Page - 243 - in Otto Bauer (1881–1938) - Thinker and Politician

the ‘thirdway’ to socialism 243 MaxAdlerwasalone in sidingwithBauer.170YetBauerwasdeaf to criticism: he refused to revisehispositionevenwhen informationaboutmassdeporta- tionsandgrowing repressionagainst theoldpowerapparatusculminating in the infamousMoscowtrials reachedtoVienna.171Withrespect to theconflict between Stalin and the socialist opposition in theussr, Bauer’s sympathies before the defeat of theworkers’movement inAustriawerewith Stalin and hissupporters.HisstanceontheMoscowtrialswasambiguous.Heconsidered themabackward retreat on the road towardsdemocratisation, criticised the arrestsanddenunciationsofBolsheviksascounter-revolutionary,andreferred to Stalin’smethodsof fighting theTrotskyists as ‘repulsive anddangerous’.172 However, healsoblamed theTrotskyists for theMoscowtrials, claiming they wereplanning a second revolution.Althoughhe castigatedTrotsky’s politics as sectarian,heobjected to the ideaofanofficial lsimotion inprotestat the ZinovievandKamenevtrials,demandingthattheInternationaldissociateitself fromtheir views.173 TheMoscow trials didnotmakehimrevise the expecta- 170 Inhisbook,DerBolschewismusinderSackgasse(BolshevismintheImpasse, 1930),Kautsky counteredBauer’sclaims,emphasisingtheossificationandcounter-revolutionaryorient- ationofBolshevism.FriedrichAdler,meanwhile,objectedtoBauer’sappreciationof the plannedeconomyandcollectivisationaselementsof socialism.Hethought thatStalin’s decisionsweremotivatednotbyapoliticalbutaneconomicrationaleandreferredtohis policiesasa ‘moveofdoubt’–seeAdler1932,p.7.DancastdoubtoverBauer’s thesis that theproletariandictatorshipwasanecessaryintermediatestage.HeviewedBauer’sclaim that theRussianCommunists couldsoondevelopproductionandraiseconsumptionas utopian–seeDan1932,pp.64–5.OnlyMaxAdlerstressedtherevolutionarycharacterof theStalinistdictatorship, justifiedtheterroragainst thekulaksasaneconomicnecessity oftheproletarianrevolution,supportedtheattemptatbuildingsocialisminonecountry, andcalledupontheMenshevikstosidewithStalin’sparty.SeeAdler1932,p.215andp.301. 171 In the SovietUnion, spectacular purges and trials took place, initially in scientific and Menshevikcircles,underthepretextofeliminating‘saboteurs’.Thesetrialswereintended toshowthemassestheallegedagentsbehindtheeconomicfailuresoftheFiveYearPlan. When theparty secretary, SergeyKirov,wasmurdered inLeningrad, Stalin took this as a pretext to settle scoreswith the ‘old Bolsheviks’. In July 1936, trials against Zinoviev, Kamenev, and 13 furthermembers of theCentralCommitteewere initiated. In January, trials against Radkov, Pyatakov, and 15 further Bolsheviks followed. InMarch 1938, the infamous Trial of the Twenty-One, duringwhichBukharin andRykovwere sentenced, tookplace. In June 1936, thegenerals,withTukhachevskyat theirhelm,wereaccusedof treason.Theofficial justifications for theGreatPurge, in thecourseofwhich70percent ofCentralCommitteememberswereexecuted,wereaccusationsofsabotage,plans fora politicalcoup,andespionageonbehalfofWesternstates. 172 SeeBauer1980ee,p.716. 173 See ‘Letter fromOtto Bauer to Friedrich Adler of 19 August 1936’, in Archival Sources.