(From Harpal Brar, Trotskyism or Leninism? (1993), 151-152.)

Was socialism built in the USSR? Trotsky says it was.

The answer we give is that socialism was built in the Soviet Union and in support of this affirmative answer of ours we quote an authority which can in no way be described as biased either in favour of Stalin and the Bolshevik Party or indeed in favour of building socialism in the USSR. This authority is none other than that master phrase-mongerer, Trotsky himself:

“Socialism has demonstrated its right to victory,” says Trotsky, “not in the pages of Das Kapital, but in an industrial arena comprising one-sixth of the earth's surf ace, not in the language of dialectics, but in the language of steel, cement and electricity. Even if the Soviet Union, as a result of difficulties, external blows, and the mistakes of its leadership, were to collapse - which we firmly hope will not happen [the real nature of Trotsky's hopes, however, were disclosed by the Moscow Trials] there would remain as an earnest of the future this indestructible fact that thanks solely to a proletarian revolution a backward country has achieved in less than ten years successes unexampled in history.” (Trotsky, The Revolution Betrayed).

And again:

“The vast scope of industrialisation in the Soviet Union, as against the background of stagnation and decline in almost the whole capitalist world appears unanswerably in the following gross indices ...

“Gigantic achievements in industry, enormously promising beginnings in agriculture, an extraordinary growth of old industrial cities and a building of new ones, a rapid increase in the number of workers, a rise in cultural level and cultural demands - such are the indubitable results of the October Revolution ... “ (Trotsky, The Revolution Betrayed).

One could not have asked for a better refutation of Trotskyism than the one advanced by Trotsky himself in the above-quoted remarks. We are highly grateful and indebted to Trotsky for these candid admissions. Trotsky was right when he admitted that “socialism has demonstrated its right to victory, not in the pages of Das Kapital, but in an industrial arena comprising one-sixth of the earth's surface'~· that there had been “gigantic achievement” in industry; that “enormously promising” had been the results in the sphere of agriculture; that there had been a rise in the “cultural level and demands” of the Soviet people. He was absolutely correct. Such indeed were the “indubitable results” of the fight for the victory of socialist construction in the USSR - the fight launched by the Party in consequence of the decision of the 14th Congress of the Party - a decision which had met with the most vicious opposition from Trotsky and the New Opposition, i.e., Zinoviev and Co.