You Say You Want a Revolution

• subscribe to print magazine

• stay in touch with our email newsletter

  Subscribe to our regular weekly e-mail newsletter. It's packed with updates on recent and upcoming stories, events, campaigns and things every progressive should be informed about.

   

• email this article to a friend

  Your Name Your Email Recipient Email

  Personal message Thought you might be interested in this article from In These Times.

   

  Please help us prevent spam by verifying the word you see in the image above

  Send to multiple recipients. Just separate each email address with a comma.

• Reader Comments (12)

  Page 1 of 1 pages

  Agreed, mostly, but I think you can make the case that the frustration boiling over among the youth, the trashings and street fighting you cite, did threaten the warmakers’ sense of security, along with the large demonstrations and of couirse the rebellion in the military and the resistance of the black populace and the Vietnamese. There’s no reason to think that persistent non-violent organizing, escalating only into voluntary submission to arrest, would have threatened them. A high US official said at the time, “Let’s face it, we’re in a war with the kids, and the kids are winning.” I think that referred to, more than anything, the escalating tactics in the streets, if not the WU.

  Posted by Dave Lippman on Feb 18, 2009 at 4:42 PM

  I don’t follow Machtinger’s logic when he says: 

  “As I understand it, terrorism refers to the killing of innocent civilians for political reasons; therefore all forms of nongovernmental violence do not qualify as terrorism.”

  9/11, drug beheadings in Tijuana, the Oklahoma City bombing, anthrax mailings, etc., etc., are apparently not terrorism according to his reckoning.

  I believe Machtinger needs to re-read his dictionary.

  Posted by todd saalman on Feb 19, 2009 at 1:31 AM

  Todd, I believe what he meant was that not all forms of nongovernmental violence qualify. In other words, some do. Including most if not all that you cite.

  Posted by Dave Lippman on Feb 19, 2009 at 5:07 AM

  I disagree with the definition of terrorism.  Terror is the root, not murder.  Murderism could be terrorism, but only because murder can cause terror.  Is systemic repression through torture terrorism?  Can’t rape be used as a tool of terror?  Focusing on death misses the point.  Terrorism is about more than just death.

  Bombings meant more for generating coverage than causing a reduction in tactical or strategic capabilities are most definitely terrorism. 

  I’m a liberal, I am not a Republican, and I still think that the Pentagon bombing was a terrorist act.  I am appalled that Ayers is as public a figure as he is.  Mr. Machtinger at least wrestles with what he has done.

  Posted by Zachary Neal on Feb 19, 2009 at 4:00 PM

  Dave—you make a valid point in that the chaos and various forms of insurrection in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s had some impact on the ability of the government to conduct the war in Indochina and, probably less so, on repression in this country.  There is a story that when Curtis Lemay proposed use of nuclear weapons in Vietnam, Lyndon Johnson asked ‘and where will you be when people break into the White House to lynch me?’
  Certainly some leaders, Johnson amongst them, included the ‘loss of a generation’ in their calculations of the cost of war.  For that purpose, it certainly didn’t hurt that some of the leaders of the Weather Underground, like Bill Ayers, were children of the elite.  Some of us, even outside the WU, came to the conclusion that simply hastening the destruction of the US would be a kind of liberation for the rest of the world from US Imperialism—regardless of the consequences for the population of this country, which was seen as hopelessly compromised by ‘white skin privilege.’
  We were wrong.  Movements like the WU, filled with contempt for the working class in this country, could never build a real movement in solidarity with people struggling for justice in other countries.  In retrospect, the inflated self-importance of those groups seems to have a greater identity with the ambitions of a dry drunk like George W Bush than with the emerging movements now seeking change from the ground up. 
  Howie’s piece speaks to some of the lessons learned from a difficult period and the challenges of building a movement.  It is a conversation we should continue.

  Posted by Bruce Johnson on Feb 19, 2009 at 4:32 PM

  one could say lexington and concord were ‘terrorists’ acts. one can say anything. understanding is a different bag of tricks. the flawed thinking of the WU was that the masses were fed up enough to act. they were not. they are not.

  Posted by jefferymcnary on Feb 19, 2009 at 7:30 PM

  Zachary—I think your definition of terrorism is too broad, and doesn’t acknowledge important distinctions.  The act of aiming matters, and trying to avoid murder matters.  When the WU bombed the Pentagon, they were not engaged in random violence meant to terrorize a whole population; they were attacking the center of American military power.  And even then, they warned the authorities of the presence of the bomb in such a way as to prevent human casualties.  Whether you would support their cause or not, if any target was ever a legitimate military target, it’s the Pentagon.  That’s not to say that the act of bombing the Pentagon was prudent or even ethical, but it can be wrong without being terrorism.  And that’s true even if the goal was chiefly media exposure (which seems to me a tendentious claim).  The Doolittle raid on Japan in WWII was chiefly symbolic and had no real military significance, but that by itself doesn’t make that act terrorism, does it?

  Posted by slabarge on Feb 19, 2009 at 8:12 PM

  While a year or two too young to have run with the actual Weather Underground I was in several revolutionary collectives with people who were or had been members of the Weathermen (changed to WU because it was sexist). As a member of RYM-2, among others, I participated in acts of violence against carefully selected targets (that were absent of any humans at the time of our attacks) as well as intentionally violent street actions in and around Washington, D.C.
  Among the interminable 20+ hour meetings we had, more than one discussed the issue of terrorism and we decided that it was never justified and that civilian deaths were to be avoided when ever possible.

  The issues the author of this article addresses are those my comrades and I  dealt with at the time, and appraises our failures quite accurately. I do not regret any of those activities, they have colored my view of the world, of the behavior of leaders and groups, and by and large, those politics still influence my behavior today.
  My mother worked at the NJ Division on Civil Rights at the time and I criticized her efforts as a waste a time. I realize in retrospect that she did more do help ‘the masses’ than anything my comrades and I ever came close to doing.

  Posted by Stannous Flouride on Feb 19, 2009 at 8:35 PM

  I was only ten years old ni 1969, studying pictures of Howard’s friend (alomng with Nixon’s, of course…) in LIFE Magazine. LIFE was a weird experience—those pics from Viet Nam (the screaming girl during a napaplm attack…) didn’t jibe with what I was being taught in school about American military honor; Woodstock and Coumbia and Chicago didn’t look anything like my small suburban town.

  I’ve read a lot about Weather Underground since—Dan Berger’s book seems pretty comprehensive, if a bit biased. I’ve followed Bill Ayer’s statements over the course, especially recently. Have to say that Howard’s essay here is one of the best analyses I’ve come across—heartfelt, critical in the best sense of the world and very relevant indeed.

  In regard to that damned label “Terrorism,” I find Howard’s definition a tad restrictive; I find most definitions too restrictive, because, having euqated terrorism with evil, the problem is that everyone wants to use the word to define that-which-WE-do-not-do. Thus, planting bombs in the Pentagon—or smashing up storefronts on the streets of Chicago—isn’t terrorism because terror involves deliberate homicide. Conversely, “Shock and Awe” isn’t “terrorism,  because it’s a “military operation.”

  Maybe a good working re-definition would be something along the lines of, “acts motivated by some political program and aiming at a political goal, whose symbolic value—designed to shock a wide audience by instilling fear—trump the actual value of the resulting damage itself.”  Mailing anthrax, 9/11, firebombing Tokyo, KKK lynchings, WU blowing up the Haymarket statue (WU), “Shock and Awe” all fit under this heading. Random, psychopathic actions don’t.

  I don’t think most individual or groups decide, “let’s be terrorists!” They devise a plan suited to a particular goal, one which may wind up falling under that rubric. There’s really no such thing a a “terrorist”—there are individuals who have, rightly or wrongly, utilized these methods in pursuit of specific goals.

  Which leads to the question: is terrorism ever justified? I’d be curious to know what Howard thinks of ELF and ALF, groups that feel that asymettrical warfare is the only tactic available to them in the face of corporate rule and public complaisance.

  After reading what I have, I found myself sympathetic with many of WU’s ideological underpinnings, but appalled at the extremes—even the rhetorical extremes—to which members would go. Howard mentions the Manson “fork” sign, but doesn’t explain its revolting significance, nor Ms Dohrn’s comments at Flint about the Tate-LaBianca murders. Hating the Pentagon at the time?  I get that. Celebrating Sharon Tate’s death, and the fork business? It’s hard for me to understand how kids would get off on it, how anyone would still want to be a part of the organization after hearing that kind of thing. Gangsta’s don’t even talk like that . 

    Thanks again, Howard, for a truly reflective essay. Most stuff tends to be either ” mea culpa, mea culpa—everything we thought and said was wrong!,” or “I’d do it all over again,” or the hedging Ayers manages so well. This seems to me to one of the more honest attempts to come to terms with both a personal past and a historical moment whose memory lingers.

  michael horan
  http://www.nosuppertonight.com

  Posted by nosuppertonight.com on Feb 20, 2009 at 1:19 AM

  I admire the courage and honesty of our author to criticize wrongs, including his own. Such were the problems I had as a college student with WU—I agreed with the Dellinger approach then and now. Good for you for making this analysis and I’m glad you’re still in the Left movement. We are not in a revolutionary situation, but we need patient organizing and action for sure. I do wish you’d mentioned the labor movement as the initial American organizing model. It, after all, invented sit-ins and several leaders mentored SNCC…the CIO of the 1930’s was plenty militant and we need to look back at that period more for tactics and inspiration. Stay with us and contribute more ideas.

  Posted by mimsky on Feb 20, 2009 at 5:44 AM

  Personally, I never thought there was much of a possibility of revolution in America.  I mean, if we didn’t have one in 1932, for example, then just when would the conditions be right for one?  Even today, with capitalism in a global meltdown, I don’t see any sign of revolution in America.  Certainly, there is plenty of discontent, anger, alienation, and all that, but it’s not really new.

  In the late-1960s, when middle class was much larger, and the welfare state and organized labor still existed, revolution in America was a truly delusional proposition—just the well-known youthful radical chic of Baby Boomers, which I never took very seriously. 

  Of course, there’s always the possibility of revolution from the right, a revolution that manages to exploit all the alienation and discontent in society in a sort of racist, nationalist, fundamentalist movement, like the Know Nothings or the KKK.  In this country, the last revolution from the right was actually that of the Confederate States in 1860-61, a revolution to conserve the aristocracy of the slave holding South and its (mostly) agrarian economy. 

  Needless to say, Jeff Davis and the Confederate States of America is not change I can believe in, no matter that I had ancestors on both sides of the question—quite literally brother against brother, in fact.  Historically speaking, though, my best guess is that a revolution from the right is more likely in America than one from the left.  Personally, I would prefer us to become a nice, secure social democracy like Canada or Denmark rather than be taken over by some fascist or right-wing populist movement. 

  we could do worse than social democracy, and often we have.

  Michael C. McHugh

  Posted by mcmchugh99 on Feb 23, 2009 at 2:52 PM

  Michael Mc, I couldn’t agree more. If we ever become a social democracy, I’ll celebrate and probably not mind that we didn’t have a revolution. Maybe we won’t need one.

  Posted by mimsky on Feb 24, 2009 at 2:27 AM

  Page 1 of 1 pages

• register a new account »Posting Security

  To participate in our forums, please register for a free account.

  Username Password

    Remember me
  

  Retreive lost password »

Also by Howard Machtinger

• You Say You Want a Revolution
  A founding member of the Weather Underground looks back at an organization unable to come to terms with its own violence.