Revolutionary
Socialist Republic1980Republicanism and the IRANo public scan is online for this item; the text below was read from a privately held copy.
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In a recent series of articles in An Phoblacht/Republican News, Ciaran O'Dowd has carried out an analysis of 'Revolutionary Gucrilla Warfare! studying struggles in China, Victnam, Cuba and Nicaragua. This represents a serious attempt by the Republican left to deepen the content of the paper. and broaden the conciousness of the member ship and supporters of the republican We welcome this attempt and the efforts of Republican News/An Phoblacht to broaden its general coverage of workiny class struggles and establish itself definitively as a left-wing paper. However we have to say that in this particular series the attempt has failed. Fundamentally it fails because the concept around which the articles are organised -- that of 'Revolutionary Guerilla Warfare! has no real existence. It is not possible to show a clear connection between gucrilla war asa particular method of warfare and the process of revolution. Revolutionary forces tan use any method of armed struggle in the conquest of power: guerilla warfare, mass uprisings or even the strug yle “of conventional armies. Nor is guerilla war in some way the spccial province of revolutionaries, The first guerilla struggle in Spain mentioned in the introduction to the 'Republican News! articles was in fact by right-wing monarchists.
NARROW MILITARY ANALYSIS This basic flaw has a number of effects. It prevents any real unified analysis of the four struggles outlined.