PARTICULARITIES OF THE REVOLUTION

[Luis Quispe <lquispe@xxxxxxxxxx>]

               THE PARTICULARITIES

EL DIARIO, LIMA-PERU: What are some of the particularities of
the People's War in Peru, and how does it differ from other struggles
in the world, in Latin America, and from the Movimiento Revolucionario
Tupac Amaru (MRTA)?

PRESIDENT GONZALO: That's a good question. I thank you for asking
it, because it gives us a chance to look at the Party's so-called
"dogmatism" a bit more. There are even those who say that we
incorrectly try to apply Chairman Mao in an era where he is no
longer applicable. In short, they babble on so much that we feel
perfectly justified asking whether they have any idea what they
are talking about. This includes the much-decorated senator who
is a specialist in violence [Trans. Refers to Enrique Bernales,
now Fujimori's UN's Human Rights Watcher]

People's War is universally applicable, in accordance with the
character of the revolution and adapted to the specific
conditions of each country. Otherwise, it cannot be carried out.
In our case, the particularities are very dear. It is a struggle
that is waged in the countryside and in the city, as was
established as far back as 1968 in the plan for the People's War.
Here we have a difference, a particularity: It is waged in the
countryside and the city. This, we believe, has to do with our
own specific conditions. Latin America, for instance, has cities
which are proportionately larger than those on other continents.
It is a reality of Latin America that can't be ignored. Just look
at the capital of Peru, for example, which has a high percentage
of the country's population. So, for us, the city could not be
left aside, and the war had to be developed there as well. But
the struggle in the countryside is principal, the struggle
in the city a necessary complement. This is one particularity,
there's another.

In the beginning of the People's War we confronted the police.
That was the reality because only in December 1982 did the armed
forces entered the war. This is not to say that they had not been
used in a support role before then. They had, in addition to
their studying the process of our development. It is a
particularity because we created a power vacuum in the
countryside and we had to establish the New Power without having
defeated large armed forces--because they hadn't come into the
war. And when they did, when they came in, it was because we had
established People's Power. That was the concrete political
situation in the country. If we had applied the letter and
not the spirit of Mao we would not have established the New Power
and we would have been sitting, waiting for the armed forces to
come in.

We would have gotten bogged down. Another particularity was the
structure of the army which I've already talked about.

All these are particularities. We have already spoken to the
countryside and city, to how to carry out the war, to the army,
to how the New Power arose; and the militarization of the Party
itself is another particularity. These are specific things that
correspond to our reality, to the application of
Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, of Chairman Mao's theory on people's
war, to the conditions in our country. Does this make us
different from other struggles? Yes.

Why do we differ from others? Because we carry out People's War
this makes us different from other struggles in Latin America. In
Cuba, People's War was not carried out, but they also had their
own particularities which they have intentionally forgotten.
Before, they said Cuba was an exceptional case--Guevara said
this--the fact is that U.S. imperialism didn't take part. Later
they forgot this. Aside from this, there was no Communist Party
there to give leadership. These are questions of Cubanism and its
five characteristics: An insufficient class differentiation which
demanded that saviors save the oppressed; socialist revolution or
a caricature of revolution; united front but without the national
bourgeoisie; no need for Base Areas; and as noted, no need for a
Party. What we are seeing in Latin America today is just the
development of these same positions, only more and more at the
service of social-imperialism and its contention with Yankee
imperialism for world hegemony. We can see this clearly
in Central America. The MRTA, the little that we know of it,
falls into the same category.

Finally, another issue that makes us different--and forgive me if
I'm insistent--concerns independence, self-reliance, and making
our own decisions. Because others do not have these
characteristics they are used as pawns, while we are not. And one
far-reaching difference: We take Marxism-Leninism-Maoism as our
guide, others do not. In sum, the greatest difference, the
fundamental difference, is in the point of departure; ours is the
ideology of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, principally Maoism, applied
to the specific conditions of our country, and I insist here
again, that this is with clear particularities which show the
falsehood of the so-called dogmatism they accuse us of--which
they do at the behest of their masters.

The complete Interview is available in the PCP Web Page:
http://www.blythe.org/peru-pcp
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