An Analytical Declaration on the Present
Crisis and the Tasks of revolutionary Communists By
CPIMLM
Note about translation: This is a tentative translation of lead article in Haghighat 45 dated June 2009
When the word fundamentalist is used here it means the faction gathered around Khamenei. The literal translation from Farsi is “principalist” but we used fundamentalist here.
An Analytical Declaration on the Present Crisis and
the Tasks of revolutionary Communists
With the cheating in the elections and the coup of one faction against another, the Islamic Republic of Iran is gripped with an unprecedented crisis of legitimacy. This has caused a leap-like growth in the revolutionary sentiments of masses of people. This situation with all its contradictions and complications can develop into a revolutionary situation. But for it to turn into a revolutionary situation there are a very serious barriers that the revolutionary Communists should seriously deal with and do all they can to solve. There is an important opportunity to advance the class struggle toward a real revolution. But everything depends on the organized communist revolutionary forces.
It was clear from the beginning that we would face a hot situation with these elections. But nobody imagined that the dimensions would take a form so widespread and so bloody. Different contradictory factors both national and international helped for to make this hot mélange. Some people are not happy that the debate between candidates for presidency and the cheating of Ahmadinejad and the election coup triggered the waves of revolutionary struggle and resistance from the masses of people. And even they have doubts about the revolutionary nature of the uprising of the masses against the reaction. But in history, revolutionary situations have never presented themselves in a clean and tidy manner. There has never been a revolution where the lining up of the classes forces has been so clean or pure, that one side had the bourgeoisie and reactionaries and the other side had the proletariat and its allies. Different classes and strata of the people enter the revolution with their own illusions. At the beginning, the line of the people and the reactionary opposition is mixed together.
The reality is that the unprecedented split or crack among “the rulers” on top (who could no long rule as in the past) triggered the explosion of the people at the bottom. But the explosion of those at the bottom happened on the basis of acute class and social contradictions in the context of the deep hatred of the IRI. The contradictions within the ruling class was accentuated by the rage erupting from the people. When it reached its peak, it activated the volcano of people’s rage. People took advantage of this split that had weakened the regime. They joined in the streets and started attacking the regime.
Over the last few years, the internal contradiction in the regime
deepened. The continual economic crisis, the deep malcontent of various classes
and strata of the people for these rulers, as well as the pressures of
Two Contradictions, Two Driving Forces
The volcano that erupted in
But if we look at the particularity of the situation, we see that the present situation is formed by two contradictions or two driving forces: the contradiction between the majority of the masses of people and the whole ruling regime and the contradiction within the reactionary rulers. These two contradiction interpenetrate and form the situation as a whole. The opportunities for a radical revolutionary change is inherent (or hidden) in the first driving force, that is the contradiction between the majority of the people and the ruling regime. But the other driving force will also exert its influence on the development of the situation and at the same time weaken the regime and makes it easier for people to hit at the regime. At the same time, it is also a source of illusions among the masses in terms of the nature of this infighting and the nature and characteristics of these factions, especially the reformists.
One of the important differences of the present situation from the revolutionary situation of ′79 is that the revolutionary crisis of ′57 developed on the basis of the contradiction between the people and the Shah’s regime. At the beginning, none of the factions of the regime were present in the people′s movement and even the reactionary Islamic force’s did not yet control it. But in the anti-regime uprising of today, a faction of the regime from the beginning has a very strong presence. Of course, along with the heightening of the situation, the control of this uprising went out of their hands in important dimensions. The “Green Silence” suddenly gave way to the night time roarings of the people. Peaceful forms developed into bloody fighting with the military forces of IRI. The scene was more and more occupied by radical revolutionary youth from the middle and lower classes and toiling classes and the unhappy children of the rich classes pulled away from the scenes of fighting. They even started to leave the country. But we shouldn’t think that the political and class polarization of this wave will happen spontaneously: In fact without the intervention of Communists in this situation, without efforts to establish a revolutionary communist leadership at least among certain strata of advanced women, youth and workers, these same sacrificing and radical masses can become foot soldiers of one or the other faction of the regime or newly formed bourgeois forces. For the time being, ruling “reformers” and their families are sitting in their safe houses, waiting to reascend to power as a result of the sacrifice of the masses.
The more people understand the nature of the infighting of the ruling classes, the less able some of the factions of the ruling class are to turn the energy of the masses to their favor. The more the knowledge the fighters have of the real weak points of the IRI and the more they will understand their own strength, the less they will be afraid of lack of bourgeois leadership. Instead of pacificism and tailing the plans of the reformists, they will quickly start planning to boldly and consciously organize the ranks of women, youth, workers and other toilers.
We cannot predict how the contradiction within the ruling classes will develop. There is the possibility of reconciliation but also of serious fighting, both militarily and among the internal security intelligence forces. The danger they feel from the masses may require them to put their differences aside and unite. But this unity will be short-lived. And in general, reconciliation among them, especially the kind of reconciliation that would look like a “victory” to the masses, sending them back to their homes, is very difficult.
How the contradiction between different factions develops has to do with the conscious intervention by both sides of the state, the political and military will of both sides and their limitations and freedoms in relation to each other and on the other hand to the radical struggle of the masses of the people. Even though the fundamentalists are stronger militarily, their internal differences and serious lack of a social base among the masses prevents them from having a single political will and coherence. Those united around the coup whether they are the original designers or those who sanctioned it or those who kept silent; all have differences with how to advance the coup plan and how far it should go. They were calculating that the powerful states of the world would recognize them and this did not materialize. And in fact the development of the struggle of the masses prevented it from happening.
Given the influence gained among the masses, the reformist faction has the upper hand politically. But the element of the people is very contradictory, fragile and in flux as far as they are concerned. They too are afraid of the masses. The reformers political will against the ruling Khamenei faction is fragile. They thought from the beginning they could create a split within the pasdaran but the fundamentalist faction had previously purged it of the reformist forces. Also on the day after the election fraud, they carried out further purges. By calling the pasdaran, army and Basij as brothers Mousavi is trying to raise his influence among them. He, like all the bourgeois forces, is not only afraid of losing his own weapons but consider it his task to make sure the weapons of the rivals are also untouched. (this is apparently unclear in the original) (footnote: idea comes from Class Struggle in France, Karl Marx). Now there are negotiations between Rafsanjani, this cunning fox of the IRI, with other top people (and there are probably some negotiations with now imprisoned reformers) in order to put a leash on the situation, but any temporary reconciliation between them will introduce bigger future fights.
The Role of Imperialist Powers Especially the
The decisions of the imperialists powers
and the rivalry among them has also had an important effect, especially on the
way different factions act. The uprising of the people upset all the calculations
of the Obama government. In order to carry out his wars in
(footnote: The Koran and the Ballot Box, Reuel Mac Gerecht). There is no doubt that Obama, considering the
world economic crisis and the
In any event, the imperialists are forced to intervene to guarantee
their interests in relation to the uprising that has completely changed the
face of
This Wave Has Just Started
With the accumulation of a thirty years of anger and the collapse of the regime’s legitimacy among the majority of people, the regimes ability to carry forward plans to suppress the masses will cause the continuation of a new wave of struggle among the masses. This wave can emerged abruptly or recede and will advance through ups and downs. The longer this revolutionary wave lasts, the more developed will be the polarization between the more advanced and the more conservative strata of the people, both objectively and subjectively.
Now the leap-like development of the deep contradiction between the masses of oppressed and exploited classes with the IRI is deepening. This is reflected in the battlefield on the streets. The radical sections in practice and in the battlefield showed their differences with the ranks of the ″green″ and ″allah akbar″. The question is that the solid core (organisationally and politically) of the radical section that has political and organisational reflection has not yet formed in these ranks. Only when the deep class feelings of a section of this more radical strata is linked with revolutionary communist political consciousness and finds organizational expression, can it be said that these part of the people have their own hard (head?). Then it can be said that the political scene has effectively changed. Then there will exist a small but concentrated conscious and determined force among the masses that can neutralize the other side, (the green party and allah akbar) and become a pole of attracting and leading the masses. The Green trend is a broad alliance of forces within the regime which includes the national religious forces and the Tudeh and Fedayeen Majority who over the past 30 years played the role of peons for the regime. These people use slogans and symbols and put forward demands and forms of struggle to try to confine the political perspective of the people to changing the cliques at the top of the power structure. But those youth and women who carry the main burden of the bloody battles have not yet consciously expressed their hopes and demands. The circles of revolutionary left among the workers, women, students and family of political prisoners and martyrs of the 1980s, who in the past dark years of silence; suppression and suffocation carried out the struggle against the IRI, must intervene actively in this situation and paint a different perspective from that put forward by the organized green forces. This situation puts heavy responsibilities before the revolutionary Communists and they must face with all their strength.
This present crisis can have several possible outcomes. Bloody repression, major reconciliation or civil war between two factions or the rise in the revolutionary spirit of the masses and the propagation of this uprising; these are some of the perspectives behind street fights and repression, negotiations in regime corridors and corridors of international powers. Undoubtedly any of these possibilities will have their own effect on how the class forces line up and the forms of struggle it takes. They will also effect how to carry out the basic tasks of the Communists. The revolutionary Communists must as soon as possible, accumulate initial force in the midst this tempest and get ready to move in more tempestuous situations. They need to put forward their own ultimate and decisive solution, that is, revolution. Not only in the realm of slogans (even though slogans are important too) but also in the act of mobilization and organization of the revolutionary masses and finally the launching of mass revolutionary armed struggle. The wide variety of class forces on the same side of the battlefield shows once again that without the hegemony of a strong proletarian core in the broad and varied camp of the “people” the road to revolution will not be open.
The Main Danger: Tailing the Green Wave
At this particular period, bourgeois tendencies among the masses have the upper hand. Tailing the reformist leadership or green wave is the main danger that we are facing broadly. Not all the people who are following this wave are supporters of Mousavi. Many think that supporting the green wave will better prepare the ground for change. But this is a dangerous illusion.
Behind the curtain of this illusion you can see the strength and influence of a strong class alliance. The power of the reformist camp does not only rise from the reformists within the regime but the reformists out of the regime who play a decisive role in expanding the power and influence of the green wave. Socially the liberal bourgeoisie and the middle and upper strata and political forces like the national religious (this is the party of Shiran Abadi) and Fayadeen Majority and Tudeh Party and part of the “left” opposition have united with the green wave. These forces seek to be integrated within the state apparatus to gain petty privileges and they call this “freedom” for the whole society.
Communists should constantly emphasize the truth that tailing of this or that faction of the bourgeoise will bring death to the uprising. Playing into the hands of the green wave means abandoning the liberating aims and future, a future whose seeds are being formed in the midst of this recent uprising. Telling the truth to the masses and struggling against their illusions in the middle of the battle requires a lot of courage. But by relying on communist consciousness and perseverance, it can materialize. There is no doubt that these truths will be taken up by those classes and strata that have deep contradictions with the IRI. And it is obvious that they will be repelled by those who do not have antagonistic contradictions with the IRI. This is natural because the people in the scene are divided into classes.
The contradiction is that the communists should both defend the waves of struggle of the masses and at the same time go against the spontaneous understanding of the people and divert the spontaneous motion of the masses to the correct path – to a direction that leads to the complete overthrow of the IRI and a real revolution.
Communists, when faced with such waves of resistance of the people with all their illusions towards the reactionary personalities and reformist solutions, should not get confused and lose their strategic orientation. Such waves are always there and will reproduce in different forms but (we emphasize again) the scene is full of different class forces with different tendencies and different views. And this will always be the case.
In such complicated conditions communists should be both materialist and maintain their strategic determination. This means that they should see the contradictory aspects of reality and as well as rapid and inevitable changes in the situation to realize their own strategy. In the middle of this revolutionary wave the positive factors will come to dominate. In most cases the illusions among the masses will rapidly collapse if the vanguard carries out its tasks correctly. Any tailing of the illusions of the masses in such conditions will rob the communist movement of any chance to influence the situation.
Lenin correctly emphasized that any social movement and any reactionary war does not need to necessarily end the way it started. With conscious intervention, communists can change the initial particularities of the war. Lenin himself put this directly into action during WWI. In the darkest of periods, when counter revolutionary opportunism had taken over the worker parties, Lenin, in the face of those who said we should unite with one of the sides of the war, said no that is not the case. He said we can and must change the nature of the war and turn it from a reactionary world war into revolutionary class civil war. This holds true for social struggles as well. A struggle that has started as a war between reactionaries can be turned to a real war between masses and the whole ruling regime.
This is the fundamental approach of the communists in the present situation. This policy not only has a social base but in the actual struggles that are going on, has shown its base very forcefully. It is important that as the vanguard, Communists first of all should not repeat the mistakes of ′79 revolution and should not tail the spontaneous tendencies of the masses. Secondly, they should use all their efforts and all their creativity to make links with the radical masses (especially women and youth) who are participating in the uprising. They should unleash the fury of women as an important force for the revolution and link the unleashed energy of the youth with consciousness and organize their force for historic class wars.
“The course of events is not written. There is no fate, the direction of the wave can be changed. New waves can be created.” (footnote 3 From Communiqué 4 of our Party on the recent situation called “Let’s Leave the Discussions after…?”) The direction of the movement of the masses of workers and toilers, especially of women and youth can be diverted. Instead of the green wave, a proletarian red wave can be mobilized. The key questions facing the communists is: will they carry out their fundamental tasks in relation to the actual situation? Will they use the actual situation to make their perspective of a communist society also that of the masses? Make the political strategy of NDR be the goal of their struggle? Can the revolutionary Communists overthrow the reactionary state by waging revolutionary people′s war and form a new power under the leadership of the proletariat and its vanguard party which has as its agenda the liberation of the whole of humanity.
What Kind of Intervention and with what Content?
The tasks of Communists at this critical juncture is not to simply and continuously make this existing movement more radical. They should take advantage of this situation. But this is not possible without going against the tide of the perspective that is dominant among the masses. Turning this wave into a wave with a different quality is the most decisive political task at this point.
It should again be emphasized that the present situation and even the movement of the masses is a contradictory mix: a part of the ranks of opposition to the regime consists of reactionaries. They want impose on the movement of the masses the perspective of changing the gang in power. The bourgeois strata outside power and the well-to-do petty bourgeoisie who have come to the scene with the perspective of reforming the regime consider themselves as natural allies of one faction of the government. And finally the oppressed and exploited masses and conscious women and men whose energy is fueled by deep class and social contradictions with the whole system.
Communists should rely to the maximum on this third strata and link their revolutionary communist line and leadership to their struggle. The demands and hopes of this strata is not fully formulated) and they do not have the organization and leadership of the revolutionary party. If this situation continues, they will be suppressed and demoralized or they will inevitably be forced to fight under the banner and along side the bourgeoisie. While uniting with the most advanced strata in this rebellion the communists must also separate them from the dominant movement and create a movement that proclaims taking society towards a future fundamentally different from the existing order. The practical meaning of this policy is nothing but:
“The broad revolutionary radical tendency that flows at the bottom of this rebellion must take conscious and organized expression. The future of this wave of struggle depends on whether the revolutionary and communist fighters are able to turn this small but more advanced section into the backbone and the bone marrow of the broad movement of the people. The consciousness of this section of women, youth and workers in relation to the present class struggle must raise. And their energy must be organized into independent organizational structures so that political and organizational centers independent from regime factions be formed for the broad movement of the people. This is necessary from for going through the political twists and turns of this movement and preparing to enter bloody and decisive battles with the enemy. It’s also important for facing the inevitable ups and downs of the uprising itself” (footnote: Communique 2 of our Party on the recent events called “The Future is in Our Grip If We Fight Correctly”)
In such a situation we should not have a limited understanding of absorbing and organizing of forces. To think that one can attract and mobilize people on the margins of this uprising is wrong, you have to be in the center. You cannot take water from roaring waves with a small bowl. Communists are able to attract advanced masses to the extent that they are able to influence the political scene on the whole and divert it.
It is only with this strategic orientation that we can formulate correct and proper political and tactical directives in each particular stage and conjuncture and adopt proper forms of struggle and organization. The political tactic and forms of struggle and organization that do not serve this strategy are not communist tactics and policies.
The first things people need are revolutionary leaders that put forward for them a clear perspective and future and politics that are fundamentally different than those put forward by bourgeois and reactionary leaders. At the same time communists also need revolutionary people to be in the scene so that they can heal the great pain that is caused by defeat and suppression and rapidly fill their ranks with the most advanced and militant children of the proletariat and the masses. The more effectively and rapidly this goes ahead, the more the communists can influence the overall situation and define correct tactics. The urgent question today is not when working class and its vanguard party will put a communist stamp on the present uprising. The question is what politics should be adopted and what action taken for the communist movement to rapidly be in this situation. Communists are in a historical junction that as Mao said, the time between each fight and rest will be constantly reduced. Without continuous/restless battles, the material for advancing proletarian revolution cannot be gathered.
Putting Forward Scientific Communist is a Necessity
During crisis and revolutionary upsurges more than any other time, the advanced take up questions like what kind of society do we want and how do we get there. These are the most urgent times to promote and popularize the necessity and possibility of struggle for new democratic revolution, the establishment of a new democratic state as a necessary step to establish a socialist society. In such a situation, brushing aside the religious thinking and superstitions and teaching the reality of how society and the world is, we can bring the new fighters rapidly to a scientific understanding. Human life does not need and will not be produced and reproduced on the basis of the capitalist system. In the last 30 years, our communist movement suffered heavy blows and was weakened. But today a new generation of fighters have entered the stage that can, by absorbing communist theories, build the communist movement as more advanced, more powerful, and with more potential to grow. So we should do our best to promote the science of communism among these fighters and courageously agitate and propagate this big truth that communism is not only not a utopia but a necessity of our time. And the workings of the capitalist system constantly brings about the means of materializing it. The fact that women, the slaves of the slaves, have stood tall against this extremely reactionary regime from the beginning of the establishment of the IRI and today are the most thorough-going in the battle field is the best sign that this world and its many ills calls out for a communist solution. Because women are the only social strata whose low societal status, oppression coincided with the emergence of class society, the complete abolition of inequality between men and women in social relations and thinking will coincide with the abolition of all class differences and the emergence of a communist society. Until then the struggle for the liberation of women will be a motive force for the advance of society.
The capitalist system in
We should have no doubt that the future of our society depends on the line and practice of revolutionary communists.
Clarify the Nature of the Green Wave to People !
Spread the Slogan Down with the Islamic Republic!
Organize the Headquarters of Mass Struggles in Different Spheres!
Raise the Red Flag of Communism and Organise the Most Advanced Around it!
Do Agitation and Propaganda about the Characteristics of the New revolutionary Power Among the masses!
Strive to Achieve a United Politics Will and Action in the C Mmt of
Central Committee of the Communist Party of
28 June 2009