This meeting took place in the autumn of 1980 at an undisclosed place. It was attended by representatives of the Ceylon Communist Party, Groupe Marxiste-Leniniste du Senegal, the Grupo para la Defensa del Marxismo-Leninismo of Spain, the Mao Tse-tung-Kredsen of Denmark, two groups from Great Britain (the Marxist-Leninist Collective and the Nottingham Communist Group).Also present were members of the New Zealand Red Flag Group, the Organizazione Comunista Proletaria Marxista-Leninista of Italy, Pour l’Internationale Proletarienne of France, the Reorganization Committee of the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist), the Unión Comunista Revolucionaria of the Dominican Republic, and the Revolutionary Communist parties of the United States and Chile.[79]
That meeting issued a joint communiqué addressed “To the Marxist-Leninists, the Workers and the Oppressed of all Countries.” It announced, “To carry out the struggle against revisionism and to aid the process of developing and struggling for a current general line in the international communist movement, the undersigned Parties and organizations… stress the need not only to maintain contact and carry out discussion and struggle with each other but actively to seek out and develop relations with other genuine Marxist-Leninists around the globe and carry out an ideological struggle and political work to win still broader forces of the international movement and the masses to consolidate the revolutionary struggles.”[80]
The communiqué sketched what its signers conceived the essence of real Marxism-Leninism-Maoism to be. Its first tenet was that “The dictatorship of the proletariat has been and remains the cardinal point of Marxism-Leninism.” In this connection, “Comrade Mao correctly pointed out that during the entire period of socialism, that is the period of the transition to communism, classes and class struggle still exist. … Mao made clear that it would be necessary to wage repeated mass revolutionary struggle, such as the Cultural Revolution, against the new bourgeoisie during the entire socialist transition.”
The second element of authentic Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, according to this communiqué, was “The seizure of power by armed force, the settlement of the issue by war is the central task and ‘the highest form of revolution.’ This is universally true for all countries. The ‘peaceful road to socialism’ is littered with the corpses of countless masses who were pointed down this road by revisionist betrayers.”
Finally, essential to genuine Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, according to this 1980 communiqué was the following belief: “The existence and the leading role of the party of the proletariat is another cardinal principle. This is expressed in an organization of the vanguard of the proletariat which must be based on a Marxist-Leninist ideological and organizational line on the principal problems of the revolution.”[81]
The communiqué rejected all association with the Albanian party and its ideas. It said “The Albanian Party of Labor and its leadership have fallen completely into the revisionist swamp. Shortly after the counterrevolutionary coup in China the APL attracted a number of genuine revolutionaries because they opposed some of the more hideous features of the Hua-Teng clique in China, especially regarding the international line. Very quickly, however, they outdid even Hua and Teng in the violence of their attack on Mao and Mao Tse-tung Thought.”[82]
The first issue of the periodical announced in the communiqué, A World To Win, appeared in May 1981. It was published first in Nottingham, England, and then in London. Among the articles in the first number of this publication was one entitled “When a Trial Backfires on the Judges,” which was said to be “A Clandestine Document from the Central Committee of the Communist Party (Marxist-Leninist) of China.”[83] Very little was heard subsequently of this organization.
The second meeting of the orthodox Maoists was held in March 1984, again at an undisclosed location. Represented there were nineteen organizations from India, Ceylon, Italy, Bangladesh, Colombia, Peru, Turkey, Haiti, Nepal, New Zealand, Great Britain, the Dominican Republic, Iran, and the United States. This conference formally established the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (RIM) and drew up a “Declaration” announcing the existence of that grouping.[84]
Over the subsequent years, the membership of the RIM varied as some of its affiliates disappeared and a few new ones were established. It was led by the Committee of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (CORIM), the membership of which was not disclosed. The RIM was reasonably well financed, if one is to judge from A World to Win and various pamphlets that it published from time to time.
It is interesting to note that the only member party of the RIM that was in fact carrying out a Maoist-style “popular war” on a substantial scale was the Communist Party of Peru (Shining Path). In 1996 it was announced that the affiliated party in Nepal was also undertaking such an effort, although few details are available concerning it. The parties of Thailand, Burma, Malaysia, Cambodia, and the Philippines, which had long been carrying on guerrilla wars, did not join the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement.
The loyalty of the RIM to Maoism as the highest stage of development of Marxism-Leninism continued to be made clear in its publications. In a pamphlet issued on the occasion of Mao’s hundredth birthday in 1993, the RIM wrote, “In the course of the Chinese revolution Mao had developed Marxism-Leninism in many important fields. But it was in the crucible of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution that our ideology took a leap and the third great milestone, Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, fully emerged. From the higher plane of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism the revolutionary communists could grasp the teachings of the previous great leaders even more profoundly and indeed even Mao Tse-tung’s earlier contributions took on deeper significance. Today, without Maoism there can be no Marxism-Leninism. Indeed to negate Maoism is to negate Marxism-Leninism itself.”[85]
At the same time, the RIM rejected the so-called Three World Theory, which the successors to Mao in the Chinese leadership had attributed to him. In the Declaration announcing the foundation of the RIM it denounced “the revisionists” subsequent elaboration of the ‘Three Worlds Theory’ which they attempted to shove down the throats of the international communist movement. The Marxist-Leninists have correctly refuted the revisionist slander that the ‘Three Worlds Theory’ was put forward by Mao Tse-tung.”[86]
The RIM gave particular attention to the guerrilla activities of the Sendero Luminoso in Peru. In the pamphlet issued to celebrate Mao’s centenary, it said, “Most important has been the advanced experience of the People’s War led by the Communist Party of Peru.”[87] The RIM periodical carried frequent articles about the supposed advances of the Sendero Luminoso guerrillas. After the capture of Abimail Guzmán and other Sendero leaders, the RIM periodical devoted extensive attention to the controversy within Sendero over whether to continue the armed struggle, indicating strong support for doing so.
Around the time Guzmán was captured, the RIM was able to make the only successful, if modest, effort to arouse sympathy beyond the ranks of orthodox Maoism. It organized the International Emergency Committee to Defend the Life of Dr. Abimail Guzmán. Among those who signed the call for a meeting to set up such a committee were ex-President Bani-Sadr of Iran, the British Labour Party’s M.P.s Tony Benn and Bernie Grant, and William Kunstler.[88]
79
85
Revolutionary Internationalist Movement;