[France and Belgium, Trotsky had crown convinced of…]

Scan page 5

France and Belgium, Trotsky had crown convinced of the tremendous possibilities that unfold themselves inside the mass reformist organisations. Unless we accept that perspective, we can play no significant revolutionary role in the history of Great Britain. It is clear that he saw this development in the light of the increasing acuteness of the international situation, and that he did not hesitate to advise that 'Our first attacks must be directed against the inconsistency of the centrists'. He also discussed the possibility of making use of the already established independent paper Red Flag and of negotiating with those groups who considered themselves to be his followers but were not prepared to follow his advice.

ASSESSM ENT

It can only be a matter for regret that this proved to be the last significant statement that Trotsky was able to make about the development of the Fourth International in Britain. In particular what we lack is any assessment of the experience ofcentry work in the Labour party in that period, when as the notes indicate, some people disappeared altogether into the coils of the Labour Party bureaucracy. and others stuck by a sectarian refusal to make the necessary turn.

Obviously. it is necessary now to make this assessment ourselves as part of an ongoing struggle for the development of the Trotskyist movement in Britain. In recommending these volumes once again to all comrades as a necessary part of taking up these questions, it is necessary to repeat that we cannot hope to understand them simply by The position of Pablo's supporters is crystallised in this passage by Harry Frankel, a member of the Minority of the American Socialist Party that was sponsored by Pablo in order to attempt to defeat opposition to his political line from the maiority of that party's leadership. Writing in 1953, Frankel brings out clearly the Pabloite submergence of the fight for leadership and principle into the abstract scheme of an "objective process" which will supposedly set all things to rights:

"Difficulties will not crush us. We have confidence in our analysis of our epoch. That analysis and the confidence which flows from it are two fold: The revolution will conquer, and the revolution will right itself! (emphasis added) We cannot know what the precise forms and tempo of this process will be, and how its two facets will work out in relation to one another. We do know the moving forces of this twofold process. Knowing this enables Marxists to live without illusions, without whining, without desparate hopes for "quick cha nges". Ill tounded hopes and last-ditch perspectives only sow the seeds of sisillusionment, despair and desertion.

"We base ourselves upon the obfective forces in the worid, (emph. added)and we feel sure that these objective forces will in the long run remedy subjective defects." [The New World Reality and the New Confusion" by Harry Frankel April 1953. International Secretariat Document 1951-1954 (SWP) Vol. 2, p. 81]