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TROTSKY'S REPEATED FAILURE AS A POLITICAL PROPHET DOES not seem to have damaged his reputation among his devoted followers. The very pivot of Trotsky's faith – that socialism in one country is doomed to failure unless supported by revolution in other countries – has been proved palpably wrong. The only reason why ‘socialist’ countries like the Soviet Union or Poland, for example, survive at all is that they are able to bolster their own inefficient systems by vast loans and imports of food and technology from states where a free economy exists. In The Revolution Betrayed, in 1937, Trotsky foretold that a defeat of Germany by the Soviet Union would result in the crushing not only of Hider, ‘but of the capitalist system’; while in the Soviet Union one of two things would happen. The first possibility was that a revolutionary party would take over which would restore freedom in the trade unions and the Soviets, as well as the liberty of Soviet parties. It would purge the apparatus, abolish all privileges and limit inequality of payment to the minimum. It was a belated conversion to freedom by Trotsky. In 1921 the sailors and garrison of Kronstadt had risen and called for every one of these reforms. They were not only mown down as ‘counter-revolutionaries’ with Trotsky's full support, and under his overall command, but his action was unequivocally justified by him years later in exile, on the grounds that failure to crush Kronstadt in 1921 would have opened the gates to ‘counterrevolution’ – in plain words, would have put an end to communist monopoly of power. The second hypothetical future of a Soviet Union victorious in a war against Germany, according to Trotsky, was the victory of a bourgeois party, which would restore private property. Of course, all political prophets go wrong more often than not. But this particular failure reveals two characteristic weaknesses of Trotsky's power of analysis.

Assertion of independence from Moscow by some West European Communist parties, inaccurately known as ‘Eurocommunism’ has caused angry reaction by Soviet Russia, especially when those parties have criticised the internal policies of the Soviet government in the matter of civil rights. The Soviet Union is also apprehensive about the possible effects of ‘Eurocommunism’ on the cohesion of the Communist bloc. But this apprehension should not be exaggerated. The USSR can still rely on the Western Communist parties for support for its foreign policy, and can exercise control over them in various ways. There is no probability of a break between the USSR and any Western Communist party in the foreseeable future.

Leonard Schupiro: Studies on the Commanding Heights in the USSR Geraint Parry: Realism and the Rage of Caliban Roy Pryce: Blurred Perspectives Patricia Thomas: Social Sciences and Government Policy-Making David Coombes: Western Interest Groups

IN STRICT TRUTH, THE FIRST TWENTY OF THE FIFTY ADULT years of my life were spent either in practice at the Bar, or in military intelligence. The latter, and especially in wartime, is, of course, geared to the overriding practical objective of winning a war, though, since I was involved with assessment of the Soviet Union's military strength and achievement, my work provided me with some kind of an introduction to the study of the Soviet Union to which, after the mid-fifties, I was to devote most of my time. But the Bar is far too egocentric an occupation to leave much time for interest in political issues, at most permitting time for the narrow practical pursuit of domestic party politics. For party politics I have never had much appetite – though I did campaign for the Conservative Party in one election.

(1970). Changing Patterns in the Theory of Revolution and Insurgency. Royal United Services Institution. Journal: Vol. 115, No. 659, pp. 3-12.

It will soon be forty years since Lenin decided, to ‘put the lid on opposition’, as he expressed it himself at the dramatic Tenth Congress of his party in March 1921. Much has happened since then, both in the Soviet Union and in the countries which have by imitation adopted the same pattern of one-party government. It is therefore worth reflecting on the reasons which led Lenin to adopt this drastic policy; and to pause to enquire into the results which have flowed from his action—whether he intended them or not.The bolsheviks took power in 1917 without having (as on so many other vital questions) formulated any precise theory about their future policy towards those who disagreed with them. There was a general acceptance of the need to deal sternly with ‘enemies’ – indeed no revolutionary government could hope to survive for long if it did not do something of the kind.