October 28, 2018 is the 80th anniversary of one of the greatest examples of working class internationalism in history—the departure of the International Brigades from the Spanish Civil War. The Spanish Civil War lasted from 1936 to 1939. The War was, along with fascist Japan’s invasion of China in 1931, the true beginning of World War II.
Prelude to world war
Many working class students of history may know about the Paris Commune, and the 1905 and 1917 revolutions in Russia. The history of workers’ fightback in Spain, since at least 1875, is somehting else to behold. It’s a proud history, and also a tragic one
The Spanish Civil War was a fight to the death of Spain’s capitalist Second Republic, 1931-39. In the first quarter of the twentieth century, Spain’s ruling class had changed little in thinking and in custom since the fifteenth century, when the monarchy of Ferdinand and Isabella began pillaging the Western hemisphere. The workers and peasants had had enough!
From “Spain’s October” to Popular Front
In 1934, Communist and left-socialist-led miners in northern Spain revolted against the fascist party’s election into the Republic. This heroic, short-lived “Soviet Republic” was crushed by the army, under the leadership of a fascist general named Francisco Franco.
The Communist Party (PCE), the largest and strongest party in Spain, then entered into an electoral “Popular Front” coalition with the Socialist Party. (For PLP’s analysis and critique of this period, read “Lessons of People’s War in Spain.”)
In 1936, the Popular Front was narrowly elected into power. Months later, the Republic was attacked by a revolt of its own army, led by General Franco, and now supported by Hitlerite Germany and Fascist Italy.
Long live the international brigades
Despite the political weaknesses of the old communist movement, especially abandoning revolution and allying with so-called “lesser evil” capitalists, a testament to the old movement’s strength and commitment to our class is how they organized millions of workers to aid the Spanish Republic under fascist invasion. In a message to José Diaz, leader of the PCE, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin called the Spanish Civil War “not solely the cause of the Spaniards, but the cause of all progressive and advanced humanity.” This was a testament to the old movements strength and commitment to our class.The major “democratic” capitalist powers, especially the U.S. under FDR, declared “neutrality” while openly selling weapons, trucks and fuel on credit to fascist Franco, Germany, and Italy.
The international working class, however, answered the workers of Spain’s call. 32,000 workers, most of them Communists, came to Spain from 37 countries to fight fascism in special divisions of the new worker-led Spanish army: the International Brigades. The worker-led Soviet Union sent as many shiploads of military aid as they could, despite a Nazi submarine blockade of the Spanish coast.
Despite being gravely outnumbered and outgunned, and having no professional training as soldiers, the Brigades were thrust into action immediately and helped achieve the seemingly impossible- the successful defense of Madrid, from November 1-21, 1936.
The Brigades played a decisive role in every major battle of the war until the capitalist Republican government ordered the Brigades to leave in October, 1938, in a desperate attempt to placate the capitalist powers. The Republic fell to the fascists in March, 1939.
Many were put into concentration camps. The war killed one million workers, of which 400,000 were captured and executed, and 500,000 fled Spain. Thousands of Brigaders fought the fascists again in World War II; thousands others became antifascist partisans led by communists in France, Yugoslavia and elsewhere. Some made it to the Soviet Union and joined the Red Army, where their experiences helped give leadership to the Eastern Front- especially in helping break the Nazi siege of Leningrad in 1944.
Dolores Ibárruri, known as “La Pasionaria,” a leading Spanish communist, addressed the departing Internationals after their parade down “Las Ramblas” boulevard in Barcelona. It was 80 years ago, today.
Excerpts from La Pasionaria’s farewell address
Barcelona, October 28, 1938
It is very difficult to say a few words in farewell to the heroes of the International Brigades, because of what they are and what they represent. A feeling of sorrow, sorrow for those who are going away, exiles from their countries, persecuted by the tyrants of all peoples - and grief for those who will stay here forever mingled with the Spanish soil.
From all peoples, from all races, you came to us. And in the hardest days of the war, when the capital of the Spanish Republic was threatened, it was you, gallant comrades of the International Brigades, who helped save the city with your fighting enthusiasm, your heroism and your spirit of sacrifice. And Jarama and Guadalajara, Brunete and Belchite, Levante and the Ebro, in immortal verses sing of the courage, the sacrifice, the daring, the discipline of the International Brigades.
They gave us everything - their youth or their maturity; their science or their experience; their blood and their lives; their hopes and aspirations - and they asked us for nothing. But yes, it must be said, they did want a post in battle, they aspired to the honor of dying for us. Banners of Spain! Salute these heroes! Be lowered to honor these martyrs!Speak to your children. Tell them of the International Brigade Recount for them how, coming over seas and mountains, crossing frontiers bristling with bayonets, sought by raving dogs thirsting to tear their flesh, they reached our country as crusaders for freedom, to fight and die for Spain’s liberty and independence threatened by German and Italian fascism. They gave up everything - their loves, their countries, homes, fathers, mothers, wives, brothers, sisters and children - and they came and said to us: “We are here. Your cause, Spain’s cause, is ours.”
Today many are departing. Thousands remain, shrouded in Spanish earth. Comrades of the International Brigades: political reasons, reasons of state, the welfare of that very cause for which you offered your blood with boundless generosity, are sending you back, some to your own countries, and others to forced exile. You can go proudly. You are history. You are legend.
We shall not forget you. And when the olive tree of peace is in flower, entwined with the victory laurels of the Republic of Spain - return!
Return to our side, for here you will find a homeland. Those who have no country or friends, who must live deprived of friendship - all, all will have the affection and gratitude of the Spanish people who today and tomorrow will shout with enthusiasm: LONG LIVE THE HEROES OF THE INTERNATIONAL BRIGADES!
click image for Election Flyer in doc formThe Republicans and Democrats serve the same class of billionaires. They are fighting over who will steer this sinking ship of US imperialism. They are fighting over how to secure Wall St. profits, US dominance and ultimately, who will lead us to war against Russia and the China.
One of the main lessons of the 2018 election circus is, this system doesn’t work. With an openly racist white Nationalist in the White House, the dogs are off the leash. From Charlottesville to the fascist Proud Boys attacking anti-racists after headlining at the East Side Republican Club in NY, from the crazed MAGA Bomber to random racist terror shootings of black people in Tennessee, Texas and Florida, a mass fascist movement has been energized by the Trump White House. It is another wave on top of the state terror of racist police brutality and immigration round-ups and deportations.
Economically, Wall Street profits are soaring and the gap in wages and wealth between rich and poor, black and white, citizen and immigrant, women and men, continues to grow. How can the rich get richer when more people are working? Because the union leaders and the Democratic politicians they are setting us up to follow, are no match for the bosses. With 40 years of attacks on unions, by Republicans and Democrats alike, wages are down and more than 90% of the workforce is non-union. The harder and more jobs we work, the poorer we get.
Around the world, neither party has been able to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Instead, war has killed and displaced millions in Syria, Libya and Yemen, where the Saudi Royal Family and the US military are starving and bombing millions.
Hunger and terror have created more refuges around the world than even World War II, and there is no end in sight. Millions have fled Africa for Europe and millions have fled South America for the North. A caravan of thousands of refugees that began in Honduras is headed for the US. Trump has called out the Border Patrol, ICE and the National Guard to round up immigrants, and separate kids from their families at the border. While Obama “quietly” deported more than 400,000 immigrants, more than all previous Presidents combined, Trump enjoys the spectacle, as it helps build a mass fascist army.
Whether you are voting or not, and most workers and youth will not, we need to defend, protect and welcome the Refugee Caravan. We can organize discussions in our unions and churches, on our campuses and high schools, and inside the army and National Guard. If Trump attacks the refugees that were in large part created by US imperialism in Latin America, workers and students should walk out, soldiers should refuse their orders.
In the end, it’s not about what Party is in power, but which class. Both Parties work for the billionaires. It was Obama who bailed out Wall St. bankers and the auto companies while tens of millions of black families lost their jobs, their homes and their futures. And the racist billionaires will never give up power to a vote. Workers and youth must take power with communist revolution. This Election Day, vote with your feet. Join PLP!
The apparent assassination of Jamal Khashoggi, the journalist critic of the most powerful capitalist boss in Saudi Arabia, highlights the declining imperialist power of the United States and its dependence on a corrupt and brutal Saudi ruling class. The Khashoggi affair also reveals Turkey’s ambitions to be the top Middle East power, in competition with the Saudi bosses—and the growing influence of Russia in the region. Driving all of these developments is the inevitability of inter-imperialist war.
Throughout the world today, capitalism is in a state of sharpening economic and political crisis. From Asia to Europe to the U.S. and Latin America, the bosses need more and more fascism to discipline their own class and to control and intimidate workers as they mobilize for the next global war. Only communist revolution can smash fascism for good and abolish the material basis for imperialist war, the competition for maximum profits.
On October 2, Khashoggi was seen on camera entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, where he needed documents for his upcoming marriage. With known ties both to members of the Saudi royal family and the Muslim Brotherhood, Khashoggi was no small-time dissident. He had allied himself with a section of the Saudi ruling class targeted by a 2017 purge by the thuggish Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS). After his falling out with MBS, Khashoggi lived in exile in the U.S. while attacking the Saudi regime as a columnist for the Washington Post. He accused MBS of creating “a climate of fear and intimidation” (Washington Post, 9/18/17).
Turkey’s counter-attack, engineered by its own thug, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was to accuse the MBS regime of planning the murder. Since the journalist’s disappearance and reported dismemberment, Turkish police and intelligence sources have leaked a series of appalling details to the Turkish press. Media reports have implicated key members of the Saudi military and intelligence apparatus as Khashoggi’s killers. Set on using the incident to undermine MBS, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is now demanding that Turkey, not Saudi Arabia, investigate and try the accused (NYT, 10/23).
Though Erdogan’s fascist regime in Turkey has been called “the world leader in jailing journalists” (2018 World Report, Human Rights Watch), it is feigning outrage at Khashoggi’s murder as a pretext to undermine Saudi Arabia. Though the two regional powers have significant economic ties, they also took opposing sides during the Arab Spring, with Turkey supporting Islamist political uprisings throughout the region and Saudi Arabia doing its best to squelch them (WP, 3/8). MBS has called Turkey one point of the “triangle of evil,” along with Iran and ISIS.
Russia courts Turkey to nix NATO
Meanwhile, Russia has mounted an effort since 2015 to bring Turkey’s rulers closer (Wall Street Journal video, 6/25). President Vladimir Putin’s strategy is to split off Turkey, the easternmost anchor of the NATO alliance, from the U.S.-led coalition. Turkey commands a chokepoint connecting the Black Sea to the Mediterranean. It also provides Russia with an alternative route for energy shipments to Europe, sidestepping a hostile Ukraine.
In December 2017, Turkey agreed to purchase the S-400 air defense system from Russia; four months later, it bought a Russian-made nuclear power plant (Bloomberg 7/11). Russia will build the land section of its Turkstream gas pipeline on Turkish soil, securing its access to European markets. In return, Turkey will get a $1 billion rebate on gas surcharges (Reuters, 5/26).
By contrast, the U.S. announced increased tariffs on Turkish imports last summer; a week later, Turkey replied in kind. The U.S. escalated the trade conflict by sanctioning high-ranking Turkish officials. But neither country appears ready to cut ties just yet. On October 21, Erdoğan released a statement reaffirming his “determination for the normalization and development of Turkey-U.S. cooperation in every area.” There is no honor among capitalist thieves, and traditional alliances will undoubtedly continue to shift as war gets closer.
U.S. rulers split on Mideast strategy
U.S. rulers seem deeply divided in their response to the Khashoggi debacle. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham called for sanctions against Saudi Arabia and referred to MBS as “toxic.” Various front-line capitalists, including JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, pulled out of an annual Saudi-hosted economic conference, forcing Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to do the same (CNN, 10/18).
But with encouragement from his son-in-law and MBS cheerleader, Jared Kushner, U.S. President Donald Trump is desperately trying to salvage the Saudi ruler’s reputation (NY Times 10/19). Even as increasingly damning details of Saudi involvement emerge, Trump continues to defend MBS and a huge U.S. arms deal with Saudi Arabia. One thing is clear: The U.S. bosses will place their capitalist class interests above any fake commitment to “human rights.”
The conflicting response to the Khashoggi incident reflects broader disagreements over U.S. strategy in the Middle East. The rulers are split over how best to control the region: whether to give traditional allies Saudi Arabia and Israel free rein to butcher whomever they please, or to hedge their bets by playing both sides, as they did in the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s (under Ronald Reagan) or by reaching a nuclear deal with Iran (under Barack Obama). Trump’s administration is pivoting back to the first of these options.
With U.S. power in the region on the wane after losing two wars and recently getting outflanked by Russia and Iran in Syria, the finance capital main wing of the U.S. ruling class cannot afford a divided front. And while Trump is a wild card whose private company “has been paid tens of millions by Saudi investors and its government” in business deals over the years (businessinsider.com, 10/16), the main wing has its own reasons to tread lightly in penalizing the MBS regime—namely, its need to keep Russia at bay. As he received “special attention” from the Saudi media at the conference in the Ritz-Carlton in Riyadh, a Russian fund manager close to Putin declared, “Saudia Arabia is a great partner for us” (NYT, 10/24).
For all the capitalist media’s dramatic appeals for “freedom of the press” and outrage over an extra-judicial killing, the Khashoggi story is really about the fight between U.S. and Russia for control over the region with the world’s largest cheap energy reserves. Workers must not be fooled into supporting one or another imperialist or local proxy in this fight. Our class interest is to expose the rulers’ intrigues. Our job is to lead the fight to take state power from their bloody hands through revolution for an egalitarian communist world.
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Saudi Arabia key to U.S. control in middle east
In the long run, despite any current tension, the U.S. has no real choice but to maintain its relationship with Saudi Arabia. U.S. bosses have planted their flag in Saudi Arabia since 1938, when Standard Oil of California (now Chevron) discovered oil there (CFR Website 5/12/17). In 1979, Zbigniew Brzezinski, former U.S. President Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser, proclaimed the “Carter Doctrine”: “An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region … will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.” Even as the New York Times editorial board hypocritically criticized Trump’s attempt to prop up MBS, it admitted that the kingdom is “an important ally in a volatile part of the world, a major purchaser of American weapons and a powerhouse in global oil politics” (NYT, 10/19).
The U.S. needs Saudi Arabia as part of it strategy to isolate their common foe, Iran. On November 4, the U.S. is set to implement a second set of sanctions to penalize any countries doing business with Iran (Congressional Research Service, 9/26). With a steep decline in Iranian oil on the world market looming, the U.S. will be relying on the Saudi rulers to increase production and keep oil prices price down; to serve as a staging point for U.S. military actions; and to grant it legitimacy in the region.
Saudi Arabia has the largest military budget in the Middle East—more than $76 billion in 2017 (Center for Strategic and International Studies 3/13). With U.S. support, it cemented its regional leadership by assembling a coalition of Middle Eastern and African countries to wage brutal war in Yemen against Iran-backed rebels there. The war in Yemen resulted in mass deaths, displacement, and the worst cholera epidemic in history.
Beyond undercutting Iran and slaughtering thousands of civilians, the move helped Saudi Arabia to secure its southern border (Aljazeera 3/26/15). Next step: A Saudi plan to develop oil ports in Yemen’s southeast (Aljazeera 8/20).
CHICAGO, October 24—The Chicago ruling class escaped a potential working-class rebellion by convicting racist killer cop Jason Van Dyke of second-degree murder and aggravated battery on October 5. But even though Van Dyke pulled the trigger, firing the 16 shots that murdered 17-year-old Black teenager LaQuan McDonald, the entire racist capitalist system bears the chief blame for murdering working-class people all over the world every day.
This will remain the brutal reality until the international working class led by the communist Progressive Labor Party (PLP) rises up in armed mass revolution to crush the capitalist bosses, their state, and their killer cops. True justice for LaQuan and all victims of capitalist state violence means communist revolution!
The whole capitalist state is guilty as hell
The verdict handed down by the jury was not even a slap on the hand of the Chicago Police Department (CPD) whose history of racist terror, torture and murder of Black and Latin workers can be traced back for decades, and the CPD are by no means the only culprits. When we in PLP say that “capitalism killed LaQuan,” we mean that this racist system began failing him at a very young age and Van Dyke was the final blow.
LaQuan was a ward of the State. He was assigned to the unfortunate care of the Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS), a system so guilty it should be convicted of murder itself. LaQuan was in and out of residential treatment centers, where youth are vulnerable to assault, rape, and prostitution and where there are no counselors, or other professionals that will provide services to this neediest population (Chicago Tribune, 12/3/14). The education system also is guilty of violence against working-class youth. LaQuan had diagnosed learning and mental health disabilities. However, Chicago Public Schools has schemed to make huge cuts in special education resources to students just like him for years (The Gate, 5/8/). Consequently, LaQuan’s school years were riddled with truancy, expulsions, and, suspensions. He was arrested 26 times since his 13th birthday and in and out of juvenile detention centers for the last three years of his life.
All “justice” fleeting under capitalism
While some might regard this conviction as a victory, it is not! The jury did not give Van Dyke first-degree murder, which is a life sentence without parole. This racist kkkop was acquitted of his charge of “official misconduct,” effectively saying that it is completely appropriate for cops on the job to empty an entire clip into a Black teen.Think what would have happened if LaQuan had shot a cop 16 times!
The racist Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), the same cop union that gave Van Dyke a janitorial job after he was fired from CPD, has backed him tooth and nail. To this end, they have vowed to appeal the verdict (WTTW, 10/5). Sentencing will not happen until October 31 and the capitalist press is already talking about Van Dyke receiving the minimum sentence for each count and running the sentences for all counts concurrently, so that he could potentially walk free in as little as six years.
PLP calls on workers to join the Red Army
PLP members and friends held a rally at a train station on the south side of Chicago a few hours after the verdict was read. Many workers were still pissed about the murder of LaQuan, the verdict and the racism that persists in this part of the city. One young man told us about his brother who was unarmed and murdered by CPD two years after LaQuan was murdered, and that there was “never any justice when the police keep killing us.”
We called on workers to join the Red Army that PLP is building so that we can overthrow this murderous system once and for all. Over 300 workers took our newspaper CHALLENGE and hundreds more took leaflets calling for communist revolution. Workers in their cars honked in support of our signs and speeches. The misleaders of the city have been calling for “peace” ever since the tape of Van Dyke murdering LaQuan was released in 2015. PLP calls on all workers to fight back when the system attacks our class. That message of fight back and rebellion was met with enthusiasm on the south side.
Rebellions are training grounds for our class to prepare to take state power away from the capitalist bosses. Rebellions also force the capitalist class to grant reformist concessions that they normally wouldn’t want to surrender to the working class such as the “right” to vote, and social security and unemployment benefits. After the 1967 Detroit rebellion, Black workers were granted access to thousands of auto industry jobs that had been closed to the Black working class. If workers in Russia had not rebelled in 1917 and eventually taken state power from the ruling class, the Nazis probably would have won World War II.
As we made speeches connecting the murder of LaQuan to mass racist unemployment, to the racist closing of 52 schools in mainly Black and Latin communities, and to the violent gentrification happening in Chicago an older Black woman said, “They (racist capitalists) only understand one thing, that’s an ass-whoopin.” It is the role of PLP to harness and organize working class anger into a fighting force that can deliver that final “ass-whoopin” to the capitalist class all over the world.
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272nd protest for Tyrone: End gag order, distribute CHALLENGE
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- 28 October 2018 72 hits
Baltimore, OCTOBER 10—Baltimore’s workers will never forget the savage murder of our working class brother Tyrone West at the hands of more than a dozen KKops five years ago. Since then workers joined by members of Progressive Labor Party (PLP) have been faithfully rallying every Wednesday to remind the city’s capitalist administration, of their crimes against black workers.
Today marks the 272 rally, and communist politics were at the forefront, and have become an expected and respected part of West Wednesday. These rallies demand accountability – for the police murder of Tyrone West, and for all victims of police terror. Despite this workers attending these rallies understand that racist police terror is an indivisible part of capitalism, and cannot be reformed.This week had a special focus, demanding an end to the gag orders that accompany almost every settlement, when victims of police terror in Baltimore are awarded a financial payment from the city
Bosses can’t gag the fightback
In this way, with gag orders, victims and their family members – probably hundreds of people – have been prevented from speaking out about what happened. It’s an effort – by capitalist politicians and top city lawyers, including City Solicitor, Andre Davis – to hold back the potential power of the movement against racist police violence. Furthermore, because talking about what happened is an important part of dealing with severe emotional trauma, the gag orders also make healing virtually impossible, after being brutalized or, worse yet after losing a loved one to street executions by police.
The slogan for this new campaign against gag orders is, “Forced Silence Condones Police Violence.” Two local organizations, also concerned with this issue, stepped in to help build support for this week’s West Wednesday activities. The local branch of the American Civil Liberties Union and Not Without Black Women participated in the rally outside City Hall, in the march to central police headquarters and, right afterward, in a special panel discussion about fighting the gag orders, at which Challenge newspaper was distributed to just about everyone in attendance.Even more important – in terms of strengthening our understanding about the strategy we need for victory against racism and capitalism – a monthly Challenge readers’ group is scheduled to start soon. So far, seven of the West Wednesday activists have said yes, they will probably participate.
Distributing Challenge is a important tool to raise workers understanding, that the only solution to eradicating police brutality is communism. To win this bright future we so badly need, our understanding of communism has to grow, and Progressive Labor Party must grow too! Dare to struggle! Dare to win, for a communist future!
