Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 11:41:59 +0200 (MET DST)
From: rolf.martens-AT-mailbox.swipnet.se (Rolf Martens)
Subject: Re: M-G: Congo: People wins! But why the industry decrease?


Hello Karl,

Sorry about this reply (to yours of 26.03) being so late.
Other things have occupied me - the discussion with Adolfo
you will have seen, and there's also a fight here in southern
Sweden against a flagrant plan of such desindustrialisation as
I was talking about: Strong bourgeois political forces want to
close down and destroy the perfectly well functioning Barseb=E4ck
nuclear power plant near to here (wilful destruction of $3-6bn),
which also has a certain international symbolic inportance - the
US imperialists etc have long been after it.

The struggle against that closing down has gotten some
international support - on this list from Jay Miles, Detroit,
which I see as a sign that some advocates of Marxism are
starting to see the importance of these questions and of doing
the right thing in them. Certain supposed "Marxists" actually
massively support the bourgeois mad destructive plans.

In reply to your request below, I think I can do nothing better
at the moment than re-post some earlier "UNITE! Infos" on the
general subject of "green" warfare. See other postings.

They don't touch on Africa on any part of it in particular. In
fact they don't directly touch on Africa at all. But desindistria-
lisation in the most highly-developed countries indirectly causes
such in Africa too. *And* there are such designs directly against
the third-world countries too.

The analysis of these things is not mine. The basic analysis
was made in the 1970s by the then revolutionary, later
degenerated KPD/ML(NEUE EINHEIT) in Germany. There also e.g.is that
1856 Marx speech in London I mentioned - see archive.

Concerning "ethno-centrism", this among Marxists of course would be
on the level with believing in gods or being a member of the Flat
Earth Society or something - not that, IMO, all writers to this list
are above suspicion of being such members.

In a speech on 01.05.1995, Jose Maria Sison, chairman of the
CP of the Philippines, i.a. mention the fact that the imperialists
are trying to prevent industrialisation of third-world countries.
That was good. In his speech there were some errors too however,
such as one phrase indicating a belief that modernisation of
technology would cause unemployment in the imperialist countries.
It doesn't, of course. The social system does. in particular,
the "green" warfare does, including the *anti*-modernisation
campaigns that are part of that warfare.

In a posting on 30.03, under "A great stride...", there is recounted
a speech by another comrade of the PCPh, Armando Liwanang, who
said i.a.:

"The petty-bourgeois hirelings pretend to criticize their imperialist
and reactionary benefactors but prettify them by conjuring illusions
that these can reform themselves about such issues as oppression and
exploitation, sustainable development, poverty alleviation, environ-
ment, gender equality, ethnicity, civil society and so on."

This in part in fact is not good at all, since it includes the
(factually idiotic) term "sustainable development" as one designating
something desirable, when in reality it stems precisely from the
very worst reactionaries and is (solely) used as a cover term for
*strangulation of industrial development* - pretending that "resources
are "scarce", when they in reality of course are practically unlimited.

Other things too seem to show that the Philippine comrades have not
seen through these things at all, in that manner which they would
need to do.

Jacques Beaudoin, of the Action Socialiste, Canada, in a posting
supporting some bad ideas of Adolfo's some days ago, also made the
mistake once more of supporting one of the imperialists' "green" nazi
destruction campaigns. - But I shall not comment more on this here.
I'm planning to relpy to those people again later.

Rolf M.


>KARL: Hi Rolf! I appreciate your efforts to understand sub-Saharan
>economic backwardness. In this way you distinguish yourself from many
>of the more overtly ethno-centric subscribers on this and other
>mailing lists who steadfatly refuse to enter into an exploratory
>discussion on this matter.
>
>There seems to be an almost total silence concerning the need to
>focus on and understand the causes for the economic stagantion in
>sub-Saharn Africa by the radical left. The virtual silence on this
>list regarding this topic corrobrates this view of mine. One would be
>forgiven for believing that it may be a manifestation of a chauvinist
>racism.
>
>ROLF:Yes, there obviuosly *has* been de-industrialisation in Sub-
>Saharan Africa. Why this awful fact?
>
>This has to do with what I've written about many times already
>and have referred to as "green warfare" by the main bourgeois
>forces in the world against the peoples of all countries.
>
>It's a global anti-industry, anti-technology, anti-science and anti-
>economic-growth campaign essentially *caused by the bourgeoisie's
>enormous fear, today, of proletarian revolution*!
>
>KARL: I am quite interested in this "green warfare" thesis of yours
>concerning Africa. I would appreciate your elaboration as to what
>you mean by it. I know you have provided some off the cuff pointers
>as to its meaning. Then I may be able to respond  more
>adequately to your message.
>
>
>                                     
>
>
>
>
>                          Yours etc.,
>                                     Karl  
>
>
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>
>



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