August 30, 1926

Greetings, Molotov!

1) Things are heading toward the inevitability of raising the question of removing Grigory [Zinoviev] from the CI. This is indicated by the decision of a number of Western parties (England, Germany) to remove Grigory. The same is indicated by the first item on the agenda of our (forthcoming) conference ("international questions"). It would be incomprehensible and unnatural if we (the VKP) "dodged" the question of removal at a time when the question has been posed by the entire situation, and two Western parties definitively propose removal. Therefore we can and must adopt a decision on the desirability of proposing removal.

2) As for the formal procedure, this must be done at an enlarged ECCI Plenum. If all parties, or an overwhelming majority of them, speak out for the removal of Grigory, then such a pronouncement can safely be considered the genuine will of all parties, that is, of the entire congress. The final decision can be referred to the congress.

2) [the number two is repeated in the text. — Ed.] It would be advisable already now to think over draft or preliminary (rough!) outlines of theses on trade unions and the economic situation. Are there any such rough outlines in the Secretariat — that is, has the Secretariat already received such "outlines"? If not, we must hurry.

3) Do you not think it advisable to introduce into trade union practice a "system" or "institution" of trade union activists by unions, and perhaps also by different branches of industrial trade unions? If this "system" has not yet been introduced, it should be, since it could facilitate both the promotion of new people and the bringing of trade unions closer to production, and, in general, the revitalization of trade unions. It is only necessary that the activists (textile, oil, coal, etc.) be broad, that they consist not only of trade union officials, not only of Communists, but also of non-Party people (something like 50-50), and so forth. How do you view this matter?

4) Do you not think that the question of Kamenev will have to be raised at the CC Plenum? Is the NKID working in the spirit of arranging Kamenev's assignment to Japan?

Well, all the best.

August 30, 1926.

J. Stalin.

P.S. I read Stetsky's article on the new opposition. The article is good, but there are individual passages that spoil the porridge. According to Stetsky, it turns out that we must not strive for the "complete predominance of proletarians and semi-proletarians in the Soviets." This is wrong. The disagreement with the opposition is not about this, but about the fact that, firstly, proletarians physically cannot have predominance in those districts where there are very few proletarians; secondly, predominance must be understood politically (and not only statistically); thirdly, we fundamentally disagree with the methods of achieving predominance that the opposition recommends to us. It is very bad that Stetsky was not helped to correct such shortcomings.

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Source: Letters of J.V. Stalin to V.M. Molotov. 1925–1936. P. 80–82.

RGASPI. F. 558. Op. 1. D. 5388.

NOTE

The October Joint Plenum of the CC and CCC of the VKP(b) in 1926 adopted a decision: "... In view of the fact that Comrade Zinoviev does not express the line of the VKP(b) in the Communist International and, by virtue of his leading factional work in the CI, has lost the confidence of a number of Communist parties (German, British, French, American, etc.), which have stated this in their decisions, the CC and CCC do not find further work by Comrade Zinoviev in the Communist International possible."

A.I. Stetsky's article "How the New Opposition Came to Trotskyism" was published in Pravda on August 26, 1926.