A letter of the KAPD from the Police Archives that talks about the preparatory work for its Red Army units and Military Organization. The letter can be found in "Organisation der leinksradikalen Bewegung im Reich, Büro Kölpin, No. 93" in the "State Archives of North Rhine-Westphalia, Rhineland Department".
The current phase of development is characterized by a fundamental clarification of proletarian consciousness. The content of this clarification of consciousness is the growing insight that, in economy and society, capitalist development has reached the stage where the struggle for communism by the proletariat becomes a necessity.
While this clarification of consciousness finds its general expression in the increasing revolutionization of the masses, it places the revolutionary vanguard of the working class before the task of becoming conscious of the specific historical forms of this struggle. Only clarity within its own ranks and a clear revolutionary direction of will enable the vanguard to rally the advancing masses under communist slogans.
The global revolutionary phase of development sees the proletariat advancing through a series of defeats and final struggles until it conquers political power. Each of these struggles demands the utmost determination from the political vanguard organization and calls for ruthless interventions in existing economic and social institutions. The will to undertake such actions does not protect the working class from disastrous mistakes if this will is not tempered by a sober assessment and clear understanding of the essential tasks at hand, striving to provide it with practical capability.
The military victory of the revolution requires, above all, the focus on revolutionary preparatory work. While all other tasks—economic and political—must first be grasped from the standpoint of militarily securing the revolution, the political vanguard organization must, when initiating military preparations, take as its starting point the relationship between the vanguard and the broader masses, as well as the forms tied to the development of revolutionary movements, from their initial flare-up to the ripening of decisive conflicts.
In every phase of the revolution, as well as in the difficult time of defending the revolution against global reaction, the vanguard of the proletariat can only fulfill its tasks if it first maintains its organizational purity, and second roots itself in the broadest masses, tirelessly emphasizing the communist tendencies within the revolutionary will of the masses through educational work, helping the masses achieve the clear communist direction they strive for.
This applies in an outstanding way to the communist vanguard elements within the Red Army units. Whether entrusted with military leadership positions, surveillance, or propaganda duties, the twofold prerequisite for the triumph of communist slogans—i.e., the victory of the proletarian revolution—is first, the connection among communists themselves, and second, the rooting of each individual communist in the masses.
It means disregarding the tasks of the communist vanguard and their historical conditions if, as a form of military preparation, the consolidation of communist vanguard elements into closed formations—so-called shock troops—is propagated. Previous experiences have shown that, in a revolutionary situation, communists form the backbone and framework of the emerging revolutionary units. Communist functionaries are the scaffolding around which the revolutionary masses group.
The carefully planned expansion of this organizational framework—as a recruitment apparatus for the masses flocking to the army in the workplaces, as the initial outline for the organizational structure of the army, but above all as sober training and the practical immersion of communist functionaries in the military tasks awaiting them—is the core of military preparation. This enables the right measures to be taken based on the situation and allows the situation to be fully exploited.
From these considerations, quite apart from the tactical imprudence of currently forming and drilling communist combat units—which tend to grow into tools of counterrevolution, allowing the revolution to be sabotaged by its own champions—it is necessary to appoint commissions of capable comrades in all economic sectors. Their task is to gain clarity about the revolutionary tasks within their economic area and then, in collaboration with reliable comrades from local groups who are qualified for the respective tasks, determine the form and means of implementation.
Illegal Organization of the KAPD of the Special Region
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