Today in Labor History December 23, 1933: Dutch construction worker and council communist Marinus van der Lubbe was sentenced to death for burning down the Reichstag. In prison, he launched a hunger strike against prison conditions, but was forcibly fed. The Nazis beheaded him on January 10, 1934 by guillotine. In 2008, the German government posthumously pardoned him. Van der Lubbe claimed to have set the fire in order to inspire the German working-class to rise up against fascism. He also claimed to have acted alone. However, the Nazis tried to make it into a communist conspiracy and arrested several other communists, who were ultimately acquitted of involvement in the fire. Many on the left, including the Comintern, or Third International (1919-1943), falsely claimed he was a Nazi agent and provocateur, or that it was a Nazi-run false flag operation. Lenin, whom founded the Comintern, hated the Council (Left-wing) Communists and lambasted them in his 1920 screed: "Left-Wing" Communism: An Infantile Disorder.”
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