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Socialist Action 2005
Draft Political Resolution
(The general line
of this resolution was adopted by the Socialist Action Political Committee
on March 2005 for presentation to the April 1-3 2005 National Committee
plenum.)
The 2004 Political Resolution adopted at last summer's
National Convention devoted considerable attention to the state of the
world political economy. We
stressed the impact of the deepening world economic crises, brought on by
ferocious competition between the U.S. and its powerful and increasingly
united imperialist adversaries in Europe as well as Japan, on the policies
of the leading imperial powers.
We similarly evaluated the effect of the associated
crises of profits and overproduction on world political and military
developments.
It is not our intention, therefore, to review the ground
we have covered quite thoroughly over the past several years. World
imperialism has found no way to mitigate its growing contradictions other
than at the expense of the world's working classes. These include continued
and deepening attacks on living
standards everywhere as well as war and more war. We have reproduced last
summer's National Convention-approved Political Resolution
as background material for this plenum's deliberations
as well as other documents under discussion in Socialist Action.
In this conjunctural resolution we want to focus on
several of the key issues in world and U.S. politics that require our
immediate attention.
The war in Iraq
First and foremost is the ongoing war and occupation in
Iraq, a devastating war that had already taken a toll in Iraqi lives in
excess of 100,000 in addition to some 1,500 U.S. soldiers. Contrary to U.S.
projections virtually nothing has changed in regard to the quality of life
of the
Iraqi people. The infrastructure that was destroyed to a
considerable extent two years, in fact 14 years ago, remains largely in a
shattered state. Whole cities like
Falujah have been leveled. U.S. troops continue to terrorize the Iraqi
masses.
The quick victory, stabilization and
"democracy" projected by the Bush Administration have not come to
pass. While hundreds of billions of dollars have been allocated to U.S.
corporations to advance the extraction of oil and otherwise rebuild sectors
of the state's infrastructure that are required for the extraction of
profits little has been accomplished.
Even here the U.S. has largely failed to reap the
benefits of conquest.
This is in large part due to the Iraqi resistance, a
diverse combination of forces including fundamentalist and secular groups
that have dealt some major blows to a qualitatively superior U.S. force.
The extreme repression of the resistance has relegated
it to an underground existence. But its continued capacity to challenge the
occupiers is an indication of its mass character. While four workers'
federations do operate, they too are repressed with their leaders often
murdered by the U.S. occupation forces. They are also plagued with
internecine conflicts.
During the period of the open military struggle of the
Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr several months ago and prior to the January
2005 elections, polls indicated that 67 percent of the Iraqi population
opposed U.S. intervention and occupation. This was the highpoint of the
opposition when it appeared that significant sectors of the Shiite
population would or could find common cause with Sunni fighters.
Moqtada al-Sadr's initial open defiance of imperial
forced a temporary and partial retreat of U.S. military ventures in Sadr
City, a poor slum-dwelling area of Baghdad. A similar standoff took place
in Falujah where the Sunnis were in control. But this short-lived hiatus
soon gave
Way to full-scale bombardment and a massacre that left
no doubt that the U.S.had no intention of negotiating anything of
substance.
Moqtada-al Sadr and his forces, representing some 20
percent of the Shiite population, have since retreated. Their political
representatives have taken posts in the majority Iraqi Alliance party of
Ayatollah Ali Sistani. In the Sunni
areas voter turnout was some two percent, with the main Sunni above-ground
organization, Association of Muslim Scholars, advocating
boycott.
The imperialist overseer's claim that the election
turnout approached 56 percent although here too there is mounting evidence
that the figures were rigged by the U.S. "specialists" assigned
to conduct the elections.
We are nevertheless compelled to recognize that the
holding of the election in Iraq, regardless of the occupation and
corruption of every sort associated with it, represented a victory of sorts
to the U.S. occupiers. In the absence
of the kind of united and massive popular opposition to the election and
occupation that was required to thoroughly discredit it,
The Bush Administration was able to modestly advance its
plans for further exploitation of Iraq's people and resources. Despite this
setback, however, U.S. imperialism's first effort of this magnitude since
Vietnam is far from secure. It is not at all guaranteed that the occupiers
can securely remain in Iraq to implement their plans to exploit what will
amount to a U.S.-controlled neo-colonial state. It is more likely that they
will be mired down in a hostile environment for years to come.
Among the most important conclusion we can draw from
this experience is that the Iraqi resistance has significantly reduced the
capacity of the U.S. to intervene elsewhere, thereby making a major
contribution, conscious or otherwise, to the struggle against world
imperialism.
Limitations of the
resistance
The Sunni-led resistance declaration that anyone who
voted in the January 2005 election was an enemy of God, and therefore a
target for murder, certainly failed in every respect to advance the cause
of unity against the occupiers. Similarly, Shiite leaders who declared that
not voting was in opposition to God's will did nothing to challenge the
occupation. Shiite/Sunni unity will
not be advanced with these politics and methods.
The historic oppression of the Shiite majority by the
Saddam Hussein regime, which based itself on the relatively privileged
Sunni minority, was no small factor in fostering illusions among
significant numbers of his Shiites victims, as well as the oppressed Kurds,
in U.S.-style democracy.
Both the failed nationalism of Hussein and his Baathist
Party in Iraq and of the region's former nationalist pro-capitalist leaders
more generally, as well as the historic collapse of Stalinism, opened the
door to an Islamic fundamentalism that is incapable of achieving the unity
necessary to advance the cause of the Middle East's oppressed masses.
Having made our position on the political inadequacies
of the Iraqi resistance absolutely clear we continue to affirm our
unconditional support to the fight against the U.S. occupation. We place no
equal sign between the desperate, if not incredible human sacrifices of
Iraqi
Fundamentalists (and others who similarly offer their
very lives to oppose U.S. occupation) and the monstrous actions of American
imperialism, the central purveyor of terror and mass murder in Iraq and in
the world.
While we differ strongly with those in Iraq who mistakenly
focus their justified hatred of the U.S. murderers on civilian Shiites, we
place total responsibility for the horrors in Iraq on imperialism. As with
the just struggle of the Palestinian masses we look to the day when a
mass-based opposition capable of uniting all the oppressed emerges to
challenge the
war-makers in state and regional struggles that combine
opposition to national and class oppression.
For now, and we do not hesitate to repeat ourselves, the
desperate acts that take place in the name of the resistance, however
futile and misdirected in some cases, have been brought on by a ruthless,
torturing and murderous imperialist occupation intent on crushing any and
all forms of opposition to its plans to plunder Iraq far into the future.
The default of the U.S.
antiwar movement
We have discussed the antiwar movement's potential for
the past two years. We have often
been surprised at the movement's resiliency and have attributed a great
portion of it to the capacity of the Iraqi people to resist the occupation,
despite the great cost in human lives. Had there been a collapse in the
face of the U.S. "shock and awe" bombardment, what most expected
to be the case, the U.S. movement would have inevitably followed suit. But
we have learned that there are limits to what the resistance can achieve,
in part because of its political deficiencies but also because of the
massive repression and slaughter it faces. The weapons
at its disposal have also been limited by the tightening
military grip of the imperialists.
Another critical factor limiting the potential of the
U.S. antiwar movement is the almost total leadership capitulation to the
Democrats in the 2004 elections. We have rarely witnessed such a spectacle.
The United For Peace and Justice coalition (UFPJ), in particular, literally
disappeared for some nine months as its constituent groups and leaders
abandoned independent mass mobilizations and instead pursued a victory for
pro-war Democrat John
Kerry. While we have experienced similar phenomena in
the past, especially during the Vietnam War, the depth and duration of the
capitulation must have set a record. During the Vietnam era, it must be
said, the ruling class offered Democrats who at least claimed to be
"peace candidates." Today
the "peace" movement was reduced to supporting a war candidate,
indeed a candidate who called for more troops and more funds for the war
than George Bush!
At base the capitulation exposed the huge gap between
the rhetoric of the UFPJ leaders, purporting to champion a broad
multi-issue agenda, and their abject subordination to whatever Democrat
reached the top of the near-pre-arranged primary contests.
The ANSWER "coalition" made no effort to fill
the void left by the UFPJ. The
central leaders of this similarly tightly-controlled group also preferred a
Democratic Party victory although they were less craven and more
sophisticated in how they presented their politics. But deeds, or their
absence, speak louder than words. ANSWER's absence from the field of
action and it's political focus on fighting "Bush's
War" told the story well.
The glaring absence of a mass democratic united
front-type antiwar coalition with a principled leadership weighed heavily
on the movement and still does. The capacity to resist the most horrible
assaults on the Iraqi people, not to mention the incessant threats of war
against a growing number of nations deemed by U.S. imperialism as the
"axes of evil," was severely restricted.
The UFPJ, conscious of its objective of providing a left
face for the Democratic Party, literally transformed itself into a
multi-issue coalition of the first magnitude. With funds and grants from
its earlier successes, it put on a significant size staff and established a
division of labor
designed to have the UFPJ address virtually every social
issue imaginable. They aimed to
cast the broadest possible net to capture voter for Democratic Party.
The UFPJ essentially became an organizing center for
local, state and national Democrats. It abandoned mass antiwar mobilizations
almost entirely with the exception of the 500,000 protestors at the
Republican Party National Convention. This New York anti-Bush
demonstration, while evidencing deep antiwar sentiment, also demonstrated
the futility of
reliance on either of capitalism's twin parties. The
potential power represented by a half million protestors in the streets was
significantly muted and undermined by the organizer's reliance on bourgeois
politics and politicians to end imperialist war.
The power generated by the Vietnam antiwar movement, a
movement capable of forcing the world's greatest military power to withdraw
from Vietnam, was in large part due to its independent and mass character.
Of course, there were other decisive factors that forced the U.S.
withdrawal, particularly the courageous and heroic struggle of the
Vietnamese. But the capacity of the 10-year long U.S. movement to
essentially sustain its independent character was critical to its success.
The success of the struggle, including its capacity to join
forces with the powerful civil rights movement, opened the door wide to the
emergence of several other social struggles that similarly won important
gains for the oppressed and exploited.
The Republican electoral victory has further demoralized
UFPJ and its liberal reformist followers, convincing them that resistance
to the system outside the Democratic Party is not productive. Understanding
this single point is key to re-building the U.S. antiwar movement. There
will be no viable social movement in this imperialist colossus that is
dependent on,
subordinate to or in any way associated with America's
capitalist parties.
The February 2005 UFPJ national assembly in St. Louis
was initially aimed at maintaining the UFPJ's multi-issue course and
orientation to capitalist politics. Central leaders had already begun
discussions on how best to relate to the 2006 elections.
But the group's top cadre changed gears a few weeks
before the assembly and decided to again "focus" on the Iraq War.
The pro-Democratic Party leadership core "discovered" in advance
of the gathering that UFPJ "lacked the resources" to take up all
the issues originally contemplated. This sudden shift took many of group's
liberal cohorts by surprise.
Convinced
that periodic mass demonstrations are near worthless in
comparison to electoral politics and that the only road to social change
was through the Democrats, they initially resisted what they considered a
fruitless focus on a single issue, like the war in Iraq.
"Leftists" in UFPJ argued that the Iraq war is
only a "symptom" of the problem. "We need to address all the
issues that are a product of "the system itself," they argued.
But "the system" they referred to was notcapitalism but rather
the "fascist" Bush Administration and the "fascist"
government they accuse him of heading.
Groups like the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP) and
their associated group, Not in Our Name! likewise advanced the
"fascist" argument with RCP leader Robert Avakian and the RCP all
but calling for a vote for Kerry.
Bush was declared to be the leader of the "Christian
fascists" who had taken over the country. He had to be stopped. The
UFPJ's rhetoric did not
differ to any significant extent.
In the days when the Socialist Workers Party played a
leading role, if not the leading role in the struggle against the Vietnam
War, the reformists of every stripe offered the same arguments. They tired
of repeated mass actions; they resisted a central focus on the war; they
rejected democratic functioning (which at that time was represented by the
principle of
one-person-one-vote) in mass decision-making united
front-type assemblies and they fought tooth and nail to subordinate the
movement to support to Democratic Party "peace candidates" like
Eugene McCarthy and George McGovern.
But the reformists in all their combinations did not
prevail. They proved incapable of derailing the movement in large part
because the struggle against the Vietnam War was truly a mass movement. An
entire generation of youth and a great proportion of the larger population
become involved in one form or another. These forces helped to stamp the
movement with its
independent character. They acted as a bulwark to ward
off any and all efforts to undermine its independent character.
With the mounting threats and/or actuality of U.S.
intervention in Iran, Cuba, North Korea, the Philippines and Syria as well
as the accomplished interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Haiti and
Yugoslavia, we believe that a general demand, of course subordinate to a
central focus on the Iraq War, against U.S. intervention and U.S. support
to occupations everywhere, is
necessary and appropriate. This includes Palestine,
where U.S. aid to the Zionist, colonial settler state of Israel guarantees
the continued denial of all Palestinian rights.
We also support the inclusion of demands for fundamental
democratic rights, especially since these are under severe attack and
infringe on several of the basic rights whose exercise is necessary to
build a mass democratic movement. Opposition to the Patriot Act, including
its provisions for increased government spying on movement organizations
and individuals
And all others can also be easily included in a succinct
statement in the text of organizing leaflets, fact sheets and other antiwar
propaganda.
Tactics: We advocate the organization of massive, legal,
peaceful demonstrations designed to involve the largest numbers possible in
the antiwar movement. We have no fetish about organizational forms of
protest. In different times, when the
level of class combativity is on the rise and the situation warrants, other
tactics, including mass strikes, would be appropriate to give expression to
the power of the movement. But this is the music of the future.
For now, mass actions are the most appropriate tactic to
maximize the expression of the full power of the movement. They are
effective in challenging the false notion that the government represents
the majority of the people. They increase the confidence of the movement in
its own power. They expose
participants to a wide range of issues that they do not ordinarily
consider. They help lead participants to the conclusion that the capitalist
itself system is responsible for today's social evils as opposed to
whichever political party or personality happens to be running the
government.
Periodic mass actions also reinforce the continuity of
the movement, allow for a visible measure of its growing strength and
unity, maximize its capacity to involve new sectors of the population in
struggle and help convince increasing numbers that the power over public
decision-making truly rests in their hands.
Mass actions indeed challenge the prerogative of the
war-makers to make war. They raise
the political price paid by the ruling class to act contrary to the
interests and wishes of the majority. They lead toward the isolation of the
ruling class and help expose its minority status and reactionary interests
in governing.
For revolutionaries, mass action is not an end in
itself, but a step toward even more powerful challenges to capitalism.
For reformists, mass actions are a sometimes necessary
routine to convince the ruling class politicians to change their evil ways
AND to present a platform for "liberal" Democratic Party
politicians to convince the masses that change is possible within the
framework of capitalism.
We have no interest in promoting individual acts or
small-scale non-violent civil disobedience protests, whether they are
conducted by pacifists or faith-based groups. These usually facilitate the
victimization of participants and severely limit the participation of the
vast
Majority who have no desire to risk imprisonment in
order to demonstrate their support for the antiwar movement. We do not
object to others who are insistent on organizing such actions, but we argue
that such actions should be conducted separate and apart from the mass
legal protests organized by the broader movement. We have no interest in
lending any credence to
The sometimes uncontrolled anarchist actions that have
disrupted or detracted from peaceful mass protests.
Democracy in the movement: This is not an abstract
question. The present competing antiwar organizations are essentially
dominated by competing political currents on the left who are more
concerned with subordinating the movement to their own ends than in
maximizing its potential power.
UFPJ and ANSWER often dominate their respective decision-making
meetings by a variety of representational formulas that guarantee that the
groups and individuals they support remain in absolute control.
Our tradition, massive decision-making conferences open
to all and based on one-person-one-vote, is designed to include and
democratically engage the entire movement. We describe our organizational
format as a united front-type organization because in reality it is not a
united front.
The classic or historic united front is a temporary
association of mass organizations to achieve very limited and immediate
objectives. If a striking union, for example, is under attack and faced
with scab-herding cops who threaten to break a strike, the broad
workers' movement has been called
upon to join the battle. The basic decisions regarding strike
strategy, tactics, negotiations, etc., remain with the
striking union.
Organization and control of the united front
mobilizations emanating from the unity of the broader trade union movement,
its component parts, federations or whatever labor structures exist, are
determined by votes of the chosen leaderships of these bodies. Where the
components of the united front are democratically organized, the mobilized
rank and file has a direct and immediate voice.
The primary objective of the united front is to amass
the essential class power to effectively defend and advance the cause of
the beleaguered strikers. Victories emerging out of such struggles usually
increase the possibilities of further mobilizations against the
prerogatives of the ruling rich.
In the antiwar movement today, there are no such mass
organizations of workers who consciously participate with their ranks. Nor
are there leaders who aim to mobilize their ranks. When unions and
unionists do participate it is usually minimally, with a few officials and
a rank and file that more often participates in small numbers, usually
without the knowledge of the union itself.
When the point is reached that a reinvigorated and
militant trade union movement decides to engage its ranks in the struggle
against imperialist war, the forms of the movement will qualitatively change.
Under these circumstances it would be the height of foolishness to propose
that an engaged union, able to mobilize thousands and more have the same
weight
In an antiwar conference or in any other gathering than
a single isolated individual.
At present, this is not the case. UFPJ conferences are
organized with some form of delegated representation with the formulas
selected in advance to achieve the desired result. Those who attend
claiming to represent this or that organization usually have as many
followers as the typical antiwar activist who may or may not belong any
organization.
During the Vietnam era Communist Party-led national
coalitions used a variety of delegated formulas that essentially excluded
the vast number of independent activists. It was only when the strength and
breadth of the movement reached a point where the Stalinists and their
liberal allies could no longer control the movement that truly democratic
forms emerged.
The size of the national gatherings increased from a few
hundred essentially hand-picked "delegates," representing various
Communist Party front groups and those of their liberal allies, to
conferences where thousands regularly participated in the deliberations.
The rapidly
exploding movement soon rejected any restrictive
formulas and welcomed all comers on an equal basis. No one political
tendency could dominate. The will of the preponderant independent majority
almost always prevailed.
None of the above, however, happened by accident. The
SWP and the YSA along with the campus-based Student Mobilization Committee
to Bring the Troops Home Now (SMC) worked hard to educate the broad
movement as to the merits of the new and more democratic organizational
forms as well as the critical importance of principled "Out Now!"
politics and a sharp focus on the war.
The SWP's central antiwar organizer, Fred Halsted, in
his book, "Out Now!: A Participants Account of the American Movement
Against the War in Vietnam," describes the strategy and tactics we
employed with great success during those times. The central lessons, albeit
with the appropriate modifications based on political changes in U.S.
society, are applicable today.
Socialist Action's
momentary tactical retreat
We have taken the time to review these matters to remind
comrades that the retreat we were recently and briefly compelled to make in
regard to taking on the kind of leadership role we had played for almost
two decades was a product of simple necessity. Following our split with the
Nat. W. group, the very existence of Socialist Action was brought into
question. Our
Focus had to shift to maintaining our fundamental party
institutions and to recruiting and educating sufficient comrades to
continue as a revolutionary organization.
Our retreat was a temporary measure to insure Socialist
Action's continued existence.
It was a recognition that the forces we had to assign to
help initiate and build the necessary mass actions and democratic antiwar
coalitions were insufficient to achieve the required results. We made one
major effort to do so in 2003. It started with great promise and ended with
a mass action of 350,000 people in San Francisco. But along the way we were
not able
To maintain the very democratic coalition we initiated.
The combination of ultralefts, reformists, Stalinists and others were dead
set against a united and democratic antiwar movement. The significant but
relatively small number of independent forces we had assembled proved
incapable of withstanding their persistent efforts to eliminate what had begun
with great promise. We have reviewed this experience in the past and need
not dwell on it further here other than to state that we have not ruled out
efforts to help re-orient the antiwar movement. Our ability to do depends
only on our capacity to win new forces to Socialist Action. Hopefully, that
time is not far away.
We conclude this section with a brief assessment of the
recent March 19, 2005 national and international mobilizations against the
Iraq war. These were modest in the U.S., with the largest actions taking
place in New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles. Our estimates indicate
that all were in the range of 10-15,000 people with smaller protests in the
range of 1,000 -5,000 taking place in several other cities and modest
protests in the hundreds or less in an estimated 700 locations.
Internationally, there were more impressive
mobilizations. London, Rome and Athens were perhaps the largest with an
estimated 100,000 participating in each action. Tens of thousands mobilized
across Europe, in the Middle East and elsewhere. It is noteworthy that the
size of the protests was generally greater outside the U.S. than in the
heartland of imperialism, an indication of the still weakened and divided
nature of the U.S. movement.
While we were eager to participate in and help build the
modest actions that did take place, as we have always done, it will take a
bit of time and require significant changes in the U.S. and international
situation until the movement returns to the massive size that we saw just a
few years ago.
The possibility of a
return to draft army
There is one factor in the present equation that could
make an immediate and qualitative difference, the reactivation of the Selective
Service System and the establishment of a draft. We have already seen
differences among the ruling rich as to the advisability of such a move. On
the one hand it is clear that to police the world U.S. imperialism requires
many more troops than it presently has available. The experience of Iraq
demonstrated that "shock and awe" aside, for the kind of victory
imperialism seeks, a victory that at minimum would allow for the long-term
exploitation of Iraqi oil, more than a token force is required. The
U.S. is not presently capable of another such venture.
A draft is required by the ruling class rich to supply
the necessary human cannon fodder to expand imperialism's reach. But the
social consequences would be enormous. Drafting American youth to fight and
die for capitalist profit, no matter how much U.S. war aims are concealed
by a compliant media, would bring on to the political scene a layer of
youth that we have not seen since Vietnam.
In combination with the rising economic and social
crises, a draft would inevitably lead to a radicalization that would cut
deep into the fabric of society.
We have already seen initial and promising signs of
youthful opposition to military service. The growing number of protests
against high school and college military recruiters is a first indication.
A generalized draft would qualitatively change the character of this effort
and the antiwar movement itself.
There have been several reports that legislation is
already readied for passage that would implement a draft within 75 days.
Such a move would indicate more about the crisis of U.S. capitalism than
has been previously revealed. A resort to a draft could only be based on an
imperialist gamble that the political price to be paid was low enough to
risk what they now
consider to be only limited possibilities for a deeper
radicalization.
But war is inherent in the system of capitalist
production. It is, as has been said many times, a reflection of politics
(and economics) by other means. It is pursued for profit and the very
survival of the system, without regard to the human consequences.
Socialist Action is profoundly opposed to any draft in
capitalist America. We reject the
right of imperialism to make war anywhere. A resort to a draft at this time
may well be viewed by the ruling class as a necessity to advance and extent
imperialism's interests against its capitalist rivals as well as against
the oppressed of the world. In the present circumstances we estimate that a
return to a draft army would signal immediate and new wars for plunder.
But the institution of a draft would also represent a
direct and immediate threat to the lives of today's youth. We would expect
their response to be massive, leading to a qualitative advance in the
movement's capacity to fight back.
The advance of the
Cuban Revolution
We have closely followed the Cuban Revolution for many
years and have established fraternal contacts with the Cuban government.
The Cuban Interests Section in Washington regularly sends copies of our
paper to Havana where our views are read with interest.
A brief review of what is new in our relations with Cuba
and Cuban developments in general will be helpful to comrades.
-Socialist Action has been invited to visit Cuba to
discuss ideas with several of Cuba's central leaders in many fields. We
have been informed that this will include a meeting with Fidel Castro. We
plan a legal visit of Socialist Action journalists as soon as possible.
-The Cubans have indicated their appreciation of the political
positions we took last year in regard to the so-called Cuban dissidents, an
array of U.S.-organized and funded counterrevolutionaries whose activities
were overseen by the U.S. State Department. Our political defense of the
Cuban actions in the matter of the U.S.-encouraged Cuban boat and airline
hijackers was similarly noted. In this regard, we published some critical
articles and a pamphlet challenging the reactionary positions taken by
several U.S. liberals including, Noam Chomsky, as well as several social
democrats who initiated petition campaigns attacking the just and defensive
actions of the Cuban government.
We presented our class position on the death penalty,
differentiating its use by capitalist regimes as opposed to its rare
application in the beleaguered and revolutionary Cuban workers state,
facing a 40+ year blockade and near state of siege at the hands of U.S.
imperialism.
-The Cubans expressed their appreciation of the actions
we have taken in defense of the Cuban Five, including our successful Bay
Area Cuba Conference last year where attorney for one of the Cuban Five,
Leonard Weinglass, addressed a large gathering initiated by Socialist
Action and broadly sponsored by several solidarity groups. The Cubans have
made defense of the Cuban Five a major priority.
-We visited the Cuban Interests Section twice in the
past year or so for discussions with both the Cuban Ambassador and the
Interest Section's First Secretary. The purpose of the meetings was to
exchange ideas, to discuss difficulties faced by the Cuban Revolution and
to inform the Cubans of the political activities we have undertaken in
defense of Cuba's sovereignty. We
have also presented our views on a number of important questions including
the 2004 elections where we differed to some extent with our Cuban
comrades.
-We attended an important meeting in Washington, D.C.
sponsored by the TransAfrica Forum, headed by Bill Fletcher and Danny
Glover. The meeting included a presentation of the Cuban view of U.S.-Cuban
relations. Following the Cuban
Ambassador's departure the group, representing some 40 U.S. organizations
concerned with non-intervention in Cuba, discussed
the political basis for the formation of a U.S. movement
for normalization of U.S.-Cuba relations.
-In the context of our support for normalization, we are
helping to propose and initiate the undertaking of a major project designed
to advance this end. This would be a follow-up to the 1999 University of California
at Berkeley (UCB) broadly-organized "Dialogue With Cuba
Conference" that attracted 2,000 participants and featured some 30
Cubans in plenary discussions with their counterparts at UCB and from other
institution and organizations
favoring dialogue with Cuba.
This new initiative would require extremely broad
support nationally. It would
involve extending an invitation to Fidel Castro and other Cuban leaders to
visit the U.S. to dialogue with prominent Americans on normalization. The
visit would include several venues across the
Country and would be initially hosted, as in 1999,
assuming agreement can be reached, by the University of California. A
prominent University of California at Berkeley professor has agreed to
explore possibilities for launching this project.
In the event that visas are granted to the Cuban
delegation, it would open the door wide to a national dialogue that would
represent a great blow to those who prefer war and invasion.
In the event that visas are denied, the most likely
variant, the Cuban delegation would still be invited to participate but via
a live nationally broadcast satellite hook-up which would allow us to have
President Fidel Castro participate at universities and other designated
locations
Across the country in the context of
university-sponsored conferences. The basic concept is to once again move
beyond the usual left-initiated small-scale Cuba solidarity events and
reach out to a very broad audience ranging from Congress people who favor
trade with Cuba to educators and others who desire lifting travel
restrictions to individuals prominent in public life who prefer dialogue
not war. Needless to say the Cubans would be extremely eager to engage in
such an effort, believing that a U.S. war against them is a real
possibility.
Celia Hart fosters a
discussion on Trotskyism in Cuba
There have been some developments in Cuba concerning the
opening of a still-limited but very important dialogue on the politics of
Leon Trotsky. We outline these
below:
-The discussion began with an important essay on
Trotsky's major contributions to revolutionary politics that was published
in the leading Cuban journal Tricontinental Magazine. Authored by Celia
Hart, the article presented in a sharp and simple form Trotsky's basic
ideas on permanent revolution, "socialism in one country" and
"peaceful co-existence." The
context was a damning indictment of the reactionary
politics of Stalinism and a championing of Trotsky's life work and
politics. Trotsky was placed at Lenin's side as among the foremost leaders
of the Russian Revolution. "Our
first soldier," he was called. Celia Hart is a member of the Cuban CP. Her parents, Haydee Santamaria and
Armondo Hart were legendary leaders of the Cuban Revolution who were
captured, arrested and imprisoned along with
Fidel Castro following the July 26, 1953 abortive attack
on the Moncada military barracks in Havana, the opening shot of the Cuban
Revolution. We promptly printed the
entire text of Hart's essay in Socialist Action and began inquiries
as to Hart's availability for discussion and
collaboration.
-Hart has followed up on her first essay with some 20 additional articles on Trotsky's contributions. She has launched a major attack on the role of Stalin and Stalinism, characterizing these as counterrevolutionary forces in the world socialist movement. Her articles are situated in the context of hailing the achievements of the Cuban Revolution and its ongoing struggle for socialism in contrast to the capitulation of the USSR and China to capitalism and capitalist restoration.
-We proposed to Hart that SA publish her essays in book
form. This was a project jointly initiated by SA and our comrades in the
Labor Standard group, with whom we have been collaborating closely on other
projects, as well as on our newspaper. Hart agreed, after contacting
several groups and prominent individuals familiar with U.S. politics and
Socialist Action. We are in the early stages of preparing first-rate
translations. With Hart's approval the book will include two 1961 speeches
by Joseph Hansen presented to young people on Trotsky's theory of permanent
revolution and its relation to the Cuban Revolution. Additionally, our SA/Labor
Standard book will include a summary of Trotsky's theory and an
introduction jointly prepared by leaders of both organizations.
-Hart continues to write on Trotsky's ideas. The April
issue of SA contains a major four-page piece deepening the discussion.
-We have just received a fascinating article written by
Hart's father, Armando Hart critiquing the ideas of Joseph Stalin. This
represents another breakthrough and a further indication that Trotsky is
alive and well in Cuba.
-A major seminar on the fall of the Eastern European
states and the USSR was recently conducted in Cuba with five leading Cuban
intellectuals participating. We have the complete text of the presentations
as well as the audience discussion. The central thrust of all panelists was
a rejection of Stalinism. One participant explained that the main pillars of
the state emerging from the Russian Revolution were
soviet democracy, nationalization of capitalist property and the
revolutionary vanguard or Leninist party. It was agreed that Stalin
destroyed the soviets and the party. There were several favorable
references to Trotsky. A public discussion of the issue of soviet democracy
represents an enormous contribution to the further development of the Cuban
Revolution.
-The recently concluded annual Havana Book Fair included
a booth organized by the British-based Militant Group that featured books
by Trotsky including his "Permanent Revolution." Some 900 copies
were sold, according to Celia Hart, who helped staff a booth that displayed
huge portraits of Lenin and Trotsky. Hart is a collaborator of the Militant
Group and has
attended its conferences in Spain and Pakistan.
-Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has stated publicly
that Trotsky's ideas on permanent revolution and socialism remain valid
today. Chavez's daughter purchased ten copies of Trotsky's Permanent
Revolution at the Havana Book Fair. We will return to Chavez shortly.
-Finally, we have been informed that a 1986 book on
Trotsky, written by former SWP member, is under consideration for
publication in Cuba. The book was written for high school-aged youth as a
photo essay of sorts and designed to introduce newcomers to Trotsky's basic
ideas.
The above summary indicates that a discussion is
underway in Cuba, however modest, of the fundamental revolutionary ideas of
Leon Trotsky. The discussion verifies once again that the Cuban's decision
to reject capitalist restoration in all its manifestations and continue
their fight for a socialist world has led to an exploration of the full
range of authentic revolutionary socialist political thinking, with
Trotsky, of course, foremost on the minds of important political thinkers..
We have been informed buy knowledgeable friends that
Hart's objective is to encourage this discussion inside Cuba and outside,
of course. We have no facts to confirm that the Cuban CP itself is engaged
in such discussions. But it is
reasonable to conclude that when several very prominent Cuban intellectuals
and Cuban CP members take up these questions without the slightest
interference, a broader discussion may not be far away.
We reaffirm our view that the Cubans are revolutionaries
of action in the best sense of the term and deeply imbued with
revolutionary socialist traditions and practice. But the Cuban CP is not
without major divisions, including a still influential but minority
Stalinist current that, like
Its counterparts in the ex-USSSR and China, prefers an
accommodation with imperialism. The majority of the CP, led by Fidel
Castro, has made a conscious decision to reject capitalist restoration.
More and more it recognizes that Cuba's fate is inextricably tied to the
emergence of revolutionary currents outside Cuba, including in the United
States.
Isolated, beleaguered and blockaded, revolutionary Cuba
has been compelled to maneuver in very troubled international waters. The
fact that its direction remains revolutionary and internationalist is a
credit to its leadership. The fact that significant deposits of oil have
been
Discovered off Cuban shores offers at least a temporary
reprieve from the worst effects of the world embargo/blockade. The fact
that Cuba retains fraternal and comradely relations with small
revolutionary groups like Socialist Action is testimony to the stress it
places on politics and program as opposed to material aid, where we can
offer virtually nothing. Our modest
capability of initiating some worthy solidarity
projects, some of which can serve to open a few doors in the U.S. and
politically serve to stay the hand of the imperialist beast, is similarly
appreciated.
We are aware of Cuba's limitations and have predicted
that its continued isolation could only lead, in time, to the further
development of bureaucratic tendencies and worse. But the capacity of the
Cuban leadership to resist these pressures has truly been remarkable, a
testament to the quality and dedication of the central leadership team
headed by Fidel Castro. The Cubans have remained on the revolutionary road,
ever in search of new ways to give expression to the aspirations of its
courageous people for direct involvement in the decisions that effect their
very lives. The possibility that this will now include a serious
examination of Trotsky's contributions as well as movement toward
soviet-type institutions of
workers democracy cannot be excluded.
The new developments in Latin America, driven by the
massive upsurges of the oppressed people revolting against capitalist
neo-liberalism, has also opened new possibilities for Cuba to advance its
ideas and win new support.
It is also reasonable to assume that our invitation to
visit Cuba and discuss with Cuban President Fidel Castro is no accident.
Our first visit to Washington was undertaken at the initiative of the
Cubans. At the second visit their invitation to send an SA delegation was
emphatically repeated. We were told
that it has been a while since we had serious talks on
Many issues and that the Cuban government desired to
explore a number of ideas with us. The government proposes to fully host a
delegation of five comrades to Cuba.
We informed the Cubans that we accepted their
invitation. We will use the opportunity to travel legally to Cuba utilizing
our legitimate credentials as professional journalists. We fully intend,
therefore, to use the opportunity to expand our newspaper coverage of Cuban
developments and to continue in related publishing projects as well as to
deepen our
dialogue.
Needless to say, a formal decision of the Cuban CP to
embrace the revolutionary ideas of Leon Trotsky would be a momentous event.
It would represent an opportunity the likes of which our world movement has
not had since its formation in 1938.
In the Fourth International, SA remains a fraternal
minority current in regard to an appreciation of the importance and
vitality of the Cuban Revolution. The majority has consistently bent to
pressures to distance itself from the actions of the Cuban leadership. The
FI's most recent
attacks on Cuba for the defensive actions it was
compelled to take against the CIA-financed "dissidents" and
hijackers is a sad example. We remain hopeful, however, that these new
developments will lead to a major adjustment in the FI's stance toward the
Cuban Revolution.
The opportunities before us are enormous. We have some
profoundly important openings to deepen SA's involvement in the political
defense of revolutionary Cuba and to fraternally collaborate with Cuba's leadership.
A note on Trotskyism
We should pause a moment to ask why, of all the
revolutionary leaders and ideas in the world today, important figures in
Cuba and elsewhere have turned to Trotsky? The same phenomenon is repeated
in Latin America as Trotskyist groups, many beginning to overcome their
sectarian past, have emerged capable of some important initiatives. In the
United States, it was Mumia Abu-Jamal, perhaps the most well-known
political prisoner on earth,
who quoted the "great revolutionary leader Leon
Trotsky" in his taped remarks that were played on March 19, 2005 at
the San Francisco and New York antiwar demonstrations.
In Europe Isaac Deutscher's Trotsky trilogy, long out of
print, has just been republished. Reviewed in a March issue of The Nation
magazine under the title "The Impermanent Revolution," social
democrat Ronald Aronson felt compelled to present a favorable account of
Trotsky's life and accomplishments, being careful, to be sure, to inform
readers of his view
that in today's non-revolutionary times and in
consideration of the fate of the USSR, Trotsky's ideas, including permanent
revolution, were no longer relevant.
The answer to the question concerning the renewed
interest in Trotsky in Cuba and elsewhere is simple. Trotsky's banner and
politics, in continuity with Lenin's, as well as the ideas and program of
Marx and Engels, remains unstained. Celia Hart pointed out that Trotsky was
the most maligned figure in revolutionary history. But she was quick to add
that those who attacked him most viciously, those who distorted and
misrepresented his views,
Were the Stalinists as well as the capitalists around
the world. Among the Stalinists, of
course, are the Maoists, whose legacy is the restoration of capitalism in
China and the immiserization of hundreds of millions.
Similarly discredited are today's social democrats, who
in a number of countries around the world head up capitalism's offensive
against the working class.
For the best revolutionary fighters, Trotsky represents
the struggle against Stalinism, social democracy and capitalism, all of
which are associated with, in one form or another, the continued rule of
capital and the ruin associated with it.
Cuba was offered the choice between the Stalinist road
leading to capitalist restoration or the socialist road leading to human
freedom and full social equality. Cuba's choice for socialism, to stand
alone, if necessary, in the face of incredible obstacles, has led the first
layer of Cuban thinkers to turn to Trotsky. For this initial layer,
Trotsky's theory of permanent revolution is reduced to its essence. That
is, today only socialism can address and solve the problems facing
humankind. Capitalism is bankrupt. It must be replaced by the revolutionary
action of the masses everywhere. Socialism is the pre-requisite for human
liberation and
progress. Trotsky, proudly described by Celia Hart as
"our first soldier," today exemplifies what is best in our Marxist-Leninist
tradition.
We cannot resist a final anecdote on the meaning of
Trotskyism. During the height of the U.S. struggle against the war in
Vietnam William F. Buckley, the rightwing conservative founder of the
reactionary publication, National Review, invited the SWP's central antiwar
leader Fred Halsted, to appear in a debate format on his
nationally-televised program, Firing Line. Buckley had taken great pleasure
in demolishing America's leading liberals, who
frequently appeared on his show. But "Big Red
Fred," as we called him, was no liberal. Following his debate, where
Buckley himself was undone, Buckley remarked, and we will paraphrase here,
"We have always been able to deal with the Stalinists. We can negotiate
anything with them. But if the Trotskyites ever get power, we are in
trouble. They will not
compromise."
Buckley inadvertently paid our movement a great
compliment. He understood thoroughly that Trotskyism represented an
unadulterated and uncompromising challenge to capitalist power. The
historic defeat suffered by world imperialism in 1917 at the hands of Lenin
and Trotsky's Bolsheviks, Soviet power and the Red Army, shook the world
and changed the course of
history. Trotsky's
heirs, those of us who are here today and in other revolutionary organizations,
and those to come, will shake the foundations of capitalism once again.
Trotskyism, in the hands of the Cuban Revolution will prove to be a potent
weapon in the rebuilding of the world revolutionary movement. While we must take care to avoid getting
too far ahead of ourselves, we are duty-bound to pursue this opening with
everything we have.
Venezuela: Another new
prospect for revolutionary development
We have carefully followed the ongoing developments in
Venezuela. We summarize our basic views and observations as follows:
1) Venezuela remains a capitalist state with a
capitalist government led by a capitalist party headed by Hugo Chavez. Both
the Chavez government and its closest observers, including the Cubans,
affirm that few significant encroachments on capitalist property have been
undertaken. But this is still the beginning of the story.
2) The Chavista majority includes highly contradictory
elements, with Chavez in control but in association with a minority and
still powerful right wing opposed to any fundamental change in the social
system. Outside the formal
government institutions stands a rightist bourgeois intent on removing
Chavez by any means available. It is intimately connected to U.S.
imperialism.
3) The Chavez government has overcome at least two major
imperialist-inspired and organized efforts to overthrow it, the U.S.-backed
and approved military coup attempt followed by the U.S.-backed referendum that
sought Chavez's removal. Both indicated a deep fear on the part of the leading
Venezuelan capitalists and U.S. imperialism that Chavez's Bolivarian
Revolution may go beyond the bounds of bourgeois reform.
4) There is an ongoing class polarization in Venezuelan
society with a native bourgeoisie frightened that its power and property
may be challenged by the revolutionary mobilization of the masses. Chavez
has given considerable impetus to innumerable mass mobilizations that have increased
the confidence of the workers and oppressed in their own power. At the same
time he has refused arms to mobilized Venezuelan
peasants to defend themselves from death squads organized by large
landowners to protect their property.
5) The Chavez regime has allowed a few nationalizations
of capitalist property and takeovers of idle land. Following an official investigation,
it was decreed, for example, that a portion of the land owned by a major British
corporation was idle and therefore subject to government
nationalization and distribution to peasants. land and
factories that have been abandoned by their owners were subject to
nationalization. In the case of the abandoned and subsequently occupied
Venepal factory in Caracus, it today functions under a system of worker's
control with the. Government retaining 51 percent ownership. The details of
this agreement are not yet clear. In recent weeks the government announced
the distribution of 100,000 hectares of idle land to individual peasant
families
6) Chavez has used funds from Venezuela's prosperous oil
industry, enriched for the time being by a huge rise in the price of oil,
to fund significant educational, health, water and other social programs
that have won him a mass following.
7) In the international arena Chavez has opposed the
U.S. imperialist war in Iraq and extended his government's solidarity to
revolutionary Cuba, pledging that an attack on Cuba would be considered an
attack on Venezuela. He has
rejected imperialist projects in the region from the FTAA to Plan Colombia, counterposing an
anti-imperialist trade association of Latin American states that, while
operating in the framework of capitalism, would
nevertheless prioritize, he asserts, the needs of the
region's people as opposed to U.S. corporations. He has made bold and
principled assertions rejecting imperialist interventions everywhere. He
has rejected the ongoing U.S. threats against Iran going so far as to state
that Iran has the same right to possess nuclear weapons as the imperialist
nations
8) Chavez has publicly opposed the capitalist model of
development and proclaimed his adherence to socialism. The Cuban news
agency, Agencia Cubana de Noticias (AIN), in a recent article entitled,
"Venezuela Begins a New Era Despite US Interventionism," notes:
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