1950 Untitled Report on the Objectives of the Communist Party

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1950 Untitled Report on the Objectives of the Communist Party Digital Archive digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org International History Declassified 1950 Untitled report on the objectives of the Communist Party Citation: “Untitled report on the objectives of the Communist Party,” 1950, History and Public Policy Program Digital Archive, Emir Farid Chehab Collection, GB165-0384, Box 9, File 17/9, Middle East Centre Archive, St Antony’s College, Oxford. https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/119886 Summary: Account of the major and tactical goals of the Communist Party, as well as a calendar of protests and recent modifications in strategy and objectives. Credits: This document was made possible with support from Youmna and Tony Asseily. Original Language: Arabic Contents: English Translation Scan of Original Document 17/9 Part one: Major Goals. The Strategy: 1- To abolish Imperialist domination. 2- The elimination 3- Liberating the country from foreign imperialists, politically or economically. 4- To establish a democratic government similar to the systems prevalent in Eastern European countries. Part two: Minor goals. They are the ones that lead to achieving the major goals. They are called “tactical.” These are the way by which the party is active daily, including the following: 1- Conducting constant propaganda in order to attract the masses, especially workers, farmers and the under-privileged to attract them to adopt the party slogans through exploiting poverty and unemployment to spread them among these groups through the struggle for peace that the party has been promoting amongst the educated and students and some politicians. 2- Promoting anti-capitalism by isolating it with the people, branding it with the blame for the unemployment and struggle of the poor. 3- Promoting anti-feudalism and promising land to be given to farmers provided they take the initiative to adopt communist principles follow communist leadership. 4- In order to gain the people’s trust, communists are instigating residents in neighborhoods and villages who are demanding better roads, water and electric services, work [illegible], better and cheaper bread and all other demands that interest people. They assist in writing their applications and requests and guide them through the process of completing applications to government offices. They form envoys to complete the application and complaints. All of this to attract friendly people in these neighborhoods and villages, which will lead to their joining the party. 5- Distributing fliers door to door to enrage the people against the government and imperialism. 6- Organizing protests for two aims: 11th of February: Democratic Youth Day 8th of March: International Woman’s Day 1st of May: Labor Day 1st of June: International Children’s Day 7th of October: the Day of the Russian Revolution However, recently, the party started to take a new revolutionary direction in its protests in order to empower its members toward violence and aggression to mentally prepare them to take the hit from armed security force members while they prepare for declaring the revolution when the time comes. The party gave the green light to its members to be ready. 4- Fighting security forces manually only. They also gave the green light for use of stones and sticks in the future as what happened in the recent protests in Damascus. They might resort to the use arms someday, which is not so out of consideration. 6- Waging minor protests in every neighborhood, called (Protest on the fly) meaning that they are quick to organize. That’s when a number of comrades aged ten or a little older someplace at one time, them they start chanting. This will get others to gather around them. One of them will chant and give a quick speech while the others watch for the police. In case the police do show up, then the watchman will alert them, so they’ll take cover, but not until they pass out the fliers to the crowd. The party had modified its plan about a year ago. It had categorized its work into four parts; 1- The party is realizing that communist ideas are not getting popular among society classes where the range of its popularity between this group and that group is their levels, so it modified the plan to target workers and farmers, especially the poor. It had practically realized that it was futile to promote to students and the educated to the struggle and the fight for a cause that does not interest them in any way since they are middle class or well to do. On the other hand, it had not completely overlooked these groups as it found a way to actively promote in their midst in the following ways: It has made its first priority to infiltrate the worker and farmer groups, organize their efforts and protecting their demands to gain their trust and get them to join. To that end, the party had formed a committee of members solely to advertise to workers to join the unions or to establish one if that wasn’t already in place while attempting to control union leadership. This committee was called, “Syrian Workers Conference,” which is merely using this name to hide its communist connections. Likewise, the party called on its members in the villages to form committee in each called, “Farmer Rescue Committee,” which handle promotion under this moniker. I can get information about this very important committee within the party and know its most prominent members soon. 2- I mentioned in section (1) that the party modified its plan and targeted fully workers and farmers without completely ignoring the educated class and students. It had assigned its educated members, mostly students, to form many organizations that are active in the name of defending students and their demands. These are: a- Democratic Youth Association, which is the primary organization. b- Democratic Lawyers Association, comprising of lawyer members and non-members who sympathize with the party and give financial and moral support. These three organizations are in charge of promoting the party under different names and demands that interest students and young people. I can find out information about these three organization’s activities and most prominent members soon. 3- Despite our Syrian society’s outdated ideas concerning woman’s rights and freedoms and vice versa and despite that women in our country have not yet entered into social and political life with distinction, the party insists that women’s participation in political struggle is crucial however hard. Thus, it formed a women’s organization called, “Motherhood and Childhood Protection Association,” which promotes the party to women under slogans and demands that interest women. However, they are struggling to find footing since women still don’t have full freedom and because they are not at a level of education where they can fathom the principles they are hearing. I will later mention the work of this women’s organization and names of its organizers. .
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