National communism

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National Communism, is an islamic form of communism which had a strong nationalist element. It is distinct from Socialism in one country and National Bolshevism.

Muslim National Communism historically lasted from around 1918 to 1928.^[1]. This was a synthesis of various contradictory ideologies including nationalism, communism and anarchism as well as religion, with people coming together from both left and right wing groups which predated the Revolution, joining the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Russian Bolshevik Communist Party) between 1917 and 1920 - some of whom were members of Stalin's Narkomnatz.

The Bolsheviks - particularly Lenin and Stalin hoped to use them as "schools of Marxism" spreading their doctrine in a part of Russia in which they did not have much influence - in particular the East. This strategy backfired as instead they became centres Islamic nationalism, although it was used by the USSR right up until the 1970s in particular in spearheading the invasion of Afghanistan.

Open conflict between prominment theorists such as Sultan Ghaliev and Lenin and Stalin broke out in 1919 at the Second Congress of Communist Organisations of Peoples of the East over the autonomy of the Muslim Communist Party as well as at the Congress of the Peoples of the East and the First Conference of the Turkic Peoples' Communists of the RSFSR and significantly at the 10th Congress of the Russian Communist Party (b) (April 1921). The crisis resulted in the purge of the Communist Party of Turkestan in December 1922 and the arrest of Sultan Glaiev in 1923.

During this time however theorists such as Sultan Galiev, Turar Ryskulov, Nariman Narimanov and Ahmed Baytursan were very influential especially through the Communist University of the Workers of the East which opened in 1921 and was very active until its staff was purged in 1924. Communists from outside the Soviets such as Manabendra Nath Roy, Snevliet and Sultan Zade also taught there, formulating similar political positions. Students pof the university included Sen Katayama, Tan Malaka, Liu Shao-Chi and Ho Chi Minh.

The great purge in the Muslim republics began in 1928 with executions of Veli Ibrahimov of the Tatar Communist Party and Milli Firka followed by the leaders of Hummet, Tatar Communist Party and even the Tatar Union of the Godless. It also happened in Azerbyjan, Kazakhstan and the Young Bukharians.

[edit] Other uses of the term

The term is also used in association with the implementation of policies used after the death of Stalin as the Soviet government loosened its control over the other communist states. Leaders of the communist regimes also felt the need to peruse more nationalistic policies in order to bolster their legitimacy in the eyes of the peoples they ruled.^[2]

Which policies were refered to as national communism depended on different national contexts. In Romania or Albania, for example, it referred to a preservation of Stalinism and a cult of personality at the same time those techniques were being repudiated elsewhere.^[3] In East Germany it meant the rehabilitation of German historical figures such as Wagner and Friedrich the Great. ^[4] In general throughout Eastern Europe national communism consisted of “de-emphasising the political hegemony of the Soviet Union and involved some accommodation of pre-socialist national identities.”^[5]

[edit] National Communist groups

• Muslim Socialist Committee of Kazan
• Azeri Hummet
• Kazakh Alash Orda
• Milli Firka
• Young Bukharians
• Young Khivians

[edit] References

1. ^ The Islamic Threat to the Soviet State by Alexandre Bennigsen and Marie Broxup, 1984, Services Book Club, Lahore
2. ^ Bideleux and Jefferies, 489.
3. ^ Tismaneanu, 188.
4. ^ Bideleux and Jefferies, 491.
5. ^ Pttaway, 137.