First Published: The Forge, Vol. 3, No. 14, July 28, 1978
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Malcolm and Paul Saba
Copyright: This work is in the Public Domain under the Creative Commons Common Deed. You can freely copy, distribute and display this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit the Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line as your source, include the url to this work, and note any of the transcribers, editors & proofreaders above.
On July 7 the People’s Republic of China stopped all economic aid to Albania. On page 13 of this issue of The Forge, we reprint excerpts from the note sent by the Chinese government to the Albanian embassy in Peking. This event has of course raised many questions.
Differences have existed between the Party of Labour of Albania (PLA) and the Communist Party of China (CPC) for quite some time, and these differences were the subject of internal debates between the two parties.
Despite these differences, China, basing itself on the principles of proletarian internationalism, has continued throughout the years to furnish Albania with enormous aid (close to $5 billion worth). However, since its 7th Congress in 1976, the PLA has launched public attacks against socialist China and its foreign policy, against the Communist Party of China as well as indirectly attacking Mao Tsetung Thought. Albania is now sabotaging Chinese aid and accusing China of “imperialism.” China has no choice but to withdraw this aid.
The Canadian Communist League (ML) also has differences with the PLA, especially on the question of the Marxist-Leninist analysis of the international situation, the theory of three worlds in a July 7, 1977 editorial of Zeri i Populit, (central organ of the PLA), the PLA puts forward an erroneous point of view on the international situation. It affirms that relations between the superpowers are characterized principally by collusion and not by rivalry. It denies that the rivalry between the USSR and the USA will inevitably lead to a new world war. It refuses to admit that there is uneven development between the two superpowers and that social-imperialism has become the most dangerous of the two on a world scale. And it denies the positive character of the non-aligned movement and of third world unity.
In fact, the PLA has liquidated the strategy of a broad united front to oppose the superpowers, thus leaving the world’s peoples unarmed in the face of their enemies, and abandoning revolutionary tasks in favour of “left”-sounding phrases.
However, up to now we have never discussed these differences publicly in order not to feed Soviet revisionism which would like nothing more than to see the international Marxist-Leninist movement divided and weakened. And we avoided this despite the attacks by the PLA branding all those who support the theory of three worlds as “counter-revolutionaries” and “revisionists”.
Today we can no longer remain silent. At this moment Brezhnev’s social-imperialist clique is engaged in an orchestrated offensive throughout the world. It is out to get control of the oil routes to Europe, establish itself in Africa, break the unity of third world countries and isolate socialist China, the vanguard of the anti-hegemonist struggle and the bastion of socialism. The threat of a new world war has become obvious to more and more people and countries.
And it is precisely this moment that the PLA has chosen to spread unfounded accusations and venimous slander about China and the CPC as well as other Marxist-Leninist parties and organizations. it’s not hard to see who benefits from these attacks.
On June 24, Zeri i Populit, central organ of the PLA, published an editorial on the Vietnam-Kampuchea conflict entitled “imperialists, hands off Vietnam”, in which it calls for all-out support for Vietnam and doesn’t mention a word about the aggressive acts of Vietnam nor of its links with the USSR. Instead it would have us believe that Kampuchea and China are the aggressors!
But, even more serious, through its positions on the international situation, and other recent articles and pamphlets, the PLA has reached the point of putting in question Chairman Mao Tsetung’s front-line role and his contributions to Marxism-Leninism.
It was Chairman Mao Tsetung who initiated and led the struggle against modern revisionism since it surfaced over 20 years ago. Through this struggle to defend the science of the proletariat, a struggle that the great educators of the proletariat – Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin, waged before him, Mao Tsetung developed Marxism-Leninism and left mankind a legacy that is a powerful instrument for liberation and that will live forever.
After the deaths of Lenin and Stalin, opportunists started attacking Leninism, all the while calling themselves “Marxists”. Today revisionists and opportunists attack Mao Tsetung Thought while claiming to be Marxist-Leninists.
The Second Congress of the CCL(ML) reaffirmed our fidelity to Marxism-Leninism Mao Tsetung Thought, and we will continue to defend this fundamental line because it is the only gµarantee of victory of socialist revolution in Canada. We will also continue to defend great socialist China and the Communist Party of China led by Chairman Hua Kuo-feng.
The CCL(ML) has always worked to build friendship with the Albanian people who defeated fascism, rejected the Soviet revisionist manoeuvres in 1960, built socialism in their country under the leadership of the PLA, and transformed Albania into the beacon of socialism in Europe. We want nothing more than to see the PLA and the Albanian people continue to maintain the exemplary role they played in the past.
The PLA’s latest acts are not a good thing. They play into the hands of Soviet social-imperialism, nurture the splittist manoeuvres of a handful of counter-revolutionary or degenerated groups and spread confusion among honest revolutionaries.
But in the final analysis, the struggles against opportunism and in defense of Marxism only strengthen our understanding of the fundamental principles of revolution as well as our capacity to apply them to the concrete situation in the world and in our own country. These struggles will inevitably lead to and are already leading to greater unity and the greater strength of the international Marxist-Leninist movement.
In fact the situation throughout the movement is overwhelmingly positive. The great majority of Marxist-Leninist parties and organizations in the world have resolutely defended the three worlds analysis, socialist China and Mao Tsetung Thought. As Chairman Mao has taught us, “The road is tortuous but the future is radiant.”