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"It's Right to Rebel!" echoes throughout Peru--from remote mountain and jungle villages, from occupied universities, and from the immense shantytowns that surround Lima. The downtrodden of Peru have risen up in a revolutionary storm. It is the first taste of real justice and power for indigenous people who have been held down for centuries. The government of Peru has countered this threat with vicious slaughter and repression, and the U.S. government has aided and directed these efforts, building a Vietnam-style firebase under the phony "war on drugs," sending Green Berets on "training missions," and supplying CIA advisors and equipment to Peru's secret police. In 1992, these counter-insurgency police managed to capture Dr. Abimael Guzmán, leader of the revolution and Chairman of the Communist Party of Peru, but the struggle continues defiantly in the face of this and many difficulties. It is right for all who stand with the oppressed to find out the truth about what is happening in Peru; to step forward and join with the Committee to Support the Revolution in Peru (CSRP), to struggle in opposition to Yankee intervention and in solidarity with the People's War in Peru.
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The People's War is led by the Partido Comunista del Peru-PCP (often called Shining Path or Sendero Luminoso in the press), and has based itself on the revolutionary principals developed by Marx, Lenin, and Mao. The armed struggle began in 1980, among the indigenous peasants of the highlands, and has spread throughout Peru to every corner of the nation. The PCP is following the Maoist strategy of protracted People's War, which allows it to start small, develop base areas in the countryside, and eventually surround the cities in order to seize nationwide power. And it is based on self reliance--not reliance on one imperialist power or another. In the base areas of the revolution a new political power is flowering. Those who have never had any real power--the workers and peasants, along with progressive forces among the middle classes--are driving out the oppressive bastions of the old order that have enforced poverty and misery on the majority of Peru's people. The common people are establishing their own People's Committees, creating a new politics, economics and culture. Land is distributed first to those who have none. The people, working collectively, plant crops which meet their needs instead of feeding the export-oriented Peruvian economy. Centuries of tradition are broken with. Indigenous women, the most downtrodden of all in Peruvian society, are liberated to step forward as revolutionary fighters, commanders in the army and leaders of the Party. The new society being forged in these remote mountain villages brings forth a vision of advancing the whole world revolution toward the ultimate abolition of all forms of domination--class, gender, race and national.
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The revolutionary uprising of the Peruvian people poses a major threat to U.S. plans for a New World Order. Peru, like other countries of the "Third World," has long been kept in a state of enforced backwardness while its economy has been bled to fill the needs of the wealthy imperialist countries. Peru reels under the weight of a crushing foreign debt, and President Fujimori's recent attempts to bail out the economy, by auctioning off national resources and other important assets, has only raised unemployment and exploitation. Only 20% of the population is fully employed. Millions of displaced peasants crowd Lima's shantytowns, which often have no running water or services of any kind. The revolution will change all this by overthrowing the government that keeps these oppressive relations in place and by building a new revolutionary society based on self-sufficiency to serve the people, not profit. A victorious Maoist revolution in Peru would send shock waves throughout Latin America and beyond. This is a challenge that the U.S. rulers cannot tolerate. A U.S.-led slander campaign of lies in the media, labelling the revolutionaries in Peru as "terrorists" and as being in league with drug traffickers, is a critical part of efforts to "demonize" the revolution and create a pretext for ongoing U.S. intervention. Peru has been the largest recipient of U.S. aid in Latin America since 1994.
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The People's War has developed for 16 years. Yet the struggle now faces a new challenge--the most critical moment in its history--where everything the Peruvian people have fought for and sacrificed for is at stake. Within the context of Dr. Guzmán's capture and other difficulties, a political line has emerged from within the ranks of the PCP calling on people to end or postpone the People's War, and to fight instead for "peace negotiations" with the Peruvian regime. The PCP Central Committee has rejected this call, vowing to fight against it, and has continued to lead the armed struggle. The Maoist parties and organizations of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (RIM) have called on people the world over to criticize and repudiate the peace negotiations position, and to take up the battle to defend the People's War in Peru and to support the PCP as they struggle to march foward toward nationwide victory in the face of these difficulties. In a time when the imperialists have boasted that communist revolution is dead and buried--and the so-called leaders of many struggles have cut deals that sell out the people's interests--the revolution in Peru stands apart as a beacon for millions of people around the world. If you hate oppression and U.S. intervention; if you refuse to swallow the hype that the "New World Order" is all-powerful and unstoppable; if you want to stand with a struggle that goes straight up against the brutal ugliness of U.S. power and aims ultimately to build a whole new world, then we urge you to contact the CSRP.
Committee to Support the Revolution in Peru
PO Box 1246, Berkeley, California 94701
415-252-5786 * Fax: 415-252-7414