War in Amerika, 1981Fight White Supremacy, Support the Black Liberation Army

New Af rikan Freedom Fighter Day, July 18,1981

for the mothers and children in atianta

"In, Atlanta, something very seriousis going on, someoneis killing our children."

—Mrs. Camille Ward Bell, oneof the mothers of 28 slainBlack children

1. For the last 21 months, 28 Black children and 3 young menare plucked off the streets of Atlantaand in broad day one by one (their bones found!

in swamps and roadways)are murdered.

Aaron, Charles,Clifford, Earl Lee;Anthony Bernard, Christopher, Eric;Yusef, Milton, Alfred, Edward;Latonya, Orlando, Jefferey;Patrick, Lubie, Patrick, Curtis;Darron, Angel and Terry:

Your bones poke out of this killing landscapethat sprouts white crosses andBlack murdered hearts andbodies of Black women in boston and d.c.

You fertilize the rich red soilthat is churningthat someday, soon, will be wonthrough bloodby its rightful owners

land now servingoil kings and the Klana land where Black bloodits life-bloodis cheap

The state imposesa curfew:all Black childrenon the streets after 9 p.m.are to be arrested

the Klan has begun their own searchfor the murderer.

The police talk of "snatches" and "snuffs"and say "these kids in the pictures

all look so innocentbut they're street hustlers"

(they are sharpening their knives)(the burn of the last gunshot on their thighs)

2.

in new rochelle, earlier this year,2 young Black men werepicked up by a copoff-duty or under-coveror posing (does it matter)stiffening/sickfor young Black blood

in my neighborhood, white menin long sleek carsdrop their- killing white powdersthat snuff out slowlyyoung Blacks and Puerto Ricans

What does it mean:28 children, from 7 to 15 years:Black fruit plucked strangledbones thrown back"like so much trash"on Atlanta streets

two girlsbetween babyhood and menses

(Angel was found tied to a treea pair of panties stuffed in her mouth)

boys, all those Black boys,Child-man, times twenty-one

The men and women they were to becomejust beginning to take shapein their small bodiesGreen shoots trampled, torn apart

What they could have beengrinds over and over in our brain

teachers/lovers/mothers

The beat of this terrorto make the hearts of mothers stopto drive the fathers' eyesinto the back of the skullThe mothers of Atlanta have said STOP

3. In Sunset Park, after the murder of Chino MendezThe violet sky is full of windThe cry goes up from the streetThe windows are stuffedwith children and old women

The younger ones lead the marchlike angry birds risingour voicestwisting in the skeleton treesin sunset parkwhere another young Puerto Ricanhas been murdered:

"Chino is dead and the cops go free—POLICIA—ASESINO—POLICIA—ASESINO'."

Anger bright as new knivesanger red, like the bright shirtsin the windowsDrunk on it,wanting to kill the copto KILL THE COPSwho with guns and dogstheir nets, their lawshoot to killyoung Black and Puerto Ricanmen and women

4. To be a cop in amerikain 1981is no differentthan joining the Klan

"Understand this," she said,"20 years agoyou heard the callto go out and organize the white communityyou did not do itand now my son is dead."

White women:will we cry out: "Adelphi!"and not: "Atlanta!"there is no time to weepthe mothers of these childrenare fighting

Let's put down our newspapers,memorize every child's name,and tell our children.Wear a green ribbon, or armband,for life.

Join the next picket, the next action,to stop killer cops.

But this is not enough:We must fight, as Vietnamese womensaid long ago"to defend the right to live"

Not until we, white women,say NO to amerikawhere white is a badgeof acceptance of daily murderis rosedaleis reagannot until we, in thousands,take up the names of the resistance:

in the eyes of hundreds of womenin the creases of the palms of old menin the flowering trees of soft atlanta nightsin the sunburnt hillsin the sledge of mississippiin the streets of new york city

Their names areliberty cityAssata Shakurthe EA.L.N.every mother who ever foughtfor her child to know the truth

To make a laser of our angerto make a flood against the enemyso that one day, soon,for every child crushedthere are ten of them deadthe only termsthat we can bealive

Part II.

And thenin springthere began to begrown men among the bodiesfound in the chattahootchie river

summer"the break"the FBI capturesWayne B. Williamsa young Black manwhom his friends call brilliant

the white sheriff's face wassplit into a grin as wideas the newspaper photo—"proof of their twisted racist scenariowhere Black motherseat their own children.

(and the Black Liberation Armyis coming coming coming coming)

the defiant sisters and brothers in Techwoodwith names like Chimurengaare picking up the gun to defend the childrenthey are lining the hallways and rooftopsof atlanta

And it's summer,and the Chimurenga of Zimbabwe istransforming to socialismand in Namibiathe brave sisters and brothersare nearer to victory than ever before

and Azania shines

red with the blood of students and freedom fighterswho continue the struggle

and hereAtlanta buries no more Black flowers(for a while, in the wake ofthe capture of a scapegoat!

and the blood is on the wallsand the Black Liberation Arnw is

coming coming coming comingcoming coming coming coming

And we women who love peacewill need to go to war to win peacefor all women and childrenfor that time is coming coming coming coming

IT IS HERE.

On July 18,1981, the Committee to Honor New Afrikan Freedom Fighters, held the first New Afrikan Freedom Fighter Day in Harlem, N.Y. tocelebrate the birthday of revolutionary freedom fighter, Assata Shakur by demonstrating support for the Black Liberation Armv and allthose who fight to defend the Black community and for the liberation of the Black Nation. Led by revolutionary Black nationalists, thedemonstration united Black, Puerto Rican and other Third World people and anti-imperialist white people around the demands: Self-Determination for the Black Nation; Free All POVV's; The Black Community is at War; Support the Black Liberation Army. All along themarch through Harlem, people on the streets responded to the militancy and determination of the demonstration and to the chants, suchas: "Self-Determination and Self-Defense, Defend Our Community at Any Expense"; "BLA, Freedom Fighters". Speakers at the rallyincluded Ahmed Obafemi who emceed the rally; Attorney Chokwe Lumumba speaking for the Committee to Honor New Afrikan FreedomFighters; Sister Dara Abubakari, President of the Provisional Government of the Republic of New Afrika; Julio Rosado of the Movimientode Liberacion Nacional ; Attorney Lewis Myers of the National Conference of Black Lawyers; solidarity statements; and African andNew Afrikan cultural presentations.

The demonstration held l!/2 years after the liberation of Assata Shakur from prison by the fighting forces of the Black Liberationstruggle, was historically significant because it represented the organized determination and leadership of the Black Liberation struggleto fight for the human rights of Black people to defend themselves and their struggle against white supremacist terror and genocide and tobuild the Black Liberation Army and the strategy of people's war to defeat U.S. imperialism and to free the Black Nation. It was significantbecause of the unity expressed between the Black Liberation struggle and the Puerto Rican Independence Movement around the strategyof people's war; and, because there was a strong contingent of white people marching under Black leadership in unity with the demandsand the strategy of the demonstration. The demonstration made clear that supporting human rights for Black people and fighting whitesupremacy must be based in supporting the right of Black people to armed self-defense and for the strategy that will win total liberation asexpressed in one of the chants: "Death To The Klan and Free The Land."

Solidarity Statement from May 19th Communist Organization,New Afrikan Freedom Fighter Day, July 18,1981

May 19th Communist Organization is honored to be here,marching in the John Brown Contingent, in full solidarity withthis day to honor Assata Shakur, the Black Liberation Army andall New Afrikan freedom fighters. We stand committed to fightfor the demands of this demonstration until they are won: SelfDetermination for the Black Nation; Free All POW's; Supportthe Black Liberation Army; Fight White Supremacy. We arehere to support the right of all Black people to armed self-defense against genocide and white supremacist attacks.

We stand committed to the strategy of national liberationwar to free New Afrika as the winning strategy—

It is War in Amerika to free the Black Nation that will winhuman rights and self determination for Black people.

It is War in Amerika to free the Black Nation that willdestroy the system of white supremacy and bring death tothe klan.

It is War in Amerika to free the Black Nation, along withthe liberation struggles to free Native American nations, Chi-cano Mexicano peoples and the Puerto Rican nation that willbring Amerika to its knees; that will defeat imperialism anddestroy this genocidal monster and create a new society basedin respect for self-determination and the struggle to construct

a socialist society. We want to fight as full allies of nationalliberation in the struggle against imperialism because as whitepeople we no longer want to live in this exploitative andoppressive system and that is why we must unite with arevolutionary strategy and make it our own.

We organized the John Brown contingent to mobilize asmany white people as we could to take a stand against whitesupremacist terrorism and to support the Black Liberationstruggle. White people must fight against Amerika's war ofgenocide against oppressed peoples. The bottom line for anti-imperialists is to support the right of self-determination andthe right to armed self-defense and to fight white supremacy.400 years of history show us that it is only through armedresistance and armed struggle that the Black Nation has sur-vived and will struggle to be free. Today, we must activelysupport the right of Black people to defend themselves againstthe murders of Blackyouth in Atlanta, the attacks by killer copsand the ku klux klan and other white terrorist armies.

The Black Liberation struggle and the Black LiberationArmy has shown us the possibility and the necessity to bemore than supporters of national liberation struggles. Westruggle to be full participants in the revolutionary struggle to

defeat imperialism. For the Black Liberation Army has led us inunderstanding that if we unite with revolutionary strategy wecan overturn this system that oppresses us all. That is why wewant to be fighting allies, like John Brown. What did JohnBrown do? He went to war.

We want to be like John Brown because we are interna-tionalists who understand that the main trend in the worldtoday is revolution. Peoples War for national liberation and thebuilding of socialism is how this revolution is happeningworldwide. Amerika is a deadly and dying empire that up-holds everything that is oppressive and negative in this world.It is losing at the hands of oppressed peoples everywhere.

We want to be part of the masses of the world who arefighting for and living under socialism. We want to be part ofthe community of women around the world who are over-turning centuries of oppression by participating fully in Peo-ples War and the fight for socialism. We want to live like AssataShakur, like Havdee Torres of the Eleven Puerto Rican POW's,like Teurai Ropa Nongo who was on the High Command of theZimbabwe African National Liberation Army and is now theMinister of Women's Affairs and Community Development in aliberated Zimbabwe, like Leila Khaled, fighting as a leader ofthe Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. We want tolive like these freedom fighters because we understand thatwe will only win our liberation as women by waging revolu-tionary armed struggle against the common enemy im-perialism.

We want our children to be part of building this newsocialist society. That is why we built the Clifford Glover bri-gade for our young people to march with us today, under theleadership of the Black Liberation struggle We want them tounderstand that a system that survives through the murder ofBlack children by killer cops and the klan provides no futurefor them. But for them to live in a better world, they must startfighting for it by fighting \vhite supremacy now. That is the waythat they will learn new values and can grow into youngrevolutionary women and men.

This is the only solution for masses of working classpeople: to break with the system and fight under the leader-

ship of national liberation struggles to defeat our enemy impe-rialism.

This demonstration today is critical in that by honoringNew Afrikan freedom fighters we affirm that the Black Libera-tion Army is alive and growing in Amerika in 1981 and that itsstrength and the consolidation of revolutionary nationalistleadership today poses the sharpest challenge to white su-premacy in Amerika, as well as the arrogance and white su-premacy of the white left itself.

It is not enough for the white left to march for El Salvador.It is a key struggle to support. But we cannot support nationalliberation struggles abroad and deny the right of the NewAfrikan nation to fight for self-determination, land and libera-tion. Such a position denies the necessity to fight white su-premacy. The Black Liberation struggle has alwavs fought withthe white left to fight white supremacy and to organize thewhite working class. To defeat opportunism we must build amovement that fights imperialism in solidarity with nationalliberation struggle.

We support Assata Shakur and the Black Liberation Army.The Black Liberation Army changes the terms of war in Amer-ika by waging that war today. In doing so, they have smashedthe invincibility of the U.S. imperialist state and are beginningto break the chains of colonialism. Nothing makes that clearerthan the liberation of Assata Shakur from prison on November2,1979 by the fighting forces of the Black Liberation struggle.That military and political triumph struck a qualitative blowagainst Amerikas war apparatus and proved decisively thatthe Black Liberation Army was not dead or all imprisoned, butwas alive and fighting today. It is the fight waged by the BLAthat proves that the Black Liberation struggle must follow thelaws of revolutionary struggles, just like every other nationalliberation struggle in the world today. And that in applying thestrategy of Peoples War to the war in Amerika, they will win,and all of us who unite with that strategy and dare to strugglewill join in the victory.

JOHN BROWN—LIVE LIKE HIM, DARE TO STRUGGLE,DARE TO WIN!

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MAY 19TH /COMMUNIST ORGANIZATION

P.O. Box 3111 • Cadrnan Plaza StationBrooklyn, New York 11202(212) 522-7294

500;