Joel A Lewis Youth Against Fascism.pdf

YOUTH AGAINST FASCISM
19. Richard Cornell, Youth and Communism: An Historical Analysis of International Communist Youth Movements (New
York: Walker and Co., 1965), 14.
20. R. Craig Nation, following the intellectual lead of Branko Lazitch and Milorad M. Drachkovitch, is one of the few historians
to emphasize this generational dynamic with the Communist movement stating, "Not surprisingly, the first generation
of communist activists was predominately youthful, radicalized by the war, and inspired by the image of a world healed
and remade, the image of a communist society. See Nation, 230.
21. Before the success of the Bolshevik Revolution, many have argued that Lenin was primarily a marginalized, although well
known figure within the socialist movement. The Bolsheviks utilized the slogan of "Land, Bread and Peace" to gain Russian
popular support. With the success of the revolution and the establishment of the Comintern, Lenin assumed leadership
of the anti-war and revolutionary movements, including the socialist youth. See Stanley W. Page, "Lenin's
Assumption of International Proletarian Leadership," The Journal of Modern History 26, no. 3 (September, 1954): 233-
245.
22. Gil Green, "Sweet Sixteen, the YCL Anniversary," Young Communist Review 3, no.2 (April, 1938): 3,5.
23. YCLGB, League Training Syllabus (London: YCLGB, 1925), 56. Albert Lindemann described the failures of the Second
International with the outbreak of the war: "According to these resolutions socialists were to do all in their power to prevent
the outbreak of war; if war broke out nevertheless, they were to direct their efforts to ending it quickly. It left ambiguous,
however, whether these efforts were to be of an exclusively revolutionary nature of whether they could take the
less audacious form of working for a simple negotiated peace. After the war broke out, and even after it became clear that
the conflict was destined to be long and bloody, the leaders of the International took no initiative either to foment revolutionary
opposition or to work for a negotiated peace." See Albert S. Lindemann, The 'Red Years:' European Socialism
Versus Bolshevism, 1919-1921 (Berkley: University of California Press, 1974), 16.
24. Kevin McDermott and Jeremy Agnew, The Comintern: A History of International Communism From Lenin to Stalin (New
York: St. Martin's Press, 1997), 4.
25. Helmut Gruber, International Communism in the Era of Lenin: A Documentary History (Greenwich: Fawcett Publications,
1967), 53.
26. "The War and the Tasks of the Socialist Youth Organizations," in The Bolsheviks and the World War, ed. Olga Hess
Gankin and H.H. Fisher (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1960), 308.
27. YCLGB, A Short History of the YCI, 9-10.
28. Willi Münzenberg, "The International Youth Conference at Berne, April 5-7, 1915," in The Bolsheviks and the World War,
ed. Olga Hess Gankin and H.H. Fisher (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1960), 306.
29. YCI, After Twenty Years: The History of the Youth International (London: Dorrit Press, 1927), 7.
30. Cornell, Revolutionary Vanguard, 20.
31. "The Day of Youth," The Young Worker: Official Organ of the Young Workers League 1, no.5 (August-September, 1922):
3.
32. Nation, 72.
33. John Riddell, Lenin's Struggle for a Revolutionary International, Documents: 1907-1916, The Preparatory Years (New
York: Monad Press, 1986), 280.
34. V.I. Lenin, "The "Disarmament" Slogan," in V.I. Lenin Internet Archive .
35. Julius Braunthal, History of the International, Volume II: 1914-1943 (New York: Frederick A. Praeger Publishers, 1967),
42.
36. See "International Socialist Conference at Zimmerwald Manifesto," in History of the Second International Internet Archive
.
37. The concept of revolutionary defeatism was one advanced by Lenin as a strategy to bring an end to WWI and to advance
socialist revolution. Lenin insisted that the working class had nothing to gain with the military victory of their own nation
during an imperialist war and should instead use their military training to bring defeat to their own nation, transforming the
"imperialist war into a civil war." See V.I. Lenin, "The Defeat of Russia and the Revolutionary Crisis," in V.I. Lenin
Internet Archive . In order to make defeatism a viable
strategy, Lenin had the Soviet delegation insist at the Hague International Peace Congress in 1922 that "the only possible
method of combating war is to preserve existing, and to form new, illegal organisations in which all revolutionaries taking
part in a war carry on prolonged anti-war activities," preparing workers for a defeatist policy before the actual outbreak of
war. See V.I. Lenin, "Notes On The Tasks Of Our Delegation At The Hague," in V.I. Lenin Internet Archive
. Prior to the Zimmerwald Conferences, the Russian
Bolsheviks had previously been a largely marginalized, though articulate sect within the Second International. See Page,
241-242.
38. Ibid, 242.
39. Branko Lazitch and Milorad M. Drachkovitch, Lenin and the Comintern Volume I (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press,
1972), 19.
40. Quoted in Gorsuch, 16. Privalov contends that the attitude of Lenin in dealing with the youth was crucial in attracting the
youth to Bolshevism stating, "(Lenin) advocated patience in dealing with young people's mistakes, and the need to correct
them through persuasion and not by force. He stressed that the older generation was often incapable of dealing properly
with young people, and that, under the new conditions, the young people were bound to have a different approach to socialism
from their fathers." See Privalov, 54.
41. Eric Hobsbawm, Age of Extremes: The Short Twentieth Century 1914-1991 (London:Pantheon, 1995),59.
42. Zinoviev was the Russian Chairman of the Comintern and a leading member of the Zimmerwald Left and the Bolshevik
Party. Zinoviev was Lenin's closest associate and accompanied him on a sealed train back into Russia after the abdication
of the Tsar during the February Revolution in 1917. Although he was Lenin's closest ally, Zinoviev was replaced by Leon
Trotsky as Lenin's second in command after Zinoviev promoted negotiations with Bolshevik opponents in the Railway
Union after the October Revolution.
43. Gregory Zinoviev, "To the Proletarian Youth," in The Gregory Zinoviev Archive
. *The initial transcription done by Sally Ryan for the
Zinoviev archive stated, "The proletarian youth it was that suffered most during the war of 1914-1919. But the proletarian
youth it was also that first raised the voice of protest against that destructive war." This grammatically incorrect translation
has been changed in this dissertation. Any inconsistencies and changes in translations have been identified and any
incorrectness remains my own.
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