DEMONSTRATING WHAT?
The movement for solidarity with the Vietnamese has advanced considerably in the past year. Two major demonstrations have shown the strength of the movement and created an atmosphere of confidence on the left, which is unfamiliar to many activists, but which has brought thousands of new young people into political struggle for the first time.
The demonstration scheduled for October 26th this year is likely to be bigger than ever, and is already beginning to involve wider sections of the political movement than ever before. In the last few months the Young Communist League and its associated organisations have joined the ranks of the solidarity movements a significant step forward from the period just before March 17th when VSC supporters had to defend the movement against a factional onslaught from this quarter. In addition there is every prospect of fruitful cooperation with a section of the trade union movement. It seems, however, that there is a need for clarity on what the left should aim to get out of the forthcoming actions, in particular in relation to violence on demonstrations — an issue which has tended to come to the fore in recent months. At root, this is a question of political attitudes, and it is desirable to outline the position which has characterised the VSC, and which INTERNATIONAL fully supports.
Basically it must be stressed that because of the importance of the Vietnamese struggle on a world scale, it was necessary to initiate a special campaign in its defence. For more than two years the VSC has sought to do this, acting as a united front on this one issue alone. This work has led the VSC and its supporters into battle against the right-wing of the Labour Party over its support for US aggression and against those sections of the left which favoured a negotiations formula. The argument for solidarity as against negotiations has been largely resolved, although the underlying political differences may still assert their presence in some form. The great majority of people formerly organised around a negotiations platform are now in the solidarity camp and their organisations have been drawn into united front
WINNING WORKING CLASS SUPPORT
The next major hurdle facing the VSC is the task of winning sections of the working class to a solidarity position, and more immediately opposing British complicity in the war. Dramatic gains in this field are unlikely, given the low level of political activity in the labour movement and the tendency for demoralisation following the savage attacks by the Labour Government against the workers, which so far have not met with a coordinated response. Furthermore, unlike the American working class, British workers have little perspective of acting decisively and effectively against the war. In spite of this, it is necessary to carry the campaign into broader layers of the working class movement. What must be stressed again and again is that VSC exists in order to win people to the side of the Vietnamese, and everything falls into place behind this: and not the other way round.
Undoubtably, the VSC experience can lay the basis for progress in other fields; it can have a uniting effect. But this is not to say that VSC should mobilise on other issues or that the only reason it should concentrate on Vietnam is because more people will turn out on that issue. Both these arguments have been put forward of late, and both betray a failure to understand the united front character of VSC - a tendency to confuse it with building an organisation with broader political objectives (as if we don't have a number of these already!) There is also an element of sectarianism which seems to imply that the Vietnamese cannot triumph until there has been a revolution in the advanced capitalist countries. Welcome as such a development would be, it must not be assumed implicitly or explicitly that this is a precondition for the victory of the Vietnamese.
Nor does our wish to see revolutions in the advanced capitalist countries absolve us from the responsibility of defending the Vietnamese Revolution: indeed it could be argued that if we cannot rise to defend the Vietnamese Revolution we cannot be expected to achieve sufficient consciousness to make a revolution in the west.
Something of this confusion and sectarianism pervades the argument for considering demonstrations as militant confrontations with the state. Having said that we want to create a mass movement on one issue, our energies should be directed to that end, and not be diverted into often meaningless battles against the police, all the more meaningless since the prospects of victory are extremely remote in the absence of a mass revolutionary movement of the working class. While "fuzz-bashing" displays a very healthy attitude towards the capitalist state and its representatives, it is quite a separate matter from our central task of mobilising increasing numbers of people in support of the NLF - a political task rather than a military one!
DEFENSIVE STRATEGY
This means that the limited resources at the disposal of the movement should be used mainly for ensuring the maximum involvement in activity. Organisation in demonstrations should be aimed at fairly modest and basically defensive measures such as ensuring that the demonstration is protected from harrassment by the police and that individuals are not left in a situation where they are vulnerable to police attacks. This involves a certain amount of self-discipline, but is more likely to win the sympathy of bystanders than a series of uncoordinated adventures. It means that we must resist behaviour of the type seen in Grosvenor Square on July 21st when some comrades sought to draw the demonstration into a confrontation on the green, contrary to the declared intentions of the organisers, even when most demonstrators preferred to remain spectators.
Tactics on demonstrations should relate to the needs of the situation and the mood of the marchers; although one's first instinct is to act to help those engaged in battle we should always avoid having our tactics determined by minorities whose motives (as on July 21st) were largely factional - seeking to expose the "revisionism" of the organisers. Whether the revelation was worth the effort is debatable, but what is certain is that such activity contributes nothing to the progress of the movement.
October mobilisation. We must continue, and develop the practice of having stewards [illegible] arms along the front of the march and at the sides applying consciously the policy of "No arrests". The "target" of the demonstration must be determined by the political objectives of action, i.e., the exposure of British complicity and the desire to show our solidarity with the Vietnamese people in their fight against American imperialism. This takes priority over tactical considerations. The fact that many demonstrators are unable to contain their anger at the sight of the American Embassy underlines the need to take steps to try to protect the demonstration from traps set by the police.
Comrades must surely be aware of the extent to which police infiltrate demonstrations. If a couple of hundred in plain-clothes are used at a football match - how many for Grosvenor Square? In order to propagate its ideas on a mass scale, the movement must operate openly and legally, using such rights as we have to the full. We do not have the means to do otherwise, unless we abandon the overall political perspective of building a mass movement (itself a prerequisite of militancy). This is the issue at the centre of the discussion on "tactics". We are demonstrating for the support of the Vietnamese, no more and no less, and October 26 will be a step forward in this respect.
* See COMMENT 17/2/68 and reply: "The Left and Vietnam", 9d post paid from 6, Toynbee St., E.1.