ABSTRACT
This chapter charts the way Münzenberg’s own views changed over his lifetime and how he increasingly not only found himself at odds with the leadership of his own German Party, but also with the Moscow-based Comintern, under Stalin’s rule. The hard left leaders within the German Communist Party viewed him as an autonomous and dangerous maverick, but now Stalin and the leaders of the KPD began attacking him openly and undermining his work.
In October 1936, when Münzenberg travelled to Moscow for what would be his last visit, he hoped that the purges and the tidal wave of persecution there would be over, but was sorely disappointed.
Münzenberg was told by the Comintern to hand over his Paris operations to the Czech Communist, Bohumír Šmeral. This was the prelude to his ostracism and exclusion from the KPD. He managed to ride out a concerted attempt to keep him in Moscow under the watchful eye of Stalin’s security services and was able to return safely to Paris.
