Post by RedWinter on Jun 2, 2005 22:36:59 GMT -5
Could We Really Win? The Possibility of Revolutionary War
by Bob Avakian
Originally published in Revolutionary Worker #431, November 16, 1987
It is a fundamental truth that revolutionary war is the necessary road to real liberation: Revolutionary war is the only means through which it is really possible to clear the ground for a radical change that will uproot exploitation and oppression. But in a country like the USA, is revolutionary war really possible? Or to put it another way: Could we really win? And if so, how?
Recently a letter that was forwarded to me speaks to these questions. It argues that the imperialists are too powerful and could not be overthrown through a mass insurrection, as out party has pictured it. The letter insists that the only possible way of overthrowing them is by waging urban guerrilla warfare. Therefore, the letter says, if we are really serious about revolution, we should not be concentrating now on political work, as our party is doing; instead we should be focusing work on military tasks. This letter raises a number of serious questions and they deserve serious answers.
Right away, as we see from this letter, as soon as the question of waging revolutionary war in a country like the USA is raised, the big problem comes up: How to deal with the awesome arsenal, the technological strength, and the vast number of troops of the ruling class and its armed forces. “We can't go up against all that,” is something that is said over and over again, even by many people who would love to be able to go up against and defeat the armed enforcers of this system—if only there were a way to do it! By “all that” people have in mind the huge amounts of guns and ammunition, tanks, artillery, naval and air bombardment, helicopter and other air transport and mobility, electronic warfare technology, and so on. . .all the way up to chemical, even nuclear, weapons in the arsenal of the ruling imperialists, along with several million troops under their command. But the fact is that “all that” is not something the enemy could just immediately bring to bear on a particular theater of war or particular battlefield, especially not a situation of insurrection and civil war in its own home territory.
First off, a ruling class like the U.S. imperialists has worldwide commitments and is constantly entangled in actual military encounters or situations that threaten to erupt into combat. Large numbers of its troops and tremendous amounts of its war materiel are tied up, all around the world, in facing off against the rival imperialist bloc (headed by the Soviet Union) and also against actual or potential revolutionary struggles, including revolutionary armed struggles, in many different countries. Such revolutionary uprisings and revolutionary wars continue to erupt and develop, often with little or no warning and seemingly “out of nowhere.” So, too, “hot spots” of conflict with the rival imperialists (and their proxies) are continually erupting. And all this is being greatly magnified in this present period of intense conflicts between the imperialist blocs and growing storms of revolutionary struggle. Thus, for the ruling class of a country like the U.S. to concentrate a very large part of its military forces in its own home territory would be a very difficult and dangerous proposition for them, just in terms of their global interests and commitments.
Furthermore, there would be very real political as well as military-tactical problems for them in concentrating a very large part of their armed forces and unleashing their most destructive weapons to put down an armed revolt in their own home territory. There is the question of what effects this would have, politically and militarily, on their whole system of alliances and pacts throughout the world. They would have to wonder and worry about the reliability of many of their troops, especially those drawn from among the most oppressed in society, when it came to putting down such a revolt based among those very oppressed people. And on the military-tactical level there would also be problems for them in using some of their arsenal—including massive air attacks and weapons of mass destruction, such as nuclear weapons—in the conditions of urban combat that would find troops from both sides engaged in very close combat and generally closely “intertwined” with each other. This does not mean that the ruling imperialists would be unwilling or unable to use very violent means to try and put down such a revolt: Certainly their actions, inside their own home territory as well as all around the world, make it very clear that in the final analysis they would try to unleash whatever bloodshed and destruction they think is necessary to put down, and put down hard, any attempt at such an armed revolt “at home.” But what they would try to do and what they would be able to do are not necessarily the same, especially keeping in mind the global commitments and conflicts they are already involved in—and the much bigger ones approaching—and all the political-military problems for them that have been mentioned.
For all these reasons, an armed uprising in a country like the USA would not be going up against “all that”-- and certainly nothing like “all that” at the very start. The most like scenario that could be pictured is one where at the start such an uprising, occurring in a number of cities at (more or less) the same time, would be facing only a fraction of the enemy forces—mainly those already on the scene with the level of organization and armament that they have on hand for putting down uprisings. It is quite possible that within a day or two after the actual insurrection started, some regular army reinforcements, with their weapons and support systems, would be sent in; but by that time, if it was winning initial victories against the local forces, the insurrectionary armed force would have gained valuable experience and tempering in the heat of battle, as well as gaining a lot more fighters from the ranks of the people and also some useful equipment. In any case, it is unlikely that right at the start an insurrection would be up against the other side's most powerfully and effectively armed and organized units, deployed offensively in an all-out effort to crush the insurrection.
And it is important to note that, in their typical arrogant contempt for the masses of oppressed people, the ruling authorities and their forces of “law and order” think of uprisings against them overwhelmingly in terms of “unruly mobs,” without political consciousness and disciplined organization, or as the actions of small bands of “terrorists,” cut off from the masses of oppressed people and having no support among them. But an actual armed uprising—one that has a real shot at winning—cannot be either of these: It would have to be firmly based among the masses of the oppressed, and would have to draw in thousands, tens of thousands, and ultimately millions of them in various forms of combat and support activity.
Two Basic Paths
In one discussion, Mao Tsetung said that all military logic could be reduced to this: “You fight your way and I'll fight my way.” But what forms this takes, how it all comes down, depends on the situation. For example, in the revolutionary struggle Mao led in China, it was possible to take up armed struggle as the main form of revolutionary struggle, more or less from the beginning. Every other form of struggle—including agitation and propaganda and other political work, as well as struggles around economic conditions, and so on—was secondary to the armed struggle and took place in the context of revolutionary war, from the beginning and all the way through the revolution, until it seized power throughout the country in 1949. Mao recognized that it was possible to carry out the revolutionary struggle in form of waging localized guerrilla warfare in the countryside, beginning where government authority was weakest, and to gradually build up the revolutionary armed forces and the liberated areas they controlled. Then, after a protracted period of such warfare, when the balance of forces had shifted in favor of the revolutionary forces—because of military victories won and other factors, including international developments—large-scale warfare would be waged to deliver the decisive defeat to the counter-revolutionary armed forces and liberate the whole country. And this is what did happen in China.
In conceiving this road to revolution, and in leading the many struggles to actually carry it out, through all the twists and turns, Mao blazed a new trail: He established protracted people's war as the basic path for the revolution in countries like China—a path that remains the correct and necessary road, as a general rule, in the Third World today—and he also developed the first, really comprehensive Marxist military line, whose basic principles apply to all revolutionary armed struggles.
But, again, how they apply depends on the situation. For Mao also recognized that, in terms of specific military strategy and operations, what was correct for countries like China was not correct for imperialist countries like the USA. The path of protracted people's war was possible in China—and is the strategic path being followed in the Maoist people's war in Peru today—because of a combination of factors. The level of technology, including means of transportation and communication, is not so highly developed in such countries. The general backwardness and uneven development of the countryside provides relatively greater opportunity for local self-sufficiency in parts of the countryside. The authority of the central government does not extend in a uniform and powerful way throughout the country. The social antagonisms in these countries are generally very acute, and the situation of the broad masses of people is desperate. The reactionary ruling class (and its imperialist masters) is not able to concentrate its armed forces with enough speed, coordination, and massive force to encircle and wipe out guerrilla forces that can hit quickly and with surprise and then move away, or “melt back into the local population,” just as quickly.
Such tactics by the revolutionary armed forces are the concrete application of the principles of revolutionary warfare—developed to their highest level so far by Mao Tsetung—to the actual situation in countries of this kind. They represent a living embodiment of he fundamental principle summarized by Mao: Revolutionary war is a war of the masses. In the actual circumstances of such countries, these tactics and their guiding military strategy provide the way for masses of people to support the revolutionary war, to actively join in this war in ever-increasing numbers, and through this war develop their ability to become masters of society. This is what it means, in such conditions, for the revolutionary forces to fight “our way.”
But this is not the case in a country like the USA, where the grip of the ruling class on society is very highly centralized in a strong national government and at the same time is powerfully extended throughout the country; where the level of technology, including means of transportation and communication, is very highly developed; where the ruling class can concentrate massive armed force in any particular place within a relatively short period of time; and where the general situation, including the conditions of the broad masses, does not incline and enable them to support and actively take part in revolutionary war except at relatively rare periods of extremely intense crisis and social upheaval. In countries of this kind, as Mao pointed out, the revolutionary path lies first in the preparation for waging revolutionary warfare—preparation that hinges on political work to influence the masses of people in a revolutionary way, to lead them in militantly confronting the system, to recruit the advanced into the vanguard revolutionary party, and to build organized bases of support for the revolution among the masses. And when the time is right for launching revolutionary warfare, it must take the form of mass insurrections, centered in the urban areas, leading to the establishment of a revolutionary regime in as much of the territory as possible, and then the waging of a civil war to finally and completely defeat the old ruling class and its counterrevolutionary armed forces.
So, in broad terms, we can sum up in the following way the difference in the strategic path of armed struggle in the two general types of countries (Third World countries and imperialist states like the U.S.): As a general rule in Third World countries it is possible and necessary to start the armed struggle in one or a few local, rural areas and wage war over a relatively protracted period of time before going over to a nationwide armed offensive to seize nationwide political power. But in countries like the U.S. the armed struggle must be initiated only when it is possible to do so roughly at the same time in a number of major urban areas and quickly go over to a basically nationwide armed struggle.
To look at it from another angle, the way you accumulate forces for the seizure of nationwide political power in imperialist countries is through a period of political work that prepares the ground for the armed struggle; in the Third World countries generally these forces are accumulated mainly through the waging of the armed struggle itself on a protracted basis.
by Bob Avakian
Originally published in Revolutionary Worker #431, November 16, 1987
It is a fundamental truth that revolutionary war is the necessary road to real liberation: Revolutionary war is the only means through which it is really possible to clear the ground for a radical change that will uproot exploitation and oppression. But in a country like the USA, is revolutionary war really possible? Or to put it another way: Could we really win? And if so, how?
Recently a letter that was forwarded to me speaks to these questions. It argues that the imperialists are too powerful and could not be overthrown through a mass insurrection, as out party has pictured it. The letter insists that the only possible way of overthrowing them is by waging urban guerrilla warfare. Therefore, the letter says, if we are really serious about revolution, we should not be concentrating now on political work, as our party is doing; instead we should be focusing work on military tasks. This letter raises a number of serious questions and they deserve serious answers.
Right away, as we see from this letter, as soon as the question of waging revolutionary war in a country like the USA is raised, the big problem comes up: How to deal with the awesome arsenal, the technological strength, and the vast number of troops of the ruling class and its armed forces. “We can't go up against all that,” is something that is said over and over again, even by many people who would love to be able to go up against and defeat the armed enforcers of this system—if only there were a way to do it! By “all that” people have in mind the huge amounts of guns and ammunition, tanks, artillery, naval and air bombardment, helicopter and other air transport and mobility, electronic warfare technology, and so on. . .all the way up to chemical, even nuclear, weapons in the arsenal of the ruling imperialists, along with several million troops under their command. But the fact is that “all that” is not something the enemy could just immediately bring to bear on a particular theater of war or particular battlefield, especially not a situation of insurrection and civil war in its own home territory.
First off, a ruling class like the U.S. imperialists has worldwide commitments and is constantly entangled in actual military encounters or situations that threaten to erupt into combat. Large numbers of its troops and tremendous amounts of its war materiel are tied up, all around the world, in facing off against the rival imperialist bloc (headed by the Soviet Union) and also against actual or potential revolutionary struggles, including revolutionary armed struggles, in many different countries. Such revolutionary uprisings and revolutionary wars continue to erupt and develop, often with little or no warning and seemingly “out of nowhere.” So, too, “hot spots” of conflict with the rival imperialists (and their proxies) are continually erupting. And all this is being greatly magnified in this present period of intense conflicts between the imperialist blocs and growing storms of revolutionary struggle. Thus, for the ruling class of a country like the U.S. to concentrate a very large part of its military forces in its own home territory would be a very difficult and dangerous proposition for them, just in terms of their global interests and commitments.
Furthermore, there would be very real political as well as military-tactical problems for them in concentrating a very large part of their armed forces and unleashing their most destructive weapons to put down an armed revolt in their own home territory. There is the question of what effects this would have, politically and militarily, on their whole system of alliances and pacts throughout the world. They would have to wonder and worry about the reliability of many of their troops, especially those drawn from among the most oppressed in society, when it came to putting down such a revolt based among those very oppressed people. And on the military-tactical level there would also be problems for them in using some of their arsenal—including massive air attacks and weapons of mass destruction, such as nuclear weapons—in the conditions of urban combat that would find troops from both sides engaged in very close combat and generally closely “intertwined” with each other. This does not mean that the ruling imperialists would be unwilling or unable to use very violent means to try and put down such a revolt: Certainly their actions, inside their own home territory as well as all around the world, make it very clear that in the final analysis they would try to unleash whatever bloodshed and destruction they think is necessary to put down, and put down hard, any attempt at such an armed revolt “at home.” But what they would try to do and what they would be able to do are not necessarily the same, especially keeping in mind the global commitments and conflicts they are already involved in—and the much bigger ones approaching—and all the political-military problems for them that have been mentioned.
For all these reasons, an armed uprising in a country like the USA would not be going up against “all that”-- and certainly nothing like “all that” at the very start. The most like scenario that could be pictured is one where at the start such an uprising, occurring in a number of cities at (more or less) the same time, would be facing only a fraction of the enemy forces—mainly those already on the scene with the level of organization and armament that they have on hand for putting down uprisings. It is quite possible that within a day or two after the actual insurrection started, some regular army reinforcements, with their weapons and support systems, would be sent in; but by that time, if it was winning initial victories against the local forces, the insurrectionary armed force would have gained valuable experience and tempering in the heat of battle, as well as gaining a lot more fighters from the ranks of the people and also some useful equipment. In any case, it is unlikely that right at the start an insurrection would be up against the other side's most powerfully and effectively armed and organized units, deployed offensively in an all-out effort to crush the insurrection.
And it is important to note that, in their typical arrogant contempt for the masses of oppressed people, the ruling authorities and their forces of “law and order” think of uprisings against them overwhelmingly in terms of “unruly mobs,” without political consciousness and disciplined organization, or as the actions of small bands of “terrorists,” cut off from the masses of oppressed people and having no support among them. But an actual armed uprising—one that has a real shot at winning—cannot be either of these: It would have to be firmly based among the masses of the oppressed, and would have to draw in thousands, tens of thousands, and ultimately millions of them in various forms of combat and support activity.
Two Basic Paths
In one discussion, Mao Tsetung said that all military logic could be reduced to this: “You fight your way and I'll fight my way.” But what forms this takes, how it all comes down, depends on the situation. For example, in the revolutionary struggle Mao led in China, it was possible to take up armed struggle as the main form of revolutionary struggle, more or less from the beginning. Every other form of struggle—including agitation and propaganda and other political work, as well as struggles around economic conditions, and so on—was secondary to the armed struggle and took place in the context of revolutionary war, from the beginning and all the way through the revolution, until it seized power throughout the country in 1949. Mao recognized that it was possible to carry out the revolutionary struggle in form of waging localized guerrilla warfare in the countryside, beginning where government authority was weakest, and to gradually build up the revolutionary armed forces and the liberated areas they controlled. Then, after a protracted period of such warfare, when the balance of forces had shifted in favor of the revolutionary forces—because of military victories won and other factors, including international developments—large-scale warfare would be waged to deliver the decisive defeat to the counter-revolutionary armed forces and liberate the whole country. And this is what did happen in China.
In conceiving this road to revolution, and in leading the many struggles to actually carry it out, through all the twists and turns, Mao blazed a new trail: He established protracted people's war as the basic path for the revolution in countries like China—a path that remains the correct and necessary road, as a general rule, in the Third World today—and he also developed the first, really comprehensive Marxist military line, whose basic principles apply to all revolutionary armed struggles.
But, again, how they apply depends on the situation. For Mao also recognized that, in terms of specific military strategy and operations, what was correct for countries like China was not correct for imperialist countries like the USA. The path of protracted people's war was possible in China—and is the strategic path being followed in the Maoist people's war in Peru today—because of a combination of factors. The level of technology, including means of transportation and communication, is not so highly developed in such countries. The general backwardness and uneven development of the countryside provides relatively greater opportunity for local self-sufficiency in parts of the countryside. The authority of the central government does not extend in a uniform and powerful way throughout the country. The social antagonisms in these countries are generally very acute, and the situation of the broad masses of people is desperate. The reactionary ruling class (and its imperialist masters) is not able to concentrate its armed forces with enough speed, coordination, and massive force to encircle and wipe out guerrilla forces that can hit quickly and with surprise and then move away, or “melt back into the local population,” just as quickly.
Such tactics by the revolutionary armed forces are the concrete application of the principles of revolutionary warfare—developed to their highest level so far by Mao Tsetung—to the actual situation in countries of this kind. They represent a living embodiment of he fundamental principle summarized by Mao: Revolutionary war is a war of the masses. In the actual circumstances of such countries, these tactics and their guiding military strategy provide the way for masses of people to support the revolutionary war, to actively join in this war in ever-increasing numbers, and through this war develop their ability to become masters of society. This is what it means, in such conditions, for the revolutionary forces to fight “our way.”
But this is not the case in a country like the USA, where the grip of the ruling class on society is very highly centralized in a strong national government and at the same time is powerfully extended throughout the country; where the level of technology, including means of transportation and communication, is very highly developed; where the ruling class can concentrate massive armed force in any particular place within a relatively short period of time; and where the general situation, including the conditions of the broad masses, does not incline and enable them to support and actively take part in revolutionary war except at relatively rare periods of extremely intense crisis and social upheaval. In countries of this kind, as Mao pointed out, the revolutionary path lies first in the preparation for waging revolutionary warfare—preparation that hinges on political work to influence the masses of people in a revolutionary way, to lead them in militantly confronting the system, to recruit the advanced into the vanguard revolutionary party, and to build organized bases of support for the revolution among the masses. And when the time is right for launching revolutionary warfare, it must take the form of mass insurrections, centered in the urban areas, leading to the establishment of a revolutionary regime in as much of the territory as possible, and then the waging of a civil war to finally and completely defeat the old ruling class and its counterrevolutionary armed forces.
So, in broad terms, we can sum up in the following way the difference in the strategic path of armed struggle in the two general types of countries (Third World countries and imperialist states like the U.S.): As a general rule in Third World countries it is possible and necessary to start the armed struggle in one or a few local, rural areas and wage war over a relatively protracted period of time before going over to a nationwide armed offensive to seize nationwide political power. But in countries like the U.S. the armed struggle must be initiated only when it is possible to do so roughly at the same time in a number of major urban areas and quickly go over to a basically nationwide armed struggle.
To look at it from another angle, the way you accumulate forces for the seizure of nationwide political power in imperialist countries is through a period of political work that prepares the ground for the armed struggle; in the Third World countries generally these forces are accumulated mainly through the waging of the armed struggle itself on a protracted basis.
