WfJRKERS IIIIN(JUIIR' 25¢No. 325 11 March 1983

Smash Reagan/Pope Counterrevolution!Defense of Cuba/USSR Begins in EI Salvador!

Military Victory toLeftist Rebels!

For Workers Revolution!

MARCH 8-With the dramatic battle­field successes by leftist guerrillas in ElSalvador, Ronald Reagan's plans forescalating U.S. intervention and nowPope John Paul Wojtyla's provocative"pilgrimage" to rally the forces ofreaction in the region, it is revolution orbloody counterrevolution in CentralAmerica.

The Catholic pope has declared a holywar against the left-nationalist Sandi­nista regime in Nicaragua. From War­saw to Managua, the Vatican is pushifiga virulent anti-Communist crusadein conjunction with Reagan/Carter'sWashington. The Spartacist League(SL) says: Defeat the anti-Soviet wardrive, from El Salvador to Poland!

Meanwhile, as the Salvadoran insur­gents have government forces on therun, the imperialist liberals andnationalist-reformists are clamoring fora "negotiated settlement." They fearthat destruction of the blood-drenchedarmy that has run the country for thepast SO years could unleash massinsurrection and social revolution. TheTrotskyist SL calls for military victoryto leftist rebels, and for the constructionof a communist vanguard party that canlead the workers at the head of all theoppressed.

The oligarchic domination that datesback to the subjugation of the Indian

masses four centuries ago, a systemenforced by the military and sanctionedby the church, is under siege. Theworkers and peasants of the isthmusface a desperate struggle of survivalagainst murderous capitalist rulersbacked to the hilt by their Yankeegodfather of the North. But the exploit­ed cannot secure victory within thenarrow limits of tiny banana and coffeerepublics. The land bridge betweenNorth and South America must becomea platform for launching socialistrevolution throughout the hemisphere.

Falling Dominoes

The U.S. administration has pulledout all the rhetorical stops to convincethe American bourgeoisie that its classrule and immediate strategic interestsare threatened by the conflict in Central

America. Speaking on March 4 tocorporate executives and politicians atthe San Francisco Hilton, Reaganproclaimed: "We believe the Govern­ment of El Salvador is on the front lineof a battle that is really aimed at the veryheart of the Western Hemisphere, andeventually at us." He estimated that "SOpercent of everything we import comesthrough the Caribbean, the PanamaCanal." And he added, resuscitating theVietnam-era domino theory, "If they geta foothold, with Nicaragua there, if ElSalvador should fall ... Costa Rica,Honduras, Panama, all of these wouldfollow." His lesson: stand by yourbutchers.

When trying to wheedle military aidout of liberal Democratic "doves"worried that the U.S. is backing anotherloser in El Salvador, however, adminis­tration spokesmen sing a different tune.

According to the New York Times (2March), "Mr. [Thomas] Enders [Assis­tant Secretary of State for Inter­American Affairs] said: 'The Vietnamanalogy is really false. We are notescalating little by little. Nobody hassuggested sending in military advisers:again making a distinction between'trainers' and combat troops." (We can'thelp recalling here the line from PhilOchs' liberal protest song "TalkingVietnam Blues": "Training is the wordwe use, nice word to have in case welose.") At another point in his Congres­sional testimony, Enders predicted thatif Salvador is "knocked off by guerril­las" then "in four or five years we'll befighting along the banks of the PanamaCanal and along the Mexican border."

While El Salvador is the "front line"in Reagan's war drive, there is no doubtas to his ultimate target. His sights areset on "rolling back" the RussianOctober Revolution, reversing the hard­fought gains of socialized property andthe planned economy in the Soviet blocstates, and returning them to the chainsof capitalist exploitation. If the SovietUnion did not exist, the drug traffickersand casino owners would long sincehave returned to Havana under the U.S."free world" auspices. Trotskyists, whilecalling for workers political revolution

continued on page 13

For Permanent Revolution in Central America!

Workers Revolution vs.the Guerrilla Road 8

Auto Militants Campaign for Sitdowns Not Soup Lines

Fremont UAW Local SaysDefeat Union-Busting! 3

Terminate the Monarchy]

Britain's Sacred Cow on Reagan's Ranch

Victory to UTU Rail Strike!

11 March 1983No. 325

WfJRKERSVANGUARDMarxist Working-Class Biweekly ofthe Spartacist League of the U.S.EDITOR: Jan Norden

PRODUCTION: Darlene Kamiura (Manager).Noah Wilner

CIRCULATION MANAGER: Linda Jarreau

EDITORIAL BOARD: Charles Burroughs,George Foster, Liz Gordon, Mary JoMcAllister, James Robertson. ReubenSamuels, Joseph Seymour, Marjorie Stamberg

Workers Vanguard (USPS 098-770) publishedbiweekly, skipping an issue in August anda week in December, by the SpartacistPublishing Co., 41 Warren Street, New York,NY 10007. Telephone: 732-7862 (Editorial),732-7861 (Business). Address all corres­pondence to: Box 1377, GPO, New York. NY10116. Domestic subscriptions: $5.00/24issues. Second-class postage paid at NewYork. NY.

Opinions expressed in signed articles orletters do not necessarily express the editorialviewpoint.

AP

Fight Reagan with Democrats-ForMass Strike Action to Bring DownReagan!"

Another SL banner highlighted thesocial.ist attitude toward the queen,recallIng the fate of the English monarchwho got the ax in 1649 from Cromwell­ian revolutionaries: "Charles I GotJ:lis-For an English Workers Repub­lIc!" In this revolutionary spirit, the SLbanner demanded: "Terminate theMonarchy! Abolish the EstablishedChurch! Abolish the House of Lords!Abolish the Licensing Hours!"

Down with the Monarchyl

The tab for the queen's West Coastvisit hasn't been totaled, but estimatesrun into the millions as money pouredout of public coffers as freely as goodchampagne at a state dinner. In the U.S.as in Britain much of the opposition tothe monarchy is based on its expense. Inimpoverished Britain, the monarchy'scastles, jewels, multi-million-dollarmaintenance and lavish feudal displaysserve an important social function forthe bourgeoisie-and cheap at the price.,The royal family is the living symbol ofthe immutability of the class structure,the principle that everybody has "hisplace" and he had better stay there.

The English bourgeoisie is quiteproud that it reached accord with thefeudal aristocracy after the bourgeoisrevolution and absorbed it into thecapitalist social order. They became theEstablishment, "forever" embodied inthe Monarchy, the House of Lords and

continued on page 13

____ _ iiiiii_iiIIIIjiiIjOo"", m.z~~

'- 'CHARLES I ,GOT", HIS·-.... ...,FOR AN, ENGLISH' WORKERS ",REPUBLICI

" '- TERMINATE \ THE v MONARCHY i "" ....ABOLISH ~THE" ESTABLI.SHED" CHURCHI

\.. ABOLISH, THE, HOUSE- OF·· LORDS! 'ABOLISH, THE· LICENSING .. HOURS! ."

" SPARTACIST.. LEAGUE

Craig Jackson

Spartaclst League protests king andqueen of Imperialist terrorism In SanFrancisco.

bourgeois hypocrisy. First of all therewas Mayor Feinstein and the Irish. SanFrancisco contains the third-largestconcentration of Irish Americans in theU.S. The majority of SF's board ofsupervisors therefore decided they hadother things to do when the queen cameto town, declining invitations to variouspresentations and dinners.

Feinstein had obviously thought shecould sidestep the issue with the ploy sheused when she hosted the butcherdictator of the Philippines, FerdinandMarcos, last fall. To assuage anti­Marcos demonstrators she had prom­ised to raise the issue of "human rights"violations with him in private. However,when she tried a similar tactic at SF'sIrish Cultural Center claiming shewould speak to Her Majesty aboutIreland, the furies of protocol unleashedtheir dictum: thou dost not speak to thequeen about such matters.

Feinstein quickly backed downsaying she was "not going to doanything to embarrass the Queen" (SanFrancisco Chronicle, 26 February).Indeed not. And to show just how farshe'd bow, at the expense of ordinarySan Franciscans, Feinstein ordered thecity's mostly Irish gardeners removedfrom their normal duties in Golden GatePark to what a Laborers Union Local400 official described as a "POW camp"at the Polo Grounds so they would notbe near the queen when she attended thebig fete at the De Young museum in thepark. Feinstein insisted, not very con­vincingly, that the gardeners wereneeded at the Polo Grounds to "trimhedges." But as Local 400 officialGeorge Evankovich said sarcastically,"if all those guys spent an hour trimmingthe hedges, there'd be no hedges left. ...Maybe they should put the boys towork dyeing the park orange for theQueen" (San Francisco Chronicle, 26February).

Moving Irish gardeners to the PoloGrounds, however, did not stop anumber of protests against the queen in

. San Francisco. On March 2, while thequeen was being entertained by Rea­gan's buddy Frank Sinatra and theentire cast of "Beach Blanket Babylon,"an Irish Northern Aid spokesman wasthrown out chanting, "Stop the tor­ture!" The largest protest of about 7,000was held outside the De Young museumwhere Reagan hosted the queen and acouple of hundred of selected others.Organized mainly by the IrishAmerican green nationalists, the"March 3 Coalition" was the usual lash­up of anti-Reagan pro-DemocraticParty reformists with mainstream Dem­ocrats: "Let's tell Reagan we wantjobs,... Let's tell Queen Elizabeth:England Out of Ireland Now!" How­ever, a prominent SL banner along theroute of march proclaimed, "You Can't

Ravitch is calling on Reagan to orderthe strikers back to work.

The TWU must act to stop MTAunion-busting! The TWU shouldshut down all scab operations set upfor overload passengers: Shut downthe scab buses! Stop rerouting andadding on trains for bused-inpassengers in the Bronx and Manhat­tan! It is criminal that the TWUleadership does nothing while theMTA picks off the small UTU locals.

The TWU got mugged last Aprilwhen the TA forced a giveback dealdown the throats of the workersunder binding arbitration, aided andabetted by union chief John Lawe.Since then there's been a return tovirtual open shop conditions with jobcuts and speedup. The issues in theUTU strike affect all transit workers.Militants in the TWU have called forthe union to take action in solidarity.Victory to the UTU strike!

hotoNYC transit militants walk picketline with UTU rail strikers.

describing the queen's and NancyReagan's long gowns and jewelry, theirendless rounds of luncheons and dinnersaboard the royal yacht, and in eleganthotels. In Depression U.S.A., the paperswere glutted with talk of quenelles ofgoose liver and lobster terrine withgolden caviar. The public was apprisedof which chardonnays and cabernetsauvignons were selected by MichaelDeaver, one of Reagan's closest advis­ers, who doubles as the arbiter of spirits.

Security for the queen was tight andexpensive. So tight that in Yosemite aSecret Service car hit one of the sheriff'scars head-on, leaving three security mendead. The queen's security also delayedw,elfare checks in San Francisco in aDickensesque story in which the copstake over the basement of City Hall for acommand post, closing off access to acity computer needed to print the checks(San Francisco Chronicle, 5 March).Plenty was spent on keeping the sacredcow away from the profane commoners.The press reported that in San Francis­co, an entire bathroom was built in theDe Young museum for the queen'spersonal and private use, at a cost of$20,000. The Wolftones, an Irish singinggroup, announced they were releasing anew song about the royal 100 entitled,"?h, The Can Is For The Queen, AndLIkes Was Never Seen."

As the queen made her way up thePacific coast in the royal yacht and Air~orce II, more than the unseasonablyVIolent storms rained on this parade of

MARCH 8-Yesterday the UnitedTransportation Union (UTU) struckthe commuter lines (Metro-North)which run from upstate and Connec­ticut to New York City. Last Tuesdaythe UTU had already shut down NJTransit, and the 160,000 extra com­muters have jammed the roads andsubways.

The Metropolitan TransportationAuthority (MTA) is out to break theback of the UTU locals as part of atakeover of Metro-North. NYC areatransit workers are divided into manydifferent unions and locals, whooften don't honor each other'sstrikes, as the transit bosses pickthem off one by one. But UTU mustnot be left to go it alone! Unionsolidarity, particularly by the power­ful Transport Workers Union Lo·cal100, can beat back MTA strikebreak­mg.

The UTU has been workingwithout a contract since January Iwhen the MTA took over the systemfrom Conrail. The TA wants to chop150 jobs, a quarter of the workforce,cutting anyone with under 15 years.Trainmen and conductors now get noovertime pay and the MTA wants tocut "swing time" pay in half! Not longago the workers were forced to giveup a 12 percent wage increase andmileage pay for the promise thatConrail would keep the bankruptsystem rolling. The union has refusedto submit to binding arbitration. Theworkers are fed up with bailing outthe railroad companies.

It could be a long strike. The MTAis hardlining it. MTA chairmanRavitch says they won't compromiseon the issue of train crew sizes. Raciststrikebreaker mayor Koch urged himto ~'stand fast" against the strikers:"We can do this on one foot." Now

SAN FRANCISCO- Tom Painewrithes in his grave, parents oflunchlessblack school kids burn with anger, Irish­Americans scream with outrage, andevery kind of democrat everywhererecoils in disgust. Queen Elizabeth II­"Queen by the Grace of God andDefender of the Faith"-meets on theWest Coast with Ronald Reagan­"Leader of the Free World and Presi­dent of All the People" (who can affordit). And ten days of spectacular royalinsult are added to the economic andsocial injuries inflicted by imperialism.But for the U.S. bourgeoisie the queen'svisit is a Disneyland carnival of reac­tion, an opportunity to celebrate itssacred principle of social privilege byflaunting a round of festivities thedecadence of which would make an oldRoman slave merchant envious.

The U.S. bourgeoisie started layingout the royal carpet for this symbol ofreaction months before "Her Majesty"stepped off the royal yacht (the world'slargest pleasure craft at 412 feet). Withher were her consort, Prince Philip, herladies in waiting, her chefs and foodtasters, and the whole complement oftraveling grovellers. Reagan, Californiagovernor George Deukmejian, theDemocratic mayors and their protocolexperts made out the royal guest listsand had the Union Jack strewn acrossbuilding fronts and hung from lamppoles from L.A. to Seattle.

The sycophantic press, particularlyon the West Coast, curtsied dutifully,

2 WORKERS VANGUARD

r

Auto Militants Camp!ign for Sitdowns Not Sou~ Lines

Fremont UAW Local SaysDefeat Union-Busting!

mont must not be the spearhead forsuccessful union-busting.

From the time the auto companiesstarted their big layoffs UAW presidentFraser has been using the sucker-bait ofracist anti-Japanese protectionism torelieve the UAW bureaucracy of anyresponsibility of fighting the autocompanies. Fraser aims to line autbworkers up behind their "own" autobosses, blaming the layoffs on Japaneseauto workers. Protectionism is the sameline used by capitalist politicians likeDemocrat Mondale. Japanese andother foreign workers are not ourenemy. The real enemy is right here athome: the auto companies, the govern­ment and both the Democratic andRepublican parties. They are all lined upin a campaign to force auto workers andother industrial workers to work at non­union wage levels and working condi­tions with Fraser & Co. as the enforcers.

In fact Fraser is inviting Japanese andother foreign producers to seek maxi­mum concessions in wage cuts andspeedup, using multi-billion dollarconcessions already given to the Big 3 asa precedent! He assured GM!Toyotathat he is "ready to sit down andnegotiate on all issues, including newwork methods which we are actuallyalready using at GM and Ford." (L.A.Times 2(19(83). Right now in DetroitUAW officials are in negotiations withFord, preparing massive concessions inwages and incentive pay so that Fordcan sell 75 percent of its steel-makingoperation at the River Rouge plant to aJapanese steel company. Yet Fraser isstill pushing the anti-Japanese chauvin­ism, trying to present this union-bustingdeal at Fremont as Toyota's responsibil­ity and GM as "reasonable". GM is infact the senior partner in this deal.Toyota is coming in as a partner withGM to offset protectionist measures likethe "local content" bill being pushed byFraser. They're going to try for an openshop, or failing that, hire who they wantand hold new union representationelections starting from scratch withmassive takeaways. If the UAW gets anykind of representation of the youngerworkforce the companies have in mind,GM(Toyota are insisting on "flexible

continued on page 15

bers, strictly by seniority, with fullcontract rights on wages and workingconditions.

The GM(Toyota union-busting dealis being followed very closely nationallyby big business. Articles and editorialsappearing in the Wall Street Journaland New York Times make it clear thatthis is seen as a prototype for not onlyauto, but other industries. Therefore theFebruary 27 Local 1364 motion de­manding strict recall rights and unionconditions has been widely publicized innewspapers and on radio. The LosAngeles Times (March 3, 1983) notes:

"For General Motors the re-opening ofthe plant is an opportunity to see if abelligerent union local can be pushedinto concessions on hiring, wages andwork rules which could set a pattern fora new nationwide auto workers' con­tract when the present one expires inSeptember of 1984."

This fight is a challenge to the UAWand the entire labor movement. Fre-

LA Times

~r

Patrick Mason

.'

been posed here are tremendous, for theUAWand the entire American labormovement. If the auto bosses can getaway with this outrage in a strongholdof organized labor like the Bay Areathey will try it everywhere else.

The UAWand the entire Bay Arealabor movement must take resoluteaction to stop this union-busting attack!Every tactic necessary must be used,from mass picketing to seal off the plant,stopping any non-union labor fromgoing in for any work, to plant occupa­tions. GM is already placing orders fornew equipment. Our bottom line mustbe that nothing goes in or out of thatplant until G M and Toyota agree thatall hiring will be laid-off UAW mem-

ing agent. Smith said the plant could benon-union, noting: "We have operated anon-union plant in Anaheim in excess ofnearly twenty years." (Detroit FreePress, February 18, 1983). This is adirect and calculated attack on theUAWand industrial unionism itself.The consequences of the battle that have

notorious Los Angeles-area policeknow they can get away with murderand will be protected, especially if it's ablack man, or woman, or even a five­year-old child that they wantonly blowaway.

We say, jail the racist, killer cop! Asociety so poisoned with racism thatthe forces of "law and order" breakinto our homes and slaughter even ourchildren is surely near its own deathagony. For socialist revolution tosweep away the decaying capitalistsystem and its racist, murderingcops!

Racist License to Kill

The bourgeois press is whitewashingthis cruel, insane murder. They'replaying up Sperl's "remorse." But itwas no accident. The racially inte­grated apartment building that Patri­cia Ridge and her son lived in isconsidered "anti-police" by the cops­in other words, it has as tenants someof the few blacks who live in OrangeCounty. So when the cops got aroutine complaint that the little boyhadn't been in his kindergarten classlately (he had been home sick), theycame in armed and ready to kill. Thisracist, capitalist state gives its policelicense to kill at will. Especially the

In Orange County, heart of "ReaganCountry," there's no other recourse ifyou're black and poor; even withwelfare plus lousy "workfare" jobs,you can't make ends meet. How wasshe supposed to know that some killercops were going to come through hercarefully locked front door, then break'down her bedroom door, then cold­bloodedly shoot down her baby?!!!

Stop GM/ToyotaUnion Busting!

At the Union meeting on February27. Local 1364 members voted over­whelming!y to pass the followingmotion:

"l' AW LCh:al 1364 will use everv tacticnecessary to ensure that all hiring at there-opened Fremont plant will be UA Wmembers strictly according to thesenIOrity agreement, and that there willbe no substandard contract in wagesand working conditions."

The motion was raised by Ruth Ryanand Karen Allen of the UAW MilitantCaucus, a class struggle opposition witha ten year history in the Local, inresponse to General Motors and Toyo­ta's statements that they had no inten­tions of rehiring the thousands of laidoff Fremont UAW members.

Union members were outraged onFebruary 17 when General Motors andToyota announced their union-bustingplans. Both G M chairman Roger Smithand Toyota chairman Eiji Toyoda saidthe "new company" would not recognizethe recall and seniority rights of UAWmembers and furthermore they did noteven recognize the UAW as the bargain-

year. These workers, too, would fightfor their jobs. The traitorous leadershipof Solidarity House is the roadblockthat must be cleared away.

We reprint below a leaflet of theUA W Militant Caucus-being distrib­uted by caucus members and supportersat unemployment offices and unionpolling places in San Jose, Fremont andOakland-which exemplifies the pro­gram and struggle that are needed on anational scale to dump the sell-outFraser gang and build a class-struggleleadership in the UAW.

LOS ANGELES-On March 3 a copin Orange County drew his gun andforced his way into a Stanton apart­ment home. The apartment seemedempty, but the policeman, AnthonySperl, thought he heard a "noise"-sohe kicked in the bedroom door andshot and killed a five-year-old child.The little boy, Patrick Mason, washome alone watching TV, carefullylocked in by his mother, who wasworking nights as an auto mechanic tosupport him. The cop said he thoughthe saw a "gun" and just opened fire,shooting the child through the neck.Patrick was apparently playing with alittle plastic toy pistol. just like anyother American kid. Except he wasblack. So now he's dead.

Killer cop Sperl has already beencleared by the police in a preliminaryinvestigation. And who are the policetrying to blame it all on? The child'smother, Patricia Ridge! "Police saidthey are considering investigating herfor child neglect," reported the LosAngeles Times (5 March). PatriciaRidge, a single mother, was out thatnight working to support her family.

Jail L.A. Killer Cop]

Racist Child Murder

FREMONT, California-United AutoWorkers (U AW) members here de­clared their intention to beat the union­busting challenge made when GeneralMotors and Toyota announced theywould reopen the Fremont plant with­out obligation to the workers laid offwhen the G M plant closed one year ago.Over the objections of representativesof the UAW International, which is ask­ing G M and Toyota for a substandardagreement. local members voted toserve notice to union chief Doug Fraserthat there will be no new wage-cutting!speed-up contract at Fremont.

UAW militants Karen Allen andRuth Ryan told WV they raised themotion at a February 27 local meetingattended by about a hundred members.The motion passed overwhelmingly. Itwas reprinted in articles in the OaklandTribune. the San Jose MerCUri'. the SanFrancisco Examiner. the Los AngelesTimes and broadcast on KSAN andKCBS radio. Several papers quotedRyan's call for tactics ranging fromdemonstrations to sitdowns to imple­ment the motion. Not only the bour­geoisie and its press but also theorganized working class is watchingFremont as a precedent-one way or theother.

Auto workers want to fight for theirjobs. Hundreds showed up spontane­ously at the Fremont union hall andmilled about in anger after the GM!Toyota press conference. In Los An­geles, 500 laid-off GM workers demon­strated March I at the Van Nuys GMplant to demand the reopening of thesecond shift. The Milpitas Ford plant, astone's tltrow from Fremont, and thehistoric Fisher Body plant in Flint,Michigan (where the great 1937 sit­down strikes won industrial unionism inauto) are both scheduled to close this

11 MARCH 1983 3

A Soartacist """"""" 2S<

Black Historyand the

, 'IBfS,Jtruggle~(. '.L~ • -,'. f '.;1-"',;". "

25C

Spartacist PamphletMake checks payable/mail to:Spartacist Publishing Co.,Box 1377 GPO, New York, NY 10116

139, 7 January 1977, for fuller docu­mentation). This CP racist filth is thekind of garbage even the FBI wasn'tbuying back then! And when the U.S.unleashed the world's first nuclearholocaust over Hiroshima andNagasaki-primarily as a warning tothe Soviet Union since Japan wasalready defeated-the CP hailed thiscrime against humanity as part of "waragainst fascism." So no wonder todaythe CP pretends it's all news to them,simply printing a bland article support­ing the commission's findings in theDaily World (25 February) titled"WWll internments racist." They cer­tainly ought to know.

The CP did offer an "excuse" for itsactions, in a buried aside in a bookreview some years ago. Albert J. Limawrote. in an article titled "Racism-abone in the throat of the labor move­ment" (World Magazine, I January1972) that:

"When the war between the UnitedStates and Japan began in the midst ofWWll. the U.S. Army decided to roundup all people of Japanese ancestry andto herd them into concentration campson the West Coast. Among others whofailed to fight this vicious racist actionwhich violated the most fundamentaldemocratic rights in our country wasthe Communist Party."Under a slogan of 'unity' in thestruggles against fascism and Japaneseimperialism. the Party allowed this actto go unchallenged. decided to dropJapanese from membership. and al­lowed their members to go to concen­tration camps."

How can any ethnic minority today, anyblack, any Latin, any "illegal alien" orrefugee, trust the CP-who sent even itsown members to the brutal concentra­tion camps without a whimper? Theybetrayed when the heat was really on,because their fundamental loyalty is notto the oppressed and working class, butto their "own" imperialist bourgeoisie.

1t's ironic that this Congressionalcommission today bemoans the "racialprejudice and war hysteria" of 40 yearsago directed against Japanese Ameri­cans just as the ruling class is waging ahysterical trade war against its imperial­ist rival Japan, encouraging workers tosuch chauvinist stunts as smashingToyotas in union parking lots. And onceagain the Communist Party is goingalong with "its own" bourgeoisie,encouraging protectionist poison. At arecent Flint, Michigan, UAW unem­ployment rally a supporter of the CP'sDaily World put up a resolution callingfor support to the UAW bureaucracy's"domestic content" bill, which only pitsAmerican auto workers against theirclass brothers and sisters in Japaneseauto plants, instead of against their realenemy, the capitalist employers.

They said the concentration campscould never happen here-but they did,and they're still here. kept ready andwaiting for the next "national emergen­cy." The war-fever of the Americanruling class, today directed centrallyagainst the Soviet Union, will destroy usall-unless we stop them. Today it is theSpartacist League, which carries on therevolutionary internationalist traditionthe Socialist Workers Party long agoabandoned, that offers the program andorganization that can unite the workersand oppressed minorities in successfulbattle against the American rulingclass.•

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massive concentration camps, but thatRoosevelt simply ignored their reports.So between the imperialist bourgeoisie'sneed to whip up U.S. war fever after thedebacle of Pearl Harbor and historicanti-Oriental racism, egged on byCalifornia agribusinesses eager to grabJapanese American farmers' land, theracist deed was done.

Who protested at the time? Only theTrotskyists-and a very few individuals,like Norman Thomas, and the Quakers.The American Trotskyists of the then­revolutionary Socialist Workers Party(SWP), although themselves sharplypersecuted by the ruling class for theiroppcsition to the imperialist World War11, offered what aid they could to theJapanese Americans. In March 1942 theSWP's Militant attacked the "brutaland indiscriminate witchhunt beingconducted against non-citizens," whilethe 30 May 1942 issue charged theroundup was "a repressive measure,based purely on racial discriminationand motivated chiefly by the desires ofBig Business for additional profits,which is presented as a necessary part ofthe 'war for democracy'."

Who did not utter a word of protest atthe time was, shamefully andscandalously in view of their preten­sions to represent the working class andoppressed, the American CommunistParty. Indeed, even the bourgeoisCongress today has gone further in"self-criticism" than the CPUSA everhas for its despicable actions duringWorld War II. The CP and its DailyWorker pledged total loyalty to Roose­velt, enthusiastically participating in theslander attacks on the Japanese Ameri­cans. The Sunday Worker (25 January1942) was but one example, carrying anarticle titled "Pearl Harbor Holds VitalLesson for Cuba," containing such vileslanders as "the fifth column of PearlHarbor was formed by the Japanese ofHonolulu," who had supposedly led theJapanese planes to their targets by"arrows made on the canefields" (see"The Agony of Japanese Americans inU.S. Concentration Camps," WV No.

#4;;{~

NOTiCE

blocks, bleeding profusely from thehead, to find the police. He pleadedwith them to save his friends, but thecops did nothing. As more youths de­scended on the car Donald Coopertoo ran for his life. But Willie Turks,his arm in a cast, was dragged fromthe car, clubbed, and left lying on asewer with his skull cracked and hisface beaten in. A few hours later hedied.

Willie Turks' murderers should belocked up and the key thrown away.But that won't end such lynch mobattacks. Black transit workers stillhave to travel through the Gravesendneighborhood every day to get towork, and blacks in the Marlboroughprojects face racist abuse all the time.TWU militants have fought foreffective union action to stop suchracist atrocities. In a leaflet and atunion meetings last summer theycalled for jailing the murderers, forthe right to armed self-defense, andcalled on the union to send hundredsof flatbed trucks with thousands ofunion brothers and sisters ready todefend the right of black people towalk the streets of Brooklyn. It willtake such integrated working-classaction, not reliance on the racist"justice" of bourgeois courts andcops, to stop the lynchers in theirtracks.

It can'thappen here?

In 1942Japanese

Americanswere

ordered toconcentration

camps likeManzanar

(above).

documented act of espionage, sabotageor fifth column activity was committed

--by an American citizen of Japaneseancestry or by a resident Japanese alien"(New York Times, 25 February). TheCommission's report noted that eventhe FBI and members of naval intelli­gence at the time saw no need for the

Put Away the Killersof Willie Turks!

The murderers' of Willie Turksmust not go free! As we go to press,Gino Bova, charged with murder ofthe black NYC transit worker, wasconvicted by a virtually all-white juryof the lesser charge of second degreemanslaughter. This is a racist out­rage! There is no justice for the blackman in the bourgeois courts! Bova,one of 15 to 20 white hoodlumsinvolved in the lynch mob murder,struck Turks in the head five or tentimes with a stick. Now the jury saysthere was no intent to kill! Theverdict is of a piece with efforts by thedefense attorney to portray thevictims of this racist atrocity as thecriminals, saying Bova was "just ayoung man trying to defend afriend"!

At the trial Dennis Dixon, one ofthe assaulted transit workers, re­counted the horror of racist mobterror in the Gravesend section ofBrooklyn last June 22. When thethree black workers left the bagelshop that night, a group of whitepunks surrounded their car yelling,"What are you niggers doing in thisarea? Niggers get out!" They rockedthe car and smashed the windowswith sticks, cans and debris. Dixon,who went down after being struck inthe face by a bottle, managed toscramble away and run several

Who Was Guiltl of the Crime Against Jap]nese Americans

The Infamy of America'sConcentration Camps

Some 120,000 Japanese Americanswere rounded up and incarcerated inbarbed-wire concentration camps by theAmerican government during WorldWar II. This infamous crime against anentire ethnic group, victims of capitalistAmerica's war hysteria, was perpetratedat the highest levels, by "New Deal"president Franklin D. Roosevelt andother prominent liberals, including thenCalifornia attorney general Earl War­ren. Now after some 40 years of buryingthis bourgeois atrocity, finally a Con­gressional commission decided to "in­vestigate" and has concluded thatindeed a "grave injustice" was done tothe Japanese Americans. Maybe, thecommittee announced, they'll evenconsider giving some reparations-as ifany amount of money could evercompensate for the savage degradation,the vile humiliation of enforced "loyaltyoaths" to the state that imprisonedthem, the homes and livelihoods andland ripped away forever by the racistAmerican state. As a recent TV movie"Farewell to Manzanar" movinglyshowed, the years of imprisonment ofthis deeply assimilationist minorityliterally destroyed the lives and hopesand self-esteem of many.

The Congressional "Commission onWartime Relocation and Internment ofCivilians," which also castigated thebrutal forced relocation of the nativepeople of the Aleutian Islands (some 10percent of whom died as a result of theuprooting), coric[uat~~7'c()rnary24that the concentration camps weremotivated by "racial prejudice, warhysteria and failure of political leader­ship." In fact, it reported, "not a single

4 WORKERS VANGUAR[

Mugabe Unleashes Tribal Vendetta

Joshua Nkomo

proletarian leadership in the struggle fornational liberation and democraticrights, aiming at a workers and peasantsgovernment. What is needed for genuinenational and social emancipation is aTrotskyist vanguard party steeled incombat against nationalist demagoguesof the Mugabe type.

In southern Africa the key topermanent revolution lies in the five­million strong' black proletariat ofSouth Africa, the industrial powerhouseof the entire continent. As we wroteright after Mugabe came to power (WVNo. 256, 16 May 1980):

"... an isolated workers state inZimbabwe with an unchallenged apart­heid regime next door could notmaintain itself for more than the shortterm. But a black workers revolutionwhich began in Zimbabwe, led by aTrotskyist party, would almost certain­ly detonate a mass upsurge by thepowerful South African proletariat.".

AI'Mugabe's Zimbabwe has emerged as

the most pro-Western of the so-calledfrontline states bordering South Africa.It can be described as a neo-colonyshared in different ways among Brit­ain, the United States and SouthAfrica. It is heavily economicallydependent upon apartheid imperialism,and has even agreed to honor the debtsincurred to South Africa by the formerwhite-settler regime of Ian Smith! TheMugabe regime has also prevented theguerrilla forces of the African NationalCongress from using Zimbabweanterritory to attack its "good neighbor"South Africa. And Washington expectsthat Mugabe's Zimbabwe will playahelpful role in imposing the "Zimbabwesolution" on Namibia! We say: Downwith the neo-colonial "Zimbabwe solu­tion"! Independence for Namibia­Military victory to SWAPO!

Petty-bourgeois nationalists in powerhave demonstrated time after time theirreactionary character. Zimbabwe isonly one more example in a very longlist. The only perspective for the toilingtrulsses<Q.f ;z,itq1411mx~, as '*NI as tbgse ofCentral America and a j baCKwardcapitalist countries dominated by impe­rialism, is that of permanent revolution:

A black African ruler massacring hisown black subjects does not undulyupset his imperialist overseers. And forWashington, Mugabe's Zimbabwe re­mains a success. The Reagan adminis­tration, which does not exactly go out ofits way to woo black African states,nonetheless renewed the $75 million inaid to Zimbabwe originally granted byCarter.

If Reagan's Washington smiles benef­icently upon Mugabe's Zimbabwe, it isin large measure because this blackAfrican regime maintains good andclose relations with South Africa.White-ruled South Africa has increas­ingly become a central part of the "freeworld" as Reagan encourages theapartheid state in its war against theSoviet-armed SW APO guerrillas inNamibia and its attempt to overthrowthe Soviet-allied nationalist MPLAgovernment in Angola, which is de­fended by 15,000 Cuban troops.

Mugabe'stroops beat

suspect.

Smash U.S./South Africa Axis!

by the leftist cheerleaders of "ThirdWorld" nationalists. "ZimbabweMasses Sweep Out Settler Regime!"cheered Workers World in 1980, whilethe SWP's Militant called it a "Victoryfor Black Freedom," the Maoist Unityproclaimed a "Historic Victory" and thechic radical Guardian announced a"People's Victory." Meanwhile. thevictorious Mugabe, whom an aidedescribed as standing somewhere "be­tween Swedish social democracy andYugoslav socialism." declared his loy­alty to capitalism at the very outset ofhis rule:

"We recognize that the economicstructure is based on capitalism and thatwhatever ideas we have we must buildon that. We are not going to interferewith private property whether it be themining sector or the industrial sector."

-:Yen' York Times. 5 March1980

But the masses still had illusions in the"socialist" rhetoric of Mugabe's ZANU.and the 1980 elections gave his party anoverwhelming majority. The electionsalso exposed the tribalist roots of theenmity between Mugabe and Nkomo.Mugabe got the votes of the Shona­speaking people, who comprise 80percent of the population, while Nko­mo's ZAPU vote was pretty muchlimited to the Ndebeles of Matabele­land. Nkomo initially served in Mu­gabe's cabinet, but beginning in early1982 the drive toward a tribalist "one­party" state began in earnest. Nkomowas dismissed from the cabinet and histwo closest aides from the guerrilla dayswere arrested on charges of treason. Atthe same time. hundreds of ZAPUactivists have been arrested. In re­sponse, thousands of Nkomo's follow­ers from the former guerrilla organiza­tion deserted the army and fled back toMatabeleland. Nkomo. who deniesleading the "dissidents," was detainedlast month, while Mugabe's forces havecreated a tribalist reign of terror inMatabeleland. Zimbabwean troops outof Matabeleland!

Fake-lefthailed"Marxist"Mugabe.

pro-Reagan London Economist (19February) argues that the Salvadoranleftist guerrillas should be induced to laydown their arms and accept imperialist­organized elections. The precedent: "alargish international peacekeepingforce of the kind sent to Zimbabwe in1980 could give them [the leftist guerril­las] the protection they need." Zim­babwe (formerly Rhodesia) is thus heldup as a model for "peaceful" reform asopposed to violent revolution.

Similarly, the Dissent Paper on ElSalvador and Central America, pro­duced in late 1980 by former StateDepartment analysts, has a wholesection on the "Zimbabwe option."These imperialist braintrusters pointedout that. as in EI Salvador. a section ofthe guerrilla leadership in Rhodesia­Zimbabwe called itself Marxist: "Mr.

Mugabe was a marxist extremist withlimited representation until his land­slide electoral victory made him a pres­tigious and influential head of state."And now Mr. "Marxist" Mugabe is oneof America's best friends in blackAfrica.

The "Zimbabwe Solution":Blueprint for Neo-ColonialOppression

"Zimbabwe Is a Success" declares thetitle of a recent article by the formerdeputy chief of the U.S. mission inHarare (formerly Salisbury). JeffreyDavidow (Foreign Policy, Winter 1982­83). And Zimbabwe is a success forimperialist policymakers. In 1980 theblack nationalist guerrilla leaders Rob­ert Mugabe and Joshua Nkomo wel­comed the return of white-ruled Rhode­sia to the status of a British colony sothat 1,200 Commonwealth troops undergovernor Lord Soames could super­vise an election. The imperialist­orchestrated deal left intact much of thewhite colonial-settler order, and the newconstitution guaranteed the whites 20percent of the seats in parliament. Theprivileged white population, who com­prise only 3 percent of the country's 7 .million inhabitants, continue to hold onto nearly half the farmland, includingthe choicest acreage. Indeed, the num­ber of white commercial farmers hasactually increased since independence.And the American diplomat Davidowobserves that "as the third academicyear after independence begins, theexcellent government schools in Har­are's posh northern suburbs remainnearly lily white."

Yet Robert Mugabe, who typicallystyled himself a "Marxist," was hailed

ChicagoTues.: 5:30-9:00 p.m., Sat.. 2:00-5:30 pm523 S. Plymouth Court, 3rd FloorChicago, Illinois Phone: (312) 427-0003

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Public Offices-MARXIST LlTERATURE­

Bay AreaFri.: 5:00-8:00 pm, Sat: 3:00-600 p.m.1634 Telegraph, 3rd Floor (near 17th Street)Oakland, California Phone: (415) 835-1535

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At a mISSIOn hospital in southernZimbabwe a frightened 13-year-oldNdebele girl said that governmenttroops came and demanded to knowwhere the "dissidents" were. "Tell US, orwe will kill you," they ordered. Thegroup of villagers she was among wasforced into huts, which the soldiers thenset afire while shooting into them. Thegirl, who suffered gunshot wounds inher shoulder and arms and burns allover arms and back, was the only one tosurvive the massacre. Similar scenes ofterror are occurring throughout the areapopulated by the Ndebele tribe. In mid­February, Zimbabwe premier RobertMugabe unleashed his praetorianguard, the North Korean-trained FifthBrigade, to rampage in Matabeleland"until all dissidents are eliminated.""Dissidents" are followers of Mugabe's

rival, Joshua Nkomo. So far, the NewYork Times (27 February) reports that"more than a thousand people havebeen killed and many more beaten andtortured by Zimbabwe's army in the lastmonth."

The eruption of state terror in thissouthern African neo-colony is ofspecial importance because the "Zim­babwe solution" has been explicitlypeddled by imperialist spokesmen as amodel to be applied from South Africa­ruled Namibia to EI Salvador. Whenevera reactionary regime could fall to left­ist or nationalist guerrilla forces, someimperialist policymakers put forward a"negotiated solution" to save the bour­geois army from a shattering militarydefeat. For example, the conservative.

Zimbabwe "Solution":Neo-Colonial Chains

11 MARCH 1983 5

Lebanon erupted Into civil war and communalist bloodshed, 1975-76: Rightist Christian Maronites (left) battle Palestinian commandos (right).

-------,After Lebanon:----'--­The Left and the Palestinian Question

From the'~rab Revolution"to Pal Americana

The myth of "Arab unity" behind thePalestinian cause was buried along withmuch else in the rubble of Tyre, Sidonand West Beirut. The indifference, tosay the least, of Arab capitals to Israel'sdestruction of the Palestine LiberationOrganization (PLO) was so striking thatimperialist and Zionist spokesmen havebeen positively crowing about it. Forexample, a prominent American Zion­ist, Aaron D. Rosenbaum, recently

PART THREE

exulted in an article entitled "DiscardConventional Wisdom":

"Israel invaded Lebanon, besieged anArab capital, and inflicted a tellingdefeat upon the Palestine LiberationOrganization (PLO). Yet throughoutthe summer the reaction and retributionmany authorities had predicted did notoccur. The Soviet Union did notintervene. The Arab states did notmobilize to relieve the PLO nor did theysever relations with the United States."

-Foreign Policy, Winter 1982-83The "conventional wisdom" whichRosenbaum urges be discarded isespecially common to the enthusiasts of"Third World" nationalism in the left.

Lebanon demonstrated that when thelate Anwar Sadat embraced the Zionistbutcher Menachem Begin and signed a"separate peace" with Israel, the Egyp­tian rais (strongman) did not reallyisolate himself from the other Arabregimes; he merely anticipated them bya few years. Israel could not haveinvaded Lebanon without first securingits southern border with Egypt, thestrongest state militarily in the Arabworld. The genocidal terror against thePalestinians in Lebanon is the directresult of Pax Americana in the NearEast, i.e., Washington's forging of ananti-Soviet alliance embracing bothZionist Israel and various Arab regimes,centrally Egypt. Indeed, Begin justifiedthe invasion by claiming that in recent

6

years; "Lebanon became a Soviet basefor the whole of the Middle East."

The 1973 War andthe Reversal of Alliances

The October 1973 war was decisive inthe transformation of Egypt from theprincipal Soviet client state to thepivotal American client among the Arabstates. Following the debacle in the 1967war, Nasser put out feelers for Washing­ton to broker a deal with Israel. TheNixon gang told the Egyptians that ifthey wanted to get the Sinai back, theywould have to formally recognize theZionist state, openly repudiate Palestin­ian national liberation, break theSoviet connection and become a U.S.client. In brief, Washington aimed tobring about, in Kissinger's words, "areversal of alliances in the Arab world."

When Nasser died in 1970, hissuccessor, Sadat, accelerated the turntoward Pax Americana. In July 1972 thenew Egyptian leader signalled in theclearest possible way his willingness tobecome Washington's man againstMoscow. He expelled the 15,000 Sovietmilitary advisers from Egypt, a rebuffwhich did not prevent the Kremlinbureaucrats from continuing to showerarmaments on its ungrateful friend andsoon-to-be enemy. We wrote at the time:

"Thus, the road for Egypt to regain theIsraeli-occupied territories no longerpasses through Moscow but throughWashington.... By expelling the Rus­sians, Sadat has eliminated at least oneof the U.S. rationales for supportingIsrael: as a bulwark against Commu­nism. Sadat would like to return to thefold of U.S. imperialism.... "

-"Murderous Nationalism andStalinist Betrayal in the NearEast," WV No. 12, October1972

Israel, however, remained intransi­gent, and the Nixon administration wasreluctant to press its ally too hard in partfor fear of antagonizing the powerfulAmerican Zionist lobby. So Sadat

decided he had to do something to shakeIsrael's confidence, increase his ownfreedom of maneuver and draw U.S.imperialism more actively into the"peacemaking" process. Hence, theOctober War.

On 6 October 1973 Sadat ordered theEgyptian army to cross the Suez Canaland attack the supposedly impregnableBar-Lev line, while the Syrians attackedon the Golan Heights. Caught bysurprise the Israelis fell back sufferingheavy casualties, but in a week or socounterattacked effectively on both theEgyptian and Syrian fronts. Anotherweek of complex negotiations betweenWaShington, Moscow, Jerusalem andCairo produced a shaky cease-fire inplace.

Israel, however, disregarded thiscease-fire and moved to destroy theEgyptian Third Army trapped on theeast bank of the Suez Canal. At thispoint Sadat called upon both Washing­ton and Moscow to send its troops toenforce the cease-fire. Trying to maneu­ver the U.S. into policing Israel, theKremlin strongly endorsed the Egyptianappeal. The Nixon gang reacted bydramatically reminding Brezhnev thatIsrael was an ally of the U.S. against theSoviet Union. On October 24 the WhiteHouse ordered a worldwide "Condition3" nuclear alert supposedly to "forestallRussian aggression." And this wasthe heyday of detente! The Sovietleaders, of course, had no intention ofunilateral military intervention.

The October War thus demonstratedhow easily the Arab-Israeli conflictcould escalate into nuclear war betweenU.S. imperialism and the Soviet Union.In this respect the Near East todayresembles the Balkans before WorldWar I. However, unlike the inter­imperialist rivalry which exploded intowar in August 1914, there exists a classline between the imperialist UnitedStates and the Soviet bureaucratically

degenerated workers state. As we wroteimmediately after the October War andWashingon's nuclear "alert":

"The fundamental hostility of U. S.imperialism to the Russian d"egeneratedworkers state tends to drive them intomilitary conflict, even in situationswhere the leaders of the two nationswant to avoid such confrontations. Forthat reason, it is necessary for revolu­tionary socialists faced with local wars,such as the present Arab-Israeli con­flict, to warn the working masses of thedanger of World War III and the needto defend the Soviet Union."

-"More War Ahead!",WV No. 32.9 November 1973

Once again, as in 1967, much of thepseudo-left rallied to the defense of thefictitious "Arab revolution," this timeunder that unlikely champion Anwar al­Sadat. For example, the not very UnitedSecretariat of Ernest Mandel and theAmerican Socialist Workers Party(SWP) declared: "The fourth Arab­Israeli war of autumn 1973 is a newphase in the armed resistance of theArab peoples to the counterrevolution­ary policy of aggression systematicallypracticed by the Zionist state" ("For theDefeat of Zionism and Imperialism!"Intercontinental Press, 5 November1973).

The elevation of Sadat to leader of theArab peoples against imperialism wasgrotesque. Nasser, at least, had nation­alized the Suez Canal and establishedclose ties with the Soviet bloc. But Sadathad already demonstrated his pro­imperialist orientation by expelling theSoviet advisers from Egypt and aban­doning Nasserite pan-Arab rhetoric.

Why then did he attack Washington'smain ally in the Near East, ZionistIsrael? In order to create the politicalconditions for a deal with Israel at theexpense of both the Palestinians and hisArab allies. As Kissinger explained,Sadat aimed to produce a crisis which"would enable both sides, includingEgypt, to show a flexibility that was

WORKERS VANGUARD

Kretz/SternU.S. nuclear arsenal targeted at Soviet Union. In 1973 Arab-Israeli war,Nixon/Kissinger ordered "Condition 3" nuclear alert.

fighting the plebeian masses forced the mouns, were able to mobilize the entirearmy to withdraw. This event foresha- Christian community by appealing to itsdowed the outbreak of civil war two ancient fear of Muslim domination.months later. And left organizations which joined

The civil war was triggered in April Jumblatt's National Movement, in1975 when a busload of Palestinians was particular the Lebanese Communistambushed and massacred by the fascis- Party (PCL), were completely eliminat-tic Phalange of Pierre Gemayel, the ed from the Christian areas. A book byprincipal Christian Maronite organiza- two Lebanese socialist journaliststion. V nderlying the conflict between reported:the Phalange and the Palestinians and "The PCl, which counted hundreds ofLebanese Muslims was a deep social Christian members and had a dominantd · .. Th H v k T.' 19 J I influence in some Christian villages.

IVlSlOn. e Hew L ~~ l,:,es ~ u y saw its membership and its influence in1975) reported that the flghtlOg was the Mount lebanon area crumble in asomething of a class war between the few monlhs. Communist militants werehaves, who are for the most part chased out or massacred, and theirChristians and the have-nots who are houses burn~d. .

, , "By gOing In on the Mushm con-fo~ the ~ost part M?slems and who .ar.e fessionalists' game, the PCl was able toalhed With the heaVily armed PalestlOl- implant itself in the Muslim areas ofan guerrilla movement." Beirut: but at the same time it lost most

Had a revolutionary Marxist party of its ranks in the Christian regi?ns."h f h P I ,. -Sehm AccaoUi and Maglda

stood at t e head 0 tea estlOlan and Salman ComprendrLebanese Muslim toilers, it would have Ie Liba~ (1976) eput forward a socialist program capable ..of attracting the have-nots in the The change~character ?f the CIVIl warChristian community, splitting and was unhappily recogmzed by theweakening the base of the Gemayels and PFLPer al-Haytham: .Chamouns Instead the struggles of the "The.battles started <i.s a .flght between

. . . reactIOnary and progreSSIve forces andLebanese Muslim toIlers and PLO ended up as a fight between Muslimscommandos were channeled into the and Christians, principally Maronites.efforts of the Muslim establishment to Whether or not we like to admit it, it is aincrease its influence in the traditional fact. The battles ended up in the street,

. .. among the ordmary people of lebanon,confeSSIOnal system. A key figure 10 between Christian and Muslim."derailing the incipient social revolution S h t' th "t f If 't". .. ,omew alOe spm 0 se -cn IClsmand tran~formmg It mto communahst al-Haytha~notes that the Palestinians'bloodlettmg was Kamal Jumblatt, . . . . .h d · h d f h D d IOdlscnmmate bombardment of Chns-ere Itary ea 0 t e ruze sect an ., ., h

. ttan neighborhoods 10 Beirut strengt -leader of the so-called Lebanese Natlon- d th h Id f th Ph I the· . ene e 0 0 e a ange overal Movement, which mcluded the M 't. . arom e masses:Important pro-Moscow Commumst "The essential character of the battles inParty and also the small Lebanese Beirut is urban warfare, but the tacticssection of Ernest Mandel's V nited used are those appropriate to theSecretariat. Jumblatt was thus the main mountains-that is, shelling from oneintermediary between the PLO leader- hilltop to another hilltop. In Beirut,

. however, there were a lot of houses andship and Lebanese left on the one hand, civilians between the hilltops This ofand the traditional Muslim clan chiefs, course lent credence to th~ Kataeblike the premier Rashid Karami, on the [Phalange] analysis that it is a battleother. between Christian and Muslim. A

Yet all wings of the PLO-the self- bomb ca~not differentiate bet~een aI d "M . L .." P I progressive and a reactIOnary

stye arxlst- emmst opu ar Christian."Front for the Liberation of Palestine B th b .. f 1976 th h d(PFLP) as well as Arafat's Fatah.".- y e egmnm~ 0 e war ~

b d· d th . f t thO t' become a successIOn of communahstsu or mate elr orces 0 IS sec an-· . massacres and counter-massacres. The

an demagogue, as did the entire Leba- Ph I k d th . ltd M I'. . a ange sac e e ISO a e us 1mnese left from the Stahmsts to the I f Q t" E t B' t. .. . enc ave 0 uaran lOa 10 as elru ,Mandehtes. ThIS hne was stated qUite k'II' I 500 d &' I. . I 109 some, elense ess men,categoncally by PFLP spokesman Yuslf d h'ld Th Ph I and· women an c I reno e a ange~I-Ha~tha~ already 10 an October 1.975 Chamounists also overran and de-mt~rvlew: A~ long as Jum?latt IS a stroyed the Palestinian refugee camp ofmajor leader l~ the.progreSSIve for~es Dbaiye, whose 3,500 inhabitants weret~e ?eman~s w111 be 10 acc?,rdanc~wlt.h Christian Palestinians. In reprisal andhiS Ide?loglc.al framewor~, But 10 thiS to relieve the pressure on other besiegedsam~ mterv.lew he ~dmlts that !u~- Palestinian camps, PLO forces andblatt s base IS feudahst ~nd sectana~, Druze militia attacked the Christian

"Kamal Jumblatt s Progressive . . hSocialist Party is a major component of Village of Damur s?uth of BeIrut, t ethe progressive forces. It is a social home base of CamIlle Chamoun. Da-democratic party, but it is really based mur was then put to the torch, 500on feudal or tribal affiliations. Jumblatt villagers killed and the rest driven outrepresents. the whole D.ruze sect as ~ell at machine-gun point. One youthfulas the SOCial democratic tendency.' . . .

-"lebanon Explodes: 'Battles Palestmlan commando exclaImed:for Survival'," MERIP "From now on, there is going to be noReports No. 44, February 1976 mercy.". They used to say that Damur

Because the PLO and "progressive" is the cemetery of the Palestinians, butLebanese forces fought on behalf of the now it's a cemetery for them" (Newtraditional Muslim clan chiefs like York Times, 22 January 1976).Jumblatt and Karami, the Maronite (In their genocidal campaign againstclan chiefs, the Gemayels and Cha- continued on page 12

.. 4i-T U. S. AIR

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~t~tt tt4'~····8t .•. ,

t

SalhaniiSygmaPLO commandos and Lebanese leftsubordlraated themselves to KamalJumblatt (top), feudallst chieftain ofMoslem Druze sect.

money. Despite a rapidly growing andincreasingly urban population, theGovernment held taxes, and conse­quently expenditures on public services,to a minimum. In the face of rabidinflation, wages were actually keptstable by importing 300,000 Syrianlaborers. This wage-price squeeze pro­duced a spate of violent labor disputesthat touched off the war in 1975."

-New York Times, 9 July 1982In February 1975 the southern city of

Sidon was paralyzed by a fishermen'sstrike against a newly established fishingmonopoly headed by none other thanCamille Chamoun. When a protestmarch was fired upon by soldiers, thecity erupted and in the subsequent street

hower Doctrine" of containing "Sovietaggression."

Eisenhower duly responded, and15,000 Marines waded ashore Beirut'sbeaches in July 1958, The Marines werenot sent simply to preserve Lebanon as apro-Western enclave in the turbulentArab East. The real target of Americanimperialism was the Iraqi revolution,based on the strategic oil workers underCommunist leadership. As it turned out,the Iraqi Stalinists, under orders fromMoscow, betrayed the revolution for thesake of "peaceful coexistence" withEisenhower. In Lebanon, under theguns of the Marines, a deal was workedout by the Christian and Muslim clanchiefs-"no victors, no vanquished"­which preserved the sectarian constitu­tion and Maronite predominance.

However, the steadily growing weightof the Muslim population, concentratedin the lower classes, built up ever greaterpressure against the National Covenant.Adding to the forces potentially arrayedagainst the Maronite elite were thePalestinian commandos, who after the1970 Black September massacre inJordan were concentrated in Lebanon.In fact, Lebanon became the only Arabcountry where the PLO could operatewith any degree of freedom.

The OPEC oil boom of the early1970s, which Lebanon shared as themain financial center and entrepot forthe Arab East, widened the socialdivisions in this bankers' republic.Peasants from the hinterland, mainlyShi'ite Muslims, and migrant workersfrom Syria streamed into Beirut and theother cities looking for work, producinga class of desperate slum dwellers. TheBeirut slums, called the "belt of misery,"existed but a few miles from exclusiveneighborhoods resembling the FrenchRiviera. A liberal American academic,Stanley Reed, describes the situationwhich finally exploded into civil war:

"The conflict occurred because leba­non's political and economic structurecheated too many people in too manyways. The Maronite businessmen andbankers who dominated the countryrefused to part with any of their hugeprofits derived from handling oil

impossible while Israel considered itselfmilitarily supreme and Egypt wasparalyzed by humiliation" (emphasis inoriginal, Years of Upheaval [1982]). Atthe end of the war America's would-beMetternich concluded, "Sadat wasstaking his future on American diplo­matic support rather than Soviet mili­tary pressure" (Ibid.).

The 1979 Washington-drafted CampDavid Accords was the intended resultof Sadat's limited action against Israelsix years earlier. A little noticed aspectof this agreement (except by the Penta­gon) was the introduction of V.S."peacekeeping" forces into the Sinai.(Here Sadat anticipated his then neme­sis, PLO chief Arafat.) The "separatepeace" with Egypt enabled the Zionistmilitarists to concentrate their warmachine against the rest of the Arabworld, especially the Palestinians. A fewmonths after Sadat flew to Jerusalem in1977 to embrace Begin, Israel celebratedthe event by invading southern Leba­non, a dress rehearsal for its full-scaleblitzkrieg last summer.

The 1975-76 Lebanese Civil War:From Social Conflictto Communalist Bloodletting

With Israel's invasion and occupationof Lebanon the Palestinian nationalliberation struggle has suffered a histor­ic defeat. The PLO commandos arescattered in concentration camps acrossthe Arab world, while the half millionPalestinians in Lebanon face genocidalterror at the hands of the Israeli armyand Christian Maronite militias. F01­lowing the lead of Sadat, PLO chiefArafat has turned openly to PaxAmericana, brokering the introductionof U.S. Marines and also French andItalian troops into Lebanon.

The Lebanese catastrophe is not, asmany of the PLO's left apologistscontend, a "moral" or "political victo­ry." Rather the defeat in Lebanon was aculmination of the entire past history ofthe PLO, its dependence upon one oranother of the Arab bourgeois statesand consequent principle of "non­interference in the internal affairs ofArab countries."

In early 1975 Lebanon stood on thebrink of a social revolution which couldhave radically altered the politicalsituation in the entire region, mostimmediately by extending itself to Syria.But the PLO leadership subordinated itsforces to the traditional Muslim clanchiefs, notably Druze sect head KamalJumblatt, and so contributed to thesubsequent communalist bloodletting.

The entity known as Lebanon is aclassic product of imperialist divide­and-rule policies. France, which alongwith Britain carved up the Ottomanempire in the Near East after WorldWar I, created a separate Lebanon inorder to maintain a base of supportamong the Maronite Christian commu­nity which feared incorporation into apredominantly Muslim Greater Syria.The French colonialist system of Mar­onite privilege was preserved in the so­called 1943 National Covenant, whenLebanon became independent afterWorld War II. The president wouldalways be a Maronite, the premier aSunni Muslim, the president of theChamber of Deputies a Shi'ite Muslim,and so on. The Christians were allocateda six-to-five majority in parliament, andmore importantly the military officercaste was drawn predominantly fromthe Maronite elite.

However, Christian Maronite domi­nation in this pro-Western outpostincreasingly came into conflict withdemographic and social developmentswithin Lebanon and the rise of Arabnationalism in the region. The confes­sional system first broke down in 1958when the Muslim establishment led anuprising against the attempt of Maro­nite president Camille Chamoun toprolong his term of office. To suppressthis uprising, Chamoun called for U.S.intervention, appealing to the "Eisen-

11 MARCH 1983 7

For Permanent Revolution in Central America

Workers Revolution vs.the Guerrilla Road

Guerrilla Road to Disaster

There are, of course, many differentbrands of guerrillaism. In Latin Ameri­ca during the '60s the dominant themewas Guevarism, also known as "foco­ism." In contrast to Maoist "people'swar," which seeks to build up a peasantarmy led by a bonapartist officer corpscalling itself a Communist Party,Guevarism relies on a small nucleus (orfoco) of guerrilla fighters who aresupposed to act as the detonator toignite the masses. In his how-to-do-itmanual on Guerrilla Warfare, Guevaragave as the first lesson of the CubanRevolution that "it is not necessary towait until all the conditions for makingthe revolution exist," guerrilla strugglewould create them. The second was thatin Latin America "the countryside is thebasic area for armed struggle." Hisvoluntarist/ militarist theory was furtherelaborated by the French cafe guerrillaRegis Debray (Revolution in the Revo­lution?), who proclaimed that "thepeople's army will be the nucleus of theparty."

cal than material) to guerrilla warfareelsewhere in Latin America.

The guerrilla episodes of the '60smostly ended in defeat within a fewmonths, or else degenerated into bandit­ry. But in Central America the Nicara­guan Sandinistas managed to defeatSomoza's mercenaries, and the Salva­doran FMLN has the upper handagainst the army, National Guard,Treasury Police, death squads and theirAmerican "advisers." However, there isanother factor: the combative Salvador­an working class, which has not beendefeated but has been politically misledand abandoned. What is needed isabove all a communist vanguard to leadit at the head of the urban and ruralmasses, to carry out a proletarianinsurrection establishing a workers andpeasants government and extending therevolution internationally. That canonly be a Trotskyist party following theroad of October 1917, the road ofpermanent revolution.

ruthlessly slaughtered by Pentagon­trained counterinsurgency squads.Guevara himself, the most heroicadvocate of guerrilla warfare, tragicallywas murdered by the CIA and its localflunkies in Bolivia in 1967. But theGuevarists were not just outgunned­their guerrilla road could not lead tosocialist revolution.

Now we are witnessing a new roundof guerrilla warfare, and would-berevolutionaries must look to the lessonsof the past as well as the events of today.Guerrillaism seems very militant, evenadventurist, while an Allende-typepopular front explicitly aims at holdingback the masses from "going too far" bytying them to a section of the bourgeoi­sie. Yet politically guerrillaism andpopular frontism are not necessarilycontradictory by any means. In EISalvador, for instance, the FMLNcoalition of five "politico-military"organizations is allied with the Revolu­tionary Democratic Front (FOR),including several marginal liberal par­ties and politicians. And all sectors ofthe FDR/FMLN popular front arecommitted to a program for a "revo­lutionary democratic" government­that is, for a reformed Salvadorancapitalism.

In Cuba, Fidel Castro originally putforward a bourgeois-democratic pro­gram of land reform and return to the1940 constitution. But not long after therebel victory, the hostility of the UnitedStates and a massive departure ofCuban capitalists forced the guerrillas inpower to expropriate the imperialistsand the entire domestic bourgeoisiesimply in self-defense. Even in thisexceptional case, however, the resultwas a bureaucratically deformed work­ers state rather than the soviet de­mocracy of the Bolsheviks. (The usualresult of such a guerrilla war wouldbe the consolidation of a nationalist­bonapartist bourgeois state, as in post­independence Algeria.) Constant U.S.aggression also explains the moremilitant tone of the Cuban leaders,compared to the cautious Kremlin, andtheir sometime support (more ideologi-

_ ..,. "m l;¥·Geographical Magazine

Combative Salvadoran trade unions played key role In repeated mass mobilizations such as the 200,000-strong protestIn San Salvador, January 1980.

"No more Vietnams," while the Sparta­cists say: "Vietnam was a victory: two,three, many defeats for imperialism!"But Ronald Reagan has placed CentralAmerica in the front line of his globalwar against Communism, like it or not.And he has his own "domino" theory,beginning with drowning the Salvador­an rebels in blood, overthrowing theSandinistas in Nicaragua, then rollingback the gains of revolutions from Cubato Poland and the Soviet Union.

For the last 20 years, ever since theCuban Revolution, the Latin Americanleft has been dominated by two maincurrents: first in the 1960s the "guerrillaroad" inspired by Castro and Guevara,and then in the early '70s the so-called"peaceful road" of Allende's popularfront in Chile. The Chilean debacle isstill fresh in people's minds with its tensof thousands of workers, peasants andstudents massacred in cold blood.However, guerrillaism was no less aroad to disaster. A whole generation ofleftists throughout the continent pickedup the gun and Che's handbook andheaded into the hills, only to be

GranmaPetty-bourgeois guerrlllaists took to the hills, refused to organize forproletarian Insurrection.

In the three years that a civil war hasbeen raging in EI Salvador, a curiousphenomenon has been observed. Theharder the leftist guerrillas fight, themore successful they are militarily, themore insistent their leaders are inoffering to exchange what has been wonon the battlefield for some cabinet seatsand promises of reform. At the height ofthe recent fighting a Salvadoran opposi­tion spokesman held a press conferencein Washington to call for immediatenegotiations and offer a cease-fire.According to the rad-Iib Guardian (5February), "[Ruben] Zamora cautionedthat the FMLN [Farabundo MartiNational Liberation Front] is not tryingto achieve a military victory in EISalvador, because the country's prob­lems must be 'solved through dialog,through negotiation, and not ... a mili­tary solution'." Meanwhile, in the U.S.EI Salvador protests exclude the Sparta­cist League for carrying our slogan,"Military victory to leftist insurgents!"Why? If the guerrillas defeat the gov­ernment army, in class-polarized EI Sal­vador it could unleash a mass uprisingand social revolution. But if the butcherarmy is not smashed, a cease-fire willjust mean giving a free rein to the deathsquads and the massacres will continue.

Another curious fact: in this region ofmini-countries smaller than most U.S.states, the leaders of the CentralAmerican left do everything possible tokeep the struggle within narrow nation­al bounds while the right-wing dictatorsaid each other constantly and are openlysupplied by the United States. Neitherthe Sandinistas, the Cubans or theSoviets provide substantial amounts ofweapons to the Salvadoran rebels, andthe FMLN refuses to call for interna­tional brigades. Moreover, even thoughthe various "armed struggle" organiza­tions all grew out of the CubanRevolution, when the Trotskyists of theSL proclaim "Defense of Cuba, USSRbegins in EI Salvador" their Americansupporters start screaming "provoca­tion." These groups which were inspiredby Che Guevara and the Vietnamesestruggle now raise as an official slogan

8 WORKERS VANGUARD

SL/SYL Forum

is regrettable, as he strived, within thelimits of his own conceptions, to be agenuine revolutionary." PB memberHarry Turner had argued that it was noloss, comparing Guevara to AdamClayton Powell, the demagogic blackDemocratic politico! Today Turner iswith the one-time Guevarists andsometime guerrilla-posing NahuelMoreno outfit-a strange marriageindeed. We also pay our respects to acourageous reformist like SalvadorAllende. The pictures of him in front ofthe burning La Moneda palace carryinga Kalashnikov automatic rifle given tohim by Fidel Castro give the lie to all thePinochet propaganda about Allendecommitting suicide. At the end of the"peaceful road" some of the popular­fronters end up in the enemy camp,while others pay the supreme price.

But if we have respect for thesemartyrs, that is more than one can sayfor the likes of Debray, an unprincipledliterary camp follower who first en­thused for Guevara, then publicizedAllende, and now as an official of theFrench government of social democratMitterrand gets a former Batista cop,the phony "wheelchair poet" ArmandoValladares, released from Castro'sprisons. The ease with which Debrayswitched from the "guerrilla road" to the"peaceful road" makes the descriptionof cynical personal careerist acompliment.

For more information: (617) 492-3928

U.S. Hands Off NlcaragualMilitary Victory to Leftist Insurgentsl

For Workers Revolution,Not Popular-Front Betrayal!

Speaker: Jan NordenEditor, Workers VanguardSL Central Committee

Sunday, March 13, 7:30 p.m.Harvard University,Harvard Hall, Room 102

BOSTON

EI SalvadorAflame!

The "Guerrilla Road"in EI Salvador

El Salvador is hardly suited forGuevara-style focoism. It is a tinycountry the size of Massachusetts withthe highest population density in LatinAmerica. Even most of the rural areasare semi-urban and there are no moun­tains, at most rugged hills and dozens ofvolcanos (which have now becomeguerrilla base camps). So there was noguerrilla movement in the 1960s, only anabortive attempt by the SalvadoranCommunist Party (peS) 'to set up an"armed branch" just in case ... which inthree years of existence didn't carry outa single action (interview with SalvadorCayetano Carpio, Punta Finallnterna­cional, October 1982). Later in the '70swhen the so-called "politico-military"organizations appeared, they were stillimbued with Guevarist conceptions.Since Che had said you had to havemountains for a guerrilla struggle, andEI Salvador had none, they coined theslogan, "the people are our mountains."

The original "armed struggle" groupwas set up in 1970 by the former generalsecretary of the PCS, Cayetano Carpio.It was so undergroundist that for thefirst two years it didn't have a name;Cayetano refused to wage a struggleinside the CP, or even to talk withsympathetic former party members!Instead it was totally conspiratorial,preparing the heroic gesture of thedefiant guerrilla sounding a clarion bypicking up the gun and galvanizing themasses with his example. The results

continued on page IO

"'The proletariat cannot sustain guerril­la war. for the very concept implies theabsence of a revolutionary situation andthe kind of irregular fighting whichrequires an ability to retreat rapidly. Inaddition to its clear class interest. it isthe organization of the proletariatwhich gives it political superiority overthe atomized peasantry. This organiza­tion is the result of the position of theworking class in the structure ofcapitalist society; to retreat into the hillswould eventually destroy the class orthe class character of its vanguard...."'The revolutionary party must. ofcourse. take an active role in organizingthe self-defense of the working masses.and the use of guerrilla tactics is oftenvital as a subordinate civil war tactic.However. the road to power for theproletariat is through mass insurrectionagainst the bourgeois state; the centralmilitary organization of the uprisingmust be an arm of and directed by the

Trotskyist United Secretariat) to theirparticular milieu of miners, whereskirmishes with the police and armywere a regular occurrence. The "Decla­ration of Fraternal Relations" betweenthe iSt and OTR established that:

mass organization of the working class.led by the Leninist party."

-WVNo. 111.28 May 1976

The Spartacist tendency was born inthe discussion over the nature of theCuban Revolution. From our inceptionwe have held that guerrillaism repre­sents a petty-bourgeois reaction to theabsence and delay of proletarian revolu­tion. Following the long string ofdefeats after the Bolshevik Revolutionof 1917, many impressionistic leftistsseized on the Chinese and Cubanrevolutions, declared themselves Mao­ists or Fidelistas and discovered thepeasant vanguard. In our first interna­tional document, "Toward Rebirth ofthe Fourth International," writtep twodecades ago by the Revolutionary Ten­dency in the once-Trotskyist SocialistWorkers Party (SWP), we noted thatalthough under exceptional circumstan­ces the petty-bourgeois guerrilla leader­ship can be forced to expropriate thecapitalists, at best this will lead to abureaucratically deformed workersstate as occurred in Cuba. Adoption ofthe so-called "peasant guerrilla road tosocialism," we wrote, would be "asuicidal course for the socialist goals ofthe movement, and perhaps physicallyfor the adventurers" (Spartacist No. I,February-March 1964).

Tragically, this last warning proved tobe true indeed. While the SpartacistLeague (SL) was one of the fewtendencies to swim against the guerrilla­ist current in the early '60s, we noted in aPolitical Bureau meeting (12 October1967) not long after Che Guevara wasassassinated by Bolivian army and CIAoperatives that "the passing of Guevara

but called only for "national liberation"through armed struggle to establish a"democratic" regime. As we explainedin our "Theses on Guerrilla Warfare":

"'One of the reasons that a guerrillamovement is forced to represent theinterests of segments of the 'patriotic'bourgeoisie is its own concomitantproperty-hungry peasant base.... Ondifferent occasions, the guerrilla leader­ship will have to rely on the financialbacking of 'patriotic' bourgeois andlandlord sectors."

-Spartacist No. II,March-April 1968

The Guevarists were fully aware of this.Debray wrote that "If it is more difficult,after Cuba, to integrate any sizablefraction of the national bourgeoisie inan anti-imperialist front, this latter canand must still be the prime objective."And in the one case where a LatinAmerican peasant guerrilla movementadopted a socialist platform, the Gua­temalan MR-13, it was met with avitriolic anti-Trotskyist onslaught notonly by the Moscow-line Stalinists butfrom Castro himself at the 1966 Tricon-

~~k. .~.UPI

Bolivian rangers and CIA hunted down and killed the heroic Che GuevaraIn 1967.tinental Congr~ss (see "Posadas in theMR-13," Spartacist No.9, January­February 1967).

All this is not to say that Leninists cannever resort to forms of guerrilla strug­gle, but only as a secondary civil wartactic. The issue was posed in Russiafollowing the defeat of the 1905 Revolu­tion, when the Mensheviks (along withTrotsky and Rosa Luxemburg) criti­cized the Bolsheviks' bank "expropria­tions." Lenin misestimated the pace ofevents, expecting a new upsurge soon,but he correctly pointed out thatguerrilla warfare is an inevitable form ofstruggle in certain periods, particularly"when fairly large intervals occurbetween the 'big engagements'" of therevolution. But he added, "the party ofthe proletariat can never regard guerril­la warfare as the only, or even as thechief, method of struggle." and that itmust be subordinated to other methods,particularly the mass insurrection("Guerrilla Warfare," September 1906).Any strategy of guerrilla warfare isutterly anti-Marxist and anti-Leninistbecause it is not based on the mobiliza­tion of the revolutionary class. theproletariat.

This same point was made in thecourse of discussions in 1974-76 whichled to the fusion of the internationalSpartacist' tendency (iSt) with theChilean Organizaci6n Trotskista Revo­lucionaria (OTR). The OTR, whilerejecting Guevarist focoism andTupamaro-style urban guerrillaism, hadadvocated "irregular war" by the work­ing class. This was the application ofguerrillaist conceptions (in this casederived from Ernest Mandel's pseudo-

In the first instance, Guevarism is anupdating of the pre-Marxian petty­bourgeois revolutionism exemplified byAugust Blanqui-adapted to a ruralsetting and in an entirely different socialand historical framework. Even thepeasantry is not to be trusted but ratherused by rootless petty-bourgeois heroes("a prestigious leader" is necessary, saidGuevara, who was later canonized byCastro as "the heroic guerrilla") in directarmed conflict with the state. At thebeginning, the guerrilla foco is deliber­ately isolated from the masses; and inalmost every case, this was the stagewhen it was crushed. The most famousexample was Guevara himself, trackeddown in the Bolivian rain forest manymiles from the nearest villages. Whenthe guerrillas did get some support fromthe peasantry such as in Guatemala,counterinsurgency experts just "re­moved the water from the fish" byrounding up campesinos in fortifiedcamps. What failed in Indochina withits vast rural masses, worked inGuatemala.

Blanquist in its tactics, strategicallyGuevarism comes down to peasant war:

"'The guerrilla is above all an agrarianrevolutionary. He interprets the desireof the great mass of the peasants: to bethe owners of their land. of their meansof production. of their animals. of allthat they have yearned for for vears."

~Ernesto Che Guevara. 'Guerrilla War (1962)

As a mass of petty-bourgeois smallcommodity producers, the peasantrydoes not have the collective strength andthe independent class interest of theproletariat. There is no characteristicpeasant mode of production, much lessa "socialist peasantry," and thereforethe peasantry cannot lead a socialrevolution. But the vast peasant massesare driven by a thirst for land, and to getit they will even follow a guerrilla band,or the 'revolutionary working class, ifthese forces can demonstrate the abilityto defeat the oligarchy and its army.Once they have their plots that will endthe peasants' role as a revolutionaryfactor. For instance, in Bolivia, wherethe peasants became landowners in 1952as the result of an extensive land reform,they became allies of the army againstthe workers in the so-called "military­peasant pact." Peasant militias wereeven sent into the mines to massacre thecombative tin miners. Thus a peasant­based guerrilla war, although directedinitially against a landlord-capitalistoligarchy, contains within it the seeds ofa restabilized capitalist regime. But eventhough numerically small, the urbanworking class in backward capitalistcountries as in Central America canbecome the revolutionary vanguard, byplacing itself at the head of a stormyagrarian revolt in the struggle for aworkers and peasants government, forthe dictatorship of the proletariat.

The petty-bourgeois Guevarists hadonly disdain for the urban proletariat."The city is a cemetery of revolution­aries," proclaimed Castro. Debray de­nounced the Trotskyist conception ofpermanent revolution, working-classarmed self-defense and proletarianinsurrection as a "provocation." All thatGuevarism offered the working classwas to "liberate" themselves by aban­doning the factories. Thus in Bolivia,Communique No. 5 of Guevara'sNational Liberation Army (ELN) calledon the historically class-conscious tinminers to leave the mines and join themin the jungles! This would have meantgiving up their tremendous social powerwhich time and again has enabled theminers to defeat counterrevolutionaryonslaughts. The shameless Debray wenteven further and condemned the entireBolivian proletariat for "hypertrophy ofclass consciousness" (Che's GuerrillaWar) because the workers were con­vinced that they must lead the peasants!!

Programmatically practically all theGuevarist guerrillas were not socialist,

11 MARCH 1983 .~

rising in San Salvador. An attemptedgeneral strike in August 1980 alsocollapsed, and it was in the wake of thatdefeat that the Salvadoran left aban­doned the cities en masse. -But evenearlier, in October 1979, a key revolu­tionary opportunity was missed whenthe so-called "human rights junta" tookover from General Romero with the aidof the U.S. State Department. .. and theSalvadoran left. And as the struggle

nears a conclusion, the battle for SanSalvador will loom large. Then onceagain guerrillaism and popular frontismthreaten to strangle the potential forproletarian revolution.

Take the case of the January 1981offensive. In a recent interview, JoaquinVillalobos, commander-in-chief of theERP, talked about why there was nourban insurrection. He complains that"the development of the massmovement ... obviously generated ex­pectations about the insurrectionalpossibilities." But "the explanation forwhy we didn't achieve our objectives isto be found in the deterioration of themass struggle in the last months due tothe terror imposed on the cities....What happened is that we lost theappropriate moment." He notes thatgeneral strikes repeatedly paralyzed thecountry during 1980, and "it took theenemy a year to wear down thismovement and ... exhaust its insurrec­tional possibilities." All very true. Heplaces the key moment at March-April1980, particularly around the time of theassassination of Archbishop Romero.The Salvadoran prelate had protestedthe government's repression, and hismurder touched off a massive protestin the capital and local rebellions tothe battle-cry of "Viva MonsignorRomero!"

But what is most significant is whyVillalobos picks this point: "At that timethere were even sectors of the bourgeoi­sie willing to establish alliances with usand we had political weight" (PuntoFinal lnternacional, November­December 1982). Thus the ERP leaderhinges successful insurrection on sup­port from the bourgeoisie-making itclear that their slogan of "armedpeople's insurrection" refers not to aproletarian uprising establishing aworkers and peasants government butto the installation of a new capitalistregime. And what about the future? Atthe end of the lengthy interview,Villalobos remarks: "So what will be theform in which the masses participate inthe final phase of the war? It's hard topredict. . .. Whether they will appear atthat moment in an insurrectional formor in the form of a general strike, or bymassively joining the revolutionaryarmy, we will have to see," Who knows,who cares-that is his position. In fact,the title of Villalobos' interview, "EISalvador: From the Insurrection toRevolutionary War," perfectly ex-

For Workers RevolutionThroughout Central America!

So who is it that "loses in the end" ifthe leftist insurgents win on the battle­field? Zamora, a dissident ChristianDemocrat, is speaking here in the higherinterests of the Salvadoran bourgeoisie.For liberals like him and FOR leaderGuillermo Ungo, calls for a "politicalsolution" are no compromise. Thedestruction of the genocidal army, thecore of the Salvadoran state, wouldremove the very basis of their plans for a"democratic, pluralist" capitalist re­gime. We understand on the basis ofMarxism, and Zamora grasps out of anacute sense of defending his classinterests, that there is no "middle way"such as the Sandinistas are attempting.In EI Salvador, where the classes are farmore polarized than in Somoza'sNicaragua, the life of such a precariousinterregnum could be measured inweeks rather than months. Yet a socialrevolution would provoke a confronta­tion with U.S. imperialism which, fromthe standpoint of tiny EI Salvador, thenationalist-reformists feel they cannotwin. So the guerrillaists and "democrat­ic" politicians of the FDR/FMLN joinhands to stave offa military victory. Butthe fighters in the field will pay the price.For them it is literally a choice ofrevolution or death.

The Trotskyists have a fundamentallycounterposed strategy, based on thetheory and program of permanentrevolution. In the epoch of imperialismthe weak bourgeoisies of the backwardcapitalist countries are unwilling andincapable of carrying out even thedemocratic tasks of the bourgeoisrevolution. Their intimate ties to imperi­alism and domestic reaction, combinedwith their fear of a militant working

with all its phony talk of "Farabundis­mo," so would the FMLN today.

Thus the ERP and FARN openly saythat they are not for socialist revolutionand seek an alliance with large sectors ofthe bourgeoisie. What of CayetanoCarpio's FPL, which calls for a "pro­longed people's war." A small pamphletentitled "Chalatenango Heroico" (dis­tributed by the Casa El Salvador"Farabundo Marti") gives an idea ofwhat the FPL's line looks like in the fieldof battle. It reports that the local militiaswere demanding "industrial arms," thatthe masses "who have been hearing foryears about armed struggle, who havebeen dreaming for years about having agun, are not going to be content with amachete." Yet, says the article, "at thelevel of the masses and the militias, we'llnever see weapons of war, not even afterthe victory." This is the logic ofguerrillaism, which relies not on themobilization of the working masses buton a "professional" party/army. Nowonder there is discontent.

And on negotiations, according to thepamphlet: "If you tell them to put downtheir arms, these people would probablyshoot anyone who came to tell themthat. ... In Guazapa the people havemade it clear that it cost blood for themto get those guns and they are not goingto give them up." Good. But in fact, theFDR/FMLN are calling for preciselythat. Concretely, in FOR spokesmanZamora's Washington press conferenceduring the January offensive he calledfor a ceasefire to achieve negotiations.(Later he tried to cover up by claiminghe was only advocating laying downarms "in the context" of negotiations).And he made clear why the FDR/FMLN tops reject a "military solution."According to the Guardian, Zamorasaid that, "To win only in a militarysense, could mean 'to lose in the end.'One purpose of military pressure is toinsure that the U.S. administrationeventually wil1 accept a negotiatedsolution that gives the rebel forces ashare of the power."

presses the anti-revolutionary strategyof guerrillaism. They have it exactlybackwards: a proletarian insurrectionmust be the crowning moment. Butthey're not talking about workersrevolution.

Let's take another of the FMLNcommanders, Ferman Cienfuegos of theRN and their Armed Forces of NationalResistance (FARN). Cienfuegos admit­ted in an analysis of the January 1981

offensive that, during the previous year,"there were situations in which it waspossible to carry out a general strike thatdid not develop into an insurrection.. ..The general strike ran ahead of us; wedidn't implement the insurrection, norwas the structure of our army preparedfor it." He notes that there were threegeneral strikes during 1980, but excusesthe fact that they were not transformedinto insurrection by referring to "animbalance in the development of thepower of the masses and militarypower"! However, by the next Januarythe masses had been intimidated andtherefore, he concludes, "it was an errorto have resorted to the classic form ofcalling for a strike" (CommanderFerman Cienfuegos Speaks, March1982). So Cienfuegos, who bombastical­ly proclaimed the "final" offensive in thefirst place, concludes that there shouldhave been no attempt to raise up themasses!

Cienfuegos, too, emphasized theimportance of "alliances" with thebourgeoisie, trying to develop a newideology of "Farabundismo." This, hesays, allows for an alliance of theworkers and peasants with the pettybourgeoisie "and the small and mediumbusiness sectors." He rails against "someauthors" who "try to portray theSalvadorean struggle as the classicstruggle of the proletariat against thebourgeoisie." In Farabundismo, ac­cording to Cienfuegos, "there also existsthe distinctive form of incorporation ofthe Christian movements." In anotherpamphlet (El Salvador: La revolucioninevitable) he remarks that, "Ourprocess is very similar to that inNicaragua but our policy of allianceswill be much broader," including "pri­vate enterprise, sectors of the army,democratic forces not yet in the FOR"and others. Call it what you may, thisconception, common to all the sectors ofthe FMLN, has nothing to do with theactual program of Salvadoran Commu­nist leader Farabundo Marti, who ledthe 1932 insurrection that was brutallysuppressed in the infamous Matanza.His program was:

"The Communist Party calls all thepoor workers and peasants of ElSalvador to bloody struggle againstthe national bourgeoisie, who areunconditionally allied to YankeeImperialists.... Down with the imperi­alist oppressor and his national dogs!"

Stalin's Comintern condemned the 1932Salvadoran uprising as "ultra-left," and

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deformedworkers state.

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Guerrillaism...(continued from page 9)

were predictably negative. Later thisbecame the Popular Forces of Libera­tion "Farabundo Marti" (FPL). In1972-74 came the Revolutionary Peo­ple's Army (ERP) recruited fromCatholic sectors, particularly the Chris­tian Democratic youth, Catholic-ledpeasant unions and the so-called "grass­roots communities" of the church whichwere spreading in the rural areas. TheERP was rent by a vicious faction fightin 1975, in which a minority accused theleadership of "militarism," whereuponthe minority leaders were shot! Theremaining ERP dissidents formed theNational Resistance (RN). The twoother members of the FMLN guerrillacoalition today are the small CentralAmerican Workers Party (PRTC) andthe PCS.

FPL leader Cayetano Carpio latermaintained that, "From the start weruled out the guerrilla foco theory," onthe basis of "the experience of someguerrilla movements in Latin Americaand in other countries that were re­moved from the people ... and thatsuccumbed to militarist designs" (Gran­rna [weekly edition], 30 March 1980).The other "politico-military" organiza­tions also reject "focoism," as hasvirtually the entire Latin American leftfollowing the tragic finale of Guevara'sadventure at Nancahuazu (Bolivia).But fundamentally the entire FMLNcoalition is guerrillaist, lacking a beliefin the ability of the working class tomake the revolution and advocatingpolicies diametrically opposed to prole­tarian insurrection. This is seen mostclearly in the FDR/FMLN popular­front alliance and its program forreforming Salvadoran capitalism. Car­pio, for example, wrote an article lastyear calling explicitly for a "democraticrevolutionary government, not for aSocialist government," in which therewould be room for everyone from "largebusinessmen to small farmers andmerchants" (New York Times, 9 Febru­ary 1982). But this opposition toproletarian revolution can also be seenin the nature of the armed strugglewhich they carry out.

While the FMLN has made animpressive showing on the battlefield,the leftist insurgents have suffered anumber of reverses-and in each case ithas been because of their failure to rousethe urban masses to struggle. That waswhat happened in the junta's phonyelections of March 1982, which theguerrillas did not effectively disrupt,handing the government a propagandavictory at home and abroad. The so­called "final" /general offensive of Janu­ary 1981 failed to achieve its announcedgoals, in particular because there was no

10 WORKERS VANGUARD

Salvadoran workers stage one-day political general strike on 17 March 1980against murderous junta.

class and the huge landless peasantry,places them in the camp ofcounterrevo­lution. On the agrarian question, forinstance: the Trotskyists call for therevolutionary seizure of the estates, thepeasants should take the land. Nosection of the Salvadoran bourgeoisieadvocates this program, for there is noseparate industrial and agriculturalbourgeoisie: they are all the samefamilies. It is significant that the landreform advocated by the FOR is nomore advanced than that enacted by theChristian Democratic/military juntatwo years ago. And they are all tied toimperialism. FDR leader Zamora-wasinstalled in the October 1979 junta at thebehest of the U.S. State Department.Today he goes around vituperatingagainst a leftist military victory.

Leninists base themselves on theproletariat, and a Central Americanworking class exists, especially in EISalvador, which in turn can have apowerful impact on the millions-strongMexican workers movement. The ma­jority of all industrial workers in theisthmus are located in this tiny country.They are employed by U.S. multination­als such as ARCO, Phelps Dodge,Westinghouse, Maidenform Bras, Tex­as Instruments, and in the Free TradeZone at San Bartolo where they are paid$4 a day to assemble semi-manufacturesfor the U.S. market. And they have arecent history of militant struggle. InMarch 1979 workers at two bottlingplants won their demands when theelectrical workers union (STECEL) cutoff power for an hour nationwide insolidarity with the bottlers' strike. Aweek later STECEL occupied the powerplants again, electrifying the surround­ing rences with high voltage andblacking out the country for a day insupport of their own demands. Thegovernment utility company was forcedto give in. And in September 1979,workers struck five factories along SanSalvador's strategic Army Boulevard,occupying the plants and taking manag­ers hostage in order to forestall amilitary intervention.

For the first half of 1980 there was aconstant stream of mass pro~ests.As theliberals were slowly eliminated from theruling junta, opposition mounted in thestreets. The formation of the Revolu­tionary Mass Coordinating Committee,the nucleus of the later FMLN, wasgreeted in a January 22 mass march of200,000, which was fired on by thesecurity forces leaving 100 dead. InMarch there was a one-day generalstrike that shut down urban transport.In April tens of thousands poured intothe streets to mourn the slain Archbish­op Romero: the toll, 40 killed bygovernment snipers. In June a secondgeneral strike paralyzed the capital:nothing moved in San Salvador for twodays. Finally, the leftist coalition calleda three-day general strike for mid­August. But instead of waging anoffensive struggle, they told the workersto stay at home or in the plants. At mostsome barricades were built in theworking-class suburbs and militias tookpot shots at the police. The strike was afailure as petty-bourgeois layers, mini­bus owners and shopkeepers, buckledunder to government repression.

The year of mass mobilization dissi­pated because the leaders of theSalvadoran left held back the struggle inthe name of their guerrillaist, popular­frontist programs. Instead of placingthemselves at the head of the workersand leading them to proletarian insur­rection, they worried about an "imbal­ance in the development of the power ofthe masses and the military power."Marxists understand that in a revolu­tionary situation the course of eventstakes on its own rhythm. Thus Leninstressed that in the Russian 1905Revolution by December an uprisingwas absolutely essential: "A general

11 MARCH 1983

strike could no longer take the govern­ment unawares: it had already organ­ized the forces of counterrevolution andthey were ready for action" ("Lessons ofthe Moscow Uprising." August 1906).But in Moscow the Bolsheviks attempt­ed to lead such an insurrection, set­ting the pattern for 1917, while inSan Salvador the guerrillaistjpopular­frontist left was able to prevent it. (Asfor the level of military power, at thetime of the Moscow uprising theworkers militias had only 80 rifles goingup against machine guns.)

This is the logic of guerrilla ism, notjust in El Salvador but everywhere.whether it is called focoism or the"armed struggle road." The guerrillaistshave no faith in the revolutionary powerof the working class. They believe thatonly a "professional" party/army iscapable of waging military struggle. InChile this was the program of the MIR(Revolutionary Left Movement), thelargest left organization outside ofAllende's Unidad Popular (UP). TheM IR had considerable influence amongsectors of workers. peasants and stu­dents; it talked of armed struggle andcarried pictures of Guevara. But it"critically" supported the UP to the end,and never called for arming the masses.Instead the MIR created artificialgroups. the so-called comandos comu­nales, which didn't get off the ground.And when the bloody end came. it couldoffer no serious resistance.

Following the defeat of the August1980 general strike. the Salvadoran leftabandoned the cities to build a "people'sarmy" in the hills. Partly in response torepression. partly obeying the dictatesof their "politico-military" strategies.hundreds of militant workers left SanSalvador for nearby Guazapa volcanoto build a "people's army." Elsewherethe composition of the guerrilla forces isoverwhelmingly peasant in origin. Andthis exodus to the countryside willinevitably have an impact on the classoutlook of the leftist insurgents. TheFMLN has created a peasant army ledby declassed intellectuals, ex-peasantyouth and some former workers. Builtout of mass organizing in the late '70s.particularly by two Catholic-led peasantunions. it can unleash a powerful stormagainst the murderous landlord/capitalist/ army oligarchy that has runEl Salvador as its fiefdom for half acentury and more. But it can also beused against the working class.

Trotsky raised this possibility in thecase of China during the 1930s, whenMao's Communist Party had trans­formed itself into the leadership of apeasant "Red Army." Should theStalinist-led peasant troops occupy theindustrial centers and come face-to-facewith the workers, he wrote. it is quitelikely that it will be used to repress theproletariat, particularly in the name ofcrushing "counterrevolutionary Trot­skyites." He wrote:

"The peasant movement is a mightyrevolutionary factor. insofar as it isdirected against the large landowners.militarists. feudalists and usurers. Butin the peasant movement itself are verypowerful proprietary and reactionarytendencies and at a certain stage it canbecome hostile to the workers. andsustain that hostility already equippedwith arms. He who forgets about thedual nature of the peasantry is not aMarxist."

-Leon Trotsky. "Peasant War inChina" (September 1932)

This possibility has already occurredin neighboring Nicaragua. During thelast moments of the Nicaraguan civilwar, when the Sandinistas had tempo­rarily retreated from the capital, theworkers and slum dwellers took overManagua the day after Somoza fled.They sacked the barracks and militaryheadquarters, obtaining many arms. Ittook the Sandinistas months to get theguns back. They began by arresting themembers of the "Simon Bolivar Bri­gade," led by the pseudo-Trotskyist

Moreno tendency, after it staged ademonstration for "workers power" inAugust 1979. They shut down theMaoist paper £1 Pueblo after it calledfor peasants to occupy haciendas of the"anti-Somoza bourgeoisie." They ar­rested leaders of the Frente Obrerogroup and of the dissident CommunistParty of Nicaragua, as well as localostensible Trotskyists. They brokeseveral strikes for higher wages andworkers control. sacking the offices ofthe CAUS union federation. And whenworkers at one textile factory (FABRI­TEX. the largest in Nicaragua) couldnot be intimidated in any other way.they brought in the Sandinista People'sArmy to dismantle the factory. remov­ing the raw materials and machines!Should the Salvadoran army collapsebefore a "negotiated solution" is workedout, the FDR/FMLN leaders promiseto do the same. Whether they cansucceed is another matter.

The "guerrilla road" of the Salvador­an left is an expression of petty­bourgeois forces opposed to the

Leninist-Trotskyist program of workersrevolution. It is no accident thatCastro's models on military matterswere not Marx, Engels and Lenin (orTrotsky, the founder of the Red Army),but Jose Marti and Simon Bolivar­leaders of the bourgeois national inde­pendence movements. This correspondsto the Castroites' "democratic" programand orientation to the peasantry. Theyreason that in the "Third World" thebourgeoisie is so weak that it must rulethrough a praetorian guard army, whichin fact acts as a political party; theiranswer is to counterpose their ownarmy/party, a left version of a militarycoup. But for communists who seek tolead the proletariat, followed by theoppressed masses of the city andcountry, in a socialist revolution, what isnecessary is to build a Bolshevikvanguard party of the working class andsoviet organs of workers power. Thiswill also lay the basis for the exercise ofgenuine workers democracy, includingbringing to justice the criminals respon­sible for the murder of Salvadoranleftist poet Roque Dalton, leader of the"anti-militarist" faction of the ERP in1975 who was shot on phony charges ofbeing a "CIA agent."

For a Trotskyist Party!

Summarizing the experience of theRussian Revolution and the first yearsof the Communist International, LeonTrotsky wrote: "Without a party, apart

from a party, over the head of a party, orwith a substitute for a party, theproletarian revolution cannot conquer"("Lessons of October"). A Trotskyistparty must be built in struggle againstthe guerrillaism, popular-frontism andnationalism of the Salvadoran left.Workers revolution in the CentralAmerican area must be internationalfrom the beginning. A workers insurrec­tion in San Salvador must not onlycombine with a peasant war throughoutthe country, but also with proletarianrevolution from Nicaragua to Mexico.For it's not a question of tiny ElSalvador taking on the Yankee colossusto the north by itself. Right next door isthe sleeping giant of the Mexicanproletariat. now facing a governmentthat has imposed drastic austeritymeasures which (together with a pushfrom events in Central America) cantake millions onto the path of revolu­tionary struggle.

The Salvadoran struggle can alsohave a tremendous impact on the UnitedStates far exceeding that of the liberal-

led El Salvador protests. The matter ofworking-class solidarity is not at allabstract. Thus the Spartacist Leagueand class-struggle unionists have foughtfor a labor boycott of all military goodsto Central American rightist juntas.And this is part of an overall struggle forthe American revolution-for labor/black mobilizations against racist ter­ror, for sitdown strikes against masslayoffs and so on. Because the only wayto secure revolutionary gains for thepeople of EI Salvador, Nicaragua,Guatemala, Mexico and the rest ofLatin America is through socialistrevolution in the United States itself.

The reformists call for agrarianreform, a mixed economy, purging thearmy and a non-aligned foreign policy,carried out by a revolutionary demo­cratic government of a "free EI Salva­dor." The Trotskyists fight for agrarianrevolution, expropriation of the bour­geoisie. destruction of the presentbutcher army and the creation of aproletarian red army, and uncondition­al defense of the degenerated/deformedworkers states, through military victoryby the leftist insurgents and a proletari­an insurrection installing a workers andpeasants government, as part of a sovietfederation of Central America in aSocialist United States of Latin Ameri­ca. As Trotsky wrote of Spain in theearly '30s: "For a successful solution ofall these tasks. three conditions arerequired: a party; once more a party;again a party." •

11

surrounding the camp. Even before TelZaatar fell in mid-August, hundreds, ifnot thousands, died of hunger, thirstand untended wounds. And when thePalestinians laid down their arms andsurrendered, they were slaughtered enmasse. Newsweek (23 August 1976)described what happened:

"As the people of Tel Zaatar surged.outtoward the 'confrontation line' betweenChristian and Muslim Beirut, therightists fell on them like wolves,arguing, by some accounts, over howmany Palestinians each right-winggroup was entitled to execute ... entirefamilies were killed."

At Tel Zaatar the Syrian Ba'athistsprovided the Zionists with a model (ifthey needed any) for the Shatila/Sabramassacre carried out by the sameMaronite criminals six years later. Infact, a Mossad agent was in thePhalangist command post during the1976 siege. A true united front againstPalestinians!

Any and all illusions that Ba'athistSyria is an ally of Palestinian liberationshould have been buried once and for allamong the thousands of corpses at TelZaatar. But poor memory is a congeni­tal disease of opportunists. Once theyhad broken the back of Palestinianmilitary power, the Syrians distancedthemselves from their erstwhile Maron­ite allies (there was never any love lostbetween Assad and the Gemayel clan)and played a bonapartist role balancingabove the myriad national and sectariangroupings of Lebanon. By the late 1970sSyria's Assad was once again hailed asan "anti-imperialist" by the PLO na­tionalists and their left cheerleaders.George Habash, head of the "radical"PFLP, recently stressed, "we have manythings in common with the Syrianregime. It is against Camp David,against the unfair U.S. imperialistsolution of the Middle East crisis"(Intercontinental Press, 31 January).

A typically centrist variant of thiskind of glorification of Assad's Syria isto be found in a leaflet put out by thesmall fake-Trotskyist RevolutionaryWorkers League of Peter Sollenbergerwhen Israel invaded Lebanon: "TheSyrian government is an unstable, anti­communist, tactical military ally in thefight against U.S. imperialism in theMiddle East" ("Defend Lebanon!," 13June 1982). It should be emphasizedthat this was written after Syria hadnegotiated a separate cease-fire withIsrael, thus allowing Sharon to concen­trate his entire machine of terror againstthe PLO forces. The Syrian bourgeoisieis not an untrustworthy ally but a mortalenemy of Palestinian national libera­tion. Should any significant section ofthe Palestinian people fall under thecontrol of the Ba'athist regime, it wouldbe subjugated as ruthlessly as themillion Palestinians in King Hussein'sJordan. And any Palestinian resistancewould be dealt with as savagely as at TelZaatar.

In 1976 Ba'athist Syria crippled thePalestinian resistance in Lebanon. Lastsummer Zionist Israel finished the job.And both Damascus and Jerusalemwere supported and encouraged by U.S.imperialism seeking to impose an anti­Soviet Pax Americana in the Near East.These military defeats were not inevi­table. The Palestinian resistance hasbeen politically disarmed by its petty­bourgeois nationalist leadership beforethe forces of Zionism, the Arab bour­geoisies and imperialism. A proletarianinsurrection in Lebanon in 1975 wouldhave shaken the colonels of Damascus,the Hashemite monarchy in Jordan andnot least the Zionist state. By contribut­ing to the transformation of an incipientsocial revolution into communalist civilwar, all wings of the PLO created theconditions for the present Lebanesecatastrophe. What is needed is arevolutionary vanguard party capableof uniting the Arab toilers and Hebrewproletariat against the Begins, Assads,Husseins and their imperialistbackers. .

[TO BE CONTINUED]

WORKERS VANGUARD

pro-Western Christian Lebanese par­ticularists? What interests lay behindthis seemingly most unnatural alliance?First, Syria, like Lebanon, is a medievalpatchwork of potentially hostile ethnic,national and sectarian groupings(Kurds, Druze, etc.). The DamascusBa'athist regime is itself drawn heavilyfrom the small Alawite sect, a splinter ofShia Islam, whose base of support iseven narrower than that of the LebaneseMaronites. Thus Assad & Co. fearedthat the breakup of Lebanon alongsectarian lines would spill over intoSyria.

Secondly, Assad, like Sadat, wasnegotiating via U.S. imperialism for areturn of the territory occupied by Israelin the 1967 war. The Syrian strongmanknew he had no chance whatsoever toget back the Golan Heights unless hecould demonstrate to Washington andJerusalem that he could police thePalestinians in Lebanon. That Assadwas unable to emulate Sadat at this timewas due solely to Israeli intransigence,not any lack of desire on his part. Inmid-I975 Kissinger complained to agroup of prominent American Jewishbusinessmen and academics: "We couldhave split the Palestinians from theSyrians [in exchange] for only a fewmore kilometers on the Golan, but theIsraelis insisted on moving the settle­ments right up to the line" ("KissingerMemorandum: 'To Isolate the Palestini­ans'," MERIP Reports No. 96, May198 I). As it turned out, Assad did notrequire the carrot of even a singlekilometer on the Golan to split from thePalestinians in the most violent way.

The Syrian military intervention inLebanon shifted the balance of forces infavor of the Maronite militias as wastragically demonstrated by the two­month siege and fall of the hugePalestinian camp of Tel Zaatar inBeirut. The Syrian army prevented thePLO commandos from lifting the siegeand also provided logistical support forthe Phalangist and Chamounist forces

not only with light arms but also Soviet­made armored personnel carriers andtanks captured in the 1967 and 1973wars. The alliance between the Israeliarmed forces and the Phalangists, whichnow wreaks genocidal terror against thePalestinians in Lebanon. was thuscemented in the 1975-76 civil war.

But it was not Israel nor the U.S.which saved the pro-Western Christianrightists from defeat; it was that pillar of"radical" Arab nationalism, Ba'athistSyria, which in June 1976 invadedLebanon with Washington's approval.For the Third Worldist left (and also theKremlin), this was indeed a low blow.Ba'athist Syria was the self-proclaimed"vanguard of the Arab Revolution."The Damascus colonels were membersin good standing of the "rejection front"which opposed negotiations with Israelfor a West Bank mini-state. Andinitially they had supported and armedthe Palestinian/Muslim side in the civilwar.

Why did this Moscow-allied Arabnationalist regime come to the aid of the

....-

Ba'athist Syria Attacksthe Palestinians

By the spring of 1976 the once­privileged Maronites were on thedefensive, squeezed into besieged en­claves as Lebanon gradually movedtoward de facto partition. Seeking toturn the tide of battle Israel beganmassively supplying the Christian forces

territorial integrity of "progressive,democratic" Czechoslovakia, theTrotskyists continued to recognize theright of self-determination for theoppressed German minority. In 1938 theliberal Prague government of Benesordered the Czech army to occupy theSudetenland and suppress the Naziagitators. Trotsky denounced this as anact of national oppression, and inresponse to the question, "what shouldbe the policy of the Bolshevik­Leninists," he replied: "If we can do it, ifwe have the strength, of course we fightagainst sending troops into the Germanregion" ("Remarks on Czechoslovakia,"Writings [1937-38]).

The situation of the Sudeten Germansin interwar Czechoslovakia and theMaronites in Lebanon is certainly inmany and important ways different. Thefundamental point, however, is thatTrotsky defended the democratic rightsof a people even as they fell under fascistleadership (in good part due to thechauvinist betrayals of the Stalinists andsocial democrats). In this he wasadhering to the Leninist principle ofopposing all forms of national oppres­sion and upholding equality for allnations. Only in this way can proletari­an class consciousness and unity over­come deep-seated national enmities.And here it should be recalled thatLenin's last political fight was againstStalin's abuse of the national minorities,specifically the Georgians. The Stalinistnotion of "progressive" and "reaction­ary" peoples leads to support for"democratic" imperialism and serves asa left cover for nationalist pogroms.

the "progressive, democratic" peoples.This kind of division of the world (andits constant redivision) into "progres­sive" and "reactionary" peoples hasnothing in common with Marxism.

To grasp the difference betweenTrotskyism and Stalinism on thisquestion, let us consider interwarCzechoslovakia. The 1919 Versaillestreaty incorporated some three millionGermans concentrated in the Sudeten­land in the new Czech-dominated, albeitbourgeois-democratic, state. Needlessto say, the Communist International ofLenin and Trotsky recognized the rightof the Sudeten Germans to national self­determination, i.e., the right to secedefrom Czechoslovakia and become partof the German national state if they sochose.

In the mid-1930s the Nazis gainedpolitical hegemony over the SudetenGermans. Nationalistically blinded, asubstantial majority desired unity withHitler's Third Reich. While the "liberal"imperialists, social democrats and Sta­linists now ardently defended the

Trotskyism ys. Stalinismon Nationalist/CommunalistConflict

Our anti-nationalist position on theLebanese civil war was denounced,often hysterically, by our fake-leftopponents at the time and still is. Forexample, a tiny Marcyite splinter group,the Revolutionary Communist League(Internationalist), in a recent article onthe successful SL-initiated labor/blackmobilization which stopped the Klanfrom marching in Washington, D.C. onNovember 27, singles out our line on theLebanese civil war as, in their view,particularly egregious: "the SL contin­ues to mistakenly uphold its position ofabstention during the '75-'76 war inLebanon, where workers and oppressedbattled the Lebanese equivalents of theKKK, such as the Phalangists" (Interna­tionalist Worker, January 1983).

As we have shown, this is exactlywhat did not happen. The combatantson both sides were organized not alongclass but along national/communal/sectarian lines. And the Palestinian andMuslim toilers did not simply battle thePhalangists but the entire Maronitecommunity. More generally, thesesmall-time Marcyites are expressing theessentially Stalinist concept that if apeople is misfortunate to fall under thesway of fascist or other right-wingleadership, then they are condemned tobe subjugated, if not exterminated, by

12

position the pro-imperialist rulers arenow in."

- Workers World, 30 January1976

In opposition to the left cheerleadersfor "progressive" communalist violence,we wrote at the time:

"In the present fluid conflict. andparticularly given the rapidly shiftingallegiances, none of these nationalistand communalist formations are fight­ing a just struggle that would meritmilitary support from the class­conscious proletariat."

-"Blood Feud in Lebanon," WVNo. 115.25 June 1976

UPI UPI

By 1976 Lebanese civil war had become communalist slaughter. Syrian-backed Maronltes killed thousands ofPalestinians at Tel Zaatar (left). PLO forces and Druze militia massacred Christian villagers at Damur (right.)

the Palestinians, the Zionist war ma­chine has fully exploited the bloodhatreds generated during the Lebanesecivil war. It was the special Israeli­organized "Damuri Brigade" of thePhalange who were the main execution­~rs of the Shatila/Sabra massacre.)

The Third Worldist cheerleaders onthe left naturally hailed the Palestinian/Muslim side in the Lebanese civil war.either denying its communalist charac­ter or else condemning the Maronitepopulation to death as pro-imperialistreactionaries. Typically, the eclecticStalinoid Workers World Party ofSam Marcy not only glorified thePalestinian/Muslim forces in generalbut specifically celebrated their destruc­tion 'Of Damur:

"The burning of Chamoun's mansionand the seizure of the stronghold of hisNational Liberal Party, the village ofDamur, underlined the new weakened

(continued from page 7)

Lebanon...

Make payable/mall 10: Spartacist Publishing Co., Box 1377 GPO, New York, New York 10116

Marxist Working-Class Biweekly of the Spartacist League

325

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the Established Church. Thus behind allthe apologies for the anachronism of themonarchy as the continuity of the past,is the expression of hard core nationalchauvinism and the trappings for thereactionary myth of class peace, i.e.,status quo.

For Americans, kings and queensseem to exist not so much on the terrainof politics as in a land of enchantmentalong with trolls, goblins and SnowWhite. But the monarchy is a pillar ofBritish rule. Generally passive, themonarchy has at certain points becomedirectly active, and remains always apotential rallying point for militaryreaction. When the British officer corpslifts its glasses to "Queen and Country"more than a traditional toast is made.The officers are in fact loyal to themonarchy-head of the military­rather than to parliament.

British monarchs are not repealingacts of parliament these days, but everyso often they assert their residual royalprerogatives, especially when theybelieve their position of privilege isbeing contaminated by democraticpractices. So even as the Britanniarecently sailed toward San Diego, themonarchy issued a high court injunctionto stop Fleet Street's tabloid press fromcontinuing to publish gossip aboutPrince Andrew and American starletKoo Stark.

It is no wonder Reagan welcomes thequeen and royal reaction to the U.S. TheReaganites doubtless feel deprived of aU.S. monarchy. Nevertheless the flaunt­ing of conspicuous wealth by Reagan'snouveau riche regime tries to accom­plish the same thing. The stretch-limoinauguration of Reagan was aptlydescribed as a "bacchanalia of thehaves." If one of Nancy Reagan's saladplates costs more than a black mother'swelfare aid for a year, it is assumed thatin the "great free marketplace" each getswhat he deserves-the filthy rich and thedirt poor.

Even more irritating amid the pompand sycophancy of the queen's visit, arethe P.R. men and ideologues who tell ushow much we common folk love it. Theysay the more society is dragged intoeconomic desperation, the more weappreciate the queens and gilded presi­dents. Depressions, we are told, areparticularly good times for the collectivepraise of the royal "lifestyle." It is atthese moments we revolutionaries arepleased to invoke the historical recordof such "culture heroes" as Louis XVI,Charles I and Czar Nicholas.

The end of the monarchy in Britain iscenturies overdue. It is a law of historythat where the bourgeois revolution wasweak or truncated some of the morerepulsive features of the old orderremain. It is not only in backwardsocieties, but also in "civilized" nationsthat some of the most elementarydemands of the bourgeois revolutionmust await the socialist revolution.•

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Next door in EI Salvador, theSandinistas' counterparts of the FDR/FM LN opposition popular front soughtto enlist the pope in their diplomaticdrive for a "negotiated solution" to thecivil war. Wojtyla supports "dialogue"in EI Salvador precisely as a means ofmaintaining capitalist rule. And hiscounterrevolutionary gospel will have apowerful effect, particularly in thedeeply religious rural areas (althoughperhaps also radicalizing many, particu­larly in Nicaragua). It is by mobilizingthe working class in an openly socialiststruggle that the prophets of reactionand anti-Communism can be mosteffectively combatted. And this requiresthe leadership of Trotskyist workersparties. built in struggle against theStalinism and nationalism which bindsthe working masses to their exploiters.Based on a program of permanentrevolution, such parties will fight notonly for workers and peasants govern­ments throughout Central America, butabove all to extend revolution to thepowerful working class of Mexico. Andin the present exacerbated crisis ofMexican capitalism, one of the mostacute points in the international eco·nomic mess, this is no mere abstractpossibility.

That fact has been well noted inWashington, and not just by theReaganites. Democratic Senator HenryJackson recently remarked:

"My concern from the beginning hasbeen that Mexico is the ultimateobjective of those forces seeking todestabilize countries in Central Ameri­ca, Mexico's the ultimate target."There are severe problems in Mexicothat could be utilized in an effort todestabilize it. Serious unemployment.Unrest. Corruption. The financialproblems. It's all there."

-New York Times, I March

The Trotskyists of the internationalSpartacist tendency have been unique inpointing from the beginning of theSalvadoran civil war to the crucialimportance of sparking revolutionarystruggle-not just empty "solidarity"gestures-by the Mexican proletariat.The FSLN, FDR/FMLN, Castro, evenMexican pseudo-Trotskyists have failedto raise this perspective because theysupported the foreign policy of theLopez Portillo government, for a"negotiated solution" to the CentralAmerican conflict in the interests ofMexican capitalism.

We Trotskyists fight for workersrevolution in the heart of U.S. imperial­ism, and concrete workers solidaritywith the Salvadoran insurgents is animportant part of that fight. Class­struggle trade unionists in the WestCoast longshore union have called for alabor boycott of all military goods toCentral American reactionary regimes.In the face of sharp American escala­tion, direct political strikes against U.S.intervention would be called for. Realsolidarity with anti-imperialist struggleabroad means waging militant classstruggle at home.•

armed, paid and directed by the CIA.Wojtyla refused to comment on thesecrimes. When Rev. Ernesto Cardenal, apoet and Nicaragua's minister of cul­ture, knelt to kiss the pontiffs ring in thereceiving line, the pope withdrew hishand and wagging a finger told thepriest to "straighten out your positionwith the Church." Later in the open-airmass in the center of Managua heattacked the five priests holding highgovernment positions for "acting out­side or against the will of the bishops."

The mass in the Plaza 19 de Julio wasthe showdown. When Wojtyla not onlyvociferously attacked the "People'sChurch" but pointedly refused to say aword of condolences for the victims ofanti-Sandinista terror, the crowd beganshouting, "We want peace," "People'spower," "Long live liberated Nicara­gua." and "No pasarim" (They shallnot pass). The pope repeatedly or­dered "silence." to no avail. Then,dramatically:

"A group of mothers whose teenagesons were reported killed by 'contras:" ,carried framed photographs of theirboys over their heads and surgedtoward the altar. demanding 'prayersfor our martvrs'."

-Chic'ago Tribune, 6 March

There were shouts of "imperialist" and"people's power." In response, the popemade a reference to Nicaragua's MiskitoIndians, a section of whom have goneinto exile in Honduras, some of themjoining the contra bands, and thenprovocatively proclaimed in the Miskitolanguage "Miskito power!" But aboutthe 85 Miskito children and motherswho died last December in a tragichelicopter crash while being evacuatedfrom areas under mercenary attack, thisapostle of imperialist reaction has hadnot a word to say.

The head of the Catholic church ineffect declared an anathema againstSandinista Nicaragua. "Viva el Papa!"will become a battlecry of the counter­revolution. According to the New YorkTimes (6 March), an FSLN organizersaid angrily, "The Pope has sold out toimperialism and to Reagan." But PopeJohn Paul Wojtyla did not "sell out"anything. It was the Sandinistas whospread illusions with slogans such as"between Christianity and the revolu,tion, there is no contradiction." Thevery fact that the pope was invited toNicaragua was an expression of theFSLN's false hopes to walk a "middleroad" with the toleration of imperial­ism, preserving a "mixed economy" andfollowing a "non-aligned" foreign poli­cy. But Reagan and the pope havebrought the counterrevolutionary on­slaught to Nicaragua's borders and intothe heart of Managua. The churchhierarchy is a potent force for counter­revolution, no less than the privatecapitalists who control 60 percent of thecountry's economy and the many pro­capitalist elements still incrusted in thegoverning apparatus, exemplified bythe former "Comandante Zero," EdenPastora.

Wojtyla's mass in Managua was quitedifferent from his triumphal tour of hisnative Poland in the summer of 1979.This was the real birthdate of theSolidarnosc "union," a pro-imperialist,anti-Soviet nationalist movement whichhonored the fascistic dictator Pilsudskiand whose leader Lech Walesa was aninstrument of the church hierarchy.Walesa/Wojtyla brought Poland to thebrink of bloody counterrevolution inlate 1981, preparing to strike for powerwhile calling for "free enterprise" andsubmission of the Polish economy to thedictates of the IMF, the internationalbankers cartel. In the imperialist coun­tries, many "leftist" cheerleaders for theSandinistas are also fervent supportersof Polish Solidarnosc (e.g., the Ameri­can Socialist Workers Party). Whilethey hail the company "union" for theVatican and Western bankers in Po­land, the Polish pope attacks their idolsin Managua. Thus they must viewWojtyla's actions as contradictory.On the contrary, he is a consistent

President's Pope Goes to CentralAmerica

(continued from page 1)

John Paul Wojtyla took his anti­Communist crusade to CentralAmerica, and his mass in Managua maybe the turning point for SandinistaNicaragua. Already in Costa Rica thePolish pope denounced "resort toviolence or to collectivist systems." InPanama he railed against divorce,contraception and abortion. In EISalvador the pope called for "dialogue"while endorsing the government's plansfor phony "elections" ordered by Wash­ington to give the appearance ofprogress on "human rights." In Nicara­gua, the pope vituperated against"unacceptable ideological commit­ments," state education "inspired byatheism" and the "absurd and danger­ous" People's Church movement whichhas supported the Sandinista NationalLiberation Front (FSLN) against con­servative Archbishop Obando y Bravo.In five separate speeches Wojtyla neverexpressed the slightest sympathy for thenationalist revolution that overthrewone of the bloodthirstiest tyrants in theAmericas.

The battle was on from the momentthe Catholic vicar kissed the ground atSandino Airport. FSLN junta coordi­nator Daniel Ortega welcomed the popewith a call for peace, because "ourpeople is martyred and crucified everyday, and we demand solidarity withright on our side." Ortega denouncedU.S.-sponsored aggression, referring tomore than 375 Nicaraguans killed bycounterrevolutionary mercenaries

CentralAmerica ...

to oust the Stalinist bureaucrats (whopolitically oppose extension of therevolution beyond their borders, as wellas refusing to adequately arm CentralAmerica insurgents), unconditionallydefend the USSR, Cuba and the otherdeformed workers states againstimperialism.

The reformist left and Latin Ameri­can nationalists try to duck this crucialquestion in order to appeal to imperial­ist liberals. Instead they call lamely for"self-determination" for Central Ameri­ca. Well, butchers like EI Salvador'sD'Abuisson and Guatemala's RiosMontt, and the region's numerous right­wing death squads, are home grown anddetermined to crush the slightest oppo­sition to their bloody rule, A civil war isbeing waged, and we take the side of theworking people of Central America outof elementary class solidarity. To refuseto call for leftist insurgents to win thewar, in favor of some kind of negotiatedsellout, means opening the way to newmassacres the moment the masses laydown their arms.

Now Reagan is demanding thatmilitary aid to EI Salvador be tripledthis year. (The deceptively small figuresmask the fact that more than $1 billionhas been poured into the region in thelast three years.) A key element in thisnew get-tough policy was a gloomyreport from UN ambassador JeaneKirkpatrick, America's "own" DragonLady, just back from a visit to herfavorite "moderately authoritarian"dictators. (No doubt after being drivenoff the stage at the University ofCalifornia/ Berkeley by angry El Sal­vador protesters, this imperialist war­monger yearned for the "real democra­cy" of Central America!) Reagan andKirkpatrick stand by their butchers. Thepresent gang in Washington was electedon a "who lost Vietnam and Nicaragua"platform, and they're not likely to giveup without trying to send in theMarines. And this would unleashtremendous struggles not o'nIy in Cen­tral America, but in the United States aswell.

11 MARCH 1983 13

Williams/Chicago Defender

Black Democrats stump for Harold WaShington, another front man forReagan's racist cuts. From left: Congressman John Conyers, HaroldWashington, Atlanta mayor Andrew Young, Jesse Jackson, Baptist leaderFranklin Richardson, Gary mayor Richard Hatcher.

TROTSKYIST LEAGUE OF CANADA

SPARTACIST LEAGUE LOCAL DIRECTORY

VancouverBox 26. Station AVancouver. B.C. V6C 2L8(604) 681-2422

Labor/Black Struggle,Not Black Democrats

Many of those who go to the polls andpull the lever for black Democrats likeHarold Washington have no particularillusions that black faces in high placeswill mean "liberation," yet they remaintied to Democratic "Iesser-evilism"

all he was a Democrat. The SWPmayoral candidate Ed Warren ran an allbut invisible campaign against thepopular Harold Washington. But theChicago Tribune captured the SWP'sopportunism in bold print the day afterthe election in an article entitled,"Socialist Pleased by WashingtonStrength.... Warren offers a "Socialist"rationale for critical support to Wash­ington while choking on an actualendorsement. He predicted a Washing­ton win and the Tribune noted "that,Warren said, would be good for his ownparty because Washington would befound unable to produce what the peo­ple want, thus giving Socialists a chance."

Meanwhile, the news broke thatWarren was offered a million dollarsand the post of head of the ChicagoHousing Authority (CHA) if he woulddrop his name from the April ballot andallow a more "suitable" candidate totake his spot. Only in Chicago. the cityof patronage where even the dead voteDemocrat, could a small-time reformistchump like Warren get an offer likethat! Still it must have been difficult forthese ballot box reformists to resist thepayoff. Imagine, a minister with port­folio in Chicago's first black administra­tion. True, it's not Castro's Cuba. or theSandinistas' Nicaragua .... But for nowhe says "my campaign is not for sale atany price," and he's toned down hisenthusiasm for Washington for theMilitant.

While the reformists hail Washing­ton's victory, life for Chicago's blacksand working people will get worse. AndJim Crow will still live in HaroldWashington's Chicago. Washingtonrefuses to support busing or call foropen housing. When asked about theJustice Department's suit against Cicerofor systematic violations of federal civilrights laws, all he could say was "itbothers me." Those who hold up HaroldWashington as the savior of blacks arehelping to refurbish the image of theDemocratic Party. But the DemocraticParty helped make Chicago America'smost segregated city. It was preciselythe strength of the Democratic Partyunder Daley and his ability to turn outmillions of Cook County voters forDemocratic presidential hopefuls whichmade it possible for the city to fend offeven the most minimal reforms of theJohnson "Great Society" era. Busing forschool integration never got one inch offthe ground in Chicago because theDemocratic Party wanted it that way.

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Cambridge, MA 02139 (213) 663-1216 (415) 863-6963

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Chicago c/o SYL WaShington, D.C.Box 6441, Main P.O. Box 2074 210 7th SI. S.E., Suite E12Chicago, IL 60680 Madison. WI 53701 Washington, D.C. 20003(312) 427-0003 (608) 251-3398 (202) 636-3537

friend and mentor Ralphe Metcalfe wasunceremoniously dumped and run outof office by Boss Daley. The Machine isnot dead. it is not dying and Washingtonhas pledged it "would not be disman­tled." "In a sense," says Washington, "Iam a product of the machine. I've dealtwith it for years. It is proper in its place"(Chicago Sun Times, 23 February). Infact, Washington is working overtime tomend fences with his Democraticopponents. He has carefully distancedhimself from the controversial Rev.Jesse Jackson, saying he will play noformal role in the new administration.At the same time he has sought arapprochement with Cook CountyDemocratic Party boss "Fast Eddie"Vrdolyak, the main man behind Byrne'scampaign.

The ex-Trotskyists of the SocialistWorkers Party (SWP) provided anamusing side show in the Chicagoprimary. These reformists are foreverrunning "independent socialist" electioncampaigns to demonstrate their com­mitment to the "peaceful, legal" elector­al road to socialism. The question ofindependence from the capitalist partiesis a purely formal question for thereformist hucksters of the SWP. Theysupported Carl Stokes when he first ranfor mayor of Cleveland as a nominal"independent," though it was obvious to

that pulled out the vote for Washington.But the left waterboys for the Demo­crats are doing their bit to channel blackanger into the small change of electoralreformism. Under the pressures of thebipartisan anti-Soviet war drive virtual­ly every so-called socialist group isscrambling for the spot traditionallyoccupied by the mainstream socialdemocrats. It's clear these reformistshave one answer to Reagan's war onblacks, workers and the poor-put aDemocrat in the White House in 1984.

The reformists all try to justify theirsupport to Washington by trying toportray him as an anti-Machine candi­date. But for 15 years he operated as aMachine flunky in the Illinois legisla­ture. He sat back and watched as his old

m· nnrlJ" fit},ltu .hl/Ion

Fake-Lefts Just WildAbout Harold

The Democratic Party hopes to cashin on the Washington victory. Afternothing but abuse and neglect at thehands of both capitalist parties, noweveryone's talking about the "increasedcredibility of the black vote." It was theblack vote that tipped the scale forJimmy Carter in 1976, and the Demo­crats have renewed hopes that they'll doit again in '84. Charles Manatt, chair­man of the Democratic National Com­mittee, called the lesson of Washing­ton's victory "very important for theDemocratic Party, because we need thatbase." And House leader Tip O'Neill hasassured Harold Washington that theparty will stand behind him. For the firsttime in ages blacks feel like they may beable to expand their influence in theDemocratic Party.

Washington's victory has certainlybuoyed the hopes of the anti-Reaganpopular front. It was mainly theremnants of the '60s black movement­King's lieutenants Jesse Jackson, AlRaby, Lu Palmer and ex-Black PantherBobby Rush, et aI.-who provided thedemagogy and grassroots organization

"astute politician" who " ... has man­aged to hold the town together de­spite the city's depressed economicstate...." Coleman Young certainly hasdone an admirable job for the autobosses and the banks, but he has donenothing to relieve the grinding povertythat grips Detroit. He's presided overmass layoffs in the auto industry thathave left the city a wasteland, and heopposed cross-district busing to inte­grate the schools. When the KKKannounced it would parade in down­town Detroit to "celebrate" the Greens­boro massacre, Young threatened toarrest anti-Klan protesters. But 500blacks, socialists and auto workers ledby the Spartacist League (SL) turned upto make sure the Klan didn't ride in theMotor City. Democrat Young has goneafter the largely black city workersunions with a vengeance, includingbusting the 1980 AFSCME strike so hecould play host to the Republicanconvention that nominated RonaldReagan! Just last fall Young mobilizedhis Democratic machine to bust thestrike of the mainly black teachersunion, shoving wage cuts and conces­sions down their throats. Harold Wash­ington's election promises more of thesame for Chicago.

Harold Washington's victory may havetipped the scales for the black mayoralcandidates in Philadelphia and Mem­phis. These black front men have donean important job for the bourgeoisie.Like the bantustan chieftains who offerthemselves up as loyal servants of SouthAfrican apartheid, the black mayorsoffer themselves up to maintain socialpeace for the racist American rulingclass.

Many of the country's black mayorscame to Chicago to boost the Washing­ton campaign, among them. ColemanYoung, Marion Barry an9 RichardHatcher. In an article entitled, "ExpertsGive Black Mayors Good Marks," theChicago Tribune singled out Detroit'sColeman Young in particular as an

The Black Mayors:Reagan's Black Overseers

Jesse Jackson described the over­whelming black vote for Washington asa "political riot, disciplined rage."Washington said his victory representedthe "coming into political maturity" ofminority groups that once thoughtsimple street protests were enough:

"We were slow to move from the protestmovement into politics. We were lulledto sleep thinking that passing a few lawswas enough. But we've got to beinvolved in the mainstream politicalactivity. That's what's happening herein Chicago. And that's the lesson that'sgoing out across the country."

-New York Times, 27 FebruaryAnd that lesson has not been lost on

the liberal bourgeosie which sees in theWashington victory the possibility ofchanneling deep-seated black outrageinto harmless electoral channels. TheNew York Times greeted the Washing­ton win as a great achievement andlauded "using the vote to assert influ­ence as the American way." As blackcolumnist and former USIA directorCarl Rowan noted, Reagan's racistAmerica, economically depressed andpolitically volatile, "is a tinderbox inwhich explosion can come quickly." Asblacks and the poor are driven todesperation, the bourgeoisie needs itsblack overseers to keep the lid on themajor urban centers.

The black Democratic mayors areReagan's field marshals of oppressionand austerity-all union-busters, allenemies of black people. There are now223 black mayors in the U.S. runningmajor cities like Los Angeles, Detroit,New Orleans and Washington, D.C.'

ChicagoMachine...(continued/rom page 16)propaganda is being circulated in thepolice department. The Chicago Defend­er reports one of the disgusting racisttracts "shows a Chicago Police Depart­ment insignia which is misspelled andlabeled 'Chicagongo Police' and has twochicken drumsticks separating thewordings. Inside the design the litera­ture has a composite of two large lips, aslice of watermelon, a slab of ribs and acan of beer." Another filthy leaflet says,"No matter what anyone else tells youthis election has come down to race....Make the difference on April 12, voteRepublican. It's the only chance wehave."

The danger of a racist cop rampage inthis racially polarized city is very real.When Byrne was elected with thesupport of the gay vote the copsdemonstrated their disapproval bybusting up over a dozen gay bars. Oneblack Chicago resident told WV thatwhen he entered a restaurant rec.entlynear the Fraternal Order of Police hall.eight white cops jeered, "Well, if it isn'tHarold Washington." and as he turnedto leave he overheard one of the copssay, "I ought to shoot that nigger."These trigger-happy thugs. the murder­ers of Panther leaders Fred Hamptonand Mark Clark, who've shot downscores of blacks in the streets, may juststage a police riot to prove a blackmayor will mean chaos in the streets.

The cops are the racist enemies ofblacks and working people and anybonapartist drive on their part toorganize as an independent politicalforce or break loose from civiliancontrol must be opposed. But Washing­ton's liberal schemes like a civilianreview board and more black cops areonly designed to make the police morecrt.:dible in the eyes of their victims. Noamount of "reforms" will eliminate theracism of cops enforcing bourgeoisproperty rights in the ghettos, or changethe role of the police as the armed fist ofthe bourgeois state. Only the destruc­tion of the capitalist system that breedscrime and racist reaction can do awaywith police terror once and for all.

14 WORKERS VANGUARD

because there appears to be no alterna­tive. At an SL forum on Chicago'sSouth Side the day after the primaries ayoung black woman said:

"I notice that you tend to put downColeman Young and Hatcher [the blackmayor of Gary. Indiana] a lot. You haveto understand that when these men wereelected they were given a city that wason the edge of financial ruin anyway.The big corporations already got whatthey wanted from the cities, so theyleave the waste heap to the black man torun. It's hard to turn a city around whenyou don't see any possible way of doingit .... I think you're being a little hard onColeman young.... He's just goingalong with the plan ...."

The point is there's no way to turn thedecaying cities around under capitalism.Detroit, Gary and Chicago are goingdown the tubes because capitalism isgoing down the tubes, and the capitalistsplan to make blacks and workers pay forthe crisis. The inner cities have becomehellhole prisons for blacks and the poor,and the black Democrats have becomethe wardens. They volunteer for thefront lines in Reagan's war on workersand minorities.

It will take integrated 'labor/blackstruggle to break down segregation, tofight layoffs, plant closures and give­backs, and to beat back Klan/Naziterror. And that means a fight againstthe Democrats, including their blackfront men and their loyal lieutenants inthe leadership of the unions. Chicago isnot just a patchwork of rigidly segregat­ed neighborhoods; there are integratedfactories, integrated unions. Last sum­mer the city got a taste of the power ofthe Marxist program for labor/blackmobilizations against fascist terrorwhen the Spartacist League mobilized3,000 unionists, blacks, Jews, gays andsocialists to stop the Nazis' threatenedattack on the Gay Pride parade inLincoln Park. Byrne told people toignore the fascist provocation. Theblack Democrats, the people whobrought you Harold Washington, hadByrne's line. They were too busy withthe campaign to be bothered with theNazis. More recently, on November 27in Washington, D.C., the SpartacistLeague initiated and led a 5,OOO-stronglabor/black mobilization that stoppedthe KKK from parading the streets ofthe nation's capital, and again the blackDemocrats sought to sabotage theaction.

The black establishment is clearlyworried that black outrage will take on aconscious, organized anti-capitalistpolitical direction as it did whenthousands of unionists and blackschased the Klan out of Washington. Sowith D.C. delegate Walter Fauntroyleading the charge, they violence-baitedand red-baited the organizers of theprotest, declaring the Klan scored apropaganda victory that day. An articleby Dr. Charles Faulkner in the ChicagoDefender (12 February) mouths thesame line: "The Klan emerged lookinglike the good guys. Blacks ended uplooking like emotional, disoriented,easily manipulated children." Whatarrogance! A vote for Washington is asign of "political maturity" but stoppingthe Klan is "childish"! The "talentedtenth" never likes it when the blackmasses take matters into their ownhands. After all, things might get out ofhand, and they might be out of a job.The black Democrats leave black peopledefenseless in the face of racist terror aslong as they get their "turn to rule."

As SL spokesman Bernard Vance putit at the February 23 Spartacist forum,"The big turnout for [Harold] Wash­ington is a defeat for black liberation. Itmeans that the old line about the Dem­ocratic Party being 'where it's at' wonagain ... that's a defeat for the interestsof black people and the working class ingeneral. We're talking about building analternative to the twin parties of thecapitalist class." What's needed is arevolutionary workers party leading allof the oppressed in the fight for blackrights and socialist revolution. That'sthe only road to black liberation!.

11 MARCH 1983

Steel Sellout...(continued from page 16)

Soviet war buildup, austerity andintensified racial oppression. Two yearsago USWA "dissidents" were in theforefront of those who cheered thestrikes in Poland organized by Reagan'sfavorite company union, Solidarnosc.This year, at home, they will doeverything possible to prevent strikeaction to scrap McBride's colossalgivebacks, just like they fought toprevent militant labor action to stop thelayoffs that have been turning Gary,Homestead and other steel cities intoghost towns.

The "solution" proposed by thecapitalists and their labor lieutenants isreadily apparent in Gary, a dyingcompany town with a black Democrat"friend of labor" mayor who is doingReagan's dirty work of enforcingausterity. The city center is almostentirely boarded up: even the USWAhas taken its offices to the suburbs.Black steel workers there know thateven 15 years seniority isn't enough toget a lousy shovel job in U.S. Steel'slabor pool. Meanwhile the top rate forunemployment benefits in Indiana is astinking $84 a week! Not DemocraticParty handouts but militant laboraction is desperately ne~ded to defendthe black and working-class popula­tions of depression-torn cities like Gary.

Steel workers must fight! A militantindustry-wide strike is urgently neededto throw back the givebacks inMcBride's face. The union misleaders­from McBride to the "dissidents" likeRon Weisen, president of Local 1397 inHomestead-are unwilling and incap­able of leading a successful strike: theirloyalties are to the capitalists' Demo­cratic Party, not the workers' interests.Class-struggle militants must thereforespearhead a fight for elected strikecommittees to wage a winning strikewith mass picketing and fighting laborsolidarity. If steel workers don't go intoaction to smash this deal, every USWAhousehold will be an economic disasterarea.

Break the No-StrikeStranglehold!

USWA members are familiar with theshopping list of givebacks thatMcBride/Odorcich signed away with astroke of the pen: the $1.25 per hourdirect wage cut, no CO LA for a year anda half, elimination of extended vaca­tions plus a week of regular vacation, aholiday lopped off, Sunday premiumpay pared back, etc. The cost amountsto over $12,000 per worker! And still,District 31 director Jack Parton an­nounced the companies may well comeback for more!

Then there's the scab clause, anattempt to squash the right to honorpicket lines: "The Union deems itselfbound by two arbitration awards atInland Steel and U.S. Steel which heldthat sympathy strike conduct is prohib­ited by the broad language of the no­strike provision." McBride and thecompanies inserted this paragraph afterthe National Labor Relations Boardoverturned both arbitration awardsmentioned. One of these cases involvesKeith Anwar, a Local 1010 member atInland Steel fired in May 1979 forrefusing to cross another USWA local'spicket line.

The Anwar picket line case won widebacking from Calumet-area steel work­ers who understand that picket linesolidarity is an essential tool for unitingworkers in struggle against the bosses.However the USWA bureaucracy,including then-district director JamesBalanoff, a so-called "progressive," sawthe picket line case as a threat to theirscabherding policies. These misJeadersuse no-strike clauses and anti-labor lawsas an excuse for junking the laborprinciple that picket lines mean don'tcross. Back in 1979 the union leaders

tried unsuccessfully to bury the case.Now McBride snatches defeat from thejaws of victory and the USWA "dissi­dents" go along with this tightening ofthe no-strike stranglehold. Militantsmust demand: Dump the no-strikeclause!

For Class-Struggle Leadership!Rank-and-file anger against this give­

back pact erupted at a Local 1010meeting attended by more than 500workers on March 3. District directorParton and Bernard Kleiman, generalcounsel for the International, tried toexplain the contract's terms, but accord­ing to union members present at themeeting, both these hacks were shouteddown. Kleiman was nailed by onemember who exposed his "backstab­bing" role in negotiating the scab clause.

The angry March 3 meeting saw thedecisive breakup of the incumbent"progressive" Rank and File Caucus,with one griever, a longtime caucussupporter, calling for the resignations oflocal president Bill Andrews and JoeGyurko, chairman of the grievancecommittee, because of their defense ofconcessions in the local contract involv­ing job combinations and the elimina­tion of a clause that provided someprotection against layoffs. (Accordingto one witness, about the only speakerfrom the floor who was not applaudedwas a member of Progressive Labor'sInCAR front group, who said the unionwas an obstacle that had to be re­moved!) What was lacking was anauthoritative class-struggle leadershipto direct the members' anger into laboraction to fight the givebacks and layoffs.

Faced with this leadership gulf, threemilitants pointed the way forward witha leaflet distributed at the Local 10 10meeting entitled, "Givebacks and Un­employment: For Steel Workers It's ...Fight or Starve!" These militantscorrectly emphasize that the AFL-CIO/Democratic alliance is based in part onprotectionism: "It's the old refrain:'Love U.S. Steel-Hate foreign work­ers'." This program leads not just totrade wars, but shooting wars in whichworking people butcher each other onbehalf of their capitalist masters. Point­ing to the concessions, mass layoffs andracism that go hand in hand with thebipartisan program to funnel trillionsinto a war machine aimed at the SovietUnion, the leaflet states:

"The only way we can turn these attacksaround is by waging some hard classstruggle. One USW A sit-in strike in aplant like Bethlehem's Lackawannaworks would be worth more than all thecanned food in Buffalo. The 'steel'companies don't give a damn aboutsteel. steel workers or the need for steelto rebuild this country from the insideout. Their drive for higher profits meanscutting loose for more profitable invest­ments (like U.S. Steel's Marathon Oil),while trying to force our wages andbenefits lower and lower. For us it'sfight or starve!"

The leadership needed to wage such afight must be forged in the struggle tooust the labor traitors, from McBride toAndrews and Weisen. The labor refor-

FUNDS NEEDEDIN PICKET UNE FIGHT

Last September 24 the NLRBordered Inland Steel to reinstate.with seniority and back pay, KeithAnwar, a member of USWA Local1010 who was fired in 1979 forhonoring the picket line of anotherSteelworkers local. But the com­pany has filed yet another appealwhich will prolong the four-yearstruggle and consume more pre­cious dollars in legal fees. TheKeith Anwar Defense Committee,already heavily in debt, urgentlyneeds money. Support this fight forlabor solidarity! Send checks pay­able to the Keith Anwar DefenseCommittee. Box 7914, Chicago,IL 60680.

mists in steel and all the unions havealways tailored their demands to thecapitalist profit system. The workingclass is being ravaged by givebackstoday not because these bureaucratshave gotten "worse" but because theprofit system itself is in severe decline.The pro-capitalist labor lieutenants areready and willing to go down with it,dragging along the entire labor move­ment. The Spartacist League says it isnecessary to build a workers party tofight for what all workers and oppressedpeople need. And that means organizingto put an end to this irrational, racistboom-bust system, replacing it with aplanned economy under a workersgovernment. •

Fremont...(continued from page 3)

work rules", i.e., runaway speedup.The Detroit Free Press (2/16/83) cites

GM/Toyota's plan to hire 3,000workers to make 200,000 cars a year atFremont, commenting, "That will beabout half the employment at a GMassembly plant with comparable annualproduction, giving the joint venturelarge labor savings over other U.S. automakers." (our emphasis)

At this point Fraser is trying to coverup the fact that as far as GM/Toyota areconcerned, all bets with the UAWareoff. Fraser is willing to accept any deal,even if it means workers with nearly 30years have their pensions stolen andworkers in the plant are worked to deathat non-union wages. For Fraser nosacrifice by UAW members is too great'to keep the auto companies makingbigger profits. That's why he is onChrysler's Board of Directors and isgoing to stay there, even when OwenBieber takes over as President at theUAW convention.

Fraser's local flunkies \ike Kamekani,Marsh and Scrempos opposed Qurmotion at the Local meeting. Marshargued for dropping that part of themotion opposing a substandard con­tract! Kamekani was quoted on KeBSradio attacking those members whovoted for the motion, stating they werelooking for "violence", thinking only ofthemselves, and that a motion propos­ing a fight for our jobs would "scareaway" GM/Toyota. This is exactly thesame line they used last year when theUAW Militant Caucus and othermembers made an urgent fight for asitdown strike to stop the closing of theFremont plant. These same juniorpartners of Fraser-Mays, Nano,Marsh, Kamekani-Ied the workers outof the plant without a fight. They told usto go quietly or else risk losing ourbenefits. But we lost everything andthese Local and International mislead­ers are directly responsible. These arethe people who then used the plantshutdown to sell the GM concessionscontract. The much-touted GIS [Guar­anteed Income Stream] is a cruelswindle to force older workers out of theindustry, giving them a "choice" ofOklahoma GM jobs with no protectionagainst layoffs or loss of GIS and allother benefits.

Despite the depression the autocompanies have regained their profitsprimarily because of the concessionsengineered by the Fraser gang, and theplant closings and layoffs they neverfought. Because of these betrayalshundreds of thousands of UAW mem­bers have been reduced to welfare, souplines or worse. This time we had betterfight to defeat the union-busters, bothAmerican and Japanese. In the courseof that fight UAW members will forge anew internationalist class-struggle lead­ership and sweep Fraser and his gangaside.

Vote for Ruth Ryan and Karen Allenfor convention delegate 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.Thursday March 10.•

15

W'liNEliS ,,1NI/JI1Ii'Break with Democrats-Workers/Blacks Need Their Own PartYl

Harold Washington Takes OverChicago MachineCHICAGO-On February 22, HaroldWashington was the victor in Chicago'sDemocratic primary over opponentsincumbent Jane Byrne and Boss Daley'skid, Richie. Newscasters choked as theyreported the upset on election night, andblacks were jubilant. It does seem likelythat "segregation city" will get its firstblack mayor. As the lvew York Timesnoted, "His defeat by a Republican isunlikely; as one Chicago alderman putit, Attila the Hun or Yuri Andropovcould win Chicago's April electionprovided they ran as Democrats." Butdespite the massive numbers of blackvoters turned out by Washington's10,aOO-strong army of volunteers-thebiggest vote in 30 years-the election ofthis Machine Democrat is no victory forChicago hlacks. As long as the capital­ists run Chicago. it will remain "segrega­tion city."

Washington's victory is being toutedas the best thing that's happened toblack people in years. "Martin LutherKing said he wouldn't see the promisedland but that we would," said Al Raby,Washington's car:lpaign organizer. "InChicago we have come to see thatpromised land." And virtually the entireleft has gone gaga for this mainlineblack Democrat. The Communist Par­ty's Daily World hailed his victoryproclaiming, "Washington Beats Chica­go Bosses." Socialist Workers Party

IJ

- • • Chicago DefenderHarold Washington's Chicago Will stili be "segregation city."

candidate Ed Warren "was jubilant February). But while the black estab-Tuesday night over the strong showing lishment and socialist fakers prattle onmade by U.S. Rep. Harold Washing- about the "promised land," for the vastton" (Chicago Tribune, 23 February). majority of black and working peopleAnd Workers World Party shamelessly Washington's victory will mean more ofurged, "Every effort should be made by the same racist hell-epidemic levelwhite workers and progressives to join unemployment, killer cuts in socialin the push to elect Washington on April services, cop terror in the ghettos, and12 as mayor" (Workers World, 25 rising Nazi/Klan terror.

The Washington victory of course ledto the predictable rumors of massive"white flight" from the city. And Byrne,whose high-handed racism in officeenraged the city's black population,deliberately inflamed racial polarizationin the final weeks of the campaign. Shesent her precinct captains into theNorthwest and Southwest side ethnicwards to spread the word, in Polish andLithuanian when necessary, that a votefor Daley was a vote for Washington."You can't answer that kind of thingunless you put on a white sheet andrun around," said William Daley, hisbrother's campaign strategist. Nowincumbent Democratic alderman Ma­jerczyk whose ward lies just north ofracist stronghold Marquette Park hasannounced his support of liberal Re­publican Bernard Epton as an ;Jet of"racial pride."

But the real focal point fora racialbacklash against the Harold Washing­ton victory is the notoriously racistbonapartist Chicago police department.Washington pledged to fire policesuperintendent Richard Brzeczek, esr;>e­ciallv after he made a campaign com­mer~ial for Byrne. Brzeczek immediate­ly retorted, "I won't work a day for thatman ... I'll quit." Now Brzeczek is sayingthe streets of Chicago may not be safe ifWashington is elected mayor and racist

continued on page /4

Throw Out the Giveback Bureaucrats!

4Billion Steel Sellout!CHICAGO-Lloyd McBride and hisgang of Pittsburgh stealers have putover the biggest "voluntary" givebackdeal in history. The new United Steel­workers of America (USWA) contractapproved March I by the basic steelindustry conference will rob some fourbillion dollars from 260,000 basic steelworkers and 100,000 other USWAmembers covered by "me-too" agree­ments. In dollars per worker, theUSWA concessions overshadow eventhe mammoth givebacks in auto lastyear. Twice in the past several monthsUSWA president McBride tried unsuc­cessfully to follow the giveback exampleset by Auto Workers head Doug Fraser.Now McBride has outdone his mentorin Detroit.

But it wasn't just McBride who pavedthe way for concessions. Equally re­sponsible are the USWA "progressives"who have helped enforce class peace foryears while the steel bosses gouged the

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union with impunity. USWA member­ship has plummeted by an incredible 50percent, yet all the bureaucrats and theirfake-left toadies can muster is foodbanks and caravans to Washington tolobby the Democrats for a few crumbs.

The USWA misleaders say what'sneeded is givebacks, taking billionsfrom steel workers' paychecks to putinto company coffers. McBride & Co.don't even pretend that their sellout will"save jobs." How could they: thecontract explicitly gives the companies afree hand to shut down plants at will.After all, layoffs are the American Way!Even without the "job protection" figleaf that was draped on Fraser's autoconcessions, 169 USW A local presi­dents bought the betrayal, while theother 63 put up only a token opposition.

In the past the steel barons provokedbitter bloody struggles by using Pinker­tons, spies, tear gas and machine guns todrive down wages; now their labor

il:::>

At U.S. Steelheadquartersin Pittsburgh,steel workersdemonstrate

againstlayoffs.

lieutenants do it for them at no extracost. From top to bottom, the USWAbureaucracy accepts givebacks as a

necessary part of the AFL-CIO­supported bipartisan program of anti­

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11 MARCH 1983