Proletarians of All Countries, Unite! LONG LIVE THE XXI ANNIVERSARY OF CHAIRMAN GONZALO'S MASTERFUL SPEECH, THAT SHINES VICTORIOUSLY AND POWERFULLY BEFORE THE WORLD AS A COMBAT WEAPON!
We, the Peru People's Movement, the generated organization of the Communist Party of Peru for the work abroad, along with the whole Party, its Central Committee and its whole system of Party leadership, the combatants and masses, celebrate this 21st anniversary of Chairman Gonzalo's masterful Speech. Being the last time that Chairman Gonzalo has pronounced himself publically and expressed his position before the Party and the communists and masses of the world, the Speech is a clear and powerful expression of Chairman Gonzalo's condition as Great Leadership of the Party, based on the creative application of Maoism to the conditions of our revolution, Gonzalo Thought. In the Speech, the Chairman arms the Party and the class, in Peru and in the world, with the correct proletarian position to confront - with people's war - the blows of imperialism, reaction and revisionism: the bend in the road of the Peruvian revolution, the appearance of a revisionist and capitulationist ROL, the imperialist "peace" propaganda and the perspective of the imperialist world war III, etc. While our Party and its Central Committee continues to lead the people's war in Peru under the complex conditions of the bend in the road, applying Gonzalo Thought to solve every problem and crush the revisionist lines, the ROL and the LOL, at the same time it continues to assume its responsibility to serve the world proletarian revolution. As a part of this, the MPP has the responsibility to bring the position of the PCP and the contributions of Chairman Gonzalo to the international proletariat and the masses of the world - a task which is even more important today, when the International Communist Movement is facing the dispersion caused by new revisionism, headed by the RCP (USA), its head Avakian, the revisionist heads of the Nepalese party and by the convergences and the conciliation with all these within our ranks around the world. This year also marks the 50th anniversary of the central documents of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in the struggle against the contemporary revisionism of Khrushchev and its followers: "A Proposal Concerning the General Line of the International Communist Movement", "On the Question of Stalin" and other documents from 1963. These are indispensable documents for each communist and revolutionary, that show one of the most important of the struggles that have contributed to forge Marxism-Leninism-Maoism as third, new and higher stage of Marxism. We firmly reaffirm ourselves in the correct and proletarian position of these masterful documents, that continue to be valid and important in the struggle against today's revisionism and in the two line struggle against convergences with it within our ranks. It is clear that revisionism, although it may change its face and its words, cannot present anything new, cannot hide its bourgeois and counterrevolutionary essence, and always keeps showing the same fundamental features of revisionism: the "peaceful transition", parliamentary cretinism, capitulation before imperialism and reaction, the "baton policy" in international relations, its collusion and collaboration - direct or indirect - with the plans of imperialism, and its old revisionist thesis of the "personality cult". In the mentioned documents, it is seen, clearly and conclusively, how the CPC under Chairman Mao's Great leadership crushed revisionism on each one of these points. So, one must ask oneself why some comrades today, while they defend Marxism and combat revisionism on some of these points, refuse to do the same on others. We salute that the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Naxalbari, in a series of articles in its magazine Naxalbari from this year, assumes the task that falls to every Communist Party, of waging open and frank two line struggle to crush revisionism, a task emphasized by the PCP in its repeated call to all the Parties and organizations of the ICM to participate in the debate with the purpose of crushing new revisionism and unite the communists of the world around the principles of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, principally Maoism. However, there are a series of points on which we do not agree with the comrades of the CPI (ML) Naxalbari. Some are questions of application or problems of development, while others are more worrying; and we are for developing the debate with the comrades more in detail on all these points as soon as there is an opportunity. Now, we only want to put forward some points concerning one of our more acute differences: the question of the so-called "personality cult". In 1963, in its Proposal Concerning the General Line of the International Communist Movement, the Communist Party of China put forward: "Over the past few years, certain persons have violated Lenin's integral teachings about the interrelationship of leaders, party, class and masses, and raised the issue of "combating the cult of the individual"; this is erroneous and harmful. The theory propounded by Lenin is as follows: a. The masses are divided into classes. Lenin said, "All this is elementary." The party of the proletariat is the headquarters of the proletariat in revolution and struggle. Every proletarian party must practise centralism based on democracy and establish a strong Marxist-Leninist leadership before it can become an organized and battle-worthy vanguard. To raise the question of "combating the cult of the individual" is actually to counterpose the leaders to the masses, undermine the party's unified leadership which is based on democratic centralism, dissipate its fighting strength and disintegrate its ranks." [our emphasis - editor's note] (A Proposal Concerning the General Line of the International Communist Movement, Communist Party of China, 1963) That is to say, that the position of the CPC and of Chairman Mao was quite clear, and that his total rejection of the so-called "struggle against the cult of the individual" was not a mere "tactic" or concession to the necessities of the struggle of the moment. On the contrary, Chairman Mao and the other Chinese communists defended the Marxist position on the great leaders and Great leadership of the revolution, because they knew that it is an indispensable necessity and an objective fact of the proletarian revolution that the proletariat in each country, in the process of all its struggles, generates its vanguard, its great leaders, and that among those, in the process of the concrete application of the universal ideology, in the struggle to death against revisionist lines, a great leader is generated who stands out and who represents the most advanced of all the experience of the class. "The Central Committee of the CPC pointed out in its letter of June 14 that the "struggle against the personality cult" violates Lenin's integral teachings on the interrelationship of leaders, party, class and masses, and undermines the Communist principle of democratic centralism. (On the Question of Stalin, CPC 1963) In fact, the slogan of the so-called "struggle against the personality cult" has appeared every time as part of a reactionary campaign to attack the great proletarian leaders that represent important leaps in the revolution and in the unity of the communists and revolutionaries of the world, for example: in the case of comrade Stalin, who defined Marxism-Leninism as second universal stage of Marxism and applied, in spite of his mistakes, Lenin's proletarian line in the construction of socialism in the USSR, and in the case of Chairman Mao, who represents a series of qualitative leaps in the development of Marxism and revolution, principally that of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. In the same way, in the case of Chairman Gonzalo, imperialism, reaction and revisionism cannot forgive the qualitative leaps that he represents: the initiation and development of the people's war in Peru and its repercussions on world level, the definition of Maoism as third, new and higher stage of Marxism and other contributions to Marxism, like the thesis "countryside principal - cities complement" etc. Today, the campaign to slander Chairman Gonzalo continues to be a necessity for the class enemy in order to be able to facilitate and promote the spreading of revisionism and opportunism in the ICM. And, just as Lenin points out in the above quote, when they cannot debate on the arguments, on the ideological and political line, they resort to insults, they resort to the hypocritical terminology of the general counterrevolutionary offensive of imperialism, mainly yankee imperialism, talking about "dictators", "cult" etc. Therefore, it is worrying that in the articles of the CPI (ML) Naxalbari, there is no discussion about the ideological and political positions of Chairman Gonzalo and the PCP. They say that the principle of Great Leadership is wrong because it implies the "infallibility" of an individual - even though neither the PCP nor Chairman Mao has argued that there are "infallible" great leaders - but they do not want to point out which are the ideological and political faults committed by these Great Leaders (like the miserable members of the LOI in Peru have unsuccessfully dared to do). Instead of debating about the line, the comrades try to question the positions of Lenin and Chairman Mao on this point with speculations and interpretations: "Without doubt, Leninist centralisation and organisational principles are not some absolutes meant to be implemented ‘regardless of the stage’. […] The immediacy of this situation must certainly have influenced the formulation of organisational principles. However, the revolutionary situation that was forming up dissipated. At this point Lenin drew attention to the need for a thorough evaluation in order to work out future steps, in the situation of ebb. But before he could grapple with this he was bedridden by an assassin’s bullets and died. It is not known whether the party concept and its organisational principles were among the issues he had in mind for review. At any rate this is not what was seen later. Statutes and methods of work adopted in a particular situation were later theorised in a very mechanical manner." (On the Maoist Party, the magazine Naxalbari, 2013) That is to say, that in Lenin one cannot find any attempt to question the organizational principles of Leninism, and there is nothing that indicates that he considered the necessity of Great leadership as merely a "method adopted in a particular situation". Then, the comrades of the CPI (ML) Naxalbari try to find a basis for their thesis in the words of Chairman Mao: "Taking lessons from the Chinese revolution and the international communist movement Mao elaborated a number of propositions on the party. One theme consistently stressed throughout is that of firmly building up the communist consciousness of serving the people, by checking attitudes of superiority in the relations between the party and the people, and leadership and ranks. This does not deny the role or importance of leadership. Mao was contradicting an outlook that absolutised leadership, and made the masses and ranks into disciples, passive instruments. He reminded communists that no matter how necessary cadres are, it is the masses that carry out things and therefore it wouldn’t do to exaggerate the role of cadres. He persists with this in the relation between the central committee and lower committees and that between the socialist state and the people. In the absence of information from the lower levels the central leadership cannot arrive at correct decisions. At times a solution may be arrived at in the lower level itself, in which case the task of the central committee is to propagate this throughout the country. Such observations of Mao topple any idea of infallible leadership. […] Mao thus developed the party concept and established it on new foundations; not on some individual behavioural traits, but solid ideological-political principles." (Ibid.) Here, the comrades correctly point out how Chairman Mao developed Marxism-Leninism with regard to the organizational principles, how to combat bourgeois attitudes, criteria and positions in the Party concerning the masses, how to firmly apply democratic centralism under the conditions of class struggle during socialism, in order to thus guarantee the power of the proletariat and crush any attempt to establish personal power, bourgeois power to restore capitalism. It is also true that Chairman Mao criticized and corrected Stalin's mistakes, the mechanical thinking, the lack of understanding of the class struggle under the dictatorship of the proletariat, etc. But Chairman Mao never contradicted the objective necessity of the class to generate a group of great leaders and a Great leadership. The necessity of Cultural Revolutions, of arming the masses with proletarian consciousness and thus mobilize them in conscious struggle against the revisionist and opportunist leaders within the Party, i.e. continue the march towards the armed sea of masses and Communism, in which we shall not need neither Party nor dictatorship - this necessity does not deny the objective and inevitable necessity and existence of the great leaders and the Great leadership of the proletariat as long as the classes still exist. Chairman Mao teaches us: "There are two kinds of cult of the individual. One is correct, such as that of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and the correct side of Stalin. These we ought to revere and continue to revere for ever. It would not do not to revere them. As they held truth in their hands, why should we not revere them? We believe in truth; truth is the reflection of objective existence. A squad should revere its squad leader, it would be quite wrong not to. Then there is the incorrect kind of cult of the individual in which there is no analysis, simply blind obedience. This is not right. Opposition to the cult of the individual may also have one of two aims: one is opposition to an incorrect cult, and the other is opposition to reverence for others and a desire for reverence for oneself. The question at issue is not whether or not there should be a cult of the individual, but rather whether or not the individual concerned represents the truth. If he does, then he should be revered. If truth is not present, even collective leadership will be no good. Throughout its history, our Party has stressed the combination of the role of the individual with collective leadership. When Stalin was demolished some people applauded for their own personal reasons, that is to say because they wanted others to revere them. Some people opposed Lenin, saying that he was a dictator. Lenin’s reply was straightforward: better that I should be a dictator than you!" (Chairman Mao Tse-tung, Talks at the Chengtu Conference, 1958) That is to say, that the "struggle against the personality cult" always expresses the struggle for the power, concretely the struggle between proletarian power and bourgeois power, between people's war and capitulation, between Marxism and revisionism, between socialist revolution and capitalist restoration. Each class will inevitably generate its leaders, its most advanced representatives. In its struggle against the exploiting classes, and especially in the Party and its Central Committee, that is the eye of the storm of the class struggle, the proletariat generates its Great leadership, and in the struggles against the bourgeois line and in the midst of revolutionary war it forges a guiding thought, the creative application of the universal ideology to the concrete conditions of its country. Thus a qualitative leap is produced, it is now not a mere assignment, a bureaucratic post, but the Great leadership of the revolution. This Great leadership is not infallible; it is subject to the same Party discipline as every Party militant, and it is subject to what the Party Congress has established. It has already been confirmed that when Khrushchev, Avakian and others "struggle against the personality cult" it is not because they worry about defending the dictatorship of the proletariat and the struggle for communism, but to undermine and attack them. Like all revisionists, they want to question and undermine the proletarian leadership of the revolution and replace it with bourgeois leadership, and in order to do so the promote the influence of petty bourgeois liberalism and anarchism in the proletarian ranks. The understanding of the principle of great leaders and Great leadership of the revolution is inseparably linked to 1) understanding the need for concrete application of the universal ideology to the concrete conditions of each revolution, a guiding thought (a subject that we have gone into more deeply in several documents), and 2) understanding the two line struggle as the motor of the Party, because it is in this struggle that the Great leadership and the guiding thought are forged. If we look at the historical course of the Communist Party of the USSR, as outlined by Lenin and Stalin, or the historical course of the Communist Party of China as outlined by Chairman Mao, these proletarian Great leaders always emphasized that these are histories of constant struggles to death to defend and apply the proletarian line and crush the non-proletarian lines. "It is through a persistent, firm and sagacious two line struggle, defending the proletarian line and defeating opposing lines, that Gonzalo thought has been forged. Among the most noteworthy struggles it is worth highlighting those waged against contemporary revisionism, here represented especially by Del Prado and his followers; against the rightist liquidationism of Paredes and his gang; against the leftist liquidationism headed by the one who was Sergio and his so-called "Bolsheviks"; and against the right opportunist line opposed to the initiation of the armed struggle. Without struggle, Gonzalo thought would not have been able to develop; and his notable handling of the two line struggle in the Party is a fundamental question that we must study and learn from." (On Gonzalo Thought, PCP 1988) However, we note that in the documents of CPI (ML) Naxalbari, there is an evident lack of reports on such struggles within that Party and in India in general, for example the struggles of the process to unite the Parties in the country. Because of all the above mentioned points, it is even more worrying that the comrades of the CPI (ML) Naxalbari in their articles do not focus much on the question of proletarian leadership, but instead use the term "scientific leadership", talk of the supposed danger, established by Avakian, of "reifying" the proletariat, and just like Avakian call for criticizing the "errors" of Chairman Mao, today when there is the urgent need, the duty of every communist, to struggle for establishing Maoism as third, new and higher stage of Marxism. It is worrying that they even try to insinuate that Chairman Mao himself was for questioning the historical role of the proletariat, when they say that he "provided space to problematise the proletariat’s historical leading role and the vanguard concept". We say that these points are worrying, because we are conscious that the comrades of the CPI (ML) Naxalbari, along with the comrades of the CPI (Maoist) and all the communists of the country, have a responsibility of enormous importance: the formation of a Communist Party to lead the revolution in India, develop the people's war to conquer the power in the whole country, culminate the democratic revolution and without any interruption continue it as socialist revolution and with cultural revolutions march until communism - and that all this will mark a milestone and an immense leap for the world proletarian revolution. We reaffirm ourselves in the position of our Party, expressed in the Letter to the CPI (ML) Naxalbari (PCP-CC, 2004): "Particularly India has a great historical responsibility in the great wave of the world revolution. The people of India, for centuries sunk into the most cruel exploitation and misery, are showing its inexhaustible source of struggle, demanding People's War, a people that will know to assume under the leadership of the Party. Correspondingly in India it is necessary to smash the imperialist plans of putting together false communist parties, with chieftains that do not do anything and never will do anything, for they are made of revisionist rottenness and do not care a hoot about the spilled blood of the masses, they are agents paid by Yankee imperialism." This is why we insist on debating the problems we have pointed out. We consider that they are mainly problems of understanding Maoism as third, new and higher stage of Marxism, but that if they are not solved may develop into more serious problems that will have negative repercussions for the revolution in India and for the world revolution. We agree completely with what the comrades have put forward concerning the urgent need to struggle for the ideological, political and organizational unity of the communists on world level. In the same way, we agree that this will mean reaching unity on the general political line of the ICM, which is not possible without unfolding the two line struggle in the ICM around the application of Maoism, and thus resolve the existing differences, and among them those we have addressed here. "We are living historic moments, each of us knows that this is the case, let us not fool ourselves. In these moments we must strengthen all forces to confront difficulties and continue carrying out our tasks. And we must conquer the goals! The successes! The victory! That is what is to be done." Chairman Gonzalo's Speech, PCP-Lima Base, 1992) LONG LIVE CHAIRMAN GONZALO'S MASTERFUL SPEECH, THAT SHINES VICTORIOUSLY AND POWERFULLY BEFORE THE WORLD AS A COMBAT WEAPON! Peru People's Movement |
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