 I think it's very fitting that we are meeting tonight, as Mannan said, on the anniversary of the death of Rosa Luxemburg. It was 103 years today that she was murdered in cold blood by counter-revolutionary forces. And she was murdered for fighting for what she believed in and what she spent her whole life fighting for, a socialist world revolution. And I think that is also a very fitting subject for today's world. I think it is time, 103 years after her death, that we set the record straight and that we, the Marxists, win her back from all those soft lefties that has tried to hijack her legacy and her history. And say straightforward that Rosa Luxemburg was an outstanding revolutionary Marxist. And her legacy belongs to us, to those who fight for a socialist world revolution. She was born in 1871 in Russian-occupied Poland. She was a Pole, couldn't speak her language in school. She was a Jew and she was a woman. And she started the fight against oppression that I think she could feel quite clearly and concretely on herself very early. Already in high school, did she become politically active? And before she turned 20, she had to flee Poland and move to Switzerland in order not to get arrested. And there she continued her political activity. And in 1898 she moved to Berlin to participate in what was probably the most important working class and workers movement on an international scale at that time, the German Social Democratic Party that was like the crown in the second international. And when she moved there, the leadership found her a little bit, I think they thought she was a little bit of a difficult woman. So they tried to derail her into the woman's movement of the Social Democratic Party, had quite a big women's part of the movement. But that was not the style of Rosa Luxemburg being driven into a sidetrack. She threw herself into the main debates of the movement at the time. And when she moved to Germany, it was this debate on revisionism, brought forward by especially Bernstein, who wanted to revise the program of Marxism of the Social Democratic movement at the time, to actually put it into reformist lines and giving up the idea of fighting for revolution for socialist revolution. And Luxemburg was one of the, I think, one of in the forefront of this fight against this revisionism of the program of the SPD of the Social Democratic movement. And since then she was a key figure on an international scale and especially in the SPD, the German Social Democratic Party, against this degeneration, this reformist degeneration taking place inside the movement. And she was one of the hardest defenders of the Marxist ideas and the revolutionary program of the SPD. And I think she wrote this masterpiece Reformer Revolution and I would really recommend everybody to read it today because you find the same arguments that you meet all over the world on the left wing. And how Rosa Luxemburg argued against it. And I think these these arguments are maybe even more valid today than they were when they were written. But first of all, I want to recommend people to buy the book obviously, but I think also I will recommend people to actually read what Luxemburg said herself, because there has been as Manon said so many myths. So I think the best thing is to actually read herself, what what she wrote. Throughout from this time, she played a key role in fighting the opportunities, the reformist degeneration in the German Social Democratic Party and in the international. And it was a fight that ended up in her being a key part of founding the German Communist Party. And it was also the fight that ended up costing her her life basically in in in January 1919. And since her death, she has become quite a left wing icon. It's like a lot of left wing people have this a portrait on the wall or something. But I would say, if you, if you look at what they say she stood for, it has been grossly distorted. Her ideas. There has been this concept of so called Luxemburgism being created or invented that somehow she was like a distinct trend within Marxism. She was opposed to the reformist but that also that she was opposed to Leninism and Bolshevism. It's like a third way you could say a softer lift, but not being reformist so it was easier for those who didn't want to. I would say basically those who wanted to hide their own reformism and revolutionary phrases they would use Luxemburg, but they wouldn't use the real Luxemburg they would, they have painted a completely distorted and dishonest picture of who she was what she wrote and what she did. Because, and I think this this it can seem a bit attractive to young honest communists who have been taught that that that Leninism is that Stalinism is actually Leninism and they they are very, I think, healthily, making this and looking for something else what they don't know is that what what they think is Leninism is actually Stalinism, and then they meet this softer version of Luxemburg and and it's being told that that is not Leninism. So they completely discard Leninism also. But this is dishonest. If you look at everything she wrote everything she did. It's clear that also Luxemburg was on the same side as Lenin and the Bolsheviks. She was a Marxist, and she was a revolutionary. And only if you take quotes and texts out of context. Can you can you paint this distorted picture. And I think it is being done in a really dishonest way. Yes. And therefore also I would recommend people to actually read her own texts. And I think also this is, this is the reason for writing this book that it is time that her revolutionary legacy is being reclaimed, and it's the same legacy that we the Marxist tendency, a defense and fight for the fight for the socialist revolution, and a fight that needs to be based on on the sound foundations of Marxist theory. And that includes the experience of Lenin and the Bolsheviks, and also of the Rosa Luxemburg. I wanted to use the time I have here to dig into, I think, what is the two most persistent and also politically harmful myths on Luxemburg, and her so called anti Leninism, and to show, hopefully, I hope you agree after this, that that it is these myths are false to the core, that he was not an anti Leninist and that he was not an anti Bolshevik. And these two main myths are one that she supposedly had this special theory of spontaneity, and that she were against building a revolutionary organization that should lead the working class that basically saying she would just lead the revolution up to the workers themselves to find out. And two, that she supposedly was an opponent of the Russian Revolution and the Bolsheviks, and both these myths are lies. And I want to show why that is the case. Before we begin with number one, the question of organization and spontaneity. We are told that Luxemburg stood for the spontaneity of the masses as against the Leninist model of a highly centralized monolithic revolutionary party. And it is especially her text, her work, the mass strike, the political party and the trade unions that are used to create this myth that quotes are taken out of and so on. But this claim, this myth, both misses the point on why she wrote the text and against whom she was polemicizing who was she actually criticizing. And furthermore, you can only claim this that Luxemburg dismisses the concept of revolutionary leadership, if you if you take quotes out of context because that is simply not what is stated in the text. That is not the point of the text at all. The article is analyzing the first Russian Revolution of 1905. And it is explaining very concretely how the Russian masses rose spontaneously in mass strikes and also how they set up Soviets. And the Soviets, these organs of workers power, they had never been thought of in any Marxist theory, it was like the invention of the workers themselves when the need arose. And it explains this process very well, I think. And the article was written at a time when there was a wave of strikes sweeping across Germany. And they were inspired by the 1905 revolution in Russia. And the discussion was taking place inside the SPD on the mass strike. What are, what are they, what, what is it, what is the phenomena and how should the party react to these strikes taking place in Germany. And it was into this debate that that also Luxemburg wrote wrote her article. And in contrast to Russia, where the workers movement was really weak in 1905 in Germany there was strong trade unions and and there was a mass social democratic party or a strong social democratic party with roots inside the mass movement. But the leaders of the German workers movement treated these strikes with contempt and said they were immature and doomed to fail. Where on the other side Luxemburg and the revolutionary wing of the SPD, they welcome the strikes and argue for the need of the party to intervene and to give these strikes a political leadership. And it goes throughout the article that she says the party needs to intervene to put forward the political way forward and to lead the masses. So it's very clear she's not saying there shouldn't be any political organization or leadership in this in this movement. And the article was written for this debate. And it was a criticism of the leadership of the German Social Democratic Party, not the Bolsheviks as those Luxemburgists are claiming. And she criticized the leadership of the SPD for treating the mass movement as a pocket knife as something they they could open and close when they found it convenient for the purposes of the party. And instead, she said that the masses they move without permission from any party, as we saw in Russia in 1905. And that was an analysis that Lenin completely agreed in. It's also also a grossly distorted picture of Lenin to what and they claim that that he thinks that mass movements is something the party can can also turn on or close at will. He completely agreed with Luxemburg that the mass movement was a spontaneous, started as a spontaneous movement. And then she argued Luxemburg, again in full agreement with Lenin, that when they moved, when the workers moved, it was role of the party to give this movement a direction and a leadership. So on this, they, the linen and Luxemburg completely agreed. In December 1905, Luxemburg went to Poland, the Russian occupied part of Poland, where also the first Russian revolution was was rebelling across. She wanted to participate in the revolution. I think it must be really difficult to sit in Germany and see what is going on. So she went in the end of December 1905, but she came when the revolution was already at an end. She was arrested already in March 1906 and never actually got to participate in the revolutionary movement. But after she was released in the summer, she went to Finland, where a lot of the Bolshevik leaders were were hiding. And she spent a long time debating with them, all the lessons of the Russian Revolution. When you read also Lenin describing these discussions, it's very clear that they, they agreed. Luxemburg and Lenin and the main Bolshevik leaders agreed fully on the evaluation of the Russian Revolution. And Lenin actually said she was one of the only ones outside of Russia that actually understood the real lessons of the Russian Revolution. In 1907, she participated in the Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Party, the Polish Party was becoming a part of the party and that was also a Congress where both the Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks participated. There has been, there had been tendencies for more unification during the revolution, but now at this Congress in 1907, the disagreements began to come to the fore again. And the evaluations and the lessons of the Russian Revolutions was on the agenda. That was like the main discussion. What was the character, what was the way forward for the Social Democrats in Russia in the next period. And Luxemburg, she had a long speech at this Congress on behalf of the Polish delegation. And the main part of the speech was a sketching attack on the Mensheviks and their actions during during the 1905 Revolution. She criticized them for giving up the independent struggle of the workers, and instead that they put their trust in the Bosvian and the liberal parties. And she was fully on the side of the Bolsheviks and praised them for their independent class policy and and generally for their actions during during the Revolution. She had one critical point of the Bolsheviks in this long speech. And that was that while she agreed with the Bolsheviks, that the next step in Russia in the Russian Revolution, should it had been victorious was an armed uprising of the workers. That is also something she's portrayed at being against the workers arming themselves. But here she says very clearly, the only next, the only logical next step in in Russia 1905 or six would have been the arming of the workers and she was in a complete agreement with the Bolsheviks on this. But she said she thought the Bolsheviks put a bit too much emphasize on the technical side of this uprising, and not on the political side. And that was the only critical point you had of the Bolsheviks. And I think that reveals something a bit more profound about Luxembourg and and also what I believe is, is her weak side that she had in general a bit abstract approach to the question of of the Bolsheviks. And I think that also showed that she came from a very big organization, the German SPD, where things were very organized. So she was a bit more that that will sort itself out, but the Bolsheviks they they had to organize everything themselves. I think if you look at history, it showed, it shows that the Bolsheviks were correct, you need to organize also practically and technically if you if you want the revolution to succeed. It's not only about giving the political leadership. But I think it's, it's very clear that even when Luxembourg criticized the Bolsheviks, she did not reject political leadership in general, just as Lenin didn't reject the spontaneity of mass struggle. The only difference was in in the in the approach of intervening in the mass movement. And in continuation of this discussion. The Luxembourgists try to use Luxembourg to also cover up for the rejection of organizing a revolutionary party or revolutionary organization. To present the myth that Luxembourg was for a genuine workers democracy. I've also sometimes heard of being referred to as a democratic socialist, which I think is quite with the wrong connotations he was revolutionary. And that she also it is presented as she was in opposition to the dictatorial methods of Leninism. And they use an article by her from 1904, called the organizational questions of the Russian social democracy. She was completely denounced Lenin and the Bolsheviks for the ultra what she called the ultra centralism, and even blankism, and blankism is the idea that you can organize a social revolution by a small cons, conspiratorial group of revolutionary leaders. And if you read this, it's really a harsh attack on the Bolsheviks. It didn't meant her words, she could be very clear, but what she also could. And I think that is very something that you only see in great revolutionaries is admit when you're wrong. So be very clear, very bold, but also say, well, I was I was proven to be wrong. And this is the case. This happened in this case also and I will come back, come back to that. It was written after the split in the Russian Social Democratic Party between the Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks and Luxembourg, like many leaders of the of the German workers movement knew only the Mensheviks and knew about the split from them. And she initially sided with the Mensheviks and launch this attack on the Bolsheviks, but I would say without actually understanding or knowing what Lenin and the Bolsheviks actually stood for. And if you if you go into this myth, first of all, I think, and this picture that that these Luxembourgists paint, think first of all, it starts from the wrong premise. It starts from the premise that the bureaucratic Stalinist degeneration of the Russian Revolution. It flows from the Leninist view of organization that is a myth or lie that you hear very often. The real fact of the matter is that the Stalinist degeneration was a consequence of the objective situation and conditions in Russia, that it was a revolution in a very backward country, and that the revolution remained isolated. And the worker state set up under the leadership of Lenin and Trotsky. This regime was separated by the Stalinist regime by a river of blood. The Stalinist regime practically wiped out the whole old Bolshevik guard. So the Stalinism was a negation of Leninism, not the continuation of Leninism. And also these Luxembourgists, they falsify what Lenin and the Bolsheviks actually stood for in order to facilitate this myth. They portray the Bolshevik party as this monolith where there was no free debate and everything was decided by the leadership and basically by Lenin. But what they actually object to is to build that the Bolshevik party was an organization that wasn't just an academic debating club. It was an organization to actually fight the revolutionary fight, an organization of the advanced layers of the working class to fulfill the task of leading the workers to taking power. And internally it was organized on the lines of democratic centralism. That is, once you have an internal debate and once the debate is closed, you have a vote and the majority decides and then you go out and actually do it. And that is something a lot of these Luxembourgists, a lot of them academics don't really like, they don't want to have a party discipline, they just want to do whatever they want to do. And then I would say, furthermore, the Luxembourgists, they turn Luxembourg's criticism in this article of Lenin and the Bolsheviks on its head. Because she didn't say in the article that the party that Lenin is striving for would end up in a bureaucratic degeneration of the revolution. What she is saying is that she is afraid that the party that Lenin is building with will end up as a sect, not being able to to connect with the masses and therefore will not be able to lead a revolution. So she's not debating whether a party should be built, or whether it should lead a revolution she's debating how it should be built in order to fulfill that task that the Luxembourgists claim that that she was against. And to just take the final blow against this myth. She changed her mind on this article. It was very clear both in articles and on the Congress in 1907. She said very clearly that her warnings and fears of blankism and ultra leftism inside the Bolshevik Party had shown to be untrue. And that reality had put it in the distant past. We speak two years, but for her experience and the history shattering experience of a revolution had shown that the Bolsheviks were correct, and she was on the side of the Bolsheviks against the Bolsheviks. So you cannot without distorting what she said what she wrote and what she did claim that she had a special theory of spontaneity and that she was against building a revolutionary organization, or that she was an anti-Leninist or an anti-Bolshevik. And if you, if you still had any doubt, she ended up her life trying to build the German Communist Party along with Karl Liebknecht, a revolutionary organization to lead the workers to take power in Germany. So that was like the final act of her life was actually to try and build this. Yes, that was the first myth. The second myth is, is the question of the Russian Revolution. And the myth is that Rosa Luxemburg was opposed to the Russian Revolution of 1907, not of 1917, the October Revolution, and the Bolsheviks. And that is also a pure lie and a falsification. The text used to create this myth is her text, the Russian Revolution that is written in 1918. And this is the only longer article that she wrote on the subject. And in this article she is he raises several criticisms of the actions of the Bolsheviks during the Russian Revolution. And this is eagerly seized by anyone who want to sound left but criticize the Bolsheviks and Lenin. But the myth completely ignores facts again. They completely ignore when and where and how the article was written. When the Russian Revolution broke out in 1917, Luxemburg was in prison. The German high command had put in prison for her own safety. So she said in prison while this was going on, I think she must have been really frustrated. And her access to information and not least reliable information and she knew this was very, very limited. She would only be given certain papers and not others and so on to read. And it was on the basis of this information. She wrote the article and she states very clearly in letters and so on that this article was written for her own self clarification. Like when you have to think something through, you sit down and do notes. That is not an article for publication. She refused to publish it as long as she lived because she knew that this criticism would be used to distort the revolution. And it would be distorted by the enemies of the revolution in order to criticize it. And Clara Zetkin, who was a very close friend of Rosa Luxemburg, she stated that after Luxemburg was released from prison in November 1918. She said that her views in this article had been wrong and based on insufficient information. And the text was never published during her life. It wasn't published until 1922 by Paul Levy when he was expelled from the German Communist Party for breach of party discipline. And I would say there was probably a bit of wanting to put some, how can you say, hair in the soup of the movement. And he had not been given permission by Luxemburg to publish this text. And this fact is never mentioned by those so-called Luxemburgists who claim that she was against the revolution. But even then I would really recommend people again to read the actual text because you cannot read the text and believe she was against the Russian Revolution or the Bolsheviks. It's simply not possible. The text starts and ends with complete praise of the Bolsheviks and of Lenin and Trotsky and the Russian Revolution. And I want to just have one quote that is from the beginning of the text. And I think that sets the record quite straight. She wrote, whatever a party could offer of courage, revolutionary far-sightedness and consistency in a historic hour, Lenin, Trotsky and all the other comrades have given in good measure. 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. And I think that says it quite clearly. She thought it was the salvation of the honor of all revolutionaries throughout the world after the complete betrayal of 1914 of the Social Democrats in Germany. And the criticism she has is a very concrete criticism and it is a comradely criticism of the actions of the Bolsheviks and not a denunciation of October. And mainly she writes it as a warning against thinking that you can take the experience from Russia and just apply it one-on-one mechanically in Germany, in a German revolution. And also she explained that the problems that the Russian Revolution faced was a direct consequence of its isolation and the backward conditions in the country. She states this quite clearly. She claims the responsibility for this, as she actually says, all the problems of the Bolsheviks, the responsibility for this lays on the shoulders of the German working class and not least the leaders of the German working class. And the only solution to overcoming it, they cannot be found inside of Russia. In breaking the isolation of the Russian Revolution by carrying out the German Revolution. So it's actually a cry to battle for the German workers to come and help the Russians in order to overcome the problems that they face. And then a warning not to think that the problems the Bolsheviks face is general and principal and should be applied in Germany, but they should be understood in their concrete context. So if we read the article in its entirety, instead of picking and choosing quotes out of context in order to misrepresent her views, it's impossible to interpret also Luxembourg as being opposed to Lenin and Trotsky. If you do it, you're lying, you're dishonest. She agreed with Lenin on all major questions. She agreed with the way that the October Revolution was carried out. She agreed with what Lenin and Trotsky had to do to defend the young Soviet Republic. And also, she was a true internationalist and understood that the German Revolution had to succeed in order to save and help the Russian Revolution. And, and this is also something that these Luxembourg is never, never mentioned. A few months later, after she wrote this article, the German Revolution did break out. And it freed her from prison in November 1918. And when she got out, she immediately threw herself into the battle, writing articles, making speeches doing whatever she could to secure its victory. And now she was face to face with some of the same problems as the Bolsheviks and ended up with the same conclusions as them. One of the things, and I would say probably the main thing, the most serious thing that she criticized the Bolsheviks for was the disbanding of the constituent assembly. And it's, it's a criticism that is eagerly seized by, by those who want to portray Luxembourg as some democratic socialist trying to have some kind of bourgeois democracy against the dictatorship of the proletariat of Lenin and the Bolsheviks. Okay, first of all, if you look at Lenin and the Bolsheviks throughout the history they had supported the call for a constituent assembly. Seeing this as a step forward from the sourish despotism, a dictatorial regime. But when they, when the of the time of the dissolution in January 1918, the, the constituent assembly didn't any longer represent a step forward. In comparison to the, to the Soviets, the workers councils that has sprung up and was a far superior way of, of organizing a democratically as a workers power as opposed to to a bourgeois democracy. And no bourgeois parliamentary system is able to express the rapidly changing views of the masses of workers, when they move, they can only like be a still picture. So the constituent assembly was a picture of the past and events had surpassed it. So when they, when they, this, when the Bolsheviks, this, how can I say this alluded the constituent assembly. They, they didn't do it for being anti democratic, they did it because it was replaced by far more democratic system, the Soviets power. And Luxembourg, when she wrote the article she was like but why can these two exist side by side. Why can't you both have the constituent assembly and the Soviets. And it's really funny. I don't know if it's funny, but then when she was faced with the problem in Germany, a year later in, in the autumn of 1918. The answer to that question became very clear to her, because also in Germany workers, councils had sprung up, sprung up all over Germany, and the leadership of the SPD. They tried to use the National Assembly, which was the same as the constituent assembly in Russia, as a way of derailing the German Revolution away from workers power away from a socialist revolution into bourgeois democratic channels and actually stopping the revolution. And also Luxembourg was very harsh and very clear in saying, she said that now the National Assembly was an, and I quote, outmoded legacy of bourgeois revolutions and empty shill, and also, and this is also a quote, to resort to the National Assembly today is consciously or unconsciously to turn the revolution back to the historical stage of both for revolutions. Anyone advocating it is a secret agent of the bourgeoisie on unconscious spokesman of petty bourgeois ideology. So she had to put a verdict on her own article a year earlier, or just a few months earlier, she would, she would call it a secret agent of the bourgeoisie. Anyone who claims this was the view of also Luxembourg, that you should take on for for the future doesn't know her history or know it and and distorts it. So, I think for anyone who will honestly read, it's quite clear that that also Luxembourg agreed with Lenin and the Bolsheviks, and none of them were anti Democrats. They were against bourgeois national democracy, or they wanted it to be surpassed by the workers taking power through workers councils or Soviets. So, basically what what happened in the Russian Revolution. So you cannot lose use Luxembourg as some kind of a how can you say that a apology for for for parliamentarism, or an opportunism, as some leftist do today. So, I hope this debunked the myths, the two main myths that there are others that you can read about in the book. But I think this is the two main ones, I want to I wanted to conclude by saying that also looking for through herself into into the revolution, but she didn't get to fight the fight to the end. Her life was cut short, as we know, by the reactionary fry cops soldiers that was spurred on by the social democrats. And, and she was murdered, along with the other outstanding leader, leader of the newly formed Communist Party, Karl Liebknecht 103 years ago today. And this left the newly formed Communist Party of Germany, it was only a few weeks old, or two weeks actually quite precisely, without its head. And in the coming months, the other many of the other leaders, those who had experience will also kill. And, and the German Revolution ended up defeated. And that was a catastrophe for workers worldwide, it left the Russian Revolution isolated, and it paved the way for fascism in Germany and we know what happened from that. So, you could, you could want to ask, could it have, have been otherwise. And I think, if we look at it, the main difference between between Germany and Russia was the existence of the Bolshevik Party in Russia, a cater organization built over the years, based on theory and with roots in the working class. And when the German Revolution broke out, the Spartacists, which was the forerunner of the German Communist Party was only a loose network of a few thousands. And some estimates says they were only 50 in Berlin. Imagine that 50 in the capital of Germany and made a major million sized country, trying to lead the Revolution. And they formed the Communist Party in the middle of the Revolution they formed it on New Year's Eve, 1918-19 so two months into the Revolution. At that time, it was actually, in my opinion, only Lenin who really understood the need for a revolutionary cater organization. For many years also Luxembourg thought that the SPD would be this organization. And I think for quite a few years also Lenin thought so too, but they didn't have it in Russia so they needed to build the Bolshevik Party. And I think that to some extent excuse her. But what I don't think it does, is that for us coming after, we know we have the, we have the, we have the hint side, we can see what happened. We cannot make the same mistake, or as a Luxembourg is due to take her weak side and make that into her major thing and praising it as something positive we have to learn from history, because we have history to look back at, and and see what is needed, that is to build cater organization and revolutionary cater organization worldwide. And to build it on a sound theoretical foundation. And I think this is that is based on Marxist theory, the experience of Lenin and the Bolsheviks, and also on the experience of Rosa Luxembourg, and her text and her ideas. In order to build on from their legacy, I think we need to learn the lessons also for her from her and and to reclaim the watches, what is her real legacy her real revolutionary legacy and to reclaim it for us in the IMT and the Marxist movement worldwide. Thank you.