Guerrila warfare

[forever socialist]

Guerrila warfare - the best way to spread socialism??

Like millions of people I have massive admiration for Che Guevara and follow the beliefs he died for, but were his methods the best way to spread socialism?? He could still be alive with Fidel if he haden't took the actions he did.
What your thoughts on this? ;)

[Sickle of Justice]

che is my hero because of what he did. he proved that he was a "good" communist by ignoring a chance at government power, instead going to try to spread the world revolution.

Personally, i think guerrilla warfare is possibly the best thing when it comes to resisting tyrannical governments. in the case of many countries however, it isn't really necessary. if reform/nonviolent is possible/likely guerrilla warfare should be avoided in favor of more peaceful protest.

My beleifs in dealing with governments such as the american, and my own in canada lean toward the theory of revolutionary potential. basically if a public is able to have a revolution if they wish to, reforms will be accepted. its like that V for vendetta line "people should not be afraid of their governments, governments should be afraid of their people"

but i support che. at least, what i know about che.

[Sickle of Justice]

also, though its unfortuanate that che died, im sure he had no regrets. had che taken the post castro offered him, his face would not be an icon of the movement. instead he became a martyr, and will be remembered forever as a symbol of what determined leftists can do when they organize.

[Kwisatz Haderach]

There is no single "best way" to spread socialism. Different strategies are appropriate at different times and places.

[OneBrickOneVoice]

Sickle,

Che was part of the Cuban government for a while before leaving to Congo. His most prominant post was as treasurer where just by signing his three letters, he sent the imperialists into a full fledged desperate retreat from Cuba.

Guerrilla warfare is auxilary to the people's regular army. Guerrilla bands operate in the rear of the enemy, in territories which the enemy occupies, or are half-and-half. This is the strategy of people's protracted war, and is the best tactic for waging revolution all over the world. Not only does historical evidence prove it from Vietnam to Cuba, but that is the most assured way that you gain the support of the masses.

Che's Guerrilla Warfare was Mao's people's war adjusted to the situation in Cuba. He realized in Congo and Bolivia that people's war needs to have a solid core, but is not dogmatic, and needs to be adjusted to the material conditions

[AmerGuerilla]

Guerrilla warfare is auxilary to the people's regular army. Guerrilla bands operate in the rear of the enemy, in territories which the enemy occupies, or are half-and-half. This is the strategy of people's protracted war, and is the best tactic for waging revolution all over the world. Not only does historical evidence prove it from Vietnam to Cuba, but that is the most assured way that you gain the support of the masses.

Che's Guerrilla Warfare was Mao's people's war adjusted to the situation in Cuba. He realized in Congo and Bolivia that people's war needs to have a solid core, but is not dogmatic, and needs to be adjusted to the material conditions

I would say thats inaccurate to an extent. Yes Vietnam and China were backed with guerillas and regular army, in China from what I've heard both worked succesfully, but in Vietnam guerillas were putting up an awesome resistance with major success and then the DRV launched their regulars and got demolished in their Easter Offensive. In Cuba in my mind was almost completely guerilla, they started in the mountains and built up from their, even in the cities they conducted guerilla warfare. Yea they eventually took small cities over until finally Havana but just because they occupied towns doesnt mean theyre regulars I'd say almost all of them had a guerilla lifestyle during the war.

[Question everything]

Meh... Better then sitting our asses all day posting on some leftist site... <_<

[Coggeh]

Originally posted by Question [email protected] 30, 2007 09:09 pm
Meh... Better then sitting our asses all day posting on some leftist site... <_<
Well said . Guerilla warfare can only be justified in the case of no freedom of speech ... in a society where using your voice is illegal the socialism can be fired in the form of a AK47 but only in those circumstances .

[Janus]

It really depends on geography and the context/conditions of the times.

[freakazoid]

Well said . Guerilla warfare can only be justified in the case of no freedom of speech ... in a society where using your voice is illegal the socialism can be fired in the form of a AK47 but only in those circumstances .

Not necessarily, but that is generally a good time to start if it hasn&#39;t already.

Guerrilla warfare itself can, and really should, be used by a smaller group against a much larger group. It isn&#39;t necessarily used to spread socialism as it is more used to remove the current establishment to replace it with something else, in our case socialism/communism/anarchy.

[RGacky3]

Only in a dictatorial regiem. In a country where there is somewhat of a democratic feeling, and where there are some freedoms and rights, guerillla fighters would probably have a very very hard time getting essencial support. The best way to fight Capitalism in thouse countries is to go after the Capitalist directly rather than the state that they use, that is through direct workers action. Any Guerilla warfare action in western countires would fall almost immediatly.

About Che Guevara, he was a very principled person, a very selfless person, but he was also pretty much a Stalinist, and he was also very merciless.

[abrupt]

Originally posted by Edric [email protected] 30, 2007 12:11 am
There is no single "best way" to spread socialism. Different strategies are appropriate at different times and places.
i agree with that.


as che always said "the only way for a revolution to be successful is through violence"

i dont agree with that. he said that because he was in love in guerrilla ware.



it does heavily depend on circumstances to figure out which is the best way to create socialist revolution

[Enragé]

guerilla warfare most often means a small group of people fighting, especially in western, urbanised countries. This is almost always a bad thing. Although the actions of a small group can sometimes be the catalyst for widespread unrest, revolt, revolution it often simply sets that small group apart from the people, most often alienate itself from the people, or in the best case they will be regarded as heroes, in the sense of "oh wow look what they do&#33; i could never do that&#33;".

We dont need a small group fighting, we need everyone fighting, shaping the future.

[Rawthentic]

I do see where you come from NKOS, but as someone said earlier, certain conditions call for guerrilla warfare, others don&#39;t. Take for example the US. Guerrilla warfare, if ever used, will be in times of revolutionary upsurge for reasons of sabotage and the like, but not large scale insurrection.

[Question everything]

Originally posted by [email protected] 03, 2007 12:32 am
guerilla warfare most often means a small group of people fighting, especially in western, urbanised countries. This is almost always a bad thing. Although the actions of a small group can sometimes be the catalyst for widespread unrest, revolt, revolution it often simply sets that small group apart from the people, most often alienate itself from the people, or in the best case they will be regarded as heroes, in the sense of "oh wow look what they do&#33; i could never do that&#33;".

We dont need a small group fighting, we need everyone fighting, shaping the future.
Still you couldn&#39;t exepct a socialist army to just appear in new york, it&#39;s not like we could professionally arm train and supply an organized, uniformed group before even a bullet was fired. Guerrilla warfare is an important stage of a revolution, it would isolate part of the mass but many would be inspired and won over to the cause, surley you must realize that if somebody is isolated by our actions then they do not have what is necessary to carry them out.

[Rawthentic]

You don&#39;t need some professional army; the workers arm themselves during times of intense class struggle and out of their is borne the proletarian army.

[Question everything]

Originally posted by [email protected] 03, 2007 02:09 am
You don&#39;t need some professional army; the workers arm themselves during times of intense class struggle and out of their is borne the proletarian army.

that is my point. Guerrilla armies however will one enough support comes to them, will begin to abandon guerrilla tactics, and will become (although I&#39;m aware this is an oxymoron) a standing militia, willing to fight openly and much more organized. This is just my belief though perhaps I am wrong.

[Rawthentic]

No, I think you are correct; the workers army is based on their armed councils and assemblies, soviets, etc.

[quirk]

Being from Ireland I have seen the sucesess that can be achieved by guerilla warfare in an industrialised country. In my own area of south Armagh the British army and police could not use the roads for 30 years and everything had to be done by helicopter. This was a massive propaganda victory for the IRA and gave them the freedom to operate quite openly and freely. If they had acess to good S.A.M.s orhad a better leadership(the IRA leadership were at this time winding down the war) they might have actually defeated the Brits at least in this area. Imagine what could have been done with a communist leadership.

I believed that all communists didn&#39;t believe that guerrilla warfare was posssible in industrialised countries however a few weeks ago I came across the website of the Revolutionary Communist Party of Canada (organising commitees) who are in fact proposing the launching of a peoples war in Canada. This is a maoist group who has links to RIM so I would like to ask what are other maoists opinions of this?

[Question everything]

Originally posted by [email protected] 03, 2007 10:09 am
Being from Ireland I have seen the sucesess that can be achieved by guerilla warfare in an industrialised country. In my own area of south Armagh the British army and police could not use the roads for 30 years and everything had to be done by helicopter. This was a massive propaganda victory for the IRA and gave them the freedom to operate quite openly and freely. If they had acess to good S.A.M.s orhad a better leadership(the IRA leadership were at this time winding down the war) they might have actually defeated the Brits at least in this area. Imagine what could have been done with a communist leadership.

I believed that all communists didn&#39;t believe that guerrilla warfare was posssible in industrialised countries however a few weeks ago I came across the website of the Revolutionary Communist Party of Canada (organising commitees) who are in fact proposing the launching of a peoples war in Canada. This is a maoist group who has links to RIM so I would like to ask what are other maoists opinions of this?
My Dad (who lived in Ireland before moveing hear) has a Bunch load of stories he tells me about the IRA and (athough we wasn&#39;t in the IRA as he is from Dublin)messing with British cops :lol:

[Enragé]

Originally posted by Question everything+May 03, 2007 03:08 am--> (Question everything @ May 03, 2007 03:08 am)
[email protected] 03, 2007 02:09 am
You don&#39;t need some professional army; the workers arm themselves during times of intense class struggle and out of their is borne the proletarian army.

that is my point. Guerrilla armies however will one enough support comes to them, will begin to abandon guerrilla tactics, and will become (although I&#39;m aware this is an oxymoron) a standing militia, willing to fight openly and much more organized. This is just my belief though perhaps I am wrong. [/b]
hm i agree.

Guerilla warfare must however be the translation of the wishes of the many, not born out of the desperation of the few (which is what it often is, look at the RAF for instance) which then loose contact with the organised working class.

[the-red-under-the-bed]

Firstly, i agree where it has been said that there is no single best way to spread socialism. IN each country and each society there are infinate amount variables that will affect the socialist revolution. Poverty levels, education levels, geography, economy, freedom os speech. All these can change the way a revolution looks.

Where guerilla warefare is useful is in a repressive society, where freedom of speech is limited, and you must take up the armed struggle to fight the working class. For guerilla warfare to work there must be huge class conciousness in the countryside amongst the peasants and rural workers, to support the struggle in these rural areas. A guerilla war can be important to fight and weaken the government, and to help set up and train the structures that will exist after the revolution, for example the Cuban leadership was able to gain experiance for post revolutionary cuba in setting up schools, and organising a peoples army to defend the revolution.
This being said, guerilla warfare cannot be successfull if it is the only aspect of the revolution. The revolution must be fought and won in the cities. The urban porletariat must be class concious and activly resisting the state. In Cuba, while che was runnign around in the hills, and the guerillas played a major role, in the cities there was significant student movements and mass strikes which played just, if not more of an an important role than the armed resistance in the country side.

I think the idea of a guerilla warfare in Canada, is stupid and ilconcieved. In a country where freedom of speech and information is widely accepted. Where class conciousness is low, (at least not high enough to feul armed struggle) and when there is no real mass movements to support it, then guerillas will only alienate people from the cause.

[Vargha Poralli]

This topic has been discussed numerous times but everybody miss the key point every time.

The Guerrilla warfare is a military tactic which is usually used by a losing side as a final rock to throw in. It is not a wonderfull tactic. Any group which adopts this tactic must be pretty much lost the war.

The one single advantage with this tactic is that it don&#39;t gives the enemy the final victory.It prolongs the war making it difficult for the enemy establish his hegemony in the zone.It must really gain success as fast as it can by winning the mass support,good supply base and logistical support and really take the war to the enemy by moving away from guerrilla tactic to conventional warfare if those guerillas really wanted to win the war.

Originally posted by hastalavictoria

You don&#39;t need some professional army; the workers arm themselves during times of intense class struggle and out of their is borne the proletarian army.

Well any army which is based on volunteer recruitment as opposed to conscription is generally called a professional army(at least in the historical context).

And fianlly not to piss on some libertarian and anarchist comrades but IMO army is one thing we need to recognise the need some centralisation.Every army neeeds a good chain of command to win wars. Decentralised guerilla units can triumph in battles but certainly cannot win wars.

[Question everything]

Originally posted by NKOS+May 03, 2007 02:03 pm--> (NKOS @ May 03, 2007 02:03 pm)
Originally posted by Question [email protected] 03, 2007 03:08 am

[email protected] 03, 2007 02:09 am
You don&#39;t need some professional army; the workers arm themselves during times of intense class struggle and out of their is borne the proletarian army.

that is my point. Guerrilla armies however will one enough support comes to them, will begin to abandon guerrilla tactics, and will become (although I&#39;m aware this is an oxymoron) a standing militia, willing to fight openly and much more organized. This is just my belief though perhaps I am wrong.
hm i agree.

Guerilla warfare must however be the translation of the wishes of the many, not born out of the desperation of the few (which is what it often is, look at the RAF for instance) which then loose contact with the organised working class. [/b]
Of course but even then it is not hard to win support with effecient propaganda, ie Propaganda of the Deed, and glorifing the worker&#39;s struggle, I sincerly doubt that if a revolution began we would have 50% or even 5% support however in time and with effective tactics the support would soon grow.

[Enragé]

Of course but even then it is not hard to win support with effecient propaganda, ie Propaganda of the Deed, and glorifing the worker&#39;s struggle, I sincerly doubt that if a revolution began we would have 50% or even 5% support however in time and with effective tactics the support would soon grow.

Not hard? I dont think so. Look at the RAF, what have they accomplished, even though im sure they had more than those 5% of support.
If you "start a revolution" with a handful of people with less than the majority of the working class behind you, you are not starting a revolution, you&#39;re starting the death of your movement, you will be completely destroyed by the state&#39;s propaganda machine, and you will not be able to make any serious counter propaganda... because a destroyed building doesnt explain communism, you might as well be islamic fundamentalist for all the rest of the country cares.
Guerilla Warfare, or violent propaganda of the deed, only causes the broader population to act if the rest of the country is on a verge of a revolution in and of itself, but merely hesitating, not knowing when the right time is, or how to go about it, but most certainly fed up with all this bullshit.

If you go around shooting people in the name of people&#39;s revolution in a situation where the vast majority of the people you claim to be fighting for havent the faintest idea of what this whole revolution is about, you are going to fail, simple.
People&#39;s revolution is just that, revolution by the people, not by some group claiming to represent it.

[the-red-under-the-bed]

NKO is spot on

[RNK]

Yes, you have to realize:

A) Your enemy controls communications; every media outlet, every tv station, every newspaper, will call you a terrorist.
B) Individually, it is incredibly hard to "disappear"; for a large group it would be nearly impossible.
C) For any "focoist" group, it would require operations spanning atleast 5 years, if not 10 or 15, for them to gain any sort of support -- and even then, it simply may never happen.
D) Focoism is very "hit-or-miss". And usually miss. It is suitable for a small-sized state with a small-sized infastructure and army, but not for a modern western state. It&#39;s been tried dozens and dozens of times. And only succeeded once.

[yns_mr]

In The Guerilla Warfare, Che says the first aim of a guerilla army sholud be to gain the qualifications of o regular army and he regards the opponent army as the main source of ammo....