INTERNAL STRUGGLE AT THE OLAS CONFERENCE
[The following article, datelined from Havana, appeared in the August 11 issue of Marcha. The author is Carlos Maria Gutiérrez, one of the editors of the Montevideo weekly, who attended the July 31-August 10 conference of the Organizacién Latinoamericana de Solidaridad (Latin-American Organization of Solidarity).
{As will be seen, the author is of the opinion that the outcome of the OLAS conference was the formation of a new international. In fact, he entitled his article, "OLAS: Nace una Internacional" (OLAS: an International Is Born).
(While this would seem to be at least a premature conclusion, the conference, with its claim to speak for all of Latin America, could certainly be taken to represent a step in that direction just as was the case with the Tricontinental conference before it.
{The article is of unusual interest, in our opinion, because of the facts it offers on the struggle that went on in the closed sessions over some of the most important issues that faced the delegates.
{The translation is by World Outlook. ]
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Today, Wednesday, the OLAS conference was supposed to have ended, but things fell behind schedule and the agenda will not be completed until possibly Friday the eleventh. This was due to two factors that were not counted on at the opening: first, the capture of two oups of CIA agents on the coast of Cuba (one on July 18, the other on Sunday the sixth) and their appearance at two press conferences that took up more than a day for the delegates and journalists; then the monolithic resistance put up by the Communist parties adhering to the Soviet line, or the delegations they control, to the majority theses of the conference.
The Cubans and the other delegations sharing their views did not wish, in the opening days, to force their hand; this atmosphere of unity -- which I sought to reflect in my first dispatches -- also included certain delegations of antithetical composition, such as the Uruguayan (with its mosaic of organizations) and the Chilean in which the Socialists and Communists held parity. But by the third day of the deliberations, the basis of the dispute was well defined and the attack levelled against the orthodox Communist parties by the tendency that was inflexibly delineating itself had become so sharp as to cut off further verbal offerings on the altar of unity.
The parity delegations, like the one from Chile, simply began to neutralize each other in voting; in the others, where the CP's exercised control, they began to rigidly apply the system of majority rule. The Uruguayan delegation, practically from the second day of the conference, divided into two unequal parts: the majority included the CP, the Agrupacién Avanzar, the MPU [Movimiento Popular Unitario], the carolino group APUM of Frade, and the three pseudo autonomous bodies (the Comité Obrero, the Comité Universitario and the Movimiento de Trabajadores de la Cultura) which the FIdeL [Frente Izquierda de Liberaci6én] improperly placed on the National Committee of the OLAS and whose delegates have voted for the CP positions with undeviating faithfulness. The minority included the MRO [Movimiento Revolucionario Oriental], the Socialist party, and the Grupo Batllista 26 de Octubre. In the case of Uruguay what existed practically was not a delegation but two sectors, one of which systematically followed the views of the CP as set forth by Arismendi, and the other, a minority, which limited itself equally systematically to standing firm in the commissions for its positions which -- a typical paradox of the OLAS -were nevertheless those of the majority in the general context of the conference.
This absurd situation, in addition, was foreseen in Montevideo, in view of the inadequate composition of the National Committee, and was no surprise to anyone.
But on top of the internal disputes of the delegations, significant things began happening in the work of the commissions beginning last Wednesday. Two aspects of the same confrontation were visible in this -- the outspokenness of the Cubans, especially the chairman of the delegation, Armando Hart, and the aggressiveness of the orthodox Communist delegates. The mechanics of the conference was as follows:
The four work commissions elaborated resolutions of a general type. At this level these were already considered to be conference resolutions subject to mere formal approval at the final plenun. Next, the presidium of the conference worked up a draft declaration which was approved by everyone and which would complete the group of general resolutions. Hence the importance of the declarations in the commissions, whose deliberations were not mere rough drafts of personal views or discussions but the expression of the definitive thought of the two clashing lines.
Commission I, in a relatively brief time, worked up its draft of a general resolution; and Commission IV, charged with drawing up the statutes for the OLAS, also completed its task without trouble. (Elsewhere in this issue, Carlos Nufiez analyzes the projected texts.) On the other hand, the deliberations of Commission III were marked with incidents, delays and heavy birth pangs which brought out -~- openly, late last night -the real objectives sought by the two contending sides. The revolutionary process in Latin America appeared to have reached a point where the narrow political schemas of the orthodox Communist parties were not sufficient to contain the new theses. The at times sectarian mentality and cult of discipline toward its leaders were likewise ill adapted to a direct dialogue in the new style of the Cubans, a style not invented by them but drawn by necessity from other sources than the old political molds and obsolete analyses.
Last week, when K.S.Karol asked Fidel Castro about the conduct of the Cuban Communist party after the revolution, Fidel answered with an affectionate maliciousness: "It was like having to go into the 1967 Pan-American Games with the Olympic team of 1924." Insistence on respect for discipline under threat otherwise of being considered against unity or something worse (this old alternative with which the CP's have been trying to intimidate the left in Latin America) no longer works.
In Commission III, during all this, it was Armando Hart himself who said, with regard to the discipline to which the defenders of the Venezuelan CP appealed as an argument in order to avoid being condemned for repudiating the. guerrillas: "The cult of discipline above everything is an absurdity which we do not understand. Discipline does not stand higher than a revolutionary line."
This new language prevailed in all the deliberations and contributed to the illuminating bracketing of the general problem of liberation adopted by the OLAS, providing a breath of fresh and reviving air. It was specifically in Commission III where the criticism of Soviet strategy in Latin America was voiced mainly in two resolutions which were fundamental, not so much because of what they said or their immediate purpose (the one referring to the USSR is not to be circulated publicly) as because of the intention of the Cubans and the majority of the national delegations to remain with their hands free from the old tactical compromises of the USSR, their evident proposal to wipe the slate clean and begin afresh, especially after the Glassboro conversations. Up until five o'clock this morning, in an impressive work session that began twenty hours earlier, Commission III discussed to the bitter end the matter of condemning the economic aid which the USSR is granting to the continental oligarchies. The vote was conclusive: 15 in favor, 8 abstentions (from the delegations who were neutralized by their parity composition) and 3 opposed. El Salvador, Bolivia and Uruguay voted in defense of the policy of the USSR. In the commission, in behalf of Uruguay, the delegate José Jorge Martinez of the Comité Universitario del FIdeL adhered to the position of the Communist parties. And when, during an intermission, Ariel Collazo proposed that this view be modified, Arismendi remained inflexible and along with him the three committees, the APUM of Maldonado, the MPU and the Agrupaci6én Avanzar. ("I am not thoroughly acquainted with the problem," said Alberto Caymaris in a phrase that immediately became famous, "so I am voting against revising the position.") José Diaz as well as Collazo spoke later in the commission to show that the Uruguayan minority agreed with the position of the Latin-American majority.
In the morning, before voting, the Chilean Communist deputy, Jorge Montes, played the final card: the Communist parties, he said, would withdraw from the commission (and perhaps from the conference) if the condemnation of the USSR was insisted upon. Armando Hart had the reply ready: "They accuse us of being anti- Communist and anti-Soviet because we are going to pass this motion. This signifies accusing Compafiero Fidel Castro of being anti-Communist and anti-Soviet. You can reach even this absurdity. One comrade has indicated that he would withdraw from the commission. Everyone has the right to withdraw, but this constitutes a threat. You must know that the Cuban Revolution has never bowed to threats from anyone. If anyone wishes to leave, he should understand that the door he takes is to the right."
The resolution on Soviet aid -which is not to be given to the press but communicated to the USSR and the socialist countries, is short -- scarcely a page. It is entitled, "Denunciation of the technical and financial aid which some countries grant to the puppet governments of Latin America," and it says in its whereases, "that at present a tendency is developing in some states of the socialist camp to grant technical and financial aid to these puppet governments" and that "this aid, far from promoting a rectification, encourages these governments to maintain, scot-free, their criminal complicity with the imperialist economic blockade against Cuba." This aid "contributes to enlarging the resources of the oligarchies and to mitigating the grave economic difficulties confronting these governments, and all this in manifest contradiction with the aspirations of
the oppressed and the exploited." Also that "It operates against the revolutionary movements in those countries where an armed struggle is being mounted because the aid brings additional resources to the puppet governments that are trying to stamp them out" and it concludes that the aid “affects the prestige of the revolutionary cause" and "creates great confusion among the masses and the ranks of the liberating movement." Because of all this, the conference will declare:
"That the technical and financial aid offered to the puppet governments by the socialist countries violates the principles of solidarity and, consequently, should not be granted.'
In the resolution on Venezuela prepared by Commission III which was likewise passed with 15 votes for and 3 against (among them, the U yan delegation), the OLAS condemns "the bungling, opportunist position of the rightist leadership of the Venezuelan CP, which by abandoning the road of armed struggle betrayed revolutionary principles and is serving the interests of imperialism and the oligarchies and all their policies of oppression."
In turn, Commission II issued four basic declarations that obviously systenatize the new line of the Latin-American revolution. Without doubt they are an important contribution in sharpening up theory. Unlike the precise definitions that were arrived at in Commission III, in these thesis documents -- as in the general draft resolution of Commission I, and in the general declaration proposed by the presidium -- the final public texts were edited in such a way as to provide a more measured and careful balancing of the different points of view.
Commission II submitted four resolutions: on the economic penetration by imperialism, on its politico-military intervention, on its cultural and ideological penetration, and on the OAS. The most important conclusions are as follows:
Economic penetration: "In the present historical conditions of latin America, the national bourgeoisie cannot head the antifeudal and anticlass struggle...The major task of breaking up the neocolonial structure belongs to the workers and peasants of the Americas, in an indestructible alliance, along with the most progressive sectors of the intellectuals, students and other middle layers."
Politico-military intervention: "Against the complex scaffolding of penetration, intervention, subversion, cccupation and politico-military hegemony of the United States in Latin America, which fits in with a strategy of continei ‘al proportions, the Iatin-American peoples must oppose a common revolutionary strategy, based on a profound feeling of solidarity, aimed at taking power by means of armed struggle."
Cultural and ideological penetration: "The intellectuals, naturally, not only have to dispense with the shameful patronage of the vehicles of imperialisn, in order to pose their revolutionary destiny; they must not only participate with their works or whatever circumstances demand in the struggle for the liberation of the Latin-American peoples. It is necessary for them in addition to set up the corresponding bodies through which to participate collectively, on a continental scale, in backing the great struggle for liberation which is under way."
On the OAS, "the right and the duty of all the Latin-American peoples to combat the agreements of this organization" is proclaimed.
As a summary of the spirit and positions contained in the documents of the commissions, the draft of the presidium's general declaration indicates positively -- although in the careful language of a theoretical document -- the line that triumphed in the conference. The explanatory part contains these postulates:
~-- Revolutionary violence offers the most concrete and manifest possibility for defeating imperialism.
-- "In many countries," the special conditions "make guerrilla war the fundamental expression of the armed struggle.”
-- "A common strategy" is required, necessitating "a clear, rounded expression of solidarity, the character of which is the struggle itself, extending throughout the continent in the form of guerrilla war and liberation armies."
The main points of the general declaration to be made by OLAS include:
-- Marxism-Leninism guides the continental revolutionary movement.
-- Armed struggle constitutes the fundamental line.
-- "All the other forms of struggle must serve and not hold back the development of the fundamental line of armed struggle."
-- "In those countries in which this task is not posed in an immediate way, the development of a revolutionary struggle must in any case be considered as an inevitable perspective."
-- "It is the historic responsibility of the people in each country and
their revolutionary vanguard to carry the revolution forward in their own land."
-- "The leadership of the revolution requires, as an organizational principle, a unified political and military command to guarantee success."
-- "The most effective solidarity which the revolutionary movements can display toward each other is to develop and bring to a culmination their own struggle within each country."
In all these documents the new revolutionary thesis is unequivocally paramount, and each of its postulates runs counter to the Soviet strategy for Latin America and the schemas that up to now were imparted by the Communist parties to the liberation movements:
-- The national bourgeoisie is rejected as a revolutionary factor, or rather what is rejected is the CP notion about for "broad" or democraticpourgeois "fronts."
-- All implications are dropped that the existing political vanguards -an idea which the CP's, through Arismendi, vigorously advocated in the commissions -- are the necessary points of crystallization for the forces involved and this function is transferred to the armed struggle as proof that the political vanguard is really revolutionary.
-- All other forms of struggle are
made subordinate to armed struggle.
~~ All possible ties with imperi-
alism and the oligarchies, whether inci-
dental or indirect with imperialism and
the oligarchies are ruled out, even on a
mere economic level.
-- Sole validity is granted to the
dual condition of a common strategy and a
unified command.
It can already be said, as a con-
sequence, that a new Marxist-Leninist
international has just been created.
Tacitly or explicitly, it has broken with
ideological and strategic dependency on
Moscow without lining up with any of the
other camps. Headquarters naturally grav-
itate to Havana. As has always been the
case with appearance of new internation-
als, it constitutes a reaction against
the ossification of the previous organiza-
tion. And its appearance, without doubt,
falls within the regroupment of revolu-
tionary forces that is occurring in the
world socialist camp. Carlos Altamirano,
the Chilean Socialist, voiced a premoni-
tion when he said here a few days ago:
"The contradiction of our epoch is no
longer expressed by the terms ‘imperialism
-- socialist countries,' but by ‘imperi-
alism ~- peripheral countries.' The Third
World, by way of the Tricontinental and
now by way of the OLAS, appears to be
assuming the task of carrying on. Havana,
from here on out, is the capital of the
new international which will proceed with
the liberation of Latin America."
FRENCH CP