THE PLA WAS FORMED IN CIRCUMSTANCES DIFFERENT FROM THOSE OF THE OTHER COMMUNIST PARTIES

ENVER HOXHA

Thursday, January 26, 1978

In the whole work for the unceassing moulding and revolutionization of our Party we have taken account of the positive and negative experience of other parties, and especially of the experience of the Bolshevik Party of the Soviet Union.

The Bolshevik Party of Lenin had to fight, for instance, against the great trends of social-democracy, against the various parties of his time which were created within and outside Russia. We have studied and know the experience of Lenin's Party, his struggle against all the anti-revolutionary and anti-Marxist tendencies. We have studied and have been guided by the struggle which Lenin waged for the formation and tempering of the Bolshevik Party against the various trends and factions within the Party and outside it. Lenin's struggle was materialized with the triumph of the Bolshevik Party against the Czarist Empire and against the outside pressure of the imperialists who sought to smother bolshevism and the first state of the proletarians in the embryo.

We have also very carefully studied the great work of Stalin, in order to see how he and the Bolshevik Party fought, and how they combated the various dangerous factions.

We are also studying the facts which, regrettably, brought about the advent to power of revisionism in the Soviet Union and the bitter experience of the Bolshevik Party of this problem.

In my previous notes I have written about the other communist parties, showing how they were created from the merger of the communist parties with socialist, social-democratic and other parties there. I have written, for instance, about the United Workers' Party of Poland, about the Hungarian Workers' Party, about the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and that of Romania, where the «Iron Guard» of Antonescu existed.

I have tried to explain how this fusion of the parties in these countries did not succeed in bringing about the tempering of the party, as Lenin and Stalin teach us, on the contrary, these parties grafted on one another were short-lived and, with the advent of the Soviet revisionists to power, set out on the road of betrayal of Marxism-Leninism, deviating from this theory.

Unlike the other parties, our Communist Party, which later was called the Party of Labour, was formed in different circumstances, in the conditions of the National Liberation War. It was formed on virgin ground, on which no other bourgeois or peasant parties existed. Our Party was formed with the Marxist-Leninist ideology at its foundations. It hurled itself into the war as a new and small Party, but determined to liberate its own country from the fascist occupiers and to create the state of the people's democracy.

The norms which were established and applied with great strictness in our Party were Leninist norms. We proceeded in the example of the Bolshevik Party of Lenin and Stalin, followed on its road and, thus, we gradually climbed the difficult steps of the war. From the beginning we set about working to create the organization of the Front, which we formed not as a party, but as a broad political organization, with the participation of all the anti-fascists, with whom we worked in order to imbue them with the ideology of our Party, with the Marxist-Leninist ideology, with the revolutionary, liberation ideology.

During the war we saw the creation of the organization of the Balli Kombëtar which represented the scum and reprobates of Albania, the stratum of beys, the mercantile bourgeoisie, the traitors and Quislings. It was made up of elements who would have formed their own bourgeois party even before, but could not because the regime of Zog and later the fascist occupation of the country did not allow them to do so.

Our Party disseminated its line among the masses through the organization of the National Liberation Front. The masses of the people who were eager to fight the occupier felt that the organization of the Front was really their own organization, they saw their desires and aspirations embodied in the program of the Party and in the line of the Front.

From the beginning, after the Liberation of the country, our Party was faced with the great danger of Yugoslav revisionism — a savage and threatening enemy — which was bent on undermining the correct Marxist-Leninist line of our Party, and worked through the secret agency headed by Koçi Xoxe to liquidate the Party and thus realize the union of Albania with Yugoslavia. That was an extremely imminent threat, but the Party was able to avert it with success.

Our Party fought against a number of deviationists who were secret a-gents in the pay-roll of the Yugoslav revisionists secret agents of Quislings and, as it turned out later, also secret agents of the Soviet revisionists. Their support in the Party was weak and so our Party, which was formed and tempered in battles, with its clear Marxist-Leninist ideology, liquidated these elements and groups and, as we know, carried on its work for the construction of socialism. Never for a moment has our Party weakened the class struggle. It has waged this struggle with great maturity in all sectors of our activity. The culprits have been condemned and the secret enemies exposed, while those who were misled were clarified, and obstacles were surmounted one after the other. This is how we built the socialist economic base, industry, agriculture and the socialist culture.

From what I said hitherto, it emerges quite clearly that the process of the formation, growth, consolidation and tempering of our Party is quite different from the process of the formation of the former communist parties in the East and the West, which now have become revisionist parties.

The strength and the unity of our Party must be preserved and enhanced continuously. The strengthening and tempering of our Party and our line in the stages of the development of the socialist society should be carried out always on the basis of the principles of Marxism-Leninism, and on the basis of the correct interpretation of this universal science of the proletariat. Our theory should never come into opposition with the situations that might be created, but the theory and the line of our Party should be able to forecast and help us to create a progressive situation within the country. That is the reason why it is necessary that the line of our Party should always remain pure, the Party should always be resolved, alert, vigilant, attached to the people, should lead the masses and should set the example in work, without fearing sacrifices.

The communists must be in the vanguard, they should be the first to make sacrifices and the last to make demands. This slogan has a great significance. Everybody mentions this slogan, but there are some who do not understand it in its proper depth and extent. To be a communist means not just to have the party card in your pocket, but the important thing is to deserve this lofty title through vigorous revolutionary struggle wherever you work and live. I say so because I think that the communist should think hard while he is at work, but also after work. The communist has a great leading mission in society, a great burden lies on his shoulders. He should never flinch under the weight of this burden, but must always think deeply and sit down to work with energy in order to do his work honourably. The communist must take an active part in all the affairs of our socialist society, which his Party of Labour leads.

Despite the fact that our small country is beset by an ocean of capitalist and revisionist enemies, our strong Party is in a position to resist any assaults and pressure from outside, to preserve a sound situation within the country, to create and temper the spirit of great revolutionary patriotism, to create the conditions for a plentiful and cultured life in our country.

All these things will be realized, because our Party is a guarantee to achieve them. We have always defended and safeguarded our Party and Marxism-Leninism against the enemies. Nevertheless we must not forget that the enemies are all around us and they want to damage us, therefore we must never put our minds at rest, we must never underestimate the enemies, we must never extinguish the class struggle and be self-satisfied, we must never lose courage.

We must always be on the attack. Our Party, the broad masses of the people must be on the attack always and for everything.