A WORLD TO WIN    #20   (1995)

 


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!