Workers Vanguard No 849 - 27 May 2005

7/29/2019 Workers Vanguard No 849 - 27 May 2005

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WfJlillEIiS 'ANfJIJAIiIJ soeNo. 849 Q 9 U ~ C ' 7 0 1 27 May 2005

u.s. Hands Off Syria!Lebanon: Imperialist Intriguesand the Spectre of Civil War

Since the assassination of formerprime minister Rafik al-Hariri in a massiw explosion on the streets of Beirut onFehruary I-J.. Lehanon has been in thegrip of political turmoil. American imperialists and the anti-Syrian "opposition"in Lehanon immediately pointed fingersat Syria. :\'ot to be left out of the spoilsthis time. french imp


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Defend the Cuban Revolution!Extradite Susana Terrorist to Havana!Last week the American government

finally "captured" an actual terrorist inthe U.S. On May 17, weeks after hewaltzed across the U.S. border andannounced he would seek asylum, counterrevolutionary Cuban gllS({1l0 (worm)Luis Posada Carriles was arrested by ofticials of the Department of HomelandSecurity-not on terrorism charges, butfor entering the country in violation ofimmigration laws. That same day, beforehis detention was announced, hundreds ofthousands marched in Havana demandingPosada's arrest. For the Bush administration, which routinely calls headlinegrabbing press conferences to. announcethe latest triumph in the "war on terror"such as the closing o f charities whichdonated to hospitals and schools in theNear East or the New York City arrest,of teenage girls alleged to be suicidebombers-Posada's "arrest" was nocause for celebration. This bloodthirstykiller was one of their own, a former CIAemployee with a four-decade resume ofterrorism which includes the downing ofa civilian airliner and the bombing of aHavana hotel. We s.ay: Send Posada backto Cuba to be tried by his victims!

Chapman/Miami HeraldCounterrevolutionary terrorist LuisPosada Carriles at Florida newsconference before his arrest.On New Year's Day 1959, a peasant

guerrilla army led by Fidel Castro andChe Guevara overthrew the U.S. puppetdictator Batista in Cuba. Over the nextyear and a half. largely in response toimperialist provocations, the Cuban government expropriated the capitalist andforeign imperialist holdings, consolidating a deformed workers state by the fallof 1960. Ever since then, U.S. imperialism has been waging a terrorist war

For Revolutionary StruggleAgainst Imperialism and WarGroups claiming to be socialist hm'e builtthe movement against the Iraq war and occu

pmiml around a pac!fist program designedto appeal to "antiwar" bourgeois politicians.Writing in 1935, revolutionary leader LeonTrotsky explained how sllch pacifist, classless appeals to "lInity" perpetuate the capitalist system by reinforcing illusions that itcan be reformed to serve the interests ofTROTSKY working people and the oppressed. In fight- LENINing to forge the Fourth International in theyears leading lip to World War II, Trotsky stressed that only Ij"(Jrkers remlutiOil can putall end to illlperialist ww:

The war danger. which is a life and death question for the people, is the supremetest for all the groupings and tendencies within the working class. 'The struggle forpeace," "the struggle against war," "war on war," and similar slogans are hollow andfraudulent phrases if unaccompanied by the propaganda and the application of revolutionary methods of struggle. The only way to put an end to war is .to overthrow thebourgeoisie. The only way to overthrow the bourgeoisie is by a revolutionary assault. ...

Marxists irreconcilably reject the pacifist slogans of "disarmament," "arbitration,"and "amity between peoples" (i.e., between capitalist governments), etc., as opium forthe popular masses. The combinations between working class organizations and pettybourgeois pacitists .. render the best service to imperialism by distracting the attentionof the working class from reality with its grave struggles and beguiling them insteadwith impotent parades.The struggle against war and imperialism cannot be the task of any sort of special"committees." The struggle against war is the preparation for revolution, that is to say,the task of working class parties and of the International. Marxists pose this great taskbefore the proletarian vanguard, without any frills ....

The initiative of a conscious minority, a scientific program, bold and ceaseless agitation in thename of clearly formulated aims, merciless criticism of all ambiguitythose are some of the most important factors for the victory of the proletariat. Withouta fused and steeled revolutionary party a socialist revolution is inconceivable.

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- Leon Trotsky, "Open Letter for the Fourth International." Spring 1935

!.I!!l!l.!!J!..'ll!ltl!/!I!.I!..IRECTOR OF PARTY PUBLICATIONS: Alison Spencer

EDITOR Alan WildeEDITOR. YOUNG SPARTACUS PAGES: Rosemary PalenqueCIRCULATION MANAGER: Susan FullerEDITORIAL BOARD: Kathleen Harris (managing editor). Helene Brosius (letters editor).Linda Jarreau (production manager), Bruce Andre. Jon Brule. Helen Cantor. Paul Cone.George Foster. Walter Jennings. James Robertson. Joseph SeymourThe Spartacist League is the U.S. Section of the International Communist League(Fourth Internationalist).Workers Vanguard (lSSN 0276-0746) published biweekly except skipPing three alternate Issues In June July andAugust (beginning With omitting the second Issue In June) and skiPPing the last issue In December. by the SpartacistPublishing Co . 299 Broadway SUite 318 New York NY 10007 Teleph one (212) 732786 2 (Editorial). (212) 7327861(BUSlfl8SSl. Address all correspondence to' Box 1377 GPO Ne w York. NY 10116 E-mail address vanguard@tlac netDomestic subSCriptions S10.00 21 Issues Periodicals postage paid at New York NY POSTMASTER Send addresschanges to Workers Vanguard. Box 1377 GPO. New York. NY 10116Opinions expressed In Signed artlc/es or fetters do not necessartly express the edltonal viewp'JlntThe closing 'date for news in this issue is 24 May.

No. 849 27 May 2005

against the tiny island state of Cuba.Posada, a Cuban exile, enlisted with theCI A before the 1961 invasion of theCuban Bay of Pigs during the Democratic Kennedy administration. He laterjoined the Venezuelan intelligence service in 1969 and, according to declassified U.S. government documents, left itin 1974. Posada spent nine years in aVenezuelan prison for the 1976 bombingof a Cuban airliner (during George BushSr.'s reign as CIA director) in which 73people were killed. Among the \'ictimswere teenage members of the Cuban fencing team, Posada "escaped" from prisonin 1985 after his g1lS({110 friends in Miamipaid the warden $28,000. and he thenjoined a CIA operation in El Salvador toassist Olivcr North's operation arming theNicaraguan contra murderers who carriedout their own war of terror against theSandinistas in Nicaragua-blowing upbridges, power plants and schools, attacking hospitals and burning crops.Though he denies taking part in the1976 airplane bombing, FBI documentsplace Posada at two meetings at whichthe attack was planned, and an FBI reporta day after the bombing records a sourcewh o "all but admitted that Posada and[Orlando] Bosch had engineered thebombing of the airline." Posada hasadmitted masterminding bombings oftourist spots in Havana in 1997 that killedan Italian businessman. Posada and threeothers linked to the terrorist Omega 7 outfit were arrested and imprisoned for plotting the assassination of Castro at aregional summit meeting in Panama in2000: they were pardoned by the outgoing Panamanian president last August.

In a 1998 interview, Posada braggedabout his years of work with the Company: 'The CIA taught us everyth ing -everything. They taught us explosives, howto kill, bomb, trained us in acts of sabotage. When the Cubans were workingfor the CIA, they were called patriots.'Acciones de sabotage' was the term theyused to classify this type of operation.Now they call it terrorism. The times havechanged."

Well, let's not jump to conclusions.Posada's presence in the U.S. has been apublic secret for weeks, evoking fearsamong sectors of the ruling class that harboring this known killer w.ould expose thehypocrisy of the U.S. rulers' "war on terror." which in reality is a war on immigrants, blacks and labor and any countrythat Washington wants to run roughshodover. In a letter to Homeland Securitysecretary Michael Chertoff, DemocraticCongressman William Delahunt wrote,"Our sudden timidity with regard to a particular terrorist threatens to underminethe fundamental credibility of our globaleffort." Delahunt's chief of staff StevenSchwadron added, "Mr. Posada does notbelong in the United States:'

It is conceivable that the U.S. maydeport Posada to a friendly governmentthat will allO\v him to live out his life inease and comfort. But. if the U.S. rulershave their way, it is unlikely that Posadawill ever be called to account for hiscrimes. Posada's partner in terror. Orlando Bosch, today soaks up the sun inMiami. Imprisoned in Venezuela withPosada, Bosch was released in 1987 afterthe intenention by U.S. ambassador OttoReich and tlown to the U.S. where he wasarrested. Over FBI objections, the firstpresident Bush pardoned Bosch in 1990.Two years later. he was granted permanent residency. The Venezuelan gO\ernment of Hugo Chavez has soughtPosada's extradition to face outstandingcharges of homicide, treason and possession and manufacture of weapons of war.A statement issued by the Department ofHomeland Security said it "does not gen-

erally remove people to Cuba" or "t ocountries believed to be acting on Cuba'sbehalf." a clear reference to the close relationship between Venezuela and Cuba.

While counterrevolutionary g1lS({110scum like Bosch plot further acts of terror against Cuba, five courageous Cubancitizens are imprisoned in the U.S. forterms of 15 years to life on bogus chargesof espionage and murder. Arrested byDemocratic president Bill Clinton's FBIin 1998, the "crime" of the Miami Fivewas to monitor and infiltrate gll\({110 exilegroups in Florida in order to report 011their plans, as well as those of the U.S.military, for attacks and other prmocations against Cuba. In a message to theAmerican people issued shortly after theirconviction in 200 I, the Miami Fiveproudly asserted that Cuba, which "hasheroically survived four decades ofaggressions and threats to its nationalsecurity, of subversi\'e plans, sabotagesand destabilization, has every right todefend itself from its enemies who keepusing the U.S. territory to plan, organize and finance terrorist actions:' Wedemand: Free the Miami Five!

Cuba has provided refuge to Americanblack activists who have found themselves in the gun sights of the racist killcrazy cops. In early May, the FBIIncreased the bounty on the head ofAssata Shakur, fonner member of theBlack Panther Party and Black LiberationArmy, to $1 million. Shakur has been inCuba since she escaped prison in 1979,sentenced to life on frame-up charges ofkilling a New Jersey state trooper. On 22Ma y 1973, Shakur, Zayd Malik Shakurand Sundiata Acoli were flagged down bystate troopers, who immediately beganblazing away with their guns, killingZayd Shakur. One of the troopers waskilled in the crossfire-with a bullet froma police revolver. Assata Shakur, shot bythe cops \vhile sitting in the back of thecar with her hands over her head, nearlydied from the wounds. In a classic example of racist capitalist "justice," the twoblack militants who survived were convicted on charges of killing the cop andtheir own comrade! Acoli remains in aprison hell over 30 years later. Hands of fAssata Shakur! Free Sundiata Acoli!

For 45 years, American administrations, Democratic as well as RepUblican,have tried to crush the gains of the CubanRevolution by a combination of militaryencirclement, a starvation embargo andan unbroken series of terrorist attacks.The smashing of capitalist class rule andcreation of a workers state, albeit deformed under the rule of the Stalinist Castro bureaucracy, brought tremendous gainsto the Cuban population, from free medical care to jobs, housing and education.We fight for the unconditional militarydefense of the Cuban deformed workersstate against imperialist attack and capitalist countelTevolution, and call for aworkers political revolution to oust theStalinist bureaucracy. Key to the defenseof the Cuban Revolution is our fight toforge a revolutionary workers party in theU.S. that can lead the American proletariat to yictory in the struggle to sweepaway capitalist rule in the U.S. ExtraditePosada to Cuba to face justice!.

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WORKERS VANGUARD


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Spartacists Intervene at Chicago Social ForumFord Foundation,

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United ...(continued from page 12)objected to United's getting anotherchance at a federal loan application lastsummer, in part to force United to eliminate its pensions so they could followsuit! The industrial unions, organized inthe mass struggles of the 1930s, wondefined-benefit pensions after the end ofWorld War II. As a result, tens of millionsof workers were able to enjoy a level ofeconomic security in old age. Today, everfewer are covered by such pensions, andnow there is an increasing likelihood ofthe bosses scrapping them altogether.Hobbled by debt. the Pension BenefitGuaranty Corporation (PBGC), the federal insurance agency responsible for taking over defaulted pensions, might itselfgo belly up, completely erasing even thereduced payments it offers retirees.Going forward, United is replacing itspension plans with 40 I (k)s, mostly paidfor by the workers themselves from theirown paychecks. with the actual benefitsdependent on the vagaries of Wall Street'parasites. It is a shift in the onus of retirement security from the company to theindividual worker, and parallels whatBush would like to do to Social Security.

and the demands of investors for profit.We warned at the time that any such"partnerships" would only subordinateworkers' interests to the company's bottom line:"Even if the workers had 100 percent. itwouldn'( make a fundamental difference.Workers have no control whatsoever overthe capitalist market. which is inherently anarchic. At the first financial difficulty they would be at the mercy of thebanks ... To 'save jobs' by making oneairline 'more competitive' is to drivedov. n the living standards of all."-"Phony 'Worker Ownership'at United Airlines,"(WV No. 593, 4 February 1994)

by the court. The treachery of the lAMleaders spurred United mechanics to votein AMFA in 2003, a craft union tradingon crass craft prejudice. AMFA leadersare known to show a contemptuous disregard for the unskilled, often immigrant,cleaners organized in the mechanic workgroups they represent. This parochialunionism also finds expression in protectionist laments over the loss of "Americanjobs" as companies outsource more maintenance work to overseas contractors.Divisions by craft and company, whichvirtually all the union tops regularly reinforce, are a set-up for victimization. That

It is telling that the bosses' goyernment, through Democrats and Republicans alike. has hastened this shift to401 (k)s. while Co ngres s still providesits own members with very generousdefined-benefit pensions. Lawmakers canretire as young as 50 and collect in excessof $100,000 a year, with automatic costof-living adjustments. As for United CEOGlenn Tilton, his $4.5 million pensiontrust goes untouched.

APMay 10: United workers protest as airline's chief financial officer Jake Bracespeaks with reporters following federal ruling axing workers' pensions.

Capitalism is marked by a relentlessdrive to wring more from the workingclass. Declaring bankruptcy, as Unitedhas done, is now a routine scam to turnthe screws on labor and make the workers payoff the company's creditors. Butwhile White House officials advise companies like Delta Airlines to file Chapter11, Congress has imposed more than 100new constraints on families facing bankruptcy. From single mothers sinkingunder a mountain of debt to the elderlytrying to keep their homes, working people are to be sacrificed to the vultures atthe banks."Employee OwnerShip":An ESOP Fable

Nowhere is this clearer than at United,where creditors like Citigroup and J.P.Morgan call the shots, not "employee owners." The myth of employee ownershipdates from 1994, when union officials convinced workers to accept massive wagecuts in exchange for employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs) and three seats onthe board of directors, promising that"ownership" would shield them againstfuture layoffs.The ESOPs epitomize the fraud of thepartnership of labor and capital preachedby the trade-union bureaucracy. Whetheror not union representatives sit on theboard of directors, the company must cutcosts under the pressure of competition

United's bankruptcy wiped out theESOPs; since this carrier's profits firsttook a nose dive five years ago, Unitedhas shrunk to 60 percent of its formersize, slashing some 40,000 jobs, including half the mechanics. When management demanded concessions in 2002, theresponse of the union misleaders was toform a coalition, not to organize a fightagainst givebacks, but as a measure toachieve savings for the company; theyeventually negotiated away $2.5 billiona year.Now management wants more and hasturned to the courts to tear up unioncontracts. Flight attendants, mechanicsand fleet service workers, insulted andharassed, their livelihoods at stake, haveoverwhelmingly authorized strikes tofight these concessions. But struggle isanathema to the union tops, who keepcoming back to the membership withrehashed concessionary contracts. Lastweek, Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association (AMFA) officials rolled over,agreeing to a tentative settlement largelyindistinguishable from the one Unitedmechanics voted down in January. Forits part, the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA) has hatched a campaignto pressure the board of directors intoremoving United CEO Tilton. It threatensjob actions, not to fight for what workersneed, but to get a new CEO who mightrob them a little less!Meanwhile, the International Association of Machinists (lAM) officials' deadline to sell out was extended to May 31

Marxist Working-Class Biweekly of the Spartacist League

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MOVE Massacre: We. Will Not Forget!Chanting "Never forget 1985' Now is the time tofree the MOVE 9!", 200 anti-racists marched and rallied in West Philadelphia on May 14, commemoratingthe twentieth anniversary of the racist mass murder ofeleven members of the MOVE commune carried out bythe Philly cops in coordination with the federal JusticeDepartment. On 13 May 1985 the cops unloaded10,000 rounds of ammunition into MOVE's house onOsage Avenue and dropped a powerful bomb on thehouse, causing a fire. Firefighters on site were heldback while cops shot at anyone who tried to escapethe burning building. Sixty-one houses were destroyedin the ensuing inferno, leaving hundreds homeless inthe black neighborhood.Ronald Reagan. the FBI. the Philly cops and blackDemocratic mayor Wilson Goode were all responsiblefor this hideous crime. But none of the perpetrators haveever faced charges. while Ramona Africa spent sevenyears in prison for the "crime" of survivirg the massacre. There is no justice in racist capitalist America.The Spartacist League and Partisan I?efense Committee, a class-struggle. non-sectarian legal and socialdefense organization associated with the SpartacistLeague. participated with a banner in the march. which

began at Osage Avenue near the site of the atrocity. ThePDC also spoke at the rally at Malcolm X Park. Fromthe beginning. the PDC has defended MOVE and publicized this racist atrocity (see "Racist GovernmentBombed Black P ~ i l a d e l p h i a , " Workers Vanguard No.848. 13 May). MOVE is a largely black back-to-naturegroup that. in their own way, cries out against "the system." including by defending the right of armed selfdefense. We demand freedom for the MOVE membersimprisoned for almost 30 years since the 1978 policesiege and assault on MOVE's Pow elton Village commune. Amid a barrage of police gunfire. a cop waskilled in the police crossfire. Nine MOVE members were given 30-100 year sentences. One of them.Merle Africa, died in prison. The remaining eightcontinue to languish in Pennsylvania's racist. overcrowded dungeons.Speakers from MOVE, which organized the rally,demonstrated that they remain defiant opponents ofthis racist system. Pam Africa introduced a blackcollege student from North Carolina who traveled to

WV PhotoPhiladelphia, May 14: SL and poe supporters join MOVE members and others in rally at OsageAvenue, near site of cops' massacre 20 years ago,the rally to recite his powerful anti-racist and antiimperialist poetry. A radio essay, "Why May 13th IsSo Important." recorded from death row by MumiaAbu-Jamal, America's foremost p o l i ~ i c a l prisoner, wasplayed. Mumia, a former Black Panther and Philadelphiajournalist, was targeted by the racist Philadelphiacops in no small part because of his eloquent reportsexposing the racist government vendetta againstMOVE. Mumia's son. Jamal Hart. has been imprisoned since 1998, framed up on bogus firearm charges.Obscenely, 6221 Osage Avenue, the site of thebombing, is occupied today by the Philly police CivilAffairs Unit-they want to ensure that no one canlook for evidence of the crime. The other housesrebuilt by the city on Osage Avenue and Pine Streetwere condemned as "unlivable" due to shoddy construction. Twenty-four families recently won a lawsuitagainst the city over this continuing victimization.Grotesquely, the city is appealing the judgment.

The speaker for the PDC presented a working-class. perspective for the str uggle against racist repression:"We have a non-sectarian, class-struggle defense program based on the understanding that it is the multiracialworking class that has the social power to ensure thatthe MOVE martyrs will be avenged. that the MOVE 9will be freed. that Mumia Abu-Jamal will be freed. andthat the racist death penalty will be abolished. and thatcapitalism will be smashed."The working class is so vital because of its power tostop production and the profits the capitalist rulers tryso desperately to protect through its cops. courts andjudges-what Marxists call the state. We look to thetrade unions-such as the Ph illy transit workers who areunder attack currently-to lead in the struggle againstcapitalist oppression ...."We will not forget the MOVE martyrs. the men.women and children gunned down and burned alive.and the seven years stolen from Ramona Africa forbearing witness to this atrocity' We will. not forgetMerle Africa' Free the MOVE 9! Free Jamal Hart!Free Mumia Abu-Jamal and all class-war prisoners '"

rorized by a system that wanted to punish her for daring to rebel.

Assata: Terrorist orSurvivor of Terrorism?

These words are written on May 13, 2005, twentyyears to the day from the police mass murderand bombing of the MOVE home in Philadelphia.Today, twenty years later, only one person. RamonaAfrica, ever spent a day in jail. What of thosecops who shot and bombed unarmed children? Whatof the politicians who unleashed these dogs of urbanwar? Like Ramona, Assata was jailed for daring tosurvive.

Cuba's valiant Fidel Castro responded almostimmediately to announce his refusal to recognize thismodern-day slave bounty. He pronounced her a political prisoner during her time in American gulags, perhaps remembering that she was held in an all-malejail during her incarceration.With the news of the posting of an additional$850.000 ~ o r the return of former Black Panther andBlack Liberation Army member Assata Shakur fromCuba, the U.S. government has taken another step inits ridiculous so-called War on Terrorism. They didthis by New Jersey officials branding Assata with thelatest libelous label, "terrorist," in an attempt to justifythis modern-day slave bounty.I f anybody knows about terrorism it's Americans,for this nation was founded in terrorism. So deep isthis truth that it lies in the subconscious of almostevery American and can be unleashed with unnervingease. Come on. Complete this phrase: "The only goodIndian is a__ ~ . " Black, white, rich or poor thatphrase echoes in American consciousness, an inheritance from a time when those dark thoughts weredark realities of. yes, genocide against the native peoples that fed and healed the starving settlers fromEurope who survived the Atlantic crossings. Terrorism, whiteterrible violence against red life and blacklife and brown life and yellow life. That is America'sttuest hidden history, hidden beneath lies about "allmen are created equa\."In 1973, when Assata Shakur and Zayd MalikShakur and Sundiata Acoli were stopped on the NewJersey turnpike, they weren't stopped because the

27 MAY 2005

cops wanted to "render assistance." This was a carstop for the unwritten crime of Driving While Black,before we developed the term. And the cops triedto kill every Black Panther in that car for this unwritten crime. Zayd was shot to death and Assata wasshot twice. And in an act of arrogance that only American judicial terrorists can devise, she was chargedwith murdering both Zayd and the cop that tried tokill her.Assata went through a devil's brew of show trialsin several states, best summed up in a book by herlawyer/aunt Evelyn Williams titled Inadmissable Evidence. These were trials that seemed more fitting forMississippi than Middlesex County, New Jersey, orManhattan Borough, New York. But no matter wherethat happened, they featured all-white juries, andambitious judges who didn't even pretend to be fairand unbiased arbiters. Even despite these obviousobstructions, she was acquitted, and when she wasconvicted in Middlesex it was clear this was a verdictnot of her guilt, but of her political ideas.To label this woman a terrorist, is to bleed allmeaning from the word. For, during her life as anactivist. during her wounding and her arrest, and during her travails as an accused in courtrooms that weremore lynching posts than halls of justice, she was ter-

For centuries, nothing has so stirred up Americanfury like the escape of a slave. That ain't just distanthistory. For daring to slip her bonds and esc'ape frombrutal and unjust bondage, the Empire now labels. hera terrorist. That's because to them, nothing is more terrifying than resistance to their imperial will. As for terrorists, if they really wanna find some, it shouldn't betoo hard to find them. Just check the White House.From death row, this is Mumia Abu-Jama\.13 May 2005

2005 Mum;a Abu-Jamal

Send urgently needed contributions for Jamal'slegal defense, made payable to "National LawyersGuild Foundation" and earmarked for "Mumia"to: Committee to Save Mumia Abu-Jamal, 130Morningside Drive, Suite 6C, New York, NY10027.I f you wish to correspond with Jamal, you canwrite to: Mumia Abu-Jamal, AM833S, SCI Greene,175 Progress Drive, Waynesburg, PA 15370.

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Blair and Paisley Turn the Screw on Sinn FeinNorthern


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and democratic activity." An article byNiall Stanage in the Guardian (I I April)observed that "disbandment of the IRAis also the logical conclusion to thecourse Adams and his like-minded comrades began to chart almost a quarter ofa century ago"-when Republican hunger striker Bobby Sands won a seat inWestminster. Today Sinn Fein representsthe vast majority of the Catholic population of the North, and its support in theSouth is growing. But it will never beacceptable as a parliamentary politicalparty while it retains even the vestige ofan armed wing. Behind the clamourcoming from Blair. Ahern and Co. forthe IRA to disband, the message is thatthe capitalist state is not going to ubideany challenge to its monopoly of armedforce by the IRA. Parliamentary democracy is simply the velvet glove over themailed fist of the state-the army. police.courts and prisons whose purpose is tomaintain the rule of capital. It is notenough for the IRA to give up its arms:Republicans are being told that theymust be subservient to all the state forceson these islands.

The murder of Robert McCartney isbeing wielded to force the Republicans toaccept the authority of the Orange state inthe North. including the PSNI. This is abitter pill. but one which Sinn Fein leaders have indicated they might be willingto swallow. Mitchel McLaughlin has said:"I f the circumstances had worked outbefore Christmas. we would have convened a special ard:fheis [national conference1 o debate the issues about policing. We want a PSNI that meets thecriteria under Patten and the Good FridayAgreement once and for all'" (Daily /re-land. 7 March). But with or without thewindow dressing of the Good FridayAgreement, the police force in NorthernIreland remains a fundamentally antiCatholic force that works hand in glovewith the Loyalist paramilitaries.Assurances have also been offered ofSinn Fein's respect for the police forcesof the Irish state. One of the party's Dail[parliament] deputies, Aengus 6 Snodaigh declared that Sinn Fein "are nowworking constructively with the Garda!to increase local accountability." addingthat "we recognise that the Garda! area legitimate police force-albeit onein need of fundamental reform" (DailyIreland. 7 March). Such appeals forpolice "reform" are simply designed togive a more "democratic" facade to thearmed fist of the state.Despite the fact that the IRA has nottaken up arms against the Irish state fordecades, the government can still whipup fear that the IRA is supposedly running "a state within a state." This is ahistorically rooted pretext for repression,harking back to the civil war in 1922-23.when the newly independent Irish statebrutally repressed Republican insurgentswho objected to the terms of the Treatysigned with the British. Today's justice minister McDowell is the grandsonof Eoin MacNeill. who supported theexecution of Republicans in December1922: his great-uncle was in charge of

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Down with antiSinn Fein witch.hunt!Northern Ireland:Sectarian Orange statelet!' , '

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Spartacist IrelandPublication of theSpartacist Group Ireland4/4 issues-Britain, Ireland (Europe outsideBritain and Ireland: 7; Other: 1 0)Order from/make checks payable to:Dublin Spartacist GroupPO Box 2944, Dublin 1, Ireland

27 MAY 2005

Pat Finucane, murdered in 1989by Loyalist UDA in collusion withBritish state.the firing squad. But although theyfought the state militarily over the termsof the Treaty, the anti-Treaty forces didnot challenge the capitalist order. On the. contrary. they supported it and were soonto be in charge of it politically. The FiannaFail party was founded by these forcesand. led by Eamonn DeValera. ran theclericalist state for decades.

Sinn Fein is a petty-bourgeois nationalist party whose politics are fundamentally no different from those ofFianna Fail. Its aim is the creation of aunited. capitalist Ireland. But this wouldbe far from a "democratic" solution toth t national question. The Catholics inNorthern Ireland are an oppressed minority. but they live within the same territoryas the Protestants, who fear becoming anoppressed minority under the clericalistIrish state. The current hardening of Protestant opinion, seen in the huge vote forPaisley's DUP. is in part a reaction toSinn Fein's claim that the Good FridayAgreement is a step towards Irish unity.This is compounded by the increasingimpoverishment of both the Catholic andProtestant working class in Northern Ireland, with the Protestants falsely believing that the Catholics have been givenpreferential treatment under the GoodFriday Agreement. Writing on the 2003elections which were swept by Paisley onone side and Sinn Fein on the other,Observer columnist Henry McDonaldexplained that the DUP was able to "paintthe peace process as a one-way pronationalist concession process." Notingthat "the only growth industry north ofthe river Lagan in Belfast has been theconstruction of almost 20 so-called peacewalls separating Protestants and Catholics on a permanent basis." McDonaldadded: "The landscape from Good Friday1998 has been radically changed. The twocommunities are further apart than theywere five years ago, politically and physically" (Ohserver. 30 November 2003).

We stand for the defence of the oppressed Catholic community in NorthernIreland and fight against all forms of discrimination in jobs, housing and education. At the same time, we oppose theforcible reunification of Ireland. even the

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Workers HammerMarxist newspaper of theSpartacist League/Britain

3/1 year-Britain, Ireland (Europe outsideBritain and Ireland: 5; Other: 7)Order from/make checks payable to:Spartacist PublicationsPO Box 1041, London NW5 3EU, England

~ u g g e s t i o n of which serves to compactthe Protestants behind the Loyalist bigots.This precludes a polarization along classlines and instead lays the basis for communalist terror. In a situation of interpenetrated peoples and fratricidal nationalism, ihere can be no equitable solutionshort of the destruction of capitalism andthe institution of workers rule. We fightfor an Irish workers republic within a voluntary federation of workers republics inthe British Isles. An elementary precondition for any just solution is the withdrawal of British troops."Socialist" Servants ofthe Bourgeoisie

Socialist Party (SP) [sister group ofSocialist Alternative in the U.S.] Daildeputy Joe Higgins leapt into the antiRepublican fray in support of the Irishstate. A Socialist Party press release (23February) details an exchange in the Dailin which Higgins asks: "Does the Taoiseach acknowledge that the great majority of residents of the Short Strand areain Belfast are horrified to have criminalbutchers in their midst. hiding under thepolitical banner of provisional republicanism?" "Crimi nal butchers" is not a

they would willingly sacrifice. for a briefperiod. their aspirations towards politicalpower. if thereby the fortunes of thenation can be enhanced" (quoted in Rem-lutioll in Ireland, Conor Kostick, 1996).At the height of the furore over themurder of Robert McCartney, Irish SWPleader Eamonn McCann outrageously

compared the IRA to the British troopsthat gunned down 14 Catholics on"Bloody Sunday" in Derry [in 1972]. Ata Belfast rally for McCartney, McCanndeclared to the capitalist media that "theMcCartney murder had lowered Republicans to the level of the British paratroopers. and cast a 'dark shadow backwards'on the whole IRA struggle" (Guardian,28 February). Talking out of the otherside of his mouth in an article in IrishSocialist Worker (22 February-8 March),McCann appealed to disgruntled Republicans to join the ranks of the SWP:

""Every ruling class voice is currentlyraised high urging Republicans to ditchparamilitarism. become totally respectable and join the conservative consensus.Forgiveness and glittering prizes are onoffer to those who accept. This wouldrepresent abandonment of struggle. TheSWP urges Republicans who think ofthemselves also as socialists to turn not

Peress/MagnumBloody Sunday Massacre in Derry, 17 October 1972. British troops gunneddown 14 Catholics, wounded many more.term the respectable Mr. Higgins wouldreadily use to describe the Loyalist UVF[Ulster Volunteer Force]. Its representative Billy Hutchinson, who was convicted of the murder of two Catholics inNorthern Ireland, was hosted by the SPat i t ~ meetings in 1995.Deputy Higgins continued: "Mr. Adamssaid this morning he has a problem goingto the police. Does he have a problem ingoing to the Short Strand unit of the provisional IRA-call it the local SS unit forshort-and demanding that it presentitself to justice?"" Comparing the IRA toHitler's SS rolls off Higgins' tongue asdo declarations of faith in the ''justice'' ofthe notorious anti-Catholic forces of theNorthern Ireland police and the shootto-kill British troops. The SP has longrefused to call for the withdrawal ofthe troops from Northern Ireland. Lastyear, when Sinn Fein youth marched ina Belfast antiwar demonstration undera banner that said. "Brits out of Irelandand Iraq." the SP denounced them.grotesquely declaring "the above slogan could only appeal to one side ofthe sectarian divide" (Socialist Voice.April 2004).Higgins' role here is no different thanthat of British Labour leaders who sidedwith their "own"' bourgeoisie in WorldWar I. He is also keeping alive the legacyof the Irish Labour Party, which refusedto oppose the Irish bourgeoisie when itaccepted the Treaty and part ition in 1921and gave backhanded support to the stateagainst the Republicans during the civilwar. Addressing a special conference ofthe Irish Labour Party and TUC [TradesUnion Congress] in 1918, Irish Labourleader Thomas Johnson said: "Yourexecutive believes, that the workers ofIreland join earnestly in this desire, that

to the Right but to the socialist ideasof self-liberation which alone offer aroad forward."And this too would be a ticket to"respectability," of the social-democraticvariety.

Lessons of theCivil Rights StrugglesMcCann's reputat ion s tems from hi s

role as one of the prominent left-wingleaders of the civil rights movement ofthe 1960s which opposed the blatant discrimination against Catholics and shookthe Orange state. The experience is richin lessons for future struggles in NorthernIreland where the sectarian divide runs sodeep that the possibility for advancingsocialist consciousness. or even classconsciousness. often seems remote. TheNorthern Ireland civil rights strugglestook place in the context of an international political radicalization, p a r t i c u l a r l ~ inspired by the struggles for black civilrights in America. A famous march fromBelfast to Derry in 1969 was modelled onMartin Luther King's 1966 march onSelma, Montgomery.In Belfast, the civil rights movementhad a base at Queen's University. whereleftists in Peoples Democracy wereactive. In the early stages there was somesupport for the civil rights struggleamong Protestant students. Followingthe brutal police repression of a 1968march in Derry, the civil rights movement acquired mass support almost overnight and leftists, including McCannand Bernadette Devlin (now McAliskey)were catapulted to prominence. However, both of them had fatal illusionsin British imperialism. Such illusionswere reinforced by the British SWP,continued on page 8

7


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--...

NorthernIreland ...(col1tinlledjrom page 7)which supported the intervention of British troops in 1969 and spoke of "thebreathing space provided by the presenceof British troops" (Soci({list Worker, IISeptember 1969). What was needed wasa perspective based on fighting to mobilize the working class.north and south ofthe border-where there was huge support for the embattled Catholics-as wellas in Britain. against the deployment ofthe troops. In the absence of a class perspective. the Provisional IRA became thedominant force defending the Catholicsin the face of brutal repression by theBritish. The IRA's forces grew dramatically after Bloody Sunday.A former leader of Peoples Democracy, Michael FarrelL in a study of theOrange state, illustrates how previousattempts at mild reform by Westmin-

Social Forum ...(continuedjrom page 3)their fighting forces." The Mexican Zapatistas. for example. were excluded fromseveral WSF meetings presumably because they are an ~ ' a r m e d force." Afterher group was excluded. Hebe Bonafiniof the Madres de Plaza de Mayo. anorganization of the mothers of those "disappeared" by the Argentine military dictatorship of 1976-83, captured it well:"The organizers have staged the eventso that all we were supposed to be talking about was 'putting a human face' onglobalization."The politics of the CSF were expresslybased on "the principles of the WorldSocial Forum." Thus, like the WSF,groups claiming to be revolutionary werenot allowed on the speaker's platform. Atone session, for example, the speaker, amember of the RCP, said he could notspeak in the name of the RCP becauseparties are not allowed.At one of the largest CSF workshops,"Alternatives to Neoliberal Globalization," ex-Maoist Carl Davidson and laborreformist Dan Swinney stressed the needfor a broad alliance with "progressive"capitalists: otherwise. Davidson said,you're just a "small group with red flags."The workshop pushed a "coalition of allforces that move together." which wouldinclude. "with criticisms." the capitalistgovernments of Venezuela, BraziL andSouth Africa. Our comrades intervened atthis workshop. pointing out how the corepolitical program of the social forumsshamelessly yet clearly articulated byDavidson. the ISO. the RCP and a host ofothers at the CSF-is that of class collaboration and the popular front. Davidson

8

l On the .United Front:t;:.!...


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Lebanon ...(continued from paRe J)Mossad, Syrian intelligence or disgruntledbusiness rivals), American imperialistswasted no time exploiting his death topush "regime change" in Damascus. In anattempt to sell his sham ;'elections" inIraq, which enshrined sectarianism inevery government seat, Bush declared:"In the Middle East and throughout theworld, freedom is on the march." It is notfreedom that is on the march in the NearEast. but rather the imperialists with theirblueprint for the remaking of the region.In addition to occupied Iraq, the U.S. nowmaintains a military presence in six othercountries: Saudi Arabia, the United ArabEmirates, Kuwait. Bahrain, Qatar andOman. In a9dition, Jordan has been usedas a staging ground for U.S. militaryactivities in the region, including in thelead-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.The current belligerence against Syriahas long been a policy of the neocons'Projcct for the Nc\\ American Century(PNAC) which, in a 20 September 2001letter to Bush, demanded that the "administr'ation should consider appropriatem e a s u r e ~ of retaliation against" Iran andSyria, which were deemed to be "known'state sponsors of terrorism." In November 2003, Congress, with the support ofboth Democrats and Republicans, passedthe "Syria Accountability and LebaneseSovereignty Restoration Act" and in May2004 Bush imposed sanctions against

Syria, lobbing at its rulers the usual litanyof accusations, which included "supportfor terrorist groups," "pursuit of weaponsof mass destruction" and providing a "transit point for foreign fighters into Iraq."President Bush trotted out the samethreats in his State of the Union addressthis February. It didn't matter that theU.S. regularly sends suspected "terrorists" to Syria, knowing they will be tortured. It didn't matter that Syria joinedthe imperialist coalition in their firstIraq war or organized polling stationsfor expatriates to vote in the recent Iraq;elections." The Syrian leadership's realcrime in the eyes of both the neoconsand their Democratic allies is its hostilityto Israel. which the U.S. seeks to surround with a"cordon sanitaire.

The international working class has noside in the current squalid powe r play taking place in Lebanon, but. as proletarianinternationalists who called for the military defense of Iraq ",ithout giving anypolitical support to the regime of SaddamHussein, We say: U.S. keep your bloodyhands of f S:rria.' DOh'/! with the colo-nial occliparion of Iraq! All U.S.lBritishtroops out of Iraq and the Sear East nOIf!Israel Ollt of the Occupied Territories!From the Crusades to GrandLiban: A Harvest of Blood

The \j,-,k,L'..' a:,c1 IllterCOmInunal bloodletting that nEil 'Kc'd much of Lebanon',history is a legal,.': of Ottoman and Frenchimperial domination and the interpenetration of myriad religious and ethnic communities, combining to retard capitalistdevelopment and prevent the consolidation of a modern state. Lebanon is dividedinto various- sectarian fiefdoms, lordedover by tribal chieftains with private militias. Its political structures are built along27 MAY 2005

The French colonial system of Maronite privileges was preserved after thecountry became independent in 1943.Under the unwritten deal between theFrench colonialists and the various Christian and Muslim clan chiefs, known as theNational Covenant, the president wouldalways be a Maronite Christian, the primeminister a Sunni Muslim and the head ofthe Chamber of Deputies a Shi'ite Muslim. The Christians were allocated a sixto-five majority in parliament and thearmy officer corps was drawn predominantly from the Maronite elite.

Syrian army troops withdrawing from Lebanon in April. Syria maintained amilitary presence in Lebanon for some 29 years.

The National Covenant was based on adubious 1932 census. No census hasbeen taken since, as such would revealthat the Muslim population has grownmuch faster than the Christian and nowoutnumbers the latter three to two. Maronite Christian domination increasinglycame into conflict with these demographic developments. The first challenge to the National Covenant tookplace in 1958 when a Muslim uprisingwas sparked by an attempt of Maronitepresident Camille Chamoun to extend histerm in office. However. Chamoun wasable to suppress the uprising, as some15,000 American Marines waded ashoreBeirut's beaches in July 1958.

sectarian confessional lines. Contrary tothe myth of "Switzerland of the NearEast" touted by the bourgeois press, Lebanon is not so much a bourgeois democracy as a pluralistic theocracy \\ith Christian ~ 1 a r o n i t e domination. To ensure thisdomination, the Maronites deny citizenship to most of the hundreds of thousandsof Muslim Kurds and Palestinian refugees who have been living in the countryfor over 50 years. Each of the officiallyrecognized 18 religious communities mayhave its own political party, its own members of parliament, its own health andsocial services, its own schools with an

Lebanese troopswere deployedby then-primeminister Rafikal-Hariri againstprotesters inworking-classsuburb of Hayal-Sellom duringone-day generalstrike, May2004. Troopsopened fire,killing five andinjuring dozens.

educational orientation often hostile toother communities, and its own laws governing marriage and inheritance and othermatters of personal status.To maintain the clannishness of thesects, civil marriage is illegal and thepersonal status laws of various communities prohibit interfaith marriages. Whilewomen were granted the right to votein the 1950s, medieval practices likearranged and forced marriages are still inplace. Honor killing is rampant, especially in the southern rural areas. It is estimated that an average of one woman iskilled each month.The rugged terrain of Mount Lebanonhas historically provided a physicallyprotected refuge for diverse religious andethnic minorities fleeing persecution atthe hands of both Christian and Muslimrulers: the Maronites originated in Syriain the seventh century when they splitfrom the Eastern church of Byzantium.The Greek Orthodox and Greek Catholics of Lebanon also came from the sameregion. The Druze, a 10th-century offshoot of Shi' ism. fled persecution by theFatimid caliphate in Egypt. The Shi'itesfound refuge from the wrath of the Ottoman rulers in the hill \illages (I f southernLehanon. Christian Armenians \\ ere dri\en to Lchanon by the genocidal terror ofthe' YOllng Turks during World War 1.

be r ,ince the C r u s a d e ~ . when Raymond of Toulouse captured the nourishing port cities of the Tripoli emirate.French rulers have had interests in theLevant. The persecuted Christian Maronites saw the crusaders, with whom theyallied against the Muslims, as liberators,thus providing the French with an avenuethrough which they would extend theirinfluence. During the declining period ofthe Ottoman Empire and afterward, the

Maronite population served as a base forcolonial penetration. The British in turnbecame the benefactors of the Druze.The massacre of 12,000 Maronites bythe Druze in the ci\'il war of 1860 provided a pretext for French military intervention. On the eye of the French ill\asion, Karl Marx wrote:"The conspirators of Petersburg and Parishad. however. in case their temptation ofPrussia should faiL kept in reserve thethrilling incident of the Syrian massacres

to be followed bv a French interventionwhich ...would open the back door of ageneral European conflict. In respecl toEngland I will only add that in 1841 LordPalmerstone furnished the Druses withthe arms they kept ever since and that in1848. by a convention with the CzarNicholas. he abolished. in point of fact.the Turkish sway that curbed the wildtribes of Lebanon, and stipulated forthem a quasi-independence which, in therun of time, and under the proper man-agement of foreign plotters. could onlybeget a harvest of blood."-New York Dailr Tribune,11 August 1860"The conspirators of Petersburg andParis" joined with the British to carveup the crumbling Ottoman Empire,and in the 1916 Sykes-Picot agreementFrance was given mandate for both Leb

anon and Syria. The carving up of theNear East following World War I represented the balkanization of the region bythe imperialist powers. Populations thatwanted to be united were separated; thosethat wanted to be separated were forciblyunited (as in the case of Iraq, for example). The point was to carve up the regionin such a way that ethnic and religiousstrife would perpetually plague it. Lebanon provides a vivid example of this.In 1920, seeking to fashion a proWestern enclave in the Levant, Francecreated the entity that it called "GrandLiban" or "Greater Lebanon" by annexing Muslim regions of Syria to MountLebanon. To divide and better rule, theFrench combined the Muslims, amongwhom nascent Arab nationalism wasgrowing, with the Christian majority,among whom they nourished a myth ofPhoenician origin and a non-Arab heritage, and who would look to France forprotection. Thus, the French knowinglycreated a state constructed to ensureplenty of intercommunal strife to justifytheir imperial ;'peace keeping" presence.

Lebanon was not the real target of theMarine landing. The imperialist powerswere alarmed by the social upheavalsthat swept the region in the 1950s. Theyviewed the rise of Nasser to power inEgypt and his nationalization of the SuezCanaL the intensification of the AlgerianWar of independence, the declaration ofunion between Egypt and Syria with theproclamation of the United Arab Republic as threats to their imperialist domination. U.S. president Dwight Eisenhowerwarned that leftist uprisings could "resultin the complete elimination of Westerninfluence in the Middle East." But theimmediate reason behind the Marines'landing in Lebanon was the eruption ofrevolution in Irae, and the overthrowof the British-ins' .ed Hashemite monarchy in Ju ly I ( ;. The Iraqi Communist Party stoo, , at the threshold ofpower in the mass upsurge th at followed.The Stalinist leadership, however, underdirect orders from the Kremlin, betrayedthe revolution for the sake of "peacefulcoexistence" with world imperialism. InLebanon, under U.S. Marine guns, a dealwas worked out to preserve the sectarianpolitical structure along with Maronitepredominance.1975-76: RevolutionaryUpheaval Channeled intoCommunal Bloodletting

The steady growth of the Muslimpopulation, concentrated in the lowerclasses, increasingly challenged the National Covenant. By the early 1970s,the mass of impoverished Shi'ites hadbecome the largest religious communalgrouping. Led by Imam Musa Sadr'sMovement of the Disinherited, they demanded constitutional changes to redressthe balance of political and economicpower in their favor. Further, the OPECoil boom of the early 1970s, which Lebanon shared as the main financial center

continued on page 10

Der SpiegelBeirut was turned into rubble during brutal 15-year Lebanese civil war.9


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Lebanon ...(continued from paRe 9)and entrep6t for the Arab East. widenedthe social disparities between rich andpoor. Shi'ite peasants from the countryside and migrant workers from Syriastreamed into Beirut and other port citieslooking for work. producing a class ofdesperate slum dwellers. The Beirutslums. known as the Belt of Misery. existbut a few miles from exclusive neighborhoods resembling the French Riviera.

The early 1970s also witnessed socialferment in the form of peasant revolts,labor and student strikes that shook thefoundations of the sectarian system. TheGeneral Council of Labor (GCL). formedin 1970 by the union of nine trade-unionfederations; led a series of strikes demanding wage increases and price controls. Students waged strikes. sit-ins anddemonstrations demanding a national educational system open to all, as opposed tothe private and sectarian schools.

The forces potentially arrayed againstthe Maronite elite found an ally in thePalestinian commandos. Forced out ofJordan after the Black September massacres in 1970, Palestinians were con-.centrated in Lebanon where they couldoperate with some degree of freedom.The armed commandos. especially inthe south. provided protection againstthe militias of the landlords and za'ims(Mafia-like urban bosses).

In early 1975. Lebanon stood on thebrink of a revolutionary upheaval thatcould have radically altered the political situation in the entire region, most

i nmediately by extending to neighboringSyria. A proletarian insurrection wouldhave shaken the colonels of Damascus.the Hashemite monarchy and. not least.the Zionist rulers.

Underlying the conflict between theMaronite Christians on one side. and theLebanese Muslims and Palestinians on theother, was a deep social conflict. As a NewYork Times (19 July 1975) article noted:"The fighting was something of a classwar between the haves, who are for themost part Christians, and the have-nots,who are for the most part Moslems andwho are allied with the heavily armedPalestinian guerrilla movement."

A Marxist party standing at the head ofthe Lebanese Muslim toilers and thePalestinians would have put forward asocialist program capable of attracting the"have-nots" in the Christian community,splitting the Maronite leadership's base.Instead, the struggles of the LebaneseMuslims and the Palestinian commandoswere channeled into the efforts of theMuslim elite to increase its influence inthe traditional confessional system.

A key figure in derailing the incipientsocial revolution and transforming it intocommunalist bloodletting was KamalJumblatt, hereditary head of the Druzesect and leader of the so-called Lebanese National Movement (LNM), whichincluded the pro-Moscow Lebanese Communist Party (PCL), the small Lebanesesection of the late Ernest Manders UnitedSecretariat and a host of Arab nationalistand Nasserite groups. The PLO leadership subordinated its forces to this sectarian demagogue, as did the entire Lebanese left. Because the PLO commandosand the "progressive" Lebanese fought onbehalf of the traditional Muslim and clanchiefs like Jumblatt, the Maronite clanchiefs, like Chamoun, were able to mobi-10

lize the entire Chriqian communit)! byappealing to its a n C l t ~ n t fear of \1uslimdOmIl1alIon. The PCL. \vhich until thenmaintained a signIficant base of supporters across the ~ e c t a r i a n divide. wascompletely eliminated from Christianareas. As the Lebanese journalists SelimAccaoui and Magida Salman wrote:

"The PCL. which counted hundreds ofChristian members and had a dominantinnuence in some Chri,tian villages. sa\\its memhership and its innuence inthe Mount Lebanon area crumble in afew month,. Communist militants werechased out or massacred. and theirhou,es hurned."By going in on the Muslim confessionalists' game. the PCL was able toimplant i t s ~ l f in the Muslim areas ofBeirut: but at the same time it lost mostof its ranks in the Christian regions."-Colllprendre Ie Lihan (1976)

By the beginning of 1976. the warhad become a succession of communalist massacres and countermassacreswith Maronites sacking Muslim enclavesand Palestinian refugee camps. whilePLO commandos and Druze militias responded by putting to the torch Christianvillages, such as the village of Damur,home base of Chamoun. The conflictwidened and a full-scale civil war ragedfor the next fifteen years.

The Third Worldist cheerleaders onthe left naturally hailed the Palestinian/Muslim side, denying its communalistcharacter and condemning the Maronitepopulation to death as a pro-imperialistreactionary mass. Celebrating the destruction of Damur. Workers World Partywrote:

"The burning of Chamoun's mansion andthe seizure of the stronghold of hisc

Survivors of1970 "BlackSeptember"massacre inwhich some10,000Palestinianswere killed byJordan's rulers.

National Liberal Party. the village ofDamur. underlined the new weakenedposition the pro-imperialist rulers arenow in."-Workers World. 30 January 1976In contrast. we wrote at the time:"In the present tluid contlict. and particularly given the rapidly shifting allegiances.none of these nationalist and communalistformations are fighting ajust struggle thatwould merit military support from theclass-conscious proletariat."-"Blood Feud in Lebanon."WV No. 115, 25 June 1976To this day, leftists in the U.S. claim thatthe civil war in Lebanon was "between theforces of the right allied with Israel andgrouped around the Christian Phalange,and the left, involving Arab nationalists,Palestinian and Druze formations and others," as Socialist Worker (18 March), newspaper of the International Socialist Organization (ISO), put it. Workers World nowhails Hezbollah as a "national liberationmovement" (9 March) and Socialist Actionasserts that the "rise of the Hezbollah represents to a certain degree a social revolution" (April 20(5). Hezbollah is jockeyingfor power like the rest of the Lebanese sec-

French troops enter Damascus, 1920.

A woman weepsover the dead bodiesof her relatives inPalestinian refugeecamp of Sabra inWest Beirut, 1982.Nearly 2,000Palestinians in Sabraand Shatila wereslaughtered byMaronite militiasorganized byIsraeli forces.

tarian groups. Hezbollah, a reactionarymass movement financed and armed byIran, is seeking to establish an Iran-styletheocracy in Lebanon. In the 1980s, itsleaders imposed strict codes of Islamicbehavior on towns and villages in thesouth. Hezbollah in power is a deadly danger, especially for women and Christians.Syrian Ba'athists MassacrePalestinians

By the spring of 1976 the onceprivileged Maronites. squeezed into besieged enclaves. were on the brink ofdefeat. as Lebanon gradually movedtoward de facto partition. In an attempt toreverse the tide of battle. Israel opened asupply line of weapons to the Christianforces. including Soviet-made tanks andarmored personnel carriers captured during the 1967 and 1973 Arab-Israeli wars.

But it was the Syrian Baathists. theself-proclaimed "vanguards of the Arabrevolution." who saved the pro-WesternChristian rightists from defeat when theyinvaded Lebanon in June 1976 with amandate from the Arab League and theapproval of both Washington and TelAviv. Like Lebanon. Syria itself is a medieval patchwork of potentially hostileethni,. national and sectarian groupingswhere the ruling minority Alawites holdsway over the Sunnis. Kurds. Druze andothers. Behind the Syrian invasion wasthe fear that the breakup of Lebanonalong sectarian lines would spill over intoSyria. Besides. the Ba ' athist rulers. whowere negotiating via U.S. imperialism forthe return of the Israeli-occupied GolanHeights. needed to demonstrate their ability to police the Palestinians in Lebanon.

The Syrian military intervention shiftedthe balance of forces in favor of the Maronite militia, culminating in the siege andfall of the huge Palestinian camp of TelZaatar in Beirut. The Syrian army provided logistical support for the Maronitemilitia that was surrounding the camp andprevented PLO commandos from liftingthe siege. Hundreds died of hunger anddisease. When the Palestinians surrendered, they were slaughtered en masse.At Tel Zaatar, the Syrian Ba'athists provided the Israeli rulers with a model forthe Sabra and Shatila massacre of 2,000defenseless Palestinians in 1982, whichwas masterminded by Israel and carriedout by the same Maronite criminals.

When Syrian forces entered Lebanonin 1976, we declared: "Syrian TroopsOu t of Lebanon!" (WVNo. 114, 18 June

1976). Our opposition to the Syrianforces was based on the fact that theyintervened to suppress the Palestinianfighters and refugees as well as the Lebanese Muslims. It was not based on thenotion that Syria was somehow violatingthe national sovereignty of Lebanon. Aswe wrote following the Israeli invasionof Lebanon ("Israel Out of Lebanon!"WV No. 308, 25 June 1982):

"There is a fundamental differencebetween the SYrian and Israeli armies inLebanon. though both are oppressors andmurderers of the peoples of Lebanon. Leb-anon is not a nation ,eparate and distinctfrom Syria. but a collection of religiousethnic fiefdoms sharing a common ethnic makeup \\ith Syria ... The Syrians inLebanon are no more a 'foreign' armythan the Maronite Phalange. Lebanonand Syria have heen for centuries a common -historical entity. uI1lted by language. culture and ethnic makeup."1982: Israel Invades Lebanon

Israel's 1982 invasion and occupationof Lebanon. backed by U.S. imperialism.marks a watershed in the history of theregion. Buried. along \\ith the 20.000 Palestinians and Lebanese killed by theZionists. was the fictiun that Israel is unereactionary mass. As Sharon's blitzkrieginto Lebanon spread death and destruction. massive antiwar protesb took placein Israel. an unprecedented developmentin the midst of a military campaign. TheLebanese war threatened to unravel Fortress Israel. In that war \\ e stood forrevolutionary defensism of the Palestinian commandos. also recognizing tha t -given the unpopularity of the war amongIsraelis and the fact that Israel's population is relatively small-rising braeli casualties could serve to widen the wedgebetween the Hebrew-speaking popUlationand the Zionist rulers of Israel. For thisreason, the decision of the PLO leadership to withdraw from Beirut. a surrende r arranged by U.S. imperialism. wasespecially catastrophic for the Palestinianpeople and the prospects for social revolution in the region.

If the war in Lebanon deeply upset liberal Zionists, it also shattered the myth ofArab unity behind the Palestinian cause.Not a single Arab state came to the aidof the embattled Palestinians facingSharon's genocidal terror. As a Palestinian commando exclaimed bitterly to aWestern newsman during the siege ofWest Beirut, "You see where the Israelisare. Well, behind the Israelis is King Fahd[of Saudi Arabia] and Hafez el-Assad [ofSyria] and King Hussein [of Jordan].They are all in this together." Indeed,from King Hussein's Black Septembermassacre of 10,000 Palestinians in 1970.under the gaze of 12.000 Iraqi troops stationed in Jordan, to the siege and slaughter of Palestinians by the Syrian-aidedMaronites at Tel Zaatar. Arab rulers havebeen as ruthless enemies of Palestiniannational emancipation a, the Zionists. Forthe Arab rulers. the Palestinian questionrepresents no more than a diversion.whereby popular discontent is channeledinto a "holy war" against Zionism.

Faced with the impotence and betrayalof the Arab states, the PLO leadershipturned to U.S. imperialism as a potentialsavior. Arafat agreed to allow the U.S.

WORKERS VANGUARD


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Vigilantes...(continued from page J2)immigrants against these attacks. Latinoimmigrants are a critical part of the working class in this country and have spearheaded some of the most militant struggles, particularly in Southern California.It is crucial to fight for full citizenshiprights for all immigrants-anyone whohas made it to this country should have

unions, slash pensions and public education, and ax social services. Now he isemulating former governor Pete Wilson,who in 1994 seize d on the anti-immigrantProp. 187 to divert attention from budgetcuts and the tanking economy. Schwarzenegger embraced the Minutemen justafter a poll announced his approval ratinghad plummeted 20 points since January to40 percent. He is appealing to the sameracist. xenophobic base he successfullymobilized in the 2003 recall election

-1.----. ~ . . . l - . ~ - - . I .. - ~ ~ ~ . . 11 ,1! JE,_ 1 , 1",* , ,A n t i ~ l e r r ~ r l S t \ ~ w s l a r g d I m m ~ r a n t S , B l a c ~ i a D t ' r ~ .

No to the USA-PatriofActand the Maritime StcurityAct!" ~ ~ ~ ~ n " " w i t h t h e A ~ i - l m m i g r a n t Witchhunt/ '.-.. .-";- . Q l f _ " " ' A M ~ "",! nMJ,liGRANT W!TUHHHHII ~ ; A ~ : l ,- , ' ~ t ' ~ ~ : ~ "'- \WBIUlt UNION P O ~ E . R I '.r : .,.",I"i, l _ ~ : N N " " " ' o --.. , ~ ~ tJ >,: tm . ~ , , ; ~ , ~ ' - . l i ~ ;' : s : ~ ,- ~ ! : ; ~ ' 1 ~ r r j li

WV PhotoPartisan Defense Committee and Labor Black League initiated labor-centeredmobilization in Oakland, California, February 2002, in defense of immigrantrights and against "war on terror."the same rights as everyone else.

California writer Mike Davis commented that "i f the governor sounds likehe is channeling his inner Nazi. it isbecause he is desperate" (Sail FranciscoChronicle. 8 May). Schwarzenegger hasrun into trouble in his campaign to gutteachers unions and all public sector

against Democratic Party governor Gray.Davis. when he pledged to block driver'slicenses for undocumented immigrants. Hehopes to use this base as a battering ramagainst the organized workers movementas a whole.Bush has criticized the border vigi.lantes, who in turn excoriate Bush's pro-

:J l ...-.

posed revival of the notorious braceroprogram to import cheap. docile labor tobe expelled when no longer needed.Schwarzenegger himself supports such a"guest worker" program while backingthe vigilantes. This is no contradiction.Schwarzenegger. like Bush. wants plentyof ]v1s:xican workers in this country-aslong as his big-business friends canexploit them and they have no rights. Allthe better if they are cowed and intimidated by the threat of deportation acrossa "secure" border.

A chorus of Democratic Party politicians denounce Schwarzenegger on thegrounds that instead of vigilantes murderously hunting down desperate immigrantsin the desert, the government should bedoing it. California senator Dianne Feinstein said Schwarzenegger should call for"additional border patrol agents." ratherthan praising "untrained volunteers" (Sac-rWl/cnto Bee. 29 April). The reputedlyultraliberal senator Barbara Boxer recentlyopposed Bush's "guest-worker" programby "saying it would 'open the floodgates'to illegal immigration" (San FranciscoChronicle. 21 April). Feinstein in turndenounced an alternative bipartisan bill(which Boxer supported) as a "hugemagnet" for more "illegal immigration."Democrats and Republicans-the two parties of U.S. capitalism-differ only overhow best to serve capitalist profits.

Arizona Democratic congressman RaulGrijalva has called for an FBI investigation into possible "hate crimes" chargesagainst the vigilantes. Workers shouldhave no illusions in this deadly d ~ n g e r o u s strategy. The FBI is carrying out the "waron terror" anti-immigrant witchhunt aspart of the capitalist state. which will use"hate crimes" laws to go after workersand the left.-

AFL-CIO officials have made a lot ofnoise in recent years about orgal1lzll1g

immigrant workers. Yet at the same time,the labor bureaucracy pushes protectionist chauvinism which helps breed antiimmigrant consciousness among workers, be they white, black or in some casesLatino. This is a poisonous product of theunion tops' policy of collaboration withthe capitalist class enemy. a policyembodied politically in the labor tops'allegiance to the Democratic Party. InCalifornia. against Schwarzenegger. justas nationally against Bush, the labor topsand reformist left work to divert opposition into support for the Democrats underthe banner of "fight the right:'An effective defense of the workingc l a ~ s requires an internationalist program. expressing the common class interests of workers on both sides of the border drawn when the U.S. stole much ofthe Southwest from Mexico in 18..J.8. Thefight for immigrant rights must be seen aspart of the struggle against all forms ofoppression. And in the U.S . that means astruggle against black oppression. thebedrock of American capitalism. Workersmust fight against the capitalist rulers'attempts to pit one oppressed groupagainst another-such as the recent grossstatemcnt by right-wing Mexican president Vicente Fox that Mexican workers"are doing the work that not even blackswant to do in the United States."Workers need their own party-a multiracial. class-struggle workers party.Such a party would organize unions todefend Latino immigrants against theborder vigilantes, fight for full citizenshiprights for all immigrants. and organize theunorganized. It would fight to mobilizethe social power of the working class inits own class interests and the interests ofall the oppressed. independently of all theparties and agencies of the capitalists.Break from the Democrats! Mobilizelabor to defend immigrants!.

"'!

Cedarland New York Times

Marines and the French Foreign Legionto disann the Palestinian commandosguarding West Beirut and escort them totheir new exile in Tunisia. Americantroops were sent into Lebanon for thatpurpose. eventually becoming a target inthe Lebanese quagmire. On 23 October1983. a powerful bomb exploded nearthe U.S. military barracks in Beirut. killing 240 Marines. 'It was to divert attention of the American population. outraged over what many perceived as asenseless intervention into the bloodyLebanese civil war. that President RonaldReagan ordered the invasion of the tinyisland of Grenada (see "Rape of Grenada.Bloody Mess in Lebanon-Marines Outof Lebanon. Now. Alive! U.S. Out ofGrenada. Dead or Alive'" WV No. 341.4 November 1983).

Meanwhile. Arafat's betrayal in withdrawing from Beirut-setting the stagefor the Sabra and Shatila massacre bySharon's fascistic Maronite henchmenliquidated the PLO as an independentmilitary force. In the end. Israel withdrewits forces from southern Lebanon in :2000.concluding its nearly 20-year occupationof that country.

Left: U.S. Marines in Lebanon, 1958. Right: Mass demonstration in Baghdad, July 1958. American troops weredeployed to Lebanon as potential intervention force to crush revolutionary upsurge in Iraq, which brought proletariatto the brink of power.

For a Socialist Federationof the Near East!Comparing the initial defeat of the

Maronites in 1975 to the e\ents of theFrench Revolution. LNM leader KamalJumblatt declared. "This is our 1789." Inthat revolution. the bourgeoisie sweptaway the feudal order and consolidated anation-state. HO\\ever. in this epoch ofimperialist domination. the national bourgeoisie in countries of belated development. like Lebanon. is incapable ofrealizing such goals as national consolidation. In their struggle for hegemony.colonial bourgeois forces may clashwith the imperialists that ravage theirresources. retard their economic de\elopment and create innumerable barriers tonational emancipation. But in the age ofimperialism. the colonial and semicolonial bou rgeoisie can only exist as middlemen and brokers for imperialism. Fromthe oil sheiks of the Gulf emirates to thebankers of Beirut and the bonapartists of27 MAY 2005

Cairo and Damascus. the ruling classes ofthe Near East are as dependent on thebackwardness and balkanization of theircountries as the imperialists themselves.Their interests are firmly intertwined withthose of imperialism. As Trotsky wroteof the Chinese Revolution in 1927:"Everything that brings the oppressed andexploited masses of the toilers to theirfeet inevitably pushes the national bourgeoisie into an open bloc with the imperialists" ("The Chinese Revolution andthe Theses of Comrade Stalin." Leo/1Trotsky Oil China r1976]).In such backward countries. the perspective for resolving the fundamentaldemocratic questions posed by combinedand uneven development, such as ensuring the democratic and national rights ofall peoples in the Near East. is providedby the theory of permanent revolutiondeveloped by Bolshevik leader LeonTrotsky. He wrote in Perll/al/ent Re1'o{lI-tiol/ (1929): "The complete and genuinesolution of their tasks of achieving democ-racy alld national emallcipation is conceivable only through the dictatorship ofthe proletariat as the leader of the subjugated nation. above all of its peasantmasses." The genuine liberation of colonial and semicolonial countries can beachieved only through the successful

struggle of the proletariat for state power,leading all the oppressed.'Within the historic cauldron of nationalhatred and communal warfare of the NearEast the prospects for eYen a modicum ofintercommunal harmony in Lebanon arebleak under capitalism. for if the historicexclusion of the Muslim population isreversed it will simply lead to the victimization of the formerly dominantChristians. There is no possibility of anequitable solution to national and communal connict short of the dictatorship ofthe proletariat.As we wrote in the last part of ourfour-part series. "After Lebanon: The Left

and the Palestinian Question-From the'Arab Revolution' to Pax Americana"(WVNo. 335. 29 July 1983): ''The struggle for the democratic rights of all thepeoples of the Near East and for the survival and national emancipation of thePalestinians must necessarily sweep awa)the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan andthe bloody Ba' athist bonapartists in Syria.bring down the rotten medieval structurein Lebanon and shatter the Zionist state.This struggle must place the revolutionaryproletariat with its vanguard party at thehead of the exploited and oppressed. andcan only find its fulfillment in a socialistfederation of the Near East.".

Down With the Colonial Occupation of Iraq!Canada Out of Afghanistan!How Revolutionary Marxists FightAgainst Imperialist War and MilitarismSaturday, June 11, 2 p.m.

Collingwood Neighbourhood HouseMultipurpose Room5288 Joyce Street

For more information: (604) 687-0353or e-mail: tllt@lookcaVANCOUVER

11


12/12

WfJ/i/(E/IS ".,,,,/1,Union'Busting at United Airlines

Capitalist Government andPension TheftWorking people across the countrywere aghast when a u.s. bankruptcycourt on May 10 backed up United Airlines management immunity in ripping

off its union pension plans. Many of the134,000 active and retired United workerswill now likely be robbed of at least halftheir retirement benefits. The messagefrom the bosses is clear enough: just shutup, work hard and die. From shrinkingwages and givebacks to the potentialshredding of Social Security. labor as awhole faces a similar p-light. But this heisttakes place at the world's second largestcarrieI', in a vital industry that is 60 percent unionized. Airline workers have realsocial power, so why is there no collective fight to stop the bosses' offensive')

It is because they are saddled with aleadership \vedded to the rule of capital.The smashing of the PATCO air trafficcontrollers union in 1981 was the watershed in a decades-long drive by thebosses to turn the clock back against theentire labor movement. At the time, "Solidarity" with PATCO \vas the rallying cry,and the line should have been drawn then.It was not. and workers have paid dearlyever since. It's time to take a stand!Despite the tremendous social power

that the hea\ily unionized airline industryworkers have, they have been picked offo.ne by one in devastating rounds ofwage-slashing, pension-stealing, union-

> busting giveback contracts. Instead oforganizing a powerful. united stand by allairport workers-mechanics. pilots. tlightattendants, ground personnel-to defeatthe union-busting and shut down the airports, the union tops have played by thebosses' rules and are complicit in creating this disaster for airline workers. Itis necessary to forge a leadership nothamstrung by the bosses' rules, one thatwill take the offensive-such as organizing non-union carriers like JetBlue-toadvance the battle from the \iewpoint ofclass waL not acceptance of capitalistexploitation and oppression.As Leon Trotsky, co-leader with Leninof the 1917 \vorkers revolution in Russia,wrote in the Transitional Program (1938):

"The question is one of guarding the proletariat from decav. demoralization. andruin ... If capitalisn{ is incapable of satisfying the demands inevitably arising fromthe calamities generated by ibelf. then letit perish. 'Realizability' or 'unn:alizability' is in the given instance a question ofthe relationship of forces. which can bedecided only by the struggle. By means ofthis struggle, no matter what its immediate

GettyUnited Airlines flight attendants protest last winter against company's threatto tear up contracts.practical successes may be. the workerswill best come to understand the necessityof liquidating capitalist s!

Workers Vanguard No 849 - 27 May 2005

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Transcript of Workers Vanguard No 849 - 27 May 2005