Workers World Support for War in Afghanistan- by the Soviets of course

Jim Farmelant farmelantj at juno.com
Mon Nov 19 12:56:45 PST 2001


Perhaps, I have missed something but I was unware that the WWP were passing themselves off as pacifists. If they are, perhaps Nathan would do us the favor of providing us with appropriate citations. If they are not, then how can they be accused of being hypocrites because they pick and choose which wars to support, and which to oppose. That is after what most of us, who are not absolute pacifists do, and I don't think that makes one necessarily a hypocrite because one might choose in a particular instance to support an antiwar movement even though one is not in general a pacifist.

Also, I would like Nathan's opinion of whether he thinks that Afghanistan would be better off today, if the Soviet invasion had been successful.

Jim F.

On Mon, 19 Nov 2001 14:42:44 -0500 "Nathan Newman" <nathan at newman.org> writes: Just to note the real hypocrisy of the Workers World folks in the present "antiwar movement"-- they were vociferous supporters of the Soviet war in Afghanistan, in fact denouncing Gorbachev and Shevardnadze for ending the war and apologizing for it. They dismissed their views as "bourgois pacifism." The WWP's contempt for "bourgois pacificism" and those who would "humiliate the military" might come as a surprise to many of the people attending their "antiwar" rallies. I'm attaching Sam Marcy's 1991 analysis of a late 80s speech by Shevardnadze where he defends "defensive war" in the name of the Soviet national interests - a line of argument I am sure George Bush would find quite comfortable for his own purposes.

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