KREMA-1 PUSHES DEAD-END POLITICS
by a RAIL comrade
reprinted from MIM Notes 144, 15 August, 1997

July 19th, Cambridge, MA hosted a punk show which comrades 
attended. The comrades distributed MIM Notes and struggled 
with those attending to oppose to the current Kriminal 
injustice system. Part of the our organizing and education 
efforts focused on the struggle to return Massachusetts 
prisoners deported to Texas. Along with gathering petition 
signatures to support that specific battle, we discussed the 
necessity to build a revolutionary alternative to the 
current imperialist system.

Hearing that the show was progressive, a comrade 
investigated one of the bands -- Krema-1. As it turns out, 
Krema-1 is rabidly anti-Communist. In particular, Krema-1 is 
an example of the "left" variety of anti-communism, which 
claims that all states are equally repressive and all 
leaders are inherently oppressors. The band's politics are a 
mixture of pie-in-the-sky idealism and historical ignorance.

Krema-1 started its set with an anarchist fairy tale:  once 
upon a time, the Spanish communists and comrade Stalin 
wanted the revolution in Spain to fail and caused the deaths 
of Spanish anarchists during the Spanish Civil War.

Back to reality:  Stalin began to rally international 
support against fascism in 1934, two years before the 
fascist coup led by Franco. The Soviet Union was the only 
government to support the anti-fascist forces with supplies 
and arms. Even Emma Goldman, famous anarchist critic of the 
Soviet Union, admitted that it was this Soviet aid that 
allowed the anti-fascists to survive as long as they did.(1)

Krema-1 also dragged out that imaginary ghost story of 
Stalin being Hitler's best friend because of the 1939 non-
aggression pact between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. 
Again, this seemingly simple story ignores concrete history.

Before the non-aggression pact, the Western capitalist 
powers were trying to force Hitler to go to war with the 
Soviet Union first, so that the West could sit on the 
sidelines and see the Soviet Union crushed. The non-
aggression pact bought the Soviet Union two years to 
industrialize and prepare for the war. As a result, the Red 
Army was able to play the principal role in defeating 
fascism -- something Krema-1 omits entirely.(2)

But Krema-1 isn't interested in success; they're interested 
in purity. They ignore the fact that real world movements to 
change the status quo have to make real world decisions, 
which include temporary compromise. In this Krema-1 and Emma 
Goldman have a lot in common. Emma Goldman explicitly said 
that the Spanish anarchists should remain pure, even if that 
meant they would be crushed.(1)

On their 7-inch and in their song "On the Prospect of Social 
Revolution", they explicitly attack MIM as "authoritarian" 
and call Mao a murderer. They also lump MIM and several 
other so-called Marxist groups together and claim that 
"[MIM] has no desire for universal freedom and the 
elimination of authority" and "[Marxists] want to replace a 
system that puts them in control."

In the short run, MIM admits to using the effective method 
of hierarchy and to gain control -- MIM wants the world's 
oppressed majority in control to exercise authority over the 
world's oppressing minority. Because the oppressing minority 
is armed to the teeth and will stop at nothing to preserve 
their privilege, MIM believes that placing the majority in 
authority is a necessary step towards MIM's long run goal:  
The elimination of all oppression, of all power of groups 
over groups. While MIM is working to build a dictatorship 
(ooh, shudder to think) of the proletariat, nihilistic 
complacency with the status quo allows such anti-communists 
to sit back and passively supports the dictatorship of the 
bourgeoisie.

As far as the unsupported charge that Mao was a murderer is 
concerned, we suggest Krema-1 read the MIM essay, "Was Mao a 
Butcher?"(3) Krema-1's unsubstantiated charges against Mao 
and Stalin and their "anti-authoritarian" demagoguery only 
serve to cover up the fact that they have no real 
alternative to the communist path forward. Mao lead the 
Chinese people closer to communism and the eradication of 
oppression of groups over other groups than has ever 
happened historically. With Marxism-Leninism-Maoism as our 
ideology we can carry on the struggle stage by stage rather 
than preaching to others about the mistakes of those taking 
action to move history forward.

NOTES:
1. See MIM Theory 8, "The Anarchist Ideal and Communist 
Revolution."
2. See MIM Theory 6, "The Stalin Issue."
3. See the pamphlet, "What is MIM?"