POLITICAL JOUWAL OF fKfdKlE Flff. OI&AH&HG COMMITTEEVnl.VII No.1 Winter 1983 $1.50

wornImperialism and the

TABLE OF CONTENTS*1. EDITORIAL

REPRESSION, RESISTANCE AND THE LEFT: The Empire Strikes Back 1

2. ON NEW AFRIKAN FREEDOM FIGHTERS DAYSpeech by Judith Mirkinson on behalf of PFOC,August 21,1982 5

3. THE TAMING OF THE FREEZEImperialist War and the Anti-Nuclear Movement 8

4. KRIEG DEM IMPERIALIST KRIEG (WAR ON IMPERIALIST WAR)Materials from the German Anti-Imperialist Movement 16

RAF Communique: Assassination Attempt on General KroesenRed Army Fraction (September 19, 1981) 17

"War on Imperialist War"by Women Against Imperialist War (Hamburg, West Germany) 18

5. JUDGMENT OF THE GRAND JURYby Carlos Noya, Liga Socialista PuertorriquenaReprinted from Correo de la Quincena, Mar.-Sept., 1982 24

6. "THIS COURT HAS NO RIGHT TO TRY US"Statements by New Afrikan and White Anti-Imperialist Freedom Fighters 28

7. STOP THE GRAND JURY! DEFEAT THE FEDERAL RICO INDICTMENT!Statement from May 19th Communist Organization 31

On the Cover: Berlin, West Germany, September 3, 1981—Thousands demonstrate against the visit of U.S.Secretary of State Alexander Haig.

Breakthrough,\h& political journal of Prairie Fire Organizing Committee is published by the John BrownBook Club, P.O. Box 14422, San Francisco, CA 94114. This is Volume VII, No. 1, whole number 10.

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BREAKTHROUGH/page 1

EDITORIAL

REPRESSION, RESISTANCEAND THE LEFT:

THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACKThe battle of Beirut will haunt imperialism and remain

etched in the consciousness of progressive people foryears to come. The Palestinian and Lebanese resistance seta standard for revolutionary struggle—the uncompromis-ing defense of principle and the spirit of sacrifice andcourage which turned military setback into moral andpolitical victory. They showed that oppressed people willfight, against all odds, for their national liberation. Andthat genocide is empire's only weapon against a peopledetermined to be free. The example of Palestinian andLebanese freedom fighters contesting every inch ofground against U.S.-supplied Israeli rockets, tanks andcluster bombs poses a challenge to anti-imperialists in theU.S. As the Palestinian struggle continues, we have aresponsibility and opportunity to make our solidarity realby sharpening our own battle against U.S. imperialism.

The U.S.-sponsored Israeli invasion of Lebanon, cli-maxing in the hideous massacres at Sabra and Shatilla,was the cutting edge in what has become a worldwideimperialist counter-offensive against movements fornational liberation and socialism. The CIA is at this verymoment directing open counter-revolutionary war againstthe government of Nicaragua, while the U.S. and Israelincrease military aid to the Nazi-like regimes in Hon-duras, El Salvador and Guatemala. Shortly before gettinghis clean bill of health from Reagan, dictator Efrain RiosMontt warned the Guatemalan people, "If you are with thegovernment, you will eat. If you stand against us, you willdie." This is also the message which the U.S.-backed dela Madrid government in Mexico is sending to that coun-try's impoverished working class and peasantry. While thewealth of Mexico is looted to repay U.S. banks, the PRI isescalating its violent attacks against the Comite deDefensa Popular (CDP) and other popular forces. InAfrica, the U.S. and South Africa are coordinating majormilitary operations against the revolutionary governmentsof Angola and Mozambique. In the spirit of "constructiveengagement" with the South African racists, the Reaganadministration has just shipped 2,500 electrified shockbatons to the South African police force. In Puerto Rico,the CIA and FBI are intensifying their war against thearmed clandestine movement as they move to implement

the 2020 Plan, designed to stripmine the island and turnPuerto Rico into a series of military bases and industrialparks by the year 2020. Here at home, in the midst of theworst economic crisis since the Great Depression of the1930s, the state has launched its heaviest assault on theNew Afrikan and other national liberation movementssince the height of COINTELPRO.

These are the grim realities behind Reagan's frozensmile and Hollywood handshake. Imperialism meansmurder, poverty and genocide for millions around theworld. These are not simply the policies of one right-wingadministration. U.S. imperialism is entering a new periodcharacterized by increasing aggression and violence as itattempts to shore up its shaken empire and solidify anational consensus behind white supremacy.

This is what we have to contend with. But many liberalsand leftists, head in the sand, refuse to face facts. Grasp-ing at straws, they issue hopeful predictions of a "newmoderation" in the wake of Democratic Party victories inthe 1982 elections. New York Times columnist TomWicker calls the election results "evidence of the essentialmoderation of the American public." Tom Hayden cele-brates his victory in a race for California State Assembly(achieved at a cost of $2 million) as the "dawning of a newday for the Democratic Party." Proponents of the nuclearfreeze rejoice over electoral victories in seven states andlook to the Democratic Congress for passage of a pro-freeze resolution, optimistic that this will help stop thearms build-up.

These are rose-colored fantasies. Imperialism uses boththe iron fist and the velvet glove, Republican "conserva-tism" and Democratic "liberalism." But the inexorablemotion, at this stage of history, is to the right. And it willget worse as the crisis deepens. Militarism and economicausterity on the backs of Third World people are alreadyenshrined as the strategy of both major ruling class parties.While 80% of New Afrikan youth are without work, theDemocrats drop their call for full employment from theirSeptember, 1982 economic report. Despite their rhetoric,the Democrats now officially accept high long-term unem-ployment as the price for "economic recovery."

Yes, there is some heat over the nuclear freeze. But this

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Massacre in Beirut: imperialism implements its Middle East "peace" plan.

obscures the widespread ruling class agreement that con-ventional military forces be strengthened, particularlycounter-insurgency units for use in the Third World. Mon-dale, Hayden and Kennedy vie with Reagan for the Zionistvote. And both parties push the "war on crime," the codeword for massive imprisonment of Black and other ThirdWorld youth and a police reign of terror in colonizedcommunities.

What is happening in America is not some bad dreamwhich will go away when enough progressive Democratsare elected. As the contradictions sharpen, resistance andmotion will develop, particularly among the colonizedwithin U.S. borders. Already there is a real upsurge instruggle and angry protest among New Afrikan, PuertoRican, Mexicano and Native people. The white suprema-cist, patriotic American consensus, rebuilt so carefullysince the Viet Nam war, is showing some strains under theweight of national liberation around the world and eco-nomic crisis at home. This means there are more openingsto build anti-imperialist movement now than at any timesince the late 1960s. The potential for militant movementcan be seen in the anti-Klan confrontations, led by theBlack community, which have recently taken place inWashington, D.C. and Boston. In D.C., the Black com-munity fought back against the police, chanting "Thecops are the Klan." Many white demonstrators joined thebattle, showing that they would not stand idly by and

accept the rise of white supremacy and fascism.But just as surely as the growing resistance of colonized

people will challenge white working class people to fightimperialism, the established white left will be there to tryto put out the fire. Opportunists steer the anti-war base ofthe nuclear freeze movement into meaningless electoralbattles. They respond, at best, with polite protest againstthe Israeli invasion of Lebanon and, at worst, with openapologies for Zionism. They urge the anti-Klan movementto petition Congress to "ban the Klan," and they triedtheir best to contain the militant confrontation in thestreets of D.C. They function as a safety valve for thesystem, holding out the false hopes that reform and theballot box will be the vehicles of social change.

COUNTER-INSURGENCY: WAR IN THE U.S.

Nowhere is the bankruptcy of these politics more evi-dent than in the deafening silence with which the left hasgreeted the state's escalating war against the New Afrikan,Puerto Rican and Mexicano movements. Over the past 15months, since the attempted expropriation of a Brinkstruck in Nyack, N.Y. by the Black Liberation Army(BLA) and white revolutionaries, we have seen a full-scalecampaign to brand national liberation movements withinthe U.S. as criminals and terrorists. The Brinks investiga-

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tion is now the largest and most expensive FBI operationever. We have seen the Joint FBI/NYPD Terrorist TaskForce emerge as a death squad, responsible for theassassination of New Afrikan freedom fighter MtayariSundiata; the brutal and systematic tortures of NewAfrikan prisoners of war; and physical threats and intim-idation directed at supporters of the New Afrikan Indepen-dence Movement. Growing numbers of New Afrikan andwhite anti-imperialist comrades have been imprisoned forrefusing to collaborate with the grand jury supposedlyinvestigating the Brinks expropriation. RICO racketeeringand conspiracy laws, designed to indict Mafia figures,have been used for the first time against revolutionaries inthe Brinks case. Puerto Rican and Mexicano leaders of theMLN (Movimiento de Liberacion Nacional) are targets ofa related grand jury witchhunt that is aimed at destroyingthe revolutionary Puerto Rican independence movement.The state's plan is to perfect the grand jury as an instru-ment for political internment, just like what the Britishpractice in Northern Ireland. The state is attempting todestroy public revolutionary organizations like the MLN,Provisional Government of the Republic of New Afrika(RNA) and May 19th Communist Organization by crimi-nalizing them and labelling them as armed terroristgroups. They have used the testimony of traitors andinformers to arrest and indict their leaders and to harassand threaten their supporters.

The KKK is playing a growing role in the state assaulton the New Afrikan Independence Movement. Freedomfor New Afrika will spell the death of the Klan and itsattempts to keep Black people colonized. The KKK hastargeted the Black Liberation Army, the RNA and the JohnBrown Anti-Klan Committee (JBAKC) because of theirpractice in fighting white supremacy and building revolu-tionary struggle against the Klan. At an Austin, Texascross-burning, the KKK displayed a coffin which it saidwas "reserved for the BLA, the RNA, May 19th, the MLNand the JBAKC." White organizers from May 19th andthe JBAKC have received numerous death threats and theybelieve that the Klan and government are setting up aGreensboro-type operation in the area.

This is serious business. It demands a unified responsefrom all progressive people. But many on the left are stillplaying the state's game. More concerned with self-pro-tection than with fighting the state, they condemn revolu-tionaries for bringing down repression. They meeklyprotest repressive measures, but reserve their fire for free-dom fighters who are advancing armed struggle in theU.S. They call for "fair trials" for prisoners of war whohave already rejected the right of U.S. courts to even trythem. They try to isolate anti-imperialists by startingwhispering campaigns, warning people not to associatewith groups that support the Black Liberation Army or the

FALN. They want a safe, white-dominated movement,untouched by the difficult and often painful realities ofrevolutionary struggle. This is why they condemn revolu-tionary acts like the attempted Brink's expropriation andwhy they refuse to support national liberation movementswithin the U.S. With their sectarian practice, they encour-age the state to strike even harder.

We have to come together and recognize that a majoroffensive is taking place against the 400-year-old freedomstruggle of the Black Nation and against the heroic strug-gle of the Puerto Rican people for independence andsocialism. White revolutionaries are being imprisoned andattacked for supporting New Afrikan independence andfighting back against the Klan. Where is the outrage andcondemnation over the savage beatings and torture ofBlack revolutionaries, over the internment of Puerto Ricanand Mexicano activists, over the grand jury inquisitions?What kind of movement sits back and, using the excuse ofpolitical difference, shuts its eyes to these crimes? WhenNew Afrikan freedom fighters like Sekou Odinga andKuwesi Balagoon demand P.O. W. status and denounce theillegitimacy of the U.S. courts, they must be supported. Ifwe are committed to building a movement that fights whitesupremacy, if we stand opposed to the continued subjuga-tion of colonized nations in the U.S., we have to take aclear stand on these issues. If not, we will help the stateusher in a period of reaction that will make the last decadelook like a tea party.

SHATTERING THE INNER PEACE

The state is now laying the foundation for further movesaway from bourgeois democracy, towards police state ter-ror and fascism. Imperialist counter-offensive abroadrequires a pacified homefront. Colonized people must berepressed and re-enslaved. White workers must be won tosupport or accept these assaults on the colonized as theonly way to protect their shrinking privileges. What thestate fears the most is the capacity of Black and othercolonized people to wage revolutionary war from withinand destroy this inner peace. The urban rebellions of the1960s are no dim memory—imperialism is sitting on atinderbox which it knows will explode. The consolidationof revolutionary armed centers within the New Afrikan,Puerto Rican, Mexicano and Native movements can leadthe fight against genocide and transform spontaneousmass resistance into protracted popular armed struggle fornational independence and socialism. This is the system'sgreat nightmare. Already, FBI director William Websterhas called the Puerto Rican armed clandestine movement"the greatest internal security threat" to the U.S. This iswhy U.S. imperialism is waging a classic counter-insur-

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gency war to decimate and contain these movements. Ourresponse must be a firm defense of national liberationstruggles, recognizing that they are the leadership forrevolution within these borders.

The harsh reality is that things will get worse. Imperial-ism will lash out with even greater cruelty as the strugglesharpens. We must expect this and develop strategy and amovement to fight back successfully. Working under theleadership of the national liberation movements, whiteanti-imperialists can build a force that challenges thewhite supremacist consolidation in America. We can winsignificant numbers of white working class people to breakwith the privileges of empire and fight the state. Themounting anger and opposition to the Klan can be trans-formed into a massive movement, embracing thousands,that supports and takes leadership from the struggle of theBlack nation for land and independence. The disgust andhorror which people experience as Reagan joins handswith the world's bloodiest dictators must be transformedinto a movement that fights U.S. imperialism, the sourceof all this evil.

But to do this, we must reject the comfortable role of theloyal opposition. We have to welcome and encourage theemergence of freedom fighters from the ranks of ourmovement. Judy Clark, David Gilbert and other whiteanti-imperialists have committed themselves to buildingarmed straggle under the leadership of national liberation.They represent the most basic challenge to the accom-

modation, compromise and legalism which so character-ize the U.S. left . We in PFOC also express ourrevolutionary solidarity with May 19th Communist Orga-nization. May 19th is one of the few forces in the white leftwhich has consistently fought for anti-imperialist politicsand whose practice is one of principled support fornational liberation and active struggle against whitesupremacy. They stand as allies with the New AfrikanIndependence Movement. We believe that the attacks onMay 19th are attacks against all anti-imperialists. We mustdefend and support these comrades. The movementagainst the RICO grand juries and the upcoming RICOconspiracy trial must be strengthened right now. Non-collaboration with the grand jury and the FBI must'become a cardinal principle of our movement. We cannever allow the enemy to break our resistance. Collabora-tors, traitors and snitches must be exposed for the humangarbage that they are.

Imperialism will not achieve the inner peace it so fer-vently covets. The next decades will be ones of upheaval,storms and battles. By strengthening our unity, establish-ing a base in the working class and in the anti-whitesupremacy and anti-militarism movements, and by sup-porting the development of people's war inside the U.S.,anti-imperialists can make real advances. In this processwe will win more people over and develop the newstrength and character that the struggle to defeat thisbloody system requires. •

III?

Black anti-Klan demonstrators overturn undercover police car in Washington D.C., November 27th. The Black commu-nity fought the police and prevented the KKK from marching.

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ON NEW AFRIKANFREEDOM FIGHTERS DAY

Speech by Judith Mirkinson on behalf of PFOC,Los Angeles, August 21,1982

We come here tonight with these slogans: Death to theEmpire, Victory to New Afrika, Long Live the FreedomFighters, and We Will Win, We Will Win!

Death to the empire; death to the system that calls thosewho fight for freedom "terrorists." Death to those whohunt Assata Shakur and Mutulu Shakur, torture SekouOdinga, murder Mtayari Shabaka Sundiata. Death to thecountry which for four hundred years has subjugated andcolonized the Black nation, denied Black people basichuman rights, committed genocide—making land, inde-pendence and socialism for New Afrika the only path forliberation. We are committed in Prairie Fire to the libera-tion of all the New Afrikan and white anti-imperialistfreedom fighters. The attempted expropriation on October20th by the Black Liberation Army and its RevolutionaryArmed Task Force was a revolutionary act. And on Sep-tember 13th, we will be there to demonstrate our solidarityto these freedom fighters and we will continue to demon-strate our solidarity and fight for New Afrikan liberationuntil victory.

We say, "Death to imperialism!" because imperialismcan have no alternatives. There can be no reforms or half-way measures—only the total dismantling and destructionof the federal system that is called the United States:independence and socialism for Puerto Rico, the socialistreunification of Mexico, independence and land for NewAfrika, and sovereignty for Native nations. This will onlyhappen through protracted people's war—the political/military strategy by which oppressed nations win life andfreedom, and oppressor nations are buried in the ground.

For us, that means life for those who fight, and that'swhy we say, "Long live the freedom fighters!" under-standing that for many it will mean giving up our lives forfuture generations to have theirs. The freedom fightersrepresent the highest aspirations of people struggling forfreedom. They are the personification of revolutionarytheory and practice. The development of armed clan-destine movements like the Black Liberation Army andthe FALN ensures that the revolution will go forward tovictory. Fighting from clandestinity, away from the eyes ofthe state, attacking the enemy where it's most vulnerable,

enables the revolutionary forces to slowly gain the upperhand. Protracted people's war makes people believe thatimperialism isn't all that powerful. It changes the condi-tions, both subjective and objective, so that others can andwill join the struggle.

For those who say, "It's too early," it's because they'restill too dominated by bourgeois ideology. The state wantsus to think that it will go on forever. For white people, notwanting to support the freedom fighters of national libera-tion and those who fight alongside them means that we arecontent with the way things are. We enjoy the privileges ofwhite supremacy and don't want things to change toomuch too soon.

In struggling with people about the importance of NewAfrikan Freedom Fighters' Day, many replied, "Well, wesupport the people in jail, but not those carrying on thestruggle from clandestinity." Or, "We support the free-dom fighters, but not New Afrika." We say, "How is thispossible?" Those who fight for New Afrika: SekouOdinga, Kuwesi Balagoon, Abdul Majid, BashirHamid, don' t struggle for struggle's sake. They' re strug-gling for their nation; they're struggling for their freedom.When people say they don't support New Afrika, theymean they don't support Black people's struggle to befree. In history, we have to remember, it was only when theBlack nation and other colonized nations built a fightingmovement that the possibility of defeating this systembecame a reality. And this is still the only way that imperi-alism will be defeated.

Still others say, "Well, you don't talk enough aboutclass." For us, class war will take the character of civil warin the oppressor nation. We can repeat the slogans of ourcomrades in Germany and Italy when they say, "Turn theimperialist war into anti-imperialist civil war." Inside theU.S. this means that those of us who are part of theoppressor nation must divide and conquer the oppressornation and make it dead. To build fascism there must besignificant support from the oppressor nation workingclass. To destroy imperialism and fascism we must orga-nize white people, the working class and others, buildingtheir solidarity with national liberation and socialism.

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This has been possible in the past, but it has never beenenough. Today we know that people will join, that we canorganize other white people to fight alongside the freedomfighters to destroy this corrupt, disgusting system. Todestroy the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacistorganizations inside the U.S., we know we must fight, andfight under the leadership of national liberation.

The only strategy to win is people's war. There is noseparate path and we must protect and defend those whodevelop the people's war now, those who develop armedclandestine movements today so that there will be truepeople's war tomorrow. The Eleven Puerto Rican Pris-oners of War have taught us that history can be made tomove forward. By consistently refusing to recognize thelegitimacy of the state, they have forced many to accept thefact that they are Prisoners of War—not criminals and notterrorists. Their steadfastness is an example to all of us.Their refusal to enter into the legal system, however goodor bad their legal case may be, is a direct confrontation tothose who say, "Jail is the worst thing that can ever happento anybody." We know that in order to struggle for free-dom, all over the world, people have gone to jail and yetthe freedom fighters continue and victory becomes a real-ity.

The U.S. has no jurisdiction over New Afrikan freedomfighters or Puerto Rican freedom fighters. The imperialiststate has no right to judge. We echo freedom fighter andpatriot Lolita Lebron when she says, "Who are the realterrorists? The U.S. has no moral right to judge anybodyin the entire world a terrorist." If we are committed toprotecting and defending the armed clandestine move-ment, however, we must understand that the state willattack us too, and we must never rely on the state's legal orelectoral machinery for justice. The only justice will comethrough fighting.

We can and will win. Many don't really believe that.For those, revolution is still a game to be entered into nowand to leave when things get too hard. Many will giveexcuses and focus on what holds us back. But revolution-aries must single-mindedly unite around what moves usforward. How many people have talked to others who say,"Well, I sort of agree, but what about all these disagree-ments?" or "I guess I just can't do it." Instead, we have tosay to people, "You can, you must struggle to unite, notstruggle to disagree. That is the only way that you willchange; that is the only way that things will move for-ward." Other people say, "But what about white people?"We answer, "What about white people?" We say, "It isunthinkable to sit by resting on white supremacy in theface of genocide." Yet for many we know it actually isquite thinkable and it's also quite comfortable. We, asrevolutionary white anti-imperialists, must make peoplefeel that it is not comfortable, that it is wrong and that they

have to change. We can say to them, "Are your goods, areyour things really more important than living in a moralworld? Is it really more important for you to have your Pac-man games, or whatever else people are playing with thesedays, than to be on the side of fighting against genocide?"We think that many people over time will hear the realityof these arguments and of course will be moved by objec-tive conditions and the growth of the struggle.

Recently I read a letter from Billy Ayers, one of theleaders of the Weather Underground Organization. Whenpeople say that the Revolutionary Armed Task Force istrapped in the 60's, they really are talking about the wrongset of people. Billy Ayers is definitely trapped in the 60's.In fact, he's trapped in pre-historic times. When you talkabout people uniting with weaknesses, you can talk aboutBilly Ayers. For someone who at a certain point commit-ted himself to revolution, this kind of letter is not onlyquite upsetting, it's sort of revolting. He writes about hissituation (referring to the fact that his comrade, Bernar-dine Dohrn, is a grand jury resister, and he's taking care ofthe children): "The kids have been shook up and areclinging to me (and I to them). I've never felt so powerlessand depressed. I want to be strong for the kids, but I thinkjust holding them, crying with them, being emotionallyhonest is the best I can do." To us, this is the exactopposite of what we want our revolutionary children to be.It is the exact opposite of how we want to struggle withother people to move forward for revolution. If all you'reconcerned about is your safety and your particular situa-tion, you will never be able to overcome the bourgeoisideology that is dominating us all.

We have to move forward and we can only do this bylooking at our strengths. The white freedom fighters in theRevolutionary Armed Task Force, people like Judy Clarkand David Gilbert, have offered us a challenge to followtheir example. We can look at their practice in the line-ups,along with the other members of the Revolutionary ArmedTask Force. These white anti-imperialists, along with NewAfrikans, have refused to give in to the line-ups. Theyhave made the authorities shackle them to dentist chairs inorder to take one lock from their hair. We can look at theirstrength and determination and we can ask ourselves,"Can we do this?" And the answer must be, "Yes!" Wewill be part of an historical process; we can be part oflooking forward, of reaching out to struggle, of graspingfor parts of ourselves and of our comrades that haven'tbeen realized yet, strengths we don't even know are there.

For those of us who are really committed, we have it inour power to become freedom fighters too. We understandthat we are at a birth of revolutionary change and weunderstand that in order for there to be birth there must bedeath. We must kill those parts of ourselves that refuse togo forward; we must kill those parts of ourselves that are

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deathly afraid of change; and we must kill those parts of- ourselves that refuse to struggle in collaboration with

national liberation inside of these illegal borders. We mustbuild our unity based on political line. We must build ourunity based on revolutionary humility. Because only this isthe basis of collective power. This is the opposite of powertrips. It's the only way that we can win.

Recently a comrade of mine told me a story about thePalestinian struggle, and I'd like to share it with you todaybecause it moved both of us immensely. She told me aboutPalestinian freedom fighters who were fighting in Lebanonand about one freedom fighter in particular who had killedfour or five Israelis. And the Israelis were closing in, and itwas very difficult. This freedom fighter had two bulletsleft and he overheard the Israeli commander saying,

"Leave this one alive; I want this one for me." And whenhe heard this, he used one bullet to kill an Israeli and onebullet to kill himself. This Palestinian freedom fighter waseight years old. This is what it means to commit ourchildren to the revolution. For those of us who are moth-ers, this is both a liberating and perhaps one of the mostdifficult processes that we have to enter into, but we canunderstand when we see the children of Palestine, whenwe see the children of Africa, when we see the children ofViet Nam, when we see the children of Puerto Rico, NewAfrika and Mexico, that we too can commit ourselves andour children to the revolution because this is the only waythat we can bring Death to the Empire, Victory to NewAfrika, and this is the only way that We Will Win! DestroyU.S. imperialism!•

DEATHTO THE EMPIRE!

Palestinian youth in the occupied Galilee. 1982.

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THE TAMING OF THEIMPERIALIST WAR AND THE ANTI-NUCLEAR MOVEMENT

I,.n what is now being hailed as "the largest peacetimerally in U.S. history," three quarters of a million peoplemarched in New York City on June 12, 1982 against thethreat of nuclear weapons and nuclear war. With thismobilization, and a simultaneous one of 50,000 in SanFrancisco, the anti-nuclear/peace movement inside theU.S. joined with similar forces in the imperialist countriesof Western Europe and Japan. In the past eighteen months,these movements have brought tens and hundreds of thou-sands of people out into the streets to protest the deploy-ment of new nuclear missiles on their soil. Thedemonstrators in this country and in Europe, for the mostpart, share the premise that World War III will come as anuclear apocalypse between the U.S. and the SovietUnion, destroying everything in a furious exchange. Whatflows from this is the prescription that a freeze on theproduction of new nuclear weapons (the U.S. and theSoviet Union already possess more than 50,000 nuclearweapons) will be a giant step towards world peace.

We do not believe that this apocalyptic scenario charac-terizes the military strategy being pursued either by impe-rialism or the Soviet Union. Nor do we think that the U.S.and the Soviet Union are equal threats to world peace. It isthe imperialist system headed by the U.S. which is respon-sible for the drive towards world war.

In the autumn of 1982 Reagan charged that the "freeze"movement is being instigated by the Russion KGB, whoare duping millions of people. This anti-communistcrusade, complete with documentation furnished byReaders' Digest, is a highly ideological assault on the anti-militarist and anti-U.S. potential of the movement. How-ever, on the issue of nuclear arms reduction and/or freezeitself, the U.S. is prepared to compromise. Conventionalwar, not nuclear war, remains the foundation of U.S.imperialism's war strategy. This is quite different from theimage put forward by the peace movement.

While the nuclear disarmament movement has beencapturing the headlines, there has been a qualitativeupsurge in conventional (non-nuclear) wars, interven-tions, and preparations for war. The imperialist powers,with the U.S. in the lead, are now waging a protracted

offensive against national liberation struggles, socialistgovernments and progressive movements. While imperi-alism is covertly attacking and attempting to destabilizethe Soviet Union and its allies, and although competitionis sharpening between the imperialists themselves, theprimary focus of war is the Third World where imperialismis being challenged by the forces of national liberation.

Why is this so? In our lifetime, nations such as VietNam, Angola, and Zimbabwe have won their indepen-dence by waging and winning protracted people's wars,and have begun the difficult process of building socialistsocieties. These newly liberated nations, along withnational liberation movements and with the other socialistcountries, constitute the greatest threat to imperialisthegemony. U.S. imperialism cannot survive without thevast wealth, resources and superexploited labor power itextracts from the colonial and neo-colonial dependentnations of the Third World. To gain new markets andsuperprofits, imperialism has established industry in areasof the world which had been primarily producers of foodand natural resources. In the years since World War II, thisdevelopment process has helped promote the leadership ofthe working class and socialist ideology in the struggle fornational liberation. Because the Third World is the weaklink in the chain of empire, and also where the raw eco-nomic and military advantage of empire is greatest, it ishere that the U.S. must concentrate its offensive.

This is where war is happening, and it is not abstract.The U.S.-backed Israeli invasion of Lebanon, the escalat-ing war against the revolutionary movements of CentralAmerica, and the South African invasions of Angola rep-resent the visible beginnings of a new period of more andmore wars, both large and small. At the same time, thegrowing genocidal attacks against national liberationmovements inside the U.S. borders are part of a develop-ing internal war: the counter-insurgency war to pacifyAmerica. On the whole, the anti-nuclear movement showslittle understanding of the roots of any of these conflictsand their connection to a new world war which wouldcertainly involve the other imperialist nations and theSoviet Union.

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FREEZE

THE SINGLE MOST IMPORTANTMOVEMENT OF THE 1980'S?

The June 12 rally was praised to the skies by such anarray of groups that its level of support looked like theresults of an opinion poll on whether we are for or againstthe end of the world. Even Reagan, whose muscle-flexingtour of Germany was upset on June 11 by 10,000 protestersfighting police in Berlin, was obliged to say, "I'd havewalked there (in the New York rally) if I though it woulddo any good." Religious leaders including the U.S. Cath-olic hierarchy, infamous cold warriors like ex-CIA chiefColby, bourgeois liberals like Teddy Kennedy and theDemocrats, and many other prominent figures have allcome out in favor of the freeze. Virtually every progres-sive organization, and many which call themselves Marx-ist, have proclaimed June 12 as "an historic turningpoint," the birth of the single most important movement ofthe 1980's.

We disagree sharply with many of the assumptionsunderlying this growing national consensus, as well aswith its conclusions. All revolutionaries and communistswant peace, but to achieve peace we must understand whythere is war. The widespread view that war will be pre-vented by a nuclear freeze or nuclear disarmament isdangerously wrong because it makes weapons the center,of the problem. But it is the system of imperialism whichcommands the armies and the weapons and which isdriving this country towards war. By focussing on nuclearweapons, people are being prepared to accept the mainthrust of U.S./NATO strategy, which is to fight and winconventional and counter-guerrilla wars.

During the past year we've attended peace demonstra-tions to organize for solidarity with the national liberationstruggles inside the U.S. We have been struck by severalfeatures of this movement. First, a deep fear for survivalbrings many people out to the rallies. On the gut level,people are aware that war is more and more likely unlesssomething is done. Anti-militarism is growing; however,the movement's defeatism and passivity are not solutions

The June 12, 1982 nuclear freeze demonstration in NewYork City.

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to people's fears. Rather, they reinforce them. The surge ofactivism at the base of the demonstrations is often chan-neled into the dead end of electoral politics. Many peoplehave developed a messianic fervor, believing that the issueof nuclear weapons transcends national, class and ideolog-ical divisions. All other struggles (including wars going onright now) are dwarfed to insignificance. The popularattitude is, "If the world is blown away tomorrow, nothingelse will matter to anyone, anymore." Best selling booksand scientific spokespeople reach a growing audience withthe horrors of nuclear devastation for all levels of biolog-ical life and civilization. This paralyzing fear is thenchanneled into a pacifist movement that proclaims itselfloyal to the "best and truest ideals of this country." Thestars and stripes wave at the rallies and rock groups blarethe message. The white liberals at the head of the anti-nuclear movement today are many of the same people who

were against the Viet Nam war in the 1960's but refused tosupport the Black liberation struggle when it faced mili-tary attack from the FBI's Cointelpro program. These anti-war "veterans" are now saying that one of the great lessonsof the 1960's is that the movement has learned never againto "provoke violence." Underlying this argument is thedefeatist belief that it makes no sense to fight the U.S. statebecause it is too strong and we will certainly lose. In theface of this we must ask what the world would be like ifcolonized and exploited people adopted this passivity andself-defeating fear; if oppressed people didn't wage armedstruggle for their freedom?

Second, the mainstream of the anti-nuclear movementdoes not understand the relationship between imperialistwar and revolution. War is never an irrational activity, orthe product of accidents. It is always the continuation ofpolitics, the resolution of profound crises by force. Deci-

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sions to make war, and to risk world war in the future, aremade by ruling classes holding state power, and not by"mad individuals." Imperialism, which must expand ordie, now faces a world that is almost completely dividedup. The days when the U.S. could wield the club ofnuclear blackmail have disappeared with the dreams thatthis would be an "American century." World war is nevera matter of "foreign policy," although it may seem so inthe U.S. which has never had a modern war fought on itsterritory. The drive towards war stems from the basicdynamics of capitalism/imperialism itself.

World War I was an inter-imperialist war fought torcontrol over spheres of influence and colonies. The 20thcentury's first massive war fought in the trenches ofEurope created the conditions in which the Russian Revo-lution could emerge victorious. The Second World Warwas fought over a qualitatively wider terrain: Europe,Africa, China and much of Asia. This war had a dualcharacter. It was an inter-imperialist conflict between themonopoly capitalists of the U.S. and Europe against thefascists of Germany and imperial Japan; and, on the part ofthe Soviet Union and its allies, it was a war to defendsocialism from the combined forces of the Allies andAxis. At the end of World War II the U. S. had becomethe uncontested head of the imperialist system, but theSoviet Union and revolutionary forces worldwide werestrengthened as well. The establishment of the DemocraticRepublic of Viet Nam in 1945 and the victory of theChinese revolution in 1949 opened up a qualitatively newera of national liberation struggle against imperialism.Even to bourgeois politicians, the past thirty-five yearshave been defined by the emergence of the Third World. Itis the role of anti-imperialists to struggle for an anti-warmovement that will divide the empires' base of support forwar and which will be part of transforming imperialist warinto national liberation and socialist revolution.

And third: the movement is overwhelmingly one ofwhite people, members of the most privileged oppressornation on earth. Its terms for survival, war and peace areworlds away from those of Third World people. The ideathat war itself is the danger and peace the solution iswidely held as simple common sense. Yet it is wrong.Under imperialism, war and peace are two ends of thesame weapon used to enforce the rule of the state. Theimperialist concept of peace has always been predatoryand white supremacist. The Middle East peace sought bythe U.S. can only result from a genocidal war to destroythe Palestinian nation. In El Salvador and Guatemala, theU.S. never tires of talking about a "peaceful democraticsolution" to the crisis. But what oppressed people arefighting for is not this kind of peace. For most of theworld's people the only peace this system offers is that of

continued slavery, the order of the police state, the serenityof the mass grave. People who believe that war alone is theproblem, and that all wars are the same, apply a selectivepacifism, refusing to support just wars fought for libera-tion on the one hand, yet going along with imperialist warsto maintain domination on the other.

The most glaring recent example of this selective paci-fism was the June 12 rallies in the U.S., just six days afterthe U.S.-backed Israeli invasion of Lebanon. This war ofconquest was not opposed by the dominant anti-nuclear/anti-war forces. At the New York rally, the leadershipsupported Zionism and imperialist war so strongly that arally of 750,000 mobilized against war refused to take astand against Israeli genocide!

A peace movement which seeks only to save its whitesanctuaries from radiation, while tolerating and support-ing colonial terror does more than apply a double stan-dard; it is racist! Not surprisingly, out of the hundreds ofthousands who marched in New York, a city where mil-lions of Black and Puerto Rican people live under terribleconditions, only a few thousand Black people joined themarch. In the months before the June rally colonizedpeople waged a bitter struggle against the rally's leader-ship which excluded them from the planning stages andrefused to recognize even their minimal demands.

The U.S. is a colonial settler state; any movement thatsees itself as expressing the true spirit of America can onlybe a movement that ignores or justifies domestic colonial-ism. Yet the same dynamic that is leading to imperialistworld war is also at work inside U.S. borders. For theU.S., streamlining the economy and society for wardepends on re-enslaving and containing the resistance ofoppressed nations inside this country. It also depends onthe development of a fascist white consensus, an "innerpeace." Oppressor nation workers must come to acceptthat the economic and social crisis they face requires themto accept austerity, "small wars" and colonial terror. Mostleftists active in the peace movement do nothing to chal-lenge this. By advancing the view of an integrated multi-national class struggle and the slogan "Money for jobs,not for war," they claim that the economic crisis and thethreat of war has put white and Third World workers in thesame boat. This denies the reality that colonized people inthe U.S. are facing—domestic genocide.

The failure of the anti-nuclear war movement to under-stand that the threat of war is tied up with the developmentof white supremacy and fascism has serious conse-quences. At the center of the government's campaign topacify domestic opposition is its effort to destroy thenational liberation movements inside the U.S. This it mustdo to mount its protracted, global offensive. The revolu-tionary New Afrikan, Puerto Rican, Mexicano and Native

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American organizations and the white anti-imperialistmovement are currently facing the greatest repressiveattack since the late 1960s; at the same time the KKK isuniting nationwide and building paramilitary formationsfor race war. Yet, in this climate, while the economic andsocial crisis is hitting more white people, the anti-nuclearmovement stands in opposition to national liberation andto the possibility of white workers participating in revolu-tionary class struggle.

ON THE THRESHOLD OF WAR

The U.S. is intent on clearing the decks for winnablewars; that is why the nuclear freeze is now being consid-ered by the ruling classes of the Trilateral countries. Tounderstand imperialism's evolving military strategy, wemust look beyond many assumptions held by the anti-warmovement and spread by the media. Leaders of the freezemovement extol the wonders of democratic dissent in theU.S. as compared to the Soviet Union, saying that bothcountries are equal threats to peace. This is nonsense. TheSoviet Union is not an equal danger with the U.S., nor is itthe main source of war. The Soviet Union is driven by adifferent set of economic and political forces than is impe-rialism. It does not have the level of economic stakes in theThird World that the U.S. has. And the projection of theSoviet Union as behind revolutionary struggle everywhereis a smokescreen for U.S. aggression, as in Central Amer-ica and Southern Africa.

The rulers of the U.S., Europe and Japan know thatnuclear war, whether with the Soviet Union or with eachother, would mean global annihilation. This type of warcould offer at best only a Pyrrhic victory. Nations, laborand capital all over the world would be destroyed far inexcess of what imperialism needs to overcome the eco-nomic crisis and dominate the Third World and socialistnations. They also know that the kind of nuclear superi-ority over the Soviet Union that could deal it a "decapitat-ing blow" is not realizable because much more than amarginal edge is needed to achieve this.

So the U.S. under Reagan is accelerating the shiftbegun by Carter towards building the capacity to fight andwin multi-front conventional and counter-revolutionarywars. A revitalized and technologically up-to-date army,elite units of Special Forces, Air Force Special OperationsWing, Navy SEAL teams and Marine Reconnaissancecompanies are being made combat ready. According to"Defense Guidance," a major document supported byDefense Secretary Casper Weinberger and covering theyears 1984-1988, the U.S. must "revitalize and enhancespecial operation forces to project U.S. power where theuse of conventional forces would be premature, inap-propriate, or infeasible." These forces will be ready first

for use in the Third World, but ultimately the plan is toreach the boundaries of the Soviet Union. The report statesthe goal as "to exploit political, economic and militaryweaknesses within the Warsaw Pact and to disrupt enemyrear-area operations." Nuclear weapons will continue tobe one aspect of the empire's military strategy, but not themost dynamic. There is widespread agreement thatnuclear weapons have failed to stem the loss of U. S. globalpower. It is also common knowledge that the U.S. believesthat it can drop at least one tactical nuclear weapon in theThird World without triggering a global holocaust. Andconventional war, based on the most advanced non-nuclear forces, includes the use of tactical nuclear weap-ons in its worst-case scenarios.

The "Defense Guidance" document confirms that con-ventional and counter-insurgency war, not full scalenuclear war, is the direction of NATO strategy. In thesection on strategy it says, "Emphasis is directed towardslimiting U.S.-Soviet confrontation to conventionalmeans." Fred Ikle, influential Undersecretary for DefensePolicy, said of the report, "To the extent that there issomething new in this administration, it is a further back-ing away from fighting a nuclear war. That's why there isemphasis on conventional war (and) improving mobiliza-tion capabilities."

The differences over military strategy are narrowingamong the imperialist countries. They are all seeking astrategic reduction and/or freeze on the production of largescale nuclear weapons. This has nothing to do with reduc-ing the danger of war or making humanitarian concessionsto the peace movement. It is really about achieving greatermilitary flexibility to fight and win wars. The U.S.believes that imperialist countries can retain/regain superi-ority over all opposition with a united NATO, control overthe world financial system, and state-of-the-art militarytechnology. So the military establishments study the Falk-lands, Lebanese, and Iran-Iraq wars to judge the perform-ance of land, sea and air weaponry.

A long-term strategy for the U.S. relationship to theSoviet Union and Europe is now unfolding. The aggres-sive posture of the U.S. towards the Soviet Union is notjust part of the anti-communist cold war line which hascharacterized every U.S. presidency since World War II; italso has an economic goal. Reagan likes to talk aboutplaying America's "ace in the hole" by initiating arenewed arms race. This would damage the Soviet econ-omy, which has a smaller Gross National Product than theU.S. and therefore must spend a higher percentage ondefense just to keep up. The U.S. hopes to pressure theSoviet Union towards a reduction and/or freeze on theproduction of strategic nuclear arms on U.S. terms as thealternative to a damaging internal crisis. Carefully timed

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statements that this country believes it can win a nuclearwar, and the refusal to reject a "first nuclear strike," aremostly saber-rattling designed to make imperialist threatsbelievable.

The economic cost of a nuclear arms race, plus the priceof conventional rearmament, has put the imperialistpowers into a terrible bind. It is a dream, Horatio Algereconomics, to believe that the U.S. will be pulled out of itsdepression by the developing new technological revolu-tion in electronics, computers, aerospace, etc. Althoughthese sectors of the economy are growing, fueled by a $1.5trillion defense plan, they cannot energize capitalism'sbasic industries—energy, construction, manufacturing,steel, autos, etc. The crisis of absolute overproduction andeconomic stagnation is a permanent feature of the patternleading towards war and social upheaval.

At the same time the nuclear build-up in Europe has meta deep and growing mass resistance by Europeans to theprospect of dying on a nuclear battleground. Europeanleaders agree that war in Europe is unlikely because of thestrategic balance of forces between East and West. TheU.S. is arguing that the NATO allies and Japan must takeup more of the burdens of defending the world system.The NATO countries have already begun playing a greatermilitary role against the Third world. The so-called multi-national peace keeping force in Lebanon is an example.This army is nothing more than a NATO intervention forcedesigned to secure Trilateral interests in the region. U.S.and NATO forces maintain or have access to more than 50

military facilities in Africa to guarantee strategic interests.These are the troops which keep the dictator Mobutu inpower in Zaire. The members of NATO have jointlyagreed, in the words of Rolf Pauls, former ERG (WestGerman) permanent representative to NATO's NorthAtlantic Council, that "We must be absolutely clear thatwe must also protect our interests outside the NATOarea... .It is not only the safeguarding of the supplies of oiland other raw materials vital for the survival and securityof Europe which is at stake. It is also necessary to provideunstable regions with more stability." All of this is hap-pening regardless of whether hardliners like Reagan andThatcher or "socialists" like Mitterand hold power. Con-tradictions over relations with the Soviet Union, such asthe gas pipeline fight, are being ironed out under thepressure to unite. And the NATO powers have developedsophisticated international secret police groups to carryout domestic repression of "terrorists and their support-ers" in order to insure the "inner peace."

THE FREEZE:WHO'S PULLING THE STRINGS?

Seen in terms of this evolving long-run strategy forEurope and the Soviet Union, the demand for a nuclearfreeze, rather than being diametrically opposed to imperi-alist strategy, can be quite compatible with it. The imperi-alists are working hard to set the course of the freezemovement, to undermine its progressive potential. Thispotential comes from its anti-militarist character and its

"Peacekeeping" imperial is t style: U.S.Marines arrive in Lebanon, September, 1982.

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possibility of mobilizing large numbers of people inopposition to the U.S. government. But this progressivepotential remains a distant hope because the current"freeze" leadership is totally tied in to the system. Thecore of this leadership, the coalition builders, operate apolitical machinery where the Democratic Party, organ-ized labor, the Catholic bishops and other prestigiousreligious groups and social democrats operate at the high-est levels. These comments from a leader of Greenpeace(one of the largest anti-nuclear/environmental groups) aretypical: "I think it's fair to say that if anything significantis going to happen on disarmament, this rally (June 12)can't be too far left... .1 personally would like to see moreright-wing and conservative groups involved, since theyare also concerned with the arms build-up because itcauses deficits."

Leaders within the Trilateral Commission are develop-ing organizations to "guide" the peace movement. Anexample of this is the story of Peace Links. The New YorkTimes of May 25, 1982, carried an article "Politicians'Wives and Peace Links." This story, released three weeksbefore the June rally, exposed how deeply the enemy isinvolved in the movement. One of the major organizers ofPeace Links is Betty Bumpers, wife of influential SenatorDale Bumpers of Arkansas. With a grant from theWinthrop Rockefeller Foundation, Bumpers has organ-ized 2,000 women in 32 of the state's 75 counties into apilot program for a national organization. She says,"What we want to do is to tap into every women's organi-zation in the country, from garden clubs to church groups,and have them put nuclear awareness on the agenda... .Allyou really have to know is that we already have enoughnuclear weapons to annihilate each other...." This projectis now getting off the ground nationally with "seedmoney" from the Rockefeller Family Fund. RosalynnCarter and Sharon Rockefeller are national volunteers.

This is one example of the effort to shape and influencethe "protest movement of the 1980s" into something thatwill in no way challenge or impede a world war. Anotherexample is the debate on the draft. The U.S. is the onlymajor imperialist country which does not have some kindof draft, due to the tremendous anti-militarist reaction tothe Viet Nam war. Although Reagan continues to opposethe draft, insisting that the volunteer army attracts morethan enough who feel "it's an honor to wear the uniformagain," the draft is an important institution that buildsloyalty to the state. Kingman Brewster, former Yale Uni-versity president and ex-Ambassador to Britain, is a lead-ing liberal who believes conventional forces are analternative to nuclear weapons. He is quoted as saying thata mass slogan should be: "I'd rather be drafted thannuked."

In these ways the peace movement is being broughtunder the hegemony of the bourgeoisie. Their vehicle ofopportunity is the freeze campaign which does notthreaten the plans of empire to wage war and genocideanywhere. To the rulers, if they play their cards right, thismovement has the potential to be a broad oppressor nationforce against revolutionary struggles for national libera-tion and socialism. In the 1980s, as in the 1960s, there willbe an anti-war movement and there will be national libera-tion struggles. At the anti-war movement's height, anti-imperialists who supported the national liberation of theVietnamese people and who supported struggles for Blackliberation inside the U.S. posed a genuine and deep chal-lenge to the movement's dominant liberalism and paci-fism. The conscious goal of the bourgeois leaders of thefreeze movement is to have a movement in the 1980swhich will either be blown away by the fire of ongoingcounter-insurgency and conventional war; or will tolerateand even promote such wars as the lesser evil, unavoidablealternatives to nuclear disaster.

Similarly, the movement against U.S. intervention inCentral America has failed to develop either a militantstruggle against the U.S. government or to supportnational liberation struggles in the U.S. This has kept itfrom having any real impact on U.S. policy. The failure ofthe anti-intervention and anti-nuclear movements to con-front the state in any way contributes to the steady slide ofmany progressive people into the arms of the DemocraticParty.

WHICH SIDE ARE WE ON?

War is inevitable under imperialism; it is here now and itis going to increase in frequency and intensity. Hiddenwars are becoming more open. More and more people feelthe need to build a movement against war. On this point theapathy and cynicism of white America is changing a little.Among the millions who have come out to demonstrationsare many who want to change the course of this country.But this isn't enough; it never has been and never will be.Effective struggle depends on our building an anti-imperi-alist movement which will lead more and more people tochallenge the power of the U.S., to upset its ability to wagewar right now. This cannot be done by accomodating orworking within a framework controlled by bourgeois lib-erals, as many on the left are now doing. The desire for amass audience is causing many so-called "revolutionary"groups to call internationalism and support for liberationmovements inside this country "sectarian." Accordingly,they reduce their goals to being able to "maximize ourability to organize within the movement for our perspec-tive." Some organizations, such as the Guardian news-

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Democrat

motherhoodii i»i iini^M^a

paper, seem to call for a halt to any serious criticism andexposure of the "freeze" movement.

The crisis of imperialism is drawing lines in the whiteleft and peace movement. There is a contemporary man-ifestation of the "split in socialism" (This was how Lenindescribed the betrayal of revolutionary internationalism bylarge sectors of the European "socialist movement" whosided with their bourgeoisies in World War I.) Country bycountry, the composition and demands of the peace move-ments are remarkably similar. They are led by socialdemocrats, reformists and revisionist forces who believethat war can be prevented by a change in foreign policy, achange in priorities, or the banning of certain types ofweapons. They are committed to keeping the systemintact, and shielding it from an anti-imperialist movementagainst war. Such a movement, which would be part ofbuilding the revolutionary offensive against the empireinside its home bases, would be an advance of real signifi-cance. This is a development which imperialism must tryto prevent. Containment of revolutionary struggle is the"raison d'etre" of social democracy, which is why theseforces are encouraged by the bourgeoisie to grow.

However, as the world crisis becomes more acute, thereis emerging, particularly in Europe, an anti-imperialistpole within the movement against war. These forces arestruggling for a revolutionary internationalist line andpractice and the rejection of oppressor nation privilege.The strategy of anti-imperialist civil war being developedby the revolutionary left in Europe defines the terms ofrevolutionary class warfare in the imperialist nations inrelation to the development of national liberation strug-gles. Most people in the U.S. movement are unaware of

the struggles within the "peace movement" which areproducing, in Germany for example, some of the mostmilitant and-war actions. Tens of thousands are calling forthe destruction of NATO; the armed clandestine move-ment has attacked U.S. bases on the average of one perweek in the first eight months of 1982 and has attempted tokill NATO leaders such as Alexander Haig and GeneralFrederick Kroesen, the U.S. Army's European com-mander. In this issue we publish exerpts from the writingsof both the public and clandestine organizations in theFederal Republic of Germany (West Germany). We do thisto advance the building of a movement in the U.S. whichunderstands that the only road to peace is through fightingalong with the national liberation movements inside andoutside U.S. borders for the total destruction of empire.

In this country, the heart of the struggle in the peacemovement is the choice between accepting the legitimacyof the U. S. system or aligning our interests as progressive/anti-imperialist white people with the liberation of themajority of the world's people, not against them. One pathleads to compromise with the most aggressive empire inthe world, to being unable and unwilling to fight againstimperialist war as it is actually being waged. The otherpath is that of allying with the national liberation strugglesto turn imperialist war into revolutionary war. By doingthis we will be able to resist the U.S. strategy of containingand ^crushing the national liberation struggles within itsborders and greatly limit the consolidation of white work-ers behind fascism and white supremacy. These are thetasks anti-imperialists must take up in struggling with the"peace movement"; only in this way will the growingviolence of war ever give way to the promise of peace.•

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(War on Imperialist War)

-Materials from the German Anti-Imperialist Movement-

"He/she who wants to fight imperialist war has to fight tosmash the imperialist system. Fight the battle in themetropolis together with the revolutionaries of the ThirdWorld!"

—RAF (Rote Armee FraktionlRed Army Fraction)

The following are documents from the revolutionary move-ment in the Federal Republic of West Germany (FRG). Thismaterial was banned in the FRG and illegally published indefiance of laws prohibiting "advertising for a terrorist group."We include a communique from the RAF issued in September1981, on the attempted assassination of U.S. General Kroesen,commander of the 300,000 U.S. troops in Europe. We alsoreprint excerpts from a paper by Women Against ImperialistWar, an anti-imperialist women's organization that supports theRAF.

The western bourgeois media and even the left media slandersthe RAF as the "Baader-Meinhof Gang" of isolated anarchistsand ultra-leftists. But in reality, it is a revolutionary political/military organization with clear anti-imperialist politics wagingarmed struggle today in the heart of imperialist West Germany.Solidarity with liberation movements of the Third World is acentral part of the RAF's politics.

The RAF slogan "War on Imperialist War!" is being turnedinto a reality. During 1982, the RAF carried out an average ofone armed action per week against the more than one hundredU.S. military installations throughout West Germany. The anti-imperialist politics of the RAF are developing a mass base in theWest German left. During the same month that the RAF attackedGeneral Kroesen, 80,000 people participated in a militant dem-onstration against U.S. Secretary of State and former NATOcommander Alexander Haig. Thousands of people battled theWest German police all day, utterly wrecking Haig's "triumphalvisit" and propaganda show. Such demonstrations are making itabundantly clear that the growing anti-imperialist movementwill not stand by and let imperialism continue to use the FRG asa launching pad for wars against Third World liberation move-ments. The military offensive of the armed clandestine move-ment and the mass anti-imperialist struggle in West Germany

are creating a real challenge and a revolutionary alternative tothe reformist politics of the social democratic leadership ofGermany's peace movement.

Since its inception a decade and a half ago, the RAF hasshown its capacity to maintain the revolutionary offensive in theface of intense repression. In 1977 RAF prisoners went onhungerstrike for POW status, sparking an international mobi-lization of support. The West German state responded by coldbloodedly murdering four RAF comrades in Stammheimprison. In 1981 one hundred RAF prisoners and supporters againwent on hungerstrike. All support work for the strike and theRAF was criminalized by the government, and forty activistswere jailed during the strike for "crimes" such as holding upbanners and distributing and possessing leaflets.

Over the last two months, the West German secret police havecaptured two women and a man alleged to be leading membersof the RAF: Brigitte Mohnhaupt, Adelheid Schulz, and Chris-tian Klar. Another comrade, Helga Roos, has been accused ofparticipation in the Kroesen action and kept in isolation for ayear. Now the West German state is actively attempting to haveher committed to a mental institution.

We urge all Breakthrough readers to act in solidarity with theRAF and the West German anti-imperialist movement by send-ing letters of protest to the FRG's BKA (Federal Bureau ofCrime), demanding an end to the repression and that theimprisoned comrades be held under conditions guaranteedunder the Geneva Convention on the treatment of prisoners ofwar. Send letters immediately c/o AKAS, Postfach 3021, 4Dusseldorf, West Germany; and to An den, 5. Strafsenat desOLG Stuttgart, 7000 Stuttgart, West Germany, with a note thatthe letter be forwarded to the appropriate government agency.

PFOC presents these materials as part of our ongoing com-mitment to build solidarity and learn lessons from the revolu-tionary movements throughout Europe. The development ofarmed struggle in European strongholds of imperialist powerrepresents a new and higher level of anti-imperialist and com-munist action against the enemy. (Ed. note: a booklet of mate-rials from the West German movement is now available fromBreakthrough; see ad on page 36.)

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RAF COMMUNIQUEAssassination Attempt on

General Kroesen

ATTACK THE CENTERS, THE BASES AND THE STRATEGISTSOF THE AMERICAN MILITARY MACHINERY!

FIGHT IMPERIALIST WAR WITHIN THE CONTEXTOF INTERNATIONAL CLASS WARFARE!

Today we have—with the Gudrun Ensslin Unit—attacked the Commanding General of the U.S. Army andof NATO's Middle Europe Section, General Kroesen.

He is one of the U.S. generals who directly hold in theirhands the imperialist politics in Western Europe up to theGulf Region, as he is the one who decides what to do andhow to do it in times of confrontation! He determines theuse of conventional destruction and he decides when andwhere neutron bombs are going to be fired. He is com-manding the U.S. troops of intervention that are stationedhere for their use in the Near East. He and Rogers are thestrategists who are called away to the Pentagon from thefrontline in Europe, as happened when a decision wasmade to intervene in Iran.

He will be one of the American military men who wantsto openly command the ERG instead of Schmidt, Gen-scher, Kohl, Strauss or whoever it might be at a time whenresistance seriously shatters the colonial status of thiscountry. For this purpose and time, the data on the left inthe FRG have for years been stored in the computers at theU.S. Headquarters in Heidelberg.

He regularly meets with the Federal Attorney to perma-nently coordinate steps and to directly check on the situa-tion. These meetings, together with reports of the WesternEuropean secret services combined within NATO, deter-mine U.S. anti-guerrilla warfare in Western Europe.

Kroesen is a frontline general.

Western Europe is no longer the hinterland from whereimperialism is waging war—now, with the victories ofliberation wars in the Third World—now, with the devel-opment of the guerrilla in Western Europe—now that thewhole of imperialism is suffering a crisis, Western Europehas become part of the worldwide frontline.

It is the part where they possess everything. But it isalso the part that has become vital for the process ofliberation on the whole, worldwide line.

The fighting within the metropolis can keep globalimperialism in check so that, together with the revolution-aries in the Third World, a new breakthrough can beaccomplished. The struggles in the metropolis now arereal steps of revolution in the centers themselves, a revolu-tion that for us must be a constantly changing process ofdeveloping revolutionary resistance.

Resistance means: attacking the counterrevolutionaryattack.

Resistance means: putting one's practice in context withthe guerrilla.

The guerrilla, the fight of the prisoners from the guer-rilla, and the fight of the anti-imperialist militants are thelines that as a unit form the revolutionary frontline inWestern Europe—or are going to form it.

Fight all battles for the conditions of life in all areas asan anti-imperialist fight—that means bringing them intothe frontline.

MAKE THE STRUGGLE OF THE PRISONERS, AS A CENTRAL POINTOF REVOLUTIONARY STRUGGLE, YOUR OWN CAUSE!!

SUPPORT THE PRISONERS HERE, IN IRELAND, TURKEY, ITALY AND SPAIN!!

THE WEST EUROPEAN GUERRILLA IS SHAKING THE CENTER!!

FIGHT WITH US!

The mistake is believing that there might be someonefighting out of the experience of weakness; but some-one who fights, somewhere, at some time knewstrength, experienced it himself, otherwise he wouldnot be fighting. —Gudrun Ensslin

We, Women Against Imperialist War, are part of thewomen's movement and the battles that have developedsince the militant demonstration against NATO on the 6thof May, 1980, in West Germany. We have had a snout fullof being reduced as women to our "natural abilities,"namely those of peacemaker, eternal mother and socialworkers who make peace between incompatibleopposites. We are no "Women for Peace" because we seethat here and everywhere in the world we cannot conjureup peace and that there will be no peace unless we fight thematerial causes for war and destroy them.

In this article we want to discuss the theories and thestrategies of the peace movement as exemplified in suchslogans as "Make Peace Without Weapons" and "WestGermany Out Of NATO," which we think to be incorrectand leading in the wrong direction. We think it is senselessto inundate politicians, the same politicians who are help-ing to prepare for war, with moral appeals. We think it ishopeless to use peaceful protest and civil disobedience tostop the war machinery of imperialism—the warmachinery that tries with all its resources to find a way outof the current crisis even at the cost of destroying the entirehuman race.

It is our aim to discuss the conditions and perspectivesof our resistance, which we feel brings us together andstrengthens us. When we say "War On Imperialist War!"we mean we have not only the threat of a Third World Warbefore us, but that we must also fight for the overthrow ofthe system which is already, all over the world, eitherovertly or covertly waging war against people who resistits power. And we must also fight the so-called "normal"conditions of living, the deadly isolation of people fromeach other, and a permanent state of war. We as women areconfronted with these conditions all the time.

IMPERIALIST WAR IS THE STRATEGYOF THE RULING CLASSTO OVERCOME CRISES

We know from the history of this country that theimperialist system needs wars to maintain its profits. Inthis century, both the world wars and fascism have shownus that the capitalists are not afraid to use any meansnecessary to broaden their possibilities of (surplus)accumulation. Inevitably when a crisis of capitalism cannot be controlled by normal methods such as increasedpolitical repression and economic exploitation (automa-tion, unemployment, reduction of workers' benefits andsocial welfare programs), the system resorts to militaryviolence. That is how in 1930 the big crisis in Germanyand Italy led to fascism and finally to the beginning of

World War II. It was in the interest of the leading Germancapital, which had fallen into a crisis, to destroy thenational borders created by the Treaty of Versailles, toregain territory and to expand their capitalist influencethrough a world war. Fascism, which meant the violentrestoration of the "inner peace" in Germany after theyears of crisis between 1929 and 1933, was a necessarybasis for the planning and the execution of the six years ofWorld War II.

German fascism was crushed by the allied forces in1945, but by no means did they destroy the conditions thatbred fascism. On the contrary, the capitalist class of thevictorious powers found new, wider possibilities forexpansion....

Part of the rebuilding that was part of the restoration ofcapitalist conditions in this society was the destruction ofany radical opposition from its very beginning. The elim-ination of any radical opposition (the German CommunistParty, communist trade unions) and the integration ofresistance into the Social Democratic Party were the mainobjectives, in the years following the "economic won-

"UMSI?

REMNUNGSSTO

Over ten thousand demonstrators took to the streets of West Berlirimperialist war plans, June 11, 1982. The banner reads, "Draw a c

,'

Sex," for the installation of a model of democracy, a modelin which the theory, the official line, was that all classesmore or less took part in the economic growth. Anyquestioning of the "growthpact" between workers andcapitalists was suppressed. And it was fought as being adanger to democracy and the well-being of the people.

The conception of "inner peace" (loyalty of the generalpopulation) and the growth of the economy which deter-mined the atmosphere of the 60s and 70s was dependentupon continuous expansion of capital. So the developmentof a world market was not only an economic, but a politicalnecessity in order to keep the people in the metropolisesquiet through increased consumption and a constantlyrising standard of living. The development of a worldmarket meant exploitation of the Third World by an inter-national division of labor. Thus, the development of themetropolises took place on the backs of the Third Worldcountries. In the 60s many countries of the Third Worldbegan liberation wars against exploitation by multinationalcorporations dominated by U.S. capital, thus bringing toan end the expansion of imperialism for world power.

'est Beih to oppose Reagan's visit and to fight against U.S./NATO'Draw adear line between us and the enemy."

IMPERIALISM CAN BE DEFEATED

The victory of the Vietnamese people, who waged adifficult, determined struggle and finally succeeded ingetting the Yankees out of their country, was the hope andexample for many liberation movements. The major sig-nificance of the victory of Viet Nam was the proof that it ispossible to fight the monster U.S.—that it is vulnerableand that it is possible to defeat it. In the last ten yearsliberation movements all over the world have pushed theAmericans back, most recently with the expulsion of theShah and his clique from Iran.

Every revolutionary struggle for liberation is able toweaken imperialism, which is dependent on naturalresources and labor power as well as political stability inthe Third World. Most obvious is the Middle East, aregion which, because of its rich oil fields and strategicmilitary location, has been declared by the Americans aspart of their "vital interests," and which they are ready todefend with all their military means. The impending sta-tioning of new middle-range missiles in Europe, aimed atthe USSR, is thus intimately connected to the Third Worldand to the interests of the imperialist states in preventingrevolution. The U.S. hopes to scare the USSR into stop-ping its support of liberation movements in the ThirdWorld, thus clearing the way for undisturbed interventionin the Third World countries when they attempt liberationfrom imperialism. Inherent in imperialism is the calcu-lated risk of the destruction of all life in Europe, and thenuclear contamination of West Germany.

But imperialism knows its vulnerability; it sees itself onthe defensive. The crises are worsening here in Europe, inits centers, as imperialism is no longer able to carry out itsplundering wars. The more the crises develop in the cen-ters, the more the resistance grows against this system thatis based entirely on destruction, and the more imperialismlooks to a military solution for its crisis—it is not onlylooking for an external military solution, but also an innermilitary solution against the resistance within the metrop-olis itself. The military "solution" which has been pre-pared for by the U.S. and West German imperialists since1945 and strengthened in the last ten years can be seen inthe development of NATO and the history of remilitariza-tion of West Germany, and in the growth in the last tenyears of a social democratic government and of repressivemeasures by the state....

THE "SMALL WAR"—COUNTERREVOLUTION

It is not the only task of NATO to plan and carry outstrategies for an imperialist attack on the Third World orthe Soviet Union. It is also the task of NATO to create andto guarantee the conditions for such an attack: the innerstability in the countries within the alliance, the quiethinterland for imperialist wars of aggression.

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Shortly after he came into office, U.S. Secretary ofState Alexander Haig described this task as the mostimportant: the fight against "international terrorism."

Concepts for the international fight against resistanceare worked out between the U.S.A. and Europe. Duringthe last ten years the FRG (Federal Republic of Germany)has been foremost in the establishing and pushing throughof projects designed for the fight against and the smashingof resistance in Western Europe. The former chief of theFederal Investigation Bureau (BKA), Herold, built up theBKA and the whole apparatus of the police into a giganticapparatus for the fight against resistance. His declared aimwas to start an offensive against terrorism. Herold oncecharacterized the fight between revolutionary guerrillamovements and the imperialists, with their strategies fordefeating resistance, as the "small war" that has pushedinto the background the "big war" among states, theglobal fight among alliances and blocs of powers. Every-one waging resistance in this country is experiencing the"small war," is feeling that the state has declared war onthem. It is important for us not to be afraid of such adeclaration of war, but to take it up: angrily, with the will toattack, joyously and seriously.

Saying: I do not like this or that, that's protest. Seeing to itthat what I do not like does not happen any more, that'sresistance. —Ulrike Meinhof

In order to clarify the conditions for the development ofour resistance, we have to go back to the history of theFRG and we have to take a close look especially at the timeafter World War II, when U.S. capital and the U.S. gov-ernment set the lines for the reconstruction of this country.If we want to become a real power against this state, apower that is able to make it impossible for the U.S.imperialists and their allies to use their war machinery, wehave to know the foe we are fighting. We have to know thisin order to be victorious.

FRG—JUNIOR PARTNEROF U.S. IMPERIALISM

We have to recognize that the FRG is no sovereigncountry, that in the phase of the reconstruction this countryhas been so invaded by U.S. capital that an economicdependency and political cooperation have been estab-lished that make it impossible to divide the FRG from theU.S.A. In this the FRG is not just a victim of U.S. interestsbut, as a strong imperialist power, is itself actively takingpart in securing and enlarging the imperialist regions ofpower.

The FRG is part of the global fight between the proletariatof the world and imperialism. There is a political, mili-tary, economic and ideological identity of interest withU.S. imperialism and so the FRG is no oppressed nation

but one that oppresses other nations. The FRG has beenestablished by the CIA and by U.S. capital as a strongholdagainst communism and as a strategic base. In this func-tion the FRG today, as part of the states aligned to theU.S.A., is a strategic subcenterfor U.S. foreign policy, apolicy that is conceived of as the world's home policy.That means that the FRG is the operational base forAmerican capital in this region. The FRG is a leadingimperialist power in Western Europe, a power that isorganizing Western Europe into a political, military andeconomic bloc of power. —Quote from the declarationmade by RolfHeiler during his trial in September 1981

The demands being made by a large part of the peacemovement neglect this reality. These demands do notexemplify that the FRG, or better, German capital and theruling class, are part and parcel of transnational capitalunder the hegemony of the U.S .A. These demands neglectthe fact that the FRG is part of NATO and that those inpower know that they can only realize their intereststogether with the Americans. If the German people wereto say, "We want to leave NATO!" they would, on oneside, be confronted with the interests of their own imperi-alist ruling class, a ruling class that does not want to leaveNATO and that cannot leave NATO. They would also beconfronted with the interests of the Americans who did notbuild up this country for the last 35 years just to give it upagain if the German people thus wish.

OUR ROLE IN THE STRUGGLE:TO FIGHT IMPERIALISM

In the FRG there is not a question of national liberation,because this country is a leading imperialist power and, asa nation that oppresses other nations, cannot just leave theimperialist war plan, cannot be neutral. The internationalcontradictions, the war between imperialism and the peo-ples in the Third World fighting for liberation, are gainingin sharpness. At the same time it is becoming obvious thatthere are only two possibilities in the world: either you arean ally of NATO or you are NATO's enemy. There is nothird way in between. Neutrality does not exist. It is not inour interest to keep ourselves out of this conflict, hopingperhaps that then the bombs might not fall on us. It is ouraim to smash NATO, to liberate ourselves and all people inthe world from imperialism.

We are only able to do this together with all the peoplesin the world. It is because of this that we think it a scandalthat at the peace demonstration in Bonn on the 10th ofOctober, 1981, the representative of the ANC (AfricanNational Congress) who was to speak in the names ofnumerous liberation movements (PLO, SWAPO, FDR,Polisario, Unidad Popular) was forbidden to speakbecause the people who had organized the demonstrationwere fearing for the good image they had with the federal

BREAKTHROUGH/page 21

government and the fascist regime in Israel. The speechthat was going to be given exactly states what the situationis now:

Peace for us means the end of everyday oppression, theend of unfair structures, the end of hunger, the ending ofthe terror of the ruling classes. The liberation movementsmake up the first rows in the frontline in the fight againstthe aggressive war-threatening policy of the U.S.A. Ourpeople every day are risking their lives in the fight forpeace and justice. They are paying a high price with theirblood. The peace movements in the FRG and in Europeand the liberation movements in the Third World have towalk hand in hand.

We, the peace movement, the anti-imperialist move-ment and the women's movement can learn a lot from theliberation movements for the fight against our commonenemy. The liberation movements did not only experiencehow imperialism defends its total power in the world withmurderous brutality. They have also experienced that onecan nevertheless defeat this enemy if one does not haveany illusions about it, if one declares war on it, if oneattacks it materially in a revolutionary war for liberationthat has to be fought on all levels, politically and militarily.

Our sisters in the liberation movements are an examplefor us, because they have won for themselves the means toattack imperialism and to defeat imperialism. They are notout to win "free zones" for themselves as are some womenin the women's movement in the metropolis. They are

fighting for their freedom within the fight for liberation.The Red Army Fraction (RAF) began taking up armedanti-imperialist struggle in this country ten years ago. Intheir attacks, like, for example, against the U.S. headquar-ters in Heidelberg in 1972, they have developed a practicethat brings the war of liberation into the metropolis, intothe hinterland of imperialism. It is a practice that sees itselfin concert with the liberation movements by attacking thecommon enemy in the "heart of the beast" (Che Guevara).

When we got together as "Women Against ImperialistWar" two years ago, it was very important for us to discussthe politics of the RAF and of the prisoners from the RAF.It was our aim to develop a new political offensive out ofthe women's movement, a movement most of us camefrom. An offensive that brings our fight against maleviolence and male supremacy together with our fightagainst the state and imperialism. We knew that we did notwish to create for ourselves quiet islands within the sys-tem, because doing that would mean not to attack maleviolence and the state, not to abolish it, but to just bypassit. This is why RAF politics is so important to us: thecomrades from the RAF and their politics do not bypassreality, do not bypass imperialist structures of violence, donot bypass alienation. This is because it is a politics thatdoes not lie and deny reality by making compromises, thatdoes not align itself with the system, but takes the perspec-tive and possibility of liberation from imperialism, our

NATO exercises in West Germany, 1982.

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U.S. and NATO Air Forceheadquarters in Ramstein, WestGermany after it was bombedby the RAF on August 31, 1981.Twenty military personnel werewounded in this action.

liberation as people, very seriously and fights for it radi-cally. The fact that continuously, for ten years, the RAFhas attacked American bases and strategists, as well as thefigures representing this state, did not only show us thatthis state can really be hurt when attacked. Most of all ithas shown us the possibility to free ourselves from alien-ated structures of passivity and fear, to develop a revolu-tionary identity and power. This possibility is clearlyshown by the fact that the RAF does not let the fight bedetermined by repression. It means that they themselvesdetermine strategic attacks and that they themselves deter-mine when and where the confrontation is going to be.

On the 6th of May, 1980, in Bremen, we ourselves hadthe experience of wanting the confrontation and of deter-mining it and of thus becoming stronger. We did not onlyprotest the public taking of an oath by soldiers; we alsomilitantly attacked those preparing for war. What was soimportant about the stones and the molotov cocktails thatflew about was that they expressed a new quality ofresistance: someone who throws stones does not enteranymore into a dialogue with the rulers, expects nothingfrom them, determines the confrontation himself, does notwant integration. What was new about the resistance inBremen was that, for the first time, anti-imperialist groupsand anti-militarist groups came together and it was thebeginning of a broad mobilization against NATO.

THE IMPORTANCE OFTHE RAF PRISONERS' HUNGER STRIKE

The anti-imperialist mobilization was continued duringthe last hunger strike of the prisoners from the RAF. It wasa hunger strike that was aimed at winning the demand forassociation for many prisoners that have been isolated foryears. The anti-imperialist mobilization was continuedduring the strike and gathered strength because ourresistance outside the prisons came together with the fightof the prisoners. In this fight our relationship to the pris-oners was no longer one of just support. We felt that it wasa fight we were fighting together. In fighting with theprisoners for their association—for their possibility tocontinue to collectively fight and work within the pris-ons—we have tackled our own fear of prisons. We havedone something in order not to let our perspective andpower end before the prison walls. In dealing with ourfears, we have realized where our power lies:

When the militant left learns what imperialism had torecognize in its defeats, namely, that its power ends whereits violence is feared no longer, they will have solved thewhole problem of imperialism's invincibility. —Hun-ger strike declaration by the prisoners from the RAF

The strong mobilization for the hunger strike has forcedthe state to make concessions. It was our mistake not toreally realize our power. We could not estimate how much

BREAKTHROUGH/page 23

the state fears the different movements coming together.We did not really realize how the state has to fight even thebeginnings of such a development of unified structures,contexts and perspectives among us. We did not realizethis and so we stopped our fight with the ending of thehunger strike. We did not force the state to implement theconcessions it had made.

But despite our mistakes we have made during thehunger strike, we have nevertheless learned what is impor-tant for our resistance and how to go on. The resistanceduring the last year here in the FRG has shown the rulersthat the time when they could carry out their projectswithout being hindered is over: the militant fights of thesquatters in Berlin, the numerous demonstrations andactions of the peace movement, the demonstration againstHaig in Berlin, the determined resistance of the peoplefighting against the NATO runway in Frankfurt.

What really shook the pigs was that in this situation,where not only in the FRG but in the whole of Europe,resistance against imperialism is developing and comingtogether, where more and more people realize who theenemy is and that you have to attack it, that in such asituation the RAF attacked the U.S. headquarters inEurope in Ramstein and the NATO high commandingofficer, U.S. General Kroesen.

This has shaken the pigs, because the mass resistanceagainst the war preparations and the armed attacks of theguerrilla have come together. The Red Brigades in Italy afew weeks ago kidnapped NATO General Dozier under thesame slogan the RAF had in the attack against Kroesen:War on Imperialist War! The Red Brigades have called fora unified struggle of the Red Brigades, RAF, IRA, andETA against U.S. imperialism.

TO WANT REVOLUTIONIS MORE THAN A PHRASE

We have felt during the last year that to want revolutionis more than a phrase, that it is more than just an analysis ofimperialism. To want revolution above all means: wantingto change yourself and others, breaking with structuresand roles that have been especially forced upon us women.It means realizing that personal and political liberation canonly be won together, that personal liberation is the condi-tion necessary for political liberation and vice versa.

The motor for our resistance is the experience that wecan overcome our fears, the knowledge and the conscious-ness that we can change weaknesses into power, that we areno longer just suffering our fate but are subjects of ourthinking, acting and feeling. Women's liberation meansthe fight for self-determination and subjectivity, meansturning around the experience we had as women to be atthe bottom, defined by weakness, alienated from our-

selves. It means turning these experiences around intocollective power, by putting our whole self against therulers, against institutions and institutionalization, againstoppression, against chauvinism. It means becoming a realforce that is able to do away with imperialist rule andpower. •

Banner placed on the U.S. Consulate in Dusseldorf, WestGermany, February 1981. It reads: International Solidaritywith the FALN-11, Puerto Rican Freedom Fighters in the.USA! Observe the Geneva Convention! Association forthe RAF Prisoners! Unity in the Worldwide StruggleAgainst Imperialism! Yankees Out!

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JUDGMENT OF THE GRAND JURYby Carlos Noya,Liga Socialista Puertorriquena

Carlos Noya is a leading member of the Liga SocialistaPuertorriquena (LSP), a public revolutionary organization inPuerto Rico. For 20 years the LSP has argued for the necessityof a protracted people's war to achieve independence and social-ism on the island. Today this strategy is being led and carried outwith growing effectiveness by the Puerto Rican armed clan-destine movement. The inability of the U.S. state to uncover anddestroy the underground forces has made public supporters ofthe armed struggle the targets of repression. For refusing tocollaborate with a federal grand jury investigating the clan-destine organizations, Comrade Noya was exiled andimprisoned in the U. S. After serving 17 months, he was releasedin March, 1982. This essay first appeared in Correo de laQuincena, organ of the political bureau of the LSP, in VolumeXIX, March to September, 1982.

The grand jury is the form of judicial terrorism used byimperialism to jail activists in the independence strugglewhenever they want to do so. The grand jury, as Corretjerhas described it so well, is the reception room for theprison, an illegal mechanism within their illegal legality.It is the arm of the FBI—more specifically of the "TaskForce," comprised mainly of agents of the CIA, FBI andNavy espionage, set up for this purpose and others:

• To obtain information on activists and organizationsthrough the use of intimidation and the threat of jail.

• To threaten activists and organizations throughimprisonment or threat of imprisonment, attemptingto influence some organizations to take more andmore reformist positions.

• To recruit informants who could be planted in, or whoare already within, organizations; to sabotage thework of these organizations and help to fabricatecharges against their leadership.

• As we already said and will expand later, to jailactivists whose work of organizing, propaganda andagitation is effective and anti-imperialist in character.

• And, of key importance, to test the attitude of theactivists and organizations in regard to this body—which is, after all, a measure of the general attitude ofstruggle—for purposes which we will explain later,near the end of this essay.

In the U.S., the grand jury has been used against thePuerto Rican independence movement, about which wewill speak more fully later, and against the Mexicano

movement, the Black movement, the Indian movement,the movement against the war in Viet Nam, the labormovement, and the feminist movement. At present it isbeing used against the Black movement and the white anti-imperialist movement.

In Puerto Rico the grand jury was first used against theindependence movement in April of 1936, when theysubpoenaed the entire leadership of the Nationalist Party.its National Junta and its Municipal Juntas, to appear andsubmit the records of the Party. The information in these

Don Juan Antonio Corretjer, shown here in 1936, when,as a leader of the Nationalist Party, he refused to turn partyrecords over to a grand jury. He was jailed for 14 months.His action set a standard for the Puerto Rican Indepen-dence Movement of total non-collaboration with grandjuries. Corretjer is currently Secretary General of the LigaSocialista Puertorriquena.

BREAKTHROUGH/page 25

records was a matter of public knowledge, but to turn themover was to surrender. This is also how Albizu and Corret-jer understood it. On the day of the subpoena, as both ofthem had agreed, Corretjer, then Secretary General of theParty, informed the court that the documents were in hispossession and that he refused to turn them over to thecourt, whose jurisdiction he did not recognize since it wasa foreign court. As expected, Corretjer was imprisoned,sentenced to one year for contempt.

The process that brought about the establishment of thisgrand jury was the execution of Colonel Riggs in Februaryof 1936, which was provoked by the massacre of fourNationalists four months earlier. Two lessons were learnedfrom this process. The first is that resistance to the grandjury is, in itself, a victory. In this specific case, the positionthat Corretjer took prevented the imprisonment of dozensof Nationalist Party leaders at that time.

The second lesson is that the grand jury arises as aninstrument of judicial terror to punish the punished; or, inclearer terms, to punish the people's self-defense againstofficial terrorism, against murders of independence activ-ists carried out by order of the U.S. imperialist govern-ment. Beyond these two lessons, it established aprecedent: non-collaboration is a complete position; it cannot be divided into testimony and physical evidence whichthey have or could obtain through other means.

Let us keep all this in mind as we analyze later experi-ences.

In 1977, a number of revolutionary Puerto Ricans,Mexicanos and one Venezuelan comrade were imprisonedin the U.S. for refusing to collaborate with a grand jury!

that was investigating the FALN—specifically the FALNbombing of Fraunces Tavern. This action was in responseto a bomb that gusanos, acting on the orders of the CIA,had placed in a restaurant in Mayaguez on Hostos' birth-day in 1975, a few hours before a pro-independenceactivity was to take place. This bomb took the lives of twoPuerto Rican workers and wounded many others, includ-ing a child. The comrades who were imprisoned, 11 in all,included Jose Lopez, now the National Coordinator of theMovimiento de Liberacion Nacional, sister organizationto the Liga Socialista Puertorrequefia; Pedro Archuleta,Mexicano; Ricardo Romero, now Coordinator of the Mex-icano Commission of the MLN; and the Rosado brothers,Julio, Luis and Andres. Julio is now the Coordinator of theEastern U.S. region of the MLN. The comrades decided toturn what looked like a defeat—their imprisonment—intoa political and organizational victory.

Effectively maintaining their political principles of non-collaboration and full support for independence andsocialism for Puerto Rico, and recognizing that the armedstruggle is the only means that can achieve it, these com-rades concretized in practice the bonds of solidarity

between Puerto Ricans and Mexicanos. They also changedfrom a group of activists with a revolutionary politicalline, organizing themselves and others into a NationalCommittee Against Repression, parts of which were con-solidated into the MLN and part of which still exists in itsoriginal form in the Southwest of the U.S. In this periodalso grew the seeds that later became the National Com-mittee to Free the Puerto Rican Prisoners of War.

And most important, the Movimiento de LiberacionNacional is, in fact, the organization that is carryingforward the public struggle in the U.S. for independenceand socialism for Puerto Rico, a fact that reformistshaven't the slightest chance to deny. And this is very, veryimportant and beneficial.

Moreover, it is very important to point out that thesecomrades carried out an extensive and intensive campaignto denounce the judicial terrorism of the grand jury and itsimperialist character in opposition to Puerto Rican inde-pendence. This campaign paralyzed the repressiveactivity of the grand jury and the comrades were freed bydefeating their respective grand juries. The comrade whoserved the most time was comrade Archuleta, who wasimprisoned for 13 months.

The victory of these comrades was so complete thatwhen another group of comrades was called before anothergrand jury after the marvelous and stimulating escape ofPrisoner of War William Morales in 1979, the campaignthat was generated froze the action of that body and no onewas imprisoned. An organization had been built that wasable to mobilize the masses against the grand jury.

And even more important, less than a year ago, anothergrand jury called five comrades from the MLN and fromthe National Committee to Free Puerto Rican Prisoners ofWar, four of whom, Maria Cueto, Andres and JulioRosado and Ricardo Romero had been imprisoned pre-viously by a grand jury. The campaign generated in sup-port of these comrades was very powerful. On December16, 1981, more than 5000 people were mobilized through-out the U.S., Puerto Rico and northern Mexico (the north-ern part of the territory of Mexico that is not occupied bythe U.S.). In Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, 3000 people cametogether in a militant protest in front of the yanqui embassyand burned the imperialist U.S. flag as a warning.

The comrades were brought before the grand jury, andall refused to collaborate. But the U.S. government, inorder to avoid a worse defeat than they had already suf-fered, opted not to jail them. The political line was main-tained, the principles were upheld, and the massesresponded.

Let us now return to Puerto Rico, to the grand jury wesee in operation now; and to begin where we should, wewill start with Vieques.

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COUAROMHW1M4SH cm^ JI/RK

The straggle to drive the Navy out of Vieques beganwith militant action and that is the direction it took forsome time. It began with the brave ocean blockades thatstopped, actually stopped, the practice of environmentalgenocide, the bombing practice. The logic of the strugglebrought this defiance to the shore, to land used as abombing target and/or amphibious landing practice. Inthis, the most difficult of the confrontations, AngelRodriguez Cristobal shined more than anyone. Angeldefended the soil of Vieques to the highest level as a man,and at the highest level of the Liga Socialista Puertorre-quena, at the level that frightened the enemy, that scaredthem because of its potential to spread to others.

The rest is known to all. The enemy cowardly assassi-nated him in prison, in solitary. And in a genuine andfeeling expression for all decent and sensitive people, thecombatants of the Resistencia (FARP), the Voluntaries(OVRP) and the Macheteros (EPB-PRT) avenged themurder through the heroic ambush of Sabana Seca.

What remains is also known to all. The enemy respondswith terrorism, from murder to the judicial terrorism of thegrand jury. Under the distracting mantle of the colonialelections of 1980, Carlos Rosario Pantojas was imprisonedagain, and I was imprisoned also. Using the ambush of thePensacola sailors as an excuse, they imprisoned comrade

Ricarte Monies. And after having to drop a fabricated caseagainst comrade Norberto Cintron Fiallo, the enemyretaliated by jailing him, too. All through the grand jury.

Other things have happened but I will limit my exposi-tion to final points: non-collaboration; and one furtherpoint on the grand jury.

Non-collaboration is a totality; it can not be divided intotestimony and physical evidence. At the beginning of thisessay, we mentioned that one of the reasons for the exis-tence of the grand jury is to measure the attitude of activ-ists and organizations with respect to that body, which is,after all, a test of the general attitude of the struggle.

When activists and organizations call for collaboration,for submitting physical evidence "already in possessionor easily obtained by the enemy," or actually do collabo-rate with the grand jury by surrendering such evidence,imperialism uses this to split the independence movement,as a depressant and as a justification for the jailing of allwho refuse to cooperate, and to strengthen the state andlegitimize terrorism and repression.

The independence straggle, since Montebello—morespecifically, since Fraunces Tavern—has won an impor-tant series of victories, political-military victories, andimportant, although limited, outbreaks of mass struggle:the case of Vieques, the case of major mobilizationsagainst the grand juries in the U.S. and Mexico. Imperial-ism has sought and continues to seek a way to limit orsabotage support by the most conscious elements for therevolution, expanding the political sphere of reformism,thus isolating the most serious, advanced forces, whichmakes it easier for them to be hit.

The incorrectly named "third alternative," which doesnot really exist, falls within this scheme. Cooperation withthe grand jury strengthens it, since it creates in publicopinion an image of effectiveness, a justification for itsexistence, a justification of the allegation that it is notpunitive but coercive, which is a huge lie that collabora-tors give credence to. The enemy uses the example of thecollaborator to justify repression against comrades whostraggle, trying to create an image of the person who doesnot surrender, who does not submit physical evidence,because he/she can not, not because he/she refuses.

The enemy must not be allowed to set up a situation likethis.

To say there is nothing wrong with submitting physicalevidence is to sow demoralization. It is a failure of a basicfundamental of consciousness-raising—to provide anexample. After all, what does the word submitting mean?

And also, what is the guarantee that the enemy, seeingthat people are submitting to the demand for physicalevidence, won't extend the demand to testimony? Thereisn't any.

fWhat the incorrectly named "third alternative" has

done, as has been well said, is "to recover and mobilizethe support of reformist sectors of the independence move-ment" and help imperialism "to launch a campaign ofconfusion and division in the heart of the patriotic forces."

At a time when a sector of the independence movementhas been subjected to the repressive action of addingprestige to the position of autonomy, to submit to theorders of the "Task Force" by way of the grand jury wouldbe to graft itself on to the global process of surrenderingindependence for opportunism.

Let us put a stop to that now.The grand jury is a form of judicial terrorism which

allows yanqui imperialism to do things as they are done inoccupied Ireland and South Africa—to jail activistsbecause they feel like it. The fact that the grand jury'is aninstrument of enemy espionage to imprison activists atwill, the reception room for the prison, and that there is noway to avoid it except in mass struggle, is what brought ourvaliant comrade Ricarte Monies to denounce them, as heshould, without a lawyer, without recognizing the author-ity they have only through their power—power they havenow, but which they will lose someday. The character ofthe grand jury as a secret political tribunal was provenwhen, at the appeal of comrade Norberto Cintron Fiallo,the government refused to answer such basic questions as:when did this grand jury begin? What is it investigating?

The reach and the political weight of the grand jury inPuerto Rico right now is evident. We must prepare our-selves to combat it with the example of those of us who didnot collaborate and will not collaborate, with the experi-

BREAKTHROUGH/page 27

ence of how to fight it, with firm principles and mobiliza-tion for independence and socialism.

NO COLLABORATIONWITH THE FEDERAL GRAND JURY!

TO THE STREETSAGAINST THE FEDERAL GRAND JURY!

Since this essay was first published, the U.S. government hasaccelerated its use of the grand jury as a political weapon. OnSeptember 24, 1982, the MLN grand jury resisters were simul-taneously arrested in four cities by teams of FBI agents. Theywere charged with criminal contempt for refusing to testifybefore a grand jury nine months earlier. All five activists hadbeen visibly organizing in their communities and had neverfailed to appear in court. Yet, the FBI seized them in their homesand on the streets as if they were dangerous fugitives.

At a press conference following their arrests, the FBIdeclared that they had captured the last remaining leaders of theFALN. The sensationalism of this charge and of the arrests waspart of a campaign to criminalize and discredit the five resistersin the eyes of the public.

The charge of criminal contempt, conviction for which car-ries an indeterminate sentence, is meant to put the MLN grandjury resisters in jail for many years. But the government movedso sloppily in putting together their case that the presiding judgewas obliged to point out that the obvious political motivation ofthe prosecution would make it difficult to obtain a conviction.Rather than risk losing, the Justice Department in Washingtondropped the criminal contempt charges on November 15 andthen promptly resubpoenaed the five Puerto Rican and Mex-icano activists to appear before a new grand jury. As we go topress, the government is moving forward with deliberation tobuild a stronger criminal contempt case against the five.

—Eds.

Ricarte Monies Garcia, aleading member of the LigaSocialista Puertorriquena,expatriated and imprisoned inNew York for resisting thefederal grand jury in PuertoRico.

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"THIS COURT HAS NO RIGHTTO TRY US!"

Statements by New Afrikan and White Anti-Imperialist Freedom Fighters

From left to right: Kuwesi Balagoon,Judy Clark, Sekou Odinga, David Gilbert.

On September 13,1982, the U.S. government began pre-trialhearings for the freedom fighters accused of participating in theattempted Brinks expropriation. However, four of the capturedfighters, New Afrikans Sekou Odinga and Kuwesi Balagoonand white anti-imperialists Judy Clark and David Gilbert, dis-rupted the state's plans by renouncing the legitimacy of the courtand refusing to participate in the trial. The Brinks expropriationattempt was carried out on October 20, 1981, in Nyack, N.Y.,under the leadership of the Black Liberation Army. In responseto the government's attempt to criminalize the action, the fourfreedom fighters have asserted that U.S. imperialism, the great-est criminal entity on Earth and colonizer of the Black nation,has no right to sit in judgment on revolutionaries fighting for theindependence of New Afrika. Chanting "Free the Land," refus-ing to stay seated and showing no respect for the proceedings,their militancy forced even the bourgeois media to acknowledgethat this is a political, not a criminal trial. Following are thefreedom fighters' statements in court:

Sekou OdingaLet me say at the outset of this statement that I am a

Muslim and a New Afrikan freedom fighter. Both posi-tions leave me out of the jurisdiction of this court and makethese court proceedings null and void (illegal).

As a Muslim I am subject to the laws of the Qur'anwhich clearly tells me to fight oppression. To enjoin whatis right and to forbid what is wrong. As a freedom fighter,fighting for the freedom, liberation and self-determinationof my people, the United Nations charter and all otherlegal bodies dealing with the subject of liberation of anoppressed people, recognize my right to wage armed

BREAKTHROUGH/page 29

struggle against my oppressor. It is important to under-stand who I am and who my people are.

I am the descendant of Afrikan slaves, brought to thiscountry in chains as captives of a brutal slave war wagedagainst the Afrikan people. My people have been fightingfor our survival, liberation and self-determination sincethe first Afrikan was illegally kidnapped and enslaved forthe profit and the pleasure of the European.

We the Afrikan descendants are now called citizens ofthe United States, but like everything else that has beenforced on the Afrikan slaves and their descendants, wewere never asked if that is what we wanted or needed. Thistitle of citizen was forced upon us, but the rights that goalong with this citizenship for the European Americancitizen were never given to the ex-slave and his descen-dants.

I am not an American citizen. I am a victim of America.I am a citizen of the Republic of New Afrika. I do not wantto be an American citizen. America has proven itself to bethe most devilish and barbarous people that has ever calledthemselves civilized.

Black people in the United States are a colonized peopleand have always been a colonized people. What is meantby "a colonized people"? A colonized people is a peoplewhose land, labor and resources are controlled andexploited by another group of people. It makes the colo-nized dependent on the exploiting group. Dependent onthem for almost everything. Their laws, their livelihood,their protection, their every way of life. A colonizedpeople doesn't ask to be dependent, it is forced on them,usually with arms, as it was forced on my Afrikan fore-fathers. And it is with arms that their hold is usuallybroken by the oppressed people. The U.S. Declaration ofIndependence declares:

.. .that all men are created equal, that they are endowed bytheir Creator with certain inalienable Rights, that amongthese are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. Thatto secure these rights, Governments are instituted amongMen, deriving their just powers from the consent of thegoverned, that whenever any Form of Governmentbecomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of thePeople to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a newGovernment, laying its foundation on such principles andorganizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seemmost likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursu-ing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reducethem under absolute Despotism, it is their duty to throwoff such Government and to provide new Guards for theirfuture security.

On January 24, 1979 the United Nations passed a spe-cific resolution stating:

The General Assembly declares that freedom fighterscaptured during the struggle for liberation must be entitled

to Prisoner of War status in accordance with the relevantprovisions of the Geneva Convention.

In 1950 as part of its "Programme of Action" to endcolonialism the General Assembly has specificallyinsisted that the captured anti-colonial freedom fightermay not be prosecuted as a criminal under the domesticlaw of the detaining colonial power, but must instead betreated in accordance with the relevant provisions of theGeneva Convention relative to the treatment of Prisonersof War. (This is resolution #2621.) So as a Prisoner of War,international law, which Article 6 of the United StatesConstitution states supercedes domestic law, prohibits mefrom being tried in a criminal court by the colonizingpower, which the U.S. government is in relationship to thedescendants of Afrikan slaves.

So I do not recognize any legitimate right of this court totry me. My only participation in these proceedings will beto push for my legitimate political rights as a freedomfighter and Prisoner of War and to denounce these illegalproceedings in particular and the colonial government ofthe United States of America in general.

"AH Power to the Righteous People"

Free the Land

Kuwesi BalagoonAs an anti-imperialist and a warrior of African descent,

dedicated to the overthrow of the United States govern-ment, as an urban guerrilla in the ranks of the BlackLiberation Army, I will not only resist the designs of asham hypocritical system of law, but outright refuse totake any part in court proceedings. At large I do not paytaxes, aid the fascist law enforcement authorities, or passup reasonable opportunities to strike the oppressors, andfind no reason to change now or any time in the future. Aslong as the United States Government keeps the masses ofBlack and other Third World people as cannon fodder, anduses force to maintain its domination over us, and I amalive, I will resist, knowing that my fate as a resister,irregardless of the state's consequences, is better than thefates of those who accept oppression and pass it on tocoming generations.

The gang of bullies under the banner of the Americanflag who practice genocide against Black, Latin andNative American peoples within its confines, while har-boring nazis and secret police from other fascist regimes,and arming and training ku klux klanners and domesticnazis, deserves no respite, and it's a sad day whenever theydo. The United States, Israel, and South Africa stand asexpanding imperialist settler states, rotten to their coresfrom inception. Their fall will mark the end of a tragic erain history, worth all truly revolutionary efforts.

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Judy ClarkI am a revolutionary and an anti-imperialist freedom

fighter, committed to overturning this system of exploita-tion, to the liberation of the captive Black Nation of NewAfrika and all oppressed nations, and to a socialist future.I do not recognize the legitimacy of this court to try us,because it is only a part of the government's armed appa-ratus of war to maintain power and domination. I will notparticipate in these so-called legal proceedings.

This court will never seek justice for the theft andenslavement of millions of Afrikan people. For the armedrobbery and continued occupation of Native American,Mexican and Puerto Rican land and sovereignty. For thestolen lives and labor of all those whose work bringsnothing but riches to the powerful.

Two thousand Black people have been murdered withimpunity by the police in the u.s. over the last five years.When this happens in Northern Ireland, it is called war.Here, they try to call it justice.

For 400 years, the rulers of this empire have used forceof arms, terror and white supremacy to enslave, dominateand exploit Black people. For just as long, Black peoplehave resisted and fought for their human rights and free-dom. They have fought for land and independence as theonly means to secure their rights as a people. The most far-

sighted and class conscious white people have joined insolidarity with this struggle, as the only road to a societybased in justice, equality and power to working people.

The right to self-determination is the most basic humanright of any people. The right to fight for it by any meansnecessary, including armed struggle, is recognized by theU.N. This court and the government it upholds tramplesupon that right and calls those who fight for it terrorists andcriminals. Well, you called Ho Chi Minh a terrorist and heled his nation to independence and socialism. You calledRobert Mugabe a terrorist and he is now the Prime Minis-ter of an independent Zimbabwe, building a non-racialistand socialist society.

We are not terrorists. We are freedom fighters, uphold-ing those same most basic and precious rights. For the lasteleven months, I have refused to collaborate with thiscourt's/d.a. 's/FBI's attempts to criminalize us and wage itsoffensive against the Black liberation struggle and anti-imperialist movement. I will never give anything ofmyself to you and I will continue to struggle as a freedomfighter.

Today, you have the power to impose this mockery onus. But tomorrow, our children and even some of yours,will dance on the ashes of this blood-soaked empire. NewAfrika and all oppressed nations will be free. And thetremendous, human undertaking of building socialismwill be the challenge.

David GilbertThe government that dropped napalm in Vietnam, that

provides the cluster bombs used against civilians inLebanon, and that trains the torturers in El Salvador callsus "terrorists." The rulers who have grown rich on gener-ations of slave labor and slave wages violently imposed onBlack people label us as "criminals." The police forces ofAmerika who have murdered 2,000 Third World people inthe last five years and who flood the communities withdrugs say that we "have no respect for human life."

We are neither terrorists nor criminals. It is preciselybecause of our love of life, because we revel in the humanspirit, that we became freedom fighters against this racistand deadly imperialist system.

The lesson of history is that oppression calls forthrebellion; social structures that live off plunder, exploita-tion and degradation mandate revolution. The 400 years ofthe rip-off of the labor and ingenuity of African people inthe New World created their absolute right of self-deter-mination and national liberation; the 400 years of brutalrepression created the necessity of armed struggle to

achieve those rights. White people with any sense ofjustice and with any hope of living in a humane andcooperative society must fully ally with Black liberation.

There should be no illusions that these proceedings willbe fair and impartial. The courts, along with the army andthe police, are very much a part of the repressive apparatusthat maintains this criminal and thoroughly illegitimatesocial system—imperialism—in power. This court has noright to try us. I will not participate in these hearings. Themass media, controlled by big money, serves these sameends. The FBI/police/media have waged a massive cam-paign of slander against us, a campaign highly politicaland reactionary in character. Can we now expect that thecourts and media will provide us a comparable forum toanswer their lies and racism?

Let no one be fooled by their cries of "law and order"and "stop crime." If those were the real concerns, warcriminals like Nixon and McNamara would be in prison,killer cops would no longer be walking the streets, the KuKlux Klan would have been wiped out, the corporationsthat grow fat from apartheid in South Africa and fromracism would have been seized long ago.

The only way we will get justice is to build a revolution-ary movement that fights for it. •

BREAKTHROUGH/page 31

MAY19TH

"A STOP THE GRAND JURY!DEFEAT THE FEDERAL RICO INDICTMENT!

Reprinted below is a pamphlet published by the May I9thCommunist Organization in December 1982. Copies are avail-able—see p. 23 for details.

On November 18, 1982, a special federal RICO grandjury indicted eleven people in the most sweeping conspir-acy case since the Panther 21 conspiracy case of 1969.After investigating the Black Liberation Army for over ayear, the u.s. government is charging freedom fighters andpublic activists alike with being part of a "racketeeringconspiracy" which allegedly planned and committed aseries of actions ranging from the liberation from prison ofAssata Shakur on November 2, 1979 to numerous bankrobberies. Named in the conspiracy indictment are: Dr.Mutulu Shakur, Sekou Odinga, Nehanda Abiodun, BilalSunni-Ali, Chui Ferguson, Jamal, Iliana Robinson, NilseCobeo, Susan Rosenberg, Silvia Baraldini and Dr. AlanBerkman. Of these eleven people, four are free today.

In the late 60's, the FBI, through COINTELPRO,assassinated and imprisoned Black revolutionary leadersin an effort to destroy the Black Liberation Struggle.Through the Panther 21 conspiracy indictment, theyattacked the leadership of a revolutionary movement at acritical stage of development. Today, as the FBI uses theRICO indictment to attack the New Afrikan movementand the BLA, the stakes are higher. Both freedom fightersand activists in the public movement face prison sentencesof up to 20 years on each count of the conspiracy indict-ment. In its effort to destroy the Black Liberation Army,the FBI has used systematic torture against New Afrikanfreedom fighters. In its efforts to destroy the New AfrikanIndependence Movement, it is making full use of tools ofrepression like the grand jury, creating special politicalpolice forces such as the Joint Terrorist Task Force, andusing tactics such as the creation of traitors.

ary movement, and particularly the Black revolutionarymovement, which poses the fundamental threat of explod-ing the very foundations of the u.s. empire. Today, the FBIis using the RICO indictment to attack the New Afrikanmovement and to stop the development of a clandestinearmy which is vital to implementing a revolutionary strat-egy for the liberation of the New Afrikan Nation. Thisstrategy to win land, independence and socialism for NewAfrika is in direct contradiction to imperialism's Trilateralstrategy for the 21st century, in which Black people areexpendable. If imperialism is to implement its strategy ofmass genocide and the forcible removal of Black people tobantustans outside the nation's major cities, it must noweradicate the New Afrikan Independence Movement, par-ticularly the armed forces which are resisting repressionand building the capability to wage a people's war. This iswhat the FBI is trying to do.

Through the RICO indictment, the FBI is also trying tostop the development of white communist revolutionariescommitted to fight for the liberation of New Afrika and alloppressed nations and the total destruction of u.s. imperi-alism. They have particularly targetted May 19th Commu-nist Organization for destruction. They know that we arecommitted to playing a role as a public organization in astrategy of people's war and armed struggle to destroy theu.s. empire. The state is well aware that we look to therevolutionary forces in the New Afrikan, Puerto Rican andMexican struggles as the revolutionary leadership in thiscountry, and they do not want to see us organize a seriousrevolutionary movement among white working class peo-ple that will fight as allies of the liberation struggles for thetotal destruction of imperialism and the building of social-ism. They have indicted Silvia Baraldini and Alan Berk-man of our organization in an effort to make our publicrevolutionary work illegal.

WHY THIS INDICTMENT?

This indictment represents an attempt by the FBI to wina counter-insurgency war aimed at destroying the struggleto free the land of New Afrika—wiping out the BlackLiberation Army and the public movement that supportsthe armed struggle. The primary purpose of the FBI is nodifferent than it has ever been—to destroy the revolution-

THE FBI'S OFFENSIVE

The RICO conspiracy indictment is the product of ayear-long grand jury "investigation" which began Octo-ber 6, 1981. Of primary concern to the FBI were theactivities of the Black Liberation Army. Since AssataShakur escaped from maximum security prison onNovember 2, 1979, the FBI has neither been able to

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Opening day of Brinks pre-trialhearings, New City, N.Y.,

September 13, 1982.

recapture her nor to capture the BLA soldiers who freedher. Assata's liberation was widely supported in Blackcommunities throughout the country. The public supportthat was built for her was effective in combatting thegovernment's efforts to criminalize Assata's liberation. Inthe next two years, the BLA would claim three moreactions: the bombing of the Eastern Rugby Union office inprotest of the South African Springbok Rugby Tour, theretaliation against the NYPD for the capture of BashirHamid (s/n James York), and the attempted Brinks expro-priation of October 20, 1981 in Nyack, New York. Thisexpropriation was carried out by a Revolutionary ArmedTask Force, built by the Black Liberation Army, whichincluded revolutionary Black and white freedom fighters.During this two-year period the New Afrikan Indepen-dence Movement continued to organize for a strategy ofprotracted people's war to win land, independence andsocialism for New Afrika. During this time, the May 19thCommunist Organization built active support amongwhite people for Assata Shakur, and other New AfrikanFreedom Fighters and for the New Afrikan IndependenceMovement.

With the capture of four combatants attempting therevolutionary Brinks expropriation of October 20th, theFBI escalated its offensive, waging an all-out war to anni-hilate the Black Liberation Army, destroy the New AfrikanIndependence Movement, and destroy the white anti-imperialist movement. The FBI's Joint Terrorist TaskForce dealt some heavy blows—the murder of NewAfrikan Freedom Fighter Mtayari Shabaka Sundiata, the

capture and torture of Sekou Odinga, the subsequent cap-ture of Kuwesi Balagoon, and the arrests of many publicactivists. In the past year, the Joint Terrorist Task Forceconducted numerous acts of terror against Black commu-nities. In an effort to arrest and frame Republic of NewAfrika activist Fulani Sunni-Ali for participating in theBrinks expropriation, they amassed 200 specially trainedpolice, equipped with tanks, helicopters and automaticweapons to raid a small school/farmhouse in Gallman,Mississippi, terrorizing three adults and twelve childrenwho lived there. During the past year, the Joint TerroristTask Force has conducted numerous break-ins of homesand cars and has kept public activists under constantsurveillance. When Silvia Baraldini was arrested, tenagents of the Joint Terrorist Task Force raided her home,carrying out 10 crates of personal belongings and May 19thliterature.

The other main force used by the FBI in its year-longoffensive has been the grand jury, convened under theRacketeering and Corrupt Organizations Act. RICO is oneof the many repressive measures that has been passedunder the guise of fighting organized crime, only to beused later against revolutionary organizations. ThroughRICO, the government can jail people solely for theirpolitical beliefs and membership in revolutionary organi-zations. RICO is being used to obtain information aboutthe New Afrikan Independence Movement and the BlackLiberation Army, to issue criminal indictments, to launchsearches for freedom fighters, to jail leaders of the publicmovements, and to turn people into traitors. In these ways,

BREAKTHROUGH/page 33

RICO constitutes an attack on the entire New AfrikanIndependence Movement.

A total of ten people have been imprisoned for refusingto collaborate with the grand jury "investigation." Thisrevolutionary and principled stand has been fought for byleaders in the Puerto Rican and Mexicano struggles, whoare now fighting the state's efforts to charge them withcriminal contempt for resisting the fascism of the grandjury. By taking the stand of non-collaboration, the grandjury resisters are carrying on the total resistance of thefreedom fighters. In the words of New Afrikan grand juryresister Shaheem Jabbar, "Our non-collaboration must beaccompanied with a conviction that prison is not a defeat.It demonstrates that the government cannot break the willand spirit of our people." By refusing to talk to the grandjury, Shaheem Jabbar, Alan Berkman, Eve Rosahn, SilviaBaraldini, Bernardine Dohrn, Jerry Gaines, Asha Sun-diata, Aisha, Yaasmyn Fula, Rilani Sunni-Ali and IlianaRobinson are building a wall of silence protecting thearmed clandestine movement.

Faced with the refusal of the grand jury resisters to giveevidence or testify, the grand jury has issued its indict-ments based on the statements of informers and traitors.The same information in the statement written by the FBIand signed by Solomon Brown under torture (a statementthat he later recanted) has now been put into the mouth ofTyrone Risen. And the stories that came from thederanged mind of Yvonne Thomas are now coming fromthe mouth of Peter Middleton. The use of traitors is aclassic tactic in counter-insurgency operations all over theworld. The FBI trains fascist police forces from othercountries to turn people into traitors through coercion andbribery. Many times this is the only way the state's policeforces have of gaining information and creating mis-infor-mation about revolutionary movements. It is no surprisethat the FBI would try this tactic within the New Afrikanstruggle. It is a victory for the state that the FBI has beenable to get two men to turn traitors on their own people.Even though the statements of the traitors are lies andfabrications, the state has already been able to use them toarrest and indict seven people and to put out " shoot-to-kin" orders on freedom fighters that it has been unable tocapture.

RICO—WHO SETS THE TERMS?

In an effort to set the political terms and hand the NewAfrikan Independence Movement and the white anti-imperialist movement a resounding defeat, the FBI isusing RICO to indict New Afrikans and white anti-imperi-alists for master-minding a "racketeering conspiracy."The FBI is trying to use this case to discredit the NewAfrikan struggle and to present revolutionaries as crimi-

nals. Kenneth Walton of the Joint Terrorist Task Force hasbeen making television appearances saying that "Thesepeople rob banks because they don't want to work for aliving." Says Walton, "It's only after they have beencaught that they come up with slogans like 'Free theLand.'" In the trial, the FBI will parade the traitors beforethe public as the living embodiment that revolution is adegenerate, self-serving criminal enterprise that anyonewith an ounce of self-respect should stay away from.

What really defines this case, however, is the strength ofthe revolutionary commitment of the freedom fighters. Inthe state trial in Rockland County where six people arecharged in the attempted Brinks expropriation, NewAfrikan Freedom Fighters have set the terms. What dothese freedom fighters represent?

New Afrikan Freedom Fighters represent the first point ofresistance for the Black Nation. Under different variationsand interpretations, they represent the continuity of ourstruggle for self-determination. They represent the uncon-querable will of our people that enabled us to survive themost brutal form of oppression the world has known.Simultaneously, New Afrikan Freedom Fightersexemplify our recognition of the need to confront andvanquish our oppressors.

-^Communique from the Revolutionary Armed TaskForce of the Black Liberation Army, New AfrikanFreedom Fighters Day, August 21, 1982.

The total resistance shown by New Afrikan and whiteanti-imperialist freedom fighters on trial in RocklandCounty on September 13, 1982 enabled them to turn apotential defeat into a victory. The state was not able tostage a propaganda coup espousing that criminals andterrorists were on trial. Instead, the freedom fighters tookthe offensive, turning the state's strategy on its head. NewAfrikan POW's Sekou Odinga and Kuwesi Balagoon tookthe stand that the u.s. court has no right to try the freedomfighters of a colonized nation struggling for liberation.White revolutionary anti-imperialists Judy Clark andDavid Gilbert joined in forcefully exposing theillegitimacy of the u.s. government. Their statementsnamed the state as the terrorists and the revolutionaries asthe freedom fighters, and their statements were heardaround the world. These freedom fighters have notstopped fighting just because they are in prison. The totalresistance that they embody is a powerful force that thestate has not been able to contain or destroy. It is thisstrength of character that we can expect Sekou Odinga tobring to the RICO case to combat the government's use oftraitors and informers.

A state victory in this conspiracy case would be adangerous precedent for all revolutionary and progressiveforces in the u.s. empire. This indictment charges freedomfighters and public activists alike with planning and carry-ing out a long series of acts. In addition to the escape of

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Demonstration,New City, New York,

September 13, 1982.

Assata Shakur and the attempted Brinks expropriation, theindicted comrades are charged with being part of a rack-eteering conspiracy that planned and carried out bankrobberies which allegedly took place in Pittsburgh, theBronx, In wood, and Arlington, Va. They are charged withseveral "attempted" expropriations of armored vehicles atNanuet, N.Y. and Danbury, Connecticut. The grand juryoffers no proof whatsoever that these "attempts" everhappened. They were described by traitor Tyrone Rison as"trial runs." Yet the FBI would use these charges to sendmembers of revolutionary movements to prison for twentyyears or more.

Silvia Baraldini is among those people charged with theescape of Assata Shakur from prison and with the kidnap-ping of a prison guard and prison matron in the course ofthe escape. In fact, this widely supported escape wasplanned and carried out by the Black Liberation Army.And it is precisely because the state wants to destroy thepublic support that it is trying to criminalize this revolu-tionary action. Since 1973, when Assata Shakur wasarrested on the New Jersey Turnpike, forces that built May19th Communist Organization struggled for white peopleto support her as a revolutionary freedom fighter. It is thiswork that was key in defining the politics of May 19th

Communist Organization that fight for the right of Blackpeople to wage an armed struggle for liberation as centralto the defeat of u.s. imperialism. Through this work weunderstood that there is no other strategy for white peopleto defeat imperialism and build socialism than through thestrategy of national liberation war. For May 19th 's revolu-tionary politics, Silvia Baraldini is being indicted on crim-inal charges.

The indictment of Dr. Alan Berkman as an accessory inthe Brinks expropriation attempt is another attack on May19th Communist Organization and an attempt to stopwhite people from participating in revolutionary struggle.Because May 19th has built public support for freedomfighters, one of our members is being charged as anaccessory in this case. Because Dr. Berkman has foughtfor correct medical care for Prisoners-of-War and hasexposed the torture of New Afrikan POW Sekou Odinga,he is now being charged with treating Marilyn Buck afterthe October 20th action, an act that carries a twelve-yearsentence. The only way to stop these fascist measuresaimed at destroying public revolutionary organizations isto build a revolutionary movement based on concretesupport for freedom fighters. By applying the principlesthat the freedom fighters are struggling for, we can changethe terms that the state is trying to set in this case. i

STOP FBI REPRESSION-

STOP THE RICO GRAND JURY

In response to this attack by the state on the New-Afrikan Independence Movement and our own organiza-tion, the May 19th Communist Organization is going on anoffensive against the FBI to stop the RICO grand jury. Theattempt of the FBI to imprison Silvia Baraldini for 20 yearsand Alan Berkman for 12 years marks the highest level ofbattle with the state that we have been in to date. For thelast year the state has tried to destroy us through mediaattacks, physical attacks, raids on our houses, jailing ourmembers, and trying to isolate us. The attacks arenational. In Texas, our organization has been a target ofattack by the Ku Klux Klan. Yet the movement we arebuilding has grown stronger. RICO is exactly the kind ofindictment the state has been looking for to deal us aserious defeat. Since the state arrested Silvia Baraldini,they have gone to great lengths to ensure that she will stayin jail. Her arrest on a criminal complaint was followed bya bond set at $300,000 and a grand jury subpoena. WhenSilvia and Alan were indicted, we waged a successful fightto get the grand jury contempt dropped and to bail Alanout of jail. The state then announced its intention to file anorder requiring hair and handwriting samples for Silviaand Alan knowing that they would be jailed rather thanprovide these samples to the enemy. The next week, thestate denied a motion to lower Silvia's bond. As we con-tinue to participate in the development of people's warinside the u.s. empire, we can expect the state to marshalall of its forces to defeat us. And we also know that, if wefight our enemy with revolutionary strategy and tactics atevery step of the way, we can turn a potential defeat into avictory.

We are committed to fighting this case based on princi-ples of support for the struggle to win land, independence,and socialism for New Afrika; support for the armedclandestine movements; total non-collaboration with thestate; and a total commitment to defeat u.s. imperialism.When we fight this case, we are fighting the politicalpolice of the u.s. imperialist state—the FBI. We know thatthe Joint Terrorist Task Force, the Ku Klux Klan, and thegrand jury are their forces for implementing their strategyand that they can be defeated.

Our goal is to stop the repression through building arevolutionary movement. We are fighting to stop theRICO grand jury—forcing the state to drop all indictmentsand subpoenas and to free the people indicted. This fight iswaged in conjunction with the fight to stop the grand juryrepression against the Puerto Rican and Mexican strug-gles. It is waged in solidarity with the freedom fighters ofthe BLA, the RATF, and the FALN. We are holdingnational demonstrations on designated days, participatingin monthly vigils called on the 26th of every month by theMovimiento de Liberation Nacional, holding forums and

charlas to build resistance to the grand juries, and conduct-ing a petition and national letterwriting campaign to theJustice Department demanding that the grand jury bestopped. We are raising money to conduct a legal andpolitical defense that will make a contribution to fightingthe government's strategy. It is a priority to bail SilviaBaraldini out of jail. These actions are all part of a fight tostop RICO and hand the FBI a defeat.

In fighting this case we have lessons of history to drawon. When the state first began to implement COIN-TELPRO (its counter-intelligence program) against theBlack Liberation Struggle, no one had heard of it. Blackrevolutionary leaders like Dr. Mutulu Shakur fought todefeat this strategy by exposing what the state was doing.We know that the state has never been able to succeed inconspiracy indictments. When the state tried to convict thePanther 21 they failed. The state has on its side the fullmilitary and bureaucratic apparatus of u.s. imperialism.But we have on our side the revolutionary leadership of thenational liberation struggles,.the developing armed clan-destine forces within these struggles, white freedom fight-ers committed to the principle of proletar ianinternationalism, communist organization, and a move-ment that is growing stronger through higher levels ofstruggle with the state. People who are doing time inprison are coming out stronger, more committed revolu-tionaries. We have history on our side. If we fight, we canwin.

LAND AND INDEPENDENCE FOR NEW AFRIKA!

LONG LIVE THE B.L.A.!

DEATH TO U.S. IMPERIALISM!

YOU CAN FIGHTTO STOP THE INDICTMENT!!!

D I want to request a speaker from the May 19th Commu-nist Organization to speak on the fight to stop the RICOindictment.

D I will set up media interviews'or circulate articles onthis case.

D I will circulate petitions, letters and literature to helpfight this attack.

D Lam contributing $ to the Liberation LegalDefense Fund.

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ADDRESS

CITY _STATE. ZIP

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HAVE YOU SEEN "LA NUEVA MUJERREVOLUCIONARIA PUERTORRIQUEftA?The Poetry and lives of RevolutionaryPuerto Rican Women.

A new anthology of poetry, biog-raphies and statements of 19thand 20th Century Revolutionarywomen. The poetry and lives ofthese women demonstrate thepower and determination of wom-en who are transformed by theirparticipation in the destructionof colonialism.

To order send $3.50 tothe New Movement in Solidarity withthe Puerto Rican and Mexican Revolutions3543 18th St. #17, San Francisco, CA 94110.

THE QUESTION OF"ZAIRE"/CONGOThe Histcry of the 1977-78 Uprising in [he Congo

by theCongolese national Liberation Front

Available from:John Brown Book ClubPO Box 14422San Francisco, CA 94114

$2 + .40 postage

10 or more:

$1.20 + .25 postage each

These six communiques from the Congolese NationalLiberation Front (FLNC), available for the first time in theU.S., tell the true story of the struggle of the Congo, whichhas been distorted and whited-out by the Western media. 32pp., 14 photos. All proceeds go to the FLNC.

"TO WINWORLD penceUJ€ MUST FIGHTIMP6RIAUSM"

DOCUMCNTSAND COMMUNIQUESFROM TH€ MOV€M€NTIN W€ST G€RMHNV

Includes:

• Anti-Reagan/Anti-NATO DemonstrationJune II, 1982 (Berlin)

a brochure by independent and anti-imperialistgroups. On June I Ith, thousands of Germananti-war activists fought riot police to protestReagan's visit to Berlin and NATO's summitmeeting.

• "War on Imperialist War"an analysis of the German anti-war and anti-nuclear movements, by Women AgainstImperialist War (Hamburg.)

• Communiques from the RAF(Red Army Fraction)

- attempted assassination of Alexander Haig- attempted assassination of U.S. Commander in

Europe, Frederick Kroesen-. bombing of U.S. Air Force Headquarters in

Ramstein, West Germany

The RAF is a revolutionary armed organization.In 1982 they carried out over 50 attacks on theU.S. military in Germany.

$2 + 40£ postage5 or more — $1.20 + 25g postage ea.

available from John Brown Book ClubPOB 14422, San Francisco, CA 94114

SUBSCRIBE TO BREAKTHROUGHD Please enter my subscription to Breakthrough beginning with issueD $6.00/4 issues, regular D $15/yr., institutional. Postage included.

Back issues and bulk orders are also available. Write us for more information. Please contact us if youwould like to help distribute Breakthrough in your area.

Name

Address .

City State ZIP

Please make checks payable tojohn Brown Book Club, POB 14422, San Francisco, CA 94114Prisoners correspondence and subscriptions should be sent to POB 60542, Los Angeles, CA 90060.

If you have a red dot on your mailing label, it's time to renew. Please notify us of address changes.

FALN BRINGS IN THE NEW YEAR"This is the FALN We are responsible for the bombings in New York City today.

PUERTO RICO! FREE ALL POLITICAL PRISONERSAND PRISONERS OF WAR!"

December 31, 1982

Federal PrisonYC Police H

lllliiowers-

NMHHKourt

The Fuerzas Armadas de Liberacion Nacional (FALN)is an armed clandestine Puerto Rican independence orga-nization in the U.S. that has carried out more than 100actions against U.S. imperialism since 1974. On NewYear's Eve their targets were the FBI, police, a federalcourt and a federal prison. One bomb damaged the

Metropolitan Correctional Center (MCC), which hasbecome a political internment center for many of thePuerto Rican, New Afrikan and white anti-imperialistswho have been jailed for refusing to collaborate withfederal grand juries. The FALN is alive and well! Longlive the armed clandestine movement!

INDEPENDENCE AND SOCIALISM FOR PUERTO RICO!

VICTORY TO PALESTINE!This is not the first time the Zionists have miscalcu-

lated. In March 1978, they anticipated a military vic-tory within 24-48 hours after their forces crossed theLebanese border. Their calculations were off by a longshot. They failed, as they always do, to take intoaccount our readiness to sacrifice in defense of therevolution and the masses, and our steadfastness in

the face of one of the most vicious military machinesof today.

This gap is inherent in any reactionary or imperialistassessment of a revolution. It stems from their igno-rance of the masses' abilities and will to sacrifice. Theycannot understand the principles of our masses andtheir revolutionary vanguard; nor do they understandwhat it means to fight for freedom, justice and libera-tion."

—Abu Ahmed Faud, Politbureau memberPopular Front for the Liberation of Palestine

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