Trotsky on the United Front at the Comintern

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Published on Friday, 15 April 2011 18:32

The Question of the United Front

Leon Trotsky

(February 1922)

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Source: New International, Vol.4 No.7, July 1938, pp.216-218 & New International, Vol.4 No.8, August 1938, pp.250-252.
Transcription/HTML Markup: Einde O’Callaghan for the Trotsky Internet Archive.
Copyleft: Creative Commons (Attribute & Share-alike) Leon Trotsky Internet Archive (www.marxists.org) 2006.

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Trotsky’s speech was delivered at the height of the discussion in the Communist International on the question of the united front. In the communist party of France, the greatest opposition to the united front came from the right wing, among whose most prominent spokesmen was the then party secretary, L.-O. Frossard and Victor Meric. As may be seen from Trotsky’s polemical reply, the question of the united front sixteen years ago was bound up with the question of an early version of the People’s Front, i.e., the bloc des Gauches, or “left bloc” with the Radicals and the social democrats, if not in the conception of the Comintern leaders, then at least in that of the right wing. Also involved was the relation between the Soviet republic and its foreign policy, on the one side, and proletarian policy in the capitalist countries, on the other. The manner in which this relationship was fixed at that time is in sharp contrast with the Stalintern manner of today. The reader will not fail to notice the topical, as well as historical, significance of the polemic. – ED.

COMRADES, I was not present at the session yesterday, but I have read attentively the two speeches which are opposed in principle to the tactic defined by the Executive: the speeches of our comrades Terracini and Daniel Renoult.

Now, I am in full agreement with comrade Radek when he says that the speech of comrade Terracini is nothing but a new and, I must confess, not quite improved edition of the objections which he once made to certain theses of the Third Congress.

But the situation has changed since then.

During the Third Congress there was the danger that the Italian communist party or other parties would engage in actions that might become very dangerous. Now, on the contrary, the negative danger threatens that the Italian party will abstain from actions which can and must be profitable for the labor movement.

It may of course be said that this negative danger is not so great as the positive danger. But time is an important factor in politics and if we let it slip by it is always utilized against us by others.

Comrade Terracini said: We are naturally for mass action and for the conquest of the masses. He repeats this time and again in his speeches. On the other hand, however, he says: Although we are for the common struggle of the proletariat, we are against the united front as proposed by the Executive.

Comrades, when the representative of a proletarian party continually asserts: We are for the conquest of the majority of the proletariat, we are for the slogan, “To the masses!” – this sounds like a somewhat belated echo of the discussions at the Third Congress. At that time we all believed that we were already in the full swing of the revolution; the feelings and moods of the proletariat, born of the war, the rather vague sentiments in favor of the revolution – of the Russian revolution as well as of the revolution in general – were regarded as sufficient for the revolution itself. But the events showed that this appraisal was wrong. During the Third Congress, we discussed this and we said: No, a new stage is now beginning; the bourgeoisie does not stand quite firmly on its feet for the moment, but still firmly enough to oblige us communists first to win the confidence of the broadest masses of workers in order to crush the bourgeoisie.

Comrade Terracini continues to repeat: We are for action to conquer the masses. Certainly, but we have already entered a more advanced stage, we are now discussing the methods of winning the masses in action. From this standpoint – how to conquer the masses – the parties are divided quite naturally and logically into three large groups:

First, there are the parties which are but at the beginning of their successes and which are not yet in a position “to play a big role in the immediate action of the masses. Naturally, these parties have a great future, like all the other communist parties, but right now they cannot count very much upon the action of the proletarian masses for they are numerically weak as organizations. Hence, these parties must fight for the time being for the conquest of a basis, of the possibility of influencing the proletariat in its action (our English party is now emerging from this situation with ever-increased success).

On the other side there are parties which completely dominate the proletariat. I believe comrade Kolarov is right in claiming that this is the case with Bulgaria. What does this mean? It means that Bulgaria is ripe for the proletarian revolution and that only international conditions stand in its way. It is clear that in such a situation the question of the united front scarcely exists. In Belgium and England, on the other hand, it signifies the struggle for the possibility of influencing the proletariat and of cooperating in its movement.

Between these two extremes, there are parties which represent a power, not only in ideas but also through their numerical and organizational strength. This is already the case with most of the communist parties. Their strength may come to a third of the organized vanguard, a fourth, even a half or a bit more – that does not alter the situation in general.

What task confronts these parties? To conquer the overwhelming majority of the proletariat. And to what end? To lead the proletariat to the conquest of power, to the revolution. When will this moment be reached? We do not know. Perhaps in six months, perhaps in six years. Maybe the interval will differ for the various countries between these two figures. But speaking theoretically, it is not excluded that this preparatory period will last even longer. In that case, I ask: What will we do during this period? Continue to fight for the conquest of the majority, for the confidence of the entire proletariat. But this will not be attained by today or tomorrow; for the moment we are the party of the vanguard of the proletariat. And now still another question: Should the class struggle stop meanwhile, until we have conquered the entire proletariat? I put this question to comrade Terracini and also to comrade Renoult: Should the struggle of the proletariat for its daily bread stop until the moment when the communist party, supported by the entire working class, is in a position to seize the power? No, this struggle does not stop, it continues. The workers who belong to our party and those who do not join it, like the members of the social-democratic party and others, all of them – depending on the stage and the character of the working class in question – are disposed and able to fight for their immediate interests; and the struggle for their immediate interests is always, in our epoch of great imperialist crisis, the beginning of a revolutionary struggle. (This is very important but I mention it here only parenthetically.)

Now then, the workers who do not join our party and who do not understand it (that is precisely the reason why they do not enter it), want to have the possibility to fight for the piece of daily bread, for the bit of meat, etc. They see before them the communist party, the socialist party, and they do not understand the reason why they have parted company. They belong to the reformist General Confederation of Labor [CGT], to the socialist party of Italy, etc., or else they do not belong to any party organization. Now, what do these workers think? They say: Let these organizations or sects – I don’t know how these not very conscious workers call them in their language – give us the possibility of conducting the fight for our daily needs. We cannot answer them: But we have separated in order to prepare your great future, your great day-after-tomorrow! They will not understand this, because they are completely absorbed by their “today”. If they were able to grasp this, to them, entirely theoretical argument, they would have joined our party. With such a mental outlook and confronted with the fact of different trade union and political organizations, they have no means of orienting themselves; they find it impossible to undertake any immediate action, no matter how small or partial. Along comes the communist party and tells them: Friends, we are divided. You think it’s a mistake; I want to explain the reasons. You don’t understand them? I regret it greatly, but we are already in existence, we communists, socialists, reformists and revolutionary syndicalists; we have our independent organizations for reasons which are entirely sufficient for us communists. Nevertheless we communists propose an immediate action in your struggle for bread and meat, we propose it to you and to your leaders, to every organization that represents a part of the proletariat!

This is entirely in the spirit of mass psychology, the psychology of the proletariat and I contend that the comrades who protest against it with so much passion (which is easily explained by the importance and gravity of the question), reflect far more the painful process of their still fresh separation from the reformists and opportunists than the mood of the broad proletarian masses. I understand very well that for a journalist who was for a long time in the same editorial board of, let us say, l’Humanité, together with Longuet, and separated from him after great difficulties – the prospect of turning to Longuet again after all this, to propose negotiations to him, is a psychological and moral torment. But the working class, the masses, the millions of French workers, do not give a tinker’s dam about these things (one can say “unfortunately!”), because they do not belong to the party. But when you say to them: We communists are now taking the initiative in mass action for your piece of bread – whom will the workers condemn and pillory for this? The Communist International, the French communist party? No, never.

In order to show you, comrades, that the hesitations gaining ground in France, especially in France, do not reflect the moods of the proletarian masses, but rather a belated echo of the painful process of separation from the old party, I will quote you from a few articles. I beg your forgiveness: the French comrades make merry a bit over our infatuation for quotations; one of them has made some very sprightly remarks about the vastness of our “documentation”, but there is nothing else for us to do. Naturally, quotations are the dessicated flowers of the labor movement, but if you know a bit of botany and if you have also seen the flowers in the sunny fields, then even these dessicated samples will give you an idea of the reality.

I will quote you from a comrade well known in France: comrade Victor Meric. He now represents more or less the opposition to the united front in a manner comprehensible by all; he vulgarizes his opposition in his ironical manner. Listen to what he says. This is supposed to be a joke – a bad one, to me, but in any case, a joke:

“Why not make a united front with Briand? After all, Briand is only a Dissident, a Dissident of the first draft, a pioneer Dissident; but just the same he belongs to the great family.” (Journal du Peuple, Jan. 13, 1922.)

What is the meaning of this? At the moment when the Executive says to the French comrades: You, the French party, represent only a part of the working class, it is necessary to find the ways and means for a common action of the masses – the voice from Paris replies:

“Why not make a united front with Briand?”

One can say, that is irony and it appears in a paper created especially for irony of this sort, the Journal du Peuple. But I have here a quotation from the same author in the Internationale – and that is incomparably more important – where he says literally:

“And permit me to put one single question – oh! without the slightest irony ... [notice this, comrades, these are the words of Victor Meric himself: “without the slightest irony”] ...”

INTERRUPTIONS: For once! ... It doesn’t often happen.

TROTSKY: “And permit me to put one single question – oh! without the slightest irony! If this thesis is accepted in France and if, tomorrow, the Poincaré-la-Guerre ministry, upset, gives way to a Briand or Viviani cabinet, determined partisan of peace, of disarmament, of an accord among the peoples and the recognition of the Soviets, won’t our deputies in parliament have to consolidate, by their votes, the position of this bourgeois government? And even if – anything can happen! – a portfolio were offered to one of our people, should he refuse it?” (Internationale, Jan. 22, 1922.)

This appears – oh! without the slightest irony! – not in the Journal du Peuple, but in the Internationale, the organ of our party. Thus, for Victor Meric it is not a question of unifying the action of the proletariat, but of his relations to this or that Dissident, to the Dissidents of yesterday or of the day before. As you can see, his argument is taken from the realm of international policy: In case a Briand government were inclined to recognize the Soviets, would the Moscow International impose upon us a collaboration with this government?

Comrade Terracini did not say quite the same thing as comrade Meric, but he too conjured up the specter of an alliance among three powers: Powers No.3, 2 and 2½ – Germany, Austria and Germany. Comrade Zinoviev said in the plenary session, and I in the commission, that there are comrades who seek in our views or in our “deviations”, reasons of state. They say that it is not our mistakes as communists, but rather our interests as Russian statesmen that drive us to the tactic of the united front. And that is precisely the veiled accusation of Victor Meric.

Now, remember that as far back as the Third Congress it was pointed out that the right wing, and particularly the lackeys of the right wing, interpreted the March events in Germany as the product of suggestions from Moscow for saving the muddled situation of the Soviets. When, at the Third Congress, certain methods employed during the March Action were condemned, it was the extreme left, the Communist Labor Party of Germany, who declared that the Soviet government is against the revolutionary movement and wants to postpone the world revolution for a time in order to be able to do business with the bourgeoisie of the West.

Now the same things are being wanned up again in connection with the united front.

Comrades, the interests of the Soviet republic cannot be other than the interests of the international revolutionary movement. If this tactic is injurious to you, comrades of France, or to you, comrades of Italy, then it is completely injurious also to us. And if you believe that we are absorbed and hypnotized by our position as statesmen to such an extent that we are no longer able to judge and grasp correctly the interests of the labor movement – then it would be proper to introduce into the statutes of our International a paragraph which says that the party that has arrived at the lamentable position of the conquest of power must be expelled from the International. (Laughter)

Instead of such accusations – note that they are not formal accusations, but insinuations which go hand in hand with the more or less official and ritualistic eulogies of the Russian revolution – I would rather that we were criticized a little more. If, for example, we were to receive from the Central Committee of the French party a letter saying: “You are now following the New Economic Policy; take care that you don’t break your neck, for you have gone too far in your relations with the capitalists”; or if the French delegation were to say: “We have seen your military review; you are copying the old militarism too closely and it may have a bad effect upon the young workers”; or if you were to say: “Your diplomacy is much too diplomatic; it gives out interviews, it writes notes which may hurt us in France” – in brief, if you were to criticize us openly, dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s, such forthright relations would be far more desirable to us than the detestable manner which goes in for hints. But all this is in passing.

After the argument from international policy, Victor Meric has an argument of a sentimental character:

“Just the same, this coming January 15, when we commemorate the two martyrs, it will do no good to come to speak to us about a united front with the friends of the Scheidemanns, the Noskes, the Eberts and other assassins of socialists and workers.” (Internationale, Jan. 8, 1922.)

Naturally, this is an argument that cannot fail to influence very simple workers who have a revolutionary feeling but not sufficient political education. Comrade Zinoviev referred to it in his speech. And comrade Thalheimer said: Comrades, if there are sentimental reasons for not sitting down at the same table with the people of the Second and the Two-and-a-Half Internationals, these reasons are valid primarily for us Germans. But how can a French communist make a statement which amounts to saying that the German communists are devoid of this revolutionary feeling, of hatred against the traitors and assassins of the Second International?

I think that their hatred is not less than that of the literati and journalists who were removed from the events. If our German comrades nevertheless carry out the tactic of the united front, the reason is that they see it as a political action and not at all as a moral reconciliation with the social democratic leaders.

The third argument is more or less decisive. We find it in an article by the same author:

“The Seine Federation has just adopted a decision on important questions: it rejects the united front by a strong majority. This simply signifies that although a year has passed, it has no intention of reversing itself. This means that after having consented to perform the painful operation, which the Tours split was, it refuses to rake up everything all over again, to appeal to those people from whom we separated.” (Internationale, Jan. 22, 1922.)

That is how the united front is presented. It is the return to the situation before Tours. And Fabre, the hospitable Fabre, declares that he is entirely in agreement with the tactic of the united front, but with one observation – and for myself I have no observation to make:

“Why should socialist and labor unity have been destroyed, with pistol in hand?”

Thus it is all clear. By putting the question in this way, acceptance of the united front means the return to the situation before Tours, it is collaboration, truce, the holy alliance with the Dissidents, the reformists. After having put the question this way, there follows the discussion on the tactic to adopt: to accept or to reject. Meric says: I reject, together with the Seine Federation. Fabre says: No, I accept, I accept.

Comrades, even in Frossard, who is certainly a politician of great value, whom we all know and who does not deal only with the funny side of a question – even in him we do not find weightier arguments. No, it is still the idea of a reconciliation with the Dissidents and not the question of the united front. Now I ask: does this question exist in France or not?

The French communist party has 130,000 members; the party of the Dissidents has a very weak membership and I draw your attention to the fact that the French comrades have named the reformists the “Dissidents”. Why? So as to denounce them before the proletariat as disrupters of the united front, as Dissidents, that is, as social-traitors. Similarly, the revolutionary CGT calls itself “Unitary” in order to demonstrate that one of its aims, its main aim, is to assure the unity of action of the proletariat.

I might also say that your methods and your actions are better than the arguments you have employed against the tactic formulated by the Executive Committee of the Communist International. I repeat: the party has 130,000 members and the Dissidents, let us say, 30,000, 40,000 or 50,000. No matter ...

INTERRUPTIONS: 15,000! Yes, the figures of the Dissidents are not always exact! It’s very hard to learn what they are.

TROTSKY: They are a minority, but not an entirely negligible minority.

Then there are the trade unions. A few years ago they had two million members; at least so they declared – the statistics of the French trade union movement are more spirited than its revolutionary enthusiasm – and now – I take my figures from the speech of comrade Renoult – there are 300,000 members in the Unitary CGT. Before the split the trade unions had 500,000 members all told.

Now, the proletarian class in France numbers millions.

The party has 130,000 members.

The revolutionary trade unions have 300,000.

The reformist trade unions have perhaps a little more or a little less than 200,000.

The Dissidents have 15,000 (30,000 or 40,000).

That is the situation.

* * * *

II

TO BE SURE, the party is in a very favorable situation; it is the most influential political organization. But it is not the dominant one! What is this party at the present moment? The French party is the result, the crystallization of that great revolutionary wave of the proletariat which rose out of the war, thanks to the courageous action of the comrades who stood at the head of the movement at the time. They used this upswing of the masses, their vague but revolutionary, primitively revolutionary sentiment, to transform the old party into a communist party.

The revolution, however, did not come. The masses had the feeling that it would come today or tomorrow; now it sees that it is not breaking out. As a consequence, there is a certain ebb and only the elite of the proletariat remains in the party. But the great mass experience, so to speak, a psychological reflux. It expresses itself in the fact that the workers leave the trade unions. The trade unions are losing in membership. Formerly they counted in the millions, and now they are no longer members. Men and women join for a few weeks, a few months, and then they leave. What does this mean? The great mass of the proletariat naturally remains true to the ideal of the revolution, but this ideal has acquired a vaguer and less realizable character, has become remote. The communist party remains, with its doctrine and its tactics. There exists a small dissident group which, during this tumultuous period of revolution, has lost all its influence and its authority. But let us suppose that this transitory situation lasts another year, two years, three years, let us suppose this – we do not wish it, but we make the supposition in order to picture the situation – how will the working class of France act if, under such circumstances, there would be a general action in the country? How will it group itself? The numerical relation between the communist party and the party of the dissidents is 4 to 1, and among the working masses the relationship of vague revolutionary sentiments to conscious revolutionary sentiments is perhaps 99 to 1.

This situation lingers on without becoming stabilized and, meanwhile, the time for the new elections is drawing close. What will the French worker think? He says to himself: Yes, the communist party is perhaps a good party, the communists are good revolutionists; but right now there is no revolution, the question is the elections; the problem today is Poincaré, is the last great effort of revenge-nationalism, just like the last blaze of a dying lamp.

After that, what is left for the bourgeoisie? The Left Bloc. But for the success of this political combination, a prop, an instrument is needed inside the ranks of the working class. This instrument is the party of the dissidents. Is it acceptable? At one time we acquired magnificent propaganda successes with l’Humanité, which has 200,000 readers, with our schools, etc.

But there are other means and we seek to set the broad masses into motion by organizing meetings, by the excellent speeches of our French friends who, as you know, are not lacking in eloquence. Well, the elections come along. And a great mass of workers will probably reason thus: Yes, a parliament of the Left Bloc is at all events preferable to a parliament of Poincaré, of the National Bloc. And that will be the moment for the dissidents to play a political role. It is true that they are not numerically strong as a political organization. They have newspapers which are not, to be sure, widely read, because the most indifferent, the most disillusioned mass of the proletariat reads nothing; it has lost its illusions, it waits for events to occur, and it has a fine flair for coming events without reading. Only the thoroughly revolutionary workers have the urge for the printed word. Under such conditions, the organization of the dissidents, this small instrument of the bourgeoisie, can acquire weighty political importance. It becomes our problem, then, to discredit in advance the idea of the Left Bloc before the French proletariat. That is a very important question for the French party. I do not say that this Left Bloc would be a misfortune for us. It would be a gain also for us, provided that the proletariat does not participate in it. Let the others collaborate in the Bloc, but not the French workers; the others will only discredit themselves thereby in advance. The big and petty bourgeoisie, the financial and industrial bourgeoisie, the bourgeois intelligentsia – let them all stake their bets on the Left Bloc as they please; we, however, will endeavor to profit by it, and to unite all the workers, at whatever cost, into the united front against the bourgeoisie, bridging all the splits and groupings in the working class.

We do not want, right now, to formulate exactly the methods of our procedure, to ask whether it will be an open or a closed letter to the executive committee of the dissidents – in case there is one. The main thing is to discredit in advance the left bourgeoisie in the eyes of the broad working masses, to compel it to take a position. This bourgeois reserve army still holds back, it does not want to expose itself, it awaits the coming events in the shelter of its editorial chambers and its parliamentary clubs, it aims to let these great and small events occur without being implicated in them and discredited by them. Then, when the elections come, these left groupings emerge from their reserve, appear before the masses, and say: Yes, yes, the communists ... but we offer you this, that and the other advantage. We communists have the greatest interest in drawing these gentlemen out of their shelters, out of their chambers, and to place them before the proletariat, particularly on the basis of mass action. That is how things stand, that is how the question is presented to us. It is not at all a question of a rapprochement with Longuet. And really, comrades, that would be a bit thick, wouldn’t it?

Fifteen or sixteen months ago, we sought to impress the French comrades with the necessity of expelling even Longuet. And now come the comrades who were not quite firm at that time with regard to the 21 conditions, and tell us: You are imposing a rapprochement with Longuet upon us! I understand quite well that a worker of the Seine Federation, after having read the articles of Victor Meric, would get such an insane idea. His mistake must be explained to him in all tranquillity; he must be shown that this is not the question, that it is above all a question of not letting M. Longuet and consorts prepare a new betrayal in the quietness of their shelters, that they must be grabbed by the collar and compelled by force to stand before the proletariat and to answer the precise questions we put to them.

We have different methods of action, comrade Terracini tells us; we are for the revolution and they are against it. That is entirely correct, I am fully in agreement with Terracini. But if this were not the case, then the question of the united front would encounter no difficulties whatsoever. Naturally we are for the revolution and they are against it, but the proletariat has not understood this difference and we must make it clear to the workers.

Comrade Terracini replies:

“But we are already doing it, we have communist cells in the unions. The unions have a very great importance. We are reaching our goal by means of propaganda.”

Propaganda will not be prohibited by this conference; it is always an excellent thing, the foundation of everything. But the question is of combining and adapting it to the new conditions and the organizational role of the party.

Here is a small, very interesting excerpt from the speech of comrade Terracini:

“When we launched the appeal for a general action of the masses, we conquered the majority in the organizations by means of our propaganda.”

“The majority” ... and then the fine hand of the author made the slight correction “almost the majority”. Another point on which we are fully agreed. But what does it mean: “almost the majority”? Both in Russian and in French, it comes down to saying the minority.

Comrades, even the majority does not yet mean the totality.

“We have the majority, we have four-sevenths of the proletariat.”

But four-sevenths of the proletariat is not yet its totality: the remaining three-sevenths may yet quite well sabotage an action of the class. For they are, after all, three-sevenths of the proletariat.

And “almost the majority” is only three-sevenths of the proletariat. Now, thanks to propaganda, we have three-sevenths, but it is still necessary to win the four-sevenths. That is not an easy matter, comrade Terracini, and if one thinks that by repeating the same methods he has employed to win the three-sevenths he will win the other four, he is mistaken, because as the party grows larger, its methods must change. At the outset, when the proletariat sees this intransigent little revolutionary group which says: “To hell with the reformists! To hell with the bourgeois state!” – it applauds and says: “Very good!” But when it sees these three-sevenths of the vanguard organized by the communists, that there is not much change in the field of discussions, of meetings, the proletariat tires of it, it tires of it and new methods are needed to show it that, now that we are a large party, we are able to participate in the immediate struggle.

And to demonstrate this, the action of the whole proletariat is necessary; this action must be guaranteed and the initiative for it must not be left to others.

When the workers say: Your revolution of tomorrow is of little matter to us! We want to fight today to preserve our 8-hour-day! – then it is we who must take the initiative in unification for today’s battle.

Comrade Terracini says:

“We mustn’t pay much attention to the socialists. There is nothing to be done with them. But we must pay attention to the trade unions.”

And he adds:

“There is nothing new in this. Already at the Second Congress of the Communist International, it was said, perhaps unintentionally: the split in the political parties, but unity in the trade unions.”

I do not understand this at all. I underlined this passage of his speech in red pencil and then in blue pencil, to express my astonishment. We said at the Second Congress, perhaps unintentionally ...

TERRACINI: It was in the polemic with Zinoviev. That was irony. You were not in the hall when I spoke.

TROTSKY: Let’s put it aside and send it in an envelope to Victor Meric. Irony is his specialty.

INTERRUPTIONS: There’s irony in Italy too, as you see ... And even in Moscow ...

TROTSKY: Unfortunately; for as you see I was misled by it. But joking aside. What does it mean: no splitting of the trade unions? And why not? The most dangerous thing in the speech of comrade Renoult, which I read with great interest and in which I found very instructive things for understanding the state of mind of the French communist party, is his assertion that at the present moment we have nothing to do not only with the dissidents but also with the reformist CGT [General Confederation of Labor]. This will be a pleasant surprise to the most maladroit anarchists, if I may say so, of the Unitary CGT. Precisely in the trade union movement, you have applied the theory of the united front; you have applied it with success; and if you now have 300,000 members as compared with the 200,000 supporters of Jouhaux, you owe it, I am sure, in half-measure to the tactic of the united front, because, in the trade union movement, where the problem is to embrace the proletarians of all opinions, of all tendencies, there is the possibility of fighting for your immediate interests. If we were to split the trade unions in accordance with the different tendencies, it would be suicidal.

We said: No, this terrain is for us. Inasmuch as we are independent as communists, we have all the possibilities for manoeuvring, of saying openly what we think, of criticizing the others; we enter the trade unions with this conception and we are sure that within a specified time we shall have the majority behind us.

Jouhaux saw the ground slipping away from under him. Our prognosis was correct. He began the split by means of expulsions. We characterized the expulsions as a crime, for it was unity of action that was needed. That was our tactic.

INTERRUPTION: Renoult said that!

TROTSKY: To be sure, Jouhaux shattered the unity by the expulsions of the communists. That’s just where the meaning of the united front lies. In our struggle against the reformists, against the dissidents, as you named them, the syndicalist-reformists, social-patriots, etc., we must make them responsible for the split, we must continually force them to express themselves on the possibility of a joint action on the basis of the class struggle. They must be faced with the necessity of stating an open “No” before the entire working class.

If the situation is favorable for the demands of the working class, we must push these gentlemen forward. In two years, let us assume, we shall have the revolution. Meanwhile, we will have an ever increasing movement of the working class. Do you think that the Jouhauxs and the Merrheims will remain as they are today? No, they will always try; they will take one or two steps forward and, since there will always be people in their camp who refuse to follow them, they will experience a new split. We will profit by it. That is naturally a tactic of movement, a very flexible tactic, but at the same time a thoroughly energetic one, for the leadership remains firmly in our hands. And when great events occur – here I am fuljy in accord with comrade Terracini – the unity of action will be established by itself. We will not prevent it. But, comrade Terracini tells us, at the given moment there are no great events and we have no reason for proposing the united front ...

TERRACINI: I never said that.

TROTSKY: Perhaps I am mistaken. Perhaps it is not you who said it. But the argument was brought forward here, for I saw it in the stenogram. The French comrades say: Yes, if great events come; but if they don’t come, what then? Then we must bring them about by our own initiative. I contend, and I believe it is an axiom, that one of the obstacles to great events, one of the psychological obstacles for the proletariat, is the fact that several political and trade union organizations exist side by side, the differences between which the masses do not understand; they do not see clearly how they are to realize their action. This psychological obstacle is naturally of the greatest negative significance; it is the outcome of a situation which was not created by us, but we must make it easier for the masses to understand it. We propose to an organization

this or that immediate action; this corresponds entirely to the logic of things. I contend that if the Unitary CGT were to adopt the tactic of ignoring the Jouhauxist CGT, it will be the greatest mistake that we can commit in France. And if the party commits this mistake, it will be crushed under its weight, because the 300,000 revolutionary workers in the trade, unions – and comrades, they are only a minimum – these 300,000 workers are practically your party, somewhat expanded by various elements, that’s all. And where is the French proletariat?

You will reply: But they aren’t with Jouhaux either! Yes, that’s right. But I say that the workers who are in no organization, the most disillusioned or mentally most sluggish elements, may very well be drawn behind us at the moment of an acute revolutionary crisis, but in a dragging epoch they are much rather a prop of Jouhaux. For what does Jouhaux represent? The sluggishness of the working class. And the fact that you have no more than 300,000 workers shows that there is no little sluggishness left in the French working class, even though the French workers are indubitably superior to the backward workers of other countries.

And now once more on the question of exposing the Jouhauxs. How is that to be done? In what way can we force them to express themselves about the mass actions and to take responsibility for them?

There is still another danger. If the Unitary CGT simply turns its back to the reformist Confederation, and tries to win the masses by means of revolutionary propaganda, it will perhaps commit the samp mistakes that the railroad union of France has already made. You know very well that the trade union movement, trade union actions, are very hard to direct. The great reserves of backward masses who are represented by Jouhaux must always be borne in mind, and if we ignore Jouhaux, it is equivalent to ignoring the masses of backward workers.

That is how the question presents itself in my eyes.

There is still another urgent question, namely, the question of the conference of the three Internationals. Comrades, it is said: The idea of working together with the people of the Second and Two-and-a-Half Internationals is a great surprise to us. We are not prepared for this idea of international collaboration with those whom we have denounced.

To be sure, it is necessary to prepare all minds in time for a turn of such scope. That is correct. The question has aroused a lively agitation. But what caused it? It was the so-called Genoa Conference, which also came up very suddenly. When we received the invitation to this conference, the personal invitation to comrade Lenin, it was a surprise to us. If this conference should really take place, whether in Genoa or in Rome, it will more or less determine the destiny of the world, in so far as the bourgeoisie can do it. Then the proletariat will feel the need of doing something.

Naturally, we communists will do everything possible, by means of propaganda, of meetings, of demonstrations; but not only among communists, but also among the workers, in the working class as a whole, in Germany, in France, there is the feeling, still vague perhaps, of the need of doing something in order to acquire an influence upon the negotiations of this conference from the standpoint of the interests of the proletariat.

Now, the Two-and-a-Half International takes the initiative: of a conference and invites us to attend. We must decide: yes or no? Should we answer these people: “You are traitors, we will undertake nothing in common with you”? Their treachery is a long-known fact, and it has been branded countless times. But these gentlemen will be able to say: We of the Second and Two-and-a-Half Internationals want to exercise a pressure upon the diplomatic conference of the bourgeoisie through the voice of the proletariat; we invited the communists, but they refused and answered us with abuse. And we reply: Since you are traitors, scoundrels (they will see to it that this word is expunged from the stenogram), we will not go. Of course, our communist audience will be convinced by us, for it is already convinced. We have no need to convince it over again. But the supporters of the Second and the Two-and-a-Half Internationals, among whom there are many workers? That is the only question of any importance. If you say: “No, the Mensheviks have lost all influence everywhere”, then I don’t worry a bit about the conferences of the Second and the Two-and-a-Half Internationals; but say so. But unfortunately, the workers who support the Second and Two-and-a-Half Internationals are more numerous than the workers who support the Third International.

The fact that must be borne in mind is that Friedrich Adler has addressed himself to us in these words: We invite you to participate in a conference which is to discuss and decide on common pressure to exert upon the bourgeoisie, upon its diplomacy. They invite us and with us the workers of the entire world. If we confine ourselves, in our reply to repeating: “You are social-traitors” – it will be a maladroit answer. The Scheidemanns, the Friedrich Adlers, Longuets e tutti quanti would then have an easy job in the working class. There, they will say, the communists claim that we are traitors; but when we turn to them and invite them to cooperate with us for a specific period and a well-defined purpose, they refuse. Let us, comrades, reserve this designation of traitors and scoundrels for the moment after the conference, perhaps even for the conference itself. But it is not now, in our letter of reply, that we should say: we refuse to attend because you are traitors and scoundrels. Will this conference surely take place? I do not know. There are comrades who are more optimistic about it and others who are more pessimistic. But if the conference does not succeed, then let it be exclusively because of the Scheidemanns. Then we shall be able to say to the workers: Your Second and Two-and-a-Half Internationals are impotent to do what they themselves proposed to us. That will not only bring us the applause of the communists, but a part of the Scheidemann people will listen to us and say: There is something rotten here; an agreement was proposed and the German social-democrats did not come. Then the struggle between the Scheidemanns and ourselves will begin anew. We will conduct it upon a broader basis, one more favorable to us. That too is the only result towards which we aspire.

I do not know, comrades, if the conference can be postponed; that surely does not depend upon our wishes. It would be very important from the standpoint of preparing the minds of the workers. But this conference is being proposed to us now, before the Conference of Genoa, and we must reply.

And even if there is a worker in the Seine Federation who exclaims: “My party wants to meet with Jouhaux. No! I tear up my card!” – we will say to him: “My dear friend, you are wrought up now; have a little patience.” And if he slams the door behind him, we will regret greatly his departure, but it will be his fault. Then, a few weeks later, when he will read the news of the British Conference, when he will see Cachin and the delegates of the other communist parties participating, speaking and acting as communists; then, after the conference, when the struggle continues but our opponents are more completely unmasked than before the conference – we shall have convinced him and all the other communists and, at the same time, our aim shall have been attained. That is why I believe that the conference should decide unanimously in favor of participation, not with the already ritualized appeals, but with the statement: Yes, we are ready, as representatives of the revolutionary interests of the world proletariat, faced with this new attempt of the Second and Two-and-a-Half Internationals to deceive the proletariat, to try to open its eyes to the criminal policy of these two Internationals.

Leon TROTSKY

Santosh Rana On Murder of Niyamat Ansari in Jharkhand

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Published on Friday, 15 April 2011 16:12

On Murder of Niyamat Ansari  in  Jharkhand

Dear Jean

Your e-mail reached me a few days back but I could not reply due to illness. I am sorry for the delay.

I heard about the murder of NREGA activist Niyamat Ansari in Latehar by a  Maoist  squad. I strongly condemn the murder.

This murder, along with many other murders committed by the Maoists in Jharkhand, Lalgarh and other areas is the inevitable culmination of a line followed by the Maoists – the line of establishing exclusive
control over any area by physically eliminating not only their opponents but any activism which is different from them. They wont allow any political activity or mass movement which is not directed by them. They
want to establish the dictatorship of their squads in the areas under their influence. Anybody who helps them with money or material, irrespective of his class position is their friend.

>*From the * beginning of the movement in Lalgarh  we have steadfastly supported the people’s agitation against police repression and for autonomy of Jangalmahal. It started as a movement by the masses and many social and political organizations joined it. Most significant was the participation of Bharat Jakat Majhi Marwa, a social organization of Santhals. But the Maoists destroyed the people’s unity by killing Sudhir
Mandi in the end of November 2008. Sudhir was a leader of Majhi Marwa. He was also the Chairman of Belpahari Panchayet Samiti during 2003-08.
Now-a-days, a Chairman of a Panchayet Samiti handles several crores of rupees in a year. But Sudhir lived in a thatched mud-house and earned his living through cultivation of Sabui grass in few bighas of
unirrigated land. His only offence was that he refused to act according to orders of the Maoist squads. I criticized this killing. I drew the attention of a team of intellectuals from Delhi ( led by Amit Bhaduri
and Gautam Navlakha) who visited Lalgarh in early 2009 to this incident and requested them to visit Sudhir’s house and see for themselves if Sudhir was such a corrupt person as to attract capital punishment. But nobody bothered about it.

During 2009 and 2010, more than 400 people have been killed by the Maoists in Jangalmahal, most of them being Adibasis, Dalits and other poor people.Majority of them were CPI(M) supporters. But more than 30 members and  supporters of various factions of Jharkhand Party were also killed. Among the killed persons were women and old. Class-wise they were agricultural labourers and poor peasants and some ICDS workers and primary school teachers.In 2010, the Maoists formed an alliance with the Trnamool Congress and started attacking our supporters.Now , on the eve of the Assembly election they are hand in glove with the Trinanmool Congress and are helping them to win the seats in the Jangalmahal.This is the logical conclusion of the disastrous line followed by them. When an alliance of Congress and
Trinamool is going all out to win the Assembly election, the Maoists have stood as their ally.

My suggestion is that all organizations and individuals who

Opposed the murder of Azad in a fake encounter

Supported the demand for release of Dr Binayak Sen

Oppose Operation Green Hunt

Support the people in their struggle for livelihood and against state terror

And are committed to the concept of Pluralism in political life

Should join hands to launch a countrywide campaign on these issues and the murder of Niyamat Ansari should be taken up as part of this campaign. If anybody takes such an initiative we are ready to join hands with  them.

Yours sincerely

Santosh Rana
General Secretary CPI(ML) PCC
15 April  2011

Bail for Binayak Sen

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Published on Friday, 15 April 2011 08:49

<http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article1698939.ece?homepage=true>
Published: April 15, 2011 12:43 IST | Updated: April 15, 2011 13:20 IST
Supreme Court grants bail to Binayak SenPTI

The activist had contended that the trial court erred in convicting him when there was no substantial evidence against him.

The Supreme Court today granted bail to rights activist Binayak Sen, who has been convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment by a Chhattisgarh trial court for sedition and helping Naxalites to set up a network to fight the State.

The Supreme Court said it was giving no reason for granting bail to 61-year-old Sen and left it to the satisfaction of the trial court concerned to impose the conditions for his release on bail.

A bench comprising Justices H.S. Bedi and C.K. Prasad passed the order on the petition moved by Mr. Sen challenging the order of Chhattisgarh High Court denying him bail.

During the hearing, the bench observed that “we are a democratic country. He may be a sympathiser (of Naxalites) but it did not make him guilty of sedition.

“He is a sympathiser. Nothing beyond that,” the bench further said, perusing the affidavit filed by the Chhattisgarh government opposing his bail.

Senior advocate Ram Jethmalani, appearing for Mr. Sen, submitted in his affidavit that the state has been unable to point out misconduct on his part.

The bench also said that all the statements made by the state has no relevance.

It said other documents and evidences produced by the state government including that he met co-accused Piyush Guha 30 times in a jail and pamphlets and documents relating to Maoist activities were recovered from his possession did not mean that he was involved in seditious activities.

However, senior advocate U.U. Lalit, appearing for the state government, said that no case is made out for the bail and submitted that the activities of Mr. Sen have to be seen in a broader perspective.

When the bench asked him whether his activities in any way connect to the offence of sedition, Mr. Lalit said, “My case has been accepted by the trial court and the apex court has only to consider whether he can be granted bail or not.”

When the court asked him if there were any documents backing the charge of sedition, Lalit said Sen visited the jail and exchanged documents with Guha and others.

However, this submission did not satisfy the bench, which said, “Visitors are screened and searched by the jail staff when they go and meet the inmates.

“The jailors are there to oversee all these things. So the question of passing letters or documents doesn’t arise.”

“The worst can be said that he was found in possession of general documents (relating to Naxal activities) but how can it be said that such possession would attract the charge of sedition. How can you lay the charge of sedition?” the bench asked.

While granting bail, the bench said, “We are concerned with the implementation of the judgement as no case of sedition is even made out.”

The Real Face of the US War on Terror: A Report from Afghanistan

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Published on Friday, 15 April 2011 08:47

Combat by camera: Anatomy of an Afghan war tragedy

U.S. Predator teams and a special operations unit on the ground studying a suspicious convoy make a series of fateful missteps as they try to distinguish friend from foe.

By David S. Cloud,

Los Angeles Times, April 10, 2011

latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-afghanistan-drone-20110410,0,200182.story

Nearly three miles above the rugged hills of central Afghanistan, American eyes silently tracked two SUVs and a pickup truck as they snaked down a dirt road in the pre-dawn darkness.

The vehicles, packed with people, were 3 1/2 miles from a dozen U.S. special operations soldiers, who had been dropped into the area hours earlier to root out insurgents. The convoy was closing in on them.

At 6:15 a.m., just before the sun crested the mountains, the convoy halted.

"We have 18 pax [passengers] dismounted and spreading out at this time," an Air Force pilot said from a cramped control room at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada, 7,000 miles away. He was flying a Predator drone remotely using a joystick, watching its live video transmissions from the Afghan sky and radioing his crew and the unit on the ground.

The Afghans unfolded what looked like blankets and kneeled. "They're praying. They are praying," said the Predator's camera operator, seated near the pilot.

By now, the Predator crew was sure that the men were Taliban. "This is definitely it, this is their force," the cameraman said. "Praying? I mean, seriously, that's what they do."

"They're gonna do something nefarious," the crew's intelligence coordinator chimed in.

At 6:22 a.m., the drone pilot radioed an update: "All … are finishing up praying and rallying up near all three vehicles at this time."

The camera operator watched the men climb back into the vehicles.

"Oh, sweet target," he said.

---

None of those Afghans was an insurgent. They were men, women and children going about their business, unaware that a unit of U.S. soldiers was just a few miles away, and that teams of U.S. military pilots, camera operators and video screeners had taken them for a group of Taliban fighters.

The Americans were using some of the most sophisticated tools in the history of war, technological marvels of surveillance and intelligence gathering that allowed them to see into once-inaccessible corners of the battlefield. But the high-tech wizardry would fail in its most elemental purpose: to tell the difference between friend and foe.

This is the story of that episode. It is based on hundreds of pages of previously unreleased military documents, including transcripts of cockpit and radio conversations obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, the results of two Pentagon investigations and interviews with the officers involved as well as Afghans who were on the ground that day.

The Afghan travelers had set out early on the cold morning of Feb. 21, 2010, from three mountain villages in southern Daikundi province, a remote central region 200 miles southwest of Kabul.

More than two dozen people were wedged into the three vehicles. Many were Hazaras, an ethnic minority that for years has been treated harshly by the Taliban. They included shopkeepers going for supplies, students returning to school, people seeking medical treatment and families with children off to visit relatives. There were several women and as many as four children younger than 6.

They had agreed to meet before dawn for the long drive to Highway 1, the country's main paved road. From there, some planned to go north to Kabul while others were headed south. To reach the highway, they had to drive through Oruzgan province, an insurgent stronghold.

"We traveled together, so that if one vehicle broke down the others would help," said Sayed Qudratullah, 30, who was bound for Kabul in hope of obtaining a license to open a pharmacy.

Another passenger, Nasim, an auto mechanic who like many Afghans uses one name, said that he was going to buy tools and parts.

"We weren't worried when we set out. We were a little scared of the Taliban, but not of government forces," he said referring to the Afghan national army and its U.S. allies. "Why would they attack us?"

---

American aircraft began tracking the vehicles at 5 a.m.

The crew of an AC-130, a U.S. ground attack plane flying in the area, spotted a pickup and a sport utility vehicle with a roof rack converge from different directions.

At 5:08 a.m., they saw one of the drivers flash his headlights in the darkness.

The AC-130 radioed the Predator crew in Nevada: "It appears the two vehicles are flashing lights, signaling."

With that, the travelers became targets of suspicion.

At Creech Air Force Base, 35 miles northwest of Las Vegas, it was 4:30 p.m., nearly dinner time.

A few hours earlier, a dozen U.S. special operations soldiers, known as an A-Team, had been dropped off by helicopter near Khod, five miles south of the convoy. The elite unit was moving on foot toward the village, with orders to search for insurgents and weapons.

Another U.S. special operations unit had been attacked in the district a year earlier, and a soldier had been killed. This time the AC-130, the Predator drone and two Kiowa attack helicopters were in the area to protect the A-Team.

The Predator's two-man team — a pilot and a camera operator — was one of the Air Force's most-experienced. The pilot, who had flown C-130 cargo planes, switched to drones after 2001 and had spent more than 1,000 hours training other Predator pilots. (The Air Force declined to name the crew or make them available for interviews.)

Also stationed at Creech were the Predator's mission intelligence coordinator and a safety observer.

In addition, a team of "screeners" — enlisted personnel trained in video analysis — was on duty at Air Force special operations headquarters in Okaloosa, Fla. They sat in a large room with high-definition televisions showing live feeds from drones flying over Afghanistan. The screeners were sending instant messages to the drone crew, observations that were then relayed by radio to the A-Team.

On the ground, the A-Team was led by an Army captain, a veteran of multiple tours in Afghanistan. Under U.S. military rules, the captain, as the ground force commander, was responsible for deciding whether to order an airstrike.

At 5:14 a.m., six minutes after the two Afghan vehicles flashed their lights, the AC-130 crew asked the A-team what it wanted to do about the suspicious vehicles.

"Roger, ground force commander's intent is to destroy the vehicles and the personnel," came the unit's reply.

To use deadly force, the commander would first have to make a "positive identification" that the adversary was carrying weapons and posed an "imminent threat."

For the next 4 1/2 hours, the Predator crew and the screeners scrutinized the convoy's every move, looking for evidence to support such a decision.

"We all had it in our head, 'Hey, why do you have 20 military age males at 5 a.m. collecting each other?' " an Army officer involved in the incident would say later. "There can be only one reason, and that's because we've put [U.S. troops] in the area."

---

The Afghans greeted each other and climbed back into the two vehicles, heading south, in the general direction of Khod.

At 5:15 a.m., the Predator pilot thought he saw a rifle inside one of the vehicles.

"See if you can zoom in on that guy," he told the camera operator. "Is that a …rifle?"

"Maybe just a warm spot from where he was sitting," the camera operator replied, referring to an image picked up by the infrared camera. "Can't really tell right now, but it does look like an object."

"I was hoping we could make a rifle out," the pilot said. "Never mind."

Soon, a third vehicle, waiting in a walled compound, joined the convoy.

At 5:30 a.m., when the convoy halted briefly, the drone's camera focused on a man emerging from one of the vehicles. He appeared to be carrying something.

"What do these dudes got?" the camera operator said. "Yeah, I think that dude had a rifle."

"I do, too," the pilot replied.

But the ground forces unit said the commander needed more information from the drone crew and screeners to establish a "positive identification."

"Sounds like they need more than a possible," the camera operator told the pilot. Seeing the Afghan men jammed into the flat bed of the pickup, he added, "That truck would make a beautiful target."

At 5:37 a.m., the pilot reported that one of the screeners in Florida had spotted one or more children in the group.

"Bull—. Where!?" the camera operator said. "I don't think they have kids out at this hour." He demanded that the screeners freeze the video image of the purported child and email it to him.

"Why didn't he say 'possible' child?" the pilot said. "Why are they so quick to call kids but not to call a rifle."

The camera operator was dubious too. "I really doubt that children call. Man, I really … hate that," he said. "Well, maybe a teenager. But I haven't seen anything that looked that short."

A few minutes later, the pilot appeared to downplay the screeners' observation, alerting the special operations unit to "a possible rifle and two possible children near the SUV."

The special operations unit wanted the drone crew and screeners to keep tracking the vehicles. "Bring them in as close as we can until we also have [attack aircraft] up," the unit's radio operator said. "We want to take out the whole lot of them."

---
The Predator video was not the only intelligence that morning suggesting that U.S. forces were in danger.

Teams of U.S. military linguists and intelligence personnel with sophisticated eavesdropping equipment were vacuuming up cellphone calls in the area and translating the conversations in real time. For several hours, they had been listening to cellphone chatter in the area that suggested a Taliban unit was assembling for an attack.

"We're receiving ICOM traffic," or intercepted communications, the A-Team radioed the Predator crew. "We believe we may have a high-level Taliban commander."

Neither the identities of those talking nor their precise location was known. But the A-Team and the drone crew took the intercepted conversations as confirmation that there were insurgents in the convoy.

At 6:54 a.m., the camera operator noted that the drone crew and screeners had counted at least 24 men in the three vehicles, maybe more. "So, yeah, I guess that ICOM chatter is great info," he said.

The screeners continued to look for evidence that the convoy was a hostile force. Even with the advanced cameras on the Predator, the images were fuzzy and small objects were difficult to identify. Sometimes the video feed was interrupted briefly.

The Predator crew and video analysts in Nevada remained uncertain how many children were in the group and how old they were.

"Our screeners are currently calling 21 MAMs [military age males], no females, and two possible children. How copy?" the Predator pilot radioed the A-Team at 7:38 a.m.

"Roger," replied the A-Team, which was unable to see the convoy. "And when we say children, are we talking teenagers or toddlers?"

The camera operator responded: "Not toddlers. Something more towards adolescents or teens."

"Yeah, adolescents," the pilot added. "We're thinking early teens."

At 7:40 a.m., the A-Team radioed that its captain had concluded that he had established "positive identification" based on "the weapons we've identified and the demographics of the individuals plus the ICOM."

Although no weapons had been clearly identified, the pilot replied: "We are with you."

The pilot added that one screener had amended his report and was now saying he'd seen only one teenager. "Our screener updated only one adolescent, so that's one double-digit age range."

"We'll pass that along to the ground force commander," the

A-Team radio operator said. "Twelve or 13 years old with a weapon is just as dangerous."

---
At 8:43 a.m., Army commanders ordered two Kiowa helicopters to get into position to attack.

By then, though, the convoy was no longer heading toward Khod. The three vehicles, which at one point were within three miles of the A-Team, had changed direction and were now 12 miles away. The drone crew didn't dwell on that news, thinking the convoy probably was trying to flank the A-Team's position.

The Predator crew began discussing its role in the coming attack. The drone was armed with one missile, not enough to take out a three-vehicle convoy. The more heavily-armed Kiowa helicopters, using the call sign "BAM BAM41," would fire on the vehicles; the Predator would target any survivors who tried to flee.

"We're probably going to be chasing dudes, scrambling in the open, uh, when it goes down," the pilot told his camera operator, whose job was to place the camera cross hairs on insurgents, so the pilot could fire the missile. "Stay with whoever you think gives us the best chance to shoot, um, at them."

"Roger," came the reply.

A little before 9 a.m., the vehicles reached an open, treeless stretch of road. The A-Team commander called in the airstrike.

"Understand we are clear to engage," one of the helicopter pilots declared over the radio.

Hellfire missiles struck the first and third vehicles; they burst into flames.

Qudratullah, one of the Afghan travelers, recalled, "The helicopters were suddenly on top of us, bombarding us."

Dead and wounded were everywhere. Nasim, the 23-year-old mechanic, was knocked unconscious.

"When I came to, I could see that our vehicles were wrecked and the injured were everywhere," he said. "I saw someone who was headless and someone else cut in half."

The Predator crew in Nevada was exultant, watching men they assumed were enemy fighters trying to help the injured. " 'Self-Aid Buddy Care' to the rescue," one of the drone's crew members said.

"I forget, how do you treat a sucking chest wound?" said another.

Soon, however, the crew in Nevada and the screeners in Florida realized something was wrong.

"The thing is, nobody ran," one crew member said.

"Yeah, that was weird," another replied.

At 9:15 a.m., the Predator crew noticed three survivors in brightly colored clothing waving at the helicopters. They were trying to surrender.

"What are those?" asked the camera operator.

"Women and children," the Predator's mission intelligence coordinator answered.

"That lady is carrying a kid, huh? Maybe," the pilot said.

"The baby, I think, on the right. Yeah," the intelligence coordinator said.

The Predator's safety coordinator, cursing in frustration, urged the pilot to alert the helicopters and the A-Team that there were children present. "Let them know, dude," he said.

"Younger than an adolescent to me," the camera operator said.

As they surveyed the carnage, seeing other children, the Predator crew tried to reassure themselves that they could not have known.

"No way to tell, man," the safety observer said.

"No way to tell from here," the camera operator added.

At 9:30 a.m., the pilot came back on the radio.

"Since the engagement," he said, "we have not been able to PID [positively identify] any weapons."

---
U.S. and Afghan forces reached the scene 2 1/2 hours after the attack to provide medical assistance. After 20 minutes more, medevac helicopters began taking the wounded to a hospital in Tarin Kowt, in Oruzgan. More serious cases were later transferred to Kabul.
"They asked us who we were, and we told them we were civilians from Kijran district," said Qudratullah, who lost a leg.

By the U.S. count, 15 or 16 men were killed and 12 people were wounded, including a woman and three children. Elders from the Afghans' home villages said in interviews that 23 had been killed, including two boys, Daoud, 3, and Murtaza, 4.

That evening, Army Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, then the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, went to the presidential palace in Kabul to apologize to President Hamid Karzai. Two days later, he went on Afghan television and promised "a thorough investigation to prevent this from happening again."

The Army and the Air Force conducted their own investigations, reaching similar conclusions.

The Army said evidence that the convoy was not a hostile force was "ignored or downplayed by the Predator crew," and the A-Team captain's decision to authorize an airstrike was based on a misreading of the threat when, in fact, "there was no urgent need to engage the vehicles."

The Air Force concluded that confusion over whether children were present was a "causal factor" in the decision to attack and, in an internal document last year, said drone crews had not been trained to notice the subtle differences between combatants and suspicious persons who may appear to be combatants.

The military has taken some steps to address these problems. Screeners now have access to radio traffic, so if a drone pilot makes a mistake, the screeners can correct it. Drone crews and screeners are now trained to use more precise descriptions in radio transmissions. And, shortly after the incident, McChrystal banned the use of the term "military age male," saying it implied that every adult man was a combatant.

Some officers in the Pentagon drew another lesson from the incident: An abundance of surveillance information can lead to misplaced confidence in the ability to tell friend from foe.

"Technology can occasionally give you a false sense of security that you can see everything, that you can hear everything, that you know everything," said Air Force Major Gen. James O. Poss, who oversaw the Air Force investigation. "I really do think we have learned from this."

McChrystal issued letters of reprimand to four senior and two junior officers in Afghanistan. The Air Force said the Predator crew was also disciplined, but it did not specify the punishment. No one faced court-martial, the Pentagon said.

Several weeks after the attack, American officers travelled to the villages to apologize to survivors and the victims' families.

They gave each survivor 140,000 afghanis, or about $2,900.

Families of the dead received $4,800.

Support the Independent Struggles in Rajarhat

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Published on Wednesday, 13 April 2011 01:18

An Appeal by Radical Socialist to all Readers of our Website

Comrades and friends,
Radical Socialist members and supporters have been active in the struggles in Rajarhat. We publish below an online petition, and urge all of you to endorse it. We also urge you to support and collaborate with the campaign in whatever way you think possible. This is an effort to make it an independent struggle, as it had been, before it became an electoral football. 
In solidarity
Rasdical Socialist


http://www.petitiononline.com/rajarhat/petition-sign.html?

To:  The Governor of West Bengal

Rajarhat, on the outskirts of Kolkata has earned global fame as West Bengal’s new IT hub and a hotspot for real estate investment with companies like DLF, Unitech and others acquiring land and setting up major projects. The first phase of DLF’s Rs 280 crore (Rs 2.80 billion) IT project has been operational since 2005 and a second IT park is on the cards. Wipro, Infosys, IBM – all the major IT houses are in operation here, on subsidized lands. A wireless hub is in the cards. In contrast to Singur-Nandigram, official state government versions portray the Rajarhat land acquisition from the mid 1993 onwards as totally peaceful. 

Rajarhat is one of the most fertile areas of West Bengal and perhaps India. Leaving aside some region used for habitation, most, if not all, of the land had been producing 3-4 crops a year. Irrigated by the adjacent canals, this area got more than adequate water. Not having to bother overtly about fertilizing their land it could produce crops with relative ease. Besides varieties of rice, different seasonal crops along with many types of vegetables, fruits and flowers too were grown here. The production satisfied demands of the local population and also provided 20 to 25% of the demands of Kolkata and its suburbs. The area also supplied fish from the local bherries (fishing embankments) and the many canals that used to overflow their banks during the rainy season. Another valuable contribution was meeting Kolkata’s demand for milk. 

To set up the Rajarhat Township the government used the British colonial Land Acquisition Act (1894) to acquire 21 Mouzzas of land to start with. The Land and Land Revenues Ministry in 1995 issued a notice and by the order of the Governor, the West Bengal Government acquired all the land and water bodies of those 21. Later on a few more were acquired. The process was started in 1996 under the 12/2 section of 1 of the Act. The total number of affected families added up to nearly 1, 31,000 people. 

According to the documents of the land revenue department the number of recorded landowners was over 30,000 while 5,000 were recorded Bargadars(share-croppers). In reality, the number of unrecorded Bargadars was double of that. Long before the government notification and land acquisition process started, the land mafia started buying up the land from the poor farmers. 

The land acquisition process officially started in Rajarhat in the months of April-May of 1996. In the beginning of this process all the farmers of Mahishgot and Thakdari declined to accept the notice. Primarily, because the price decided upon for each Katha, i.e. Rs 6000 was too low as compared to the officially government registered price. More importantly for the major section of people here, farming was their assured source of income for the upkeep of their family and they knew no other way of earning their livelihood. Farmers unwilling to accept the notice was subjected to tremendous intimidation and brutality. CPI (M) goons were going around Rajarhat forcing people to accept the notice at gunpoint and this resulted in the farmers unifying to form Rajarhat Jami Bachao Committee (Save Rajarhat Land Committee) to resist. This organisation was not under the control of any political party 

All over Rajarhat the land use laws as well as the municipal laws are being flouted with impunity as ponds, other water bodies and marshland are being rapidly filled up and multi-storeyed buildings are being erected at a breakneck pace. Millions of rupees are being siphoned off by cocking a snook at the municipal laws by pocketing the various subsidies provided for house building and by illegally extracting money from the public in the name of building roads. Valuable trees planted by the Panchayat are being cut off and the lives of common people are being ruined in many other such destructive ways. 

It must be pointed out that worried about the dangers of having the natural drainage system of Kolkata and its adjoining areas irrevocably damaged and the ecological balance being destroyed by the steady acquisition of all the arable land and water bodies of Rajarhat, a case was filed with the green bench of Kolkata high court. As a matter of fact, Dhupirbil and Ghuni-Jatragachi area consisted of 2095 hectares of natural sewerage which has been filled up. 53 species of fish (many of them are endangered) were found here according to Department of Fisheries, Government of West Bengal. 

The sad irony of it all is the fact that while the farmers were paid only Rs. 6000, the same land was being sold by the government to the businessmen at around Rs. 600 000 a katha, while the promoter and developers in turn were making a profit of around Rs. 1,50,00,000 to Rs. 2,00,00,000. This means that the farmers are getting 1% of the profit that the government is making in selling the land to the big business or equivalently the farmers are earning 0.0001 % of what the real estate business are earning from the land. It is worth mentioning that in all of Rajarhat municipality the land price is determined as Rs 1500/square foot for multi-storeyed apartments. 

Yet after all this the land sharks are now eyeing the remaining farm lands in Rajarhat. A new scheme has been undertaken envisaging another township to build over 23 Mouzzas of land from Rajarhat and Bhangar. 

This scheme has been named BRADA for Bhangar Rajarhat Area Development Authority. In this plan 15 Mouzzas of Rajarhat and 8 Mouzzas of Bhangar are to be included. The total area of land acquired under this scheme would be around 4.5 Hectares. The BRADA scheme to be set up to the east of New Town of Rajarhat. This project would include – Modern roads, sewerage, car park, plazas, electric power station, sports grounds, waste disposal system, system to maintain the ecosystem balance, medical and engineering colleges, information Technology Park and housing. Industrial training centre, sports complex, water sports, agro-marketing zone, model school etc. 

It is being touted that BRADA is being set up to stop predatory private business interests from taking over areas adjacent to the New Town and to enable development in a manner that is beneficial to the lower middle class and the common man. Apparently all this will be carried out without spending government funds but with the help of private agencies instead. 

However, it seems the BRADA scheme too would be beneficial to the interests of the affluent, a special dispension where the low income groups and the common man has no place. Since this scheme is to be set up with private capital to the tune of thousands of crores, quite obviously this will ensure the enrichment of ministers, officials and the political leaders associated with this project. One should bear in mind that associated with this scheme is the same group of people who so ruthlessly had deprived the farmers of Rajarhat of their land and livelihoods. Rajarhat is sodden with the blood of the poor and it will never dry out. 

If we are still silent, the day would not be very far when Rajarhat will be completely erased from the agricultural map of the state while the struggle of the helpless farmers will be lost down the memory hole. 

We demand that: 

• Immediately stop all acquisitions.
• Immediately allow farming, fishing and other traditional activities on lands that have been acquired but on which no construction has been started.
• Half of the profit accruing from the commercial transfer of lands and real estate business on the acquired lands of Rajarhat must be distributed to the landowners-farmers-fisher folks-sharecroppers and others due to the illegitimate acquisition of Rajarhat land.
• An end to the illegitimate eviction of farmers-fisher folks at Rajarhat and everywhere else.

A Letter to Anna Hazare regarding his reported endorsement of the Narendra Modi government

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Details

Published on Monday, 11 April 2011 16:12

Respected Swami Agniveshji, Shanti Bhusanji, Prashant Bhushanji, Arvin Kejriwal


We do not have the Email number of Annaji. We request you to kindly pass on our following letter to him. We request you to do needful on this issue which is very crucial for downtrodden masses and social movements in Gujarat. You may be receiving many more such statements.


Rohit Prajapati & Trupti Shah
Social Activists of Gujarat
Ghanshyam Shah
(National fellow, Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla)

Dr. Nandini Manjrekar
Dr. J. S. Bandukwala
President, People’s Union for Civil Liberties, Gujarat
Fr Cedric Prakash sj
Director, PRASHANT   (A Centre for Human Rights, Justice and Peace)

Dear Annaji,

The statement reported in Indian Express - “The kind of model that Gujarat and Bihar chief ministers have presented, that model should be emulated by all other chief ministers... I am saying this on the basis of the kind of works Bihar and Gujarat CMs have done in the field of rural development,” Hazare said during an interaction at the Press Club here today. – is unfortunate and does not reflect the reality of real Gujarat. We would like to draw immediate quick attention of our friends outside Gujarat is that Mr. Modi’s response to the Mahuva farmers' agitation during the recent assembly budget session is a stark reminder of the stand of Gujarat Government.

Farmers, Women, Fishing Communities, Salt-pan Workers, Tribals, Dalits, Workers and Minorities all have been waging a constant battle with the Modi government to seek what is rightfully theirs, but it remains an uphill struggle for them in Gujarat. People's movement in Saurashtra, Kutch, and Tribal areas in Gujarat only points to the contrary endorsement of Modi rule for rural development in Gujarat, Annaji.

Industrial development and development claims by CSR is one thing, while the claims of actual job creation in Gujarat, where unemployment continues to increase is yet another contrast. Annaji, we have ‘Job Killing Growth’ in Gujarat.

The success story of the two digit growth has masked the several digit realities of loss of livelihood, land acquisition, displacement and permanent loss of natural resources, which are treated as free goods in this process. The investment figure without the displacement and depletion of natural resources figure and the employment figure without loss of livelihood does not make sense.

Development-Induced Displacement in Gujarat 1947-2004 report prepared by Dr. Lancy Lobo and Shashikant Kumar of Centre for Culture and Development clearly indicates that there are 4,00,000 households displaced and affected in Gujarat during 57 years of Independence, amounting to 5% of the total population of Gujarat from developmental projects such as water resource related, transport and communications, industries, mines, defence, sanctuaries, human resource related, government offices, tourism and so on. This report further indicates that a total of 33,00,000 hectares of land has been acquired during 1947-2004 as computed from 80,000 Gazette notifications of the government of Gujarat and from Land Acquisition Departments from 25 Collectorates through RTI Act. This figure does not include the land acquired and people affected by the most controversial project Sardar Sarovar Dam [Narmada]. The acquisition of land was not based on the market value of the land but by bypassing the rule of law and even all the rules of market mechanism.

This figure of displaced also does not include the people who were dependent on land for their livelihood but were not the owner of the land. Thus real figure of loss of livelihood may even cross the figure of 50,00,000. We hope that this figure is not negligible for the Government of Gujarat.

Vibrant Gujarat summit is talking about huge investment but is silent on the issue of land acquisition and loss of livelihood because of the land “acquisition”.

Also, Annaji your endorsement of rural development is contrasts, the pollution map of Gujarat, which has contaminated land, surface water, and groundwater. Villages in Ankleshwar, Vapi, Nandesari and Vatva, Saurashtra and Kutch persistently remind who bears the brunt of industrial development. The groundwater has been contaminated in 74 talukas out of 184 talukas of Gujarat.

In Gujarat, one of the project the Final Effluent Treatment Plant (FETP). Touted by the Chief Minister, Mr. Narendra Modi, the Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB), and various Industries Associations as a state-of-the-art solution the structure does not even meet the GPCB norms since 2006 even then the Chief Minister Mr. Modi of Gujarat inaugurated a pipeline of the same plant on 25^th January 2007 and Centre and State Government invested more than Rs. 100 crores in the company. The explanation with the relevant documents for such an act was asked by us from the Chief Minister Office but the CM office replied that the documents are destroyed by their office and that is why they can not provide the information.

We have the Government who has not even care to appoint the members of Lokayukt in Gujarat State by giving all possible excuses.

We can share more information about the Gujarat. Annaji visit Gujarat to know the reality at grassroots level about ‘destructive development’ in Gujarat. We are ready for open debate on ‘destructive development’ of Gujarat based on facts and figure.

Rohit Prajapati &         Trupti Shah
Social Activists of Gujarat

Ghanshyam Shah
(National fellow, Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla)

Dr. Nandini Manjrekar
Dr. J. S. Bandukwala - President, People’s Union for Civil Liberties, Gujarat
Fr Cedric Prakash sj
Director, PRASHANT   (A Centre for Human Rights, Justice and Peace)