Bolivia: Year Two of the Banzer Dictatorship

[p058] BOLIVIA: YEAR TWO OF THE BANZER DICTATORSHIP The French Organisation Communiste Internation- aliste provided Guillermo Lora with rationalizations for the betrayals by his party, the POR, during the Bolivian right-wing military coup of Hugo Banzer two years ago. They did this by their distortions of the tactic of the United Front and their unprin- cipled defence of the Popular Assembly—organ of the Popu- lar Front in Bolivia.’ Lora helped to betray the Bolivian revolution (with the Stalinists), but the OCI em- bellishes the betrayal and pre- sents the defeat to the Euro- pean workers as if it were an inevitable and accomplished fact; the terminal development in an objective process beyond the control of any party or group leaders, By implication they blame the workers and peasants for the defeat. This method of belittling the revolutionary potential of the working class is but the reverse side of the ‘theory’— Menshevik to the core—which exaggerates the power of the national bourgeoisie and helps to paralyse the will of the vanguard. This reformist argument is. unambiguously stated in the OCI draft statement to their international pre-conference: ‘... in 1963 at the Reorgan- ization Congress of the Pabloites and _ organizations - which, with the SWP, split with the IC, some documents on the “colonial revolution” were adopted. To justify their capitulation to the petty- bourgeois nationalists in the colonial and __ semi-colonial +4 - Says that the bourgeoisie is weak not only countries Pabloism established “‘as a general social tendency, the numerical. and economic weakness of the national bourgeoisie”. ‘The mistake had also been made until-1958 by the French majority in the PCI... The theoretical mistake was obvious: Marxism teaches the following: however weak it is, numerically and economically, the bourgeoisie is powerful because of the power of its links with wérld imperialism.’ Sinister role ‘La Correspondance Inter- national’ Jurle °1972. It is this Menshevik ‘theory’ that informs the opposition of the OCI to any support to the NLF in Vietnam and to their political patronage to the Men- shevik policies of the POR in -Bolivia. Marxism, on. the contrary, national because of its belated develop- ment, but above all, because of the historical decline of world imperialism. To question this basic principle is to revise the historic prognosis of Lenin and Trotsky. This is precisely the role of the OcI. In. this the OCI needs no assistance even. from __ the Stalinists. In doing this-and in providing .a. ‘convenient -public foram. for Lora in France, the © OCI ieaders have revealed the sinister rolé of centrism and its shameless capitulation to Stalinism and _ bourgeois- nationalism. The Bolivian — events have proved in a tragic way that those who make a fetish of the programme, as the OCI do, and use it as an alternative to the Struggle for theory, are always the first to betray the pro- gramme. The International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) states that there can be no struggle for programme “without a_ simultaneous development of — dialectical theory. The history of the struggle against every variety. of revisionism has shown that the struggle to defend the pro- gramme is inseparably con- nected with and subordinate to the struggle for perspective— a struggle which is impossible without the development of the Marxist theory of know- ledge and the party. In 1951-1953 Pablo pro- posed to abandon the Trans- itional Programme of the FI, because he_ replaced the historical perspective of Trot- sky with his middle-class theory of ‘war-revolution’, ‘liberaliz- ation of the bureaucracy’ and ‘centuries of degenerated workers states’. The struggle against Pablo was much more than a fight for programme, It was a struggle for a correct method of orient- ation. Today under essentially the same pressures, but under. more critical objective con- ditions, the OCI-POR try to liquidate the FI and revise its programme by attacking the foundations of Marxist theory and the concept of the revolu- tionary party—both of which are integral to a correct pers- pective. Unprepared in 1953 the same question is posed by these un- principled factionalists and opportunists: can socialist con- sciousness develop in the work- ing class without a constant _ Fourth International Spring 1973.

[p059] ~. Struggle waged by the revolu- ‘tionary party armed = with Marxist theory against bourgesis consciousness? We > Say unequivocally that the road adopted by the OCI-POR is the road of opportunist-centrist adaptation to the spontaneous labour movement to bourgeois consciousness and_ leads—in- exorably—to betrayal and defeat. That is why in May- June 1968 in France and in August 1971 in Bolivia, historic events. of the most favourable variety for build- ing the party and International found these revisionist groups unprepared organizationally and disoriented politically. Like the ILP and SAP in the 1930s, these groups are nothing more than ‘left’ appendages of Social Democracy or Stalin- ism; intermediate centrist groups which are not pledges for the future, but decayed survivals of the past. The ICFI takes its stand with Trotsky against these middle-class liquidators of Marxism who serve _ the objective needs of monopoly capitalism and its Stalinist, reformist and petty-bourgeois agencies. As the’ Transitional Pro- gramme states: ‘The Fourth . International does not search after and does not invent panaceas. It takes its stand completely on Marx. - ism as the only revolutionary doctrine that enables one to. understand reality, unearth the cause behind the defeats and consciously prepare for victory.’ This tradition is completely opposed to the systematic centrist adaptation § to bourgeois pressure, to the- demagogic cover-up of defeats and the prostration before Stalinism and petty- bourgeois nationalism which character- izes the POR and OCI, - It is indeed no accident that — Lora—the.__ revisionist © who faithfully carried out Pablo's class-collaborationist line in the 1952 Bolivian revolution-- should find himself in fraternal solidarity with the OCI leaders in derailing the most promis- — ing development in Bolivia in the last two decades. ' The support which the OCI gave to Lora was motivated not by interest in the struggle of the colonial peoples, but agreement with Lora’ on method and a determination to break with the International Committee, to proceed untram- melled on.a course of centrism and opportunism. The OCI agreed with Lora that the role of the party was to reflect the present level of thinking of the working class, of necessity still within a bourgeois framework, rather than to conflict with it. They therefore agreed with Lora that collaboration with Stalinism on the basis of mini- mum agreements and com- promises must replace a ruth- less struggle against Stalinism. The OCI had earlier made formally correct. criticism of Lora’s adaptation to Stalinism, but now ignored his continuing the same policy. Thus they agreed with Lora on_ the liquidation of Trotskyism! They used Lora to break from the Trotskyist movement inter- nationally. The fast-moving events since the split of the OCI from the International Committee fully confirm this assessment. Immediately after a fund raising tour of France spon- sored by the OCI, Lora pro- ceeded to negotiate with the Stalinists, the Pabloites, the guerrillaists, the Maoists, Lechin’s supporters and. . . Torres himself. The result was the FRA, a popular-front form- ation combining — workers’ Parties with the representatives of a section of the bourgeoisie. — Lora, quite consistently with his - past practice and _ his method, proposed that the FRA itself will be the vehicle for the socialist revolution! ‘The anti-imperialist. front,’ - according to Lora, has the central aim of ‘the construction of socialism and the conquest of power’. Next the OCI called a special Latin American conference of its supporters (January 1972), At this conference Lora defended the FRA and insisted . that it is the natural extension of the Popular Assembly and of his past. activities in Bolivia; The OCI. however, tried in - vain to differentiate itself from the FRA, while at the same time maintaining its support for the previous policies of the POR. ‘The OCI’s position was not one of principled opposition to a front with the national bourgeoisie and certainly not. a call for the construction of the Trotskyist party. It main- tained only that the ‘united anti-imperialist front’ should be organized by the ‘united workers’ front’. The conference came to a complete impasse. Then followed the pre-con- ference meeting of the OCI's split-off from the International Committee. Lora’s POR did not even honour the gathering by sending a representative to attend! The main business of the conference was to declare that not only is the Fourth International dead in general but so also is the International Committee in particular! In less than a year the full logic of the events of August 1971 has worked itself out, pushed ahead by the swift pace of the capitalist crisis and the international class struggle. The issue in August 1971. was whether or not we proceed to — construct Trotskyist parties on the basis of a turn towards Marxist philosophy, breaking from Stalinism and nationalism, or liquidate Trotskyism com- pletely into centrist amalgams with those who betray the working class. The Fourth International will now be built by those who absorb completely the lessons ‘of the Bolivian events. The renewed movement of the ’ Bolivian masses indicates once again the determination of the working class in Latin America to destroy once and for all im- perialism and its native capital- ist henchmen. The movement of the workers in Latin America pushes spontaneously beyond the existing leaderships, But precisely at that point it ' must fall back if a conscious leadership is not constructed. _ The horrors of fascism are in store if the task of con- structing this leadership is not immediately undertaken. The International Committee is con- ‘fronting. this task. November 14, 1972 BOLIVIA: Year two of the Banzer dictatorship

[p060] Statement by the International Committee of the 4th International THE INTERNATIONAL Com. mittee of the Fourth Inter- national calls on its sections and supporters in every country to fight for the mobilization of the organized working class in defence of the Vietnamese re- volution, against the genocidal onslaught of US imperialism. The US army and air force are engaged on the greatest operation of © mass destruction of human life in the whole of history. B52 bombing raids in North Vietnam have killed more people in less than two weeks than the Atomic tombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. The tonnage of bombs dropped by US imperialism in Vietnam is greater than the total dropped in the whole of World War II. The attack now going on marks a. decisive new stage not only in the Vietnam war, but in the world crisis of capitalism and the international class struggle. Early in October 1972, US President Nixon, campaigning for re-election, cyni-: — cally and deliberately gave the false impression that peace terms were about to be finally signed. The real meaning of that manoeuvre is clear. US impe played with the fate of millions of workers and peasants in Vietnam in order to win time and consolidate their power for their attack on the American working class and, through the trade war, on their rivals and on the working class throughout the world. The mass extermination in North Viet- nam today is the inevitable accompaniment of the new stage in the crisis of inter- national capitalism. The continued heroic . Struggle of the Vietnamese people, despite US imperialism’s genocidal policies, is the foremost example of the resistance of the working class. Imperialism has no answer to the re- sistance of the masses excépt this mass destruction of life and ‘of the means of production. Everywhere the capitalists ‘turn, they need to smash the working class, an undefeated working class which resists every attack. There is now not the slightest question of an agreed solution of the monetary crisis sparked off by Nixon’s scrapping of the Bretton Woods system in August 1971. Special Drawing Rights, merely a new form of paper money, have accelerated world inflation and there will be no inter. national agreement on them. The controversy on IMF loans and Drawing Rights to ‘developing’ countries means only that ‘aid’ to these countries is at an end. The new bombing in Vietnam is the traditional capitalist ‘solution’ te their insoluble crisis—war and mass destruction. The colonial workers and peasants must now be physically wiped out. Having in the past unloaded their crisis on to the colonial peoples, the imperialists will now turn with ‘renewed ferocity to the repression and destruction of the working class in the advanced countries.. Fourth International Spring 1973

[p061] It is in this brutal material form that the identity of interest of the workers of the advanced and colonial: countries asserts itself, Nor will the US imperialists flinch from Pursuing the trade war to the point of military conflict, involving the deaths of millions of workers and wiping out of the means of production. They know no other way out of the crisis. The revisionist advocates of a ‘neo-capitalism’, reputedly free of the old imperialist contradictions and not needing to solve its crises in war, are guilty of the most treacherous de- ception and betrayal of the working class This is the criminal responsibility of the (Pabloite) Unified Secretariat of Mandel, and of the Communist Party Stalinists. Vietnam today is Europe and America tomorrow, unless the working. class is mobilized to stop the imperialist attack and move through this struggle to the conquest of power. There is no other way. None of the capitalist parties has any ‘compromise’ alternative. McGovern, supported by reformists, Stalinists and ‘protesters’ of all kinds as the ‘lesser evil’ against Nixon, has spoken against the new attacks only on the ground that the loss of US air crew is ‘excessive’! In Britain and the rest of Europe, the reformist and trade union leaders play the classic role of social-democracy. Nothing could better exemplify the death of reformism than their utter failure to organize even the slightest opposition to the US attacks. The severity of imperial- ism’s crisis reveals them for what they are—its lackeys. They are indicating to_ the working class the hangman’s role, which they will play against the working class in Europe itself in the new. stage of the struggle. _ World Stalinism bears the main res- ponsibility for the fate of the people of Hanoi and Haiphong, and for the absolu- tely criminal refusal to mobilize the working-class internationally against the new stage of imperialist attack. Ever since Nixon’s measures of August 1971, ending the convertibility of the dollar and launching the trade war, every- thing has depended on preparation of the working class to challenge for state power: all possibility of reform has vanished. The only alternative to the revolutionary struggle for power was and remains a. series of wars and counter-revolutiona dictatorships, the only method by. whic the imperialists can deal with the working’ class. But Stalinism, both in Moscow and Peking, draws closer to . imperialism. Having betrayed the French revolutionary struggle of 1968 and suppressed the Czechoslovak working class, with im- perialist blessing, the Stalinist bureaucracy now accelerates its plans for the European Security Pact and the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks, all the time continuing to encourage the secret diplomacy over Vietnam. New long-term Soviet agreements with US imperialism, together with the new approaches of the Chinese bureaucracy, left Nixon free to enter the present —