Christopher Hitchens was a

Christopher Hitchens was a member of the “International Socialists” (IS) from 1966 to 1976. This wasn’t the worst of the Trotskyist groups (after all, they did recognise Russia to be a form of state capitalism). When he joined, IS was even flirting with the non-Leninist views of Rosa Luxemburg. After May 1968 , which Tony Cliff analysed as failing because of a lack of a vanguard party, Cliff decided that his organisation needing “Leninization”. Which happened, culminating in the foundation in 1977 of the SWP as a classic Leninist vanguard party. After ceasing to be a Trotskyist Hitchens seems to have still retained a soft spot for Luxemburg as in this book review dating from June this year. But his support for the US invasion of Iraq ruined his reputation with the ex-Trotskyist left, as that other ex-Trotskyist Tariq Ali explained on the BBC the other day.