The question of guerrilla warfare is of great interest to our Party and to the working masses. We have already touched upon this issue in passing on numerous occasions, and we now intend to proceed with the more comprehensive exposition of our views that we promised[1].

I

Let us begin at the beginning. What fundamental requirements must every Marxist meet when considering the question of forms of struggle? First, Marxism distinguishes itself from all primitive forms of socialism in that it does not confine movement to any single, fixed form of struggle. Rather, it recognizes a wide variety of forms of struggle—not by “inventing” them, but by generalizing, organizing, and imbuing with consciousness those forms of struggle that emerge spontaneously within the course of revolutionary class movements. Firmly opposed to all abstract formulas and doctrinaire recipes, Marxism calls for a keen, attentive engagement with the mass struggles that are unfolding—struggles which, as the movement develops, as the consciousness of the masses grows, and as economic and political crises intensify, give rise to ever new and increasingly diverse methods of defense and attack. For this reason, Marxism absolutely refuses to rule out any form of struggle. Under no circumstances does Marxism limit itself to the forms of struggle that are currently possible or actually existing; instead, it acknowledges the inevitability of new forms of struggle—forms unknown to the activists of a given historical period—as social conditions shift and evolve. In this respect, Marxism learns, so to speak, from mass practice itself, far removed from the pretensions of “systematizers” who seek to teach the masses artificially contrived, armchair “systems” of struggle. As Kautsky once observed, while examining the forms of social revolution, “we know that the coming crisis will bring forth new forms of struggle that we cannot yet foresee.”

Second, Marxism demands that the question of forms of struggle be approached from a thoroughly historical perspective. To raise this question outside of a historically specific context means failing to grasp the very ABCs of dialectical materialism. At different moments in economic evolution—and depending on varying political, national‑cultural, everyday, and other conditions—different forms of struggle come to the fore, becoming the dominant forms of struggle; and in turn, secondary and peripheral forms of struggle undergo transformation in response. To attempt to answer yes or no to the question of a particular means of struggle without carefully examining the concrete circumstances of a given movement at a particular stage of its development means completely abandoning the ground of Marxism.

These are the two fundamental theoretical principles by which we must be guided. The history of Marxism in Western Europe offers us countless examples that confirm what has been said. European social democracy today regards parliamentarism and the trade union movement as the principal forms of struggle; it recognized the insurrection in the past and remains fully prepared to recognize it again in the future—should the prevailing conditions change—contrary to the views of liberal bourgeois such as the Russian Kadets{1} and the “nameless ones”{2}. Social democracy rejected the general strike in the 1870s as a social panacea, as a means to overthrow the bourgeoisie by non‑political means in one fell swoop—but social democracy now fully recognizes the mass political strike (especially after the experience of Russia in 1905) as one of the indispensable tools of struggle under certain conditions. Social democracy had acknowledged street barricade fighting in the 1840s, only to reject it on the basis of certain data in the late nineteenth century—yet it expressed complete readiness to reconsider this latter view and to recognize the appropriateness of barricade fighting after the experience of Moscow, which, according to K. Kautsky, had pioneered a new barricade tactic.

II

Having established the general tenets of Marxism, let us turn to the Russian Revolution. Let us recall the historical development of the forms of struggle it brought forth. First came the economic strikes of the workers (1896–1900), then the political demonstrations of workers and students (1901–1902), the peasant uprisings (1902), the onset of mass political strikes combined with demonstrations in various configurations (Rostov in 1902, the summer strikes of 1903, January 9, 1905), the all‑Russian political strike accompanied by localized instances of barricade fighting (October 1905), the mass barricade struggle and armed uprising (December 1905), the parliamentary, peaceful struggle (April–June 1906), the military, partial uprisings (June 1905–July 1906), and the peasant, partial uprisings (autumn 1905–autumn 1906).

Such was the state of affairs by the autumn of 1906, viewed from the standpoint of forms of struggle in general. The autocracy’s “response” to these struggles was the Black Hundreds pogroms—beginning in Chișinău in the spring of 1903 and culminating in Sedlec in the autumn of 1906{3}. Throughout this entire period, the organization of Black Hundreds pogroms and the brutal assaults on Jews, students, revolutionaries, and conscious workers grew ever more sophisticated, ever more refined—combining the violence of the Black Hundreds’ armed forces with the violence of a mob bought off through bribery, eventually extending to the use of artillery in villages and towns, merging with punitive expeditions, punitive trains, and the like.

This is the basic backdrop against which the picture unfolds. Against this backdrop emerges—undoubtedly as something particular, secondary, and peripheral—the phenomenon that this article seeks to examine and evaluate. What, exactly, is this phenomenon? What are its forms? What are its causes? When did it first arise, and how widespread has it become? What is its significance within the overall course of the revolution? And what is its relationship to the struggle waged by the working class under the guidance and leadership of social democracy? These are the questions to which we must now turn, moving beyond our initial sketch of the broader context.

The phenomenon that interests us is armed struggle. It is waged by individuals and small groups of individuals—some affiliated with revolutionary organizations, while in certain regions of Russia (and in most cases, the majority) they belong to no revolutionary organization whatsoever. Armed struggle pursues two distinct objectives, which must be rigorously distinguished from one another: first, it aims at the assassination of individual targets—officers and rank-and-file members of the military and police apparatus; second, it seeks the confiscation of funds, both from the government and from private individuals. The confiscated funds are allocated in part to the party itself, in part specifically for arming and preparing for insurrection, and in part for sustaining those who engage in the kind of struggle we are describing. Major expropriations—such as the one in the Caucasus, amounting to more than 200,000 rubles, or the Moscow operation, which yielded 875,000 rubles{4}—were directed primarily to revolutionary parties; smaller-scale expropriations, on the other hand, were used above all—and sometimes entirely—to support the “expropriators” themselves. This form of struggle undoubtedly reached its broadest development and greatest prevalence only in 1906, following the December Uprising. The intensification of the political crisis to the point of armed conflict, and especially the worsening conditions of need, famine, and unemployment in both rural areas and urban centers, played a crucial role among the factors that gave rise to this particular form of struggle. As the predominant—and indeed, in many cases, the exclusive—form of social struggle, it was embraced by the lumpenproletariat, by vagrants and outcasts, and by anarchist groups. In response to this struggle, the autocratic regime adopted measures such as martial law, the mobilization of fresh troops, the anti-Semitic pogroms in Sedlec, and the establishment of military field courts.

III

The conventional assessment of this struggle typically boils down to the following: it is anarchism, Blanquism{5}, old-style terrorism—acts carried out by isolated individuals cut off from the masses, acts that demoralize workers, alienate broad swaths of the population, disrupt the movement, and ultimately harm the revolution. Examples supporting this assessment can easily be found in the daily news reports published in the newspapers.

But are these examples truly conclusive? To test this, let us turn to the region where this form of struggle was most fully developed—the Latvian region. Consider the complaint lodged by the newspaper Novoe Vremya{6} (dated September 9 and 12) regarding the activities of the Latvian Social-Democratic Party. The Latvian Social-Democratic Workers’ Party—part of the RSDLP—correctly publishes its newspaper in an impressive circulation of 30,000 copies{7}. In the official section, lists of spies are printed, and the elimination of such individuals is the duty of every honest person. Those who aid the police are declared “enemies of the revolution” and are subject to execution, while also forfeiting their property. The Social-Democrats instruct the local population to remit funds to the party only upon presentation of a receipt bearing the party’s official seal. In the party’s latest annual report, among the total income of 48,000 rubles for the year, 5,600 rubles are listed as having been received from the Libau branch—funds obtained through expropriation for the purchase of weapons. Novoe Vremya, naturally, rails against this “revolutionary legislation,” against this “menacing government.”

No one would dare label the activities of the Latvian Social-Democrats as anarchism, Blanquism, or terrorism. But why not? Because here the connection between this new form of struggle and the uprising that took place in December—and that is once again brewing—is strikingly clear. While this link may not be so readily apparent when viewed across the entirety of Russia, it nonetheless exists. The spread of “partisan” warfare precisely after December, and its intimate connection with the intensification not only of economic but also of political crises, are beyond dispute. In the past, Russian terrorism was the work of intellectual conspirators; today, partisan warfare is generally waged by militant workers—or simply by unemployed laborers. Blanquism and anarchism may come easily to mind for those inclined toward rigid categories, but in the context of an uprising as clearly defined as that in the Latvian region, the utter inadequacy of these prepackaged labels becomes glaringly obvious.

The case of the Latvians vividly illustrates the fundamental error, the lack of scientific rigor, the ahistorical nature of our customary analyses of guerrilla warfare divorced from the broader context of insurrection. We must take this context into account; we must reflect on the distinctive features of the interstitial period between major uprisings; we must understand the forms of struggle that inevitably emerge during such times—rather than settling for a stock collection of terms that are equally applicable to both Kadets and Novoe Vremya: anarchism, banditry, vagrancy!

It is often said that partisan actions disrupt our work. Let us apply this reasoning to the post-December 1905 era, to the age of Black-Hundred pogroms and martial law. In such a period, what disrupts the movement more profoundly: the absence of resistance, or organized partisan warfare? Compare central Russia with its western periphery—Poland and the Latvian region. There is no doubt that partisan warfare is far more widespread and more highly developed in the western frontier. And just as surely, the revolutionary movement as a whole—and the Social-Democratic movement in particular—are far more deeply disrupted in central Russia than in its western periphery. Of course, it never occurs to us to conclude from this that the Polish and Latvian Social-Democratic movements are less disrupted because of their partisan warfare. On the contrary: what follows from this is simply that partisan warfare bears no responsibility for the disruption of the Social-Democratic workers’ movement in Russia in 1906.

Here, one often invokes the peculiarities of national conditions. Yet this very recourse to “national conditions” starkly reveals the weakness inherent in prevailing lines of argumentation. If the issue lies in national conditions, then the problem does not reside in anarchism, Blanquism, or terrorism—sins that are common across Russia and even uniquely Russian—but in something else entirely. Let us examine this “something else” in concrete terms, gentlemen! You will then see that national oppression or antagonism explains nothing, for such phenomena have always existed on the western peripheries; it is only in the present historical epoch that partisan warfare has emerged as a distinct form of struggle. There are many places where national oppression and antagonism are rife, yet partisan warfare remains absent—indeed, it sometimes flourishes even in the absence of any overt national oppression. A close, case‑by‑case analysis will demonstrate that the root of the matter does not lie in national oppression, but rather in the specific conditions that give rise to rebellion. Partisan warfare is an inevitable form of struggle at a time when mass movements have, in practice, reached the threshold of insurrection—and when more or less extended intervals elapse between the “great battles” of civil war.

It is not partisan actions themselves that disorganize the movement, but the Party’s own weakness in failing to harness these very actions effectively. This is why, among us Russians, the customary anathemas hurled at partisan activities are often accompanied by clandestine, haphazard, unorganized partisan actions that truly do undermine the Party’s cohesion. Unable to grasp the historical conditions that give rise to this struggle, we are likewise powerless to neutralize its harmful aspects. And yet the struggle continues unabated—driven by powerful economic and political forces. We cannot eliminate these underlying causes, nor can we eradicate the struggle itself. Our complaints about partisan warfare are, in essence, complaints about our own Party’s shortcomings in preparing for insurrection.

What we have said about disorganization also applies to demoralization. It is not partisan warfare that demoralizes; rather, it is the lack of organization, the chaos, the nonpartisan character of partisan operations that lead to demoralization. Neither condemnation nor denunciation of partisan actions can in the slightest degree shield us from this most undeniable form of demoralization—because such condemnations and denunciations are utterly powerless to halt a phenomenon rooted in deep-seated economic and political causes. One might object: if we are powerless to stop a phenomenon that is both abnormal and demoralizing, then surely that is no justification for the Party to resort to abnormal and demoralizing means of struggle. But such an objection would be purely liberal-bourgeois in outlook—not Marxist—since a Marxist cannot regard civil war, or partisan warfare as one of its forms, as inherently abnormal or demoralizing. The Marxist stands firmly on the ground of class struggle, not on the terrain of social peace. In certain periods of acute economic and political crises, class struggle inevitably develops into outright civil war—into armed conflict between two distinct sections of the people. In such times, the Marxist must adopt the standpoint of civil war. From a Marxist perspective, any moral condemnation of civil war is wholly unacceptable.

In the era of civil war, the ideal of the proletarian Party is a fighting Party. This is absolutely beyond dispute. We fully acknowledge that, from the standpoint of civil war, one may—and indeed must—demonstrate the impracticality of certain forms of civil war at particular moments. We readily accept criticism of various forms of civil war from the standpoint of military expediency, and we unreservedly agree that the final word on such matters rests with the practical activists of the Social-Democratic movement in each individual locality. Yet, in the name of Marxist principles, we insist that we must not dismiss the analysis of civil-war conditions with trite, stereotyped phrases about anarchism, Blanquism, or terrorism; nor should we allow the senseless tactics employed by some such or other Bolshevik organization{8} at a given moment to be trotted out as a bogeyman whenever the question arises of whether Social-Democrats should participate in partisan warfare at all.

We must approach references to the “disorganization” caused by partisan warfare with a critical eye. Every new form of struggle, fraught with fresh dangers and new sacrifices, inevitably “disorganizes” organizations that are unprepared for this novel mode of combat. Our old propaganda circles were disorganized by the shift to agitation; our committees were later disrupted by the move to demonstrations. Any military action, in whatever war, introduces a certain degree of disorganization into the ranks of the combatants. From this fact alone, we cannot conclude that we ought not to fight; rather, we must conclude that we must learn how to fight—nothing more, nothing less.

When I see Social-Democrats proudly and self-satisfiedly declaring: “We are not anarchists, we are not thieves, we are not bandits—we are above such things; we reject partisan warfare,” I cannot help but ask myself: Do these people really understand what they are saying? Across the country, armed clashes and skirmishes are erupting between the Black-Hundred government and the populace—a phenomenon that is utterly inevitable at this stage of the revolution’s development. The population reacts to this situation spontaneously, without organization—and precisely because of this, its responses often take unfortunate, misguided forms, manifesting themselves in armed clashes and attacks. I understand that, due to the weakness and lack of preparedness within our own organization, we may choose, in a given locality and at a given moment, to relinquish Party leadership over this spontaneous struggle. I recognize that local activists must decide these matters for themselves, and that transforming weak, unprepared organizations is no easy task. But when I encounter a Social-Democratic theorist or publicist who displays not sorrow at this lack of preparation, but rather proud self-satisfaction—and who, with narcissistic delight, endlessly repeats the phrases about anarchism, Blanquism, and terrorism that he memorized in his youth—I feel a profound sense of indignation at the degradation of the world’s most revolutionary doctrine.

It is said: The partisan war brings the conscious proletariat ever closer to the down-and-out drunkards and vagrants. This is true. But from this it follows only that the party of the proletariat can never regard the partisan war as the sole or even the primary means of struggle; that this means must be subordinated to other, more fundamental forms of struggle, and must be tempered by the enlightening and organizing influence of socialism. Without this latter condition, every single means of struggle in bourgeois society—indeed, absolutely every single means—only serves to draw the proletariat closer to various non-proletarian strata, whether above or below it; and left to the blind forces of history, such means become worn out, distorted, and debased. Strikes, left to the whims of fate, are perverted into “Alliances”—agreements between workers and employers against consumers. Parliament is transformed into a brothel, where a gang of bourgeois politicians peddle wholesale and retail “popular freedom,” “liberalism,” “democracy,” republicanism, anticlericalism, socialism, and every other commodity in vogue. The newspaper becomes a public procurer, an instrument of mass corruption, a crude flattery of the base instincts of the crowd, and so on, and so forth. Social democracy knows no universal means of struggle—no means capable of erecting a Great Wall of China between the proletariat and those strata that stand either slightly above or slightly below it. In different historical epochs, social democracy employs different means, always subjecting their application to strictly defined ideological and organizational conditions[2].

IV

The forms of struggle in the Russian Revolution display an astonishing diversity when compared with the bourgeois revolutions of Europe. Kautsky had, in part, anticipated this when, in 1902, he observed that the coming revolution—though he added that this might not apply to Russia—would be less a struggle between the people and the government than a conflict between two distinct segments of the populace. In Russia, we undoubtedly witness a far more extensive development of this second kind of struggle than in the bourgeois revolutions of the West. Though the enemies of our revolution within the ranks of the people remain few in number, they grow ever more organized as the struggle intensifies, gaining support from the reactionary factions of the bourgeoisie. It is therefore entirely natural—and indeed inevitable—that in such an era, an era marked by nationwide political strikes, an uprising cannot take the form of old‑style, isolated acts confined to a very brief span of time and a narrowly circumscribed area. It is equally natural and inevitable that the uprising assumes higher, more complex forms: a protracted civil war that sweeps across the entire country—namely, armed conflict between two distinct segments of the people. Such a war can only be conceived as a series of large-scale battles, separated by relatively long intervals of time, interspersed with numerous small skirmishes during these interludes. Once this is the case—and there is no doubt that it is—the task of social democracy must be to establish organizations that are best equipped to lead the masses, both in these major engagements and, whenever possible, in those minor clashes as well. In an age when class struggle has intensified to the point of civil war, social democracy must set itself the goal not merely of participating in this civil war, but of assuming a leading role in it. Social democracy must train and prepare its organizations so that they truly emerge as a warring faction, seizing every opportunity to inflict damage upon the enemy’s forces.

This is a difficult task—there is no denying it. It cannot be resolved overnight. Just as the entire people are reeducated and learn through struggle during the course of a civil war, so too must our organizations be nurtured and, drawing on the lessons of experience, be restructured in order to meet this challenge.

We lay no claim whatsoever to imposing any preconceived form of struggle upon practitioners, nor do we presume to decide from behind a desk what role particular forms of partisan warfare should play in the overall course of the civil war in Russia. We are far from regarding the concrete evaluation of specific partisan actions as a matter of ideological direction within social democracy. Rather, our task is to do everything in our power to foster a sound theoretical understanding of the new forms of struggle that life itself is bringing forth—to combat relentlessly the rigid formulas and prejudiced notions that prevent conscious workers from properly framing this new and arduous question, and from approaching its resolution with the requisite clarity and insight.

“Proletary,” No. 5, September 30, 1906

Printed according to the text of the newspaper “Proletary.”