ASPECTS
OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE THEORY OF GUERRILLA WAR: A CRITIQUE OF THE WRITINGS OF
REGIS DEBRAY
Men fight and lose the battle, and the thing
they fought for comes about in spite of their
defeat, and when it comes turns out to be not
what they meant, and other men have to fight
for what they meant under another name.
William Morris
ONE
REVOLUTION
AND GUERRILLA WAR
A
reading of history indicates that guerrilla warfare is not in itself a
revolutionary form of struggle, for it has occurred in many periods of man's
history as the classic way for the less well armed to fight the organised power
of a strong opponent, and has often served as an adjunct of regular warfare in
the purely military sense. It has been used by " reactionary and counter
revolutionary forces,as well as by revolutionary movements; banditry has often
had a guerrilla character"(1) .Going back to the eighteenth century, we
find that guerrilla warfare was employed in the American War of Independence,
especially in the Southern colonies (guerrillas like Francis Marion "the
swamp fox"; committees of public safety "employing terror against the
Tories, burned their homes, tarred and feathered them, and confiscated their
property"(2)); in the American Civil War, partisan bands were extensively
employed by the Confederacy organised as adjuncts of the regular armies (the
Mosby's and the Ashby's)(3). On the Continent guerrilla warfare was employed
against Napoleon both in the Russian campaign and in Spain; while back in the
States the Indians pursued guerrilla warfare well into the later half of the
nineteenth century. At the conclusion of the Spanish American War, guerrilla
bands in the Philippines waged war on the Americans in the period 1899-1906(4).
In the twentieth century guerrilla warfare bas been extensively waged in Arabia,
China, Vietnam, Algeria, Greece, Palestine, Malaya, Philippines, Occupied
Europe, Kenya, Cyprus, Cuba, to name only a few. At no time did communist
parties claim or hold a monopoly over the conduct of guerrilla warfare. The
communists were indeed insistent that "at no time have we seized upon one
form of struggle as applicable to all situations"(5). The reason for the
eruption of the struggle in their view,was inherent in all countries with deep
seated social wrongs; there were apt to be at any given time, some people who
can be inspired to take up arms, even when a revolutionary situation did not
obtain, in the hope of changing their conditions of life. Such acts, whether
spontaneous or conspiratorially planned, the communists were emphatic, were no
more than isolated cases of desperation and\or adventurism.
Lenin
had explicitly set down the pre requisites for the existence of a revolutionary
situation ; this obtained when "the lower classes do not want to live in
the old way, and the upper classes cannot carry on in the old way"(6). The
revolution is impossible without a nationwide crisis affecting both exploited
and exploiters. But what Lenin was talking about was really grounded in actual
Russian particularity; what the Bolsheviks successfully carried though in Russia
in 1917 was an armed insurrection; the success of the Revolution was only to be
achieved later with the successful termination of the civil war, in which both
regular and guerrilla warfare were extensively used. Lenin's
strictures have sounded hollow in the post second world war period, when
revolutionaries were faced with a different social and political environment,
and the struggle became much more protracted. Lenin's deterministic strictures
were denied by reference to Marx's dictum, "World history would indeed be
very easy to make, if the struggle were taken up only on condition of infallibly
favourable chance". Lenin himself had denied the supreme role of guerrilla
war(which later adherents were to ascribe to it) writing in 1906 that " the
party of the proletariat can never regard guerrilla warfare as the only, or even
as the chief method of struggle; this method must be subordinated to other
methods; it must be commensurate with the chief methods of warfare, and must be
ennobled by the enlightening and organising influence of socialism"(7). The
Russian Revolution gave birth to two great debates, one related to the existence
of a distinct Marxist strategy of war(the Unified Military Doctrine), and the
other, concerning the doctrine of revolution from without(the Export of
Revolution). Frunze, the main exponent of the "Unified Military
doctrine", held that " a new science of war was necessary, which would
express the social character of the working class as the new master of
society"(8).He argued against the hierarchy and iron discipline of
Trotsky's Red Army, and demanded instituting a democratised structure of
command, with military commissars subordinated to political commissars,
themselves elected from below and
not appointed from above. On the strategic doctrine of the proletarian army,
Frunze insisted that the war of manoeuvre predominated over the war of position,
and that the working class was superbly suited to conduct mobile offensive
actions. The offensive was to be the new doctrine of the proletariat's army.
Trotsky, commissar for war, rejected the idea of the existence of a distinct
Marxist strategy of war. He regarded military affairs as a technical branch of
science. In 1922 , he wrote, "There is not and there has never been a
military science. There does exist a whole number of sciences upon which
military affairs rest"(9). He argued that manoeuvrability and the offensive
were nothing peculiarly proletarian, quoting French military manuals and the
works of Marshal Foch(10),and insisted that those who talked about the new
science both misunderstood Marxism, and were falsely generalising the specific
conditions of the Civil War. The doctrine of Revolution From Without was
championed by Tukachevsky(11). He advocated offensive proletarian war against
neighbouring bourgeois states to overthrow capitalism and help install the local
communist parties in power. He called for the creation of an International
General Staff of the Proletarian Revolution, to co- ordinate external operations
all over the continent(12). Tukachevsky had the opportunity to put his ideas
into practice in the Polish Campaign(which incidentally was opposed by Trotsky)
and which ended in total defeat for the Red Army at the gates of Warsaw. Very
little was heard of the doctrine in the following years(it could of course be
argued that the communist states of Eastern Europe were set up in exactly the
way Tukachevsky had advocated).
It
was however in China that the theory and practice of peoples war was being
tested; the historical result of this massive struggle was the formulation which
had eluded the Soviet debates of the 1920's; a Marxist strategy that theorised a
new form of military conflict - the peoples protracted war.
Mao
formulated in practice his doctrine of guerrilla war and produced a new theory
of revolutionary practice unifying within it, politics and war. This was based
on a number of considerations; that the revolutionaries consider mass support
the primary condition for their success, thus winning and maintaining popular
support remain the central objective of the guerrilla movement throughout the
struggle; that the popular support of the guerrilla is predicated upon the moral
alienation of the masses from the existing government, thus the revolutionaries
chief aim is to activate and perpetuate the moral isolation of the enemy, until
such isolation becomes total and irrevocable.Mao emphasizes that the steps
leading up to a revolutionary war cannot be created by conspiracy; they are
partly inherent in a situation of rapid social change where the ruling elite
fails over an extended period to formulate and maintain a process of
legitimization, as well as transforming the social and economic set up. The
revolutionary guerrilla movement, concentrates on out-administering and not on
out-fighting(though this too) the enemy. Thus the undertaking as such is a
constructive and not a destructive one( a point constantly ignored by
theoreticians of counter revolutionary war). The use of terror by the guerrillas
should be largely foregone; when it is necessary to use it, it should be highly
selective and combined with other forms of political action to make its meaning
clear. Finally, the existence of an external sanctuary though important at
various stages of the struggle, is of greater psychological and diplomatic than
military or political value to the guerrillas(13). The struggle cannot begin
before the organisation of a solid communist apparatus ; the Red Army develops
from, and under the control of, this party apparatus, where the military command
is constantly subordinate to the political leadership. Base areas must be
established as a precondition for development of a protracted war. The war
launched by the Red Army from its secure and fixed bases should aim at the
countryside slowly encircling the cities. The war is conducted through a united
front of all patriotic and nationalist forces, and proceeds through three
stages. Initially it takes the form of guerrilla operations, after a period of
consolidation the struggle is stepped up and intensifies, to be enshrined
finally in a regular war of position. The revolutionary forces are composed of
local militia, guerrilla units, and regular forces. The war can only be
successfully terminated after the success of the third stage. Transition from
one stage to the next is not mechanical and varies according to local
conditions; the most difficult stage is undoubtedly the opening one, the
guerrillas being then at their weakest and with little experience. The socialist
revolution is to be launched only after the protracted war against the enemy has
been won. This was more or less the course of the Chinese armed struggle
following the failure of the urban revolution in 1927. Lin Piao, veteran of the
struggle from its early beginnings, emphasised the relevance of the Chinese
experience to the struggle in the Third World, and in the world wide
confrontation between socialism and capitalism. His messages was that "the
establishment of rural revolutionary base areas and the encirclement of the
cities from the countryside, is of outstanding universal practical significance
for the present revolutionary struggle of all the oppressed nations and peoples
in Asia, Africa and Latin America."(14) Peoples war as practiced by the
Chinese is held to carry universal validity on a global scale, with the Third
World(the countryside) surrounding and defeating the capitalist world(the
cities).
Two
special factors of extreme importance have been noted in consideration of the
Chinese experience, which it is argued, render it unique, and inapplicable to
the struggle in the Third World. First, China was engaged in a war against a
foreign occupying power, Japan, which makes a National Bloc policy operational,
and which lends strength and adherents to the struggle waged by the red army :
secondly, the size of China is a special factor, the communists could seize
"a remote area(as indeed they did) and hold it long enough to restructure
its social relations before any government invasion"(15). In the post war
period with the speedy dismantling of colonial empires, and the relatively small
size of most Third World states, these two main pre-conditions for a successful
re-enaction of the Chinese model, remain unfulfilled. The nearest successful
revolution to conform to the Chinese model was the Algerian Liberation war, with
important qualifications. (The Vietnamese model, similar in many respects to
China, yet possessing very unique characteristics, will for the sake of
simplification be regarded as one with the Chinese).
The
Algerian Liberation war(1954-1962) contributed next to nothing to the
development of guerrilla theory, and its post independence development has been
a direct consequence of its spontaneous and ideologically unrevolutionary
outlook. In many ways it serves as a what should not be done model for
revolutionaries. The Algerians, fighting against a colonial power, succeeded in
securing a base in the relatively impenetrable Aures mountains. In both
spheres,(a national struggle uniting diverse classes, and the securing of a
relatively impenetrable base) the Algerian war satisfied the conditions of the
Chinese model. Yet the success of the Algerian nationalists was due more to
political than to military factors. In 1958 the paratroopers had won the battle
for Algiers the capital, and by 1961, the army was winning the war in the
countryside, having at the same time insulated the movement from its major
sources of supply across the border. Yet the FLN continued to succeed in
out-administering the French authorities, and in spite of severe military
setbacks, the years 1960-62 witnessed a resurgence of violent mass activity in
Algiers itself. Final political victory was a the result of a failure of the
will in Paris(similarly with the Cyprus model), and unlike the Chinese, not
victory in the field. Algeria did not proceed to the building of socialism after
independence, and ties with the metropolitan country remained strong. The
Algerian Revolution has been regarded by many observers as an example of a
revolution that failed. It was left to Cuba to provide a new theory and practice
of revolution.
The
success of the Cuban Revolution is in itself based on a heresy, and constitutes
a continuous provocation to communist orthodoxy. The armed struggle was
initiated by a handful of men who were nearly completely wiped out in their
first engagement; the guerrilla movement lacked a coherent political social and
economic program, and the leadership of the movement combined both political and
military functions. Guevara, who sought to build a new model for revolution on
the basis of the Cuban experience, claimed that Cuba contributed three
fundamental lessons to the conduct of the revolutionary movement in Latin
America(16). First, that popular forces can win against the enemy; second ,that
it is not necessary to wait until all conditions for making the revolution
exist, the revolution itself can create them; and third, that in underdeveloped
Latin America, the countryside is the main arena of armed struggle. The
guerrilla fighter is thus above all "an agrarian revolutionary"(17).
Guevara called for the creation of the professional revolutionary, his job, to
make the revolution, his politics to be born in the struggle itself.
Guevara's
formulation is a challenge to the leadership of the orthodox communist parties
of Latin America. They have continuously voiced their belief in Revolution,
insisted on the primary role of the urban working class, and rejected any one
road to revolution (in practice, their favourite path has been the electoral
road, and the United Front tactic) The communist leadership takes its cue from
revolutionary doctrine as expounded by the Soviet Union. With the advent of the
policy of peaceful co existence and the Sino Soviet split, the Kremlin has
declared orthodoxy in the Third World to consist of three main tenets. First,
that the national bourgeoisie is essentially progressive(18); secondly, that in
the changing balance of force between the Socialist and the capitalist bloc,
armed revolution is not necessarily the path
to emancipation and development(19); and thirdly that the center of world
revolution remains in the industrialised developed world(20)(a rejection of the
Chinese-Cuban thesis that the weakest link of the international capitalist
system, and its most sensitive one, is in the Third World). Thus from the
vantage point of communist orthodoxy, the Cuban rebel band followed a Blanquist
strategy, described by Engels as the view "that a relatively small number of resolute well
organised men would be able at a given favourable moment, not only to seize the
helm of the state but also to keep power, by energetic and unrelenting action
until they had succeeded in drawing the mass of the people into the revolution
by marshaling around a small band of leaders"(21). Yet the fact was that
the rebel band had succeeded in Cuba, and in a relatively short time(the
revolution did, contrary to popular myth, possess a political movement - the
July 26th movement- and had intensive contacts with other progressive forces on
the Island and in exile; the armed struggle was only a part- the most important-
of a much larger political struggle against the dictatorship).
In
the 1960's Latin America abounded with small organisations of Fidelesta, some of
whom had broken away from the communist parties while others had came from the
reformist nationalist parties, and who laboured to re-enact the Cuban model in
their respective countries. Invariably, every single one of these movements
failed. Every Foco installed by revolutionaries had by the late 1960's been
eradicated by the army . To many, it seems that the failure of the strategy is
not inherent in itself, but was due to the faulty understanding and application
of the Cuban lessons. The Cuban Revolution in its success,has posed the problem
of alliances and fronts ; of the revolutionary potentialities of the national
bourgeoisie; of the role of the vanguard; of the maturity of the revolutionary
situation;of the necessity of the revolutionary party; and of the extent to
which the subjective factors could either utilise or create the revolutionary
situation(22). Without formulating the correct answer to these questions,
victory was impossible.
R.Debray
applied himself to the task of formulating the answers to the questions posed.
In his earliest writings on Latin America(1963) he was already expounding the
thesis that the countryside rather than the town is the main field of struggle.
His early writings attempt to formulate a short account of the political context
of the revolutionary movement, & forwards the contention that the Cuban
Revolution, by its very success, has revolutionised the forces of counter
revolution more speedily and effectively than it did the revolutionary movement
itself. But it was only in 1967 with the publication in Havana of
Revolution in the Revolution, that he put forward a comprehensive view of
the unfolding of the revolutionary process. The book appeared at a time when the
Fidelesta forces had sustained a shattering defeat and a shift was taking place
from the countryside back to the town. Yet until the full implications of the
defeat of Guevera's Bolivian venture became apparent, the Cuban model continued
to posses a certain degree of validity(and still does). Urban guerrillas have
seized upon Debray's formulation and are trying to adapt them to their
conditions. In the long run, the aim of the guerrilla groups is still manifestly
to open a guerrilla front in the countryside; the shift is a purely tactical
one. The preparatory stage of the struggle can only be initiated in the towns;
Debray's analysis is seen as misrepresenting the real nature of the development
of the Cuban Revolution.
The
work itself has been described as " an accurate account of the thinking of
the leaders of the Cuban Revolution on those subjects.....we have here for the
first time a comprehensive and authorised presentation of the revolutionary
thought of Castro and Guevara"(23). This was to be the authorised version
of the Revolution as released by Havana, and an institutionalisation of the
Cuban model. The Cuban introduction to the book says that , "no one else
who has written about the Cuban Revolution has had access to such a wealth of
material for historical research..(he had) complete access to the leaders of the
Cuban Revolution and to unpublished documents"(24). Indeed this was how
Debray's work was received , by both communists and revolutionaries. Cuba's
success had itself posed the question whether its particularity could be
generalised into a workable model for continental revolution. Debray sets out to
prove that the answer is yes.
TWO
THE
DEBRAY THESIS
Introduction
The
outstanding feature of Debray's ideas lies in their striking contradictions (the
earlier articles versus Revolution in the Revolution)(1). The argument has been
put forward that these two periods compliment each other(2); the first, dwelling
on the socio-political aspects of the struggle, the latter on the armed struggle
itself. Such a presentation does not however seem tenable. Nowhere does Debray
present an economic, social and political analysis of Latin American conditions;
yet in his writings there is a consistent mixture of the military and the
political. A large part of "Revolution..." is concerned with refuting
the strategy of the orthodox Latin American Communist parties, while his first
article(3) concentrates mainly on the military side and is a refutation of the
viability of urban guerrilla action.
It
is undeniable ,however ,that there is a strong strand of continuity in his
works. As early as 1963 he was putting forward the theory of the rural Foco as
the correct form of struggle, and repudiating the reformist policies of the
American communist parties. What is missing in his latter works is the emphasis
on the political struggle; his repudiation of the promise not to set up a
Cuban Model, irrespective of the particularity of each country's
conditions, and his emphatic rejection of the armed struggle as a categorical
imperative. By 1967 the political lines in Latin American had hardened with the
open split between left revolutionaries and orthodox communists, and Debray
ascribed to his theories a continental significance. The following section will
deal briefly with his earlier formulations.
Revolution
and Counter Revolution
Debray
saw the success of the Cuban Revolution as the direct cause of the
transformation of the conditions of transformation of Latin America. In the
struggle, there are "no military or political experiences that are
unilateral"(4), and Cuba's success had revolutionised the forces of counter
revolution more speedily and effectively than it did the revolutionary movement
itself. Imperialism, possessing all the material means of organised violence and
a determination to preserve the status quo is in a better position to learn the
lessons of the past. Thus the door which Cuba had prised open has been solidly
bolted; from within by the ruling oligarchies uniting into a single counter
revolutionary front, from without by imperialism reinforcing its military
repressive apparatus, and extending increased military aid and training
programs. An attention to theory is thus the highest priority for Cuba; "
the triumph of revolutionary spontaneity has become the death of that
spontaneity"(5). The efforts to set up a Foco in slavish imitation of Cuba
had all foundered, but Castro insisted that the fault lay with the
revolutionaries; the objective conditions for revolution existed, but there was
"an absence of subjective conditions in the vanguard"(6). It is
imperative to recognise that Cuba had put an end to all models, even a Cuban
one, and revolutionaries have to make their own way, to find a new and
unsuspected weakest link.
Debray
regards his Foco theory as a formulation of the Lenninst concept of the weakest
link in the special conditions of Latin America; only a minority organisation of
professional revolutionaries is regarded capable of carrying through a
successful struggle. Conscious of similarities with Blanquism, he denies that
the Foco aims at seizing power on its own or thorough military defeat of the
enemy, but that it "aspires to engage the masses themselves in the
struggle"(7). The struggle is national and anti colonial, thus a vanguard
party is not an indispensable condition as Cuba has demonstrated. Moreover a
National Liberation struggle " cannot be conducted under the banner of the
Marxist Lenninst Party"(8) because of the aristocrisation of the small
working class, and the struggles national character. But the Foco does not
constitute a strategy in itself and its appearance pre supposes an analysis of
"national contradictions understood in class terms"(9). The pre
conditions can only be fulfilled by deciding by whom, where, with what program
and with what alliances, and within what integrating strategy can the armed
struggle be launched. The working class, numerically insignificant,
bureaucratic, corrupt, and removed from the main battle field, cannot play the
leading role; this falls to the poor peasantry who are the truly vanguard class.
The basic area of the struggle is the countryside. The Battle of Caracas showed
that the urban guerrilla cannot win(10); he has no hope of ever developing into
a regular army capable of confronting the established army, he cannot convert
people, and cannot perform his role as a social reformer. The only conclusion
possible is that drawn by the Venezuelan guerrillas themselves , who withdrew
into the country side as the only viable environment for the successful
continuation of the armed struggle.
Revolution
in the Revolution
Debray
sets himself three main tasks; to examine the lessons falsely drawn from the
Cuban Revolution, to discuss the tactics used by Latin American
revolutionaries(and which led to failure), and to attempt a formulation of the
correct strategy for armed struggle in the whole Continent.
It
is because of an overdue emphasis on theory, Debray suggests, that so much
confusion exists among the ranks. The main danger lies in the assertion that
"the Cuban model can no longer be repeated in Latin America". Though
the increased awareness on the part of revolutionaries of the revolutionary
works of Mao, Giap, Lenin is basically beneficial, Latin America's possession of
highly distinct and special conditions leads Debray to conclude that, " all
the theoretical works on peoples war do as much harm as good "(11).
Revolution has to be learnt in practice through the actual process of armed
struggle. He holds up the model of the Cuban leadership; "one may well
consider it a stroke of good luck that Fidel had not read the military writings
of Mao before disembarking on the coast of Oriente"(12). But this one
model, the Cuban, due to the similarity of conditions does apply to the rest of
Latin America. Its actual processes offer an answer to the most central
question: how to overthrow the power of the capitalist state. This, Debray poses
as essentially a problem of finding a solution to the question of the breaking
up of the reactionary army. The Cuban answer is the building up, through
guerrilla warfare in suitably chosen areas of "a mobile strategic
force"(13). The problem in Latin American cannot but be posed in a military
form; any political line "which in terms of its consequences, is not
susceptible to expression as a precise and consistent military line, cannot be
considered revolutionary"(14).
In
examining revolutionary struggles in Latin America, Debray points to the failure
of Armed Self Defense in Colombia(1964) and Bolivia(1965). The reason for this
failure is inherent in the defensive nature of the method. Both these movements
accepted the System and fought defensively within it for narrow interests. This
is implicitly a denial of the role of the armed unit which is organically
separate from the civilian population. It is an attempt to repeat the successful
Chinese and Vietnamese models in Latin America. But while in China armed self
defense zones extended to areas already military secure, and viable as a result
of the war being waged on other fronts with regular and mobile troops, in Latin
America Armed Self Defense has been used to create autonomous zones. The
Bolivian miners defeat by the regular army in 1965 was ample proof of the
impossibility of successfully carrying through an armed insurrection against a
modern well equipped army. Debray draws the lesson that "in order to
destroy one army, another is necessary"(15). This can only be born through
the guerrilla struggle.
Self
Defense reduces the guerrilla force to an exclusively tactical role; its
responsibilities(the protection of peasant families) hinder it from playing an
offensive role. While it is able to provide protection for the population for a
limited time, in the long run "it undermines the security of the civilian
population"(16). In order to destroy the repressive shock forces of the
state, the revolution needs a shock force of its own.
Debray
turns his attention to another favourite of Latin American revolutionaries,
Armed Propaganda. This they consider a preliminary to direct action, and is
aimed at winning popular support. Thus the first nucleus of fighters is divided
into small propaganda patrols, which cover the mountains, go into the villages,
holding meetings, making speeches, explaining the social goals of the
revolution. Debray views these attempts at political agitation as based on a
misconception of the real nature of state power.
The
problem is one of state violence; "the neo-colonialist ideal is still to
show force in order not to have to use it"(17). In order to destroy the
idea of the unassailability of the forces of order, there is nothing better than
combat. The guerrillas are not like fish in water. They themselves initially are
"the foreigners, lacking status, who at the beginning can offer the
populace nothing but bloodshed"(18). Armed Propaganda ,other than being a
lengthy process, weakens the initially small forces of the guerrillas. The Foco
would have to be divided into small patrols with insignificant firepower. Thus
instead of the guerrillas first tearing up the enemy's fingers, they open up and
spread their own fingers. The best and only form of successful Armed Propaganda
is direct action, physical destruction of enemy material and personnel; thus,
"the destruction of a troop transport truck, or the public execution of a
police torturer, is more effective propaganda than a hundred speeches"(19).
This kind of action shows that the revolution is on the march, and that the
enemy is no longer invulnerable. Debray calls on Castro's example who
"during two years of warfare, did not hold a single political
rally"(20). In itself, Armed Propaganda, conducted before the start of
guerrilla operations, is a provocation to the enemy, exposes the guerrillas to
danger, and the future and possible zones of operations to government action.
Linked
to his rejection of Self Defense Zones and Armed Propaganda, Debray also denies
the feasibility of a Fixed Guerrilla Base. Special factors in China(extensive
territory, high density of population, absence of airborne troops, existence of
regular guerrilla armies) facilitated the success of this strategy. None of the
necessary conditions however, exist in Latin America. For the guerrilla force to
attempt to occupy a fixed base is to deprive itself of its major weapon,
mobility , and to permit itself to be contained within a fixed zone of
operation, offering the enemy an identifiable target. Debray denies the myth of
inaccessible zones, for "no place is inaccessible; if anyone has been able
to reach it, then so can the enemy"(21). A fixed base plays into the
enemy's hands, whose ideal is "to wage a short war to destroy the Foco in
its embryonic stage", and a fixed base affords him just such a target,
before the guerrillas have linked themselves closely to the local population or
acquired a minimum of experience. There can only be one guerrilla base in the
initial period, and that is the territory where the guerrilla happens to be
moving.
A
major part of Debray's work is devoted to a polemical attack on the leadership
of the orthodox communist parties for not embracing the strategy of the armed
struggle. They subordinate the guerrilla Foco to the needs of their political
struggles in the City, and treat guerrilla war as only one of several possible
political tactics. This resulting subordination of the military to the political
leadership of the city leads to harmful effects. The leadership in the towns,
out of touch with the actual conditions in the mountains, cannot understand the
necessities of the struggle, for "the jungle of the city is not so brutal;
life is for all unequally given, but given nevertheless"(22). The result is
logistic and military dependence; seen from the outside, the vital needs of the
guerrillas are "details", "material limitations of the class
struggle", or simply "the technical side". Debray calls for a
unification of the military and the political leadership, as the absence of a
single command means that "there is no clear strategy, and in the absence
of a clear strategy no plan for action"(23). The guerrilla groups are
reduced to anarchy in their pursuit of the struggle. This vital necessity to
adopt a clear and explicit strategy can only be achieved by answering questions
like - What is the fundamental form of class struggle ? What is the terrain ?
What is the primary objective ? To all these questions the communists give
answers which are at variance with the needs and objectives of Latin America and
its revolutionary militants.
The
struggle in the mountains results in the practical transformation of the
guerrilla into a socialist revolutionary. While the communists wait for the
successful revolution before they can educate the masses, the guerrilla army
educates people in the struggle and contributes towards the creation of
socialist man . The first stages of life in the mountain are devoted to
unlearning the degrading habits of the city; it is "a battle within the
guerrilla himself to overcome his old habits, to erase the marks left on his
body by the incubator of the city"(24), to recreate himself the new man.
Debray
poses the question central to his thesis as a choice between the party and the
guerrilla. In previous revolutions, the object was not the destruction of the
repressive apparatus (the army) but the seizure of state power in order to
transform the social structure. The peoples army was thus an instrument of its
implementation, while it was the party, the vanguard of the class , which
determined the political context, and directed the military apparatus. In Latin
America, Debray insists that the situation is inherently different. Unlike China
and Vietnam where "the class struggle took the form of a patriotic
war"(25), Latin America is composed of politically independent states,
where the communist parties, for various reasons, did not take root and develop.
Thus the pre-requisites of the struggle are different. Echoing Castro ("Who
will make the Revolution in Latin America ? The people, the revolutionaries,
with or without the party"(26), Debray states that there is "no
metaphysical equation in which vanguard = Marxist Leninist party"(27).
Those who want to make the revolution can go ahead and constitute themselves the
vanguard. The time has passed for believing that it suffices to be in the party
to be a revolutionary. The value of a revolutionary, like that of a party,
depends on activity, and primarily on armed activity.
The
guerrilla movement does not seek to create a new party; it seeks rather to wipe
out and unify within its ranks, round the most urgent military tasks, doctrinal
and party divisions. This implies abolition of the "plethora of
commissions, secretariats, congresses, etc."(28). Eventually the future
peoples army will itself beget " the party of which it is to be
theoretically the instrument. Essentially the party is the army"(29). At
the same time the guerrilla movement alone can achieve a class alliance between
workers and peasants, and is a confirmation in action of this alliance. As
Debray sees it, "in the mountains, the workers, peasants, and intellectuals
meet for the first time"(30).
The
shortest amount of space in given to the actual problem of the setting up of the
Armed Foco. Following the Cuban experience, Debray enunciates guerrilla war as
going though three stages, "the stage of establishment, the stage of
development, and the stage of revolutionary offensive"(31). The first stage
is the hardest to surmount, and the most exposed to all sorts of accidents.
The
guerrilla unit is visualised initially as a small group completely
self-supporting and scrupulously shunning the rural population. It does not
assume its defense and avoids any open contact with peasants, operating in
complete secrecy. The maxim of the group is "constant vigilance, constant
mistrust, and constant mobility"(32). The essential watch word is Security
and the guerrillas must "maintain a certain aloofness" from the
civilians in a given zone as the latter are vulnerable to infiltration and moral
corruption by the enemy. This mistrust should encompass the guides who help the
guerrillas, and comrades who have to make various trips to the towns, as the
latter "demoralise and disorganise weak members of the Foco"(33).
As
far as the recruits are concerned, in addition to conviction, Debray mentions
physical fitness as the most basic of all skills, to the extent that "there
is a close link between ideology and biology". A perfect Marxist education
is not an imperative condition, but "physical aptitude is the pre-requisite
of all other aptitudes"(34). The group requires no political commissars and
no cadre training schools(both manifestations of subordination to the party).
The Foco itself is the best education for future leaders. Simultaneously,
Democratic Centralism has no place within the Foco; decisions belong to the
command. Organising meetings and elections lead to a relaxation of conscious
discipline, and to a loss of efficiency and self confidence. The Foco should be
conducted in a strictly military professional manner.
The
Setting Up of A Model
Debray
in putting forward an argument for the decisive role of violence rests his
arguments on two premises which are to some degree inter-dependent : first, that
no possessing class gives up power without a struggle, and second, that no
popular movement which fails successfully to challenge the ruling powers
monopoly of violence, will be capable of the social energy necessary to invent a
totally new order of society(35). Latin America has had a long tradition of
popular violent insurrections: looking back only to the last fifty years we note
the Mexican Revolution, Sandino's guerrillas in Nicaragua, the Tenente rebellion
led by Prestes in Brazil, Columbia's frustrated class struggle of the Violencia,
and the aborted Bolivian Revolution in 1952.
The
defense which Debray formulated on behalf of the Foco is basically that it has
been misunderstood. Debray concedes that it is utopian to see it as an isolated
military detonator organised by itself and independent of an urban network, but
contends that his aim was "to break down the theoretical and mental block
hindering the development of the armed struggle only where it was already under
way"(36). Thus the work is concerned not with the question of whether a
revolutionary situation exists or not, but what happens when it does (Venezuela,
Guatemala, Colombia). Yet Debray admits that there is in his writings an
ambiguity of the "Descriptive and the normative lending itself (despite its
own self) to the setting up of a Model"(37). But he insists that he was not
consciously trying to set up a model. Cuba is used as an example and "an
example is not a model"(38). This choice was based on the fact that Cuba is
the least known and most talked about revolution. At the same time the emphasis
on the military is not exclusive, it is only under specific conditions that
" the political can be expressed mainly in a military form"(39), while
the absence of a socio political analysis is indicative that it is not the main
aim of the book and is provisionally taken for granted.
What
Debray is saying in essence is that the whole Foco theory is not what it seems
to be, and while trying to raise some defense of his theories, he accepts as
justified criticism that whatever the intentions, his work has been interpreted
both by supporters and detractors as an effort to build a Cuban Model for
revolution throughout Latin America. That as such it is grossly inadequate and
moreover has been a prescription for failure.
THREE
A
THEORY OF PURE ACTIVISM
The
Cuban Revolution
Debray's
impressive credentials as regards the Cuban experience are sadly irrelevant to
his presentation of the practice of the Cuban revolutionaries. It departs
dramatically from their actual revolutionary practice, is selective in its
emphasis and strongly sectarian in its recommendations. Debray simply does not
come to grips with the Cuban Revolution.
The
implication throughout is that Cuba was ripe for Revolution in the 1950's simply
as a result of exploitation and misery. Yet on these grounds, most societies
should have been ripe for revolution from the beginning of human history. We are
not treated to any discussion of the special constellation of economic, social
and political conditions which made the Revolution possible. Cuba's success in
making the Revolution without a vanguard party(indeed in spite of the communist
party till late 1958) only explains its particularity and not its generality as
Debray would like us to think. Initially the Revolution did not have a socialist
character and it was not Castro's guerrillas who made possible Cuba's
transformation from Liberation to Socialism, but the alliance with the Communist
Party after the termination of the armed struggle. The fighting in the Sierra
Maestra need not necessarily have led to socialism. Not all revolutionary
movements have succeeded ; in a number of cases the guerrilla leaders
degenerated into self-seeking corrupt politicians, and the peoples army became a
self perpetuating Junta. Algeria is a glaring example.
The
role of the bourgeoisie in Cuba was decisive. The revolution did not succeed in
the face of bourgeois opposition but with its support. Castro, in his defense in
1953 after the aborted attack on the Moncada Barracks, did not frighten the
liberal bourgeoisie. He demanded civil rights, justice, libertarian freedoms, a
fair share for the masses, and a return to constitutionality. During the
struggle, he maintained contact with the cities and never alienated the
bourgeoisie to the extent that it would turn against him. Two Cuban authors(1),
commenting on Debray's writings, have emphasised that at certain stages of the
struggle, the revolution was completely dependent on Bourgeois participation in
the shape of supplies of arms and money. The national bourgeoisie played an
important part in the struggle, one that is unlikely to be repeated in any other
Latin American country. Debray's observation on the struggle between the City
and the Sierra, a reflection of the lack of homogeneity of the forces
participating in the struggle, is irrelevant to the rest of Latin America.
There, the revolutionary forces are openly socialist, and the character of the
revolution will be socialist from the start. After Cuba's success, as Debray
himself reminds us, the forces of reaction will not be taken by surprise. The
bourgeoisie becoming increasingly less national, will force a direct
confrontation of classes from the beginning. This in itself necessitates the
formation of the revolutionary party.
Debray
argues that Cuba made the revolution without the party, yet it was a political
organisation, the 26th July Movement, which gave birth to the armed struggle.
The guerrillas did not create the party. The July 26th Movement(with no
counterpart in Debray's
model) formed the guerrilla forces, the embryo of the rebel army, which only
after victory, developed in association with the communist party. It is a
misreading of history and the facts to state that the Cuban Revolution was
started by the Foco: by the time Granmma landed, Cuba had long been well
prepared for invasion. The Foco was only the center of a much bigger
revolutionary movement, comprising ,besides the July 26th Movement, the Student
Directorate, and various other organisations both in Cuba and in exile. These
carried out intensive propaganda from the early 1950's, while the communist
party influenced certain sectors of the working class promoting other
complimentary forms of political activity in the overall context of the
struggle. The Cuban people indeed had a long history of organisational
experience and mass struggle, and Castro's victory was only "the
culmination of a long series of thwarted revolutions"(2). Added to this
were the special conditions of the Sierra Maestra, characterised by Guevara as
the emergence of a dissatisfied class of middle peasants. The Students
Directorate itself waged a campaign of urban violence, which pinned down a large
part of the government forces and produced intensive counter terror, leading to
the loss of the last shreds of support for Batista. The Foco did not in itself
constitute an organising magnet ; real activation came about through the various
bodies composing the political organisations supporting the armed struggle, and
not, as Debray would have us believe, due to the existence of a radio
transmitter, a purely technical medium, elevated by Debray into an
organisational apparatus mobilising people through the sole use of propaganda.
If
Cuba signified anything, it was in its demonstration effect, showing that the
Revolution is possible "in a micro-country, without the immense resources
of China, and bordering the United States"(3). Its main features, absence
of foreign intervention, bourgeois support, loss of legitimacy of the Batista
regime, special conditions of the Sierra, proletarianisation of the peasants by
capitalist agriculture, the small size of the Island, and effective leadership,
makes for its uniqueness, and the particularity of its example.
The
Party and the Foco
Debray's
portrayal of the party-guerrilla relationship is posed in essentially geographic
terms, with irreducible antagonistic content. Yet in the prevalent conditions of
Latin America (different from Cuba), there is an imperative necessity for the
revolutionary party to carry on the political task of combating bourgeois
ideology in the countryside in what promises to be a long drawn out war. Debray,
writing an entire book on how to make the revolution says precious little about
the development of political consciousness. Activism is the only form of
political work/education he recognises. The party has no useful role to play. At
the same time, he "applies to all parties in general, the criticisms of a
particular genus of political parties"(4). He rejects the whole method
because of a particular (the communist)use of that method.
A
problem, central to Marxism, the relationship between the guerrilla and the
peasant is scarcely mentioned. The
only specific suggestion we are offered to win over the peasants is
Combativeness. Debray never discusses what the guerrillas fight for. But without
a program and specific socio-economic reforms, the struggle between the state
and the guerrillas would appear to the peasantry as "a squabble between two
parties equally alien to them."(5).
The
subordination of the city to the countrywide is based on a complete
under-estimation of the political process. We are not told how the old party can
be repudiated "without losing links with the working class"(6), or how
to arouse the support of the exploited masses for the guerrillas, so that they
will be the vanguard of the exploited, and not simply their own vanguard; or how
the activities of the guerrilla fronts could be centrally organised. To the
large and politically organised section of the urban working class, Debray has
nothing to say,, except perhaps that they should make for the mountains.
As
far as the Foco is concerned, Debray envisages a whole period (initiation of the
Foco to final victory) during which the military struggle is the only form of
political activity. Only after a new party develops can political activity be
pursued. To the orthodox communist parties, irrelevant to the armed struggle,
Debray finds it impossible to visualise an alternative. Revolutionary action
thus becomes the creator of political consciousness. But the communist parties
themselves have fought in a number of places (Venezuela, Columbia), and many
right wing groups have been known to take up arms. This did not create within
them the consciousness that Debray assumes the actual process of fighting would.
The lesson seems to be that war itself does not unify nor create
revolutionaries. What does, is common objectives. This pre-supposes an ability
"to analyse the historical process correctly,(that is) an organisation
which is disciplined and cohesive- a party"(7).
What
we are told about the formation of the Foco is very sketchy (the Foco is assumed
already armed, equipped, installed and entrenched). Indeed , nowhere does Debray
pose the question of how the Foco is to be prepared or who will prepare it. His
answer is a tactical formulation for the assembly of cadres, exploring the
terrain and engaging the enemy. But how are the guerrillas to shoot in such a
way that the exploited masses will understand that these shots are fired by
their vanguard, and to go on to participate in the struggle ? We are not told
how the guerrilla peasant relationship is to be formed. Initially the guerrilla
is advised to shun the civilian population, but in attempting to become
invisible to the enemy, the Foco runs the risk of becoming invisible to the
peasants (contrast with Mao)(8). In a sense, this prescription for avoidance of
the population shows an awareness that the conditions for revolution do not
really exist. The Foco is not only distinct from the rural population it is also
distrusted by it. The three golden rules of conduct are based on a constant fear
of betrayal, "constant vigilance, mistrust, mobility"(contrast with
Mao's Three Rules and Eight Points)(9). In Debray's own words, the guerrilla
goes through a phase of absolute nomadism.
What
is so blatantly missing throughout Debray's analysis is any meaningful mention
of the Peruvian experience(10). Luis de la Puente, who had spent some time in
Cuba, was consciously trying to imitate the Cuban experience, and he failed in
record time. His failure casts doubts on the validity of many of Debray's
formulation, yet this is one of the major guerrilla experiences in Latin
America, which he claims to be examining, but which he inexplicably chooses to
ignore.
Debray's
denial of any role for the urban masses, in addition to his strictures on the
inherent bourgeois nature of the city, leads him to a complete rejection of
armed urban action. This not only contradicts the Cuban and the Venezuelan
experiences, but in addition we have the development of urban action in the late
1960's as a direct refutation of Debray's recommendations . As long ago as 1915
, Connoly wrote on the suitability of the city for armed actions characterising
it as "a huge maze of passes or glens formed by streets and lanes. Every
difficulty that exists for the operation of regular troops in the mountains is
multiplied a hundredfold in a city"(11). Contemporary urban guerrilla
movements, engaging in diverse forms of action,(armed struggle as only one of
the methods employed), have demonstrated the possibilities and the utility(in
the short run at least) of such action.
The
Necessity for Revolutionary Theory
Revolution
in the Revolution sets out to challenge the traditional Marxist thesis of
revolution as a movement of the industrial proletariat. At the same time, it
rejects the Maoist version of a peasant guerrilla army led by the communist
party. But while it is true that Latin America is not China, we must also
recognise that it is not Cuba. Debray's main assumption, that Latin America is
ripe for Revolution, is not substantiated by his observations ; yet his greatest
weakness lies not in specific errors (large though these are), but in his
attempt to prescribe a course which all Latin American revolutionaries must
follow irrespective of the contrasting and differing conditions of the
Continent. He is entitled to his rejection of revolutionary theory , but it is
difficult to accept his contention that conditions in a whole region can be so
unique so as to transcend history and render irrelevant past revolutionary
theory, no less than practice. This is in no way a denial of the importance of
the congruence between tactics and strategy and local conditions, without which
no revolution can succeed. But Debray's thesis, based on the uniqueness of Latin
America, does not bring out meaningfully those distinct features of the region
which bear on his theory. We are presented with no distinguishing features which
unite the Continent, and at the same time separate it from the rest of the
underdeveloped world.
Latin
America presents us with a number of objective features(12); a culture of
poverty(13), pressure on the land, growth of population and urban explosion,
degenerating terms of trade, continued military involvement in politics, and
increased American political and economic intervention. But to Debray, an
analysis of social change, of specific problems and demands of concrete groups,
of current formulations of slogans and programs, seems unimportant and idle
tasks. His works deal mainly with tactics and ignore problems of broad political
strategy. He is pre-occupied with military techniques, and this leads him to
demolish all alternative political strategies; urban insurrections, peasant
leagues, self defense zones, Trotskyites , Maoists, Communist Parties - all are
contaminated. But then who is left to make the Revolution ?
Debray
poses a number of problems : the armed struggle and power, the peasantry and the
countryside, class and strategic terrain; his
principle achievement lies in demonstrating that the orthodox communist parties
are incapable of leading the proletariat to the conquest of power. But we are
left with the question unanswered : Is the countryside the fundamental terrain
of armed struggle because the peasantry as a class are more revolutionary than
the proletariat ? Or, is it because the countryside as a strategic terrain is
more propitious than the towns ? Is the main aim of the Foco to demoralise the
repressive apparatus or to accumulate forces within the exploited classes
? Debray stresses the increasing effectiveness of government control of rural
areas, but he reduces this to fear of the central authority's coercive
apparatus. This leads to a view of the revolutionary elite as an alien group
sharing no communality of interest with the peasants. Inescapably we arrive at
the primacy of the military factor as a means for subverting government
legitimacy. The Foco becomes predominantly destructive, with a reversal of the
stages of revolutionary war. The government is to be outfought before it is
outadministered. The legitimacy of the system, understood predominantly in
military terms, can only be subverted by military means. As such, Debray's Foco
theory is ideally suited for the US counter insurgency program. The people are
spectators in a military contest, granting their support to the winning side.
The
deeper attitude underlying Debray's formulations seems to be that Latin America
needs a revolution rather than that it is ripe for one, and his method ends up
by becoming his program. He presents a mechanistic view of a guerrilla force
without a political base, neither explaining its motives nor protecting its
peasant sympathisers, developing the military power to topple a government . He
forgets the basic rule of guerrilla warfare, that the guerrilla fighter is first
and foremost a political partisan, and that his battle is for the political
allegiance of the oppressed and the dispossessed.
FOUR
THE
NECESSITY OF STRUCTURAL CHANGE
The
death of Che Guevara in Bolivia, hailed by many as the end of the armed
revolutionary struggle, only signifies the failure of a particular approach to
revolution - the strategy of the Rural Foco. Debray, primarily an organisational
man, has reduced complex social and political processes to a simple
organisational formula, universally valid. The method was shown to have failed,
but the problem persists. What is the problem ?
For
Latin America and the underdeveloped countries of Asia and Africa political
decolonisation has not effected the rate or extent of economic exploitation. The
international division of labour, characteristic of imperialism, is becoming
more ,not less, marked; the underdeveloped produce and export more and more
primary products, the industrial capitalist countries produce and export more
and more manufactured goods. This international division of labour, far from
being modified, has grown sharper, "for some the tasks of producing raw
materials and the sub human living standards that go with it, for others
industrial expansion and the concomitant high standard of living"(1).
Within the underdeveloped world, taking Latin America as our example, basic land
tenure and social conditions remain unchanged. Less than 5% of landowners own
over 75% of the arable land; social class are still strictly segregated between
riches and poverty. Mobility is nearly non-existent and social inequality and
economic stagnation produce repeated interventions by the military. Political
instability and military dictatorships are still typical in Latin America in
1972, The traditional ruling classes, the landed oligarchies and the comprador
bourgeoisie, failing to overthrow the social, political and cultural obstacles
in the way of modernisation, have been replaced in several countries by
petty-bourgeois bureaucracies, often in alliance with the military, who in their
turn have also failed to achieve the desired social and economic transformation.
At most, they have nationalised the commanding heights of the economy, and
undertaken relative agrarian reform, but are incapable of mobilising the masses
reduced to unemployment, underemployment, and sometimes even emigration, to
rebuild the country. This inability is reflected in the corruption and nepotism
of these bureaucrats who themselves consume the major share of national income
(a large part of course is spent on maintaining the military establishment,
organised violence in the direct and open service of the ruling oligarchies).
The
United States has tried through the Alliance For Progress to provide its own
solution to the problem , and it has failed. Latin America's population grows
explosively at the highest rate in the world, and "as they reproduce, Latin
Americans are formulating a mute challenge for which the system has no
answer"(2). The system has no way of incorporating a growing segment of the
population into the productive process, though this segment is still quite small
compared to the wide space it inhabits, and the fabulous economic potential of
the soil and the subsoil. The attempts of the United States to " absorb the
problem in the womb"(3) have failed. The political and military successes
achieved by the military dictatorships and their US allies have not been based
on any significant change in the structural factors underlying the social and
political conflicts; the underlying pressures making for Revolution still exist.
The 1970 victory of Allende in Chile, raised hopes (and seemed to prove the
orthodox communist theses) that the electoral road to power is viable. Yet a
repeat performance in Uruguay towards the end of 1971 failed to materialise. The
only alternative to armed struggle is the appearance of progressive army juntas,
like in Peru and Bolivia, but the latest coup in Bolivia has indicated the
shortcomings and the easy reversibility of such a path.
If
present Latin American experience is indicative of anything, it is of the need
for a combination of different tactics in the pursuit of the armed struggle, and
the rejection of the dependence on any one group or strategic terrain. The rural
struggle is plainly irrelevant in countries like Brazil or the Argentine, both
with an overwhelming urban concentration. Moreover, the system " can
co-exist with a localised insurrection in the countryside"(4), ( as indeed
is currently happening in Venezuela) because the countryside in marginal to the
real power centres, the cities. On the other hand, urban guerrilla actions which
failed in Caracas in the early 1960's and in Brazil in the later sixties, have
flourished spectacularly in Uruguay. The Tupamaros have shown the ability of an
urban guerrilla organisation to survive over time. They have demonstrated that
the urban guerrilla can ( contrary to Debray) link
its action to the concrete
demands and aspirations of the masses. By winning donations for hospitals and
schools, by exposing financial corruption, by punishing torturers, by backing
workers on strike, they have won sympathy and popularity among the urban
proletariat. A different experience is offered by Argentina, where in May 1969 a
spontaneous armed uprising took place, and the workers battled with troops in
barricaded cities (5). Since then urban guerrilla action has been on the
increase.
At
the same time, it is important to remember that Debray's thesis on the
revolution revolutionising the counter-revolution retains its validity. Improved
counter insurgency techniques have been increasingly implemented with US
training and support ; according to official figures " more than 50,000
Latin American officers were trained by the US between 1950-1969; on the ground
US agents and military advisors provide intelligence and technical
guidance"(6). US involvement extended at times to direct military action.
The same author (who is extremely favourable to US policies) reports that "
the special forces conducted 52 anti subversive missions in Latin America,
including parachute drops into guerrilla areas, in the single year of
1965"(7).
Debray's
Foco theory has been assimilated by revolutionaries throughout the
underdeveloped world(8), and even by groups in the post industrial societies of
the West(9). Even those guerrillas in Latin America who operate in the cities
accept many of his organisational formats, and the rationale underlying their
actions is the belief in armed action itself as the small motor which will set
the big motor of the masses into action. At the same time revolutionary
experience on many fronts, and not least in Vietnam (10) which has been the
formative influence for many revolutionary groups including and especially those
in the post industrial societies, has been in sharp contradiction to many of
Debray's formulations. To take a random example, PAIGC in Portuguese Guinea has
in its practice negated the universal validity of the Foco theory and
demonstrated that the armed struggle could not have been undertaken if " a
period of more than two years had not been devoted beforehand to preparatory
political work"(11). Indeed in Africa, relations of production in many
countries are at a very primitive level with the exception of small urban
islands, completely separated from the rest of the country. The problem of
agrarian reform as such does not pose itself. Increasingly the problem of the
revolutionary potential of the peasants has itself received increased attention,
with special emphasis paid to differentiation within the ranks of the
peasantry.(12)
A
consensus of opinion is slowly forming which can perhaps best be summed up in
Trotsky's words in 1928 that " without an alliance of the proletariat with
the peasantry, the tasks of the democratic revolution cannot be solved....but
the alliance of these two classes can be realised only through an irreconcilable
struggle against the national bourgeoisie"(13). Yet neither the form which
this alliance should take nor the methods it should adopt - insurrection, urban
guerrilla, rural guerrilla, combined legal and illegal work, etc. -have been
agreed upon by contemporary revolutionaries. (In Turkey for example, the urban
Foco is still maintained, and the same in Iran after the defeat of an attempted
rural Foco; Maoist parties pay lip service to the armed struggle but have
nothing to show ; the Naxalites in India adopted a policy of bloody terrorism;
the communists continue to adhere to the peaceful road though they do not
discount the use of the armed struggle as a particular form of pressure; the
varieties are really endless). But considering the protracted nature of the
struggle and the relative strength of the antagonists, the outstanding feature
of the whole phenomenon is the persistence and continuity of the repeated
attempts, sustained by an inexplicable inner force...Gramsci's optimism of the
will.
Notes
Chapter
One
l.W.J.Pomeroy(ed).
Guerrilla Warfare and Marxism . Lawrence and Wishart. London 1969. p.9.
2.
W.J.Pomeroy. Guerrilla and Counter Guerrilla Warfare: Liberation and Suppression
in the Present Period. International Publishers. New York 1964. p.20.
3.
Ibid. p.21.
4
ibid. p.29.
5.
ibid. p.89.
6.
V.I.Lenin . Left Wing Communism: An infantile Disorder. London. p.65.Progress
Publishers. Moscow.
7
V.I.Lenin. Guerrilla Warfare. In J. Gerrasi(ed.) Towards Revolution
:Volume One. China, India, Asia and the Middle East. Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
London 1971. p.32.
8.
Introduction to Tukachevsky. New Left Review. N.55.May/June 1969. p.78.
9.
L Trotsky . Military Writings. Merit Publishers. New York 1970. p.73.
10.
ibid. p.86.
11.Tukachevsky.Revolution
from Without. New Left Review. N.55. May/June 1969.
12.
ibid. p.28.
13.
E.Ahmad . Revolutionary Warfare and Counter Insurgency. In N.Miller &
R.Aya(ed.) National Liberation :Revolution in the Third World. Free Press. New
York.1971.
14.
Lin Piao . Peoples War. In Gerrassi. op.cit. p.84.
15.
ibid. p.13.
16.
Che Guevara . Guerrilla War. Monthly Review Press .NY 1961.p.15.
17.
ibid. p.18.
18.
Y.Zhukov et all. The Third World ,Problems and Prospects : Current Stage of the
National Liberation Struggle. Progress Publishers. Moscow. 1970. Chapter 2. pp.
41 & 44.
19.
ibid. p.23.
20.
ibid. p.26,29.
21.
E.Wolfe. Peasant Wars of the Twentieth Century. Faber & Faber. London .1971.
p.268.
22.
J.Slovo. The Theories of R. Debray :An analysis. An African Communist pamphlet.
London 1968. p.8.
23.
R.Debray . Revolution in the Revolution :Armed Struggle and Political Struggle
in Latin America. Monthly Review. July/August 1967. Vol. 19. N.3.Introduction by
L.Huberman & P.Sweezy. p.7.
24.
Debray. op.cit. p.12. Cuban Introduction.
Chapter
Two
1.
R. Debray. Report from the Venezuelan Guerrilla,1963.(RVG).
Castroism:The long March in Latin America,1965.(CLM)
Problems of Revolutionary Strategy in Latin America,1965.(PRS).In
R.Blackburn .R.Debray. Strategy for Revolution. Essays on Latin America.
Jonathan Cape.London.1970.
Debray. op.cit. Revolution in the Revolution ?1967.(RR).
2.
P.Anderson. The Marxism of R. Debray. New Left Review.N.45. Sept/Oct.
1967.
3.
RVG
4.
PRS. Blackburn. op.cit. p.130.
5.
Debray. The Role of the Intellectual. Blackburn.op.cit.p.156.
6.
PRS. p.128.
7.
CLM. p.38.
8.
ibid. p.53
9.
ibid. p.52.
10.
RVG. p.109.
11.
RR. p.21.
12.
ibid. p.20.
13.
ibid. p.24.
14.
ibid. p.24.
15.
ibid. p.35.
16.
ibid. p.45.
17.
ibid. p.51.
18.
ibid. p.52.
19.
ibid. p.53.
20.
ibid. p.54.
21.
ibid. p.63.
22.
ibid. p.71.
23.
ibid. p.73.
24.
ibid. p.71.
25.
ibid. p.100.
26.
ibid. p.98.
27.
ibid. p.104.
28.
ibid. p.102.
29.
ibid. p.105.
30.
ibid. p.110.
31.
ibid. p.32.
32.
ibid. p.42.
33.
ibid. p.44.
34.
ibid. p.102.
35.
Similarity with the arguments of Franz Fannon of the "liberating"
effect of violence. A sort of Purgatory which the oppressed have to go through
before they can realy call themselves free.See The Wretched of the Earth.
36.
R.Debray. Reply to My Critics. Monthly Review. Feb/March 1969. p.14.
37.
ibid.
38.
ibid. p.17.
39.
ibid. p.18.
Chapter
Three
1.
S.Torres & J.Aronde. Debray and the Cuban Experience. In L.Huberban
and P.Sweezy. R.Debray and the Latin American Revolution. Monthly Review Press.
New York.1968.p.15.
2.
R.Moss. Urban Guerrillas. The New Face of Political Violence. Temple
Smith. London.1972. p.147.
3.
P.Worsley. Revolutionary Theory: Che Guevara and Regis Debray. In
Huberman & Sweezy(ed.) op.cit. p.136.
4.
D.Mckelvey. R.Debray:Historical Truths and Historical Aberrations. In
Huberman & Sweezy(ed.)op.cit. p.91.
5.
J.Petras. Political and Social Structure in Latin America.Monthly Review Press.
New York.1970.p.355.
6.
J.Quartim. R.Debray and the Brazilian Revolution. New Left
Review.N.59.January/February 1970.
7.
C.Silva. The Errors of the Foco Theory. In Huberman and Sweezy(ed.). op.cit.
p.18.
8.
Mao Tse Tung. Selected Works. Vol.1. pp.135,136,149.
9.
Mao Tse Tung. Selected Military Writings. P.341.
10.R.Gott.
Guerrilla Movements in Latin America. Nelson. London 1970. The author gives an
account of the setting up and the failure of the Peruvian Foco.
11.
J.Connolly. Street Fighting. In Pomeroy(ed.)op.cit. p.138.
12.The
works of Andre Gunder Frank and
James Petras offer a challenging analysis.
13.
Best Characterised in the works of Oscar Lewis.
Chapter
Four
1.
P.Jalee. The Pillage of the Third World. Monthly Review Press. New York. l965.
p.27.
2.
E.Galeano. Brazil and Uruguay: Euphoria and Agony. Monthly Review. February
1972.
3.
Galeano op.cit. reports that in 1968 AID spent 8 million dollars to this end.
The Ford Foundation granted more than 4 million dollars for birth control
research. In 1969 the whole region had more than 1000 birth control clinics.
4.
Silva. op.cit. p.21.
5.
E.Laclau. Argentine, Imperialist Strategy and the May Crisis. New Left Review.
July/August 1970. The author provides a brief description of the events and the
background.
6.
Moss. op.cit. p.157.
7.
ibid.
8.
G.Chaliand. The Palestinian Resistance.Penguin.London. 1971.pp.10,61.
9.
See H.Jacobs(ed.) Weatherman. Ramparts Press. New York. 1970. Also literature of
the American Black Panthers and of the SDS in Germany.
10.
An Analysis dealing with Guerrilla warfare which ignores Vietnam(as the whole of
this paper does for reasons of space and because of the nature of the Vietnamese
revolution) is , in many ways incomplete. The Vietnamese experience both
organisational and political has more to offer than a dozen Foco theories.
11.J.Chaliand.
Armed Struggle in Africa : With the Guerrillas in "Portuguese" Guinea.
Monthly Review Press. New York. 1967. p.118.
12.
H.Alavi. Peasants and Revolution. In R.Miliband & J.Saville. The Socialist
Register 1965. A Survey of Movements and Ideas. Merlin Press. London.
1965.p.274.