The Rise and Fall of the Anti-Vietnam War Movement in the U.S.

8/10/2019 The Rise and Fall of the Anti-Vietnam War Movement in the U.S.

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nd there was little rebellion except after the war when the U.S. bosses tried unsuccessfully to get U.S.roops to oppose the communists in Italy and elsewhere. In Vietnam, it was the realization that the U.S.

was at war against the working class and peasants, the overwhelming majority of the country. How coulhe U.S. be fighting for the freedom of the Vietnamese people if it had to indiscriminately bomb, burn, amprison them for fear that anyone could be an enemy? It was the strategy of People's War, which isundamentally based on the consciousness and commitment of the masses, that helped sharpen the clasonsciousness of the U.S. troops who rebelled.

What about the movement in the U.S.? The urban rebellions in the black community were far more

estabilizing to the U.S. government than the peace marches ever could be. Hundreds of cities experiencebellion; more importantly, a whole generation of youth and young adults, especially urban black andatino workers were learning that it was possible to fight back. One common aspect of all the groups

mentioned so far -- the Vietnamese, the Chinese, the U.S. troops, and the urban rebels -- was that theyad guns.

he peace movement was often militant, and many on the campuses came to reject non-violence andought heroically against the police. But in the end, the bosses destroyed that movement because it wasot politically and militarily strong enough to stand up to the bosses' state power -- its guns. That shouldot be a surprise. In pre-Nazi Germany there was an anti-fascist movement much larger than the 1960's

movement in the U.S. It brought millions of people into the streets, millions voted for Communist Partyandidates, millions of others supported liberals who used the language of socialism. There were general

trikes and rebellions. But in the end, the fascists won and had to be destroyed by the Soviet Red ArmyMany other countries have had anti-capitalist movements much larger and more militant than the campumovement of the 1960's. Those mighty movements have not defeated imperialism in those countries, sos no insult to say that the 1960's student movement in the U.S. was a less important factor in ending thietnam war. But there are aspects of that movement that have had a lasting and important impact,specially the growth of anti-imperialism, anti-racism, communism and the PLP. To understand the causnd consequences of that movement, it is useful to look at the context in which it developed.

mperialism in the Post World War II Era

ritish, French, and German imperialism were severely weakened by World War II. The ability of thoseations to make huge profits by exploiting the less expensive labor of the old colonies of Asia, Africa, anatin America was damaged by several developments. The most obvious was that they were seriouslyconomically and militarily weakened by that war. The U.S., on the other hand, came out of the war quitrong militarily and economically, and U.S. corporate interests were eagerly investing in those colonies eocolonies and setting up puppet governments to serve the U.S. interests. Finally, and most important,hose colonies and neocolonies, the working class and its allies, especially the peasants, took advantage he weaknesses of the European powers to launch wars to drive the imperialists and their brutal puppetovernments out of their countries. Many of those workers and peasants followed the leadership ofommunist parties and had fought against Japanese and German fascism and now wanted to continue ttruggle against all the other imperialist exploiters and their local partners in exploitation and oppression

ommunists in many countries adopted the strategy of wars of "national liberation" as the transition toocialism and eventually communism. These wars had two aspects. They were fighting against themperialists, taking over capitalist property, and arming the masses; this all helps lay the basis forommunism. But, they also were explicit in their alliance with some elements of the capitalist class, andheir programs for national liberation included allowing certain capitalist enterprises and policies to operafter the imperialists were driven out. (More recently, this has evolved into inviting the once hatedmperialists back into the countries which they had exploited and brutalized in the past.)

he national liberation strategy developed out of an aspect of Lenin's theory of imperialism. Lenineveloped the important theory that capitalism would not simply fall in nation after nation as a result ofational economic crises, because the capitalists of some countries would be able to increase their rates rofit by investing money and exploiting less expensive labor in other countries (the colonies andeocolonies.) Struggle in those colonies and neocolonies would weaken the international capitalist systemnd help bring on revolution in both the colonized area and the imperialist country. On the tactical level,


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ertain imperialists were weakened by the wars of national liberation, and the living conditions of manyworkers and peasants improved in some cases as some of the imperialist wealth now was distributed to workers and peasants.

hina was the most powerful example of this; the destruction of the Japanese and then the capitalistovernment in China led to a socialist system where the living conditions of the Chinese people improvespectacular way. However, the record has now shown that those gains can be reversed as Communistarty leaders create a new elite that accumulates privilege and wealth and even goes looking for imperia

nvestors with whom they can jointly exploit the working class. But history is never simply reversed. Ever

hange, positive and negative, has effects that go beyond the immediate situation and affect still otherhings. While national liberation wars lead back to capitalism, the struggles of the working class for a befe can help us learn how to defeat capitalism and build the communist party and communist revolutionecessary for the final and complete destruction of capitalism.

mperialism and Vietnam

n the late 1940's, a Vietnamese communist, Ho Chi Minh, organized the struggle to drive the French outietnam. By 1954, the French were completely defeated at the battle of Dien Bien Phu. As part of therrangements for a peaceful retreat of the French, Ho Chi Minh's forces were to go to the northern part he country while pro-French forces gathered in the south to leave the country. After elections, the count

was to be unified. In 1956, the U.S. stepped in. There were no elections in the south; President Eisenhoater stated that his understanding was that the communist Ho Chi Minh probably would have won thelection with 80% of the vote.

go Ding Diem, a Vietnamese living in the United States as part of a CIA project, was flown over toietnam and put into power as the leader of South Vietnam. An imaginary line was drawn, and the U.S.aid that Ho Chi Minh could hold the north, but that South Vietnam would be a separate nation allied wihe U.S. The U.S. picked a loser in Diem. South Vietnam was over 80% Buddhist; Diem was a Catholic wersecuted many Buddhists. He also was personally corrupt and robbed millions from the treasury. Worknd students were suppressed, and the U.S. began sending hundreds of troops to Vietnam as advisors telp Diem.

Many rank and file workers and peasants wanted to rebel against Diem, but the policies of Ho Chi Minh is Soviet backers was to discourage that at first. Eventually, rebellion in the south developed. Furtherm

many soldiers from the south had gone north only temporarily and found themselves separated from theamilies for years. By 1958, many of the them were moving back south as well, often with their weaponhe puppet Diem government and the U.S. called this "infiltration from another country", and Presidentennedy had about 20,000 U.S. troops in South Vietnam by 1963. By this time, the communist-led Natioiberation Front (NLF) controlled over 80% of the countryside with over two-thirds of the people. The CIhen assassinated Diem because he was so incompetent, and the U.S. installed a series of other rulers.

n the summer of 1964, the U.S. government reported that a U.S. ship in international waters was fired y a North Vietnamese boat. The U.S. fired back and the crew reported a night long battle. Shortly afterhat, in a second report, the U.S. sighted a North Vietnamese boat and attacked it; the Vietnamese firedack and the U.S. sunk one of the Vietnamese boats. President Lyndon Johnson declared that it was anutrageous violation of international law for the North Vietnamese to have attacked a U.S. ship in

nternational waters when the U.S. had been supplying the South Vietnamese government but had doneothing to North Vietnam. Actually, this later turned out to be a lie; it was later revealed that U.S. militaommandos had illegally landed in North Vietnam repeatedly and committed bombings and sabotage behat incident. The ship incident came to be called the "Gulf of Tonkin" incident, and President Johnsonsked the Congress for permission to bomb a navy port in North Vietnam to punish them. However, theGulf of Tonkin Resolution" was worded very vaguely, giving Johnson congressional permission to take

whatever military steps he wanted to in North or South Vietnam. Only two senators, and no congressmepposed it; Johnson was given a blank check. With this in hand, Johnson and Nixon put in a force of ovealf million soldiers (over 3 million actually served at one time or another.) The U.S. dropped more bomn Vietnam than all the countries of the world used on each other in World War I and World War IIombined -- and doubled! The U.S. tried very hard to win that war.


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y 1968, those forces allied with the Soviets seemed to consolidate power within the movement in Vietnheir strategy focused heavily on tactical military damage to U.S. forces, rather than on continuing thetrategy of People's War and building communist consciousness. The Tet Offensive in early 1968 killedhousands of U.S. troops and intensified anti-war sentiment in the U.S. It also killed many thousands of ravest fighters in the NLF and set the tone for more conventional battles between Soviet equipped Nortietnamese troops and the U.S. forces. Later that year, Ho Chi Minh repaid the Soviets by endorsing theoviet invasion of Czechoslovakia; the "independence" aspect of the national liberation struggle was nowhe main aspect of their strategy, rather than the move towards socialism or communism.

he pro-U.S. forces in Vietnam had virtually no support anymore from the Vietnamese people. The U.S.trategy of mass bombing intensified, including bombing the city of Hanoi in North Vietnam in an attempo help the South Vietnamese puppets work out a better compromise with the north. But eventually, afte

million Vietnamese and 60,000 U.S. personnel were killed, along with a destroyed economic and politicalabric in Indochina that led to famine, war and the deaths of hundreds of thousands more in Cambodia,.S. left and the NLF and North Vietnamese Army triumphed. After the war was over, after Johnson hadied and Nixon resigned, the U.S. government released documents admitting that the Gulf of Tonkin

ncident was a fake. The initial attack on the U.S. ship by the North Vietnamese never took place, whichwas just as the North Vietnamese had claimed at the time. The people of the United States were trickednto supporting the war in the beginning by an event that never happened.

he Rise of the Anti-War Movement in the U.S.

he "Sixties" was much more than the white student anti-war movement on college campuses in the U.Sll over the world struggles against imperialism were raging. The Algerians forced France to grant

ndependence, and Castro's forces had just taken power in Cuba and forced out the gangster-puppetegime of U.S. imperialism right on the U.S. doorstep. Various nationalists from Ghana to the Congo tondonesia were thumbing their noses at U.S. imperialism, guerrilla movements emerged in Latin Americand the Chinese Communist Party made a sharp split away from the U.S.S.R., claiming that the U.S.S.R.

was abandoning the world-wide struggle against imperialism and acting like a capitalist-imperialist powerome and abroad. The Cultural Revolution in China mobilized millions of workers and students in a militattempt to stop China from creating elitist institutions that were leading back to capitalism.

n Europe and Japan millions of students battled police again and again in opposition to imperialism and

ther forms of capitalist oppression. In France, college students sparked a rebellion that engulfed theworking class and led to a general strike that completely shut down France. In a move reminiscent of thuppression of the Paris Commune one hundred years earlier, the government of France maderrangements with Germany, its main adversary, to provide troops to put down the French workers andtudents. Lucky for the French bosses, the phony "Communist" Party of France worked night and day toabotage that struggle, selling it out for a few francs and saving French capitalism, and the German Arm

was not needed. The "Sixties" was more than a U.S. event.

t was also more than a campus event in the U.S. By 1960, it seemed to many that the left movement ihe U.S. was finished. In the late 1940's, the communists were driven out of the unions they had built; b953, there was no threat of a revolution in the U.S. But the U.S. ruling class intensified its anti-commurive because they needed to rally the people against the Soviet Union and China and to support U.S.

mperialism. While some intellectuals debated the economic merits of Marxism versus a market economyhe real assault against communism presented to most people in the U.S. in the 1950's, was thatupposedly it was alien, Russian or Chinese, it did not play fair, it used spies to steal the atom bomb, an

wanted to put into power a group of foreign bosses. The response of the Communist Party was to retrerom the struggle to spread communist consciousness and communist organization and instead just buildberal organizations.

lso, U.S. imperialism was so profitable for that short time following the war -- two decades or so -- thawhen workers demanded higher wages, more health care, education, housing, and social services, theemands were sometimes granted. The standard of living improved significantly, and that fed the illusiohat capitalism worked and could be made more pro-working class by working for change within theystem. The election of Kennedy, a youthful optimist who combined militant anti-Soviet patriotism with


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umanist slogans seemed to combine all the elements of a successful empire. But there were a few crac

he liberal optimism of the Kennedy years was already tarnished while he was still President. Manymericans were against the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba by the CIA. Both the invasion and the fact thatailed made Kennedy look less like a hero and more like just another politician. Kennedy also took the U.o the brink of nuclear war with the Soviets over the question of Soviet missiles in Cuba. While someraised Kennedy's toughness, the nation was split. Millions of American people were upset that the natioame so close to nuclear war over Cuba. There was also the capture of a U.S. spy plane and pilot over toviet Union. Adlai Stevenson, the greatest hero of the liberals, had worked to maintain a phony image

onesty and integrity; millions of Americans watched him on television lie to the UN and the Americaneople by denying that there was any spy plane, until the Soviets produced the pilot. And while thessassination of John Kennedy produced considerable shock, it was the murder of suspected assassin

Oswald, and the whole botched cover-up that intensified disillusionment with U.S. liberal democracy. Thvents all helped weaken respect for the U.S. government, but it was actual involvement in trying tohange the system that taught the working class its strongest lessons.

irst was the anti-racist movement expressed through the Civil Rights movement. In the early 1960's,undreds of thousands of Americans took to the streets to protest racism against black Americans. Theevere political repression of the 1950's was still fresh, yet large numbers of people were willing to publtand up and criticize the government. The sleepy, repressed 1950's became the hot 1960's very quickly.he second trend was the increased militancy of the working class. There were many strikes, especially i

eavy industry, and there were major union organizing campaigns among farmworkers, hospital workersnd white collar workers. There also was a movement of discontent among many college students,ntellectuals, and youth; it was based on sensing the contradiction between the promises of capitalism inhe richest country in the world, and the reality of the stupidity, wastefulness, emptiness, and hypocrisy ven "secure middle class" life in the U.S., where success was measured by clothes and cars. It would b

mistake to overestimate this aspect of discontent; after all, it was mainly the militant, mass struggles ofworkers in Vietnam and the U.S. that provided the focus and impetus for the Sixties. But there was aommon thread in all these struggles.

f the U.S. was so great, so rich, such a strong believer in freedom and prosperity, how come black peowere denied basic human rights, how come workers were not sharing enough in this prosperity, how comulture was so shallow and decadent and human relations were still fundamentally based on suppressinguman freedom, potential, and energy by channeling our minds towards the task of acquiring materialtatus symbols? And finally, how come the U.S. supported vicious dictators in other countries, supportedhem to the extreme of killing thousands of workers and peasants and even drafting U.S. youth againstheir will to protect those corrupt, fascist regimes?

o it was not simply deprivation and oppression that gave rise to rebellion; it was hope, the belief thatwhat existed did not have to exist and that change was possible. That hope originally was quite naive,ften even patriotic -- -"How could the wonderful U.S. government do such nasty things?" But soon theombs of the U.S. Air Force and the clubs of the police shattered much of that naive hope.

ampus Protests

he most famous campus protest of the early 1960's was the Free Speech Movement (FSM) at Universityalifornia, Berkeley. Black students in the South had organized protests before and actually were the

mpetus for the civil rights movement, and the boycotts, voter registration drives, and demonstrations inouth became a training ground for hundreds of students from Northern colleges. The FSM actually cameut of a struggle for the right to collect money on campus for civil rights workers in Mississippi. Theniversity took the position that since some of the civil rights workers were getting arrested, they werengaged in illegal activity, and it was against university rules to allow the collection of money for illegalctivities. This shocked and enraged students on campus who were furious that their liberal university

would so strongly side with the racists in the South -- opposing voter registration drives and protecting thillers of children. The students took over a campus building, and the police were called in to arrest theundreds and hundreds of students inside. Newspaper photos and television film clips showed tens of

millions of Americans the extreme brutality of the police, smashing heads with clubs, throwing people do


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oncrete stairs, pulling women by their hair -- all because of a sit in to support civil rights, something th.S.A. was supposed to stand for.

n the summer of 1963, the first serious protest against U.S. involvement in Vietnam took place in New Yity. It was sponsored by the Progressive Labor Movement, the organization which formed the Progressiabor Party in 1965. The demonstration was small compared to the hundreds of thousands who would

march later, and while there was some support for the anti-U.S. imperialism view, there was also significostility as well. But this was the first militant anti-imperialist demonstration of that era, in sharp contraso the pacifists who mainly were terrified of the imperialists and their nuclear weapons.

n February, 1965, President Johnson used the Gulf of Tonkin resolution to order systematic bombing oforth Vietnam. The day after, anti-war committees began to form on dozens of university campuses. Aidfascist dictator in South Vietnam was bad enough; systematic bombing raids against North Vietnam an

massive troop build-up shocked hundreds of thousands of Americans and gave credibility to those radicand anti-capitalists who had been so critical of the U.S. government in the past. Demonstrations against

war were held on many campuses. A small, campus-based organization, Students for a Democratic SocieSDS) called for a march against the Vietnam War for April 17, 1965.

DS came out of the old, liberal trade union movement. It was originally called the Student League forndustrial Democracy, a youth offshoot of the League for Industrial Democracy. It mainly took collegetudents to low income neighborhoods to work on community organizing projects -- issues such as houstop signs near schools, etc. SDS also had a clause in its constitution that barred communists fromecoming members. In 1964, many members of SDS expressed their ambivalent support for the Democrarty with a campaign button "Part of the Way with LBJ". Work in the civil rights movement in the South

ncreased the militancy of many in the organization, who became impatient with the respectable liberals.he break became much sharper when SDS called for the April 17 demonstration; the liberal establishmet that point was strongly anti-communist and strongly in support of President Johnson's escalation of th

war.

he April 17 march was branded as "radical". The newspapers urged people to stay away; this would notrespectable demonstration, like those of Martin Luther King -- -this was anti-American. SDS organizers

xpected a few thousand people to show up. Over 25,000 marchers showed up, and suddenly SDS wasropelled into the leadership of the campus anti-war movement. Many campuses set up organizations wames like "Committee to End the War in Vietnam" which included liberals, radicals, socialists, pacifists, evisionists (liberals who pretend to be Marxists). In addition to these broader anti-war committees, the

were often other groups on campus -- -SDS chapters, Draft Resistance Unions, Marxist study groups, anivil rights groups. Nationally, a coalition of liberals, pacifists, and revisionists formed the National

Mobilization Committee (MOBE).

he MOBE was not a grassroots organization that organized struggles to hurt the war effort; it was a toown coalition that mainly called for occasional demonstrations especially in Washington, D.C. MOBE ral

were characterized by speeches from liberal politicians and union leaders. Many rank and file people in tmovement were against giving the politicians and union leaders a platform to speak, especially since maf those leaders who spoke were involved in pro-imperialist activities abroad and racist, anti-working clasolicies at home. Leadership of the MOBE consisted of faction fights, mainly between the revisionistSocialist Workers Party", pacifists, and the revisionist "Communist Party". The capitalist news media ofteppeared to criticize the MOBE, but in fact, it much preferred the MOBE to SDS and especially to PLP. Tevisionists hid behind the pacifists, who were no threat to U.S. imperialism, while the clowns such as Aboffman and Jerry Rubin made pro-drug, anti-working class comments that turned many workers andtudents away from the anti-war movement. The most important newspapers, including the New Yorkimes gave millions of dollars of free publicity to the MOBE, announcing its marches weeks in advance touild and legitimize MOBE leadership of the movement. As a result, the MOBE was important as a focaloint for the big demonstrations and newspaper publicity. But actually, they had little support among theank and file; it was the local anti-war committees, and SDS, which directly and consistently brought anmperialist ideas to hundreds of thousands of college students.

ontrary to a romantic reading of history, there was considerable support for President Johnson's policie


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nd considerable hostility to anti-war demonstrators, especially in the beginning. At University of Wisconor example, about 250 people participated in the 1965 SDS March on Washington. That same weekend,he leadership of the University of Wisconsin Young Democrats drove to Washington with petitions signey six thousand students in support of President Johnson. Thousands of buttons demanding: "Bomb Han

were distributed, and a stupid song in praise of the Green Berets became the top selling record in 1966.he seeming support for President Bush in the early days of the Persian Gulf war might seem strong, bu

much of it is superficial, just as initial support for President Johnson's war eventually turned to oppositio

n the black community, opposition to the war was stronger. Muhammed Ali was stripped of his

hampionship title for opposing U.S. policy. There was a developing consciousness that imperialism ineneral and the war in particular were racist. Opposition in the white community deepened during theourse of the war as it became clearer that the U.S. was at war against the majority of people in Vietnas more U.S. soldiers were killed, as people witnessed the brutality of the U.S. government at homeuppressing anti-war protests, and as some elements of the anti-war movement reached out and spreadnti-imperialist consciousness on campuses and in the communities. But in the early days of the war,rotesters in the U.S. were at risk of beatings and arrest by right wingers as well as police.

y 1966, SDS shifted its focus more towards becoming an anti-war organization. However, it stillmaintained its multi-issue approach. This was in contrast to some of the revisionist and liberal groups waid that a single issue anti-war organization that made coalitions with anyone against the war was the

way to go. About that time, SDS dropped its anti-communist clause. SDS at this point was still influence

y patriotism and anti-communism, however. Much of the rhetoric spoke in terms of fulfilling the truealues of the United States through democracy, and SDS had to allow free speech, even if it meant havio allow communists to join.

lso in 1966, the Progressive Labor Party formed an anti-imperialist organization, the May SecondMovement, or M2M. M2M never became a mass organization, but it served a very valuable purpose. Itffered a solid anti-imperialist analysis of the war in Vietnam and called for international solidarity with tietnamese and militant action; this was in contrast to most of the anti-war movement, which was tryinglame the whole war on President Johnson. M2M printed up and distributed tens of thousands ofewspapers with the anti-imperialist analysis, and they were distributed in many places where people haever even heard of the PLP. Interest and respect for the PLP began to grow as a result of thencompromising, serious work of party members. PL had been involved in the anti-racist Harlem uprisin964 and had proudly defended the right of the black community to fight back. While the old "Communiarty" was cringing, PLP openly defied the U.S. State Department ban on travel to Cuba and organized there. PLP members refused to take the "2S" student deferment, the Selective Service classification that

made college students exempt from the military draft. PLP rightly saw that as class privilege and arguedhat revolutionaries should be immersed in the working class. PLP members took the position that insteaf refusing to go into the military, young people should go in and organize rebellion inside the military, aLP members practiced that policy. At Brooklyn College, a PLP organizer was protected by a crowd ofhousands of students who resisted the police trying to arrest him. But it was when PLP made a decisionoin and build SDS that the party and SDS that the student movement began to transform.

he years 1966 and 1967 saw the growth of draft resistance organizations and continued demonstrationgainst the war. Students were enraged to find that colleges would suspend student activists and theneport to the military draft boards the names of those students in order to have them immediately draftehe myth of the neutrality of the university was being cracked, and students held sit-ins against militaryecruiters and Dow Chemical Company, the company that manufactured napalm. The U.S. State

Department sent a team of speakers around to college campuses; they were often met by hundreds ofeering students and sometimes were driven off the stage by hostile chanting and booing. In August of967, a massive demonstration, perhaps a half million, marched in New York City. The fall saw many moemonstrations, including hundreds being beaten and gassed in Madison, Wisconsin. SDS was still not th

eader of the campus movement, but SDS chapters were forming on many campuses. The summer of 19lso saw urban rebellions against racist police terror in one hundred U.S. cities. The Detroit rebels held

major parts of the city for a week, and thousands of troops had to be diverted from going to Vietnam inrder to put down the rebellion. Clearly, militant actions such as these could damage the war effort muc

more than peace marches ever could.


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y late 1967, the ruling class was also trying to pick the leaders of the anti-war movement. Senator EugMcCarthy of Minnesota and Senator Bobby Kennedy, brother of the assassinated President, were competor the leadership of the Democratic Party on slogans that called for negotiations with the Vietnameseebels and the North Vietnamese. It was becoming clear that a significant section of the U.S. ruling clasid not want to see a major land war drag on if they could ensure a moderate Vietnam, on the Yugoslav

model, which might call itself Marxist, but which would not be a threat to U.S. interests. Thousands oftudents were being diverted into those electoral campaigns. It was also during those years that marijuand LSD, flooded the college campuses. There is no question that the widespread use of these drugs huhe anti-imperialist movement, despite the fact that many leaders in the movement advocated drug use.

y 1967, SDS was still relatively small. In December, at the National Council meeting in Bloomington,ndiana, there were a few hundred in attendance. PLP members were especially active in SDS in Boston,ew York, especially Columbia University, in San Francisco, and to a lesser extent, Los Angeles andhicago. PLP members fought for the line of a worker-student alliance. A student movement could do juo much on the campus; once it reaches its limits, it much either transform or become twisted, distortednd die. Students should reach out to rank and file workers, especially industrial workers, and build stroersonal and political ties as a way to truly strengthen the anti-imperialist movement. The National Offic

eadership of SDS scoffed at this strategy, instead insisting that the true vanguard was going to be the nmiddle class of technocrats, computer programmers, etc. Many of them asserted that the industrial worklass was either hopelessly reactionary or was becoming insignificant. They attacked PLP from an anti-

working class and anti-communist position, asserting that PLP was totalitarian, against drugs and therefo

fun", and wanted to suppress their middle class creativity in a sea of dull, unintelligent, insensitive workut they were looking over their shoulders in fear, because they saw that PLP was winning over aignificant base of support in key campus SDS chapters.

968

he year 1968 saw intensification of class conflict and class consciousness that brought about, within themits of the movement at that time, some qualitative changes in the movement. The Tet Offensive drovome the point that the U.S. could not win this war as quickly as hoped. A broader lesson from that washat the bosses don't always get their way. Thousands of dead U.S. soldiers within a few weeks and scef mass destruction made many in the U.S., including some in the ruling class, question whether the war

was worth it, or whether some kind of deal could be made. Then Martin Luther King was assassinated.

While King mainly diverted masses of black workers away from rebellion and into harmless non-violencehere were those in the ruling class who feared any leader who might be able to consolidate and focus twenty million black Americans. Malcolm X had been assassinated a few years earlier, and many saw thettacks as attacks against any kind of serious anti-racist organizing. In the days after King was killed, onundred more cities went up in rebellion. Contrary to Dr. King's message, many in the black working clasad learned that non-violence does not work.

n Chicago, a twelve year old was shot and killed while running from police after Mayor Richard J. Dalyrdered the police to "Shoot to Kill" looters. Criminal street gangs worked with the police to put down thebellion. Then Bobby Kennedy, brother of assassinated President John Kennedy was himself assassinatehe day he won the California Democratic Primary, which had almost certainly assured that he would winhe Presidency. Those who looked to liberalism to save them from militarism saw how capitalism's bruta

s widely used against even loyal opposition, and there was a wave of doubt throughout the movement ao whether the system could be reformed by liberal means.

t was during that same few months that the worker-student strike shut down France and gave inspiratio young people all over the world that rebellion was right. It was also during this time that news of the

Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in China was being eagerly studied by thousands of radical youth inhe U.S. and Europe. Here was a hopeful sign that the masses could rebel to try to prevent what hadappened in the Soviet Union -- -the defeat of socialism. In the midst of the same few months, the SDShapter at Columbia University organized a sit in and strike and shut the university down.

olumbia University is a prize university for the U.S. ruling class. The SDS chapter there was torn betweeeveral factions including a group that promoted the anti-working class views of many in the National Of


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f SDS, and another caucus led by PLP. The PLP group played a major role in this action, both in doing ay to day basebuilding to involve large numbers of students, and in planning the seizure of the buildinghe PLP group fought hard for the campaign to have a strong, obvious pro-working class thrust. One of

main demands was to stop the construction of a gymnasium that would destroy the housing of hundredworking class people, along with demands against Columbia's involvement in the war. Again, millions ofelevision viewers witnessed the beatings and bloody faces of students who were being arrested for minharges. And again, the lesson was learned: you can fight back! PLP issued tens of thousands of copies pecial flyer that analyzed the Columbia rebellion in terms of successful revolutionary strategy: "Build aase; Struggle Sharply; Strike Hard; Fight to Win."

During and after the Columbia strike, interest in SDS intensified all over the country. Students wereontacting the National Office, members of local anti-war groups were setting up SDS chapters, andstablished chapters saw increasing numbers of students join. It was in this context that SDS held its 19ational Convention during that summer.

he 1968 convention was much larger than the one just a year before; SDS had become essentially aifferent organization in just one year. PLP leaders had warned that there would be an attempt to force ut of SDS. Others in SDS thought that PLP was exaggerating. The party's analysis was based on annderstanding that liberals will resort to fascism when they are threatened. Sure enough, a prearrangedutburst by a small, police-infested collection of anarchists prompted the National Office leadership toncourage anti-PL speeches, ending in an attempt to instigate mass chanting of "PL Out" to drive PLP o

f the room and out of the organization. It failed. Many learned an important lesson. The anti-Communiad no unifying political principles except fear that they might no longer be in charge. When the anarchot up and denounced PLP for being "Stalinists" who oppose freedom, the SDS National Office gangheered and applauded. Then when the National Office gang attacked PLP for supposedly betraying Stalecause they found some quotes from Stalin that appeared to be at odds with PLP's line, you could see narchists applauding. Interestingly, on the stage encouraging the chanting was Carl Oglesby, who just ouple of years before wrote an impassioned defense of the right of communists to be in SDS.

art of the attack was because PLP had begun to criticize the North Vietnamese leadership, who werealling for negotiations with the U.S. The only just solution for the Vietnamese people was a total

withdrawal of U.S. imperialism, and the abolition of capitalism -- power to the workers. Any negotiationshat would leave the Vietnamese people with less than that would be a sell-out. But even as PLP criticizehe Vietnamese leadership, we continued to fight harder against U.S. imperialism than anyone else in th.S. We organized strikes, boycotts, protests; we brought anti-imperialist ideas to hundreds of thousandeople; we led the way in spreading anti-imperialist sentiment to workers; we fought the police and drewome of the heaviest jail terms in the campus movement. The National Office gang could not convince

many serious people that PLP was hurting the struggle.

LP held its own because PLP members proved through action that we were working to build SDS hardehan anyone. Quantitatively, PLP brought hundreds to SDS; qualitatively, the strategy of worker-studentlliance gained considerable respect as a result of the France worker-student general strike. But nearly ahe national offices stayed under the control of the anti-communist faction, who would soon play down tiscredited line about middle class revolution and instead pretend to be Leninists, attacking PLP becauseid not mechanically follow every word Lenin, Stalin, and Marx had written.

bout a month later, the Democratic Party held its nominating convention in Chicago. Thousands showep to protest. Mayor Daly announced that nobody would be permitted to remain in the parks after closinhe police moved in to clear out downtown Grant Park after closing. Thousands of demonstrators wereurrounded by the police, who charged in on motorcycles, cars, and horses, beating everyone in sight. Tops attacked protestors, newspaper reporters, tourists, anyone near the area. Hundreds of people wereear gassed. Again, millions of people witnessed an intense, bloody police attack on people who wereommitting the relatively insignificant crime of staying in a park after it closed. This was the last straw foundreds of thousands of people. The first eight months of 1968 taught many people that capitalism'srutality could not be stopped by working within the system.

he Empire Strikes Back


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When colleges opened in the fall of 1968, there was an explosion of support for SDS. The first SDSmeetings of the school year saw huge turnouts on many campuses: over 400 students attend at Harvardbout 500 at the University of Texas, 800 at the University of Wisconsin, for example. These were notemonstrations; these were SDS meetings! On campus after campus, students realized the importance oational organization that rejected the politicians and organized grassroots militant struggle. The U.S. rulass could not tolerate an organization like SDS unifying the hundreds of thousands of protesting studenrom all over the U.S., especially an organization that was increasingly accepting ideas from the Marxist-eninist PLP. A multi-pronged strategy was developed to undermine the movement.

enator Eugene McCarthy insisted that he would remain in the race for President and not endorseumphrey; this served to channel thousands of youth out of protests and into electoral work. Universitiend police tolerated the widespread use of marijuana and LSD on campuses. On many campuses, studeould publicly use illegal drugs with no consequences, unless they were considered a political threat. Thehey were sometimes arrested and faced long prison terms. The liberal news media made superstars ouhe biggest fools in the movement in order to make the whole movement look like fools. Liberal anti-ommunists outside the movement gave lots of money to the anti-PLP factions within SDS. And theovernment sent secret police agents, from city, county, and state police, FBI, CIA, and who knows whather agencies, into the movement for generally three purposes: informing, acting like fools orrovocateurs, and trying to create splits within the movement. One Trotskyite group in Tennessee had

more police agents in the group than regular members, which is no surprise because serious activists hao respect for them anyhow.

nti-war demonstrations were happening all over. PLP members worked systematically to recruit people DS, to fight for the worker-student alliance strategy, and to start new SDS chapters. A serious effort byhe SDS National Office leadership could have brought hundreds of new chapters and tens of thousands ew members into SDS. But the NO gang not only had rotten politics. They were incompetent. They websessed with PLP, suppressing articles from PLP members in SDS publications, frustrated that PLP wasaining support for the worker-student alliance strategy and recruiting students to the party. On at leastne occasion, an SDS national leadership meeting degenerated into people standing on tables, throwingishes, and screaming out drunken speeches about which ones of them hated PLP more than the others.he SDS National Office leadership hated PLP more than they hated the ruling class, and they focused thfforts on protecting their positions, rather than on fighting against imperialism. SDS literature was late ietting out, requests for new memberships were delayed or lost, and the opportunity to start hundreds

DS chapters was also squandered away. The NO leadership did some organizing. It usually consisted ofne of the leaders showing up on a campus, making a speech to hundreds of interested students, insulthem for not quitting school, or for being white, or for not being revolutionary enough, and then leavingocal organization disheartened and in a shambles. The other strategy they developed was to makenprincipled alliances with other leftist groups who were hostile towards PLP.

he 1968-1969 school year saw a big increase in the number of anti-racist struggles. Black students onmany campuses held demonstrations and sit-ins against racism. Often the struggle was diverted intoemands that black studies departments be set up, or that black cultural centers be established, or thatdmissions of black students be increased. Police attacks against these students were sometimes veryrutal, especially on the all black campuses.

During this year, the ruling class tried to force the movement onto the defensive by bringing to trial theChicago Eight", eight people who were charged with conspiracy because of the violence during theDemocratic Party convention in Chicago that past summer. They carefully picked the defendants. The focwas Abbie Hoffman, the drug pushing clown whose anti-working class speeches were emphasized in theews media. Also indicted were Bobby Seale, a leader of the Black Panther Party, a couple of pacifists, ane or two liberals who were relatively unknown. The trial dragged on for months. Most of the defendanid not even know each other before the demonstration, and the charge of conspiracy was a frame up. udge met secretly and illegally with prosecutors during the trial, and he gave so many contempt of couritations to the defendants that some of them faced longer prison terms from the contempt citations thahey did for the alleged conspiracy. Bobby Seale had a gag tied over his mouth and his body was tied tohair in the courtroom because he repeatedly challenged the judge. The sight of him tied up and gaggenraged tens of thousands of black and white workers and students. The trial was mainly a farce; after


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many appeals, the defendants got off. But the trial served to intimidate many people, divert others fromaking the offensive against imperialism, and convince many workers and students that the anti-war

movement was run by anti-working class, phony clowns like Abbie Hoffmann.

During that year the police attacks against the Black Panther Party also intensified. The Panthers started s a grassroots organization that patrolled black neighborhoods and reported on police brutality. Eventua

many of them came to realize that the violence of racism had to be met with violence from the masses.hey were a nationalist organization, but they were not an anti-white organization, and much of theirhetoric was influenced by Marx, Lenin, and Mao. The attacks on them were especially murderous. Police

et up ambushes, gunned down a number of activists, and jailed many more. Dozens died. Eventually,ome in the leadership of the Panthers shifted the focus to legal defense and began to work closely withhe "Communist Party" (CPUSA) who exerted influence on them to tone down their militancy.

y November, Eugene McCarthy urged his supporters to vote for the Democrat Hubert Humphrey, butixon won anyhow. Many felt even more alienated from the Democratic Party, and campus activityontinued to surge. In New England and the mid-west members and friends of PLP worked day and nigho build SDS to bring new chapters into the organization, and to fight for the line of worker-student alliaWSA). Anticipating attack from the NO leadership of SDS, a WSA caucus was established to fight for thane within SDS. By now, the NO gang were all talking about workers, too. Events in France as well as throwing support for WSA and PLP within SDS forced them to start imitating the rhetoric of PLP s workinlass line and Leninist analysis. These same characters who just months before were denouncing worker

s reactionary and impotent and making anti-communist attacks against PLP for supposedly being "Pekinriented" and rigidly Leninist and undemocratic suddenly realized the power of a working class, Leninistnalysis. But their essentially vacillating, middle class, self-centered view of the world prevented them frommersing themselves in the working class and fighting for revolution. SDS National Council meetingsontinued to grow. The December, 1968 meeting had about a thousand participants. Tensions were verigh; there were organized chanting confrontations and PLP had to organize a defense squad to defend ghts to speak at microphones.

Winter, 1968-1969 also saw the most sustained, militant campus protest so far. Students at San Francisctate College organized a boycott of the school around a number of demands, including more admissionor black students. The struggle was led by the Third World Liberation Front (TWLF), which had two PLP

members playing leading roles. SDS was active in the coalition, and PLP played a leading role in SDS aswell. Hundreds and hundreds of students were arrested as they attempted to shut the school down. Thedministration would vow to keep it open, only to have hundreds of students surround buildings and shuown, month after month. Students from SFSC made speaking tours to rally support and inspire studentround the country.

LP Develops Its Line

During that school year, PLP concentrated on basebuilding. Despite intense attacks from the NO gang, Pontinued to build its base and increase its membership and support within SDS. Early 1969 also saw anmportant development in the political line of PLP. As the North Vietnamese leadership moved closer andloser to the traitorous leaders of the U.S.S.R. and entered deeper into negotiations with the U.S., ourriticisms of Ho Chi Minh's leadership sharpened. Only People's War could win communism; allying with .S.S.R. would eventually sell out the Vietnamese people. Furthermore, it was in early 1969 that PLP masharp, direct attack on all forms of nationalism.

Marxists have generally opposed the nationalism of imperialist countries, (although the CPUSA did glorify.S. patriotism and other CP's in France, Italy, and elsewhere have similarly pushed patriotism.) But Lennd Stalin were ambivalent on whether nationalism of the oppressed people from the exploited countries

was good. On the one hand, Marx, Lenin, and Stalin all emphasized at various points that nationalism worm of bourgeois, capitalist ideology. It went against internationalism and was a form of selfish ideology

my people, my country, etc. On the other hand, Lenin and Stalin were sensitive to unevenness andweaknesses in the capitalist-imperialist camp, and at points they did believe that struggles to drivemperialists out of exploited countries could be useful in weakening the imperialist centers. That is true, those struggles are led by forces committed to some kind of capitalism, then it will mean continued


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ppression for the working class. Lenin and Stalin hoped that pro-Communist forces would lead thenational liberation" struggle and would be able to defeat the pro-capitalist forces. By 1970, PLP concludhat those struggles lead to the preservation of capitalism and especially, making alliances with capitalist

misleads the working class and encourages pro-capitalist consciousness, which is the worst mistake thatommunists can ever make.

LP did not reach this conclusion from rereading some sacred texts. This came from practical experiencespecially in the 1960's. In Algeria, the national liberation struggle supported by communists all over the

world had defeated the French, only to have anti-Communists come to power to continue to oppress the

working class. In Indonesia, over a half million communists and their supporters were slaughtered in a fweeks' time; they had made an alliance with Sukarno, a nationalistic capitalist who threatened to cut intmperialist profits, instead of organizing an independent movement for communist revolution. Fidel Castrowas tying Cuba closer and closer to the rotten bosses of the U.S.S.R. Maybe "oppressed group nationalisould help militarily defeat a particular imperialist in the short run, but it leads back to capitalism, which

means all the destruction and death of the war was wasted and would have to be repeated in a genuineevolution.

Within the U.S., as well, PLP concluded that oppressed group nationalism, which was mainly blackationalism and various forms of Hispanic nationalism, was also a dead end. Unity with bosses from thelack and Latino communities would not lead to self-determination; those bosses are inevitably tied to or another ruling class financial circle, and some of those bosses are vicious exploiters in their own right

lack and Latino cops kill black and Latino youth, black mayors fire black sanitation workers on strike, anlack businessmen exploit and super-exploit black workers. The only self-determination is communism. Ather kind of "self-determination" strategy means self-determination for some capitalists and oppression he working class. Studying about the ancient slave owning kings of Africa or getting Afro-American Stud

Departments and cultural centers would not help confront and defeat racism, and encouraging blacktudents to leave the working class to attend college to become middle level bosses in service to the racystem would not help the masses of black workers. Twenty years later, the correctness of our position heen proven again and again.

We do understand the importance of fighting racism within college courses, and ignoring the achievemenf non-European cultures is one form of racism. But letting standard history courses teach "white, male,uling class history" which most students take, while setting up a few "black history" courses that a fewnti-racists students take is actually avoiding the struggle against racism. Increasing the numbers of blactudents on campus has become a more complex issue. It is true that denying black youth the opportunor education to become teachers, nurses, and engineers is a form of racism. On the other hand, the maurpose of a college education from the ruling class point of view, is not to train people for jobs. Jobraining could be done cheaper and more efficiently in other ways. The main purpose is to build loyalty tapitalism and the ideas that support capitalism among many of young people who really need to be ally

with blue collar and white collar workers and fighting against capitalism alongside them.

s communists we are proud of the working class and believe that working class youth should fight forommunism rather than try to solve their problems individualistically, by trying to become part of a so-alled middle class. There are now thousands of black cops, politicians, administrators, lawyers, bosses,

managers who help protect the racist profits of capitalism, and many of those traitors got their positionsecause of the anti-racist struggles of the working class. While we oppose racist policies on campus thatxclude or push out black, Latino, and other working class students, it was especially important, in theontext of the rise of "middle class" black nationalism, to take a strong stand against the line that the wo defeat racism was for individuals to rise higher in the capitalist system.

ommunist parties develop campaigns and lines of struggle based on what will help build communistonsciousness and commitment within the context of the class struggle at the time; every set of demandxcept "Communism!" is imperfect and incomplete in so far as they might exclude some progressive aspf the class struggle. We oppose whatever the bosses want by taking it to a higher level. When the bosshut it down, we say to the working class "Take It Over and Open It Up"; when they try to keep it open

with exploitative business as usual, we say "Shut It Down." As it turned out, in the 1970's many schoolseveloped almost completely open admissions policies without mass struggle; the ruling class was not


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pposed to exposing many more black youth to a couple of years of college. However, as the economyides down in the 1990's, we can expect to see increased efforts to force black, Latino, and other workilass students out of the universities.

Within SDS, the NO gang tried to use PLP's critique of nationalism to say that PL was objectively allied whe imperialists and racists. PL's critique was not some abstract polemic; internationally, we sharpened oritique of Ho Chi Minh and within the U.S., we offered a very sharp, but essentially supportive, critique he Black Panther Party's conservative move towards legal defense and fundraising. For the anti-workinglass, anti-communist NO gang, this was an opportunity to pretend that they were the "real" Marxist-

eninists. But PLP continued to build a base for anti-imperialist worker-student alliance and revolution.n three hundred years, Harvard University, the most prestigious university in the U.S., had never been sown. It weathered world wars and national economic collapse. The PLP-led WSA caucus led the majoritf the SDS chapter at Harvard. Carefully applying revolutionary basebuilding to even Harvard University, arty had been involved in systematic, door-to-door organizing in the university dormitories. There wereemonstrations, forums, study groups, and a thousand debates and discussions with rank-and-file studebout Harvard's role in supporting imperialism. A major assault against Harvard would be important for t

whole campus movement. After considerable planning, a group of about 200 students took over the maniversity building demanding an end to ROTC officer training and an end to the university's destruction

working class housing. City police were brought in, and again, many students were beaten bloody whileeing arrested. SDS called for a strike, and thousands of students responded in support. Harvard was sh

own! The campus remained shut down for weeks while student activists flocked to Boston to learn abohe strike. Militant actions continued on dozens of other universities, and interest in SDS continued to sw

s SDS prepared for its July, 1969 National Convention in Chicago, it was obvious that there would be amajor confrontation between the old National Office leadership of SDS and the forces led by PLP. Fifteenundred people showed up for the convention, in an atmosphere of extreme intimidation. The NO gangearched people entering the hall and consistently harassed pro-PLP forces. PLP had its own defense sqo guarantee its right to speak and the safety of our members and supporters. The atmosphere in the

meeting room was very tense as the NO gang tried to evaluate how much strength they had. They paragroup of speakers to the front to attack PLP. Members of the Black Panther Party who felt that they wbove criticism were brought in to attack PLP. They said that they were the vanguard and nobody wasllowed to criticize them, and that PLP was the enemy, and that if SDS did not kick PLP out of SDS, thenhe Panthers would "deal with" SDS as well. This produced the expected reaction of racist fear in many ohe middle class white students who were supporting the NO gang; all their stupid racist fears of beingiolently attacked by black men with guns was suddenly right before them! The Panthers couldn't quite poff smoothly however; their speeches were punctuated with especially vicious anti-women comments t

rew choruses of boos from the crowd and exposed the NO gang for being opportunist, racist, and sexis

hen a leader of the NO gang said that in light of the Panthers' comments, all the anti-PLP forces wouldaucus in the next room to discuss what to do. Less than half went into the other room, including someenter forces who were curious about what was going to happen there. It was obvious that there wouldsplit, and there were a number of students there who were uneasy about accepting leadership from P

ut who also detested the corrupt leadership of the NO gang. The charge that PLP was betraying the antmperialist struggle because PLP dared to criticize Ho Chi Minh fell flat, because it was obvious that PLP ctively fighting against imperialism and racism harder than any of the NO gang; we did the dormrganizing, leafleted the factories, confronted the police, and sent people into the military while the NOang held press conferences and made speeches.

fter a day or so, the NO gang returned with their supporters. Members and leaders of PLP were onxtreme alert. We made the estimate that there would be an attempt to start a full scale riot among thefteen hundred people inside the hall so that the police could attack the hall, beat and arrest hundreds, attempt to destroy SDS. No matter how viciously the NO gang spoke, we were to remain silent in order o provoke a riot. If attacked, we would, of course, fight back. Bernadine Dohrn approached the

microphone trying hard to look militant and made a statement that concluded with the words that PLP wow expelled from SDS. At that point, the hall fell dead silent, and as they say, the air really was so stillharged with tension that you really could feel electricity in the air. Then, suddenly, the voice of one


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woman from the audience crackled through the hall. She was laughing. The absurdity of a small minorityxpelling the majority of people from the hall was too much to bear. Then hundreds and hundreds ofeople joined in the laughter and then started chanting as about five hundred walked out of the hall.

he nine hundred or so who remained elected officers and pledged to continue to build SDS. But the oldO gang had control of the office and most importantly, of the membership lists. They were able to put

mailings to the SDS membership full of lies about how the majority kicked a small minority of PLPupporters out of SDS. The majority group did not have access to any of the mailing lists and had to tryeconstruct the organization based on personal contacts. The capitalist news media ran story after story

bout how SDS had collapsed and no longer existed. The liberal and revisionist media took the side of thO gang, sometimes criticizing them, but blaming the collapse on PLP. One story that they spread was tLP had packed the convention with hundreds of PLP members who weren't even students in order to wotes; in reality, there were fewer than sixty PLP members out of the fifteen hundred there. But consiste

with the bourgeois line, the liberals could not believe that the masses could accept leadership fromommunists; so they had to say that it was a trick! The media did a job spreading cynicism through the

movement, and the NO gang finished the job. As soon as they distanced themselves from PLP, they rapidegenerated into a collection of squabbling middle class cults, each led by its own self-proclaimed genius

heir version of the SDS newspaper became more and more bizarre, full of self-congratulatory rhetoric aanguage that attempted to imitate a combination of badly translated Lenin and the worst stereotype ofow racists believed that black people spoke. Then they split, and split again, and split again. Every

oudmouth from the NO gang had to be the leader, so they each formed their own little group. TheWeathermen" later "Weather Underground" gained the most publicity. They were very heavily infiltratedhe police, and they made a name for themselves by pretending to be terrorists. Actually, they did nothio hurt the ruling class. A few of them blew themselves up playing with bombs in an expensive New Yorkpartment, but mostly they did stupid, impotent things, like running through a Pittsburgh high schoolndressed, in order to shock the students. The capitalist news media loved them.

hey were the perfect stereotypes -- it was a virtually all-white group. One was a lawyer, one was the sf the millionaire head of Commonwealth Edison, the electric company that cheats the Chicago workinglass, and many of the remainder were from upper class and upper middle income families. If a person'saddy has a lot of money, it does not automatically mean that the person is reactionary. But when a groonsists of a bunch of pretty well off kids, whose whole purpose is to express their personal rage, then ts just another form of liberalism -- liberalism with noise, maybe a bomb or two, but mostly thunder withghtning or rain. Threatening: "If you don't stop the war, I'm going to hold my breath until I turn blue" aying: "If you don't stop the war, I'm going to bomb a statue in the park" is in essence the same thingeeble liberal rage. A few in the Weather Underground split and got involved in some robberies, but in th

main, they served the bosses well by maintaining the lie that revolutionaries were spoiled, nutty, white rids.

Most SDS members did not attend the Chicago convention. The only news they got about SDS was fromapitalist news media, which said SDS no longer existed, and from the rapidly disintegrating NO gang (wad the mailing lists), whose pathetic ranting disgusted anyone serious about fighting the system. ManyDS chapters disbanded. The NO gang tried to maintain the name SDS and the SDS newspaper for som

months, but it got stranger and stranger. There were hysterical ramblings bordering on fascist ideologybout riding the rhythm of rock and roll music and grooving with the violence and so forth. Their high ponsisted of a feeble action in Chicago's wealthy Gold Coast neighborhood; several hundred ran through treets breaking windows in stores and parked cars. Numbers of them were arrested, and several leadered. The FBI then put some of the leaders on the "most wanted" list because fleeing state lines was aederal crime. They went into hiding and the news media was now able to say that these rich, white kid

were terrorists in hiding on the most wanted list. It is important to note that the charges that most of theaders were fleeing from were insignificant misdemeanors, such as mob action, disorderly conduct, etc.nd when some of the main leaders finally turned themselves after fifteen or so years in hiding, most ofhem received very light penalties; most got no jail sentences, in contrast to hundreds of activists, includ

many in PLP, whom the bosses jailed for months during that period. The "Weather Underground" servedhe cops well; as in other countries, police agents can damage a movement by using provocateurs such hese.


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hose NO gang leaders who did not join the Weather Underground set up a couple of sects based on Maworship and worship of their own "chairmen." The group led by Klonsky went through twists and turnsrying to justify every rightwing turn the Chinese leadership took. His group was riddled with disgustingersonal corruption and eventually collapsed. The group led by Avakian hung on as a tiny sect thatlternates between opportunistic politics hidden by a kind of poorly done imitation of militant, angry urbaouth language while pathetically trying to elevate "Chairman Avakian" to superstar status.

On the heels of the SDS split, capitalism had yet another weapon to use against the developing anti-mperialist youth movement. A massive concert, lasting several days and involving hundreds of thousand

outh was held at Woodstock. The counter-cultural movement, which had been somewhat linked to theeftist political movement in their common objection to certain aspects of capitalism, was now following inevitable path towards being another form of capitalist diversion. While some said that rock music fosteolitical rebellion, in the main, it lived off of that rebellion and diverted that rebellion into safe channels uling class could accept, including drug abuse and other forms of selfish personal gratification.

he 1969 -1970 school year started out calmer on campus than the previous year. The SDS chapters thaLP led were still thriving, growing, and PLP advanced a new strategy for the campus movement. The

Worker-Student Alliance could not simply be a strategy; it had to be a reality. When any movement reacs limits, it must either transform based on the processes that have developed within it, or it must becowisted, perverted, distorted and eventually die out. The campus movement had militantly battled policehut down universities, and mobilized hundreds of thousands of students. If that movement did not

roaden its approach and focus its intense energy outward towards the working class, it would self-estruct. It was approaching its limits as a campus only movement. PLP proposed the Campus Workertudent Alliance (CWSA) to focus students' efforts on building real, flesh and blood ties between studentnd workers. PLP had organized "work-ins" where dozens of students took factory jobs for the summer rder to build ties with workers and build anti-imperialism within the industrial working class. The CWSA

was based on the idea that the obvious place that students could reach out to workers on a consistentasis was the campus. SDS chapters effectively supported and participated in many rank and file campus

workers' struggles. There was some confusion as some members mistakenly thought that we werebandoning the anti-imperialist struggle in order to concentrate on winning economic demands for camp

workers. That was wrong. The goal was to build an anti-imperialist base of support among workers andevelop lasting relationships that would build a solid alliance.

all, 1969 saw another massive demonstration in Washington. The party proposed that SDS lead a breaway from the main march over to the Department of Labor building in support of General Electric workehat were striking. The chant: "Warmaker, Strikebreaker, Smash GE" rang out as over seven thousandeople joined our action. For the next few months, the campuses actually toned down a bit. There wereome struggles organized by black students, but the belief that SDS had collapsed hurt the campus anti

war movement. In December, 1969, several leaders of the Black Panther Party were murdered by Chicagolice. There were some militant protests, but some of the optimism of the anti-imperialist campus

movement was fading, as Nixon, drugs, the SDS split, and political repression took their toll. In March,970, there were a few rumblings again. SDS and PLP led a crowd of four thousand students at Berkelegainst ROTC. They were attacked by the police and they drove the police off campus. There were a fewther skirmishes on campuses. Then, President Nixon ordered the U.S. military to invade Cambodia.

here were explosions on dozens of campuses. Tens of thousands of students took to the streets, oftenwith no organizational leadership. The war was broadening out; it was time to take action. President Nixot on television and called the protestors "bums." Governors ordered the National Guard onto manyampuses. On a number of campuses, students were shot. At Kent State University, four of the studentsied. The news media carried pictures of the shootings, including of Guardsmen firing into a crowd, usinegal pistols, and shooting at people who were running away. Then, campuses exploded all over the Untates. Actually, over a dozen black students were killed by police over the previous few years, but racisaused many students to take the Kent State shootings more seriously. Maybe it was the realization thaapitalism was coming to get them too that shocked them. In any case, over five hundred campuses wehut down by angry students who blocked doorways, occupied buildings, and fought pitched battles usinottles, stones, and sticks against the police. ROTC buildings were burned down on a number of campus


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nd many campuses stayed shut down for the rest of the school year.

n the context of that struggle, SDS tried to focus the campus strikes against the university administrationd government. Students were demanding an end to military recruiting, ROTC, and Defense Departmenesearch. On many campuses, liberal students and faculty made deals with university presidents to hurt nti-war struggle by pretending to support it. College presidents officially closed their campuses for a feways to shed some phony tears, take control of the anti-war movement, and then reopen the colleges w

mperialist business as usual. Revisionist groups aided this sell out in ways that were especially treacheron Detroit, at Wayne State University, for example, the Trotskyite "Socialist Workers Party" argued that

orcing ROTC off campus was not a revolutionary enough demand; they said it would be better to takeontrol over the whole university and turn it into an anti-war university, a center from which anti-wartudents could organize the whole city. It sounded very revolutionary, but see how it worked out. Theniversity bosses agreed to give the SWP gang office space, use of printing facilities, and paper. The SWhen said that the university was now "theirs" and there was no need to keep the strike going. MembersDS and PLP said that as long as ROTC continued on that campus, students should keep the strike goinnd keep the picket lines up. SWP_supporters opposed the strike and some even joined with pro-fascisttudents in breaking the picket lines to reopen the school. Eventually the school reopened, and ROTCemained on campus to help the U.S. government carry out the war. The SWP got bought real cheap -- ttle bit of paper and some ink. There is a lesson here for organizers about learning how to see beneathevolutionary rhetoric to grasp the essence of a political line.

he massive strikes following Kent State was the high point, and the beginning of the end of the campunti-war movement. The liberals organized another big march on Washington, the last really massivemarch. SDS and PLP called for another breakaway at the Labor Department and this time, about 15,000oined us. The police-infested "Weathermen" organized an attack against our office there, and weuccessfully beat them up as we had done time after time. But on the campuses, the mood was changin

Many students said: "I didn't believe you revolutionaries when you said that capitalism was ruthless. I wwrong. You were right. I'm scared. I'm going to drop out of things for a while." If SDS had still had themass following it had just twelve months before, it could have tied those hundreds of campus shut dowogether into one unified movement, it could have further helped to consolidate anti-imperialism as theeading ideology of that movement, and it could have helped sustain the optimism and confidence that tulers were working to erode. The U.S. bosses anticipated that; their worst campus nightmare was for

Marxist-Leninist PLP to lead a worker-student alliance oriented SDS which in turn was leading hundreds

housands of students -- the powerful combination that would lead to masses joining and helping lead tevolutionary communist movement.

he following two years (1970-71, and 1971-72) were marked by a major let down on campus. The newmedia began to report protests less and less. In a sense, that points out a major weakness of the Sixtiesnti-war movement. They were dependent on the capitalist news media for publicizing their actions, and

when the news media cut back, much of that movement became isolated, because they did not build a bwith the working class. There were occasional bright spots during that time, such as the shouting andlapping down by 1200 students at Harvard of government mouthpieces who were defending U.S. policyut in general, the movement was fragmented, and the "Weather Underground" proved very helpful to tosses in harming the movement. Other secret police agents were involved in various phony terrorist ploo discredit the movement, and by now, drug use was so common on college campuses that one could s

marijuana clouds floating out the windows of conservative fraternity houses. The movement was furtheronfused by developments in Vietnam and China. The North Vietnamese leadership was now seriouslyalking with the U.S. Students wondered: Would the war end soon? Should we continue to risk educatioobs, life, and limb if there is going to be a settlement any day now? Then Mao Zedong, the most imporevolutionary in the world, began discussions to improve relations with Nixon. Nixon couldn't go to any cn the U.S. without facing angry protests, but he could go to China and be welcomed with smiles and huhis further undermined the anti-imperialist movement all over the world, including in the U.S. Was the

most prestigious Marxist-Leninist in the world saying that Nixon and U.S. capitalism was not so bad? Someftists tried to defend that policy with some bizarre logic about how Mao the government official had aifferent capacity from Mao the communist. But the effect was to confuse and demoralize sections of thenti-imperialist movement in the U.S.


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DS and PLP continued to build a base. Although the mass anti-war movement was in a state of declineur party continued to sharpen our line and recruit more and more students to the party. We reevaluateur work and made a sharp self-criticism that we had not fought nationalism hard enough in the past, as a result had not won enough black students and workers into membership and leadership of the partDS focused more sharply on campus racism, as well, organizing campaigns against academic racists sucs Jensen, Herrnstein, Shockley, and Banfield. The bosses were now funding campus Afro-Americanultural Centers as a way to undercut the anti-racist movement, and Senator George McGovern wasrought out to be a "peace" candidate for President in order to further divert the energies of youth. Andhe negotiations with North Vietnam dragged on. And the Chinese leadership got cozier and cozier with t

.S.

n November, 1972, Nixon defeated McGovern by the then largest margin in U.S. history. In the spring o973, it was clear that the U.S. was losing the war. Nixon hoped that massive bombing of Hanoi, the caf North Vietnam, might force the North Vietnamese to negotiate a settlement that would allow the U.S.

east some part of Vietnam. Thousands of civilians were killed by the U.S. bombs. There were militantrotests on a number of U.S. campuses and cities, but they were not sustained for long.

During that two year period when campus activity had fallen off, there was increasing militancy from theworking class. There were strikes in major industries, and militant caucuses were leading wildcat strikesgainst their union leaderships as well. The important anti-war action was taking place inside the militarhousands of U.S. soldiers were refusing to follow orders. Several hundred U.S. officers were killed by U

roops, and the U.S. military stockade at Long Binh was burned down by U.S. troops. The bosses had tollow, even encourage drug use as a way to try to prevent rebellions. The U.S was still losing the war inietnam, and more people in the U.S. were questioning how the U.S. could have the support of theietnamese people if the war was so hard to win. When the massive, murderous bombing of Hanoi failedring the North Vietnamese to their knees U.S. policy began to emphasize "Vietnamization." This policy upposed to replace U.S. troops with anti-communist troops from the South Vietnamese government. Buhere were enough South Vietnamese troops to defeat the rebels to begin with, it would not have beenecessary for the U.S. to intervene so massively in the first place. Basically, as the U.S. gradually pulled f Vietnam, the South Vietnamese military lost battle after battle. In 1975, the NLF and North Vietnamesrmy directly attacked Saigon and captured the city, while newspapers all over the world showed desperrightened U.S. personnel climbing onto helicopters to flee.

he U.S. war against Vietnam was over, although the destruction continued. Large parts of Cambodia weevastated, populations were dislocated, and famine and war brought on by the U.S. war against Vietna

ed to the deaths of hundreds of thousands there, and the Vietnamese had to cope with thousands ofnjured, with destroyed industrial facilities, and with burned and poisoned land. But the war was over, anhe anti-war movement was over.

fter burning down buildings and shutting down schools, the campus movement had reached its limit. Itwas faced with the choice of transforming to worker-student alliance or become twisted, and distorted aventually defeated. That movement was not totally defeated. Out of it came the International Committegainst Racism (InCAR). By late 1974, SDS as an organization had also reached its limit. What was need

was an organization that was the worker-student alliance, rather than an organization of students thatwould ally with workers. SDS was dissolved and most of the activists joined the International Committeegainst Racism (InCAR), which PL had helped organize to build a mass movement against campus racismnCAR soon developed a base off the campus as well, and established a firm base in a number of cities,

with branches at schools, hospitals, factories, and neighborhoods. As we enter another period of inter-mperialist wars, InCAR and PLP are in a much stronger position to lead masses of workers and studentshan we were in the 1960's.

What Came Out Of It?

here is a tendency to view the campus anti-war movement in one-sided ways. Some people mistakenlyay that that movement was the main force that ended the war. Others say that that movement wasrelevant to anything. The campus movement was not a main force in ending that war, but it was an

mportant force in helping to build anti-imperialist consciousness in general and the communist moveme


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LP, in particular.

he campus movement did help spread the idea that the U.S. government was wrong, and that it wasood to use militant action to stop the war. To some extent, some members of the working class were

nfluenced by these ideas, and it is probably true that anti-war activities in the U.S. helped develop thenti-Vietnam War consciousness of some of the troops. This was good, but it should not be overestimathe urban rebellions did far more to promote militancy than did the campus protests.

he anti-war movement probably helped create a climate in the U.S. that prevented the U.S. ruling class

rom militarily intervening in Angola in 1975. President Ford wanted such an intervention, but Congresswould not appropriate the money. But again, the anti-war sentiment within the military was a much morotent force in preventing a U.S. military adventure in Angola. Besides, the U.S. continued to fund a faserrorist group there to keep the leftist government there from consolidating power for some years, whilehe same time, major imperialist oil companies made deals with the leftist Angola government guaranteeheir profits. It was not crucial for the U.S. to invade Angola.

urthermore, the remnants of the anti-war movement were not strong enough to prevent U.S. militaryction in Panama, Libya, Grenada, Lebanon, and now, the deployment of a half million troops for a majo

war in the Persian Gulf. Without communist revolution, all reforms eventually get taken away.

inally, the anti-war movement helped create a general anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist climate that stillxists in the U.S. People are more skeptical of big corporations, of imperialism, and of capitalism. Tens ohousands of people were affected by that movement and chose jobs in areas such as teaching, where t

wanted to continue to spread anti-imperialist, anti-racist ideas. But again, this should not be overestimaMuch of that anti-imperialist sentiment has been tangled up with pacifism, which only disarms the anti-mperialist movement. On the other hand, as discussed above, the development of InCAR has helpedustain anti-imperialist, pro-Communist consciousness and activity in many places.

n the end, what matters is the growth of communist consciousness, the development of a communistmovement, and the building of a revolutionary communist party. In the U.S., this has been the PLP, whias now become an international communist party. Some readers might think that this conclusion is narnd self-centered. But if we examine the general development of capitalism, we see that it leads tomperialism, to economic collapse, to fascism, and to war. There have been massive movements whichpposed war, economic oppression, and fascism, that were much more powerful than the Sixties movemn the U.S. The anti-fascist movements in Germany and Indonesia and Chile and Argentina and Iran andozens of other countries are examples of that. But in country after country, no matter what types of gahe working class won -- housing, medical care, jobs, breaking up of some large imperialist corporations arms -- in the end, the fascists, in alliance with the liberals, will sweep all those gains away if those gainose a threat to the maintenance of capitalism. And along the way, they will kill and kill and kill millions

who oppose them, not just communists, but anyone, whether anti-capitalist or pro-capitalist, who might threat to them. Only revolution can permanently end that threat, and revolution can only happen with

evolutionary communist party to develop and lead that struggle.

n fact, even in countries where socialist revolution took place, first state capitalism and now major aspef corporate capitalism are being restored, along with all the racist, sexist, exploitative, and pro-imperialolicies that capitalism inevitably develops. Socialist revolution is not an adequate solution; the revolution

must guarantee communist economic relations and reject all forms of special privilege, of nationalism, ofapitalism. If socialist revolution was not a guarantee, how can anyone believe that anything less thanevolution can sustain any victories?

he campus anti-war movement did help develop the PLP. As a result of leading struggles against themperialist war, our party recruited hundreds of members who in turn have helped recruit many more. Bqually important as the quantitative growth of the party has been the qualitative development of thearty's line and membership. In the early days, party leaders would say that PLP had the revolutionary lut it could not call itself the vanguard party until it was firmly rooted in the working class. The strugglever the past twenty five years has been in that direction, and PLP is truly a revolutionary working classarty. Many students from the anti-war movement were won to joining the party and helping to help


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ecruit many of the workers who today help lead the party.

inally, that struggle helped the party to sharpen our understanding about what communism is and howet it. Our line moved further to the left as a result of actual experience. The more we criticized blackationalism, the more successful we became at winning black workers and students to membership and

eadership of the party. The more we attacked the international revisionists, the more our internationalwork has grown. Our experience with the liberals taught us that they were not simply cowards and sell-uts, unwilling to go all the way; on the contrary, the are willing to fight very hard against us and the ref the working class.

Our initial criticism of the Vietnamese communists was not quite accurate; we said that alliance with the.S.S.R. and negotiations with the U.S. would prevent the complete removal of U.S. imperialism fromietnam. Actually, the revisionists did totally defeat the U.S. But now they are inviting them back. And a

we watched the heroic struggle of millions of Vietnamese people lead to invitations for the imperialists toeturn to Vietnam to exploit the working class, as we watch the once socialist U.S.S.R. become a majormperialist force in the world, and a participant in imperialist wars for profit, the truth should be clearerhan ever. The working class can settle for nothing less than a complete destruction of racism, of sexismationalism, of all forms of capitalism, of all forms of exploitation. Anything less than world communism y an international party will lead again and again back into the cycle of capitalist exploitation, fascism,

world war.

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The Rise and Fall of the Anti-Vietnam War Movement in the U.S.

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