INTERVIEW TO PARTIZAN (TÜRKIYE)
Previous Comment América Rebelde
It is an honor for América Rebelde to carry out this interview with the Partizan comrades. As the reader will realize, Partizan is an icon in the struggle of the Turkish proletariat and revolutionary movement that despite Erdogan’s repression and fascism does not hesitate to fly the flags of Comrade Ibrahim Kaypakkaya, founder of the Turkish Communist Party / Marxist-Leninist . The internationalist sense of América Rebelde strengthens ties with the struggles of other lands, peoples, classes and latitudes. Only the unity of the poor peoples of the world, of the international proletariat, will put us all on the path of the world proletarian revolution.
First of all, we would like to thank you for this interview on behalf of Partizan. We will try to answer your questions as best we can. First of all, it would be appropriate to clarify the meaning of the name Partizan in advance. The name Partizan has two concrete equivalents in our country. First, Partizan is the name of the movement embodied in the Communist Party line created by Comrade İbrahim Kaypakkaya. Those who represent the communist line of comrade İbrahim Kaypakkaya are also called “partisans”. Just as the Leninists were once called Iskraites. The latter is a theoretical journal that publishes ideological-political publications in the direction of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism. Partizan is known above all as the name of a political line that is not just a magazine. Each of your interview questions contains very comprehensive answers. We will answer your questions as clearly as possible, but to a certain extent in an abbreviated form.
Partizan website
About the Turkish Communist Movement
1920, the Turkish Communist Party (TKP) was founded. What was the context of the class struggle for the formation of the Turkish Communist Party (TKP)? What were the ideological elements typical of Turkish reality that converge in the Communist Party of Türkiye?
As you mentioned, the TKP declared its foundation at the congress in Baku, Azerbaijan, on September 10, 1920. The TKP was based on the communist principles of the 3rd International, which was founded under the leadership of Comrade Lenin.
Before the founding of the TKP, there were spontaneous communist circles in Istanbul, Adana, Eskişehir, Izmir and the cities on the Black Sea, especially in Istanbul, which carried out activities among the working class, intellectuals and youth. The experiences of struggle and organization of the revolutionaries from the Armenian, Greek and Balkan peoples in the multinational Ottoman state were also among the sources of the communist movement in the Ottoman Empire.
The Ottoman Empire joined the alliance with German imperialism in the First Imperialist War of Partition within the framework of dependency. When the Ottoman Empire and its allies lost the war, the Ottoman Empire was occupied by the victors of the war. The semi-colonial status of the Ottoman Empire, which had been accelerating since the beginning of the 19th century, turned into colonization with the defeat in the First Imperialist Partition War. The heavy defeat of the Ottoman Empire’s army (on the “Eastern Front”, the border area with Russia) against Russia and the fact that thousands of its soldiers were taken prisoner by Russia created one of the historical-political preconditions for the founding of the TKP. The emerging revolutionary atmosphere after the October Revolution offered the communists the opportunity to organize themselves among the captured soldiers. With the communist agitation and propaganda that was carried out among the captured Ottoman soldiers in the Caucasus region, the TKP achieved significant successes. Comrades Mustafa Suphi and Ethem Nejat, who led these efforts, and other communist cadres, together with delegates who came to Baku from various regions of Anatolia, announced the founding of the party on September 10. Comrade Mustafa Suphi was a respected and distinguished communist leader who also served as secretary of the Third International. The party was founded at a time when the Ottoman Empire was occupied after the defeat of the colonial power and a national liberation struggle was being waged against the occupation. It must be emphasized that this national struggle was led by the political-military representatives of the Turkish comprador bourgeoisie and large landowners. In fact, the aim of the TKP was to enter this struggle, take the lead in it and realize a people’s revolution linked to the programme of national independence.
How does Turkish imperial history influence the formation of the Communist Party? How do you deal with it from within the working class?
With this question you are probably emphasizing the annexationist and old colonialist character of the Ottoman Empire and its impact on the struggle of the working class. Today’s Turkish state, which was founded in 1923, is not an imperialist state, but a semi-colonial, semi-feudal state dependent on imperialism. In this case, it is not correct to consider a non-imperialist country, which develops a submissive relationship with imperialism, as imperialist and to evaluate the reaction of the working class to imperialist policies.
The oppressed, dependent position of the Kurdish nation and the annexation of its territories, the annexation of Cyprus or the occupation and aggression tendencies it undertakes from time to time in pursuit of neo-Ottoman dreams do not change this fact. Since the mid-1800s, the Ottoman Empire was a semi-colony of capitalist imperialist countries. After 1918 it was occupied and lost this relative independence. As we explained in the first question, this de facto occupation ended with the founding of the Turkish Republic in 1923. The newly founded Turkish state was ostensibly independent, but remained an economic-political semi-colony of imperialism. Until the declaration of independence of the nations and peoples of the Balkans against the Ottoman Empire in the early 1910s, these territories were Ottoman dependencies. In the historical economic process of the Ottoman Empire, the first germ cells, struggles and organizations of capitalism and thus of the working class took place here. As with all revolutionary work and communist organizations after this reality, the tradition of class work and organizational resistance left clear traces in the later work of the TKP and the formation of communist cadres.
There are many parties that define themselves as communist. How is this broad communist movement expressed? What are their differences?
This is essentially related to the strength as well as the prestige of the tradition of communist struggle in Turkey. In addition to the Communist Party of Turkey/Marxist Leninist (TKP/ML), which carries out the struggle with the MLM ideology, Democratic People’s Revolution, Socialism and Communism program, the old «Sovietist» parties of the modern revisionist line, the Hocacı revisionists of the Enver Hoxha line, those who follow in the footsteps of the Trotskyist tradition or semi-Trotskyist parties, legalist parliamentarist 2nd Internationalist forces of different ideological tendencies who call themselves communists… In short, there are many formations, large and small, calling themselves communist parties or organizations. All the ideological conflicts, splits and divisions, all political tendencies and new trends experienced by the international communist movement are reflected in our country. Because the tradition of political struggle, organization and struggle is alive and strong, and because the ideology of communism has always dominated this tradition, the revolutionary as well as reformist-legalist political foci insist on experiencing the honor and privilege of being called by this name. This is actually a good thing for the revolutionary-communist tradition of our country. For example, with the giant wave of liquidationism following the collapse of the modern revisionist, bureaucratic capitalist, pseudo-socialist bloc, the old parties of many years in many countries of the world liberalized and declared their allegiance to imperialist-capitalism, while most of them abandoned the communist titles and symbols in their names. In the same process, in our country, thousands of revolutionaries, especially TKP / ML militants, sacrificed their lives with sickle-hammer flags for communism, revolution and socialism in the countryside, cities and dungeons. Thousands of them were imprisoned, subjected to severe cruelties and paid the price. This tradition continues. As we mentioned above, the difference with the MLM ideological-political line is profound, even if it is labeled «communist». From the understanding of MLM to the understanding of socialism under the dictatorship of the proletariat, from the tactics and forms of struggle to the strategy of revolution, from the line of war and revolution to the understanding of armed struggle, from liquidationist-legalist economism to the revolutionary Bolshevik-Maoist line, from the line of ideological compromise with anti-MLM currents to the line of relentless philosophical-ideological war with them… To put it briefly, the difference is deep, fundamental and irreconcilable. This difference also applies to the structures that call themselves MLM and communist…
The former communist party dissolved itself in 2014 to reorganize in 2017. Revolutionary communist parties, Maoists, have been created under the influence of Ibrahim Kaypakkaya. What is the importance of Ibrahim Kaypakkaya? What were his main theoretical and ideological contributions? How is Comrade Ibrahim’s ideology carried out?
By former communist party, you probably mean the Communist Party of Turkey (TKP). The TKP is a legal and reformist, revisionist party in our country. Your question is confusing. First of all, it is necessary to clarify this confusion. The Communist Party founded by İbrahim Kaypakkaya in our country is the Communist Party of Turkey/Marxist-Leninist (TKP/ML) founded on April 24, 1972. Detailed information about the TKP/ML can be found on the official website and the website of the illegal mass media organ Workers’ and Peasants’ Liberation. When the TKP/ML was founded in 1972, it defined itself as a continuation of the communist line of the TKP founded in 1920. Although the “Communist Party” mentioned in your question expresses that it represents the TKP founded in 1920, it is a reformist-revisionist formation that finds a place for itself within the ruling system. The process of splitting that you mentioned took place within this reformist-revisionist party. In fact, since the revisionist, social-chauvinist and Kemalist (the official ideology of the Turkish state) stooge Şefik Hüsnü, who took over the leadership after Mustafa Suphi and 15 leading cadres were brutally murdered by the Kemalists in January 1921, the TKP lost its character as a communist-revolutionary party. With the return from socialism, the reformist-revisionist line became loyal to Khrushchev’s modern revisionism, and the TKP took on a social-fascist-reactionary character. Although today’s representatives of this tradition also undergo deviations, name changes, etc. from time to time, they mainly continue on their path of reformist and social-chauvinist politics within the order and the Kemalist state apparatus.
Comrade Ibrahim Kaypakkaya was initially under the influence of the Workers’ Party of Turkey, which was supposed to represent socialism in Turkey like all revolutionaries of the time, and acted in this direction. However, the increasing dynamics of class struggles both in the world and in the country made it possible in a short time to understand the reality of the reformist-revisionist and anti-order line of the Workers’ Party of Turkey (TİP). Comrade İbrahim Kaypakkaya’s strong attachment to the scientific theory of MLM led to his break with this line. With this break, he began to work as an organized revolutionary cadre in the Proletarian Revolutionary Brightness (PDA) and the Workers and Peasants Party of Turkey (TİİKP), the political movement most influenced by MLM at the time. Despite his very young age, he took responsibility for the entire work of the workers as a deputy member of the organization’s Central Committee. While fulfilling his revolutionary practical duties on the one hand, as a leading cadre involved in the revolution, he began a radical reckoning with the ideological-political, generally accepted and intellectual hegemonic patterns of both the TİİKP and the entire Turkish leftist tradition: The nature of the state, fascism, armed struggle and people’s war, official historiography, Kemalism (the official ideology of the Turkish state), the Kurdish national question and the prevailing social-chauvinist modes of thought. .. All these issues are topics on which comrade İbrahim Kaypakkaya waged an ideological struggle with the traditional leftist revolutionary movement and the intellectuals who shaped these movements ideologically through intense polemics and ideological struggle. In the course of this struggle and its intensification, comrade İbrahim Kaypakkaya created his own MLM methodology and leadership character. Three Weapons for the Revolution: After revealing the strategy and principles to create the party army and the people’s revolutionary united front, he broke his ties with all kinds of opportunism and internalism and lit the fuse of the people’s war in the areas suitable for political planning with the flag of rebellion against those wallowing in the swamp of opportunism. With the strength and coherent-systematic integrity of the ideas put forward by comrade İbrahim Kaypakkaya, his mastery of MLM political philosophy and his scientific methodology, he expressed not only a demarcation from the traditional leftists and revolutionaries of his time, but in essence a leap, a radical break with the traditional anti-MLM left.
TKP/ML Official Website
Workers-Peasant Liberation Official Website
About fascism in Türkiye
Erdogan has been characterized by his fascist and repressive position. He has allied himself with the Islamic State and “Israel” in the genocide against the Kurdish People. He has repressed the Kurdish Communist Party (PKK) and imprisoned Abdullah Ocalán also against the HDP party. He has taken journalists prisoner and closed pro-Kurdish newspapers and has also repressed Partizan and its readers. Is fascism new in Türkiye or does it has historical origins? Which are they?
First of all, it should be said that the PKK is the Kurdistan Workers’ Party. Founded in 1978, the PKK defined itself as the Kurdistan Workers’ Party as a national liberation movement influenced by socialism. The abbreviation PKK is the Kurdish acronym for the Kurdistan Workers’ Party; Partiye Karkeran Kurdistan (PKK).
To come back to your question: Fascism in Turkey has been a form of state, a form of rule by the rulers, since its foundation. In other words, it is not a system that emerged with Erdoğan and the AKP, as many opportunist reformist political currents claim. Here we again come across the importance of comrade İbrahim Kaypakkaya. Comrade İbrahim Kaypakkaya is the rare theorist of this period who concretely exposed the form that the traditional analysis of fascism took in semi-colonial and semi-feudal countries. He presented an analysis of fascism that contrasts with the views that limit the characterization of the fascist state as the “power of the most reactionary sections of finance capital” as a form of state supremacy that can exist in imperialist countries. With imperialism, especially in semi-colonial and semi-feudal countries with semi-colonial and semi-feudal form of the sovereign state in the form of fascist state supremacy, albeit in the form of parliamentary masks, the fascist form of state supremacy in the specific case of Turkey is a special place in this sense that it concretely reveals.1923 as a result of the agreements with the imperialists and the occupying powers of the Ottoman Empire as a result of the agreements on the lands left by the Republic of Turkey on the founding process of the state of the Republic of Mustafa Kemal’s name embodied by the leadership “Kemalism” is the official ideology of the state in Turkey. Comrade İbrahim Kaypakkaya defined Kemalism as fascism and the ruling state form as a fascist state. With this definition, comrade İbrahim Kaypakkaya reached a different position by making an ideological break not only with the dominant ideology of the ruling state, but also with the progressive-revolutionary-socialist circles that attributed a progressive, even anti-imperialist quality to Kemalism and Kemalist power.
The history of the Turkish state, which at its foundation (1923) had a semi-colonial status based on the servitude of imperialism, is full of massacres and genocidal crimes against the working class, the oppressed poor peoples, the oppressed nations, nationalities and faiths. In 1915, when the Ottoman Empire still existed, it committed one of the biggest genocides in the world by massacring 1.5 million Armenians, and then the people of Pontus-Rum, numbering about 300 thousand people, were subjected to a genocidal massacre. Tens of thousands of Christian Assyrians-Chaldeans-Syrians were also massacred in a similar manner. The new Turkish state, founded in 1923, continued this practice of genocide and massacres. The racist massacres and killings of the Kurdish nation (1921 Koçgiri, 1925 Diyarbakır, 1926 Ağrı, 1930 Zilan Deresi, 1937 Dersim are some of these massacres. ), racist massacres and assimilation policies, systematic Islamic-Sunni oppression and massacres of people belonging to a religious minority, such as Alevis (1978 Maraş massacre, 1978 Malatya massacre, 1980 Çorum massacre, 1993 Sivas massacre, 1995 Gazi massacre are some of these massacres), state violence and bans against communists, total prevention of democratic rights and freedoms and oppression, torture and arrests against democratic forces… This is the routine policy of the 100-year-old Turkish state. The state, dominated by the comprador bourgeoisie and the big landowners, which has been oriented towards a racist-chauvinist and reactionary policy since its foundation, has adopted fascism as its governing philosophy. This characteristic has not changed even after the one-party phase of its foundation (after 1945). Some periods of rupture, in which democratic rights and freedoms were partially experienced, did not change the traditional fascist character of the regime. Such brief respites are temporary historical intervals in which the democratic struggle of the masses intensifies and becomes an organized and material force to assert their demands. In such moments, the power of the masses’ struggle forced the rulers, on the one hand, to withdraw their fascist aggression and, on the other, to legitimize their power by establishing the consent of the emerging popular opposition in their internal conflicts. Since the fascist military junta in Turkey in 1980, the Kurdish National Struggle has pursued a policy of total repression, destruction and liquidation against the guerrillas of the Kurdish National Struggle, especially against the forces of the TKP/ML resisting the military junta. All political, military, administrative and legal state formations of the Turkish rulers are on the axis of this strategic fascist orientation. The arrest of the PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan, the repressions and arrests against the legal forces of the Kurdish national movement, the state terror against the revolutionary work of Partizan and other revolutionary-democratic forces are the result of this strategic fascist state conception and policy.
However, Turkey remains a military power in the region and constitutes the geographical border with Europe. It is the entrance to Europe. It has a strategic location. Its relationship with the United States is close. How does this relationship with imperialism, its condition as a military power, influence the development of the labor movement, of an alternative, popular and revolutionary press? Is there room for it?
As you mentioned in your question, the Turkish state is a loyal servant of the American-European imperialist bloc. It has the second largest army in NATO. Although it is in the position of a semi-colonial servitude dependent on imperialism and aligned with the axis of US imperialism’s political military planning, it occasionally exploits the contradictions between the imperialist powers for its own historical-regional interests and security. It is a state that tries to take advantage of the opportunities that arise and makes aggressive and occupying attempts for this purpose. As examples we can mention the annexation of Cyprus, the invasion attacks in Syria and Iraqi Kurdistan, the aggressive policy towards the Aegean and the Mediterranean. Although it regularly has problems with its masters, the Turkish state has been a loyal extension of NATO and the imperialist bandit system since its foundation. It is an almost indispensable strategic power for the imperialist powers. Economically, militarily, politically and diplomatically, this position has never changed. Thus, after the Second Imperialist Partition War, two military coups in 1960 and 1980, the military memorandum of March 12, 1971, were carried out with the direct guidance and support of the US, as was the one in Şişli on September 11, 1973. On September 12, 1980, when the fascist military junta seized power, the US ambassador in Ankara sent a one-line fax to Washington with the following message: “Our boys did it!”. The weakening of the Turkish state contradicts the imperialist interests in the region and in the world, which is why they continuously and systematically support the Turkish state. In this context, all fascist repressions against the democratic forces, the media and the progressive dynamics are supported by the imperialists in every way. Since the revolutionary press is systematically repressed, it must show serious resistance and fighting power in order to protect and preserve its existence.
The genocidal attacks of “Israel” against Palestine forced much of the world to recognize the Nazi-fascist character of Zionism, of the genocide that is being perpetrated there. One of the largest, most massive, mass demonstrations in support of Palestine took place in Turkey, Istanbul. How do you explain this demonstration under the government of Erdogan, who is also an ally of “Israel”? What content did that demonstration had? What happened next?
Yes, there were strong demonstrations and protests to condemn the Zionist-fascist aggression and to show solidarity with the Palestinian people. This is still going on. For the revolutionary movement in Turkey, the Palestinian struggle is historically and currently the expression of an area where the bridges of common ground, common struggle and solidarity are very deeply rooted, both politically and emotionally. Relations between Turkish and Palestinian revolutionaries have been established since the 1970s. In the ranks of the Palestinian national liberation struggle, PKK and Turkish revolutionaries and socialists have given martyrs and suffered in Israeli prisons. In the past, the Palestinian national liberation struggle was led by revolutionaries such as Fatah, the Democratic Front for Palestine and the PFLP, which were dominated by left-wing secular forces. In these times of resistance, the political Islamists in general and the Turkish political Islamists in particular showed no interest in this resistance. To summarize, the Palestinian struggle for freedom has always been the cause of the revolutionaries. Let us remember the betrayal of the Arafat-led Fatah and the selling out of the resistance by accepting the servitude of imperialism in the Oslo peace negotiations. With the wave of liquidation that developed at the time of the collapse of revisionist pseudo-socialism, the weakening and neutralization of the left-socialist forces in the resistance became the order of the day. At this moment, the Palestinian children, youth and people known as the “little general with a stone in his hand” were left alone with the Zionist regime, and the Palestinian Islamic resistance movement HAMAS filled this void. This is also a parallel to the growing wave of political Islamism in the world after Afghanistan. This is the process by which political Islam in general and Turkish Islamists in particular have deepened their interest in Palestine. They have established close relations with Islamic currents in Palestine, just as they support the Muslim Brotherhood or other political Islamist currents. However, their behavior has always been hypocritical and dishonest. All economic, commercial, political and military agreements, relations and cooperation with the Zionist state of Israel have been maintained without interruption. This also applies to the last genocidal attack, which lasted over 7 months. From jet fuels to steel to products used in the manufacture of strategic war vehicles, trade capacity continued to expand. At first they lied to the population by saying “we have broken off relations”. They continue to sell the products that Israeli Zionism needs to kill the Palestinian people. The Turkish state, embodied by Erdogan, is the servant of imperialism. The AKP government led by Erdogan is the embodiment of profit, interest, lies and pragmatism, which are in the leaven of political Islamists. The anger and resistance of the people of Turkey against the genocidal attacks of the Israeli occupation state on the Gaza Strip are great. However, the large AKP rally in Istanbul that you mentioned was a rally in which the AKP used the anger and reaction against the occupation of Gaza precisely to serve its own sovereign interests. Incidentally, the period in which the rally took place was also the eve of the local elections in Turkey on March 31. The rally means nothing other than that the occupation of the Gaza Strip and the genocide of the Palestinian people is being used as an election issue, with the AKP/MHP political force, which is slowly losing power, also trying to consolidate its own masses. The AKP political force, which boasts of organizing one of the largest rallies, has attacked many protests against the Israeli occupation by the state security forces and arrested many people who were arrested in these protests, in addition to ongoing trade relations with Israel. These examples also reveal the hypocritical and self-serving attitude of the AKP’s political power in the Gaza occupation.
On the class struggle in Türkiye
The richest 1% in Turkey concentrate 40% of the gross domestic product and there is 24% poverty, if not more. How does the ruling class express itself in Türkiye? What are its main characteristics? In what state is the labor movement, the workers, the popular movement?
The statistics you mentioned are figures that present the real picture, i.e. poverty and hunger, in a more optimistic and relatively attenuated way. There are other and more objective analyses that show that the proportion of poor and hungry people is over 80 percent. Suicides and tragic incidents are widespread and are fueled by unemployment, debt, hunger and despair. It is difficult for workers and employees to lead a normal life. Even if they work, even if they are retired, they suffer from hunger. Unemployment is enormous, reaching 40 percent, especially among young people.
Even Turkey’s inflation data reveals the economic reality. According to the state’s official statistics authority, TÜİK, the inflation rate for May 2024 was given as 75.45 percent. It should be said right away that the data from TURKSTAT are not real inflation rates. TÜİK comes to this conclusion with the data it falsifies in order to cover up the economic crisis. On the other hand, according to ENAG (Inflation Research Group), which was prepared by independent academics and economists for the same period, the inflation rate for May 2024 was given as 120.66 percent. However, even if we take the inflation rate announced by TurkStat based on manipulated data, Turkey ranks fourth in the world in terms of inflation. However, we are dealing with a reality where purchasing power is low and the minimum wage is below the hunger line. When you consider that 50 percent of the working population in Turkey, where the hunger line for a family of four is TL 20.098, consists of minimum wage earners who receive TL 17.002 net according to the figures announced by the DISK (Confederation of Revolutionary Trade Unions), the picture we have described becomes more understandable.
As a result of neoliberal economic plundering policies, the country is in an economic crisis and collapse that has worsened in recent years and cannot even produce a hopeful narrative of recovery. The consequences of this picture, which has deepened in parallel with the cyclical crisis of imperialist capitalism and shows no signs of a way out, are quite devastating and increasingly shocking for the working class and the people of our country. The only solution of the rulers, who are trying to hide behind the promise of good days with economic measures and fiscal discipline, is higher taxes and measures that reduce the cost burden of labor on themselves. The debt agreements with the World Bank and the IMF leave them no other choice. In economic terms, this is a ruthless terror against the poor, and in some ways they are desperate. Against this economic picture, there are reactions and struggles by workers and laborers in almost all sectors. Mostly spontaneous, unorganized and sudden reactions and isolated local resistance and strikes are the order of the day. The trade unions are largely under the ideological, political and administrative control of the fascist regime and are largely yellow bureaucratic structures. As a result of fascism’s attacks on the trade union struggle and in particular the attacks of the fascist military junta of 1980 on the one hand and the class-collaborative policies of the aforementioned yellow-bureaucratic understanding of trade unions on the other, trade union work within the working class in Turkey has declined in recent years. To give an example: In the late 1970s, when the revolutionary movement was most active, the number of unionized workers in Turkey was 5 million 700 thousand and the unionization rate was around 60 percent, while in 2024 it was 2 million 485 thousand and 15 percent. Especially with the trade union law enacted in 1981 after the fascist military junta of 1980, trade union activities were severely suppressed. Trade union activity, which played its part in fascism’s ongoing attacks on the organization, also followed a trajectory parallel to the decline of the social movement.
However, in the course of the development of the labor and popular movement, which has been pushed back in the last 8 years by fascist repression comparable to military dictatorships, all signs are visible that we are on the eve of this process. There is every possibility that it will develop into a mass movement of the workers and the people, that the revolutionary forces that will lead this wave will both establish themselves as a revolutionary subject and bring the movement to a more solid organizational-institutional form.
The worsening of the crisis of capitalism worldwide has led to an increase in repression and counterinsurgency strategies. The idea of the internal enemy is strengthened. In what situation are the human rights, fundamental rights? How many political prisoners are there in Türkiye? Turkish prisons are famous for their brutality and barbarity.
The crisis of imperialist capitalism and the struggle for hegemony and power are intensifying. There is already talk of the Third World War or of its imminent threat. It is only a matter of time and moment before a situation similar to that in Syria and Palestine emerges in many regions and countries of the world involved in the imperialist hegemonic conflict. The historical, political and social conditions for the emergence of revolts, anti-colonial struggles and major social class movements directed against imperialism and local rulers are gradually maturing. Turkey, as a crossroads between Asia, Europe and the Middle East, is already a place with a strong dynamic of struggles and uprisings in this respect. For 50 years, there has been an organized, armed struggle for revolution and socialism that has continued uninterrupted and has not been suppressed. Despite occasional setbacks, this dynamic of struggle has always been present. For 40 years, the Kurdish national forces have been waging one of the toughest guerrilla wars in the world against the Turkish state and army. For the state forces, which are constantly characterized by paranoia and fear of collapse and disintegration, human rights, law, democratic values or civil legal norms make no sense and enemy law(!), which was conceived by the Nazi jurist Carl Schmidt and legitimized as part of fascist state law, becomes the determining norm. This is what is happening in our country. Over 10,000 progressives, Kurdish patriots, revolutionaries and communists are locked up in dungeons. In addition, there are 20,000 Erdoğan opponents who have been imprisoned by the regime in the course of its internal disputes and are being held in prisons. It is very difficult to give an exact figure, as the number of prisoners in Turkish jails is constantly rising. Most recently, 77 people were arrested for participating in a legal demonstration on May Day and in solidarity with Palestine.
You mentioned that Turkish prisons are known for their cruelty. This barbarity is not specific to prisons, but the barbarity of the fascist character of the Turkish state. This barbarism reflects in prisons the barbarism to which the working class and the broad masses of the people are subjected at every moment of social and political life. Ultimately, prisons are one of the repressive apparatuses of the state. In this sense, it is one of its instruments to intimidate society on the one hand and, on the other hand, to expose and isolate the most progressive elements of the social and class struggle. The policy it applies to the progressive revolutionaries and communists it imprisons is the barbarism inherited from the dungeon culture of the Ottoman state and continues to be applied.
As Bertolt Brecht put it: “If you are looking for democracy in a country, it is enough to look at the prisons and cemeteries of that country.” When you look at the policies of the ruling classes in Turkish prisons, the attacks, in short the barbarism, you can see one of the darkest forms of fascist politics. After the fascist military junta in 1980, 650,000 people were arrested, 230,000 people were sentenced in military courts and thousands of people were locked up in prisons. During this process, 171 people were tortured, 48 people were executed and a total of 300 people were murdered. This is just a cross-section of Turkey’s history. Nothing has changed in the prisons since 1980. We continue to witness a process in which even the smallest social opposition is locked up in prisons.
The history of prisons in Turkey is also a history of massacres. After 1980, the state carried out massacres of revolutionaries, communists and patriots in the prisons of Buca, Ümraniye, Ulucanlar and Diyarbakır on various dates. In these massacres, 27 revolutionary prisoners were murdered. On December 19-22, 2000, another one of the biggest massacres in the history of prisons took place. In this massacre, 28 revolutionary prisoners were massacred in simultaneous attacks on 20 prisons using various weapons, including chemical gases. Today, the policy of massacring revolutionaries, communists and patriots through torture in prisons continues. However, the history of prisons, which is a history of massacres on the side of the rulers, is a history of resistance against these massacres and surrender policies for revolutionaries, communists and patriots. Both physically and ideologically, resistance to the state’s policy of destruction and surrender has never been lacking in the prisons, and the tradition of resistance to these attacks continues despite the price paid in various forms of resistance, including hunger strikes and death fasts. To date, nearly 150 revolutionary-communist and patriotic prisoners have immortalized themselves in the hunger strikes and death fasts against the attacks in prisons in 1982, 1984, 1996 and 2000-2007, 2020. Today, the hunger strikes and death fasts continue in various prisons, targeting the prisons where isolation and torture are intensified, which the state calls Y, S and R type.
Today, the state aims to subdue revolutionary prisoners not only through massacres, but also through isolation and treadman attacks, which include practices such as family and lawyer visits, phone and letter bans, and policies aimed at depersonalizing, alienating revolutionary values and making them no longer a danger for the continuation of the ruling classes’ system. While these measures are directed against the prisoners, relatives of prisoners are arrested outside for depositing money for their imprisoned children. In short, the policies of the ruling classes in Turkish prisons, as the areas where oppression and coercion are applied in their simplest form, from the Ottoman Empire until today, have become famous for their barbarity.
Of course, the barbaric measures and practices of the Turkish ruling classes are not limited to prisons. Due to the nature of the fascist system, the traces of this barbarism and massacres can be seen in almost all areas of life, and they continue to this day. Turkey is also a country where revolutionary, communist, patriotic and dissident intellectuals and artists were murdered and disappeared by state organizations. In this sense, the Saturday Mothers in Turkey, inspired by the resistance of the Mothers of Plaza De Mayo in Argentina, who have been fighting for decades to find their relatives who disappeared in detention, have resisted every Saturday with various protests to search for their murdered and disappeared sons. The Saturday Mothers’ protest has been going on for 1000 weeks since 1995. For 1000 weeks, despite all kinds of pressure, torture, arrests and bans, the Saturday Mothers have not given up looking for their disappeared sons. The Saturday Mothers’ demonstration has also gone down in history as the longest-running demonstration in Turkey.
However, against the guerrilla struggle, which is the field of struggle where this barbarism is experienced in its darkest form, the fascist state also has experience of the dirty methods of struggle that it uses. Since the beginning of the 1970s, an uninterrupted guerrilla struggle has been waged in Turkey within the framework of the class and national liberation struggle. While this struggle of the various revolutionary and national liberation organizations, including the TKP / ML, gives hope to the people, it is a dream of fear for the state. For this reason, it attacks the guerrilla war with the most brutal, barbaric and inhuman practices and massacres the guerrillas with chemical weapons. The state, which pursues a policy of repression, torture and murder against the supporting civilian population, throws thousands of people into prison for supporting the revolutionary struggle. Its aim is to prevent this struggle, which it sees as a threat to the continued existence of its system of rule. Despite all these attacks, however, it has not succeeded in ending the guerrilla struggle, which has been waged in parallel with the revolutionary struggle for almost 50 years. Nor will it be able to end it.
You, our Latin American friends, know this relationship very well. The equation is very clear. All countries where poverty, class and political contradictions, civil wars and revolts prevail are areas where criminal gangs, encouraged and supported by the local sovereign powers and states, develop their activities within the knowledge and control of the imperialists. Nicaragua, Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela, Turkey… This is an equation that never changes. Through these criminal gangs and through these organizations, directed and politically protected by some special violent apparatuses of the state, both the financing of the counter-revolutionary war is created and these gangs act as a tool for special operations against the people and the revolutionary forces that the states cannot always easily carry out.
An inter-imperialist war for a New World or Imperialist Order has been going on for quite some time now. On the one hand the US, NATO and the European Union and on the other China and Russia. The war in Ukraine is in full development and, as we mentioned before, the genocide against the Palestinian People and also against the Kurdish People. In Africa, anti-European, anti-French or anti-colonial sentiment has resurfaced. How does all this influence Turkey’s in its internal politics and in its ruling class and working class?
It is premature to describe the struggle for supremacy between the imperialist countries and blocs over Ukraine and Syria as a war between imperialists. At the moment the war is being waged by proxy. The possibilities of sustaining or managing this for a long time seem quite limited. At the moment it is a war of attrition, of containment, of encirclement, of testing and weakening power, of testing and consolidating its own bloc, of testing its military limits and outcomes, of economic outcomes… We think it would be more accurate to speak of a period, such a political conjuncture, in which they will decide on a possible new imperialist balance of world power or a destructive war, which they see as inevitable for imperialist hegemony. The developments against French imperialism in Africa must also be seen as an expression of this struggle for supremacy. Especially with the political and economic influence of the new social-imperialist China on the African continent, it is already foreseeable that such anti-colonialist tendencies will increase. We should not forget Asia as the continent where the storm will actually break loose, Taiwan, the Philippines and the situation created by possible conflicts in these places. It is possible to define the process as a tense crisis process that includes all possibilities, including an imperialist war. Although the ruling front in Turkey, especially the Erdoğan clique, pursues the perspective of close cooperation and collaboration with Russia and has turned this into a pragmatic balancing policy in recent years, the place of the Turkish state in a possible decisive confrontation and conflict is on the front of the US and NATO. Undoubtedly, they are deeply concerned about the existence of the state in the event of a possible conflict war or a severe crisis due to their major problems such as the Kurdish issue while struggling with the economic crisis. At the moment, the working class and people of Turkey are facing economic collapse as part of the crisis of imperialist capitalism and are not yet aware of the consequences of a possible total conflict for them. It is obvious that communists and revolutionaries, anti-imperialist progressive forces have an important political responsibility to focus on this issue.
Finally, Türkiye has carried out bombings in Syria and Iraq with the excuse of attacking Kurdish military forces. It has invaded Syria and stolen considerable resources. How does Erdogan’s military policy fit into the design of the New Imperialist Order?
Erdoğan’s military policy is actually an extension of the strategic Kurdistan and regional policy of the Turkish rulers. We are talking about a Turkish state sovereignty, a fascist-racist state philosophy that has annexed the Kurdish region, that does not tolerate the slightest hint of democratic rights, let alone the Kurdish nation’s right to self-determination, and that even denied the existence of the Kurds for a long time.
Taking advantage of the Syrian crisis and with the aim of eliminating the anti-American Assad-Baath regime by supporting Islamist gangs, the US-European imperialist bloc has formed a tactical and necessary alliance with Kurdish nationalists. While the imperialists, led by US imperialism, organized the Turkish state and the Islamist forces against Assad, they also developed relations with the Kurdish forces in this region. The relations established by the imperialists with the Kurds of Rojava, whose status and national rights the Turkish state cannot even tolerate, have always disturbed the Turkish rulers. For this reason, tensions arose between the US and its masters, who invaded the Kurdish areas and the regions controlled by Kurds whenever they found the opportunity and at favorable times by calculating the balances between Russia and the US. Due to its regional plans, its tactical local cooperation with the Kurds and the indispensable strategic importance of the Turkish state for them, US imperialism gave the green light for the invasions in a controlled and limited manner. Here, it can be said that the Turkish state has opportunistically benefited from the delicate international balance and contradictions. If this situation creates favorable conditions (balance between the US and Russia), it must be predicted that the invasion attacks will continue. At the moment, we can say that Russia does not offer this opportunity to the Turkish state due to its NATO stance in Ukraine and sensitive relations with the Syrian regime. The Turkish state’s invasion attack also applies to Iraqi Kurdistan. It has established military bases and occupied a large part of Iraqi Kurdistan in order to eliminate the PKK guerrillas and their activities in the region, or at least to drive the guerrillas and the war beyond the borders of Turkish Kurdistan. Even if it sometimes contradicts US interests and leads to tensions, it cannot be said that the Turkish state’s military action represents a radical opposition to US interests.
About Partizan Magazine
When was Partizan founded? Why was it created? What is its proposal?
The magazine Partizan was first published in 1978 as a political-theoretical magazine. Until the September 12 Military Fascist Junta, it was published legally. Then, since July 1992, it has been published again as a theoretical-political journal. The magazine Partizan is the publication organ of the ideological-political line of the Marxist-Leninist-Maoists (MLM) in our country. Its publication policy is based on the ideological-theoretical line of comrade İbrahim Kaypakkaya, the representative of the ideological line of the MLM in our country. Since 1978, 124 issues and 27 special issues have been published at regular intervals and the magazine continues to be published in different periods.
Partizan magazine continues its publication activities in Turkey under the Umut Publishing House. Umut Publishing House is engaged in a wide range of activities by publishing Yeni Demokrasi Newspaper, which includes Partizan magazine and is published at 15-day intervals in İbrahim Kaypakkaya’s series, as well as Yeni Demokrat Gençlik magazine, Yeni Demokrat Kadın magazine and various books and pamphlets. With its regularly published bulletins, it also carries out organizational work in the field of workers and employees as well as in the families of martyrs and prisoners. Umut Publishing House is an agitation/propaganda and organization tool for the working class and the masses towards Democratic People’s Revolution, socialism and communism with its magazines, newspapers, books, brochures and bulletins.
What we have mentioned so far is the written press. But we also have visual media that broadcasts on the partisan line. As Partizan Media, our media work, which is the voice of revolutionary propaganda on Youtube and various social media platforms, continues. Partizan Media in the world and Turkey compiled by current developments in the weekly news bulletin content broadcasts, as well as revolutionary content documentaries, movies, cinevision, music broadcasts such as. This should be mentioned in passing. Among the documentaries published by TKP/ML affiliated to TIKKO (Workers Peasants Liberation Army of Turkey) guerrillas prepared by the guerrillas (scenario, shooting, layout, etc. technical preparations were all made by the guerrillas) «Guerrilla Four Seasons» documentary was published. This documentary is a documentary in which sections of the guerrilla’s life are narrated. We also share the link for those who want to watch the documentary. The documentary has been translated into English, French, German and Greek by Partizan Medya. Chinese and Spanish translations were also made outside of our organization.
https://www.partizanmedya13.net
https://www.youtube.com/c/PartizanMüzik
https://www.yenidemokrasi34.net
https://www.yenidemokratkadin12.com
https://www.partizanmedya13.net/guerrilla-four-seasons-video.html
There must be many other alternative media in Türkiye. What differentiates Partizan from the rest of the media?
We can briefly answer your question by saying that the difference between Partizan’s work in the field of print and visual media and other progressive-revolutionary and democratic media is that it is the media of communism and the Kaypakkaya line.
There are many media that have been repressed, but why is it also against Partizan and also against its readers? It is difficult to carry out journalism, to maintain Partizan in a Nazi-fascist context? How do you achieve it? How is it maintained not only in the informational field but also in the concrete and direct struggle?
The state terror of repression and arrests is indeed not only directed against the employees or supporters of the Partizan press. Anyone who does not submit to this fascist and oppressive state, who does not shy away from its word and deed, who exposes its crimes and injustices, who resists it, who tries to rebel and organize, receives his share of these attacks. The most violent attacks are directed against the most resistant and uncompromising revolutionary groups that do not submit to the system, and Partizan is undoubtedly one of the most important of them. Partizan represents a line that is affected by these attacks. So much so that it is the revolutionary claim of an understanding/tradition that has been closed many times and had to change its name, but has always considered it a duty to bring the propaganda of the revolution to the masses, which is what Partizan brings to these days. As we have already mentioned, Umut Publishing House has published many revolutionary newspapers besides Partizan magazine, which have suffered from these attacks. The Yeni Demokrasi, Özgür Gelecek and İşçi-Köylü newspapers were subjected to multiple repressions, bans and closures. Although they had different names, they were able to address the masses with the same revolutionary content. However, it is a revolutionary journalism whose employees were repeatedly imprisoned and tortured, whose editors-in-chief faced centuries of imprisonment and were arrested. We can say that the key to success in maintaining revolutionary press work despite all fascist attacks is revolutionary aspiration and revolutionary consciousness.
Today, dozens of journalists, press people and working people from various revolutionary circles who do not belong to Partizan are imprisoned, sentenced or on trial. Such a stubborn, unyielding and militant press tradition has developed in our country. In order to publish magazines and publications legally, writers, editors-in-chief, printers, etc. were sentenced to hundreds of years, spent many years in prison and were murdered. These attacks have always existed in the history of the fascist state and they still continue. But the legitimacy of this space has always been defended and protected with our teeth and fingernails, with heavy prices paid, and fascism was not bowed down. This must be the only secret of these achievements: To resist, to work and to continue on the right path without hesitating to pay the price!
Is there an alternative media network in which Partizan participates?
There are many media organizations in Turkey that see themselves as socialist. Although from time to time there are joint platforms and joint actions and declarations in the face of repression in the field of press publishing or in the field of socialist, revolutionary media in general, it is not possible to speak of a regular and systematic platform. In Turkey, there have been various platforms established from time to time by organizations broadcasting on a revolutionary line. Especially in the 1990s, these were platforms where joint activities were organized to intervene in various agendas. However, they are not systematic and organized. In addition, there are various associations that oppose the fascist oppression and the practices of the state against the revolutionary/oppositional press.
What happens in Turkey, in the Middle East, is also of utmost importance for the poor people of the world, for Latin America also. (Interestingly, the government of Nicolás Maduro (socialist of the 21st century) has strengthened ties with Erdogan. In fact, Erdogan was in Venezuela during the period of greatest repression and military offensive against the Kurdish people, in Rojava.) Do you think it is important to develop a with Latin American alternative media and see the possibility of Partizan having its version in Spanish, Portuguese?
It is important and valuable for us to build relationships with alternative media in different parts of the world. It is even more important to develop relations with the alternative media in countries where the dynamics of the development of the class struggle are more intense. Partizan magazine is not only the voice of the revolutionary struggle in Turkey, but also the voice of the international communist movement in terms of the communist line that characterizes this publication. In this sense, we have relations with many international revolutionary publications. Among the revolutionary communist press in other countries, there is also a press that publishes in some Latin American countries. Our relations with the above-mentioned revolutionary communist press are up to date.
And in various periods, news, articles, etc. published in the revolutionary-communist press and broadcasting organs of various countries and some books are translated and published in Turkish, just as the articles, articles and news published in our magazine and some books published by our publishing house Umut Publishing are translated and published in English, Portuguese, French, Spanish. In particular, Red Herald, La Cause du Peuple (France), A Nova Democracia (Brazil), Class March (Greece) are some of the newspapers and magazines with which we are in a common international struggle and mutual solidarity.
We think we have come to the end of our interview and we thank you once again for giving us this opportunity. We think that such interviews are important for the development of international revolutionary relations and for the opportunity to get to know each other and express ourselves in the international arena.
To learn more
Jose María Sison: In Honor of Comrade Ibrahim Kaypakkaya
