Will the WPB/PVDA/PTB join the accusation that the KKE is (still) not free of 'Chruchov-Breznjevian “left”-formulated, revisionism'?(4)

While analysing (in Will the WPB/PVDA/PTB join the accusation that the KKE is (still) not free of 'Chruchov-Breznjevian “left”-formulated, revisionism'?(2) ) the critic of Alexandré Garcia, “En defensa del pueblo chino (1a parte)” on the article ”The International role of China”, writtten by Elisseos Vagenas, member of the CC of KKE, I realised how the ACTUAL revisionist leadership of the WPB/PVDA/PTB once manipulated the congresses, in preparation of a later “revisionist transformation”.

Important political analyses (to compare with analyses which were made in the KKE and then submitted to an affirmation on the 19^th congress) made by Ludo Martens - when he was still by-majority-on-congresses elected president of the WPB – normally should have been discussed, eventually amended and then voted in order to be a party-point-of view which had to be assimilated by alle party-members.

But those analyses, presented as “books written by Ludo Martens” were integrally – but very formally – presented as “party-points-of view” in reports ABOUT the congresses. And - in the beginning – everybody was urged “to buy, read and promote around him or her “ those books. But this “guideline” quiet down and now (while those books are not printed and sold anymore by EPO itself) the new leadership can take positions which are OPPOSING former positions.

So for example there is the book (not existing in English, only in French or Dutch) “From Tien An Men to Timisoara struggle and debates inside the PVDA(WPB) (1989-1991)”, (EPO, 1994, ISBN 90 6445 898 7) (I searched on the web... this book is not available anymore, anywhere)

In the book “Party of the revolution” (compilation of the documents of the 5^th congress in 1995) there is made references to the book “From Tien An Men to Timiisoara...”:

“Inside the Workers Party of Belgium is existing a huge consensus on decisive political questions on which a lot of organisations have split.

These consensus is the result of broad debates: and is formulated in definitive documents.(...) “From Tien An Men to Timisoara” (...)”The USSR, the velvet contra-revolution” (...) ”Another view on Stalin”...”¹

By “huge consensus” is formulated a - by a lack of conscious study and discussion among ALL members and eventually amending on the 5^th congress - just formal acceptance as “party-point-of-view”.

Translations of characteristic passages of “From Tien An Men to Timisoara...”:

p. 13 Who chooses to become member of the Workers Party of Belgium (WPB; Partij Van De Arbeid – PVDA) is doing that after serious deliberation. He will engage himself for the liberation of the working class and the working masses. He knows that he is sharing with all other members of the Workers Party of Belgium an identical ideal and an identical engagement and that all are bounded by an identical discipline. In the Party democracy and creativity is promoted in order to realise better common objectives. A communist is not only struggling to put an end to exploitation, repression and injustice in his own country. Since capitalism has become a global system, class-struggle of the workers is internationalist. Each communist is supporting the anti-imperialist and democratic revolutionary movements in the third world. He is solidary with the socialist revolution and with those communists who defend socialist construction against the old hostile classes, against the imperialist subversion and against the revisionist tendencies in the party itself. The political line of the Workers Party of Belgium concerning the history of the socialist countries, is formulated in the two books “The USSR and the velvet contra-revolution” and “Another view on Stalin” an further in the document “Tien An men, from revisionist derailment to contra-revolutionary rebellion”

p.145 .....(S)ince Deng Xiaoping, about whom Mao said he was the second Chinese Chruchev, came into power, the policy of Mao certainly is revised and revisionism has certainly spread.

p. 170 When Hu Yaobang, and later on Zhao Zhiang, were secretary-general of the Chines Communist Party, they followed a line which was more revisionist than that of Chruchov between 1956 and 1964. Who is claiming that the dictatorship of the big bourgeoisie has began with Chruchov, logically has to conclude – as are doing our Albanian comrades – that capitalism is restored in China. But we have seen how fiercely has been struggled in the Chinese CP and how the rightmost group has taken a beating in June 1989

This proves that the seizure of power by the revisionists encounters over a long historical period of great resistance and that they can be reversed., A fact that does not diminish the enormous difficulties to realize that turnaround.

The authentic dialectical points of view of the WPB (formulated by Ludo Martens but afterwards affirmed on the 5^th congress in 1995),on the analyses made by Enver Hoxha about the political developments in China are certainly less unilateral as those of Alexandré Garcia (of which he insinuated that they are the SAME as that of the WPB – read the large quote in the paragraph “The references of Alexandré Garcia to the WPB and/or its former president Ludo Martens, in my previous article Will the WPB/PVDA/PTB join the accusation that the KKE is (still) not free of 'Chruchov-Breznjevian “left”-formulated, revisionism'?(3) ):

p. 213. From 1973, when the foreign policy of China began to swing to the right, Enver Hoxha formulated a number of pertinent observations on the class struggle internationally. It is beyond all doubt that the Chinese Communist Party, and also our own party, could have drawn lessons out of these critics and could have avoid positions which were to one-sighted.

When China began to support a united Europe against the two superpowers,as well on political as on economic and military level, Enver Hoxha made the following remark:”Let us struggle to tighten the contradictions, Zhou Enlai is saying. Up there we agree. But for whose benefit the contradictions had to be tightened? And are those the only contradictions? (...) Do we have to forget that there exists the huge problem of classes, the struggle of the proletariat, that is to say, solving the contradictions between proletariat and bourgeoisie?”²

Enver Hoxha has never shared the opinion of the Chinese Communist Party, considering the USSR in the years '75-'85 as the most dangerous superpower. (...)

Enver Hoxha was therefore right to focus the barrage of his criticism on the strategy of Deng Xiaoping, who declared in October '77: "One must have to defeat the global war plan of the Soviet Union and I hope that that fight will unify the whole world, third world world, the second world and even the United States that belong to the first world. (...) the mobilization should be a"multilateral, political, ideological, economic and military one.”³ Enver Hoxha accused the adventurous type and provocative character of that strategy. "It may not care Deng Xiaping whether the actions that he stands lead the peoples of the proletariat of all countries into a bloodbath collapse ... That fascist takes no notice of the liberation struggle of the people which turn against imperialism, social-imperialism and against the reactionary bourgeoisie in their own country."⁴

But while Enver Hoxha condemned the opportunistic deviations from the Chinese Communist Party, he overreached in a no less dangerous leftist formulations..

From the moment that Nixon in 1971 was received in China, Enver Hoxha advanced the hypothesis that China was becoming a new “superpower”. (...)

Enver Hoxha had a clear view on the danger existed that the Chinese leadership would conciliate with certain revisionist tendencies. (...)

But instead of making a concrete analysis of the political struggle in the Chinese Communist Party – as well of the revisionist tendencies which surely exist, as also of the Marxist-Leninist tendency – Enver Hoxha lost himself in leftist exaggerations and unfounded statements. (...)

But Enver Hoxha thought he had to prove more, namely that Mao would never have been a Marxist! “Mao continues to claim that "the peasants the most revolutionary and guiding force, that the revolution must rely on farmers. The role of the proletariat in the revolution under Mao is only coming on the second and perhaps even on the third place.(....)”⁵ The first text of the first volume of the works of Mao has as title ANALYSIS OF THE CLASSES IN CHINESE SOCIETY. It is written in 1926 and is on itself sufficient to contradict all think twists of Enver Hoxha. During the whole revolution the Chinese Communist Party delivered an intense clandestine work among the workers. Lot of worker-cadres were sent to guerilla-areas when they were on the brick of been discovered by the police. There they joined the proletarian cadre which has always been the backbone of the peasant-army.

It is in fact interesting to determine once more that the leftist and extremist “analyses” are standing apart from reality and are denying dialectics. That is the reason why they can easily coincide with the “revisionist” analyses.(...)

Enver Hoxha has formulated some critics on the way on which the struggle has been waged in the Chinese Communist Party. They are worth being studied. In 1966-67 he had the following commentary on the struggle against revisionism during the Cultural Revolution.”One should fight his enemies not only in word or wall papers but, if necessary, even with a well-directed shot. The enemy must feel the blows of the dictatorship of the proletariat.”⁶ “If one continues with the opportunist “education, and re-education”, than is one exposed to great danger.”⁷ “A revolution which is not hitting the leaders of the betrayal, is not revolution”.⁸ (...) “It was found that there is an opportunist, liberal-bourgeois attitude adopted towards the hostile, anti-party elements. Khrushchev praised the Chinese for that attitude and Mikoyan called it "the good attitude of the Chinese comrades" who "had nothing in common with the policies of Stalin towards de cadres.”⁹ “Liu Shaoqi and with him his whole group, will again bow his head, like he did already all those times, and he will raise his again, like those other times. But Mao will not anymore be there to save the situation.”¹⁰

The events of the last fifteen years, give those comments their full meaning. Deng Xiaoping and the other members of the group around Liu Shaoqi have made their self-criticism, and promised that they would no longer set the correct decisions of the Cultural Revolution in question But once in power, they have allowed that Hu Yaobang and Zhao Zhijang put into practice a much more advanced revisionism than what Mao fought in 1966. It is clear that the CCP has difficulties to develop a coherent Marxist-Leninist line, in what concerned the dictatorship of the proletariat, the class struggle under socialism and Marxist-Leninist education. The party has not been able to find a correct balance between the criticism on and education of cadres who have made mistakes of opportunism and the elimination of the hard revisionists. And apparently the revisionists constantly improve their tactics, to hide their true intentions, to take in leadership positions and to recruit bourgeois elements of

But Enver Hoxha withdrew unfounded and premature decisions out of the fact that opportunistic mistakes could be noticed. He contributed little to the aspect of "political struggle - criticism - education and re-education of the cadres” and laid one-sided emphasis on purification and repression (...).

For Enver Hoxha any disagreement was a conspiracy. There was little effort to try to solve even serious disagreements by discussion and political struggle. Balances of such political struggles were not used for the education and the political and ideological unification of the cadres. There was apparently a unity, but that was not based on the common understanding of the contradictions that came up during the fight.

The official (on congresses by a majority affirmed) line of the WPB/PVDA/PTB about China is one that is very critical about the politic of “Reform and Opening” started in 1978 by Deng Xiaoping. Although at the time of 1994 there was the recognition of “positive aspects” to it, there was ALSO the recognition of “a danger of revisionism” of the possibility of a “restoration of capitalism” in China. This point of view was abandoned by the national WPB-cadre, Boudewijn Deckers, and so was silently “allowed” to WPB-cadre Peter Franssen to develop the point of view that “the politic of Deng Xiaping was a correct Marxist answer on the utopian or “leftist” policy which Mao had supported after -say- 1950”. (I will prove this CONCRETELY in further articles – in fact I did this already partly in this (downloadable) document wich is an critic on Peter Fransen's analysis) The by congresses approved - by Ludo Martens formulated - point of view about “the reforms of Deng Xiaoping”:

p.221. In the first place there is the economy. The ten years of the reforms of Deng Xiaoping have brought undoubtedly much material progress. But they have also increased the influence of capitalism and imperialism and so created the economic base for the contra-revolution. The liberalisation and the liberation of the powers of the market have strengthened the economic powers which fight socialism and which sooner or later, will unchain a fight for the power. And that is what they have done during the so-called “movement for democracy on the Tien An men-square.(...)

Boudewijn Deckers in 2003¹¹ referred to this point of view in a negative and “truncated” (and so subjective) way.... and then linked it to Ludo Martens or to the “WPB-point of view of that moment” (see note), so wiping the original point of view out of the “collective memory” of the party:

“In 1989, after the events of Tien An Men, we had the impression that capitalism was wildly attacking in all directions and was threatening to become the main aspect in China¹². But today the socialist state disposes more laws and regulations in order to control the development of the capitalist enterprises and to orientate towards a mixed economy.”¹³

Further, the ORIGINAL point of view of the WPB -formulated by Ludo Martens in the book “From Tien An Men to Timisoara....”:

p.222 The otherwise reasonable policy of the limited development of capitalist industry in China has been derailed and resulted in a proliferation of capitalist enterprises.(...)

p.223. Imperialism and capitalism, who have a solid base of influence in the Chinese economy, supported the so-called democratic movement and the "reformers" in the circles around Zhao Zhiyang, with the aim to establish a legal political power.(...)

The second negative development which we could notice in China between 1979 and 1989, is situated on political level; with the growing of a new contra-revolutionary power.

As soon as China proposed an economic policy that involved the development of a capitalist sector and let do the multinationals their appearance, also appeared on the political level, the first anti-socialist forces. In 1979, Beijing had a "wall of democracy", a wall on which all types of anti-communist publications found a place. On March 9, 1979 on what became a famous wall poster (.....) .... the following lines (...) Second point: "We demand the release of the obsolete statements of Mao Zedong and of the principles of Marxism, which no longer correspond to reality. In addition, we demand the abolition of class struggle" Third:"We demand that the Communist Party, which was owned by Mao Zedong, once again become the party of the whole people "(...)¹⁴ (...).

p. 224 The man who in '78-'79 defended most powerful the political views of imperialism, was Wei Jingsheng. He has, in the Western right-side, acquired a certain prestige with its slogan that China needed a fifth modernization: democracy (...).

The counter-revolutionary ideas, which Wei defended along with a small group of admirers of imperialism in '79, found over the years an increasing resonance among the intellectuals. There are several causes for this. The party neglected the Marxist-Leninist education of the students. She has not waged no more struggle against the political conceptions of imperialism. Liberalism, corruption and illegal enrichment spread among certain factions of the party. (...)

p. 225. A third negative development played a decisive role in the development of the mass movement of Bejing: the internal divisions of the Chinese Communist Party and the appearance of a very influential revisionist wing.

Hu Yaobang, General Secretary of the Party since 1981, was the most prominent representative of this Chinese revisionism. In 1981 his group "rejected the theory of classes and class struggle throughout the socialist period and the presence of the bourgeoisie within the Communist Party.”¹⁵

WPB-cadre Peter Franssen talked about the necessity during construction of socialism of a “united front ... with the (national) capitalists and bourgeoisie”, in 2007.

In this “analysis” of 2007, he is in fact “paraphrasing” Mao Zedong's “fundamental essays “About new Democracy”(1940) “About Coalition-government” (1945) and “About the correct solution of contradictions among the people” (1957), in which is strived towards a united front with the capitalist class in order to lift the country out of its underdevelopment and in which is defended that the building of socialism is very gradually an spread over a long historical period.”¹⁶

Further the ORIGINAL point of view of the WPB...:

p. 226. Four years later Hu would declare: “We have decided from now on, not to use anymore the expression of anti-party and anti-socialist element.”¹⁷ Rotten and corrupted elements, bureaucrats and revisionists could now quietly proceed.

Deng Xiaoping “rehabilitated” those party-cadres as Liu Chaochi, who were judged that they followed an anti-socialist and a capitalism-promoting direction...¹⁸

Further the original judgement of the WPB about the link between “rehabilitation” of revisionists and the submission of the whole CCP to their revisionist ideology:

p. 226 In 1988 Hu was replaced by one of his allies in the revisionist faction: Zhao Zhyyang.

To make clear in which direction the evolution went, Beijing Information wrote in 1988 that “Chruchov won a certain popularity in China”, while “ Stalin was a dictator and certainly not a revolutionary”. (....)

If some people start a subjective not-argued reasoning against Stalin, one does well to focus in order to capture their real message.

So, Professor Lu Congming of the Party School depending of the Central Committee, stated that "the character of the present age gradually changes from imperialism to social capitalism.¹⁹ Suddenly the danger of imperialism disappeared, both for the Third world and for China! Lu continued, "developed capitalism can produce elements of socialism and transition to socialism by peaceful means. (...) The socialist economy and capitalist economy are both socialized market economies. (...) The contemporary capitalism is a good model of a socialized market.”

WPB-cadre, Peter Franssen, defended the “policy” of the CCP of “let to do the development of capitalist production-relations their historical job of preparing the production-forces in order to be able to alter the production-relations at the moment that they are 'ripe' enough to do so”..²⁰

The point of view of the WPB about this policy, prepared in the analysis of Ludo Martens but affirmed on the 5^th Congress(1995) was:

p.226 When we hear such stupidities, we can understand the rage of Mao Zedong who was criticising during the Cultural Revolution “the bunch of contra-revolutionary revisionists”.²¹

That “bunch of contra-revolutionary revisionists”.... were rehabilitated by Deng Xiaoping, while the Cultural Revolution was considered by him and the majority of the leadership of the CCP (and the leadership of the WPB after 2003 supported this consideration...) to be a “total-not-to-repeat-ever-again disaster”.

Further:

p. 226 Afterwards, Professor Lu lifted a paean to capitalism. "One sees a change in ownership of the means of production: social ownership supersedes private property. Then there is the participation of the workers in the management of their business. The macro-state control over the economy, in fact, marks the beginning of planned economy. The new distribution of income by the government and the development of social security, helping to reduce the difference between rich and poor,” This revisionist states capitalism as a social model that has already has fulfilled all the promises of socialism Then he calls for a capitalist policy in China, as the best means of developing socialism .... And so we find that the ideology which Lu, as a teacher at the Higher Party-cadre, proclaims, is very similar to the thoughts of Mr. Wei, who still stays in prison. (...)

We find this also very similar with the ideology of Peter Franssen, who was able to propagate this ON a meeting organised by the University of Wuhan, the Central Compilation and Translation Bureau of the CC of the Communist Party of China and the Academy of Social Sciences of China as a “honourable” speaker.²²

But the original point of view of the WPB (formulated by Ludo Martens).... included the remark that the repression of Deng Xiaoping against the contra-revolutionary insurge (1989) does not guarantee that Deng left his revisionism:

p. 227 To understand the political clash May-June 1989 at the Tien An Men Square, we should know that in January broke out a first major internal struggle within the Chinese Communist Party. The student movement of 1986, inspired and led by Fang Lizhi, had attacked the very basis of socialism in China. Deng Xiaoping, who hitherto followed tightly revisionist Hu Yaobang, changed optics. (....)

The fall of Hu Yaobang has weakened the revisionist core at the head of the party. Nevertheless, Deng Xiaoping had appointed another representative of the same flow, Zhao Zhiyang as Secretary-General. (...)

In 1988, Zhao Zhiyang, the new Secretary-General, continued the same policy and protected the revisionist groups that were brought by Hu Yaobang in the leadership of some party-institutions. Under his leadership, they could expand their influence. A in 1986 had the closest cooperator of Zhao, Bao Tong, Beijing, authorized the establishment of a Fund for Reform and Opening of China. George Soros, a major American businessman, was the lender.²³ (...)

p.237 Hu Yaobang deceased on 15 April 1989. He was an important representative of the liberal and pro-imperialist faction in the party. (...)

p.249 As of 1989, some American specialists believed that in China restoring capitalism had reached. "the point of no return". The decline of collectivization in the countryside, the development of collective and private enterprises, the autonomy of enterprises, the creation of a layer of technocrats who were won for the Western model, the special economic zones, foreign investment ... That everything, so they told, is a solid economic base for capitalism.

Also, some revolutionaries believed that Deng Xiaoping had restored capitalism in China. But the recent changes (this text was written in 1990, NICO) after June 1989 in the political and economic orientation show that these were premature conclusions.

The question remains whether the Communist Party will persevere this rectification long enough and will implement the critics on the mistakes made, thoroughly?

The China-experts assume different hypotheses to predict the future of China

Some believe that the revisionists in the party will now keep quiet a time, to use more left-wing language and will wait on serious economic difficulties for another power grab to do.

Others think that the current political and ideological rectification will remain superficial, that bureaucratism, corruption and parasitism will spread further and that the rot will continue as it has done since 1978. The happening of June 1989 would have only delayed the advance of the capitalism.

A third group believes that Deng Xiaoping will pivot back tot the right and will support a tendency à la Hu Yaobang and Zhao Zhiyang. They recall that in February 1989 Deng still claimed that the party had not made no major errors since 1978. Deng would recoil from a serious self-criticism over this period and rejoin the political reforms of the capitalist type.

Other experts predict that China will burst under pressure from provincial particularism and by the actions of counter-revolutionary pro-Taiwan forces. China would know a new period of devastating civil wars whose outcome can not be predicted.

Finally, one can also consider that the current party leadership will succeed in making the correct synthesis of the political principles that Mao has developed during the Cultural Revolution and the more flexible economic policies that were followed since then. Thus China would be able to find a new dynamism, both at the political and economic side.

During the Cultural Revolution, Mao Zedong indeed not found the right methods to solve the problem of capitalist decay. on But at least he had estimated correctly this crucial issue. The political evolution of the past ten years clearly confirms some of his analysis.(...)

All these positions about China, Deng Xiaoping, danger of revisionism, danger of restoration of capitalism are just “erased out of the collective memory of the members of the WPB” ....and so “allowed” other cadres, as Herwig Lerouge and Peter Franssen to develop a REVISIONIST WPB-point-of view.

This I will explain concretely in further articles and proving my statements by BROADLY quoting texts of national WPB-cadres, Herwig Lerouge, Boudewijn Deckers and Peter Franssen.

1“Partij van de Revolutie”, EPO, 1996, ISBN 60 6445 933 9.

2Enver Hoxha, Reflexions sur la Chine, part 2 (1973-1977), Ed. 8 Nëntori, Tirana, 1979 p. 6-7.

3Ibidem, p.685.

4Ibidem, p.688.

5Ibidem, p. 193-194.

6Enver Hoxha, op cit., deel 1, p.357.

7Ibidem, p. 352.

8Ibidem, p. 376.

9Ibidem, p. 385.

10Ibidem, p. 386.

11In Marxistische Studies no 64, Publicatiedatum: 2003-11-01, “Vragen over de ontwikkeling van het socialisme in de Chinese

Volksrepubliek”, Boudewijn Deckers

12Ludo Martens, Solidair, nr. 23, 7 juni 1989.

13http://marx.be/nl/content/archief?action=get_doc&id=60&doc_id=278, Marxistische Studies nummer 64, publicatiedatum: 2003-11-01 Copyright © EPO, Marxistische Studies en auteurs — Overname, publicatie en vertaling zijn toegestaan voor strikt niet-winstgevende doeleinden, "Vragen over de ontwikkeling van het socialisme in de Chinese Volksrepubliek" ("Questions about the development of socialism in de Chinese Peoples Republic"), by Boudewijn Deckers

14Le Printemps du Pékin, Gallimard, Parijs, 1980, p. 69-71 – Le dégel, 6 March 1979.

15Beijing Information, 2 November 1981, p. 21.

16 http://marx.be/nl/content/archief?action=get_doc&id=72&doc_id=376, Marxistische Studies nummer 78, publicatiedatum: 2007-11-22 Copyright © EPO, Marxistische Studies en auteurs — Overname, publicatie en vertaling zijn toegestaan voor strikt niet-winstgevende doeleinden, "De ontwikkeling van het socialisme in China", Peter Franssen. in "Hoofdstuk 2 1949-1976: de eerste periode van de socialistische opbouw",.....in "§ De Culturele Revolutie".

17Lawrence Macdonald and Jean-Christophe Tournebise, Le Dragon et la Souris, Bourgeois, Paris, 1987, p. 34.

18http://www.people.com.cn/english/dengxp/contents2.html, Selected works of Deng Xiaoping Vol. II, "ADHERE TO THE PARTY LINE AND IMPROVE METHODS OF WORK, February 29, 1980" (but at the moment -as I tested- the text itself in not attainable, perhaps in another place.......)....YES I found another link: http://dengxiaopingworks.wordpress.com/2013/02/25/adhere-to-the-party-line-and-improve-methods-of-work/

19Beijing Information, 9 January 1989, p. 21-23.

20 http://marx.be/nl/content/archief?action=get_doc&id=72&doc_id=376, Marxistische Studies nummer 78, publicatiedatum: 2007-11-22 Copyright © EPO, Marxistische Studies en auteurs — Overname, publicatie en vertaling zijn toegestaan voor strikt niet-winstgevende doeleinden, "De ontwikkeling van het socialisme in China", Peter Franssen. in "Hoofdstuk 2 1949-1976: de eerste periode van de socialistische opbouw",.....in "§ De voorwaarden voor het economisch socialisme".

21Circular Note of the Central Committee, 16 May 1966.

22https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NZDehsll_dDToNYzkh1POex98FvdQmvSIHgvtrvOAtQ/preview?pli=1, Friedrich Engels and scientific socialism in contemporary China. It is 110 years since Friedrich Engels, the man who along with his companion Karl Marx laid the foundations of scientific socialism, passed away. To commemorate his death, an international symposium was held in the Chinese city of Wuhan. The organisers were the University of Wuhan, the Central Compilation and Translation Bureau of the CC of the Communist Party of China and the Academy of Social Sciences of China. 32 Chinese speakers made contributions, as well as 13 foreigners. At the request of the organisers, Peter Franssen, journalist with the Belgian weekly Solidaire and researcher at the Institute for Marxist Studies, wrote a contribution.

23Problems of Communism, September-October 1989, p. 19.