Neither of two positions, stated on this list (S. Soloviov and F. Lobov)
is, in my opinion, acceptable for Russian communists.  The former
practically coincides with the critique of this war by the pro-Western
bourgeoisie and its hack ideologists like the "fighters for human rights."
The latter is little else than a call  for class truce, capitulation before
the "nationally minded" bourgeoisie and bureaucracy.
As usual, the ruling ideology turns out to be that of
the ruling classes, doesn't it?

There can be no doubt that the main, direct enemy of our working class
is the Russian state, the state of the bureaucracy and bourgeoisie.  No
foreign invader, no hater of Russia could bring so suffering to the
toilers of our country as this ruthless, "our own" enemy did.

There can be no hope for a new revolution and its defense, without the
complete, to the ground, destruction of this state.

But it is of the utmost significance for the working class of the
Russian Federation as to WHO will destroy this state.  Whether it
will be destroyed by Islamic fascists and Western ultraimperialists
(aided by the parochial interests of the ruling groups in Russia--added
in English translation) . . . . or by the organized workers of our
country.

The state and statehood are not the same.  The defeatism of the
Bolsheviks did not mean a call for the occupation of the Russian Empire
by the German army and its imperialist partition.  The Great French
Revolution demolished the Bastille, but rose to the defense of the
territorial integrity of France.  If the German troops had occupied Paris,
there would have been no Paris Commune.

 But am I not exaggerating things?  Isn't such a scenario for Russian Federation too
far-fetched, unimaginable?

No, it is not.  The loss of our statehood, the partition of our country
into puppet territorial enclaves, even its direct military occupation
are very real threats.  Moreover, if during the critical week in August
the people of Dagestan did not shield the strategic passes leading to
the Caspian, today it could the turn for the rest of the Northern
Caucasus, the south of Russia and Tatarstan.  If it were not for the
strategic nuclear forces, created by the Soviet people, NATO planes
would have already bombed Mozdok and Rostov.

Furthermore, in case of a serious revolutionary threat to the regime of
capitalist restoration the military intervention  is more than likely.
The Russian bourgeoisie and bureaucracy themselves will call for this
intervention.  This is how it always was and always will be.  What in
this case will be the attitude of  the Western working class and the
Left to the intervention by NATO? Will they want, will they be able
to forestall such intervention, to prevent their imperialists from carrying it out?

The experience of NATO's aggression against Yugoslavia leads me to
conclude: NO.  Not only they won't be able to, but, to the large extent,
will not want to.

While the working classes of the West have been carrying out  the
economic struggle (at times successful) against their bosses,
they firmly follow in the steps of the imperialist foreign policy of
their ruling classes, remain saturated with the spirit of imperial,
cultural, and even racial superiority.  After all, it were their sons,
not of bankers and industrialists, who sat in the cockpits of NATO
bombers and aboard its air carriers, destroying the last Balkan nation wo
still dared to stand up to imperialism.

To this conclusion, we must add another.  As this war demonstrated, not
an insignificant part of the Western Left have become, consciously or
not, accomplices of new fascism, the "liberal" imperialism of Clinton
and Blair, the imperialism of "human rights."

Never before in the history of capitalism its leading countries were able
to achieve such degree of unity in their drive for global domination, as
we see it today.  All remaining and inevitable contradictions between
them granted, we can now justly talk about the existence of Western
ultraimperialism.

If so, then what is the REAL, PRACTICAL meaning of  the demands--raised by
ISWoR and their supporters in Europe, USA, and Canada, i.e., in the
belly of the imperialist beast--in a most categorical manner: "Russian
Troops Out of Chechnya!" and "Right for Self-Determination to the Chechen People!"?

Abstracted from the real balance of forces in the world, as if neither
NATO nor the medieval fascism of the Maskhadov-Basaev regime, looking at
imperialists with hope, existed in it--these demands make them
accomplices of "their own" imperialists, expressing their most cherished
desires.

But don't we face another danger by defending our statehood, the
territorial integrity of RF and, therefore, the unity of our working
class, against Western imperialism, our compradors, and Islamic
fascists?  Don't we run the risk of degenerating IN REALITY, IN PRACTICE
to social-patriotism?  Don't we surrender to the mercy of our class
enemy?  Don't we promote "class peace" between the oppressors and their
victims?  Don't we help to strengthen our Pinochet a la russe?

Yes, this is a terrible danger.  Having avoided the rocks of external
threats we may destroy ourselves against the hard place of internal
ones.  This last danger is all the more real because our movement is so
weak and fragmented, because our working class remains demoralized by
its historic defeat and the barbaric conditions of its existence.

What is to be done?

Should we  keep silence as what by most part has been happening?  That
would be, no doubt, the worst of all possible solutions.

If we had even a small but bold and determined party of the working
class, in my opinion, such a party would choose the following tactics.
First of all, it would explain to the working class all the complexity,
contradictions, and dangers of the present situation, and would point
out at imperialism, capitalist restoration, and the weakness of the
Russian proletariat as being mainly responsible for it.  This party
would appeal to the multinational working class of RF to defend its
statehood and territorial integrity against imperialism and bourgeois
separatism.  It would appeal to the soldiers and officers of the Federal
army to stop obeying the orders of  counter-revolutionary generals, to
go over to the side of workers, and turn their arms against the state of
Russian bourgeoisie and bureaucracy.

But this remains only my personal opinion.

<snip>

Vladimir Bilenkin