-I __Australasian ______
Number 190 Autumn 2005 50 cents Australian Military Get Out of Aceh Now! Indonesian Troops Out! Australian Imperialists Seize On Tsunami Catastrophe
casting images of Australian soldiers in Science in Service Aceh domg some work apparently to pro vide clean water supplies. The "Aussie" of Humanity military is being portrayed as saviours of the dark-skinned Asian masses. Don't Could Have buy a word of this! This is the same mil itary that three years ago was kidnapping Saved Thousands Afghan, Near Eastern and South Asian asylum seekers on the high seas and The massive tsunami that crashed onto dumping them on the remote Pacific the shores of eleven South Asian and island of Nauru. This is the military that African countries on 26 December last has been used in the past to smash work year has left hundreds of thousands dead, February: Prime minister Howard ers strikes (the coal miners in 1949, the and millions without housing, food, water with Australian soldiers in Aceh. airline pilots in 1989 who struck against Australian imperialists have been the Labor government's pro-business and employment. The scope of the deva expanding military presence in Asia "Accord") and which will be used in the station and the terror delivered on the Pacific reijion. Right: Troops take peoples affected is hard to comprehend. over Solomon Islands, July 2003. future when struggles of workers and the Now disease and starvation haunt the oppressed threaten bourgeois class rule. traumatised survivors seeking to recon This is the military whose white soldiers struct shattered lives, which overwhelm immediate and generous outpouring of regions under the pretext of providing from the elite lRAR Townsville regiment ingly were already defined by poverty monetary and other aid by trade unionists "aid." The U.S. despatched planes and were photographed in 2000 dressed as and oppression. As pointed out by our and individuals across Australia. Geelong helicopters and 20 U.S. warships, along fascist Ku Klux Klansmen humiliating comrades in the U.S., in Workers Van oil refinery workers voted to increase with 13,000 military personnel to the non-white soldiers. This is also the mili guard No. 839, 7 January 2005, "The their union's initial proposal of ten thou Indian Ocean. The USS Abraham Lin tary that is today taking part in the mur mind numbing death toll, and the deaths sand dollars for the victims of the disas coln and Seahawk helicopters were derous U.S.-led colonial occupation of yet to be counted, are the result of disas ter to one hundred thousand dollars. ostentatiously positioned off the coast of Iraq including, as described by Australian ter magnified by class inequalities and the These are real expressions of solidarity Aceh. Meanwhile Japan also rushed defence intelligence scientist, Dr. Rod subordination of science to capitalist by the working class for its sisters and 1,000 troops to the area. The Australian Barton, directly carrying out brutal inter rule." Indeed, in a society where science brothers in South Asia and fly in the face imperialists, for their part, stationed the rogations of Iraqis. is wielded in the service of all human of the deep-going white racism of this warship Kanimbla, C-130 Hercules air To fully comprehend the motives ity-instead of for the profits of a tiny backward and insular society. craft, helicopters, landing craft and up to behind the military expedition to Indone class of exploiters-tens, if not hundreds, However, the various imperialist pow 900 military personnel in and off the sia one needs to understand imperialism of thousands could have been saved. ers seized on the disaster to position their coast of Aceh. as the highest stage of capitalism and how Following the tsunami, there was an blood-soaked militaries in the affected The capitalist media have been broad- continued on page 2 HerOic Aboriginal Militants Hit With Heavv Sentences Free Redfern Political Prisoners Now! FEBRUARY 23-Ten days ago, hun others have received non-custodial sen dreds of Aboriginal people and leftists tences. Last week, Raymond Carr, a marched in protests in Sydney and Mel cousin of TJ, lost his appeal against a 12- bourne to mark the one-year anniversary month jail sentence for his participation of the killing of Thomas "TJ" Hickey. in last year's struggle. We say: Free the The 17 -year-old Kamilaroi Murri youth Redfern political prisoners now! Drop died after being pursued, and by all indi all the charges! cations rammed, by a police vehicle From arrests of picketers during the while riding his bicycle in Redfern. But 1998 MUA struggle to the violent cop today, those in jail are not the racist cops attacks against the 2003 high-school stu who caused the youth's death. No, those dent strikes against the Iraq war, there has in jail are the Redfern Aboriginal mili certainly been plenty of vicious state tants who, following TJ's killing, heroi repression meted out against struggles of cally defended their community against the working class and oppressed in the marauding police in a nine-hour pitched last several years. BuUhe heavy jail sen battle. tences handed down to Redfern militants. Several of the 35 or so people arrested and the sizeable jail term received by Vic ASp photo over the battle on 15 February 2004 have torian trade-union leader Craig Johnston Redfern, 13 February 2005: March commemorating one-year anniversary of already been convicted on charges in last year, is a new mark in right-wing death of T J Hickey. Spartacist League supporters joined protest, called cluding "riot" and "affray." Some have political repression in the recent history for union/black actions to protest killing of the Kamilaroi youth at hands of been hit with lengthy jail terms while continued on page 9 racist state. ---~----...... ~
the "lion's share" devoted to assist Aus North Korean and Vietnamese deformed ~?.# Tsunami ... tralian and New Zealand companies to workers states against imperialist attack (continued from page 1) gain a foothold in Aceh. and internal counterrevolution! In the r The entire Australian ruling class, and face of renewed imperialist hostility in that plays out in this region. As explained its Labor Party (ALP) lackeys, are ecsta response to North Korea's announcement by Russian revolutionary leader, VI. tic over the intervention into Indonesia. that they hold nuclear weapons, we assert Lenin, this system is one in which the Australia's increasing militarism in the again our stand for the right of North ruling classes of the richest capitalist region had been widely viewed in Asia Korea and China to hold such weapons countries are compelled, through their with deep suspicion. In the months before to defend themselves. very inner workings and thirst for profits, the tsunami struck, even the pro-imperia into an unrelenting drive for new markets, list leaders of the semicolonial countries For Class-Struggle Opposition ever-greater natural resources and sources in ASEAN protested the Howard govern to Australian Imperialism! of cheap labour in the neocolonial coun ment's repeated assertion of Australia's Australia and the other imperialist tries. The various imperialist bourgeoisies "right" to military strikes into Asian powers have relished the chance to tryout enforce this neocolonial looting abroad countries without their permission. Now, military techniques in Aceh. They are and exploitation of the working class at however, Australian troops have been sta also gaining practice in establishing the home, and protect their own spheres of tioned in the most populous country in kind of support infrastructure that would exploitation from rival powers, through Southeast Asia without overt opposition inevitably accompany future colonial the deadly coercive power of their state and with the support of that country's expeditions. What this has meant is that apparatus. The military, alongside the president. Even if this particular expedi while tsunami victims face death from police, courts and prisons, is at the core of tion ends up being temporary, it has set a hunger, lack of water and poor sanitation, this capitalist state, which is constantly precedent for future military adventures purported disaster "relief' has often been into Indonesia and other large Asian Paul Jones being strengthened. inappropriate. The Indonesian minister October 2003: Thousands of union While much weaker than their coun countries. coordinating the relief effort in Banda ists protest attacks on workers' terparts in the U.S., Japan or Germany, The expansion of Australian military Aceh, Alwi Shihab, revealed that the safety fol/owing death of 16-year-old the Australian ruling class is a wealthy and police in Southeast Asia is a deadly World Health Organisation (WHO) had worker Joel Exner. Struggle against imperialist bourgeoisie in its own right. threat to the region's toiling masses. It asked Germany to tum around a hospital bosses' assaults on unions at home Alongside defending strategic geo-politi was the Australian Secret Intelligence ship because it was not needed. "We don't must be combined with opposition to cal interests, its post-tsunami interven Service stationed in Jakarta, that in want them to come over from a far dis Australian imperialist militarism. tion into Indonesia has much to do with collaboration with the CIA, helped tance just to have a very limited number protecting and expanding the vast profits orchestrate the 1965-66 anti-Communist of patients ... [but] they insisted on com plunder of raw materials, to blood-suck that Australian companies such as BHP- bloodbath in Indonesia. This led to as ing," he said. "I said no, but they are ing debt peonage. In 2003 alone, the tourists, too, they want to see, so I said eleven countries hit by the tsunami 'let them come.'" The exasperated co repaid a total of 68 billion dollars to for ~ January: eign creditors in debt repayments, more Women stand ordinator of WHO in Aceh, Professor Ronald Waldman declared, "When I think than eleven times what they had been amid ruins of promised in aid as of 18 January! Kuede Teunon, medical, I think public health, I think Aceh. food, water, sanitation-primary health It is then truly nauseating to now 1J1 Catastrophic care services. The aid tends to come in an see the racist Australian prime minister ~ tsunami inverted fashion; hospital assets come in (John Howard), government and capital en obliterated before what we really need ...." ist state-fresh from vindictively deport entire towns Indeed, it is clear that the scale of the ing the Bakhtiyaris, a family of Afghan and villages loss of life on 26 December itself was refugees-portray themselves as the oh across South so-generous friends of the South Asian Asia including largely a product of capitalist neglect and contempt for the subjugated masses of the tsunami victims. Meanwhile, a blitz by in Indonesia, the capitalist media has sought to channel neocolonial countries. So, while wealthy Sri Lanka, India the outpouring of generosity by working and Thailand. countries like Japan and the U.S. along people into chauvinist ideas of moral the Pacific "ring of fire" can get early superiority over other nations. warnings from the Pacific Tsunami Warn Billiton, Leighton Holdings, Clough many as one million workers, rural toilers This celebration of the Australian ing Center (PTWC) headquartered in Engineering have gouged from the and ethnic Chinese being killed by the nation and state seeks to obscure the truth Hawaii, and utilise other advanced tech superexploited masses across the archi Indonesian military and reactionary that capitalist Australia was foundeq on nologies to alert seashore populations, no pelago. Following the 1997 economic Islamic mobs. We say: Australian/all the bloody wars of dispossession against such systems were in place for the poor collapse and the criminal Bali bombing imperialist military/cops get out of Aceh the Aboriginal people, which resulted and oppressed countries of South Asia. in October 2002 Australian companies now! Not one person, not one cent for in some 20,000 Aborigines being massa Even though the Indian Ocean is offi have divested billions of dollars from the the Australian imperialist military! cred by white settlers and the early colo cially outside the domain of the PTWC, Southeast Asian region, particularly Today the various imperialist ruling nial military; that capitalist Australia was scientists there recognised the threat and Indonesia. Now with a surge of aggres classes are using the "war on terror" to founded on an official policy of White reportedly sent an early alert to 26 coun sive militarism, the Australian capitalist impose their imperialist diktats on the Australia anti-Asian racism. Instead, the tries, including Thailand and Indonesia. rulers are intent on establishing a more region. The history of imperialist military masses are to be proud of the "spirit" and "secure" and "stable" environment for adventures in Asia has been one of bloody Yet as scientists scrambled to alert the "values" of capitalist White Australia and revitalising and broadening economic campaigns to suppress struggles against world, government officials, including in its military, all the better to be lined up by plunder in the region under the pretext of neocolonial subjugation and capitalist Australia did next to nothing. Scientists the ruling class to support its future colo the "war on terror." rule. The U.S. and Australian imperialists on the Cocos Islands, 600 kilometres nial expeditions. Meanwhile, workers are Capturing the true motivation behind killed millions of workers and peasants in from Sumatra, alerted Australian emer meant to accept the government's con the Australian rulers' intervention in their murderous counterrevolutionary gency planners of the tsunami but, it is certed union-busting attacks, including Aceh, a 3 January Australian editorial wars in Korea and Vietnam. Today, they claimed, "key officials within Indian the draconian legislation planned to be baldly stated, "A disaster recovery effort seek to use various combinations of mili Ocean nations could not be reached" introduced in July, because that is in the in Indonesia that runs for months and tary pressure and economic penetration to (Belfast Telegraph, 28 December 2004). "great" country's "national interests." years to come will benefit our commer try and reverse the anti-capitalist revolu This is simply not believable. Rather, the Against such poisonous nationalism, cial cause and strengthen regional com tions that triumphed in China, North way in which the relative value of human we revolutionaries fight to advance the mitments to co-operate with us in the war Korea and Vietnam. They have seized on life and property is calculated by the understanding that proletarian solidarity on terror by demonstrating to all of the tsunami catastrophe to brandish their American and Australian imperialists is with the South Asian masses requires Southeast Asia that Australia is not just a military hardware in a part of the world seen by the fact that the huge U.S. mili opposition to the imperialist depreda polite neighbour but a friend that sticks not too distant from these deformed tary base on the Indian Ocean island of tions conducted by the Australian ruling by its mates." This is also the real purpose workers states. Meanwhile, Japan and the Diego Garcia, which prior to the imperia class. Imperialist exploitation not only of the $1 billion in Australian government U.S. have recently been working in tan list occupation of Iraq was the main U.S. causes terrible suffering in the neocolo "aid" to Indonesia, which was announced dem to provocatively restrict the Chinese launching pad for death and destruction nial countries, it also strengthens the with much self-congratulation in early navy's access to the Pacific Ocean in both Iraq and Afghanistan, was given capitalist ruling class against the work January. The money will be controlled by through the network of islands off plenty of warning! (See article on page ing class at home. So while the Leighton Australia through a partnership with the China's eastern seaboard. For the uncon 3.) And while the U.S., supported by Aus Holdings bosses are today salivating at blood-drenched Indonesian regime and ditional military defence of the Chinese, tralia, spends U.S.$228 million every day the prospect of expanding their profits in bombing Iraq and terrorising its popula Indonesia, Leighton subsidiaries Thiess tion, the installation of a basic tsunami and John Holland have tried to weaken warning system in the Indian Ocean workers' conditions at Melbourne's could be had for a paltry U.S.$20 million. Mitcham-Frankston tollway construction Once the tsunami did strike without project. On 16 February, Victorian mem SPARTACIST ~ warning, the scale of the ensuing disaster bers of the Construction, Foresty, Mining was magnified by the immense poverty and Energy Union struck a range of For a workers republic of Australia, part of a socialist Asia! of South Asia where in order to eke out Leighton's Thiess and John Holland Marxist newspaper of the Central Committee of the Spartacist League of Australia, an existence supplemented by the sea, sites. What is needed is to combine the section of the International Communist League (Fourth Internationalist). millions subsist in ramshackle housing fight against the escalating union-busting EDITOR: P. Balasubramaniam bereft of the most basic necessities let at home with a struggle against imperia YOUNG SPARTACUS EDITOR: D. van Scheveningen alone technologies. Rudimentary social list subjugation abroad. CIRCULATION MANAGER: Mike Wallace infrastructure, inadequate access to med In this we look to the better traditions PRODUCTION MANAGER: Glenn Blackall ical care, poor transport facilities and of the workers movement in this country Printed by trade-union labour. often sparse supplies of running water all when it engaged in powerful acts of Published quarterly by Spartacist ANZ Publishing Co., GPO Box 3473, Sydney NSW 2001. struggle on behalf of the oppressed peo E-mail: [email protected]. Subscriptions: $5 for 4 issues; overseas $7. compounded the catastrophe for those ples. For instance at the end of World War Opinions expressed in signed articles or letters do not necessarily express the editorial viewpoint. who initially survived the wave's impact. Printed by Spotpress Pty Ltd, 105 Victoria Rd, Marrickville. ISSN 0311-3264 This poverty is the direct product of the II Australian waterfront'workers, many of imperialist looting of South Asia-from them pro-Communist, refused to load or No. 190, Autumn 2005 Date of issue: March 2005 the brutal exploitation of labour, to the continued on page 8 2 AUSTRALASIAN SPARTACIST -1 -British Imperialism and Diego Garcia Removing a People From History
The following article is reprinted from Cold War drive, aimed at overthrowing Workers Hammer (No. 189, Winter 2004- the gains of the world's first workers state 2005), newspaper of the Spartacist that remained despite its Stalinist degen League/Britain. eration. The establishment of a military base on the island was critical to US imperialism's aim of securing hegemony WORKERSIlAMMER~ over the Indian Ocean as a staging ground for control of the Indian subcontinent and In one of the least known crimes of Persian Gulf and as part of its military British imperialism, between 1968 and encirclement of the Soviet workers state. 1973 the people of the Chagos islands in Similarly, their ambition to gain control the Indian Ocean were expelled from of the strategically important deep-water their homes, forced into ships' holds and harbour of Trincomalee in Sri Lanka was dumped thousands of miles away in the prepared through the removal of Tamil Seychelles and Mauritius, where they peoples from the area which in turn paved were left to die in poverty. This racist the road for the genocidal anti-Tamil atrocity against the 1500-strong black pogroms in the mid-1980s. population of the Chagos islands was Today, in the words of the US State prepared by the Harold Wilson Labour Department, Diego Garcia is an "all but government in the service of the anti indispensable platform" for the "fulfil Communist Cold War drive against the ment of defence and security responsibil Soviet Union. Diego Garcia, the largest ities in the Arabian Gulf, the Middle East, island, was leased as a military base to South Asia and East Africa". It was a US imperialism. Recently a group of launching pad for the. invasions of Diego Garcian campaigners, fighting Afghanistan and Iraq, the base from against the British authorities' refusal to which US B2 stealth bombers have flown grant them accommodation in Britain, thousands of miles and back to rain terror protested in Downing Street, chanting on the Iraqi peoples. Various sources also "Tony Blair is a thief. Give us our suggest that "terrorist" suspects are being islands back." US/British imperialism interrogated there under conditions even out of Diego Garcia now! For the right more secret than those at Guantanamo, of return and compensation to the where sadistic torture and barbarism islanders! Lee Besford/Reuters reign. And, just as they were assisted in Diego Garcia is located halfway securing Diego Garcia by an Old Labour between Africa and Indonesia, and government, US imperialism continues to encloses one of the largest deep-water A group of islanders be served by the loyal toadies of Blair's harbours in the Indian Ocean. At the from Diego Garcia New Labour government in the one-sided height of the Vietnam War, the establish (above) arrive at slaughter and colonial occupation of Iraq, ment of a military base there was consid the High Court in and in the racist "war on terror" at home ered to be of strategic importance by the London. Families and abroad. protest against imperialists. In 1965, the British rulers In 1983 our international tendency created the "British Indian Ocean Terri British imperialism's racist expulsion organised emergency protests around the tory", with Diego Garcia as the main of islanders (right). globe against the terror against the Tamil island, including by annexing the Chagos people in Sri Lanka, writing in our urgent islands from Mauritius before that coun appeal for such protests: "The defense of try was granted independence in 1968. the Tamils, now facing genocide, must be This annexation resulted from a secret linked to a revolutionary socialist per deal to lease Diego Garcia to US imperi spective, which alone can secure national alism as a military base for the next 50 Scotland on Sunday justice for all the peoples of South Asia" years. B52's and you and me" (focusweb.org). sians could return to the outlying islands, (see "Stop Anti-Tamil Massacre in Sri Mark Curtis in his book Web of Deceit Families who had lived on the islands for the Foreign Office announced it would Lanka", Workers Vanguard no 335, 29 (2003) quotes recently declassified For generations were "shoved into ships' be impossible to abide by this ruling July 1983). So too, the defence of the eign Office documents, suffused with holds against their will and transported to because of treaty obligations with Wash right of the Chagossian people to return to racist imperialist contempt for the people Port Louis and dumped on the quayside. ington. Last June the Blair government their homeland or even to receive com of the Chagos islands, demonstrating that Homeless and lost, mothers and fathers invoked the archaic royal prerogative to pensation for the countless lives that were the depopulation was calculated to suit and grannies and children and grand crush the 2000 judgement, and a decree shattered in advancing the interests of the the aims of British and US imperialism. fathers wandered into the slums of the was issued that banned the islanders imperialist rulers, is necessarily linked to One official wrote that the removal of Mauritian capital. By the thousand. The from ever returning to their homes. a revolutionary internationalist perspec the islanders "was made virtually a con poor of Port Louis took them in. But The savage expUlsion of the Chagos tive-one which fights to liberate all of dition of the agreement when we negoti many people from Diego Garcia died. sians from Diego Garcia was integrally humanity from the depravities of imperia ated it in 1965". In return, Britain would Others ended up in prison. Children ate linked to the imperialists' anti-Soviet list exploitation and oppression. _ receive cut-price Polaris missiles. green mangoes and salt. That is rock The expulsions were brutal. Lizette bottom poverty in Mauritius. Emptiness Tallatte, who was one of those expelled, in their hearts." told journalist John Pilger that by way of The Wilson Labour government went a chilling threat as to what would happen to extraordinary lengths to fabricate the if the islanders did not acquiesce, over a lie that there were no local inhabitants on thousand of their pets were rounded up Diego Garcia. Curtis writes, "British pol u.s. Bases Out! and gassed using the exhaust fumes from icy was: after removing the islanders US military vehicles. "They put the dogs from their home, to remove them from While U.S. military aircraft have with ALP support announced that tens in a furnace where the people worked ... history". However, for over thirty years flown off from Diego Garcia to rain of thousands of U.S. and Australian when their dogs were taken away in front the Chagossians have fought desperately bombs on Iraq, the joint U.S.! troops will carry out "training" in three of them, our children screamed and for justice through the courts only to be Australia Pine Gap spy station in the joint bases in the Northern Territory cried." One islander, Lindsey Collen, denied time after time. Responding to a Northern Territory has no doubt been and Queensland. The new Joint Com describes the anguish of forced exile in High Court ruling in 2000 that the expul active in pinpointing imperialist bined Training Centre will allow Aus her article "The island of Diego Garcia, sions were illegal and that the Chagos- strikes against the people of Iraq. The tralian facilities to be linked through Pine Gap base collects electronic high-technology communications to and photographic intelligence from the U.S. Pacific War Fighting Center around the world. It forms part of a in Hawaii. Centrally, the anti-commu string of U.S. bases in the Indian nist U.S.lAustralia alliance is aimed Spartacist League of Australia Ocean and Asia-Pacific region. Like at overturning the gains of the anti E-mail: [email protected] Web site: www.icl-fi.org Diego Garcia and U.S. bases in the capitalist revolutions in China, North Melbourne Sydney Philippines, South Korea and Oki Korea and Vietnam. As part of our nawa, Pine Gap was used for decades defence of the Chinese, North Korean, GPO Box 2339 GPO Box 3473 to target the Soviet degenerated work Vietnamese and Cuban deformed Melbourne Vic 3001 Sydney NSW 2001 ers state. Today it forms part of the workers states and our opposition Phone: (03) 96544315 Phone: (02) 9281 2181 platform used to support increasing to jackal Australian imperialism, we imperialist military intervention by demand: U.S. bases out now! Down the U.S. and Australia in East Asia with the U.S.lAustralia alliance! Not International Communist League and the South Pacific. one person, not one cent for the Aus Box 7429 GPO, New York, NY 10116, USA Last July, the Howard government. tralian imperialist military!
AUTUMN 2005 3 Beslan Massacre and the Putin Regime
We reprint below an article, slightly adapted, from Workers Vanguard (No. 840, 21 January), newspaper of the Spartacist League/U.S.
With the massacre of hundreds of hostages, half of them children, in Bes lan, North Ossetia on 3 September 2004, Russia's savage war against Chechnya returned to world headlines. This three day standoff, in which over 1,200 people were taken hostage, capped a chain of terrorist attacks. They began the night of August 24-25, when two airliners from the same Moscow airport were almost simultaneously blown out of the sky by suicide bombers, killing all 89 on board. Then, on August 30, a Moscow subway station was targeted by a suicide bomber, killing ten. These attacks were a real gift to Russian president Vladimir Putin, who has regained a level of popular support AP Gamma for what was becoming a very unpopu Grozny: Russian soldiers threaten woman and child during neighborhood sweep. Ruins of Minutka Square, once lar war. Islamic fundamentalist Shamil Grozny's largest marketplace. Basayev, a longtime leader of the Che chen resistance, who first came to bourgeois nationalism. We forthrightly Revolution and against the capitalist res media. The Beslan massacre also in national prominence in 1995 with the oppose the Great Russian oppressor toration led by Boris Yeltsin. After the creased calls to end the moratorium on seizure of some 2,000 hostages (accord embodied in Putin & Co., as we militar collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991-92, the death penalty that was enacted in ing to UPI) in a hospital in southern Rus ily defend Chechnya against the Russian Chechen independence was proclaimed. 1996 as a condition for Russia joining the sia, claimed responsibility for the Beslan imperialist occupation. We are for prole Russia invaded Chechnya in 1994 and Council of Europe. hostage taking in a written statement. tarian action against Russia's war on the by 1996 Chechnya had won de facto In the wake of Beslan, pogromist Basayev also took responsibility for the Chechen people. The fight for Chechen independence at the cost of 60,000 to hysteria was whipped up against non 2002 hostage-taking in a Moscow theater. independence is essential to the interests 100,000 lives (based on data from human Slavic peoples from the Caucasus and That attack was suppressed by Russian of the multinational working people of rights organizations), the vast majority Central Asia. Putin's nonstop media bar police using poison gas, resulting in the Russia, who face continued attacks on civilians, as 6,000 Russian soldiers were rage against the "two-legged beasts" pro murder of at least 129 hostages. their own lives by the very state power sent home in body bags according to vided the backdrop for nationwide These attacks are criminal from the that is carrying out the war in Chechnya. official figures, while estimates are as xenophobic attacks. In Moscow alone, viewpoint of the working class. Not only At the same time, we extend not an high as 14,000. 11,000 people were rounded up by state are they counterposed to the cause of iota of political support to the national Estimates of the number of Chechen authorities, and 890 were deported in a Chechen national rights, they embrace ism of Chechen resistance leaders like civilians killed in the first Chechen war one-day sweep. Vigilante auxiliaries to of 1994-96 and the second war launched the police were organized nationally. in 1999 range from about 100,000 to In Ekaterinburg, five cafes frequented 200,000! Chechnya's cities and towns by refugees from the Caucasus were have been leveled. Industrial sites like attacked by skinheads, killing one person Grozny's Krasny Molot factory, which and sending two to the hospital. before the Chechen wars was Europe's After the September 11, 2001 attack biggest producer of oil drilling equip on the World Trade Center and the Penta ment, are now piles of brick and refuse. gon, Putin repackaged the repression in Documented examples of Russian Army Chechnya as part of the "war against methods of terror and collective punish terrorism." Washington granted Putin a ment are as extreme as they are bar free hand in Chechnya in return for baric. Chechen men have been chained Russia withholding its veto of the UN to armored trucks and forced to watch Security Council Resolution authorizing while both female and male companions the American invasion of Iraq in the are raped and sodomized by Russian spring of 2003. But this has its limits, as soldiers, as reported by Newsweek. In was seen recently in Ukraine, where some villages, everyone over the age Washington thumbed its nose at Putin by of twelve was chained together and bankrolling the presidential candidate blasted to pieces with artillery, leav seeking closer ties with the West (see ing their remains to be dragged off by "'Democracy' Movement Made in packs of wild dogs. Russian troops out U.S.A.-Ukraine: Robber Barons and of Chechnya! Nationalist Demagogues Fall Out," WV No. 838, 10 December 2004). While AP The Putin Regime: turning a blind eye to Russia's war in Beslan families mourn their dead after school massacre. Repression and Bonapartism Chechnya, both the U.S. and its close the same mentality as that of the racist Shamil Basayev, who promotes reac During Putin's first term in office, he ally, Britain, have extended political asy rulers of the Russian capitalist govern tionary Islamic fundamentalism, or to rammed through a new labor code that lum to exiled former cabinet ministers of ment-identifying the multinational President-in-exile AsIan Maskhadov. After greatly restricted the rights of trade Maskhadov's government. Washington is working masses with their capitalist ex participating in the successful 1994-96 unions, in effect banning strikes. Putin intent on checking Russian hegemony ploiters and oppressors. In the case of resistance against Mosco,",< and being predictably sought to use the Beslan mas along the periphery of the former Soviet Beslan, located in North Ossetia to the elected president in January 1997 (after sacre to increase his already considerable Union. west of Chechnya, this can only lead to the Russians assassinated Chechen presi powers. Within days, he issued a propo Meanwhile, a bevy of right-wingers further interethnic bloodletting, with the dent Dudayev in April 1996), Maskhadov sal, which was duly passed, to end direct in Washington have formed an Ameri historically Christian Ossetians pitted was driven from power when Russian elections of Russian governors and other can Committee for Peace in Chechnya against the primarily Muslim Ingush and troops rolled back into Chechnya in 1999. regional leaders. Putin can now appoint (ACPC), whose message, in the words Chechen peoples. Formerly integrated Today he seeks imperialist intervention leaders, subject to ratification by regional of the New Left Review (November schools in North Ossetia are reportedly and the enrichment of his own capitalist parliaments. If the regional parliaments December 2004), is "that authoritarian being segregated by nationality since the backers. reject his appointees twice, he has the ism is in Russians' DNA and that Putin massacre. Yet the hostage-takers' demand The war against Chechnya is a direct authority to disband them. More recently, would do well to learn the lessons de for Russian withdrawal from Chechnya result of the capitalist counterrevolution Putin won overwhelming parliamentary Gaulle drew from Algeria." The ACPC is a just demand that has widespread in the Soviet Union. We of the Inter support for a counterterrorism law that includes former national security advisor support, even throughout Russia. national Communist League were unique hands the Kremlin broad powers to Zbigniew Brzezinski and former secre As proletarian internationalists, we are among the left in our forthright defense declare states of emergency, restrict free tary of state Alexander Haig as well as fundamentally opposed to all forms of of the gains of the 1917 Bolshevik speech and clamp down on the news continued on page 11 4 AUSTRALASIAN SPARTACIST . - f - The Founding of the Trotskyist Group of Greece The following article is reprinted from Workers Vanguard (No. 838. 10 Decem ber 2004), newspaper of the Spartacist League/U.S., section of the International For a Leninist Party in Greece! Communist League. The article was earlier published in Greek in November 2004. For a Socialist Fed'eration of the Balkans!
The International Communist League (Fourth Internationalist) is pleased to ----~IS~PAurRTf8Acg;JSrnTI~ • ~ ,~'"" ISPARTACJSTI~ = announce the founding of the Trotskyist Group of Greece, as a sympathizing sec H iop1>01) T11<; TPO'TO'KUJT1Kll<; Ol1ooa<; T11~ Euaoa~ tion. The Greek comrades were won to A1UK1JPU;11 ApIIDV KUl rUt tva AEV1VUJT1KO KO ...... a (JT11V Ellaoa! the program of the ICL over a period of time through debate over programmatic Mt:P1KU :t.T01Xt:lU np0'YPUP.P.UTO<; rUl Ilia l:oO'laA10'T1KT) OIlOO'1tovoia differences and testing our agreement in Aw9vrl~ KOIlP01)Vl(JT1Kti 'EvcoO'1} TroV BaAKavirov! common work. (T£TUpTOare8vlO'T1K1\)
The first contact with the ICL was H Ald)vrl~ KOJ..lJloUVlonKli 'EvrocrTl (T£ta.pto~ OTI)'KQV CUt6 tOY l:7t6po, K\)p~ miv(t) 0'tTlV made in 1995 by Spiros, a leader of ou:9vumKt'j) (dKElICL) o.vaKolVcwsl f.I£ £1)lapi~ avaYKat.&rrl'ta 'tT\~ n:poacrnlO11t; 'twv 01KU1WJlO:tUlV tOlV <>t1101] t11v {Op1lO1] t11S TPO<
::D We reprint below an article from Work
Chinese Workers Fight Privatisation of State-Owned Industry
The following article is reprinted from lose their seniority status. In addition, they announced that the Workers Vanguard (No. 837, 26 Novem would have to serve a six-month "proba ACFTU itself was ber 2004), newspaper of the Spartacist tionary" period during which they would already moving to League/U.S., section of the International receive 60 percent of their new salary. establish a union Communist League. Strikers maintained an around-the branch at the fac clock presence at the factory entrance, in tory. However, no The number of worker demonstrations rotating shifts of 200 workers. Banners elections were held China Labour Bulletin and strikes in China has increased sharply hanging from the factory gate declared: to endorse this Women workers at Tianwang Textile Factory struck for in recent years. In particular, moves by "We want to survive!" "Protect workers officially imposed almost seven weeks against Hong Kong bosses after the Beijing bureaucracy to privatize state rights!" and "Give us back the funds we body. privatisation of their plant. owned factories, which have resulted in worked hard for!" Four days into the An integral part hundreds of thousands being laid off in strike, on September 18, some 1,000 police of our program for proletarian political imperialism. When the likes of Han and recent years, have been fiercely resisted appeared at the factory gate with water revolution in the deformed workers states the Bulletin promote "independent" trade by the workers. Though nationwide gov cannons and prepared to forcibly disperse is the struggle for unions free from state unions in China, they are promoting capi ernment statistics on the number of pro the pickets. Awakened by their comrades control-as opposed to the ACFTU, talist counterrevolution. tests since 2000 are not available (itself a banging on wash basins, thousands of which is an arm of the ruling bureaucracy In the face of the fundamental hostility telling sign), an analysis of Chinese gov workers and their families poured out of in China. Trade unions are necessary even of the capitalist states to the very existence ernment reports shows an increase in the plant dormitories and surrounded the in a healthy workers state to guard against of the workers states, it is indispensable each of the past three years. According to cops. Confronted by this massive show of possible encroachments and abuses by to distinguish between working-class the right-wing think tank, the RAND solidarity, the police retreated without the government, as well as to help plan opposition to bureaucratic abuse and im Corporation: attempting to use their water cannons. production, work methods, etc. But the perialist opposition to the workers states "Sichuan, China's largest province, appar The whole privatization plan of the trade unions must be based on defense of themselves. No genuine proletarian oppo ently saw an increase in protests of almost 20 percent last year, to nearly 1,500. Tianwang Textile Factory was carried out collectivized property. We warn against sition to the Stalinist misrulers can be "No region has experienced more dem in a way designed to implicate the work those like Han Dongfang and his China built without a firm commitment to onstrations than the aging northeastern ers in their own demise. A few years ago, Labour Bulletin, which baldly admits that defending the gains of the Chinese Revo rustbelt, known to the West as Manchu the factory was turned into an employee its chief editor has been featured on radio lution. A Trotskyist party in China would ria, where market reforms have badly and management-owned shareholding broadcasts of the Voice of America and inscribe on its banner: Defend the system hurt workers and pensioners from ineffi cient state enterprises. Police in Liaoning company. Workers paid 4,000 yuan Radio Free Asia-both of them official of collectivized property, the central gain Province on the border with North Korea ([U.S]$483) for a share in the company anti-communist mouthpieces for U.S. of the 1949 Revolution._ claimed a stunning 9,559 incidents involv (Communist Party officials also invested ing more than 863,000 people between in the company). But the dream of January 2000 and September 2002-an average of almost 10 incidents involving "cooperative" capitalism did not last 90 people each day for nearly three years." long. Now, the workers are reportedly ..ti§an Defence -International Herald Tribune, being forced to sell shares back so China ··£o... _ittee 3 June [2004] Resources can take over. The Associated Press (15 November As with other strikes in this same [2004]) reported that workers in Shenzhen period, the Tianwang workers' struggle in southern China seized the Hong Kong was brought to an end by a "carrot-and Hands Off RAC Activists! owners of an electronics company, demand stick" policy. Police rounded up more ing unpaid wages. In response, the police than 20 strikers and issued "wanted" warned them not to hurt the hostages, but notices for three others, leading a satis Drop the Charges Now! took no action against the workers. Illus fied China Resources spokesman to pro trative of the increasing number of labor claim that the strike was "under control." The following protest statement in These grotesque raids, alongside the actions in China was a recent strike by China Resources then got most workers defence of arrested refugee rights continuing persecution of the Bakhti 6,800 mainly women textile workers at to return to the factory by agreeing to lim activists was faxed to Immigration yari family, suggest vindictive repri the newly privatized Tianwang Textile ited concessions: dropping the idea of a Minister Amanda Vanstone on 23 sals against those refugees who in Factory in Xianyang (Shaanxi province) probation period and signing longer-term December 2004 by the Partisan desperation managed to escape the bar in northern China. The battle lasted almost contracts while insisting on the lower Defence Committee, a class-struggle baric Woomera concentration camp in seven weeks, the longest known strike wage scale. We demand the release of the defence organisation associated with 2002, and against those humane and since economic "reforms" were introduced arrested strikers-and all those arrested the Spartacist League (SL). courageous activists who have sup over two decades ago. The workers were in other, similar strikes-and the drop Charges against two of the arrested ported them. fighting impending layoffs and wage cuts ping of all charges against them! activists have been dropped but at the The federal government's incarcer being proposed by their new capitalist According to the Hong Kong-based time we go to press, the other two ation and deportation of innocent employers, the Hong Kong-based con China Labour Bulletin, one of the strik defendants, Sunil Menon and John people sometimes to torture and death, glomerate China Resources. The com ers' demands was for the right to elect Morris, continue to face charges. On fully backed by the Australian Labor pany's offer would give laid-off workers their own factory-level trade union and to II January, supporters of the SL Party, is part of the ongoing racist war a severance payment of one month's register it with the officially sanctioned joined some 100 leftists and refugee against refugees, immigrants and wages for each year they worked there. trade-union organization, the All-China rights supporters in a demonstration Aborigines-a war that ultimately tar Those not laid off would be required to Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU). demanding the dropping of charges gets the working class as a whole. sign short-term contracts at lower pay and To head this off, municipal authorities against the pro-refugee activists. A Fomenting the deepest racist reac resolution from the NSW Teachers tion your government seeks to divide Federation in support of the defend working people in order to minimise ants was read out at the rally. A fur united struggle against the union ther protest on 25 January at the busting and profit-gouging capitalist Down With Liberal/ALP court appearance of the pro-refugee rulers. However ongoing actions by activists at Sydney's Downing Centre refugee rights activists, and the sup Reactionary "Family Values" Crusade! saw the courtroom packed with their port that hunger strikers at the Baxter supporters. concentration camp continue to receive, show that many refuse to be We condemn the 1 December raids diverted or intimidated by the gov For Free Abortion by the Australian Federal Police and ernment's vicious anti-working-c1ass immigration officers on the homes of racist persecution. refugee-rights activists in Brisbane, Struggles by refugees and their Sydney and Melbourne. At least four supporters against your internation on Demand! people face charges, including ally notorious racist immigration laws, Refugee Action Coalition (RAC) including mandatory detention and members, Mark Goudkamp and John forced deportations, are in the inter Melbourne Sydney Morris. The charges reportedly relate ests of all the working people and op 6.30 p.m., Thursday, 14 April 7 p.m., Friday, 8 April to allegations of "making a false state pressed. Hands off the RAe activists! ment in the course of supporting an Drop all the charges now! Asylum The Annex, Upstairs at Trades Hall Humanist House application for an Australian pass now for refugees! Close the concen Cnr Lygon and Victoria Streets 10 Shepherd Street port" and "using a false name to oper tration camps! No deportations! Full Carlton Chippendale ate a bank account." citizenship rights for all! (entrance on Victoria Street) (off Broadway)
AUTUMN 2005 7 ---r-
Mobil oil and gas operation in Aceh itself. "combat terrorism" in the Philippines! attached" [our emphasis] (Green Left Tsunami ... They believe this goal is best served by What the latter means is murderous Weekly, 19 January). maintaining a unified Indonesia. (continued from page 2) repression of workers, peasants and the Leaders of the main grouping within But the imperialists can potentially Moro minority in the south. Last Novem SA, the Democratic Socialist Perspective, service Dutch ships in aid of Indonesian countenance a range of tactical options ber, the Philippine police and army have in the past sought to excuse such Seamen's Union actions against Dutch to ensure their interests. For example, for strafed striking Hacienda Luisita sugar demands for Canberra to carry out some attempts to reconquer their former 24 years Australia strongly backed, both workers and their families, leaving seven "progressive" act abroad as an attempt to colony. These actions spread from one militarily and politically, Indonesia's dead and hundreds wounded. wrest a concession from the ruling class country to the next leading to an interna blood-soaked occupation of East Timor. So while whatever potable water, food, through struggle, similar to demands for tional working-class campaign that para Then, in 1999, concerned that Indone housing and other material aid that the improved social services at home. How lysed Dutch shipping and ultimately sia's apparent inability to maintain its suffering victims of the tsunami can get ever, in reality these two types of helped secure political independence for grip on East Timor would destabilise is welcome, we warn that any economic demands are quite different. Demands Indonesia from colonial rule. Indonesia itself and with an eye on the aid program from the racist Australian on governments at home for increased In the current political climate of all massive oil wealth at stake, Australia, government must be treated with deep public funding for schools, hospitals, sided social reaction, many workers and with the backing of the U.S. and the UN, suspicion. This includes the much bally childcare etc., can serve to mobilise work youth are furious at the increasingly staged a direct colonial takeover of East hooed $1 billion package for Indonesia, ing-class opposition to capitalist govern racist, militarist and repressive nature of Timor. Since its formal independence, which in any case is a pittance compared ments and, if achieved, improve the lives this society. Two years ago there were they have brutally enforced a neocolonial with the massive profits Australian com of working people. As such, communists enormous protests on the streets, includ order in which the East Timorese people panies have extracted from the Indone generally support such demands. But for ing significant union contingents, in op remain the poorest in Asia, many liter sian archipelago. eign "aid" programs are not concessions position to the war on Iraq. In recent ally starving, while the Australian gov Papua New Guinea (PNG) provides a to class struggle granted by the imperia anti-war rallies, protesters have carried ernment and Australian mining giants, good example of how imperialist "aid" lists but are calculated choices they make slogans and worn badges and T-shirts pro BHP and Woodside Petroleum, steal bil works. The Australian ruling class is well according to their predatory goals. When testing Australia's theft of East Timor's lions from East Timor's Laminaria aware that its plunder of mineral-rich enacted, Australian foreign aid programs oil. We say: U.S.!Australia out of Iraq! Corallina oil and gas field. PNG has bred much resentment against it -whatever short-term benefit a part of Down with Australian imperialism's In general, the imperialists prefer to and its puppet regime. Fully one third of them may provide to a small number of plunder of East Timor's oil/gas! Aus have the bourgeoisie of the neocolonial the ODA budget for 2004-2005 is directed oppressed people-are always aimed at tralian military/cops out of Aceh, East country enforce their imperialist plunder. to "increased support for basic policing, reinforcing neocolonial subjugation of the Timor, Papua New Guinea and the Sol A major goal of Australia's intervention including in PNG, the Pacific and East Third World masses. omon Islands! SA's demand for increased foreign aid But the fight for class-struggle opposi "without strings attached" promotes the tion to Australian imperialism runs smack fraud that Australian imperialism can be up against the pro-capitalist Laborite par pressured to act in the interest of human liamentary and union misleaders of the ity and not its own predatory interests. workers movement. Prostrate in the face The logic of these views was made of the bosses' renewed union-busting explicit as early as 29 December when offensive, the nationalist union bureau long-time leader of the Democratic crats preach the lie that workers will ben Socialist Perspective (DSP) and Socialist efit from the success of Australian Alliance, Max Lane, grotesquely argued companies and promote loyalty to the that a detachment of Australian troops murderous Australian military. Two years deployed to serve in the occupation of ago when the bombs began to rain on Iraq should be diverted to Aceh instead! Baghdad, the union tops reneged on their By contrast, the reformist Socialist earlier promises of significant industrial /1 Party of Australia (SP), part of the osten r •.J action in the event of a military attack on Abraham sibly Trotskyist Committee for a Workers Iraq, arguing they would not want to dis Australian "peacekeepers" in East Timor. Troops International, correctly warned in a recent advantage "our troops." Today the bu enforce terrible poverty, defend subservient web posting against any "confidence in reaucracy's ALP mates in parliament have regime which acquiesced to massive neocolonial capitalist aid agencies or imperialist responded to Howard's announcement of theft of oil resources. Above: East Timorese forces or local military." However, while protest visit by John Howard. . 450 extra troops to Iraq by calling for the SP state that "the presence of foreign troops to be used in this region instead! imperialist troops will generate big anti Indeed, in late 1999, it was the Laborite in Aceh is to cement closer ties with the Timor" (Australian Government Au sAID imperialist movements in the future," they union tops that were at the forefront of the TNI and other Indonesian state forces. A website). The PNG police have been fail to callfor Australian troops to get out pro-imperialist rallies calling for Aus recent example of how these forces func more than repaying these aid "invest of Aceh. Instead, their main demand is for tralian "Troops In Now!" to "Save East tion to protect imperialist profit making ments." In late June 2001, they murdered "Democratic control of aid by commit Timor," which led to Australia's neocolo is seen in the Indonesian operations of at least six people participating in protests tees of local people, workers and poor nial occupation and theft of oil and gas. Melbourne-based Newcrest mining giant. by students and workers in opposition to farmers organisations .... " This demand is What is needed is a political struggle Part of the $122.9 million in profits Australian imperialist interests in PNG, at best utopian: is arch-union-buster John to break the working-class base of the raked in by Newcrest in 2003-2004 was and IMF and World Bank-directed pri Howard about to hand out "aid" money, Labor Party from its pro-imperialist tops extracted from the Toguraci mine on the vatisations and cutbacks. Now alongside which is intended to boost the profits of in the fight to build a revolutionary remote Indonesian island of Halmahera their cops and military in the Solomons, Australian companies, if this money is to workers party. Such a party would infuse in North Maluku. There, Newcrest have Australia has more than 200 police on the be put in the hands of Sri Lankan or the working class with a staunch interna employed TNI and the notorious Indone ground in Papua New Guinea to more Indonesian workers organisations? tionalism and with hatred for bourgeois sian Mobile Brigade (Brimob) paramili directly aid in enforcing "stability" in When one examines the SP slogan militarism. It would be committed to the tary thugs against indigenous people their main historic neocolony. more closely it turns out to be worse than greatest act of solidarity possible with protesting the rape of their land. In early Historically, a big aspect of imperialist fatuous. Genuine Trotskyists raise slo the toiling masses of this region: the January 2004, Brimob forces gunned foreign aid programs has been to "roll gans seeking to mobilise class-struggle sweeping from power of the rapacious down at least two protesters. back" communism. The most famous opposition to imperialist intervention. As White Australia imperialists through Having the blood-drenched neocolo economic aid package in history was the such our key slogans over Aceh and Iraq, socialist revolution. nial regimes in Southeast Asia do their U.S. Marshall Plan at the end of World for example, are to demand the imperia dirty work is cheaper for the imperialists War II. This aimed to prop up the totter list troops get out. But by positing the Neocolonialism and and ties up less of their own troops than ing West European bourgeoisies, who idea that imperialist aid can be controlled Imperialist Economic ''Aid'' direct imperialist occupation. Most were tainted with fascism and facing a by the masses and put to a genuinely The resource-rich Aceh province has importantly, they hope it will provoke less working class inspired by the Soviet Red benevolent purpose, SP undercut de today particular importance for the com opposition from peoples who remember Army's heroic smashing of the Nazi mands for the imperialists to get out. peting imperialist powers. Aceh flanks with hatred the horrors of colonialism. Third Reich. Today, Australian ODA in In September 1999, this perspective the strategically important Malacca Strait And this is where the whole question of Vietnam includes support to the "devel that somehow the imperialists can be through which much of Japan's oil from imperialist government "aid" comes in. opment of the private sector," that is, to controlled to act on behalf of the the Near East is shipped, and through Foreign aid is specifically directed by the undermining the collectivised property oppressed-was applied by the Socialist which much of Asia's exports to Europe rich countries to prop up the local colonial forms. The imperialists' goal there is Party and almost the whole gamut of the must move. Aceh has seen a decades regimes (including by arming and train to destroy the deformed workers state reformist and centrist left in the most long struggle by the Free Aceh Movement ing its military forces), to buy off military issuing out of the 1975 victory of the disgusting way when they marched in (GAM) for independence from the and civilian officials and politicians, and Vietnamese social revolution, which tri demonstrations screaming for Australian Javanese-centred Indonesian ruling class. to open up markets to its own companies umphed through a stunning defeat on the and UN troops to enter East Timor as The Indonesian government's brutal war at the expense of rival powers. battlefield of the U.S. and Australian "peacekeepers." The SP (then known as against the oppressed Acehnese people This is borne out by even a cursory imperialists and their local puppets. the Militant Socialist Organisation) has been accompanied by systematic tor review of Australian government aid hailed these mobilisations, even gushing ture and rape and led to up to 10,000 disbursements. Even the government's Australian Imperialism and that, "If it wasn't for the pressure of the deaths there since 1998 alone. Australia own "Summary of Australia's Interna the Reformist Left Australian people, Canberra and 'our' has backed the Indonesian military's tional Development Cooperation 2004- The attitude of much of the left to armed forces would be once again putting (TNI) renewed offensive against the 05" states that the aid is aimed at Australian capitalism's aggressive inter the 'national interest' (i.e. protecting the GAM from the time it began almost two "advancing Australia's national interest," ventions in this region since the tsunami interests of Australian bosses in Indone years ago. Today the U.S. and Australian which in this class-divided society always is typified by the Socialist Alliance (SA) sia) before the massacres of the people of rulers hope that the ostentatious presence means the interest of the capitalist ruling lash-up. SA has criticised the cynicism East Timor" (Militant, October 1999). of imperialist troops, their control of class. The $500 million in Official Devel of the Australian government aid pack Now, when it is widely recognised that basic supplies to the desperate Acehnese opment Assistance (ODA) assigned by age and directed people to donate to Australia's role in East Timor is one of people and the enormous disruption the Australian government to East Asia is SEGERA, an alliance of Indonesian brutal neocolonial domination and theft caused by the tsunami will enable them aimed at assisting in "promoting stability non-government organisations. But at the of East Timor's oil and gas, SP, with to oversee the end of the GAM insur and security" in Indonesia, includi ng same time they have demanded "that a great deal of chutzpah, attempt a gency. They want a "stable" Indonesia to improving "Australia's counter-terrorism the Australian government massively shabby cover-up of their' actions in 1999. maintain a smooth flow of profits such as capacity building initiative for Indonesian increase its aid to all the countries They falsely claim that they "stood those extracted from the huge Exxon- police," and strengthening the capacity to affected ... and give it without strings almost alone against the flag-waving of 8 AUSTRALASIAN SPARTACIST the ruling class, its media, the ALP and union leaders, and the petit bourgeois Redfern ... left groups like the DSP who suppported (continued from page 1) [sic] the Australian military intervention into East Timor" (Socialist Party web of this country. The persecution of the site, 27 October 2004). It was actually Redfern defendants is not only an the Trotskyist Spartacist League that example of the chemically pure racism of opposed the September 1999 "Troops in capitalist Australia's "justice" system but Now!" mobilisations and refused to. an indication of what the ruling class participate in them. Instead we held intends to do to others who engage in speakouts and forums opposing the determined struggles in defiance of the AustralianlUN intervention. bosses' state. It is thus in the very inter ests of the working class to fight for For an Internationally Planned, freedom for the Redfern political pris Collectivised Economy! oners. And the proletariat-with its num The task of rebuilding following the bers, organisation and ability to shut massive destruction wrought by the down production-has the social power to decisively push back capitalist attacks Daily Telegraph tsunami and alleviation of the poverty February 2004: Black militants courageously defend Redfern community in that magnified its human cost demands a on all the exploited and oppressed. nine-hour pitched battle following death of "TJ" Hickey at hands of cops. massive program of building hospitals, But against the Redfern militants Racist NSW Labor government is now meting out hefty prison sentences to schools, housing and infrastructure. stands a racist NSW Labor government, those who fought off police marauding. But undertaking such a program itself which is determined to prosecute them demands freeing the impoverished South and determined to intensify the subjuga street and subjected to racist abuse by Labor Defense (ILD) in the U.S. The Asian countries from the yoke of imperia tion of the Aboriginal community living police. ILD was born out of discussions in list exploitation and cries out for the repu in the Redfern area known as The Block. But the Hickey family has defiantly Moscow in 1925, fusing the revolution diation of their foreign debt. With the present leadership of the unions resisted pressures to give up the fight for ary internationalism of the Bolshevik Yet the thoroughly corrupt and brutal beholden to the White Australia chauvi justice for TJ. "We're not giving up; Revolution with the principle of the rulers of the neocolonial countries are nist Labor Party, the fight to mobilise we're going to fight till they put it there," syndicalist Industrial Workers of the tied by a thousand strings to the imperia unions in defence of the Redfern black declared Gail Hickey after the racist World that "an injury to one is an injury lists, whom they rely on to protect them militants must go forward in defiance NSW Labor government refused to allow to all!" We recall here the words of from the oppressed masses in their own of the current political domination of a plaque, which noted that her son had James P. Cannon, ILD secretary from countries. The role of these agents of im Laborite nationalism and racism in the died "from a police pursuit." to be 1925-28 and, later, founder of the Ameri perialism can be seen in the period fol workers movement. erected at the site where he suffered his can Trotskyist movement: lowing the tsunami. In Aceh, under the Importantly, there have been some con fatal injuries. "The class-conscious worker accords to umbrella of the imperialist military pres crete expressions of support for the Red The continuing outrage over TJ's the class-war prisoners a place of singu lar honor and esteem. The class-war pris ence, the TNI have continued their butch fern militants. A motion passed at a killing and last November's cop killing 5 October 2004 meeting of the Australia oners are stronger than all the jails and ery. Since the 26 December catastrophe of Palm Island Aborigine, Mulrunji jailers and judges. Asia Worker Links (AAWL) in Mel alone, the TNI have slaughtered more Doomadgee, has become a focus of " ... The victory of the class-war prison than one hundred Acehnese, many of them bourne concluded that: "AAWL will en anger against racist cop terror. This just ers is possible only when they are in civilians while at the same time thieving, courage unions and labour movement anger should be harnessed to defend separably united with the living labor skimming off and selling goods and food organisations to support campaigns in the Redfern and Palm Island militants movement and when that movement claims them for its own, takes up their donated for relief. Now there are ominous defence of the Aboriginal people arrested arrested for courageously protesting since the Redfern riot." Last year, protest battle cry and carries on their work." reports that Acehnese villagers are being the cop killings. But broadening and -"The Cause that Passes Through forced into large relocation camps con statements in support of the Redfern strengthening support for class-war pris a Prison," Labor Defender, trolled by the TN!. This is designed to defendants were sent to the NSW oners requires a struggle to break illu September 1926. prevent any aid being passed on to GAM, attorney-general by prominent Aboriginal sions that the capitalist courts which try The Redfern militants are together with further isolate the GAM fighters and activists Jenny Munro and Sam Watson, and convict them, are in any way "neu Craig Johnston the most significant strengthen the control of the TNI over a by the prisoners' rights group Justice tral umpires" in this racist, sexist and class-war prisoners in this country for desperate population. We say: Indonesian Action and by the Partisan Defence class-divided society. The workers and many, many years. Their struggle in Feb Committee, a non-sectarian class-strug troops out of Aceh! Down with Aus oppressed must be won to the under ruary last year, which was joined by gle defence organisation, whose purpose tralia's arming and training of the TNI standing that the courts are an integral Maori and other youth of immigrant is in accordance with the political views butchers! part of the capitalist state machinery that background, met with sympathy from of the Spartacist League (SL). SL sup In Sri Lanka meanwhile, the Sinhala the racist ruling class uses to enforce its opponents of racist oppression around porters have been raising the need to sup chauvinist bourgeois government has rule of exploitation. the world. The question of defence of the port the arrested Redfern militants in Yet in the same leaflet (distributed at the Redfern Aboriginal political prisoners, in stepped up its provocations against the speeches at left meetings and rallies. oppressed Tamil minority. The military 13 February Sydney rally) that correctly word and deed is a litmus test for any The Socialist Alliance (SA) group has calls for dropping of charges against the group claiming to stand for the working have been blocking aid to, and invading, also called for defence of the Redfern welfare camps in areas controlled by the Redfern militants, SA/ISJA also promote class and oppressed. Free Craig John militants. A joint Indigenous Social Jus the authority of the courts. The leaflet is ston and the Redfern political prison separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil tice Association (lSJA) and SA leaflet Eelam in the island's north and north mainly devoted to pushing the idea that a ers! Defend the Redfern and Palm distributed at the 13 February Sydney new coronial inquest can bring some Island Aboriginal militants! east. In southern India, low caste dalits rally included a slogan demanding "the were dragooned to do the dirty and dan measure of justice for TJ and his family. immediate dropping of charges arising But like the first inquiry last year, another Fax protest statements demanding gerous cleanup after the tsunami, ini from the Redfern and Palm Island inci freedom for the Redfern militants and tially without gloves or masks. "inquiry" conducted by the capitalist state dents!" An SA speaker at the rally, Raul will be another whitewash conducted by the dropping of charges, to the NSW In economically backward countries, Bassi, also stated that until all charges are Attorney-General, Robert Debus, on (02) and in particular those countries subju the same state whose cops caused the dropped against those in Redfern and on youth's death and whose courts today 9228 3166. Fax copies to the Partisan gated by imperialism, it is only the work Palm Island who were arrested after have convicted (and prisons are holding) Defence Committee on (02) 9281 2185. ing class drawing on the support of the protesting police violence in their com the Redfern militants and Victorian trade rural toilers that can, by seizing state munities, there will be no justice. We wel union leader Craig Johnston. power, throw off the imperialist yoke, come this and say that those serious about In contrast to SA, the SL speaker at give rights to oppressed minorities and defending the Redfern political prisoners the 13 February Sydney rally outlined a Just Out! lay the basis for ending social backward should actively broaden support for the program for mobilising the working ness. In establishing its own class rule, arrested militants and use whatever class independently of the capitalist the proletariat would inevitably make influence they have in the workers state, calling for unionlblack mobilisa ;\ ~kr.Hi'i( rapid inroads into capitalist property movement to mobilise union support for tions against racist terror and to protest Black History forms. If such future workers revolutions, this struggle. What is urgently necessary the killing of the Kamilaroi youth at the in places like India and Indonesia, are not CIISS Struglle are united-front protests and actions to hands of the state. A powerful example ~-- Ho.fll-__ to be strangled by imperialist military defend the Redfern and Palm Island was seen in 1989 when hundreds of intervention and/or economic blockade, black militants. Trade unions, Aborigi building workers downed tools and or by their own inherited economic back nal activists, immigrant minorities, left joined a black protest outside Sydney's wardness, they will necessarily have to ists and anti-racist youth must be special weapons police headquarters extend to the major imperialist centres, brought together in struggle to demand: after cops shot dead Aboriginal worker appealing to the proletariat to throw out Drop all the charges! Free them now! David Gundy. These workers formed a their own capitalist rulers. This is the per defensive perimeter around the demon spective of permanent revolution outlined There is No Justice in stration, facing off the assembled cops by Russian revolutionary leader, Leon the Capitalist Courts! who would have loved nothing more Trotsky, and which was confirmed in the Police have meanwhile been carrying than to riot against the protesters. Such triumph of the 1917 October Revolution. out a cowardly campaign of harassment powerful actions, hurting the profits of Speaking from the summit of Soviet and repression against both the relatives the capitalist bosses in whose interests power in 1925, Leon Trotsky noted that of the Redfern militants and those of TJ. the racist state acts, would give pause to science has the "capacity to increase One of the youth's aunts, who is also the the vicious NSW Labor government and man's power and arm him with the power sister of arrested Redfern militant Darryl its killer cops. Ultimately, however, to foresee and master nature" (Problems Hickey, has spoken of how she and her putting an end to racist state terror will of Everyday Life). But the capitalist class family, who live in Sydney's west, have require a socialist revolution to over Black History and largely constrains science to the narrow been victimised by police since the kill throw the racist capitalist system. the Class Struggle purpose of accumulating profits. The road ing of TJ and the Redfern upheaval. For we communists, the fight to No. 18, January 2005 Police have driven past her house yelling of progress can be unblocked only by top defend those persecuted for defying the $1 (48 pages) pling rapacious capitalist rule through a insults over loudspeakers and even her capitalist state is inseparable from our Make cheques payable/mail to: series of socialist revolutions and estab young daughters have been harassed by opposition to capitalist exploitation and Spartacist ANZ Publishing Co. lishing a worldwide planned socialist cops. TJ's teenage cousins living in west racist oppression. In this we are inspired GPO Box 3473, Sydney NSW 2001 economy.• ern Sydney have also been stopped on the by the traditions of the International AUTUMN 2005 9 the democratic rights of homosexuals, While the KKE is a mass reformist that grew out of opposition to the rule of Greece ... including their right to marriage and to workers party, the Pan-Hellenic Socialist the military junta in Greece from 1967-74; (continued from page 5) have children. All consensual forms of Movement (PAS OK) is a bourgeois they generally targeted representatives of sexuality should be private and the state or populist formation and has been so from the bourgeois state and imperialism]. transmIttmg private property from one church must not intervene. We call for its foundation. In contrast to elements When the oppressed act against the bour generation to the next while serving in "state and church out of the bedroom." on the Greek left, such as the Cliffites, geoisie and its state, we defend them general as a mechanism for regimenting we reject on principle any political against capitalist repression; however, we the population through the inculcation of For a Revolutionary support to this party of the class enemy. oppose the desperate petty-bourgeois conservative social values. Thus, the lib Workers Party! The Greek comrades worked together strategy of individual terrorism which is eration of women cannot be achieved The Greek Communist Party (KKE) is with comrades from the ICL long before antithetical to the task of rendering the without the abolition of the system of pri a mass reformist party with major influ vate property. The expropriation of the ence and roots in the working class. bourgeoisie through proletarian revolu Unlike the Stalinophobic Greek fake tion and the extension of that revolution Trotskyists, we do not ignore the KKE, to the more advanced industrial countries, but seek to win its working-class base establishing the material foundations for to the genuine communism of Lenin and a socialist society of material abundance, Trotsky. As we wrote in Workers Van will lay the basis for the replacement of guard No. 565 (11 December 1992): Thessaloniki, the family. "The KKE is the historic mass party of June 2003: In Greece, women did not have the the Greek working class. Its partisan Police right to vote until 1956, while the dowry struggle against the Nazi wartime occu pation and in the civil war that broke rampage was only formally abolished in 1986 and out in 1944 gave it great authority. That against leftist in reality still exists. Although abortion authority was duly abused to block the protesters was legalized (with severe restrictions) seizure of power by the working class at outside in 1986, it is difficult to obtain, particu the end of the war, when the Communist European Party, as in France and Italy, made peace Union larly for teenagers and poor women. We meeting. are for free abortion on demand! with the bourgeoisie, disarmed the work ing class and entered into a popular-front Following the counterrevolution in the capitalist government to rebuild the Soviet Union and East Europe, women Greek capitalist state machine. This 1945 workers in Greece, as elsewhere, have betrayal did not prevent the bourgeoisie, been those most affected by the capital aided and abetted by British and U.S. im the section was founded. In this collabor proletariat conscious that it is the only ists' attacks on the working masses. perialism, from turning on the Commu ation we produced a number of leaflets, class with the historic interest and social Working mothers have faced the closure nists, renewing the civil war and slaughtering thousands in a campaign translating key articles-e.g., "Declara force to smash capitalist exploitation. of public nurseries and kindergartens. designed to break the potential for work tion of Principles and Some Elements of The comrades of the Trotskyist Group We fight for free, quality health care and ing-class revolution. Program," "The Bankruptcy of 'New of Greece, section of the TCL, are com for free, 24-hour childcare. "The defeat of the KKE-led forces in Class' Theories," "Women's Liberation mitted to building a party that represents Greek society is extremely homo 1949, conforming to Stalin's postwar and the Struggle Against Imperialist Sub the interests of the multi ethnic working phobic, as was demonstrated recently by settlement with Churchill that gave jugation" and others. We wrote a state class and champions the rights of all the the case of the Mega Channel TV broad Greece to imperialism, paved the way for ment in defense of the arrested anarchists oppressed-women, homosexuals, youth, caster, which was fined €100,000 for a series of rightist regimes culminating and other protesters in Thessaloniki in immigrants and ethnic minorities. It is in the infamous colonels' dictatorship of showing a gay kiss in its Close Your Eyes 2003 against state repression. We defend necessary to fight for the political inde 1967-74. Despite this history, the goal of series. In counterposition to the homo the KKE has remained to find its way and call for the immediate release of all pendence of the proletariat in order to phobic Greek left we seek to act as a Len back into the corridors of capitalist those jailed in the roundup of the ELA overthrow the capitalist order by success inist tribune of the oppressed and defend power." and "17 November" groups [two groups ful proletarian revolution.
Agreement for Common Work Between Greek Comrades and the ICL (FI) 1. The current group in Greece origi women through socialist revolution and nated from a split within a group that opposition to women's oppression. We had been having discussions with the fight for full democratic rights for homo ICL since 1999. The reason for the split sexuals, in opposition to the male-chau was a months-long fight over the vinist, homophobic Greek society and the national question-the defense of the Greek left. We are for the separation of rights of national minorities in Greece church and state. and opposition to Greek national 5. The Greek comrades stand for full chauvinism. There were previously citizenship rights for all immigrants. fights with others in the original group They have already carried out many about the Russian question, the centrality interventions, both in common work of the woman question in Greece, the with comrades of the ICL and by them general strike question and the party selves, into immigrant demonstrations. question. As an excuse for breaking with More than 200,000 Immigrants-Albanian, Kurd, Pakistani, the ICL over these questions, a minority rally outside Bangladeshi, Russian, Iraqi, Palestinian, of the group cynically accused the ICL heavily guarded etc.-have become a key component of of "centrism" and "chauvinism" when U.S. embassy the proletariat in Greece and the Greek the bombing against Afghanistan began in Athens during group has to fight for the unity of the in October 2001 (International Internal four-hour nationwide proletariat against any kind of racism. Bulletin No. 54). strike against 6. The group agrees with the position 2. Comrades of the Greek group came U.S.-led invasion of of the ICL on the recent war on Iraq Iraq, March 2003. to the politics of the ICL through fights and the Afghanistan war in 2001. The and subsequent splits centered on the Greek group fought under the slogans: Russian question. Two members had split Defend Iraq against the imperialist attack from the lex-Morenoite] Communist of the U.S. and its allies! Down with League/Workers Power group over the the colonial occupation of Iraq! All defense of the Chinese deformed workers American and allied troops out of the state, while another comrade of the orig Near East now! We called for class inal group wrote a document supporting struggle against the capitalist rulers at the intervention of the ICL into the DDR home in counterposition to the Greek in 1989-90. Another comrade of the cur left, which had a very parochial posi rent group came from the Greek Commu agreement with the ICL's positIOn on Albanians and the Arvanites, etc., includ tion: "No Greek participation in the Iraq nist Party. Given the influehce that the CP Poland, although it has not been dis ing the right of self-determination, espe war" and also against the pacifism of has in the Greek working class, it is the cussed in the current group. We reject the cially for the Macedonian and Albanian the antiwar movement "Stop the War." main obstacle, so it is very important for Stalinophobia of the anti-communist minorities. It is also important to defend We supported the blockade of the Ameri the future of the group that an ex-member Greek pseudo-Trotskyists who refuse to the rights of the persecuted Roma people. can Souda base and we intervened in of the CP is one of the Greek comrades. intervene into the Greek Communist The comrades fight against Greek chau the workers strikes against the war. We The group stands for the unconditional Party-a mass pro-Soviet Stalinist party vinist poison inside the working class. called for Greek troops out of Cyprus. military defense of the deformed workers that has the support of the most ad The resolution of the myriad national 7. A key question confronting Trotsky states-China, North Korea, Vietnam and vanced sections of the Greek working questions in the Balkans requires a social ists in Greece is the question of Cyprus Cuba-and for proletarian political revo class and youth. ist federation of the Balkans. and our internationalist, class-struggle lution against the bureaucracy. We came 3. Greece is a Balkan country, and it is 4. A Trotskyist group must be a Lenin opposition to the anti-Turkish chauvin to agree with the ICL's analysis of the the only Balkan country to which the ist "tribune of the people." And for ism of the Greek bourgeoisie. We call for collapse of Stalinism in East Europe October Revolution did not extend. And Greece, where the ultra-reactionary the immediate withdrawal of all Greek through studying the "Documents and the Greek capitalist state is the only one Orthodox church has enormous influ troops from the island. We also demand Discussion on the Collapse of Stalinism" in the Balkans that does not recognize ence, the oppression of women is the withdrawal of the Turkish army, the by Seymour and St. John in Spartacist any national minority. A Trotskyist extreme. The Greek "holy trinity" of UN contingent and the British troops No. 45-46 (Winter 1990-9\). on which a group in Greece must fight against "homeland-religion-family" which the and bases. Our fight is for a proletarian comrade of the ICL gave a presentation. Greek chauvinism and defend the rights capitalist state promotes is strongly con solution to the national question, which The Greek group agrees with the position of national minorities-which are for nected with the national and the woman of necessity requires the revolutionary of the [CL on Afghanistan. "Hail Red cibly Hellenized-the Macedonian5, questions. A central issue for Trotskyists overthrow of the nationalist bourgeoisies Army in Afghanistan:' There is initial Vlachs, Pomaks. Turks. Cham (Musiim) must be the fight for the liberation of in Nicosia/Lefkosa, Athens and Ankara. 10 AUSTRALASIAN SPARTACIST c.. that explained U.S. goals for bringing u.. Iraq ... "democracy" to the region as follows: <{ (continued from page 12) "Iraq-a tactical goal, Saudi Arabia a strategic goal, and Egypt-the great administration, which considers the Iran prize." ian Shi'ite Islamic regime at the pinnacle No wonder then that the entire Arab of the world "axis of evil," maneuver the world and "old Europe" are on edge. A polling elections in Iraq to bring the Shi'ites to station in the Growing discontent within the American northern city power, thus strengthening Iranian influ military and a real shortage of troops will of Samarra ence in the region? Answer: the Bush not necessarily stop a zealously ideo blown to administration doesn't know where it is, logical Christian fundamentalist White rubble in much less where it is going, Attempting House, no doubt anxious to hasten Arma lead-up to to disprove new revelations by Seymour geddon, from widening the war in the 30 January Hersh (New Yorker, 24 January) that U.S. region-and certainly not from launching "elections." commandos have already been dropped murderously destructive bombing raids into Iran, Cheney told MSNBC's Don on Iran. U.S. keep your bloody hands Imus, "We don't want a war in the Middle off Iran! East if we can avoid it." Where do these Democratic rights for all the peoples former Soviet dissident and right-wing in the interest of human needs. They lunatics think Iraq is, Greater Texas? of Iraq, and across the Near East more Israeli minister Natan Sharansky is now built antiwar demonstrations designed to France, Germany and Britain are wor broadly, cannot be achieved under capi being touted by both the born-again presi appeal to liberal Democratic politicians ried about Bush waging another war in talism, but require the overthrow of dent and Secretary of State Condoleezza who argue that the Iraq war is damaging the Near East. They have substantial eco bourgeois rule in the region and the Rice. A London Guardian (22 January) to the interests of the U.S. On January 12, nomic investments and trade deals with establishment of a socialist federation of writer quipped that Bush's speechwriter 16 Congressional Democrats issued an Iran and are urgently negotiating to get the Near East. This is the Trotskyist suffered a heart attack while working on open letter to Bush calling for "immedi the Ayatollahs to foreswear development program of permanent revolution. This the inaugural address, "and its fire-and ate steps to begin the withdrawal of U.S. of nuclear weapons. Cheney's disavowal means combining the struggle against brimstone rhetoric seems to have been forces from Iraq." These Democrats are of war plans against Iran was anything the occupation with a struggle against all aimed at having the same effect on some getting themselves in position to play the but. Stating that "Iran is right at the top manner of bourgeois nationalism and of the world's leaders." same role they did before the war: to cor of the list" of world trouble spots, Che religious fundamentalism, and poses the The template for the U.S. imperial ral antiwar sentiment into the safe fold of ney dropped that "the Israelis might well urgent need to forge Marxist parties to presidency was set a long time ago. And the capitalist Democratic Party. decide to act first and let the rest of the lead the struggles for workers rule. Inter though this ruling class may currently The fight against imperialist war must world worry about cleaning up the diplo national extension of the revolution to have a Christian wacko at the helm, none become a fight against the entire capital matic mess afterwards." The Zionist neo the rich centers of imperialism-chiefly theless the power behind the ship of state ist system which breeds it, and against cons in the Bush administration have the United States, Germany and Japan is the relentless U.S. capitalist drive for both U.S. capitalist parties, Democrats as long had their sights on "regime change" is not only essential for worldwide egali profits, which in a world economy neces well as Republicans, who take turns pre in Iran as part of their overall plan to tarian socialist economic planning, but sarily results in imperialism, the inevita siding over an increasingly cruel and redraw the map in the interests of Israeli taking power out of the hands of the war bly bloody expression of capitalism at its divided society. Largely because of its security and American imperialist inter crazed U.S. imperialist rulers is essential highest stage. Imperialist aggression and pro-capitalist misleadership, the working ests. As we reported in "Mullahs, Mon for the future of life on the planet! war are not "policies" that can be ended class, which alone has the ability to over archists, Neocons and Zionists" (WV No. within the framework of capitalism-the throw capitalism and open the road to 820, 20 February 2004), Pentagon plan Imperialist War entire system must be overturned. human progress again, has been absent ners Richard Perle and Douglas Feith and Workers Revolution Rejecting this Leninist understanding far too long as a contender for political first schemed a new Near East plan many The imperial ambitions so blatantly of imperialism, the reformist organizers and social power. Our task, as a small years ago in a position paper they drafted displayed in Bush's second inaugural of the antiwar movement, like Workers Marxist international organization, is to in 1996 for incoming Israeli prime minis speech were couched in bizarre Christian World and the International Socialist fight to reestablish the understanding that ter Benjamin Netanyahu. In 2002, Perle fundamentalist rhetoric. They were also Organization, peddled the lie that the the road to human freedom lies through prepared a slideshow for Pentagon chiefs inspired by Zionist neocon ravings, as capitalist system can be reformed to work working-class socialist revolution .•
8. The group agrees on the ICL's an politics, as it is liberally spiced with some centage died en route. Stalin also for alysis and thesis on Pabloism. We want quasi-Marxist verbiage. This "left" face Chechnya ... cibly resettled the Volga Germans and a to fight to forge a Greek section of the was, however, jettisoned within a few (continued from page 4) number of other peoples from the Cri ICL. We have been contributing our years of the party's founding and any mea and Caucasus. monthly payment since May 2002. We would-be "leftists" were soon expelled neoconservatives like Pentagon advisor In the late 1950s, the liberal Stalinist accept the discipline of a democratic from the party. In contrast to elements of Richard Perle and former CIA head regime of Nikita Khrushchev restored centralist international. The Interna the Greek left, such as the Cliffites, we James Woolsey. The ACPC calls for a the Chechen-Ingush Republic and large tional, according to Lenin and Trotsky, is reject on principle any political support "direct international presence" (i.e., West numbers returned to their homeland. the necessary tool for the fight against including electoral support-to this party ern imperialist troops) in Chechnya. They enjoyed a substantial degree of capitalism, for new October Revolutions of the class enemy. Calls for foreign intervention in Chech national autonomy, preserving and devel and for the protection of national sec 10. An important task is the reading of nya feed into moves by U.S. imperialism oping their language and cultural iden tions from alien class pressures. We fight Workers Vanguard and other ICL propa to increase its military presence in the tity, despite the fact that the Soviet against the pretenders to Trotskyism ganda, and continuing the reading of region. The Pentagon already has a net Union was a degenerated workers state the SWP, Taaffeites, etc.-who are an Marxist classics for cadre development. work of military bases in Central Asia dominated by Russian nationalism. obstacle to the reforging of a Trotskyist We should study and learn from the long and the Caucasus. This includes U.S. As Georgi M. Derluguian notes in his party. We seek to build the party through and complex history of the Greek Marines in Georgia, which is also occu insightful essay 'The Guevaras in splits and fusions, including from among Trotskyist movement (e.g., the Greek pied by a garrison of Russian troops. U.S. Turbans" (New Left Review, September the CP youth and the anarchist milieu. Archio-Marxists and the Communist out of Central Asia and the Caucasus! October 1999), "In the 1960s Soviet 9. Unlike the Stalinist Communist League of America's Greek newspaper) Russia out of Chechnya and Georgia! Central Asia and the Caucasus were com Party, which is a reformist party based on and make it available to the rest of the Down With Great Russian monly described as a showcase of mod the industrial proletariat, PAS OK is a ICL. As Trotskyists in Greece we have to ernization, and this was not mere bourgeois-populist political formation. study about the Greek Civil War/national Chauvinism! propaganda." By all indicators, Soviet While it has influence in the main trade question/Cyprus, as well as the Trotsky The most disgusting response to the citizens from this region were centuries union federations in Greece (which are ist movement and its split during World Beslan massacre among leftist groups ahead in development compared to neigh generally craft unions), PASOK's exist War II on the Nazi occupation. The com comes from the dubious Socialist Equali boring Turkey, Iran and Afghanistan, ence is not dependent on the labor move rades need to study the ICL's statement ty Party (SEP) of David North, which especially when one considers the condi ment. PASOK's origins are in the on the imperialist bombing of Serbia and declared that the demand for an inde tion of women. bourgeois Centre Party of George Papan the Balkan slaughter and, with the help of pendent Chechnya is "a reactionary pro dreou-the father of PASOK founder the ICL, the national minorities in Greece ject, whose realization would benefit only Today, these regions have been thrown Andreas-whose social base the party as a part of the Balkans. aspiring bourgeois elements and their back centuries in time. The deepening inherited. PASOK's ideological under 11. In order to accommodate this com communalist and Islamic fundamentalist hold of nationalism and Islamic funda pinnings are illustrated by the party's mon work it is necessary to study the allies" (World Socialist Web Site, state mentalism on the consciousness of the seminal 3 September [1974] founding English language. It's also necessary for ment by the Editorial Board, 4 September peoples of the former Soviet Union is a Declaration, which combined hawkish comrades of the ICL to study Greek. 2004). reflection of capitalist counterrevolution. Greek nationalism over the Cyprus issue 12. As a task we have to project National rights for the peoples of the What is needed to galvanize proletarian with characteristic populist claims to rep some modest public work in interven Caucasus and Central Asia were won as opposition to the capitalist rulers of Rus resent all "dispossessed" Greek people, tions through regular sales to the student part of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, sia and the other former Soviet Repub defined to include peasants, small busi milieu. In opponent meetings and in which destroyed what Lenin called the lics is the forging of a revolutionary nessmen, managers, etc. The 3 Septem demonstrations we have already partici tsarist "prison house of peoples." Under workers party steeled in Leninist inter ber Declaration is moreover one of the pated in common work with the ICL in the Soviet Union, autonomous regions nationalism. As we wrote at the begin more leftist expressions of PASOK's Greece and in London. were established for formerly oppressed ning of the first Chechen war a decade 13. Until it is realistic for a comrade to peoples such as the Chechens, Osse ago (WVNo. 614,13 January 1995): be able to transfer to Greece, it would be tians, Tartars and Bashkirs in the Urals. "An intemationalist, revolutionary workers helpful for the Greek group to get more Under Stalin's rule, national rights of movement fighting for a democratically planned, egalitarian economy and true Visit frequent visits, of longer duration. As soon non-Russian peoples were savagely equality between the peoples of this region as possible we need a comrade to transfer trampled on in the Caucasus and else could rally the working masses of all the the leI. to help in the building of the section and where. During World War II, Stalin dis Caucasian peoples to overcome the raging the organizing of our political work. solved the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous fratricidal national conflicts. An authenti 14. We look forward to producing Soviet Socialist Republic, falsely claim cally communist, Leninist-Trotskyist van Web Site! guard party must be forged in sharp propaganda related to the class struggle ing it had supported the invasion by Nazi struggle against all variants of national www.ic.·fi.org in Greek society in order to intervene to Germany. The entire population was ism, and in particular against the chauvin give flesh to the ICL program .• deported to Central Asia, and a large per- ism of the Great Russian oppressor.". AUTUMN 2005 11 --,- Australasian , SPARTACIST ~ Iraq: Sham Elections, Savage Occupation
The following article on the sham elec banned, newspapers were suppressed and tions and continuing brutal occupation in voting took place only in areas under the Iraq is reprinted from Workers Vanguard Saigon government's control. Sound (No. 841, 4 February), newspaper of the familiar? The next year a rather more Spartacist League/U.s. Only days before significant event for the liberation of the Iraq's 30 January "elections" Australian Vietnamese people occurred: the Tet soldiers showed the meaning of "democ Offensive, beginning the night of Janu racy" under the U.S.-led imperialist ary 30, 1968, which shattered the myth occupation when they shot an Iraqi man of U.S. military "progress." outside the Australian embassy, simply In Vietnam and EI Salvador, military hecause he allegedly refused their orders victory for the opponents of U.S. imperi to "hit the ground." This follows on the alism directly posed the possibility of heels of an incident late last year in which lifting the yoke of imperialist subjuga Australian soldiers riddled a car with tion and opening the road to social revo hullets, hitting one of the Iraqi occupants. lution, as occurred in Vietnam. Such is In late February, John Howard an not the case in Iraq today. The clerical nounced that 450 more Australian troops reactionary forces and Ba'athists now would he sent to Iraq. Also supporting dominant in the "resistance" to U.S. the occupation, ALP leader Kim Beazley imperialism are also enemies of the responded, "we need to be differently working class, women and minorities. engaged, not more deeply engaged." Yet the ferocity of the resistance in Iraq Wider War Threatened has meant that imperialist armies find The stage is set now for civil war themselves increasingly, save for large within Iraq's borders and significant de
scale missions, confined to their bases, Zaklin/EPA stabilization beyond. Iraq is not a nation unable to even travel the 20-kilometre Mosul, 8 January: U.S. troops brutalise a man accused of supporting insurgents but a patchwork of different peoples and road linking Baghdad's airport to the in Iraq. He later died. ethnicities carved by the British imperi capital's Green Zone. When Iraqi forces alists out of the old Turkish Ottoman on the ground aim their blows against the Empire at the end of the First World War. imperialist occupiers, we revolutionary The Sunni Arab minority has historically Marxists take their side against the U.S., dominated the Arab Shi'ite majority as its Australian and other allies, and their well as a portion of the Kurdish nation Iraqi lackeys. Every blow struck against (which also spans parts of Iran, Turkey the imperialist occupiers is a blow for the and Syria). We warned: "Absent the work international working class. ing class emerging as an independent Iraq is of course not the first country to political force in a struggle against neo feel the savagery of colonial occupation colonial rule, each of these popUlations forces that include the Australian military. and strutting thug Ayad Allawi, the for won. The Americans don't seem prepared can only come to power by oppressing the Shortly after occupying East Timor in 1999 mer Ba'athist goon called "Saddam lite" to go door-to-door to check on who voted, others and in alliance with U.S. imperial under the guise of protecting "human by his own American handlers, mouth as the Nazis did-though staining the ism" (WVNo. 830,6 August 2004). rights," Australian troops were torturing pieties about "free elections" in the midst forefingers of those Iraqis who did ven The Sunni Arab minority is the big captured prisoners and terrorising Timor of overwhelming U.S. military terror. ture out to vote does give new meaning to loser under the American occupation, ese women in their homes at night. The Curfews were imposed and car traffic was the term "marked man." and so will continue the insurgency Australian-led UN forces have created, banned anywhere near polls, whose loca The Americans' cynical use of fake against the foreign imperialist occupi and violently backed, a neocolonial state tions were kept secret until the last min elections under battlefield conditions is ers-as well as the criminal sectarian apparatus in East Timor that has ensured ute, as were the names of most of the not new. Resurrecting Reagan's gory violence against the Shi'ites, the Kurds, Australian imperialism's massive theft of candidates for a meaningless "national 1982 electoral sham in EI Salvador, Pen and other peoples and tribes. Meanwhile, oil and gas from this impoverished coun assembly" to draft a meaningless "consti tagon chief Donald Rumsfeld said last the Kurds want control of the oil wealth try. On 4 December 2002 in the East tution" under the boot of the U.S. occu December, "I mean, my goodness, EI Sal in their region and many Kurds have illu Timor capital, Dili, the combined forces piers. But a few plastic ballot boxes and vador had elections when people were sions that the American occupation will of the UN/Australian police force and cardboard booths, with a compliant being shot at and there was a civil war protect them against Arab reconquest. the UN-controlled East Timorese police American press to burble about the "joy" going on, and it worked fine" (Wall Street The fight for Kurdish self-determination opened fire on unarmed high school of the day, were all Bush really wanted Journal Online, 10 January). The only is a just struggle, requiring the overthrow students protesting against cop violence. for his cynical photo-op, as supposed "choice" allowed was either junta chief of four capitalist states. We call for a Eighteen of the demonstrators were shot independent election observers "observed" Jose Napoleon Duarte or death-squad Socialist Republic of United Kurdistan. and up to five were killed. We demand: safely far away in Jordan. torturer "Blowtorch Bob" D' Aubuisson. But in Iraq today-and only in Iraq-the Australian military get out of Iraq, East Meanwhile, the horror of war contin Meanwhile, a leftist military insurgency Kurdish question has become decisively Timor, Aceh and the Solomon Islands! ues. New revelations of Iraq torture and was raging, whose military victory, we subordinated to the American imperialist Not one person, not one -cent for the Pentagon spy units burrowing into Iran said, "is an absolute necessity on the road occupation, of which Kurdish political racist Australian imperialist military! have come out. Veteran investigative to workers power in EI Salvador." We and military forces have become an inte journalist Seymour Hersh points out that wrote, in "Reagan's Junta Holds 'Elec gral part. The struggle for Kurdish inde FEBRUARY 1-While U.S. jets screamed in Iraq "the number of tonnage dropped tions by Death''': "To talk of any kind pendence can only go forward through overhead, u.s. soldiers surrounded Iraqi has grown exponentially each month. of elections while the junta's army intransigent opposition to the occupation polling places to make sure Bush's fake We are systematically bombing that is intact...is preparing a gigantic defeat and the Kurdish nationalists who col "election" on January 30 came off. The country.... It's simply a tui-key shoot" for the Salvadoran masses. The heroic laborate with U.S. imperialism. "election" was designed purely as a legiti (CounterPunch online, 27 January). worker and peasant fighters are not For the first time in centuries, Shi'ites mizing cover for the continuing savage The supposed "sanctity of the vote" shedding their blood to get more elec will rule an Arab country, which is a U.s. occupation. It was a despicable and means less than nothing to the U.S. presi toral farces but to break the chains of reason al-Sistani and many other Shi'ite cynical fraud, in which at least 44 Iraqis dent, who stole his first presidential elec oppression that bind them" (WVNo. 300, leaders pushed for the elections. This died in widely predicted violence. While tion through disenfranchising black 5 March 1982). has Sunni Arab rulers apoplectic that we denounce criminal terror against inno people. In terms of fake elections, he During the Vietnam War in the 1960s, a Shia "Crescent" will run from Iran cent civilians, including those who came might have taken a lesson from the Nazis. in South Vietnam the U.S. broke the -through Iraq to Lebanon, via Syria. out to vote behind the American barbed Today, in the midst of all the imperialist monotony of regular military/CIA coups Notably, the oil wealth of Saudi Arabia is wire, we recognize that every military crocodile tears over the Nazi death camp with occasionally letting its puppets concentrated in Shi'ite areas, as is the blow struck against the U.S. and British Auschwitz, let's recall that Hitler made stage "elections." One such typical foray largest concentration of oil wealth in Iraq occupiers, their allies and mercenaries is concentration camp inmates vote. In the in 1967 (when the U.S. had half a (apart from Mosul), not to mention the a blow against imperialist aggression. 12 November 1933 Reichstag elections, million troops on the ground) was "won" oil wealth controlled by Iran's Shi'ite U.S. out of Iraq now I prisoners at Osthofen, Brandenburg and by former generals Thieu and Ky, as theocracy. Now, why would the Bush It was grotesque to watch U.S. puppet Oranienburg were given ballots. Hitler Buddhists and peace candidates were continued on page II 12 AUTUMN 2005