Trotsky with Hitchens and Service Chapter 5 of 5

[normalkuriboh]

Service is clueless and inaccurate. Fact.

[Drac39]

I miss Hitchens and wish he had wrote a book about Trotsky.

[AutoBahnForever]

Hitchens and Service are clueless and inaccurate ? I would assume they have done more research than a part time student commentator. Waiting for the video with you being interviewed on national television about your opinions and comments.

[sangliasuga]

again, the bolsheviks did EXACTLY WHAT HITCHENS said they didn't: replace a system with an independent judiciary(elected judges, jury trials since 1864) and a parliamentary democracy(@ least the beginnings of one) under Karensky.

Hitchens has lost his mind; almost as post-modernist as the religious nuts re usually humiliates in debate

[sangliasuga]

Hitchens of course sounds like an idiot when he calls the White Russian Armies "fascist;" they were in fact fighting for an independent judiciary as Tsarist Russia had elected judges and jury trials since 1964. Who eliminated the "independent judiciary," the unelected, totalitarian, despotic Leon Trotsky. I can't believe there are people who think Hitchens is intelligent.

[shmuelposin]

Did Hitchens just say "The Protocols of the Elders of Stalin"? Oops... He didn't catch his mistake, either.

[workingclasslass]

What a weak ,sorry and pathetic little propaganda show ,no doubt some ignorant folk will be taken in by this utter dross but lets hope not ! The three of their brains combined wouldn't match a third of Trotskys !

End unemployment,homelessness,pros­titution etc etc MASSES of the world unite against the exploiting FEW !!!

Lets have REAL Socialism !!!

[spinozareagan]

@workingclasslass A third of Trotsky's brain? You mean the third that wasn't splattered all over his desk when the ice pick carved open his skull?

[workingclasslass]

2 ) "...which....not ONLY promote the most rapid growth of industry and collectivisation but which also secure the necessary stability of the social regime ,that is ,FIRST of all to strengthen the alliance of the workers and peasants".

Others show up Service in more detail for the right wing propagandist of the elites ,who is trying to rewrite history . Dont be fooled by them .

UP THE WORKERS !

[workingclasslass]

1 )This right wing propagandist tryed to say Trotsky would have enforced industrialisation and collectivisation as ruthlessly as Stalin ,which is pure tosh !Since Trotsky said " The tempos of these two processes are interdependant. The proletariat is interested in the highest possible tempo for these processes ...systematically improving the material level of the toiling masses . The optimum tempos,ie,the best ....are those which .............. 

[workingclasslass]

Anyone who is idiotic enough to buy this book of baised right wing lies that Service spews forth will be completely ignorant of the facts about Leon Trotsky. This sanctimonious wee dick gives only HIS views and not the facts ...

[castlekingside28]

"ive been reading your works and you really fell for Trotsky but less and less over the years" - yeah so like lots of people Hitchens mellowed with age!

[TheHitchsonian]

Again. This moderator is a total philistine asshole. WHo is this guy? and why is Hitchens, or Service, wasting their breath talking with this indoctrinated, conservative pleb

[Drac39]

I'm not denying there is a view of Trotsky through a romantic lens and this seems to be what irks Service and these other British historians.

[Drac39]

I think Service is a brilliant writer and articulate speaker but his books contain so many of his personal opinions and that is not the testament of a good historian. His 'Stalin' biography has an uncomfortable amount of positive things to say about the man

[mattandersonWSWS]

Robert Service and other leading British academics have launched a campaign of historical falsification, slandering Trotsky, and denying his historical significance. The purpose of the campaign is to prevent young people coming into political struggle from learning about Trotsky's political legacy. David North of the World Socialist Website has written a number of essays in defence of Trotsky - see "Political biography and the historical lie: An examination of Robert Service’s Trotsky" on wsws

[Underground906]

To see why that's typical, and those things go addressed in favour of pulling at miniscule, irrelevant details and indignation of even being challenged perpetuating that self delusion/deception, J. Glazov's United in Hate:The Left's love affair with tyranny and terror explains it perfectly from the son of political refugees who had to flee execution in the USSR. Those in the grip of idolatory marxist worship are unlikely to seek anything that opposes it of course, but I'll reference it anyway

[Underground906]

I've read the threads to all these videos and have yet to read a factual rebuttal. But that doesn't seem to be a strong point of lefties I know. They usually just squeeze anyone who opposes their views into boxes labelled right-winger, fascist, racist, sexist, xenophobe or whatever it is and that is sufficient for them not to have to address properly. No matter how ill fitting that box. I haven't seen anything different here as yet. Just lefties romanticizing Trotsky as the vids suggest.

[KOGR11]

@Underground906 Not to mention a youtube video comment is hardly the place to elaborate on a book criticism. If you are indeed so much under the impression that Service's history on Trotsky is to be considered "Biblical truth" and want a serious contention against the points on the book then you should visit those forums that focus on it. However this cover of the book here on this video is hardly adequate with no counter point made by hitchens to contend Service's history.

[Underground906]

@KOGR11 I've read/listened to some of the most prominent criticisms. They exemplify the typical reaction you'd expect from fantasist, romanticist Marxist ideologues when their airbrushed beliefs are challenged I mean Taaef, or whatever his name is? Just insane. The very essence of an indoctrinated mind mired in idealism sans reason encapsulated perfectly in his response. i don't care that Service's book contained trivial academic errors. Tthere are more salient and important points ...cont.

[Underground906]

..points that have been left unanswered in favour of more pressing details like getting a persons' name right. Points that a normal, sane, decent person would see as the highest priority to contend are these claims: Trostsky in favour of a one party state. Mass terror. An end to political and cultural pluralism. Against democracy. The difference between his,Lenin's, and Stalins strain being narrow. These speak the loudest. North didn't address them. I haven't seen any1. Typical.

[KOGR11]

The book isnt that great, and has quite a large number of historical inaacuracies. And this is hardly a neutral review with Hitchens on the other side. Appaling discussion.

[Underground906]

@KOGR11 Fan of Trotsky?

[KOGR11]

@Underground906 read the book.

[Underground906]

@KOGR11 I asked that in reference to where you said it was an appalling discussion. Not your opinion of the book. I'm sure if the points Service made in this discussion had been as wrong as a lot of his detractors say they are, then Hitchens would have been more opposing.

[KOGR11]

@Underground906 Obviously Hitchens had little intention of opposing Service in the first place because of his own similar political opinions on trostsky. It was an appaling discussion since this discussion is lil more than Hitchens and Service agreeing with each other point to point ignoring the limitations, exaggerations and historical fabrications in the claims made by the book. Hitchens being a well known right winger would obviously not be opposing.

[Underground906]

@KOGR11 It's just seems your distaste is down to them being right wingers. That tag is enough for Lefties to vehemently oppose something, no matter what that happens to be. In fact, I haven't actuallu seen any specific point of fact overturned or disputed. Only obvious Trotsky admirers consistently say how Service's book is full of fabrications, etc, but nothing more than that assessment is given. What are these fabrications? Why have no points in these vids been contended as is? Just the usual

[KOGR11]

@Underground906 what my distaste is down to is strictly your opinion. You dont have to a leftist to see Services biased history, you just have to have prior knowledge about trotsky before reading Service's book. Which point of fact do you want overturned? which part of the book? there has been enough discussion on it in relevant forums about the books criticism not just by leftist by also by people who have studied history prior to Service.

[yampymusic]

Agree with Villa72 re. Service's intellectual limitations. For example, he struggles to see more than one counter-factual move ahead. Thus, as CosmosLoyal points out, he gets completely owned by Hitchens in Chapter 3 of 5 (starting around 1.13) when he states that Trotsky would have caused a bloodbath in Germany, a bloodbath which he then has to concede would probably have had the somewhat redeeming feature of erasing Hitler from history.

[CosmosLoyal]

Service is another in a long line of conservative pseudo Empiricists cherry picking historical sources to fit in with their prejudices. The fact that he refuses to debate many Marxists regarding the true nature of Trotsky is further evidence of this. I struggled to take him seriously as an historian after his counterfactual assertion that Trotsky would have created a blood bath in Europe. As Hitchens correctly pointed out it would have averted the 60 million strong blood bath of WW2.

[Underground906]

@CosmosLoyal Did you not listen to the rest of it after Hitchens had said that? Obviously not. You hold up your own assertion that he's just another conservative..... as evidence? Services reasoning around the projection of Trotsky creating a bloodbath was based on better reasoning than those who worship Trotsky and like to imagine a completely different scenario had he succeeded Lenin. Nothing will shake you ideologues from your hero worship. Nothing. How do you even know he's a conservative?

[villa72]

Service is detailed but he's not a good thinker. Anyone who would say definitively one way or another "Trotsky would have made communism humane" or "Trotsky would have been worse than Stalin" is a poor historian. Trotsky made an after-the-fact assessment of the failure of the Soviet regime that lo and behold suited Trotsky, but that does not make it an a priori untruth. His voice was the closest we had to the inside of the revolution.

[Lacedaemonia]

Thank you for posting these videos. Very enlightening and good to see a rational respectful debate (although as an earlier commenter says, they don't have much to debate).

[KeepColdwithCoolidge]

Thank you posting these videos, good sir. Very interesting.

[ExaltedLeader]

I think Mr. Price is have a grand ol' time just making shit up.

Where does he get any of his thoughts that Trotsky was as iron fisted as Stalin? Certainly not from any of Trotsky's writings, and certainly not from any of Trotsky's contemporaries (as they were all dead before they could say very much about Trotsky).

It's just one more speculative Bourgeoisie hack job.

[spokmage]

i think this series has been very interesting and worthwhile!

[rb1601]

Had Service had his way, the Whites would've had millions of Jews annihilated. Taaffe and his Socialist Party are not good ambassadors for Trotskyism, I'd like to see fellow professor Alex Callinicos debate Service at Marxism 2010.

[benthejrporter]

Yeah I'd like to hear that too. Hitchens is a great disputant. He's far better than Richard Dawkins in the God vs Atheist debates. I see Peter Taaffe has made a video critiquing this one and he challenges Service to a live debate. So far Service has declined; that's a shame. I'd like to see it happen.

[drmodestoesq]

Let's not forget it was Trotsky who rubber stamped Zinoviev' s plan to arrest the families of the Kronstadt mutineers who were on the mainland. He clearly was up to his neck in anti-democratic, anti-pluralist totalitarian mass murder.

[benthejrporter]

As they landed on Kronstadt the Bolsheviks echoed Machiavelli's "The Ends Justifies The Means". But in this world the ends can often be determined by the means when dealing with people who have both feelings and memories... like most of us do I'm sure. If somebody I loved was part of the Kronstadt garrison I wouldn't say: "Well if it's good for the Revolution it'll do." Like hell! I'd become a reactionary just to piss everybody off!

[rb1601]

Kronstadt was justified. You haven't had to work with anarchos, any movement they touch turns to shit.

[drmodestoesq]

My understanding is that the Kronstadt rebellion was based on the desire (based on their point by point demands) for freedom of speech and assembly, the legalization of trade unions and secret ballot voting et cetera.. They strike me as heroic champions of anti-authoritarianism. I'm glad so many of them escaped to Finland. Emma Goldman accused Trotsky of hypocrisy when he condemned the state terrorism of Stalin. Kronstatdt demonstrates the way he coerced the population when he was in power.

[rb1601]

No, they were annoying self identfied ultra-left anarchists who were trying to claim the revolution for themselves. It goes back to Bakunin's expulsion from the First International.

[drmodestoesq]

This flies in the face of the fact that Trotsky called the sailors of Kronstadt the "finest flower of the revolution." Hardly a description one would give to impractical anarchists. Furthremore, along with Alexander Shlyapnikov, Alexandra Kollontai and the Worker's Opposition Party, who supported their aims, the Kronstadt rebellion was based on the correct belief that the Communist party was consolidating power and brutally crushing any dissenting views.

[rb1601]

The Kronstadt rebellion was led by Stepan Petrichenko, a self-proclaimed anarcho-syndicalist. The Kronstadt leaders also made a pact with the Whites to secure aid to the island. They were actively jeopardising the revolution for their own delusional ends and there was no alternative to military action.

[benthejrporter]

I'm not going to get into a childish "Hey man, I've been there!" competition with anyone, but how do you know I've never had to work with Anarchoes? If Trotsky et al thought Kronstadt was justified then I hope they didn't complain when the relatives of the victims joined the Whites. Massacres like Kronstadt are the greatest recruiting poster for your enemies.

[rb1601]

Calling Kronstadt a "massacre" is pure exaggerated nonsense. The number of casualties were more or less equal on both sides. The rebellion was in danger of completely fucking up the revolution and handing victory to the Whites.

[alexeirayu]

A fine video. Suh educated people talk about Trotsky and analyze history. It's great.

[fdoric6]

Two hacks making big bucks falsifying history. Scum sucking vermin

[SurelyYewJest]

I don't see this fight that everyone is claiming CH and RS are having. I see them complementing each other's expertise, with little in the way of objections taken. Hitchens isn't drawing a blank at 9:45, he's thinking through the suggestion made. He wasn't asked to recall, but to consider. As for idiots like socratic1968, have you not heard CH's denunciations of communism and the USSR in other forums? You don't sound like you know much of the man. I don't see an emasculated CH at all.

[socratic1968]

Sorry, but you are a complete and utter fool.

CH is many things and, like christian morality, you must check the calendar if you want to pin him down.

I have followed this man for many years and it is quite obvious that he has a soft spot for Trotsky and Jews in general.

The best evidence for this is his animosity for mother teresa. Calling her a "douche bag" for taking money from a roman catholic robber baron, Keating.

BUT, CH is shamefully silent re jewish robber barons in 2008.

[SurelyYewJest]

You're officially a Class A liar. You're basically saying CH is a secret zionist Jew. What about the West Bank settlers he's denounced? What of the radical Jewish right he's lambasted? You haven't followed CH for sh!t, and you have no clue what his positions are. I've watched dozens of hours of CH debates, read his material, etc. His positions most assuredly do not change with the wind, and if they do it's for a damn good reason.

[rb1601]

Trotsky didn't kill anyone through starvation. The Russian Civil War was about liberating Russia from White fascism. Even Winston Churchill criticised the White pogroms. The Ukrainian famine happened under Stalin in the 1930s.

[kubiczech25]

"The Russian Civil War was about liberating Russia from White fascism." That is, of course, bullshit. Communist coup was originally directed against democratic government of Kerensky.

[rb1601]

Kerensky was an ineffective weakling who was being manipulated by the White fascists, and his government was never democratically elected.

[drmodestoesq]

Finally, someone mentions the Kerensky administration which was destroyed by communist thuggery. This Whites versus Reds drivel is a exculpation of communist mass murder. The answer to Nazi Germany wasn't communism it was democracy.

[rb1601]

No, the Kerensky adminstration was destroyed by its own weakness and incompetence in the face of the Whites.

[SurelyYewJest]

Who claimed the crimes of the Reds were a triumph over the Whites? If either had won the consequences would have been disastrous *and* murderous, so it's a wash. The only reason the Whites look less guilty is because they never obtained power.

[rb1601]

dudeandsparky,

The whining anti-communist Service is not "THE" voice on Russian history - Isaac Deutscher was, even Tony Blair has praised his biography of Trotsky.

[kubiczech25]

Anti-communism is natural position of every decent human being.

[R0undAboutMidnight]

Well, both Deutscher and Service are pretty biased. Service also has an annoying habit of ad hominem. I lean towards Deutscher's interpretation, but reading Service is good to balance things out.

[rb1601]

Service unashamedly covers up White anti-Semitism in his book. He is a right-wing disgrace.

[eeuumuscle]

mass extermination of Muslims? you are idiot JPCannon9...you sure dont know what he thinks or says...he calls out Islam for the backward, maniacal religion it is...he is wrong on the Iraq war but he is not wrong on the pig-headed religion that Islam is, hijacked by phony hypocritical mysoginists who love to fuck boys on the side

[socratic1968]

Hitchens gets a beat down by the man to his left.

Hitchens is a dangerous fool. A propagandist for Paul Wolfowitz and the neocon agenda, which is to make the world safe for zionism.

I love seeing hitchens get such a clear beating. He lost so badly here and yet so subtle, he was beaten senseless by the man to his lift. sweeeeet.

[NightmareRavens]

First of all, I'd like preface that for one who demonstrates little to no understanding of the nature of debates- exchange of ideas and opinions- and not a showdown of intelligence as much of the content is arbritrary to the debator.

Second of all, much of Hitchens' view is anti-conservatism and anti-imperialism. Hitchens is often on the left of the political spectrum. Much of his views persists until this day. He supports Wolfowitz to some extent, but that doesn't him a propagandist.

[rayvasc]

he even starts to quote service from his book and interrupts service in the process. better to have the man speak than be  quoting him. unbelievable.

[rocknfuckenroll]

Good golly I hate the host. I wanna punch the host in the dick. He's so annoying. He's always adding "foot notes" to his questions and interrupting the experts when they start talking. Or he interrupts them to pointlessly repeat something they just said seconds ago, probably just to try and prove hat he's smart (which he's obviously not). And I just hate the fucking dumb idiot look he always has on his face. He looks like a 90 year old Alzheimer's trying to figure out how to use a mobile phone

[dudeandsparky]

interesting interpretation enigma. quite valid but a little off the mark in my opinion. service is an oxford scholar and hitch watches what he says and looks more deferential than usual. he knows that service is THE voice on russian history. hitch is the dilittante. hitch is the most articulate speaker i have heard though. love him

[enigma343]

What's with these comments? This wasn't a high school debate they were conducting here. I perceive Hitchens as being acutely aware of his own possible bias on the subject, thus his deference to Mr. Service. Disagreeing with someone is not 'insulting' them - I think this is one of the few times I've seen Hitchens enjoy and respect the company of another intellectual. And the pauses towards the end are probably because this topic is so close to him, and Trotsky was a complicated figure.

[rayvasc]

hitch looks a little intimidated by service but why wouldn't you be. he is THE man on this issue.

[agentssith]

I think this is one of the first discussions I have seen Hitch have where he wasn't arguing.

[beebobox]

he unlike some people, knows when he's speaking to someone who knows more then he does, and he's willing to listen and learn.

more ppl like that :)

[fidomusic]

@agentssith He actually treats his opponent with respect, which is unusual. It's probably because he knows that Service knows more about Trotsky than he does.

[cmack3000]

thanks for the video. it's always good to hear the hitch talk about something other than religion or iraq

[shikagonga]

agreed - hitchens seemed emasculated

[spinozareagan]

Yeah, you're right. He lost his manhood. Now he is no longer a man but a woman

[SurelyYewJest]

Why is the default position of shame to be associated with being female?

[spinozareagan]

@SurelyYewJest I'm sorry, I was being intentionally over the top to point out the idiocy of describing the harshness of "hitchens seemed emasculated."

[mythaught]

9:45... hitchens draws a blank?!?!? wow... that's rare footage. enjoyed the videos - thanks

[rebelmusicfan]

Christopher is indirectly insulted by Robert Service to many times I am surprised Hitch did not fire back the only time was when he made a materialist Marxist argument against service concerning Stalin killings in eastern Europe (he remarked that they were race not communist motivated)

[socratic1968]

Hitchens is a typical urban journalist blow hard.

Trotsky was cur from the same cloth.

How many people did he kill in the early 1920's through starvation?

They destroyed the Russian economy when they took over and then, when there was no capital production, they stole food from farmers to give it to the communist upper class.

Can you imagine your children crying and dieing for lack of food?

This is what Trotsky gave humanity.

SHAME ON YOU CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS