Date: Fri, 6 Jun 1997 14:23:40 -0400
From: hariette-AT-easynet.co.uk (Hariette Spierings)
Subject: M-G: Luis Arce Borja: Interview with Jose Maria Sison (CPP) 


Comrades:  

The important work of the World Mobilisation Commission in unmasking phoney
supporters of the People's War in Peru - contrary to the catcalls and
slanders of the revisionists, opportunists and counter-revolutionaries
posing as "Marxists" - actually goes in paralell with the tasks of promoting
the 
unity and reconstitution of our glorious International Communist Movement.  

As comrade Sison below expresses, this is a patient and protracted task that
moreover requires the development of the revolutionary struggle.  As real
friends and real revolutionaries rally together, the solidarity of their
common struggles reflects itself in the growing theoretical and practical
unity of the most important revolutionary movements in today's world:  The
People's War led by the proletariat in Phillipines and Peru stand today as
beacons for the peoples of the world.

Let us salute these concrete and firm developments.

Adolfo Olaechea





ON ARMED STRUGGLE, PEACE NEGOTIATIONS 
AND THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNIST MOVEMENT
Interview with Jose Maria Sison
Founding Chairman, Communist Party of the Philippines
 
By Luis Arce Borja,  Editor-in-chief,
El Diario International
5 June 1997


What is the present reality of the armed struggle in the Philippines?  What
is the economic and social reality of the poor masses in the country?  At
which stage is the people's war?

The people's war in the Philippines is still at the stage of the strategic
defensive.  Tactical offensives are being carried out in the form of
extensive and intensive guerrilla warfare on the basis of an ever widening
and deepening mass base.  

Under the neocolonial and neoliberal policies of the imperialists and the
local exploiting classes of big compradors and landlords, the chronic crisis
of the semicolonial and semifeudal ruling system is ever worsening and
providing the fertile conditions for the growth in strength and advance of
the armed revolution.  The toiling masses of workers and peasants are driven
to rise up in arms by oppression and exploitation.


In which manner does North American imperialism intervene in the
"counterinsurgency" in the Philippines?

U.S. imperialism has engaged in direct military intervention in the
Philippines by providing the strategic plan for total war and low-intensity
conflict, officer training, recruitment of intelligence and psy-war assets,
military and police advisors and trainors, comprehensive range of weapons,
military transport and communications equipment, intelligence exchange,
psywar operations and electronic surveillance on the ground, by planes and
by satellites.  

The Philippines is imprisoned by US naval and air forces.  In the light of
international law, the armed revolutionary movement for national liberation
and democracy is not a mere insurgent force but a co-belligerent force in a
civil war with international characteristics due to US domination and
intervention.  

What are the short- and long-term perspectives of the revolution in your
country?

The current stage of the Philippine revolution is new-democratic, under the
leadership of the proletariat, through a protracted people's war.  Upon
nationwide seizure of political power, the socialist stage of the revolution
can commence.  As regards the protracted people's war aimed at the basic
completion of  the new-democratic revolution, the probable course of
development includes the strategic defensive, the strategic stalemate and
the strategic offensive.  

At this stage of the revolution in the Philippines do forms of people's
power already exist?  What are these forms?

Since the beginning of the people's war in 1969, the revolutionary forces
and the people have been building Red organs of political power in the
countryside.  First, the barrio organizing committees are formed as
provisional organs of political power as a result of expansion work.  Then,
the barrio revolutionary committees are elected as regular organs of
political power as a result of consolidation work.  Consolidation work means
building the mass organizations of workers, peasants, women, youth, cultural
activists, children and so on and building the local branches of the
Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP).

The CPP is directly in charge of organs of political power at levels higher
than the village.  It has experimented with the establishment of the
provisional revolutionary government at levels higher than the village and
has drawn positive and negative lessons from the experiment.  The National
Democratic Front of the Philippines helps to pave the way for higher organs
of political power by establishing secret united front committees at those
higher levels.


What similarity exists between the revolution in the Philippines and the
revolutionary process which directs the CP of Peru?

The current revolutions in the Philippines and in Peru are similarly
new-democratic in character.  They arise from basically similar semicolonial
and semifeudal conditions.  Both of them are led by a communist party guided
by Marxism-Leninism-Maoism and involve the mobilization of the workers and
peasants for the completion of the new-democratic revolution and for the
consequent socialist revolution.

What are the lessons drawn from the rectification campaign within the CP of
Philippines?  What were the principal errors?

In ideology, the principal lesson is to uphold Marxism-Leninism-Maoism
against the errors of  modern revisionism, empiricism and dogmatism.  In
politics, the principal lesson is to adhere to  the analysis of Philippine
society as semicolonial and semifeudal and to carry forward the
new-democratic revolution through a protracted people's war.  

This  is  in opposition to the erroneous notion that the country has become
highly urbanized and industrialized and that the cities have become the
decisive ground for armed and legal struggles from the beginning to the end
of the revolution.  This notion led to both "Left" and Right opportunism.  

The principal "Left" opportunist errors included the presumptions that urban
insurrections and spontaneous mass actions are the leading factor and that
the people's army is a purely military force, detached from painstaking mass
work.  The principal Right opportunist error advocated legal struggle as the
main or principal form of struggle and wished to use the united front as the
tool for liquidating the revolutionary party of the proletariat. 

In organization, the principal lesson is to uphold democratic centralism
against the errors of bureaucratism and ultrademocracy.  Over a long period
of time, bureaucratism ran rampant.  Then, ultrademocracy was whipped up by
a handful of revisionist and liquidationist elements. 

What is your analysis of the international communist movement?  What will be
the ideological, political and programmatic basis for the unity of the
communists at the international level?  

The international communist movement has been undermined and weakened for
decades by revisionist betrayal.  The Marxist-Leninist-Maoist parties are in
the best position to comprise and develop the international communist
movement because they adhere to Marxist-Leninist theory and practice, have
the correct explanation for the phenomenon of modern revisionism and grasp
the line of advance for the proletarian revolution.

The basis of ideological unity in the international communist movement is
Marxism-Leninism-Maoism  and opposition to revisionism and opportunism.
However, parties that expressly adhere to Marxism-Leninism or Maoism can
have conferences, seminars and fora to clarify the ideological and political
line among themselves. They must also participate in international
gatherings along a broad anti-imperialist line, try to build a broad
international united front and struggle for the resurgence of the
anti-imperialist and socialist movement.

More important than international gatherings are the revolutionary homework
being done by the Marxist-Leninist-Maoist parties.  The international
communist movement can become strong again through the concrete application
of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism in various countries and through serious efforts
to wage armed revolution or prepare for this.

It is foolhardy to try building the ideological, political and
organizational unity of communist and workers' parties on an international
scale by putting together a hodgepodge of Marxist-Leninist and revisionist
parties.  The unity of the international communist movement should not be
confused with the broad anti-imperialist united front.

>From your viewpoint, what is the present expression of revisionism and
opportunism?  How does this occur in the trade union and political movement
and even in certain armed movements?

In various countries, there are revisionist political parties and
revisionist-led political movements which can criticize the concrete
manifestations of oppression and exploitation but which systematically
oppose the revolutionary essence of Marxism-Leninism.  They neither wage
armed revolution nor prepare for it ideologically, politically and
organizationally.

In the trade union movement, revisionism and opportunism confine the working
class to economistic and legalistic struggles within the capitalist system
and prevent the working class from undertaking revolutionary education and
militant class struggles which are directed towards the overthrow of the
entire system of oppression and exploitation.

An armed movement is not necessarily free from a revisionist and opportunist
character and direction.  We have seen in contemporary times national
liberation movements led by the radical anti-imperialist petty-bourgeoisie
and not by the revolutionary proletariat.  Under the influence of
revisionism and opportunism and dependent on external powers, the leaders of
certain armed movements have gone into neocolonial compromises as in Africa
and the most shameless forms of capitulation as in Central America.

What is your analysis of China, Cuba and Korea?  Do you consider that
socialism exists in these countries?

All these countries call themselves socialist.  Cited as proof of socialism
are the rule of the communist party, public ownership of some means of
production, and some social guarantees and services.  But we must consider
whether the working class is really in power or not and whether certain
social appearances are in the service of the of the people or of a rising
new bourgeoisie.

The restoration of capitalism in China has been in full swing since 1978.
The monopoly bureaucrat capitalists and the private bourgeoisie have
overthrown the proletariat and are in full control of the communist party,
the state, the economy and culture.  Fictitious communists use the name of
the communist party to legitimize their rule.  The private sector is now
dominant over the state-owned enterprises.  Social guarantees are being cast
away and social services are being privatized.

Cuba and Korea have certain historical and current flaws and weaknesses in
their claims to being socialist countries.  After the collapse of the Soviet
Union, they are confronted with serious difficulties. The United States
continues to take a hostile attitude towards them and at the same time try
to manipulate internal and external factors and induce "reforms" in exchange
for accommodation in the world capitalist system.

Cuba and Korea are still resisting US imperialism and in that respect
deserve anti-imperialist solidarity.  But it is one thing for a
Marxist-Leninist party to uphold in the sphere of international law and
diplomacy the right of any country to national independence and whatever
social system it has.  It is another thing to apply rigorously the
Marxist-Leninist criteria for socialism in determining whether Cuba and
Korea are socialist or not.

What is the balance of the different international initiatives directed at
coordinating the parties and organizations of the Left?

I presume that you are using the term "Left" in a broad journalistic sense.
I will try therefore to cover the wide ground indicated.

Initiatives undertaken by classical and modern revisionist parties continue
to have more participants than those undertaken by parties that adhere to
Marxism-Leninism-Maoism or to  Marxism-Leninism-Stalinism.  The Socialist
International of the social-democrats is still formally the largest.
Zhuganov of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation is reported to be
trying to organize his revisionist international.  

It is pointless to try beating these pseudo-Left international formations by
putting together a hodgepodge of Marxist-Leninist and revisionist parties
and calling it the unity of the international communist movement.  Once upon
a time the Soviet social-imperialists boasted of having the largest
international formation of communist and workers' parties.  What has become
of that formation?  

In view of the decades of betrayal by the Soviet party and then by the
Chinese party, it is understandable why there are but a few genuine
Marxist-Leninist-Maoist parties in the meantime.  Though currently small in
number, the genuine communist parties have the quality and potential to
increase their number and strength in the long course of the world
proletarian revolution.

Right now, international groupings and gatherings which are based on the
broad political ground of anti-imperialist solidarity get a far bigger
number of participants, including parties, movements and mass organizations,
than any ideologically defined grouping or gathering of parties and
pre-party formations.

The Marxist-Leninist-Maoist parties can extend their reach through broad
anti-imperialist gatherings.  The Marxist-Leninist-Maoist ideological
position requires the use of political struggle and the international united
front to arouse, organize and mobilize the broad masses of the people.

In ideological gatherings of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist parties or in broad
gatherings of anti-imperialist forces, there must be respect for the
independence and equality of the participants.  Coordination and arriving at
resolutions must not be governed by democratic centralism or by some
majority rule but by consensus of independent and equal participants.

What is the balance of  the different processes of armed struggle in the world?

Revolutionary armed struggles led by the proletariat, as in the Philippines
and Peru,  are still small in number.  But they play an inspiring and
decisive role in upholding the revolutionary essence of
Marxism-Leninism-Maoism in theoretical and practical terms.

They carry the torch to light the revolutionary way for the proletariat and
people of the entire world.  They stand out against the revisionism or
opportunism, the  neocolonial compromises and capitulation that have
betrayed the revolution in a number of countries.

For the time being, counterrevolutionary violence is more widespread in the
world than revolutionary violence.  Most of the violence today consists of
one-sided brutal attacks of the imperialists and the local reactionaries on
the people and internecine warfare among the reactionaries themselves.
Interimperialist war also looms ahead.  The new world disorder is the eve of
the new upsurge of armed revolution.
 
What do you think of guerrillas who negotiate the revolution through peace
dialogues and agreements?

When principal leaders of the Communist Party of the Philippines were
arrested in the '70s, the Marcos fascist regime offered negotiations for
"national unity and reconciliation".  It offered the release of political
prisoners, the legalization of the CPP and large amounts of money for
"rehabilitation" in exchange for capitulation and ending the armed struggle.
The CPP has consistently refused that kind of negotiations and agreement.

I think that the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Peru is correct
in promptly upholding people's war and repudiating negotiations with the
fascist Fujimori regime.  It is the revolutionary leadership and the masses
in the field that make the decisions.  It is counterrevolutionary to
consider stopping the people's war and capitulating to the enemy.

There are circumstances when revolutionary forces of whatever stage of
development can and should negotiate and when they cannot and should not.
To negotiate or not to negotiate should be decided by the determination and
objective to further strengthen the armed revolution and never to stop it.
Genuine revolutionaries never take the path of capitulation.

Negotiations and agreements can be correctly made in certain circumstances,
like forging a truce and alliance with a smaller enemy to fight a bigger
common enemy (e.g., CPC-KMT alliance against Japan), paving the way for a
general offensive by effecting the withdrawal of a foreign aggressor and
exchange of prisoners of war (e.g., Paris peace accord of 1972) and gaining
points for the international recognition of the status of belligerency
(e.g., the current negotiations of the National Democratic Front of the
Philippines and the reactionary Manila government).

In the conduct of armed revolution, the united front policy must be used to
take advantage of the splits among the reactionaries and to promote the
armed revolution against the enemy.  In this regard, negotiations and truce
agreements are made with certain reactionaries in order to make the armed
struggle more effective against the common enemy.

So far, the CPP has more experience in making temporary and unstable
alliances with lesser reactionaries against bigger reactionaries than in
negotiating with no less than the central reactionary government for the
purpose of gaining points for the recognition of the status of belligerency
under international law.  At any rate, the GRP-NDFP negotiations are bound
by The Hague Joint Declaration of 1992, which prevents the Manila government
from imposing its constitution on the NDFP.

Do the theses of Chairman Mao on bureaucrat capitalism, protracted people's
war and the proletarian cultural revolution continue to be valid for you?

Yes, those theses of Mao remain valid.  They were scientifically and
socially proven in Mao's time.  The evil consequences of negating those
theses also  verify their validity.

Protracted people's war is the invincible weapon of the people in
semicolonial and semifeudal countries.  This strategic line allows the
proletariat to give the fullest play to its basic alliance with the
peasantry in order to overthrow the enemy and install a people's democratic
state.

Bureaucrat capitalism is characteristically the key force of the comprador
big bourgeoisie in semicolonial and semifeudal countries.  After the
new-democratic revolution is completed and when the socialist revolution is
going on, failure to grasp class struggle as the key link can lead to the
emergence of bureaucrat capitalism on the basis of a petty-bourgeoisified
bureaucracy and intelligentsia and under the influence of the international
bourgeoisie.

The basic principles and methods put forward in the theory of continuing
revolution under proletarian dictatorship and in the practice of the great
proletarian cultural revolution have been proven correct by the proletarian
revolutionary forces and people in Mao's time as well as by the subsequent
revisionist betrayal and capitalist restoration in the post-Mao period.    

END OF INTERVIEW

Published by Committee Sol Peru - London
Press Commission

Committee Sol Peru is a member of the World Mobilisation Commission (WMC) 
to Defend the Revolution in Peru





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