Red Flag Newspaper
International Communist Workers Party
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Things are going well with ICWPs military collective. We have made important developments this past year. Inside the fleet, communist organizing is steadily growing, and communist consciousness is pretty contagious among all these working-class sailors.
Politicizing sailors remains a challenge, but those who are politically curious tend to be open to our ideas. And, of course, the sailors who avoid politics look to the politicized sailors, eventually, when they need answers and explanations to the problems they face in capitalism.
In the navy, communists and friends-of-communists are now located all over the world and on all sorts of platforms from carriers to frigates. Thanks to ICWP, and a little help from modern technology, communist networks inside the military are becoming more and more organized. There is so much opportunity for revolutionary work in the military and it seems that only ICWP is taking advantage of this important and necessary work.
As much opportunity as there is inside the military, ICWP has only scratched the surface of its capabilities. The real growth of this work depends on young comrades, who have the courage to walk into the belly of the imperial beast, ready to bring the struggle into the barracks.
I’ve seen comrades educating and recruiting. I know comrades who have enlisted and I’ve met comrades who plan to enlist. They are all very impressive and inspiring people, and they make me proud to be a part of ICWPs military collective.
I’ve always thought about the military as a career ever since I could remember.
I thought about becoming a soldier of the United States, to serve and honor
my country, to protect my brothers and sisters, to become the best soldier
possible.
But now I see the truth with communism and now my reasoning for the
military has taken a different route with the spreading of awareness about
ICWP and Red Flag.
In high school I am in the JROTC (Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps).
As a senior cadet, when I was in the 10th grade, I was invited to my first May
Day March. After that day, I became more involved with Red Flag events.
Now I have a better understanding of what true communism stands for—
no borders, no poverty, no struggle to survive tomorrow.
Today I stand here before you ready to carry out our current mission to
gather members for the Party and to gather soldiers for a Red Army.
SPAIN--This May Day the ICWP is preparing to participate in the International Workers’ Day events.
Our goal is always to try to distribute many Red Flag newspapers to the workers, to talk to them and try to build networks and to talk about Communism. The workers are tired of the same old thing: corruption, social exclusion, evictions, poverty, sellout unions, and even about those who say they are leftists and who only want to enrich themselves at the cost of the working class.
We will try to print Red Flag full size this year like comrades do in other parts of the world.
This May Day we will go and tell the world that we communists are working to destroy capitalism and that we are not afraid, we don’t have borders and that in our cells we will be stronger than ever building communism..
Long live May Day!
Long live communism!
Long live the ICWP!
April 20— We had a very successful event over a barbecue (braai) on Saturday. The turnout exceeded all expectations: over 50 workers came. Industrial metalworkers from Reclam Group Company came in numbers. This company is one of the worst. It super-exploits labour, has no regard for workers’ lives, and pays a pittance for hard, dangerous work.
The presence of many industrial workers set the tone for an intense discussion about how ICWP is different from past communist parties and how we can eliminate the bosses and their system of wage slavery. The comrades who have been around the party for a year patiently explained that the past revolutions were led by communists who believed socialism would lead to communist revolution.
Experience and correct understanding based on dialectical materialism has shown that socialism keeps a key aspect of capitalism: wage slavery. This inevitably leads to full-blown capitalism. Our party will eliminate wage slavery and struggle to build society based on the needs of the international working class.
Workers displayed their readiness and enthusiasm to join the party. We’ve talked about having our own regular meetings start in earnest. One comrade, a regular Red Flag reader, came with five others. They showed interest in ICWP, and asked important interesting questions which were thoroughly responded to.
We will keep in touch with these comrades as we all live in the same neighbourhood. We knew each other back when we were branch leaders in the African National Congress and South African Communist Party structures. This initiative can be sustained and could bring enormous results for the party. We all look forward to working together in building ICWP in this area.
The next morning, we read the front-page Red Flag article, “Farmworkers’ strike....” Although its writers are far away, it was as if they were present during our discussions. The article provided the answers we were looking for in a clear manner. That is how powerful the Red Flag is. It is able to respond to questions that seem difficult, in a very simple yet profound way.
The Saturday event could not have come at a better time. It has helped us gain confidence in our abilities as a collective to mobilize the masses for communism. It has galvanized us to work together going forward.
Our struggle to ideologically win the workers to communist revolution comes against the backdrop of xenophobic (anti-immigrant racism) attacks on immigrants in South Africa. Scores of immigrants have been killed. Their homes and property have been razed and fear grips the areas where immigrants live. Racism and nationalism are at the root of these attacks.
South Africa is in a deep economic crisis. The bosses want South African workers to think that they are losing their jobs because workers from Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Somalia, Bangladesh, etc. take away their jobs. It is not the immigrants who take away jobs. It is the capitalist bosses who close their factories and move them to other countries where the wages are even lower than South Africa. Bosses fear the unity of the international working class and hence they are viciously spreading xenophobia.
We answered the bosses’ xenophobia by massively distributing a flyer in the areas where immigrant workers live, calling for communist revolution. The response was overwhelming. Many workers raised their fist and told us, “This is exactly what we need.”
An ICWP comrade who has personal ties with many immigrant workers is tirelessly organizing for the party. We plan to hold a mass rally attacking xenophobia and calling for communist revolution.
Based on our past experience, we have launched a week-long communist school. We are studying dialectical materialism.
We had a very honest, productive struggle around the black consciousness movement. A comrade, who has joined ICWP, still vacillates between black nationalism and communist internationalism. After we watched the dialectical materialism DVD, the comrade very honestly admitted the futile nature of black nationalism. This struggle made even deeper sense as an immigrant worker from Botswana defended our party’s understanding that capitalism must be destroyed to eradicate racism.
Our party here is young but the comrades have shown immense commitment. We are learning that capitalism is uneven, and that it creates opportunity for revolutionary change. The comrades in South Africa have truly grasped the meaning of mobilizing the masses for communism and are putting it into practice.
As a comrade said, “I breathe communism every second in my life. I talk to students, workers, immigrants about the need for communist revolution. Once I was blind, deaf and dumb because I believed in black nationalism. But that was then, not now.” This comrade lives in a shack where capitalism has made life a nightmare.
The comrade was asked, “How many workers do you think we can mobilize for the next big event of the Party?”
He said, “500.”