Proletarians of all countries, unite !

MAOISM AND THE TWO LINE STRUGGLE WITHIN THE REVOLUTIONARY INTERNATIONALIST MOVEMENT (RIM)

Document from

Committee Sol Peru - London

October 1994

A Red Star Information Bureau Publication

MAOISM AND THE TWO LINE STRUGGLE WITHIN THE REVOLUTIONARY INTERNATIONALIST MOVEMENT (RIM)

London 12/10/94

"A form has now been found for the rectification movement, namely, speaking out freely, airing views fully, holding great debates and writing big-character posters". Chairman Mao Tse-tung - Have Firm Faith in the Majority of the People, October 17, 1957.

"The unity of opposites is the fundamental concept of dialectics. In accordance with this concept, what should we do with a comrade who has made mistakes?. We should first wage a struggle to rid him of his wrong ideas. Second, we should also help him. We should proceed from good intentions to help him correct his mistakes so that he will have a way out. However, dealing with persons of another type is different. Towards persons like Trotsky and like Chen Tu-hsiu, Chang Kuo-tao and Kao Kang in China, it was impossible to adopt a helpful attitude, for they were incorrigible". Chairman Mao Tse-tung - Dialectical Approach to Inner-Party Unity. November 18, 1957.

A BETRAYAL SPEARHEADED AGAINST MAOISM AND THE REVOLUTION

In the context of the victorious development of the Maoist-led revolution in Peru, one of the negative consequences of the capture of Chairman Gonzalo, the leader of the Communist Party of Peru, has been the plot of peace negotiations sprung by imperialism and the fascist regime of Fujimori. This reactionary manoeuvre was set in motion with the support of a handful of die-hard renegade capitulators.

In the course of their treason these renegades have committed ever more crimes against the people and the revolution. The ringleaders of this gang have today heavy blood debts with the proletariat and the people of Peru. Since they have proven incorrigible and incapable of rectification, they can only be objects of struggle and not of help. In the case of these ringleaders, we are dealing with true enemies of the people and not simply with deluded people.

However, despite the failure of the policy of the pro-imperialist regime in fostering capitulation within the ranks of the Communist Party of Peru, a crisis of development within the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement has now arisen.

For now, we should consider these differences as contradictions within the people, and for that very reason it is imperative to solve these correctly, using the Maoist method of struggle and help. First struggle and then help. Open struggle, massive and public, that all may speak freely, that all points of view can be put across and debates may take place. If we all proceed in this fashion, we shall be able to resolve these problems in a satisfactory way and this struggle will serve to further promote the Movement.

However, people insisting on following a different road will not be forgiven by the masses. They will regard them as incorrigible individuals, like Trotsky and like Chen Tu Hsiu.

As we all already know, on October 1, 1983, Fujimori, the tyrant who acts as president of the old Peruvian state, went before the UN General Assembly and announced to the world the 'surrender' of the Peruvian Maoists, bragging of his empty victories. The objective of this political stunt was to allay the fears of the international banks and to win time in his struggle against a revolution that is continuing its unstoppable advance.

To carry out this plan, the regime has resorted to a psychological warfare plot of impeccable Yankee pedigree: forged videos and letters that vainly attempt to use the figure of Chairman Gonzalo to induce the Peruvian communists, the proletariat and the people, to shun the road of People's War and capitulate before fascist tyranny and imperialism.

Confronting this plot, the Communist Party of Peru has continued to develop the People's War and carry out its Sixth and Penultimate Military Plan for the Seizure of Power in the Whole Country. Thus, the revolutionaries aim at successfully completing the current stage of strategic equilibrium and at developing the strategic offensive of the Peruvian revolution.

TRAITORS SEEK THE PROTECTION OF OPPORTUNISTS

The smashing blows of the People's War in the countryside and in the cities have fully demonstrated today that the purported peace negotiations between Fujimori and Chairman Gonzalo were nothing but a fraud engineered by imperialism. Moreover, the Central Committee of the Party has issued numerous documents denouncing this fraud and rejecting any negotiations with the fascist tyranny aimed at 'bringing the People's War to an end'.

It has been clearly established that this reactionary plot was hatched with the complicity of a handful of opportunist traitors and infiltrated agents. It has also been established that, at the international level, these traitors are led by 'the individual in Sweden' and the sidekicks he had appointed as heads of the Peru People's Movement (MPP) of certain European countries. It is also a fact that these turncoats who serve the fascist Fujimori tyranny were representing the PCP within the International Committee of the RIM, and that now, they have been unmasked, condemned and denounced by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Peru.

Currently, within the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement itself, and taking advantage of the confusion generated by the liquidators' plot, opportunism has again lifted its ugly head and is generating problems that, if not correctly solved, can have negative effects on the advance of Maoism in the world and damage the international movement in support of the People's War in Peru.

OPPORTUNISM IS NOURISHING TREASON

To this date, and despite the People's War advances and the PCP's victories against reaction in Peru, despite numerous and growing protests throughout the world against the fraudulent plot of the pro-imperialist tyranny and its accomplices, the International Committee of the Movement, bureaucratically controlled by the followers of the Revolutionary Communist Party USA, refuses to come out in the open to condemn the puny gang of traitors that organised the fraud of letters and videos together with the fascist regime of Fujimori.

On the contrary, the International Committee of the RIM continues to maintain secret relations with the chieftain of the capitulators gang, 'the individual in Sweden', despite the PCP having warned, condemned, and denounced his activities in its International Directive of December 1, 1993, addressed to the MPPs, the Sol Peru Committees and other Support Committees for the Peruvian revolution in the rest of the world.

Moreover, recently the Revolutionary Communist Party of the USA (RCP-USA), member of the RIM, has adopted a policy of refusing its bookshops to carry the literature of the Peru People's Movement of the USA because it is directed against this treason and publicises the documents of the Central Committee of the PCP confirming this just position.

On the other hand, this party, and also the International Committee of the RIM, is circulating the black propaganda about the People's War churned out by Fujimori's agents to promote defeatism and capitulation on the pretext of 'studying' these materials before taking up a position.

In practice, the International Committee of the RIM and the RCP USA which controls it, are adopting a totally liberal position in this respect, forgetting that the RIM is not, and cannot ever be, a high school debating society. The RIM is either a fighting machine for the proletariat in order to advance the world revolution or it is nothing.

REACTIONARY BUREAUCRATIC SEAL

This pedantic attitude of the bureaucracy of the IC of the RIM in dealing with reaction and with revolution like some sort of 'even handed professors' is equivalent to disowning the leadership of the Communist Party of Peru: its Central Committee. In synthesis, this attitude is tantamount to betrayal of the most elementary principles of the Movement and directly serves the class enemy in validating the basic aim of Fujimori's plot: Fostering a split in the PCP.

The pretext trotted out by the IC of the RIM for its opportunist and stubborn position is to allege that, as far as they are concerned, there are two currents within the PCP: one in favour and another against the peace negotiations. In this cynical manner they stamp their own bureaucratic seal to certify and validate the reactionary plot of the dictatorship and the imperialist propaganda claiming precisely a purported 'split within the PCP'.

This attitude of the International Committee of the RIM is totally unacceptable and unprincipled. It is a hypocritical position fostering splits and threatening the liquidation of the RIM itself.

THE FUNDAMENTALS OF THE TWO LINE STRUGGLE WITHIN THE RIM

To avoid misunderstandings, the true background of this two line struggle within the RIM should be clearly presented before the masses. It is important to begin by noting the incontrovertible facts: to emphasise that the PCP, from the very first moment of its incorporation in this movement, held that the RIM was merely a step in the direction of the reconstruction of the International Communist Movement; that the basis of unity of the RIM was only relative; that the RIM had serious problems of line; that it had hegemonic tendencies, principally at the level of the International Committee; and that if these problems were not overcome, the Movement could not advance in its tasks.

Therefore, the struggle that Maoism faces within the RIM, is a struggle to rescue this movement from those shortcomings, a struggle to propel it forward. The RIM must cease to be a 'gentleman's club' where the handful of people controlling the RCP USA are able to do as they please: recognise and de-recognise parties while arbitrarily guiding the Movement by an overt bourgeois line.

However, in order to carry out this struggle in a principled manner, it is necessary to raise it to an ideological plane and reveal the theoretical roots underpinning the current right-wing opportunist line these people are peddling.

The Revolutionary Internationalist Movement began to emerge in 1980, when 13 Communist parties and organizations signed a declaration 'To the Marxist-Leninists, the Workers and Oppressed Peoples of All Countries'. In this declaration - as Chairman Gonzalo noted in the PCP document 'International Line' - these parties "called upon the communists to unite around Marxism-Leninism and take-up Chairman Mao, but without regarding him as a new stage and failing to give him universal validity".

Chairman Gonzalo tells us that this endeavour was "led, principally, by the Revolutionary Communist Party of the United States (RCP USA)" and that later..... "In 1983, the RCP USA requested links with the Communist Party of Peru", a Party that was already engaged in leading the People's War in Peru precisely basing itself upon Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.

The RCP, main promoter of RIM, invited the PCP to subscribe to the Declaration of 1980. Chairman Gonzalo says on this point: "....the PCP did not agree because this Declaration did not consider Mao Tse-tung Thought, and moreover, we were already standing on the grounds of Marxism-Leninism- Maoism".

Chairman Gonzalo continues: ".... in March 1984, the II Conference of these organisations took place and the formation of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (RIM) was agreed and they approved a joint declaration in which there is talk about uniting around Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tse-
tung Thought. Our position on the incorporation of the PCP into the RIM is synthesised in our letter to the Committee of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement, of October 86: 'We would wish to reiterate two questions on this point. Firstly, from the beginning of our relationship, the central point of our differences has been the substantial and decisive problem of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism as the sole, true and new stage of development of the proletarian ideology. The question of its universal validity, and principally the problem of Maoism as the key issue".......

"Therein lie our differences on the question of the label of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tse-tung Thought. Nevertheless, we thought, and still think that the resolution of this problem - for us an indispensable, necessary and basic point - is complicated, requires time and moreover, requires further development of the revolution ........Secondly, our signing of the Declaration that resulted from the II Meeting in which RIM was founded, was done with reservations and even with clear disagreements.........which evidently involve differences on the questions of the principal contradiction, the revolutionary situation of uneven development, the world war, and some criteria on the role of the Movement"......

"It also involves differences on even more important points such as the universal validity of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism and particularly, the general validity of People's War......as well as on our insistence on always raising the slogan "Proletarians of all countries, unite"......... Today, the Declaration has been questioned by some as an opportunist document, others have charged that it is useless as far as resolving the burning problems demanded by the revolution is concerned, and that, therefore, we should march to a new declaration"......

"The PCP considers that RIM faces problems on different levels: on the ideological level, to advance in understanding Marxism-Leninism-Maoism........ on the political level, to advance in defining the fundamental contradictions and the principal one in the world, the question of the Third World War and the fact that revolution is the main trend, that if an imperialist war were to break out the question would be to transform it into People's War; in reference to construction, which shall be the road that we must follow in order to achieve the International that we need, an International that must be the continuation of the glorious International Communist Movement; on the question of working among the masses, we base ourselves in our banners "the masses make history", " rebellion is justified" and (on the existence of) "the colossal mountain of garbage", and that mass work is for the purpose of initiating or developing the People's War; on the question of leadership, we consider this a key issue that demands time for its formation, development and recognised authority; about the two line struggle, we consider that it is not being handled as it should be"......

"These are problems of development, but if these are not handled in a just and correct fashion, it can result in disarticulation and these negative possibilities can not but worry us. We consider that the RIM Committee is attempting to impose upon us the label of "Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tse-tung Thought", to restrain our Party within the limits of the Declaration and to resolve problems of leadership within the Committee in a manner that gives us grounds to think that hegemonic tendencies exist in it'".

Chairman Gonzalo also says: "Taking this situation into account, we reaffirm ourselves in the line adopted at the IV National Conference of the PCP of October 86 about developing our action as a fraction within the International Communist Movement so that Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, principally Maoism, be the leading and guiding ideology of world revolution..........We are for the reconstitution of the Communist International and we consider the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement as a step in that direction, a step that will be useful on that account, provided RIM sustains itself on a just and correct ideological line". (Quotations are all from 'International Line of the PCP' - The underlining is ours).

OUR OWN EXPERIENCE IN THE TWO LINE STRUGGLE

In 'What is to be Done?', Lenin taught: "If you must unite, Marx wrote to the Party leaders, then enter into agreements to satisfy the practical aims of the Movement, but do not allow any bargaining over principles, do not make theoretical 'concessions'". Moreover, Lenin pointed out: "What at first sight appears to be 'unimportant errors' may lead to most deplorable consequences, and only shortsighted people can consider factional disputes and a strict differentiation between shades of opinion inopportune and superfluous".

Therefore, as Maoists in Great Britain, it is our task to report on our own experience in the two line struggle within the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement. A struggle carried out against the shortcomings that Chairman Gonzalo and the PCP so precisely pinpointed more than a decade ago. We shall deal with the experience in the two line struggle against the opportunists within RIM of those who today are working around Committee Sol Peru.

Working first around Red Star Information Bureau and agitating by means of the Yenan Society, later grouped in the Maoist London Committee (of Supporters of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement), and today, rallying round Committee Sol Peru, the proletarian revolutionary line in Great Britain has staunchly fought - at times even against the prevailing wind - the opportunism that has nestled in the bureaucracy of the International Committee of the Movement from its very foundation. Today, it is our duty once again to take up this struggle.

As early as May 5, 1984, the 166th Anniversary of Karl Marx, when the foundation of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement was announced in a Public Conference, the current spokesman for Committee Sol Peru - London, then speaking in the name of Red Star Information Bureau, said:

"Proletarians and oppressed peoples of the world, unite! ..... and rally to the red flag of Marxism-
Leninism-Maoism hoisted high in the South American mountains by Chairman Gonzalo. Give wholehearted support to the just political and military line of the Communist Party of Peru. Reassemble your ranks, get organised, and advance courageously along the Shining Path of the world proletarian revolution, the struggle for socialism and the communist society!".

On this occasion, the platform of the meeting was chaired precisely by those elements associated with the line put forward by the RCP USA. These people portrayed the PCP as a party in total agreement with the Declaration of the RIM; as a party that shared their own thesis centred on 'imminent danger of war' and not on the Maoist thesis that 'the revolution is the main historical trend in today's world'.

Moreover, they negated the 'revolutionary situation of uneven development', they negated the universal validity of Maoism and the 'general validity of People's War'. With their inveterate hegemonism - and surprising everyone with their misuse of their position on the platform - the RIM organisers tried to silence the representative from Red Star who was speaking from the floor of the Conference. This anti-democratic attitude did not succeed thanks to the protests of the public.

Therefore, from the very beginning of the development of RIM, two lines in unity and struggle manifested themselves in Great Britain: a Marxist and a non-Marxist one, a consistent line and an opportunist line, at that time appearing as a 'left' opportunist line, as we shall show.

STRUGGLE FOR AND AROUND THE UNITED FRONT

Later that same year, a talk on the People's War in Peru took place in the University of London Union, once again organised by the leaders of RIM. This event featured as the main speaker the person who today is known as the 'individual in Sweden'.

In this context, a private meeting was arranged with representatives of the International Committee of the RIM, the 'individual in Sweden' and the people from Red Star Information Bureau. Its purpose was to agree to collaborate in developing the campaign in support of the Peruvian People's War in this country.

However, besides this practical unity for a common objective, it is appropriate to note today the main differences that arose from that very first moment. Ideological differences that, although at that time expressed only in embryonic form, are in essence the same differences underpinning the present struggle today.

In the conversations held with the 'individual in Sweden', who at that time spoke on behalf of the PCP in Europe, he put forward the following theses:

"The proletariat is no longer the main force of the revolution in developed imperialist countries, this force is now to be found among 'the most oppressed elements', such as immigrants, lumpen elements, etc.". This is an identical thesis to those upheld by the RCP USA and other similar groups, principally in the USA. A thesis that contradicts the immortal slogan always raised by the PCP: "Proletarians of all countries, unite!".

"The 'original' Trotskyists were right in their polemics with Stalin". A thesis that corresponds with the main plank of the RCP USA and of Robert Avakian its president, who hold that the line of the 7th Congress of the Communist International (1935), and therefore, that of Georgi Dimitrov, is 'pure revisionism'.

ROOT CORE DIFFERENCES WITH THE NON MARXIST ANTI BOLSHEVIK LINE

In this way, they also indirectly attack Stalin, since this leader not only upheld and applied this line, as did also Chairman Mao, but was personally a member of the Leading Committee of the Communist International at that time. Besides, this also contradicts Chairman Gonzalo and the PCP, who in their document 'Marxism and the Trade Union Movement' say:

"Pay attention to the experience of the Communist International ....... but take into account that in its midst an acute two line struggle took place, and that in that struggle the influence of Trotskyism and Zinoviev, etc., manifested itself ....."

"The Communist International fought stubbornly against fascism. The Report of Dimitrov to the VII World Congress of the Communist International is specially important for us who are facing up to a fascist government and the corporatisation of Peruvian society.........Centre your attention in the second part of the report, "The United Front of the Working Class Against Fascism" and particularly in the chapters "The Struggle For Trade Union Unity " and "The United Front and the fascist mass organizations"...........

"Pay even more attention to the title "The Establishment of Unity of Action"; "that unity of action be directed against fascism, against the offensive of capital, against the menace of war, against the class enemy. That is our condition!". (From the document of the Communist Party of Peru "The Proletariat and its Struggle for Emancipation: Marxism and the Trade Union Movement", published in 'El Diario' (Lima), January 12, 1988). (The underlining is ours).

PROMOTING THE UNITED FRONT

However, as we have already said, having sufficient grounds of accord for the common tasks in support of the People's War in Peru, it was agreed to collaborate on that issue.

The representatives of the RCP USA line in this country responded to this initiative by proposing the formation of a local committee in London to support the RIM. This invitation was accepted by the revolutionaries and a series of meetings and contacts with the aim of setting up the London Supporters Committee of the RIM took place.

OBSTRUCTING THE UNITED FRONT

Nevertheless, in parallel to this effort, the disciples of Robert Avakian tabled a document elaborated by a purported 'Marxist-Leninist Programme Commission' and entitled: "'The Unholy Alliance' - Bases of Discussion for an Organisation of Supporters of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement in Britain". In this document the followers of the line of the RCP USA systematized and disseminated their anti-Marxist thesis on the 7th Congress of the Communist International, holding that the line of the United Front that emerged from this Congress was a 'revisionist line'. These gentlemen branded comrade Georgi Dimitrov as a 'great revisionist' and as a 'great traitor'.

Underhandedly they did the same with comrade Stalin, whom they accused of 'implementing this criminal policy'; at the same time they put a slur on Chairman Mao as a 'dubious proletarian internationalist', 'not always a consistent Marxist-Leninist'. Marx, Engels and Lenin, were presented as people who were 'not always Marxists', etc. All this in the name of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement from which they proclaimed themselves 'official representatives', as well as claiming that the Communist Party of Peru (PCP) and Chairman Gonzalo shared their points of view.

ZINOVIEV'S GRANDCHILDREN

In synthesis, all this reflects a 'Zinovievist' line corresponding to the 'original trotskyist theses' of Gregori Zinoviev, who had been instrumental during a certain period in misleading the Communist International.

This 'left opportunist' line was precisely overcome at the 7th Congress of the Communist International, something that his 'grandchildren' even now evidently have not forgotten. In China, for example, a representative of this 'left opportunist' current was Li Li-san, whose line was overturned by Chairman Mao at the Tsunyi Conference in 1935, the same year of the 7th Congress of the Comintern.

In Peru, this 'ultra-left' line, with its characteristics of workerism, dogmatism and cosmopolitanism, was actively expressed during the first phase of leadership of the PCP by Eudocio Ravinez, later degenerating into overt right-wing opportunism.

Chairman Gonzalo in referring to this event in the history of the PCP says: ".......but the founder died in 1930, and less than two years since the formation of the Party ........... the Party had no time to consolidate itself when a tendency that already existed overwhelmed it, openly questioning Mariategui and his line. Moreover, Mariategui's line was changed by Ravinez. In this manner, opportunism usurped the leadership of the Party with the most dire consequences for the class and the revolution.".

IDEOLOGICAL DEBATE

In the face of these provocations and the hegemonistic attempt to impose such 'ideological basis' the British Maoists challenged these gentlemen to hold a debate on their claims. This polemic was accepted and agreed.

This important public event took place in London on November 30, 1984. This confrontation totally defeated them and exposed before the masses that the pretensions of these gentlemen had nothing in common with the truth.

Therefore, the 'champions' of this tendency had to flee London in ridicule and return to their base in the city of Nottingham. Later, some of the better elements among them broke with, or in any case, did cast aside such positions and have collaborated with the Maoists. From this process arose a London Committee to Support the RIM, under the guidance of the proletarian revolutionary line, whose prestige was therefore strengthened.

However, the International Committee of the RIM continued to function in London controlled by a disembodied bureaucracy with no links with or responsibility before the masses, refusing to recognise the London Support Committee, attempting to set up parallel organisms, and continuing to carry out other provocations and attempts at undermining and silencing it by different means, as we shall see.

THE ROLE OF THE 'INDIVIDUAL IN SWEDEN' AND ATTEMPTS AT RESTORATION

"The Rightists are liars, they are dishonest and do bad things behind our backs. Who would have thought Chang Po-chun would do so many bad things?. I think the higher the office these types hold, the greater their treachery". Chairman Mao Tse-tung - Have firm Faith in the Majority of the People, October 17, 1957.

A few months later, these 'officials' linked to the RIM bureaucracy, attempted to make a comeback. To this end, they organised a lavish Conference about the People's War in Peru for February 15, 1985 in London. The guest star of this event was, again speaking in 'representation of the Peruvian revolutionaries', our 'friend' the 'individual in Sweden', who, at that time was already misusing the trust of the PCP as his 'party' card.

As the local defenders of the proletarian revolutionary line we decided to mobilise ourselves in support of this Conference. We regarded the Speaker as a voice of the PCP. However, at the same time, we decided to present firmly and clearly our points of view directly to the masses. Below are some extracts from the document that we published and distributed on that occasion in the name of the Supporters Committee of the RIM in London:

"'My attitude, since my incorporation in this vanguard, has been one of a firm believer, of a fervent propagandist of the United Front', Mariategui wrote on the First of May, 1924...'" (Chairman Gonzalo - Let's Retake Mariategui Road and Reconstitute his Party).

Acting upon the spirit of unity reflected in the above quotation, the London Supporters Committee of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (Maoists), calls upon the Marxist-Leninist-Maoists, the democratic and progressive forces in this city, principally the proletariat, Peruvian and Latin- American residents in London, to show their fervent support for the People's War in Peru and attend and participate enthusiastically in the Conference of February 15.

There are principled differences between us and the organisers of this Conference. This we cannot and do not want to conceal. But we are also convinced that the visiting Speaker, being a Peruvian supporter of the PCP, will reflect on the day the authentic line of Chairman Gonzalo. We are therefore convinced that he will reject the liquidationist theses that the gang of 'official organisers' spread during the other 364 days of the year.

These comrades who describe themselves as followers of Robert Avakian and of the line of the RCP-USA, after their ideological trouncing in the public debate of last November 30 in London on the question of the United Front - a debate that clearly established the semi-trotskyist character of their theses on the 7th Congress of the Communist International - are day dreaming by using this Conference of Support for the People's War in Peru to underpin their own line. In our opinion, they will only raise a stone to let it drop it on their own feet.

Our Committee proposes that Marxist-Leninist-Maoists should listen attentively and respectfully to the words of the Peruvian Speaker, and that at the end of his speech, we shall ask him questions serving to clarify the important issues that are being debated about the road forward within the International Communist Movement. We propose to ask the following questions:

How does the PCP consider Marx and Lenin? Were they or were they not consistent Marxists?

In the opinion of the PCP, did Chairman Mao and V.I. Lenin have or not have the same point of view regarding proletarian internationalism?

Does the PCP believe that the policy of comrade Stalin, should be considered as a 'criminal policy'?

Does the PCP regard comrade Georgi Dimitrov as a 'great traitor' and the policy of the United Front he upheld as 'sheer revisionism'?

Which one is the Marxist policy? - The united front of the revolution advocated by Chairman Mao or the liquidationist line of Zinoviev, Li Li-san and others, the line of 'close doors' that today is being promoted by some self-proclaimed official representatives of Maoism and the line of the PCP?

Were the followers of Kautsky, the II International revisionists, right in claiming, as do today some self-anointed defenders of Maoism, that 'Lenin was not accused of being an agent of the Kaiser for absolutely no reason'?

It is important to ask these questions. Unity cannot be achieved at the cost of principles, especially when there are people who are already engaged in attacking the proletarian line and its leaders........ As Mariategui said, and Chairman Gonzalo has repeated, 'we live in an era of intense ideological belligerence'.

On the occasion of February 15, the central question is to lend our support to the People's War in Peru. To that end we shall practice and will always continue to respectfully practice unity. But the year is composed of 365 days, and during all the other 364, these 'official' comrades who today want to benefit of the 'political capital' of the PCP by means of this Conference, continue to develop a line that can only result in a split and in harming the cause they themselves claim to be defending. And what is worse, they carry out this line taking the name of the PCP in vain, in order to buttress their absurd theses. Therefore, let us shed some light upon the true state of these affairs".

AVOIDING DEBATE

In the course of this Conference, the 'individual in Sweden', confronted with direct quotations of Chairman Gonzalo, could not elude the truth about the position of the PCP in relation to the United Front - therefore showing, very much to his discomfort, that the theses advocated by those who follow the line of the RCP-USA had nothing whatsoever in common with reality.

However, then this gentleman, with the pretext of preserving unity, refused to answer all other questions, closed the debate and ran off, together with the 'official leaders', leaving the public in total perplexity. For many comrades at that time this may have seemed surprising behaviour but today we evidently have an explanation.

To grasp the precedents of these polemics, we need to refer to a document published then (October 1984) by the Red Star Information Bureau in London. This document rejected the positions of Robert Avakian and the RCP USA (which in essence are the same that were being put forward in London by the 'official leaders' and by the 'individual in Sweden' in the name of the RIM):

ABOUT THE 'NEW IDEAS' OF BOB AVAKIAN

The President of the Revolutionary Communist Party of the USA, Robert Avakian, likes to parade himself as the standard bearer of Maoism in our era. Mr. Avakian is a self-proclaimed defender and propagandist of 'new ideas' which, he alleges, arise from the 'immortal contributions of Chairman Mao'. What is there of truth in all of this?

The problem with the prolific articles and books of this author, published by the party that he chairs and of which he is undisputed leader and guide, has nothing to do with the contributions of Chairman Mao. However, it has everything to do with the dense fabric of speculations he weaves around them, using artificial arguments to peddle ideological counterfeits.

These, far from being new, are essentially the very same key ideas that modern revisionism used and continues to use in opposing Marxism, Marxism-Leninism and therefore true Maoism. As we shall see, the only 'new' thing here is the ingenious method to re-package revisionism with which Mr. Avakian wants to befuddle us: "If for example the socialist camp had really been consolidated and strengthened and developed as a socialist camp in the 1950's and after I think analysis would show that it was very likely that the imperialists would have launched a world war against that socialist camp sometime probably in the 1960s. They would have very likely had the necessity to do that". - Robert Avakian, Advancing the World revolutionary Movement: Questions of Strategic Orientation - Revolution (RCP USA Theoretical Journal), Spring 1984. (The underlining is ours).

Please pay serious attention to what is being said here. It is necessary to lift the dense curtain of adjectives, and conditionals used by the author and reveal clearly the essence of his thesis: THAT THE CONSOLIDATION AND STRENGTHENING OF THE SOCIALIST CAMP WOULD HAVE FORCED IMPERIALISM TO LAUNCH A WORLD WAR.

Is this a 'new idea'?. Not at all. Today all Marxists are well aware that this, and no other, was the basic stand formulated by Khrushchev and modern revisionism.

Lenin said: 'He who does not adhere to principle, generates a split'. All Marxists know that it was Khrushchev who hastened the split in the socialist camp, that the counter-revolutionary actions of Soviet revisionism were the root cause of the lack of consolidation of the socialist camp, compelling the Marxist-Leninists to fight against the social-imperialist direction that revisionist treason impressed on the Soviet Union and the Eastern European countries.

According to Robert Avakian, this action of Khrushchev and his gang was an altruistic act that spared us the horrors of a Third World War. On that basis, one should indeed conclude that Khrushchev did act correctly in removing the 'necessity' of imperialism in unleashing such a war 'some time during the sixties'. In other words: Long live Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev, saviour of humanity and world peace!. Maybe Mr Avakian only meant to say: 'Probably and most likely' saviour of humanity!.

Whichever way you look at Avakian's point of view, the inescapable conclusion is that it absolutely opposes the view of Chairman Mao, in whom he claims to base his 'new ideas'.

Let us see. In his own contemporary evaluation on this issue - in the decade of the fifties - Chairman Mao expressed a totally different point of view:

"On the whole, the international situation is fine. There are a few imperialist powers, but what of it?. Nothing terrifying even if there were a few dozen more." - Chairman Mao, Speech at the Second Session of the Eight Central Committee, 1956.

In his Talks at the Conference of Party Committees Secretaries of 1957, Chairman Mao developed this evaluation even further:

"The contradiction between the imperialist countries and the socialist countries is certainly most acute. But the imperialist countries are now contending with each other for the control of different areas in the name of opposing communism. What areas are they contending for?. Areas in Asia and Africa....".

The Chairman added: ".....their embroilment is to our advantage. We the socialist countries, should pursue a policy of consolidating ourselves and not yielding a single inch of our land. We will struggle against anyone who tries to make us do so. This is where we draw the line beyond which they can be left to quarrel among themselves".

Concluding: "In short, our assessment of the international situation is still that the embroilment of the imperialist countries contending for colonies is the greater contradiction. They try to cover up the contradictions among themselves by playing up their contradiction with us".

This point of view of Chairman Mao is put across consistently in all his writings and speeches of that era, as well as in all later pronouncements.

One of the fundamental errors that led Khrushchev to take up revisionist positions, is precisely this incorrect evaluation of the question of the 'danger of war'. Essentially, modern revisionism irrupts on the scene waving the banner of 'protecting world peace'. Under the pretext of protecting the peace, they abandon Marxism because they perceive the 'militant policy' of communism as a provocation that forces upon the imperialists the 'necessity of unleashing a war' in order to suppress the imminent revolution. In synthesis, the revisionist error is grounded in confusing the appearance (the playing up on the part of imperialism of their contradictions with the socialist camp, with communism) with the essence of imperialist policy (their mutual competition for markets, colonies and spheres of influence).

Evidently, Mr Avakian shares the basic evaluation of Khrushchev. For Avakian, Chairman Mao was wrong and Khrushchev was right. For our US-Maoist ideologue, the victory of the Marxist policy within the socialist camp (its consolidation and strengthening) would have generated war.

According to Chairman Mao and Marxism, a revolutionary policy prevents, delays, and eventually, by means of revolutionary civil war, can eliminate or stop imperialist war. That is why Marxism teaches that, "in the last analysis, only revolution can prevent imperialist war".

MORE PEARLS OF 'AVAKIAN THOUGHT'

We continue quoting from the same document:

Mr Avakian does indeed burn abundant incense at the altar of Chairman Mao. How much of this is really sincere?. How much of this is even Marxist?.

Let us look at some other pearls of wisdom in Mr. Avakian's own 'immortal contributions'. In referring to what he describes as 'a struggle or a disagreement (however it should be described)' between V.I. Lenin and the Irish revolutionary James Connolly, Avakian insists that Chairman Mao's outlook was the same as Connolly's and different from Lenin's in this respect: "To continue to be provocative I would say that this (Connolly's) was more or less the viewpoint of Mao: while he fought for proletarian internationalism and overall you would have to certainly say that he was a proletarian internationalist, his view point on what proletarian internationalism is, the viewpoint that comes through in his writings and speeches is the viewpoint that we represent the Chinese nation and on that basis we are for unity with the proletariat and all the other oppressed peoples throughout the world. This differs from the view point that Lenin fought for - that whether in an oppressed nation or in an oppressor nation from an ideological stand communists do not represent nations". - Robert Avakian, ibid. (the underlining is ours).

In other words, according to Mr Avakian - and extracting the essence of his thesis from such a farrago of words: Chairman Mao was a petty bourgeois revolutionist. Isn't that what is really meant by saying that Chairman Mao differs from Lenin on proletarian internationalism?. Is this not precisely what Khrushchev alleged against Chairman Mao?. Did Khrushchev not charge Chairman Mao and the Maoists with pushing the world towards nuclear war and splitting the socialist camp in order to defend 'narrow Chinese national interests'?. Did not Khrushchev and his successors argue that Chairman Mao was guilty of pitting his 'Chinese nationalism' against the 'Leninism' of the Great Soviet Union?. No wonder these 'new ideas' of Avakian sound so familiar.

Besides, what Avakian says about Lenin's viewpoint is also false. The 'contradiction' that Avakian 'establishes' is nothing but a three card trick that our 'ideologist' achieves by cutting out most of a quotation from Lenin. In his work 'Marx and Engels', Lenin says:

"Nations are an inevitable product, an inevitable form, in the bourgeois epoch of social development. And the working class cannot grow strong, become mature and take shape if it does not 'constitute itself the nation', if it is not 'national' ('though not in the bourgeois sense of the word').....".

Of this part of the quotation Mr. Avakian says nothing. However, let us continue with the same paragraph of Lenin: "....but the development of capitalism more and more breaks down national barriers, destroys national seclusion, substitutes class antagonisms for national antagonisms. It is, therefore, perfectly true that in the developed capitalist countries 'the working men have no country' and that 'united action' by the workers of the civilized countries at least, 'is one of the first conditions for the emancipation of the proletariat' (quotes ('') are from the Communist Manifesto by Marx and Engels)".

In order to establish his 'contradiction' between 'Mao the petty bourgeois nationalist' and 'Lenin the proletarian internationalist', Mr Avakian notices only that 'the working men have no country', forgetting everything else. As we already pointed out, a cheap trick for substituting his own cosmopolitan outlook for real proletarian internationalism, at the same time that he smears Chairman Mao and dresses Lenin up in the garb of a Trotskyist clown.

After all of this, can anyone be surprised when Mr. Avakian says that 'Lenin himself wasn't called a German agent for absolutely no reason'?. Can anyone be surprised if this 'new - and novel - communist' who repeatedly exhorts us to 'break with old ideas', ends up embracing a position that resumes and synthesises the typical slander hurled against Lenin by the Mencheviks and the Left liquidators in 1918 at the time of the Brest-Litovsk peace negotiations?. Did not the 'grandparents' of this ultra-revolutionary gentleman then charge Lenin with betraying the proletarian revolution to German imperialism?.

The truth is that the 'old ideas' that Mr Avakian wants us to cast off are the ideas, traditions and principles of the International Communist Movement, Marxism, its Classics, and concretely, the ideas of Chairman Mao whom he unduly claims as his inspiration. Evidently, these ideas, traditions and principles, in his opinion, should be substituted with his 'new ideas', which, as we have seen, are nothing but the old 'original principles' of the petty bourgeois revolutionists who since 1918, and even long before, have been spreading their absurd slanders and carrying out their provocations against the proletarian leaders and the teachings of Bolshevik communism. In synthesis, against the red line of Chairman Mao.

We have seen how in one short pamphlet, Mr. Avakian has achieved a veritable record of anti- communist provocation that makes Trotsky look rather tame: Dimitrov, a revisionist and a traitor, Stalin, a criminal politician, Chairman Mao, a petty bourgeois and a chauvinist, Lenin, an agent of the Kaiser. In the process, this gentleman also subtly manages to send up three cheers for old Nikita Khrushchev!.

Thus Spoke Robert Avakian and the RCP USA in 1984!

A CARICATURE OF MARXISM

In 'Imperialist Economicism' (Collected Works, page 1916, Vol 22 - Published in Proletariskaya Revolutsyia Nº7), Lenin said: "No one can discredit social-democracy (communism) unless it discredits itself. Whenever this or that important Marxist theoretical thesis or tactic succeeds, or at least becomes the order of the day, whenever this or that theoretical thesis or tactical advance comes under the concentrated attack of the open and consistent enemies of Marxism, it is also usually threatened in a hopeless manner by certain 'friends'. Such friends discredit this Marxist advance by turning it into a caricature of itself".

This happens too with Maoism, with Gonzalo Thought, and with the revolutionary advances that the People's War in Peru has contributed to the proletariat and the people at the international level in theory and practice. There are also such 'friends' who make of this theoretical advance, of these glorious achievements of the class, of this heroic revolutionary struggle, a grotesque caricature. In this manner they contribute their grain of sand to the discrediting of Marxism. This truth expressed by Lenin matches well the well known saying: 'with friends like this, who needs enemies?.

Some friends of the Peruvian revolution who follow the lead of the RCP USA, as well as other similar revolutionists, are precisely this kind of 'friends'. Whenever the PCP and Chairman Gonzalo advance a correct thesis or implement a successful policy, together with the inevitable attack of the professional reactionaries, such 'friends' also take the field and draw a grotesque caricature discrediting those theses or policies with their ham-fisted 'defence'.

A CARICATURE OF THE PCP AND THE DAY OF HEROISM

Let us take the case of the massacre in the prisons of Lurigancho, Santa Bárbara and El Fronton, events in which the fascist regime of Alan García assassinated more than 350 prisoners of war (19 of June, 1986, Day of Heroism). Our 'official' friends from the RIM in London partially coincided with the Trotskyist press in evaluating such events. The Trotskyists painted them as the actions of illuminated madmen who had undertaken a hopeless and pointless rebellion. They condemned these events as another proof of the 'suicidal, fanatical and terrorist madness' of the Maoists. While it must be said that our 'friends' did burn high volumes of incense to the heroism of the PCP's prisoners of war and to Maoism, they also portrayed these events as 'an insurrection on the part of those who preferred to die than continue living in this cruel world of exploitation', forgetting to mention that this massacre was a premeditated and planned action of the genocidal regime, while simultaneously glossing over the crucial importance of exposing the criminal activities of the fascist Apra party and their II international accomplices.

The impression reflected in their press was that of a suicidal act of sheer courage and bravado undertaken with the sole and exclusive aim of demonstrating how revolutionary 'their Peruvian comrades were'. Evidently, our friends expected everybody to salute them for the great merit of 'officially representing' such heroic and fearless communists before the world. To ride on the backs of the proletarians while unpunished reaction mows them down, is the only way to describe such an immature and caricature-like 'defence' of the true and glorious heroism and steel like resistance of the PCP's war prisoners.

A CARICATURE OF THE PROLETARIAT

In the context of the class struggle in Great Britain our 'friends' also managed to 'threaten' in a hopeless manner the cause of winning over public opinion in favour of the Peruvian revolution among the masses, principally the proletariat; let us look at some examples:

In 1984-85 the great miners' strike took place, a protracted and glorious action of the British proletariat that in its course came to mobilise wide sections of the working class and, at times, to challenge, even by violence, the bourgeois imperialist dictatorship itself. Hundreds of thousands, millions of proletarians and democratic people participated in one way or another in this great workers movement undertaken by the traditionally most combative section of this country's proletariat. In this context, there were demonstrations, solidarity stoppages, public collection of strike funds, and the protracted and stubborn head-on clashes of the working masses at the mine gates against the repressive forces of the state, principally the police at the service of the employers, the imperialist state itself.

Thus, 1984 saw the growing development of intense political activity in Great Britain alongside the growing social polarization created by the miner's strike. A strike that with every passing day began to assume more and more a concrete political character far beyond a simple trade union dispute, and in the course of which, at some point, the very question of state power was openly raised by the struggling workers, the very question of class dictatorship.

In the London Committee of Supporters of the RIM we then proposed to carry out an intense campaign to publicise the revolutionary developments in Peru among the striking miners and their even more numerous sympathizers, workers, students and other democratic sections who were participating in these actions.

This proposal of ours was plainly rejected by the 'official leaders of the RIM' who claimed that the miner's strike was nothing but 'the stinking black smoke of a decaying class and not the fire of real revolutionaries'. However, this did not put us off, and despite the practical difficulties, we were able to send a delegation to the pits of the Kent area, in Southern England. In Kent we were given shelter by the miners themselves, we shared their bread, we partook in their struggles and in the pickets to stop scab labour breaking the strike at the mine gates. In those intense days we were to learn many lessons about the fighting spirit and organisational capacity of the working class in developed countries. These are key lessons in order to understand the concrete strategy and tactics of the revolutionary struggle in such countries.

In these visits, the workers themselves requested that we should address their great mass meetings. We spoke to them about our solidarity and gave them truthful information on the revolution in Peru and the development of Maoism in the world. Those of us who partook of this great and unforgettable experience will never erase from our minds the proletarian spirit, the class solidarity, the real internationalism and the great enthusiasm that the revolutionary news awoke in the masses of our brother miners of the Kent area.

Even today, we have in that zone many good and true friends, principally among the masses and the mining youth, but also among the rank and file union leaders, some of whom, despite holding totally different opinions than ours in many issues, never stopped us from expressing our views in any way, always behaving correctly and courteously with us. The class is always the class, something that the petty bourgeois intellectuals will never fully understand. We especially noted that this supposed 'black and stinking smoke' showed more fire and held more promise for the battles to come than all the 'red' bombast of the crimson ultra-revolutionaries who follow the line of the RCP USA.

Later, during 1985, in the mass demonstrations staged by the miners and their sympathizers in London - at that time, such sympathizers were even organising themselves into Support Committees by areas and neighbourhoods all over the country - we distributed many thousands of leaflets and pamphlets about the People's War, about the PCP and Chairman Gonzalo, emphasising proletarian internationalism.

Never in our campaign to popularise the ideas of the Peruvian revolution and to win public opinion in favour of Maoism, now more than ten years old, we have observed so much interest and solidarity like we did in those memorable actions of the proletariat in the streets.

ECONOMIST THESES

Another important event in British social life, in the class struggle in this country during the second part of the 80s, also saw the 'official representatives' of the RIM and the true Marxist-Leninist- Maoists take diametrically opposed positions. We are referring here to the protracted conflict pitting the printing workers union against the giant press monopolist Rupert Murdoch due to the re- structuring of the labour practices in that industry.

The printing unions are some of the oldest unions in this country and are mostly identified with the labour aristocracy, made up of many workers that according to the old labour practices and the social conquests, earned high salaries and had ample benefits and a high standard of living. Some of them were even able to pass on their employment to sons and relatives as part of their inheritance. However, these workers suffered a cynical lock-out by the employers when they refused to accept the new conditions and were arrogantly dumped to the social waste-heap, hiring strike-breakers and substituting skilled labour for modern computerised processing in order to maximise capitalist profits.

Despite the privileged status of such workers and the compensation offered by the bosses for every job position to be given up, this was effectively a bosses lock-out and the solidarity of the class was not to leave these workers isolated in their struggle. Moreover the class correctly perceived this action of the bosses as a barefaced attempt of the imperialist bourgeoisie to unload their crisis onto the backs of the working people. Therefore, for over a year there were pickets and support demonstrations, some of which we ourselves saw being turned into large scale violent combats, with many injured and arrested people suffering brutal reactionary repression.

In order to support this just cause and to condemn the unbounded ambition of the bosses, the workers of London called for a Great May Day Parade to pass in front of the new printing works of the Murdoch press monopoly in London's East End, a plant that had been turned with the protection of the state apparatus into what the workers themselves dubbed 'Fortress Wapping'. In this occasion, and adopting a different stance to the one they had in the case of the miners, the RIM 'officials' also participated. This was, in part, a consequence of the criticisms aimed at them because of their previous attitude.

On that occasion, by means of a May First Manifesto, we carried out a just recapitulation of the class struggle, including a critical summing-up of the economist policies that arise on the grounds of privilege among certain sections of the workers, firmly but soberly calling the class's attention to the terrible consequences of Economicism and of capitulating the revolutionary struggle. We reminded the class of the consequences of abandoning principle and proletarian internationalism. We aimed at demonstrating in a practical manner to the class what can be expected from the bosses 'sympathy' by using the example of the printing workers, thus complying with the obligation of educating the class, an ineluctable task of Marxists.

At the same time, we dealt with the theme of the Peruvian revolution, with the development of Maoism, with the fight against revisionism and the policies of the worker's aristocracy, outlining the revolutionary tasks and emphasising the necessity of the construction of their necessary instruments, the Party, the United Front, and what we in that Manifesto described as 'the necessary and appropriate instrument to face the armed resistance of the class enemy'.

However, in their parallel efforts, our 'friends' the disciples of Robert Avakian, distributed in the name of the RIM a economist and workerist tract promising those who joined-up with the Movement that they would lead them in 'rebellion' in order to achieve a society guaranteeing them a 'secure job' and a 'fair day's wages'. Once again, the anti-imperialist tasks in solidarity with the Peruvian revolution and the tasks of the proletariat in reference to the development of Maoism, criticism of revisionism, and the task of winning public opinion for the revolution, were turned into a hopeless caricature by these gentlemen.

CARICATURES OF SELF-CRITICISM

With the development of the People's War in Peru, with the growth of international solidarity with the revolution led by the Maoists in Peru and the consequent greater diffusion of the writings of Chairman Gonzalo and of the points of view of the PCP - now available directly from proper sources in Europe and USA - and, also partly due to the repeated ideological and political blows dealt them by the representatives of the proletarian current, for some time, the bourgeois line became subordinated within the activities of the RIM.

They ceased in their direct attacks upon the Marxist Classics, their literature against Georgi Dimitrov and the United Front was temporarily confined to their most secret closets. More articles from PCP sources began to appear in the RIM's press and eventually, even the RCP USA itself let it be known that they had carried out a 'self-criticism ' on the question of their ideological positions, particularly, on their line centred on the imminence of imperialist nuclear war among the super-powers which they had for a long time upheld as the 'main historical trend' and 'main contradiction in today's world'.

In a certain fashion, such self-criticism was itself compelled by the very circumstances of international politics, that had rendered such theses totally indefensible without a major overhaul.

However, the RCP USA has never published the results of such 'self-criticism', or at least, up to now, no one knows these directly. Despite some of their followers asserting that this indeed took place, we must, however, say that we cannot vouch for it. Moreover, there are other followers of the bourgeois line that deny any knowledge of the existence of such self-criticism. Maybe it is still 'under study' or being 'debated'. Who knows! Maybe somewhere there is already a 'Secret Report' from the RCP USA patiently asleep during the life-time of its leader!.

The important thing, however, is to see how our caricaturist 'friends' understand Marxist criticism and self-criticism. We must remind them that the very purpose of criticism and self-criticism is not to humiliate or punish anybody. It is to be able to use experience in order to advance Marxist understanding with the aim of solving problems.

A self-criticism announced but not revealed is merely a pointless exercise. To make contradictory noises about self-criticism without anyone knowing for sure anything about it, is nothing but an admission that there has been a change of line but not of ideology. In synthesis, and at the very most, a change of sales pitch but the merchandise being peddled remains the same.

The modern revisionists were also past masters at secret self-criticisms. For example, when Khrushchev fell, the revisionists led by Brezhnev made some 'self-critical' noises on the issue of Stalin. They also altered the external appearance of their political regime, especially their evident subservience to the imperialist bourgeoisie, principally the US. They ceased their craven fealty and clownish praise for the imperialist leaders, as Khrushchev had done with Eisenhower and Kennedy. They even began to mumble 'militant calls' aimed at deceiving the masses with bogus 'anti- imperialism', a useful ruse in their new orientation in which contention became primary and collusion with the other imperialists became secondary.

What all this really meant was that modern revisionism had fully entered into its social-imperialist phase of competition for colonies and spheres of influence. It should not be necessary to say that with such posturing they did deceive some petty-bourgeois revolutionists, but not for very long.

Deng Xiao-ping and his disciples are also masters of this trade. After long years of denigrating Chairman Mao to the seventh hell, from time to time these revisionists also make their self-critical noises and somehow restore him his 'condition as a great Marxist-Leninist'. We have particularly observed this charade during the celebration of the 100 Anniversary of Chairman Mao carried out in China and other parts of the world by Deng's followers.

From time to time, they also carry out their so-called campaigns against the 'spiritual pollution' resulting from the very capitalism they themselves have enshrined in China and, on this pretext, persecuting the poorest sections, the dispossessed, and principally, the class conscious proletarians.

However, with such cheap tricks, revisionists of all hues continue to bamboozle some 'socialists' in the world who even today refuse to see China and all other revisionist regimes as for what they are really: fascist dictatorships of big international financial capital, directly exercised by Deng's gang and others just like them. As Lenin once noted, revisionists and opportunists always swear by Marxism wherever it is popular among the masses and they perceive an advantage for their interests in doing so.

OPPORTUNISM RAISES AGAIN ITS BLACK BANNER

Two lines, a proletarian and a bourgeois line, with their respective recognised leaders at the international level, the line of the PCP and Chairman Gonzalo, and the one of the RCP USA respectively, have coexisted in unity and struggle within the RIM during the whole of its process of development. Therefore, these constitute the unity of opposites that is the RIM. There are two General Headquarters. The proletarian one that keeps an 'open fire at the light of day', and the bourgeois one that commits underhand 'arson' in the darkness.

Therefore, while the proletarian line has always proceeded with the intention that this unity may serve for the development of a new Communist International - an International like the one that the proletariat needs for its struggle for political power in the world - the bourgeois line has impeded, pigeonholed and caricatured this just policy of Chairman Gonzalo and Marxism.

For this purpose they adapt like chameleons clinging to their positions inside the RIM and continuing to impede and block the objectives of the proletariat by different and changing methods.

Like the old Italian aristocracy described by Visconti in the film 'Il Gatopardo' (The Leopard), they are also masters at 'changing certain things so that everything may remain the same'. Today, this opportunist line shows unequivocal signs of making a comeback, this time openly configured as a Right-wing opportunist line:

A CHANGE OF LABEL

It is in this context that the dialectical leap announced by the IC of the RIM on 26/12/93 in adopting Marxism-Leninism-Maoism as the Movement's ideology should be understood.

It is true that since the very foundation of the RIM, Chairman Gonzalo and the PCP have advocated this move. However, what the PCP regards as a necessary and urgent 'understanding of the importance of Maoism for the world revolution', our 'friends' have caricatured as a simple change of label, a mere 'birthday present' for Chairman Mao in his 100 Anniversary.

We say this because, in practice, what some, not all, within RIM, are presenting as 'Maoism', is nothing but a red flag to oppose the red flag. A toy rattle to divert attention from their true anti- Marxist orientation.

Let us see. Simultaneously with their change of label, our 'caricaturist friends' have also changed their line of business. They have confined their ultra-Left positions to the archives and have proceeded to unfold an openly Right-wing opportunist line, centring in 'Defending the Life of Doctor Guzman' and relegating the question of the revolution that Chairman Gonzalo embodies.

Describing their work as a 'democratic and humanitarian task' they are determined to sit on the fence on the all important issue of the plot of capitulation defended by the 'individual in Sweden' and his gang. In this fashion they have been managing the International Campaign to defend the life of Chairman Gonzalo, burning incense to Maoism while at the same time betraying and emasculating it in practice. According to them, this is in order 'not to frighten the masses'. In reality, the masses they are talking about are nothing but 'masses' of big-wigs and personalities whose signatures they collect with special relish, congratulating themselves no end when they obtain the support of some former Prime Minister or other, the signature of this or that Pop star, this or that MP of some bourgeois parliament.

The workers, peasants and students and truly democratic masses, are not frightened by the revolution and not put off by Maoism. No, it is the big-wigs and the personalities who our caricaturist 'friends' do not want to frighten. In synthesis, theirs is a case of being afraid of scaring 'the good bourgeois' into keeping wallet and fountain pen tightly closed in their pockets.

We can now see how the same theoretical thread holds together the two sides of the liquidationist coin of the bourgeois line of the RCP USA. It is nothing but the old Menshevik fear that the bourgeoisie may 'recoil' in the face of the revolution's advance. That, and nothing else, is what these gentlemen are today dressing up as 'Maoism'.

This and no other was the source of the 'ultra-Left' thesis of Robert Avakian on the question of the imperialist world war that would have occurred in the sixties 'if the socialist camp had really consolidated and strengthened itself'. Then their intention was to agitate the spectre of imperialist nuclear war so that the 'good bourgeois' would become scared of themselves and come to accept the leadership of our caricature heroes for their 'revolution in the eighties'.

Today, his disciples, given body and soul to open Right-wing opportunism, think that if the People's War continues to grow stronger, if Maoism is upheld and applied more firmly, if capitulation and treason and its advocates are openly condemned and unmasked, the reactionaries 'very likely' would have 'the necessity' to kill Chairman Gonzalo, and the question is for them 'to move heaven and earth' to defend his life above all things and principles. For them, today the issue is 'not to scare the bourgeois' so that they won't kill Dr. Guzman. As we already said, these are but two faces of the same coin.

IN SYNTHESIS

It is necessary to fight against opportunism inside the RIM. It is necessary to aim at the head and to reveal the roots that underpin it. It is necessary to advance in the reconstitution of the Peru People's Movements (MPPs) on the basis of repudiating all the anti-Marxist theses that the 'individual in Sweden' and the 'officials of the International Committee of the RIM' have jointly sown in its midst. Otherwise, these organisms would be unable to do the task that Chairman Gonzalo and the PCP has enjoined them. The urgent task of functioning: ".....as a red fraction within the International Communist Movement so that Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, principally Maoism be the command and guide of the world revolution...". If otherwise was done, they would inevitably fall again to charlatans of the same style as the 'individual in Sweden'.

We should bear specially in mind the words of Chairman Gonzalo: "We are for the reconstitution of the Communist International and we consider the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement as a step in that direction, a step that would be useful on that account, provided that it sustains itself on a just and correct ideological line".

It is necessary to raise the banner of the 7th Congress of the Communist International very high and to proclaim its reconstitution basing it upon retaking the road pointed out by Georgi Dimitrov, by comrade Stalin and Chairman Mao Tse-tung, who were and continue to be inseparable in the defence of its General Line.

We must draw a demarcation line vis a vis the theoretical equivocations promoted by Robert Avakian and the RCP USA leadership. Here in London at the time of the foundation of the RIM we had already said: 'The RIM is good, is a step forward. However, there are still many people who are not in it and should be, and there are others that are in it, but if they do not change their attitude, it would then be better that they were not'.

The events we have outlined in this report, have only reaffirmed us in the necessity to open intense fire in defence of the interests of the proletariat and the people. We are always advocates of the unity of the greatest number. However, such unity is only possible if it is based upon principles.

We clearly understand the need to draw a distinction between our own bureaucracy and the reactionary bureaucracy, between the 'bureaucracy of Yenan and the bureaucracy of Sian'. This is a sound Maoist policy.

However, if theses that the International Communist Movement had already repudiated more than 60 years ago are stubbornly regurgitated and applied to damage the revolution at every turn it undergoes a difficult period, if, moreover, there is no will to rectify, nor real self-criticism, then, despite our best intentions we would have to suggest that Chairman Mao's teaching: 'Fewer but better troops and a more efficient administration', be immediately applied to the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement.

FOR THE RECONSTITUTION OF THE COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL

Let us move forward to the reconstitution of the International Communist Movement holding aloft its glorious banners, the old and the new. The banners of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Dimitrov, and principally those of Chairman Mao, all of them banners of the Communist Party of Peru and of Chairman Gonzalo, repudiating revisionism and combating opportunism at every turn. This, and no other, should be the minimum base for unity for the communists of the world.

Let us remember that in this long and complex process of constructing the unity of the communists of the world, to date, we have had three Internationals. That the First was founded by Marx and Engels and was liquidated by the followers of Bakunin. That at that time, Marx and Engels wrote the following about these liquidators: "Here we have a society which under the mask of the most extreme anarchism, directs its blows not against the existing governments but against the revolutionaries who accept neither its dogma nor its leadership......It infiltrates the ranks of the international organisations of the working class, at first attempts to dominate it and, when this plan fails, sets to work to disorganise it. It brazenly substitutes its sectarian programme and narrow ideas for the broad programme and great aspirations of our Association." (Marx and Engels are here referring to the First International).

Let us recall that in order to preserve the principles of Marxism and to defend the long term interests of the class, it became necessary to dissolve this International, because otherwise, as Marx and Engels then said: "....it would have in any case died assassinated by unity placed above principle".

That a few years later, Engels founded an International that eventually became infinitely more powerful. That, however, after his death, this International also developed revisionism and deserted class principles adhering to social-patriotism and harnessing the class to the war chariot of the imperialist bourgeoisie despite all the resolutions of its Congresses. That in order to preserve Marxism and to defend the interests of the class, once again the revolutionaries had to proceed against the 'official leadership'.

That they went over the heads of the 'old leadership', and destroying the 'old Party', and turning the imperialist war into civil war, they seized power in Russia despite the curses, scheming and treason of the gentlemen of the II International. Let us recall that once in power, the Soviet proletariat under the leadership of Lenin and Stalin contributed infinitely to the formation of the III International, that was in time to be more powerful and combat-ready than the one we lost to the disciples of Kautsky.

Therefore, this is the Great International that today we want to reconstruct, defeating revisionism and opportunism once again and adhering the class to Marxism, today Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, principally Maoism.

In synthesis, let us recall that in every struggle against revisionism, placing principle above the need for unity has always resulted in effectively preserving the interests of the revolution. That the revolution and the class always emerge more powerful than before from every great battle against revisionism. That this is true even when the class is compelled to smash first the 'old Party', 'the old apparatus' whenever it is no longer possible to reform it.

Let us bear this in mind, never for a moment forget it, and all will be well in the end: That the formation of the RIM was a step forward in the direction of a concrete objective. That, even though this Movement has had many problems of development and line difficulties, thanks to the efforts of the revolutionaries it has even managed to take more than one step in that direction.

Take into account that the RIM is merely a Revolutionary Movement, and not yet an International for communists. In some occasions, as Lenin once indicated, it is necessary 'to take a step back to be able to take two forward'.

Of course, if it is possible still to rectify, this should be done, and thus unity would surely emerge strengthened. Today, however, only a struggle can bring this rectification about. But, if this road is no longer transitable and our adversaries obstinately persist in their unprincipled and divisive policies, in any case, from our efforts and from the efforts of all good comrades, the whole class and the people, a new more powerful and solid unity will always emerge at the end of the day. And this unity will surely be, a step and more than one step, in the reconstitution of "the International that we need".

WHAT IS TO BE DONE?

It is imperative to appeal immediately to all member parties of the RIM, if necessary, going over the heads of their leadership. It is imperative that all should adopt a clear position vis a vis these facts. It is necessary to bring all these issues out into the open, popularise them among the revolutionary masses so that the masses may themselves judge the role of their leaders. Any other kind of attitude, is closed-doors, is 'gentleman's club', is Rightism!.

Only in this way can this negative phenomena - the lack of unity and political coordination of the Maoists at the international level - be overcome and turned into a positive factor allowing for a true advance beyond a simple change of label.

A PROCESS THAT SHOULD START AT HOME

To achieve these aims, today it is more urgent than ever to rectify the MPPs and that these organisms should boldly integrate themselves in a united front to defend the revolution in Peru and the proletarian line at the world level. It is really necessary to constitute a red fraction in order to raise these banners and undertake these tasks, not with the aim of scaling bureaucratic positions, but to advance the interests of the proletariat and the people.

Finally, and in this connection, and to show once again that the clean-up of the 'colossal mountain of garbage' must always begin at home, we reproduce here a few lines written a few moths ago by our Committee:

"Currently, after overcoming the immediate crisis generated by the desertion of certain elements, a handful of rotten leaders that included the principal responsible persons in Sweden, Mexico, Germany and France, the Peru People's Movement is entering into a new period of development.

These individuals, in the event of the imprisonment of Chairman Gonzalo, turned coat and went to work as the handmaids of Fujimori's "Peace Agreement", dragging along a few others and achieving a certain degree of success in creating confusion, fomenting splits and driving away good elements from the masses who stay away from unprincipled internal disputes.

This new and powerful development can be observed in the appearance of new organisms of the MPP type (for example, in the USA) and the reconstitution of others (Sweden in Malmö), as well as in the wide support that the International Communist Movement and the revolutionaries of the world are lending to those publications, organisations and individuals that have taken the field against the "Peace Agreement" plot and the bogus 'Directive of Chairman Gonzalo' fabricated by Fujimori and Montesinos.

However, it is also an undeniable fact that this unpleasant experience compels the necessity of rectification for the MPPs. This experience demonstrates that within the organisms generated by the PCP for its work at the international level, an unprincipled gang of counter-revolutionaries with their own ideology and organisation had secretly nestled during many years.

That these elements hid their true nature under the cover of the most revolutionary phraseology. That they agitated the reddest of red banners to oppose the red banner. That these were individuals like Khrushchev and Lin Piao, incense burners and praise singers. People who, to disguise their Right-wing opportunism, swear undying loyalty and vow absolute submission at every possible turn: quotation mongers and champions of the stereotype style of Party writing. Moreover, they have also left us an inheritance of bad methods of work. Methods that have a hold even among those that did not follow them in this occasion along the road of capitulation and have not enlisted themselves in Fujimori's counter-revolutionary ranks.

Therefore, this issue should not be addressed with a mere change of leading personnel. It should be addressed by repudiating the political line, the ideology that underpins betrayal. This should be done scientifically, systematically and in an organised fashion. It is no good to be content with trimming the leaves, one must go to the roots of the problem.

This is why it is necessary to make a bit of history and seek out the roots of these events within the MPPs. Only an unrepentant idealist could assume that all this bourgeois carrion, all this desertion, could have appeared all of a sudden upon the stage, complete with "Directives from the Leadership" and plans for a revisionist "Second Congress", like Minerva, who in Greek mythology was born full grown and armed from the Godhead of Zeus!".

Today we have attempted, with our limited means, to make part of this history and contribute to forward this process applying it to the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement itself. The revolutionary masses in Peru and the world have placed great hopes upon this Movement. The masses are optimistic and have unflinching faith. Provided the revolutionaries are above board with them and trust them, the masses will understand this struggle and actively back it making it their own, and thus developing the Movement itself. The important thing is that this struggle is undertaken boldly and in a totally principled manner. Comrades, we should indeed begin this very day!.

Committee Sol-Peru - London

10 B HOMESTEAD ROAD

LONDON SW6 7DB

Tel: 071 386-7607