The Red Plough Vol 2-3

The Red Plough
http://theredplough.blogspot.com/
Vol. 2-No 3
September 2011



The United Left Alliance and the North-Some thoughts!
On Saturday June 25th 2011 in Liberty Hall, Dublin there was a coming together of over three hundred political activists under the banner of the United Left Alliance.
The ULA first emerged late last year when a number of groupings came together to form a bloc of revolutionary socialists as a response to the economic crisis facing capitalism. The response by all the main stream electoral parties to that crisis and their unity in accepting the dictates of the European Band and the IMF mean that there was little or no opposition to the cosy consensus of capitalism. All agreed that the burden of saving the banks and the financial institutions of Capitalism must fall on those lest able to bear the pain and with no responsibility to that crisis- the working class. The ULA fought the recent elections in the South and won five seats to the Dail including members of the People Before Profit (SWP mainly) the Socialist Party(SP) and the WUAG based mainly around Tipperary. While this was not a great victory it has encouraged many non-aligned activists that maybe there is a change in the wind and a serious mass left party may well emerge.
That is why there was good turn out at the forum in Liberty Hall. During the course of the day it was clear there were a number of demarcation lines between the groups. The SP wanted the word socialist to be central to what the ULA was while the PBP wanted a much looser formation.
In a recent important interview1 Tommy McKearney asserts that the reason for this was to appeal to the middle classes. This critique that has often been thrown at in particular the SWP. In appealing to wider sections outside the working classes it is often alleged that they are prepared to water down their politics.
There was an air of politeness that seemed to permeate the whole conference Nobody seemed to want to offend or rock the boat. Only on the issue of the North did tempers rise with the Socialist Party under attack for their position on the UVF invasion of the Short Strand. Unfortunately some comrades took umbrage at this and seemed to resent the raising of “controversial” issues. Surely it is better to explore key issues and understand the different positions of both individuals and groups. And what is wrong with a bit of passion at meetings?
The SP do not want the ULA to organise in the North at this moment in time while the rest were in favour. Correctly the SP pointed out that at the first sectarian clashes in the North the Alliance, if it included the Socialist Party, would face great difficulties. So they say the time is not ripe for the ULA to organise in the North. They are correct in this because they are wrong in their approach to the North. It takes some doing to be consistently wrong on the North for years but the SP have managed this.
Yes, they may have a formally correct marxist analysis about violence and class divisions but in actual practice they err always on the side of not offending the unionist sensitivities of the protestant working classes. They apply blame equally on the two sections of the working classes when sectarian clashes occur forgetting that usually, but not always, the driving force is orange or loyalist sectarianism.
Would the Socialist Party give a bye ball to the KKK in the USA? If not why do they give the UVF a bye ball in the North? In their explanation of why there was “riots” on Monday and Tuesday of June 20th and 21st 2011 the SP called the invasion of Short Strand by hundreds of UVF volunteers an “orchestrated attack”2 But they then tried to balance that by attacking the involvement of so called “dissident republicans” in wounding two protestants and a journalist (obviously journalists don’t do religion). Let us not forget that the SP in the past gave a platform to the PUP’s Billy Hutchinson while refusing to take republican speakers from the floor at the same meeting.
Needless to say the vast majority of the residents in the Short Strand saw the situation slightly differently. Having endured regular invasions from gangs of unionists lumpen proletariat over the course of the last two centuries they saw the “orchestrated attack” as a dry run for ethnic cleansing or an attempted pogrom.
The nationalist community in East Belfast is only a small fraction of the overall population in East Belfast and have been regularly held to ransom for the “good behaviour” of other nationalists in the north. The UVF attack on Short Strand could be liken to the Black Hundreds attacks on the Jewish people in Tsarist Russia.3 It is no wonder that in the face of actual real moment attacks some republicans immediately resorted to the use of arms in defence of the area.While that action was unwise this writer is certainly not going to condemn armed self-defence of working class areas. The North has a long and bloody history of armed incursions into nationalist areas resulting in deaths, mass evacuations and burnt out districts. Perhaps those Republicans who entered into the British controlled decommissioning process have now had second thoughts.
In 2001 the SP in an attempt to show their even handedness in their explanation of the events surrounding the Holy Cross Blockade wrote as follows,
“But the sectarianism is not all one way, despite the misleading attempts by some nationalists to portray it as such. Sinn Fein recently published a centre page in An Phoblacht listing the attacks on Catholics. This is a deliberately one sided approach ignoring the attacks that have also taken place against Protestants.”.4
However the SP fails itself to outline the attacks against protestants which would have been the sensible thing to do and show how there is widespread sectarianism in the Northern society. If truth be told the approach of the SP is itself one-sided and is designed to create a myth of sectarianism as an all embracing disease equally affecting both sides.
Let us be clear there is no equivalence between loyalism and republicanism.
One is the essential belief in domination, supremacy, and retains all the trappings of the remnants of Imperialism. Like the Black Hundreds they act in defence of the ruling classes.
The other is an expression of resistance by an exploited dominated and oppressed people. One can argue about the relevance of each to the 21st century but the violence of the oppressed is not the equivalent of the violence of the oppressor.
“We do not and never have put all wars on the same plane. Marx and Engels supported the revolutionary struggle of the Irish against Great Britain, of the Poles against the tsar, even though in these two nationalist wars the leaders were, for the most part, members of the bourgeoisie and even at times of the feudal aristocracy . . . at all events, Catholic reactionaries. When Abdel-Krim rose up against France, the democrats and Social Democrats spoke with hate of the struggle of a “savage tyrant” against the “democracy.” The party of Leon Blum supported this point of view. But we, Marxists and Bolsheviks, considered the struggle of the Riffians against imperialist domination as a progressive war. Lenin wrote hundreds of pages demonstrating the primary necessity of distinguishing between imperialist nations and the colonial and semi-colonial nations which comprise the great majority of humanity. To speak of “revolutionary defeatism” in general, without distinguishing between exploiter and exploited countries, is to make a miserable caricature of Bolshevism and to put that caricature at the service of the imperialists.)”5
These words of Leon Trotsky must be well know by the comrades in the Socialist Party. Why then do they allow themselves to become the working class equivalent of the middle class Alliance party with their even handed “plague on all your houses” approach?
This is not in any way to condone justify or excuse sectarian attacks. Regardless of who engages in them they are wrong. The Red Plough fundamentally disagrees with the use of armed resistance to British Imperialism at this juncture of time and believes it vital to build bridges to workers from what ever section of the working class they come. But we will not do that at the cost of denying the existence of Imperialism. Nor should any self respecting socialist shy away from solidarity with those who are indeed victims of that Imperialism.
To those “progressive loyalists” (and there are indeed progressive loyalists on some issues) we would say claim not the reactionary elements of Britishness such as Imperialism, monarchy, British Army wars of aggression etc, but the positive elements that evolved within British history such as the Levellers,6 the Chartists,7 the struggle for the vote, the welfare state, feminism trade unions and so on.
As early as 1872 an Isabella Tod established a society called the North of Ireland’s Women’s Suffrage Committee and the Irish suffrage movement also included the Unionist Women’s Franchise Association. So there is a huge democratic and progressive hidden history within the working class traditions in Britain and Ireland that regardless of their perceived nationality workers today could learn from.
Take for example the case of a Roberta Black, born in Larne in 1904. During the 1930’s she was active in the Belfast Peace League becoming its secretary. Apart from her involvement in that campaign she was also active in the Nursery School movement. In a newspaper interview she said of herself:

'I am a Socialist because I believe in equality of opportunity for all human beings regardless of birth, creed or colour. I feel any exploitation of man by man, class by class or nation by nation to be morally wrong. My ideas came from my home background, which was Christian Socialist, and later working in nursery schools in industrial areas in the 1930s I was shocked by the consequences of insecurity, unemployment and illness.’

She was was one of the founders of Edenderry Nursery School, off the Shankill in 1938 and Frederick Street Nursery School, close to York Street in Belfast in 1941. In both of those working class areas there was widespread poverty and deprivation. and she acted as honorary secretary for both of these Belfast schools. She was also on the Management Committee for the Northern Ireland Fever Hospital.

When she went to Coventry with her husband in 1957 she joined the local Labour Party and served as Secretary to the Cheylesmore Ward Labour Party. For the next decade she wrote to various parliamentarians, particularly Labour MPs, about the chief political issues of the day such as the Vietnam War. Her return to Belfast in 1972 did not break her links with the Labour movement. Indeed, she joined the Northern Ireland Labour Party and acted as canvasser, polling agent, etc, during parliamentary and council election until her death in 1975.8 She is but one example of the hidden history within the wider protestant working class. It is a history that needs to be reclaimed.

After the 2nd world war there was a strong communist vote and the Northern Ireland Labour Party had a strong presence in industrial areas and at one time was seen as a major threat to the unionist party’s control. Sadly the NILP could not face up to the challenges thrown up by the emergence of the Civil Rights Movement and following the outbreak of the armed conflict in the early 1970‘s members of that N.I.L.P. ended up in the armed ranks of republican and loyalist groups.
However traces of that progressive history are still evident today. After generations of conflict there are many ex-republican and loyalist activists now working hard in working class communities to bring down sectarian attacks and reach out to the “other side”. They may not be in the trade union movement; they may not be in “left groups”; but night after night particularly during the “marching season they work hard to reduce tensions and yet their contributions will rarely be recognised. Some of those from a loyalist background admitted that the protestant working class should have supported the Civil rights movement and that they were also exploited by the “big house protestants”. Some Republicans have come to recognise the sectarian nature of some of their actions of the past. Indeed they now recognise that it is the class question that is central to the needs of the working classes in Ireland.These are not matters of insignificance. These people were and some still are leaders in their respective working class communities.
That creates a possibility of progress especially as the current economic crisis shows no sense of ending. Unemployment is rising, benefits are being cut the state sector is been diminished and families are struggling to survive. Capitalism world wide is facing its greatest ever economic challenges. To survive it needs to claw back from the working classes the gains of centuries of struggle.
This has created an upsurge of class struggle throughout Europe. Working class resistance to the economic penalties being imposed in places like Spain, Italy and Greece has been widespread. So there is no better time for the left to come together and push the positive messages of Socialism which can unite the working classes. But it can not be done by hiding softening or denying the actual realities of Imperialism. Sadly some on the Left have not learned the lessons of history
Over 100 years ago the same issues arose in Belfast when the Irish Socialist Republican Party tried to organise there. Although subject to attacks from the Orange Order and other loyalists the ISRP’s main problem was other Belfast socialists organised in the Belfast Socialist Society.
They held their noses as they dismissed the ISRP as a Irish nationalist organisation rather than what it was, part of the wider internationalist socialist movement.
“The Belfast socialists held a rather abstract view of internationalism, believing that any talk of the “national question”in Ireland was little more than a distraction from the “real” class issues. They believed that any potential unity between Catholic and protestant workers along class lines would be jeopardized by any discussion of issues relating to Irish sovereignty and independence from the British Empire”9
Sounds very familiar does it not? All those brave young people attracted to the type of politics espoused by organisations like the SP and the SWP or its many fronts need to realise that Imperialism does exist. It is operating in Afghanistan, Iraqi, and Libya. And it operates in Ireland. Of course it does not show it true face most of the time as British Imperialism uses various tactics honed over the years to keep the natives on side. Their biggest achievement in recent years was to persuade the Sinn Fein (Provisional) leadership to accommodate and collaborate with its plans for Ireland.
But when it shows its brutal face, such as the use of torture, shoot to kill brutalisation of political prisoners etc, all one will get from some on the left is formal denunciations on paper but no actual appearances on the streets along side republicans. No. That is a step too far. Better to hold the noses and hope they will go away with their flags sit down marches etc against injustice. It might interfere with the “class question”which is winning masses of workers especially protestant workers over to the ranks of socialism! Might it. Ahem!!
Such a stance, this writer affirms, is against all that socialists like Connolly, Lenin, and Leon Trotsky stood for, wrote about, or lived their lives in struggle for.
What was noticeable at the ULA conference was the steady stream of speakers carrying their party allegiances into each and every speech and never deviating in the slightest from their perceived party line. There was little sense of real engagement or self doubt. Our line is correct. End of story. That closed mind syndrome is critiqued by McKearney as follows
“-I would argue with so many of the Trotskyist groups, is people coming in from beyond the working class believing that they can interpret what the working class needs. It’s an old problem with Trotskyism for many, many years and it remains.. They hold on to bourgeois instincts, that they think of themselves as so much superior in many ways, its almost as if they are a religious sect, where they alone have the answers in some sort of bible.”10
It has always been the easy way out for republicans to denounce Trotskyists especially when some groups claiming affinity to the ideas of Trotsky act in a superior fashion. In the late sixties the leadership of the Republican movement regularly denounced those within their ranks who disagreed with the leadership as Trotskyists or right wing catholics. After the foundation of the IRSP even Seamus Costello denounced Trotskyism even though there were many individual followers of the ideas of Trotsky who joined the IRSP. Trotskyists were the hate figures for the Official Republicans/Workers party heavily influenced by the totalitarian ideas of Stalinism.
But Tommy McKearney’s words could easily be directed at other organisations. For example the Provos themselves have always had an elitist attitude. They have always had an instinctive distrust of the masses. Since their foundation that which they can not control they seek to destroy.Tommy should well remember in the 1970’s when armed Republicans treated those involved solely in politics with contempt. Also for many years the leaderships of the organisation to which Tommy gave allegiance to, considered themselves the legitimate Government of Ireland and indeed their current leadership acts as if it is! The classic example of Republican elitism is to be seen in the writings, behaviour and attitudes associated with the leadership of Republican Sinn Fein who consider themselves and themselves alone, as the only true republicans!!
So elitist attitudes are not confined to so called far left groups.It has permeated all the republican groups. Indeed it was in response to that very elitism that Ta Power wrote his seminal document11 on organisation.
But of course arguments rarely change people’s attitudes or opinions particularly if they are in the confines of a tightly knitted group bound by loyalty and discipline. No, it is the actual course of the class struggle that changes things.
The current world wide crisis of capitalism does not manifest itself in simple easy understood ways. The crisis of Southern capitalism and the attacks on the living standards of the working classes has heightened awareness among advanced sectors of the working class. The emergence of the ULA is a manifestation of that as is the increase in the vote for PSF and the increase in independent TDs.
However the North has not yet suffered the same drastic cuts yet as the south partially due to the large state sector and the ability of the current Stormont administration to put of painful decisions for as long as possible. The divided working class look to their respective parties to look after their interests So left republicans and left socialists do not yet feel the need for a clear unified response. The pressure from below is not yet coming through. But our function ,( i.e. those of us on the left,) needs to be to shatter the illusions that the masses have in their political representatives. In the last analysis they are simply the agents of capitalism administrating things in the interests of the ruling classes and ensuring the continuing exploitation of the working class of all and no religions.
Therefore it would be better if the left apart from increasing its agitation and propagandising and mobilising advanced sections of the class kept channels of communication with all other groupings of the left. That does not mean agreement, nor watering down our politics but it does leave open the possibilities of a strong left eventually emerging. In the last analysis it will be power of the working class that creates the conditions for the emergence of a genuine revolutionary body
So the emergence of the ULA is an important event. It may open up new opportunities for the left. Is the left mature enough to seize the opportunities? Time will tell.

Minutes of the general sessions
http://ranksavagespit.wordpress.com/2011/06/26/minutes-from-the-united-left-alliance-forum/
Discussion
http://tomasoflatharta.com/2011/06/26/ula-forum-a-resounding-success/#comments

Programme of ULA
http://www.unitedleftalliance.org/about-us/

Marxist Education
http://www.newyouth.com/archives/theory/marxismfaq.asp

James Connolly Archive http://www.marxists.org/archive/connolly



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The Red Plough Vol 2-2

The Red Plough

http://theredplough.blogspot.com/

Vol. 2-No 2

June 2011

1/Editorial

2/United front anybody?

3/Responses to “The Elections- a Democratic Revolution?”

Between rebellion as a private study and the public

Defiance is simple action only which will flicker

Catlike, for Spring. Whether at nerve roots is secret

Iron, there’s no diviner can tell, only the moment can show

Simple and unclear moment, on a morning utterly different

And under circumstances different from what you’d expect.

From Poem by Charlie Donnelly

(Irish volunteer killed in the Spanish Civil War)

Editorial

Consolidation of the Elites.

What a few months! The North’s Assembly Elections , The British Queen’s Visit to the 26 counties and the President of the most warlike nation nation on Earth receives a rapturous welcome in Ireland.
The elections were no surprise. There was much of a muchness about the results.

 Both the DUP and Provisional Sinn Fein consolidated their positions as the main representatives of the nationalist and unionist populations and can now administer the North safe in the knowledge that there is little opposition to fear. Both the Unionist Party and the SDLP suffered losses and are in no position to do much about the DUP/Sinn Fein alliance. Instead they sheepishly took their allocated seats in the Executive, glad even for the few crumbs from the top table.

What constituted the left was as usual all over the place; no agreed candidates, standing against each other in local elections and unable to inspire the electorate. Apart from West Belfast and Derry the various candidates from left parties did poorly. Eamon McCann received a very creditable vote in Derry, partly due to his back history and the support of a cross section of activists that included feminists, republicans, environmentalists and socialists of all hues. He at least might have made a difference if elected in the Assembly.

In West Belfast the PBP candidate received over 1600 votes while the independent candidate with a background in Socialist Democracy receive a derisory 122 votes. Two other left candidates between them polled another 900 odd votes. This in a constituency with the worst social conditions, the worst unemployment and the highest crime rate and with the highest proportion of working class people than any other constituency and despite over 20 years of having a G. Adams as its MP! Indeed those republicans opposed to the Adams strategy could not even agree a united candidate in this same constituency.

The British Queen’sVisit was a huge success!!!-That is for the ruling elites in both Britain and Ireland. At a time of huge burdens imposed on working people to pay for the mistakes of the bankers and property developers it was sickening to see how the British Queen’s visit was used to distract people from economic realities, bind the ruling classes of Britain and Ireland together. It must have been a real eye opener for those republicans who imagined there was huge opposition to the visit. The opposite was the case not only did so called “rebel” Cork welcomed the British monarch but the visit produced the largest mail bag ever to Buckingham Palace welcoming the visit from many Irish people.

For Republicans who are solely focussed on the “national question’ perhaps it is time they asked themselves serious questions rather than live in an illusionary world. It is clear the vast majority of people south of the border welcomed enthusiastically the visit of the British monarchy. The reunification of the country is the last thing on their mind. The Pale now covers 26 counties. Only northern nationalists were indifferent or opposed to the visit.

The Monty Pythonesque protests from the various republican groups did little to advance their cause. Three separate protests by four separate groups!Oh how the Special branch must have laughed.
When the then united Republican Movement in the sixties took a left turn it was envisaged that there would be coming together of the labour and republican movements in a unified body. How realistic that was is a moot point but certainly today we have a multitude of small republican and left organisations that can barely pass the time of day with each other.


It is no wonder that nationalist and unionist workers stuck with their usual parties. They could see no viable alternative.

Finally the visit of the USA President set the seal on the consolidation of the political process that has seen not only the integration of former armed guerrillas into the ruling elites on the islands but the almost total dis-integration of the neutrality of the Irish Free State. All sections of the ruling classes on these islands now are fully signed up not only to neo-liberal economic policies that bear heaviest on the working class but fully backs USA foreign policies world wide. Key sections of the ruling elites across party lines also regularly brief the USA on every day events in Ireland. The recent wikileaks only confirm what we have believed for decades.
To sum up the elections and the Queen and Obama’s visit set the seal on the Northern settlement and consolidated the integration of the Southern ruling class into the international elites of capitalism.
These are serious setbacks for all progressive forces on these islands.
jm

The United Front

The German word for ‘united front’ is Einheitsfront.‘Das Einheitsfrontlied’ was an anthem that took a simple, direct and powerful approach to build the class consciousness of German workers

As man is only human, He must eat before he can think.

Fine words are only empty air And not his meat and drink.

Chorus:

Then, Left! Two Three Then, Left! Two Three There‘s a place, Comrade for you,_

March with us in the workers‘ united front; For you are a worker too.

As man is only human, He‘d rather not have boots in his face.

He wants no slaves at his beck and call, Nor life by a masters‘s grace.

Chorus

And since a worker‘s a worker, No class can free him but his own;

‘The emancipation of the working-class Is the task of_ the workers alone.’

(Copied from Marxism Digest, Vol. 90, Issue 40)

The unity of the left is a bit like the mythical search for the Holy Grail in the Arthurian legends. Like the bold knights of old we believe it is out there and only if we travel far and wide will we find it. However most of the “left” while, like the knights prepared to travel far and wide in theoretical discourse, find it very hard to actual talk to fellow socialists or republicans who have a socialist class analysis and are beside them!

Recently a leading member of a left group admitted he had never talked with the leadership of another left group in the past fifteen years. This writer indeed along with other staunch comrades was given the cold shoulder many times when attending so called unity of the left meetings or conferences despite the fact that we had a Marxist analysis of the situation in Ireland and of the armed conflict.

Our crime (or misdemeanor) was we were not prepared to adopt a holier than thou attitude to those who still clung to the discredited strategy of armed struggle carried out by the Provos. Indeed we did argue that there was a time and place for limited armed resistance whilst accepting from the mid 1990’s that that was no longer feasible. Indeed it could be plausibly argued that we did as much if not more than the “left” to win people away from armed struggle. To do that we collectively talked to anyone who would listen to our analysis regardless of their part in conflict.

That involved taking both political and personal risks, something not unique as a lot of other people also did so in order to try to end an armed conflict that was going nowhere. Few of those trying to stop armed conflict, outside of our own group claimed to be Marxists or the “left”. Why? Because the “left” was too busy searching for the Holy Grail of left unity (under of course their own groups hegemony, i.e. unity but on their terms) to do anything about real actual existing conditions.

Which bring us to the” Das Einheitsfrontlied!” Written at a time when the German working class was about to be devastated as it leadership swung from ultra-leftism to capitulation to bourgeois forces the anthem still speaks to us today.

‘The emancipation of the working-class Is the task of_ the workers alone.’

No elitist group, whether armed with guns or a marxist bible can liberate on behalf of the working class. Indeed it is classic tactic of dictators to assert that they and they alone have the interests of the people at heart and therefore what they do or say goes, because it is in the interests of the people. Check out Gadaffi or Mubarack for evidence of this. However this is not to argue against theory or building a revolutionary party for we agree that as Lenin argued

“Without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement… role of vanguard fighter can be fulfilled only by a party that is guided by the most advanced theory.”

It is one of the main tasks of such a party to provide leadership to the working class whilst a the same time recognising that it is the workers themselves who can achieve their own emancipation. A revolutionary party takes account of the moods expectations and hopes of the workers. It does not operate apart from and disdainful of the class.

Unfortunately armed republicans do. They use for example the uprising of 1916 citing it as evidence that a gallant few could take it upon themselves to raise the standard of revolt. But they tend to downplay the fact that the leaders of the uprising surrendered after 6 days to spare lives.

Furthermore the subsequent guerrilla warfare waged by republicans up until 1921 had the support of a substantial number of people.

That is not the case today. There is widespread opposition within northern nationalists to the continuation of armed struggle, not to mention almost total hostility to armed struggle within the vast majority of the population of the Southern state.
Those who think that killing a PSNI member regardless of his religion will somehow create the conditions to lead to the ending of British Imperialism influence in Ireland are sadly mistaken.

The immediate strategic aims of active armed Republicans probably include,

-discouraging nationalists from joining the PSNI,

-embarrass Sinn Fein leaders into condemning acts they themselves had approved in the past,

-provoke a backlash from loyalists so that they, the armed republicans, can be seen as defenders of the nationalist population,

-cause so much daily disruption that more aggressive tactics are used by pro-British security forces evoking sympathy and support among sections of northern nationalists.

However conditions today are very different from the early part of the 20th century and indeed from the early 1970’s
After all workers and their families North and South are currently enduring the harshest recession from the 1930’s when these words were written

As man is only human, He must eat before he can think.

Fine words are only empty air And not his meat and drink”

Or as others have asserted you can not eat flags.
Flag waving is a common tactic of those who wish to appeal to the lowest common denominator, whether it is the Orange order tramping through nationalist districts or Sinn Fein wanting equal status for the Tricolour with the Union Jack. (Who can forget the absurdity of Ogra Sinn Fein painting red post boxes green)

At the counts in the 26 counties elections Provisional Sinn Fein made a fetish of flying the Tricolour trying to identify themselves as the foremost patriots of the nation. That goes with their politics a combination of populism, leftist rhetoric while denying in practice there are real class differences within the “people.”

Appeals to tribalism or sectarianism is not a tactic that any self respecting Republican can condone. That is why so many former Republican combatants can not support the PSF strategy in the north that reinforces sectarian divisions. The Good Friday Agreement and the St.Andrews Agreement were not the settlement of the Northern problem but a settlement of the past and the undoing some of the effects of partition.

What we have now is a truce between the tribes-peace in the feud.

Not a solution! That was not what many Republicans initially took up arms for. Many are now asking was it worth it?

Recently Mike Hall’s Island Pamphlets published its 96th publication entitled “Republicanism in transition” which posed a series of questions to representatives of the IRSP, Republican Sinn Fein, Official Republican Movement, eirigi, and a group of independent Republicans. Other republicans of various hues were also invited but did not take part.

What is clear from the pamphlet is the clear recognition by most involved of the serious defeat that republicanism has suffered, a recognition of the sectarianism inherent in the armed struggle an acceptance of the “Britishness”of the unionists and the denial of the tactic of armed struggle in the current circumstances. While there is not unanimity about these it is clear that increasingly sections of irish republicanism are moving from a 19th century view of the world to an acceptance of the 21st century with all its difficulties. All but one of the groups emphasised the class nature of the struggle.
Some of the participants seem to envisage a series of discussions and pamphlets as a precursor of an intellectual or organisational renewal of republicanism. Unless such a development is class base, and moves forward on both political and theoretical levels and avoids nationalism it will be doomed to failure. But neverthe less initiatives that try to bring some semblance of leadership to the working class wheter among the left, among republicans or a ccombination of both deserves support.

Gr.
Responses to “The Elections- a Democratic Revolution?”
In the last edition of The Red Plough Vol. 2-1 an article The Elections- a Democratic Revolution? provoked the following responses.
On the IRSP discussion site a comrade in the IRSCNA support organisation of the IRSP in the United States wrote,

CraobhRua
Global Moderator

“The massive flaw with this attempt at criticism is the fact that IRSP members weren't just name calling, some were out campaigning for comrades on the ULA list. Working for left candidates who are outside of the IRSP while also criticising the limitations of the Alliance is pretty much what Gerry seems to be doing and advocating, so...yeah, next time maybe ask the IRSP what they were up to on the ground. “

http://rsmforum.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=gotopost&board=general&thread=4854&post=27763
Then on the “The Irish Republican Forum” was this response from an obvious supporter of Stalin

KillinSnakes
Senior Member



Join Date
Aug 2007
Location "apologist scum"

“The massive flaw with this attempt at criticism is the fact that IRSP members were out campaigning for some on the ULA list. Working for left candidates who are outside of the IRSP while also criticising the limitations of the Alliance is pretty much what Gerry seems to be doing and advocating, so...yeah, next time maybe ask the IRSP what they were up to on the ground.”


Could KillinSnakes really be CraobhRua?
Now there is a mystery!!

But to be serious I welcome the fact that the comrade accepts that that my designation of name calling was correct-
“-IRSP members weren't just name calling-”

His/her petty comment of “attempt at criticism” is unworthy of a socialist. It was and is a valid criticism that is accepted by some of the IRSP comrades I speak to on a regular basis.

Another comment was the following,

Good to see the IRSP statement on ULA criticized. I felt that was complete crap at the time.

That was a worthwhile contrast of Arab mass protests with the republican militarist strategy. Critically I'll say that the analysis of the dissidents is a bit too close to the SF (or even SDLP) line. They represent an undemocratic militarist minority, isolated in terms of the political priorities of republican communities, and that their tactics are totally futile.

All of the above is true but it's also simplistic to a certain extent, and it doesn't preclude their gaining support due to this utter political vacuum - SF with little real credibility due to a stalled GFA which can only promise further economic hardship, and an absence of any serious left-republican tendency - which exists amongst nationalist communities in the north (especially in the most deprived areas mentioned in the post, Lurgan, West/North Belfast, etc). not to mention the concurrent breakdown of "law & order" and its populist exploitation by ONH et al via punishment attacks.

The same mixture of accurate and semi-moralistic criticisms were made of the Provos in their day yet despite the (at times obvious) futility of their tactics they still harnessed mass support...it's not a perfect analogy but worth bearing in mind.

Maybe I'm just skeptical as to the extent of the political ambitions of most working-class nationalists when they're besieged by anti-social elements, a hostile and at times nakedly sectarian state, and where the left generally (not just the republican left) is a negligible political force. At least regarding the last point the organisation of éirígí in the west and seemingly the re-organisation of the IRSP in the Lower Falls are positive steps.

Even the electoral support for SF in the Saorstát puts them in an awkward position where they have to explain away the lack of congruence between their radical rhetoric in the south and their implementation of austerity in the north.

If only a ULA had been sorted in the north it would have solved a lot of electoral headaches (for example 3 or 4 varieties of trots and left republicans running in the west, and none in north belfast) come May and offered an opportunity to display a degree of "revolutionary leadership" as the blog suggests.

Just some thoughts, not very organised

From Tiarnán Ó Muilleoir.

In response to above I replied

Comrade I attended Marxist Weekend School (SWP) in Belfast and saw slight thaw in the "sectarianism" of the far left. There are definite possibilities of extending the ULA in the North but will require diplomacy, comittment and genuine desire to try to provide working class leadership and should be open to multi-tendencies including left republicans and open to all other left groupings. Very difficult but not impossible.

Did you see the silly response in ISRP Forum to, in my mind, a very mild criticism of the IRSP position?

My! some people are very sensitive and precious! Don’t they know that uncritical acceptance of positions and lack of constructive criticism leads to the worse excess of totalitarianism .

Gerry R.


Comrade,
I definitely agree re the decrease in overt left sectarianism. The internet is playing a big role in that and how it's opened things ...up in terms of discussion (i.e. reducing the influence of the party line dictated from on high as well as the 'us vs them' mentality).

On a more base level the electoral achievements down south are a major motivation for intra-trot unity right now (although ironically enough the SWP in belfast split recently). You're right if it's to come to anything it has to be genuine open discussion and principled united campaigns rather than the opportunism and front-group stuff we usually see...which implies allowing left-republicans a voice and a seat at the table.

I can't see the thread or discussion in the IRSP forum but i can't say I'm surprised, much as I respect the members that I know personally. The IRSP attitude towards original theorising or polemics of any kind still seems pretty defensive.

From Tiarnán Ó Muilleoir.




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The Red Plough Vol 2-1

The Red Plough
http://theredplough.blogspot.com/
Vol. 2-No 1
March 2011


1) The elections- a democratic revolution?

2) Lessons of the Middle East

3) What’s On

Quote

Only struggle educates the exploited class.
Only struggle discloses to it the magnitude of its own power, widens its horizon, enhances its abilities,clarifies its mind, forges its will."

V.I. Lenin


The Elections- a Democratic Revolution?

Some commentators described it as a “democratic revolution.” They were not talking about the current uprisings in parts of North Africa or the wave of mass demonstrations across the Middle East. Rather they were talking about the results of the 26-county elections, which saw the dominant force, Fianna Fail reduced to a mere handful of seats, 20 in all.

The party that emerged from the depths of the old nationalist parties and the fascists, Fine Gael, reached their highest every total of seats, 76. The Labour Party also reached its highest number of seats, 37. It is clear they will form a new coalition Government in tandem with Fine Gael unless there is a massive revolt by rank and file labour party members. That leaves an opposition composed of Fianna Fail, Sinn Fein(P), and Independents composed of a variety of views including five who signed up to the United Left Alliance. Sinn Fein (P)had their best every result winning 15 seats.

The irony of the results is that, while it is clear that the electorate punished Fianna Fail for the appalling economic mess that ended up with the Irish people in hock to European bankers and forced to face years paying off debts run up by other bankers, they also elected in overwhelming numbers those committed to the self same policies that Fianna Fail were advocating. As political commentator Vincent Browne put it

“If Fine Gael and Labour have problems in agreeing a programme, the problems are ones of personality and perception. There are no incompatibilities of principle or ideology.”(1)

They both agree to submit to the European Central bank and the IMF. They will want to reduce the interest paid to the same banks but not to the principle of punishing the vast majority of the Irish people for the sins of the bankers and property speculators. To pay of the bankers they are going to introduce a property tax on top of the huge burdens that the previous Fianna Fail/Greens coalition had already imposed.


The leadership of the Labour Party is firmly in the hands of those who once were members of the Workers Party and who knew clearly of the continued existence of the Official IRA. Yet they still pretend they can not work with Sinn Fein(P) because in the words of some Free state commentators SFP are “toxic”.

It is clear that large sections of the electorate, north and south do not share this view. To it’s credit SFP at least adopted a policy of “burning the bond holders”, ie refusing to pay the debt.

The Labour Party for its part still has not yet learned the lessons of its involvement in coalition with main- stream capitalist parties. Vincent Browne quotes figures from the last time Labour entered a coalition.

“During the period from 1994 to 1997 when Ruairí Quinn was Minister for Finance, Seán Healy, then of Cori, calculated that in every one of the budgets for which Quinn was responsible, it was the rich who benefited most. And, in a telling indictment of Labour's five-year tenure in office in the 1990s (first with Fianna Fáil from 1992 to 1994 then with Fine Gael and Democratic Left from 1994 to 1997), the Institute of Public Health calculated that 5,400 people died prematurely every year because of the scale of inequality here.”

There is no evidence that Labour’s participation in a capitalist Government has done anything to alleviate the conditions of the working class. The evidence is to the contrary. Clearly the Labour leadership for the baubles of office is prepared to sacrifice the Irish working class on the altar of the foreign bondholders bankers and exploiters of the workers.

Perhaps Eamon Gilmore should remember what he stood for once when a member of the Democratic Left after splitting from the Workers Party. This was the Democratic left position on the labour party in the early 1990’s.

"Who can point to a single issue in the economic area where this Government has adopted a position or taken a decision that might not have also been taken by the previous Fianna Fáil-Progressive Democrats administration or the minority Fianna Fáil Government which went before that?
"Has the Labour presence led to any new radical approach to the unemployment problem or new measures to secure an equal distribution of wealth? There is no evidence of that..."
"Far from being in partnership with Fianna Fáil, the Labour Party has now been almost totally assimilated into the political culture which the Tánaiste (Dick Spring) spoke of in such withering terms in the dying days of the last Dáil."

Men of principle, how are ye!

Like previous leaderships the current Labour leadership is well assimilated into the political clientism that passes for politics in the 26 counties. The system itself is geared towards that. Only a radical break can change that.

The coming together of United Left Alliance (ULA) and its modest success hold out some hope for the future. It has been described, I believe, unfairly by the IRSP as

“-a couple of sects espousing reformist rhetoric and reformist demands.”(2)

Indeed it may well turn out a total failure and previous history of the organisations involved does not breed a great deal of confidence in its future direction. The IRSP are indeed correct in questioning its coming together only at election time. Indeed it would be better if a longer-term strategy was worked out in conjunction with those who aspire to a socialist society.

However to simply talk about reformism in a condemnatory way misses the point. How to convince those from the working classes to vote, not to replace Tweedledum (FF) with Tweedledee (FG) but to change the system. And it is only the working class who have the power to change the system. Currently it is easy to say that the masses are confused by reformist ideas and that they don’t vote or act in their class interest but to say that is to ignore reality.

Every day there are classes between the forces of capital and labour (Not that the Labour party would ever describe them as such)
For example see the “ SUPPORT O'CALLAGHAN DAVENPORT HOTEL STRIKERS” at Facebook (http://www.causes.com/causes/582437-support-o-callaghan-davenport-hotel-strikers?m=82ea650a)

These struggles will intensify as the screw is tightened on the working class. All those manifestations of struggle need to be generalised so that the class see the connection between their exploitation and the system. That requires leadership.

While the Red Plough has no illusions about the leaderships of parties like SFP and the Labour party we do recognise that many of their rank and file are committed to change. Name calling does little to build a movement of change.

Is the left, whether the labour left or the republican left, capable of creating the revolutionary leadership that is needed?

.(1) http://politico.ie/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=7346:fine-gael-for-office-with-a-few-capitalist-cheerleaders&catid=273:election-2011&Itemid=1192
(2) http://rsmforum.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=4748







Lessons of the Middle East


For over forty years in the North of Ireland Republicans of various hues have used armed force to change the status of the Northern state and create a united and/or socialist, Ireland. Indeed the provisional IRA procured arms from Gaddafi’ Libya when Gaddafi was going through a so called “anti-imperialist ‘phase. Those arms allowed that organisation to maintain its armed campaign for many years before its final defeat.

Recently off- shoots of the Provos have despite all evidence to the contary maintained that armed struggle is the only way forward. However whether they are the real, the really real or the really really real IRA’s none of the groups is capable of maintaining a consistent armed struggle.
Occasionally shots are fired in Lurgan, Derry or somewhere else, bombs and hoax devices are planted yet the vast majority of people ignore it and get on with their lives. While there is little enthusiasm for the Stormont Assembly or the power sharing administration among many nationalists there is not yet enough opposition that could possibly justify armed struggle. Of course there maybe the occasional “success” such as the killing of a uniformed soldier or policeman, the assassination of a prominent politician, the burning down of a furniture store , the bombing of a “prestige” target and the kneecapping of a “local hood”.

But will that change the fundamental relationships between Britain and Ireland? Will it improve the position of northern nationalists? Will it win over the protestant working class to socialism? Will it bring about a United Ireland? Or will it stop crime in working class communities? Will it hell! All it will do will be to see another generation of young people languish in British and Irish jails. And for what? Yet another glorious defeat.

Compare and contrast that with what is now happening in the Middle East. Note how weeks, sometimes days, of mass action by the people succeeded in changing autocratic dictatorships that had been in power of decades. In Libya the mass struggle there is now combined with mass armed actions as the people attempt to overthrow the regime of Muammar al-Gaddafi. Tunisia, Egypt, Lebannon, Jordan, Quatar etc there have been tremendous explosions of popular discontent. Change is certainly in the air and Imperialism caught unawares tries to adjust to the new situation and stop the mass movements from radically changing the status quo.

Oil has been the dominant factor in the running of these countries for years. So the Western powers supported, armed, financed and trained the police and armies of corrupt leaders in these countries. All in the interests of Western imperialism.
Suddenly the whole deck of cards started to tumble down when the Tunisian masses responded to the tragic suicide of a young market trader denied a license by corrupt police. Corrupt was rife in both Tunisia and Egypt ; massive wealth for the thousand of so elite families and dire poverty for the millions. That was the reality.

Hence the massive explosion of anger that fanned the flames of revolt throughout the Middle East. The mass explosions have at their core democratic demands. Of course within the struggles there are religious fundamentalists, monarchists, and enthusiastic followers of Imperialism but there are also vast masses wanting fundamental changes in the political social and economic conditions under which they live. And they are the driving forces for change.


While it is too early to predict the outcome of those mass struggles there are certainly valuable lessons for us here in Ireland.
Change comes, not as Mao says from the barrel of a gun, but when the masses move. Individual acts of violence, unrelated to the needs and aspirations of the masses, is elitist militarism and does nothing to advance the cause of either the militarists or the masses. That is also the lesson to learn from other successful revolutions such as the Cuban and Chinese revolutions. Armed struggle in both was linked to the social emancipation of the masses and without that support both revolutions would have failed. (the development of China’s revolution from 1949 is another separate question)


The other key lesson from the mass uprisings in the Middle East is the breaking down of national and religious barriers. There is an internationalism occurring in what is happening that transcends the state barriers imposed by imperialism. The masses in Egypt, Libya etc saw what their brothers and sisters had achieved in Tunisia and started to emulate them creating a bond among the Arab masses. Of course just as in Ireland Imperialism will try to fan the flames of tribalism, sectarianism and fundamentalism in order to maintain a foothold in the Middle East.

It is for the progressive elements in the struggle to ensure that does not happen. Otherwise like Ireland the struggles will be diverted in blind alleys of bigotry and sectarianism. When that happens there is only one winner, Imperialism.



WHATS ON

History Staff/Postgraduate Seminar Series

* Venue : Postgraduate Seminar room, 18 College Green, Belfast at 4pm.

* Event Open To : Students, Staff, General Public

11 March
Chris Loughlin: Beaten and crushed? Violence and intimidation against the Belfast labour movement, 1924−39.


Marxist Education
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James Connolly Archive http://www.marxists.org/archive/connolly



The Red Plough is an independent Republican Marxist Internet publication


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➢ We welcome political comments and criticisms. If you know of anybody who might wish to receive the Red Plough please send his or her e-mail address to
 john.martinps@virgin.net

 



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The Red Plough Vol. 1-13

The Red Plough

Vol. 1-No 13

October 2010

1) Editorial
2) Re-establishing Costello Commemorations
3) Seamus Costello 25th Anniversary speech
4) 2004 Commemoration

5) Seamus Costello Commemoration Speech 2006
6) Key Ideas of Seamus Costello
Editorial
SEAMUS COSTELLO REMEMBERED.


The Red Plough is re-publishing the following documents and speeches first published in the Plough. Although there is some repetition we consider it worth while as contained within these documents are the key elements that define republican socialism and also shows the correct analysis of the so called peace processes that have ultimately stabilised British rule in Ireland. The first speech was delivered before a very small group of IRSP members from Dublin at the graveside of Seamus Costello as the Republican Socialist movement sought in the mid 1990’s to re-establish the Costello commemoration as an important part of the political calendar. That aim has been well achieved as the ideas of Costello are once again seen as relevant to republicans. The analysis contained in these documents are the result of the collective efforts of the leaderships of the Republican Socialist Movement. They are as relevant today as they were then.


The 1997 speech

Comrades,

We gather here to play homage to Seamus Costello, radical revolutionary republican socialist. In the modern Ireland we live in there will be many who do not know the story of Seamus Costello, many not aware of the role Seamus played in modernizing republicanism in his time.

Seamus was the main driving force behind the politics of Republican Socialism from the early sixties until his murder twenty years ago in October 1977. He showed the way forward for the republican movement; no movement that deserts the people, ignores the current realities and refuses to acknowledge the economic needs of the working class deserves to exist. Seamus played a major part in convincing many in the mainstream republican movement that the time for clichés, flags and faded memories of old men was long past.

If Irish republicanism has played a progressive role in Irish society it is because of its ability to renew itself in each generation and become relevant to the lives of the people from which it had sprung. Seamus Costello was a catalyst in renewing the republican tradition in the later part of the 20th century. He pointed the way by standing for elections taking his seat, playing a full part in the community he came from while never forgetting the crime of partition. A full blooded socialist Seamus saw a role for an army of the people prepared to both defend the interests of the working class whilst also prepared to challenge imperialism and its hold over the whole of Irish society.

It was for this latter reason that the Official Republican Movement, which Seamus had stayed with after the emergence of the Provos because of its more formal commitment to socialism, expelled him after first suspending him in 1973 and trying to isolate him. His dismissal formalized the differences between the reformists and the revolutionaries.

The sad pathetic decline of the reformists in what became the Workers Party is just reward for their betrayal of their own principles. In pursuit of an illusionary unite between unionist workers and nationalist workers the 'Sticks' "took the Queens shilling" and stood all they believed in on its head.

A recent breakaway from the Workers Party might persuade some that there is some socialist hope still there. Be not fooled. How can the new sticks have any credibility when they performed a counter revolutionary role for years? They are an historical irrelevance.

Seamus took the revolutionaries with him. He went on to found the Irish Republican Socialist Party and to protect it went on to build the INLA.
Around the slogan relevant to that time, "For National Liberation and Socialism" the Republican Socialist Movement was launched. Many of the best revolutionaries of the day flocked to the banner of the IRPS.

They were attracted by the words of Seamus,
"We must make no secret of the fact that we’re a Revolutionary Socialist Party, prepared to give leadership on the streets and in the elected chambers. We stand for the unity of the anti-imperialist struggle and the class struggle. We must involve the masses in issues that effect them".

In words that perhaps some here in the light of subsequent Republican history might find surprising, he wrote, when advocating a broad front policy,

"We recognize the absolute necessity of securing a constitutional solution to the present crisis which will allow the Irish working class the freedom to pursue their interests as a class in the context of the development of normal class politics. In our view the first step in securing a constitutional solution which meets this requirement must be for Britain to concede the right of the Irish people to exercise total sovereignty over their own affairs"

Seamus went on to work passionately for what he believed in. He led the defence of the party against the activities of the heavy Gang in the Garda who did all they could to smash the movement. He co-coordinated the defence of the movement against the armed assault of the Officials. He organized a major anti-imperialist conference at the Spa Hotel Lucan. And he worked day and night to build the Republican Socialist Movement

His assassination on the direct orders of the political leadership of the Workers Party was a body blow to the movement and to the cause then of anti-imperialist unity.

It was said of Seamus

"They will have to shoot him or jail him or get out of his way but they certainly wont` stop him. Costello the revolutionary Marxist socialist whose ambition is a secular, pluralist united Socialist Republic won’t go away until he gets it"

Unfortunately for us comrades, they shot him. So died a former Adj. General, Chief of Staff, Director of Operations I.R.A. Vice President of Sinn Fein, and Director of Operations and Chief of Staff, in the INLA. He died a member of Wicklow County Council, County Wicklow Committee of Agriculture, Eastern Regional Development Committee, Bray Urban District Council, Bray branch of the I.T.G.W.U. Bray and District Trades Union Council, the Cualann Historical Society and Chairman of the IRSP.

This was a man! He lived life to the full and his allegiance was always and only to the working class. Would that we had 10 people like him today.

Subsequently our movement without the guiding leadership of Seamus was riven by disputes informers and infiltrated by anti-socialists. A long hard struggle, costing the lives of some of our best comrades, including Ta Power and Gino Gallagher, has won back the movement to its original goals, socialism and the liberation of the working class.

But while we are aware of what we want to achieve do we know how to go about achieving it? No party or movement can rest on its laurels, or past record, sing the old songs, call itself socialist or revolutionary and expect the working class to flock to its banner. Comrades throw away the old certainties. This is not the sixties or seventies, the state socialist projects have collapsed, capitalism unfettered is rampant and the road ahead is long hard and arduous if a belief in socialism is to be reborn in the working class.

Our movement to be relevant it must update its republican socialism. Too close a concentration on the national question and an unquestioning approach to the nature of Imperialism in Ireland has distorted and held back the struggle for socialism in Ireland and also incidentally is the antithesis of the approach that Seamus would have taken.

From this platform today, may I appeal to all those who define themselves as Republican Socialists or as Connolly Socialists do as Seamus did, get involved in the day to day activities of the class.
Don’t sit and bemoan lost opportunities, and past tragic days, and comrades long gone jailed or dead.

Don’t be the old -dreaming dreams of lost opportunities. Seize the time now and become active again, not for the glory but for the class. Everyone has something to contribute no matter how small. Participate in your union branch, join or set up a community group in your area to organize people, protest, agitate organize.

You don’t need a party card to be angry nor to contribute to the building of discontent with the system. But to beat the system you do need comrades. From this platform we appeal to all genuine republican socialists, participate in the fight back. You do have something to offer.
.
Look around at the society we actually live in and I defy you not to be angry at the injustice and inequality and not have the wish to change things. Rezoning scandals, passports for sale scandals politicians with links with drug barons are all but symptoms of a rotten system.

The jails are full and 56% of prisoners in Mountjoy come from 6 pockets of deprived areas of Dublin. While the banks and other financial institutions ride the Celtic tiger, a 150 babies are born to drug abusers in Dublin. The medical services and the back up social services for them are totally inadequate as it is for most working class people. Landlords bully and intimidate tenants and only a few are called to account. In the building trade employers refuse to enforce the existing inadequate safety standards and already nine workers have died this year on building sites.

Meanwhile back in the Dail it now emerges that the lily-white Labour party is up to their neck in justifying selling passports for £1 million. So much for ethics high standards in public life. Has Dick Spring ever thought about trying socialist measures for establishing jobs and keeping people in employment?

The sideshow of the presidential election should not fool anyone into thinking that all is well in the Irish Republic. It is not. It is true that the rich do well, as do many sections of the middle classes but inequality is growing and more and more people particularly single parents and old people find themselves on the margins of society, forgotten, voiceless, powerless.

Who shall speak for them if not us? No movement in Ireland understands better than us the feeling of isolation. We have been deliberately excluded from many forums, from fighting elections, and maligned consistently in the media with lies falsehood and slander.

Since the emergence of the peace process in the past five years attempts have been made by both British intelligence and mainstream republicans to denigrate, marginalise or destroy the Republican Socialist Movement.

These attempts were not made because this was a warmongering mad dog organization, (which it is not, nor ever was, no matter what the O`Reilly or Murdock media print). No, attempts were made to destroy us because we as socialist republicans were able to identify the flaws of the peace process and articulate a clear political position of opposition to that process.

Let me repeat here today what we have said consistently, the peace process is fatally flawed, and will not produce a final settlement.
We believe that there is not the political will to tackle the fundamental wrongs of the northern state.

Will the British government tackle the thorny questions of the northern judiciary and the R.U.C.?

The chair of a Sub committee on International Human Rights of the U.S.A.`s House of Representatives, Chris Smith, is quoted as saying about the heads of the judiciary, Robert Carswell and the Head of the R.U.C.

"Both men remain in a state of denial, refusing to admit that human rights abuses take place in their agencies."

Will the Brits tackle this? We think not. Will the nationalists next summer be freed from intimidation, fear, house burning from loyalist mobs while the RUC stand and watch? We think not. Will in five years time the level of employment for nationalist and unionists be the same? We think not? Constitutional tinkering with the northern state will not eradicate its fundamentally sectarian nature. It has to go.

Our party is calling for the establishment of a Republican Forum where republicans and socialists of all hues can dialogue together to map out a way forward for the future, in the tradition of Seamus Costello’s call for a broad front and building anti-imperialist unity. We believe from the socialist perspective this is the only way to go. The talks at Stormont are not the way to remove the burdens of sectarianism, discrimination and oppression from the northern nationalists.

However this movement will not do or encourage anyone else to do any actions designed to throw us all back into full-scale armed conflict. As socialists we understand only to well how working class communities suffer during armed conflict. We commend the decision by the INLA to move to a position of defence and retaliation and endorse its no first strike policy.

Such a movement was always in line with the founder of the army’s vision of an army of the people for with and of the people, not separate above and fighting for the people as militarist elites would have.

Agencies of many kinds have approached the leadership of the IRSP requesting them to encourage the INLA to call a full ceasefire. The leadership has listened patiently to these requests and is not immune to argument, reason and good judgment.

We have encouraged not only the leadership of the INLA to consider all requests but also the rank and file. It was made clear to the leadership of the I.R.SP any change in the current position by that organization will be solely on the basis of the interests of the Northern nationalist working class. No offer of a place at the table, nor respectability, nor trips to Washington, nor the Dail, will influence that decision.

Comrades, Seamus Costello was a modernizer in the sixties and seventies. He made a difference. Today he would be the same, modernizing, up to date, radical republican and socialist.

Let us follow that example of Seamus Costello. Stand with the marginalized, the downtrodden the victims, the poor, all who are voiceless in the modern Ireland. Strive for equality, solidarity, working class unity, human rights and justice for all. Let us rebuild the socialist vision so that we renew in the Irish working class a vision of socialism as

" The heart of a heartless world"
GR





Seamus Costello 25th Anniversary speech

Comrades, friends socialists, republicans. I have been given the honour to speak on behalf of the organisations that Seamus Costello founded. That is, for me, a great honour and one that I hope I can adequately fill.

I know that others will speak of Seamus the man and of their memories of him. My own memories include a fierce argument with Seamus in 1969, 33 years ago, in downtown Belfast on the merits of radicalising the civil rights struggle. Needless to say history proved Seamus right.

Seamus’s experience, his farsightedness, his political acumen his leadership skills were all lost not only to the republican socialist movement when he was assassinated but lost to the people of Ireland. The loss of such an outstanding leader damaged our movement but it also removed from the scene a workers leader who I believe would never have allowed the class question to be isolated and then removed from the struggle for national independence.

The Good Friday Agreement has benefited the middle classes not the working classes As we predicted when the Good Friday Agreement was signed, sectarianism has not only been institutionalised it has spread like wildfire.

This movement took the extremely difficult decision to recognise that the will of the Irish people was for the implementation of the GFA and for peace. We acted accordingly and the INLA cease-fire has been as solid as any. We have respected the wishes of the Irish people. We now call on the Irish Government to respect their own Good Friday Agreement and immediately release the last remaining prisoners to qualify for release under the Good Friday Agreement, Dessie O¹Hare.

Today there is a neo-liberal economic agenda at work and it has been accepted almost totally by all the mainstream parties both north and south. Republicans in Government in the Stormont Assembly introduced public private partnerships that by all the available evidence are bad for the public sector.


The privatisation of public utilities is an utter disgrace, an attack on social ownership and a worship of the worst excesses of capitalism. The Fianna Fail/ Progressive Democrats are doing the same while the left sits and fumes impotently.

However it ills becomes a member of the Republican Socialist Movement to engage on verbal criticisms of other socialists and republicans if we have not removed the mote from our own eyes. There is no better time, nor no better place than within sight of the grave of our founder, Seamus Costello to acknowledge our errors and faults.

This movement lost sight of the goals of our founders. We swayed from mindless militancy to irrelevant political posturing. We failed to learn the lessons of history and repeated them. In place of socialist theory and strategy we elevated action to the fore and in the process lost the idealism and politics that had originally motivated the movement. We for a time lost sight of the importance of the class issue in the national struggle. Consequently without a firm ideological base we floundered, betrayed our ideals and lost many good comrades. It’s no wonder that in the past comrades walked away, disillusioned and demoralised with the movement. We gave the media and our political enemies the opportunity to portray our movement as a feuding failing and futile organisation.

Our failure was in essence a failure of leadership. At the grave of the greatest leader of the republican left since James Connolly that is a hard, harsh but necessary thing to say.

But if collectively we failed individually we had many fine comrades and volunteers who kept the flame of Republican Socialism alive. I need only mention a few names Miriam Daly, Ronnie Bunting, Noel Little, Ta Power and Gino Gallagher to make the point. Other names can’t be mentioned here but I particularly want to here mention and praise the staff and Volunteers of the INLA, whose discipline and defence of nationalist areas in particular over the past summer was in the best traditions of republican socialism. Daily in those areas violence continues unabated as the poison of sectarianism enflames working class areas.

The INLA has been active in defence of those working class areas. That poses no threat to any ceasefire or threatens anyone except sectarian and racist bigots. When the police and the forces of the state turn a blind eye to sectarian attacks is it any wonder that republicans have to take to the streets to defend areas from sectarian attacks. Seamus Costello’s vision of an army of the people is as relevant today as it was the early seventies and is implemented on the streets of Belfast. Those republicans in front line working class communities neither by word or deed will heighten or enflame sectarian tensions. That was not the way of Connolly Mellows or any other Republican Socialist. It is not our way.

Time and circumstances change. The rank and file of this movement under Gino Gallagher’s leadership took back control of the movement and reasserted the primacy of politics. The leadership of this movement is committed to collective leadership and full consultation with the membership and to developing and expanding republican socialist ideas in the working class movement.

However no movement deserves to continue to exist if it is only concerned with its own history it’s own problems and its own dreams. It is now time for Republican Socialists to turn towards the mass organisations of the working class if we are to influence the future. It is what Seamus did and it is what we now need to do. If this movement cannot attract the most class-conscious members of the working class to its banner then, it will be judged by its own standards, a failure.

Today as we come to the slow ending of the armed conflict that has engulfed us all over the last three generations it is time to re-affirm our first principles. Why did they who died for a Republic think they were doing?

Was it for an abstract freedom? for glory? for the freedom to exploit others? for the copper fastening of partition? for the restoration of Stormont? For a capitalist Ireland?

It was for the right of you and me and all citizens born on or living on this island to have political economic and social freedom in a Republic that really did cherish all the children of the nation equally. That is the Socialist Republic.

Our Movement is made up of ordinary men and women, who live ordinary lives but who want, what is considered extraordinary today, the right to live in a Republic that is democratic inclusive and based on socialist principles. Our political life in Ireland has become so dumb-downed that a Photo opportunity means more than a political Manifesto, idealism or beliefs.

Who today stands by the Republic of Connolly? It is those ordinary men and women, who are, whether in the INLA, the IRSP, fighting in the prison camps for political status, standing on picket line, taking strike action, involved in mass action and in day to day trade union activity, in community and tenant associations fighting the drug barons and the armed criminals and trying every day to alleviate the hardships of working class life- they are the real defenders of the Republic. Not for them the easy allure of the Yankee dollar. Just the ongoing republican struggle for a socialist Ireland

Friends and Comrades, we know what side of the barricades we stand on. It is on the side of the oppressed, the exploited, the marginalized and the derided. Where ever in the world there is resistance to Imperialism we are in solidarity with the resisters. We make no apology for our anti-imperialism.

Last week in Belfast a fitting memorial was erected to the memories of Ronnie Bunting and Noel Little and like today it was good to see old friends and old comrades who have been to the forefront of radical political struggle in Ireland for more than thirty years.

I am reminded of one critic of Marx who said that he had-

'Founded no lasting political party, had led no successful or unsuccessful revolution had produced no major finished work that amounted to a systematic exposition of the critique of capitalist civilisation to which he intended to devote his life and a six volume work. Yet his thought was to shake the world."

“Yet his thought was to shake the world.” Think of that. Three weeks ago I had a conversation with a working class member of the PUP, who when he heard I was an ERP made a point of coming up to me and telling me that he had been greatly influenced into politics by reading the early ideas of the Official IRA and the writings of Seamus Costello!!

Seamus was man both of his time and ahead of it. Seamus Costello was a republican, a socialist, an Internationalist and a leader. He was and is an inspiration. He left a political party, the IRSP, and an army the INLA and he left a political set of ideas that still have a relevance to the people today. The movement is still in existence, a survivor of three decades of conflict in spite of all that was thrown at us.

We stand here today a to affirm that republican socialism is still moving forward in struggle today. We have restored the ideas of Connolly, Mellows, and Costello to the forefront of our thinking. As we look around us today we represent hundreds of years of collective experience of radical, principled struggle. It was from the likes of Seamus Costello in particular we learned the principles of Republican Socialism.

Surely it is not beyond us to delve deep into our collective experience and emerge re-invigorated, re-energised and recommitted to advancing the cause of republican socialism in Ireland.

Let us today no matter who we are when we walk away from this graveside, re-commit ourselves to the liberation of the working class, to the establishment of the republic and to the raising of the class struggle in every area of struggle we can.
G.R.




2004 Commemoration

Friends and Comrades

Once more we gather to pay homage to Seamus Costello, republican, socialist, revolutionary. Seamus in life was a giant of a man politically. He stood out among his contemporaries for his belief, energy ideas and charisma. In death he stands out for us as an icon, a hero to emulate and a leader to mourn.

As founder member of the IRSP and the INLA he played his part in ensuring that the authentic ideas of republican socialism would endure. The ideas of Connolly and Mellows, the radical tradition of the Republican Congress, the more progressive ideas of the republican movement were all encapsulated in the person of Seamus Costello.

But in paying tribute to Seamus we do not make the mistake of mindless hero-worshipping. Irish republicanism has played a progressive role in Irish society because of its ability to renew itself in each generation and become relevant to the lives of the people from which it had sprung. Seamus Costello was a catalyst in renewing the republican tradition in the later part of the 20th century. Seamus played a major part in convincing many in the mainstream republican movement that the time for clichés, flags and faded memories of old men was long past. He pointed the way by standing for elections taking his seat, playing a full part in the community he came from while never forgetting the national question and the crime of partition. Seamus saw a role for an army of the people prepared to both defend the interests of the working class whilst also prepared to challenge imperialism and its hold over the whole of Irish society.

That is what we must learn from the leadership of Seamus: the ability to adapt to renew and to avoid becoming stuck in the old ways. After all the world he lived has all but disappeared. The Soviet bloc no longer exists, there is only one super-power, the officials have become irrelevant while the Provos of the seventies are but a distant memory and dreams of the year of victory have become replaced with that radical revolutionary cry- implement the Good Friday agreement!! Those who claimed to have smashed the old Stormont now want to rebuild it and look forward to working in a coaliation with the party of Paisley. So much for the strategy of fragmenting unionism. I wonder what Seamus would have made of it all?

Internally he would have been disappointed at the way his movement lost its way in the aftermath of his death particularly in the eighties and earlier nineties. Since 1995 we have painfully examined our past failures held our hands up to past mistakes and have taken this movement back to the ideals, ideas and beliefs that first motivated Seamus and his fellow comrades to set up this movement. We have tried to instil confidence, self-respect, loyalty to the movement and a fundamental belief in the primacy of politics. These attribute go to the very heart of our ideology. Confidence in the class, self respect for our values of socialism, loyalty to our own movement but not uncritical loyalty, and of course the primacy of politics.

But Seamus would not have been satisfied with just that. There is so much more to be done. A huge emphasis must be placed by the incoming leadership of this movement on political education on activity, on discipline, on democracy and on being revolutionary agitators. The days of the loud mouth in the pub are gone. The days of using this movement as a flag of convenience for personal gain are gone. The days of bullying working class youth are gone. The days of policing working class communities are gone.

Those things were never on the agenda of the Republican Socialist movement but unfortunately some scum floated towards the top of this movement in the past aided by the British. Their day is done. Republican socialists must be servants not masters of the working class. That’s what we are about; taking the message of liberation, of class struggle of republicanism to the vast majority of people on this island. Externally I have no doubt that Seamus would have continued to be anti-imperialist and socialist and republican. Seamus had beliefs. Not interests.

Seamus’s advocacy of the Broad Front was premised on the belief that the coming together of radical and progressive forces was in the interests of the Irish working class. Not for him or any republican that adhered to Connolly Socialism a reactionary alliance with the most conservative forces in Irish Society.

For how else can you categorise the pan Nationalist Front of Sinn Fein (Provisional) the SDLP and the coaliation of Fianna Fail and the Progressive Democrats; an alliance with the every people who demonised republicans, who split with gold the republican movement, who supported the most repressive laws against republicans, who framed our comrades over the Sallins affair and persistently and consistently demonise this movement?

What republican in the tradition of Tone can accept an agreement that reduces the anti-imperialist conflict of over two centuries to a sordid little sectarian war between two “communities” for by signing the GFA the signatories accepted the internal conflict argument that British Imperialism had been promoting for years; that the conflict in Ireland was religious. Good Friday Agreement has led to increased sectarianism as the working classes are pressured into identifying with the two sectarian blocs. Partition has been solidified.

We reject the notion that there are two separate divided communities. Republican socialists reject the two-community approach. There is one community and a divided working class and while elements of that self same working class clash those who benefit from the divisions of the working class pocket their profits and come July jet of to quieter and sunnier climates.
Was that what the conflict was about? That is no victory, nor indeed an honourable draw. That was a crushing defeat for the progressive forces in Ireland. Was it for this that men and women sacrificed the best years of their lives in struggle in prison in exile and in death?
Is it not time to call a halt to the endless round of talks about talks about talks especially when the two main groups cannot even meet in the same room?
What kind of Government can work when the leading partners don’t even talk to each other? And in relation to parliamentarianism Seamus had it right when he said,

“Before the Republican Movement can achieve power, we must succeed in breaking the confidence of the people in the existing Parliamentary institutions, and I would suggest that this should be one of the main functions of our T.D.s. They should also be full time Revolutionary Organisers in their own areas, thereby demonstrating to the people who elected them the fundamental difference between ourselves and the other parties.”
Don’t misunderstand what we are saying. The IRSP with the full support of the INLA are in favour of dialogue. We emphatically re-state that armed struggle is not the way forward today. That road may lead somewhere but most assuredly not to the Republic. Yes dialogue is possible. But not with those who think we are lesser human beings. Why should republicans seek to be talked to by right wing bigots of the DUP? They don’t represent the real interests of any section of the working class. Lets reach out to the working class on the basis of principled political positions not for temporary expediency.
Seamus Costello a man before his time pointed the way forward, and I quote,

"We maintain that any co-operation with the Protestant working class must be on the basis of a principled political position. It must be on the basis of explaining fully to the Protestant working class what all our policies are. We must try and politicize them, simultaneously with conducting a political campaign to get rid of Britain”

There is no permanent solution possible that envisages the continued existence of the sectarian six county state. Those who pretend otherwise fool not only others but themselves.

Unless and until the six county state is either totally abolished or totally transformed, sectarianism will dominate politics here and the Imperialist can continue to present our conflict as a religious struggle. Well my friends it is not. It is a political conflict against the imperialist imposition of foreign rule on any part of this island.

Similarly the conflict in Iraq is not about fundamentalist Muslim terrorism but about the Imperialist exploitation of the resources of Iraq. Those who are against that war should have a simple clearly understood slogan for the British and USA invaders=Out of Iraq-out of Ireland. Any other position ignores the reality of the naked brutal power of Imperialism and lets them of the hook.

To those on the left who merely raise the slogan Stop the War catch yourselves on. It is only by a consistent and principled opposition to all forms of Imperialism that wars can be ended. The bounden duty of the left is not to patronise liberal opinion with platitudes but to stand by the anti-imperialist fighters and extend critical support to progressive anti-imperialist fighters. And it that offends the liberal classes well, tough.

No body, especially not an administration of Brits, whose hands are covered with the blood of thousands of innocent Iraqis, has the right to call republicans, who oppose their claim to rule this island, criminals. We are not and we never have been terrorists.

Seamus Costello was a freedom fighter, patriot anti-imperialist and socialist. So it is only right to express our full solidarity with current Republican political prisoners in Maghaberry and re-iterate our call for the immediate release of Desi O’Hare and the other qualifying Republican prisoners arising from the Belfast agreement. We make no distinction between different republican groupings when it comes to solidarity with republican prisoners.

Do not forget there would be no republican prisoners in gaols if there was a final settlement to the national question. And so long as the national question is unsettled then so will there be republicans who will wage a struggle to establish a republic on the island for all the people of the island. But Comrades while we right emphasise the-so called bigger picture of the political dispensation we must never forget the day to day struggles of working people. We need to take the ideals of socialism out of the realms of discussion and manifestos and elections and make it directly relevant to our underprivileged communities. Poor health low wages substandard housing class based education services, crime and anti social behaviour are neither republican nor loyalist, catholic or protestant, North or South, six or 26 county issues. They are class issues and affect us all W e need to arouse in our class the spirit of fraternity. That’s the way to take on the symptoms of neo-liberal capitalism, sectarianism, racism, sexism, homophobia, anti-social behaviour, alienation, poverty, drug abuse and self-destruction.

A real movement built on the values of fraternity solidarity co-operation and democracy will crumble away these barriers to freedom in Ireland. Our movement to be relevant it must update its republican socialism. Too close a concentration on the national question and an unquestioning approach to the nature of Imperialism in Ireland has distorted and held back the struggle for socialism in Ireland and also incidentally is the antithesis of the approach that Seamus would have taken.

From this platform today, may I appeal to all those progressive republicans, Republican Socialists or Connolly Socialists to do as Seamus did, get involved in the day-to-day activities of the class.
It’s fine and useful to reminisce about the past-to write the histories to tell the tales of past heroic deeds but comrades it does not challenge the future.

These are glorious days to be alive and see the stirrings of class struggle in the world. There is a growing anti imperialism worldwide, Iraq, Nepal, the Philippines, Pakistan, India, Venezuela, Bolivia and the former Stalinist states the working class is moving into battle. Now ask how you can aid this struggle. Everyone has something to contribute no matter how small. Participate in your union branch, join or set up a community group in your area to organize people, protest, agitate organize. Remember to beat the system you do need comrades. From this platform we appeal to all genuine republican socialists
Look around at the world we actually live in and I defy you not to be angry at the injustice and inequality and not have the wish to change things. There are enough resources in our world to feed and clothe everyone. Yet every day thousands die from disease famine and hunger. Why because of capitalism.

W e have called in the past for the convening of a Republican Forum where republicans and socialists of all hues can dialogue together to map out a way forward for the future. That’s in the tradition of Seamus Costello’s call for a broad front and building anti-imperialist unity. But we recognise that many on the left think they can go it alone and don’t need to relate to any section of the Republican left.

It will be part of our task to persuade not only the left but also the working class, by the things we do, by the actions we take, by the examples we set, by the calibre of the comrades we attract to our banner of the Starry Plough that there is merit in working together.
For comrades many people still harbour illusions that Sinn Fein in Government North and South can make a difference to the social and economic conditions in this country. They cannot. They will not. At best they may put a more human face on capitalism but it will still be capitalism and that ‘s a system that exploits, brutalises and also is destroying the world. It itself needs to be destroyed –not reformed.

Let us follow that example of Seamus Costello. Stand with the marginalized, the downtrodden the victims, the poor, all who are voiceless in the modern Ireland. Strive for equality, solidarity, working class unity, human rights and justice for all. Let us daily work towards the socialist republic. In the end that’s the only fitting memorial to all our dead comrades, Seamus included.

Comrades there is much work to be done. Lets do it.
Thank you.
G.R. Ard Comhairle Member


Seamus Costello Commemoration Speech 2006

At the largest Costello Commemoration in many years the following speech was delivered by former POW and member of the Ard Comhairle of the IRSP Martin McMonagle.

Friends and comrades,

We once more gather to pay homage to the founder of our movement, Seamus Costello. Seamus did not suffer fools gladly, No leader can afford to be weak and weak is not a word to associate with Seamus Costello. He was strong in his beliefs, strong in his convictions, strong in his commitment to the revolutionary road to the Socialist Republic. He was a 24 hour a day man, working openly politically to advance the interests of the working class while secretly organising recruiting and arming a revolutionary army that he saw as the only way to wrestle control of this country from the parasites and vultures of imperialism. He was also a thinker and a doer, a combination that everyone who aspires to be called a Republican Socialist should aim for
Of course in the intervening years from Seamus’s cruel assassination by the enemies of the working class, Ireland north and south has changed. The once mighty USSR has collapsed and the policies associated with its state socialism have been discredited. By the start of the 1990’s socialism seemed doomed as the gains of the 1917 Bolshevik revolution all but disappeared.

Many walked away from struggle believing the propaganda that Capitalism had triumphed. Just as in Seamus’s day, some republicans began to want to do a deal with Imperialism and now just as in the seventies ended up sucked into doing the work of the Imperialists.

Our own movement, which had been in slow, decline following the removal of our charismatic founder and leader was all but finished in the early nineties. We had then an apolitical leadership that had only contempt for the politics of Costello and the movement. Fortunately we had rank and file members still committed to the ideals of republican socialism and leaders like Gino Gallagher who began the mammoth task of turning the movement around. Central to that task was the merging of theory and action, the putting into practice of Collective Leadership and the Primacy of Politics as outlined by Ta Power.

The task begun in 1994 is far from complete. We lost Gino murdered by British elements. We made mistakes sometimes elevating individuals who were only interested in their own egos into positions of authority. But we have learned from those mistakes and of course in building up revolutionary organisations one needs to remember that it is inevitable mistakes will be made. There is no such thing as a pure revolution. There is no guidebook to advise how to change the world- only the experiences that the working class movement worldwide has accumulated in trying to wrestle power from capitalism.

We have tried to learn from those experiences especially the experiences of the working class in Ireland. In the interests of that class the INLA declared its ceasefire. Despite provocations, despite British agents, despite the rise in sectarian attacks our leadership has maintained that ceasefire because we are convinced that is the correct revolutionary position at this moment in time. Comrades and to all republicans out there we say as clearly as we can, “ the war is over”

Revolution is a serious business. It can only occur when the mass of people see the need for change. Individual actions divorced from the interests of the class are at best futile and at worst sheer adventurism. At this juncture in time what is needed is maturity, commitment, and hard, hard political work. There are no short cuts and are task is to convince people of the relevancy of our views and our actions to their lives. That is what the whole of Seamus Costello ‘ political life was about. He tried to show that his brand of republicanism, republican socialism was relevant to the lives of the people. That’s why he picketed councils led deputations, fought elections and took his seat. He set out to arouse the people to the indignities they suffered. And that is today our task. Comrades Seamus Costello was a man who was not just a republican in the north and a socialist in the south. He recognised the two could not be separated. The class question and the national question are so intertwine they cannot be separated.

That’s why we reject the partition of the isle. That’s why we oppose the Good Friday Agreement and that’s why we must build up in the working class areas of the South a class based revolutionary party that articulates the deepest desires of the working class people.

Deep within the body politic in the 26 counties a malaise, a malignant growth of corruption, greed, individualism and naked self-interest exists. At the very top An Taoiseach, Bertie is in debt to businessmen. In football it is called a bung, I call it a bribe. Fianna Fail, formerly “the republican party” is now the party of big business Tribunals are investigating planning corruption. Garda are accused of corrupt practices and come down heavy on working class criminals while ignoring the stench of corruption at the top. Young people leaving university now have to wait years before they can get on the housing ladder as the property boom lines the pockets of the investors and builders while landing thousands of ordinary decent folk in debt for the rest of their lives.

Be under no illusions, the so called “Celtic Tiger’ was good for business but bad for people. It will inevitably grind to a halt. Already the forces of the right wipe up racist hatred against the migrants, attracted here by the Celtic Tiger’. At the same time religious fundamentalist financed from the USA try to poison the minds of the people with religious bigotry intolerance and superstition. And the state basically writes off huge working class estates around Ireland and tolerates the drug gangs as they poison the bodies of our young people. It is time for a fight back and we will do what we can to help organise our class against these “scumbags and low lives”, whether in the pulpit, the boardroom or in housing ghettoes.

At the same time we must not only observe events internationally which affect Ireland, but we must act. Seamus Costello would have been down in Shannon supporting and leading protests against the death dealing USA planes refuelling there. He would never have met George Bush but would have picketed him. Shame on the Provisional Republican leadership for its capitulation and bending of the knee the USA imperialists.
There is nothing wrong with pragmatism but pragmatism with out principle is betrayal.

Seamus would also have been shoulder to shoulder with the Ross port Five. In fact wherever there would be injustice oppression exploitation. Seamus Costello would have been leading the resistance.

If we really want to honour Seamus Costello rededicate yourselves comrades to the struggle of the Irish working class. The weapons of struggle may have changed from the days when many of us first became involved, but that does not mean the struggle does not go on. It is just on a different playing field.

Take up these weapons of struggle today, the weapons of protest, of the placard, of the radical newspapers of the internet of the community halls, the trade union rooms, the letters pages of the papers, the strike committees, the groups against racism, poverty, homophobia, low wages, communities against drugs, families against death drivers and so on and so on.

In other words comrades if there something that affects our class that is where we need to be. Because that is the battleground of the struggle today. That is where we, you, me, need to be-leading our class in struggle.

Recently there has much talk of so-called” dissident” republicans coming together renewing or revitalising republicanism.

We too are dissidents. We dissent from the way Ireland is today. We dissent from the new partitionist mentality. We dissent from the acceptance of Imperialism. We dissent from the acceptance of Capitalism values of greed individualism and profit making. We dissent from the Aherne business government. We are proud to be dissenters in the republican tradition.

But we are very much aware that Irish Republicanism’s renaissance will not be by re- fighting the battles of the sixties seventies or eighties. Nor will it be renewed by repeating old mantras, old slogans, or old policies.

Comrades live in the here and now, take up today’s battles, march away from this graveyard, sacred to republican socialism with fire in your belly, steel in your soul and integrity in your eyes to liberate our class and country. That’s how to honour Seamus Costello that’s how to renew republicanism. Victory to the Irish Working Class.

(Martin Mc Monagle IRSP)











Key Ideas of Seamus Costello


October 2007 is the 30th anniversary of the death of Seamus Costello at the hands of former Comrades in the Official IRA which was then transforming itself into the Workers Party. The Republican Socialist movement has always honoured the memory of Seamus Costello, not only for his leadership qualities but also because of his ideas. It is true you can kill a man but you can not kill an idea.
There were a number of key ideas that Seamus Costello advocated and that are still relevant today.

1/The link between the class and the national question.
When the IRSP was formed the Officials were moving away from opposition to the British Imperialist presence in Ireland. Indeed they moved rapidly to a position that embraced that same imperialism in opposition to a caricature of a reactionary Irish nationalism. The Provos themselves were very much anti-communists and distrustful of so called “alien ideologies” They were right wing nationalists (with guns). Only later under pressure from northern volunteers and prisoners did they make a shift to the left and cal themselves socialists. That description can no longer be applied to Sinn Fein (Provisional). They are now, a right wing nationalist organisation, (without too many guns) having shed their newly acquired radicalism, on the long march to Stormont. The IRSP argued and still do that the only struggle worthwhile is the struggle for a socialist Ireland. The only class capable of banishing Imperialism uniting the country and its people and creating a just and equitable society is the working class taking power and building a socialist society.

2/ The Broad Front.
Seamus argued that it was important to build a broad front of organisations that identified the continuing presence of Imperialism as the major contradiction in Irish society. Therefore it was important for unity in action while not compromising principles. Today the issue of a broad front is not on the agenda because of the set backs suffered by republicanism and the left. But there certainly is more scope for joint action among a wide diversity of organisations provided they can put aside their petty sectarian attitudes towards those with whom they disagree.

3/ The Protestant working class
Seamus Costello took a similar attitude towards the protestant working class as James Connolly. He was critical of those he called ring-road socialists who hide their republicanism in an attempt to curry influence with the protestant working class. He argued that republicans had to convince the protestant working class that their own interests lay in unity with catholic workers and that their long-term interests lay in the creation of a socialist Ireland. At the same time he was sensitive to their sense of identity. Within the RSM he argued strongly against any actions that could be construed as sectarian attacks against Protestants.

4/Elections.
Seamus strongly supported the struggle inside the republican movement against the long-standing policy of abstentionism. He argued that abstentionism was a tactic not a principle and that republicanism itself had to move away from being an almost semi mystical set of beliefs towards becoming a vibrant activist political movement that was relevant to the needs of the working class today. He himself saw electoral politics as a means to activate the working class into political action and saw the debating chamber as just another area of revolutionary politics. Not for him a trust in elected politicians who only took account of working class interests when election time came around.

5/Armed Struggle.
Seamus as Chief of Staff of the INLA supported armed struggle but armed struggle that was directed against British imperialist forces. He saw it as another weapon in the armour of revolutionary struggle. Within the INLA itself he was an advocate along with others for acessation, before he was assassinated. He certainly saw a role for armed struggle but always within a political context and not just as a reflex action against the state. He would almost certainly have endorsed the Ta Power doctrine of politics in command had he been given the time to fully develop his ideas with the RSM.

With the passage of time one would imagine that the wounds of old battles would heal or at least be lessened in intensity. Not so when it comes to the personality and ideas of Seamus Costello. The Workers Party in their own partial history of their Party say;

-“that a minority opposition led by Seamus Costello over a two year period sought to reverse the May decision (official IRA ceasefire and at the same time frustrate the development of a disciplined socialist party. In this he was supported by Trotskyist and other ultra-left elements on the fringes of the Party and by sectarian adventurers, largely in Belfast. In 1975 they launched murderous attacks on key Party personnel, killing both rank and file members and leading figures in Belfast and severely wounding the future General Secretary Sean Garland.”
Of course the reality is that it was the Workers Party- to -be that launched a vicious armed assault on the IRSP in a failed effort to wipe it out at birth. That they failed must be still a major source of bitterness within the WP. Only as recently as last year Sean Garland gave a lecture on the 90 anniversary of James Connolly’s death. He could not resist the opportunity to once again launch a vicious attack on the memory of Seamus Costello. He accused Seamus of being responsible for the bitterness caused when the provisional alliance was being formed. He accused him of being in favour of a “sectarian terrorist campaign” of being “totally ruthless” and of “twisted aims”.
He does not mention that in the early seventies he himself was in alliance with Seamus in relation to armed struggle and that together they had been the two people most responsible for moving the republican movement to the left. No one doubts that Seamus Costello was a hard taskmaster. He did not suffer fools gladly. But he was not sectarian nor a mindless militant.
Clearly the reason for Garland’s attacks on the memory of Seamus Costello have more to do with both the failure of the Workers Party project and the increasing growth in the genuine revolutionary ideas of republican socialism. One has to wonder why those who call themselves, Republicans, Socialists, Marxists and Communists reserve their greatest hatred, venom and spleen for other Republicans, Socialists, Marxists and Communists? What agenda do they work to?
History will in the long run judge all but we are confident that the revolutionary ideas that Seamus Costello and the Republican Socialist movement espouse will long outlast the sterile, sectarian, Stalinism of the reformist Workers Party. We salute the memory of Seamus Costello.


____________________

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