Proletarians of all countries, unite!

[Prepared for the Internet by the Magazine Red Sun]

PREPARATORY SESSION OF THE SECOND PLENUM OUTLINE OF THE STRATEGIC PLAN OF CONSTRUCTION OF THE REPORT:
CONSTRUCT THE CONQUEST OF POWER
IN THE MIDST OF THE PEOPLE'S WAR

Frame of Reference

This will be the central report for the preparation of the II Session of the Central Committee. Several days ago an outline on the topic of Building the Conquest of Power, was distributed. We have revised this outline and added a fifth part, "the III Campaign to Impulse," with the goal that this report will have all the pending questions that we are interested in handling. Afterwards, aside from studying documents, we have evaluated the Balance of the II Campaign to Impulse and its expansion. Consequently, since this is our work, and what is appropriate today is to see the part of Construction as a substantial problem and see it as an Outline of the Strategic Plan of Construction. It is also necessary that we look at the III Campaign. Before beginning this exposition, we would like to recall what we concluded from the Congress. The Congress is an event of transcendental importance for the Party, and we move and guide ourselves within its framework. Obviously we must guide ourselves on the Basis of Party Unity, that is, Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, Gonzalo Thought, on the Program, and on the General Political Line.

We would like to highlight point six of the Program. It says: "Fight for the formation of the People's Republic of Peru as a class Front based on the worker-peasant alliance, led by the proletariat headed up by its Communist Party, as the formation of New Democracy that carries forward a new economy, new politics, and a new culture." We know what this implies. It is very important in this moment within the perspective of conquering power throughout the country. It is intimately linked to point 14 which says: "Fight tenaciously and heroically for the total and complete triumph of the democratic revolution throughout the country, and with the culmination of this stage, immediately, without any pause, pass over to the socialist revolution along with the international proletariat and the people of the world, in order to continue humanity's march to its final goal, Communism, by means of cultural revolutions." It is also very important that we bear in mind point 14 of the Program. Evidently, we must complete the first stage of the revolution, for which the conquest of power countrywide is aimed. But the question doesn't end there, the problem is the continuation of the revolution, as a socialist one aiming at Communism, linked to the international proletariat and the peoples of the world through all the zigzags and great struggles that will be unleashed through cultural revolutions. On this point 14, it is very important that we always reaffirm ourselves on our final goal: Communism. If we did not do so, we would not be Communists.

On the other hand, we must focus on to and base ourselves on the characterization of this period made by this same Congress. The document tells us: "But considering that the democratic revolution in the country is passing through a period characterized by:

• 1. A deepening of the general crisis of Peruvian society, principally of bureaucratic capitalism;
• 2. An increase in the reactionary nature of the state, today with a fascist, corporativist, Aprista government headed by the genocidal Garc¡a P‚rez;
• 3. The sharpening of the class struggle, with the masses realizing the necessity to combat and resist;
• 4. The People's War is developing vigorously and increasingly; and
• 5. The people need a People's Republic built according to the principles of new democracy.

This is a period that covers approximately four or five years, which is to say that we are moving forward within this period and the characterization made by the Congress is plainly valid.

Item one talks about the deepening of the crisis of Peruvian society, principally of bureaucratic capitalism. The Peruvian republic is living through its worst crisis within the third moment of bureaucratic capitalism, which is its destruction; all the daily events demonstrate it.

Item two tells us that there is a major increase in the reactionary nature of the state. This is obvious since it is its path. When we characterized them as aiming at a new restructuring of the old state, this can be nothing more than its reactionarization. Thus, they try to fortify their state to better combat the People's War, because their state represents a rotten system. Obviously, now we are not dealing with Garc¡a, we are dealing with Fujimori and his new government. Even before the government took command of the Peruvian state it was deeply discredited, and in a short time, has shown all of his reactionary essence.

Item three refers to the sharpening of the class struggle, and we see that it is happening. Furthermore, this sharpening of the class struggle takes as an example the People's War (and its innovative forms of struggle) for its daily combat. Events show this. What item three is telling us in reference to combat and resist is more evident every day, with the understanding that today the problem is to combat and resist to serve the People's War as the Party.

Item four states that the People's War is developing vigorously and increasingly. This is shown now that we are engaged in mobile warfare. This shows the fortification of the People's War, its development, and the difficulties that the reactionary government has in fighting us. At the same time we hear how the reactionaries are demanding a new strategic plan, which demonstrates the difficulties they have in confronting the People's War that is vigorously expanding countrywide.

Item five, refers to the People's Republic. It is a sincere hope of the people. It has already been specified as the People's Republic of Peru and it is precisely in its service that we must work. This is the form of state that the conquest of power will establish.

The third element of the Basis of Party Unity is the general political line. In synthesis, we develop what was established within the framework of the Congress, which guides us. In the same way, we should consider the I Plenum of the Central Committee, which is very important because of the problems that were outlined there. The First Plenum aimed at problems of construction and the building of conquest of power throughout the country, and we are guided by this because when a political line is just and correct, the greater the necessity to line to apply it. We are opposed to the believe that "line is enough." Thus, the meeting of the Political Bureau, and the events handled there, are proof of the politics that we are applying and how they are stamped on reality. Similarly, in the August circular we specified outlines of the new government, its plans, and how to respond to them with the goal of launching our "Third Campaign to Impulse" [the People's War].

Furthermore, we must always keep in mind our victorious process of People's War which after 11 years is transforming Peruvian society. The war is the superior form through which the fundamental problems of the revolution are resolved and society is transformed to benefit the class and people. It is the principal form of organization. It is a war of masses, peasants (especially poor ones), the proletariat and the petty bourgeoisie. We must see the role of the masses in the war. This is very important because the masses make history. We must keep in mind the role played by the People's War in Peru in the world proletarian revolution, which for us is a major responsibility.

Finally, we must see that everything that the Party leads cannot be developed unless we guide ourselves by Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, Gonzalo Thought (MLM, GT) our ideology and essence of the Basis of Party Unity (BUP). We must reaffirm ourselves in it today more than ever before, because MLM, GT is under attack, and they try to defame and deny it. We must maintain absolute conviction that it is all-powerful because it is true, it is the plain truth. A solid truth like a rock. After all, their attack is idealist verbiage, it will pass, and the deeds will remain as incontrovertible reality. It is true that we live in difficult times, but the main tendency of history in today's world is revolution, it is incontrovertible and will impose itself. Communism will impose itself and shine throughout the world. We must keep in mind the words of Chairman Mao that the road is difficult but the future is bright. Thus, Comrades, the revolution will triumph throughout the entire world, and whether it takes more or less time depends mainly on the actions of Communists.

This is the frame of reference unfolding today. We must keep in mind that the resolutions of the Congress is our guide, including the Basis of Party Unity with and its three elements set forth in the First Plenum of the Central Committee (CC), in the Meeting of the Political Bureau, the process of the People's War and the role played by the International Communist Movement.

TITLE. Very expressive and with a slogan. Our problem is to conquer power countrywide, and that is what is said here as a guide, a goal to reach. It calls on us to build the conquest of power countrywide, to structure it based on the ideological and political construction as principal and simultaneously in organizational construction, in the midst of the class struggle of the masses and in the two-line struggle. At the same time, it emphasizes that we can only do all of this through the People's War. These are three slogans intimately united, unbreakably linked, and inseparable. We cannot build this without the People's War nor without the goal of building this for the purpose of serving the conquest of power countrywide. We could not conquer power without People's War, or without building it, and we could not wage the People's War without the goal of conquering power countrywide, nor could we wage it without the construction of the Party, the Army and the Front.

The People's War is of major importance by having the construction as a base and the conquest of power as a guide, because it is part of the Program established by the Party's Congress. The three slogans are: "Develop the People's War, Build the Conquest of Power, and Conquer Power Countrywide."

OUTLINE. This should be an outline in the strategic plan of construction, and we believe that an outline is relevant. The Party has experience in making them. In 1978 in the VIII Plenum of the CC, the outline for the armed struggle was approved. This expressed the particularity of our People's War which should evolve in both the countryside and the city, with the countryside as the principal [scenario of the war] and the city complementary. In 1980, the Party approved the outline of the militarization of the Party by way of political and military actions, and a defined policy to complete the initiation of the armed struggle, established the organic forms needed to build the army, the detachments, the forms of struggle, and the elemental armed actions. Today, we are presented with the need for an outline to build the three instruments. This outline is more developed than the previous ones we have had, but we consider that it should be worked on and developed so that after being approved by the CC, it will begin to be applied as a pilot plan. After a reasonable time it will be approved in a definitive form and then evolve into the strategic plan of construction. Both the pilot plan as well as the approval of final plan have as a correlation, military plans of the People's War.

All of the above will carry us to a future plan for the conquest of power, which will be a military plan that specifies the People's War in its final stage, a plan that will also have its outline and a pilot plan, a plan that will address the control of the countryside, and will have a vertebral column in the New State in a much wider form. It will also contain the insurrections for the conquest of power in the cities, from the small, to the medium, to the large: the capital. Consequently, the principal thing this session should deal with, is this outline for the strategic plan of construction, which does not contradict the primacy of the People's War. QUOTATIONS

1. May document, pg. 113. There are many who talk about the "obsolescence of Marxism," which is nothing more than the putrefaction of revisionism which impedes the march of humanity. Chairman Mao, applying contradiction, taught us that the "new" is always imposed and replaces the "old." This is a universal law. It is eternal like matter (no matter how many detours we run into.) This means that the profound conviction of Communists is in accordance with the process of development of matter. Mao also taught that the "new" is born in the midst of hardships and opens its path amiidst very difficult struggles. At the end it imposes itself. This is how it has been, is, and how it will be.

2. May document, p. 105. The march of matter and humanity has given, as part of this material process, the ideology of the proletariat, that is the greatest ideology, because the proletariat is the last class in history, and the most complete ideology which cannot be prevented from developing.

It is also good to emphasize that it is an ideology and system that differs from any other ideology and system, because today it is denied. They are the upholders of the obsolete irrationality of the XVIII Century. We Communists are radical transformers, developers and practitioners. We carry forward the most rational processes like the dictatorship of the proletariat, socialism, the goal of communism, and an immense historic process that will complete the long work of humanity, towards the realm of liberty.

3. May document, pg. 105. Humanity has a course, and a nonlinear development with specifications and a specific nature. It is this way, because this is part of contradiction, it is the particular. Historical reality shows that we have had a process since primitive communism, slavery, feudalism, capitalism and socialism, and that we have Communism as the goal. This is the historical path of the class struggle. They are modes of production established independently at the will of anyone, as the product of the development of humanity, the process of the struggles of humans to meet their needs. The tortuous paths of today are nothing more than the expression of what was before. In history, there is no new and different system which has imposed itself all at once; it has always done so through a struggle that was first laid down, consolidated, and then imposed upon.

In our case, upon creating the Communist revolution, the revolution led by the proletariat, having democratic or socialist or cultural revolutionary forms, we make the only true revolution of history. Marx taught us that all revolutions before ours have been the substitution of one group of exploiters by another. Only the Communist revolution substitutes the power of the exploiters with the power of the exploited, and is the one that initiates the process of the dictatorship of the proletariat and lays down the conditions that make everything based on classes disappear and make the State disappear. For this reason, it is something original, different and new. The road to arrive to Communism is complex but will be victorious. Humanity will not be able to enter easily into Communism. We will see great complexities and extremely hard struggles but we will handle them, because since 1917, we have entered the new era, the era of the world proletarian revolution, and we will see situations that have never been seen before. This is what Marx, Lenin and Chairman Mao taught us. Socialism and Communism will be imposed on the Earth. There is no other goal for humanity. This is a consequence of the unstoppable process of matter and humanity.

4. May document, pg. 113. There is much talk about peace these days, but we Communist know that as long as there is private property, classes, and imperialism, war will be a continuing danger. What is happening in the Middle East? They keep sending more troops and not only to Iraq and Kuwait are implicated there, but also both of the imperialist superpowers. They participate in a different way, but they are involved, along with many other imperialist powers, even Japan. The situation has some features of extending itself and having violent repercussions throughout the region, one of the hot spots of the world. Chairman Mao taught us that as long private property, classes and imperialism exist, the danger of war will continue. The process of these wars and their dimensions depend on the sharpening of the class struggle. We must apply this today, and keep in mind what the First Congress agreed upon about spheres of influence, and a new redistribution of the world that were accurate.

Later, the Chairman Mao taught us, we must be prepared for war, but, not when war is knocking on our doors. The problem is to focus on the principal aspect, which is revolution. Revolution is the principal historical and political tendency in the world, because the problem is that in politics, revolution is what is new, and counterrevolution is the old, and the new imposes itself on the old. In this way, revolution will impose itself on counterrevolution. Politically, history unfolds in zigzags as part of its process, not its negation. In the face of a counterrevolutionary offensive, man must act, Communists even more so. We must transform this offensive into a revolutionary counteroffensive; because the expression of the main political principle, depends on the transforming action of man. We Communists must make People's War a concrete reality according to the concrete conditions of each revolution. We believe that this is not sufficiently understood by the Revolutionary International Movement. Thus, we must see revolution as a historical tendency, as a political expression, and as the way man reflects upon situations. We must act to transform them, so that they act as the principal historical and political tendency.

5. Chapter II, quotes from Chairman Mao, Sixth quote, "organizing the people in order to demolish the reactionaries is our obligation." If we do not strike at everything reactionary, it will not fall no matter how decayed it is. It is not enough that the old state is decomposing, we must destroy it. Its destruction is the prerequisite to building the new state. p> 6. May document, pg. 190. Chairman Mao calls upon the Marxist- Leninist-Maoists to joint with the vanguard of the proletariat. It is indispensable to add the Maoists, because Maoism is the new, third and superior stage. It is the ideology that unites the Maoists of the world. He calls upon the people of the oppressed nations which constitute the growing mass of the world's population. He also calls upon the people of the imperialist countries, in the U.S., in the USSR as well as in other imperialist powers like Germany, Japan, and China. Thus, he calls upon Communists and revolutionaries of the world to unite, so that the immense masses express their power over the earth.

We must unite to defeat imperialism, revisionism and world reaction, which is clearly valid today.
He ends with a powerful affirmation. As long as there is exploitation on the Earth there will be no new world. Therefore, our task is to destroy imperialism, revisionism, reaction, and every system of exploitation, and construct socialism. It is enough to see the social experiences that have been lived through, how they swept away centuries of exploitation in a few decades. This was not total and complete because there was not enough time, but how was it that backward countries like China and the USSR became powers and superpowers? Only socialism is capable of developing the forces constrained by imperialism, revisionism and world reaction. In these processes there has been (capitalist) restoration that has evolved into revisionism that is shamelessly unleashing capitalism. It is because they [revisionists] have abandoned Marxism, because they restored capitalism, and abandoned the construction of socialism. But revolution will arise and socialism will once again be developed. We must investigate all the things that socialism has advanced in those experiences, with the goal of gaining positive and negative experiences from the construction and development of socialism.

THREE STRATEGIES. This outline of the Strategic Plan of Construction is headed by three strategies. POLITICAL STRATEGY: CONQUER POWER. A Party has as its objective the conquest of power and to follow the path to enter Communism, the greatest radical transformation that humanity will live through. The passage to Communism will not be easy or short. We must consider that the entire system of four thousand years, more or less, of private property must be swept away, and the period prior to the entry into Communism will be less, but more than decades. Every Communist Party should work with this perspective, conscious of the process.

Our Party was founded to conquer power. It was reconstituted to complete this objective and initiated the armed struggle to follow a road, and this road has taken us to the nearby goal of conquering power countrywide. We have a political strategy that guide us, and it is a complex, intensified, and glorious struggle to finish off the democratic revolution and build the People's Republic of Peru. All of our work aim toward this goal. MILITARY STRATEGY: PEOPLE'S WAR

DEVELOP MOBILE WARFARE AND FORGE THE PREPARATIONS FOR INSURRECTION.
People's war is the highest military theory that history will see, no other will surpass it because the proletariat is the last class in history. This strategy of people's war is the source of our advance, of our victories, because it is a war of masses led by the Party, and based principally on the poor peasantry, which upholds the interests of the proletariat and defends the people. This war must continue developing and its nerve centers, the base areas that are spreading to higher levels, up to the conquest of power countrywide, this will demand another leap, another military plan from us. What is appropriate today is to develop mobile warfare, which we are already handling, and at the same time develop the preparations for the insurrection, which we are already doing so.

STRATEGY OF CONSTRUCTION: BUILD THE CONQUEST OF POWER COUNTRYWIDE.
For the first time we propose three strategies. Today it is indispensable to propose a strategy of construction, a consequence of the process of the Peruvian revolution and the People's War. We have dealt with the reasons for the title. Our problem now is to build this conquest and apply the principle of construction linked more closely to the three keywords: Develop, Build, and Conquer!

INTRODUCTION
1. On optimism and Party work (Peking Review 37-38/1977, pg. 8.) Our point of departure is the law of the unity of opposites, the essence of our understanding, the universal law of contradiction. We must always base ourselves on that.

We must apply contradiction to whatever task we begin, first taking it up with the conviction that it is possible; second, that without arduous and tenacious work, we will not complete it well. This governs the immediate goal today.

To fear and not to fear is another contradiction, it is part of the human condition, it exists in the individual dimension and is natural. But in the class struggle, this takes on a much greater dimension, the contingencies are greater and more complex and the number of problems are greater. We may even have to master nature, which is still hardly understood today.

Entering into the principal part of the quote, the greater part of humanity, the proletariat and Communists, put optimism on the first level. "A strategic challenge to death, scorn for the hardships, and all the difficulties will be overcome," is what guides and sustains Communists. The exception are the cowards and opportunists because they are not centered on the collective, on what is new, or on the perspectives of humanity. They see everything black, because the bottom of the grave is like that; but few think that way.

Why be optimists? Being optimistic allows us to overcome difficulties; it is the condition to take each work seriously, allowing us to understand and investigate issues of concern. Only in this way can we see the diverse facets of things, take their essence and manage the laws that govern them, so that by applying them, we can transform the world. With those laws we can resolve contradictions; turn true tigers into paper tigers, from democratic revolution to socialist revolution, turn what is difficult into easy. For us today the task of conquering power countrywide is a new task. There are many problems we need to understand better, but we know that we have the conditions to solve them. Furthermore, we are aware that the People's War is a necessity and must be completed.

All of this demands optimism from us, a great optimism to handle this new situation. We must recall the beginning. It was also a leap similar to today's, and we now have experience. The difference is that today, the leap is qualitatively superior. Hence, we must be optimists to complete our goal of conquering power countrywide.

As always, Chairman Mao forewarned us about possibilities and realities, apparent possibilities, false ones (the supposed insurrection that the PUM dreamed about), real possibilities, the conquest of power countrywide, the People's Republic of Peru and the transition from democratic revolution to socialist revolution. This is not writing in the water, it is practice that is reaching it goals.

Another contradiction is that there are some hotheads whose ardor clouds their understanding. Impetuosity, is good but not sufficient, we require cool heads and scientific judgement to analyze. Some say we have already conquered power but don't say how, or what plans to make. They only see the sparkling exaltation of victory but don't do anything to create it. Some only have cool heads, and from so much meditating and racking their brains, they end up being spectators. Tomorrow they will say, "See, I told you there were no conditions!" at every minor setback we are faced with. They are the ones who wait for mistakes to show or jump up. War, then, needs both impetuosity and cool heads.

Thus, we don't need sparkles that soon go out, nor cold spectators. We need to have revolutionary passion, counting on clear minds and a resolute will sustained by the optimism of conquering power countrywide.

Peking Review, 27/28, pg. 8. Errors and injustices. Sometimes, some comrades don't see their faults and only judge the faults of others. It is very painful when one is the victim of an injustice, but Chairman Mao taught that even if they take you from one place to another, or pass you from one responsibility to another, but in these times of greatest adversity we go through, we will be able to learn better and there will be no obstacles to accomplish our tasks well.

It is ridiculous to turn personal questions into questions of state, or to disavow principles because you think yourself treated unjustly. Those who think this way are centered on their own skins, putting their own merits ahead of the Party, not seeing the powerful actions of the masses but rather believing it to be their titanic individual labor.

There is no deed free of making mistakes. Unjust treatment will always occur; Communists must not become sullen because their mistakes have been criticized. Errors will occur even with a just and correct line, because of new situations, people who make mistakes in application, etc. But if the leadership analyze, discuss and correct these errors, and reasons are given to those who made them, then we advance. If a case occurs where someone has been wrongly displaced from his tasks, he is exonerated before the people, and thus, that person will be happy and will not act against the Party or the revolution. But if the leadership is not just and correct, if the leaders maintain a wrong line, these rectifications will not be feasible. In this case, those who have the correct line must unfold a struggle to impose it.

We must ask the masses to observe us, to criticize and self-criticize as many times as necessary. Chairman Mao taught us that we must serve the class and not individuals, not ourselves, but the revolution. It is because of individualism that the affliction hurts so much, that it even dents service to the revolution that is the condition of being a Communist.

Marx taught that the historical processes determined that in order to benefit humanity, we must sacrifice and grind down the individual and even classes. We can see this also among animals and plants. When all is said and done this grinding of one part serves the preservation of the entire species. What is important then is the class, the whole, not the individual. It is what Chairman Mao teaches us as the "quota".

2. On understanding the objective world (Peking Review, 27/28, pg. 13.) The problem requires that the entire Party reach a unification of understanding of its process; it proposes that the means of achieving this, is the rectification campaign. Today we need to develop the rectification campaign so that the entire Party understands how to develop and complete the democratic revolution, the necessity to conquer power countrywide. We are armed to achieve this goal.

He [Chairman Mao] teaches us that only after two reversals and two victories could they understand the situation in China. For us today, now that we are going to conquer power countrywide, we are presented with many reversals and problems, even defeats, which is why we must be tempered for these contingencies. Don't forget that it is we, ourselves, who are responsible for our revolution. There is no international strings from powers or superpowers and everything that happens to us, will be entirely our responsibility. We are conscious of this immediate goal. We know that we can and will achieve it. We must make this necessity understood by the entire Party, the army and the masses throughout the country and the world. We must create public opinion as well as attack all those falsehoods and defamations until they are defeated as well as the sinister campaign they spread, which is that we are not going to conquer power. They seek to create confusion and lack of confidence in the masses and in the people's army, in order to isolate us.

Note that only after 20 years did they have a clear idea of the general political line. They say that for a long time they acted with a large amount of blindness. The Congress has established the Basis of Party Unity (BUP), but we must consider, how much is mistaken, how much is due to insufficient understanding in the Party, the army, and the masses. If we are going to conquer power countrywide, we must have political plans, defining what to do first and what to do later. Our Party needs indispensable theoretical, ideological, and political work in construction, and in the People' s War. We need to synthesize all our experience so that we can use this to arm the Party, the army and the masses. As Maoists, we will achieve this.

3. The ideological and political line decides everything (use the full version of the quote). It tells us that the ideological-political line allows us to find men, the contingent we need, militants and arms to conquer power. We have a line that is just and proven, endorsed by the Congress and by almost 11 years of the People's War. If the line is incorrect, everything will be lost; the ideological-political is the key thread in the network. If we deviate from it all the network will unravel. The basis to resolve all the new problems is our ideological-political line.

In the May document, pg. 108. It is the realization of politics in command. The revolutionary organic forms serve the political necessities as their objective. The Party is not an end in itself, it is to lead the revolution, and the masses are making it. When an organic form is no longer in accordance with the needs of the struggle, it should be changed. The organic forms change according to the necessities of the revolution. Some are obsolete and should be changed, others are insufficient and should be developed and improved, while others may express their goodness. Today, these problems present themselves as a necessity and even more so, if we are in the building of the conquest of power countrywide. We must be very clear in this process, as there will be comrades who will say that what we were doing before was wrong, when it was not that way. It is a failure to see that the very development of the revolution demands changes, new modalities. These positions express a lack of confidence in the revolution. In the line they enclose a loss of perspective. We also think that in general people tend to repeat what is known, and there is a certain resistance to change. This also must be overcome in order to take on the new.

The great orientation. See the May document, pg. 108. The problem is a correct leadership and handling of the three "magic wands" of the revolution in an interrelated way. This is the thesis of Chairman Mao, and we should keep it in mind.

These quotes on construction also make us to consider that in the current situation, in building the conquest of power countrywide requires that we realize a series of new modalities. New things also have laws. Part of this is the tenacious effort needed to impose them and above all, the need to develop a firm and astute struggle to prevent the old from reestablishing itself, since the "old' resists and denies its own death. The struggle to impose the "new" is a necessity.

4. The proletariat, organization and the Party. Lenin in "One Step Forward, Two Steps Back" outlined a great thesis. The proletariat is powerful, but it expresses its transforming force only when it is organized. But take note that Lenin is talking about construction, and in the context of ideological-political construction. Later on, he outlines the basis for ideological unity.

What is the situation of the proletariat today? The class is not united in the country. Due to the general crisis of bureaucratic capitalism, the big bourgeoisie following the advice of its imperialist masters are trafficking with the necessities of the class. They lower their wages, and they don't recognize their conquests, and they worsen their working conditions. Unemployment is the order of the day. They think that the proletariat will submit to this, because if they don't sell their labor power what will they live on? It is even worse now that they are seeking the greatest surplus value possible, an even greater capitalist accumulation. Misery is gorging more and more on the class. They seek to brutally sink them, and they want to impose all the rot of capitalism on them and, therefore, use every means toward this end. But, before everything else that the proletariat generates, when it is organized and united, it generates a Party capable of opposing all of this, a party that is similar to the army, a part of militants, "the legions of iron" as Lenin says in another part. Recall what Engels outlined about the two powers in the world, the organized power of reaction and the disorganized power of the masses, that is a power that must be organized in order to express its superiority.

With such a party, with the class organized and united in its Party, no decrepit reactionary power will prevail. Our Party, the army of the class, the organized masses led by the Communist Party can conquer power by way of the People's War. Reaction will not prevail. We will demolish the old state and we will destroy bureaucratic capitalism, imperialist subjection and semi feudalism. Internationally, we Communists will finish off imperialism, revisionism, and world reaction. Communism will be imposed despite all the zigzags the revolution experiences. Today, the proletariat will tighten its ranks. It will strengthen itself despite all the imperialism, all the revisionist rot, despite all the anarchism of the anarchist intellectuals who always oppose the Party and burst with tinsel and noise, as their unfounded attacks reveal. In this way, the proletariat united in a powerful Communist Party will conquer power in the country and will follow its socialist path until Communism. In the world, it will sweep away imperialism, revisionism and world reaction. Let us reiterate, the basis for all this is the organization of the class. Marx said that "the class has the power of numbers": the organized class, then, is powerful.

Lenin in "Urgent Tasks of our Movement." Once more he speaks about the Party. The Party should always interest us because it is the vanguard of the proletariat, and it is the general staff of the revolution. More than this, if in today's world the need for the Party is denied, if they change the names of the parties whose leadership they usurped in order to negate their necessity, if they abandon the symbols of Communism, we must then reaffirm ourselves in the necessity of the Party. The Party is key, because it is the indispensable leadership for the Communists.

It is a Party with men and women who not only dedicate their free afternoons but also devote their entire lives. We should also note the need for a large organization, without forgetting that it is a class Party with a mass character. Don't confuse the two. What is referred to is the need to count on a large contingent capable of fulfilling every type of task more so today, when we aim at the conquest of power countrywide. We need to aim for the specialization of the leaders, of the cadre. We apply being Communists first, and principally combatants and administrators. We must, therefore, keep this in mind, it is very important. Chairman Mao taught us the need to be red and expert, principally red.

We must never tie our hands. The Party must propose activities that it can fulfill, using all the procedures that correspond to its conditions, activities that permit the greatest results, according to conditions. A Party that is well organized can lead a strike and obtain major victories; note that the precondition is that the Party be well organized. The class, the masses must fight to win victories. These struggles are feints, military exercises, preparations, maneuvers, that will prepare the masses for the decisive battles to come. This coincides with what Marx taught us about guerrilla warfare that prepares the class for its future struggle for power. This is very useful in handling the struggle for living conditions serving the conquest of power.

We are facing an enemy fortress, the old power, and from there they strafe us with machine-guns and take away our best leaders. This is the reality, hard but certain. Faced with this, what is to be done? He doesn't say dialogue, he doesn't say surrender, he doesn't say retreat; he says assault it, take it, and we will do so. What is the condition for this? We must unite all the forces of the proletariat that wake up with the force of the revolutionaries in a Communist Party, a Party that will have the broadest masses, a Party that unites all the active and honest elements that want revolution. Some will be militants, some supporters, others only friends. We must aim for the Party to be the only center of leadership and the recognized vanguard of the class. Internationally, the problem is also one of Communist Parties that maintain their character as parties of the class. We must think about the problem of the parties in Eastern Europe, wouldn't it have something to do with that peculiar process of making parties from an amalgam of parties? This is a problem.

5. On Capitulation.

This merits our attention because many are capitulating in the world and in the country. The phenomenon of the new revisionist counterrevolutionary offensive is serving the imperialists and world reactionaries, and it is rotting part that of the people, insufficiently based on principles and in the dialectical understanding of the world. It has repercussion among the intellectuals. In the 1960s, they got tired of calling themselves Marxists, or rather they got tired of dressing up as such, so now they renege and are embarrassed to have put on that mask. They are striving to be worthy of serving imperialism, revisionism and reaction. This convergence of the new revisionist counterrevolutionary offensive in collusion with imperialism dreams of the definitive destruction of Marxism. It dreams of sweeping away all that the revolution has done, all its gains, all its heroic actions. They seek to enthrone the old once again, that wicked domination by reaction in the most sinister moment of imperialism. This has repercussions and we see capitulation and monstrous apostasies.

We see this among the petty bourgeoisie, among the scabs of the working class. The MRTA, for example, is the chief hawker of capitulation in the country. They spread "peace," bourgeois democracy, the market economy, human rights, reactionary ideologies, and bourgeois culture. They capitulate in the face of imperialism. Capitulation expresses itself in two ways: capitulation in the face of native reaction and capitulation in the face of world reaction. It is always this way. Its objective is to sell out the revolution. It is rot that needs to be rooted out with blood and fire and this requires a strategy and tactics.

In Peking Review, 37/1975, on pg. 8, "Criticize Water Margin." Chairman Mao in the struggle against the rightist wind launches a struggle against capitulation. He takes a literary work and criticizes it, because comrades, art has a class character. He says that this novel is an example of what capitulation is. It is criticism that forms part of the efforts to apply the politics of Chairman Mao in the study of theory and on the prevention and opposition to revisionism. We must note the importance of theory: theory is a great battle front, it is an international necessity.

Communists need to handle Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, principally Maoism. We need to apply it and defend it, because with it, we can defeat every assault against Marxism. For us it is also a necessity. It is indispensable to handle the new state, to build socialism. The May document should be studied well and thoroughly, because it shows how we see Marxism and what questions we must resolve today with its illumination. It shows how to build the new state, describes democracy and dictatorship, private property, the problem of the united front, etc. These are real problems that present themselves today to Communists in Peru and the world.

For victory, we need a contingent of Marxist theoreticians, obviously indispensable to maintain the course of the revolution and to build socialism. Chairman Mao called upon the Party to study theory.

The merit of this novel is that it describes capitulation. It aims against the corrupt officials and saves the emperor. We see this in our country, for example PUM aims at [Economic] Minister Hurtado and exonerates Fujimori. This is capitulation. To practice capitulation is to practice revisionism, amnesty and enlisting. This is what the MRTA seeks, it is what the IS, IU, MAS, Minister Amat and Minister Hellfer seek. Those who capitulate, seek the offer of amnesty and recruitment, it is what they are offered, but as far as the MRTA, what does it do? It doesn't wait, it demands it, and offers it.

Combating capitulation is important because it is part of the struggle of the Party and the people in its efforts to adhere to Marxism, to combat revisionism and to persist in the revolutionary line. This is a problem more important than yesterday, because it plays into the next 50 to 100 years.

In order to combat capitulation we try to carefully differentiate between the specific characteristics of the capitulators. In the case of Del Prado his problem is to adjust to perestroika. For the MRTA and Polay, they capitulate with Castroite positions by means of arms. MAS says that Marxism is supposedly obsolete and that there should be a replacement with social-Christian positions. Patria Roja, like the Chinese revisionists of today, proposes that Marxism is going through a combination of reforms to advance, and that the world reactionaries or bourgeoisie are trying to use them to combat socialism. Internationally, they kneel before imperialism and the many revisionists, within the country capitulate before the big bourgeoisie, the landlords, and all are against the People's War. Do not forget that there are two factions of the big bourgeoisie, and that within each faction there are also groups. Revisionists are all those who call themselves Marxists but revise Marxism; opportunists are those who accommodate themselves with whatever faction to survive; and the bourgeoisie, are those who uphold the ideology of the bourgeoisie and defend it.

We must study Marxism well to combat revisionism, imperialism, and reaction. We must apply elevation and popularization and differentiate between leaders, cadres and militants, the army and the broad masses.

In Peking Review, 9/l986. The novel is a negative example. It promotes the capitulationist line, and then what does perestroika propagate? It propagates capitulation before imperialism, the most unchecked capitalist restoration, and it promotes revisionism. For example, to oppose corrupt officials without aiming against the entire bureaucracy as a component of the old state, but only against the corrupt, is for what purpose? Moralizing to make the old order more tolerable. We have an opposite position. We aim at the recalcitrant representatives of the old state, using selective annihilation to overthrow the decrepit order.

The entire novel is impregnated with the idea that the officials are bad and the emperor is good, this is its basis. For this reason, they aim at Hurtado [a cabinet member of Fujimori] because they think Fujimori is good, but they try to force, and impose on him. They ask Fujimori to moralize, that he renovate his justice. On the other hand, we ask nothing of him, we try to take away his power. To oppose the corrupt officials is to be loyal to the emperor. They aim at Hurtado they defend Fujimori, if they are "moralizing" then they are defending the system.

In the heart of the reactionaries there is a contradiction. Some aim to annihilate the revolution and some wish to disintegrate it from within, but both defend the system and are opposed to the revolution. They are two sides of the same coin.

Confronted by the revolution the reactionaries adopt a double tactic: the armed repression and the offer of amnesty and enlistment, that is capitulation. However, to reject or accept capitulation constitutes the focus of the two-line struggle.

The trilogy of the capitulationist line is:

• 1.To aim their attacks against officials, not the emperor;
• 2. Amnesty and enlistment; and
• 3. Repress the revolution.

We must not confuse the limitations of those who fight with those who surrender to the enemy. In China the peasants fought but were defeated, because without proletarian leadership they could not triumph, that was their limitation. Those who are in the struggle and capitulate, who surrender before the enemy, are seeking positions, and in this way form their armed base to later divide the peasant movement.

One of the characters, the capitulator, practiced revisionism disguised as revolutionary, developing counterrevolutionary activities and aimed at substituting the revolutionary line with a capitulationist line. He wasn't even a fellow traveler, but a traitor, an arch-criminal.

The philosophy of the capitulator was feudal and bourgeois. Loyalty and justice were synonyms that they used, and they acted in those names. If one has a bourgeois conception and is in the revolution, then he will capitulate.

His practice, ideas, and tactics are more perverse than the violent actions against the revolution, he uses feudal ideology with words about peace, justice, equality, and democracy to put out a rope and drag the masses behind them. The philosophy of life of all exploiting classes is characterized by seeking high positions, and recruiting lackeys.

In all times, capitulationists will inevitably arise within the revolutionary camp. There are old capitulators and contemporary ones, who practice class capitulation in the country and national capitulation overseas. Class capitulation is where they submit to the bourgeoisie and to imperialism. This fits like a ring on a finger to those who act this way, within and outside the country.

¹This is a temporary.translation, final correction is pending.