Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista

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Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista ( POUM , Catalan Partit Obrer d'Unificació Marxista "Workers' Party of Marxist Unity") was a revolutionary Marxist party in the Second Republic of Spain .

history

founding

The POUM emerged in 1935 from the merger of the Trotskyist Izquierda Comunista (Communist Left) around Andreu Nin and Juan Andrade with the Bloque Obrero y Campesino (Workers 'and Peasants' Block) around Julián Gorkin and Joaquín Maurín . The latter was based on Nikolai Bukharin . The majority of the supporters of these two groups were to be found in Catalonia (there especially in Lleida ), in Valencia and in Extremadura .

Spanish Civil War

During the Spanish Civil War between 1936 and 1939, the POUM worked with the anarcho-syndicalist trade union Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT), later mainly with the radical group Amigos de Durruti . In numerical terms, the POUM was far weaker than the anarchist camp. In addition to the fight against the coup d'état around Francisco Franco , the social revolution was in the foreground for this alliance , which drew opposition from many groups within the republican camp, especially the communists.

In the POUM militias , u. a. Members of Trotskyist, left-wing socialist and opposition communist groups such as the German SAP (like this, the POUM belonged to the London office , an association of left-wing socialist and independent communist parties) and KPO and well-known personalities such as George Orwell (who wrote about it in Homage to Catalonia , German: Mein Catalonia ), Albert O. Hirschman and the later social democratic member of the Bundestag Peter Blachstein . In Barcelona the training and formation of militia units took place in the Marx barracks.

The PCE , the Communist Party of Spain represented in the Popular Front government, which followed the Comintern line , vilified the POUM as a “Trotskyist traitor” and a cover organization of the fascists . This happened against the background of the Moscow show trials against alleged internal enemies of the USSR, which had been taking place since August 1936 .

The PCE acquired a dominant position within the republican zone due to the Soviet arms deliveries against Franco. The communist criticism was directed not least against the anarchists, with whom one could not take it on head on. The CNT, which is part of the Caballero government , did not openly support the POUM. In May 1937, during the May events , there was an armed conflict in Barcelona that lasted for days , in which the POUM fought with the anarchists against communists and supporters of the central government. At the beginning of the fighting, on May 5th, 1,500 militiamen from the anarchist column Roja y Negra , the Lenin Division from the POUM and the 128th Brigade of the 28th Division set out from the Aragon Front for Barcelona. They were attacked by central government planes near Binéfar . After negotiations, however, the unit returned to the front. Around 500 people died in the May event.

The Moscow-loyal communists reinterpreted the events as a fascist coup attempt. As a result of the May events, the revolution lost more and more ground. Only a short time later, the head of government, who had always spoken out against a ban on the POUM, was also overthrown.

Party ban in 1937 and split in 1939

On June 16, 1937, the party was finally banned. The POUM party office in the Falcón Hotel was closed by order of the Soviet Consul General Vladimir Alexandrovich Antonov-Ovsejenko in Barcelona and converted into a prison where 40 POUM members were interned and tortured. The party chairman of the POUM Andreu Nin was also abducted, tortured and murdered by the Soviet secret service GPU . The public trial for treason against the POUM members ended with prison terms for the defendants. The required death penalty was not pronounced, however, because doubts arose about the communist representation. The POUM ban was confirmed.

In July 1937, after internal power struggles and civil war-like clashes in Barcelona , the POUM units were disbanded. Many of the POUM officers and foreign militiamen close to the POUM were arrested if they could not escape or hide. The arrest of foreigners mostly took place when they came to Barcelona on leave unarmed . Colonel Rovira, the commander of the 29th Division , was summoned to the army headquarters and arrested. The 29th Division also included a British company, the leader of which, Georges Kopp, was also arrested. Generals Asensio and Martinez were also arrested. Most of the POUM militia was but after returning from lengthy battles of the of Soviet - Communist surrounded commanded troops and disarmed. The foreign militiamen, who were unencumbered by the Soviet Communists, were assigned to the International Brigades .

The conflictual situation between the various anti-fascist and communist groups, among other factors, contributed to the fact that Franco emerged victorious from the fighting at the end of the civil war, eliminated the republic and established a personalized dictatorship in Spain in which all socialist organizations were banned.

After 1939 the POUM split up several times, residual groups continued to exist in French exile and in Catalonia until around 1980. The Fundación Andreu Nin is dedicated to the memory of the POUM and Andreu Nin .

literature

Movie

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Hugh Thomas : The Spanish Civil War , Ullstein Verlag, Berlin West 1962, p. 330
  2. ^ Antony Beevor, The Spanish Civil War, ISBN 978-3-442-15492-0 , 2nd edition, page 340
  3. ^ Antony Beevor: The Spanish Civil War , ISBN 978-3-442-15492-0 , 2nd edition, page 352
  4. ↑ Patrik von zur Mühlen: Spain was their hope (Left in the Spanish Civil War 1936-1939) , Research Institute of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Bonn, Verlag Neue Gesellschaft GmbH, 1983, ISBN 3-87831-375-6 , p. 61 ff .