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.
Maoist Internationalist Movement

More white vomit on Peru

October 12, 2006

Now that the Maoist-led People's War in Peru is over, a decade after all the last polemics finished, the RIM has gotten around to admitting 10% of crucial truth surrounded by 90% bullshit in a recent article on Peru and the RIM's role. The participants of that time all know that the RIM's position was white vomit, but it's been quite a long time and now we need to explain to youth having to get this as history, one step at a time what happened when the Peruvian state arrested Gonzalo, the leader of the greatest communist force in the Western Hemisphere at that time.

For itself, MIM immediately published that "Gonzalo Thought is still free," but eventually a split became apparent and MIM found itself having to backtrack and review two different poles. "Gonzalo Thought is still free" turned out not to be a slam dunk and we retracted until we had further word on what people were thinking in Peru about that.

Prior to the arrest, Avakian was already indicating he had major differences with Gonzalo. For his part Gonzalo argued for a "red fraction" in RIM, the participants many of which were not calling themselves Maoist, just for starters. The struggle going on was rather intense. Gonzalo's Central Committee circulated a document criticising RCP=CIA for among other things "hegemonism." People who knew the PCP knew that did not mean "sharp line struggle." Hegemonism is not asking for someone else to take a stand, the way some critics of MIM recently said in regard to Iran. PCP in its heyday was very intense, not the "peace and love" sorts that we might encounter in the First World soaked in super-profits. Anyone who dealt with even just exiles interested in the PCP was prepared for military-style confrontation as befitting a People's War. What you saw in a video of Peruvian comrades marching before being murdered in prison, that was representative.

Much more relevant to "hegemonism" is that RCP=CIA repeatedly and observedly went around the Peruvian leadership. An example of this became apparent when the RCP=CIA stopped circulating Luis Arce Borja's periodical in the United $tates in the name of studying the peace accords pole. Revolution Books had been distributing the periodical by prior agreement. With the arrest of Gonzalo, Luis Arce Borja found his work unable to continue as before, thanks to RCP=CIA hegemonism, in perfect collusion with the CIA, which did not want Luis Arce Borja or any collected analysis to be heard at a time of crisis for the PCP. Thus we learn an important lesson in struggle and security. There has been an important arrest and of course signs point to the United $tates. Where is the problem? It is important to keep confronting people for questions of stand for purposes of security. MIM is now using the Iran question to improve the liveliness of its contacts and advance the proletarian line including security.

This was important in the united $tates, because there are always some Peruvians in the united $tates at any given moment. Peruvians also wanted to set a good example what should happen internationally in a situation like that. It was not just a matter of what Peruvians would be contacted at all.

The central question that posed itself by 1993 was would peace negotiations be permissible, with the context being such a blow to the leadership. This question posed itself insistently. Luis Arce Borja has written an excellent comparative article on this subject once Nepal started making the news.

MIM made it quite clear it did not regard itself as part of a Comintern. MIM emphasized that it was the choice of the Peruvians. Nonetheless, we also said Mao had peace negotiations but that Maoists must not disarm. MIM's main concern was that Peruvians would look to a Comintern for an answer, but PCP was already lodged in such a Comintern, so it was difficult to put MIM in PCP's shoes. An outfit trying to sweep away everyone calling him/herself "Maoist" outside Peru called "New Flag" labelled our position as for "peace accords." New Flag was trying to discredit the whole movement in solidarity with the PCP. New Flag sought to demoralize people with its one-liners about MIM supporting peace accords. In any case, as practice showed, MIM did more to distribute PCP CC articles than anyone else in the English-language. We also did some Spanish and French. Through Internet we distributed more than anyone.

In any case, A World to Win #32 now admits:

The party's Central Committee comprising those party leaden (sic.) remaining free, rejected this call as a "Right Opportunist Line" (ROL) "What goes against principles cannot be accepted," the party said, adding. "It is an international communist norm that one cannot lead from inside prison." But they said more than that: The whole thing was a "hoax" concocted by the regime in collaboration with the US and a "black grouplet" of renegade impris­oned (and now expelled) party members. The idea that Chairman Gonzalo could be associated with it was a "plot", part of US- sponsored "low intensity warfare" against the people's war. (2) The man who looked like Gonzalo, the party told people, was an actor.

This is really quite amazing as years were spent arguing just the points in that paragraph. At the time, RCP=CIA was saying that there was no one to be left outside the PCP. For years they cried against purging. Now it is finally admitting that the PCP CC did not agree--now when it is too late for the admission to do any good except for instruction purposes.

Now we hear from AWTW why RIM ran all its obstruction tactics against the PCP- CC:

The Central Committee's "solution" to the problem, the idea that it was all a "hoax", might have seemed like the only way out to those leaders determined not to surrender. But in fact, this idea turned out to be a trap. It worked against the party's ability to persist in the people's war for two reasons. First, because, if there was certainly unclarity at the beginning as to the circumstances of the call for peace accords, there was never real evidence that it was a "hoax". How could continuing the war be sustained on the basis of telling party members to shut their eyes as Chairman Gonzalo's call for peace accords seemed more and more like­ly to be the reality? Second, this approach tried to avoid the problem of analysing and defeating the arguments being given for why it was necessary to end the people's war.

Who did it trap RIM? You never generated anyone worthy of taking leadership with your approach. You coddled the peace accords people who produced nothing. Instead, what we can see is that you obstructed what was available, just as you now obstruct Iranians resisting U.$. imperialism/Great Satan.

The rest of the article, the 90% is a contemplative materialist argument about how it turned out that Gonzalo indeed was a capitulator, at least as far as we can tell from prison appearances in which we cannot interview him. When Luis Arce Borja said Gonzalo was a capitulator recently, the RIM people jumped up and said "Ah hah! We were right." That's 90% of what this article is about--a prediction of sorts.

No, RIM was not correct. The question is not what we know now. The question was what did we know in 1992 and 1993 then even up to 1996. With RIM the point is always some prediction by an individual, in this case about an individual. Yet how was it going to be possible to answer this question in 1993? Should all the PCP have surrendered to go to Navy prison and ask Gonzalo in persyn? The people who asked this question at all were doing the work of the CIA in that context, because there was no way to get to whether or not Gonzalo really capitulated or not. We could contemplate our navels on the question as long as we wanted, but it was an inherently divisive question incapable of satisfactory answer--perfect for the CIA.

The RIM always asks the wrong questions for the wrong context, because it is run by the CIA with the purpose of disruption under the red flag. With this question about the man Gonzalo and other nonsense, the RCP=CIA justified cutting off El Diario Internacional. From the AWTW article, we can see that 2000 was another endpoint and RIM admits that there are problems with various people who cannot deal with the question of Gonzalo.

This is really another stunning admission coming as it did after MIM's exposure of this question as well. What the AWTW article does NOT do is compare the leaders that the RCP=CIA gave credence to. To this day, RIM is supporting www.redsun.org/www.solrojo.org which has shown no progress in its thinking at all. It did not bother to say anything about Lebanon or Iran this year. Yet RCP=U$A and RIM including www.cpnm.org is calling that shit some connection point to some vanguard party. Hiding under their skirts is far worse.

No thanks, RCP=U$A, you hegemonically overthrew the existing procedures you had with the PCP. And revolutionary camp's work stood much better than all the garbage you have supported these years. Just compare your peace accords supporters clamoring for RIM and your www.redsun.org with the leadership you overthrew for the CIA. Actually, you did a good job--for the CIA, but we still have to explain this to the youth.

For the historical record, now that it is 2006, both MIM and Adolfo Olaechea thought that the PCP Central Committee line was "metaphysical," but we supported it. All that MIM did was point out that Mao did negotiate in a winning position without disarming and we also pointed out there is such a thing as a two-line struggle. Nonetheless, it is clear just from looking at the Canto Grande capitulation alone, that the PCP had its reasons for putting its principal focus on one attitude on one question and not letting people get confused that there is two-line struggle with people outside the party.

Adolfo Olaechea's motivations were separate, but he was working with Luis Arce Borja. Adolfo Olaechea translated and MIM distributed the "hoax" line articles--for which RIM is criticizing MIM now that Luis Arce Borja has changed his position on Gonzalo the individual. Yes, the RCP=CIA has picked at two problems in Luis Arce Borja's articles over a period of many years. But what total jokes have they supported all this time in contrast? MIM brought the revolutionary camp web traffic many years through its link pages and then shifted www.eldiariointernacional.com to the Peru page. The revolutionary camp proved able to get things done.

Again, MIM applied a materialist approach to the questions at hand. We were not 100% happy with the line, but we had a choice among leaders and MIM picked the right leaders or the right line that was available from Peruvians, not New Yorkers or Parisians. We chose the best that there was. None of the shit that RIM has supported has done anything to change MIM's mind in the 1993 to 2006 period. That is the real concrete question at hand to this day, what they leave out completely. Even if it turned out that some revolutionaries later degenerated or were repressed, the comparisons of the past several years for RIM would all be unfavorable to RIM. The CIA also outlived Huey Newton, so what.

Just as the RCP=u$a perpetually rewrites the history of the Black Panthers, the RIM publication now talks about Luis Arce Borja without mentioning other individuals at the time other than Avakian. It would be like a smaller version of talking about Stalin and neo-conservative Perle without mentioning Trotsky.

Readers should compare MIM's anti-hegemonist materialist method with RIM's hegemonic idealism in service of CIA. RIM fought like dogs against the idea that there was a "hoax" and instead called the peace accords people "ROL," which RIM now finally admits is not what the PCP intended. It further virtually admits that its critics' position was "revolutionary," while leaving out the necessary self-criticism that its own line was "counter-revolutionary." And yes, MIM knew the SARBEDARAN played a role in CIA schemes at that time, but its activities today stand as counterrevolutionary in their own right. There is even somewhat of a repeat in history in tension with Joma Sison on related questions of the interests of the international communist movement.

So it has to do with reading history, but one step at a time, with the right questions for the right context. There was no way to do a decisive check on Gonzalo when the question first appeared. And it did not matter anyway, because there were only two camps, one of revolution and one of counterrevolution. It was not our job to overthrow the revolutionary camp and pretend we were going to find better leaders while actually providing cover for the counterrevolutionary attack. That was the job of the CIA.