Guerrilla Warfare

by Walter Laqueur

  Urban terror in its most sophisticated and, for a while, most effective form, made its appearance in Uruguay, the very country which Guevara thought the least likely scene of armed struggle because it was the most democratic. The Tupamaros (MNL) came into being in 1963; the heyday of their movement was between 1968 and 1972.44 The movement did not, however, produce a great deal of literature; its programatic writings were few and far between. Their doctrine was first outlined in the form of a catechism, "Thirty questions to a Tupamaro," circulated in late 1967.45 The basic difference between the Tupamaros and other left-wing organizations was, as they put it, the emphasis on revolutionary action rather than theoretical statements; revolution is not made by the elegant phrase. Once accepted that the basic principles of socialist revolutions are given and tested in countries such as Cuba, "there is nothing more to discuss." An armed movement can and should start operating at any time. The Tupamaros shared the conviction of the early Fidel that action should proceed "with or without a party." Strategies adopted elsewhere in Latin America could not be applied to Uruguay if only because the prospects for rural foci were almost nonexistent. This was compensated for, however, by the fact that the enemy was exceedingly weak. The Uruguayan security forces counted only some twelve thousand men, badly equipped and trained, "one of the weakest organizations of repression in America." Montevideo was a city sufficiently large and polarized by social conflict to make it an arena more suited to the struggle than many other centers on the continent. Overcoming their distaste for political programs, the Tupamaros produced a platform in 1971 but it contains little of interest since it closely resembled the programs of other left-wing movements on the continent, referring to agrarian reform, the nationalization of big factories, the expulsion of "imperialism," etc. More revealing were their occasional pronouncements on practical issues. The Tupamaros specialized in kidnappings, and for three years the government failed to retrieve a single hostage. A Tupamaro leader stated that the kidnappings were part of an overall strategy designed both to obtain the release of captured comrades and to undermine the foundations of the regime.46 In contrast to other Latin American guerrilla movements, th e Tupamaros endeavored to keep out of the ideological quarrels of the left; this was probably easier for them to do successfully than for guerrillas elsewhere, for the Tupamaros had a virtual monopoly as far as guerrilla operations in Uruguay were concerned. They were the most internationally minded of all Latin American guerrillas and took up Camilo Torres's idea of a continental organization of armed forces. This internationalism was probably not unrelated to the exposed situation of Uruguay; they very much feared an invasion from Brazil or Argentina. Their social composition was even more middle and upper class than that of other guerrilla movements: these were the sons and daughters of the establishment. (According to an apocryphal account, a Ph.D degree was a conditio sine qua non for membership.) In 1971 they decided to join the other forces of the left in a broad popular front (frente amplio) to contest the election; their candidate, however, did rather badly, receiving less than twenty percent of the vote.

  Organizationally, the experience of the Tupamaros is interesting; they managed to combine "strategic concentration" with tactical decentralization and compartamentación of the basic units. This made it difficult for the security forces to paralyze their organization despite frequent arrests. The Tupamaros were the only Latin American guerrillas to establish something akin to a countergovernment with "prisons of the people" and hospitals. They greatly undermined the authority of the government, disrupting the civil administration and the economic life of the country. Eventually, the democratic regime was replaced by a dictatorship, the army was brought in and liquidated Tupamaro activities with surprising ease. Some observers have explained the defeat of the Tupamaros in 1972 with reference to their mistaken decision of the previous year to open their ranks to many new members. But while this may have contributed to their downfall, the main reason was apparently the loss of revolutionary élan. Although the decline of the Tupamaros took place (unlike the downfall of the ALN in Brazil) against a background of severe economic crisis, there appears to be no close connection between guerrilla success (Cuba) or failure with the economic situation. Debray correctly noted in retrospect that, in digging the grave of liberal Uruguay, the Tupamaros also dug their own.47

  The Uses of Terror

  The shift from rural guerrilla warfare to operations in the cities was by no means limited to Latin America. There had been urban terrorism in Palestine during the last years of the British Mandate, in Cyprus and Aden, and, of course, in Ireland. In some instances only sporadic actions by very small groups were involved, elsewhere the struggle lasted for years and was well organized. "Urban guerrilla" factions were plagued by internal division not less than their precursors in the countryside. Ulster and Spain provide typical examples. The IRA split into two factions in 1969: the more militant "Provisionals" advocated the establishment of a thirty-two county Democratic Socialist Republic based "on the 1916 Proclamation, justice and Christianity," and attacked the "Officials" of the IRA for their Leninist ideological bias and their failure to launch massive terrorist action in Northern Ireland.48 The Basque nationalist movement split into several factions. ETA VI propagated a Trotskyism of sorts, dissociating itself from Basque "bourgeois nationalism";49 while supporting terrorist operations in principle, it concentrated on political activities. Meanwhile ETA V, another faction of young militants (who derived their inspiration from the Algerian insurgents) engaged in spectacular terrorist acts, decrying the Marxist "vegetarianism" of their opponents. Unlike Guillen and Marighela few of the leaders of these urban terrorist groups attempted to provide a new doctrine, but they were very ready to furnish personal accounts of impressions and explanations. Pierre Vallieres, one of the leaders of the Quebec separatists (FLQ) combined Paris Left Bank anarcho-Communism with a Fanonian belief in the cathartic effects of revolutionary violence.50

  For a somewhat more systematic ideological exposition and an attempt to present a coherent strategic concept one has to turn to the advocates of urban guerrilla warfare in West Germany and the United States, The groups involved were small in numbers, the effect of their operations insignificant, but they attracted a great deal of publicity and, at least to that extent, succeeded in achieving their aims. The Baader-Meinhof group (RAF — Rote Armee Fraktion), whose origins were in the student movement of the 1960s, stated in their first manifesto that the formation of armed resistance groups for purposes of "urban guerrilla" operations was both possible and justifiable.51 The overall aim was the seizure of power; the main obstacle facing the RAF was, according to the leaders of the group, the unfortunate fact that the public had been immunized by counterrevolutionary propaganda.52 With attacks against state oppression however, the masses could be revolutionized — bombs would help to awaken their consciousness. The state apparatus was to be demoralized, and partly paralyzed, thereby destroying the myth of its invulnerability and ubiquity.53 In the first phase of the struggle the main task would be to disseminate the idea of an armed struggle, to collect arms, and to organize small units of three, five or ten members. During the second phase the actions of a minority would turn into a mass struggle; with the support of the masses, militias were to be formed in those areas where the enemy was so much weakened as to be no longer able to concentrate his forces. Critics noted that the concept up to this stage closely followed Maoist strategy — simply transferring it to the cities.54 During the third and final phase, mass action (street demonstrations, strikes and barricades) would support the terror of the guerrilla units. Following the Latin American example, the RAF aimed at provoking the authorities into using increasingly brutal retaliation, massacres, and "Fascist concentration camps." The RAF regarded their struggle as part of a worldwide campaign against American imperialism, but this emphasis on the connections with national liberation movements in Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Latin America evoked criticism from within. A former leading member
of the group, the lawyer Horst Mahler, noted that operations in such a context were no longer urban guerrilla warfare but the establishment of a fifth column of the Third World inside West Germany — a concept unlikely to appeal to the masses.55 He also criticized the elitist character of the RAF, "the total isolation from the masses." In their very first declarations the RAF announced the intention to combine legal political activity (Basisarbeit) with the armed struggle. Such a combination, however, soon came to be regarded as impractical be it only because it would not escape the attention of the police. Mahler argued that even though it was exceedingly difficult for individuals to engage simultaneously in legal and illegal activities, the RAF as such should have found a way to overcome this obstacle. The movement needed a (civilian) base; some of the operations initially envisaged against absentee landlords and speculators were highly appropriate and it had been a mistake for the RAF to discontinue them.

  According to their original concept, the Baader-Meinhof group acknowledged that the revolutionary proletariat was the only force capable of guaranteeing victory over capitalism. In time the RAF would become the mailed fist of a (new) Communist party. This concept too fell by the wayside and was replaced by a new strategy which (Mahler claimed) was rooted in the anti-authoritarian phase of the student movement, with its counterculture, its "moralistic" attitude towards politics and other "petty bourgeois" ideological remnants.

  The leaders of the RAF group were neither "instinctive" guerrillas nor well-educated theoreticians, but activists whose imagination had been caught by the armed struggle in other parts of the world. They wanted to apply the "lessons" of the Far East and Latin America to conditions that were utterly different. It would be unrewarding to submit their military concepts and political ideas to rigorous analysis. They never made it clear what kind of revolution they had in mind, or whether a political party was needed to carry it out. They argued that the urban insurrections of the past such as the Paris Commune or the Russian revolution of November 1917 were of no use as a model for Germany in the 1970s. But they never indicated a more appropriate historical model, nor did they develop one of their own. On the other hand, they were heirs to a German tradition in which at least lip service ought to be paid to theory. They could not possibly reject ideology as did segments of the American New Left. ("Fuck programs! The goal of the revolution is to abolish programs and turn spectators into actors. It's a do-it-yourself revolution. . . .56) What mattered in the last resort, however, was the thirst for action not a conviction based on "scientific theory."

  But for the Germans' belief that all self-respecting terrorists needed a theory there were obvious similarities between the RAF and the small groups of white American "urban guerrillas" who developed out of the civil rights and anti-Vietnam demonstrations, and the university sit-ins. They were rooted in the age of radical chic when instructions for the fabrication of Molotov cocktails were featured on the cover of a journal dedicated to the critical study of English letters. Ideologically, these groups were inchoate and their manifestos were illiterate — the illiteracy of liberal, middle-class schools, not of the ghetto. Their common denominator was the destruction of the present political and social order, but beyond this it was a case of everyman-his-own-urban-guerrilla.

  The main white "urban guerrilla' faction, the Weathermen, emerged when the SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) split into three groups in late 1969. Many of its members had visited Cuba and Vietnam and wanted to bring the war back home: "We are adapting the classic guerrilla strategy of the Viet Cong and the urban guerrilla strategy of the Tupamaros to our own situation here in the most technically advanced country in the world."57

  While guerrilla movements elsewhere fought for national liberation, the Weathermen maintained that in America the urban guerrilla has to be antinational. For the revolution to be defined in national terms within so extreme an oppressor nation as the U.S. would be tantamount to "imperialist national chauvinism," But there was at least one section of the American people to which the concept of national liberation was applicable. Hence the appeal to build a movement which would support the blacks who, in the past, had fought almost alone. The Weathermen contacted the Black Panthers but these rejected the call for a joint urban guerrilla war, instead suggesting a mere alliance.

  The Weathermen were not sanguinely optimistic about the prospects of revolution in America; they saw it occurring, if at all, as a belated reaction to a successful world revolution. They were aware that it was pointless to appeal to workers or peasants, and they regarded the university campus as their main base. If Guevara (sic) had taught them that revolutionaries moved like fish in the sea, the alienation and contempt of the young people for America had created the ocean they needed. Guns and grass were united in the youth underground, freaks were revolutionaries and revolutionaries were freaks, as one of their communiqués put it. The manifestos of the Weathermen and of the SLA (Symbionese Liberation Army) betrayed the influence of a hedonistic counterculture; whatever they had learned from Guevara, it was not his appeal for an ascetic life. Making love, smoking dope and loading guns were all part of the revolutionary process, as they envisaged it. The "most potentially explosive conflict" brewing in America was between men and women and the program of the SLA stated expressis verbis that a system had to be created whereby people would not be forced to stay in personal relationships when they preferred to be free of them.58 The Weathermen's interest in politics was strictly limited; they were not concerned with training revolutionary cadres, let alone the education of the masses. The main aim was to scare and shock "honky America" and to this end all violent means, however barbaric, were appropriate. They approved of the murder by the Manson gang of the actress Sharon Tate, eight months' pregnant; to shoot a "genocidal robot policeman" was regarded as a sacred act.59 Subsequently, the Weathermen copied, without marked success, the strategy of certain black groups who saw the Lumpenproletariat and criminal elements as their natural recruits. Even later the SLA, with its emblem of a seven-headed cobra ("a i70,ooo-year-old sign signifying god and life"), aimed specifically at enlisting nonpolitical convicts into its ranks; they, after all, were only the victims of the system. What attracted a few young men and women (more women apparently than men) was not ideology but a life style, above all, "togetherness." A member later recalled that what had struck him was "that they were a family, a big very tight family. I wanted to be part of that. People were touching each other...."60

  The aims of the black urban extremist groups by comparison were far more tangible. They did not complain about "our colossal alienation" but did demand lull employment, decent housing, education, and the power to determine the destiny of the black community. Some of them, such as the Cleaver faction of the Black Panthers and the Black Liberation Army, were advocates of urban terror. The policeman was the representative of the occupation army in the black ghetto; the weapon was needed to educate the masses. Negro youth were called upon to show their mettle by brandishing guns. America was to be burned and looted, to be cleansed with fire, blood and death. Founded by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale, the Black Panthers were subsequently plagued by as much internal division as their white counterparts. Stokely Carmiehael, their erstwhile prime minister, a "cultural nationalist," was denounced for "not maturing to embrace" the ideology of the party, i.e., "the historical experience of Black people in America translated through Marxism-Leninism."61

  The fullest exposition of their doctrine was provided by Eldridge Cleaver, minister of propaganda. Marxism-Leninism was an outgrowth of European problems and a new ideological synthesis was called for to suit American conditions. There was no ail-American proletariat just as there was no ail-American Lumpenproletariat. The working class, as he saw it, was the right wing of the proletariat, the Lumpen constituting the left wing. It was not the Lumpen who were the parasites, but the working class. The streets belonged to the Lumpen, and it was in the streets that the Lumpen would rebel. They could not strike because they had no secure
relationship with the means of production: they had been locked outside the economy. Their immediate oppressor was the pig police who confronted them daily. Thus the Lumpen, who had been analyzed out of the revolution by the (white) Marxists-Leninists, would hit out at all the structures around them.62

  The Cleaver faction was eventually ousted from the Black Panther party which, under Huey Newton, moved more and more towards community action. The Cleaverists on the other hand advocated the combination of above-ground political action with antipolice terror, bank robberies, the execution of businessmen and the kidnapping of diplomats. George Jackson, who was killed during an attempted jailbreak in August 1971, envisaged in his book Blood in My Eye (1972) resistance to the Fascist American government as a "fluid, mobile, self-impelled attrition of people's urban guerrilla activities lying in wait inside the black colony." Other spokesmen stressed that they regarded themselves as the "Babylonian equivalent" of the Tupamaros, Frelimo and the NLF.63 If there was only a thin line between bandits and revolutionaries this (they assured the flock) should not cause undue apprehension, for many famous revolutionaries had started their careers as bandits before becoming politicized. Furthermore, there were good tactical reasons for letting revolutionary acts seem like acts of banditry.64

  The bark of the American "urban guerrilla" was considerably worse than his bite. By late 1970 the Weathermen had failed; the operations of the SLA in 1974 were no more than the actions of a few unstable individuals, the like of whom have always existed on the margins of a violent society. Eldridge Cleaver, after a prolonged stay in Algiers, discovered that the "Babylon" from which he had fled in anger and disgust had much to recommend itself. Thus the appeals to conduct "urban guerrilla warfare" petered out.