DEPARTED POWER

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVIII, Issue 22, 7 January 1928, Page 5

DEPARTED POWER

EX-SOVIET RULERS jj FALLEN TO LOW ESTAT'L, NOW HUMBLE FACTOBfU WORKERS. I [By Cable — Press Assn. — Corey right.] (Received 7, 8.50 a.iff/) London, Jan, 6. An unconfirmed report is published in Pari s that Trotsky, Zinovieff, and other members of the opposition are now humble workers in a Moscow leather factory,—(A. and N.Z.) PLAIN SPEAKING. BROUGHT THEIR DOWNFALL. TROTSKY’S CRITICISM OF COMMUNISTS. There was genuine tlluff of drama in the joint session of 'die Communist Party central and eontaol committees which expelled Leon Trotsky and Gregory Zinovieff from membership in the General Committee. Trotsky, in October, 1917, as President of the P etrograd Soviet and a leading membei- of the military revolutionary committee, the body which prepared and directed the Bolshevist coup, was on.a of the foremost figures in the great revolution that brought the Rusutian Communist Party into power. And in October, 1927, the party wlemnly banished Trotsky from its councils. It was an indisputably dramatic occasion; and Trotsky,, who has always been a supirb actor on the revolutionary stage, took advantage of what may well be his last opportunity to hurl into the teeth of Stalin, Bukharin Rykoff and the Other party leaderts a speech so resonant with defiance that it was generally accepted as a declaration of withdrawal not only from the Central Committee but -'Slso from the party itself. A growing din of interruptions from the majoirity of his audience reached its height when Trotsky invoked a letter which Lenin had left with instructioms that it be read to the first party congress which should meet after his passing. PROTESTS “(ZIGZAG” POLICY. In this letter Lenin characterised Stalin as “too rough,” and recommended that he be removed from his post as general secretary of the party. With this letter a? his text, Trotsky shouted critical comments op the Stalinites. (This elicited a storm of protesting cries: “Old slander," 1 “Shame,” “L»e,’> “Menshevik,” “Petty bourgeois.” As soon as Trotsky was aide to continue, he opened up a new line of attack. “The leading firaction thinks that everything can be done with force. That is a basic mistake. Force can play a great revolutionary rolo, but on one condition: that it be subordinated to g correct clac B policy. Persecuting, depriving of work, arresting, the ruling fraction operates against its own party.’’’ Trotsky ended on the note of bitter denunciation of the present party policy, which, he asserted, ivas tending steadily toward conservatism, although with occasional “zigzags,” gestures of radicalism, designed to keep up revolutionary appearances. The last words were literally drowned in the chorus of abusive interruptions Trotsky’s swan-song was ended.

STALIN TAKES SPEECH COOLLY. After an interval, Stalin answered with characteristic strength and coolness the attacks which had been launched against him. In regard to Lenin’s letter, he declared that he had twice offered his resignation as general secretary of the pnrtv, but since it, had been refused. h P had no option except to remain at his post. Discussing Trotsky’s personal position. Stalin remarked that if the narty could dispense with such a great authority as George Plekhanoff /the founder of Marxian socialism in Russia) it could'also go victoriously forward without Trotsky and Zinovieff So Trotsky to-day is outside the ranks of the Communist Party. It is a ci”7ms fate, and yet one that somehow corresponds with Trotsky’s brilliant, fiery, mercurial, unstable temperament, his ardent, forceful character. An intense individualist, after his inspiring leadership of the Red Army he came into hopeless conflict with the powerful, disciplined machine of the Communist Party organisation. From silent dissent he passed to open revolt; and now his way seems to have parted definitely from that of the ruling Communist Party. TROTSKY PRINTS HIS DEFIANCE Despite th® dark and uncertain future which awaits him (for there is no 100 m for independent political activity outside the Communist ranks in Russia) Trotsky is probably happier now than at any time for the last three or four years. One senses an exultant note as he deliberately breaks all his formerly self-imposed bonds of party discipline, defiantly nrints and circulates his illegal literature, turns against the leaders of the party organisation the same torrent of vehement rhetorical invective that he formerly brought into play against the Tsar and the old regime. Trotsky is and remains a perennial rebel.