[1999] Philippines: The Great Left Divide

A SPECTER is haunting the revolutionary movement in the Philippines — the specter of seemingly interminable splits.

In the seven years since Armando Liwanag issued his “Reaffirm our Basic Principles and Rectify Errors” document, the Left — or more appropriately, the Left of the national democratic (ND) tradition — has gone through an unprecedented period of metastasis. The once monolithic movement that at its peak in the mid-1980s commanded 35,000 Party members, 60 guerrilla fronts, two battalions and 37 company formations, and foisted ideological and organizational hegemony in the progressive politics during the Marcos dictatorship is now history. Out of it have emerged fragments of disparate groups — eight at least — that continue to wage “revolution” in similarly disparate forms.


The Great Left Divide

Related:

Philippine Socialism Archive

Banned or Suppressed Publications in the Philippines

Sean Gervasi, 1992 lecture: The US Strategy to Dismantle the USSR

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Sean Gervasi, 1992 lecture: The US Strategy to Dismantle the USSR

Related RAND Corporation documents:

Economic factors affecting Soviet foreign and defense policy: a summary outline

The Costs of the Soviet Empire

Sitting on bayonets : the Soviet defense burden and the slowdown of Soviet defense spending

Moscow’s Economic Dilemma: The Burden of Soviet Defense

Exploiting ‘fault lines’ in the Soviet empire: an overview

The Foreign Policy of the Russian Revolution

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No idea could be more erroneous or harmful than to separate foreign from home policy. The monstrous falsity of this separation becomes even more monstrous in war-time. Yet the bourgeoisie are doing everything possible and impossible to suggest and promote this idea. Popular ignorance of foreign policy is incomparably greater than of home policy. The “secrecy” of diplomatic relations is sacredly observed in the freest of capitalist countries, in the most democratic republics.

The Foreign Policy of the Russian Revolution

Throwing Washington Overboard.

The present war days are furnishing an opportunity to study the spirit of capitalism at close range. Much that we have said about the inner make-up of the capitalist system must have seemed “theoretic”; the historic facts upon which we based our arguments not having fallen within the personal observation of the masses, our conclusions were disregarded. Now, however, the facts are at hand; all can see, hear, feel, smell them.

Throwing Washington Overboard.