VOL. XVI (2010), NO 23 - The International Newsletter of Communist ...

The International Newsletter of Communist Studies Online XVI (2010), no. 23 83
los Rios as well as the trade union leaders Daniel Anguiano (a socialist) and Angel Pestaña
(an anarchist). 14 The socialist and anarchist forces in the organized trade unions were more
or less equal. Both groups were supported by important regions: while the socialists
dominated the workers movement of Basque Country, Asturias and Madrid, the anarchists
had their “fortresses” in Catalonia. This balance of power might be the main reason for
Borodin’s unwillingness to make a decision in favor of one side.
There existed no communist nucleus in Spain at that moment, and Borodin’s goal was to
create such a nucleus. He started some negotiations with the militants of the Partido
Socialista Obrero de España (PSOE) in Madrid who wished to affiliate with the 3 rd
International, and promised them to grant “fraternal aid” as soon as the Communist Party has
been founded. 15 However, the archive documents show that Borodin did not expect the CP
to appear immediately.
On January 4, 1920, the Soviet emissary sent a report on the activities he had carried out to
the head of the Amsterdam Bureau of the Comintern. “Things look very bright indeed”, he
wrote: “The Mexican Socialist Party, now the Communist Party, has declared for the Third
International. In Cuba a Communist Section has been organized. In both these places great
enthusiasm is displayed. Also, in Mexico a bureau has been formed for the purpose of calling
a Latin American Congress, delegates to come from North, Central and South America and
from the West Indies”. 16
In the same report Borodin began to describe the situation in Spain as he saw it: The
congress of the “Federation of Socialist Youths, […] by an overwhelming majority has
declared for the Third [International]. As to the Spanish Socialist Labor Party the situation is
different. At the congress of the party the Old Guard succeeded […] in creating a fiction,
which, like all fictions is very attractive to children. – We are not going to join the second
[International], was the tenor of it. […] We shall tell the ‘revolutionary elements’ of the Second
[International] to follow us to the Third [International], and if they refuse we shall tell them
what we think of them and depart for Moscow. Very dramatic, is it not?” 17
The Soviet emissary observed many militants of the Socialist Youth who believed this story,
although they had voted for the affiliation with the Comintern. He was quite sure that the
underlying motive for such thoughts was “the desire of the Left Wingers to maintain unity of
the party at all costs” together with the left wingers’ isolation from international connections:
they “have not heard anything from the Bureau of the Third [International]. All they ever
received (and that came indirectly) was the Manifesto [of the First Congress of the
Comintern], which they published and which gave them some ground to stand on”. Borodin
saw the lack of material resources as the left wingers had no press of their own and “no
organization of any sort to defend their policy”. The PSOE newspaper was restricting the
access for the left opposition to publish their opinions and information. Another newspaper
(“Nuestra Palabra”) was, in fact, dedicated exclusively to the defense of Bolshevism, but it
was in no way connected with the Socialist party. 18
In such a situation Borodin started to organize a bureau (or a news agency) with the purpose
of “keeping in constant touch with the international situation”, and his conviction was that the
14 Angel Pestaña attended the Second congress of the Comintern in 1920.
15 Joaquín Maurín: Sur le communisme en Espagne. As cited in: Lazitch/Drachkovitch, Op. cit., p. 153.
16 M. Borodin to S.J. Rutgers, January 4, 1920. RGASPI, 497/2/1, 1.
17 Ibid., l. 1-2.
18 Ibid., l. 2.