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         THE MAOIST INTERNATIONALIST MOVEMENT

  MIM Notes 48                   JANUARY, 1991 

MIM Notes speaks to and from the viewpoint of the 
world's oppressed majority, and against the 
imperialist-patriarchy. Pick it up and wield it in 
the service of the people. support it, struggle 
with it and write for it.

IN THIS ISSUE:
1.  DIPLOMACY ADVANCES IMPERIALIST WAR PREPARATIONS
2.  PRISON PROTEST SQUELCHED AT TRENTON
3.  REVOLUTIONARY DEFEATISM
4.  LETTERS
5.  MAO SAYS STALIN 70% CORRECT
6.  LIBERALISM KILLS
7.  UNDER LOCK & KEY: NEWS FROM PRISONS AND PRISONERS
8.  ONE YEAR IN BROOKLYN, NEXT YEAR IN JERUSALEM
9.  'NO BLOOD FOR OIL' WON'T END WORLD WARS
10. OPPRESSED COUNTRIES:CEASEFIRE REACHED IN LIBERIA
11. FMLN RELIES ON NEGOTIATIONS, NOT PEOPLE'S WAR

The Maoist Internationalist Movement (MIM) is a 
revolutionary communist party that upholds 
Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, comprising the collection 
of existing or emerging Maoist internationalist 
parties in the English-speaking imperialist 
countries and their English-speaking internal 
semi-colonies, as well as the existing or emerging 
Spanish-speaking Maoist internationalist parties 
of Aztlan, Puerto Rico and other territories of 
the U.S. Empire. MIM Notes is the newspaper of 
MIM. Notas Rojas is the newspaper of the Spanish-
speaking parties or emerging parties of MIM.
MIM is an internationalist organization that works 
from the vantage point of the Third World 
proletariat; thus, its members are not Amerikans, 
but world citizens.
MIM struggles to end the oppression of all groups 
over other groups: classes, genders, nations.  MIM 
knows this is only possible by building public 
opinion to seize power through armed struggle.
Revolution is a reality for North America as the 
military becomes over-extended in the government's 
attempts to maintain world hegemony.
MIM differs from other communist parties on three 
main questions: (1) MIM holds that after the 
proletariat seizes power in socialist revolution, 
the potential exists for capitalist restoration 
under the leadership of a new bourgeoisie within 
the communist party itself. In the case of the 
USSR, the bourgeoisie seized power after the death 
of Stalin in 1953; in China, it was after Mao's 
death and the overthrow of the "Gang of Four" in 
1976. (2) MIM upholds the Chinese Cultural 
Revolution as the farthest advance of communism in 
human history. (3) MIM believes the North American 
white-working-class is primarily a non-
revolutionary worker-elite at this time; thus, it 
is not the principal vehicle to advance Maoism in 
this country.
MIM accepts people as members who agree on these 
basic principles and accept democratic centralism, 
the system of majority rule, on other questions of 
party line.
"The theory of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin is 
universally applicable. We should regard it not as 
dogma, but as a guide to action. Studying it is 
not merely a matter of learning terms and phrases, 
but of learning Marxism-Leninism as the science of 
revolution."
-- Mao Zedong, Selected Works, Vol. II, p. 208
* * *

DIPLOMACY ADVANCES IMPERIALIST WAR PREPARATIONS

by MC12 & MC44

December 9, 1990--At the end of a long rainbow of coercive 
diplomacy, the United States succeeded in wringing out an advance 
approval of war against Iraq from the United Nations Security 
Council on Nov. 29. The final vote on the council was 12-2.(1)

Instead of choosing between war and diplomacy, the United States 
is pursuing both with a vengeance. Consolidating power over 
allies, creating puppets and punishing defectors, the USA is 
laying the groundwork for a broader military victory in the war of 
expansion in the Middle East. The wide-ranging efforts undertaken 
by the USA around the world underscore the imperialist nature of 
the conflict, eliminating arguments that the war is caused by a 
single policy decision or an aggressive personality.

Diplomacy

The Security Council resolution officially gave Iraq until Jan. 15 
to surrender Kuwait to the United States or face total destruction 
at the hands of the U.S. war machine.

China, Cuba and Yemen were the last holdouts, as the Bush 
administration pulled out all the stops to ram the resolution 
through. China, which has the power to veto a Security Council 
resolution, held out for talks with U.S. Secretary of State James 
Baker as a first step toward restarting the flow of commerce and 
lending which the USA cut off after the state capitalist, pro-
Western Deng Xiaoping regime massacared students in Tiananmen 
Square in June 1989. China got talks, but no (public) deal, so 
they agreed to abstain instead of vetoing.

Baker met with the Cuban foreign minister at the last minute, the 
highest level meeting between the two countries since the Cuban 
revolution in 1959, but there were no deals and Cuba still voted 
no.(2)

When Yemen also insisted on voting against the war, the USA 
announced plans to cut off $70 million in annual aid to that 
country.(3)

War all but certain

At a press conference on Nov. 30, President Bush made it clear 
that he was not interested in a peaceful settlement (though of 
course he said he was). He did say he had no intention of fighting 
a half-assed war.

"This will not be a Vietnam," he said. "If we get one kid that's 
apt to be in harm's way, I want him backed up to the hilt by 
American firepower."

In the same speech, Bush said he would permit high-level talks 
between the United States and Iraq, but was not prepared to make 
any deals. The point of the talks was not to negotiate, he said, 
but just to repeat U.S. demands to Iraqi President Saddam 
Hussein's face.(4)

Twin occupations

Since the USA first sent troops to Saudi Arabia, in apparent 
response to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, Saddam Hussein has said he 
would only withdraw from Kuwait if Israel ended its 23-year 
occupation of Palestinian land, and Syria pulled out of Lebanon 
(see MIM Notes 45). While Bush has maintained that there is no 
connection between the various illegal occupations in the region, 
a number of Arab and non-aligned governments don't agree.

Cuba, Yemen, Malaysia and Colombia have drafted a Security Council 
resolution, supported by most of the Council's members, which 
calls for sending a U.N. delegation to investigate the Israeli 
police killings at the Temple Mount Oct. 8, and proposes an 
international peace conference to settle the "Palestinian 
question."(5)

The United States, which holds a veto on the Council, would rather 
come up with a proposal it wouldn't be obligated to veto. Any plan 
which Israel would object to, and not comply with, is likely to be 
vetoed to save the embarassment of having to back a pariah nation 
at a time when the USA is supposedly supporting the U.N. Any 
decision to hold an international peace conference, against the 
will of Israel, would also be considered a major victory for 
Saddam Hussein, because the USA has always blocked such measures 
in the past. At the same time, if there is a U.S. veto and sell-
out Arab governments such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Syria 
continue supporting the U.S. war, then these countries will surely 
face the redoubled fury of their already-angry masses.

War war war

Meanwhile, the all-out buildup of war forces continues unabated. 
Those liberals who whined when Bush announced he was moving into 
an offensive posture were wrong to think Bush had changed his 
plans. The buildup has not slowed since it began in August, when 
the USA began marching on the road toward war.

Now U.S. troop strength in the region is planned to reach 430,000 
by sometime in January,(6) and total allied forces already number 
more than 500,000.(7)

The U.S. armed forces have called up more than 100,000 reserves to 
supplement the force,(8) out of a total of 188,000 authorized for 
the war.(9)

The all-"volunteer" army, which the war machine has used since 
ending the draft in the early 70s, relies on economic coercion and 
propaganda brainwashing to force young people into service. The 
armed services are the tool by which imperialists send their poor 
to die for others' riches. 

But now the Army is preventing the expiration of enlistments, 
retirements and transfers home, forcing thousands of soldiers per 
month to remain in the service against their will--whether they 
originally "volunteered" or not.(10) The U.S. war machine is 
stretched thin--transferring soldiers from other important 
bases--and the clamor for a military draft is growing louder.

As Iraq sends 250,000 more troops to join the 430,000 already in 
Kuwait and Southern Iraq(11)--meeting the U.S. increase tit for 
tat--the dream of a quick and easy war is becoming more and more 
remote. Some reports conclude that an all-out frontal 
attack--currently preferred by military planners--would cost the USA 
up to 15% of its attacking forces.(22)

While the President claimed that "this will not be another 
Vietnam. This will not be a protracted, drawn-out war," he didn't 
say it won't have a price.

Imperialist conflicts explode

A lot of noise has been made over the small contributions to the 
war made by U.S. allies. These critics either ignore or don't 
understand that this war is not a moral crusade to end aggression 
or defend the people of the Middle East.

The era of imperialism--the highest stage of capitalism and the 
precursor to revolution--carries capitalist contradictions to their 
fullest extreme. In this era, which began around the beginning of 
this century, three conflicts are increased:

*the conflict between capital and labor, between monopoly 
capitalists and the international proletariat,

*between imperialists themselves, as monopolists and national 
powers vie for control over world resources, and

*between imperialist nations and the oppressed nations, where 
increased exploitation of land and labor produce conditions 
favorable to revolution.(12)

In the imperialist stage, capitalism's economic basis in 
competition (expand-or-die) drives the capitalist powers to war to 
grab more land and cheap labor for themselves, to allow the export 
of capital into underdeveloped countries to flow freely. While 
force is planned to bring Iraq beack into line as a U.S.-
controlled resource, the current crisis also allows the USA to 
gain more control over vulnerable allies through diplomacy and 
economic pressure, gaining an edge over rival imperialists 
(especially European and Japanese powers) in the process. The 
massive war machine is the tool of choice for the economically 
weaker USA.

While Iraq generates huge profits from its export of oil, its 
economy remains dependent on imports for infrastructure, 
technology, and many basic necessities including food.

The threat of self-sufficient oil-producing countries is 
especially acute in an era in which the United States is afraid of 
losing control over Third World countries to other imperialists. 
Control over international oil markets--gained in this case 
militarily--has huge potential economic advantages for control over 
the underdeveloped world.

One of the major prizes already emerging from the crisis is Syria, 
which has been the Arab world's most vehement enemy of Iraq for 
years. Pulling Syria into the Amerikan arena was deemed important 
enough to demand a meeting between Bush and President Hafez al-
Assad of Syria, the first top-level contact between the two 
countries in 11 years.(13) 

The crisis has also reinforced the allegiance of such traditional 
puppets as Egypt, Israel and Turkey, the latter of which only 
recently agreed to allow its airbases to be used for an attack on 
Iraq.(14)

The high oil prices, which have resulted from the war, while 
causing fear on U.S markets, also have a bonus appeal for the USA. 
The United States, the world's second largest producer of oil, can 
expect to see its rivals suffer more from high prices, spreading 
the effects of an oncoming recession more evenly. And Saudi 
Arabia, the world's largest exporter, and currently squarely in 
the U.S. back pocket, is drawing record profits from the 
crisis--already $10 billion more than it would have otherwise.(15)

Some of that cash is going straight to the war effort, as the 
Saudi monarchy has pledged $1.5 billion more to Egypt after it 
agreed to beef up its military contribution, and up to $1 billion 
to Syria for 15,000 troops and 300 tanks.(16) This aid in addition 
to new loans, grants, and forgiven debts by the USA is used to 
firm up client support; Egypt's military debt to the United States 
has been forgiven (see MIM Notes 46).

But strategically speaking, more control over the Arabian 
Peninsula and surrounding region is an important part of the USA's 
long term plans.

The State Department in the 1940s called the Arabian Peninsula "a 
stupendous source of strategic power, and one of the greatest 
material prizes in world history," and "probably the richest 
economic prize in the world in the field of foreign 
investment."(17)

Iraq's invasion threw a wrench in the works of U.S. plans for 
expansion into the region. In January, the administration had 
announced the goal of increasing U.S. exports to Iraq, for which 
the USA had become top trading partner.(17)

Earlier, in 1988, the U.S. government had said it was a good time 
to get in on the Iraqi economy, due to a "wide range of economic 
reforms to increase productivity and encourage private sector 
industrial growth and import substitution," largely in the 
agricultural sector.

"American firms are strongly encouraged to investigate the market 
and introduce their products and services to Iraqi officials now," 
the government said.(18)

The goal of trade domination extended to Kuwait as well, which had 
increased its U.S. imports from 1988 to 1989 by 24%.

The USA wants to better its trade balance with these countries--to 
balance heavy oil imports--by increasing exports, especially of 
capital-intensive industries. Seizing control of oil reserves is 
an important part of creating and developing dependency on the 
United States, supplemented by increased control over markets and 
imports.

In 1989, Saudi Arabia exported twice the amount it imported in its 
relationship with the USA. But in 1988, the United States regained 
"chief supplier" status with Saudi Arabia, according to the U.S. 
government, and the opportunity for a major increase in that 
export market was just on the horizon. The state-owned Saudi oil 
company had plans to double its production capacity in the next 10 
years, to 10 million barrels per day, at a cost of $15-30 
billion--money spent on capital-intensive infrastructure from which 
U.S. exporters stand ready to profit.

The Commerce Department this April urged "U.S. oil equipment firms 
[to] take immediate action to establish or reestablish a presence 
in the Saudi market."(19)

Economic crisis at home

Recessions and expansion are balancing forces in the imperialist 
march toward its own grave; they drive each other, producing 
greater urgency and greater risks at every turn.

The bourgeoisie has admitted that the U.S. economy is in a 
recession--meaning the economy is shrinking overall. And that 
economic pressure is increasing the stakes for the expansionist 
war.

The USA lost more than 250,000 jobs in November, as the official 
unemployment rate climbed .2% to 5.9%--the highest official rate 
since October 1987. 200,000 of those were factory jobs, for a 
total of 800,000 lost in two years. Service jobs were also 
down.(20)

The government's index of leading economic indicators was down 1.2 
percent in October, other major indicators were at their lowest 
point since 1982--all evidence that the economy shrank in October 
and November.(21)

More than simply a dependent country which has gotten out of line, 
such as Nicaragua, Iraq represents the prize of control over oil 
economies with huge, capital-intensive profit-generating 
industries. The potential economic independence of oil-exporting 
countries underscores the need for military control to insure 
thorough and widespread domination--with all the risks that 
entails--while increasing the potential economic rewards in terms 
of expansion and stability.

The United States is putting a lot of cards on the table in this 
war. Its victory here would have catastrophic consequences for the 
people of the Middle East in particular. Its loss could mark the 
beginning of a truly new world order.

Notes:
1. Detroit Free Press (DFP) 11/30/90, p. A1.
2. DFP 11/30/90 p. 14A.
3. New York Times (NYT) 12/5/90, p. A11.
4. NYT12/1/90, p. A4.
5. NYT 12/8/90, p. A6.
6. DFP 11/29/90, p. A11.
7. NYT 12/7/90, A8.
8. NYT 12/5/90, p. A11.
9. NYT 12/4/90, p. A8.
10. NYT 11/24/90, p. A4.
11. NYT 11/27/90, p. A8.
12. See V. I. Lenin, Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, 
available from MIM for $2, postage paid.
13. DFP 11/30/90, p. 14A.
14.  NYT 12/5/90, p. A1.
15. NYT 9/6/90; NPR 12/8/90.
16. NYT 12/6/90, p. 10.
17. Noam Chomsky in Z, 10/90.
18. Business America, 4/25/88.
19. Business America, 4/23/90.
20. NYT 12/8/90, p. A1.
21. NYT 12/4/90, p. C1.
22. Newsweek 12/10/90, p. 27.

* * *

PRISON PROTEST SQUELCHED AT TRENTON

by MC11

On Aug. 7, seven prisoners in New Jersey's maximum security 
Trenton State Prison wore red armbands to commemorate the death of 
George Jackson, an African-American revolutionary who died in 
Soledad Prison (California) 25 years ago. In the weeks that 
followed, the six were transferred, prison guards provoked another 
set of prisoners to violent self-defence, seven more prisoners 
were transferred to out-of-state prisons, and the prison went on 
lockdown for over a month. Prison officials blamed the incidents 
on a group of 68 prisoners who they charged with conspiring to 
kill prison guards. 

MIM recently received a letter and several newspaper clippings 
from a prisoner being held in Trenton State's Management Care Unit 
describing the events of August and September. With this 
information and other interviews, MIM has pieced the story 
together.

As spokesperson for the New Jersey State Department of Corrections 
explains, "Demonstrations are illegal. All the prisoners know 
that." But Linda Hickman, the wife of one of the prisoners who was 
transferred in the aftermath of the violence, says "If six or more 
guys are in a group, that's a demonstration. So the seven were 
standing wherever, and the Department of Corrections says it's a 
demonstration. The superintendent kept saying, if they'd just 
asked permission, he would have allowed them to demonstrate." 

Hickman, co-chair of the Concerned Families Association, a group 
that formed during the lockdown to protest the Department of 
Corrections' (DoC) treatment of the prisoners, says she has no 
doubt that the DoC's reaction was primarily a response to the 
prisoners' political beliefs. George Jackson, a member of the 
Black Panther Party who advocated the armed overthrow of the U.S. 
government and wrote inspiring propaganda for the Afrikan-American 
masses from his prison cell, was never a favorite with the DoC. 
(See book review, page 9). Prisoners daring to express their 
solidarity with   Jackson's revolutionary ideology were not about 
to be looked on with favor either.

On Aug. 8, the seven prisoners who wore armbands were transferred 
to a state facility for the criminally insane. Several weeks 
later, they were separated and transferred against their will to 
other New Jersey state prisons. 

At Trenton on Aug. 10, as prisoners were returning to their cells 
from the recreation yard, violence broke out between guards and 
prisoners. Six guards were injured. The Department of Corrections 
calls it a "premeditated, planned savage attack" by a "covert 
organization of militant prisoners" who had conspired to kill the 
guards. In a letter to Hickman following his transfer to another 
part of Trenton State, one of the prisoners involved in the 
incident describes what really happened.

Several days before the incident, the letter says, "racist guards 
held a demonstration behind the prison walls demanding the 
creation of an even more brutal and effective penal system [at 
Trenton State]...."  The prisoner population of Trenton State 
Prison, according to the Department of Corrections, is 64% Black, 
22% white, and 13% Hispanic.

The guards' demands were not officially sanctioned by the 
Department of Corrections, but a campaign focused on provoking and 
harassing Afrikan prisoners unofficially went into effect. On Aug. 
10, the letter says, the harrassment reached the point where the 
prisoners had to fight back. The prison went into lockdown 
immediately.

According to an affidavit signed by prisoner John Bland, a new 
round of prison guard brutality began moments after the outbreak 
was quelled. Bland, along with 100 other prisoners, was in the 
recreation yard when the violence broke out. They were ordered to 
strip to their underwear before lining up to reenter the prison. 

"I was stripped, frisked, and ordered to interlock my fingers on 
top of my head and walk on the yellow line," his affidavit reads. 
"There were officers in riot gear flanked on my right and left 
side leading into the institution. I took approximately 20 steps 
when Correction Officer Marczak hit me in my lower back with a 
police stick. I fell to the ground and was cuffed behind my back. 
A police stick was placed under the cuffs causing my back and head 
to lunge forward toward the ground. While being escorted through 
the institution in a bent forward position completely naked, I was 
hit on the back with police sticks." Bland was left in a concrete 
detention cell for three days without any clothing or bedding. He 
was later charged with assaulting the guard that beat him.

Another prisoner, Andre Herd, also issued an affidavit describing 
similar treatment. He added that guards screamed racial slurs at 
him while hitting him with a baton.

The Concerned Family Association (CFA) formed soon after lockdown 
measures went into effect. Says Hickman, "I understand this is a 
prison, however, I have someone in there and I want to know what 
the hell is going on." In the first phase of the lockdown, she 
says, "The guys had no phone calls, no attorney visits, no visits 
to the law library, no leaving the cell, no work--so no ability to 
earn credits toward release--no contact with institutional 
paralegals, no recreaction, no visits, they had one shower every 
four days, their mail was tampered with, and a lot of guys lost 
legal papers and personal property."

Five prisoners were transferred to out-of-state prisons against 
their will soon after the incident, a Department of Corrections 
official says. Sixty-eight prisoners were placed in solitary 
confinement. By mid-December, 12 were still there.  

The CFA attempted to meet with the commissioner, a top-level 
prison bureaucrat, during the first few days of the lockdown, but, 
Hickman says, "He said 'no, I do not meet with those type of 
people.'" After the CFA complained to the governor's office, they 
were able to meet with two low-level officials.

"They promised nothing," Hickman continues. "Oh no, they promised 
to put up a sign saying 'contact visits are being 
videotaped'--which is nothing. A five-year-old kid can do that." 
The CFA's original goal, Hickman says, was to establish a visitors 
advisory board which would meet regularly with the prison 
administration to discuss conditions in the prison. 

One of the prisoners who was transferred out of state was the 
former chairperson of the Prisoners' Representative Council, 
which, Hickman says, was "the only voice the guys had in the 
prison." The chairperson acted as a liaison between the prisoners 
and the prison administration; the council served as a forum for 
communication between prisoners. David Lambert, Hickman's husband, 
was made chairperson of the PRC after the lockdown. He was 
transferred a few weeks later. 

"David is vocal," Hickman says, "David is intelligent, and plus 
David is gonna fight back. The day they transferred David was the 
day [prison superintendent] Beyers decided to decentralize the 
PRC. What he did was illegal and he knows it."

Instead of allowing prisoner representatives to meet and convey 
their concerns to the prison administration, the administration 
reorganized the system so that several prison officials are 
responsible for meeting with one prisoner, individually, from 
different areas of the prison.

Audrey Bomsey, an attorney with the Public Advocate's Office who 
will represent some of the transferred prisoners, said in mid-
December that prisoner beatings by guards are continuing. The 
guards, Bomsey says, still walk around in full riot gear. 

* * *

REVOLUTIONARY DEFEATISM

by MC12

This war, and there is more and more reason to believe there will 
be a war,  is not simply a policy of the United States government. 
This war is the inevitable result of imperialism--the product of 
capitalism growing into its highest stage.

As long as capitalism is to survive, it must grow. By the 
beginning of this century, the major capitalist powers had spread 
beyond their borders, to the point where all the countries of the 
world were subservient to one capitalist power or another. This 
marked the dawn of the imperialist stage of capitalism--its final 
stage.

When this first division of the world was achieved, the 
imperialist powers bumped heads in their attempt to continue 
acquiring more territory, more access to natural resources and 
labor, and more markets to absorb the export of capital. Thus 
World War I was an economic necessity, not a simple policy 
decision. The history of world wars since then has since continued 
in this vein.

But the lifeblood of imperialism--war--is also the cause of its 
downfall. Imperialist wars spread out and eventually weaken 
imperialist countries in relation to each other and also 
absolutely.

In the long run then, imperialists losing wars is a good thing for 
the international proletariat. It hastens the downfall of the 
dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, and heralds the entry onto the 
world stage of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

But imperialist wars mean that proletarians (or non-proletarian 
lackeys of imperialism) fight and die for the interests of the 
bourgeoisie. This is a crime, and revolutionaries must fight to 
end all such wars. But calling for an end to the war--Stop the 
war!--is an empty slogan unless it is the first step in the effort 
to end all such wars, in the process of overthrowing imperialism 
with proletarian revolution.

Revolutionaries wish no harm on the innocent or misguided people 
who have joined the armies of imperialism. African-Americans and 
Puerto Ricans in particular have historically been pressed by 
economic coercion into service to die for their oppressors; this 
is a crime against humanity.

MIM wants the USA to lose this war, knowing that means the deaths 
of thousands of innocent people on both sides. This position is 
only justifiable if it is backed up by the commitment to fight 
imperialism to the bloody end ourselves, and to take full 
advantage of this defeat of U.S. imperialism to advance the cause 
of the international proletariat. Only in this way will the deaths 
of U.S. and Iraqi soldiers not have been in vain.

In 1915 V. I. Lenin, leader of the 1917 Bolshevik revolution in 
Russia, said of World War I: "Turning the present imperialist war 
into civil war is the only correct proletarian slogan."(See The 
War and the Second International) This is the long-term objective 
of revolutionaries in the present war as well, first identified in 
Lenin's theory of revolutionary defeatism--calling for the defeat 
of one's country in an imperialist war.

MIM works toward such a war. Because even when social movements do 
affect imperialist policies, as some say occurred during the 
Vietnam War, the people of the world have nothing to celebrate 
unless those movements lead to the destruction of imperialism in 
the long run.

* * *

LETTERS

MIM NOTES CENSORED IN PRISON

Dear MIM:

I would first of all like to thank you for your consideration in 
routinely sending me copies of your issues of MIM Notes. You 
should know, however, that I have now been transferred to another 
facility. I am no longer at the Correctional Center in X. I am now 
here at the Correctional Center in Y. Unfortunately both 
facilities have a rule of screening any left-wing literature or 
news. However, they have no problem at all with incoming right-
wing christian literature which is not screened. This has been 
quite frustrating for me to say the least. But, as a true warrior, 
I refuse to throw in the towel. If you know of any legal way I can 
fight this I am willing to go that route as well as the ones I've 
already formulated.

Fight the Power
--Prisoner from the Midwest

MC 11 replies:

There have been some court rulings on censorship of publications 
that prisoners may cite in arguments or court cases with various 
prison bureaucracies. One court said that the Constitution 
requires a "substantial factual showing by correctional officials 
that a publication poses a tangible threat to the order, security, 
or rehabilitative programs of the prison before they may bar the 
publication from the facility."(1) Another court ruled that 
"literature that criticizes police or corrections officials cannot 
be excluded... [without] a substantial showing that the 
publication does indeed pose a tangible threat to the order and 
security of the institution...."(2) Another has said that a 
revolutionary publication may not be censored only because of the 
beliefs it expresses; it must be found to pose an actual threat to 
security, order, or rehabilitation within the institution.(3) 
Prison officials are not supposed to impose a blanket ban on a 
periodical they find objectionable once--every issue is supposed to 
be reviewed individually.(4) There is also some precedent for 
requiring prison officials to censor only the portions of a 
periodical that they deem unsuitable for prisoners' eyes, and 
deliver the rest of it.(4)

As most prisoners undoubtedly realize, the decisions on who gets 
sent to prison and the "rights" they have while living under the 
direct control of the capitalist state are subjective. The system 
is designed to protect itself and the ruling capitalist class 
which it serves. So despite the existence of laws which ostensibly 
protect prisoners' "rights," there is no guarantee that they will 
be upheld or enforced. Even the rulings cited above, made under 
the pretense of protecting prisoners' access to information, do 
not seek to hide their underlying motivation, which is to maintain 
tight control over any ideas or material that might convince a 
prison population to revolt against their jailers. 

In general, the capitalist class prefers to rule through the 
ideology of liberal democracy--giving people as many "civil 
rights," as much "freedom of expression" as possible without 
threatening their own power. But for most prisoners liberal 
democracy has long since been revealed as a sham, leaving 
revolutionary ideology an increasingly logical and attractive 
option. For the same reason MIM believes prisoners are one of the 
most revolutionary groups in Amerika, then, the prison system 
seeks to prevent prisoners from receiving MIM Notes. The prisoner 
from the Midwest is not the first to have the newspaper censored. 

MIM does not advocate prisoners attempting violent revolution 
within U.S. prisons at this time, so technically MIM Notes cannot 
be said pose a clear and present danger to the security and order 
of the institution. Conditions in the United States are not right 
for such actions yet--the state would simply crush a prison revolt 
through military force. Instead MIM urges prisoners to join the 
party, study Maoism, write for MIM Notes, and educate themselves 
and those around them in political economy and revolutionary 
strategy. It is our job as Maoists to create public opinion, both 
inside and outside U.S. prisons, to enable such action--which no 
doubt will be part of a larger revolution--to succeed. 

Although MIM supports all attempts at prison reform through the 
legal process as it does anything that will better prisoners' 
current conditions, the party puts no faith in the legal process 
as a method toward attaining justice--for prisoners or anyone else. 
However, since the party sees prisoners as an important 
revolutionary group and believes it is vital to gain their support 
and participation, MIM will do its best to ensure that the 
newspaper reaches the prisoners who request it. The party is in 
the process of investigating the case of the prisoner from the 
Midwest. Other prisoners who have a subscription but are not 
receiving the paper should inform us of their situation. 

Notes:
1. Jackson v. Ward, id. at 559; accord, Thibodeaux v. State of 
South Dakota, 553 F.2d 558 (8th Cir. 1977); Aikens v. Jenkins, id. 
at 775; also U.S. 396, 94 S.Ct. 1800 (1974), Procunier v. 
Martinez, at 413, as cited in the second edition of Daniel E. 
Manville's Prisoners' Self-Help Litigation Manual, Oceana 
Publications, New York, 1986, p.91 and p.86.
2. Jackson v. Ward, at 563, op. cit., p. 91.
3. United States ex rel. Larkins v. Oswald, 510 F.2d 583, 587-88 
(2d Cir, 1975) ("revolutionary or militant rhetoric" improperly 
seized); Aikens v. Lash, 390 F.Supp. 663, 671-72 (N.D. Ind. 1975), 
aff'd, 534 F 2d 751 (7th Cir.1976 (Mao Tse-Tung improperly 
excluded), op. cit., p. 92.
4. Guajardo v. Estelle, 580 F. 2d at 762 (5th Cir. 1978), op. 
cit., p. 93.


WEAK ANALYSIS AT GULF PROTESTS

Dear MIM:

The anti-war protest in my city was interesting. I didn't need a 
mask or santa claus suit, so I wore dark shades [to avoid 
detection--MC5] However, our mutual friend and I spotted some pigs 
video-taping us and a group of Trotskyists, so we tried to lay 
low; I did get out about 50-60 issues (probably because I was the 
only one not asking for $) before I high-tailed it out of there.

The crowd consisted of mostly middle-class nonviolence-oriented 
students, and a few "concerned" older people, basically your all-
white suburban dwellers who all believe that Dow Chemicals "let 
you do great things." Now they may have legitimate cause for alarm 
that their own sons, daughters, sisters and brothers could be 
killed, and yet another monument to "American 'sacrifices' 
overseas" will have to be built.

But they steadfastly refused to link the necessary continued 
oppression of Third-World peoples with their own consumerism, and 
a few of the speakers even called for some of that George Bush 
"prudence" to let the economic violence (i.e. sanctions) run its 
course, and starve the Iraqis into obedience.

It seems that unless Saddam voluntarily removes his troops and 
apologizes (don't count on it), "Operation Imminent Thunder" plans 
to thunder into Kuwait soon after January 15 and exterminate a few 
more people of color for "our way of life" (count on that).

Body-bags were passed out and references made that 50,000 had been 
sent to the Saudi desert for our poor boys. There was of course 
the usual liberal call for a conditioned withdrawal and a 
reinvestment in, some vague term, "infrastructure;" although this 
may be another call for bribes for the white working class. But 
that's not going to happen because they've already voluntarily 
lined up front and center for the opportunity to travel and kill 
dirty Arabs; Secretary of State Baker was simply telling the truth 
when he stated that this mobilization was only about jobs.

It should come as no surprise that as the justification for the 
cold war dies, that bringing all NATO troops back here could risk 
economic collapse, so a new enemy had to be created... quickly. 
Comrades, I think this could be an escalating of the North/South 
conflict that you've referred to in the past. When these 
"activists" are ready to see the true crisis that this could pose 
for capitalism, and seek to work towards a 
communist/internationalist future, the seeds of revolution may 
have a chance to grow in this country. But not before an analysis 
of class structure is done on a global scale, with a particular 
form of injustice not being valued more or less because of 
ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation.

The Trotskyists there were trying to convince me that I should 
follow their own line on the Soviet system and the white working 
class; I told them that I was not going to support a class that is 
so influenced by racism and consumerism, and pointed out to them 
that their reluctance to endorse Mao may stem from his skin color, 
and not anything they could prove.

I didn't remember where you all stood on their group, the Worker's 
Vanguard/Spartacus, but I was emphatic about Maoism being the 
ideology that has liberated the largest number of people in 
history.

-- MC15
December 1990


CONSCIOUSNESS = POWER

Dear MIM:

Rebellious greetings.

"Death will be often, but blood will flow continually on both 
sides though."

In your recent paper (MIM Notes 47), I notice that you had 
published my poem, with respect, loyalty and dedication I salute 
you for your time, patience and commitment to the cause for 
action.

The consciousness of the people will have to be raised before they 
will fully adopt the concept of revolutionary violence because the 
amerikkkan system has so thoroughly brainwashed the majority of 
the world's people to believing that a revolutionary is a hating 
person that preaches and practices hatred, (but it must be made 
clear to the people that a revolutionary is drawn by the love of 
his/her people.)

Malcolm X once said, "to be a revolutionary you would have to 
spend some time in jail." This is in fact true, see, because once 
you become known of your activities, the government will set out 
to paralyze your movement/organization or eradicate you from 
existence all at once. However, the Black Panther Party teaches 
that, "if a comrade is serving the people then the people will 
provide a place to sleep." Then they go on to say, "if comrades 
are educating and organizing the masses, then the masses will 
provide food and shelter for the 'rades." That's why they called 
it "survival programs" and fundamentally speaking I think this is 
what we need now if we're to build-to-win.

I wish to become a part of outside activities, something that has 
to do with young movments. Your support is requested.

--A Young Dragon at War with the Government
December, 1990


SPONTANEOUS WASTE

Dear MIM:

More than XX of us met to form a "Revolutionary United Front" as a 
result of the "drug war" conference here last month at X 
University. We feel, our committee, which is a part of this front, 
that Operation Desert Shield is just a maneuver typical of the 
U.S. empire. A war on invasion of Iraq would be "an accident." No 
one at the meeting had any scientific facts to support the 
"Coalition to stop U.S. intervention in the Middle East" 
viewpoint.

Anyhow the majority of this front agreed against spontaneous 
"energy wasting" mobilizations around false issues which are being 
pushed by the Rocky Mountain Peace Center (RMPC) which was 
denounced as being "irritantly Gandhian."

There was a presentation for a "coherent leftist movement," and 
after the Coors "bloodbath" we need to rebuild. Professor X X said 
that an organization that can't protect itself is a useless 
organization. Earlier the Irish Republican Army (IRA) was noted as 
a good example of a self-defense organization.

It was implicitly stated that this front is not a united front 
between "liberals and radicals." We don't want to "reclaim" the 
constitution but put it in the trash heap of history. At this 
point the front is made up of "settler activists" in the majority 
along with Afrikan and Mexican intellectuals.

We just received MIM Notes 47 and will surely distribute it at our 
next meeting. Unity is a process with its own rhythm. It takes 
time, but we'll get there!

--In study and struggle, 
XX for the Front
December 1990

MC5 replies:

The implication that the war in the Persian Gulf is a distraction 
from organizing against national oppression in the United States 
is not in agreement with the MIM line against militarism and 
imperialism.

Maoists could disagree with this position the way the letter-
writer has. The question is not a fundamental line of demarcation.

The war in the Persian Gulf is important because imperialism is a 
system reaching around the globe. Its global reach makes 
imperialism seem very powerful. However, at the same time, the 
global reach of imperialism makes it vulnerable.

The U.S. imperialists were not able to instantly quell Iraq's 
threat to its empire with military forces. The imperialists have 
sent a large portion of their troops from Europe to deal with 
Hussein.

Moments like these give the oppressed nationalities everywhere an 
inkling of what it will be like to rise up in revolution. The U.S. 
empire cannot keep its grip everywhere at the same time.


DON'T GET CAUGHT SHORT

Dear MIM:

We have been receiving copies of MIM Notes which we have been 
successfully distributing free. Unfortunately too successfully, as 
the last issue I did not even get a chance to read. If possible I 
would appreciate it if you would increase the quantity you are 
sending by ten or fifteen per issue.

--Foreign distributor
November 1990

MIM Notes welcomes letters from all its readers. Letters may be 
editor for space and clarity. MIM also distributes regular 
theoretical debates. Those interested in joining should send $1 
cash per month to MIM Notes, P.O. Box 3576, Ann Arbor, MI 48106-
3576.


THE CASE AGAINST STALIN:
CRITIC FAULTS STALIN FOR THE NON-AGGRESSION PACT WITH HITLER AND 
EXECUTING MEMBERS OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY

Dear MIM:

From 1975 to 1981 I was a militant in a Maoist party. Then the 
party dissolved and I became an independent grassroots movement 
member in my country, until I came here not much ago.

I got MIM Notes 40 and read most of it. It was like to live again 
in an old time. Actually, my ideas changed a lot in the past ten 
years.

Probably you will think this is a letter from a revisionist. 
Anyway, I want to write it.

I was very interested in Mao's writings in the 1970s. I read the 
whole Selected Works and many Chinese magazines too. My comrades 
called me "el chino" (the Chinese). I was the expert "in Chinese 
questions." I read a lot of Stalin works, too.

In the 70s, the general secretary of the party where I was a 
militant made a statement: "Stalin is a delimiting line. He made 
errors but in the overall picture, he was a good revolutionist. So 
we have to defend him. If not, we will fall step by step into the 
mud of revisionism." So I defended him. Although I had many 
arguments with people who said they didn't like any butcher, I 
always defended him.

But the time passed and I began to take into account other points 
of view and I began to change my mind about the "errors." For 
instance, I noticed that the functioning rules of the Communist 
Party Soviet Union (CPSU) were completely disturbed during 
Stalin's time. During 13 years, there was no congress of the 
party. 

But this is not the worst. The worst is that most of those elected 
to the Central Committee of the CPSU in the 17th Congress were 
dead or in jail when it began the next congress. It is very hard 
to believe that Bukharin, Kamenev, Zinoviev, Rakovski, Rikov, 
Riazanov and the other many Bolsheviks killed during Stalin's rule 
were all traitors.

Many Russian or non-Russian communists coming in 1939 from Spain 
to the Soviet Union met the death they avoided [in the USSR] in 
the struggle against fascism. This is the case of Antonov-Ovsenko, 
for instance, the man who led the revolutionary fighters to take 
the Winter Palace of 1917.

There is a lot of myth about Stalin's help to the Spanish Republic 
during the civil war 1936-1939. It is true that the Soviet Union 
sent to Spain planes and other arms. In that time, Stalin was very 
interested in opposing fascism.

But he was also very interested in pressing Spanish communists to 
fight against a little Marxist party, Partido Obrero de 
Unificacion Marxista (POUM), that was denouncing Moscow's moves 
against the old Bolsheviks. The general secretary of this party, 
Joaquin Maurin, disappeared and many think he was killed by 
Russian advisers.

The attacks against POUM and anarchists led in 1937 to the 
Barcelona riots that weakened a lot the common front against 
fascism. You can read about all this in Orwell's Homage to 
Catalonnia. But there are two books by Jesœs Hernandez (Yo fui 
ministro de Stalin and En el pa’s de la gran mentira) where you 
can read about all this. Hernandez was a member of the central 
committee of the Spanish CP and one of the two communist ministers 
in the Republican Government during the war. In 1939, he fled to 
the USSR and a few years later he wrote these two books.

There is a book by Z. Medvedev entitled Let History Judge--Origins 
and Consequences of Stalinism. You can read there a lot about the 
history of the Soviet Union during Stalin's life. There are three 
interesting persons you can read about in this book: Yezhov, 
Yagoda and Vyshinksy. Yezhov and Yagoda were the chiefs of the 
police during the thirties, when many old Bolsheviks were killed. 
They both were killed too. Vyshinsky, an old Menshevik, was the 
state prosecutor in the great purges. He was a great liar who 
without batting an eye listened to the "confessions" of the 
defendants, most probably got by coercion and torture. He survived 
Stalin and died in 1954.

In your paper I read about the intelligence of Stalin signing the 
German-Soviet Pact in 1939. But Stalin was completely candid with 
this pact. It's true the English wanted to push Hitler against the 
USSR, but Stalin signed the Pact and thought the peace was already 
granted for his country. Even he did silly things to make the 
Germans happy.

Soon after the Pact, Litvinov, a Jew, was removed from his post. 
Even the anti-German propaganda was forbidden. The movie Alexander 
Nevski, an anti-German film directed by Eisenstein in 1937, was 
put off circulation. Eisenstein was suggested to set up Wagner's 
The Walkyrie at the Bolshoy. The opera had a great premiere with 
the fascist ambassadors attending. A few weeks later Germany 
attacked the Soviet Union. (Indeed, the opera was immediately 
dropped and the film immediately sent to the theaters.)

Of course, Stalin did not pay attention to the information of 
Soviet intelligence telling him the Germans were ready to attack. 
(I read a very good French book about this. The title in English 
would be The Red Orchestra.) It's not difficult to conclude that 
the Soviet Union won the war against Germany in spite of Stalin, 
not by his leadership.

I guess you support the idea the USSR was socialist until Stalin's 
death. Then it became a state capitalist country. At least, this 
is the usual Chinese-Maoist theory of the 60s and 70s. 

Now I think that is a very simplistic theory. Where was the 
bourgeoisie before the "Khrushchev coup d'etat"? Ninety-five 
percent of the people in the party and the government were the 
same before and after 1953. Was Beria the leader of the 
proletarian line? I think he was really a leader, the leader of 
the repression and murder line. It's impossible to deny that 
repression weakened in the Soviet Union after Stalin's death and 
the 20th Congress of the CP. If the bourgeoisie got the power 
would it not be logical to think the new class would need more 
repression? The problem of the nature of the East countries is a 
great one. But I don't think Mao solved it.

I don't know much about Trotsky, but I think he was probably right 
in many things. In the last years, I'm beginning to get closer to 
his theory about the economic and social structure of the Soviet 
Union. Anyway, it's clear he was killed by Stalin's orders. The 
arm of Stalin was really long.

Stalin is for me one of the worst figures in recent history and 
the one that "objectively" did more against communism than any 
other.

I think Mao tried to analyze the experience in the Soviet Union, 
but he was not successful. Really, I don't know if he can do much 
more than he did. But it seems to me that in socialism it's 
essential to maintain as wide and as much as possible the civil 
liberties. Mao didn't oppose the Soviet repression of Berlin riots 
in 1953 and the invasion of Hungary in 1956, when the president 
Imre Nagy was shot. He didn't understand the centrality of 
socialist democracy. He was too linked to the past, to Stalin. He 
was not able to break the tradition of socialism with no 
liberties.

It is impossible to have any warranty that a party cannot become 
degenerated. You have to trust in people and, indeed, it is 
neither a sure warranty.

It seems to me during Mao's rule, China developed a lot and 
Chinese people improved very much their living standards. As you 
say in your newspaper, almost never there was solving of political 
problems in the Chinese CP by violent ways. (Nevertheless, Lin 
Biao is a dark point in this respect.) The difference between Mao 
and Stalin is for me the difference between a progressive figure 
and a butcher tyrant.

Mao was very wrong in the nuclear war issue. He pushed forward 
China to the arms race and he said many time they were not afraid 
of nuclear war. His policy in this was completely unrealistic 
(idealistic, if you prefer). He didn't take into account the 
possibility of an end for mankind with a nuclear war. As Einstein 
said, this possibility has to make a change in the way of thinking 
in many issues. Now we know about the nuclear winter that probably 
would slay all the upper life after a nuclear war.

It's very hard to be a Marxist in a world like the one of today. 
You cannot deny [that former Romanian President] Nicolae Ceausescu 
was a dictator who submitted the Romanian people to a great 
oppression. Romania was probably one of the countries where women 
have been most oppressed. But you know also Ceausescu had a very 
good relationship with the Chinese, even in Mao's times. Almost 
nobody in the left said something against this tyrant. Now, we 
have to regret it.

The great capitalists in the world are happy. They are seeing new 
markets where the Western products are coveted. Poland, Hungary, 
East Germany are walking clearly to Western capitalist economies.

Bush and the U.S. right are exuberant not only for those things: 
They got rid of Noriega, too, and at the end pushed Sandinistas 
out of the government. In the abortion struggle they are winning 
step by step. And, regardless of the changes in the East, the arms 
companies are earning more money. The SDI [Star Wars] budget grew 
again this year.

So, it is important that people struggle against this bourgeoisie 
responsible for the repression and poverty of almost everybody in 
many countries abroad and for the poverty and repression for many 
in the States. This bourgeoisie that continues wasting money in 
advanced weapons that perhaps some time can lead them to trust in 
the possibility of winning a nuclear war and so, why not try it?

But I think this struggle is for years. We have capitalism for a 
long time. It's important to get a good amount of supplies for the 
travel and give up the dead weight.

I think it's possible to get supplies from the Marxist classics, 
but also from Rosa Luxemburg, Rakovsky or Bukharin. And Malcolm X, 
Martin Luther King and Rudi Dutschke. And we have good socialist 
authors still living: Edward P. Thompson, Howard Zinn, Samir Amin, 
Ernest Mandel. Many times perhaps we do not agree completely with 
them, but we have to learn to endure the differences. Even non-
Marxist thinkers such as Bertrand Russell, Einstein or Ghandi can 
light a little bit the way to liberation. But we need an open 
mind.

When I was in the March 24 Archbishop Romero Commemoration and the 
March to End the U.S. War in El Salvador I felt really good 
regardless of the snow and the cold weather. There was a lot 
different people there. But we all have a common struggle.

We have no common struggle with people like Stalin.

Good luck.
--Anti-Stalinist

* * *

MAO SAYS STALIN 70% CORRECT

MAO SAID THAT STALIN, IN SPITE OF HIS MANY MISTAKES, WAS 70% 
CORRECT. STALIN MISSED THE ESSENTIAL POINT THAT CLASS STRUGGLE 
CONTINUES UNDER SOCIALISM, BUT HE GUIDED THE SOVIET UNION AS WELL 
AS ANY LEADER OF HIS DAY.

by MC5

The writer of the adjoining article, " case against Stalin," is an 
articulate opponent of Josef Stalin. Stalin headed the Communist 
Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) and Soviet government from 1922 
until his death in 1953. MIM chooses to refute this article 
because the critic makes many common charges against Stalin and 
uses several important books that the bourgeoisie has in its 
arsenal against communism.

None of the critic's arguments, treated below, suggest any 
historical alternative leader to Stalin. Never does the critic 
look at the choices available to the Soviet Union at that 
particular time in history and suggest specific policies to avoid 
Stalin's many errors.

The substance of a Maoist critique of Stalin is the understanding 
that the bourgeoisie can arise from inside the party itself and 
that class struggle continues after socialism is achieved. Stalin 
made the mistake of thinking class struggle had ended in the 
Soviet Union. This, however, does not mean that everything he did 
was evil or that other Soviet leaders at the time would have done 
any better. This essay treats the critics' charges against Stalin.

"Where was the bourgeoisie before the 'Khrushchev coup d'etat'"?

Chinese leader Mao Zedong who directed the Chinese revolution 
until his death in September 1976, explained the origins under 
socialism of a possible restoration of capitalism in the spring of 
1976: "You are making the socialist revolution, and yet don't know 
where the bourgeoisie is. It is right in the Communist Party--those 
in power taking the capitalist road."(1)

Recognizing that in the highest ranks of government, party leaders 
had a relationship to the means of production which made it 
possible for them to become a bourgeoisie was Mao's distinctive 
contribution to Marxism-Leninism. He was the first communist 
government leader to explain this phenomena.

In capitalist society, government leaders do not control the means 
of production politically because the means of production are not 
owned by the public. But under socialism, party leaders exercise 
political control over the means of production. Therefore the 
question was whether the party leaders organized production in a 
socialist way or in a capitalist way.

Soviet Communist Party Chairperson Nikita Krushchev, who came to 
power in 1956 by a coup d'etat, and others were the bourgeoisie in 
the party under Stalin. When Stalin died, they rose to power 
(rehabilitating some of the leaders disgraced by Stalin along the 
way). For more information on this subject MIM distributes a book 
called The Restoration of Capitalism in the Soviet Union by W.B. 
Bland for $7.50 priority mail. 

Was the purge of communist leaders "the worst" about Stalin?

Stalin's harshest critics say he executed seven million people.(2) 
Others use a figure of 20 million, counting starvation and civil 
war. If there is any truth to these accounts, the "worst part" 
about Stalin would be his attacks on the masses, not the party. 

Many critics misunderstand the reason for these attacks and would 
have killed even more ordinary civilians by starting a civil war 
in the Soviet Union, purging their opponents or battling the Third 
Reich without Allied support. It wasn't until Mao that there was a 
theory of how to reorganize society and conduct class struggle 
successfully, without just killing off everyone accused of 
political impurities.

Leon Trotsky, for example, was himself like Stalin in that his 
solution to party impurities was execution. As commander of the 
Red Army (from March 1918 to January 1925)--the army of the 
revolutionary Soviet Union--Trotsky ordered the use of military 
force against the Krondstadt uprising of sailors in 1921. The 
Krondstadt uprising was protesting Communist Party policies.(3)

While Trotsky was in charge of the civil war (1918-1920), he 
ordered "killing honest Communists for such a relative trifle as 
disobeying orders."(4) Furthermore, by Trotsky's orders, "A local 
commissar was executed, as were twenty-six men who had deserted, 
and he accompanied the executions with an order that in case of 
mass desertion or unauthorized withdrawals it would be the 
commissar who would be shot first."(4) 

In contrast, the bourgeois academic Adam Ulam says Stalin would 
have impressed "primitive Communists" during the civil war by 
"shooting 'gentlemen' for treason." By this Ulam explains that 
Stalin came down hard on former Tsarist military officials in the 
Red Army who had questionable loyalties.

 Trotsky and Stalin both were delegated powers of execution during 
the civil war against those that opposed the communist revolution. 
Both Trotsky and Stalin rightly saw executions as necessary, but 
this point often gets lost when ignorant critics of Stalin marvel 
at how little violence Trotsky did once he was out of power 
compared with Stalin, who was still in power.

Neither Trotsky nor Stalin had Mao's theory that a potential 
bourgeoisie was already in the party. They lacked an understanding 
of the economic roots of the bourgeoisie and political struggle in 
society at large. Stalin and Trotsky both executed what they 
thought were holdovers from the old society. 

Trotsky argued that the lack of development of the productive 
forces held back the revolution in the Soviet Union. As such, the 
Soviet Union could not have a full-fledged socialist revolution, 
only one with a bureaucratic leadership. He said, "'the 
dictatorship of the proletariat has found its distorted but 
indubitable expression in the dictatorship of the 
bureaucracy.'"(5) This, according to Trotsky, justified political 
violence against those he labelled politically "Stalinist."(6)

For more on Mao's basic development of Marxism-Leninism and 
differences with Trotsky and Stalin, see Mao's A Critique of 
Soviet Economics.

Did Stalin order the demise of the leftists in the Spanish Civil 
War from 1936-39?

As for the Spanish Civil War, this is the issue of Stalin, the 
boogey-man in control of international movements. The Communist 
Party of Peru (CPP which is known in the press as Sendero 
Luminoso) is not under Stalin's thumb, Stalin having been dead 37 
years. Still, the people's army in Peru kills mayors who call 
themselves "democratic socialists" in a country run by a military 
regime. In other words, people in countries outside the Soviet 
Union have their own reasons for fighting a civil war within the 
so-called left.

 To blame the failure of the revolution in Spain on Stalin is to 
attribute powers to him that he did not have. As it stands, the 
critic blames Stalin for what happened in Spain without mentioning 
what was better. No other government did anything to stand up to 
Adolf Hitler and the Spanish fascists during that civil war in 
Spain.

The imperialist governments did not render any aid to the anti-
fascists in Spain. Stalin's government did. If the Trotskyists had 
overthrown a government anywhere in the world, they could have 
given the anti-fascists government aid, but the Trotskyists 
didn't, so no comparison between Trotskyism and Stalinism is 
possible on this point.

There is a big difference between a Stalinist government and an 
imperialist government. The Trotskyists and anarchists complaining 
about Spain are just trying to blame their world-wide failure on 
Stalin personally.

Did Stalin leave the USSR unprepared for the Nazi invasion in 
1941?

 If it had not been Stalin in power, it is likely that the world 
would be under Hitler's Third Reich today. Even with Stalin's 
breakneck industrialization to prepare for war--Hitler came very 
close to completely conquering the Soviet Union in 1942.

As early as 1926, Stalin made defense against imperialist invasion 
a high priority by harshly criticizing Trotsky for his "Clemenceau 
Declaration."(5)  

In the Clemenceau Declaration, Trotsky cites Clemenceau's 
willingness to oppose the French government when the German were 
80 kilometers from Paris. Trotsky was saying that the CPSU need to 
fight the civil war with those who opposed them (in spite of the 
German advance) in order to have the strongest government. This 
was the last straw to many party members who then asked for 
Trotsky expelled or even executed.

In 1931, Stalin made a speech famous for its exactness in 
predicting the necessity of industrialization for World War II and 
Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941: "No comrades... the 
pace must not be slackened! On the contrary, we must quicken it as 
much as is within our powers and possibilities.... The history of 
old Russia shows... that because of her backwardness she was 
constantly being defeated.... Beaten because of backwardness-- 
military, cultural, political, industrial, and agricultural 
backwardness.... We are behind the leading countries by fifty to 
one hundred years. We must make up this distance in ten years. 
Either we do it or we go under."(7)

Most of the critic's points are small and taken out of context. It 
is petty to discuss the moving of certain diplomats (mouth pieces 
for state policies in the first place) or granting one opera or 
denying any number of films in the face of preparing for World War 
II and avoiding a Nazi attack as long as possible.

The critic is right Stalin did "silly things to get the Germans 
happy" from 1939 to 1941 to avoid a world war where 20 million 
Soviet people, as well as millions of German proletarians, 
eventually died. One would hope that any statesperson would do 
silly things without losing sight of the important things.

For example, Stalin dismissed a Jew, Litvinov, from the Foreign 
Office before the Non-Aggression Pact of 1939, not after as the 
critic asserts. Stalin replaced the Jew with an "Aryan" in order 
to obtain the Non-Aggression Pact from Hitler.(8) That pact gained 
Stalin crucial time to industrialize and prepare for Hitler.

 Once again we should be glad Stalin was in power and not the 
critic. Dealing with an irrational actor like Hitler, the critic 
probably would have started war much earlier and without any 
allies. In 1938, Stalin proposed to England and France that if 
either of them were willing to fight the Nazis, the Soviet Union 
would join. Yet, neither England nor France were willing to stand 
up to Hitler in Czechoslovakia in 1938, so to fight, the Soviets 
would have had to go it alone.(9)

As for other common bourgeois claims about Stalin in World War II, 
Stalin's and Hitler's armies were face-to-face in Poland and the 
rest of Eastern Europe before Hitler invaded the Soviet Union. It 
was a tense situation for 18 months, especially in running into 
each other in foreign countries.

It is not that Stalin ignored "the information of Soviet 
intelligence" about Hitler's imminent invasion, which Stalin had 
predicted years earlier. All the major powers were good at 
determining the war postures of their opponents by examining their 
troop movements. In the week before the invasion, Stalin publicly 
lambasted the British for trying to provoke Stalin and Hitler. In 
these statements, Stalin demonstrated his knowledge of the armies 
amassed on the border with Germany.(10) Stalin recognized that he 
should appear to uphold the Non-Aggression Pact scrupulously or 
create a self-fulfilling prophecy of provocation and aggression.

Hitler conquered France, a power supposedly superior to the Soviet 
Union, in a matter of weeks. He took over Eastern Europe. Then he 
bombed England. Stalin was right to delay conflict as long as 
possible.

If Stalin had not pushed the breakneck industrialization of the 
Soviet Union, Hitler would have had all of Europe. 
Industrialization was necessary to produce the resources that 
Stalin needed to confront the Third Reich; the USSR's primitive 
agricultural economy would have produced inadequate goods in 
insufficient amounts.

If the USSR had failed, Hitler could have chosen to build up his 
war-machine including the atomic bomb with all his new resources 
or proceed with an immediate air-landing in England.

But why bother? England was letting everyone else do the fighting. 
So if Hitler had conquered continental Europe, it seems unlikely 
that England would have done anything but make a deal with Hitler 
the way he wanted to to join the Aryan race to English stock to 
conquer supposedly inferior peoples.

Since the United States was not involved, maybe it too would have 
made a deal or remained isolated. Maybe it would have fought Japan 
or maybe Japan wouldn't have attacked the United States if Hitler 
had come to an understanding with England.

All this is to say that when Stalin signed the Non-Aggression 
Pact, the Soviet Union was preparing to go it alone against Hitler 
sooner or later.

Still, Stalin was forthright about the hardships fast 
industrialization brought to his own people. "Of course, this is 
an unpleasant fact, if we shut our eyes to the truth that our 
country, our industry, cannot for a while do without this extra 
exaction from the peasant."(11)

Stalin defended this course both in terms of economics and 
preparation for impending war. "[By definition] the socialist 
state cannot exploit the peasantry.... The payment of this extra 
contribution takes place in the circumstances where the peasant's 
standard of living continually improves." (11) In fact, most 
peasants became industrial workers which meant a rapid increase in 
the standard of living.

Between 1913, which had the highest pre-revolution industrial 
production, and 1953 when Stalin died, industrial production 
multiplied 30 times. This gave the Soviet Union an economy second 
only to the United States'.(12)

Were there better historical alternatives to Stalin?

The anti-Stalin line has a basic weakness: It is possible to admit 
every single one of the critic's points and still regard Stalin as 
70% correct, just as Mao did. The article simply doesn't mention a 
better alternative to Stalin during the period in question. Who 
should have ruled instead of Stalin?

 However much intellectuals might like Trotsky's ideas, in 
practice they have amounted to the status quo of imperialism for 
the last 63 years since Trotsky managed to get himself kicked out 
of the CPSU. Trotskyism is a doctrine that attracts a lot of 
commitment, but has yet to get anywhere. In all the world's 
revolts and revolutions there has never been a Trotskyist 
revolution.

There is not enough space here to dissect Trotsky's plan of the 
mid-1920s to organize agriculture along military lines. For more 
information on how Trotsky would have broken the alliance between 
workers and peasants in the Soviet Union and brought about the 
defeat of revolution much sooner, see Kostas Mavrakis's book On 
Trotskyism.

Then there is Nikolai Bukharin, who became the second-ranking 
member of the CPSU and government once Trotsky, Zinoviev and 
Kamenev had thoroughly discredited themselves by 1927. Bukharin is 
perhaps the most credible historical alternative to Stalin in the 
Soviet Union of the 1930s. But Bukharin was on the same side with 
Stalin on most issues till the late 1920s.

Then starting in 1928 there was a famine. Bukharin advocated 
continuing the New Economic Policy (NEP)--a policy allowing free 
trade and capitalist incentives for the peasantry. In contrast, by 
1928 Stalin argued that capitalism could no longer develop Russian 
agriculture, so he pushed for collectivization as the way out of 
famine and forward into industrialization.

If Bukharin had had his way in agriculture, would the Soviet Union 
have survived? The rest of the capitalist world was in the Great 
Depression of 1929, a depression largely started in the capitalist 
agricultural sector. Bukharin wanted more of the same depression-
causing capitalism to solve the Soviet grain crisis. Perhaps 
agriculture would have muddled along, but industrialization would 
not have occurred under a Bukharin-extended NEP.

If Hitler had blitzkrieged a Trotskyist Russia, where there was 
civil war internally (perhaps labelled "political revolution" or 
"dictatorship of the working class" over the peasantry ), or a 
Bukharinist Russia, wallowing in agricultural feudalism, he would 
have seized all of Russia right up to the Ural Mountains, probably 
even before he occupied France. 

The critic does not mention what would have happened if Stalin 
hadn't led the record-breaking industrialization of the Soviet 
Union. The bourgeois critics make so many loose and minute 
accusations that people are likely to never learn the important 
history of the period. The critic righteously condemns Stalin as a 
butcher-tyrant, but the truth is the critic has the ethical 
horizons of a tapeworm. 

Notes:
1. Raymond Lotta, "Introduction: Mao Tsetung's Last Great Battle 
(1973-76)," And Mao Makes Five (Chicago: Banner Press, 1978), p. 
40.
2. Anton Antonov-Ovseyenko, The Time of Stalin: Portrait of a 
Tyranny (New York: Harper & Row, 1980), p. 212.
3. Kostas Mavrakis, On Trotskyism: Problems of Theory and History 
(Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1976), pp. 10-11.
4. Adam Ulam, Stalin: The Man and His Era (Boston: Beacon Press 
Books, 1989), p. 173. 
5. Mavrakis, op. cit., pp. 74-5. On the Clemanceau Declaration see 
Isaac Deutscher, The Prophet Unarmed: Trotsky: 1921-1929, pp. 349-
50.
6. MIM Notes 39..
7. Adam Ulam, Stalin: The Man and His Era (Boston: Beacon Press 
Books, 1989), p. 340. Isaac Deutscher, Stalin: A Political 
Biography (New York: Vintage Books, 1960), p. 328.
8. Deutscher, op. cit., p. 432.
9. Bruce Franklin, "Introduction," The Essential Stalin: Major 
Theoretical Writings, 1905-1952, p. 24.
10. Deutscher, op. cit., pp. 454-5.
11. Ulam, op. cit., p. 306.
12. "More on the Historical Experience of the Dictatorship of the 
Proletariat," People's Daily, (Peking: Communist Party of 
China,12/29/56).

* * *

LIBERALISM KILLS

Reversal of Fortune

This is a liberal movie from hell. If you want to see a movie that 
unabashedly cheerleads for the Amerikan legal system and proudly 
upholds the letter of the law (as it stands--this movie is not even 
about making reforms) as being more sacred than human life, this 
is a good one. 

It is the story of Claus Von Bulow, a real-life zillionaire who 
was sentenced to 30 years for attempting to murder his wife, who 
ended up in an irreversible coma.

The big hero is famous Harvard professor and practicing lawyer 
Alan Dershowitz, who steps in to handle Von Bulow's appeal. He 
regrettably has to ditch his other case, in which he is trying to 
keep two innocent Black kids from being executed. The two kids 
come up a few times in the course of the film, just to show what a 
great liberal guy the esteemed lawyer is for doing lowly pro bono 
work.

Dershowitz wrote the book the movie was based on. Hence the movie 
glorifies Dershowitz, whose name is today in the news as the 
attorney  representing Leona "only the little people pay taxes" 
Helmsley.

At one point in the movie the lawyer's ex-girlfriend, whom he is 
trying to lure back, overhears him on the phone to one of the 
kids. She is proud of him but disappointed by the lack of time and 
attention he gives to his personal life. The viewer is supposed to 
adopt her perspective sympathetically, conceding that while 
charity is noble, it is not as important as their relationship. 
The kids on death row are time-consuming charity work, not human 
beings. Not that MIM thinks liberal or progressive lawyers can 
make a difference--but this is an example of inconsistent and 
corrupt values. 

The most ironic line in the movie comes when the frustrated lawyer 
says, "if I can't get two innocent Black kids off, I sure as hell 
can't get Von Bulow off." This naive analysis of the legal system 
maintains that while Black people might be unjustly persecuted 
some of the time, the courts (representative of the Amerikan 
public) are really on their side at heart.

More reactionary and disturbing is the notion that the challenge 
of rescuing Claus Von Bulow in the name of legal 
technicalities--those ever-so-important rights we all must 
protect--is more important than the kids on death row, even if they 
are innocent. Reversal of Fortune wants viewers to hate wealthy 
people like Claus because their lives are decadent, but it offers 
in contrast the humble life of the Harvard professor, who also 
makes a killing. Further, the movie wants its audience to feel 
sorry for rich people--they have problems too. Glenn Close (playing 
Von Bulow's wife) spends several flashback scenes sobbing to her 
husband that their marriage isn't as she expected; she never 
wanted him to work when she had enough money to support them both.

In the name of the sanctity of the "right" to a fair trial, Claus 
(probably guilty, but who cares--it's the principle) walks free and 
the Black kids are still on death row. And the bourgeoisie lives 
happily ever after.

--MC44

* * *

UNDER LOCK & KEY: NEWS FROM PRISONS AND PRISONERS

THE PRISON WRITINGS OF GEORGE JACKSON
Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson

by MC¯

George Jackson's letters to his family, friends and legal counsel 
are uplifting writings, the words of a prisoner who would not 
compromise with the authorities because he knew it would do no 
good. Jackson's letters affirm the need to study political economy 
to build revolution while conveying the repression of solitary 
confinement and 23-hour-a-day lockdown.

The strength of this collection, edited by Jean Genet, is its 
analysis of capitalism as the enemy. It is also a story of 
Jackson's transformation from lumpenproletariat to Black 
revolutionary nationalist. The weaknesses are Jackson's bad line 
on women--whom he criticizes as counterrevolutionary--and his 
focoist tendency to  believe that the gun can liberate the Black 
colony at once, regardless of the level of organization among the 
masses or other historical conditions.

Women

The first part of the book, mostly letters to his mother and 
father, is not very political. Jackson uses many sexist 
stereotypes in this section, often to criticize his mother for 
failing in his brother's and his own education. He says, for 
example, that unmarried white women are left to become 
prostitutes, nuns and lesbians (p.45). While it is true that 
economic forces put more pressure on unmarried woman (the fastest 
growing population in poverty are womean and children), Jackson's 
stereotype is homophobic and derogatory.

Much of what could be criticized as sexist in Jackson's writing is 
left as ambiguous. He says that "The white theory of 'the 
emancipated woman' is a false idea" (p. 46), which is an economic 
reality of Amerikan capitalism, but no context is given. To his 
credit he does explain that Black women are the backbone of the 
family (p. 74).

Non-violence

Jackson's analysis of non-violence is right on. The reality of 
prison life shows non-violence for what it is: a privilege for 
those who command the power of the law on their side.

"The concept of nonviolence is a false ideal," says Jackson in 
criticizing Martin Luther King, Jr., the Black leader who lead 
much of the Civil Rights Movement around desegregation. "It 
presupposes the existence of compassion and a sense of justice on 
the part of one's adversary. When this adversary has everything to 
lose and nothing to gain by exercising justice and compassion, his 
reaction can only be negative" (p. 128).

Jackson saw the limitations of non-violent protest in the 
internationalist terms of the struggles in Vietnam and the 
Philippines (p. 166). Still, this criticism could not be mistaken 
for a mindless acceptance of violence as a tactic: "It may serve 
our purpose to claim nonviolence, but we must never delude 
ourselves into thinking that we can seize power from a position of 
weakness, with half measures, polite programs, righteous 
indignation, loud entreaties" (p. 167).

Study

Jackson knew that study was key to advancing the national 
revolution and that without advanced theory the revolutionary army 
he envisioned would be lead down a blind alley.

"To seize power for the people and relegate fascism to the history 
of books the vanguard must change the basic patterns of thought. 
We are going to have to study the principles of people's 
movements. We are going to have to study them where they took 
place and interpret them to fit our situation here. We have yet to 
discover the meaning of people's war, people's army" (p. 168).

Focoism

The biggest weakness in Jackson's letters is his fondness for the 
focoist revolutionary model, in which a small group sparks the 
masses to rebel through an armed action. Jackson identifies 
himself with Ernesto Che Geuvarra, the Cuban focoist who fought 
the Cuban Revolution with Fidel Castro. Jackson is also a fan of 
Franz Fanon, who believed that armed struggle itself creates a 
revolutionary transformation. Jackson mentions many 
revolutionaries in his letters, but he is not advocating Marxism-
Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought as the way forward.

In a letter to Angela Davis, Jackson suggests his program for an 
"antiestablishment war." This involves getting some money 
(unspecified means), opening  "as many skeet, trap, rifle, and 
pistol ranges as I could rent space for around the black 
community," beginning martial arts training and publishing 
propaganda on military strategy. All this would be done, in 
Jackson's words, "without a hint of political flavoring" (p. 223).

Jackson relies on the idea that an armed action, not political 
struggle, will create revolutionaries and bring the revolution. He 
concludes this section saying "'One doesn't wait for all 
conditions to be right to start the revolution, the forces of the 
revolution itself will make the conditions right.' Che said 
something like this" (p. 223).

With this tactical shortcoming and other problems in mind, MIM 
suggests that people read George Jackson as a strong case for 
liberation of the Black colony within the United States. Jackson 
supports self-determination and Black liberation to the end and 
was a strong ally of the international proletariat.


TRENTON PROTEST
by MC11

On Aug. 7, seven prisoners in New Jersey's maximum security 
Trenton State Prison wore red armbands to commemorate the death of 
George Jackson, an African-American revolutionary who died in 
Soledad Prison (California) 25 years ago. In the weeks that 
followed, the six were transferred, prison guards provoked another 
set of prisoners to violent self-defence, seven more prisoners 
were transferred to out-of-state prisons, and the prison went on 
lockdown for over a month. Prison officials blamed the incidents 
on a group of 68 prisoners who they charged with conspiring to 
kill prison guards. 

MIM recently received a letter and several newspaper clippings 
from a prisoner being held in Trenton State's Management Care Unit 
describing the events of August and September. With this 
information and other interviews, MIM has pieced the story 
together.

As spokesperson for the New Jersey State Department of Corrections 
explains, "Demonstrations are illegal. All the prisoners know 
that." But Linda Hickman, the wife of one of the prisoners who was 
transferred in the aftermath of the violence, says "If six or more 
guys are in a group, that's a demonstration. So the seven were 
standing wherever, and the Department of Corrections says it's a 
demonstration. The superintendent kept saying, if they'd just 
asked permission, he would have allowed them to demonstrate." 

Hickman, co-chair of the Concerned Families Association, a group 
that formed during the lockdown to protest the Department of 
Corrections' (DoC) treatment of the prisoners, says she has no 
doubt that the DoC's reaction was primarily a response to the 
prisoners' political beliefs. George Jackson, a member of the 
Black Panther Party who advocated the armed overthrow of the U.S. 
government and wrote inspiring propaganda for the Afrikan-American 
masses from his prison cell, was never a favorite with the DoC. 
(See book review, page 9). Prisoners daring to express their 
solidarity with   Jackson's revolutionary ideology were not about 
to be looked on with favor either.

On Aug. 8, the seven prisoners who wore armbands were transferred 
to a state facility for the criminally insane. Several weeks 
later, they were separated and transferred against their will to 
other New Jersey state prisons. 

At Trenton on Aug. 10, as prisoners were returning to their cells 
from the recreation yard, violence broke out between guards and 
prisoners. Six guards were injured. The Department of Corrections 
calls it a "premeditated, planned savage attack" by a "covert 
organization of militant prisoners" who had conspired to kill the 
guards. In a letter to Hickman following his transfer to another 
part of Trenton State, one of the prisoners involved in the 
incident describes what really happened.

Several days before the incident, the letter says, "racist guards 
held a demonstration behind the prison walls demanding the 
creation of an even more brutal and effective penal system [at 
Trenton State]...."  The prisoner population of Trenton State 
Prison, according to the Department of Corrections, is 64% Black, 
22% white, and 13% Hispanic.

The guards' demands were not officially sanctioned by the 
Department of Corrections, but a campaign focused on provoking and 
harassing Afrikan prisoners unofficially went into effect. On Aug. 
10, the letter says, the harrassment reached the point where the 
prisoners had to fight back. The prison went into lockdown 
immediately.

According to an affidavit signed by prisoner John Bland, a new 
round of prison guard brutality began moments after the outbreak 
was quelled. Bland, along with 100 other prisoners, was in the 
recreation yard when the violence broke out. They were ordered to 
strip to their underwear before lining up to reenter the prison. 

"I was stripped, frisked, and ordered to interlock my fingers on 
top of my head and walk on the yellow line," his affidavit reads. 
"There were officers in riot gear flanked on my right and left 
side leading into the institution. I took approximately 20 steps 
when Correction Officer Marczak hit me in my lower back with a 
police stick. I fell to the ground and was cuffed behind my back. 
A police stick was placed under the cuffs causing my back and head 
to lunge forward toward the ground. While being escorted through 
the institution in a bent forward position completely naked, I was 
hit on the back with police sticks." Bland was left in a concrete 
detention cell for three days without any clothing or bedding. He 
was later charged with assaulting the guard that beat him.

Another prisoner, Andre Herd, also issued an affidavit describing 
similar treatment. He added that guards screamed racial slurs at 
him while hitting him with a baton.

The Concerned Family Association (CFA) formed soon after lockdown 
measures went into effect. Says Hickman, "I understand this is a 
prison, however, I have someone in there and I want to know what 
the hell is going on." In the first phase of the lockdown, she 
says, "The guys had no phone calls, no attorney visits, no visits 
to the law library, no leaving the cell, no work--so no ability to 
earn credits toward release--no contact with institutional 
paralegals, no recreaction, no visits, they had one shower every 
four days, their mail was tampered with, and a lot of guys lost 
legal papers and personal property."

Five prisoners were transferred to out-of-state prisons against 
their will soon after the incident, a Department of Corrections 
official says. Sixty-eight prisoners were placed in solitary 
confinement. By mid-December, 12 were still there.  

The CFA attempted to meet with the commissioner, a top-level 
prison bureaucrat, during the first few days of the lockdown, but, 
Hickman says, "He said 'no, I do not meet with those type of 
people.'" After the CFA complained to the governor's office, they 
were able to meet with two low-level officials.

"They promised nothing," Hickman continues. "Oh no, they promised 
to put up a sign saying 'contact visits are being 
videotaped'--which is nothing. A five-year-old kid can do that." 
The CFA's original goal, Hickman says, was to establish a visitors 
advisory board which would meet regularly with the prison 
administration to discuss conditions in the prison. 

One of the prisoners who was transferred out of state was the 
former chairperson of the Prisoners' Representative Council, 
which, Hickman says, was "the only voice the guys had in the 
prison." The chairperson acted as a liaison between the prisoners 
and the prison administration; the council served as a forum for 
communication between prisoners. David Lambert, Hickman's husband, 
was made chairperson of the PRC after the lockdown. He was 
transferred a few weeks later. 

"David is vocal," Hickman says, "David is intelligent, and plus 
David is gonna fight back. The day they transferred David was the 
day [prison superintendent] Beyers decided to decentralize the 
PRC. What he did was illegal and he knows it."

Instead of allowing prisoner representatives to meet and convey 
their concerns to the prison administration, the administration 
reorganized the system so that several prison officials are 
responsible for meeting with one prisoner, individually, from 
different areas of the prison.

Audrey Bomsey, an attorney with the Public Advocate's Office who 
will represent some of the transferred prisoners, said in mid-
December that prisoner beatings by guards are continuing. The 
guards, Bomsey says, still walk around in full riot gear. 

* * *

ONE YEAR IN BROOKLYN, NEXT YEAR IN JERUSALEM

Meir Kahane

Drawing from two recently-published books, Robert I. Friedman'sThe 
False Prophet: Rabbi Meir Kahane--from FBI Informant to Knesset 
Member (Brooklyn: Lawrence Hill, 1990) and Ward Churchill and Jim 
Vander Wall's The COINTELPRO Papers: Documents from the FBI's 
Secret Wars Against Dissent in the United States (Boston: South 
End, 1990), MIM Notes 47 looked at Kahane's early years as a para-
military youth group member, informant, author of CIA pro-Vietnam 
War propaganda, and point-man in the FBI's war against the Black 
Panther Party (BPP)--information largely suppressed by other 
sources.

These are fearful times for Palestinian Arabs, and it seems 
Kahane's death may ironically add to their worries. A generation 
of Palestinians has grown up in the West Bank and Gaza Strip--lands 
where they constitute the majority--under Israeli rule. Israel is 
putting new energy into its effort to colonize the West Bank. War 
in the Gulf may well bring a Palestinian holocaust. Kahane, as a 
tool of the Amerikan state and a Zionist leader, personified 
imperial aggression against Palestine. His death removed a potent 
symbol of the enemy. And if memorial services in New York and 
Israel are any indication, a JDL resurgence is on the horizon.

New York City cops intervened when the JDL attacked BPP 
headquarters in 1970, restraining the Panthers while Kahane yelled 
racist taunts through a bullhorn before driving off (p97). But 
such actions helped to open the rift between New York's Blacks and 
Jews--now so wide that 90% of Jews voted against Mayor Dinkins in 
last year's elections.

Often using information supplied by Richard Perle, a Reagan 
Pentagon man who was at the time chief aide to hawkish Sen. Henry 
"Scoop" Jackson (p108), the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) or 
the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Kahane's JDL showed it 
could affect politics on a global scale as well. In the late 
sixties Soviet Jews, inspired by Israel's victory in the Six Day 
War, began to identify more closely with Zionism, holding rallies 
and demanding exit visas. Soviet Premier Brezhnev cracked down 
violently, renewing a tradition of Russian anti-Semitism which had 
been dormant since the revolution. Kahane hatched a Machiavellian 
plan to secure their release. U.S.-Soviet Strategic Arms 
Limitation Talks (SALT I) were due to begin, and Kahane, with his 
inside information, recognized that the militarily-inferior 
Soviets most needed arms reduction. So he set about to hurt 
superpower relations, forcing the Soviets to put more on the 
bargaining table--namely visas for Jews.

Kahane always maintained that he was only trying to get publicity 
for his cause. On December 29, 1969, for example, "the JDL 
simultaneously took over the [New York] offices of TASS (the 
Soviet press agency), Intourist (the Soviet tourist agency), and 
Aeroflot (the Soviet airline), and boarded a Russian commercial 
passenger plane...." (p108), issuing press releases to fill the 
resulting front-page stories. But they can hardly have planned an 
operation of such a scale without help from U.S. intelligence. 
Later actions represented a campaign of outright terror. June 
1970: an Aeroflot hijacking. The hijackers were sentenced to death 
in Leningrad depite requests for commutation from President Nixon 
and Pope Paul VI. Nov. 1970: bombing of Aeroflot and Intourist 
offices. Jan. 1971: bombing of Soviet cultural center in 
Washington. March 1971: bombing of pro-Soviet Communist Party, USA 
headquarters. April 1971: bombing Soviet trade center in New York. 
Dec.1971: bombing a Soviet ship in Rotterdam. (pp114-15).

Only when the campaign to re-elect Nixon in 1972 seemed to require 
dŽtente, a Cold War thaw, did the U.S. government try to stop its 
Frankenstein's monster. After forging links with the Mafia (pp120-
23), Kahane fled federal indictments and relocated to Israel in 
Sept.1971 (p134). Setting up an Israeli JDL and steering clear of 
electoral politics, Kahane began attacking offices of the 
Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in Europe and pressing for 
Israeli settlements on the West Bank. There followed murders of 
Palestinian mayors, a machine-gun assault on a bus carrying Arabs, 
Kahane's election to the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, and 
eventual removal when his outspoken racism grew embarrassing.

These events were too public for the press to ignore, though the 
JDL's continuing ties to the Mossad--Israeli intelligence--and to 
Yitzhak Shamir--Israel's prime minister--are never discussed. 

Today Kahane's campaign for Soviet Jews has to be counted an 
overwhelming success. Virtually all two million will be released 
this year and next. With the U.S. State Department limiting 
immigration here, they are going to Israel. Shamir has promised 
that they won't be settled on the West Bank, but the Jews they 
displace surely will be. More and more, Israel is taking the shape 
Kahane and his friends--in Washington--envisioned.

--MC89 

Note: All references are to Robert I. Friedman's The False 
Prophet: Rabbi Meir Kahane-- from FBI Informant to Knesset Member 
(Brooklyn: Lawrence Hill, 1990).

* * *

'NO BLOOD FOR OIL' WON'T END WORLD WARS

by MC24

Anti-war movements around the country and around the world are 
growing as the Amerikan war-machine prepares for war with Iraq. 

Thousands of protestors in Chicago; Washington D.C.; New York; 
Milwaukee; Cambridge, Mass.; Columbus, Ohio; Seattle; Austin, 
Texas; Ann Arbor, Mich. and Lincoln, Neb. all held mass 
demonstrations in a national day of anti-war protest on Dec.  8.

Three thousand people attended the Washington rally. Anti-war 
demonstrators marched from the White House to the Vietnam War 
memorial where 50 protestors were arrested for blocking the street 
after the police announced the rally had no permit.(1) Vietnam 
veterans marched to the Vietnam War memorial to lay a wreath for 
another imperialist war. 

The next day about 3,000 anti-war demonstrators rallied in front 
of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel after an awards ceremony at Ellis 
Island in New York Harbor in which President Bush, Ronald Reagan, 
and Richard Nixon were among 101 others being honored for their 
contributions to Amerika. The protest was organized by the 
Coalition Against U.S. Intervention in the Middle East.(3)

Campus activism has also figured prominently so far. Six 
University of California-Berkeley students were arrested during a 
sit-in at an ROTC building last month. Organized, Vietnam-style 
teach-ins around the war  at Rutgers, Princeton, Michigan.(4)

World-wide dissent

World-wide public dissent against this war is growing. Only 36% of 
French people favor involvement in the U.S. war, according to a Le 
Fiegero survey, down from 46% in September. An earlier survey 
showed that 53% of the people in France wanted to support Amerikan 
foreign policy; that figure has dropped to 40%.(4)

In Turkey, while Prime Minister Turgut Ozal grovels for the right 
to participate in the war, 72% of respondents in a recent Turkish 
poll opposed Turkish military involvement.(4)

Third World revolutionaries know Amerika's real concern is with 
economic and global domination. They are not--like the bourgeoisie 
and its allies benefiting from colonial resources --blinded by 
Amerikan propaganda calling for "human rights" and respect for 
"international law." Amerikan troops, culture and capital 
continuously pillage the Third World to sustain its advanced 
capitalist economy.

Polls in this country continue to show income level correlating to 
level of support for the war (see MIM Notes 45). The oppressed of 
this country--especially African-Americans and Puerto Ricans--have 
fought and died in white Amerika's wars too many times. But of 
course the United States also is not without its fair share of 
war-crazed hawks. According to a recent Time/CNN poll taken, about 
24% of the Amerikan people believe using nuclear weapons against 
the Iraqi people would be justified if "we become bogged down in a 
stalemate with Iraq."(5) Fifty-nine percent of the Amerikan public 
believe that the "liberation of Kuwait is worth fighting for."

What is to be done?

So what is to be done, not just to stop this war, but all 
imperialist world wars?  

A wide variety of single issue and reformist groups in the United 
States--including the Center for Constitutional Rights, the 
Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador, the 
National Rainbow Coalition, U.S. Peace Council, American Friends 
Service Committee, Palestine Solidarity Committee, Vietnam 
Veterans of America, Presbyterian Church, SANE/Freeze, Progressive 
Student Alliance--are involved in the anti-war effort. These groups 
have organized a united coalition and set up a "1-800" number with 
Western Union which sends "mailgrams" to the White House. The 
message asks for a negotiated settlement in the Persian Gulf.(6)

MIM commends these anti-war sentiments, and particularly those 
reservists around the country who have refused to fight another 
Amerikan war.

But videos, chants and phone calls--even signs that read "NO BLOOD 
FOR OIL"--will not put an end to this and other wars of expansion.

MIM does support all anti-imperialist struggles. However, MIM does 
not want to see this anti-war movement fail in the same way that 
the anti-Vietnam war movement of the 1960s did. The U.S. war 
machine will not go away--in the Middle East or anywhere else--by 
simply calling up the White House and asking Mr. Bush to "please 
negotiate." Nor will it go away because of rallies.

The slogan "U.S. OUT OF THE MIDDLE EAST," is misleading. It 
assumes that if and when the United States ends Operation Desert 
Shield Amerika will no longer control the oil-fields (not to 
mention Israel). This is simply not true. The only way the United 
States will remove its troops from Saudi Arabia and Iraq is if it 
could preserve the imperialist-capitalist structure by other 
means. And history has shown that the economic demands of this 
structure require wars of conquest and re-conquest.

MIM urges those who sincerely want to end all oppression and 
imperialist wars to join a party with a program for the liberation 
of the international proletariat--building for revolution step by 
step.

The anti-war movement of the 60s was a failure because it did not 
seize the long term goal of revolution. Students for a Democratic 
Society (SDS), the largest student activist group organized in the 
late 60s, was able to push for some campus gains--and turned a lot 
of heads--but not much else was accomplished. With thousands or 
even millions of people espousing revolutionary views, the 
achievements of the 60s could and should have been monumental.

 But SDS, like the anti-war movement emerging on college campuses 
now, was a broad coalition group based on attracting as many 
people as possible on the theory that political organization, 
discipline, and correct analysis were not as important as getting 
as many people to a rally as possible. The more people at the 
rallies, the more effective the movement would be, it was argued. 
This lead to a strategy of  building a coalition group broad 
enough to encompass people of all political stripes, including 
many of those who had an interest in ending the immediate war 
without attacking the system that caused it. Not surprisingly, the 
end of the Vietnam war brought an end to the strength of SDS. 

If broad coalition politics are "more effective" than 
revolutionary politics, then such coalition groups should not 
dissipate when they "succeed." Work with us toward revolution 
against the imperialist war machine. Until capitalism is 
destroyed, lives will be continue to be destroyed in order to feed 
the oil-and-blood-thirsty beast which monstrously consumes the 
world's people and resources.

Notes:
1. National Public Radio, 12/9/90
2. L.A. Times 10/21/90, p. A10.
3. Associated Press, 12/9/90
4. ABC Nightline, 12/6/90
5. Time, 12/10/90
6. Palestine Focus, 11-12/90.

* * *

OPPRESSED COUNTRIES:CEASEFIRE REACHED IN LIBERIA
by MC25

The 11-month civil war in Amerika's West African colony of Liberia 
ostensibly ended Nov. 28 with a cease-fire agreement between 
leading rebel Charles Taylor and representatives of the other four 
contingents in the bloody power struggle that displaced half of 
Liberia's population and killed at least 20,000 people. Talks 
between the factions, held in Mali, were arranged by the Economic 
Community of West African States (ECOWAS). This was the first 
successful attempt to bring all sides to the negotiating table.(1)

The agreement came one week after the installation of the interim 
government in the country's capital of Monrovia by a 6,000-member 
West African peacekeeping force known as ECOMOG.(1)

Charles Taylor's attendance at the summit was made possible by 
ECOMOG. Taylor had refused negotiations on grounds that the 
interim government, which he called illegitimate, and its 
supporter ECOWAS, had supported the country's ousted dictator. 
Taylor and his NPFL (National Patriotic Front of Liberia) "Black 
Scorpion" forces led the rebellion last December against the 
regime of former President Samuel K. Doe.(2)

The interim government was represented by its President, Dr. Amos 
Sawyer. Sawyer is the leader of the Movement for Justice in 
Africa(MOJA) and its formerly banned Liberia People's Party 
(LPP).(1) 

Prince Johnson, the former commander of Taylor's forces and the 
man responsible for Doe's death, also attended the summit. 
Johnson's forces are rumored to have been supported by the United 
States. Amerika wanted Doe murdered because he was no longer 
useful, but was not happy about Taylor's links to Libya.(3)

Representing the remnants of Doe's forces, and members of his 
Krahn ethnic group, was Brig. David Nimley. (1)

The fifth key player was ECOMOG itself, as the main source of 
Taylor's continued objections, led by Nigerian Maj. Gen. Joshua 
Dogdnyaro. Taylor later claimed that ECOMOG soldiers had violated 
the ceasefire agreement on Nov. 30 by killing two NPFL 
soldiers.(4) 

Taylor refused to attend an earlier conference with ECOWAS in 
Banjul, after declaring war on the group that created ECOMOG. The 
rebel leader, then self-proclaimed president, seemingly had a 
change of heart due largely to his loss of military and economic 
aid from Libya, as well as from Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso--two 
ECOWAS nations who refused to supply troops to ECOMOG.(1)

Taylor attributes his new acquiescence to the expansion of ECOMOG 
from five member nations to include the 16 ECOWAS members, and his 
belief that such an expansion will limit the threat of Nigerian 
control over Liberia and its upcoming elections.(1)

Nigerian dominance

Nigeria, which Taylor has accused of supporting the Doe regime, 
economically dominates ECOWAS, and in recent years has expressed 
disillusionment with the regional cooperation goal. ECOWAS was 
formed to support Pan-African goals of economic cooperation. 
Dominance by Nigeria threatens the anti-imperialist intent of 
ECOWAS. Another shadow of doubt on the prospects for ECOWAS 
leadership is cast by the ready support offered to it by Johnson, 
a likely Amerikan plant.(5)

The potential for the emergence of anti-imperialist leadership in 
Liberia seems limited at this time.

History of dependence

Liberia was founded in 1822 by the American Colonization Society 
as a penal colony for "freed" slaves who were seen as potential 
"troublemakers." The dominance of the Amerikan-Liberian settlers 
over politics promoted the acceptance of this colonial status and 
almost full dependence on Amerikan aid.(6, 7)

The era ushered in by Doe represented a shift away from the 
dominance of Amerikan-Liberians, who constitute a mere 60,000 of a 
national population of 2.6 million. They had previously ruled 
through property ownership requirements for voting.(6)

Doe's 1980 coup, which took power from the Amerikan-Liberian 
oligarchy, also fueled the current divisions between the Krahn, 
Gio and Mano ethnic groups. The coup may have been anti-
imperialist in intent, but it was corrupted by the pipeline of 
U.S. money and Doe became a tyrant. Ten years of dictatorship and 
monopartyism later, Doe's legacy is one of record foreign debts, 
corruption, and military abuses.(8)

Many Liberians originally saw Charles Taylor as their ticket out 
of Doe's nightmare. But through his massacre of the Krahn people 
he has proven to be nothing more than the vengeful criminal Doe 
accused him of being.  Taylor has shown no desire to work for 
Liberian self-reliance. In an attempt to gain U.S. approval, he 
said, "I want to make Liberia the Hong Kong of West Africa."(3)

Enter Prince Johnson. Fed up with fighting Taylor's battles with 
no prospects of personal power gain, Johnson formed a little army 
of his own. Except he meant business, doing away with the 
lingering threat of a Doe resurgence by killing him. Johnson did 
what most Liberians, including Charles Taylor, wanted to do.(3)

Suddenly, Taylor lost the support of not only the Liberian 
population, but also most of ECOWAS. Johnson quickly offered his 
support to ECOMOG and the interim government, no doubt with 
thoughts of retaining control over the military after the 
elections.(3)

Sawyer is possibly the best alternative yet, and according to a 
leading African political scientist he is a committed socialist. 
He is a professor of political science at the University of 
Liberia, who because of his long standing opposition to the Doe 
regime spent the last several years in the United States, 
presumably since the banning of the LPP. What he intends for  the 
socialist transformation of Liberia is unclear. His elite status, 
commitment to constitutional and electoral change, and his exile 
stint in Amerika indicate that he is not revolutionary. 
Regardless, he is ineligible for election, as dictated by the 
interim delegation.(8)

No date has been set for elections as yet. A victory gained by 
Taylor or Johnson would clearly represent a renewal of Amerikan 
ownership of Liberia. With both men's records of brutality in the 
war preceding them, it is more likely that a political leader 
would be elected. MIM knows little about the current goals of 
political contenders to that election, and awaits the emergence of 
an anti-imperialist agenda from any of them.

Notes:
1. NYT, 11/29/90, p. A3.
2. NYT, 11/27/90 p. A4.
3.West Africa 8/6-12/90, p. 2230-2231
4. NYT, 12/6/90, p. A9.
5. West Africa.10/22-28/90, p 2513
6. Africa, 1989, World Today Series, P.54.
7. Africa, South of the Sahara 1990, p.614
8. West Africa 9/10-16/90, p. 2478

* * * 

FMLN RELIES ON NEGOTIATIONS, NOT PEOPLE'S WAR

by MC18

On Nov. 20, El Salvador's Farabundo Mart’ National Liberation 
Front (FMLN) launched its biggest offensive of 1990. FMLN soldiers 
attacked government installations in half of El Salvador's 
provinces, including over a dozen military positions. Electrical 
service was disrupted in more than two thirds of the country.(1)

This attack is the latest of the FMLN's 11-year revolt against the 
U.S.-supported Salvadoran government, which is headed by President 
Alfredo Cristiani and the ARENA party. Over 75,000 people have 
died since the civil war began 11 years ago.(2) This most recent 
attack resulted in at least 20 deaths and 46 wounded.(1) During 
the ensuing violence of the following week the Salvadoran 
government reported a total of 232 dead and 510 wounded.(2)

In response to the attack on its puppet government, the United 
States announced on Dec. 7 that it would rush $48.1 million in 
military aid and hardware to the Salvadoran military.(3) The $48.1 
million is a reduction in the appropriated aid of $85 million, 
half of which the U.S. Congress voted to withhold six weeks before 
due to human-rights violations on the part of the Salvadoran 
government.(3, also see MN #46) The United States has supported 
the death-squad government of El Salvador with about $4 billion in 
military and economic aid over the last decade. The low level of 
aid in 1990 is in response to the growing unpopularity of public 
support for the Salvadoran government in the U.S. Congress, 
especially since the murder of six Jesuit priests by government 
soldiers in 1989. The United States is certainly embarrassed by 
last year's blatant display of ARENA's traditional death-squad 
techniques, though not enough to actually revoke its support for 
the ARENA government. Congress managed to end up leaving President 
Bush with total authority over dispensation of aid. Bush will be 
required to inform the United Nations of its intentions to release 
the aid, but no United Nations approval will be necessary.(2)

The restoration of aid comes at a time when the Salvadoran 
government and the FMLN are engaged in supposed "peace talks" 
aimed at ending the decade-long rebellion.(3) The FMLN identified 
its Nov. 20 offensive as "a military response to the armed forces' 
impunity, repression, military operations and the intransigence of 
the government which refuses to demilitarize society and clings to 
a criminal army."(1) 

The U.S. State Department will use the offensive to speed the 
delivery of military aid, stating that the offensive "calls into 
question the FMLN's sincerity at the negotiating table." But the 
United States made no attempt to hide the fact that the talks are 
meaningless. One State Department representative indicated that 
"Just because they're talking doesn't mean that the war has 
stopped."(2) With restoration of U.S. aid, the Salvadoran 
government now has no motive for reaching a negotiated settlement 
with the FMLN. On the contrary, the renewed aid will give them the 
resources they need to proceed with their suppression of the FMLN.

Bush will undoubtedly also proceed to release the other half of 
the allotted aid, since all he needs to do to issue the rest is 
certify that the FMLN has failed to negotiate "in good faith" with 
the Salvadoran government at the current U.N.-sponsored 
negotiations in Switzerland.

MIM supports all national liberation movements that are struggling 
to throw off the yoke of imperialism. And the FMLN has been 
organizing and fighting against the United States for years. But 
their coalition tactics have been ineffective. The FMLN's current 
actions only reinforce MIM's previous analysis of the conflict 
(see MIM Notes 46). The FMLN has repeatedly stated that they would 
willingly demobilize and "join the current political process" if 
the government's military is disbanded,(1) affirming the fact that 
the FMLN is not interested in gaining independence for El Salvador 
through revolution. Though it is clear that the FMLN doesn't 
actually want to join the ARENA government, their strategy amounts 
to wanting a bigger slice of the political pie, with no chance of 
attaining national liberation from U.S. interference in the 
Salvadoran economy. Their current rhetoric lacks meaningful 
criticism of U.S. imperialism in Latin America, and rebukes the 
Salvadoran government only in the fact that it has retained "a 
criminal army."

The FMLN stated on Sep. 11, 1989 that they would ask for continued 
U.S. financial aid once the armed struggle had ended, proposing to 
the U.S. Congress "the transformation of military assistance into 
an aid fund for El Salvador's economic and social recovery."(4) 
This makes them, unfortunately, a willing pawn in the United 
States' methodical efforts to cement U.S. hegemony over all of 
Latin America.

Notes:
1. NYT 11/21/90, p. A3.
2. Detroit Free Press 11/29/90, p. 17A.
3. NYT 12/8/90, p. A3.
4. "FMLN Proposal to Achieve Democratization, an end to 
Hostilities and a Just and Lasting Peace in El Salvador," FMLN, 
9/11/89, p. 3