Fascist antifascism

Are antifa authoritarian leftists?

Kureigo-San

Are antifa authoritarian leftists?

In some countries there definitely is an element (at least) that are. In Italy, I'd say a large proportion of Antifa (and social centres more generally) are Leninists of one sort or another.. related to the OP Banda Bassoti, a famous (within Italy) left-wing Ska Punk band, is organising a tour in the Donbass region of Ukraine to support the 'anti-fascist' 'people's militia' against the fascist Ukraine government..

Here's an English version of their call-out:

Everywhere in Europe you won't hear any information about what the fascist government in Kiev is doing in Donbass and in Ukraine. Italian and European press are totally subdued by European Union and United States.
No news on bombing civilians, on persecution of Russians, communists and anybody who appears to be a partisan of the popular Militia; not a word on the fact that the “European” Ukraine is the biggest Workshop of International neo-nazism.
We are tired of all that and, with Novarossjian popular Militia, we are organising a fund rising antifascist Expedition.
We will bringing our antifascist solidarity to Donbass territory with a concert.
As previously done in 1984 in Nicaragua, in 1994 in Salvador, in 2004 in Palestine we are now ready for another journey.
From 26th until 30th September 2014 we will be in that lands who are resisting Nazis attacks. We will visit Novarossija. Our programme is to set up a concert in Rostov on Don, the city who shelters a huge refugee camp, and one in Novarosija.

Akai, have you got any links for the 'Anti-fascist' gathering they're having? Some interesting names and groups on there, including obviously Jobbik and Roberto Fiore of Forza Nuova, two outright nazi groups.. I suppose they'd back the pro-Russia side as an anti-EU move?

Ed

Kureigo-San

Are antifa authoritarian leftists?

In some countries there definitely is an element (at least) that are. In Italy, I'd say a large proportion of Antifa (and social centres more generally) are Leninists of one sort or another..

Anti-fascism was official state doctrine of the GDR and much of the Eastern Bloc (the Berlin Wall was called the "Anti-Fascist Protection Rampart" for example - according to SED doctrine, fascism was still alive and kicking in West Germany), so it's not surprising if you see loads of Stalinists at antifa rallies around here*. I don't know what the situation in the Ukraine is, but I can fathom something similar is happening there.

*Anti-fascism in post-cold war Germany is peculiar anyway. In some places it's become a mass sport even liberals and apolitical people participate in, with colorful flags and mayors speaking at rock against racism festivals. In a way it's continuing the post-WWII ideology of Hitler and the Nazi being an outside aggressor that drove the innocent German people to war.

akai

There are lots of articles, let's see.

Cheers for those, akai. I found similar ones as well, which all mention the Jobbik guy and 'other nationalists'.. found this article on the blog of some academic specialising in the far-right with the list that you've put up above though.. I don't suppose you've heard anything more in particular about Roberto Fiore and Giovanni Maria Camillacci, have you? Or any other Italians for that matter..

Polish fascists (and perhaps other fascists too) are divided on this. NOP and "autonomist nationalists" supports Maidan (NOP cooperate with Ukrainian neonazi Svoboda Party). Another faction is pro-Russian or pro-separatist.

akai

About this conference, we can send loud jeers to "socialist" attendees:

Richard Brenner (Workers Power)
Alan Freeman (Socialist Action)
Boris Kagalitsky (Kremlin in disguise)

Do you have a source on this? PM me if you want.

~J.

So hold on, Richard Brenner is going to a conference with Nick Griffin?! Even for him that is pretty low…

More info from that Anton Shekhovtsov bloke:
Boris Kagarlitsky, a Kremlin's mole in the leftist movement (updated)

Deluded British leftists like to invite Russian allegedly left-wing publicist Boris Kagarlitsky of the Institute for Globalization Studies and Social Movements to take part in their events.

On 2 June this year, he joined, via Skype, the founding meeting of the "Solidarity with the Antifascist Resistance in Ukraine" that was attended by Richard Brenner, Lindsey German (Counterfire), Andrew Murray (Communist Party of Great Britain), Alan Woods (International Marxist Tendency) and Sergei Kirichuk (Borotba).
[...]
Kagarlitsky (and Richard Brenner) also took part in the conference "The world crisis and the conflict in Ukraine" held in annexed Yalta on 6-7 July 2014 and co-organised by his Institute for Globalization Studies and Social Movements. Other co-organisers of this conference - the ultranationalist "Novaya Rus" (New Russia) headed by Aleksey Anpilogov - held a second conference titled "Russia, Ukraine, New Russia: global problems and challenges", to which they invited international fascists such as Frank Creyelman (Vlaams Belang), Luc Michel (Parti Communautaire National-Européen), Márton Gyöngyösi (Jobbik), Roberto Fiore (Forza Nuova), Mateusz Piskorski (Samooborona) and Nick Griffin (British National Party). (Only Piskorski and Fiore, however, were able to come.)

And here is a photograph that features Kagarlitsky in a company of Russian fascists: Aleksey Belyaev-Gintovt (prominent member of Aleksandr Dugin's International Eurasian Movement), Yevgeniy Zhilin (militant extreme right Oplot group), Konstantin Krylov (far right "Russian Social Movement - Russia") and Yegor Kholmogorov.

Edit to add: obviously other people who know more about the ins and outs of Russian fascism will have to confirm.. like, the pic above could just be him and some burly looking blokes, i don't know.. but the blogger seems like he knows his stuff so I'm inclined to believe him..

What a grim looking bunch. Probably fascists.

This seems like a sensible article on connections between Russian far rightists and the pro-Russians militias: http://www.socialistproject.org/international/the-russian-far-right/ It points to http://www.sova-center.ru/en/ Does anybody know more about that Sova center?

edit: last question already answered. On the sponsors list I see the usual pro-Western NGO crowd who usually take a pro-Maidan/ andi-Donetjs line. The site may still be useful but should be used with care.

Ed

like, the pic above could just be him and some burly looking blokes, i don't know.. but the blogger seems like he knows his stuff so I'm inclined to believe him..

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1525635867650029&set=a.1379522135594737.1073741827.100006108909633&type=1&permPage=1

though this is much funnier imo
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1527891867424429&set=a.1379522135594737.1073741827.100006108909633&type=1&permPage=1

. but the blogger seems like he knows his stuff so I'm inclined to believe him..

The blogger seems like he had someone take a photo of him with a EU flag- forming a halo above him- in the midst of gawking and then posted it as a profile picture on his blogspot account

akai

This article is not bad to orient people as to what is happening. Only for me it is a little wishy-washy, sort of starting from the incorrect idea that the separatists are anti-fascists and confronting that idea. But I think not far enough.

Anti-fascism was Soviet imperialism defending itself against German aggression. This anti-fascism is Russian imperialism defending itself against German aggression (And Ukrainian imperialism- which also considers itself a successor state to the USSR- has its own anti-fascism: see any NYC based upper class aristocracy/intelligentsia rag on this war for examples: New Yorker, NYRB, etc). Allying with any/all pro-democracy forces in Germany's periphery is part of this strategy. Eurasianist fascists (or anti-Oceania fascists is more accurate) just sense which way the wind is currently blowing: an economic & political debacle in the EU. Similarly the fascist Chiang-Kai-Shek was build up by the Soviet Union and during the war against Japanese fascism his forces were allied with Soviet and Chinese Bolshevik forces.

The other label that tricks people is "left". People should know that in many places in E. Europe and especially the former Soviet Union the "left" is really a great big melting pot and includes very unsavoury characters.[

And where and when is/was this not the case?

Banda Bassotti being fucking idiots and doing the 'anti-fascist' caravan in Ukraine. Anyone know what the black, blue and red flag with the Russian writing on it is? I think the others are Russian Communist Party..
[youtube]Pgw_IMiCT_I[/youtube]

I was reading this story from BBC and noticed the DNR flag [second image down in the article]. The knotwork symbol looks a lot like the Russian National Unity emblem, but appears to be stylized somewhat differently. Anyone know what the symbol is referencing?

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-29480628

And then supposedly at the other end of the political spectrum and on the pro-Ukrainian state side of the now advanced conflict there we have the weird Ukrainian NIHILIST anarchists urging anarchists and others to join up with anti-Russian militias and the official Ukrainian army!

The 2014 meeting is mentioned here too now: https://libcom.org/library/investigation-red-brown-alliances-third-positionism-russia-ukraine-syria-western-left (more before and after this paragraph):

vagabond

In early June 2014, Kagarlitsky was present through Skype at the founding conference of the “Solidarity with the Antifascist Resistance in Ukraine” [archive], which was also attended by Richard Brenner from Workers’ Power (a British Trotskyist group which was dissolved and merged into the Labour Party in September 2015), Lindsey German from Counterfire, Alan Woods from Socialist Appeal and the International Marxist Tendency, and Sergey Kirchuk from Borotba (see below). In August 2014, Kagarlitsky was hosted by the UK-based Stop The War Coalition together with Tariq Ali and Lindsey German [archive].

Update: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/andrew-murray-corbyn_uk_5b9e971ae4b013b0977bc53e

According to a recent article (last chapter) in Rolling Stone a couple of westerners that fought on the side of Syrian Democratic Forces in an Antifa Platoon in Rojava reportedly later after the IS had been expelled from their former capital of Raqqa traveled to Donbass to enlisted in a side of the Ukrainian nationalists. According to the article the antifa platoon in question was formed by "avowed communist" of Moroccan Italian descent and played a major role in clearing the IS out of parts of Raqqa. An extreme case, no doubt, but in my view this highlights that the violence/adventure/glory often associated with the antifa movement can easily attract politically unreliable elements to the cause with a thirst for adventure.

Sike, are you sure they sided with the Ukrainian nationalists and not with the pro-Russian separatist forces?

jura

Sike, are you sure they sided with the Ukrainian nationalists and not with the pro-Russian separatist forces?

From the last paragraph in the Rolling Stone article:

They joined a militia known as the Georgian Foreign Legion, on the side of the Ukrainian nationalists against the Russian-backed separatists.

Apparently, the ‘Georgian Foreign Legion’ is part of the “Georgian National Legion.” The “Georgian National Legion” itself in turn was founded in 2014 to aid the Ukrainian military against Russian separatists in the Donbas. Reportedly, in December of 2017 after a number of it’s members had been wounded during a single day of combat the GNL broke away from the Ukrainian military over accusations by the GNL of incompetence among the leadership of the Ukrainian military. I have no idea what the GNL is up to since the RS Rojava "Antifa Platoon" article was published but I think that it's a safe bet that the unit didn't up and go over to the Russian separatists simply on account of it's misgivings about the quality of the leadership of the Ukrainian military.
source 1
source 2

Huh, interesting. Thanks.

jura

Sike, are you sure they sided with the Ukrainian nationalists and not with the pro-Russian separatist forces?

This is not unheard of: https://libcom.org/forums/organise/nihilist-ukrainian-anarchist-online-zine-11022018?page=2#comment-603132

Yeah, it's not unique - apart from the Ukrainian anarchists mentioned above, the Utopian magazine put this out a few years back: http://www.utopianmag.com/articles/defend-ukraine-fight-russian-imperialism

Events not only demand an unequivocal anarchist political defense of Ukraine's territorial integrity but solidarity with military actions aimed at defeating Putin's adventure.

Although from a brief skimread of the Rolling Stone article, the individuals in question didn't sound that anarchist/revolutionary-leaning anyway - not had time to read it in full though.

Mike Harman

This is not unheard of: https://libcom.org/forums/organise/nihilist-ukrainian-anarchist-online-zine-11022018?page=2#comment-603132

Yeah, I posted quite a lot in that thread. I was surprised in this case because most self-described "communists" joining the conflict in Ukraine that I've heard of identify with the Donetsk and Lugansk "people's republics", not with the "ukro-fascist" state.

Tankies go fight for Donbass, dronies go fight for Ukraine.

Rurkel

Tankies go fight for Donbass, dronies go fight for Ukraine.

What's a Dronie? Haven't heard that term before?

I suspect it's pro-US/NATO/West elements (drone strikes rather than tanks).