[Marxism] Betancourt's halo [SIC] under spotlight

[Lüko Willms]

On Sun, 1 Mar 2009 01:18:38 EST, Jscotlive at aol.com wrote:

> Joaquin's distaste for the FARC at a time when they have come 
> under most pressure from the Colombian military, a US proxy, 
>> is revealing. His  distaste for what he describes as kidnappings, 
> but which the FARC and their  supporters, struggling against 
> the most reactionary regime in the region, would  describe 
> as arrests (perhaps in the same way the Colombian state 
> would  describe the imprisonment of FARC members, 
> sympathisers, trade unionists  and leftists) is obvious.

  But the fact is that the FARC takes prisoners in order to exchange them for 
money or the release of some of their people in the government's goals. 

  I don't think this helps to advance politically and to undermine the political 
base of the Bogotà regime. 

  The Cuban "Rebel Army" of Fidel Castro, Camilo and Che released the 
prisoners they took after taking their arms, boots, and uniforms and giving 
them some political explanations. Fidel said that this lead to the Batista 
soldiers giving up themselves to be taken prisoner instead of fighting tooth 
and nail not to be captured, because they knew how they would be treated. 

  This is not to say that taking hostages is absolutely ruled out in 
revolutionary politics, but it depends on the concrete situation. See Leo 
Trotsky's "Their moral and ours" for an extended discussion of morals and 
politics. 

  BTW, British TV journalist and author Phil Rees (<http://philrees.tv/>) 
visitied also the FARC for his six part series "Dining with terrorists" on Al 
Jazeera International. See 
> 
<http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/general/2009/02/200925650129291
22.html>
for the part "America's Backyard". 

  Please note the link of "Watch part two" on the bottom of the side text to 
the Youtube link for the second installment ("after the break") of each part of 
the series. 

  Very interesting. 

  Although -- I just watched the Colombia part to look for FARC statements 
on their hostage taking -- it is not easy to get the original Spanish words of 
the two FARC guerillas speaking behind the english translation dubbed over. 

  The second part of the "America's Backyard" looks into the history of the 
Nicaraguan Contras, which were armed and financed by the USA. 


Comradely yours, 
Lüko Willms
Frankfurt, Germany
--------------------------------
visit http://www.mlwerke.de Marx, Engels, Luxemburg, Lenin, Trotzki in 
German