STALIN AND THE WORLD PROLETARIAT
GEORGI DIMITROFF
Communist International
Jan. (1), 1940, pp. 13-24
It is with a feeling of gladness and pride, of profound respect and boundless love that millions of people all over the capitalist world join with the peoples of the vast country of socialism in celebrating Comrade Stalin’s sixtieth birthday.
Millions of working people in the capitalist countries look upon Stalin as their close friend, wise teacher and great leader. No other person in the world enjoys such unshakable confidence and prestige in the ranks of the working class movement, in the ranks of the working people of all countries as our Stalin, the genius who is carrying on the cause oi Marx, Engels and Lenin.
Everyone of Comrade Stalin’s public utterances is listened to with avidity and studied with care by millions and millions of people, who are inspired by his words to heroic feats and derive from them fresh confidence in the triumph of socialism all over the world.
To what is the immeasurable strength of Stalin’s influence to be attributed? Why do the working people respect him and love him so deeply? Because they know that Stalin has no other interests than defense of oppressed and suffering humanity, has no other life than the life he devotes to the weal of the working people. Because they know that Stalin’s entire theoretical and practical activities, his entire life, are inseparable from socialism; they know that it was under his leadership that the Soviet people built up a socialist society and transformed the age-long dreams of the finest minds of humanity into the splendid reality of today. Because the working people look upon the Soviet Union as a powerful bulwark in their own struggle for emancipation, and on Stalin as the wise pilot of the country of victorious socialism— the fatherland of the working people of the whole world. Because they know that Stalin and the Soviet people have one single thought and one single will, devoted to the service of all the oppressed, exploited and disinherited.
The strength of Stalin’s influence lies in his great teaching, which has been tested by the experience of millions, in the justness of his cause, which has been confirmed by immortal deeds. For decades the learned men of the bourgeoisie have asserted that socialism was a utopia. Stalin has now demonstrated socialism to the millions as a living reality. For decades the ideologists of the bourgeoisie asserted that the peasant possesses an “anti-collectivist skull,” and that he would never reconcile himself to socialism. Stalin demonstrated that the peasantry, given the state leadership of the working class, would moor its bark forever to the shore of socialism. The Social-Democratic frauds asserted that socialism could be reached through bourgeois democracy.
Stalin maintained that the people can reach socialism only through the dictatorship of the proletariat, whereas bourgeois democracy opens the way to capitalist reaction and unleashes imperialist wars. They asserted that through capitalist stabilization mankind would enter the phase of “organized capitalism.” Stalin demonstrated that capitalism would plunge into an abyss and be shaken by tremendous upheavals. And it was Comrade Stalin who proved to be right.
The masses can now see that, whereas capitalism dooms them to poverty, starvation and unemployment and flings them into the bloody gulf of devastating war, the Soviet Union, led by Stalin, is not only preventing its population of one hundred and eighty-three millions from being drawn into the imperialist war, but is erecting a powerful barrier against the conversion of the war into a universal holocaust.
Millions of working people all over the world look upon Stalin, upon his teachings and his leadership as the embodiment of the all-conquering power of the Bolshevik Party and of the revolutionary theory of Marxism-Leninism, as the embodiment of the all-conquering power of the working class. Hence the profound intellectual conviction, the onward march of which no obstacles can halt, and which is moving the armies of revolutionary fighters in the world of capitalism.
II.
The working class in the capitalist countries are learning and will learn from Stalin the Bolshevik art of fighting and vanquishing the class enemy. His teaching, tested and confirmed by the vast experience of the triumphant struggle for socialism, furnishes an inexhaustible arsenal of intellectual weapons for the entire world proletariat.
From Stalin, the advanced proletarians are learning, above all, to understand the exclusive importance of revolutionary theory in the struggle for the liberation of the working class.“Without a revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement,” Lenin said, and this well- known maxim Comrade Stalin has followed with undeviating consistency throughout his revolutionary activity.
Two typical examples will perhaps illustrate better than anything else the immense importance which Comrade Stalin attaches to theory. On the eve of the first Russian Revolution, while fighting for the creation of a Bolshevik Party and upholding Lenin’s teaching against the attacks of the opportunists, Comrade Stalin explained the vital necessity of linking the working class movement with socialist theory. In his pamphlet, A Glance at Party Disagreements (1905), he wrote:
“A spontaneous labor movement, a movement without socialism, inevitably becomes petty and takes on a craft-unionist complexion, subordinates itself to bourgeois ideology.... On the other hand, socialism outside the labor movement remains a phrase and loses its meaning, no matter on what scientific grounds it stands....
“What is the conclusion? The labor movement must unite with socialism; practical activity must be closely bound up with theory, and so give the spontaneous labor movement a Social-Democratic meaning and character.” (L. Beria, Stalin’s Early Writings and Activities, pp. 53-54, International Publishers, New York.)
The other example is a very recent one. Despite his tremendous preoccupation with the task of guiding the socialist state, Comrade Stalin worked on the compilation of the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.) and wrote for it the section on dialectical and historical materialism, which represents the summit of Marxist philosophical science. Thanks to these labors of Comrade Stalin, we now have a remarkable theoretical work, an encyclopedia of fundamental knowledge in the Marxist-Leninist theory and a sure guide to the world proletariat in its struggle to overthrow capitalism and establish socialism.
For many decades, Comrade Stalin has been developing, supplementing and enriching the Marxist- Leninist teachings. His gigantic labors are the embodiment of creative Marxism. He is an irreconcilable enemy of all dogmatism. He cannot tolerate the application of ready-made patterns and petrified formulas to the concrete problems of the class struggle of the proletariat.
Himself setting a brilliant example in the combination of Bolshevik fidelity to principle with the utmost flexibility, and applying the Marxian dialectics in a masterly fashion, Comrade Stalin never tires of warning us against mechanically applying the experience of the working class movement in one country to that of other countries, where conditions are different. He demands a comprehensive analysis of every concrete historical situation, an analysis of the alignment of class forces with an eye to the specific national attributes of each country. He teaches the Communists to base their strategy and tactics on actual realities and to regard theory, not as a collection of abstract dogmas, but as a guide to action.
In the article he wrote on the occasion of Lenin’s fiftieth birthday, Comrade Stalin gave a striking description of the difference between creative Marxism and dogmatic Marxism. Comparing the attitude towards Marxism of the opportunists of the pre-war Second International with that of the Bolsheviks, headed by Lenin, he wrote:
“The second group [i.e., the Bolsheviks—G.D.], on the other hand, attaches prime importance not to the outward acceptance of Marxism, but to its realization, its translation into reality. What this group chiefly concentrates its attention on is to determine the ways and means of realizing Marxism that best answers the situation, and to change these ways and means as the situation changes. It does not derive its directions and instructions from historical analogies and parallels but from a study of surrounding conditions. It does not base its activities on quotations and maxims, but on practical experience, testing every step by experience, learning from its mistakes and teaching others how to build a new life. This, in fact, explains why there is no discrepancy between word and deed in the activities of this group, and why the teachings of Marx completely retain their living, revolutionary force.
To this group may be fully applied Marx’s saying that the Marxists cannot rest content with interpreting the world, but must go further and change it. This group is known as the Bolsheviks, the Communists.”
While advancing the Marxist- Leninist theory, Comrade Stalin has simultaneously waged and continues
to wage a relentless struggle against all attempts of the opportunists to distort and misrepresent Leninism.
Treachery in policy has usually begun with revisionism in theory. Such was the case with the opportunists of the Second International. Such was the case with the Mensheviks. Such was the case with the Trotskyites, the Bukharinites, the Zinovievites and the other enemies of the Party and of the working class. The fight for the purity of revolutionary theory and irreconcilability towards its vulgarization and mutilation are inseparable features of Bolshevism. Lenin and Stalin, the leaders and theoreticians of Bolshevism, attached the highest importance to this struggle and themselves engaged in it unceasingly.
All Comrade Stalin’s activities are an unsurpassable example of the way Leninism should be defended. Just as Lenin upheld Marxism in a long struggle against the whole pack of revisionist “theoreticians,” refusing to allow them to emasculate it and rob it of its revolutionary character, so Comrade Stalin has upheld Marxism-Leninism against the vile attempts of enemy agents to corrupt this theory and thereby reduce the proletariat to impotence.
Comrade Stalin’s incessant concern for the purity of the advanced theory of the working class, and his contributions towards its development, are of particular importance under present-day conditions. The enemies of the working class in all the capitalist countries have started a crusade against this theory. In connection with the imperialist war and the offensive of world reaction, a savage campaign has been launched against revolutionary Marxism, against Communism. The enemies have a mortal hatred of the Marxist-Leninist theory, for they can see that its sway over the masses is spreading and becoming a material force, and it is showing the working people the right way to combat imperialist war, bourgeois reaction and capitalist slavery.
The bourgeoisie has set every means in motion to disarm the working class ideologically. The church, backed by the learned lackeys of the bourgeoisie, has proclaimed a crusade against Marxism, and they are being seconded by the agents of imperialism in the Second International; a vociferous and brainless campaign is being waged against Marxism by the Ministries of Propaganda that have been specially set up; works of Lenin and Stalin are being burned and destroyed by the brutal shock troops of reaction.
But vain are all the attempts of the bourgeoisie, which, in its anti-Marxist crusade is combining subtle deceit with gross police prosecution, coaxing with threats, corruption with courts-martial. They are vain because the advanced workers are learning the Marxist-Leninist theory from Comrade Stalin; they are learning from him how to defend it from the attacks of all its enemies, how to carry it to the broad masses of the working people, how to combine it with the practical class struggle, and how to ensure its undivided supremacy in the international working class movement.
III.
The workers of the capitalist countries are furthermore learning from Comrade Stalin to understand the highly important role of the Party of the working class, the art of forming and consolidating it, of strengthening its fighting efficiency and maneuvering ability in every way, and of extending its connections with the working masses. They are learning the Bolshevik art of ensuring the leading role of the working class with regard to all other working people. Stalin’s splendid account of the glorious and heroic history of the C.P.S.U. (B.) contains a classical description of the importance of the Party to the cause of the working class.
“The history of the Party teaches us, first of all, that the victory of the proletarian revolution, the victory of the dictatorship of the proletariat, is impossible without a revolutionary party of the proletariat, a party free from opportunism, irreconcilable towards compromisers and capitulators, and revolutionary in its attitude towards the bourgeoisie and the state power.” (History of the C.P.S.U.(B.), p. 337, International Publishers, New York.)
The building, consolidation, molding and utmost development of this party, of which history knows no equal, was and is Comrade Stalin’s chief concern.
Day by day, for decades prior to the October Revolution, living the hard life of a revolutionary working underground in Tsarist Russia, and later in the new, Soviet conditions, Comrade Stalin worked with Lenin in building, forging and consolidating the Bolshevik Party. Nothing could halt this fight for the Party, neither the repressive acts of the tsarist police nor persecution by the Provisional Government, neither the machinations of the bourgeoisie nor the subversive activities of the Mensheviks, the Trotskyites and other agents of the class enemy.
Lenin and Stalin overcame every obstacle and smashed the resistance of all the forces of the old world, for in this struggle the leaders of Bolshevism based themselves on the might of the working class and were fulfilling its historic mission. Nor was the consolidation and development of the Bolshevik Party halted by the despicable wrecking activities of the Trotskyites, Zinovievites and Bukharinites who, after Lenin’s death, attacked the Party, and the underlying principles of the Bolshevik Party, with redoubled ferocity.
Stalin defeated all the machinations of the enemies, swept them from the victorious path of the working class, upheld the Party, cemented the iron unity of its ranks and led it to the highest summits of victory. He gathered together all the great historical experience gained in the building of the Bolshevik Party, both in the bourgeois-democratic period and in the period of the socialist revolution, and armed the world proletariat with these generalizations drawn from this experience.
Stalin’s “Conclusion” to the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.) describes with the utmost clarity, profundity, and precision what the Bolshevik Party was and is—a model for the proletarian parties of the capitalist countries.
At the dawn of Bolshevism, Lenin set forth his celebrated thesis regarding the importance of organization for the working class. “In its struggle for power,” he taught, “the proletariat has no other weapon than organization.” And the cardinal embodiment of this organization of the proletariat is its Party. It is the vanguard, the general staff of the working class, without which it would have been impossible to muster the forces of the proletariat, or create its powerful class organizations, or ensure the alliance between the working class and the other working people in town and country for the attainment of victory. Hence the major and fundamental task, a task of the utmost importance to the working class of the capitalist countries, is to forge genuine revolutionary parties, parties of the new type.
What is needed for the forging of such parties? An unceasing struggle for the Bolshevization of the Communist Parties. Proceeding from the historical experience of the Bolshevik Party, on the one hand, and mindful of the specific conditions in which the Communist movement is developing in the capitalist countries, on the other. Comrade Stalin tells us what Bolshevization means and how it is to be attained.
“Bolshevization,” he wrote in 1925, “requires at least certain basic conditions, without which the Bolshevization of the Communist parties is impossible in general.
“1. The parties must not regard themselves as an appendage of the parliamentary election machine, as the Social-Democratic parties in fact do, and not as a free supplement to the trade unions, as certain anarcho-syndicalists sometimes assert, but as the highest form of class combination of the proletariat, designed to lead all other forms of proletarian organization, from the trade unions to the parliamentary
groups.
“2. The Party, especially its leading elements, must have fully mastered the revolutionary theory of Marxism, which is indissolubly connected with revolutionary practice.
“3. The Party must base its slogans and directions not on formulas and historical parallels learned by rote, but on a careful analysis of the concrete conditions of the revolutionary movement at home and abroad, in which the experience of revolution in all countries must absolutely be taken into account.
“4. The Party must test the slogans and directives in the fire of the revolutionary struggle of the masses.
“5. The whole work of the Party, especially if it has not yet rid itself of Social-Democratic traditions, must be reconstructed on a new, revolutionary footing, so designed that every step and every action of the Party should naturally lead to revolutionizing the masses, to training and educating the working class masses in the spirit of revolution.
“6. The Party in its work must be able to combine supreme fidelity to principle (not to be confused with sectarianism!), with maximum connection and contact with the masses (not to be confused with tailism!), without which it is impossible for the Party not only to teach the masses but also to learn from them, not only to lead the masses and raise them to the level of the Party but also to take heed of the voice of the masses and divine their urgent needs.
“7. The Party must be able in its work to combine an irreconcilable revolutionary spirit (not to be confused with revolutionary adventurism!) with the maximum flexibility and maneuvering ability (not to be confused with opportunism!), without which it is impossible for the Party to master all forms of struggle and organization, to link up the day-to-day interests of the proletariat with the fundamental interests of the proletarian revolution, and to combine the legal struggle with the illegal struggle.
“8. The Party must not conceal its mistakes, it must not fear criticism, it must be able to improve and educate its forces using its own mistakes as an example.
9- The Party must be able to form a basic leading group of the best elements of the foremost fighters, devoted enough to be genuine spokesmen of the aspirations of the revolutionary proletariat, and experienced enough to become the real leaders of the proletarian revolution, capable of applying the tactics and strategy of Leninism.
“10. The Party must systematically improve the social composition of its organizations and rid itself of corrupting opportunist elements, with the aim of making its ranks monolithic to the utmost degree.
“11. The Party must establish iron proletarian discipline, based on ideological unanimity, clarity as to the aims of the movement, coordination of practical actions and an attitude of clear understanding on the part of the general membership towards the aims of the Party.
“12. The Party must keep a systematic check on the way its decisions and directives are being fulfilled, without which the latter risk becoming empty promises capable only of undermining the confidence of the broad proletarian masses in the Party.
“Without these and similar conditions, Bolshevization is nothing but an empty sound.” (Pravda,February 3, 1925.)
The conditions of Bolshevization laid down by Stalin have played and are still playing a tremendous part in the development and consolidation of the international Communist movement. They may be compared in significance with the role of Lenin’s well-known works, “What Is To Be Done?” and “One Step Forward, Two Steps Back,” in the history of the Party.
The importance of these splendid principles laid down by Comrade Stalin is immeasurably enhanced by the conditions which prevail today. It is enhanced by the fact that in the midst of the imperialist war and rampant world reaction, profound changes are taking place in the international working class movement, giving rise to ever new and complex tasks for the Communist Parties. It is enhanced by the fact that owing to the treachery of the Social-Democratic leaders, millions of Social-Democratic workers find themselves at the crossroads; the best of them are coming more and more clearly to realize the necessity for a joint struggle with the Communists, and the speedy realization of the fighting unity of the working class will depend largely on the Bolshevik skill of the Communists. The importance of Stalin’s principles is further enhanced by the fact that the Communist Parties are faced with the highly urgent task of ousting the agents of the bourgeoisie from the ranks of the working class movement in order decisively to direct the latter along the lines of a genuine proletarian policy.
Learning from Comrade Stalin, the Communist Parties in the capitalist countries have considerable achievements in the matter of their own Bolshevization. They have developed ideologically, politically and organizationally; they have done a great deal to purify their ranks of alien, opportunist elements; they have strengthened the solidarity of their ranks, and, as recent events have shown, have stood a severe test without erring from the right path. But they feel and realize that they still lack much to become real Bolshevik parties.
And the Communists will work with even greater energy and persistence to put into practice in the Communist movement, Stalin’s principles of Bolshevization, without which the victory of the working
class cannot be ensured.
IV.
The advanced workers of the capitalist countries have learned, and are now learning, from Comrade Stalin how to wage a Bolshevik struggle against the influence of the bourgeoisie and of its agents in the ranks of the working class. It is to the vital interests of the entire working class promptly to discover the people and the channels through which this influence is conveyed, to tear the mask from those who pose as the friends of the proletariat, and ruthlessly to expose and paralyze the disastrous consequences of their corrupting activities.
The history of the working class movement in all countries shows that, in addition to employing open violence, the capitalists make wide use of the method of disintegrating the ranks of the working class movement from within. By various devices they tame, bribe, and corrupt leaders of the working class movement who are susceptible to flattery, who hanker after cheap popularity, or have a weakness for the good things of life; they admit them to their salons, invite them to their table, flatter their vanity, and pet and praise them for every despicable deed they commit. They offer better conditions to the labor aristocracy, which has been fostered at the expense of colonial super-profits. At the same time, with the help of their government bodies, they smuggle spies and provocateurs into the working class movement and try to get them installed in leading posts with the object of systematically disorganizing the working class movement and keeping it in a state of disunity and impotence. Moreover, as we know, the working class is not separated by a wall from the other sections of the population, and its ranks are constantly being replenished from the petty bourgeoisie.
As a consequence of all this, non-proletarian influences penetrate into the working class movement.This is reflected in the ideology and policy of the organizations and parties active in the ranks of the working class. Unless these bourgeois influences and bourgeois agents in the working class movement are combated, it is impossible to protect the day-to-day interests and needs of the proletariat, or to achieve the ultimate aims of its movement.
The chief channel through which bourgeois influence penetrates to the working class in the capitalist countries was and still is Social-Democratism.
In the realm of theory, Social-Democratism is either a vulgarization and distortion of Marxism, or else a downright and cynical repudiation of Marxism, an open rupture with and desertion from Marxism to the ideological position of the bourgeoisie. In practice, Social-Democratism is a policy of reconciling the class antagonisms between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, a policy of class collaboration between them and of subordinating the interests of the proletariat to the interests of the bourgeoisie.
Social-Democratism rejects the idea of a strongly-welded proletarian party capable of leading the working class in a determined struggle against capitalism. Social-Democratism fosters organizational disunity in the proletarian organizations, it splits the working class movement. Social-Democratism repudiates proletarian internationalism; it is a camouflage for bourgeois chauvinism in the ranks of theworking class. Social-Democratism is the most vile and poisonous weapon imperialism has in its campaign of slander against the Land of Socialism.
With the help of Social-Democratism, the bourgeoisie disarms the working class ideologically,undermines its faith in its own strength, poisons its mind with doubt and skepticism, paralyzes its will, disorganizes its ranks, and sets one section against another, and thus endeavors to keep the working class under its ideological and political sway in order to preserve its own class rule.
The entire experience of the international working class movement furnishes a vivid illustration of the disastrous role played by Social-Democratism. At this moment of history, Social-Democratism and its spokesmen are the instrument with which the bourgeoisie is endeavoring to divert the working class from its revolutionary path, to press its organizations into the service of the criminal imperialist war and the counter-revolutionary campaign against the great Land of Socialism.
Whereas the Soviet Union is striving to bring this criminal imperialist carnage to an end, whereas the advanced proletarians are opposing the war and holding aloft the banner of proletarian internationalism, the apostles of Social-Democratism, the leaders of the Second International—all these Blums, Citrines, Tanners, Sandlers and Hoeglunds—are rabid warmongers and malignant instigators of the anti- Communist and anti-Soviet campaign. Together with their imperialist bourgeoisies, and in conjunction with the Finnish White Guards, with bloody butchers like Mannerheim, they are working against the Finnish people, against their democratic republic and against the Soviet Union. Faithfully serving their imperialist masters, they furiously rage against Communism, insist on the suppression of the Communist Parties and the Communist press, engineer police raids and demand that the Communists be flung into prison and concentration camp. There is no criminal and vile act to which these utterly corrupt leaders of the Social-Democratic parties have not resorted in their campaign against the revolutionary movement and the Land of Socialism.
Social-Democratism, which began by revising Marxism and ended by completely repudiating it, which for decades has served as an instrument for demoralizing and disorganizing the working class movement, has now become a weapon for the suppression of the working class, a weapon of reaction, imperialist war, and counter-revolutionary attack on the Land of Socialism.
One service Comrade Stalin has rendered the world proletariat is that he has for decades waged a relentless struggle against Social-Democratism, disclosed its social roots and the reasons for its influence, and has indicated the ways and means of vanquishing and eradicating it. On the tenth anniversary of the October Revolution, Comrade Stalin wrote:
“Social-Democratism today is an ideological pillar of capitalism.... We cannot get rid of capitalism unless we rid the working class movement of Social-Democratism.”
The profound truth of this conclusion has been borne out by the entire experience of the working class movement in the capitalist countries. It is now being realized by the Social-Democratic workers, who are growing more and more indignant with the treacherous policy of their leaders.
One of the most important tasks of the Communist Parties is to conduct a struggle to win away from the influence of Social-Democratism workers who have fallen under its baneful influence, enlist them in a Ijoint struggle with the Communist workers, and fight for the complete elimination of Social- Democratism from the ranks of the working class. And they are learning and will continue to learn the art of successfully accomplishing this from Comrade Stalin.
V.
In the eyes of the working class of the world, Comrade Stalin is a proletarian leader who ideally combines all the finest features, properties and qualities of the class whose historic mission it is to reconstruct the world.
Stalin is our best champion of proletarian internationalism. All his activities and teachings, like the activities and teachings of Marx, Engels and Lenin, are thoroughly imbued with the spirit of proletarian internationalism. The deep roots of this internationalism lie in the very nature of the working class.
Stalin is as international as the working class. Stalin is as international as Bolshevism. Stalin is asinternational as the Marxist-Leninist teaching, which indicates the way of emancipation to all theexploited and oppressed on the face of the earth. Comrade Stalin’s theoretical and practical works are concerned with the interests of the workers of all countries, of all nations and races.
Comrade Stalin wages a most irreconcilable struggle against nationalism and chauvinism, which are strenuously fostered by the bourgeoisie and its ideologists. Like Lenin, he has always worked to instill the spirit of proletarian internationalism in the minds of the proletarians of the world and of the working people of the Soviet Union. He teaches us that the victory of socialism in the U.S.S.R. is a powerful pillar for the liberation movement of the working people in the capitalist countries. He teaches the Soviet people that this victory would have been impossible without the support of the international working class. He teaches us that the achievements of the peoples of U.S.S.R. help to strengthen the working people in the capitalist countries in their struggle against the exploiters. He teaches us that the struggle of the working people of the capitalist countries facilitates the progress of the Soviet Union towards Communism. Comrade Stalin’s profound proletarian internationalism is daily felt by the workers of the capitalist countries. They look upon Stalin not only as the leader of the peoples of the Soviet Union, but as the leader of the proletariat of the entire world, a leader who has devoted his life to the realization of their cherished hopes and aspirations.
The cause of the international Communist movement is indissolubly associated with the name of Comrade Stalin. By their indefatigable efforts to create a Bolshevik Party, their long and irreconcilable struggle against opportunism in Russia and in the international arena, their development of Marxism in conformity with the new conditions of the class struggle, and their achievement of the victory of the great socialist revolution in the U.S.S.R., Lenin and Stalin laid the foundations for the Communist International. The Communist International was built up and its fight was and is being waged on the basis of their great teachings. All its activities have been guided by the example of the struggle of the glorious Bolshevik Party of which they were the builders. The Communist International is the International of Lenin and Stalin, just as the First International was the International of Marx and Engels.
The Social-Democratic lackeys, in an attempt to hurt the Communists, taunt them with being "Stalinists.” But we Communists are proud of being called by this honorable title, just as we are proud of being called Leninists. There is no greater honor for the proletarian revolutionary than to be a real Leninist, a real Stalinist, to be a supremely faithful follower of Lenin and Stalin.
And there is no greater happiness for the Communists than to fight under the leadership of the great Stalin for the triumph of the just cause of the world proletariat.
Not everybody can be a Stalinist. The honorable title of Leninist-Stalinist must be earned by Bolshevik effort and staunchness, by supreme devotion to the cause of the working class. The Leninist- Stalinist guard of champions of the proletariat—the gold reserve of the international proletarian movement—is growing from day to day, spreading and multiplying in every corner of the earth. They alone, and not the despicable Social-Democratic lackeys of imperialism, are the spokesmen of the interests and needs of the working class. And this glorious guard will lead the international proletariat, under the banner of Marx-Engels-Lenin-Stalin, to victory over the forces of the old world.
But the Bolsheviks know that victory never comes of its own accord, that it must be fought for and won. We must learn from Stalin what creative Marxism means; we must learn from Stalin how to build a Bolshevik Party; we must learn from Stalin how to strengthen our bonds with the masses under all conditions; we must learn from Stalin how to fight Social-Democratism; we must learn from Stalin revolutionary courage and revolutionary realism; we must learn from Stalin to be fearless in battle and ruthless towards the class enemy; we must learn from Stalin to display inflexible will and to overcome all difficulties and vanquish the enemy; we must learn from Stalin to be thoroughly faithful to the cause of proletarian internationalism—for these are the cardinal conditions for paving the way to and achieving the victory of the working class.
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