The
Comintern (
Communist
International, also known as the
Third International) was an international
Communist organization founded in
Moscow in March 1919. The International intended to fight
"by all available means, including armed force, for the overthrow of the international bourgeoisie and for the creation of an international Soviet republic as a transition stage to the complete abolition of the State."[1] The Comintern was founded after the dissolution of the
Second International in 1916, following the 1915
Zimmerwald Conference in which
Vladimir Lenin had led the "
Zimmerwald Left" against those who supported the "
national union" governments in war with each other.
The Comintern held seven World Congresses between March 1919 and the final congress in 1935. As of 1928 it was estimated that the organisation had 583,105 members, excluding its Soviet membership.[2]
At the start of World War II, the Comintern supported a policy of non-intervention, arguing that this was an imperialist war between various national ruling classes, much as World War I had been. However, when the Soviet Union itself was invaded on June 22, 1941, during Operation Barbarossa, the Comintern switched its position to one of active support for the Allies. The Comintern was subsequently officially dissolved in 1943.
Although divisions between revolutionary and reformist-minded elements had been developing for a considerable time, the origins of the Communist International derive from the split in the workers' movement that surfaced in 1914 with the beginning of the First World War. The First International (a.k.a. the "International Workingman's Association"), founded in 1864, had split between the socialists and the anarchists who preferred not to enter the political arena, setting their sights instead on the creation of a strong anarcho-syndicalist movement. The Second International, founded in 1889, followed, but tensions surfaced again in the new International.
