Date: Mon, 22 Sep 1997 21:48:03 -0400
Subject: M-G: Cuba:  Socialism or Social-Fascism? Exposure of Hillier's "theoretical roots"


Below the evidence of the total bankruptcy of the phoney "defender of
Stalin" and "Champion of Dimitrov" J. Hillier.  The article below was the
one which finally forced the hand of the revisionist hack J. Hillier into
"taking his ball home" and carrying out a fascist coup de etat himself,
directed against the People's Democracy of LeninList, its founding
principles and its Panel of Moderators and rules.


Adolfo Olaechea


Banging his Khruschevite drum, Hillier says:


>Adolfo continues to plug his lunatic line that Cuba is a fascist
>country. We have had the arguments already, which is why I have not
>bothered to reply to the latest wave of rants.
>
>His recent offering on the term fascism breaks new ground, though, even
>for poor old Adolfo. Clearly still stung by having to admit that Cuba is
>*not* fascist according to the clear definition of fascism adopted at
>the 7th World Congress (which Adolfo accepts), he now tries to say that
>my insistance on this definition is just so much playing about with
>words.
>
>His evidence? A brief exchange with our former subscriber - El
>Corresponsal Especial - and someone unknown to me on whether *Peru* is
>fascist. 
>
>Does this Peruvian critic cite Dimitrov's definition? No. What he does
>do is fumble about with a couple of factors which, according to him, are
>crucial to fascism, but which are lacking in the case of the present
>Peruvian state.
>
>This Peruvian critic, in his efforts to disprove whatever it was that El
>Corresponsal was arguing, does not pretend to be a Marxist, and so does
>not even mention the Marxist definition of fascism. So where is the
>similarity with what I did?
>
>There are some new subscribers who must be wondering what is going on
>here with all these strange posts from Adolfo. Let me tell them that we
>have just had a bizarre debate on this list in which Adolfo Oleachea, a
>supporter of the line of the Communist Party of Peru and an ideological
>adherent to Marxism-Leninism-Maoism-Gonzalo Thought has treated us to
>the absurd spectacle of a self-proclaimed Communist trying to show that
>Cuba  is fascist. Having lost all the arguments, having contradicted
>himself more than a dozen times, he is still trying to maintain this
>madness, all the while beating his breast and boasting how his marxism
>has swept everything before it.
>
>Sad really.
>-- 
>Jim
>

And here, how we find where this "Defender of the Faith" had drunk his
"mother's milk" - Aristotle and Kant!:

Jim Hillier continues to "bang his Khruschovite shoe on the table" thinking
that with insults and adjectives he is making any headway.  His sadness is
understandable, his entire vision of the world has been turned upside down,
and the basic Aristotelic and anti-Marxist character of his alleged
"anti-revisionist Marxist-Leninism" lays in tatters and revealed as a
holding action on behalf of the same old revisionist theories developed by
the Khruschovite and Brezhnevites "philosopher" hacks to emasculate
Marxism-Leninism of its dialectical-materialist essence, turning it into a
system of wooden absolutes and "unchangeable definitions".

He thinks himself clever by nailing his colours to HIS interpretation of
Comrade Georgi Dimitrov's definition of fascism as "the open terrorist
dictatorship of the most reactionary, most chauvinistic and most imperialist
elements of finance capital".

He says that since Castro's is not an "open terrorist dictatorship" then we
can not call it a fascist dictatorship of the type Dimitrov was examining.  

But then we say, it is not an open terrorist dictatorship - although a
bouregois dictatorship is always "openly terroristic TO ITS VICTIMS" - this
is only because it wraps itself in the bogus banner of socialism and
prattles about Marxism. 

That, therefore, the correct characterisation of such a regime is one of an
unbriddled (not restricted by any bourgeois democratic formality) terrorist
dictatorship (all bourgeois dictatorships use terror against the
proletariat) of the revisionist bourgeosie against the proletariat of Cuba,
and a bitter and dangerous enemy of the international proletariat:  A social
fascist regime

Hillier accepts that Castro is a revisionist - he accepts that his prattle
about Marxism falls outside from even his very own and recently drawn (and
now conveniently forgotten) dividing line between Marxism and revisionsim:
The question of Stalin.  

Exposed on this account, Hillier is continuing with his sanctimonious
"ego-trip" and his bean fest of arguments ad-homini (anyone who does not
share his shibolleths and "articles of faith", his "pantheon of heroes of
the revolution", in syntesis, his outlook, is dubbed an idiot, a lunatic, etc.)

Moreover, Hillier now clutches at another flimsy straw.  He picks on the
question of whether or not Castro acts on behalf of the "most reactionary
circles of imperialism", and to his wooden and undialectical mind, it is a
self-evident truth that altought Castro IS - and after what comrade Green
has shown and even Luis Proyect has tacitly accepted, this is certainly
undeniable - acting on behalf of imperialist circles including among those
the Vatican circles headed by the Pope Wotjila, US imperialist and European
imperialist circles - among which, in particular, and most glaringly, figure
the imperialist Spanish circles directly linked to the Franco clique
(specially those who Franco's last right-hand man, Manuel Fraga Irribarren,
heads), these circles cannot possibly be deemed IN TODAY'S CONDITIONS as the
"most reactionary". 

That is what Hillier's latest straw boils down to in the last analysis.  For
Hillier, the most reactionary circles are those who - like the old Nazis' -
must perforce show the teeth and claws of raw fascism and rattle the stage
with their incoherent ranting, must mutter loudly anti-communist slogans,
must be the wealthiest and the most powerfully entrenched imperialists.  


Since in his "feigned blindness" he does not wish to see that many of
precisely those circles have already their monopoly capital and financial
claws deeply embedded in Cuba and that the Cuban regime is ALREADY aligned
with their current anti-comunist offensive, which essentially consists in
attacking the proletarian and the oppressed classes by stigmatising their
struggles as "terrorist drug dealing", he then smugly comes out and says:

"Look, Castro cannot be posibly a fascist because he does not obey the most
reactionary circles of imperialism.  His power is not the power of finance
capital itself".  How can anyone think such a thing of good ole Fidel
Castro?  How can anyone - but a lunatic and an idiot - contradict me on this
account"?  

What kind of reasoning for a communist is this in the present era?

We have seen IN AN UNFORGETTABLE WAY that the mighty Soviet Union and China,
the socialist world of the fifties, and the bastions of socialism during the
anti-revisionist struggle, have fallen ALL, not to the MARTIAL OFFENSIVE -
to the blitzkrieg, panzers, bombs, cannon, airplanes, massacres,
witch-hunts, concentration camps - of the old style fascists with their
simplistic sledge-hammer tactics.

No.  These bastions have fallen to the Troyan horse, to the corruption,
blandishments, "investment", "humanitarian aid", "bogus solidarity" and the
"sugar coated bullets" of the MOST REACTIONARY CIRCLES OF WORLD IMPERIALISM.

We have seen that these very most reactionary circles have counted on the
revisionist Troyan horse to implement their tactics, and they have suceeded
there where the Nazi hordes failed.  However, anyone pointing out these
evident facts, is, according to Hillier, "a lunatic and an idiot" who ought
to be hounded from the company of civilised people.

Moreover, in attempting to give some sort of "theoretical counter-argument",
Hillier clings like a limpet to a wooden and frozen definition of "the most
reactionary circles".  

For him, these "most reactionary circles" must be the most openly
anti-communist and most vociferously anti-socialist, without even realising
that these aspects of policy of the "most reactionary circles" follow
closely on the heels of the sugar coated bullets of the very same financial
and political interests who are TODAY using the Troyan horse tactics of
revisionism as the battering ram to throttle the revolution and victimise
the proletariat.

For Hillier and his school of thought, history is but a succession of the
most absurd errors and accidents, not a logical development.  Thus, they see
fascism as a "definite category" and not as a logical development in history.  

For them, there is no interconnection at all between Khruschev, Brezhnev,
Gorbachev, Castro, Deng and Yeltsin.  The process of capitalist restoration
- the process of the world counter-revolution - is not a logical historical
consequence of a political, economic and class line, but an accident
occurring all of a sudden, and out of the blue sky of "real socialism",
thanks merely to the "loss of nerve" of this, that and the other revisionist
leader who "went to far" in his revisionism.  Thus, for them, the Soviet
Union was fine and dandy even down to Chernenko, and all is merely
Gorbachev's fault.

For these gentlefolk, revisionism itself becomes a classless category in
their Aristotelian world of "philosophers" formed in the anti-Marxist school
of modern revisionism, a system of beliefs that obviously still colours
their thinking.

Hillier has attempted to petrify and "define" fascism as if it was a
"marxist" category, and uses for that purpose his own anti-Marxist and
undialectical reading of comrade Dimitrov, who was no Aristotle or Kant, but
a Marxist leader. 
This Aristotelian and idealistic "dogmatic" approach is deeply embedded in
the "marxist" formation of such people as Hillier, and it is not really
surprising that they cling to it for dear life.

In this connection, comrades ought to consider that in Marxism categories
must not be constructs in terms of which reality is viewed, because beyond
every category there is always the Kantian "unknowable thing in itself".

Marx, commenting on Proudhon's economics, put his objections to Proudhon's
methodology in these terms: "Instead of conceiving the... categories as
theoretical expressions of historical relations.....corresponding to a
particular stage of development....., he garbles them into pre-existing,
eternal ideas".

Marx held that whatever categories must be developed, must have a basis on
objective reality.  He specifically rejected the notion that categories
could be constructs in terms of which reality is viewed.

Kenneth Neill Cameron, the American scholar, in his book "Stalin Man of
Contradiction" - which despite upholding other unrelated erroneous
conclussions we shall want to quote in this connection - has rightly noticed
and pointed out that in Marx and Engels categories are seldom used, even as
a term, but that they simply speak of ideas or concepts, theories and
hypothesis:

"Engels writes of "identity and difference" - necessity and change - cause
and effect," and discusses them in various places, but he does not
SYSTEMATISE them and makes no distinction between them and other general
concepts.  Furthermore, his emphasis is on the FLUIDITY OF CONCEPTS,
reflecting the FLUIDITY OF OBJECTIVE REALITY". 

Lenin, like Marx and Engels, stressing that these categories must have a
basis in reality "....noted but few categories, considering them to be the
same as fluid "GENERAL CONCEPTS" which were helpful in "cognising the
world".  He emphasised that they "have to be derived" from objective reality
"and not taken arbitrarily or mechanically". (ibid)

Lenin asked: "If EVERYTHING DEVELOPS, does not that apply ALSO to the most
GENERAL CONCEPTS and categories of thought?" - And, note well that Lenin
answers this question in the affirmative. 

K. Neill Cameron, who is an anti-revisionist of the "pro-Soviet" school" and
with whom we obviously do not share common views in other aspects, however,
also factually records that:

"In Stalin's 1938 essay, which he intended as a condensed account of the
views of Marx, Engels, and Lenin, there is no mention of the categories of
dialectical materialism; nor was there in other works on dialectical
materialism at the time, for instance in David Guest's "A Textbook of
Dialectical Materialism (1939).  The concept of categories as a major aspect
of dialectical materialism apparently first achieved prominence in "The
Fundamentals of Marxist Philosophy" in 1958.  By the time of "The
Fundamentals of Marxist-Lenist Philosophy" (both Soviet revisionist
theoretical elucubrations - A.O.), they had grown into a veritable
philosophical army".

And K. Neill Cameron continues then to depict how modern revisionism and its
battery of "Marxist-Leninist professors" proceeded to distort and
de-naturalize Marxism into an ideological fig-leaf for eunuchs, bureacrats
and pedants:

"In addition to the 13 categories listed above, there are others (in the
Soviet revisionist "bible" "The Fundamentals of Marxist-Leninist Philosophy"
- A.O).: "In the previous chapters we have examined several philosophical
categories, for example, matter, motion, space, time, the finite and the
infinite, consciousness, quantity, quality, measure, and contradiction". To
which if we add "property" we have a total of 25 categories.  And there are
another 16 similar entities which appear to be granted a kind of
semi-category status:"

"Universality and difference are the relationship of the object to itself
and other things, characterising the stability and variability, equality and
inequality, similarity and dissimilarity, identity and non-identity,
imitability and inmitability, continuity and discontinuity of its
properties, connections, relationships and tendencies of development".

>From his reading of the revisionist gobbledigook above cited, Cameron
rightly concludes: "The importance of the "categories" (for the authors of
this modern revisionist grotesquerie - A.O.) can scarcely be exaggerated.
They form the pathway to truth, trascending science".

And thus, according to the "theoretical developers of modern revisionism
authors of the "Fundamentals of Marxism-Leninist  Philosophy, Moscow 1974",
"....A person must master the categories in the course of his individual
development in order to posses capacity for theoretical thought".

Hillier now - thinking himself to be the "master of the categories" and thus
in possession of real "capacity for theoretical thought", has introduced us
to at least an entire new series of revisionist inspired categories or
semi-categories for which he demands absolute submission, as if these were
eternal and unchanging objects of veneration, beyond Marxian analysis
(except by "lunatics and idiots" (another of his "categories", I pressume),
carried out for POLITICAL PURPOSES by combatants of the working class. 

To this "exalted realm" of the modern-revisionist inspired categories,
Hillier, with his "theoretica training", now promotes: "Fascism",
"social-fascism", "the most reactionary circles of imperialism" and "the
most terroristic dictatorship".  All those concepts, "useful to aid the
cognitive process" and that should be "based on political reality" and
understood in a Leninist way in which "everything develops" and this
obviously applies to "the most general concepts" at every level.  

But these concepts - which are only "useful" in the political struggle and
to "aid the cognitive process" of comrades (in other words, for comrades to
be able to see CLEARLY (and POLITICAL clarity is always the Leninist way)
whether the Castro regime is "friend or foe" of the revolution, and to what
extent has the enmity of this regime towards the proletarian revolution
DEVELOPED at present) - must fit his for ever sacred formulas and definitions.

Hillier, in grasping at comrade Dimitrov's definition of the old style
fascism of the 20s and 30s, fails to understand it in a dialectical manner
and to see the glaring factor that Dimitrov is speaking of "reactionary
circles" and that revolution and reaction are in fact a contradiction in
development. 

That in this context, any question as to who the "most reactionary circles
of imperialism" are AT ANY GIVEN MOMENT in history, must perforce be based
on the concrete reality of the day and not in any "eternal and unknowable
thing in itself" or "category". That such a determination must also be
related to the degree of ACTIVE ENGAGEMENT of those reactionary circles on
the struggle AGAINST the revolution (that is the meaning of "reactionary" in
Marxist terms, and has nothing to do with either wealth or relative position
in the pecking order of the system of imperialism, because in fact history
has proven that the "most reactionary circles" are seldom those of the
imperialist circles that are "satisfied" with their relative position, but,
on the contrary, those seeking a re-arrangement of that particular bourgeois
pecking order).  

And finally, that in determining who the "most reactionary circles" may be
AT PRESENT, such important and determining factors of concrete reality as
the "growing reactionarisation" of ALL imperialist circles, the fact that we
live in an era of "fierce competition" and a "re-arrangement" of the
imperialist pecking order by means of a contentious redivision of the world,
must be taken into account for any such category as "fascism",
"social-fascism", "the most reactionary circles" and "open terrorist
dictatorship" to be of any use in aiding the "cognitive process" of
comrades.  In other words, to serve the revolution by illuminating the facts
and not the counter-revolution by obscuring and veiling them.  

We have described and defined fascism IN OUR DAYS as "reaction on the move"
- in synthesis, reactionary ACTION against the revolution - in a context of
a process of capitalist restoration and growing reactionarisation of ALL
imperialist circles.  

We have, moreover, specified social-fascism as this very same reaction on
the move by means of capitalist roaders who wave the flag of socialism to
disguise their fascistic class essence.  We have seen how comrade Dimitrov's
various other descriptions and concepts and ideas about fascism, fit the
modern revisionists and Castro - who is directly engaged in
counter-revolutionary action in supporting the fascist Fujimori regime -
like a glove.  

This is the ESSENCE of our thesis of a New Fascism which today disguises
itself in the cloak of a "left-wing" veneer, but UNDERTAKES the MOST
EFFECTIVE AND DANGEROUS actions against the revolution.  This corresponds
well to an era in which the growing reactionarisation of imperialism has
SHARPENED class contradictions to an extraordinary degree. 

It is politically useful in order to emphasise the fact that many good
socialist minded people are under the illusion that the remaining regimes of
revisionism are only "mis-guided comrades", "brave socialists holding up
against all odds" etc., which is the most dangerous conception for
communists to have, since it actually lulls people to sleep leaving a free
hand to the restorationists, and - as it has been proven beyond doubt - does
nothing at all to prevent, and let alone prepares or calls for a struggle
against these RESTORATIONIST TREND which is still DEVELOPING and sinking to
new lows everyday passing.  

Does the fact that we have presented a new formulation mean that we reject
comrade Dimitrov's formulation as incorrect or inssuficient for its time?
No, it does not.  As comrade Stalin pointed out:

"Some textualists and Talmudists who quote mechanically without delving into
the essence of the matter, and APART FROM HISTORICAL CONDITIONS, may say
that one of these conclussion should be discarded as being absolutely
incorrect, while the other conclussion, as the absolutely correct one,
should be applied to ALL PERIODS OF DEVELOPMENT. Marxists, however cannot
but know that the textualists and Talmudists are mistaken; they cannot but
know that BOTH OF THESE conclussions are correct, though not absolutely,
EACH BEING CORRECT FOR ITS OWN TIME".

And to remind Hillier of how Marxists dispose of the pedantic buts and ifs
of those who want to clutch at "definitions" and "categories" as if these
were anything more than useful concepts that must AT ALL TIMES be
subordinated to the CONCRETE INTERESTS OF THE REVOLUTION, and which are not
there for the self-satisfaction of pedants or truculent High Priests and
Thought Police of "Marxian Sanctimoniousness", let us see how comrade Stalin
disposed of one such comrade Kholopov's objections:

"Evidently, having discovered a contradiction between those two formulas and
being deeply convinced that the contradiction must be removed, Comrade
Kholopov considers it necessary to get rid of one of these two formulas as
incorrect, and to clutch to the other as being correct for all PERIODS and
COUNTRIES.  The result is something in the nature of a hopeless situation.
Comrade Kholopov does not even suspect that both formulas can be correct -
each for its own time".

"That is always the case with textualists and Talmudists who do not delve
into the essence of the matter, quote mechanically and irrespective of
historical conditions, and invariably find themselves in a hopeless situation".

Hillier would do well to medidate most seriously too on Stalin's further words:

"The textualists and Talmudists regard Marxism and SEPARATE CONCLUSSIONS AND
FORMULAS of Marxism as a collection of dogmas, which <<never change>>,
NOTHWITHSTANDING CHANGES IN THE CONDITIONS OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIETY.
They believe that if they learn these conclussions and formulas by heart and
start citing them at random, they will be able to solve any problem,
reckoning that memorised conclussions wil serve them for ALL TIMES AND
COUNTRIES, for all occasions of life.  But this can be the conviction only
of people who see the letter of Marxism but not its essence, who learn by
rote the texts of conclussions and formulas of Marxism, but do not
understand their meaning".

And most importantly, to remember too - now that he has embarked not merely
in justifying and mollycoddling revisionism, but in heaping insults on that
account upon revolutionaries, and even dragging the PCP - a party actually
engaged in a life or death struggle AGAINST ALL SORTS OF REACTIONARIES
(whether circles of imperialism or not) and that is in fact ADVANCING the
cause of the OPPRESSED AND EXPLOITED MASSES, these illuminating words of
Great Stalin:

"Marxism is the Science of the laws governing the DEVELOPMENT of nature and
society. THE SCIENCE OF THE REVOLUTION OF THE OPPRESSED AND EXPLOITED
MASSES, the science of the victory of socialism in all countries, the
science of building communist society.  As a science, Marxism cannot stand
still, it develops and is perfected.  In its development, Marxism cannot but
be enriched by new experience, new knowledge - consequently SOME OF ITS
FORMULAS AND CONCLUSSIONS cannot but change in the course of time, cannot
but be replaced by new formulas and conclussions, CORRESPONDING TO THE NEW
HISTORICAL TASKS.  Marxism does not recognise invariable conclussions and
formulas, OBLIGATORY FOR ALL EPOCHS AND PERIODS.  Marxism IS THE ENEMY OF
ALL DOGMATISM".

(All quotes from Stalin above are from Pravda, August 2, 1950).


Hillier, moreover, in clutching to comrade Dimitrov's formulation like if it
was some form of "heavenly revelation", bases himself on such insubstancial
and exterior and contigent factors (that is why we say he is merely
clutching at straws) such as whether or not Castro rants overt
anti-communism or pays lip service to Marx and Lenin, or if his regimes has
or not specific contradictions with certain sections of the imperialist
bourgeosie which are still unresolved, without even bothering to analyse
whether there is in fact any genuine Marxism-Leninism in Castro's lip
service, or whether those contradictions his regime still has with certain
circles of imperialism are antagonistic any longer. 

He dogmatically and Olympically ignores the concrete reality of whether
these actual and real contradictions between some circles of imperialism and
the Castro regime have at present developed into sharper, or assuaged into
minor ones.  Whether or not these "contradictions" are still predominantly
of the kind which at times would merit anti-imperialist support for Castro
insofar as he resists imperialism and does not capitulate to it, or if these
are merely part of a quarrelsome haggle among various imperialists and
bureacrat-capitalist interests, a mere part of the collusion and contention
that always occurs within any process of capitalist restoration, as
historical precedent shows it does.  

All this, Hillier as a "neo-Aristotelian" supplier of "further categories"
to be added to the "Marxist-Leninist Philosophical armoury" of the modern
revisionist trained "theoretician", he brushes aside with contempt, and
keeps banging his indignant shoe on the table, rabble rousing among the
unaware and sundry new comers to this list in the most demagogic fashion.

Hillier approaches comrade Dimitrov's definition of fascism in the 1920s and
30s in the manner of a "doctor of the law", clutching every external
condition, he ends up with the husk while missing altogether its essence. 

I think that he ought to reflect on what K. Neill Cameron also notes of how
the "trained theoretician of modern revisionism" reasons:

"It is primarily the categories which "make it possible to give a true
reflection" of reality.  The path to truth now lies NOT IN STRUGGLE OR
PRACTICE, but in the philosophical study of abstractions.  So extensive is
the domain of the categories (in the arsenal of modern revisionist trained
theoreticians), in fact, that not only Marxist, but all thinking is to be
enclosed in abstractionist ideological boxes".

And what he further observes:

"The categories seem to have devoured almost everything, even the "laws" of
"dialectics"........To omit mention of the actual "struggle of opposites"
and to refer only to the "law" which reflects it, and then to subordinate
the law to a category shows that, as before, we are back not with Marx but
with Kant.  In fact the whole "system" of categories is basically Kantian
(viewing the world through a series of mental constructs)". 

And bearing in mind that "the concept of categories - eternally unchanged
mental constructs - was introduced into philosophy by Aristotle who proposed
10 categories or modes of thought" and that Kant reintroduced it into
philosophy as a system of categories, proposing 12, it is not difficult to
see how this sclerotic mode of thought can only serve to foster idealism,
cover up the facts in any debate and Spanish inquision like strangle any
possible march forward of Marxism, thus serving counter-revolutionary
objectives.

Hillier and I have both arrived to the conclusion that this debate is
endangering the stability of Leninlist.  However, we have adopted two very
different and anatgonistic positions insofar as to where should be seek the
causes and remedies of this state of affairs.

For Hillier the "threat to Leninist" arises from the substance of the debate. 
Hillier feels and proposes - like the Roman Cardinals of old standing
judgement over Galileo  - that the "heretic" who has committed the "crime"
of forwarding the "unheard of, lunatic and idiotic theory" that the
"revisionist world" is not the one in "revolution" around the proletarian
sun, but in fact a spent comet on a counter-revolutionary course of action
aimed against the proletariat, and that knowledge and cognisance of this
fact should be of paramount concern for those who sincerly want the
revolution and care little for the reputations and tender feelings of the
chieftains of revisionism.  

This he cannot live with, and is therefore seeking "excommunion" and
"punishment in hell" for the "heretic".  He invokes the "law" and rattles
around in Jesuitic fashion brandishing the conclussions of Comrade Dimitrov
as if these were the Mosaic Tables inscribed by God for ever, and did not
actually refer to a phenomena in an specific time and place.  It is good
that we know where this form of "theoretical training" has come from,
because it comes from Aristotle and Kant via modern revisionism, and
certainly not from Marx, Engels, Lenin or Mao Tsetung. 

Hillier also invokes the basis upon LeninList was formed to cry "foul" and
to befuddle people into thinking that according to the principles laid down
at the onset of this list - which I myself drafted - to call Castro a
"social-fascist" is a violation of the rules and endangers the list.  

For that purpose, he is raking his brain in seeking some sort of
counter-revolutionary rebellion among subscribers - apparently dreaming of
"packing the hall" with "new subscribers" - an old revisionist tactic - and
showing once again that he is prepared to stoop to manipulating his
moderator's position to favour his side of the debate by seeking a bogus
"democratic centralist" consensus outside the moderators panel.  That
splitist and opportunist course of action will not be allowed to prosper
since it is in fact against the rules of the list.  So, Hillier would be
better advised to write any dreams of such a ruse off, and think of
something better.

This is the basic principle for what LeninList was set up:

"The undersigned invite applications from among the members of this list to
join us on a list of genuine and principled unity geared to the
re-affirmation and development of Marxism in accordance with the needs of
the present historical era, and dedicated to uncompromising combat against
bourgeois imperialist ideology within the ranks of the Left, and to drive -
and keep away - from all legitimate Marxist forums and the movement at
large, the agent provocateurs and the zubatovist agencies of our class
enemies. That is the only rule".
    
So where does Hillier draw his rule that you cannot attack Castro as a
revisionist "agent of bourgeois imperialist ideology within the ranks of the
left"?.  Since when does it not constitute revisionism and sanctification of
the worst bourgeois imperialist ideology to compare yourself to Jesus Christ
while at the same time granting the imperialist characterisation of Stalin
as a demonic tyrant, as Castro just did to Dan Rather in front of millions
of televidents?  Since when his innumerable attacks on the proletarian
leaders are not an expression of the very bourgeois ideology we are pledged
to drive and keep away from this legitame Marxist forum?

Since when have revisionist and capitalist restorationist been granted
immunity from any serious defence of Marxism?

Hillier has forgotten Lenin's dictum:  "It is impossible to fight against
imperialism without fighting against revisionism and opportunism".

  
On the other hand, I also think that the basis of this platform - LeninList
- has been and continues to be endangered, but not from debating substantive
issues which are of fundamental importance for the revolution, even if at
times that means challenging - Galileo like - the shibboleths of the
Inquisitors and the witch-hunters generals.  

Mind you, we had no interest in this kind of debate at the present time,
partly because it was absolutely predictable that sanctimonoiusness and the
"renting of patrician togas", the "gnashing of false teeth", sheer
truculence, banging shoes on the table, the liberal use of unsubstanciated
adjectives such as "lunatic", "idiot", blatant and pedantic accussations of
"lying" etc., were bound to come flying thick from people who have not yet
renounced their rotten revionist shibboleths and therefore are still
clinging and dreaming of counter-restorations in the bureacratic fashion for
the lost "kingdoms" of asocialism which has already passed away, not in
small measure thanks to their own unwitting or witting efforts.

We, like Marx, think in a different fashion than the Neo-Kantian,
neo-Aristotelian disciples of the "Fundamentals of Marxist-Leninist Philosophy"

For us, our approach to counter-restoration is not mechanical nor is a
question of restoring things as they were with a few adjustments to "conform
to the laws of Marxism-Leninism".  Like Marx, we think in different terms,
and we approach the problem of counter-restoration in a different spirit: 

"The old Poland is certainly lost, and we should be the last one to wish for
its restoration. The old Germany, the old France, the old England, the old
social order in general is lost.  The lost of the social order, however is
not a loss for those who have nothing to lose in the old society, and at the
present time this is the case for the large majority of people in all
countries.  They have, in fact,  everything to gain from the destruction of
the old society, for it is a pre-condition for the formation of a new
society no longer based in class antagonisms". (Karl Marx, Speeches on
Poland, November 29, 1847). 

For us, therefore, the proletariat has nothing to gain from keeping in place
and petrifying the class antagonisms between the bureacratic bourgeosie in
power in countries such as China, Cuba or Korea, and by propping up and
sanctifying their corporativist "old order" geared against the proletariat
and the peoples of the world.  That "old order" is certainly lost,
althought, like old England, old France and the ole Uncle Sam, they too are
still barely standing like the ghosts of Christmass past bowl in hand before
international finance capital.  

We have nothing to lose "in the old society", and Cuba, China, etc. are
today held by regimes who are bent in restoring the old society.  These are
enemies of the proletariat and Marxism, not their friends. Moreover, these
regimes play a fundamental role in undermining the new wave of revolution,
which even if it is today a tender and small shoot, should be the paramount
interest of Marxists and revolutionaries to protect and help develop.

Because, for genuine Marxists, as Engels said:  "All nature, from the
smallest thing to the biggest, from a grain of sand to the sun, from the
protista to man, is in a constant state of coming into being and going out
of being, in a constant flux, in a ceaseless state of movement and change"
(Dialectics of Nature).

And thus, like comrade Stalin, we too conclude from this very principle:

"Hence we must not base our orientation on the strata of society which are
no longer developing, even though they AT PRESENT constitute the
pre-dominant force, but on those strata which are developing and have a
future before them, even though they AT PRESENT do not constitute the
predominant force".


In our opinion, then, what is presently endangering this platform is the
high-handed manner in which insults and baseless demagogy is being used to
generate public opinion against those who have presented their arguments and
stand by them in the face of all the cage rattling on the part of the
apologists of Castroism.

After all, the question of whether it is just or unjust to denounce the
Cuban regime for following a social-fascist political orientation, can only
be judged to have been correct or excessive by historical development, not
by any Star Chambers presided over by any self-appointed Inquisitorial Agents.  

We stand by the justice and correctness of our characterisation - as
published in the recent document, and continue this struggle precisely
because we consider that the role of Marxists is to see farther into the
general lines of historical development in order to play their role as
guides of the masses.

It is the fact that Hillier is mimicking malecki's style of "moderating" in
all its insalubrious sanctimoniousness, that is in fact endangering this
platform, and not any political denounciation of counter-revolutionary
actions whatsoever, come from whom their may, and hurt as these may hurt
those who have still a stake in the old decaying order.

If Hillier had an ounce of common sense left from his apoplectic behaviour
of the last few days, he would realise that calling people liers, idiots and
lunatics, and rabble rousing, is not conducive either to settle issues, nor
to look forward to such company for much longer.


Adolfo Olaechea 

 
         



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