The 100^th year of the formation of the Communist International. The struggle for peace and socialism continues.

Intervention from the Communist Party in Denmark, KPiD

The founding of the Communist International in 1919 had a tremendous significance for the development of the communist movement. In Denmark and in many other countries the communist party was founded in the wake of the formation of the International.  

The first years after the Russian revolution and the formation of the Komintern were marked by a tightening class struggle. At the same time the socialist revolution in Russia meant that now you could see in your own eyes that a new social structure could be realized on the background of the needs and experiences of the working class. Such models we do not have any more. We are facing a situation where people believe more in the collapse of the planet than that capitalism with its devastating imperialism fails as a system.

From around 1922 the Komintern concentrated on the unity front strategy - that is to mobilize the workers for a common struggle in spite of disagreements. At the same time it was important for the newly formed communist parties to learn to act according to the method of unity work without giving up on their own goals and points of view.

But unfortunately this strategy was completely undermined by the social democracies in many countries. The capitalist crisis was as big as today – it started with the stock-exchange crash in USA in 1928. Komintern was marked by internal conflicts after Lenin’s death. And this did not benefit the struggle of socialism. Concepts like social fascism were used against the social democrats which were an ideological error, as it ruined the possibility of forming an alliance between workers/colleagues in the unity front strategy against the common enemy.

That was strongly corrected in connection with the 7^th world congress of Komintern in Moscow in 1935. Here the parole was stated: The fascism is the enemy! Now it was high time to gather around the united popular front policy. A policy and alliance gathered broadly between workers, self employed, petty fishermen and petty farmers towards a common goal – to crush fascism. We won and we lost.

But we were after the 2^nd World War able to preserve parts of the history because of the backing of the socialist countries and the formation of among others. The united popular front came back in the sixties in the fight against nuclear weapons and during the protest movements against the war of USA in Vietnam. The consciousness of the peoples of imperialism continued far into the 1980’ies with the peace movements. That is nearly lost today.

At the start of the 70’ies the European imperialism started against a background of the Coal and Steel Union to build the EEC. Again we used the policy of a united popular front. And our party progressed again. Now the EU has become an overstate superstructure. It is corrupt, finance governed, undemocratic and rearming. It crushes the trade unions and workers’ rights and ignores national, democratic referendums.

We see new structures in all directions militarily. The conflict between the capital of the EU and that of the USA causes the formation of The European Interventions Initiative (E12). It is an alliance between EU and NATO countries which views it as its task to interfere militarily anywhere in the world for the imperialist interests of the EU. Officially the alliance is an interstate cooperation, but in reality it is a form of expansion of the military dimension of the EU.

EU has in advance constructed PESCO (Permanent Structured Cooperation) adhered by 25 EU countries and moving in the same direction. The structure is aimed to make it possible to avoid popular decisions like BREXIT and the Danish military reservations.

For the peoples in the European countries a sharpened competition between an imperialist USA and EU can never lead to a common solidarity of interests. It is the globe and the world peace which i threatened again. It is vital and about time that we use this forum to resume the popular front strategy. The imperialist war pollution of the globe must be stopped. We must use the forums we have, such as the World Federation of Democratic Youth and the World Peace Council, our parties and festivals, trade unions, environmental organizations and resistance movements. Let us use each other and show the world that imperialism is the problem and socialism the solution.

The history of the Communist International is a very educational history showing that the communists must continuously analyse the concrete conditions of the class struggle in each individual country and in the definite historical period. Both the unity of action of the workers and the popular front strategy were and are relevant – but under quite different conditions. To decide beforehand on a definite model for how the class struggle must be conducted is dogmatic and wrong. The strategy is determined. The tactics must all the time follow conditions.