An All-American Insurgency:
The Attack on the Raleigh GOP headquarters:


By L. Blisset, D. Fengel, and G. Sus


On November 6th, only four days after Election Day, anarchists in North Carolina took power into their own hands by trashing the Republican Party headquarters in Raleigh, North Carolina. This is an action of great symbolic and tactical importance to anarchists and anyone else interested in defeating the Bush regime. The Republicans and local media acted horrified, fear-mongering the act as "domestic terrorism" and "incompetent," and in their words reveal the very real fear they have direct action as it reveals the true incompetence of local police forces and vulnerability of the Republican Party on the eve of their victory. Showing a characteristic lack of solidarity, The Left and other so-called "progressives" have called the act "juvenile" and "ineffective," which is a curious case, since it was their failure as organisers that let Bush win, and their inability to take any effective action against the murderous wars and economic meltdown that has shown their tactics and politics to be a dead end. The recent appearance of the Joint Task Force for Terrorism shows how seriously the U.S. government takes the action - and we anarchists should take heed as well.

We admit we were shamefully watching the election coverage in on our couch in London that day, and were despondent about the state of politics in the United States. Was there any hope for...revolution? For an actual movement of resistance against the depravity of the Bush regime? Although the election in some ways was a choice between Bush and a kinder, gentler Bush with no change in the overall trajectory of U.S. policy being proposed by either candidate, the victory of Bush shows the more virulent advocates of brute force have overcome those who favour a more velvet-glove approach to global capitalism. The election handed the world's most powerful army to a band of psychopaths for four years and that does matter. Tell someone killed in Fallujah that this doesn't matter. The question is "What could we do?" Many protested peacefully and no-one noticed, others vowed to continue with their community organising, and some like ourselves remain on the Internet and type. But what can we do?

The Action Itself

Anarchists in North Carolina had a plan. From what we can tell, they organised on a massive-scale not usually to be expected in a place like North Carolina, which is not exactly the Brighton (or even Eugene) of the United States. They organised secretly and without infiltration, and then began a festive, carnival-esque march in the style of Reclaim the Streets. Disrupting traffic, some participants in the march (perhaps without the knowledge of others) smashed the windows of the North Carolina Republican Headquarters, shot fireworks off in or near the building, and covered it in spraypaint, including the infamous circled A. Everyone escaped from the police, who were shown to be utterly incompetent at defending the interests of the local politicians. To show that the action was not aimed just at the Republicans, the anarchists marched under a banner that said "Fuck Bush, Fuck Kerry! We Need a Revolution!" and left a burnt two-headed puppet of Kerry and Bush at the Republican headquarters. Only by bad luck did two rapid Bush-supporters neighbours captured three of the protesters as they were leaving the march. This was an inspiring action for those of us who weren't there - it directly attacked a symbol of an oppressive and brutal regime at a moment of its highest victory, attracting lots of news coverage and enraging the supporters of the Bush regime and its apologists within the Democratic party and the Left.

Overcoming A Tactical Impasse

The anarchist movement has been paralysed by a false choice between covert actions done in small cells, like the acts of the Earth Liberation Front, and mass mobilisations like as recent protests against the Republican National Convention. As events at the European Social Forum show, the traditional Left, such as Marxists and NGOs, are increasingly adopting the rhetoric of anarchism in order to revitalise their own failing causes, while becoming more and more hostile to actual anarchists. Mass mobilisations like the FTAA protests in Miami have been met with a level of paramilitary repression reminding us of Genoa. Secretive cell-style actions result in high charges like the 22-year sentence given to Jeff "Free" Luers and led to the exclusion of many people just beginning interest in direct action. High damage covert actions are easily construed by the government as terrorism and opens social movements to intense repression, possibly destroying the base of support for militancy. However, the actions in Raleigh show a third way is possible. This way is of covertly organised actions that target symbols of power and cause actual damage that involve large numbers of people, actions that both involve a diversity of tactics with varying levels of involvement.No, it does not take two hundred people to burn a building to the crowd, but an easily accessible action like a broken window at a large gathering shows that anyone can take action, and inspires thousands.

Seattle can Happen Anywhere

This tactical style has several advantages. Its lessons harken back to some of the early successes of the anti-capitalist movement like the Seattle Black Bloc. While the Seattle Black Bloc was decried by many, from corporate PR spokespeople who took economic damage to members of the Direct Action Network that thought it stole the media spotlight (also who were shocked it was organised outside the framework of the spokescouncil meetings), the Seattle Black Bloc gave the anarchist movement unprecedented media coverage and, though much of it was negative, it inspired hundreds if not thousands of malcontents to join the anarchist movement. Direct action gets the goods and smashing a few windows is clearly a direct action, even if it was a spectacular one that did more to feed the media than long-term economic damage. The Seattle Black Bloc was apparently like the Raleigh action, organised covertly by a group thought not to be more than a hundred people. It was a surprise, and therefore could not be organised openly in a public meetings. Relying on the element of surprise, these actions remain virtually unstoppable by state repression. Almost all of the Seattle Black Bloc and the Raleigh demonstration escaped. This shows that the anarchists clearly outmaneuvered the local police forces and outwitted whatever passes for "Homeland Security" intelligence. Especially in Raleigh is a clear victory that shows all the chestbeating of the Bush administration against terrorism to be hollow and in truth a facade. It displays the weakness of the Bush regime for all to see, like the Black Bloc showed the world how fundamentally some people were against the WTO. The Seattle Black Bloc is a model that apparently has not been repeated with success at any mass mobilisation, and the Black Blocs at the 2001 IMF/WB protests in Washington D.C., the Blue Bloc in Prague 2001, and the Black Bloc at Genoa were differing creatures, very huge and organised almost aboveground.

The real message of the Raleigh protest is that Seattle can be anywhere. All required is a network of militancy, a cunning plan, a mite of courage, and a measure of secrecy. It can happen anywhere, in any town. Clearly choosing a time and target with high symbolic value insures media coverage and helps make the action comprehensible as an act of social rebellion. Can Raleigh be repeated? What better time than now, what better place than here.

Even in Raleigh

First, we would like to point out the fact that such an attack comes from North Carolina as opposed to say, New York or San Francisco. We're sure the local police and ruling class are surprised. However, this should not be surprising, and this stands in contrast with Europe. The anarchist movement in the United States is surprisingly widespread, often stronger outside major cities in rural and small towns with force and vigour. Many of the most dedicated anarchists seem to come from smaller towns and the desolate fundamentalist heartland of the United States, places such as Iowa and Kentucky. Upon some Internet research, North Carolina has also hosted to a surprising amount of militant and anarchist-inspired protests. Multiple Reclaim the Streets, a shutdown of a major corporate park in solidarity with the 2004 G8 protests, and at least one Wal-mart burnt down (the U.S. equivalent of ASDA). From our inspection of North Carolina IMC, it appears they also specialise in friendly picnics and fighting police brutality, and confronting the Klan.

Common Critiques

There have been a number of criticisms to the protest made by conservatives, liberals, leftists, and conservative anarchists. One common critique is that the real way to political change is registering people to vote, or voting itself. This is clearly ridiculous, for despite the best efforts of Puffy Daddy and Bill Clinton the Democratic Party did embarrassingly bad at the polls and voter turnout was not much higher than it had been four years ago. Despite all sweat put in to the election, the Anyone But Bush camp that included not only Democrats but "progressives" like Michael Moore and even avowed anarchists like Noam Chomsky was soundly defeated. If there is any proof that representative politics can't change anything, this election was it. We assume the same thing will happen here in some awkward Tory-Green-Liberal-Democrat alliance against Labour for Anyone But Blair. Obviously, many people are going to be attracted to forms of politics based on direct action instead of indirect representation, and so the action in Raleigh makes perfect sense. Supposed democracy by the vote has failed, so take politics into the streets. This has also been a time-honoured tradition of this from the Boston Tea Party to the Black Panther Party in the United States. The protest was criticised by many "progressives", Leftists, and even "anarchists" for giving anarchy a bad name by associating it with violence and vandalism. This critique assumes that the media message is true, and that most people believe it. It also fails to note this was not vandalism or a thoughtless attack but a well-planned action against a symbol of state and capitalist power, which explains the high charges and bails laid against the Raleigh Three, which would have been much less had it been sheer vandalism against a corporate store. The State understands the difference between juvenile vandalism and focused political direct action, many activists and journalists do not. This critique assumes there is some dichotomy between anarchists doing community organising such as community gardens, free parties, or anti-police brutality work and anarchists taking militant direct action such as attacking the GOP headquarters. Some even go far as to claim such actions are "reckless" and could be the work of COINTELPRO.

Community organising and direct action are complimentary as anarchists have since the Spanish Revolution to the present day in the anti-globalisation movement. Anarchist community organising is at its best by letting people take direct action in their own lives. The best gains of anarchism like the eight-hour working day or the failure of global summits happened through direct action, not in spite of it. Dividing people into "good" and "bad" protesters, into "community organisers" and "terrorists", is what COINTELPRO and M6 used to destroy groups like the Black Panther Party, driving a wedge in between their public face in the Oakland chapter and the more autonomous cells that wished to continue direct action against the State in the New York Chapter and the Black Liberation Army. Subcommandte Marcos says we need "both sides of the moon, the dark and the light".This action was clearly organized by anarchists, not COINTELPRO. COINTELPRO would not dress two hundred people in black to trash the Republican headquarters, but they would post misleading statements on the Internet, saying that such action somehow alienates oppressed people. The oppressed sectors of society, whether they agree or disagree with specific tactics, like taking action, and know any action is more effective than the bullshit of voting. Lastly, some have compared this night time action to the Klan, based mainly on the presumed skin-colour of anarchists. This shows ignorance of both anarchists, who are against racism and fascism and have even in North Carolina battled fascists in the Streets when the traditional Left was too scared to confront them. It speaks the truth about the Left's startling ignorance of the use of militant direct action by African American communities in the States, such as the Wilmington uprising after the assassination of Martin Luther King and the subsequent Wilmington Ten case of arson against a racist grocery store. The roots of African American armed resistance lie in the small town of Monroe, North Carolina and the legacy of Robert F. Williams. We applaud these historic figures and so applaud those in Raleigh, as well as all the people who have fought for freedom without having their name ever known.

Support the Prisoners!

However, three names are known - there were three people, dubbed the Raleigh Three, up on ludicrous felony charges with a 50,000 dollar bond each. David Reuben Hensley, Melissa Lynn Brown and Vanessa Marie Zuloaga, according to the police and corporate media who often lie about such matters, were caught changing out of black clothing in a residential neighborhood after the attack on the GOP headquarters by local vigilante Josh Robbins and a friend. Even if this is true, they may have been only participating in the demonstration and not have taken part in the attack on the GOP headquarters.Each was charged with one count of malicious destruction of property with an incendiary device merely because they were in the location and the only people they local police could blame. The police were obviously caught with their pants down and trying to blame anyone, and the FBI Counter-Terrorism Taskforce is now visiting Raleigh and harassing local anti-war activists in an attempt to both round up more suspects and silence dissent.

The entire world can march under one unified banner as we did on February 15th against the war on Iraq and nothing will change. Hope is not lost; together we can take intelligent and focused direct action, done on a large scale in Seattle and on a smaller scale in Raleigh, and we will change the world. There is no comparison of violence against property such as those in Raleigh took against the United States government to the violence the United States government has caused through organized murder in Fallujah. The triumph of Bush has showed us all that representation in politics, all forms of electoral and representative democracy, has failed. Only action without representation, direct action, can save the world from destruction. Actions that are organised by networks of friends, with the element of surprise and sensible targets will have a lasting effect. Propaganda by the deed, what other type of propaganda do we need?

To support the Raleigh Three, you can send money through PayPal, at  http://www.paypal.com. Click on "send money" and enter in  ealbiston@yahoo.com as the recipient.

If you would like to send money through the mail, send it to:

Liz Albiston
PO Box 281
Chapel Hill, NC 27514-0281
(please email  ealbiston@yahoo.com and let her know how much you're sending.)