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25¢ WfJ/iNI/iS ',1"'0,111'"~~X'523 No. 423 6 March 1987

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The American ruling class has con­ cluded that Ronald Reagan may contin­ ue to reign as president, but he can no longer rule. The Tower Commission, Imperial Presidency in Crisis originally appointed to "investigate" the operations of a runaway National Security Council, came back with a damning report that in diplomatic language indicted the entire administra­ tion. "Chaos" had descended on the White House, the president "didn't understand" what was going on in the Iran/contra affair, the "legal underpin­ ning" for the arms shipments to Teheran via Israel was "at best highly question­ able," and,the whole "private" contra supply operation run out of the NSC was an elaborate attempt to get around a Congressional prohibition. Above all, the Reaganauts' schemes, each more bizarre than the next, failed miserably. The Commission ludicrously called the whole business an "aberration." But all wings of the bourgeoisie agree that drastic measures have to be taken to clean up the mess. The United States, which proclaims itself leader of the "Free World," has been made a laughingstock, and ever since the scandal broke, paralysis has set Actualidad Espanola in. European imperialist allies refer to Tricky Dick run out of town. the "black hole in Washington." Under Now it's bedtime for Bonzo. the headline "Wanted: a Leader," the Los Angeles Times (13 February) "appalled by the absence of the kind of itself, and there are other programs to mobs in Howard Beach, Queens and editorialized on behalf of the American alertness and vigilance to his job and to "solve" the crisis. General Haig has Forsyth County, Georgia to night­ bourgeois establishment:, "Someone these policies that one expects of a declared his candidacy for president, riding firebombers in Marquette Park, needs to seize control of the White president." Muskie's devastating con­ saying if he is elected, "nobody, but Chicago. But there have also been House, and there isjust one person who clusion: "We do not regard him as a nobody, will ever ask you who is in substantial countermobilizations to can do it: Ronald Reagan." But Reagan mental case, but we regard him as a charge" in the White House (Philadel­ KKK terror, including in such unlikely evidently can't, and that puts U.S. rulers person who didn't do his job." phia Inquirer, I March)! And while places as Louisville, Kentucky and in a dilemma. On CBS' Face the Nation There is an acute political crisis at the Reagan's contras are still spreading Maryland's Eastern Shore. With the news program, former Democratic pinnacle of U.S. capitalism, which could death and destruction around the globe, government in turmoil, now is the time Senator Edmund Muskie spoke for all quickly spread-through the imperialist the racist terrorists carry out their for the working class and oppressed to • three panel members, saying they, were alliance. Yet capitalism will not fall by bloody terror at 'home-from lynch . continued on page 4

On the night of February 18,Tampa police strangled the life out of 23-year­ old Melvin Hair, making him the latest black victim of the wave of racist Black Outrage Over Klan/cop terror sweeping Reagan's America. A day later, black East Tampa exploded, outraged over the choke-hold murder and a city report released that same day whitewashing the Tampa cops' brutal beating of New Tampa Choke-Hold Cops York Mets star pitcher and hometown hero Dwight Gooden. Hundreds of black youth fought a running battle with police, hurling rocks and bottles. 'filled with gasoline as numerous fires were set. Cops in riot gear sealed off a .. five-block area of East Tampa and police helicopters circled overhead. The next night, black Tampa was still burning. Fourteen blacks were arrest­ ed on charges ranging from looting to assault. Melvin, Hair's mother had called police to take her son to the crisis center of Hillsborough County, be­ cause her son required medication. Police' arrived and dragged him down Ledford/51. Petersburg Times' the steps of his apartment building. East Tampa burns with black anger against killer cops' murder of black youth, Betty Johnson, a friend of the family assault on NY Mets pitcher Dwight Gooden (right). continued on page 10 revolution in America's "backyard." Most recently raids by immigration Full Citizenshil! Rights for Foreign-Born Workers! cops on the homes of Tamil refugees in Toronto have driven home the link between the racism and anti­ communism which is the heart of the Canada Slams Door on Salvadorans "illegal aliens" scare. After their apart­ ments were ransacked Tamils were TORONTO-On February 20, hun­ would not deport refugees seeking asy­ detention centers. All refugees will be warned by immigration officers, "As dreds of desperate Latin Americans, lum in Canada, but American INS deported if immigration officials con­ refugees you should not read com­ refugees from death squad terror in EI Commissioner Alan Nelson declared sider that they "may have had an munist books"(Canadian Tribune, 2 Salvador and Guatemala who are now that individuals "found to be deport­ opportunity" for asylum in another March). fleeing the U.S. government's racist able" would be processed accordingly. . country or even if they "had safe refuge Scandalously, last summer it was crackdown on "illegal-aliens," found the At the same time Bouchard has de- in a refugee camp in some Third World Ed Broadbent, leader of the social­ Canadian border closed by the decree of country" ([Toronto] Globe andMail, 21 democratic New Democratic Party, Reagan's junior partners in Ottawa. February). who demanded a "tougher look at all Following approval by the U.S. Con­ Some critics have sought to portray our immigration procedures" to prevent gress last October of the Simpson­ Canada's new immigration decrees as a "abuse" by "quick buck artists." And the Mazzoli immigration "reform" act, departure from its "humanitarian past." Tory government's racist crackdown aimed at deporting several million On the contrary, up until the I960s against Latin American refugees is not undocumented foreign-born workers, Canada had a virtual whites-only going down very well with the public. thousands have looked to Canada as immigration'policy. During World War Demonstrations were held at the Fort their last resort. Facing impossible U.S. II they sealed the borders to Jews Erie "Peace Bridge" border and Mon­ requirements for documents, fired by .desperately trying to flee Hitler's con­ treal churches have provided shelter and slave-labor employers who have been centration camps. But after the war the advice to refugees in defiance of the legal threatened with stiff fines for hiring doors were opened to thousands of Nazi .consequences. There has even been talk "illegals" and looking at the death· executioners.' Last summer, 155 Tamil of extending the U.S. sanctuary move­ sentence of being shipped back home, . refugees, fleeing the terror of Sri Lanka ment's "underground railway" network they have been heading to the Canadian and virtual concentration camp coridi­ north to Canada. El Norte. Since the beginning of the year tions in West Germany, risked their lives At the height of the anti-Tamil hys­ over 6,000 people have applied for in a three-week nightmare voyage to get teria last August, the.Trotskyist League refugee status in Canada, close to half of asylum in Ganada. Reaching Canadian of Canada distributed thousands of them from Central America. In re­ shores after being rescued from over­ special supplements of Spartacist Cana­ sponse the Conservative government in crowded lifeboats by Newfoundland da, headlined "Stop the Racist Back­ Ottawa rushed through legislation fishermen, they were met with a racist lash! Political Asylum for All Tamil denying entry. backlash whipped up by the bourgeois Refugees!" at plant gates, in minority Under the new measures all refugee WV Photo media and politicians. neighborhoods and to unionists at claimants coming from the U:S. will be Spartacists in Los Angeles demon­ A reporter from Ottawa commented: Labor Day marches. Fighting the racist strate against racist deportations. sent back until an immigration hearing "There is a suspicion that the [Canadi­ immigration policies of the imperialists is scheduled in Canada. That could take manded documentary proof that all an] government's swift reaction tq the means building a proletarian interna­ months, if not years, and meanwhile refugees are "genuine"-i.e., that they refugee problem, now that it involves tionalist party of world socialist revolu­ hundreds of these "bus people" are will be killed if deported.: Central Americans, reflects an effort tion to free working people and the backed up in U.S. border towns' such as In March, the government plans to to please the Reagan administration" oppressed, from EI Salvador to Sri Plattsburgh, NY. The Tory Employ­ introduce a bill that will limit the stay of (WBAI News, 23 February). The cam­ Lanka to North America. It is to this ment and Immigration Minister Benoit refugee claimants in Canadato 72hours paign against Latin American im­ task that the international Spartacist Bouchard claimed that Washington duting which time they willbe held in migration is closely linked to the fear of tendency is dedicated.• _____Letter Celebrate International Women's Day! How ILA Backed Down Jim Crow Seventy years ago, on International Oakland, CA After we were denied service, we Women's Day, 8 March 1917, the women 1/6/87 organized several hundred demonstra­ textile workers of Petrograd led a dem­ Dear comrades, tors and picketed the restaurant daily. onstration of90,000 that signaled the end And each day a larger mob of racists of 300 years of tsarist autocracy ani WV's recent article on the Inter­ surrounded us, spitting, shoving and the beginning of the Russian Revolution. national Longshoremen's Association screaming obscenities. On the second anniversary of the Soviet (ILA) in WV 417 was excelient. The In the midst of this escalating victory Lenin reported what that revolu­ following story is another example of situation, the black Gulfport ILA local TROTSKY tion meant to women: LENIN the ILA's key role-in the fight against intervened. They hada meeting with the Jim Crow racism in the South. mayor and Chief of Police. They laid In the course of two years of Soviet power in one of the most backward countries of In the summer of 1965, I was in down the line saying if any of us were Europe more has been done to emancipate woman, to make her the equal of the Gulfport, Mississippi doing civil rights arrested or injured, theCILA would "strong" sex, than has been done during the past 130 years by all the advanced, work with the Student Nonviolent strike and shut down the port. enlightened, "democratic" republics of the world taken together. Coordinating Committee (SNCC). The It worked! Not only were we not Education, culture, civilisation, freedom-all these high-sounding words are arrested or beat up" but the restaurants accompanied in all the capitalist, bourgeois republics of the world with incredibly Longshore union literally stood be­ tween us and racist violence. began to serve blacks. It was an foul, disgustingly vile, bestiallycrude laws that make women unequal in marriage impressive demonstration of how the and divorce, that make the child born out of wedlock and the "legally born" child One of SNCC's main activities was fighting to integrate restaurants, which power of labor could be brought to bear unequal and that give privileges to the male and humiliate and degrade on the struggle for black liberation. womankind.... refused to serve blacks. Ourmethod was Down with the liars who speak about freedom and equalityfor all, while there is an to enter a popular coffee shop with an Comradely, oppressed sex, oppressing classes, private ownership of capital and shares and people integrated team and try to get served. Diana C. with bursting bins who use their surplus grain to enslave the hungry. Instead of freedom for all, instead of equality for all, let there be struggle against the oppressors and exploiters, let the opportunity to oppress and exploit be abolished. That'is our slogan! Freedom and equality for the oppressed sex! JUST OUT! Freedom and equality for the workers and labouring peasants! Women and ~;!~t!~ -Y. I. Lenin, "Soviet Power and the Status of Women," November 1919 Revolution Spring 1987 No. 33 (24 pages) • Sex, Race and Class In the ~. "American Century" • Free America's Class-War Free America'S ---..:..::== o!'..'!..f!!.~.'!.! ~ Prlsonersl ClaSS-War .!!!!!..'!! .: Prisoners! DIRECTOR OF PARTY PUBLICATIONS: Liz Gordon • The Battles Against Syphilis and AIDS' Soe_1. EDITOR: Jan Norden PRODUCTION MANAGER: Noah Wilner • Extend Gains of Bolshevik Revolution to Afghan CIRCULATION MANAGER: Jon Lawrence Peoplesl EDITORIAL BOARD: Bonnie Brodie, Jon Brule, George Foster, Liz Gordon, Jan Norden, James Robertson, Reuben Samuels. Joseph Seymour, Marjorie Stamberg. • Workers Derail French Noah Wilner (Closing editor) Regime Workers Vanguard (USPS 098-770) published biweekly, except 2nd issue August and with 3-week interval December, ::"''''t:.;.,..,,~ ~.~....- by the Spartacist Publishing Co .. 41 Warren Street, New York. NY 10007.Telephone: 732-7862 (Editorial), 732-7861 $.50 single issue -....,. ! , ==:c:=:. AlghMiaran! $2.00 4-issue subscription The e.tt'"Ao-lnat $yphilq; Women 4 1Io...... ~...... (Business). Address all correspondence to: Box 1377. GPO. New York, NY 10116. Domestic subscriptions: $5.00/24 ...... va.AmI-eb"'::':108: BuIld...... •...... •...•..•.•...• issues. Second-class postage paid at New York, NY. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Workers Vanguard. . ~8olahm1:==F"~! Make checks payable/mail to: Box 1377. GPO. New York. NY 10116. . •·•·•·•••• 14 Spartacist Publishing Co. ~ Opimon~ expressed in signed articles or Jetters do not. necessarily express the editorial viewpoint. . .. .; .•.• .•... ,.•.• #:; .• ..,..• :ot= Box 1377 GPO New York, NY 10116 . No. 423 6 March 1987

2 WORKERS VANGUARD Taking their cue from Koch and his killer cops, the racists are increasingly angrl Protest Over Murder of Black Grandmother taking to the streets. On february 26, a black family's home in Crown Heights, Brooklyn was firebombed. On February 22, blacks waiting for a bus in Bayside, Queens were chased and shot'at by a racist, bat-wielding mob. On February NYC Killer CQP Sullivan Walks 24, "former" KKK "imperial wizard" David Duke showed up outside City On February 26, more than 150 an­ Hall, after grandstanding in front of the gry protesters, overwhelmingly black, New Park Pizzeria in Howard Beach demonstrated outside Bronx Supreme where the lynch mob murderers of Court after killer cop Stephen Sullivan Michael Griffith assembled last Decem­ was acquitted in a racist sham "trial." ber 20. Duke is, recruiting for his Sullivan was the triggerman in the 1984 "National Association for the Advance­ eviction-by-murder of black grand­ ment of White People" and claims mother Eleanor Bumpurs. Before an­ dozens of members in the racist Howard nouncing the verdict, Judge Fred Eggert Beach enclave. Last month, Duke was in ordered cops to eject supporters of the the thick of the attack by hundreds of Eleanor Bumpurs Justice Committee racists on a civil rights march in Forsyth who protested the exclusion of hun­ County, Georgia. New York City is on dreds of blacks while white off-duty the verge of a racist explosion and cops packed the spectators' seats. As the fascist scum like Duke want to light the protesters were carried out, the crowd match. jamming the hallways chanted, "We say After Sullivan the cop was turned guilty!" loose, Roger Warshaw, a spokesman for Inside the courtroom, the cops the Eleanor Bumpurs Justice Commit­ erupted in applause at the "not guilty" tee, said that under slavery the white verdict. An elderly black man shouted masters "needed our labor." In 1987,he out "Heil Hitler!" Mrs. Bumpurs' said, "black people have become a daughter Mary later summed up the Wilford Harewood superfluous population." But while "trial": "If you're black get back. You Protest outside Bronx courthouse February 26~ Vengeance for Eleanor unemployment is sky-high in the ghetto, have no rights." In the demonstration, Bumpurs! Jail Killer Cop Sullivan! black workers do have power-as a key Spartacist supporters' signs proclaimed, Hundreds of additional police waited The police have taken the verdict as a component of an integrated labor "Vengeance for Victims of Koch's Kill­ at nearby Yankee Stadium. Civilians license to kill. Sullivan went on TV and movement. The 37,000-strong Trans­ er Cops!" "Jail Killer Cop Sullivan! entering the courtroom were screened vowed he'd do it again, while PBA port Workers Union (TWU), for exam­ Vengeance for Eleanor Bumpurs!" by metal detectors and police dogs president Phil Caruso crowed Sullivan ple, is heavily black, and this city doesn't "Reagan's Anti-Soviet War Drive Fuels sniffed for explosives. This blatant was just "doing what he's paid to do." run without their labor. Militant transit Racist Lynch Mob Terrorists!" and assertion of "police power," of cop (Caruso also claims the recent ban on workers in the Committee for a Fighting "Remember Michael Griffith and Willie bonapartism, has marked the case from hog-tying prisoners is a violation of the TWU called for the formation of union Turks! Gun Control Kills Blacks!" the beginning. In February 1985, when PBA contract.) And two days after the defense guards to patrol the streets of The courthouse, in the black and Sullivan was first indicted, 10,000 killer cop walked they did it again, as Howard Beach, using labor's muscle to Hispanic South Bronx, was an armed armed NYPD cops surrounded the eight cops cornered a black Muslim they make them safe for all working people. camp. Hundreds of cops ringed the courthouse-an ominous armed dem­ said was carrying a lead pipe at 125th The racist terrorists in and out of block and manned nearby rooftops; onstration against any civilian control and Lenox in Harlem, and cut him uniform must be stopped with labor/ a police helicopter hovered overhead. over the killer cops and their guns. down in a hail of bullets. black mobilizationsl B

more than ever on black Democratic Party mayors like Harold Washington Black Teacher's Home Firebombed and Detroit's Coleman Young to check social struggle. The KKK and Nazis have targeted Chicago blacks who break the "color Chicago Elections and Racist Terror bar" by moving across Western Avenue. The racist terrorists must be smashed by CHICAGO-As the white Machine aggravated arson and let out on the by the reformist left and nationalists) is the organized power of labor and Democrats whip up racist opposition to streets with incredibly low bail. Police harder to sell. "It's just the same old blacks, like the CTA transit workers and black Democratic mayor Harold Wash­ initially labeled this attempt at racist same old," said Cabrini Green resident the 26,OOO-member Chicago Teachers ington, they have inspired a wave of murder as a "randomact of vandalism"! Charles Smith. In 1983, "we cam­ Union. That same power must also be terror against blacks on the Southwest The night before Stirgus' home was paigned for Washington. Then we were mobilized to fight the decimation of the Side. On February 17, nightriders fire­ firebombed, a black Washington sup- . constituents. ... After they won, we industrial proletariat of the Midwest, as bombed the home of black schoolteach­ porter in Marquette Park returned from became hoodlums, thugs-and drifters "smokestack" industries like auto and er Dorothy Stirgus, who narrowly an election rally to find his home hanging out in the projects" (Sun­ steel become rusting hulks. This requires , escaped with her life. Stirgus told WV defaced with racist slurs, "KKK" and Times, 8 February). an integrated, class-struggle workers she was watching TV in bed when she swastikas. Harold Washington and the Demo­ party, forged in struggle against the These attacks came a week before the cratic Party are and have always been union tops who keep labor and minori­ Democratic Party mayoral primary, as defenders of the racist, capitalist system. ties chained to the Democrat/Dixiecrats remnants of Boss Daley's Machine went Washington spent decades as a kept and this racist, capitalist system. all out to elect "anyone [white] but state legislator, and later Congressman, The bosses like to call this state the Harold." When a fewdozen blacks from of Boss Daley's Machine. Today, with "Land of Lincoln," but in Chicago it's the South, led by Ben Chavis, came to the Reagan gang on the ropes, the clear that it is necessary to finish the Chicago on a "reverse freedom ride" to capitalist rulers of this country depend Civil War!. campaign for Washington, former mayor Jane Byrne denounced them as "carpetbaggers," the Ku Klux Klan's language for those who fought for black SPARTACIST LEAGUE/U.S. LOCAL DIRECTORY rights during Reconstruction. Washing­ National Office: Box 1377 GPO, New York, NY 10116 • (212) 732-7860 ton won 96 percent of the black vote, and riding on the endorsements of the Atlanta Detroit Norfolk Chicago Tribune and the Sun- Times Box 4012 Box 441794 Box 1972, Main PO (and the support of the LaSalle Street Atlanta, GA 30302 Detroit, MI 48244 Norfolk, VA 23501 bankers) also captured 21 percent ofthe Boston Los Angeles Oakland white vote. Narrowly defeating Byrne, Box 840, Central Sta. Box 29574, Los feliZ Sta. Box 32552 Washington now faces a Republican Cambridge, MA 02139 Los Angeles, CA 90029 Oakland, CA 94604 college professor (who defeated Spanky (617) 492-3928 (213) 380-8239 (415) 839-0851 the Clown in the GOP primary) and a Chicago Madison San Francisco white Democrat or two running on Box 6441, Main PO c/o SYL, Box 2074 Box 5712 "independent" slates in the April 7 Chicago, IL 60680 Madison, WI 53701 San Francisco, CA 94101 general election. WV Photo (312) 663-0715 (608) 257-8625 (415) 863-6963 Four years ago Chicago blacks had Dorothy Stirgus barely escaped illusions that Harold Washington Cleveland New York Washington, D.C. death in racist firebombing of her Box 91037 Box 444, Canal St. Sta. Box 75073 home. would change "Segregation City." For many those illusions remain. But this Cleveland, OH 44101 New York, NY 10013 Washington, D.C. 20013 (216) 881-3700 (212) 267-1025 (202) 636-3537 heard a crash in the hallway. "I jumped time around Washington's campaign out of bed and ran to the door.... When rarely ventured into the projects, "high­ I pushed the door open I saw flames up rise ghettos" like Cabrini Green and the Toronto and down my hall." Stirgus had to jump Robert Taylor Homes. After four years TROTSKYIST LEAGUE .Box 7198, Station A through the wall of fire to escape: "I - of more racist terror, mass unemploy­ Of CANADA Toronto, Ontario M5W 1X8 didn't stop-I just ran!" The four racist ment and police brutality, the lie of (416) 593-4138 ' punks arrested were only charged with "black faces in high places" (cheered on 6 MARCH'1987 3 colonel put the arm on King Fahd of Reagangate ... Saudi Arabia, threatened President Arias of Costa Rica to cut off U.S. aid, (continuedfrom page 1) ordered the U.S. ambassador to Costa Rica to organize a united contra bring down Reagan through sharp class "Southern Front," and much, much struggle! more. Changing of the Guard McFarlane, As the White House ran its private Casey, wars, lying to Congress and hiding The day after the Tower report was Regan- much of the facts from the Cabinet as issued, Don Regan was unceremonious­ the gang well, the New York Times (2 March) ly fired as White House chief of staff, that couldn't concluded: "Frustrations with democra­ informed of the event by a TV an­ lie straight. cy, it seems, led President Reagan to nouncement of his successor. Regan, turn his National Security Council into who had imperiously· insisted on a secret government." Former .NSC "micromanaging" everything in the head McFarlane said 'at one point to White House, was variously referred to nominee to head the CIA withdrew. As Tower Commission's report. When North: "If the world only knew how as "prime minister" and "the real you can imagine, it's no easy job to find IraniContragate first broke, Reagan many times you have kept a semblance president." But in trying to get Ronald replacements: the only man they could had called up to thank his "American of integrity and gumption to US policy Reagan out there reading his lines, find for Buchanan's job turns out to hero" Oliver North, remarking that the they would make you Secretary of State. Regan committed the cardinal sin of have been a member of a Nazi youth story would make a great film. But in But they can't know and would com­ running afoul. of Nancy Reagan. The group. Meanwhile, North's secretary 300-plus pages the Tower report lays out plain if they did-such is the state of First Lady who would be empress had Fawn Hall is decidedly no Rosemary the script for a Laurel and Hardy democracy in the late 20th century." The insisted on keeping the president sealed Woods; after vowing not to shred-and­ comedy of errors. Cakes, bibles, pistols, Reaganauts set out to slam the Soviet off from the press, even trying to cancel tell, she's now talking to the special planeloads of missiles listed as oil "Evil Empire" up against the wall, roll the annual State of the Union speech. prosecutor in exchange for immunity drilling equipment: the latest revelation back the Nicaraguan Revolution, re­ She cited medical reasons, and with a from prosecution. .was a scheme to ransom a hostage with store the "American Century" and 76-year-old Reagan who's obviously not As the U.S. administration unravels, $300,000 in chemically treated bills that "avenge Vietnam." They were going to in touch she may have a point. But that the turbulence in Washington issending would disintegrate after a couple of "save democracy" from the State De­ doesn't help the imperialist bourgeoisie, shock waves through the U.S.' "Free days! That one flopped, too. And partment, the Pentagon, Congress and which needs a functioning government. World" allies and surrogates. The split while Mcfarlane/Poindexter/North are the American people. And one thing nobody proposes to do is in the Nicaraguan contras reflects quoted disparaging the ayatollahs, the But the "Reagan Doctrine" didn't to turn the store over to George Bush. divisions between the State Department net result is that Khomeini has managed work, because the contra scum are The appointment of "moderate" Re­ and the CIA ...and the fact that the to bring down the Great Satan. losers-they have been smashed on the publican former Senator Howard Baker Sandinistas have won. "After this On whether he had authorized the battlefield in Nicaragua. U.S. imperial­ as Regan's replacement was widely [Tower] report it's all over," says a U.S. first Israeli delivery of antitank missiles ism got its ass kicked in Indochina, and greeted with a sigh of relief by main­ official. "We need to start thinking to Iran, Reagan first told the Commis­ most Americans don't want to see the stream politicians. For a while it had about evacuating the contras" (Time, 9 sion he agreed with former NSC head body bags coming home inanother mad looked like no one would take the job. March). In Britain, arch-Reaganite McFarlane that he had approved it; Third World military adventure to put a But the Wall Street Journal (2 March), Maggie Thatcher, herself increasingly then (on chief of staff Regan's orders) he gang of rapists and murderers in power. reflecting the forebodings of conserva­ unpopular, is on the verge of calling denied he had okayed the shipment, and So six years into the abortive "Reagan tives generally, was distraught over the elections. The French government is finally he sent a letter saying: "I don't revolution" the Sandinistas are still "Baker regency," fearing that 'it could paralyzed in uneasy "cohabitation," remember-period." Reagan's one at­ there, and Gorbachev has a lot more "effectively end the Reagan Doctrine," with a rightist premier and "socialist" tempt to defend himself in public was to credibility than the liar in the White ask an audience, who could remember House. In fact, over lran/Contragate what they weredoing on August 8, 1985. the American Congress would like a This has spawned a new adult trivial little glasnost (openness) itself. The pursuit. When the Los Angeles Times (1 Tower Commission talked to every March) asked musician Frank Zappa living past president and virtually every what he was doing, he replied facetious­ living former vice president, secretary of ly: "I was head of the National Security state, war secretary, CIA head and Council arranging to have arms shipped chairman of the J oint Chiefs of Staff. Its Reagan with to Pakistan and Angola and diverting modulated but devastating conclusions, contra bosses funds through a Swiss bank account in therefore, represent the consensus of the and North. order to shamelessly spend it on the U.S. bourgeoisie. campaigns of my favorite Republicans." But that whole controversy is beside Bonapartism and Democracy the point. On 17 January 1986 Reagan ."The President is the ultimate deci­ signed a secret finding approving arms the 28 percent maximum tax rate and president, battered by mass student sion maker in national security.... We sales to Iran and ordering the affair kept could not long endure exercise of Star Wars, thus endangering their protests and then a month-long rail secret from Congress. And on the contra president's "place in history." Baker was strike that threatened to turn into a Executive power by committee. A aid diversion, North writes in a 16 May strong Executive with the flexibility to to be the great conciliator, who would general walkout bf labor. And Washing­ 1986 memo: "the President obviously orchestrate the cameo appearances of ton's chief NATO ally West Germany is conduct foreign and diplomatic affairs knows why he has been meeting with is an essential feature of our form of the Great Communicator. But the first torn between wanting an arms deal with several select people to thank them for day on the job he put his foot in his Soviet leader Gorbachev and fears that government," intoned Senator John their support for Project Democracy in Tower in presenting the Commission's mouth, referring to Nancy Reagan as a an agreement to eliminate medium­ [Central America]." As the PROF "dragon." range missiles could lead to a U.S. report. Make the NSC responsible to computer messages and scores of Congress? No way, they say. A ban on Regan follows. former CIA chief pullout from Europe. memoranda show, North reported Casey, former National Security Advis­ As the American political super­ NSC "operational roles"? The trouble everything to his chiefs McFarlane and with Iran/Contragate in their eyes is er Poindexter and Lieutenant COIDnel structure totters, the falling debris can't then Poindexter, Regan sat in on North. Already, Navy.secretary John help but shake the economic house of that it gave covert action a bad name. virtually every NSC meeting, Shultz and The U.S. ruling class wants a strong Lehman, deputy defense secretary cards on Wall Street. This administra­ Weinberger knew what they wanted to Nestor Sanchez and White House tion, after all, is more closely identified executive. Their problem is that "effec­ know, and Reagan knew all (whether or tive" presidents have been hard to come propaganda boss Pat Buchanan headed with Big Money than any other in not he forgot it). Who's surprised? for the door while they could still walk decades. And whilethe stock market has by in recent years. Lyndon Johnson, Reagan was pushing covert action and Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan out. Assistant Secretary of State Elliot been soaring, it could quickly plum- vowing to overthrow radical-nationalist Abrams will be "gone by summer," it's 'met-looking curiously like Reagan's were all elected with overwhelming Sandinista Nicaragua from the start. It majorities, and all were disgraced or reported, and dozens of other high and ratings in the opinion polls. Swindling is was all blatantly illegal, but Worse than middle-level administration officialsare rampant: the Boesky and "Yuppie Five" driven from office. So once again, as at that in the eyes of the Tower Commis­ the time of Watergate, U.S. rulers are emptying their desk drawers. And in insider trading scams have been tracked sion and the American bourgeoisie, it order to avoid a "Gatesgate" donny­ to the top levels of the most prestigious was"clumsily and amateurishly" carried brook with Congress, the White House brokerage houses. Billions are going out, and it failed. into junk bonds as takeovers drive out "Project Democracy," or PRODEM, productive investment. Added to the was the code name for the covert mammoth U.S. budget deficit and Latin program funneling arms and guns to I Spartacist League American bank debt, this spells a CIA-backed anti-Communist forces Public Offices disaster waiting to happen. Any finan­ around the world, from Nicaragua to cial shock could bring it all tumbling Angola to Afghanistan and Cambodia. ~ -MARXIST LlTERATURE­ down. Time (9 March) warned that Tens of millions of dollars were raised because of the mountain of debt, "in the Bay Area from rake-offs on Iran arms sales, Fri.: 5:00-8:00 p.m., Sat.: 3:00-6:00 p.m. event of recession... the resulting bank­ contributions from kings and sultans, 1634 Telegraph, 3rd Floor (near 17th Street) ruptcies and attendant hardships would Oakland, California Phone: (415) 839-0851 tax-deductible donations from Texas probably be more severe than during right-wingers, profits from drugrun­ Chicago any downturn in recent memory." ning, etc. With some creative account­ Tues.: 5:00-9:00 p.m.. Sat.: 11 :00 a.m.-2:00 p.m. 161 W. Harrison St., 10th Floor . Demise of the "Reagan Doctrine" ing these funds were not only used to Chicago, Illinois Phone: (312) 663-0715 finance the CIA's Nicaraguan merce­ New York City "If this report had been written by naries, despite the Boland Amendment Tues.: 6:00-9:00 p.m., Sat.: 1:00-5:00 p.m. Robert Ludlum, it would make the which for a time banned "direct and 41 Warren St. (one block below fiction best seller list overnight. It's a indirect" U.S. military aid to the ChambersSt. near Church St.) New York, N.Y. Phone: (212) 267-1025 -report about a President out of touch contras; butalso to lobbyCongress and and a President out of control." That defeat anti-contra Congressmen in the New York OS\ was one Congressman's reaction to the '84 elections. In the course ofit, a lowly Was Ollie's Fawn Sandlnlsta pawn? 4 WORKERS VANGUARD talking of a crisis of the imperial presidency. The presidency has always represent­ ed institutional bonapartism, a power rising above the elected lawmakers. The American Revolution was, after all, a bourgeois revolution, and not the most radical at that. The "founding fathers" Two, three, many took care to construct a government defeats for U.S.: that would enable the executive branch imperialism! or the courts, as bastions of property, to Saigon, 1975 nullify laws enacted by a popularly (left); Reagan's elected legislature. A second, upper­ dogs of war. house of Congress, the Senate, was shot down, Nicaragua, 1986. originally non-elected and intended to give veto power to the much less popuious Southern states-i.e., to the slaveowners. The American constitu­ tional historian Charles Beard describes these so-called "checks and balances" as "a government endowed with certain "moral rearmament" of U.S. imperial­ was endorsed by Democratic Congress­ journalists to contra bases in Honduras, positive powers, but so constructed as to ism, through his"human rights" crusade man Ron Dellums. The main organizers and toured contra leaders in the U.S. It break the force of majority rule and directed at the Soviet Union. And then were aclot of anti-Spartacist renegades is now reported that PRODEMCA has 'prevent invasions of the property rights came the "Reagan revolution" which around one Bob Mandel 'and the received an undisclosed amount from of minorities" (Charles A. Beard, An was supposed to "roll back Commu­ extended Mandel family; his former Carl Channell, theContragate PR man Economic Interpretation ofthe Consti­ nism" for real, not merely by beefing up buddies of the "External Tendency" who received millions in rake-offs from tution ofthe United States [1913]). the Pentagon arsenal, but by mobilizing (now "Bolshevik Tendency") tailed Oliver North's Iranscam money. The executive branch has been the the American masses in a popular along with this mini popular front. In A few short months after Reagan principal arm of U.S. imperialism in the crusade against the "Evil Empire." Yet contrast, 12 years ago, at the height of came to power, he busted the PATCO continual exercise of every kind of mass Reagan barely, got to first base. A the Watergate crisis, the Spartacist air controllers union. This top-paid, rapine, butchery and war. Woodrow passing enthusiasm for the racist rape of League said: overwhelmingly white union was one of Wilson engineered America's entry into tiny black Grenada (where the 82nd "Socialists should support a congres­ the very few labor groups to endorse Airborne had its hands full with a few sional move to impeach Nixon. But Reagan, yet they saw their leaders led World War I by concealing that the impeachment is not enoughl:., The passenger ship Lusitania, sunk by hundred middle-aged Cuban construc­ fight to remove Nixon musl become a away in shackles like slaves in the German submarines, was carrying mu­ tion workers) could barely divert atten­ fight not to replace Nixon with Gerald antebellum South. This strikebreaking nitions to the British. Franklin Roose­ tion from the fiasco of 241 Marines Ford, but a fight to 'replace the rule of gave the green light to bossesaround the velt prepared the way for World War II blown up in Beirut. The increasingly capital with a workers government!" country who went on a rampage of frenzied covert operations orchestrated Iemphasis in original} takeback union-busting, including the with his secret "destroyer deal" to arm -"What Labor Should Do England and by pushing Japan to from the White House were a futile About Watergate," WVNo. 34, deliberate murder of strikers on the the attack on Pearl Harbor. Truman attempt to cover up the administration's 7 December 1973 picket lines. But nowthe Reagan gang is A-bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki, failure. And now they have brought And what is one to make of the on the run, and the workers and not to defeat Japan but to send a warn­ Reagan's demise. absurd demand raised by the Workers oppressed of America face a weak and ing to the Soviet Union, whose Red Ar­ League (WL) of the dubious David isolated regime. Though no one in the Impeachment Is Not Enough! my had won the war against Nazi Ger­ North (no known relation to Oliver), for bourgeoisie is talking impeachment, For Workers Revolution! many. World War II was the last war an AFL-CIO inquiry into the Irani according to the polls fully a third of the Congress ever formally declared. Tru­ With the ruling class in disarray, the contra affair? Lane Kirkland & Co. are U.S. population think Reagan should man sent troops to Korea as a "police possibility is posed for the working loyal lieutenants of American capital- "consider" resigning! Now is the time to hit back, while they're down. But that requires, first and foremost, a fight to dump the labor lieutenants of Reagan's counterrevolution and to forge a Trot­ skyist party that can link the seething anger of the ghetto with the social power of the factory. And there's not a lot of time. The warships are still off Lebanon. The new National Security Adviser Frank Car­ lucci is reportedly considering plans for a naval quarantine of Nicaragua, and Reagan (who has predicted Armaged­ don in our time) still has hisfinger on the "nuclear button. At home, Attorney General Meese- demonstrates his appe­ tites for a police state, trying to decree a­ WV Photo; federal death penalty while effectively Spartacisl League at PATCOrally (left); Solidarity Day 1981 (above). "AFL­ abolishing - the Miranda (suspects' CIA" traitors knife class struggle, aid Reagan's anti-communist crusades. rig-hts) ruling. And COINTELPRO "dirty tricks" are not just a Watergate action" and LBJ_ fabricated a bogus people and oppressed of this country to ism, who have proved their loyalty to memory, as more than 50 break-ins have attack, on U.S. ships to get the Tonkin -break politically from the Democrats the class enemy by fronting for CIA been recorded in offices of groups Gulf Resolution. Along the way, the and Republicans, to forge a class­ union-busting operations abroad and opposing U.S. war moves in Central CIA has overthrown adozen or more struggle workers party that can sweep sabotaging strikes at home. From the America. The basis is being laid for a elected governments, from Iran to away the lying, murdering, incompetent beginning, the "AFL-CIA" tops have bipartisan Reagan regency, with Con­ Central America. criminals who are driving America to maintained a conspicuous silence about gress brought into the show. But such a The schemes cooked up by Ollie ruin while oppressing the peoples of this affair that has shaken the anti-labor regime would be united on a platform North are no more bizarre than the CIA the world. But as the spectre of a new Reagan government to its roots. The for a rationally orchestrated anti-Soviet attempts to kill Fidel Castro, including Watergate loomed, various reformists reason is not hard to find: the anti­ war drive, which spells union-busting, poisoned cigars and biological agents to raised the call for impeaching the communist labor fakers are getting mass homelessness, hunger and racist make his beard fall out. But the CIA's president. Communist Party leader Gus more than moral encouragement from terror at home. gusanos were smashed at the Bay of Hall, trained in decades of donkey work the network spawned by Oliver North. A few days before the Tower Com- , Pigs. Above all, the heroic peasants and for the Democrats, declared that the When Ronald Reagan proclaimed mission report was released, the lead workers ofVietnam decisively defeated iranicontra affair was "grounds for "Project Democracy" in 1982, it in­ article in Time magazine (2 March) U.S. imperialism, triumphing over impeachment," and urged the "new cluded a publicly funded arm, the began: "On the Day of Judgment, superior military force and putting an Democratic majority" in Congress to National Endowment for Democracy according to ancient religious tradition, 'end to the "American Century." LBJ take this course (People's Daily World, (NED). Prominent on the NED board all secrets willbe revealed and all hidden was driven from' office by the Tet 13November 1986). So what would that of directors are AFL-CIO chief Kirk­ sins bared.... Some aides went so faras Offensive of 1968,which exposed the lie bring? George Bush, former head of the land, American Federation of Teachers to speculate that, depending on how that victory was "around the corner." CIA, representative of Texas oil inter­ head Albert Shanker, Democrat Walter Ronald Reagan and his lieutenants And it was the bombing of Cambodia, ests and one of the more sinister ele­ Mondale and right-wing union-buster react, Feb. 26 could turn out to be a in the course ofan increasingly unpopu­ ments in Washington. Senator Orrin Hatch of UtalCOf the secular analogue of Judgment Day." lar, losing war, that led to the wiretaps In the San Francisco Bay Area, a $18.5 million disbursed by the NED in Far from it. For the imperialists-who on Washington officials and the Water­ toxic waste dump of pseudo-Trotskyist 1985, some $rI.5 million went to the turned Vietnam into a moonscape, gate plumbers job that brought down grouplets, the ex-Maoist MLP and AFL-CIO and its Free Trade Union ordered the slaughter of tens of thou­ Nixon. He was never charged for his assorted New Leftovers held a demon­ Institute (FTUI), notorious for its role sands of Central American peasants and hideous crimes against the Indochinese stration at Oakland Airport, February in CIA schemes to wreck militant labor wagewar Onlabor and blacks at home­ masses, of course. The sole article of 20 around the slogan "Oust Reagan-­ unions around the world. Closely Judgment Day will come when a impeachment concerned the Watergate Bush!" Well, if the Republican president intertwined with the AFL-CIO's "free victorious socialist revolution sweeps cover-up-i.e., Nixon's crimes against and vice president go, that puts the trade union" outfit is PR6DEMCA, a away all the Watergaters and Contra­ the bourgeoisie. _And then a dirty deal Speaker of the House of Representa­ "private" fundraising outfit heavily gaters, the My Lai mass murderers and was patched up with Ford, the unelected tives, Democrat Jim Wright of Texas, involved in Oliver North's scams. their rapacious capitalist masters. vice president, to let the criminal - next in line! Not surprisingly, the ten PRODEMCA has channeled NED That's when we will finally 'open the butcher off with a pardon. slogans of the demonstration included dollars to the internal contra organ La books to find out the murderous secrets Democrat Jimmy Carter began the no criticism of the Democrats, and it Prensa in Nicaragua,paid for tours by , the Tower Commission didnn reveaL_ 6 MARCH 1987 5 Spartacists Sue "Accuracy in Academia" AlA: Reagan's McCarthy~ites

mental and ultrarightist forces, making The Spartacist League is suing "Accu­ AlAIAIM "Big Lie" witchhunters Reed racy in Academia, Inc." (AlA), its Irvine and Les Csorba, with assault rifle. it very, difficult to believe that AIA/ executive director Laszlo Csorba III Their Dartmouth Review cohorts AIM could be ignorant of these cases. and Reed Irvine, founder and chairman launched terrorist sledgehammer attack In the pursuit ofour own democratic of AlA, for willful, false and deadly on "Shantytown" (bottom) occupied by rights, the SL is fighting in the interests accusations against our organization. anti-apartheid activists. of every unionist, every campus pro­ Irvine is notorious as the head of AlA's tester, every perceived political oppo­ parent organization, Accuracy in Media nent of this reactionary government. (AIM), which specializes in character Csorba's "Appeasing the Censors" goes assassination of liberal journalists while after the Spartacus Youth League for a braying about a supposed Red Menace protest against Marine recruiters at the in the American mass media, The legal University of California/Berkeley in papers charging Irvine personally and as January 1985. In that incident Sparta­ a representative of AlA were served on cist youth activist Guillermo Bermudez the morning of February 13, as this was.seized by a campus cop in a deadly professional witchhunter entered ABC choke hold, then slapped with a phony studios to discuss' his brainchild, charge of "assaulting" a police officer. Amerika-the 14-1/2 hour, viciously But the AlA doesn't mention this, or anti-Soviet soap opera which just that the charges against Bermudez were bombed in America. dismissed more than a year later-a .An AlA pamphlet authored by victory that gave a black eye to the Csorba, titled "Appeasing the Censors: CovertAction Reaganite witchhunters. The AlA's li­ A Special Report on Campus Free' bel against us is part of an operation Speech Abuses," touted by nationally to repress all who would protest syndicated columnists as an "authorita­ the criminal policies of the U.S. tive" report on leftist student activity, government. makes the following statement: "Their publications (Workers' Vanguard, Big Brother and Big Bucks Young Spartacus, and The Spartacus Historically, every mobilization for [sic]) urge 'military victory' for the imperialist war has had as its domestic communists in El Salvador, and the reflection an anti-red, anti-labor, anti­ killing of police officers." As any black reaction. Going after the per­ reading of Spartacistpublications ceived "opinion makers" in the media would quickly and clearly expose, the and elite universities, too, was an charge that we urge the killing of police integral part of the McCarthyism of the is a totalandlethal lie. Police have a way 1940s and '50s. Irvine has all the of killing people tagged as "cop-killers." crudeness, belligerence and methods of AlA's attempt to equate our forthright witchhunter Joseph McCarthy, though Marxist politics with terrorism is a he lacks the prerogatives of the Senate. conscious and deadly smear. In defense Through organizations like the World of our members and supporters we Peter Blakely Anti-Communist League he "networks" intend to mobilize every moral, political government which seeks to criminalize Tearing a page from the notebook of. aging Nazis, East European fascists and and legal resource at our disposal to labor, black and leftist protest, equating Hitler's propaganda minister Joseph their very powerful disciples running bring these Big Liars to task and fight dissent with "treason." But today's Goebbels, Irvine's main weapon is the death squads and contra terrorists on this "libel that kills." , witchhunters have a problem. The fact is Big Lie. Bill Moyers, formerly at CBS five continents. It's both ominous and We in the Spartacist League are by no that no major architect of bloody and one of AIM's prime targets, noted logical that Irvine & Co. get a hearing in means the first or only targets of Irvine/ American imperialism from Jeane that Reed Irvine "is to accuracy in the the seats of power. When Reagan placed Csorba's poison pens. As "Big Brother" Kirkpatrick to Cap Weinberger can set media what Cleopatra was to chastity a wreath on the graves of Nazi SS killers to the media with his platoon of "Little foot on a college campus without on the Nile" (CovertAction, Spring at Bitburg, the message was clear: to Brothers" in the nation's classrooms, evoking a storm of protest. Soviet leader 1984). AlA offers no substantiation or revive Hitler's war against the "Bolshe­ Irvine is dedicated to red-baiting frame­ Mikhail Gorbachev has more credibility proof for their deadly slander against vik menace." And we know what ups and McCarthyite purges of any with the U.S. media than Ronald "what the SL, the lie that we supposedly urge Hitler's anti-Soviet war drive meant for radical or liberal academic or journalist did I forget and when did I forget it" "the killing of police officers," because labor, Jews and other minorities in who deviates from the ultrarightist Reagan. I950s-style red scares justdon't there isn't any, and there can't be any. Germany, not to speak 'of accuracy in Reaganite "ethic." AlA has compiled a pack the same wallop these days with a Any reading of our press, any examina­ the media. hit list of some 10,000 alleged Marxists population that's increasingly alienated tion. of our program and actions-would AIA/AIM are part of the Reagan­ and 35,000 liberal professors to harass . from a government widely despised as a show such advocacy to be at total auts' domestic war to regiment the in an effort to make them conformto its gang of bumbling, incompetent, war­ variance with all that we stand for. American population into acquiescence reactionary social agenda, or else drive crazed liars. Furthermore, a review of our suc­ to the bipartisan anti-Soviet war drive. them out of public life. AIM has Unable to win the "hearts and minds" cessful legal challenges against similar In an article entitled "The Rise and successfully forced the transfer or firing of Topeka, much less Harlem, today's attempts to falsely brand our Marxist Decline of Accuracy in Media," the of liberal journalists deemed soft on McCarthyites aim not to convince the political organization as "violent," Nation (13 September 1986) basically communism by red-basher Irvine, in­ public but to silence them through "terrorist" or conspiratorial would also dismisses Irvine as a "paper tiger." Like timidating others from expressing their intimidation, branding political oppo­ give pause: we have fought and won all liberals who believe in the eternal views, And already AlA's "Appeasing nents as "terrorists" to whom rights and retractions of such smears from the strengths of a "free" America they write the Censors" has found its way into the due process do not apply. It is in this California Attorney General in 1979, off AIA/AIM as just the "lunatic New York Post (9 October 1986)and the context of a bonapartist solution to the from the Moon organization's Wash­ fringe." But Irvine and Csorba are more Chicago Sun-Times (14 October 1986). "Vietnam syndrome" that AIA/AIM's ington Times (which both Csorba and than just ideological witchhunters. Reed Irvine's AlA and AIM are the dirty tricks and slander must be under­ Irvine write for) in 1983,from the FBI in They're sinister Oliver Norths on the living embodiment of what we've stood. As Reagan & Co. revved up the 1984 (see "A Workers Party Has the home front, reflecting the "privatiza­ described as "McCarthyism with a anti-Soviet war drive, AlA's role has Right to Organize!" page 7). As we shall tion" of the drive for counterrevolution drawn gun." AIA/AIM are the ideologi­ been to undertake a pre-emptive first show, AlA/AIM are directly and inti­ from Nicaragua to Afghanistan. It's cal shock troops for the Reagan/Meese strike against political protest. mately linked to these same govern- privatized McCarthyism. The biggest corporations in the U.S. Washington In~ulrer make their tax-deductible contributions 28 May 1982 ~ openly to AIM, not the Aryan Brother­ TheLetelierLegendLives On ~ hood which is a genuinelyfringe, openly

II.-IbWIw : .. ~==--=: fascist outfit. This is because, distasteful ~~..::.=~.:t.. :::.-=":.:&;:--::::--n.-":'::'::=~= ~ ""'IC.....==_==_;:_==_=_ -. :T -....-.---~-=?!:.§ --.----,--__ .., if.., ...... ~.""'...,--... e-:;-".. =: s as even some right-wingers find Irvine, <0 g The smear in the bourgeois establishment knows that r;I~i§ Aceoraey In Media :::. they need their "new McCarthyites." As 1?J:4~ -_-~-k-_-_-_-_-_-.-"'-u-_-_-. "J the service of ~ the gun~ Irvine documented in CovertAction (Spring =~:"''':'if-E~~ 3:;:.:--==== E:":'-:'===-':­ 1984), AlA/AIM's financial backers _0.-."•..,. ..-. =====--:==,: I'=::':-~=:= disinformation _ ...... -,-_ ...._ ...... _ ...... _ •• 1 ....- ., _ ...... _.~- ----...,."~"_"c..-...... -_...... ,.-...­ in wake of span the gamut from the main players in :r.:=.-.:::..-.::z:.. ..-...e-...... :.-=:==.;:.::.~.::::.:.=-.:::_ ...... _.-._ .- _ •.. _ Letelier Watergate (Richard Nixon, Spiro Ag­ ...... _ ..-...--_-...D,C.i11 ___.....-__ ...... ,.....,_---.""-_ ...... "'- - ' -_ ' assassination. new, Bebe Rebozo, Maurice Stans) to E~E..~=:_ ...._-..__. ~..:-:z~S~",..wt E-=S;~.=~~~...... _ ..__ .. :. ex-CIA chief William Casey: Othercon­ tributors include the loaded dowager 6 WORKERS VANGUARD Claire Booth Luce, Texaco, Good­ ness for book-burning. Professor Linda year Tire and Rubber Co., Reader's Arnold, a historian at Virginia Poly­ Digest Foundation; Exxon USA, technic Institute, entered AIA/ AIM~s Chevron, Union Carbide, IBM, and the cross hairs because she assigned How­ We Beat Back ""Terrorist" Smears labor-hating right-wing beer magnate ard Zinn's The Twentieth Century as a Adolph Coors. text for her introductory courses. The AIM represents and is backed by book and Zinn himself are on AlA's A Workers Party Has the right-wing CIA dirty tricks specialists "blacklist'! for portraying "American and "retired" generals who map out heroes" such as Henry Ford and "Seven Days in May" coups-with the Douglas MacArthur as "villains." Pro­ Right to Organize! forces to back them up. AIM contribu­ fessor Arnold received a phone call from tor Richard Mellon Scaife, an old hand Reed Irvine. "We ended up arguing for The Spartacist League has a proud record of fighting this dangerous new at creating and maintaining CIA propa­ an hour, mostly about Zinn's book. McCarthyism. In self-defense we have battled the attempt to falsely brand us as ganda fronts, has bankrolled AIM to Three times he asked, 'Don't you think outlaws to be shot first and questioned later. Under the banner: "A Workers the tune of a cool half million bucks. the book should be burned?' I said I'm Party Has the Right to Organize!" we have been in the forefront against the AIM co-founder Bernard Yoh was an • against book burning" (Nation, 5 April attempt by this government and its spokesmen to equate political opposition adviser in counterinsurgency techniques 1986). with violence, criminal conspiracy or terrorism. to U.S. puppet Ngo Dinh Diem in Is Little.Brother Watching You? Vietnam, 1955-62. He was a conduit for CIA funds to operations in Vietnam, an AlA began its campaign in August FBI Retracts Its "Definition" Slander adviser to Generalissimo Franco in 1985 with a nationwide network of Spain, to the South Korean and student and non-student finks at 160 . Philippines dictatorships, a stalwart colleges and universities to harangue The Spartacist League (SPL), a Marxist backer of Moon and contributor to the professors, complain to the administra­ political organization, was founded in tion, solicit letters from right-wing 1966. The historical and theoretical Moonie Rising Tide. Robert Moss, a roots· of the SPL derive from the early notorious disinformation mercenary politicos against these professors and Communist Party, U.S.A. and the Socialist who was the author of the first open call otherwise try .to stifle teachers from Workers Party. The i~ediate precursor for a coup in Chile, run on the front page expressing their views. AlA describes of the SPL was the Revolutionary Tendency itself as a "vibrant new movement that of the Socialist Workers Party. The SPL of a CIA-funded magazine in March It.. RI has an. official youth section named the 1973, now writes fundraising pitches for has leftist academics shaking in their Spartacus Youth~eague. AIM. sandals." Within this bit of humor lies . These links, but the tip of the iceberg, the true purpose of AlA. . r.='~~ The SPL was once the subject of an FBI "Appeasing the Censors" represents a domestic security investigation. The cast a certain light on AIA/AIM's investigation was closed in 1977, unbridled enthusiasm for the interna­ new twist in AlA's tactics to witchhunt however, and it did not result in any faculty. The pamphlet retails vicious rn-ISTS criminal prosecution. tional contra scum and the methods for smears against left groups, including ~'~~rb~~Ctst ' liquidating political opponents they'd WV Photo like to bring home. One of Les Csorba's not only us but InCAR (lnternation- -al Committee Against Racism) and In settlement of the SL's lawsuit against the 1983FBI "Terrorism" Guidelines, the FBI personal heroes is the kill-erazy Salva­ and the Attorney General agreed to change the FBI definition of the SL to exactly what doran ultrarightist Roberto D'Aubuis­ CISPES (Committee in Solidarity with the·SL1s-aMarxist political organization. The FBI thereby conceded the central claim son, nicknamed "Blowtorch Bob" for the People of El Salvador), in order to of the SL's lawsuit, that Marxist political principles and advocacy cannot be equated his preferred method of interrogation. isolate the left and scare professors from With violence, terrorism or a criminal enterprise. In 1984 Csorba traveled toEI Salvador association with such groups. It seeks on an all-expense-paid trip by the more broadly to charge liberal faculty members and allegedly complaisant administrators with providing a protec­ tive milieu for the left-e-just like the '50s McCarthyite accusations of "comsymp" and "dupe' were designed to intimidate and silence liberal opinion. Generalized fear and isolation were key to the success of McCarthyism, as expressed in an old joke. A· liberal professor is attacked by a right-wing mob as he leaves campus. Turning to his attackers, the professor says, "Wait, I'm not a communist, I'm an anti-communist!" The mob leader responds, "We don't care what kind of communist you are," The lJJbor-B1tlt:k Mobilization march story and pummels him to the ground. Butthe Laszlo Csorba's idol: Salvadoran fundamental and widespread unpopu­ Moonies death squad leader "Blowtorch Bob" larity of the Reaganauts' war drive is Retract D'Aubuisson. . hardly fertile ground for AlA, hence their increasingly frantic efforts and Ubel That Kills Council for Inter-American Security-a bigger lies. D.C. think tank which according to "Appeasing the Censors" adopts the NACLA's Report on the Americas Orwellian line of the Reagan adminis­ The SL lawsuit (July/August 1986) last year promoted tration that those who protest the key forced the Moonies to nationwide tours by Nicaraguan contra architects of U.S. imperialism's interna­ retract their deadly spokesmen. Csorba's Central American tional terror have impinged on the "free libel against the militant "vacation" included participatingin a speech" of the government. But the Bill union-backed, SL-initiated search and destroy mission with the elite of Rights is supposed to protect politi-cal demonstration which Atlacatl Brigade and posing, rifle in freedoms for the populace against stopped the KKK hand, with government soldiers. Csorba government censorship.and abuse-not from marching in was also listed as a contributing writer the other way around! Csorba makes Washington, D.C. for Freedom Fighter, a publication the ludicrous' assertion that "there 27 November 1982. which sends readers who donate $20 or certainly is no freedom of speech on the more a spent brass rifle cartridge larger campuses where radical groups recovered from a battle between the are active in opposing American foreign Deukmejian Retracts "Terrorts!" Smear FDN and Sandinista troops. policy" (emphasis in original). William Irvine himself was involved in the "re­ Rusher, publisher of the National ..... 1I11!altfllmia e.e, ao.. UI~.7 assassination" through disinformation Review, put it bluntly in an article in It"nrtwnt of Justiel' 19i6')3'Z2-24iiJ . of Chilean exile Orlando> Letelier and AlA's Campus Report (September C5l'orgl' Bl'ululU'jinn his assistant Ronni Moffitt. After the 1986): "The academy is almost the last {II·...__~OU...... ,.....I former Allende cabinet minister and sanctuary remaining' to the American AlSomtgC5tnmd ambassador was blown up by Pinochet left. ... From that final redoubt they will ~ember 14. 19~1 agents in downtown Washington, D.C. have to be dragged one day, kicking and Federal Bureau of Investigation Pennsyl vania Avenue between 9th & 10th nil in 1976, David Atlee Phillips' Associa­ screaming." The real life model for this Washington. D.C. 20535 tion of Former Intelligence Officers scenario is El Salvador's National Subject: Correction of Oepartnent of began circulating papers supposedly University which was shut do~n at Justice's Publicatinn found in Letelier's briefcase, claiming gunpoint in 1980-byD'Aubuisson's pals Dear Sir or Had4J'l: that Letelier was a Cuban agent (and in the military. A lot of people were This is to inforM you that the inclusion of the Spartacist Leanue and of the Spartacus Youth Leaoue on page 11 of the Oeoartl'lent of Justice's publication, thus presumably deserved his fate). dragged out "kicking and screaming"­ ·Or(Janized Crime in California .•• 1979, Annual Repnrt to the California When even the FBI determined thatthis and never seen again. Legislature. Part 2 Terrorism.' was in error. story was a total fabrication, Irvine Csorba himself got his start at the .. ~t,rulY yours charged the FBI with a cover-up. University of California/Davis, with According to CovertAction (Spring "Students for a Better America" (SBA), 1984), Irvine wrote more-than 55 stories Chief. Bureau of roanlzed Cril!ll! a prototype of AlA. Csorba's target was and Criminal lntellinence on this case. It's a model of the AIM Saul Landau, an outspoken critic of method, the smear in the service of the U.S. policy in Central and South gun. - America who co-authored a book on the California Attorney General retracted the inclusion of the SL in the 1979"Terrorism Perhaps his admiration for Pinochet's murder of Letelier (Assassination on Report" and sent notification to law enforcement agencies throughout the country. junta is where Irvine developed a fond- continued on page 8 6 MARCH 1987 7 clearly don't know accuracy from a "Accuracy in hole in the ground, and maybe a good lawyer ought to take them to court and Academia"... teach them what libel is" (Nation, 13 (continued from page 7) September 1986). But Bonner was pulled from Managua and transferred Embassy Row [1.980]). The group's to the business desk. commitment to the "free exchange of The message was not lost on other ideas" was captured on an SBA placard journalists covering Central America. at a Grenada "victory" rally, "I'dlove to An article on the Managua beat in kill a Communist." Csorba distributed a Esquire (November 1986) explained the flyer against Landau containing infor­ chilling effect: "Several reporters said mation Landau believes was obtained that sympathetic stories they had from his FBI files, as well as "quotes" written about the Sandinistas had falsely attributed to Landau and Fidel drawn protest letters to their ,editors Castro which Csorba lifted from the spy - from the State Department, letters that novel Monimbo by... CIA operative might have been dismissed out of hand Robert Moss and witting journalist during Vietnam, but now carried an Arnaud de Borchgrave. Landau filed a implicit threat after the Bonner case." complaint with the university's Judicial AIM was able to get its hour-long Affairs office noting, "the provocative rebuttal to a PBS series on the Vietnam nature of the notice could also make me War broadcast by that network. And a target for extremists, who might take after ABC aired The Day After, a drama the aspersion seriously enough to attack War criminal Weinberger starring Jason Robards about the me" (California Aggie, 22 February gets the reception he terrible effects of nuclear war set in 1985). Csorba's malice sparked a, deserves at Harvard, Kansas, AIM submitted a resolution ···.1:1., F ~ November 1983. HUAC-style probe by conservative Young Spartacus prior to the corporation's annual meet­ Republican senator Richardson who ing "expressing concern that the net­ threatened to "raise the issue of Lan­ ing the American Historical Associa- life" movement. In the May 1986 tion, the Organization of American Campus Report, AlA ran a prominent work's facilities had been used to dau's appointment when the state disseminate Soviet propaganda." Al­ Historians, and the American Associa- fund appeal for the legaldefense of these Legislature considers the UC budget" though, according to the Nation article, (California Aggie, 7 March 1985). tion of University Professors which racist assailants with the snide call to condemned AlA as "clearly inimical to support' "free speech and free play." ABC denies that its decision to produce Csorba can't be troubled with adher­ Amerikahad anything to do with AIM, ing to facts or any standards of accura­ the principle of free expression of views Among the backers of right-wing organs by all members of the academic commu- like the Dartmouth Review are multi- "Irvine wrote in his newsletter: 'Last cy. He answers to a higher authority: November, when "The Day After" was nity." AlA's job is to try to create a millionaire William Simon and "neo- God. And there's no stopping anyone being discussed, a lot of us thoughtthat social climate through fear and intimi- conservative" Irving Kristol, who in who thinks he's got a direct pipeline to a movie about a Soviet take-over would the Almighty. Still wet behind the dation on campuses so that Klaus 1966 was exposed as an "indirect'> Barbie or Heinrich Himmler himself, if recipient of CIA moneys. Simon and be an appropriate counterbalance to the ears-e-pipsqueak Csorba is an "85 UC nuclear war scenario that ABC was Davis graduate-s-he has already been only he could be resurrected from the Kristol are also major contributors to grave, could use the "respectability" of AlA. airing.... I think our pounding on ABC "born again." His own divine revela­ has paid off'." Irvine says he didn't like tions provide some insight into his a university platform for their policies While Csorba hurls his Big Lie at the without protest. They'd like P.W. Botha Spartacist League, baldly and falsely the final product, though; he would character, or lack thereof. Csorba was doubtless have preferred a more upbeat, to be a featured speaker on race claiming that his inventions appear in quoted in the Christian newspaper, The Triumph ofthe Will-type ending. Forerunner, as saying, "I used my relations at Atlanta University. our press, he also cites as a source for prestige and power [while an executive alleged "disruptive tactics" on our part Fight the AlA/AIM Witchhunters! council member in UCD's student gov­ The Big Lie: Weapon of the Right an article by one Elizabeth Greene ernment] to manipulate others through which ran in the Chronicle of Higher Accuracy in Academia has gone after election fraud, stealing and misusing • Those who must resort to terror will Education (12 February 1986). Ostensi­ us in part because they see us as student funds. I was a disgrace" (Cali­ be found first arid foremost in the camp bly a publication for university adminis­ domestic "surrogates" for the forces fornia Aggie, 19 April 1984). of the dying imperialist system. Brute trators and faculty, the Chronicle is Reagan is after abroad. We Spartacists Some prominent targets on AIAj force, laced with lies, is the only recourse cited no less than five times in the short are forthright in our unconditional AIM's hit list of 45,000 include: Mark for a system which imposes global wars, capsule smear of the Spartacus Youth military defense of the Soviet Union Reader, a professor at Arizona State starvation and hideous oppression on League in "Appeasing the Censors." against U.S. imperialism. We have University who describes himself as a the peoples of the world. In this Certainly fora dry, academic journal, actively campaigned to provide material "Whole-Earth person" and whom Irvine country, the bombing of the black the Chronicle maintains a hefty interna­ aid to the radical-nationalist Sandinista attacked as promoting "fears of nuclear MOVE communein Philadelphia bears tional network, with reporters stationed Nicaraguans faced with the' CIA's war"; Terry Anderson of Texas A&M hellish witness to the bloodthirsty from Cape Town to Helsinki, Eastern contra war, Washington's trade embar­ (who is also suing AlA for libel); Bertell terrorism of the capitalist state. This Europe to Manila, Managua to Mos­ go and the threat of U.S. invasion. In cow. And while we don't pretend to solidarity with our class brothers and know who she really is, Liz Greene is no sisters we have led militant protests stranger to us. against those directly responsible for In an earlier incarnation as a writer murderous' U.S. policy, like Jeane for the Columbia University Spectator, Kirkpatrick. And we will continue this Ms. Greene was cornplicitin calling the fight to keep the butchers on the run! police against some of our members We stood ,for the defense of Libya when they attempted to submit to the against the Pentagon's terror bombing. Spectator an announcement of our In southern Africa, we hail Soviet-, successful suit against the Moonies' backed Cuban troops defending black Washington Times-for the same lying Angola against the South African army; charge of urging violence against police and we call for the smashing of that Csorba and Irvine are peddling apartheid, for workers revolution and today. Now Ms. Greene's article sur­ the establishment of a black-centered faces as the source for Csorba. It would workers republic. appear that young "yellowjournalists" Here at home, the definition of in the mold of Claire Sterling-author "radical" has considerably broadened of that masterpiece of disinforrnation, under the impact of Reaganj Meese's The Terror Network-l-ese afoot. Cer­ attempted social counterrevolution. To­ Sandinista supporters grow more militant tainly the techniques-plantinga phony day it could easily encompass those who Irvine in bed with Nazis, Moonies, story in a little-known publication, then believeit's all right to read Playboy, who death squads of World Anti­ I·~~;!~ replaying it for broader circulation as don't wish to urinate in a Dixie cup Communist League. Csorba writes "proof" of the lie-come straight out of every day on the way to work, who cling for "campus contra" journal (right). the CIA's manualsfor black propagan­ to the beliefthatchurch and state should ----- da via the "mighty Wurlitzer" of media be separate, who want their children to manipulation. be taught science and not superstition. Ollman, a Marxist who was explicitly. state-supported terrorism requires a The bourgeois media both revile and Our Marxist commitment to defending denied chairmanship of an academic climate of opinion, one offearand knee­ heed Reed Irvine.' Washington Post and extending the gains of the Enlight­ department in Maryland because of his jerk conformity. Unrestrained use ofthe editor Ben Bradlee called him a "retro­ enment means that we are staunch political views; Mary Karasch of Oak­ Big Lie is indispensable. And that's mingent vigilante" (the kind that uri­ secular humanists and defenders of the land lJniversity in Michigan, because where AIAj AIM come in. nates on himself) but New York Times right to privacy. her lectures on Latin American history In the last two years there has been a publisher "Punch" Sulzberger meets Likewise, our dedication as revolu­ criticized U.S. policy; William G. wave of racist assaults on campuses with Irvine regularly and buckles under tionaries to black liberation, to the Storey, a theology professor at Notre around the U.S. Most infamous for to his pressure. Take the AIM operation completion of the tasks of the CivilWar, Dame and defender of homosexual terrorist violence in the service of against New York Times reporter has meant that we have uniquely and rights. AIAj AIM harbor particular reaction were the conservative Dart­ Raymond Bonner. Though far from a with success mobilized the integrated venom against Northwestern professor mouth Review staff members who radical, Bonner's Central America labor movement against Ku Klux Klan and InCAR supporter Barbara Foley wielded sledgehammers against a sym­ reports didn't always side with the U.S. and Nazi provocations in major urban for her commendable participation in a bolic shantytown while it was occupied death squad clients in the region. Irvine centers, as in the LaborjBlack Mobi- protest against Nicaraguan contra lead­ by anti-apartheid activists. For that, the went running to Sulzberger brandish­ .Iization that stopped the Klan from er Adolfo Calero. Dartmouth Review has become the ing allegations of rad-lib skeletons in marching in Washington, D.C. on 27 AlA's tactics against individual darling of the right in much the same Bonner's closet. Then-foreign editor November 1982. Because our goal is the professors have earned it the enmity of a . fashion as abortion-elinic bombers are Craig Whitney concluded that AIM emancipation of labor from the chains host of professional associations includ- the front line of the reactionary"right to' "ought to change its name ...they of capitalist exploitation, we have 8 WORKERS VANGUARD nuclear war being launched when a computer "game" was connected to the weapons lcunch system. This is not Reagan's Plans for World War II simply fiction: in mid-1980, Strategic Air Command headquarters in Omaha American emissaries wing into Tehe­ network ("01," pronounced see-cubed­ produced by high-altitude nuclear det­ and the Pentagon's command center ran disguised as Irish pilots, bringing eye in Pentagonese) to orchestrate space­ onation, which would wreak havoc with went on alert when a single chip failure Khomeini a key-shaped cake (baked in a satellites and nuclear weapons during communications. At least 50 are already led the c.omputer to interpret a test Tel Aviv kosher bakery), a Reagan­ and after World War III. And this isn't in place. message as an actual nuclear attack inscribed Bible, a pair of Colt revolvers "Star Wars" fantasy land-a lot of the • Ground mobile command centers, (Alan Borning, "Computer System and a planeload ofAmerican TOW anti­ stuff's already deployed. actually 18-wheel lead-lined tractor­ Reliability and Nuclear War," Commu­ tank missiles. Tens of millions of dollars The 01 network being deployed by trailer trucks, to be used by the president nications ofthe ACM, February 1987). in rake-offs from military sales to Iran But this real danger of "accidental" by Israeli and Saudi arms merchants are 31: SOURCES: Institute of Electric and nuclear war pales before Washington's laundered through Swiss and Panama­ C A vision of nuclear war Electronic Engineers Spectrum, TRW plans for a computer-driven nuclear nian dummy companies to purchase M1LSTAR holocaust. Soviet guns for the U.S.' Nicaraguan Reagan's secret National Security contra mercenaries. Wierd-o-rama. But Theelectromagnetic TheC'I network is designed Decision Directive 13,issued in October pt.Jlse. or EMP,is to linkall crucial battle while public attention is focused on the created by a nuclear stations duringnuclear war. 1981, elaborated on Carter administra­ explosion in the The Milstarsatellite network, tion plans for "decapitation" (i.e., National Security Council "cowboys" in atmosphere. EMPis an 70,000 milesin space, would the White House, over at the Pentagon enormous connect thousands of radios assassination) of the Kremlin leader­ electromagnetic charge andcomputerterminals in ship. It called for a U.S. capability to secret operations have tripled under akinto lightning. It can militaryheadquarters, Reagan, to more than $35 billion a year. damage the electronic un':erground bunkers. missile control the escalation of a drawn-out circuitry crucialto silos.submarines. It's not just running around Central computers anddisrupt tractor-trailers andairborne nuclear war, force Soviet surrender and the e'l network. command posts.Milstar preserve sufficient nuclear arms to American jungles. They're planning a wouldbe theglobal nuclear first strike against the Soviet switchboard. receiving and dominate a post-WW III world. The relaying launchordersfor stripped-down "Strategic Defense In­ Union, and their orders (like Oliver nuclearweapons. North's) come from the top. We've said itiative" being projected for early for some time that this country is being deployment amounts to a "defense" of run bya gang of nuclear nuts. Now a remaining American missiles in the series by Tim Weiner in the Philadelphia wake of a U.S. first strike on Russia. Inquirer (8-10 February) on "The And among Colonel North's first jobs at Pentagon's Secret Cache" lays it out: the National Security Council was "Under the Cloak of black-budget installation of computers and high-tech secrecy, the Reagan administration is communications equipment, and re­ spending billions on nuclear bombers viewing "plans for the conduct of an and millions to train dolphins as extended nuclear war and the survival of underwater saboteurs. It has developed elaborate plans for winning a months­ top American officials" (San Francisco long nuclear war-World War lII-and Examiner, 4December 1986).You don't preparing for World War IV. The plans see Democratic liberals complaining include robots stalking radioactive about that. battlegrounds, satellites orchestrating For the American ruling class is nuclear attacks and generals speeding Montgomery/Philadelphia Inquirer along interstates in lead-lined trucks, united in pursuit of its war drive against ordering warheads fired from faraway Pentagon obsession: "command, control, communications & intelligence" the Soviet workers state. As the Inquirer to ''win'' Dr. Strangelove was sane in comparison. silos." wwm. notes in the concluding article of its World War Four? You read right. the Reagan administration includes: and/or his generals to continue the series, Congress in the Reagan years has Weiner notes: "Since 1981, shortly after • The Milstar satellite system (for nuclear war. Two prototypes have al- supported U.S. covert actions with President Reagan took office, the Military Strategic-Tactical and Relay) ready been built. hundreds of millions of dollars. And fundamental U.S. defense strategy has designed to transmit launch commands • AI (artificial intelligence) robots to behind Congress' back new super-secret been to be able to fight and win a six­ for nuclear missiles from silos and pursue the battle in the "enhanced Pentagon outfits were spawned, such as month nuclear conflict-World War submarines. The first space test of a nuclear environment," as the military the Intelligence Support Activity, to III-and remain strong enough after­ Milstar satellite was carried out on calls it. The Pentagon's Defense Ad- provide a permanent group to coordi­ ward to strike again." It's all part of the December 4. vanced Research Projects Agency notes nate paramilitary operations. Weiner government's plans to wage "limited" • The Navstar or Global Positioning that these robots will "not generate reports, "Two officers who are said and "protracted" nuclear wars, official System satellites, which help guide discourse"-i.e., they don't talk back. to have participated in the Activity U.S. doctrine since the Democratic nuclear missiles to their targets. The DARPA's 1987 budget calls for com- were Lt. Col. Oliver L. North and Carter administration. The Reaganauts' satellites also have IONDS (Integrated puters to "relieve military personnel in Maj. Gen. Richard V. Secord" of Iran/ declared goal is to "prevail ... under the Operational Nuclear Detector System) complex decision-making tasks"; for- Contragate fame. From mining Nica­ conditions of a prolonged nuclear war" sensors to pinpoint nuclear explosions mer Pentagon missile defense chief raguan harbors and bombing Tripoli and to "force the Soviet Union to seek and assess the efficacy of the attack. Jacob Gilstein is even more blunt: "No to sending the KAL 007 civilian air­ earliest termination of hostilities on Navstar is scheduled to be fully opera- human being can enter the real-time liner on a provocative spy mission over terms favorable to the United States" tional this year. decision-making loop and control the the Soviet Union; the war crazies in (from the "Fiscal Year 1984-1988 De­ • The GWEN (Ground Wave Emer- system. It has to be pre-programmed Washington are toying with blowing up fense Guidance"). The key to this strat­ gency Network) system of 500 un- with logic so the computercanmake the the world. It will take proletarian egy is a computerized command, con­ manned radio towers designed to decision and run the game." The revolution to sweep away the nuclear trol, communications and intelligence withstand the electromagnetic pulse popular movie War Games depicted a madmen.• sought to intervene with our class­ about charges of treason and a wartime all the confetti gone, Reagan must potential victims ofthe dirty disinform­ struggle program and propaganda in mobilization of the police and military wonder, as he tries in vain to recover ers of AlA/AIM will join us in support working-class battles such as the strike to crush antiwar activity. from Irangate, Contragate, Shuttlegate, of our libel lawsuit. We know, though, of East Coast longshore workers last Reagan and Meese long for a return a cabinet in shambles and a population that what Csorba and Irvine's murder­ October. to the McCarthyite period when mil­ that sees the White House and their ous libel represents will not be finally AIA/AIM and its fellow travelers lions of Americans were mobilized for extragovernmental McCarthyite hit­ defeated until the system which needs it subscribe to the right-wing notion that war on Communism: recall the ticker­ men for the lying, murderous thugs they and breeds it is replaced through a the U.S. lost its dirty, genocidal war tape parades for MacArthur. Where has are. Weare confident that many of the victorious socialist revolution.• against the Vietnamese people because of some conspiracy of "liberal media" and rowdy college kids. So today they 1- want to head off a similar "conspira­ ...... JaG No.85·I5l! cy" which might mean losing "the b_ lilT. hpmar e-t pf fp WaUrh etatn Order Yours Now! IWIDeCClUaTOF11EUNlnDSTATES big one"-World War III. It's plenty ()oJoeu Ta....1_ OCTOIEIl TEaM••• crazy-but these crackpots wield some Eowa., w. hw..... ill hit aR'iciaI GI*i" • Cowrnar • In Defense of Science: GlI.o;u..... w...... W. Cwn. j .. , ia h.. ollie",. influence in a country whose command­ 8vII Kru..l1-aM Ta.uau 1U111"...... Gl*1I, • Auorat, CIIIeQI of 1.adIiauI, Lou...... Spartacist League/Partisan : ...."""'" Of' ElUCAnGfiI, ....T....'" G. CLAUIUl er in chief "jokes" about beginning the PelitioMr•• ."::-:::~.r.. ~.,,EduuI...; -~ Defense Committee brief bombing of Russia in five minutes. For Ollrnrt ST...... 011A...-c:&. of".'..... &,...... against teaching of biblical -.- the Reaganites, military defeat for U.S. ~ AcuIUAU. Lou...... EUIIIJrn'UY "... "creationism" in the public =::r I.lIUC&nall,O'LUII' ....IIN Saeoo.. .. nann ..~ 'IV 'nW VllrnD n4ft1 imperialism can only be understood as IIQOIID ~ CDP1' ...... w. ...,..& aacvrr schools. filed 1986. ,f",''''~ due to an "excess of democracy" at 0.. "'""" ""1'HI:~Cou'TOtAHuu UIEF fOIl THE SPARTACIST LEAGUE: AS naTQ frnM e:..:un home. Consider Reagan's response at an AIIICUSCU- • For Separation of Church and IIIEFFOII11ESPARTACISTlEAGUE AND April '84 press conference when asked State: Spartacist League brief PAll11So\N IIEFENSE~AS about his position in favor ofa declared a.c... IL WCII.&U.na1l opposing government attack on NGCUSCLW.ME0liI1IIHAIs OF AI'I'EU.US. o-rolc-.111._ ...... 'a-u war in Vietnam. Reagan answered by NewYod&. )(.. '1ork t.ml Sun Myung Moon and intrusion Lan:Lu.WCII.&IanatI . raving against "the enemy within": (212)-1- into constitutionally protected ""'-C_~~l.

Black Panthers Lands in the Mud and Philly Readers of WV familiar with the the demonstration the BT had done black MOVE highly dubious nature of the self­ nothing to support it and that rally were victims of styled "Bolshevik Tendency" (for­ organizers had asked the BT for at Meese/FBI merly known as the "External Ten­ least a written endorsement of the "state terrorism," dency") will not be surprised to learn demonstration's demands. "So they protesters say. of this outfit's latest provocations at huddled amongst themselves a bit, the Oakland rally demanding "Free­ put something in writing, so we gave dom Now for Geronimo Pratt!" them a speaker; that's the way we do things. Also they attempted to unorganized, demand full citizenship The BT marched into the crowd in donate one' dollar-that was their and union rights for foreign-born military formation and BT guru Pratt Fought whole group's donation today. We workers. And it would struggle for a Howard Keylor-trailed by a BTer told them to stuff it. Somebody once class-struggle workers party to fight for loaded with photographic equipment said in the labor movement, it's good for Us ... a workers government. obviously intending to capture the to know who your friends are and The black leadership in this country hoped-for "incident"-shortly pro­ (continued from page 12) who your enemies are. So all I can from Jesse Jackson to Lionel Wilson are ceeded toward the stage. Approach­ say, folks, is listen to what they say, Now, there obviously should be thou­ tied to the parties of the oppressors. ing from 'the side opposite the access but hold on to your wallets." sands out here for Pratt today, and After those MOVE adults and children ramp clearly being used by rally BT speaker Gerald Smith railed there's a reason why there's not. It's not were murdered, what did Jesse Jackson speakers, Keylor attempted to leap against Spartacist"factionalism," the that people don't care, because when we, call for? He wanted to make sure a few over some shrubbery onto the stage. frequent theme of anti-communists. the Spartacist League, provided revolu­ black businessmen were going to get Blocked by a rally monitor, Keylor's Grotesquely, Smith used this diatribe tionary leadership in Washington, D.C. contracts to rebuild the homes that were acrobatics landed him flat on his to rehash the FBI slanders equating to stop the Klan in 1982, thousands of destroyed. That is, he wanted a little bit posterior in the mud. As the rest of Ron Karenga's dubious US organi­ working people and black youth turned of black capitalism over the graves of the BTers rushed forward to play zation and the Panthers, blaming out. It has to do with the lack of - those murdered. And I don't have to tell their part in the orchestrated farce, US's assassination of L.A. Panther revolutionary leadership within the you how Jackson was all over arch­ Keylor then announced that the BT leader Bunchy Carter on "blind fac­ labor movement and the oppressed segregationist George Wallace, praising wanted a speaker! minority populations.. Because today him and saying, "The South shall rise tionalism" between the groups. the' labor movement is shackled by a again." It sure as hell is rising again. As Spartacist spokesman Al Nel­ Bunchy Carter was the political pro-capitalist trade-union bureaucracy Like down in Forsyth County, Georgia, son later told the demonstrators: mentor and close comrade of Geroni­ that is totally committed to the capitalist where Klan terrorists are rising again "This next group, I tell you, is a real mo Pratt, and he was murdered system. It's a wonder that Lane Kirk­ while so-called black leaders led anti­ test of our very firm belief in workers because he was in the government's land and the AFL-CIO bureaucrats racist protesters to that county, like democracy. Since leaving our organi­ COINTELPRO cross hairs! In slan­ didn't help finance that anti-Soviet war­ sheep being led to the slaughter. Jimmy zation as individuals five or six years derously attacking SL "sectarian­ mongering Hitler Big Lie film that's Carter is from around there. Remember ago, they've since come together as a ism," the BT attempted'to use FBI being shown on TV, Amerika, since him? Jimmy Carter, the Democrat, one group whose main purpose in life "dirty tricks" to besmirch those who their class-collaborationist program is of his first statements was, I am for seems to be to hate the Spartacist defend the victims of state terror as just as anti-Soviet, just as' anti-union, ethnic purity, I am for keeping the League and everything we repre­ well as the martyrs who fell in the just as anti-black, just as anti-woman as blacks in segregated neighborhoods, sent." Nelson explained that prior to struggle for black liberation. the Reaganite Cold Warriors. right? We fight for class-conscious workers The Russian Revolution established a to forge a class-struggle revolutionary planned economy and a collectivized doesn't ride in Moscow. Capitalism will Pratt who stood, and is still standing, in leadership, breaking workers and mi­ property system, and despite its subse­ surely destroy us-the Reaganites' Star the front lines of the struggle against this norities from the property parties, the quent Stalinist political degeneration War weaponry is no joke-unless we system is our fight. He fought for us and Democrats and Republicans, a leader­ resulting from a political counterrevolu­ destroy it, unless we build that mass now we're using our power to fight for ship that would unleash the power of tion, those gains remain and must be revolutionary integrated workers party, him. This is a very important beginning. labor on behalf of all the oppressed. It unconditionally and militarily defended a Bolshevik party like the one Lenin and It's not a question of one demonstra­ would fight for the Geronimo Pratts, it against imperialism. Those gains belong Trotsky built in tsarist Russia to lead the tion, but for final victory, labor and its would fight for the Johnny Spains, it to us. That revolution was the greatest working class and ,oppressed to the allies must rely only on its own inde­ would fight for Ramona Africa, for all victory for the international working seizure of state power, to a workers pendently organized strength and power class-war prisoners. It would demand class and it was the biggest defeat for government, to the dictatorship of the in opposition to all wings of the capital­ jobs for all, for a shorter workweek with the imperialists. That's why the bosses proletariat. ist class. Freedom now for Geronimo no loss in pay. It would organize the hate Russia-and that's why the Klan The fight for class-war prisoners like Pratt! Free all class-war prisonersljs

Gooden for his own beating at the hands alive today. war zone down there." And the war on Tampa Cops ... of the local cops last December 13. Nonetheless, the report concludes black people won't end aftertwo days of Gooden was driving his silver Mercedes there is "no evidence" of "intentional police occupation. The unemployment (continued from page 1) home from a basketball game when he police brutality," claiming Gooden rate for black youth in the area is 48 was pulled over by the police and beaten instigated the assault by reacting in a percent, Gilder said. With no jobs, no and eyewitnessto the police attack, said, bloody. Taunting him with racial epi­ "hostile fashion" after being pulled over future, these young blacks have been "All three of them jumped on him and thets, they went after the superstar's by the cops. It also asserts race was not a condemned by capitalist society to the had him in the neck break or whatever pitching arm, yelling "Hit his arm, hurt "factor," even though Gooden and his refuse heap, and racist cop terror is the you call it. They were kicking and it, end his career." The report affirms four companions are black and all 22 means to keep them there. In 1967 the beating him and choking him."The cop Gooden was "undoubtedly struck sever­ police involved are white! Facing the National Guard was called into Tampa screamed, "I'll kill.the black m-f" (St.. al times by various officers with fists, threat of a stiff jail sentence which to suppress blacks after the cops shot Petersburg Times, 20 February). John- . knees, flashlights and nightsticks," and would destroy his professional future, dead a 19-year-old "robbery suspect." son and Hair's mother pleaded with the that a cop "pulled his revolver and Gooden, now in spring training at St. Twenty years later, black misery has police to stop, but were held at bayby a placed the barrel under Gooden's chin." Petersburg, pleaded "no contest" to only increased, as even the modest gains cop who cocked his gun. Melvin's sister They shined a Mag-Lite in his eyes, felony charges of battery on a police of the civil rights movement are being arrived as his limp body was tossed into holding a mock interview: "Dwight officer and resisting arrest. Not content reversed in the Reagan years. the squad car. The cops said Hair Gooden, Action Sports, how are you with this, the racist cops are still pulling Democratic mayor Sandy Freedman, threatened "four people with a knife," doing?" and "Our listeners are waiting him over without cause and staking out the Tampa NAACP and local black but the Tampa PO now admits he was to hear something. Do you have any his house, Gooden says. preachers appealed for calm and non­ unarmed. comment?" They tried unsuccessfully to As a pall of smoke hung over East violence...and for more black cops. As black Tampa seethed, the city apply a choke hold to "subdue him," but Tampa, Bob Gilder, former Tampa From New York's black police commis­ released a report which blamed Dwight Gooden was too strong for them, so he's NAACP president, commented, "It's a sioner Benjamin Ward to L.A.'s former top cop, now mayor Tom Bradley, black hands on the nightstick still mean choke-hold murder in the ghetto. But the chain of racist terror can be broken, mobilizing the black population in alliance with labor, like the largely black Tampa lLA dock workers. Shutting down the port and local industry to protest the cop rampage would teach some respect to the racists in blue and to the bosses; such as convicted Watergate felon George Steinbrenner, owner of the New York Yankees and the American Ship Building Company in Tampa, who in 1983 shut down his Lorain, Ohio shipyard axing 1,500 jobs in order to - bust the union. 75t (32 pages) 75t (32 pages) Cops out of East Tampa! For labor/ 25$ (18 pages) Make checkspayable/mail to: Spartaclst Publishing Co., Box 1377 GPO, New York, NY 10116 75$ (32 peges) black defense to smash racist terror! Hands off Dr. K!. WORKERS VANGUARD 7 attend the February 21 demonstration support for Geronimo's cause. Freedom because of the PDC's accordance with Now for Geronimo Pratt! PDC: Free Gero,nimo! the political views of the Spartacist We urge you to send letters and League, and the active role ofthe SL in telegrams demanding Geronimo Pratt's The Partisan Defense Committee walks out of San Quentin a free man. helping build this action. In the tradi­ freedom to: 9th Circuit Court of thanks all who helped build the success­ But nothingwill give him back the years , tibn of the International Labor Defense Appeals, U.S. Courthouse, 450 Golden ful united-front demonstration to free they've stolen from him. Demand under the leadership of James P. Gate Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94102; America's foremost class-war prisoner, Geronimo's freedom: mobilize your Cannon from 1925to 1928,which stood and California State Parole Board, Geronimo Pratt, in Oakland, California unions and community groups; organ-: on the anti-sectarian principle of "an District Parole Office, 759 South Van on February 21. The diverse and broad ize demonstrations; send. letters and injury to one is an injury to all," the Ness Avenue, S!J.n Francisco, CA 94110, support for Geronimo Pratt reflects the telegrams; publicize this case and do Partisan Defense Committee urges re: Parole Hearing for Elmer Geronimo many for whom he fought. The demon­ whatever you can. labor, socialist, defense and civil rights Pratt. To continue the fight to free stration stimulated new publicity and Unfortunately there were individuals organizations to support the campaign Geronimo Pratt, write to the Partisan brought labor support to his case. and groups who placed factional regard to free Geronimo Pratt. We, of course, Defense Committee, P.O. Box 99, This work must be expanded and above taking a stand for Geronimo's remain ready to coordinate with others Canal Street Station, New York, NY repeated until the day Geronimo Pratt freedom, by refusing to endorse or to achieve the largest mobilization of 10013.•

1LWU member told WV he was in Iowa when the Panthers were active in Pratt Rally ... Oakland and admired their work. He (continued from page 12) _contrasted how the government treated the Ku Klux Klan and the Panthers: were among the morethan 100 endors­ "They killed Fred Hampton and Mark ers demanding freedom for Geronimo Clark back in Chicago. 1 know around Pratt, as were former Black Panther Des Moines quite a few ofthe Panthers Party leaders Bobby Seale, Bobby Rush were busted on phony charges.... On and Kathleen Cleaver. the other hand you have the Ku Klux Phone workers from. Communica­ Klan, with a long history of killing and tions Workers of America Local 9410 murdering innocent people. And yet (San Francisco) came on Saturday today their leaders can walk around in carrying their union banner. Messages perfect safety." were read from Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1555 President Hank Keep Up the Fight! White, veteran socialist and fighter for The Partisan Defense Committee and black liberation Richard Fraser, the Labor Black League, as well as en­ Spartacist League of Australia and New dorsers like the Spartacist League, built Zealand, and the Ujamaa Society at heavily for the rally as part of an Atlanta University. Letters to the 9th ongoing campaign to secure Geronimo . Circuit Court of Appeals from Califor­ Pratt's freedom. Tens of thousands of nia Assemblyman Elihu Harris and leaflets were distributed at union meet­ International Longshoremen's and ings and plant gates; pot luck dinners Warehousemen's Union (lLWU) Local Protesters and parties were held to raise money to 6 Business Agent Joseph Lindsay de­ demand pay for the rally. The Communist Party manding Pratt's freedom were also read. freedom for U.S.A. and National Alliance Against Local media covered the demonstra­ Geronimo Pratt. Racist and Political Repression failed to tion, including ABC-TV's Channel 7. Right, Alameda County Supervisor endorse the rally, however. The John Fellow prisoners of Geronimo Pratt at Brown Anti-Klan Network was absent San Quentin saw the news, calling out to John George addresses rally as well, reportedly because the Sparta­ him that his case was on TV. Spartacist outside Oakland cist League was involved. This sectari­ spokesman Don Alexander was inter­ City Hall. anism can only hurt efforts to free class­ viewed on the black radio station war prisoners like Pratt and many KPOO the night before the rally. Both others still behind bars. the San Francisco Chronicle and Exam­ But support for Pratt's freedom is iner publicized the rally, helpingto build fight against oppression, not only despaired of mobilizing the tremendous growing. At a February 27 press support for Pratt's case. And it received because of the justice of his case and the social power of the organized, integrat­ conference in Oakland, former Black international coverage, as Radio Mos­ crime of his continued imprisonment, ed labor movement, they were unable to Panther Party chairman Bobby Seale cow broadcast a report on February 24: but for the memory of his fallen link the struggle in the ghetto to the urged support for a letter-writing "In Oakland, California a demonstra­ campaign demanding Pratt's freedom. tion has been held in support of a cornrades-e-like Bunchy Carter in Los factories, to the power of the working demand to free Geronimo Pratt and Angeles, like Little Bobby Hutton, class.... We, the Spartacisf League, call More than 500 people have responded other political prisoners in the United gunned down here in Oakland at the age' for black liberation through socialist to the PDC's call to submit letters to the States. A rally after the demonstration of 15, not far from where we stand revolution." Court of Appeals and California Parole pointed out Geronimo Pratt, a leader of Board calling for his release. We urge the Black Panthers organization, has today.... Class-struggle defense means For some who came out.therallywas been in jail for 16 years now, suffering using the power of the working class. It an education. One 18-year-oid black our readers to take up this urgent cause. for his political views. He was impris­ means .labor action." woman from the Universityof Califor­ Speaking at the February 21 rally, oned on a frame-up charge." Alameda County Supervisor John nia told WV, "The first reason why I Karen Allen, one of the demonstration's Radio Moscow noted that other "dissi­ George brought the day's stormy weath­ came to the rally is because I'm a fan of organizers; gave a moving report on her dents suppressed by the United States" er to bear in -his remarks to the rally: Malcolm X. I always have believed in visit with Pratt in San Quentin the day include Leonard Peltier and black "Today is symbolic because the wind the Black Panthers; I always was against before. When it's over, she said: prison activist Johnny Harris, on was out here today, but it is a wind of Martin Luther King.... I came because "The guards come on the loudspeaker it was about the Black Panthers and 1 and say 'All prisoners to the rear-all Alabama's death row since 1975. change. The rain will come down like visitors to the gate!' And they rip him Pratt, a highly decorated Vietnam justice and we've got 1"0 continue this would like to learn more about them." away. In the last few moments, you see veteran, was railroaded to prison as a struggle." Frenchie Alford, a vice Others who braved the rain had experi­ his eyes, knowing that he's locked up; victim of the 'FBI's COINTELPRO president of the Oakland Education ence of working-class struggles, from a you're leaving, but he's not. You finally Association, emphasized the need to Salvadoran phone worker to a Mexican walk out of that prison and you know (Counterintelligence Program) murder that man has got to be free, he's got to be and disruption operation. He faces a continue the fight, saying, "The time is farm worker from Watsonville, where outside with us, organizing with us, So parole board hearing in May and is now for the freedom of our brother cannery workers on strike for more than . he thanks all of you for your efforts. fighting for a new trial. His 1971 Geronimo Pratt from the walls. of a year sent a solidarity greeting. A black Let's keep fighting!". conviction was orchestrated from the confinement. We must press on to highest levels of government. It relied on ensure that justice does prevail." Willie the-vtestimony" of an LAPD agent and Lee Bell, Recording Secretary and FBI informer who lied on the stand Human Rights Chairman of Machinists about his relationship to those agencies. Local 739, noted that Pratt's frame-up Further, the FBI "lost" wiretaps proving exposed the continuing injustices Marxist Working-Class Biweekly of the Spartacist League Pratt was 500 miles away in Oakland at "perpetrated and manipulated by cer­ the time a Santa Monica schoolteacher tain dregs in the dupe Reagan's adminis­ (and antiwaractivist) was murdered, the tration, particularly when he's under o $5/24 issues of Workers Vanguard 0$2/4 issues of crime they framed him for. As former sedation.... Each one of us here today (includes Spartacist) International rates: Women and Revolution o New 0 Renewal $20/24 issues-Airmail FBI agent Wesley Swearingen testified could very well be the next victim of a $5/24 issues-e-Seamail 0$2/10 introductory issues of in 1985, "Pratt was set up." frame-up." o $2/4 issues of $partacist Workers, Vanguard Jeff Higgins of the Labor Black Guillermo Bermudez spoke for the (edicion en espanol) (includes Spartacist) League declared at the rally, "Geronimo Berkeley. Young Spartacus Club. Name _ Pratt, unbowed and unbroken, still Spartacist League spokesman Don committed to the cause of the op­ Alexander stressed the need for Address ~ _ pressed, is an inspiring model of dignity "class-conscious workers to forge a _~ Phone (__) -'-' _ and determination for decent working class-struggle revolutionary leader­ people everywhere." Partisan Defense ship." He noted the Black Panther Party City State Z'ip --.= Committee speaker Janet McCullough inspired black militants because of their . 423 John added' that Geronimo Pratt's -rejection of craven "Uncle Tom" poli­ Make checks payable/mail to: Spartaelst Publishing Co., Box 1377 GPO, New York, NY 10.116 "freedom must be the cause of all who tics, but "as black nationalists, they 6 MARCH 1987 11 W,/tltE/tS ""fJU,/t,

Black Panther Leader Behind Bars for 16 Years eman 5: • " ree eronlmo ra I"• OAKLAND-Demanding "Freedom Now for Geronimo Pratt! Down with Meese/ FBI COINTELPRO Frame­ Up!" oyer 200 union members and offi­ cials, black and Hispanic activists, students and socialists rallied Saturday, February 21 at Oakland's City Hall Plaza Park. Former Los Angeles Black Panther Party leader Elmer "Geroni­ mo" Pratt has been imprisoned for over 16years, eight in solitary, framed up for a crime he did not and could not have committed. From San Quentin prison this courageous fighter for black free­ dom sent greetings to the demonstra­ tion: "The fact of you coming together in workers' demands for Justiceshows a degree of recognition that really fright­ ens the manipulators of labor as they are helpless when faced with the raw awesome power of the worker. ... My freedom would be a victory and a statement that to be a militant fighter for black liberation is not to be a criminal." The rally brought an outpouring of support from coast to coast. Initiated by the Bay Area Labor Black League for Social Defense and the Partisan Defense Committee-a class-struggle, non-sectarian legal defense organiza­ tion in accordance with the political views of the Spartacist League-the rally was endorsed by over 60 unions United-front Oakland rally and labor officials. Congressman Ron February 21 drew wide Dellums and prominent black.Bay Area labor and black support. officials Doris Ward and Wilson Riles At podium, unionist Frenchie Alford. continued on page 11 >

"Pratt Fought for Us, ",-. Now We're Fighting for Him"·

We print below excerpts from the wild beasts of U.S. imperialism, the Meese and Ronald Reagan would be remarks by Spartacist League Central Edwin Meeses and Ronald Reagans, put in solitary confinement themselves Committee member Don Alexander at put a militant fighter for the oppressed for eight, ten years, and then shipped to the February 21 Oakland rally for behind bars after they tried to kill him in El Salvador and be put into the hands freedom for Geronimo Pratt: 1969. For 16years Pratt has been injail, of the Salvadoran workers and peasants eight of them in solitary confinement, who would place them on trial! The I want to tell everybody here that I under conditions designed to break and COINTELPRO program had one basic was sitting in that courtroom back in the destroy him. Over the years the Sparta­ aim: to kill, to jail, to drive out of the early '70s when Geronimo'pratt was cist League, unlike the pro-Democratic country as many Panthers-as they could. framed by the bourgeois state. I saw Party left, has consistently called on the So when they attacked the Panthers' "To be a militant fighter for black with my own eyes how happy the racist integrated labor movement and all anti­ headquarters in Los Angeles, the cops liberation is not to be a criminal." cops, the racist judge, the Los Angeles racist fighters to come to the defense there probably would have likedto have -Geronimo Pratt Police Department and the various of Geronimo Pratt and all class-war dropped a bomb on their headquarters ·bombs down on the heads of Vietnam­ other' venal criminals that put Pratt­ prisoners. like they did to MOVE in Philadel­ ese workers and peasants who beat away, how happy they were that day. What really should happen, and what phia-except during that period of time their butts and sent them packing. Because what happened was that these really would be justice, is if Edwin U.S. imperialism was busy raining continued on page 10 12 6 MARCH 1987