Orinoco Tribune – Special Interview with Joti Brar (Communist Party Great Britain Marxist-Leninist)

Premiered Jul 28, 2023British Communist Joti Brar: PCV & KKE do Disservice to the Anti-Imperialist Cause

Caracas (OrinocoTribune.com)—During an interview with British communist Joti Brar, the European political leader expressed her frustration with the way the Venezuelan Communist Party (PCV) and the Greek Communist Party (KKE) have initiated an international campaign against the Bolivarian Revolution and against the anti-imperialist cause, after the recent rupture of relations and subsequent confrontation between the PCV and the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV).

On July 24, Jesús Rodriguez-Espinoza—the editor and founder of the Orinoco Tribune—interviewed the British communist cadre, who is an anti-imperialist and socialist leader of the Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist-Leninist). Brar has been involved in the socialist movement since an early age, working as trade union organizer and as a writer on topics such as imperialism, socialism, and the working class. She also actively participates in the World Anti Imperialist Platform.

Inter-imperialist debate
Brar was first asked about how some forces—especially in the Global North—hold the notion that the war in Ukraine is some sort of imperialist battle between Russia and Ukraine in a “neo-colonial” revival of the old Russian empire and also have created the idea of China as another imperial power. Brar clearly responded that capitalist forces have taken Marxist-Leninist terminology and “turned [them] against us,” including words like imperialism and colonialism.

“They use these terms which are Leninist, which are Marxist terms which have an emotional impact on socialists, right? And they use them to describe their actions. They talk about Russia as an aggressive imperialist power. So that immediately has an emotional impact on people who identify as socialists, right? “Oh gosh, I can’t be on the side of aggressive imperialists,” and then they say what they want to do, bless them, is to decolonize Russia … Don’t you understand? So the imperialists are very good at taking our terminology and using it against us. But of course, this only works if you’re a self identifying, emotional communist, and not an actual student of socialism. Because if you study Marxism, this won’t fool you … the root cause is opportunism.”

The British Marxist further spoke on the Ukrainian issue, regarding the idea that Vladimir Putin simply woke up one day and decided he was going to attack Ukraine because he’s an evil, aggressive monopolist and wants to loot the country, stating that such an idea “doesn’t make any sense.” In her opinion, this is one of the reasons behind the creation of the World Anti Imperialist Platform, “because clarity is really needed.”

On this same issue—specifically, regarding the component of political training—she highlighted the fact that many “Marxists” treat ideology as a “a reading list that they did once.” She emphasized that only a methodical and recurrent reading of the Marxist-Leninist classics is capable not only of countering bourgeois propaganda that every person has to withstand on a daily basis, but to bring back one’s convictions and sharpen perspectives on relevant issues.

In response to a question about the responsibility of Trotskyists and Anarchists on the deviations from the real Marxist-Leninist ideology, Brar said that Trotskyism is “a modern movement created and funded by the state machinery of the west. It’s a petty bourgeois ideology, but it’s been heavily promoted, created, funded in order to catch revolutionary young people, particularly students—who would otherwise be a reserve of the revolution—to keep them busy for a while and then spit them out.”

Brar added that they are “catching people who sincerely want to do something about the injustice they see in the world,” when asked about how to bring those participating in good faith in these deviations to the Marxist-Leninist side. “So those people are really our people, they’re people who should be with us. But they’ve been caught by this machinery and that’s a shame for them … you’ve got to recognize that their ideology itself is absolutely incompatible with socialism.

“It’s a pro imperialist ideology, essentially, that the organizations, many of them, are led and funded by the state. They’re not going to be pulled into anything useful, but many of their people are sincere people, who are just misinformed and miseducated by this machinery. So is there hope for catching some of these people, changing their minds, pulling them back? Of course; if there wasn’t, if you can’t change people’s minds, you can’t make a revolution.”