Stalin (Joseph Vissarionovich Djugashvili)
A Letter To Comrade D-ov
First Published:1947 in Volume 7 of the Russian Edition of J. V. Stalin Works
Source: Works, J.V. Stalin, Foreign Languages Publishing House, Moscow, 1954,
Volume 7, pp. 16-8
Comrade D-ov,
I am late with my reply, but I had no time to reply earlier:
1) I think that you read the article' carelessly, otherwise you would certainly
have found in it the passage from Ilyich's article about "the victory of
socialism in one country."
2) If you read the article carefully you will probably understand that the point
at issue is not complete victory, but the victory of socialism in general, i.e.,
driving away the landlords and capitalists, taking power, repelling the attacks
of imperialism and beginning to build a socialist economy. In all this, the
proletariat in one country can be fully successful; but a complete guarantee
against restoration can he ensured only by the "joint efforts of the
proletarians in several countries."
It would have been foolish to have begun the October Revolution in Russia with
the conviction that the victorious proletariat of Russia, obviously enjoying the
sympathy of the proletarians of other countries, hut in the absence of victory
in several countries, "cannot hold out in the face of a conservative Europe."
That is not Marxism, but the most ordinary opportunism, Trotskyism, and whatever
else you please. If Trotsky's theory were correct, Ilyich, who stated that we
shall convert NEP Russia into socialist Russia, and that we have "all that is
necessary for building a complete socialist society" (see the article "On
Co-operation"), would be wrong.
3) Evidently, you failed to note that the published article is part of a
"Preface." Had you noted this, I think you would have understood that the
"Preface" must be taken as a whole.
4) The most dangerous thing in our political practice is the attempt to regard
the victorious proletarian country as something passive, capable only of marking
time until the moment when assistance comes from the victorious proletarians in
other countries. Let us assume that the Soviet system will exist in Russia for
five or ten years without a revolution taking place in the West; let us assume
that, nevertheless, during that period our Republic goes on existing as a Soviet
Republic, building a socialist economy under the conditions of NEP* - do you
think that during those five or ten years our country will merely spend the time
in collecting water with a sieve and not in organising a socialist economy? It
is enough to ask this question to realise how very dangerous is the theory that
denies the possibility of the victory of socialism in one country.
But does that mean that this victory will be complete, final? No, it does not
(see my "Preface"), for as long as imperialist encirclement exists there will
always he the danger of military intervention. Nevertheless, it is obvious to
everyone that it is the victory and not the defeat of socialism. And there can
scarcely be any reason to doubt that at the same time this victory creates the
pre-conditions for the victory of the revolution in other countries.
I see that some comrades have not yet abandoned the old Social-Democratic theory
that the proletarian revolution cannot be brought about in countries where
capitalism is less developed than, say, in Britain or America.
5) I advise you to read again some of Ilyich's articles in the symposium
"Against the Stream," his pamphlets The Proletarian Revolution and "Left-Wing"
Communism, and also his article "On Co-operation."
With communist greetings,
J. Stalin
January 25, 1925
* I am fully justified in making the second assumption because the strength of
our Republic is growing and will continue to grow, and the support we are
receiving from our Western comrades is increasing and will continue to increase.
-J. St.
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