Chomsky on Anarchism.pdf - Zine Library

CHOMSKY ON ANARCHISM
At the outbreak of the Fascist revolt the labor organizations and
the democratic elements in the country were in agreement that
the so-called Nationalist Revolution, which threatened to
plunge our people into an abyss of deepest misery, could be haIred
only by a Social Revolution. The Communist Parry, however,
opposed rhis view wirh all irs might. It had apparently completely
forgotten its old theories of a "workers' and peasants'
republic" and a "dictatorship of the proletariat." From its constant
repetition of its new slogan of the parliamentary democratic
republic it is clear that it has lost all sense of reality. When
the Catholic and conservarive sections of the Spanish bourgeoisie
saw their old system smashed and could find no way our,
the Communist Party instilled new hope into them. It assured
them that the democratic bourgeois republic for which it was
pleading put no obstacles in the way of Catholic propaganda
and, above all, that it stood ready to defend the class interests of
the bourgeoisie. 120
That this realization was widespread in the rural areas was underscored dramatically
by a questionnaire sent by Adeumte to secretaries of the UGT
Federation of Land Workers, published in June 1937.121 The results are summarized
as follows:
The replies to these questions revealed an astounding unanimi·
ty. Everywhere the same story. The peasant collectives are today
most vigorously opposed by the Communist Party. The
Communists organize the well-to-do f.'umers who are on the
lookout for cheap labor and are, for this reason, outspokenly
hostile to the cooperative undertakings of the poor peasants,
It is the element which before the revolution sympathized
with the Fascists and Monarchists which, according to the testimony
of the trade-union representatives, is now flocking into
the ranks of the Communist Parry. As to the general effect of
Communist activity on the country, the secretaries of the U.G.T.
had only one opinion, which the representative of the Valencia
organization put in these words: "It is a misfortune in the fu llest
sense of the word." 122
It is not difficult to imagine how the recognition of this "misfortune" must
have affected the willingness of the land workers to take part in the antifascist
war, with all the sacrifices that this entailed.
The attitude of the central government to the revolution was brutally
revealed by its acts and is attested as well in its propaganda. A former minister
describes rhe situation as follows:
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