Date: 1916-03-08
Source: ru:PSS/v49

Source: PSS, Volume 49

Dear Comrade! Please accept my apologies for responding to your letter so late.

I have been delivering lectures in various cities across Switzerland.

I am deeply grateful for your kind reply. I would be most pleased if our collaboration could proceed without any friction.

To be frank: there was never the slightest doubt that you and Comrade Pannekoek were “decent people,” as you put it. What truly concerned us was the sudden shift in the editorial arrangements. Under the original draft, we had been granted editorial authority—meaning the editorial board consisted of your group (you plus Trotsky) and the Zimmerwald Left; and within the bureau of that Left, as you well knew, we held two out of three votes: Radek, Zinoviev, and mine.

With the revision of the draft, we lost our editorial rights and were reduced to mere contributors.

Of course, we could not dispute your right to formulate the statutes. But still, isn’t it only natural—don’t you agree?—that as contributors, we should at least have some legal safeguards?

I hope that matters are now clear and that the issue has been settled once and for all.

As soon as I received your letter, I instructed the dispatchers to send you our organ (“Social Democrat” is not a periodical; since the outbreak of war, issues 33–51 have been published). Are you receiving it?

I take this opportunity to discuss several important questions pertaining to our collaboration.

(1) Our theses on the right to self-determination* were sent to you by Radek (please also forward them to Gorter—I am writing him in detail about this in connection with his pamphlet). I regard the Dutch–Polish position

* See “The Socialist Revolution and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination” (Collected Works, 5th ed., Volume 27, pp. 252–266). Ed.

as fundamentally flawed in theory—and practically disastrous in terms of policy pursued by small states. Can our shared struggle against both old and new annexations (what, exactly, is an annexation?) not bring us closer together? After all, the perspectives of the Germans, the British, and the Russians are far more significant—and objectively more correct—than the Dutch or Polish stance! Gorter calls for “national independence” for the Dutch East Indies. Very well—but isn’t that precisely the right to self-determination?! If Kautsky and the Russian Kautskians (including Trotsky) pose the question incorrectly, then that only serves as further evidence against the Kautskians! (If you are interested in this issue, please ask Gorter to send you my letter. I would be delighted to discuss this matter in greater depth with Dutch Marxists.)

(2) The German group “Die Internationale.” Have you read their theses in the third issue of Grimm’s bulletin? 241
In my view, this represents a decisive step to the right after the first issue of the journal “Die Internationale.” Not a single word is directed against the Kautskian “center”—and that is the crucial point for the German party. Not a single word is spoken about the split (Otto Rühle is absolutely right—and it is imperative to remain silent about it following his article!!). Not a single word is said about explicit means of struggle—about illegal organization, and so forth.

And then there is the claim: “In the era of imperialism, there can no longer be national wars!” This is theoretically incorrect. Colonial wars are, in essence, national wars. (India versus England, and so on.) In practice, this amounts to nothing less than chauvinism: we, the representatives of the great powers, forbid oppressed peoples from waging national wars!!

My conclusion is this: “Die Internationale” seeks to enter into an agreement with the Kautskians. Otherwise, these theses cannot be interpreted in any other way. And to add to that: Strebel, in “Neue Zeit,” praises Bernstein! 242 Zetkin, in “Gleichheit,” takes a stand against the Zimmerwald Left—a diplomatic phrase aimed at countering “Bolshevik sectarianism” (!!). The phrasing is crafted with such finesse that no one can discern what, exactly, constitutes our “sectarianism”!!

HENRIETTE ROLAND-HOLST. MARCH 8, 1916.

Zetkin advocates for a “aurea mediocritas”* between Ledebour and the Zimmerwald Left. But she says not a word about how this might be achieved. What, then, is our mistake?—not a single word, not a single line, has been written on this topic in Switzerland, where there is no censorship.

How else can you explain this except as a desire to reach an agreement with Kautsky and Co.?

(3) The “draft” you and S.D.R. prepared (Bulletin No. 3) seems to me exceedingly poor. 243 Even Radek himself was unable to defend this draft. What, then, is the purpose of such a drastic reduction of the party program? A program for the socialist revolution? There is no need for such a program at present—and in any such program, the clause on the conquest of political power is conspicuously absent. In a program of this sort, Sections 6(A) and 5(B) appear highly peculiar; Section 6(B), too, sounds rather strange: precisely in the event of a socialist revolution, we will need a militia to safeguard the new order. We are not pacifists. We cannot expect to win immediately across the entire globe (without civil wars? without wars at all?!). The colonial program is entirely missing.

Only when we are fully convinced that we stand on the very threshold of such a revolution do we require a program of this kind—but even then, it must be formulated quite differently.

At present, however, what we need is something entirely different: the workers’ movement requires clear guidelines on the necessity of breaking with social-chauvinists and Kautskians, on the importance of clandestine organization, on the means and methods of mass struggle, and so forth.

(4) We will soon send you our theses addressing items 5–8 on the agenda of the Second Conference**. It would be wonderful if we could reach an agreement—not on every item, perhaps, but at least on some of them.

(5) What, then, are our differences with Trotsky? That is surely what interests you. In a few words:

* – the golden mean. Ed.

** See “The Proposal of the Central Committee of the RSDLP for the Second Socialist Conference” (Collected Works, 5th ed., Volume 27, pp. 282–293). Ed.

He is a Kautskian—that is, he seeks unity with the Kautskians within the International, with the Chkheidze faction in Russia. We are firmly opposed to such unity. Chkheidze uses lofty rhetoric—claiming, for instance, that he stands with Zimmerwald (see his latest speech in “Vorwarts,” March 5)—to conceal the fact that he shares the views of the Organizational Committee and those who participate in the military committees*. Trotsky is currently opposed to the Organizational Committee (Axelrod and Martov), yet he advocates for unity with the Duma faction led by Chkheidze!!

We are categorically opposed to this.

With best regards to you, Comrade Pannekoek, and to all our Dutch comrades!

Yours, N. Lenin

My address: Wl. Ulianow
Spiegelgasse 12.
(Schuhladen Kammerer)
Zurich I.

P.S. Is there any truth to the newspaper reports linking “New Reviews” (New York) with “Vorbote” (see “Internationale Korrespondenz,” No. 69)?

Don’t you think it would be extremely important to publish Issue No. 2 of “Vorbote” as early as March?

First published from the manuscript
Translated from German