WORLD WORLDWIDE RUSSIA News Journal Update - (en) Russia, AIT: 100 years ago, French "communists" killed anarchists (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 On January 11, 1924, a tragic event occurred that became a landmark for

the French labor movement - the cold-blooded murder of two
anarcho-syndicalist labor activists by the "communists", right in the
middle of the House of Trade Unions. This article is intended to remind
you of the facts and the strategy of the "communist" party to seize
hegemony in the labor movement, even including the physical elimination
of those who challenge its methods. This is a story that does not belong
only to the past...
At the beginning of the twentieth century, the House of Trade Unions was
located at number 33 on Rue Grange-aux-Belles. In fact, this building
has been the center of activity of the General Confederation of Labor
(CGT) since June 1907. The hall on the ground floor could accommodate up
to 3 thousand people, and it was very popular among labor activists.
There was also a dispensary and a printing house there.

Although the CGT at its creation in 1895 had a revolutionary orientation
influenced by anarchism, this became a thing of the past after the
Congress of Amiens, which adopted a Charter containing compromises
between reformists and revolutionaries (Marxists and anarchists). In
1914, the CGT, like the rest of the left (and even libertarians), fell
into nationalism, joining the "holy alliance" during the First World
War. However, a minority remained in revolutionary and pacifist
positions. It was at Grange aux Belles that its participants met,
maintaining contact with each other in the face of adversity and turning
this room into a forum where all revolutionary tendencies could find
expression, without the desire to predominate one over the other.

But after the war and especially after the Russian Revolution,
everything changed. The French "Communist" Party, created in 1921,
adopted the Leninist theses of centralization and a single party. For
her there could be no other revolutionary option other than her
"communism". Voices from within and without that contradicted the party
line were suppressed. The task of the "communists" then was to ensure
their control over the Unitarian CGT (UVKT), which was created only in
1922 after splitting from the reformist CGT.

Indeed, after the end of the 1914-1918 war, revolutionary ideas quickly
spread among members of the CGT trade unions. To avoid the risk of
losing control of the union, the reformist Social Democrats, through a
series of maneuvers, caused a split to exclude the revolutionary
minority that formed the UVKT. It included anarchists, "communists" and
revolutionary syndicalists (or "pure" syndicalists). But this tactical
alliance, the sole basis of which was the formation of a common front
against the reformists within the CGT, no longer had any meaning in the
new CGT. It quickly became clear that the "communists" intend to remain
the sole masters of the UVKT leadership, that the "U" in its name means:
"everyone united around the communists"...

The "communists" could count on the strong support of the revolutionary
syndicalists ("pure" syndicalists) from the La Vie Ouvrière group
(Monatt and the future organizers of the magazine "La Révolution
Prolétarienne"), with whom they agreed to purge the UVKT of its
anarchist elements. Ironically, the "communists" will get rid of the
revolutionary syndicalists as soon as these "useful idiots" (as Lenin
put it) are no longer useful to them. In the October 1925 issue of their
magazine La Révolution Prolétarienne, revolutionary syndicalists Monatte
and company complained that the "communists" whom they had helped expel
the anarchists from the UVCT had in turn expelled them... The
revolutionary syndicalists had always been the "useful idiots" of the
"communists" ...

The "House of Trade Unions" was legally the property of the Union of
Syndicates of the Seine, which was part of the UVKT. In order to assert
their hegemony within the UVKT, the "communists" needed to take control
of the building and "squeeze the anarchists out of it."

This scenario unfolded in several episodes throughout 1922-1923:

First of all, the "communists" were increasingly gaining a foothold in
the "House of Trade Unions", turning it into a political, if not
political, meeting place. Thus, it was at the address
"Grange-aux-Belles, 33" in May 1921 that the first national congress of
the "Communist" Party decided to call itself the "French Section of the
Communist International" from January 1, 1922 and adopted the first
charters. organizations. In June 1922, the first congress of the UVCT
took place in Saint-Etienne. Bolshevik Alexander Lozovsky, sent by
Moscow, coined the term "anarcho-syndicalism", which he identified with
"anarcho-reformism", to ridicule those who refused to unconditionally
adhere to the "communist" line and join the Red International of Trade
Unions (Profintern), which had just been created in Moscow.

Libertarians felt they were facing political exploitation of the trade
union movement. Tension grew, but remained in "verbal" forms, despite
the harshness of statements and denial from the "communists." These
latter increasingly multiplied unsubstantiated allegations and
insinuations, and libertarians increasingly questioned the need to
remain in the UVCT.

On October 15, 1922, in order to "stake out" the territory, the
"Communist" Party held its second congress in the building at 33
Grange-aux-Belles, in the presence of another delegate from Moscow,
Dmitry Manuilsky, sent by the Comintern. The "House of Trade Unions"
gradually turned into the "House of the Party," which increasingly
irritated anarchists committed to the idea of trade union autonomy in
relation to political parties.

Moreover, the "communists" were less and less hiding their desire to
Bolshevize the UVKT and use it as a "drive belt" of the party: since
1923 and the moment of the occupation of the Ruhr by the French army,
the opportunity arose to implement the directives of the Profintern on
the subordination of the trade union to the party, modestly renamed into
"cooperation between the Communist Party and the trade union on a
national scale." Then the UVKT signed the first agreement with the
Communist Party on joint actions within the framework of the "Central
Committee for Action against Imperialism and War." In January, the UVKT
was the only trade union center to take part in the Essen Conference in
Germany, convened by the Communist International, and signed, together
with seven other "communist" parties in Europe, a manifesto "against the
predatory Treaty of Versailles and for the struggle against the
occupation of the Ruhr."

Internationally, anarchists who had at one time supported the Russian
Revolution eventually responded to information about the real situation
coming from Russia. They met in Berlin in 1921 and decided to convene a
major international congress to which all non-Bolshevik revolutionaries
were invited. This congress met at the end of December 1922 - beginning
of January 1923, still in Berlin. The Russian anarchists in attendance,
some of whom held important positions in the Russian Revolution (like
Alexander Shapiro), painted a depressing picture of the situation in the
young Soviet Union and the terror by which the "Communist" Party ruled.
Congress decided to publish a pamphlet containing evidence, "The
Suppression of Anarchism in Soviet Russia," a veritable little black
book of "communism." Using these examples, they sought to demonstrate to
the working public the danger of Bolshevism.

The International Congress, which united, among others, the Spanish CNT,
the Argentine FORA of Argentina, the German FAUD, the Italian USI,
Russian anarcho-syndicalists, as well as envoys from Asia, decided to
revive the International Labor Association (I.A.T.) as a revolutionary
alternative to the Profintern. A message of sympathy was sent to the
French anarcho-syndicalists who attended the congress as guests, with an
invitation to officially join the M.A.T. But the French
anarcho-syndicalists hesitated; they want to fight within the UVKT,
hoping for victory at the emergency congress to be held in Bourges in
the summer of 1923.

Throughout 1923, conflicts between anarchists and "communists" around
the "Russian question" grew in the UVKT. Anarchists spoke increasingly
loudly about the disappearances and murders of activists in the Soviet
Union, repressions against workers in Petrograd, sailors in Kronstadt,
or also against Ukrainian peasants and the Makhnovshchina. On the eve of
the extraordinary congress of the CGT, they translated and distributed
the M.A.T. pamphlet. "The Suppression of Anarchism in Soviet Russia".

But the extraordinary Congress of Bourges in 1923 was marked by the
victory of the "communist" majority, which, when voting on draft
resolutions, gained three-quarters of the votes, over the finally
defeated anarcho-syndicalist minority. Now the way was open for the
"Communist" Party to increasingly assert its influence on the UVKT,
especially since the Bolshevization of the "Communist" universe began in
1924.

 From now on, the "Communist" Party could no longer be shy and - in
order to clearly demonstrate its influence - decided to convene an
election meeting in the "House of Trade Unions" on January 11, 1924. For
the anarchists this was too much; they considered that the "communists"
had crossed the "red line." Le Libertaire, the newspaper of the
Anarchist Federation at the time, then called for this controversy to be
brought to a rally of "communists" to voice a point of view different
from that of the pro-Moscow election supporters.

The public meeting began on the evening of January 11. About 3 thousand
people were present in the hall. Three hundred libertarians came. On the
podium, one after another, the leaders of the Communist Party and the
International Red Aid replaced each other. Marta Bigo, one of the
leaders of the party and UVKT, speaks. A libertarian activist interrupts
her: "Syndicalism is none of your business." First skirmishes. One of
the leaders of the PCF and manager of L'Humanité, Marcel Cachin, is
trying to restore calm.

Nothing helps. On the contrary, shouts and applause are heard, and
hand-to-hand fighting increases. Julien Le Pen, secretary of the
electrical fitters' union, cuts off the electricity. Henri Reynaud, one
of the secretaries of the UVCT and a member of the Communist Party,
turns it on again, thereby making it possible for the clashes to
continue. Albert Trent, the newly minted party secretary, steps up to
the podium and launches into a series of insults at the anarchists
gathered in the left corner of the room, trying to occupy the podium.
Trent, who served as a captain during the First World War, was
criticized for his military background, martinet behavior and the daily
abuse he poured out in L'Humanité.

For the first time, Communist Party security intervened to repel the
attackers who tried to occupy the podium. Trent orders the security
force, led by former military man Georges Beaugrand, to respond more
vigorously. After this they open fire. Jules Boudou, real name Sellene,
secretary of the carpenters' union and one of the main leaders of the
trade union minority, is shot in the throat, but miraculously survives.
However, Nicolas Clos, a minority member of the unitary metalworkers'
union, and Adrien Ponce, a member of the organizing committee of the
Anarchist Union and an activist of the unitary builders' union, who May
Pickeray recalls as a rebel who lived under pseudonyms, are fatally
wounded and die while being transported to hospital.

The next day, the newspapers Le Libertaire and L'Humanité come out with
mutual accusations. But there is plenty of evidence: the libertarians
were grouped in the left corner of the hall, and the bullet holes were
on that side. The anarchist newspaper and the organ of the CGT, Le
Peuple, publishes a growing body of evidence. Some of the activists
present were able to give an accurate description of one of the
shooters. However, the libertarians themselves removed evidence that
could have identified the shooter. On January 15, during Ponce's
funeral, three thousand people followed the funeral procession, and the
Communist Party prompted Clo's lifelong friend to declare that he was
allegedly a member of the party, although this contradicted all
evidence. The Communist Party managed to attract only a few people to
his funeral.

The UVKT authorities, at the urgent request of the anarchists, formed a
commission of inquiry, which, on the advice of the communist majority,
never published the results. By chance, one of the perpetrators of the
shooting was clearly identified as Gabriel Ducoeur, a "communist" and
head of the Federation of Railway Workers, known for his rampant
violence during the First World War. In 1929, two libertarian and trade
union activists from the CGT, Julien Le Pen and Albert Guigui, victims
of intrigues by the "communists", revealed his name.

In anarchist memory, the death of Clos and Ponce joined the deaths of
other libertarians who fell under the blows of Leninists - from the
disappeared Baltic sailors to those killed in the May days in Barcelona.

After these murders, the newspaper Le Libertaire published the headline:
"Let's break with the murderers." Anarchists, as well as non-communist
syndicalists (but not revolutionary syndicalists) left the UVKT to
temporarily regroup into the Federal Union of Autonomous Trade Unions
(UFSA). However, this emotionally motivated departure could not hide the
ideological differences between those who retained hope in the
revolutionary project and those who were resigned to abandoning any
prospect of a break with capitalism. Following two years of debate, the
latter joined the ranks of the reformist and social democratic CGT. The
anarchists decided, on a proposal presented by Budu, among others, at
the UFSA congress in June 1926, to create the Revolutionary-Syndicalist
CGT (CGT-SR), which became the French section of the M.A.T.

MAT. still exists today, more than 100 years later, and the current
CNT-AIT has taken up the baton of the CGT-SR as a section in France
committed to the same values of renouncing political parties and
fighting for workers' autonomy...

Is this a story from the past? Don't be so sure...

In 1924, the newspaper Le Libertaire concluded its article "The Killers"
with these words: "There is now blood between the criminals of
Grange-aux-Belles and us. We will keep this in mind and know how to act
accordingly." However, a hundred years later, many anarchists seem to
have forgotten this and do not hesitate to join the same trade unions as
the ideological successors of the Grange-au-Belle murderers, sign joint
leaflets with them, or even organize common events with them.

We could say that, after all, these are stories of the past, that much
water has passed under the bridge since then, and now those times and
those sectarian practices of the "communists" are gone. But is it?

Since 1924, "communists" (whether in their guise as orthodox Leninists,
Stalinists, Trotskyists or Maoists) have repeatedly demonstrated their
desire for dominance and their refusal to tolerate methods or strategies
different from their own. Let's remember the Spanish resistance fighters
killed by "communist" guerrillas, or the resistance fighters whom the
"communists" refused to help escape from Pétain's dungeons simply
because they had the misfortune of being anarchists.

If we are closer to our times, we can remember the unemployed Isabelle
Ferron, who was killed by activists of the organization "Act Together
Against Unemployment!" (AC!) and the SUD trade union in 1998. We will
also not forget the reaction of many "left" organizations, be it in the
Tarnak case or during the riots of 2005 ("Those responsible for the
violence and damage must be punished," the press said -release of the
French Communist Party on November 3, 2005), about the expulsion by
members of the CGT of a group of illegal immigrants from the labor
exchange they seized in 2009, or even more recently about accusations of
every conceivable evil against the "yellow vests" - accusations to come
which was led by Martinet from the CGT ("The yellow vests are supported
by certain big bosses").

Throughout history, the authoritarian tendencies of the labor movement
have condemned as "provocateurs" all those who dared to act
autonomously. They reported them to the state and its police, which is
why they were beaten and repressed uncontrollably, but, if necessary,
they did this dirty work themselves.

Even today, as we have seen with pension reform, political parties and
trade unions are obstacles to self-organization and the struggle for
liberation. They are merely pacifiers of a social situation that is
nonetheless explosive. (Didn't Sophie Binet say that we shouldn't do
anything that could interfere with future Olympic Games?).

Anyone who does not remember his past is doomed to relive it.

As dark clouds loom over the horizon, it is important to remember who
our friends are and who are not.

Do not forget. Don't forgive.

Nicolas Clos and Adrien Ponce, you are with us!

Anarcho-syndicalist activists of the French Ministry of Health

http://cnt-ait.info/2024/01/11/11-janvier-1924/

https://aitrus.info/node/6188
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