NOTÍCIAS DA GUERRA POPULAR: [** MAOIST_REVOLUTION **] Events are not linear, and the players are not playing by any particular models.

Events are not linear, and the players are not playing by any particular models."

by Mike Ely

I'd like to step back and think about what is true in what Ka Frank is raising in his three points on Jed Brandt's analysis.

For example on the talk about a "last battle" in Nepal's revolutionary situation (either on May 1 or in the following month or this summer):

I think that many people reading this often have a set of fixed assumptions (in their heads) of what an endgame of dual power has to look like: specifically the October storming of the winter palace. And I suspect that some people will be expecting such a scenario now, and will even be frustrated when things don't unfold that way.

Memories and models are extremely strong in the thinking of human beings � including many radical people. (You think you have "seen this before" � when, in fact, you haven't!)

When people speak of revolution, it is often assumed that they must be talking of, or planning just such a moment. And people often "hear" what they assume � no matter what others are saying (including, in this case what the Nepali Maoists are saying or what Jed Brandt is saying).

I think that those of us watching Nepal's revolutionary people should not assume that (even now) things are moving linearly in a "February to October" kind of way � where history has kept the model, but just changed the name from the Russian monarchy to the Nepalese Monarchy, from the Russian October to the Nepali June.

Jed's main point about the existence of dual power and its instability is very true. But these contradictions are unlikely to play themselves out in (a) either a linear way or (b) along the lines of a model we may have fixed in our heads. Events are not linear, and the players are not playing by any particular models.

To put it another way:

Things are building to a "High Noon in Nepal" � but not every "High Noon" ends with a decisive shoot out. Some do. And not every shoot out ends with the good guys winning. Though some do. But sometimes someone blinks. Sometimes someone even runs away. Sometimes they both agree to go have a tense drink, shake hands in public, but secretly expect to shoot each other next week.

Our communist movement has a history of "inevitabilist thinking" � where it is assumed (and believed) that the contradictions "must" resolve themselves a certain way (or in some set of binary possibilities � like "socialism or barbarism" or "world war or revolution" or whatever).

The world is far more squiggly. complex and dynamic than that � rarely are events preordained.

Red Guards storming the Winter Palace, October 1917

In the concrete: It's not like:

"The Nepali Maoists have been maneuvering, patiently and skillfully but now, finally, they will be able to put aside that playbook of maneuver, and now finally they will agree to enact one of our cherished model scenarios."

No. They really are trying to push things toward radical changes of power � but are really hoping to maneuver enemies (including the army) into positions of powerlessness and even (to the extent possible) step by step compromise. They are not simply trying to create the most favorable context for "relaunching the armed struggle" � they might well be "willing to accept" something else.

I agree with Ka Frank that people should give the UCPN(Maoist) January document a close read � both in what it says, and what it leaves unsaid in public.

It is quite possible that this particular crisis (from now on to the other side of May 28) will be resolved in some way short of a "storming of the winter palace." It may be, that in some country sized game of "chicken," someone blinks this time (and perhaps again the next time). And of course, it is also possible that events will cascade out of control � or that someone in a very controlled way will try to go for a decisive violent blow at their opponents.

For example, as has happened before, the various reactionary parties could agree to have the Maoists lead an unstable and probably paralyzed coalition government. Or those reactionaries could disagree, with some parties agreeing and the military command raging in refusal.

There are, as Ka Frank says, negotiations and demands being raised for just such a new coalition government � for the fall of the current parliamentary government, and for the forming of a new one (a) under Maoist leadership but (b) within the framework of the current reactionary state and social system.

Also: Is it impossible that some surprise compromise is reached on the constitution � breaking the stalemate? It seems unlikely (from far away), but I would not assume that a compromise constitution is completely impossible.

A new Maoist-led coalition government would be (as Ka Frank correctly points out) ineffective � and it would not be a "seizure of power" in a Marxist sense. And all the players in Nepal know that it would be ineffective � and it is also true that another period of ineffective government (under nominal Maoist leadership) could be very frustrating for many of the most energetic and revolutionary forces in the country.

Jed points out that a whole set of political changes rest on the accomplishments and sacrifices of a decade of people's war � i.e. on the development of widespread political awakening among the rural people, and the creation of a peoples liberation army. It is that PLA that makes the maneuvers inside Kathmandu different � and has (so far only!) prevented the reactionary army from simply killing the revolutionary left (who they hate so bitterly).

However, here too, I don't think we should assume that this PLA will simply now appear and "finish" the revolution with a bang. It could happen that a specific insurrection is already planned � i.e. there may be (as in Lenin's 1917 days) a secret unnannounced plan to take power by mobilizing armed squads through out the capital. But the Russian army was far more defeated and crumbled in October 1917 than the Nepali army is in May 2010. It would be hard, now, to simply "take the capital" without immediately entering into direct fighting with a still-organized military force.

Here too let's consider the "non-model" scenarios that Ka Frank raises (involving key conflict points like: a new coalition government, a new constitution, and army integrations). There may be unexpected and sudden compromises reached on any of them. Such compromises may cause the dual power crisis to stagger on for a while longer (taking new forms), or they may (as Jed warns) start to undermine the mass energy, and trigger disillusionment and despair.

Integration of Opposing Armies

Jed did not speak of the issue of army integration. (And I haven't understood it well enough, from here, to dare write about it.)

In short: There has been (for years) talk of resolving dual power by simply "integrating" the armies. And (on paper) that was once agreed to by all sides. But the devil (not surprisingly) is in the details � because one form of "integration" leaves the Maoist army dispersed and powerless, and other scenarios of integration leaves the royalist National Army transformed and dominated � and so in some ways, each side seems to be raising demands and scenarios that the other can't possibly accept.

But here too, things may not be simple or linear. Integration plans may not simply prove impossible and just a prelude for one armed camp to rise up and defeat the other.

There are, as Ka Frank says, intensive efforts (including by the weakening middle forces, but especially by foreign intervention) to push through some scenario of integration. The Maoists are (from what we can see) energetically working to created armed instruments outside the PLA framework. They seem to be forming local militias. The Young Communist League is transforming itself (and its mass periphery) more and more into something that could possibly act as a more disciplined striking-and-defending force.

On one hand, this energetic Maoist militarization of mass formations may be the creation of auxiliaries for their PLA � for a threatened civil war (or for what the French revolution called "levee en masse" (i.e. a mass uprising of the people, connected to the people's much smaller organized military forces). Let's be clear: history is not full of examples of opposing armies agreeing to merge!

But (again breaking with what our rigid models may suggest) there are other possibilities: it is not inconceivable that Maoists might agree to some form of integration with the army. From afar, it is hard to gauge its likelihood or what their calculations might be. But if the Maoists rise to head a new coalition government (and therefore assume the position with legal authority to control the National Army) they may also consider some (as yet unknown) integration scenario. Including even one where their currently encamped PLA is officially abandoned in some form and withdrawn from cantonment or dispersed, and where future Maoist military calculations shift to reliance on new militia and YCL formations. (Again, we are talking of possibilities here.)

Caesar on Human Weakness

I have been re-reading an old favorite � Julius Caesar's memoir of how he conquered the Gauls (an early description of imperialist conquest and empire building).

One theme that Caesar returns to several times is that he believes humans (generally) are far too quick to think that "things are turning out the way I hoped." They gather the data they receive into patterns that self-deceptively serve (or mimick) their own preferred outcomes. (And in war, Caesar consciously exploits that weakness in opponents � to deceive them, to surprise them, to defeat them.)

I think that we too should be very careful not to read the event in Nepal "through the lens" of our pre-conceived models (and preferences).

I will not (for the moment) unravel here how Ka Frank also seems to read the events through a distorting lens � he does, i believe, have such a lens and much distortion. And when the Nepalis don't follow Ka Frank's preferred models of behavior and speech, he "sees" that as intolerable.

But what I am saying is that these events will not be linear. There is a crisis. The current conditions and balances of dual power are very unstable � and may shift suddenly. The Maoists are mobilizing (for the moment). May 1 and then May 28 are emerging as possible nodal points.

But we should not assume (in a linear or naive way) that all this will resolve itself in the immediate period, or that the resolutions will take "cherished forms" from the past, or that momentary resolutions are not possible, or even that it is impossible that they may resolve themselves in terrible ways (i.e. the defeat of the people, or the betrayal of the people).

This is a living event unfolding before us. Its path is not written out. The main players are not working from a "playbook of models." They are not putting on a "revival of a cherished old play" (where they will be speaking lines we have memorized and working toward outcomes we have learned to expect).

This is real life, and the coming events are not fixed, or preordained. And it is all the more reason to watch and learn � and to act in partisan political ways to help the oppressed take the stage and take the power.

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