Editing Trotskyism (section)

=== Asia ===
==== China ====
In China, various left opposition groups in the late 1920s sought to engage Trotsky against the Comintern policy of support for the Kuomintang.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |first=Robert J. |last=Alexander |author-link=Robert J. Alexander |title=International Trotskyism |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Trotskyism Online}}</ref> In 1931, at Trotsky's urging, the various factions united in the Communist League of China, adopting Trotsky's document "The Political Situation in China and the Task of the Bolshevik-Leninist Opposition". Prominent members include [[Chen Duxiu]], [[Wang Fanxi]] and [[Chen Qichang (Trotskyist)|Chen Qichang]]. The League was persecuted by the Nationalist government and by the Chinese Communist Party.<ref>{{cite web |title=International Trotskyism – China: Early Years of the Chinese Communist Party |url=https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/alex/works/in_trot/china1.htm |first=Robert J. |last=Alexander |author-link=Robert J. Alexander |access-date=22 June 2020 |via=[[Marxists Internet Archive]]}}</ref>

In 1939, [[Ho Chi Minh]], then a Comintern agent in southern China, reported that "everyone united to fight the Japanese except the Trotskyists. These traitors . . . adopted the 'resolution': 'In the war against the Japanese, our position is clear: those who wanted the war and have illusions about the Kuomintang government, those concretely have committed treason. The union between the Communist Party and the Kuomintang is nothing but conscious treason'. And other ignominies of this kind." The Trotskyists were to be "crushed".<ref>{{cite magazine |title=Vietnam & Trotskyism |first=Simon |last=Pirani |author-link=Simon Pirani |magazine=Workers Press |url=https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/document/vietnam/pirani/hochiminh.htm |via=[[Marxists Internet Archive]]}}</ref> In 1949, the [[Revolutionary Communist Party of China]] ({{lang-zh|中國革命共產黨}}; RCP) fled to Hong Kong. Since 1974, the party has been legally active as October Review, its official publication.<ref>{{cite news |title=Leftist Parties of the World – China |work=[[Marxists Internet Archive]]}}</ref>

==== Vietnam ====
In French Indochina during the 1930s, [[Vietnamese Trotskyism]], led by [[Tạ Thu Thâu]], was a significant current, particularly in Saigon, Cochinchina.<ref>{{cite book |editor-last=Richardson |editor-first=A. |title=The Revolution Defamed: A documentary history of Vietnamese Trotskyism |publisher=Socialist Platform Ltd |date=2003}}</ref> In 1929, in the French Left Opposition {{lang|fr|La Vérité}}, Ta Thu Thau condemned the Comintern for leading Chinese Communists (in 1927) to "the graveyard" through its support for the [[Kuomintang]]. The {{"'}}[[Sun Yat-sen]]-ist' synthesis of democracy, nationalism and socialism" was "a kind of nationalist mysticism". In Indochina, it could only obscure "the concrete class relationships, and the real, organic liaison between the indigenous bourgeoisie and French imperialism," in the light of which the call for independence is "mechanical and formalistic". "A revolution based on the organisation of the proletarian and peasant masses is the only one capable of liberating the colonies ... The question of independence must be bound up with that of the proletarian socialist revolution."<ref>{{cite web |last=Ngo |first=Van Xuyet |title=Ta Thu Thau: Vietnamese Trotskyist Leader |url=https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/revhist/backiss/vol3/no2/thau.html |website=[[Marxists Internet Archive]] |access-date=14 September 2019}}</ref>

For a period in the 1930s, Ta Thu Thau's Struggle group, centred around the newspaper [[La Lutte (newspaper)|La Lutte]], was sufficiently strong to induce "Stalinists" (members of the then [[Indochinese Communist Party]]) to collaborate with the Trotskyists in support of labour and peasant struggles, and in the presentation of a common Workers Slate for Saigon municipal, and Cochinchina Council, elections. Ta Thu Thau was captured and executed by the Communist-front ''Viet Minh'' in September 1945. Many, if not most, of his fellow ''luttuers'' were subsequently killed, caught between the Viet Minh and the French effort at colonial reconquest.<ref>{{cite book |last=Ngô |first=Văn |title=In the Crossfire: Adventures of a Vietnamese Revolutionary |publisher=[[AK Press]] |location=Oakland, California |date=2010}}</ref>

==== Sri Lanka ====
[[File:Lsspoffice.JPG|thumb|right|[[Lanka Sama Samaja Party|LSSP]] main office in [[Colombo]], Sri Lanka]]

In Sri Lanka, a group of Trotskyists (known as the "T Group"), including South Asia's pioneer Trotskyist, [[Philip Gunawardena]], who had been active in Trotskyist politics in Europe, and his colleague [[N. M. Perera]], were instrumental in the foundation of the [[Lanka Sama Samaja Party]] (LSSP) in 1935. It expelled its pro-Moscow wing in 1940, becoming a Trotskyist-led party. After a prison break it helped form the short lived [[Bolshevik–Leninist Party of India, Ceylon and Burma]] (BLPI).

After the war, the Sri Lanka section split into the Lanka Sama Samaja Party and the [[Bolshevik Samasamaja Party]] (BSP). In the general election of 1947, the LSSP became the main opposition party, winning ten seats, the BSP winning a further 5. It joined the Trotskyist Fourth International after fusion with the BSP in 1950 and led a general strike ([[Hartal 1953|Hartal]]) in 1953.<ref name="Ervin">{{cite book |last=Ervin |first=W. E. |title=Tomorrow is Ours: The Trotskyist Movement in India and Ceylon, 1935–48 |location=Colombo |publisher=Social Scientists Association |date=2006}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |first=Y. Ranjith |last=Amarasinghe |title=Revolutionary Idealism & Parliamentary Politics – A Study Of Trotskyism In Sri Lanka |location=Colombo |date=1998}}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine |last=Goonewardena |first=Leslie |author-link=Leslie Goonewardene |date=1960 |url=https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/goonewardene/1960/lssp.htm |title=A Short History of the Lanka Sama Samaja Party |magazine=What's Next? |via=[[Marxists Internet Archive]] |access-date=16 February 2019}}</ref>

In 1964, the LSSP joined a coalition government with [[Sirimavo Bandaranaike]], with three members, NM Perera, [[Cholomondeley Goonewardene]], and [[Anil Moonesinghe]], brought into the new cabinet. This led to the expulsion of the party from the Fourth International. A section of the LSSP split to form the LSSP (Revolutionary) and joined the Fourth International after the LSSP proper was expelled. The LSSP (Revolutionary) later split into factions led by [[Bala Tampoe]] and [[Edmund Samarakkody]]. Another faction, the "Sakthi" Group, led by [[V. Karalasingham]], rejoined the LSSP in 1966.

In 1968, another faction of the LSSP (Revolutionary), led by Keerthi Balasooriya split, to form the Revolutionary Communist League – more commonly known as the "''Kamkaru Mawatha'' Group", after the name of their publication – and joined the [[International Committee of the Fourth International]] (ICFI). In 1996, the group changed its name to [[Socialist Equality Party (Sri Lanka)|Socialist Equality Party]].<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2015/07/30/seps-j30.html |title=Sri Lankan SEP General Secretary Wije Dias interviewed on national election channel |date=30 July 2015 |website=[[World Socialist Website]] |archive-url= |archive-date=}}</ref> In 2024 with assistance from European comrades, particularly in France, many of who fled the [[Sri Lankan civil war|Sri Lankan Civil War]] a historic Tamil translation of Trotsky’s [[The Revolution Betrayed]] was published, accompanied with public meetings for the book’s launch.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2024/02/06/ulli-f06.html |title=SEP (Sri Lanka) public meetings to launch Tamil translation of Trotsky's the Revolution Betrayed |website=[[World Socialist Website]] |date=6 February 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241116022934/https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2024/02/06/ulli-f06.html |archive-date=16 November 2024}}</ref>

In 1974, a secret faction of the LSSP, allied to the [[Militant (Trotskyist group)|Militant]] group in the United Kingdom, emerged. In 1977, this faction was expelled and formed the [[Nava Sama Samaja Party]], led by [[Vasudeva Nanayakkara]].

==== India ====
In 1942, following the escape of the leaders of the Sri Lankan LSSP from a [[British Empire|British]] prison, a unified [[Bolshevik–Leninist Party of India, Ceylon and Burma]] (BLPI) was established in India, bringing together the many Trotskyist groups in the subcontinent. The BLPI was active in the [[Quit India Movement]] and the labour movement, capturing the second oldest union in India. Its high point was when it led the strikes which followed the [[Bombay Mutiny]].

In India, the BLPI fractured. In 1948, at the Fourth International's request, the party's rump dissolved into the [[Congress Socialist Party]] as an exercise in [[entryism]].<ref>{{cite journal |title=Trotskyism in India: Part One: Origins Through World War Two (1935–45) |journal=Revolutionary History |volume=1 |number=4 |date=Winter 1988–89 |via=[[Marxists Internet Archive]] |url=https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/document/india/india01.htm}}</ref><ref name="Ervin"/>