Agents Provocateurs

In the 1980's, many on the Left believed that the Revolutionary Communist Party were agent provocateurs. The state was already known to have massively infiltrated the labour movement, with hundreds of union and LP officials on the payroll of Special Branch and the Secret Service, and with sleepers, and undercover agents infiltrating any and every organisation even mildly critical of the status quo, many of them literally “sleeping with the enemy”. The police state openly had its representatives in post office sorting offices, as one CWU member told me, which opened and read communications going to known activists. They routinely tapped phones, and bugged the offices of trades unions, as happened with the NUM during the 1984 strike. The use of agents provocateurs and false flag operations, both to gain information on your opponents, and to muddy the waters, bringing opprobrium and ridicule on to them, is a well established tactic in the armoury of the state. So, it would not have been surprising for the state to have at least sown the seeds to create the strange plant that appeared in the form of the RCP, whose positions were from the beginning, to say the least, bizarre.

Today, the RCP goes under a profusion of different names, having gone through the stage of the Living Marxism magazine, and then appearing as the Institute of Ideas, Academy of Ideas, Spiked amongst a plethora of other persona. Indeed, not only do its members operate in exactly the same way that Internet trolls do, by their continual interventions that seem designed only to be controversial and provoke a response, but they mirror the actions of trolls who also assign to themselves a huge array of different persona through which they make their interventions into debates, the result always being to muddy the waters and to make rational debate difficult. Moreover, one has to wonder why it is that those associated with the RCP and its numerous front organisations, like Claire Fox, Ella Whelan, or Brendan O' Neill have been able to obtain the fawning of the mainstream media, when they represent so very little. Even in terms of the micro sects that littered the landscape of the British far left, the RCP were always at the most micro end of the spectrum, and yet, barely a day goes by when the BBC or Sky does not have one of these individuals gracing our screens, and that was even before Lady Fox, joined with Farage to promote ultra nationalist reaction.

But, whether the RCP and its inheritors were, or are, agent provocateurs in the pay of the state is really irrelevant. Their activities amount essentially to the same thing. Their weird and wacky politics have always acted to muddy the waters, to discredit the Left, and to provide succour to the Right. Like the trolls, they act to make it more difficult for rational discussion, and they tie up the real Left in clearing away all of the shit they throw over that rational discussion. It is, of course, also the method used by the Russian trolls used by Putin to muddy the waters in democratic debate, particularly during elections, or as in the EU referendum. Its no wonder that so many of these elements found their way into the camp of Putin's friend Farage. The way these trolls and agents provocateurs muddy the waters, and undermine the Left can be seen in this comment by Labour MP Johnathan Reynolds, and the response to it, by some on the Left.

Responding to the “Resist and Act for Freedom Rally”, Reynolds commented,

“I choose the opposite side to these people, on all matters.”

Hiscomment was quoted approvingly by Andrew Coates on his blog. But, Reynolds approach demonstrates precisely what has been wrong with the mindless approach of much of the Left on a whole series of questions. It is the opposite of the approach that a Marxist should take, of analysing the facts, and then coming forward with an independent working-class position, based upon it. We do not say, “our enemies enemy is our friend”. In the 19^th century, as Marx describes in The Communist Manifesto, after capitalism had become dominant, the landed aristocracy continued to undertake a rearguard action against it, trying to defend its own established privileges, and prevent the further forward development of capital. But, just, because, by this time, a large working-class had begun to confront the forces of capital that did not in any way mean that they would ally with the landed aristocracy in that endeavour. The bourgeoisie was now the enemy of the working-class, and the landed aristocracy were the enemy of the bourgeoisie, but that did not in any way make the working-class the friend of the landed aristocracy or vice versa.

And, that same idea was pursued by Lenin, in the 1890's. The Narodniks presented themselves as the enemies of the bourgeoisie, but they did so by trying to hold back the further development of capitalism, and by promoting the interests of the small producers. However, as Lenin points out the interests of the independent small producer was inseparable from the social conditions under which it existed, that of Russian landlordism. Socialists certainly had no interest in promoting that as against the development of capitalism, which was, in fact, the means of the further development to Socialism.

As Trotsky points out in “Learn To Think”, we do not determine our positions by simply placing a minus sign wherever our opponents place a plus sign. The positions adopted by the trolls, the agent provocateurs, or simply the seriously deluded and confused are idiotic, but simply adopting, as a knee-jerk response, the opposite of those positions, means that you end up with equally idiotic positions yourself, now simply with a positive rather than a negative sign in front of them! So, for example, we see some people adopt a position of opposition to imperialism, and on that basis, they conclude that their friends must then also be, other enemies of imperialism. Yet, just as Marx points out that the landed aristocracy were enemies of the bourgeoisie, but no friend of the working-class, just because someone is an enemy of imperialism, also does not make them a friend of the working-class. Pol Pot was an enemy of imperialism, but he was no friend of the working-class. The mullahs in Iran are enemies of imperialism, but they are no friends of the working-class. Yet, sections of the Left have allied themselves with these reactionary class forces, simply on this basis of placing a plus sign where there enemies place a minus sign. If Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas etc. are enemies of imperialism, they conclude, then they must be friends of ours!

A good example of the mindlessness of that approach is illustrated by the comment in the above post by Jim Denham, who responded to my comment along the above lines. Denham says,

“Of course, you’re correct about the “anti imperialist” left’s asinine record of siding with all sorts of reactionaries on the basis of “my enemy’s enemy is my friend” (cases in point: the SWP, the Stop the war Coalition, etc, etc) … but in the case of pro-Trump conspiracy theorists, I for one have no objection to operating on that general principle.”

Of course, that was not what Trotsky had in mind when he advised his followers to Learn To Think, and Denham's mindless approach collapsed on first contact with reality. The organisation he belongs to the Alliance for Workers Liberty, bases itself on the ideas of the petty-bourgeois Third Camp of James Burnham and Max Shachtman. As Trotsky described at length, it abandoned Marxist materialism in favour of petty bourgeois subjectivism. But, the SWP is also part of that tradition. As subjectivists and moralists, their starting point is always some Kantian Categorical Moral Imperative. For the SWP that is opposition to imperialism, for the AWL it is opposition to anti bourgeois-democratic forces. Of course, in practice, this is not absolute either. The SWP does not seem to oppose Iranian or Russian expansionism, for example, whilst the AWL does not seem to mind backing anti-democratic forces provided they are the allies of the democratic imperialism it now sees as the rightful agent of progressive change in the world.

So, for example, the AWL is a big supporter of Israel, and the Israeli state. And, likewise, it is a big opponent of Iran. But wait. Trump and his supporters are also big supporters of Israel, and Israel is a big supporter of Trump (and likewise with Johnson), so then, mustn't Denham and the AWL, place a minus sign where Trump and his supporters have placed a plus sign? Mustn't Denham and the AWL declare that, if Trump is a friend of Israel, the AWL must surely now be its enemy? And, likewise, Trump is an enemy of Iran, and vice versa. So, now, must not the AWL declare itself a friend of Iran? Of course, the question was asked of Denham, but answer back came there none.

I watched the interviews with some of the people who turned up to Trafalgar Square this last weekend to protest about the lockdowns, and of course, the media picked probably the nuttiest of the nutty, so as to make their case, but it is quite clear that most of those that turned up are at best highly deluded, and at worst they are acting like every other troll, and agent provocateur to muddy the waters, and prevent rational debate. You can't rationally debate COVID19 or the lockdown, if you start from the premise that the virus does not exist, when clearly it does, any more than you can rationally debate climate change if you deny it is occurring when clearly it is. The role of the agent provocateur is to provide Aunt Sallies that can be easily knocked down, and in the process to demonise others who challenge the dominant ideas of society. So, for example in a discussion on Sophie Ridge on Sunday, Professor Sunetra Gupta, who has argued that the lockdown is ineffective, and damages the interests of the poorest and most vulnerable, was attacked for putting forward a position based upon Libertarian principles. Quite the opposite was true. As she said her position was based upon communitarian principles of protecting the vulnerable. But, attacking her on the basis of some supposed Libertarian motives acted to muddy the waters, and avoided the need to actually answer the facts and the science that she put forward.

The vast majority of those that turned up to the rallies organised by the Right are people who are highly deluded, some will have some kind of mental disorder. The Ickeheads who think that there is some global conspiracy by alien lizard people clearly need some kind of treatment. But, these people are also being manipulated by people who do not believe any of that nonsense, but are prepared to draw in others to give them influence, or the appearance of having support. Fascists have always worked in that way. But fascist organisations are also infiltrated and manipulated by the state. What is clear is that powerful forces created a moral panic in relation to COVID19. Pressure from a mass, as a result of that moral panic, forced an elite to respond by imposing lockdowns. The lockdowns inevitably failed to deal with the virus, whilst equally inevitably causing global economic catastrophe that capital cannot allow to continue. It is desperately trying to avoid lockdowns, but cannot admit that its representatives made a once in a century mistake in imposing them in the first place. It is looking to other alternatives such as test and trace, which will also inevitably fail.

In the meantime, those that promoted and pursued these insane policies must prevent rational discussion of them, and their failure. The actions of the conspiracy nutters, the pro-Trump supporters, the Ickeheads and so on, act as a convenient distraction and Aunt Sally, discrediting any rational opposition to the current failed strategies. A left that has learned to think has to cut through all of that crap, and instead of simply adopting the position of my enemy's enemy is my friend, it must calmly analyse the facts, and develop an independent working-class position. That position most certainly is not to simply call for the failed lockdowns to be implemented more harshly, or for a test and trace strategy, which has also failed miserably, and will continue to fail miserably, to replace it. The only rational strategy as it has always been, is to protect the vulnerable minority, the 20% of the population actually at serious risk, and to allow the 80% to go about life as normal, so as to rapidly create herd immunity, thereby preventing the further spread of the virus.