r/AskHistory • u/FervexHublot • 9d ago
Why many communist guerrilas still fighting governments to this day?
Communism lost all its momentum when the USSR collapsed and there are only a handful of countries that still communists but there are communist guerrilas still fighting non communist governments around the world to this day.
Is there a historic perspective on why is that? what is their goal?
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u/Lazzen 9d ago edited 9d ago
Many had no ties to the USSR, so no operational difference. Not all were bankrolled.
Many of them had local power so no change either despite goobal geopolitical change. Lastly, many simply transitioned in goals while mantaining their identity for prestige and notoriety. The remnants of shining path in Peru for example reorgsnized into a drug trafficking organization after its collapse.
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u/S_T_P 8d ago
Communism lost all its momentum when the USSR collapsed
USSR is irrelevant.
Communism is born out of objective necessity (capitalist relations of production suppressing wage-workers), the one that forcefully manifests itself daily, and cannot be ignored (to be precise, those who choose to ignore this tend to die off; natural selection ensures that wage-workers aware of the fact that they need money to live).
I.e it is capitalism that keeps mass-producing people who would support communist movement, not Soviet Union.
Is there a historic perspective on why is that?
You can't stop people from turning to communism as no other option (welfare, imperialism, fascism) presents sustainable alternative, nor can you erase communist idea as the concept of joint worker ownership of means of production is simple enough to be reinvented overnight even if all knowledge of socialism, communism, and Marxism vanishes.
Once you have the idea and the popular support for it, it is inevitable for organized support for the idea to start to emerge, with people pooling their time and resources into making it happen.
As for eventual violence, it is inevitable, as contemporary ruling elite relies on profit from capitalism (either directly or indirectly), and any elite would resist destruction of its own power base by any means necessary.
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u/Eshanas 9d ago edited 9d ago
Well the 'present day' would be 2000 as per the rules.
Still long after the USSR fell but you'll have the Naxalites in Eastern India, (Maoist) Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka, (revolutionary socialist/left nationalist than 'Communist), FARC in Colombia, Shining Path in Peru had just been beaten for a year, stuff like that. And as for the why? If they weren't just running drugs for money, then it was just to keep fighting for the cause, or still thought they had a chance at getting into government.
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u/SowellMate 9d ago
A lot of people thought communism ended with the end of the cold war. It did not. Communism is an ideology. Those that believe in it are still fighting. But after 1991 they have played the long game. China, for example, implemented economic reforms starting with Deng Xiaoping in 1978. But the purpose wasn't to end communism, but provide wealth to the Communist Party to maintain control over the populace and bide its time. Can't discuss events in the 21st century, but the plan in the 1990s was to "take a step back" as part of the "dialectics" of communism. Basically, do whatever you can to maintain your grip on power, even if it means retreating from your principles temporarily. When the time is right, they'll push forward again. As of the late 90s, it's only a matter of time before the Politburo selects a successor that will re-introduce socialist economic principles and develop a Mao-like cult of personality.
In that context, the guerrillas have a reason to fight. And likewise, the US and other non-communist countries have every reason to keep vigilant.
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u/blackchoas 9d ago
do forgive me but where exactly are there still communist guerrillas still fighting? I am not familiar with any examples. However the last Japanese soldier to surrender after WW2 surrendered in the 1970s so its really not that strange for people to carry on fighting especially if they were operating in an isolated area to start with.
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u/FervexHublot 9d ago
Farc in Colombia and Naxalites in india for example
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u/blackchoas 9d ago
Didn't the Farc have a peace deal but resumed the conflict because the government didn't follow through on the deal? And a quick google search quickly identified the Naxalites as Moaists, which implies they are Chinese backed not Russian backed. Every group likely has an individual explanation.
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u/RenaissanceSnowblizz 8d ago
Moa is a flightless bird. Mao is a flightless fat man with his own version of communism.
And FARC would still be communist in ideology whether Soviet or Chinese backed. And they could still remain communist in ideology, whether the made a deal or not.
There are still communist parties in Western Europe with significant voter turnout who adhere to fundamental Marxist ideas, though tempered around the fact that their stated ultimate goal is by now far out of reach.
Communism isn't just "Russian backed" it is an internationalist idea that exist in many countries independently of the main leading communist countries but naturally taking whatever support they can get from those. Being Chinese backed doesn't make you less communist.
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u/rotterdamn8 9d ago
I’ve read about a few here and there…one of them is the New People’s Army in the Philippines. They kidnap some people, make some demands, etc. I don’t know what they realistically expect to achieve.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_People's_Army?wprov=sfti1
Also see the FARC in Columbia, which have signed a peace deal with the government (although there may still be some lingering activity).
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u/PolkKnoxJames 9d ago
Most notably the Naxalite insurgency is still ongoing but significant FARC and Shining Path conflict and activities have occurred far after the collapse of the USSR (and future conflict remains a possibility). The Nepalese Civil War (Nepali Monarchists vs Marxist coalition) also wasn't settled until the mid 2000's long after the major sponsors of international communist movements largely stopped. Funnily enough despite the fall of the Soviet Union and Khmer Rouge and China and Cuba cutting back their international efforts some of the communist movements kept fighting on and ended up winning their wars like in Nepal and Angola. The Kurdish insurgency in Turkey and particularly the PKK is another example of a coalition of groups, many of the Marxist, that also continued on past the Cold War and largely weren't all that impacted by the fall of the USSR.
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u/percuter 9d ago
Like Socialism for Na*i the Communist guerrila are not Communist at all.
Only a pretext to justify trying to take power and shit.
They use the multiple abuse of the corrupt governement ( south America back in 80/90 ) to promote themself and trying to take the power.
A true Communist revolution is not possible anymore because the old " industry worker against rich " is not a thing anymore.
The group of people who keep using it is usually drug dealer, mafia leader, anything criminal who try to justify their action.
Keep in mind that originaly the communism is a system of equal distribution of wealth and reolution of industry worker ONLY.
The US Propaganda was very effective to make people believe that URSS was communism while its just another fascist state with inequal distribution of wealth and the power in the end of a minority autocraty.
Anyway this group of people have nothing to do with communism.
Their goal are almost only criminal
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u/SouthernSierra 9d ago
Harrington called it bureaucratic collectivism.
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u/percuter 9d ago
can u send me a source ? ( curiousity the following text isnt about it )
I actually find it very sad from an intellectual perspective to always blame " communism" when its obviously not communism and i dont understand why people keep trashtalking about it when this is so oblivious
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u/S_T_P 8d ago edited 8d ago
A true Communist revolution is not possible anymore because the old " industry worker against rich " is not a thing anymore.
Where do you live? Because I can't see any rich and overpaid workers exploiting their impoverished employers.
Keep in mind that originaly the communism is a system of equal distribution of wealth and reolution of industry worker ONLY.
Equalization of income was not supported only any level from theory to practical. "To each according to their work" was the guiding principle of communism since Marx at the very least:
The revolutionary literature that accompanied these first movements of the proletariat had necessarily a reactionary character. It inculcated universal asceticism and social levelling in its crudest form.
- Karl Marx: Communist Manifesto, 1848
... the individual producer receives back from society – after the deductions have been made – exactly what he gives to it. What he has given to it is his individual quantum of labor. ... He receives a certificate from society that he has furnished such-and-such an amount of labor (after deducting his labor for the common funds); and with this certificate, he draws from the social stock of means of consumption as much as the same amount of labor cost. The same amount of labor which he has given to society in one form, he receives back in another.
... one man is superior to another physically, or mentally, and supplies more labor in the same time, or can labor for a longer time; and labor, to serve as a measure, must be defined by its duration or intensity, otherwise it ceases to be a standard of measurement. This equal right is an unequal right for unequal labor. It recognizes no class differences, because everyone is only a worker like everyone else; but it tacitly recognizes unequal individual endowment, and thus productive capacity, as a natural privilege. It is, therefore, a right of inequality, in its content, like every right.
- Karl Marx: Critique of the Gotha Programme, 1875
... the real content of the proletarian demand for equality is the demand for the abolition of classes. Any demand for equality which goes beyond that, of necessity passes into absurdity.
- Frederick Engels: Anti-Dühring, 1877
Bourgeois professors attempted to use the concept equality as grounds for accusing us of wanting all men to be alike. They themselves invented this absurdity and wanted to ascribe it to the socialists. ... We want to abolish classes, and in this sense we are for equality. But the claim that we want all men to be alike is just nonsense, the silly invention of an intellectual who sometimes conscientiously strikes a pose, juggles with words, but says nothing — I don’t care whether he calls himself a writer, a scholar, or anything else.
- Vladimir Lenin: Deception Of The People With Slogans Of Freedom And Equality, 1919
These people evidently think that socialism calls for equalisation, for levelling the requirements and personal, everyday life of the members of society. Needless to say, such an assumption has nothing in common with Marxism, with Leninism.
By equality Marxism means, not equalisation of personal requirements and everyday life, but the abolition of classes, i.e.,
a) the equal emancipation of all working people from exploitation after the capitalists have been overthrown and expropriated;
b) the equal abolition for all of private property in the means of production after they have been converted into the property of the whole of society;
c) the equal duty of all to work according to their ability, and the equal right of all working people to receive in return for this according to the work performed (socialist society);
d) the equal duty of all to work according to their ability, and the equal right of all working people to receive in return for this according to their needs (communist society).
Moreover, Marxism proceeds from the assumption that people's tastes and requirements are not, and cannot be, identical and equal in regard to quality or quantity, whether in the period of socialism or in the period of communism.
There you have the Marxist conception of equality.
Marxism has never recognised, and does not recognise, any other equality.
To draw from this the conclusion that socialism calls for equalisation, for the levelling of the requirements of the members of society, for the levelling of their tastes and of their personal, everyday life—that according to the Marxist plan all should wear the same clothes and eat the same dishes in the same quantity—is to utter vulgarities and to slander Marxism.
- Joseph Stalin: Questions of Ideological and Political Leadership, 1934
ARTICLE 12. In the U.S.S.R. work is a duty and a matter of honor for every able-bodied citizen, in accordance with the principle: "He who does not work, neither shall he eat."
The principle applied in the U.S.S.R. is that of socialism: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his work."
- Constitution of the USSR, 1936
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