Date: Mon, 03 Mar 1997 18:05:06 +0100
Subject: M-G: Mark Jones and the PCP! 


This is in answer to Mark Jones who at present sees the PCP in Peru as and
"example" to follow. Good Luck Mark!

Bob Malecki

THE CRISIS IN THE PCP-SL

One year after his capture, Gonzalo made a U-Turn. He decided to make the
"new great decision" and to advocate the end of the people's war and a
"peace agreement" with Fujimori.

He justified that shift writing that the PCP-SL without Gonzalo's
leadership is not capable of winning the war. For Gonzalo, only he himself
could lead his party to the victory and because he was in jail for all his
life and he
was incapable of leading the party in the war, the PCP-SL needed to avoid a
serious defeat.

He understood that the PCP-SL couldn't win the war and that the priority
was to protect the life of thousands of political prisoners and of most of
the PCPSL leadership in jail. He offered Fujimori a deal.

The destruction of the APRA, the United Left and "revisionism" is something
that Gonzalo was happy with and he congratulated Fujimori for achieving
these and some reforms. A very secret deal is on the agenda. The
pro-Gonzalo forces are progressively being liberated from prison and in the
mass organisations they are becoming "left" supporters of the regime.

Gonzalo's shift is a complete contradiction of what he said in his speech
when he was showed in a cage. Until 1992 the PCP-SL considered that they
achieved "strategic equilibrium" and that they have to prepare a war of
movements and the military occupation of Lima and other cities. Before his
capture Gonzalo moved to Lima and he led a constant bomb campaign. Nearly
every day the PCP-SL put bombs in many places. They put bombs even in
places in which many ordinary workers were walking. In Tarata (Miraflores)
they kill more than ten innocent workers and street sellers. In the road
between Callao and Lima they put bombs which injured or killed innocent
passengers.

These actions created a panic in society and many ordinary people were
becoming alienated from the PCP-SL who have a record of killing workers and
popular leaders and of destroying electricity plants and factories. Gonzalo
over-estimated the influence and capacity of the PCP-SL. His move to Lima
to prepare the final assault was  an adventure and he paid for it with his
capture.

One year later he realised that he could do nothing in jail and that his
party was defeated. The PCP-SL didn't achieve the "strategic equilibrium"
and it was very unpopular amongst the workers and poor people. The shanty
towns were the bastions of the left and the PCP-SL always wanted to expel
the United Left from them. The PCP-SL managed to help the army and Fujimori
to destroy the left in the shanty towns and since the 1990s the
overwhelmingly majority of the shanty towns became supporters of Fujimori
who is giving them some order and some crumbs.

Gonzalo's shift created a big problem amongst his comrades outside the
jail. They didn't want to end the war. Some of them established a lucrative
power base in the Huallaga river area (world's main cocaine producer). Some
of them were genuine fighters which wanted to continue the struggle.

The Central Committee outside the jail (the so-call Feliciano wing) decided
to continue the "people's war". Gonzalo made several presentations on TV
and sent many of his handwritings everywhere showing his new position.
Gonzalo's father and mother in law supported his new position. All the main
PCP-SL leaders in jail (Miriam, Morote, Meche, Cox, etc.) and more than 90%
of the PCP-SL political prisoners openly supported him. On TV Gonzalo's
lawyer (Crespo), Morote and other leaders gave presents to the Fujimorists
and tried to be nice to the people that before they condemn as "fascist
rats which have to be killed". There are many pictures in which Gonzalo
appears with many of these leaders. In Europe many pro-PCP-SL Solidarity
committees decided to support the "new great decision".

The PCP-SL's Central Committee couldn't accept Gonzalo's betrayal but they
also couldn't denounce him. The PCPSL has a feudal structure. Gonzalo is
consider a living god and the only basis of party's unity. For the PCP-SL, 
its ideology is "Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, Gonzalo's thought and principally
Gonalo's thought". Initially the Central Committee denied Gonzalo's
capitulation. It wrote that this was a farce or that Gonzalo was probably
under drugs. Nevertheless, the pro-people's war Central Committee had to
admit that there is a "black clique" around all former PCP-SL leaders in
jail (except Gonzalo) who have to be smashed because they are advocating a
peace agreement with Fujimori. The Central Committee cannot try to ignore
reality and cannot cover the sun with a finger.

So, the Central Committee is trying to separate Gonzalo's thought from
Gonzalo's person. This is a kind of religious exercise. Gonzalo's thought
could live for ever no matter if the real individual could renounce it.

Gonzalo's capitulation created the first significant split of the PCP-SL.
>From 1970 to 1993 Gonzalo was able to expel factions which didn't have any
later importance (like the Bolsheviks in mid-1970s or New Democracy in the
early 1980s which opposed a premature and "Hoxhaite" starting of the
people's war). The "Great Decision" was the first big explosion.

Nevertheless, the explosion continues.

The Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (RIM), a Maoist international
created around Aavakian's RCP (USA) which was the main international
supporter of the PCP-SL, adopted a contemplative position. For the RIM
there was a battle of two lines. At the end the RIM decided to side with the
faction which was continuing the war.

The pro-Feliciano supporters became very upset with these oscillations. The
Maoist Internationalist Movement (a clandestine USA-base group) took the
opportunity to oppose the RIM. The MIM have a lesbian symbol and are trying
to became the best defenders of the PCP-SL's Central Committee while it
is killing homosexuals as part of increasing the morals of the PCP-SL's
"liberated areas".

The Peruvian supporters of Feliciano's PCP-SL are divided between the
pro-RIM, the pro-MIM and the "Red Flag" which is against both US Maoist
internationals.

The "Red Flag" claim to be the only representative of the PCP-SL's Central
Committee abroad. It is in charge of the PCP Web Page. It criticised the
pro-MIM for fighting for the defence of Gonzalo and the political prisoners.
They are against the defence of most of the PCP-SL prisoners because they
are supporting the "peace agreements". They are trying to separate Gonzalo
thought from his body. The importance thing is to stress the militarist
Gonzalo thought and the Central Committee which is now the only living
incarnation of that thought. For the "Red Flag" the Maoists who are
supporting the people's war but also have some illusions in Gonzalo's
living person could end in a new peace agreement. The "Red Flag" accused
Olaechea and Arce Borja as leaders which are trying to use the PCP-SL
struggle to build their own popularity.

The MIM and El Diario Internacional are denouncing the "Red Flag" as a CIA
plot like they denounce the rest of the left. Olaechea and Arce Borja are
trying to be the only authority outside Peru in supporting the "people's
war". They are trying to build a World Mobilisation Committee, which is in
fact an attempt to create a new Maoist international around the MIM and some
pro-Feliciano committees.

The wars between all these factions are based on slanders, accusations and
verbal and physical violence. The pro-Feliciano forces openly congratulated
their comrades when they killed members of the Gonzalo's pro-peace agreement
faction. The different pro-Feliciano groups attack with any kind of slander
or dirty accusations. Many supporters of the PCP-SL are demoralised and
outside these wars.

The PCP-SL is in a terminal crisis. Gonzalo decided to became a new Haya de
la Torre. Haya was the founder of a mass petit bourgeois anti-imperialist
party in 1924. In the early 1930s the APRA organised terrorist attacks and
putches.  Nevertheless, in the 1940s and 1950s it became an imperialist
puppet. In the late 1950s and in the early 1960s Haya initiated
super-coexistence with Prado and Odria, right wing anti-communist dictators
which persecuted the APRA when they were in power.

Gonzalo's capitulation is even worst than the terrible "convivence" of Haya
de la Torre. Gonzalo wants to be like "Comandante Rolando", the leader of
Bolivian Maoism who launched a popular war against a left bourgeois
nationalist regime in 1970, who became part of the establishment and
minister of labour of very anti-working class regimes in recent years.

Today there is a dirty game between the two factions of the PCP-SL (the
pro-people's war and the pro-peace agreement). Gonzalo is playing with
both. He use the militarist wing and its violent attacks to push Fujimori
to make
concessions to him. And he tries to press Fujimori to allow more freedoms
for his pro-peace comrades with the aim of stopping the militarists. When a
significant pro-Feliciano militarist is captured, the army sends him to
talk with Gonzalo and he would convince him or her to abandon Feliciano and
to support him.

This is creating problems among Feliciano's supporters. Some want a
complete breakdown with the possibility of having any link with the peace
agreement. Some want to continue in armed struggle until Gonzalo could
achieve more concessions from the regime.

None of these factions would lead a workers and peasant revolution. The
PCP-SL strategy is based on a complete rejection of Bolshevism. Only a
proletarian revolution made by workers and peasant councils and militias
and lead by a MASS leninist-trotskyst party could abolish capitalism. The
PCP-SL is against the workers and peasants organisations, councils and
militias because they are "fascist" or "revisionist". The PCP-SL is against
the building of a mass party using the electoral tribune and united front
tactics. The PCP-SL is against general strikes, soviets and insurrections.
They wanted a private war with the army in which the working class is a
subordinate entity which has to abandon its programme and class interests
and to follow the militarist petit bourgeoisie.

The electoralist stalinists (United Left) and the militarist stalinists
(MRTA and PCP-SL) block the road to a proletarian revolution because they
are against the creation of workers power and they are for a popular front
with sections of the bourgeoisie. We defend every left group against
repression and we are for the unconditional freedom of all their prisoners.
We don't fight only for the release of our comrades and the crushing of the
other left forces. We demand all the Peruvian left and unions to make a
united front in ACTIONS with the aim to mobilise the workers and peasants
against more privatisation, more militarism and more laws against the
unions and the workers.

In that fight the trotskyists from Poder Obrero and other groups should
work to converge and to develop a new revolutionary party.




     --- from list marxism-general-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---