The history of Afghanistan

Afghanistan, many people know of it. A nation destroyed by civil war and foreign armies. Russian stalinists and American imperialists tried to impose their will on the Afghans. They only created more hatred and caused more pain. Afghanistan remains a very backward nation, were conservative Islamic values are still regarded very high. Opposition to these Islamic values is not tolerated. Not by the religious leaders and not by the corrupt Islamic government!  

Today Afghanistan is called the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. In the past it was also called:

- Emirate of Afghanistan 1823-1926
- Kingdom of Afghanistan 1926-1973
- Republic of Afghanistan 1973-1978 ( again from 1987 till 1992 ) 
- Democratic Republic of Afghanistan 1978-1987
- Islamic State of Afghanistan 1992-1996
- Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan 1996-2001

The first state founded in Afghanistan was the Emirate of Afghanistan in 1823. This state emerged out of the Durrani Empire. For 103 years Afghanistan was ruled as an absolute feudalistic monarchy. The Afghans were able to hold back the foreign imperialist forces that tried to occupy the nation. Nations like Russia and Great Britain tried to conquer Afghanistan  but they all failed. Between 1839 and 1842 the Afghans fought against the British East Indian Trading Company, that tried to steal the resources of Afghanistan. After three years of fighting, the British capitalists were defeated and forced to retreat.

But the British imperialists did not leave Afghanistan completely. So a second war started in 1878, this war is called the second Anglo-Afgan War. After another victory by the Afghans, the British Indians were forced to leave Afghanistan. Yet the British Empire was allowed to control  Afghanistan's foreign relations! 

After a few years the Afghan government wanted complete independence from British imperialism. The first world war and the Russian Revolution weakened the power of the European colonialists. So in May 1919, the Afghan government again stood up against the British Empire. This led to a final third Anglo-Afghan war. This war only lasted a few months. 

Finally after 1.700 British soldiers had died, did the British Empire accepted full independence and sovereignty of Afghanistan. The Emirate of Afghanistan was replaced by the Kingdom of Afghanistan in 1926. King Amanullah Khan wanted to reforms the feudalistic nation. But he western style reforms were not welcomed by the conservative tribes. After three years the tribes rose up against the king and he fled the nation! 

Habibullah Kalakani was the tribe leader who led the revolt against Amanullah Khan. After the king fled to Europe, he became the next monarch. Unlike Amanullah Khan, Kalakani was a dogmatic Islamic monarch. He closed down woman schools and he banned western culture in Afghanistan. Kalakani wanted a pure Islamic Afghanistan. Yet the supporters of the old king did not surrendered. Top general Mohammed Nadir Shah led the forces loyal to the old king. He attacked the conservative tribe forces of Habibullah Kalakani and was able to defeat them. The city of Kabul was recaptured and Kalakani was executed. Soon general Mohammed Nadir Shah became the next king of Afghanistan. He rule for three years until he was murdered by a student in 1933!

Mohammed Zahir Shah was the son of Mohammed Nadir Shah and became king of Afghanistan at age 19. Under his rule Afghanistan started to modernize itself. After 1945 the king wanted to end the feudalistic nature of the nation. After sharing power with his uncles for many years, the king was able to rule for himself in the 1960’s. It was then that he created a new constitution. This new constitution gave political freedoms to the Afghans and by 1970 political parties were legalized! 

It was the 60's that marked the foundation of the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan. This communist party was founded by Nur Muhammad Taraki and Babrak Karmal. The PDPA was based on stalinist principals like almost all communist parties. Taraki and Karmal were elected into the Parliament as representatives of the PDPA. 

The party was not liked by the ruling monarchy. But what limited party growth was the sectarian nature of its internal factions. Taraki and Karmal both represented a fraction. In 1967 the party divided itself into these factions, the biggest being the Khalqs ( led by Tarki ) and the Parchams ( led by Karmal ) as well as the Setami Milli and Grohi Kar. These new divisions started because of ideological and economic reasons. Most of Khalqs supporters came from ethnic Pashtuns from the rural areas in the country. The Parchams supporters mostly came from urban citizens who supported social-economic reforms in the country!

Prime minister Sardar Mohammed Daoud ended the Kingdom of Afghanistan in 1973. While the king was in Europe, the prime minister took power and became the first president of the Republic of Afghanistan. Daoud was not loved by radical Muslims who hated the secular government that Daoud led. Soon fighting broke out between soldiers and Muslim extremists. In 1977 the president created the National Revolutionary Party and banned all political parties. Afghanistan became a single party state under president Daoud! 

In April 1978, the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan had regrouped itself. The main factions were united and they were able to rally 2.000 people in Kabul against dictator Daoud. The president was shocked by the unity that PDPA leaders showed. Now he feared a coup because many soldiers in the army were sympathetic to the PDPA. Daoud ordered the arrest of communist leaders but he was too slow. It took him a week to arrest Nur Muhammad Taraki, while Babrak Karmal was able to flee! 

But in the Afghan National Army, supporters of the PDPA started a revolt. Soldiers attacked troops loyal to the president. On April 28 of 1978, soldiers loyal to the PDPA attacked the presidential palace. Killing dictator Daoud and his family. Their bodies were put into a mass-grave and not found until 2008! After the death of president Daoud, the army gave power to the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan. Nur Muhammad Taraki of the Khalqs became the chairman of the Revolutionary Council and started to purge the party of his opponents. The Khalqs wanted a radical socialist transformation of Afghanistan, while the Parchams said that Afghanistan was not ready for a socialist society. The Republic of Afghanistan was renamed into the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. A hypocrite name since the nation was a single party dictatorship! 

Both the land reforms and the social reforms were met with huge hostility. The conservative tribes opposed the land reforms and hated the progressive ideals spread by Taraki. Woman were giving freedoms they never had before, but Islamic leaders opposed that. They prevented young girls from going to school and refused to give them any rights at all. As a result the supporters of Taraki attacked religious leaders and buildings. They burned the Koran and destroyed Mosques. His angered the deeply religious population of Afghanistan!

Outside capital the anticommunist tribes formed a resistance movement called the Mujaheddin. These Mujaheddin were supported by conservative Islamic nations like Pakistan, Saudi-Arabia and other Islamic groups. The United States of America would also donate millions to the Mujaheddin of Afghanistan. These Islamic fighters were called ''freedom fighters'' by the western media! 

Nur Muhammad Taraki radicalism was opposed by almost all Afghans who lived outside the capital. Even members of the PDPA felt he went too far. Hafizullah Amin was a close ally of Taraki, but he too started to oppose the chairman of the Revolutionary Council. Amin talked with Soviet leaders and they too had enough of Taraki's radicalism. So in September 1979, Nur Muhammad Taraki was murdered by soldiers loyal to Hafizullah Amin. Hoping he had Soviet support, Amin became the new leader of the Revolutionary Council. 

Hafizullah Amin ended state-atheism. He even started to use Islamic words in his speeches. He went so far by saying that the Islam and socialism were equal. But most Afghans did not buy his story. Under Nur Muhammad Taraki it was Hafizullah Amin, who supported the killing of religious people and the destruction of Mosques. The Mujaheddin did not stopped with fighting and kept growing in numbers! 

The Soviet-Union feared that the Mujaheddin would soon destroy the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. They no longer trusted the promises of Hafizullah Amin. Soviet leaders gave support to the outcast Babrak Karmal of the Parchams. But in Afghanistan, Hafizullah Amin remained committed to the idea that the Soviet-Union supported him. Yet the USSR wanted him death, so Soviet troops were ordered to attack the Tajbeg Palace. On December 27 of 1979, Operation Storm-333 was put into action. Until the last moment did Hafizullah Amin believed that the Soviet-Union was on his side. Even the soldiers of the Soviet Army had a hard time to believe that the chairman of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan was a ''CIA collaborator''.

But the attack went on and chairman Hafizullah Amin was killed. His daughter was wounded but survived. Out of 600 Soviets soldiers, 100 died. The 2.000 man strong guards of Hafizullah Amin were all slaughtered by the Soviets. With his death came an end to Khalq rule in the PDPA. The moderate Parchams were put into power by the invading Soviet Army! 

Babrak Karmal became the next chairman of the Revolutionary Council. He ended the radical politics of the Khalqs. But the Islamic Mujaheddin said that Babrak Karmal was a Soviet puppet and that he was just another ''atheist''. So the Islamic rebels kept fighting. They also got support from some elements of the revolutionary left ( maoists ) who opposed the dictatorship of the PDPA. Supporters of Mao Zedong were called public enemies by the PDPA. The Afghanistan Liberation Organisation is founded in 1973 and is still fighting against the current Islamic government of Afghanistan. When the PDPA took power they banned the Afghanistan Liberation Organisation. Many supporters of the ALO were arrested and tortured by the secret police of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. 

The People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan was purged of all Amin supporters. Also the Soviets wanted to make sure that the radical Khalqs never took power again. Only technocrats, opportunists and people the Soviets trusted were allowed to have power. The Khalqs were still popular in the party, so the Parchams made sure that party rules were changed to serve the demands of the Soviet-Union! 

More then 100.000 Soviet troops aided the army of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan in their fight against the Islamic Mujaheddin. The Soviets were responsible for many crimes against the Afghan people. They destroyed villages and burned down religious buildings. As a result the Mujaheddin also committed crimes by murdering Afghans who did not supported Islamic morality. Females who worn none-Islamic clothing were attacked, some were murdered. The most radical Islamic fighters would kill anyone who would not follow their theocratic believes. Meanwhile the western wold was supporting the Mujaheddin. US president Ronald Reagan made sure his government would sell guns to the Afghan anticommunist Mujaheddin. 

After seven years of rule, Babrak Karmal was removed from power by the head of the Afghan secret police. Dr. Mohammad Najibullah took power in the PDPA and ended the single party state. Babrak Karmal lost his Soviet friends as they saw that Karmal bought not genuine changes. They exiled him to Moscow and gave him a house and a dacha. The nation was named back to Republic of Afghanistan and secular none-extremist parties were allowed to participate in the elections! 

In 1988, the Revolutionary Council was disbanded and Dr. Mohammad Najibullah became president of the Republic of Afghanistan. Opposition parties were allowed to enter the elections. Yet the Mujaheddin boycotted them, they wanted to destroy the PDPA and the secular government. So the Afghan Civil War did not ended with the removal of Babrak Karmal! 

Dr. Mohammad Najibullah abandoned socialism, as stalinism collapsed around him. By 1990, the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan dropped the communist ideology and changed it's name to Homeland Party. With the collapse of the Soviet-Union, the Afghan government lost its main investor. Meanwhile the Islamic Mujaheddin were paid millions by the Saudi-Arabians and the Americans. One Islamic leader used that money to create an international network of radical  Mujaheddin fighters. This network got the name Al-Qaeda and its leader became Osama Bin Laden! 

With all that money from Saudi's and Americans, the Mujaheddin were finally able to defeat the government of Dr. Mohammad Najibullah. General Abdul Rashid Dostum defected to the Mujaheddin as the secular government collapsed. In April 1992, the government surrendered to the forces of Abdul Rashid Dostum, now a supporter of the Islamic State of Afghanistan. The army of the Republic of Afghanistan was not out of weapons or ammunition. They still owned many airplanes and tanks. But with the defection of general Abdul Rashid Dostum, many military commanders choose to flee! 

The new Islamic State of Afghanistan soon entered a civil war of its own. The fight was based around the radical Muslims and the moderate ones. For the moderate Muslims the Islamic State of Afghanistan should be like the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. But the radical Muslims wanted a return to the days of the Emirate of Afghanistan. Soon the radicals created the Taliban, a group of extremists who still fight for a Islamic theocracy! 

Dr. Mohammad Najibullah lived four years in the United Nations compound in Kabul. As the moderate Muslims fought the Taliban, he negotiated for his exile to India. But in 1996 the Taliban conquered the capital. Najibullah was dragged out of the UN compound and hanged by Taliban forces. With his death a wave of terror began. Islamic dogmatism was imposed  and woman were forced to cover themselves completely. Men were forced to grow a beard and all things related to western culture were banned! 

A new nation was founded by the Taliban. They created the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, with Mohammed Omar as supreme leader. The moderate Islamists founded the United Islamic Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan. This anti-Taliban group was able to control the provinces in the north. That is why this alliance of moderates was called the Northern Alliance by western journalists!

After the attacks on 9/11 in the USA, the Americans wanted revenge. They claimed that the Taliban were hiding Osama Bin Laden. The Americans demanded that they turned him over to them. Taliban leadership wanted to bring Bin Landen to their own court and the Americans were allowed to bring evidence of his guilt. But that was refused as the Americans wanted war and not a fair trail. So American forces attacked the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan and drove the Taliban away from Kabul!

The United Islamic Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan, took power and put Hamid Karzai up as president of the new Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. In the year 2004 this new moderate Islamic republic was founded. Hamid Karzai is now president for over nine years. But like the Soviet puppets he is a puppet of the Americans. Win out their money and soldiers, his Islamic Republic of Afghanistan would collapse to the growing Taliban!

Afghans have suffered a lot. Even today there is no freedom or peace in Afghanistan. Taliban forces are still terrorizing the people, but the corrupt government is no alternative. Political parties who oppose Islamic morality are banned. Members of the former PDPA are still hated en excluded from society by the Karzai regime. The Islamic Republic of Afghanistan is build by the supporters of the moderate Mujaheddin and they still hate the ex-PDPA!

Supporters of Hamid Karzai claim that Afghanistan is a free nation. But in reality it is not. The Afghans are still oppressed by a corrupt Islamic government led by a puppet of US imperialism. This is why the Taliban is growing again. People have enough of Hamid Karzai who did nothing to end poverty and inequality. Today only a few remember the days when woman were free to cloth themselves. Stalinist Afghanistan may not have brought workers rule or genuine socialism. But it did liberated females from Islamic morality. Unfortunate that morality rules again in the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan!

Young Afghan woman during the secular era of

Afghanistan ( 1978-1992 )

PS: On March 6th 2012, the puppet government of President Hamid Karzai approved a new “code of conduct” for the women of Afghanistan that officially condones wife beating, legally bars women from leaving the home without a male guardian, bars women from mingling with men at markets, in offices, or in school, and states, “men are fundamental and women are secondary.” 

Al-Assad is losing his secular mask, Shia Islamists fighting for him!

Syrian dictator Bashar Al-Assad claims to fight Islamic fundamentalism. He says that Al-Qaeda is the main element in the rebel movement against him. Many supporters of Al-Assad have said that the Syrian government is secular and that the rebels are dangerous Islamic fundamentalists. The rise of Al-Nusra as part of Al-Qaeda have proven that Sunni Islamists are part of the rebel movement. But now the Shia Islamists are joining the Syrian Civil War, not as a rebel movement against the dictator, but as supporters of Bashar Al-Assad!  

There are two main Islamic ideologies in the world. Sunni Islamism and Shia Islamism. Both ideologies oppose each other and sectarianism violence has led to many deaths. Most Muslims are part of the Sunni religion. But the Iranians and the tribe of Bashar Al-Assad are Shia Muslims. In other Arab nations, the Sunni Muslims have always ruled and oppressed the Shia minority. Saddam Hussein of Iraq and Hafez Al-Assad hated each other. Their hatred was political and religious, Saddam was a Sunni and Hafez was a Shia. Also the Ba'ath Party in Syria follows the ideals of Zakī al-Arsūzī, while the Iraqi Ba'ath Party remained loyal to Michel Aflaq,, the original founder of Ba'athism! 

The fundamentalist Muslims of the Al-Nusra Front are all Sunni Muslim. They oppose Shia Islam and hate all who belong to this religion. There are enough reports about killing of innocent Shia Muslims. This is also the reason why the Sunni dominated Arab nations, all support the rebel moment against the Syrian government. Saudi-Arabia, Qatar, Oman and the United Arab Emirates would love to see a Sunni led Syrian government. They are the blinded by sectarian hate towards Shia Muslims! 

One famous Shia Islamic group is the Lebanese Party of God, called Hezbollah. This radical Islamic movement and political party is led by Hasan Nasrallah, a theocratic leader who wants to impose Islamic dogma on the people of Lebanon. Hasan Nasrallah is allied with Bashar Al-Assad and the Islamic Republic of Iran. Both Syria and Iran, are the main suppliers for Hezbollah! 

The Party of God ( Hezbollah ) has been fighting for an Islamic state in Lebanon since 1985. Their man enemy is the State of Israel, who they hate and oppose. Hezbollah enjoy's a popular status with poor people and young militants. Many Arabs hate the Zionist state and the occupation of Palestine by Israeli troops. 

Hezbollah has now send its militants to Syria, to fight for the secular government of Bashar Al-Aassad. This while Sunni Islamists are fighting against the Syrian dictator. Hezbollah knows how to fight the guerilla/street war, they have fought it for many years with Israeli and Lebanese armed forces. The main Syrian Armed Forces are not able to deal with the rebels, so the Hezbollah militants are put into the nation. 

The Syrian Civil War is now turning more bloody. Sectarianism between groups is very high. Even the Free Syrian Army is divided between militant groups. Revolutionary socialists say that we must support the people of Syria in their fight against Al-Assad and the Islamists. Syrians must set up independent councils, these councils will be the foundation of a new democratic Syria. We give no political support to the Syrian government nor to these rebel leaders in Turkey. Revolutionary socialists call for the rule of ordinary people through freely elected people's councils. Like the soviets in Russia and the workers councils in Germany, these people's councils will be vital for the birth of a socialist workers state!

The three Shia leaders! 

Liverpool - a city that dared to fight

Interview on Militant, the Labour Party and the struggle of the socialist led council 1983-87 in Liverpool

Peter Taaffe speaking to 
"Tony Snell in the Morning"

Liberalism, the enemy of workers and poor people

Liberals, called leftists in the United States of America. Those who want to oppose the dogmatic rule of the rich call themselves progressive liberals, they are called the radical left-wing by Fox News. But when you look closer you see that their so called leftism is not anti-capitalist. Liberals may oppose the corrupt politicians and their capitalists donors, but when it comes to the system of capitalism, all liberals support it. Liberalism is not a leftist ideology, it can be progressive when based in social liberalism or social democracy.  But most liberal parties in the world are not social liberal! 

American conservatives hate liberalism, they hate it because the liberals fight for personal freedoms. These freedoms are opposed by the conservatives. In the USA many liberals are called socialists, communists, marxists and enemies of freedom. But this is far from true, the conservative media around Fox News, uses the paranoia that many Americans feel with words like socialism and communism!

But liberalism is not anti-capitalist. Progressive or social liberals want to regulate the market and force the rich to pay more taxes. But those progressive liberals are in a minority, most liberals only support personal freedoms and don't want to limit the power of capitalism. In Europe most liberal parties are conservative liberal. Let us look at the Dutch; People's Party for Freedom and Democracy ( VVD ). The VVD is a conservative liberal party. They support many personal freedoms from abortion to gay marriage. Yet the same VVD opposes regulation of the markets. That is why most individualists and supporters of capitalism support the VVD. 

Democrats 66 is the official social liberal party in the Netherlands. D66 was founded in 1966 as a progressive liberal group. Unlike the VVD, Democrats 66 do not look at the state in a negative way. For them the state must regulation some markets and provide some social security. But that was in the 60's, today the supposed progressive liberals of D66 have degenerated into neoliberalism like many liberal parties. The Liberal Democratic Party in the Netherlands and the Social Liberal Party are the only true progressive liberal parties. They are unfortunate very small and few know of their existence!

Neoliberalism was created by conservative liberals who wanted to end government control and regulation of the economy. One of the first neoliberal leaders was Margaret Thatcher. She was a conservative and leader of the Conservative Party in the UK. As a conservative she mixed her traditional opposition to regulations with the liberal concept of a free market economy. Thatcher lived in a time when the government of the UK was very bureaucratic and regulated many sectors of the economy. The British ruling class once supported this idea of state regulation. They did this because they knew that the social democrats ( moderate socialists ) had the support from the working class. If the workers would remain loyal to the pro-capitalist social democrats, then capitalism would be save. But by 1983 the era of the social market economy was ending. Capitalists found new cheap labour markets to exploit. The People's Republic of China allowed foreign capitalists to use their workers, also India became more capitalistic. Faced with a massive capital flight to cheap labour markets, world politicians started to move to the right-wing! 

In the 80's most political groups shifted to the right-wing. Liberals, conservatives and social democrats all embraced the idea of less government and more market. With the collapse of the USSR in 1991, the ruling class started a major political offensive against the traditional left-wing. Socialists were told that capitalism was the victor, many capitulated to this. The communist parties went into desperation after the collapse of the Soviet-Union. Some communist parties changed their name and became social democratic, like the Communist Party of Great Britain, the Italian Communist Party and the Communist Party of the Netherlands. 

New liberalism was also the ruling ideology of Tony Blair. This rightist social democrat led the Labour Party in the UK. He won the 1997 elections and would remain leader of Great Britain for almost 11 years. Tony Blair did not ended the right-wing reforms that Margaret Thatcher started. Privatisations went on and the market ruled supreme causing poverty and income inequality. In 2001, the social democrats supported the American conservatives in their War on Terrorism  Also the Labour Party supported the imperialist invasion of Iraq in March 2003! 

In 2013 most liberal parties are neoliberal. Progressive liberals are rare to find, some have mixed with social democrats who are now much closer to liberalism then to socialism. Social liberals and social democrats have much in common today, they only differ on how much regulation is needed. This is unfortunate only as difference in ideological therms. Because when it come to govern, most social liberals and social democrats support neoliberal positions like privatisations and deregulations. That is why many people see no difference between the political parties. They may differ in propaganda during elections, but when the time comes for govern, most political parties support the demands of the markets and not their political ideology! 

Why is liberalism the enemy of workers and poor people? Because liberals will support the capitalists during class struggle. They will not take side with the workers and the poor. Some progressive liberals may do, but most will remain loyal to those who own the means of production. We see this in Russia of 1917. The liberals wanted a democratic capitalist Russia and opposed the rule of workers councils ( soviets ). After the czar was forced out, the liberals and moderate socialists ( social democrats ) founded the provisional government. Yet workers and poor people founded the soviets!  

The first Congress of Soviets was held in July 1917, yet the liberals and capitalist parties wanted a centralized parliamentary democracy. Only two political group were in favour of the soviets, the Russian Social Democratic Workers Party ( Bolsheviks ) and the left-wing of the Socialist Revolutionary Party. By November of 1917, the Bolsheviks won a majority in the soviets and called for the rule of workers. The liberals and others opposed this idea!

After the soviets took power the capitalist opposition took up arms. The liberals could have supported the workers and the soviets, but they choose to fight them. They were not alone in this. Anti-Soviet Russians founded the White Armies and with help from 200.000 foreign soldiers, they started the Russian Civil War.

Liberal betrayal we also see almost 89 years later in the USA. Barack Obama promised change after 8 years of conservative rule. Many Americans wanted change because the previous conservative president; George W. Bush was not loved. But after Obama got elected, he went along with the markets and the capitalists. There never came any genuine change. Barack Obama was able to get himself re-elected in 2012, but only because there was no genuine alternative to him. Even today there is still not major change in the USA! 

Western liberals and even some leftists were very happy with the election of Obama in 2008. Revolutionary socialists tried to warn them about the right-wing nature of Obama, but nobody want to believe. Many workers and young people are blinded by the propaganda of the Democratic Party. ''Change'' was the main slogan used by the Obama supporters. But as the markets wanted it, Obama did not brought any changes to the capitalist system! 

For many young people in the USA, liberalism seems an idealistic ideology. Personal freedoms and limited regulations of the markets. But when it comes to politicians even the liberals can be bought. There is little idealism in liberal politicians. In Europe most liberals only support those who pay them. It is not strange that the electorate of the liberal parties are those who have a wealthy background. But because of the shift to the right-wing in the last 23 years, people lost faith in politics. Some only vote on populists, others only because they like the politician. Very few people vote on a political party because they support the ideology of that party! 

Liberals are also anti-socialist because they say that socialism is about government rule only. They point at the social democrats and stalinists, who used a bureaucratic state and massive regulation ( red tape ). Liberals hate red tape bureaucracy, they believe in individualism and personal responsibility.  This is shared by some elements in the working class, who are angered when the government is slow and inefficiently. Revolutionary socialists oppose red tape bureaucracy, but also individualism. Society is made up of individuals but we cannot live by the Darwinian code ''everyone for him/her self''. That is the problem of most western societies.  Liberal individualism has turned people into arrogant beings, who only care about their career and personal wealth. Liberals say that it is human nature, but we oppose that!

Revolutionary socialists don't oppose liberals because of individual freedoms. We also support many liberal freedoms. But the only freedom we oppose is the freedom to exploit workers and take the wealth they create. Yet liberals who believe only in the individual think that it should own others. Classic liberals loved private property so much that they opposed anti-slavery. A slave was your property and classic liberals defended that. This is why we oppose liberalism. We want workers to control not only their own life, but we want them to control their society and economy. Liberalism only grants them freedom to vote and speech, but when it comes to the economy they support those who own the economy and not the millions who work in it! 

Godfather and Godmother of neoliberalism

Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. 

They were conservative liberals! 

50.000 East Germans used as guinea pigs

West German capitalist pharmaceutical companies have used 50.000 East Germans for experiments. These experiments were made during the times of the German Democratic Republic ( 1949-1990 ). About 50.000 people were used to test new medicines for the West German market. The East Germans who underwent these tests never knew that their medicnes were experimental and that they were guinea pigs for West German pharmaceutical capitalism. Fifty East German hospitals were paid 800.000 West German Marks for every test the East Germans carried out! 

East Germany was a Stalinist republic founded in 1949. Its leaders were former members of the Communist Party of Germany and the Social-democratic Party of Germany. The two parties were forced to fuse in 1945, out of their fusion a new party was born: the Socialist Unity Party of Germany ( SED ). The SED became the ruler of the National Front, a political coalition of East German parties. Although the National Front was made up of many parties, the SED was the only one who was allowed to rule! 

West Germany was founded as a capitalist democracy and remains to this day dominated by mighty capitalists. Most major capitalists were united in the Free Democratic Party, the main liberal party that supports free market capitalism. Konrad Adenauer became the first federal chancellor of West-Germany. He was in favor of a mixed market economy. The West-German capitalists accepted the mixed market economy, because they feared a working class victory during elections! 

The German Democratic Republic faced its major crisis in 1953. After the death of Stalin the working class rose up against Walter Ulbricht, the SED leader and de-facto dictator of the DDR. East Germany was not able to compete with West Germany, who received billions of dollars from the Marshall Plan. The Soviet-Union was not giving money, they were dismantling  German industries and machines as war reparations. This led the DDR weaker then the Federal Republic of Germany ( BRD ).  

By 1953, Walter Ulbricht wanted to force workers to work harder and longer for less money. This angered the East German working class, who had enough of four years under Stalinist rule. The rebellion began with a strike in East Berlin. Soon thousands left their work places and joined the demonstrations. They shouted ''we are the people'' and ''free elections, freedom''. The East German Stalinists panicked and asked for Soviet support. The Soviet-Union saw the danger of a working class revolt and ordered their armies in the DDR to crush the workers rebellion!

The July 1953 rebellion was crushed. Eight leaders who led the working class were put on trail and executed. After these Stalinist show trails, the SED fired 75% of their secretaries. Because many of the party's lower-ranks supported the strike and rebellion. Soon the party was purged of the last critical members. Many East Germans took their chance and fled to West Gemany. Between 1949 and 1961, more then 1 million fled to the west. This led Walter Ulbricht to build the famous Berlin Wall. The SED said that the wall was a ''Anti-Fascist'' Wall to protect the DDR from West German fascists. In reality the wall was build to keep East Germans inside the DDR. It is ironic that many fascists in today's Germany live in the east. The neonazi's of the National-democratic Party of Germany are strong in former DDR provinces! 

West German pharmaceutical companies needed to conduct 600 medical tests on living humans. Since there were not enough West German test subjects, they went to the German Democratic Republic, who always needed West Germany money. The East Geman Mark was worthless outside the DDR, while the West German Mark was a strong currency in the world market. East Germany needed the money so they sold their people to the West German pharmaceutical companies. The price was 800.000 West German Marks for every medical test! 

Fifty hospitals in East Germany were paid money to use West German experimental medicine on people. At least two people died because of these experimental medicine. We also know that thirty babies were giving the drug: EPO. East Germany was not a stranger when it came to drugs. The government used drugs to boost the abilities of its athletes. Many sportsmen and woman were giving drugs in order to win many medals for the ''socialist'' fatherland. This is why East Germany was so good at the Olympic Games, they were cheaters! 

In the hospitals that were paid money to carry out these experiments, only those in charge knew of it. Most doctors and nursers were not told that these medicine were experimental. The 50,000 victims never gave personal permission to be used as guinea pigs. This is just another crime German stalinism is guilty of. Oppressing the German working class, living in luxurious villa's, spying on workers through the Ministry of Security ( Stasi ) and finally using their own people as guinea pigs for West German money. 

Stalinism is criminal and anticommunist.    

East German athletes were giving 

drugs to boos their muscles

during international sport events!  

Henk Sneevliet, a forgotten hero

He was co-founder of the biggest communist party in the world. Founding father of a party which members were slaughtered in Indonesia. A revolutionary Marxist who stood up against social democratic betrayal and Stalinist degeneration. His name was Henk Sneevliet, a forgotten hero of the working class. This is his story, the story of his life that brought him from the early social democracy to revolutionary socialism/communism. On 12 April 1942, Sneevliet was executed by the Germans in The Netherlands. He died as a proud internationalist! 

Hendricus Josephus Franciscus Marie Sneevliet was born on 13 May 1883. His birth city was Rotterdam but he grew up in 's-Hertogenbosch. After school he went working for the Dutch railroads in 1900. Soon he joined the Social Democratic Workers Party ( SDAP ) and the rail trade union. In 1907 he was the first socialist elected into the city council of Zwolle. 

A few years later Henk Sneevliet became chairman of the Rail Road Union. Unlike most social democrats, Henk Sneevliet was a revolutionary socialist and more radical. His first class with the moderate socialists was in 1911, when the radical trade unions supported a sailors strike. Yet the biggest trade union and the SDAP opposed the strike. This angered Sneevliet who left The Netherlands to work in the Dutch colony of Indonesia ( Dutch Indies ). 

He lived in Indonesia from 1913 till 1918. His stay in the colony turned him into a anti-colonialist. Sneevliet hated the way the Dutch were ruling. He became a member of the Union of Rail and Tram Staff. This moderate trade union was unique because it had both Dutch and Indonesian workers. Because Henk Sneevliet was a good trade unionist he was able to turn this moderate union into a mighty voice for the working class in Indonesia!

The SDAP and the colonial rulers were hot happy with Henk Sneevliet. Social democratic leaders wanted to work with the ruling class and Sneevliet was opposed to that. By 1916 he left the moderate SDAP and joined the Social Democratic Party. This party was orthodox Marxist and opposed working with the parties of capitalism! 

On 7 November 1917, the Russian working class took power. Soviet Russia became the first nation that expropriated the bourgeoisie. Revolutionaries around the world were fascinated by the Bolsheviks. Henk Sneevliet and the Social Democratic Party were among the first supporters of the new Soviet government. A year later the SDP renamed itself into the Communist Party Holland. It joined the Communist Internationale in 1919! 

Because of his support to the Soviet Russians, Henk Sneevliet was forced to leave Indonesia. Back in the Netherlands he was partly marginalized by the CPH leadership. The party criticized his work in Indonesia and prevented him from becoming a party leader. Sneevliet went to work in the trade union movement again. Two years later he went to Moscow for the second congress of the Communist International. But not as a representative of the CPH. He went as a member of the Communist Party of Indonesia, a party founded by his supporters in Indonesia! 

Vladimir Lenin liked the Dutch revolutionary. He was very impressed by Henk Sneevliet's way of speaking to workers. Lenin gave Sneevliet work for the Communist International. He send him to China to build the communist movement there. In July 1921, Sneevliet was in China as founding father of the Chinese Communist Party. But the young communist party was not very good in Sneevliet's eye's. He looked to the mighty Chinese Nationalist Party led by the left-wing nationalist Dr. Sun Yat-sen. Sneevliet wanted the CCP to work with the nationalists to fight the reactionary war lords.  

The other founding fathers of the CCP opposed working with the nationalists. But with help from Moscow, Sneevliet got his way. Although reasonable at the time, this alliance between communists and nationalists would proof to be a disaster. After Sun Yat-sen's death in 1925, the Chinese Nationalist Party came under the control of Chiang-Kai-Shek. An anticommunist right-wing nationalist, who hated communism. Sneevliet's proposed alliance with the nationalists would lead to the killing of 50.000 communists in 1927 by nationalist forces!

After the death of Vladimir Lenin, Sneevliet became critical of the Soviet-Union. He opposed the growing bureaucracy led by Stalin and sided with Leon Trotsky. His opposition brought him again into conflict with the now Stalinist leadership of the Communist Party Holland. As members of the Left Opposition were expelled from the All Union Communist Party in the Soviet Union, Henk Sneevliet choose to leave the CPH. Two years after he left the communist party, Sneevliet founded the Revolutionary Socialist Party, that was in 1929! 

In August of 1933, the RSP signed the declaration of the four. This document was signed by four anti-Stalin revolutionary socialist/communist parties, who wanted to build a new international of revolutionary parties. The moderate  Second International and the Third Internationale now led by Stalin, were seen as corrupt and anti-Marxist! 

Henk Sneevliet was a strong opponent of fascism. But the Dutch government did not supported his anti-fascism, they jailed him for insulting a friendly head of state. This friendly head of state was Adolf Hitler, who was elected leader of Germany in January 1933. Hitler was seen as a friend of the Netherlands and Sneevliet's criticism were not welcomed. So the leader of the RSP was jailed for insults he made towards the German dictator! 

In 1935 the Revolutionary Socialist Party fused with the Independent Socialist Party ( OSP ). Out of this fusion came the Revolutionary Socialist Workers Party. Although called a trotskyist party by history, the RSAP never joined the Communist Fourth International in 1938.  Henk Sneevliet and Leon Trotsky were both committed to their own believes and those believes did collide. A major disagreement was the support of Sneevliet to the Spanish POUM. The Workers Party of Marxist Unification was founded by a fusion between the Spanish trotskyists and supporters of Nicolai Bukharin, the right-wing group of the original Bolshevik Party!

Leon Trotsky was not in favor of the POUM, while Sneevliet supported it. Today we can say that Trotsky was right about his concerns, but his rejection of the POUM completely was wrong. Sneevliet knew that the POUM was the only genuine revolutionary socialist party in Spain during the Spanish civil war. His support to this party was no mistake as Trotsky claimed!

Sneevliet also refused to support the USSR, while Trotsky kept calling the Soviet-Union a bureaucratic degenerated workers state. But for Sneevliet the USSR had nothing to do with socialism or a workers state. That is why the RSAP did not called its members to support the USSR against foreign imperialists. Trotsky and his supporters remained committed to defend the USSR, while Sneevliet opposed any defense of the Soviet-Union! 

After 1938, Sneevliet and Trotsky broke off contact. A mistake of both men. Their own dogmatism had splintered the anti-Stalinist communist movement even more. The split between Sneevliet and Trotsky, was the first in a line of many splitsts in the anti-Stalinist camp. The American; Socialist Workers Party would face many splits after the murder of Leon Trotsky and the second world war! 

In the Netherlands, the RSAP remained opposed to colonialism and capitalism. They were hated by the Communist Party of the Netherlands, which was now led by pro-Stalin communists. Unfortunate the Dutch working class were loyal to either the social democratic SDAP, the Stalinist CPN or religious parties. At that time many workers voted on the party of their religion. You had a catholic party, a protestant party and hardcore anticommunist parties like the National Socialist Movement led by Anton Mussert, a fascist! 

Nazi Germany invaded the Netherlands on 10 May 1940. Henk Sneevliet and his RSAP knew that they would be banned soon. Unlike the CPN, SDAP and other parties, the RSAP disolved itself very fast. In her place a resistance movement was founded. The Marx, Lenin, Luxemburg  Front ( MLLF ) became one of the first Dutch resistance movements. 500 people joined to fight the Germans! 

Between May 1940 and April 1942, the MLLF was active in many ways of resistance. Their newspaper was very popular with 50.000 illegal copies made. Henk Sneevliet was the leader of the MLLF, but his own dogmatism and arrogance was sometimes the reason why he made mistakes. Take the German invasion of the USSR. Sneevliet did not believed that Hitler would invade the USSR. So the newspaper of the MLLF printed stories of the German-Soviet none aggression pact. When Hitler invaded the USSR, the newspaper of July 1941 could not be spread, because its headlines were about the neutrality between Nazi Germany and the USSR. But Sneevliet demanded that the paper was to be spread to workers. He even wanted to expel any member who would not spread the newspaper. His authoritarianism was also the reason why many independent socialists left the party before the war! 

For two years, Sneevliet evaded the Germans. Finally they arrested him and the leadership of the MLLF in April 1942. For his resistance against the Germans he was sentenced to death. Since the Germans captured all leaders of the MLLF, the group dissolved after their execution. Some remaining revolutionary socialists abandoned the resistance or started to work with other groups. On 12 April 1942, Sneevliet and the MLLF leadership were executed. Just before the Germans shoot them, they sang the Internationale!

Today the Chinese Communist Party is the biggest party in the world. With 70 million members the CCP is huge. But the party had lost its original ideology. Chinese leaders are now state-capitalist and no longer care about workers and international socialism. The Communist Party of Indonesia was eliminated by the Indonesian dictator Suharto. This military general killed 500.000 communists and was supported by the USA and western Europe for his strong anticommunism! 

The leadership of the Chinese Communist Party is aware that Henk Sneevliet was a founding father. But they know little of the man himself. The city of Shanghai has opened an exhibition about the life of Sneevliet. Yet even that will not do honor to the name Sneevliet. Only a genuine socialist China will do that. Had Sneevliet survived the second world war, he would have opposed Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party. Because Henk Sneevliet hated Stalin and all those who abused socialism and communism for totalitarian rule. A great revolutionary socialist and forgotten by many. But his legacy lives on in all revolutionary socialists who stood up to Stalin, Hitler and other dictators! 

Henk Sneevliet speaks to Soviet workers in 1920

Leon Trotsky is translating his story and stands behind him! 

Lenin's last years

Vladimir Lenin is called a dictator, a monster and only less evil then Stalin. The capitalists, social democrats and anarchists love to tell you the story of dictator Lenin. How he destroyed the free Russian Republic and ''Russian democracy''. The anarchists hate Lenin for his Red Terror and his crack down of the Kronstadt Uprising which is worshipped by anarchists as a third Russian Revolution. But Lenin was no dictator. He was elected by workers and soldiers in November 1917. Sure he was authoritarian, but so were many leaders during the Russian civil war. This is a story not of Lenin's struggle against 21 foreign armies or the anticommunist Russian movement. Our story is that of Lenin's last years, in which he discovered the true nature of Stalin! 

Stalinists think that Lenin and Stalin were of the same kind. Nothing is true, Lenin hated Stalin brutality and rude behaviour. Also he saw the absolute power Stalin got as a result of the civil war. Lenin was unsure if Stalin was able to deal with so much power. So he wanted the party to remove Stalin from the position of general secretary. That Lenin opposed Stalin was kept a secret for many years. It was not until 1956 that the Soviet people found out about the criticism he had made towards Stalin!

Joseph Stalin was a close ally of Lenin before the Russian Revolution. But unlike Leon Trotsky, Stalin's role in the civil war was limited. He fought for the defence of the city of Tsaritsyn, a city that was renamed in his honour in 1925. Stalin also fought in the Polish-Soviet war in 1921. As commander he wanted to capture the city of Lviv. Red Army leader Leon Trotsky opposed this because Warsaw was the main target, Stalin refused to obey orders and attacked Lviv. Because of Stalin, the Red Army lost the Battle of Warsaw. Trotsky wanted to attack Stalin on that, but Lenin ordered the man of steel back to Moscow!

In Moscow Stalin played a dirty game. He wanted his home nation of Georgia to become a Soviet state. Georgia was a social democratic republic and neutral in the Russian Civil War. But Stalin and Georgian Bolsheviks started civil unrest and used the brutal crackdown of the Georgian government to convince Lenin that the workers of Georgia were rising up. Lenin believed Stalin and ordered the Red Army to aid the supposed workers rebellion. The Soviets took control of Georgia and established the Georgian Socialist Soviet Republic. Stalin got what he wanted and made sure that ethnic Georgians had little to say. Soon Lenin opposed the politics of Stalin regarding Georgia. He called Stalin a great Russian chauvinist, who imposed Russian nationalism on the Georgians. It was then that Lenin saw that Stalin was not a pure communist, but a brutal man who could be a danger to the new Soviet-Union!

But Lenin's health was getting worse. In May 1922 he got his first of three strokes. This first one left him unable to speak for weeks. After that the doctors suggested he took some rest. That was almost impossible for Lenin, who was used to work 14 hours a day. But the first stroke proved that he needed to calm down. The civil war was nearly over and the Red Army was driving the White movement out of Russia. While resting Lenin dictated several documents about the nature of the Soviet state and gave criticism of many leading communists like Stalin, Zinoview, Kamenev and Leon Trotsky. The last letters to the communist party are called Lenin's testament. In these letters Lenin said that Stalin was not good enough to be the leader of the party. Also he feared the state bureaucracy and the powerlessness of the soviet councils. 

The communists had taken power in Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan. The Caucasian Soviet republics were united in the Transcaucasian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic. A move not welcomed by the Georgian communists who wanted an independent Soviet Georgia. The plan was to unite all these Soviet nations into one big Union of Socialist Soviet Republics. But Lenin would not be able to be chairman of this new USSR. Just before the formation of the new union, Lenin got his second stroke that left him paralyzed on the right side. Unable to move and write he could no longer be chairman of the council of people's commissioners!

Joseph Stalin, Grigory Zinoview and Lev Kamenev took over and became the Troika of the communist party. They would lead the early Soviet-Union, while Lenin went into retirement. Yet the leader of the Russian Revolution did not wanted to give up the fight. Unfortunate behind his back, Joseph Stalin controlled his life. Soon Lenin became a prisoner in his own house and body. In March 1923, he got his third stroke that left him mute, he could no longer speak. Win out his voice, Lenin was now completely out of the picture. Stalin knew this and made sure that he was still in complete control. The people who took care of Lenin stood under direct command of Joseph Stalin!

At 18.50 hours on 21 January 1924, Vladimir Lenin died. His last 10 months must be have been difficult. Unable to stop Stalin and not able to speak to the people who could stop him. Leon Trotsky was kept away from him and not even informed of the funeral. Lenin was never able to be chairman of the Soviet-Union. On paper he ruled the USSR until January 1924, but in reality he was out of politics by the time the Soviet-Union was founded.

Was Lenin a bad leader? A dictator like many people claim? For stalinists and dogmatic communists he is a saint and the supreme revolutionary leader. But for us revolutionary socialists he is just one of many revolutionaries of that time. He was not pure good and not pure evil. Lenin made error's and mistakes. The uncontrolled Red Terror, the brutal crackdown of those who opposed his revolution are parts we criticize. Also Lenin wanted to re-educate the youth into good communists. He banned western movies and western youth culture. This he called ''bourgeois'' trash that was poisoning the minds of the Soviet youth. But few young people joined the Communist Youth League before Stalin's rise to power. The NEP and the market economy were not good propaganda for young people!

But for poor workers Lenin was an alternative. He gave them power and the feeling they were more then just wage slaves. Millions came to support the ideals of Lenin. Unfortunate because of Stalin, these ideals were deformed to serve the needs of the Stalinist bureaucracy. In Spain the working class took power in 1936, much like in Russia. Yet the Spanish Socialist Workers Party and the Spanish Communist Party opposed the Spanish Revolution. So the anarchists and revolutionary socialists took the leadership in this revolution. In Barcelona, the workers took control from the capitalist Republican government. For a very small moment in human history, a genuine socialist society was build. Free from capitalism and exploitation. Yet the Republic of Spain entered a civil war and the leaders of the Spanish Revolution choose to support the capitalist Republicans against the fascist Nationalists. Soon the Spanish government turned against against the groups who supported the Spanish Revolution. The anarchists and revolutionary socialists were banned and hunted down by the Stalinist NKVD ( secret police ). By 1939, the Republic of Spain collapsed and general Franco became dictator of Fascist Spain. He would remain dictator until 1975!

Lenin became a dogma in the Stalinist USSR. Stalin made statues of himself and Lenin which he placed in every Soviet city. Children were told to love Lenin and to learn all about the first leader of Soviet Russia. For them Lenin was a grandfather and a religious icon, in a huge cult of personality. Lenin became the God of Marxism Leninism, the official state ideology was named after him. The communist party made sure that any criticism of Stalin was called a criticism of Lenin. By 1928, Joseph Stalin had defeated Leon Trotsky and banned free speech in the All Union Communist Party. It would not be until 1956 when the party would allow more internal free speech. True free speech would not return until the last three years of the USSR. In 1988, opposition political parties were allowed. But the bureaucracy was not able to save the Soviet ideal. After years of lies, corruption and abuse of power many workers viewed capitalism as an alternative to stalinism. Even today few workers think that socialism can work. Most are still paralyzed by the capitalist lies spread about communism and Lenin himself! 

Vladimir Lenin in 1923, paralyzed and mute! 

Stalin controlled his last months