Ah Rob,
Seems I touched a "aussie" nerve. But the point is that the East Timorese
certainly will not get Independence which if you noticed we support now!
Unfortunately it will take a proletarian revolution throughtout Indonesia
led by a marxist revolutionary party in order to obtain this.
As far as the Australian left is concerned there Social patriotic tailing of
this "humanitarian"
wrip off is their own little August 1914 of backing there own bourgeoisie in
fact demanding that they play the role of mini cop for imperialist interests
in the area. That is the *real* sorry state of affairs down under with the
"left"!
And their is a lot more at stake then just Timor. In fact not only is the
future of Indonesia at stake but China,and the rest of South East Asia.
As far as Russia I agree. The left is terribly silent about the conflict
going on at present. Here to the left must begin to take on the whole
question of post Soviet society and the fact that not only did we get a
capitalist counter-revolution but Russia has its *own* imperialist
intentions.
As far as the Australian left and yourself. Well why not be consistent in
your opportunism and call on the UN to set in troops in this conflict? So
even these craven opportunists are silent on this stuff.
However, this stuff is quite complicated in that we are not dealing with a
colonial country like in Timor but left overs from a degenerated workers
state where independence means in this case Islamic fundamentalism and the
raw resource rich parts of the SU going their own way.
Another example of this might be the call by the nationalists in the richer
parts of Northern Italy for independence from the South and poor parts of
Italy.Would we support such a call? No I don't think so.
Finally the only class capable of actually leading this struggle to a
successful conclusion in Timor is the Indonesian proletariat. In the case of
Italy and Russia it is their respective proletariats that might have to
fight both reactionary successionists and there own new rulers who have
declared a holy war against all people with dark skins in White Russia and
both wings of the Italian bourgeoisie in the north and south who oppress
them.
so far as the article on Timor. I stand behind it and support it. Consider
it just the record of what you yourself admitted. The left is gonna have a
lot of trouble trying to climb out of the corner they now have painted
themselves into when this stuff explodes.
Or as the Austraian ICLers put it:
"Just as they portray imperialism as merely a policy which can be changed
through pressure, the reformist and centrist left foster the illusion that
the capitalist state-particularly under a Labor government-can act on behalf
of the workers and oppressed minorities at home. In a 1935 polemic against
Stalinist class collaboration, Leon Trotsky, coleader with Lenin of the 1917
Bolshevik Revolution, exposed the reformist underpinnings of those who
promote the "democratic"credentials of capitalist imperialism. Describing
Lenin's struggle against the social-chauvinists in World War I, Trotsky
wrote:
"To the myth of pure democracy he counterposed the reality of bourgeois
democracy, grown on the foundation of private property and transfornied by
the course of development into a tool of society, excluded, according to
Lenin, the possibility of the proletariat's taking power within the
framework of democracy and with its
methods.... The perspective of peaceful progress or democratic socialization
is revealed from this point of view as pure utopia. The preparation for
revolution demands a simultaneous break not only with the bourgeois radicals
but, as we already know, also with the democratic reformists in the working
class itself."
-"The Comintern's Liquidation
Congress" (August 1935)
Warm regards
Bob Malecki
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[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]För Rob Schaap
Skickat: Tuesday, October 05, 1999 6:44 PM
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Ämne: M-TH: East Timor and the Western Left
A pretty useless document, Bob. Yeah, Australia is a minor imperialist
nation state. Yeah, we're a paternalistic bunch, with some racism in our
soul. Yeah, we check with Uncle Sam first. Yeah, Aboriginal Australians
have been hideously treated. And, no, the executive levels of our union
movement are not mostly genuine class fighters. And no, a UN force can not
be seen to arm one side in a conflict. So what else is new? The UN
intervention is still saving lives, isn't it? And they're not killing
anyone (this is NOTHING like Kosovo). Well, not yet, anyway.
We can but guess how this is going to pan out. And that may well have
little to do with the dodgy aspirations of the big boys involved. An
engaged left, with a sense of where things stand and whither they might be
nudged, might be just what's needed now.
Which - if the cyber-left is anything to go by - is a real pity.
Why don't you tell us what a good job the Russians are doing in razing a
plethora of Chechen villages to the ground and shredding hundreds of Chechen
civilians and Russian conscripts coz of some trouble ... over in Dagestan?
Or has it more to do with distracting people from the murderous corruption
being inflicted upon them? Russia is no longer the champion of proletarian
emancipation, y'know, Bob. And in Chechnya, murder IS being done!
Or tell us about how good things are in Ambon, where those murderous UN
troops have deigned not to spread that poisonous imperialism of theirs?
I mean, what is it with you blokes? What did the East Timorese ever do to
you? Doesn't what THEY want count for just a little?
I don't know about anybody else here, but I'm getting well tired of pro
forma blurts like this. A tempest is descending about us, and all the left
seems to be able to do - indeed, all it seems inclined to do (and not just
on this list) - is launch smug predictable boring malodorous little farts at
it. And in the name of praxis, too.
Sad.
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