other part was completely Syrian.
Could you explain the role of the Stalinist organisations in tail-ending the bourgeois reformist Jumblatt and supporting the 'programme of national reform'?
The Communist Party has always entered into a front with Jumblatt. The strength of Jumblatt is that he has an electoral base because of his origins as a Druze leader, which gives him strength on the parliamentary level. This meant that the CP had a programme which was the demands of the Moslem bourgeoisie: for example, a parliament of 50 per cent Moslems and 50 per cent Christians, and the leadership of the bourgeois army half Christian and half MosAnother aspect was that while the CP had been devoted to the parliamentary road, it now mobilised for the first time on an armed level. This helped to attract many young militants from the neighbourhoods. But at the same time it had the programme of the Moslem bourgeoisie, which did not represent an alternative to the other nationalist forces.
On the military level one could fight with other organisations, but in Lebanon, where the nationalists were giving the war a religious character, it was crucial for the workers movement to have a systematic revolutionary policy attacking this religious aspect. This would also present an alternative to the masses in a situation where the bourgeois state had virtually disappeared.
What was the CP's position on the Syrian invasion?
The Moscow bureaucracy adopted a sort of neutral position because of is close relations with une oyran regime. The Lebanese CP had to find from the French and Italian CPs, now unal taese parties call Have posttions independent of the direct plans of Moscow.
The position of Moscow is related to that of the Syrian CP, which supported the intervention. This put the Lebanese CP in an awkward position, because the Syrian CP was supporting those who were killing their own members.
What are the positions of the far left organisations?
The far left in Lebanon was strong 1967 until 1971-72, on crisis began to express itself fully. There was a very strong centrist anti- (OACL). The crisis was so strong that the organisation split.
the reformist deterioration. This left split could not find any alternative form and completely disappeared. It has left many individuals who make up a leftist milieu, developed an organised form.
completely on the line of the Communist Party and you cannot differentiate it.
the RCG and the Workers League. The WL is a split from the PFLP, which made severe ultra-left errors in the civil war. Their main slogan was long live the soviets! Well, there were no soviets.
and made a big step in understanding the need for a centralised communist party in the Arab region, saw it as only an Arab thing. were saying that an international would be built after this party. This showed that they their understanding of building the Arab party outside the international working class movement.
And what role did the RCG play?
tary level, especially in the defence of the neighbourhoods. We had to be on the barricades every night, pecially in two most important Shiite neighbourhoods Nabaa.
publications, including publications in specific strongly directed against any religious factor. For example, all our publications in the neighbourhoods went under the title Toiling masses of all religions, unite!' ment or the regime or elections was posed, we raised the slogan of the Constituent Assembly. Our programme was completely opposed to the bourgeois programme advanced by the Stalinists and the reformists.
the army we opposed the idea of mixed Christian-Moslem leadership, and proposed to build a workers and peasants army, militias organised in neighbourhoods elect their representatives. able to make some small examples of this in the neighbourhoods where we had some presence.
to stress the importance of the selfintervention organisation of the masses. We could not just say, 'you must build soviets'. That would have been an abstract and propagandist idea.
problems of expropriation and food supply, where we could intervene and build the beginnings of self-organisation. We had some experiences of the expropriation of food in the poor neighbourhoods, where the decision was taken by base committees which would elect representatives.
repressive bourgeois state, a strong when its state. This means that repression is prepared for the left, particularly the revolutionary left. We have now to A pro-Maoist part left, criticising but has not The second part of the OACL was STUDENTS G