Date: Mon, 18 Mar 1996 00:09:32 GMT
To: marxism-AT-jefferson.village.virginia.edu
From: hariette-AT-easynet.co.uk (hariette spierings)
Subject: Re: Assassination of Maria Elena Moyano


>The NACLA article I tracked down and reported on a few weeks ago,
>happened to be on Villa El Salvador. The point where it is 
>is consistent with the account given by Luis Quispe in his 
>two articles on "Mother Courage", is that the reformist nationalist 
>agenda in suburbs like Villa, was running out of credibility.
>
>The early collective enthusiasm was going, the funds from the 
>centre for handouts were reducing, allegations of corruption
>were beginning to mount. Despite the fact that the sources 
>used by the NACLA writers were hostile to the PCP the 
>article suggests that the decline in the support for the 
>reformist left was primarily for these reasons.
>
>The article also however makes no reference to any other executions/
>assassinations of leftist leaders for this very large suburb of 
>300,000 and a focus of PCP activity. I think this puts MPP
>(Peru People's Movement) under some pressure to say 
>if the execution of Moyano was such a good thing in 1992,
>why were there no other executions in this suburb subsequently?
>
>Why complain about the enemies of the PCP getting religious leaders
>to denounce this act? It is not enough to check as Luis claims,
>popular opinion in Villa. It is necessary to view it in a national and 
>international context. 
>
>If Moyano had just got a visa to go to Spain, why not let her go?
>Surely that would have given much more political capital to 
>the PCP and its allies, instead of you having to write long explanations?
>
>Nao's cynical doctor records him as specifically ruling out the 
>Chinese airforce pursuing and shooting down Lin Biao. Why?
>
>As well as a tendency to present the analysis of this execution 
>in moral terms, instead of considering questions of political capital,
>there seems to me a failure of a wider political analysis.
>
>While the PCP is trying to maintain a strategy of people's war,
>international finance capital and its allies, are subjugating
>Peruvian national capital and its reformist allies. There is little 
>evidence of a political strategy by the PCP that gives this due 
>emphasis and tries to unite 95% of the population. 
>
>The assassination/execution of Maria Elena Moyano, would be consistent
>with this sectarian weakness.
>
>
>
>Chris
>


Come on Chris!  be serious!  Have you ever read Chairman Mao's report on the
fighting in the Chinkiang mountains and what he has to say about good things
and bad things in relation to those who carp at the excesses of the
revolution?  There is an article called VERY GOOD, VERY BAD, which deals
with this very theme.  Do not try to turn the Chairman into a Buddha either!

I am sure a re-read of that part of Mao will give you a less "vegetarian"
perspective.  Are you seriously suggesting that the reactionaries would have
not found another reason to condemn the PCP as "terrorist" if Mrs Moyano had
been protected?

I think not.  Moreover, in that case, there was another issue that is also
important for the revolution - the masses.  The masses must be protected and
listened to, and their most rabid enemies made an example of.  Otherwise,
the masses will not raise their heads, will not be able to stand up for
themselves and would loose faith in the revolution if their most justified
demands - including revenge against their worst enemies - are frustrated and
ignored in order to satisfy the finicky sensibilities of Left wing dons in
far away countries.  Revolutions are no dinner parties!.  

Moreover, I resent a little your attitude. You would not have dared to
preach in these terms to the EUROPEAN partisans fighting the Mussolini or
Hitler regimes who shot and punished many hundreds!.  What is all this but a
bit of supercilious euro-centrism relishing telling off the "poor Third
World apprentice revolutionaries" for throwing-up a bit of a rumpus at the
College dining room, while judiciously sitting at your place in the High
Table?   

Really, "your Honour"!


On the other hand, yes, the task of winning public opinion is not made any
easier by the revolution not being a dinner party. To win public opinion for
the revolution in times in which capitulation and pacifism is taken a hold
on people's minds, is a hard job cut for real marxist revolutionaries, for
intellectuals of the working class, the cadres of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Mao.  
If the job was easy, what merit would the masses find in it that they should
put up with us?  In what way would we be serving them just by receiving
praise and kudos for being the representatives of such exemplary, genteel
and perfect revolution?  Why even bother to struggle if everyone would cheer
as on wherever we went? Even Louis Project will be praising us from the top
of Mount Sinai!  No, Chris, one must earn the title of Communist, of
Marxist, of revolutionary. 

Your attitude could be more helpful and partisan without dropping your
positive criticisms.  You should stop looking at the revolution as some one
else cause, and realise that if you are a serious Marxist, it is no one's
but your very own. So, if the task is hard, but you believe it is worth
doing, do put the shoulder in the struggle and stop carping unreasonably!

Adolfo Olaechea




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