Meanwhile, in Nepal...
By GARY LEUPP
February 16, 2005
Meanwhile, in Nepal...
The Bushites are preoccupied with creating their empire, fighting against governments which actually mount no challenge to U.S. imperialism (in the Leninist sense), governments willing to work out accommodations with the U.S., and normalize diplomatic and trade relations. In early 2003, Saddam Hussein, fearing invasion, offered the U.S. unlimited weapons inspection rights, oil concessions, and Iraqi support for any U.S. Middle East peace plan, in exchange for calling off the planned attack. In March 2003, Richard Perle rejected the proposal as a "no-starter," demanding instead that as the price of peace Saddam should leave Iraq and his army surrender to U.S. forces. Saddam, with a history of CIA ties, wasn't opposed to the U.S. system. Nor are the Iranian mullahs, really, who preside over a capitalist economy largely dependent on foreign capital.
But while the administration with long-term inter-imperialist relationships in mind proceeds down its road to Damascus, far off in the Himalayan foothills revolutionaries dead-serious about overthrowing capitalism and imperialism are making steady progress. The People's Liberation Army of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), which has been waging a People's War since 1996, might actually soon seize state power. They had already gained control of much of the Nepali countryside when popular King Birendra and other members of the royal family died in a mysterious shooting rampage in 2001. Birendra's brother Gyanendra succeeded him and has been an unpopular monarch from the outset. Maoists stepped up their military campaign after he took the throne, prompting the prime minister to step down. The next prime minister announced a truce with the rebels, and peace talks began in June. The Maoists demanded an end to the monarchy and the convening of a convention to write a new constitution, eventually dropping the first demand. But no progress was made, and the Maoists resumed fighting in November. Gyanendra proclaimed a state of emergency. In January 2002 Colin Powell paid a visit to Nepal, the first ever visit by a U.S. secretary of state, denounced the Maoists as "terrorists," called the war against them part of the war on terror, and offered military aid. Gyanendra officially designated the rebels "terrorists" as well.
But since then the CPN(M) has steadily consolidated control over the countryside, following Mao's strategy of encircling the cities. In the capital of Kathmandu, it repeatedly demonstrated its ability to shut the city down by calling general strikes (bandh). Its student and women's organizations held large demonstrations, pressing demands, wielding much clout in the city. The government held a second round of talks beginning in May 2003, having bowed to a rebel demand that the "terrorist" label be removed. These too broke down. In recent months the rebels have shown their ability to shut down all roads leading to the capital. Last month the king of neighboring Bhutan told reporters in India, "today the Maoists have total control more or less of the whole country."
That was before Gyanendra, on Feb. 1, sacked the prime minister and his cabinet, declared martial law, cut phone and internet lines to Kathmandu, arrested dozens of political leaders and announced he was assuming direct rule for three years. Nearly all political commentators believe this move will only strengthen the insurgency.
For several years the king, parliamentary parties, and the Maoists have engaged in a triangular power struggle. The parties support the constitutional monarchy and deplore Maoist violence, but want talks. The Maoists express contempt for the parties, including the several ostensibly "communist" ones, and insist, with Mao, that "political power grows out of the barrel of the gun." But they unite with the parties in protesting policies of the king. After the breakdown of the second round of talks, they stated that they would only be interested in direct talks with the monarch himself. Now Gyanendra has called for such talks, and indicated he's even willing to discuss a constituent assembly. But it may be too late for the king. The Maoists have declined his offer. "Gyanendra has pushed the country into darkness _ there is no justification for immediate talks," stated CPN(M) leader Prachanda. Meanwhile, on Feb. 9, the Maoists busted out 145 prisoners, including comrades, from a jail in the western district of Kailaliat.
The king of Bhutan is worried, because Bhutan has its own embryonic Maoist insurgency. India has a huge Maoist movement with an increasing degree of organizational unity. Attacking police and landlords, the Maoists have taken control of much of the region around Hyderbad and for some years have been able to shut the city down when they call a bandh. The Maoists of Nepal and India make no bones about the fact that they are coordinating actions and envision People's Wars enveloping much of South Asia, including Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.
One scenario is Indian military intervention in Nepal, producing a Maoist-led nationalistic response, accompanied by protests from the Indian masses and stepped-up guerrilla war within India. But China, however unhappy with a Maoist regime on the Tibetan border (a real Maoist regime to shame the capitalist-roaders in Beijing), would be even less happy with Indian troops in Nepal. The Maoists' victory may come at a time when the U.S. is bogged down in a broadened war against "Islamic terrorism" and has few resources to fight the old bugaboo, communism. Which after all was pronounced dead, with some fanfare, after the collapse of the USSR.
The revival of communism as a global challenge would be the Bush administration's worst nightmare. Maoists aren't likely to hijack planes and crash them into American skyscrapers. But they're likely to strive to build egalitarian societies free of foreign domination, inspiring others in the process, including many in the imperialist countries. It has happened before (think 1968). Back in October 2002 I wrote an article in which I cited a British officer's statement to the Telegraph that the Maoists would "continue to gain ground. Unless something dramatic happens, it's only a matter of time before they win." I suggested then some of the possible international consequences:
The radical left throughout the world would be heartened by a victory, somewhere; impressed to see the red flag planted, as the secretary-general of the CPN(M), Prachanda, likes to put it, atop Mt. Everest, the roof of the world. (I think particularly of the Maoists in the Philippines, and their 14,000-strong New People's Army, who are also engaged in a people's war and have control over 8,000 villages throughout the Filipino archipelago; and of the Senderistas in Peru, who show some signs of revival.) The governments of the world---virtually all of them---would be very highly displeased, and mainstream intellectuals puzzled. The victory would, after all, constitute a challenge to the Fukuyama thesis (about the "and of history" as a clash of ideologies) and the Huntington thesis (about the "clash of civilizations"). We'd be back to the old capitalism vs. communism discussion, which was supposed to be behind us, all settled, and consigned to the rubbish heap of history!
Let the discussion begin.
Gary Leupp is Professor of History at Tufts University, and Adjunct Professor of Comparative Religion. He is the author of Servants, Shophands and Laborers in in the Cities of Tokugawa Japan; Male Colors: The Construction of Homosexuality in Tokugawa Japan; and Interracial Intimacy in Japan: Western Men and Japanese Women, 1543-1900. He is also a contributor to CounterPunch's merciless chronicle of the wars on Iraq, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia, Imperial Crusades.
He can be reached at: gleupp@granite.tufts.edu
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