30 years ago the USSR retired from the historical stage. It was the first proletarian state in the World, it managed not only to survive through the hard civil war confrontation in the first years of its formation, but also to organize the great process – the building of socialism, and as the result it had created a new social mode – a socialistic one.

What is the real contemporary significance of the Country of Soviets history, which is not used to be treated positively among the ruling classes?

Bourgeois historians and politicians usually say, that the USSR was a gloomy and totalitarian country, that appeared as the result of coincidence, repressing its population and conducting an aggressive internal and external policy, having an inefficient economy, that lost to the capitalistic “West” in the cold war. In general, the USSR is treated as a singular zigzag of history. From this point of view, the Soviet history cannot teach the new generations to anything at all, and if it can, then it can teach only that it is dangerous and senseless to repeat such an “experiment”. This is a bourgeois position.

But, unlike this point of view, there is another one, that has the class and scientific foundation.

The Soviet system has become a reality in Russia as the result of a revolution, that was a natural result of all the historical process and social contradictions.

After 1917 the struggle against exploitation and oppression had reached a new level all over the world. It was the stage of practical realization of the project, which is now proved to be possible. Unprecedented socialistic system, relied on the working people, has opened up a new age of the human history.

The decline of the organized class struggle, that we witness in our age, - it is only a temporary crisis, which is certain to be over.

The human history does not come to stop, periods of decline and reaction are always followed by periods of revolutionary ascent. The Soviet experience of the proletarian dictatorship realization may be useful in the next turn of the socialist construction. These lessons must be perfectly learnt. Both achievements and mistakes, made by the Communist party and the Soviet people, must be taken into account in order to avoid the difficulties, that had been standing on the way of socialist newcomers or to overcome these difficulties with the knowledge of how it was done before.

So, let us extract some lessons for the future together.

Communists of the XXI century should realize, that long and organized class struggle of the workers under the bourgeoisie dominance is crucial for a successful proletarian revolution. Just in such class battles workers acquire the strike activity, they start to unite in effectively acting unions, they get the skills of workers’ democracy, they learn to find class interests of proletariat and bourgeoisie in various events, and also acquire sufficient level of class consciousness.

The Russian proletariat still could organize big strikes in the 90s of the XIX century. In Saint-Petersburg, in Nizhny Novgorod, in Moscow, in Riga and in Warsaw the concentration of production reached such a degree, that thousands of workers could find a contact with one another and act jointly.

The revolution of 1905-1907 had become a “final rehearsal” of the Great October. V. I. Lenin wrote, that the victory of the October Revolution in 1917 would have been impossible without it. [1] This revolution has shown the strength and solidarity of the Russian proletariat, its capability to lead peasantry as well as oppressed nationalities, i.e. to be a leader and a hegemon in the revolution, happening in a peasantry and multinational country. In 1905 the Russian proletariat has learned to apply mass political strikes – this skill proved to be useful in 1917.

The working class had enriched itself with the experience of the armed uprising in Moscow (December 1905). It was particularly important, that in 1905 the proletariat had created a principally new organizations of the working people – the Soviets, both the organs of an uprising and the form of power of the working people. The experience of the formation of workers deputies’ Soviets in 1905 allowed to create the Soviets of workers’ soldiers’ and peasants deputies throughout the whole country very quickly in 1917.

In 1905 the proletariat had started the struggle for the army, they have attracted thousands of soldiers and sailors to the revolutionary side. And this experience was also of use in 1917, when the proletariat widely applied both these tested 12 years ago and new forms of work in the army, gaining soldiers and sailors to go across the revolution side.

During the 1905-1907 revolution the proletarians realized, that they could fight and win in the class battles.

And the experience of the first Russian revolution has shown, how important it is to have a proletarian revolutionary party during the revolutionary crisis. Such party must be armed with the scientific socialism theory and must form the goals and methods of struggle. Lenin taught, that such a party is a necessary subjective factor for the realization of the revolution. The bolshevist party has learned to apply various forms of struggle and organization of masses: legal, illegal, peaceful, non-peaceful, parliamentary and non-parliamentary.

The revolution demonstrated the importance of struggle against the “left” and the “right” opportunism. Besides, the bolshevist party has acquired the political experience of a “left block” tactics, i.e. agreements with the petty-bourgeois parties for the sake of a broad front of protestors against the authorities under the guidance of the proletariat.

Active participants of the 1905-1907 class battles, who made the backbone of the conscious proletariat, were the living bearers of the experience in subsequent revolutionary battles.

After the defeat of the first Russian revolution, in 1907-1914, the proletariat managed to recover after the defeat. In 2012-2014 in Saint-Petersburg and other industrial centers of Russia the proletariat had started a new rise of class strike struggles, that was interrupted only by the World War I.

In the 1917 the proletariat has widely applied its revolutionary experience, collected in previous struggles. From the first days of the February revolution soviets, trade-unions, factory workers’ committees started to appear – all these forms were already familiar to the Russian working people.

In his work “April Theses. Tasks of the proletariat in this revolution” Lenin managed to theoretically combine all the practices of class struggle of Russian proletariat with the revolutionary situation they had. His program became a base of new Bolshevicks’ strategy. They headed the workers’ struggle, and the October Revolution became its highest point.

Thus, we can see, that the combative skills of the working class were formed during the decades before the revolution by the experience of class struggle. They are absolutely necessary to smash the power of the capital, and it is impossible to overestimate them. This lesson is very important: the experience collected in previous class battles is a necessary factor of victory in the Revolution.

There is no doubt, that being deprived of this advantage, having no experience in class battles, the working class, who had not learnt even to fight for its economic interests, who are unable to distinguish “its own” from “alien”, who are incapable to unite in its own interests, who are unaware of the decisive and guiding role of the revolutionary theory, - they are doomed to failure.

In 2014 the working class of the Ukraine was at such a stage of decline, thanks to the opportunist leadership Communist Party of the Ukraine (the KPU). The Ukrainian workers were ideologically disoriented and organizationally disarmed.

The historical role of the proletariat is to be a leader of all the working people and a hegemon of the revolution. It comes from the key Marxist point: the proletariat alone is a genuinely revolutionary class. In his writing “Reformism in the Russian social-democracy” 

V. I. Lenin: “As the only consistently revolutionary class of contemporary society, it must be the leader in the struggle of the whole people for a fully democratic revolution, in the struggle of all the working and exploited people against the oppressors and exploiters. The proletariat is revolutionary only insofar as it is conscious of and gives effect to this idea of the hegemony of the proletariat”. [2]

By the beginning of the October Revolution the Russian proletariat made up only a bit more than 10 per cent of the Russian population. However, being well-organized and rallied under the leadership of the Marxist party, they managed to gain to their side a huge majority of people and to lead them to storm the capitalism. The proletarian hegemony in 1905-1907 revolution and in February 1917 revolution allowed them to bring folk masses closer to a higher stage of the revolution – socialistic – and lead their movement towards socialism.

In 1917 Russia was a country with a majority of peasantry, and with numerous petty bourgeoisie in towns and cities. In the class confrontation the proletariat with its huge revolutionary experience managed to lead the working peasantry, that was incapable for a revolutionary struggle for its emancipation on its own. On the stage of socialistic revolution the alliance of proletariat and the poor peasantry was formed, ‘cause it was necessary to fight the bourgeoisie not only in the city, but also in the country.

In alliance with poor peasants and almost robbed petty-bourgeois strata in towns and cites, Russian proletariat managed to win the Civil War and to conduct industrialization in industry and collectivization in agriculture.

Under the conditions of the revolution and the civil war the Russian intelligentsia – a narrow strata of intellectuals and educated technical specialists – had divided into two parts. Some went on to serve to the bourgeoisie and organized sabotage against the Soviet power. But others took the side of the working class and got the opportunity to work, to develop science and technique, arts and culture for the working people. A considerable part of the officers of the old Czarist army supported the October revolution and joined the Red army.

So, the proletariat managed to extend its hegemony over a considerable part of the intelligentsia, that was involved into the construction of a new socialist society.

It is important to understand, that the proletariat does not take power in the revolutionary way and does not rule over the other classes on its own.

“The dictatorship of the proletariat is a specific form of class alliance between the proletariat, the vanguard of the working people, and the numerous non-proletarian strata of the working people (petty bourgeoisie, small proprietors, the peasantry, the intelligentsia, etc.), or the majority of these strata, an alliance against capital, an alliance whose aim is the complete overthrow of capital, complete suppression of the resistance offered by the bourgeoisie as well as of attempts at restoration on its part, an alliance for the final establishment and consolidation of socialism”. [3]

At the moment the proletariat is extremely fragmented. The typical city strata represent a broad mixture of proletarian, semi-proletarian, petty-bourgeois and bourgeois groups of population. If a probable revolutionary situation rises we should not forget an important lesson of the October revolution: it is necessary to form a class alliance of the working people; we should not reject an alliance with one or another strata of the working people because of their non-proletarian signs. And, undoubtedly, we should not forget, that it is the proletariat, who must be the leader in such a class alliance.

Based on the experience of all the prerevolutionary struggles, of the February revolution and all the subsequent events, the Russian working class and the Bolshevist Party realized, that they would not be able to hold their power without the dictatorship of the proletariat.

Developing, V. I. Lenin developed Marx’ ideas about the dictatorship of the proletariat. He justified its necessity and innevitability in the period of transition from capitalism to Communism. V. I. Lenin’s book “The revolution and the state” is a concentration of theoretical conclusions and practical advices how to organize the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The history shows, that there is still no such a country, where the overthrown exploiters’ classes would not fiercely resist the working class coming to power. Once there are economic conditions for exploitation of man by man, the inevitable hopes of overthrown lords to restore their power will smoulder, and such hopes will turn into attempt of such a restoration, supported by the world capitalism from abroad.

The exploiters resistance to the cause of socialism makes inevitable their violent suppression, for which the working class needs a tough proletarian power. Its necessity is reinforced because after the victory of revolution bourgeoisie comes to most extreme forms of struggle, making mutinies, plots (conspiracy) and sabotage up to a civil war unlished.

It is important to understand, that after the revolution the overthrown exploiters would still have a considerable force and advantages (money, knowledge, organizational skills, communications with foreign countries, experience in warfare and etc.). The struggle with the most dangerous enemy of revolution requires decisive measures.

The dictatorship of the proletariat is necessary also because there is yet another force in the society, that oppose proletariat – a petty-bourgeois element. Its social basis is formed by numerous petty-bourgeois strata of population. They have a double nature: under certain circumstances they can be an ally of the working class, but they can also support the counter-revolution. The working class, using its power, must attract to its side these petty-bourgeois strata, transform their social nature, that generates their class hesitations, and make them participants of the socialist construction.

The Russian proletariat, having come to power, exercised their dictatorship through a whole system of organizations [institutions]: soviets, trade-unions, cooperatives, and also through specially established forced structures of the revolution: - the Red Army, the People’s Militia, the All-Russian Emergency Commission and others.

Acting under conditions of the civil war, post-war devastation, uneasy years of the new economic policy, collectivization and industrialization, the organs of the proletarian dictatorship managed to eliminate the classes of capitalists and lords, suppressed their resistance, eliminated the exploitation of man by man, strengthened the social basis of the Soviet power, attracted broad masses of people to state-government. The Soviet democracy emancipated all strata of population and nationalities, that were oppressed earlier, and provided full equal rights.

During the revolution and the process of realization of the proletarian dictatorship in the Soviet Russia and later on in the Soviet Union there appeared the main principles of organization of the Soviet organs of power, Soviets:

— Soviet is the organ of power, formed according to the class attributes in production-territorial districts. Soviets rely on objective organization of people in the process of labor.

— Deputies of soviets are the people, who are put forward by the working people and elected by them. Deputies are constantly connected with their electors and are accountant to their collectives.

— A deputy of any level can be recalled ty his/her electors in any moment.

— The soviet resolves practical issues, and does not present a “representative chattering”. The bourgeois principle of division of power is abandoned, and these, who take a decision, organize its implementation.

— The session principle offers to deputies the opportunity to work more on the spot.

— The soviets are formed without the votes of the exploiters classes, and with the advantage of workers’ representation over that of peasants and other strata of population. The soviets can block activity of the bourgeois fractions and parties.

The USSR history had shown - and this lesson is very important for us – that any deviation from the principle of the Soviet democracy, the admission of alien to the proletariat class elements to the soviets, repudiation from the soviets as the organizational form of the proletarian dictatorship, turning them into a parliament is mortal to socialism.

Does the proletariat need its own revolutionary party? And if it does, then what should it be?

The historic merit of V. I. Lenin – is the foundation and creation of a new type party, the party, which managed to be a leader of the proletariat in the victorious October revolution. This Bolshevist party managed to organize a victory in the civil war; a restoration of the devastated National economy; headed the industrialization and collectivization of the agriculture; that this party was the organizer and the guiding hand of the Soviet people victory in the Great Patriotic war and it could manage the solution of the rest post-war tasks.

The revolutionary Communist party differs basically from bourgeois parties both from outside and in its essence. Capitalists unite in their parties in order to impose the dictatorship of their class as a whole, to solve their narrow group issues and to pursue their policy through parliament and other representative bodies via bourgeois elections. The main task of any contemporary bourgeois party is to win in the elections, to get a majority in parliament, to put forward its candidates to the highest posts in the state, and for this to create by all ways a popularity of its brand and its candidates. Everybody know very well, that all electoral promises are usually forgotten next day after the ballot.

By the beginning of the XX century among the second international parties there formed a tradition of reliance on the political struggle of parliamentary type. Former proletarian parties got accustomed to participation in bourgeois elections, in conditions of legality revolutionary struggle seemed to be not necessary and even out-of-dated.

When capitalism entered a new imperialist stage of its development and generated a new period of crises and wars, all old social-democratic parties turned out to be not ready for the new conditions. Only the Leninist party managed to combine the tactics of legal and illegal actions, to work out a revolutionary position in respect of the imperialist war when put forward the slogan to turn the imperialist war into a civil one, and managed to act successfully in the world revolutionary crisis.

The features of the new party were described by bolsheviks not a time. These features were most completely enumerated by Joseph Stalin in his work “The Foundations of Leninism”. [4]

Let us remind the main points:

The party is an advanced detachment of the working class. It imbibes all the best elements of the working class, it is armed with advanced theory and can apply these arms in practice. The party must be a political chief and a military staff of the proletariat. The party must be closely connected with the advanced detachment of the working class, but it is also necessary to be in touch with other detachments of the working people.

The party is an organized detachment of the working class, it must be able to be in charge of the struggle in the most difficult conditions. A discipline, a democratic centralism, a subordination of minority to the majority, planned work – these are important features for a Marxist proletarian party.

The party is a highest form of the class organization of the proletariat. It leads ideologically other proletarian organizations: trade-unions, cooperatives, parliamentary factions, factory committees, non-party unions of women, the press and others. The party must be able to pursue its policy among non-party members of all these organizations by methods of agitation and propaganda.

The party is an instrument of the proletarian dictatorship. It is not a purpose, but a tool in the hands of the proletariat for to conquer its dictatorship, for its holding, expanding and strengthening. The party introduces a spirit of discipline and organization into millions of masses.

The party is a unity of the will, and there is no place for factionalism in it. Internal criticism and self-criticism is welcomed inside the party as well as democratic discussion of all issues. But after the discussion is concluded and a decision is taken, the unity of the will and that of actions comes into effect.

The party should always remember about the necessity to clean itself from opportunistic elements.

So, the main features of the party are famous, they were formed historically and are tested by practice. Some features may be somewhat modified according to the time, place and conditions.

The practice of the XX and XXI centuries proves that if the proletariat is led by not a vanguard party of a Leninist type but by an organization of another kind, then the proletarian revolution is sure to be defeated by the bourgeoisie in one of its starting steps.

One more important conclusion is that a true communistic party must fight the opportunism. This struggle must take place in all the workers’ communities and at all the working levels, not only at the ideological one. Only this can prevent the opportunists, those bourgeois agents pretending to be revolutionaries, to take roots among the workers as it happened many times since the Marxism’s appearance.

As socialism is more and more constructed, the class struggle does not disappear, and even does not get any weaker. The class struggle under socialism does not end, but acquires a new shape, it goes on as that of a proletarian (Communist) creative tendency against the petty-bourgeois tendency of private ownership. An indispensable feature (characteristics) of socialism is the power, that exercises the proletarian dictatorship and provides the victory of the positive Communist tendency.

The new socialist society, that had just recently completed the stage of open struggle with the exploiters, would necessarily be confronted with another, hidden, but no less dangerous forms of class struggle.

The essence of this point was very well described in the speech of Joseph Stalin “About industrialization and the bread problem” (July,9 1928):

“We often say that we are promoting socialist forms of economy in the sphere of trade. But what does that imply? It implies that we are squeezing out of trade thousands upon thousands of small and medium traders. Is it to be expected that these traders who have been squeezed out of the sphere of trade will keep silent and not attempt to organise resistance? Obviously not.

We often say that we are promoting socialist forms of economy in the sphere of industry. But what does that imply? It implies that, by our advance towards socialism, we are squeezing out and ruining, perhaps without ourselves noticing it, thousands upon thousands of small and medium capitalist manufacturers. Is it to be expected that these ruined people will keep silent and not attempt to organise resistance? Of course not.

We often say that it is necessary to restrict the exploiting proclivities of the kulaks in the countryside, that they must be heavily taxed and the right to rent land limited, that kulaks must not be allowed the right to vote in the election of Soviets, and so on and so forth. But what does that imply? It implies that we are gradually pressing upon and squeezing out the capitalist elements in the countryside, sometimes driving them to ruin. Is it to be presumed that the kulaks will be grateful to us for this and will not endeavour to organise part of the poor peasants or middle peasants against the Soviet Government's policy? Of course not.

Is it not obvious that our whole forward movement, our every success of any importance in the sphere of socialist construction, is an expression and result of the class struggle in our country?

But it follows from all this that the more we advance, the greater will be the resistance of the capitalist elements and the sharper the class struggle, while the Soviet Government, whose strength will steadily increase, will pursue a policy of isolating these elements, a policy of demoralizing the enemies of the working class, a policy, lastly, of crushing the resistance of the exploiters, thereby creating a basis for the further advance of the working class and the main mass of the peasantry.

It must not be imagined that the socialist forms will develop, squeezing out the enemies of the working class, while our enemies retreat in silence and make way for our advance, that then we shall again advance and they will again retreat until "unexpectedly" all the social groups without exception, both kulaks and poor peasants, both workers and capitalists, find themselves "suddenly" and "imperceptibly," without struggle or commotion, in the lap of a socialist society. Such fairy-tales do not and cannot happen in general, and in the conditions of the dictatorship of the proletariat in particular.

It never has been and never will be the case that a dying class surrenders its positions voluntarily without attempting to organise resistance. It never has been and never will be the case that the working class could advance towards socialism in a class society without struggle or commotion. On the contrary, the advance towards socialism cannot but cause the exploiting elements to resist the advance, and the resistance of the exploiters cannot but lead to the inevitable sharpening of the class struggle“. [5]

We need to say, that in the period of Gorbachev’s perestroika and some later, in the period of the capitalist restoration in the USSR, there were frequent attacks of the class struggle aggravation at the extent of approaching to socialism on the Stalin’s formula, coming from the leaders of counter-revolution. Some attackers were even trying to mock and to speak ironically as if Joseph Stalin alledgedly was short-sighted and ignored the contradiction: Communism is closer and closer and the class struggle goes on to sharpen and there is no end to it.

However, history has proved, that it was Stalin, who was right, and not his critics from the right and the “leftest” camps. The contradiction of the class struggle aggravation as socialism is being built formula has a dialectical character. The moribund classes will never know rest until they try absolutely all possible ways how to prevent the construction of socialism and to terminate this historical process. Petty-bourgeois tendencies usually gather their pace when there appears a a certain gap (problem) in the practice of socialism. To monitor this process is the main function of the proletarian dictatorship.

We know, that after the death of Joseph Stalin the bourgeois tendencies in the USSR took a new shape. The shadow (dark) economy, corruption, profiteering, localistic tendencies and nationalism, that were not finally smashed, gradually started their offensive. Anti-Soviet spirits penetrated into the Communist Party, the state organs and special services. The situation was aggravated by the circumstance, that since approximately the middle of 1950s the Soviet people stopped to feel itself a militant detachment of revolution, they got accustomed to victories and started to think, that capitalism is defeated forever, that all harmful phenomena, that are still retained in the USSR, are temporary; that socialism in our country is already constructed and is irreversible.

Instead of a class mobilization for fighting the enemy in its new form, the Soviet people, including old party cadre, displayed their mass placidity and quietly commissioned the struggle with the enemy to the state security services.

it was, certainly, absolutely insufficient at all. Besides, localist interests, corruption and bourgeois tendencies were imperceptibly developing in security services too.

All bourgeois tendencies, that were not subdued before, had not missed their opportunity at the moment of weakening of the proletarian dictatorship and played the role of an advanced detachment of the counter-revolution in the end of 1980s.

One should not forget, that even a ripe and mature socialism contains simultaneously two opposite tendencies: a socialist tendency and a capitalist, petty-bourgeois one. Until a complete Communism is constructed in the whole World, the capitalist tendency will impede any movement forward in every way and even try to return history backwards. In conditions of the socialist society it is necessary to constantly struggle with the negative capitalist tendency – not only never forget about it, but also spare no efforts and recourses to completely eradicate it. The Communist party and workers in the USSR had forgotten about this dialectics of struggle in the last decades of the USSR, that had led to catastrophic consequences.

The Marxist theory does not dictate any detailed remedies and ideal models of the socialist society. Marx and Engels wrote, that Communism is not a state, that should be established, and not an ideal, to which a reality should be adjusted. They called communism a real movement, that negates the current state of things, that is unjust and hampering the development of the society.

Socialism is such as it came out-of capitalism depending on current conditions. It can be vigorous, wicked, not replete and even bloody. As we concluded, the class struggle is not over under socialism, but it takes a new form, it hoes on as the struggle of a proletarian, Communist and creative tendency against the petty-bourgeois tendency of private ownership. An obligatory characteristics of socialism is the power, that exercises the proletarian dictatorship and provides the victory of a positive Communist tendency.

The socialism is characterized:

In the political field socialism, according to Lenin’s definition, is an elimination of classes. I.e. the movement to overcome class differences, differences between manual and intellectual labor and so on. V. I. Lenin clarifies, that “The abolition of classes requires a long, difficult and stubborn class struggle, which, after the overthrow of capitalist rule, after the destruction of the bourgeois state, after the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat, does not disappear (as the vulgar representatives of the old social-ism and

the old Social-Democracy imagine), but merely changes its forms and in many respects becomes fiercer“. [6]

In the field of economic relations socialism is the overcoming of the commodity production elements and momentum in immediately social production.

In the moral respect socialism provides ever growing opportunities development of everyone and anyone.

Many working people in other countries supported the October revolution and helped it in every way.

Quite a different was the reaction to the revolution victory among the exploiters classes: malice, fear for their ownership, the aspiration to smother the power of workers and peasants by all means. The most developed imperialist states (the USA, Great Britain, France, Germany, Japan and others) organized intervention into the Soviet Russia and helped with their weaponry, foodstuff and equipment to the counter-revolution forces in their struggle against the Soviet power.

But the working class of foreign countries had managed to organize resistance to the attempts of the World imperialism to smother the revolution. The mass movement “Hands off the Soviet Russia” started and developed not only in very capitalist countries, but also in the interventionist forces sent to Russia. Been based on the historical experience, obtained by the international workers movement and the role of the movement in the civil war, one can say, that the struggle for the socialism in a single country had become a cause of conscious workers in all countries. It was a practical implementation of the slogan: “Proletarians of all countries, unite!”

In 1919 English dock workers refused to load the weapon, designated for the troops of interventionists and the white guard. Sailors and workers stopped the work they had to do for the anti-bolshevik forces.

In December 1919 the port workers in the French city of Bordeaux refused to load military equipment for interventionists and the white guard. The delivery of weapon to the anti-Soviet forces was hampered by the Italian railway workers in 1921. In Germany, Finland and Hungary, Japan, China and other countries there were mass protests against the cooperation with the White movement and imperialist interventionists.

V. I. Lenin wrote:

“The international bourgeoisie has only to raise a hand against us to have it seized by its own workers“. [7]

French military sailors, unwilling to fight against the Red, started an uprising in the Black Sea in 1919. And in the ranks of the Red Army there fought not only representatives of all nationalities of Russia, but also Hungarians, Czechs, Chinese, finn people, poles and people from other countries.

The international movement “Hands Off the Soviet russia” was one of the main forces, that made England and France withdraw its troops from the Soviet Russia and repudiate from the open intervention.

The World revolutionary rise after the first world war emerged not only in Russia. In a set of capitalist countries – in Finland, in Hungary, in Bavaria and in Slovakia – the working class, though for a short time, nevertheless took power in its own hands.

The World imperialist reaction – matchlessly stronger in economic and military respect – managed to subdue the revolutions in Europe by bayonets of the German imperialism and the Entente armies. However, it did not stop a strong wave of strike movement, that arose in France, England, Italy, the USA, Japan.

only in Russia workers managed to take and retain power, to organize the proletarian dictatorship and start a mass socialist construction after the Civil war. But this victory is an undoubtless achievement of the World proletariat. It is an important lesson of international solidarity, that communists and workers of all countries should learn for their future victories.

After the October Revolution the revolutionary proletariat and its allies eliminated the man-by-man exploitation as well as the sources, that cause the exploitation – the private ownership on means of production - and turned them into a social ownership; offered the land to peasants; nationalized large industries, banks and transport, monopolized the external trade.

Solving the socialist tasks, the October revolution had relieved the position of the people by having solved to the end the unresolved tasks of the bourgeois-democratic revolution. it did away with the estate division of the society, eliminated the estate and class privileges and restrictions. The Soviet power proclaimed the freedom of conscience, separated the church from the state and the school from the church, women were granted equal rights.

The equality was proclaimed not only formally, in the texts of the laws, but it was also realized in practice. The social policy of the Soviet state was exercised exclusively in the interests of the working classes. The Soviet power had performed profound transformations in the countryside, provided elimination of illiteracy, made the modern healthcare, the secondary and high education accessible for all as well as the right on labor and rest and opened the access to spiritual and cultural development.

Before the revolution more than a half of the country’s population suffered from the national oppression. The new workers power brought social and national emancipation to numerous nationalities of Russia, equal rights were proclaimed. Every nation had got the right of self-determination – either to stay within the Country of Soviets or to secede and form a state of its own. The national policy of the workers’ state had delivered a blow at both great-power chauvinism and the bourgeois nationalism.

The victory of the Soviet power in national areas had altered the fate of the earlier-oppressed nations of Russia. All nations of a large country managed to unite into an integral union state – into the Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics. The USSR was formed on the 30th December 1922 by the way of unification of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (the RSFSR), the Ukrainian, the Belorussian Soviet Socialist Republics and the Trans-Caucasian Soviet Federative Socialist Republics with integral bodies of power and with Moscow as its capital provided each of these republics de jure retained its right of free secession.

The creative strength of proletarian dictatorship and the Soviet power had fully emerged in the birth of the new historical community, called the Soviet People. There appeared conditions, in which many previously oppressed nations had made a leap from feudal and patriarchal relations to socialism. Economic and cultural backwardness had also been overcome in national regions.

Earlier progressive people used to call the Russian Empire as the prison of nations – nationalities, different in their earlier historical way and their cultural development, were united in a big state mechanically, by means of violence, economic or any other pressure. For the benefit of ruling classes nationalism was imposed inside Russia, there were often cases of national hostilities, pogroms and national discrimination.

Counter to every nationalism the proletarian internationalism asserted the unity of workers of all nationalities, their joining in workers’ organizations, in joint creative activity and in the cause of defense. The new workers’ power managed to not only proclaim equality for all nations living in the USSR. In the course of joint activity, in its struggle with exploiters’ classes, in construction of thousands of cities and plants, in the course of the hardest war with nazism previously odd nations, who were in different levels of their development, managed to become an integral, the Soviet People. The working people of all nationalities within the USSR took the Soviet Power as the most important and joint historical achievement. People of various nationalities displayed miracles of dedication and heroism in the course of the New World construction, in the course of its defense from the encroachments from the side of imperialists. And inside the new Historical Community there were both the development of each national culture and the flourishing of the common new Soviet culture.

The right of national self-determination, gifted by the proletarian dictatorship in the course of the revolution, presupposes obligatory equal rights for all nations in the state as well as obligatory protection of all rights of national minorities, imposing of a broad self-government and self-rule, and automisation of the national regions. This principle presupposes both the freedom to secede from the union and to remain in it. The Soviet Union had been integral and invincible just thanks to the keeping of its unity’s foundation – socialism and the Soviet Power.

When the power lost its proletarian class character as the result of committed errors and socialism was destroyed, then there happened a disintegration of the USSR, whose national parts crawled away to their national corners – each headed by its own national bourgeoisie.

Today the bourgeois propaganda and top bourgeois politicians from Vladimir Putin to Vladimir Zhirimovsky are trying to blame the demise of the USSR on bolsheviks and their model of federative organization of the USSR with the right of national self-determination up to secession.

The mendacity of this claim is evident if to comprehend, what was the political foundation, on which the building of the new-type state was erected. The foundation of the national and territorial system of the USSR, equally comprehended by Lenin and Stalin, was the Soviet Power, i.e. the organizational form in which the proletarian dictatorship was realized. - The supreme, genuinely progressive form of democracy – the proletarian democracy – that of the working people and for the working people, the Soviet Power. It is known, that the working people do not need to divide the seats for their stores in the marketplace. They can always agree among themselves. The history proved, that until the power was really Soviet and the party was really Communist, neither internal nor external enemies, and even such striking imperialist force as the hitlerite fascism, could destroy the Soviet Union. And the same history proved, that after the party and the state had lost their class characteristics, the USSR was destroyed relatively quickly and without resistance by the economic policy of the market reforms, i.e. by capitalism. So it is a proper occasion to once again emphasize the crucial importance of the class foundation of the state.

The historical example of the friendship of nations in the USSR as well as the origin of the new Soviet People community on the foundation of the proletarian dictatorship show very well, in which way the unification of the humanity will follow, when capitalism is finally over.

The contemporary bourgeois propaganda is trying to slander socialism and the proletarian dictatorship in the USSR. They create gloomy and mendacious pictures of terror, oppression, gloom and lack of culture. It is clear, that capitalists are afraid of the working people power and long to persuade the working people, that socialism is something out-of-dated and not attractive.

But the objective analysis of the Soviet Union history bring us to another conclusion: the proletarian dictatorship is a strong instrument in the hands of workers and their class allies to establish social and national equality. All the contemporary deep-rooted conflicts, even if they go into the depth of centuries, may be effectively, bloodlessly and relatively quickly resolved in the interests of the working people by means of methods, proved by practice, discovered in the course of socialism construction in the USSR. We must stress that ethnical conflicts are always difficult and complicated, they demand much time and the dictatorship of the proletariat as an effective instrument to solve them.

In 1930 Joseph Stalin wrote an article “Dizzy from success: the questions of the collective farms movement”. This material, published in the central All-Union Communist Party organ – PRAVDA newspaper, said, that on the background of evident successes, achieved by the Soviet Power in the cause of collective farms construction, there appeared some dangerous spirits in the party, leading in some cases to the rejecton of persuasion and to an overestimation of our own forces.

“But the successes have their seamy side, especially when they are attained with comparative “ease” — “unexpectedly” so to speak. Such successes sometimes induce a spirit of vanity and conceit: “We can achieve anything!”, “There is nothing we can’t do!” People not infrequently become intoxicated by such successes; they become dizzy with success, loose all sense of proportion and the capacity to understand realities; they show a tendency to overrate their own strength and to underrate the strength of the enemy; adventurist attempts are made to solve all questions of socialist construction “in a trice.” In such a case, there is no room for concern to consolidate the successes achieved and to utilise them systematically for further advancement. Why should we consolidate the successes achieved when, as it is, we can dash to the full victory of socialism “in a trice”: “We can achieve anything!”, “There is nothing we can’t do!” [8]

Stalin strongly criticizes such spirits, that can lead to dangerous consequences, for instance, to growing distrust of population to the activity of the Soviet and party organs (institutions). Where there is a dizzy from success, there appear some leaders, who are capable to ignore real spirits and needs of ordinary people. There appears a temptation to solve complicated problems, that require long discussion and persuasion, at a stroke. In such cases the working people themselves feel as if they are pushed aside from solution of their problems, the decisions are taken instead of them by the ruling Soviet and party officials, making thus a political blunder deliberately or not.

In 1930 this negative phenomenon emerged in violation of the voluntariness principle in organization of collective farms. Peasants could be “pressed” in various ways instead of agitation and persuasion, coercing them to join the collective farm (Kolkhoz). Such “overtones” could bring only a disappointment among the people, a growth of conditions favorable for a hostile anti-soviet propaganda.

Another negative side of this “dizzy from success” is not only an overestimation of one’s own forces, but also an underestimation of the class enemy. in the end of 1920s such an enemy was the “kulak” – the agricultural bourgeoisie, who were in opposition to the Soviet Power. All cases, when the voluntariness principle was violated, were immediately utilized by kulaks in their anti-kolkhoz propaganda.

Joseph Stalin resolutely cricitizes the spirits of euphoria, that arose in the Communist party on the background of unexpectedly easy successes. Dizzy from success is a running ahead of others when solving complicated problems, going off reality and off the masses of the working people, who haven’t yet taken the new cause as their own.

In the USSR, especially after the Great Patriotic War, on the background of fast restoration of the national economy, destroyed by the war; on the background of construction of new industries and of thousands of plants and factories;, on the background of successes in nuclear energy, in space, in machine-building and in aviation; on the background of the crumble of the colonial system and formation of a group of fraternal socialist countries, there appeared a feeling among the Communist party and the Soviet people, that socialism is irreversable. A return of capitalism seemed to be something unthinkable.

But the crumble of socialism had become possible among other reasons because not only most of the Soviet pople, but also the communists turned out to be morally disarmed in front of this danger, they turned out to be not ready to resist to the offending capitalism, they appeared to be defenseless before its Jesuitical propaganda.

The dizzy from success had overwhelmed masses of Soviet citizens and helped to the enemies to execute their counterrevolutionary overthrow. One should take the danger of a euphoria and of underestimation of the strength of the class adversary as historically proved in the cause of the socialist construction.

For decades of revolutionary struggle bolshiviks created a broad theoretical basis. Articles and newspaper notes, booklets, texts and shorthand records of speeches, books, letters and other sorts of historical documents make up an extensive scientific library. Today we have access to hundreds of outstanding works, covering all social and political aspects.

V. I. Lenin, the greatest theoretician after the death of Engels, and after the death of Lenin – Stalin and other Lenin’s disciples managed not only to develop Marxism theoretically, but also enriched the theory with a new experience in new conditions of the class struggle, in the period of the socialist revolution and assertion of the proletarian dictatorship.

Works of Lenin and Stalin are an inestimable wealth, that is helpful to all revolutionaries in comprehension of theoretical and practical issues. These works have become classical ones, that is actual and well-applicable, if tackled after careful consideration, and not mechanically.

The Russian bolsheviks had picked up the baton in developing theory from Marx and Engels in appropriate manner. A big contribution was made in philosophy; the political economy was contributed by the theory of imperialism; Plenty of books, articles and other materials written by V. I. Lenin and J. V. Stalin are dedicated to the struggle with opportunism, the workers movement, to the questions of party-building, issues of revolutionary tactics and to solution of state tasks, to the formation of the Komintern, to the problems of collectivization of the agriculture and other current problems, that arose in the course of the revolutionary activity.

We can innumerate themes and directions, comprehended and elaborated by the bolshevik theoreticians, yet for a long time. But it is important to understand, that the theoretical legacy of bolsheviks is not a dogma, not a set of some patterns, which can be taken and brought into our age without proper consideration, and not a creed.

Marxism - including the contribution of Lenin, Stalin and their associates – is a developing theory, a blueprint for action. The logic of Marxism requires not learning of its texts by heart or quoting them, sometimes improperly, on every occasion. For an analysis of the current moment in our age one needs a careful reading of classics of Marxism writings, with obligatory understanding of the difference in conditions between the XX century and our age.

To be a Marxist means to follow the method of Marx, to learn finding the main events and phenomena of social life, to correlate the advices of classics with all the complicity of current conditions. Just so did Lenin, Stalin and other bolsheviks themselves.

Only in this way one can extract correct conclusions and get working recommendations from books, written one hundred years ago.

Nowadays there exist a big number of groups of people and individuals, calling themselves followers of Soviet communists. But portraits of leaders, red flags and quotations are not enough to prove, that the Marxist teaching is properly understood and correlated with reality. To apply Marxism in practice is far more difficult, than just simply reading the works of classics. it is this work – the introduction of Marxism into our present practice, into the workers’ movement whatever it is, that is a genuine following to the teaching. And it is this cause, that is now most important for Marxists.

And it is the invaluable historical experience of proletarian dictatorship in the USSR, that demonstrates, that the Marxist literature is not just beautiful words, but a combative revolutionary theory, that can enrich our practice and give us a right and victorious direction. It is so about the experience of mistakes and political surrender of the late CPSU under Gorbachev. One should not think, that this counterrevolution happened without a battle. True communists rendered their resistance to the perestroika policy as that of alteration of the social system, the course on the market economy, i.e. capitalism. These were our comrades, who came up in last but one day of the XXVIII CPSU congress on behalf of the Communist Initiative Movement with a statement of minority (1259 votes against 2012 with 414 abstentions and 160 delegates, who did not take part in the voting). This statement, which was made by a constitutor (founder) of our party Viktor Tyulkin on the 11th of July 1990, said: “We consider it necessary to warn all communists of the country – the improperly considered transference to the market... violent, counter to objective processes, treatment of socialism by capitalism will entail not better economic performance and living standards, but their inevitable worsening; it will bring about a broad social protest, it will bring about hardships for the people... The party cannot go on Perestroika, that led to deterioration of life for the people. There are another concept of economic perestroika, and not a one, leading to neither capitalism nor back to the administrative system. We consider it necessary to fix at the congress this view of minority of its delegates for we could initiate from the rank-and-file a broad discussion of alternative projects within the party and be ready for potential collusions as the result of a complete failure of the economic course.

Resuming, I would like to note, that the main idea is that the party should not exercise perestroika, that brought about a hard worsening in lives of the people, any longer.

In as far as the Communist Party is concerned, it will not survive this upheaval, and then there will remain no one to stand for the final goals of the movement”. [9]

As we know, our predictions had unfortunately come true. It is also the experience of theoretical and political struggle for communists of the World.

The experience of the October Revolution and the realization of the proletarian dictatorship had clearly proved, that the transition from capitalism to socialism is possible not through reforms, as opportunists preach, but only through a revolution. Fates of revolutions, that followed the October in Eastern Europe, in Asia and in Cuba, show, that in nature there is no other way for transition to socialism except for a revolution.

It is important to take into account objective and subjective premises of revolution. Bolsheviks and the Russian proletariat historically, in their own experience, showed, how all these premises should be practically taken into consideration.

Having made a serious and enormous progressive overthrow in his own country in all spheres of social life, the Russian proletariat has had an irreversible impact on the whole World. The revolutionary practice of the Russian working class made a blow to the world reformism, having proved the historical righteousness of the bolshevik Leninist cause. Roza Luxemburg wrote:

“All the revolutionary honor and capacity which western Social-Democracy lacked was represented by the Bolsheviks. Their October uprising was not only the actual salvation of the Russian Revolution; it was also the salvation of the honor of international socialism”. [10]

The bolshevik example inspired socialists in other countries. In various countries, where the class struggle required, there formed Communist parties. It was an appropriate result of the workers’ movement development.

The proletarian dictatorship established in Russia created conditions for the formation of the Communist International – the international proletarian organization, that played an outstanding role in ideological and organizational strengthening of the World Communist Movement, in overcoming both the right and the “left” opportunisms. The Communist Movement had become an influential international force, with which the world imperialism had to consider.

The victory of Socialism in Russia and the origin of the USSR had shown to all nations the way of socialist transformation in a revolutionary way, armed the revolutionary and national-liberation movements with a rich experience and example of struggle for socialism.

The proletarian state had managed to defeat fascism, inspiring millions of progressive people throughout the whole World for the struggle with this imperialist phenomenon.

The USSR had rendered aid to many nations in their national-liberation and revolutionary struggles. The crumble of the world colonial system is also a direct consequence of the October Revolution.

The Soviet Union accepted students from many countries, unselfishly assisted in construction of important industrial objects in the countries of Asia and Africa as well as in Cuba.

Thanks to the existence of the Soviet state, the imperialists couldn’t further rule the world. They had to respect the economic and military might of the USSR, that supported the victims of imperialistic expansion.

For several decades people in some countries With the help of the USSR managed to tear away from capitalism. After the World War II there existed a group of socialist states, that formed the socialist community and rendered economic and military assistance to one another and shared with their experience and scientific achievements.

Practical realization of the proletarian dictatorship showed, what a mighty instrument it is in the hands of the advanced social class, having revolutionary significance for the whole World.

Today, when there is no Soviet Union on the world map, the World Workers” Movement lives out a crisis. But imperialists cannot simply roll back all social achievements, conquered by the working people in the XX century under the influence of the first state of proletarian dictatorship.

Many contemporary workers, susceptible to the cliché of the ruling bourgeois propaganda, and by now having no socialist views, nevertheless recognize the necessity of struggle for the 8-hour working day, for pensions and social welfare, for accessible qualified medical care, for high-quality and accessible education, for protected work-places, for doing away with unemployment. The Soviet people could enjoy All these goods thanks to the October revolution and to the effective work of the proletarian dictatorship. In many industrialized bourgeois countries some of these progressive achievements had also become a reality under the influence of the Soviet experience. Capitalists were getting more yielding, when they saw, what the proletarians, who can fight for their rights, can do.

Now the bourgeoisie has gone into the offensive on the previously conquered social achievements of the working people in all over the World. The USSR does not exist for almost 30 years. Previous fears and apprehensions are almost forgotten by capitalists.

It is so, that workers in all over the World need the Soviet experience and proletarian dictatorship again. Further the urgency of the lessons of XX century socialism will ever grow. But this time not only for to achieve minimal goods, but for an ultimate defeat of capitalism and for the construction of the new socialist society in the whole World.

The history of the USSR showed, that the construction of socialism is a complicated process, in which there often appear ramifications of various variants of further development. The proletarian dictatorship creates conditions to subdue evident bourgeois forces and tendencies, that are trying in every opportunity to turn off the revolutionary development towards Communism and to throw the society back to capitalism, i.e. back to the formation that had become out-of-dated and had been overcome at the expense of big efforts. But inside socialism there remain and smolder some latent non-socialist tendencies, which are not easy to identify and stop. Such tendencies can effect the option of the road, and this danger should not be underestimated. The catastrophe, that happened to the Soviet Union, makes us, contemporary communists, carefully study not only achievements, but also defeats and mistakes of the USSR.

The REPORT OF THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE RUSSIAN COMMUNIST WORKERS’ PARTY (RCWP-CPSU) “100 years since the Great October Socialist Revolution and the lessons for contemporary Communists”, prepared in 2017, [11] contains a detailed analysis of the whole set of historic mistakes and corresponding conclusions, that we are obliged to mention here in short.

The report says: “From our, materialistic, point of view the main cause of temporary defeat of socialism in the USSR were our own, internal mistakes, revisionism and apostasy of the top leaders of the party”.

• The main theoretical mistake of the Soviet communists is the rejection from the main issue in Marxism – from the proletarian dictatorship.

Lenin believed that recognition of proletarian dictatorship is the main issue of Marxism: «Only he is a Marxist who extends the recognition of the class struggle to the recognition of the dictatorship of the proletariat». [12] Until 1951 the dictatorship of the proletariat was consistently exercised in practice in the USSR. It was a necessary momentum of development of the October revolution.

After the death of Staling with N. S. Krushchev in power in the CPSU leadership there formed a revisionist group, which put in doubt those achievements, that had been obtained under the leadership of Joseph Stalin, And they initiated reconsidering the key Marxist issues of class struggle and proletarian dictatorship.

On the XXII CPSU congress a revisionist, essentially anti-Lenin’s anti-Marx program was adopted by the initiative of Khrushchev and his associates. It claimed, that allegedly «the working class of the Soviet Union on its own initiative and based on the goal of the construction of Communism has transformed the state of its dictatorship into nationwide state …It’s the first time that we have a state that doesn’t represent a dictatorship of any particular class… Proletarian dictatorship ceased to be necessary».

Thus a biggest and crucial blunder was made, The rejection of THE PROLETARIAN DICTATORSHIP AND OF THE socialist goals subserved to the alteration of the class essence of the Soviet state. It became incapable to carry out the working class interests, that are social ones in the epoch of the proletarian dictatorship.

The CPSU rejections from the main issues in Marxism on its XXII congress – from the proletarian dictatorship; from the goal of the socialist production and that of socialism itself led to the growth of the private ownership spirits and, after all, in spite of active resistance of the Communist minority, led to the destruction of the party, the state and the country. This rejection was not only the result of the revisionism and uncovered apostasy in the CPSU leadership, but it was also the fault of those party members, who, instead of study and understanding of Marxism-leninism, learned quotations and slogans, relying on the authority of the revisionist party leadership, and for this reason the consistent Communist forces failed to win opportunists, revisionists and renegading traitors of socialism. This is a lesson not only for the communists of the USSR and today’s Russia. It is a lesson for the whole workers’ and Communist Movement.

• Economic mistakes: commodity elements in social production and sliding towards capitalism.

The movement to non –commodity immediately or direct social character of production is not only the attribute or sign, but also a precondition of existence and development of socialism.

Capitalism, first of all, is an over-all commodity production. V. I. Lenin clarified, that capitalism itself is a result of the commodity production development, and reiterated in many of his works, that the commodity production in its development gives birth to capitalism constantly and inevitably . With all that Lenin never suggested that the commoditization of production should be immediately abolished. He always stressed, that we talk about overcoming commoditization, walking away from commodities, negation of commodities in the socialist socialized production.

Stalin consequently followed in practice the trend of Lenin aimed at overcoming commoditization in the production of the period transitory to Socialism and turning the production into directly social one.

In socialist economy commoditization exists only as a negation of its directly social nature and belongs to these imprints of capitalism, that are to be overcome in the process of development of Socialism as incomplete Communism into the complete one. Thus we have all reasons to stipulate, that the development of socialist economy means intensification of its directly social character and overcoming of commoditization and ever-growing orientation of production on the satisfaction of the society’s demands. Regardless the state of pre revolutionary development, or the retreats and compromises communists have to undertake, The aim should be always the same, i.e. the transition to socialist - directly social production. The advance of socialist economy was ensured in as far as the state provided for the organization of production as directly social one. Plan and centralizations are as high achievements of civilization as differential calculus or evolution theory by C. Darwin. Nevertheless this achievements can serve the interests of working people only under conditions of proletarian dictatorship, in the conditions of directly social production.

The decision to abandon the political basis of Socialism, i.e. dictatorship of proletariat taken in 1961 by khrushchevites authorities and the economic reforms of 1965 gave birth to the process of gradual accumulation of negative wings in socialist economy and social relations. The strengthening trend favoring private property had disastrous effects on the National economy. The reform presumed that enterprises should estimate their output in rubles and profit and that led to such negative consequences as growing group egoism, deficit and inflation. Manufacturers were interested to release less products at higher prices, the inequality of exchange between cities and rural areas increased, the share of luxury items and socially harmful products in the range of products produced for personal consumption had sharply increased. Under the conditions of blooming shadow economics bourgeois transformation of leadership of the party and the government veiled by hypocritical phrases about fidelity to Communism took place.

That was the start of Gorbachev’s Perestroika, as the process of changing standing social order and complete rejection of socialism. at the XXVIII Congress of the CPSU transition to market, i.e. to Capitalism, was approved.

• Political mistakes in Socialist construction. Departure from the Leninist principles of the development of the Soviet Power.

The RCWP believes, that some political mistakes, oddly enough, were made even on the rise of the USSR’s movement towards Socialism. In 1936, when international situation was escalating and the threat of war was growing, contrary to the RCP (b.) acting program provision, the adoption of a new constitution resulted in a largely forced departure from the elections of government bodies through labor collectives. Though many of the characteristics of the Soviets were preserved (the nomination of candidates for deputies by labor collectives; the high proportion of workers and peasants in the deputy corps; periodic reports of deputies to voters; and the combination of legislative and executive functions in the Soviets), nevertheless some rules, that give to the working class some advantages as mostly organized tin the process of labor, were revoked. There appeared some premises of sliding to a parliamentary system, torn away from labor collectives and allowing to the deputies, mostly of high level, elected from territorial districts, to ignore the will of the working people without any risk of being recalled. The lack of control of state power by labor collectives, and its relative independence from them, contributed to the diminished role of workers in social management and bureaucratization of the whole system of state power. The socialist character of Soviet power was preserved, and the power continued to act in the interests of the working class to the extent that the leadership of the Communist Party remained faithful to Marxism-Leninism.

The rejection of the basic Soviet principle to elect deputies from labor collectives in factories and industrial plants and transition to elections from territories were formally substantiated as the general expansion of democracy, though in fact it was a step toward the transition from the soviet, proletariat democracy to the parliament, bourgeois democracy, implying formal equality and ignoring actual inequality. Such single formal extension of the equal right to vote to all citizens without exception, including representatives of the former exploiter classes, could not lead to any true expansion of democracy. This step objectively led to the weakening of the working class dictatorship, i.e. to the cutback of the workers democracy.

The actions of the Soviet leadership may be understood and explained: facing the aggravation of the international situation - the strengthening of fascism and the growing threat of war – it was essential, on one hand, to formulate political arguments for the international communists in exposing the slander of the allegedly dictatorial, antidemocratic power in the USSR, and on the other hand, to strengthen the centralization of state administration for this period of preparation and conduct of war.

However, the mistake was that after the war ended and the root cause of it was off, it was not decided to return to these Soviet principles. Many years later, when the actions of the revisionist leadership of the CPSU headed by Gorbachev created the appropriate conditions, the rejection of the dictatorship of the proletariat, elections in the territories and metamorphosis of the leading cadres facilitated the counterrevolutionary seizure of power.

Thus, it is obvious, that the departure from the Leninist principles of the Soviet Power is fatal for socialism.

So we have studied the main lessons, that we extracted from the experience of realization of the proletarian dictatorship state in the USSR. Only fanatic apologets of the bourgeois system or indifferent philistines, who are not used to analyze history, can doubt the urgency of these lessons.

But for those, who are right now connected with the workers’ movement and who work for the future revolution, which must once and for all solve the overripe issue of capitalism alteration for socialism in the world scale, this soviet historical experience is certain to be of great importance.

The activity of people’s masses is the biggest force. It was always underestimated by official historians, serving to the ruling exploiters’ regimes.

In general they still go on considering revolutions as something happening accidently and without any legal and objective reasons.

This experience of the past class battles is treated by communists in a very different way. Learning lessons from past revolutions is a long Marxists’ tradition.

The XX century revolutionaries relied on the experience of the great bourgeois French revolution, they followed the example of Jacobins, studied their mistakes, miscalculations and achievements.

The revolutions of 1848-1850 and the Paris Commune were carefully analyzed by Karl Marx. His researches became a sample of dialectic and materialistic analysis of revolutionary events.

The actions of bolsheviks and the working class were greatly influenced by V.I. Lenin’s conclusions, made in his works “The lessons of the Commune”; “To the memory of the Commune”; “Lessons of the revolution”; “Lessons of the Moscow uprising”.

We are sure, that the October Revolution and the experience of socialist construction in the USSR are not only the most important events of the XXth century, but also the beginning of a new age in development of the whole humanity.

The study of this experience requires a serious scientific approach and constant correlation of the experience with contemporary practice.

Only true Marxists’ approach will make the socialistic revolutions of the nearest future successfull.