On Khrushchev's Phoney Communism
Peking Review, On Khrushchev's Phoney Communism. July 17, 1964
Excerpts
At the 22nd Congress of the CPSU, Khrushchev announced that the Soviet Union had already entered the period of the extensive building of communist society. He also declared that "we shall, in the main, have built a communist society within twenty years." This is pure fraud.
How can there be talk of building communism when the revisionist Khrushchev clique are leading the Soviet Union onto the path of the restoration of capitalism and when the Soviet people are in grave danger of losing the fruits of socialism?
In putting up the signboard of "building communism" Khrushchev's real aim is to conceal the true face of his revisionism. But it is not hard to expose this trick. Just as the eyeball of a fish cannot be allowed to pass as a pearl, so revisionism cannot be allowed to pass itself off as communism.
Scientific communism has a precise and definite meaning. According to Marxism-Leninism, communist society is a society in which classes and class differences are completely eliminated, the entire people have a high level of communist consciousness and morality as well as boundless enthusiasm and initiative in labor, there is a great abundance of social products and the principle of "from each according to his ability, to each according his needs" is applied and in which the state has withered away.
According to Marxist-Leninist theory, the purpose of upholding the dictatorship of the proletariat in the period of socialism is precisely to ensure that society develops in the direction of communism. Lenin said that "forward development, i.e., toward Communism, proceeds through the dictatorship of the proletariat and cannot do otherwise." Since the revisionist Khrushchev clique have abandoned the dictatorship of the proletariat in the Soviet Union, it is going backward and not forward, going backward to capitalism and not forward to communism.
Going forward to communism means moving towards the abolition of all classes and class differences. A communist society which preserves any classes at all, let alone exploiting classes, is inconceivable. Yet Khrushchev is fostering a new bourgeoisie, restoring and extending the system of exploitation and accelerating class polarization in the Soviet Union. A privileged bourgeois stratum opposed to the Soviet people now occupies the ruling position in the Party and government and in the economic, cultural and other departments. Can one find an iota of communism in all this?
Going forward to communism means moving towards a unitary system, of the ownership of the means of production by the whole people. A Communist society in which several kinds of ownership of the means of production coexist is inconceivable. Yet Khrushchev is creating a situation in which enterprises owned by the whole people are gradually degenerating into capitalist enterprises and farms under the system of collective ownership are gradually degenerating into units of a kulak economy. Again, can one find an iota of communism in all this?
Going forward to communism means moving towards a great abundance of social products and the realization of the principle of "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs." A communist society built on the enrichment of a handful of persons and the impoverishment of the masses is inconceivable. Under the socialist system the great Soviet people developed the social productive forces at unprecedented speed. But the evils of Khrushchev's revisionism are creating havoc in the Soviet socialist economy. Constantly beset with innumerable contradictions, Khrushchev makes frequent changes in his economic policies and often goes back on his own words, thus throwing the Soviet national economy into a state of chaos. Khrushchev is truly an incorrigible wastrel. He has squandered the grain reserves built up under Stalin and brought great difficulties into the lives of Soviet people. He has distorted and violated the socialist principle of distribution of "from each according to his ability, to each according to his work," and enables a handful of persons to appropriate the fruits of the labor of the broad masses of the Soviet people. These points alone are sufficient to prove that the road taken by Khrushchev leads away from communism.
Going forward to communism means moving towards enhancing the communist consciousness of the masses. A communist society with bourgeois ideas running rampant is inconceivable. Yet Khrushchev is zealously reviving bourgeois ideology in the Soviet Union and serving as a missionary for the decadent American culture. By propagating material incentive, he is turning all human relations into money relations and encouraging individualism and selfishness. Because of him, manual labor is again considered sordid and love of pleasure at the expense of other people's labor is again considered honorable. Certainly, the social ethics and atmosphere promoted by Khrushchev are far removed from communism, as far as far can be.
Going forward to communism means moving towards the withering away of the state. A communist society with a state apparatus for oppressing the people is inconceivable. The state of the dictatorship of the proletariat is actually no longer a state in its original sense, because it is no longer a machine used by the exploiting few to oppress the overwhelming majority of the people but a machine for exercising dictatorship over a very small number of exploiters, while democracy is practiced among the overwhelming majority of the people. Khrushchev is altering the character of Soviet state power and changing the dictatorship of the proletariat back into an instrument whereby a handful of privileged bourgeois elements exercise dictatorship over the mass of the Soviet workers, peasants and intellectuals. He is continuously strengthening his dictatorial state apparatus and intensifying his repression of the Soviet people. It is indeed a great mockery to talk about communism in these circumstances.
Khrushchev has ulterior motives when he puts up the signboard of communism. He is using it to fool the Soviet people and cover up his effort to restore capitalism. He is using it to deceive the international proletariat and the revolutionary people the world over and betray proletarian internationalism. Under this signboard, the Khrushchev clique has itself abandoned proletarian internationalism and is seeking a partnership with US imperialism for the partition of the world; moreover, it wants the fraternal socialist countries to serve its own private interests and not to oppose imperialism or to support the revolutions of the oppressed peoples and nations, and it wants them to accept its political, economic and military control and be its virtual dependencies and colonies. Furthermore, the Khrushchev clique wants all the oppressed peoples and nations to serve its private interests and abandon their revolutionary struggles, so as not to disturb its sweet dream of partnership with imperialism for the division of the world, and instead submit to enslavement and oppression by imperialism and its lackeys.
In short, Khrushchev's slogan of basically "building a communist society within twenty years" in the Soviet Union is not only false but also reactionary.
The revisionist Khrushchev clique say that the Chinese "go to the length of questioning the very right of our Party and people to build communism." This is a despicable attempt to fool the Soviet people and poison the friendship of the Chinese and Soviet people. We have never had any doubt that the great Soviet people will eventually enter into communist society. But right now the revisionist Khrushchev clique are damaging the socialist fruits of the Soviet people and taking away their right to go forward to communism. In the circumstances, the issue confronting the Soviet people is not how to build communism but rather how to resist and oppose Khrushchev's effort to restore capitalism.
The revisionist Khrushchev clique also say that "the CPC leaders hint that, since our Party has made its aim a better life for the people, Soviet society is being 'bourgeoisified,' is 'degenerating.' " This trick of deflecting the Soviet people's dissatisfaction with the Khrushchev clique is deplorable as well as stupid. We sincerely wish the Soviet people an increasingly better life. But Khrushchev's boasts of "concern for the well-being of the people" and of "a better life for every man" are utterly false and demagogic. For the masses of the Soviet people life is already bad enough at Khrushchev's hands. The Khrushchev clique seek a "better life" only for the members of the privileged stratum and the bourgeois elements, old and new, in the Soviet Union. These people are appropriating the fruits of the Soviet people's labor and living the life of bourgeois lords.
Thus it can be seen that Khrushchev's "communism" is indeed "goulash communism," the "communism of the American way of life" and "communism seeking credits from the devil." No wonder he often tells representatives of Western monopoly capital that once such "communism" is realized in the Soviet Union, "you will go forward to communism without any call from me."
There is nothing new about such "communism." It is simply another name for capitalism. It is only a bourgeois label, sign or advertisement.
How the imperialists are hoping for the restoration of capitalism in the Soviet Union! How they are rejoicing!
We would advise the imperialist lords not to be happy too soon. Notwithstanding all the services of the revisionist Khrushchev clique, nothing can save imperialism from its doom. The revisionist ruling clique suffer from the same kind of disease as the imperialist ruling clique; they are extremely antagonistic to the masses of the people who comprise over ninety per cent of the world's population, and therefore, they too are weak and powerless and are paper tigers.
Source: "On Khrushchev's Phoney Communism," Peking Review, No. 29, 17 July 1964, pp. 7-28 (excerpts).