What If The AWL Quoted Trotsky Correctly?

Before I went away Llin Davies contacted me to say that the posts she had made to the AWL website in relation to the debate over “What if Israel Bombs Iran?” had all been deleted. Nothing new there then as this seems to now be the way that the AWL deal with debate – either shout down your opponent, censor their views, or of they are a member of their organisation demand an oath of allegiance in front of a star chamber. Llin posted me to ask if she could post her comments here as an article and I agreed, but it was difficult while I was away, and for a period unable to get an Internet access to arrange the details. Llin’s post is given below.

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The main reason I posted a comment on the AWL site, in respect of the debate over an Israeli attack on Iran, was a comment by Mark Osborn, which was so blatantly a falsification of Trotsky’s position in relation to the Second World War that I didn’t think it should be left to go unchallenged. I have since seen many more instances where the AWL completely misrepresent the views of Trotsky, and do so in a way that means that they must understand that they are misrepresenting him, that this is no longer a question of simple mistakes but an indication of a systematic distortion for their own sectarian ends.

Mark Osborn wrote,

“Nevertheless, the Trotskyists who followed Trotsky’s lead on this clearly recognised that, while they could not support the Allies, there was a real difference between, for example, German Nazi imperialism and the imperialism of the US.”

See: Here .

Ironically, his comment was titled “sects and lying sects”. Is this true? Did Trotsky, make such a distinction between “Fascist” imperialism, and “Democratic” Imperialism? No, it is not at all true. In fact, the very opposite is the case. I wrote back to say so, and as evidence quoted Trotsky’s criticism of the Palestinian Trotskyists, a criticism levelled for the very reason that the Palestinians WERE making the very distinction that Mark osborn attributes to Trotsky!

Trotsky, wrote,

“We maintain that in the quarter of a century that has elapsed since the outbreak of the last war, imperialism has come to rule even more despotically over the world; its hand weighs more heavily on events during peacetime as well as wartime; and finally, that under all of its political masks, it has assumed an even more reactionary character. In consequence, all the fundamental rules of proletarian “defeatist” policy in relation to imperialist war retain their full force today. This is our point of departure, and all the conclusions that follow are determined by it…..

Monarchist reaction in the last war, they state, was not of an aggressive historical character, it was rather a survival, whereas fascism nowadays represents a direct and immediate threat to the whole civilized world. The struggle is therefore the task of the international proletariat as a whole in peacetime as well as wartime. It is only natural if we become suspiciously wary: such a narrowing down of revolutionary tasks – replacing imperialism by one of its political masks, that of Fascism – is a patent concession to the Comintern, a patent indulgence of social-patriots of the “democratic” countries….

They focus their attention on fascism, as the immediate threat to the world working class and the oppressed nationalities. They hold that a “defeatist” policy is not applicable in those countries which may be at war with fascist countries. Again, such reasoning over-simplifies the problem, for it depicts the case as if the fascist countries will necessarily be found on one side of the trenches while the democratic or semi-democratic are on the other. In point of fact, there is absolutely no guarantee for this “convenient” grouping. Italy and Germany may, in the coming war as in the last, be found in opposing camps. This is by no means excluded. What are we to do in that case? Indeed, it is becoming increasingly difficult to classify countries in accordance with purely political features : Where would we assign Poland, Rumania, present-day Czechoslovakia, and a number of other second-rate and third-rate powers?

The main tendency of the authors of this document is apparently the following: to hold that “defeatism” is obligatory for the leading fascist countries (Germany, Italy), whereas it is necessary to renounce defeatism in countries even of doubtful democratic virtue, but which are at war with the leading fascist countries. That is approximately how the main idea of the document may be worded. In this form, too, it remains false, and an obvious lapse into social-patriotism….

They do not take sufficiently into account the fact that in the epoch of decaying capitalism shifts and semi-shifts of political regimes occur quite suddenly and frequently without altering the social foundation, without checking capitalist decline. On which of these two processes must our policy be based in such a fundamental question as war: on the shifts of political regimes, or on the social foundation of imperialism, common to all political regimes and unfailingly uniting them against the revolutionary proletariat? The fundamental strategic question is our attitude toward war, which it is impermissible to subordinate to episodic tactical considerations and speculations….

But even from the purely episodic standpoint, the above-cited idea of the document is incorrect. A victory over the armies of Hitler and Mussolini implies in itself only the military defeat of Germany and Italy, and not at all the collapse of fascism. Our authors admit that fascism is the inevitable product of decaying capitalism, in so far as the proletariat does not replace bourgeois democracy in time. Just how is a military victory of decaying democracies over Germany and Italy capable of liquidating fascism, even if only for a limited period? If there were any grounds for believing that a new victory of the familiar and slightly senile Entente (minus Italy) can work such miraculous results, i.e., those counter to socio-historical laws, then it is necessary not only to “desire” this victory but to do everything in our power to bring it about. Then the Anglo-French social-patriots would be correct. As a matter of fact they are far less correct today than they were 25 years ago, or to put it more correctly, they are playing today an infinitely more reactionary and infamous role….

If there are chances (and there indubitably are) that the defeat of Germany and Italy – provided there is a revolutionary movement – may lead to the collapse of fascism, then, on the other hand, there are more proximate and immediate chances that the victory of France may deal the final blow to corroded democracy, especially if this victory is gained with the political support of the French proletariat. The entrenchment of French and British imperialism, the victory of French military-fascist reaction, the strengthening of the rule of Great Britain over India and other colonies, will in turn provide support for blackest reaction in Germany and Italy. In the event of victory, France and England will do everything to save Hitler and Mussolini, and stave off “chaos”. The proletarian revolution can of course rectify all this. But the revolution must be helped and not hindered. It is impossible to help revolution in Germany otherwise than by applying in action the principles of revolutionary internationalism in the countries warring against her….
But the Czech working class did not have the slightest right to entrust the leadership of a war “against fascism” to Messrs. Capitalists who, within a few days so safely changed their coloration and became themselves fascists and sub-fascists. Transformations and recolorations of this kind on the part of the ruling classes will be on the order of the day in wartime in all “democracies”. That is why the proletariat would ruin itself if it were to determine its main line of policy by the formal and unstable labels of “for fascism” and “against fascism”….

That policy which attempts to place upon the proletariat the unsolvable task of warding off all dangers engendered by the bourgeoisie and its policy of war is vain, false, mortally dangerous. “But fascism might be victorious!” “But the USSR is menaced!” “But Hitler’s invasion would signify the slaughter of workers!” And so on, without end. Of course, the dangers are many, very many. It is impossible not only to ward them all off, but even to foresee all of them. Should the proletariat attempt at the expense of the clarity and irreconcilability of its fundamental policy to chase after each episodic danger separately, it will unfailingly prove itself a bankrupt. In time of war, the frontiers will be altered, military victories and defeats will alternate with each other, political regimes will shift. The workers will be able to profit to the full from this monstrous chaos only if they occupy themselves not with acting as supervisors of the historical process but by engaging in the class struggle. Only the growth of their international offensive will put an end not alone to episodic “dangers” but also to their main source: the class society.”

See: Bulletin of the Russian Opposition

Could Trotsky’s words be any clearer here in affirming that there could be NO question of making a distinction between imperialism in its “fascist” mask as opposed to its “democratic” mask? No, there could be none. Yet, in reply, Sean Matgamna tried to quote back this very piece to prove that Trotsky here WAS arguing for such a position. He quoted, one passage from the above,

“If there were any grounds for believing that a new victory of the familiar and slightly senile Entente (minus Italy) can work such miraculous results, i.e., those counter to socio-historical laws, then it is necessary not only to “desire” this victory but to do everything in our power to bring it about. Then the Anglo-French social-patriots would be correct.”

To suggest that because eventually democracy was established in Germany and Italy Trotsky WAS arguing for such a distinction. But, of course, in 1939, Trotsky did not know that such an occurrence would happen so he could hardly be basing his opinion on an event he did not know would occur! Far from it, he believed the opposite would be the case.

Is it just an accident that Sean in trying to make this argument left out the very next sentence of Trotsky from that quote, which says,

“As a matter of fact they are far less correct today than they were 25 years ago, or to put it more correctly, they are playing today an infinitely more reactionary and infamous role….”,

and thereby completely reverses the meaning which he wants to attribute to Trotsky’s words?

You will not find that post of Sean, because it, along with my original post to which it was replying, have simply been deleted, clearly because they are so damning to the AWL’s position.

Sean also tried to argue that because Trotsky had been wrong about democracy not being established in Germany and Italy that meant that it was necessary to rethink Trotsky’s position, but then the AWL cannot have it both ways, either Trotsky’s position was what they claimed it was, in which case no re-evaluation is necessary, or else when they claimed that Trotsky distinguished between “fascist” imperialism and “democratic” imperialism they were blatantly misrepresenting him in order to claim him for their position. In order to further muddy the waters, and misrepresent Trotsky, Sean also referred to Trotsky’s writings in relation to the Third Period.

The reply to that line of argument is really three-fold. Firstly, to establish beyond doubt what Trotsky’s position was in relation to the Two Masks of Imperialism, Secondly, to distinguish between what Trotsky said in relation to the Third Period, where he was talking about relations WITHIN a particular State, and what he says in relation to imperialist war between states, and finally to look at what the actual experience of the period after WWII was.

Again all of the posts on both sides relating to this have been deleted, so I can only provide here the points I made in relation to the argument.

I responded to the first point by providing a long list of quotes from Trotsky just from his writings for 1938-9, some of which even use the term “the two masks” in describing imperialism in its “fascist” or “democratic” form, as identical. As Trotsky makes clear time and again, what is important is not the superficial political regime which acts as a mask, but the economic and social base on which that regime stands. Time and again the AWL, as adherents of the Third Camp, fall into that trap of basing themselves on that superficial analysis of the political regime rather than the class nature of the State.

The list is given below.

1. Page 18 of Writings 1938-9 is all about this synonymy.

2. "Fascism is a form of despair in the petit-bourgeois masses, who carry away with them over the precipice a part of the proletariat as well. Despair as is known, takes hold when all roads of salvation are cut off. The triple bankruptcy of democracy, Social Democracy and the Comintern was the prerequisite for fascism. All three have tied their fate to the fate of imperialism. All three bring nothing to the masses but despair and by this assure the triumph of fascism." (p19)

3. "Three hundred fifty million Indians must reconcile themselves to their slavery in order to support British democracy, the rulers of which at this very time, together with the slaveholders of “democratic” France, are delivering the Spanish people into Franco’s bondage. People of Latin America must tolerate with gratitude the foot of Anglo-Saxon imperialism on their neck only because this foot is dressed in a suede democratic boot. Disgrace, shame, cynicism – without end!" (p20)

4. The following quote could be used completely in relation to an attack by Israel on Iran.

"The democracies of the Versailles Entente helped the victory of Hitler by their vile oppression of defeated Germany. Now the lackeys of democratic imperialism of the Second and Third Internationals are helping with all their might the further strengthening of Hitler’s regime. Really, what would a military bloc of imperialist democracies against Hitler mean? A new edition of the Versailles chains, even more heavy, bloody and intolerable. Naturally, not a single German worker wants this. To throw off Hitler by revolution is one thing; to strangle Germany by an imperialist war is quite another. The howling of the “pacifist” jackals of democratic imperialism is therefore the best accompaniment to Hitler’s speeches. “You see,” he says to the German people, “even socialists and Communists of all enemy countries support their army and their diplomacy; if you will not rally around me, your leader, you are threatened with doom!” Stalin, the lackey of democratic imperialism, and all the lackeys of Stalin – Jouhaux, Toledano, and Company – are the best aides in deceiving, lulling, and intimidating the German workers." (p21)

Virtually nothing has to be changed here other than the names of Ahmedinejad for Hitler, and Matgamna for Stalin.

5. "The Czechoslovakian crisis revealed with remarkable clarity that fascism does not exist as an independent factor. It is only one of the tools of imperialism. “Democracy” is another of its tools. Imperialism rises above them both. It sets them in motion according to need, at times counterposing them to one another, at times amicably combining them. To fight against fascism in an alliance with imperialism, is the same as to fight in an alliance with the devil against his claws or horns." (p21)

6. The following quote sets out what Trotsky believes should be the position adopted towards the agents of “democratic” imperialism in the workers movement such as the AWL.

"The struggle against fascism demands above all the expulsion of the agents of “democratic” imperialism from the ranks of the working class. Only the revolutionary proletariat of France, Great Britain, America, and the USSR, declaring a life and death struggle against their own imperialism and its agency, the Moscow bureaucracy, is capable of arousing revolutionary hopes in the hearts of the German and Italian workers, and at the same time of rallying around itself hundreds of millions of slaves and semi slaves of imperialism in the entire world. In order to guarantee peace among peoples we must overthrow imperialism under all its masks. Only the proletarian revolution can accomplish this." (p21)

All the above from “Phrases and Reality”

7. "And what does democracy signify in Great Britain? The maintenance of what exists, that is above all the maintenance of rule of the metropolis over the colonies. The same is true in relation to France. The banner of democracy covers here the imperialist hegemony of the privileged minority over the oppressed majority.

In the same manner we cannot speak of fascism “in general”. In Germany, Italy, and Japan, fascism and militarism are the weapons of a greedy, hungry and therefore aggressive imperialism. In the Latin American countries fascism is the expression of the most slavish dependence on foreign imperialism. We must be able to discover under the political form the economic and social content." (p26)

8. "In certain circles of the intelligentsia at present the idea of the “unification of all democratic states” against fascism enjoys popularity. I consider this idea fantastic, chimerical, capable only of deceiving the masses, especially the weak and oppressed peoples. Really, can one believe for even a single moment that Chamberlain, Daladier, or Roosevelt are capable of carrying on a war for the sake of the abstract principle of “ democracy”? Had the British government loved democracy so much, it would have given freedom to India. The same is true of France. Great Britain prefers the dictatorship of Franco in Spain to the political rule of the workers and peasants, because Franco would be a much more pliant and reliable agent of British imperialism. England and France have given Austria to Hitler without resistance although war would be inevitable if he so much as dared touch their colonies.

The conclusion is that it is impossible to fight against fascism without fighting against imperialism. The colonial and semi-colonial countries must fight first of all against that imperialist country which directly oppresses them, irrespective of whether it bears the mask of fascism or democracy." (p27)

9. "This bureaucracy does not trust the masses but fears them. It seeks rapprochement with the ruling classes, especially with “democratic” imperialists. To prove this reliability, Stalin is ready to play the role of policeman throughout the entire world." (p27)

That seems to sum up the AWL position in Iraq and elsewhere, though without Stalin’s ability to actually play a significant role.

The above quotes from “Fight Imperialism to Fight fascism”

10. "In order to understand correctly the nature of the coming events we must first of all reject the false and thoroughly erroneous theory that the coming war will be a war between fascism and “democracy.” Nothing is more false and foolish than this idea. Imperialist “democracies” are divided by the contradictions of their interests in all parts of the world. Fascist Italy can easily find herself in one camp with Great Britain and France if she should lose faith in the victory of Hitler. Semi fascist Poland may join one or the other of the camps depending upon the advantages offered. In the course of war the French bourgeoisie may substitute fascism for its “democracy” in order to keep its workers in submission and force them to fight “to the end.” Fascist France, like “democratic” France would equally defend its colonies with weapons in hand. The new war will have a much more openly rapacious imperialist character than the war of 1914-18. Imperialists do not fight for political principles but for markets, colonies, raw materials, for hegemony over the world and its wealth." (p32)

11. "In wartime all differences between imperialist “democracy” and fascism will disappear." (p32)

12. "Those working class “leaders” who want to chain the proletariat to the war chariot of imperialism, covered by the mask of “democracy,” are now the worst enemies and the direct traitors of the toilers. We must teach the workers to hate and despise the agents of imperialism, since they poison the consciousness of the toilers; we must explain to the workers that fascism is only one of the forms of imperialism, that we must fight not against the external symptoms of the disease but against its organic causes, that is, against capitalism." (p32)

13. "I am not sufficiently acquainted with the life of the individual Latin American countries to permit myself a concrete answer on the questions you pose. It is clear to me at any rate that the internal tasks of these countries cannot be solved without a simultaneous revolutionary struggle against imperialism. The agents of the United States, England, France (Lewis, Jouhaux, Toledano, the Stalinists) try to substitute the struggle against fascism for the struggle against imperialism. We have observed their criminal efforts at the recent congress against war and fascism. In the countries of Latin America the agents of “democratic” imperialism are especially dangerous, since they are more capable of fooling the masses than the open agents of fascist bandits.

I will take the most simple and obvious example. In Brazil there now reigns a semi fascist regime that every revolutionary can only view with hatred. Let us assume, however, that on the morrow England enters into a military conflict with Brazil. I ask you on whose side of the conflict will the working class be? I will answer for myself personally—in this case I will be on the side of “fascist” Brazil against “democratic” Great Britain. Why? Because in the conflict between them it will not be a question of democracy or fascism. If England should be victorious, she will put another fascist in Rio de Janeiro and will place double chains on Brazil. If Brazil on the contrary should be victorious, it will give a mighty impulse to national and democratic consciousness of the country and will lead to the overthrow of the Vargas dictatorship. The defeat of England will at the same time deliver a blow to British imperialism and will give an impulse to the revolutionary movement of the British proletariat. Truly, one must have an empty head to reduce world antagonisms and military conflicts to the struggle between fascism and democracy. Under all masks one must know how to distinguish exploiters, slave-owners, and robbers!" (p33)

All the above from “Anti-Imperialist Struggle is key to Liberation”

See: here

14. "The United States only exists as a “guardian of liberty” for Haya de la Torre: we see in that country the most immediate danger and, in a historical sense the most threatening." (p101)

15. "to base a strategical calculation upon the idea that the United States is a permanent defender is something else. We consider the opportunist position not only erroneous but also profoundly dangerous because it creates a false perspective and hinders what is the real task, the revolutionary education of the people." (p101)

16. "Can it be that Haya de la Torre simply proceeds from the premise that the imperialist domination of the United States is a “lesser evil”….The “democracy” of the United States at the present time is nothing more than one expression of its imperialism." (p102)

17. "It is self-evident that one who considers the North American imperialist bourgeoisie the “guardian” of the colonial peoples liberty cannot seek an alliance with the North American workers." (p102-3)

All the above from “Haya de la Torre and Democracy”

18. "The attempt to represent this brawl of interests and appetites as a struggle between “democracy” and “fascism” can only dupe the working class." (p233)

19. "The Social Democracy and the Comintern are concluding deals with democratic imperialism “against fascism” and “against war”. But their “lesser evil” inescapably retreats before a greater evil." (p342)

The above from “Ten Years”.

Those quotes, just from one volume, should I think prove the point. No wonder the AWL deleted such an indictment of its method and its politics.

Having done that, what of the argument about Trotsky’s articles during the Third Period? In fact, what they have done is to misrepresent things as much as they did with the above quote, which turned Trotsky upside down by leaving out the vital last sentence from the quote. Of course, Trotsky distinguished in Germany between fascism and social democracy arguing they were not twins. But, that argument has nothing to do with distinguishing between “fascist” imperialism and “democratic” imperialism in a conflict BETWEEN states as the above quotes show. And Trotsky was talking here of the difference not between fascism and democracy, but between the Nazis and the Social-Democrats.

If we take the argument about fascism and democracy itself, for example in relation to Spain, then again the AWL’s argument is not that of Trotsky but that of Stalin and the Popular Front. In telling workers that “fascism” is a “greater evil” than “democracy” as opposed to two different masks for the same class oppression they drive the workers towards an alliance with the bourgeoisie as surely as did Stalin in Spain. Trotsky in Spain as much as in France for example in the “Action Programme” does not tell workers to fight for bourgeois democracy as a “lesser evil”. In fact, if you read what he says he is not actually arguing for a defence of bourgeois democracy at all; he is arguing for socialist revolution under cover of an inclusive struggle for bourgeois democratic freedoms. How could he do otherwise, the whole basis of Permanent Revolution is that, in the age of imperialism, bourgeois democracy can only be secured via proletarian, rather than bourgeois, revolution. Nothing of what he says either in relation to Spain or France is about defending bourgeois democracy per se. He does not speak about the struggle for bourgeois democracy being via alliances with the bourgeoisie, as the AWL end up with in terms of Israel/Iran, or imperialism in Iraq, or with Yeltsin in Russia, or Imperialism in Serbia, in Tibet and so on, but in violent opposition to that bourgeoisie, which will, even in its Liberal democratic form, tomorrow throw off that mask in favour of the fascist mask. He does not speak of waging that fight through bourgeois democratic means such as through Parliaments, but through the establishment of Factory Committees, Peasant Committees, and Workers Militia. He speaks, particularly in Spain, of a struggle for bourgeois democratic freedoms by the workers seizing the factories and property of the bourgeoisie!

The Action Programme for France

Again Trotsky stands on the opposite side of the barricades to the AWL.

Turning to their argument that we have all the experience of the period after the War which Trotsky’s writings could not address. They say Trotsky was wrong in his prognostication to the Palestinians. True, but was the general thrust of his argument correct? In Germany, the post war regime was hardly democratic was it? It was stuffed to the gills with former Nazis!!! They occupied prominent places not just as politicians but as high ranking Civil Servants and judges with the full approval of the imperialists! Whilst accommodating Nazis there were laws against socialists, which, for example, legally blacklisted them from various jobs, and that law remained in force as late as the 1970’s, it also covered censorship of various socialist ideas.

See Here

Or as its put here:

“Simpson, Christopher. The Splendid Blond Beast: Money, Law, and Genocide in the Twentieth Century. New York: Grove Press, 1993. 399 pages. Reprinted in 1996 by Common Courage Press, Box 702, Monroe ME 04951, Tel: 800-497-3207.

It's common to read biographies of men who waged war during the first half of the century, when issues were clear and warriors could be heroes. So when Christopher Simpson takes a look at two cases of genocide -- the slaughter of Armenians in World War I and Hitler's holocaust -- it's a surprise to discover that things are not so simple. Allen Dulles, for example, helped a number of Nazis to escape, and worked for the greater glory of postwar Germany, which also meant a better bottom line for the German industrialists he represented before the war. While later claiming to be unwilling victims of the Nazis, these industrialists were happy to contract with the SS for forced labor from concentration camps, because it was profitable. They got off easy at Nuremberg; the Allies felt that rapid reconstruction would be a hedge against revolution in war-ravaged Europe.

The larger point of this well-documented book is that complicity in genocide ranged far and wide, on both sides of the front in both wars. When it came time for accountability, international tribunals were stymied by the same machinations of privilege and power that started the problem in the first place. The structure of international law is weak, and easily overruled by elites who simply want to "get on with business."”

We also have as late as the late 1960's the attempt assassinate the student leader Rudi Dutschke because of his role alongside the Trade Unions to oppose the Emergency Laws which withdrew basic consitutional rights.

In France, the post war regime of De Gaulle was hardly a model of democracy nor its continued role in Algeria and other colonies. Let’s not forget DeGaulle’s Coup D’Etat in 1959 either. Nor was Britain a model of democracy in relation to its colonies and its tactics in Aden or against the Mau Mau. Japan has had a corrupt one Party state effectively under the rule of the LDP, for the last 60 years nearly.
Sean himself has written of the fact that in Britain what we have is an elected Dictatorship as opposed to bourgeois democracy. I seem to recall having read one of his articles somewhere where he also described De Gaulle’s regime as Bonapartist, and one of their comrades I have a vague recollection of claiming that Bonapartism was a normal condition for capitalism. Bonapartism might not be fascism, but its not bourgeois democracy either!

So, which version do the AWL want to have us believe; the version that “democratic imperialism” spreads bourgeois democracy and sweetness and light, or the version that Bonapartism and a decay of bourgeois democracy are endemic.

Finally, let us do what Sean asks and look at the experience of imperialism in the post war period and see how much “democracy” it has spread.

1940’s – handed over millions of people in Eastern Europe to Stalinist totalitarianism.

1950’s – supported corrupt and brutal military dictatorships in Korea and Vietnam and elsewhere. Overthrows democratic regime of Mossadegh in Iran, and installs Dictatorship of the Shah. In Latin America overthrows nationalist governments that challenge interests of US big business, and installs and supports corrupt military and semi-fascist dictators. British and French imperialism in conjunction with Israel launch invasion of Egypt, not for any democratic reason, but purely for profit and control of the Suez Canal.

1960’s - US imperialism takes over from French Imperialism in supporting military Dictatorship in South Vietnam, drops more bombs on Vietnamese than whole of Second World War, bombs non-combatant nations in Cambodia and Laos, paving the way for Pol Pot’s murderous regime in Cambodia. US having for a long time supported the corrupt Batista Dictatorship in Cuba, tries to put him back in power when Castro overthrows him. US continues to interfere in Latin America and support a range of fascistic and military regimes. France continues its less than democratic policy in Algeria and other colonies. Various imperialist powers support a range of fascistic and militaristic regimes in Africa from Haille Salassie to Idi Amin to Mobutu.

1970’s – US imperialism threatens to “destabilise” Italy if its people elect “Communist” government in democratic elections. Britain dismisses “democratically” elected Gough Whitlam Labour Government in Australia. US continues its less than democratic support for the military regime in South Vietnam, and its even less than democratic bombing of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. (Of course, the AWL’s mentor Max Shachtman supported that action, whilst the ideological creator of the “Third Camp” – James Burnham - had by that time gone the whole hog, and was supporting fascistic politics.) US continues to support Dictatorship of the Shah until he’s overthrown. US continues to intervene in Latin America. British imperialism introduces the not very democratic system of “internment” read concentration camps in Northern Ireland, a part of the State which hardly qualified as meeting basic bourgeois democratic norms for the Catholic population to begin with.

1980’s – US actively supports Dictatorship of Saddam Hussein including provision of conventional and chemical weapons in order that he can conduct a proxy war against Iran who whilst hardly qualifying as bourgeois democratic does unlike Iraq at least hold elections with competing parties. US does deal with Iran in Iran-Contra scandal in order to provide arms to the extreme right-wing and murderous contras in Nicaragua. US supports the semi-fascist regime, Death Squads and all in El Salvador. US invades Grenada because it doesn’t like the government there. Makes films about its great wartime success there to cover its defeat in Vietnam. US imperialism through its ally the military Dictatorship in Pakistan provides arms, and assistance to the clerical-fascist gangs in Afghanistan that seek to overthrow a Soviet backed modernising regime, and put in its place a medieval theocratic regime that murders and rapes gays and women. Creates its own Frankenstein in the form of Bin Laden. Imperialism in general continues to support militarist and fascistic Dictatorships around the world for example in Saudi Arabia, and other undemocratic regimes such as Jordan, Kuwait and other Sunni Arab oil states.

1990’s – Imperialism invades Iraq. Its long running active support for Apartheid in South Africa, however, does come to an end.

Yes, they are right we should take all that into consideration of the experience of “democratic” imperialism over the last 6o years, in assessing the two masks of imperialism – the democratic and the fascist.


Llin Davies