From: mim3-AT-mim.org Date: Tue, 17 Jun 1997 11:03:26 -0400 (EDT) Subject: M-G: MIM responds to Revolutionary Worker on Peru Articles on this subject too long to put on the Marxism Space will appear on MIM's www.etext.org/Politics/MIM page soon. MIM on the May 18, 1997 RCP-USA statement on Peru The phony Maoists of the "Revolutionary Communist Party-USA" (RCP-USA) continue to speak for the Communist Party of Peru (PCP), evermore shamelessly as time goes on. In the May 18, 1997 Revolutionary Worker, despite MIM's criticism, the RCP-USA continues the line that the authors of the Canto Grande capitulationist document are merely examples of "right opportunist" politics within the PCP and not outright counterrevolution. The RCP-USA is seeking to straddle those who would continue the People's War and those who would lay down their arms and dissolve the base areas, but there is no straddling revolution and counterrevolution. After the arrest of Comrade Gonzalo, the leader of the Peruvian Revolution, some comrades in the Canto Grande prison of Peru wrote a document called "Outline for a Basic Document." This poisonous weed said, "Ending the people's war represents neither surrender nor abandoning the revolution, but rather continuing the struggle under new conditions." In addition, the document continues, "II. Basic Approach 1. Sign a peace agreement whose application would lead to the ending of the war the country is experiencing. 2. End the people's war begun 17 May 1980, in all its four forms of guerrilla actions. Disband the People's Guerrilla Army, destroying its arms and combat material; likewise, dissolve the People's Committees and the revolutionary base areas of the People's New Democratic Republic." Going back as far as statements released in 1994, MIM said it would never be permissible to advocate laying down arms as a matter of principle until the day of communism globally. "Outline for a Basic Document" advocates laying down arms now, but the RIM calls it "written in the latter part of 1993 by leaders of the Right Opportunist Line." (A World to Win, 1995, p. 64) By this the RIM means that these Canto Grande authors are still members of the PCP, just guilty of being off the correct course. In contrast, we at MIM believe that the PCP-CC is in favor of developing the People's War and distinguishes between counter-revolutionaries and right opportunists. Those who brazenly advocate laying down arms and dissolving base areas are taking a counterrevolutionary line. It is not permissible within the party. Those who hesistated, to consider the idea of a peace accord or to evaluate the evidence that Comrade Gonzalo wants the peace accord or to evaluate the mood of the masses toward peace, these are right opportunists since the PCP-CC wants to continue the People's War without negotiations. The RCP-USA is now going beyond right opportunism and hardening its counterrevolutionary stance with regard to the Canto Grande weed. MIM did not know how bad the Canto Grande weed was till 1996 when we obtained the A World To Win magazine with the weed in it. Those officially tied to the PCP have no excuse for not acting quickly on the Canto Grande weed as soon as they had it. MIM has great sympathy for all people in Fujimori's prisons. We do not wish to second-guess their tactics for dealing with torture and repeated prison massacres. Nonetheless, it is a different matter for the RCP-USA to be saying that the "Basic Outline" is merely "Right Opportunist." The authors of the Canto Grande weed are no longer members of a real Maoist party. They purged themselves from it. The RCP-USA points to documents it says are from the PCP; however, the RCP has never shown that the PCP-CC believes that the Canto Grande weed is an example of the "Right Opportunist Line." The RCP-USA simply made that up out of thin air. Numerous other statements from the PCP-CC show that the PCP-CC considers the peace accords idea a "hoax" of the Peruvian police. Should the RCP-USA ever prove that the PCP-CC says that the Canto Grande document is merely "Right Opportunism," then our criticism will extend to the PCP-CC as well. This is a question of the universals of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism. The fact that the RCP-USA may be correct about what the PCP-CC's position is, but cannot prove it in detail or in any interactive way is just further proof how the whole rehashing of the COMINTERN idea is not going to work--especially outside the narrow confines of Europe where the participating parties used to be close together. The RCP is basing its RW article on documents more than one-half year old. When we add the consideration that document fraud has occurred inside and outside Peru with regard to PCP documents, the case against the RIM concoction used by the RCP-USA to boost its own politics gets all the worse. Inevitably the RCP-USA inserts its own opinions where details from the PCP are lacking. Objectively-speaking this means imperialist country domination of the RIM--even on absolutely fundamental questions like where to draw the line between counterrevolution and the party. The RCP-USA has also made another new and important admission in its own backhanded way. "Over the last two years, supporters of the Right Opportunist Line that arose from within the PCP, calling for negotiations with the government and an end to the people's war, have put out a paper under the El Diario name. The Central Committee of the PCP has condemned and repudiated its line." MIM has not seen the copies of El Diario that the RCP-USA is referring to, but MIM does know that the ones calling for negotiations removed Luis Arce Borja's name from the masthead and thus attacked him. At precisely the same time, the RCP-USA launched an attack on Luis Arce Borja internationally, with individual supporters ranging from Detroit to Malmoe, Sweden. Now the RCP-USA has basically admitted it was acting in concordance with what it calls the "Right Opportunist Line" in 1995 and 1996. MIM charged this at the time, but the RCP-USA had nothing to say in its defense with regard to the pro-peace accords El Diario. Through the RIM publication "A World to Win" the RCP-USA has continued its coordinated attacks against Luis Arce Borja into 1997. Just as patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel, dialectics is the last refuge of revisionist mystics like the RCP-USA. For years the RCP-USA has been criticizing metaphysics in the name of dialectics in the context of Peru. It turns out that all this criticism of metaphysics is just a cover to smuggle counterrevolution into the vanguard party. MIM too has always criticized as metaphysics any line that said that consideration of peace accords is counterrevolutionary. However, the Canto Grande authors went far beyond considering the sentiments of the people for peace. The Canto Grande authors advocated laying down arms and dissolving the base areas. Communists do not lay down their arms during peace accords; although they may cease-fire as long as they protect themselves. The RCP-USA's abuse of dialectics does not surprise MIM, because dialectics apart from materialism is Hegelian idealism. Such is useful stuff for personality cults seeking to obtain a new deal for the labor aristocracy tying itself to imperialism. Whenever we talk about how the oppressor nation workers are parasites, the RCP-USA objects and calls them proletarians and does so in the name of dialectics. However, just because crises can and do happen and parasites do return to the proletariat on occasion and just because even counterrevolutionaries and members of the bourgeoisie join the revolution in some minority percentage of cases, we do not have to be two-faced and fork-tongued like the RCP-USA. --- from list marxism-general-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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