| Marxist Groups in the Anti-War Movement
By Paul M. Weyrich
CNSNews.com Commentary
February 25, 2003
Some people on the far-Left have criticized my statements calling for an investigation of the neo-Communist background of some of the anti-war movement's organizers.
However, they have not taken the time to investigate International A.N.S.W.E.R.'s ties to the avowedly Marxist Workers World Party or Not in Our Name's ties to long-time Maoist Bob Avakian's Revolutionary Communist Party.
Village Voice columnist Nat Hentoff said my proposal asking Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, or Congress, to investigate the anti-war movement's ties to neo-Communist groups like the Worker's World Party and the Revolutionary Communist Party was un-American in an interview with the leftist website TomPaine.com.
Is it un-American to question where these groups, which routinely organize often-violent demonstrations against the World Bank, political conventions, or the looming war on Iraq, get their money?
I find it amazing that these groups are able to organize regular protests that bring together tens or hundreds of thousands of protesters on a rather regular basis, while we on the right can only organize one large demonstration against abortion each year.
It takes a lot of money and resources to pull off these protests. During the Cold War, we know that the Soviet Union gave millions of dollars to support the Communist Party USA, but where are these groups getting their funding?
Some groups on the far-Left, at least in the past, have supported the overthrow of our Constitution, but this is not to say that all of them have or continue to do. A lot of Americans, including myself continue to have reservations about the war, but we need to know which groups or individuals involved in the anti-war movement present a clear and present danger to our constitutional system.
Had the good folks at TomPaine.com or Mr. Hentoff taken the time to research the ties between the Worker's World Party and International A.N.S.W.E.R., they would have found the links are plain as day. The Worker's World Party website features prominent links to the International A.N.S.W.E.R. website and the International Action Center which established A.N.S.W.E.R. in late 2001.
Considering that TomPaine.com is financed by the Florence Fund, whose tax returns for the year 2000 show that it has financially supported socialist-leaning groups such as the Alliance for Democracy which participates in the Independent Progressive Policy Network along with the Communist Party USA and the Democratic Socialists of America, it is not surprising that they sought to tar me with a McCarthyist label.
Unlike the Left, which routinely and baselessly calls conservatives such as myself fascists or Nazis in an effort to stifle debate, the same baselessness cannot be said for A.N.S.W.E.R. and its cohorts who are avowed Marxists, at least behind the scenes.
The fact is International A.N.S.W.E.R. was established in part by Worker's World Party member, frequent Worker's World Party newspaper columnist and co-director of former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark's International Action Center, Brian Becker, according to a November 2001 entry in the IAC's web archive.
This is the same Brian Becker who once wrote in a November 1997 Workers World Party news service article, "...it is crucial that revolutionaries fight tooth and nail for their values, their principles and the revolutionary conceptions put forward by Marxism and Leninism," in reference to a speech given by Cuban dictator Fidel Castro to a global communist gathering on the island.
Mr. Becker provides the key link between the IAC, A.N.S.W.E.R. and the WWP, so there cannot be any doubt that the anti-war movement's key organizing group is a neo-Communist front.
The urgency needed in further investigating A.N.S.W.E.R.'s ties to the Worker's World Party takes on added concern because the WWP has posted a manifesto on its website entitled: "Bolsheviks and War: Lessons for the Anti-War Movement."
Communist ties to the anti-war movement do not end with the WWP. As I said before Not in Our Name, another anti-war front is an operation of the Maoist Revolutionary Communist Party.
If you visit the Revolutionary Communist Party's website, an organization that has supported the Maoist Shining Path guerillas in Peru, Not in Our Name is featured in a prominent place on its website. In fact, the party's news publication features numerous stories chronicling the anti-war group's activities.
Some Marxist groups, such as the Trotskyist Socialist Worker's Party are using the anti-war movement to exploit the naivete' and idealism of young Americans to recruit them into their Marxist cabal.
The February 3, 2003 edition of the Socialist Worker's Party newspaper, "The Militant," features articles entitled, "Young Socialists draw protesters interested in revolution" and "Young protesters interested in revolutionary ideas." The last article details the SWP's efforts to recruit young people to its cause during the January 18, 2003 protest in Washington, D.C.
Revolutionary Communist Party, Worker's World Party and Socialist Workers Party are avowedly communist and are integrally involved in organizing the anti-war movement. Therefore, my questioning the involvement of neo-Communist group in the anti-war movement cannot be considered a political witch hunt.
Perhaps if TomPaine.com, which bills itself as showcasing "the ideas, opinions, and analyses too often overlooked by the mainstream media," were true to its mission it would have investigated the anti-war organizer's true identities instead of castigating me for speaking the truth. I don't expect them to take my word for it, but anyone who is adept in using the Internet as a research tool will discover that I'm correct.
While Americans have a constitutional right to oppose the war or ask for a redress of their grievances, we need to be on guard against those groups who wish to exploit anti-war sentiments to undermine our Constitution. | |
