Re: On fascism's historic triumph (was Re: [Marxism] Re: Massivebombings and civilian populations

["Carlos A. Rivera" <cerejota@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Einde O'Callaghan" <einde@xxxxxx>

> I'm afraid I don't have the time to answer this contribution in the detail
> it deserves and requires so I'm afraid I'll have to pass, except to make a
> brief comment on the final point.

Fair enough. For the time being (hopefuly) we all are going to be around for
some time... ;-)

> First of all I'd like to make clear that I was at that time involved in
> mass militant action against the fascists which did on occasions also mean
> confrontation with the police, most famously in Lewisham in 1977 where I
> spent most of the day in the front line in the confrontation with both
> fascists and police, but this tactic was also followed after the
> foundation of the ANL. We made some tactical errors, notably at Brick Lane
> during the second Carnival in London (although that was also the result of
> a dreadful organisational cock-up), but I think our general orientation at
> the time was correct and I still advocate this strategy here in the east
> of Germany, where the fascist threat is very real.

Glad to hear that. We need veteran anti-fascists everwhere.

> However, I opposed the trend known as squaddism because it meant a
> departure from mass action and the development of elite squads of street
> fighters. It was in effect a depoliticisation of the struggle and I
> experienced it at first hand in Islington, which was one of the places
> where the struggle against squaddism was first taken up, mainly because
> punch-ups with the Nazis in the Market (I've forgottten the name now) and
> at Islington Green absorbed the energies of the whole North London
> district for several months and led to comrades who weren't able to
> involve themselves in the confrontations for reasons of sex, age, stature,
> health or whatever dropping out of activity mainly because we weren't
> doing anything else at all.

It was a crisis of leadership then, not of squadism. If the leaders of the
ANL had been fully commited to destroying fascism, they would have been able
to harness "squaddism" and mass action together.

And in perspective the old SWP accusation of "squadism" as "depolitizacing"
seems like a bad a bad joke. I would argue that Red Action, and the IWCA are
proportionally much more important politically than the SWP. In any case,
they have demonstrated, whatever we think of their politics, a high degree
of politization and creativity, something that contradicts the accusation
that "squadim" promotes depolitization.

But since you were a participant in the events, maybe you can shed some
light on the extent the debate over the troubles extended into the debate of
squaddism.

> Squaddism also led good comrades to do incredibly stupid things like the
> kidnapping of a National Front organiser, an escapade that landed several
> very good comrades in jail for a long time. A provocateur couldn't have
> done it better, but unfortunately this was actually the result of
> over-enthusiasm for a profoundly mistaken policy.

Actually, I don't view that as wrong, in principle. Neither did Trotsky for
that matter, which is why I put my comment in the first place. Fascism must
be physically eliminated whenever possible. Trotsky said as much.

You are confusing the tactical error of a blundered operation, with an
effective politico-military strategy. Of course, since the SWP wont touch
anything military with a ten-foot pole, this will fall in the cracks.

> The later development of Red Action and it's offshoot, the IWCA, seems to
> me to have involved a dangerous shift onto the ground of the Nazis, e.g.
> taking up issues that make concessions to backward (sometimes even racist)
> ideas within the "indigenous" working class, justified on the basis of
> taking up the concern of white workers (even if this terminology isn't
> actually used).

I am ambigous towards the IWCA project, but I do admit that they have
stopped the BNP & Co's offensive of the 90s by providing an alternative for
the white working class "protest" vote. That is anti-fascism of deeds not
words. All the while the ressurected ANL was basically the P.R. wing of the
BNP.

> However, I emphasise that this is based on no direct knowledge of the
> current activities of RA and the IWCA, but rather on discussions on
> various British discussion lists that I subscribe to. I am willing to
> concede that these discussions may be one-sided or distorted by the
> political perspectives of the participants in these discussion lists. N.B.
> very few if any of these commentators are members of the British SWP and I
> have no idea what the official British SWP take on the IWCA's activities
> is.

I don't belive they have any, but the SA contested (and lost to) the IWCA in
various councils. And of course, the IWCA being a political project of Red
Action, the bulk of its founders being the same people you helped expel from
the SWP certainly should figure in out minds. The SWP has never been kind to
ex-members.

> In conclusion I'd just like to point out that I wasn't trying to provide
> an analysis of the reasons for the vicrtory of German fascism - I was
> simply pointing to the significance of the complete destruction of all
> organisations of the German working class for the lack of organised
> resistance as a supplement to pointing out that the tactics of the allies
> (particularly the terror bombing of working class communities even in the
> closing weeks of the war) didn't exactly do anything to promote the
> development of resistance, let alone a mass uprising.

I understood that, but I was just basically letting a lot of built up things
I have seen you comment over the years regarding fascism in this list and
over at LT. And of course, seeing you as comrade in spite of the need to be
forceful in one's position.

In other words, I wasn't directly answering just that point, but a series of
points that create a "history", with an identifiable ideological bias.

sks


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