WfJRIlERS VANGIJARD 25¢No. 296 :~: Jl!ln 8 January 1982

Down With Anti-Soviet Sanctions!

I

. , ,011 aroose

o;1

Warsaw, December 15: Jaruzelski regime's countercoup checks clerical-nationalist Solidarnojc.

With Allies Like These ...

U.S. rulers' attempts to make Polandthe casus belli of Cold War II haverun into resistance and even outright

continued on page 8

and no action, Reagan resorted toeconomic sanctions, first against thePoles (canceling LOT airline's landingrights in the U.S., denying fishing rightsoff Cape Cod, cutting off some foodshipments), and then against the Rus­sians (prohibiting export of capitalgoods for the oil and gas industry andhigh-technology electronics, suspendingAeroflot landing rights). As long asWest Europe and Japan don't followsuit-and they adamantly say theywon't-these sanctions will end uphurting American capitalists more thanthe Russians. The American businesscommunity remembers Carter's Af­ghanistan grain boycott and other"punitive" measures as a case of shoot­ing oneself in the foot. But regardless ofthe quantitative effect of Reagan'sactions, all class-conscious workersmust oppose this imperialist economicwarfare against the USSR. Down withthe anti-Soviet sanctions!

people to form free trade unions and tostrike."

This from the man who destroyedthe air controllers union by firing theentire membership for daring to 'strike!And this is the same "freedom fighter"who is sending millions of dollars inweapons to the death squads in ElSalvador which every single nightmurder at least four times as manypeople as have been killed in Polandsince the beginning of martial law! Thesame U.S. imperialism which hailed(and helped prepare) the bloody 1973coup in Chile that murdered 30,000leftists and which slaughtered more thana million peasants and workers inVietnam. When Reagan & Co. talk of"free trade unions" they mean whatexisted under the Hitler-lovers MarshalKy and General Pinochet.

Under criticism that he was all talk

U.S.: Anti-Red Front Over Poland 3Italy: "We Won't Strike for the Madonna" 4France: Mitterrand's "Sacred Union"

Over Solidarnosc 5

Solidarnose by the Polish army, U.S.imperialism's plans for a "free world"Poland on the Soviet border, or at leastof a bloody battle between the Sovietmilitary and the Polish masses, havebeen greatly frustrated. From WallStreet to the White House, America'sruling class feels frustrated and angry. Ifthe Reagan administration's initialresponse was "low key," it was onlybecause they had been counting on aRussian takeover and, like Carter overIran and Afghanistan, they had beencaught out (while hiding from allegedQaddafi hit squads). But under pressurefrom the right, not least of all from therabid Cold Warriors of the AFL-CIObureaucracy, Reagan has revved up the"freedom for Poland" campaign. In hisChristmas message the U.S. presidentdenounced the "forces of tyranny" inPoland for denying the "basic right of its

JANUARY 5-Ronald Reagan andGeneral Haig are fit to be tied. Lastsummer Reagan proclaimed that thePolish crisis represented "the beginningof the end" of Communism. And hewasn't speaking as the host of the"General Electric Hour" now; ascommander in chief of the most power­ful imperialist army in the world, he'sprepared to do something about it. Intheir drive to "roll back" Communism,the Reagan boys are staging provoca­tions around the globe-shooting downLibyan planes over disputed waters,threatening blockades of Cuba andNicaragua. But Poland was key. Withthe eruption of the pro-Western anti­Communist Solidarnosc, NATO rulingcircles saw a historic chance-the best,they said, since World War I.I-to driveSoviet power back to Russian borders.Liberal commentator Ronald Steel laidout the stakes involved in the Solidar­nose bid for power:

"Had Solidarity achieved its mostsweeping demands, broken the Com­mimist Party's monopoly of power, andtaken Poland out of the Warsaw Pact,Soviet control over the rest of EastEurope would have been threatened.The other satellites might have followedsuit. ... The Iron Curtain could havebeen cracked."

-New York Times, 3 January

Ever since the onset of the Cold War,Western imperialism has aspired toreconquer the Soviet sphere of influence(the East European bureaucraticallydeformed workers states) diplomatical­ly recognized by the 1945 Yalta Agree­ment. Now NATO politicians areopenly talking about repudiating andreversing Yalta. Meanwhile the Reaganadministration has used the bugbear ofa "Soviet threat to Poland" in order togain popular support for a trillion­dollar arms build-up and its nuclearfirst-strike strategy. Aiding (more than$350,000 via the AFL-CIO alone) andegging on the West's Trojan HorseSolidarnosc to challenge the Sovietsever more directly, making contingencyplans for and repeatedly playing whatone administration official called "theSoviet intervention game," the U.S. wasdoing everything it could to provokeRussian military intervention inPoland.

Now with the crackdown against

Black Outrage in Signal Hill

Bring Ron SetUes' Murderers to Justice!

Los Angeles, December 5: Mass rally protests racist pollee brutality.

LOS ANGELES-Several thousandstudents and workers, mainly black,gathered in Signal Hill Saturday,December 5 to protest the brutal policemurder of black college football starRon Settles in a local jail cell last June.A Spartacist League/Spartacus YouthLeague (SL/SYL) contingent was thebiggest and most visible left-winggroup in attendance, our bannercalling "For Labor/Black DefenseAgainst Racist Terror!" Also presentwas a group of militant Los Angelesphone workers from CWA Local11502. While rally organizers deniedthe SL/SYL a speaker at the rally andenforced a ban on literature sales dur­ing the protest, this anti-communistsentiment was clearly not shared by thecrowd, for altogether some 160 piecesof Spartacist literature were sold at thedemonstration.

Mounting race terror in Reagan'sAmerica, both from the killers in blueand their friends in white sheets, mustbe met by mass mobilization of laborand blacks. Yet at the rally the liberalssuch as the NAACP could only call fora boycott of Signal Hill businessesduring Christmas rush. Long BeachState College black nationalist activistAmen Rahh called for replacing theLos Angeles County attorney generaland for the L.A. County board ofsupes (where the police have thehighest murder rate in the USA) totake over the Signal Hill cops!

The futility of the NAACP boycottstrategy and of Rahh's appeals to theracist capitalist state was underscoredwhen Victor Deane, a black youth andparticipant in Saturday's rally, was

picked up Saturday night by the LongBeach cops. His crime? Wearing a"Justice for Ron Settles" T-shirt!Deane was told he could expect theRon Settles treatment, was brutallybeaten, is now in a wheelchair and

urinating blood.At the rally long-time ILWV activist

and supporter of the Communist La­bor Party David Arian urged labor toget involved. What's needed, though, isnot token bureaucratic "involvement"

1WV Photo

but a mobilization of the integratedblack, white and Latino labor move­ment in the area, particularly Long­shoremen, OCAWand Teamsters inthe Long Beach-San Pedro harbor. Jailthe killers of Ron Settles!

Letter

WORKERS 'ANfiUARIJMarxist Working-Class Biweeklyof the Spartacist League of the U.S.EDITOR: Jan Norden

ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Charles Burroughs

PRODUCTION: Darlene Kamiura (Manager). Noah Wilner

CIRCULATION MANAGER: Linda Jarreau

EDITORIAL BOARD: George Foster, Liz Gordon, MarkKellermann, James Robertson, Reuben Samuels, JosephSeymour, Marjorie Stamberg

Workers Vanguard (USPS 098-770) pUblished biweekly, skippingan issue in August and a week in December, by the SpartacislPublishing Co., 41 Warren Street, New York, NY 10007.Telephone: 732-7862 (Editorial). 732-7861 (Business). Address

-. all correspondence to: Box 1377, GPO, New York, NY 10116.Domestic SUbscriptions: $5.00/24 issues. Second-class postagepaid at New York. NY.

Opinions expressed in signed articles or letters do notnecessarily express the editorial viewpoint.

"the only black candidate for president." And youdescribed Kartsen's as "a token campaign." BrotherConason, in writing a campaign puff piece you twistedthe facts all to hell.

So we called you on it. Your defense is akin to (a)before the girl's ax murder the defendant was an honorstudent; (b) (more grandly) Benedict Arnold had beena brilliant American officer. More to the point, whilegovernment and bureaucracy are prone to commitgreat evil, "Absence of Malice" in the press can hurttoo-especially if the target is a small group, madeterribly vulnerable to repression by extremely unpopu­lar, hard-bitten Marxist views. With the Wall StreetJournal threatening us, we don't need misrepresenta­tion from the Village Voice's Joe Conason, too.•

Who's Redbaiting,Joe Conason?

"Workers Vanguard"Box 1377, GPONew York, N.Y. 10116

To the editor:

It's too bad that George Crawford's letter, publishedin your last issue [WVNo. 295,18 December 1981],didn't make it into the Voice. Since you put it in yourpaper, I may as well try to respond.

All reporters make errors, and I admit mine ingetting Mr. Kartsen's first name wrong. Perhaps Ishould have referred to Arnold Cherry as the onlysignificant black candidate for TWU Local 100'spresidency. I never saw Kartsen's literature, though Idid read about his campaign in your paper (where I sawno picture of him). His effort struck me as not sodifferent from similar efforts in other unions, andprobably worthy of less attention than I gave it. Doesany of this constitute "red-baiting"?

Or was it red-baiting to identify the SpartacistLeague as a Trotskyist splinter group? I don't think so.'Red-baiting is to write, as Crawford did, that theCommunist Party "hustled votes" for Frank Barbaro.Had Ed Koch said the same thing during the campaignI'm sure you would see my point. It's also red-baitingwhen the same thing is said about Arnold Cherry, as ithas been so many times by the cronies of John Lawe.

I never accused Kartsen or anyone else of being

2

"controlled from the outside." And as for Crawford's"Murdoch-baiting" remarks at the end, I don't recallany such recriminations when I wrote about JaneMargolis, about your position on the Greensboromassacre (in "Press Clips") or about MarjorieStarnberg's Assembly campaign. As I now recall, yourattitude then toward this Murdoch employee was-toput it delicately-very solicitous.

Yours, etc.,Joe Conason

WVreplies: Joe Conason wrote in the Village Voice(2­8 December 1981), in his piece "TWU Reformers SplitAgain":

"Finally, Arthur Kartsen, a new face supported by theTrotskyist splinter group known as the SpartacistLeague, is running a token campaign denouncing Laweand the dissidents." [your emphasis]

The Village Voice didn't want to print our letter inreply without massive editing. We protested andwithdrew our letter and printed it ourselves along withour covering protest to the Voice. The Village Voicealmost simultaneously printed our original, unedited,unexpurgated reply. Then Joe Conason sent us hisletter prin'ted above.

As Conason makes rightly clear in his letter, he hasdone decent and honest work in the past, surely notleast-from our standpoint-coverage of the Sparta­cist tendency. But that begs the question of what he didthis time-distortions of the verifiable and obvioustruth of the Transit Workers' recent election struggle­in which he gored our ox. Brother Conason, reflectedwithin the union are many political programs andfeelings which one also finds in organized publicpolitical groupings and organizations. Yet you singledout the Spartacist League solely. You called another

No. 296 8 January 1982

WORKERS VANGUARD

Social Democrats/Fascist Emigres/Wall Street Journal

Anti-Red Front Over Poland

WV Photo WV Photo

"State Department socialists" join hands with anti-Communist rightists. Left: Harrington's DSOC with PilsudskiiteKPN in New York, December 29. Right: Sollenberger's RWL with Meanyite Cold Warriors in Detroit, December 18.

SWP, RWL: Shamefaced"State Department Socialists"

It is no accident that SWP membersjoined with the Friedmanite Libertari­ans in defense of Solidarnosc,just as it isno accident that the Pilsudskiite KPNjoined the Harringtonite demonstra­tion. This is not Hungary '56, whereTrotskyists backed the workers councilscalling for anti-Stalinist proletarianpolitical revolution while anti­Communists demonstrated for capitalistcounterrevolution led by CardinalMindszenty. In Poland '81, socialdemocrats, the AFL-CIO, ultrarightistemigres, the Wall Street Journal andRonald Reagan all call for "solidaritywith Solidarnosc." You've made yourbed, SWP. Now sleep in it!

But the SWP cannot effectivelycompete with DSOC for the mantle ofAmerica's "democratic socialists," espe­cially in the climate of renewed ColdWar. Increasingly it is becoming anirrelevant and idiosyncratic sect. For aslong as the SWP remains formally"Trotskyist," abstractly claiming todefend the Soviet bloc degenerated/deformed workers states against coun­terrevolution and "democratic" imperi­alism, this will remain a fundamentalobstacle to bourgeois liberal respecta­bility. In practice, of course, the SWPhas long since abandoned Soviet defens­ism. The 18 December Militantheadline-"Defend Polish Workers!Stop U.S. War Threats Against Cuba,Nicaragua, EI Salvador!"-is pure"third campism."

In Poland the SWP claims theclerical-nationalist counterrevolution­ary mobilization around Solidarnosc isa proletarian political revolution. Quite

continued on page 10

Communist protests, in San Francisco'sUnited Nations Plaza on December 14.The demonstration was called by theultra-capitalist Libertarian Party, fol­lowers of economist Milton Friedman,mastermind of starvation and unionbusting, from Pinochet's Chile toBegin's Israel to Thatcher's Britain."Socialism is Tyranny," said the Liber­tarian protesters. Yet marching withthem were members of the SWP as wellas Clara Kaye's ragtag Freedom Social­ist Party. The San Francisco Chronicle(15 December 1981) neatly captured thenature of this seemingly unusual unitedfront:

"The Libertarians were there becausethey hated socialism."The Socialists [SWPers and others]were there because they thought thePolish government was giving socialisma bad name."

Members of the SWP's youth group,the Young Socialist Alliance (YSA),found out about their party's unitedfront with the Libertarians only througha Spartacus Youth League (SYL)leaflet distributed to their confer­ence in Philadelphia this weekend. Anewspaper photo in the SYL leaflet ofprominent SWP spokesman (and oppo­sitionist) Nat Weinstein marching infront of a sign saying "Smash theCommunist Tyrants" caused quite a stir.After SWP honcho Malik Miah held upa copy of our leaflet, saying this showshow you can get in trouble by marchingin the right-wing Poland demos, SYLleafletters were swamped by YSAerswanting to get the goods. Since the S.F.

. incident tQ.«: SWP1X.~ has abandone~the Poland protest scene, tacItly adml ..ting that the American friends ofSolidarnosc are overwhelmingly opencounterrevolutionaries. But was Wein­stein out of step with the SWP?

Unlike Shanker's outfit, the moreliberal wing of "State Departmentsocialism," Michael Harrington's Dem­ocratic Socialist Organizing Committee(DSOq, would prefer not to associateitself with the rabid right. But thepredominance of the "captive nations"brigades in the pro-Solidarnosc protestsmakes such a dissociation impossible.For example, on December 16 at theNew York Polish consulate there was acontinuous all-:day dl;monstration witha gradually shifting political composi­tion. When DSOC and some of its "thirdcamp" satellites showed up late in theday, one newscaster understandablyasked, "Now, this is a demonstration bya coalition of left- and right-winggroups?" When the Harringtonites heldanother protest at the consulate on the29th, they were joined by Polishsupporters of the Confederation for anIndependent Poland (KPN), a strongfaction within Solidarnosc. The KPN isan openly anti-Communist, Pilsudskiitegroup, which even the Wall StreetJournal (26 October 1981) admits is"tainted by a history of anti-Semitism."

There are other "democratic social­ists" as well who have joined thecapitalists in mourning Solidarnosc,notably the fake-Trotskyist SocialistWorkers Party (SWP). True, even moreso than the Harringtonites, the SWPwould like to distinguish itself from therightists. An article in the 25 DecemberMilitant was headlined, "News MediaHave a Field Day with Anti-SovietProtests." Militant readers would neverknow that elements of the SWP partici­pated in at least one of these anti-

S.F. Examiner

"News media have field day with anti-Soviet protests" (headline In theMilitant, 25 December). Like the one the SWP marched In at the PolishconSUlate in San Francisco, December 14.

Immediately after the Warsawcrackdown, December 13, the AFL­CIO bureaucracy and Albert Shanker'sSocial Democrats, U.S.A. set up theCommittee in Support of Solidarityalong with a veritable rogues' gallery ofdefeated counterrevolutionaries: thePolish-American Congress, Coalitionfor a Free Russia, Ukrainian Democrat­ic Alliance, Abdala Cuban Movement,Solidarity Council of Afghan FreedomOrganizations. A leaflet distributed bythe AFL-CIO, Social Democrats andthe "captive nations" scum at theirDecember 19 demonstration at thePolish consulate in New York washeadlined "Stop Soviet Killers!" andunderneath depicted a Red Armysoldier with his teeth around a bloodiedPoland. One wonders how come Omega7 and the Croatian Ustashi didn't makethis one ... or quite possibly they did.

One also wonders if the heavilyJewish membership of Shanker's UnitedFederation of Teachers (UFT) realizedthey were making common cause withEast European emigres who long for the"good old days" of Pilsudski, Horthyand the Iron Guard when those anti­Semites could vent their anger with anold-fashioned pogrom. But then anti­Communism makes strange bedfellows.And Shanker is an anti-Communist'santi-Communist. He's been attackingReagan up and down for "playing itsoft" over Poland, demanding a com­plete break of economic relations withthe Soviet Union. It says volumes aboutSolidarnosc that last fall it opened anoffice in New York in the headquartersof Shanker's UFT.

U.S. imperialism is on a straightfor­ward course for war with the SovietUnion, and "freedom for Poland" isnow the main battle cry. The Americanruling class has had its problemswhipping up popular fervor for the newcrusade against "godless Communism."Reagan/Haig's attempt to draw the lineagainst "the red menace" in EI Salvadorby arming its kill-crazy junta has evokedfears of another Vietnam among U.S.liberals. Washington's enlistment ofSouth Africa as its front-line force inAngola is not likely to strengthen whatlittle loyalty American blacks still havetoward the "free world." And withQaddafi and Khomeini running around,it's not been easy to generate enthusiasmfor the Afghan "freedom fighters," acollection of feudalist cutthroats whopray to Mecca five times a day to keeptheir women enslaved. Oh yes, and thenthere's that all-but-forgotten paragonof "human rights": Pol Pot's Kam­puchea-which made Stalin's Gulaglook like a country club-backed bythe U.S. against the Soviet-alliedVietnamese.

But in the Poland of Solidarnosc,NATO commanders and Wall Streetfinanciers saw the perfect anti­Communist cause. In fact, knowingtheir direct military options there arelimited, Washington did its best toprovoke Soviet intervention. For Po­land, the Reagansand Haigs call for free­dom, democracy, national independ­ence, even workers' rights. Hard-bittencapitalist reactionaries, men whose basicgut instinct is to smash any strike theyencounter, are suddenly champions ofmilitant trade unionism-of course,only in Poland. Perhaps unconsciouslyborrowing from Stalinism, the imperial­ist bourgeoisie is seeking to build thebroadest "people's front" in defense ofSolidarnosc. A Wall Street Journal (16December 1981) editorial declares: "Ifthe coup succeeds in crushing Solidari­ty, we capitalists willjoin the democraticsocialists in mourning."

Social Democracy Shows ItsUgly Face

Having gotten their orders from thecapitalists to march in defense ofSolidarnosc, the "democratic socialists"have been doingjust that. And look whothey're marching with: Ukrainian andLithuanian collaborators of the Gesta­po, Batista's torturers, Afghan feudal­ists who shoot school teachers forteaching young girls to read. In the U.S.,pro-Solidarnosc demonstrations havebeen dominated by East Europeanemigres, many of whom fought on thelosing side in World War II and thenfled to "the land of the free" one stepahead of the Red Army's vengeance.

8 JANUARY 1982 3

Italian Workers Balk at Eurocommunist Treachery

"We Won't Strike for the Madonnaof Czestochowa!"

UPI

Italian workers in solidarity with Fiat strike in 1980. But they wouldn't go outfor Walesa and Wojtyla.

Now Available:

Workers VanguardBound Volume 12

WV Nos. 271-2952 Jan.-18 Dec. 1981

failure to do anything about the devas­tating layoffs and inflation at home.And there is also widespread mistrust ofWalesa & Co. One worker was quotedas saying of Solidarnose: "Some of itschoices seem to demand a return tocapitalism." In Bologna, so-called Ka­bulisti (PCIers who supported Sovietintervention against CIA-backed Islam­ic reaction in Afghanistan) in left-wing

Also Available:Vol. 1 WV Nos. 1-34

Nov. 1970-Dec. 1973

Vol. 2 WV Nos. 35-58Jan.-Dec. 1974

Vol. 3 WV Nos. 59-89Jan.-Dec. 1975

Vol. 4 WV Nos. 90-1142 Jan.-18 June 1976

Vol. 5 WV Nos. 115-13825 June-24 Dec. 1976

Vol. 6 WV Nos. 139-1627 Jan.-17 June 1977

Vol. 7 WV Nos. 163-18624 June-23 Dec. 1977

Vols. 8-11 forthcoming

Berlinguer aspires to attain politicalacceptability so that his party, like thesocial democrats of Scandinavia, Brit­ain and Germany, can alternate in officewith bourgeois formations as the execu­tive committee of finance capital. Thishas been the aim of an his politicalgambits, from the "historic compro­mise" and "Eurocommunism" to the"third road." But to achieve this status,the PCI must, to use the words of LeonBlum, show that it is prepared to act as"loyal management of capitalist socie­ty." And here mere reformism is notenough. While the bourgeoisie has beenwilling, in extremis, to resort to "popu­lar fronts" with Stalinist parties as ameans of heading off revolution, for theordinary running of the state it insiststhat its labor lieutenants cannot servetwo masters, both the Kremlin andItalian capitalism.

Carrillo's Spanish CP has alreadycrossed this bridge on the path ofsocial­democratization, and Berlinguer hasbeen looking for the right occasion.Recall his famous 1975 interview withCorriere della Sera where he said that"to achieve socialism in freedom it isbetter that Italy remain in NATO,because this way there is no danger ofmilitary intervention by the USSR."Together with Carrillo the Italian CPthrew away phrases like "dictatorshipof the proletariat" and "Marxism­Leninism," which are empty rhetoric fora party committed to upholding thecapitalist system. And since August1980 the PCI has warned of the

continued on page 10

PCI: Burning the Last Bridgesto the Kremlin

Rivoluzionaria (LOR-formerly GBL,associated with Alan Thornett's TILC)outrageously compared the crackdownin Poland to the bloody 1973 coup inChile, even referring to "the Pinochetsof Warsaw." Nowhere does the LOReven mention defense of the social andeconomic gains of the degenerated/deformed workers states against coun­terrevolution, and these "socialist"friends of Walesa label anyone whoopposes (or is "indifferent" to) Solidar­nose "deadly enemies of the internation­al working class." (What does that makeReagan?) In fact, virtually the onlyorganized tendency to oppose the powergrab by Walesa & Co. is the LegaTrotskysta d'Italia (LTd'I), sympathiz­ing section of the international Spar­tacist tendency. But despite its smallsize, the LTd'I has a wide audience.In little over a month our comradessold more than 800 copies of a 32­page pamphlet, "Stop SolidarnoseCounterrevolution."

Make payable/mail to:Spartacist Publishing Co.Box 1377 GPONew York, New York 10116

$20.00per volume

factory councils argued, "Solidarnosewas born a year ago and already it'strying to undo socialist power!"

So far there has been little sharpopposition to Berlinguer's line in theCommunist Party hierarchy. But thePCI bureaucrats have not been able toignore the negative response, apparentlyunexpected, from their base. L'Unito,the party newspaper, has dedicatedseveral articles to polemicizing againstthe membership. In Torino the partyapparatus mobilized against the so­called kabulisti (or "Afghans") ofBranch 39, who called for suppressingthe counterrevolutionary activities ofSolidarnose. The "Afghan" branchleader denounced the "anti-Communistscum, from the MSI [fascists], theChristian Democrats and the Socialiststo the so-called left, those of II Manifes­to and Lotta Continua" who all supportWalesa. This speech reportedly drewapplause from roughly a third of thePCI activists.

The pseudo-Trotskyists, meanwhile,have lined up solidly with Solidarnoscand the Western bourgeoisie. In Torino,according to the "far-left" paper LottaContinua, "the Christian Democraticbanners were side by side with theFourth International [USec] banners."A leaflet by the tiny Lega Operaia

admitted that not only hard Stalinistsbut also "the others don't want todemonstrate together with [ChristianDemocratic leader] Piccoli." In Milanoand Torino, only a few hundred workersshowed up 'for trade-union-ealled dem­onstrations over Poland.

An article in the "far-left" daily IIManifesto (18 December 1981) reportedon the situation in Bologna under theheadline: '''Walesa Is a Provocateur,We Don't Strike for the Black Madon­na.' Difficult Atmosphere in the Facto­ries." There was a real "upsurge againstSolidarnose in the factories and in the[PCI] branches themselves," the articlenoted:

"Some Communist branches refused todistribute the national leadership'sdocument. A couple of officials, work­ers at SIP, said: 'We won't join thestrike, so obviously don't ask us toorganize it.' At the GD metal plant, a'historic' stronghold of the BolognaFLM [Metal Workers Federation], twodepartments with a Communist majori­ty, after reading the agenda for thefactory council which declared forSolidarnosc, took out pen and paperand wrote a counterdocument. Theycirculated it in the factory and began tocollect signatures. At Wrapmatic,another metal plant, a long discussionended with the decision to stay in thefactory. 'We won't strike for Walesa,'they announced. The list could go on."

At the Weber plant in Bologna a groupof workers overran a picket line formedby union delegates. Both strikers andnon-strikers were predominantly mem­bers of the PCI.

At a demonstration by metal workerson December 17 in Milano's CathedralSquare, strikers vociferously heckled astudent speaking for Solidarnosc:"They're talking too much about War­saw. Talk about unemployment inItaly." Communist Party leaders havetried to explain away this oppositionfrom their ranks as a reflection ofItalianparochialism. No doubt this is anelement, along with a healthy dose ofanti-clericalism. But usually the work­ers' anger is directed at their leaders'

the leaflet with the party line on Poland"(L'Espresso, 27 December 1981). AtFIATs Mirafiori works in Torino,where the PCI and union tops sabo­taged a hard-fought strike in late 1980,workers noted that it was strange that "aunion that nine months ago did notagree on anything internally, all of asudden decided to go all out forPoland." In Milano a local party leader

Rebellion in the Factories

This campaign was rapidly spreadthroughout the PCI apparatus. Therewas reported dissension in the meetingsof party activists, but in the factoriesopposition to Berlinguer was massive.When the three union federations calleda one-hour strike "in solidarity withSolidamosc," the strike was a failure allover the country. In Genova, thesecretary of the powerful PCI-Ied dockworkers union admitted "there wasmassive resistance when we distributed

MILANO, December 3I-The preven­tive coup launched by the Warsawregime to stop counterrevolutionarypreparations by Polish Solidarnose isleading the Italian Communist Party(PCI) to the brink of internal rift andperhaps to an open split. PCI topsimmediately issued a condemnation ofthe crackdown in Poland, and partychief Enrico Berlinguer declared cate­gorically on national TV, "The forwardthrust originating in the October Revo­lution has been spent." But at the base,in the factories, Italian workers over­whelmingly refused to heed the Euro­communists' call for strikes and dem­onstrations in "solidarity withSolidarnose." A worker in Bologna ex­pressed the sentiment of many, replyingto union organizers, "I don't strike forthe madonna of Czestochowa."

For the Communist Party leadershipwhat is posed is a final break withMoscow, crossing the Rubicon in theprocess of social-democratization whichin varying degrees has taken its tollamong the Stalinist parties of WestEurope. Long since become reformist,the Eurocommunists are looking toensconce themselves in the capitaliststate by swearing undivided loyalty totheir "own" bourgeoisie. In a televisedpress conference on December 15,Berlinguer pronounced his verdict onthe "real/existing socialism" of theSoviet bloc:

"The forward-moving capacity of re­newal in the societies of East Europe hasbeen exhausted. I am speaking of theforward thrust which has its beginningsin the socialist October Revolution....Today we have reached a point in whichthis period is at an end."

-L'Unita, 16 December 1981

The PCI leader also went out of his wayto praise Pope Wojtyla's statements onEast Europe and said that "today thequestion of Italy leaving the AtlanticPact [NATO] must not be raised."

In case there was any ambiguity abouthis aims, on the 17th Berlinguerdelivered a hard speech against martiallaw in Poland before the CommonMarket "parliament" in Strasbourg, forwhich he received the applause of theassembled bourgeois and social­democratic statesmen. Speaking tojournalists there, he compared thepresent moment to the collapse of theSecond International and the birth ofthe Communist International, sayingthat the PCI's "third road" meantconstructing socialism "respecting thevalues and rules of democracy" (L'Uni­to, 18 December 1981). That same dayhe held a four-hour meeting with WillyBrandt, chairman of the German SPDand of the social-democratic SecondInternational, on the prospects for a"Euro-Ieft." And on December 18Berlinguer met with Spanish CP leaderSantiago Carrillo to map out a jointEurocommunist offensive.

4 WORKERS VANGUARD

Keystone Pavlovsky/Sygma Gamma-Liaison

On December 14 thousands marched together in Paris for pro-imperialist Solldarnosc: Gaullists (left), Social Democrats (center) and fake-TrotskyistOCI (right).

From Fascists to the "Far Left"

Mitterrand's "Sacred Union"Over SolidarnoSCPARIS, January 2-Alone in WestEurope, France has witnessed a massanti-Soviet, anti-Communist mobiliza­tion in response to the Polish militarytakeover. When 50,000 marched inParis on December 14 to show "solidari­ty with Solidarnosc," it was a veritableunion sacree ranging from the fascistsand Gaullist opposition to the rulingSocialists and the so-called far left­embracing every major political force,in fact, except the Communist Party(PCF). The fact that the right denounces"communism" in the name of Christiancivilization while the leftists do so in thename of socialism can't hide theircommon front in support of NATO­backed Lech Walesa's Solidarnosccapitalist counterrevolution.

The motor force of the Polandprotests has been the Socialist Party(PS) of French president Fran<;oisMitterrand and social-democraticunion bureaucrats. Ever since takingoffice six months ago Mitterrand hasrivaled Reagan himself in anti-Sovietrhetoric, emphatically supporting Af­ghan and Polish counterrevolution­aries. In the absence of mass resistancein Poland, the shock waves are nowdying down in France. But with the firstpopular-front government since thepost-war years, including PCF ministersin the cabinet, the anti-Soviet unholyalliance could prove an explosivemixture. Polish events could lead to adeep rupture and far-reaching politicalupheaval in the French left and workersmovement.

The day after Jaruzelski's preventivecoup, the Parisian press went wild,particularly the pro-Socialist Le Matinand the ex-New Left Liberation. Norumor was too implausible, no accusa­tion too outrageous for their anti-Sovietravings. The alleged torture of dissi­dents Kuron and Michnik, the claimthat 45,000 had been arrested-chargesthat the rest of the bourgeois presswouldn't touch-became front-pagenews. The French radical petty bour­geoisie went berserk-joggers ran tenkilometers for Poland on New Year'seve, feminists proposed dumping gar­bage in front of PCF headquarters;masses, sermons, candlelight proces­sions "for Poland"; non-stop Chopin onall the radios, especially his funeralmarch!

The PS-Ied outcry in France over thePolish crackdown far exceeds anythingseen in the U.S. While Reagan wasbanking on Soviet intervention to whipup anti-Soviet fervor, Mitterrand &Co., ideologues of "democratic social­ist" counterrevolution in the Sovietbloc, were bound to mobilize moreactively for Solidarnosc. In the Second

8 JANUARY 1982

International and the Common Market,the French social democrats opposedtheir German brethren, who are insis­tent on preserving "detente" at all costs.

- Mitterrand is unenthusiastic aboutannounced U.S. sanctions against theUSSR, but not for being "soft onCommunism." Denouncing Jaruzelski'saction as Kremlin-inspired, Paris iscalling for an "offensive application" ofthe Helsinki Accords and taking aim atthe Yalta Agreement which dividedEurope into Soviet and Americanspheres of influence after World War II.

Eurostalinists Up Againstthe Walt

At home, the Socialists see a chanceto crack the PCF, and they are puttingthe screws on Georges Marchais and hislieutenants, so far with mixed results. Soan anti-Communist union cartel­including the CFDT (which pushesMitterrand austerity under the guise of"self-management"), Force Ouvriere (aCold War "socialist" creation of theCIA) and the official Catholic trade­union federation-called for a one-hourstrike on December 21 to supportSolidarnosc. Their aim was clear: dragthe ranks of the Stalinist-controlledCGT, France's major union body, intothe hysterical Cold War campaign. Itwas undoubtedly the first time that theultra-reactionary daily Le Figaro hadever supported a strike! Meanwhile thegovernment announced that strikingstate employees would be paid for thelost time (some private employers didthe same).

But in spite of heavy backing from thestate, the press and the bosses, thisreactionary strike failed to achieve itsgoal. No more than 5 percent of theFrench workforce went out-heavilyconcentrated in white-collar sectors likebanking, teachers, etc. Not surprisingly,the greatest turnout was in heavilyCatholic Brittany and Alsace. In con­trast, in the CGT bastions of heavyindustry, such as Renault auto factories,the strike was decidedly a non-event. Nothanks to the Communist Party/CGTtops, who only complained ofreactionary maneuvers to drive the PCFout of the government and did little tomobilize their ranks against this strike insupport of counterrevolution.

While the Stalinist CGT bureaucratswere trying to temporize and "coolthings down," and the "far left" wascheering on the social democrats' strikefor counterrevolution in Poland, ourcomrades of the Ligue Trotskyste deFrance (LTF) issued an appeal head­lined "No Strike for the Pope, NATOand Mitterrand!" The LTF leaflet ended

with a call to: "Break the pro-imperialiststrike! Break the minutes of silence withthe slogan 'Military defense of theUSSR!'" Distributed at the Renaultauto plant near Rouen and at severalpostal centers in Paris, the leaflet waswell received by CGT militants. With agut impulse to defend the Soviet Unionagainst the imperialists, the mass ofPCF/CGT militants rejected the strike.

The presence offour PCF ministers inthe cabinet is still a means forMitterrand to pressure the Eurostalin­ists to keep in line ... or else. Last June,after the PCF's electoral losses hadrendered it more malleable, the Social­ists accepted some ornamental Commu­nist ministers in order to purchase laborpeace from the CGT. In return theyexacted a declaration in which Marchaishad to endorse the PS' Cold War line onAfghanistan, Poland and the Euromis­siles (including the Soviet SS-20s). WhenJaruzelski ordered out the troops, thePCF initially tried to have its cake andeat it too. They echoed the line of thePolish bureaucracy, that repression ofSolidarnosc was strictly an internalaffair, while PCF ministers publiclysupported Mitterrand's statement.

But under pounding from the PS, theFrench Communist bureaucrats had toresort to some fancy footwork. CGTleader Seguy called for freeing any"genuine" unionists in Solidarnoscimprisoned by the military regime.Marchais sent a letter to Jaruzelskiurging an early end to martial law andsuggesting that Soviet interventionwould be denounced by the PCF. Whenthat didn't stop the social-democraticpressure campaign (which is echoed byEurocommunist softs inside the partyand the CGT apparatus), the PCF topsdid another pirouette. At the end ofDecember the Stalinists' No.2 laborfaker, Krasucki, issued an open letter tothe PS warning Mitterrand to call off hisdogs. It was just a cynical renegotiationof the deal made in June: Don't give ustrouble on Poland, say the PCF/CGT,and we won't give you trouble in theplants.

On December 30 Marchais flatlydeclared that Solidarnosc had made abid for power and had to be crushed.(Earlier the Communists tried to down~

play this-after all, when Walesa visitedParis in October he met with CGTleaders.) No doubt the PCF tops havefollowed closely the disintegration ofthe Spanish Eurocommunists. In itspresent weakened condition, if theFrench CP adopts the SP position onPoland it runs the risk of being eatenalive by Mitterrand & Co. But theEurostalinists' reluctant defense ofJaruzelski has nothing in common with

genuine communist defense of thedegenerated and deformed workersstates against capitalist counterrevolu­tion. This requires the ouster of theStalinist bureaucrats who have mort­gaged Poland to the imperialist bankersand who in France (and not only there)have sabotaged every serious strugglefor workers revolution.

What Next for the "Far Left":Pilsudski Brigades?

When the union sacree marched inParis on December 14 in support ofPolish Solidarnosc, the French fake­Trotskyists found themselves in thesame demonstration, in fact, shoulder toshoulder with the Gaullists and fascists.As the rightists chanted "Communists,assassins!" the exposure of the revolu­tionary pretensions of the "far left" wasjust too glaring. So they eased theirconsciences by the cheap expedient ofbarring the Gaullist contingent from theprocession. This empty gesture was notonly useless (the Gaullists merely took aparallel side street), it could not hide theexistence of the rotten anti-Soviet bloc.Meanwhile, riding the anti-Communistwave, degenerate remnants of theFrench New Left embarked on a seriesof provocations-sitting in at the Polishconsulate at Lyons, occupying a Polishfreighter at Rouen, firebombing Soviet­model cars in Perpignan.

The Organisation CommunisteInternationaliste (OCI) of Pierre Lam­bert was only mildly discomfited by thebloc with the bourgeoisie in the name ofcounterrevolution. When an OCI stu­dent honcho at one of the Pariscampuses read off a list of groups who

continued on page 10

WfJRIlERS'ANIIJARIJMarxist Working-Class Biweeklyof the Spartacist League

24 issues-$5Introductory offer (10 issues) $2International rates: 24 issues-$20 airmaill

$5 seamail10 introductory i.ssues-$3 airmail

-includes Spartacist

Name _

Address

CityState Zip _

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Make checks payable/mail to:Spartaclst Publishing Co.Box 1377 GPONew York, NY 10116

5

SpartacistLeagueWins ...(continued from page 12)

discredited Smith Act and "CriminalSyndicalism" laws.

The California Organized CrimeBureau and the Deukmejian report arepart of a burgeoning government "anti­terrorist" apparatus which includes theRICO ["racketeering"] laws, witchhunt­ing grand juries, and a beefed-up secretpolice-all aimed at searching out andultimately destroying political opposi­tion as "terrorism." Labeling Marxistsas political "terrorists" is an excuse todeny the most basic democratic rightsand legal due process.

Deukmejian's 1979 "Report onOrganized Crime" is an especiallysinister document. It whitewashes therace terrorists of the Ku Klux Klan andNazis, claiming the real danger of thesefascists lies "in their ability to createtrouble by attracting violence fromthose on the extreme left." This is a

classic attempt to use the terrorist rightas an excuse to go after the left and thelabor movement.

We vigorously opposed our inclusionin the 1979 report not simply becausethe allegations about us were false butespecially because the report claimed wewere vicious outlaws, terrorists andcriminals. We were falsely labeled asdangerous people, to be dealt withmilitarily, mad dogs to be shot down. Itwas a murderous effort to set us up forthe same kind of campaign of govern­ment violence that destroyed the BlackPanther Party.

In fact, as Deukmejian has beenforced to admit, we are not outlaws,terrorists or criminals. We are Marxistswho have been politically active inCalifornia and other states for morethan 15 years. We struggle to politicallyorganize the American working class, tobring workers to the understanding thatthey need their own class party, aworkers party, to fight for their immedi­ate and ultimate interests. Such aperspective excludes substitutionistmeans such as terrorism, which is afutile, despairing strategy that turnsaway from the working-class struggle toabolish capitalism. Our victory today is

a vindication of the right of the workingclass and its party to organize.

In the radical movement we have ahistory of campaigning for workersdemocracy, opposing those who at­tempt to subordinate it to bourgeoisnorms of rule. The rule of the bourgeoi­sie is ultimately based on terrorism.Despite its protestations to the contrary,the American bourgeoisie is no excep­tion. Examples abound: the Palmerraids, the unseating of socialists electedto the New York State Legislature, theincarceration of Japanese Americansduring World War 11, the suppression ofthe Watts rebellion, the Vietnam War.

In issuing his 1979 report Deukmejianwillfully tried to confuse Marxisteducation with terrorism. In forcing aretraction of the false allegations leveledat us we have won a victory for freespeech. Socialists who believe the SovietUnion is right in Afghanistan, who arefor the victory of leftist insurgents in EISalvador, who maintain Polish Solidar­nose is not an agency of proletarianpolitical revolution but a counter­revolutionary company union of theCIA and imperialist bankers, have aright to say so without being calledterrorists.

Gubernatorial hopeful Deukmejianwas forced to retract his wrongful andvicious smear of us because our courtsuit was becoming a political liability forhim. The case has been gaining increas­ing support from public officials, civilliberties activists and others who, whilenot sharing our Marxist views, nev­ertheless know by experience andreputation that we are neither "terror­ists" nor "criminals."

The case evoked particular sympathyand concern from black spokesmen,including Congressman Ron Dellums,J\orthern California NAACP counselOliver Jones, Oakland City CouncilmanWilson Riles, Jr. and Alameda CountySupervisor John George. Such supportis not surprising given the targeting ofblacks and minorities by Reaganitereaction.

We would like to thank all those whosupported us in pursuing this suit to itssuccessful conclusion. Our victory is ablow against the renascent McCarthy­ism of Deukmejian and Reagan. We willcontinue to exercise and defend ourrights, organizing the workers partywhich will struggle for the immediateand ultimate interests of the workingclass and all the oppressed.•

State Official Admits Error inPutting Group on '79 Listof Left-Wing Terrorists

By ROBERT LINDSEYSped.aI to'lbe New Yan nmes

LOS ANGELES, Dec. 25 - A Marxistpolitical organization, the SpartacistLeague, has dropped a suit against theCIllifom1a Attorney General's officeafter the ottice acknowledged that it hadbeen wrong to include the group in a listof lett.wIng terrorist orp.niIatlOllS pub­Ushed in 1979.

The orpnlzatlon had contended thatthe state had WI'OIlgfuJly depicted It aspr'OIle to violence. The Spertadsts hadcIIarged that the aet101l was part of "re­nucent McCarthyism" and a "murder.ous effort to set us up for the same kindof campaign of GoYemment violencethat destroyed the Black PantherParty."

In a 1979 report to the legislature,Qeorge DeukmeJlan, the California At·tomey General, listed the Spartacistl,eague and a related group, the Sparta.ous Youth League, together with theProgressive Labor Party, the Commu­D1st Workers Party, the InternationalQmunittee AgaInst Racism and theRe\'OlutiOrllU)' COInmunIst Party as lett­*!Dg~ operating in California.

Attempts to 'Illclte' Cbarged

The report said that the organizationsshared a "radical ideology a."ld ad­YOCacy of vloleoce," asserting: "Theyaplolt Issues of public concern In at­tempts to Incite the populace and createviolence 'It'tlerewr possible; their propl)­ganda IIteratun! Is hlghly inflammato­ry, and their activities range from coun­terd6iMiWtlatIWi -lIP!Dst r!lbt-W1n&extremists to lIfIlng violent and crimi·nalllCt!vities in labor disputes and occu-

propoginflaIDlties rastratiOitremislcrimin.putcs <federal

OWegantzascribinroristsists ...filed aguingfamedtryingly protattemras an I

the Black Panther Party."In a 1979 report to the legisla­

ture, George Deukmejian, theCalifornia attorney general, list­ed the Spartacist League and arelated group, the SpartacusYouth League. together with theProgressi ve Labor Party, theCommunist Workers Party. theInternational Committee AgainstRacism and the RevolutionaryCommunist Party as left-winggroups operating in California.

Tbe report said that the orga­nizations shared a "radical ideol­ogy and advocacy of violence,"asserting: "They exploit issues ofpublic concern in attempts to in­cite the populace and create vio­lence wherever possible; their

By PATI MORRISON, Times 814ft Writer

Group's Designation InOll .An!ltltll mtlUtllas Terrorists Voided iL

Compiled from Examiner news services

Marxists, not mobstersTHE STATE BUREAU of Organized Crime and Criminal

VItelligence has issued a letter saying a Marxist groupmistakenly was included in a 1979 report on organized crime.according to the Spartacist League-Spartacist Youth League.The state attorney general's office retracted the inclusion ofthe group under an out-of-<'Ourt settlement of theSpartacisrs civil suit, and a letter will go to federal, state andlocal agencies. said Keith Douglas of the group's centralcommittee. Gina McGuiness. a spokeswoman for stateAttorney General George [)eukmejian confirmed theretraction today. saying the inclusion of the the group in theterrorist report "was an error." She said officials hadchecked the files and there was "no substantiation" for theterrorist label.

Marxist group taken oflttlement, an 0 I ,

ernment agencies that

ns responded tt revolutlonis

t tbe state, arglrganiZation.

ler for the grouLeague is not

principle."

ijian said theio withdraw it;

a review offied.

e is higbly inf!om counterdelists to urginlisputes and oc

'" ngs," tbe repol

Coatiaued from First Pagement spokeswoman Gina McGuiness. "When we re­s~arched our files after they filed suit, we didn't findenough substance to justify what had been said (in thereport)."

Spokesmen for the Spartacist League said FridayA California Marxist group an- Spartacist League and the Sparta- they also intend to distribute copies of the retraction

nounc;ed Friday that Its lawswt cus Youth League with several left- letter to members of the Legislature, who are also onagainst state Atty. Gen. George wing organizations and said that all the distribution list for the report.Deukmejian has been settled out of of them were committed to an "ad- "We vigorously opposed our inclusion in the 1979 re-court with the distribution of a let- vocacy of violence ... urging VI- port not simply because the allegations about us wereter from Deukmejlan's office admit- olent and criminal activities in labor false," said a Spartacist League statement ISSUed Fri-ting that the group's inclusion on a disputes and occupation by force of day, "but especially because the report claimed we were1979 list of terrorists "was in error." federal office buildings." vicious outlaws, terrorists and criminals ... It was a

The Spartacist League had sued In the retraction letter sent to the murderous effort to set us up for the same kind of cam-Deukmejian earlier this year, claim- 2:l federal, state and local lawen- paign of government violence that destroyed the BlackIng that because it and the Sparta- forcement agencies who receive the Panther Party."cus Youth League had been listed in annual organized crime report. The statement by Al Nelson of the league's centralthe 1979 report, "Organized Crime Charles E. Casey. chief of the state's committee claimed the retraction was a "small but verym California," they had become bureau of organized crime and Important Victory for the real majority of the AmerIcan"targets ... for harassment and criminal intelligence. wrote, "Thi" people-labor, blacks Chicanos. Jews, Asian-Ameli-persecution and intimidation by law is to inform you that the inclusion of cans."enforcement and right-wing orga- the Spartacist League and the Spar- The rctraction represents "a victory for free speech,"nizations," They said they were tacus Youth League on Page 11 of Nelson said. "Socialists who helieve the SoViet Union IS"Marxists, not terrorists," the Department of Justice's publi- right in Afghanistan. who are for the victory of leftist

The report, one of the first such cation ... was in error," msurgents m EI Salvador, who malntam (that) PolIshever made public. listed right- wing "The agreement was basically Sohdarnosc (SolIdarity) is not an agency of proletarian

Legislature, Attornev and left-Wing grouos, from the Ku that we'd retract what was in the pohtlcal revolutIOn but a counter~revolutlOnary compa,listed the S artacist Klux Klan to the RevolutIOnary 1970 report," said Justice depart. ny. union of the CIA and ImperIahst banke:,s. have a

':..'l::,'f.rt~~::: Commom" P,rty " ,"<lod'd <h, rim':--if. ngh' mii .,<hook",mg;;;"'''''''' I

,~~~t~1 Comm" l' . f. ~ I.~...t ~,t\U ~o:r ~imtstionsshi ~~nJrant't~roTtxamttttr r

Ice." ~ ~ petlon by force of Federal otfice build-

lic concern in I IState d.-gest . MARXISTS DROPPING ~dals of the Spenactst organiza.I~ate violence ,I tlOIlS responded by describing them-

SUIT IN CALIFORNIA ~tI~~~==that Mr. Deukmejian had defamed theorpniZatiOIl and was trying to suppressoonstitutionaily protected dissent in a"classic attempt to uae the terroristright as an excuse to go after the left andthe labor rDOYIlIDent.' ,

Rachel Wolkenstein, a lawyer for theorpniZatiOllin New York City, said In atelephone interview:

"'The Spartadst League is not a vio­lent group by either program or by prln­dple."

A spokesman for Mr. Deukmejfansaid that the Attorney General's officebad decided to withdraw its characteri.zatlon of the group atter a review of itsfiles determined that it was not jUStl­Led. As part of an out-of~ settle­ment, an otftalal of the agency sent let·ten to government agencies that had re­cel'ftld the 1979llst and saId its report onthe two organizations was erroneous.

The SplI.rta~ League and its youthOrpnizatiOIl are among a handful ofpolltlcal organizations in this c:ountlywhose members, professing adherenceto the principles of Communism de­llCribed by ICarI Marx, say that they areopposed to capitalism in this e:ounUyand establish a "workers party."

AI Nelson, a member of the SpertadstLeague's ceotra1 committee, depictedthe leap and Its ,outh group In an in­terview as TnltskyIst factions that,while believing "in the unconditionalmilItary defense Ilf the Soviet Unionapinst imperialism," had renouncedStalin's police state taet1cs. He said thatthe two groups had "!e?eral hlllldred"members.

Noting that !e'Yeral leaders of theblack commllll!ty in· caIifomJa hadsided with the organizations in the dis­pute With Mr. DeulaDeJlan, Mr. Nelson_rted that there was concern"among blacks and liberals" that theAttorney General "and the Reagan Ad­mlnJstratiOll," would attempt to su~

press political dis!ent under the guise offighting terrorism. "They are willfullyCXlIlfuslng legitimate Marxist educatlonaDd leftist aetlYity with internationalterrorism," he asserted.

Spartacists OffTerrorist List

Los AngE'les

A Marxist political group. thE' SpartaeistLeague, hilS dropped a suit against thE' state

I ptlorneY eenenl pfter the rfflce admitted that

w·----------....::..;-:....:.·LI~group In a list

{giiiiJillim-J :~::::::......~ to violence. The

e action was part of afor the same kind ofce that destroyed the

~an ~rantisco ~~roni('tt, Suit Dropped .

In an importanl civil liberties ,ictory. theSpartacist League (SU recently won a suitagainst the California altorney general's of­fice. which had labeled the small Trotskyistgroup as a "terrorist" organization.

[n a 1979 report on "Organized Crime inCalifornia," California Attorney GeneralGeorge Deukmejian stated that the SL, theRevolutionary Communist Party. the Pro­gressive Labor Party and the CommunistWorkers Party had emerged as "yet anotherdangerous faction with which law enforce­ment would have to deal. "

The report. which was distributed to lawenforcemcnt officials and newspapersthroughout the state, said the groups attemp­ted "to incite the populace and create vio·Ience wherevcr possihle.·· It also' said thaItheir "literature is highly inflammatory"and that they urgcd "Violent and criminal ac­tivities in labor disputes and occupation byforce of federal office buildmgs."

LaSI summer the 51. filed suit against theattorney general's office. arguing that the 51.was a Marxist political organization and nota "lerrorisl" group. The suit staled that thereport interfered with the organization' s"legitimate exercise of constitutionally pro­tected right>" as well as provided "therationale for govcrnment surveillance. infilt­ration and disruption."

The allorney general's office could notback up its charges. and as part of an out ofcourt selliement on Dec. 15 it sent letters tolaw enforcement officials in the state sayingthat thc inclusion of the SL in the 1979 ter­rorism report "was in error." However. noofficial retraction has yet been made of thelisting of Ihe other groups as ·'terrorists."

SL spokesman AI Nebon said that "label­ling Marxists as political 'Ierrorists' is an ex·cuse to deny the most basic democraticright> and legal due process." Nelsonadded. "right-wing zealols hope to si­lence their opponent> by creating a newMcCart'hyism, an atnH>sphere of intimida­tion and antiCi..lmmunist hvsteri£l. Thev wantto muzzle free speech. Th~y must nnt he pcr­milled In do so."

Spartacist League:Civil liberties victory

By Robert LindleY_VorkTI_

LOS ANGELES - A Marxistpolitical organization, the Spar­tacist League, has dropped a suitagainst the California attorneygeneral's office after the officeacknowledged that it had beenwrong to include the group in alist of left-wing terrorist organi­zations published in 1979.

L'l..J The organization had contend­IJed that the state had wrongfUlly

r .... . I ..~y IS prone to violence.Qlnldon~ ~rJbun. TODAY sts had charged that

SATURDAV ~~~s~r~n~f~':,:~~:L- --__--__------.----:-,.....,......: to set us up for the

same kind of campaign of gov­ernment violence that destroyed

6 WORKERS VANGUARD

found out about our inclusion in theCalifornia "Organized Crime Report"when a redbaiting letter to the Universi­ty of California (Los Angeles) DailyBruin referred to it to allege the SL was agroup of criminals and terrorists. Wehad not seen the document because thissort of information circulates only topolice agencies, legislators and thepress. Moreover, the California "Organ­ized Crime Report" is used as anauthoritative "source" on terroristgroups.

We were targets in a new style ofwitchhunting. The California "Organ­ized Crime Report" of I979 was notsimply a "subversives list." The largestleft organizations like the CommunistParty and the Socialist Workers Partywere not included while the KKK andHell's Angels were. In the McCarthyperiod the government tried, convictedand jailed communists for their ideas;prosecutors read selected passages ofMarx and Lenin as "evidence." But afterthe Vietnam War and given the miser­able economic and social failure of the"American Dream" it has not beenenough to simply brand people ascommunists to put them in jail. Statutesfor legal witchhunting like the SmithAct have become generally discredited.Black Panther Party leaders weresimply murdered in their beds.

The ReaganjHaig Cold War II of the1980s goes beyond simple red scare, tothe "red-terrorist" scare, under theslogan of combating "Soviet-inspiredinternational terrorism." A series ofmeasures has been taken in the name ofthis new form of"red menace" includinga new legal license for the CIA to spyon and infiltrate domestic left groups,pardons for convicted secret policeagents, Congressional cries for a newHUAC and squeezing off the Freedomof Information Act.

The case against our inclusion in theCalifornia "Organized Crime Report"confronted the new legal witchhuntingapparatus. Prosecutors are using an actpassed by Congress in 1970, the Racket­eer Influenced and Corrupt Organiza­tions Act (RICO), which gives themsweeping legal powers. The PartisanDefense Committee pointed out theominous connection between the Cali­fornia "Organized Crime Report" andRICO in a fund appeal letter ofNovember 25:

"The danger goes beyond California.Deeming organizations 'terrorist' is thegovernment's justification for sendingmilitary troops to arrest alleged Brinksrobbery conspirators and precludinglawyers from representing clients. Anew federal-New York City jointterrorism task force is launching a'major racketeering investigation' usingthe draconian RICO conspiracy laws.This law has only the vaguest definitionof 'racketeering,' permits multipleprosecutions for the same act, extendsthe statute of limitations, imposes

continued on page 8

wide audience in the Bay Area. Dianac.::oleman said workers must break withthe capitalist political parties, and builda party of their own which can opposethe bipartisan anti-Soviet war drive andfight for a workers government.

But Deukmejian wants us to beknown for what we don't do: forterrorism. The would-be McCarthyshope to squash those who call upon theworkers and oppressed to act in theirown interests. They willfully confuseMarxism with terrorism in order tocreate the atmosphere and legal appara­tus to harass, repress and wipe out theMarxists.

Punching a Hole in the RICO Net

We were included on a governmentlegal hit list without our knowledge. We

WASHI'(;T(>,,\. D.C ~O~~3

JU~ •

DEPARTME~T OF THE TREASURY

U'\ITED STATES SECRET SERVICE

:9:.

~?(j~~

The Secret Service, of course, regrets that this incidentoccurred. Obviously, due to the extreme complexity of supply­ing protection to the President and others, and the sensitiveand sometimes conflicting interests that come into play, theSecret Service cannot be absolutely certain that other misunder­standings will never occur. You can be assured, however, thatevery effort will continue to be made to assure that errors ofthis nature are kept to a minimum.

Dl-pl-l"r OIRiCIOK

Re: Alleged False Arrest/Jane Margolis/CWA ConventionDetrolt, Michlgan; July 16, 1979

Ms. Jane l1argolis475 Alvarado Street, #3San Francisco, California 94114

Dear Ms. Margolis:

I~tn:SPARt~~~..

Please be advised that in response to the above referencedmatter the Secret Service Office of Inspections was directedto look into this claim to determine, as accurately as pOSSI­ble, what did in fact occur at the time of the oriainalincident. Based upon this inquiry it is the opInion of thisService that a misunderstanding between a Secret SerVIce agentand a Detroit police officer resulted in your being removedfrom the convention floor.

Following your initial removal from the floor of theconvention, the law enforcement personnel on the scene beganquestioning why, in fact, you had been removed. As soon as itbecane apparent that you had not violated any law, but ratherthat an error in judgment had been made, you were released.

The Secret Service's involvement in this misunderstanding,which is obviously regrettable, arose from our agent's confu­sion over why you were actually being arrested. It was hisbelief that he was assisting a Detroit police officer in makIngan arrest. At the same time, the Detroit police officerbelieved that the arrest was being made for a violation offederal law. In any event, it is now apparent that no arrestshould have been made under the cirCUMstances.

It should be noted that there is no indication whatso­ever that there was any political motivation to these actions.

Again, the Secret Service regrets that this misunderstandinghas caused you distress.

Sincerely yours,

A)'- <., ) Jj<:~ £,I ..

~yroD I. Weinstein'leputy Director

WV Photo WV Photo

SL demonstrated in four West Coast cities July 23 against the Deukmejian witchhunt. San Francisco (left), LosAngeles (right).

some 1,200 people showed up, primarilyfrom labor unions, blacks and otherminorities and socialists. The Nazis didnot show up. and furthermore have notbeen seen in San Francisco since then."

Our protest of this witchhunt raisedthe banner: "Workers Party Has theRight to Organize!" We are known forwhat we do-for actions such as ourdemonstration that stopped the Nazison April 19 in San Francisco. We wantto be known for our record in support oflabor and militant class struggle; knownfor our defense of blacks, increasinglyunder attack by Reagan reaction, andour defense of the oppressed anddemocratic rights for all-for ourTrotskyist program of socialist revolu­tion internationally. We ran a candidatefor Board of Supervisors in San Fran­cisco in 1980 to bring our program to a

I --L..I -----L,

In July 1979 a well-known memberof the CWA Local 9410 (San Fran­cisco) executive board and spokes­man for the Militant Action Caucus,Jane Margolis, was dragged off theunion's convention floor in Detroitby the U.S. Secret Service rightbefore Jimmy Carter was scheduledto speak. She was manhandled,interrogated, threatened with beingheld incommunicado-to politicallyshield the president from the voice ofmilitant unionism.

The Secret Service's open invasionof the CWA convention was aflagrant and highly unusual provoca­tion. It sparked protests by hundredsof unionists, socialists and civillibertarians who joined the UnionCommittee Against Secret ServiceHarassment (UCASSH) campaign.

The Spartacist League, whichfights to build a class-struggle oppo­sition in the labor movement, en­dorsed and actively built theUCASSH campaign. EventuallySecret Service deputy director My­ron I. Weinstein (now acting director)was forced to send a letter of "regret"to Margolis, along with a check for$3,500. which Margolis turned overto the union (see WVNo. 259, "JaneMargolis Wins!" 27 June 1980).

When theSecretServiceApologized

importance of a victory in our case,particularly by. blacks and includingblack elected officials as well as .civillibertarians. Alameda County Supervi­sor John George wrote in a November 25fundraising letter ins.upport of the case:

"I find Deukmejian's characterizationsof the SL/SYL to be totally unfounded."Personally. I welcome the opportunityto support this case which I see as partof the fight against right-wing attackson civil liberties and the threat of a newMcCarthyism in this country."

As support for the case began tobuild, and the court deadline ap­proached for the attorney general toactually present some evidence for thecharges against the Spartacist League,Deukmejian's office renewed contactwith the SL's lawyers for an out-of­court settlement. A representative of theattorney general's office, Gina McGuin­ness, later told the San FranciscoExaminer that after a search of theirfiles they could not find "substantia­tion" for the charges. But earlier theyhad claimed that the SL was deletedfrom the 1980 "Organized Crime Re­port" not because of the court suit, butits inactivity in 1980. Yet 1980 was themost active year in the SL's l5-yearhistory of political work in California.In fact, as Spartacist spokesman AlNelson noted at the press conference:

"We became conspicuous earlier thatyear [1980] when the Nazi Party of SanFrancisco said that on April 19th theywere going to celebrate Hitler's birthdayat the Civic Center. We initiated acounterdemonstration at the same timeand the same place as the Nazis hadpromised theirs. We received endorse­ments from officers from 22 localunions. and nine local unions them­selves. The demonstration took place;

Marxists...(continued/rom page 12)

8 JANUARY 1982 7

WV PhotoNYC, December 19: AFL-CIO bureaucracy spearheads Reagan's anti-Sovietwar drive.

Marxists...(continued from page 7)

increased criminal sanctions, and al­lows the government to strip defendantsof assets to prevent them from hiringtop lawyers. The scope of this RICO'net' is now consciously being extendedto political 'terrorist' organizations.And it is Deukmejian and the CaliforniaBOCCI [Bureau of Organized Crimeand Criminal Intelligence] which iscredited with pioneering the redefini­tion of organized crime to includepolitical organizations (see FordhamUJw Review, Vol. 49, p. 170, SN 18)."

Barry Tarlow notes in the FordhamLaw Review that the Organized CrimeControl Commission of the CaliforniaDepartment of Justice has "urged abroad definition" of RICO including"terrorist" organizations. This commis­sion has not only shown prosecutorshow to use RICO to go after the left andlabor organizations; they even compileda "list" in the form of a report that woulddesignate left-wing organizations as"terrorist." And Deukmejian put the SLon that list until we forced him to take itoff. Everyone may know that the SL is a

.group of "Marxists Not Mobsters," toquote the San Francisco Examiner, butwe were labeled "terrorists" under thegeneral rubric of "organized crime," inpart to set us up for RICO. And whowas the vice chairman of the commis­sion which produced the pioneeringCalifornia "Organized Crime Report"which tries to redefine political terror-'ism as organized crime? None otherthan Reagan's adviser Edwin Meese III,then Alameda County DA.

With the ominous RICO net spread­ing out after the Nyack Brinks bank job,it is no wonder San Francisco's blacknewspaper Metro Reporter (14 Decem­ber 1981) warns that witchhuntingRICO grand juries could begin wide­ranging probes of "respected blackorganizations." To prove "associationin fact" under RICO is easy. TheNational Lawyers Guild newspaper,Blind Justice (December 1981), reportsthat "recent statements by the FBI andthe United States Attorney indicate that'the association in fact' which gives riseto the 'enterprise' being investigated bythe current grand jury may be acommon belief that socialism should beestablished in the United States and/ora belief in 'the destruction of our form ofgovernment as we know it'."

As the old labor motto said, an injuryto one is an injury to all, and the SLvictory in this case can be shared by allthose who are targeted by the witch­hunters, all those who want to strike ablow against the new McCarthyism.•

The Priceof ViCtory

The successful conclusion of theSL/SYL suit against Californiaattorney general Deukmejian is avictory not only for socialists, butfor all who oppose attempts tomuzzle free speech through McCar­thyite intimidation. The PartisanDefense Committee undertook tosupport this case financially andnow has outstanding debts ofapproximately 54,000. Throughoutthis case we faced the resources notonly of the State of California, butof right-wing tycoons who call thetune for the new witchhunters. Thissmall but very important victory is asetback to the Reaganite attemptsto set up the left and all politicaloppositionists as "terrorists."Please support the fight againstrenascent McCarthyism by sendinga generous check to the PartisanDefense Committee, P.O. Box 99,Canal Street Station, New York,NY 10013.

8

ColdWarriors ...(continued from page 1)

opposition from their West Europeanallies, especially the most powerful one,West Germany. When asked aboutBonn's reaction to the Polish crack­down, government spokesman KurtBecker replied bluntly, "There are noimplications for the West. Next ques­tion, please." Chancellor HelmutSchmidt's reaction, while visiting EastGerman leader Erich Honecker in theDDR, was to regret that martial law inPoland had been "necessary." And theinitial statement on Poland by theSecond International, penned by Ger­man social-democratic chairman WillyBrandt, refused to condemn the coup.Meanwhile, Schmidt has been sittingaround on a Florida beach mouthing offagainst Reagan's sanctions to JamesReston of the New York Times, long­time confidante of Democraticpresidents.

An incensed and bewildered WallStreet Journal (4 January) complainedthat "something powerfully strange istaking place in the German psyche." TheJournal is right in the sense that theWest German masses want no part ofReagan's anti-Soviet war drive. Ob­servers have compared the 350,000 whomarched in Bonn last fall against moreNATO missiles with the tiny pro­Solidarnosc protests, the largest ofwhich were about 6,000. There is, infact, a direct connection. As the influen­tial liberal Der Spiegel (4 January)editor Rudolf Augstein put it:

"If, however, you hold dear KonradAdenauer's "rollback," to be accom­plished economically and by arma­ments; if you want to revive the policy ofDulles, which was abandoned by theinventor himself, of driving Sovietpower back behind Russian borders;then go to it-if you want the capitula­tion of your opponent, then you choosewar."

The German people do not want to beinvolved in Reagan's "rollback" war inwhich their country will be the main,and perhaps only, battlefield.

But Schmidt and Brandt are nopacifists, and they are not "patsies forthe Russkies" as the reactionary Re­publican right would have it. Germanimperialism has a long-term strategy forregaining Prussia and Saxony (EastGermany)-not to mention Silesia andEast Prussia-and dominating the restof East Europe, centrally by subvertingthe region economically and thenmaking a deal with the Kremlin. Thehawkish correspondent for the NewYork Times (3 January), John Vinocur,understands the core of Bonn's Ostpoli­tik (Eastern policy) as "the search for alevel of continuing accommodation withMoscow that could some day permitGerman reunification, and the realeradication of the consequences ofWorld War II." German finance capital,having failed to take East Europe and

Spartacist League/Spartacus Youth League

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I;,".~.~".

I

break the USSR militarily in the lastwar, prefers for now to undermine theSoviet bloc from within.

If the German social democrats haveplayed it very cool over Poland, theirFrench counterparts have sought towhip up anti-Soviet frenzy. So theGerman social democrats are now anti­Reagan "detenters" while the Frenchsocial democrats have become pro­Reagan Cold Warriors, challenged onthis score only by the Italian Eurocom­munists who are gearing up for adefinitive break with Moscow. Thesesharp divisions are dramatic evidence ofhow the reformists defend and express,above all, the interests of their ownbourgeoisie. German capital sees itsinterests in national reunification andfurther economic penetration of EastEurope; Mitterrand's program is one ofprotectionism, austerity and anti-Sovietmilitarism, while serving as the ideologi­cal spearhead of "democratic socialist"counterrevolution in the Soviet bloc.

Solidarnosc Has Friendsat Chase Manhattan

The imperialist bourgeoisie support­ed Solidarnosc as long as it looked like ithad a chance of taking power. But nowthat Walesa looks a loser, some bankersare looking to Moscow to pay Poland'sdebts. Call it compensation for notwinning the big prize in Poland:capitalist counterrevolution. The houseorgan of international financiers, theLondon Economist (28 December 1981)explained: "Russia now controls Polandagain and does not want a Polish defaulteither." Reportedly the Jaruzelski re­gime has come up with $350 million ininterest payments just in time, andinformed opinion thinks it's reallyRussian gold.

There is nothing new in this. TheSoviet Union has long been subsidizingthe Polish economy. Since the mid-late­1970s, in fact, Poland has functioned asan intermediary for Western financecapital to extract economic surplusfrom the Soviet workers and peasants.This is particularly egregious since thestandard of living in Moscow and Kievis distinctly lower than in Warsaw andGdansk. In 1977, for example, Polesconsumed 65 pounds of red meat a year,almost as much as West Germans, whileRussians ate only about 50 pounds ayear. Yet the Soviet Union has beenexporting thousands of tons of meat toPoland in order to keep the Polishmasses quiet.

A lot of liberals and rad-libs, in orderto justify their support to Solidarnosc,are fabricating the notion that Westernbankers are supporting Jaruzelski'scrackdown. Recently Cold War liberalJames Wechsler, in a column entitled"Bankers' Battle Hymn" in the NewYork Post (23 December 1981), claimsthere is a cabal of"Western bankers andAmerican Communists and Trotskyists,incongruously united in apologia for theruthless crackdown by the Polishcommissars and their Kremlin spon­sors." By Trotskyists he means theSpartacist League and cites the headlineof the last issue of Workers Van­guard, "Solidarnosc CounterrevolutionChecked." Contrary to Wechsler'sprediction, ·the consortium of Western

~=TREENLANl>~~..w<

END 14 .. II

banks holding the Polish debt refusedWarsaw's request for an additional loanto cover their interest payments, expect­ing the Russians would now pay. TheLondon Economist, as usual, expressedthe policy of imperialist finance: " ... aPoland without a free Solidarity is notworth rescuing."

As for the $27 billion in Polish debt tothe West, these loans have been soprofitable that many banks would comeout ahead even if they got not anotherred cent. The Wall Street Journal (7December 1981) admitted: "And somebankers boast privately even were theyforced to write off their Polish loansnow they might show a profit on theirloans to the nation over the past decade,so lucrative have been these deals."

It is outrageous that the Polish andSoviet workers should be milked by theprofit-hungry bankers of Zurich,Frankfurt and New York. A revolution­ary workers government in Warsawwould immediately cancel the imperial­ist debt. But it is not our task, as aTrotskyist vanguard fighting for prole­tarian political revolution in the Sovietbloc, to advise the Warsaw bureaucrats,who have ruined the Polish economy,how to get out of the hole they're in. Tobe sure, should the Stalinists default, allclass-conscious workers must defendPoland and the USSR against retalia­tion by the bloodsucking financiers andtheir political hirelings.

For Polish Trotskyism

Encouraged by Radio Free Europeand the Polish pope, it was clear thatSolidarnosc was moving to overthrowthe Warsaw regime and break with theSoviet Union. As we pointed out lastissue, Jaruzelski's countercoup came atthe last possible moment as a move froma position of powe.r. Secret government­sponsored polls in 1980-81 showed thatonly 3 percent of the population wouldvote for the Communists in free elec­tions; another 20 percent for socialists ofvarious sorts, and 43 percent forChristian Democrats-i.e., for capital­ist counterrevolution in the name of thepope and (bourgeois) democracy. Forthose who couldn't see the logic ofSolidarity's progression, Solidarnoscleaders spelled it out in a closed meetingin Radom. The tapes, which havebecome known as "Radomgate,"stripped off Lech Walesa's mask of asimple trade unionist. More extensiveexcerpts of these tapes have now ap­peared in the Western press, includingthis revealing excerpt from Walesa:

"After all, let us realize that we arebringing this system down. Let us at lastrealize this. If we agree to have privatestorekeepers, buy up state farms andensure complete self-management, thissystem will cease to exist."

- Washington Post,20 December 1981

The international Spartacist tendencydrew the conclusions last September asSolidarnosc took up the Cold Warpropaganda themes of "free elections"and "free trade unions" throughout EastEurope. "Stop Solidarity's Counterrev­olution!" before it is too late, we said.And, for now, the power grab by this"company union for the bankers and theCIA" has been blocked. After the initialmethodical roundup of Solidarity lead-

WORKERS VANGUARD

Friends of Lech Walesa, Inc.So Lech Walesa is Time magazine's

"man of the year." "Lech Everyman,"they dubbed him, "the courageouslittle electrician from Gdansk" who"led a crusade for freedom." Inaddition to a lengthy personalityprofile (during his frequent drives toWarsaw, Walesa reportedly spent histime "tuning in to rock played byRadio Free Europe") and history ofSolidarnosc, Time's year-end specialtried to milk the Polish crackdown forall it was worth with a nine-page essayon the Communist Danger. It was theusual "free world" propaganda fare:while playing up seven strikers killedby the Polish army, the entire issue hasnot a word or picture about EI Salva­dor, where the U.S.-backed junta mur­dered more than 20,000 during 1981.

But it's the story behind the "Man ofthe Year" story that's most interesting.A letter from the publisher says thepiece was based on "several sessionsbetween Walesa and Time this year,including a question-and-answerbreakfast for the Time Newstour inOctober at Charles de Gaulle airportoutside Paris." That's the first time thistete-a-tete has been mentioned in theAmerican press, and there's more to itthan Time lets on. The "common man"from Gdansk got together with some

uncommon friends in the West, itseems. For meeting with Walesa alongwith Time editor Henry Grunwald atthat October 18 breakfast in a poshairport restaurant were a host of topAmerican corporate executives.

Not a word was breathed about thisconfidential get together between theleader of Polish Solidarnosc andleading Western capitalists until twomonths later, after the crackdownwhich checked Solidarity's counter­revolutionary bid for power. The well­informed French muckraking weeklyLe Canard Enchaine (16 December)just published an account, entitled "AWink from the Americans," whichnoted the secretive arrangements:

"Early in the morning their [Soli­darnosc delegation] bus takes theauforoUle du Nord [heading for ascheduled meeting In Vaudricourt],but barely outside of Paris it takes thecutoff leading to Roissy airport.Arriving at their destination, thePolish unionists reach Maxim's anairport restaurant deserted at thathour. It's 8:30 a.m. In front of therestaurant, a cordon of CRS riotpolice. Inside, at tables laid forbreakfast, 20-odd Americans receiveWalesa and his friends.

Discretion and Mum's the Word

"These businessmen arrived two hoursearlier, by a special airplane.... Here's

some wonderful dirty laundry­expensive, too. Philip Caldwell,president of Ford; Robert Tirby,president of Westinghouse; DavidLewis, ditto for General Dynamics;Henry Heinz representing the food/agriculture group of the same name,and Thomas Watson, an IBM big­wig. Plus a TWA v.i.p. and severalpotentates of only slightly lesser im­portance, banking and life-insurancechairmen.... ."All this crowd for Lech Walesa,considered a veritable head of ashadow government. The introduc­tions are rapid and discussion begins.A system of simultaneous translationis in place, proof that on the Americanside in any case the interview was nottotally improvised."

Among the questions asked by thesehardheaded captains of industry andhigh finance: "Are you prepared togive up your Saturdays off?" "DoPolish workers know how to work andare they ready to?" "Is it the end ofMarxist-Leninist ideology in Poland?""Do you wish the Communist party toremain in power?"

During Walesa's Paris visit ourcomrades of the Ligue Trotskyste deFrance (LTF) demonstrated denounc­ing Solidarnosc as a company unionof the Western bosses. When an LTFreporter asked the Solidarity leaders ata press conference about their call for

the International Monetary Fund totake over Poland's economy, thehaughty Le Monde became indignantthat "some of our colleagues seemeddetermined to make them admit asecret penchant for capitalism." Sonow it is revealed that while Le Mondewas denouncing a Trotskyist slamagainst Walesa's "simple trade­unionist" credentials, the latter wasengaged in hush-hush talks with U.S.capitalists to offer better terms thanthe discredited Stalinist regime!

For Trotskyists it did not take suchspectacular revelations to show whatthe pope's little Polish "freedomfighter" was up to. Already at the timeof its first congress last September,when Solidarnosc took up the ColdWar propaganda themes of "freeelections" and "free trade unions,"inviting such sterling "free trade­unionists" as long-time CIA agentIrving Brown and opening a U.S."press bureau" in the offices of "StateDepartment socialist" Albert Shank­er's UFT, we warned: "Stop Solidari­ty's Counterrevolution!" For a Marx­ist analysis of Walesa's course tocounterrrevolution, read the Sparta­cist pamphlet, Solidarnosc: PolishCompany Union for CIA andBankers.

TROTSKYIST LEAGUE OF CANADA

SPARTACIST LEAGUE LOCAL DIRECTORYChampaignc/o SYLP.O. Box 2009Champaign, IL 61820(217) 356-1180

ChicagoBox 6441, Main P.O.Chicago, IL 60680(312) 427-0003

ClevelandBox 6765Cleveland, OH 44101(216) 621-5138

DetroitBox 32717Detroit, MI 48232(313) 868-9095

Save TurkishTrade Unionists fromGallows!

ments that originally hailed the coupare telling the generals to clean uptheir act if they want to keep gettingtheir loans.

Not so the Reagan gang. Althoughthe Turkish junta rounded up morethan 10,000 in the first week after thetakeover, the U.S. State Departmentindicated its "sympathy" with thegenerals, and the New York Timesbenevolently termed it a "bloodlesscoup." But when it comes to Polandtoday, Reagan howls as if thecrackdown in Warsaw was genocide!Recently, only a few weeks before theDISK leaders went on trial, U.S.defense secretary Weinberger metwith the junta to "enlarge andimprove defense cooperation" to thetune of $403 million in military aidalone during 1982. For U.S. imperi­alism, Turkey is strategic as amilitary bastion on the Balkan flankof the USSR, especially so since the"loss" of Iran, and Greece's threat toboycott the military wing of NATO.While union leaders are in the dockfacing the death penalty, and evenNobel Prize winning poets are deniedpassports to travel abroad, Wein­berger praises the junta for having"embarked upon the course that willbring a democratic government"(New York Times, 6 December1981)!

The left and labor movementinternationally must demand imme­diate release of the DISK leaders andall prisoners opposed to the junta andthe ultrarightist gangs. Labor shouldreject Reagan's anti-Soviet Solidar­nose sanctions and start hot-eargoingall military aid to the junta as an actof international solidarity with theTurkish workers and peasants underthe gun. Free the 52-UnchainDISK! Down with NATO!

On December 24 Turkey's militaryjunta began the mass show trial of 52leaders of the Confederation ofRevolutionary Trade Unions(DISK), the 500,000-strong militantunion federation banned since thegenerals' coup of September 1980.Jailed for over a year with virtuallyno legal rights, the defendants­much of DISK's top leadership­face execution if convicted. They arecharged with organizing, before thecoup, May Day rallies and demon­strations against anti-labor laws andprotesting assassination of unionleaders by fascist hit squads like the"Grey Wolves." The junta, whichoverthrew a constitutionally electedgovernment, now charges the tradeunionists with having violated theconstitution! According to theirlawyers, the trial was delayed becausethe military authorities tried togather evidence linking DISK withthe pro-Moscow Turkish Commu­nist Party (TKP), which itself hasbeen outlawed since 1923.

When the military took over,vowing to crush political terrorismand end economic chaos, DISK'sactivities were banned, along with allstrikes and collective bargaining.Some 600 union officials were arrest­ed. Although the junta feigned even­handedness in crushing "extremists"of both the left and right, the fiercerepression has fallen much morefrequently and brutally on the left,the organized labor movement andthe oppressed Kurdish minority.Hundreds of Guevarist guerrillas,especially members of Dev Yol(Revolutionary Way), have beenmurdered outright by the army andpolice. Torture of political prisonersis so widespread and savage that evenWest European bourgeois govern-

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think that General Jaruzelski's counter­coup is the same as Nazi, or evenFrederick the Great's rule would bebrutally disabused of this notion.

It has been reported that someSolidarnosc militants, and even a fewleaders, have been asking, "How didthings go so wrong, so fast?" Well, youwere against many of the right things,but what were youfor? Theforms of themovement frequently suggested prole­tarian political revolution, but tragicallythe content was dominated by theCatholic church and Western imperial­ism. The program of Walesa & Co.would have meant disaster for Polishworking people. So everything impor­tant is learned the hard way, and Poland1980-81 is no exception. What's needednow is a period of underground re­groupment, a political reckoning withSolidarnosc. Only the Trotskyist pro­gram of ousting the sellout bureaucratsthrough political revolution, in order todefend and extend the historic gains ofsocialized property, can show the wayforward. A genuine Leninist vanguardof the Polish working class, partof a reborn Fourth International, canbe built only through uncompromisingstruggle against counterrevolution.•

TorontoBox'7198, Station AToronto, Ontario M5W 1X8(416) 593-4138

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Berkeley/OaklandP.O. Box 935Oakla~d, CA 94604(415) 835-1535

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ers, the flurry of resistance has dieddown. The general strike or armedresistance which would have forced abloody confrontation, hardening thepresent disastrous lines of division,fortunately did not occur. The immedi­ate danger of counterrevolution hasbeen checked, but the fundamentalcrisis of Polish society has not beenresolved.

The Polish masses are undeniablyinfatuated with the capitalist West, withAmerican jeans and flags and Germancars. They should know that Polandcannot break from Russia without amajor new war which would again meantheir ruin. After World War II, theentire country was forcibly transferred200 miles to the West, taking land whichthe Germans took 1,000 years to absorb.And the Germans are not generous withtheir Lebensraum. Counterrevolutionin Poland would mean a capitalistreunification of Germany, creating apowerful imperialist juggernaut inCentral Europe with no room for thePoles, except perhaps as agriculturallaborers. As the soldiers in those funnyhelmets start marching east again, Poleswould necessarily embrace Russianarmy boots for protection. Those who

8 JANUARY 1982 9

Mauroy speaks today necessarily leadsto capitulation, or complicity ... [as] in1936, when the government of LeonBlum refused to take the side of theSpanish masses against the Franco­ist uprising.... " (Rouge, 18-23 Decem­ber 1981)

Scandalous! Here the pseudo­Trotskyist LCR attacks the imperialistFrench government for non-inter­ference in a deformed workers state,then compares Stalinism to fascism.Pinochet equals Jaruzelski, Spain equ­als Poland-there is not an ounce ofclass criteria in these outrageous com­parisons; or rather, the LCR, in thecourse of its own social-democ­ratization, adopts the criteria of bour­geois democracy. And apparently dem­onstrations are not enough to defendSolidarnose. What does the LCRwant-for Mitterrand to threaten tobomb Moscow with the French nuclearstrike force (force de frappe) in order tofree Walesa?! In the Cold War hysteriawhipped up by the Socialists, theMandelites have abandoned all pretenseof Soviet defensism-the hallmark ofTrotskyists even in the darkest daysafter Stalin's assassination of Trotskyand as the Kremlin dictator was openingthe way for Hitler's invasion.

The LCR, also, tries to peddle thefairy tale that the imperialists are hostileto Solidarnose. And now they borrowanother leaf from the Lambertist bookby vituperating against the Yalta Agree­ments, which supposedly united imperi­alists and Stalinists forever in partition-ing the world. Actually, the LCR istailing after Mitterrand, who said in hisNew Year's message that "everythingwhich allows us to get out from underYalta is good." (Another of the LCR'snew allies who want to "roll back" Yaltaturns out to be none other than Carter'sDr. Strangelove, Brzezinski!) In reality,the Yalta Agreement rapidly brokedown under the impact of the Cold War.When today social democrats (and thefascists) talk about "getting out from __under Yalta," they meart'ctfpllahstrestoration in East Europe. Of coursewhen Stalinists talk about Yalta theymean detente with imperialism paid forby beheading proletarian revolution inWest Europe.

Contrary to the OCI and LCR, thereis an unholy alliance directed against theSoviet degenerated workers state ... andthey're part of it. The powerful Westernfriends of Solidarnose who sit in theElysee Palace, the White House and theVatican are united in their aim ofrestoring capitalism in the Soviet bloc.The task of authentic Marxists is todefend the historic gains of the interna­tional working class, inherited from theOctober Revolution of 1917, againstSolidarity's counterrevolution. Themasses of the French working class mustbe won away from the disastrousmisleadership of the reformists, Stalin­ists and social democrats alike. Onething is the same in East and WestEurope and the rest ofthe world: the keyto revolutionary victory is the construc­tion of Trotskyist parties in the struggleto reforge the Fourth International..

Address I

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(continued from page 5)

would be present on the 14th he listedthe fascist student organization withoutbatting an eye. The Lambertists habitu­ally flee from defending the Soviet blocagainst imperialism by claiming that theStalinists and capitalists formed a holyalliance against the working class atYalta in 1945. Today they cynicallyclaim Washington, the Vatican andMoscow are all allied againstSolidar­nose! So Reagan didn't impose sanc­tions on the USSR, Wojtyla isn't callingfor freeing Walesa and the Wall StreetJournal didn't back Solidarity?!! Tojustify its treachery, the OCI simplydenies reality.

As for the Ligue CommunisteRevolutionnaire (LCR), the Frenchsection of Ernest Mandel's "UnitedSecretariat," its posture as the militantbuilders of Mitterrand's popular fronthas taken it very far indeed fromanything resembling Trotskyism. TheLCR outrageously compares Poland toChile, accusing Jaruzelski of using"methods which are in no way prefer­able to those of Pinochet"! And thenthey condemn the French governmentfor appealing to the "sacrosanct princi­ple of non-interference": "The 'non­interference' of which [Prime Minister]

Mitterrand's"sacredU · "nlon ...

ported by everyone from the fascists toNew Leftists!) which condemned thecoup in Poland and "Soviet imperial­ism." But so far these "Afghans" orkabulisti do not seem to have undertak­en any kind of organized opposition toBerlinguer's line. No wonder: for the"pro-Soviet" elements in the PCI andunion bureaucracy have no real alterna­tive program to counterpose to theEurocommunist treachery of Berlinguer& Co. They are united by their funda­mental reformism, as the bitter defeat ofthe FIAT strike demonstrated so vividly(see "Italian CP Knifes Fiat Strike,"WV No. 270, 12 December 1980).

Yet if there is a country in WestEurope where a revolutionary opposi­tion to the class collaboration of theStalinist/Eurocommunist betrayerscould gain very significant support inthe working class, Italy is it. If the PCIleadership is going slowly in making thefinal rupture with its past, it is for fearthat precipitous movement could sparka major split. Now more than ever, withthe dramatic events of the Polish crisisand the capitalists' mounting attacksagainst the conditions of Italian work­ers, the Trotskyist program of uncondi­tional defense of the Soviet bloc againstimperialism and counterrevolution, ofworkers political revolution in the Eastto oust the treacherous Stalinist bu­reaucrats and socialist revolution inthe capitalist West could appeal to themilitant proletariat of Italy.•

(continued from page 4)

"irreparable consequences" which aSoviet intervention in Poland wouldhave for its already tenuous ties to theKremlin. Now, in the context of ColdWar II, with the most anti-Communistadministration in Washington in dec­ades, Berlinguer thinks he sees his bigchance over Poland. If the PCI canprove its worth to the imperialists,attacking the Soviet Union as vehe­mently as the social democrats, perhapsit can overcome the veto on PCIparticipation in the government.

Berlinguer & Co. seem ready to jump.But can they take their base with themintact? They are caught in a contradic­tion between reformist desires to sup­port "independent" European imperial­ism and fear that this could severelyweaken their organizational weight: 12million voters (30 percent of the total,far more than the Socialists and SocialDemocrats); control of the most power­ful union federation, CGIL, with 5million members, and strong peasantcooperatives; 1.8 million party mem­bers, with 200,000 or so activists and anapparatus numbering tens of thousands.Already they have control of citygovernments in the most importantcities (Rome, Milano, Torino, Genova,Naples, Florence, Bologna, etc.) Andthey don't want to risk that. So even thebureaucrats must take notice whenfaced with such vocal opposition fromthe membership.

Inearly 1980 there was significantprotest within the PCI against theparty's condemnation of Soviet inter­vention in Afghanistan. This time fivePCI city councilors in Milano brokeparty discipline by refusing to vote foran otherwise unanimous motion (sup-

the general and his colleagues will regainthis loyalty in the future. A long articleby Marcy on "The New Polish Crisis"(Workers World, 18 December 1981) isutterly devoid of any socialist programor perspective save a rhetorical questionas to "whether the military underpresent conditions can, is capable of, oris fully united in, resuscitating Polandon a socialist basis." Likewise, at a NewYork City forum on December 15, Lineof March spokesman Bruce Occefiaexpressed "the hope" that the Jaruzelskiregime "can successfully break the backsof the anti-socialist elements." Heopined, "This cannot be done unless thePolish party persists and deepens thelegitimate reforms and rectification ofthe party line in practice vis-a-vis theworking class."

To speak of reforming and re­suscitating Polish Stalinism is especial­ly grotesque. Here is a bureaucracy sodiscredited, so corrupt, which has soruined the economy that millions ofPolish workers now think they would bebetter off under Western-style capital­ism. Certainly the mass of the Polishproletariat can be won away from theircurrent infatuation with Pilsudski'smemory, Wojtyla's Vatican and Rea­gan's America. But it will only bethrough uncompromising struggleagainst the Stalinist bureaucracy, whichis ultimately responsible for the counter­revolutionary eruption around Solidar­nose. The future of socialism in Polandlies not in restoring a Stalinist policestate but in the development of agenuinely communist (i.e., Trotskyist)vanguard. As a Spartacist spokesmantold the December 15 New York forum:I "Unlike the LOM, we do not want tosee

the Stalinist party gain stronger control,but in fact seek the recrystallization ofatruly international proletarian groupingthat can lead a political revolution."

Under Trotskyist leadership the richcommunist tradition of the Polishproletariat will be renewed-PolishStalinism never! •

ItalianWorkers ...

The Bankruptcy of Stalinism

It's a dog's life being a Stalinist hack.If the National Lampoon had tried toparody the response of the U.S. Com­munist Party (CP) to the crackdown inPoland, it couldn't have come up withthis one. It's beyond parody. The DailyWorld (15 December 1981) headlinereads: "Poland Heeds Unity Call­Nation Goes Back to Work." Maybe theCP was hoping no one would notice themartial law, mass arrests, later someshootings. General Jaruzelski's regime,which doesn't have the luxury ofindulging in such fatuous nonsense,admits strikes in a number of importantindustrial locations and widespreadslowdowns.

The danger of a counterrevolution inPoland-a Kronstadt on a massivescale-was very real, and it had to bestopped. It was real because it was notjust the machinations of a handful of"extremists" in Solidarnosc, as theStalinists try to pretend. Three decadesof Stalinist misrule and mismanagementhave, for now, driven the mass of thehistorically socialist Polish workingclass into the arms of the Vatican andNATO imperialism. That is a monumen­tal crime of Stalinism.

While the official Kremlin apologistsin the U.S. blandly state that GeneralJaruzelski commands the loyalty of thePolish masses, the fellow travelers, suchas Sam Marcy's Workers World Partyand Irwin Silber's Line of March(LOM) group, express pious hopes that

(continuedfrom page 3)

the opposite. Expressions of support bySolidarnose leaders for Western imperi­alist "democracy" have been clear andnumerous. For example, on Americantelevision, broadcast on November 2,Lech Walesa was asked by WalterCronkite: "Is there any country that youwould see as a model for the kind ofdemocracy you'd like to find in Po­land?" The Solidarnose leader replied:"Quite a lot of things from the Statesand other countries fit as well ... yoursystem has passed the test." Does theSWP think Reagan's America is amodel of workers democracy?

If the SWP does a bad imitation ofDSOC, Peter Sollenberger's Revolu­tionary Workers League (RWL) does abad imitation of the SWP. A fake­Trotskyist grouplet largely limited toAnn Arbor/Detroit, the Sollenber­gerites try to present themselves as. theleft wing of "movement" radicalism.And since at this juncture radical/liberalopinion is strongly anti-Soviet, so arethey. In mid-December the Sollenber­gerites' trade-union group at Ford'sRiver Rouge plant put out a leaflet,"Victory to the Polish Workers!" which,like the SWP, claims that pro­imperialist Solidarnose stands for"workers democracy." In typical "thirdcamp" fashion it declares: "We areagainst intervention by the U.S. or theSoviet Union."

In practice the RWL stands to theright of even this declared "thirdcampism." The SWP and even DSOChave sufficient concern for their "social­ist" image not to participate in the AFL­CIO's "Stop Soviet Killers" demonstra­tions. But when the Detroit unionbureaucracy called a pro-Solidarnoserally on December 18, Sollenberger'speople answered the call. Like all suchAFL-CIO Solidarnose rallies this oneattracted a lot of East European clerical­nationalists or worse. The most promi­nent slogan was, "We Support StrongU.S. Actions," while a large banner nextto the Sollenbergerites proclaimed:"Freedom for Poland-Blessed Motherand Pope Are With Us." There is a namefor self-styled leftists who participate inthis kind of demonstration: "StateDepartment socialists."

Anti-RedFront...

10 WORKERS VANGUARD

Free Haitians from Reagan'sConcentration Camps!

While Ronald Reagan welcomescounterrevolutionary Cuban gusanosand Polish defectors with open arms inorder to foment anti-Communism andanti-Sovietism, black refugees fromthe Haitian dictatorship of "BabyDoc" Duvalier are not wanted in racistAmerica.

The miserable plight of Haitianrefugees has touched off growingprotests, as occurred in New York onJanuary 2. Carrying signs such as"Fort Drum-America's Auschwitzfor Haitians," more than 2,000 people,predominantly Haitian immigrants,marched down Brooklyn's EasternParkway demanding freedom andpolitical asylum for over 2,500 Hai­tians being held in government deten­tion centers. A Spartacist Leaguecontingent chanted, "A basDuvalier-Pouvoir ouvrier!" (Downwith Duvalier-Workers power!),which was picked up by enthusiasticmarchers. SL signs read: "Free Hai­tians from Reagan's ConcentrationCamps!" "Reagan Welcomes Gusano

Scum, Deports Haitian Blacks," "FullCitizenship Rights for All ForeignWorkers!" and "No Deportations!"

Inside the horrid camps whereHaitians facing deportation are kept,they have been staging protests of theirown. On December 24, some 600refugees at the Krome Avenue Deten­tion Center in Miami started a five-dayhunger strike to demand their release.The strike ended on December 28,after black demonstrators stormed thefront gate of the Krome camp demand­ing freedom for their brothers incar­cerated inside. Cops and riot guardsused tear gas and clubs to drive backthe protesters. Nevertheless, duringthe ferment over 100 men managed toescape over the barbed wire fences atthe rear of ~he{,;compound,.

Despite the desperate militancy ofthe incarcerated refugees, the policy ofthe Haitian support movement hasbeen to pressure the U.S. governmentto guarantee "basic human rights."There can be no "human rights" undercapitalist butchers like Duvalier, while

New York City, January 2.

Reagan hates everybody fromPATCO air controllers to Salvadoranguerrillas and blacks from Haiti.What's needed is workers revolution­ary struggle to smash the Duvalier

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dictatorship and internationalist de­fense of Haitians who have escaped tothe U.S. International labor solidarityis key to defeating Reagan and hispuppet Duvalier!

Elections in NYC Transit&. e ...

TWU Under Koch's GunsNew York City transit workers are

facing a vicious ruling-class offensive,with Mayor Koch leading the charge.While indictments mount againstTransit Authority brass for corporatekickbacks on faulty equipment, Kochblames the workers for the disastrousstate of NYC subways. He threatens tofire workers who don't meekly submit tothe TA's productivity drive. Meanwhile,editors at the Post and Daily News areworking overtime to scapegoat Local100 of the Transport Workers Union(TWU) and its members for the"Doomsday Express." The subways areindeed a disaster waiting to happen, forriders and workers. Just last week

. another transit worker, Edward Szebut,was crushed beneath the wheels of anexpress train. And if the New Yorkbanks and politicians have their way,TWU members will get a very raw dealwhen their contract expires March 31.

Local 100 recently held its electionsunder the shadow of this threat. For themore than 20,000 TWU members whocast ballots in December, the electionwas in large part a verdict on the 1980strike and the role the "dissidents"played in contributing to that defeat.The 1980 contract was one of the worstever, and every striker was stung withwhopping fines under New York's anti­labor Taylor Law. After first voting tostrike, the "dissident" executive boardmajority authorized Lawe's givebacknegotiations and did nothing to keep thestrike going until the union had wonamnesty. At no time did they putforward a program to win this crucialstrike, by mobilizing the working-class,poor and minority population of NewYork behind the leadership of thepowerful TWU.

So incumbent John Lawe was re­turned to a third term as Local I()()president with an absolute majority of11,732 votes. His "dissident" opponents,Arnold Cherry and Mike Warren,received 5,272 and 3,228 votes respec­tively. The lopsided pro-Lawe turnoutwas not so much an enthusiasticendorsement of his no-strike, giveback

8 JANUARY 1982

policies as it was a massive vote of noconfidence in the "dissidents." Giventheir role in the 1980 strike, Cherry andWarren are correctly seen as beingincapable of leading strikes that win.Thus Lawe made significant inroadsamong subway workers who had pro­vided Cherry his main base of support inthe last election. Despite the anti-strikebacklash, a core of militants voted fortwo class-struggle candidates. Ed Kart­sen received 136 votes for president, andDavid Brewer got 106 votes from his co­workers in car maintenance for execboard.

New York City is a test case forReagan's racist austerity. The TWU isunder the gun because it is a largelyblack and Latin union in a city ofminorities and foreigners, a city towhich both Democrats and Republicansin the White House say: "Drop Dead!"From the Sydenham Hospital shut­down to the skyrocketing cost of asubway token, the TWU has the powerto lead black and white in the fightagainst killer cuts. But the presentunion leaders are more interested intoeing the line for Reagan's anti-Sovietwar buildup than fighting the cuts insocial services that are being used to fuelit. John Lawe marched at the Polishconsulate in support of SolidarnosC'drive to "give back" Poland to theWestern bankers, but refused to attendthe funeral last July of black motormanJesse Cole, a victim of the TA'smaintenance cuts.

Lawe has done his best to wipe out alltraces of militancy in the TWU. TheTransit Workers used to lead city laborwith their longstanding policy of "nocontract, no work." The Local 100 chiefhas trashed that tradition. He has givenup the union's right to strike in favor ofbinding arbitration, which means somepro-capitalist lawyer will dictate con­tractual terms to the TWU. Lawe'sprogram of retreat means slow death forthe TWU. With the dues checkoff beingrevoked in reprisal for the 1980 strike,the very existence of the union is now atstake.

Arnold Cherry, black two-time pres­idential contender and darling of thereformist left, offers no alternative. Heclaims to oppose binding arbitration,but his Cars and Shops Team voted withLawe at the TWU convention inSeptember to eliminate the "no con­tract, no work" policy and "establishprocedures for impartial resolution ofcollective bargaining disputes." LikeLawe, Cherry supported "real Demo­crat" Frank Barbaro against Koch.Barbaro's Unity Party was in part thebrainchild of Ted Kheel, "impartial"arbitrator for the TA and TWU! What'sa "militant" doing in bed with Kheel,whose job is to maintain the class peacethat is strangling transit workers?

During the campaign Cherry soughtto prove his "respectability" (to thebosses) by resorting to a crass red­baiting smear against Kartsen andBrewer. He issued a leaflet calling them"strike happy," "ultraleft Sparticists"(sic) who would "put our people out onstrike to make them martyrs for some­one else's cause"! Since when is the rightto strike someone else's cause? WhileCherry denounced Mike Warren forfeeding the vicious anti-TWU campaignof Rupert Murdoch's Post, he said notone word about running to the bosses'courts. No accident-for Cherry, too,has used the courts as a substitute formobilizing the ranks of the union tofight. Warren nearly aborted the localelections when he sued Lawe over theproduction of 10,000 extra ballots. (Itshould come as no surprise that War­ren's attorney is David Lubash, whoonce ran Joe Carnegie's legal drive to getthe TWU decertified under the TaylorLaw!) Kartsen and Brewer slammed the"dissidents" for their union-bustingsuits in a leaflet to the membership thatsaid, "Let's be clear, the government isthe tool of big business, and the courtsserve their interests. Keep the govern­ment out of our union. Drop the courtsuits! We can clean our own house!"

Kartsen and Brewer have a consistentrecord of defending the union. When

motorman Jesse Cole bled to death inhis crumpled cab, these militants foughtto shut NYC transit down and make thefuneral a massive walkout: When Lawerenounced the right to strike, in re­sponse to Reagan's union-busting at­tack on PATCO, Kartsen and Brewercalled for shutting down Koch's "Trainto the Plane" in protest. They were theonly candidates to insist it will requiremobilizing the power of the unionthrough strike action to win anythingthis time around.

Not surprisingly the reformists of theCommunist Party (CP) and the Social­ist Workers Party (SWP) tailed afterCherry. After the vote, the CP's DailyWorld hypocritically warned transitworkers not to give up the tradition of"no contract, no work." They didn'tmention that CP supporters in Cherry'sentourage voted along with him to scrapthe policy at the convention. Apparentlythe Stalinists' "class-struggle" politicscome out only when the struggle's over!The SWP's Militant avoided the elec­tions altogether. It's obvious the SWPwouldn't support Kartsen, since theyexcluded him from their public forumson transit! Some ofthe SWP supportersin the shops claimed they supportedCherry and even sported Cherry Teambuttons on occasion. The SWP hasnever been shy about supporiing selloutunion "reformers" like Arnold Millerand Ed Sadlowski in the past. So howcome their endorsement of Cherrydidn't make it into print?

The TWU is up against the wall. Nomatter how much the leadership tries toconciliate and retreat, the attacks on theunion will continue. The TWU has thepower to lead city labor, Harlem, thepoor and even sections of the middleclass in a fight to save New York fromReagan and Koch. Under the blows ofthe class struggle, transit workerssooner or later must realize it is better tofight. When they do they will look tomilitants like Kartsen and Brewer and tothe class-struggle program of the Spar­tacist League.•

11

W,/tIlE/tS ".filJlL/tIJDeukmejian Takes Back £'Terrorist" Charg@

Spartacist League WinsCalifornia Smear Case

jo

Subject: Correction of Departnent ofJustice's Publication

Dear Sir or Madam:

This is to infOrM you that the inclusion of the Spartacist Leaque ann of theSpartacus Youth Leanue on page 11 of the Department of Justice's publication,"OrClanized Crime in California .•• 1979. Annual Report to the CaliforniaLeC)islature. Part? TerroriSM." was in error.

P.O. BOX '3357

SACRAMENTO 95813

(916) 322-2430

December 14, 19B1

~lItt uf Qralifornill

irpartmrnf of J1uEtirrO)rorgr 1Jrukmrjian

(PRONOUNCED DUKI:.W4Y.G'H I

.AttDrnty ~tntrlll

Federal Bureau of InvestigationPennsylvania Avenue between 9th &10th 1MWashinqton, D.C. 20535

The following is a statement read by Al Nelson oftheSpartacist League Central Committee at a presscoriference in Sacramento. California December 18.Press coriferences were also held in San Francisco andLos Angeles.

The Spartacist League and Spartacus YouthLeague, Marxist political organizations, have success­fully concluded a suit against California AttorneyGeneral George Deukmejian, obtaining a retraction ofthe charges made in the attorney general's 1979"Report on Organized Crime in California" where weare characterized as "terrorists" and a "dangerousfaction with which law enforcement would have todeal."

Yesterday we obtained from the San FranciscoOffice of the Attorney General an affidavit affirmingthat Charles Casey, Chief of the Bureau of OrganizedCrime and Criminal Intelligence, has sent a letter tomajor federal, state and local law enforcementagenciesstating that our inclusion in Deukmejian's 1979 reportwas in error. This confirms our contention that ourabsence from the 1980 "Report on Organized Crime"was a shamefaced admission by Deukmejian that weare not "terrorists" or "criminals."

Following a press conference today in Sacramentowe intend to deliver a copy of Casey's letter to allmembers of the California Legislature.

This is a small but very important victory for the realmajority of the American people: labor, blacks,Chicanos, Jews, Asian Americans-everyone targetedby the right-wing policies of Ronald Reagan andGeorge Deukmejian.

Right-wing zealots of the Reagan/Haig/Deuk­mejian stripe are intently preparing a third worldwar aimed at the Soviet Union. They hope to silencetheir opponents by creating a new McCarthyism, anatmosphere of intimidation and anti-eommunisthysteria. They want to muzzle free speech. They mustnot be permitted to do so. Deukmejian, Reagan's manin California, hopes to obtain a new lease on legalwitchhunting, with charges of "terrorism" replacingthe old "advocacy to overthrow" of the legally

continued on page 6

"Marxists Not Mobsters"It's not every day that revolutionary

Marxists are able to back down aMcCarthyite witchhunter like Califor­nia attorney general George Deukme­jian. But on December 17 Deukme­jian's office acknowledged that lettersof retraction had been sent admittingthey made an "error" including theSL/SYL in the "Terrorism" section ofthe 1979 "Organized Crime Report"(see Spartacist League statementabove). In just five months from whenthe SL suit was filed, Reagan's man inCalifornia-the state's top cop and

likely Republican candidate forgovernor-had taken it back. The SLvictory has received wide press cover­age with substantial articles in the NewYork Times. the Los Angeles Timesand other West Coast papers.

"We were determined that no matterwhat it took we were going to continueour efforts until we had our nameretracted" from the list, said Al Nelsonfor the Spartacist League at a Sacra­mento press conference on December18. The SL's determination to fight the"terrorist" set-up/smear meant not

only a lawsuit, but a concerted effort toraise the issues and political conse­quences at stake in the case. Protestdemonstrations in four West Coastcities proclaimed": "Workers Party Hasthe Right to Organize!" With thePartisan Defense Committee, whichprovided legal co-eounsel, membersand supporters of the SL/SYL raisedfunds, solicited endorsements andbegan to publicize the case. Therewas quick recognition of the dangerposed by Deukmejian's smear and the

continued on page 7

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12 8 JANUARY 1982