Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:02:21 1200+
Subject: M-G: Re: M-I: Zaire


> Date:          Thu, 10 Apr 1997 09:39:54 -0400 (EDT)
> To:            marxism-international-AT-jefferson.village.Virginia.EDU
> From:          Louis Proyect <lnp3-AT-columbia.edu>
> Subject:       M-I: Zaire
> Reply-to:      marxism-international-AT-jefferson.village.Virginia.EDU


Proyect writes of Zaire as if there had been no analysis of the 
relation between nation and class there on these lists. He seems to 
think that Kabila's forces could turn into  Sandinistas. This is 
obviously his "fatherland" of the mind - the spontaneous 
petty-bourgeois led national revoution that translates into 
socialism without the intervention of a revolutionary vanguard. 
Proyect will be there to supply the socialist "bullets".  Proyect is 
worse than useless, because his politics of capitulation to petty 
bourgeois nationalists have been shown to be bankrupt in Nicaragua, 
and in South Africa where the petty bourgeois ANC is rapidly 
promoting itself into the bourgeoisie.  He wants to repeat the same 
defeat  in Zaire.

Discussion on this list about Zaire has been mainly around whether or 
not there is any basis for believing in a national-democratic stage 
in the revolution.  The Trotskyists have said NO! The LCMRCI and 
Workers Voice, both of which have had fairly lengthy articles 
published on M-I, have called for the arming of the workers and poor 
peasants independently of Kabila's forces. It is precisely because 
Kabila is able to use the democratic instincts of the 
downtrodden  masses that the masses need to be forwarned and 
forearmed against a Kabila deal with Mobutu, or his own deal with the 
US  along the lines of a Mandela, or another Mobutu, which must 
include a betrayal of the masses aspirations.

Proyects wishful thinking about the glory days of the Kabila/Cuban 
joint forces in Zaire in the 1960s' is a pipe-dream,  While nobody 
has said that Kabila is a "puppet" of the US, he is a US proxy backed 
indirectly through Uganda and Rwanda.  Support of this kind is very 
different from support from Cuba or the former SU. Kabila's room for 
maneover is almost nil.  He will do a deal, it is only a question of 
time, and the outcome will be decided  by which of 
the two major forces are the strongest in Zaire,  the US imperialists 
and their compradors or the Zaireian masses supported by the worlds 
workers and led by revolutionary socialists. 

Dave [for Permanent Revolution and  on this list]



> In an article in today's NY Times, reporter James Bennet describes US
> imperialism's attitude toward Laurent Kabila's insurgency:
> 
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
> But administration officials said they remain unsure what kind of rule might
> follow a collapse of Mobutu's government and are wary of the intentions of
> Laurent Kabila, the leader of Zaire's rebels, who now controls about a third
> of the country.
> 
> Officials at the White House and the State Department insisted that they
> were not calling on Mobutu to resign, but rather for him to help create a
> transitional government that would hold democratic elections. McCurry
> acknowledged that he was skirting the lip of such a request, saying,
> "Ambiguity is an art form."
> 
> But when pressed for elaboration, he added, "I think that it's clear that we
> have to move beyond President Mobutu and think about how we begin to
> structure a government that can address the needs of the Zairian people, and
> that's what the United States is committing to supporting."
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> I decode this reporting in the following manner. Kabila represents the armed
> people rallied around a nationalist program and leader making an attempt to
> win power through insurrectionary violence. The United States has opposed
> such types of governments for an entire 100 years, nearly without exception.
> It can set a bad example for suffering neocolonial peoples everwhere. They
> may take it upon themselves to liberate themselves and they might even
> choose to load their nationalist rifles with socialist bullets.
> 
> The United States appears to be trying to create a new puppet government
> through the guise of "democratic elections". This is the tactic they used
> during the dying days of the Somoza dictatorship in Nicaragua. The
> Sandinistas rejected this ploy, as I expect the Kabila forces will.
> 
> I have heard repeatedly on this list that Kabila is a puppet of the United
> States. I have yet to find any evidence of this. Isn't this, by the way, the
> real project for Marxists? To explain the class dynamics of the revolution
> in places like Zaire? I plan to write as much about Zaire as I can from now
> on. The rise of Kabila and the opposition of the SACP to the rightward drift
> of the ANC demand our attention, don't they?
> 
> Speaking of South Africa, one has to wonder about the significance of the
> following, also contained in the NY Times article:
> 
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Bernard Valero, the press counselor of the French Embassy in Washington,
> said France supported negotiations between the rebels and Mobutu's
> government, which are taking place in South Africa. The United States is
> also supporting that process, hoping it will lead to democratic elections.
> 
> An administration official said that Washington remained unsure whether
> Kabila, the rebel leader, will embrace democracy. "There's room for hope,
> but I don't think anyone wants to be overconfident about that," the official
> said.
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> What exactly is the role of South Africa? Is it simply a site for
> negotiations or does Thabo Mbeki have a stake in a "democratically elected"
> government in Zaire rather than one that comes to power through armed
> struggle. Wouldn't a radicalized Zairean state power undermine the
> neoliberal experiments of the ANC?
> 
> These are the questions, aren't they?
> 
> 
> Louis Proyect
> 
> 
> 
> 
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