Capitalism still thrives on genocide

REVIEW: Year 501: The Conquest Continues, by Noam Chomsky 
Boston: South End Press, 1993, 331pp. pb. 
Reviewed by an Illinois prisoner, 16 May, 2000

As a man of African descent, whose knowledge of world events is, 
at best, elementary, I find this book to be a serious eye opener. 
Although I do not agree with the author's political stance of 
anarchism, I have to respect the fact that "raw truth" is 
universal, no matter who is telling or exposing that truth. I 
highly recommend that all progressive people obtain a copy of this 
book and include it in your study and in your overstanding. This 
is must-read stuff.

Year 501 starts off with a chapter called "The Great Work of 
Subjugation and Conquest," which is a powerful eye-opener on the 
"art" of demented men doing evil to humanity for money. This 
chapter dwells on the destruction of the African continent as well 
as the First Nation people of North and South America,  The author 
explains the how institution of chattel slavery, set up by the 
Portuguese and Spanish colonists, was eventually taken over by 
white Amerikans.

This chapter shows how Europeans "justified" their actions as well 
as the expose of the extent and beginnings of "open capitalism" 
and world conquest. The author comes at you from the standpoint 
that capitalism is the main reason for actions such as oppressing, 
subjugating, controlling, and destroying people. I don't fully 
agree with him here. Yes, I agree that capitalism is a driving 
force for the evil that men do in the matter of imperialism, 
colonialism, and raw ugliness, but the foundation of these actions 
comes from a diseased, mutated, devil-like mentality, which is not 
taught at first, but is born naturally. [MIM strongly disagrees 
with the reviewer on this point. See the response below -- ed.] It 
is taught in later times as cultural norms and necessity. The 
savagery of the European man, drunk on devil knowledge and blinded 
by capitalist concepts of power, did some very devastating and 
super ugly acts and atrocities to the First Nation peoples of the 
Western Hemisphere. It reminded me of how Hitler and his crew 
"taught, seduced, tricked, and serenaded" almost the entire German 
population into wiping out an entire "race" of people with false 
philosophies, fake science, fear, hatred, and miseducation. The 
Indigenous people of the western hemisphere were almost wiped out 
of existence because of the Caucasian man's desire to achieve 
monetary gain and power form a Eurocentric perspective. In 
capitalism, the message that the author is trying to convey is 
that in capitalism, human life has no value other than as a 
commodity to obtain money with. 

The author, after explaining the actions of the Europeans of the 
18th and 19th Centuries, masterfully ties together the struggle of 
world conquest of those days with the struggle for world 
domination today. He goes on to explain how the different European 
Nations struggle for domination and control of non-Caucasian 
people and their lands, and he exposes real instances of how they 
achieved it, quoting from true sources, so that veracity will not 
be an issue. He explains how Europeans violated each other's 
agreements, treaties, and pacts in order to gain dominance and how 
they used and destroyed large segments of the Afrikan and First 
Nation peoples in the process.

What moved me was a quoted statement that he repeated from the 
person who engineered the "Trail of Tears" death walks that were 
forced on First Nation people. Another part that moved me was when 
the author exposed how the United $tates has totally manipulated 
countries in Central and South America to oppress and murder their 
own people to satisfy America's interests, using Guatemala and 
Brazil as examples. The author also uses Mummar Gadahfi and Saddam 
Hussein to illustrate how the United $tates continues even today 
on its conquest towards Manifest Destiny.

Today the super rich of America are at the forefront of monopoly 
capitalism in the world with the IMF, World Bank, WTO and NATO 
operations.

The author shows proof that the United $tates is basically the 
enforcer of the Rich Men's Club and their striving for world 
domination through economic and/or military force, terror, 
starvation. No corner or spot of the world is left untouched by 
the United $tates' struggle for total domination, no natural 
resource is spared. The author documents again and again how the 
government destroys a country of its right to self-destiny and 
independence, using Indonesia, Brazil, and Mexico as examples. The 
African and the First Nation peoples were capitalism's first 
"theatre of operations" in the art of world dominance. As the book 
righteously says, after 500 years, the conquest continues.

The U.$. is, without question, the world power and all other 
European-dominated countries are playing minor partners, henchmen, 
or dupes in the scheme of things. Chomsky gives enough information 
to convince anyone that capitalism is in need of destruction by 
any and every means necessary. But as he also states, "the masses 
have to be educated and taught on these realities, for only the 
masses can shut it down."

I truly recommend this book, for if you can get around the fact 
that Noam Chomsky is an anarchist, you can truly increase your 
knowledge of the "heart, mind and soul of capitalism" on a local, 
national, and world level, as well as how it affects absolutely 
everyone on this planet. Capitalism is truly the enemy of 
humanity! It must be destroyed! All progressive elements and 
rational independents should read this book.

MIM adds: We thank this comrade for h study and contribution to 
the Under Lock & Key 2000 campaign. In July we are focusing on the 
situation of Latino and Indigenous Nations in Amerika's prisons. 
While Year 501 does not address the situation of prisoners 
specifically, its subject is the centuries of conquest that have 
made the Latino and Indigenous nations within u.$. borders the 
semi-colonies they are today. We have asked prisoners to study and 
review books that relate to the conditions of the Latino and 
Indigenous semi-colonies in preparation for this month because 
understanding the relationship between imperialism and the 
oppressed nations is necessary to understanding the imprisonment 
of semi-colonial peoples. MIM argues that this country's history 
of genocide makes Amerika unfit to judge or imprison any member of 
an Indigenous or Latino semi-colony. The united snakes is not the 
legitimate government of the oppressed nations.

MIM disagrees with the reviewer on one major point: evil is not 
inherent in any humyn being. As materialists, we believe in 
science and the physical world. Greed and selfishness are indeed 
characteristics taught to people under capitalism. These social 
traits go well with a society in which neither a job nor a place 
to live is guaranteed. But we call these social traits because 
they are learned and because they can be eradicated through 
socialist revolution and the development of socialist society into 
communism. For example, when there is no monetary incentive for 
possessing an excess share of land, the motivation for genocide 
that the reviewer and Chomsky describe will be gone. For a more in 
depth discussion, see "Maoism on human nature," in MIM Theory 9.

We also add that MIM is very happy to work with anarchists. 
Although we disagree on the methods of getting there, anarchists 
and Maoists do share the same basic goal: An end to oppression.