From A World to Win News Service
Full text of the Analysis by the Communist Party of Iran (Marxist-Leninist-Maoist) on the Underclass Uprising in Iran:
We will fight the Islamic Republic of Iran, we will organize people for the revolution!
Death to the Islamic Republic—Fight for a new socialist republic in Iran!
“Marxism consists of thousands of truths, but they all boil down to one sentence: it’s right to rebel against reactionaries!” (Mao Zedong)
January 8, 2018 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us
A World to Win News Service. A massive social storm has arisen to bury the Islamic regime of Iran. The passionate and joyful voice of struggle of those who have been silenced and bent under the oppression of the corrupt Islamists has coursed through the society. People run into the heart of danger fearlessly as they see a horizon in which the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) that has ruled with religious tyranny for 40 years might cease to exist. With firm, solid steps, we must carry on to reach the point where, on the ruins of the Islamic Republic, we will build a new, fundamentally different state and society. We must not allow the chains of oppression simply to rattle, but not break, as happened in 1979. The religious fascists came to power in Iran by stealing a revolution, and not only was this a disaster for Iran and the Iranian people but it also led to reinforcing reactionary Islamist movements in the Middle East and North Africa. For the sake of the majority of the underclass who rose up, and for the sake of the emancipation of humanity, we must not allow a repeat of such a catastrophe.
The Islamic Republic’s legitimacy was fragile even before this big upsurge, but it has now deteriorated further, irrecoverably. The popular movement quickly moved from economic demands and discontent over inflation to slogans like “death to Khamenei” [the “Supreme Ruler” of the IRI]. At this point, the regime pulled back by reducing the price of foods like eggs, suspending the rise in petrol prices and returning the deposits of those whose money had been stolen by the banks—but this resulted only in mocking laughter among the people and frustration among the rulers.
The leaders of the Islamic Republic are so concerned that every day they provide new grounds for analysis and speculation. Long-standing divisions among them are deepening, and they are unable to achieve a unified solution. There is no common solution even within the main factions of the establishment (reformists and conservatives). At the same time as they order repression, they are terrified by the reaction and call for tolerance. The establishment’s various factions are engaged in a political reckoning amongst themselves, with each attributing the cause and origin of the popular uprising to the “inefficiency” of the other factions and their “conspiracies” and “destructiveness”. The divisions opening inside the ruling establishment gave the underclass and deprived masses an opportunity to rise up and rebel. The rivalry between these various factions and their need to expose the others’ thievery and corruption, as well as President Rouhani’s exposure that the great share of the national budget is allocated to religious institutions, has fueled people’s anger. It does not matter exactly where the people’s uprising started. The uprising was not caused by these fights but it did benefit from them. The cause of the uprising and protest is the capitalist economic system, which is characterized by religious tyranny, injustice and extreme discrimination, poverty, underemployment and high unemployment, and the suppression of any form of protest. This exploitation and repression and the imposition of various types of social discrimination, including in the form of the oppression of women and of the people of different nationalities, are intrinsic to the Islamic Republic of Iran’s very existence. The main origin of the people’s uprising lies in the economic relations of capitalism: on the one hand, the wealth produced by the labour of millions is concentrated in the hands of a small group of parasites, and on the other, the masses are deprived of the fruits of their own labour and lack the most basic human rights. The entire military, security and ideological repressive apparatus is guarding these relations.
In terms of the content of the uprising’s slogans and the determination being shown, it is comparable only to the mass movement that arose against the Shah’s regime in 1978-1979. In political terms, this upheaval is targeting the entire system and its chieftains. In terms of the scale and the composition of the class and the circles involved in the struggle, of its geographical spread and political and practical radicalism, it is unparalleled in the history of the Islamic Republic.
While in the 2009 uprising it was basically the middle classes in several large cities and mostly in the capital Tehran who came to take back their stolen votes, this time the driving forces in the movement are mainly workers, the labouring classes and the poor masses and unemployed concentrated in the small cities, some of whom even have a higher education. The slogan “Death to Khamenei”, which is being shouted today in various cities while people rip down photos of him or Khomeini, is functioning much as did the slogan “Death to the Shah” in 1979, with the pulling down of the Shah’s statues. The slogan “Death to the Shah” was the expression of the masses’ hatred of a tyrannical regime, and the slogan “Death to Khamenei” is the concentration of public hatred of the Islamic Republic and the horrendous crimes and injustices that the exploiting capitalist class and the Islamists who uphold its interests have imposed on the people for four decades. Slogans such as “you have turned Islam into a springboard for making people miserable”, “You hail Hussein [a famous Shiite Islamic martyr], while rape is your habit”, “Death to the Mullah’s rule,” “Death to the Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist (Velayat-e Faqih),” and attacks on mosques, seminaries, and Islamic propaganda centers, are all clearly targeting religion and the theocratic state. And slogans such as “you, reformists, conservatives, your time is up” are calling for a transition from the “conservative” and “reformist” factions of the establishment and putting forward the necessity to overthrow the rule of the Islamic Republic.
All the political forces of the old order, from Trump and Netanyahu to Iran’s Mujahadeen and Royalists, are struggling to stamp their reactionary names on this movement and to put forward their alternatives, which qualitatively are no different from the current order. The leaders of the Mujahadeen are trying―with the backing of the imperialists—to find themselves a place in the post-Islamic Republic order and make the capitalist “free market” in Iran “even more free”. The advocates of the monarchy, whose oppressive dynasty was once overthrown by the people, are calling on people to return to the past, even as the Islamic Republic continues the same crimes and the same exploitative class relations that the monarchy represented.
It is a vital lesson from the history of the Iranian struggle that governments change, that crowns of kingdoms roll in the streets, but if the masses of people allow themselves to be deceived by the programmes of the reactionary classes, if there is no horizon or programme for genuine liberation—if the horizons and programme of the communist revolution are not available and are not taken up by the struggles of the people, then the chains of oppression and servitude will never be ripped asunder, and another round of oppression and backwardness will begin in a different form. During the 1979 revolution, the turban and the pulpit replaced the throne; this not only failed to make any positive change in people’s lives but indeed worsened things hundreds of times.
The middle class has not yet joined the uprising, and even though the “invisible hands” of the capitalist economy have steadily pressed them downwards and their fundamental interests lie in radical changes in society; nevertheless, based on their class position, they are terrified of radical uprisings, of social revolution and of the impoverished strata who are the driving force in such uprisings. The satisfaction of this class with the establishment and with its own social status plays an important role in the regime’s stability. Yet today the Islamic Republic of Iran is unable to stabilize the socio-economic life even for this strata.
The Islamic regime of Iran must be overthrown. What is the social content of this overthrow, and what kind of republic should be built on its ashes to represent the immediate and long-term interests of the majority of the people, including the workers, the toilers of the city and countryside, women, progressive intellectuals, the middle classes, different nationalities, and Afghan immigrants? The separation of religion and state is a just and right demand which calls for a people’s uprising.
The Islamic Republic is an autocratic regime run by an iron fist of security and military repression. Its military and security repressive apparatus must be broken. The Islamic Republic is a social system whose mechanism is based on the degradation and subjugation of women. The freedom and equality of women in law, in the family and in society must be ensured, and men must deeply transform their thinking and their behaviour towards women. The constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran classifies its people in terms of gender, nationality, and religion, and entitles each group to different “legal” rights. The Islamic Republic opposes the rights and lives of gay people. The unconditional legal equality of everyone inhabiting the country, without any discrimination or distinctions based on gender, nationality, language, sexual orientation, or beliefs, must be ensured. The Islamic Republic is an aggressive military force that provides military and security services to reactionary regimes such as in Iraq and Syria and to reactionary groups such as Hezbollah and Hamas, and it commits crimes against the people of these countries. The overthrow of this regime and the establishment of a socialist republic will secure the freedom and independence of all the peoples in the region. The Islamic Republic is a state-capitalist state and system that is dependent on imperialism. The overthrow of the Islamic Republic is the first step to cut off the hand of the worldwide capitalist system from the economic, social and political life of this country.
The Islamic Republic, based on capitalism’s profit-driven economy and incompetent management, has devastated the environment and deprived the country’s 80 million people of clean water and air. Without overthrowing this regime, even the first step cannot be taken to restoring the environment. This political-ideological, socioeconomic system is the source of the country’s corruption, embezzlement, and plunder, including of the natural resources and financial wealth, by the statesman of the Islamic Republic.
The people’s slogans
Many of the slogans of this movement are rich and educational and have burned important facts into people’s minds, but key demands and slogans such as the abolition of compulsory veiling and freedom and equality for women, the elimination of national oppression against the non-Persian nations, have not been expressed in any of the protests and rallies. In addition, some slogans are completely against the interests of the people—for example, slogans supporting the return of the Royal family of the Shah to Iran, which is the result of a superficial, impulsive analysis of the Islamic Republic. We should take a deeper look to see the common features of this regime and the Shah’s regime, despite big and important differences. Another example is the slogan for “an Iranian Republic”, which is in complete contradiction with the notion of “republicanism”, as republicanism is based on the principle of the total equality of the country’s citizens, whether they are Iranian or not. Furthermore, the social content of such a republic is unclear and obscure. Amidst the upheaval, people’s thinking must be diverted away from racism and nationalism and transformed based on the coexistence of all nations inhabiting Iran as well as on international solidarity. This uprising can last only if it changes everything, including the thinking of the people who are fighting for this cause and willing to sacrifice their lives for it.
At some demonstrations, people have chanted the slogan, “Get out of Syria, think about us”. Even though the slogan opposes the crimes of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards in the Syrian war, the second part, “think about us,” makes it clear that people chanting this slogan are not concerned with the fact that the Revolutionary Guard supports the brutal, criminal regime of Bashar al-Assad and is the main cause of Syria’s devastation and destruction. The best slogan to attract attention to what really is happening is: “Cut off the hands of the Quds Force (Branch of the Revolutionary Guard fighting in Syria) from Syria!” The same holds for the slogan, “Neither Gaza nor Lebanon, my soul is for Iran”. Gaza and Lebanon, like Iran and the rest of the world, are grounds where different political forces are manoeuvring. In the Gaza Strip and Lebanon, the Islamic Republic is supporting corrupt groups like itself. The suffering of the people of Lebanon and of Gaza and Syria, Egypt and Turkey are all rooted in the capitalist system. In each country, according to the characteristics and events of history, different regimes sit on the top of this exploitative social system, but all are essentially the same. As a result, our movement for a real revolution in Iran, when taking its first step, i.e. the overthrow of this Islamic regime, will be a breath of fresh air blowing throughout the Middle East and give the region’s people the good news that there is a way to establish a just and decent social system with equality, liberty, and autonomy.
Trump and Khamenei, leaders of two outmoded, reactionary social systems
Trump, the fascist president of the United States, and his vice president, Michael Pence, who in his oppressive religious thought is not much different from Iran’s Mullahs, have said they supported the uprising in Iran. The leaders of the Islamic Republic have expressed hatred for this support and have made it a weapon to stifle the people’s uprising. We too express our disapproval, but for a qualitatively and fundamentally different reason. The reason for our hatred is that the Trump/Pence fascist regime, like the Islamic Republic, represents an outmoded and decaying social system and oppressive, reactionary and oppressive thinking and values. The Trump/Pence regime is deeply misogynist and holds that women should be subordinated to men and that women’s social role should be breeding and serving men. In fact, the Trump/Pence regime wants to imitate the Islamic Republic’s model of the imposition of religious laws to run society and force society to obey biblical rules. The Trump/Pence fascist regime wants to replace the regime in Iran with a power like the one in Saudi Arabia, to better serve US interests. Thus in a movement for revolution whose aim is the overthrow of the Islamic regime of Iran and its political-ideological and socio-economic system, the slogan “in the name of humanity, down with the fascist Trump/Pence regime” must be one of the main slogans, and we should build international unity with the movement in the United States that has set driving this regime out as its goal. We must never forget the internationalist statement by Mao Zedong: “They have their own people here, and we have our own people there.” Our peoples in the United States are the Blacks, Latinos, and Native Americans who have been the targets of genocide by the US ruling governments. Our peoples are the revolutionary communists and the women and men fighting for the emancipation of humanity against this imperialist state, and in particular today those fighting for the overthrow of the Trump/Pence fascist regime.
Plans for suppressing the uprising
Despite the fact that the Revolutionary Guards have stated that “the situation is under control and there is no need for the Revolutionary Guards to intervene”, the general policy of the Islamic Republic is that under conditions where the social upheaval is expanding, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards will intervene and put the police and Basij (reactionary militia) under its control. The breadth and the dispersed character of today’s upsurge is an important advantage, impeding the control of the Revolutionary Guards and the intelligence agencies. So they will try to intensify their control in the big cities. The youthful, highly mobile character of this movement has frightened the repressive forces, especially in small towns. In the face of the brutal repression that the police and Basij are using against the protesters, it is the people’s obvious right to defend their lives with violent resistance.
However, it should be noted and kept in mind that the demise of the Islamic Republic’s armed forces will be decided in a planned battle under the strategy of a “people’s protracted war”. This war will organize tens of thousands of young men and women in a struggle to ensure victory. Party activists are obliged to seize every possible opportunity to raise the awareness of the youth involved in the current struggle about this strategy and its requirements.
The Islamic Republic’s repressive apparatus goes hand in hand with its political tricks, with the central policy of “divide and rule”. Today the regime’s main policy, driven by the leadership of the reformists, involves mobilizing the middle strata by terrifying them with fear of the “Syria-ization of Iran” and of social insecurity. There is pressure on artists and athletes who voted for Rouhani during the presidential election to once again mobilize the middle-class against the masses to serve the establishment’s interests, and this time not only to drag people to the ballot boxes but to repress the popular insurrectionary movement. Before the movement began, the Revolutionary Guards had plans to occupy Tehran’s streets under cover of countering the street harassment of women and children—this was opposed by the Interior minister. It is even likely that these types of criminal acts are fueled by the Revolutionary Guard gangsters themselves, to provide cover for winning the support of the middle strata, who fear the uprising. The fear of Iran’s “Syria-ization” is another threat frightening the middle classes. Yet this danger can be demolished only by the overthrow of the Islamic Republic’s entire military and security apparatus. Indeed, today the various gangs in the government have divided Iran among themselves, each with its own loyal military and security force and a monopoly over financial resources.
The intellectuals and artists must take a side and recognize the fact that the people have rejected the entire system. They should call on the middle strata and overcome the divisions between the middle strata and the lower strata, which was seen in the long queues in the voting centres of northern Tehran (wealthier neighbourhoods )and the empty voting centres in southern Tehran (poor neighbourhoods). It is the people’s demand that the intellectuals and the artists come forward and support the people’s movement threatening the government.
The continuation of this movement depends on its development into a movement for a real revolution
There is no doubt that the insurgent movement will have lots of ups and downs. These ups and downs are caused by deceptions and political games from different factions and figures in the regime, the repressive plans of the Ministry of Intelligence, the Judiciary Ministry, the army and the Revolutionary Guards and Basij forces, as well as by the lack of a coherent strategy and leadership in the movement itself.
Our Party will regularly expose these tricks and plans, and its activists will work with all their strength to expand the Party’s core groups on the basis of raising awareness among masses about the new socialist republic as the only alternative to the Islamic Republic, so as to build a firm backbone for transforming today’s movement into a movement for revolution.
The development of the women’s revolutionary movement has a decisive influence on the quality of this mass movement and its continuity. Unlike 2009, in the current movement women are not yet on the front lines. We must quickly organize women’s forces in every neighbourhood and workplace and turn the demand for freedom and equality for women as well as the struggle against the forced hijab into a demand of the movement as a whole. And in unity with the student and worker movement, the male-dominated atmosphere and thinking and behaviour of this movement must change. It is now time for a new student movement to defend the people’s insurgent movement and its demands for the separation of religion and state and the dismantling of the mullahs’ rule, to open the university doors to gatherings of the people, and to stop the entry of intelligence ministry spies and dismiss the security forces of the universities. The student movement should serve the masses’ urgent need to debate and discuss what kind of state and society they should build. The student movement should play an active role in bringing to the fore the slogan, “no society can be free without women’s liberation”.
The student movement in every city and province should point out the top representatives of the system, such as those directly selected by Khamenei and the commanders of the repression, and make them the target of the masses’ attacks: for example, in Khorasan province [the largest province in Iran, with long borders with Pakistan and Afghanistan] in solidarity with the people’s struggle to expel Alamolhoda (Khamenei’s representative in the province) and Reisi [the conservatives’ unsuccessful presidential candidate], form a committee of students, workers, and representatives of the slum-dwellers of Mashhad to transfer the administration of the huge wealth of Astan Quds Razavi’s foundation1 to the people. In all of these activities, Party activists must mainly expose the common roots of all oppression and injustice and show the people the real road to emancipation, and strongly and convincingly win over many fighters to the cause of the communist revolution and organize them under the leadership of our Party.
Experience has shown that the enemy will not remain rattled for long. As a result, we must capture the moment, spread awareness, and develop our revolutionary experience and skills in mobilizing people in order to organize their forces—led by the Party―in a movement for revolution. Organizing a secret backbone for this movement is a crucial task that can guarantee the continuation of the movement in conditions of oppression and ebb. People should know that there is a long, hard fight ahead of us. This road will not be traversed only through street protests.
A strategic approach to today’s mass uprising
What can convert today’s movement into a movement for revolution is primarily its political content as concentrated in the slogans. A slogan can push people’s minds in a negative direction in opposition to the battle for a just and decent human society, or in a positive direction reinforcing this struggle. It is necessary that large changes take place in the thinking and values of those involved in these struggles so that this movement can find the strength and quality to continue resisting a strong enemy. A major section of those involved in today’s fight with the Islamic Republic regime must deeply understand the alternative content of the new socialist republic and want to fight for it. The formation of such a force, even small, will greatly affect the character of the movement. Two key documents serving this struggle will be published soon by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Iran (MLM): “The manifesto and the revolutionary programme for the communist revolution” and “The character and function of the new state: The new socialist republic in Iran”. Awareness of the principles of a society that we, the Communists, are fighting for and of the structures, laws, and functions of the new socialist state in Iran can serve not only to win over some people to the communist revolution but also to bring in a wider number of allies and followers to the path of liberation. Because they will be able to see and understand the emancipatory character of our alternatives, and they will be able to compare it with the existing situation.
But simply desiring such a community is not equal to getting it. To reach the new society, we need a roadmap and leadership. In Iran, our Party has taken the responsibility for leadership. The backbone of our roadmap for the overthrow of the Islamic Republic is the science of communism—the new and evolved science of communism. Communism was founded by Marx and Engels and developed by Lenin and Mao Zedong in the course of the great socialist revolutions of the twentieth century. After the painful defeat of these revolutions, the necessity to develop this science was met by the greatest Marxist of our era, Bob Avakian, who is the leader of the communist revolution and its party in the US. What enabled us to develop the Manifesto and the Programme for the communist revolution in Iran and the Constitution of a new socialist state of Iran was understanding and applying this science of emancipation.
All our Party’s parties groups and cores, as well as all its committed supporters, should, in the context of this statement’s line and guidance, be actively involved with local initiatives in the current uprising and lead it towards a revolutionary direction. Independent and innovative announcements and slogans are needed to respond quickly to any situation that is arising. All the Party’s members and supporters must keep in mind that every struggle we wage today should serve the purpose of establishing the new socialist state in Iran and the emancipation of all humanity around the world.
The Communist Party of Iran (Marxist-Leninist Maoist)
2 January 2018
You can find the full document in Persian here: (www.cpimlm.com)
1. This is a foundation in Mashhad, Iran with a religious cover. It is the administrative organization that manages the Imam Reza shrine and various institutions that belong to the organization, and through years of thievery and corruption it has managed to accumulate astronomical wealth. [back]
On March 17, 2017, A World to Win News Service (AWTWNS) announced its transformation into a more thorough-going tool for revolution based on Bob Avakian’s new synthesis of communism. Read its “Editorial: Introducing a transformed AWTWNS” here.
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