The WWP's lukewarm response to redbaiting

["Hans G. Ehrbar" <ehrbar@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Below I am sending the WWP's response, in their paper
"Worker's World," to recent redbaiting attempts.


I wish this response had been more assertive.  Of course, at
the present time the WWP will rub many peace activists the
wrong way, because the pacifists only want to prevent the
massacre of Iraq, while the WWP wants to bring down the
capitalist system.  But now is the time to spell this out
openly so that people will think about it.  The WWP is in
the center of attention of a lot of people right now.
Everyone is immensely grateful for the work they did to get
the anti-war movement going; they should feel entitled
to explain why they have been doing this.


Now is a good opportunity to raise the issues: what kinds of
organization is needed to overcome the system, why the WWP
supports any alternatives in the world which attempt a more
socialist path, even if they are far from perfect
(Milosevic, North Korea), etc.  Now that they have
everyone's ear, they should openly explain their strategy
and tactics.  The article which I am including here is much
too defensive; it says the WWP is not uncritical but really
very critical, it is not diminishing the anti-war movement
but very committed to stopping this war.  They should go on
the counteroffensive and say instead: we are critical not
only in words but in deeds, and in order to truly fight war
you have to fight the capitalist system.  (This would have
been much better than the tired line that the Pentagon is
the one who has the weapons of mass destruction.)  There is
no need to gloss over the fact that resisting the sytem
takes a lot of committment by their members.  There are many
people out there right now who would be willing to commit
themselves if they saw a way how to do it.  By their timid
response to redbaiting, the WWP is missing out on a great
opportunity.


Hans G. Ehrbar


Here is the article from the "Worker's World":




IIIII   Redbaiting and the movement   IIIII

*Divide and conquer isn't working*

By Deirdre Griswold

There has been a new flurry of broadcasts and articles in
the leading media outlets of the capitalist establishment
trying to divide and weaken the burgeoning anti-war
movement. They are happening at the very moment that it is
taking on enormous momentum and becoming a factor that even
the Bush administration has to take into consideration, as
it moves ahead with its criminal plans to attack Iraq.

The attacks are directed at the ANSWER coalition especially,
which has organized the biggest anti-war protests since the
Vietnam movement.  ANSWER, which is made up of many very
active groups in the areas of international solidarity and
social justice, is being slandered as nothing but a "front"
for Workers World Party.  This denies the fact that many
progressive currents with different political outlooks can
come together on a principled basis--against the war, for
instance--while maintaining their independence and
integrity.

It is just a repeat of the old tactic of redbaiting that was
used to break up the progressive movement and a lot of
unions in the 1950s.

Workers World itself is being misrepresented as "Stalinist"
and caricatured as mindless supporters of dictators around
the world.

What seems to bother the pundits most is Workers World's
refusal to give any credence to the U.S. imperialist
government's claim that its interventions around the world
are aimed at spreading democracy and development, or at
least at overthrowing bloody and dangerous dictatorships.
Workers World does not agree with all the political
positions of every regime whose sovereignty and resources
are under attack by imperialism.  But it knows that an
imperialist takeover is never the solution; that the
installation of a neocolonial puppet regime, no matter how
disguised and sanitized, is the death of self-determination
and any genuine democracy for the people.  It is up to the
people of these countries, not the interventionist empire
builders, to determine what kind of government they want and
who should be their leaders.

Those who are attacking WW have distorted this position,
equating it with ideological servility to all the policies
of the regimes and parties in question.  Nothing could be
further from the truth.  Workers World has always had an
independent, critical approach to the world struggle based
on its understanding of revolutionary working class
politics.

Here are some examples of the media coverage.

A column by Michael Kelly, dripping with venom and called
"March ing with Stalinists," appeared in the Jan. 22
Washington Post. It actually was a right-wing attack on a
New York Times editorial about the huge Jan. 18 anti-war
mobilizations, called "A Stirring in the Nation." Kelly was
furious at the Times for not having redbaited the ANSWER
coalition, the organizer of the protests, and for not
dissing Workers World Party in the editorial.

The Times was quick to seek forgiveness. It responded with
an article by Lynette Clemetson on Jan. 24 called "Some War
Protesters Uneasy with Others," in which she described
Workers World as a "radical Socialist group with roots in
the Stalin-era Soviet Union." (Not true.)

This article was very tricky because it pretended to be in
sympathy with the anti-war movement, which it presented as
being diminished by radicals in positions of leadership,
especially from Workers World Party.  In order to argue this
point, it had to lie about the size of the Jan. 18 protests
in Washington and San Francisco, saying that "tens of
thousands" attended. This is off by a factor of 10. Even the
San Francisco police now admit the protest there was at
least 150,000, and estimates of the crowd in Washington
range up to half a million.

In fact, the International ANSWER coalition has organized
what even these newspapers admit are the largest
demonstrations to date against the Iraq war and the biggest
anti-war protests since Vietnam.  It has done so by
addressing all the issues related to the Iraq war--such as
U.S. aggression in other parts of the world, racism at home,
and imperialist militarism's disastrous economic effects on
the workers here.

The Times, pretending to speak in the name of others in the
movement, says this diminishes the anti-war forces, who only
want to focus on Iraq.  But the newspaper has to lie about
the numbers to make this argument.

Fortunately, many people both inside and outside of the
ANSWER coalition have made public statements rejecting the
redbaiting and the attempts to divide the movement.

The Times and the Washington Post, of course, do not speak
for the movement. They have always been tribunes for the
ruling establishment in this country. And this establishment
has, until now, given the war its full endorsement. That
could change as the anti-war movement around the world grows
more powerful and the economic situation at home worsens,
especially if the war drags on. But for now there's no
question that these powerful interests want to divide and
weaken the movement, not help it along by offering friendly
advice on tactics.

It is interesting that a number of these attacks ridicule
the reading of messages from Mumia Abu-Jamal at the
protests. Mumia is reviled here, by the police especially,
but he is recognized in the rest of the world as a
U.S. political prisoner as well as an eloquent voice against
the war from the Black community.

Despite the endless, foaming-at-the-mouth propaganda, the
majority in this new movement are not going to bed at night
worrying about Korea or Iraq or Cuba or Grenada or any other
country ringed by U.S. nukes and troops. No, they are
worried about George Bush and his power-drunk
associates. They are worried about the Weapons of Mass
Destruction of the Pentagon, and the dangerous propensities
of this capitalist superpower as the economy worldwide
begins to contract.



- END -

*Reprinted from the Feb. 6, 2003, issue of Workers World
newspaper*












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