[EMAIL PROTECTED] DHKP Bulletin No: 18 Date: January 1, 2002
HISTORY IS ON OUR SIDE, THE FUTURE IS OURS! ======================================== 2001: The imperialists saw that they could not make the world's peoples surrender! 2002: Imperialism's attacks and the resistance by the world's peoples will grow! 2001 was a year of hunger, war, tyranny and resistance. There were a number of important developments. Theories, claims and policies were put to the test. The clouds of error hanging over the last 10 years began to be dispelled. The class struggle intensified in every corner of world, in every area. But what makes the year 2001 important in world history is not that the class struggle continued but that the reality of its continuation was seen in all dimensions. 2001 has this significance: it was the end of a period which started at the beginning of the 1990s, when the collapse of the USSR gave rise to sermons about the eternal victory of capitalism and the end of the class war. From now on, imperialism no longer utters cries of triumph over revolutionary struggles, national and class liberation struggles and socialism. On the contrary, it is gazing at a nightmare. More than two years ago it gave this nightmare a name when it said "the 21st century will be the century of uprisings." The nightmare grew worse in 2001. The nightmares were of city squares echoing to the slogans of "death to capitalism". It was confronted by the anger of the world's peoples, expressed in various forms. Also, a nightmare for it was that it could not eliminate the ideology of socialism, nor physically eliminate the revolutionaries as easily as had been hoped. This was what they saw. The armed and unarmed struggles for revolution and for the national liberation of the peoples continued. People's liberation wars went on in the countries of Latin America, Africa and Asia, from Turkey to Colombia, from Sri Lanka and Palestine to Nepal. On the world scale, hundreds of thousands came out against the pro-American new world order of "globalisation" and the system's economics and politics... On September 11, the anger of the oppressed struck at America's economic and military heart.... For over a year there has been a great resistance to the policies of imperialism and Turkey's oligarchy, who were trying to bring about surrender. And the worldwide banditry by imperialism and the policies of terror and oppression in imperialist centres. were the main aspects of the reality of class war in 2001. Theories about "the death of socialism" , "farewell to the proletariat" and the end of the class war were put to rest. This was because the source of the theories, that imperialism had changed its spots, was undermined by imperialism itself. Imperialism leaves people hungry. It burns, destroys and kills. Who can claim the contrary? Who can defend nonsense about "imperialism intervening to bring human rights and democracy to other countries" in a world where it leaves 1.2 billion people hungry and, bandit-like, rains bombs down on poor countries? How can those who defend it make their freakish theories credible? Resistance and the class struggle bear the stamp of history. And 2002 bears its imprint. We felt bitterness, we longed for our disappeared, we lamented that we were not able to organise more powerfully when imperialism fired missiles and used more powerful weapons to massacre the impoverished peoples, we experienced the misery of the hungry.But these are not what placed their stamp upon the year, rather it was our will and the developing struggle for justice and against hunger. This is how the history is written. The darkness of tyranny replaces with the light of resistance if there is resistance against tyranny. This is what we remember from the year 2001. We have seen millions go out onto the streets shouting slogans against capitalism. Those revolutionaries who sacrificed themselves for socialism, independence and freedom are lights illuminating us with the inheritance they have left. No day was empty; no price paid was in vain. Those who resisted the bombs of imperialism and the bullets and massacres of the oligarchy made 2001 a year notable for resistance and struggles. On a world scale, the honour and confidence of resistance belongs to us During the 365 days of 2001, Turkey experienced a historic resistance. What we resisted was the pro-American world order. What we resisted were the pro-American policies aimed at making the peoples of Turkey surrender. We defended values and spirit of sacrifice produced by a thousand years of people's rebellions. This resistance happened in the face of the most multi-faceted oppression in Turkey's history. The resistance was a barricade, not only against tyranny but all the ideological and cultural influences aimed at bringing about surrender. It played the role of breakwater against the wave of liquidation. This is one of the points concretising that the resistance played the role of a barricade. While tyranny was attacking us in waves of assaults and some were securing themselves in the shallow waters of enemy, we were struggling against tyranny. We are continuing to struggle against the furious waves. Our march to victory or death shows the peoples of the world a necessary coastline. Where that coastline is, there is also independence and freedom, bread and justice. These are things that the peoples of the world need like they need air and water. We will bee that coastline.2001 was a year in which we became more sure of ourselves. On a world scale, and in our country. In the face of such encirclement, we were able to resist and were not defeated. Let no one doubt that the ideology and beliefs which make such resistance possible are the strongest ideology and beliefs in the world. The content of the resistance spread beyond the frontiers of Turkey. It boosted the morale of the world's people. It showed that the values of the people lived on, the fight for socialism continued, as well as their spirit of sacrifice. And the spirit of sacrifice is now the nightmare of the imperialists and the collaborationist oligarchy. In the world and Turkey; there is no place left for deceived and the deceivers. There is no place left for faint-heartedness. There will be resistance and fighting. Those who resist will win. The revolutionary ideology is an ideology which means winning a good future for our people. Have we not seen the USA's attacks on Afghanistan? Was that "stone age" ideology a revolutionary ideology or an imperialist ideology? Who defends the stone age by condemning four billion people to hunger and poverty? A state of poverty, in which they are even deprived of safe drinkable water? The Marxist-Leninists were right. And they will continue to be right. The reality of imperialism is exposed by none other than the Marxist-Leninists. Today in Turkey and the world, the question "Where are we going?" does not permit faint-hearted or inadequate answers. The ruling classes in the world and Turkey want to establish an absolute police system to keep the peoples under their control and tutelage. It is no simple matter to get 1, 2 or 3 billion people to accept being hungry. The oligarchy in Turkey feels the same need for policies to keep 65 million people hungry. In our country and the world as a whole, imperialist state terror is on the increase. Nowadays, this is not even a secret on a world scale. Everything is being done in the most backward, primitive and coarse manner. Imperialism's aggressiveness, exploitation and fight for more markets is there for all to see. The errors and attempts to mislead others about the nature of imperialism spring either from imperialism itself or from reformist intellectuals who wish to maintain a place within the system by upholding the status quo. Imperialism openly makes people go hungry; its only weapons are repression and violence. That is what it does. Is this a secret in the world? Have the theories of Marxism-Leninism not stated that? Imperialism's human rights manoeuvres in Afghanistan, "one bomb, one food package", are unforgettable. The people are not taken in by it, though. Those who drop food packages alongside bombs show that their conception of humanity is the kind appropriate to Bush. The propaganda and theories about the "cold war being over" and "a unipolar world" were shown to be empty and false, as were the political analyses that our country, "in this new period", could democratise itself and eliminate the Susurluk state by going into the European Union. Recent developments have dealt a major blow to this admiration for the EU and the dream of using it for democratisation. Leave democratisation alone; it merely another way of making our country dependent on imperialism. This is a level where the IMF directly and openly rule and interfere in internal policies including assigning ministers. And you don't need to be a political scientist to see that our country is not going to become a democracy, rather it will be thoroughly dependent on imperialism, which, alongside its collaborators, will be able to plunder in a more unrestrained fashion. You don't need a road map to see that. These theories are belong to the revisionist-reformist left, which lost their support when the Soviet union was collapsed, lost their credibility as long as the people of the world are concerned. The city squares of 2001 bear witness to that. Millions demonstrated against the imperialism's World Bank and the IMF and their policies, at national and international level. The masses wanted justice and bread in the face of frightening inequality between countries and people. This reality of hunger and injustice was experienced in the most blatant manner, from the poorest countries of South Asia and Africa to the imperialist centres themselves. However, 10 years of propaganda were not able to make the minds of the masses surrender. In places forced to experience hunger and injustice, the most limitless imperialist propaganda cannot destroy the people's demand for bread and justice; nor will it be able to. Imperialism's response to the demands of the masses was armoured cars, bullets and new repressive laws. This was the reality hiding behind the claim that the bullets fired at Genoa were an "exceptional" or "unrelated" occurrence. This was also shown after the September 11 events when the opportunity was taken to make changes in anti-terror laws. Imperialism's democracy mask fell away. When there is a struggle against the system, the imperialists want to annihilate it, and they stop being champions of democracy, and in hundreds of thousands of actions, many of them violent, they have shown that they are continuing the traditions of Hitler; in fact nothing at all separates them from Hitler's policies. In our country, like in the rest of the world, hundreds of thousands of labouring people have come out onto the city squares to oppose the IMF. Perhaps those who came out onto the city squares did not want power. Perhaps they did not see the paramount need to oppose tyranny. But they wanted bread. They will see that the more they want it, they will see that tyranny is neither distant nor ignores them. They will see that bread is in between teeth of rulers as long as they continue to demand it. This is why the rulers afraid of. Because they were afraid, they could not even tolerate the masses going out into the streets following the initiatives of pro-system parties and trade unions, but used repression and legal sanctions to terrorise the struggles for rights and freedom. Fearing that they could no longer deceive the masses by wrapping themselves in demagogy about "democratisation", they brought out new repressive laws. So as not to be caught unprepared by the growth in the people's struggle, the system set up new counter-revolutionary organisations. It armed them. They were established to carry out torture and murder policies. But whatever preparations are carried out by the imperialists and the collaborationist oligarchy, they will be futile against the actions of hundreds of thousands, millions of people. The peoples of Turkey and the world will make the struggle for justice and against hunger grow. The events in Argentina are just the latest example of this, and a small one. There will be many Argentinas. Becauise the neo-colonial countries are all having IMF policies inflicted on them. Because even in the imperialist centres the people's bread is reduced with every passing day, and rights are eroded. The alternative of revolution and socialism will again be put on the world's agenda! The last months of the year 2001 were a nightmare for imperialism and its collaborators, despite America's "victory in Afghanistan". The oligarchy in Turkey was not able to liberate itself from its nightmare despite opening the F-Type prisons and despite major repression of the masses when they went out to demonstrate. The bourgeois media gave expression to this truth when it said in headlines on December 31, "Oh, it's over!" All the imperialists and their collaborators feel the same way. Look at the statements by the spokesmen of the authorities; you will see nothing other than sentences expressing their low morale and lack of belief. Yes, they got off cheap. This is what the reason behind "Oh, it's over!". This is what we see when we see the things from the eyes of the rule which condemn the people to starvation and tyranny. But in future years they will not get off so easily. The city squares will be choked with people. The people's anger and violence will lash out in various forms. Leaving a year that was a nightmare for them, they enter a year full of greater nightmares, all the more demoralised, all the more unsure of themselves. And for this reason they will be all the more aggressive. There can be no doubt that the coming years will be a period in which revolutions will be supported again, and the socialist alternative will be in demand. This is not merely an optimistic desire, but the scientific and social reality. The slogans of "death to capitalism" shouted from an American city like Seattle, all the way to the streets of Genoa, caused them to hesitate, wondering where it would end. Because counter-revolutionary, capitalist restoration in the socialist countries and the propaganda based on it had created a transitory period in which this alternative "was removed". This was a period where socialism could be made to sound bad even among socialists. But 2001 was marked by signs that this was starting to be overcome. Historical and social truth, the realities of economics and sociology put forward the alternatives for humanity: capitalism or socialism. Any roads other than these are nothing but fabrications. Let nobody develop theories about the end of history, globalisation, or the victory of democracy. Beliefs borrowed from capitalism and bourgeois ideologues purport to explain today and tomorrow. But those in our country and the world who, in connection with globalisation, talk of "capitalist democracies not connected to imperialism" and "democratic republics", must be politically blind. For there is no third way! This is a war of life and death. Yes, the start of the 21st century is shaped by a fight bearing this name. Capitalism, or, to put it another way, imperialism plundering the world under the name of globalisation, can also see the probability of its own end. So on a world scale, this is a part of its programme, working to stave off this probability, a programme of aggressiveness, imperialist terror, hanging, cutting down, burning, destroying, imprisoning. Look how even in the imperialist centre of Europe, the discontent of the masses is such that propaganda about the "social state" is no longer listened to. The policy of unlimited plunder and massacre also create the basis of a popular movement which can only settle when the power is conquered. In this war of life and death the greatest disadvantage of the peoples in the world is lack of organisation and fragmentation. Our two basic duties are, within our national frontiers and on a world scale, to encourage the peoples to organise themselves, and to unite at every level against the imperialists who themselves are today united and focused around the USA. It is possible and necessary for everyone to act against imperialism. Every resistance will bring morale and strength to the four corners of the earth. Every resistance will increase the peoples' self-confidence and give them the courage to want power. At the start of the 1990s the imperialist media shouted out to the world at the top of its voice, in a kind of bombardment, "socialism is dead!" And it was the start of a time in which the world's people were left hopeless and without recourse. But peoples who are hopeless and without recourse can be turned into mere individuals, be corrupted and deprived of their organisations. It is a fact that they succeeded for a decade. 2001, on the contrary, was a turning point in this period. The world's peoples cannot be left hopeless and without recourse. Because even in a period when imperialist propaganda and the reformist sectors whose minds had surrendered to it did their best to blacken it with their theories about civil society, we protected hope and the way out of the impasse, we gave life to dying hope and we defended dying socialism. And this will again envelop the masses. The billions who want to be free from hunger and who want justice have need of hope, and the revolutionaries are that hope. We can never draw a rose-tinted picture of 2002. As part of this war of life and death, there will be no limits to imperialism's repression, massacres, bans and terror. It would not be wrong to say that we are entering a more violent period of the struggle. The class struggle will find its balance and the road to people's liberation will be opened at the point when the unlimited tyranny of imperialism receive the courageous reaction of the people who eliminate selfishness and fear. The great resistance, which started on October 20, 2000 and is still continuing is just the spirit of sacrifice and courage which the world's people need at this point. The peoples' traditions of sacrificing themselves for freedom and independence are old ones, but in the last years these traditions have been most strongly expressed in our resistance. At the start of the 1990s, the revolutionary movement in Turkey played an important role by not abandoning itself to the counter-revolutionary wave that gripped the world, and by resisting the imperialist terror at the start of the 21st century, it will give strength to and boost the morale of the peoples' resistance. Again, we are among those that imperialism wants to make surrender with its policies of hunger and massacres. We celebrate the new year 2002 with the wish that the peoples of our country and the world will in this year continue to struggle in a more organised and more valiant fashion. Our wish is the policy of our Party. We will strive to make this struggle and this resistance more organised and valiant in the days and months ahead; in this new year we appeal to all the world's revolutionaries to step up their efforts in this regard. DEVRIMCI HALK KURTULUS PARTISI (REVOLUTIONARY PEOPLE'S LIBERATION PARTY)
