Directive letter from LD Trotsky. October 21, 1929
Politburo
and state security agencies. To the 100th anniversary of the formation of the
Cheka, pp. 242-266
October 21, 1929
No. 44053
Top secret
SO OGPU
During a search of Blumkin's house, an
unfinished letter was found addressed to Comrade Trilisser, in which he reports
on the nature of his connection with Trotsky, the directives he received from
the latter, and his illegal connection with the Trotskyists upon his return
from Constantinople in August of this year. During interrogation, Blumkin
testified that he intended to send this letter to Comrade. Trilisser and
immediately hide from Moscow, as he feared imminent reprisals.
Deputy Prev OGPU: Berry
Deputy. Beginning SOOGPU: Agranov
Application
Deputy early SO OGPU Comrade Agranov
I. G. BLUMKIN'S READINGS
October 20, 1929
From about the spring of 1927, I began to lean
towards the views of the Trotskyist opposition on issues of international
(Comintern) and internal party policy.
Thus, below we will talk about my party
behavior over a period of more than two years.
The impetus for my solidarity with the
Trotskyist opposition was not questions of internal politics, but of the
Comintern, in particular and mainly the questions of the Chinese revolution,
which interested me more directly in view of my work in the Far East, in
Mongolia.
Arriving in April 1927 on a business trip to
Moscow from Mongolia, where I was a representative of the OGPU and the Chief
Instructor of the State Internal Security of the Mongolian Republic, I found
myself in the midst of a discussion on the question of the Chinese revolution.
Interested in her, I then visited Comrade. Radek at his apartment (I found
Alskiy and others at Radek's) and informed him of his oppositional moods.
Being to a very large extent divorced from the
actual divergence between the party and the Trotskyist opposition on questions
of internal policy and having no direction on this score, I considered it
possible for myself through the OGPU not to make a corresponding statement.
After spending about a month in Moscow, I returned back to Mongolia.
The period from spring to November 1927, when
he came to Moscow for the second time, was a period during which both the
opposition’s program on internal politics and its factional work was hastily
developed and sharpened. I spent this entire period in Mongolia, being very
overloaded with instructor's KGB and any other work (I had residency
assignments for a number of neighboring countries - Tibet, Inner Mongolia, some
parts of China). Purely businesslike concentration, separation from the USSR,
overload - all this led to the fact that I did not find any oppositional
activity, either analytical or practical. On the contrary, before my departure
for Moscow in the spring, I in Urga repeatedly made leading reports to the
Party organization in the spirit of the policy of the majority of the Central
Committee.
I arrived in Moscow in November. This was
after the opposition street demonstrations. The very fact of the opposition's
appeal to the non-party masses I learned with great difficulty and did not
share it.
At the end of my stay in Mongolia, the GPU was
informed of my oppositional moods. And that I was meeting in Moscow with some
leaders of the opposition, the GPU also knew. This was not a secret for the
GPU. The GPU knew my vacillations.
I must say that Comrade. Menzhinsky,
Trilisser, and Yagoda showed great tolerance and readiness to help me end these
vacillations.
Soon after my arrival, these comrades had a
conversation with me, in the sense indicated above. I gave them every guarantee
of my KGB loyalty, but I did not completely dissociate myself from the
opposition.
Sosnovsky, to whom I appeared upon my arrival
in Moscow with a declaration of my solidarity with the opposition, was the only
person through whom I was connected with the opposition. After listening to me,
he said that he should talk with Trotsky about the form of my use. At the same
time, he said that from Comrade. Radek and Tarkhanov (Tarkhanov was with me in
Urga on his way from China) already know about my oppositionism and that, in
particular, Radek attaches great importance to using me as an experienced
person in illegal technology. If the party did not have other grounds, then
only from this alone it would be possible to conclude that already at that time
the opposition was thinking about building an illegal organization. The most
interesting thing in my conversation with Sosnovsky was that, as it seemed to
me, he treated me with some distrust. Part of our conversation was attended by
Comrade Boguslavsky.
During the second meeting, Sosnovsky informed
me that he had spoken with Trotsky about me. Sosnovsky recommended that I
should not put my signatures under the platform of the opposition, as an
oppositionist, until I was legalized, and that the use of me is conceived in
some future illegal work; for now, can I, asked Sosnovsky, tell him whether
they are going to arrest and exile the opposition, and that, in general, it
would be nice if, while I work in the OGPU apparatus, I could inform the
opposition about the issues that were connected with its immediate political
destiny. Sosnovsky also said that the fact of my collaboration with the
opposition would be hidden from Radek and Boguslavsky under the pretext that I
was once a Left Socialist-Revolutionary (11 years ago). This struck me as
particularly piquant. As if the opposition could or could not forbid me to show
solidarity with it.
In general, the opposition in that period
(autumn 1927) was in complete confusion over organizational prospects. On the
one hand, people, apparently, thought about some kind of illegal work, on the
other, they still seriously considered it necessary to obey the party, denied
the formation of the faction, expecting arrests and exile, planning illegal
work, at the same time remained in a legal position; it was quite difficult to
understand anything at all, and this circumstance discouraged me, a person
accustomed to organizational clarity. That is why I understood Sosnovsky's
proposal to inform the opposition about very limited things of interest to it
through the OGPU as something undignified, not fully thought out and completely
unrelated to the purely organizational calculations of the opposition.
After this expectation, Sosnovsky and I had
several meetings - 2-3. There seem to be only two. One of them was at the
apartment of a personal friend of mine, a doctor; the rest are in Sosnovsky's
apartment. These meetings were very short, they were attended by Sosnovsky's
wife, Olga Danilovna, I told half-gossipy things and myself received
information about what was happening from the opposition.
It goes without saying that if I seriously
thought of engaging in information for the opposition, taking advantage of my
position in the GPU, then with all the objective and subjective difficulties I
would behave completely differently.
It is very easy to answer this first basic
question of my behavior, which I myself have raised.
First, I had nothing to do with the
departments that deal with the opposition; secondly, among the workers of these
departments, with the exception of two or three comrades, I have never had and
never have any personal acquaintances; thirdly, my meetings with the heads of
the GPU were always of a purely business nature, related to my direct work;
fourthly, the general KGB restraint and secrecy is in itself a sufficient
obstacle to information.
If now we were to recruit all the workers of
the SDU and other departments related to the opposition, and ask them if I was
interested in anyone, ever and in any form of anything, then the answer would
be categorically negative. And those two or three comrades about whom I spoke
are comrades - Agranov, Artuzov and, conditionally, comrade. Deribas.
And here you are, Comrade Agranov, yesterday
together with Comrade. Deribas answered my aforementioned question that I had
never asked you about anything or was interested in any form before my
departure abroad.
There still remains the question of the
possibility of obtaining materials. As an employee of the foreign division of
the INO, I had nothing to do with the materials of other departments and never
received or saw general information reports from the OGPU.
As for the materials of the INO itself, all
the comrades from the INO can also confirm that I have never been interested in
anything, with the exception of Mongolian affairs, in which I have discovered
and continue to show great interest. Obtaining materials on other cases from
the INO is rather difficult. The Mongolian affairs remain, and in them I myself
am a fairly good reference book. But Sosnovsky was not interested in these
matters. The only case from Mongolian affairs that interested him, and about
which Sosnovsky learned from me, on my own initiative, was the case of Nesterov
and Stepanov who had been arrested in Mongolia by me. By the way, the OGPU
itself made it possible for a number of oppositionists (Rakovsky, Trotsky,
Pyatakov, and others) to get acquainted with the Nesterov case. But only the
characterization that I gave to these people was far from in favor of the opposition.
Without having the slightest idea about the degree of involvement of these
people in opposition work, I viewed them, mainly Nesterov, as a wrecker of
Soviet work in Mongolia, as an agent of the right side of the MONPRA in Soviet
instructions, as a White Guard who needed to be destroyed without hesitation.
As for Stepanov, I arrested him mechanically, following an unmotivated order
from the OGPU, and in Moscow I was not at all interested in him.
The Nesterov case was the only case related to
the opposition, about which I once talked with Comrade. Agranov on his
initiative, and then not as an interrogator, but as an answer to Agranov's
questions about Nesterov's activities in Mongolia. T. Agranov can confirm what
a devastating characterization I gave to this white man. But I did not hide my
attitude to this matter from Sosnovsky, just as I did not hide it from anyone
in the OGPU.
As I said above, my departure from Mongolia
was caused by the fact that among a number of White Guards I had taken out from
there was Nesterov. And so I was sorry that the great work I had done in
Mongolia and beyond its borders during the year, which was part of a huge work,
calculated for three years, that it was thwarted, was put under attack because
of the arrest of Nesterov.
I deliberately dwelled on the above in such
detail, not because I am suspected of anything. On the contrary, you too,
comrade. Agranov, and comrade. Deribas, during our yesterday's conversation,
quite clearly abandoned any suspicions. But, if someone could have doubts about
whether I used my stay in the OGPU to inform the opposition, and if my personal
sincere word were not enough for these doubters, then let them have an
objective picture of my capabilities. and my actual behavior.
At the same time, I ask, of course, to
remember that all the time we are not talking about informing any foreign
power, but also party members - yesterday's leaders of many branches of party
and Soviet work, wavering revolutionaries. Comrades who were only interested in
issues related to their personal fate. The latter was very typical for the
opposition at that time. So, for example, when I once met with my former deputy
for the People's Commissariat for Trade, Ioselevich, the only thing that
interested him, and what he asked me about, was whether he would be arrested or
not, and if I could not, out of friendship, to tell. Ioselevich can confirm to
you that I categorically refused to talk to him about this.
It’s also interesting, after all, what, during
two meetings with Sosnovsky, could I tell him. I remember this very well, and
although no one asked me about it, I take the initiative in raising this
question and answering it. The GPU should not have any doubts about my
frankness to the end.
I remember, by chance, when I was at
Deribas's, I heard that he was aware of some measures taken by the opposition
to find an apartment for Zinoviev. I told Sosnovsky about this in a joking
manner.
At that time, it was supposed to send me to
liquidate the uprising in Yakutia. Comrade Yagoda asked me to familiarize
myself with the materials from Comrade Puzitsky. I have not seen or read these
materials. Comrade Puzitsky kept putting off my acquaintance with them until he
himself was sent to liquidate this uprising, but I heard something from one
short conversation with him. And I told Sosnovsky that we had a White Guard
bandit uprising in Yakutia in connection with my proposed trip there.
I heard by chance in the apparatus of the GPU
that one of the missions assesses the ongoing internal party struggle as a
symptom of the fall of the Soviet regime.
And I told Sosnovsky about this, but at the
same time in a tone of apprehension that the opposition might really play into
the hands of the imperialists.
That's about everything that I told him during
my two meetings with Sosnovsky. The greatest innocence, scantiness and
randomness of this "information" is in itself quite obvious.
At our meetings, Sosnovsky, and especially
Olga Danilovna, were mainly interested in whether I could personally give them
money. I promised them to sell some of my personal belongings and, accordingly,
give money, while they expressed great retrospective regret that in their time,
being in power, they did not bother to save money for a black opposition day.
All this happened during the end of November -
December. We met only two or three times during this period. This is also, in
itself, quite revealing. During this period I did not meet with any of the
oppositionists. In January, the opposition was expelled. I remember that I said
goodbye to Sosnovsky over the phone. After that, I saw Olga Danilovna once for
several months. During this meeting, it was mainly about my giving money, and
the main content of the meeting was to digest what was happening.
In March, I went to the Caucasus for medical
treatment, and was treated until May or June. Now judge for yourself how
intensively I informed the opposition.
In April in Gagra I met with Leonid Petrovich
Serebryakov, who had arrived there from Semipalatinsk. It is known that by this
time the first retreats had already occurred, and such moments began to appear
in the party line that the opposition could not provoke to itself.
My repeated conversations with Leonid
Petrovich Serebryakov, from whom back in 1919 I accepted combat missions in the
rear of one of the fronts, when I almost paid with my life, convinced me that
even then, at least such oppositionists as Serebryakov, found the basis for
rapprochement between the party and the opposition on the main issues: the
fight against the kulak, the assessment of the right danger. He, Serebryakov,
told me verbatim that now it would be very easy to make a reservation, but that
this is hindered by the fact that the party demands a renunciation of views, an
admission of guilt, etc. omissions are mainly psychological. Poorly imagining
then that Serebryakov's point of view may be a shade, I regarded it as the
evolution of the entire opposition. The conversation with Serebryakov pushed me
very strongly away from the opposition, but the psychological wounds were very
fresh, and,
When I jerked to Moscow, in May or June, then
the so-called. the left course was in full swing. It found its expression in
the proclamation of slogans of self-criticism and pressure on the kulaks, in
the conclusions that the party drew from grain procurements, and in the
well-known decisions of the April 1928 plenum of the Central Committee.
All this very much softened my opposition
mood, and, struggling between political analysis and a sense of bitterness over
the fate of a number of party people, I personally found a way out for myself
in the fact that I gladly accepted a new offer of work abroad.
Since the discussion above was about informing
the opposition by me, I will allow myself here to cite the opposite fact. The
conversation with Serebryakov and his assessment of the situation pushed me so
much towards the party that, having arrived in Moscow, I immediately informed
Comrade. Trilisser and Menzhinsky in the most detailed way about the mood of
Serebryakov, indicating that he is on his way to the party. Moreover, I even
had a semi-official instruction from Serebryakov to talk about this with
Comrade. Menzhinsky, which I did because I considered such a proposal
politically acceptable.
Upon arrival, I accidentally met Olga
Danilovna on Nikitskaya Street, on the eve of her departure to Barnaul. I
pointed out to her the party course, the increasing waste, and, as the latest
fact, the mood of Serebryakov. At first she greeted me with a reproach that I
did not give money and did not come to her, and after the political part of our
conversation, she directly suspected that I was an agent of the GPU. I remember
now, she said to me: "Well, did they go to Gagra to decompose, to split
off?" We parted with hostility.
From the moment of my return to Moscow and
acceptance of my offer of legal work in the East, I started to get busy.
Training of people, cover - all this required all the energy and attention and
travels across Russia (Leningrad, Rostov and other points). During this period
I was a disciplined party member. In the meantime, the party line was
developing more and more, like a left line, deviations from the opposition
increased, and when I left the USSR in September, the opposition sentiments in
me died away. True, the party line was characterized by the opposition as a
left zigzag of right-wing politics. I had doubts on this score, but I told
myself that there is only one fear - a semi-proof thing, and the facts of
today's political day, there is another thing - sufficiently demonstrative, and
that it is necessary to decide whether it is a zigzag or not a zigzag,
regardless of whether what,
I formulated the position for myself in this
way. The radius of divergence between the party and the opposition is narrowing
every day, and that if even during the 15th Congress the opposition could
resist the demand for surrender, now, in the autumn of 1928, there is nothing
to surrender from. It is very hard to worry about the fact that, with this
course of the party, many of its blood sons are in exile and prisons, I
consoled myself that, in the end, the radius of divergence between them and the
party on political grounds will narrow, and in a year, at the most, these
people will return to the party, which, to a very large extent, has actually
happened by now.
I think that this can be the end of the first
period of my party behavior in more than two years, from the spring of 1927 to
the fall of 1928; I have expounded it in the main and characteristic moments
absolutely completely.
From October 1928 to February 1929, I had no
opportunity, being abroad in an illegal position, to follow the political life
of the Union. The conditions of my conspiracy forced me to hide my knowledge of
the Russian language for moments. The only source of my observation of the life
of the Soviet Union was, and then occasionally, the White Guard press, but it
was very difficult to deduct anything in its obscure and malicious
denominations. However, she highlighted one fact quite fully - the fact of the
struggle against the right, and I registered this fact as a new proof of the
groundlessness of the opposition policy. At the same time, the same fact
further strengthened my confidence that the return of the opposition to the
party is a matter of the near future.
This is clear if we bear in mind that I
understood the struggle against the Rights as a struggle not against
individuals, but against a certain political program, in response to which the
opposition, underestimating the Leninist vigilance of the Central Committee,
formulated many of its theses.
That during this period a very complex process
is taking place within the opposition itself, that while one part of it is
going through the evolution that I imagined, the other part (Trotsky) pulls out
the buried permanent together, righteous, etc .; I had no idea about this
abroad. That is why, against the background of my, to a certain degree idyllic,
confidence that the Party would keep the opposition comrades for itself
completely, I was shocked by the news of Trotsky's expulsion abroad.
When, in one of the European cities, where I
arrived in connection with my work in the East, I learned about the expulsion
of Trotsky as a fact, then, first of all, with my point of view indicated
above, I was politically completely disoriented. It seemed to me that I had
misunderstood the prospect of a rapprochement between the party and the
opposition, and that it was not factional narrow-mindedness that was to blame
for this, but the party. First of all, it seemed to me that the expulsion of
Trotsky was a symptom of the fact that the last line of the Party was a zigzag.
At that time I did not understand all the specificity of the particular problem
of Trotsky's expulsion. The expulsion also excited me terribly in an emotional
sense. I was in a state of nervous illness for several days. The fact of
Trotsky's expulsion abroad was perceived by me from the angle of the physical
danger that threatened him. There was not the slightest doubt for me that he
will be killed in the coming days by terrorist elements of the monarchist
emigration. I believed that for all his political delusions, the party should
not have put him in front of this danger. I also believed that the party should
not have, by sending him abroad, deprived him of the opportunity to return to
her. Fractional narrowness prevented me from seeing the reason for this not in
Trotsky himself, but in the party. My first reaction was to immediately leave
for Constantinople, but the interests of the cause prevailed, and I spent as
much time in Europe as was necessary for the successful completion of all my
operations.
I arrived in Constantinople on April 10.
From the moment I received the news of
Trotsky's expulsion, the second period in my party behavior within the
above-mentioned period begins. The emotional shock from the fact of Trotsky's
expulsion, with the political disorientation that this fact caused in me,
revived opposition ferment in me and consolidated it at a sharp angle, it was
in this state that I arrived in Constantinople. I was guided by the thought,
first of all, to help Trotsky personally. On April 12, passing along Pera
Street, at the tunnel, I accidentally met Trotsky's son, Lev Sedov, whom I had
known before in the USSR. I greeted him and asked him for information about the
events that led to the expulsion of Trotsky, and said that I was a friend and
he could trust me.
The information he gave me about the massive
growth of the opposition, that the fight against the Right is a tactical step,
etc., could not help weaken my oppositional relapse. On April 16, I had my
first and only meeting with Trotsky. It happened in his apartment on Iset Pasha
Street and lasted over four hours. With the feelings that gripped me, for the
first time in many years of my work in the organs of the OGPU, I lost my sense
of KGB discipline. At the same time, the other, purely businesslike, side of
this discipline made me go on a meeting with Trotsky, to observe conspiratorial
guarantees so as not to endanger my immediate work.
A very large part of our conversation was
devoted to things of no political interest. Trotsky told the details of his
exile, his life in Alma-Ata, indulged in some more distant memories, shared his
views on visas to Europe, his impressions of Turkey, etc., was interested in my
life and work for the entire period before my departure for border. When,
telling him about Mongolia, I touched upon the reasons for my departure, he
recalled Nesterov's case with interest.
As in the conversation with Sosnovsky, I could
tell him nothing more than what was said above (especially since he himself got
acquainted with this matter at the GPU). I will not hide my irritation at the
fact that the arrest of Nesterov disrupted all my work in Urga, I shared with
him.
When this personal part of the conversation
was over, Trotsky turned our conversation on a political track. He did not
engage in any complete statement of his political mood, obviously believing
that I was sufficiently aware of this. First of all, I heard from him a
completely clear point of view on the possibility of the fall of the Soviet
regime, not as a separate perspective, but as an opportunity for the coming
months. I remember his literal expression: “Before the wave was going up, but
now it is going down, swiftly down”. At the same time, Trotsky did not explain
why, as a result of what catastrophic processes, he expresses his conviction
about the fall of Soviet power almost in the coming months. I remember firmly,
speaking about his relations with the representatives of the GPU in the
consulate, he told me: “I told this comrade Minsky that maybe
I had the impression that Trotsky was
considering his expulsion almost as one of the signs of the possibility of the
fall of the Soviet regime in the coming months. Limiting himself to this phrase,
he immediately went on to what the opposition should actually do in connection
with such a prospect. He said that since the Soviet power may soon perish, the
task is to find among the elements of the Communist Party such cadres who, when
the Soviet regime is replaced by some other system, will form the left part of
the proletariat under the conditions of this new systems, when the present
Communist Party will be irreparably compromised in the eyes of the proletariat,
and that it is necessary to build an illegal organization not only for today,
but also for tomorrow.
I remember that to the remnants of my
revolutionary youth, such an inconceivably "revolutionary" task
seemed terribly seductive. And, frankly, I didn’t really think about the
political meaning of this phrase. If Comrade is right. Radek, when he says that
Rakovsky's only argument is: “Do you think Leo has no head?” I was then in the
same position doubly, tripled. It seemed to me, given the state in which I was,
that since Trotsky so confidently believed in the possibility of the fall of
Soviet power, then the real task of all true revolutionaries is: to think about
the future of the proletariat.
Then Trotsky began to talk about his literary
plans. Of these plans, some of which have already been implemented, the
following deserves attention. He is going to prepare for publication a large
secret archive, which he managed to bring with him. In this regard, several
times he expressed surprise at how they did not notice it, and how - he still
cannot understand that - he was given the opportunity to take this archive with
him. From the materials of the archive he named the unpublished minutes of the
April 17 conference of the party, some semi-printed materials of the same
conference with Stalin's resolutions, his correspondence with Lenin, the
minutes of some meetings of the Central Committee. At the same time, he said
that some of these materials, at one time, on the instructions of the
opposition in Leningrad, either in Istpart, or elsewhere, were simply stolen
from the case. Said, that he is now busy with the systematization of this
material, after which he will begin to publish it, and this material will be
several printed volumes. In general, he was very fond of such exposing work.
At the same time, Trotsky remembered that I
had once prepared his military works for publication and was engaged, in
particular, in the work of compiling an essay about his trip. Based on this, he
asked me to urgently draw up for him to include in his autobiography a detailed
report on the activities of this train. In one of the next days it was done by
me. This was one of two literary contributions made to him there.
Further, the conversation focused mainly on
conspiratorial work in the USSR and in connection with the USSR.
Trotsky asked me if I do not know how much
foreign correspondence is now going to the USSR, in comparison with pre-war
times, more or less? I replied that, in my opinion, more. And to this he asked
for proof. As proof, I cited, firstly, the consideration that now there are two
million emigrants who are in correspondence with the USSR from abroad, and,
secondly, that the Mitrofs ( residents of the near abroad - approx.), who used
to give internal correspondence, as part of the empire, now give foreign
correspondence, and that with their departure many families remained on both
sides of the border. As a result, foreign correspondence, in comparison with pre-war
times, should have increased. From this, Trotsky concluded that if foreign
correspondence increased, then the possibilities of its perlustration coverage
narrowed, and that this circumstance should be used to send propaganda
literature and letters in private letters. At the same time, he remembered the
method of sending "Vienna Pravda" to Russia. He said that newspapers
were embedded by them in simple letters that were sent to random addresses, and
that out of ten addresses, one, and sometimes several, were addresses that
turned, by virtue of a social nature, into an apparatus of voluntary
distribution.
From this area, the second thing that
interested him was the registration of all oppositionists, or sympathizers, or
half-sympathizers, who are at work in various Soviet bodies abroad, mainly in
economic bodies. Concerning this, he said that "I generally think that
this should be the starting point."
The third point in this area, put forward by
Trotsky, was related to money. Here he said that since we are talking about
opposition work for a long time, for years, not only within the framework of
the Soviet regime, but also under the system that will replace it, then very
large money is needed for work, so, approximately, five million to start. This
money must be obtained either by means of expropriation (the word
"expropriation" was not uttered; but, speaking of money, Trotsky said
quite transparently that it must be obtained; Sedov later spoke directly about
expropriation), or by using the opportunities that they had at their disposal
people sympathetic to the opposition who are in Soviet bodies abroad.
Apparently, in this connection he was interested in the fact of the stay of a
number of persons abroad. He asked me if I knew where Putna was. I replied that,
according to my information (before leaving abroad, I accidentally saw Putna),
Putna is in Finland. He was also interested in the mood of Potemkin, the former
consul general in Constantinople, now an adviser in Andorra. He spoke about
Potemkin in some detail, recalled the whole story associated with him. He was
also interested in the location of Goldenshtein, who in 1925 was a resident of
the OGPU in Constantinople. About Goldenshtein, he said that this was his old
friend from the Viennese emigration, that they lived in Vienna in the same
apartment, provided each other with material assistance and all kinds of
services, and that Goldenshtein subsequently kept in touch with him, and when
he left for Turkey, he came to him for a visit and for directives. I told him
that Goldenshtein was in the official post of Consul General in Berlin, and
that he, apparently, was not disposed in opposition.
Trotsky also asked if I knew any of the
oppositionists at the Soviet consulate in Constantinople, what was the mood of
the consulate cell there, and so on. He also wondered whether I know who is now
the military attaché in various parts of Europe and the East. I replied that I
did not know. From his questions in this area, as expected, I got the
impression that he is looking for every opportunity to use his personal
relationships and his old connections in the Soviet apparatus to organize ties
with Russia. He was especially interested in whether there was anyone in this
sense in Paris. Of those whom I knew, I named him Sharmanov, who was there at
the official work of the People's Commissariat for Industry in the position of
Consul General, but at the same time gave an unflattering moral assessment of
Sharmanov, which later really proved to be true in a form that was scandalous
for Sharmanov.
The fourth thing that interested Trotsky was
finding the possibility of establishing direct communication with Russia, he
was interested in the possibility of obtaining any communication among the
crews of ships, Soviet or foreign, plying between Russia and foreign ports.
Regarding the first, I told him that this is a rotten Ropitov public, which
cannot be trusted even in the general Soviet sense, that, with a few
exceptions, these are corrupted semi-smuggling elements. As for foreign ships,
it seems to me that French or Italian comrades should help here. In any case, I
practically do not imagine the possibility of doing anything in these two
directions. I suggested that you need to use some kind of Turkish felucca
making small freight traffic between Turkish ports, for example, Trebizond, and
our ports, Batum or Sukhum, that in general he should instruct someone to
rummage among the semi-smuggling, semi-naval Greek-Turkish human material from
Galata, what you can find there: but this is only part of the task. It is also
necessary to have your own permanent people in the corresponding Soviet points,
as, for example, in Batum, Sukhum or in the Crimea. Later, we returned to the
question of felucca more than once when we met L. Sedov (I will talk about this
below). Then Trotsky touched on some general prospects, favorable or
unfavorable for conspiratorial work in the USSR from abroad. I expressed my
deep doubt to him about the possibility of doing any work from abroad under the
Soviet order. General isolation of the USSR, difficulties and almost
impossibility of obtaining visas, impossibility of free movement from the USSR
abroad and back, as it was before, before the war, the monopoly of foreign
trade, making it impossible for commercial shipments, etc., etc .; all this, I
said, is the strength of the Soviet system, not only in the economic sense, but
also a guarantee against hostile anti-Soviet work. I told him that the
bankruptcy of the ties of the entire counter-revolutionary emigration is also
determined, in particular, by these same facts. Trotsky agreed with this, but
in contrast to this he put forward another feature of the Soviet system, as
favorable for conspiratorial work. This feature, he said, is that before the
revolution it was impossible to expect to find such a huge number of
sympathetic elements that could be used to work in the pores of the government itself.
This, he said, is our capital, which must be used in every possible way. that
before the revolution it was impossible to expect to find such a huge number of
sympathetic elements that could be used to work in the times of the government
apparatus itself. This, he said, is our capital, which must be used in every
possible way.
It goes without saying that the party and the
OGPU will draw appropriate conclusions from all these plans, but one
conclusion, the socio-political one, later became clear to me. The base of
possibilities on which he (Trotsky - OM) thought to build his work from abroad
in the USSR is catastrophically limited and associated with methods of a
semi-adventurous, sabotage nature.
True, the case took place in April, two months
after his expulsion (as we will see later, the situation had not improved by
August).
In general, I had an idea of complete
helplessness and hopelessness.
Separately, Trotsky paused on the question of
keeping me for work. He expressed the idea that I should not arouse any
suspicion about Trotskyism and that it would be nice in general if the GPU used
the fact of my stay in Constantinople to instruct me to cover it (Trotsky). I
replied that, firstly, I myself would not go for it, and, secondly, knowing me
and my attitude towards Trotsky (now it has already irrevocably passed), the
comrades from the OGPU would react to my readiness to do such work, as a kind
of psychological surprise. This moment in our conversation was a moment that
flashed as if in passing. This completes the practical and main part of our
conversation.
In the future, we agreed that I would get
acquainted with the opposition literature unknown to me and would think out the
problems concerning which I confessed to Trotsky in my great doubts about the
correctness of their interpretation by the opposition (the question of the
peasantry, etc.). It was decided that I would keep in touch through Lev
Lvovich, and that our meetings should be organized with "scientific
secrecy." Trotsky was afraid of being discredited by the fact if it were
revealed that he was connected with an illegal employee of the GPU.
He also outlined the prospects for my literary
collaboration with him, saying that he was going to publish a small organ for
Russia with a release about once or twice a month. He counted on my active
cooperation in it. On this we parted.
For the public around Trotsky, my visit was
explained as the visit of a publisher who came to him with an offer to purchase
from him all his autobiographies and some works for publication in Hebrew,
although no one except Lev Sedov and Trotsky saw me.
My overall impression of our date was very
controversial. I remember that I was particularly struck by his thought about
the possibility of the fall of the Soviet regime, but his personal charm and
the dramatic atmosphere of his life, full of insecurity, individual cleverly
slipped political fears - all this excited me in my then state.
From those impressions that are of a certain
political interest, I can reconstruct the following.
During that period, his actions proceeded
along four lines - first, his personal structure; secondly, in restoring ties
with the corresponding political aggregates of Trotskyism abroad; third, the
restoration of communication with the USSR and, fourth, the organization of
information.
In the first respect, he was busy with feverish
negotiations and relations with German, French and American publishing houses.
Representatives of German and French publishing houses came to him, with whom
he agreed on the publication of some of his works.
On the second line, he corresponded with his
supporters in Germany and France; in the latter, mainly with Rosmer. By this
time, the latter had managed to do something for him, and in practice, Rosmer
sent him several French comrades (5-6) who lived with Trotsky in the apartment,
helped him work, communicate with the outside world and carried his guard, he
himself I worked with them. As for the third - ties with the USSR, there was
the weakest point, and my appearance was greeted as the main hope. In this
part, he mainly made plans, practically having nothing. His communication by
this time was limited to correspondence, mostly by telegraph, with his
relatives in Moscow. The correspondence went to the name of Lev Lvovich's wife,
Anna Samoilovna Sedova, who lives in the CEC house, in the famous apartment
number 101.
In the fourth respect, the case was presented
most ideally. He established direct contacts with all foreign correspondents in
Constantinople and turned them into a kind of press office. As soon as he
needed to make something public, create another sensation, he immediately
gathered these bourgeois journalists and inspired them accordingly. He told me
about his relationship with these journalists.
In the matter of his personal arrangement, he
had the hope of obtaining a visa to some of the European countries. Rosmer
wrote to him that it might be possible to arrange a visa to Holland. He was
terribly burdened by his stay in Turkey, mainly because he was cut off from the
Western European labor movement.
A few days later I met with Lev Lvovich. This
meeting, as well as the following meetings, were generally few in number, had
no practical character, because I could do nothing practical, being completely
isolated from the Soviet apparatus. The main purpose of this meeting was to
provide me with opposition literature.
I received from him, Trotsky, six articles
published during this time in the foreign press, and later works: "What's
next," "Who leads the Comintern," "Letter to a benevolent
party member," "The collapse of the center-right bloc," and two
three small articles.
Sedov was very interested in the possibility
of getting at least some Trotskyist at the consulate, at the Soviet Trade Fleet
or at the Trade Mission. A few words should be said here about the general
nature of all our meetings.
There was always a grain of practicality in
them, which was expressed only in the receipt and return of opposition
literature by me. For the rest, the content of these meetings consisted of
memories, experiences of what was happening, the exchange of everyday
impressions and the communication of news from Trotsky's life (chances for a
visa, literary work, relations with the Turkish police) and plans, plans,
plans.
Reading opposition literature kept me in the
opposition spirit and, as it were, prolonged my purely emotional experience of
Trotsky's fate.
Thus, from the motley content of my
conversations with Sedov, I will now select and systematize only what was
practical in them and what may be of certain interest.
The servants who were recommended to him by
Comrade Minsky when Trotsky was still living in the consulate, they considered
to be an informant for the OGPU. Sedov said that they tried not to speak in her
presence, hiding materials from her, but could not refuse her, since she was
Russian and knew Russian.
Once Sedov confessed to me that he had a
sympathetic boyfriend at the consulate who was helping him, and with whom he
sometimes slept.
At one of the meetings, Sedov informed me that
Yefim Dreitser had died of a hunger strike in Tobolsk isolation ward. This news
shocked me. Dreitser was my comrade in the army, in the 27th division, in which
he was the military commissar, and I was the chief of staff and commander of
the 79th brigade. I loved Dreitzer very much and, at Trotsky's suggestion,
wrote about him, and not so much about him as about Dreitzer's generation, an
article signed "Svoy", which was to be translated into German and
French and published in some opposition organs. This was my second and last
literary contribution.
At one of the meetings, Sedov told me that
Trotsky is concerned about the release of Bordiga, whom he considers in
international Trotskyism, after himself, a decisive figure. Bordiga is
imprisoned on some island in Italy, his term will soon expire, and Mussolini
will probably not release him, but will mechanically extend the term of
Bordiga's stay in prison, and that Trotsky, in this regard, is thinking of
arranging an escape for Bordiga; so, would I agree to take on such a mission. I
replied that the release of a revolutionary from a fascist prison is a good
thing, that, of course, I would take part in such a case, but in practice I
cannot do this, since I am connected with work, yes, and, besides, I doubt that
it would be possible perform a similar operation. To this I was answered that
this case could be formulated solidly, with the participation of the Italian
comrades;
At one of the meetings, Sedov told me that
they receive information from Russia through Berlin, mainly through Paris; that
they received a letter from Russia, from exile, directly to Constantinople,
addressed to them; that they are in correspondence with their family in Moscow;
that Trotsky would very much like to get Poznansky and Sermukov - his former
secretaries, that the OGPU promised to release them, but now he is not letting
them in.
Sedov also told me that the writer Panait
Istratiy, who had returned from the USSR, was passing through either Norway or
Holland, feeling the ground regarding Trotsky’s admission there, but that he
could not, due to his impracticality, bring this matter to an end, and that
there is hope to do this with the help of the French comrades. The fact that
Panait Istratii opposed them abroad, I learned only after my arrival in the
USSR.
Repeatedly Sedov expressed fears about the
possibility of an attempt on Trotsky's life and, once, asked me for detailed
instructions on how to organize his protection. I did it. He said that you need
to have at least 8 people for security. Advised him about night and day shifts,
about filtering visitors, about Trotsky's exits to the city, apartment layout,
etc. Great hopes were expressed by Sedov for obtaining visas in the event that
MacDonald's cabinet came to power in England. It happened just during the
election campaign in England. This question was probed by Trotsky at the Sydney
Web, who specially came with his wife to Constantinople to meet with Trotsky. I
remember that I protested about the reception of the Sydney Web, I was even
going to tell Trotsky about it.
By this time, Trotsky had moved (this took
place in July) to the Princes' Islands, to the Prinkino Island. Sedov himself
repeatedly planned to travel to Europe and the USSR, probed the soil and asked
my opinion about whether he would be given a visa. He was personally sure of
obtaining a visa to the USSR.
Once Sedov told me that among the French
communists sent by Rosmer there was a very useful person. The specialty of this
man was that he had a bureau in Paris that was engaged in the rationalization
of the apparatus in unprofitable small trade and industrial enterprises, that
he was a very businesslike man with great connections, that Trotsky was going
to engage in business operations through him, and that the moral of this fable
is this: could I use this person for myself. I refused this, firstly, because I
treated with great distrust of the public that surrounded Trotsky, and,
secondly, because I firmly set myself the task of keeping my work and my
enterprises completely secret from anyone. was not.
In the same way, Sedov once told me that they
had one person sent to Palestine from the USSR through the Comintern or the
Profintern, but it was also reported that Rosmer and his wife had come to
Trotsky and that the French government had refused Rosmer a foreign passport.
...
At one of our meetings, Sedov returned to the
issue of purchasing a felucca. By this time, I was also interested in the
affairs of my main work, since all the time I wanted to emancipate myself from
postal communication with our legal apparatus and studied the possibilities of communication
in case of war, I collected all the necessary information. The possibility of
acquiring a felucca was quite real; it was possible to put it on the Trebizond,
Batum or Sukhum line in the same way; it was possible to have someone in the
composition of a very small, felucca, team, if such a person was found with
Trotsky.
Sedov told me that Trotsky decided to carry on
work from Turkey only if he did not stay in Turkey; if he loses any hope of
being admitted to one of the European countries and settles in Turkey, he will
have to carefully consider in what form it will be possible for him to conduct
work from Turkey. This question was connected with those guarantees of loyalty
to his behavior in Turkey, which he repeatedly gave to the Turkish authorities
in order to get them a free regime.
From the conversation with Sedov, the
hopelessness of the situation with communications in the USSR followed with
undoubted certainty, although during this period they received information from
the USSR twice.
It was already said above that my first
meeting with Trotsky took place on April 16, on May 30 I left deep in the East.
Thus, my relationship in the first period lasted for a month and a half; at
this time, no more than five or six meetings took place, the nature of which I
have elucidated above. It goes without saying that I could not do anything
practical during this period, in fact, speaking, it was a connection of
acquaintance, not work. At the same time, during this period, I only met two or
three times with a representative of our apparatus, and the very nature of the
meetings, short and exclusively businesslike, excluded any possibility of their
use on my part.
During one of the meetings I received from
Sedov a note from Kamenev's well-known conversation with Bukharin. Since the
entire political background, the entire class side of the disagreements that
Bukharin had and the party had and still has, remained in the shadows from me,
it is natural that this document made a heavy impression on me. I just sobbed
over this document. My assistant comrade Shin is a witness to this.
The social meaning of the disagreements in the
Politburo between the majority of the Central Committee and the group of
Bukharin and Tomsky eluded me, and it seemed to me that the struggle against
the "Rights" was an organizational process, and not a manifestation
of the deeply principled Leninist line of the Central Committee. These
ambiguities delayed for some time the elimination of my last opposition doubts.
Throughout this period, I never for a minute
abandoned the interests of the business. I spent two and a half months in a
number of Eastern countries, working feverishly, which resulted in well-known
results. Of course, Trotsky knew that I was abroad through the GPU, he knew it
for a long time. Thus, of course, he had a very general idea of the nature of
my work, but that was all. I kept my practical work completely secret.
In general, purely businesslike devotion to
the work that was entrusted to me, with my personal vacillations between the
Trotskyist opposition and the party, coexisted in me quite in parallel. It
seems to me that psychologically it is quite acceptable, and this is an
objective guarantee of my sincerity when I say this.
I also introduced the opposition literature I
received to my assistant, Comrade Shin, a former member of the French Communist
Party, a friend of my childhood and youth, I took to Paris, a characterization
of which I gave in due time, and which I presented in January to Comrade
Velizhev. The latter approved it.
I must say that Comrade Shin is an excellent
revolutionary material and is heroically devoted to our cause; he gave in to
oppositional treatment with great difficulty; he put forward purely logical
considerations that without being in the USSR, not knowing all the party
argumentation and practice, he could not immediately take the one-sided point
of view of the opposition. He, of course, was impressed by the purely outward
revolutionary imposingness of Trotskyist criticism and personally the complex
figure of Trotsky.
At some of my last meetings with Lev Sedov,
Comrade Shin was present. At my suggestion, he arranged a meeting with Trotsky.
It goes without saying that he, too, succumbed to a certain kind of poison from
Trotsky's personal impression.
When I left for the East, not yet having the
strength to vomit, I instructed Shin to meet with Lev Sedov, but the most
limited number of times, in no case revealing himself. In this area, I gave him
very tough and threatening directives. For two and a half months they met, as I
learned about it on my arrival, three times. I am entirely responsible for the
Trotskyism of Comrade. Shina, and I have no doubt that his departure from the
purely emotional feelings of Trotskyism will not meet with great difficulties;
all of this is based on the fragile film of personal feelings.
I returned to Constantinople on August 5, I
immediately sent a telegram to Moscow about the need, on a number of
organizational issues, of my work and on the basis of fresh material from my
eastern trip, a direct meeting with Comrade Trilisser.
I affirm with all sincerity and categoricality
that I did not adjust the necessity of my visit to the USSR to the need for
opposition work. Fortunately for me, I can assert this not only by referring to
my sincerity, but also on the basis of some evidence. Back in January, before
Trotsky's exile, this is not difficult to trace in my letters, I raised the
question, depending on some organizational issues, about my recall. It is not
difficult to inquire with Comrade Velizhev that when we saw him in January, I personally
raised the question of my recall before him, again depending on some
organizational issues. And in February, before my departure to Europe, where I
learned about the expulsion of Trotsky, I raised the same question in one of my
letters in the same way. Finally, in April, from Constantinople, I sent a
telegram in which I argued that further work rests on the question of a
technical worker, and if it is not resolved, I categorically refuse to continue
my stay in Constantinople at all. Finally, the very character of my telegram
asking permission to come was devoid of any categorical nature.
That I was leaving for the USSR, I informed
Lev Sedov and, succumbing to the inertia of vacillation, I accepted from him
the instruction to convey Trotsky's letters to Moscow. I had to pass these
letters to one of the following four persons: Anna Samoilovna Sedova (Lev
Sedov's wife), whom I had to find in GUM, in one of the NKPS institutes where
she works, or Trotsky's daughter, or her husband Volkov, whom he was supposed
to find through a certain Dudel, who lives in the house of the Mossovet on
Gnezdnikovsky lane. in No. 912. At the same time, I received one copy of the
brochure What Happened and How, which was on sale in all the bookstores of
Constantinople, and one copy of the Opposition Bulletin, No. 1-2, printed in
Paris.
On the day of my departure, I had a last
conversation with Lev Sedov, who conveyed to me the following: "The main
task is communication and communication again." Those sitting in Moscow
should take care to establish contact with Constantinople by all possible means
- through Riga, Europe and directly with Constantinople. Of Trotsky's
directives, the main thing was that it was necessary to finally take shape,
that the state of affairs in the international Trotskyist organization is very
pessimistic, that there are hundreds of shades between different groups of
Trotskyists in individual countries, and that the number of shades increases
even more when it comes to the consolidation of Trotskyist groups. different
countries among themselves, that the main fragmentation and squabbles - in
France; that there is almost no one to rely on. As for Germany, Urbane is
right-wing, and, in general,
The letters themselves were written in a
chemical way on the pages of two books I gave to the OGPU.
In confirmation of receipt, Anna Samoilovna
had to send a telegram with a conditional signature. To prove that I am a
trustworthy person, I did not receive any password, but had to remind her that
she was bringing mail from Alma-Ata in a pillow. In the event of my return to
Constantinople, I had to bring the information that Anna Samoilovna would give
me. At my own discretion, I had to meet with those persons whom Anna Samoilovna
would have indicated to me in Moscow. The whole assignment boiled down to this:
it was purely informational and postal and did not contain any active or
organizational tasks.
Here I must note that during my two and a half
months in the East, I did not have the opportunity to observe Trotsky's speeches
on such issues as the day of August 1, and, on the other hand, such facts as
the departure of a number of individuals and groups from the opposition. ...
On August 10, I left Constantinople and on the
14th arrived in Moscow.
The very atmosphere of the USSR immediately
began to sober me up, and I decided to refrain from fulfilling the assignment
until I thoroughly figured out what was happening in the country. I left the
USSR in September 28, arrived in August 29, - almost a year later, during this
period, on the one hand, completely divorced from the reality of the Soviet
Union, from the life of the party and, on the other hand, subjected to an
emotional impression from expulsion of Trotsky. It became clear to me that a
year in the life of the Soviet Union is a very significant fact. Gradually I
became convinced that the struggle against the Rights is an expression of the
general Leninist policy of the Party, and that my impressions, taken from the
recording of a conversation between Kamenev and Bukharin about the
organizational character of this struggle, are wrong impressions. I made sure
that the self-criticism proclaimed in the spring of 1928 made tremendous
strides and began to go more and more from the bottom up, that the party is
pursuing a truly class, deeply Leninist policy in the countryside. A policy in
which administrative measures against the resisting kulaks are combined with a
deep digging under the foundations of capitalism in agriculture in the form of
energetic collective and state farm development. On the other hand, the success
of the spring sowing campaign of 1929 convinced me this party policy in the
countryside by no means leads to processes dangerous for agriculture, as the
"rightists" shouted about it.
On the question of industrialization, it
became clear to me that the maximum course had been taken for
industrialization, the inflection of which would simply contradict the
objective resources of the Soviet economy at its present stage.
The more I thought about the five-year plan
for the development of the national economy, the more it became clear to me
that this was not only a plan for the socialist reconstruction of the Russian
economy, but, in a way, a five-year plan of struggle.
Compared to the truly revolutionary atmosphere
that I felt in the country, in its economic process and people, in the new
forms of involving the masses (socialist competition, etc.), Trotsky's phrase
about the Thermidorian smell beating in the nose seemed to me a nasty
feuilleton.
In whatever area I thought about the previous
oppositional moods, I came to the conclusion that reality laughed at them
cruelly.
When I compared the analysis of the opposition
in the spring and summer of 1927 with this picture, it became quite clear to me
that the opposition underestimated the Party and its Central Committee and,
deeply, in all its fears and apprehensions, had gone bankrupt. Against the background
of this picture, which I saw in the USSR, it seemed to me spiteful and
ridiculous the expectation of the fall of the Soviet regime. The collapse of
the opposition added to this picture.
Of course, I did not come to these conclusions
right away, it took a month and a half to get acquainted with literature and
life. Acquaintance with the transcript of the April 1929 plenum of the Central
Committee and the Central Control Commission, which took place at the time when
I was abroad subjected to a relapse of Trotskyism, played a decisive role in
eliminating my internal vacillations.
About a month ago, when I was still in a state
of vacillation, a certain Plomper, a former party member expelled for the
Trotskyist opposition (deputy director of GOSET), whom I had known since 1926,
came to see me. He was the only oppositionist whom I have met since my arrival
from abroad.
The duality of my inner state was also
expressed in my attitude to Plomper. I took the party and the general line
under frenzied protection, then I gave in to some of the secondary, mainly
moral, arguments of Plomper. Plomper himself was in an illegal position,
behaved very carefully with me, limiting himself to stating that he was
connected with some illegal remnants of the opposition. I provided Pomper with
personal material support, several times left him to spend the night at my
place. To my former comrades, I introduced him as Finkelstein. Having learned
from him that the brochures "What and How Happened" and Bulletin No.
1-2 had already leaked from abroad to the USSR, I gave the two copies I had,
one and the other, for him to read, subject to return, he told me did not
return them. I learned from Plomper that he has the opportunity to reprint,
Plomper, of course, did not know that I was connected
with Trotsky and where I came from.
Once, at the moment of another hesitation, I
sent him with letters to Anna Samoilovna, but he could not find her, and I took
the books back from him, under the pretext that I would give them personally to
another person.
From the moment when I finally came to the
above political conclusions, I began to experience painful hesitation on the
question of the form of my liquidation of any relation to Trotskyism. A
multitude of psychological prejudices prevented me from immediately finding a
direct path to this elimination. I justified Plekhanov's famous expression that
we are very often socialists in ideology and petty bourgeois in psychology.
This gap between the final political conclusion and the psychological sensation,
it became the reason for my, already different, non-political throwing. My
condition was complicated by my purely business situation. Above, I have
already said that at the same time my concern for my work was getting along
with the political mood.
On the business side, in view of the great
importance attached to Comrade. Menzhinsky and Comrade Trilisser to the results
and prospects of my work, I was at the stage of great organizational
preparation for the development of the work done, I found and prepared people,
sent them abroad, deeply and sincerely was fond of fulfilling a large plan of
our work in the east, part of which was implemented over the past year. It was
very difficult for me to think that if I did not conceal from the GPU the
renewal of my connection with Trotsky, then the work, which to a very large
extent depended on me personally, would suffer from this. At the same time, I
understood that it was impossible to hide the above facts from the GPU and the
party. Added to this was the fear that at a time when I was deeply, finally
decided without a trace to sweep out of myself all the Trotskyist nonsense -
they might not believe me, they might treat me formally. I was afraid that my
older comrades would follow the analogy with the past of my political and
physical youth. As luck would have it, the period of these doubts coincided
with a somewhat dry, cruel, as it seemed to me, attitude towards me on a purely
business basis by Comrade. Trilisser, one of the few comrades in the GPU, who
studied me well personally. Another comrade to whom I could reveal all my
experiences, Comrade Menzhinsky, was ill, and besides, I was frightened by the
thought of causing him in his painful state a new burden. Comrade Berry was on
vacation. to whom I could reveal all my experiences, Comrade Menzhinsky, was
ill, and besides, I was frightened by the thought of causing him in his painful
state a new burden. Comrade Berry was on vacation.
All these psychological contradictions led me
to become incredibly entangled in my own hesitation. All this led to the fact
that, despite the repeated insistence of Comrade. Trilisser to go abroad, I
delayed my departure, as I felt very badly burdened by such a load. In the end,
I decided to complete the work I had begun, to seat, where necessary, all the
new workers I received, for which I would ask Comrade Trilisser to send me
abroad, accompanied by the deputy for no more than 2-3 months necessary for
such an operation, so that after this time I turn over the affairs to this
deputy and return back. With the appropriate request, I am to Comrade.
Trilisser and turned. He promised to have a serious talk with me on this topic
(it was not so long ago), but we did not manage to talk.
Even abroad, I had the idea of meeting with
some of the leading comrades from among the departed. When, upon arrival in the
USSR, I learned that Comrade. Radek in Moscow (I had reason to regard Radek as
my old and good comrade), I rushed to him, but learned that he was away in
Zheleznovodsk.
Comrade Radek rushed to Moscow not so long
ago, just in time for the aforementioned moment of my throwing. I came to him
in order to learn from him about the final position of Ivan Nikitich Smirnov
and others, and in order to tell him in the order of old factional relations
that I had finally decided to move away from any half-hearted conciliatory
relationship to the opposition. Being extremely depressed and exhausted by my
experiences, I could not resist talking with Radek within the framework of a
purely informational message and revealed to him, as they say, my whole aching
soul. Radek advised me not to postpone my confession until my return from
abroad and out of my purely personal friendly frankness (he gave me my word
that our conversation would be deeply personal) began to do a factional matter.
He directed me to Comrade. Smilga, who knew me from the PURU and the 19 front.
After a conversation with Comrade Smilga and a second conversation with Radek,
I felt that I was being drawn into some new factional game. This completely
disorganized me, and I became nervously ill.
In this state, I shared my experiences with my
great friend, an employee of the INO - comrade. Gorskoy. She observed my
condition and can characterize it. This seasoned party comrade and an
impeccable Chekist advised me to immediately go to the Central Control
Commission or the GPU with direct admission of my mistakes. Several days ago I
phoned Comrade Solts, asking him to be received along with Ordzhonikidze, which
Comrade Solts refused to do. In the end, I decided to write about everything to
Comrade. Trilisser, and in a state of nervous illness I decided to leave
somewhere for a while.
On the 15th, I put all my affairs and papers
in order, wrote the letter you know to Comrade Trilisser. At the very last
moment, at half past eleven in the night, I called com. Gorskaya to the
apartment in which I was staying in order to consult with her again. She
advised me to immediately report to Comrade. Trilisser. I went with her to the
Kazansky railway station to find out if there was a train to Rostov, I came
back and, in the end, ordered the driver to go to the GPU.
To the proletariat and to the Communist Party,
I, like many, came from the petty-bourgeois and objectively
counter-revolutionary party of the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, in which I
was a member at a very young age (I was not yet 18 years old). As a member of
this party eleven years ago, I already once, in immeasurably more active and
dangerous forms for the Soviet Republic, used the apparatus of the Cheka on the
orders of my party ...
When I became convinced of the
counterrevolutionary nature of the Left Socialist-Revolutionary
"policy", I voluntarily appeared with complete surrender to the Soviet
regime. No one can doubt how deeply and how often over all these years I was
more than once ready to sacrifice and sacrificed my life for the interests of
the Communist Party and the Soviet revolution. You, comrade. Agranov, you know
this well.
Until 1927, I was not a member of any
opposition groups, either directly or indirectly. Eleven years have passed and
on a new basis, to an immeasurably lesser degree and form, as a representative
of another petty-bourgeois, objectively counter-revolutionary deviation of the
proletarian revolution, the Trotskyist deviation, I again intended to put
factional discipline above general Party and general Soviet discipline. It
became clear to me that, to some extent, it was no coincidence that these
inclinations coincided and crossed on me, and I decided firmly, without the
slightest remnants, relying on the results of these two years, to sweep out of
myself the rotting rump of emotionality, etc. garbage that prevented me from
completely and completely merging with the batch.
I ask the Party and the OGPU to give me
confidence in this, my second, after such a long period, the last hesitation.
The only guarantee that I can give is that I will try to justify this trust in
practice, to an even greater extent than I did when moving from the Left
Socialist-Revolutionaries to Bolshevism. The process of forming a revolutionary
Bolshevik consciousness and character and acquiring a temper is a complex
process. The last obstacle and the last barrier that I overcame in this process
was my half-Trotskyism. I declare with conviction that I now belong to the
Party from head to toe, and that in the struggle that lies ahead of it, in
diabolically difficult and difficult conditions, the struggle for the general
line, which will have to be wrested with blood from the capitalist elements of
town and country, for preparation, organization and development of the
international revolution, for the defense of the USSR, the party can dispose of
me without reserve, as a disciplined party member. I not only completely, on
all points, break with the opposition, but I am ready at the first order of the
party in the form in which it deems it necessary, to the best of my ability to
wage an active struggle against this opposition.
(Ya.G. Blumkin)
Directive letter from L. D. Trotsky
The letter is written in the hand of L. L.
Sedov, in chemical ink on the margins of Aldanov's book
"Contemporaries". The book was brought from Constantinople by Ya. G.
Blumkin.
About the renegade of Radek and company T.
wrote an article - "A pitiful document", which is published in three
languages.
According to all data, the coming autumn will
be a crisis one. Preparation for it presupposes merciless exposure and cutting
off of the capitulators.
An important private task is to create correct
and lasting relationships with us.
It is necessary to send one or two people for
organizational work in Berlin and Paris. The best of any of the serious exiles.
The Parisian Kharin played the role of a
provocateur: he took the documents for printing and handed them over to the
embassy, we had copies. Work in the field of foreign opposition is
progressing slowly.
On September 1, the weekly Veriti (Truth) is
published in Paris, edited by Rosemer, with the participation of active young
people of our direction. On October 1, an international magazine, Opposition
(monthly), will be published in Paris, for the time being in French. Only with
the release of these publications will the work acquire a systematic character,
moreover, political, and not only propaganda.
Numerous small groups became a direct obstacle
to the movement (including the lifeless groups of Tran and Paz). We put the
publication without them. All living things from their groups will join.
Therefore, do not be surprised or frightened by possible top regroupings and
desertions. There are Radeks and half-Radeks here as well. The most important
thing now is to have a weekly publication that will provide our coverage of all
the events in the world. Urbahns is not our man. This is a confused and not a loyal
person, i.e. spoiled by the Zinoviev school. He vacillates between Brandler and
Korsh, and in practical work he chases after a cheap sensation. There is a
struggle of currents in the Leninbund. We need a serious weekly newspaper in
German.
We will put it (a German weekly) after the
French editions. And in Germany one should not be intimidated by the inevitable
top reshuffles. Live and active groups in Belgium and America S. Almost all
groups took the wrong position on the issue of the Sino-Soviet conflict. We
will criticize them openly and decisively. There are three groups in Austria.
Frey's group remains on the sidelines. In Czecho-Slovakia, our group is
starting to publish a document, ties are being established with South America.
Do not send documents through Urbahns. He is
also not loyal to transmission and reproduction in print. Send us directly to
girlfriends addresses (see below).
Addresses:
Paul Joseph 105, Rue des Boulets Paris 1 le
Jacques Andre Boiffard Paris 22 Boulevard
Barbis
Frau Martha Natarsohn Liechtenstein str 123
Wien IX
Fr Kaissa Mechelsohn Stanislausg 2/15 Wien III
All these addresses are for a visit and for
letters to chemical and others.
Berlin has a good address for visitors, not
for letters:
Frau A Pfemfert Nassauische str 17 Berlin
Wilmersdorf
Send us more than ten - twenty - thirty
addresses in Moscow and the provinces and Leningrad, indicating what is for
chemistry, what is for sending newsletters, printed materials, etc. We have no
addresses. More reliable addresses. Submit the catalog. Sent, but did not
receive a notification of receipt. Apparently it didn't make it. Encrypt
carefully.
Confirm this receipt in Aki's telegram with
the same conventional word that was in Alma-Ata. Word before signature.
Greetings.
RGASPI. F. 17. On. 171, D. 136, L. 94-126.
Script.
Typescript. Published: Mozokhin O. Confessions
of a terrorist // Military-Historical Archive. 2002. No. 6 .
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