Manifesto of the German Anti Parliamentarians to the Proletariat of the World
Origins of the KAPD
Comrades ! Proletarians !
On December 5th 1920, the Communist Workers Party of Germany (KAPD) was
recognised as a sympathising Party of the Third International.
The KAPD and its programme is in direct opposition to the VKPD (Vereinigte
or Unified Communist Party of Germany) which was formed in November 1920
form the Left USPD and the former SpartakusBund (KPD) and which belongs to
the Third International as a fully recognised section. The KAPD is in also
in complete opposition to the tactics of the Third International, as laid
down in the Theses of the Second Congress. The KAPD sees in these tactics
the terrible danger of opportunism pure and simple; the danger of an
opportunism which will lead the Revolution into a morass and will thus
prove disastrous to Russia herself.
The KAPD has arisen out of the former opposition in the SpartakusBund. The
executive of the KPD, with Russia's help thrives. It is the strongest and
largest section of the Party, and the spirit of Parliamentarism has gained
in their leaders, Levi, Thalheimer, Kickert and others, under the influence
of Radek and Bronski.
Every means has been used to destroy the KAPD. Nevertheless, it has gained
in strength and had to perforce be recognised by the Third International as
a sympathising Party, with the right of having a permanent Advisory
Representative on the Executive.
The Greatness of the Third International
The KAPD, which had always recognised the fundamental greatness of the
idea underlying the Third International and the necessity for unity with
Soviet Russia, is determined to fight opportunism by uniting all the forces
of the opposition for a persistent struggle inside the Third International,
coupled with a thorough revision of the Theses in a Marxist revolutionary
sense as its next aim.
Its full views are laid down in an 'Open Letter to Comrade Lenin' (An
Open Letter to Comrade Lenin: An Answer to Lenin's Pamphlet 'Infantile
Sickness of Leftism in Communism' published by the KAPD, Berlin)
We must also at this juncture raise the following essential points which
however cannot be discussed and justified in detail:-
In Western Europe we have in contradistinction to the overwhelmingly
agrarian East, other production conditions and hence other class conditions
and a different spiritual structure. Western Europe is dominated by Banking
interests and Capital which keep the gigantic proletariat in spiritual and
material slavery, and which unite all the bourgeois and petty bourgeois
classes. This forces the proletarian masses to independent action which in
the Revolution can only be achieved by industrial organisation and by the
Abolition of Parliamentarism.
Points of Difference
The Third International believes that the Revolution in Western Europe
will follow the line of the Russian Revolution
The KAPD believes that the Revolution in Western Europe will lay down and
follow its own laws.
The Third International believes that the Revolution In Western Europe
will be able to follow a policy of compromise and alliance with petty
peasants, petty bourgeois and even bourgeois parties.
The KAPD believes this is impossible
The Third International believes in the inevitability (during the
Revolution) of splits and dissensions between the bourgeois, petty
bourgeois and petty peasant.
The KAPD believes that the bourgeois and the petty bourgeois will form a
united front against the proletariat right up to the end of the Revolution.
The Third International underestimates the power of North American and
Western capital.
The KAPD formulates its tactics according to those of that great power.
The Third International does not recognise the power of the Banks and of
Big Business, which unites all bourgeois classes.
The KAPD on the other hand builds up its tactics on this unifying power of
Capital.
Not believing in the capacity of the West European proletariat to stand
alone, the Third International neglects the spiritual and intellectual
development of this proletariat which in every sphere is, after all, still
imbued with bourgeois ideology and chooses tactics which allow slavery and
subordination to bourgeois ideas to be maintained.
The KAPD chooses its tactics with the main object of setting free the
spirit of the proletariat
Owing to the fact that the Third International does not base its tactics
on liberation of the spirit, nor in the unity of all bourgeois and petty
bourgeois parties, but on compromises and 'splits' it allowed the old trade
unions to exist and endeavours to receive them into the Third
International.
The KAPD whose first aim is liberation of the spirit, and which believes
in the unity of the bourgeois, recognises that trade unions must be
destroyed and that the proletariat requires better weapons than the General
Workers Union in Germany.
For the same reasons that the Third International allows Parliamentarism
to remain, for these very same reasons the KAPD abolishes Parliamentarism.
It pulls up evil by the roots
Owing to the fact that the Third International does not believe that
liberation of the spirit is the first essential in Western Europe, and does
not believe the bourgeoisie has a United Front in the Revolution, it takes
within its fold masses without ascertaining whether they are really
communistic, without demanding from them tactics which would prove that
they are Communists and not just masses.
The KAPD wishes to form Parties in every country which consist of
Communists only, and formulates its tactics accordingly. Through the
example of these Parties, small at the beginning, it will turn the majority
of the proletariat viz. the masses into Communists.
Thus the masses of Western Europe are to the Third International the
means; to the KAPD they are the end.
Through these tactics (which were the right ones in Russia) the Third
International has adopted a leaders policy.
The KAPD on the other hand conducts a masses policy.
Comrades, Proletarians. The KAPD holds the belief that all of these are
vital questions of the proletarian revolution.
In the middle of February there will take place a Party Meeting of the
KAPD at which special attention will be paid to the tactics of the Third
International.
You are cordially invited to take your part in it, we beg you to
communicate this invitation to your members.
With Communist Greetings
The Communist Workers Party of Germany
Reprinted from the 'Workers Dreadnought' of January 29th 1921