From: "Bob Malecki" <malecki-AT-mail.bip.net>
Subject: Re:M-TH: Kosovo
Date: Sun, 15 Mar 1998 05:34:35 +0100



Dave  on Kosovo!


Thanks to those who have initiated and kept up this debate.
Ive been a bit busy to join in until now.

Yes this is and extremely important discussion!

Hugh has been the only one to seriously address the situation in
Kosovo on this list. He is correct to defend the right of Kosovo to
self determination. Yoshie and Bob end up in the same camp - do
nothing because the ethnic Albanian leadership is reactionary and
aligned to the US. This is an abstentionist position which has
nothing in common with Trotskyism.  James also is unable to suggest
any concrete way out of this situation except to endorse the call for
imperialists out!  Meanwhile the US/UN is building on its success
in wrapping up Iraq in tighter sanctions, and is now imposing further
heavy sanctions on Serbia in order to create its client state the
"Republic of Kosovo".

Bullshit Dave! The problem with Hugh's and the Morenoite position is that he
is tailing a reactionary nationalist mobilization and nobody is "abstaining"
from taking a position on oppressed minorities in the former Yugoslavia. In
fact I quite clearly and explicitedly said in and earlier reply that
communists do take sides in these struggles. We would certainly in Kosovo go
into a military defense with workers and their organizations against
chauvinist Serb pogroms directed at them. But I allso said that we would not
give one bit of political support to the Albanian bourgeois nationalists who
are asking for NATO to intervene on their side..

Yeah, sure the break-up of Yugoslavia was a cause of the current
situation in Kosovo, but what was it and why did it break-up?
I'd be interested to know what James and the RCP thought the former
Yugoslavia was.

I too would like to know Jim's position on this stuff. Both Hugh and Dave
known very well the ICL position on inter-penetrating people's..But so far
Jim has no position on finding a way out...

For Trotskyists,  it was a degenerated workers state,
which given its inherent bureauratic mismanagement and stagnation,
finally succumbed to 50 years  of imperialist pressure. The rival
restorationist leaderships in the  former degenerate workers republics of
Serbia, Croatia and  Bosnia,  all became engaged in territorial expansion
to present themselves as willing partners to one or other imperialism.
Who can be surprised that  in such  reactionary conditions they
gathered  much popular support?

Exactly! And they did this not in the context of a deformed workers
state--but in order to become the new ruling class over their fiefdoms..And
just because these are popular mobilizations certainly does not mean that
"Trotskyists" tail them. If this was the case then Trotsky certainly would
have supported the popular front in Spain in the thirties! In fact the
national question is nothing more or less the question of the popular front
extended to this former deformed workers state connected to the strive by
the now ex-Stalinist bureaucracies to become ruling classes in this part of
the world. The problem here is that we have FOUR distinct groups of peoples
fighting over the same bit of territory and this in  itself makes moot the
classical Leninist position on the national question (for example Finland)
where you had one bit of territory with one people occupying that territory.
The ICL position of interpenetrating peoples or in other words a situation
where you have more then one group of peoples occupying the same territory
is and extension and development of Marxist/Leninist theory and action in
order to solve this problem..

Against the reactionary  break-up of Yugoslavia, revolutionaries
had to be against all forms of  oppression and for the only answer to it,
socialism, by building multinational workers militia. Although the
objective was to defend  the workers states, and form a socialist
Federation of the Balkans, to be opposed to capitalism and imperialism
is of no practical use if you are not prepared to fight all
concrete forms of oppression being used to restore capitalism.
In this context  revolutionaries  had to call for workers defence against
national oppression in whatever form it took in the former Yugoslavia.

Certainly communists are prepared to fight all forms of culteral and ethnic
oppression, but this does not mean that one becomes the tail of one
particular group in the former Yugoslavia in order to do this as Hugh has.
First with the Bosnian Moslems and now with the Albanians..In fact Hugh has
leaped on the nationalist bandwagon from the left in order to become the
best builders of
movements that are streamlined to finish the job of dismantling this former
deformed workers state. Just this makes it far more complicated then James
or Trotsky ever could possibly think. This is not the classical national
question of China in the 1920's but the destruction of the deformed and
degenerated workers states in the ninties.


Mostly it was ethnic cleansing on all sides, mobilised by
whatever national chauvinism could be dug up and paraded. Some of
the left, like Hugh's tendency, defended the national rights of the
Bosnian Muslims. In our view, to the extent that the Muslims formed a
distinct national minority, this took on an increasingly reactionary form,
and became a proxy for US interests in the war.  In that sense, the
Muslim Bosnia was at least as oppressive as  oppressed. The Dayton
Accord  shows the results with Bosnian Muslims  gaining a
disproportionately large share of the  former, but now capitalist,  Bosnia.

Yes exactly! Hugh and much of the left backed one side in this communalist
bloodbath! Where it was quite clear from the beginning that all sides
committed viscious crimes against the other national groups who occupied the
same territory. And if the Croats, Bosnians or Albanians had got the
military power to defeat the Serbs all of these leaderships would have
REVERSED THE FORMS OF OPPRESSION rather then eliminate them. This is why
Communists like the ICL took the position of revolutionary defeatism on all
sides in this war while opposing all outside intervention...At best Hugh is
tailing Bosnian Muuslim nationalism and now Albanian nationalism (albeit
with a fake left "Trotskyist" cover) in order to ride on the wave of
reactionary popular front politics!

He even goes futher and shouts his support to General Galteri in
Argentina--The Irish Question and the middle east to strengthen his
arguement. In these three cases it is under the guise of the
anti-imperialist United Front  that Hugh and others liquidate the need for a
communist opposition to these Nationalists and anti-imperialist fakers. In
fact supporting Galteri in the war with Britain was both the Morenoite and
LCMCRI's Social Democratic betrayal of August 1914 where they backed their
own Bourgeoisie in Argentina including the bloody military who has always
drowned the Argentinean proletariat in blood!

Ethnic cleansing was motivated by more or less direct imperialist aid and
intervention,  including the UN. Revolutionaries  said Out!  to all these,
whether it was the UN creating unsafe havens, or the US backing
Izetbegovich,
or NATO bombing Srbska. In that latter situation it was  necessary to fight
against Serbian ethnic cleansing [and Croatian and Bosnian also]
and at the same time defend the Serbs from imperialist bombing.

Once again Dave almost gets it right in word! But it was not just the Serbs
who were into ethnic cleaning. The Croats and Bosnian Muslims were certainly
into ethnic cleansing in those terrotories they controlled..But the left
fell victim to imperialist propaganda and the real crimes of just one side
in this conflict the Serbs. Which effectively put the left in the camp of
imperialism as there left cover to go in and smash the Serbs.

Despite the correctness of this programme, as opposed to those who
did nothing,  the reactionary forces pushing in the other direction were
overwhelming. Today the former degenerated workers state of Yugoslavia
is fragmented into a number of independent capitalist states including the
rump Yugoslav Republic which comprises mainly Serbia. Kosovo is an
oppressed nation within that Serbian dominated Republic because 90%
of the population are ethnic Albanians and want autonomy from Serbia.

Ah yes the classical cry of our "Trotskyists" when for all there trouble in
trying to be the best builders of these kinds of movements wind up be out
manuvered by the nationalists.. What was it Trotsky said about "seperating
the reds from the blues"?
Hugh's latest enthusiasim on this list both over Iraq and now Albania where
his organization went so far as saying that Sadaam's Iraq is in the
forefront of the anti-imperialist struggle and now his cheerleading of
Albanian nationalism under the cover of the legitimate support of the
national question is hardly even the Leninist position in the classical
sense! In fact Lenin saw the national question as a NEGATIVE question and
worked out tactics in order to move things towards a future proletarian
solution to the problem. Trotsky too witryh his permanent revolution was
into this also. But Hugh is into the politics of the COMINTERN of Stalin in
word with his utter capitulkation to these mobilizations and their political
content which hardly is progressive and leading forward--but in fact is
being used by the ex-Stalinists to go backwards and create ruling classes in
this part of the world!
So what we have here is both Hugh and Dave trying to use the correct
classical position on the national question that Trotsky and Lenin had and
applying it to the WRONG situation and taking the working class not
forward--but BACKWARD!!!!!


Now that the Serb leadership is clamping down on the
expressions of Albanian nationalism in  Kosovo, we have to be against
that, even if the ethnic Albanian leadership, spurred on by the US,
has a project of a Greater Capitalist Albania. This is because
national oppression is but one expression of the class struggle and
we have to defend the right to self-determination which includes
succession from the Yugoslav Republic and fusion with Albania.

There is NO solution to the national querstion in this context in
Yugoslavia. Because we have four distinct groups of peoples fighting over
the same territory.

Only by defending workers who are nationally oppressed
can we win them from their bourgeois reactionary leadership to the
international struggle for socialism. To turn our backs on national
oppression means to abstain in the struggle to win the masses and
hand victory to the bourgeoisie on a plate.  Our slogan must be for a
Socialist
Republic of Kosovo in a Federation of Balkan socialist republics!

In fact Hugh is turning his back and supporting one side against the other
here. That is the problem. And Dave's banal left rhetoric of a federation in
a future republic maks no sense unless one understands that we do not get
their by supporting struggles which de facto mean one side getting the
upperhand and reversing the forms of oppression. This is what Hugh does
concretely with his one sided support to first the Bosnians and now the
Albanians.

Therefore, we must be  at the same time opposed to ALL imperialist
intervention AGAINST  Serbia and FOR Albania. US/UN/EU/NATO OUT!
If the imperialist intervention on the side of the ethnic Albanians
becomes a source of reverse oppression against Serbia, then we could
no longer support Kosovo's SELF-determination. That is, if the US/UN
established a puppet government in Kosovo and used it as a base for
military attacks on Serbia, this would make Kosovo complicit in the US
imperialist oppression of Serbia.

Sure Dave! Lets see you get the above off the ground. But the main slogan of
the Albanian nationalists is getting just NATO to solve there problems. Just
as the Croats want the Germans to solve there problems. Just as the Serbs
want the Russian capitalist state to solve there problems, just as the
Bosnian Muslims want the Allyotohahs to solve their problems.

Only by having a programme to fight for democracy against oppression,
can we have any hope of winning workers from their reactionary bourgeois
misleaderships in the service of imperialism, and to the struggle
for socialism.

Dave is fighting for "democracy". We Communists fight against all forms of
nationalist oppression--but we do this without giving one bit of political
support to any of the contending nationalists in the former Yugoslavia..And
the problem with at least Dave and Hugh's position is that they have taken
sides and support one of the contending bourgeoisies against the other in
this part of the world albeit with a left face and in the name of
"Trotskyism"...

Warm regards
Bob Malecki

Dave.

> Bob writes:
>
> >Actually the left hooked into one side of this conflict from the very
> >beginning including Hugh and his organization. The Bosnian Muslim side.
It
> >reflects the fact that they have no understandiong of the national
question
> >and especially the question of inter penetrating peoples..
>
> This is not so. There has been no "left" consensus on the Yugoslavian
civil
> wars.
>
> My organization the LIT took the side of the Bosnian people, most of who
> are officiously muslims the way most Swedes are registered Christians. In
> our direct intervention we struggled to help working-class Bosnians in
> Tuzla, where the multi-cultural, working-class traditions are strongest
> (they are also strong, but less class-based in Sarajevo).
>
> By emphasizing the "Muslim" aspect of supporting Bosnia, Bob is doing part
> of the job of the imperialist propaganda machine for it.
>
> >Now Hugh is playing the left tail to Albanian nationalists. And is using
> >nationalist arguements against the Serbs to back up this stuff.. And
doing
> >it with some pretty horrible jingoism!
>
> So now Bob jumps on the smears bandwagon to misrepresent what I'm saying
as
> irrational chauvinist ravings.
>
> Bob, how are you going to deal with the Kosova problem without a programme
> including a united front with Albanian nationalists?
>
> You don't have a concrete understanding of the role of bourgeois
democratic
> demands such as national liberation and democratic representation in a
> repressed nationality or ethnic group. This weakens your political impact
> greatly.
>
> >He completely covers up that all sides in the Yugoslavian conflict are
> >prepared to commit all kinds of attrocities if just they had the military
> >capability..
>
> All sides in a war fight with weapons if they can. Atrocities is another
> matter.
>
> Would you apply this same reasoning (as many reactionaries did) to the
> military activities of the NLF and the North Vietnamese fighting against
> the US?
>
> What you can't accept is the obvious fact that the Serbian state has been
> and is the aggressor oppressing minority peoples, and the reason is your
> sterile identification of a deformed workers' state with progress as
> against any of its opponents. This is dead-end stuff.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Hugh
>
>
>
>
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