Prachanda warns of collapse of peace process

[Saorsa]

Nepal Maoist Chief threatens Peace process collapse, parties reprimand


Telegraph Nepal

Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal threatened at the three party meeting held at the Constituent Assembly premises that any move to prohibit his party from forming a government would lead to abrupt collapse of the entire peace process.

Any government, Dahal thundered, formed without taking his party into confidence will not last for long. “We will not let the government last long”, he claimed.

Here you go. That was enough for some Nepali Congress and UML leaders to rebound.

They thus retorted, “Are you trying to threaten us?”

Those who were particularly aggravated by Prachanda’s threatening remarks were none less than Ram Chandra Poudel, Bimalendra Nidhi, Ram Saran Mahat, Krishna Sitaula of the Nepali Congress, reports Nagarik Daily, July 13, 2010.
Similarly, Home Minister Bhim Rawal and Pradip Gyawali of the UML also could not resist Prachanda’s threat loaded remarks and spoke their mind against Prachanda’s fiery utterances.

Later, Prachanda said “I do not mean to say exactly what I had said but I was just trying to portray the current situation”.

http://telegraphnepal.com/news_det.php?news_id=7950

[theAnarch]

This situation should not come as a surprise to any revolutionary. the Bourgeois parties are not willing to even finish the takes of the Bourgeois revolution, so long as the United Communist Party (Maoist) pushes a revolutionary coarse forward conflict is inevitable.

What kind of rhetoric does the UML communist party use to support counter revolution?

[Saorsa]

Preserving democracy, the rule of law, opposing Maoist totalitarianism etc

The usual bourgeois rhetoric.

[The Vegan Marxist]

More violence seems inevitable at this point. The UML are trying their hardest to make sure that Maoists are not in control, while other parties are at least trying to make sure that Prachanda, the choice by the Maoists themselves, is not brought in as PM. I don't see this going on for another year. Something's bound to happen.

[Saorsa]

The Maoists could still cobble together a majority government. They only need the support of a few minor parties to do so. But that still wouldn't be enough to write a new constitution, so it would just be postponing the deadlock - not breaking it.

I have no idea what's going to happen next. Let's wait and see.

[RED DAVE]

The Maoists could still cobble together a majority government.Why the fuck would they want to do that: go into a coalition government with brougeois parties?


They only need the support of a few minor parties to do so.Class collaboration.


But that still wouldn't be enough to write a new constitution, so it would just be postponing the deadlock - not breaking it.Since the Maoists have pinned the revolutionary process to the writing of a bourgeois constitution, with bourgeois parties, the deadlock is of their own making.


I have no idea what's going to happen next. Let's wait and see.Co9nsidering that the Maoists have shown no indication that they are going to lead the urban masses to power, it will be interesting indeed. If this weren't a historical tragedy in the making, it would be funny.

RED DAVE

[Saorsa]

Dave, you seem incapable of listening to brown skinned people when they explain their actions. Perhaps if they employed a white Trotskyist to explain it for them you'd take their explanations seriously.

What right do you have to complain about how the Maoists are going too slow, or not doing things the right way? These people will die if they fuck up. If it wasn't for the existence of the PLA and the YCL, they'd be dead already. When have you lead a revolution? What do you even know about being in a revolutionary situation, other than what you've read in history books?

You don't know what you're talking about, and you're substituting arrogance for analysis.


Why the fuck would they want to do that: go into a coalition government with brougeois parties?

I don't have Prachanda on speed dial, but I'd venture a guess that it may have something to do with pushing through army integration and writing the new constitution, the combination of which could break the power of the reactionary NA officers corps over its soldiers.

I understand that smart Western Trotskyists like you can just brush away tens of thousands of soldiers like flies, but the backward Asians just aren't as strong as you :-( They have to take creative tactics if they want to defeat the army without destroying the nation and inviting foreign intervention.


Since the Maoists have pinned the revolutionary process to the writing of a bourgeois constitution, with bourgeois parties, the deadlock is of their own making.

The masses themselves have pinned it to the writing of a revolutionary constitution. You don't know shit about Nepali history, why do you continually pretend otherwise? The demand for a Constituent Assembly has been raised for decades in every street protest and every radical movement in Nepal. It is the demand that set the revolutionaries apart from the reformists, who were happy to just argue for increased political space within the monarchy. The creation of the CA was a victorious end to decades of struggle, and the beginning of a bitter and fierce series of struggles to come.

The workers and peasants themselves are debating the new constitution and have been discussing how it should look for decades. The Maoists base their revolutionary agenda on empowering the masses to transform society themselves... and that means fighting to bring the peace process to a successful conclusion with a new constitution, which is what the working people of Nepal actually want.


Co9nsidering that the Maoists have shown no indication that they are going to lead the urban masses to power, it will be interesting indeed. If this weren't a historical tragedy in the making, it would be funny.

They've never indicated anything else. But typically, the Cliffites are doing imperialism's job for it by trying to drive wedges between the UCPN (M) and the international support network it desperately needs. That's the role you lot objectively play in the system - imperialism's servants on the 'left'.

Perhaps you should try to take a humble approach, recognising that you actually don't know that much about the situation on the ground in Nepal and don't actually have the right to pretend you know what path forward the Maoists should take. Read their explanations for the strategy they are currently taking, and try to understand them.


Many revolutionaries, many Maoists and our comrades have raised one question. You reached the gate of Kathmandu, why was it necessary to enter into the peace process? That is a big question.

War to the Gates — Why Then Change Tactics?

True, we had liberated 80% of the countryside and we had reached up to the gate of Kathmandu. But in order to seize countrywide power, for countrywide victory, our strength was not enough. The Royal Nepalese Army (RNA) was confined to their barracks, they could seldom come out. Whenever they were carrying out actions against our forces, they could just suddenly come out of their barracks, go 4-5 kilometres away from the barracks and encircle a village, and kill each and every person they found before returning. The next day they would propagate that they had killed a number of Maoists from the People’s Liberation Army.

Actually, they were not able to kill our force. They killed the common people. That was their practice for almost one year, since one year back. On the one hand, the RNA could not actually inflict any defeat on our People’s Liberation Army. On the other hand, we were not able to capture their big barracks. They were well fortified, especially with the help of US military experts. They used land mines to surround the barracks, and they used barbed wire. We tried many times but we failed to capture their barracks. That was the situation militarily. We were in a stagnant position militarily. We were trying to make a breakthrough but were not able to capture the barracks, because they were well fortified, and they had lots of modern weapons supplied by India and also helicopters. We were unable to achieve further military victory.

That was the military situation and so far as the political situation is concerned we enjoyed the support of the urban people, but it was not to the level that was required for general insurrection. The support was there, but finally to capture the city and the capital it was necessary to carry out insurrection, revolt. The support provided by the masses was not at a sufficient level in the cities including Kathmandu, because the masses were divided. Some supported Nepali Congress, other people supported other parties and the level of support of the masses was not enough that was required to achieve the final victory. So this was the political situation.

A Plan for Broadening Political Support

So in the midst of this situation we decided that in order to get further support from the masses our party should take some other initiatives to gather further strength. Otherwise the war would remain in a stagnant situation. Neither the enemy could defeat us, nor could we defeat the enemy. That was the situation. For how long could we continue this situation? War has its own dynamics, it cannot stay still for a long time, for example, if we cannot win victory, the enemy will eventually be able to defeat us. We had to take a new initiative. According to the dynamics of war you have to find a new way to maintain a dynamic situation, we should not be in a static situation in a war for long.

In those circumstances our party decided to take different steps, other political manoeuvres. Our party worked out alternative political tactics of going to the negotiations. Right from the beginning we explained People’s War as a total war. Sometimes there is a wrong notion among Maoists that People’s War is simply the war in which we confront the opposite army, the confrontation between two armies, but this is not true. People’s War is different. People’s War is a total war. We are confronting the enemy on all fronts, including the military front as well as the political front, economic front and also cultural front. On different fronts we have to fight the war, so it is a total war.

http://kasamaproject.org/2008/04/09/gaurav-the-revolution-in-nepal/


In most third world countries autocratic monarchy has already been abolished, and in those countries though the basic foundation of society is still semi-feudal, semi-colonial, the political superstructure was led by bourgeois democrats. But in our case even the political superstructure was dominated by the autocratic feudal monarchy, the national bourgeoisie was very weak and they could not carry forward the bourgeois democratic revolution. It was the proletarian party which had to take the lead to abolish the autocratic monarchy and introduce a bourgeois democracy, which could be again transformed through struggle into New Democracy, a proletarian democratic system.

Therefore we adopted these tactics, and after 2001 we followed these tactics and by 2005 we had reached the stage of strategic offensive in the PPW. Then we thought it was time to focus our activity, to shift our activities to the urban areas. By that time we had liberated most of the countryside, where the poor peasantry lives, and under 25% of our population lives in urban areas. There the petty bourgeoisie class and other classes needed to be mobilised if we were to complete the stage of strategic offensive and capture the state in a revolutionary manner. After 2005 we decided to shift our activity to the urban areas, because without mobilising the masses in urban areas we couldn’t complete our strategic offensive, capturing the state. With these tactics in mind we entered into the negotiation process with certain parliamentary parties who were all struggling with the monarchy but which were too weak, their class nature was too weak, they couldn’t struggle with the monarchy and complete the bourgeois democratic revolution. When the autocratic monarchy centralised all state power in a coup, it was easier for us to have an alliance with those bourgeois democratic parties and we made the 12-point understanding. On the basis of that 12-point understanding we launched a mass movement which we called the 2nd mass movement. After the 2nd mass movement there was a huge upsurge of the people and the autocratic monarchy was forced to accept the Constituent Assembly and to step down. After that we made the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, in which we had to make certain compromises. Those compromises were made to abolish the monarchy, hold the Constituent Assembly elections and then move ahead to complete the bourgeois democratic revolution in the country.

There are some ambiguous features in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement. Our understanding, the revolutionary party’s understanding, was that after abolishing the monarchy and establishing a bourgeois democratic republic, the proletarian party would take the initiative and launch forward the struggle towards New Democratic Revolution. We knew the bourgeois forces, after the abolition of the monarchy, would try to resist, and our main contradiction then would be with the bourgeois democratic parties. This we had foreseen. So we have not said that after the abolition of the monarchy we’ll stop there. We never said that. What we have said is that we would align with the bourgeois democratic parties to abolish the monarchy, and after the abolition of the monarchy then the contention would be between the bourgeois forces and the proletarian forces. A new field of struggle would start. That was clearly stated in the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, the subsequent interim constitution and other documents we passed.

After the Constituent Assembly elections, when our party emerged as the largest force and we abolished the monarchy, there was a lot of enthusiasm among the masses of the people. Our party’s tactical line had been correctly implemented. That gave a tremendous force to the basic masses of the people and our support greatly increased. For the time being we cooperated with the interim government also, because by participating in that coalition government we thought we could work within the bureaucracy, within the army, within the police and within the judiciary, in order to build our support base through those state structures, which would help us for future revolutionary activities. With that in mind we participated in the coalition government. After the abolition of the monarchy, when the main contradiction would start with the bourgeois democratic forces, then our struggle took a new turn.

After April 2009 [when Prachanda resigned from government], that phase of the Constituent Assembly and implementation of the bourgeois democratic republic was more or less complete. Our understanding is to now carry on the struggle forwards to complete the New Democratic Revolution. So again we made a tactical shift, showing that from now on our major fight would be with the bourgeois democrat parties who are backed by imperialism and the expansionist forces. With this thinking our party left the government and now we are focusing on the mass movement, so that now we could really practice what we have been preaching. That means the fusion of the strategy of PPW and the tactic of general insurrection. What we have been doing since 2005 is the path of preparation for general insurrection through our work in the urban areas and our participation in the coalition government.

But what one should not forget was that we had never ever surrendered the gains of the PPW, what we had gained during the ten years of struggle. We had formulated the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), we had our base areas, we had a lot of mass support, and all this we have been able to preserve. But we have not been able to convey to our comrades outside the country that the gains of the People’s War were never surrendered. The PLA is still with us, and the arms we collected during that war are still with us within the single-key system, monitored by the United Nations team, but basically the key is with us and the army is with us and we have never surrendered. This shows we have not abandoned the path of PPW. What we have done is suspended that part of the activity for some time and focused more on the urban activities so that we could make a correct balance between the military and political aspects of struggle. After some time we will be able to combine both aspects of PPW and general insurrection to mount a final insurrection to capture state power. We would like to stress that we are still continuing in the path of revolution, but the main features we tried to introduce were to make a fusion between the theory of PPW and the tactic of general insurrection. After coming to the peaceful phase I think whatever confusion there was has been mitigated and people realise we are still on the revolutionary path.

Now we are preparing for the final stage of the completion of the New Democratic Revolution. In a few months when the contradiction will sharpen between the proletarian and bourgeois forces, maybe there will be some intervention from the imperialist and expansionist forces. During that time we may again be forced to have another round of armed clashes. Our party is already aware of that and we have decided to again focus on the basic masses of the people both in urban and rural areas. To strengthen those mass bases we have formed the United National People’s Movement, which will be preparing for both struggle in the urban areas and to strengthen our mass base in the countryside. In the decisive stage of confrontation with the reactionary forces we could again combine our bases in the rural areas and our support in the urban areas for a final assault against the enemy to complete the revolution.

I would like to say we have never abandoned PPW, the only thing is that there has been a tactical shift within the strategy. This is one point. The other point is that being a Maoist we believe in continuous revolution. Revolution never stops. Even when one stage is completed, immediately the new stage should be continued. Only that way can we reach socialism and communism. That is a basic tenet of Maoism. Being a Maoist, this reasoning of continuous revolution can never be abandoned. We are still in the course of PPW, though the tactics have shifted according to the nature of the time. But there is a confusion in the international community of proletarian forces, and we would like to clarify this, but I think this thing can be better done in practice than in words. Anyhow we are confident we can convince our comrades who have some doubts about our activities that we are still pursuing the path of revolution. We will complete the revolution in a new way and we have to show that revolution is possible even in the 21st century. And Nepal can be a model of revolution in the 21st century.

http://kasamaproject.org/2009/12/12/interview-with-nepals-bhattarai/

[Imposter Marxist]

To think, I used to be sympathic to Trotskyists before I came to Revleft. :rolleyes:

[RED DAVE]

Alastair: stop race baiting me. Your use of terms like "Western" and "white" in the manner that you are doing consitutes racism. As a white, Western, American, Jewish male Trotskyist, I have the same right as any leftist to criticize the Nepali Maoists, the US Trots, the South African Stalinists, the British social democrats, the New Zealand whatevers, etc.

Cut it out.

RED DAVE

[Saorsa]

Sure. You have the right to make criticisms. But you also have the responsibility to admit to yourself and everyone else that you don't actually know anything much about making a revolution in practice, and could perhaps have a lot to learn from these people. But no... instead you criticize their every move, acting every time like you're some High Inquisitor of Marxism with the task of sentencing the heretics every time they break some precious orthodoxy of yours. It's arrogant beyond belief, and deeply irritating.

You don't know much about Nepal, you know nothing at all about how to build a succesful revolutionary movement in the unique conditions present there, and you know precisely nothing about how to build a revolutionary movement in your *own* country in practice.

Do the Nepali Maoists write articles condemning the heresies of revolutionaries like you in the USA? No, they don't - they're too busy making a revolution happen in their own country.

You're the one who needs to cut it out. You need to look at your own chauvinistic attitudes and try to deal with the fact that revolutionaries in the Third World might actually not need your guidance at all.

You don't even make concrete criticisms any more at all. You just say "this is a bourgeois move because Maoism is bourgeois and the Maoists are bourgeois Maoists". It doesn't provoke productive discussions.

One of the things my party, the Workers Party of NZ, has always united around is that we don't tell revolutionaries overseas what path they need to take, because we're capable of admitting we bloody well don't know. Maybe you should look into this approach.

[RED DAVE]

Sure. You have the right to make criticisms. But you also have the responsibility to admit to yourself and everyone else that you don't actually know anything much about making a revolution in practice, and could perhaps have a lot to learn from these people.First of all I do know something: I learned from the great revolutionaries of the past. And while there is no substitute for practical experience, practical experience must be guided by knowledge of previous practice and theory.

What the Nepali Maoists are doing is, essentially, reproducing the practice of the Chinese Maoists. This is clear. They are not basing their revolution on the working class. They are not calling on workers to form councils; they are not calling on peasants to seize the land. Instead, the leadership of the party is using the workers and peasants as leverage in a constitutional process which involves negotiating with the bourgeois parties for position.


But no... instead you criticize their every move, acting every time like you're some High Inquisitor of Marxism with the task of sentencing the heretics every time they break some precious orthodoxy of yours. It's arrogant beyond belief, and deeply irritating.Tough shit that it irritates you. And it's not arrogance; it's honesty.

I am a Marxist with the responsibility to speak the truth as I see it. My criticisms are based on very real problems that I see with the practices of the Nepali Maoists. What am I supposed to do? Shut up? Or should I be intimidated by the reverse racism that you tried to pull.


You don't know much about NepalNo, I don't know much, but as we used to say in the US: You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind is blowing. I see serious problems with their practices, problems which are neither subtle nor difficult to discern.


you know nothing at all about how to build a succesful revolutionary movement in the unique conditions present thereThe conditions in Nepal are similar to any underdeveloped country. And Marxism is Marxism. Marxists build revolutions based on the power of the working class. The Nepalese Maoists are not doing that.


and you know precisely nothing about how to build a revolutionary movement in your *own* country in practice.Bullshit. I have been an active revolutionary in the US for decades. And I belong to an active Marxist tendency. I think I have a fair idea about how it needs to be done here, at least for openers.


Do the Nepali Maoists write articles condemning the heresies of revolutionaries like you in the USA? No, they don't - they're too busy making a revolution happen in their own country.Rhetoric and bullshit. If the Nepali Maoists paid more attention to other countries, maybe they wouldn't do things like getting involved in seminars in the US under the political sway of the bourgeoisie. And maybe they could spare a couple of minutes to say something about the women workers in Bangladesh, right next door, who have taken to the streets to fight for a living wage.


You're the one who needs to cut it out. You need to look at your own chauvinistic attitudes and try to deal with the fact that revolutionaries in the Third World might actually not need your guidance at all.Kiss my ass. As a Marxist, it is my responsibility to praise or criticize according to my beliefs. You have a fabulously stalinist mind. My criticisms of the Nepali Maoists may, in fact, be misguided and dead wrong. However, it's still my responsibility to voice them and not be intimidated by the likes of you.


You don't even make concrete criticisms any more at all. You just say "this is a bourgeois move because Maoism is bourgeois and the Maoists are bourgeois Maoists". It doesn't provoke productive discussions.I have pointed out, again and again and again, that the Nepali Maoists are engaged in coalition building with bourgeois parties to run a bourgeois state which will be part of the apparatus for exploiting the working class. The Maoists are still doing this. So, the same criticism still stands.


One of the things my party, the Workers Party of NZ, has always united around is that we don't tell revolutionaries overseas what path they need to take, because we're capable of admitting we bloody well don't know. Maybe you should look into this approach.You are dead wrong about that principle. Maybe you should see some of the things that Marx, Lenin, Luxemburg and the Third International when it wasn't a stalinist tool wrote about other countries and conditions there.

RED DAVE

[Saorsa]

First of all I do know something: I learned from the great revolutionaries of the past. And while there is no substitute for practical experience, practical experience must be guided by knowledge of previous practice and theory.

Sure, you think you did. But how can you know whether your take on the lessons they offer is an accurate one? How can you know you took the right answers from the questions they raised? You've never had the opportunity to test your theory in a revolutionary situation.


What the Nepali Maoists are doing is, essentially, reproducing the practice of the Chinese Maoists. This is clear. They are not basing their revolution on the working class.

You're very fond of saying 'this is clear' or 'this is obvious', as if that closes the debate. I think the complete opposite is clear.


They are not calling on workers to form councils;

Neither did the Bolsheviks, until *after* the workers of Russia organically developed the Soviet model as the one that best suited their struggle in their conditions. The Nepali workers and peasants have never raised demands for urban Soviets modelled on those in Russia. The Bolsheviks did not arbitrarily impose Soviets, forcing them down the throats of workers who had no desire for them. Why should the Maoists do the same?

Furthermore, you're fetishising the specific over the general. The Soviets were not special because they were Soviets, they were special because they were organs which provided the working masses an opportunity to organise and control society from the bottom up. The Maoist party itself, along with its mass organisations, it's people's courts and people's councils, provide such an opportunity. The Maoist movement itself is organising and controlling society from the bottom up, and is searching for a way to break the power of the state and achieve final victory. Do you ever give backward brown people the benefit of the doubt? They really don't need your wise guidance.


they are not calling on peasants to seize the land.

I'm still undecided on whether you generally speak out of ignorance, or with a deliberate agenda to slander the Maoists. You've been following the news available on this forum for some time now, you must have seen the frequent reports of Maoist land seizures and the even more frequent reports of the bourgeois parties demanding captured land be returned... and the Maoists delaying and refusing to do so.


Instead, the leadership of the party is using the workers and peasants as leverage in a constitutional process which involves negotiating with the bourgeois parties for position.

They're trying to break the power of the Nepal Army, its reactionary officer corps, and they're trying to win concrete gains while they struggle to do this. A new constitution will be the single greatest victory achieved by any people's movement in Nepali history. Only an arrogant, chauvinistic Western Trotskyist could dismiss that as nothing.


Tough shit that it irritates you. And it's not arrogance; it's honesty.

Nah, it's arrogance. With a healthy dose of chauvinism towards backward brown people.


I am a Marxist with the responsibility to speak the truth as I see it. My criticisms are based on very real problems that I see with the practices of the Nepali Maoists. What am I supposed to do? Shut up? Or should I be intimidated by the reverse racism that you tried to pull.

There's no such thing as reverse racism. I'm just commenting on some interesting coincidences I see... like how every revolution you're prepared to support (and pretty much every revolutionary) is a white European, and you don't ever extend similar support to revolutions in Asia. Just a funny wee coincidence.

As for what you should do. You should try to deal with your arrogance. Learn a bit of humility, and try to see what you can learn from revolutions unfolding across the world at the moment... rather than assuming these stupid brown people need your wise guidance if they are to succeed.


No, I don't know much, but as we used to say in the US: You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind is blowing.

Yeah and didn't that end well.


I see serious problems with their practices, problems which are neither subtle nor difficult to discern.

You see serious problems with the fact that they're not Trotskyists. Almost all of your criticisms are just attacks on Maoist theory or Chinese history. You rarely criticise the concrete practices of the UCPN (M) itself - if you did there would be a lot more scope for productive debate.


The conditions in Nepal are similar to any underdeveloped country. And Marxism is Marxism. Marxists build revolutions based on the power of the working class. The Nepalese Maoists are not doing that.

Every country has different and unique conditions. That's the nature of uneven development. While Nepal may be similar to other countries, the specific problems the Maoists have to overcome in the here and now are unique.

You're a history textbook communist. You see revolutions as things that are a foregone conclusion, just as if you were reading about them in a book. So with your theoretical approach it may be easy to claim that the same blueprint approach can be used in every country in the world... but it doesn't work like that in reality.


Bullshit. I have been an active revolutionary in the US for decades. And I belong to an active Marxist tendency. I think I have a fair idea about how it needs to be done here, at least for openers.

I didn't say you weren't a revolutionary. I said you know nothing about how to build a revolutionary movement, let alone bring about a succesful revolution. The proof's in the pudding - where is this mass revolutionary movement you built? I don't see millions of US workers on the streets waving your party flag, or any red flag for that matter. You've failed. And while there are plenty of reasons for that, and I'm not blaming you for it personally, it's still a fact. You have proven, in practice, that you don't know how to build a revolutionary movement in your own backyard... yet you think you can tell the stupid brown people in a country you've never even visited how they need to do it.


Rhetoric and bullshit. If the Nepali Maoists paid more attention to other countries, maybe they wouldn't do things like getting involved in seminars in the US under the political sway of the bourgeoisie.

You criticise for the sake of criticising. What on earth is the problem with attending a function organised by the US? They want to get off the US terror list, which is hardly unreasonable. Are you telling me you've never been to a function or conference in your life that wasn't organised by communists?


And maybe they could spare a couple of minutes to say something about the women workers in Bangladesh, right next door, who have taken to the streets to fight for a living wage.

So what? There's plenty of stuff they don't comment on. We only get press communiques from the UCPN (M) in English every few weeks, if we're lucky.

I don't think I've seen any comment from the American ISO about the major attacks on unions the New Zealand government has just launched. This is proof that you are a bunch of petit-bourgeois nationalists with no sense of internationalism whatsoever. Shame on you.


Kiss my ass. As a Marxist, it is my responsibility to praise or criticize according to my beliefs. You have a fabulously stalinist mind.

"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge." You're living proof.


My criticisms of the Nepali Maoists may, in fact, be misguided and dead wrong. However, it's still my responsibility to voice them and not be intimidated by the likes of you.

I'm not trying to intimidate you. I'd probably struggle to do that in real life, let alone over the internet. What I'm trying to do is convey to you that when you don't know what you're talking about... you should be honest about that. I'm trying to convey to you that you have a chauvinistic attitude towards Third World revolutionaries, and that you need to admit this and try to deal with it.


I have pointed out, again and again and again, that the Nepali Maoists are engaged in coalition building with bourgeois parties to run a bourgeois state which will be part of the apparatus for exploiting the working class. The Maoists are still doing this. So, the same criticism still stands.

And I have pointed out, again and again and again, why the Maoists are doing this. I have provided the explanations they themselves have given for this tactic, again and again and again. But you don't listen, because you never listen to what brown revolutionaries from the Third World have to say. You assume they're too stupid to be worth your time, and that they require the guidance of a European Trotskyist.


You are dead wrong about that principle. Maybe you should see some of the things that Marx, Lenin, Luxemburg and the Third International when it wasn't a stalinist tool wrote about other countries and conditions there.

That's exactly my point though. Men and women leading mass revolutionary organisations during a time of major revolutionary upheaval, men and women who have tested their theory in practice and know from their own eyes what a revolution looks like... they have the right to criticise the methods used by other revolutionaries overseas. The First, Second and Third Internationals all emerged out of mass international revolutionary upheaval, and the second and third in particular were made up of mass revolutionary parties.

There's a world of difference between that and a group like mine or yours. Your comparison fails.

[Barry Lyndon]

RED DAVE,

Comrade Alastair is not 'race-baiting' you. He has pointed out, as I have noticed as well, that many Trotskyists(as well as left-coms, etc.), will NEVER, under any circumstances, take the contributions and practice of Third World revolutions seriously, whether in China, Vietnam, and Cuba in the past, or Venezuela and Nepal at present, but instead continue to exclusively idolize white European theorists in the increasingly distant past. Given that the masses struggling in those countries are almost exclusively non-white, it does raise the question in any reasonable leftists mind as to whether your blanket dismissal is rooted in racism and First World chauvinism, if only of the subconscious sort.

You have to get over the fact that the industrial working class that was the focus of Marx, Engels, Luxemburg, Lenin, and Trotsky in the late 19th and early 20th century is almost gone as a political force, fractured partially by political defeats and also bribed into compliance with the capitalist system.
The real focus of revolutionary politics has been in the Global South since the mid-20th century, and I suggest that you stop living in the past and adknowledge the hard reality. Judge revolutionary movements on their own terms, and stop trying to squeeze them into your orthodox Trotskyist bottle, c. 1930's.

[theAnarch]

All right lets calm down kids.....

anyway for anyone to make a truly accurate analysis we would need to be in Nepal.

So long as the conditions are not right for immediate socialist revolution there is nothing wrong with supporting a constitution that guarantees democratic rights and abolishes feudal social institutions, in essence forcing the Bourgeois to complete the bourgeois revolution.

[Saorsa]

Exactly. The bourgeoisie cannot be trusted to make its own revolution in the late imperialist epoch, so the bourgeois revolution has to be carried out by the proletariat. This is happening in Nepal right now, and those with their blinkers off can see it.