The Ligue trotskyste de France is a French Trotskyist

Trotskyism

Trotskyism is the theory of Marxism as advocated by Leon Trotsky. Trotsky considered himself an orthodox Marxist and Bolshevik-Leninist, arguing for the establishment of a vanguard party of the working-class...

 group. It is a section of the International Communist League (Fourth Internationalist)

International Communist League (Fourth Internationalist)

The International Communist League , earlier known as the international Spartacist tendency is a Trotskyist international. Its largest constituent party is the Spartacist League...

 or "Spartacist" tendency.

The LTF was founded in the mid 1970s, reportedly after members of the Spartacist League (US)

Spartacist League (US)

The Spartacist League/ US is a Trotskyist organization in the United States. It was the original Spartacist group that helped to inspire and organize similarly oriented groups around the world...

 started proslytizating in France. The LTF campaigned against the Union of the Left during the French legislative election, 1978

French legislative election, 1978

The French legislative elections took place on 12 March and 19 March 1978 to elect the 6th National Assembly of the Fifth Republic.On 2 April 1974 President Georges Pompidou died. The non-Gaullist center-right leader Valéry Giscard d'Estaing was elected to succeed him...

, considering the coalition a popular front

Popular front

A popular front is a broad coalition of different political groupings, often made up of leftists and centrists. Being very broad, they can sometimes include centrist and liberal forces as well as socialist and communist groups...

. In the 1981 elections

French presidential election, 1981

The French presidential election of 1981 took place on 10 May 1981, giving the presidency of France to François Mitterrand, the first Socialist president of the Fifth Republic....

 it offered the French Communist Party

French Communist Party

The French Communist Party is a political party in France which advocates the principles of communism.Although its electoral support has declined in recent decades, the PCF retains a large membership, behind only that of the Union for a Popular Movement , and considerable influence in French...

 leader Georges Marchais

Georges Marchais

Georges René Louis Marchais was the head of the French Communist Party from 1972 to 1994, and a candidate in the French presidential elections of 1981 - in which he managed to garner only 15.34% of the vote, which was considered at the time a major setback for the party.-Early life:Born into a...

 "savagely critical support" if he ran against François Mitterrand

François Mitterrand

François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand was the 21st President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra, serving from 1981 until 1995. He is the longest-serving President of France and, as leader of the Socialist Party, the only figure from the left so far elected President...

. They later condemned him for keeping the PFC in the Union of the Left.

In 1980 the LTF launched a periodical, Le Bolshevik edited by William Cazenove. Through the 1980s the group continued to supported the positions of the international Spartacist movement, ie, opposition to Solidarity, support of the Soviet war in Afghanistan

Soviet war in Afghanistan

The Soviet war in Afghanistan was a nine-year conflict involving the Soviet Union, supporting the Marxist-Leninist government of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan against the Afghan Mujahideen and foreign "Arab–Afghan" volunteers...

 and opposition to Khomeini.

External links

• Archive of recent issues of Le Bolshevik