Pravda (1970) - full transcript

Beloved comrade Rosa,
you ask me what country I'm in,

and what's happening.
Listen, I'm not sure.

Here are some pictures
and sounds. The color is bad.

It's West German film
processed in a Bulgarian lab.

What's in this country,
you ask me.

TV girls wearing
cashmere sweaters.

Three.
Places where...

Three.

Places where people work,
in this country they are...

Three.

Places where people work,



in this country they are
terribly sad.

Probably they haven't yet
had a revolution.

Very often tunes of
American music, rearranged.

They manufacture machine tools,
arms, uranium,

a lot of steel, trucks,

locomotives, streetcars.

This must be a country already thrust
into the world of modern economy,

a Western country.

Yes, we are in the West:

in the fields, advertising
for large American companies.

Seven.

That's a picture of a young
working girl in a bikini,

but we didn't have
the right to show it

because it was sold to
Columbia Broadcasting Corporation.



The young workers
like the Beatles a lot,

and the government lets them wear
their hair long. It must be Yugoslavia.

No, that's Czechoslovakia.

Full of historic Western traditions.

Sundays, many workers
would rather wash their cars

than fuck their wives.

Public transport for
less fortunate workers.

For sleeping and making love, the
government has built egalitarian housing.

In the factories, the formen have
a hard time making the workers work.

Thirteen.

The hotels sell photos...

Thirteen.

The hotels sell reproductions
of photos from Playboy.

There's still quite a few small shop-
keepers, especially in the large cities.

Neon advertising for Russian trains.

There are journalists who do reports
on the workers for television.

There are tanks, yes tanks,
to watch over the peasants.

Unemployed young people

have the right to use
children's playgrounds.

Nineteen. Even so,
it must be a socialist country.

The cherry trees which are beside
the road are really next to it,

not behind fences,

which means that this product
is available to everyone.

The workers look angrily

at the way in which the production
of cars has been divided in two,

large cars for leaders,

small cars for workers,

if they can afford them.

We're in a socialist country.
Whoever says socialism, says red:

the red of the blood spilled by
the workers for their emancipation.

That's a large factory in Prague,

with pictures of people's leaders.

There was fighting between
the different kinds of red:

the red which comes from the left and
the red which goes toward the right.

During the night,

pictures of the workers' leaders
have been removed.

Twenty-five.

Production is fouled up.

We're in a very sick country.

Another picture we haven't
the right to see

because Czech news has sold it

to a West German TV station.

Twenty-seven. The Americans
are not the only ones,

there are also Japanese and Italian
firms advertising nonstop.

Not only workers,

but a working class, a Czech
and Slovak working class.

It'd be a mistake to think we're talking
about a worker like other workers,

about just any worker.

This is a view of Prague
taken from the window of a hotel

for tourists from
Western European countries.

And this is a magazine mailed
from Prague by the Cubans

for the militants of the Western
European countries, where it is banned.

This is a nationalized food store.

Thirty-three.
This is the same lying girl.

This is a working-class suburb.

This is a high-class whore
hustling customers.

This proves that there are executives,
because these are executive secretaries.

These are students.

In 1968, they danced
throughout the spring.

Those are wire fences that
the government puts around

everything which is the
private property of the people.

That doesn't belong to anyone.

It's collectivized wheat.

These are the so-called children
of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The newspaper of the unions

claims these locomotives belong
to the railway workers and passengers.

The Czech and Slovak working class
tries in vain to speak.

They'll never understand the party
which gives their orders in Russian.

Forty-three.
Here are the ghosts

of the Second International.

They swoop down like vampires
on the Czechoslovak working class.

"As soon as a crow sees a rose,
it thinks it's a nightingale,"

a Georgian proverb.

Forty-five.

These puppets and traitors
have a name.

Yesterday, Bernstein and Kautsky.
Today, Brezhnev and Kosygin.

They fire on the
Czech and Slovak people

using James Bond's revolver,
painted red in order to

hide their crimes
from honest communists.

The same way the Khrushchev report,
which purposely added

to the confusion surrounding Stalin,

has today become the staunchest
ally of bourgeois imperialism

in its fierce fight against
revolutionary movements everywhere.

Good. What we have
just seen, Rosa,

is the concrete situation
in Czechoslovakia,

but that's all,

just travelogues, souvenirs,

like Delacroix in Algeria, or
Chris Marker on strike in Rhodiaceta.

The New York Times
and Le Monde call it news.

And I agree with you, Rosa,

it isn't enough. Now
we must make the effort

to rise above this
perceptive knowledge.

We need to struggle to transform it
into rational knowledge.

To make that effort, to struggle,

what does this mean then,
concretely, for us?

This means: analyze concretely
this concrete situation.

We are in a country of sick people.
We see that right away.

Good. But what is their sickness?

This is what we have to find out.

This sickness is
connected with treason,

with the revision of Marxism
by pseudo-communists.

We can sense that immediately.

Good. But the treason didn't just
happen like that, just by chance.

In order to struggle against
these revisionist traitors,

we must first unmask them, first
examine their history, first know.

And for you and me, Rosa,

to move from sensing to knowing,
what does that mean?

That means beginning
to put together the film.

Beginning to take apart
the contradictions.

That's what we
have to do now, Rosa.

We've got to do some editing.

We've got to organize the
images and sounds differently,

to only accept them
for what they really are.

What are they, Vladimir?

External manifestations
of the communist reality,

of the communist irreality,
in Czechoslovakia today.

External causes.

Yes, external causes.

Now let's organize the external causes
along anti-revisionist lines.

Yes.

Editing these images and sounds
along anti-revisionist lines

and establishing new contradictory
relationships between them,

bringing to light internal causes

and therefore beginning to know the
very substance of this thing called

the present situation in the
Socialist Republic of Czechoslovakia.

Second part of the film.

Concrete analysis of the
concrete situation.

Revisionism in practice.
Revisionism in practice.

We rented this car
at the airport in Prague.

We rented it from whom?

Just as in Moscow, Warsaw, Bucharest,

we rented it from
an American company,

Hertz or Avis,

two branches of American
banking or chemical trusts.

This car is a Skoda.

It was manufactured by the Skoda
factory, nationalized in 1945

by the Czechoslovak
popular democratic forces

after their victory over fascism

and with the support of red troops
under comrade Stalin's leadership.

Therefore this Skoda belongs
today to the Skoda workers,

and as a result to the Czech people

who took possession of the
means of producing it.

But Hertz and Avis, both firms
belonging to the imperialist camp,

don't rent cars out of goodwill.

They do it to make a profit.

Therefore Hertz and Avis have
appropriated, deviously,

and with the complicity
of the Czechoslovak leaders,

the overtime exacted by
these same bosses

of the Skoda workers. The
appropriation of surplus value

theoretically no longer existent,
reappears. And practically,

the more the socialist workers of
Skoda work, the more the imperialist

shareholders of Hertz and Avis
fill their pockets.

Revisionism has played its part.
The theses of Ota Sik and Liberman

have become those of Galbraith
and Jean-Jacques Servan-Schreiber:

the free market needs slaves

and the slaves of revisionist countries
are better-trained than others.

In August 1968, Russian tanks

wanted to smash the resistance
of the Czech and Slovak people.

But they did an about-face in front
of the kings of oil and Coca-Cola.

The new tsars surrendered
to an old star:

advertising, number one star
of the western economy.

Westernism in practice.
The world belongs to the two of us!

OK, comrade?
OK, boss!

Westernism in practice.

An example. A worker in
the CKD factories

makes part of
the anti-aircraft gun

which will serve his comrades,
the artillerymen of North Vietnam,

to fight effectively against the
planes of the Yankee invaders.

Two comments to make:

small models of
these same planes are sold

in special stores where you have to
pay for them in foreign currency.

Furthermore,

this worker is asked to produce more

without being taught to connect this
production with the political struggle.

He is required to make a gun without being
told where, why, and how it will be used.

In short,

the party asks him to grasp
production with one hand

but not revolution with the other.
Westernism in practice.

Nothing surprising about that.
You remember, Rosa? Prague in 1948.

We had thrown Masaryk
out of the window.

And Gottwald, what did comrade
Gottwald say upon taking power?

"Today, the entire
working class is united.

We are advancing together,
with a mass of peasants,

the urban middle classes,
the working class intelligentsia,

and a part of the Czech
and Slovak bourgeoisie.

We are advancing now towards
a national and democratic revolution,

and not towards a
socialist revolution."

"Not towards a socialist revolution."

Remember, Rosa.
We said to comrade Slansky:

"Let's throw off our illusions and
prepare ourselves for the struggle."

And what did comrade Slansky reply?

"What will the rest of the world say
if we let the workers into the street?"

Result: look, Rosa, Mr. Muscle,

union delegate installed by the
Kennedy-Khrushchev class alliance.

And what is the job of
this mother-fucking fighter?

To pretend to set up workers' councils in
order to better stifle the people's voices

to make a travesty of the struggle
for production, turn it into an opera.

Westernism in practice.

While the proletariat
sacrifices itself,

the wives of the politicians
of the bureaucratic state

go to beauty salons to the music
of successful Parisian films.

Here are Josef Stakhanov and John Taylor.
Where do they come from?

Stakhanov has arrived from Moscow
on an Aeroflot Ilyushin Il-62.

Taylor from New York
on a Pan Am Boeing 737.

What the hell are John Taylor and
Josef Stakhanov doing in Prague today?

They've come to speed up
the building of socialism,

and they're working together on a
site on the Avenue Friedrich Engels.

Let's analyze how they
organize their work.

John Taylor announces:

"It is necessary:

to break down all work
into simple elements.

It is necessary:

to find out which movements
are useless and eliminate them.

It is necessary:

to divide each job into elements
corresponding to six functions:

transaction, transport and handling,

supervision, anticipation,
stock-building."

Josef Stakhanov announces:
"There's only one possible way,

contracts between industrial
enterprises and the kolkhozy.

In order to ensure the labor
supply of these enterprises,

workers have to be bound to
production by salaries.

In order to apply and strengthen
the principle of commercial return,

accumulation of capital must
be intensified within industry.

That is the task,"
declares Josef Stakhanov.

What does this image mean?
What does this sound mean?

This means that today, the holy
alliance between Stakhanov's work force

and Taylor's work methods,
that today this holy alliance,

this peaceful coexistence
in the organization of work

on a small building site
in the Avenue Friedrich Engels

is a result of the
Cuban missile crisis,

a result of Camp David,
a result of Yalta.

This means that the
Narodny Bank in London

did not put politics first

when it used the golden ruble
to Bolshevikly resist

the imperialist
Bretton Woods agreement.

Result: at teller windows of the Paris
branch of the Bank for Northern Europe,

the golden ruble had the idea
of changing into Euro-dollars,

the highest form of
financial imperialism,

and the ruble had this idea
before the dollar.

Result:

Novotny or Dubcek, doesn't much matter.
The worker, like the student,

is only a slot machine.

Result:

a beach,

the industrial suburb
of Bratislava,

the apartment houses
right next to the beach,

the role of that beach,

the necessity of not ruining the
Slovak people's labor capital.

Leisure equals rest.

Work equals movement.

Leisure equals rest.

Work equals struggle.

Leisure, remaining
a class-bound being.

Work, taking a class stand.

Contradiction:
class being, class stand.

Contradiction resolved in
socialist Czechoslovakia

as in capitalist France,
Italy, Sweden, Brazil.

As a result of refusing the people
the one right left out

of the bourgeois declaration
of the rights of man,

the right to politically
meaningful work,

the streets of Prague have become
like those of London, Milan, Zurich,

only more sad, because this
sadness is not a sign of struggle.

Here, all the demands
of the French communist unions,

the English shop stewards,

or the militants of the Italian
Communist Party, have been satisfied.

Here, no infernal cadences

or hovels, almost the same
housing for everyone.

But every day, as in Paris,
New York, Stockholm, Madrid,

every day...

But every day, as in Paris,
New York, Stockholm, Madrid,

every day it's get up, go out, work.
Get up, go out, work.

Class being. Class stand.

Being a revisionist is
becoming a class being again.

And how do you become
a class being again?

By refusing to fight everywhere
from a class point of view.

By refusing to struggle,
criticize, transform.

By refusing to combat
right-wing red deviationism

in the name of left-wing
red proletarianism.

Moreover, Rosa,
here are some concrete proofs.

He says he works with a
product for a certain machine...

Today, two faculties
in Prague are on strike...

What time do you leave work?

At six.

- We're on strike.
- Yes, that's what we're trying to do.

That is, to make, to hold rallies...

You're on strike for the...

for the livestock...

Do you live far from here?

That is, their
loss of feeling useful,

as in their relation
with the students and the workers

and the organization
of people who do not...

He doesn't know exactly what machine
he makes this product for.

The relationship between
the students and the workers,

I believe that
in our country it is better,

for example, than in the capitalist
countries, where it's more difficult...

He wants to talk, because
his cooperative is doing well,

it's a rich cooperative,
and he's responsible...

It's for a sewing machine...

For them it's very dangerous
for the workers to meet with us,

who agree with us.

I met a friend who...

Go to the movies, go to a cafe...

Tonight he'll watch television...

Yes, of course...

- We can't do it.
- Why?

It's what I said before.

So we had this strike, at the
beginning we put up posters...

A farmer who had a small property...

had bought a house...

and now...

They have to...

They have to make the school
they had promised.

If we strike...

Leaving here, he goes with a
girl to the movies or a cafe...

It was a house of his parents

which they had for more
than forty years.

We agree for the most part,
of course, but

with the Yugoslav communist
party, you can go there,

how have they done...

Yugoslavia, Romania, Bulgaria,

and France.

The communists are
people like ourselves...

You see, Rosa? I was right.
Revisionism in practice: Hertz and Avis.

Westernism in practice:
advertising.

Taylor and Stakhanov: a show.

The two workers from the
electrical plant in Bratislava,

the students from the faculty
of philosophy in Prague,

peasants from the Alexander
Dovzhenko cooperative,

they have furnished the proof.

What proof?

Westernism in theory.
The proof that the rape

of a popular democracy
by western ideology

is one of the principal aspects
of modern revisionism.

The proof that
the revisionists find

in the womb of western culture,
support for their treasonous policies.

When the students
occupy their university,

do they fearlessly fly
the red flag?

No.

They timidly raise a black flag,

not even the black flag of
Kronstadt or Catalonia,

but the black flag
of bourgeois mourning.

What does that mean?

It means the student
struggle is founded upon

suicidal humanism,
not revolutionary determination.

Another concrete proof:

conversation with Vera Chytilova,
asset of the Czech cinema.

She thinks it
doesn't only depend

on the question of
freedom or non-freedom,

she believes there are
many more possibilities

in a state film.

She thinks that here
there is no technology,

no equipment, no money,

but in terms of freedom,
yes they have it.

Perhaps in the end it would
be best to stop making films

and let others make them.

For example, today Forman
is making a film with Paramount,

and Paramount, for me,
is the same thing as Novotny.

Western culture:
weapon of modern revisionism.

We are in a popular democracy.
The Orlik cinema is showing

"Angelique, Marquise of the Angels".

Above the cinema is the
Georgi Dimitrov school.

But what did Dimitrov say? He said:
"The popular democratic state

represents the power of the workers,
of the vast majority of the people

under the leadership
of the working class."

Did the working class ask
to have "Angelique" shown?

No, and...

What does this mean?

Simply that here,
just as in Hollywood,

movies are made
for the common man.

You go to the people,
you don't come from them.

You criticize the people's shortcomings,
without taking the people's point of view.

In short, you make the same kind
of movies as the people's enemies.

Westernism in theory.

Vera Chytilova.

American films, French
newspapers, English music.

What is the aim of the
imperialist ideology?

To conceal the existence
of the struggle,

to disguise the war between
the old and the new,

to try to forget
the class struggle.

Who makes use of Western
ideology in Czechoslovakia?

Revisionism. Against whom?

Against this worker, whom it prevents
from seeing the contradiction

between making an anti-aircraft gun
for North Vietnam in the morning,

going to see "Angelique, Marquise
of the Angels" in the evening.

Who profits from that?

Who splits his sides laughing

when someone says there is no
art or science without a class base?

Those who betrayed Marxism,
the revisionists.

To keep power,

in order to stay in power,

the revisionist boss makes use
of a lackey: the intellectual.

This flunky broadcasts in
profusion the bourgeois ideas

that are necessary and
sufficient for his boss:

individualism, egoism,
false sexuality, etc.

At all times,
intellectuals have been

fertile ground for
bourgeois degeneration.

That is why the revisionist boss

avoids as much as he can
instilling them with

the ideology of the proletarian
class, and on the contrary

tries his best to raise the working class
to the level of the intellectual.

Westernism in theory.

Revisionism in theory.

In words, it's day and night.

In fact, every day, night falls
over Czechoslovakia.

Sixty-eight.

Revisionism in theory.

1945: Czech and Slovak peoples
liberate themselves from fascism.

1949: Novotny takes power.

1968: the Czech
and Slovak peoples

resist the tanks of their
false brothers, the invaders.

1968-69: Dubcek,
Husak and company

remain proprietors of power.

Proprietors. Power.
Private property.

Yes, revisionist power is born
from the struggle of the people.

But whoever says revisionism
means treason.

Once the people have
put them into power,

the revisionists devote all their
energy to keeping the people,

especially the working class,
out of power.

Having refused the people the
right to speak and act,

the revisionist princes
suck their blood.

Here politics is the
business of specialists:

the butchers of Prague.

Orders from high up are carried out
by the police at the bottom.

The Communist Party has strayed
far from the working class.

The Communist Party has strayed
far from the working class.

There's only a short distance from
political prostitution to the whorehouse,

and it's quickly cleared
by the directing clique.

The bureaucrats are looking to rendez-
vous in large international hotels

to fornicate with the children of
the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The unions have become
ordinary enterprises

for subcontracting labor,
in the service of ambitious men

looking for promotion
in the state apparatus.

The torture and death of
proletarian internationalism.

The revisionist bureaucrats,
like all reactionaries,

are afraid of the people, that is
why they use police terror.

Just as in capitalist countries,

the Ministry of the Interior becomes the
Ministry of Repression, the civil war

between the workers and the power
of the revisionist feudal system.

The death of democratic centralism,

murdered by demagogy
and the lies of opportunists.

Sixty-nine.

Revisionism is not
the same as imperialism,

but its methods are identical.

USA equals imperialism.
USSR, social-imperialism.

USA, Latin America.
USSR, Eastern Europe.

The Soviet revisionists regard a
number of coutries as their colonies.

Toward these countries,
the new Soviet revisionist

counter-revolutionary tsars
have adopted a policy of rape,

of economic pillage
and political vassalage.

Thanks to their
alleged economic aid

and self-styled military assistance,

Soviet revisionists have
infiltrated like shameless foxes

into the countries' daily lives.

"To live among the people
like a fish in water,"

say the Chinese comrades.

"To hide in vans in order to spy
on the Czech and Slovak people,"

say the self-styled
Soviet comrades.

Yesterday Czechoslovakia,

today Cuba, tomorrow Egypt.

Although revisionism is socialist in
words, it is imperialist in practice.

By servilely
bowing their heads,

by using Radio Moscow
to drown out

the angry cries of their people,
Czech and Slovak revisionists

have shown they are the truest
allies of social-imperialism,

the truest allies of imperialism.

In a general way, we can say that

the revisionists cite in their support
texts of Marx, Engels and Lenin

with the sole intention of
lying to the people.

When the revisionists
say socialism,

they mean social-imperialism.

When they say internationalism,

they mean social-colonialism.

When they say information,

they mean deformation.

When they say
proletarian class stand

they mean bourgeois class being.

Therefore, third part:

to a picture of sickness,
add a sound which is not sick.

Third part:

add the true sound to
a false picture

in order first to find
a true picture again.

That's what we're
going to do now, Rosa.

Use the law of
the unity of opposites,

discovered by Marxism-Leninism,
in order to observe socialist society.

Managerial class.

Memorandum to administrators
of the Party and State.

Our position in the life
of the State and Party

means that if we are not careful

we risk falling into
bad habits of bureaucracy

and granting ourselves
special privileges.

Comrades, let's be careful,
beware of being arrogant,

keep to our simple way of life,

banish flattery and egoism,

share the life of the people,
refuse privileges.

Our practice ought to be guided

by the idea of whole-heartedly
serving the people.

All we do should arise from the
interests of the people,

and not a small
privileged part of it.

This means several things.

Thinking of all problems in
Marxist-Leninist terms.

Knowing the essential thing is not to
understand the laws of the objective world

in order to explain it,

but to use knowledge of these laws
to transform the world.

The knowledge of these laws
is not gained solely from books,

but also from practice.

After we have acquired theoretical
knowledge from practice,

we must verify the truth of these ideas
through the actions of the masses.

To do that, we must apply
democratic centralism.

We must solve the contradictions
between centralism and democracy.

We must refuse to solve these
problems by administrative fiat.

We must condemn
unprincipled democracy.

Among the people,
centralism and democracy

are two contradictory aspects
of a single whole.

The search for this unity,

the unity of democracy
and centralism,

the unity of
liberty and discipline,

must be the main aspect
of our leadership.

All controversies among the people

can only be solved through
democratic methods:

discussion, criticism,
self-criticism,

persuasion and education.

They cannot be solved
by repression,

that is contrary to
the people's interests.

Our other principle of practice
is investigation.

We need to continually inquire
within the masses

in order to modify our practices,

and bind ourselves every day
more closely to the masses.

Not only are we unafraid
of the people's criticism,

we must take it into account.

The people's criticism is the
moving force behind our leadership.

If we don't want

revisionism to win,

we've got to master leadership
based upon the principle:

"arise from the masses
and return to the masses".

We cannot follow the
example of Khrushchev:

undermining democratic centralism...

No longer think of subjectivity
in terms of impression,

but in terms of class.

...attacking comrades by surprise.

We ought to be modest and prudent,

take care not to be presumptuous,

practice self-criticism and have
the courage to correct our errors

and the shortcomings in our work.

We should never claim
for ourselves all merit,

and blame others for our faults,
as Khrushchev did.

If we follow these
principles in our work,

bureaucratic revisionism
will be beaten,

things will become clearer and
the future will be less gloomy.

Re-education of the intellectuals.

In order to mold administrators
who will really serve the people,

the proletariat must assume the historic
task of re-educating the intellectuals.

The process of the peaceful evolution
of the dictatorship of the proletariat

into a revisionist clique
in the USSR

teaches us that domination
of bourgeois ideology

on the cultural level
leads inevitably

to restoration of capitalism
on the political and economic level.

Consequently, after taking power...

THE COMMUNISTS ARE BOTH

THE MOTOR AND THE TARGET
OF THE REVOLUTION

This proves that the re-education
of the intellectuals is a major task.

Large numbers of workers must
go into the university,

the theaters, the movie studios,
in order to wage the...

...ideological fight along the lines of
struggle, criticism and transformation.

This will not only lead
to a new phase

in the struggle
against bourgeois ideology,

but will also speed up the process
by which the working class

remolds the lives of the
intellectuals into its own image.

Why call this re-education?

Because the intellectuals received
a bourgeois education in the past.

Because in the present, the revisionist
line of Dubcek-Brezhnev-Husak

has not educated them in proletarian
ideas, but in bourgeois ones.

The intellectuals need to be educated
in the proletarian conception of the world

so that they reject the
bourgeois ideas

instilled by
revisionist education.

That's the content
of this re-education.

The re-education of the intellectuals
remains a major problem

throughout the period of revolution
and the building of socialism.

After seizing power,
the proletariat

undertakes to recast the
intellectuals in its own image,

to form a contingent of proletarian
intellectuals in its own service.

This is an imperative for
the consolidation

and development of the
dictatorship of the proletariat.

An imperative for the
proletariat's establishment

of its own dominant position in the
ideological and cultural domains.

To carry out this task,

it is indispensable to undertake
a radical revolution in education.

DOWN WITH THE NEW TSARS

Analyzing the Spanish
student movement,

which has been reaching
ever greater proportions,

the Spanish Marxist-Leninist
communist party

has set the way forward.

We must take the following
important measures:

Send students and teachers to
production for a time.

Condemn the bourgeois theory
of science beyond class,

and of abstract knowledge.

Pose, in everything taught, the
question: for whom, against whom?

Fully denounce the self-styled
most influential academics

involved in
revisionist pursuits.

Multiply the number of working class
propaganda groups in the universities.

AGAINST THE PETIT-BOURGEOIS SLOGAN
"I ENJOY APPEARANCES"

OPPOSE THE
MARXIST-LENINIST SLOGAN

"LET'S MAKE OUR
ENJOYMENT APPARENT"

Practice the method:
struggle, criticism, transformation.

Not taking these measures means
not acting in the proletariat's interests.

The proletariat will only free itself
completely after having freed all mankind.

Proletarian policies
must mark out a solution

to the masses
and the intellectuals

and must strive to transform
negative factors into positive ones.

We must undertake the re-education of
the intellectuals from this point of view.

Adoption of this
critical perspective should

permit those who have committed grave
errors to admit and correct them.

As for the small minority
of Party responsibles ultimately

following the road of capitalism,

we must concentrate our...

we must concentrate our
hatred upon them,

for it is their revisionist
line and education

which has poisoned
our young intellectuals.

We must make a distinction between
this handful of counter-revolutionaries

and the large majority of
intellectuals fooled by this clique.

We must establish a clear distinction
between two types of contradictions:

contradiction among the people, and
contradiction between the enemy and us.

To resolve the contradiction
between the intellectuals

and the dictatorship
of the proletariat,

we must adopt the process:
unity, criticism, self-criticism, unity.

The peasantry.

In the country of the Danube, many
factions were fiercely fighting.

Lenin sided with the blacksmiths

because he believed only they could
ensure the future of the country.

One could ask them to
give their utmost

and their activities were
highly useful to their fellow men.

Lenin said:

"If the peasants alone
redouble their efforts,

the harvest will increase
by a very small amount.

If, on the other hand, they are
given a sufficient number of plows,

the result will be considerable."

At the time, there were
two sorts of plows.

Some were made of wood
in the old way,

others, which were newer,
were made of iron

and were forged in large workshops
belonging to powerful owners.

But there was only

a relatively small number
of iron plows.

They cost a great deal,
and could only be used profitably

over large tracts,
and with the aid of horses.

The simple wooden plows,
on the other hand,

could be built and drawn by the
peasants themselves, but they only made

very shallow furrows in the soil.

These plows were used
by poor peasants.

Moreover, these peasants had too
little land to feed themselves.

They were often obliged
to work elsewhere,

for wages on large estates.

Many peasant sons went to the
towns to seek work in the

large metal factories,
or in other workshops.

But only some of those
whom the land could not feed

were fed by the towns.

The trade in plows was
narrowly restricted.

Firstly, the large estates
were few in number.

Secondly,

the iron masters had to keep the
price of plows to a high level.

They increased their own profits

not by increasing
the number of plows sold,

but primarily by making
the workers work longer.

The continuing flights of poor
young peasants from the countryside

meant one could always find
new journeymen,

working for low wages.

Great poverty reigned among them.

Helped by Lenin,

the blacksmiths drove out
the iron masters and seized power.

Before the expulsion of
the iron masters,

the poor peasants
supported the blacksmiths.

Afterwards, the blacksmiths aided them
in driving out the large landowners.

The poor peasants at once
divided the land they had won.

Before coming to power, Lenin
had taught it was necessary

above all else to provide
iron plows to the whole country,

and many had understood he
intended to do away immediately

with the small holdings.

However,

when he seized power with the help
of the blacksmiths, he did the opposite.

He left the land
to the poor peasants,

as he had left the workshops
to the journeyman blacksmiths,

allotting to each one

as much land as he could
cultivate on his own.

In this way, he considerably
increased the number of

plots of land too small for
the use of the iron plow.

Only several large estates
were taken over

and managed by
himself and his pupils.

The philosopher Luxemburg
violently reproached Lenin.

She said:

"Lenin is like all the others.
Power weakens his memory."

And: "He who succeeds
forgets much."

Lenin answered:

"I have taught, now they learn.

They have listened,
now they experience."

Lenin laughed at those who believed
one could, in one day, by decree,

put an end to a thousand years of
misery, and went on his way.

Soon the situation was as follows.

The blacksmiths, after having
driven out their oppressors,

produced as many
iron plows as they could,

without worrying what price
they could sell for.

The landowners had also
been driven out

and their estates were now
administered by the State,

or by the innumerable
isolated small peasants.

Among the peasants, there were
some who had almost enough land,

and horses to draw the plows.

Yet for them it wasn't
obvious to buy iron plows

because their land was too small.

The peasants who were completely
poor had no horses and went hungry.

Once again they had to find
those who were better off

and work for them for wages
or the lending of horses.

They soon again became
very discontented.

Their hatred turned upon
the well-to-do peasants.

Lenin did nothing to suppress this
hatred, on the contrary, he fanned it.

The blacksmiths sent men

around the country to make
propaganda for the iron plows.

They advised the poor peasants

to associate in the
largest possible number,

and to combine as much
land as they could,

so the use of iron plows
could be profitable.

To those who followed their advice,
they would send an iron plow on credit.

But to the isolated peasants
who were better off,

they would not grant credit,

and would only send them
iron plows after long delays.

"We are in the same position as
the poor peasants," they said calmly.

"We blacksmiths no longer each have
an anvil which belongs to us alone.

Without that, we cannot make plows."

Lenin replied:

"If you want the land
to grow wheat,

give up the land now
in order to get it."

Which means:

"If you give up the plots of land which
belong to you, you will get more wheat."

It was true.

Soon gigantic tracts were created,

larger than the manorial estates
of the old days.

After a time, the well-to-do
peasants themselves

in turn had to join
with these large tracts

because they were no longer able
to find wage laborers,

and their fields
produced little wheat

since the old wooden plows did not
trace a deep enough furrow.

Thus Lenin realized his program
by carrying out his task

and letting nature
carry out its own.

Re-education of the intellectuals.

"Don't say 'nature',
say 'dialectic of nature'."

Cf. Friedrich Engels.

The army.

The first decree
of the Paris Commune was

the suppression of the standing army
and its replacement by the armed people.

That demand now figures
in the program

of all parties
calling themselves communist.

In that way, the Commune seemed to have
replaced the shattered state machinery

simply by instituting
more complete democracy,

by the suppression
of the standing army

and the election and recall
of all officials without exception.

Now, in reality,

this "simply" represents
a gigantic task:

the replacement of institutions by
others which are fundamentally different.

The replacement of institutions by
others which are fundamentally different.

Here it is definitely a case of
transformation in quality.

Realized in this way,

as fully and methodically
as possible,

bourgeois democracy becomes
proletarian.

The State,

that official power designed
to subdue a determinate class,

is transformed into something which is,
properly speaking, no longer a State.

It is no less a necessity

to subdue the bourgeoisie
and break its resistance,

but here the organ of repression
is the majority of the population

and no longer the minority

as had always been the case
in the time of servitude

and wage slavery.

Now, from the time when
the majority of the people

subdue its oppressors,

there is no longer need of
a special power of repression.

Seventy-five, part 2.

In this sense the State
begins to disappear.

In the place of the special
institutions of a privileged minority,

of the officials and leaders
of the standing army,

the majority itself can
directly take over these tasks.

And the more the
functions of State power

are exercised by all the people,
the less necessary this power becomes.

It is precisely here that
we see the turning point

of bourgeois democracy
into proletarian democracy,

of oppressors' democracy
into democracy of the oppressed,

of the State, as a special
power created to subdue

a determinate class,
into the repression exercised

on the oppressor
by the general power

of the majority of the people,
the workers and the peasants.

Dictatorship of the proletariat.

Who are our enemies?
Who are our friends?

This question is extremely
important for the revolution.

Without a large measure
of democracy for the people,

the dictatorship of the proletariat
will never be able to consolidate.

The proletariat must exercise,
in every area,

its dictatorship
over the bourgeoisie.

After the annihilation
of its armed enemies,

there still remain
unarmed enemies.

They have means to wage a struggle
to the death against the proletariat.

Maintaining firmly the
dictatorship of the proletariat

and creating the conditions
for the passage to communism.

The revisionists obliterate the difference
between socialism and capitalism,

between the dictatorship of the
proletariat and that of the bourgeoisie.

We must fight against egoism
and criticize revisionism.

Without destroying,
we cannot build.

Destroying is criticizing,
is making revolution.

Workers' propaganda teams

will remain in the schools
for a long time,

participate in all the tasks of
struggle, criticism, transformation,

and direct the school
from that time on.

THE

DICTATORSHIP

OF THE

PROLETARIAT

IS

THE ENTRY

OF THE WORKING CLASS

INTO

THE SUPERSTRUCTURE

Quit the machines

Go out, proletarians

March and march

Form up for the attack

Flags arrayed and weapons loaded

In cadence step
For the assault, advance!

OK?

Seize now the factory,

Dig the grave of capital.

Your life is more

Than being a machine.

All for all,
Nothing for the exploiter.

The world must be won,

Arise proletarians!

Our brothers' blood

Calls for justice.

Nothing can stop

The wrath of the masses.

In London, in Paris,
Budapest and Berlin,

Seize power,
Worker battalions!

Take your revenge,

Worker battalions!

Our best...

The Third International.

Fiftieth anniversary
of the creation

of the Third
Communist International.

The great revisionist circus.

The clowns of Moscow and their
Czech and Slovak accomplices

disguise themselves
as Marxist-Leninists.

Editorial from Pravda: "Long live
the Third Communist International,

however articles 4, 6, 7 and 11,

on the conditions of
the admission of parties

to the Communist International,
include erroneous aspects."

What do articles
4, 6, 7 and 11 say?

Article 4. In Brazil:

Refusing to undertake systematic
agitation and propaganda

in the army would be treasonous

to the revolutionary movement.

Article 6. In Palestine:

Arab workers must be shown that
staying out of imperialist wars

means not accepting the
arbitration of the great powers,

but destroying capitalism

through revolutionary violence.

- Article 7. In Italy:
- Strikes must be based

upon a complete break
with reformism.

Article 11. In Czechoslovakia:

questionable right-wing elements
in the party must not be replaced

by other questionable
right-wing elements.

Listen, you're exaggerating, Rosa.

You cite true texts, but with what?

With images still half false.

You thought we could seize
just like that, by chance,

the relations of production
between images and sounds.

In fact, you've
acted dogmatically.

What you've ultimately adopted
is the style of posters and slogans.

You thought you'd
taken a step forward.

Result: we've taken
two steps backward.

Let's look backward
now that we're there.

Czechoslovakia. We have
seen in practice, practically,

first, the patient,
the concrete situation.

We have seen in
theory, theoretically,

second, the sickness,
revisionism,

beginning with concrete analysis
of the concrete situation.

We have shown, without being able
to pass from theory to practice,

thirdly, Marxism-Leninism,

how to cure this sickness,
how to fight against revisionism,

continuation and end, concrete
analysis, concrete situation.

Fourth part. Czechoslovakia.
New concrete situation.

Situation of class struggle. Fierce
struggle between old and new,

between the red revisionism of the right
and the red Marxism-Leninism of the left,

the red of the proletariat.

Good. Now to think.

That's difficult. Good.

Now, having right ideas.

Ideas. Philosophy.

We must make a new departure in
the philosophy of images and sounds.

It is imprisoned.

By whom?

By the revisionists and bourgeois
who imprison everything.

Why must we free it?

Mao Tse-tung, who liberated
the Chinese people,

said that he used
philosophy to do it.

But what philosophy
are you talking about?

I told you it was imprisoned. The task
of prisoners is to free themselves.

You're editing in circles
and we're not moving forward.

We advance by going
around in circles,

engaged in various struggles
in the course of their history.

Not history, social practice.

Men acquire

a rich experience

drawn from both their
successes and failures.

Not history, social practice.

Yes. Where do
right ideas come from?

Do they fall from the sky? No.

They come from social practice.

From three kinds
of social practice.

Social practice.

Struggle for production.

Struggle for production.

Struggle for production.

Social practice.

The class struggle.

The class struggle.

The class struggle.

The class struggle.

The class struggle.

Social practice.

Scientific experimentation.

Scientific experimentation.

The social existence of men
determines their thought.

Throw off your illusions

and prepare yourselves for the
struggle against revisionism!

Let's firmly resolve not to
recoil before any sacrifice!

Let's overcome all difficulties

in order to win the victory
against revisionism!

See you soon, Rosa,
with all my love.

Love you. Good-bye, Vladimir.

Long live the resistance of the Czech
people against Soviet social-imperialism!

Long live Mao Tse-tung's thought!