fascists attacking treacherously, hut ideological opponents, honest Social Democratic workers included—is an enormous crime and madness that must inevitably turn upon the revolutionary party itself. In the bitter struggle that the Bolsheviks conducted against the Narodniks and the Mensheviks during the fifteen years that preceded the October revolution, there was never a question of employing methods of physical violence. As for individual terror, we Marxists rejected it even with regard to the tsarist satraps. Nevertheless, in recent times the Communist parties, or rather their apparatus people, have resorted more and more frequently to the disruption of meetings and to other methods for the mechanical suppression of adversaries, notably the Left Opposition. Many bureaucrats are sincerely convinced that this is what real Bolshevism consists of. They avenge themselves on other proletarian groups for their impotence against the capitalist state, and thereby transform the bourgeois police into an arbiter between us.

It is difficult to imagine the depravity engendered by this combination of impotence and violence. The youth become more and more accustomed to thinking that the fist is a surer weapon than argument. In other words, political cynicism is cultivated, which more than anything else prepares individuals for passing over into the fascist camp. An implacable struggle must be waged against the brutal and disloyal methods of Stalinism, by denouncing them in the press and in meetings, by cultivating among the workers a hatred and contempt for all these pseudorevolutionists who, instead of appealing to the brain, take a crack at the skull.

Concerning the Ch'en Tu-hsiu group, I am pretty well acquainted with the policy it followed in the years of the revolution: it was the Stalin-Bukharin-Martynov policy, that is, a policy in essence of right-wing Menshevism. Comrade N. wrote me, however, that Ch'en Tu-hsiu, basing himself on the experience of the revolution, has come considerably closer to our position. It goes without saying that this can only be welcomed. In your letter, however, you categorically dispute Comrade N.'s information. You even contend that Ch'en Tu-hsiu has not broken from Stalin's policy, which presents a mixture of opportunism and adventurism. But up to now I have read only one declaration of program by Chten Tu-hsiu and therefore am in no position to express myself on this question.

In other respects, I conceive a solidarity in principle on the Chinese question only on the basis of clear replies to the following questions:

As far as the first period of the revolution is concerned:

1. Did the anti-imperialist character of the Chinese revolution give the "national" Chinese bourgeoisie the leading role in the revolution (Stalin-Bukharin)?

2. Was the slogan of the "bloc of four classes"—the big bourgeoisie, the petty bourgeoisie, the peasantry, and the proletariat (Stalin-Bukharin)—correct, even for an instant?

3. Were the entry of the Chinese Communist Party into the Kuomintang and the admission of the latter into the Comintern (resolution of the Politburo of the Soviet Communist Party) permissible?

4. Was it permissible, in the interests of the Northern Expedition, to curb the agrarian revolution (telegraphic directives in the name of the Politburo of the Soviet Communist Party)?

5. Was it permissible to renounce the slogan of soviets at the time the broad movement of workers and peasants developed, that is, in 1925-27 (Stalin-Bukharin)?

6. Was the Stalinist slogan of a "workers' and peasants'" party, that is, the old slogan of the Russian Narodniks, acceptable for China, even for an instant?

As far as the second period is concerned:

7. Was the resolution of the Communist International which said that the crushing of the workers' and peasants' movement by the Kuomintang of the right and the left signified a "transition of the revolution to a higher stage" (Stalin-Bukharin) correct?

8. Under these conditions, was the slogan of insurrection, issued by the Communist International, correct?

9. Was the tactic of guerrilla warfare, reinstituted by Ho Lung and Yeh T'ing and approved by the Comintern at the moment of the political ebb tide of the workers and peasants, correct?

10. Was the organization of the Canton uprising by the agents of the Comintern correct?

As far as the past in general is concerned:

11. Was the 1924-27 struggle in the Communist International against the Opposition on the Chinese question a struggle of Leninism against Trotskyism or, on the contrary, a struggle of hIenshevism against Bolshevism?

12. Was the 1927-28 struggle in the Communist International against the Opposition a struggle of Bolshevism against "liquidationism" or, on the contrary, a struggle of adventurism against Bolshevism?

As far as the future is concerned:

13. Under the present conditions of victorious counterrevolution, is the mobilization of the Chinese masses under democratic slogans, particularly that of the constituent assembly, necessary as the Opposition believes, or is there any ground for limitation to the abstract propaganda of the slogan of soviets, as the Comintern has decided?

14. Has the slogan of the "workers' and peasants' democratic dictatorship" still a revolutionary content, as the Comintern thinks, or is it necessary, on the contrary, to sweep away this masked formula of the Kuomintang and to explain that the victory of the alliance of the workers and peasants in China can lead only to the dictatorship of the proletariat?

15. Is the theory of socialism in one country applicable to China or, on the contrary, can the Chinese revolution triumph and accomplish its task to the very end only as a link in the chain of the world revolution?

These are, in my opinion, the principal questions that the platform of the Chinese Opposition must necessarily answer. These questions have great importance for the whole International. The epoch of reaction that China is now passing through must become, as has always happened in history, an epoch of theoretical preoccupation. What characterizes the young Chinese revolutionists at the present time is the passion to understand, to study, to embrace the question in its entirety. The bureaucracY lacking an ideological basis, stifles Marxist thinking. But I do not doubt that in the struggle with the bureaucracy the Chinese vanguard of the proletariat will produce from its ranks a nucleus of notable Marxists who will render service to the whole International.

With Opposition greetings,

L.D. Trotsky

From Writings of Leon Trotsky (1929). Text from the Militant (NewYork) February 1, 1930.