Nick G.

The terrorist violence in Paris appals people everywhere. Terrorism is the antithesis of what Communists strive for in order to achieve the overthrow of capitalism and imperialism.

Communists seek to build the capacity of the people to achieve their own liberation. They believe that the end of the imperialist era will be the result of a mass struggle undertaken by the people.

Terrorism by contrast unleashes acts of violence against randomly targeted members of the population.  In nearly all cases, these are the same people whose lives we seek to enrich and expand by bringing capitalism and imperialism to an end.

In so far as terrorism involves acts of violence designed to intimidate opponents by making everyone feel afraid and unsafe, the greatest use of terrorist violence in the modern era has come from the colonialist and imperialist powers.

Civilian targets of US drone attacks are as much victims of terrorism as the 129 innocents killed in Paris.  In the frontier wars waged by the British colonialists to seize this country from its Aboriginal inhabitants, frequent reference was made to the use of “exemplary violence” and to “inducing a state of terror in the natives”.

The Australian Communist poet and playwright Christopher Barnett has lived in France for the last 30 years.  Writing on his Facebook page, he identifies points of commonality between the ISIS-inspired terrorists and those of imperialism:

“the salafist takfiris, are as perverted a form of islam as it is possible to be

“fascists of all kinds have one thing in common, they are fascinated with themselves & they hate the people, despise the people, especially the innocent, especially the innocent

“the connection between imperial power & these hoodlums is that they choose soft targets, they always have, it does not take great inspiration to murder unarmed people whether it is in tal afar, beirut or paris.”

There is nothing anti-imperialist in the terrorism of ISIS and similar groups.  In so far as they aspire to establish the Caliphate they resemble nothing more than the imperialists they purport to despise.  Like the imperialists, they are convinced of their own righteousness, of their own values and beliefs and will stop at nothing to impose themselves on others through force and violence.

Our Party extends its sympathies to the people of Paris, but our proletarian internationalist convictions require us in the very same breath to extend our sympathies to victims of both ISIS and the imperialist powers in Iraq, Libya, Syria and Yemen, to the Palestinians and Kurds with their as yet unrealised aspirations for formal nationhood, and to the many African nations and peoples seeking freedom and social advancement.