Among the many groups on the youth left, REVOLUTION (the allied youth group to the League for the Fifth International) has managed to issue a message of support to Hands Off the People Of Iran and Communist Students in the wake of their shoddy exclusion in the run-up to Stop The War conference.

In that message, they openly state their political differences with us, and we owe it to them to respond in kind – Dave Isaacson has done so. The original message is posted at the bottom.

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Thanks for the support John (and all at Revo). It is
much appreciated.

If you don’t mind (I’m sure you won’t), I want to cut
straight to the differences.

..

The RNC writes: “REVOLUTION supports the right of all
to resist imperialist oppression, whether it is as
part of a trade union, the Iranian army, or an Islamic
militia. Socialists must fight alongside these forces
in order to win these fighters to revolutionary
communism – a fight not only against imperialist war,
but the system responsible for it– capitalism.

“It is here that we differ from our comrades in HOPI
and Communist Students.”

It would be useful if you could clarify what the
“here” you refer to is. Is it the whole preceeding
paragraph, or just bits of it? Please be specific.
Presuming you think we may differ on all this, let me
say we don’t. Our differences actually spring from
something else, but for the moment I will refer to the
issues raised in this paragraph.

1. “REVOLUTION supports the right of all to resist
imperialist oppression, whether it is as part of a
trade union, the Iranian army, or an Islamic militia.”
So do I, absolutely. Nothing in the statements of Hopi
or CS rules this out. Where we might differ on this
issue is what would constitute resistance to
imperialist aggresion, and I think we do differ on the
likelihood of this resistance coming from Islamic
militias and particularly the Iranian army.

2. “Socialists must fight alongside these forces in
order to win these fighters to revolutionary communism
– a fight not only against imperialist war, but the
system responsible for it– capitalism.” We only fight
alongside these forces to the extent that they
actually are resisting imperialism themselves.
However, the Iranian regime is not anti-imperialist
and I doubt it will even resist imperialism when the
bombs come falling. I certainly don’t rule
temporary alliances with reactionaries out – but this
is a tactical choice. And if alliances along these
lines are made between revolutionaries and
reactionaries, then the revolutionaries must not hold
back on their criticisms and differences just because
they are in an alliance. Also they must not place any
trust in their alliance partners – they remain our
enemies (albeit secondary ones) as long as they remain
reactionaries.

These are my comments – not the policy of Hopi, or
CS for that matter. However there is nothing in the
statements or political platforms of Hopi or CS that
suggests these differences that you say exist. There
certainly are differences over anti-imperialism and
many other issues between Revo and many CS comrades.
But when Luke and Alastair came to the Hopi launch
meeting in Leeds I think the only real differnce with
the written Hopi statement that they had was over
whether Iran had a ‘right’ to nukes.

I hope that the RNC is not creating differences that
do not exist in order that it doesn’t look silly in
not joining Hopi just because of the nukes difference.

* Our campaign demands are: No to imperialist war!
* No to the theocratic regime!
* The immediate and unconditional withdrawal of US/UK
troops from the Gulf region!
* Opposition to Israeli expansionism and aggression!
* Support to all working class and progressive
struggles in Iran against poverty and repression!
* Support for socialism, democracy and workers’
control in Iran!
* For a nuclear-free Middle East in a nuclear-free
world!

for the full Hopi statement see:
http://www.hopoi.org/main.html

Has Revo considered joining Hopi?

————————–

Statement from REVOLUTION National Council on the exclusion of HOPI and Communist Students from affiliation to Stop the War Coalition 21/10/07

We note that Hands Off the People of Iran and Communist Students have been excluded from affiliating to the StWC Coalition. Whilst we have our political differences with HOPI, we see this exclusion as bureaucratic and hypocritical, especially seeing as HOPI and Communist Students have consistently opposed the War on Terror. At the same time the StWC leadership has seemed more than happy in recent months to invite Liberal Democrats and even a Tory MP, Michael Ancram onto its platforms, allowing individuals within these parties to pose as anti-war when nothing could be further from the truth.

Since the invasion of Iraq by the US, hundreds of thousands of people have lost their lives and life continues to deteriorate for those left behind. Multi-billion dollar contracts have been handed out to infrastructure companies such as Halliburton and effectively mercenary ‘security’ armies such Blackwater, all companies based in or with close links to the occupying nations, working to pillage Iraq of its valuable energy resources.

In heroic opposition, the Iraqi people have taken up arms against the imperialists. Involving many hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, militia organisations have driven US and UK forces out of whole areas of the country and back to their bases.

With the threats from the imperialists against Iran increasing daily, many thousands, even millions of Iranians will instinctively arm themselves against the aggression and fight back in the event of invasion. Many will very likely join militia organisations, and many of these will be of a religious persuasion. Many will queue up to join the Iranian army despite its reactionary policies towards women and homosexuals and authoritarian lack of democracy to fight back against the occupying forces.

REVOLUTION supports the right of all to resist imperialist oppression, whether it is as part of a trade union, the Iranian army, or an Islamic militia. Socialists must fight alongside these forces in order to win these fighters to revolutionary communism – a fight not only against imperialist war, but the system responsible for it– capitalism.

It is here that we differ from our comrades in HOPI and Communist Students, yet this should not and must not be used a reason for their non-affiliation. The diversity of opinion in StWC is what has allowed it to mobilise so many thousands, even millions in the past. However, Andrew Murray suggests that it is HOPI and Communist Students’ criticism of StWC that is the reason for their exclusion.

REVOLUTION would like to make clear that in such a broad and diverse movement, disagreement over the politics of the coalition is inevitable and therefore the need for democratic debate over the issues is essential in choosing the right path forward to stop the brutal war on terror.

To this effect we are fully against the exclusion which sets a dangerous trend within StWC and represents an attack on democracy and diversity. We will be making this point absolutely clear at the StWC AGM on Saturday, 27th October.

RNC