I N T E R N E T ' S M A O I S T M O N T H L Y = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = XX XX XXX XX XX X X XXX XXX XXX XXX X X X X X X X XX X X X X X X X V X X X V X X X X X X X XX XXX X X X X X X XX X X X X X X X XXX X X X V XXX X XXX XXX = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = THE MAOIST INTERNATIONALIST MOVEMENT MIM Notes 63 April 1992 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. REAL FEMINISTS CHOOSE REVOLUTION p4 2. ENFRANCHISED BLACKS; EMPOWERED WHITES 3. AMERIKA EXPOSES NATIVE ALASKANS TO DEADLY TEST 4. STALINIST GARBAGE? 5. AMERIKA'S SOLUTION TO RAPE: CASTRATE BLACK MEN 6. ECO PIG COMES CLEAN 7. IT PAYS TO BE RICH 8. FUJIMORI EXPANDS "CIVIL DEFENSE" UNITS 9. MEXICAN WORKERS STRIKE 10. THE ONE-DAY WAR: ISRAEL INVADES LEBANON 11. COUNTING BEANS IN THE SHADOWS OF THE EMPIRE 12. BRAZILIAN DEATH SQUADS MURDER STREET CHILDREN 13. VIETNAM'S SPRING VICTORY 14. SAYING 'NO' TO COLUMBUS: 500 YEARS OF RESISTANCE 15. RODNEY KING IS EVERY BLACKMAN 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 * * * REAL FEMINISTS CHOOSE REVOLUTION Women who don't have control over their lives can't gain control over their bodies. As hundreds of thousands of women converge on Washington this month for a rally sponsored by the National Organization for Women, revolutionaries are at a crossroads for feminism. As internationalists, we can't forget that the majority of the world's women--80%--are in the Third World. Any movement that doesn't work to overthrow imperialism, the system that dominates those women and their countries, isn't really feminist. All women should have safe, free access to abortion. On that there is no question. But it is only rich women for whom the legal access to abortion itself is the primary issue. When a movement is built around the legal right, separate from the national and class oppressions which regulate the exercise of that "right"--then the First World has produced a movement which does more harm than good. Only the privileged women of the First World would construct a movement based so exclusively on legal rights, pursuing the legality of "choice" as if class and national oppression were not relevant to women. Where was the First World feminist movement when abortion was "legal" but restricted to affluent women? What "choice" can there be without food and shelter? What "choice" can there be when Third World women--including the women of the oppressed nations within Amerika--are locked in struggle with the imperialist patriarchy which seeks to control their population? While First World women clamor for the "right" to choose fewer children, oppressed women face forced sterilization by governments groveling for Amerikan and World Bank approval. Any real feminist movement must face the oppression of the majority of the world's women and confront the imperialist patriarchy head on with a revolutionary movement. See Sterilization, p. 4 * * * ENFRANCHISED BLACKS; EMPOWERED WHITES The biggest electoral hot-air balloon of the season wasn't the U.S. presidential race, but the whites-only referendum in South Africa on March 17. After whites voted two-to-one in favor of President F. W. de Klerk's proposal, he declared, "Today we have closed the book on apartheid."(1) Nothing could be further from the truth. Most white voters-- representing 16.6% of the population--said "yes" to this statement: "Do you support the continuation of the reform process which the State President began on Feb. 2, 1990, and which is aimed at a new constitution through negotiation?"(2) What would the result have been if the question was: "Do you support full equality for Blacks?" The vote represented a victory for ruling-class whites: the South African Chamber of Business supported the referendum based on "practical concerns, rather than moral convictions, to prevent further political instability and economic isolation." The all- white South African Mineworkers Union, on the other hand, urged a "no" vote to protect their top-of-the-market status.(3) Sure enough, the short-term ambitions of the whites came true: the international bourgeoisie cheered, as South African stocks and bonds soared on domestic and international markets.(4) The "reform" process in South Africa has opened the door for political reforms for some Azanians--and bought the white minority nation a lot of time to wage war on the most progressive elements of the oppressed, who have died by the thousands in government- backed "factional fighting." Every day the negotiations continue, the African National Congress grows further from its former mass base--and the country moves closer to revolution. --MC12 Notes: 1. New York Times 3/19/92, p. A1. 2. NYT 3/18/92, p. A4. 3. Wall Street Journal, 2/2/92. 4. WSJ 3/19/92, p. C1. * * * INJECTING DEATH A deadly experimental vaccine campaign has left indigenous Alaskan communities reeling from a perilous outbreak of AIDS. The indigenous people of Alaska; Pine Ridge, South Dakota; and the White Mountain Apache are all the targets of a Centers for Disease Control hepatitis B vaccination experiment which forces the vaccine on school children and newborn infants without informed parental consent. The program takes advantage of the indigenous peoples' dependence on government-sponsored medical care, which also makes centralized record keeping convenient for the doctors of death. The blood-based experimental vaccine used in Alaska was contaminated with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. Leaders from one indigenous tribe say their people have never been so sick. In one village, 30% of the people may be infected. The government calls the arctic lands "a natural laboratory" for research which "may provide information crucial for future defense needs." And the people pay the price. AMERIKA EXPOSES NATIVE ALASKANS TO DEADLY TEST by MC99 eaving a river of blood and a lawsuit in their wake, researchers from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) are on their way from Alaska to Pine Ridge, South Dakota, where they will continue testing hepatitis B vaccines by forcibly inoculating the indigenous population there. It was recently discovered that the vaccine they used was contaminated with the HIV virus, which causes AIDS--it was only administered to indigenous people. The testing ended early in Alaska because people started to refuse the vaccines administered by the Public Health Service (PHS) after a large outbreak of AIDS. The CDC says the White Mountain Apache are also targeted for these experiments. One village may lose 30% of its population as a result of the experiment.(2) History of the vaccine Since 1987, when the vaccination program started, school children have been pulled from class to be vaccinated without informed parental consent. Mary Ann Mills of the Sovereignty Movement explained, "Nobody was told that the vaccine wasn't proven." HIV testing of the U.S. blood supply became mandatory in 1985; the hepatitis B vaccine used is plasma-derived. The source for the antigen (part of the vaccine which contains the disease the vaccine is to prevent) is blood. In 1990, when protests against the experiment were halting the CDC's progress, the Center tried to test the entire indigenous population of Alaska for HIV. Some people were tested, but the results were never disclosed. Indigenous people in Alaska are dependent on the PHS for all of their medical care.(3) Where consent forms existed in this deadly research game, they were purely a legal formality, designed to protect the PHS from having to bear follow-up medical expenses if the vaccine caused any damage. The consent form said that if the vaccinated children suffer any ill-effects they will only be provided with medical care for two years. Unfortunately, the incubation period for HIV is up to 10 years or longer. The school children were vaccinated by the Alaska Native Medical Center, a public service hospital in Anchorage. Since 1987, 50% of indigenous Alaskans (40,000 people) have been inoculated with the hepatitis B vaccine, including 2,000 infants who were vaccinated at birth.(3) Local sources say that AIDS has recently broken out in epidemic proportions in indigenous communities.(2) Picking the subjects The 98th Congress of Alaska wants to pass the Arctic Research and Policy Act, which would designate the Arctic as a territory for research in several fields, including health care. The law calls the Arctic "a natural laboratory for research into human health and adaptation ... [which] may provide information crucial for future defense needs."(4) When studying the course of a disease or virus, the ideal test population is, first, one which is expendable to the ruling class, and also one for which medical history already exists. Indigenous nations fit these criteria well. "Many patients have received lifelong care within this [PHS] system, and their entire medical history has been recorded."(1) These records, available to the Arctic Research Plan, are centralized and computerized, making the data that much more convenient for the doctors of death.(1) Indigenous children are even better research subjects than adults. Dr. Brian McMahn, who headed the hepatitis B vaccine program for the Alaska Native Medical Center, explained: "Frustrated by the widespread reluctance of adults to be vaccinated against Hep. B, a federal panel has recommended that children be vaccinated," he said. "Public Health Service has recommended vaccinating children for a disease whose victims are almost always adults ... the benefits of a hepatitis vaccine program will not appear for about 20 years."(2) One risk of experimental vaccines is that the virus antigens contained in them can recombine their genetic material or combine with unknown viruses, which are part of the body. This combining process can result in a new virus, which has the possibility of being more deadly than the original disease.(3) Science under imperialism is controlled by those in power. In Amerika, the Department of Defense, the CDC, the National Institutes of Health, and the World Health Organization, are the organizations which police all large-scale scientific research. Genocide In one of the 200 affected tribes, the Den'ina, the elders say that their people have never been so sick. In the past they were able to rely exclusively on their own medicine. The stamina of the Arctic indigenous people, in the face of such severe climate, is of interest to colonizers for two reasons. First, by understanding what biologically constitutes the health of the indigenous people, they can covertly wipe out the remaining population. Second, colonizers need more information on how to survive in sub-zero temperatures themselves. Hence the genocidal medical experiments. Historically the Den'ina clans would compete among themselves to see which clan could come up with the best way to help the people, but the tribe is finding that such principles are not exactly compatible with the federal and state governments.(2) The villages are appealing to the United Nations to honor existing treaties with indigenous people--a tactic designed to keep a public focus on the issue--as well as soliciting money from the PHS for doctors. MIM supports all oppressed people's claims to self-determination. But MIM also recognizes that neither money from the PHS nor U.N. intervention will result in the elimination of oppression. Only revolution will do that. Notes: 1. Arctic Research Plan, Interagency Arctic Research Policy Committee, July 1987, p. 220. 2. Women of All Red Nations, February 1992, p.1. 3. Address to the Green Party State Wide Convention, Traditional Den'ina Tribe, September 1991, Homer, Alaska. 4. Public Law 98-373, 98th Congress, Section 102(6). * * * STALINIST GARBAGE? In recent months, MIM has been posting Maoist flyers across the country. Many of these flyers get torn down, and MIM has noticed that our anti-Trotskyist flyers are in the greatest danger. On one lamp post in the East MIM found a response posted below the flyer. MIM commends the writer of this response for placing their views in front of the public to let the masses judge, rather than simply tearing down the flyer of their opposition. MIM is happy to offer the writer's opinions even wider circulation than they would receive on a lamp post by reprinting their letter here with MIM's response. TEXT OF MIM'S FLYER Myth: Trotskyism is a revolutionary communist alternative to Stalinism and Maoism. Fact: In 65 years of practice, there has been NOT ONE revolution led under the banner of Trotskyism--not the Soviet Union (where a majority of the leaders of the Revolution threw Trotsky out), not China, not Albania, not Korea, not Vietnam, not Kampuchea, not Eritrea and not Ethiopia. While Trotskyists have led no Third World revolutions, they have succeeded in one thing--splitting the First World communist movement. Trotskyists--communists in words, best friends of the ruling class in deeds. Trotskyism--part of the problem, not part of the solution. A CRITIC'S RESPONSE Note to the MIM, This is Stalinist GARBAGE! You are forgetting one socialist revolution in which Trotsky played a leading role (second only to Lenin): The Russian Revolution! Just because Russia is now turning back to capitalism in no way negates Trotsky's contributions to Russian and world revolution. If Trotsky was expelled from the Russian Communist Party, it was because of his opposition to the power-hungry dictator who destroyed every early Bolshevik who stood in his way: Joseph Stalin. Lenin considered Trotsky's ideas and work valuable to the Russian Revolution, and they are valuable today. The last thing we need in a Marxist and socialist movement is this narrow-minded "toe the party line" attitude. There must be room for differences of opinion and a free exchange of ideas. That includes the ideas of Trotsky, which by now should be rescued from the Stalinist rewritings of history. Go back and study and learn! --An independent-minded Marxist MIM'S REJOINDER ON THE LAMP POST Note to independent-minded Marxist, MIM is glad to see you place your beliefs before the public for all to judge. MIM has studied and learned from history--from the lack of successful Trotskyist history among other things. Trotskyists have been sitting around waiting for world revolution for 65 years while people in the Third World have been having revolutions in spite of Trotsky, who said socialism could not be built in the Soviet Union (reason enough to expel him from the party) and cannot be advanced in any country with a national liberation revolution. While society is moving forward, the Trotskyists are still back in the 1920s wishing for revolution in the West. A closer reading of Lenin (see: The United States of Europe Slogan among other things) will reveal that Lenin did believe in advancing socialism in one country, at the time in the Soviet Union, and he specifically refuted Trotsky's counterrevolutionary rhetoric to the contrary. This is just one of many important points on which Lenin and Stalin disagreed with Trotsky. As a defender of Trotsky, it is ironic how you only care about revolution in one country--the Soviet Union--while Maoists are supporting and leading revolutions all over the world. MIM will print your note (in the interest of the free exchange of ideas) along with a response. We hope you will take our response as seriously as we take your note--don't be misled by Trotskyist rhetoric, look at their practice: No revolution=support of imperialism. * * * AMERIKA'S SOLUTION TO RAPE: CASTRATE BLACK MEN For the thousands of young, wealthy, white men on Amerikan college campuses who are accused of rape each year, society prescribes "sensitivity training." For a Black 28-year-old man who has worked as a shoe-shiner much of his life--now accused of rape--some Amerikans are calling for castration. At the urging of Texas State District Court Judge Michael T. McSpadden and with the collusion of his own lawyer, his doctor, the state prosecutor, and the accuser and her family, Steven Butler--convicted for molesting a 13-year-old--last month agreed to be castrated in lieu of a prison sentence.(1) Butler's relatives and the Houston chapter of the Black United Front protested the sentence, and Butler himself changed his mind- -choosing prison over mutilation--when told of the medical consequences of the operation.(2) "Rights" activists and some so-called feminists had scary things to say about the mutilation sentence: "It makes you feel good, but in the long haul it doesn't deal in any way with the basic issues of sexual assault," said Cassandra Thomas of the National Coalition Against Sexual Assault, about why she was not satisfied with the castration sentence. Watching a Black man coerced into bargaining away his testicles doesn't make revolutionaries feel good--it makes us mad as hell. Butler's case is a good example of why MIM, like the Black Panther Party of the 1960s, believes Blacks cannot get a fair trial in white Amerika's courts. In a country where fascist leader David Duke gets millions of white votes and imprisonment rates for Black people are more than seven times higher than for white people, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that the "justice" system is grossly biased in favor of the white nation.(3) But when sex comes into the picture, Blacks are especially subject to persecution by privileged whites pressing for white supremacist justice. Under Amerika's capitalist system, where social inequality makes uncoerced sex impossible, pseudo-feminists have turned the accusation of rape into a tool to imprison and subjugate Black men. Castration is not a new concept to the 25% of Black men who go to prison during their lifetimes: Butler's case simply serves up harsh symbolism of how far the white nation is willing to apply its legal system toward the genocide of its Black colony. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, 22% of the people convicted for raping white women are Black.(4) Since Blacks account for 13% of the population, and people generally have sex with (and rape) those of their own "race," this number is extremely skewed. The distortion results largely from pseudo- feminists urging women to use the imperialist state to stop rape: a form of oppression that can only be expunged by overthrowing the very system they look to for help. Indeed, white "feminists" even tell Black women to turn Black men over to the cops, all in the name of sisterhood. --MC11 Notes: 1. New York Times 3/7/92 p. A1. 2. NYT 3/13/92 p. A8. 3. Americans Behind Bars: A Comparison of International Rates of Incarceration. Available from: The Sentencing Project 918 F St. N.W. Suite 501, Washington D.C. 20004. Cited in Prison News Service July/August 1991. 4. Female Victims of Crime, January 1991 NCJ-1268826. * * * ECO PIG COMES CLEAN "Lawrence Summers, chief economist of the World Bank, sent a memorandum to some colleagues on December 12th [1991]." Excerpts: "Just between you and me, shouldn't the World Bank be encouraging more migration of the dirty industries to the LDCs [Less-Developed Countries]? ... I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest-wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that ... "I've always thought that under-populated countries in Africa are vastly under- polluted ... The concern over an agent that causes a one-in-a-million change in the odds of prostate cancer is obviously going to be much higher in a country where people survive to get prostate cancer than in a country where under-5 mortality is 200 per thousand." Eco-pig Summers notes that arguments against exporting toxic waste pollution to the Third World include "intrinsic rights to certain goods, moral reasons, social concerns, lack of adequate markets, etc." He goes on to comment that these petty concerns shouldn't bother the World Bank today since they never have in the past. -- MC86 Notes: The Economist 2/8/92, p. 66. * * * IT PAYS TO BE RICH A dentist in Tokyo, Japan had his life saved when a bullet from a gunman was stopped by his fat wallet. The pigs claimed the bullet was found halfway through the bundle of 42 bills of Mr. Oyama's wallet. The reason for the attempt on his life was not revealed. - -MA68 Notes: Associated Press, 2/1/92. * * * FUJIMORI EXPANDS "CIVIL DEFENSE" UNITS Peru's President Alberto Fujimori said his government may hand out weapons to Lima residents so they can "protect" themselves from the revolution. Last year the New York Times reported that the Peruvian government handed out weapons to paid-off peasants outside of Lima, the capital, in a desperate attempt to stop the revolutionary tide led by the Maoist Communist Party of Peru (PCP). These government-backed militias are in fact low-budget civilian death squads, and their brutal killings are often blamed on the PCP. Fujimori also put a $500,000 reward to anyone who kills Comrade Gonzalo, chairman of the PCP. Many of these calls by Fujimori came in response to the successful one-day armed strike of Lima called by the PCP on Feb. 14. The PCP continue selected assassinations, military strikes and creation of base areas in Lima shantytowns, in preparation for liberating Lima from bureaucratic capitalism and imperialism. While Fujimori was dishing out weapons to fight the PCP, he ironically criticized the United States during a recent drug summit in Texas by saying that U.S. funding is inadequate and its policies are imbalanced for emphasizing police and military repression. --MC67 Notes: Weekly News Update on Nicaragua and the Americas. Nicaragua Solidarity Network of Greater New York, Issues 108, 109. 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY. 10012. $25/year. * * * MEXICAN WORKERS STRIKE On Jan. 27, some 7,500 maquiladora workers struck at two General Motors plants and two auto supply companies in Matamoros, Mexico. Three of the four firms agreed to a 25.5% wage increase to end the strikes, but other issues remained unresolved. On Jan. 28, another 7,500 workers walked off the job at four more companies. The union represents 32,500 maquila workers; as many as 27,000 could walk out if agreements are not reached with the Maquiladora Association of Matamoros, which represents 62 mostly U.S.-owned plants. Many of these workers make less than a dollar an hour, and those wages are better than other workers' since the Matamoros workers are unionized. They are super-exploited--they earn wages below subsistence level. The U.S. capitalists who own many industrial plants in Mexico super-exploit the workers, rake in the profits for themselves and use some of them as concessions to keep white workers north of the border quiet. --MC67 Notes: Weekly News Update on Nicaragua and the Americas. Nicaragua Solidarity Network of Greater New York, Issue 106. * * * THE ONE-DAY WAR: ISRAEL INVADES LEBANON Using a bulldozer to throw off U.N. troops, Israeli tanks and armored personnel carriers roared into Lebanon on Feb. 20 to attack guerrilla fighters in the villages of Kafra and Yater. The guerillas, reported to be members of the Party of God, were firing rockets into northern Israel and Israel's occupied "security zone" in southern Lebanon.(1) The invasion was part of Israel's expansionist program to grab territory in the region and to squash Arab revolutionaries fighting for self-determination. The Israeli Army invaded Lebanon in 1982, driving all the way to the capital city of Beirut. Israel established the "security zone" in 1985. After the exchange of rocket fire and the invasion, guerillas from the Party of God and the Syrian-backed Amal have agreed to withdraw from southern Lebanon to avoid further Israeli incursions.(4) The invasion came just four days after Israeli commandos assassinated Party of God Leader Sheik Abbas Musawi in southern Lebanon. Party of God fighters launched rockets into Israel in retaliation.(2) Israel responded with an artillery barrage against 30 Lebanese towns. Lebanese police said that the shelling killed five people and wounded 50; 75,000-100,000 refugees have fled their villages within the "security zone."(3) Israeli helicopter gun ships swooped down on Musawi's motorcade on Feb. 16 as he left a rally in the town of Jibchit, just north of the "security zone." Rocket fire blew his car to pieces. His wife, five-year-old son and at least four body guards were also killed. Israeli Army commandos fired automatic weapons at people fleeing the scene.(3) The assassination is part of Israeli-Amerikan work to put down Muslim and other nationalist revolutionaries. Musawi had just condemned the current Washington peace talks as a sham, saying, "America wants to dominate everything."(2) The Party of God is making anti-imperialist demands, including calling for Israel to withdraw from all of Lebanon and the city of Jerusalem.(3) The so-called Arab-Israeli conflict is not one of racism or religious hatred, as many pundits say. It is a conflict between imperialist and oppressed countries. Israel occupies Palestinian lands and part of the country of Lebanon. This occupation, and the invasions and wars necessary to maintain it, are only possible with the extensive help of the United States, which gives Israel $3-4 billion every year. Israeli commandos previously abducted Party of God leader Sheik Abdel Karim Obeid from his home in southern Lebanon in 1989. They have since offered to trade him for Israeli prisoners of war.(3) According to the New York Times, the Party of God was formed when a contingent of Iranian soldiers was sent to Lebanon to help repel the invading Israeli army. The West views the party as an Iranian- backed state terrorist organization.(3) The Party of God claimed responsibility for the 1983 bombing of the U.S. embassy and Marine Corps compound in Lebanon, in which 241 people, the majority U.S. Marines, were killed. It also claimed responsibility for bombing a French Army barracks and the 1985 bombings of U.S. and French embassies in Kuwait.(3) All mainstream media information out of Israel is censored by the government.(1) --MC� Notes: 1. New York Times 2/21/92, p. 1. 2. NYT 2/27/92, p. 1. 3. NYT 2/27/92, p. 6. 4. Detroit News 2/23/92, p. 3. * * * COUNTING BEANS IN THE SHADOWS OF THE EMPIRE The recent formation of Emerging Markets Corporation (EMC), an investment management firm specializing in underdeveloped countries, is a good example of how "development" banks are shadows of imperialist banks. EMC plans to manage investments in Mexico, Chile, Venezuela, Thailand, Indonesia, India and Hungary. Donald C. Roth, to be the chief executive of the new firm, is leaving his post as treasurer of the World Bank. Other executives include a former vice president of Salomon Brothers, and a former senior vice president of the World Bank. At the end of 1990, portfolio (publicly traded) investments in Third World companies came to about $20 billion, and Roth expects that to increase to $100 billion. He expects a $5 billion share of this market. EMC shows some of the dynamics of capitalist circles. Roth and Moeen A. Qureshi both held high-level executive positions in the World Bank. Qureshi worked for International Monetary Fund for 13 years. The World Bank and International Monetary Fund are banks set up to supposedly help Third World countries develop, but in reality they merely tie the countries down with high interest loans and forced austerity measures, to serve the interest of imperialism. They also help Third World dictators--comprador bourgeoisies like General Suharto of Indonesia--get rich. These two men are using their contacts and sophisticated analysis of Third World conditions and hooking up with a Wall Street tycoon--Jay F. Higgins--to get super-rich from paper investments. --MC67 Notes: New York Times 2/13/92, p. C4. * * * BRAZILIAN DEATH SQUADS MURDER STREET CHILDREN by MC86 A report released in mid-February revealed that Brazilian government-backed death squads are killing 2-3 street children per day in Brazil's largest cities, a rate which has been steadily increasing over the past five years.(1) Back in late November 1991, "thousands of ... street kids from seven cities marched through Rio's financial district to protest ... the systematic extermination of street kids" by the death squads.(2) "Storekeepers hire the squads to 'clean-up' high-crime areas where 'You can get a kid under age ten killed for $40,' said one Rio police officer. 'Now, a kid who runs drugs or heads a gang is more expensive. His head can cost up to $500.'"(2) Oppressed children often suffer under the harshest conditions of all, including homelessness, hunger, sexual assault, and early death. So it is in the United States, where young Black men are systematically killed or rounded up in prison to keep the streets "safe" for Amerikan business and consumers--and to suppress the revolutionary resistance within the Black nation. School daze In the state of Rio de Janeiro alone, Amnesty International recorded 1,175 exterminations of youth in the first six months of 1989.(4) Videos of burnings and lynchings have been featured on Brazilian television.(5) The state has created a "Ministry of Child Affairs" but, "only $1 out of every $20 allocated ... filters down to the children's level."(6) "The death squads don't just kill children," says Judge Siro Darlan of the juvenile courts. "They go after criminals, homosexuals, old people, anybody. They exist because the government can't guarantee security to the people. So it's a threatened population that takes things into their own hands."(7) The Brazilian Institute's 1989 report documented that 80% of the victims were males between the ages of 15 and 18--the truly "threatened population."(1) Health Minister Alceni Guerra said the government had evidence that businessmen are financing and directing the killing of street children. Fully half of the members of the city's death squads are off-duty or ex-cops. Brazilian police officers are paid $100 a month.(7) Moonlighting brings in the extras. Col. Carlos Cerqueria, chief of Rio's police force, states, "The public isn't happy. They want us to be tougher with homeless kids and get them off the streets. In the developed world, people don't question whether a kid has the right to live if he's broken the law. In Brazil, we're still discussing it."(7) But the so-called developed world is not so sure either. For Third World people--both in and outside of the U.S.--population control programs, forced sterilization, high infant mortality rates, and short life expectancies, all decrease Third World population, for the "crime" of being too many, too angry and too dangerous. Black and broke Fifty percent of Brazil's 150 million people are descendents of African slaves. Of the 37 million children who live in poverty in Brazil, as many as twelve million are homeless on the street.(8) A report compiled by the Brazilian Institute for Social and Economic Research and the National Street Children's Movement shows that (in areas where nationality had been recorded) "82% of the victims [in the first six months of 1989] were black or of mixed race."(1) The Street Children's Movement, founded in 1985, claims close to one million members. Officially, the November march was held for passage of child protection legislation by the national Congress.(3) In reality, the children marched for their lives. Brazil's choking debt to imperialist banks has reached $111 billion and hundreds of thousands of people are streaming into the cities begging for bare subsistence jobs.(7) The 26 Brazilian states are on the verge of bankruptcy and cannot pay their employees, and minimum wage is $40 a month.(6) Brazil is being reamed by foreign capital as the broad masses starve and "unruly" street children are systematically eliminated. Notes: 1. Third World Resurgence 1/92, p. 40. 2. San Francisco Chronicle 11/30/91, p. A7. 3. Third World 7/91, p. 47. 4. Amnesty International 1990. 5. Los Angeles Times 3/17/91, p. A4. 6. Latinamerica Press 11/23/89, p. 4. 7. Insight 8/5/91, pp. 12-20. 8. Latinamerica Press 11/23/89, p. 4; Insight 8/5/91, p. 12. * * * VIETNAM'S SPRING VICTORY Although Amerika's final days in Vietnam have been the subject of many fictions, documentaries and political essays, most of these accounts ask "Why did Amerika lose?" But the more potent question is "How did Vietnam win?" To help answer this question, MIM excerpts several chapters from Our Great Spring Victory by General Van Tien Dung, the Vietnamese Communist Party Central Committee member in charge of the Ho Chi Minh campaign launched against Saigon from April 26-April 30, 1975. "During the process of the strategic general offensive, our party followed the enemy's decline very closely, discovering evidence of their disintegration in time to take positive steps to capitalize on it. Striking just at the opportune moment, a small force would have great power.... "[As the campaign unfolded] cadres and fighters knew this was the most decisive battle of this final phase of the general offensive and uprising that would conclude the war against the United States. Before their eyes were the last ramparts of the most obstinate and reactionary band of lackeys of the U.S. imperialist aggressors, the enemy we had to destroy.... "The tasks of political mobilization and ideological education had been carried out continuously and creatively in our armed forces, so that our cadres and fighters had become all-around people, strong and wholesome in mind and body.... "Ho Chi Minh campaign headquarters was bustling with activity the night of April 29. Flashlights, hurricane lamps, and headlights burned bright in every hut and along every road. Gray heads bent over black heads as they pored over the maps, watching the vivid red arrowheads being drawn longer and longer.... "In these sacred hours ... the fighters wrote on their helmets, on their sleeves, on their gun slings the immortal proclamation of President Ho Chi Minh: Forward! Total victory is ours! "When it was almost light, the American news services reported that [U.S. Ambassador] Martin had cleared out of Saigon in a helicopter. This viceregal mandarin, the final American plenipotentiary in South Vietnam, beat a most hasty and pitiful retreat. As it happened, up until the day he left Saigon, Martin still felt certain that his quisling administration could be preserved.... He went all the way out to Tan Son Nhat airfield to observe the situation. Our barrage of bombs and our fierce shelling had nearly paralyzed this vital airfield, and the fixed- wing aircraft they had intended to use for their evacuation could longer operate.... When Martin reported this to Washington, President Ford issued order to begin a helicopter evacuation.... "At the height of their invasion of Vietnam, the United States had used 60% of their total infantry, 58% of their Marines, 32% of their tactical Air Force, 50% of their strategic Air Force, 15 of 18 aircraft carriers, 800,000 American troops (counting those stationed in satellite countries who were taking part in the Vietnam war), and more than 1 million Saigon troops. They mobilized as many as 6 million American soldiers in rotation, dropped over 10 million tons of bombs, and spent over $300 billion, but in the end the U.S. ambassador had to crawl up to the helicopter pad looking for a way to flee. Today, looking back on the gigantic force the enemy had mobilized, recalling the malicious designs they admitted, and thinking about the extreme difficulties and complexities which our revolutionary sampan had to pass through, we were all the more aware of how immeasurably great this campaign to liberate Saigon and liberate the South was." There is a sad postscript to this victory, however. Since the glorious spring of 1975, Vietnam has faltered. Its collectivized agricultural system fell apart, corruption in the party and failure to apply the mass line destroyed its planned markets and now the "communist" leaders boldly advocate capitalism, begging the U.S. to lift the trade embargo and bring foreign investment to Vietnam. For a 100 page essay on socialism in unified Vietnam, send $8, cash or check made out to ABS. --MC� Notes: Van Tien Dung. Our Great Spring Victory. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1977. Available from MIM for $7, postage paid. * * * SAYING 'NO' TO COLUMBUS: 500 YEARS OF RESISTANCE by MC86 Indigenous people from the North Pole to the tip of South America are organizing themselves to gain independent power in the face of 500 years of capitalist, imperialist extermination. Leaders representing 1,000 indigenous nations, with 39 million people in Meso and South America, and 1.8 million inside Fortress Amerika, have been forging international political links. Meeting in 1989 and 1990 in Quito, Ecuador, these leaders issued a Declaration rejecting the "Quincentennial" celebration called by international capital to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the invasion of Abya-Yala (the "pre-Colombian" term for the Amerikas) by the pirate Cristobel Colon. The word "colonize" has its origin in the real name of this first white settler. "Celebrating the arrival of the Spaniards would be like celebrating the massacre of one's own family," says Rigoberta Menchu of Guatemala.(1) "You wouldn't ask a Jewish person to celebrate Hitler's birthday," says Angelica Gonzalez, president of United Latino Artists of Los Angeles. "Why would you ask us to celebrate Columbus?"(2) Although Hitler's birthday is not yet an official public holiday in Amerika, the settler masses do worship a variety of thugs with special shopping days. So it comes as no surprise that General Mills tells cereal box readers that "Columbus discovered the New World" and "celebrated with a breakfast including Honey Nut Cheerios."(3) Resistance past The 100 million indigenous people who populated Abya-Yala in 1492 did not peacefully jump into their graves. The T�inos, original inhabitants of Haiti, poured molten gold down the throats of conquistadores. Ordinary people have always violently resisted colonization. Of the T�inos, Colon wrote in his log, "With 50 men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want."(4) The communal societies of Abya-Yala were not conquered by sheer numbers of grubby settlers prosecuting unjust wars. The colonies were militantly garrisoned by millions of workers fleeing European poverty to settle in Amerika. Expanding colonialism at that time demanded that increasing natural resources be brought back to Europe, so "explorers" were sent out to steal land and raw materials, and slaves, if possible. But the Europeans fought many losing battles, and might not have conquered Abya-Yala overall, had it not been for their high-tech weapons--not only their guns and ammo, but also smallpox and other lethal germs. Resistance present Through their experience with imperialist ruthlessness, the oppressed necessarily learn that political power does not grow out of the barrel of a pen. Today, the Communist Party of Peru leads by example in successfully demonstrating that there are no "rights," only power struggles. The 500 Years of Resistance movement has no bureaucratic center, and actions are autonomously planned and executed in different areas. But "some groups within the popular movement of South & Meso America persist in their attempts to reduce the Indian cause to just a class struggle by imposing their agendas and political framework, minimizing all political dimensions and aspirations of Indian peoples."(6) MIM recognizes that class struggle is conditioned by gender and revolutionary national interests, and we support revolutionary national liberation struggles. MIM also knows that without sharpened revolutionary communist organizations as the cutting edge on the knife of the people's wrath, attempts to reform capitalist governments will simply result in the continued reign of death-squad power. What they want. What we believe MIM upholds and critically supports the 500 Years of Resistance movement as a potentially powerful tool to create public opinion and help wipe the fog off the Looking Glass. Ultimately, we work for a concentrated unity of all oppressed peoples into a great revolutionary force, that will wipe our planet clean of private property, patriarchy, and national oppression. This is happening-- one step at a time. MIM urges the 500 Years of Resistance movement to scientifically build independent power bases for the world revolution and not to be seduced by the false promises of oppressive governments. This is the first in a MIM Notes series covering the 500 Years of Resistance. Next month: contradictions between urban and rural interests in the process of building independent power of the oppressed. Notes: 1. Report on Guatemala Winter 1991, p. 2. 2. The Reporter 2/2/92, p. 1. 3. Cereal box, emphasis added. 4. Rethinking Columbus, p. 7; educational pamphlet available from Rethinking Schools, 1001 E. Keefe Ave., Milw., WI 53212, $6 includes postage. 5. Bulletin from Consejo Regional Indigena del Cauca-CRIC, Popayan, Cauca, Colombia, 12/18/91. 6. South and Meso American Indian Information Center (SAIIC), P.O. Box 28703, Oakland, CA 94604, $10. Newsletter, p 3. * * * RODNEY KING IS EVERY BLACKMAN by MC67 Before the Rodney King beating case came up for trial, the state scrambled to make sure they had it their way in advance. The trial was moved to a mostly-white community, and all Black people were kicked off the potential jury during questioning. The case was a politically-charged symbol of every-day police brutality at its worst. Liberals and well-meaning reformists harbor the illusion that justice can be attained within a capitalist, imperialist society. But justice will never be realized in Amerika until Blacks, Latinos and indigenous people throw off the chains of colonial rule and seize power. Beginning on Feb. 5, lawyers sifted through a pool of 2,000 people in search of an "impartial" jury.(1) Much to the joy of the defense team, the trial was moved from Los Angeles to a conservative and wealthy white community, Simi Valley, north of L.A.--home of Ronald Reagan's Presidential library and many police officers. Approximately 1% of the residents there are Black.(2,3) A 41-page questionnaire asked potential jurors about their attitudes toward the police, their past experiences with the police, and their affiliations with political organizations.(1) The state would never allow this trial to be held in downtown L.A.--not because of the jury, which could have been rigged anywhere--but because the courtroom would have been a "madhouse" and a center for political organization of the oppressed. The cops are charged with five felony counts, including assault by force likely to produce great bodily injury and assault with a deadly weapon.(4) The beating occurred on Mar. 3, 1991, when King was pulled over for a traffic violation and viciously assaulted by three white L.A. police officers, with more than 40 other people witnessing thescene.(4) King was struck at least 56 times with nightsticks and kicked seven times.(5) He suffered nine skull fractures, a shattered eye socket and cheekbone, a broken leg, a concussion, injuries to both knees, facial nerve damage that left his face partially paralyzed, as well as burns on his chest from a Taser dart gun shot.(4) After the beating, King was hogtied and dragged face-down to the side of the road; an ambulance arrived five minutes later.(4) A year later, King suffers from memory loss, slurred speech, blurred vision, a limp; and he is unable to work.(6) People should be outraged by the King beating, but progressive people must keep in mind that Rodney King is just one of thousands of people in Amerika who get brutalized by the police every year. The only thing which makes King an exception is the publicity his case has received. The brutality is extensive. Although many local "cop-watch" groups do exist, MIM is not aware of any national organization that compiles complete statistics on police brutality or complaints against the cops.(4) For now, all we have to go on are records of official complaints and Justice Department figures--both with flaws. The Police Misconduct Lawyer Referral Service, a local L.A. agency, logged more than 600 complaints against the L.A. Police Department (LAPD) in 1990. About 25% of these complaints involved explicit allegations of assaults by the police, but only two of the 600 complaints actually resulted in felony charges.(4) In New York, between 1985 and 1989, 24,651 allegations of police misconduct were filed with the Civilian Complaint Review Board.(9) According to the New York ACLU, however, only one officer in the past six years has been convicted of brutality charges.(100 According to figures compiled by the Department of Criminal Justice, 17,707 charges of police "misconduct" have been "investigated" around the country by the FBI in the past six years. These federal cases do not include those handled solely by local police departments--which are the majority of police complaints.(8) The Rodney King case has prompted liberals to call for watchdog agencies, independent special prosecutors, and better police training--as if the problem is simply a few "bad" cops. Police review boards and other accountability reforms are only a smokescreen. Such reforms do not reduce the number of police brutality complaints and cops still serve the same functions as always: capitalist protection, control and terror. Rich capitalists need protection from the oppressed nationals who commit "crimes" in response to their misery. "Law and order" means maintaining capitalists' control of resources, people, and their labor. The real criminals are the capitalists who, in their greedy pursuit of profit, steal relentlessly from the people. Until oppressed people take state power, police terror will continue. Notes: 1. New York Times 3/2/92, p. 10. 2. Christian Science Monitor 2/6/92, p.2. 3. NYT 2/22/92, p. 8. 4. NYT 3/18/91, p. 1, 8. 5. NYT 3/12/91, p. 15. 6. NYT 2/3/92, pp. 1, 12. 7. The Crisis, Newspaper of the NAACP. 4/91, p. 27. 8. NYT 3/21/91, p. 10. 9. NYT 3/27/92, p. A15. 10. Black Scholar May/June 1986.