The release of Hugo Blanco is an Inspiring victory for the entire Latin American revolutionary movement. Peru's outstanding revolutionary fig ure became famous throughout the continent for his method of going directly to the peasants and heipins them to organize themselves into pow erful and militant unions, principally under slogans demanding recognition of their democratic rights, particulariy those associated with a thoroughgoing agrarian reform.
a death sentence, Hugo Blanco proclaimed his adherence to the Fourth International and emphasized that the socialist revolutions Latin America following the Cuban revolution.
Hugo Blanco's release came a little more than seven and one-ball years after his arrest. He was held for more than three years in Arequipa in solitary confinement. before he was finally brought to trial in Tacna.
After being sentenced, Hugo Blanco was taken to the prison island of El Frontón, notorious for its brutal conditions.
In both Arequlpa and El Fronton, Hugo Blanco staged various hunger strikes in protest against the vile con ditions under which he was held, or in solidarity with other prisoners whose rights were violated.
Captured by the Peruvian military forces, who hunted him down as a guerrilla fighter in 1963, Blanco was twice threatened with judicial murder.
his life being saved in each instance only by a massive campaign of international protest.
Hugo Blanco grew up in Cuzco, where he saw at first hand the des perate poverty of the oppressed In dian masses who constitute the majoriof the Peruvian population. From his youth, he spoke Quechua, the Indian language, as well as Spanish.
In the early 1950s, Blanco went to Argentina, where he studied agronomy and worked as an active union member in an American-owned meat-packing plant. When he returned to Peru, he helped to organize the giant dem onstrations at the time of the visit of the then Vice-president Richard Nixon in 1958. Forced to flee Lima, Hugo Blanco returned to Cuzco, where he and his comrades began to organize peasant unions.
In the upsurge of the Latin American revolution inspired by the estab lishment of a workers state in Cuba, Hugo Blanco became a legendary fig ure in Peru. Working among the landless peasants of the valley of La Convencion in the Cuzco region, he organized unions to defend the rights of the landless against the Jacendodos (big landowners).
Blanco translated the Trotakyist program of mame struggle in accordance with Peruvian conditions. Im the winter of 1962 and spring of 1963, the revolutionary peasant unions led by him engaged In large-scale roeuperations" of lands Wiegally held by the hacendados.
The landowners responded with ar my and police attacks. and in the ensuing battles, several soldiers were killed. Hunted by the military, Blanco was hidden successfully by the peas ante from November 1962 until May on to reaffirm and strest his membership of the Fourth International and his undying belief in revolutionary Marxism. Neira, a correspondent for the Lima daily Expreso, described the peasants' attitude toward Blanco:
"Fought by the right, his image dis torted by prestige due to erroneous reports about him being a guerrilla fighter, Injured by the silence, If not of the traditional, bureau cratic groups of Communism, extolled by the FIR Frente de Izqulerda Revolucionario- Front of the Revolutionary Left. feared and hated by the unorganized уаласолаз [Indians bound to personal service to the land lordal and the hacendados, admired by the union ranks, Hugo Blanco looms over the whole South.
"This Is the straight truth, without falsification, of what this man, who is a prisoner loday In Arequipa, means to the peasant masses We owe him everything. say the peasants. in fact every change in Convención and elsewhere in the country was accelerated due to the danger they saw in the peasants having no. hope other than hope in the revolutionary unionIsm of Bianco.
"Devotion to Blanco is total; they doa't dare bring him to trial. 1 am referring to the unionired peasants. "He is our chief, they say. And in every peasant's home there is an empty bed. It's the one that was wait ing hopefully for the leader when he was going around the region organizing or when he was passing during the night, under the stars. fleeing from the police.
"In the Plaza de Armas in Cusco, the evening came, dressed in red, flaming. The meeting of the peasants was languishing. The crowd, disciplined, standing. listened, applauded. laughed, or yawned.
"Then a student came forward He took the mike and shouted In Quechua:
'Causachu companero cana, Hugo SETTER "The crowd awoke and responded with great shouts:
"Causachu, cansachi, cousachn."
"Long livel Long live! Long live?
*I saw this repeated throughout the South. No other name arouses greater fervor among the men. in striped ponchos who speak the euphonious Quechua. The shadow of Hugo I am not exaggerating: the unity of this agrarian movement that has no limits, like an immense ocean. whether in ideology or comportment.
and gunfire, has, nevertheless, a name that unites the people of the mountaine and the valleys, of the baclenda and the community-Hugo Blanco."
Support for Blanco extended into the urban working class as well, as was demonstrated by a twenty-four. hour general strike demanding his re lease that paralyzed the city of Cuzco In December 1963 The Cuban leaders, even though they were at variance with his tactical Guevara said of him:
"Hugo Blanco Is the head of one of the guerrilla movements in Peru. He struggled stubbornly the te pression was strong. I don't know what his tacties of struggle were, but his fall does not signify the end of the movement It is only a man that has but the movement continues." fallen, Hugo Blanco's standing with the new revolutionary generation in Peru can be judged from the following com ments by Hector Bejar in his book Peru 1965: Notes on a Guerrilla Expenience:
. under the influence of the left in some instances and spontaneously in others, the unionization of the pensantry broadened from 1956 up to 1962. The highest point of this great wave, because of the political quality of ite leaders, was In the valleys of La Convencion and Lares and the most outstanding figure was Huge Blanco."
This widespread support for Hugo Blanco proved to be a great embar rasement to the Communist party. par ticularly in view of the fact that the CP had contributed to the defeat of the peasant movement by withholding ald because of Blanco's Trotskyist affiliation.
Hector Bejar describes in his book the impact that Blanco's movement had the radicalizing Peruvian youth. many of whom had been in Trotskylet militant Thin fact presented a serious problem for the left. Hadn't It been said for many years that the Trotskyists were agents of imperialism? Hadn't it been repeatedly claimed that Trotskyiam was a counterrevolutionary current? The years of Stalin ism were not in the distant past, and In any case, even with the idol of Stalin fallen, the supreme anathema against Trotskyism had not been withdrawn by anyone; it remained in full force "This, on the one hand. On the other, the left as a whole did not become fully incorporated into the peasant struggle. It directed the organizations from above, advised the unions, sent organizers temporarily into the field, but It did not lead 'from within' the way Blanco did "On the one hand, its still existing political prejudices prevented it from giving Blaneo the collaboration he merlted. On the other hand, its inertia kept it Jocked within the old urban molds."
Hugo Blanco and twenty-eight other peasant organizers were brought to trial before a milltary court on Au gust 30, 1966. Prior to the trial, news papers reported that the prosecutor would ask for a twenty-five-year Ben tence and that the Judges would In crease the sentence to death.
But although the trial was held In the tiny, isolated village of Tacna Blanco's supporters were able to mo bilize sufficient public attention to stay the hands of the executioners. The military judgew rejected their legal ad viser's recommendation of the death penalty and sentenced Hugo Blanco to twenty-five years' confinement in the Island prison of El Fronton.
Not content with this savage sen tence, Peru's rulers soon made a sec ond attempt to place Hugu Blanc before a firing squad. When his law yer appealed the sentence to the Su preme Military Court in November the prosecutor also appealed, asking the court to order Blanco's execution For the next eleven months, the res outlonary leader's life hinged on thi outcome of the internations campaig in his defense. Demonstrations, resc lutions, appeals were launched aroun the world -Japan, France, Canada the United States, Belgium, England Scotland, Greece, Italy, Chlle, Sweden West Germany, Nigeria, India, Mex co. Argentina, as well as in Pen Blanco recelved the support of An nesty International, Jean-Paul Sartre Bertrand Russell, the Chilean M11 [Movimiento de Izqulerda Revolucion aria - Movement of the Revolutionar Left, Labour members of parliamer in England, the Québer Federation o Labor, the Italian General Confedera tion of Labor, the Walloon Worker party, and numerous other organiza tions and individuals In New York, nearly 400 partic pants in the Socialist Scholars Cor ference signed a petition demandin amnesty.
Shortly thereafter, the United Stab Committee for Justice to Latin Amer can Political Prisoner [OSLA] wa organized. USLA took on an Increa ingly larger role in the defense Blanco, and after Peruvian Presider Fernando Belaunde Terry ylelded t the internatlonal pressure and permi ted the Supreme Military Court to cor firm Blanco's original sentence in Ch tober 1967, USLA continued the cam
Our Mole reporter went to the TUC "demonstra Aid, UNA, Freedom from Hunger, etc. The lion™ against the Bill at the Royal Albert Hall last week, expecting to be bored out of his mind and to catch up on some sleep. In the event it was quite a jolly evening to start with, though the natives got restless towards the end when they realised they too had gone there without just cause.
We started off with some lovely community hymh-singing as people found their way to their seats. I suppose they were worried about an Ibrox Park disaster as people fell over themselves to best the gospel. In any event Billy Graham would have loved it: This emotional softening up went through some reaily nice working class classics, songs of struggle, such as "Down at the Old Ball and Bush", "Toot, toot tootsie goodbye". And, Just In case people were feeling a little apprehensive about being jailed under the Tories, we had "When you're smiling, you're always smiling, the whole world smiles with you". There's nothing like a bit of internationnlism to give a warm rosy glow. And after the General Council members had taken their seats, behind the massed ranks of chrysanthemums, we had the strains of "When the Saints go Marchin" In"
But despite these desperate attempts to ensure that a good time would be had by all, there was no euphoria when our compere for the evening, Lord Pilkington of Cooper, took his place at the pulpit, Given that most of the people present were trade union officials, guests of the TUC, or just plain stupid to have gone there anyway, what followed was remarkable. From the beginning the air was punctuated by cries of "Kill the Bill" and "General Strike the microphones and fill the Albert Hall with constructive critleism. Of the 6,000 present an estimated half refrained from giving any applause to Wilson or Feather, and of those some hundreds were opposing the platform in an active fashion.
Wilson '3 speech was a spirited defence of Donovan and an attack on "those one or two of you who have to come to jeer and ure not trades unionists anyway". One speech was received with massive applause: that of Bill Wedderburn, Industrial law expert, who was clearly the only one on the platform to fully understand the Bill. He distinguished himself from the others by calling for a soelalist society (which brought the house down] and contrasted with Feather who bemoaned the loss of the "social revolution" that had taken place under Labour, Wedderburn did not make a speech. He just explained, and for that he got rapturous applause after a respectful hearing. Feather after a few jokes was scarcely audible as people began to vacate their seats for the comfort of public houses. He could dimly be heard reciting the borrors of life under the Torles and brought us the crushing news that the numbers of old Bal pensioners nare increased Since the defeat of for review this year. In October, it was discov.
There were some brighter spots. Ena Sharples Bred that at Morris's British Leyland were brought a messuge of solidarity from Coronation employing women directly at E10 5s. for a 20Street. Of course, Bessle Braddock's dead and, thank God, no one could replace her, but the friendly socialists at Granada allowed our Ena to Cleanwell, as it pays British Leyland to use tape a message and her ugly mug to be blown up thousands of times on a giant screen. And at for parity. The contractor reported that British one point we had a visitation. Lord Citrine came Leyland "couldn't" pay more than their 5/back from the dead. Once again the lights were killed and a searchlight illuminated his VIP box where he stood, silverhaired, looking like an ambassador waiting to be kidnapped. His recor ded volce told us how the Bill would have to be of what goes to the women! (though BL is drastically amended if it was to be at all workable. And as the lights came up again, he disappeared., He left his chauffeur outside.
YOUNG LIBERAL SACKED BY CHARITY FOR ANT-APARTHEID RESEARCH Donglas Marcheer, International Secretary of the Young Liberal movement and a ViceCuirman of Putney Young fiberals, was recently sacked from his job as Youth Officer for the Voluntary Committee on Overseas Aid and Development /COAD, He had recently heen doing research into the political implications of the Cabora Bassa dam scheme in Southern Africa. He received a letter from Mr. F. Lees, the General Secretary of COAB, explaining that this type of wark *Infringed Charity laws" and as a result his services were no longer reanired Mir Warchant Chairman of Freedom from Hunger is Sir Gilbert Rennie, a former Governor-General of Rhodesia.
At a meeting of activists to discuss the sacking, Mr. Marchant said, "T have no doubt that the reason behind my sacking was the findings of my research into the Cabora Bassa dam scheme and the disclosure of the extent of inohement of British companies. There are people involved in these charities who stand to gain from the perpetuation of Apartheid. They do not want the public to know the details of the scheme and its role in preserving the white minority regimes in South Africa and the Portu guese territories in Southem Africa.
"Although it will be difficult es I no longer have the resources Chad at VCOAB, I shall continue my research. / hope to publish a pamphlet to work in. This action is a help, but it is not on the scheme in the near furure."
commented, This vicious and unfair sacking is an example of the growing victimisation of activists invobed in the Anti-Apartheid cause.
The fact that this type of research was part of Douglas's work makes me wonder if this is the start of a campaign to remove politically conscious people from Charity posts."
OXFORD WOMEN CLEANERS STRIKE TOO Not two months after the strike at the Board of other militants reported in Red Mole no. 13 by Linda Fryd of London Socialist Woman Group), women cleaners went on strike in the Pressed Steel factory in Oxford, They came out on January 1st in support of a E4 pay claim, after the management had offered them precisely 5/-.
Like the London women, Pressed Steel cleaners are employed through a contractor-in this case London and Home Counties. Pressed Steel Fisher first brought the contractors in some years ago when the women began to organise into the T&GWU. The first firm they used attempted to get away with reducing wages paid from 5/2%d to 3/6d per hour. 100% unionisation was organised to combat this. But the cleaners still get only £6 5s for a 20 hour week, on evening shift. And negotiation on their behaif by the union has not always brought benefits: like the occasion two years ago when e new contract was sioned for fewer women-that is, the union allowed the management to sack some workers, Instead of the original 120, 95 women are now employed at Pressed Stael.
The present Pressed Steel contract was due hour week. At both Pressed Stael and BMC (BMC is contracted at the same rate through competing firms), the women put in a demand offer on the contract. The contractors of course couldn't give up any of their rake-insome of these firms are known to get only 200% presumed to drive a harder bargain than that). And of course we all feel for Stokes & Co. facing a hard winter after making only £4 million profit last year. - The fact is that without the contract system British Leyland would have to pay its cleaners basic engineering rates, which of course it doesn't want to do.
The Pressed Steel cleaners' strike has held solid and despite their isolation they voted or January 4th and January 11th to continue the strike. One reason for their isolation has been the acceptance of a two-year deal by the BMC women. Under this deal they are limited for the whole pariod to a 30/- rise over a year. They are bound by a "faxibility and mobility" agreement under which they can be moved around and doubled up at the will of the management. They have also agreed to "natural wastage"fancy term for permitting the bosses to lay off workers. The pressures on women workers to strike orticial, so that the women are recerving no strike pay: a fairly obvious instance of dis crimination against women workers, the case for a strike being so clear-cut. Moreover, the union negotiator has reduced their claim from E4 to E2 10s.
What is desperately needed for the success of the strike is support from other workers, In the case of London, May Hobbs said they would never have got so far without help, and in Oxford as well support is urgently needed. So far in Oxford not nearly enough has been done.
Inside Pressed Steal, the only gesture of solidarity so far has been the refusal of other T&G workars to handle refuse bags put around by the THE TRUTH WILL OUT, SOMETIMEST management. The strikers hope that other workers twill come out when the place gets unfit enough. More urgent steps are needed. Most Graham Tope, Chairman of South East Y. L. important of all the strike must be made official at once. If the T.U. officials do not hurry to take action, then that only shows the greater urgency of building Trade Union Councils of Action to help gain support for women and any other workers in struggle But the Oxford strikers need support NOW. Messages of support to: Mrs. Phyllis Jones, 20 Merlin Road, Blackbird Leys, Oxford.
In im December, the Mational Asselition of Schoolmasters (the union of the career minded male chauvinient met in Manchester The Seaver Vice President Mr. Choking made a reds under the heal? artack on the NUT He pointer out that there wern at least wo meriters of the C.P on the NUT executive-the C.P, being the poll dual perty plying hover with the dritab conomy. He followed fils by explaining it war not a sneer chiperon and that each person i Alould have the right to mair polition yies but all thather had the right to know ebout twen However, this atract on te CP work in the NUT goes selly amas and will embarrass Mal Morris feeding NUT buresuerat and favourite C.P. pin-upl. Resetonary teachers fot umom, else, there are still many/ should be theN fel that the C.P, i active in the NUT. active in serving their antineers. The CP mechare fought agema tha milliones in the NUT 10 cared for sevking on December Bm EVENTS MONDAYS: Birmingham Red Circle, 7.30 p.m., The Black Swan, Bromsgrove Street, Digbeth WEDNESDAYS: Stefford Red Circie, B p.m, Dag & Partridgs, South Walls.
Institute, Bothwell Street.
JANUARY 19th: Left Forum, Commercial Hotel, Bathgate, 7.30 p.m. - Why Socialism'", Free if at all possible.
JANUARY 20th: University of Canterbury Socialist Society, Robin Blackburn on The Death of the New Left, 8 p.m.
JANUARY 20th: Chelmsford, Mid-Evex Tech: Teriq Ali on Revolutionary Socialism. 7.30 p.m. JANUARY 23rd: "Teachers and tha industrial Relations Bill: Speakers: Joe Finch, Duncan Hallas. 2 p.m, Northants. Nutto Hall, Jockeys Fields, W.C.1. Organised by "Education Today & Tomorrow" & "Rank & File". JANUARY 25th: Gorky's "The Mother". Film show by London Socialist Woman Group 8 p.m, at Chelsea Poly, Manrase Road (ishconfirmed, so chack by ringing 574 74071. Entrance 3/-, proceeds to night-cleeners fund.
FEBRUARY 2nd: London Socialist Women Group public meeting: "What does part-time work da for women?" Discussion introdueed by Jew Porter. Bp.m with 2,400 bottles of fresh milk and gave them George IV puh, Pantonville Road (corner Cumming Streetl. (King'y X or Angel).
FEBRUARY 12th: A Red Mair Forum, Devid McLallan will introduce a discustion on Marx's Gruntripse, extracts from which will be soon be bopcaring in bodic form. Time & place of meeting to be announced later. MARCH Sth: "Women Unite" demonstration for 4 demands: Equal Pay Now: Froe 24 hour Nursery Faci- a little better at 5,400,000, the Myers men lities; Equal Education & Job Opportunities; Free Contraception & Abortion on Demand. Assembles 1.30, Speakers Corner. Rally Trafalger Square, 4 p.m. Provision for children. Contact: March 6th Ad Hoc Committee, c/o 23 Baalbec Road, London N.5, ring 01-226 3911.
MARCH 28th: Day Seminar an "Socis Coupee 8 Con. to demand a 60% wace increase.
"In the thousands of years we've inhabited these islands, we've confined ourselves to a mere 20% of their total area.
That's one acre.out of sepry five. Even so, a couple of problems which the Industrial Revolu tion brought in its wake have yet to be-solved.
"Namely those uf pollution and urban squalour. Or to put it the impolite way, filth and rotten housing.
"It's the rotten housing conditions which concern the majority of ur.
"Out of 18% million dwellings in this country nearly 2 million are totally unfit for habitation.
Not surprising therefore that a large section of the public is asking what is being done to solve this problem."
One could be forgiven for assuming that the above was a bit of socialist propaganda designed - to disprove the racialists" lie about overcrowding They would be wrong, however -it is an extract from the National Press, placed by the Building Societies Association" of Park Street, W.1.
The very people who have amassed thousands of millions of pounds by battening on the housing problem.
SHITHOUSE OF THE YEAR Many telerfewers have seen the kind face and heard the homely voice of the workers champ Zon. Mr. Victor Grayson, Keir Hardie Feather, to his friends plain Vie Feather, general secretory of the TUC Unfortunately too few people know him in the rote of landiond and ballift A fantily of four are jacing eviction from a ried cottage owned by Vic Feather.
Mr. Ernest Rogers, 46, his wife and two voung daughters were given a month's notice in October, Then Mr. Rogers, who worked as a poultryman for a Mr. Hammond, a farmer, was deciared redundant. The cottage leased by Mr.
Hammond went with the job.
Mr. Rogers, a former member of the BrO and the Boilermakers Union, is refusing to vacate the cottage.
The feudal baron T: U. leader Vie Feather THURSDAYS: Glasgow Red Circle, 7.30 p.m, Christian has written to Mr, Rogers saying, "I'm aorry for the position you find yourself in. The only amagement F have about the tenancy is with Mr. Hammond and when the lease is finally completed a member of our family is writing to move in."
One dey in the not-foo-distant future, Shithouse Feather, the militant revolutionary workers movement will evict you from the post you so ably prostitute.
Footnote: For ancialists wishing to help fight the eviction, the cortuge is in Tirchmarsh, REDISTRIBUTION It was recenlly reported from Cordoba, Argen tina, a four-man guerrilla group held up a lotry all away in a nearby poor neighbourhood.
THERE'S MONEY IN MUCK Nothing ever escapes the profit-seekers. Broken Myers & Co. belleve the shares of Fisons, the fertiliser to-drugs group, should be bought at their present level of 42.-.
Pronts tor me last year should come out reckon, and they say 8,400,000 could be on the cards for 1971.
The men and women who work in Fison Fertiliser Factories suffer abominable conditions at notional average wages. With the E3,000,000 increase in profits forecast, they have every right
viewpoint of the official Zionist leadership of
----- pull-quotes -----
The freeing of Hugo Blanco is like- wise a great victory for the world Trotskyist movement. In court, facing
building of a revolutionary-socialist party represented the key to winning
Hugo Blanco, photographed in Limu soon ufter his release. The first thing Blanco did was to demand the release of Eduado Crews and other militants will in prison. He then went
which can just as well turo peaceful and cooperative an explode in blood
approsch, were well aware of the im- portance of his work. In 1963 Che
Now". Don't believe the bullshit about handfuls Trade buildings which led to the formation of of people. No handful of people could overcome the Cleaners Action Group by May Hobbs and