(Yürüyüş 74, July 8, 2018)
AKP Fascism Attacks With Its Mafia, Civilian Fascists And Police;
Threats, Intimidation, Plots, Provocations, Corruption, Depoliticisation, Torture, Massacres… Fascism Attacks Using All Its Methods
Because Its Fear Is Great!
WE WILL RESIST AND FIGHT AKP FASCISM! AS IN GAZI, CAYAN AND KUCUKARMUTLU WE WILL FRUSTRATE THE PROVOCATIONS OF THE AKP WITH PEOPLE’S RESISTANCE UNDER THE LEADERSHIP OF THE FRONT!
Those Who Call On AKP Fascism To Show “Common Sense”, Those Who Think They Can Act Against Fascism With Phrases Uttered From Parliamentary Chairs, Confederations And Mildewed Offices In Their Chambers Are Politically Blind!
Fascism Has No “Common Sense”.
Those Who Do Not Resist Are Condemned To Destruction!
Before June 24 (date of elections in Turkey) in a number of places from Bursa to Konya and Urfa, groups organised by the AKP attacked election stands of the CHP, Iyi Party and HDP. Even on the eve of the election, the AKP made threats that if they lost the election, they “would not accept it”. Especially in Istanbul there were many reports of fascist attacks and provocations by the AKP. After the results were declared AKP supporters in Habipler put on a display of weapons and did a kind of “victory parade” in various parts of the city. Despite intending to, their convoys did not enter Gazi, Cayan or Armutlu.
Because there was no turn to attacks in the country as a whole, many sections did not stop to look at developments. We are up against an AKP government policy of fascist organisation and attacks. The principal targets of fascist organising by the AKP are poor areas where revolutionaries are organised and counter-revolutionary forces cannot easily enter and if they do they do not feel “secure”.
On the evening of the election, on the pretext of an “AKP celebration” this AKP attempt to put on a show in impoverished neighbourhoods was a continuation of the policy of (Interior Minister) Suleyman Soylu in holding meetings as a provocation in Gazi and Kucukarmutlu shortly before the election. Both before the election and on the night of the election we frustrated this policy. We did not permit AKP convoys to enter our neighbourhoods to put on a show. Again and again we showed that if they attack our poor neighbourhoods they will meet resistance.
In all countries ruled by fascism, apart from the official army and police of the state there is also fascist organisation. Because first of all, all fascist governments need a certain mass base; secondly the state feels the need to hide its fascist face. The dimensions, form, how and when these organisations are used may change depending on the class struggle and the conditions of the day. But what does not change is that fascist governments will resort to such methods. It is necessary to know this and to prepare for it.
In our country reformism and opportunism, rather than see this, issue statements against AKP fascist organisation that “this cannot be accepted in democracies”, “it’s a scandal” etc. and find the solution to be complaining from seats in parliament.
This is no solution to fascist terror.
However, you can respond to fascist terror with the strength of the organised people and the revolutionary violence of the people. The history of the peoples of the world and our own country is full of examples showing there is no other way.
The Fascist Attack Plan On The Night Of The Election Was Frustrated By The Front.
In response to the AKP’s election threats, the people of Gazi went out to protect their neighbourhood and started to come out into the streets when the voting was over. The slogans like “AKP thief, murderer and enemy of the people” began to be shouted in Gazi.
The High School Dev Genc (Dev Genc – “Revolutionary Youth”) gave the leadership. They were to the forefront of the masses with the banner “THE ELECTIONS ARE A DECEPTION – THE ONLY ROAD IS REVOLUTION”.
This action lasted about four hours. The people of Gazi were on their feet and certainly no fascist gang or AKP convoy got into Gazi. High School Dev Genc were guided by the Gazi Uprising and the Gazi martyrs and like their elder brother, said “the police station is the target” and the last word on June 24 was the march in front of the police station.
During the march nearly 2,000 people of Gazi were on the streets.
Reformism and opportunism were like they always are. “Like they always are” like during the Gazi Uprising, the June Uprising, the Great Resistance…
“Take down your banner, High School Dev Genc, or the police will attack.”
“This mass cannot march to the police station…” they said as they sought to hold back the resistance.
Everything of their politics was “draw back to within the limits the state will accept” and this was shown on the evening of June 24. They have the same attitude to the Yuksel resistance. The same attitude to OHAL (the state of emergency). At the point they have reached today, reformism and opportunism ARE DESTROYING THEMSELVES. They can destroy themselves but we will not allow Gazi and the fortresses revolutionaries have defended at the cost of their lives to be destroyed. And we did not. We marched with our banner and went “straight to the police station”. The AKP police were there with about 20 armoured vehicles. But they could not attack.
A similar march took place on the evening of June 24 in Cayan. The AKP fascist convoys could not approach the neighbourhood.
High School Dev Genc prevented fascist gang provocations led by the AKP on June 24. If it is asked where High School Dev Genc got the strength to do that, the answer is in its experience, not its numbers, and in its ideological clarity.
They learned from the Great Resistance. They learned from young leaders of the Gazi Uprising such as Ali Haydar Cakmak and Sezgin Engin. They learned from those like Berkin Elvan. They learned from the 80 hours of resistance in Gazi for Gunay Ozarslan’s funeral.
This is what they had learned: there can be no conciliation with fascism, a struggle must be waged.
All Contradictions Come Together In Poor Neighbourhoods, They Are The Places Where Contradictions Are Sharpest
Economic contradictions and corruption are at their sharpest in poor neighbourhoods. There is hunger and unemployment in poor neighbourhoods. The oligarchic system to a large extent has control over factories and schools. But the contradictions in poor neighbourhoods make this difficult to achieve in them. The existence of the revolutionary movement is the essential barrier here.
When we look at all the gecekondu (shantytown) neighbourhoods, the number where the revolutionaries are organised and able to give hope and authority to the people is still very small. But these are enough to influence the policies of the oligarchy. Particularly in Gazi, Okmeydani, Kucukarmutlu and Cayan but also from Ikitelli to Alibeykoy, from Sarigazi to Gulsuyu and from Kirac to May 1st Neighbourhood, for years fascism has been unable to destroy the Front. The issue is not how many neighbourhoods we are in, or their total population, our very existence is a threat for the oligarchy. The oligarchy does not forget the Gazi Uprising, it does not forget the June Uprising. It knows that all poor neighbourhoods becoming like Gazi is not a distant possibility and the Front is capable of making this possibility a reality. This is why they attack the Front. This is why they want to “clean” the poor neighbourhoods where the Front is. This is why they publish news that Gazi has been “cleaned”.
The fascist state has directed a lot of “initiatives” towards Gazi. It has resorted to occupations in an attempt to stop marches of the people from taking place, not allowed our corpses to be removed for funerals, our democratic associations are besieged and raided. Terror is sown in the streets of Gazi. But all this is frustrated by the line of resistance and war. Every time they come to Gazi to occupy it but every time they leave with their tail between their legs. Suleyman Soylu’s latest “time in Gazi” was no different. The people surrounded the police armoured cars and Soysuz (“ignoble” in Turkish – a play on words with regard to his name Soylu, which means “noble”) and shouted at him to “go away”.
We Organise The Revolution In The Poor Neighbourhoods
Where is the “neighbourhood”we refer to, and what is its place from the point of view of the revolutionary struggle? These, in contrast to all distortions by the oligarchy and the left, were answered theoretically and practically long ago.
When we talk of neighbourhood”, it is poor neighbourhoods we refer to. Poor neighbourhood were all sections of the people are to be found. We do not see poor neighbourhoods as “liberated zones” nor do we aim to turn them into “liberated zones”. There are two reasons why this is neither possible nor necessary; the first is due to the reality of Turkey, the second is our conception of strategic People’s War.
We seek people’s power. That is, we do not want five or six poor neighbourhoods, we want the whole of the homeland. There is no prospect of a movement not organised in poor neighbourhoods making the revolution. The essence of the problem is this. “To organise the revolution today is to organise the people – to organise the people is to organise the neighbourhoods”.
The oligarchy policy of “urban transformation” is not simply about raising money, it is a way of preventing revolution. It is about eliminating poor neighbourhoods at a time of contradictions being sharpened, anger being organised and uprisings being possible at any moment.
For this reason we are present in the poor neighbourhoods and will continue to be. We will continue people’s parliaments and militia organisation. We seek the withdrawal of the enemy’s political and military institutions from the poor neighbourhoods. As was said in Front statement No. 459, dated February 21, 2016:
“This is why the enemy has no strength in our neighbourhoods; politically or militarily we will not allow them to move around freely.
This is why we will drive the enemy from our neighbourhoods and imprison them in their centres.
For this, neither politically nor militarily will we allow the enemy to breathe and for this we will use our parliaments (Turkish: meclisler) and militias. “
In the poor neighbourhoods we want to tear down the bourgeois political and ideological sovereignty and cause the revolutionary ideology and culture to dominate. We are aiming for and are creating the basic organisations where the people will learn to rule themselves.
This is not done with a “civil society” viewpoint nor with a “liberated zones” attitude, we want a viewpoint of WANTING REVOLUTION AND AIMING FOR PEOPLE’S POWER.
We aim for a parliament-type, shura-type organisation consisting of basic people’s organisations like the “Soviets” to take power, using the People’s Parliaments of the Front to take power for a Revolutionary People’s Government throughout the country, and we will achieve this. Our policy in these elections through the call “The Elections Are Not A Solution, Let Us Organise In People’s Parliaments” were our election policy in conformity with our aims.
We Call On All Sections That Are Against Fascism To Abandon Deceits And Games And Struggle Against Fascism!
We have yet another election behind us. Who won? In American and European imperialism’s neo-colonial Turkey, the elections only ever have one winner: imperialism and the oligarchy. The result was no different this time. Those who think they will change it either do not understand the reality of neo-colonialism and fascism or are ignoring it.
Before the elections they created an exaggerated environment of hope. On the evening of the election this hope turned to deep disappointment, low morale and hopelessness. Fascism strengthened the domination of low morale and hopelessness. Hope is in the struggle for revolution. The solution is in revolution.
From the viewpoint of bourgeois democracy’s formal institutions and rules, this could not be considered an election in even the minimum sense. Repression, terror, tricks, intimidation, blackmail, all the methods used by fascism, anyone thinking a government “on the side of the people” has surrendered to the system. It is bad for exploitation and tyranny to be practised by “one man”, but are they democratic if practised by “many men”? These are unscientific policies and definitions. They are concepts FOR THOSE THAT HAVE NOT GOT THE COURAGE TO CALL FASCISM WHAT IT IS AND TO STRUGGLE AGAINST IT.
“One-man regime” means nothing, there is fascism. Whether this is a “one-man” regime or a “450-man regime”, the problem is that it is formed by fascism. They say “parliament is being marginalised”; OK, was parliament previously a competent authority and more important, weren’t that parliament’s decisions the decisions of fascism? Did the parliament not pass all fascist laws? What problem of the people was solved there? Weren’t all massacres applauded there?
Leave parliament, come to the poor neighbourhoods for the sharpest contradictions!
The approach of Kurdish nationalism to the poor neighbourhoods is based on self-interest. They do not organise for people’s revolution, it is a matter of winning HDP votes. Opportunism’s attitude to poor neighbourhoods lacks logic. They belittled the decades of developing revolutionary struggle in the poor neighbourhoods, calling it the “struggle of lumpens” and the tradition of resistance in poor neighbourhoods was called “teenage culture” – that was how they explained it, they criticised the “populism” of the revolutionary movement, accusing it of “distance from the class”. Essentially opportunism and reformism belittled and looked down on the struggle of the poor in the shantytowns, they had nothing to say to the poor – they did not see that the class is in the poor neighbourhoods and nowhere else.
At the most ordinary, the most backward level even they do not wage the democratic struggle even with legal struggle, they are devoid of the strength to defend and the will, they have dropped back to the most reactionary level and are even becoming a left that lacks a reason to exist.
Historically, the left was to the forefront in the struggle, in the resistance, on the barricades, paying a price and confronting the attack.
Apart from the Front there is no part of the left in Turkey remaining.
What is there of them?
They have become a reserve force in the PKK’s politics of collaboration with the USA, and through the agency of the HDP they have become bogged down in parliamentarism.
The argument in Gazi over whether to march to the Higher Elections Council or the police station summarises the parting of the ways.
The Future Is Resisting Everywhere! We Are Resisting. The Future Is Ours!
Those who do not trust in their own strength or in the strength of the people have got into the situation where they rely on the USA or the EU or on economic crisis to put some restraints on the AKP.
Those who count on the AKP’s contradictions with imperialism are waiting in vain for the AKP to be anti-imperialist. Imperialism is not giving up on the AKP, nor is the AKP’s behaviour anti-imperialist. What is definite is this: AKP-US contradictions are temporary and secondary, the AKP-US alliance is permanent and essential.
On the surface of the earth the only force that wages an anti-imperialist struggle and will be able to do so is the revolutionaries.
Instead of imperialism giving up on the AKP, its support makes the AKP into a force indistinguishable from it. It is clear that imperialism will not support any force that is contrary to its own interests. A people’s government is not established by ruling class contradictions. A people’s government is established by people’s war.
Like eyes fixated on the eyes of a horse, those whose eyes are fixed on nothing but parliament are also incapable of seeing fascist attacks and organisation and they close their eyes to what they do see. Because seeing and accepting this reality would mean struggling against it.
What are the forces in our country that call themselves left-wing and democratic doing? They are burying their heads in parliament like ostriches bury their heads in sand. Keep doing that! You will fade to nothing there. You know this well but you have no other political future.
Another political future is available from struggle in every area of life and resistance. That future is found in those who marched to the police station in Gazi. That future is in those who resist in Yuksel. That future is present in those who resist in prison. The future is in those who light the fires of resistance one by one from one tent to another. It is brought to life in those who practice a policy of continual resistance to continual fascism. That future is in those the oligarchy “searches for” and who reply with concerts and new musical compositions. That future is in those who raise high the banner of internationalism while imperialism seeks to divide the peoples. That future is in those who without hesitation condemn cooperation with US imperialism and continue the anti-imperialist struggle of the peoples. Those who are not are neither a part of the democratic struggle nor a part of tomorrow.
Organising Civilian Fascists Is Part Of What The Fascist State Does
From the very start the AKP aimed at and created a fascist attack force separate from the police and the army. The AKP’s first attacks on resistance were perpetrated through “zabita” (a kind of police). The AKP used former Special Team (anti-terrorist detachments of the 1990s) members and trained them as zabita for their first attack organisation.
When AKP province and city chiefs pose with weapons in their offices, and threaten to choke and spill the blood of members of the CHP, journalists and various other sections, this is not just some personal eccentricity. This kind of thing is in no way a chance occurrence. It is the conscious policy of the AKP.
In Habipler they are arming the people. They are establishing commando camps. They are creating organisations like HOH (People’s Special Movement). In various forms, some not yet revealed, they are undoubtedly continuing to organise fascists.
Wherever the people’s struggle is developed or the struggle of the people has not been broken, civilian fascist organisations will also try to attack. This is a method fascism also resorted to in the past. Wherever the revolutionaries were effective and organised, the civilian fascists were mobilised to attack. Between 1977 and 1980, MHP-Idealist Hearth members were trained in commando camps and organised by means of the civilian fascist movement to stage massacres of university students, spray gunfire at coffee shops in neighbourhoods, and abduct and murder individual revolutionaries.
A large section of the left pulled back in the face of fascist terror, but the revolutionary movement was not without politics when confronted by fascist terror, and it replied to the civilian fascist terror by organising the people and revolutionary violence. In the neighbourhoods, the schools, the dormitories, it organised sentries and armed defence against fascist terror, and it organised vengeance actions against fascist terror attacks. During that historical period fascist terror was driven back, fascist plans were spoiled and it was made possible by this policy.
Those who in Gazi said we should not say “the police station is the target”, or said “let us not march with the banner” do not know or have forgotten this history. In the face of fascist terror, there is no other way than to struggle tooth and nail, to get armed and to take vengeance!
The AKP’s Contra Organisations
The AKP’s contra organisations were personally formed by Tayyip Erdogan. These fascist organisations continue the concept of calling their leaders “chief” (Turkish: sef) or commandant (basbug) and organise and motivate themselves through a chief (reis).
The fact that a Tayyip Erdogan relative named Orha Uzaner had formed an organisation in his administration was mentioned in the press, later the AKP drew a veil over it. But Orhan Uzuner’s words are clear: “Our aim at the moment of danger is to awaken the people and give information. Our smallest instrument is the whistle. I have a megaphone in my car. At the necessary moment we will use weapons. It is necessary for us to make such preparations.”
And since July 15 the AKP has wanted to create a civilian fascist organisation. The weapons it distributed that night were never taken back.
The AKP is for example certainly not organising against imperialist occupation.
All the AKP’s preparations are against the people and revolutionaries, and against the democratic opposition.
Another of the AKP’s contra organisations is called SADAT.
SADAT was organised by one of Tayyip Erdogan’s chief advisers. The full name of this SADAT institution is the International Defence Directorate, it is a contra institution founded by retired Brigadier General Adnan Tanriverdi.
Tanriverdi worked in one of the Turkish Armed Forces’ contra-guerrilla units, the General Staff Special Warfare Office. In September 2012 it was reported in various parts of the press that that in a number of cities SADAT had opened “contra training camps” and there the AKP had organised 2,800 people to be trained in “irregular warfare”.
SADAT, which is organised to look like a “company”, teaches courses (!) on subjects like “Irregular Warfare”, “Sniping”, “Protection”, “Destruction”, “rescue-abduction exercises” and “psychological warfare”.
The Mafia Arm Of Civilian Fascist Organising
Another form in which the AKP practises fascist terror is through using the mafia. So that they could be used for AKP policies, 21 mafia were released from prison in a night. Sedat Peker aimed to organise and train fascist terror groups.
If Sedat Peker is the most obvious way the mafia has been used against the people and revolutionaries, the AKP has actually used dozens of mafia groups. The Mafioso Cakici in prison was given a “right to unlimited conversation” report and as AKP-mafia collaboration, Cakici made threats against all sections opposed to the AKP and MHP. While imprisoned lawyers of the people, Grup Yorum members, revolutionary prisoners are punished with years of visit restrictions, Cakici was granted privileges. The AKP alliance with mafia is the result of its war on revolutionaries.
Mafia groups utter threats to hang and cut throats, such as saying “we will make the gutters run with blood” and “if the Reis (chief, a reference to Erdogan) even dies a natural death, we will hang you from trees and flagpoles.”
There Is Only One Answer To Fascist Terror – Resistance!
The threats and intimidation operations of AKP fascism are out there. They say, “We will hang and cut throats, we will strangle those who oppose us.” They are uniting official and civilian fascist terror.
OK, can they succeed in silencing and intimidating the people?
The answer to this question does not depend on the AKP and its fascist forces, it depends on US.
What is decisive is not what they want to do, it is what we will do against these fascist plans and threats.
The only way to defend poor neighbourhoods and also democratic associations is to resist. Thousands of associations have been closed, Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said after closure orders, “We put a lock on them and went.” This statement was valid for a great number of the associations they decided to seal up in that way. But one exception was democratic institutions operated by the People’ Front. We never accepted the seals on the doors. We gave the answer, “They went and we broke the lock”.
Of course, all this is not a new situation. At the end of the 1990s we developed revolutionary politics to defend democratic institutions. Fascism in those days also carried out hundreds of raids on associations, publications and trade union offices. But only the supporters of the Front resisted and put up barricades.
Why?
Because apart from us, all sections see fascism as legitimate. They see it as legitimate for the fascist state to raid offices and associations. And apart from ourselves no section of the left has had the courage to put up barricades or pay a price. Certainly we have paid a high price to defend our democratic institutions. After putting up barricades many of our people have been taken to torture centres, dozens have been imprisoned.
This line has also been shown towards OHAL. Reformism and opportunism always produced theories that “resistance is impossible in OHAL conditions”, again, we were the ones who resisted.
In every area we will resist and fight. This is a line that makes it possible to build a barricade in front of all attacks by AKP fascism, official or civilian, and we will reply to them.
Gunay Ozarslan made a call, “Do not surrender.” Hatice Asik said, “Attack,” when she only had stones in her hand and had attacked an imperialist headquarters. Elif Sultan Kalsen said, “Courage.” Safak and Bahtiyar said, “We are justice.” And then Oguz, Leyla and Mahir said, “The enemy cannot bomb all the mountains of Anatolia”, fighting with the weapons they retrieved from a bombed shelter. Bilgehan reminded the enemy that “they will pay a price.” A High School Dev Genc said, “the police station is the target.” And this is what needs to be done.
Poor Neighbourhoods Are The Road To People’s Power
Nobody Will Drive The Front From Them!
We will be in the poor neighbourhoods – because that is where all the people are. All the exploited and oppressed are there. Today those who are far from poor neighbourhoods will find that they are a part of them – as Marx said:
“The bourgeoisie up to the present has placed its hand on and removed all the respect from occupations; judges, lawyers, priests, poets, scientists have all been made into its wage labourers.” And this process will continue.
We will be in the poor neighbourhoods – because,
IT IS ONLY THE POOR WHO CAN PUT AN END TO POVERTY!
IT IS ONLY THE HUNGRY WHO CAN PUT AN END TO HUNGER!
IT IS ONLY THE OPPRESSED WHO CAN PUT AN END TO TYRANTS!
This is why it is the Front that will organise the poor, the hungry and oppressed and bring down the system!
Let us recall a report prepared by the USA concerning in particular sacrificial and revolutionary violence actions directed at American imperialism:
“We will never allow a Maxist-Leninist organisation to become a force again on earth.
We will destroy them… They will be a negative example to the world, after this everyone will feel he has the strength to carry out an action against us, this is a very dangerous tendency… We will never allow this.”
And let us recall another policy of American imperialism:
“Again, we will never allow a second Soviet Union.”
The aim of revolution and revolutionaries is expressed in three words: Independence, democracy, socialism.
These three aims cannot be achieved WITHOUT DRIVING IMPERIALISM FROM OUR LAND. So whoever claims to defend independence, democracy and socialism must be ready to do one thing, to organise and fight against imperialism. Those who do not are defending independence, democracy and socialism in name only.
Whether USA or AKP fascism, they threaten all forces that are against them. This is clear. They do not confine themselves to threats, they imprison and kill also. This is also clear. It is history that will pass a verdict. Our verdict is clear:
We will not abandon Marxism-Leninism, we will exist as a Marxist-Leninist organisation; instead of reaching agreement with imperialism to escape imperialist attacks, we will be the flag of the anti-imperialist struggle of the peoples of the world.
Instead of saving ourselves from death by giving up our ideology and aims, we will build up our self-sacrifice and march on the enemy. There is no force that can make you give in when you are ready to look death in the face! Instead of giving in to those who are determined to “eliminate” us, we will build up our strength and determination to eliminate them.
And finally: against those prepared to drown the world in blood to prevent people’s power, we will build up people’s parliaments, we will establish the second Soviet Union in Turkey.
IN CONCLUSION:
1 – When our poor neighbourhoods are under attack, every Front supporter knows, whatever their duty, and without waiting for instructions, to organise resistance.
2 – Every Front supporter knows that in the face of attack the first task will be to call the people out into the street.
3 – 23 years ago in March, in the Gazi Uprising the voice saying “the police station is the target” continues to be our guide pointing the way for us in the poor neighbourhoods. In the resistance to attacks we must point out a target to our people.
4 – In a march to the target we must start the resistance at the point where our road is blocked. Our resistance may take various forms from sit-down actions to barricades. We will do whatever will get a result.
5 – Every resistance must have a demand, and must aim to achieve a result; it is not a matter of ending it of our own will, we must aim to take it to a higher level. For example, when we arrive at a goal instead of turning back we must hurl stone and set fires in response to efforts to block our path. Those who think of attacking our poor neighbourhoods must realise that we will respond with vengeance to every attempt at an attack.
6 – The poor neighbourhoods are our concrete fortresses. The big cities are our concrete forests. Against fascist attacks and provocations, against attempts to establish system institutions, we will resist and fight in our concrete fortresses.
