China update: The working class must lead the movement!

 Written by: (Contributed) on 5 December 2022

(This is the latest update, written on December 1, by our Chinese friends. We have added several explanatory notes - Eds.)

December 1. The movement continues to take a turn for the worse and the solidarity movement in Urumqi is now, so to speak, completely cut off from the reality of the rest of the Chinese people. It has become a movement of the liberals. We have to break with them and demand that the original aims of the movement and the needs of the socialist revolutionary line come to the side of the interests of the masses and not those of the liberals.

The Chinese government has begun preparations to organise a silent commemoration of the death of Jiang Zemin, and some liberals in the country have immediately taken advantage of the opportunity to join the commemoration. On this issue there are two factions within the liberal community, those who support this and those who do not. Although Jiang Zemin is by definition their historical enemy, this conflict over whether to commemorate him or not did not split them internally, showing the unprincipled and opportunistic nature of their entire faction.

And what about our liberals abroad? For example, the Solidarity with Urumqi Middle Road event[1] now developing in Japan. In addition to our Hong Kong-independence, Tibetan-independence and Xinjiang-independence forces on the scene, our liberals and their Japanese friends have also put up more banners to split China, such as Zhuxia independence[2], the disintegration of China and the Great Shu Republic[3]. This proves that our judgement of November 30 was completely correct. The liberals are inextricably linked to international imperialism and their political interests and demands are bound together, which dictates that they have to make China take the path of being divided, in which case China will be divided and split into many, many regions, leading to an even more tragic end than in history. It is an abyss. Most of the voices abroad now pursue such a reactionary line. There are, of course, revolutionary ones. We must better unite and support each other with our international comrades, otherwise we cannot eliminate the influence of the liberals abroad.

This solidarity movement, held by the liberals, is now beginning to turn more and more into a reactionary movement. It is only natural that their demand for the independence of the various nationalities and regions cannot be genuine, as opposed to the right of national self-determination that the socialist revolution was intended to give to the proletariat. The Hong Kong independents are fighting for a return to British rule, the Xinjiang and Tibetan independents are planning to return to the rule of their local religious groups, which are undoubtedly bourgeois. The overseas and domestic forces of the private bourgeoisie everywhere and the forces of international imperialism have joined forces to use the false rights of a bourgeois democratic republic as bait to use our students and try to deceive our masses in order to lead our country to a fractured end. This has to bring to mind the end of the disintegration of the Soviet Union, which indeed has similarities, but in fact is much more than that. Our people must realise the historical consequences of this line, which tells us that we can only follow the path of the socialist revolution, that we can only apply the revolutionary line of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, and that we must gather with the fundamental interests of the proletariat.

But also because of the liberals' naive illusions and the fragmentation of the masses, this solidarity and protest movement is becoming less and less powerful. They have isolated themselves from the huge potential of the protest movement (i.e. our proletariat and petty bourgeoisie). Judging by the current situation, this line will certainly not yield good results at the moment, they cannot yet shake the rule of the bureaucratic bourgeoisie, which is currently united as never before in our country and which has learnt many ways of guarding against the liberals from the example of the end of the Soviet Union.

But it is necessary for this movement to fulfill its original mission rather than the mission of the liberals, that is, the opening of the epidemic policy, and the requirements of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of information. This requires a shift in the future course of the movement. The movement needs to be controlled by the revolutionaries and led by the correct revolutionary method, or for the next new movement to continue to be promoted as a result of the fundamental contradiction between the proletariat and the bureaucratic capitalist class in our country.

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[1] On Sunday November 27, thousands gathered on this road, named after Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang Province, to protest Covid-19 restrictions that were believed to have contributed to a loss of life in an Urumqi building fire.

[2] The suggestion that China should disintegrate into a series of small countries. Some supporters see the provinces becoming their own countries. Its inspiration is the Spring and Autumn Period (roughly 770-476BC) when the royal authority of the Zhou Dynasty over the various feudal states eroded as more and more dukes and marquesses obtained de facto regional autonomy.

[3] Da Shu, or the so-called Republic of Basuria, its self-proclaimed “President” is Sichuanese-born Liu Zhongjing who moved to the US in 2016. He calls for the independence of Sichuan as the home of the Ba people.

Daniel Duggan: US strips Australian citizen of rights

 

Written by: (Contributed) on 4 December 2022

An extradition case being played out with a Cold War spy drama has raised serious civil liberties issues for all Australian citizens. The case also has serious implications for the sovereignty of Australia and the nature of its 'alliance' with the US, particularly with the South Pacific and what actually constitutes espionage.

All governments remain apprehensive about 'spy cases', which invariably reveal unintended and confidential information from within the corridors of power.

Australia is no exception: subsequent legal proceedings, if they take place in an open court, may, therefore, prove highly incriminating for government departments and officials who prefer to remain anonymous and linger in shadowy, grey areas of Canberra.

The arrest of US-born Australian citizen Daniel Duggan on 21 October following information published in the British media about thirty retired military pilots accepting lucrative contracts from the Chinese government to train Chinese fighter pilots, barely made big time reading. Coverage, in Australia, remained rather limited and heavily edited to avoid unnecessary publicity about the present US-led Cold War raging in the Pacific region. Duggan, however, was noted as a former US military pilot who had spent ten years flying, amongst other planes, Harrier 'jump jet' fighter planes.

Duggan was informed he had been 'arrested as part of a co-ordinated effort by the Five Eyes countries who share an intelligence pact: the US, UK, Australia, New Zealand and Canada'. (1) The Five Eyes possess highly sophisticated signals intelligence monitoring facilities which readily access most telecommunications systems. In recent times it has had its main focus on the sensitive areas of the Pacific where China has made considerable in-roads into favourable diplomacy with many countries. The moves led a US congressional committee in 2018 to conclude the US was no longer the dominant power in the region. (2)

It has led to a flurry of US-led diplomacy across the region which has included the Partners in the Blue Pacific in June with the UK, Australia, New Zealand and Japan, aimed to 'forge closer connections with Pacific governments'. (3) It was followed by the US-Pacific Island Country Summit in Washington in September attended by leaders or representatives of fourteen countries together with the Secretary-General of the Pacific Islands Forum and Australia and New Zealand as observers. (4) It was noted in official diplomatic media releases that the outcome was 'a new milestone in US-Pacific co-operation … underpinned by shared history and values', together with $810 million for expanded programs. (5)

The diplomatic moves have also been accompanied with widespread regional surveillance and intelligence operations which appear primarily focussed upon China's aid and trade programs and the questioning of their validity for possible dual-use for their military, particularly in the case of the Solomon Islands where the Cold War has become very hot indeed. (6) The Melanesian countries of the South Pacific are regarded as particularly sensitive, forming a buffer to protect the sovereignty of Australia's northern approaches.

China's aid programs and planning to upgrade maritime and air-fields and landing strips have, therefore, come under specific scrutiny in the case of the Solomon Islands, where the government in Honiara has a special security pact with Beijing. Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare, a devoutly religious man, has become a 'bogey-man' and crypto in the eyes of the US and their underlings in Canberra. The leasing of Tulagi Island to the China Sam Group in 2019, for example, met with outright hostility from Washington and Canberra; it was suggested it 'could also have served a dual-use purpose for military objectives'. (7)

It is, therefore, relevant to note Duggan had been associated with a controversial South African-based company closely aligned with AVIC, a Chinese operation which had planned to establish an 'aviation hub' in the Solomon Islands as part of the recent security pact between the two governments. (8) It is also relevant to note the South African company had information on their website about facilities for training test pilots 'in an unnamed 'far-East  Asia location', without specifying where, indicating China may have planned to out-source training to other countries. (9)

An ex-Marine pilot who has known Duggan for almost 20 years said it was well known Chinese companies had been recruiting military fliers – and he struggled to comprehend why Duggan would now be targeted for arrest.

“I can’t imagine what secrets he would have, that he would pass along, that would have caused him this much trouble,” said the ex-Marine, who requested anonymity because he still worked for a commercial airline. “I think the China work was pretty well known by most ex-military pilots. I would have first heard about it well over 10 years ago … it’s just that it’s recently made the news.”

The ex-Marine pilot said Duggan had been “working for a company in China doing CRM training” – referring to cockpit resource management, a set of procedures used to improve flight safety. (9a)

Following his arrest, Duggan, was detained under what has been described as the 'most restrictive conditions known to Correction Services'. (10) It has included denial of treatment for a prostrate condition and pens to document his objections. His lawyer, Dennis Miralis, has described the repressive conditions as 'extraordinary, unprecedented, unjustifiable treatment, he believed was the result of foreign interference … in 22 years of practising criminal law specialising in extradition, I have yet to see anything as remarkable as this'. (11)    

It was also further noted by Miralis that, 'as we informed the court, this is unprecedented, to have an Australian citizen being placed on the most severe inmate restrictions akin to people convicted of terrorist offences and multiple homicides in circumstances where he has never been in trouble with the police neither in Australia or anywhere in the world'. (12)

Duggan has not been charged with any legal offences, although the US government is seeking his extradition. He has been an Australian resident since 2002 and citizen from 2012, and renounced his US citizenship. The US government, nevertheless, announced in a legal hearing in late November that Duggan had three options: he could waive the extradition, consent to it, or contest the eligibility and surrender to the US'. (13) The US, it would appear, have taken a very broad definition of the term espionage in the case, where it would usually be defined in legal proceedings in a very specific and narrow manner of providing assistance to an adversary.

Duggan's alleged business relationship with Su Bin, a Chinese-Canadian businessman who was later jailed in the US on espionage-related offences in 2014, likewise, has also remained at the level of an allegation of an unspecified and not clarified nature: criminal charges and their resolution by conviction remain based in proof beyond reasonable doubt from evidence presented in a court of law, not by mere association or liaison. The fact the information was not presented in court by Trent Glover, representing the US government, but leaked to a major Australian media outlet remains evidence, in itself, of underhand behaviour designed to create an under-current of popular opinion against Duggan. (14)

It remains highly relevant to note Duggan has also denied breaking any US or Australian laws. A legal hearing in late November resulted in an official complaint being filed by Dennis Miralis with the Australian Attorney General and the Inspector General of Intelligence and Security about the 'secrecy provisions' surrounding the case, as well as the conduct of Australian security services involved in the extradition. (15)

The US have until 20 December to lodge formal legal proceedings, marking the sixty days from arrest of Duggan and his detention. It will be interesting to note their planned response and acceptance of Australian law and regulations. And whether any forthcoming legal formalities are dealt with in an open court, to enable observers to access the relevant information about the extradition request. No doubt government officials in Canberra are already undertaking possible 'damage limitation' procedures and advice about further legal hearings taking place in secret.

The Duggan case has thrown further light on the sycophantic nature of the so-called 'alliance' where the US retains the right to dictate terms and conditions to compliant governments and officials in Canberra.

These are dangerous Cold War developments which have far-reaching implications for all Australian citizens, particularly those who have worked for joint enterprises, part and/or wholly controlled Chinese businesses either in Australia or elsewhere, or as expatriates with foreign governments regarded by the US as not being compatible or in line with 'US interests'. 

If the US is allowed to use its broad definition of espionage to secure the extradition of Duggan, he may be the first of many to meet the same fate. Journalists, academics, teachers and researchers, will be particularly vulnerable, together with anyone who has had access to sensitive information, either from public sources or elsewhere.

Australians historically have expected more of their governments and legal systems; the arrest and detention of Daniel Duggan is a disgrace and totally unacceptable,  

                                            We need an independent foreign policy!

1.     Pilot with spy link to face justice, Australian, 28 November 2022.
2.     Study: US no longer dominant power in the Pacific, Paul D. Shinkman, Information Clearing House, 22 August 2019.
3.     Solomon Islands deals a blow to US, Sputnik News, 29 September 2022.
4.     Biden hosts, CNN., Politics, 29 September 2022.
5.     US-Pacific Island Country Summit, Website: US Department of State, 30 September 2022.
6.     See: China's strategic objectives and ambitions in the south-west Pacific, Strategic Analysis Paper, Future Directions International, 31 October 2019.
7.     Ibid., page 5.
8.     Australian, op.cit., 28 November 2022.
9.     Extradition bid flyer 'treated like terrorist', Australian, 29 November 2022.  
9a.   US ex-fighter pilot’s Australia arrest for China work puzzles former comrade: ‘can’t imagine what secrets he would have’ | South China Morning Post (scmp.com)
10.   Ibid.
11.   Ibid.
12.   Ibid.
13.   Ibid.
14.   Ibid.
15.   Ibid.

"Sign up for the future of Oz"

Written by: Ned K. on 4 December 2022

South Australia’s Murdoch empire-owned Sunday Mail newspaper for Sunday 4 December 2022 had a two-page lead article spread headed "Sign Up For The Future Of Oz".

The article detailed the skills shortages for jobs in Australia's growing naval, air-force, army and missile manufacturing industry. 

The skills will be needed to build 8 nuclear powered submarines, at least 12 Hunter class Frigates, at least 6 patrol vessels, 450 Infantry Fighting Vehicles, Boeing Unmanned aerial vehicles, Short Range Ground Based Air Defence, including radars, missiles, launches and control systems.

Most of the jobs required to provide the skills needed are specialised trade and engineer level positions, including combat system engineers. Non-trade level jobs required will be in low paid support services such as grounds maintenance, catering and some white-collar jobs in federal government offices in Canberra.

Australian people realize that a responsible government will ensure that Australia can defend its coastline and the people who live in Australia.

The problem is that most of the build-up and focus on defence industry is not for ensuring defence of coastline or people who live here.

In the article in the Sunday Mail, there is an interview with Richard Marles, the Defence Minister. He makes it perfectly clear that it is a "race against time" in establishing an entirely new industry to support the top secret and "extremely complex nuclear technology provided by the US under the AUKUS security pact".

The cry for Australian young workers to pursue a career path in the defence industry is not to contribute to the defence of Australia, but to provide the workforce to enable the federal government to do what it is told to do by the US and UK corporate interests who benefit from AUKUS.

The article in the Sunday Mail names some of these corporations. They are all US or UK multinationals. BAE Systems feature prominently as does Babcock, KHA , Raytheon and Boeing. There are many more multinationals involved, making specialized parts or systems needed to operate the AUKUS war machine. All of these developments will drain the public purse and leave less money to be directed at health, housing, education and renewable energy.

The organised working class is developing its opposition to the AUKUS Alliance. The following resolution was passed unanimously at the recent CFMMEU National Conference:

CFMMEU National Conference is opposed to the ongoing and reckless AUKUS military alliance to develop nuclear submarine capability. 

The secretive plan could cost as much as $170 billion and continues to escalate conflict with China and throughout our region. 

This money should be spent on health care, education, social housing, natural disaster response and development of publicly owned renewable energy capacity. 

We support workers across the world opposing war and excessive military spending and pledge ongoing opposition to further expansion of the nuclear industry.

Unfortunately, the Albanese Government is into AUKUS and the US-Australia Alliance no less than previous governments since Whitlam at least ended Australian involvement in the US imperialist war in Vietnam. Albanese and Penny Wong are both from the "Left" faction of the ALP while Marles is from the "Right" faction. However, they all sing off the same song sheet in subservience to AUKUS and the US-Australia Alliance.

Is this "the Future of Oz" that is in the best interests of the current and future generations of Australian people? 

Update from China: Raise the red flag!

(Above: Shanghai November 2022.  Photo by Ray Noir on Flickr.)

 Written by: (Contributed) on 4 December 2022

(On December 1, we posted our translation of a contribution sent to us by Chinese comrades. We are now posting an update, dated November 30, which particularly identifies the role of opportunism within the current mass movements, and the reliance of such opportunism on US-led imperialism. This is our translation, and we have not been able to check with our Chinese friends on its accuracy. However, we are confident that it captures our correspondents' meaning. We have added two explanatory notes - Eds.)

November 30. We note the increasingly liberal nature of the movement as the nature of a mere student protest movement, which degenerated to a rudimentary stage. But with the death of Jiang Zemin, it seems to have given these remaining liberal dreamers a chance to redevelop their own movement, and they began to discuss solemnly whether to take advantage of Jiang's death to call on other classes to join their liberal movement for their own purposes by commemorating him. The speculative nature of the liberals is clear to us today, as Jiang Zemin, one of the key political figures in the suppression of the student movement and the suppression of the liberals in the June 4 Incident, is enjoying the tributes of the liberal activists today. Although the Communist Party's "Letter to the Whole Party, the Whole Army and the Whole Nation" promulgated today contains passages specifically and loudly emphasising Jiang Zemin's credit for the suppression of the June 4 incident to prevent the liberals from taking advantage of it, the rulers wrote: "When serious political turmoil occurred in our country in the spring and summer of 1989, Comrade Jiang Zemin embraced and implemented the Party's Central Committee's decision to flagrantly oppose unrest, defend the correct decision of the Party Central Committee to oppose unrest, defend the socialist state power and safeguard the interests of the people, rely closely on the Party members, cadres and the masses, and vigorously maintain stability in Shanghai." But this does not prevent the liberals from once again using the slogan "those who deserve to die are not dead, those who should not die are dead", trying to continue to use similar tactics as they did in '89 to take advantage of Hu Yaobang's death in the present[1], without any progress! The use of such a hot face on a cold ass[2], trying by all means to use Jiang Zemin's death for their own political purposes, has instead helped the rulers to hoodwink the masses into mourning the death of Jiang Zemin.

Who is Jiang Zemin? The man who greatly defended the reform and opening up and promoted the development of Chinese capitalism, the man who single-handedly wiped out what remained of the social welfare of the Chinese working class and promoted the great layoffs. At least 30 million workers were laid off and 70 million total unemployed were created. The man who defended the high agricultural taxes that drove the bourgeoisification of the countryside and created mass peasant poverty, even as large numbers of peasants had to participate in the plasma economy to sell their blood for a living. The liberals want to exploit this? Want to keep the proletariat deluded to honour their class enemies while at the same time helping these liberal fantasists to realise their own beautiful dreams?

Jiang Zemin should be condemned. In this case, it is better for the proletariat to remain politically aloof even now than to join the coalition of rulers and opportunists in honouring Jiang Zemin.

We can also see that due to the blockade of communication in the country, the liberals went over the wall to the extranet and typed out their demand for constitutionalism in China and to turn China into a bourgeois democratic republic, which immediately led to a whole bunch of liberals following the trend and making voices and comments that they wanted to run. Is turning China into a constitutional state, a state ruled by the Guomindang, for the betterment of the liberals? What do they take the working people of China for?

Ah, the general democratic voice of the world is in solidarity with us, but mainly with our liberals. This means that our liberals are inextricably linked to the opportunist reformist ideology within foreign imperialist countries, and this is their international ally. There is no doubt that liberalism is the most serious opportunism in our contemporary society, a threatening line second only to “socialism with Chinese characteristics” as the main enemy. The political interests of the liberals demand that they necessarily bind themselves to a more radical political line of betrayal of China and of the proletariat, leading China to a condition even more miserable than the present rule of the bureaucratic bourgeoisie. They can only rely on the international allies of the bourgeoisie if they are to overcome the rule of the now unprecedentedly powerful bureaucratic bourgeoisie in China. We must call for a break from such a line and come to the line of socialist revolution.

Who are our international allies of the proletariat of China, the other suffering masses, the students? It can only be the revolutionary communist parties, the revolutionary proletariat, and the masses demanding socialist revolution in all countries. They want to achieve an independent socialist state, and so do we. We must help each other, and we must help each other in building a socialist state in the future. These are the forces that are our most reliable international allies, these are the forces that are our international comrades and will never betray each other. Because our interests and theirs are united, whether our victory or theirs will help each other's revolutionary cause.

Lenin said in Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism: "In fact, the particularly rapid and particularly nasty development of opportunism does not guarantee a consolidated victory for opportunism, just as the rapid development of an abscess on a healthy body only hastens the festering of the abscess and restores the body to health." The essence of liberals is also a kind of opportunism, and the earlier they are in the early stage of the movement, the more they can bluff and deceive the masses. But the possibility of not being able to overcome them is not allowed, and overcoming them will help the minds of all of us oppressed to grow.

Our people must recognise their hypocrisy for what it is. We good students must abandon this reactionary ideology and resolutely break with the degenerate and opportunistic elements! Break with the erroneous liberal line and all other lines! We must firmly come to the revolutionary Marxist-Leninist-Maoist line. We need to embrace and assist the working class like those in Foxconn in Zhengzhou, and also go and integrate with the feudalised working masses. Instead of degenerating into the ranks of the liberals and their foreign imperialist allies, we must resolutely raise the red flag!

---

[1] Hu Yaobang was a noted liberal within the Party’s leadership, the Secretary-General of the Party and an ally of capitalist-roader Deng Xiaoping. His death on April 15, 1989 precipitated the student movement that led to the June 4^th Incident.

[2] It means that they have been flattering and pleasing others, but others ignore them; the face is enthusiastic, the ass is cold refers to these two different types of behaviour.

Bittany Higgins: The Law fails again.

 Written by: Nick G. on 3 December 2022

 The shock decision to drop charges against the alleged rapist of Brittany Higgins is a damning indictment of the legal system.

The first trial against the alleged rapist had to be abandoned just before sentencing following the discovery of actions of a juror that compromised the process. A date for a new trial in 2023 was set.

It should never have got to the point where Higgins’s mental health had been so damaged in the first trial, by the trial itself and by the environment it engendered, that she is now in hospital and the charges against the alleged rapist, Bruce Lehrmann, have been dropped.

On Friday, as he announced he would not seek a retrial of Lehrmann, the director of public prosecutions, Shane Drumgold, said of Brittany Higgins: “During the investigation and trial, as a sexual assault complainant, Ms Higgins has faced a level of personal attack that I have not seen in over 20 years of doing this work,” he said. “She’s done so with bravery, grace and dignity, and it is my hope that this will now stop.”

Independent medical evidence that suggested there was a “significant and unacceptable risk to the life of the complainant” if a second trial was pursued, was the basis for the public prosecutor’s decision.

Brittany Higgin’s case achieved an unprecedentedly high profile because of the reputational damage to Parliament, site of the alleged rape, and various Ministers of Scott Morrison’s government, including Morrison himself.

But women know that many cases of rape, of sexual assault, go unreported because of the history of women being destroyed by the court processes, just as First Peoples also decide against seeking justice from a legal system that too often works against them.

Marxists have always held that the political and legal system developed in response to the needs of the dominant class to have its right to privately own the means of production fully secured. The relations between people involved in social production, between the propertyless workers and the propertied classes, and all those in between, were also protected and secured through legislation.

Ideologies that served those relations of production shaped and defined laws that determined how society should operate. The superiority of men over women (patriarchy) and the superiority of Europeans (white people) over black and other coloured peoples developed in tandem with property laws (laws of class) came to characterise the capitalist legal system.

A legal system that emerges from racial, gender and class inequality will inevitably seek to crush and destroy victims of race, class and gender who seek justice within it.

To the extent that it has succeeded with Brittany Higgins, to the extent that it succeeds daily to deny justice to the poor, the socially disenfranchised, First Peoples, immigrants, those outside the patriarchy, it is itself guilty.

The time for fundamental social change grows closer.

 

China: A revolutionary summary of the experience of the current state of the campaign in November.

(Above: "White sheet revolution" by Trong Khiem Nguyen on Flickr.)

Written by: (Contributed) on 2 December 2022 

(Our Party has received the following contribution. We print it in solidarity with Chinese comrades struggling to lift the spontaneous struggles currently taking place in China to a higher level of conscious action – Eds)
 

I see the problem with the movement groups over there, it's always good to have movements. But there is too much liberal thinking in there, still trying to divorce the movement from politics, still thinking that this completes a completely decentralised rejection of highly organised action. This is essentially action for action's sake, a completely blind submission to the limitations of the present situation without a clear purpose and scientific judgement of future forms, or active steps towards qualitative transformation of the movement and its expansion.

Is this movement going to keep on pointlessly fighting with eggs and stones? Since we have less power now, we should concentrate on guerrilla warfare and wars of annihilation, rather than fighting the police hard. For example, we should concentrate our forces to see if we can control the jamming vehicles (1) , so that the information about the isolated and blocked frontline struggle in different parts of the country can have a chance to spread to the whole country and the movement can be sustained. We need to expand the political influence of the movement, but we also need to do other kinds of propaganda and joint work to influence other classes and other masses, to help them transform their own reality through the struggle, and to let them know that the influence of the class struggle is spreading, all in order to get more people involved and at the same time to preserve our strength.

Instead of maintaining decentralized demonstrations, how can we avoid seeking to further decentralize the energy, and only use it to consider personal safety, such as what to do if you are caught by the police? But we haven't yet given more consideration to more serious matters and to more of the problems that we need to care about and solve. This kind of erroneous thinking is still very naive.

(Above: November 27 -  a traffic policeman tries to clear Urumqi Rd, Shanghai.  ​Photo Runen Liu on Flickr)

Why did the climax of the movement pass so quickly? Why is the low tide coming back so soon? Are conditions for launching the next movement more difficult with more brutal attacks and repression? Why can't the movement continue? This is the childishness of the early days of the movement, and it is something we need to grow up and correct quickly. There is no revolutionary action without revolutionary theory, and today's status quo has sounded the alarm for us! Without the use of scientific revolutionary theory to guide our actions, the realization of the revolution is completely impossible.

At the same time, the miserable existence of our oppressed class determines that our confrontational actions, armed actions, and military actions can only be carried out in the most economical way, and the people's war can only be the most economical war, and its construction will be far greater than their destruction. It can only take a thorough mass line, and must achieve the best integration with the entire oppressed masses and classes.

Therefore, we need to develop a red armed force in the movement, a small red guerrilla group composed of our comrades. It can only be armed with Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, which is currently the most scientific and only theory that can undertake the mission of the entire revolutionary history. Then a tightly knit, highly organised military force is formed. Such an independent, highly politically conscious, tightly knit and highly organised team with a scientific revolutionary doctrine would be able to extend its influence on the masses and expand our influence at the height of the movement. Such a team is also in a position to be able to do all kinds of difficult and demanding military activities, expanding the entire duration and intensity of the movement. On the other hand, this kind of team can save its strength to the greatest extent during the low period of the movement due to its rigour and mass nature so that it can act under the best possible conditions for the next movement.

(1) Electronic jamming car: An interference vehicle with electricity as the main power, which by emitting long-distance EMP rays, interfere with the people’s social and other media, causing them to lose control and enter a chaotic state, in order to achieve the state’s own goals.

Will trillionaires or Iran’s people benefit from another revolution?

 

Written by: Louisa L. on 1 December 2022

 (Above: Photo sourced from Revolution and nothing less! | Communist Party of Iran (cpimlm.org) )

When the 1979 Iranian revolution overthrew the brutal regime of the British and US-installed Shah, people worldwide celebrated. Like those of us who celebrated when the US was defeated by tiny Vietnam, Muslims particularly were overjoyed.  Torture, random imprisonments, murder, suppression had been smashed. 

For some the hijab became a symbol of successful resistance to the world’s most powerful bully. Yet in Iran on International Women’s Day, tens of thousands of women protested against the newly enforced hijab.

Communists, the Islamic left, social democrats were part of the united front that toppled the Shah. Huge strikes played a pivotal role, and women, often carrying children, helped to neutralise and win over the army. Amid the turmoil, Khomeini’s group eventually took the lead and established a theocracy, a dictatorship just as vicious as the Shah’s. 

Like a civil war

Now, over 40 years later, Iranian women are burning hijabs and theocracy is itself in crisis from people’s uprisings. 

Women are in the forefront. Communists and Islamic leftists have been suppressed and driven underground exactly as they were under the Shah. They are not as strong now as when they – and their armed militias – played leading roles in launching the 1979 revolution.

Last time Khomeini’s name became the strongest rallying call as revolution unfolded. This time it is Mahsa Amini, a young woman who her family say was ‘not an activist’.

A local Iranian, a Kurd, who recently visited Iran says the poor have continually been pushed back until they could take no more, with inflation one of the biggest problems. No one has been allowed to talk or write against the theocracy. Jail and torture were the result if they did. 

He tells Vanguard, “For twenty years the ideology police have targeted women over the hijab and over what they do and say. It is one of the weakest points of the Islamic government.

“The current situation is much bigger than other protests in 2018 and 2020. 

“When Mahsa Amini was killed, the contradiction between the government and the people became the most important. It is now like a civil war,” he says.

China and Russia fuel secondary contradiction

He states a secondary but still important contradiction involves imperialist interference. 

In 2002 US President Ronald Reagan labelled Iran, North Korea and Iraq the ‘Axis of Evil’.  

For the US and Britain before it, control of the oil industry and mega-profits, plus Iran’s strategic position remain the other key motivators. A US blockade against Iran has not been successful.

Instead, the formation of the BRICS group (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) in 2006, and the escalating economic and military power of Chinese and Russian imperialism sent shock waves through the US ruling class. 

“Iran is very powerful in the Middle East, standing against US and European imperialism. The people get no benefit from this policy. Russia and China empower the Iranian regime to stand stronger against the people because Iran strengthens their strategic position,” he says.

He tells Vanguard that unlike the 1979 revolution, workers haven’t come out to the street in an organised way. Without workers the regime would grind to a stop. 

There were some strikes, but the working class hasn’t mobilised, partly because six months ago the government increased workers and teachers’ wages in an effort to win them over.

This makes Iranians overseas more important. 

Democracy has a class content

‘Democracy’ has been the catchcry of the current upsurge. Yet it can be both an empty word or even its opposite. The US parades its so-called democracy.

But it is democracy for the trillionaires. Its wealth arose from slavery and even now it imprisons more people than any other country. Human beings, overwhelmingly black and poor are warehoused for profit in its gigantic privatised prisons. 

And Australia, our ‘great democracy’, is built on First Peoples’ stolen lands, stolen children, on ongoing invasion and genocide. 

Democracy has a class content. Is it democracy for the people or for the richest of the rich? 

The richest foreign corporations pay no tax in Australia, while thieving our resources. Our public health, education, housing systems are falling apart, surviving only by unsustainable workloads of nurses, doctors, teachers, cleaners and the rest. Homelessness is sky-rocketing, with older women who have worked all their lives falling victim. 

The US and its allies work hard to subvert the current struggle to serve their own interests. 

In 1979, ordinary people sacrificed themselves to overthrow an unjust regime, only to see another just as cruel imposed. What tragedy if it happened again.

Deep thinking, looking below the pretty words and ideas to the murky reality beneath and mobilising on that basis, is the hope for the future.