08.11.2001

Taliban bloc

Bob Pitt replies to criticism of his support for reactionary anti-imperialists

Ian Donovan obviously enjoys writing long articles, but his capacity for churning out words is unfortunately in inverse proposition to his ability to address his opponent?s arguments. His idea of a response to criticism, apparently, is simply to reassert his original views, at even greater length (Weekly Worker October 25). In reply, I will restrict myself to a few of the main points at issue.

Whereas Lenin argued in a polemic against Piatakov that it was impermissible to side with ?reactionary classes? in a struggle against imperialism, Trotsky, with his support for the Abyssinian feudal emperor against Italy and his backing for the ?barbarian? monarch of Tunis in a hypothetical conflict with French imperialism, evidently did not share Lenin?s position on this issue.

This difference of opinion was not related to the existence or non-existence of colonialism. Lenin was writing in 1915, at which time - in case it has escaped Ian?s attention - the major imperialist powers were in possession of formal colonial empires on a large scale.

The obvious conclusion is that, in endorsing Lenin?s view, Ian fundamentally disagrees with Trotsky?s. But Ian cannot bring himself to admit it. And this from a man who accuses me of being a ?biblicist?!

Ian must know perfectly well that I am the last person to be accused of Trotskyist orthodoxy. With regard to Trotsky?s writings, my attitude is very much in line with Ira Gershwin?s view, that the words that you?re liable to read in the bible ain?t necessarily so.

I believe Trotsky was wrong on the character of the epoch, the transitional method, the class character of the Soviet Union, the causes of the degeneration of the Bolshevik Revolution, the need for Leninist methods of organisation and much else besides. In fact the last time I met Ian I argued with him that Trotsky was entirely mistaken in condemning the Popular Front pact that was concluded in Spain to contest the February 1936 elections - an argument which produced a horrified reaction from Ian!

My attitude to Lenin is the same. I think that Piatakov was correct in 1915 when he argued that imperialism is our ?mortal enemy?, and I regard Lenin?s formulation as one-sided and undialectical.

It is also worth noting that the early Comintern, which Ian apparently regards as the fount of revolutionary theory, did not necessarily agree with Lenin on this question.

Lenin?s Preliminary draft theses on the national and colonial questions from the Second Congress of the Communist International, with their emphasis on ?the need to combat pan-islam and similar trends, which strive to combine the liberation movement against European and American imperialism with an attempt to strengthen the position of the khans, landowners, mullahs, etc?, were in fact substantially amended by the congress. The final version referred to the necessity of opposing movements which tried to tie the struggle against European and US imperialism to ?the strengthening of the power of Turkish and Japanese imperialism, the nobility, the big landlords, the clergy, etc?, which gives this section of the theses an entirely different emphasis.

Nor was it the case that Trotsky?s support for ?reactionary classes? in their struggle against imperialism was based on opposition to colonialism as such. Another familiar quotation from Trotsky - much used during the Malvinas War - states that, in the event of a military conflict between Britain and a ?fascist? regime in Brazil, he would be ?on the side of ?fascist? Brazil against ?democratic? Great Britain?. This position scarcely derived from Brazil?s status as a colony, as the country had acquired independence from Portugal back in 1822.

Anyway, does it really make such a difference whether a major capitalist state pursues its imperialist interests through colonial conquest or by other means? At no point throughout the past century has the US ruling class set out to establish a formal colonial empire along the lines of the old European powers. But just because the victims of US imperialism are not colonial subjects, does this make their sufferings any less appalling or their resistance any less legitimate?

Let us take the example of Vietnam. Whereas France waged a bloody war against a communist-led insurgency in order to retain Vietnam as a colonial possession, the US waged a bloody war against a communist-led insurgency in order to impose a US puppet regime. Does Ian honestly believe that, from the standpoint of the anti-imperialist struggle, there was some fundamental, qualitative difference between the two cases? After US forces carpet-bombed NLF-held areas, napalmed villages, poisoned the land with chemical defoliant and massacred women and children, does Ian imagine that Vietnamese peasants turned to each other and said, ?Well, let?s be fair to the Americans: at least they?re not trying to colonise us like those bastard French did??

Is the arrogant imperialist bullying of Cuba any less oppressive because the aim of the US is to replace the Castro government with one made up of rightwing exiles from Miami, rather than to impose direct rule from Washington? Are the hundreds of thousands of children who have died in Iraq as a result of sanctions any less dead because the aim of the US is not direct colonial conquest? With his endlessly repeated insistence that the end of old-style colonialism has essentially changed the character of imperialism, I think Ian has lost any sense of what is really going on in the world.

Ian claims that favouring a victory for the Taliban forces over US and British imperialism is to line up against the Afghan people on the side of their oppressors. In support of this he quotes a claim by the Revolutionary Association of Afghan Women that ?no Afghan ... will be deceived by the ?nationalistic? gestures of Taliban?, and asks what I think of it.

I would answer by quoting the words of the late Abdul Haq, the former Mujahedin commander recently captured and executed by the Taliban, who on the eve of war warned the US against attacking his country: ?I know my people. If they are bombed, they will close ranks ... when the bombs fall, the Taliban will say, ?The Americans are trying to kill us. We must fight.? They will fight. Despite everything the Taliban has done to destroy human rights, to destroy care of people?s health, education, their livelihoods, they will fight. Afghans will always unite in the face of what they see as a foreign enemy ...?

I believe that the Afghan people (or at least the Pashtun community, to which Haq was evidently referring) are absolutely correct in seeing the need to bloc with the Taliban against the main enemy - which at the present time is emphatically not at home.

Ian argues that a military defeat for US and British imperialism at the hands of the Taliban could possibly lead to the overthrow of the existing regimes in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, etc, by militant Islamists. He regards such a prospect with ?horror?. Leaving aside the fact that the same thing might just as well occur in the event of a victory for US and British forces, as the result of a backlash by the masses against those regimes that have failed to take a stand against the slaughter of fellow muslims in Afghanistan, is Ian really arguing that the continued existence of the Saudi monarchy or the Pakistani military dictatorship should be favoured as the ?lesser evil??

It is obvious that the declarations of Osama bin Laden have a huge resonance among the masses: ?A million innocent children are dying at this time as we speak, killed in Iraq without any guilt. We hear no denunciation, we hear no edict from the hereditary rulers. In these days, Israeli tanks rampage across Palestine, in Ramallah, Rafah and Beit Jala and many other parts of the land of islam, and we do not hear anyone raising his voice or reacting. But when the sword fell upon America ... hypocrisy raised its head up high.?

These are sentiments that are shared by millions, and have turned bin Laden into a popular hero, a sort of islamic fundamentalist Che Guevara. No Marxist would identify with bin Laden?s reactionary ideology (and in the past, I agree with Ian, we should have been for the victory of the Soviet-backed PDPA government in Afghanistan against bin Laden and his fellow Mujahedin). But does Ian really believe that there is nothing legitimate or potentially progressive in the current mass support for bin Laden?s anti-imperialist rhetoric? If so, he really has lost the plot.

It may well be that the main beneficiaries of this mass anti-imperialist sentiment will be the militant islamist organisations. But if the secular leftist forces are to stand any chance of countering this development, they will have to find a hearing among the masses who are influenced by militant islamism. In my opinion, this cannot be done by demanding that the masses ?condemn? the September 11 attacks, by issuing ultimatist slogans such as ?oppose islamic fundamentalism? or, least of all, by refusing to take sides in the imperialist war against the Taliban.

Finally, while it would perhaps be too much to expect an honest polemic from someone who claims that I ?supported the ?victory? of the grotesquely chauvinist, anti-Albanian Milosevic tyranny against the overwhelming majority of Kosova?s people? (where did he get that from?), I must take up Ian?s accusation that I ?deviously hide? my views from those with whom I work in the anti-war movement. On the contrary, at our last local Stop the War meeting, I specifically mentioned my view that a military victory for the Taliban would be the best outcome, in order to underline the point that we all held political views which others in the campaign would not necessarily accept and that it was therefore necessary to find common ground in our opposition to the war.