June 10 & All That
The forthcoming elections should prove interesting! The SWP's new
front, the Respect Unity Coalition (RUC) have thus far done a pitiful job in
garnering support, whilst other Trots are intent on continuing to support the vile Labour Party. Once again people are being called on to support the "good" parties to prevent the BNP doing well by some, whilst others demand that the electoral farce by turned into a referendum on Blair.

Two issues are particularly interesting in these particular elections.
The more obvious one is how well the BNP fare. There has been some media slagging of the BNP, most recently in the News of the World - which
revealed that the BNP are a party of vicious racists and fascists! We were
shocked! Should the BNP do well on June 10, we feel that they will prove
entertaining in office: their successful candidates in local authority elections have shown the inept standard of the people they have available for election. To have them strut their stuff on a wider stage - the European Parliament - may give them the stage they've desired for so long, but we suspect that it will also prove a problem for them. The attraction of a party tied to "respectable" politics for the BNP's traditional recruits is limited. It's possible that a successful election for the likes of Nick Griffin will prove a boon for the NF who may gain some of the disaffected BNPers. On the other hand, a poor showing for Britain's foremost fascist party may lead to Griffin's early exit from the BNP leadership and a return to street politics as the Old Guard go back to what they know best. In this situation, the best thing anti-fascists can do is to gain intelligence on the various BNP
candidates and their supporters. If the chance for a full and frank discussion comes up whilst the BNP are on the hustings, so much the better!

The other potentially topic of especial interest in these elections is
the performance of the SWP's Respect: the Unity Coalition (RUC). An unholy alliance between the SWP, Galloway and the Communists, it's come out of the Stop the War Coalition, and is notorious for supporting the less
likeable Muslims - the Muslim Association of Britain and so forth. In the
Birmingham local elections, the RUC want their supporters to vote for the People's Justice Party, a bizarre lot who want to see an independent Muslim Kashmir.

Though the SWP and their grubby allies hoped to raise a million pounds with which to finance their electoral venture, it appears that they were not
successful - for which small mercy we should, perhaps be grateful. In standing for London mayor alone, they had to raise £20,000, of which they'll be lucky to see a penny again.

The RUC's policies appear mostly non-existent, made up on the hoof by
their candidates. Galloway's stance on abortion and the death penalty sits
ill with the views the SWP have long expressed: and in their grubby
alliance the SWP seem to have abandoned principles they have previously described as shibboleths,such as women's rights. For anarchists this is amusing. It proves once more what we've repeatedly said about the SWP and their unprincipled opportunism.

Yet this has a darker and less hilarious side. The SWP with Galloway
and the rest of the RUC are doing not only themselves damage, but also
inflicting it on the rest of the British left, who in many people's minds are tainted by association. The SWP's failure on June 10 will hopefully be the first part of anannus horibilis for them, with a dismal Marxism and costly failure at the European Social Forum to follow. What causes us concern, though, is that the anarchist movement in the UK may pay too.


REVIEWS
This month we look at a selection of recent books published by AK
Press.

2/15: The Day The World Said No To War
Barbara Sauermann (Editor), AK Press. £18.99
February 15 last year saw protests across the world against the
incipient war on Iraq. In scores of countries, and hundreds of cities, millions of people took to the streets to voice their opposition. This book contains photographs from that day, of symbolic naked demonstrations, of a-b marches, artwork, graffiti and so on. If that's your cup of tea, then this is the book for you. Although this is an interesting idea, and perhaps the concept's not too bad, it's not really my can of lager.
It does show that opposition to the war was truly global, something
that's often mentioned but equally often forgotten as few people have seen
pictures from the demonstrations in Bombay, Cape Town, Antarctica's Ross Island and Seoul.
Worth a look, if you see it, but not - I'd suggest - something you'd
want to buy; certainly not at nineteen quid!!!
1/5

Controlled Flight Into Terrain. Stealworks Anthology 3.0
John Yates, AK Press. £7.00
For many years - since at least the early '90s - John Yates has been
producing artwork. Who can forget the Officer Friendly? or the
Democracy - We Deliver t-shirts? This new collection is more of the same. Though his early efforts were original, thought-provoking and punchy, his recent work appears more tired and repetitive than anything else. John Yates is a gifted artist - perhaps it's time, having made his mark in one style of political art, that he try something different. One for aficionados only, really.
2/5

What is Anarchism?
Alexander Berkman, AK Press. £10.00
As the blurb notes on the back of the book, this book combines the
texts of two of Berkman's best-known works, What is Communist Anarchism? and the ABC of Anarchism. In it Berkman lays out his vision of anarchism, one surely influenced by his long association with that other gifted anarchist Emma Goldman. For those who have not yet encountered Berkman's work, this is an essential anarchist text. Those who are already familiar with Berkman's work may wish to get this to replace their old, well-thumbed copies.
4/5

Guy Debord: Complete Cinematic Works
Ken Knabb (Editor), AK Press. £22.00
This book is very interesting but mainly for people already well-versed
in Guy Debord. It contains the scripts of his films, from Howls for Sade
(1952) to Ingirum imus nocte et consumimur igni (1978). The uninitiated won't, frankly, gain too much from this book: although I'd previously read Society of the Spectacle I don't think I got as much from this book as those fascinated by Debord should. The price alone will, I expect, dissuade all but the most ardent admirer of the famous Situationist from purchasing it.
4/5

DIARY DATES
Every Thursday
Picket of McDonald's at Leicester Square, from 5.30pm - 8pm.
Details from www.mcspotlight.org
JUNE
05 NUM National rally, Hallam FM Arena, Sheffield.
06 London Class War Meeting
12 Norwich's first annual anarchist bookfair- 07941 657485.
www.twotins.tripod.com
12 International Day of Action- in Solidarity with Jeff "Free" Luers.
imprisoned for 4 years of a 22year+ sentence for burning three Sport
Utility Vehicles (SUVs) at Romania Chevrolet in Eugene, Jeff has continued to be active in prison and fight back with his words and inspiration.
www.freefreenow.org
13 1100 London Socialist Film Co-op.
Wobblies (Bird & Shaffer, USA, 1979, 89 minutes)
The classic portrayal of the IWW campaign in the USA between 1905 and
1918.
Now this really is class war! Followed by a discussion led by (of all
people!) Tony Benn. At the Renoir Cinema, Brunswick Square, London WC1
(tube Russell Square)
Admission £6/£4.
19 Manchester Radical Bookfair. At Bridge Mill 5, 22a Beswick Street,
Ancoats, Manchester M4 7HR. More details from
www.radicalbookfair.org.uk. A Class War stall is booked

JULY
1-4 Green Anarchy in the UK- Gathering of the tribes "We have called
this gathering to give green anarchists in the UK and elsewhere a great
opportunity to get together and share thoughts and ideas about how to
fight the megamachine, that is civilization, and learn primitive skills."
Bilston Glen Anti-Bypass Protest Site, near Edinburgh 07747606558
www.bilstonglen-abs.org.uk

MAYDAY IN DUBLIN
OUR CORRESPONDENT REPORTS
This year's quiet Mayday in London meant that many activists went to
Dublin for the demonstrations against the EU conference and jamboree there. One of our members who went describes the day for us:

Mayday in Dublin was beautiful and sunny. As I wandered down to the
centre of Dublin I wondered what the day would hold in store. There
were fuck loads of filth everywhere, and the scene was reminiscent of what I'd heard about Prague - the Garda were dotted around in groups of
three-five, looking very shifty and guarding everything in sight. Expectation soon turned to dismay as word reached me that one anarchist from Britain had been detained by the filth outside the Four Courts. It later turned out that he'd been detained by the Garda under the Misuse of Drugs Act, and to have his identity checked, and was effectively arrested and held for an hour. When I caught up with him, we strolled down O'Connell Street chatting and observing the cops.

The first of two protests I went on was a tour of south Dublin, from St
Stephen's Green (the most overgrown I've ever seen!) via the Ministry
of Justice, a squat and an occupation of a privatised park. This gave us
the idea to reclaim one of the private squares in London, of which there
are many around Victoria and Sloane Square.

The main event - the reason many anarchists had congregated in Dublin
- started fairly late in the day. O'Connell Street was closed to traffic
as several thousand anarchists and other troublemakers gathered to
march on Phoenix Park, where the EU leaders were having a banquet.
Numbers were considerably higher than at the earlier demonstration.

We headed north from O'Connell Street, passing Parnell's statue and
heading past the Garden of Remembrance in Parnell Square. A police
barricade at the north side of Parnell Square was confusingly hastily removed as we approached! Talking to a seasoned legal observer from London I tried (but failed!) to make sense of what the cops were up to.

This soon turned from your normal two mile march into something much
longer - I think that the walk to Phoenix Park, or that part of the Navan Road we eventually reached, was about four or five miles. The march kept
stopping and starting, and wrongfooted the coppers almost the entire length of the demonstration... Until we suddenly stopped.

A few words about the policing of the marching bit: we saw few police
on the route we were taking, but there were about 8,000 Garda (and 2,000
soldiers!) ita. There was evidence of cops about, but it was not until too late that the full scale of their mobilisation became apparent.

We stopped in the middle of nowhere. It was a part of Dublin few
tourists or locals can come to, with nothing to attract them, and no shops to bring shoppers. A long, straight road, from which a glance at the A-Z
revealed no easy routes of retreat. With a friend I went scouting, to see a line of police being formed ahead. On the right was a park and playing field, on the left a housing estate swarming with Garda. And the line ahead had not caught the attention of the mass of demonstrators. I began to feel that the Dublin Grassroots Network had not reckoned on the scale of the police response to the demonstration. Passing my observations on, I looked on as events progressed. The police line was massively reinforced, and the number of anarchists prepared to take on the police looked unlikely to succeed.
In a position where retreat if charged by the police was not an option, I felt that the planner of the demonstration had perhaps been casual in ensuring that those who'd taken part would remain safe.

The Black Bloc - of Wombles, local anarchos and those of us from
Britain - moved forwards at last. It was a joy to see the discipline with which they moved up to try to break the police lines! For once, it looked like a proper block of people, not the normal disorganised way we operate. A strange stand-off ensued, then normal service was resumed and scuffles broke out across the length of the line. At this point, the road and pavement were about fifty feet across, and here and there I saw a journalist get in between the anarchists and the Garda. They did not like that! They liked it even less, when in the semi-twilight watercannon began to play across the crowd. Quite a few journalists were soaked, and many of them had their cameras with them!

The scuffling continued for quite a while. It was uncertain what the
police would do. From our vantage point it became increasingly unclear what was happening at the front as the light diminished. Deciding it was time to return to the centre of Dublin, a friend and I tried to circle round
the north side of the Navan Road, through a mazy estate. We attracted the
interest of a helicopter which persisted in pursuing us for about forty
minutes. When finally it left us alone, we were little further on, still lost within the labyrinthine lanes and cul-de-sacs we'd ventured into.

Suddenly we found our way out of the maze we'd been in, only to see
people running ahead of us. A glance behind showed us why: there were riot cops chasing behind us. Running from them, we scaled a couple of walls and made good our escape.

We returned to the Navan Road, quite some way from where the scuffling
had occurred. There were large numbers of police still about, covering all
the side-roads. Apart from a few demonstrators making their way home, and the large numbers of police in the shadows, the road was empty. It was a strange and not altogether comfortable feeling.

After walking somewhat further, but still little closer to the centre
of Dublin, we reached a road with some traffic on it. Deciding to get a
cab, we returned to Parnell Square. Almost as soon as we got out of the cab, we were surrounded by police - but strangely we managed to evade further contact by going into a pub. My companion swore that they had been after us, but I felt that it had been such a half-hearted show that they really weren't after us.

I left him to get a bus back to his B&B and walked up to mine. On the
way I passed a squad of police by a bridge on the road to Drumcondra. The police were out in force to capture anyone they felt had been causing trouble.

I stopped briefly by a canal when I saw the cone of light from a
helicopter plainly around the Navan Road. Although I wondered what was still going on there, I never found out. The chop-chop-chop of helicopters
reverberated through the night air for some considerable time afterwards,
reinforcing the impression of a troubled city.

I went up to a pub before going back to my B&B. They had the news on in
there, showing scenes of the day's events. The battle the Sky
journalists were describing was in no way a proper battle - more a bit of
reasonable scuffling. The police had a static location to defend, and we had had to try to break through their lines to reach our objective. That was my
thought, but when on the Sunday I met some other anarchists I found out that others felt that the token attempt to break through the police lines had had to be made, not with any expectation of success but to do something.

I was very disappointed by this. About twenty-five people were arrested
for the "violence" on Mayday, few (if any) of those arrests were necessary.
We had few assets on our side, of which our mobility was probably the most important. By stopping of our own accord and losing that mobility, it
had been assured that the police would be able to repel any attempt to
reach Phoenix Park - and also that any attempt to breach the police
lines would only end in failure.

The remainder of my time in Dublin I spent doing touristy things. I'm
not too happy about the way things were organised in Dublin. I hope that
the next time something goes off in Dublin, as it will do with Bush's
imminent visit, the Irish anarchists learn from the lessons on Mayday, and the best of luck to them!

REMEMBERING THE PAST
ANNIVERSARIES FOR MAY
1: 1998: US: Eldridge Cleaver, Black Panther Party cofounder, dies at
62, California.
2: 1980: Pink Floyd's hit single "Another Brick in the Wall (Part II)",
with its chorus of kids chanting "We don't need no education", is banned by
the South African government.
3:1886: US: Police kill four & wound at least 200 as Chicago's finest
attack McCormick Reaper Works strikers.
4: 1886: US: Haymarket Square Bombing. A bomb kills seven Chicago cops as they attack demonstrators at a rally protesting police brutality
yesterday at McCormick Reaper Works.
5: 1916: Ireland: John MacBride, Irish rebel, is executed.
6:1882: Irish republicans assassinate Lord Frederick Cavendish (Irish
Secretary) & Thomas Burke (Under-secretary) in Phoenix Park, Dublin.
7:1954: Vietnam: Viet Minh forces defeat French at Dien Bien Phu.
8:1967: US: A federal grand jury indicts heavyweight boxing champion
Muhammed Ali for refusing to be inducted into the armed forces.
9: 1785: Joseph Bramah receives British patent for beer pump handles.
10: 1922: US: In Chicago 200 labor leaders arrested for complicity in
murder of two policemen, bombing of factories.
11: 1812: England: Spencer Percival, Tory Prime Minister, is
assassinated in the lobby of the Commons by John Bellingham, who is cheered by the crowds outside as he is led away.
12: 1984: England: Animal Rights demonstration held, London.
13: 1993: US: Eight African-American protesters are indicted in
Chattanooga, Tennessee, for participating in a demonstration at the unveiling of a memorial for Chattanooga police.
14: 1080: Massacre of Bishop Walcher of Lorraine & his retinue.
15: 1872: Julia Ward Howe declares the first Mother's Day as an
anti-war holiday.
16: 2000: The Moonies buy United Press International (UPI) news
service.
17: 1940: Emma Goldman is buried in Waldheim Cemetery, Chicago, close
to the Haymarket martyrs.
18: 1979: US: Silkwood vs. Kerr-McGee case establishes corporations are
responsible for the people they irradiate.
19: 1897: Oscar Wilde is released from Reading Gaol.
20: 1970: Mao Tse-tung issues "People of the World, Unite and Defeat
the US Aggressors and All Their Running Dogs!"
21: 1979: Russia: Royal lickspittle Elton John is the first rock star
to perform in the USSR.
22: 1868: US: First train robbery in the world, in Indiana, when the
Reno Gang makes off with $98,000.
23: 1701: Captain William Kidd is hanged for piracy & murder.
24: 1968: France: In Nantes the events of 1968 reach a pinnacle. For a
week the city & surrounding area is controlled by workers themselves.
25: 1978: US: The Unabomber's first bomb injures one at the University
of Illinois.
26: 1871: France: Paris Commune (Bloody Week). Battles at the Bastille
& Villette, the Communards are defeated this evening at Belleville & Père
Lachaise.
27: 1977: The Sex Pistols release "God Save the Queen" in Britain.
28: 1938: US: Three Seattle cops are convicted of manslaughter for
beating a black man to death in custody, but two are later pardoned by the
governor.
29: 1913: France: The audience at the opening of The Rites of Spring,
in Paris, riot due to the sensuality of the dance & Stravinsky's
disturbing music.
30: 1814: Mikhail Bakunin born.
31: 1578: The Catacombs of Rome are discovered by accident.
Compiled by the Class War historian