Kuibyshev:… What is demanded now of a leader of the party, a leader of the Soviet state? Is it only an admission of his former mistakes, moreover in such an innocent form? Is it only a modest statement such as “I am doing the best I can”? This “I am doing my best” formula can even be uttered by a non-Communist. Any conscientious bureaucrat can say that he is doing the best he can. But is that all that's demanded of a leader standing at the head of the Soviet state? More than ever before, the party is entering upon the course of bitter class battles [klassovye boi]. The enemy has been dislodged from many of his positions, but the enemy has not given up. He has become hardened. He will resist and oppose us fiercely. Sabotage within the country, the resistance of the kulaks who are in the process of being liquidated—all of this expresses a bitter class struggle. The threats of an intervention—this is the other side of the same coin. The class enemy, sensing that its last positions are being overtaken by socialism, is becoming hardened and prepares itself for an assault on the proletarian, socialist state. And it is absolutely clear that at such a time it should be demanded of a leader of the party or Soviet state, first and foremost, that he lead the battle for the general line, that he take his place in the front ranks of this campaign. It is not enough that he should say that he “is doing the best he can” of that which is demanded of him. We demand of a leader of the party and of a leader of the Soviet state a relentless struggle against all attempts at concealing ideologically class-alien tasks from us.

Can one say that Comrade Rykov, after deviating from the party, has demonstrated the slightest effort to march in step with those who are leading the party ahead? Can one say that in his struggle with a class-alien ideology, which he [himself] once mistakenly preached, Comrade Rykov has demonstrated so much as an iota of the passion necessary for a leader? No, one cannot say any such thing. For this reason, you are forced to conclude that it is apparently hopeless at the present time to see in Comrade Rykov a steadfast comrade-in-arms in these battles.

I believe that the implementation of a plan of such exceptional difficulty as that which confronts us in 1931 demands solid unity between the top echelons of the Soviet and party leadership. Not the slightest cleft should be permitted between, on the one hand, the Soviet apparat and the comrades heading it and, on the other hand, the leadership of the party. … It must be clearly and firmly understood: acknowledgment of the general line is not all that is required. One must fight for the general line, and one must fight against all deviations from the general line. These, in the last analysis, conceal class-alien expectations and hopes that are hostile to us… .

Comrade Bukharin often says that what is demanded of him is penitence and more penitence and still more penitence and innumerable more acts of penitence. I think that it would be an affront to the Plenum of the Central Committee to think that any of us here would be guided by such a desire, that is, to watch Bukharin or Rykov once again going through the ritual of penitence from this podium: “I am guilty of this, I am guilty of that and that, too!” That's not needed. What is needed is an admission of one's real mistakes and a correct political assessment of them. Instead, we have seen only these mistakes [defended here] in the most various ways… .