Leon Trotsky Quotes

Let us not forget that revolutions are accomplished through people, although they be nameless. Materialism does not ignore the feeling, thinking, and acting man, but explains him.

The theory of the permanent revolution, in contradiction to the theory of socialism in one country, was recognized by the entire Bolshevik party during the period from 1917 to 1923.

In 1917 there was not a single Bolshevik who considered possible the realization of a socialist society in a single country, and least of all in Russia.

Where the sole employer is the state, [opposition] means death by slow starvation.

[Vladimir] Lenin died in January, 1924; three months later [Joseph] Stalin expounded in writing Lenin's conception of the proletarian revolution.

The people will have the right to elect their representatives from a list of candidates [who have been approved by the Party].

England is nothing but the last ward of the European madhouse, and quite possibly it will prove to be the ward for particularly violent cases.

Without a correct strategy the victory is impossible. But even the most correct strategy cannot give the victory under unfavorable objective conditions.

As for us, we were never concerned with the Kantian-priestly and vegetarian-Quaker prattle about the sacredness of human life.

Our party's most outstanding mediocrity.

Against my protests a mausoleum was built on the Red Square, a monument unbecoming and offensive to the revolutionary consciousness.

Only in the Fall of 1924 did [Joseph] Stalin discover that it is especially Russia, as distinguished from other countries, which can by its own forces build up a socialist society.

[Joseph] Stalin closes the exposition of these [Leon Trotsky] ideas with the words, "Such are in general the characteristic features of [Vladimir] Lenin's conception of the proletarian revolution."

It is therefore not true that the mere existence of the Soviet Union is capable of assuring the victory of the revolution in other countries.

If one cannot get along without a mirror, even in shaving oneself, how can one reconstruct oneself or one's life, without seeing oneself in the "mirror" of literature?

It is quite clear that the German and Chinese revolutions in case of victory would have changed the face of Europe and Asia, and perhaps of the whole world.

National self-sufficiency or "autarchy" is the ideal of [Adolf] Hitler, not of [Karl] Marx and [Vladimir] Lenin.

Fascism is a caricature of Jacobinism.

To overthrow the power of the bourgeoisie and to establish the power of the proletariat in one country still does not signify the full victory of Socialism.

The main task of Socialism - the organization of Socialist production - remains still in the future.

That the existence of the Soviet Union has an international revolutionary significance is a commonplace equally recognized by friends and foes.

Simultaneously the Left Opposition in the course of several years carried on a struggle against the Stalinists in favor of collectivization.

I wrote a study about this question, The Lessons of October, which served as a pretext for my elimination from the government.

What shall we call an "immediate possibility"? In 1923 the situation in Germany was profoundly revolutionary, but what was lacking for a victorious revolution was a correct strategy.

Yet the proletariat has not only a vanguard, but also a rearguard, and besides the proletariat there are the peasantry and the bureaucracy.

The Soviet State does not need either illusions or camouflage. It can claim only that world authority which is confirmed by the facts.

Once again, he who ignores the problems of revolutionary strategy would do better not to talk about revolutions at all.

The usages and methods of warfare are thus determined by changing circumstances and, therefore, they themselves can in nowise be eternal.

I feel here that this time they have succeeded.

The Soviet Union needs thinking and critical friends, such as are capable not only of singing hymns in the hours of success, but of not shrinking in the hour of defeat and danger.

It is also false that the revolution ripens and comes to development only in the national soil.

In spite of the existence of the Soviet Union, however, the proletarian revolution during the past years has not recorded a victory in any other country.

You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you.

Not believing in force is the same as not believing in gravitation.

Old age is the most unexpected of all the things that can happen to a man.

Terror is a powerful means of policy and one would have to be a hypocrite not to understand this.

In the meantime, the first characteristic of a really revolutionary party is -- to be able to look reality in the face.