rare Karl Radek w

I translated The Communist Manifesto, focusing on clarity and inclusiveness. I hope you like it!

“Later, Trotsky would observe that a debilitated autocracy got the enfeebled autocrat it deserved.” — Stephen Kotkin, Stalin, Volume One: Paradoxes of Power, 1878-1928

Nikita Khrushchev, 1956

“The Marxist doctrine is omnipotent because it is true. It is comprehensive and harmonious, and provides men with an integral world outlook irreconcilable with any form of superstition, reaction, or defence of bourgeois oppression. It is the legitimate successor to the best that man produced in the nineteenth century, as represented by German philosophy, English political economy and French socialism.” — V.I. Lenin

Today marks the anniversary of the Bolshevik uprising that began on January 29, 1918 at the Arsenal Factory in Kiev. Although the revolt was suppressed, the workers were commemorated by the Soviet Union. The uprising is the subject of “Arsenal,” a 1929 Soviet film by Alexander Dovzhenko.

Are all fascist Nazi’s, because I’m not really sure what a fascist is

Fascism is a political ideology characterized by dictatorial power, extreme nationalism, suppression of political opposition, and often a merger of state and corporate power. Nazism, on the other hand, specifically refers to Hitler's Nazi Party in Germany. While sharing some features with fascism, Nazism includes elements of racial purity and anti-Semitism as fundamental tenets. Notably, the Italian fascists (who preceded Hitler and who Hitler admired) did not share the Nazis' obsession with race (but ultimately went along with it).

hello comrade! i was wondering if you plan on translating all four episodes of 20th December, i think it is excellent that you are translating it! cheers

Yes, that is the plan, but it will take me a long, long time. It took me a month to do the first episode and that was with a lot of time off. But I do plan to do all the episodes.

As a heads up, the Western propaganda machine is going to be much worse. Now that there's confirmation that South Africa are preparing to take Britain and the United States to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for complicity in the State of Israel’s war crimes and genocide on Gaza- we think that it's important to note that it's almost like clockwork that the propaganda machine will skyrocket with new anti-Palestinian resistance defamation and unfounded allegations levied to further hostility within our already divided communities.

Read more on South Africa's proposal here:

News sourced from Anadolu Ajansı.

It’s a no-brainer that we’ll see a sharp rise in pro-Israel propaganda, and it’s highly likely that there’ll be a crackdown on pro-Palestinian and anti-Zionist rallying. You see, the Capitalist hegemony is almost ridiculously predictable once you figure out how it functions and operates; the historical cycle of committing atrocities and subsequently excusing themselves with absurd lies of brainwashing propaganda. The United States and United Kingdom will certainly not take kindly to South Africa's intention to charge them in this international lawsuit- thus they will need a retaliation that gains more favour for them from the general public.

Expect more confounded accusations of antisemitism and Jew-hatred imposed on celebrities, organisations, journalists, even nations. Expect more fascist laws passed to silence Palestinian resistance support, and more Islamophobic fear-mongering.

Propaganda is not always easy to spot and deconstruct, so be sure to stay vigilant and think critically in context of current events. However the Imperial core are growing weaker, with such incredible numbers, millions of people, showing support to Palestine internationally- we are no longer easily fooled by their usual tactics. In the putrid face of propaganda, the Palestinian resistance still persists.

"Out of the real power of society over external nature and social forces there follows another feature of ideology of the new world, viz., the complete absence of all fetishism, the purity and clearness of knowledge and the emancipation of the mind from all the fruits of mysticism and metaphysics. The last traces of natural fetishism will disappear, and this will reflect the final overthrow of both the domination of external nature over man and the social fetishism reflecting the domination of the elemental forces of society; the power of the market and competition will be uprooted and destroyed. Consciously and systematically organising his struggle against the elements of nature, social man will have no need for idols which are the personification of a sense of helplessness in the face of the insuperable forces of the surrounding world. The unknown will cease to be unknown because the process of acquiring knowledge – systematic organisation on the basis of organised labour – will be accompanied by a consciousness of strength, a sense of victory, arising from the knowledge that in the living experience of man there are no longer any spheres surrounded by impenetrable walls of mystery. The reign of science will begin and put an end to religion and metaphysics for ever."

-- Alexander Bogdanov, 1919

source: Socially Organised Society: Socialist Society

“Working people of the city of Lenin, join the socialist competition to better prepare your homes for winter!"

V. Selivanov, 1942.

When Soviet President Konstantin Chernenko died, a hastily called meeting of the CPSU Politburo voted five against electing Mikhail Gorbachev as his successor. Coincidentally (?) three opponents of Gorbachev in the Politburo, among whom was Grigori Romanov, were out of town and not present at this all-important meeting and were not notified to come immediately.

Grigori Romanov once was a powerful figure at the highest level of the Soviet State. As a young man during the 1940s, he had fought the Nazi invaders in the defense of Leningrad. A committed Communist, he later rose through the Party ranks to become the head of the Soviet Union’s second-largest city, Leningrad, for 25 years.

In 1983 he was summoned to Moscow by the then president Yuri Andropov and became a member of the CPSU Politburo. When Andropov died in 1984, Konstantin Chernenko took over. But he too was not healthy and passed away the following year. Grigori Romanov was considered one of the two possible successors to Chernenko; the other one was Vladimir Shcherbitsky. "No one seriously considered Gorbachev," says Romanov.

On the day that Chernenko died (March 10, 1985–19.20 hrs) Romanov was in Vilnius, Lithuania with his wife. They had been given a trip to the sanatorium and could only fly back to Moscow on the following day. Two other Politburo members were also at that time out of town; Dinmuhammed Kunaev was in Alma Ata, Kazakhstan and Shcherbitsky was in the United States. If these three members (the usual size of the Politburo is about 14 full members) had been present at the meeting, as they could have been the following day – Gorbachev would never had been elected, says Romanov. "By the time we arrived in Moscow, the very next day, he’d already done it without waiting for us as Politburo rules demanded. That fast! That was it… He’d already cut the deal in secret with all of them. And you think that the timing of Chernenko’s death, I mean, was all accidental? (bid).

The fact that Gorbachev was not even seriously considered as the successor to Chernenko, appears to be supported by an article in 1992 in the New York Transfer News Service, which wrote the following about Gorbachev’s performance:

"When Mikhail Gorbachev was elected General Secretary of the CPSU, he had done little to distinguish himself with his comrades in the Central Committee or later in the Politburo. The highest-ranking job he held was that of a Central Committee secretary in charge of agriculture. He had earlier studied at the Stavropol Agricultural Institute where he obtained a degree in agriculture, to which he later added a degree in law. Thus, he was a lawyer and an agricultural official directly responsible from the Central Committee to the Politburo. His performance until then was, if anything, lackluster. Indeed, his last years in that post were characterized by agricultural failures attributed by the Soviet press to poor weather (!) They certainly did not add to his stature. Nothing he had done could recommend putting him on a pedestal above all the others."

Furthermore, an article in "Time Europe" of January 4, 1988, confirms that Romanov was the chief candidate for the top job.

But Gorbachev and his cabal appeared to have outmaneuvered his rivals. He succeeded because Chernenko died at a moment that his main rivals were out of town, either by pure luck or timing or "in a planned manner", as Romanov seems to suggest by his question – "Was the real timing of Chernenko’s death accidental?" There is no doubt that Chernenko was a sick man which he spent much of his last few months in hospital and that his death was not unexpected. The Soviet news agency TASS later released the text of his medical bulletin, which stated the following "following the manifestations of liver and pulmonary-cardiac insufficiency, Mr. Chernenko’s heart had stopped." But doctors do have a good deal control over the timing of a person’s death. Romanov could be right that the timing was not altogether "accidental".

Tom Paine, writing in the "Cold War Series: Ten Years After" said about Gorbachev: " In order to trump his Politburo rivals, Gorbachev did every wild thing that he could think of, the better to be able to brand them all, quite inaccurately, as reactionaries, as Stalinists. In the process he ruined the Soviet economy, encouraged the nationalities to rise up against his enemies, and inadvertently broke up the Soviet bloc in the attempt to remove Communist leaders who sided with his perceived enemies in Russia. Finally he started the process of breaking up the Soviet Union itself, in April of 1991, by initiating talks on a new Union Treaty. This was done in order to head off an attempt by the loyal members of Central Committee of the CPSU to remove him from power."

Not surprisingly, Romanov does not have a good word to say about Gorbachev. " He will pay for his sins! I can’t stand the sight of his pig’s mug. He’s a traitor A traitor to the Motherland! He’s sniveling about how no one here thanks him, about how ungrateful Russians are to him. To hell with Gorbachev! He started this disaster. He was a catastrophe, an ignorant peasant who had no right to come into the big city…"

And so writes Andrew Meier in "Black Earth":

"Now, in advanced retirement, far from his rarefied life among the Party, Romanov echoed the lament of many a common man in Russia. In the years after the Soviet collapse, he had found company. Romanov has no power now, but he took solace in the knowledge that millions of Russians share his views. His principle conviction – things were much better before – has become the motto of his generation."

Source: https://www.northstarcompass.org/nsc0403/veteran.htm

"Trans rights are human rights!"

Mongolian leader Yumjaagiin Tsedenbal with Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev in 1974

"What is Soviet power? What is the essence of this new power, which people in most countries still will not, or cannot, understand? The nature of this power, which is attracting larger and larger numbers of workers in every country, is the following: in the past the country was, in one way or another, governed by the rich, or by the capitalists, but now, for the first time, the country is being governed by the classes, and moreover, by the masses of those classes, which capitalism formerly oppressed. Even in the most democratic and freest republics, as long as capital rules and the land remains private property, the government will always be in the hands of a small minority, nine-tenths of which consist of capitalists, or rich men.

In this country, in Russia, for the first time in the world history, the government of the country is so organised that only the workers and the working peasants, to the exclusion of the exploiters, constitute those mass organisations known as Soviets, and these Soviets wield all state power. That is why, in spite of the slander that the representatives of the bourgeoisie in all countries spread about Russia, the word "Soviet" has now become not only intelligible but popular all over the world, has become the favourite word of the workers, and of all working people. And that is why, notwithstanding all the persecution to which the adherents of communism in the different countries are subjected, Soviet power must necessarily, inevitably, and in the not distant future, triumph all over the world.

We know very well that there are still many defects in the organisation of Soviet power in this country. Soviet power is not a miracle-working talisman. It does not, overnight, heal all the evils of the past- illiteracy, lack of culture, the consequences of a barbarous war, the aftermath of predatory capitalism. But it does pave the way to socialism. It gives those who were formerly oppressed the chance to straighten their backs and to an ever-increasing degree to take the whole government of the country, the whole administration of the economy, the whole management of production, into their own hands.

Soviet power is the road to socialism that was discovered by the masses of the working people, and that is why it is the true road, that is why it is invincible."