special attention should be paid to the assertions of the Greek comrades that the RCWP in its analysis repeats the harmful theory of “fascism for export.” They even went so far as to say that “Fascism for Export” is a bourgeois theory that was first put forward by Russian bourgeois political forces during the 2006 Orange Revolution in Ukraine.

We are embarrassed to make this remark, but, first of all, it is blatantly untrue. The analysis of manifestations of fascism in foreign policy, which we often call “fascism for export” in journalism, was first carried out, including with our participation, by the Honored Worker of Culture of the RSFSR Boris Lavrentievich Fetisov and published in 2009 by the Russian socio-political newspaper Narodnaya Pravda. After that, it was discussed, agreed and adopted as a position at the plenum of the Central Committee of the RCWP. In 2012, the Greek comrades mention that there was a serious discussion in the pages of the ICE magazine. At the same time, they consider that the warning made by the KKE in 2014 that this theory will lead to a wrong course of collaboration with bourgeois political forces has been fully confirmed in practice.

We assert that practice has fully confirmed our analysis and foresight. And the divergence of our assessments is caused by the departure of the Greek comrades from the standpoint of the scientific approach and, as a result, the rejection of the Comintern definition of fascism. The comrades do not speak openly and directly about this, but write in a very intricate way: “However, it should not be forgotten that this definition, made by the Comintern, was formulated during a period of serious polemics on the part of a number of Comintern leaders, and it was precisely in practice that its inability to show the connection between fascism and capitalism and to take this into account in the strategy of the international communist movement was manifested.”

It’s strange and even painful to hear. Did Dimitrov’s definition fail? Let us remind you: “Fascism in power is an open terrorist dictatorship of the most reactionary, the most chauvinistic, the most imperialist elements of finance capital, a special form of class rule of the bourgeoisie. Fascism is not a supra-class power, nor is it the power of the petty bourgeoisie or the lumpenproletariat over finance capital. Fascism is the power of finance capital itself. It is the organization of terrorist reprisals against the working class and the revolutionary section of the peasantry and intelligentsia. Fascism in foreign policy is chauvinism in its crudest form, cultivating zoological hatred against other peoples.”

In our analysis, we are talking about fascism in foreign policy! Fascism consists in the rejection of democratic forms of bourgeois rule and the transition to open bourgeois imperialist terror. In the modern world, most of the most developed bourgeois states use various forms in their domestic politics with the appearance of bourgeois democracy, refraining from exercising dictatorship in an openly terrorist form. The international arena is a different matter. We assert that after the defeat of (we are sure) temporary socialism in the USSR and the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, there has been a negative change in the balance of forces determining the situation throughout the world. First, in the absence of examples of socialist countries, capital launched an all-out offensive against workers’ rights in domestic policy. Secondly, the imperialists are trying to solve their internal problems by means of external expansion. In foreign policy, world imperialism, and above all its shock troops represented by the imperialists of the United States and the NATO countries, began to act much more unbridled, aggressively, without looking back at the bourgeois-democratic norms of international law and so-called public opinion. This is exemplified by the massacres of Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and now Syria, threats against the DPRK and Iran, and the initiation and support of today’s bloody conflict in Ukraine. In the words of V. I. Lenin, “we have before us a completely naked imperialism, which does not even find it necessary to clothe itself in anything, believing that it is already magnificent.”

We regard the ongoing escalation of tensions in the Middle East and Ukraine as the spread of neo-fascism – “fascism for export.” “Fascism for export” is an undisguised terrorist imperialist policy of violence and bloody solution of the interests of world imperialism, the core of which is finance capital, which ignores all laws and norms of international law. This is a modern form of fascism. At the same time, chauvinism in its crudest form today manifests itself in the statements of US presidents about evil empires, about rogue states, about the special responsibility of the United States for the fate of the entire world, with the conclusion that they have been given the right to decide everything!

The denial of this fact, the reactionary domination of the United States, is detrimental to determining the position and tactics of the struggle of the Communist Parties. Hence your skeptical attitude to the manifestations of fascism in foreign policy – “fascism for export” – and even your rejection of the Comintern’s definition of fascism. And in the end, this led to a mechanical transfer of assessments from 1914-1917, the time of the First Imperialist War, to the current situation.

You write that the criticism of the RCWP is unfounded and unfounded, but we reflected all these points in the Report of the Central Committee to the March Plenum (26.03.2022) “On the attitude of the RCWP to the military actions of the government of the Russian Federation and the armed forces of Donbass in Ukraine”. You can read the report, and we are fully prepared to answer questions and criticisms. Only people who are not confident in themselves are afraid of criticism. The RCWP is confident in its position and ready to clarify relations.

You, dear comrades, write that “on the one hand, the RCWP pays lip service to the imperialist war, which is the result of inter-imperialist clashes, and on the other hand, by declaring the ‘protection of the people of Donbass’ and the alleged ‘denazification’ of Ukraine, it actually supports Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the imperialist war and the Russian bourgeoisie, which it regards as the guarantor of the struggle against fascism.”

But this only shows that you have not understood, in Lenin’s words, “the fundamental economic question, without the study of which nothing can be understood in the appraisal of modern war and modern politics (here and hereafter the editor’s emphasis), namely, the question of the economic essence of imperialism.”

Of course, the war for the Russian bourgeois class, which is much weaker and in the process of establishing imperialism, is also becoming imperialist, since bourgeois Russia is defending its interests, its desire to exploit the gas and oil pipelines itself, including the country’s human resources. But this does not mean that the working class of the Russian Federation is indifferent to the prolonged, persistent and aggressive attack on Russia by the forces of the United States, NATO and the EU, that we do not notice the use of open fascism as a weapon in Ukraine, that the prospect of repeating the fate of Yugoslavia, Iraq or Libya is more preferable for the working class of Russia than the oppression of the domestic bourgeoisie. Today, the military actions of the Russian Federation are no longer aimed at seizing resources and markets through the subjugation of Ukraine, but at protecting the interests of bourgeois Russia, Russian capital and even the integrity of the country. We do not support the authorities and do not call for all forces to rally around them, as the CPRF does, on the contrary, we call for using the situation to explain the true causes of the tragedies we are experiencing and to organize the struggle against capitalism, for socialism and the restoration of the USSR. But we are not simply calling for an end to the war, because that essentially means calling for an end to the war against fascism. With real fascism, which is fed and directed by the biggest imperialist predators, which calls itself the successor of the fascists of 1941-45, which today openly uses civilians as human shields. There is no way we can do that. We believe that it is possible and necessary to beat the fascists with any weapon with the involvement of all possible forces. At the same time, a conscious factor must be introduced into it, i.e., agitation for the development of the anti-fascist struggle into a struggle for socialism.

And the calls for the defeat of one’s own government in this war do not correspond to the essence of the moment, do not contribute to the approach of the revolution, since there is no corresponding situation, and today, in the words of Lenin, it is not yet possible for the revolutionary movements in all the belligerent countries to coordinate and cooperate with each other. The victory of the United States and NATO today will be the victory of the advancing fascism. The intensification of fascism of regimes is observed in all EU countries, especially in the Baltic states.

This point is very difficult to understand, because there is a great temptation to simply transfer the assessments of the First Imperialist War to the present day.

Criticism of the KKE

You write that the RCWP unfoundedly accuses the KKE of “mistakes” as well as of a lack of solidarity with the people of Donbass. This, of course, is not the case at all. Of course, we admit that you sympathize with the people of Donbass and condemn the fascist manifestations of the Kiev regime. Together with the communists of Donbass and Ukraine, we are grateful to the KKE for the consistent protests that have been carried out since 2014, including from the rostrum of the European Parliament.

But this is solidarity and support for the victims, the protection of the suffering and oppressed population, and we, as a party, first of all support the struggle of this people themselves against the fascists, and we ourselves participate in it to the best of our ability, helping the formation of communist forces in the republics.

We take this opportunity to express our gratitude to the deputies of the KKE who, for their political activities against the war, were included in the official “black list” of the reactionary regime in Kiev. But let me tell you that our comrades-in-arms in Donbass are directly involved in hostilities, suffering losses both in the wounded and in the lives of comrades. Our mutual friend, the head of the Workers’ Front of Donbass, Mykola Belostenny, who fought in 2014-15, went to enlist in the militia at the military registration and enlistment office, but his 69-year-old has not yet been hired. Today he works as an ambulance driver, sometimes transporting the wounded, including soldiers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, from Mariupol to the hospitals of the DPR under fire. And the guys who are younger are fighting. And the fact that the Russian bourgeoisie, not at all for ideological reasons, is compelled to help their struggle, does not negate its just character and absolute necessity.

Inner-Party Processes in the RCWP

The Greek comrades note: “Recent events threaten to be a crushing ideological and political blow to the RCWP, as evidenced by the so-called ‘Conference in Support of the Struggle Against Fascism in Ukraine’, held on March 20, 2022 at the headquarters of the Central Committee of the RCWP.”

As you know, certain tensions have arisen in our Party in connection with this question. There are even defections of unstable comrades from the Central Committee and from the ranks of the Party. And we have to note with regret that, voluntarily or unwittingly, the comrades of the KKE contribute to these processes, including by accepting the signature of a group of young people, allegedly from the organization of the Russian Youth Union (Bolsheviks), under the Statement of the 42 parties, although we told you that they are in fact provocateurs trying to seize the brand and website of the Komsomol. You did not react to this and even repeated this disinformation in the newspaper “Rizospastis” for the general reader, in fact misleading about the position of the RCSM(b). We think that such actions also do not contribute to the strengthening of comradely relations between our parties.

In addition, we note your attempts to interfere in our domestic political work with the voice of opponents of our party. So, you write to us: “… It is with great sadness that we observe your joint activities with Russian far-right, nationalist organizations, such as the Other Russia party (the National Bolsheviks).”

We have already given explanations on these issues on the party’s website and in the TR newspaper, which you may have read. The Other Russia is by no means a socialist organization, but it is by no means a far-right party. It is not really a party, because it does not have clearly defined class positions, but it does not support private capitalism, and one of the populist slogans is “Capitalism is shit!” These are mainly young people, they are not so much nationalists as patriots of the Soviet past and the greatness of the USSR, in which all peoples occupied a worthy place. In their luggage the hoisting of the red flag over Riga (November 17, 2000), for which the comrades received real prison sentences. Their representatives are fighting in Donbass not for the Russian world, but against the fascists. We are trying to introduce elements of class consciousness into this youth subculture, including through the example of Lenin’s understanding of the national pride of the Great Russians. We don’t always succeed, but quite often we succeed. We have been cooperating for many years and will continue to do so.

Поэтому мы бы пожелали вам прежде, чем делать выводы, посоветоваться с нами. В любом случае мы не собираемся молча терпеть извращения нашей позиции и даже самих исторических фактов.

The fact that the Donbass militia often includes not the most advanced, but various Orthodox, Cossack, national-patriotic, and even anti-communist elements, does not at all change the nature of the anti-fascist struggle. It is impossible to win with the avant-garde alone, as Lenin taught. It is necessary to attract and use any forces, it is necessary to beat the fascists with any weapon. And it is no coincidence that the core of the resistance to the Nazis was made up of miners and tractor drivers, as even President Putin was forced to admit. And you shout the guard when “in the name of the struggle against fascism the road is opened to co-operation with the opportunist forces, with the Social-Democrats, with sections of the bourgeoisie.” Damn it! We will learn from the USSR and Stalin.

The RCWP allegedly embarked on a dangerous political path

In conclusion, we are compelled to categorically contradict you with regard to the statement of the International Department: “With this letter we call on you to reconsider your position, which not only does not conform to the founding declarations of the ICO and the ECI, but also cuts you off from the line of the successive forces of the international communist movement.” Allow me to know who gave you the right to single-handedly determine the boundaries of the successive or inconsistent forces of the communist movement? Both the CIE and the ECI, as we know, have a procedure for collective consideration of issues and decision-making. In our opinion, here again you have the same element of communist arrogance to which we have already referred, and which has ruined many parties with a glorious revolutionary past.

In conclusion, we openly say that, of course, we agree with your statement: the RCWP has embarked on a dangerous political path. Only we did this in the depths of the CPSU, fighting its degeneration and Gorbachevism, we did it in 1991, when, in response to Yeltsin’s ban on the activities of the CPSU, we replied that in 1941 there were even tougher banners and established the RCWP. In 1993, when they participated in the defense of the House of Soviets, shot by Yeltsin from tanks. We have quite consciously embarked on the path of struggle, and we are well aware of the danger of deviating from the principles of Marxism-Leninism. We learn from the Bolsheviks and Lenin: “It is possible to defeat a more powerful enemy only with the greatest exertion of forces and with the obligatory, most thorough, careful, cautious and skilful use of every ‘crack’ between enemies, even the slightest, of any antagonism of interests between the bourgeoisie of different countries, between different groups or types of bourgeoisie within individual countries, as well as of any possibility of gaining a mass ally, even the slightest. Even if it is temporary, shaky, unstable, unreliable, conditional. Whoever has not understood this has not understood a grain of Marxism and of scientific, modern socialism in general.”

Only people who are not confident in themselves can be afraid of temporary alliances, even with unreliable people. We are self-confident, therefore, respecting you, we reserve the right to defend our Marxist-Leninist approach to political practice.

Let us not falter on the chosen path!

With friendly greetings and wishes to think about the issues raised.

19.05.2022Leningrad

The article was sent and published on the Solid website