The recent army manocuvres al Heathrow, and the threat of the possible use of troops in the miners' strike, has brought discussion on the role of the armed forces to the forefront of current debates in the workers' movement. It is vital-literally a matter of life and deaththat the working class movement clearly understands this question.
The capitalist army is the most carefully protected of all the organisations of the State. Although he draws completely wrong political conclusions, Communist Party member Jack Woddis described the nature of the army very well in his pamphlet "Time to Change Course": "The upholders of the establishment are given all the facilities they require to mould the minds of the army men, to foster anti-democratic conceptions and Influence them to regard civilian activities for the redress of winvances or for changing our socity as dangerous heresies that must be repressed by force.
At me same time, she menspers or she aou forces are denied democratic freedoms, and are banned from participating in normal political activities or belonging to trade unions or political parties.
*The politics of preserving the status quo are dinned into troops every day; but the politics of working for progressive change are disaliowed.
LAST LINE OF DEFENCE The reason for this careful screening is that the army is the last line of defence for the capitalist class and its property. The Drib Telegraph, for example, has pointed out that in the event of a General Strike the employers would "have to rely on the police and the army". Every army in the world is a positive hot bed of extreme rightist and fascist plots.
In Italy a lascist group, the MSl, has as its candidates in elections a host of admirals and generals, and the Pisa military training centre is being used to give military training to the fascists. In France it was army leaders Like General Salan who led the fascist OAS, and now still stand behind the fascist right. In Britain the NE and other such groups are fall of Coloneis; Generals, and Air Vice Marshalls, In every country in the world where there has seemed to be even the slightest whitt of a socialist trumph-for example Chile, Greece, Spath-the army has intervened.
But if there is general agreement on the left regarding the nature of the copitalist army there is complete disagreement on what must be done about it. The Cornnunist Parties around The world, instead of keeping to Lenin's position that the capitalist army must be smashed, have arrived at the absurd conclusion that the army can be bargained with or won over. This can reach lunatic lengths. Luis Corvalan, leader of the Chilean Communist Party, had the following tosay only a tew weeks before the coup in 'Some reactionaries have begun to seek new ways to dre a wedge between the peopic and une armed Tones mauramang howe less than we and terending to replace the professional army. No sirs! We consinue to support the absolutely professional character of the armed institurions. Their enemies appear not in the ranks of we pouple our m we reacuonay camp.
POLITICAL PREPARATIONS far clearer understanding of its role by arresting Corvalan, torturing him, and threatening to execute him. This was the inevitable result of the line spetled out so cleanly by Allende in a speech he delivered in September 1972:
*There will be no armed forces here other than the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force, I shall elimin Red Weekly & February 1974 Pige 6 ate any others if they appear'. (Speech of 10 Septem ber 1972)
This was precisely the problem when the coup came in Chile-there was only one armed force and it did not belong to the workers. As a result thousands of workers are now suffering mass torture and murder at the hands of those "forces stipulated by the constitution".
Of course the political preparation necessary to deal with the army, precisely because of the nature of the armed forces, is the most danger ous of all political work. It has nothing to do with playing around at being Che Guevars on Hampstead Heath, nor anything to do with the activities of the Angry Brigade. What it does involve is, right from the beginning, orienting the workers' movement towards the political task of breaking up the bourgeois army and arming the working class.
If this is done it is quite possible to achieve real results, Particularly impressive in showing this was the Gl movement against the Vietnam war inside the United States armed forces, which •affected tens of thousands of soldiers.
The remarks of Mick MeGahey in relation to troops in the miners' strike, despite their limitations, point to some important possibilities, precisely because the army is now likely to be used against the civilian population in relation to the army. There is some tradition in Britain of this type of activity. The most famous was probably the "Don't Shoot" leaflet, for which Tom Mann was jailed in 1912, containing the words 'You are workingmen's sons. When we go on strike to hetter our lot which is the bot also of Your Fathers, Mothers, Brothers and Sisters, YOU are called upon by your Officers to MURDER US. Don't do it... Think things out and refuse any longer to Murder Your Kindred."
While, as we shall see, this idea that soldiers are simpiy "worker in uniform' leads to very serious mistakes, nevertheless the type of material can teach some usetul lessons.
LABOUR BUREAUCRATS The row over MeGabey's statements has shown the tolal hankruptcy of the Labour Party and trade union bureaucrats on this question. What MeGabey actually said was the following "If the troops were called in I would speak to them. don't see them as a reactionary mass, there are many working ciass lads in the armed forces and even some TEES SAL He also said he would not pall on the troops to mutiny but. *.. would let them know the facts of the dispute, Wie would do this by distributing leaflets and information to them, but that would only be done after they were called in, According to the Evening Standard on 29 January, when MeGabey was asked to clasify whar he meant he said: *I would not ask any troops to disobey orders. Far from it-l woold not ask them to accept the respon sibility for the miners' struggle ... This is not conspiracy, This us not muuny, as ony alowing poi people to understand the purpose for which they are empluyed."
The reaction to MeGahey's speech from the Labour Party was despicable. First oil the mark was that most open enemy of the working class within the Labour Party - Reg Prentice. Next was pseudo-radical Willie Hamilton, who dectared MeGahey would be shot for saying such things in Russia, This is, unfortunately, true, but what Hamilton does not point our is that This 'absolutely professional anny' showed a it is true in about 85 of the 100 countries of the so-called "free world. Gormley and other rep resentatives of the NUM right-wing also disowned MeGahey, on the not very reassuring grounds that the NUM executive had never discussed what to do in the event of the army being called Finally the Labour Party joined the fray officially, with a statement from Callaghan and Above: members of the Irish Citizen Army guarding trade union headquarters at Liberty Hall in Dublin; right: drilling practice for an ICA unit ... Work to arm the masses is a difficult job, but it can be done, In Ireland, James Larkin, founder of the Irish Transport and General Workers' Union, formed a Citizen Army in 1913 to defend workers' struggles from the police and bosses' thugs."
031939 Hayward, Chairman and Secretary of the Party respectively, This said, in part: *We utterly repudiate any attempts by communists or ofbers to use the miners as a political battering ram to bring about a general strike or to call on troops D disobey lawful orders in the event of a strike. Thes is silly and dangerous nomsense.
Callaghan also went on the BBC's 'World at One' on Tuesday to say 'No political party could call on troops to disobey lawful orders'. This is just arrant nonsense. When the forces of the German ariny were used by the lawfully cons tituted' head of the Government, Hitler, to smash the trade unions, should German workems have urged soldiers to obey those orders? Would Callaghan and Hayward have advised the soldiers of the Greek, Chilean and Spanish armies to shey their orders when the ruling class in those countries staged coups?
MA The line of the Labour Party is an open betrayal of the working class, and MeGahey must be completely defended against their attacks. But MeGahey's statements pose on part of the problem. The question of the us troops to strike-break is understood by at le some sections of the Communist Party, CP industrial organiser Bert Ramelson speaking the CP executive said that the use of the arr at Heathrow was part of the scbeme to con on the public to see the any an use in our cates. If could veil preparations for what th fear may be the successful development of ! mass movement towards a general strike. (Morning Star, 14 January).
The trouble is that the Communist Pare not see that the job of the army will not be a bit of peaceful scabbing, but, in the first crunch it will be called in as an armed pow