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3300 neo-Nazis demonstrated in Berlin against the celebration of Victory in Europe day, the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe. A crowd approximately double that size demonstrated to stop them from marching. The Nazi movement in Berlin is an urgent reminder that MIM's line for collective responsibility is the only correct road for countries like Germany and the united $tates.
The neo-Nazis said they should no longer hold the burden for "'a cult of guilt.'"(1) To them, the Soviet invasion of Germany was not liberation, but "'occupation'" and VE celebrations are a product of "'professional Jews.'"(1) It's the usual insane stuff, almost designed to disregard theory.
Because the Soviets did win World War II, and the Nazi movement is not in power, the real problem is the imperialist country so-called Left and how it clears the way for the Nazis, who otherwise would never get anywhere without the so-called Left's theoretical and agitational aid. Always the chauvinist Left plants the ideological seeds and the Nazis are the practice.
For example, in this VE day spoiling, several German imperialists criticized the neo-Nazis. Interior Minister Otto Schily called it a "'disgrace.'"(1) President President Horst Koehler said Germans "'look back with shame.'"(1) He also said, "We have the responsibility to keep alive the memory of all this suffering and of its causes, and we must ensure it never happens again. There can be no drawing the line."(1) Minister Juergen Trittin criticized "'these Nazis who were trying to glorify the greatest genocide in history.'"(2)
How the so-called Left fails on this is that these are imperialists. Yet these imperialists are more advanced than these Nazis marching. MIM will say that out of regard for the truth. Most so-called Left organizations will not. Lenin already told us that the labor aristocracy can be the most die- hard element, but the so-called Left based in the labor aristocracy can't say it.
There are two underlying chauvinist reasons. One is that the so-called Left is busy catering to the demands of the Nazi marchers, who the so-called Left sees as proletarian or wayward labor aristocracy about to return to the proletariat. For MIM, these neo-Nazi marchers are just labor aristocracy--petty-bourgeoisie--and we have nothing at stake in making excuses for them. Quite the contrary, we have everything at stake in making sure they do not confuse the exploited and oppressed just because the neo-Nazi youth with shaved heads are smaller exploiters than the imperialists.
Included in the Western so-called Left's demands is an increased share of global exploitation. The so-called Left is unable to give that up and hence out of solidarity with the neo-Nazis won't say that the imperialists are actually more advanced on this question.
Another factor is that when one pursues electoral reformism, one seeks to curry favor with voters. The reformists seek votes for Democrats in the united $tates and Social-Democrats in Germany and sometimes that leads to failure to criticize when criticism is necessary. Likewise cult leaders and gurus don't say anything that would cost recruits.
Some of these same organizations of the so-called Left are composed of individuals who would get bent out of shape if an inconsiderate litterbug dropped a chewing gum wrapper on the street. Yet, tell them that German workers carried out millions of genocidal actions in World War II, and the so- called Left makes excuses. It's "false consciousness" they say. They think of German so- called workers as passive objects--even when those German workers are carrying out very systematic political action on behalf of raising their own exploiter status.
It's not false consciousness. It's action on behalf of an exploiter class. False consciousness is a border war that flares up. It is not a march through numerous countries with a plan for world domination. At some point, the actions of the Germans with alleged false consciousness would have to sink in and it could no longer be false consciousness. That did not happen in Germany.
The so-called Left tells a criminal fairy-tale in which the proletariat was a bunch of passive objects who did not bring down Hitler. What is forgotten is that the Germans fought with Hitler to the end. The exploiter attitude had to be beaten out of Germany, and still the beating did not go far enough.
Today we cannot say there are 3300 Germans with false consciousness. The world knows what happened in World War II. These are just recalcitrant exploiters who want a more militant parasitic posture for Germany along with the so-called Left oinking for things that make the Germans and Amerikans think about war for oil and racist repression for jobs--superprofits shared by fewer bandits.
The imperialists can expand into the Third World and buy off Western populations. The people who want fascism at home are the labor aristocracy. In Germany, they have already fire-bombed Turks and Kurds. In 1993 five Turks died in one incident.(3) Despite this "revolutionary" practice of their line, the German and other Western so-called Left continues oinking about oppressor nation so-called unemployment, many times when as social-democrats they uphold capitalism under which unemployment of real proletarians is inevitable anyway.
Throughout Europe there is a resentment by the labor aristocracy against the migrant workers. The resentment is not by the imperialists hiring them and that needs to be said. If Germany goes to fascism internally with the social forces as they are now, it will be because the labor aristocracy drags the imperialists into attacking the Turks and other national minorities within German borders.
The correct attitude is much more common in Germany and Japan than in the rest of the West. "'Spasibo'" said thousands of demonstrators opposing the Nazis in Berlin.(2) That is "thank you" in Russian. There is no comparable expression in the history of the white so-called Left in Amerika. Thanks to the Red Army, "'Spasibo'" is still closer to German views than the Hitler salute.
The most criminal dynamic force in undermining the anti-Nazi consensus in Germany is the united $tates, which slowly and steadily spreads international political fallacies to reverse correct verdicts from World War II. It goes beyond the fact that the Republicans opposed World War II, because they were not sure who was worse, the Nazis or communists and it goes beyond the Black Book of Communism authored in France that says Nazism was a lesser evil. The old wounds in Latvia and other Baltic states reopened by Bu$h in May 2005 are still with us and an incorrect understanding of the Cold War is whitewashing all the Nazi activities in eastern Europe. Yet that is in a sense all old news. The real problem occurs with the attitude toward 9/11, and in this we have to point out that the Zionists are no effective counterweight to Nazism. We have a whole new generation with a whole new set of issues.
Every year that the united $tates fails to take collective responsibility for 9/11 is another year of festering and bitter nationalism of the Nazi and similar kinds throughout the world. The united $tates is in no position to tell German Nazi youth to feel guilty about World War II, when the united $tates cannot even own up to 9/11.
In the massively deluded Amerikan so-called Left, they dig in their heels against MIM's leadership for proposing the joint dictatorship of the proletariat of the oppressed nations, as happened in Germany after World War II. The Amerikans believe they are more sophisticated than that. Somehow Amerikan imperialism is better than German they think.
Even the so-called Marxists oppose the MIM line out of a love for their oppressor nation. They are in opposition to revolution unless it is of the exploiter kind following Hitler, Trotsky or some other guru to lead the Western objects out of their misery. Criticizing the fascists as labor aristocracy worse than the imperialists in any context might be tantamount to giving up the white worker uprising fantasy of many on the so-called Left. Protection of that utopian fantasy above all else many decades after its relevance leads to disgusting excuses for fascist action throughout the West.
The Western so-called Left needs to look hard at those Germans saying "Spasibo" and learn something instead of doing spade work for the next fascist movement from below. If we put up the good fight and it looks like we may not win inside imperialist country borders with proletarian demands, that is no reason to take up a nationalist view with labor aristocracy demands and oppose proletarian revolution.
Notes:
1. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2005/05/08/AR2005050800324.html
2.
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=7
39443 ; . http://news.ft.com/cms/s/2c92aab4-bfe2-
11d9-b376-00000e2511c8,dwp_uuid=d4f2ab60-c98e-
11d7-81c6-0820abe49a01.html
3. http://edition.cnn.com/WORLD/europe/9810/15/germany.politics/
MIM is concerned that the neo-Nazis will use dresden for their advantage. MIM is wrong. Dresden presents an opportunity to split the imperialists and to point to the humanity of communism.
MIM should realize that harshly condemning the imperialist mass murder at Dresden serves the anti-imperialist cause. All MIM has to do is point out that the USSR did _not bomb civilian targets at all. Do we see pictures of red air fleets bombing cities in Germany? No. This is a very strong argument in favor of Stalin!!
This fact definitely turned me to communism. I can tell any German "the Soviets did NOT abuse you!" And they know I am right, despite fascist rape legends. I can also say "The Imperialists DID abuse you!" When I think of the war I think of the actions of all sides. Only the Soviets are clearly humane.
MIM should not underestimate the imperialists' butchery. The correct line on Dresden (and Hamburg, Bremen, Stuttgart, Berlin, Duesseldorf, Essen, Köln - in short -every- major German city) is to blame the imperialists. The Soviets did not in any way shape or form engage in mass murder of Germans and the Germans know it!
Further: it is wrong to compare the bombing of Dresden to the bombing of the WTC. The WTC was attacked by the oppressed (so we are told anyway). Dresden was attacked by oppressors. The WTC was a symbol of global financial domination by amerika. Dresden was a place with some railroad yards and lots and lots of refugees, many if not most of whom were unregistered.
mim3@mim.org replies: We're not saying that ex- Soviet citizens should now be saying, "we should have bombed Germany like the Brits and Amerikans did." The question is more one of the history of Amerikan views. The majority of Amerikans held that the bombing of Dresden was right and the collective responsibility movement in Germany was right.
MIM is drawing attention to Dresden so saying we are not is factually wrong. We're quite happy to deal with it. If drawing attention to Dresden results in a revulsion that leads to a favorable impression of Stalin, then that's OK by MIM. So is anarchist- pacifism, another possibility from thinking about Dresden. Yet in a sense, these are both recruiting questions, not really handling public opinion as it exists in its own right. We are unlikely to win someone to anarchist-pacifism or communism strictly on the question of Dresden alone and that's what makes Dresden commemorations this year an agitation/public opinion question, not one of party-building. Dresden could be a last straw only for someone who is already thinking about a host of issues concerning imperialism.
In building public opinion we want to cause a fermentation that may lead later down the road to other things. It is the electoral politicians and other assorted opportunists who simply cannot distinguish between public opinion work (best thought of as done anonymously with unseen consequences) and direct recruiting--and that inevitably worsens sectarianism. One of the reasons for MIM's public opinion effectiveness is that before MIM speaks, MIM always wades in and knows the relative proportions of opinion from surveys and also through confirmation talking to thousands of Amerikans in all walks of life.
Both the Japanese and German examples are relevant; although Dresden is the one where imperialists themselves are on record saying it was a civilian target worthy of "psychological warfare." Your comments are an example of some rethinking the imperialist country population has to do. Yet, the imperialists and the public generally have not come forward to call the bombing of Dresden wrong. We do not hear them say, "9/11 made me realize we were wrong about Dresden and we need to go back and re-evaluate our history." It's still a case where the vast majority co-exists with a double standard and knowing that is key to influencing public opinion as best we can. It is not appropriate to treat Western exploiters as if they were duped proletarians about to wake up. The most positive proof of this is public opinion in Japan and Germany.
In speaking with Zionists about Ward Churchill, Dresden is obviously relevant, but also for those who cannot get out of territoriality concerning the German Holocaust, Japan is another checkpoint. We find no widespread view in the West that Japan's action in World War II was uniquely criminal the way Hitler's was. So to argue against Ward Churchill using Germany is one thing, but most Amerikans and I$raelis would have no way to dodge the question of collective responsibility that the Japanese accepted after World War II.
As for neo-Nazis using Dresden, we are not wrong. They already do use it every year and it's not a question of theory. To the extent that the neo-Nazis' white brothers and sisters in the West do not uphold "collective responsibility" for themselves, fuel gets added to the flames. So the movement for collective responsibility has to be generalized to the majority-exploiter countries, partly to preserve and advance the gains in Germany and Japan that we see by oppressor nation people.
What resonates for neo-Nazis whether they know it or not is the economic position of their peers in the West. Likewise, the German and Japanese examples have powerful potential in spreading to Amerika, France, Belgium etc. The underlying economic conditions and nationalist pride are similar in these countries. It's not just that we ask people to join in solidarity with the peasants in Peru or India. There is a most advanced example in the oppressor nations themselves, "'Spasibo.'"