Lenin on Serbia’s role in World War I: A useful analogy for the current Ukraine war?

By Michael Pröbsting
Published
Serbian soldiers

Since the start of the Ukraine War, a number of organisations have wrongly taken a neutral position in this conflict. They refused to defend Ukraine despite its semi-colonial character and Russia’s imperialist character. To justify such an approach, they often used the example of Vladimir Lenin’s position on Serbia in World War I.

We will not discuss the Ukraine War as such, something I have covered in numerous other documents.1 We shall rather focus on one specific aspect in the debate among Marxists, namely Lenin’s actual position on the defence of Serbia in World War I and why it is wrong to apply it to the Ukraine War today.

The Marxist position on the Ukraine War

Since the start of the invasion two and a half years ago, we have emphasised the reactionary character of Russia’s war. As is well-known, there is a long history of national oppression of the Ukrainian people by Great Russian chauvinism. Furthermore, the war has an imperialist character from the side of Russia, which became an imperialist Great Power in the early 2000s.2 In contrast, Ukraine has been a semi-colony since the restoration of capitalism in 1991.3

We have characterised Ukraine’s struggle against Putin’s invasion as a just war of national defence. At the same time, we have emphasised the dual character of the conflict, since it is not only a national liberation war by Ukraine but it is also linked with the accelerating rivalry between imperialist powers.4

Hence, a consistent internationalist and anti-imperialist position requires a dual tactic. Socialists are obliged to defend semi-colonial Ukraine against Russian imperialism. However, they must lend no support for the chauvinist and militarist policy of any Great Power against their rivals. Hence, it is impermissible to support economic sanctions or similar Great Power measures.

In a Manifesto, published a few days after the beginning of the war, we summarised our position in the following slogans: 

Defend Ukraine! Defeat Russian imperialism! International popular solidarity with the Ukrainian national resistance — independent of any imperialist influence! Down with all imperialist powers — NATO and EU as well as Russia! In all conflicts between these powers, revolutionaries fight against both camps!5

While we side with Ukraine and its just war of national defence, we refuse to lend any political support for the bourgeois and pro-NATO government of Zelensky.6

How centrists misuse Lenin’s example of Serbia

Numerous self-proclaimed Marxists who refuse to defend Ukraine have justified their position by referring to Lenin’s approach on Serbia’s role in World War I. Serbia was a capitalist semi-colonial country that was attacked by the imperialist Austro-Hungarian Empire in July 1914. While Lenin recognised that, in itself, Serbia’s struggle was a just war for national self-determination, he emphasised this was a subordinated element in the World War, which had an imperialist character. In such a situation, the national element in Serbia’s case could not play an independent role. Consequently, the Bolsheviks opposed calling for the defence of Serbia.

From this, centrists conclude that it would be likewise legitimate to refuse to defend Ukraine today, since this war supposedly constitutes only a subordinated element in the inter-imperialist rivalry between NATO and Russia (and China).

Alex Callinicos, the leading theoretician of the Socialist Workers Party (UK) and its International Socialist Tendency, wrote in an article explaining his organisations’ position:

Inter-imperialist struggles and wars of national defence often interweave. The First World War started when the Austro-Hungarian Empire attacked Serbia, which it blamed for the assassination of its crown prince Franz Ferdinand. Russia then backed Serbia, leading to an escalating process of military mobilisations that ended in a terrible general war. The German Marxist Karl Kautsky argued that the role played by the Serbian struggle for national self-determination meant the conflict wasn’t just an imperialist war. Lenin responded, ‘To Serbia, i.e., to perhaps one percent or so of the participants in the present war, the war is a ‘continuation of the politics’ of the bourgeois-liberation movement. ‘To the other ninety-nine percent, the war is a continuation of the politics of imperialism.’ Of course, the balance is different in the present case since the direct fighting involves just Ukraine and Russia.7

The Trotskyist Fraction, whose main force is the Socialist Workers’ Party (PTS) in Argentina which, as part of the Left and Workers Front (FIT-U), has several deputies in national and regional parliaments, argues similarly:

Like the Ukraine war, the First World War led to historic debates on the Marxist Left. In 1914, there was a legitimate war of national liberation by the Belgian people against an unprovoked German attack and occupation. Serbia was also waging a war of national defence against an imperialist power, Austria-Hungry, that wanted to devour it. Had Lenin and other Marxists attempted to look at either of these partial conflicts in isolation, they would have needed to give full support to the Belgians and Serbians. But they recognized this would have meant placing themselves on the side of the imperialist Allies. As most socialists would agree today, World War I was not a series of isolated wars of national liberation — it was a global conflict among imperialist powers. Socialists needed to fight for the defeat of their “own” bourgeoisie. (…) Today, socialists in the NATO countries need to oppose their “own” imperialist power. (…) Socialists need to fight for an independent position.8

Finally, the ultraleft International Bolshevik Tendency, which comes from the Spartacist tradition whose founder was Jim Robertson, argues:

It can happen, however, that conflict between imperialist powers becomes the defining feature of the situation – in such cases, a non-imperialist country’s independence and right to self-determination become illusory in the context of an inter-imperialist struggle for control of its territory, whichever side it chooses or is forced to align with. Today, this applies to the war between imperialist Russia and neocolonial Ukraine, which is backed by a massive coalition of Russia’s imperialist rivals. In The Collapse of the Second International (1915), Lenin addressed this type of situation vis-à-vis Serbia’s war against the Austro-Hungarian empire. (It follows a Lenin quote which we will reproduce below, Ed.) The problem, Lenin argued, was that the Serbian struggle for national self-determination had become subsumed in the broader inter-imperialist conflict. (It follows another Lenin quote which we will reproduce below, Ed.) Likewise, Ukraine’s struggle to defeat Russia cannot be separated from NATO’s campaign to diminish Russian imperialism – a campaign whose victory would result in further subordinating Ukraine to German and US imperialism.9

Irrespective of their different traditions, these organisations arrive at the same conclusion of refusing to support Ukraine by referring to Lenin’s position on Serbia in WWI. However, they are all mistaken in such an interpretation of the Bolshevik’s position.

What did Lenin say?

Lenin recognised the imperialist character of WWI from the very first days. The Bolsheviks opposed all imperialist Great Powers — both the Central Powers as well as the Entente — and advocated a policy of revolutionary defeatism in all participating countries. This strategy was summarised in famous slogans such as “The main enemy is at home” (Karl Liebknecht), that the defeat of the own imperialist ruling class was the “lesser evil” and that revolutionaries should strive for the “transformation of the imperialist war into civil war”, that is, the advance of the proletariats’ struggle for power under the conditions of war.

The Bolsheviks were fully aware that while the war as a whole was imperialist, it also had in the case of Serbia, which was attacked by Austria-Hungary, the element of a national war of defence. They wrote in their first Manifesto in October 1914:

In fact, the German bourgeoisie has launched a robber campaign against Serbia, with the object of subjugating her and throttling the national revolution of the Southern Slavs, at the same time sending the bulk of its military forces against the freer countries, Belgium and France, so as to plunder richer competitors.10

However, they also made clear that this element was subordinated to the overall imperialist character of the World War:

The present war is, in substance, a struggle between Britain, France and Germany for the partition of colonies and for the plunder of rival countries; on the part of tsarism and the ruling classes of Russia, it is an attempt to seize Persia, Mongolia, Turkey in Asia, Constantinople, Galicia, etc. The national element in the Austro-Serbian war is an entirely secondary consideration and does not affect the general imperialist character of the war.11

Lenin considered the “national element in the Austro-Serbian war” as secondary only because it was a comparably very small and subordinate factor in a world war involving all Great Powers. Given most Great Powers had colonial empires, it meant most countries in the world participated, in one way or the other, in this gigantic confrontation.12

Lenin wrote:

The national element in the Serbo-Austrian war is not, and cannot be, of any serious significance in the general European war. If Germany wins, she will throttle Belgium, one more part of Poland, perhaps part of France, etc. If Russia wins, she will throttle Galicia, one more part of Poland, Armenia, etc. If the war ends in a “draw”, the old national oppression will remain. To Serbia, i.e., to perhaps one per cent or so of the participants in the present war, the war is a “continuation of the politics” of the bourgeois-liberation movement. To the other ninety-nine per cent, the war is a continuation of the politics of imperialism, i.e., of the decrepit bourgeoisie, which is capable only of raping nations, not freeing them. The Triple Entente, which is “liberating” Serbia, is selling the interests of Serbian liberty to Italian imperialism in return for the latter’s aid in robbing Austria.13

However, he insisted that if the war between Serbia and Austria-Hungary would take place in isolation — that is, not as part of a world war — socialists would be obligated to support the Balkan country:

In the present war the national element is represented only by Serbia’s war against Austria (which, by the way, was noted in the resolution of our Party’s Berne Conference). It is only in Serbia and among the Serbs that we can find a national-liberation movement of long standing, embracing millions, “the masses of the people”, a movement of which the present war of Serbia against Austria is a “continuation”. If this war were an isolated one, i.e., if it were not connected with the general European war, with the selfish and predatory aims of Britain, Russia, etc., it would have been the duty of all socialists to desire the success of the Serbian bourgeoisie – this is the only correct and absolutely inevitable conclusion to be drawn from the national element in the present war.14

Lenin repeated this approach in several documents, all the more as he considered the national question of crucial importance in the epoch of imperialism:

Of course, even now there are blotches of the old colour in the living picture of reality. Thus, of all the warring countries, the Serbs alone are still fighting for national existence. In India and China, too, class-conscious proletarians could not take any other path but the national one, because their countries have not yet been formed into national states. If China had to carry on an offensive war for this purpose, we could only sympathise with her, because objectively it would be a progressive war. In exactly the same way, Marx in 1848 could call for an offensive war against Russia.15

I think it is mistaken in theory and harmful in practice not to distinguish types of wars. We cannot be against wars of national liberation. You quote the example of Serbia. But if the Serbs were alone against Austria, would we not be for the Serbs?16

Lenin was quite clear about the relationship of the “national element” and the “imperialist element”. He recognized the “national element” in the Austro-Serbian war but viewed this conflict as only a small factor within the whole World War, which had a thoroughly imperialist character. Hence, socialists could not defend Serbia since this objectively would have meant to side with one imperialist camp against another (Serbia was part of the Entente). However, if the Austro-Serbian war would have taken place in isolation, the Bolsheviks would have supported the Balkan country and advocated the defeat of its imperialist opponent.

How to apply the analogy to the Ukraine War?

How should we correctly apply the analogy with Serbia to the Ukraine War. The above-quoted centrists all “ignore”, or better pretend not to be aware of, the gigantic difference between the Austro-Serbian war in 1914-18 and the current Ukraine War: the former case was part of a World War involving all Great Powers and resulting in about 15-22 million deaths while the latter is an isolated war without an ongoing world war.

The centrists’ analogy with Lenin’s position on the subordinated role of the Austro-Serbian war would only be appropriate if the current Ukraine War was part of World War III. However, as far as we know, such a colossal event has not begun yet.

Some centrists might try to defend their position by saying that there is a cold war between Western and Eastern imperialists and that such a conflict is kind of equivalent to a World War. However, such an objection is nonsense.

First, a world war is not the same as a cold war. One kills millions of people and escalates the contradictions between classes and state to the utmost extreme. The other does not — it is rather a step towards such a possible apocalyptic scenario, and it is not unavoidable that it results in Armageddon. It can be brought to an end either by a socialist world revolution or the implosion of one of the belligerent camps (see for example the last Cold War (1948-91), which ended with the collapse of Stalinism). To confuse these two scenarios is ridiculous and criminal idiocy.

Second, every historian knows that WWI did not appear out of thin air but was the result of the long-existing rivalry between European imperialist powers — most importantly France, Germany, Britain, Russia and Austria-Hungary. There were several occasions in the years before 1914 where the European powers were in a stage of acute crisis or even close to military conflict: the Agadir Crisis and the Tangier Crisis between Germany, France and Britain — both conflicts about control of Morocco (the first in 1905-06 and the second in 1911); the Bosnian Crisis of 1908-09; and the Balkan Wars in 1912-13. All these crises brought rivalry between imperialist powers close to an explosion.17

Serbia itself had been in conflict — economically and diplomatically — with the Austro-Hungarian Empire for a number of years before 1914 (similar to the conflict between Russia and Ukraine before 2022). At the same time, it was financially dependent on France, which held three quarters of its debt. Furthermore, it was politically and militarily allied with Russian imperialism for many years and viewed it as its “protector”. In fact, the whole world war started because Russia mobilised troops after Austria-Hungary started a war against its Serbian ally on July 28.18

The Second International was fully aware of the cold war between imperialist powers and discussed how to resist the war-drive at its congresses (most importantly in Stuttgart in 1907) as well as the Basel Conference in 1912. The resolutions adopted at these congresses took a correct position against such a reactionary war between the Great Powers. But when the war started in summer 1914, the Second International, riven by the influence of the opportunist labour bureaucracy and aristocracy, failed to put their words into deeds.

The only exceptions were the minorities who founded the Zimmerwald movement and, in particular, the left wing of the Second International led by Lenin and Rosa Luxemburg. The latter put up an energetic and consistent struggle against the imperialist war and laid the foundation for the Communist International, which was founded in March 1919.19

Notwithstanding this failure, the fact that the Second International warned about a looming Great War in Europe and discussed this as the most important issue at its congresses before 1914 reflects that this period was one of armament race and accelerated inter-imperialist rivalry; that is, a cold war between Great Powers.

When Lenin discussed the possibility of an Austro-Serbian war in isolation — without the context of WWI — he had in mind a situation as it existed before 1914. Hence, he could not but consider Serbia as it existed at this time, that is as a capitalist semi-colony allied with Russian imperialism that operated in a world political situation characterised by a cold war between the Great Powers.

The role of imperialist aid

Some say socialists cannot support a semi-colony if it receives aid from this or that imperialist power. We have already discussed this argument on several occasions.20 At this point we shall limit ourselves to referring to Lenin, who faced similar objections and who rejected such arguments:

Britain and France fought the Seven Years’ War for the possession of colonies. In other words, they waged an imperialist war (which is possible on the basis of slavery and primitive capitalism as well as on the basis of modern highly developed capitalism). France suffered defeat and lost some of her colonies. Several years later there began the national liberation war of the North American States against Britain alone. France and Spain, then in possession of some parts of the present United States, concluded a friendship treaty with the States in rebellion against Britain. This they did out of hostility to Britain, i.e., in their own imperialist interests. French troops fought the British on the side of the American forces. What we have here is a national liberation war in which imperialist rivalry is an auxiliary element, one that has no serious importance. This is the very opposite to what we see in the war of 1914-16 (the national element in the Austro-Serbian War is of no serious importance compared with the all-determining element of imperialist rivalry). It would be absurd, therefore, to apply the concept of imperialism indiscriminately and conclude that national wars are “impossible”. A national liberation war, waged, for example, by an alliance of Persia, India and China against one or more of the imperialist powers, is both possible and probable, for it would follow from the national liberation movements in these countries. The transformation of such a war into an imperialist war between the present-day imperialist powers would depend upon very many concrete factors, the emergence of which it would be ridiculous to guarantee.21

The general staffs in the current war are doing their utmost to utilise any national and revolutionary movement in the enemy camp: the Germans utilise the Irish rebellion, the French—the Czech movement, etc. They are acting quite correctly from their own point of view. A serious war would not be treated seriously if advantage were not taken of the enemy’s slightest weakness and if every opportunity that presented itself were not seized upon, the more so since it is impossible to know beforehand at what moment, where, and with what force some powder magazine will “explode”. We would be very poor revolutionaries if, in the proletariat’s great war of liberation for socialism, we did not know how to utilise every popular movement against every single disaster imperialism brings in order to intensify and extend the crisis.22

We shall point out that one cannot exclude the possibility that the character of the Ukraine War could undergo a qualitative change in the future and be transformed from what is primarily a national liberation war into a war where Ukraine becomes a proxy of Western imperialism, and therefore equally reactionary on both sides. As we analysed in several documents, such a transformation could take place if NATO troops directly intervene in the war, if Ukraine becomes a member of NATO or the EU or if similar developments take place. However, while such a course is currently advocated by some minority sectors of the Western political and military elite, it has not taken place until now — hence there has been no such transformation of the war’s character.23

The centrists completely misinterpret Lenin’s example of Serbia’s role in WWI. They wrongly claim that the Austrian-Serbian War, as part of such a gigantic slaughter of people, is the same as the current war, which has evolved as a result of the contradictions between semi-colony Ukraine and Russian imperialism within the context of a cold war between Great Powers. Lenin explicitly argued that if the war between Austria-Hungary and Serbia would take place without the context of a world war, socialists would be obligated to side with the Balkan country and advocate the defeat of the imperialist power.

This example demonstrates once more that without a concrete and dialectical analysis of a war, as well as of the world situation, it is impossible to find a correct orientation.

Lenin Ukraine Russia Russian imperialism NATO Serbia World War I Imperialism

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