Has anyone met Jan Appel? Or know anyone who has?

Yes, the ICC did indeed know Jan Appel. He took part in the discussions that led to the formation of the Révolution Internationale group that later became the ICC's section in France, and he was present at the founding congress of the ICC in 1976. Several comrades of World Revolution met him on both occassions, but there are other comrades of the ICC in France and Belgium who knew him much better and who have warm memories of him.

If his grandchildren want to get in touch with us they can do so by e-mail ( international@internationalism.org ) or by writing to our section in France at this address:

RI

Mail Boxes 153

108 rue Damremont

75018 Paris

France.

We will be more than happy to pass on to them whatever we can of the torch that Jan Appel passed on to us. For more details of Jan Appel's life, see our brief obituary we wrote in 1985 here:

http://en.internationalism.org/ir/042_janappel.html

Beltov,

for the ICC.

That's libcomm editors speak for, "we nicked it off someone's site and never bothered to credit it", isn't it?

Well that makes a change then .....

Knightrose, some of the stuff in the endpage archive was itself taken off other sites without credit. Unless we go 2000 articles individually and found out where they were first published and by whom, they won't all have credits on.

However there is this note on the library linked from the right hand column (which has been there for about six months), which both apologises for this, lists the main sources, and asks people to contact us if they see anything which they originally put up. When you contacted me about As We See it/Don't see it, I amended the listing and added credits in, if there's any other articles on there that need this doing for I'll be happy to do the same.

I was only taking the piss. I've done it myself.

He must have HATED syndicalism.

I can't actually find it, do you have it?

8)

Actually nastyned, yes it is a ghastly site (1990's tech)! But I'm pleased it fulfilled it's purpose of getting the text circulated. The hardcopy was definitely not going to do that. And for some reason my password doesn't allow access to it anymore. So it'll just hafta fester away there.

Here's a picture of a KAPD flyer.

http://www.marxistische-bibliothek.de/kapdwahlen.html

Quick, nick it!

It is true of course that the time Mike Baker spent 'finetuning' the MWC additions was time spent delaying the publication. That wasn't a major problem. It was actually the inaccessibility of his writing style that was the major problem. The language was very jargon-ridden and the sentences went on forever. The logic was very meandering and where a point could have been made in half a page he might take two or three. (Somewhat reminiscent of many ICC tracts!) If I remember correctly the MWC additions amounted to more than half the actual book itself. Another reason why on-line publication was a neccesity was the poor quality of the book binding. Just applying a very light thumbing action to any page would cause it to be detached from the spine. It was put together surreptitiously on a school press somewhere in the New Cross area.

There's no doubt about it. Mike Baker could be pompous at times. And yes, he was very much a chauvanist about most things German. He was what you could call an old school dogmatic Marxist, but he did have the strength to act on his convictions. Not many know that in the early 50's he was dismissed from his university lectureship in the former GDR, tortured by the political police and then expelled from the country. Baker always maintained that it was his Marxist critique of the regime that caused his expulsion. Of course that does not indicate that back then that he had councillist tendencies.

As for your allegation that on his death bed Joe Thomas cursed Mike Baker, I do know (from what Baker said to me) that Joe didn't want to see him. But right up to about 8 hours prior to his death I was in phone contact with Joe and he never said anything against Baker. Joe knew then that his death was imminent. He was always a man who spoke his mind. I have no answer as to why at that stage in his life he should refrain from what he normally did, and not make known his (alleged) feelings of exploitation. It is out of character for him not to have done so. I do know that in the months prior to his death and despite his steady decline of health, that Joe made strenuous efforts to attend the meetings of the MWC. Hardly the actions of a man who is exploited! Are you saying that Baker coerced Thomas in some way?

Joe himself had his pecularities. He forbade a graveside ceremony. Instead, his many friends and comrades had to suffice with a memorial meeting (which, BTW, Baker organised). Take what you may from that, but suffice to say, Baker held no perceivable grudge against Joe Thomas.