{"id":5932,"date":"2014-06-25T15:58:59","date_gmt":"2014-06-25T21:58:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lavozlit.com\/?p=5932"},"modified":"2014-06-25T15:58:59","modified_gmt":"2014-06-25T21:58:59","slug":"debate-south-eastern-ukraine-and-marxist-policy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/workersvoiceus.org\/es\/2014\/06\/25\/debate-south-eastern-ukraine-and-marxist-policy\/","title":{"rendered":"Debate: South-eastern Ukraine and Marxist policy"},"content":{"rendered":"

UKRAINE<\/em>
\nWritten by R. Le\u00f3n <\/em>
\nSaturday, 21 June 2014 19:12<\/em>
\nThe revolutionary process in Ukraine, one of the sharpest and most contradictory processes of our times, is in the grip of two great counterrevolutionary forces.<\/p>\n

On the one hand there is the new traitorous oligarchic Petro Poroshenko administration that heading the imperialist bandits of IMF and European Union (EU) will continue with the brutal attack against the Ukrainian toiling masses initiated by the Turchinov-Yatsenyuk administration.<\/p>\n

On the other hand there is the reactionary Vladimir Putin administration, representative of the historic national oppression of Russia over Ukraine that suffered a bitter blow with the fall of Yanukovich that also launched a counterrevolutionary offensive to keep Ukraine inside their cone of influence, the highest peak of which was military occupation and the subsequent annexation of Crimea.[1]<\/a><\/p>\n

Just the way we put it in our latest statement, \u201cThe new Ukrainian administration as well as Moscow share the policy that the crisis that they had spawned is to be downloaded onto the backs of the workers and they arebound on putting an end to<\/strong>\u00a0the revolutionary process. The former as well as the latter are agents of imperialism.\u00a0<\/strong>But within this process they wrangle over the share of exploitation and plunder of Ukrainian resources.\u201d[2]<\/a><\/p>\n

Counterrevolution in Ukraine is a two-headed creature and both have to be chopped off by the independent action of the working class and the toiling masses in general in the west as well as in the south east of the country.<\/p>\n

That is why we say that\u00a0the unity of the Ukrainian working class against both bourgeois counterrevolutionary projects,\u00a0<\/strong>to fight against the colonisation boosted by Poroshenko-IMF-EU and against any other separatists movement that may divide workers and impinge on the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine.<\/p>\n

Only independent policy of this nature can lead to the achievement of an independent, united and socialist Ukraine.<\/p>\n

Stalinist standpoint\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

Unfortunately this is not the position of most of the left. Right from the very beginning, Stalinism in its most diverse variants, among which we include Castro-Chavism, picked sides against the Ukrainian revolutionary process and in defence of such murderous oligarch as Yamukovich, identified with the maintenance of Russian oppression and imperialist colonisation of the country.<\/p>\n

These trends isolate the contradictions of the process and make them absolute, such as the existence of illusion in the EU and the presence of ultra-right nationalist neo-Nazi during the protests at the Maidan Square and so conclude that it was all about \u201ca fascist coup financed by the CIA and U.S.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to this logic, military occupation and the secessionist referendum boosted by Putin that led to the annexation of Crimea to Russia and the separatism of the pro-Russian sectors that is now taking place in the southeast of Ukraine can be regarded as a just and progressive response to the alleged \u201cvictory of Nazi-fascism\u201d in Kiev.<\/p>\n

In this way, Stalinism repeats in Ukraine the same script they have been using in Libya and Syria: when popular masses arise against the bourgeois governments whom these trends support, they present these processes as part of an \u201cimperialist world conspiracy\u201d, and pick sides together with these oppressive regimes against the peoples.<\/p>\n

With this logic, Stalinism in general and Castro-Chavism in particular upheld Yanukovich and currently they support for Ukraine any action coming from the \u201ccamp\u201d headed by Putin, presented by their propaganda as a kind of \u201cnew nit-imperialist leader\u201d, nostalgically associated to a re-birth of \u201csoviet power\u201d that is said to be leading the \u201cnon-aligned\u201d in the midst of a kind of re-edition of the \u201ccold war\u201d against the USA.<\/p>\n

\u2026 And their repeaters, dubbed “Trotskyists”<\/strong><\/p>\n

It is within this framework that trends that claim to be Trotskyists have yielded to the pressure of Castro-Chavism, and even if their arguments sound most \u201cleftish\u201d, they reach the same conclusions. We have already had a look at this distressing phenomenon in the case of Libya and Syria. Now we can witness it in Ukraine.<\/p>\n

This is the case of Socialism or Barbarism (SoB from it name in Spanish), an international trend to which the New MAS of Argentina belongs. Their analyses on the Ukrainian situation \u2013 especially since the events in the southeast of that country \u2013 have seen as frequent as they are \u2013 in general lines \u2013 coincident with Castro-Chavist positions and even with those of Putin himself \u2013 in at least three of the principal items: 1- The protests at Maidan Square and the fall of Yanukovich; 2- Comprehension of the right to self-determination of nations from the Marxist point of view; 3- stemming out of this item, their position in the face of the annexation of Crimea and the self-styled “People’s Republic of Donetsk” (DPR).<\/p>\n

Was the fall of Yanukovich a democratic victory or was it not?<\/strong><\/p>\n

SoB criticises us for assessing that the fall of Yanukovich was an enormous democratic victory of the toiling masses, a first great achievement of a revolutionary process that had begun and is now underway because \u201cwhat prevailed in the awareness of sectors of the masses who detonated the Euro-Maidan was the illusion regarding European Union and not the perspective of socialism or anything like it[3]<\/a>and to the fact that after that fall it was a \u201cpuppet of the USA and the EU and the IMF government with oligarchs or their agents what cropped up plus a good share of Nazi-fascists\u201d[4]<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The SoB follows this pattern: as the masses had no \u201csocialist perspective\u201d and they trusted EU and it was a pro-imperialist government with representatives of the ultra-right who took over after Yanukovich, the process as such was reactionary; there was a defeat of the masses and a victory of imperialism and Nazi-fascism.<\/p>\n

This sectarian reasoning puts an equal sign between the progressive processes of struggle of the exploited masses against governments and capitalist regimes with their counterrevolutionary leaderships and starts by denying reality with is always contradictory.<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s international situation, where the sharpening of the crisis of revolutionary leadership becomes manifest, makes partial victories to occur that are then usurped by counterrevolutionary leaderships. But that does not make them any less victorious, triumphs in which workers carry out fantastic experiences of struggle. They can even be driven to ultimate defeats by these counterrevolutionary leaders, but this will always remain disputable for we are talking of live processes.<\/p>\n

This is a piece of truth that any workers who has ever participated in a strike will admit and understand this, for nobody with the least notion of class struggle would omit supporting a just strike of workers simply because the leaders are traitors. On the contrary: we do our best to support the strike and from this position we dispute it against the bureaucracy.<\/p>\n

That is why a mechanical and subjectivist schema like that of SoB invariably leads to political sterility and opportunism, denying the very processes and, in this way curtailing the possibility to fight for them against counterrevolutionary leaderships with an independent policy that may overcome this dramatic contradiction and build a Marxist and revolutionary leadership within the struggles of the masses, with all the unavoidable limitations and forms that take place.\u00a0In short, the practical outcome of this sectarian vision is the renunciation of the struggle for building a revolutionary leadership.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Furthermore, in the SoB case, there is another problem: the method. They falsify our standpoint and even the theoretic heritage of Nahuel Moreno for they accuse us of asserting that democratic victories or the triumph of political democratic revolutions against dictatorial regimes will \u201cobjectively\u201d lead \u201cby themselves\u201d to socialism. This is a lie. We treat these processes as important achievements, but always within the framework of revolutionary processes in which revolutionaries must continue, supporting such victories, fighting for the seizure of power by the proletariat and socialism.<\/p>\n

This theoretical deviation leads such trends such as SoB to quote in their articles such \u201cserious\u201d analyses by \u201cMarxists\u201d such as Boris Kagarlitsky, who says, \u201cThat is why Maidan, regardless the demands posed, had its roots in a programme of dismantling of democracy. Yanukovich administration was corrupt but democratic, something very well known in Latin America.\u201d[5]<\/a><\/p>\n

What a curious concept of \u201cdemocracy\u201d, even if it is bourgeois, the one that the favourite analyst of SoB defends, the one that regards an oligarch who ruled with almost absolute power[6]<\/a>, the one that had the protesters in the Square annihilated by the Berkut (elite police troops) and dozens of snipers who murdered more than a hundred people.[7]<\/a><\/p>\n

But SoB ought to be more consistent with their own schema. If Yanukovich was a \u201cdemocratic government\u201d up against a movement of “dismantling of democracy” under the hegemony of fascists from Svoboda and the neo-Nazis of Pravyi sektor, carrying Wolfsangel insignia used by the Waffen-SS\u201d\u00a0[8]<\/a>\u00a0 and from the very beginning all for \u201cthe take-over by the pro-western Yatsenuk and the fascists from Svoboda\u201d[9]<\/a>they ought to say so\u00a0<\/strong>clearly, the way the Stalinists do,\u00a0that they were with Yanukovich and all for annihilating this essentially \u201cNazi fascist movement\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In the same way, if our critics had a minimum of coherence to assist them, even without any political support,they should unconditional return of Yanukovich, an allegedly \u201cdemocratic\u201d president evicted by an essentially \u201cneo-Nazi\u201d movement.<\/strong><\/p>\n

And while we are about it, if what we saw during the overthrow of Yanukovich was a phenomenon of a kind of \u201chegemonic\u201d neo-Nazism with some weight among the masses, SoB ought to explain why Svoboda and the Sector of the Right obtained respectively 1.7% and 0.67% of the votes in the recent elections.[10]<\/a><\/p>\n

In our opinion, the \u201clack of socialist perspectives\u201d and the take-over by a neoliberal, pro-imperialist administration with ultra-right parties inside of it that usurped the democratic victory that the toppling of Yanukovich were, above all, the outcome of the lack of a proletarian revolutionary leadership.<\/p>\n

This however does not diminish the importance of this democratic victory and let alone does it invalidate the revolutionary process initiated by the activity of the masses, with all their confusions and limitations, which is still underway in Ukraine.<\/p>\n

The determining fact in Ukraine is that Maidan triggered off a process of confrontation between revolution and counterrevolution that neither the new government nor imperialism or Putin have so far been able to control or stabilise.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is so, because the masses made a fast experience and feel victorious. They challenged and defeated the police (later on they made them kneel down to beg publicly forgiveness for the repression), they began a crisis in the army and evicted an authoritarian oligarch regarded as an agent of Russian domination. This feeling of \u201cit is necessary to fight and it is possible to win\u201d will become very important in future confrontations against the plans of adjustment that Kiev has started to implement.<\/p>\n

Only the comprehension of the process as a whole, with all its contradictions and limitations will make it possible for us to take part in it and so build a revolutionary leadership that can lead the heroic actions of Ukrainian masses towards the seizure of power and socialism.<\/p>\n

Schematic visions like that of the SoB are sterile for the central objective.<\/p>\n

Falsifying Leninism in order to abandon the struggle for the unity of Ukraine<\/strong><\/p>\n

It is amazing to see how SoB, who always assumes an arrogant and professorial position when discussing with other trends, now gets lost in the cobweb of their own contradictions as a result of the erratic schemas when analysing reality.<\/p>\n

Another argument wielded by this trend to deny the popular victory in Maidan is that this process \u201cplaced the partition of Ukraine on the agenda\u201d[11]<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0 As from that moment on, on several occasions they repeat that \u201cfrom the very beginning\u201d their notes \u201cwarned\u201d that \u201cNational unity in Ukraine was at stake\u201d.<\/p>\n

But in spite of all these \u201cwarnings\u201d, SoB had no qualms about supporting the annexation of Crimea by Putin and the entire separatist movement embodied in the self-styled “People’s Republic of Donetsk”.<\/p>\n

That is why, last March, SoB saw no harm for the \u201cNational unity of Ukraine\u201d in the military occupation and annexation of the peninsula by Russia. What is more, the juggles and euphemisms used to conceal the gross aggression committed by Putin against Ukraine when referring to this robbery as \u201c\u2018migration\u2019\u201d to Russia of the peninsula of Crimea\u201d[12]<\/a>This humorous image makes you think that Crimea \u201cwalked\u201d into the arms of Kremlin.<\/p>\n

According to the commentators from SoB, the Crimea affair was nothing to do with any annexation by Putin for it simply stood for \u201cpicking ripe fruit from the ground\u201d;[13]<\/a>according to this trend, “Crimea, a mostly Russian population with a Tartar minority, has never been part of the historic Ukraine<\/em><\/strong>\u201d.[14]<\/a>\u00a0Furthermore, the \u201cmigration\u201d took place as from a referendum that gave it \u201cdemocratic legitimacy;\u00a0<\/strong>a legitimacy that the Kiev administration does not have.\u201d[15]<\/a><\/p>\n

This is precisely Putin\u2019s discourse and that of Stalinism as a whole with which they pretend to justify the annexation of Crimea. When SoB talks of a \u201cpopulation that is mostly Russian with a Tartar minority that has never been part of the historic Ukraine, they simply \u201cforget\u201d that today\u2019s Crimea, long before the “Transfer” of this territory to Ukraine by Khrushchev in 1954, was a Tartar \u201cnation-state\u201d and was annexed in 1783 by the Tsarist Empire. They also \u201cforget\u201d that today\u2019s \u201cRussian majority\u201d in Crimea was the outcome of\u00a0brutal Russification\u00a0<\/strong>boosted by the tsars and a\u00a0genocide against the Tartar population\u00a0<\/strong>when between 200 and 250 thousand people boosted by Stalin in 1944, which set up one of the most brutal and criminal ethnic cleansing in modern history.[16]<\/a><\/p>\n

For over two centuries, Crimea was turned into a Russian enclave, that is to say: a territory occupied by a population mostly transplanted (after the eviction and ethnic cleansing of the autochthonous population, the Tartars of Crimea) in order to guarantee the total control over the naval base in Sebastopol, historic military outpost of Russian interests in the region ever since the imperial times.<\/p>\n

That was why we were against the separatist referendum in Crimea. Not only because it was boosted by Putin and will take place under a military occupation, but also because the \u201cRussian population\u201d has no right to national self-determination understood as the Marxist-Leninist concept of \u201cseparation\u201d and the right to \u201cconstitute an independent national State\u201d.[17]<\/a><\/p>\n

That is why, the comparison drawn by SoB of the ethnic Russian or Russian-speaking population of Crimea with the cases of Catalonia and Euskadi. The latter are oppressed nationalities inside the Spanish State; the \u201cRussians\u201d of Crimea are no oppressed nations; to the contrary, they are part of an enclave that is the product of brutal Great-Russian chauvinism and oppresses Ukraine and the remaining former non-Russian soviet republics<\/p>\n

Crimea is comparable to Falkland Islands.\u00a0<\/strong>Defending the democratic right of \u201cnational self-determination\u201d of the Russians in Crimea would be the same as defending this right for the Kelpers of the Falklands and acknowledging their \u201cvoluntary\u201d aspirations of maintaining this Argentine territory under British domination expressed in the phony “referendums” boosted by London.<\/p>\n

But this SoB\u2019s standpoint \u2013 that justifies the aggression of the Great Russian oppressor in Crimea – is aggravated when it is upheld for the case of the region of the Southeast of Ukraine, which they regard as \u201chistorically part of Ukraine\u201d.[18]<\/a><\/p>\n

And yet they supported the separatist referendum of 11th May, highlighting its \u201cmassive character\u201d and the \u201cright to decide\u201d of the ethnically Russian and Russian-speaking population of these cities, which proves that warning against the dangers jeopardising Ukraine were mere lip.<\/p>\n

Is there any \u201ctheoretic explanation\u201d for this attack against the Ukrainian unity, even if they say they are all for it?<\/p>\n

SoB responds, \u201cWe are all for national unity of Ukraine.\u00a0But of course this national unity must be voluntary\u00a0<\/strong>(\u2026)\u201d[19]<\/a>And they reassert the idea, \u201cfor revolutionary socialists, national unity of this country or of any other country must be\u00a0free and voluntary.\u00a0<\/strong>It cannot be upheld putting a gun to the heads of\u00a0a sector of the population,\u00a0<\/strong>and denying their right to decide whether they wish to separate or not.\u201d[20]<\/a><\/p>\n

That is to say: in any country it should be enough for \u201ca sector of the population\u201d (they do not even mention anything like \u201cnationality\u201d) to have the \u201cfree will\u201d to be separate from this or that national state and we, the revolutionary socialists would be duty bound to acknowledge this \u201cright\u201d.<\/p>\n

To justify this position, SoB quote from \u201cThe right of nations to self-determination\u201d written by Lenin in 1914 that we transcribe the way it stands in the SoB web:<\/p>\n

\u201cNorway is linked to Sweden by geographic, economic and linguistic bonds not any less close that the bonds that join many non-Russian Slav nation to the Russians. But the union of Norway to Sweden was not voluntary\u2026\u201d[21]<\/a><\/p>\n

True enough, in this text Lenin did defend Norwegians\u2019 right to separate from the Swedish State as \u201cthe union of Norway to Sweden was not voluntary\u201d. The problem is that\u00a0SoB omits the next part of the quotation and cut the paragraph in the middle.\u00a0<\/strong>We believe it to be a good opportunity to do justice to the appropriate method of Marxist discussion and facilitate the access to the complete quotation from Lenin, extracted from the same SoB source:<\/p>\n

\u201cNorway is linked to Sweden by geographic, economic and linguistic bonds not any less close that the bonds that join many non-Russian Slav nation to the Russians. But the union of Norway to Sweden was not voluntary so that Rose Luxemburg talks of \u201cfederation\u201d in vain, simply because she does not know what to say.\u00a0Norway was given away to Sweden by monarchs, against the will of the Norwegians and Swedes had to take troops to Norway in order to subject her.\u201d<\/strong>[22]<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

That is to say, the \u201cunion of Norway to Sweden was not voluntary\u201d because Norway was a nation that had been annexed to Sweden, against the will of the Norwegians, using the power of the weapons. It was in this concrete historic context \u2013 which SoB conceals to the readers \u2013 that Lenin defended unconditionally \u201cNorway\u2019s right to be separated\u201d.\u00a0[23]<\/a><\/p>\n

Contrary to SoB conception, even if Marxism in most cases is against the creation of multiple \u201cmini-states\u201d, it defends the\u00a0unconditional right to national self-determination (separation) of oppressed nationalities.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Within this context, is the population of Russian origin and Russian-speaking of the Southeast of Ukraine an oppressed nationality within the Ukrainian state? Not in the least. And least of all the population ethnically Russian in Crimea, The contrary is true: it has always been the Ukrainians who were oppressed by Russia.<\/p>\n

The terrible \u201cjail of nations\u201d was expressed in Ukraine through military invasions and occupations, genocides, prohibition of the Ukrainian language, etc. Just to have an idea of what the brutal \u201cRussification\u201d in this latest aspect, even in 1987, of the total number of schools in the main cities, only 16% taught using the Ukrainian language against 83% that taught in Russian alone.\u00a0[24]<\/a><\/p>\n

Consequently, all these false comparisons that SoB makes with these nations with the Catalonians, Basques or Norwegians just do not fit here.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, the revolution underway in Ukraine ought to serve the purpose of all the trends that claim to be revolutionary \u2013 and let alone those who claim to be Trotskyists \u2013 to recover Trotsky\u2019s entire heritage on the point of national oppression that Russia has exerted over Ukraine for centuries. Trotsky as categorical on this point:<\/p>\n

\u201cBureaucracy also strangled the people of the Great Russia. But with the Ukrainian question things got even more complicated due to the\u00a0massacre of national expectations. Nowhere else the restrictions, purges, repressions and \u2013 in general \u2013 all forms of bureaucratic roguery had such murderous dimensions as in Ukraine,\u00a0<\/strong>where they tried to annihilate the powerful yearning of greater freedom and independence deeply rooted in the masses\u201d.[25]<\/a><\/p>\n

Against the entire Stalinist ideological arsenal that tries to deny the historic oppression of Russia over Ukraine[26]<\/a>, to which many \u201cTrotskyists adapt themselves, it is fundamental for the new generation of Marxists to study the general teachings of Lenin on the issue of the national problem:<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is necessary to tell the difference between the nationalism of the oppressing nation and the nationalism of the oppressed nation; between the nationalism of the great nation and that of the small nation.<\/p>\n

\u201c[\u2026] the internationalism of the oppressing nation, or of the so-called \u201cgreat\u201d nation (even if it is great only in its violence, only as great as a henchman) should not be reduced to merely observing unevenness, which on behalf of the oppressing nation, or the great nation, compensate the inequality that occurs practically in life<\/p>\n

\u201cThose who have not understood this do not understand the truly proletarian position in the face of a national problem; deep in their hearts they still have the petty bourgeois viewpoint and that is why they cannot help sliding down to the bourgeois standpoint now and again.\u201d[27]<\/a><\/p>\n

Exit the forum<\/strong>when separatism appears\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

The vicious adjustment plan boosted by Kiev attacks all workers, those of the east as well as those of the west. As we have seen, these attacks have triggered off a progressive process of proletarian struggles in some cities of the southeast. However, it is an error as grievous as common in most of the left to mix up these processes of proletarian struggles with armed actions and conformation of the “People’s Republic of Donetsk”. They are two completely different things.<\/p>\n

That is what we assert in our statement, \u201cThere is a progressive national struggle in Ukraine as an oppressed action,\u00a0against the historic Russian oppression as well as against the world imperialism.\u00a0<\/strong>This struggle must go on and today it is expressed in confrontation against the Kiev administration and the EU-IMF and of Moscow.\u00a0This has nothing to do with the current secessionist attempt expressed by the ‘People’s Republic of Donetsk’<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0and the criminal attempt at separatism headed by organisation that carried out the referendum 11th May that must be rejected by the working class of Ukraine and of the world.\u201d<\/em><\/strong>[28]<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

A sample of the Stalinist positions on the characterisation of the events in the Ukrainian southeast is to be found in an article by James Petras who quotes the Brazilian CP, \u201cThe Kiev administration is the outcome of a coup financed by the USA (\u2026)\u201d[29]<\/a>and the DPR with their militias would be \u201cWorkers\u2019 and Peoples\u2019 Councils in East Ukraine an embryo of socialist democracy. Popular militias are the embryo of a Liberation Army.\u201d[30]<\/a><\/p>\n

Well then, once again, the Sob\u2019s vision of the events is essentially the same, \u201cThe rising in the East is, socially speaking, the rebellion of the industrial and proletarian region in Ukraine\u201d[31]<\/a>They assert that it is a rebellion \u201carmed and one that actually exerted power in the main cities in the East\u201d[32]<\/a>\u00a0 and very progressive and opposed to Maidan for \u201cwe can see red flags with the hammer and sickle at rallies carried out surrounding the statue of Lenin\u201d[33]<\/a><\/p>\n

With the same intention, trying to bestow on the DPR \u201cmassive and progressive character\u201d, they highlight that \u201cthe referendums in the Donetsk and Luganski oblasts were attended massively\u201d[34]<\/a>and that the statement of the People’s Republic of Donetsk also speaks of social property\u201d,[35]<\/a>etc.<\/p>\n

Once more, this repetition with a layer \u201cMarxist\u201d varnish that SoB makes out of the \u201cWorkers\u2019 Councils\u201d and the \u201cLiberation Army\u201d that Stalinism has invented to support the pro-Russian separatism.<\/p>\n

As we have already mentioned, in sectors of the workers\u2019 movement in the cities of Ukrainian southeast there is enormous mistrust and displeasure against the central government in Kiev and the brutal attack on the standards of living. This is very progressive for it shows the importance of the space for independent working class policy against Kiev and against Moscow that is fundamental for the revolutionary proves to make headway. But these incipient but extremely important processes of independent struggle are the opposite of People\u2019s Popular Republic of Donetsk and Lugansk.<\/p>\n

In our latest statement, we greeted the precious examples of the miners Kryvyi Rih (Dnipropetrovsk) in the southeast who had supported the Maidan struggles and now they claim for a \u201cproletarian Maidan\u201d. They fight against the adjustment plans from Kiev aid also against separatism and are for the unity of the working class of east and west in order to fight again the Russian and Ukrainian oligarchs.<\/p>\n

This process can also be seen in other mining towns such as Krasnodon (Lugansk) and Mariupol (Donetsk) where thousands of workers who work in the mines of the oligarch Akhmetov walked into the streets to express their support to a \u201cunited Ukraine\u201d and to evict the armed pro-Russian separatists from the town hall and other public buildings.[36]<\/a>These facts prove that a real possibility for workers to control the situation is on the agenda confronting the pro-Russian separatists and the pro-imperialist Kiev as well as the local oligarchs such as Akhmetov.<\/p>\n

What is the reason for SoB\u2019s \u201cexit the forum\u201d regarding these real progressive proletarian processes?<\/p>\n

Unlike what the self-proclaimed DPR expresses, \u201cthe rebellion of the industrial and proletarian region in Ukraine\u201d, facts of life evidence that the\u00a0DPR is the materialisation of a separatist project that is increasingly isolated and that real movements of the toiling masses are turning against it as soon as its programme of dividing the country and of annexation to Russia became clear.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The DPR and the secessionist referendum boosted by its leaders must not be supported by revolutionaries.\u00a0It is a reactionary project that, following the guideline of annexation of Crimea to Russia, proposes the partition of Ukraine so as to create a new country, called \u201cNovorosia\u201d (New Russia).<\/strong>[37]<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

This project became clear enough after the phony referendum that the DPR organised in favour of an abstract idea of \u201cindependence\u201d[38]<\/a><\/p>\n

On the next day, Denis Pushilin, one of the leaders of the DPR read an \u201cofficial\u201d statement that says, \u201con the basis of the expression of the popular will of the People’s Republic of Donetsk and in order to re-establish historic justice we request from the Russian Federation to examine the issue of incorporation of the Popular Republic of Donetsk to the Russian Federation\u201d[39]<\/a><\/p>\n

Recently, on occasion of the elections, Andrei Purgin, vice-Prime Minister of the DPR was emphatic:\u00a0this is no longer Ukraine,\u00a0<\/strong>so there is nothing to vote. It is an election to elect the president of a foreign country. (\u2026)\u00a0Our project to recover New Russia\u00a0<\/strong>affects more provinces than Donetsk and Lugansk and we need time.\u201d[40]<\/a><\/p>\n

This secessionist project is nefarious for, were it to materialise, Ukraine would lose 26.2% of its population and 18.5% of its territory (included Crimea); a region liable for 15% of the GDP and where 12% of the natural resources are to be found.[41]<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2026and to the Nazi-fascist pro-Russians<\/strong><\/p>\n

Furthermore, it is amazing how the SOB, who correctly exposes such organisations as Svoboda and the Right Sector keep their mouths shut in relation to the leaders of the alleged \u201cproletarian rebellion\u201d that is said to be represented in the DPR. This is not a minor detail for they are all extremely pro-Russian nationalists with connections with Russian organisations that are also Nazi-fascists.<\/p>\n

The \u201cPrime Minister\u201d of the PRD, Aleksander Borodai, is Russian that is regarded as the main architect of the annexation of Crimea to Russia.\u00a0What is taking place in the east of Ukraine is part of the same geopolitical project.\u00a0<\/strong>The territory of Crimea is closely linked to Donbas and the people who boosted these movements are the same. So as soon as I finished my work in Crimea I automatically came here.\u201d He declared.[42]<\/a><\/p>\n

The commander-in-chief of all the armed groups of the DPR is also Russian and he refers to himself as Igor Strelkov, while his real name is Igor Guirkin, an officer of Russian intelligence service[43]<\/a><\/p>\n

Viacheslav Ponomariov, \u201cpopular mayor\u201d of Slaviansk, is one of those who most insists with Putin for support and weapons-[44]<\/a><\/p>\n

Actually, the entire political nucleus of those that lead the self-proclaimed are of a movement founded as early as 2005 and they call themselves, precisely,\u00a0\u201cRepublic of Donetsk\u201d\u00a0<\/strong>(\u201cDonetskaya Republika\u201d). Among its founding members we can see Aleksandr Tsurkan, Andrey Purgin and Oleg Frolov; the former also used to be a member of Yaunkovich\u2019s electoral committee. The others were members of the powerful pro-Putin\u00a0\u201cEurasiatic Union of Youths\u201d\u00a0<\/strong>(Evraziyskiy Soyuz Molodezhi), of the State university of Moscow and an advisor to the presidency on the Russian Duma an extreme right organisation, very close to Kremlin. Also the neo-Nazi Alekandr Matyushin, known in the neo-Nazi environment under name of \u201cvaryag\u201d and member of Russian neo-fascist organisation \u201cRussian Image\u201d\u00a0<\/strong>(Ruskiy Obraz) belongs to this movement.<\/p>\n

In late January, when the most acute crisis in Maidan was budding, a meeting of these extreme right groups was held in Donetsk. Movements such as \u201cPatriya\u201d,\u00a0<\/strong>the neo-Nazis of the \u201cSlav Unity\u201d (\u201cSlavyanskoe Edinstvo\u201d) and\u201cWhite Taganrod\u201d\u00a0<\/strong>of Rostov and hooligans of the football team Shakhtar. . The meeting was called \u201cThe\u201cUkrainian project\u201d as a menace for the Russian world\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0decided to create an “organizing committee” for the “defence of the city” and “moveable groups, able to move quickly at any time.”[45]<\/a><\/p>\n

In the same way, the central nucleus of do so-called \u201cself-defences\u201d of the DPR consists of paramilitary Nazi-fascist groups that exist since a long time before the current crisis and have direct participation of Russian military men, as even the leader of the organisation admit.[46]<\/a><\/p>\n

As an example let us mention a paramilitary organisation\u00a0\u201cRussian National Unity\u201d<\/strong>, a fascist organisation with \u201ctens of thousands of members\u201d existing in over 400 Russian cities and has recently called to form \u201ca body of volunteers\u201d to help \u201cRussian Orthodox Brothers\u201d in the east of Ukraine.[47]<\/a><\/p>\n

Among the best fitted out military organisations we can also see the \u201cVostok Battalion\u201d\u00a0<\/strong>and \u201cOplot\u201d.\u00a0<\/strong>Miroslav Rudenko, one of the leaders of the DPR responds to the latter and he overtly defends the membership of south-eastern Ukrainian to former Russian empire. Oplot asserts that, after its independence, Ukraine \u201cwas first stated as an entity that is separate from Russia and later on as an anti-Russian entity.\u201d[48]<\/a>Another leader of the DPR, Zajarchenko, confesses that Oplot was \u201cthe only organisation that called for weapons to put some order in the country\u201d[49]<\/a>during the protests against Yanukovich in Kiev.<\/p>\n

Lastly, among the \u201cpeople\u2019s militias\u201d we can also find a fair number of troops of the dissolved\u00a0Berkut.\u00a0<\/strong>Many of these soldiers had joined the Crimea separatists and joined the Russian troops. This is how the former Berkut of southeast of Ukraine joined the forces of the DPR at the request of their former colleagues of Crimea.[50]<\/a><\/p>\n

These facts demolish the Stalinist versions that pretend to exhibit these leaders and these armed Nazi-fascist groups as part of a \u201cproletarian rebellion\u201d or as \u201canti-fascist fighters\u201d.\u00a0The contrary is true; the budding but very progressive processes of proletarian struggles, as we have seen, occur against this separatist project of the DPR.<\/strong><\/p>\n

That is why it is scandalous that, even admitting that the DPR has a separatist project with \u201ctwo programmatic variants that are expressed in the Ukrainian east: that of\u00a0extreme federalism\u00a0<\/strong>(that would also include the areas of previous relations, economic measures and foreign trade) or else that of directly\u00a0joining<\/strong>\u00a0the Russian Federation\u201d,[51]<\/a>they should demand from Putin (in unison with the Russian leadership) a more resolute intervention, including supplying these separatist and neo-Nazi groups with weapon.<\/p>\n

That is so that they accuse Putin of having a “sinister”, “treacherous”, “cowardly” and “fainthearted” policy because he has not provides a single cartridge to the ‘pro-Russian’ East Ukrainian”,[52]<\/a>\u201c\u2026and let alone\u00a0heavy weaponry not to mention Russian soldiers\u00a0<\/strong>disguised as whatever may be\u2026\u201d. According to SoB, this stands for\u00a0Putin\u2019s betrayal<\/strong>\u00a0of the \u201cinsurgent masses\u201d in the east of Ukraine. Now we wonder, if Putin \u201cbetrayed\u201d the \u201cinsurgent masses\u201d in the East of Ukraine, is it because at some time he was with them?<\/p>\n

The consistent conclusion that stems out of this \u201ccriticism\u201d of SoB of Putin\u2019s betrayal cannot be anything but: Putin, intervene NOW in the southeast of Ukraine. Putin, stop making speeches and send weapons for the PRD! The result of this kind of policy could not be anything but annexation of Ukrainian southeast \u2013 the way it happened in Crimea.<\/p>\n

All these questions prove that, caught in the contradictions of their own theoretic ramblings, the leadership of SoB has no independent policy for the revolutionary process in Ukraine. The contrary is true: on purpose or not they have fallen into the mortal trap of \u201ccampism\u201d proposed by Stalinism and objectively dog-tailed up behind Putin\u2019s actions and those of the secessionist of the DRP.<\/p>\n

As far as we are concerned, we shall keep on insisting that the progress of the revolution in Ukraine has everything to do with confronting and defeating the two counterrevolutionary menaces that harass: the one represented by the imperialist looters and the Kiev government as the one that is being materialised in Putin\u2019s policy and the pro-Russian separatism. Faced with this\u00a0double counterrevolutionary threat,\u00a0<\/strong>only an independent policy may clear the path for socialist revolution, which will take place against the imperialist colonising policy and against the Great Russian oppressor.<\/p>\n

________________________<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a>\u00a0See:\u00a0Los revolucionarios ante el referendum en Crimea<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0for a compilation:\u00a0Neither Putin nor EU\/US! For an independent and unified Ukraine<\/a><\/p>\n

[2]<\/a>\u00a0IWL-FI Stastement:\u00a0On the Ukrainian situation<\/a><\/p>\n

[3]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2113<\/a><\/p>\n

[4]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2374<\/a><\/p>\n

[5]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2508<\/a>\u2013 Underscoring ours unless the contrary is stated.<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a>Let us remember that one of the engines that moved the demonstrations at Maidan was the immediate removal of Yanukovich, the derogation of repressive laws as well as the annulment of the 2010 Constitution so as curtail the president\u2019s powers<\/p>\n

[7]<\/a>Yanukovich tried to send the army to repress Maidan Square directly. He failed because the revolutionary process spawned a crisis among the rank and file that affected the command chain. See: http:\/\/pstu.org.br\/node\/20421<\/a><\/p>\n

[8]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2113<\/a><\/p>\n

[9]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2113<\/a><\/p>\n

[10]<\/a>http:\/\/www.la-razon.com\/mundo\/Poroshenko-gana-elecciones-presidenciales-Ucrania_0_2058994144.html<\/a><\/p>\n

[11]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2047<\/a><\/p>\n

[12]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2220<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

[14]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2128<\/a><\/p>\n

[15]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2128<\/a><\/p>\n

[16]<\/a>\u00a0Los revolucionarios ante el refer\u00e9ndum en Crimea<\/a><\/p>\n

[17]<\/a>http:\/\/www.marxists.org\/espanol\/lenin\/obras\/1910s\/derech.htm<\/a><\/p>\n

[18]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2220<\/a><\/p>\n

[19]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2452<\/a><\/p>\n

[20]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2128<\/a><\/p>\n

[21]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2452<\/a><\/p>\n

[22]<\/a>http:\/\/www.marxists.org\/espanol\/lenin\/obras\/1910s\/derech.htm<\/a><\/p>\n

[23]<\/a>http:\/\/www.marxists.org\/espanol\/lenin\/obras\/1910s\/derech.htm<\/a><\/p>\n

[24]<\/a>Kowalewski, Zbigniew:\u00a0Ucrania: despertar de un pueblo, recuperaci\u00f3n de una memoria<\/a>. Revista\u00a0Correo Internacional<\/em>\u00a0n\u00famero 56, noviembre de 1991.<\/p>\n

[25]<\/a>http:\/\/www.ceipleontrotsky.org\/La-cuestion-ucraniana<\/a>(Subrayados nuestros).<\/p>\n

[26]<\/a>In the website of the Brasilian Communist Party we can read, for instance, things like what follows: The USSR exists no more\u00a0 National oppression that with time was established inside the USSR over Ukraine exists no more. This does not\u00a0 mean that Russian imperialism exists no more and has ceased to act over it. But the national oppression that exists today is that of the western Ukrainians against the Russian majority. Even if the Russian oppression over Ukranians explains the wrath of the western Ukranians against Moscow, it does not justify the current oppression against the Russians in Eastern Ukraine.\u00a0http:\/\/pcb.org.br\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

[27]<\/a>\u00a0http:\/\/marxists.org\/archive\/lenin\/works\/1922\/dec\/testamnt\/autonomy.htm<\/p>\n

[28]<\/a>\u00a0On the Ukrainian situation<\/a><\/p>\n

[29]<\/a>\u00a0http:\/\/pcb.org.br<\/a><\/p>\n

[30]<\/a>\u00a0http:\/\/pcb.org.br<\/a><\/p>\n

[31]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2368<\/a><\/p>\n

[32]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2286<\/a><\/p>\n

[33]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2452<\/a><\/p>\n

[34]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2460<\/a><\/p>\n

[35]<\/a>http:\/\/www.mas.org.ar\/?p=1546<\/a><\/p>\n

[36]<\/a>\u00a0On the Ukrainian situation<\/a><\/p>\n

[37]<\/a>\u00a0See\u00a0www.elconfidencial.com<\/a>. Invoking maps of the former Tsarist empire, Putin used the term Novorosia, to refer to the region of southeatst of Ukraine \u201cBy using tsarist terminology I mean that it is not Ukraine but Novorosia. It is all about Jarkov, Lugansk, Herson, Nikolaiev, Odessa, which in the tsarist days were not in Ukraine and vere handed over later on. God knows why\u201d. (El Pa\u00eds 19\/04)2014). Novorosia was a tsarist province formed in the XVIII on the territory conquered from the Otoman empire north of the Black Sea. It existed until 1802.<\/p>\n

[38]<\/a>\u00a0On the position of the IWL with respect to the referendum in the Ukrainian southeast see:\u00a0On the Ukrainian situation<\/a><\/p>\n

[39]<\/a>\u00a0http:\/\/internacional.elpais.com\/internacional\/2014\/05\/12\/actualidad\/1399909578_267199.html<\/p>\n

[40]<\/a>\u00a0http:\/\/www.abc.es\/internacional\/20140525\/abci-entrevista-andrei-pugin-donetsk-201405241737.html<\/p>\n

[41]<\/a>\u00a0 El Pa\u00eds:\u00a0Ucrania podr\u00eda perder su territorio<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

[43]<\/a>http:\/\/internacional.elpais.com\/internacional\/2014\/05\/10\/actualidad\/1399742901_257025.html<\/a><\/p>\n

[44]<\/a>http:\/\/internacional.elpais.com\/internacional\/2014\/05\/10\/actualidad\/1399742901_257025.html<\/a><\/p>\n

[45]<\/a>\u00a0See the website:\u00a0crisiglobale.wordpress.com<\/a>, that will redirect you for an account of the meeting to the pageswww.<\/a>politikus.ru<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0www.<\/a>zavtra.ru<\/a>.<\/p>\n

[46]<\/a>http:\/\/sp.ria.ru\/international\/20140529\/160258770.html<\/a><\/p>\n

[47]<\/a>http:\/\/www.elministerio.org.mx\/blog\/2014\/05\/nacionalistas-rusos-ucrania\/<\/a><\/p>\n

[48]<\/a>http:\/\/internacional.elpais.com\/internacional\/2014\/04\/30\/actualidad\/1398886956_295432.html<\/a><\/p>\n

[49]<\/a>http:\/\/internacional.elpais.com\/internacional\/2014\/04\/30\/actualidad\/1398886956_295432.html<\/a><\/p>\n

[50]<\/a>http:\/\/es.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Rep%C3%BAblica_Popular_de_Donetsk<\/a><\/p>\n

[51]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2460<\/a><\/p>\n

[52]<\/a>http:\/\/www.socialismo-o-barbarie.org\/?p=2368<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UKRAINE Written by R. Le\u00f3n Saturday, 21 June 2014 19:12 The revolutionary process in Ukraine, one of the sharpest and most contradictory processes of our times, is in the grip of two great counterrevolutionary forces. On the one hand there is the new traitorous oligarchic Petro Poroshenko administration that heading the imperialist bandits of IMF […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13882120,"featured_media":5933,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_wpcom_ai_launchpad_first_post":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[27806,27827],"tags":[29097,29098,29099,27642],"class_list":["post-5932","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-internacionalinternational","category-theory-history","tag-dpr","tag-great-russian","tag-norway","tag-ukraine"],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.5","language":"es","enabled_languages":["en","es"],"languages":{"en":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"es":{"title":false,"content":false,"excerpt":false}}},"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t