Long Live Communist Maoism in Nepal Peoples War!

[maoists_nepal]

HI IAM COMARDE aksh from nepal iam maoist its nice to be here
IN NEPAL WE R IN FIGHT WITH THE GOV THE KING OF NEPAL HE IS A THIVE HE SEND HIS PEOPLE TO THE JAILL IF SOME SAY BAD THING ABOUT HIM AND HE STOLE THE POOR PEOPLE MONEY HE AND WITH SOME HELP FROM USA ...


READ ABOUT THE PEOPLE'S WAR IN NEPAL



Just when it seems that revolutionary communism has all but disappeared in the world, Nepal's Maoist rebels seem to grow stronger and stronger. bbc news .

It is estimated that they now have between 10,000 to 15,000 fighters, and are active across the country, with many parts completely under their control.

So how did the rebels transform themselves from a small group of shotgun-wielding insurgents in 1996 to the formidable fighting force they are today?

The disillusionment of the Maoists with the Nepalese political system began after democracy was re-introduced in 1990.

Shining Path

Many who are key figures in the rebel movement today played a role alongside mainstream political parties in over-throwing Nepal's absolute monarchy.

Although they participated in the country's first parliamentary elections, their disenchantment with ceaseless political squabbling - and their anger at the plight of the rural poor - prompted them to take up arms.

In doing so, there is little doubt that the two key rebel leaders, Prachanda and Baburam Bhattarai, derived their inspiration from Peru's Shining Path rebels.


The Maoists military strength has increased considerably in recent years

Both men wanted to emulate the Shining Path's stated objective of destroying government institutions and replacing them with a revolutionary peasant regime.

As with the Shining Path, Nepal's Maoists deal with dissent ruthlessly. Human rights groups say that like the security forces, they are guilty of numerous summary executions and cases of torture.

The Nepalese Maoists have also made some "homegrown" modifications to Maoist ideology.

Caste resentment

They argue that what makes them different from other communist parties in the country is that they want a complete revamp of the multiparty democratic system as part of a programme aimed at turning the country into a Marxist republic.

But on this issue there is some ambiguity, because in the past Maoist negotiators have hinted that they will abandon this demand so that the peace process can be kick-started.

So powerful have the Maoists become that few dare defy their call for a general strike in Kathmandu


In fact the only area where they have stayed consistent is in their demand for an end to Nepal's constitutional monarchy.

Another key grievance of the rebels was the resentment felt by lower caste people against the authority wielded by the higher castes.

The Maoists say that the reason they have so much support is because most of their supporters have traditionally been treated as second-class citizens or worse.

Many analysts that this is the real explanation as to why such a seemingly anachronistic movement has made such dramatic headway.


The rebels can now threaten Kathmandu itself

Unquestionably there is a substantial number of people in Nepal who see the Maoists as the only genuine alternative to the old, repressive social order.

The first Maoist attack is believed to have taken place in 1996, when six government and police outposts were attacked simultaneously in mid-western Nepal. Similar attacks took place on a regular basis in the same area over the next few years.

Initially the rebels were not taken seriously at all by the government, diplomats, journalists or the all-pervasive aid agencies that dominate Nepal's economy. They were lightly armed and not considered a genuine military threat.

Rebel abductions

But since then they have become one of South Asia's most potent rebel groups, rivalling the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka.

Today the Maoists are well organised, and the firepower at their disposal greater than ever.

Rifles and explosives have been stolen from captured police outposts and it is believed that the country's open border with India has made it easier to smuggle arms and money.


While many support the Maoists, others are fearful of them

So powerful have the Maoists become that few dare defy them when they call a general strike in Kathmandu. The rebels' threat to cut off the city from the rest of the country can no longer be considered an idle threat.


Only a few weeks ago, the rebels abducted hundreds of school children for a week long "re-education" course on Maoist ideology right under the noses of the security forces on the outskirts of Kathmandu.

The Maoists may not yet have the strength to win their "People's War" but they are too strong to lose it.

As one analyst put it, the government appears to be caught in a classic catch-22 situation.

Until there is substantial social and economic development in the areas of the countryside where the Maoists hold sway, the insurgency will continue.

But development cannot happen until the government gains even limited access to these areas, and access can only be achieved by using highly unpopular and potentially counterproductive military means against a well-organised guerrilla army.

[maoists_nepal]

any one can say hi to me iam new friend here :P
my pic in avtar iam on the left with telephon LONG LIVE MAOISIM AND REAVLOTION

[Zingu]

Well, this is interesting!

I bet alot of our members would love to hear of the stories you must have of the movement in Nepal. We haven't heard much about it, and are wondering what is going on. We have some Maoists who would love to interview you then.

Welcome to the boards! We hope you stay a long time comrade! :)

[maoists_nepal]

THANK U FRIEND

THATS MY BROTHER PIC HE KILLED FOR THE FREEDOOM OF THE POOR PEOPLE HE KILLED FOR THE RED REALVOTION FOR PEOPLE's war



wish to live a free in free communism country
LONG LIVE NEPALIS MAOISTS AND COMMUNITS TO FIGHT THE KING OF NEPAL AND THIR DOGS USA

[maoists_nepal]

my pic of my brother he dead in 2004

[maoists_nepal]

LONG REALVOTION FROM THE HAMLAIA
Authorities in Nepal now say 100 died in clashes between Maoist rebels and government forces in the remote western district of Rukum on Thursday.
The clashes were by far the biggest since King Gyanendra assumed direct power on 1 February, vowing to crack down on the rebels.

The army said it had recovered 97 rebel bodies and that three soldiers died.

The rebels have not commented on their dead but say the army's losses were much higher.

None of the claims could be independently verified.

The Maoists have been fighting for nearly 10 years to replace the monarchy with a communist republic. About 11,000 people have been killed.

Maoist strike

Security forces said on Saturday a further 47 Maoist bodies had been found since the Rukum clash, adding to the 50 recovered on Friday.

Rukum is a rebel stronghold about 550km (340 miles) west of Kathmandu.



"Some bodies were buried while others were abandoned in the forests and by the side of streams," an army official told the Reuters agency.

The army said about six soldiers were hurt in addition to its three dead when the rebels attacked an army base with rocket launchers and mortars.

The clash was the first major battle since the king dismissed the government, saying it had failed to tackle the Maoist threat.

The battle also came amid an 11-day strike, which will end on Tuesday, called by the rebels to protest at the king's move.

Bus attack

Police said on Saturday that three people died and dozens were hurt when a bus travelling to Kathmandu on Saturday hit a mine.

Security officials blamed Maoists for setting off a landmine that struck a bus travelling to Kathmandu from the southern district of Rautahat on Saturday.

Police said an Indian citizen was among the dead.

They also said a second explosion had gone off, injuring two Russian nationals.

They were heading to the base of Mount Everest when their vehicle hit a landmine north-east of Kathmandu, police said

[maoists_nepal]

Authorities in Nepal now say 100 died in clashes between Maoist rebels and government forces in the remote western district of Rukum on Thursday.
The clashes were by far the biggest since King Gyanendra assumed direct power on 1 February, vowing to crack down on the rebels.

The army said it had recovered 97 rebel bodies and that three soldiers died.

The rebels have not commented on their dead but say the army's losses were much higher.

None of the claims could be independently verified.

The Maoists have been fighting for nearly 10 years to replace the monarchy with a communist republic. About 11,000 people have been killed.

Maoist strike

Security forces said on Saturday a further 47 Maoist bodies had been found since the Rukum clash, adding to the 50 recovered on Friday.

Rukum is a rebel stronghold about 550km (340 miles) west of Kathmandu.



"Some bodies were buried while others were abandoned in the forests and by the side of streams," an army official told the Reuters agency.

The army said about six soldiers were hurt in addition to its three dead when the rebels attacked an army base with rocket launchers and mortars.

The clash was the first major battle since the king dismissed the government, saying it had failed to tackle the Maoist threat.

The battle also came amid an 11-day strike, which will end on Tuesday, called by the rebels to protest at the king's move.

Bus attack

Police said on Saturday that three people died and dozens were hurt when a bus travelling to Kathmandu on Saturday hit a mine.

Security officials blamed Maoists for setting off a landmine that struck a bus travelling to Kathmandu from the southern district of Rautahat on Saturday.

Police said an Indian citizen was among the dead.

They also said a second explosion had gone off, injuring two Russian nationals.

They were heading to the base of Mount Everest when their vehicle hit a landmine north-east of Kathmandu, police said

[KrazyRabidSheep]

Do you take those photographs yourself?

I particularly like the grafitti one. "Long Live People's War".
It seems somebody really wanted to get the message out to the rest of the world (Hence the English).

How long have you spoken English, by the way?

[maoists_nepal]

i study english and french in communist school in west nepal in small village cahtwan the communists they teach us free and meical is free
pic i got with my self some and some from party

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 13 2005, 10:48 PM

In doing so, there is little doubt that the two key rebel leaders, Prachanda and Baburam Bhattarai, derived their inspiration from Peru's Shining Path rebels.
....
Both men wanted to emulate the Shining Path's stated objective of destroying government institutions and replacing them with a revolutionary peasant regime.

As with the Shining Path, Nepal's Maoists deal with dissent ruthlessly. Human rights groups say that like the security forces, they are guilty of numerous summary executions and cases of torture.
That's right, the Nepalese Maoists are similar to Peru's Shining Path...or Cambodia's Khmer Rouge. A petty-bourgeois sect, with a following among the peasants, seeking to use force to impose its petty-bourgeois dogmas on working people. They are carrying out a campaign of terror, not only against the government, but against the workers and peasants. They can only set back the struggles of working people, in Nepal and worldwide. As the Khmer Rouge and Shining Path have.

Some links on this I've given before:

Maoists and monarchy brutalize and silence civilians (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/04/10/INGQEBP75824.DTL)

Maoists execute 10 villagers, burn houses (http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1462004,00.html?gusrc=rss)

Maoists brutalize members of workers' parties in Nepal (http://www.kurakani.tk/Article479.phtml)

Village vigilantes hunt alleged Maoists with axes (http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/04/11/news/nepal.html)

There's some reason to believe that the Maoists are wearing out their welcome. The vigilante stuff seems led by some of the wealthier elements of the village, with tacit government support...but the fact they can draw others behind 'em indicates growing hostility to the Maoists.

This is what happened to the Shining Path after a time as well: many of the peasants they ruled by terror came to hate 'em, including in their base areas.

[RedStarOverChina]

I'm sorry about ur brother.
I have a Nepalese friend who's a Marxist. He complained thta Maoists dont threat other communists very well. Also I have heard of looting done by the part of Maoists. But I have learned to doubt everything I hear. Is looting common? If it is, then perhaps they are not really Maoists after all, because Mao emphasized that the army should have a close relation with the people. I just want to hear ur side of the story (So far I've only heard from Nepalese Marxists and western media)

[Phalanx]

I saw an interview with your brother on bbcnews.com He said he came from a middle-class family and he wanted to fight the government. And he just died?

[Bolshevist]

Every comrade in Nepal has my unconditional support. To fail to do such is betrayal of the masses in Nepal. Even worse to brush them off as "terrorists" or "human rights abusers" on the basis of some articles in the bourgeious media. You should be ashamed of yourself Severian!

maoists_nepal, Do you have any information between the quarrel between Chairman Prachanda and Bhattarai? Bhattarai has said Prachanda is not deemed to have his picture placed with Marx, Lenin, Stalin and Mao. Do you agree with this?

[Raisa]

I dont want to sound crazy, but is it possible that the government could send out people to imposter as soldiers and give the maoists a bad name?

In general...do governments do that?

[Redmau5]

Originally posted by Lenin i [email protected] 14 2005, 03:33 PM
maoists_nepal, Do you have any information between the quarrel between Chairman Prachanda and Bhattarai? Bhattarai has said Prachanda is not deemed to have his picture placed with Marx, Lenin, Stalin and Mao. Do you agree with this?
None of them deserve their picture placed beside Marx and Lenin, they're fuckin' nobodies. Stalin doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as Lenin or Marx either.

[El_Revolucionario]

If the Maoists win their revolution, will they set up a real democratic communist state or will they follow suit with China and set up a brutal regime?

[Martin Blank]

Dear comrade Aksh, I am more than pleased to see you here. Perhaps you can answer some questions about the real situation in Nepal at this time. Let me begin, though, by expressing, on behalf of the Communist League, our unconditional support for the Nepalese people's struggle against the monarchy and for real democratic change on the "roof of the world". We may disagree with specific policies of the CPN(M), but we must not let those differences blind us to the genuine, historically-progressive work you and your comrades are doing.

I am particularly interested in what work is being undertaken to organize and empower working people in the cities of Nepal, to prepare for their participation in the society you wish to build. (I'll list my questions separately for easier answering.)

Have the comrades of the CPN(M) raised the slogans of workplace committees and workers' councils (soviets) for the workers of Kathmandu and other cities?

What work has been done to win over the majority of Nepal's urban proletarians to the perspective of a state based on such committees and councils, as part of a larger "commune state" (or workers' republic, as we call it)?

Have the workers of Nepal begun to arm themselves and organize into militia that would coordinate with the guerrilla army in the countryside?

What level of participation do the workers of Nepal in planning the future organizing and development of a future society?

Have steps been taken by the CPN(M) to educate workers on how to organize and control their workplaces once those facilities have been expropriated?

In short, what practical steps have been taken to elevate the proletariat of Nepal to the level of a ruling class?

I would be very grateful for any answers you can provide.

Miles, Communist League
http://www.communistleague.org/

[bolshevik butcher]

Ok, so the maoists are winning in nepal, good, there better than the monarchy. However are they gonna set up democracy and workers' control when they win?

[Severian]

Originally posted by Lenin i [email protected] 14 2005, 09:33 AM
Every comrade in Nepal has my unconditional support. To fail to do such is betrayal of the masses in Nepal.
I see. If I fail to support those who are waging a campaign of terror against the workers and peasants, that is a betrayal of those workers and peasants. I suspect your attachment is to some abstract concept of the masses, not to actual flesh-and-blood working people.


Even worse to brush them off as "terrorists" or "human rights abusers" on the basis of some articles in the bourgeious media. You should be ashamed of yourself Severian!

Yeah, I've noticed that people who dismiss anything inconvenient on the excuse that it appeared in the bourgeois media are usually in complete denial of reality. Frankly, no political tendency on earth is more blatantly dishonest than Stalinists; give me the bourgeois media (read critically of course) any day. Given its range of voices, it's usually possible to puzzle out semblance of truth from its contradictions at least.

Plenty of observers from diverse perspectives have testified to the brutality of the Khmer Rouge, the Shining Path, and now the Communist Party of Nepal(Maoist) - against working people. I think it's those who support these mass-murderers who should be ashamed.

RedStarOverChina wrote:

If it is, then perhaps they are not really Maoists after all, because Mao emphasized that the army should have a close relation with the people.

An interesting question. Their methods are very different from those of the People's Liberation Army led by Mao, that's for sure. Or the NPA in the Phillipines, another Maoist group. Very different from any party or army which has actually been part of a struggle of working people.

On the other hand, these Khmer Rouge-type groups are definitely inspired by certain ideas preached by Mao. They're taking some of Mao's ideas to their ultimate conclusion in a way Mao never did, one might say. As far as the class roots beneath those ideas, there are similarities and differences.

[redstar2000]

Welcome to the board, comrade Aksh.

Speaking personally, I wish every success to the great struggle to overthrow the corrupt monarchy and the caste system in Nepal.

I hope you will post anything that you can which will tell us more about what is happening in Nepal...especially things that you see with your own eyes.

After the war is won, we will be even more interested in the details of the kind of society that Nepalese Maoism establishes.

Best wishes,

http://www.websmileys.com/sm/cool/123.gif

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 14 2005, 06:27 PM
Speaking personally, I wish every success to the great struggle to overthrow the corrupt monarchy and the caste system in Nepal.
And...here we have someone who rejects Leninism supposedly because it's authoritarian....wishing success to Pol Pot-ism.

[Anarchist Freedom]

If I remember correctly RS2K said that he supports all revolutions. It was in my shining path thread.

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by Severian
And...here we have someone who rejects Leninism supposedly because it's authoritarian....wishing success to Pol Pot-ism.

I think your crystal ball needs a larger cooling fan...it's been generating some very odd results lately, probably due to overheating.

A judgment that the Nepalese Maoists are "Pol Pot-ists" is, to say the least, entirely unsupported by the existing evidence.

I don't expect them to do more than remove the king's head, introduce land reform, and bring Nepal stumbling into the 19th century, myself.

What's the matter with that?

http://www.websmileys.com/sm/cool/123.gif

[Hiero]

Wow this is good experince.

Just to be sure, aksh are you in Nepal now?

Keep up the good work with the updates, and best of luck to the CPN(Maoist)

[OleMarxco]

Originally posted by "RedStar2000"
What's the matter with that?
:redstar2000:
Well, for once, it would be very cruel and unusually mean to the monarchists! ;)

[Severian]

There's no "crystal ball" involved. The CPN(M) holds a fair bit of the countryside and its possible to see what kind of regime they implement now. And of course they openly compare themselves to Sendero - their comrades in an international Maoist organization, the RIM - and Sendero's record is well-known.

Another article - from 2003, which IIRC was in the past, not the future (http://www.worldpress.org/Asia/933.cfm)


Pushkar Gautam was among those who joined the Maoist insurgency at this time, eventually becoming a field commander. He explains the rebellion in classic Marxist terms, as “the struggle initiated by the distressed class against the bourgeois.” Since the 1990s, though, Gautam has had a falling-out with the movement and now works as a columnist at a respected Nepali-language biweekly newsmagazine. “I was not satisfied with the Maoists because they started attacking the ones who they repeatedly said they were fighting for.”

Gautam acknowledges that “every people’s war is a terror. But, in case of Nepal, the people have been most terrorized by the Maoists. If this weren’t bad enough, they are forced to bear the terror perpetrated by the security forces and the armed supporters of the political parties.”
....
Even as disenchantment with the government grows in the cities, support for the Maoist rebels is ebbing in their traditional rural power-base, says Top Bahadur Khadka, who runs a human-rights organization in Rukum, a western district that has borne the brunt of some of the worst fighting. “The rebels are now losing popular support because of their own activities. They forcefully extort money and seize food from the locals’ houses,” he says. “Worse, they have recently begun forcing local youths to join as the number of willing recruits has dwindled.”

Gautam says that in his days with the Maoists, there was no need to resort to crude force to find new members. In his day, “Recruiting villagers was an art,” he reminisces. “The youths were manipulated by promises of liberation or martyrdom.”

Now, I will make one prediction: it's more likely than not, that the Nepalese rebellion will sooner or later fade away like the Shining Path. For the reasons given in the above quote.

It's also of some interest what the CPN(M) respond to the comparison:

First, there is no independent and authentic account of events in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge available so far. Whatever is emanating from the Western media appears to be highly exaggerated to us.
Second, we are no Khmer Rouge but CPN (Maoist), that believe in no blind aping of anybody but in the creative application of the universal law of development of nature and society as embodied in Marxism-Leninism-Maoism to the concrete conditions of Nepal.

Christ. Yes, the scale of the Khmer Rouge's mass murder may be exaggerated by most capitalist media, but the fact of mass murder cannot seriously be denied. Those who feel the need to do so.....

The CPN(M)'s comrades in the US, the RCP, seem to regard the Khmer Rouge as....people who made some mistakes. for example (http://www.awtw.org/back_issues/1999-25/PolPot_eng25.htm)

[Bolshevist]

Originally posted by Severian+--> (Severian)
I see. If I fail to support those who are waging a campaign of terror against the workers and peasants, that is a betrayal of those workers and peasants. I suspect your attachment is to some abstract concept of the masses, not to actual flesh-and-blood working people.
[/b]

What you fail to see is that this People's War could not have achieved to control 80% of the country side without the support of the people. If they are waging war against the people (You sound like a neo-con) why is the people giving them support?


Originally posted by [email protected]

Yeah, I've noticed that people who dismiss anything inconvenient on the excuse that it appeared in the bourgeois media are usually in complete denial of reality. Frankly, no political tendency on earth is more blatantly dishonest than Stalinists; give me the bourgeois media (read critically of course) any day. Given its range of voices, it's usually possible to puzzle out semblance of truth from its contradictions at least.


You obviously lack the ability to read the bourgeious media critically, you seem to think that the Maoists are Pol Potists!!


Severian

Plenty of observers from diverse perspectives have testified to the brutality of the Khmer Rouge, the Shining Path, and now the Communist Party of Nepal(Maoist) - against working people. I think it's those who support these mass-murderers who should be ashamed.


These "workers" you speak of, they don't happen to be informers for the police and the army? You know, the army that has imprisoned entire villages, commited large-scale executions and mass raped women. I say put a bullet in their heads before they can rat out on the Maoist movement in Nepal. The saying "A revolution is not a dinnerparty" comes to mind, perhaps you should give that some thought.

[workersunity]

I would also like to know how the maoists are gonna try to make sure things dont end up like china, and with the party dictatorship, the proletariat should be ruling not the party

[RedStarOverChina]

What you fail to see is that this People's War could not have achieved to control 80% of the country side without the support of the people. If they are waging war against the people (You sound like a neo-con) why is the people giving them support?

my thoughts exactly.

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by Severian
There's no "crystal ball" involved. The CPN(M) holds a fair bit of the countryside and it's possible to see what kind of regime they implement now.

Unless you go there (and assuming you speak the language fluently) and, further, that people there have some reason to think you are trustworthy and speak freely and frankly to you...it looks very "crystal ballish" to me.

It's easy enough to invent "terrorist mythologies"...particularly about distant lands with only fragmentary information from dubious sources available.

Remember the stuff that the New York Times published about the Bolsheviks and Russia from 1917-1922?

I don't deny the possibility that you may be right -- that the Nepalese Maoists "are nutballs" who kill everyone who isn't part of their movement and will slaughter millions if they come to power...whatever.

I simply don't think that is a reasonable conclusion based on the evidence that you or anyone has provided thus far.

To repeat a point that I've made in threads similar to this one: peasant revolutions are dirty.

They are fought by people who do not share our "modern values" of "humane warfare"...indeed, most Nepalese have probably never heard of such concepts.

(Nor should I have to add that when westerners attempt to suppress such peasant revolutions, that they behave in practice even more barbarically than peasant revolutionaries.)

I'm quite sure that every "third-world" revolutionary movement has committed atrocities that you or I or the people on this board would shrink from as "going too far", "unnecessary", "counter-productive", or just "insane".

We think of revolution as a rational undertaking -- because we are products of an advanced capitalist society. Only such violence should be used as is necessary to win, in our view.

That's obviously not how revolutionary peasants see things.

http://www.websmileys.com/sm/cool/123.gif

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

OH NO! SENDERO ARE THROWING BABIES FROM THE INCUBATORS!

Seriously, give me a break.

Are the CPN(M) carrying out a perfect workers' revolution? No - they're not - but why the fuck would we expect one? Nepal is distinctly not a modern capitalist nation.
Are the CPN(M) committing "war crimes"? It seems likely (though, as to the degree, using Sendero, again, as a base for comparison, we can be relatively sure many charges are utter bullshit), but what can ask from a peasant revolution in one of Earth's last absolutist monarchies? Of course it's going to be bloody and unpleasant.

[Raisa]

You people act like the ones in third world countries are too stupid to have socialism.

You dress it up , but that is what I gather from it. Tell me how their the only ones making the revolution then?

[Raisa]

Originally posted by Severian+May 15 2005, 02:17 AM--> (Severian @ May 15 2005, 02:17 AM)
[email protected] 14 2005, 06:27 PM
Speaking personally, I wish every success to the great struggle to overthrow the corrupt monarchy and the caste system in Nepal.
And...here we have someone who rejects Leninism supposedly because it's authoritarian....wishing success to Pol Pot-ism. [/b]
How is what is going on in Nepal "pol-potism" ??!

I really dont know what to think of you with that, but I dont know how to see where you are coming from!

people in third world dont want feudalistic slavery anymore.....they dont even have a big mac to piss on...and they FIGHT and some of you criticise them like your countries deserve socialism and they do not......

But obviously enough people in nepal are discontented with the way the class system treats people, that they want socialism....what are they supposed to do about it?

Want socialism and fight for something else?!!

[RedStarOverChina]

I agree completely with Raisa.


You people act like the ones in third world countries are too stupid to have socialism.

Sometimes I have that rotten feeling as well; the feeling that many people here harbour prejudice against third world countries' struggles. I certainly HOPE that I'm wrong.

[Severian]

Originally posted by Lenin i [email protected] 15 2005, 03:29 PM
You know, the army that has imprisoned entire villages, commited large-scale executions and mass raped women. I say put a bullet in their heads before they can rat out on the Maoist movement in Nepal. The saying "A revolution is not a dinnerparty" comes to mind, perhaps you should give that some thought.
"The people" is an abstraction. Which people?

I acknowledge that they have the willing support of a section of the peasantry...in fact, that's implied by what I've already said, that they seem to be losing support.

The overripeness of the conditions for revolution in the world as a whole, the extremely oppressive situation in Nepal, and the lack of a revolutionary party - create a leadership vacuum which even a totally reactionary group can move into.

A couple old articles about Peru, from the Militant explaining how this type of thing can happen:
Part 1 (http://groups-beta.google.com/group/misc.activism.progressive/browse_thread/thread/62085042031f8442/685e5a6d9c70247b?tvc=2&q=%22shining+path%22+%22martin+koppel%22&hl=en#685e5a6d9c70247b)
Part 2 (http://groups-beta.google.com/group/misc.activism.progressive/browse_thread/thread/66024e43ffbac1a7/9828c8bf9a58d8a5?tvc=2&hl=en#9828c8bf9a58d8a5)

It has won support among peasants by promising "land to those who till it." In areas under their control the guerrillas execute landlords, judges, and other corrupt authorities.

In coca-producing areas Sendero offers coca farmers protection from the government and abusive drug traffickers in exchange for support and payment of "taxes."

Above all what Shining Path offers is "order." The group sets up its so-called people's committees in rural villages that establish strict rules for conducting local affairs and organizing agricultural work. The committee of five is run by a Sendero cadre, who "represents the proletariat," as one of its documents states.

A New York Times reporter recently described his visit to Raucana, a shantytown outside of Lima that is run by Shining Path. "Protected by high walls, watchtowers and trenches, squatters collectively dug wells, raised light poles and laid out streets," he observed. "A square was designated for people's trials and public whippings of prostitutes, thieves, homosexuals, drug users and wife beaters."

The appeals to order, stability, a strict moral code, and quasi-religious worship of a "wise" supreme authority, President Gonzalo, are particularly directed to women. The burden of the social breakdown falls especially hard on women in the countryside, who are responsible not only for child-rearing but often for feeding the family as men migrate to the cities in search of work.

In spite of its demagogy Shining Path is no friend of peasants. "At first the Senderos seemed good because they imposed order against the authorities who had committed abuses," explained one refugee from a rural village. "But then
they showed their fangs, because they not only demanded food and lodging from us but began to take away our children and husbands to attack other communities. They also began to demand our domestic animals to feed the 'comrades.'"

The Maoists have also benefited from a military vacuum...the Nepalese army is exceptionally ineffective, and was not even deployed against them until they had taken 22 of Nepal's 75 districts.


These "workers" you speak of, they don't happen to be informers for the police and the army?

No. Try to get some information on the situation other than the propaganda of one group. You, like other posters in this thread, have made no serious effort to engage the facts I've presented.

Since you reject the bourgeois media, here's the webpage of one of the main union federations in Nepal (http://www.gefont.org/political_update/conflict_compilation.htm#conflict) (and probably the most militant of them)

Tulasi Chaudhary, Central Committee Member of Federation of Agricultural Workers of Nepal (FAWN), a resident of Dang district was kidnapped by Maoists and so badly beaten that his both hands and leg are broken. The event took place in September 2004. He is still in the hospital in Kathmandu and will have to remain for 6 months in the hospital. His treatment is being done by the donations and assistance from GEFONT and civil society organizations. Enclosed picture itself tells story how Maoists damaged his both legs & hands after abduction.

They give numerous similar examples. Note as well the opposition of actual workers' organizations to the Maoists' phony "strikes" - in reality blockades based solely on attacks and threats against bus drivers and other workers.

[Severian]

Unless you go there (and assuming you speak the language fluently) and, further, that people there have some reason to think you are trustworthy and speak freely and frankly to you...it looks very "crystal ballish" to me.

Well, gee, if the situation was really that unknowable...logically you oughta reserve judgement, and not take a position.

But in fact there are people who have done all the things you mention, and more...these people are called.....Nepalese. No voice coming out of Nepal, other than the Maoists themselves, disputes that they are carrying out terrorism against the workers and peasants.

I've linked the statements of a number of them. I'm gonna give some more info at the bottom of this post.

But some people are more interested in some anonymous guy who claims to be a Nepalese Maoist but turns out to be posting from an internet address in Saudi Arabia. How many people in Nepal do you think have internet access, anyway?


Remember the stuff that the New York Times published about the Bolsheviks and Russia from 1917-1922?

In reality, the bourgeois media does not usually say the same kind of stuff about revolutionary movements as they do about Sendero and the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist.) Every informed observer recognizes those two are different and worse than other guerilla groups, and the Khmer Rouge comparison is made much more frequently than it is to other guerilla groups.


I don't deny the possibility that you may be right -- that the Nepalese Maoists "are nutballs" who kill everyone who isn't part of their movement and will slaughter millions if they come to power...whatever.

Who are you quoting? Not me, nor have I mentioned any numbers - for Cambodia or Nepal. But anyway....

I see...it's possible, but you don't seem to much care. ("Whatever"?!) At any rate, you can't be bothered to find out before endorsing their armed campaign.


To repeat a point that I've made in threads similar to this one: peasant revolutions are dirty.

This is not a peasant revolution. It is not any kind of revolution. Counterrevolution would be closer. Yes, revolutions are messy. This, however, is not mess: it is regimentation enforced by systematic terror against working people.

It's methods are not the methods of the Chinese Revolution, or the Vietnamese Revolution...let alone the Cuban Revolution.

There seems to be an attitude here that Nepalese peasants are just ignorant savages so you can't expect anything better from them...in fact, some of the most poor and oppressed people on earth have produced revolutionary movements and leaders...just because the objective conditions for socialism don't exist doesn't mean that people can't fight in a progressive direction.

The Burkina Faso revolution came out of a situation even more backward than Nepal...the contrast in their political approaches could not be more stark.

****
More fun with people who "go there" - indeed, live there - and "speak the language fluently":

Interview with the leader of the Communist Party of Nepal (United Marxist-Leninist) (http://www.time.com/time/asia/2004/nepal_king/nepal_intvu_madhav.html)

Apparently the largest workers' party in Nepal, and its stance towards the guerillas seems to be shared by the numerous other parties calling themselves Communist or Marxist-Leninist. (A number of these, including the CPN(UML) itself, seem to come partly out of a Maoist background. It doesn't matter your exact ideology, RL posters, the Chairman Prachandra will be happy to have your arms and legs broken regardless.)

TIME: What about their claim to be the only ones to represent the people, particularly the poor?
Nepal: I told them, 'I don't think you will be in a position to sustain a regime even if you win the war. Your policies are not acceptable: the whole world knows the fate of Pol Pot. You believe in one-party rule, one-party dictatorship and no one will support that. You are cutting off people's heads, taking out their eyes, committing the most inhuman barbarity. Even if anyone dares raise a finger to you, you kill them.' That sort of ideology will not maintain order for long, and they will not be able to sustain their rule as their policies will not be digestible to the international community. The practice of the Maoists is that of terrorism. Every day there are more reports that they are not sparing innocent people. Of course, they denied this was their policy, said such acts were not carried out on their instruction and if they did happen, they were investigated and the guilty were punished.

Indeed, he goes further than I would: People will not accept an autocratic monarchy, neither will they accept an autocratic dictatorial one-party system. We must transform both sides, although it is true to say that the democracy of the King is better than the democracy of the Maoists.

From the party's website, probably a document from a couple years back (http://www.cpnuml.org/analysis.html):
This party has started to make physical attack on the cadres and sympathisers of the CPN (UML) after its wrong and misleading propaganda against the UML failed to produce any effect. We must resist, oppose and expose such terrorist and violent actions of this party both ideologically and politically. In addition to an extensive denunciation for their terrorist and criminal actions, they should also be retaliated strongly if they mount an attack against us. Our party, therefore, must formulate a plan to seriously face the CPN(Maoist)'s dogmatist and ultra-leftist thinking as well as its terrorist activities.

Oh, more fun with Nepalese guerilla comments on the Khmer Rouge: (http://www.insof.org/politics/Mahara_cnn.html) (From one of their websites, for those with bourgeois-media denial issues)

CNN: The U.S. government says you are like the Khmer Rouge, that you use the same tactics the Khmer Rouge used in the 1970's. How would you like to respond to that?

Mahara: We do adopt the strategies and tactics of all the past wars fought for the freedom of people all over the world. But we don't do that mechanically.

The allegations that we fight like the Khmer Rouge are absolutely wrong. We are fighting for our cause in our own style. According to the geography, the enemy and the situation of Nepal, we are fighting according to that.

So we can be comforted to know they will carry out mass murder "for the freedom of people all over the world"...but only in a distinctively Nepalese "style."

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 15 2005, 11:54 PM
But obviously enough people in nepal are discontented with the way the class system treats people, that they want socialism....what are they supposed to do about it?

Want socialism and fight for something else?!!
Without getting into tactical questions, I support workers and farmers fighting to take political power into their own hands, in every country on earth. There are plenty of actual struggles by workers and farmers in the world, from France to India, people who have any feel for them at all don't need to go chasing after reactionary groups.

Like other posters in this thread, you haven't engaged my point...that the guerillas in Nepal in no way represent a movement of working people, but a petty-bourgeois sect that directs its violence in part against working people. Nor the facts presented in support of this point.

Some more lovely examples of this. (http://www.nepalnews.com.np/ntimes/issue85/fromthenepalipress.htm#3)

[Martin Blank]

Originally posted by Lenin i [email protected] 14 2005, 11:33 AM
Every comrade in Nepal has my unconditional support. To fail to do such is betrayal of the masses in Nepal. Even worse to brush them off as "terrorists" or "human rights abusers" on the basis of some articles in the bourgeious media. You should be ashamed of yourself Severian!
Well, before comrades begin to get really worked up about Severian's comments, let's not forget that he supports a political organization (the Socialist Workers Party U.S.) that backed Khomeini's mullahs during the 1979 Iranian Revolution and lined up with Bush-Cheney during the 2000 constitutional crisis (just two of many examples, I might add). "By your friends, ye shall be known," as the saying goes.

Miles

[Hiero]

So Severian what do you propose.

Anarchist teenagers expressing some act of love in the street.

You are being Chauvinist, you think they Nepalese are idiots, that they don't have a clue in the whole matter and are just following orders from some central party?

Who are able to smash the Monarchy, install a socialist government and be anti imperialist?

The Maoists.

Who should we support whether we are Trot, Communist, Anarchist?

No question the Maoists.

[redstar2000]

Originally posted by Severian+--> (Severian)The overripeness of the conditions for revolution in the world as a whole, the extremely oppressive situation in Nepal, and the lack of a revolutionary party - create a leadership vacuum which even a totally reactionary group can move into.[/b]--emphasis added.

Didn't you know that was coming?

The Maoists in Nepal are "totally reactionary" and what's even "worse"...there's no Trotskyist party on the scene!

:o :o :o

Severian has a rather unique way of looking at "third world" struggles.

1. If there are no Trotskyist parties leading the masses, then the people who are leading must be "totally reactionary".

2. And therefore, whatever bad things are said about them in the bourgeois media can be accepted as true.

3. And those bad things, in turn, "prove" that the non-Trotskyists really are "totally reactionary".

Or, in short, only Trotskyist parties can be truly revolutionary...anywhere.


The Burkina Faso revolution came out of a situation even more backward than Nepal...the contrast in their political approaches could not be more stark.

The Burkina Faso revolution?

Well, life is full of surprises...I was completely unaware that there was such a thing as the "Burkina Faso revolution".

Is Burkina Faso a Trotskyist "workers' state" now?

Perhaps you should enlighten us on this completely unexpected development.


Originally posted by CP-[email protected]
We must transform both sides, although it is true to say that the democracy of the King is better than the democracy of the Maoists.

Ok, those guys have said outright that they support the "King's democracy" (:lol:) and so the Nepalese Maoists physically attack them.

Isn't that what you do to guys who are on the other side?


Nepal News
A superb indication of our commitment in this field is that the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) recognizes us as the number one site on news about Nepal and have given us permission to host their daily Nepali broadcast segment. We are also recognized by CNN and various other web sites.

Nepalnews.com offers its services to consumers free-of-charge and will derive its revenues from advertisers and e-commerce merchants. We pledge to provide the advertisers and the marketing community with the imperious proposition of reaching a highly targeted, self-segmenting audience of consumers at the time they are considering purchases.

Severian's source is a Nepalese bourgeois news service...clearly dedicated to telling "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth" about the Maoists in Nepal. :D

If the BBC, CNN, and Severian endorse their reliability, how can we dare do otherwise?

Pretty easy, actually. :lol:

http://www.websmileys.com/sm/cool/123.gif

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 16 2005, 02:17 AM

Well, before comrades begin to get really worked up about Severian's comments, let's not forget that he supports a political organization (the Socialist Workers Party U.S.) that backed Khomeini's mullahs during the 1979 Iranian Revolution and lined up with Bush-Cheney during the 2000 constitutional crisis (just two of many examples, I might add). "By your friends, ye shall be known," as the saying goes.
Which is, of course, lies. Pure factionalism. And irrelevant to the issue at hand. One more poster who refuses to engage the facts and arguments I've given.

[viva le revolution]

Nice to have another comrade from south-east asia! Aksh, are you still in Nepal, I'm from Pakistan myself. I fully support the Maoist revolution in Nepal. People who criticised the movement as pol-potist have obviously watched a little too much of CNN and Fox news! Making sweeping generalizations about a movement based on the bourgeois media is like a slap in face of our cause!
I am currently active myself distributing translated marxist literature in the FATA regions of Pakistan. Look forward to hearing more about the developments in Nepal and the struggle against corrupt Monarchs and Royalists!

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 16 2005, 09:40 AM
Severian has a rather unique way of looking at "third world" struggles.

1. If there are no Trotskyist parties leading the masses, then the people who are leading must be "totally reactionary".
Hmm...so right next to each other, we have a post accusing me of supporting Khomeini and Bush....and another making the opposite accusation, that I support nobody but Trotskyists. Both are false, of course. As anybody whose read any of my many posts on the Cuban Revolution knows. Redstar included, of course.

My criterion is class not ideology and certainly not self-applied historical label. This is very hard for some people to understand since they are so far from the approach of the Communist Manifesto: having "no interests separate and apart from those of the working class as a whole." Redstar, for example, uses the criterion of what's bad for U.S. imperialism, not what increases the consciousness and organization of the workers.

From 1985-87, Burkina Faso had a revolutionary workers and farmers government headed by Thomas Sankara. You could tell because of its actions.

And of course I don't compare all Stalinist-led struggles to the Khmer Rouge, either: just Nepal and Peru. Because of their actions.

Which you, and other posters, are still refusing to deal with.

Basically, we have a lot of distractions being thrown out there by people who can't even attempt to refute the points I've made.


Ok, those guys have said outright that they support the "King's democracy" (laugh.gif) and so the Nepalese Maoists physically attack them.

Isn't that what you do to guys who are on the other side?

Refused to follow that link or any other, didn't you?

In fact, the Communist Party of Nepal (UML) is part of the opposition to the absolute monarchy. Their point is that the Maoists are worse, not that the king is good.

And no, revolutionaries don't shoot people for politically supporting the regime. Revolutionaries target enemy combatants. That was the practice of the Cuban Revolution, especially.


Severian's source is a Nepalese bourgeois news service

Wow, what a discovery. Welcome to the ranks of those who use this excuse to deny everything inconvenient....as I said before.

And of course I've given other sources: a Nepalese workers' party, a labor federation, an ex-guerilla (who's still in opposition to the monarchy, and was apparently jailed along with student activists in 2004), interviews with the guerilla leaders...

[Anarcho-Communist]

As long as a leader of the maoists is in place they will have a hard time crushing them!

good luck for the peoples war!

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 16 2005, 03:42 PM
As long as a leader of the maoists is in place they will have a hard time crushing them!
An interesting point here...a turning point in the demise of the Shining Path was the capture of their semi-divine leader and his subsequent "repentance" probably under torture...the destructive effect this had on Shining Path was probably due to the personality cult.

There is a similar cult around Prachandra and his holy writ, now officially labelled "Prachandra Path".

Another source:
Human Rights Watch on the conflict in Nepal - "Between a Rock and a Hard Place" referring to the atrocities of both the government and the Maoists. (http://www.hrw.org/reports/2004/nepal1004/)

From Section V:

The Maoists are responsible for a significant number of summary executions of civilians. Often, the executions are preceded by torture of the victims, which in many cases is done publicly in front of villagers and family members. The Maoists tend to target particular individuals for assassination or execution, particularly suspected government informants, local political activists or non-Maoist party officials, local government officials and civil servants, and individuals who refuse extortion demands from the Maoists. The Maoists are also responsible for executions of off-duty army and police officers, often capturing them when they go to their villages to visit family members. In the vast majority of cases, the Maoists officially claim responsibility for their killings, explaining that the executed individuals were “informers,” a vague charge which encompasses any act which defies Maoist dictates. Typically, the Maoists will return to the village of their victim, and inform the family or villagers of the killing. In more high profile cases, such as the murder of Ganesh Chilawal summarized below, the Maoists will post an article on their website describing the murder as a significant success in their “march towards victory.”

Because the Maoists often kill individuals to punish them for rejecting Maoist rule—that is, collaborating with the government, engaging in non-Maoist political activities, refusing to pay extortion—the Maoists often carry out their executions in plain view, and occasionally demand that local villagers and family members of the victims be present during the killings in an attempt to ensure the maximum deterrent effect on the population. In other words, the Maoists clearly use targeted killings to intimidate local villagers, ensuring that villagers know that deviance from Maoist demands will result in a brutal death. Because the killings are aimed at instilling fear, they are often accompanied by horrific torture and slow and painful killing methods, making the victim suffer for hours before death. In other cases, Maoists simply execute their victims with a single gunshot.

An official of the Nepal Human Rights Commission explained to Human Rights Watch that the “killings from the side of the Maoists were intended to terrorize the population,” and that such killings, particularly the killings of suspected informants, were often “unimaginably brutal,” involving mutilations such as cutting out the tongues of victims, breaking individual's bones until the death of the victim, and burning victims alive.142 The head of Nepal’s leading human rights organization, INSEC, similarly confirmed that his organization had documented that torture was used in the majority of killings committed by Maoists, and explained that his organization had documented many cases where victims had their bones broken or had been mutilated and tortured prior to death.143

The impact of the Maoists’ campaign of killings is clearly visible in Nepal. A single Maoist murder sends an effective message to an entire area and makes the local population acutely aware of the consequences of arousing the suspicion of the Maoists. In many of the villages visited by Human Rights Watch in Maoist-controlled areas, villagers were simply too terrified to even discuss any Maoist violations in the area. The extreme brutality of the Maoist killings, as well as the remoteness of the areas in which some of the worst abuses have been reported, makes investigating Maoist abuses in Nepal much more difficult than documenting government abuses. In rural Nepal, almost every village has Maoist informers (reportedly often children) and publicly discussing Maoist abuses could have dire consequences. In contrast, the government forces have only an occasional presence in rural Nepal when they move through on operations, so local villagers do not fear negative consequences from discussing government abuses.
.....
The continued targeting of peaceful non-Maoist political activists by the Maoists is a particularly troubling trend, and demonstrates the Maoists’ intolerance for political opposition to their absolute control. Many of the political activists murdered by the Maoists committed no greater crime than continuing their membership in non-Maoist political organizations such as the Nepali Congress or the United Marxist Leninists, and many were popularly elected by the local civilian population. The Maoists' ongoing campaign of murder against their peaceful political opponents reveals that they brook no opposition, and belies their public advocacy for a democratic state.
......
Summary Execution of anti-Maoist human rights activist Ganesh Chilawal, Kathmandu, February 15, 2004

Ganesh Chilawal, a thirty-five-year old man, was gunned down in broad daylight by the Maoists for his work advocating on behalf of victims of Maoist abuses. Chilawal was an active member of the Nepali Congress Party. In 1998, he was attacked by Maoists in his village home for his pro-Congress activities. He had been cut all over his body, and had to be hospitalized for three months. After this experience, he founded the Maoist Victims Association, an NGO working to help civilians who had been victimized in different ways by the Maoists. As part of this work, Chilawal spoke out openly against the abuses suffered by the persons who sought the support of his organization.

The Maoists started threatening Chilawal directly. He received threats to his life through letters, faxes and telephone calls. His family told him to stop; they knew from his first experience that the Maoists could be very brutal in their assaults. But Chilawal persisted in his work helping victims, and denouncing the Maoists, going so far as provocatively burning an effigy of the leaders of the Maoist movement in public.

On February 15, 2004, the family noticed an increase in the number of phone calls and faxes threatening Chilawal’s life. It was a Sunday, and his family urged him to stay at home, not to go to work that day. But he had meetings scheduled, and he went to his office. His office workers noticed nothing unusual. At the end of the day, at 5:10 p.m., Chilawal came out of his office to go back to his house. As he came down the stairs, five rounds of bullets were fired at him. He collapsed and died almost instantly. His office workers rushed out and noticed a motorbike with two men speeding away. The Maoists have since claimed responsibility for Chilawal’s murder, even posting his murder as a success on their website.

Human Rights Watch gives other similar examples.

[Bolshevist]

Originally posted by [email protected] 16 2005, 09:42 PM
As long as a leader of the maoists is in place they will have a hard time crushing them!

good luck for the peoples war!
I agree. And ignore herr Severian, he is nothing but a anti-communist and anti-revolutionary "comrade"

[Anarcho-Communist]

severian be gone this is all about fighting for the freedom that the maoists once had, give them luck, they may not make it but have faith in them...

[redstar2000]

In many of the villages visited by Human Rights Watch in Maoist-controlled areas, villagers were simply too terrified to even discuss any Maoist violations in the area.

That would be...

1. We "know" that Maoists are guilty of horrible atrocities because of stories told by Nepalese villagers.

2. But if the Nepalese villagers have no atrocities to report, that's because they are too terrified of the Maoists to speak freely.

3. So the Maoists are "guilty"...no matter what the villagers say or don't say.

Hey, that's pretty neat! Let's see the Maoists squirm out of that one! :lol:


In rural Nepal, almost every village has Maoist informers (reportedly often children) and publicly discussing Maoist abuses could have dire consequences.

Goddam sneaky kids! :lol:


The Maoists' ongoing campaign of murder against their peaceful political opponents reveals that they brook no opposition, and belies their public advocacy for a democratic state.

Yes, the Nepalese Maoists are definitely not bourgeois "democrats".

Scandalous! :lol:


After this experience, he founded the Maoist Victims Association, an NGO working to help civilians who had been victimized in different ways by the Maoists.

Interesting...who put up the money?

One of these days, by the way, we ought to have a discussion of "NGOs"...they are often not quite what they seem.


Originally posted by Severian
As anybody whose read any of my many posts on the Cuban Revolution knows. Redstar included, of course.

Yes, I am aware of your consistent and, indeed, uncritical support of the Castro government. Perhaps you think of them as de facto Trotskyists...I don't know.

What I do know is that you seem to be developing a position that at least strongly implies that only Trotskyist parties can be truly revolutionary.

You've condemned the Iraqi resistance as "Sunni supremacist", Peru's Shining Path and now Nepal's Maoists as "utterly reactionary Pol Pot-ist". I surmise that, if you are consistent, you likely have similar views of the FARC and the ELN.

The "dead give-away" is your use of the phrase the lack of a revolutionary party...by your standards, Maoists in the "third world" can't be revolutionaries. No matter how many guerrilla struggles they begin or, for all I know, no matter how many they win...they're "not Trotskyist" and "therefore" cannot be "real revolutionaries".

And, therefore, are "unworthy" of our support.

As I said earlier, this is a "unique" view of "third world" struggles...holding them to a standard that they probably will never meet.


Redstar, for example, uses the criterion of what's bad for U.S. imperialism, not what increases the consciousness and organization of the workers.

Shame on me! :lol:

Well, it's like this. The victories of U.S. imperialism in recent decades effectively "close off" any significant opportunities for "increasing the consciousness and organization of the workers"...as we have, in fact, seen with our own eyes.

Successful imperialism creates a reactionary political climate in the working class...even when their objective material conditions are deteriorating.

Unsuccessful imperialism has the opposite effect...when imperialism suffers defeat, the working class -- or at least a significant portion of it -- begins to sharply question the whole set-up.

That doesn't mean, in a simple-minded way, that imperialist defeat leads directly to a revolutionary situation at home.

But it points things in that direction. The "consciousness and organization of the workers" can increase as a consequence of imperial defeat...in a way that simply doesn't happen in periods of imperial victory.

Accordingly, it's in our direct class interests to support anti-imperialist struggles wherever they happen and whatever their political character.

That doesn't mean creating or spreading illusions about what sort of regimes those struggles will end up constructing...the Nepalese Maoists will undoubtedly set up a one-party despotism that will be very harsh with landowners and "high caste" individuals. It will not be "heaven" or have anything in common with Marxism except a few scraps of terminology.

So what?

What it will do is boost the morale of Maoist revolutionaries in other countries, encouraging them to step up their own anti-imperialist struggles...in places where the U.S. will "take the hit" much more than is the case with Nepal.

In particular, a Maoist victory in Nepal could have tremendous influence on India...and a Maoist revolution in India would have a huge impact on the whole existing global structure of imperialism.

I'm not predicting that...but it's certainly something to keep in mind.

http://www.websmileys.com/sm/cool/123.gif

[jcbn]

Reports from "Human Rights Watch" should be taken with a grain of salt. It's not an impartial or independent organization. Rather, it's tied to the US foreign policy establishment at the highest levels.

One example of HRW's blatant lack of balance, of the top of my head, was their approach to the 2002 US-backed coup in Venezuela. HRW didn't condemn the coup or the Constitution-violating coupmakers who overthrew democratically-elected president Hugo Chavez. Instead, HRW just called on the coupmakers to behave themselves.

Here's an article on HRW, hosted on a libertarian antiwar site, with some good research on its board members: (http://www.antiwar.com/rep/treanor1.html).

[Martin Blank]

Originally posted by [email protected] 16 2005, 05:28 PM
Which is, of course, lies. Pure factionalism. And irrelevant to the issue at hand. One more poster who refuses to engage the facts and arguments I've given.
Lies? No. I actually read The Militant.

Factionalism? No. Not a member of the SWP (wouldn't want to be, either).

Irrelevant? No. These examples -- a couple among many -- point out the "through-the-looking-glass" method of the Barnesites.

Your "facts" are culled from the bourgeois "media". Your arguments are shaped by those "facts". Arguing with you on such a basis would be like arguing about the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela with someone who parrots Washington's line.

Oh, wait....

Miles

[Red Heretic]

Sevarian, Maoists oppose Pol Potism, and Pol Pot oposed Maoism. Pol Pot ad ties with the REVISIONISTS in China, not the Maoists.

http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/faq/polpot.html

[American_Trotskyist]

Are the Maoist fighting a Marxist War? No

Most people know my view on Maoism, regurgitated Stalinism in an even more reactionary form, but lets save that for another time.

Are the peasants with the Maoists? I certainly appears so.

Were the tactics of Sendero taking grain and animals to feed themselves justified? Yes, even the Bolsheviks took food forcefully and as for the animals, it is better to not have Spot than have a human starve to death

Are the 'Reports' accurate? No. The New York Times is just another paper owned by the ruling class, their facts are usually manipulated and sometimes falsified. Are they usable? No.

The Maoists hardly even have program and are in the most opportunist group I have seen, appealing to bourgeois parties, as a petty bourgeois movement they seek to create a "People's", grouping all classes into a "People", revolution, allowing the merchants and new Kulaks to enter. Have the even gone as far as to ask the Indian Bourgeois class to intervene to save, "Democracy"?

No the Maoist aren't a liberation group for the workers, but they certainly aren't what the capitalist say and I find it hard to believe that anyone would regurgitate their lies to defend a Marxist position.

Could they lead to Pol Potism? Quite possible since Pol Potism is just the logical end of Maoism, a backward movement in an even more backward country, it all depends if they can survive.

[Djehuti]

I wish luck to the peasants (in absence of the weak bourgeoisie) capitalist revolution in Nepal. Establishing primitive accumulation is unfortunatly always a violent (yet necessary) business.

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 17 2005, 11:24 PM
Were the tactics of Sendero taking grain and animals to feed themselves justified? Yes, even the Bolsheviks took food forcefully and as for the animals, it is better to not have Spot than have a human starve to death
Heh. I suspect livestock is meant here. And what do you think happens, exactly, to peasants who have lost their livestock and crops, if not starvation?

Revolutionary guerillas typically try to make sure their taxation falls mostly on the upper classes and imposes no undue burden on the peasants or other working people.

As even Mao said (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-4/mswv4_23.htm) "Don't take a single needle or piece of thread from the masses." The forces he led in fact tried to follow such a policy and as a result won the voluntary support of the peasants and ultimately defeated the Japanese and Kuomintang.

Also, here we have another poster acknowledging the result might well be another Cambodia...but seeming not to care.

In addition to the obvious disaster this would represent for Nepal's working people, and for any prospect of their revolutionary self-organization, lemme just point out this would be a disaster for communism worldwide.

In the aftermath of the fall of the USSR and Eastern European regimes, it's more imperative than ever to emphasize that communism does not represent bureaucratic tyranny. Another Cambodia, at this time, would contribute greatly to further discrediting the very idea of communism.

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 16 2005, 07:07 PM
The "dead give-away" is your use of the phrase the lack of a revolutionary party...by your standards, Maoists in the "third world" can't be revolutionaries. No matter how many guerrilla struggles they begin or, for all I know, no matter how many they win...they're "not Trotskyist" and "therefore" cannot be "real revolutionaries".

The concept of the need for a revolutionary party is Leninist...as you oughta know from your incessant polemics against that Leninist concept. I have no need to "develop" any line on the need for a revolutionary party in every country, or the distinction between revolutionary anti-imperialist and bourgeois nationalist forces (eg Iraqi Baathists)...as the early Communist International took care of that quite well IMO.

The Cuban Communist Party is, well, communist. Judging by their actions. All other political forces can be evaluated based on their actions. What a concept, huh? 'Course applying this requires gathering and evaluating facts, which I realize is way too much work for you.

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 16 2005, 07:36 PM
Reports from "Human Rights Watch" should be taken with a grain of salt. It's not an impartial or independent organization.
That's true of anything. Nobody is unbiased. Including antiwar.com, as we'll see in a minute.


Rather, it's tied to the US foreign policy establishment at the highest levels.

Eh...it's a bourgeois organization, certainly. And all the organizations of the ruling class are tied together. But it's also often critical of U.S. policy, including three articles on U.S. torture policy on its site's front page right now. And one on the Nepalese government's repression. It's not unusual for HRW to take positions that are held by neither the Democratic nor Republican party, e.g. opposing the embargo on Cuba.


One example of HRW's blatant lack of balance, of the top of my head, was their approach to the 2002 US-backed coup in Venezuela. HRW didn't condemn the coup or the Constitution-violating coupmakers who overthrew democratically-elected president Hugo Chavez. Instead, HRW just called on the coupmakers to behave themselves.

That sounds more like an example of too much balance. As a Marxist, I'm not convinced balance, neutrality, or fence-sitting is such a wonderful thing. Part of the "neutrality" of "human rights organizations" is typically refusing to take sides on who the legitimate government is and things of that nature.


Here's an article on HRW, hosted on a libertarian antiwar site, with some good research on its board members: (http://www.antiwar.com/rep/treanor1.html).

Hm. Well, I won't dispute what he says about the board members; I already figured it was a bourgeois organization.

What he says about its record seems distorted, and Comes from somebody who opposes human rights anyway. (http://web.inter.nl.net/users/Paul.Treanor/human-rights.html) So his criticism is not so much that HRW is failing to act on its stated principles, but opposition to those principles.

The rightists who run antiwar.com are often critical of "democratism", as Patrick Buchanan calls it. Basically they think U.S. foreign policy should be run on the basis of naked national interest ("America First")rather than under a veil of promoting democracy. For one thing Buchanan and some of the others ain't so enthusiastic about democracy.

Dunno how to characterize Treanor's overall politics, but that right-wing opposition to "democratism" is probably why antiwar.com chose to run the column.

Incidentally Amnesty International makes similar statements about the Maoists (http://web.amnesty.org/report2004/npl-summary-eng)

[Anarchist Freedom]

I support the maoists Because As far as I can tell from here is that everything is good. When I read the Interview with the maoists by one of the RCP members it was a great read! It did not once mention avakian there great leader. I would suggest that people read the interview. Many of the people involved in this war are teenagers like myself who believe strongly in revolutionary politics. The police go into these villages burning them to the ground raping women beating children.


We speak harshly of the as far as we know non existant human right abuses of the maoists when the people there fighting against are performing by far worse acts of human right abuse.

As far as I can tell some of the things the maoists did like abduct communist party leaders who where AGAINST the peoples war was fine. But your putting to much focus on the maoists and the few things they did. 90% of all the human rights abuse are by the current goverment.

[Bolshevist]

Here is the coverage of the People's War in Nepal by Li Onesto: http://rwor.org/i/nepal/nepal4.jpg

[Anarchist Freedom]

Here is the real link. (http://rwor.org/s/nepal.htm)


The link you put up is of a picture I posted the Real URL.

[bolshevik butcher]

I saw a report on the news last night that said the maoists could be destroyed in the kings latest offfensice, is this true? ;)

[flyby]

i also think that part of this issue is the clash between REAL LIFE REVOLUTION and various rigid (and even dogmatic) preconceptions.

It is important to look at politics and life as a real process, not as a jerry-rig of prejudices.

A peoples war is either supported by the people, or it fails. It either serves the peastant masses, and is supported by them (including with food and new recruits) or it fails.

It is easy for people sitting in imperialist countries to denounce the revolutionaries for getting food from the people.... but what are they supposed to do? Helicopter in MREs from some warehouse in south carolina!!?

Similarly: what should be the revolutionary approach to the middle classes?

Someone in this thread implied that it was crudely opportunist to relate to middle class forces and parties....

but if you are close to seizing power (as they are in Nepal) -- then they are exactly at the point of finding ways to bring new and broad forces into supporting the new revolutionary order.

As part of the revolutionary process, the "center" doesn't hold, and a new polarization starts to emerge. And the forces of the revolutionary proletariat can build broad support for a new system

And so, there is an importance to bringing close those parties and forces that can be ripped away from the old order, and can (in one way or another) support the new system.

Is it opportunism to do this? Well, it can be done in an opportunist way, or in a revolutionary way.

But certainly it would be wrong (and self-defeating) to insist that the revolution can't seek allies (even vacillating and temporary allies) as it reaches for the final conquest of power.

--------------------------------------------------

And, finally, I have written before about Severian's mechanical thinking... And won't waste anyone's time here.

But there is a crude (and almost silly) formulaic thinking that goes on. It starts like this: "Pol Pot killed to many people. Sendero Luminoso of Peru is like Pol Pot. the CPN(M) upholds Sendero, so they must be like Pol Pot. So therefore when bourgeois forces in Nepal accuse the Maoists of attrocities, I'm inclined to believe them, and promote their stories as the truth."

If you think of it, this is based in a series of false leaps. Actually the PCP of peru is nothing like Pol Pot. The CPN(M) upholds the PCP (and is together with them in the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement) -- but anyone with eyes can see that their approach is rather different from the PCP in many ways.

This kind of approach is the opposite of a real, materialist approach to truth. It is an idealist method of apriori thinking. (Another example, i've seen on this mesage board a lot: Mao upheld stalin by saing that he was overall revolutionary and should be evaluated as 70/30, therefore Mao must have been a "stalinist," and therefore we can reject the whole chinese revolution and Maoism without bothering to even know anything about it. and so on.)

You can't understand the world like that. You just make embarassingly mechanical arguments in public, that can't really convince anyone capable of critical thought.

[jcbn]

Originally posted by [email protected] 18 2005, 09:02 AM
Eh...it's a bourgeois organization, certainly. And all the organizations of the ruling class are tied together. But it's also often critical of U.S. policy, including three articles on U.S. torture policy on its site's front page right now. And one on the Nepalese government's repression. It's not unusual for HRW to take positions that are held by neither the Democratic nor Republican party, e.g. opposing the embargo on Cuba.
HRW is not only a bourgeois organization, it's an imperialist organization directed by former US state department staffers, academic fellow-travelers, and individuals tied to the George Soros brand of "liberal" US hegemony. Just because it might disagree with Bush 2's torture policy or the Cuban embargo doesn't change the fact that this organization is an avowed opponent of all movements in the world fighting US imperialism. Its disagreements with US foreign policy revolve around tactics not ends.


That sounds more like an example of too much balance.

No, failing to condemn the April 2002 coup isn't "too much balance," especially since HRW has devoted far more energy to undermining the legitimacy of the democratically-elected Chavez government. It shows that HRW is on the side of the Venezuelan opposition (http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/articles.php?artno=1200).


What he says about its record seems distorted, and Comes from somebody who opposes human rights anyway. (http://web.inter.nl.net/users/Paul.Treanor/human-rights.html) So his criticism is not so much that HRW is failing to act on its stated principles, but opposition to those principles.

As I said in my original post, I linked to the article from antiwar.com because it profiles each of the members on HRW's board of directors, demonstrating the ideological and material linkages between this so-called "human rights organization" and the US state. The author's politics or antiwar.com's politics aren't the issue here.

On the other hand, you posted an excerpt from a HRW report on Nepal without any sort of preface, explanation, or commentary (critical or otherwise), so what are we supposed to assume, except that you consider it a credible source?

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 18 2005, 04:44 PM
HRW is not only a bourgeois organization, it's an imperialist organization
Which, in the U.S. and other advanced capitalist countries, are two words for the same thing.


the fact that this organization is an avowed opponent of all movements in the world fighting US imperialism.

Is this a fact? When exactly did they "avow" that?


Its disagreements with US foreign policy revolve around tactics not ends.

Again, redundant. True of all disagreements among bourgeois forces. Those disagreements are, nevertheless, useful in assessing conditions and situations.


On the other hand, you posted an excerpt from a HRW report on Nepal without any sort of preface, explanation, or commentary (critical or otherwise), so what are we supposed to assume, except that you consider it a credible source?

I do consider it a credible source. HRW is usually factually accurate. Which is more than I can say for RCP publications.

I've even used HRW (and Amnesty Int) to defend Cuba by pointing out the contrast between its reports on Cuba and those on bourgeois democracies in Latin America. Cuba comes off looking pretty damn good...keeping in mind the objective conditions and that the criteria of bourgeois democracy aren't the criteria of workers democracy. Despite all that, it comes closer to bourgeois-democratic standards than the bourgeois democrats in, say, Colombia do. And, my point is, HRW and Amnesty are facually accurate enough that comparing their reports shows that.

I accept that you posted the Treanor piece for only one reason, and I don't dispute his list of board members...I just thought it a useful chance to comment on a couple political questions. You can't be too watchful over radical right ideas creeping left.

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 18 2005, 01:52 PM
But there is a crude (and almost silly) formulaic thinking that goes on. It starts like this: "Pol Pot killed to many people. Sendero Luminoso of Peru is like Pol Pot. the CPN(M) upholds Sendero, so they must be like Pol Pot. So therefore when bourgeois forces in Nepal accuse the Maoists of attrocities, I'm inclined to believe them, and promote their stories as the truth."
Heh. No. I didn't assume the CPN(M) were like Sendero just because they belong to the same international organization; I waited to see. Really, it wasn't apparent initially. But as time has gone on they've become more blatant in their use of force and terror against the workers and peasants...conscripting fighters is really not normal for guerilla armies.

As for Sendero, certainly no ideological criterion coulda led me or anyone to compare 'em to the Khmer Rouge. It was their actions.

(Plenty of Maoists ain't like the Khmer Rouge - the NPA in the Phillipines for example - and fine, I'll accept that Pol Pot wasn't a Maoist. It really doesn't matter which set of dogmas are being jammed down the throat of the workers and peasants by means of terrorism by a petty-bourgeois sect. So: no ideological criterion led anyone to draw that conclusion about Sendero.)


A peoples war is either supported by the people, or it fails. It either serves the peastant masses, and is supported by them (including with food and new recruits) or it fails.

I couldn't agree more! And in the case of Peru, we found out...it was the latter.

Our different assessments of the CPN(M)'s character lead to different predictions. It's a teensy bit like a testable hypothesis. You say "but if you are close to seizing power (as they are in Nepal)", and gaining support from broader forces. I say they're losing support, are unlikely to take power, and will eventually go the way of Sendero.

Let's see whose assessment is closer to reality. Time will tell.

***

Incidentally, that RCP stuff that was linked was exceptionally dishonest even for them. They had a bit on a "bandh" which they mistranslate "general strike"...everyone else calls these Maoist actions "blockades". It's called by an army, not a union (even the RCP article doesn't claim any union or worker support), and the way it works is: stay home or we shoot you. See the GEFONT union federation link I gave earlier.

[OleMarxco]

Originally posted by Severian+--> (Severian)Which, in the U.S. and other advanced capitalist countries, are two words for the same thing :redstar2000: [/b]

Hardly. Similar, but not necessarily THE exact alike thing-thang! But they are bound to be seen collaboratin'! :P


flyby
Similarly: What should be the revolutionary approach to the middle classes?

They will be mostly "left alone" (to a lesser extent) because that is of which the class everyone, rich and poor, will be force-melded into after the revolution, me thinkesth! ;)

[Red Heretic]

Originally posted by [email protected] 19 2005, 09:45 AM




Is this a fact? When exactly did they "avow" that?

Yes actually, the CPN practices Unity-Struggle-Transformation (called Unity-Struggle-Unity in the USA). The principle of U-S-T is that with unite with all forces that can be united, while struggling about the issues we disagree with, and then eventually there is a transformation unifying both of our lines when we come to a better understanding.


I do consider it a credible source. HRW is usually factually accurate. Which is more than I can say for RCP publications.

I've even used HRW (and Amnesty Int) to defend Cuba by pointing out the contrast between its reports on Cuba and those on bourgeois democracies in Latin America. Cuba comes off looking pretty damn good...keeping in mind the objective conditions and that the criteria of bourgeois democracy aren't the criteria of workers democracy. Despite all that, it comes closer to bourgeois-democratic standards than the bourgeois democrats in, say, Colombia do. And, my point is, HRW and Amnesty are facually accurate enough that comparing their reports shows that.

You're not going to get away with making up bullshit about the RCP's publication withoout being able to back it up. It's easy to go around claiming everyone who disagrees with you, but I personally find the RCP's book and newspaper to be some of the most enlightening I have ever come across.

As for AI and HRW reports, they are not written from an unbiased or neutral stand point. They for example, condemned the CPN once for providing courses to teenagers on how to use guns. Imagine someone teaching a group of people who live in terror from police repression to defend themselves, how horrible (/sarcasm). But really, the AI and HRW reports do not put struggle into context, or explain why maybe children need to know how to defend themselves so they aren't rounded up and exected by the police like the RNA so often does.

All documentation has bias, and to equate violence from the oppressed with the violence of the oppressor is like equating the violence of a rapist, with the violence of a woman resisting rape.

[Severian]

Originally posted by [email protected] 19 2005, 04:43 PM
As for AI and HRW reports, they are not written from an unbiased or neutral stand point. They for example, condemned the CPN once for providing courses to teenagers on how to use guns. Imagine someone teaching a group of people who live in terror from police repression to defend themselves, how horrible (/sarcasm). But really, the AI and HRW reports do not put struggle into context, or explain why maybe children need to know how to defend themselves so they aren't rounded up and exected by the police like the RNA so often does.

All documentation has bias, and to equate violence from the oppressed with the violence of the oppressor is like equating the violence of a rapist, with the violence of a woman resisting rape.
Yes, everyone's biased. None of that contradicts my statement...that HRW is usually factually accurate.


Yes actually, the CPN practices Unity-Struggle-Transformation (called Unity-Struggle-Unity in the USA). The principle of U-S-T is that with unite with all forces that can be united, while struggling about the issues we disagree with, and then eventually there is a transformation unifying both of our lines when we come to a better understanding.

Fine words, but actions speak louder. Somehow I doubt that kidnapping and torturing activists of workers' parties is part of trying to achieve unity with those parties. And for my part I wouldn't be real interested in uniting with people who are trying to break my arms and legs. If I wanted to do that, I could do it by myself.


It's easy to go around claiming everyone who disagrees with you, but I personally find the RCP's book and newspaper to be some of the most enlightening I have ever come across.


Then possibly you could stand to expand your range of reading.

I'm not going to do a general critique of RCP literature here, but I just gave an example of their massive dishonesty about the guerillas' blockades in nepal, which they mislabel general strikes. I've gone through a couple of their articles posted here in the past, on Tibet and on the Russian Revolution, and showed where they were accurate and where they were...not so accurate.


And to equate violence from the oppressed with the violence of the oppressor is like equating the violence of a rapist, with the violence of a woman resisting rape.

I agree! And to equate the revolutionary struggle of working people, on the road to their self-liberation, with a campaign of terror by a petty-bourgeois sect against working people....is just as bad.