Edward Snowden, the man who exposed the NSA/CIA spying!

Edward Snowden, a young man who is on the run. He enemy is his former boss who he exposed. Yet his boss is very powerful and exposing his crimes made him an enemy of his nation. Snowden worked for a private company that was working with CIA/NSA files. During his time working with the CIA/NSA he discovered what we revolutionary socialists knew all along. The CIA/NSA is spying on the American people through a system called PRISM. After exposing the spying, Snowden fled the USA and went to Hong Kong. There he told the world about the true nature of the CIA/NSA. Their nature is not to protect the people of the USA, but to spy on them. Reading their private mails and watching their activities on the internet. Classic Orwellian, BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU!

Edward Joseph Snowden was born on June 21 of 1983. He grew up in Wilmington, North Carolina. In 2004 he tried to become a soldier in the Special Forces of the US Army. But he was discharged after he broke both his legs during special forces training. The CIA recruited him for a job and he worked for the agency for two years. In 2009 he left the CIA to work for a private contractor in a NSA facility! 


In march 2013 he worked for Booz Allen Hamilton, a private contractor for the NSA. Snowden was working with classified files on the PRISM program. This program is about the NSA/CIA ability to easily spy on people through the internet. 98% of all data collected by PRISM are coming from huge social media groups like Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, Apple, Facebook and Skype. With their data the NSA/CIA spied on the American and the people of the world. Because not only Americans are targeted, also foreigners can be watched by PRISM! 


Edward Snowden discovered that the USA was spying on the people of the world. Then he made the biggest decision of his life. He left his family, his girlfriend, his nation and fled to Hong-Kong. There he contacted the British newspaper; The Guardian and told them the true about PRISM. Until June 2013 only the US government knew about the PRISM program!


News stories based on documents disclosed by Snowden were as follows:


By Wikipedia.com 


On June 5, The Guardian released a top secret order of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) that ordered a business division of Verizon Communications to provide "on an ongoing daily basis" metadata for all telephone calls "wholly within the United States, including local telephone calls" and all calls made "between the United States and abroad''


On June 6, The Guardian and The Washington Post revealed the existence of PRISM, a clandestine electronic surveillance program that allegedly allows the NSA to access e-mail, web searches, and other Internet traffic in realtime.


On June 9, The Guardian revealed Boundless Informant, a system that "details and even maps by country the voluminous amount of information collects from computer and telephone networks."


On June 12, the South China Morning Post disclosed that the NSA has been hacking into computers in China and Hong Kong since 2009.


On June 17, The Guardian reported that the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), a British intelligence agency, had intercepted foreign politicians' communications at the 2009 G-20 London Summit.


On June 20, The Guardian revealed two secret documents, signed by Attorney General Eric Holder, describing the rules by which the NSA determines whether targets of investigations are foreign or domestic.


On June 21, The Guardian made further disclosures about 'Tempora,' an 18-month-old British operation by GCHQ to intercept and store mass quantities of fiber-optic traffic.


On June 23, the South China Morning Post reported that Snowden had said the NSA had hacked Chinese mobile-phone companies to collect millions of text messages and had also hacked Tsinghua University in Beijing and the Asian fiber-optic network operator Pacnet. The newspaper said Snowden provided documents that listed details of specific episodes during a four-year period!


On June 25, Greenwald reported Snowden claims that he had sent files with NSA secrets to associates for his personal insurance, and that their contents would be revealed should something untoward happen to him!


Edward Snowden has a good reason to fear for his life. Because the criminal CIA has agents all around the world. Also the US imperialist government has already send threats to nations who are sympathetic to Snowden. The Republic of Ecuador offered him political asylum. Soon the US government said that if Ecuador would offer Snowden asylum, then the financial aid the nation received could be halted. The right-wing propaganda network; Fox News said ''For its own good, Ecuador might want to reconsider rolling out the red carpet for NSA leaker Edward Snowden as he crisscrosses his way through anti-American countries while seeking asylum'' 


For revolutionary socialists, Edward Snowden is a hero. A very brave American who stood up against government abuse of their power. We revolutionary socialists know first hand how criminal the CIA and NSA are. During the Cold War the CIA was the main counterrevolutionary agency of the capitalist ruling class. They were instrumental in helping right-wing dictatorships. The CIA aided the South Korea military junta and spread the lies that ''communists'' were responsible for the murder of 150.000 Koreans in the Bodo League camps. Also they trained numerous death squads in Latin American nations. Squads who would murder left-wing activists and trade unionists. In the Republic of Colombia, these right-wing forces were trained by the CIA, to fight the guerrilla's of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia!


In Western Europe, the CIA tried to stop the growing of communist parties. In Italy they worked  with the media and the Catholic Church to destroy the mighty Italian Communist Party. In Western-Germany the CIA and the government of Konrad Adenauer made sure that West-Germany became a anticommunist nation, that would raise children as enemies of socialism and communism. In Asia, the CIA aided the dictatorship of Chiang-Kai-Shek and they supported the absolute monarchies in Cambodia, Laos and Thailand! 


CIA criminals brought Mobutu to power in the 60's. This African kleptomaniac, murdered 160.000 people and stole all the wealth from the Republic of Zaire ( now Congo ). They also supported the racist government of South Africa. So we revolutionary socialists had no illusions about the CIA and NSA. We knew that these agencies were spying on people. A capitalist state must spy on people to protect those who own the means of production. Revolutionary socialists have always been the target for government agencies, because of our opposition to their capitalist masters! 


The US media is mostly against Edward Snowden. Only progressive Americans like The Young Turks are supportive of him. TYT is led by Cenk Uygar and Ana Kasparian, together with their TYT supporters they are the biggest American online news show on the internet. But when we look at the regular media, we see that most American media networks call Edward Snowden a traitor! 


Now Edward Snowden is lost. At this moment ( 27-06-2013 ) we don't know if he left Russia. His last know location was the Moscow Airport, but he did not entered the Russian Federation. So he maybe still on international grounds at the airport. What his next destination is we don't know but one thing is sure, the USA will stop at nothing to capture him. We know that the criminal US government does not love people who expose their crimes. That is why Edward Snowden is a hero, he dared to stand up against US imperialism and he exposed their criminal spying business!




A demonstration in Hong-Kong for Snowden! 

DSM activist threatened with deportation!

South African authorities have made a vicious attack and unwarranted attack on Liv Shange, an organiser of the Democratic Socialist Movement (DSM) – the South African section of the Committee for a Workers’ International. They have threatened to prevent her from returning to the country after visiting her family in Sweden with her three children.

By the Democratic Socialist Movement in South Africa 

Liv Shange is clearly being victimised by the ANC-led government for the role she and the DSM have played in the mineworkers’ strikes last year and in the building of a new alternative party - the Workers’ and Socialist Party (WASP). These threats are part of a series of attacks made recently on mineworkers and trade union activists. The DSM and WASP will not let this attack pass in silence.

Two days after Liv Shange left South Africa to visit her family in Sweden, the South African Newspaper, the Sunday Independent published an article claiming to have received information from the South African Department of Home Affairs that Liv was being investigated by them and by state intelligence. The article stated that this is linked to the role she played in the mineworkers’ strike last year. The ANC secretary-general, Gwede Mantashe, had already accused “foreigners” from places like Sweden and Ireland for promoting “anarchy” in the mines when he spoke to mining managers two weeks ago!

Liv and the members of the DSM supported the mineworkers’ strikes last year. They helped to set up and link strike committees of different shafts and mines together in the National Strike Committee which subsequently developed into the National Workers’ Committee. It was also out of the mineworkers’ independent committees that the call came for a new workers’ party leading to the founding of WASP. Liv has learned to speak fluent Zulu and has addressed many workers’ mass meetings, becoming a well-known face in the struggle.

Longstanding member of DSM

Liv Shange moved to South Africa in 2004. She is married to a South African and has three children with her in Sweden but due to return to school for the second semester which begins on July 15. Before moving to South Africa, Liv was active in the Swedish sister organisation of the DSM, Ratviserpartiet Socialisterna and was an elected councillor in the northern town of Lulea. Throughout her time in South Africa she has been actively involved in campaigning as part of the DSM and is now a leading member of the organisation.

The investigations referred to in the article, following on from the public attacks on the DSM by the ANC general secretary, Gwede Mantashe, are clear attempts to scapegoat the DSM for the resistance which the bosses face in the mines.

It appears that there is political interference in the Department of Home Affairs which has taken advantage of the absurd complications which have beset Liv’s attempts to reside regularly with her family in South Africa. Liv’s passport with her spousal visa was stolen when she was mugged in late 2010 – causing difficulties which it now appears the authorities are trying to exploit against her. Home Affairs claimed not to have any record of her spousal permit issuing her with a tourist visa instead. With the long and frustrating process of resolving the ensuing complications still pending, the basic legal position remains that Liv, as the wife of a South African citizen, should have every right to come back to the country together with the children.

Liv has been active in the struggle for genuine, democratic socialism all her life, in South Africa as well as in Sweden. Like all members of the DSM, she stands for the building of democratic, worker-controlled trade unions which are prepared to take on the necessary battles with the bosses. She works for the revival of working class fighting traditions and for taking forward the struggle for the socialist transformation of society. She sees this as the only way out of the capitalist dead-end – nothing to do with Mantashe’s “anarchy”, by the way. Liv has seen the ANC order guns to be used against workers at Marikana and elsewhere. Her right, and that of millions more, to criticise the government without fear of reprisal must be honoured.

Protest and solidarity

The Committee for a Workers’ International urges workers and socialists of all countries to condemn with international protests this victimisation of a dedicated activist and the threats against Liv Shange in particular and the DSM as a whole.This attack on the DSM and the mineworkers is not isolated. Mining bosses recently tried to suspend worker-activists who were involved in the strikes of last year. Various attempts have been made to discredit the DSM in the eyes of the workers. But workers see through the propaganda of the capitalist media and they know that an injury to one is an injury to all. Mineworkers, trade unionists and left activists will come out in protest against any attack on Liv Shange if the Ministry of Home Affairs continues to threaten her with a deportation order!


Liv Shange with her children

Turkish struggle against dictators

In the Republic of Turkey there are huge protests against the authoritarian government of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Turkish protesters are angry about the capitalistic nature of their nation. Erdoğan is a conservative president who serves Turkish capitalism very good. The city of Istanbul is one big shop center, very few green area's remain. One of the last green places in the city is the Taksim Gezi Park. The government wants to demolish the park in order to build new shopping centers. This sparked protests from many Turks who did not wanted to lose one of their last green places!    

Many capitalist nations call Turkey a democracy. We revolutionary socialists oppose that. A nation that is suppressing a minority ( Kurdish people ) cannot be a genuine democracy. Also the state of Turkey remain very authoritarian. There are many Turks who got jailed for criticizing ''Ataturk'' and speaking out about the Armenian genocide. A nation that shows disrespect for basic human rights cannot be called a democracy!


The Republic of Turkey was founded in 1923 after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. Its first president and dictator for life became Mustafa Kemal. This officer in the Imperial Ottoman Army fought for the independence of Turkey from western imperialist powers. After the founding of the new Republic of Turkey, Mustafa Kemal abolished the old Ottoman caliphate, turning the former Islamic nation into a secular state!


But Kemal was not a democrat. He wanted to rule for himself and did not tolerant opposition parties. His Republican People's Party became the only legal party in 1925. In today's Turkey, children are brainwashed with the idea that Mustafa Kemal was a democratic president and that his single party state was needed. A very big falsification of history. Kemal also banned Islamic conservatives, progressive liberals, moderate socialists and the revolutionary communists. The first communist party in Turkey was founded in 1920 during the struggle against western imperialism. But the Turkish communists were never able to build a massive workers party. In 1921 the leadership of the party was murdered. Some say that Mustafa Kemal ordered the killing because he feared competition from the communists. After the founding of the Republic of Turkey, Kemal build a puppet communist party in order to keep workers away from the Communist Party of Turkey who opposed him. After 1925 the party was banned along all opposition to the ''Great Mustafa Kemal Atatürk''.


The ''Great Mustafa Kemal Atatürk'' would rule unopposed until his death in 1938. But it would take another  seven years before opposition parties were legalized. When opposition to the Republican People's Party was allowed, the military was very powerful. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk made sure that the army was to guard the secular principals and to end any government that would abandon his principals. The Turkish Army indeed made sure that many governments were removed from power. Between 1945 and today there were three major coups led by the Turkish Army!


During the cold war the Turkish Military and the American Army worked very close to safeguard capitalism in Turkey. Many leftists were arrested and jailed, leading to the formation of many left-wing guerrilla movements. A famous left-wing resistance group is the Workers Party of Kurdistan. This political party is founded in 1974 and used to fight for a independent and socialist Kurdistan. The Partiya Karkerên Kurdistan  or PKK is called terrorist group by Turkey, the USA and the European Union. But many Kurdish people supported the PKK in their fight against Turkish imperialism. Because the Kurdish people remain oppressed by the Turks who used to ban their language and traditions!


Today the PKK is no longer a revolutionary Marxist-Leninist party. After the arrest of their leader and the collapse of the USSR, the party abandoned Marxism-Leninism ( Stalinism ) and the idea of a independent socialist Kurdistan. Today the PKK claims to fight for autonomy of Kurdish people in Turkey. As a Kurdish nationalist party, the PKK did not have good relations with the Turkish left-wing. For many nationalistic Kurds, the Turks were/are the enemy and remain hated till this day!


The military of Turkey took power again in 1980 and prepared the nation for major reforms. Radical capitalism was introduced as the state privatized many enterprises. The military junta was supported by the USA ( to no surprise ) who loved the capitalists reforms. That 650.000 people were arrested and 400 journalists were sentenced to a total of 3315 years’ imprisonment, meant nothing for the USA of Ronald Reagan who loved the anticommunist politics of the military junta!


After the military had created their civilian puppets, new elections were held. This is how Turkish politics used to work in he past. The people elected a government that was not liked by the military. Then the military would stage a coup and remove the government. The people elected another government, yet when this government did something the generals did not liked they removed that government. In total this was done three times between 1945 and 1990! 


Many governments feared the power of the military, this angered many Turks who wanted democracy and respect for their elected representatives. In 2002, most Turks voted for the Justice and Development Party. This new conservative party with Islamic principals won a huge victory over the secular establishment. Her leader Recep Tayyip Erdoğan became president of Turkey. But the military kept a close watch on this new government!


But unlike previous governments this conservative one did not feared the military. After years of supreme military influence over politics, the Turkish state arrested some retired generals for planning a coup. For the first time the Turks saw a government that fought back. When these generals were jailed for 20 years, the power of the government over the military was restored. But Recep Tayyip Erdoğan would soon lose his popularity, as his capitalist politics would not benefit most Turks!


In the 11 years since he came to power, Erdoğan is loved by conservative Islamic Turks. But the supporters of radical secularism oppose him.. When we look at the map of Turkey we see that most opponents of the conservative government are founded in the western coastal regions. These regions are the most secular because of tourism. Many Turks in the tourist industries are good educated and speak many European languages like English, German and some Dutch. Those Turks are mostly secular in nature, because of their western education. But most Turks inside Turkey remain conservative Islamic. They favor traditionalism and Islamic conservatism!


The Justice and Development Party ( AKP ) is a center-right political party. Since religious parties are banned in Turkey, most religious principals are founded with conservative parties. The AKP is also a capitalist party and supports a market economy. Their main opponent are the social democrats from the Republican People's Party!


In 2013, the government wanted to destroy one of the last green parks in the city of Istanbul. This sparked the anger of many people, they started to gather in the Taksim Gezi Park to oppose president Erdoğan. The president was not amused with these demonstrators and ordered the police to clear the park. Police brutality was huge and many demonstrators were injured. This caused more Turks to join the demonstrations against the Turkish government and the president! 


Fights soon broke out as Erdoğan ordered a harsh crackdown of all protesters. More then 3.000 people got inured and the police arrested 7.000 Turks. The authoritarian use of force caused more and more anger as more Turks the protests  On 17 June, sixty years after the famous East German uprising, the working class of Turkey went on strike. Major trade unions said that the brutality of the police is unacceptable and so the workers stopped working. In Taksim Square Istanbul, many demonstrators were attacked by police teargas, pepper-spray and water guns. The brutality of the police was very hard and many demonstrators were injured!


But president Erdoğan made sure his supporters were ready. As the police cleared the demonstrators, the supporters of the president started their own demonstration. 200.000 conservative Turks came to the capital to support their president. The reason why the president is still popular has to do with the fact, that many Turks have no genuine alternative to Erdoğan. The old secular elite is not trusted and Erdoğan brought some stability after all these years of military dominance over politics!


The demonstrations against Erdoğan are not led by the old elite, although their symbols are used. Turkish flags and the face of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk are mostly used by the demonstrators. Yet none of the Republican People's Party leadership has dared to led the movement. Also the fascist; Nationalist Movement Party oppose the demonstrators and calls them ''leftist scum''. The Turkish nationalists hate the  demonstrators because they unite Turks and Kurds, both their ethnic flags are used in protests. Because the right-wing nationalists of the Nationalist Movement Party hate Kurds, they denounce the protests as ''leftist scum'' 



Revolutionary socialists in Turkey demand;


Full democratic rights

  • Immediate release of all those imprisoned during the protests
  • An independent commission to investigate the police violence composed of elected representatives of trade unions and the movement
  • Freedom for all political prisoners
  • Full democratic rights including the right to demonstrate, to gather, to form parties and trade unions
  • No to any kind of military coup, intervention and interference; full democratic rights including the right to form trade unions for all soldiers and police.
  • Abolish all anti-terror laws and special courts as well as all repressive and reactionary laws, implemented by the AKP government over the last years
  • No censorship, free media – end repression against journalists, bloggers, tweeting people and TV stations, no closure of Hayat TV
  • Freedom and equal rights to practice or not practice any religion, end paternalism of the state, end all attempts to divide and rule. For the democratic rights for all to live their lives as they decide.
  • End the oppression of Kurds, equal rights for all including the recognition of minorities and minority rights. Right of self-determination up to and including the right to form an independent state.
  • Foreign troops out of Syria, no military intervention of Turkey or imperialist powers in the region.
  • For a constituent assembly of representatives, democratically elected in workplaces, neighbourhoods, cities and villages to guarantee full democratic rights and social security for the mass of the population

Jobs, decent wages, social security

  • End the enrichment of a few, end the plans to re-develop Taksim Square, end all profit-driven projects
  • End privatisations, re-nationalisation of privatised property
  • End the attacks on workers in the public sector
  • Significant increase of the minimum wage
  • Decent houses and living for all
  • Nationalise the banks and companies dominating the economy under workers’ control and management
  • For a democratically decided, socialist plan to organise and develop the economy in the interest of the working and poor people without harming the environment.
  • For a government of and in the interests of workers, youth and the poor.
  • International fightback against exploitation, oppression and capitalism. For a socialist democracy, for a socialist con-federation of states of the Middle East and Europe on a voluntary and equal basis!

Czech scandal

The Czech Republic is a capitalist nation since the collapse of stalinism 23 years ago. Before 1992, the Czech Republic and the Republic of Slovakia were one nation called Czechoslovakia. The collapse of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia started in 1989 after peaceful demonstrations led to the first democratic elections since 1948. The capitalist revenge was sweet and the communist party was declared a criminal organisation in 1993. Under nationalist pressure, Czechoslovakia was split in two nations!     

Although the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia was declared a criminal organisation, its supporters regrouped and in the Czech Republic, the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia was founded. This communist party remained very popular with the elderly and poor people who did not benefit from capitalism. Angered by the refusal of the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia to support capitalism, the anticommunist political parties are still trying to ban the reformed communists! 

The new capitalist system brought many changes. By 1998 more the 80% of the economy was privatized and many people owned stocks. Yet the capitalist reforms were not seen as good enough and the government started to cut social security and wages. These austerity programs were called ''necessary'' a very familiar term since they say the same things today. The Czech Republic became a member of the European Union in 2004. 

Growth continued in the first years of the EU membership. The credit portion of the Financial crisis of 2007–2010 did not affect the Czech Republic much, mostly due to its stable banking sector which has learned its lessons during a smaller crisis in the late 1990's and became much more cautious. As a fraction of the GDP, the Czech public debt belongs among the smallest ones in Central and Eastern Europe. Moreover, unlike many other post-communist countries, an overwhelming majority of the household debt – over 99% – is denominated in the local Czech currency. That's why the country wasn't affected by the shrunken money supply in the U.S. dollars! 

Supporters of the capitalist government have called the Czech Republic to be a beacon of liberty and freedom. Yet in the last 23 years the government has become more corrupt. As politicians became tools of big money, ordinary people felt betrayed. In 2002, the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia was able to win 18% of the votes, shocking the new capitalist establishment. Since then the right-wing media has tried all dirty tricks to turn people against the party. This has worked partly and the communist party lost many voters since 2002. But this is more thanks to the result of dying elders who lived in the Stalinist era. The party has little support among the young people, most youth see nothing in the old style communist party still plagued with supporters of stalinism! 

The current scandal ended the political career of prime minister Petr Nečas. This leader of the Civic Democratic Party ( main liberal conservative party ) became the focus for a major investigation into organized crime. The police started major raids against suspected criminals. The investigation of the case started in early 2012, according to Robert Šlachta, the head of the Unit for Combating Organized Crime. Ivo Ištvan, the Chief Public Prosecutor in Olomouc, confirmed that a total of 400 policemen were deployed in the raids! 

According to the Czech media and political commentators, the case consists of several more or less related parts. A leaked police document based on wiretapping records indicates that spying on the Prime Minister's wife by his managing director was prompted by personal motives and that the relationship between Nagyová and Nečas was more than just work related."We see a story that meets the quality parameters of a good Mexican telenovela", commented the newspaper Mladá fronta DNES.

The arrests and charging of several deputies were substantiated by the fact that they were rewarded by lucrative posts in exchange for their resignation and loyalty to the Civic Democratic Party during an important parliamentary vote. While the police considers it to be a case of corruption, Petr Nečas claims it was a standard political deal. Indeed because capitalist parties never play fair! 

It is so hypocrite that Petr Nečas and his right-wing scum say that socialism and communism are corrupt and evil, while their own governments are fielled with corruption and abuse of power. The capitalist parties from social democrats to conservatives have sold the people of the Czech Republic to organized crime and this latest scandal proofs it again. Many East European nations are plagued with political corruption, capitalism only made it worse! 

Unfortunate there is no real left alternative in the Czech Republic. The communist party is the biggest radical leftist party and the only parliamentary group that fights the dictatorship of the markets. There is a small democratic socialist party next to the communist party. The Party of Democratic Socialism ( SDS ) was founded after some people left the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia. These leftists stand for a democratic socialist Czech Republic. Unfortunate there are very few supporters of the SDS, mostly because of the anti-socialist climate in the Czech Republic among the media and government! 

Workers in the Czech Republic must demand new elections. The current government is not only corrupt, but criminal as well. A socialist alternative must be build in order to end the rule of organized crime and political corruption. The Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia and the Party of Democratic Socialism must work together on a revolutionary socialist program. Only a unity of major radical leftist parties under the banner of socialism, can put up a fight against the parties of greed and exploitation! 



Petr Nečas left office after he was named in the scandal 

The criminal CIA of the USA

We all know the criminal KGB of the former Soviet-Union. This secret police was the sword and shield of the ruling communist party bureaucrats. The KGB was founded to protect the workers state, but soon degenerated into a monster that slaughtered many workers and communists. Under Stalin the Soviet secret police was called NKVD and terrorized the population of the Soviet-Union. After the collapse of the USSR we learned of its atrocities,  they spied, murdered and arrested millions. But what people forget is the criminal activities of the American CIA. The opponent of the KGB was not the good guy during the cold war.

By Jorein Versteege with texts from Steve Kangas!

The CIA made sure that many regimes remained friendly to US imperialism. They were the ones who gave power to Mubutu in Congo. They also supported general Pinochet during his coup against the left-wing president of Chile. CIA criminals also aided the military dictatorships of South Vietnam and South Korea. In South Korea they turned a blind eye to the crimes of the military junta. The CIA build a clone of themselves in South Korea called the Korean Central Intelligence Agency ( KCIA ). This KCIA served the military junta very good, until its director killed the military president of South Korea in 1979. The KCIA was renamed after the murder, but remained a powerful weapon in the hands of the military!

Like the KGB the CIA has always been used by the government to spy on their own people. But unlike the KGB, the CIA was more active in leftist groups. Because the enemy of the ''free world'' was on the left side of the political spectrum during the cold war. Right-wing nationalists, fascists and neonazi's were not seen as the main enemy. We see this in Germany were the government kept a very close eye on revolutionary socialists, communists and anarchists. This allowed the far right to attack immigrants. The National Socialist Underground ( NSU ) was responsible for the killing of nine people. Between 2000 and 2006 they were able to murder unopposed, because the German government did not saw the far right as a threat! 

CIA forces also played a major part in the secret war in Laos. The Kingdom of Laos was created by the French colonialists, but the nationalists of the Pathet Lao opposed it. Soon the Laotian civil war became part of the Vietnam war as Viet Cong forces used Laos to move to South Vietnam. The weak monarchy was not able to stop the Viet Cong forces so the CIA aided the Royal Laos Army to fight the Viet Cong. Although the USA claimed not to fight in Laos, the CIA was already over its neck in it!

The CIA was founded after the second world war, to protect the ruling class of the United States of America. Official it is told that the CIA defends the ''freedoms'' of the American people. But only bourgeois democrats and conservatives believed that lie. Ever since its foundation the Central Intelligence Agency had one goal, to oppose leftism and destroy it. The CIA recreates a covert action wing, innocuously called the Office of Policy Coordination, led by Wall Street lawyer Frank Wisner. According to its secret charter, its responsibilities include "propaganda, economic warfare, preventive direct action, including sabotage, anti-sabotage, demolition and evacuation procedures; subversion against hostile states, including assistance to underground resistance groups, and support of indigenous anti-communist elements in threatened countries of the ''free world''. In Italy after the war, the CIA tried to corrupt the democratic elections when the Italian Communist Party threaten to win the elections. The CIA bought votes, broadcasting propaganda, threatened and beat up opposition leaders, infiltrates and disrupts their organizations. It worked -- the communists were defeated! 

One of the most successful propaganda of the CIA is Radio Free Europe. Over the next several decades, its broadcasts are so blatantly false that for a time it is considered illegal to publish transcripts of them in the U.S. Today Radio Free Europa is still broadcasting news against regimes that are opposed by the USA. But by no surprise there is little opposition news coming from dictatorship that are friendly to US imperialism. Nations like China, Saudi-Arabia and others who are not democratic! 

After the second world war, the CIA started to remove leftist leaders from power. The first victim of a CIA supported coup was Mohammed Mossadegh, who was prime minister of Iran. Mossadegh was removed in a military coup, after he threatened to nationalize British oil. The CIA replaces him with a dictator, the Shah of Iran, whose secret police, SAVAK, is as brutal as the Gestapo. A year later the CIA overthrows the democratically elected Jacob Arbenz in a military coup. Arbenz has threatened to nationalize the Rockefeller-owned United Fruit Company, in which CIA Director Allen Dulles also owns stock. Arbenz is replaced with a series of right-wing dictators whose bloodthirsty policies will kill over 100,000 Guatemalans in the next 40 years. The CIA is indeed a criminal weapon of US imperialism and its ruling class! 

After Vietnam was divided in two nations, the CIA was ordered to destroy the leftist nationalist regime of Ho Chi Minh by any means. CIA officer Edward Lansdale spends four years trying to overthrow the government of North Vietnam, using all the usual dirty tricks. The CIA also attempts to legitimize a tyrannical puppet regime in South Vietnam, headed by Ngo Dinh Diem. These efforts fail to win the hearts and minds of the South Vietnamese because the Diem government is opposed to true democracy, land reform and poverty reduction measures. The CIA’s continuing failure resulted in escalated American intervention, culminating in the Vietnam War! 

In Haiti, the CIA helped an autocratic dictator into power. With US military support the CIA helped "Papa Doc" Duvalier to become dictator of Haiti. He created his own private police force, the "Tonton Macoutes," who terrorized the population with machetes. They would kill over 100,000 during the Duvalier family reign. The U.S. does not protest their dismal human rights record. Another 100.000 deaths thanks to those CIA criminals! 

The Republic of Cuba was a puppet of US capitalism for many years. But in 1959 a leftist nationalist revolution ended the rule of capitalists and exploiters. Fidel Castro became leader of Cuba and opposed US imperialism and capitalism. The CIA was told to murder Castro because of his support to the Soviet-Union. As Castro declared Cuba to be a ''socialist'' nation in 1961, the CIA trained 1500 anticommunists to invade the island. The famous invasion of the Bay of Pigs was a huge failure for the CIA and the US government. Fidel Castro would rule Cuba until 2008 and is still alive!  

In 1964, the democratic government of Brazil was removed by a military coup. A CIA-backed military coup overthrow the democratically elected government of Joao Goulart. The junta that replaced it will, in the next two decades, became one of the most bloodthirsty in history. General Castelo Branco would create Latin America’s first death squads, or bands of secret police who hunt down leftist, workers and opponents for torture, interrogation and murder. Often these supposed "communists" are no more than Branco’s political opponents. Later it was revealed that the CIA trained these death squads! 

Latin America was a CIA controlled continent. Presidents who were critical of the USA or who opposed the capitalist world, were removed from power by right-wing coups. The Republic of Bolivia was the next target of the CIA in the early 70's. After half a decade of CIA-inspired political turmoil, a CIA-backed military coup overthrow the leftist President Juan Torres. In the next two years, dictator Hugo Banzer would have over 2,000 political opponents arrested without trial, then tortured, raped and executed! 

A famous CIA supported coup was the removal of Salvador Allende. On September 11 of 1973, the CIA overthrows and assassinates Salvador Allende, Latin America’s first democratically elected socialist leader. The problems began when Allende nationalized American-owned firms in Chile. ITT offers the CIA $1 million for a coup (reportedly refused). The CIA replaced Allende with General Augusto Pinochet, who would tortured and murdered thousands of his own countrymen in a crackdown on labour leaders and the political left! 

Today the US imperialist war machine is fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan. But the CIA was partly responsible for the Taliban foundation. The Democratic Republic of Afghanistan was founded by leftist soldiers who supported the Stalinist; People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan. After a year of chaos and unrest, the Soviet-Union invaded the nation. The CIA immediately began supplying arms to any faction willing to fight the occupying Soviets. Such indiscriminate arming meant that when the Soviets left Afghanistan, civil war erupted among the Islamic fighters. Also, fanatical Muslim extremists possessed state-of-the-art weaponry. One of them is Sheik Abdel Rahman, who would become involved in the World Trade Center attacks in New York on 9/11 of 2001! 

In El Salvador the CIA was supporting a criminal military right-wing government. The Archbishop of San Salvador, Oscar Romero, pleaded with President Carter "Christian to Christian" to stop aiding the military government slaughtering his people. Carter refused. Shortly afterwards, right-wing leader Roberto D’Aubuisson had Romero shot through the heart while saying Mass. The country soon dissolved into civil war, with the peasants in the hills fighting against the military government. The CIA and U.S. Armed Forces supplied the government with overwhelming military and intelligence superiority. CIA-trained death squads roamed the countryside, committing atrocities like that of El Mazote in 1982, where they massacred between 700 and 1000 men, women and children. By 1992, some 63,000 Salvadorans were killed thanks to American weapons and CIA training! 

Rising popular revolt in Haiti meant that "Baby Doc" Duvalier would remain "President for Life" only if he had a short one. The U.S., which hated instability in a puppet country, flow the despotic Duvalier to the South of France for a comfortable retirement. The CIA then rigged the upcoming elections in favour of another right-wing military strongman. However, violence kept the country in political turmoil for another four years. The CIA tried to strengthen the military by creating the National Intelligence Service (SIN), which suppressed  popular revolt through torture and assassination! 

After the collapse of stalinism, the CIA did not end its criminal behaviour. Like the Soviet KGB, the American CIA is a product of criminals. The CIA should be abolished, its leadership dismissed and its relevant members tried for crimes against humanity. Our intelligence community should be rebuilt from the ground up, with the goal of collecting and analysing information. As for covert action, there are two moral options. The first one is to eliminate covert action completely. But this gives jitters to people worried about the Adolf Hitlers of the world. So a second option is that we can place covert action under extensive and true democratic oversight. For example, a bipartisan Congressional Committee of 40 members could review and veto all aspects of CIA operations upon a majority or super-majority vote. Which of these two options is best may be the subject of debate, but one thing is clear: like dictatorship, like monarchy, unaccountable covert operations should die like the dinosaurs they are! 

By Steve Kangas

Abolish the CIA 
and see them for what
they really are:
CRIMINALS! 

Radical religion, a danger to democracy and human rights

Radical religion is on the rise. Christianity, Islam and Judaism are not win out radicals who want to impose their theocratic views on others. Since the Iranian Revolution in 1979, Islamic fundamentalism has become a force many fear. It is ironic that the USA is partly responsible for the rise of Islamism. Al-Qaeda is founded with American money that Osama Bin Landen got during his fight against the secular Stalinist government of Afghanistan. But Christian fundamentalism is rising too. The Republican Party of the USA seems to be turning more Christian right-wing, as many conservatives claim to oppose secularism! 

Many people say that Islam is the biggest danger to democracy and human rights. Many American Christians claim this. It is however very hypocrite for a fundamentalist Christian to say that a Muslim is a mortal enemy to democracy and freedom. Many Christians in the USA hate secularism and democracy. They don't say it, but deep in their hearts many would love to see a world were the Bible rules supreme. We are not talking about secular Christians. Many Christians in the USA are radical and theocratic. For them the Bible is the only law they want to see in government! 


In Europe many Christians and Jews have turned towards secularism. For them religion is private and they don't want to enforce their views on others. Many Muslims share this believe, because they too love freedom and democracy. But because people with an Islamic background are discriminated against in the western world, many fall under influence of radical groups like the Party of Liberation ( Hizb ut Tahrir ). 


This Hizb ut Tahrir is an fundamentalist Islamic party, that claims to have one million members worldwide. Their goal is clear, they want to create an Caliphate of Islam. In this caliphate, the only law is the law of Sharia. There is no separation between state and religion, Islamic morality would rule.


Hizb ut-Tahrir rejects democracy as a western system and un-Islamic despite aspects of it such as elections existing in the Islamic political system. Hizb ut-Tahrir argues democracy as a system is the rule of people, for the people, by the people. The basis of the democratic system is that people possess the right of sovereignty, choice and implementation. ... it is a Kufr system because it is laid down by man and it is not from the Shari'ah Laws! 


However, Hizb ut-Tahrir believes the Caliph ( the head of the Caliphate state ) should be elected and be accountable to those who have appointed him. The position should not be inherited through blood lines, or imposed on Muslims, but elected by them, contrary to the principles of Shia Islam. Muslims should then pledge their loyalty to the Caliph! 


The '' Caliph" is the head of state in the Khilafah. He is not a king or dictator but an elected leader whose authority to rule must be given willingly by the Muslims through a special ruling contact called baya. Without this baya he cannot be the head of state. This is completely opposite to a king or dictator who imposes his authority through coercion and force. It argues the tyrant kings and dictators in the Muslim world are examples of this, imprisoning and torturing their populations and stealing their wealth and resources! 


Islamic democracy for Hizb ut Tahrir means elections for Muslims only. That is not a democracy according to western views, but a democracy only for one group. Much like a single party state, were only members of the ruling party are allowed to participate in elections. For us revolutionary socialists, Hizb ut Tahrir is a danger to the working class. Because of their hostility towards woman rights, gay rights, secularism and Marxism!


Yet some Muslims feel that Hizb ut Tahrir is a force of good. They feel betrayed by the western world they view as degenerated and hypocrite. Revolutionary socialists can partly understand that. With all the racism and discrimination it is understandable some reject the western ideologies. But the working-class must reject Hizb ut Tahrir and their Islamic dogma. Because a theocracy is a danger for all workers, it does not matter if it is called Christian, Islamic or Jewish! 


There are many Christian theocratic parties in the world. A Dutch Christian right-wing party is the Reformed Political Party ( Staatkundig Gereformeerde Partij ). The SGP is founded in 1918 and the oldest political party in the Netherlands. For the SGP the Bible is the absolute word of God. Since their foundation they try to impose Christian dogma on the Dutch people. They opposed woman rights, hated the idea of secularism and fought against same sex marriage. Until a few years ago the SGP spoke very clearly about the creation of a theocracy in the Netherlands. Now they have reformulated their goals. They claim to support the parliamentary democracy and the rule of law. But that law is based on separation of state and religion, does the SGP support secularism now? Or is it only a mask to hide their Christian theocratic dogma? 


Christian sects are famous in the USA. One of them was a leftist Christian cult called the ''People's Temple''. This Church led by Jim Jones committed mass suicide in 1978. More then 900 people killed themselves and their children. After they killed a member of the US congres, the followers of Jim Jones were told to kill themselves . The ''People's Temple'' was a left-wing Christian cult, but today's sects based on fundamentalist Christianity are mostly right-wing. Take the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas. The WPC is a small sect with only 40 members. It used to have 70 members a few years ago. But many children who were raised in the WBC have left the church, reducing its members to 40!  


The Westboro Baptist Church says their believes are based on  primitive Baptist and Calvinist principles. They hate other Christians, gay's, atheists, Muslims, Catholics and all who are not members of the WBC. Fred Phelps is 83 years old and the absolute leader of this Christian sect. His family is famous for picketing at funerals of death soldiers with signs saying ''God hate Soldiers'' or ''God hate gay's''! 


In the State of Israel, radical Jews make up only a small part of the Israeli society. Most Jews are secular and support a democracy. Yet a minority of Jews have a lot of influence, as they demand Israel to be completely Jewish. At this moment the State of Israel is a mixture between secularism and Judaism. The extremist Jews want to impose Jewish law on all people living in Israel and the occupied Palestine territories. The most extremist Jewish political party in Israel is the; The Jewish Home. This radical right-wing Zionist party is founded in 2008 and supports ultra nationalism, the greater Israel ideology and religious Zionism. It won 12 seats during the 2013 elections, making it the fourth largest party in the Israeli parliament.


Extremist Jews are also found in the occupied Palestinian territories. Jewish colonists who occupy Palestinian lands are mostly anti-Arabic and hate the Palestinians. There are enough video's of colonialists attacking Palestinian children and their families. With support from the Israeli Army these Jewish colonists have the freedom to bully and intimidate many Palestinians every day. Reminding them that they are the rulers of Palestine. Some Palestinians have turned against the colonists and even committed murder out of anger. Yet the Israeli Army is quick to defend the colonists against Palestinians, who want to fight these extremist Jews who occupy their land! 


Western media loves to show radical Muslims. Because when Muslims kill others it is big news. Christian terrorism is weak and limited, but Islamic terrorism is rising and hot news. So the western media is spreading the idea that many Muslims could be terrorists. In the USA this is enforced by radical Christians in the Republican Party. Christian extremist leaders like Michelle Bachman claim that the Muslim Brotherhood is ruling the CIA. Also the Tea Party movement shows a strong radical Christian identity. 


A great example of a right-wing populist attacking Muslims we see in the Netherlands. In 1999 a young girl was murdered in Veenklooster in Friesland ( North Netherlands ). Pim Fortuyn a rising right-wing populist, said that the killing was the work of a foreigner. Because the way of the murder was not typical western, according to Pim Fortuyn. The right-wing populist blamed immigrants who fled Afghanistan and were kept in Veenklooster. Many Dutch demanded the arrest of these immigrants, even when DNA proofed their were innocent. Pim Fortuyn was murdered too, but not by a Muslim or a foreigner. In 2012 the killer was finally found. It was a 45 year old white farmer, who raped and killed the young girl in 1999. But because of the hate Pim Fortuyn spread, the immigrants were blamed by the Dutch in Veenklooster! 


Many people fear Islam. They fear that Muslims would support the ideology of Hizb ut Tahrir. The right-wing fuels this fear by focusing on young Muslim boys who commit crimes. They focus on the behavior of a few thousand Muslim boys who have problems with the law. There are one million Muslims in the Netherlands, yet only those who do criminal things are often seen in the media. Good Muslims are not hot news, while bad Muslims are always good news! 


Revolutionary socialists oppose hatred towards Muslims. But we also oppose Hizb ut Tahrir and Islamism. Religion is private matter and must not be enforced by a political party or the state. Radical religious groups like Hizb ut Tahrir, the Dutch SGP and the Westboro Baptist Church are a danger to freedom and human rights. But so are elements in the Republican Party of the USA, who want to impose Christian morality on people. In this way Hizb ut Tahrir and the Republicans do not differ much from each other! 






Hizb ut Tahrir, the Party of Liberation 
An extremist political party! 

Struggle, Solidarity, Socialism

Struggle, Solidarity, Socialism