STRUGGLE. SELF-DETERMINATION SOCIALISM [roTEM 2S$3 R ffiffi i,ffi 9/11 0ne Year later: "And We're Not Going Back!" Full-Spectrum Entropy: The thoughts of a NYC Paramedic 5 I m mig ra nt Wo rke rs Re bu ild Special 0perations in by James Creedon M ove me nt fo r Le g a lizati on 12 a Special Period 2A by Bill Gallegos by Stan Goff Gampus Workers in Knoxville, TN Stand Up Colombian Defend Jose Maria Sison! "With the Union We Can Play Trade Unionists: As the US Targets An Unending Slaughter a Part in lur 1wn Destiny" 7 15 the Philippines 24 tett by Chad Negendank by Cro:b) by Doug Wordell Building a Union from Scratch: An lnteruiew with The Struggle to 0rganize Comandante Raril Reyes' : U nive rsity H o use ke e pe rs ol the FARC : . 18 in North Carolina 10 by Chip Smith SPEGIAT $=GTIOIU ffiffiwffiffiw ffiffiwffi Max Elbaum's EDITORIAL LOGOMOTTOTU Revolution ln the Air As We Face a New War, "Remember To Let's Not Forget the Kick lt Over" 40 The Fire Last Time: Lessons of the Old Wars by Scott MX Turner A New Geseration Reads BAGK IIU THE I'AY Bevolation in the Air PRISOIUER OF 42 by Christopher Day The Chicano Moratorium rHE ISSUE by Dennis O'Neil Jos6 Solis Jordan and GULTURE ?s State Repression Today leessegp,1gq4tpflMa.qigry, .".,: : 38 The Switch (a short story) 40 by Khalil Has$ah by Michelle Foy by Terry Bisson They Wanted to Serve The ?eople; Chicanos asd the Fight against EDITOR TRANSLATION SUBSCRIPTION INFO Natioml 0pptession in the Eric Odell iohn A. For subscription information or to New Gommunist Movement 34 Bruce H. learn more about the Freedom DESIGN Road Socialist Organization, visit by Biil Gallegas Lizet R. Doug Wordell our web site. Daniel D. Two Veterans of the STAFF Josd N. WEBSITE New Communist Eric Odell Zancudo www.freedomroad.org Doug Wordell Movemenl Look Back SPECIAL THANKS EMAIL by Paul and Vicky Dennis 0'Neil Ajamu Dillahunt f reedomroad@f reedom road,org Juliet Ucelli Martin Eder Dianne Wright ADDRESS Stan Goff Freedom Road Bruce H. P0 Box 1 386 Doug Monica Stuyvesant Station New York, NY 1 0009 Chip Smith Zancudo COVER PHOTO Jon Levine @ sB3 al tat AS WE FACEA NEW WAR, LET'S NtlT Reading the Possibilities Properly FORGETTHE LESSONS OFTHE OLDWARS The common and natural tendenry for people fighting today against a new attack on Iraq is once again to proclaim s we go to press, the US remains based on an error of philosophical ideal- that we face a new Vietnam in the poised on the brink ofattacking ism-of underestimating the role of Middle East. But we should look at the Iraq. Although they face grow- conditions out in the world and overesti- first Gulf War as a much closer parallel ing worldwide resistance and dissenting mating our own limited abilityto change to the situation we face now. To do oth- voices even within the ranks of the ruLing those conditions. Despite a major split in erwise could once again have disastrous class, the Bush administration seems the movement and the errors in overem- consequences for us down the road. If heedless of all this in their march toward phasizing potential US casualties, we Bush and his junta are unlucky, the sit- war. built a big movement and built it fasq uation after an invasion and occupation This is one of those historical however, in retrospect there was no way could well degenerate into something a moments that have greatly heightened we were going to stop that war no matter whole lot messier, but the initial war is repercussions. Decisions made and what we did. If the movement had likely to look more like 1991 than 1971. actions taken during the next few spread a summation based on this Let's not set ourselves up for despair months will shape the terrain of the left realiry the movement during the '90s once again. for years to come. Organizations that might have come out a little healthier. Despite the fact that opposition to misread the situation and take a wrong \Mhy didn't the movement develop a the war is broader than a decade ago, we turn will be pushed back into (greater) more accurate summation of the first face a regime hell-bent on attacking irrelevance, and others that choose cor- Gulf War? It didn't have the opportuni- Iraq. And despite all the (accurate) rect strategies will gain new footholds. ty. There were few vehicles to spread a jokes we make about what a dim light common summation, rooted in a dialec- bulb Dubya is, his regime filled with A New Vietnam. or a New Gulf War? As someone who cut my political teeth in the first Gulf War, I remember the melancholy many existing progressive Whatever happens in the upcoming weeks and months, groups were stuck in after the slaughter in the Iraqi deserl in the winter of 1991. the single most important thing we can do is to learn from It took years for much of the movement to climb out of its Gulf War Syndrome the battles we fight and strive to fight even hetter the next and begin to build again. A certain mea- sure of this was probably unavoidable, time around. but a lot of it might have been avoided had more activists properly grasped the objective conditions we faced. The war was going to be horrible and tical materialist outlook, of the people with visionary plans for geopo- bloody for the US, we warned. It would experiences of the movement. The Iitical control of the main oil-producing be a new Vietnam; thousands of GI's Guardian, the much-missed newspaper region of the world, and they're willing were going to be brought home in body of record for the Left, was in the process to take much short-term political dam- bags. (This emphasis was partly based of falling apart. The internet was only in age to carry out those plans. That's not on the lie propagated by the ruling class an embryonic stage. There were (and to say that they won't have it all blow up that the movement against the war in are) no large left parties. The Soviet bloc in their faces a few months from now. Vietnam had spit on GI's rather than was falling apart and the US ruling class But the fact is that our limited forces uniting with their resentment and rebel- was declaring the end of history leaving can only have a limited impact at this liousness.) Then the US attacked and many left groups confused and disillu- point. We should certainly all be work- only 133 US troops were killed. Once it sioned. The combination of all these ing as hard as we can against the war, started, the masses in the US swung factors left the movement subject to peo- but we also shouldn't have any illusions behind the president, and the anti-war ple's spontaneous emotional responses about this fact. The thing we should movement dried up and blew away. The rather than clear-headed analysis. keep in mind as we organize is the like- overwhelming summation within the Iihood of imperial overreach down the movement was one of failure. road. We may not stop this war, but we This summation was wrong. It was can prepare to make the most of the FREEDO M ROAD ln This lssun fallout from it, because there could be a (The development of the global justice lot. North Korea has already given them movement during the '90s is probably As we build a movement against an a good taste ofit. one of the main reasons for this imperialist attack on Iraq, we can't lose Build 0rganization, advance.) We should do what we can to focus on the countries the US is lining Build rhe United Front spread anti-imperialist politics far and up to target next. Two of the chief wide within the movement. Rhetoric- countries of concern are Colombia and Another lesson to take from our limited Iaden ranting and raving, though, is not the Philippines. This issue of Freedom strength is that we desperately need a substitute for an anti-imperialist mes- Road has an article on page 15 by leff more organization. More mass organi- sage spoken in a language people will Crosby about the mass killing of trade zations in local communities, in understand. We must also avoid union leaders going on in Colombia, neighborhoods, on campuses. More demanding that a pure anti-imperialist along with an interyiew on page 18 with sectors of the population. More nation- outlook be the basis of unity for any Raul Reyes, a member of the secretariat al networks and alliances. Bigger and coalitions or alliances we build. Our of the central command of the FARC, stronger revolutionary organizations. task is to build a united front, bringing the largest guerrilla organization in All these take time, to develop, of together all those forces that can be Colombia. course; there are no secret shortcuts. united against the Bush regime's war We also have a piece on page 24 by There is only the demand that we be drive. United for Peace and fustice, a Doug Wordell on the need to defend relentless at building organization, on broad national network of a broad Iose Maria Sison, the intellectual leader all these levels. range of groups working against the of the Philippine revolutionary move- The movement against the war has war, is one model we can learn from ment.