Central Committee, Communist Party of Peru (September 1995)
Central Committee, Communist Party of Peru (September 1995)
Analyze Fujimori’s speech; which in summary, attempts to rewrite what he did in his first term, in the framework of the three tasks of the reactionaries and the plan of the imperialists, principally the Yankees, and the armed forces.
[Before, during or after the important dates, strive to unfold offensives and counteroffensives in accordance with the national situation and the specific conditions of each Committee, and in the framework of our counter-campaigns (campaigns).]
2. "The seizure of power by armed force, the settlement of the issue by war, is the central task and the highest from of revolution. This Marxist-Leninist principle of revolution holds good universally, for China and for all other countries."
3. "In China war is the main form of struggle and the army is the main form of organization. Others forms such as mass organization and mass struggle are also extremely important and indeed indispensable and in no circumstances to be overlooked, but their purpose is to serve the war. Before the outbreak of a war all organization and struggle are in preparation for the war, as in the period from the May 4th Movement of 1919 to the May 30th Movement of 1925. After war breaks out, all organization and struggle are coordinated with the war either directly or indirectly."
4. "Without armed struggle the proletariat and the Communist Party would have no standing at all in China, and it would be impossible to accomplish any revolutionary task."
5. "[We have learned that] without armed struggle neither the proletariat, nor the people, nor the Communist Party would have any standing at all in China and that it would be impossible for the revolution to triumph. In these years the development, consolidation and the bolshevization of our Party have proceeded in the midst of revolutionary wars; without armed struggle the Communist Party would assuredly not be what it is today. Comrades throughout the Party must never forget this experience for which we have paid in blood."
6. "According to the Marxist theory of the state, the army is the chief component of state power. Whoever wants to seize and retain state power must have a strong army. Some people ridicule us as advocates of the ‘omnipotence of war’. Yes, we are advocates of the omnipotence of revolutionary war; that is good, not bad, it is Marxist. The guns of the Russian Communist Party created socialism. We shall create a democratic republic. Experience in the class struggle in the era of imperialism teaches us that it is only by the power of the gun that the working class and the labouring masses can defeat the armed bourgeoisie and the landlords; in this sense we may say that only with guns can the whole world be transformed."
7. "The Red Army’s operations take the form of counter-campaigns against ‘encirclement and suppression’. For us victory means chiefly victory in combating ‘encirclement and suppression’, that is, strategic victory and victories in campaigns. The fight against each encirclement and suppression’ campaign constitutes a counter-campaign, which usually comprises several or even scores of battles, big and small. Until an ‘encirclement and suppression’ campaign has been basically smashed, one cannot speak of strategic victory or of victory in the counter-campaign as a whole, even though many battles may have been won. The history of the Red Army’s decade of war is a history of counter-campaigns against ‘encirclement and suppression’."
8. "In the enemy’s ‘encirclement and suppression’ campaigns and the Red Army’s counter-campaigns against them, the two forms of fighting, offensive and defensive, are both employed, and here there is no difference from any other war, ancient or modern, in China or elsewhere. The special characteristic of China’s civil war, however, is the repeated alternation of the two forms over a long period of time. In each ‘encirclement and suppression’ campaign, the enemy employs the offensive against the Red Army’s defensive, and the Red Army employs the defensive against his offensive; this is the first stage of a counter-campaign against ‘encirclement and suppression’. Then the enemy employs the defensive against the Red Army’s offensive, and the Red Army employs the offensive against his defensive; this is the second stage of the counter-campaign. Every ‘encirclement and suppression’ campaign has these two stages, and they alternate over a long period.
By repeated alternation over a long period we mean the repetition of this pattern of warfare and these forms of fighting. This is a fact obvious to everybody. An ‘encirclement and suppression’ campaign and a counter-campaign against it--such is the repeated pattern of the war. In each campaign the alternation in the forms of fighting consists of the first stage in which the enemy employs the offensive against our defensive and we meet his offensive with our defensive, and of the second stage in which the enemy employs the defensive against our offensive and we meet his defensive with our offensive."
9. "2. The subjective forces of the revolution have indeed been greatly weakened since the defeat of the revolution in 1927. The remaining forces are very small and those comrades who judge by appearances alone naturally feel pessimistic. But if we can judge by essentials, it is quite another story. Here we can apply the old Chinese saying, ‘A single spark can start a prairie fire’. In other words, our forces, although small at present, will grow rapidly. In the conditions prevailing in China, their growth is not only possible but indeed inevitable."
10. "With the exception of only a few chapters, every more important part of the annals of the revolution from 1848 to 1849 carries the heading: Defeat of the revolution! What succumbed in these defeats was not the revolution. It was the pre-revolutionary traditional appendages, results of social relationships which had not yet come to the point of sharp class antagonisms--persons, illusions, conceptions, projects from which the revolutionary party before the February Revolution was not free, from which it could be freed not by the victory of February, but only by a series of defeats. In a word: the revolution made progress, forged ahead, not by its immediate tragicomic achievements, but on the contrary by the creation of a powerful, united counter-revolution, by the creation of an opponent in combat with whom, only, the party of overthrow ripened into a really revolutionary party."
11. "...but at the same time the major prerequisites for helping the struggle in the cities and hastening the rise of the revolutionary tide are specifically the development of the struggle in the countryside, the establishment of Red political power in small areas, and the creation and expansion of the Red Army."
12. "...only concentration will enable us to wipe out comparatively large enemy units and occupy towns. Only after we have wiped out comparatively large enemy units and occupied towns can we arouse the masses on a broad scale and set up political power extending over a number of adjoining counties. Only thus can we make a widespread impact (what we call ‘extending our political influence’), and contribute effectively to speeding the day of the revolutionary high tide."
13. "As to dividing our forces over a wide radius, it is possible only on the two conditions that circumstances are comparatively favourable and the leading bodies fairly strong."
14. "The more adverse the circumstances, the greater the need for concentrating our forces and for the leaders to be resolute in struggle, because only thus can we have internal unity against the enemy. Only in favourable circumstances is it advisable to divide our forces for guerrilla operations, and it is only then that the leaders need not stay with the ranks all the time, as they must in adverse circumstances."
15. "To extend stable base areas, employ the policy of advancing in waves; when pursued by a powerful enemy, employ the policy of circling around."
16. "...revisionism is an agent of the bourgeoisie in the ranks of the proletariat, and so it provokes splits. It divides the communist movement and Communist Parties, it divides the trade union movement, and it breaks up and divides the people’s movement."
"Revisionism obviously is a cancer, a cancer that has to be ruthlessly eliminated. Otherwise we won’t be able to advance the revolution. Remembering what Lenin said, in a concise way, we must forge ahead on two questions, the question of revolutionary violence, and the relentless struggle against opportunism, against revisionism."
"Revisionism has already lost out, it’s only a matter of time. The problem is already defined, the rubbish has begun to be swept away, burned away; as I said, it’s only a matter of time. The process of their demise began years ago. And if we go back further, to the beginnings, the ‘ball game’ was lost when they became revisionists, when they abandoned their principles..."
17. "Make trouble, fail, make trouble again, fail again . . . till their doom; that is the logic of the imperialists and all reactionaries the world over in dealing with the people’s cause, and they will never go against this logic. This is a Marxist law. When we say ‘imperialism is ferocious,’ we mean that its nature will never change, that the imperialists will never lay down their butcher knives, that they will never become Buddhas, till their doom."
"Fight, fail, fight again, fail again, fight again...till their victory; that is the logic of the people, and they too will never go against this logic. This is another Marxist law. The Russian people’s revolution followed this law, and so has the Chinese people’s revolution."
18. "The existence of serious weaknesses in the War of Resistance may lead to many setbacks, retreats, internal splits, betrayals, temporary and partial compromises and other such reverses. Therefore it should be realized that the war will be an arduous and protracted war. But we are confident that, through the efforts of our party and the whole people, the resistance already started will sweep aside all obstacles and continue to advance and develop."
19. "We are here in circumstances which some think to be a great defeat. They are dreaming. Today we say to them this is only a bend in the road. Nothing more! A bend in the middle of the road. And though the road is long, we shall travel it to the end. We will reach our goal and we will win! You will see it."
20. "...one does not play at insurrection, one does not play at revolution. But when one raises the banner of insurrection, when one takes up arms, there’s no taking down the banner, it must be held high and never lowered until victory. This is what he taught us, no matter how much it costs us! Marx has armed us then, as Lenin has, and, principally Chairman Mao Tsetung taught us about the price we have to pay--what it means to annihilate in order to preserve, what it means to hold high the banner, come what may."
21. "Have we gone through difficult times? Yes. But what has reality shown us? That if we persist, keep politics in command, follow our political strategy, follow our military strategy, if we have a clear and defined plan, then we will advance, and we are capable of facing any bloodbath."
22. "THE PEOPLE’S WAR WILL INEVITABLY WIN!"
Analyze Fujimori’s speech; which in summary, attempts to rewrite what
he did in his first term, in the framework of the three tasks of the reactionaries
and the plan of the imperialists, principally the Yankees, and the armed
forces.
Once more the country was shaken by the raging flames of the People’s War, from the Principal Region to the capital itself, the zone of operations of the Metropolitan Committee. In this way, in the Ayacucho Zone Committee, we defeated the sinister "encirclement and suppression" campaigns of the genocidal and sellout armed forces. We went around base number seven and base fourteen, agitating and mobilizing the masses, carrying out seizures of cars on the Ayacucho-San Francisco highway, and wiping out mesnadas [paramilitary groups--trans.] in Ccano; in Yanamonte a tractor belonging to the old State was sabotaged; in base 33 (Ene River) enemy forces were wiped out and cattle were taken to feed the "Red Bastion" Revolutionary Base Area and the forces of the People’s Liberation Army, and as a complement to this, there were ambushes, wiping out and harassing of enemy bases. Similarly, the Cangallo-Fajardo Zone Committee carried out a magnificent incursion in La Mar, Vilcashuaman, and Cangallo, right under the nose of the counterinsurgency bases, resulting in confiscation of more than 30 boxes of dynamite and a radio transmitter. Meanwhile, the Huancavelica Zone Committee carried out the stunning Supaymayo-Lachoc ambush, wiping out 9 police (including a major), and confiscating 9 HK rifles. In addition, magnificent ambushes were carried out in the Huallaga Regional Committee, wiping out more than 50 special forces (commandos), confiscating one MAG machine gun, an RPG rocket launcher, more than 30 FAL, M-16 and AKM rifles and a radio transmitter. And in Lima, the Metropolitan Committee and Socorro Popular placed powerful car bombs at the Maria Angola tourist hotel and the home of the lackey congressman Joy Way. These are just a few of the most notable of all the actions carried out during the July offensives; there were also actions in the north, the south, and the center, such as the ambush at Pichanaki.
For all the above reasons we say that our plan has been successfully brought to a close. In this way we also have celebrated the 15th anniversary of the invincible People’s War, smashing the dried-up cackling of the genocidal and sellout Hermoza Rios and Fujimori, who said repeatedly that "in July 95 Sendero Luminoso will be wiped out." Once more they have suffered a defeat, and they have had to swallow their own rotten vomit. The same goes for the revisionists and capitulationists of the right opportunist line, who made the dark prediction in 93 that the People’s War could not be maintained because "conditions do not exist."
It is important that we recognize and give a heartfelt salute to the extraordinary Heroism and Great Firmness on the part of the Base Areas in withstanding suffering and sacrifice. These masses are an example to all the Peruvian people and they deserve our great respect and admiration; together with the People’s Liberation Army and the Communist Party of Peru, they struggle shoulder to shoulder to maintain the New Power, whatever the cost; developing a new economy, new politics, new culture.
Also we salute the heroic militants and combatants of the Communist
Party of Peru and the People’s Liberation Army, who by putting politics
in command, being always guided by Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, Gonzalo Thought,
have won victory after victory, overcoming all difficulties, always holding
high the banners of the People’s War, always fighting against imperialism,
reaction and revisionism.
In terms of the cities, we uphold the criterion of a single people’s war, but with the specific feature in this period of developing a gradual advance, seeking to fuse people’s war with the class struggle of the proletariat and the broad masses of the poor neighborhoods and the shantytowns; at all times applying the concept of two hills [the enemy and the people--trans.] and laying the bases for insurrection.
BUILDING: Smashing revisionism, develop a General Reorganization of the Party.
In the countryside for some time now a corporativist militarization has been developing, with the aim of shackling the peasant masses; therefore only through armed struggle and political mobilization can we incorporate the peasantry into the People’s War, eliminating step by step the control and pressures exercised over them by the repressive forces and the paramilitary groups [mesnadas] (Resettlement without repressive forces! Resettlement without paramilitary groups [mesnadas]! Civil Defense is criminal defense!)
In the cities this government has set up an almost fascist police control, run by the armed forces; this must be exposed and defeated. Because of this we must pay a lot of attention to the relationship between open and secret work, aiming at developing secret work. In all we do, we must be better than the reactionaries!
TWO-LINE STRUGGLE: Develop two-line struggle against the revisionist and capitulationist right opportunist line (ROL).
Study these documents: The Struggle Against Revisionism; Lenin and the
Proletarian Revolution; and Khrushchev’s Revisionism.
[Before, during or after the important dates, strive to unfold offensives
and counteroffensives in accordance with the national situation and the
specific conditions of each Committee, and in the framework of our counter-campaigns
(campaigns).]
Peru, September 1995
Central Committee
COMMUNIST PARTY OF PERU
Translated by the U.S. Committee
to Support the Revolution in Peru
Committee to Support the Revolution in Peru
PO Box 1246, Berkeley, California 94701
415-252-5786 * Fax: 415-252-7414