Joel Rocamora

Democracy and CommunismJoel Rocamora Institute for Popular Democracy, 14 September 2002 CPP not terrorist BRINGING THE AMERICANS and the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) together continues to stir the political pot. Suddenly everyone is asking if Joema is a "terrorist". Leave it to the Americans to get us asking the wrong questions all over again. I have problems with the CPP but it is definitely not a "terrorist organization". It does not engage in repeated, indiscriminate killings of non-combatants to achieve political effect. The Arroyo administration, with the assistance of the Americans, is using "anti-terrorism" discourse to open up the diplomatic front in its fight against the CPP. Because it continues to be preoccupied with the Abu Sayyaf, the military knows that it cannot do much against the NPA. One area where the CPP is vulnerable is in Holland. With a new rightwing government including the anti-refugee "List Pim Fortuyn", the Dutch readily agreed to American demands to freeze CPP/NDF bank deposits. How much practical effect this will have remains uncertain. Bank deposits of identified CPP leaders have finally been frozen but only after they have had time to withdraw funds. Even if these known accounts are frozen, it would not have much impact. The CPP certainly does not keep open accounts. The government has apparently cut off housing allowances but not social security payments, which sustain CPP cadres in Holland. I seriously doubt stories coming from NDF circles that the Dutch are planning to extradite Joema to the US. The reason for this inaction may be that the new right wing government has to fight against deeply embedded liberal traditions in the bureaucracy and the judiciary left over from decades of left-of-center social democratic governments. There is, however, a bill pending in parliament which would adopt the shameful Australian practice of putting refugees in concentration camps. If this bill passes, the CPP is in trouble. Being in a concentration camp would certainly cramp Joemas style. Left Dis-Course: Send in the "Vanguard" I AM NOT sure what it says of the Philippine Left that even a failed

government counter-insurgency initiative has an impact on how we relate to each other. Defensive responses from the CPP are understandable, even if I wonder sometimes what political impact threats on Americans in the Philippines are supposed to elicit, and from whom. We are all forewarned not to fall into the trap of attacking each other. But do we really need help from the Americans on this? The CPP reserves its best rhetorical weapons against other Left groups. Victor Briz of Bukluran ng Manggagawang Pilipino (BMP) could not resist a gratuitous insult against Akbayan in a letter on the terrorism issue. The CPP and those Popoy Lagman left behind are the most arrogant towards other Left groups. A decade after, Joema is still fighting the RARJ battle. Bayan Muna prefers to embrace Gloria Macapagal Arroyo rather than Ric Reyes. Sanlakas prefers the pro-Erap Peoples Movement Against Poverty (PMAP) to the socialist Bisig. I asked a leader of one of the groups which merged with Sanlakas if the insulting arrogance of some of her comrades is an ideological stance or a post mortem aping of Popoys personality. When I look back on the united front work of the CPP, its cadres have been least arrogant, most respectful of other perspectives during periods of rapid growth of its forces. Is it possible that todays arrogance goes with unacknowledged doubt about the prospects of victory? Is embracing doubt counter-revolutionary? It certainly does not do much for party discipline. But those of us who have abandoned "vanguard" arrogance embrace self-doubt as a necessary antidote to sectarianism. The shinier side of the coin of doubt is respect for the work of other progressives. Doubt becomes a problem when it results in self-imposed intimidation from those who by virtue of their revolutionary arrogance presume to set standards for other Left groups. The only antidote to this kind of intimidation is to sort out what standards should be common for all who claim to be Left, and those which go with chosen ideological stances and strategy and tactics. The irreducible minimum is acceptance of each others dedication to the poor and oppressed. Without this, antagonism is not only justified, it is obligatory. If we can accept this of each other, we can then debate the two major issues we confront, what alternative society are we offering our people, and how do we get there - strategy and tactics. Please excuse me if I postpone a discussion of alternatives. Because we

spend a lot of our time and energy justifiably attacking capitalism, we have no choice, at least initially, but to focus on a discussion of socialism. I cannot, for the life of me, claim to know what a socialist economy, society, and politics would mean. Worse, I do not know where to go for help. Not anymore to the "actually existing socialisms" of the USSR and Eastern Europe. Not to the Chinese and Vietnamese who were smart enough to prevent the collapse of their regimes by adopting many aspects of capitalist relations. For godsake, even the "beloved leader" is reported to be seeing ideological lessons from the massive discrepancy in living standards between North and South Korea. If we accept democracy as a progressive value, I could say my answer to the socialism question is whatever we succeed in shaping in the course of struggling for it. So that this answer does not become an evasion, I have to admit that it does not exempt us from the tasks of leadership - from having a vision that sets parameters for negotiated outcomes. Because, despite the ideological bravado of some groups, no one on the Left really has answers to this "ends" issue; much of the debate on the Left is really about strategy and tactics. I dont have much patience anymore for approaching the issue from the vantage point of whether there is a "revolutionary situation" that justifies taking up arms, especially when there are those who have been saying such a "revsit" has been around for the last 40-or-so years. This is not only un-Marxist, it is political "whistling in the dark". I prefer a more practical approach, one which asks where we are going to get heavier weapons for the latter stages of guerrilla warfare, especially when the two times the CPP tried to smuggle in weapons, they sunk the boats themselves. There is a much more important question, that of leadership, of our relations with the people we presume to lead. Issues related to political leadership will always be debated because social conditions are constantly changing. On the part of those who would presume to lead, there are matters of choice. Leading means being some distance from the people you want to lead. How far ahead is the first choice. Marxist Leninists attach names to these distances, short ones are "reformist;" farther distances, "revolutionary". We used to get all worked up over the finer details of the difference. At this time what is important for me are the social costs we ask the people we lead to bear. The more "revolutionary", the greater the social cost. If there is consultation about

costs, "how much" is a matter of negotiation. The problem is, the more "revolutionary" the goal, the greater the need to work underground, and then the more difficult "negotiation" becomes. When you are engaged in armed struggle, there is a premium on discipline. When bullets are flying, you do not consult. But it is precisely under these conditions that you ask the greatest sacrifice. Being underground means extremely difficult living conditions, risking capture, being jailed and possibly tortured. Guerrillas are asked to make the ultimate sacrifice. The communities where guerrillas operate also pay the cost of military operations in lives and the disruption of carefully worked out strategies for survival. Armed struggle generates a terrible strain on the social fabric of communities where guerrillas operate. When guerrillas begin their work, everything is kept quiet and discreet. When the community is won over to the struggle, the existence of the party and its mass organizations moves more and more into the open. Maintaining strict military security then becomes the responsibility of the whole community. In effect, the community becomes militarized. Family, economic and other social relations outside the community become more and more difficult. The other social cost of armed struggle is borne by the guerrillas themselves. I have not written much against armed struggle because I do not want to insult those who engage in it. Most of the guerrillas Ive known, I admire. Especially their acceptance of the possibility of torture. But torture by comrades? Robert Francis Garcias book, To Suffer Thy Comrades: How the Revolution Decimated Its Own, does not make for a full accounting of costs. It is only part of an answer, one which, in the intensity of the horror it exposes, forces us to confront a whole host of other issues. I wont be diplomatic about this - I find the CPP position on the purges disgusting. What families of victims of the CPP anti-DPA campaigns want is a dignified burial, the kind of accounting which enables them to give meaning to the deaths of their sons, daughters, and other kin; lovers and friends. Those who survived the torture want to dream other dreams, rather than their nightmares. What the CPP wants is not a decent burial for its victims - what it wants is to bury the issue.

(14 September 2002) Copyright 2002 Institute for Popular Democracy