Long Live the Red First
of May 1994!
- Statement by the
Committee of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement
1 May 1994
Since the beginning of May First over one hundred
years ago, the class conscious proletarians have always used this
occasion to measure their strength, focus their struggles, examine
the current situation of their movement and reaffirm their goal
of carrying the struggle all the way through to the end - the achievement
of a world without classes, or communism.
What is the situation we face today? The world
is still reeling from the momentous events of the last few years
which brought about the collapse of the former Soviet bloc. The
Western imperialists were quick to leap upon this development as
proof that communism had disappeared from the earth. But those twisted
regimes of Eastern Europe and the former USSR were "communist" in
word only, and in those countries, like in the West, a small class
of exploiters lived off the labour of the working people and sought
to expand this exploitation to the far corners of the earth. Mao
Tsetung had long ago exposed these regimes as socialist only in
name but capitalist and imperialist in deeds.
So the genuine communists grouped in the Revolutionary
Internationalist Movement were not in any way deterred by the collapse
of the East bloc. Rather we were overjoyed at the collapse of one
set of reactionary rulers and saw in their fall the forerunner of
further shocks and crises that would shake the Western rulers and
their servant regimes as well.
And indeed this has been the case. The "new world
order" proclaimed by the U.S. imperialists has been shown to be
full of turmoil, strife and crisis. Even though the U.S. has committed
great crimes such as the invasion of Iraq, they have been unable
to prevent people from struggling. This can be seen most powerfully
in Peru where the Communist Party of Peru, a participant in RIM,
has continued to wage a powerful People's War against the reactionary
regime sponsored by U.S. imperialism, despite the difficulties involved
with the capture of the Chairman Gonzalo, the Party's leader.
In Mexico the armed peasant revolt in Chiapas shook
the whole country and brought the possibilities of revolution into
much sharper focus for millions around the world. In the Kurdish
regions of Turkey masses have continued to resist the barbaric counter-revolutionary
war of the Turkish reactionary regime. In for two years now, periodic
upheavals have punctured the reign of terror the Islamic Republic
has tried to impose on the people. In other nations oppressed by
imperialism, outbreaks of struggle are frequent.
In the U.S. itself powerful explosions of the masses
have taken place in Los Angeles and shown that even in the imperialist
heartlands there are armies of gravediggers waiting for the chance
to bury their oppressors.
In Palestine the U.S imperialists felt they could
impose a settlement that would bury the hopes of the Palestinian
people for a return to their homes and permanently establish and
sanctify Israel as an imperialist outpost in the Middle East. But
here too their vicious plans have encountered great difficulties.
The masses have seen that the treachery of Arafat and the massacre
at Hebron are two sides of the same reactionary coin.
All over the world, the conditions for the majority
of the people are becoming more and more difficult. In many places
they have long since become intolerable and the people yearn to
take up arms against their oppressors. The people are compelled
to struggle. World imperialism can only offer more exploitation,
further tightening of repression, hunger, disease and misery for
the majority of the population of the world. Even many of those
sections of the people who, in some countries and for some periods
of time, had a more tolerable existence are increasingly coming
under attack.
Why, then, are there so few struggles in the world
today with a genuine revolutionary perspective? A great reason,
of course, is the cowardly betrayal of those forces who claimed
the leadership of the people's struggles only to clamour after a
place at the servants' table. Some of those who previously postured
as opponents of imperialism are today openly protecting its interests.
And these misleaders and these betrayals do weigh heavily. Some
of the former friends of revolution lost heart under the fierce
anti-communist barrage of the class enemies.
But we cannot rest content to blame the current
state of affairs on the opportunists, revisionists and betrayers.
As the words of the Internationale put it, "We must ourselves decide
our duty, decide and do it well."
In order for revolution to advance, there must
be a revolutionary vanguard organisation and it must have the vanguard
ideology. Today that can only mean Marxism-Leninism-Maoism. This
is the proletarian ideology, the scientific ideology forged by Karl
Marx, V.I. Lenin and Mao Tsetung in the course of leading revolutionary
struggle of hundreds of millions of workers and peasants the world
over. It shows us how to fight and how to win. It shows the relation
between our struggle of today and the communist goal. Without it
we cannot understand the world correctly, and we would never be
able to change it.
The Revolutionary Internationalist Movement is
the only movement which joins together the vanguard parties of the
proletariat in different countries on the basis of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
It is the only international movement which, since its inception,
has been resolutely opposed to all of the imperialists and to the
revisionist and opportunist misleaders as well. Today our forces
are growing, both in strength and in their ideological and political
unity, waging the armed struggle for power in Peru and preparing
to launch the revolutionary struggle for power as soon as possible
in other countries, in accordance with the strategy for revolution
in each country.
Supporting the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement
is a task for all of the class conscious proletarians and revolutionary-minded
people. We are calling on our supporters to make further sacrifices
and donate financially to help RIM.
Comrades throughout the world should study and
apply the historic document Long Live Marxism-Leninism-Maoism!
Where there is no Marxist-Leninist-Maoist vanguard
party, those who are serious about revolution should take up the
fight to forge one. Where such organisations and parties exist,
they should be strengthened and helped to step up their revolutionary
activity.
The hatred of the existing system must be infused
with a scientific understanding of the nature of the current system
and how to destroy it. The hope for revolution must take on a concrete
programme for bringing it about. The desire for a new society must
be combined with a vision of what this society is. The Revolutionary
Internationalist Movement and its participating parties and organisations
are unifying the dreams of the oppressed with the power of the only
scientific ideology - Marxism-Leninism-Maoism!
Long
Live Marxism-Leninism-Maoism!
Celebrate
the 10th Anniversary of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement!
Contribute Funds to RIM!
Build
and Strengthen Maoist Parties United in RIM!
Support
the People's War in Peru!
Defend
the Life of Chairman Gonzalo!
Long
Live Proletarian Internationalism, Long Live the Red First of May!
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