NTERNATIONAL I IEWPOINT V News and analysis from the Fourth International IV380 - July/August 2006

War in the Middle East: Holding a whole population hostage International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

IV380 - July/August 2006

War in the Middle East - Milosevic - Scotland

War in the Middle East The sinking ship of US imperial ambitions - Gilbert Achcar 3 Israel's Dual Onslaught On Lebanon And Palestine - Gilbert Achcar 6 "Israel is holding a whole population hostage" - Gilbert Achcar 7 Changing the Rules of the Game? Let it Be! - RCG - Lebanon 10 Israel's new Lebanon war - Piers Mostyn 11 The future of Israel is at stake - Michel Warschawski 14 Twin Battles - Gilbert Achcar 15 The 33-Day War and UNSC Resolution 1701 - Gilbert Achcar 17 Hezbollah's Victory (2000) - Gilbert Achcar 21 Italy Chomsky, Tariq Ali criticise Rifondazione on Afghanistan, back antiwar MPs 23 Withdraw Italian troops from Afghanistan! - Sinistra Critica (Critical Left) 24 Against the Italian intervention in Afghanistan - Franco Turigliatto 25 Yugoslavia Dossier - On Slobodan Milosevic - Catherine Samary 26 Slobodan Milosevic: Architect of Yugoslav break-up - Alan Thornett 40 Venezuela The revolution seen from the left: Chavismo's original sin - Roland Denis 43 South Africa Resistance to neoliberalism - Josep María Antentas 46 Repression and electoral fraud Showdown in Mexico - Phil Hearse 49 Workers movement The European trade union movement today - a rapid overview - Thadeus Pato 52 Scotland Statement on the crisis in the SSP - International Socialist Group 57 SSP is split by Sheridan - Socialist Resistance statement 58 Fighting "Jurassic Park" capitalism Russian Social Forum Success - Aleksander Buzgalin 62 Brazil Socialists of the World Support Heloisa Helena - Support on-line petition! 64 Pakistan Gorja - a great victory for textile workers - Farooq Tariq 66 Theory Marx, Weber and the Critique of Capitalism - Michael Löwy 67

INTERNATIONAL VIEWPOINT is a review of news and analysis published under the auspices of the Executive Bureau of the Fourth International. IV appears online at www.internationalviewpoint.org and in a monthly pdf version. Editorial office: PO Box 112, Manchester M12 5DW UK ISSN 1294-2925 2 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Armed Globalisation The sinking ship of US imperial ambitions

Gilbert Achcar

"The defeat of Hezbollah would be a huge loss for Iran, both psychologically and strategically. Iran would lose its foothold in Lebanon. It would lose its major means to destabilize and inject itself into the heart of the Middle East. It would be shown to have vastly overreached in trying to establish itself as the regional superpower. The United States has gone far out on a limb to allow Israel to win and for all this to happen. It has counted on Israel's ability to do the job. It has been disappointed. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has provided unsteady and uncertain leadership.... His search for victory on the cheap has jeopardized not just the Lebanon operation but America's confidence in Israel as well." Charles Krauthammer, Washington Post, August 4, 2006 "But the administration now has to admit The lead-article in a recent issue of Time neocons of the Bush administration have what anyone - including myself - who magazine, published before the start of been pushed aside nurtured the hope that a believed in the importance of getting Iraq Israel's new Lebanon war, heralded "the end new salutary course of the administration's right has to admit: Whether for Bush reasons of cowboy diplomacy" - it took note of the foreign policy was in gestation. The reshuffle or Arab reasons, it is not happening, and we obvious fact that "the Bush Doctrine that went along with George W. Bush's can't throw more good lives after good foundered in the principal place the U.S. tried second term, despite the exit of realist-in- lives.... But second best is leaving Iraq. to apply it": chief Colin Powell who, anyway, had quite Because the worst option - the one Iran loves limited influence on the administration, "Though no one in the White House openly - is for us to stay in Iraq, bleeding, and in easy seemed indeed to confirm the "twilight of the questions Bush's decision to go to war in range to be hit by Iran if we strike its nukes.... neocons" that some Clintonites had Iraq, some aides now acknowledge that it has announced two years ago. [2] We need to deal with Iran and Syria, but from come at a steep cost in military resources, a position of strength - and that requires a public support and credibility abroad. The However, what the Time authors announced broad coalition. The longer we maintain a Administration is paying the bill every day as as marking the end of "cowboy diplomacy" - unilateral failing strategy in Iraq, the harder it it tries to cope with other crises. Pursuing the "a strategic makeover is evident in the will be to build such a coalition, and the forward-leaning foreign policy envisioned in ascendancy of Secretary of State stronger the enemies of freedom will the Bush Doctrine is nearly impossible at a Condoleezza Rice" - proved to be no more become." Thomas Friedman, New York time when the U.S. is trying to figure out how than wishful thinking almost as soon as it was Times, August 4, 2006 to extricate itself from Iraq. Around the printed, in light of the events that unfolded world, both the U.S.'s friends and its subsequently as Israel launched its most Everyday that passes shows more of those adversaries are taking note - and in many brutal aggression. Cowboy diplomacy, it who enthusiastically supported the Bush cases, taking advantage - of the strains on the turned out, had just been replaced with administration's imperial drive in the Middle superpower. If the toppling of Saddam cowgirl diplomacy - essentially the same. East leaving its sinking ship. There can be no Hussein marked the high-water mark of U.S. doubt any longer that what many had forecast hegemony, the past three years have True, Condoleezza Rice did her best to put long ago is proving absolutely true: the Bush witnessed a steady erosion in Washington's some make-up on the face of the Bush administration will definitely go down in ability to bend the world to its will." [1] administration's foreign policy, but there was history as the clumsiest crew that ever stood no significant shift in substance. A pillar of at the helm of the American Empire. The authors' most serious grievance was this administration since its inception, she stated as follows: shares the same delusions of grandeur and Bush and his cronies have already secured folly of overreaching designs that their position in the collective memory as the "As it turns out, Iraq may prove to be not only characterize the rest of the team. Put in grave-diggers of U.S. post-Cold War imperial the first but also the last laboratory for charge of the State department for Bush's ambitions: they have accomplished the preventive war. Instead of deterring the rulers second term, Rice's mission consisted incomparable feat of squandering the in Tehran and Pyongyang, the travails of the primarily in sealing off the many leaks in the U.S. occupation may have emboldened those exceptionally favorable conditions that U.S. administration's foreign policy ship: it was regimes in their quest to obtain nuclear indeed a mission impossible. The ship is imperialism faced since the other world weapons while constraining the U.S. sinking inexorably in the dark waters of the colossus started crumbling from 1989 on. military's ability to deter them." Iraqi oil slick. They have wasted the unique window of opportunity that the same Krauthammer This very bitter assessment was accompanied The U.S. "hyperpower" that is able to knock quoted above had called in 1990 the in the Time article by the same hope that was down any other regular army on earth - the "unipolar moment." But they have wasted it shared by the large chorus of U.S. allies, hyperpower whose military expenditure because they were inspired by precisely the protégés and clients: for all of them, with the exceeds that of the 200+ states that constitute same imperial hubris that has distinguished outstanding exception of the Israeli the rest of the world, and whose military the likes of Krauthammer and Friedman. government, the fact that the most prominent budget alone exceeds the GDP of all other 3 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

countries but for 14 of them - proved one of the two as the U.S. tentatively practiced in Palestinian branch), the Egyptian section, more time in contemporary history that it is Vietnam, but could not carry to conclusion came out openly in support of Iranian unable to control rebellious populations. For because the American population wouldn't President Ahmadinejad's provocative anti- that, all the sophisticated killing gadgetry that have tolerated it. Israel statements. Hamas's accession to the Pentagon possesses is of very limited power through the January 2006 Palestinian help. Controlling populations involves In Iraq, Washington was faced, on the other election dealt a further blow to Washington's troops: it is a kind of industry where labor- hand, by a much graver problem, one that regional strategy. Tehran jubilated, force can hardly be replaced with hardware. became clear by the beginning of 2004: the outbidding again all its Arab rivals in That is why, incidentally, dictatorships are Bush administration had been induced - by its supporting the new Palestinian government. relatively more at ease in this business, as own foolishness and the sales patter of some It is at this point that Israel stepped in, seen they can mobilize at will from their of the Pentagon's Iraqi friends or the stupid from Washington as the likely savior of what populations and don't fear paying a high price delusions of others - into believing that it otherwise is looking more and more like an in soldiers' lives. could win the sympathy of a major chunk of imperial Titanic. Iraq's majority community, the Arab Shiites. The U.S. proved unable to control Vietnam This proved a total disaster as the clout of One more time in four decades of strategic with a much higher rate of occupation troops Iran-friendly Shiite fundamentalist alliance between the U.S. sponsor and the to inhabitants than is the case in Iraq. And organizations completely dwarfed whatever Israeli champion, Washington, still believing yet, U.S. military power is today much constituency Washington's henchmen could in the Israelis' old reputation of infallible greater than at the time of Vietnam in all buy among Iraq's Shiites. The Bush know-how in dealing with their Arab foes, respects except the one that is most crucial administration was left with no alternative for unleashed its favorite proxy against those that for occupation endeavors: troops. The its imperial design but the classical recipe of it deemed to be Iran's proxies, namely Hamas number of U.S. troops has been radically cut "divide and rule," trying to foster antagonism and Hezbollah. What the Bush administration since Vietnam and the end of the Cold War. between the three main components of the has overlooked, however, is that Israel's Inspired by a spirit typical of the capitalism Iraqi population, countering the Shiites with reputation had already been very much of the automation age, the Pentagon believed Arab Sunni forces in alliance with the Kurds. eroded by its blatant failure in controlling the that it could make up for the unreliability of It ended up fueling Iraq's slide toward a civil 1967-occupied Palestinian territories, and human resources by depending heavily on war, thus aggravating the overall spectacle of even more so by its Saigon-like withdrawal sophisticated weaponry - the so-called its failure in controlling the country. [4] from southern Lebanon in 2000, after 18 "revolution in military affairs." It thus years of occupation. Israel has already met its entered in the age of "post-heroic" wars as There is no doubt that the way in which the own Vietnam in Lebanon. they were aptly called by a maverick analyst American Gulliver got tied down by the Iraqi of military affairs. [3] And, it did not take Lilliputians has considerably emboldened And like the Pentagon after Vietnam, Israel's much trouble indeed for the U.S. to defeat Iran, the other Middle Eastern pillar of what war planners have shifted since Lebanon to a "post-heroically" the Iraqi army of Saddam George W. Bush labeled the "axis of evil" at "post-heroic military policy," relying much Hussein. Controlling the Iraqi population the onset of his post-9/11 war drive. The more on their very much superior hardware "post-heroically," however, proved an utterly defiant, nay provocative, attitude of than on their ground troops' fighting altogether different challenge. Iran against the U.S. colossus was made capability. When it invaded Lebanon in 1982, possible only because the latter proved in Israel was chiefly fighting the PLO guerillas: The U.S. has been steadily losing control Iraq to stand on feet of clay. And Tehran in Lebanon, these were anything but "fish in over Iraq ever since the occupation settled countered successfully the attempt by water" as they had managed to alienate the down in 2003. It was confronted, on the one Washington's Arab clients to expand the Lebanese population through arrogant and hand, by the unfolding of an armed sectarian feud from Iraq to the rest of the clumsy behavior. The Lebanese resistance insurgency in the country's Arab Sunni areas Arab region so as to isolate the Iranian that gathered momentum from 1982 onward, that proved impossible to quench with the regime as Shiite - a ploy that was used with and in which Hezbollah came to play the limited number of U.S. occupation troops some measure of success after the Iranian major role, was a completely different story: available. For, if an invading army is not revolution of 1979. Tehran countered it by this was the Israeli army's first encounter capable of exerting control over every single outbidding all the Arab regimes in hostility to with a truly popular armed resistance with acre of inhabited territory as local armed Israel, thus building up its image as a lines of supplies on a terrain adequate for forces usually do, there is only one secure champion of the pan-Islamic cause. guerilla warfare. Israel faced the same way to get rid of an armed insurgency dilemma described above with regard to Iraq moving within its popular constituency "like A key to Tehran's success is the alliance that and, like the U.S. in Vietnam, it was a fish in water" as Mao Zedong once put it: it weaved with Hamas, the most popular compelled to swallow the bitter cup of a drain the pool. This means either to commit embodiment of Sunni Islamic withdrawal that was tantamount to defeat. genocide, as the Russian army has started to fundamentalism. This alliance was enhanced do in Chechnya, or to displace the population when the largest section of the Muslim Israel's belief in the invincibility of its into concentration camps, or a combination Brotherhood (of which Hamas is the superior weaponry - with a hubris that was 4 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

enhanced by the amateurship in military in the way Israel is doing in Lebanon would Security Council resolution calling for a affairs of Olmert and Peretz, the present have brought upon itself an outcry of a ceasefire. And Israeli generals, faced with the captains of its crew - led the Israelis to magnitude that bears no relation to the faint total failure of their "post-heroic" bombing believe that they could force the Hezbollah or timid reproaches made to Israel on the campaign, are engaged in a race against the into capitulation, or push the Lebanese to the theme that it is overdoing it. clock in order to grasp, through an utterly brink of a new civil war, by taking the whole destructive "post-heroic" ground offensive, of Lebanon hostage, destroying the country's But for all that, Israel's brutal aggression was as much as possible of southern Lebanese civilian infrastructure and pouring on its not able to succeed. On the contrary, it has territory at the lowest possible cost in Israeli Shiite-populated areas a deluge of bombs. already proved to be what Ze'ev Sternhell soldiers' lives. Israel deliberately flattened whole described somewhat euphemistically as neighborhoods and villages on a pattern that Israel's "most unsuccessful war" [5] But the most they can realistically expect resembles some of the bombings of WW2 - concluding with this bitter statement: now is to hand back this territory to an or a Fallujah on a much larger scale, and international force that would be accepted by "It is frightening to think that those who accordingly much more visible. Israel's new Hezbollah. French President Jacques Chirac decided to embark on the present war did not war on Lebanon displayed the murderous himself, though he's been Washington's close even dream of its outcome and its destructive collaborator on the issue of Lebanon since fury of an act of revenge against the only consequences in almost every possible realm, population that managed to oblige it to 2004, has emphasized that Hezbollah's of the political and psychological damage, concurrence is a condition that must be met. withdraw unconditionally from an occupied the serious blow to the government's No country on earth, to be sure, is willing to territory. credibility, and yes - the killing of children in try to accomplish in Lebanon the mission that vain. The cynicism being demonstrated by The criminal behavior of the Israeli armed Israel itself is unable to fulfill. And the Shiite government spokesmen, official and forces in Lebanon, with regard to the organization has already stated that it won't otherwise, including several military international conventions defining what accept any force with a mandate going correspondents, in the face of the disaster constitute war crimes, went beyond those that substantially beyond that of the already suffered by the Lebanese, amazes even the U.S. perpetrated on a mass scale in its existing UNIFIL that Israel considers as a someone who has long since lost many of his post-Vietnam military endeavors, whether in nuisance. youthful illusions." Iraq or in former Yugoslavia. In this, Israel's Whatever the final outcome of the ongoing onslaught on Lebanon amounted to a peculiar Far from inducing civil war between the war on Lebanon, one thing is already clear: instance of the so-called "extraordinary Lebanese, Israel's brutal aggression only instead of helping in raising the sinking ship rendition" policy. It is well-known how succeeded so far in uniting them in a of the U.S. Empire, the Israeli rescue boat has Washington has handed over individuals it common resentment against its murderous actually aggravated the shipwreck, and is wants "interrogated" well beyond the brutality. Far from forcing Hezbollah into currently being dragged down with it. limitation imposed by U.S. legislative surrender, it turned the Shiite fundamentalist constraints to those among its clients who organization into the most prestigious foe August 6, 2006 face no hindrance in the dirty business of Israel ever had since it defeated Egypt in torture. Now Washington has entrusted to Gilbert Achcar grew up in Lebanon and teaches 1967, transforming Hezbollah's chief political science at the University of Paris-VIII. His Israel the task of defeating Hezbollah, seen as Nasrallah into the most popular Arab hero best-selling book The Clash of Barbarisms just came a major piece in a regional counter-offensive since Nasser. Far from facilitating the efforts out in a second expanded edition and a book of his against Iran, in the hope that Israel could do dialogues with Noam Chomsky on the Middle East, by Washington and its Arab clients to drive Perilous Power, is forthcoming. the dirty work and accomplish the task the wedge further between Sunnis and without incurring much trouble. Shiites, it led many prominent mainstream NOTES Sunni preachers to proclaim open support to Shamelessly exploiting one more time the Hezbollah, including preachers from within [1] Mike Allen and Romesh Ratnesar, "The End of Cowboy Diplomacy," Time, dated July 17, 2006. horrible memory of the Nazi judeocide - an the Saudi kingdom - the ultimate humiliation exploitation which reached new peaks in for the Saudi ruling family. The Iraqis [2] Stefan Halper and Jonathan Clarke, 'Twilight of the indecency on the occasion of the ongoing war unanimously denounced the Israeli Neocons," Washington Monthly, March 2004. - Israel's leaders believed that they would aggression, while Washington's most thus be able to deflect any criticism from the [3] Edward Luttwak, "A Post-Heroic Military Policy," formidable Iraqi foe and Tehran's ally, Foreign Affairs, vol. 75, n° 4, July/August 1996. Western powers a.k.a. "the international Moqtada al-Sadr, seized the opportunity to community." And although the resources for organize another huge demonstration [4] I have described this process in Perilous Power (see bio this exploitation are unmistakably depleting line below). An excerpt on Iraq 2006 will soon be posted matching the one he organized against the on the Internet. with every new threshold in brutality that occupation on April 9, 2005. Israel crosses, it is still effective indeed: any [5] Ze'ev Sternhell, "The Most Unsuccessful War," other state in the world that would have At the time of writing, Washington is still Haaretz, August 2, 2006. attacked a neighboring country, deliberately striving to buy Israel some more time by committing war crimes concentrated in time imposing unacceptable conditions for a UN 5 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Middle East Israel's Dual Onslaught On Lebanon And Palestine

Gilbert Achcar

This interview was conducted by Paola Mirenda on July 15, 2006, for the Italian daily Liberazione, the newspaper of the Partito della Rifondazione Comunista (PRC). Q. Since last Wednesday, the Iranian President Ahmadinejad's Israeli Army has been imposing provocative statements since his a siege on Lebanon and election one year ago were part bombarding the country as a of this game, which fits in with result of the abduction of two of Tehran's strategy facing the its soldiers and the killing of USA, at a time when American seven others by a Lebanese pressure on the nuclear issue is Hezbollah commando unit. in full escalation. But, whatever Israel's reaction was the case, it can be said that what predictable, even in its Hezbollah did has prompted a Israeli artillery... disproportion. What are the test of strength that risks costing unite the population in a revolt whole population hostage, political and strategic reasons them a great deal, as it is costing against Israel. bombing the densely populated that can be seen behind this the whole of Lebanon very much Gaza strip in the midst of general action by Hezbollah? already. I don't know for sure what world indifference. This is the Hezbollah's real political main source of destabilization in Achcar: The explanations that Q. A test of strength against calculation has been, but they the region - this violent and Hezbollah has given for its Israel or within Lebanon? certainly expected a large-scale arrogant behavior of Israel that is action are many. The first reason reaction on the part of Israel, Achcar: The test of strength is in full harmony with the equally invoked is to try to obtain the which has already invaded primarily against Israel, because arrogant and violent behavior release of prisoners - there are Lebanon several times before. Israel tries through its actions, the United States displayed in several Lebanese believed to be For this reason, it seems to me held in Israeli custody, although whether in Palestine or in Iraq. Lebanon, to crush the resistance that their action entailed an only two are officially detained important element of Q. What is the Lebanese by Israel (in addition to close to movements. The recent events "adventurism," all the more that government's position facing 10,000 Palestinian prisoners) - have been seized as pretexts to the risk they have taken involves Hezbollah's action? Israel has as well as to act in solidarity crush both Hezbollah and the whole population. They have decided to consider this action with the struggle of Hamas in Hamas, and the violence of the actually taken a very big risk in as being the responsibility of the Palestine, which is animated by Israeli military onslaught is to be initiating an attack on Israel, whole government despite the a similar inspiration to that of read in that context. Israel takes knowing its huge military power Lebanese Prime Minister's Hezbollah, and to react to the entire populations hostage; it has and brutality, and the population denial. ongoing onslaught on Gaza. Of done so with the Palestinian population and is doing the same could hold them responsible for course, it was logical to expect Achcar: Israel's policy consists now with the Lebanese. It has a new war and a new invasion, this violent retaliation on Israel's exactly in holding entire part, in light of what it did to bombed Beirut's airport and the cost of which the Lebanese imposed a blockade on Lebanon: people will have to bear. populations hostage, as I said. It Palestine in reaction to the has done so with the abduction of another soldier. all that for an action claimed by one Lebanese group, not by the But having said that, it is Palestinians; in the Lebanese In this crisis, there are many Lebanese state. In fact, Israel necessary to stress that the case, it is even more evident dimensions involved: holds hostage an entire principal responsibility for the because, while it is true that international observers have population in a disproportionate deterioration of the whole Hezbollah is part of the discussed the possible role of reaction that aims at pulling the situation falls on Israel. It has government, its participation is Syria and, above all, Iran in what rug from under the feet of its lately reached new peaks in its minimal and it stands actually in is occurring, and what opponents and at pressuring utterly revolting behavior, the opposition. The Lebanese calculations there are regarding local forces to act against them. especially with regard to Gaza. government is dominated by a the regional balance of forces. But if this is indeed Israel's After the abduction of the soldier majority that is allied with the Tehran, whose relation to calculation, it could backfire, as by a Palestinian group, the United States, and they can now Hezbollah is similar to that of it is possible that a military Israeli army has killed dozens take the full measure of the Bush Moscow to the communist action of such a scope could lead and dozens of Palestinian administration's hypocrisy that parties at the time of the to the exact opposite and civilians. Israel can abduct and claims to be very much "international communist radicalize the population more detain with impunity Palestinian concerned by the fate of the movement," has been engaged against Israel than against civilians, but when some Lebanese people only when it is for some time in an anti-Israeli Hezbollah. The murderous Palestinians kidnap one of its a matter of opposing Syria. To bidding game against rival Arab brutality of Israel's reaction, the soldiers in order to use him for hold the present Lebanese governments in order to win closure of the airport, the naval an exchange, it resorts to government responsible for over Sunni Muslim opinion. blockade, all are acts that could unrestricted violence, taking a Hezbollah's action, even after 6 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

this government has officially the Palestinian Authority when Middle East taken its distance from that the latter was led by Arafat. action, is a demonstration of Hezbollah never had any Israel's diktat policy on the one sympathy for Arafat and even "Israel is holding a whole hand, and on the other hand the less so for Mahmoud Abbas, in population hostage" indication of Israel's whom they don't recognize the same radical opposition to Israel determination to compel the Gilbert Achcar Lebanese to enter into a state of that they see in Hamas, when civil war, as it tries to do with the they don't accuse them of Palestinians. In each case, Israel betraying the Palestinian cause. wants to compel one part of the The rise of Hamas's clout in local society - Fatah in Palestine Palestine has been perceived by and the governmental majority Hezbollah and by Iran as a in Lebanon - to crush Israel's victory, and Iran was the first main enemies, Hamas and state to offer compensatory Hezbollah, or else they be funding to the Palestinians when crushed themselves. Western funds were cut from them. Q. What relates the Hezbollah and Hamas movements? Q. How will the Lebanese population react to what is Achcar: They have similar happening? Will Hezbollah get ideologies and a radical their solidarity or will it be held ...Lebanese destruction opposition to Israel. Hamas are responsible for their suffering? Sunni Muslims, while Hezbollah are Shiite Muslims, but both of Achcar: The popular base of them are allied to Syria and Iran. Hezbollah is Shiite, of course It is a sort of regional alliance (Shiites are the largest minority against Israel. Hezbollah was among Lebanon's communities, born after the Israeli invasion of none of which constitutes a July 18, Gilbert Achcar talked to US Socialist Worker's Alan majority). But certainly many Lebanon in 1982 and Hamas at Maass about the causes and background of the Israeli assault on among the Sunni minority the time of the first Intifada in Lebanon. approve its action as a gesture of 1987-88. The fundamental solidarity with Hamas and the The US media place the blame the stretch of Lebanese territory reason for the existence of both Palestinians, whereas the for Israel's attack on Hezbollah, that it seized in 1967. is opposition to Israel, the brutality of Israel's reaction for "starting" the violence? Is national struggle against the Since 2000, there has been an increases this solidarity. On the that how you view the situation? occupier of their territories, the ongoing low-intensity war other hand, it is probable that the struggle against a common between Hezbollah and Israel: enmity to Hezbollah among Whatever one thinks about enemy identified as Israel, as cross-border skirmishes, covert major parts of the Lebanese Hezbollah or the operation well as the United States behind Israeli action in Lebanon, minorities other than the Shiites mounted by Hezbollah-and I do it. - the Christian Maronites, the have my own reservations about including assassination of its appropriateness with regard Hezbollah leaders, etc. The division between Sunnis Sunnis, the Druzes, etc. - will be reinforced because they feel to to its foreseeable consequences- and Shiites in Iraq is due to But what Israel is carrying out have been put at risk by this cannot by any logic justify domestic factors peculiar to the now in Lebanon is massive Hezbollah's unilateral choice what Israel is doing. country, but is not otherwise retaliation against a whole and consider that they will be important in the whole region. population. It is holding a whole made to pay the cost of this The killing of the seven Israeli This division appeared also in population and country hostage choice. The risk, obviously, is soldiers and the kidnapping of Lebanon this last year, though in and trying to impose its that the sectarian divisions two soldiers was an act of war, a much less virulent fashion, conditions. deepen within Lebanon and that and Lebanon and Israel are two when the majority of the Sunni this leads eventually to a new countries that are still at war. community, led by Hariri who is This brutality is most cowardly, civil war. The decisive question allied with the Saudis and the because whatever military is whether the Lebanese Israel regularly encroaches on U.S., found itself in opposition means Hezbollah-or the whole governmental majority will yield Lebanon's sovereignty: it has to the majority of Shiites led by of the Lebanese state, for that to the Israeli diktat at the cost of aggressed the country matter-possess are dwarfed by Hezbollah allied with Syria. But a new civil war, or decide that innumerable times, especially this division could hardly the military power of the state of the priority is to oppose the after 1967 (the first Israeli become an important factor in Israel. Israeli aggression and preserve devastating attack on Beirut's countries where the two the country's unity. For the time airport took place in 1968); it communities, Shiites and This isn't some kind of an equal being, this second option seems invaded a small piece of Sunnis, are not both present, as fight, despite the fact that to be prevailing. One can only Lebanese territory in 1967 (the Hezbollah is retaliating with they are in Iraq and Lebanon. In hope that it will remain so. The Shebaa farms), a big chunk of some rockets. One of the world's Palestine, there are hardly any international protest against the southern Lebanon in 1978, half mightiest military powers is Shiites. dual Israeli onslaught can of Lebanon in 1982; it then committing a naked aggression contribute strongly to the The relation of solidarity that occupied a big part of the against one of the weakest states reinforcement of the option of Hezbollah has with Hamas it did country until 1985, its southern in the Middle East, and common resistance. not have either with the PLO or part until 2000, and it still holds murdering scores of people. 7 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

They have already killed over for example, the capture of one People in the West, especially in War, they used to see everything 200 people in less than one soldier by the Palestinians the United States, have to worldwide in terms of a week, and the number keeps becomes Israel's justification for become aware of the hypocrisy confrontation with the former growing day after day. The a murderous and destructive of their government, and of this Soviet Union. Now, they see overwhelming majority, more assault on Gaza, while Israel total lack of justice and even everything in the Middle East in than 90 percent, of Israel's holds close to 10,000 humanitarian commiseration in terms of a confrontation with victims are uninvolved civilians. Palestinian prisoners in its jails, dealing with the Arab Iran. They are neither fighters, nor most of whom are civilians populations of the Middle East. Besides that, Israel has its own even militants; just ordinary abducted by Israel in the They have to become aware of specific reasons for wanting to civilians, families and a territory that it occupies since the fact that, for very good get rid of Hezbollah, as the considerable number of children 1967 in total violation of reason, the Arab and Muslim organization that played the appallingly torn to pieces by international law. Israeli bombs. peoples are coming to perceive major role in forcing Israel to We know this double standard that they are considered as sub- withdraw from Lebanon, in human beings, and that their 2000. This is an organization Israel is destroying the well. Noam Chomsky has made lives have no value in the eyes of that is permanently defying infrastructure of the country. It is it one of his specialties for so Israel, the United States and Israel by its very existence, its also destroying the livelihood of many years to denounce the their allies. very presence. hundreds of thousands of people. permanent double standards and Lebanon is a country where the hypocrisy in the imperial summer season is very important Therefore, they become Ever since Israel left Lebanon, countries and in their media. We to thousands and thousands of receptive to the kind of discourse there's been a determination to are now witnessing an appalling that comes from the likes of take revenge on Hezbollah, and people-the large proportion of new case of that same double Osama bin Laden-that if our we're now witnessing Israel in the population that get seasonal standard. civilian lives have no value to the midst of carrying this out, jobs in the tourism sector and them, then their civilian lives using the pretext of the border depend on these earnings for And the fact is that if this should have no value to us. So clashes. their living for the whole year. hypocrisy can go unnoticed for we are reaching a completely And now these people are being an average audience in Western infernal situation because of the The US government denounces fired by the tens of thousands countries, you can be sure that in criminal reactionary policies of Hezbollah as a band of because everybody understands the overwhelming majority of the U.S. administration and the terrorists. What is the actual role that there won't be any "summer Third World countries-and, of Israeli government. that it plays in Lebanon? season" in Lebanon. course, in Muslim countries, and, even more so, in Arab What are Israel's goals in Throughout the years, Lebanese If you take all this into politics have had a communal countries-the double standard is carrying out this assault? consideration and compare it to dynamic, so you have some kind conspicuously and outrageously whatever border operation Strategically speaking, both of identification of communities obvious. Hezbollah executed, it is Israel and the United States with this or that political absolutely clear that this has That's why people don't give any consider their main enemy in the organization. Hezbollah become just a pretext-seized on credit to the utterances of Middle East to be not bin Laden managed to become the main by Israel, backed by the United Western leaders-to the Bush or al-Qaeda-these are only minor force in the Shiite community, States and other countries, to try nuisances in their eyes, if which is the largest minority in administration's talk about to impose what they have been conveniently useful nuisances- Lebanon, where no religious democracy and other lies. attempting to force since 2004. but Iran. community constitutes a Instead, what we are seeing right majority. That year, they had the UN There is what they call the Shiite now is that the hatred toward not Security Council adopt a axis or crescent, which has its Hezbollah came to play this role only Israel but the United States, resolution calling not only for source in Iran, and goes through for a variety of reasons. The the withdrawal of Syrian troops and all the other Western the pro-Iranian Shiite forces in major one is the role that from Lebanon, but also for the countries backing Israel and Iraq, through the Syrian Hezbollah played in liberating disarmament of armed groups in allying with the United States, is government, which is allied to southern Lebanon, where the the country-meaning, above all, reaching heights which are far Iran, and reaches Hezbollah in Shiite community is Hezbollah, and secondarily, the beyond what existed before Lebanon. concentrated, from the Israeli Palestinians in their refugee September 11, 2001. invasion. camps. This is why they consider In other words, the United States Hezbollah a very important But there are other factors. The double standard of Western and the state of Israel are enemy-because with their kind Generally speaking, the rise of media presentations of the preparing for the rest of the of conception of the world, they Hezbollah's influence fits into a situation and the hypocrisy of world, including their own see everything through their framework that we've seen at the Israel's statements are so populations, nightmarish events, obsession with what they regional level for the last 30 glaring that they constitute by compared to which 9/11, I'm consider to be their main enemy years, where the failure of the themselves a moral aggression- afraid, will be only a foretaste. state. At the time of the Cold left and the bankruptcy of 8 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

nationalist leaderships create a considers it as national How does the war on Lebanon fit powerful enemies to try to find void in the leadership of the resistance. with the other wars that the U.S. external sources of support. mass movement that has been and Israel are carrying out in Hezbollah has to get the means filled by organizations of an Can you talk about how Israel's the Middle East? from somewhere to be able to Islamic fundamentalist assault on Lebanon is connected resist. character. to the intensified war on For Israel and the U.S., the main Palestinians since Hamas won enemy, as I said, is the whole Or does Washington believe that This was very much propelled control of the Palestinian alliance, with Iran as the most it is entitled to intervene by the Iranian Revolution in Authority? central part of the alliance. The wherever it wants by the sole 1979. The shock wave of the main target is the Iranian regime, right of its "manifest destiny"- revolution was tremendous in There are several connections. which they want to get rid of, in for instance, backing today the the area-especially, of course, To be sure, there are connections one way or another. so-called People's Mujahedin of among the Shiites, since Iran is a of a kind that fit into Iran in its cross-border attacks The Syrian regime is more of a Shiite country. Washington's conspiracy theory. against Iran from U.S.-occupied secondary enemy. I don't believe Iraq, after having backed The birth of Hezbollah was the Hamas and Hezbollah are both that there is a real drive toward yesterday the far more result of the conjunction of this organizations in the same overthrowing that regime. Israeli significant contras against shock wave with the conditions regional alliance. Part of officials explain that they don't Nicaragua's government-while created by the Israeli invasion of Hamas's leadership live in exile wish to see a new Iraq unfolding Iran has no right to support its Lebanon in 1982. It was born in Syria, and it has very good at their border, because they correligionists in Lebanon or after the invasion, and its rise relations with Iran. Tehran backs know that if the Syrian regime Palestine. This chutzpah is only was associated with its success Hamas: when the new were to collapse, that's what you exceeded by U.S. complaints in the fight against the Palestinian government was would get: a chaotic situation against Iranian interference in occupation. elected, and there was a boycott that could very much threaten Iraq, a country under U.S. organized by the Western powers the security of Israel. occupation! Another factor is the way that and Israel, Iran was the first Of course, they would like to get Hezbollah managed to build its country to pledge support for the The fact that Hezbollah has links the Syrian government to break social base. Hezbollah was very Palestinians to compensate for to Syria and Iran doesn't mean in with Iran. And they want to much backed by Iran from its that boycott. the least that it is not waging a compel Tehran, too, to abide by founding. Tehran trains and legitimate national resistance their rules. But because they funds Hezbollah, and the The other connection is the struggle-in the same way that the don't have any confidence in the organization has made clever use result of how Israel's onslaught fact that the Vietnamese were Iranian regime, they wish that backed by this or that of the funds that it gets. It on Gaza has been so they could overthrow it in one Communist country didn't mean organizes several kinds of social traumatizing for the whole way or another. That's their basic in the least that they were not services and a social network, region. goal: what they call in fighting for the liberation of their which helps huge numbers of Whatever the original Washingtonese "regime country. Shiite families. motivation for Hezbollah's change." operation that captured the It also managed to translate the With the prevailing replica of the Israelis-I'm saying this, because clout built through the resistance Cold War imperialist mentality, Hezbollah's chief Hassan in political terms, when it Hezbollah is presented as a mere Nasrallah said that it had been entered the elections. Hezbollah agency of Iran. Now, to be sure, months in the planning-when it has an important fraction in the it's no secret to anyone that took place, it was seen across the Lebanese parliament and there Hezbollah is closely linked to whole Middle East as a are even Hezbollah ministers in both Damascus and Tehran. And legitimate and necessary gesture the Lebanese government. Hezbollah would have been of solidarity with the people of foolish to undertake its July 12 So it's not a "terrorist" Gaza who are being crushed by attack without some degree of organization, as Washington's Israel. That's why there was a lot coordination with its backers. and Israel's terrorist of sympathy for it. governments call it. It is a mass So what? Unlike those of the party fully involved in the legal Like in Lebanon now, Israel Afghan mujahadeen, when they political life in Lebanon. used the pretext of the abduction were fighting against the Soviet of one of its soldiers in Gaza to occupation of their country, the No one in Lebanon, except for a hold the whole population weapons Hezbollah is using are, tiny minority of ultra hostage and begin a frenzy of of course, not U.S.-made or reactionaries, considers what destruction and murder that falls U.S.-provided! Hezbollah does in confronting into the canons of state mass Israel to be "terrorism." The terrorism of the worst sort It is absolutely normal for forces Lebanese government itself known in history. confronted with much more 9 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Lebanon Changing the Rules of the Game? Let it Be!

A Statement

Revolutionary Communist Group - Lebanon

By their attempt to kill a large number of unarmed civilians, Lebanese areas, with what that weapons, especially through and to destroy infrastructure that has been previously destroyed implies concerning the friendly forces in the world. many times, the current Zionist government, in response to disarmament of the resistance, Fourth: This current battle won't "The sincere promise" operation that the fighters of Hezbollah putting an end to its role in be the only one which our lately performed, aims at changing the rules of the game, confronting the occupation, and implementing the remaining peoples will find themselves making the Lebanese people pay a very high and recurring items of Resolution 1559. This obliged to fight against the price. at a time when the country needs Israeli aggression, behind which are the allies of Israel in the To achieve this, the Zionist borders of the strip, for the the utmost solidarity and unity in Imperialist west. This calls, government doesn't only count purpose of trading him for the face of the destructive war on its sweeping military power, detainees in the Israeli prisons. that Israel is launching against above all, for the surpassing of but also on official Arab and the Lebanese people. It is the the current confessional face of international collusion, which is The latest operation, during same story being repeated again the resistance, towards the extremely disgraceful and which the fighters of Hezbollah and again, the story of the Trojan retrieval of its general national flagrant. This collusion is succeeded in kidnapping two horse, ready for use at the right face, and which is accomplished performed by different Israeli soldiers, was faced with a moment to complete the reversal through the entrance of the governments in Europe and disgraceful official Arab position of the political, social and broadest scope of national and America, particularly, but also (the same previously faced by economic balances in its favour progressive forces once again the Arab governments, primarily the Palestinian operation). It and the favour of its masters into the resistance, in an the Saudi, which held the represents, in fact, (almost) the outside the country. atmosphere of deep Islamic resistance "fully only shining solidarity collaboration and agreement To answer all this, requires responsible" for "uncalculated movement with the struggle of with the Islamic resistance. continuous work to gather the adventures" and that "it should the Palestinian people and for largest political and popular face, alone, the consequences of the easing of its pains and Fifth: Concerning the complaint front - in solidarity with the the conflict it created"!! This miseries. At the same time it to the United Nations, whatever heroic act that the fighters of the disgraceful position was later expresses loyalty to the cause of the reality of the balance of resistance accomplished; not taken also by the Egyptian the Lebanese detainees and their powers inside the security submitting to the local and Arab president Mubarak and the Palestinian and Arab comrades council is, and the almost and international pressures; Jordanian King Abdullah the in the Zionist prisons. absolute American hegemony refusing to hand over the two Second in a joint statement. inside it, Lebanon has to insist Second: Facing the respect for kidnapped soldiers except under on the immediate and human dignity with which this the conditions which the The current situation is open to unconditional halt of the Israeli operation, which only targeted secretary general of Hezbollah numerous possibilities, and it aggression, on the one hand, and soldiers, was characterized, we announced. It is essential to requires taking into for full compensation by Israel cannot but notice the mean spirit defeat the current Israel war consideration the following for the human and material that we hear from the local right aims and open the road to what visions, conclusions and losses that this aggression tendencies: wing, tied to world Imperialism, the military analyst in Israeli caused, on the other hand. which is very cautious to avoid Haaretz newspaper Zeif Shev First: "The sincere promise" did any form of confrontation with expected, "if Israel loses this Sixth: Furthermore, there is an not come like lightning in a clear Israel, looking only to its confrontation"... "its strategic utmost need to respond to the sky. Israel has been making daily material interests, and to the and military stance in the region collaborating and weak stand of aggressions, by sea and air, billions of dollars that were will change, and its deterrence the official Arab regimes, and against Lebanese sovereignty; expected within the tourism will be shaken against the specially to the Saudi stand there are still many Lebanese sector during this summer. It is a guerrilla fighting and the rocket which is flagrant in its hostility detainees in Israeli prisons; tens mean spirit that was expressed in weaponry". of martyrs' bodies are not statements by many of the towards the resistance, and in its returned to their parents. The figures of what is called the 14 Third: The current and almost actual collaboration with the Israeli army continues bombing March coalition, and specifically absolute capability of Israel to Israeli aggression, by calling for the Gaza strip, killing by the Prime Minister Fuad continue its destruction of vital the Arab masses, in all their Palestinian civilians and Saniora and his government. installations and infrastructure, nations, to hit the streets, and assassinating activists and These statements and speeches and in committing wide express their condemnation and militants in Gaza and the not only distanced themselves massacres, is specifically due, to anger against their governments' occupied West Bank, on the from any solidarity with the the absence of necessary positions, and in sincere pretext of retrieving the soldier operation, but also seemed to artillery against its military air solidarity with the resistance of Jelaad Shalit who was condemn it and its participants, force. This requires the attempt, the Palestinian and Lebanese previously kidnapped by calling for the completion of the starting now, and in any possible peoples against the Zionist Palestinian organizations on the Lebanese army's control of all ways, to provide this type of occupation and aggression. 10 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Middle East Israel's new Lebanon war

Statement by Socialist Resistance (England and Wales)

Piers Mostyn

They must develop their activity to force the Egyptian, Jordanian, and Mauritanian governments to withdraw their recognition of Israel and completely cut their relationships with it, and to force the other governments which The present war in Lebanon began with the kidnapping of two and killing of three Israeli soldiers have various kinds of ties and by Hizbollah. The Israeli Defence Force responded with a massive campaign of air strikes across agreements and normalization Lebanon. Hizbollah in turn responded by firing missiles into Israel. On the simple basis of this acts with Israel, to put a final end to them. chronology, IDF actions cannot be explained as "self defence" against the Hizbollah missile attacks. In any event they were grossly disproportionate, deliberately targeting densely populated The inaction of the Arab regimes civilian areas and basic infrastructure. Of the hundreds of civilians to have died over three weeks, must not excuse the Syrian 20 are Lebanese for every one Israeli. regime, whose officials only gave verbal meaningless support In the first instance therefore, only awaited a pretext. In any Lebanese society - meaning that so far, without giving any direct this is a war of criminal event, once Hizbollah called for the party is accepted as a actual support to the Lebanese aggression by the Israeli state - an immediate unconditional legitimate democratic entity by people in its current fierce designed to destabilise Lebanon ceasefire, the Israeli state (in nearly all strands of that society, confrontation. and the region and assert the refusing to agree) was entirely whatever the disagreements over Zionist state's power by bullying responsible for any continued politics or religion. It is a Seventh: The struggle against weak and compliant states into violence. resistance movement that owes Israel is an essential part of the submission. The real Israeli it's origins to the 1982 Israeli struggle against all the forces of agenda was set out early on by The Hizbollah kidnapping came invasion of the country (which oppression and hegemony and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, to after two weeks of an Israeli involved the notorious Sabra and exploitation. Starting from this wage war against the "axis of onslaught on Gaza - that still Shatilla refugee camp massacres understanding, requires of the evil that stretches from Teheran continues at full strength - organised by Olmert's free people of the world and to Damascus." slaughtering civilians, predecessor as PM and political forces opposing capitalist kidnapping politicians and mentor, Ariel Sharon) and 18 globalization and war to build Blame for the war cannot be others and destroying basic years of occupation. Its serious and active solidarity with ascribed to Hizbollah's initial infrastructure. This in turn legitimacy stems from its role in the Lebanese and Palestinian action - however risky any followed months of sanctions resisting this occupation and peoples, and against Israel and military engagement with the against the democratically finally driving Israel out - in the the current war that the generals IDF may be. To state otherwise elected Hamas-led Palestinian context of the unwillingness or of Tel Aviv are launching. It is a is to accept that the people of Administration designed to inability of other forces in fight which can begin to deepen Lebanon, Palestine and smash it. The European Union Lebanon or the Arab world to the bloody dilemma that the elsewhere should just sit on their and the USA both supported the take action. occupying and aggressive state hands. blockade. Pro-western regimes of Israel faces, and to initiate a across the Arab world were As socialists in favour of It was a very limited response to silent. UN relief organisations secularism in politics, we cannot start to its ending, in as much as a long history of IDF kidnapping and other NGOs all declared a give political support to a global and genuinely of Lebanese citizens, an illegal major humanitarian crisis. Non- Hizbollah given its religious international front is formed to occupation of the Shab'aa Farms EU Switzerland was the sole character. Nonetheless, like show solidarity with the two area of the country and repeated western state voicing protest. Hamas it is strongly rooted in peoples and their struggle for bombings and other aggressive Hizbollah's action was and serves a community that is liberation, sovereignty and just cross border incursions. And as undoubtedly a legitimate act of religious. Like Hamas it is often peace. In this context, the rules even staunch supporters of the solidarity against this general wrongly characterised as of the game might really change, Israeli state have pointed out the trend - interpreted and welcome "fundamentalist" when it has but this time not for the interest IDF onslaught made no sense as such on the street in Gaza and nothing in common with of Israel! militarily if the primary aim was across the Middle East. Taliban-style politics. It has, by 15-07-2006 releasing prisoners or stopping its actions, shown willing to Hizbollah missiles. It is Hizbollah is not a "terrorist" work with other forces for the The Revolutionary Communist Group therefore logical to assume that organisation, whatever that is. It unity of a multi-confessional are sympathisers with the Fourth the origins of this onslaught are is a mass movement with dozens International in Lebanon. Lebanon. independent. Experienced of MPs and ministers in the observers, like veteran Israeli national government. This Whilst reserving the right to oppositionist Uri Avnery believe government is a coalition that criticise its politics and tactics, it was years in the planning and straddles all sections of we nonetheless call for 11 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

socialists, anti-imperialists and have been no mass rallies in southern Lebanon - fearing thank Hizbollah for its anti-war activists to show denouncing Hizbollah despite that it may be an inadequate tool "sacrifices" in defence of unconditional solidarity with its the tremendous devastation and for the desired forcible Lebanon's sovereignty. The resistance to Israel's murderous loss of life across the country. destruction of Hizbollah. subsequent climbdown over a attack and other attempts to Israel has failed to shift the ceasefire is a humiliation for the interfere with the right of the question of "Hizbollah Which is not to say that any mammoth Washington-financed Lebanese people to free self- disarmament" from its previous international intervention into and organised war machine - determination. position within the politics of Lebanon - whether under the made worse by a context of five Lebanon - one to be resolved guise or the UN, NATO or other years of failed war aims in Given the Israeli state's stance in internally, by agreement of all umbrella - should be supported. Afghanistan and Iraq. claiming to "root out Hizbollah parties, if at all. On the contrary it should be terrorism", it is ironic that the opposed. History, in Lebanon The USA and Britain have been Prime Minister of Lebanon, Another interpretation is that and elsewhere, has shown that steadfast in providing which Israel sees as an ally, this was no Israeli such an intervention, whatever unconditional and uncritical himself described Hizbollah as a miscalculation and it was a it's terms would inevitably be for support for Israel. This support "resistance movement" as the frustration at Hizbollah's the purpose of imposing an for the deliberate mass murder of bombs rained down on Beirut. integration into the country's agenda dominated by the major civilians has been transparently And in back door diplomatic body politic that fed a desire to imperialist powers - the same obvious to the whole world negotiations by the USA and smash it - this was an exercise in forces that control the security despite the paper-thin attempt to European powers, Hizbollah has attempted regime change. This council and have set the pace in hide it behind the diplomatic entrusted the speaker of the would explain the targeting of the so-called "peace process" in nicety of "opposing an Lebanese Parliament, a member the Lebanese army and even one Israel/Palestine. immediate ceasefire" or "the of the Shia-based Amal party to or two Christian communities - necessity of laying out the basis speak on their behalf. Therefore almost as though to teach them a Whatever the Israeli state's for a lasting peace". attempts "root out" Hizbollah lesson. Certainly once it was calculation, the apparent threaten to pull down with it the apparent that air strikes were not political and military failure was US/British perspectives have political as well as economic and sufficient, the military invasion underlined by a sudden U-turn in been so indistinguishable to social infrastructure. was underway the IDF took on announcing a temporary Olmert's that they have used the job for itself. ceasefire, only 48 hours after almost exactly the same words. It seems that Israeli strategists dismissing the possibility, in On the 18th July Blair explained may have been fooled by In this context the deliberate response to global outrage at the the war aims in terms of "an arc Western propaganda about last targeting of an unarmed UN murderous attack on the village of extremism right across that year's "Cedar Revolution" (in outpost and Red Cross of Qana leaving over 60 civilians region, that wants to disrupt the which mass mobilisations ambulances - despite the risk of dead. This despite Hizbollah process towards democracy and following the murder of Rafik increasing international isolation having, that day, launched it's freedom, whether it's in Iraq or Harriri and the fingering of the - may have been calculated as highest daily number of missiles, in Lebanon or down in the Syrian government for being necessary to remove any almost three weeks after the start Palestinian territory, that arc of involved led to Syria being independent observers from the of war. extremism is being supported by driven out) and the Lebanese scene before the real slaughter. A countries like Iran and Syria". elections that followed. It may not dissimilar tactic to the If clarity were needed, be that Olmert sought to drive a deliberate targeting of hospitals Lebanon's Prime Minister Fouad The next day he said, "We need sectarian wedge into Lebanese and doctors during ferocious US Siniora told Condoleeza Rice to recognise the fundamental society to get other communities assaults on Fallujah and other she was not welcome to return to nature of the struggle in the to turn on Hizbollah - similar to cities in Iraq - in order to Beirut until the US changed its region which has far reaching Israel's utilisation of the Falange minimise independent reports of stance - an unheard of statement consequences far beyond our and Christian right forces during atrocities. from the leader of a small, own region and even in countries the 1970s civil war and the 18 impoverished pro-western like our own. All over the year occupation. These considerations may also government. As though to rub in Middle East there are those who explain the reluctance of Israel the apparent collapse of want to modernise their nations If so, this seems to have been a and it's backers to embrace the Israeli/US/British military who believe as we do in massive miscalculation. There idea of a new international force objectives, Siniora went on to democracy and liberty and 12 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

tolerance. But ranged against But things haven't gone to plan. enthusiastically fought for and We face a highly volatile them are extremists who believe There have been protests across implemented five years worth of situation. If Israel and the the opposite who believe in the middle East. Pro-Western war mongering across the imperialists succeed in their fundamentalist states and war dictatorial regimes like Saudi Middle East and a "war on aims of smashing Hizbollah and not against Israeli actions, but Arabia, that have sat on their terror" against the muslim re-organising Lebanon this against its existence. In virtually hands or given a tacit nod to this community at home. Similarly would be a strategic victory in every country of the region aggression, are openly when supine Foreign Secretary the strategy across the region following which there will be including on the streets of concerned about destabilisation. Margaret Beckett woke from her further aggression against Iran Baghdad such a struggle is being slumbers long enough to protest played out". Who can doubt that Israeli public support for the war and any other less than has largely remained rock solid. at US planes sending bombs to compliant state. the Israeli state, as it always has Israel stopping over in done, is acting as regional proxy There have been no mass protests. But the small protests Prestwich, Glasgow. These splits However if this war does not for imperialism? have a capacity to grow, as the and vacilliations simply go to succeed and, as current events Imperialist war aims are to lies about the purpose and show quite how weak Blair is possibly indicate - it radicalises opposition to Zionism and continue by other means what conduct of the war become and how much pressure the imperialism across Lebanese has been so disastrously obvious and the military, human, government is under. He should society and a host of other Arab impossible in other parts of the financial and diplomatic costs go now. states against Israel and its Middle East. The debacle in Iraq become apparent. Support for backers - it could become a and Afghanistan and anxiety those small forces of opposition During the furore over the recent small but significant step over the risks of any military within Israeli society is a crucial raid in Forest Gate, East London towards shifting the balance of attack on Iran have destabilised element to solidarity within the and the anniversary of the imperialist states. murder of Jean Charles de political forces against the Bush/Blair goal of re- imperialism. organising the region around an Menezes, Blair's line was Another key task in Britain is to consistently that these steps will imperialist military-economic target British complicity. Public Solidarity action continues to be continue to be necessary to game plan. The new "domino opinion has quickly understood urgently and visibly needed. "protect" British citizens against theory" of "democratic the true picture, opposing the revolutions" installing a series of terrorism. Not only will the Piers Mostyn is a supporter of government's craven stance by a Socialist Resistance, a socialist compliant pro-western clear majority. Unlike the Iraq current British state stance newspaper produced by British governments on the model of war there is no fig leaf of outrage the Muslim community, supporters of the Fourth International in conjuction with other marxists. Jordan and Egypt, across the overthrowing a brutal dictator or but it once again demonstrates region has been thrown off removing WMDs. Here emperor that the imperialist state is the course in Iraq. Elections in Blair, from the start, had no cause and driving force behind Palestine, Egypt and even clothes. His usual moral claim of instability and danger. Lebanon have given democratic "humanitarian interventionism" legitimacy to precisely those was immediately revealed as it's forces the war was designed to opposite - moral bankruptcy and eradicate. collusion with war crimes. Already he is paying a price with The increasing focus for this deep splits at the highest level of imperialist anxiety is Iranian his government among the most influence in Iraq, Lebanon and senior and loyal cabinet elsewhere. The Lebanon ministers - one of whom, Straw, onslaught thus appears to be has broken the basic principle of conceived as a new route to British parliamentary politics - fulfilling these aims - hitting collective cabinet responsibility. what had been perceived as a soft spot - a "small" guerrilla Of course Straw and others organisation in a mixed country deserve absolutely no credit for historically aligned to the West. this stance, having 13 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Middle East The future of Israel is at stake

Michel Warschawski

"We must reduce to dust the villages of the south [ . . . ] I don't changing the situation in The hatred generated by the understand why there is still electricity there." Lebanon, and not PM Olmert or bombardment of Beirut - the Defense Minister Peretz. She is destruction of Lebanon's With these words, Israeli Using the pretext of the the one who has succeeded, until infrastructure, the hundreds of Minister of Justice and former capturing of two Israeli soldiers, now, in standing against civilian deaths, the hundreds of Labor Party leader, Haim the Israeli government has international pressures in favor thousands of refugees, the Ramon, summarized his decided to open a new front in of a cease fire. [ . . . ] In order to scorched earth policy in the suggestions for the continuation the global, non-ending, be successful, she needs military south - is immense throughout of the military offensive in preemptive war of re- cards, which, unfortunately, the Muslim world. It may even Lebanon, following the failure colonization. They are ready to Israel has not yet been able to rapidly contaminate the Muslim of the invasion of Bint Jbail. As send their soldiers to open the deliver. Except the punishment communities in the northern for the Israeli military high way for the "new democracy in by fire of Hezbollah and countries. Moreover, unlike in command, supported in the the Middle East" and to sacrifice Lebanon [sic], the military previous, apparently similar cabinet by Labor minister its own population as collateral Israeli cards have been limited, crises such as the invasion of Benjamin Ben Eliezer, the victims of this new kind of Lebanon in 1982, this hatred is until today, to the conquest of solution is to occupy a portion of ethnic war. This is clearly developing on the fertile ground two Lebanese villages near the South Lebanon after destroying expressed in an expensive of the global war of border. If Israel doesn't improve all the villages. According to this advertisement published by the civilizational discourse and an its military cards in the fighting, plan, Israel will "ask" the local Israeli neo-cons on the front ethnicization of the conflict. we will feel the results in the population to leave prior to the page of Ha'aretz: Consequently, it will be destruction of the villages by political solution." [2] extremely difficult to eradicate way of several dozens of SMS Israel is at the forefront of the In these words, senior political this anger after the clouds of messages. Those who would war against world Jihad. We battle dissipate and the dead are and military analyst Ze'ev Schiff decide to stay, or, more simply, have two options: either to buried. summarizes the nature of the US don't receive the "humanitarian" strengthen the fanatics, through secretary of state's visit to SMS call, would be considered withdrawal and separation, Olmert, Peretz, and Halutz are Jerusalem this weekend. terrorists. through unilateral retreat, which the most dangerous and irresponsible leaders Israel has will make of Israel the scene of Sooner or later, however, the US Horrible? Indeed, but not the main struggle between ever had, playing with a fire unexpected. The Israeli war in administration will have to which may burn away our very fanatical Islam and the accept a political solution, based Lebanon is the paradigm of war enlightened world, or to national existence in the Middle more or less on what was in the 21st century - wars of strengthen the moderates [ . . . ] East. recently outlined in Rome. That world re-colonization and the and to transform Israel into the is, until the next round in this On the weak shoulders of the subjugation of the peoples of the world center of justice and non-ending preemptive war, in small Israeli anti-war movement earth to Empire. interfaith [sic] understanding. In which Israel will continue stand not only the fate of the the Middle East there are no In these wars, the lives of playing its role as the armed present Israeli citizenry and the short-cuts. civilians are not only of very vanguard of the so-called moral decency of our society, limited value - as in all wars - At the end of the advertisement, civilized world. but the very future of our but considered as a legitimate a short end note: "Remember: children in this part of the world. What the Israeli public fails to target, actively or passively distorted philosophical understand is the dramatic "We refuse to be enemies!" is guilty of supporting terrorism: a sensitivity [sic] to human lives implications that their one of the slogans of our terrorism which is, in fact, part will make us pay the real price of government's policy has on the demonstrations. Never before of their very culture. In ten the lives of many, and the blood state's very existence in the heart has such a slogan been so years, we witnessed a gradual of our sons." [1] evolution of the dominant of the Arab and Muslim worlds. important, so urgent, and so existential. discourse: from terrorist groups, While more and more voices By its unlimited brutality and its to terrorist states, to terrorist among the Israeli public are civilizational rhetoric and Michel Warschawski is a journalist peoples. The ultimate logic of challenging, if not the strategy, the State of Israel is and writer and a founder of the the global war is full legitimacy, at least the scope of demonstrating to the peoples of Alternative Information Center (AIC) in ethnicization of the conflicts, in the region that it is, and wants to Israel. His books include On the the present military operation, Border (South End Press) and which one is not fighting a the US administration is remain, a foreign and hostile Towards an Open Tomb - the Crisis of policy, a government, or specific demanding that Israel not body in the Middle East: no Israeli Society (Monthly Review targets, but a "threat" identified surrender to the pressures of more than an armed extension of Press). with a community. Fear is the those who are working for a the United States of America and NOTES starting point of the new era, cease-fire: its anti-Muslim crusade of the hatred is its finality. This is the 21st century. [1] Ha'aretz, 30 July 2006 reason why the neo-cons of the US Secretary of State, US administration are speaking Condoleezza Rice is the leading Everyone knows the fate of the [2] Ha'aretz, 30 July 2006 of a non-ending war. figure of the strategy aimed at Crusaders, ten centuries ago. 14 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Middle East Twin Battles

Interview by Andrew Kennedy

Gilbert Achcar

AK. It seems clear that Israel was just waiting for a pretext to launch its action, and So when Hariri, and the Saudis behind him, Hizbollah provided it. Is that your view? went into dispute with Syria, France offered Washington its help in sponsoring UN GA. Israel's goal is indeed clearer than Hizbollah's was when they mounted the July 12 resolution 1559, which called for the operation. It seems that the operation had been prepared by Hizbollah for several months, as withdrawal of Syrian forces from Lebanon as Hassan Nasrallah said, and they regarded it chiefly as a way of obtaining the release of well as the disarming of non-government Lebanese prisoners in Israeli jails through an exchange. It was not meant originally as a reaction armed groups in the country, meaning to the events in Gaza-though it was perceived by the Arab public opinion as a gesture of Hizbollah and the Palestinian refugee camps. solidarity with the Palestinian population. At any rate, Hizbollah was certainly not expecting an Since 2004 France has thus worked in close Israeli reaction on this scale. alliance with the US on the issue of Lebanon. Israel's goal is very clear and was stated from The US conditions for a ceasefire are But the latest offensive has caused cracks in the beginning. The July 12 operation was identical to those defined by the Israelis and the alliance. The Saudis denounced seized upon as a pretext to launch an concerted with them. As Washington puts it, Hizbollah at first, but as the Israeli offensive that had also very obviously been this is part of the Bush administration's 'war aggression became more obviously brutal in preparation for a long time. The goal, of on terror': Israel's aggression fits with the and murderous and impacted on Arab public course, was to obtain Hizbollah's destruction: US-led imperialist war drive launched since opinion, the Saudis, the Egyptians, the what the Israeli army was not able to achieve 9/11 in this part of the world where two- Jordanians, all Washington's Arab clients during its occupation of Lebanon, it now thirds of world oil resources lie beneath the have had to shift their stance and tell wanted to obtain by forcing the Lebanese to ground. Washington: Your Israeli friends are going to do it and pushing the country to the brink of spoil the whole thing, we are reaching a civil war. On the other side of the fence, what the US- boiling point which is quite dangerous, it is Israel alliance is fighting through Hizbollah time to stop. The crisis is getting increasingly The Israeli government rejected the idea of is Iran or the Iran-led alliance in the area, an international contingent at first, insisting perilous for the whole stability of pro-US including Shiite forces in Iraq, the Syrian regimes-for example in Egypt the Muslim that only the Lebanese Army should go regime and the appeal of this alliance to south, thus indicating that it wanted the Brotherhood is capitalising on the situation. Sunni fundamentalists like Hamas and the Lebanese to disarm Hizbollah. The Israeli Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, which Chirac has taken the middle ground since strategy was on the one hand to deal supported Hizbollah in the recent crisis. then-pleasing the Saudis more than Bush in Hizbollah direct blows and on the other hand calling for an immediate ceasefire and an to take the whole Lebanese population So there are two conflicts intertwined in the international troop presence based on a hostage in order to obtain what it wanted present war-the direct one consisting of political agreement. from the Lebanese government. In light of Israel's aggression against Hizbollah and Israel's military failure to deal Hizbollah a Lebanon, and the indirect one consisting of In your July 15 interview with Liberazione major blow and its political failure so far to the US campaign against Iran. The UN you said that Israeli military action could split the Lebanese population, they have Security Council has just adopted a US- radicalise the Lebanese population more settled for a revised objective whereby sponsored resolution on the issue of Iran's against Israel than against Hizbollah. Is that European Nato forces would be deployed in nuclear program-quite impudently, given that happening? south Lebanon-with or without a UN fig leaf. the same Council has not yet called for the It is happening indeed and beyond my Who are the main actors here? Is this a proxy cessation of Israel's mass slaughter in expectations. The very brutality of the Israeli war by the US? How far does this tie in with Lebanon. aggression is actually counterproductive for Israel's own interests and aims? Israeli goals-and is unifying Lebanon in What role does France play in all this? resisting the Israeli offensive. Israel's The coincidence of the objectives of the onslaught has been so murderous, so governments of Israel and the US has never The French position has evolved. In 2004 Jacques Chirac offered the US a common indiscriminate, that the great majority of the historically been so transparent as it has been Lebanese have drawn the same conclusions: front at the UN against Syrian forces in since 2001, when George W. Bush came to firstly, that the Israeli offensive was prepared Lebanon. Their basic interests converged, power in the US followed by Sharon in Israel. long ago so that the whole discussion of the contrary to what was the case with regard to The degree of openness of their collusion is July 12 operation is somewhat irrelevant, as Iraq. In this case, the French are mainly unprecedented. Never has the US so blatantly it was clearly used as a pretext; secondly, that interested in Saudi money. Just a few days and openly endorsed an Israeli aggression. Israel is not targeting Hizbollah alone and not The Israeli army is doing the military work ago, they signed a deal for a big sale of even the Shiites only, but the whole while the US is doing the diplomatic work, weapons to the Saudi kingdom. Chirac's population. blocking ceasefire resolutions and buying friendship with Hariri, father and son, fits Israel the time needed to fulfil its military very well within this framework-as everyone The whole country is being held hostage. The objectives, while supplying it with the knows, the Hariri clan is closely linked to the whole economy is destroyed. True, the needed weaponry. Saudis. offensive has mostly killed Lebanese Shiites- 15 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

probably over 1000 already if one includes capable of evolving leftwards. Is that a those still under the rubble-but in terms of fantasy? lives affected, impoverished, and ruined, a huge number of Lebanese are affected, and Basically, yes. Even a plebeian group like Israel is clearly perceived as the enemy of the Muqtada al Sadr's organisation in Iraq is Lebanese people as a whole. more socially threatening to the bourgeoisie than Hizbollah. The latter, of course, is At a more general regional level, the hatred radical in its opposition to Israel, as is usual for Israel and the US is reaching new peaks. with Islamic fundamentalist forces linked to All this will undoubtedly fuel the growth of Iran, but in Lebanese politics Hizbollah is terrorist organisations of the Al Qaeda type. integrated fully into the system. It has two I'm afraid that what we have seen up to now- ministers in the government that is dominated More than 100,000 people marched 9/11, 7/7 and Madrid-is but a foretaste of by Hariri-led US clients and it allies itself against the war in London, August 5 horrors to come that will affect the civilian with quite reactionary figures. populations in the West. True, it organises social services, but only as saying they do not want to occupy south Has the Lebanese Left been able to play churches or charities do-they represent no Lebanon again-for good reason. much of a role in giving political shape to this social threat whatsoever to the bourgeois In Palestine, when the cost of keeping direct national wave of anger and defiance? Or are social order. There is not even a potential for control over the Palestinian-populated they marginalized? that, given Hizbollah's ideology, its structure, territories became too high after the first its close links to Iran and to Syria. Iran, Intifada of 1987-88, Israel ended up The Lebanese Communist Party (LCP) is a Hizbollah's model of society and state, is relinquishing that direct control. But it plans shadow of its former self, of what it used to utterly bourgeois in its social structure. to maintain the bulk of its colonial be in the 70s and 80s. It was one of the most Whatever populist ranting Ahmadinejad (the important Communist Parties in the Arab settlements in the West Bank as well as its Iranian president) may have given vent to, direct control over the borders between the world, relative to the size of the country, and last year, in his electoral battle for the one of the major actors in the civil war of Palestinian-populated areas and presidency against the capitalist Rafsanjani, neighbouring countries, whether Gaza's 1975-1990. The LCP was the first to launch these do not translate into any kind of attacks against the Israeli occupation in 1982, border with Egypt or the stretch of land along concrete social measures. the Jordan river isolating the West Bank from after the invasion settled down, in the name Jordan. of the 'national resistance'. In that respect, Chavez's Venezuela is a far more progressive state: Iran is not a Muslim Is Israel more vulnerable now? Only later were the 'Islamic resistance' and equivalent of Venezuela. Such equivalents Hizbollah launched. Hizbollah dealt with the existed in the Middle East in the 60s, but it is This question relates to a point long made by LCP as a rival since the latter's main social out of their defeat that Islamic Jewish critics of Zionism. Far from becoming base was among Shiites and in southern fundamentalism was able to grow. the sanctuary for the Jews of the world that Lebanon, that is among Hisbollah's target the Zionists promised, Israel is more and constituency. Hizbollah built itself partially Ben Gurion had the idea that Israel's more turning into a deadly trap for its Jewish through fighting the LCP over this frontiers should be natural- the Litani river in inhabitants. The old warning by anti-Zionist constituency and managed to prevail. In that, the North and the river Jordan in the East. Is Jews is getting more and more relevant it was greatly helped by Iranian backing and this what links the attacks on Lebanon and because of the evolution in destructive by the fact that it played on the dominant the Palestinians? techniques and weaponry. Israel is exposing ideological trend in the region that was in its own population to huge risks. favour of Islamic fundamentalism since the The Greater Israel schemes are obsolete and 1970s, whereas the LCP lacked political have been so for a very long time. Hizbollah's Israel's ruthless, barbaric way of dealing with boldness and was deeply affected by the rockets are a further proof of the fact that the Palestinians and the Lebanese feeds unfolding crisis of the Soviet Union. 'natural boundaries' do not mean much. Even hatred against it in the whole area. This will after it invaded Lebanon in 1982, Israel could certainly result in many people wanting to In the 1990s the LCP itself went into deep not keep the newly occupied territory under inflict on the Israelis the most painful damage crisis, splitting and fragmenting. What its direct control for long. possible, compared to which Hizbollah's remains is not completely invisible, but it is Katyusha rockets might look quite benign. It no longer in a position to play an important These are mountainous areas suitable for takes some 50 Hizbollah rockets to kill one role-unfortunately, as it is the major left-wing guerrilla struggle, and the Lebanese Israeli on average in the ongoing grouping in the country. Hence, Lebanon is population has undergone military training confrontation. But what if devices could be no exception to the general rule in the area: through several years of civil war. Hence the made to inflict mass destruction on Israel? the historical failure of nationalist forces and huge caution of Israeli troops in penetrating That is what Israel is inciting against itself. the failure of the Left have created a vacuum south Lebanon after July 12. The Israeli that has been filled by Islamic Defence Force took just three villages in the Zawahiri, Bin Laden's second-in-command, fundamentalists. first two weeks and at relatively high cost; it made a statement calling for strikes against met fierce resistance. It decided to resort to Israel as if he wanted to outbid Hizbollah. Some on the British Left would probably like flattening the little town of Bint Jubail after Israel is presently inflicting a terrible to entertain the idea that Hizbollah is proving unable to control it. The Israelis keep nightmare on the Lebanese, it has been 16 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Lebanon The 33-Day War and UNSC Resolution 1701

Gilbert Achcar inflicting a permanent nightmare on the Palestinians, but it is also preparing an appalling nightmare for its own people.

What are the prospects for building a new Arab socialist Left? What can socialists and anti-imperialists do? The resolution adopted by the UN Security Council on August 11, 2006 fully satisfies In the Arab world nowadays the space for neither Israel nor Washington nor Hezbollah. This does not mean that it is "fair and building a socialist Left is quite marginal, the balanced": it only means that it is a temporary expression of a military stalemate. Left is ideologically isolated. Nonetheless Hezbollah could not inflict a major military defeat on Israel, a possibility that was there should be a permanent effort at always excluded by the utterly disproportionate balance of forces in the same way that rebuilding a socialist Left and that cannot be it was impossible for the Vietnamese resistance to inflict a major military defeat on the done by tail-ending Islamic fundamentalism. U.S.; but neither could Israel inflict a major military defeat - or actually any defeat Left-wing activists should not let the whatsoever - on Hezbollah. fundamentalists occupy alone the terrain of the fight against imperialism and the Zionist In this sense, Hezbollah is undoubtedly the which a rocket was launched at its territory, state, as some sections of them tend to do, but real political victor and Israel the real loser in even though rockets were fired from it is clear that the Left won't become a match the 33-day war that erupted on July 12, and wastelands. for the religious forces in this respect anytime no speech by Ehud Olmert or George W. soon. Bush can alter this obvious truth. [1] The stratagem succeeded at that time in alienating from the PLO a significant part of In many other fields, however, the In order to understand what is at stake, it is the population of southern Lebanon, aided by fundamentalists are no competitors-when necessary to summarize the U.S.-backed the fact that reactionary leaders were still a they are not foes: in the fight for workers' and goals that Israel was pursuing in its offensive. major force down there and that the peasants' rights and interests, the rights of the The central goal of the Israeli onslaught was, Palestinian guerillas could easily be unemployed, women's rights, the fight of course, to destroy Hezbollah. Israel sought repudiated as alien since their behavior was to achieve this goal through the combination against sexual oppression, for secularism, generally disastrous. This time, given the liberty of conscience and freedom from the of three major means. incomparably better status of Hezbollah rule of religion in social life, etc. These are among Lebanese Shiites, Israel thought that it issues around which the Left in the Arab The first one consisted in dealing Hezbollah could achieve the same effect simply by world should intensely campaign-but it a fatal blow through an intensive "post- dramatically increasing the scope and should do so without expecting to achieve a heroic," i.e. cowardly, bombing campaign brutality of the collective punishment. breakthrough in the near future, lest it get exploiting Israel's "overwhelming and rapidly demoralized. asymmetric advantage" in firepower. The campaign aimed at cutting Hezbollah's road The third means consisted in massively and The building of a new Socialist Left in the of supplies, destroying much of its military gravely disrupting the life of the Lebanese Arab region can be helped by the infrastructure (stocks of rockets, rocket population as a whole and holding it hostage international Left. Even though Latin launchers, etc.), eliminating a major number through an air, sea and land blockade so as to America is quite far away, the Left turn there of its fighters and decapitating it by incite this population, especially the is inspiring. But the main influence on the assassinating Hassan Nasrallah and other key communities other than Shiite, against development of a socialist force in the party leaders. Hezbollah, and thus create a political climate Middle East will come from Europe, where conducive to military action by the Lebanese The second means pursued consisted in there is a significant socialist Left. army against the Shiite organization. This is turning Hezbollah's mass base among why, at the onset of the offensive, Israeli The antiwar movement in Western countries Lebanese Shiites against the party, which officials stated that they did not want any Israel would designate as responsible for has been very important in educating the force but the Lebanese army to deploy in their tragedy through a frenzied PSYOP Arab public that this is not a clash of southern Lebanon, rejecting specifically an campaign. This required, of course, that civilisations or of religions, but an imperialist international force and spitting on the Israel inflict a massive disaster on Lebanese war drive serving capitalist interests and existing UNIFIL. opposed as such by social movements in the Shiites by an extensive criminal bombing West. The progress of the social movement in campaign that deliberately flattened whole This project has actually been the goal of villages and neighborhoods and killed Europe can only have beneficial effects in the Washington and Paris ever since they worked hundreds and hundreds of civilians. Middle East. For that, it is also crucial for the together on producing UN Security Council European socialist Left to stand at the This was not the first time that Israel had resolution 1559 in September 2004 that forefront of the struggle against resorted to this kind of stratagem - a standard called for the withdrawal of Syrian troops Islamophobia, thus undermining the Islamic war crime. When the PLO was active in from Lebanon and "the disbanding and fundamentalist propaganda that is nurtured southern Lebanon, in what was called disarmament of all Lebanese and non- by this very same Islamophobia. "Fatahland" before the first Israeli invasion in Lebanese militias," i.e. Hezbollah and the This interview will appear in the September edition of 1978, Israel used to heavily pound the organizations of the Palestinians in their Socialist Outlook. inhabited area all around the point from refugee camps. 17 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Washington had believed that, once Syrian There is no need to dwell any further on strains arise between Washington's agenda forces were removed from Lebanon, the Israel's most blatant failure: reading the and the concerns of its oldest Middle Eastern Lebanese army, which has been equipped and avalanche of critical comments from Israeli clients and protégés. Israel's new Lebanon trained chiefly by the Pentagon, would be sources is more than sufficient and most war was such an opportunity: as soon as able to "disband and disarm" Hezbollah. The revealing. One of the sharpest comments was Israel's murderous aggression proved Syrian army effectively withdrew from the one expressed by three-time "Defense" counterproductive from the standpoint of the Lebanon in April 2005, not because of the minister Moshe Arens, indisputably an Saudi ruling family, who are terrified by an pressure from Washington and Paris, but due expert. He wrote a short article in Haaretz increasing destabilization of the Middle East to the political turmoil and mass mobilization that speaks volumes: that could prove fatal for their interests, they that resulted from the assassination, in requested a cessation of the war and a switch February of that year, of Lebanese former "They [Ehud Olmert, Amir Peretz and Tzipi to alternative means. Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, a very close Livni] had a few days of glory when they still friend of the Saudi ruling class. believed that the IAF's [Israeli Air Force's] Paris immediately came out in favor of this bombing of Lebanon would make short shrift attitude, and Washington ended up following The balance of forces in the country, in light of Hezbollah and bring us victory without suit, but only after giving the Israeli of the mass demonstrations and counter- pain. But as the war they so grossly aggression a few more days to try to score demonstrations that occurred, did not make it mismanaged wore on... gradually the air went some face-saving military achievement. The possible for the U.S.-allied coalition to out of them. Here and there, they still let off first draft resolution crafted by the two envisage a settlement of the Hezbollah issue some bellicose declarations, but they started capitals circulated at the UN on August 5. It by force. They were even obliged to wage the looking for an exit - how to extricate was a blatant attempt at achieving ensuing parliamentary elections in May in a themselves from the turn of events they were diplomatically what Israel had not been able broad coalition with Hezbollah, and rule the obviously incapable of managing. to achieve militarily. The draft, while stating country thereafter through a coalition "strong support" for Lebanon's sovereignty, They grasped for straws, and what better government including two Hezbollah nevertheless called for the reopening of its straw than the United Nations Security ministers. This disappointing outcome airports and harbors only "for verifiably and Council. No need to score a military victory prompted Washington to give Israel a green purely civilian purposes" and provided for over Hezbollah. Let the UN declare a cease- light for its military intervention. It needed the establishment of an "international fire, and Olmert, Peretz, and Livni can only a suitable pretext, which the Hezbollah's embargo on the sale or supply of arms and cross-border operation on July 12 provided. simply declare victory, whether you believe it or not.... The war, which according to our related material to Lebanon except as Measured against the central goal and the leaders was supposed to restore Israel's authorized by its government," in other three means described above, the Israeli deterrent posture, has within one month words an embargo on Hezbollah. offensive was a total and blatant failure. Most succeeded in destroying it." [3] It reasserted resolution 1559, calling for a obviously, Hezbollah was not destroyed - far further resolution that would authorize from it. It has retained the bulk of both its Arens speaks the truth: as Israel proved "under Chapter VII of the Charter the political structure and its military force, increasingly unable to score any of the goals deployment of a UN-mandated international indulging in the luxury of shelling northern that it had set for itself at the onset of its new force to support the Lebanese armed forces Israel up to the very last moment before the war, it started looking for an exit. While it and government in providing a secure ceasefire on the morning of August 14. compensated for its failure by an escalation in the destructive and revengeful fury that it environment and contribute to the It has not been cut off from its mass base; if unleashed over Lebanon, its U.S. sponsors implementation of a permanent cease-fire anything, this mass base has been switched their attitude at the UN. After and a long-term solution." This formulation considerably extended, not only among having bought time for Israel for more than is so vague that it could only mean, actually, Lebanese Shiites, but among all other three weeks by blocking any attempt at an international force authorized to wage Lebanese religious communities as well, not discussing a Security Council resolution military operations (Chapter VII of the UN to mention the huge prestige that this war calling for a ceasefire - one of the most Charter) in order to implement resolution brought to Hezbollah, especially in the Arab dramatic cases of paralysis in the history of 1559 by force, in alliance with the Lebanese region and the rest of the Muslim world. Last the 61-year old intergovernmental institution army. but not least, all this has led to a shift in the - Washington decided to take over and overall balance of forces in Lebanon in a continue Israel's war by diplomatic means. Moreover, no provision restricted this force direction that is the exact opposite of what to the area south of the Litani River, the area Washington and Israel expected: Hezbollah By switching its attitude, Washington which under the draft resolution was to be emerged much stronger and more feared by converged again with Paris on the issue of free of Hezbollah's armament, and the limit its declared or undeclared opponents, the Lebanon. Sharing with the U.S. a common, of the zone that Israel has requested to be friends of the U.S. and the Saudi kingdom. albeit rival, dedication to taking the most out secured after having failed to get rid of of Saudi riches, especially by selling the Hezbollah in the rest of Lebanon. This meant The Lebanese government essentially sided Saudi rulers military hardware [4], Paris that the UN force could have been called with Hezbollah, making the protest against regularly and opportunistically stays on the upon to act against Hezbollah in the rest of the Israeli aggression its priority. [2] right side of the Saudis every time some Lebanon. 18 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

This project was totally unwarranted by what Combined, the two precedent formulations Israel had achieved on the ground, however, come quite close to a Chapter VII mandate, and the draft was therefore defeated. or could easily be interpreted in this way, at Hezbollah came out strongly against it, any rate. Moreover, the mandate of UNIFIL making it clear that it would not accept any is actually extended by Resolution 1701 international force but the existing UNIFIL, beyond its "areas of deployement," as it can the UN force deployed along Lebanon's now "assist the government of Lebanon at its border with Israel (the "Blue Line") since request" in its effort to "secure its borders and 1978. The Lebanese government conveyed other entry points to prevent the entry in Hezbollah's opposition and request for Lebanon without its consent of arms or changes, backed by the chorus of Arab states related materiel" - a sentence that definitely Hezbollah fighter including all U.S. clients. Washington had no does not refer to Lebanon's border with Israel choice then, but to revise the draft as it would but to its border with Syria, which runs the though he offered to respect the 1996 not have passed a vote at the Security length of the country, from north to south. agreement whereby operations of both sides Council anyway. These are the major traps in Resolution 1701, would be restricted to military targets and and not the wording about the withdrawal of spare civilians. In this regard, Nasrallah Moreover, Washington's ally, French the Israeli occupation army that many stressed that his movement started shelling President Jacques Chirac - whose country is comments have focused on, as Israel's northern Israel only as a reaction to Israel's expected to provide the major component of withdrawal is actually propelled by the bombing of Lebanon after the July 12 the international force and lead it - had deterrent force of Hezbollah, not by any UN operation, and that Israel was to be blamed himself declared publicly two weeks into the resolution. for extending the war to the civilians in the fighting that no deployment was possible first place. without prior agreement with Hezbollah. [5] Hezbollah decided to give its green light for the approval by the Lebanese government of Nasrallah then stated a position toward The draft was therefore revised and Resolution 1701. Hassan Nasrallah gave a Resolution 1701 that could best be described renegotiated, while Washington asked Israel speech on August 12, explaining the decision as approval with many reservations, pending to brandish the threat of a major ground of the party to agree to the UN-mandated verification in practical implementation. He offensive and to actually start implementing deployment. It included a much more sober expressed his protest against the unfairness of it as a means of pressure in order to enable assessment of the situation than in some of the resolution, which refrained in its Washington to get the best possible deal from his previous speeches and a good deal of preambles from any condemnation of Israel's its standpoint. In order to facilitate an political wisdom. "Today, Nasrallah said, we aggression and war crimes, adding however agreement leading to a ceasefire that became face the reasonable and possible natural that it could have been much worse and more and more urgent for humanitarian results of the great steadfastness that the reasons, Hezbollah accepted the deployment Lebanese expressed from their various expressing his appreciation for the diplomatic of 15,000 Lebanese troops south of the Litani positions." This soberness was necessary, as efforts that prevented that from happening. River and softened its general position. any boastful claim of victory - like those that His key point was to stress the fact that Resolution 1701 could thus be pushed where cheaply expressed by Hezbollah's Hezbollah considers some of the issues that through at the Security Council on August 11. backers in Tehran and Damascus - would the resolution dealt with to be Lebanese have required Nasrallah to add, like king internal affairs that ought to be discussed and Washington and Paris's main concession was Pyrrhus of Ancient Greece, "One more such settled by the Lebanese themselves - to which to abandon the project of creating an ad-hoc victory and I shall be lost!" Hezbollah's he added an emphasis on preserving multinational force under Chapter VII. leader wisely and explicitly rejected entering Lebanese national unity and solidarity. Instead, the resolution authorizes "an into a polemic about the assessment of the Nasrallah's position was the most correct increase in the force strength of UNIFIL to a war's results, stressing that "our real priority" possible given the circumstances. Hezbollah maximum of 15,000 troops," thus revamping is to stop the aggression, recover the had to make concessions to facilitate the and considerably swelling the existing UN occupied territory and "achieve security and ending of the war. As the whole population of force. The main trick, however, was to stability in our country and the return of the redefine the mandate of this force so that it refugees and displaced persons." Lebanon was held hostage by Israel, any could now "assist the Lebanese armed forces intransigent attitude would have had terrible in taking steps" towards "the establishment Nasrallah defined the practical position of his humanitarian consequences over and above between the Blue Line and the Litani river of movement as such: to abide by the ceasefire; the already appalling results of Israel's an area free of any armed personnel, assets to fully cooperate with "all that can facilitate destructive and murderous fury. Hezbollah and weapons other than those of the the return of our displaced and refugee knows perfectly well that the real issue is less government of Lebanon and of UNIFIL." people to their homes, to their houses, and all the wording of a UN Security Council UNIFIL can now as well "take all necessary that can facilitate humanitarian and rescue resolution than its actual interpretation and action in areas of deployment of its forces operations." He did so while expressing the implementation, and in that respect what is and as it deems within its capabilities, to readiness of his movement to continue the determinant is the situation and balance of ensure that its area of operations is not legitimate fight against the Israeli army as forces on the ground. To George W. Bush's utilized for hostile activities of any kind." long as it remains in Lebanese territory, and Ehud Olmert's vain boasting about their 19 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

victory as embodied supposedly in standing behind it and with the advantage of the countries expected to send the principal Resolution 1701, one needs only to quote its intimate link with the Lebanese Shiite contingents are all NATO members: along Moshe Arens pre-emptive reply in the population that was the principal target of the with France, Italy and Turkey are on standby, already quoted article: Israeli war of revenge. As senior Israeli while Germany and Spain are being urged to military analyst Ze'ev Schiff put it in Haaretz: follow suit. Hezbollah is no fool however. It "The appropriate rhetoric has already started "A lot also depends on who will aid in the is already engaged in dissuading France from flying. So what if the whole world sees this reconstruction of southern Lebanon; if it is executing its plan of sending elite combat diplomatic arrangement - which Israel agreed done by Hezbollah, the Shiite population of troops backed by the stationing of the single to while it was still receiving a daily dose of the south will be indebted to Tehran. This French air-carrier close to Lebanon's shores Hezbollah rockets - as a defeat suffered by should be prevented." [6] This message has in the Mediterranean. Israel at the hands of a few thousand been received loud and clear in Washington, Hezbollah fighters? So what if nobody Riyadh and Beirut. Prominent articles in On the last issue, the antiwar movement in believes that an 'emboldened' UNIFIL force today's mainstream press in the U.S. are NATO countries could greatly help the will disarm Hezbollah, and that Hezbollah sounding the alarm on this score. struggle of the Lebanese national resistance with thousands of rockets still in its arsenal and the cause of peace in Lebanon by and truly emboldened by this month's success The third issue, naturally, is the mobilizing against the dispatch of any NATO against the mighty Israel Defense Forces, "disarmament" of Hezbollah in the zone troops to Lebanon, thus contributing to will now become a partner for peace?" delimited in southern Lebanon for the joint deterring their governments from trying to do deployment of the Lebanese army and the Washington's and Israel's dirty work. What The real "continuation of the war by other revamped UNIFIL. The most that Hezbollah Lebanon needs is the presence of truly means" has already started in full in Lebanon. is ready to concede in this respect is to "hide" neutral peacekeeping forces at its southern At stake are four main issues, here reviewed its weapons south of the Litani River, i.e. to borders and, above all, that its people be in reverse order of priority. The first issue, on refrain from displaying them and to keep permitted to settle Lebanon's internal the domestic Lebanese level, is the fate of the them in covert storage. Any step beyond that, problems through peaceful political means. cabinet. The existing parliamentary majority not to mention a Lebanon-wide disarmament All other roads lead to a renewal of in Lebanon resulted from elections flawed by of Hezbollah, is linked by the organization to Lebanon's civil war, at a time when the a defective and distorting electoral law that a set of conditions that start from Lebanon's Middle East, and the whole world for that the Syrian-dominated regime had enforced. recovery of the 1967-occupied Shebaa farms matter, is already having a hard time coping and end with the emergence of a government with the consequences of the civil war that One of its major consequences was the and army able and determined to defend the Washington has ignited and is fueling in Iraq. distortion of the representation of the country's sovereignty against Israel. Christian constituencies, with great under- August 16, 2006 representation of the movement led by This issue is the first major problem against former General Michel Aoun who entered which the implementation of Resolution NOTES into an alliance with Hezbollah after the 1701 could stumble, as no country on earth is election. Moreover, the recent war affected readily in a position to try to disarm [1] On the global and regional implications of these deeply the political mood of the Lebanese Hezbollah by force, a task that the most events, see my article "The Sinking Ship of U.S. Imperial Designs," posted on ZNet, August 7, 2006. population, and the legitimacy of the present formidable modern army in the whole Middle parliamentary majority is thus highly East and one of the world's major military [2] As an Israeli observer put it in an article with a quite disputable. Of course, any change in the powers has blatantly failed to achieve. This revealing title: "It was a mistake to believe that military pressure could generate a process whereby the Lebanese government in favor of Hezbollah and its means that any deployment south of the government would disarm Hizbullah." Efraim Inbar, allies would radically alter the meaning of Litani River, whether Lebanese or UN- "Prepare for the next round," Jerusalem Post, August 15, resolution 1701 as its interpretation depends mandated, will have to accept Hezbollah's 2006. very much on the Lebanese government's offer, with or without camouflage. [3] Moshe Arens, "Let the devil take tomorrow," Haaretz, attitude. One major concern in this regard, August 13, 2006. however, is to avoid any slide toward a The fourth issue, of course, is the renewed civil war in Lebanon: That's what composition and intent of the new UNIFIL [4] Both the U.S. and France concluded major arms deals with the Saudis in July. Hassan Nasrallah had in mind when he contingents. The original plan of Washington emphasized the importance of "national and Paris was to repeat in Lebanon what is [5] Interview with Le Monde, July 27, 2006. unity." taking place in Afghanistan where a NATO auxiliary force with a UN fig leaf is waging [6] Ze'ev Schiff, "Delayed ground offensive clashes with diplomatic timetable," Haaretz, August 13, 2006. The second issue, also on the domestic Washington's war. Hezbollah's resilience on Lebanese level, is the reconstruction effort. the military as well as on the political level Hariri and his Saudi backers had built up thwarted this plan. Washington and Paris their political influence in Lebanon by believed they could implement it dominating the reconstruction efforts after nevertheless under a disguised form and Lebanon's 15-year war ended in 1990. This gradually, until political conditions were met time they will be faced by an intensive in Lebanon for a showdown pitting NATO competition from Hezbollah, with Iran and its local allies against Hezbollah. Indeed, 20 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Lebanon Hezbollah's Victory (2000)

Gilbert Achcar

Written at the time of the Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon, in May 2000, News from Within, a publication of the Alternative Information Center in Jerusalem, published an interview with Gilbert Achcar which provides useful background.

Q: Hezbollah's victory gives a broad the coffins of GI's landing back in the US PLO leadership that had been accumulating blueprint of a comprehensive strategy were during the Vietnam War. In both cases, concessions and capitulations for many (military, political) in defeating Israeli the population of the invader country became years. And he got what he wanted, to a degree occupation. Can you evaluate the possibility more and more opposed to a war effort that that he could not have even imagined when of its reproduction elsewhere? was clearly devoid of any moral justification. he started the talks with the Arafat leadership! Instead of building on the Achcar: In order to do so, one has to separate This had already been experienced by Israel impetus of the Intifada, and doing everything the various elements of this "broad blueprint" since the beginning of its full-scale invasion possible to sustain it until they got the as you call it. Let us start with the military of Lebanon in 1982. The withdrawal from withdrawal of the Israeli army from the entire aspect, since you mention it: I would say that Beirut in 1982, and later on from most of the populated areas - without betraying anything the peculiarities of the Lebanese terrain occupied Lebanese territory in 1985, were of what they stood for previously and with should be as obvious to anyone in the Arab mainly motivated by the fact that the Israeli very minimal accommodations, negotiated world as the peculiarities of the Iraqi terrain population could not endorse a situation in not by the PLO but by the leadership of the are now to anyone in Washington who took which Israeli soldiers were facing death Intifada within the territories - the Arafat the 1991 Gulf War as a "broad blueprint" for every day for the sake of an occupation leadership went into what even some Zionist further US interventions. I mean that, just as which could hardly be justified, even from a commentators described as an ignominious the desert is the ideal terrain for taking full mainstream Zionist view. So the key issue is surrender, leading to the execrable situation advantage of the superiority in air power (as that of the balance between the cost and prevailing now. proven by the great contrast between the six benefits of an occupation: whereas in the weeks of carpet-bombing of the Iraqi troops Golan the benefits for Israel exceed the Hezbollah acted differently: they kept up the in 1991 and the poor results of NATO's air present costs, in southern Lebanon the pressure uncompromisingly. And they forced campaign against the Federal Republic of reverse was very obviously true. the unconditional and total withdrawal of the Yugoslavia in 1999), the mountainous and Israeli army from the Lebanese territories populous character of southern Lebanon Let us now extrapolate to the Palestinian occupied since 1978 (the remnant goes back should be taken into consideration before occupied territories: during twenty years the to the 1967 War). A tremendous victory, generalizing its experience into a "broad benefits clearly exceeded the costs from the indeed! And surely a feat that the Palestinian blueprint". viewpoint of Israeli "security." The desperate population will ponder and from which they "guerrilla" operations of the Palestinian will draw some inspiration. This being said, what should be emphasized Resistance could not counterbalance the in the first place is that the victory in southern feeling of enhanced security stemming from Q: To what extent is the Hezbollah victory a Lebanon was not a "military" victory. The the extension of the border to the Jordan slap in the face for the imperialist agenda in Israeli army has not been defeated militarily: River. The situation began to change the region? What might we expect from it in it was much less exhausted than the US dramatically with the mass mobilization of the future? forces in Vietnam, and even in the latter case the Intifada. This made the cost nearly it would be quite improper to talk of a intolerable for the morale of the Israeli army Achcar: The Lebanese victory is certainly a "military defeat." In both cases, the defeat is and for the reputation of Israel in its backer defeat for the US agenda which, like that of primarily a political defeat of the countries. The pressure mounted within the its Israeli ally, foresaw the insertion of this governments, against a background of an Israeli army, up to its highest ranks, in favor withdrawal into an overall peace agreement increasingly reluctant population in the of a withdrawal of the troops from the with Syria including all sorts of conditions, invader country. In that regard, the military populated areas, and their redeployment in concessions and guarantees obtained for action finds its value in its political impact, those strategic parts of the West Bank where Israel. Besides, Israel is the "most brilliant" and not primarily in its direct military impact. no Palestinians are concentrated. proxy of the US armed forces, the one always The guerrilla actions of the Lebanese quoted as an example to follow. And here is a Resistance against the occupation - which It is precisely to this pressure from the withdrawal, taking the shape of a debacle, was very far, even proportionally, from military that Rabin was responding when he evoking irresistibly the images of the US matching the scale of the Vietnamese entered the Oslo negotiations. He tried to get debacle in Vietnam, in1975 - incidentally just Resistance - were mainly effective through the highest possible price for the at the time of the 25th anniversary of the their impact on the Israeli population, just as implementation of this withdrawal from a latter! This is a new vindication of the 21 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

famous "dare to struggle, dare to win" that But they were never a key force in the To be sure, they also took advantage of the inspired so bravely the Vietnamese Resistance movement: they lost their impetus ideological winds, which blew much more in Resistance. And it can be expected that it will long ago to the benefit of Hezbollah, and their direction than in the direction of a left contribute to reversing the winds of turned into a purely conservative and that became utterly demoralized by the defeatism that have swept through such a big patronage-based party. collapse of the Soviet Union. part of those who once used to fight imperialist domination. Hezbollah conducted all sorts of operations Q: What are the implications of the to establish their monopoly over the Hezbollah victory on the relation of the However with regard to the US agenda in the resistance movement, up to repeated political forces in Lebanon? For the Middle East, I think that the main change in onslaughts against the Communists, Palestinian refugees there? And for the entire the Israeli agenda - which will certainly be murdering some of their key Shiite cadres in region? integrated in the agenda of the next US particular. The CP behaved in a most servile Achcar: One thing is sure. This victory will administration - is that the prospect of a manner, not daring to retaliate and instead greatly enhance the appeal of Hezbollah in peace treaty with Syria is pushed back calling on the "brothers" in the Islamic Lebanon, and of the Islamic fundamentalists indefinitely. The Zionist establishment is Resistance to behave in a brotherly manner - in the whole region. In Lebanon, Hezbollah definitely not eager to relinquish the Golan a call which has no real chance of being faces an objective limitation due to the for the sake of just establishing relations with heard if it is not backed by decisive action to religiously very composite character of the Syria, relations that will never be "normal" show the damage that could result, precisely, population. Hezbollah are inherently unable anyhow. And they are all the less eager to do from the alternative behavior! Such an to win over Christians, Druzes, or even Sunni so in that the Syrian dictator Hafiz Al-Assad attitude contributed greatly to the progressive Muslims, in any significant numbers. They is on the verge of death [he died in June shift in the balance of forces to the advantage are no threat to the Palestinian refugees, since 2000] and the political future of the country of Hezbollah. Many of the most militant their Islamic universalism make them is highly uncertain. members of the Lebanese left among the champions of the Palestinian cause. In that Shiites were attracted to Hezbollah. sense, they are actually competitors to the Q: Why has the Lebanese victory been Palestinian forces in Lebanon, whether claimed by Hezbollah alone? Were not other We should recall that at the beginning of the Arafat loyalists or left dissidents; at best they forces - Palestinians, Lebanese Left - Lebanese civil war in 1975 there was no can contribute to strengthen the Palestinian involved in the resistance movement? If not, Hezbollah and the CP was the major militant Islamic fundamentalist tendencies. why not? force among the Shiite population in southern Lebanon. The party started losing ground to In that sense too, their victory is a bad omen Achcar: The reason Hezbollah appeared as the advantage of Amal first, and Hezbollah to Arafat, obviously, as I have already the only father of victory (as the saying goes, later after 1982. In both cases the lesson was explained. Among Palestinians in the West victory usually has several fathers, whereas the same: all these movements were Bank and Gaza, Hamas members are the only defeat is an orphan) is that they did appealing to the same constituency, i.e. the ones likely to be boosted by Hezbollah everything they could to monopolize the traditionally very militant Shiite population triumphalism. More generally, we can say prestige of the resistance movement. After of southern Lebanon. In such a competition, that this victory will be precious for the the 1982 Israeli invasion, you had an uneasy the shyest is doomed to lose inevitably, all the whole Islamic fundamentalist movement in coexistence and competition between two more so when you don't even dare to put countering the negative impact of the recent tendencies in the fight against the occupier: forward your own radical program and you events in Iran. Those who thought they could the Lebanese National Resistance, dominated end up tail-ending the dominant communalist already bury Islamic fundamentalism (a by the Lebanese Communist Party, and the forces. Here again you need to dare to French "Orientalist" recently produced a Islamic Resistance, dominated by Hezbollah. struggle and dare to win! book heralding the terminal decline of this The Palestinian forces had been wiped out phenomenon) are blatantly refuted. As long from southern Lebanon by the invaders; Hezbollah have been very effective on that as they have no real competitor for the those remaining in the refugee camps were score. They were definitely very "daring" in embodiment of the aspirations of the not really a match for Hezbollah, especially their actions, inspired by their quasi-mystical downtrodden masses, and as long as the since some Lebanese forces like the Shiite views of martyrdom. And they knew also social effects of "globalization" are with us, communalist militias of Amal were keen on how to win the souls and minds of the the fundamentalists will also be part of the preventing them from spreading again out of population, by making a very clever use of picture, with ups and downs naturally. the camps. Amal are still there - they are the significant funding they got from Iran, among those who recuperated the stretch of thus organizing all kinds of social services to land abandoned by Israel and its local proxy. the benefit of the impoverished population. 22 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Italy Chomsky, Tariq Ali criticise Rifondazione on Afghanistan, back antiwar MPs

Tariq Ali, Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky (right) and Tariq Ali World-famous academic and peace campaigner Noam Chomsky, and well known writer and socialist campainer Tariq Ali have added their voices to those calling for Rifondazione to change its position on Italian troops in Afghanistan and backing Tariq Ali - An Open Letter to Fausto Bertinotti antiwar MPs. Here we publish Tariq's open letter to Fausto Dear Fausto, Bertinotti and Chomsky's statement, with an introduction by Gilbert Achcar. I was surprised to hear that Rifondazione was preparing to vote in favour of keeping Italian troops in Afghanistan, for 'humanitarian Introduction by Gilbert Since l'Unione holds no majority reasons'. I want to try and convince you that this would be a serious Achcar in the Senate without the eight error, just as I argued in the last century with those on the left, who Senators, there is tremendous supported the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan. Eight members of the Italian pressure being exerted on the Senate and two members of the latter to get them to change their Big powers or surrogate states "They are sweltering and dying Italian Chamber of Deputies, all stance, in the name of coalition acting on their behalf have no in Helmand not to prop up an belonging to the left-wing of the solidarity and interest, including right to occupy countries. The embattled regime in Kabul, for ruling coalition (l'Unione, led by a threat to move the decree by two big projects of the global which they are hopelessly Prime Minister Romano Prodi) means of a vote of confidence neo-liberal order have been (1) undermanned, but to keep have announced their intention that would face them with the to insist that the new capitalism NATO alive in Europe, an to vote against the government choice between reneging on is the 'sole' way of organising unworthy mission... How did the on the issue of Afghanistan. their stance or letting the humankinf from now till the Americans induce Nato in 2004 government fall. planet implodes and (2) to to become Hamid Karzai's Silvio Berlusconi, Italy's disregard national sovereignty as mercenary army? What previous Premier and George W. However, the latter threat is a key to international relations in intelligence did the cabinet Bush's buddy, had sent 1,300 defused by the announcement by the name of 'human rights'. receive from Washington, where Italian troops to Afghanistan as a some members of the "center- officials openly spoke of component of the Nato force right" that they will vote for the A few weeks after 9/11, I dumping Afghanistan on uppity operating there, as well as 2,600 decree extending the mission of debated a leading Bush NATO to teach it a lesson after troops to Iraq as part of Bush's Italian troops in Afghanistan, as ideologue, Charles the Balkan shambles? ...Every "coalition of the willing." they don't want to abstain on an Krauthammer for one hour on assessment I have heard issue that they support Canadian television. He suggests that the sort of The new "center-left" wholeheartedly, particularly admitted that the war in campaign envisaged by the government, betraying the since the Afghan deployment Afghanistan was as I had put it 'a government in southern expectations of the majority of was initiated by the Berlusconi crude war of revenge.' Afghanistan would require not its electors, has announced a government to which they 3,000 or even 10,000 troops, but phased withdrawal of troops belonged. Three days ago the CIA over 100,000. Even the latter from Iraq that doesn't differ disbanded its special unit created total has failed in Iraq, and Iraqis much from the one Berlusconi To counter the pressures exerted to track and exterminate Osama cannot hold a candle to Afghans had already negotiated with the on them, the antiwar MPs have Bin Laden, a tacit for insurgent fanaticism." (The US government. At the same launched a petition and called acknowledgement that the Guardian, 5 July, 2006) time, l'Unione has proclaimed its for expressions of support. situation had changed drastically intention to extend the mission These will be reported at an since 9/11. So what is the There is simply no excuse for the of Italian troops in Afghanistan, important antiwar assembly, function of NATO armies in NATO presence in Afghanistan despite the fact that Nato forces organized by the Peace Afghanistan. 'Human Rights'? except that of pleasing in that country, recently movement and the antiwar MPs, Even conservative journalists in Washington. In recent weeks the redeployed toward the South, are to be held in Rome on July 15. Britain (whose soldiers are being killing of Afghan civilians has increasingly engaged in war The debate and vote in the killed regularly) would laugh at increased tenfold. Headlines activities, acting as US auxiliary Senate will take place in the last any such assumption. One of which speak of '500 Taliban forces. week of July. them, Simon Jenkins, recently killed' are deliberate returned from a trip to Kabul and disinformation. As was predicted Even if Italian troops were not The build-up of support, wrote a public warning to Blair: by some of us at the time, the sent to the South, they would including international support, Afghans do not like being nevertheless be part of Nato's for the antiwar Italian MPs is "The debacle of Britain-in- occupied and would begin to war-machine. The Afghan thus very important for their Afghanistan cannot be ignored, resist sooner or later. Fausto, ask fight and their ability to resist the people are of course entitled to because British troops are at yourself why there should be any pressure. To support the anti-war security, but neither US troops, risk. They were never meant to foreign troops there at all. nor the troops of the US- MPs, sign the petition. be at risk and their presence in dominated Nato, can provide that country has nothing to do That the centre-left supports this. with British security. NATO and backs most US wars 23 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

is well-known. Let them do it withdrawal you will be Italian Leftists Appeal with the support of Fini, Bossi swimming in a dangerous sea. and Berlusconi (they are, after Don't forget the pathetic Withdraw Italian troops from all, of the same opinion). imperial past of your own state. The invasions of Albania and Afghanistan! Why should the occupation of a Abbyssinia by Mussolini were foreign country be treated as a explained by the same logic: we Support needed from international Left vote of confidence? And if it is are taking European civilization the honest answer has to be: we to these backward feudal Sinistra Critica (Critical Left) do not have any confidence in monarchic states. Regime the NATO presence in change was not acceptable them Afghanistan. For Rifondazione and it should not be now. to vote in favour would be a The new centre-left italian government of Romano Prodi is tragedy for the European Left I write as an old friend of going to ask parliament to vote for continuing the Italian and I fear can only lead to Rifondazione. I hope I can military presence in Afghanistan. This is a clear break with the remain one after the vote next disasters both in Afghanistan anti-war feelings of the Italian left that were expressed in the and in terms of creating an Tuesday. enomous anti-war mobilizations which took place under the alternative in Italy. Yours fraternally, reactionary Berlusconi government. If you get into arguments such as the character of the regime that Tariq Ali Left senators and members of parliament are under pressure from the might follow a Western goverment to vote against their own convictions. For the moment, eight senators have stated that they will refuse to vote for the Prodi government on this question. As the centre left only has a two vote Noam Chomsky - Letter to the Antiwar MPs majority in the Senate their decision could force Prodi to withdraw the Italian armed forces or to count on the support of the right wing to Dear friends, approve his decision.

I have learned of your appreciation for your insistence To help the left representatives to resist, sign this appeal. To sign it courageous stand against Italy's on upholding the principles of send a mail to: [email protected] participation in military Article 11 of the Italian operations of NATO, as it is Constitution, that "Italy You can also sign it through the website: www.sinistracritica.org, being converted into an repudiates war as an instrument where you will find the Italian text and you can sign by sending your international intervention force of offence against the liberty of full name and e-mail address. subordinate to the United States. other peoples and as a means of resolving international disputes; Expansion of NATO to the East, accepts, on the condition of Don't vote for this mission! in violation of firm guarantees to equality with the other States, In Afghanistan there is a war in which Italy is participating fully Gorbachev when he agreed to a the limitations on sovereignty through the UN mission. The Prodi government, following the line unified Germany within NATO, required for an order which of the previous government has decided to keep Italian troops in was already a very serious threat ensures peace and justice Afghanistan, without chaning its military presence in any way. For to international peace and between nations; promotes and years we have demonstrated against all wars, including the one in security, even apart from the encourages the international Afghanistan, with no ifs nor buts. Italy cannot and must not deceit. organisations established with participate in this mission and the pacifist left, first of which is the that end." The new and still more Party of Communist Refoundation (PRC), must not approve it. We expansive role NATO is Sincerely yours, call on the parliamentary representatives to vote in coherence with assuming poses serious threats their own convictions and on the Unione for it to note this clear position by changing direction and going towards an "exit strategy" to international order. I would Noam Chomsky in Afghanistan and respect of Article 11 of the Constitution included like to express my personal in the governmental programme.

Tariq Ali is a socialist writer and Noam Chomsky is the most broadcaster who has been particularly prestigious theorist of linguistics in the active in anti-imperialist campaigns, English-speaking world. He has been from Vietnam to Iraq. Born and a courageous and tireless critique of brought up in Pakistan, he now lives in American imperialism and the Zionist Sinistra Critica (Critical Left) is a current in Rifondazione, which includes the London. state since the 1960s. comrades of Bandiera Rossa, Italian section of the Fourth International.

24 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Italy Against the Italian intervention in Afghanistan

Senate speech by Franco Turigliatto

Franco Turigliatto

At the end of July, the Italian government led by Romano Prodi from 1999 Washington Pact and question on which nobody can asked the Italian parliament to vote the continuation of the foresees an unnatural and claim an electoral commitment. Italian military mission in Afghanistan. As readers of illegitimate role for the Atlantic Alliance as "world policeman". During these weeks, I've never International Viewpoint know (see appeal) dissenting felt anachronistic, a rebel, or a parliamentarians led by the Sinistra Critica (Critical Left) 3) It is precisely this nature of dissident. On the contrary, never representatives waged a campaign against the decision of the the conflict and of the matters as in these days have I felt so in Party of Communist Refoundation (PRC) to support this we are currently discussing that tune with the 62% who want the governmental move. have led me to view the troops withdrawn from compromise made by the Afghanistan, rising to 73% As the Unione government has a big majority in the Chamber of majority of the government as among Unione voters. Think Deputies, the votes against by SC deputy Salvatore Cannavó and three completely insufficient, as it was about it: how can we fail to others were not a problem for the government. However, in the Senate unable to insert any element of understand that the presence of the government has a majority of only two, and SC has two senators. countertendency into a foreign foreign troops cannot be seen by The government therefore decided to make the vote a question of military intervention project that local people as interference, confidence. After a broad discussion, Sinistra Critica decided its remains permeated by the domination and manipulation. senators should on this occasion vote for (the right wing did not vote multilateralist philosophy and How can we fail to understand and left the chamber). This vote was linked however to a statement, the concept of "humanitarian that our soldiers are viewed as now signed by 16 senators, that they would not vote for this military war", the same that characterised occupiers, like the other military mission when it next comes up in 6 months' time. the Kosovo conflict. forces taking part in a war with a tragic balance sheet of civilian We publish here the speech by SC senator Franco Turigliatto to the Not only does the government victims (97%)? Senate during the debate. not intend to carry out any exit strategy but also it is going so far No, government representatives, "I am speaking in this assembly towards the workers who these as to reinforce the overall no, Members of Parliament, it is with concern, if not to say weeks have told me they military purview to be not just, it is a grave error to distress. The measure under appreciate our battle, but at the implemented in Afghanistan and continue along this path, we discussion euphemistically same time have asked me not to in the Enduring Freedom can't keep our soldiers in refers to international missions, bring the government down, to mission linked to that conflict. Afghanistan to kill and be killed. but as everyone knows, we are allow them to continue to 4) Furthermore, this 5) The government's decision to talking about war, the very war evaluate its actions over the fundamental disagreement is in make this measure a confidence that as we speak, once again in coming months. However, this line with the standpoint that the vote requires that we sacrifice the Middle East, is destroying decision does not take away forces of the radical and pacifist our fundamental dissent so as the lives of hundreds of women, from my underlying irreducible left have stood for and practised not to endanger the government. children and men. Yesterday's and unchangeable dissent with over the past five years, that is, It is a painful choice, weighing conference in Rome was unable regard to a measure (even taking from the time the vote on the heavily on our conscience and to impose a ceasefire or even to into account the massive Afghanistan mission brought a political convictions. We feel demand for withdrawal from have attempted to request it. commitment from this that we have been subjected to Iraq), which simultaneously parliament. This line of conduct blackmail that we will no longer The government has made this contemplates the continuation of is perfectly coherent with the accept in the future. measure a vote of confidence. I the war mission in Afghanistan. positions of the peace have noted the political balance movement, taking a stand from The government should take 2) The fact that this mission is with which minister Chiti has October 2001 on the struggle note of this because on the war indeed a war is affirmed by all approached the problem under against the US war in we cannot go along with a future military analysts and NATO discussion with the so-called Afghanistan and subsequently, vote of confidence. If the itself. It is no coincidence that dissenting opinions in terms of against sending Italian soldiers executive persists in its the respective positions and NATO is calling upon its into that theatre of war. commitment to a war mission it disagreements. member nations to redouble will do so with the votes of those their efforts in terms of men and A coherence that we fully who support this choice; we will 1) I will vote in favour of the resources, and that in February support and which can certainly vote no. Just as we will vote no vote of confidence for a single of the current year, it already not be confined within the game to other military operations, such reason, out of a sense of loyalty changed the rules of engagement of parliamentary tactics or as the Lebanon operation aired and commitment towards the to prepare for the Taliban governmental geometrics. in NATO circles. electorate that has voted out the offensive. This is a war mission Moreover, because no rightwing parties and allowed that is part of the new NATO's governmental programme has If Italy really wants to make a for this government to take form, strategic project that emerged ever decided to confront a contribution to peace in the 25 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Middle East, it will take a Yugoslavia forthright stand against Israel's policy; bombing a defenceless country indiscriminately, with a substantial consensus among Dossier - On Slobodan Milosevic Western countries, provoking incredible devastation among the civilian population. Catherine Samary

It would struggle for the construction of a real Palestinian state and in this framework, for a UN interposition mission, not only between Israel and Lebanon but also on the Gaza Strip and on the 1967 border Faced with the wars of ethnic cleansing which have ravaged Bosnia-Herzegovina, the between Israel and the West dominant theses have centred either on deadly inter-ethnic hatreds or on Slobodan Bank! It would make it clear to Milosevic - the "butcher of the Balkans" or adversary and victim of the great powers. the Israeli government that if This ignores the deep causes of the crisis of v For before this war there was no united Israel is entitled to stability, this the Titoist system and a major political and policy concerning these latter (and will be possible if it recognises specific element concerning the "warlike corresponding pressure on the media); nor the rights of the other peoples of transition" [1] in the former Yugoslavia : the were the media " simply" press organs of the the Middle East, starting with specific alliance that the Serbian president rulers. The pressure which can be exerted on the Palestinian people, that are formed with Franjo Tudjman, the president of currently crushed and denied. the media at a time when governments are Croatia throughout the 1990s. involved in a war did not exist. There were, 6) The peace movement is our rather, other sources of information, This is the real black hole for the real partner in dialogue in this emanating notably from all those who were International Criminal Tribunal for the matter. Nowadays, this effectively attacked by Belgrade. Former Yugoslavia (ICTY - see below) and movement is seeking to re- the great powers, who precisely relied on the establish its own dynamics, its v It is necessary in this framework to accord strong states of the region and their alliances own ideality and its own a particular attention - which would merit to "stabilise the Balkans". ambitions for peace. We believe specific study- to the Croatian propaganda covering the regime of Franjo Tudjman we have contributed actively, But this is also a black hole for those who precisely because it was a major hidden with our explicit statement of presented Milosevic as the adversary of the aggressor supported by the United States and dissent, of reopening a great powers and the progressive Germany [2], because it took as its hostages discussion that already seemed counterweight to all reactionary nationalisms the Muslim refugees, supposed "allies" who closed. - including that of Tudjman. influenced the discourse of Sarajevo, and Different initiatives have been The similarity of the two regimes and the because the alliance between Milosevic- taken in Italy, with our choices of their leaders are much greater than Tudjman and the Bosno-Serbian and Bosno- contribution, and others will be their differences. Croat militias was essential to understanding in future. We will take part in all the war in BH as well as the Dayton Accords. of these, to get to the next vote The real initial choice of the United States to on military missions with the support the Tudjman regime against "Serb- Paradoxically, the demonisation of Milosevic greatest possible forces against Communism", to cover up the aggressive facilitated his defence at the ICTY. the extension of unacceptable dimensions of his policy in the media and to It renders no service to the victims of ethnic military operations. We will do provide him with arms was relayed through this with a clear, transparent the support given by Germany to Croat and cleansing policies. To denounce it does not position; we will do it without Slovene independence. imply any complicity with his regime -but being subjected to any further there are (unhappily) many ways of being blackmail and intimidation. We These orientations gave a certain credibility reactionary, other than being Hitler. Making will do it in the name of peace to the thesis of Milosevic's defenders, this point politically involves taking into and of the political coherence according to which the "great powers" and account all the victims of these policies that characterises our "their media" led an anti-Serb policy of whatever their community, and whatever the commitment, knowing that we demonisation of the Belgrade regime, leading nationality of their aggressors. It gives are only a part of the movement, to the NATO war against Belgrade and the meaning to a left discourse which should go but a necessary one. indictment of Milosevic. beyond the misleading "socialist" and "Yugoslav" labels. Senate intervention 27/7/200 This thesis is supported by the massive propaganda of the media during the NATO But also we should not accept silence on the Franco Turigliatto was elected as a Senator for Piedmont on the PRC list war (see point 4) and by partial truths, but it role and the hypocrisy of the great powers - in last month's elections. He is a is globally false. and demand a balance sheet of the policies member of the Critical Left current pursued. within the PRC, and of the Italian v On the one hand we cannot confuse the section of the Fourth International. role of the media and what influences them, It is necessary then to approach in a distinct concerning the Yugoslav crisis and conflicts manner the general causes of the crisis of the before and during (or after) the NATO war Titoist system and federation to understand (March-June 1999). what led to the wars. Behind a fog of labels 26 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

and ideologies, it is necessary also to evoke the break with the Kremlin in 1948 was Yugoslavia (except for Slovenia). At the the powerful media propaganda and counter- justified in terms of Marx against Stalin, the same time, the system became propaganda. Paris Commune against statism. Self- confederalised: the republics and provinces management was extended to all the spheres acquired growing rights in relation to those of From whence the four following points: of social production, opening real margins of the federal centre, in spite of persistent accountability in conflict with the ambiguities and contradictions (Kosovo and I) the deep internal/external causes of the bureaucratisation of the system of the single Vojvodina had the same representations and crisis of theTitoist regime and federation; party. The majority of intellectuals identified rights as the republics with the constitution of II) From the deconstruction of Titoist massively with the socialist ideals put 1974 - while remaining formally provinces of Yugoslavia (social ownership and forward, while criticising various aspects of Serbia; the "subjects" who were given the multinational federation) to the the system and its reforms. The latter, right of self-determination were ambiguous: recomposition of the dominant/dominated frequent at the time of Tito, were always peoples or states?). nation states. responses by the regime to the social movements and conflicts which appeared, These three sets of factors did not then yield III) The false thesis of the single aggressor: after it had repressed their "leaders". This a coherent and conflict-free system; but being from the Milosevic-Tudjman alliance to the "Titoist" combination of rights and selective associated with a constant economic growth Dayton Accords - test and black hole of the repression produced, on the one hand, an until the end of the 1970s, it was a system dominant analyses of the ICTY. extension of the self-management rights perceived as capable of reforming itself and recognised until the end of the 1970s; but, on of recognising new rights. IV) The NATO war in Kosovo and the the other, repressive measures killing indictment of Milosevic. Again on the ICTY initiative and free thought and the The fourth factor is "external": The Yugoslav enlargement of horizons to manage conflict; project was attractive in terms of its ability to I) Internal/external causes of the the overall effect being incoherence and resist the risks of assimilation and external crisis of the Titoist regime and ineffectiveness. But the rights recognised domination. During the Second World War, federation also gave a feeling of dignity and real social in spite of and against the violence and inter- well being until the end of the 1970s. ethnic hatred propagated by the Croat 1. The points of support of the Titoist regime Ustachi fascists, or the Chetnik partisans of Third factor: the extension of national rights the Serbian dynasty, the partisans (anti- Living together, despite the black pages of was considerable by comparison with the fascist resistance led by the Yugoslav the past, is worth the effort if it involves first Yugoslavia which smothered diversity in Communist Party) organised diverse peoples living better and with more dignity; on the a "unitary" and dictatorial fashion; but there against the foreign occupier, on the basis of a bases of converging living standards. Living remained an inequality of status between multinational popular army, anchored in the better also means feeling more protected Slav peoples, granted the right to self- poor peasantry to whom land was distributed. from external risks together than separately. determination and non-Slav communities And they also built a counter-power on treated as minorities - notably the Albanians, federative bases, prefiguring another In all these respects, we can raise four main who were more numerous than the Yugoslavia resting on the assembly of the factors which gave Tito's party and the Montenegrins. The second Yugoslavia would committees of national liberation (AVNOJ) second Yugoslavia born from the résistance not have emerged without the realisation of a in the reconquered territories, resisting the of the Second World War a real legitimacy federative system, but the conflicts with the diktats of the great powers allied at Yalta - and popular base. The first three are internal, Kremlin prevented the new state from Stalin among them. With a regional impact the other external. orienting itself towards the project of Balkan which tended to escape the Kremlin's control. The first: increases in standards of living confederation with the neighbouring states This is the underlying cause of the These were constant and general throughout which would have facilitated the egalitarian "excommunication" of Titoism by Moscow the country from 1945 to the end of the 1970s treatment of the Albanian question, notably in 1948. But, far from making it disappear, - with rates of growth of production among in Kosovo, and avoid the pre-eminence of the this rupture would force the Yugoslav the highest in the world, near to an average of "Southern Slavs" of Yugoslavia. National Communists to consolidate their popular base 10% per year in the 1950s, subsequently rights would nonetheless evolve according to by radical reforms; encouraging them also to falling to around 6-7%. This country of the the conflicts appearing, in the framework of enlarge, via the non-aligned movement, the capitalist "semi-periphery" before the second socio-economic reforms (what type of international margins of resistance to world war, more than 75% peasant in 1939, planned production and distribution of "campism" that the Cold War wished to was no more than 30% peasant in 1980. The resources?), cultural reforms (in the broadest impose: namely the pressures to submit progress would remain considerable up to the sense, recognition of the minority languages themselves to the domination of Moscow in end of the 1970s: in the area of education (a as official and Bosnian Muslims as an ethnic- the name of resistance to imperialism. In student rate which was among the highest in national reality/religious substratum in the 1968, again, the Soviet intervention in the world - and the highest in Kosovo among same way as the Bosno-Serbs or Bosno- Czechoslovakia was exploited by the regime young Albanians, at the end of the 1970s!), of Croats) and political reforms (what to consolidate by mobilising the people in a social security - extended to peasants, of articulation between mode of decisions at the "popular defence" alongside the official health, of social promotion for the children of federal and republican levels, including in the Yugoslav Army; the rapprochement of links peasant or worker families. election of the cadres of the single party?). with neighbouring Albania was then From the mid-1960s onwards, the consolidated together with the increase of the Second factor: increases in social status, in institutional evolution confirmed a durable rights recognised to the Albanians of Kosovo human dignity. Self-management was very recognition of the distinction between (notably a university in Pristina in the popular among the workers until the crisis of citizenship (civil rights) and "people" (in the Albanian language, then constitutional the 1980s, as surveys by the sociologist Neca ethnic-national sense), the republics being changes going in the direction of a quasi- Jovanov show; its introduction, at the time of nearly all recognised as pluri-national like republic). 27 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

In sum, until the end of the 1970s, the three the more quickly as real or presumed for their action. The old protagonists of a sets of internal factors evoked appeared as adversaries were repressed. socialist alternative critical of Titoism the conquests of a system protecting the mobilised in 1968 had been repressed and its peoples concerned against external The victims of this repression - left or right, protagonists had collapsed into the nationalist aggression - and giving Yugoslavia an Marxist or not, religious believers or not - opposition, or again, particularly if young, international stature of which the people were would re-emerge in the years of crisis, in the had opted for neoliberalism, not forgetting proud. context of a discrediting of a Marxism which those who had preferred exodus or passivity. had become an official religion, benefiting Those who remained in the different 2. Internal/external causes of crisis from their status as victim and rehabilitating Communist Parties were subjected to the pre-Titoist ideologies. discredit of the system and the parallel rise of But the absence of real democracy and of nationalism and a collapse into neoliberalism transparency of the system undermined over Pluralism would emerge then in the worst of a significant part of the former time the progressive and stable content of fashion and in a fog of labels as seen Communists. growth, of rights to self-management and elsewhere in the world. national, individual and collective rights. The Yugoslav Peoples Army (JNA) had been These "endogenous" causes of crisis would consolidated at the institutional level to The suppression of any forceful criticism and be aggravated by external factors. attempt to limit the factors of disintegration. recall faced with the necessary But it defended in fact its privileges on the experimentation of reforms favoured the With the arrival of Mikhaïl Gorbachev in turning in of everyone on themselves and power in 1985, the risk of Soviet intervention scale of a federal state, without real political opacity, hence also waste and indebtedness. disappeared. But Germany and the Vatican coherence, although attached to the tradition Resistance to measures of redistribution were seen in Belgrade (with Austria) as of the Titoist Yugoslav resistance. It was deepened inequality in living standards per favouring Slovene and Croat separatism and wary, from this viewpoint, of Serbian inhabitant between regions. The nation in the globally weaving an anti-Yugoslav and anti- nationalism. Contrary to what has often been ethnic-cultural sense of the Yugoslav Serb conspiracy. There was no longer a said, it intervened in Slovenia, in a "phoney Constitution became increasingly a political "common enemy" as factor of internal war" (with its soldiers unarmed) on the orders nation, as nationalism was used by the party- cohesion. of the head of government the Croat liberal state to increase its privileges of power at the Ante Markovic - the only one to really have a Parallel to this, the break-up of the federation level of the republics and provinces. The Yugoslav orientation - and not at the request and the system was catalysed by a foreign system was increasingly hit by corruption, of Slobodan Milosevic: the latter had neither debt of more than 20 billion dollars by the generalised indebtedness, and an overall the power to do so, nor the intention in this turning point of the 1980s. The increase in ineffectiveness; but the bureaucratic powers sense, while he colluded behind the scenes the price of oil in the 1970s when the country in place, diverting the critiques towards with the Slovene leader, Milan Kucan to indebted itself in a decentralised import nationalist interpretations, diverted the manage the separation. This intervention strategy, then the increase of interest rates on failings of the system onto "others", (which led to several dozen deaths in this private debt brought about by that of US rates destroyed the necessary solidarity and made army, faced with the Slovene Territorial in 1980 contributed, equally with the internal opaque and impossible any outcome based on Defence) produced a major crisis in an army mess, to this " debt crisis" - which similarly socialist, internationalist and self-managed which remained "Yugoslav" before being struck Hungary, Rumania, Poland and the values. nationalist; accelerating the independence of German Democratic Republic (GDR). Slovenia and the disintegration of the Repressive responses to discontent and Yugoslav army (by splits and purges) on the The "visible hand"of the International indebtedness affected growth adversely for basis of new independent states. After the Monetary Fund weighed on the "structural the first time in the 1980s, marking major declarations of independence by Bosnia, adjustments", demanded ever more urgently. ideological reverses, favoured by the context Belgrade withdrew what remained of the The "classic" neoliberal recipes, imposed as of a crisis of socialist projects and neoliberal Yugoslav army of the republic, leaving to the universals at this time had a specific impact offensives in the 1980s. The repression by the militias of the Bosnian Serb nationalist in Yugoslavia: the market and privatisation single party of contested ideologies had leaders the essence of the existing finished off the disintegration of the system meant, as in the USSR and the other countries of self-managed social ownership, infrastructures and armaments. Like other identifying themselves with socialism, aggravating the overall crisis of the whole of generals faithful to the past of Titoist making the party - and then its leadership - the Federation. Faced with four figure resistance, the Serbian general Jovan Divjak the supreme judge of "truths" and of the inflation, the liberal prime minister Ante rallied the Armija of Sarajevo against Serb collective interest, or the "historic" interests Markovic chose, in 1989, the road of "shock nationalism in Bosnia. Based on of the proletariat. The flexibility introduced therapy" inspired by the IMF recipes: the new conscription, the rump Yugoslav army after the break with Stalin in 1948, had been privatisation laws that he implemented established in 1992 (Serbia-Montenegro) broadly challenged with the repression of the sought to break the social resistance to a remained much less the direct instrument of 1970s. The intellectual and revolutionary market which was supposed to reunify the the government in Belgrade than the quality of the leaders trained in the resistance, economy and to give it coherence. paramilitary police forces. internationalism (many of them had participated in the international brigades in At the end of the 1980s, no unifying factor The reformist party of Ante Markovic was Spain) and the anti-fascist struggle was real; was at work on the social-political level. the only political current opposed to the but it did not immunise the effects of the various nationalisms on the Yugoslav scale - privileges of power, nor give them the Whereas the country experienced thousands on free market bases. And it is quite simply "science" of adequate responses to the of atomised strikes ,the workers of Vukovar, not true that liberal capitalism had as its problems which emerged. New cadres, a multi-ethnic town in Croatia ,came to objective and interest the dismantling of all increasingly marked by statism and Belgrade calling for a general strike. But they of Yugoslavia. The IMF, the US and most bureaucratism, invaded the single party all would find no political (or trade union) relays European governments (Germany and the 28 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Vatican apart) had initially hoped rather for a defeat), nor the victory of his discredited retuning to the inegalitarian recomposition of liberal Yugoslav state, and supported Ante neoliberal and pro-NATO adversaries. Much the nation states emerging from the crisis of Markovic, fearing the destabilising aspect of more ambiguous and opaque than these the Titoist system. secessionist nationalisms. Pragmatism propaganda images, the fall of Milosevic prevailed in the evolving alliances and the illustrates first the discredit of his corrupt and II- From the dismantling of Titoism use of conflict - but in a very different context clientelist regime which had won a relative (social ownership and multinational from the Balkan wars at the beginning of the majority in various elections only because of federation) to the recomposition of 20th century and the two world wars between massive abstention and an opposition which dominant/dominated nation states great powers. Independently of any appeared not only divided but often worse privileged alliance and outside of conspiracy than him. The general causes, internal and external of theories, it was primarily the intrinsic the crisis of Titoist Yugoslavia do not exhaust mechanisms of neoliberalism and its It was the appearance of a "credible" the debate because they do not necessarily prescriptions which were responsible candidate (discovered by polling!) [3] that imply war. If we reject the theses of fatal disintegration of the federation - rendering changed the situation - with the decision of interethnic hatreds, we must examine the European construction fragile in a logic of the opposition to support him by forming a political actors in the disintegration, and the competition and privatisation destroying front with nothing else in common than being manner in which the ownership rights and social and national cohesion. "anti-Milosevic", whereas the popularity of national rights which accounted for the Kostunica stemmed from three factors: he popularity of Titoist Yugoslavia - unlike the To the workers, the neoliberalism of Ante had not been corrupted either by the first Yugoslavia of the interwar period [4] - Markovic offered generalised competition, clientelism of the regime or by that of his gave way to a decomposition without end. job insecurity, and wage austerity wrapped in western-funded adversaries; he had radically a share ownership which challenged in criticised the NATO war; and he had The equation of all nationalisms, while practice the self-managed status and its reproached Milosevic not for his Greater having a partial basis, founders on the protections. Serbia orientation but for having in his eyes relations of power and domination. But in the betrayed, in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo by decomposition of Titoist Yugoslavia we As for the great mass of small peasants, the signing the Western peace plans. We are very should bring out the dominant role of the neoliberal programme brought them nothing; far from the explanations founded on the governments in position in Slovenia, Serbia on the contrary, it threatened to suppress the apparent image of a NATO "victory" opening and Croatia, who imposed their choices on social security and protections won under the an era of "progress". But this new "Yugoslav" others. Titoist regime. president no longer had a country (the rump Yugoslavia gave way to the state of Serbia- 1) Statism as a form of challenge to the socio There remains the urban middle layers and Montenegro, on the verge of breaking up) ; economic system and the multinational intellectuals and the bureaucracy of the he no longer had any coherent socio- federation party/state. The neoliberal project of economic political programme to offer in privatisation, far from rallying them on a resistance to the neoliberal polices that his The transformation of the states as regimes Yugoslav basis, would on the contrary erstwhile allies would radicalise. The effects taking decisions on ownership and national differentiate them - each seeking from the of these policies explain the difficulties in rights is of central importance to the state of "its" community protections or building political majorities and the rise of "Yugoslav transition". These regimes have of "clientelist" guarantees of privatisation which the vote for the nationalist right. course used history, memory, media were more credible than those available on propaganda, traumas and fear the Yugoslav scale. The absence of real Slobodan Milosevic was not the cause of all Yugoslav bureaucratic unity also produced the evils and that is why his fall has resolved But in the context of multidimensional crisis, bourgeois aspirants of al nationalities and an nothing. He embodied an eclectic politics and debt and inflation of the 1980s the neoliberal initial uncertainty at the territorial level of the ideology, in evolution and thus differing, precepts had to deal with an essential state which would manage the transformation indeed in rivalry and in part in conflict with question to which they had not responded in of ownership. the systematic orientation of a Greater Serbia advance what state was going to privatise the and of his adversaries/allies - and that is why resources and wealth embodied in social Although conserving a certain he was a point of support for the great powers ownership, on what territory, with what "Yugoslavism" and a "socialist" label, the in their peace plans. But he was not a "citizenship" and "historic" legitimation? regime of Slobodan Milosevic was not the progressive alternative -he buried Titoism in bearer of any programme, or orientation promoting as in the rest of Yugoslavia the a) Towards the territorialisation of ownership which could yield a progressive alternative statisation/privatisation of ownership and the which would be attractive to the peoples of dismantling of national rights - and thus he On the socio-economic level, it was the various nationalities. And this is not only could not be a response either to necessary to "prevaricate" over the rights of an effect of external "propaganda" neoliberalism or Great Serb nationalism with self-management to challenge "from above" demonising him, no more than his fall was which he not only flirted, but incorporated and in opacity [5] - in complete constitutional the product of external actions waged against into his "Yugoslav" past. illegality - the constitution of 1974 avoided his regime - contrary to what has been tendencies to interpret and manage social claimed by many: on the contrary, This composite reality is at the source of the ownership like that of the state, or again like international sanctions against Serbia and the incoherency of the theses of the prosecutor that of the "groups:" workplace collectives, NATO strengthened Milosevic and Carla del Ponte, as well as those who have technocrats, bankers and so on), the law postponed his fall. The latter, in September presented the Milosevic regime as an imposed a societal and self-management 2000, was not the product of a revolutionary adversary of the world order and the great based approach. That obviously did not give uprising (although there were real powers. It alone allows us to understand why a simple answer as to how to articulate mobilisations of youth and popular mass the Milosevic regime has been perceived in a "society" in its power of management and demonstrations to confirm his electoral contradictory fashion. We can clarify this by control. But it legally forbade the "sale" of 29 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

this ownership to private interests, without v The Slav "peoples" were recognised as However, the non Slav communities were not democratic consultation affecting the whole such everywhere where they were found a " people" -because of the idea that they had of society. Yet that is what all the new states independently of their percentage, and in a an external state of reference (with the - Serbia included - would do, primarily for non-territorialized manner exception of the Roma, an ethnic national their own profit. community without a state) v Yugoslavia was then not only a The logic of privatisation advanced without multinational federation, but based on Thus, for example, the Albanians of speaking its name and without respecting any republics which, in general, were also thus. Yugoslavia (who represented half of all kind of societal "constituent" procedure, Albanians, and who were much more although it amounted to a challenge to the Resistance and defiance towards the numerous than the Montenegrins) were not Yugoslav constitution. Behind the scenes of a possibility of the emergence of a recognised as a "people" in Kosovo and in federation which was increasingly paralysed "Yugoslavian-ness" - which the first Yugoslavia. Nonetheless, to avoid the status, and racked by corruption, three figure Yugoslavia had wished to impose in a unitary perceived as discriminatory indeed hyperinflation and debt, a certain "Milosevic fashion - had not stopped the spontaneous threatened with assimilation, of a "minority", commission" in May 1088, had made initial emergence in the censuses of a national Titoism had invented the notion of proposals, drawn up by neoliberal category of "Yugoslavs" based on mixed "nationality" (narodnost), without right to economists and directly drawn from the IMF marriages and cultural osmosis. self determination and thus distinct from recipe book, notes Susan Woodward [6]. The "nation" (narod), but capable of having Croatia was in this context defined at the last Yugoslav government of Ante Markovic similar rights Notably that of a locally level of its constitution as the state of the introduced a "shock therapy" of neoliberal official language Or representation in the Croatian people and of the Serbian people inspiration against "inflation" (n reality federal bodies similar to other communities (12% of the population) because both were against the self-management rights resistant (in the rotation of the presidency, for historic, secular, evolving components in to the market) in 1989. The new laws on example, each year attributed to another their mixes and distinctions. This recognition "social ownership" were voted through by the community, the Albanians counted as Slav of the Serbs of Croatia as a people was federal institutions in which Slobodan peoples) The transformation of Kosovo into a essential after the traumas of the Second Milosevic participated along with his Croat, quasi-republic, itself multinational, reflected World War It functioned as a protection of Slovene and other colleagues. Statisation and this "Titoist" tendency towards a greater living together which did not imply a share ownership would squeeze, as in a vice, recognition of the diversity of the peoples of separate "territorialisation", but a rejection of the societal logic (shares were initially to be the federation the policies of ethnic cleansing waged by the distributed free to the workers, to sweeten the Croat Ustashi against the Serbs in the name The growing confederalisation of the system pill). of "Croatness" which rejected the Jews, the from the mid 1960s crystallised in the The federal laws were then prolonged after Serbs, the Roma - but incorporated the Constitution of 1974 which gave the republican units and provinces increased the break up of the federation (Slovene and Muslims (and thus the territory) of Bosnia. rights, transforming them into basic actors of Croat secessions in June 1991) by the new The case of Bosnia-Herzegovina (BH) was the system (in the control of taxes and independent states. Even in Slovenia, where both similar and different. The treatment of external revenues as well as the nomination there was no war and international sanctions the "peoples" of Bosnia was the same - no of cadres in the congresses which henceforth to slow the pace of privatisation, social territorialisation or recognition of the took place at the level of republics in ownership was far from easy to "bury". it multinational reality dependent on some autonomous fashion, allowing an flourished in all the laws of Slovene as of percentage (there was moreover no absolute "ethnicisation" of the composition of the Serb privatisation [7] in the early years of the majority in Bosnia, the Muslims (in the institutions). "transition". "national" sense of Titosm, distinct from citizenship) [9] - called Bosnians since 1994 But in becoming key actors of the system, But everywhere, state territorialisation and - formed the relative majority of around 40%; they tended to be bearers of a right of self- commodification of property rights was against around 1/3 of Serbs and some 18% of determination rivalling that which was radically modifying the status of workers, Croats. Bosnia was then the state of its three recognised at the constitutional level to the now dismissible [8]. peoples; but this notion had a subjective, "peoples". From another viewpoint, the b) Towards the territorialisation of "nations" historic, cultural sense integrating religion, procedure of dissolution of the common state with a freely determined choice in censuses, also concerned the social actors, self- The "states" (republics), without being and not territorialised; all being at the same management, in that the outcome of the artificial realities on the historic level, had time citizens of Bosnia and of Yugoslavia. labour of each and the common patrimony not set up the federation it is the latter which But this also protected everyone against the" belonged to everyone. had made them emerge, recognised or historic" desires of Serb and Croat Globally, with the crisis of the 1990s all the consolidated, articulating a dual notion nationalism, each with their project of forced underpinnings of Titiosm tended then to be avoiding both the normative crystallisation assimilation of the Muslim Slavs [10] of challenged under a "statist" form. and the narrow territorialsiation of "nations" Bosnia: BH belonged neither to one nor the Titoist Yugoslavia, distinguished citizenship - other, but to those who lived with the black 2) New relations of domination an objective notion defining civic rights and and white pages of their own history and duties across the territory as a whole - and conflicts, mixed and neighbouring, their But three big blocs were distinguished at the "nation" or "peoples" treated in subjective identities evolving, so magnificently level of the leaders in position, the first two fashion and open to evolving individual recounted by the Nobel prize-winner Ivo playing in fact a dominant role imposing their choices (one could declare oneself Andric or by Mesa Selimovic in this "Death choices on others - bypassing any really "undifferentiated" at the national level) and the Dervish". concerted procedure of dissolution. 30 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

First bloc: the new powers of Croatia and question of Kosovo concerning the whole finding themselves politically in a Yugoslavia Slovenia, emerging from the first free period of the 1990s - and until the turning dominated by a Serb nationalist renewal. elections of 1990, choosing to leave the point of 1998-1999 this was a situation of Their proposal was an asymmetric sinking ship. "Neither war nor peace" dominated by the compromise, so as to maintain together all peaceful resistance of Ibrahim Rugova. There the republics, with more confederal rights for But Slovenia, together with Slobodan was on the contrary a desire for political, republics who wanted them and the Milosevic, modified its constitution cultural and socio-ethnic "re-Serbification" maintenance of a common framework... unilaterally to affirm the right of self- of the province (blockage of sale of Serbian determination as right of the Slovene people, lands, encouragement of the employment of This formula was rejected both by the Croat which coincided as it happens with the state Serbs instead of Albanians in the public and Slovene leaders and by Slobodan [11]. sector or with Albanians being massively laid Milosevic: they would determine and impose off for not respecting new laws, their conception of the right of self- Serbian nationalism acted as a foil in encouragement of the return of Serbs to the determination, each in their own way. Slovenia as in Croatia - with a reciprocal province, notably those fleeing the conflicts game of mirrors in Serbia against the "anti- in other republics). v The self-determination of the people and Serb" peoples. But the real adversary, whose of the Slovene state were superimposed, policies were boycotted, was in Slovenia, Beyond that, the reincorporation of Kosovo except that it was not supposed to be Croatia as in Serbia, Ante Markovic who was, for the master of Belgrade, not part of a unilaterally determined, without a procedure sought to build a neoliberal project of project of a "Greater Serbia" but of a Serb- of consultation with the other peoples of the privatisation on the Yugoslav scale - with the dominated Yugoslavia incorporating all the federation, without discussion on the support of the IMF and the main western Serbs, centralist on a federal (and not management and sharing of the heritage, of powers (except, then, Germany, Austria and confederal) mode, applying a majoritarian the common "patrimony", on the Yugoslav the Vatican). principle to the benefit of the Serbs (and no scale - it was nonetheless in the framework of longer a confederal Yugoslavia where the the federation that Slovenia had won its The solidarity affirmed for a time in Slovenia federal bodies functioned by consensus - thus rights as a state, consolidated its language with the Albanians of Kosovo in 1989 (in fact independently of the numerical force of the and its national rights. But the Slovene to weaken Belgrade) was very relative and national communities). constitution was transformed to affirm the rapidly forgotten: the rich republics were no right to a unilateral choice. longer interested in funding federal Milosevic's break with Titiosm took place development or the resources which went to then on the two levels invoked: it began at the v Self-determination was interpreted by Kosovo The few intellectuals who, with the end of 1989 on the level of property rights, it Franjo Tudjman as self-determination of the Croat economist Branko Horvat, fervent continued with the challenge to the status of Croat state (through a majority in a defender of Yugoslav self-management, autonomy acquired by Kosovo in the referendum of citizens) to smother any right launched a petition in favour of a "Yugoslav constitution of 1974; the whole being as a "people" for the Serbs of Croatia; the initiative" to manage the constitutional translated by the suppression of the reference new constitution adjusted the law and Croatia conflicts on Kosovo were rapidly to socialism with the establishment of the 3rd was defined as the state of the Croat people marginalized in their respective republics. In and last rump Yugoslavia (Serbia- and other citizens and minorities. But the Croatia Ustashi symbols reappeared, as did Montenegro) - all of this, which touches on logic of the negotiations in Bosnia was to the Croat nationalist discourse embodied in the fundamental constitutional rights of the there demand a right as " people" for the Tudjman who prepared the unilateral people, being done without any popular Croats by seeking to territorialize it in the modification of the Croat constitution consultation. direction of a state-based separatism. suppressing its multinational Titoist dimension Third bloc: Macedonia and Bosnia v In Serbia, the regime of Slobodan Herzegovina, which Titoist Yugoslavia had Milosevic would also play on two levels but Second bloc: Slobodan Milosevic and his transformed and consolidated [12], treated as in coming closer to the French model: allies of the "Serbian bloc ", made up of "artificial creations" of Tito by their Kosovo was reintegrated in the Serbian state, representatives from Montenegro, the neighbours. These two republics were Serbianness being defined as republican and Vojvodine and Kosovo taken back at the end rendered particularly fragile by the crisis of universal on the territory - the Albanians of the 1980s by the constitutional changes the federation, as much in their relations with having the full right to be Serbs. The status of challenging the rights won under Titoism: the their now threatening neighbours as on the minority was codified in this framework, but ambiguities of the 1974 constitution making internal plane, because of the diversity of it is the right of a Serb "people" which was these provinces quasi-republics were their populations, polarised between several advanced at the beginning of the 1990s in suppressed by clearly re-establishing the "solutions " in the defence of their rights. We Croatia and in Bosnia, tending to subordinate status of the provinces to should first look at the entanglements and territorialize it according to a state-based Belgrade. This logic can be characterised as conflicts through their eyes. separatist logic (hence the self-proclamation "Great Serbian" (as Lenin spoke of the Great of Serb autonomous republics): which was Russian behaviour of Stalin in Georgia and At the turning point of the 1990s, the leaders rejected by the Serbs - the status of minority, elsewhere), a major regression in relation to of the two republics tried desperately to or dissolution - was imposed on the the rights won under Titoism but in synch contain a Yugoslav framework, against Croat Albanians with French and international law in relation and Slovene separatism: on the socio- to "minorities"... economic level, as less developed republics, Placed before a dilemma (a menacing they were favourable to a more redistributive independence or insertion in a Serbo-slavia) It was not then a policy of genocide, nor of and federative logic than Serbia defended the leaders of Macedonia and BH would ethnic cleansing (Kosovo, with around 2 against the richer republics, but they fought decide to proceed to referendums on self- million people, is 80% Albanian) - moreover at the same time against the departure of determination towards independence, under Milosevic has not even been indicted on the Slovenia and Croatia before the fear of the pressure of international diplomacy: these 31 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

procedures were supposed to reflect a be a Muslim - Alija Izetbegovic. And, responsibility, dignity and legal status - the democratic choice and independence would, conscious of the danger for Bosnia of the collective defence of national rights is it was said, prevent war. break up of the federation, it was the latter legitimate and necessary. Self-determination who had, with the Macedonian president in this sense does not imply any uniform or None of this was true. Gligorov, defended until the end the universal response, rights can be defended maintenance of a Yugoslav logic. and realised in pluri-national state 3) The majoritarian referendums - denials of Independence would disturb the fragile frameworks. But the correct treatment of democracy trapping all the minorities equilibrium, under the pressure of the national rights imposes reciprocity, transformations and orientations of the equivalence of rights and status. Procedures uniquely based on "citizenship" neighbouring states - Serbia and Croatia. and involving a majority vote, taken on a The defence of the rights of Serbs against republic-by-republic basis, when the national War of aggression or civil war? The war fears and real threats in Croatia was questions remained sensitive and intertwined which ravaged BH was both. And we cannot completely legitimate if it did not become were denials of real democracy. They understand it in its breadth and violence or transformed into violent aggression against produced a generalisation of the crisis of the part of the Muslim victims without the Croat neighbours, imposed by militias "minorities", of their fears, and of the use of considering the Milosevic-Tudjman alliance, coming from Belgrade - and if it involves these latter in war-based strategies. and the links between Bosno-Serb and equivalent recognition of status and of rights Bosno-Croat nationalisms using the fear of for the Albanian communities. v The Serbs boycotted this type of an "Islamist danger". referendum in a Croatia which suppressed More substantially, for a "socialist", the their status as people - but they were also III - The false thesis of the single question of social ownership and social rights propelled towards violence against their aggressor: from the Milosevic- independent of nationality would involve a neighbours by militias coming from Belgrade Tudjman alliance to Dayton - black major difference with the "Yugoslav" inciting the proclamation of the "autonomous orientation of Milosevic. Serbian republics" within a separatist logic. hole and test of the dominant analyses and the ICTY Both the regime of Slobodan Milosevic and v The Albanians of Kosovo boycotted the that of Franjo Tudjman had the same 1) From the gelatinisation of the differences elections and institutions imposed in the new approach to social ownership, with its between the two regimes to their mirror game constitutional framework by Serbia in the clientelism (and nepotism) in the later province and unilaterally proclaimed the We know well today what the "socialist" privatisations; the same aggressive autonomous republic of Kosovo, electing a label was worth in Eastern Europe and in the degradation of the national rights won under parliament and a president, Ibrahim Rugova: world. The fact that Milosevic's party bore it Titoism by the minority communities of each they would peacefully organise separate has been a catastrophic trap for the Yugoslav regime - Kosovo would remain a "Serbian school and health institutions until 1998. left. We have stressed the major ruptures that internal affair" while the Krajina remained an he had inaugurated with the best elements of "internal Croatian affair"; both combined the v The Albanians who represented around Titoism. And at the international level, the action of paramilitary forces behind the 25% of Macedonia also boycotted the lucid and critical analysis of those who scenes with a parliamentary and pluralist referendum in this new state whose 1991 pursued rightist policies with left, worse still regime (sufficiently pluralist, moreover, for constitution only recognised one people "socialist" labels, is imposed with an both to be in the minority in certain regions (Slavo-Macédonian) and its official essential vigilance on all those who wish to or towns of their respective republics); both language. But the measures taken by the restore meaning to words and to choices. adopted a profile of victim rather than Macedonian President Gligorov of warmonger; and both sought compromises association of Albanian minorities with the Some have also favourably contrasted the making them interlocutors of the great government helped postpone the outbreak of Yugoslavism of Milosevic with the powers who were more "moderate" than their violence. However, the inequality of status of nationalism of Tudjman. But that is to forget far right; both considered Bosnia- Albanians, and notably of their language, that Serbian nationalism dominated the first Herzegovina and the rights consolidated would render them necessarily receptive to Yugoslavia in a dictatorial fashion and that a there as artificial creations of Tito. the evolution of the situation in Kosovo. The unitary "Yugoslavism" is another Ohrid accords of 2003, after the violent nationalism. In short, one can be "nationalist" The Serbo-Croat alliance of 1939 for the explosions which ravaged the "FYROM" in various ways on various territorial scales. establishment of a Croat Banovina in the (Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia - a Indeed we have already stressed that the framework of the first Yugoslavia on the name used to placate Greek nationalism), Yugoslavism of Milosevic was at the basis of a carve-up of Bosnia-Herzegovina would modify the constitution, suppressing idéological and political level (in his was certainly at the heart of the Milosevic any reference to a Slavo-Macedonian people, programme and alliances) oriented towards Tudjman meeting of 1991. Each regime had but also introducing rights and procedures of Serb domination in Kosovo, and a logic paid lip service to the integrality of Bosnia - collective decision, and strengthened the connected on many points with the first and the recognition of the independence of status of the Albanian language. In other Yugoslavia against the gains of the second. Bosnia by Tudjman's HDZ reflected this. But words it went in the direction of recognition the ethnic division of Bosnia was within the of a multinational state. On the other hand the national questions and "logic" of the break-up of Yugoslavia - in national rights should be distinguished from Belgrade it was argued that Bosnia was a v In Bosnia-Herzegovina, the status of the "nationalism" as a chauvinist ideology "mini-Yugoslavia" and that if the frontiers of three peoples was not changed following the imposed on the backs of others. . But when it the one were challenged, why should those of pluralist elections of December 1990, and the is about cultures in the broadest sense (linked the other remain intact? And when the three nationalist parties promised to govern to history, religion, language - without any Western world rejoiced in the destruction of together to win over the protest vote. The unique and normative genesis), the rights of the federation and the Titoist system, why president of the collegial presidency was to peoples to sovereignty - that is to say then maintain this "Titoist creation" - the 32 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina? Better still, v it does not characterise correctly the Bosnia and Croatia - thus "respecting" we know how much in France and beyond Milosevic regime; the thesis hides its publicly the integrity of BH. The other, more the notion of "Muslim" in the ethnic-national composite and evolving reality - the "moderate" line defended by Tudjman's party sense was not understood - this is moreover "simplification" hinders the critique of (HDZ), worked for the territorialisation of why it was replaced by that of "Bosnians". Serbian nationalism and the "Greater Serbia" the Croats of BH in Herceg-Bosna, next to The "genesis" of the nations in the Balkans policy; Croatia, with its "capital", Mostar - so as to had been structured largely by religions - be able to demand the "self-determination" of which organised social functions, education v it conceals the real-politik of the great the Croat people. and justice in the former Ottoman millets; powers and the relationship of Milosevic to and this had been and remained one of the the great powers. The thesis of the "sole Serb aggressor" was "cultural" and historic components, in the supported by the discourse from Sarajevo at broad sense, of the Croat people a) Again on Greater Croatia - first silence of the beginning of the war. To struggle on two (predominantly Catholic) and the Serb people the ICTY fronts and denounce those that the United (predominantly Orthodox). States supported was certainly difficult: the The anti-Serb and anti-Semitic discourse of resistance of the Armija of Sarajevo, But with the end of Titoist Yugoslavia, it was Tudjman, the return of the Ustachi symbols multiethnic and not only "Muslim" needed possible to adapt the strategy of ethnic and militias, incorporated in the official Croat weapons. Croatia and Herceg-Bosna were on division of Bosnia. With Bosnia being a state army, the demonisation of "Serbo- the road for the delivery of all aid sent to the of its three peoples, Belgrade and Zagreb Communism" to prettify the Croat pseudo resistance - and were also the only possible pushed the line that "Muslim" = terrorist; and "democrats", the rehabilitation of a fascist "rearguard" for the Muslim refugees. But it basting themselves on the reality of the past and leaders were all denounced in was a dangerous rearguard, a hostage taking known Islamic convictions of Alija Belgrade and largely hidden or minimised in which muzzled discourse in a disastrous Izetbegovic, worked for a "self- the mainstream media: Croat nationalism fashion [15]. Inside the solidarity movement determination" of the two other peoples, on was, it was said, uniquely "defensive" against ethnic cleansing, Croat pressures to territorialised bases. The reality, the meaning designate only one aggressor - and one ethnic It is essential to distinguish the violence of of the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina was there. type of "rapist" - were terrible - the feminist the aggressors from the legitimate defence of movement knew it, notably Rada Ivekovic, a those attacked. Yet is it necessary to verify There was a mirror game between the two Croat feminist denounced as a "witch" that those who are victims here are not regimes and the predominant propaganda because she had dared to say that the rapists aggressors there. Serb nationalism borrowed opposing the two regimes - either demonising were also Croat [16]. exclusively the Serbo-Communist aggressor; a lot from Zionist propaganda - the genocide or extolling it exclusively as the only of yesterday committed by the Ustachi But after the anti-Serb ethnic cleansing, progressive regime which resisted the great covering and legitimising the revanchist Herzeg-Bosna was ravaged in 1992-1994 by powers and NATO. policies of ethnic cleansing today Alain a policy of ethnic cleansing of Muslims by Finkielkraut, rightly indignant at this use of the Croat nationalist troops, with the razing Tudjman's policy was all the more hidden past genocides to justify aggression today, of all the Muslim neighbourhoods of Mostar, and exonerated because it was denounced in unhappily fell into a total blindness on the in the shadow of the symmetrical policy Belgrade. reactionary Croat ideology and policies [13]. carried out by the Serb militias. And reciprocally, the reactionary reality of Indeed the objective of "Greater Croatia" had The involvement in this violence of the Croat the Tudjman regime blinded the defenders of an institutional, ideological and military army under the control of Minister of the Milosevic regime (or led them into a power which was "visible" to whoever Defence Gojko Susak was direct. Under culpable silence) to the dirty work being wanted to see it [14], with two aspects: pressure from the US - fearing the creation of carried out by the regime's militias and its a Muslim rump state, martyr and destabiliser mercenary Arkan or/and by the militias of the v on the internal level, the reconstruction of at the heart of Bosnia, an orientation also Serb nationalist allies sof the Socialist Party a selective "Croatness" as the basis of the rejected by the majority of Bosnian Muslims in the early 1990s, in Kosovo, Croatia and new constitution and modification of the - a third variant emerged in the attempt to Bosnia. status of the Serbs to return them to the status unify the Croat majority regions with the of "minority". To "consolidate" this Muslim majority regions in the "Croat- 2) The false thesis of the single aggressor - regression, a violent ethnic cleansing was the ICTY tested Muslim federation". This "reconciliation" to necessary which reduced their percentage coalesce against the Serb militias has The thesis of the Serbo-Communist single from 12% to less than 5% with the military bequeathed a "federation" which remains aggressor and propagator of policies of ethnic operation of summer 1995 which expelled fragile to this day. cleansing and genocide is false from four several hundred thousand Serbs. points of view: In these two dimensions, internal and v The logic of Greater Croatia was extended external, the Croat regime was not as it v it conceals the importance and mendacious on the external level towards Bosnia. At first claims a simple "victim" of Serb aggression, aspects of the campaign of the international hypocritically: with the right to vote in still less a friend of the Muslims, whose Croat lobby whitewashing the Tudjman Croatia accorded to the Croats of Bosnia refugees were real hostages. It was known regime of Greater Croatia; anticipating an incorporation in the same about and written about at the time. But today single state; but also from 1991, when the the publication of the Croat archives [17] v it conceals what the leaders in Belgrade sovereignty of BH was recognised, by the witnesses to it in all clarity. and Zagreb had in common in these years of implementation in practice of a policy of "transition", the alliance on the backs of the territorial expansion. There are several The silence or minimisation of these realties minorities of their states which lay at the variants: one, advocated by the Ustachi - on the political level or that of the "justice" heart of the drama of Bosnia's Muslims; troops, sought to aggregate the whole of of the ICTY is unacceptable and 33 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

counterproductive as to the possibility of wished to propagate a religious renewal in Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic at the combating the blindness of what was protecting it from the clientélist behaviour head of the Bosno-Serb nationalist militias Milosevic's policy: the hundreds of and corrupt practices which arose from and Mate Boban at the head of the Bosno- thousands of Serb refugees in Serbia and integration in the government - visible in the Croat nationalist militias were associated their lives are sufficient to undermine the movement of Alija Izetbegovic, as in the with the negotiation of the "peace plans" up thesis of a single aggressor nationalism. practise ce of the other parties in power. until Dayton. They met at Graz in Austria and on the ground they worked together around b) The alliance of Serb and Croat If there were various Islamist currents it was Sarajevo besieged by a "sole aggressor". The nationalisms against the "Islamist danger" at then false to claim that BH had broken up first had received the weapons and the heart of the war in Bosnia: what does the because threatened by an "Islamist danger" - infrastructure of the Yugoslav popular army, ICTY say about it? and if this latter was to grow, it was in the withdrawing from BH; the second were first place in reaction to the aggression directly aided by the Croat army. This is the The Milosevic-Tudjman meeting of 1991 suffered by the Muslim peoples. was certainly decisive in the implementation central cause of the wars of ethnic cleansing and the reason why the Muslim population of the political-military discourse and The neighbours of yesterday were not, in (less than 45% of the population) accounted strategies. The regimes in Belgrade and general, the direct protagonists of violence for around 70% of the victims. Zagreb - but also the Bosno-Serb and Bosno- [19] - and wished massively to return to live Croat parties, presented themselves on the in their places of origin, with a great nostalgia It should be repeated: to see and condemn international and internal level as a "rampart for the past, But the ethnic cleansing one without seeing and condemning the other against the Islamist danger" - and the internal functioned in the form of communicating is criminal, unjust and stupid - leading to the separatism relied on such a "danger" to vessels: people who had suffered ethnic Serbs, themselves victims of ethnic justify the carve-up of Bosnia-Herzegovina, cleansing were encouraged to come and live cleansing, having the deep feeling of legitimised in its turn by the "right of self- in the houses of others who had themselves suffering from an international"anti-Serb" determination" of peoples. been attacked and had fled their homes. The conspiracy. Which can only lead to their own leaders in Belgrade and Zagreb, relayed by They would use the Islamic declaration blindness to the crimes committed in their the Bosno-Serb and Bosno-Croat regimes drawn up in; 1970 by Alija Izetbegovic and name. would propagate fear through their media; reproduced at the beginning of the 1990s to while on the ground the militias propagated c) the evolving Yugo-Serb policy of identify a false equation: majority of violence and hate to separate those who lived Milosevic, another test for the ICTY Muslims (in the sense of people) equals together. Islamic or Islamist majority (with all the If the "anti-Serb" media campaign was ambiguities in the meaning of the word, Any ethnic map of Bosnia of 1989 shows that mendacious and counter-productive, the quickly assimilated to Islamist terrorism). no part of BH was "homogeneous" ethnically. criticisms of Milosevic were not "only" lies. The thesis had "self-realising" dimensions: But Herceg-Bosna was next to Croatia and There was certainly a "Yugo-Serb" squeezed between two aggressor the Croat population was relatively orientation from the Belgrade government, nationalisms the Muslims would supply some concentrated there, although the towns - like using, until the end of the 1980s the fears of 70% of the 100,000 victims of ethnic Mostar - were not homogeneous; the Serb the Serb minorities in Kosovo, Croatia and cleansing, and when you are attacked for population was nearly twice as numerous as Bosnia; certainly a policy of Serb domination being "Muslim", you have plenty of reasons the Croats (around 33% against 18%) and was reaffirmed towards the Albanians of to affirm yourself as such. The legitimate much more dispersed in the territories which Kosovo in an aggressive fashion by the solidarity of the Muslim world and the arrival were mixed and far from Serbia: the project constitutional changes in Serbia; there was in Bosnia of Mujahidin would increase the of building a Serbian state - the republika also, at the beginning of the 1990s the concerns manipulated by Belgrade and srpska - that the constitution of Dayton decomposition/purge of the Yugoslav popular Zagreb. recognised as and "entity" of BH was then army (the JNA) and the collapse of what organically a bearer of greater violence. remained behind the Belgrade government as Alija Izetbegoviic, for his part, oscillated rearguard of the Serb militias in the between an Islamic project (sometimes ready But everywhere where the towns were operations led in Croatia; and there was to accept a "Muslim state", even a rump one, mixed, there was ethnic cleansing with the certainly an alliance of Milosevic with the in the "peace" negotiations) and Bosnian goal of building states that "held" to expel the Great Serb nationalist far right of the Radical Muslim nationalism, stressing first the populations unsympathetic to the project of Party of Vojislav Seselj giving this latter the maintenance of the frontiers of BH; and he linking up to the big neighbours. resources for his aggressive policy with its was in conflict, even inside the Bosnian relays in Croatia and Bosnia. Muslims, with the orientation of a resistance The instability of successive "peace plans" up built around secularism and a mixed Bosnia until Dayton was fundamentally linked to the But this alliance was interrupted for some [18]. progress on the ground of these state projects: years, then renewed under the NATO bombs. "the Islamist danger" as point of departure Because it was mainly in the Muslim and arrival (with evocation of the presence of Because from 1991, Slobodan Milosevic majority regions like Tuzla, that "citizen" Bin Laden in Bosnia) - from which he fears would meet Franjo Tudjman to negotiate the parties would make the most impact, and the will for secession; this latter attached essence on the backs of the populations contradicting the equation evoked later. The to a right of self-determination as "people" - concerned : the ethnic division of Bosnia. SDA, the party of Alija Izetbegovic was itself without discussing the fashion in which the The political choice of Milosevic was also to traversed by numerous currents and splits "choices" have been established, the origin of attempt to reinsert himself in the international distanced from Muslim fundamentalism. The the violence is seen in the appeal to resist of "accord", in return for approval of the UN project of a Muslim state was not attractive in Alija Izetbegovic who is, in this "optic" the peace plans in Croatia, then in Bosnia - thus the Bosnian context - including for those who real "warmonger" [20]. his reversal of alliance. Namely the 34 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

renunciation of the logic of secession, less Serbo-Communism - making up for its policy armies, then refloated, to bring about an open and short term. in Iraq and its silence on Chechnya; to begin equilibrium of relations of military force on to emphasise NATO rather than the UN; and the ground. It was imposed to ratify the It was then that Milosevic renounced his to ridicule the attempts at an autonomous "ethnic" territorial division which had been alliance with the Serb leader in Croatia Milan European policy. negotiated: 51% for the "federation" (Croat- Babic who killed himself in the Hague some Muslim) and 49% for the second "entity" (the days before the death of Milosevic. If Babic Whatever the hidden intentions of republika srpska) recognised at Dayton. had been convinced by the prosecutor Carla Washington, "peace plans" confirming the del Ponte to testify against Milosevic in advances of the war were effectively b) As Richard Holbrook stressed, the political return for a reduction in sentence, he was in hypocritical impasses. And such was the deep aspect of the agreement was global -regional, the days to come supposed to be called back and sincere source in the solidarity precisely in the hope of overall stabilisation. to the court by Milosevic in his phase of movement of an appeal to interventionism defence. Certainly, this "hostile witness" was from the great powers : visibly, arguing "you v The political-military agreement allowing able to underline how much Belgrade "knew" can't fight war with war" none of the western the ceasefire was without winners or losers - of what happened, and allowed the governments were ready to lose men on the and thus eminently contradictory : the nationalist militias freedom of action, or ground to defend human lives, principles or Bosnian president signed because the relied on its own mercenaries in the dirty rights (there was no oil in Bosnia, it was said frontiers of BH were maintained; the others work of ethnic cleansing. The uprising of in the solidarity movement, to explain the because the ethnic cleansing had been ratified Serbs of Croatia was both reaction and cynicism of the great powers and the lack of and links of confederation between each résistance to the multiple aggressions assistance to people in danger). Against the "entity" and the neighbouring states remained inflicted by the regime of Tudjman and anti- illusion of protection by bombings or foreign possible. Croat ethnic cleansing perpetrated in a logic troops, some in the movement called rather v Alija Izetbegovic could remain president of secession. But Milan Babicshould have for the lifting of the arms embargo which of a BH declared sovereign; also witnessed to the fact that Slobodan raised the right of legitimate defence. But Milosevic used his weight to arrest this logic pushing forward a debate on the meaning, v but Franjo Tudjman, signing in the name and supported the UN plans provisionally form, organisation of the struggle in relation of the Croats and Slobodan Milosevic in the freezing the situation, against Babic himself to a multi-ethnic future. name of the Serbs signed because both were who rejected them! consolidated by this signature, on the The games of internal politics in the US and international level, in BH and in their Also the Bosno-Serb leader Biljana Plavcic in the world were the essence. For Clinton, it country. was to be another "hostile witness" that was about reinserting the US in the prosecutor Carla del Ponte wanted to use diplomatic game in Bosnia, with the That means questions for the great powers against Milosevic. She did not call him, European partners. and the ICTY (and the defenders of although it is not known why. The fact is that Milosevic): Milosevic was, from 1991, the point of The European governments had themselves support for the various peace plans from the privileged "their common construction" over v Franjo Tudjman agreed to be a signatory at UN and the Europeans in Bosnia against his their disagreements: they were aligned Dayton only when the "Serb question" had former allies Karadzic, Mladic, and Biljana behind Germany in the recognition of the been "settled" by ethnic cleansing of several Plavsic. The opposition to Milosevic independence of Croatia and BH, to save the hundred thousands of Serbs over the summer reproached him for this! We have even seen façade of a EU "foreign policy" without of 1995 - in the sight of and in the knowledge the photos of Zoran Djindjic alongside really uniting their choices of privileged of the great powers and of the ICTY, as well Bosno-Serbian leaders today still sought by alliance - France and Britain seeking to as Milosevic; the ICTY, criticising the "treason" by balance on the side of Belgrade the support Milosevic! given by Germany to Zagreb. v The massacres of Srebrenica also took place just before Dayton. Mladic and The impasses of the thesis of Carla del Ponte The Croat-Muslim war undoubtedly opened Karadzic were indicted by the ICTY, notably lie there., In the opposite sense, the defenders eyes in the US, but did not lead to any change for their direct responsibility in this massacre of Milosevic have a certain difficulty in of discourse. But the bases for a new united - and it is that which allowed them to be explaining the Milosevic-Tudjman alliance real-politik were going to be posed: the sidelined at the Dayton negotiations. Some and Milosevic's suppor fort the peace plans. search for a stabilisation of the Balkans by dare to say, as an "excuse", that the leaders of support for an understanding between the the Bosno-Serb militias (Mladic and Dayton is at the heart of these contradictions strong states of the region - Serbia and Karadzic) fell into a trap because they - because this was also the moment of a Croatia, sidelining the more radical believed that the combatants of the Sarajevo turning point in US policy towards nationalist forces. army were going to defend the enclave, Milosevic. whereas they had abandoned it without The end of the war in Dayton was obtained warning [21]. It is undoubtedly true that the d) the great powers, Milosevic and Dayton on the basis of two sets of conditions - NATO enclave was abandoned by Sarajevo - as bombs against Bosnian Serb targets playing Vukovar was undoubtedly sacrificed by US diplomacy, initially sidelined from direct totally at the margin, and in order to make Zagreb. The archives will speak one day. It is management of the Yugoslav crisis, took up this acceptable in the US, the passage from a above all true that the enclave should have and propagated the thesis of an aggressive discourse demonising Milosevic to to one been protected by the forces of the UN and of Serbo-Communism in criticising the UN and which valued and consolidated him. NATO - and that it was not. EU "peace plans" in Bosnia. Which allowed the US to kill a number of birds with one a) at the military level : the US pushed by all If these Srebrenica massacres are part of a stone: to present themselves as friends to the means for the end of fighting between Croats genocide - as one of the ICTY cases against Muslims (Albanians and Bosnians) against and Muslims and the unification of their two general Krsticahs concluded, and if we 35 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

condemn the military leaders like Krstic not, Rugova and his LDK (Democratic League of France and Britain wanted to make Kosovo as was stipulated in the appeal, for having Kosovo) party, since the constitutional the Dayton of EU "foreign policy", Hubert desired such a massacre or genocide, but for changes imposed by Belgrade in 1989. From Védrine and Robin Cook took in hand the not having intervened to stop it, Milosevic the balance sheet of Dayton was born an negotiations at Rambouillet, on the basis of would undoubtedly have been condemned on alternative strategy of resistance for the project of substantial autonomy; the similar bases to Krstic - but the great powers independence, seeking the question of NATO was sidelined but not the should have been also. internationalisation of the conflict by presence of an international military force violence. the Kosovo Liberation Army from the application of the agreement But the The opponents of Milosevic, including (UCK) was born in 1995 with heterogeneous "worst" happened for the diplomats: in Zoran Djidjic who would then become the ideological bases. Its actions began in February 1999, two weeks of negotiations point of support of the US and NATO or deployment against the Serb police apparatus not between Albanians and Serbs, but Vojislav Kostunica, who would be the victor - provoking reprisals all the more between separate diplomats and delegations, over Milosevic in September 2000 would disproportionate as the frontier of résistance would conclude with a refusal of the reproach the latter with having betrayed the went well beyond the UCK and whole Kosovars to sign this draft - accepted by Serbs of Croatia and Bosnia at Dayton. And families, notably in the villages, solidarisd Belgrade - because it buried the if they were called to the bar at the Hague, with their members who were involved: the independence of Kosovo. The military wing they could only confirm the fact that they more the UCK was repressed, the more its remained suspended. were hostile to the international plan unlike struggle became popular - although marginal, The form and content of the negotiation (with Milosevic at the time of Dayton. extremely sectarian in its behaviour including a status for Kosovo written and imposed by within the community and incapable then of Slobodan Milosevic accepted this "final the great powers, the US at the head), had challenging the popularity of its political solution" on the backs of the Serbs of been denounced by the leader of the UCK, adversary Ibrahim Rugova. Croatia, for it won him international Adem Demaci who advocated a boycott and recognition at Dayton, and won silence on Between 1996 and 1998 this latter was had been sidelined from the delegation: the Kosovo. Belgrade tried moreover to channel "classed" as a "terrorist", not only by renunciation of the armed struggle for the Serbs fleeing Croatia towards the Belgrade, but also by all Western diplomacies independence was considered as a Repukika Srpska and Kosovo to consolidate including the US, who demanded only of capitulation. the Serb ethnic presence there. He also won Belgrade certain "moderation". Towards the out over his former Bosno-Serb allies: on the Madeleine Albright tried to continue the end of 1998, the level of violence convinced eve of the Dayton accords, Ratko Mladic ant process, in vain. This defeat for the first the US that they could draw some geo- Radovan Karadzic, directly responsible for phase of Rambouillet at the end of February strategic advantages from the situation - the massacres at Srebrenica were indicted by was commented on by Jean-Michel Demetz extending those won at Dayton by Richard the ICTY. And it is this which allowed in l'Express under the headline : "Double Holbrooke. Milosevic to sign the Dayton accords in their setback for Madeleine : in Kosovo, neither agreement, nor strikes : the US secretary of place - "in the name of all Serbs" Does it need Globally, it amounted henceforth to using the State is disappointed" [22]. to be said that he could only do sit with a conflicts of Kosovo in the goal of confirming certain legitimacy among the Serbs of and extending the redefinition of NATO and Bosnia, because the Republika Srpska, A new time limit was given- with the its deployment towards eastern Europe, decision to resume negotiations on March 23. produced by ethnic cleansing, was establishing US military bases in this region recognised as one of the two entities of BH. Meanwhile, the UCK was convinced by and notably in the strategic zone of the Madeleine Albright to sign the autonomy Dayton set up not only a "ceasefire" but also Balkans, with access to the sea in Albania and a constitution, without consultation of the agreement, in return for an oral commitment Romania; working for the integration of to a NATO presence on the ground, rapid populations, ratifying ethnic cleansing as European construction in an Atlanticist basis of citizenship in the various entities. elections and a consultation of the population framework, against any autonomous EU after three years. An unviable set-up, it is said today policy. Since the goal was NATO - it "sufficed" to Finally, as collateral effect of these The will to use the UCK was reflected by the impose it as integral part of the accord, and "arrangements", the Albanian peaceful demand to treat it as a political interlocutor - "punish" by bombings Belgrade's expected resistance led by Ibrahim Rugova lost any no longer terrorist but without supporting its refusal to have NATO troops on its territory hope of international recognition at Dayton - pro-independence logic (for fear that the [23]. A few strikes were supposed to suffice, and the activity of the Kosovo Liberation independence of Kosovo would destabilise to make Milosevic back off, "as at Dayton", it Army (UCK) began from this point, seeking Macedonia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, was said in superficial journalistic to internationalise by violence the conflict in producing new conflagrations). commentaries. Kosovo. US diplomacy relied on a triptych: The Dayton accords had, quite simply, IV) Again on NATO's war in Kosovo substantial autonomy - but not independence brought satisfaction to their signatories - and for Kosovo - thus domination by Belgrade and on the ICTY it is hard to see what Milosevic had lost there. and frontiers maintained (terms discussed There was no war in Kosovo, but the change Dayton signified then the consolidation of the with Belgrade and de facto acceptable for the in rights and massive dismissals of those who strong powers of the region. The hope for Serb party), to gain acceptance on the main did not accept submission to Belgrade, then a international recognition of the self- issue : NATO. Belgrade did not wish to hear muscular police repression of the pro- proclaimed republic in Kosovo was buried. about it but "Milosevic-Hitler" had already, independence armed struggle whereas the from the accords negotiated in 1998, great powers legitimated in substance this Criticism then surged of the strategy of accepted the presence in Kosovo of observers repression and the maintenance of the peaceful resistance pursued by Ibrahim from the OSCE. existing frontiers, The more the US asked 36 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Belgrade to repress the Albanians "not much" around 45 deaths took place) to the end of the security services, estimated on January 12, under pain of bombing, the more they war in June 1999. According to Pierre Hazan 1999 : "The East of Kosovo is still not logically incited the UCK to provoke the [30], such a decision was taken in a involved in an armed conflict". Public life in military and police forces of Belgrade in "preventive" fashion by the Canadian towns like Pristina, Urosevic, Gnjilan, and so hoping for the bombardment of Belgrade. magistrate [31], out of defiance towards the on continued on relatively normal bases great powers rather than under their pressure: during the whole of the period of conflicts. On March 25, 1999, Le Monde headlined she feared, according to this thesis, that The actions of the security forces (were not) [24]: " Bill Clinton invokes Churchill against confronted with a war which turned into a directed against the Albano-Kosovars as Hitler to justify intervention" with the veritable fiasco for NATO, the governments ethnic group, but against a military adversary subheading: "The US president wants to limit of the Alliance had sought an agreement at [the UCK] and its real or supposed partisans the Serbian ability to continue their any price with the leader in Belgrade. One " [35]. "genocide" " can on the contrary note that the indictment of Milosevic went in the exact sense of v Finally, on September 6, 2001, the And on the NATO website [25], we find a NATO's propaganda to legitimate its action Supreme Court of Kosovo, in Pristina, text entitled "Fight against ethnic cleansing [32] - but we can admit that Louise Arbour concluded, after enquiry that there was no in Kosovo" which presented thus the action (like Carla del Ponte) was herself victim of genocide in Kosovo during the period of NATO : this propaganda. incriminated (see AFP dispatch of September 7). "NATO launched an air campaign,' Operation The indictment of Milosevic for genocide in Allied Force, in March 1999 so as to put an Kosovo was then predicted : hundreds of What did the European parliamentarians, or end to the humanitarian catastrophe which mass graves, dozens of Srebrenicas, tens if the US Congress know about it? What did was then taking place in Kosovo" [26]. not hundreds of thousands of deaths from the "republican" France, which refuses to genocide predicted by Clinton - and recognise the status of people to the The nature of the conflict and the justifying the war [33]. Corsicans, and has declined to adopt the negotiations, or what blocked them - the Council of Europe's Minority Languages question of independence, on the side of the To ensure Germany's military commitment Charter, say about it? What balance sheet did Kosovo Albanians, and of NATO on the Serb which was no small thing especially for the they draw of it? What accounts have the side, are not mentioned in this presentation. Greens, the German Defence Minister could European parliaments and the US Congress only play on a "never again" which evoked Yet, Patrice de Beer (Le Monde, 25/04/1999) demanded of a war which would be a the anti-Jewish genocide. Rudolf Scharping evokes the criticisms formulated in the US by precedent heavy with negative affirmed the existence of a plan for the Brookings Institution analyst, Ivo consequences? "deportation" of Albanians on April 9, 1999, Daalder, on the eve of these bombings: "In claiming that this had been implemented In the absence of a genocide in Kosovo, the Kosovo we haves been incapable of offering from November 1998 in Kosovo. indictment was enlarged to include the two anything other than this horrible and other big file : on Croatia (1991-1995) then in predictable choice between the end of NATO Except that ... Bosnia (1992-1995) united in a sole trial to or a war with Serbia".. signify the coherence of a sole policy of v the plan proved a fraud of which the ICTY Greater Serbia, propagating ethnic cleansing. The "air campaign" degenerated into war - no longer speaks; without any UN mandate. The principal But the trial stopped there success of NATO was to avoid breaking up v from the end of the war international v The ICTY was silent on the policy of [27]. It was manifest that the bombings had observers were sent on the ground to the Tudjman and the Milsoevic-Tuddjman catalysed a catastrophe in Kosovo - 800,000 supposed mass graves (see. El Pais, alliance Albanians fled the province; a civilian 23/11/1999) with all the means of population was taken as target, either by error investigation of a protectorate under a NATO v The ICTY was silent on the policy of the - given the "height" of the strikes - or presence supposed moreover to protect all great powers. voluntarily (the US command hoped that the communities. According to the report of Serb population would turn against Human rights watch in 2001 [34], the mass It would take some time and means to draw Milosevic). And, visibly, the opposite expulsion of Albanians during the NATO war the specific balance sheet of the ICTY. happened, patriotism in the face of bombs could serve in reality several objectives: a Several approaches should be employed [36] perceived as unjust, immediately modification of Kosovo's ethnic - legal, obviously [37], but also historic, strengthening Milosevic and trapping his composition; a negotiation on the territorial political and sociological. Against the opposition [28]: the Belgrade journalist division of Kosovo; but also objectives tendency to hide the political questions Stanko Cerovic, a declared adversary of inextricably linked to the NATO war itself - behind an international law used in an Milosevic, analysed it bitterly [29]. to destabilise the neighbouring states and arbitrary fashion by the great powers [38] make an intervention on the ground more imposing if not a right of the victors (there On May 22, 1999 - during the war itself - the difficult. The report evokes the balance sheet was not that much "clarity" in the ICTY) a Canadian magistrate Louise Arbour, of the bodies exhumed by the ICTY after two law of the dominant. prosecutor of the ICTY, took the decision to years of enquiries, as of July 2001: 4,300 indict Slobodan Milosevic, then president of Albanians killed by the Serb and Yugoslav It would be necessary to consider the genesis the FRY and several other political and forces - less than in some hours at Srebrenica. and evolution of this ad hoc tribunal ; analyse military leaders of the regime for "crimes its dependency on the choices of real-politik against humanity and violations of the laws v While Joshka Fisher, German Foreign of the governments that have created it; its or customs of war". The indictment related to Minister justified the NATO war by a evolving and limited possibility of the period from January 1, 1999 (when the "humanitarian catastrophe" evoking a collaborating with the new states and legal controversial massacre of Racak which led to genocide, an official report of the German apparatuses emerging from the Yugoslav 37 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

crisis; its perception by the various peoples Before the establishment of a quasi- between 1991 and 1995. The Prosecutors concerned, with sometimes the hope that it protectorate in BH after the Dayton-Paris demanded the consideration of three would prevent impunity but also Accords (1995), the ICTY had practically no indictments in a single trial, which Judge disillusionment and defiance - the distance means (financial and military-police )to Richard May refused. But the Chamber of also of a Tribunal based in the Hague. It function and obtain arrests. after Dayton, its Appeal accepted the demand for a single trial would be necessary finally to analyse what its financial resources were increased the US on February 1, 2002 -a demand supported by own magistrates wanted to do with it as well decided to partially pay their debt to the UN the accused, who pleaded not guilty and as the attitude of the main accused, who - which is the main source ; but 14% of its wished to defend himself. rejected the legitimacy of the ICTY but resources are private, notably via the decided to use it as a tribune and defend financier Soros). Its capacity to arrest The trial began on February 12, 2002, (see. himself there. The trial was far from being a criminals depends always on the good will of Le Monde diplomatique, April 2002) on the simple show trial, even if one considers it that western governments having troops on the basis of Anglo-Saxon procedures. The first it could not be a bringer of real justice [39]. ground and on the cooperation of the states part of the trial finished in summer 2004. emerging from the former -Yugoslavia. Non- Catherine Samary teaches at the University of Paris Milosevic's defenders are in their turn public procedures of indictment were IX-Dauphine. confronted with a major contradiction of their introduced to facilitate the arrests. Just before thesis: Milosevic was the point of support for the Dayton accords (signed by Serb president NOTES all the Western peace plans since 1991, and Milosevic, Croat president Tudjman and the ally of he who committed the worst Bosnian president Izetbegovic), the Bosno- [1] See notably Diane Masson, l'utilisation de la guerre dans la construction des systèmes politiques en Serbie et crimes against the Serb populations, and Serb nationalist leaders Rastko Mocnic and en Croatie -1989-1995, L'Harmattan 2002 ; and Marina borrowed from the US, for his defence, the Radovan Karadzic were indicted notably for Glamocak, La transition guerrière yougoslave, discourse of the "war against terror". the crimes committed in Srebrenica, later L'Harmattan, 2002. characterised by the ICTY as genocide - and To restore meaning to words - when the [2] Initially supported also by the Vatican. But John Paul have not to this day been arrested. II, to the great joy of the Serbs of Croatia, explicitly opposition to Milosevic is turned towards the distanced himself from the Croat propaganda notably right, leaving him the monopoly of calling On May 22, 1999 ,during the NATO war on during his 1997 visit and in Sarajevo. himself "left", worse "socialist". To restore to Kosovo, the Canadian magistrate Louise [3] See Le monde diplomatique, November 2000. the peoples concerned the right to appropriate Arbour, then prosecutor of the ICTY, indicted their history, as actors and not as victims - Slobodan Milosevic for crimes against [4] The "Kingdom of Serbs, Slovenes and Croats" instead of confiding it to the great powers humanity and war crimes (accusation relating emerged from the dismemberment of the Ottoman empire who cynically use their fears and conflicts for and that of Austri-Hungary after the First World War. to Kosovo between January and June 1999). Dominated by the Serb dynasty, it took the name of their own egoist ends and who destroy any The Swiss magistrate Carla del Ponte Yugoslavia in 1929 in the framework of a dictatorial policy of real social solidarity in the name of succeeded Arbour in September 1999. regime. It remained 80% rural and in the "periphery" of "modernity" and "civilisation". western capitalism, dependent on foreign capital, incapable of industrialising the major part of its territory. The NATO war (which lasted from March to It broke up under the invasion of a forces coalescing To shed light on all the crimes committed in June 1999) ended with the signature of around Nazi Germany during the Second World War. The the wars of ethnic cleansing as well as that of resolution 1244 of the UN Security Council second Yugoslavia was born out of the armed resistance of NATO - without accepting the one as the alibi by Milosevic, then Yugoslav president, the "Partisans" to this occupation, led on federative bases by the Yugoslav Communist Party, whose leader Josip for the other [40] - is a prerequisite to the establishing a UN protectorate with a NATO Broz (Tito), died in 1980. After a decade of socio- future reconciliation that can lead to a presence in Kosovo -but in the framework of economic and political crisis which paralysed the system progressive future. It is a prerequisite to any the existing frontiers of the Yugoslav Federal in the 1980s, the federation broke up with the Slovene and real "self-determination" (in the sense of the Republic (RFY) of which Kosovo was to Croat declarations of independence in June 1991. sovereign choice of peoples, in their history, remain a province [5] It is not possible to develop this point here. I have their diversity and their mixtures) without made an analysis comparing the transformations of accepting that "self-determination" of the one Milosevic was beaten at the elections of ownership, state and social relations in "réinsérer la Serbie December 2000 by Vojislav Kostunica dans l'analyse de la transition", Revue d'études can be achieved on the backs of any other comparatives Est/Ouest, vol.35 - March-June 2004, n°1-2, people. It is a prerequisite to finding, (reproaching Milosevic for having betrayed CNRS, pp. 116-156. inventing (against the arrogance of those who the Serbs in Bosnia and Kosovo and criticism claim to impose "models" nowhere validated) of the NATO war) -and not by the liberal pro- [6] Susan Woodward, Balkan tragedy, chaos and dissolution after the cold war, Washington DC, the just solutions to the intertwined social, NATO opposition led by Zoran Djindjic. Brooklngs institutions, 1995, pp 106-107. national and political questions of the Under pressure from Montenegro, the FRY Balkans - in a Balkanised world, was dissolved, and provisionally replaced by [7] And it has been attacked head on in Slovenia (which of the state of Serbia - Montenegro (in the new all the new members of the EU did least during the 1990s to destroy its past social gains and apply neoliberal That will take time. But it is a political task to constitution, Kosovo is a province of Serbia ; precepts). See. note 5. take on against all the mendacious being still a protectorate of the UN its final propaganda - including that of NATO. status is currently being debated). [8] Unemployment existed under the Titoist regime, but it was the product of an insufficient creation of jobs notably in the face of a rural exodus, and not because of layoffs : The International Criminal Tribunal On April 1, 2001 Milosevic, indicted by the one of the real powers of the self-management collectives for the Former Yugoslavia minister of the interior for misappropriation was precisely over employment including hiring of of funds, handed himself over to Serbian directors - which would bequeath, in some cases, as in The UN Security Council created the justice. On June 28, 2001 he was transferred Slovenia, specific links between these latter and the workforce. International Criminal Tribunal for the to The Hague. In September the accusation Former Yugoslavia - ICTY - in 1993 to deal brought against him was extended to Croatia [9] In the first post-war censuses, Muslims could declare with war crimes or crimes against humanity (August 1991-June 1992), and on November themselves to be Serbs, Croats or indeterminate - and they opted for the latter, when the possibility was offered to on the territory of the former Yugoslavia from 12, 2001 Carla del Ponte filed a third them in the 1960s to say they were Muslims (with a capital 1991 onwards. It is based in The Hague. indictment for crimes committed in Bosnia M, in the secularised ethno-national sense), they took it, 38 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

massively. Religion had been a component of their history [19] See Svetlana Broz (granddaughter of Josep Broz, pursue NATO for the complaints brought against it. - like Orthodoxy for the Serbs and Catholicism for the known as Tito), Des gens de bien au temps du mal. Amnesty International and Human rights watch of 2001 Croats. That does not imply any evolution or fixed Témoignages sur le conflit bosniaque (19921-1995), (see note 34) have however estimated that in striking "identity", contrary to the nationalist collapses of the Lavauzelle, Paris, 2005. civilian targets and using fragmentation bombs, NATO has 1990s where one was obliged to "prove" who one was on not respected international humanitarian agreements. "objective" criteria. [20] The book by Diana Johnstone presents "objectively" this thesis, simply by evoking the "discourses" adhered to [33] See "L'opinion, ça se travaille... Les médias & les " [10] See "mouvante identité des musulmans"; on Bosnia- inside the Serb population, without evoking any argument guerres justes" Du Kosovo à l'Afghanista" Serge Halimi Herzegovina read notably Xavier Bougarel, "anatomie contradicting it ; however, she cites abundantly the and Dominique Vidal, Ed. Agone, Coll. Contre feux. d'un conflit", La découverte, 1996. Islamist Declaration and evokes the presence of Bin Laden ; the whole proceeds from a basic analogy with the policy [34] www.hrw.org/reports/2001/kosovo/undword.htm [11] I cannot develop here an important point concerning of the sorcerers apprentice of the US supporting Bin Laden This report also establishes the balance sheet of the the ambiguities of the right to self-determination in the against the USSR in Afghanistan, confirming the basis of aggressions committed by the members of the UCK against Serbs or Albanians or minorities "collaborating " Yugoslav context. I have dealt with this question in Serb fears, without evoking the role of propaganda and Serb nationalist militias and armies "The fool's crusade", with the Serbs in 1998 and after the war. "Autodétermination, le cas yougoslave", in La justice et la Pluto Press, London. guerre/Justice and war, document bilingue, Dialogue, [35] Intelligence report, German Foreign Office, 12 Revue internationale d'Arts et de Sciences, vol. n°8, [21] This is the thesis put forward in Johnstone's book. January 1999, cited by Michel Chossudovsky on n°31/32, Automn/winter 1999 02/10/2000. [22] See the dossier of l'Express. [12] The first unitary Yugoslavia had no republics and had [36] Mark Osiel has implemented such a multi initially recognised as constitutive peoples only the [23] Which the US has now obtained. See. Le monde disciplinary approach in a study on other big international Slovenes, Serbs and Croats. Macedonia was considered as diplomatique January 2006. trials, which should be extended, with its specificities on "south Serbia" by Serb nationalism, as "Bulgar" (in its the Milosevic trial : Juger les crimes de masse Edition du language and national reality) by Bulgar nationalism -and [24] Patrice de Beer , Le Monde March 25 1999 seuil, February 2006. Original title Mass Atrocity, as historically Greek land by the third neighbours. Collective Memory and the Law, 1997. See. Also Olivier [25] The text came to light in February 2005. Corten and Barbara Delcourt, Droit, légitimation et [13] In recent radio broadcasts he "stigmatises" me for politique extérieure : l'Europe et la guerre du Kosovo, Ed. taking "pro-Serb" positions - a category of analysis that I [26] The text, in spite of the fact that it is supposed to have Bruylant , éditions de l'Université de Bruxelles, 2001, reject precisely, since it is not "pro-Serb" to say that Serb been updated in February 2005, dares to conclude by: "If collection de droit international : droit international, nationalism is not alone in being guilty of crimes. it first intervened in Kosovo so as to protect the Albanian politique et idéaologies, 1998. See also Le monde speakers against ethnic cleansing, NATO has shown itself diplomatique, February 2002. [14] Le monde diplomatique, August 1992 : "la dérive just as determined to protectt he Serbs of the province d'une Croatie 'ethniquement pure'" against a similar fate, since the deployment of the KFOR [37] See notably the reflections of Stéphanie Mauras, in in the province in June 1999". Both these "protections" Le monde 24-03 2006 ("ICTY : un bilan en demi-teinte"), [15] In Sarajevo in December 1992 I had direct contact have been just as unreal in fact. on the Anglo-Saxon procedure and its tendencies to a with Alija Izetbegovic's advisors who spoke explicitly of "Manichean vision" of history. On the major stakes of the the double aggression suffered - but the choice was not to [27] During a television broadcast on the BBC on August " responsibilities of command" in the various massacres, fight on two fronts at once. The following year they were 20, the US Under-Secretary of State, Strobe Talbott, said see balkans.courriers.info. confronted with the explicit offensive of ethnic cleansing that the divergences inside NATO were so pronounced of the Muslims in Herceg-Bosna. The US pressures to "that it would have been very hard to preserve the unity [38] Beyond their practices at Guantanamo, we know that establish the alliance with the Croats and the political and resolution of the 'Alliance" without the agreement the US exerted pressure on all the candidates to the EU, in ex-Yugoslavia and eastern Europe, to refuse to collaborate choice of Alija Izetbegovic - unfavourable to a real concluded with Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic in with the International Criminal Court in Rome concerning multiethnic mobilisation which might rebound on him - early June. See www.wsws.org. US citizens at the very time that they "demanded" that rested on a simplistic public propaganda. [28] And, when more than a year later, after having vainly Belgrade collaborate with the ICTY. That has not helped the credibility of the ICTY in Serbia. [16] The use of the women's cause and women's hoped for popular uprisings, the West looked to elections associations in this war, as in others, would nonetheless to finish off Milosevic - a paradox when he was compared to Hitler - they detected by poll who could beat Milosevic [39] The extract of the trial published in documents by the meet major resistance. In 1980s Belgrade some Serb : not Zoran Djindjic, devoted to NATO, but Vojislav defenders of Slobodan Milosevic witness that it was often female lawyers denounced a mendacious propaganda Kostiunica, more nationalist than Milosevic (he possible to destabilise the Prosecutor, in other words, against Albanian rapists of Serb women in Kosovo; during reproached him for having abandoned the Serbs of Croatia paradoxically for those who wish to purely denigrate the the Bosnia war, Tudjman sought to control an international and Bosnia following those of Kosovo) radically hostile to ICTY, they show that it was far from the show trials of the feminist conference blocking the arrival of the "women in the NATO bombings, and not corrupt. Stalinist type. But they also highlight a major dimension black", Serb feminists demonstrating regularly against the of the defence of Milosevic : not opposition to the world war in Belgrade. But its operation was thwarted. [29] Stanko Cerovic, Dans les griffes des humanistes, ed. order, but the desire to be a point of support in the "fight Climats, 2001 against terrorism"... See. Patrick Barriot, Eve Crépin, Le [17] See the publication in May and June 2005 of 36 procès Milosevic ou l'inculpation du peuple serbe, L'âge stenogrammes on these meetings by the weekly Feral [30] Pierre Hazan, La justice face à la guerre. De d'homme, Lausanne, 2005. Tribune (Croatia) and the magazine Dani (Bosnia) and the Nuremberg à la Haye, Stock, Paris 2000 commentary of Andrej Nikolaidis in the monthly Monitor [40] Such was the meaning of an appeal launched at the (Montenegro) of July 2005. [31] Read "Serbie, Louise Arbour : frappe préventive" end of March with Pierre Bourdieu, where we rejected the (Institute for War & Peace Reporting), 29-05-99, NATO bombings in stressing at the same time "self- [18] See. Xavier Bougarel, "L'Islam bosniaque, entre Archives, Courrier des Balkans. determination" - against a status of Kosovo imposed either identité culturelle et idéologie politique", in Le Nouvel by Belgrade, or by the great powers We rejected the false islam balkanique. Les musulmans acteurs du post- [32] The "political" 'image of the ICTY has been on the "choice" between NATO and Milosevic. Le Monde communisme 1990-2000, Maisonneuve & Larose, Paris, contrary strengthened by the indictment and by the fact published the text under the signature of Bourdieu on 2001. that Carla del Ponte considered that there was no basis to March 30, 1999. The appeal then became European. 39 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Yugoslavia Slobodan Milosevic: Architect of Yugoslav break-up

Alan Thornett

Slobodan Milosevic died during his trial at the UN's International War Crimes Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in The Hague - just after he was refused permission to go to Moscow for treatment. He was 64. He stood accused of war crimes in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and Kosovo. Whatever the legitimacy of the victors justice represented by the Tribunal - it is a poor substitute for a true international court - there is no doubt of his guilt. The evidence is overwhelming. He was indeed the butcher of the Balkans. The role of Milosevic, however, remains of Yugoslavia, and carries the principal Six months later Milosevic was indeed controversial on the left. Not least because it responsibility for the carnage involved. The President of Serbia - and the direction he was involves controversies about the role and driving force behind the carnage was the taking was unmistakable. In 1989 even the nature of Stalinism, the causes of its collapse, resurgence of Greater Serbian nationalism, limited autonomy enjoyed by Kosovan and and the right of self-determination of nations. which he orchestrated from an early stage. Voijvodinan as Autonomous Provinces was abolished. It also raises the issue of whether the unity of The internal social and economic crisis, of Yugoslavia could have been preserved, after course, which brought down Stalinism in the Both Provinces were annexed into Serbia. the collapse of Stalinism and the Warsaw Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, existed The de facto absorption of Montenegro Pact, and who was principally responsible for in full force in Yugoslavia. This caused quickly followed. Milosevic had torn up the its destruction. tensions between the Republics and forced 1974 constitution and was seeking to replace Yugoslavia into damaging arrangements with it with a highly centralised state dominated The SWP obituary of Milosevic in Socialist the IMF. Milosevic dealt with the crisis of the by Serbia. Worker (18.3.06) raised such controversies in Stalinist like many of its top functionaries, by that it makes no significant distinction The consequences for the Federation were turning to nationalism between the role of Milosevic in the break up absolutely clear. The more dominant Serbia of Yugoslavia this and that of Franjo Tudjman After Tito's death in 1980 it had been clear became the less other nationalities were of Croatia and even Alija Izetbegovic of that Yugoslavia could only be held together prepared to stay within it. Bosnia-Herzegovina. They were all equally by a guarantee against the rise of Serbia into responsible. It even makes no distinction Milosevic now pledged to reunite Serbs the dominant position it held in the pre-war between them when it comes to war crimes - which, he said, had been divided by the 1974 period. This meant strengthening, rather than which in the case of Izetbegovic is constitution. It was the launch of his Greater weakening, the relatively progressive 1974 scandalous. It is worth another hook at the Serbia project - by which he meant the constitution - which had devolved power and history. creation of a common mono-ethnic state for autonomy to the constituent Republics. It all the Serbs, currently spread across the Yugoslavia was a federation comprising six defined Yugoslavia as a multinational state in various Republics. It was a concept Federal Republics: Slovenia, Croatia, which no single nationality could claim a supported by all political parties in Serbia Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro majority. This was the basis on which the and articulated as early as 1986 in the and Macedonia. There were two Autonomous Federation coexisted. notorious Memorandum of the Serbian Provinces, Vojvodina (majority Hungarian Academy of Arts. It could not be achieved population) and Kosovo (80% Albanian This coexistence, however, was soon to come without the break-up of Yugoslavia and the population) - both within the Serb Republic. under pressure from Serb nationalism. In the annexation of at least a third of Croatia and There was a history of both Serb and spring of 1981, Kosovar Albanian two thirds of Bosnia-Herzegovina - with the Croatian nationalism prior and during the demonstrators in Pristina - who were ethnic cleansing of non-Serbs from those world war two. This declined in the post-war campaigning for Kosovo to be promoted to territories. period under Tito (who was a Croat) to the the status of a Federal Republic - were extent that most people thought of savagely attacked by Serbian police. Once Kosovo, Voijvodina and Montenegro themselves as Yugoslav rather than their were swallowed up, resistance to the advance original nationality or their religion. In 1987, Milosevic, who was now Serbian of Greater Serbia project fell to the newly party boss and increasingly a nationalist elected governments of Slovenia and Croatia. Milosevic - who came to prominence in the demagogue, addressed a rally of Serbs in They tried to negotiate acceptable terms for 1980s through Communist Party ranks in Kosovo and made his infamous "no one them to stay in the Federation; proposing that Serbia and learned his politics in the should dare to beat you" speech. He was it take the form of "free union of democratic Belgrade bureaucracy in the latter years of lauded by the Serbs and came away as de states" - proposals which were supported by the Tito period - was pivotal in the break-up facto Serb president in waiting. Bosnia-Herzegovina and Macedonia. 40 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Milosevic rejected this and all subsequent Serbian People" to be set up throughout "the wounded. Surviving Croats retreated in proposals along these lines. Serbs lands of Yugoslavia". He now disarray. articulated the Greater Serbian project even In December 1990 Slovenia voted in a clearer than his mentor Milosevic. In November (1991) the Bosnian Serbs, led referendum for secession from the by Radovan Karadzic, voted to secede from Federation, though it did not act on the Serbian forces were now occupying a quarter Bosnia and found their own state. Serb decision at that stage. Slovenia, however, was of Croatia, and expanding. It was undeclared deputies had already walked out of the now increasingly dragging Croatia with it war, although Tudjman was reluctant to Bosnian Parliament and formed their own towards independence. recognise reality given the military Parliament. Bosnia was now split apart in the imbalance he faced. On May 3rd (1991) way Croatia had been. Franjo Tudjman was elected President of Tudjman belatedly warned that war was By the end of November (1991) Serb forces Croatia. He was a Stalinist bureaucrat turned probably unavoidable. It would be a war, had achieved most of their objectives. Croatian nationalist, later to have war crimes however, that would have little to do with Milosevic now advocated a cease-fire and on his hands. defending the rights of Croatian Serbs (the UN intervention, which would freeze current 200,000 Serbs living in Zagreb were ignored) In March (1991) the Serbs of the Krajina battle lines to his advantage. Borisav Jovic, and everything to do grabbing Croatian (borderland) Region of Croatia, in what was Krajina Serb Interior Minister, put it this territory and undermining its right to claimed to be a spontaneous uprising, took way: "At this point the war in Croatia was independence. over the region and declared it an under control in the sense that all the Serb independent state. The uprising was led by On May 25th (1991) Slovenia and Croatia territories were under our control, all, that is Serb nationalist strongman Milan Babic. simultaneously declared independence. The except central Slavonia. Slobodan and I They named it the Autonomous Province of decided now was the time to get the UN EC opposed the declaration - which was Krajina, later Republika Srpska Krajina. troops into Croatia to protect the Serbs there. Western policy at that stage. Two days later We saw the danger - when Croatia would be the Yugoslav National Army (NGA) invaded The uprising had the full backing of recognised, which we realised would happen, Slovenia in an attempt to prevent its Milosevic, and it was armed and supported the JNA would be regarded as a foreign army implementation of the declaration. The JNA by the Yugoslav National Army (JNA). invading another country. So we had better were forced to abandon the invasion after 10 Federal authority was collapsing and the JNA get the UN troops in early to protect the days by a combination of international was already acting under Serbian control. It Serbs". was a body-blow to the unity of Yugoslavia pressure and surprisingly strong Slovenian and a massive challenge to Croatia - which resistance. Croatia had lost a third of its territory to was split wide open by it. Tudjman had no Serbian forces. There were thousands of dead army to resists the JNA and sought to Ultimately Slovenia could not have defended and half a million Croatian refugees. Early in stabilise the situation by diplomacy. He, in itself, but Milosevic only had limited interest December (1991) Tudjman visited Bonn to any case, had his own agenda for carving up in Slovenia since it had a negligible Serb seek EC recognition. A week later Germany the region (i.e. Bosnia-Herzegovina) in population. announced that if the EC did not recognise favour of a Greater Croatia once he was Croatia and Slovenia it would do so In August (1991) Serb forces carried out the pushed towards independence. unilaterally. first ethnic cleaning of the war in the Krajina Two weeks later, at the end of March (1991), village of Kijevo - which was a pocket of Two weeks later Bosnia-Herzegovina and yet another crucial decision was made. Croat population surrounded by Serb-held Macedonia decided to seek independence. It Milosevic and Tudjman concluded that territory. Soon after Babic announced that the was that or being a part of a Greater Serbia Yugoslavia was now effectively finished, and Krajina Serb paramilitary forces had fused they could not accept. On January 17 (1992) that three, or more, successor states would with the JNA. the EC agreed to recognise Croatia and eventually emerge. The issue now was how Slovenia but not Bosnia-Herzegovina or In early September (1991) the Croatian city they would each carve out their own ethnic Macedonia. of Vukovar (43% Croat and 37% Serb) was states to the detriment of Bosnia. Later, EC shelled by Serbian irregulars with heavy mediator Lord Carrington, after meetings On March 1 (1992) the assault on Bosnia with Milosevic and Tudjman, made the same weapons supplied by the JNA. Tudjman started when Serb paramilitaries erected point. responded by laying siege to JNA barracks barricades in Sarajevo, dividing the city. across Croatia. On September 19th a JNA Bosnia was torn apart by Serbian and "When I first talked to Presidents Milosevic force, with tanks and heavy weapons, left Croatian forces for three years. Bosnian cities and Tudjman", he said, "it was quite clear Belgrade bound for Vukovar. Within days were bombed into rubble and their that both of them had a solution which was Vukovar was under siege and heavy inhabitants starved out. Europe saw its first mutually satisfactory - which was that they bombardment. genocide, since world war two. Bosnian were going to carve up Bosnia between Muslims faced massacre, rape, and terror. In them". On October 1st (1991) the JNA laid siege to Srebrenica 7,000 Muslim men and boys were the Croat port city of Dubrovnik - which was killed in the course of a few days. Three In April (1991) Milosevic recognised the 82% Croat and just 6% Serb. Vukovar fell a quarters of Bosnia¹s territory was occupied Krajina Serbs as a separate state. Ultra- month later. It was reduced to rubble after by either Serbian or Croatian forces. 30,00 nationalist Bosnian Serb leader, Radovan weeks of hand-to-hand fighting. Over 500 Bosnian women were raped as part of a Karadize, called for "an armed force of the Croats were killed and nearly 2,000 policy of terror. The war left a quarter of a 41 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

million dead and three million Bosnian 78 days. The US dominated Alliance had Slovenia came almost a year after the start of refugees. found a role for itself in the post Soviet era, war in the region. It came a long time after an opportunity to demonstrate the superiority the invasion of Slovenia and Croatia by There is plenty for which the Bosnian regime of it weaponry, and as a means of extending Serbian forces: i.e. well after the die was cast could be criticised. But the idea that it was no its influence to the East. on the unity of Yugoslavia. Imperialism, different to those of Milosevic or Tudjman is particularly Germany, did seek to intervene, preposterous. Bosnia was by far the most In Britain a campaign was launched against of course, but this was not the decisive factor. multi-ethnic and multi-cultural Yugoslav the war in the form of The Committee for Republic. For Bosnia it was a war of survival Peace in the Balkans. The role of Milosevic The bombing of Serbia ended when a and a war in defence of a multi-ethnic remained controversial. The Committee itself compromise was found acceptable to both society. That multi-ethnicity mostly survived was silent on the role of Milosevic. The SWP NATO and Milosevic was struck. Key for throughout the war. There were Serbs and (within it) opposed the bombing but Milosevic was that Kosovo remained part of Croats at every level of the Bosnian state and underplayed Milosevic's campaign against Serbia and that the multi-national force military. 10% of the army were Serb or Croat, Kosovo. Socialist Action - which no longer moving in to occupy Kosovo was under UN and there were 50,000 Serbs and 30,000 exists but was influential in the Committee at (rather than NATO) control. Previously Croats in Bosnian Sarajevo throughout the the time - saw Milosevic as some kind of unacceptable conditions, such as the right of siege. representative of actually existing socialism NATO to access to any part of Serbia were and described Serbia as "the chief obstacle to dropped. A similar deal could probably have The war ended in 1995 after Bosnia had at the capitalist break-up of Yugoslavia. been struck with Milosevic without the last turned the tide on the battlefield and bombing. began take back parts of its territory. Such politics influenced the shape, and Suddenly Milosevic, the architect of the unfortunately the size, of the anti-war The national rights and aspirations of the conflict, became the West's negotiating mobilisations as well - since it gave them a Kosovars were set aside in all this and remain partner in Dayton Peace Treaty - which he strong pro-Serb flavour. Most potential unresolved. Yet again the lesson has not been signed on behalf of the Bosnian Serbs who he supporters of the anti-war movement, beyond learned that the problem of the Balkans had drawn into the conflict. A divided Bosnia the ranks of the organised left, started from cannot be resolved without the right of self- was turned into a UN protectorate and left to strongly opposing the ethnic cleansing of the determination for all the peoples of the region pick up the pieces. Kosova Albanians, and stayed away once being respected. they perceived the pro-Serb bias of the Fittingly Milosevic's final undoing came not In nearly 5 years of warfare in Slovenia, movement - even those who did not see at the hands of NATO or the UN but at the Croatia and Bosnia not a single military NATO as a solution. action had taken place on the soil of Serbia. hands of the Serbian people. In October 2000 Also in all three cases, war had been waged The issue of independence for Kosovo, a mass uprising of Serbian workers a general by forces receiving orders from Belgrade, which we advocated it as the only lasting strike and mass demonstrations and the storing of the parliament building - over a aided by irregulars trained and equipped by solution, was not taken up by the SWP. disputed election result drove him and his the JNA. We argued that there were two wars taking corrupt clique from office. Six months later As a result of these wars 200,000 died, place: one waged by Milosevic against after a stand-off at his mansion he was mainly civilians, half a million wounded, and Kosovo and another against Serbia by Nato arrested and taken to The Hague. two million made refugees. All ideas of and we were opposed to both. We called for As for the Tribunal at The Hague, it has been "equal responsibility" for these war should be NATO out of the region and Serbia out of selective as to whom it pursues. Not only rejected. We should not equate the aggressor Kosovo. We were part of a co-ordination have Radovan Karadzic and his military chief with the victim. Milosevic was the prime within the Committee of those groups Ratko Mladic never been brought to book for mover of these wars, Tudjman was a second supporting this position: ourselves, Workers Srebrenica. But the likes of Tony Blair, string dictator with regional ambitions and Power, the Socialist Party, the CPGB, Milosevic's old friend Bill Clinton, plenty of blood on his hands. Izetbegovic was Workers International and Workers Action. Madeleine Albright and Wesley Clark - who the leader of the principle victim of these bombarded Serbia for 78 days killing wars. Many on the left (particularly SA but including Tony Benn and other anti-war thousands of people also go unpunished. The After the Bosnian war finished Milosevic MPs) insisted that Yugoslavia had been use of depleted uranium and cluster bombs; was already developing another - his ethnic broken up not by Milosevic's project but by the targeting of a civilian passenger train, the war against the Kosova Albanians. During imperialist intervention. They pointed the Chinese embassy and Radio Serbia - killing 16 media workers - are of no consequence. the next four years 350,000 ethnic Albanians decision of Germany and the EC to recognise were driven out of the country to become Slovenia and Croatia (the richest Republics) They can all rest a bit easier now. Even refugees. as independent states. Once Slovenia and Milosevic's attempt to bring them to Hague Croatia had gained independence, they as witnesses to their crimes has come to an In 1998 the Kosovan Albanians mounted argued, it was "natural" for Serb minorities end with his passing. mass protests against Serbian rule, police within Croatia and Bosnia to "rebel" and the troops were sent in to suppress them. In 1999 scene was set for war. Alan Thornett is a leading member of the ISG, British an escalating refugee crisis was used by Nato Section of the Fourth International, and sits on the to launch an unprecedented bombing As the above account sets out, however, Executive Committee of Respect. campaign against Serbia, which went on for German and EC recognition of Croatia and 42 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Venezuela The revolution seen from the left: Chavismo's original sin

Roland Denis

Neither "Chavismo" nor the "Bolivarian revolution" are political phenomena originating from the traditional left, and this is their original sin. They emerged from revolt in the streets and uprisings in barracks, not the rational decision of a complex reality in which we perhaps a stupid one: since the vanguard or a left political bloc directing a revolutionary live. Obviously, that has not Paris Commune and the first process to victory. We are dealing then with a strange and been easy and it is still very Soviet government of 1917- extremely complex phenomenon, informed by the most difficult to identify a pole in this 1919, was there a single libertarian and radical elements of society and the popular revolutionary left which has government in history which has movement, now bearing the flags of anti-capitalism and clarified entirely its doubts and responded to this indicator and socialism. lacunas. Yet, in our perspective, which has lasted more than two obvious errors continue to be years "in power"? If there has But we are also dealing with a If there is then a "classist basis" reproduced, perhaps by the been one, send the reference. We society traumatised by poverty it is undoubtedly formed in necessity of seeking refuge in a prefer in these circumstances to and by the degree of corruption contact with certain combative perimeter of certainty which admit that history has shown that engendered by a model of nuclei of the workers and allows this or that organisation, this parameter of comprehension accumulation founded on an Marxist movement, but above all group or tendency, to insulate and action suffers from immense "economy of extraction", that is from the debates and the itself from the chaos of reality gaps and from political a dependent national economy influence of very diverse and and crisis "without certain impotence. Perhaps the of a state subsisting heterodox historic currents of outcome" of the order of anarchists, autonomists, fundamentally on the oil rent, struggle (cultural resistance, domination in our country. councilists, libertarians, the and a capitalist structure liberation theology, comrades of Durruti, Zapatistas, reproduced thanks to the "cimarronismo" [1], the street On the one hand, a left which were right about the unviable subvention of the rate of profit democracy demanded in the radicalises its discourse starting nature of using the vanguard through an agreement of neighbourhoods, social from its appreciation of the party and the state form as tools redistribution (which is movements of every type, "class nature" of this for the emancipation of labour? moreover, not at all legal and spontaneous popular uprisings, government (bourgeois, petty Doesn't this state form (its open, hence the permanent "state national liberation movements, bourgeois), and of the ideological affiliation doesn't of impunity" in which we live) revolutionary Bolivarism, armed "populist", "reformist", matter much) concentrate in "nationalist" elements which run between the dominant classes struggle, Latin American critical itself all the rules, culture, through it for class reasons. Thus and the political elites in power. Marxism, indigenous protocols, relations, which it is a government condemned, This structural base of our social movements and so on). There render capitalist domination lies the second original sin of the beyond its declarations, to formation, after nearly a century historically viable? "Bolivarian movement": its defend the interests of national of existence, has created an unusual diversity and and imperialist capital (we refer The problem of the orthodox extremely unequal society (those heterodoxy today represented by to the majority of Trotskyist class-based characterisation, who profit from the oil booty the figure of Hugo Chavez. currents, very active today in inherited from the Leninist and those who are excluded from some workers' sectors). This can tradition, tends to be its it) but engenders at the same The errors of a certain left be totally correct if we restrain excessive contempt both for the time the motivation for a popular critique ourselves to a criterion of formal social situation (its diversity, the resistance movement which and sociological comprehension, relations which develop, the struggles for the most urgent and The "revolutionary sectors", that according to which we would inter-relationship of social often elementary popular is those who participate in oppose in our political subjects) on which the order of demands (water, electricity, political and social struggle imagination this government (of domination rests, and for the housing, land, work, education, seeking the necessary juncture petty bourgeois, peasant or recent events which have created health and so on.) and which between theory and practice, are marginal origin) to a possible new political values, new modes suffers from being a marginal faced with an immense government formed by the of resistance, new spaces of movement, largely excluded challenge of comprehension and delegates of workers and interaction between the from the central debate on the definition of a line of action exploited classes in general, exploited classes, new production and distribution of coherent with our historic organised and identified as such. programmatic perspectives, the wealth created. responsibility as well as with the But then we pose a question, outside of which the revolution 43 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

is impossible if not in the heads capitalism, dependant and enemy of al imperialism. What his ideals, but surrounded by a and mystifications of the predatory. The most extreme other outcome could there be band of traitors, hypocrites, vanguards. We don't want to say versions of this "radical beyond a mystification? The crooks who profit from his that we should ignore the role of nationalism" claim that Chavez most radical proposals authority, organised essentially the traditional working class, the is nothing more than a "puppet" objectively resemble the good in the parties of the government founding act of the conquest and of neoliberalism disguised as a old programmes of a great part - the MVR, PODEMOS and PPT control of the means of socialist. of the Latin American left of the in particular [7] - who use them production and the advances 1930s and 1940s, which have in their turn as the main tools of towards very concrete forms of We are entirely agreed on the given birth to parties like APRA appropriation of the functions of organisation of power in which strategic "duality" that traverses (Peru) and Democratic Action government and posts in general, the place of this sector is central. the government and its (Venezuela) and we know today in the state and the organized The challenge is to extirpate economic policies (exploration how they ended up. If the popular sector. It sees the main from our heads the sociological of new relations of problem is Chavez and his difficulty of the Bolivarian obsession of "class" and to see in production/alliance with government, that would mean revolution as corruption and all these workers' dynamics transnational capital). The that the real revolutionary bureaucracy, and reiterates its another expression of the totality establishment of mixed government, like a God total support to the president but of the class struggle, tbe enterprises is without doubt a descending from Olympus, increasingly distances itself experience of rebellion and the huge and unacceptable would, with divine force and a from the new elites who constitution of new orders of concession to oil capital. Beyond great number of orders and monopolise the political society which emerge from the that, projects like the plan for the decrees, establish a national state representativeness of the simultaneous insurrection of the development of coal extraction with absolute sovereignty in the revolutionary process. exploited. In itself, the in the region of Zulia, the framework of a new occupation of a building is no transnational penetration in the civilisational reality. Basically it The most important dimension more important than the territories turned towards mining amounts to the re-elaboration of of this critique is not the justice occupation of a rural holding or activities (basically gold and one of the follies of which the of its analysis or its theoretical a factory, the most important fact diamonds), the models of old radical left (at least, its most depth (obvious weakness: the is the multiplication of these development proposed, the very consistent elites) remains idealisation of Chavez, the phenomena of expropriation of vision of continental integration, prisoner, the offspring both of personalisation of the capital, their massification, their the concession of a privileged Soviet Marxism and the government), what counts, is political creativity and their role for finance capital, witness programmes of national that it is the only critique which capacity of defence faced with clearly to the fact that, to say the liberation and voluntarism has acquired a mass character. It the attacks of the capitalist state. least, the "transition towards specific to our American lands. has become "popular" in all socialism" is still doubtful and senses of the term and little by Another fairly widespread left contradictory. But does that The good critique little, it has been forced to make critique is what we would mean Hugo Chavez and his qualitative leaps which have characterise as radical- government are no more than Of course, there are other wings obliged it to evolve from nationalist. The focal point of pawns of imperialism? Again, a of the "left" who expose their commentary to political fact and these critiques no longer resides formal reasoning is employed, critical viewpoint, all "anti- to the construction of strategies in the class affiliation of the emptied of facts, totally abstract Chavistas", like the new liberal of political action to destroy the government but in the question and politically impotent as left - "anti-Bourbonist" as shameful enemy of corruption of the sovereignty, more several of these tendencies of Petkoff says [6] - annexed by the and bureaucratism. It is what we concretely in the problem of the ultra-nationalism have shown right opposition. The problem in call in the Projecto Nuestra ambiguity the government has themselves to be. The problem their view is the "tyrant-despot", America [8]: the construction of shown on its "anti-imperialist" us that, although some of them the "populist", the "anti- a "reason for all". This is not the positions. It criticises the fact speak of a "clash of democrat" Hugo Chavez, with a enlightened "reason" of self- that whereas the government civilisations" [5] and even of political ideology which is consciousness/Hegelian self- makes declarations opposed to struggle against state capitalism, Castroite or "archaic". A logic reflection. It is simply the US imperial domination, there is they do not go beyond simple that one finds in certain anarchist concrete domain of collective a privatising alliance with the oil denunciation and ideological nuclei, for whom the problem is reasoning in which the capital transnationals (extended propaganda. more or less the same. Chavez revolutionary process is now to the sphere of the the militarist, Chavez the expressed in its most productive exploitation of gas) through From their position, there is no authoritarian and so on.). But in and transformative matrix. In "mixed enterprises". It is also alternative except a truth, it is not in our interest to fact, it has already led to opposed to the abandonment of mystification of political power discuss with these tendencies magnificent processes of orimulsion [2] as energy or a kind of original pure because either we are their mobilisation, social irreverence, alternative. We find here a lot of community beyond history political enemies, or, more radicalisation of the libertarian denunciations which bear on the which will be restored as saviour simply, because they add and egalitarian spirit, self- question of the "productive of humanity. There have never nothing to the debate. organisation which is in fact the model" as a whole. Criticisms been "people, movement, real central point constructed by the are made that the plans for the and current collective action of What interests us is another Bolivarian revolution in the mining industry, the transformation". This discourse critique, very left also but ideological field. It is also the carboniferous plan, the southern implies that in reality everything perhaps more ingenuous. We can space in which all our hopes are gas pipeline [3], the participation is resolved in closed call this the "popular-moralist" concentrated, no longer as of Venezuela in the IIRSA [4], conspiracies and between critique. As critique and political arrogant vanguards but as the payment of the foreign debt leaderships, or thanks to a posture, it is very simple. It revolutionary combatants who and so on are no more than a programme which would impose states that Chavez is an honest both in their material conditions simple reproduction of the anew the state Leviathan. A state man, a genuine revolutionary, a and their emotions are identical model of developmentalist owning everything and the man of the people committed to to this people. 44 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

What should the left say authorities are concerned, against corruption, capitalism [2] A combustible created in Venezuela leading to an increasingly and imperialist aggression. We from the combination of water and and do? bituminous or extra-heavy oil. marked tendency to control both propose as slogan: "Ten million Beyond interpretations in the the social processes of wills to deepen the revolution". [3] A single and united gas network from vanguard circles or popular organisation and self- Venezuela to Argentina. We have called this campaign sectors, it is in our view government and the productive [4] An initiative to integrate the regional important to understand that it is and workers' experiences in the "for all our struggles". An infrastructure of South America, a vast the development of a social cooperatives and "recovered" "other" campaign [10] on programme of construction of new roads, movement which although enterprises. A situation of Venezuelan territory so that the bridges, waterways and energy and communication links especially in the several times encouraged to "maximum confusion" before real struggles can breather, so tropical and Andean zones. It is a wing of organise from the bureaucratic which the rank and file that the right words are found, so the ALBA (Bolivian Alternative For the government structures (Land leadership tends to repeat the that the rank and file nuclei can Americas). Committees, Communal same schema applied for at least organise, through the necessary [5] The quotation is from Douglas Bravo. Councils, Health Committees, four years: keep quiet, wait, mobilisation to erect the bases of A long-term anti-imperialist militant, energy and water committees) is pursue organisation, don't an "autonomous transitional Douglas Bravo was leader of the Party of beginning to take its distance underestimate the enemy, but all the Venezuelan Revolution (PRV) and its programme" shared by all the armed wing, the Armed Forces of from these forms of leadership this begins to look a little communities in struggle. The National Liberation (FALN, 1962-1969). and to establish its own policies inadequate. It is necessary to idea is not to limit this campaign He is today the main leader of the "Tercer and strategies developing a take a collective step forward. camino" movement, an evolution of the to the elections. The ideal would PRV-FALN of which Hugo Chavez was a critical attitude towards the state Until now, the attempts have be to go beyond them so that by member until 1986. as a whole and which is been interesting but insufficient February 27 [11] we have the [6] A former member of the PRV and the radicalising from day to day. (the mobilisation begun by bases of a common programme With the most important sectors of the indigenous Venezuelan Communist Party, Teodoro and plan which allows the Petkoff created the Movement Towards autonomous social movements movements, miners, peasants effective deepening of the Socialism (MAS) in 1971 on a line of (peasants, recovered companies, and above all workers). Faced democratic critique of Stalinism before revolutionary process. There is students, indigenous peoples), with the emergence of these evolving towards social-democratic and even talk of an electoral ticket then outright neoliberal positions. Under this organised base of the phenomena, the state apparatus common to all the movements the government of Rafael Caldera (last popular movement is the neutralises them, when it is Christian Democrat government before associated in this initiative to unavoidable class matrix for the incapable of repressing them as Chavez), he was minister of planning deepening of the revolution. If with the miners, by transforming form a counterweight to the (Cordiplan) and applied a neoliberal parties of the government [12]. It programme of reduction of inflation and we do not found a common them into centres of the size of the administration (Agenda theatre for political action and administration of resources is a significant decision but it Venezuela). He left the MAS when the the construction of a project of which it will grant them for their will be still in the background in majority of the latter decided to support relation to the priority objectives Chavez in 1997. He is now the main society, it is very likely that the development. This cooption representative of the social-liberal anti- Bolivarian revolution will in the removes their combatitiveness of mobilisation, meeting, Chaves left and is a candidate for the coming years undergo a decline by strengthening the tendency to listening, the construction of the presidential elections of December 2006. programme "of the poor" so as to of such a magnitude that it "depoliticisation" of their action [7] The government coalition is made up would disappear as a real and increasing the unity of their initiate from next year a new of these parties and others: the MVR phenomenon of the exercise of bases as corporation and not in stage of the revolutionary (Movement for a Fifth Republic) was justice, of freedom and the class terms (such is the situation process, characterised by the founded in 1997 to provide Chavez with an electoral presence; PODEMOS (POr la construction of sovereignty, of a good part of the alternative autonomy and unitary DEMOcracia Social) is the pro-Chavez independently of Chavez. communication spaces). radicalisation of the popular split from the MAS whose leadership left struggles. This campaign should the Chavez coalition in 2000, protesting We are today at a time of This context demands a against the radicalisation of measures; the begin in one or two months, PPT (Patria Para Todos) exists since 1997 "maximum confusion". On the qualitative leap towards a new following a unitary conference as a successor to La Causa Radical, a split one hand the imperialist conjuncture in which relations to form "the command for all our from the PCV in the early 1970s; the PPT has provided the main cadres of the offensive against Venezuela, the between the government and the struggles". Our creativity and evolution of "Plan Balboa" and "non-administered" popular Chavez government. Among the parties of political will are going to be the governing coalition, we should "Plan Colombia" as military movement would change determinant to its development, mention the PCV (Venezuelan Communist Party). plans for attacking Venezuela, radically. Today, critical and and we want to find ourselves in and the pressure of the electoral combative nuclei have emerged a totally different terrain, in [8] "Our America Project" campaign (the campaign for ten across Venezuela. They struggle which equality and the fight for million votes [9], aid the in defence of the Bolivarian [9] So that the legitimacy of the coming the dignity of others will be the cohesion of the popular bases revolution, but at the same time elections - the right, which knows it will priority and not a political use of lose, is considering a boycott - is not around the figure of Chavez and represent a faithful testimony to the collective. contested, Chavez has spoken of an the position of the government, the exhaustion of the objective of 10 million votes. on the other hand, the institutional schema of the state Roland Denis is an activist in the [10] The author here clearly refers to the institutional decomposition as central lever of the process of Projecto Nuestra America [Our "other campaign" of the Zapatistas. under which we live, transformation. We have America Project] - April 13 Movement, increasingly manifest at the level proposed steps forward in the one of the currents of the Venezuelan [11] Reference to the popular uprising of radical left. of the municipal and federal future presidential campaign February 27, 1989. governments (town halls, (December 2006) by creating NOTES [12] In Venezuela, voting is done through provinces, in the immense inside it an alternative dynamic a party. One can thus vote for Chavez by majority in the hands of the axised on the synthesis of all [1] "Cimarronismo", one of the most voting for the PCV, the MVR, or any other "bloc of change") produce a these programmes through original components of the cultural group which presents him as its candidate. collective exhaustion which dialogue, mobilisation, mass syncretism of the "New World", emerged from numerous new artistic forms sometimes borders on despair. In meetings, raising the themes of originating from the mix of Amerindian, fact, even the institutional anti-bureaucratism, the struggle African and European cultures. 45 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

South Africa Resistance to neoliberalism

Josep María Antentas

The victory of the African National Congress (ANC) in the democratic elections of 1994 marked the end of apartheid in South Africa, after a long period of negotiations between the forces of the regime and the liberation movement, initiated in the late 1980s and early 1990s. These culminated in an agreed model of transition whose strategic perspective had been established in the camp of the liberation movement in a clear form in 1990 with the formation of the Tripartite Alliance between the ANC, the South African Communist Party (SACP) which was well integrated into the former, and the main trade union confederation of the country, the Confederation of South African Trade Unions (COSATU).

The ANC came to power with a neo- ownership which has undergone very few impelling its own political project, with the Keynesian program, the Reconstruction and alterations with respect to the period of formation of a "Workers' Party", inspired Development Programme (RDP) whose apartheid (McKinley, 2004). more or less by the Brazilian model and initial implementation was very partial, but disputing the political hegemony of the ANC which was abandoned two years to later in These processes of increased inequality have and the SACP. But gradually this project was favour of the Growth Employment and been accompanied by the emergence of a abandoned and the political leadership of the Redistribution Strategy (GEAR), a program small "new black middle-class" with its own ANC and its hegemony within the union of neoliberal aspect. specific interests. By this conjuncture of movement was accepted, with the SACP in a elements, the evolution of South African stronger position at the end of the 1980s and The adoption of GEAR was accompanied by society has been defined as a transition from early 1990s, on the eve of the negotiations for the promotion of a regional sub-imperialist racial apartheid to class apartheid (Bond, the transition towards a post-apartheid project based on a neoliberal agenda of rapid 2004). society. economic integration of the African continent and its insertion in the global economy, From the 1970s to the end of the 1980s, A road without return? through the New Partnership for Africa' s South Africa was characterized by a mighty workers' movement, formed in the heat of the Development (NEPAD, Bond, 2004). The first part of the 1980s was marked by processes of industrialization of the 1950s debates and negotiations between the various The objective of the ANC government is to and 1960s that led to the formation of a union sectors for the formation of a single consolidate a new dominant historic bloc significant industrial working class. Between unitary confederation, which would based on capital oriented to large-scale 1950 and 1980 the number of black workers culminate with the setting up of COSATU in export, the promotion of a "black in manufacturing industry rose from 360,000 1985, integrating the broad majority of bourgeoisie", and the inclusion in a to 1,103,000, and in mining from 450,000 to unions in the country. Different orientations subordinate form of the middle layers and 768,000 (Bond, Miller, and Ruiters, 2000). coexisted from the beginning, but sectors of the working-class (Dessai, 2004). progressively those linked to the ANC The strikes in Durban in 1973 marked the acquired a hegemonic position and the old The social consequences of GEAR have been birth of a new combative trade union movement. As Jacquin explains (1999), "union left" fragmented and adapted. very drastic for the popular sectors: increased COSATU developed a very significant role unemployment, rising from 16% in 1990 to several currents with different union projects emerged within this movement: within the fight against apartheid, although more than 40% in recent years; a fall in the its relations with other pillars of the liberation average income of working class families of A first current inked to the ANC; a second movement, the neighbourhood and civic around 19%, in particular in those sectors linked to the Black Consciousness Movement groups rooted in the townships and poor linked to the informal economy, around 50% inspired by Steve Biko; and a third, formed districts, were always an element of of the economically active population; a by independent Marxist trade union cadres, controversy. strong polarization of the distribution of who constituted what Jacquin calls the "trade wealth and income; an increase in poverty, union left", and which was involved in The militancy and combativeness of the with the official rate at 70% and of extreme setting up the main industrial unions of the trades unionism incarnated by COSATU poverty, estimated at 28%; an increase in the country, whose culmination was the made it an organization which was admired price of basic public services, like water or formation of FOSATU in 1979. internationally. Along with the formation of electric lighting, due to privatisation and the the Brazilian CUT in 1983, and the eruption policies of "cost recovery", that have caused The trade union left initially embodied an of independent trades unionism in South massive cuts in supply to some 10 million independent project with respect to the ANC Korea in 1986-87 (which would culminate families for not having paid bills, and and, from the 1980s onwards, a part of its with the creation of the KCTU in 1995), the maintenance of the structure of land nucleus considered the possibility of constitution of COSATU was one of the best 46 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

examples of development of a model of municipal workers, SAMWU, protagonist of includes in this amalgam of marginalized combative trades unionism in the countries of important struggles against privatisation. sectors that sustain them (Dwyer, 2003). the semi-periphery, in a context of an Dessai (2004) makes a comparison with the international ebbing of workers' movements, There is no organized union left current, but struggles of the "urban crowd" at the the zenith of neoliberalism, and progressive the negative effects of neoliberalism on beginning of industrialization, analysed by adaptation of the first to the second. COSATU's base places it in a situation of authors like Hobsbawm, as loosely structured permanent structural tension. As indicated by and inconstant movements of the urban poor In 1990, COSATU formally joined the Trevor Ngwane (2003), there is reason to for economic change. tripartite Alliance with the ANC and SACP believe that the accumulated malaise will and from 1994 it maintained a subordinate lead to a greater union combativeness since We can conceive of them as reactive and relationship with the ANC government. From "the leadership of COSATU has captured the defensive movements for daily survival 1994 the trade union model of COSATU, and bodies of the workers, but not their souls" carried out by what Davis (2005) calls the its members, experienced a progressive "urban informal proletariat" of the hyper- transformation towards a unionism of more The emergent resistance degraded peripheries of the great cities of the institutionalised agreements, less militant, South, whose way of life is "informal The impact of neoliberal policies led to the survivalism". Their characteristics reflect the and lacking a horizon of socialist emergence, from the end of the 1990s, of transformation. transformations undergone by the working- increasing social resistance that experienced class and the impact of the processes of This involved changes in its organizational a period of rapid growth from 2000 to 2003, "urbanization disconnected from although it later contracted partially. This culture, a greater bureaucratisation, and the industrialization" that according to Davis is must be considered not only as a result of the cooption of important union leaders in distinctive of the present dynamic of increase in poverty but as a direct response to positions of responsibility in the government, capitalism (except in China) and that fits well the policies of the government (Dessai, and also of middle cadres at company level in with South African reality. 2004), in particular against the policies of departments of human resources (Jensen, privatisation of basic services like water or A number of campaigns and organizations 2004)COSATU was affected by neoliberal electric lighting, which constituted a central have emerged. Among the most important are policies and unemployment, and it has mechanism in what Harvey (2004) calls the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC), set suffered a significant fall in affiliation. "accumulation by dispossession". up in 1998 around the demand for access to In 1996 COSATU unions had 1.9 million drugs for carriers of the HIV virus, a This "neoliberal dispossession" is added to affiliated members, whereas in 2005 the movement with a large social base and a the "historical dispossession" caused by formalized organizational national structure. number was 1.7 million. In fact from 1996 apartheid and its legacy. The social base of 500,000 affiliates were lost, although they these movements (habitually referred to in It has acted as a "single issue" campaign, gained 300,000, the majority due to the South Africa as "new social movements", in a focused against the pharmaceutical entrance of new unions into the usage of the term different to that used by multinationals and avoiding confrontation confederation, like DENOSA or SASBO, of "European theory" in relation to new social with the ANC government; the Anti- conservative tradition. The profile of movements) is formed by the most Privatization Forum (APF), essentially based membership also experienced significant impoverished sectors of South African in Johannesburg, set up in 2000 as point of evolution with a growing greater weight of society, the inhabitants of the townships, the contact between several organizations, most qualified and "white collar" workers to the local communities and the most stricken importantly the Soweto Electricity Crisis detriment of semi-skilled and "blue collar" urban areas affected by massive Committee (SECC). workers. Faced with the application of unemployment, an extraordinary s housing GEAR, the strategy of COSATU has been crisis and lack of services. A good part of the The SECC was set up as a riposte to the simultaneously to maintain its subordinate social base of these struggles is formed by the increase in the cost of electric lighting after Alliance with the ANC and at the same time unemployed, although they have not privatisation, organising the famous to express its disagreement with its policies. developed a collective identity as Operation Khanyisa of illegal reconnection unemployed in the style of the Argentine of supplies to families who had been The confederation has oscillated between piqueteros, and women also play a significant disconnected because of non-payment; the mere verbal opposition to governmental role. Anti-Eviction Campaign (AEC), created in policies without any real strategy of 2001 in the region of Cape Town as a confrontation with them, and the Many analysts, like Dessai (2003) have response to the increasing evacuations of organization of important punctual talked about the protagonists of these families for non-payment of mortgages or mobilizations, among them several general movements in terms of the "poor", a vague rents; and the Landless People' s Movement strikes. Within the confederation, the most and loosely defined category but also one (LPM), formed in June 2001, because of the combative sector has been the union of used by the movements themselves, and that extreme slowness of the agrarian reform. Its 47 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

base is formed by an amalgam of sectors headed the fight against the apartheid. They to the ANC and the SACP, a process that, ("landless", small farmers, rural poor and so were created outside the "politics of the given the weakness of the socialist left, will on) and its self-definition as "landless" transition" but they operate on the political take time. expresses the demands for justice of the terrain (McKinley, 2004) and fill, albeit in a impoverished rural sectors. It is inspired by very partial form, the vacuum left by the (Beyond the bibliography cited below, I thank the Brazilian MST but has neither its force neoliberal turn and the institutionalisation of Brian Ashley and Marcia Andrews of the nor its global significance (Greenberg, 2004). the traditional forces of the working-class AIDC of Cape, Mark Weinberg of (Ngwane, 2003), in a context however of lack Johannesburg, Thabo, Arthur and Bongwani These different movements have had a of political alternative to the ANC and the Lubisi of the SECC, and Bongani Masuku of fragmentary existence and little mutual SACP and the great weakness of the socialist COSATU for information on South African coordination. Nevertheless, they participated left. realities). jointly in the mobilizations for the UN World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) in Relations with the forces of the Alliance, and Bibliography: Durban in 2001 under the umbrella of the the ANC itself, has been in general very AIDC. (2004). "From fighting apartheid to fighting Durban Social Forum (DSF) and, later, conflictual, although the type of concrete neoliberalism" in Alternatives Vol. 2, nº 8. pp. 2-3. during the World Summit for Sustainable relationship is variable and goes from open Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg in confrontation, as is the case of the APF and Benjamin, N. (2004). "Organisation Building and Mass 2002, within the framework of the Social Mobilization" in Development Update Vol. 5. nº 2. pp. 73- the AEC, to tense relations, as is the case of 94. Movement Indaba (SMI) coalition. the LPM which has members of the ANC and SACP inside it, and the search for agreement, Bond, P. (2004) en "From Racial to Class Apartheid: South The latter later became permanent as a Africa's frustrating decadeof freedom", Monthly Review. as is the case of the TAC that has tried to win national coordination, although weak and the support of the government in the face of Bond, Miller, y Ruiters (2000). "The Southern African superstructural, of the movements. the multinationals (Benjamin, 2004). Working Class: Production, Reproductionand Politics" in Johannesburg was testimony to the strong Socialist Register 2001. pp. 119-142. division between the social movements, Challenges and perspectives whose demonstration mobilized 20,000 Davis, M. (2005). "Planeta de ciudades-miseria" in New Left Review (edición española). In English, Planet of people, and the forces of the governmental After their unstoppable growth between 2000 Slums. Alliance who in their own march mobilized and 2003, the social movements experienced only 5,000. Both counter-summits were also Dessai, A. (2003). "Neoliberalism and Resistance in South a certain ebb tide and several difficulties as Africa" in Monthly Review,Vol. 54, nº 8. the occasion to symbolically insert the facing simultaneously strong state repression struggles against neoliberalism in South and attempts at cooption; while maintaining Dessai, A. (2004). "The post-apartheid State and Africa in the international cycle post-Seattle. concrete struggles; continue developing after Community Movements" in Development Update Vol. 5. nº 2. pp. 49-72. having obtained some initial basic successes; This resistance has emerged as periodic translate their mobilizing force into stable Dessai, A. y Pithouse, R. (2003). But we are thousands: movements on the basis of concrete organizational consolidation; advance dispossession, resistance, repossession and repression in defensive demands directed fundamentally Mandela Park. Durban: Research Report nº 9, Center for medium and long term strategic perspectives, against the local administration, ordered to Civil Society. and, in particular, extend their organized implement the policies of privatisation social base and establish alliances with other Dwyer, P. (2004). The Contentious Politics of the (Dessai and Pithouse, 2003). They have Concerned Citizens Forum. Durban: Center for Civil social sectors, beyond the "poor" and the unfolded a broad spectrum of strategies, Society. unemployed, as well as students and the including a "repertoire" of actions like: legal organized working-class. Greenberg (2004). The Landless People's Movement and processes, demonstrations, public the Failure of Post-apartheid land Reform. Durban: Center occupations of offices, illegal reconnection of For this reason, the relationship between for Civil Society. services that have been cut off, physical these movements and COSATU is a central Harvey, D. (2004). El Nuevo imperialismo. Madrid: Akal. blocking of the evacuations of houses, and strategic element. Globally, this is tense and In English, The New Imperialism, Oxford 2005. confrontations with the police (McKinley and distant. COSATU is identified by the Naidoo 2004). Jacquin, C. (1999). The Trade Union Left and the Birth of movements as part of the governmental bloc, the New South Africa. Amsterdam:IIRE. Its organizational structure is variable in and the movements are described as "ultra- leftist" bye COSATU, which fears their anti- Jensen, M. (2004) "10 years of democracy-Where to with terms off organizational formalization and COSATU?" in Alternatives Vol. 2 nº 8. pp. 5-6. geographic scope. The number of people ANC approach. Against this background, it effectively organized, beyond punctual seems reasonable on the part of the social McKinley, D. (2004). "The Political Economy of the Rise movements to look for bridges with the of Social Movements in South Africa" in Links nº 25. pp. mobilizations, is relatively weak. It is 41-50. possible to consider that they are movements unions, without losing the capacity for their that do not have a mass base, but a mass own initiative, through concrete agreements McKinley, D y Naidoo, P. (2004). "New Social orientation (Ngwane, 2003). for unity of action, so dragging significant Movements in South Africa: A Story inCreation" in sectors outside the camp of the Alliance Development Update Vol. 5. nº 2. pp. 9-22. Politically, this resistance to neoliberalism (AIDC, 2004). The strengthening of this Ngwane, T. (2003) "Chizpazos en Sudáfrica" in New Left has emerged outside of the forces of the social resistance must be accompanied also Review (edición española). Alliance bloc and the historic forces that by attempts to construct a political alternative 48 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Repression and electoral fraud Showdown in Mexico

Phil Hearse

Teachers rally in Oaxaca

On 16 August Mexican president Vincente Fox sent 800 federal riot police with armoured cars to guard the parliament building in Mexico City, against the possibility of attack by the tens of thousands of protestors occupying the centre of the city in a informal economy and with it The strike resulted from an semi-permanent encampment. The protestors are demonstrating urban mass poverty in the huge attempt by the government to against the giant fraud in July's presidential election, which edge of town barrios. Social remove the Mexican Miners robbed centre-left candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador inequality has deepened Union's top officer, General (popularly known as 'AMLO') of victory, and handed the massively, in a country already Secretary Napleón Gómez presidency instead to right-winger Felipe Calderón, candidate one of the most unequal in the Urrutia, and replace him with of Fox's National Action Party (PAN). world. Like Brazil, Mexico is a Elías Morales Hernández, a country where the rich live like union dissident who is This summer has witnessed a Why has this huge social conflict the rich in Switzerland and the reportedly backed by the Grupo series of harsh struggles and built up over the summer? Two poor live like the poor in India. Mexico mining company. As street battles as the outgoing factors underlie much of the Mexico labor expert Dan La government of Vincente Fox tension - the build up to the Social tensions have been high Botz explains: sought to stem the rising tide of presidential election which the since the emergence of the social protest - using the Mexican oligarchy, in close Zapatista indigenous movement "The strike by members of the traditional methods of the collaboration with the United in 1994. With no independent National Union of Mining and Mexican elite - vicious States, was desperate not to lose mass party representing the Metallurgical Workers of repression and electoral fraud on to even the moderate left, and interests of the workers and the Mexico (SNTMMRM) resulted a grand scale. the progress of the 'Other poor, Subcommandante Marcos from both labor union and Campaign' - the project of and the EZLN have acted as a political causes. The explosion While the protests are currently uniting and building Mexico's sort of substitute leadership, and cave in at the Pasta de centered on the electoral fraud, social movements from below, giving consistent support to Conchos mine in San Juan de over the summer there have been launched by Subcommandante every militant struggle. But Las Sabinas, Coahuila in several other key battles - a mass Marcos and the EZLN a year paradoxically the Zapatistas northern Mexico on Febuary 19 movement in the state of Oaxaca ago. themselves have been largely killed 65 miners. The Miners to bring down the corrupt right- confined to their Chiapas Union leader Gómez Urrutia wing government (including a But behind these factors are mountain strongholds, a blamed the employer, Grupo 44-day strike by Oaxaca more fundamental issues. Since limitation that the Other Mexico, calling the deaths schoolteachers leading that mass the election as president of right- Campaign aims to overcome. "industrial homicide." The Pasta movement), a prolonged strike wing Svengali and narcho- de Conchos cave-in set off a by miners and steelworkers and politician in chief Carlos Salinas How has this spring and summer storm. Throughout Mexico a huge conflict with federal and de Gotari in 1988, Mexico has of battle unfolded? politicians, academics, state riot police in the militant been suffering the continued intellectuals, and ordinary community of San Salvador pressure of neoliberalism, which Miners and steelworkers people criticized the mining Atenco in Mexico state. in as a result of the NAFTA strike company..... agreement has wrecked There is more to come. Already traditional communal peasant More than a quarter of a million "While miners throughout the Lopez Obrador's centre-left agriculture and devastated miners and steelworkers walked country mourned the death of Party of the Democratic agricultural communities. off the job between March 1-3 in their brothers and complained of Revolution (PRD) has set a wildcat strikes at 70 companies health and safety conditions in series of dates for mass The net result is an avalanche of in at least eight states from their own mines, there was no mobilisations going into the migrants to the cities, central to northern Mexico, official or wildcat strike in the autumn, mobilisations which particularly Mexico City, virtually paralyzing the mining immediate aftermath of the could easily escape its control. flooding the ranks of the industry. accident. 49 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

"Then, on February 28 the livelihoods. The organisation Atenco stand-off Mexican Secretary of Labor which led the struggle, the FPDT announced that Gómez Urrutia (Peoples' Front in Defense of was not actually the head of the Land), remained in existence. union, but that the real general In a statement on 4 May, the government buildings. On June secretary was Elías Morales This militant community invited Revolutionary Workers Party 14 state and federal paramilitary Hernández. The government's Subcommandante Marcos to who support the Fourth police launched a violent attack action was based on part of speak in the town on May 1. Two International, declared the on the protestor's encampment in Mexican labor law known as days later police attempted to events at Atenco to be "a which several people (the exact "taking note" (toma de nota), arrest flower sellers from Atenco deliberate provocation against number is unknown) were killed. under which the government who set up their stalls on some the Other Campaign" saying that The very next day the teachers recognizes the legally elected land owned by the American "without a shadow of doubt" the and their supporters re-took the officers of labor unions." [1] multinational Walmart in the police attacks has been designed Zócalo , instituting a two-month nearby community of Texcoco. to coincide with Marcos' visit, period of virtual 'dual power' in The government turned to The flower sellers called for help and to impede the progress of his the city and much of the state. violent repression of the striking campaign. After finishing the on their mobile phones and Indeed on July 5 the Popular miners and steelworkers Valley of Mexico part of his trip hundreds arrived to beat back the Assembly of the People of supporting them. On April 20 Marcos was due to travel to San police attack. A day of bloody Oaxaca (known by its Spanish eight hundred state and federal Luis Potosí, were an important battles followed, in which two initials APPO) declared itself to police launched an assault on rally for the release of political people were killed by be the legitimate government of 500 striking workers who had paramilitary riot police. prisoners was due to take place. been occupying a steel mill in the state. Lázaro Cárdenas. Two were Next morning the federal riot Uprising and terror in Since then there have been killed, five seriously injured and police carried out a brutal attack Oaxaca repeated mass marches, 40 wounded. on the town, which involved - as assassinations of popular leaders is the style in Mexico - brutal Oaxaca state on the Pacific coast Since Felipe Calderón declared by 'unknown' gunmen who have beatings, the wrecking of homes, has a long militant history. In the himself winner of the opened fire on several the theft of money and the arrest early 1970s it was the site of a presidential elections Grupo demonstrations, the takeover of of more than one hundred. In jail militant guerrilla struggle led by Mexico has been on the several radio and television dozens were subject to torture the Party of the Poor, which offensive against the miners. At stations to put the mass media at and more than 20 women were resulted in near-genocidal Nacozari, one of the world's the service of the people, police raped or otherwise sexually repression in which thousands of largest copper mines, just a few young people assumed to abused. Some key leaders of the attacks on those radio stations miles south of the US border, support the guerrilla were killed. community, including FPDT and at the time of writing (late 1400 miners have been on strike leaders Ignacio del Valle and August) a threat by Oaxaca since March 24. On July 12 the Over the summer there has been Felipe Alvarez, remain in jail business people to stage a state- board said they'd abandoned a prolonged struggle against the wide strike against...the inability accused of 'armed kidnap' (a ultra-corrupt state government their jobs, and gave the mine's of the state government to stop reference to the abduction of of right-wing Governor Ulises owner, Grupo Mexico, all the strikes! permission to close down several cops during the first day Ruiz Ortiz, a member of the PRI of the battle). operations, effectively firing the (Institutional Revolutionary In response to their inability to strikers. At the time of writing Party, until recently the main The Atenco attack caused crush the mass movement the strike is unresolved. party of the Mexican elite). It politically, Ulises Ruis - backed outrage in Mexico and beyond started with a strike by militant by Vicente Fox's national Bloody conflict in Atenco because television reporters teachers for better wages and government - has unleashed a were allowed to film many of the more financial support for poor reign of terror in the streets of San Salvador Atenco, 30 kms events, including the beating of students, by soon mushroomed Oaxaca. Right-wing death west of Mexico City, is a largely one man by more than 20 riot into a general campaign to force squads prowl the city by night agricultural community which in cops. As a consequence of the Ulises Ruiz to quit. 2001 led a huge and successful Atenco attack the Zapatista and have carried out drive-by battle against the building of a leadership declared a red alert The teachers and their allies shootings at the radio and new Mexico City airport, which and started a nationwide occupied the main square television stations, as well as would have confiscated their campaign for the release of the (Zócalo ) in the city of Oaxaca, opening fire on several land and destroyed their imprisoned Atenco campesinos. including taking over some demonstrations. 50 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

On 21 August the Channel 9 leading candidates, Felipe Riot police wait in front of Oaxaca cathedral. television station headquarters, Calderón of the PAN and used as a headquarters by the Manuel Lopez Obrador of the dissident movement, was PRD appeared to be neck and attacked and burned by right- neck, but with some polls nationwide across all the polling two-decades of neoliberalism wing thugs, making it unusable. putting Lopez Obrador slightly stations. and intensified subordination of ahead. In the event, when the Mexico to the needs of US On 22 August city and state final result was posted, the More than 30% of the multinationals and agri-business. police agents, dressed in black official result gave a slight supposedly sealed ballot boxes Violent repression, harsh and wearing masks, traveled advantage to Calderón, leading had been opened after the methods of struggle and throughout the city in a caravan to widespread suspicions of elections, raising the spectre that occasional outbursts of fury on of motorcycles and pick-up electoral fraud. their contents were altered." [2] those at the bottom of the pile trucks. The convoy of 34 are the inevitable results. vehicles joined up at about As Mexico City journalist and Since July 30 the centre of twenty minutes after midnight left-wing activist Peter Gellert Mexico city, including the Regrettably what the poor and and opened fire on TV and radio points out: Zócalo, has been occupied by oppressed of Mexico lack is a security watchposts from their tens of thousands of protestors. nationally structured anti- moving vehicles. As the caravan "Given the close vote and According to Gellert: capitalist political party which passed radio station La Ley 710, AMLO's (Lopez Obrador's) can represent them, co-ordinate "Many far left and social teacher Lorenzo San Pablo charges of electoral fraud, a the struggles and intervene on organisations that didn't Cervantes received bullet partial recount of 9% of the the national political terrain. As participate in AMLO's campaign wounds to the back. He was country's 131,000 polling we noted above, the Zapatistas are involved in the anti-fraud taken to the hospital and later stations was ordered by the and the Other Campaign can to a protests. Along the eight died. Federal Electoral Tribunal. certain extent play the role of a AMLO and his supporters, kilometre stretch of substitute leadership, but only In Oaxaca, as elsewhere, right- however, have been demanding encampments, a wide array of partially, occasionally and wing government forces are a 100% recount. The recount, neighbourhood associations, inadequately. While the far left trying to effectively militarise which began on August 9, has unions, student groups and in Mexico has been correct to the struggle, create an not resolved the dispute. The political organisations can be support the Other Campaign, the atmosphere of fear and tension, AMLO forces charge serious found. key question is what lasting create mass feeling of crisis and discrepancies, even on the basis political results it will lead to. "Unfortunately, the Other disorder and blame all this on the of the small 9% sample, among Campaign, an initiative launched Phil Hearse, a veteran revolutionary rebellion - to create the them: by the Zapatista National socialist in Britain, writes for Socialist atmosphere for a future bloody Resistance. Liberation Army and headed by crushing of the movement by the In 43% of the sample, Calderón the charismatic army or police. had been accredited with more NOTES votes than he actually received, Subcommandante Marcos, while The situation is now extremely lowering his total number of condemning the fraud, has [1] Mexican miners and steelworkers on strike - International Viewpoint May 2006 dangerous for the mass votes by 13,500. This was abstained from the mass movement, especially as tactical 5000% more votes than AMLO demonstrations. During the [2] Green Left Weekly August 30 2006 divisions have emerged, with the lost in the recount. election campaign, the Other teachers abandoning their 44- Campaign centred most of its day strike without having In 65% of the recounted polling fire on AMLO and the obvious achieved their objectives. The stations, there were either more deficiencies in the PRD's fate of the Oaxaca struggle is ballots deposited than there were program and methods. Some closely linked with that against voters or more voters than there organisations that participated in electoral fraud centred on the were corresponding ballots. In the Other Campaign are, occupation of central Mexico Mexico, control of the paper however, involved in the anti- City. ballots is extremely strict. In the fraud protests." 9% of the polling stations that Electoral Fraud were recounted, these The huge political crisis in discrepancies involved 120,000 Mexico is deeply rooted in the In the run-up to the July 2 ballots - half the difference massive social inequality that presidential election the two between the two candidates has been deepened by nearly 51 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Workers movement The European trade union movement today - a rapid overview

Thadeus Pato

The neo-liberal policies of the last twenty years have had important consequences for the trade union movement. We have, however, to make a distinction between the objective effects, those that are so to speak interiorised, of these policies on the trade union movement as a result of the transformation of work and of the forms of employment, and the measures taken by the ruling class and its representatives in the parliaments by means of changes in legislation that are explicitly directed against the unions.

1. Preamble capitalism". It is absolutely necessary to put sickness benefits, etc.), thanks to forward the objection that, today as privatisation and the cutting of subsidies. In what follows we will avoid using yesterday, we are dealing with capitalism in fashionable terms such as "neo-liberal the ordinary sense of the term and that the v Internationalisation of production (within policies" and "globalisation". This is for the question of knowing whether it is more or and outside Europe). That is what we call following reasons: less "rapacious" depends only on the today "globalisation", which from a relationship of forces in society. qualitative point of view is not new. The First of all, they lead to confusion, because difference is that today, on the one hand this they amount to implicitly affirming that we And there is the subject, because what is process has considerably increased and on are seeing at the present time a new phase of decisive for evaluating this relationship of the other hand, because of the technological development of the capitalist system. This is forces is the state of the workers revolution, the transfer of units of production not the case. We are still in the period that organisations. is easier and faster than ever, which means Mandel designated by the name of "late that production becomes located above all capitalism" or "the old age of capitalism" and 2. Liberal economic policies and where wage costs are lowest. all the characteristics of this period that he their consequences for the trade defined correspond to the present v Reduction of taxes for the rich. development of the policies of capital. The union movement only thing that has changed is the speed at On the European and world scale, we are still v Maximum utilisation of the possibilities of which capitalism has imposed itself in a phase of a dominantly depressive long the technological revolution: rationalisation, everywhere in the world. This formidable wave. The objective of the class in power automation, lean production. acceleration dates from the collapse of the over the last twenty years has been to find a Eastern bloc. All these measures have been more or less solution to get out of the ongoing economic applied in all the countries of Europe, but all crisis, a solution that would quite simply Secondly, the term globalisation is just of them have not been applied in every another denomination to designate a enable it to raise the rate of profit thanks to a country at the same time and to the same tendency that is inherent in capitalism, its whole series of measures. degree. That is what explains in part the expansion throughout the entire world - unequal development of national economies, which is therefore in no way a qualitative Basically, it's a question of the following considered within the European Union. In change. points which we will deal with in a more thorough way later on: this process a part of the measures that we Thirdly, the concept of "neo-liberalism" is an have mentioned, in particular the imprecise term, because in reality there are v Increasing casualisation of working internationalisation of production, is used as several neo-liberal schools, some of which conditions. As we can see for example in a threat against the working class of the are very far from the present economic Germany, there is a drastic diminution of so- country and its organization. The ruling class policies based on supply (thus, the classic called "normal working conditions" in other pursues, with this global policy, two German neo-liberalism of the school of words a full-time job with a permanent important objectives: Eucken, Ropke etc., envisages state contract. intervention in economic life). 1. To make the European Union the most v An attempt to import cheap labour: in this powerful and most dynamic economic bloc in And fourthly, these two concepts are often domain the Bolkestein directive was meant to the world. That is what is involved in the used in a sense that lets it be understood that be a decisive step forward for capital. "Lisbon process": there exists "another capitalism"- in the same category of ideas there also appear zoological v Reduction of costs in the social field 2. To overcome the crisis of the fall in the rate classification such as, for example, " (lowering of pensions and reduction of of profit. 52 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

3. Policies that are directly aimed against the trade union movement.

Here, we must not ignore the fact that there exist different strategies in different countries and that it is therefore difficult to proceed to a generalisation.

The explanation for this is that there subsist in the different countries different judicial rules defining trade union rights. As a consequences, the way of acting openly against these rights, with the aim of putting in place the conditions for the policies described in point 2, will be different in each country.

In Germany, for example, the rights of the trade unions, particularly the right to strike, have always been very strongly codified. A strike is only authorised in the case of negotiations concerning wages or the terms of the work contract, political strikes are in general illegal and there are certain rules which restrict trade union activities. Furthermore, in Germany social democracy has exercised and continues to exercise a strong direct influence on the DGB (the general trade union confederation), an influence that is not in any significant fashion contested in the country. That is why the need to change the legislation concerning the evolution of the trade union movement in the who are supposedly self-employed are no unions has not been felt in Germany, even different European countries. longer unionised and are even less easy to though some judicial decisions have mobilise. 4.1 The Transformation of the Labour Market introduced certain restrictions. It is the same for workers who are employed The following graph has been built up on short-term contracts, casual workers and In most of the other countries of the EU there starting from figures from the German temporary workers. These people are for are several trade union confederations, linked Federal Republic, but the general evolution almost identical reasons very hard to to different political currents or parties, but that is perceptible here can be observed in the mobilise for trade union action. mainly to parties that defend the dominant whole of Europe. As we can see, working political and economic ideology (except in conditions have been dramatically It would of course be a mistake to present this Spain). transformed. In 1980 we still had in Germany evolution as the culmination of a consciously worked-out plot against the workers' The country that has suffered the hardest 80% of workers who benefited from normal movement. What is involved here is attacks against trade union rights is Britain, working conditions, that is, full-time and unlimited contracts, whereas all the other essentially a consequence of the capitalist where in the 1980s, under the Thatcher strategy we spoke of above, with the aim of government, the unions suffered considerable forms of work, such as part-time work, short- term contracts, casual jobs, occupied a reconstituting their rates of profit. It is not losses in strength and in influence, because of necessary to develop here how the significant changes in the legislation. negligible place - temporary work was practically non-existent. Today, normal flexibilisation of working conditions has consequences which make resistance from We do not think that it is the measures taken working conditions represent less than 50% the working class and its trade union against the trade union movement, including and the tendency is still downwards. The organisations difficult, indeed is some sectors legislative measures, which best explain the most important increase is in the number of impossible, and this obviously has a positive situation of the unions. It is certainly the part-time workers and of mini-jobs and secondary effect for the employers. liberal offensive of the last 25 years that has limited term contracts. played an essential role, but the trade union The repercussions on workers' consciousness Temporary work has also increased leaderships totally capitulated in front of it by of this transformation of the reality of the enormously. It is particularly interesting to allowing themselves to be caught up in the working class, particularly the increasing rise observe the increase in the number of self- inherent logic of liberal economic policies. of individualism, very noticeable among self- employed workers, who do work that is employed workers, as well as the 4. The Detailed Effects of Liberal outsourced by enterprises. These workers, accompanying loss of trade union Economic Policies who previously carried out the same work as consciousness, are taking on an importance wage earners. now do so as self-employed that is difficult to appreciate with any With the help of some figures and statistics, workers. In general, they work for the same accuracy. we will try to sketch some elements of this company as before, but they themselves take evolution and its background. This on the risks and very often have markedly We can see here (Table 1) that because of this description cannot be exhaustive, but it will clearly inferior revenues. That has, of course, dramatic transformation of the structure of contribute to an understanding of the non-negligible effects on the fighting ability work, on the one hand the fighting capacities resemblances, but also the differences in the of unions in certain sectors, since the workers of trade union organisations have been 53 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

considerably reduced, and on the other that evolution described in the preceding In the Scandinavian countries and in Belgium for many workers, it has had negative paragraph. As we can see, trade union the situation is quite different. We have in consequences for trade union consciousness. membership in continental Europe, that is to say in Austria, Italy, Germany, the these two cases a regular increase in 4.2 The evolution of trade union membership Netherlands and France, but also in Ireland membership, or at the very least a and Britain, has fallen continuously since At first sight, we could think that Table 2, 1980 at least (this is also true for Japan and stabilisation of the number of members in the which follows, partly contradicts the the United States). same period. Table 3 Length of Strikes: Number of Days Lost per 1000 workers Country Average 1990-2003 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 Belgium 31 34 22 65 18 23 32 46 13 27 8 41 18 Denmark 163 42 30 27 50 33 81 31 41 1250 36 48 23 75 21 30 Germany 14 42 30 27 18 7 7 3 2 1 2 0 1 9 5 1 Finland 173 446 230 41 10 309 547 11 48 61 10 110 26 31 28 18 France 104 67 48 37 49 40 291 54 29 55 56 102 74 44 193 Greece 241 1720 432 209 116 47 31 52 26 18 Britain 36 82 33 24 30 13 18 55 10 11 10 20 20 51 19 34 Ireland 124 266 100 218 70 28 128 107 66 31 164 70 80 15 25 13 Italy 157 342 195 179 236 237 57 119 72 33 54 51 57 49 45 38 Luxemburg 0 0 60 2 0 0 0 5 0 0 0 Netherlands 25 37 17 15 8 8 122 1 2 5 11 1 6 354 2 Austria 40 3 19 8 4 0 0 0 6 0 0 1 0 3 393 0 Portugal 46 63 53 83 24 30 19 16 36 44 31 19 18 44 22 18 Sweden 57 191 5 7 54 15 162 16 6 0 20 0 3 0 152 4 Spain 338 283 486 701 147 732 121 123 138 92 102 233 119 297 46 249 EU (15) 81 175 120 133 84 133 92 53 36 49 35 56 40 63 59 Zone Euro 92 197 144 162 97 164 105 54 42 34 41 66 45 67 66 Estonia 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 21 0 Latvia 0 0 0 0 37 0 0 4 0 0 Lithuania 10 2 0 0 0 Malta 1 20 21 38 114 110 14 9 32 19 5 22 11 Poland 58 6 8 3 4 11 8 0 0 1 0 Slovakia 7 0 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Slovenia Czech Rep 5 0 1 1 5 Hungary 1 2 10 94 1 1 0 11 55 3 1 1 7 Cyprus 111 5 18 26 29 37 Switzerl'd 2 1 0 0 0 4 0 2 0 7 1 1 6 6 2 Norway 79 79 1 207 19 54 26 279 3 137 3 233 0 70 0 66 USA 44 55 43 37 36 45 51 42 38 42 16 161 9 5 32 Japan 2 3 2 5 2 2 1 1 2 2 2 1 1 0

54 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

prevent the maintenance of a relatively high number of strikes in comparison with other countries. To explain that, it must not be forgotten that the right to strike has a different legal status depending on which country. So in Germany, it is codified in a very restrictive way. Political strikes are in general forbidden. Solidarity strikes are only authorised in a very limited framework. But if we consider the European Union or the Euro zone, we have to take note that on average, we are seeing regular fall in the number of strikes since 1990.

The following graph (Table 4) shows the average number of strike days per year per 1,000 workers during the period 1995-2003. We can make two observations: first of all, the countries which have by far the lowest number of strike days are the countries of Eastern Europe, which after the dissolution of Comecon experienced a dramatic process of de-industrialisation and which have thus lost "the biggest battalions" of trade union members.

It is also interesting to observe that during this period Germany had a low number of strikes. There are two reasons for that: on the one hand, East Germany experienced, after the Wall came down, the same process of de- industrialisation, with the same consequences (high unemployment and the disappearance of stable jobs), and on the other hand economic growth in Germany since 1990 has been markedly weaker than in the other Western countries of the European Union.

But this evolution, at first sight very things stand out clearly: first of all, we see And that is the second interesting point: we divergent between Scandinavia and the rest that there is no automatic correlation between can see that, with a few reservations, the of Europe, is explained by other factors. the degree of trade union organisation and the importance of the number of strike days is in Changes such as those which have occurred number of strike days. correlation with economic growth. It is n in the structure of work do not act in a linear Denmark that we have seen, since 1990, the It is true that in a series of countries, way on the degree of trade union highest average number of strike days, and it particularly in Germany, the numbers of days organisation. Other factors also play a role : is also in Denmark, along with Finland, that we will come back later to the most important lost because of strikes by thousands of economic growth has been strongest. of them. The level of unionisation does not workers has decreased, parallel to the allow us to draw conclusions as to how continuing fall in the level of unionisation. However it must be noted that historical strong struggles are in the countries However, elsewhere there are countries, for factors are also to be taken into account; in concerned. example France, where at the start of the countries like Spain, France, and Italy the phase the weak degree of unionisation did not habit of struggle is firmly embedded and But it should not be forgotten that not only in Europe, but also in the industrialised countries outside Europe, the liberal economic offensive of the last 25 years has had the effect of considerably reducing the level of unionisation. One of the main reasons for this is undoubtedly the modification of working conditions described above.

4.3 The development of working-class struggles

It is interesting to consider the evolution of the number and the length of strikes in the course of the last 15 years (Table 3). Two 55 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

because of that it is independent of the level attains its maximum level, while in the Europe in the face of the liberal offensive of of unionisation. This is for a multiplicity of system called Rhenish capitalism, the degree Capital. reasons which we will not go into here. of organisation is rather weak compared to the extent to which workers are covered by v of a general decline in the level of 4.4 Degree of organisation and contractual collective bargaining agreements, which is unionisation. system identical or even superior to it. The In the last three years, it seems, according to decentralised and deregulated system, which In the graph which follows (Table 5), a recent figures, that a turnaround is taking is prevalent in the liberal market economy, is bourgeois economist tried, in 2002, to show place - the number of strike days (and in the relationship between the level of marked by an average level of unionisation some places the level of unionisation) is on unionisation - the percentage of workers who and a low degree of cover by collective the increase and we have seen a succession of are organised - and the way in which the bargaining agreements. economic and political struggles led by the system of collective bargaining is regulated, unions, but: If we now compare this with the figures the degree of extension of collective presented earlier concerning the number of bargaining, in other words to what extent the v Almost all these struggles (and their strikes, we see that generally speaking the collective agreements negotiated by the number is growing) are of a defensive nature. most liberal economic systems also have the unions apply to all workers. In the graph, we In Germany for example they are directed lowest number of strike days. can see that it is possible to proceed to against the attempt to lengthen working different regroupments according to the hours, lower wages and make working 4.5 Women in the unions conditions even harder. economic system and the type of trade union organisation which predominates in the An important change in the trade union v Faced with the European employers, who groups of countries. Of course, it is not here movement over the last 30 years is the have developed a common strategy against either a question of ideal forms, but of certain change in the level of unionisation of women the working class, there does not exist any transitions. The author basically workers. We present here the comparative visible common strategy of the trade union differentiates between three types: a figures in 1970 and 2001 for three countries. organisations (with the exception of the decentralised and deregulated economy, what In general, the number of women who are transport unions, which have successfully he calls the free market economy; next, unionised has increased by 100 per cent over organised action against the directive on Rhenish capitalism, in which there is a power the period. The reasons for this are partly the transport in the European Union) and there of regulation by the unions, with state explosive growth of women's employment are very few joint actions. intervention and powerful workers' and partly also the fall in the number of male organisations; and lastly, co-operativism, trade unionists. However, it must be noted v The unions are still too national. with highly centralised unions which have an that these important structural changes have v A large part of the trade union leaderships ability to regulate. in the majority of countries found very little is closely linked to parties which defend a reflection at the higher levels of the union Here we find the solution to the problem line of liberal market policies and/or which hierarchies. evoked in paragraph 4.1, that is that the are purely and simply corrupt. Scandinavian unions, particularly in Sweden, 5. Conclusions have a level of unionisation of more than 80 The essential task of the European trade union movement in the coming years is to per cent, but that on the other hand the We had over these 25 years a situation: frequency of struggles is in no way oppose the European strategy of the employers, which manifests itself on the comparable. This results from the fact that in v of economic crisis. a system of co-operation, the unions take on economic level in a visible way by part of the functions that would be the v of a decline in the activity of the class aggravated job flexibility and mobility. On responsibility of the state in another system. struggle, with symbolic defeats (the British the political level, it is to oppose projects Belonging to the union plays a role of social miners in the 1980s). such as the Lisbon Agenda and the attempt to protection. put it into practice thanks to a battery of v of political accommodation and specific measures, including the directive on To sum up, this graph shows that in a system capitulation by the main trade union transport, the Bolkestein directive and the of co-operation, the degree of unionisation organisations in the capitalist countries of projected Constitution. It is a question of opposing that with a unitary cross-border European trade union strategy that really organises action, which necessitates going beyond the framework of the present purely bureaucratic international trade union organisations.

Thadeus Pato, Leadership member RSB, Germany and of the IC and Bureau of the Fourth International.

56 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Scotland ISG statement on the crisis in the SSP

International Socialist Group

The following statement on the acute internal crisis which has broken out in the SSP was issued by the ISG, the British section of the Fourth International.

The Scottish Socialist Party - long a beacon of hope for those seeking Three weeks later on November Sheriff's officers, with crippling to build broad alternatives to the rightward march of social democracy 27 the decisions of the EC financial implications for the including Sheridan's resignation SSP. Alan McCombes's house - is in the grip of an acute This, apparently, was strongly was put to a full meeting of the was also searched. internal crisis. opposed as potentially SSP's delegate body the National damaging, or even disastrous, Council (NC) by National On May 28, an emergency On the one side of a very sharp for the SSP and for Sheridan Secretary Allan Green. His meeting of the NC was called to divide is its most prominent himself, and he was urged to report was and endorsed with 93 consider what was now a major member, and former convenor reconsider. for and 10 against. Sheridan crisis. The only proposal from (effectively party leader) himself voted for it. the EC to the meeting was to Tommy Sheridan. He has the He refused and the meeting maintain the refusal to hand over support of MSP Rosemary voted unanimously (including According to Green (SSV 269) the minutes. It was an untenable Byrne, the SWP and CWI the platforms) that he should be the way the NC also endorsed position. Alan McCombes would platforms as well as a section of asked to resign in order to limit the decision to keep the EC stay in jail, and it could lead to the membership. the upheaval of a court case, minutes confidential. long prison sentences for which would be more severe if individuals and financial On the other side are those he remained national convenor Eighteen months later, in May bankruptcy for the SSP. around long-time SSP central of the SSP. 2006, with relationships further leader Alan McCombes. This deteriorated, the issue exploded Tommy Sheridan arrived at the includes MSPs Frances Curran, Whether his resignation would again. The court action was NC - in a highly charged Rosie Kane and Carolyn Leckie in fact provide much protection under way and News of the atmosphere - with an Open and a majority of the recently for the SSP was another matter. World lawyers were asking for Letter from himself, which he disbanded International Socialist Going to the courts was a the minutes of the November distributed simultaneously to the Movement platform. It also reckless strategy and was likely 2004 EC and any other media. Its practical proposal was includes the bulk of the SSP to have implications for the SSP documents relating to the that the minutes be handed to the youth organisation, Scottish whether Sheridan was national meeting to be handed over as court, in a sealed envelope, in Socialist Youth. convenor or not. evidence. order to release Alan McCombes from prison - the release of the Although tensions have existed In any case there was an The EC discussed this and minutes to the News of the since the SSP made its electoral alternative, and that was to tell agreed unanimously - including World could still be challenged breakthrough in 2003 - winning the News of the World to mind the SWP and CWI platforms - in court. six MSPs, the current crisis its own business, and stop telling that the SSP had the right to keep broke out at an emergency lies. What happens amongst its minutes confidential and they Releasing the minutes was now Executive Committee (EC) consenting adults is there own should not be surrendered to the unavoidable, but Sheridan's meeting on November 9 2004. It business and no one else's. court. The EC also renewed its proposal was embedded in a was convened to discuss the call for Sheridan to drop the huge, politically unsupportable, expectation that the Sunday Sheridan resigned, however, the case. diatribe against the EC majority. scandal rag, the News of the following day, quoting family World, was planning to publish issues. The consequences of this Allan McCombes, who held the It described the EC majority scurrilous allegations about were always going to be minutes, was promptly ordered variously as "an unsavoury Sheridan's private life in its dramatic, given his centrality to to hand them over or be jailed. cabal"; "akin to the dark days of forthcoming edition. the SSP. The News of the World He refused and was sentenced to Stalinism"; "McCarthyite" and did indeed publish allegations 12 days in jail and ordered to "effectively acting for the state"; Tommy Sheridan insisted that if about him the following Sunday, appear again. At the same time It was designed to show that it this happened he would take the claiming that he had had a the SSP offices in Glasgow and was not his decision to go to the News of the World to Court. lengthy extra-marital affair. Edinburgh were searched by the courts which caused the crisis 57 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Scotland SSP is split by Sheridan

Socialist Resistance statement - August 27 2006 but the actions of his opponents Letter to the SSP United Left Socialist Resistance since. which was distributed at a meeting of the SSP NC meeting It attacks the SSPs policy of 50- on June 25. This contained 50 women's representation by criticism of the SSP United Left saying "we are a class based statement which we find socialist party. Not a gender unacceptable. obsessed discussion group". Interventions are being made To raise the temperature even into this situation by the SWP more the Sunday Herald carried and the CWI, most crudely the a story that morning that the CWI. Peter Taaffe claims that he Tommy Sheridan won the first round of his defamation action proceedings of the November and Phil Stott, CWI leading against the News of the World (NoTW) in the Scottish Court of 2004 EC meeting had been member in the SSP, met with Session (Scotland¹s highest court) on a majority (7- 4) decision revealed to the court and the Tommy Sheridan in advance of media by an unnamed member the NC and that the Open Letter of the jury. He was awarded his claimed £200,000 in damages. of the SSP leadership. An and its general approach was The NoTW has said it intends to appeal and an investigation by emergency resolution was produced on his advice. the Lothian and Borders police has begun into allegations of adopted calling for the perjury committed during the trial which is expected to last six immediate resignation anyone The position put forward in months or more. responsible for this or who had Socialist Worker is that the Since then Sheridan has moved their decision to tell the truth to knowledge of it. choice on offer is between Tommy Sheridan's model of a quickly to split the SSP. He has the court. They now face the The Sheridan Open Letter was a broad based party and Allan called a rally for Sunday possibility of perjury charges bid for a new majority and it was McCombes's model of a narrow September 3 to form a new party against them. successful, at least at that NC. inward looking one. This is in opposition to the SSP. Though Both the SWP and the CWI The EC resolution was defeated rubbish. The idea that Allan he told The Herald of August 20 and a resolution reflecting the McCombes wants a narrow that this was only one of two immediately lauded the decision Sheridan letter was carried. The party of that kind flies in the face options he was considering - the of the court as a "fantastic entire strategy which the EC had of everything he has done and other being to go out of politics victory". No doubt for Sheridan, been pursuing (keep out of the said for the last 10 years and his and become a barrister - the new who must have expected to lose, courts) had been overturned and record of building the SSP. party option seems to have won it was a fantastic victory. But for the NC gave full support to There may be implications out. Now both the SWP and the Scottish left the whole thing Tommy Sheridan in his case involved in this debate as to the CWI platforms [1] have met, is a disaster. It is also a setback against the News of the World. character of the SSP, its structure declared support for his call, and for the British and European left, and accountability, and how it are building for the September 3 given the positive influence the Events at the NC have brought should be built - but they do not rally. SSP has had on the development about a sharp realignment of take these lines. of the European left since its Socialist Resistance is opposed forces within the SSP, not least foundation eight years ago given the decisions of the SW It is crucial that the SSP survives to this split and supports the and CWI platforms to throw as a united organisation out of United Left and others who are It was Sheridan¹s decision to their weight behind the Sheridan this crisis since it demise would appealing to the members to stay take the NoTW to court, and his initiative. Sheridan has called for be a blow to the left and the in the SSP and continue to build repeated refusal to consider any it. The unity of the Scottish left, a new leadership to be elected on wider movement on a European other course of action, which on which the SSP was built has the basis of what he is putting scale. The NC meeting on June was the cause of this disaster. to be defended. forward. His letter concludes: 25th rightly took the decision to Once he went down that road, "The battle to reclaim the SSP to bring the conference of the SSP The jury majority may have been under the circumstances he did, class politics begins today". forward to the autumn of this more than happy to see a the SSP was certain be dragged year. It is important that this reactionary rag like the NoTW in, and the outcome disastrous - Recently a group from the NC conference build on the given a bloody nose - a whatever the decision the jury minority have launched a new strengths and traditions of the sentiment we can all share. But it had taken. platform in the SSP called the SSP and does not try to divert it SSP United Left. In our opinion was not just Tommy Sheridan into a difference course. It is also Mistakes were no doubt made by this represents the best and the NoTW who were important that elects a leadership the EC, who were desperately opportunity on offer to rebuild involved in this trial. Others which is representative of all trying to deal with the crisis the SSP on principled lines. were drawn into it whose strands of opinion within the Sheridan created, but the SSP. integrity has been trashed. There We urged our comrades within were the 18 witnesses for the responsibility was his. For him the SSP to support this initiative Statement by ISG Political Committee NoTW, including 11 members of to turn reality on its head and and work constructively within 29.6.06 the SSP EC, who were dragged blame the EC majority for the it. Unfortunately three of our into court under citation against crisis is like the arsonist blaming The International Socialist Group is comrades took a different view the British section of the Fourth their will. These SSP members the victim for failing to put out and put their names to an Open International. have been branded as liars by the fire. 58 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Sheridan's unilateralism reflects on November 9 2004, called to one of the political factors consider allegations published in behind this crisis - the "Great the first of the two NoTW unaccountable Leader" articles. These allegations syndrome i.e. the idea that a referred only to a "married party is built around a central MSP", but it was clear from the charismatic leader, who in the context that it was Sheridan. He end regards his or her self as admitted to the meeting that he bigger than the party, and had indeed visited Cupids in unaccountable to it. It is one of Manchester on two occasions. the dangers which small mass He had told this to two of those Tommy Sheridan with Gail Sheridan after the court decision parties like the SSP face. There present previously. are other such examples around as Alan McCombes points out in The minutes put it this way: The NoTW obtained a citation positions and insisted that: "We his statement in the SSP bulletin "Tommy admitted to the meeting that the minutes of this meeting - are a class-based socialist party. issued on August 7. that he had in fact visited the which they had controversially Not a gender-obsessed club on two occasions, in 1996 extracted from the SSP through discussion group. Our socialist Sheridan was originally part of a and 2002 with close friends. He the powers of the court after principles and class identity team. He was the most visible acknowledged that this had been Alan McCombes went to prison define us first. Not our gender or member, the one in the media reckless behaviour and had, with in an attempt to keep them sexual orientation". spotlight, and perceived as the hindsight, been a mistake. confidential - be used as party leader, but he worked with evidence at the trial. Catriona Grant argued in Julia others and depended on others At the same time he made it Bindel¹s article "a win for who made contributions which clear that if he was named in this Central to the process of splitting machismo" in the Guardian of were more hidden even inside regard by the NoTW the the SSP was the open letter August 8 that the trial was not the party. The team was under following Sunday (which was Sheridan circulated at the about class but about gender. strain before this issue exploded the expectation) he would sue emergency SSP National There has indeed been a problem and could not withstand the them for defamation, despite the Council (NC) meeting on May of male power relationships impact of this crisis. truth of the matter. It was on the 28 2006, called to discuss the involved. With the exception of basis of the stance - that he situation and held whilst Alan Gail Sheridan, who achieved This crisis was triggered by two would sue over allegations McCombes was in prison. The celebrity status, all the women articles published in the NoTW letter had been issued to the which were none-the-less true - involved in the case came off in November 2004. These media prior to the meeting badly. that he was asked to resign as claimed that Sheridan had had SSP convenor by a unanimous extra-martial affairs, engaged in In its first paragraph it says: As Julie Bindel observed all but vote of those present. It was his group sex at a Glasgow hotel, "Today there exists an two of the witnesses on stance which created the depth and had visited Cupids (a sex unsavoury cabal of comrades at Sheridan's side were men and of crisis in the SSP. club in Manchester) with NoTW the core of the leadership, their most of the witnesses against hands on the apparatus, who are him were women. Sheridan has journalist Anvar Khan and The minutes record the more interested in pursuing referred to fellow MSP¹s others. opposition to this which existed personal vendettas, through vile Frances Curran, Rosie Kane, and in the meeting: "Without Eighteen months later, in lies and slander, than conducting Caroline Leckie as the three response to defamation charges exception all contributors the class struggle". It goes on to witches in a misogynistic filed by Sheridan, the NoTW disagreed with the strategy of describe them as: "akin to the attempt to undermine three defended the articles as denying the allegations. All felt dark days of Stalinism"; strong women who disagreed "substantially true". They cited that this would be the most "McCarthyite" and "effectively with the reckless way he was five women witnesses who damaging strategy for the party. acting for the state". The letter threatening the party. claimed to have either had The general feeling was that this was designed to either stampede affairs with Sheridan, or had was a bad situation and that the a majority into supporting him at In court Sheridan claimed that seen him at Cupids or having "least worst" option should be that meeting, which is what there were two separate group sex in the Moat House found". Had Sheridan been happened, or provide the basis to conspiracies against him. The hotel in Glasgow. The evidence insisting on suing over false lead a minority out of the SSP at first by the NoTW, which he said of two of these as witnesses was allegations would have been a the end of the meeting or soon had been out to get him for a tainted in that they had sold their different matter altogether. after. long time, the other by a faction stories to the NoTW. This is inside the SSP leadership who sordid journalism typical of the And there were other options he At the heart of the open letter were out to oust him as part of a NoTW but not proof that they could have taken. He could have was a major political attack on political take-over. This was were telling lies. ignored the allegations, come women in the SSP and a nonsense but it neatly diverted clean, or denounced them and dangerous attempt to claim that the proceedings way from eye- The NoTW also cited evidence they would have blown over. feminism is alien to class witness accounts of sexual from within the SSP Executive The idea that the only way he politics. The letter attacked the activities, some of which were Committee (EC) itself. This could survive politically was to SSP's 50-50 policy which difficult to rebut, to political concerned statements Sheridan take the NoTW to court was ensures equal numbers of conspiracy theories which the had made, at a meeting of the EC nonsense. women and men in elected jury were hardly in a position to 59 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

assess. There had certainly been plus four more who were not when the framework was set for proposal only made sense if he political tension in the SSP, but cited but who have issued a the trial and the split, and when accepted that the minutes were that is very different to a statement since to that effect. the SWP and CWI platforms accurate in the first place. factional conspiracy. The SSP The 11 include Allan Green and swung behind Sheridan - the has had sharp political debates Colin Fox, neither of whom are validity of the minutes of Sheridan, the CWI, the SWP and before without factionalism. members of the United Left and November 9 2004 had not been others tell us that it is scandalous who strove hard to persuade in question. Now Sheridan's that 11 SSP EC members The NoTW cited 11 of the 19 Sheridan against his defamation open letter proposed, on the one appeared in court as witnesses SSP members who had been case. hand, that the minutes be handed for the defence. But what were present at the November 9 2004 to the court, and on the other they supposed to do? If they had EC meeting as witnesses at the The other four EC members questioned their authenticity - refused to appear they would trial. These were MSPs Rosie appeared as witnesses for claiming that they were falsified have been arrested and charged Kane, Carolyn Leckie and Colin Sheridan and said exactly the as part of a conspiracy to remove with contempt of court. If they Fox, plus Allan Green (national opposite to the 15. They agreed him from office. refuted the minutes and lied they secretary) Richie Venton with him that what he had would risk perjury, which carries (Glasgow organiser), Alan actually said at the meeting was This made sense from his point a heavy prison sentence. But McCombes, Keith Baldassara that he had never visited Cupids, of view. Once he had proposed more than that were they to deny (Glasgow councillor), Catriona and that the minutes had been handing the minutes to the court something in court which they Grant (EC member), Jo Harvie fabricated. Only one set of he had to either drop his knew to be the truth in order to (editor SSV), Allison Kane witnesses could be telling the defamation action or discredit protect Sheridan's image as a (treasurer), and Barbara Scott truth -hence the perjury the minutes. If he accepted that respectable married man? (minutes secretary). investigation. they were true that would be the end of his case. Up till then no There are certainly times when Remarkably they were able to The rights and wrongs of these one had questioned the minutes, socialists would do otherwise, make these citations because of a statements and Sheridan's which had been known to those but this would be in situations fabricated set of minutes of the denunciation of the 11 are at the who were at the November 9 where what is at stake was the meeting (as opposed to the core of this issue and the crisis it meeting for the last year and a defence of collective action or an official minutes) which had been has created. Alan McCombes half. There had been questions issue of principle. This was not sent to the NoTW anonymously, has said of Sheridan's raised as to whether they should an issue of principle. These presumably by Sheridan or one allegations: "this was to accuse have been kept confidential to comrades were being asked to of his supporters. Who else the 11 of a monstrous political the EC, but not about their put the interests of one man would fabricate minutes to his frame-up including the forgery accuracy above the collective interests of advantage? These contained of documents, a criminal the SSP. They were right to say Sheridan¹s version of conspiracy to pervert the course As an alternative to the no. proceedings and included an of justice, and systematic publication of the minutes to incomplete list of those present. perjury". Indeed it was. It was, SSP members aggregate Others have argued that the 11 At this stage the SSP had not as Richie Venton says in his meetings had been held up and should have had a bout of given the minutes to the court letter to SSP members, "the down Scotland in order for EC collective amnesia. It would and the names for citation were mother of all inventions". members to give verbal accounts have been extremely difficult, taken by the NoTW from the of the circumstances under however, for 11 people to all say fabricated minutes. The conclusion is inescapable. which Sheridan was asked to that they could not remember Tommy Sheridan lied his way resign. There is plenty of what happened at a meeting as These witnesses attended court thought the case and in the evidence that members were told unforgettable as that one. It was under the strongest protest and course of this repeatedly accused details of what happened at the held in the glare of publicity, and were each asked, under oath, if others of lying whilst knowing November 9 2004 EC meeting at has had a profound effect on the the (official) minutes were they were telling the truth. He these meetings. SSP. It would have been even accurate, and if Sheridan had had expected the entire EC, who more difficult for the minutes admitted that he had visited had urged him not to take court Sheridan also claimed, in his secretary, who was one of the 11, Cupids in Manchester. They action, to lie in court in order to open letter, that he had never to have argued that she could not each confirmed that both were back up his case. He then read the minutes. This is flatly remember what she had the case. Sheridan promptly regarded them as traitors contradicted by Alan McCombes recorded. denounced them in front of the because they refused to do so. who insists that the minutes were court as liars and perjurers and The message was loud and clear. discussed in a meeting between The dilemma faced by the 11 the minutes as a fabrication. It Sheridan was prepared to go to Allan Green, Colin Fox and was understood in advance and was he said "the mother of all any lengths to the defend the Sheridan on May 12 2006 soon was discussed at a meeting of the stitch-ups". It was not just the moralistic reputation he had after they had been cited by the EC two weeks before the trial NoTW that Sheridan had put on cultivated as a clean living NoTW. If he had not read them started. That meeting voted 17 trial - it was the SSP as well. sexually loyal husband and if before then it was because he for, 2 against, and 1 abstention, that meant smashing up the SSP had not bothered to read them. that if witnesses were asked a In fact of the 19 present at the then so be it. At that meeting, McCombes direct question in court they EC meeting of November 9, 15 reveals, it was Sheridan himself should not lie or commit have confirmed the accuracy of Right up until the momentous who proposed the adoption of contempt of court. Those who the minutes - the 11 who NC meeting on May 28 - when the policy of refusing to hand the voted for this included Graeme appeared in court under citation everything changed in the SSP, minutes to the court. His McIver and Jock Penman, who 60 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

were two of Sheridan's witnesses The treatment of some of the allegation. They are the alliance between George in court, and Sinead Daly of the women witnesses by Sheridan consequently keeping the story Galloway and the SWP which CWI. This restated a position was demeaning to say the least. running around lie detector tests forms the basis of Respect. It which had been taken at the NC After sacking his legal team in which have been taken by some would be a huge step back from itself. No one proposed any order to bring his own of their witnesses (not the SSP the democratic unity on which alternative. considerable persuasive powers ones) and challenges to Sheridan the SSP was constructed. directly on the jury Sheridan to take such a test himself. The The scandalous allegations of cross-examined them himself. issue is still selling newspapers There is also likely to be sharp scab (i.e. crossing class lines) Katrine Trolle broke down after for them. Perjury charges at the difference between it main and liar against the EC majority three hours in the witness box. end of the police investigation components. The SWP have escalated after the trial finished. She had at first denied that she are unlikely but possible. Some regarded Sheridan as a The Daily Record carried an had had a four-year affair with of the witnesses, SSP and non- nationalist in the past, but maybe interview with Sheridan on Sheridan but accepted it was true SSP, are strongly demanding this is something else which will August 7 with the headline "I'll after being cited to appear in perjury charges in order to clear be reassessed. their names. The NoTW is destroy the scabs who tried to court as a witness for the NoTW. Then there is the CWI, which appealing on the basis that the ruin me". There are photos of Her story was backed up by will be in an awkward situation outcome of the trial was perverse MSPs Frances Curran, Rosie evidence from her flatmates and in this alliance given their hostile and are seeking a retrial. Kane, Carolyn Leckie and Colin phone records of Sheridan¹s relationship with the SWP in Anything could happen. Fox with the word "scab" phone calls to her. Sheridan put England and Wales and the stamped over them. Frances it to her in court that she had This damaging split in the SSP model they are pushing for their Curran was not even a witness! invented the whole thing to new mass workers party. They Colin Fox issued a statement the undermine his position in the does not in any way devalue the importance of building broad regard Sheridan as an ultra- same day which called on "all SSP. Far from seeking publicity, pluralist parties of the working nationalist and a parliamentary SSP members, regardless of their or anything else, she had done class. Such parties are the reformist. These are all forces views during the court case, to all she could to keep out of the which were held together inside product of objective political immediately disassociate whole issue. the SSP by the existence of the developments - the collapse (or themselves from Tommy ISM which formed the core of In terms of mistakes made by the semi-collapse) of the CP's, the Sheridan¹s scurrilous smear". the organisation from its EC the minutes of the meeting of march to the right of social inception. This is the same Daily Record November 9 2004 should, in our democracy, the decline of the which paid Sheridan £30,000 for view, never have been taken in Labour left, and the emergence These developments are a defeat his story! Sheridan takes action the way they were. The various of mass resistance in the form of for the radical left in Scotland against one section of the explanations for taking them the global justice and anti-war and internationally. This is a movements. The need for such capitalist media and then sells with the details involved are defeat brought about by the parties is not about to go away. his story about it to another. He unconvincing. But in the end it determination of one man to put What has the be re-emphasised, calls the media "scum" on the was not the minutes which were his ego, his desire to create an however, is that genuine one hand and uses it to attack the problem for Sheridan. It was image of a respectable family pluralism, gender equality, fellow SSP members on the what happened at the meeting, man, before the interests of the democracy, accountability, other. and that existed as the truth party he and others had worked whether it was minuted or not. including the accountability of for nearly a decade to build. The charge of scab relates to Without the minutes EC the most prominent members is Sheridan¹s demagogic claims - members could still have been not an options extra for such The only winners from a split in taken up with relish by the SWP cited to appear and asked to parties. It has to be built into the SSP will be the pro-market and the CWI - that the trial was a explain what happened at the their culture and their practice if forces in Scotland, the nationalists, and the Blairites. battle between capital and labour meeting and exactly why they are to have a long-term role. Socialist Resistance will stand in the form of a battle between Tommy Sheridan had been asked What are the prospects for with the comrades of the SSP in Tommy Sheridan and Rupert to resign in the way he was. Sheridan¹s new party, which will their determination to rebuild Murdoch. Socialists have to It is also hard to see where the be based, presumably, on a their party out of the debris. know which side they are on in policy of withholding the slightly different version of the such a battle, they have minutes from court was going to SSP manifesto? Its starting point Socialist Resistance is a socialist repeatedly claimed. It is newspaper produced by British go after the NC on May 28. The is not good, based as it is on a simplistic nonsense. The idea supporters of the Fourth International policy that the EC was putting to wrecking action against the SSP in conjuction with other marxists. that socialists are committed, as that NC was not sustainable. It over the refusal of SSP members a matter of principle, to support was the non-viability of that to lie in court in order to protect NOTES any case, however reckless, policy which - although he had his personal reputation. It could simply because it is between a [1] Supporters, respectively, of the British proposed it himself - gave well be engulfed in a battle with Socialist Workers party and the Socialist leading socialist and the likes of Sheridan the opening in that the NoTW again before it has Party Rupert Murdoch, irrespective of meeting which he seized upon. existed very long where all this the facts or the consequences for will dragged out again. It will be others (including other The issue is not over, however. an alliance - and probably called socialists), is preposterous. It Unusually the judge did not put a and alliance or a movement reduces politics to crude restraining order on the NoTW rather than a party - between sloganising. to stop them repeating the Sheridan and the SWP not unlike 61 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Fighting "Jurassic Park" capitalism Russian Social Forum Success

Aleksander Buzgalin

The second Russian Social Forum has just come to an end in St.Petersburg. Despite various obstacles put by the state authorities (including arbitrary detention of activists and other forms of police repression), more than a thousand people from different regions of Russia, and also from many other countries, attended the gathering. The forum declared its support for a number of constructive program proposals concerning education, housing policy, labor issues, human rights, energy and environment. Those who love bloody spectaclesand unhealthy sensations were disappointed; the alterglobalists did not organize any brawls, and no shop windows were smashed. 1. Why riot- and mayhem-lovers 2. Who we are, and what are we were disappointed going to do.

Unfortunately, in today's Russia (and not The Russian Social Forum is a network of only here), philistines and journalists diverse social organizations and movements, for some minutes. The journalists who pandering to the philistines' taste prefer to a network that shows in practice, constantly flocked towards the big boss, with their usual report crimes, violence, bloodshed, scandals working, that another world is possible and servility, inevitably diverted general attention and other "hot" topics. For this kind of necessary - a world oriented not toward the to a certain extent, and we decided to make public, a serious, constructive debate on "market fundamentalism" but toward human use of this situation in order to protest against urgent problems faced by people in Russia development andsolving social and the detentions and arrests of our comrades. and other countries is simply too boring. environmental problems. Among the most The forum participants chanted "Freedom!" active groups that took part in the forum and other slogans denouncing the repression There were no fistfights, so the were: independent trade unions; campaigners by the authorities, while Matviyenko tried to alterglobalists' scheme was a 'failure'. And against the commercialization of housing and explain that the authorities loved us. you can explain endlessly that the forum communal services; the "Education for All" organizers had other goals, and those goals and "For Human Rights" movements; Despite all that, the basic aim of the plenary were mainly achieved. The gathering was alterglobalist organizations proper, such as meeting - providing information about the organized not by "antiglobalists" guided by "Alternatives" (a movement that supports main directions and tasks of the forum's work moth-eaten ideas of isolationism, Stalinism citizens' social initiatives), "Collective - was achieved. Then, the serious work etc. but by supporters of world integration Action" Institute; organizations of victims of started. quite different from the present one that is the Chernobyl disaster and those who helped Discussions were held on issues of defence of imposed by the so-called "G-8". to liquidate its consequences; "greens", and human rights, forms and methods of the dozens more. For us, the aim of integration is not in struggle against "filling-in" house realizing the US and NATO geopolitical In all about 1500 people registered at the construction, against evictions from ambitions, nor in helping to satisfy the profit- forum that took place on July 14 and 15 in the dormitories, against the rise of costs of thirsty transnational corporations who Kirov Stadium in St.Petersburg. Many of housing and utilities, and so forth. As a result, dominate the world markets under the cover them came simply to see what was happening constructive recommendations have been of the slogans of free trade, nor in the at this gathering that frightened the developed - what needs to be done and how spiralling growth of international financial authorities so much. In the author's opinion, should it be realized, with creation of new speculations (up to 2500 billion dollars a about 300 people worked actively in networks and strengthening of old ones. In a day!). It is something else. We say, "A seminars, round-table discussions and longer term, these networks will provide different world is possible!", and on the basis symposia at the forum. Many militants of more effective organizational base for of world experience and expert studies, we left-wing youth organizations, anarchists and citizens defending their rights and interests as show, just what kind of the world this would other politically-oriented activists saw inhabitants. be. participation in meetings and protest actions outside the stadium as their priority. Similar steps were made to develop solidarity We call for a serious debate on possible of independent trade unions that are alternatives. Neither the authorities, nor the 3. What happened at the forum, and defending workers' rights in the conditions of philistines, nor mass media serving their what are our positive demands Russia's present-day "Jurassic Park demands like the idea of such a debate. capitalism". The opening event was intended to be a So what are these alternatives all about? Who working session, including presentation of The forum discussed a wide range of human were the participants at the forum in main thematic blocks of the forum's work, rights issues, from developing constructive St.Petersburg, and what were they doing but the well-timed visit by the St.Petersburg steps consolidating the structures of civil there? Governor Valentina Matviyenko kept us busy society to very definite demands for release 62 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

of political prisoners and our arrested So, we have carried out the work that was politely, but many of our comrades were comrades. Facts were presented intended to be done in St.Petersburg. In this detained without explanation or taken off demonstrating that in Russia, there is more respect, the forum was quite successful. from trains, and some were charged with and more arbitrary repression by bureaucrats criminal offences, with explosives or and police, less and less real democracy, and Very important was the fact that activists of narcotics planted on them. social organizations, parliamentarians, young that it becomes more and more difficult to people from many countries addressed us at A couple of days before the forum, the exercise elementary civil and social rights. the stadium and worked together with us. The member of the organizing committee Mikhail Important practical steps toward establishing forum participants reacted enthusiastically to Druzhininsky was arrested, and later, another a united action network involving interventions by a well-known Italian social organizing committee member, Ilya "traditional" human rights defenders and left activist Vittorio Agnoletto. A member of the Ponomarev, was detained. A number of the European Parliament, where he serves in the St.Petersburg activists could not return home activists campaigning for social justice were Human Rights Commission, Agnoletto in the evenings, since they had been told that proposed. At the forum, one could point out a sharply condemned the police outrage preparations were being made to detain or positive role played by Lev Ponomarev, the initiated by the Russian authorities. Speeches arrest them. leader of the movement "For Human Rights", by German comrades, French trade union and by Lyudmila Alekseyeva, the head of the activists, many other guests from abroad During the time the forum was held, Moscow Helsinki Group. They stated were received with enthusiasm. The youth especially on July 15, our comrades were unambiguously that human rights defenders delegation from Ukraine, young people from constantly being detained using all sorts of in Russia are increasingly oriented to a the Baltics and Poland were particularly cooked-up pretexts. After the end of the constructive dialogue with left-wing active. forum, several dozens activists who defenders of social justice. participated in anti-G8 protest actions were At the same time, the forum encountered a lot taken into custody. Among the most important constructive of problems and contradictions. A major initiatives proposed at the forum was the problem was arrests and detentions of our We should give their due to a number of "Education for All" program document comrades. There were also numerous internal media outlets, and in particular to the radio presented and discussed at a special disputes and disagreements, some of them station Moscow Echo, as well as to a number symposium where it was shown that the essential, others arising from difficulties in of internet sites who reported honestly on government?s policy, with its efforts to understanding and interaction between such these repressive measures by the authorities. diverse groups as human rights activists, left privatize educational institutions and to Most of the pro-Putin media, however, political organizations, youth groups, introduce a new Chubais-style reported "a picture of total harmony" playing anarchists, "presentable" professors from "voucherization" (this time in the field of up the fact that the St.Petersburg authorities education networks... education), would lead the country to a loss had provided several army tents and a field of what remains of its (once great) Sometimes we could not avoid organizational kitchen for us. At the same time, there were intellectual potential, making it impossible to problems and disputes. We also had to "inaccurate" reports that the participants were achieve a "society of knowledge" in a proper discuss at length how to react to the police also given free meals. Everyone who way. The positive part of the "Education for blockade of the stadium and to the attended the forum and ate that soup and All" program contains concrete proposals for authorities' ban of our demonstration. Some buckwheat knows that we paid for everything ensuring high quality and universal members of the organizing committee ourselves. accessibility of education; these are measures reacted positively to the idea of our meeting The fact that we were allowed to occupy the that would allow the education to be oriented with Putin, that originated from within the stadium was the result of a compromise with to human development, not to "the markets". presidential administration. However, an the authorities, compromise not very pleasant agreed decision was made: we could engage for us. They agreed that we would use the The basis for elaboration of the program was in a dialogue with the government leaders arena of the stadium (which, it should be provided by materials prepared by O. N. only on the condition that all our comrades noted, was closed for reconstruction) only Smolin, professor and State Duma deputy, were freed (of course, they weren't, and no after they had understood that we would not and by dozens of well-known scholars, such a "dialogue" took place). teachers, and education experts. It also change our minds about holding the forumin explains how to obtain resources for the Nevertheless, all these disputes did not St Petersburg anyway. Probably, they decided that it was better to lock us up in the stadium development of education, and how to use prevent us from carrying on our work. than to face far bigger problems if we would them effectively, how to make attractive the 4. The right hand of the government hold the forum somewhere else, in more teacher's work, and much else. The All- "open" place. Russian Movement "Education for All" doesn't know... becomes, more and more, the organizational ...what the left hand does. As a result, more Some representatives of the presidential basis for realization of this program, in than two hundred people arrested, held in administration constantly tried to convince us collaboration with trade unions and youth custody, humiliated... that federal authorities' attitude to the forum organizations. is exceptionally democratic and friendly. But An extremely harsh attitude of the authorities mass "clean-ups" of our comrades, the ban on These are only a few examples of specific was a feature of this forum. More than two demonstrations, and riot police in vast documents discussed at the forum, and hundred participants were arrested, held in numbers around the stadium clearly showed practically-oriented decisions made. There custody, or persecuted in another way. In exactly the opposite. So, it was very relevant were also documents on energy, environment some cases (including that of the author that before the end of the forum, Lev and other issues. himself), the dialogue was conducted Ponomarev presented a declaration strongly 63 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Brazil Socialists of the World Support Heloisa Helena condemning the authorities' actions and demanding release of our comrades and Support on-line petition! stopping their persecution.

5. The alterglobalists: "white fluffy kittens", or...

In concluding these quick notes that are being written during the first hours after the end of the forum, I would like to stress that organizations and movements that form the network of the Russian SocialForum are not "white fluffy kittens" admonishing everybody "to live together peacefully". Not by chance, the main slogan of the forum was: Many of us signed, two years ago, a protest against the exclusion of Heloisa Helena "Rights cannot be granted ? rights are to be and other members of parliament from the PT, the Brazilian Workers Party. conquered!". We'll demand from the authorities that our legitimate social and civil rights be realized. We'll fight for this demand using all methods permitted by international Please email your name (with your position law and by the Russian constitution. We'll Today, Heloisa has become the presidential candidate of the new Party of Socialism and or capacity) or the name of your organisation, advance it resolutely, in serious dialogues to: between experts, at meetings and in Liberty (PSOL), founded by several bureaucratically excluded or dissident discussions, - and, if the authorities are [email protected] unwilling to listen to citizens, in the same members of the PT, and of a Left Front. way as participants of protest actions against While Lula's government followed a typical or sign at the "monetization of social welfare benefits" social-liberal course, disappointing millions did it in early 2005; many of those people of people who voted for him in the hope of www.petitiononline.com/heloisa1/ who took part in the second Russian Social a radical social and political change, and Principal signatories so far (all in a personal Forum were also active in the 2005 people all over the world who expected capacity unless otherwise indicated): campaign. At the same time, we have been from Brazil a new impulse for anti- and remain opposed to senseless hooliganism imperialist struggle, Heloisa Helena and her Gilbert Achcar, university professor and and to provocative violent acts. The image of comrades remained faithful to the original author anti-imperialist and socialist programme of "antiglobalists" smashing windows is forced Antony Arnove, International Socialist the PT. upon us by those people who are really afraid Organisation, US of our constructive initiatives. And the She is today the only candidate in the Chris Bambery, editor, Socialist Worker, authorities are afraid; otherwise, they would Brazilian elections who raises the historical Britain not have detained scores of citizens who banners of the Brazilian labour movement, wanted to make their way to the forum. José Barreto, Coordinator, Carabobo of the peasants, the poor and the oppressed: Region of the National Union of In any case, what the authorities think of us is Workers (UNT), Venezuela v a radical agrarian reform, not so important. We know perfectly well that Emilio Bastidas, Coordinator, Aragua the government implements its policies of v suspension of the payment of the foreign Region of the National Union of "market fundamentalism" and bureaucratic debt, Workers (UNT), Venezuela lawless rule not because it is ignorant of the Daniel Bensaïd, LCR, France interests of citizens, but because these v rejection of the Free Trade Area of the policies are beneficial to those who put the Americas (ALCA), Olivier Besancenot, presidential government in power. This is why we address candidate, LCR, France our words and actions, above all, to the v a substantial reduction of working hours Alister Black, International Committee, society, to the citizens, to those who solely is without loss of pay, Scottish Socialist Party able to change our life, finding in themselves José Boda, Executive member, v a moratorium on the use of Genetically the resolve to unite with comrades, so that Oilworkers' Union, Fedepetrol, Puerto Modified Organisms (such as Monsanto's another way of life, more humane and just, La Cruz, Venezuela will become possible in Russia and Terminator seeds), Patrick Bond, political economist, throughout the world. v support for the ALBA, the Bolivarian University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Alexander Buzgalin is a professor at Moscow State Alliance of the Americas (Venezuela, Africa University and the coordinator of the Social Bolivia, Cuba). Peter Boyle, national secretary, Movement "Alternatives". He was a member of the Democratic Socialist Perspective, Organizing Committee of the 2nd Russian Social The elections in Brazil are of concern for Australia Forum socialists everywhere in the world. In solidarity with the poor and the exploited Sue Branford, writer on Latin America Brazilian masses, we support the only Robert Brenner, economist, US socialist candidate in the next Brazilian Andrew Burgin, Press Secretary, Stop presidential elections, Heloisa Helena. the War Coalition, England and Wales 64 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Alex Callinicos, Socialist Workers Party, Espacio Alternativo, Spanish State Lluis Rabell, member of the National Britain Linus Jayatilake, President, United Council of the Catalan United Left, Joan Collins, Dublin City Councillor, Federation of Labour, Sri Lanka Spanish state Campaign for an Independent Left, Mick Rafferty, Dublin City Councillor John Percy, Democratic Socialist Ireland (Independent), Ireland Perspective, Australia Orlando Chirino, National Coordinator John Rees, national secretary, Respect Dr Vickramabahu Karunarathna, of the National Union of Workers (UNT) Andy Reid, Public and Civil Service President, Left Front, Sri Lanka Venezuela Union NEC member, Britain Claudio Katz, economist, Argentina Frances Curran MSP, Scottish Socialist Revolta Global, Catalunya Alain Krivine, LCR, France Party Teresa Rodriguez, member of the Mike Davis, University of San Diego, Dharmasiri Lankapeli, General Federal Presidency of Izquierda California Secretary, Media Employees Federation, Unida/United Left, Spanish state Roland Denis, on behalf of Proyecto Sri Lanka Edgard Sánchez, on behalf of the Nuestra America/M-13 de Abril, Paul Laverty, screenwriter Revolutionary Workers' Party (PRT), Venezuela Mexico John Lister, London Health Emergency Colin Fox, MSP and Convenor, Scottish Alfredo Saad Filho, university professor, Ken Loach, filmmaker Socialist Party London Francisco Louçã, MP Portugal, Left Boc Ana Gabarró, member of the National Ahmed Shawki, editor, International Council of the Catalan United Left, Michael Lowy, Brazilian author Socialist Review, US Spanish state Finian McGrath, Independent TD, Oscar Sogliano, Bolivia Richard Gallardo, National Coordinator Dublin North-Central, Ireland Alan Thornett, Respect National of the National Union of Workers (UNT) Patricia McKenna, former Member of Executive, Britain Venezuela the European Parliament, Irish Green Diosdado Toledano Gonzalez, member Marcos García, National Coordinator of Party of the Presidency of Izquierda the Public Employees Union José Melendez, Finance Secretary, Unida/United Left and member of the (FENTRASEP), Venezuela Permanent Council of the Catalan Steelworkers' Union (SUTISS), United Left, Spanish state Lindsey German, convenor, Stop the Venezuela War Coalition Greg Tucker, National Train Crew John Moloney Public and Civil Service Mike Gonzalez, Professor of Latin Secretary, Rail, Maritime and Transport Union NEC member, Britain American Studies, Glasgow University Union, Britain People's Democratic Party (KPP-PRD), Tony Gregory, Independent TD, Dublin Marcos Tulio Díaz, General Secretary, Indonesia (Dita Indah Sari, Chairperson; Central, Ireland Construction Union (UBT), Venezuela Zely Ariane, Department of Jesús Vargas, Coordinator, Carabobo George Grollios, university professor, International Relations) Thessaloniki, Greece Region of the National Union of Pedro Montes, economist, member of Workers (UNT), Venezuela Joe Harrington, Former Mayor of the Federal Presidency of Izquierda Limerick City, Ireland Vilma Vivas, Coordinator, Táchira Unida/United Left, Spanish state Region of the National Union of Richard Hatcher, Director of Research, Workers (UNT), Venezuela Faculty of Education, University of Jaime Pastor, member of the Federal Central England, Birmingham Political Council of Izquierda Hector Wesley, Public and Civil Service Unida/United Left, Spanish state Union NEC member, Britain Ismael Hernández, Coordinator, Carabobo Region of the National Union Stalin Pérez Borges, National Niel Wijethilake, General Secretary, of Workers (UNT), Venezuela Coordinator of the National Union of Corporation Co-op & Mercantile Union, Sri Lanka Dave Hill, Professor of Educational Workers (UNT) Venezuela Howard Zinn, writer, US Policy at the University of Northampton, James Petras, Professor Emeritus, England adviser, MST in Brazil Slavoj Zizek, Slovenian philosopher 65 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Pakistan Gorja - a great victory for textile workers

Farooq Tariq

The 39 days strike by some 15,000 textile workers at Gojra that most of the power looms many through the electronic and ended in a stunning victory for the workers. This did not come were working, the striking print media. The news could not without sacrifices by the workers involved in the strike. workers burnt copies of the be suppressed by the local Twenty-eight workers are still in jail waiting their plea of bail paper in protest. This gave an hostile journalists. application to be heard. On 15th August, a meeting of excuse to the local textile bosses to manipulate the situation and Despite the arrests and tortures, representatives of striking workers, power looms bosses and some of the journalisst turned the workers were able to set up district administration lasted well over seven hours at District against the striking workers. The the strike camp once again. It Coordination Officers House in Toba Tek Singh. local journalists were mainly became the rallying point for the The meeting agreed to raise the and attending the meeting. This close friends of the bosses. They workers. Hundreds of workers workers wage from Rupees 97 ($ sparked an immediate walkout boycotted the strike news and no will get together everyday at the 1.61) to Rupees 160 ($2.66) per of the workers in that particular reports of the strike were printed camp and distribute their day. They agreed that all the street. Within two hours most of in most of the local and national leaflets. The police had to give in power looms factories will be the workers of the town left the news papers. on this question. registered by the government. factories in protest. "Now or On 5th August, over 80 workers Social security cards will be never" was the slogan. The strike On 1st of August, the local were arrested who were going to made for the workers. A social has started. police dismantled the strikers Toba Tek Singh to meet the local security hospital will be built in camp late at night. This was to administration. The whole the district. A local advocate Saif Cheema sabotage a public meeting the played a vital role in supporting next day where I was supposed district was cordoned by police The wages had not been raised the workers. His house became to speak in solidarity of the and many workers were not for the last 18 years, an the center of the strike. He workers. On 2nd August, over a allowed to enter the district. Still unprecedented freezing of wages helped the workers to set up a 1000 workers attended the over 400 workers were able to by the local textile bosses. strike camp in the town center. public meeting. It was agreed on gather at the district courts to The Toba Tek Singh district our suggestion to put up the protest against the arrests. The There are a total of 20, 000 secretary Labour Party Pakistan camp next morning come what local administration invited the workers at Gojra, a town 40 (LPP) put the workers in contact may. It was also agreed that a representatives to start the kilometers away from with the Faisalabad power looms national and international negotiations. It was accepted. Faisalabad, the hub city of workers movement called solidarity campaign be started. Several rounds of negotiations textile industry in Pakistan. The Labour Qaumi Movement. The meeting was full of were held between 5th to 15th workers were subject to all sorts Majority of the leadership of emotions and the workers were August. of oppression during these years. LQM are member of LPP. The really happy to hear us and some The town is divided by two cooperation of the two of the trade union leaders from The union made it clear that we gangster groups who a long movements played a decisive Lahore. are not just demanding the history of conflict with each role in sustaining the strike. The release of the arrested workers other. This has resulted in district leaders of Awami The attempt to set up the camp but main demand is better wages dozens of murders from both jamhoori Tehreek, the left on 3rd August resulted the arrest and conditions. It made it clear sides. But these groups were alliance in Pakistan, gave full of 28 workers including the that more aorkers are ready to go united in suppressing the solidarity to the striking president of LQM comrade to jail but the strike will not end. workers. workers. Mian Abdul Qayum. The workers were physically I went again to Gojra strike The strike started on 8th July by The striking workers were assaulted by the local police and camp on 8th August from Lahore some 70 percent of the power tortured by the gangsters of the a strike leader was garlanded alongside with other leading looms workers of the town. A local textile bosses on several with shoes round his neck to comrades of LPP. Speaking to day earlier, they had a public occasions and the local police humiliate the workers. He was workers at the camp, I invited meeting where well over 3000 did not take any action against paraded in front of the bosses by the Gojra police to arrest me as attended, demanding an them. The workers were the local police. well because a case has been immediate raise in the wages. harassed by the police who took registered against me as well. The workers formed a union and several striking workers in day A case was registered against me This was to show complete gave a 15 days notice for the custody without charges. But the and 30 others with charges of solidarity with the striking acceptance of the demands. workers were determined to go provocative anti- government workers and to show that we will on. speeches and breech of section not leave them. The police did On 8th July, one worker was 144 of the penal code. The not come to arrest me while they kicked out of a factory and was When the well circulated Daily arrests and registration of the were just outside the camp. The accused of forming the union Express Pakistan printed a lie case made the strike known to press conference on the same 66 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

Theory

Marxism and classical sociology Marx, Weber and the Critique of Capitalism

Michael Löwy

day at Toba Tek Singh was well reported all over the country.

A delegation of Human Rights Commission of Pakistan went to the town on 11th August to meet Despite their undeniable differences, Marx and the local administration to Weber have much in common in their appraisals of protest the violation of the modern capitalism: they share a vision of the human rights. They also spoke at capitalist economic system as a universe where the strike camp in Gojra. Two "individuals are directed by abstractions," (Marx), LPP leaders were part of the where impersonal relations and objects delegation. [Versachlicht] replace personal relations of The national and international dependence, and where the accumulation of capital solidarity campaign to send becomes an end in itself and, by and large, protest letters to general irrational. Max Weber Musharaf, Labour minister and Their analysis of capitalism is inseparable it is an essential dimension of that which minister interior resulted also a from a critical posture-explicit in Marx, more makes the impressionable force of the work good pressure. Finally the ambivalent in Weber. But the content and in its dual political and scientific dimension. district administration took a inspiration of the critique are very different. As Lucien Goldmann has written, Marx did firm position to help the And, whereas Marx banks on the possibility not "mix" the distinction between fact and workers. of overthrowing capitalism by workers of value, but developed a dialectical analysis in socialist persuasion, Weber is a fatalistic and which explication, understanding and The 39 days strike by those who resigned observer to the mode of production valorization are rigorously insperable. [1] had been earning less than two and administration that seem to him to be Dollars a day ended ina success. (b) The point of view of the proletariat, a inevitable. The workers are happy. The victim of the system and its fossilizing camp is taken away by the I potential. This class-based perspective workers themselves. The strike inspires-as Marx clearly recognizes in the ended only when a culture of The anti-capitalist critique is one of the main preface to Capital-his critique of bourgeois resistance, solidarity, strong points extending throughout Marx's political economy. It is from this point of determination and sacrifices was work, and gives it its coherence. This does view that values like "justice" are very evident. It was clear to the not prevent one from seeing a certain reinterpreted: their concrete meanings differ bosses and administration that evolution in his thought: whereas the according to the situation and interests of the strike will not end. Although, Communist Manifesto (1848) is insistent on different classes. only 70 percent of the local the historically progressive role of the workforce participated but it (c) The possibility of an emancipated future, bourgeoisie, Capital (1867) is more prone to never went down than that. The of a post-capitalist society, of a communist denouncing the ignobility of the system. leaders are still in jail. But utopia. It is by the light of the hypothesis-or hopefully, they might be Nothing could be more false than to oppose, wager-of a free association of producers that released on 19th August on bail. as is so often done, a young "ethical" Marx to the negative traits of capitalism appear in all a mature, "scientific" Marx. their vastness. The workers at Toba, Kamalia and other towns are contacting Marx's anti-capitalism is grounded in certain (d) The existence, in the past, of more human us to help them in their wage implicit values or criteria, the most frequent social or cultural forms destroyed by increase. We are planning a among them being: capitalist "progress." This reference, of power looms workers romantic origin, is especially present in the (a) Universal ethical values: liberty, equality, convention in the end of August texts where Marx and Engels analyze justice, autonomy, selfaccomplishment. The to demand the increase of the primitive communism, a form of communal workers in the whole area and articulation between different human values life without a market or state, and without Pakistan. constitutes a coherent whole; that one can private property and without the patriarchal design a revolutionary humanism that oppression of women. Farooq Tariq is the general secretary constitutes a principle benchmark for the of Labour Party Pakistan.. ethical rejection of the capitalist system. The The existence of these values does not mean moral indignation against the infamies of that Marx takes on a Kantian perspective, capitalism burst from every page of Capital; opposing a necessary transcendence to 67 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

existing reality: his critique is immanent, to 3) The venal quantification of social life. calamity." [7] Considering certain of its the extent that it is made with reference to a Capitalism, which is regulated by exchange manifestations-the most sinister among them real social force which is opposed to value and the calculation of profits and the being the poverty laws or the workhouses, capitalism-the working class-as well as to the accumulation of capital, tends to dissolve and the "Bastilles of the workers"-Marx writes in contradiction between the possibilities destroy all qualitative value: use value, 1847 this powerful and prophetic passage created by the impulse of the productive ethical value, human relations and which seems to presage the Frankfurt School: forces and the limitations imposed by sentiments. Having replaces Being, and "barbarism reappears, but this time it is bourgeois relations of production. consists of mere cash payments-the "cash engendered in the very core of civilization nexus," according to Carlyle that Marx and becomes an integral part of it. It is the The anti-capitalist critique of Marx is appropriated for his own use-and the "glassy leprous barbarism, barbarism which is the organized around five fundamental themes: waters of egoistic calculation." leper of civilization." [8] the injustice of exploitation; the loss of liberty from alienation; venal quantification; Now, the battle against quantification and All these critiques are intimately related: they irrationality; and modern barbary. Let's Mammonism (again a term from Carlyle) is are mutually exchanged, they reciprocally examine each of these points, emphasizing one of the principle leitmotifs of presuppose themselves, and they are their lesser known aspects. romanticism. [5] Like the romantic critiques articulated in an organized anti-capitalist of modern bourgeois civilization, Marx vision, which is one of the distinctive traits of 1) Injustice and exploitation. The capitalist thinks that capitalism introduces, in this the reflection of Marx as a remade system is grounded, independently of this or sense, a profound degradation of social communist thinker. that political economy, on the unpaid surplus relations and a moral regression to pre- labor of workers, giving rise to, through capitalist social relations: "there came a time On two other questions-which today are of "surplus value," all forms of rent and profit. at last when what all that these men had the greatest relevance-the anti-capitalist The extreme manifestations of this social looked upon as inalienable became an object critique of Marx is more ambiguous or injustice are the exploitation of children, of exchange, of trade, from which they would insufficient. miserable wages, inhuman working hours, be estranged. It is the time when the same and the sordid conditions of working class things which until then were communicated, 6) The colonial expansion and/or imperialism life. But these conditions of the laborer are a exchanged, bartered; supplied but never sold; of capitalism, the violent and cruel matter of a specific historical moment; the acquired but never bought-virtue, love, domination of colonized peoples, their system itself is intrinsically unjust because of opinion, science, conscience, etc.-where submission by the preemptory force of the the parasitic exploitation of the labor force by everything will at last pass into commerce. It imperatives of capitalist production and the direct producers. This theme occupies a is the time of general corruption, of universal accumulation of capital. One observes here a decisive place in Capital and was essential in venality, or, speaking in political economic certain evolution in Marx's thought: if in the making the Marxist workers movement. terms, the time when everything, moral or Manifesto he seems to celebrate in progress physical, having become market value, is the subjugation of "barbaric (sic), peasant 2) The loss of liberty from alienation, carried to the market to be appreciated for its nations" to bourgeois civilization, in his reification, and commodity fetishism. In the fair value." [6] writings on British colonialization in India capitalist mode of production, individuals- the somber aspect of western domination is laborers in particular-are dominated by their The power of money is one of the most brutal evoked, but as a necessary evil. own products which take the form of manifestations of capitalist quantification: autonomous fetishes and escape their control. through the mode of production it denatures It is only in Capital, notably in the chapter on It is a long and developed problematic in the all "natural human qualities" in submitting to the primitive accumulation of capital, that writings of his youth, but it also emerges in the money standard. "The quantity of money one finds a truly radical critique of the the celebrated chapter on the fetishism of becomes more and more the unique and horrors of colonial expansion: the commodities in Capital. [2] powerful property of man; at the same time enslavement or extermination of indigenous that it reduces all being to its abstraction, it is peoples, wars of conquest, and the trading of At the heart of Marx's analysis of alienation reduced by its own logic to quantitative blacks. These "cruel acts and abominable is the idea that capitalism is a type of being." atrocities,"-which, according to Marx disenchanted "religion," where objects in the (approvingly citing M. W. Howitt), "do not market replace divinity: "The more the 4) Irrationality. The periodic crises of have a parallel in any other era of world worker is externalized in his labor, the more overproduction that jolt the capitalist system history, in any other savage race, as gross, the outside, objective world, which he unveil its irrationality-"absurdity" is the term pitiless, and as shameless as it was"-are not himself creates, becomes powerful, the more used in the Manifesto: there are "too many simply converted into profits and the loss of he is self-impoverished and the more his means of subsistence," even though the historical progress, but are properly internal world becomes poor, the less he majority of the population lacks necessary denounced as an "infamy." [9] possesses that is his own. It is the same with means of subsistence. This global religion. The more man invests in God, the irrationality is not contradictory, of course, The Manifesto rejoices in the domination less he is able to retain his own self." [3] The with a partial and local rationality, at the level over nature made possible by the expansion concept of fetishism reinvents the history of of production management in each factory. of capitalist civilization. It is only later, religions in the form of primitive idolatry specifically in Capital, that the aggression of which itself already contains the same 5) Modern barbarism. In a certain sense, the bourgeois mode of production against the principle of all religious phenomena. capitalism is the harbinger of historical natural environment is evoked. In one progress, exemplified by the exponential famous passage, Marx suggests a parallel It is not an accident that in their writings the development of productive forces, thereby between the exhaustion of labor power and theologians of liberation- Hugo Assmann, creating the material conditions for a new that of the sun by the destructive logic of Franz Hinkelammert, Enrique Dussel-draw society with solidarity and freedom. But, at capitalism: "Each progression of capitalist largely on Marx against capitalist alienation the same time, it is also a force of social agriculture is a progression not only of the art and fetishism in their denunciation of "the regression in the sense that it "makes from of exploiting the laborer, but also the art of idolatry of the market." [4] each economic progression a public depleting the earth's soil; each progression in 68 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

the art of augmenting its fertility for a time is active subject. Taking a distance from his accumulation: "considering the point of view also a progression in the ruination of its relation to the rationalist tradition of the of personal welfare, it expresses how durable sources of fertility. . . . Capitalist Enlightenment, he is perceptive of the irrational is this direction where man exists production therefore develops the technique contradictions and limitations of modern for the purpose of his enterprise and not the and the combination of the process of social rationality as it manifests itself in the reverse." [15] production that exhausts at the same time the capitalist economy and in bureaucratic two sources from which are obtained all administration: its formal and instrumental Just as the treatment of the "naive" point of wealth: the earth and the laborer." [10] Here character, and its tendency to produce effects view that cannot perceive the absurdity of the one sees the sketch of a vision of an that lead to the overturning of the system-without accounting for its formidable immanent dialectic of progress-the ironic emancipatory aspirations of modernity. economic rationality-his remarks put the way the term is used is simply an expression- Research into the calculability and efficiency spirit of capitalism profoundly into question. which signals the ecological problematic, but of all goals leads to the bureaucratization and From all the evidence, two types of which was unfortunately not developed by reification of human activities. It is this rationality are in conflict here: that which is Marx. diagnosis of the crisis of modernity that will purely formal and instrumental slowly return through its appropriation by the (Zweckrationalität), which has as its sole II Frankfurt School (e.g., Adorno, Horkheimer objective production for the sake of and Marcuse). [12] production, accumulation for accumulation's Everything else is the problematic of Max sake, money for money's sake, and that, more Weber. His position on capitalism is much What informs Weber's pessimistic and substantial, which corresponds to the "natural more ambivalent and contradictory. One may resigned diagnosis of modernity is the refusal state of things," and related to values say that he is torn between his bourgeois of the illusion of progress so powerful in (Wertrationalität): that which deals with condition which is identified with the destiny European consciousness from the beginning human welfare and the satisfaction of their of German capitalism and its imperial power, of the 20th century. As he wrote in one of his material needs. and his intellectual identity, sensitive to the final public interventions in 1919: "it is not arguments of the romantic, anti-capitalist the blossoming of summer for which we This definition of the irrationality of Zivilizationkritik so influential on German wait, but all at once a night which is polar, capitalism is not without certain similarities university mandarins at the turn of the glacial, somber and harsh." [13]This with the ideas of Marx. The subordination of century. From this point of view he is pessimism is inseparable from a critical an end, the human being, to a means- comparable to another bourgeois intellectual vision of the nature of capitalism and of its enterprise, money, the market-is a theme that of that era in Germany who was also torn-if dynamic of rationalization and is endlessly discussed in the Marxian not schizophrenically-between bourgeois and modernization. problematic of alienation. Weber was intellectual persuasions: Walter Rathenau, a conscious of this, one can observe, in his Prussian and a Jew, entrepreneur capitalist One can distinguish two aspects, narrowly conference in 1918 on socialism: "all of this and critic of mechanistic civilization. linked to one another, in Weber's critique of (the impersonal functioning of capital) is the substance of the capitalist system: therefore that which socialism defines as 'the Rejecting all socialist ideas, Weber did not domination of things by human beings,' that hesitate occasionally to employ apologetic 1) The inversion of means and ends. For the is to say: of the means over the objective (the arguments in favor of private capital. More spirit of capitalism-of which Benjamin satisfaction of needs)." [16] It is no accident often he seems to be inclined toward a Franklin is a chemically pure ideal-typical that Lukács's theory of reification in History resigned acceptance of the inevitability of example-to accrue money, always more and Class Consciousness is supported as bourgeois civilization. Yet, in certain key money (or to accumulate capital, as Marx much by Weber as by Marx. texts, which have been among the truly great said), is the most supreme and ultimate imports in the history of 20th century objective in life: "money has been considered 2) The submission to an all-powerful thought, he gives free reign to a lucid up to this point as something in and of itself mechanism and imprisonment by that system critique, pessimistic and profoundly radical, which appears entirely transcendent and that we have created ourselves. This theme is of the paradoxes of capitalist rationality. absolutely irrational under the relation of intimately tied to the previous one, but it According to the sociologist Derek Sayer, "to 'benefit' of the individual or the 'advantage' places emphasis on the loss of liberty, the a certain extent his critique of capitalism, like that one may get to try and possess. Gain has decline of individual autonomy. The locus a negative life-force, is more incisive than become the end man proposes for himself; it classicus of this critique is in the final that of Marx." [11] This judgment is no longer governs him as a means to satisfy paragraphs of The Protestant Ethic, without somewhat excessive, but it is true that the his material needs. This reversal of what we doubt the most celebrated passage and the Weberian argument touches on the very may call the natural state of things, so absurd most influential in Weber's oeuvre-and one of foundations of modern industrial/capitalist from a naive point of view, is clearly one of the rare moments where he dares to assign civilization. the characteristic leitmotives of capitalism the meaning of "value and time judgments." and it remains entirely foreign to all people All at once Weber proves, with a resigned It goes without saying that the themes of this who have not taken its breath." [14] nostalgia, that with the triumph of the spirit critique are quite distinct from those of Marx. of modern capitalism we are obliged to give Weber ignores exploitation, he is not A supreme expression of modern rationality up the "Faustian universality of man." interested in crisis, has little sympathy for the in view of an end- Zweckrationalität or, Awareness of the bourgeois era's arrival, struggles of the proletariat and does not call according to the Frankfurt School, according to Goethe, brings "a sense of colonial expansion into question. And yet, instrumental rationality-the capitalist departure; of a renouncement of an age of similar to the Nietzschean or romantic economy reveals itself, from the point of opulence, and human good." Kulturpessimismus, he is aware of a view of the material needs of human profound contradiction between the individuals, or simply from their benefit, as In another sense, capitalist rationality creates unreasonableness of modern, formal "absolutely irrational." Weber often returns to a context that is increasingly restrictive: "the rationality-of which the bureaucracy and this theme in the Protestant Ethic, insisting puritan wanted to be a person of needs-we are private enterprises are the most typical constantly upon the irrationality (his forced to be." The modern economic order, incarnation-and that of the autonomy of the emphasis) of the logic of capitalist tied to the technical conditions of 69 International Viewpoint - IV380 - July/August 2006

mechanistic production "determines, with an mechanisms of valorization and automation NOTES irresistible force, the lifestyle of the ensemble inscribed in market exchanges leads to the of individuals born in this mechanism-and monetarization of social relations and a [1] L. Goldmann, "Le marxisme est-il une sociologie?" in Recherches Dialectiques, Paris: Gallimard, 1955. not only those things that directly concern "depoeticization" of the world-that is to say, economic acquisition." Weber compares this as the market becomes a prosaic aspect of life [2] It is true that one may observe, as has been remarked constraint to a kind of prison where the there is a withering of experience and of by Ernest Mandel, an evolution between the 1844 system of rational production of goods Manuscripts and the economic writings of his maturity: "poiesis." [21] The Heidelberg school of the passage of an anthropological conception to a imprisons individuals: "according to the view sociology may not have conceived the historical conception of alienation. Cf. E. Mandel, The of Baxter, the appearance of material wealth Formation of Karl Marx's Economic Thought, 1967. possibility of replacing the autocratic logic should wear like a light coat on the shoulders that was selfvalorizing with a democratic [3] K. Marx, 1844 Manuscripts. of saints which at any moment can be form of production. [22] shrugged off. But fate has transformed this [4] H. Assmann, F. Hinkelammert, A idoloatria do coat into a steel cage." mercado: Ensaio sobre Economia e teologia, S. Paulo, Ed. More that Marx and Weber part on the idea of Vozes, 1989. Also see on this subject the fascinating text the substantial irrationality of capitalism-that of the young Walter Benjamin-largely inspired by Weber- The image has made good. It is striking for its "Kapitalismus als Religion," Gesammelte Schriften, tragic resignation, but also for its critical it is not contradictory with respect to its Frankfurt, Suhrkamp Verlag, 1991, volume VI, pp. 100- dimension. Many interpretations and formal or partial rationality. Both make 103. translations of the expression "iron cage" reference to religion in order to attempt to [5] Cf. M. Löwy and R. Sayre, Révolte et Mélancolie. Le (stahlhartes Gehäuse) exist: For some, it has come to terms with this irrationality. romatisme a contre-courant de la modernité, Paris, Payot, been likened to a "prison cell," whereas for 1992. others it has been more like a shell (carapace) For Weber, it is the origin of this [6] Poverty of Philosophy, p. 33. weighing one down as if he were a snail. Yet irrationalism, of this "reversal of that which it is more probable that Weber borrowed the we call the natural state of things" that we [7] K. Marx, Capital, vol. 1 pg. 350 New York: Vintage. image from the "iron cage of despair" from need to explain, and he proposes to make [8] K. Marx, "Arbeitslohn," 1847, Kleine Ökonomische the English Puritan poet Bunyan. [17] In any reference to "a series of intimate sentiments Schriften, Berlin, Dietz Verlag, 1955, pg. 245. case, the Protestant Ethic seems to describe tied to certain religious representations": the the reified structures of the capitalist Protestant ethic. [23] [9] K. Marx, Capital, vol. 1, pp. 557-558, 563. economy as a shell or prison, cold and [10] Ibid. pg. 363. implacable as steel. For Marx the origin of capitalism does not return us to a religious ethic of thrift, but [11] D. Sayer, Capitalism and Modernity: An Excurses on Weber's pessimism makes him fear the end of rather to the brutal process of expropriation Marx and Weber, pg. 4, London: Routledge, 1991. all vision and all idealism, and the and pillage that he designates by the term [12] See the important book on this subject by Philippe succession, under the aegis of modern primitive accumulation of capital. The Raynaud, Weber et les dilemmes de la raison moderne, capitalism, of a "mechanical petrifaction, reference to religion nevertheless plays an Paris, PUF, 1987 also the article "Figures du marxisme adorned by a kind of convulsive vanity." [18] wébérien," Actuel Marx, 1992. important role for understanding the logic of It is a question of the progress of reification capitalism as "inversion." But, we saw above, [13] M. Weber, Le savant et le politique (1919), Paris, C. Bourgois, 1990, p. 184. which extends itself, out of the economic for him it is a matter less of a causal sphere to the various other domains of social determinant as in Weber that of a structural [14] M. Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of activity: the state, rights and culture. [19] affinity: irrationality is an intrinsic Capitalism Well before the Frankfurt School, Karl characteristic, immanent and essential of the [15] Ibid, pg. 73. Cf. also pg. 80. Löwith was aware, as in his brilliant essay of capitalism mode of production as an 1932 on Weber and Marx, that the "dialectic alienated process similar in its structure to [16] M. Weber, "Der Sozialismus," in Schriften zur Sozialgeschichte und Politik, Stuttgart, Reclam, 1997, of reason" was evidence for the Weberian religious alienation. In both cases humans are pg.246. critique of capitalism and its affinity with the dominated by their own products- money Marxian problematic: [17] Derek Sayer, Capitalism and Modernity, pg. 144 under capitalism, God under religion. speaks of a "shell," whereas the Bunyan hypothesis has Weber himself declared that here lies the real been argued by E. Tiryakian, "The Sociological Import of It is in exploring the elective affinities a Metaphor: Tracking the Source of Max Weber's 'Iron problem of culture-rationalization toward the between the Weberian and Marxian critiques Cage'," in P. Hamilton (ed.), Max Weber: Critical irrational-and that he and Marx agreed in the Assessments, London, Routledge, 1991, vol. I, 2, pp. 109- of capitalism, and in the amalgamation in an definition of his problem but differed in his 120. original step that Lukács produced the theory evaluation. . . . This paradoxical inversion . . of reification and Adorno and Horkheimer [18] All above citations The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit . becomes most clearly evident when it of Capitalism, pp. 222-225. occurs in exactly the type of activity whose the critique of instrumental rationality-both innermost intention is that it be specifically among the most important and radical [19] Cf. Pierre Bouretz, Les promesses du monde, pg. 367. rational, namely, in economically rational theoretical innovations of 20th century [20] K. Lowith, Max Weber and Karl Marx, p. 48. activity. And precisely here it becomes Marxian thought. [24] plainly apparent that, and how, behavior [21] The term, poi¯siV, in Greek means "to make" as well as "to do" and has cultural and aesthetic overtones. which is purely purposive-rational in * Published in Logos, a journal of modern society & culture, Vol. 1 issue 3, summer 2002. (Translator's note) intention turns inexorably into its own opposite in the process of its rationalization. * Translated from the French by Michael J. Thompson. [22] I refer here in my use of terms such as "depoeticization of the world" to those advanced by Jean- [20] Marie Vincent in his recent work, Max Weber ou la Michael Löwy is Research Director in Sociology at démocratie inachévée, Paris: Editions du Félin, 1998, pp. the CNRS (National Center for Scientific Research) III 141, 160-161. in Paris. He is the author of many books, including The Marxism of Che Guevara, Marxism and In conclusion, what Weber, in contrast to [23] Protestant Ethic, pg. 50. Cf. also pp. 73, 80. Liberation Theology, Fatherland or Mother Earth? Marx, did not know was the domination of and The War of Gods: Religion and Politics in Latin [24] M. Löwy, "Figures du marxisme wébérien," Actuel exchange value over human activity. The America. Marx, no. 11, 1992. 70