This is an archive of the former website of the Maoist Internationalist Movement, which was run by the now defunct Maoist Internationalist Party - Amerika. The MIM now consists of many independent cells, many of which have their own indendendent organs both online and off. MIM(Prisons) serves these documents as a service to and reference for the anti-imperialist movement worldwide.
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THE MAOIST INTERNATIONALIST MOVEMENT
MIM Notes 152 DECEMBER 1, 1997
MIM Notes speaks to and from the viewpoint of the
world's oppressed majority, and against the
imperialist-patriarchy. Pick it up and wield it in
the service of the people. support it, struggle
with it and write for it.
IN THIS ISSUE:
1. WHITE SUPREMACISTS KILL VIET YOUTH
ASIAN COMMUNITY MOBILIZES IN RESPONSE
2. INDEPENDENT MEDIA SHUT DOWN BY FCC:
RADIO FREE ALLSTON FIGHTS BACK
3. LETTERS
4. ENGLAND, EUROPE: STOP AMERIKAN INJUSTICE
5. CALIFORNIA GUARDS INSTIGATE VIOLENCE BETWEEN
PRISONERS
6. BAYLOSIS SPEAKS ON STRUGGLE OF FILIPINO MASSES
7. AMERIKAN-SINO SUMMIT REEKS OF CAPITALIST
HYPOCRISY
8. AMERIKA BUYS BIG WEAPONS SO IRAN CAN'T
9. TACTICAL OFFENSIVES OF THE NPA BECOMING MORE
VIGOROUS
10. ENGLAND: STRUGGLE FOR MAOIST PARTY CONTINUES
11. MARXISM-LENINISM-MAOISM ONLINE
12. UNDER LOCK & KEY
* * *
WHAT IS MIM?
The Maoist Internationalist Movement (MIM) is a
revolutionary communist party that upholds
Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, comprising the collection
of existing or emerging Maoist internationalist
parties in the English-speaking imperialist
countries and their English-speaking internal
semi-colonies, as well as the existing or emerging
Spanish-speaking Maoist internationalist parties
of Aztlan, Puerto Rico and other territories of
the U.S. Empire. MIM Notes is the newspaper of
MIM. Notas Rojas is the newspaper of the Spanish-
speaking parties or emerging parties of MIM.
MIM is an internationalist organization that works
from the vantage point of the Third World
proletariat; thus, its members are not Amerikans,
but world citizens.
MIM struggles to end the oppression of all groups
over other groups: classes, genders, nations. MIM
knows this is only possible by building public
opinion to seize power through armed struggle.
Revolution is a reality for North America as the
military becomes over-extended in the government's
attempts to maintain world hegemony.
MIM differs from other communist parties on three
main questions: (1) MIM holds that after the
proletariat seizes power in socialist revolution,
the potential exists for capitalist restoration
under the leadership of a new bourgeoisie within
the communist party itself. In the case of the
USSR, the bourgeoisie seized power after the death
of Stalin in 1953; in China, it was after Mao's
death and the overthrow of the "Gang of Four" in
1976. (2) MIM upholds the Chinese Cultural
Revolution as the farthest advance of communism in
human history. (3) MIM believes the North American
white-working-class is primarily a non-
revolutionary worker-elite at this time; thus, it
is not the principal vehicle to advance Maoism in
this country.
MIM accepts people as members who agree on these
basic principles and accept democratic centralism,
the system of majority rule, on other questions of
party line.
"The theory of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin is
universally applicable. We should regard it not as
dogma, but as a guide to action. Studying it is
not merely a matter of learning terms and phrases,
but of learning Marxism-Leninism as the science of
revolution."
-- Mao Zedong, Selected Works, Vol. II, p. 208
* * *
WHITE SUPREMACISTS KILL VIET YOUTH
ASIAN COMMUNITY MOBILIZES IN RESPONSE
Two white supremacist youth who savagely tortured
and killed a Viet sojourner in California were both
recently convicted for first-degree murder.(1)
Normally when the murder victims are oppressed
nationals, the bourgeoisie and labor aristocracy
collude to free the white nation murderers or give
them very light slaps on the wrist. In this
particular case, two major factors pushed the
convictions through: the response of the outraged
Asian community and the danger that these youth
pose even to white Amerikan society.
On January 28, 1996, Gunner Lindberg and Dominic
Christopher assaulted Thien Minh Ly, a Georgetown
University medical student, as he was rollerblading
at his former high school in Orange County,
California. Encountering Ly alone at night on the
tennis court, Lindberg stabbed Ly repeatedly while
Christopher egged him on. They watched Ly bleed to
death and then left. Lindberg later wrote to his
cousin and bragged: "Oh, I killed a jap a while
ago I stabbed him to Death... I pulled the knife
out a butcher knife... I stomped on his head 3
times ... and stabbed him in the side about 7 or 8
times he rolled over a little so I stabbed his back
about 18 or 19 times then he laid flat and I slit
one side of his throat on his jugular vain... then
Domminic said 'do it again' ... so I cut his other
jugular vain... [and] stabbed him about 20 to 21
times in the heart... then I wanted to go back and
look, so we Did and he was Dying just then taking
in some bloody gasps of air ... [and then Dominic]
kicked the fuck out of his face... [sic]" (2)
The pigs initially believed that Ly was murdered by
an acquaintance because "[t]he multiple wounds
indicate[d] a lot of hatred and anger was behind
it."(3) When it was uncovered that hatred was
indeed the prime motive --white supremacist hatred
-- the pigs were quick to close ranks and deny any
"unsubstantiated" "racial overtones" in spite of
the fact that both men were "known white
supremacists".(4,5) They then asserted that robbery
was the only motive although Ly had no valuables
with him at the time of the murder. The local
bourgeois media parroted this line, calling the two
men "alleged racists" even after the pigs raided
their apartment and found Nazi, Ku Klux Klan and
other white supremacist materials.(6)
Pressured by the Asian communities, the pigs and
courts finally had to admit -- albeit in a gentle
way -- that Lindberg had indicated his deep
resentment and dislike for the Asian community."(5)
The bourgeoisie, its armed forces and media wings
have it within their interests to deny that
violence against the oppressed nations targets them
specifically because they are oppressed nations.
The Amerikan imperialists do not want oppressed
nationals to recognize that their oppression is
systemic and do something against that very system.
White nation workers also benefit materially from
hiding this fact. In particular, violence against
Asian and Asian-descended nationals is less likely
to be acknowledged as a racist act. As a Korean
wrote in the Tustin Weekly: "The cover-up of the
motive and the selective omission of words printed
in the newspaper have made me realize the racism
against Asian-Americans [sic] is not considered a
serious problem."(7)
Amerikan imperialist wars in Asia have hardened
Amerikan chauvinism against Asian nationals. In
particular, the successful revolution in Viet Nam
and the resounding Amerikan defeat there has
embittered the settler nation against the recently
established Viet and Southeast Asian communities in
their midst.
Orange County in California has a large population
of Viet nationals who have built a vibrant
community, Little Saigon, in the middle of
reactionary settler chauvinism. Police brutality
and the criminalization of Southeast Asian youth
have been two outgrowths from the antagonistic
national contradiction between the dominant white
nation and the Southeast Asians.
Anti-Asian sentiment is not a recent trend in
Amerikan ideology. It is as Amerikan as slavery,
oppression and genocide. During the 19th century,
Chinese labor played an essential role in building
the economy in the west while Euro-Amerikkkans
waged land-thieving and genocidal wars against the
First Nations and Mexico. When the white settlers
swarmed west, they terrorized, massacred, and
disenfranchised Chinese nationals under the banner
of white chauvinism.
In the book Settlers: The Mythology of the White
Proletariat, J. Sakai points out that "the
[Amerikan] Empire-wide campaign against the Chinese
national minority played a major role in the
history of Euro-Amerikan labor; it was a central
rallying issue for many, a point around which
immigrant European workers and other settlers could
unite."(8)
This was as true in the 1800's as it was in the
1980's, when Japan-bashing regained currency. Japan
was becoming a competitive imperialist power to
contend with during the eighties. As Amerikans
became more restless and discontented with their
perceived economic eclipse, Japan-bashing within
the united snakes became a life-and-death matter
for the internal oppressed Asian and Asian-
descended nations.
In June 1982, Vincent Chin, a Chinese draftsman,
was brutally murdered by two unemployed white
nation autoworkers because he was a "jap"
responsible for "layoffs in the automobile
industry."(9) In a broad show of labor-aristocratic
support, a jury of their peers found these two
crackers innocent in spite of overwhelming
testimony and evidence of their guilt. The two
murderers never spent a day in jail. MIM has stated
before that the Vincent Chin case "demonstrates
that it is often the white workers at the vanguard
of reaction within u.s. borders while the
imperialists generally take the lead in extremist
reaction abroad. In this case, the imperialists
were willing to put the heat on the white workers
[by prosecuting them], but the white workers
themselves turned out to be unwilling to live
without racism."(10)
The murder of Vincent Chin and the acquittal of his
murderers concretely demonstrates how white nation
workers are reactionary national chauvinists. Their
dominant economic and social positions of power
makes the white nation as a whole opposed to
genuine alliances with oppressed nation workers and
to revolution. Because they are bought-off with
imperialist super-profits, the white nation forms a
labor aristocracy within the imperialist countries.
They are willing to participate in and condone
oppression and murder and will even themselves kill
to maintain their privileges skimmed from the
exploitation of the Third World.
In general the bourgeoisie and its injustice system
go to great lengths to support white supremacy and
settler terrorism against the oppressed. After all,
in the hearts and minds of the white nation, the
lives of three million "gooks" is insignificant in
comparison to the lives of 200,000 crackers.
Amerika rarely punishes its own except when they
present a danger to the white nation itself. In
this particular case, one of the white
supremacists, Gunner Lindberg, had shot a Missouri
pig's son, showing himself to be a danger to the
white nation as well. But if it had not been for
the mobilization of the Asian communities, the
bourgeoisie would have been content to lightly
punish Lindberg and his accomplice Dominic
Christopher for "attempted robbery" without
acknowledging their racism.(11) It was the
political pressure of the outraged Asian
communities which forced the bourgeoisie to
categorize the murder as a "hate crime" motivated
by reactionary Amerikan chauvinism.
The overall white nation chauvinist tendency is to
lump all Asian nationals together as a monolithic
whole, in complete disregard of the historical
antagonisms and material conditions between
different Asian nations. White nation chauvinism
reacts against Asians as a group and does not
differentiate between "gook," "jap" or "chink."
This common oppression lends itself to unity
between the Asian-descended nations within the
u.s., the growth of a pan-Asian political
consciousness and ultimately, a revolutionary pan-
Asian nationalism.
In a letter written to Thien Ly after his murder,
his mother writes. "It has been more than a year
since you had to leave us -- your parents and
siblings -- because of the cruel and discriminatory
hands of two wicked people who destroyed our
family, forcing you to leave us painfully, leaving
us, your parents and two siblings in an immense
sadness... I do not understand why their hearts
were so cruel and wicked."(12)
MIM sympathizes deeply with the Ly family's pain
and points to Amerikan imperialism as fundamental
root of violence against the oppressed. The Asian
masses in the belly of the beast have mobilized
against this example of white nation chauvinism.
MIM encourages the Asian communities to get angry,
organize and take pan-Asian nationalism even
further. Racist violence cannot be stopped until
the system which underpins it is overthrown.
NOTES:
1. Daily Bruin (UCLA) 1 October 1997.
2. LA Times Orange County 4 March 1996. This letter
lead to Lindberg and Christopher's arrest.
3. Tustin Weekly2 February 1996.
4. LA Times OC 3 May 1996.
5. Tustin Weekly 3 May 1996.
6. Orange County Human Relations Commissioned
reported that white supremacists committed the
majority of local hate crimes in 1995: 102 out of
175. In that year, crimes against Asians increased,
while crimes against jews decreased. These figures
are of course vastly underreported since it does
not include the violence of poverty, starvation and
disease against the oppressed. LA Times OC 3 March
1996.
7. Tustin Weekly, Letters to the Editor.
8. J. Sakai Settlers: The Mythology of the White
Proletariat Morningstar Press: Chicago, 1989, p.31-
37. Available from MIM for $12.
9. W. Wei The Asian American Movement Temple:
Philadelphia, 1993, p. 194.
10. "'Asian American' film review" by MIM, as yet
unpublished.
11. MIM thinks Amerikan doublespeak is ironic
because Amerika has robbed and is continuing to rob
the oppressed nations of their resources and
freedom but that is considered the Amerikan Dream.
12. "Letters to Thien" webpage
* * *
INDEPENDENT MEDIA SHUT DOWN BY FCC:
RADIO FREE ALLSTON FIGHTS BACK
On October 28, Radio Free Allston was shut down by
the Federal Communications Commission for operating
illegally. Radio Free Allston (RFA) is a low-power
FM radio station that, "was formed to provide the
greater Boston community in general and Allston-
Brighton in particular, with access to the 'public
airwaves' access which is now prohibitive because
of cost and Federal Communications Commission (FCC)
regulations." They broadcasted for eight months at
106.1 FM without a license from the FCC. On October
28th two agents from the FCC showed up at the
station and ordered them to shut down or face fines
and arrest. The station operator, Steve Provizer,
decided to shut down in the short term while they
fight the legal battle to reopen.
RFA was well known in the community for traveling
to political events and providing live coverage
where other media were conspicuously absent. The
live coverage of political activism around Boston
and its willingness to broadcast political
commentaries and announce events along with the
alternative play list and wide array of foreign
language and other alternative programming
distinguished Radio Free Allston from the
mainstream radio on the rest of the dial.
The operation of RFA was entirely public. RFA
publicized the station address and offered contact
information on their web page. This was a political
decision to fight for support for small watt
stations. In July, it even managed to get the
Boston City Council to pass a resolution supporting
the station.
There was a complaint lodged with the FCC against
Radio Free Allston by WROR-105.7. WROR is a 50,000
watt station owned by Greater Media, a New Jersey-
based corporation that has 15 stations in five
markets.(1) But there is no evidence that RFA
interfered with WROR's broadcasting, this is just
an excuse for the corporate controlled media to get
the FCC to crack down on independent media.
In 1978, the FCC stopped licensing stations smaller
than 100 watts. It appears that the FCC is stepping
up enforcement. The day after shutting down RFA,
the FCC shut down WDOA, a 60-watt pirate music
station in Worcester that had been operating for
almost two years. While the FCC is running around
shutting down tiny community stations, corporations
are allowed to own as many as eight radio stations
in a market. And it is the pressure from these
corporations that is leading part of the driving
force behind the FCC crack down. According to the
Boston Phoenix, "The National Association of
Broadcasters (NAB), a powerful lobby that worked to
weaken the ownership restrictions on radio stations
two years ago, has been urging the FCC to crack
down on pirate stations."
As RFA pointed out: "Have you ever wondered why
there are no stations that speak for communities?
The answer, of course, is money." RFA's philosophy
that they should be fighting the corporate
ownership of media has put them in the leadership
of this battle on the radio front. RFA's literature
describes the monopoly of radio and offers
compelling arguments for the importance of this
battle:
"Last year, because of deregulation mandated by
Congress, fully half of America's small radio
station owners were swallowed up by a small,
powerful group of enormous corporations. Didn't
know that Disney and Westinghouse were in the radio
business? Last year, these two corporations alone
picked up radio stations worth 224 million dollars.
"If you're thinking about getting into the radio
business -- aside from the cost of the station --
you'll have to fork over at least $50,000 to
undergo the licensing process demanded by the
Federal Communications Commission (FCC). This is
big money for you and me, but chump change to these
conglomerates, who pay each other the big money
privilege of playing ring-around-the rosy with
America's media." That chunk of money goes toward
lawyers and engineers who are part of a small
circle familiar with how the game has to be played.
"Because of this centralization of power, there's a
lot of news that never sees the light of day.
Knowing that information gets funneled through the
news bureaucracies of GE, Fox, Westinghouse,
Warners and company (owners of thousands of radio
stations, CBS, NBC, etc..), how likely does it seem
that these litigious companies will sanction news
that may be controversial, let alone say anything
bad about themselves?"
RFA estimates that there are about 200 illegally
operated small radio stations across the country.
MIM would add to this estimate of alternative radio
stations the many small alternative newspapers also
operated around the country. These alternative
media sources are key to the fight against
imperialism and need our support in the struggle
against corporate media control. There is no free
speech under imperialism, only power struggles. For
this reason MIM supports RFA's struggle for greater
access to free speech.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts
is planning to fight on behalf of RFA to argue that
the FCC's ban on low-power licenses violates free-
speech protections.(1) It is worthwhile to take up
these battles in court whenever possible. There is
a court battle going on in Berkeley, California
over the operation of Free Radio Berkeley which is
challenging the FCC on First Amendment grounds.
These legal battles may force the FCC to change its
rules. But these battles will always have to be
fought as long as we live under imperialism because
this political system allows for the financial
control of the media. This is why MIM sees these
battles for access to free speech as part of a
larger struggle to overthrow imperialism and
establish a system of socialism that is run by the
people, not the corporations.
RFA is encouraging supporters to sign petitions and
write letters to local newspapers. For more
information or to sign a petition you can reach RFA
at www.tiac.net/users/error/radiofreeallston.
NOTES:
1. Boston Phoenix, November 6 - 13, 1997.
2. All other information in this article was taken
from the Radio Free Allston Web page.
* * *
LETTERS
***The following is excerpted from a letter
responding to the article in the November 1st MIM
Notes on the Serve the People Food Program
(STPFP)"Repudiate 'charity' -- promote
revolution!"***
Dear MIM,
The MIM Notes article stated: "The STPFP
distributed sandwiches to homeless men and wimmin
on an irregular and limited basis." By omission,
this sets up a straw STPFP: the STPFP distributed
sandwiches and fliers containing MIM's program. The
basis was irregular, but for a good while it was
weekly. As for the limited basis of the program, at
this point it would be good to publicize the actual
numbers, which are an accomplishment MIM can take
credit for even while backing away from the STPFP:
over 500 sandwiches were distributed, each with a
copy of MIM's program.
This article really begs the question of why MIM
rejects the STPFP as charity work, while MIM
criticizes those who say the same of the Black
Panther Party's Serve the People Programs. It has
been acknowledged that, bending to pressure from
FBI poison-pen campaigns, the BPP made sure to not
propagandize while distributing food. Another
question begged: what will create "an already
vibrant political movement"?
A partial answer: "In short, all the practical
problems in the masses' everyday life should claim
our attention. If we attend to these problems,
solve them and satisfy the needs of the masses, we
shall really become organizers of the well-being of
the masses, and they will truly rally around us to
give us their warm support. Comrades, will we then
be able to arouse them to take part in the
revolutionary war? Yes, indeed we will." (Mao,
1934)
Whatever the STPFP's shortcomings, it was not
significant enough an experiment to justify your
broad dismissal of its potential. What we can sum
up are such things as what was ineffective about
the flier used. And the fact that we can now better
sum up the form propaganda work among drug-addicted
homeless people should take is an accomplishment of
the STPFP.
The question raised in the article is what kind of
work the party should lead: agitation and
propaganda only? Organizing only the organs of
revolutionary warfare and the future ruling
PolitBuro? No, the party also needs to become an
organizer of the well-being of the masses. Else,
there will be no party to speak of, no army, no
united front, no revolutionary war, no state power.
You wrote: "The [CCP] and the Red Army did not go
into the countryside to hand out PB&J sandwiches,
they went there to mobilize the peasantry to solve
their pressing political needs themselves. In
particular, the CCP organized the peasants into the
armed struggle to seize state power." First of all,
again here you flog a straw dog by omitting the
fact that all sandwiches came with MIM's program
and a call for involvement. Addressing the masses'
needs via sandwiches does not preclude mobilizing
the masses to solve their own needs; taking the
lead in problem-solving is a necessary prerequisite
for involving the masses. I am concerned about your
use of the word "political." Are you trying to
counterpoise sandwiches with politics, so that the
sandwiches look like pitiful charity work?
Mao from 1934's "Be Concerned with the Well-Being
of the Masses, Pay Attention to Methods of Work''
again: "I earnestly suggest to this congress that
we pay close attention to the well-being of the
masses, from the problems of land and labour to
those of fuel, rice, cooking oil and salt." More:
"If we only mobilize the people to carry on the war
and do nothing else, can we succeed in defeating
the enemy? Of course not. We must lead the
peasants' struggle for land and distribute the land
to them, heighten their labour enthusiasm and
increase agricultural production, safeguard the
interests of the workers, establish co-operatives,
develop trade with outside areas, and solve the
problems facing the masses -- food, shelter and
clothing, fuel, rice, cooking oil and salt,
sickness and hygiene, and marriage." I recommend a
careful re-reading of this essay, which opposes
"bureaucratic leaders" who "talk only about
expanding the Red Army, enlarging the transport
corps, collecting the land tax and selling bonds
[but pay] not the slightest attention to the well-
being of the masses. . . . We should convince the
masses that we represent their interests, that our
lives are intimately bound up with theirs. We
should help them to proceed from these things to an
understanding of the higher tasks which we have put
forward, the tasks of the revolutionary war, so
that they will support the revolution and spread it
throughout the country, respond to our political
appeals and fight to the end for victory in the
revolution. The masses in Changkang say, 'The
Communist Party is really good! It has thought of
everything on my behalf.'" You are correct that
armed struggle was the broad context of this Mao
essay. But the particular context was the existence
of the "bureaucratic" line which, in my opinion,
yours resembles.
The article errs by incorrectly calling the STPFP
"beyond our reach" -- again, it was a problem of
collective will, not resources. As for a "concrete
impact", on the one hand, 500+ sandwiches isn't
much; on the other hand, by similar standards, MIM
Notes frequency, size, and distribution isn't much
either. And I dare say that a sandwich will do more
than a MIM Notes to address the practical problems
in the masses' everyday life. (Dialectically, the
MIM Notes will have its impact, but for concrete
impact, the sandwich wins. And when the sandwich
comes with MIM's program and contact info, it's no
longer really a contest.)
-- a comrade in the west
MIM RESPONDS: This letter does a good job of
demonstrating how it is possible for a Maoist party
to carry out a relatively large program that is led
by incorrect political line. The letter also shows
us how divorcing the study of theory from the realm
of practice can make for lazy theory and ultra-left
practice together.
The author is correct to raise the example of the
Black Panther Party as the BPP was the Maoist
vanguard in this country from 1966 through to the
early 1970s. The BPP's Serve the People programs
were carried out in the context of a vibrant
movement to free political prisoners, oppose pig
activity generally, and oppose the U.$. war in
Vietnam among other things. MIM is building these
same activities against prisons, police brutality
and imperialism, but without such a movement, it is
not the right time to initiate such far-reaching
STP programs.
The article "Repudiate 'charity'" in MN149 made
clear that propaganda work among drug-addicted
homeless people is not a form of activism we have
the resources to be taking on right now. Any
lessons learned in the course of this project came
at the expense of getting ahead of ourselves,
devoting resources to this program instead of to
programs we could follow-through on, and misleading
the masses into thinking that this is the correct
form of revolutionary organizing at this time --
all of these things point to the fact that this
program was wrong for us in 1997. The letter writer
promotes a lazy approach to theory in saying that
even if we made avoidable mistakes, at least we
learned something. MIM consistently struggles to
apply the theoretical lessons of past revolutionary
struggles and not to repeat errors.
Maoists do not pat themselves on the back for
learning through ultra-leftism, we do not say "hey,
we wasted the people's time and money for a few
months but at least we got some practical
experience doing it." We must take responsibility
for understanding our material conditions well
enough to not make egregious ultra-left errors. We
will make honest mistakes at times but as the
article in MN149 pointed out, this was not one of
them. It was a mistake we could have prevented and
we plan not to make similar mistakes in the future.
The letter writer wants to equate the
"particularity" of a supposedly bureaucratic line
existing in Amerika today with one which Mao
struggled against in China in 1934 -- to argue that
MIM harbors a bureaucratic line because it is not
doing work in 1997 which Mao insisted the Chinese
Communist Party do in 1934. Yet the letter writer
wants to dismiss the Chinese armed struggle as mere
context for the CCP's work! The background to the
masses in Changkang saying "The Communist party is
really good!" is that "when fire broke out in a
poor peasant's house destroying one and a half
rooms, the township government appealed to the
masses to contribute money to help him. In another
instance, three persons were starving, so the
township government and the mutual-aid society
immediately gave them rice."(Be Concerned with the
Well-Being of the Masses, Selected Works Vol.1, p.
148-49)
Without the armed struggle defensible gains are by
definition much smaller. The armed struggle is the
only thing that can make a mutual aid society and a
benevolent township government possible. It is also
the prerequisite for making these things worth
supporting because without it the township
government is necessarily feudal or bourgeois at
best. The method the CCP used to help the masses
see that the party's interests were bound up with
their own was to take leadership in work the masses
could participate in.
On the question of "leading the masses to solve
their own problems," the article on the STPFP
argued that this program offered no such
leadership. In the passage quoted by the letter
writer, Mao refers to "heighten[ing the peasants']
labour enthusiasm and increas[ing] agricultural
production," but the letter writer says nothing
about how MIM handing out sandwiches and a copy of
our program is even the beginning of mobilizing the
masses to participate in caring for their own basic
needs. Again, this represents the theoretical
sloppiness of the ultra-left, which wants to take
the spectacular and most public aspects of past
movements while ignoring the years of arduous
struggle which went into building those movements.
No one is disputing Mao on the necessity of paying
attention to the well-being of the masses; what we
are arguing is the question of whether under
current conditions such a program could amount to
genuinely effective work for the masses' well-
being. Even in the Mao essay which you quote, which
was written when the CCP was at a higher stage of
struggle than MIM is today, Mao talks about
mobilizing the peasants, not about mobilizing the
lumpen to meet its own needs.
The STPFP was rightist in doing charity work rather
than holding out for the vibrant political movement
that would allow this work to expand into
independent organizing for the masses' needs, it
was leftist in asserting that the party public-
opinion building apparatus was sufficiently strong
that this program could effectively organize the
lumpen into meeting their own needs.
To call one sandwich per week addressing the
practical problems of the masses' everyday life
makes a joke out of hunger, especially when it is
combined with an argument which guts the importance
of building sustainable and expandable independent
institutions of the oppressed. MIM does have many
effective Serve the People programs including our
revolutionary Free Books for Prisoners program,
prisoner re-lease program, the educational work we
do through literature distribution and organizing
events, and the many struggles we carry out on
behalf of the prisoners in Amerika. MIM now seeks
to expand these programs as we build others. It is
important that we don't get ahead of ourselves and
waste resources on programs that we can not
properly sustain or develop to effect the masses
well-being. At the same time we need to think big
and work towards the day in the not too distant
future when we will be able to sustain programs on
the scale of our Filipino comrades who provide
medical care for the people, organize them to
defend their land, and help them to become self-
sufficient while fighting armed revolution against
imperialism.
* * *
ENGLAND, EUROPE: STOP AMERIKAN INJUSTICE
We the prisoners, communists and progressive
individuals, including some Quakers, fighting the
unjust court system in Amerika generally have our
backs against the walls. The U.$. criminal
INjustice system churns out convictions without
regard for the supposed principles of "innocent
until proven guilty" or "beyond a reasonable
doubt," while the white nation trails along with
the tough-on-crime bandwagon. MIM calls on
Europeans who have recently noticed Amerikan
injustice in action, and to organizers within U.$.
borders who oppose brutality and injustice, to take
up our fight against the entire sprawling and
oppressive Amerikan justice system.
The recent au pair court case has shown many
Europeans that the Amerikan court system is not
about justice. MIM urges those who are watching to
look deeper into the Amerikan system and see that
au pair's case is one in a system which does not
bring about justice -- this is the one case which
was turned around, but what about all the less
famous ones? Many Amerikan whites have realized the
same thing in the wake of Louise Woodward's
conviction and release -- but what about Geronimo
Pratt, what about Mumia Abu-Jamal, and what about
all the captives whose words fill the pages of MIM
Notes' Under Lock & Key? What about those prisoners
who have not yet found such anti-prison forces as
MIM Notes but who live under the thumb of the
prison guards every day?
MIM directs its fire at the U.$. criminal injustice
system as a whole and we call on all genuine anti-
imperialists to do the same. We call for sustained
and increased opposition to the system which
imprisons the oppressed nationalities at rates many
times their percentages in the population, and
which arrests oppressed nation youth for hanging
out with their friends.
We call on all progressive-minded people in Europe
to support and distribute MIM Notes, which is the
most censored newspaper in the U$A. It is being
censored in the U.$. prisons, because we report the
real conditions of prisons -- including the crimes
of wardens and guards. It is being censored because
we consistently report many examples of injustice
and even murder being carried out by the Amerikan
legal system.
ANTI-PIG COMRADES IN EUROPE:
UNITE WITH MIM AGAINST PRISON CENSORSHIP
We know that many progressives in Europe can work
with communists like us. Even if we disagree on
important principles, we're pushing for the support
of progressives in Europe to fight the battle only
MIM and a few individual progressives are fighting.
In Europe, many people do not believe that being a
communist is a crime. Here in the U$A, they ban our
literature and invent charges against prisoners who
read it. While MIM advances literacy by
distributing free books, magazines and newspapers
in prison, the state prison authorities often
confiscate the literature and throw it out. Only
sometimes do prison authorities follow the law and
inform us that our literature has been confiscated.
There is often no pretense in allowing prisoners to
rehabilitate themselves by learning to read
interesting and intelligent material. The
reactionary view is that prisoners should leave
prison as ignorant and sick as possible, to have no
economic future and to spread infectious diseases.
Consistently, we have brought cold, hard statistics
and reason to people within U.$. borders through
publications, educational events, posters and other
organizing. While we find some anti-prisons
activists we can ally with, the majority of
settlers only line up for more emotional responses
to crime. They do not listen to communists or
Quakers or the prisoners themselves. That is why it
is so important for Europeans to work with MIM in
the struggle to turn the tide against the largest
prison state in the world. The presence of anti-
prison activism is stronger in Europe than in
Amerika and we must add this voice to our own. MIM
and Amerika's prisoners need more English and other
Europeans to aid in the struggle to criticize the
white settler nation of Amerika and build more
opposition to the use of prisons as a tool for
oppression.
For every censored MIM Notes covering prison
conditions in the U$A, let there be 10 new readers
of MIM Notes in Europe! Then let there be 10 new
signatories to petitions sent to MIM Notes to ease
these conditions. Libertarian and anarchist
friends: distribute MIM Notes as retaliation until
the censorship stops! The forces of reaction will
be weaken as more unite with MIM against the
Amerikan INjustice system.
FACTS OF AU PAIR CASE
On October 30, a jury in Middlesex County,
Massachusetts found Louise Woodward guilty of
second degree murder in the death of a baby. The
prosecution claimed the baby's head was so damaged
that the au pair must have thrown the baby hard
enough to cause as much damage as a high-speed car
accident. The defense brought medical authorities
who argued that the baby had already been injured
some days earlier and it did not take much for the
baby to die. MIM claims no special knowledge on
this case.
But this case of conflicting hard evidence only
adds to our proof that Amerikans view criminal
defendants as guilty until proven innocent, and
that they will happily ignore a clear and
reasonable doubt. Anything a cop says is worshipped
in our sick society -- to the point where a
videotape in Simi Valley could not convict cops of
beating Rodney King while entirely circumstantial
evidence put forward by cops can convince a jury to
convict an au pair.
On this or that case, one might be wrong, but
overall the statistics tell no lies: the U$A is
the world's number one prison state. While
complaining about Jiang Zemin, the U$A is
imprisoning more people per 1,000 than China is,
and with equally lame excuses. While China executes
more people than the U$A, the U$ prison system is
still responsible for more total wastage of lives
per 1,000 people.
CAMBRIDGE BACKGROUND:
LIBERAL "LEFT" SWINGS RIGHT
In the Cambridge political region a spate of crimes
has unleashed the mystic side of this liberal town,
an emotional side open to rightist demagoguery.
Even a concentration of tens of thousands of
liberals in one place is no defense against
reactionary demagoguery, only Marxist science can
fully defeat reaction. Now with the defeat of rent-
control by a narrow state-wide vote, increased
petty-bourgeoisification has pushed Cambridge
politics even further into the mainstream.
It seems that in this area of approximately 100,000
there has been shock after shock in the last few
weeks. In September, Cambridge court handled the
murder of a girl in neighboring Somerville, which
is filled with ethnic whites of older ages and
wannabe Cambridgeites of younger ages who could not
find housing for rent in Cambridge.
Then there was the case of the 10-year-old boy
Jeffrey Curley apparently killed and then raped.
Post-modern liberal City Council member, Katherine
Triantafillou has turned the murder into an issue
of language. Triantafillou questioned whether we
know for sure that Curley's killers were a gay
couple, writing to the Cambridge Chronicle
objecting that a womyn was verbally insulted on the
street after the publicity surrounding the murder
for being a "dyke child molester." This is typical
of what infuriates MIM so much about post-modern
liberalism. People are dying and these post-modern
liberals are mostly concerned about language.
Triantafillou's knee-jerk reaction shows how
shallow her support for lesbian and gay issues is.
She implies that if Curley's murderers really were
gay, then bigotry against gays and lesbians is
justified. MIM does not deny that there are very
sick people in this decadent society. No one social
group has a monopoly on sickness because the
sickness is systematic and so we do not condone
bigotry except for bigotry against people defending
the system.
This focus on language makes the struggle against
oppression look hopelessly ineffective and skewed
in its priorities. Triantafillou could be thinking
of tactical things to do in the struggle and
capturing the emotional energies of the people for
effective action. The focus on Curley's death does
nothing to aid the struggle for an end to
patriarchal violence. MIM connects this rabid crime
hype with patriarchal violence -- one form of
oppression is aimed at the oppressed nationalities,
the other at children. Whatever the sexual
orientations of the sick people who killed Curley,
the review of anti-death penalty law in
Massachusetts is a reactionary outcome of the hype.
Today in Cambridge, there are city workers pulling
down posters from utility poles around the clock at
huge taxpayer expense. This hurts MIM organizing
because we cannot afford television time or space
in newspapers to publicize our public events. Yet
the Cambridge Chronicle's only concern with this
policy (October 30, 1997) is that it is affecting
crime notices being posted.
BRIGHT SPOTS AND LESSONS FOR FURTHER STRUGGLE
MIM marveled when the au pair Louise Woodward
gained the support of her whole hometown in
England, including $22,000 for her parents. While
this case is an exceptional one: a white European
convicted of murder in the white nation courts of
Amerika, MIM is still glad for the attention it has
drawn to the court system generally. The ease with
which Woodward's charge was reduced and her
sentence practically eliminated to time served
should prompt those in Europe who were watching
this case to investigate how many others could or
should have the same outcome. Could this really be
a one-time accident? Or is it true as MIM argues
that all prisoners in Amerika are political
prisoners, because the pigs who arrest them and the
courts which convict them are thoroughly abusive
and corrupt?
Such support is rather rare in the U$A, even in the
Mumia case which has received such celebrity even
in the liberal newspapers. The few disoriented
socialists and communists in Amerika only get the
courage up to speak out on a handful of cases
already approved by the liberal bourgeois media.
That is how impossible it has become to challenge
the political climate, the climate MIM calls labor
aristocracy politics. MIM looks to turn the
criticism of the handling of the Louise Woodward
case into prolonged criticism and attention on the
criminal INjustice system generally.
PATRIARCHY'S MURKY AREAS HIDE REACTION
Self-contradictory patriarchal reasoning led to
much public criticism of the dead baby's mother,
even from liberal Cambridge wimmin. They say the
mother put her career above her child and none of
this would have happened if it had not been for
her.
The U$A is just not set up to support two-career
families with children. So fearful of communism,
the public including the majority of workers
opposes government handling of infants. Hard-core
Christians easily invent stories about child
molesters in day care centers as if there were none
in Christian families where mothers stay at home.
Whether through private care or public care,
children are currently victims of patriarchy. Under
socialism, we will rid ourselves of reaction and
move forward with careers for wimmin, public and
collective care of children and ever-greater
independence of children from adult authority as
they are taught to care for themselves.
GIVING WORKERS MORE JOBS TO PROTECT THE PRISON
STATE
There is no question workers are getting jobs from
a repressive political and intellectual climate.
MIM says the white nation is privileged enough,
without working directly in the service of
imperialism. In Cambridge, people obtain jobs to
pull down posters full time. Others get jobs
turning college campuses into armed camps complete
with barbed wire.
In nearby Hartford, Connecticut, a billboard for
union politics stands. "Ah, finally the U$A is
unionizing," says the social-democrat in Europe?
No, this is a billboard showing criminals leaving
prison if the public does not increase the prison
budget to hire more union prison guards and raise
their wages.
The traditional labor movement is behind the prison
and crime hysteria here, as are rank-and-file
workers. We must understand the economic interests
of the labor aristocracy which fuel this class
alliance of capitalists and workers. The hysteria
is directed at an expanding group being turned into
a lumpenproletariat -- immigrants, oppressed
nationals and even a section of settlers. Even the
white imprisonment rate in the U$A is far above
European norms except in Russia.
The organizations in the U$A that must cater to
workers -- who are mostly labor aristocracy as
Lenin defined it -- these organizations cannot and
do not take a firm stand against the prison craze
and white crime hysteria. They are too worried
about appeasing their chauvinist constituents and
paralyzed themselves, by their own labor
aristocracy connection.
MIM does not need our friends to agree with us on
this issue. There is no need to understand
Amerikkkan politics to know that the reactionary
movement on crime in the U$A must be stopped. We
know our European allies will realize that if they
do not help to defeat the forces of the reactionary
prison-state in the U$A, it will come for them
next.
* * *
CALIFORNIA GUARDS INSTIGATE VIOLENCE BETWEEN
PRISONERS
By a rail comrade
Two California prisons infamous for their bad
conditions and inhumane treatment of prisoners are
being investigated by the white nation's Federal
Bureau of Investigations. The California Department
of Corrections (DOC) tried to cover up internal
reports that guards were staging fights among
inmates at Corcoran Prison in Kings County and
Pelican Bay Prison in Crescent City.
At Pelican Bay Prison the guards instigated fights
by passing rumors about prisoners who were
convicted of molesting. The guards also bribed
prisoners with alcohol and money, to start
conflicts with those convicted of molesting in the
white nation's courts.
At Corcoran the guards exploited racial and gang
tension to bring about violence between prisoners.
Prisoners from rival gangs were sent into the yard
together and then the guards would shoot at the
prisoners if they failed to stop fighting on cue.
According to the Kings County Chronicle, over fifty
prisoners have been shot through this kind of set
up since 1988, when the prison opened. In the
1980's a prison edict issued the integrated yard
policy which required yards to be integrated by
gang and race affiliation, officials responsible
for the edict claimed they wanted to teach rival
gang inmates to get along.
In reality they saw this integration as the perfect
scheme to cause prisoner on prisoner violence so
that they could support their requests for billions
of dollars in new facilities. Prisoner on prisoner
violence became a source of entertainment to the
guards, they bet money on who would win a fight.
One prisoner at Corcoran reported that the guards
gave him extra sandwiches for winning a fight.
These disgusting details have only been revealed
after a prison videotape of such a staged fight
where a prisoner was shot dead by guards, and
reports from one guilt stricken guard.
Lieutenant Steve Rigg complained to the Warden that
the integrated yard policy was not working. In
response, Rigg was threatened by the Warden, who
saw that the integrated yard policy was indeed
working toward proving that there was a growing
problem of prisoner violence.
The reports of prisoner violence were to be used in
a request for more government funding for the
prison facilities and staff at Corcoran prison.
Lieutenant Rigg then turned to the F.B.I. with
stolen prisoner files and prison log books in which
there were many inconsistencies about the fights
that preceded guards shooting prisoners. The DOC
then tried to block investigations. The F.B.I.
claimed they would investigate the issue. This
means they will treat it as an isolated incident.
The F.B.I. solution to this systematic problem
might be to fire a couple of guards.
At Pelican Bay, one guard has been accused of
giving alcohol to prisoners to bribe them into
fighting prisoners convicted of molesting. The
guard would make certain prisoners aware that
certain other prisoners were convicted in the white
nation's courts of child molestation, instigating
fights, and even instructing prisoners how they
could kill someone without a weapon.
The mainstream press, the DOC and the F.B.I. have
tried to make this kind of atrocity look like an
isolated incident. They charge one or two guards
with something which is systematic inside the white
nation prison system. According to California DOC
reports, seven prisoners have died from shots fired
by guards during prisoner fights at Corcoran. At
Pelican Bay, prison officials have managed to put
all the blame on one Latino guard by bribing
prisoners to testify against him.
MIM does not believe that justice can be served in
the corrupt injustice system of the United Snakes.
These incidents of guards staging prisoner fights
are just one example of the psychological and
physical torture of the people incarcerated by the
injustice system. The conviction of those
responsible for supposedly isolated cases of
misconduct can only help to partially expose the
injustices inherent in this imperialist system.
We urge all who are oppressed by this imperialist
system to understand the Amerikan history of using
any justification to infiltrate and smash
revolutionary or nationalist organizations. The
current system is one in which the laws are not
applied equally. So while MIM believes it is
important to expose the DOC for breaking its own
rules, we assert that revolution is necessary to
achieve true justice. Only when the people obtain
power over their economic, political, judicial,
educational, and military systems can we truly have
justice and equality for all people.
* * *
BAYLOSIS SPEAKS ON STRUGGLE OF FILIPINO MASSES
***Over the last two months, MIM and RAIL helped
organize a continent-wide speaking tour for radical
Filipino activist Rafael Baylosis to bring a deeper
understanding of the national democratic struggle
in the Philippines to a broad audience. BAYAN
International USA, a legal, multi-sectoral national
democratic organization based inside u.$. borders,
initiated and co-sponsored the tour.
Rafael Baylosis is an experienced activist in the
national democratic struggle in the Philippines. He
participated in the "First Quarter Storm" of 1970
which mobilized thousands of Filipino young people
against the Marcos regime, and he later joined the
revolutionary movement in the countryside.
He was arrested and imprisoned twice for his
revolutionary political conviction and activities,
for a total of more than eight years. First, in
1973-76 during the Marcos regime, and second, from
1988 to 1992 during the Aquino administration.
Released temporarily on bail July 1992 with an
inconclusive case in court for alleged "illegal
possession of firearms and explosives in
furtherance of rebellion."
Since his release, Baylosis has been giving
political and theoretical education to mass leaders
and members of progressive people's organizations.
He is currently a consultant to the National
Democratic Front of the Philippine (NDFP) panel for
socio-economic reforms in the NDFP-Government of
the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) peace talks
and a consultant to BAYAN (New Patriotic Alliance),
a legal, multi-sectoral national democratic
organization.
The following article summarizes the political and
economic situation in the Philippines loosely based
on several of Baylosis' talks. MIM takes full
responsibility for the editorial content.***
SEMI-COLONIAL AND SEMI-FEUDAL NATURE OF PHILIPPINE
SOCIETY
Philippine society is semi-colonial because it is
politically and economically dominated by foreign
powers, even though the Philippines is nominally an
independent country. The dominant foreign power in
the Philippines is u.$. imperialism, but Japanese,
Australian, and European imperialism all
participate in the exploitation of the Philippines.
Philippine society is semi-feudal because the main
mode of production in the Philippines remains
agrarian and backwards, and because the problems of
landlessness and severe exploitation of the
peasantry by a handful of big landlords persist.
75% of the people in the Philippines are peasants
and 70% are landless.
Because Philippine society is semi-colonial and
semi-feudal, the majority of people of the
Philippines face poverty, unemployment, lack of
heath care, and exploitation. In general, the
current political and economic situation denies the
people of the Philippines their right to self-
determination.
The economy of the Philippines is an import
dependent, export-oriented economy. The Philippines
exports raw materials and semi-finished products.
The products which are produced in the Philippines
are heavily dependent on foreign inputs, such as
steel and capital goods. The Philippines does not
have a steel industry, chemical industry, or
petroleum industry, all of which are essential to
any modern economy. No steel means that the people
cannot develop capital goods. No chemicals denies
the Filipino people the ability to produce
pharmaceuticals and fertilizers. No petroleum means
that control over energy and transportation is not
in the hands of the people. The lack of national
industrialization is perpetuated by comprador
Ramos' kowtowing to imperialist contracts which
only send super-profits plumping the imperialist
nation economies and line the pockets of the
comprador bourgeoisie.
U.$. MILITARY OCCUPIES THE PHILIPPINES
One of the clearest examples of u.$. imperialism's
political dominance in the Philippines is the u.$.
military's continued occupation of Philippine
territory. Despite the fact that the Government of
the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) terminated
the u.$. military's lease on Subic Bay Naval Base
and Clark Air Force Base in the early 1990s in
response to a mass movement to kick the bases out
of the Philippines, several current and proposed
treaties give the u.$. military free rein in the
Philippines.
For example, the Status of Military Forces
Agreement (SOFA) grants u.$. soldiers immunity from
prosecution during port calls and joint exercises
with the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP). The
proposed Access and Cross Servicing Agreement
(ACSA) would grant u.$. troops, planes, and ships
access to Philippine ports and airfields. The u.$.
Navy is currently lobbying for access to 22 ports
around the Philippines. This would give the Navy
more access to the Philippines than when Subic Bay
Naval Base was open. The u.$. military is also
lobbying for a base in southern Mindanao, where
both the New People's Army (NPA) and the Moro
Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) are waging armed
struggle against the GRP. The u.$. military already
financed the construction of an airfield there.
The Philippines is important to the u.$. military
because it gives them a base for operations against
East Asia. The Philippines was used as a staging
area for the predatory Korean and Vietnam wars.
RECTIFICATION CAMPAIGN STRENGTHENS THE MOVEMENT
The struggle against imperialism, feudalism and
bureaucrat capitalism in the Philippines has made
great gains in the five years since the second
great rectification campaign. Baylosis explained
that, since the CPP-led rectification, the movement
has greatly expanded its influence in the
countryside, expanded its mass base in the cities,
and purged itself of the military adventurists and
urban insurrectionists who had greatly weakened the
movement, especially in the 1980s.
The adventurists had prematurely attempted to
develop major military operations, without regard
to the NPA's capabilities and mass base. This led
to losses at the hands of the U.S-backed regimes.
And the urban insurrectionists had attempted to
turn every political action in the cities into an
armed uprising, which resulted in needless
destruction and alienation of the movement from the
masses.
With these two tendencies purged, Baylosis said the
movement has been able to make great advances,
while the movement members who splintered off have
degenerated into obscurity or outright
collaboration with the reactionary ruling classes.
NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE GRP
Baylosis also explained the role of the NDFP's
legal strategy, including negotiations with the
GRP. He was joined at the podium in Washington,
D.C. by Arnedo Valera, the former main counsel
regarding the Mediola Massacre of 1987, chair of
the Washington Human Rights Forum, and also a
consultant to the NDFP on international law and
human rights.
Baylosis and Valera spoke at length about the
NDFP's ongoing negotiations with the GRP. Baylosis
explained that the negotiations where one part of
the NDFP's legal struggle, which is secondary to
the armed struggle of the people's war. The
negotiations are taking place at a time when there
is a power imbalance between the parties, with the
government having an advantage over the people's
forces. As long as that is the case, Baylosis said,
the NDFP does not expect to reach a final
settlement, and during this time the NPA does not
suspend its military operations. At the same time,
the negotiations can be used to win some
concessions from the GRP that might reduce
repression in the country, or lessen the negative
impacts of the war on the people.
However, Valera described many instances in which
the GRP has gone back on its word in the
negotiations and has not lived up even to the
agreements which have been signed by both panels at
the talks. In the process, the GRP is exposed as an
obstacle to a just and lasting peace in the
Philippines.
Baylosis and Valera also reported on the recent
capture of two military officers by the NPA in a
tactical offensive. They said that the NPA was
treating the officers humanely, as prisoners of
war, and that they would probably release them
after a formal request from the government in
accordance with the Geneva Conventions on the
conduct of war. The government has not yet made
such a request, which would acknowledge that the
conflict is a legitimate one, not a criminal matter
or a case of government versus alleged terrorists.
In the meantime, the GRP has said that it will not
resume negotiations until the POWs are released.
Audience members, who were mostly supportive of the
national democratic movement, asked several
important questions, and a productive discussion
followed the talk given in D.C. One audience member
wanted to know what the NDFP hoped to finally
achieve in the peace negotiations, suggesting that
a sharing of power with the government or a
division of territory might be reasonable outcomes.
Baylosis explained that the NDFP does not expect a
settlement with the government as long as it is in
power and the people are not.
Another person asked why, if the government was so
repressive, there were other candidates for
president besides the U.S.-backed former-general
Fidel Ramos. Baylosis explained that as long as
there had been bourgeois democratic elections in
the Philippines, the outcome had never been to the
benefit of the people, because the candidates and
the election process were controlled by the ruling
classes, and -- increasingly -- by the military and
former military officers now in civilian positions.
However, he added that the NPA does attempt to
influence some elections, especially local
elections in areas where the people's movement has
a lot of support, and where the outcome might
result in limited progressive developments for the
people. Several people also asked for clarification
of the rectification movement, and in particular
the consequences of the errors by the revisionists
and opportunists.
MIM considers this leg of the speaking tour a
success because it contributed to a greater
understanding of the national democratic movement
in the Philippines among activists and potential
activists who have an important role to play in the
United States as well as in the Philippines.
The event also demonstrated the solidarity that
exists between MIM and RAIL and the revolutionary
movement in the Philippines, and provided MIM with
an opportunity to do its internationalist duty in
support of Third World movements against U.S
imperialism and its puppet regimes. Exposing the
atrocities of U.S. imperialism, in the Philippines
and elsewhere, is an important part of MIM's
principal task, which is building a revolutionary
movement in the imperialist countries.
* * *
AMERIKAN-SINO SUMMIT REEKS OF CAPITALIST HYPOCRISY
The u.s.-China summit held the first week of
November was little more than a publicity stunt for
both capitalist countries. One main summit goal was
expanding economic cooperation that will increase
the profits of the big capitalists and ruling class
in both countries. Jiang and Clinton also used the
summit to posture on human rights issues.
The United Snakes is most interested in relations
with China for financial reasons: representing a
quarter of the world's population the country
offers a huge potential market as well as a vast
reserve of labor to exploit. This year, Amerikan
exports to China hit an all-time high. The u.s.
government and corporations view access to China's
markets as a key point of negotiation.
Using admission to the World Trade Organization as
a bargaining chip, Clinton said "We strongly
support China's admission into the World Trade
Organization, but in turn China must dramatically
improve access for foreign goods and services."(1)
In a deal timed to coincide with the summit,
Chinese officials signed a $3 billion order for 50
jets made by Boeing Co. -- the biggest Chinese
planes order ever. Clinton agreed to allow exports
of u.s. nuclear energy equipment in return for
Chinese assurances that China will no longer
provide nuclear assistance to Iran. The Chinese
also said they would join a global initiative on
information technology that would cut tariffs on
$1.4 billion in u.s. exports of computers and
software to China from 23 percent to zero. Such a
move would lower prices for u.s. high-tech exports
to China, and result in higher sales.(2)
China went the route of state-capitalism in 1976,
but unlike the plumped up labor aristocracy in the
imperialist united snakes, the majority of China
does not benefit from super-profits extracted from
Third World nations. The moves to ease tariffs and
trade for the Amerikan imperialists only means that
the over one billion Chinese rural poor, the over
100 million jobless masses in China will continue
to be denied control over their nation's economy
and development. When Amerikan capital-intensive
goods flood the market without tariffs, the Chinese
people are not able to compete and develop self-
sufficient industrialization as was one project of
Maoist China. Though the big capitalists thriving
after the sale of state enterprises and mutual
imperialist deals will get fat off the Amerikan-
Sino diplomacy, the masses will continue to be
subjected to super-exploitation and poverty.
CRITICISMS TARGET JIANG AND IGNORE AMERIKAN
LOCKDOWN
Jiang Zemin's tour around the united states was
marked with demonstrations at every stop as
Amerikans, Chinese, Tibetians and others turned out
to express their views. The majority of the
demonstrations were protests against China's rule
in Tibet and human rights violations in mainland
China. But at each stop there was also a group of
supporters who turned out to welcome Zemin.
Most of these supporters were Chinese nationals but
in Cambridge, Massachusetts the Workers World Party
was spotted with a large banner supporting "Chinese
communism," demonstrating that some so-called
communist groups are still hopelessly confused
about the difference between communism and
capitalism.
MIM calls China state capitalist to distinguish it
from the free market capitalism of many imperialist
countries. Under state capitalism the economy of a
country is centrally controlled. But in both forms
of capitalism a few individuals are getting rich at
the expense of the majority of the people who are
exploited. With state control this exploitation is
often hidden under the guise of ownership by the
people, but taking a close look at the economy of
China reveals that it has been on the capitalist
road since the death of Mao. Those who defend China
as if it were not capitalist look more and more
foolish as even the so-called communists in China
admit that they are in fact implementing
capitalism. (See MN148 article "Chinese leaders run
from socialism" and "The Capitalist Roaders are
still on the Capitalist Road.")
The summit included some verbal sparing over the
question of human rights violations in China.
Clinton obviously felt the public pressure to take
a hard line on China while Jiang stood his ground
and defended his government. The sum total of it
was a lot of verbal posturing that made both
leaders look good to the people of their countries.
Clinton told Jiang that they have "fundamental
differences" over human rights and that China is
"on the wrong side of history" by refusing to
permit free expression. Jiang said that jailed
religious leaders were law breakers and that Tibet
lived in "happiness and contentment." Jiang's
overall answer to criticisms: "In terms of
structural reform, we will expand democracy,
improve the legal system, run the country according
to law and build a socialist country under the
law.''(2)
Jiang made an interesting comparison between
China's actions in Tibet and Abraham Lincoln's
emancipation of Blacks from slavery in the u.s.
civil war. "It was our democratic reform that
emancipated some one million serfs and slaves."
While MIM does not support Jiang or the Chinese
government which restored capitalism after Mao
died, we agree with Jiang that Tibet under the rule
of the Dalai Lama meant suffering for the majority
of Tibetians forced to live as serfs and slaves.
The current situation for Tibetians under
capitalist Chinese rule mirrors the situation for
Blacks in the united snakes in that both
governments do not offer the people self-
determination. MIM supports the right to self-
determination of all nations and we recognize the
struggle fought by the Tibetian communists to
overthrow feudal rule as a tremendous advance for
the Tibetian people. The aid given by communist
China helped the people of Tibet end feudalism in
their country. But we recognize that state-
capitalist China is not operating in the interest
of the people of mainland China or the people of
Tibet.
Members of Congress pledged to adopt a prisoner of
conscience in China or Tibet on Oct 28 in
preparation for Jiang's visit. Senate Foreign
Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms greeted
dissidents expressing concern about the summit,
saying, ''As we meet, hundreds and thousands of
Chinese and Tibetan citizens are locked away by the
Chinese regime, some in labor camps, others in
prison, for exercising their rights. The treatment
they receive is horrific.''(3) Helms pressured
Clinton to use meetings with Jiang to push for the
release of prominent Chinese dissidents.
But while there was much outcry over China's
imprisonment of political activists and their poor
treatment of prisoners, nothing was said about the
situation in the prisons in the united snakes. The
u.s. is number one in imprisonment per capita in
the world. This country has a greater proportion of
Blacks in prison than apartheid South Africa. There
are a number of people in Amerikan gulags
imprisoned explicitly for their political beliefs
and activism.
And prison conditions in this country can only be
described as torture. In a country where prisons
are run for profit and used as a means of social
control, the indignation expressed by government
leaders and activists over Chinese prisons
underscores the hypocrisy of these people as they
ignore the more than million lives being wasted
behind bars in Amerika.
NOTES:
1. Text of Clinton's speech from AP 25 October
1997.
2. San Jose Mercury News 6 November, 1997.
3. San Jose Mercury News 18 October 1997.
* * *
AMERIKA BUYS BIG WEAPONS SO IRAN CAN'T
by an MC
The united snakes just pulled off a deal to buy 21
MIG-29 fighter jets from Moldova, a former Soviet
republic. Neither country will say how much the
u.s. paid, but Pentagon officials are reportedly
pleased with the price. The deal includes promises
of future so-called humanitarian aid to Moldova,
among other things.
MIG-29 jets are single-seat fighter planes that
launch nuclear and other missiles. The going rate
is around $30 million per plane, but the secretary
of defense claimed to have paid much less than that
for the fleet of 21 (plus spare parts and more than
500 non-nuclear missiles for the planes). The
imperialist united snakes learned that Iran was
interested in buying some of the planes from
Moldova, and had apparently sent a team of
inspectors to examine the planes. Pentagon
officials said that while there were other nations
who were interested in the MIGs, it was the Iranian
interest that triggered the Amerikan purchase.
This massive purchase of weapons of mass
destruction marks the second time in recent history
that Amerika used this tactic of buying weapons
before an enemy nation could. Defense secretary
William Cohen defended the purchase by saying that
not only that Iran should not have access to
sophisticated weapons capable of launching nuclear
missiles, but also that, "[w]e're going to analyze
them. And I'm sure that the Air Force may come up
with some utilitarian use of them."(1)
The united snakes has spent $1.8 billion since 1993
helping Russia and other former Soviet republics
dismantle nuclear weapons, so that Amerika could be
sure that the weapons do not fall into the hands of
alleged terrorists. Under the same program, the
united snakes bought enough uranium to build 25
nuclear weapons in 1994 from Kazakhstan, in order
to prevent the uranium from falling into the hands
of imperialist-labeled rogue nations.
MIM and its supporters know that it is the
imperialist united states that is the rogue nation,
and revolutionaries and progressives all over the
world and in Amerika are most fearful of Amerika
having weapons of mass destruction. MIM does not
feel protected knowing that the Amerikan government
now has 21 new fighter jets, and MIM does not
believe that it is okay for people to starve while
more than $50 million was spent on these MIGs.
NOTES:
1. The New York Times, 5 November 1997 p. 1.
2. The Washington Post, 5 November 1997 p. A23.
* * *
TACTICAL OFFENSIVES OF THE NPA BECOMING MORE
VIGOROUS
***MIM Notes prints the following excerpts from an
article by the New People's Army of the Philippines
(NPA) in order to refute the lies that communism is
dead and armed struggle for national liberation is
a thing of the past. Even the reactionaries have to
admit that the NPA, which is under the absolute
leadership of the Communist Party of the
Philippines, is advancing.
This is due to two reasons. (1) The basic problems
of Philippine society persist. In particular,
landlessness and armed reaction drive many peasants
to accept that armed struggle is necessary to solve
their problems. (2) The rectification campaign
inside the NPA and the CPP have made great strides
in rejecting all sorts of erroneous and anti-people
ideas and reaffirming their adherence to Marxism-
Leninism-Maoism.
MIM Notes will print the second part of this
article in the next issue. The second part
documents the increasing abuses of the reactionary
armed forces in the Philippines.***
In the face of the isolation of the US-Ramos regime
from the people due to the crisis created by the
semi-colonial and semi-feudal condition of the
country, the New People's Army is launching more
vigorous tactical offensives and is continuing the
expansion of its mass bases. Even the Chief of
Staff, General Arnulfo Acedera, was forced to admit
that the NPA is becoming more vigorous with its
armed struggle.
Before this, on August 31, no less than the former
Department of National Defense Secretary Renato de
Villa admitted that "The movement was able to
generally recover by the end of 1996 and in the
first half of 1997. This is still the primary
threat to the security of the country. The NPA was
able to recover 597 villages (or 12% increase) and
the NPA forces increase because of the
Rectification Movement in 1996-1997. The NPA are in
the Cordilleras, Central Luzon, Southern Tagalog,
Bicol, Central Visayas and 3 regions in Mindanao."
Following the examples of his AFP [Armed Forces of
the Philippines - MIM] Chief, Northern Central
Luzon Command (NOLCOM) Major General Ismael
Villareal employs psywar tactics with statements
that "the military was able to confiscate 50
firearms from the NPA in Isabela" to cover the
tactical offensives of the NPA. Yet he also
admitted that "there is an active expansion and
strengthening of the NPA in Northern and Central
Luzon. And the NPA is able to launch tactical
offensives in the provinces of Abra, Apayao,
Benguet, Kalinga and Ilocos Sur and it is able to
expand in Tarlac, Pangasinan and Aurora." (PDI,
April 11, 1997, p. 15)
This is also the tone of General Renato Aguda of
the Cordillera Regional Command (CRECOM). He
boasted that "the NPA in the Cordilleras is already
crushed because their leaders are already coming
down (from the hills) to surrender." But last May,
NOLCOM formed and trained 2 companies of
"Cordillera Indigenous Peace Keeping Unit" or CIPKU
from the 176 troopers of CPLA of Conrado Balweg who
are the "Special CAFGU" of NOLCOM against the NPA
in the Cordilleras. [The CAFGUs or Civilian Armed
Forces Geographical Units are paramilitary units
infamous for their savage attacks on the people,
especially political activists. - MIM]
Even in Central Luzon, the Philippine National
Police (PNP) is using psywar propaganda in making
such statements that "there is a split of the NPA
due to unsettled issues about money collected from
progressive taxation." This is done since to cover
the frustrated military operations against the NPA
in the Zambales-Pangasinan and Bataan since March.
In the Visayas, the NPA continues to recover
previous guerrilla zones that were neglected for
one reason or the other. The tactical offensives of
the NPA in the Visayas refuted the statement of the
Visayas Command (VISCOM) that the "NPA is already
crushed ion the Visayas."
The NPA in Mindanao is taking advantage of the
sporadic fighting between the Moro Islamic
Liberation Front (MILF) and the AFP that happens
from time to time in Central and Southwestern
Mindanao. On April 22, Jorge Madlos of NDF Mindanao
made a statement that "since 1995, the areas
recovered reaches to hundreds of villages, there
was an expansion and increase to few hundreds the
number of full time forces and an increase in
thousands of the organized masses."
According to Madlos, "the territories in the
provinces of Zamboanga, Lanao, Budidnon, Agusan,
Surigao, Cotabato, and Sarngani have expanded and
continue to expand. The support of the masses to
the NPA continues to expand and also that of the
sector of the professionals and the mass movement
in the urban areas. These successes disprove the
enemy propaganda that they are victorious. This
also proved the bankruptcy of the contras and
revisionist traitors."
THE TACTICAL OFFENSIVES
The NPA launched more than 35 tactical offensives
from March to October, 1997. The NPA killed or
wounded 10 officers of the AFP and PNP which
include 2 majors, 5 lieutenants among others. More
than 50 enemy troopers were killed and dozens of
them wounded. The NPA also confiscated several
dozens of firearms and thousands of ammunitions as
well as other military materials.
OCTOBER 12 - The NPA punished 1Lt. Bito Solima,
Commanding Officer of the HQ Support Unit of the 19
IB in front of the University of Eastern
Philippines in Catarman, Samar. This was confirmed
in the report of the Philippine Army HQ.
[...]
OCTOBER 5 - The 68 IB and the PNP Intelligence
Group, "Spider," punched the air when they attacked
an empty NPA camp in Barangay Batang, Infanta,
Pangasinan.
SEPTEMBER 26 - A unit of the NPA was able to escape
from the encirclement of the AFP-PNP troopers in
Barangay Wangal, Kasibu, Nueva Viscaya. Because of
this, 5 enemies including 2 soldiers of the 77 IB,
Philippine Army, one PNP and two intelligence
agents of MIG2 were killed in the ensuing mis-
encounter among them.
Last October 7, to avoid embarrassment, the AFP and
PNP tried to conceal the incident by disseminating
a statement to the bourgeois press and said, "the
encounter happened between the AFP-PNP against a
criminal syndicate and those MIG agents killed were
criminals." The 502 Brigade of the PNP in RECOM 2
intensified military operations in the borders of
Nueva Viscaya-Quirino because of the present
construction of the Casecnan Dam that started there
last July 21.
[...]
AUGUST 26 - The NPA raided the police station in
the municipality of Bansud, Oriental Mindoro. Two
security guards were killed. Before this, on July
30, the NPA punished and killed an abusive police
officer, PO2 Faustino A. Reyes in Barrio Alag,
Baco, Mindoro Oriental and confiscated his firearm.
AUGUST 10 - The NPA raided a PNP camp in Barangay
San Jose, Antipolo, Rizal, and killed 2 abusive
police elements and wounded another 2 policemen
from the Regional Mobile Force Company. This was a
warning by the NPA to abusive policemen in Antipolo
and nearby towns who became instruments in land
confiscation by big business companies in the
provinces of Rizal-Quezon and Laguna.
AUGUST 5 - The NPA raided the municipal hall on the
island of Jomanlig, Quezon and took away 2 M16
Armalite rifles, 3 revolvers, and on communication
radio. The NPA were in army uniforms so they were
able to disarm the policemen without engaging them
in a gunbattle.
[...]
JULY 31 - A patrol unit of the Regional Mobile
Force of CRECOM was ambushed by the NPA and [the
NPA] killed two policemen in Barangay Tumalunog,
Flora, Apayao. The RMF CRECOM provides protection
to STII and Taggat, logging companies partially
owned by [former General] Juan Ponce Enrile in the
Paco Valley.
[...]
JULY 15 - The NPA sabotaged a quarry company in
Angat, Bulacan. This quarry business destroys the
environment and scrapes gravel and sand along the
river of Remedios Trinidad and Angat, Bulacan. The
NPA destroyed the quarry equipment and burned down
one back hoe, 3 bulldozers and 3 sand gravel
trucks.
JULY 5 - The NPA put a stop to the destructive
project of the Asian Development Bank (ADB)
Watershed Rehabilitation Project in the towns of
Bulalacao and Puerto Galera that cost P40 M, but
will only serve the tourists in Puerto Galera,
Oriental Mindoro. The NPA banned the workers from
going back to work so that the project cannot be
finished.
[...]
MARCH 26 - The Alvarez Peralta Command of the NPA
ambushed 5 policemen and 3 CAFGU in Palauig and
confiscated their firearms. The Chief of Police of
Palauig, Manuel Alop, was killed as well as 4 other
policemen. Before this, the 703rd Brigade, 68 IB
and PA launched military operations in the
boundaries of the Pangasinan-Zambales which was
highlighted by bombings, artillery and mortar fire
as well as hamletting last March and June.
***New People's Army October 14, 1997***
* * *
ENGLAND: STRUGGLE FOR MAOIST PARTY CONTINUES
London, ENGLAND -- A cyberspace mailing list based
in England to discuss Marx and Lenin has fallen
apart. The so-called "Leninlist" was an offshoot
from the "Marxism List" administered by SPOONS at
jefferson.village.virginia.edu.
The last straw for the split was apparently the
question of Cuba. When the 1980s-style revisionists
on the list found out that Maoism considered Cuba's
Castro to be enemy, they kicked out some people,
including Adolfo Olaechea based in London. Adolfo
Olaechea apparently sped up the process by calling
Cuba "fascist" and "social-fascist."
The Leninlist formed initially to avoid the social-
democrats and Trotskyists on the "Marxism List."
Initially Leninlist invited MIM participation, but
Adolfo Olaechea purged MIM that same month in June,
1997.
The backbone of the organization is the so-called
Communist Action Group. MIM held high hopes for the
Communist Action Group as it initially formed, but
as time goes on, it is clear that it is a warmed
over version of 1980s revisionism. By holding up
defense of Castro as more important than Mao's
theory of class struggle against the bourgeoisie in
the party, the Communist Action Group demonstrates
that it has learned nothing from the evermore
blatant restoration of capitalism in the old Soviet
bloc.
The duty of someone such as Castro who criticized
Mao and Maoism on behalf of the Soviet Union is to
look back and say honestly that Mao was right and
Castro and his pro-Soviet line were wrong: there
really is a bourgeoisie in the party in this era of
socialist revolution. Yet Castro goes on singing
the same song as if nothing had changed in the last
30 years. For this alone, Castroism is an enemy
ideology. No amount of charity to the Third World
or holding of international conferences gives
Castro the right to avoid the fundamental duties of
communist leaders today.
In England, Adolfo Olaechea has been associated
with several failures of Maoist organizing. In this
latest round, he offered the Leninlist to put a
1990s face on revisionism. Adolfo Olaechea had the
role of protecting the Khruschevites in Leninlist
from Maoist criticism. To do this, he used his
credentials of association with the Peruvian
Revolution and banned MIM in June.
In a posting to marxism-
general@lists.village.virginia.edu on October 1,
Adolfo Olaechea was so good as to make clear that
he rued the loss of his pact with Castroite and
Khruschevite revisionism. "It is now evident that
he has opened wide the doors to all the caricatures
of Maoism we had formerly kept out of LeninList by
the legitimate moderators process." This is how
Adolfo Olaechea points out to the revisionists that
they are losing their cover by ditching him. Now
surely MIM will attack he warns them.
Leninlist also long ago banned Paul Cockshott,
according to an October 2nd, marxism-
international@jefferson.village.virginia.edu
message. MIM does not find this surprising
considering that Cockshott has an idea about the
flow of surplus-value and agrees with MIM that the
majority of English workers are not producing
surplus-value.
A November 8 statement by the practical owner of
Leninlist re-iterated that there would be no return
to the status quo, because of the issue of Cuba. It
made favorable references to various revisionists
and social-democrats including the CPI and CPI-M in
India.
MIM reiterates that it is the vanguard organization
of England and other English-speaking imperialist
countries. Comrades should stop wasting time with
warmed over revisionists.
NOTE:
gopher://jefferson.village.Virginia.EDU:70/0R937232
-943620-/pubs/listservs/spoons/marxism-
international.archive
* * *
MARXISM-LENINISM-MAOISM ONLINE
MIM'S ELECTRONIC HATE-MAIL BAG:
WHITE SUPREMACIST CLAIMS AFRICANS HAVE NO HISTORY
Before MIM launched its own web site in February of
1996, a friend of MIM created a page for the Party
which included the text of the Black Panther Party
Program of 1966, something you can also find on
MIM's current web site along with the full-text of
some BPP newspaper articles and MIM's own party
program. Of all our online materials, it is the BPP
portion of the site that has prompted the steadiest
flow of white supremacist hate-mail to MIM. In
general, we simply delete such garbage from our
mailbox, but occasionally we print examples of such
mail with a response.
The following letter is the most recent addition to
MIM's e-hate-mail bag. We reprint it here in order
to expose, respond to and discredit it. It is a
good example of the white supremacist national
oppressor position, which claims that oppressed
peoples have no history -- and hence no nation and
no claim to national self-determination. It is
fitting the BPP -- the vanguard of the Black
struggle for self-determination in the late 1960s
and early 1970s and avowed internationalists --
still inspires the white supremacists to write:
"Dear MIM: I understand you are interested in
education on African History. First such a lesson
is impossible do to the fact that your ancestors
never developed a written language, the first
factor in a peoples' having history. But I can tell
you the African Negro never developed a road, a
cart, a wagon, a system of numbers, an alphabet, a
form of government beyond local tribary, pottery, a
structure beyond the mud hut, agriculture, or any
piece of technology (advanced or basic) that would
bring any significance to the GREAT subject of the
African History. :-) ... "I'm sorry but when I
stated the African Negro never developed pottery I
meant to say a bridge, a system of measurement, or
domesticate a single animal (even though numerous
docile beasts abounded him). :-)"
MIM Responds: It is the height (or depth) of
cowardice to write this unsubstantiated filth in a
private e-mail. Why won't you say it in a public
forum, with an address that the masses can respond
to directly, with some accountability! We are
printing your letter in a continentally circulated
newspaper to expose your lies and your agenda to
the masses.
This writer upholds a theory that white Europeans
introduced language, agriculture, government and
manufacturing to Africa. This would mean that none
of these activities existed before the 15th century
(the first point of contact with European
colonialism) -- a patently absurd proposition. The
theory exists both to deny oppressed peoples' right
to self-determination, and to claim that all
progress in oppressed nations has come from their
oppressors.
Readers who are interested in a good, brief history
of African societies before the 15th century should
pick up Walter Rodney's "How Europe Underdeveloped
Africa," available from MIM for $11. The first
chapter outlines developments in pottery, pre-
industrial manufacturing, trade and agriculture --
including advanced techniques such as crop
rotation, terracing and mixed farming -- on the
African continent before the arrival of European
colonialists. Rodney is careful to demonstrate the
uneven levels of development in different regions,
and to insist on evaluating the concrete conditions
of each.
Rodney's fundamental thesis is that European
colonialism (later imperialism), actively under-
developed Africa by violently subjugating its
people and setting up an economic system based on
the super-exploitation of labor and the theft of
resources. The practical application for
revolutionaries reading this work is to organize to
overthrow the system that created such global
inequality and to build socialism.
PRISON CONNECTIONS:
LOTS OF VALUABLE INFORMATION AND SOME MISGUIDED
REFORMISM
http://persephone.hampshire.edu/wmpig/prisoncon.htm
l wmpig@persephone@hampshire.edu PO Box 9606 North
Amherst MA 01059-9096
Prison Connections is both a print and online
publication of the Western Mass Prison Issues
Group. It contains articles about prison struggles
in Massachusetts and elsewhere, as well as
information about political prisoners and prisoners
of war. The publication's purpose is to "inform and
connect people, while offering points of view on
prisons from people not usually heard from. We are
interested in printing material which actively
combats the forces of oppression keeping us
separated and offers life-affirming alternatives."
In the most recent issue, there are articles about
sentencing disparities for cocaine and crack, the
struggle of Massachusetts prisoners to establish a
political action committee, and book reviews. The
current issue of Prison Connections was among the
first to bring to MIM's attention a new postage
policy at Walpole Prison that greatly reduced the
ability of prisoners to write letters.
The web page is continually updated with action
alerts and events around North America, including a
number of prison and POW-related events led by
RAIL. Their link page is an extensively put
together list of many different resources on
prisons, from activist groups to the Department of
Corrections in most states. There is also a search
engine to search the site.
MIM and Prison Connections have a lot of practical
unity in recognizing that the current incarceration
craze doesn't affect the crime rate, and that the
current system targets Blacks and Latinos. Our
disagreements, however, are shown the most clearly
in the article "Volunteers Sought: Alternatives to
Violence Program."
Alternatives to Violence Program (AVP) (not
associated with the Western Mass Prison Issues
Group) started in 1975 when some prisoners in New
York "working with youth gangs and teenagers at
risk were having difficulty communicating their
message about the consequences of violence,"
contacted the Quakers to conduct a workshop. Out of
that organizing, a movement was born. Now AVP needs
more volunteers from the outside to assist in the
anti-violence workshops.
Masses-on-masses violence, as well as unfocused
violence against the oppressor, sets back the
people's struggle and so MIM opposes it. But the
problem with the AVP approach is that it puts the
focus on prisoners' individual actions. Instead,
they should focus on the larger society that
encourages violence among the oppressed for the
sake of keeping the oppressed nations down through
internal strife and selective prosecution.
Some of the other articles in Prison Connections
support the formation of prison Political Action
Committees as an effective way to make social
change. In one book review, Prison Connections
correctly criticizes a book for focusing only on
the illogical Amerikan practice of incarcerating
large numbers of people for non-violent drug
offenses, but ignoring violent crime. However,
Prison Connections also criticizes the book for not
discussing "cost effective alternatives to
incarceration for violent offenders," such as so-
called "community-based" intervention programs or
other forms of state surveillance.
MIM thinks the corporate and Amerikan government
leaders are among the most violent criminals
offenders in the world. As such, these pigs have no
moral authority to condemn the perpetrators of
smaller crimes as "criminals." Violent crimes
amongst the people exist because we live in a
violent society and there is nothing we can do
within this society to change that. This is why MIM
is organizing for a revolution to eliminate the
roots of injustice and crime: capitalism,
imperialism and patriarchy. The system's rules have
proven themselves incapable of curing the ills of
this system.
We publish this review to alert others to this
useful web site, and in the hopes of opening a
dialogue with Prison Connections about the most
effective ways to aid prisoners and to stop crime.
* * *
UNDER LOCK & KEY
AMERIKKKA THE BEAUTIFUL
by a Pennsylvania prisoner
You play with life, lost your heart and soul, When
you can't take what you want, You use lies and
manipulation to gain control.
Threats and Intimidation is the secret behind your
power, Those you can't frighten, violence becomes
the hour.
The existence of your system is coming to a close,
Your treachery and deceit we the people begin to
expose.
You pass unjust laws to lock a nation down, You
assassinate the character of our leaders or plant
them in the ground.
The man was naked lying in his bed, How was the pig
justified shooting him in the head?
Nine MOVE members remain in prison and one on death
row, Free our political prisoners let them all go.
You manufacture drugs for your own people and them
give them time, Tell me who is the one committing a
crime?
The East is gaining power the West is losing hers,
Beware of the media for she plays colorfully with
words.
You sell poison as a means of birth control, You
put guns in the hands of children to collect more
souls.
Michigan subjects prisoners to neo-slavery
***The below excerpt was written in response to a
RAIL May Day Pamphlet, "Celebrate May Day: Support
Prisoner Workers", Factsheet of Michigan Prisoner
labor, Thursday, May 1, 1997. For a copy, send
s.a.s.e. to MIM.***
...Your Michigan factory pay information is a
little misleading. Nowhere in the MDOC [Michigan
Department of Incorrections] do prisoners earn
$2.00 to $5.00 per hour at any job unless employed
with some outside business. To insure the veracity
of this statement, I have spoken with five inmates
all employed at MDOC farms. They said they made
$3.00 to $5.00 dollars per day for 8-10 hours of
backbreaking labor and only in certain types of
jobs, of which there are very few.
The majority of inmates have no job at all and the
majority of those employed make about $20.00 per
month. Once employed they no longer receive free
over the counter medications or free cosmetics,
thus they must purchase all their living needs,
except regular, "meals". This does not include all
the other financial burdens imposed upon us, such
as laundry. If you want to get your laundry done
right and to make sure you get it back, you do not
send it out to the state laundry, but instead pay a
worker to personally machine wash it for about
$4.00 per month. Hope that clears up some confusion
regarding Michigan slave wages.
With Strength and Wisdom in the Struggle,
-- A Michigan Prisoner, 9 October 1997
IMPERIALISTS ARE THE REAL ENEMY
... I was transferred to this plantation in
KKKolorado. The oppression and domination in the
mountains of KKKolorado is basically the same but,
more cynical at a higher altitude. The air is
thinner, and so is the humanness of the treatment
of the prisoners. The racial hatred and police
tyranny pollutes the atmosphere. The Willie Lynch
syndrome is in full effect on this plantation.
Division and disorder is the rule among prisoners.
There are many gang members and gangs here. Many of
which continually and perversely assault and injure
each other over trivial and banal differences. As
expected many fall into the genocidal trap created
or put here by the oppressors. Many are mentally
and spiritually dead and oblivious of the enemy
devices and plantation plots.
In fact many of the prisoners in bondage here fail
to realize exactly who the real enemy is.
Especially, those who deem themselves as hardcore
bonafide gang members. Their reasoning has been
clouded with violence and ignorance, and obscures
their ability to see who the real enemy is. Some of
them see their fellow prisoners as the enemy, and
yet the police as not. It is a strange situation.
Un[til] we deal with the ultimate enemy can we deal
with each other, because when we are continually
warring with one another, never will we be
successful in defeating the enemy. ...
-- A Federal Prisoner, 15 July 1997
MIM ADDS: The above letter describes how the lumpen
proletariat can be confused about who are their
enemies. The imperialist pigs are the real enemy.
The pigs try to pit different groups against one
another in effort to divide and conquer the masses.
Prisoners should unite and work with MIM and RAIL
toward revolution. Expose the crimes of the
imperialists and organize to end oppression.
UNITY IS POWER
... I am in a Maxi, Maxi, Max Prison in New York
State, Southport Correctional Facility. This
facility, years ago, was turned into what is called
the box or hole. This is the main isolation box for
all the New York State prisoners who violate the
co-called prison/slave rules.
We are locked down 23 hours a day. There are no
contact visits with our families or friends.
Whenever we step out of cells, we must be
handcuffed and chained to the waist. The yard is
nothing but a yard full of 1-man cages, which is
where we have our 1 hour of recreation. There are
prisoners who go against the next prisoner. All
they are doing, without knowing, is helping the
oppressors do their psychological torture.
It is very doubtful that there will ever be unity
in the New York State Prison system, the way there
was unity on September 13, 1971, "The Attica Riots"
These Prisoners died to attain what we are losing
today. Today the oppressors are taking back
everything the Prisoners of the Attica Riots died
for. Soon, little by little, we will not have
anything at all. The sad thing is, we are letting
the oppressors take everything, and do nothing to
stop it.
The way things are going today in the New York
State Prison system -- prisoners going to war
against each other. So I may not sound like a
hypocrite, this has included me in the past. Giving
the real enemies a show to watch, as the oppressors
sit and bet on which prisoner is going to stab or
knock-out the next one first.
To all Prisoners in New York State locked down, in
the box or population: If you are reading this
letter Please wake the hell up! And realize who is
our real #1 enemy. I wear the same greens and have
a state number just like you. You are not my enemy!
The New York State DOC is our enemy! The Governor
of New York State is our enemy. The Government of
the United Snakes of Amerikkka is our enemy. They
are the ones who do not want us to see light again.
And if we are seeing light, freedom, want to lock
us up like dogs.
Please, lets stop fighting each other and unify as
one to overthrow our real enemy - the oppressors
who oppress us morning, afternoon and evening with:
their psychological mind games, playing with our
food, disrespecting our visitors, letters and
pictures.
Please do not misunderstand me. I am not saying
pick up the sword, No! Pick up the pens to fight
the oppressors. ... Remember the pen is mightier
than the sword. Let's wake up once and for all. ...
Let's stop the war against each other, and unite
against our real enemies - the oppressors. Remember
Unity is Power. ...
Respectfully,
-- A New York Prisoner, 15 July 1997
MIM ADDS: The legacy of the Attica Rebellion
proves that prisoners have the ability to unify
toward revolution. Exposing the pigs for the
criminals they are and knowing your enemies are
revolutionary accomplishments demonstrated by this
letter. The masses outnumber the imperialists, so
we are confident that victory is inevitable with
time. Keep up the struggle.
ATTICA ASSASSINATION DAY FAST
Revolutionary Greetings Comrades, This is the 26th
year of Attica Assassination Day, and I have been
fasting with two other brothers. And let me say
this, I have never in the eight years that I have
been down on this bid, be around the most cowardice
people I have ever been around in my life. I
explain to these punks what this fast is for and
everybody says, "I'm with that." until the day came
for us to fast.
What's important is that me and my Afrikan brothers
stuck it out. I find it very sad that brothers are
not willing to stand strong for brothers that died
in the struggle for all prisoners. These crackers
have these brothers so petrified that it's
pathetic. What makes this even more sad is that
this is the facility right next to Attica.
Some people tell me that I'm living in the past
because of my rebellious ways, but that's just
their justification for being a sorry ass Negro and
having fear of this imperialist system that we live
in. I never mind these cracker ass canines, because
I am more concerned with my own kind.
This was not just a fast for the Attica brothers.
It's a fast for all the brothers and sisters who
stood up for us and struggle for us to make things
better. It's also for my wife that I adore so much
for standing by her husband all of these years.
...So I will always be a revolutionary with the
struggle for the rest of my life.
-- A New York Prisoner, 13 September 1997
MIM ADDS: Thank you for informing us of your
commemoration of Attica Prisoner Struggle. It is
essential to learn from our revolutionary brothers
and sisters whose legacy we are carrying on. We are
quite willing to help by sending MIM Notes and
other materials so that you can educate prisoners
around you. Organizing takes a lot of work to build
strong foundations for acts of defiance, we must
first educate and struggle. Don't give up on your
fellow prisoners who are afraid of the pigs. You
are leading by example and not living in the past.
HELL ON EARTH IN TEXAS
... In 1996, i was personally refused treatment by
an RN [Registered Nurse] at Ellis One Unit in
Huntsville. Three days later, unconscious and near
death i was sent to Sealy Hospital via Emergency
Air ambulance.
i was rushed unconscious to surgery to remove a
porta-cath device from my right pectoral. Not a
life or death surgery, it had nothing to do with my
diabetic keto-acidocious, or pneumonia, which were
the causes of my illness. i had already refused
previous attempted to remove it so prison doctors
and nurses would not have to service it monthly.
During this minor surgery i died on the operating
table. Was i too weak, had too much anesthetic, who
knows? Records were altered, info left out. They
covered their asses. i was on life support for four
days, until someone read in my medical file that i
had a no recessitation clause. Thinking here is a
way out, to cover their asses, they disconnected
the machine breathing for me, covered me up and
pronounced me dead for good.
Fuck that said my brain. It's not time to go and i
started breathing on my own, though still
unconscious for three more days...
On the 7th day in intensive care i woke up. i could
not move, and barely speak. In days to come i could
not walk or feed myself, could not remember my
family, etc.
...The Prison Chaplain told my family every day
that i was fine, and recovering with no problems. I
have scars at my Achilles tendon on both feet from
leg shackles while unconscious in my coma state.
Scars on my spine from whatever apparatus i was
confined in also.
I was in the hospital from August 96 to November
96. Now I have to use a walker due to paralysis in
right arm and leg. To date, 10 June 97, I have had
no physical therapy, and not one treatment that was
ordered by Sealy Hospital. I was sent to a unit (i
am almost 50) where the average age is 25, for
"Better Medical care than i could get at Ellis
One."
First thing the prison doctor told me was no pain
meds or therapy are given here. So here i sit. In
six months i have gained 40 plus pounds. Had no
treatment other than basic diabetic needs. In
constant pain, no care, no lawyer, no shit, with 16
years to parole date.
Don't get me wrong. i'm not crying, even though i'm
dying here. I just thought people should know
what's going on. I didn't hear this shit somewhere,
i am living and dying it everyday, Hell on earth in
Texas, one day at a time.
-- A Texas Prisoner, 10 June 1997
CHAINED TO A BED FOR FIVE DAYS
Dear MIM, This is a situation I went through within
the confinement of Atlanta, USP [United Snakes
Penitentiary]
On July 1, 1997 my celly was kicking on the door of
our cell in administrative segregation. My celly
wanted to be moved to another cell. But a Lt.
Cortrette and 4 other officers came to the door and
told my celly that if he kicks the door again he
will chain both of us down.
I then asked the Lt. Why would he chain me down? He
then said, "Shut Up!" I then told him to shut up.
He told me and my celly to cuff-up. We both
complied. After I was handcuffed and the door was
opened, Lt. Cortrette and the other officers
wrestled me to the floor and put feet shackles
around my ankles.
Once I had handcuffs and feet shackles on lying
face down, Lt. Cortrette gets on my back and bangs
my head on the bottom of the bed leg, made out of
steel, until my forehead was busted. I had to have
3 stitches in my forehead.
Then Lt. Cortrette had me chained to the bed on my
back for 5 days straight. Then wrote me a false
incident report saying that I assaulted him while
in handcuffs.
He did this to justify my injury. I presently have
litigation in court against Lt. Cortrette. This
same Lt. Cortrette has assaulted a very large
number of prisoners, only after they were
handcuffed. I believe that if we don't get rid of
this sadistic animal he will soon kill a fellow
prisoner. I'm asking the readers to write to:
Director of Bureau of Prisons, Kathleen Hawk, 320
First St. NW, Washington, DC 20534
Ask for an investigation into the assaults at
Atlanta United States Penitentiary, PO Box PMB,
Atlanta, GA 30315.
Thank you,
-- A Federal Prisoner, 12 August 1997
MIM RESPONDS: We commend the above prisoner for
exposing the brutality of the Amerikkkan injustice
system. In addition we hope that your litigation
may provide you with some temporary relief from the
brutality. But remember that this Pig is only one
minor cog in the huge machine of oppression. He is
supported by the imperialists and most likely
rewarded for his brutality.
Often imperialist pigs will try to single out
individuals as bad cops or rogue officers to
distract people from the criminal system that
breeds these individuals. They want people to
believe that police are good and just and only a
few are brutal. This is not true. The cops and
prisoncrats make up the social control branch of
the oppressive imperialist system. It is their job
to be brutal and to oppress the masses.
So file lawsuits, or write letters of protest, but
keep in mind these are short-term reformist battles
that must be waged in the context of revolution.
The oppression will continue until the imperialists
are eventually overthrown.
MICHIGAN PRISONER FACES RETALIATION FOR EXPOSING
ABUSES
Dear Mao Comrades; ... The MIM Notes, in fact, have
been such a great learning experience and
inspiration that I was kidnapped and placed further
in the belly of beast, called rats holes, cages or
detention blocks. [This was] for sending out a
letter to local authorities expressing the will and
suffering of dead spirit-prisoners here in Adrian,
MI. This letter was sent also to the Michigan
Department of (IN)Corrections exposing the European
Supremacy via the Guards wearing KKK Head garments;
the constant subtle harassment, and unreasonable
lockdowns with no explanation.
The letter was vague but it revealed all the
tactics this facility has been using to mount
tensions creating an atmosphere for an uprising.
Mind you I am the Assistant Minister of an Islamic
organization and I hold some very strong views
which I conveyed to the modern day Roman
Administration and they brought me up on some
trumped up, bogus, insane charges of conspiracy to
incite a riot. This was in February that I was
placed in the death of hell, as a way of
retaliating against me. Thus they sought to mind-
torture me for using what they consider
unflattering words.
Well say not truth breed hatred and I will avoid
it; dissimulation raise friends and I will follow
it. Are the enemies made by truth better than the
friends obtained by flattery? I can not please man
and please my Creator. To displease man very often
pleases the Creator-Allah. ...
Using the phrase, "Possibility of a riot." was that
which they used to write this major misconduct
[report so] that [I] could have a traumatic
experience.
... My statement did not imply a riot or was
organizing a riot. But I forgot these fascist
dictators are taught what to think and not how to
think. Thus reason is not even a topic of
discussion.
After evaluation we concluded that this whole
process was used as a tool to neutralize good bold
effective leadership by targeting and labeling them
as a "SECURITY THREAT GROUP". Which is a new policy
in Michigan prisons. Basically its a policy program
like the one created under J. Edgar Hoover who
sought to destroy any courageous leaders "By any
means Necessary."
They tortured my comrade and me for 10 days;
knowing that we were innocent of these charges and
never have been associated with be gang members.
... They thought they were going to break our
struggling spirit by sending us to the torture
chamber... However Allah teaches us that no weapon
formed against the righteous will stand. Thus in
March 1997 we were vindicated. But I am sure they
are going to keep trying until we are in a secure
maximum dungeon or dead. That still won't prevent
me from exposing these repressive snake grawlers
they are. Trying to put themselves up as some law
living citizens when they are modern day Herod
killers attempting to destroy the Afrikan
leadership in these kkkoncetration kkkamps.
The families and the public need to know about
these carpet-hidden truths of oppression that are
overwhelming in prisons. And we, as the rejected
and forgotten in prison, are not using this as a
crutch for attention. This shit repression is real
and I hope one day you begin to understand the
nature and intent of these kkkoncentration kkkamps
termed prison. Even if you do not understand our
pain and suffering we still need your support.
Please help us here in Michigan prisons but
particularly in Adrian, MI. Or all hell can break
out and your uncles, sons, daughters, cousins,
brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, etc will be
altered mentally and spiritually from this
experience or perhaps totally annihilated.
... The Roman Guard just brought a letter to me
written by the inspector requesting for a re-
hearing. As he believes the charges should be
sustained and wants us found guilty. I told you
that they would not stop short of trying to kill
our reputation as good leaders....
Yours in the Struggle,
-- A Michigan Prisoner, March 9, 1997
OHIO PRISONERS' STRIKE AGAINST OPPRESSION
***The call went out through Ohio gulags for all
state prisoners to remain on their lock, or cells
and to refuse to participate in any and all prison
activities on November 1, 1997. Prisoners have
organized this peaceful protest to oppose proposed
legislation which does not halt 'multiple flops'
handed down by the Parole board to force prisoners
to endure "indeterminate sentences" to several
thousand Technical Parole Violators (TPVs).
Since the call originated, prison officials have
retaliated against individuals whom the prisoncrats
claim organized the stoppage.
MIM fully supports the struggles of prisoners
languishes in the Amerikan gulags to expose and
organize against national oppression, social
control and specifically, long, indefinite and
purposeless sentences. We currently have limited
information on the status of the Ohio work stoppage
and resulting events. We urge prisoners to use the
pages of MIM Notes to expose the atrocities in Ohio
prisons and prisons across Amerika. The below was
released by prisoner organizers of the stoppage.***
WHAT PRISONERS WANT...
1. Prisoners want all prisoners who have been
placed in isolation as a result of this work
stoppage released from isolation, and any conduct
reports for refusal to work removed from their
records. We want an investigation into any use of
force that results from this peaceful work stoppage
by state legislators.
2. We want TPVs who have been back in the system
more than 9 months, released on parole, as would be
the case if these prisoners were under the new
sentencing laws of S.B. 2, which became law in
1996.
3. We want an end to multiple flops which extends
the amount of time a prisoner serves far past what
would be served if prisoners were serving time
under S.B. 2.
4. In regards to "life" sentences, lifers want a
meaningful halftime review, and not a meaningless
"paper" review. Lifers want hearings where they are
actually present. There is nothing in purposed
legislation that would remedy the abuses from the
parole board concerning life sentences.
5. In general, prisoners want sentences modified to
reflect what we would have if we were under S.B. 2.
6. We want the phones turned back on so we can
verify that the state government has agreed to the
above. If the phones aren't turned back on we can't
contact our outside representatives.
PRISONERS WANT EQUAL JUSTICE!
* * *
MIM ON PRISONS AND PRISONERS
MIM seeks to build public opinion against
Amerika's criminal injustice system, and to
eventually replace the bourgeois injustice system
with proletarian justice. The bourgeois
injustice system imprisons and executes a
disproportionately large and growing number of
oppressed people while letting the biggest mass
murderers - the imperialists and their
lackeys - roam free. Imperialism is not opposed to
murder or theft, it only insists that these crimes
be committed in the interests of the bourgeoisie.
MIM does not advocate that all prisoners go free
today; we have a more effective program for
fighting crime as was demonstrated in China prior
to the restoration of capitalism there in 1976. We
say that all prisoners are political
prisoners because under the dictatorship of the
bourgeoisie, all imprisonment is substantively
political. It is our responsibility to exert
revolutionary leadership and conduct
political agitation and organization among
prisoners ñ whose material conditions make them an
overwhelmingly revolutionary group. Some prisoners
should and will work on self-criticism under a
future dictatorship of the proletariat in those
cases in which prisoners really did do
something wrong by proletarian standards.
***WHAT NON-PRISONERS CAN DO TO SUPPORT
PRISONERS***
*1. Struggle with, work with, finance and join
MIM. The best way to support prisoners is to
overthrow the system under which capitalists profit
from the exploitation of prisoners. History shows
that the best way to do this is to build a Marxist-
Leninist-Maoist party. The oppressors will not give
up their power without a fight.
*2. Finance MIM's prison work. Our biggest bill
each month is postage. Most of the prison comrades
who read MIM Notes have no way of paying for it.
So if you have money, send what you can afford.
Every cent helps, and stamps are as good as cash to
us.
*3. Distribute MIM Notes and Notas Rojas. Bring
the voices of prisoners and their supporters to as
large and wide an audience of people as possible.
Contact MIM for bulk rates and distribution tips.
*4. Start or join a prison support group. MIM can
provide advice and resources to help you build
public opinion for prisoners and their struggles.
*5. Fight censorship, beatings, torture and other
fascist outrages. Under Lock and Key often
features the addresses of prisoners' friends and
enemies. Work with the friends and let the enemies
know you're watching. (Don't expect to win the
fascists to the side of humanity, however. See #1
in this list).
*6. Stay in touch. Keep us informed of pro-
prisoner work you do. Our readers might find it
educational or inspirational
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