Not only every commander and every Red Army man but also every worker and peasant in our country knows that this is utter rubbish. Why, of course they must. He was exiled and later assassinated by … Historical analogies are very tempting. Comrade Varin remarks, in the journal Voyennaya Nauka i Revolyutsiya [8], that the mobility of our troops surpasses all historical precedents. Must the Government, the leading Party and the War Department have definite views on all these matters? [Let me recall that this was written in 1905. But this answer is purely formal. [Note by Trotsky] [Galicia was in Austrian Poland, Poznan in German Poland – B.P.] The operations of civil war are, unquestionably, distinguished by an exceptional element of manoeuvring. The failure of our August march on Warsaw and the defeat of the September movement in Italy changed the relation of forces in favour of the bourgeoisie throughout Europe. We need peace not from doctrinal considerations but because the working people have had enough of war and privation. A quickening of military thought and a heightening of interest in theory is unquestionably to be observed in the Red Army. In the West there are Poland and Romania, with, behind them, France. The peasantry, Trotsky believed, would no doubt play an important part in any revolutionary action, but they they were too dispersed and uneven in class composition and consciousness to be unable to play the leading role. The regulations must teach how to fight, and not just coach for offensive operations. One need only add that the essence of modern methods of nutrition consists in locating the aperture of the mouth, inserting the food therein, and, after it has been masticated with the least possible expenditure of energy, swallowing it. The entire art of our constructive work in Soviet Russia in the military sphere (and not only in that sphere) consists in combining the international revolutionary-offensive tendencies of the proletarian vanguard with the revolutionary-defensive tendencies of the peasant masses, and even of broad circles of the working class itself. THE FIRST RUSSIAN REVOLUTION: TROTSKY Trotsky based his theory of Permanent Revolution on a specific conception of the peculiarities of Russia’s historical development, which emphasised the role of the Tsarist state in social and economic development, and consequently, in … we get the answer: it must comprise the sumtotal of the principles of the structure, education and utilisation of our armed forces. So long as this basis is lacking, an international general staff would inevitably become a caricature. The ‘balance of power’ on the European Continent has been upset. In February 1918 German militarism, though already undermined, was nevertheless still strong enough to crush us, with our military forces which were insignificant at that time. So, then, no question of principle is involved for us where revolutionary offensive warfare is concerned. Our Party learned to apply the Marxist method by acting and thinking. Are there, perhaps, some impatient strategists who really intend to shift on to the shoulders of the Red Army the burden of the ‘final, decisive conflict’ in the world, or at least in Europe? Whoever thinks this policy is indefinite and conditional, whoever remains unclear concerning ‘what kind of army we are preparing, and for what tasks’, whoever thinks that ‘it is impossible at one and the same time to educate both in the spirit of defence and in the spirit of the offensive’, understands nothing at all, and would do better to keep quiet and not hinder others! Does Solomin think, perhaps, that this quenches ‘the spirit’? Suvorov compared the change of leadership in the Army to the teeth of a shark: each new row is sharper than the previous one. Hence the need for a strategy of manoeuvre arose first among the Whites. It was necessary, though not sufficient, if one was to be a good marshal-under-instruction, to keep on conjugating the verb “to attack”.’, The conservative Journal des Débats of October 5, 1921, subjects to sharp criticism from this standpoint the regulations for infantry manoeuvres which were issued this summer. We shall in this way establish the preconditions both for better conduct of manoeuvring operations and, if need arises, for positional operations too. The composition and structure of the Red Army, in accordance with the nature of the workers’ and peasants’ state [sic] and the tasks of its armed forces. In the 20th century, Russia is the poorest and most backward country in Europe. Need one (and can one) call the sum-total of these principles a military doctrine? Armed intervention is like the forceps of the obstetrician: used at the right moment it can ease the birth-pangs, but if brought into play prematurely it can only cause a miscarriage. First introduced over a hundred years ago, Leon Trotsky’s theory of Permanent Revolution remains a vital tool for understanding the world today. Trotsky projected the capitalists' lockout during the 1905 revolution, when they still commanded the support of the tsar's police and army, forward to a situation under a revolutionary government of the workers and peasants, when they wouldnotenjoy such support. From scientific prediction of the further course of development we gained unconquerable confidence that history was working for us. 1917 (10th October) At a meeting of the Bolshevik Central Committee, Lenin called for a Bolshevik Revolution. Viewed from the broader context of the Great Terror which followed, the execution of the most popular and well-regarded generals in the Red Army command can be seen as a preemptive move by Stalin and Nikolai Yezhov, People's Commissar of State Security, to eliminate a potential rival and source of opposition to their planned purge of the nomenklatura. Communist Leon Trotsky helped ignite the Russian Revolution of 1917, and built the Red Army afterward. Matters do not improve as we proceed. The war assumed a clearly defensive character on our part. in Krasnaya Nov (Note by Trotsky)] the offensive was (and formally still remains to this day) the official doctrine of the French Republic. as in the best military thinking, extreme partisanship and scrupulously sober observation indeed go hand in hand. Almost at the same time, the mighty revolutionary wave in Italy was broken – not so much by the resistance of the bourgeoisie as by the perfidious passivity of the leading workers’ organisations. Fundamentally, Trotsky fell from power because his theory of Permanent Revolution and his consequent insistence on continued revolutionary agitation abroad would have cut off all technical aid from the Western world, and so made any attempt at industrial development more difficult in Russia. The two men fought dramatically from time to time. The Frenchman wants nothing better than to take the offensive, whether he attacks first or second – an offensive, that is, which is properly organised. That danger is the very thing a theory should prevent by lucid, rational criticism. Comrade Solomin accuses us (see the military-science journal Voyennaya Nauka i Revoluyutsia) of having, so far, failed to answer the question: ‘What kind of army are we preparing, and for what tasks?’ [Note by Trotsky]. But if strategic retreat is excluded from the concept of manoeuvre, then, obviously, strategy will acquire an extremely rectiineal character – that is, will cease to be a strategy of manoeuvre. Our efforts were not crowned with success. Whatever problem was being discussed, Borisov would invariably raise his two fingers in order to have the opportunity to say: ‘This question can be decided only in conjunction with other questions of military doctrine, and for this reason it is first of all necessary to institute the post of Chief of the General Staff.’ From the womb of this Chief of the General Staff the tree of military doctrine would spring up, and produce all the necessary fruits, just as happened in antiquity with the daughter of the Eastern king. Such an investigation does not, of course, promise to turn all strategy topsy-turvy. ‘At the beginning of this excellent little work,’ the newspaper writes, ‘a number of principles are set out ... which are presented as being the official military doctrine for 1921. But the whole trouble is that as soon as our military ‘doctrinaires’ pass from lamentations about how useful a doctrine would be to attempts to provide us with one, they either repeat, not very well, what has already been said long ago, what has entered into our consciousness, what has been embodied in resolutions of Party and Soviet congresses, decrees, decisions, regulations and instructions, far better and much more precisely than is done by our would-be innovators, or they get confused, stumble, and put forward absolutely inadmissable concoctions. While it can be said of the more far-sighted empiricists of British imperialism that they have a keyring with a considerable choice of keys, good for many typical historical situations, we hold in our hands a universal key which enables us to orientate ourselves correctly in all situations. Comrade Tukhachevsky submitted to the Communist International a proposal that an international general staff be set up and attached to. They merely tried to put a minus sign wherever previously there was a plus. One cannot, therefore, consider capacity for manoeuvring a special manifestation of the revolutionary character of the Red Army. There are, objectively, difficulties and practical mistakes in our constructive work. As it continues to develop, the Red Army has become and is becoming more and more similar to them in formally organisational and technical respects. Strategy may play an important role. ’ such is the revelation, almost revolutionary! 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