Turkey/DHKP/C The History of our party III

[english at ozgurlluk.xs4all.nl]

THE STATE OF EMERGENCY AND THE MASSACRES OF FASCISM AGAINST THE PEOPLE

Before the junta, the oligarchy introduced the state of emergency as a
transition phase. Under these circumstances we were faced with the
task to organise the masses and step up our resistance. The
opportunistic and revisionist block were perplexed when the state of
emergency was proclaimed. They withdrew in a political silence for
months and watched the developments. Our movement evaluated the
situation and announced the military coup. This situation demanded
readiness and we called upon all anti-fascist and anti-imperialist
forces to unite their forces and join the resistance. 

With the massacre in Maras, the oligarchy opened a new chapter. They
intended to intimidate the revolutionary-democratic forces and push
them into passivity. 

We had to prevent to consequences, the massacres by fascism, the
tactics of intimidation and provocations between the Sunni and
Alevites etc., the provocations on a religious and ethnic level. It
was the oligarchy's aim to move the confrontations and provocations
into the areas where our Alevi and Sunni people were living together.
The opportunist left remained indifferent towards these developments
which were going over from fascist terror to open fascism. The endless
talk about unity of these organisations resulted, months later, in
insults and conflicts and superfluous calls for a front which might
exist in name, but didn't in reality. Those who can not stand up
against the enemy in the political arena, who are always having
difficulty to maintain their existence, are playing a game with the
masses by exploiting their desire for unity to keep their own heads
above water. That was the reason why are calls, "unity can only exist
in the struggle, unity will be achieved by stepping up the struggle in
all areas", remained unanswered. 

While the left remained silent and confused about the massacre of
Kahramanmaras and the declaration of the state of emergency, Devrimci
Sol carried out occupations of colleges, schools, factories and other
workplaces, based on the "masses" and revolutionary violence. These
actions included tens of thousands of people. A manifold of illegal
actions were carried out nation-wide and fascist centres were
destroyed. 

While we continued our efforts to render the tactics of fascism to
intimidate the masses futile and to realise a revolutionary order on a
sound basis, we were confronted by a new and heavier attack by the
oligarchy. 

The massacre by fascism, carried out on 16 March at the University of
Istanbul, was a first sigh that fascism intended to carry out large
massacres in Istanbul as well. The left, remaining cold towards this
massacre, could not understand what fascism was planning and what is
was and it cleared the road for its tactics, leading to the massacre
of Maras. 

With the massacre of Kahramanmaras by the oligarchy, the people -
already intimidated because of the daily executions of revolutionaries
and democrats by civic fascists - became split and divided, ethnic and
religiously determined confrontations, that is to day artificial
conflicts, were created to divide this country, to incite a civil war
and to destroy the revolutionary people's forces. 

Especially the Alevites war harshly attacked and presented as
communists, because this made it easier to get the Sunni on a
contra-revolutionary line. The failing practice and policy of the
left, solely directed at the Alevite religious creed, facilitated the
job of the oligarchy to get the Sunni on a line which was loyal to the
state. From now on it was no secret that there would be more massacres
like the one in Maras. Especially the cities of Elazig, Malatya,
Sivas, Tokat, Corum and Amasya had the  suitable characteristics to
carry out massacres there and to divide the people. 

>From 1974, the oligarchy incited the civic fascists against the
revolutionary potential and the people. From the point the civic
fascists were insufficient, the state intervened itself. The main
target of the civic and the official fascists was to crush the class
struggle, despite all the side effects. 

The oligarchy continued the civic fascist attacks, protected by the
state, and propagated its neutrality despite this fact that, trying to
distort the consciousness of the people with a so-called "conflict
between the left and the right". And it can be said that they were
partly successful with this demagogy. One of the reasons for this
success was that the opportunist and revisionist left interpreted the
attacks by the civic fascist as independent from the state and that
they saw them as attacks, merely carried out by the fascist MHP and
its organisations. Many left-wing groups saw the MHP like this, they
did not see that it was a party which was especially created and
controlled by the CIA and the contra-guerrilla. Therefore they
complained by the state, believing- pious wishes - that the fascist
attacks would stop. The ostensibly most active left groups said that
they could only pursue a defensive line, serving the security of the
masses. The declare war against the fascist centres, active resistance
and mobilising the masses against the fascists were seen by them as
"letting yourself to be provocated and terror". Although the strategy
of the organisation "Revolutionary Path" (Devrimci Yol) was based on
the people's war - according to their own statements -, it led them to
open revisionism. Whatever is said, these views were shared by all,
from the reformist to the opportunist groups. They opposed
revolutionary violence, aimed against fascism, and they criticised
those who resisted actively. The representatives of this thought
distanced themselves from organising the armed people's struggle
against fascism and when the repression and the violence increased,
large numbers of the left dropped their theories and surrendered to
fascism. 

It was predictable that those who did not judge the situation on the
basis of a Marxist-Leninist ideology would bow and surrender to
organised fascism and the fascist methods and tactics. However, under
the circumstances of those days and when all were preaching their own
theses of "people's struggle-armed uprising", it was impossible to
tell this to the people. That it was the truth was seen be all ten
years later. These left groups who had no confidence in their own
strength, who were unable to judge the reality in the country
correctly, drew and nourished their theories mainly from revisionism
and the ideology of the civic society. These deviant tendencies did
not overlook the integration in the system when their former
supporters, from which they drew their strength and whom they trusted,
became less and less. 

RISING FASCIST TERROR AND THE DEVELOPING STRUGGLE IN THE CITIES AND IN
THE RURAL AREAS

The massive attacks by the civic fascists refuted the demagogy of
"conflicts between the left and the right" of the state and they
developed into a situation of permanently increasing attacks by the
fascist state. The state could not prevent that the people's masses
developed a political consciousness and sided with the
revolutionaries. And when they could not achieve results by using
massacres, open fascism was their last resort. 

We had to prevent the fascist attacks, we had to ruin their plans,
cross their games of "divide and rule" and we had to extend our
organisation, prepare for the phase of open fascism and increase the
struggle in a situation in which all the freedoms, restricted before
anyway, were totally abolished and in which the attacks and operations
by the enemy constantly increased. 

Devrimci Yol, become more and more spontanistic, did not deliver one
voluntary contribution regarding strategic and tactical programs and
because of them, years war lost in which strategic steps would have
been possible. While open fascism was approaching, we were far away
from serious organising to at least secure survival and continuation
of the struggle. Before everything else, we were a young organisation
and we lacked necessary experience and professionality. What we had
achieved till then, what still had to be done and what had to be
understood absolutely, were things, one might say, we learnt while
confronted with the arrogance of the opportunists and traitors.

Because of the treason by the former revolutionaries, the
revolutionary movement was faced by the danger to fight under the
circumstances of open fascism without sufficient preparation. Despite
years of struggle, we were far remote from realising the line of
people's struggle in practice, to organise the masses in the cities
and in the rural areas and to convince the people to fight. After
positive results by the "Armed Struggle Units against Fascist Terror",
we had to introduce these in the rural areas as well. That's why we
sent armed units in strategically beneficial areas in Kurdistan and
the Black Sea region. The armed units were not yet able, technically
nor considering equipment, to start an urban guerrilla. The
revolutionary history of Turkey did not have any experience in this
field which we could have accepted as legacy and on which we could
have built. The armed units had to live in the rural areas and gather
experience by directly facing the tactics of fascism. As long as
possible, they should take precautions, gather experience and avoid
attacks against the enemy forces. Only in case of an attack, they
should have the perspective to protect themselves. In the field of
urban guerrilla, our armed units - although we did not define them as
urban guerrilla, had gathered considerable experience. Now it was
possible to organise the urban guerrilla, based on the experiences of
the armed units which could be called professional. But in this phase
which pointed in the direction of open fascism and in which the enemy
forces were strengthening in the cities, we absolutely had to find
ways to spread in the rural areas to provide air for our cadres in the
cities. Defeat and suffocation of the struggle in the cities would
have been inevitable if this strategic line had not been deepened. 

REVOLUTIONARY JUSTICE AGAINST FASCIST TERROR

The masses already witnessed in those days what our revolutionary
justice meant. The massacres by fascism, against women, children and
the elderly, and the arbitrary bomb attacks against residential areas
created chaos. As the latter builders of revolutionary power,
revolutionaries have to react sensitively regarding revolutionary
justice, notwithstanding the circumstances. Guided by this line, which
distinguishes us from the rest of the left, we even made a difference
between the guilty and the non-guilty when we attacked police
stations. Nobody was shot, only because he was a member of the state
forces. Among the state forces, we found the guilty who shot our
comrades and we punished them. 

For example, the fascist gendarmerie chief commander Erdal Görücü
arrested a group of comrades who had distributed leaflets. Although
our comrade Hüseyin Aksoy surrendered, he was shot by Erdal Görücü.
Thereupon we announced during a campaign in this area that we would
punish the fascist Erdal Görücü in all cases. He was found later and
punished. In the context of our actions in the "Campaign against
Imperialism, Fascism, Price Increases and Unemployment" against
speculators, a oil truck was confiscated and handed over in people's
property. The policemen of the Sisli police station attacked. Three
policemen opposed the killing of our comrade Hüseyin Tas, only the
fourth policeman, Ismail Top, advocated the murder. Because our
comrade Hüseyin Tas was standing in front of a barricade, he had no
possibility to escape and was mortally hurt by the bullets, fired from
Ismail Top's gun. 

The policemen, knowing about our view of revolutionary justice, gave
us the name of the guilty policeman. The guilt of Ismail Top was made
public to the people, he was found later and punished, without the
other policemen getting harmed. 

Many other examples could be listed. Such a way of operating can be
considered a luxury in these days when the struggle has taken another
form and has increased. But at the birth of a revolutionary movement,
achieving acceptance among the people, of which the cadres have
internalised revolutionary justice and in which the justice of
revolutionary power is reflected in the thoughts, this has played a
mayor role. 

The developments of these thoughts lead to the following: one chooses
friends and enemy more carefully, friends are valued more, the masses
are better organised, people are listened to better and confidence in
the own strength increases. Those who have a contrary view about this
can, if in possession of power and the state apparatus, not
distinguish correctly between the guilty and the non-guilty, they will
apply contra-revolutionary methods more and more, and they will not
respect the other revolutionary forces. The weapons are determining
their policy, their own non-revolutionary line is disguised by the
revolution and they apply terror against the people. Although they
might achieve temporary successes this way, internally they nourish
mistrust. These developments will lead to an increasing
contra-revolutionary attitude. 

Many left-wing groups, far remote from the thoughts of
Marxism-Leninism and revolutionary justice, opposed us as
opportunists, reformists and Kurdish nationalists. In stead of using
their energy and strength against the enemy, they directed themselves
against revolutionaries and patriots and they destroyed these people. 

This situation among the left and the nationalist groups facilitated
the work of the oligarchy, the preparations for open fascism. The
groups who had no confidence in their way of organising, in the
ideological and armed struggle, liquidated each other, because they
did not want to leave a strength behind which could have criticised
their policy... This reached such a level that in some places, the
politicised segments of the population became demoralised, just
because of this reason, their confidence was broken, and they left the
revolutionaries. The people could not see them as the future anymore
and they questioned their capability to take power. Our movement
basically trusted its own strength to organise the people and to
increase the struggle. The view to wipe out the left from the arena
first, to then start the struggle against the oligarchy shows a lack
of ideological confidence. Even against those groups who massacred our
supporters and cadres, no revenge was sworn, in stead it was tried to
expose these forces in front of the people. In these attacks by the
left, Kemal Karaca was killed by the Kurtulus Sosyalist Dergisi, the
MLSPB killed Mehmet Bückün and the 10-year old son of our supporter,
the TKP-ML murdered Mustafa Albayrak and Aydinlik killed Turgut
Ipcioglu. Many comrades and supporters were beaten, many escaped
assassination attempts, were wounded and sometimes saved from being
killed by coincidence. Despite these murders of our comrades, our
movement showed great ripeness and insisted that there should be no
blood shed from revolutionaries. They called upon all left groups to
oppose this fight, to prevent these fights, to look for solutions and
establish a commission, approved by all groups, to go through the
problems and find a solution. But the left rejected these proposals
and was responsible that blood of revolutionaries continued to be shed
until the coup of 12 September. 

AND THE TRAITORS OF AYDINLIK

The summit of hostile attitude of opportunism towards our movement was
formed by Aydinlik (PDA) with their contra-revolutionary attacks. With
the slogan "Neither America, Nor Russia" and the theory of
"social-imperialism", the Aydinlik opportunists to over the paternity
of the ideology of the opportunist left. Their revisionist thoughts
did not aim at investigating imperialism from the perspective of
Marxism-Leninism, the took the national bourgeoisie as the basis for
their propaganda and erected even thicker walls between themselves and
the revolutionaries. The Aydinlik group, behind the scenes of this
tendency, directed the people's masses to false targets, more and more
they started to play a provocative collaborator's role for the
oligarchy, their systematic attacks, together with the oligarchy, were
directed against the revolutionary forces. The resistance against
fascism was seen as a conflict between the right and the left and the
USSR were made the target of the people's masses. Thus they disguised
the real imperialism and proclaimed: "The greatest danger is
social-imperialism". 

This view therefore supported the stationing of the 4th. Army Corps at
the border with the Soviet Union as a defence against an attack by the
USSR. The champions of this theory labelled all left forces (except
Devrimci Yol) as "misguided left" and they adopted a
contra-revolutionary line. Aydinlik was present as a counter-force at
every resistance against fascism and imperialism. They reached a point
of protecting the fascists and opposing the revolutionaries at the
colleges, in the streets, the factories and the villages. They tried
to justify their stand with the argument: "Anarchism is pushing
national unity into chaos" and "a provocation by social-imperialism".
Everywhere where there were reactions against the national hymn, were
there were protests against chauvinism, they raised the nationalist
flag, together with the forces of the oligarchy.

Their view about the American imperialism was as follows: "The most
dangerous imperialist, that is to say the imperialism of Russia, is
hiding", and in this way they wanted to re-direct the struggle against
imperialism.

For years, this provocative group hid behind a "leftist" mask. It was
the lengthened arm of the oligarchy, but it enjoyed an acceptance in
the left arena. Parallel to the increasing attacks by the oligarchy,
it attacked the growing revolutionary resistance to bar the developing
struggle. That's why they started their provocations and they attacked
the revolutionaries. 

Turgut Ipcioglu, a gymnasium pupil and a leading cadre of DEV-GENC,
was shot in November 1978 because he tried to stop the provocations.
In Elazig and other cities, they opened fire upon many comrades,
protected by the police. Our comrades were targeted and betrayed to
the police. This attitude was not only directed against our movement.
All organisations which waged an armed struggle were targets of such
attacks. One of their targets was the PKK. The PKK was, according
Aydinlik, "the MHP of Kurdistan" and therefore everything was
justified. The persistence in this view and the contra-revolutionary
attitude showed their real face and these could no longer be tolerated
by the left. Thereupon our movement called upon all revolutionary and
patriotic forces to expose this view together. But the left did not
answer this call. On our own strength, we succeeded to expose this
view to the people in the colleges and other areas and we prevented
their provocations. Although the majority of the left remained silent
about our attitude towards Aydinlik, they distanced themselves from it
and they avoided relations with them. The only exception was Devrimci
Yol. It did not take a position and continued to carry out activities
together with Aydinlik. Aydinlik was aware of the reformist closeness
to Devrimci Yol regarding the view about the USSR. Mainly Aydinlik
felt close to Devrimci Yol because of its practice which was close to
the system and because of the lack of a power perspective and they
tried to win them for their side. The roots of the friendship between
Devrimci Yol and Aydinlik are located in this closeness between their
lines. 

Aydinlik had internalised the bourgeois ideology and they waged a
struggle against the revolutionaries. When the revolutionary struggle
and the attacks by the oligarchy increased, Aydinlik understood that
there were plans made for a future junta and they recklessly increased
their attacks against the revolutionaries. In publications like "The
Unknown Left" and "49 Left Groups" in the daily newspaper Aydinlik,
they mainly reported the addresses and names of those who defended the
armed struggle to the oligarchy.

Aydinlik repeatedly emphasised that they would not attack the system
and that they did not have any problem with the government.
Furthermore they put the national character of the governments of
those days first, putting up theses like the one that the real threat
was coming from Russia and that all Third World countries had to
create one united front against social imperialism and they offered
the bourgeois parties a national coalition. The entire left, which
rejected this view, was presented as "misguided leftists and
provocateurs" and they asked fascism to take measures. With this
policy, Aydinlik disturbed all and showed that they defended an even
more chauvinist line than the MHP fascists. Aydinlik intended to proof
themselves to the oligarchy. Despite their good services, some aspects
did not quite please the oligarchy, such as some of their magazines
(like the one about the contra-guerrilla). And when they found
themselves in Mamak, to pay for these disturbing magazines, they made
an effort to proof to the oligarchy what good services they had
rendered and how heroically they had led the struggle against the
anti-system left. 

After the publication of the "The Fake Left", almost the entire left
distanced itself from Aydinlik and the contacts with it were broken
off. In general Aydinlik orientated itself to the "national
bourgeoisie". The position of our movement towards the provocative
policy of Aydinlik has not changed. In the important points, it has
been proven right  to keep this position, following our principles. In
the years that followed, the opportunists began to flirt again with
the contra-revolutionaries. They forgot that Aydinlik had betrayed
revolutionaries, they forgot its real role which was to harm the
struggle, derail it, even though they appeared with different faces.

This position does not only concern the provocative line of Aydinlik,
it is also directed against the opportunists and the revisionists who
unbalance the struggle and who try to diffuse the political line. This
is the moment in which the foundation for ideological and
organisational independence is laid. Those who have not past the tests
will be judged. Depending on where the wind is coming from, they will,
once turning to the left, then turning to the right, choke in their
short-term gain seeking policy.

THE FIRST CONSPIRACY, VACANCIES IN OUR MOVEMENT AND THE VICTORY OF OUR
NOTION OF DEMOCRACY

When the state of emergency was proclaimed, when the massacres against
the population, the fascist terror and the operations of the military
and the police became harder and when the oligarchy had to take
measures to establish open fascism, we entered the political arena. We
surpassed the organisational problems and took the mission on
ourselves to lead our peoples and to increase the struggle. But those
who could not understand this mission and our historical and political
split from Devrimci Yol, slowly began to show their real, right, faces
and they switched to stubbornness.

Despite its right-wing position and ideological-organisational
unclearities, Devrimci Yol did have a broad basis. With this basis
they were able to impress the opportunists, make them servile, and
they increased there attempts to isolate our movement from the left.
They did not shrink back from physical attacks. On the other side the
boots of the 12th. of September could be heard....

Those who were not more as a mere bush fire, dreaming that the
revolution was just around the corner, were startled when they
realised that we were continuing the heritage of the THKP-C, that we
were continuing straightforwardly, without deviating to the left or
the right. They were scared because they saw that this heritage was
not, as the opportunist-revisionist left tried to portray the THKP-C,
the heritage of a movement with just a limited number of people who
were just carrying out a few armed actions. On the contrary. We are a
mass movement which unites the masses and revolutionary violence and
continues the road of our conviction with determination. To bring our
movement of the road the came up with totally different and devious
calculations and they organised a conspiracy. There were 3 persons who
had been assigned in new areas of our movement and who had taken sides
with us since the beginning of the split with Devrimci Yol. But
apparently they had never really understood the reason for the split
and they saw the revolution and being a revolutionary as some kind of
hobby. Although they were active in different regions and had no
contact with each other, they met without informing the movement and
the concocted a plot. It could be questioned whether these persons had
internalised the revolution or not, and then we are not even talking
about the fact whether or not they were able to lead a group or
organisation. Because this requires political courage, something they
lacked. It was Ertugrul Kürkcü who injected this courage into them and
who sang songs of praise about imperialism during the THKP-C trials,
who crept for fascism and who claimed that they had been used as
puppets in a game. 

After Ertugrul Kürkcü, who had not cared for the revolutionary
struggle for years, saw that the THKP-C and its armed struggle were so
big that they did not fit his small world, he made a U-turn, forgot
all the provocation theories of imperialism and started to give
interviews in the bourgeois press like "the THKP-C was a revolutionary
movement", thus attempting to re-enter the political arena. At first
he flirted with the Kurtulus, then with Devrimci Yol. But he did not
concretely engage in either. Although he was smudged, he intended to
restore his name by using the THKP-C. He tried to justify himself and
he tried to present himself as a force by drawing the THKP-C to his
side. The conspirators within our movement offered him an opportunity
to do so. The theories they championed were very interesting. They
emphasised that Devrimci Yol, Devrimci Sol and Kurtulus should unite
because there were no fundamental differences in their roots. Of
course, this view was not according to the way of thinking of Devrimci
Sol. The aim was to eclectically unite Devrimci Yol and Kurtulus and
to destroy Devrimci Sol in this process. Despite the statement of E.
Kürkcü, "the THKP-C was a revolutionary movement", his right-wing
views within the Kurtulus scene and his judgement of the THKP-C were
known. When one realises what point the revolutionary struggle had
reached and thinks about the dimensions of the clear front which had
been built, it become obvious that these artificial theories could not
gain ground. 

Because the representatives of these theories were stemming from our
movement, this attack was mainly directed against us. Looked at from a
different angle, it was also a direct attack against the Kurtulus
Sosyalist Dergisi and Devrimci Yol, independent from Ertugrul's will,
because it were not Devrimci Yol and Kurtulus Sosyalist Dergisi who
were being discussed, it was us who were at the centre of the
discussion. If these people had really had the intention to unite
these three political structures, they would have continued their
tasks within the organisation, they would not have conspired and left
the organisation, they would have staid and become the ideological
champions of these thoughts. However, they met in secrecy, they
disclosed the relations of our organisation and chose the way of a
split, without even thinking it necessary to inform the responsible
mechanisms. 

As a young, newly established movement which still carried the marks
and the sediments of the past, we realised that we would leave these
behind in time and that we had to continue our road. 


-- 
Devrimci Halk Kurtulus Cephesi (Revolutionary Peoples Liberation Front)
DHKC Informationbureau Amsterdam
http://www.ozgurluk.org/dhkc                          
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