SINCE MY last letter (SO 27) | have been scouring the pages of your paper for an answer to my questions, but find little illuminacon inere. in particular, you seem to have gone silent about your attitude to the KLA. Surely now it is clear that the slogan "Arm the KLA" was wrong. Any arms sent to the KLA would have been used in one of three ways:
• returned meekly to NATO's occupying force • used for ethnic cleansing of Serb and Roma peoples • used to police the Kosovar population The one thing they would not have been used for would be the L IN THE NINETIES, millions of women and men have taken part in • mobilisations against the evils of capitalism and the bureaucratic dicta.
torships. This reflects the fact that humanity face widening dangers. Ecological, military, social and economic devastation faces millions of I People.
Many more people recognise the barbaric nature of capitalism. in a I situation where the inability of the social democratic an communist 1 parties to provide socialist solutions is becoming clearer, the task of creating new leaderships remains ahead. Socialist Outlook is written and sold by socialists committed to this struggle. We are the British supporters of the world-wide marxist organisation, the Fourth International. We stand for the revolutionary transformation of society and a pluralist, socialist democracy world wide.
The overall goal which we pursue is the emancipation of all human I beings from every form of exploitation, oppression, allenation and vio.
lence. pluralist, multi-parcy, feminist, ecologist, anti-militarist and international ist. It must abolish wage slavery and national oppression.
The working class is the backbone of unity among all the exploited and oppressed. The working class and its allies must uncompromisingh gradually acquire the experience and consciousness needed to defeat capitalism at the decisive moment of crisis. I to fight their particular forms of oppression make an essential contribution to the struggle for a different society. They are organised around the principle "None so fit to break the chains as those who wear them".
gles. Furthermore we fight for a strategic allance between workers and these organisations - an alliance which respects their legitimate I autonomy, I and a revolutionary International, we aim to guide and encompass the global interests of the workers and oppressed. By building a united struggle against exploitation and oppression we aim to ensure the survival of the human race.
If you think this is worth fighting for, and you like what you read in Socialist Outlook, why not join us? Drop a line to us at PO Box 1109. [ London 2UU, and and well be in touch.
On the question of East Timor, your slogan is "Arm the Liberation Front", by which I assume you mean Falantil, but arms supplied to Falantil would not have been used at all! While the militias and TNI were carrying out their slaughter, the communities were defenceless because Falantil had obeyed UN zones Anana busmao ordered his troops not to take any action that might be interpreted as starting a civil war. In fact, white his people were being slaughtered, Gusmao was on the phone to western governments and multinationals telling them he would honour all existing contracts and property relations. Socialism must be under the control of ordinary people, democratic, fight against capitalism and for a clear programme of action in order to The mavements of women, lesbians and gay men, and black people The whole working class needs to fully commit itself to these strug By building simultaneously revolutionary organisations in each country In both areas the CW called for arms to be sent to the communities so that communities could organise their own defence. The CWi was confident that ordinary workers and peasants would instinctively put these weapons to better use than their "political leaders ever could Surely there is enough tragic evidence to show that bourgeois national movements fail their people.
They fail to defend them when they are attacked, they fail to return land to the peasants or nationalise industry, they accommodate themselves to the wishes of impensesm ano dramately become the policemen of their people rather than their liberators Will Matthews in SO 27 makes some serious points recommend. ing socialists to stay in the Labour Party.
Although I left the party a few years ago to do more fruitful work outside, I can't condemn those I who do solid work in the party.
However Will mistakenly tries to justify his choice by recalling 1 that Trotsky, in the mid-1930s, called the Independent Labour I Party a sect even when it had 100,000 members.
He scems to suggest that, so long as socialists are few in num. ber, we will become a sect if we venture outside the Labour Party.
The ILP was not a sect because it had "just' 100,000 Many workers and organisations, including Trotsky's, had fewer members at that time - as today - but were less sectarian. In fact, the ILP was a sect despite its numbers. den by Yasser Arafat, Gerry Adams and countless other nationalist leaders, particularly since the collapse of Stalinism. Socialists in this country need to encourage the building of an independent socialist working class movement worldwide rather than see legitimate national liberation movements led into a blind alley by their bourgeois nationalist leaders.
Max Neill, Preston • See page 17. Max's slogan neatly avoids defining which "community" and which section of workers and peasants should be armed. We will return to this debate in tuture issues of Socialist Outlook. Esen Troisky couldn't solve problem of sectarianism on British left Because it had a mistaken atti. tude toward the Communist and Labour parties and towards the working class a whole, turned away from a line of march that could have united the workers' movement in campaigning against fascism and war.
Being inside the Labour Party does not prevent the development of such a sectolike mentanty. as some of the Trotskyist currents in ¡You get a better view withi Don't miss an issue: SUBSCRIBE now! 20 pages of internationalist news, views and marxist analysis each month. 12 issues delivered for just £10. OVERSEAS subscribers 12 issues for just £20. SPECIAL OFFER (UK only): One year of Socialise Durlook, PLUS one year of International Viewpoint (Fourth International magazine) for only £30. PLEASE send me • 12 issues of Socialise Outlook • 12 issues of Socialise Putlook plus International Viewpoint. I enclose f... Name Address Phone SEND TO: Socialist Outlook, PO Box 1109, London N4 200 We welcome readers' letters on any topic. Letters over 400 words may be cut for space reasons. Write to Socialist Outlook, PO Box 1109, London N4 2UU. email: [email protected] the Labour Party have proven in the years since then.
However political life in the Labour Party, for both the right and the left, is presently greatly removed from the independent mobilisation of the working class, the unemployed and the radical youth.
Currents outside the party have, in ways that reflect their modest size, found ways to try to move close to the best of those in strugBrough the lobby radicalising:
of Labour Party by turning socialist and green organisations in the direction of campaigning and by winning people to non-sectarian and revolutionary socialism.
Such activity protects socialists from sectarian degencration far more than any party card.
Chris Brooks, London SE24. Post Code _Age
¡ No magic cure for British ¡left's sectarian disease