The following letters, originally in Russian, were only recently found in the police files on Andres Nin in the National Historical Archives in Madrid (Ministerio de gobernación, policía [histórico], h.394). This material represents a significant historical discovery. Most importantly, Trotsky’s correspondence is an important political weapon for today’s revolutionary movement.

This in depth article deals with the horrors that capitalism has inflicted on humanity. In the first part of this article we see the real face of the capitalist class, both its predatory nature on a global scale and its capacity for violent suppression of any mass popular revolt that challenges its right to rule. Some will say, yes but this was in the past; now the system has become more civilised and humane. Recent history shows that this is utterly false.

Eighty years after the beginning of the Spanish Civil War and 40 years after the end of the Franco dictatorship which followed it, this is an issue which in Spain raises white hot passions. Far from this being an historical question, it is a burning one today. As a new revolutionary upswing is starting, the new generation is attempting to come to terms with the lessons of the past.

Today marks the 80th anniversary of the beginning of the Spanish Civil War. On 17 and 18 July, 1936, General Franco began his military uprising in Morocco, a prelude to the fascist uprising throughout Spain. The Popular Front government, elected in February, was suspended in mid-air. The landlords and capitalists went over to Franco. The workers, however, responded in a spontaneous fashion. Had the revolutionary upsurge been successful, it could have changed the whole course of history.

In this recording from the Red October 2015 weekend school, Jorge Martin discusses the lessons of the Spanish Revolution of 1931-37, and explains their relevance to the situation in Spain today.

The acute crisis of the political regime that emerged in 1978 has focused general attention once more on the so-called “Democratic Transition”, a process that spanned the period from the death of the dictator, Franco, in November 1975 through to the historic victory of PSOE (the Socialist Workers’ Party of Spain) in the elections of October 1982. The current regime, the monarchy and the ruling class, conscious of their crumbling prestige, are now attempting to regain their lost credibility and authority by means of the most scandalous historical distortion

Recently the Spanish Marxist Tendency published a new edition of Felix Morrow's classic Revolution and counterrevolution in Spain with a new introduction by Alan Woods. and the book has already been sold out and a second edition is in preparation. Today we are publishing the introduction by Alan Woods which provides a brief analysis of the reasons for the defeat of the Spanish Revolution of 1931-37 while also dealing with the resurgence of the Spanish workers' movement in the 1960s and 70s and drawing the lessons for today.

On September 19^th Spain woke up to the news of the death of Santiago Carrillo, General Secretary of the Spanish Communist Party (PCE) in the crucial years 1960-82. He passed away at the age of 97 in his home in Madrid. Usually the death of a leader of the workers’ movement would only get limited press coverage and perhaps some official statement from trade unions, Socialist and Communist Party local branches, and so on. But this was completely different. All newspapers reserved their front page for the news. El País, the mouthpiece of the liberal bourgeoisie, paid fulsome homage to Carrillo with long tributes from prominent celebrities. King Juan Carlos came to Carrillo’s

Jorge Martín speaking on the Spanish Revolution at ULU Marxist Summer School in London, June 2012.

The year 2001 marks the 70th anniversary of the proclamation of the Spanish Republic in 1931, an event which was the opening shot in the Spanish Revolution. Also 65 years ago, on July 18th 1936, we saw the uprising of Franco, once the Spanish ruling class understood that they could no longer rule through 'democratic' means. We are publishing here an article by Alan Woods which deals with the last period of the spanish Revolution. This article was first published in 1986 as a concluding part of a series of articles on the Spanish Revolution 1931-37.

Alan Woods, of the International Marxist Tendency, speaks to University of Arts' London students at the Whitechapel Gallery, London, where a replica of Picasso's great painting of the massacre at Guernica is on display. Using this powerful masterpiece as a starting point, Alan explores what makes great art; to what extent is great art a reflection of the period from which it comes; and can propaganda be great art?

The part played by the Bolsheviks in the history of the Russian revolution of 1917 proves the importance of the role of leadership. The history of the Spanish revolution proves the same thing, but in a negative sense. In September Alan Woods spoke to the Socialist Appeal Northern Weekend School in Britain, which had as its general theme 'The Class, the Party and the Leadership', on those events which took place in Spain 70 years ago.

John Peterson, National Secretary of the Workers International League in the U.S., presenting at a forum on the Spanish Revolution at May Day Books in Minneapolis, MN on November 13th, 2008.

The prophetic description of anonymous warfare, the blankets of darkness and death dropped over civilian populations still resonate. To the degree we realise the truth expressed in this work, Guernica stands as possibly the greatest painting of the 20th Century.

Alan Woods speaks on the Spanish Revolution in a youth meeting of Socialist Appeal. Listen to the audio file here (wav file) or here (smaller mp3 file).

“The tragic experience of Spain is a terrible - perhaps final - warning before still greater events, a warning addressed to all the advanced workers of the world. ‘Revolutions,’ Marx said, ‘are the locomotives of history.’ They move faster than the thought of semi-revolutionary or quarter-revolutionary parties. Whoever lags behind falls under the wheels of the locomotive, and consequently - and this is the chief danger - the locomotive itself is also not infrequently wrecked.”

On the 80th anniversary of the Asturian Commune we are publishing an article originally written ten years ago. During the Commune the mining and industrial region of Asturias in Spain witnessed one of the most fascinating revolutions in the history of the 20th century. During the course of 15 days men and women fought to establish a new society free of exploitation and ruled by the principles of workers’ democracy. This was the beginning of the Asturian Commune.

Marxists study history not for the smugness of 20/20 hindsight, but in order to learn its lessons. Trotsky's insistent call for a united front of workers' organisations to defeat fascism in Germany went tragically unheeded.

The national question was of primary importance in the process of revolution and counter-revolution in the 1930s, from which important lessons can be learned. Today, the national question of the Spanish state continues without resolution. The bourgeoisie have been historically incapable of successfully completing the task of a bourgeois-democratic revolution of national unification. On the contrary, 40 years of horrible centralism, exercised by the Francoist dictatorship, exacerbated the centralist tendencies. Upon the fall of Francoism, these tendencies became even more defined.

Women have traditionally been regarded as a backward layer of society and a bulwark of the Church and reaction. This "backward" character, however, is not something innate to women, as the bourgeoisie would like us to believe. The explanation for this is not to be found in any biological differences, but in the double exploitation that women suffer under capitalism. As Bebel succinctly put it, "The female sex suffers doubly: on the one hand suffering under the social dependence on men... and on the other hand, through the economic dependence to which they are all subject, as women in general, and as proletarian women in particular; in the same way as proletarian men." (A. Bebel, Women

This introduction originally written in 1995 points out that the new generation of young workers and youth should learn the lessons of history. The tragedy of the Spanish revolution is a painful lesson of cynical betrayal. We must learn from the defeats as well as the victories of working people to prepare ourselves for the future.

What has been called the ‘May Days of 1937’ in Barcelona are an event of this kind, independently of the fact that the event took place within one of the two opposing camps in the course of a civil war, the Spanish Civil War. In fact, the duality of powers began in July 1936, with the victorious counter-stroke of the workers in a number of large cities, including Barcelona, against the military coup d’etat of General Franco.

In 1973, as the situation in Spain moved towards revolution and final overthrow of the hated Franco regime, Ted Grant wrote this document drawing all the lessons from those tumultuous events.

Class polarisation and radicalisation of the Spanish workers, youth and middle class showed at the end of 1972 that the days of the Franco regime were numbered. Ted Grant examined the paramount importance of the coming revolution in Spain for the international working class and criticised the Spanish CP leaders who appeared to have learnt nothing from the defeat in the Civil War.

This article was written as an introduction to a Spanish language edition of Trotsky’s writings on the Spanish Revolution. This English translation was published in 1967. Broué outlines the main lessons that Trotsky drew from the experience of the Spanish revolution, lessons that need to be taken on board today.

This is an introduction to Trotsky's pamphlet, "The Lessons of Spain: The Last Warning" (1937), written by Ted Grant in collaboration with Ralph Lee while they were in the Workers' International League: a predecessor to the International Marxist Tendency. Ted and Ralph's introduction was praised by Trotsky himself in a letter to the WIL in 1938, which was suppressed and hidden for 80 years before finally being reunited with its rightful owners.

Felix Morrow's book, written in the white heat of the struggle, remains a Marxist classic on the Spanish Civil war. It is one of the clearest account produced of the movement of the Spanish masses, describing the events in Catalonia and the role of all those involved. This book contains the text of "revolution and counter-revolution" together with the earlier "civil war in Spain" and Ted Grant's 1973 article which provides an overview of the Spanish revolution. This book provides an excellent companion to the writings of Leon Trotsky on this question and deserves to be studied by all class-conscious activists.

"We must now say openly that the Spanish "Left Communists" have allowed this exceptionally favorable interval to slip by, and have revealed themselves to be in no way better than the Socialist and "Communist" traitors. Not that there was any lack of warning. All the greater therefore is the guilt of Andrés Nin, Juan Andrade, and the others. With a correct policy, the "Left Communists" as a section of the Fourth International might have been at the head of the Spanish proletariat today."

"For a successful solution of all these tasks, three conditions are required: a party; once more a party; again a party. Upon the Spanish Communists lie glorious historic tasks. The advanced workers of the world will follow with impassioned attention the course of the great revolutionary drama, which will a day sooner or later require not only their sympathy but also their co-operation." (Leon Trotsky)