[Marxism] Reply to Alex Callinicos

[Sebastian Budgen <sebastian@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

ZNet | Iraq

Reply to Alex Callinicos

by Gilbert Achcar; January 19, 2005

18 January 2005

 

Dear Alex,

 

Thank you very much for your letter. I am very pleased at this new 
opportunity to have an exchange with you, all the more because I admire 
your rare ability to sustain demanding intellectual activity and an 
academic career simultaneously with very active involvement in 
practical politics.

 

Both of us are deeply committed to building the antiwar and 
anti-imperialist movement, as we have been consistently doing for so 
many years. It is this very reason that gives our discussion some value 
as a reflection of different views on the militant left -- not an 
exercise in armchair rhetoric. Moreover, we are able to hold a 
discussion that sets a good example of a comradely and friendly 
exchange between people who make real arguments, instead of throwing 
various epithets in each other's faces and distorting each other's 
views.

 

Now to comment on the content of your letter. You say that you read my 
article "On the Forthcoming Election in Iraq" on ZNet "with a growing 
sense of dismay." I'm sure I won't surprise you if I say I'm not 
surprised. The fact is that I wrote my piece with a view to warning 
sections of the Western anti-imperialist movement against a misreading 
of the situation in Iraq that might lead to dire political consequences 
-- especially with regard to the efforts being made to restore the 
level of mobilization reached by the antiwar movement before the 
invasion of Iraq. Among those sections I wanted to warn, the antiwar 
movement in the US and Britain -- the two countries whose armed forces 
play the major role in the occupation of Iraq -- were prominent in my 
mind. I have myself felt a "growing sense of dismay" at various 
positions held in some left-wing circles on these issues.

 

From this angle, I must say that after reading your letter carefully I 
was both pleased and bewildered. I was pleased at the fact that my 
arguments have apparently had an impact on your views -- perhaps a 
further instance of the very kind confidence in my judgment as a 
"source of orientation" that you express at the beginning of your 
letter. I was bewildered though by the inconsistencies in your letter, 
stemming from the fact that you only go halfway in accepting my views 
and therefore fall into contradictions that are unusual for a sharp 
mind like yours.

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=15&ItemID=7062_______________________________________________
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