The Young Broz 49
for bread and work.”^235 Consequently, the SKOJ became a party within the
party, so to speak, with even more members than the CPY. The communist
movement began to be an expression of protest for young intellectuals more
than for the proletarian masses, who were not numerous and were certainly less
radical. In Yugoslavia in 1939 there were about 730,000 workers, only half of
whom were employed in factories.^236 The influx of new people into the CPY
increased revenue, which Broz watched over himself, and the circle of sympa-
thizers grew steadily. It is interesting to note that during the regular meetings
of the party nobody discussed the internal situation in the Soviet Union, which
was in the grip of Stalinist terror. It was as if nothing was happening there,
neither good nor bad.^237
In spite of the internal opposition Broz had to deal with, in the months after
his return from Moscow he continued to strengthen his position, introducing
an “iron discipline” into the party, as his comrades approvingly said. On 9 and
10 June 1939, in a village near Ljubljana, he convened a secret session of the most
prominent members of the party from all over Yugoslavia. On that occasion
sectarianism was condemned and the measures taken against Petko Miletić, as
its most important exponent, were confirmed.^238
Although Petko was banished from the CPY, he, Marić, and Kusovac con-
tinued plotting against Walter, trying to deny him the right to lead the party.^239
Marić and Kusovac even managed to convince Yugoslav émigrés in America
to stop helping the CPY financially, claiming that it was now led by persons
whose mandate had been revoked by the Comintern.^240 The most dangerous
of all three for Walter was Miletić, who was released from jail in June 1939
and was then able to further develop his intrigues against his rival, first in
Yugoslavia, then in Moscow. “Petko writes, writes.. .” recalled Tito later, refer-
ring to the stream of his denunciations, as if in a nightmare.^241 Apparently he
had gathered a group of followers who had been expelled from the party in
Montenegro, “poisoning them ideologically with his lies.” When, at the end of
September 1939, Djilas and his colleagues managed to get the original tran-
scripts of Miletić’s police interrogations, it appeared that he had not behaved
as bravely as was generally believed. This material was promptly sent to the
IKKI. Miletić reacted immediately, leaving for Istanbul where, thanks to his
Bulgarian friends, the Soviet consulate gave him a visa for Moscow. He went
there certain he would still have supporters at the Comintern who would
defend him from the calumnies of “that vulgar scum,” as Broz and his comrades
were labeled.^242
At the end of September, Broz also returned to the Soviet capital through
Le Havre and Leningrad. He came at the invitation of the Comintern, where
many still suspected him of Trotskyist inclinations. He was traveling on board