By Marijan Kubik & Alksandar Banjanac.
The Great October Socialist Revolution that happened one hundred years ago turned a new page in the history of mankind. The Great October Revolution ignited the revolutionary spirit in the hearts of hundreds of millions of people around the world, and infused them with confidence in their fight for a new world.
The October Revolution did not break out suddenly and as something that was generated solely in the Russian reality, it rather resulted from the entire flow of recent world, and in particular European, history. It was the fruit of the socialist aspirations, existence and functioning of the working class with the goal of tearing down the society divided in classes and the creation of classless human society.
All the progressive forces on the planet recognise the epochal, profoundly transformative role of the October Revolution and its significance as a continuous inspiration. We proudly and rightfully point out that the Russian October Revolution also inspiredthe Yugoslav workers' movement. Inspired by the ideas ofthe October, it was preparing for a long and painful, but victorious socialist revolution of its own.
World War I
World War Iis the prototype of the maxim defined by a military theorist Karl von Clausewitz (1780-1831): “War is a mere continuation of policy by other means”. The shot fired by the Yugoslav nationalists Gavrilo Princip in Sarajevo in 1914 set off the powder keg filled with political, economic and military rivalry among the major powers.
It was the culmination of long-standing diplomatic and political squabbling and bickering, arising from economic rivalries of the European capitalist powers – their capitalist elite.
On the occasion of the hundredth anniversary of the October Revolution, it is impossible not to remember, with deepest respect, Dimitrije Tucovic, under whose leadership the Serbian Social Democratic party functioned as one of the most progressive and revolutionary workers’ parties in Europe. Tucovic dedicated his entire life to the struggle for workers’ rights, social justice and civil and human rights. With Lenin, Tucovic was one of the rare steadfast Marxists, who spoke against the opportunism of the members of the Second International. His conviction, that “conflicts, dangers of war and wars are not caused by hostilities and hatred between peoples, but by the efforts of the capitalist class to subject and exploit other nations and peoples”, is still undeniably true today.
During the war in Yugoslavia,there were strong winds announcing change – the Red October. There are records of protests of sailors in the Austro-Hungarian war ports by the end of 1917. In Pula, there were anti-war protests, as well as desertions. The great strike of 11,000 workers of the arsenal seeking a truce, higher wages and better nutrition broke out in 1918. In support of workers' unrest, the sailors from the warships “Erzherzog”, “Prinz Eugen” and “Aspern”, refused obedience to their commanders. Thirty-five members of the Naval air stationreceived long-term prison sentences on the grounds of disobedience. Due to the senseless expansion of war operations, worsening living conditions, difficult position of the Slavs, and echoes of the October Revolution, the unrestswere spreading. The mutiny of sailors in the Bay of Kotor began on February 1, 1918at noon on the ships “Sankt Georg” and “Gea” when about 6,000 sailors of the Austro-Hungarian navy took command into their own hands and put up red flags on about forty ships in the Bay of Kotor. They requested separate peace to end the war, improved nutrition and regular leaves.
This was not only an expression of anti-war sentiment in the Austro-Hungarian monarchy.According to the report of the Serbian military attaché in Padua, the rebellion of sailors was “a result of Leninist ideas that were so widespread in the Austro-Hungarian Navy that they significantly weakened the familiar harsh discipline”.
However, due to a series of oversights on the part of the leadership of the rebellion,the uprising started to fade to a certain extent. The Command issued an ultimatum to the rebel sailors on February 2,it ordered evacuation of the civilian population and the German U-boats were ordered to sink the rebel ships. The rebellion was crushed. Three hundred eighty-six sailors and non-commissioned officers were charged before the regular military court. Of these, 48% were of South Slavic origin, 20% Italian, 13% Czechs and Slovaks, 10% Germans, 8% Hungarians, and the rest were Poles, Romanians and Ukrainians. Although about 1,200 sailors were arrested, only 98 of these were taken before theimpromptu military court. Around ten sailors died in prison,two died in the rebellion, the majorityreceived long-term prison sentences and four were sentenced to death by a firing squad.
World War I ended with the signing of the Treaty of Versailles, which was a great humiliation for the German people. The young Soviet republic was completely excluded from the drafting of the treaty. Supposed to put an end to war, the Treaty of Versailles turned it into a constant threat hovering over all humanity. Rather than provide “eternal peace”, the treaty missed its target from the very beginning. In fact, the same generation that created the peace treaty found itself amidst the flames of another war, even more devastating and more horrible and with more crimes and victims, only twenty years later. Karl Marx’scomment about The Treaty of Frankfurt – “This is the safest way to transform the war into a European institution. This is the most reliable way to turn the future peace into a mere ceasefire.” –is also applicable to the Treaty of Versailles.
Yugoslavs in the October Revolution
The First Serbian Volunteer Division was formed on April 16, 1916 in the town of Odessa. It consisted of nearly 10,000 volunteers. Shortly before The February Revolution, the army corps consisted of approximately 40,000 volunteers. The town of Odessa was its headquarters. The First Division headquarters was in Voznesensky and the Second Division headquarters was in Alexandrovsky. The triumph of the Bolsheviks over the imperial dynasty could have been well anticipated. In such a revolutionary mood, new ideas started spreading among the Serbian Volunteer Corps soldiers. Towards the end of March of 1917, arrays officers started forming military unions within the Volunteer Corps. The proposal was supported and encouraged by the revolutionary unions of the Ukrainian citizens in the area between Odessa and Voznesansky, where the Serbian Volunteer Corps units were situated.
The Serbian Volunteer Corps Command attempted to prevent the spreading of revolutionary ideas among its members. Therefore, in April 1917, General Mihajlo Zivkocic introduced, by a decree, troop, regiment and division councils, as well as the Corps Assembly, intending to use them to influence the political mood in the units. The results, however, were insignificant.
In the assembly of Serbian Bolshevik-oriented volunteers in Odessa, the Federal Yugoslavia was proclaimed as the ideal. It was emphasized that “The Russian Revolution and the victory of the Russian democracy are a new era in the history of mankind and, thus, the Russian revolution cannot remain only Russian”. The volunteers established the Yugoslav Revolutionary Union in Kiev in summer of 1917.
The supporters of the Revolution started leaving The Volunteer Corps on a large scale, thus reducing it to one half.
Around 35,000 Yugoslavs were involved in the revolutionary activities – they joined the Red Army units. Towards the end of 1917, the Serbian-Soviet Revolutionary Unit was formed and in August of 1918 the First Yugoslav Communist Regiment was established in Tsaritsyn. Many of the Yugoslavs remained in the lasting memory as the Soviet Union heroes. Many participators, upon their return in their home country, got actively involved in the activities of the unification of the proletariat in the newly formed bourgeois state and they played a significant role in creating a revolutionary workers party.
In the beginning of World War I, social democratic parties were either prohibited in Yugoslav countries or their work was suspended due to war circumstances. In the final stages of war, under the influence of harsh social circumstances and the perspective of defeat of the Central Forces, they gradually renew their organisation and began to operate. From 1917, and in particular in 1918, in the Yugoslav countries, primarily those under Austro-Hungarian rule, there were many military, workers’ and peasants’ movements. Under the influence of those revolutionary developments and in the aftermath of the October Revolution, the renewal of the activities of social democratic parties was imbued with vehement political and ideological conflicts. Among the leaders of the recently renewed social democratic parties of Serbia, Bosnia and Hercegovina and Dalmatia the supporters of class struggle prevailed. They emphasized the solidarity with the October Revolution and accepted Lenin’s initiative to create a new, communist International.
In the time of establishing the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenians in December of 1918, the leaders of Serbian and Bosnia and Hercegovina’s social democratic parties proposed an initiative for uniting workers’ organisations in the new country. The congress of united social democratic parties and organisations, held in Belgrade from April 20 to April 23, 1919, passed a decision to form the Social Democratic Workers Party of Yugoslavia (of communists) or SRPJ(k). They declared a revolution and a dictatorship of the proletariat, as well as acceding to the Communist International as their goals. On that occasion and with the participation of the same delegates, the Congress of the Trade -Union Unification was held where the unity of trade unions movement was declared and the Central Workers Trade Union Council was elected. A Conference of socialist (communist) women was held, too. They accepted the programme of the Social Democratic Workers Party of Yugoslavia. On October 10, 1919 in Zagreb, the League of the Communist Youth of Yugoslavia (SKOJ) was established and they also adopted the programme of the Social Democratic Workers Party of Yugoslavia.
Socialist workers party of Yugoslavia (communist) changes its name to the Communist Party of Yugoslavia at its Second congress in the following 1920.
The year of 1919 was marked by the rise of the revolutionary movement. The influence of the SRPJ(k) was increasing rapidly and soon it grew into a significant political factor in the country. In the municipal elections in March and August of 1920, the party won the elections in many municipalities in cities such as Belgrade, Zagreb, Osjek, Skopje, Nis, etc. In the elections for the Constituent Assembly in November of 1920, it won 59 mandates and was ranked third according to the number of MPs in the Assembly. In summer of 1920 SRPJ(k) had over 65,000 members and the united trade unions around 210, 000. At that time, it published its central newspaper – The Workers newspaper, as well as a number of province and local newspapers.
In the municipal elections held in March of 1920 in Croatia, Slovenia and Dalmatia, 490 communist councillors were elected. They won the majority of votes and absolute majority of mandates in Zagreb, Osijek, Vukovar, Knjizevac, Virovitica, Crikvenica, Cakovac, Valpov, etc. A communist Svetozar Delic was elected the mayor of Zagreb. However, the duke (ban) appointed by the Government in Belgrade annulled the results of the elections and appointed the city commissioner, justifying this act by a lawsuit for treason that had been filed against Delic. In response, Delic convened a session, but the police dispersed it. Communists did exceptionally well in the elections in Montenegro, particularly in Podgorica. In the municipal elections in Serbia, Macedonia and Kosovo in August of 1920, communists won in 37 municipalities, Belgrade, Nis and Skopje being among them. In many cases, similarly to Zagreb, the officials prevented the elected communist councillors from taking over the office; the same thing happened in Belgrade, where Filip Filipovic was elected the mayor but was prevented from taking over the office.
In April of 1920 the strike of about 50,000 railroad workers was held, which was one of the most major workers’ actions of that period. The strike was marked by the reinforced commitment of the regime to suppress the revolutionary movement (the first prohibitions of celebrating May 1, stronger censorship, arrests of SRPJ(k) leaders, suspension of communist councillors in municipalities and dissolution of the communist local governments, declaration of militarisation of railroad workers, armed attacks on strikers, etc.).
Calming of revolutionary movements in Europe, the support of imperialistic forces of Antanta to the office holders in the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenians and its partial inner stabilisation, enabled the regime to carry out more resolute operations against the revolutionary workers’ movement in the country. In December of 1920 the Government, accusing the Communist Party of Yugoslavia (CPY) of preparing a coup, took advantage of the conflicts with the gendarmerie and the army in the miners’ strikes in Bosnia and Hercegovina and Slovenia to ban communist activities and to impose dictatorship by a so-called “Obznana” law (Proclamation). The long period of dictatorship would last almost until the beginning of World War II. The Kingdom of Yugoslavia, which had been extremely reactionary and backward country even prior to the dictatorship, was dully characterized as the “dungeon of nations”.
During the dictatorship, the activities of the Party were forced underground by brutal repression, the entire assets of the Party were confiscated, trade union associations and organising of workers strikes and demonstrations were also banned as illegal, all Party front organisations were banned as illegal, mass arrests commenced, thousands of communists were persecuted, imprisoned, tortured and killed, and the CPY received a heavy blow, which dramatically affected its organisational disunity. It is interesting to note that the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was the last country in Europe to recognise The Soviet Union (USSR). This only happened immediately before the outbreak of the war threat, in 1940. The CPY faced World War II as an underground movement, but it did not prevent it from being the organiser of the magnificent antifascist rebellion. In autumn of 1941, Yugoslav partisans controlled a free territory size of the contemporary Belgium, where November 7 – the Day of the Great October Revolution was publically celebrated.
The October Revolution and Socialist Yugoslavia
Following a long period of dictatorship and after gruelling National Liberation Struggle during World War II, in which, according to the estimates, over 1,200,000 Yugoslavs were killed (among these a large number of prominent Party cadre –seasoned communists who experienced the period when the Party was forced to operate underground, the war in Spain, as well as our National Liberation Struggle), freedom and the victory of our revolution eventually arrived. The roads were paved for building a new society and a victory of a new man awakening from a long period of backwardness. The CPY succeeded in seizing power and proclaiming progressive goals amidst the new creative enthusiasm. Our society became a socialist society and the victories of radical changes materialised daily.
The achievements of the October Revolution were bright examples to a young socialist federal republic. The marking of the holiday dedicated to the October Revolution became a ceremony at the state level. The Yugoslav Party stood on the line of the proletariat internationalism and therefore “the significance of the Red October as the first stage of the world revolution and its powerful base for further development”1 played an important ideological part in the Party that had much yet to learn and to advance.
However, the tragic events of 1948 proved that little was learned and implemented. The CPY leadership, self-complacent with their own revolutionary sweep, and in reality incapable of applying the great ideas and implementing the goals set before them as the governing body of the Yugoslav proletariat, took the road of opportunism and alienation from the proletariat. The deformities within the state and social structures, i.e. their highest levels, became more and more visible, as the post-war period elapsed.
Parallel to this, in an increasingly unhealthy spiritual and ideological climate, the cult of Josip Broz Tito was being built. Many communists were elected for or excluded from the Central Committee of the Party without the Committee’s meeting. After 1940, The Central Committee of the Party met for the first time as late as in spring of 1948. All this led to a great doubt among the proletariat masses and the communists in the proper operation of the Central Committee and the Party leadership. As early as in the beginning of 1948, the growing divergence between the Soviet and Yugoslav leadership ensued. In June of 1948, the Bucharest meeting of the Information Bureau of the Communist and Workers’ Parties of Europe was held, when a resolution was passed calling on a self-criticism of the Yugoslav leaders and whereby many omissions and mistakes in the interior and international politics were pointed out. The Yugoslav leaders first decided not to attend the Information Bureau meeting and subsequently rejected the resolution in its entirety. The rejection of the resolution was confirmed in the Fifth Congress of the CPY, held on July 28, 1948. The delegates to the Congress had not been elected, but previously determined. In the concluding remarks of his speech, Tito stated that he and the CPY would remain unwaveringly loyal to Marx, Engels and Lenin’s teachings and to Stalin.
That fact contained the hypocrisy that would accompany the Yugoslav party, or rather the League of Communists of Yugoslavia, as the party was renamed in the Sixth Congress of 1952, along its historical path. The loyalty to the principles of scientific socialism, consistency and authenticity in addressing these principles, applied to the specific circumstances of Yugoslav experience of building socialism, would remain to a greater or lesser degree present as a declarative guideline. In reality, already from 1948 began the rapid divergence from the fundamental principles of the science established by the classics of the scientific socialism, the principles based on the experience of the proletariat struggle and confirmed in practice by the Great October Revolution.
Although Yugoslavia justifiably rejected the Marshall plan in 1947, seeing in it the most impressive instrument of the American doctrine of restraining communism, the Yugoslav leadership after the conflict with Stalin will start to receive first of all economic, and then military aid from the Americans in 1949. Available documents from the US archives witness that in exchange for the American aid, Yugoslavia was ready for the war with USSR.
During 1949 yugoslavian government participate in liquidation uprising of Democratic Army of Greece. In March 1949, Tsaldaris, as Minister of Foreign Affairs in Athens and diplomatic arch-blunderer, spilled the beans. Speaking at Corinth that the Daily Mail correspondent in Greece, during the celebration of the reopening of the Corinth canal, he said the correspondent, Paul King, who was standing nearby, and said, "Very soon the king Tito and be allies." Just a few months later, in the summer of 1949, King Paul and Tito Maharaj showed on battlefields that have already been practically comrades-in-arms. They fought together against the Democratic Army of Greece. In fact, during the entire out imperialistic offensives last year against the Democratic Army of Greece defends Grarnmos and Vitsi, Tito gave the Greek bourgeoisie for the help that the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Greece, N. Zachariadis, put IT "had a decisive influence on the outcome of our armed struggle," and finally forced the Greek liberation movement to a temporary withdrawal. Deputy Prime Minister of the Government of that time Athens, S Venizelos has publicly stated: "Without the help given to us by Yugoslavia, we could not be in a position to achieve such success." I Agence France Presse, as stated in the works of 18 October 1949 in Athens, sent a telegram to the "diplomatic holiday in Washington believe Tito's role in the development of the situation in Greece, as at least as a crucial economic and military assistance the US delivers the Greek Government ". In fact, Tito had not joined the imperialist camp, that he actively helped Greek bourgeoisie regime Athens would likely have failed so far. "Tito knew that only if Monarch-Fascism can prevail in Greece, and the Greek Democratic Army was defeated, could provide your wallpaper and get help from the US and Britain." (N. Zachariadis :. new situation, new tasks).
In the Sixth congress of the CPY, according to the personal confessions of Aleksandar Rankovic, who was practically the second most prominent figure of the Party at that time, from 1948 to 1952 the Party expelled 218,379 members who had been admitted to the CPY until spring of 1948. When we consider the fact that in the beginning of 1948 the CPY had 285,147 members, we can realise the scale of the putsch that had nothing to do with democratic principles of scientific socialism.
The earlier mentioned Sixth Congress confirmed the new direction of the party – “The socialist self-management”, under the veil of consistency to the interpretation of the works of classicists of scientific socialism Marx, Engels and Lenin (Stalin is no longer mentioned). This direction will be, until the breakup of Yugoslavia, the main ideological path. The term “self-management” has its long history in the labor movement in Yugoslavia. 140 years ago in Kragujevac (in 1876), a manifestation took place which is remembered in history under the name “Red banner”. On that day in February of 1876, the workers and other progressive people took to the streets to defend the victory in the elections won by the socialists. The red flag which was carried had the word “Self-management” printed on it. At the same time, that is the first important victory of the young labor movement. The Party ideologues tried to join the theory of scientific socialism with the new course of Yugoslavia in every way. The Paris commune was declared as the first practical attempt of the proletarian self-management, and Marks’s principle “association of independent producers” was declared as an ideal precisely in self-management in Yugoslavia. Self-management will represent the breakthrough of bourgeoisie ideology in the Yugoslav party and set out in quest of allegedly new «socialist» roads, which were capitalist in fact, in the economy, internal and foreign policy, education and culture, and in all sectors of life.
Self-management was first proscribed in the law from 1950, with the aim of proving that,unlike in Yugoslavia, there was no proper management of the working class, but rather of the bureaucrat class, in the USSR and other socialist countries.In reality, the law actually meant abandoning the planned economy and the beginning of breaking of the state property. Self-management meant transfer of the state wealth into the hands of a group of people and local administration onto which the stateimposed onlyfiscal obligations. This would lead to the reconstruction of bourgeois market principles in Yugoslavia, the anarchy in the relations of production, the introduction of the shareholder ownership instead of collective ownership and to a more pronounced uneven growth, which would result in unemployment, corruption, nationalism and subsequently secessionism.
The international politics that Yugoslavia led also meant undermining of basic principles that had triumphed during the Red October: of the proletarian internationalism. To a greater or lesser extent, depending on the period, Yugoslavia led an anti-Soviet policy. The Cold War circumstances mirrored the class conflict and this war that was fought between socialist countries led by the USSR on one side and imperialistic countries on the other side, pushed Yugoslavia into the so-called “Non- Aligned”movement, one of whose ideological creators was Tito’s Yugoslavia itself. Non-alignment was the principal determinant of the Yugoslav international politics from the 1960s and the interpretation of the party’s internationalism. It was a classic example of the “third way” politics, whose reactionary essence had been explained by Lenin who had stated that the third way was there to indicate that there was no other way in relation to imperialism and exploitation.
The gradual reconstruction of capitalism in Yugoslavia will reach its complete form in the course of and upon the completion of the fratricidal wars on its territory, i.e. following its dissolution. Moving away from the principles of the October Revolution of the Yugoslav party will be one of the key factors in this process. This unfolded symbolically, too. The October Revolution and its relevance will have its place in Yugoslav socialism, but with constant revisions of its significance and its achievements. It is Illustrative to mention that early biographies of Josip Broz Tito emphasized his participation in the October events in Petersburg, since he was at that time in Russia as an Austro-Hungarian prisoner. His later biographies no longer contain such assertions.
Upon the temporary collapse of socialism in Yugoslavia
The October Revolution represents a hot and current topic even following the collapse of socialism, or at least of its relics on the territory of former Yugoslavia. The position of Yugoslavia and the historical development of our country against the October events in Petersburg do not cease to be a topic popular with the professional public, as well as the tabloid press. Needless to say, this topic is relevant as an example of historical revisionism.
After the reconstruction of capitalism in our country, the October Revolution started getting a highly negative connotation in the public sphere and among predominant attitudes of bourgeois intelligentsia and bourgeois media. These ideological attacks represent an integral part of severehistorical revisionism, i.e. forgery. Similar processes can be perceived to a greater or lesser extent in other former socialist countries in Eastern Europe and the USSR. We are going to mention some of the predominant postulates that do not cease to be ideological weapons used to primarily attack the conscience of working people.The aim is to create an image that working people cannot launch historical processes by themselves, that the basis of these are well-planned hidden interests of powerful figures from various spheres with their personal motives, who use working people as their puppets in order to realise the goals of different spheres of interests.
Let us list some of these “theories”:
- It is logical that Russia’s external adversaries and enemies were interested in a revolution. World War I was being fought, Russia was fighting Germany. Therefore, it is evident that the October Revolution was Germany’s interest and deed.
- The Russian Revolution of 1917 was a revolution instigated by American and European oil interests with the aim of taking control over Russian oil fields from the hands of the Rothschid-Nobel duo.
- The original organisers of the communist movement and the October Revolution were Jews, so the October Revolution was in fact a Jewish attempt to occupy Russia.
- The English Intelligence Service financed and carefully instructed Russian revolutionaries for years. Three out of five congresses of the Lenin’s party were held in London. Therefore, the Revolution was an act of English interests. Anglo-Russian conflicts had lasted continuously since the Napoleon wars. Let us recall the Crimean War and the constant subversive role of the British diplomacy that thwarted the Russian attempts to occupy Constantinople on a number of occasions.
- A wide network of conspiratorial organisations, modelled against the Freemasonic lodges, operated in favour of the revolution in Russia and played a decisive part in constituting the first Provisional government and subsequently its breakdown and the triumph of the Bolshevik Revolution.
Being a turning point for the historical process that inspired and does not cease to inspire hundreds of millions of people, for the ruling class the October Revolution is a target that is legitimate to attack by all means. Those attacks are attacks on the conscience of the working man and are a part of the institutional framework of the official politics in our country. The October Revolution disappeared from the public sphere, which means that all streets, institutions, clubs, etc. that bore a name of or association to the October Revolution, have been renamed. School history textbooks regard this event as a turning point for “introducing a Bolshevik dictatorship” in their non-scientific interpretation.
NKPJ (The New Communist Party of Yugoslavia) and the October revolution
In difficult times before the breakup of Yugoslavia, in the situation of ideological disorientation of the working class and the culmination of anti-communist attacksunheard of since the period before WWII, a qualitative step forward in defending the achievements ofthe October revolution in Yugoslavia, their further affirmation, and setting them up as vital goals of our working class, was made by forming The New Communist Party of Yugoslavia in 1990. Libertarian, democratic, internationalist inspirations that have guided us in our work for twenty-six years, are incomplete without the inspiration we draw from the biggest event in the history of human civilization – the Great Socialist October Revolution. Our commitment torestoring the authentic principles of Marxism-Leninism, which have guided us since our founding, has set the legacy of the Great October Socialist Revolution as the highest priority in our party's ideological orientation and practice.
Commemorative activities in the form of scientific, political, cultural and artistic events that we organize every year to mark the day of the October Revolution have become a tradition. They are the most solemn demonstration of our commitment to the work of scientific socialism and are regularly organized by our party.
However,even more important is the fact that our party constantly interprets the October events and their importance through our program, political views, public statements, activities, and in other ways. Thus, according to the stance of the NKPJ, the October Revolution was the mother of all the subsequent proletarian revolutions, it was carried out by the working class in alliance with the peasantry and the progressive intelligentsia, with the leading role of the Communist Party of Bolsheviks led by V. I. Lenin. Thanks to the success of the revolution and the subsequent victory in the Civil War, the USSR, the world’s first state of workers and peasants,was established. The NKPJ constantly reiterates that the success of the October Revolution proved the correctness of the Marxist-Leninist teachings about the inevitability of an overthrow of the bourgeoisie by a revolution, and the establishment of a dictatorship of the proletariat, the most democratic mode of social organization in the pre-communiststage, necessary for the successful establishment and development of socialism. The revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat represent only one stage in the process of class struggle that is continually unfolding as long as there are classes of capitalists and proletarians; this struggle is dynamic, it has its ups and downs, victories and defeats on both sides, but the Great October solidifiedthe inevitable fact that socialism is a legitimate stage in the development of human society.
Continuous inspiration for the new victories of the working man
The peoples of Yugoslavia madetheir contribution to creation of a new stage in the historical development of human civilization marked by the Red October. Our people enthusiastically received the news of the victory of the October Revolution in Russia,shoulder to shoulder with the international proletariat,and they also played their part both in the revolution and in spreading its flame throughout our region. Thus, the October Revolution, in addition to its historical and internationalist character and importance, became an importamt event in the national history of our people and an inspiration for political, historical, cultural and economic processes. It remains so, as enduring inspiration showing that the rule of workers and peasants is not merely a utopia and that opressors can be defeated andthat the suppressed can freethemselves from their shackles. The ideas of the October revolution remain an important example of libertarian inspiration for our freedom-loving people that in the whirlwinds of the world history have so often lost their freedom, independence and dignity which are still at stake and threatened by the interests of big imperialist powers for which the Balkans does not cease to be a sphere of great interest.
On the eve of the hundredth anniversary, the great anniversary of the October Revolution, despite all the problems that humanity faces today, we wish to highlight a new dose of optimism and pride, of revolutionary inspiration and the need for persistent and consistent struggle for the cause of the proletariat based on the most consistent principles –the principles of Marxism-Leninism. It is a historical inevitability and a certain fact that a counter-revolution is always followed by a new revolution, that the current defeats suffered by the mankind, and the proletariat in particular, are only a moment in time before a new episode when the working people will again seize power in our country as well, when the power will go to those who produce material and spiritual goods. Despite all the ups and downs, upsides and downsides that socialism has had in the past hundred years, it has proved to be a key prerequisite for the development and progress of human civilization in the modern epoch.
The future belongs to socialism!
