Date: Sat, 29 Mar 1997 07:11:52 +0100 (MET) Subject: M-G: UNITE! Info #31en: 5/8 What c. Adolfo's riddles hide UNITE! Info #31en: 5/8 What c. Adolfo's riddles hide [Posted: 29.03.97] [Continued from part 4/8] MY 1994 CRITICISM OF THE REACTIONARY "RIM DECLARATION" The following criticism of the so-called "Declaration of the RIM" completely unmasks and refutes that declaration, which was firts published in 1984 and has since been translated into more than 20 languages, as a phoney, reactionary document, which in reality vilely attacks Mao Zedong's correct line. It was first published, as the last part of the article "Why Does the RIM Help U.S. Imperialism Encircle the PCP?", in my 8-page English-language leaflet "INFORMATIONSBLAD No. 24 Eng" on 12.08. 1994, and later posted on the Net on 01.01.1996 as "UNITE! Info #3en". I reproduce it here from part 3/3 of that Info. [From "UNITE! #3en", part 3/3, 01.01.1996:] *The Revolutionary Line of Mao Zedong and of the Former KPD/ML (NEUE EINHEIT), and the Phoney"Marxist" Declaration of the RIM* The RIM Declaration of 1984 contains some vicious open attacks on (at least formerly) well-known correct principles of Marxism and some flagrant untruths about the then existing situation in the world and recent history, including omissions of vital facts. It's difficult to see how these things could have been the results of even gross ignorance on the part of its authors. With particular fury, the Declaration attacks Mao Zedong's extremely successful foreign policy of a united front against imperialism in general and against one or two superpowers in particular. By the 1960:s, U.S. imperialism had long been the main protagonist of reaction. Such imperialist former big powers as Great Britain, Germany, France and Japan could no longer compete for hegemony. Mao Zedong correctly analyzed them as belonging to an intermidary zone between the then only hegemonic power and the socialist countries. In the well-known "A Proposal Concerning the General Line of the International Communist Movement" of 1963, one of the CPC documents of "the Great Polemics" unmasking Soviet revisionism, he correctly urged the working-class in the capitalist countries which U.S. imperialism was controlling or trying to control to "direct their attacks mainly against U.S. imperialism but also against their own monopoly capitalists and other reactionary forces who are betraying the national interests". For heaven's sake, no!, the Declaration cries out (p. 23, English version). We're all for Mao Zedong, of course, but that was one of his mistakes! Imperialist countries, you see, can have *no* legitimate "national interests" but *only* imperialist ones. Mao Zedong's "erroneous" view "seriously affected the development of the Marxist-Leninist movement in these countries". It also "had a long history in the international communist movement", and it definitely "should be broken with" (p. 23). You must never advocate such united fronts against one or two superpowers! Mao Zedong's view did have a long history in the communist movement. As all who have had to use Marxism to fight back against the attacks by phoney"Marxist" helpers of imperialism and social-imperialism on this point know, it was precisely the correct view of Lenin, too. His "The Discussion on Self- Determination Summed Up", for instance (in Collected Works, Vol. 22), written in 1916 in the middle of the then raging imperialist war, was aimed precisely at refuting the view of some Dutch and Polish socialists that there could be "no" *national* wars, at least not in Europe, in the imperialist period and that it was "impermissible" ever to support the national independence of an imperialist country. He wrote, i.a.: "If Belgium, let us say, is annexed by Germany in 1917, and in 1918 revolts to secure her liberation, the Polish comrades will be against her revolt on the grounds that the Belgian bourgeoisie posess 'the right to oppress foreign peoples'! - There is nothing Marxist or even revolutionary in this argument. If we do not want to betray socialism we *must* support *every* revolt against our chief enemy, the bourgeoisie of the big states, provided it is not the revolt of a reactionary class." Was this unknown to the RIM Declaration's authors? If you read some of the many articles and books by the chairman of and one other "theoretician" (RW/OR) of the RCP, USA, comrades Bob Avakian and Raymond Lotta, you can see that they at least are very well read in the works of Marx and Lenin. Did they have a hand in, in 1984? This is unknown but does seem likely. Anyway, calling that Declaration "Marxist-Leninist" is a lie. China's successful foreign policy under the leadership of Mao Zedong, which helped the proletariat in the world and the oppressed peoples and nations enormously and which gave China itself an international prestige which was never greater than in 1976, was one of the important achievements of the Chinese revolution in general and of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, 1966-1976, in particular, which made the leadership remain in the hands of the revolutionary proletariat. The last five years even have seen an enormous "posthumous victory", so to speak, of that foreign policy. By 1974, the situation in the world described above had developed further so that, against a rising tide of national liberation struggles in or by countries of the third world, of revolutionary struggles by the masses in many other countries as well and even some struggles by capitalist/imperialist countries to shake off foreign domination, the entire imperialist system was being upheld mainly by two superpowers, which also were contending with each other for hegemony, Soviet social-imperialism and U.S. imperialism. Mao Zedong in that year presented his famous and correct analysis of the countries' in the world being divided into three groups, three worlds, neither then nor later forgetting the class struggle continuing also within the different countries, never ceasing to advocate revolutionary war as the way for the proletariat to seize power. And he was at that time already advocating the forging of a broad international united front against the two superpowers, in particular against social-imperialism, and later sought to include not only small and medium-sized imperialist countries, those of the second world, but even certain forces of U.S. imperialism into a united front against Soviet social-imperialism as the then most dangerous source of war, which had put its economy on a military footing and above all was threatening an aggression against Western Europe. The danger of a war in Europe being started by social- imperialism was a very serious threat in the mid-'70:s. Mao Zedong's China and, in Europe itself, above all the KPD/ML (NEUE EINHEIT), whose genuinely proletarian revolutionary character enabled it to see the facts, persistently warned about it, while almost the entire bourgeoisie pretended there was "detente". When the Russian new tsarists could not realize their hegemonic plans, their entire empire got into increasing difficulties and by 1989 started to crack. The masses oppressed by it revolted. The recent partial downfall of that pillar of reaction, Soviet social-imperialism and social-fascism, on the whole greatly has improved the world situation. This upheaval also has caused further economic misery but it will in the long run be very beneficial for the peoples of the world. Bourgeois leaders as one man are calling it "a defeat of communism". That's a good one. Most of those people licked social-imperialism's boots while Mao Zedong and his adherents told all how like Hitler fascism it was. *"Never Unite the Many to Defeat the Few!"* *"Superpower Lackeys Are the Real Revolutionaries!"* Even more loudly than at Mao Zedong's correct analysis of the world situation in the '60:s, the RIM Declaration howls at his correct analysis of the situation in the '70:s and at the immensely important foreign policy decisions which followed from it, which were intensely disliked by that group within U.S. imperialism which had connived at the social-imperialists' aggressive plans because they suited its own counterrevolutionary aims. These decisions weren't Mao Zedongs's at all, you see! It was "the revisionists" in China who then "to a large degree" "controlled" its diplomacy! (p. 25) (Precisely when in fact Chairman Mao was receiving more foreign heads of state than ever, precisely when more people than ever listened to his words.) And to advocate unity of the third world was "all wrong"! To portray countries of the second world as intermidate forces was even - "counterrevolutionary"! "The Marxist-Leninists" (who? - perhaps the above-mentioned "uncle" comrades Avakian and Lotta, who both had published books with such attempts) have "correctly refuted" the "revisionist slander" that "the 'Three Worlds Theory' was put forward by" Mao Zedong! (p. 25) It was indeed a "nasty" theory to the superpowers and their helpers. Here again, one basic principle of this Declaration stands out: By no means should there be a united front against those reactionary forces in the world which at the time are the most dangerous! This "principle" is being upheld by today's "RIMlers", too. The Declaration does contain many phrases which may look very revolutionary. It even repeats some important truths, including *some* of those extremely important principles concerning inner-party struggle which were stressed by the Documents of the 10th Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC), in 1973. However, it never refers directly to those Documents, which, like practically all the other very important CPC documents of the 1966-76 period, the RIM has always been discouraging people from studying in the original. And, significantly, it leaves one thing out which, i.a., precisely hits at the RIM's line: "It is imperative to note that one tendency covers another. The opposition to Chen Tu-Hsiu's Right opportunism which advocated 'all alliance, no struggle' covered Wang Ming's 'Left' opportunism which advocated 'all struggle, no alliance'. The rectification of Wang Ming's 'Left' deviation covered Wang Ming's Right deviation. The struggle against Liu Shao-chi's revisionism covered Lin Piao's revisionism." (CPC's 10th Congress, Zhou Enlai's report, Peking Review 35-36/1973, p. 21) This element, one tendency covering another, also was present in the struggle within the CPC at that time and played a significant role in the later overthrow of socialism in China, in 1976-78. Here, too, the RIM Declaration grossly falsifies the demonstrable facts of what happened, this time in order to justify the admiration which the RIM has always tried making people feel for its quite particular "heroes", the phoney"leftist", in reality ultra-rightist, group of persons who had degenerated into becoming, i.a., superpower lackeys, known as the "Gang of Four". The "gang" was named so by Mao Zedong, who in 1974 repeatedly urged them to stop functioning as a such. Their leader, Jiang Qing, in 1972 already, through a series of secret unauthorized interviews with historian Roxane Witke, had started seeking U.S. support for herself as "Dowager Empress" after Mao Zedong's death. Even better suited their line social-imperialism. The CPC's CC's two decisions, proposed by Mao Zedong, on 7.4.1976 to dismiss the publicly criticized openly-rightist Deng Xiaoping and to appoint Hua Guofeng First Vice-Chairman also hit the "gang", whose member Zhang Chunqiao had "outranked" Hua Guofeng but was "bypassed" as less to be trusted. Mao Zedong at CPC meetings towards the end of his life repeatedly sharply criticized not only Deng Xiaoping and his "right deviationist wind to reverse correct verdicts" of 1975-76 but also Jiang Qing's phoney"left" reactionary line, explicitly warning against her "wild ambitions" of "becoming CPC chairman" and even saying: "After I die, she will make trouble". This the Gang of Four did. Less than a month after Mao Zedong's death (9.9.1976) they attempted a coup to seize power. *How Was Socialism Overthrown in China, How Did the Marxist- Leninists Analyze This and What Has Been the RIM's Fairy Tale About It?* The phoney"left" gang was dealt a decisive blow and its coup attempt foiled when all its four members were arrested on 6.10. 1976 by the forces of of Hua Guofeng, who publicly promised to continue Mao Zedong's line completely and thus also continue the criticism against the "traditional"-rightist Deng Xiaoping. This blow against the long-hated Gang of Four, therefore, received massive and enthusiastic support from the Chinese people and also from genuinely Marxist-Leninist forces abroad. But the RIM, e.g. in its Declaration (pp. 25-27), portrays this blow as "the counterrevolutionary coup d'e'tat in China". This "theory" is not only obviously very strange, it also defies the facts. How could suddenly, in revolutionary China, a coup d'e'tat have succeeded without at least great turmoil; why wasn't there mass resistance against the action hitting Mao Zedong's "closest comrades in arms"(!), as the Declaration calls the gang? What really is inferred here, together with the untruth that China's diplomacy "to a large degree" was controlled by revisionists, is: The great beacon of the early '70:s, China, was "half revisionist". It's pure fantasy, aimed at promoting "Gang-of-Four-ism" today. What actually took place was that Deng Xiaoping's right- deviationist group utilized the damage caused and threatened by the phoney"left" clique and the intense hatred it caused, to further their own purposes step by step, secretly being joined by Hua Guofeng's group, who as early as in November, 1976, started breaking their promise wholly to uphold Mao Zedong's line. One revolutionary party in the world - as far as I know - analyzed this correctly: the KPD/ML(NEUE EINHEIT) in Germany. Comrade Gonzalo's PCP (fraction), for instance, never did show an understanding of it. It never distanced itself from the Gang of Four and, even before its "RIM days", held some correspondingly phoney"left" views on international issues. Such a stand, as taken by an isolated revolutionary party in a comparatively backward country like Peru, may well be judged to be an honest and relatively harmless mistake. It takes on a different character when propagandized internationally and systematically since 1984 by an entity such as the RIM. This all comrades inside or outside the RIM must see. *The RIM's Utter Silence on a Historic Reverse by the Bourgeoisie, Led by U.S. Imperialism, and What This Reverse Must Mean* During the decade before the RIM Declaration was written, a series of mutually interconnected issues had risen to great importance, at least in Europe: The extremely reactionary anti- growth, anti-nuclear-energy, anti-science, anti-technology and anti-industry campaigns instigated by the most right-wing bourgeoisie, including the revisionists, in general and by U.S. imperialism in particular. And it was the preceding phoney"Marxists" who had provided and misled those groups of ignorant people who supported these assaults on vital interests of the masses, mainly under the upside-down pretext of "environmental protection". These attacks, which continue today, with ever more bourgeois forces behind them, stem from the bourgeoisie's fear that the technological and industrial development might make conditions ripe for a revolutionary workers' movement which would endanger their entire rule in the world. Marx even noted the beginnings of this fear some 140 years ago, pointing out: "Steam, electricity and spinning machine were revolutionaries of a much more dangerous character than even the citizens Barbe*s, Raspail and Blanqui." (Speech in London, 14.4.1856) Today the bourgeoisie on certain vital points already completely have reversed their earlier striving for more and more industry, better and better technology. In most so-called "advanced" countries, they are retreating from nuclear energy, in part even >from the use of oil; they are advancing backwards into the coal age, even into the windmill age, are systematically creating mass unemployment and tearing down earlier welfare systems. Clearly, all this calls for radical counterattack by the Marxist- Leninists. Such has been delivered by one, only one, party, the KPD/ML(NEUE EINHEIT), which thereby also, when it was still revolutionary, gruesomely further unmasked the earlier phoney- "Marxists". And what do the RIM and its Declaration say on this enormous subject? Not one word. Again, the RIM's standpoint greatly pleases, above all, U.S. imperialism, which is engineering anti-nuclear-energy campaigns and other foul things in the world and greatly fears those counterattacks against them which only our ideology, actual Marxism, makes possible. In order also to reverse the reversal, the proletariat must strike down the bourgeoisie's rule in the world completely, and the genuine Marxist-Leninists must begin do do some uniting. [So far the extract from my 1994 article, posted on 01.01.1996.] [Continued in part 6/8] --- from list marxism-general-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005