Guerrilla History - Jose Maria Sison: In Conversation with Comrade Joma

Episode Date: September 17, 2021

In this episode of Guerrilla History, we bring on Professor Jose Maria Sison, better known as Comrade Joma, to talk about his life, how it impacted his ideology, the history of the Communist Party of the Philippines, and more!  Comrade Joma is an absolute legendary figure, and it was a pleasure and an honor to be able to talk with him.  A must listen conversation for anyone interested in proletarian struggles and People's War in the Global South, especially the Philippines! Jose Maria Sison is the Founding Chairman of the Communist Party of the Philippines, Chair Emeritus of the International League of People's Struggle, and the Chief Political Consultant of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines.  He's written extensively, a great place to find some of his works is via our friends at Foreign Languages Press.  They have several of his works available for free as pdfs or for affordable print copies on their website https://foreignlanguages.press/.  Guerrilla History is the podcast that acts as a reconnaissance report of global proletarian history, and aims to use the lessons of history to analyze the present.  If you have any questions or guest/topic suggestions, email them to us at [e-mail]. Your hosts are immunobiologist Henry Hakamaki, Professor Adnan Husain, historian and Director of the School of Religion at Queens University, and Revolutionary Left Radio's Breht O'Shea.   Follow us on social media!  Our podcast can be found on twitter @guerrilla_pod, and can be supported on patreon at https://www.patreon.com/guerrillahistory.  Your contributions will make the show possible to continue and succeed! To follow the hosts, Henry can be found on twitter @huck1995, and also has a patreon to help support himself through the pandemic where he breaks down science and public health research and news at https://www.patreon.com/huck1995.  Adnan can be followed on twitter @adnanahusain, and also runs The Majlis Podcast, which can be found at https://anchor.fm/the-majlis, and the Muslim Societies-Global Perspectives group at Queens University, https://www.facebook.com/MSGPQU/.   Breht is the host of Revolutionary Left Radio, which can be followed on twitter @RevLeftRadio and cohost of The Red Menace Podcast, which can be followed on twitter @Red_Menace_Pod.  Follow and support these shows on patreon, and find them at https://www.revolutionaryleftradio.com/.     Thanks to Ryan Hakamaki, who designed and created the podcast's artwork, and Kevin MacLeod, who creates royalty-free music.

You don't remember Dinn-Vin-Vin? No! The same thing happened in Algeria, in Africa. They didn't have anything but a rank. The French had all these highly mechanized instruments of warfare. But they put some guerrilla action on. Hello and welcome to guerrilla history. History, the podcast that acts as a reconnaissance report of global proletarian history and aims to use

the lessons of history to analyze the present. I'm your host, Henry Huckimacki, joined as always by my co-hosts, Professor Adnan Hussein, historian and director of the School of Religion at Queens University in Ontario, Canada. Hello, Adnan. How are you doing? We missed you last time. You weren't here for the last episode that we recorded. Yeah, doing great. Sorry to have missed last time. Looking forward to this conversation and I'm glad to be with you. Absolutely. It's always a pleasure seeing you with none. And I'm also joined, as always, by Brett O'Shea, host of Revolutionary Left Radio and co-host of the Red Menace podcast. Hello, Brett. How are you doing today? Hello, I'm doing great. And I'm really excited about this episode in particular. Yeah, me too. We have a absolutely fantastic guest coming up, one of the most thoroughly, let's say, tested guests that we've ever had in terms of personal trials and tribulations as a result of his political activity. Our guest today is Professor Jose Maria Sison, who more commonly is known as Comrade Joma, chairperson emeritus of the International League of People's Struggle, founding chairman of the Communist Party of the

Philippines, co-founder of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines, it goes on and on. And currently, Professor Sisson is a political refugee in the Netherlands. So we're talking about somebody who's been active in the fight against capitalism and against imperialism since the 1960s and is still fighting from exile to today. So it's very exciting that we're going to be able to talk to him. Guys, what do you think? I mean, this was a very short notice episode. I emailed them yesterday. I finally was able to get his contact information through some connections that we have through the show and got an email the same day saying, I'm free tomorrow and the other times that he was available. We weren't available. So this was a one day turnaround on

this interview. What do you guys think about this upcoming interview? Brett, why don't I turn it to you first? Yeah, no, I'm really excited because actually I think it was like last week that somebody on Twitter sent me a screenshot of Joma posting the episode that we did on the Communist Party of the Philippines on Rev Left onto his Facebook. And that was like, he sort of tickled me and I shared it with some of my comrades and friends and family. And it's like, isn't this really cool? He actually listened and shared the episode. And then just immediate turnaround, Henry's like, by the way, we have them so we can talk to him. And I was like, this is wonderful. So I'm really excited. I'll just say, Brett, let me just add in real quick. It was very serendipitous timing. I

didn't decide to contact him because I saw that on Twitter, like you shared. I've been trying to get a hold of him for like six months at this point. So the fact that they came in within like a one week span of time was just very ironic. Yeah, that's awesome. And so, you know, we have that episode if people are interested in this and want to hear more, but to have his perspective as the founder of the Communist Party of the Philippines and all that he's been through is just going to be really, really exciting and so yeah i'm definitely here for it oh that's an amazing uh synchronicity uh that's great uh i'm excited because i think this is oral history is a really big part of history and of passing and transmitting experience and knowledge of the struggle and we've sort of begun

developing it seems a little bit of a sub-series of speaking with third world uh you know marxist liberation fighters, you know. We had a great episode with Hesilayami, you know, talking about Maoist People's War in Nepal, and that was so interesting and instructive. And it's wonderful to be able to hear from another person's perspective on the struggle in sort of the global south. And that's something very valuable, I think, for our audience to not only hear historians, talking about what happened and analyzing the struggle, but to hear people who have participated in it and have thought carefully about it, share their experience. I think it's really something special. So I'm very much looking forward to this in our kind of continuing series, you might say,

of Maoist, you know, third world, global South, strugglers for liberation and for justice. Absolutely. I'm just going to jump in and say that. Joma is a I mean he's kind of the total package in terms of what we could take this conversation with he's a scholar he's a writer I mean he has a ton of books that he's written including a award-winning book on poetry about his time in prison he's a political prisoner former political prisoner twice as a matter of fact he's an organizer he's an activist he was the founder of the communist I mean he's done everything that we could possibly want to talk to he's done everything that somebody could do that we would want to talk to about.

So it's going to be a very interesting episode that we have because there is so many places that we could turn. So I think what we're looking at here in terms of what we are going to try to cover is a little bit of like a personal, political, ideological biography of Joma and then talk about something of the history of the Communist Party in the Philippines, the Communist Party that he founded. I mean, who better to talk about the history of it than him. Before I turn it back over to you guys for any final thoughts before we get into this conversation because we're running a bit close to the time that he's going to be coming in. I just want to give a shout out to our friends at Foreign Languages Press who carry a lot of Joma's work. You can access it for free or for in print very cheap.

You can either download the PDF for a grand total of $0 or it's like $6 per book. They've got multiple works of his specific characteristics of our people's war, basic principles of Marxism, Leninism, a primer, selected readings of Jose Maria Sisson, and an interesting one, stand for socialism against modern revisionism, which came up during the second great rectification movement, which we'll hopefully talk about during the interview. And it's written by Armando Lewinag, but

most people think that that was a pseudonym or a nom de garre for for joma but i don't think he's ever confirmed that but if you pick up that piece it's probably also something by him so if you want to read some of the work from joma you can do it for free via pdf by going to foreign let me just check the website foreign languages dot press and finding any of those works that i listed guys why don't we go around the horn one quick time and just say any final thoughts that we have about this upcoming interview before we bring Joma in. Adnan, why don't we start with you? Well, we should really get to it.

I think there's going to be a wealth of insight and experience. As you pointed out, he's not only a scholar, but a political activist, and he's had experiences that go across the gamut of the range of struggle and of reflection on that struggle. So hopefully he'll have some real insights for us about what it's like to start a political party to organize in the underground to be a political prisoner. and where he sees the politics of the global south and the Philippines going today under U.S. imperialism and a changing geopolitics. Maybe he has some interesting insights on the perspective

of the U.S. in the Pacific during this era of China's, you know, strength as a real rival in that region. It'll be interesting to see the politics of where the Philippines fits into that. Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's interesting and worth mentioning that, the Communist Party of the Philippines and Joma himself are considered to be a terrorist organization by the right-wing Duterte government. I believe by the United States officially, the European Union designated Joma as a person supporting terrorism. I think they reversed that decision technically. But in any case, this is somebody who the international forces of reaction in imperialism very much have in their targets, not just him as an individual, but the Communist Party

the Philippines more broadly. And so I think it's worth mentioning that this is an ongoing struggle. It is not something in the abstract. This is a concrete people's war that is being waged in the Philippines. And it's just fascinating to know that we have access to talk to somebody of that caliber and to keep in mind that this is an ongoing struggle. Yeah. And the last thing I'll say is just to reiterate the fact that Brett, you're absolutely right, that he's still listed as a person supporting terrorism by the United States. States. I believe he has been since 2002. The European Union, as you mentioned, did have him listed as a person supporting terrorism, but they changed that, I think, in 2009. And the Duterte

government also has him listed as a person of terrorism, although it hasn't really gone through the courts. They have some different procedure for how to do that. Interestingly, Duterte was a former student of Jomas at university, which I think will, it's a very interesting note. Brett, you have a final note before we close up. I just want to say that I formally recognize the United States government as a terrorist organization and the Duterte regime has won well. So for what it's worse, since we're bouncing these words around. Fair. Fair. All right, listeners, I wish you could see Adnan's face right now. It's got a very, very red and happy looking face. All right, we're going to wrap up the conversation. Yeah, so we're going to wrap up

this bit of this episode and get right into the interview. with Professor Jose Maria Sison, Comrade Joma. Stay tuned, listeners. We're back on guerrilla history, and we're joined by our very distinguished guest, Professor Jose Maria Sison, Comrade Joma. Joma, hello, it's an absolute pleasure to have you on the show. Thank you for inviting me, to your show.

It's a pleasure and honor for me to be with you today. It's an honor for us as well. So I think let's get right into the conversation. Brett, I'm going to turn it over to you for the first question that we have here. So why don't you take us away on this conversation with Joma? Yeah, absolutely. Huge honor to speak with you. And I think we want to start just talking about your life a little bit.

So can you talk about your personal political development and maybe how you came eventually to embrace socialism and then eventually Maoism? I have a very conservative background, a very reactionary one, you may say. I come from my landlord family with relatives in government and so on. And so at the age of nine, I memorize in a week the Latin. responses to the priest. I became a sacristan or acolyte, no? But at the same time, I did not agree with what was being taught to me in catechism, the myths that you find in the about, in the midst from the Bible, about the Genesis and so on and so forth. I started as a dumb ox also, no, having low grades until grade.

three. But then when I was in grade four, I began to excel and my father said you become a lawyer and be a politician like your uncles and so on and so forth. And I

enjoyed listening to the populist, the demagogic speeches of the politicians during election time. And then I had But, you know, this is one thing that my parents did wrong in making a conservative upbringing for me, and I was kept in, because I was one of the last two male children in a family of seven,

in a brood of seven, we were sent to the local public school. And we had, as classmates, children of our own tenants, you know, tenant in our land, and also middle class elements of the town who used to be critical of how their families lost their land by great-grandfather. And I sympathize with them, and I would bring those critical stories home to the chagrin of my great-grandfather. parents. So I had sympathy. And then, you know, these peasant children, who are my classmates and playmates, had parents. I listened to their parents who talk about the Hoqbalahap, no, in Central Luzon. So that was in the 50s, early 50s, and the Hoqbalahp movement was still alive. Or to be more specific, the Hukbong Mapalaya of Pilipinas, the People's Liberation Army, there was a change of name after World War II. And so, and then my mother comes also from a landlord family in Central Luzon,

but they also had poor relatives. And so twice, twice of my rich relatives were killed, no? the hooks. And my mother said, oh, our own relatives killed them. He referred to, she referred to our poor relatives. And then when I went for high school to the American run Jesuit school, we had an apartment in a slum area. And I was able to watch the workers. And they I saw them going to work and then preparing for strike, you know. And I had a barber who was my first political teacher. He came from Central Luzon, Pampanga, and he talked lovingly about about the hook about the hooks.

He was sympathetic to the hook movement. And then when I was first year high school, I was offended when a senator, Senator Plaro Mayorecto was an anti-imperialist, would be denounced by my American Jesuit priest as a crazy communist. That got me interested in studying communism, no? But I could not get hold of a book. It was only in it was only in

third year high school when I got hold of a anti-communist book written by a doctoral student at Fordham University the author was Charles McFadden

and you know this guy the author made the mistake of quoting extensively from Marx and Engels. And I was impressed more by Marx and Engels and, you know, the Christian philosophers with whom the author was siding. So I learned Marxist theory by reading anti-communist book. To quicken my presentation of my development,

I would say that in general I developed, I say progressive liberal democrat, and I was an epitrotic Filipino against colonialism and against U.S. imperialism. I got influenced by my professors in the University of the Philippines, but I made a big leap in 1958 from being a progressive. aggressive liberal and anti-imperialist to being a Marxist. I read books by Marx, Angles, Lenin, and Mao Zedong, starting from 1958. By 1959, I thought I was already well-equipped to debate with a professor who was an exponent to logical positivism. And I made good use of Lenin's materialism and imperial criticism. And with regard to social questions, I would begin to compare semi-colonial semi-fueled China

with Philippines with then the same character of China before it won the revolution in 1949. So that was, I think 58 to 1959 would be the time that I made the big leap by 59. I was already organizing Marxist Leninist study circles under the cover of a cultural association, the student cultural association of the University of the Philippines, because there was the anti-soversion law which punished any, surrogate party, extension or front of the Communist Party. So it takes only two witnesses for you to be prosecuted and jailed or sentenced to death, depending on the claim against you, whether you're an ordinary member or officer.

So there were the anti-communist restrictions. There was a Cold War, and there was the high tide of McCarthyism, as late as 19-20. Because, you know, MacArthur was a Catholic. And the so-called Catholic Philippines would still like him, even if Eisenhower had already rejected McCarthyism. So I wrote articles for the campus paper, and my organization became known as a fighter. for national liberation and for new democracy.

You know, we deliberately adopted the acronym Ska-Uk, Student Cultural Association of the U.P., in order to counter the Upska, which was the University of the Philippines, student Catholic action of the Philippines. So that's an indication of how backward the times were at the higher levels of the university. There was a big clash, big contradiction

between what I call the religious sectarians and the liberals. And the liberals were divisible into two kinds. You have the conservative or the Berkian conservative type of liberals, and you have the Jacobin type of liberals. So we, the Marxist, Alliedist, allied ourselves with the progressive liberals against the religious sectarians and the conservative liberals.

That was the division in the university. So it was a time of ferment, and the underground communist party. of the Philippines, particularly its general secretary Hesuzlava, took notice of me. It took notice of my articles and the growing mass actions we were conducting, especially the mass action of 1961, when we were able to organize 5,000 students. And the students and the students, barge into Congress in order to literally break up the anti-communist witch hunt being conducted by the Committee on Anti-Filippine activities, a copycat version of the Committee on Un-American Activities in the U.S. So as late as 1961, the MacArthur Witch Hunt was still being done

in the Philippines. Then the underground communist party was trying to contact me. Because of the best action of March, 1961, my teaching fellowship

in the University of Philippines in English was the cut, no? And so I took the opportunity to go to Indonesia and I was not contacted by the representative to the underground party of the Philippines until after I returned from Indonesia in 1962.

So by the time I had already learned Bahasa in Indonesia and learned so much about the mass movement in Indonesia. And I was invited to join the party in the Philippines and in 1962, and I was surprised to be put immediately in the executive committee of the party. So that was the end of the course, the general course of my political development. By the way, it was also important in my political development that after being a standout in student activism, we joined research and education department of the workers

party Latangagawa and there we developed relations with workers with trade unionists and peasant leaders that was a very important thing and then I went to Indonesia

to learn the mass movement there when I came back I went back to the Workers Party because I then called the Worker Party or La Pian Mangagawa, which was renamed Socialist Party in 1964. I have a follow-up question. Just a brief one. So you mentioned the hooks several times in your opening presentation. And just for the listeners who are unaware, the hooks were a Marxist-Leninist

guerrilla group, based on my understanding, Marxist-Leninist guerrilla group who originally formed in 1942 to fight against the Japanese. And then after the end of World War II, continued the fight against, at that point, the U.S. supported government of the Philippines until 1954. And this was called the Huk Balahab Rebellion. So feel free to look that up listeners. But Joma, my question for you is, if you can briefly just talk about the hooks and how you viewed them, you would have been a very young man at the time, how you viewed them from a theoretical

and a tactical standpoint during your early development? Well, I sympathize with the hooks because even if I would hear my parents to talking to the tenants that the communists would like, or the hooks would like the state to be the landlord, no? And, you know, there is a comparison between the personal relations of the landlord to the peasants. peasants can tell about their problems, and they can ask for loans and so on, no, or consideration about the crop. But then my parents would say, oh, you would have, if you have the state as your landlord,

then you will have a very insensitive landlord, no? So that, and our tenants listening will just knock their heads. But when they talk to them, they would talk differently. And they like the hooks, you know. So that was my indirect experience with the hooks. Indirect experience like, you know, this hearing about some poor relatives of ours in Pampanga and other province killing some of our rich. But it would be killing two rich landlord relatives of ours, no?

So I was impressed with the hooks. Because, you know, at the time, my level of understanding was, you know, attuned to the, you know, the bourgeois populist speeches of the politicians, you know, the poor against the rich. So I had an understanding. I had a sympathy for the poor against the rich. And I used to read the vernacular literary magazine and then write for it. The usual story that is, you know, rich and poor, rich boy and poor girl, marrying in the sky class differences.

The first story I made was a tragedy. I showed the irreconcilability of the class contradictions between the poor girl and the rich boy. So anyway, I had such sensibilities at an early age. Now, I referred to my barber, who came from Pampanga, the center of the hoopbalah movement, And I was very much influenced by his sympathetic statements about the hoax. So that was, so I referred to him as my first professor in political science.

You mentioned that it was very dangerous to be involved with the Communist Party during this period because of the law that you mentioned. So I wanted to ask you, you yourself, from November 1977 to March, 19. were in military prison under Ferdinand Marcos. I wondered what was that experience like, and did that time change your worldview or ideology in any way? Of course, I had a very bad experience being arrested and then in prison. Soon after arrest, I would be subjected to physical torture. So the physical torture took some weeks.

The worst torture, however, was, you know, the death threats and, you know, the what I called the punching. There was the punching sessions as well as the most painful would be, you know, since I was blindfolded, no. The attacks on the floating ribs and the abdomen, no. And the worst would be in terms of physical torture would be hours and hours of what I call the water cure with my mouth shut with a face towel and water would be flowed into my nostrils, into my nose.

And that has the drowning effect. I think that's called the waterboarding method. So it's an American style of torture that has been imparted to the Filipino puppet military. And then the worst part, because the psychological torture. I was arrested in 1977, and then I was kept in solitary confinement up to, well, up to 1984, 84. There were only two years out of my nine-year, nine-year confinement.

There were only two years when I had, I was put in a cell with two companions. And then the two companions were released, and I was back to solitary confinement. But then I could converse with some political prisoners at the other side of a wall. So we would converse by shouting. So that was already about 1984 by 1986, I would be released as a result of the downfall of Marcos. But, you know, the torture and long-term imprisonment did not break me. I had waste of keeping up my fighting spirit. Actually, I combined fighting spirit with a sense of humor.

Sense of humor would include singing or composing. When I had no paper and pen, I would compose poems mentally and recite them. And the guards would think I was going loco, but that was my way of relieving myself of the deadly monotony of imprisonment. And then I would make friends with guards. And I would even play on the differences, the regional differences of the guards. because in the maximum security detention unit where I was confined and also Nino Aquino was confined but we never saw each other

and it happened that the general in charge came from the middle part of the Philippines and the guards who came and the ordinary guards who came from my region which was also the region of Marcos, had contradictions with the officers who were principally Visayan, no? So I got a lot of information by talking to the Ilocano guards. And then I noticed when times were going bad economically,

and they would tend to side with me against Marcos. So, but of course, They would not show that to the higher officers. I'm going anecdotal. You can proceed with the next question if you think I need to go to the next question. Sure. We have so much to ask you. So we'll move on.

This one's related. So as you mentioned in 1986, you were released after the fall of the Marcos regime. You were released by Corazon Aquino, which was a good thing, as was her attempt at agrarian reform, even though the implementation of the agrarian reform wasn't that great. But Aquino also presided over the Mendiola massacre, free marketization of the economy, among other things. So I'm just curious how you view the person, the individual who was responsible for releasing you from prison, but also did some of these really bad things like massacring. you know, workers and protesters, when you look back at that time in your life.

How do you view her? Let me tell you about the whole range of my relations with Cori Aquino, no? The only time that I met here, her husband, that was in 1967, she served as coffee. And so I knew her as a friend, and that was also her attitude. And but there was a sense of mutual gratitude by the time that Marcos was overthrown because we were friends and allies against the Marcos dictatorship. And the sense of mutual gratitude came from the fact that she made promises about the release of political prisoners

in exchange in consideration of the alliance against Marcos. So she fulfilled the promise. But then, you know, Aquino, it comes from a big landlord family, which is a big comprador at the same time, you know, their income from sugar exports is used to, you know, to import consumer goods from abroad. That's the big Combrador role. And when she became president, she acted the same way that Marcos behaved in economic

and in political and economic terms, except for the delay in the exposure of the funds. of the bourgeois state, and to consolidate her power, she offered ceasefire talks, supposedly to define what would be the agenda for peace negotiations. But, you know, he was only interested in ceasefire. And then, but the ceasefire agreement was done, was made. But then the massacre, the massacre of peasants and peasant demonstrators and there's urban supporters occurred, you know. It is possible, in my view, it is possible that the pro-mark of elements in the army, in the presidential security force, deliberately attack the demonstrators

because of their pro-Marco sentiments. But Aquino would become complicit in the massacre of the massacre, of the peasants and the other victims because she did that, investigate and prosecute the generals in charge. And then she, she,

She took the position of unsheating the sword, and beginning, and doing away with the ceasefire agreement, and launching all-out war against the revolutionary movement. So, the same class and the same state, unchanged state, behind Aquino, and becoming a state terrorist. I, you know, she, I was able to get my passport to make my world tour in 1986. But by 1988, under the pressure of the U.S. and the military, she canceled my passport in 1988. Yeah, harrowing. For the next question, I was hoping that you could talk about your arrest in 2007. for listeners who are unaware of the allegations levied against you, which you were subsequently cleared of.

Can you talk about that? Oh, you're referring to my arrest in 2007 here in the Netherlands. Now another lady called Gloria Magapagal Royal was under pressure also by the same U.S. directed puppet army. So in 2007, false murder charges were filed against me. Before that, in 2005 and 2006,

the Philippine government under Arroyo was requesting the Dutch government to have me extradited to the Philippines because of supposed because of the alleged murder cases. But the Dutch government said, no, he cannot be extradited to the Philippines or any third country because of the protection

provided by Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights. But you give us the information, documents and witnesses, And we will arrest him by charging him with using Dutch territory to order criminal acts in the Philippines. So the Dutch and the Philippine government cooperated in having me arrested within Dutch jurisdiction. And I was put in prison. A Manila city court has ordered the arrest of Communist Party of the Philippines founder, Joma Sison, his wife, and 36 other members of their organization for murder. In an arrest warrant issued August 28th by Judge Thelma, Buni Medina of the Manila Regional Trial Court, Branch 32, Sison and his co-ccused are allegedly responsible for the so-called Inopakan Massacre, a purge of CPP members accused of various defenses in Leite province in the 1980s.

Sison and his wife, Juliet, a former communist peace negotiator, have been in self-exile in the Netherlands for over two decades. Also among those ordered arrested are National Democratic Front of the Philippines Senior Advisor, Luis Hallandoni, pardoned former CPP Chair Rodolfo Sala, alias Ka Bilog, and communist consultant Leo Velasco. The murder case against them, rather, was filed in 2006 after the skeletons of 67 victims were discovered in Subangaku Village in Inopakan. was recommended for those accused. We were supposed to be holding a peaceful protest in front of the Dutch embassy to call on the Dutch government

to release Jose Maria Sison. It's a peaceful protest and action to express our grievances against the Dutch and Philippine governments against the sabotage of the peace process here in the Philippines. Malayayayin Joma Sison.

It would have been one. worse if I were extra, if I had been extradited to the Philippines, but I was tried in the, I was arrested and other houses were raided to search for evidence. But I won all my cases from the level of the district court to the appellate court. And I think the charges were baseless. And I was supposed to have ordered the killings of a number of people but there was no proof

whatsoever for those charges how did you feel well I'm relieved I was in solitary confinement for more than two weeks because of what sir can you explain me? Because of the silly false and politically motivated

charge that started in Manila and which the Dutch police picked up, but there's no basis. So... What do you think about these accusations? The accusation is false. As I told the judges, examining judges, tell nothing.

The charge is entirely out of my character. It's against my moral and political principles to have anything to do with any kind of murder. And besides, it's silly, because in the Philippines, the killing of the two persons, Kintanar and Tabara, they were specifications. The incidents concerning them were specifications in this foolish charge of rebellion against myself and 50 other people, including progressive members of Congress, anti-Arroyo military officers. Mr. Sisson, what are you going to do now?

Well, I would like to sit down somewhere. I have a prepared statement. I'm deeply pleased and thankful that the direct bank has decided to release me from detention. You cannot imagine how happy I am. It is extremely painful and humiliated. to be subjected to solitary confinement and tough interrogations under overheated lamps. The ordeal is acute because I am innocent of the false and politically motivated charge leveled against me. I have nothing to do with any murder, especially if it is something concocted by the Arroyo regime. This is against my moral and political principles.

I am a teacher by profession who loves the exchange of ideas towards common understanding and practical cooperation. In the Arroyo failed, and I guess the pro-U.S. generals like Esperon, who is again with the current president, Duterte, General Esperon, who is national advisor of Duterte, was then, you know, the, chief of staff of Arroyo. He was working with this reactionary pseudo-social democrat, actually, extreme right Christian politicians, like Norbert Gonzalez, and, you know, and trying to frame me up. We previously noted that you founded the Communist Party of the Philippines in 1968,

And we wondered if you could talk about what it was like building the new party and what were the biggest triumphs or victories of it and the mistakes that you can tell us about from your perspective in its early organizational days. Well, after joining the party, the old Communist Party in 1962, I was. almost immediately put in the executive committee. And I would find out that the old party had no more, no more mass following. Jesus Lava, the general secretary, was just hiding himself in Manila. He was already isolated

even from the remnant roving bands of the hooks in central Luzon. And with me, joining the executive committee was the labor leader Ignacio Laksina. Only the two of us in the committee had connections, had connection with the mass movement with labor as well as youth. Now, two other members of the committee were nephews of Jesus Lava. So it's a nepotistic kind of setup, no?

with one nephew being a high executive in the Colgate Palmoli, an American company. And the other one was the clerk of court, of the Court of Appeals. And the fifth member was the circulation manager of the biggest, then the biggest newspaper, newspaper, and he happened to be a close friend of one of the two, two lavas. So it was a lava-dominated committee, and they were presuming, they were actually appointed by their uncle, Lesothalva. So, but you know, we, I still had high respect for the family then, no? And I don't regret joining the old. party, you know, it was part of my experience and learning trajectory.

But you know, by 1965, the committee appointed me to draft a general report. The first report will be made after so long. And I made a drop which looked into the background of the old party, why it has gone, why it has become so weak and small. And one of the lava cousins said, one of the lover cousins in the committee said, no, that is just a memorandum, the drop of a memorandum, I will write the general report. He never did. After that, he spread the word to some peasant and worker leaders that I require high school diploma for anyone to become a party member.

They made me appear as a pedantic fool, requiring a high school diploma for membership in the community. part of the Philippines, so that sort of intrigue was spread. Ah, but then, we were prepared. Our groups of proletarian revolutionaries in the youth movement, in the workers' movement, in the PESA movement, were ready. So by 1966, when the Lava Group revisionist group decided to expel us, we also expelled them. We started the rectification, the first rectification movement.

And that would start in 1966, and that prepared the founding, the reestablishment of the communist part of the Philippines under the guidance of Marxism, Leninism, Muslim thought in 1968, December 26, 1968. We had the mass following. But of course, you know, you will be surprised, why we were so concerned about quality. And so we had 12 delegates represented 80, 80 communist members already well-schooled and trained under the guidance of Marxism, Lennism, Muslim thought. When we established the communist part of the Philippines, the figures are better.

Of course, the number of 12 is similar to that in the founding of the Chinese Communist Party, But they represented only some 54 communists, and we represented 80, with a mass following of about 35,000, 15,000 youth, and 20,000 workers. So the mass following was bigger. The peasant following would come later when we would link up with the better part of the remnants of the old people's army, the hoax. We linked up with the hoop units under the leadership of Bernabe Buscino in January, 1969. And by March, March 29, we founded the new people's army. Well, I just wanted to follow up with a question that brings a little bit to today from your earlier experiences and analysis,

wondering about what you think are the legacies and processes currently of U.S. colonialism and imperialism on the politics of the Philippines today. Well, the United States has made very lasting legacies, which you can only undo with the People's Democratic Revolution. Nominal independence was granted in 1936, and the Philippines became semi-colonial. The United States, before it granted nominal independence, made sure that it had the U.S. Philippine Treaty of General Relations, by which the United States, before it granted nominal independence, made sure that it had the U.S. Philippine Treaty of General Relations by which the U.S. property rights, military bases, and so on,

would be maintained. So up to now, the U.S. would have overall economic, political, military, and cultural control over the Philippines. And before that, before that, from the beginning of the Americans, The American conquest in 192, the U.S. started to develop a semi-fudal economy.

The elements of that were already there in the later part of the Spanish colonialism. But semi-fudalism meant allowing peasants to go to the frontier areas, to go to the mining areas. The mines were open, the roads and bridges were improved for transport, the goods, and so on. So the feudal structures were removed. And you have the Comprador Big Bursazii arising from the landlord class. it is distinct as the trading and financial agent of the U.S. monopoly firms. That's the same if you don't set up, and it continues. It has continued since then.

But the biggest legacy of the U.S., it is the murder of 1.5 million Filipinos. And so far, the Filipinos have not exacted. compensation in any way. So the blood deaths of the U.S. imperialism are still to be paid, no? It's the Vietnamese people who succeeded, you know, in defeating U.S. imperialism. The Filipinos can be proud of being the first to fight U.S. aggression in Asia, and being the first country to kick out a Western power. from Asia

and despite colonialism was kicked out in 1898 and so and the

independence that came about came well ahead of the Chinese revolution of 1911 very much ahead

of those nominal grounds of independence even in Indonesia of Indonesia, there was some amount of armed support for Socarlo from the people. But she benefited from Japanese collaboration against the Western powers. And of course, we Filipinos are very much ahead in terms of real independence from colonialism or in terms of granted nominal independence,

The Philippines are ahead. India got its nominal independence from the British rulers. Only in 1947. The Philippines were ahead by one year, not getting, forgetting from the U.S. This semi-colonial republic status. So next question. Mao famously said that reactionaries are paper tigers. What has waging people's war?

and leading a Communist Party taught you personally about the nature of reaction in general. Well, Mao is saying reactionary is a paper tiger. It's a nice literary way of expressing how divisible is a monster into its parts. You can tear it apart easily, just a piece of paper you can tear it apart. That's a simple way of expressing dialectical materialism.

Materialism teaches us that things are constituted by contradictory parts, by parts that are in contradiction. So if you are the oppressed people and you have a well-armed, you have a well-armed enemy, that well-armed enemy is so small, in fact, but it has the power in terms of arms, and in terms of control over the means of production. Okay. You may be impressed with the wholeness. Someone who will just be downfounded by the wholeness of something, you know, like a Philistine, you know, being impressed by, you know, a big state, but a big, or let's say,

someone who doesn't know any better is impressed with a car. car but then you open up the hood of the car and you see it's parts you can tear apart the dominant card so that's the same thing you can you can you can you can you divide you study the part the something and consider the parts and then you learn how to tear it up now and then just another way putting this if your enemy has the strength what kind of strength shall you get from him? You engage in guerrilla warfare, concentrate a superior strength

against a small part of the enemy, and you get the arms of the enemy unit that you hit. Strategically, the enemy may be ten times stronger than you, but at the tactical level, because you have the support of the people, like a guerrilla unit can hit any small

part, any small, vulnerable part of the big enemy. And in due course, through protracted people's war, you build your strength. And you must choose the battlefield. You must, the battlefield must be widened up, must be widened up for maneuver. You cannot be, you cannot, you can, you can, you can have all the flexible tactics. If the superior enemy force comes, you retreat, man. And you lay landmines on the path, you have sniper teams, and you have ambushes

while you move away your main force. And if the superior force of the enemy is even bigger, it is capable of encircling your force, and you better ship position. And at any rate, when the end of the end, enemy deploys, no matter how big, an enemy force, be it a battalion or a regiment. It deploys its parts, eventually. It is a command post.

It has peripheral post. It has patrols. You can hit the peripheral post as well as the patrols, one by one. And that's the way how guerrilla warfare is carried out. So this simple expression of Mao expresses in a single phrase what you can do with an enemy that looks so invincible. You can tear it apart. I have a follow-up question regarding people's war.

So Joma, the dictator Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law, and that declaration of martial law was widely critical. credited with the swelling of the numbers of the new people's army, whereas it used to be just a few hundred. It eventually became thousands, perhaps 10,000. Do you agree with that generally held consensus that the declaration of martial law caused the swelling of the numbers? And can you talk about how the reaction of his government affected the people's war and the way it was carried out? Even before Marcos in Philippine history, the ruling class and its state has on how violent it is in terms of arms oppression of, let's say, the hooks.

That's well demonstrated in so many cases of violent actions against poor people, against peasants and workers. Okay? And then there is also what you call from the Bible. There is also what you call the daily violence, the bail of exploitation, no? Even when the enemy is not killing you, it is starving your children, it is depriving you of medicine for the sick just because they are poor. That's the violence of class exploitation. Okay?

So the new people's army and the communist part of the Philippines learn from that historical truth. experience. Now, Marcos, who thought he was a great fellow in terms of satisfying his personal ambition thought that he could take advantage of what he called the social volcano in the Philippines, and he would promise to make the Philippines great again. So he was out to violate liberal democratic principles and go-fascist. So he succeeded in declaring national martial laws a way of imposing

fascist dictatorship on the Philippines. But eventually, it was proven to be stupid, although he only stayed long much longer than any of these reactionary presidents, but he would be overthrown. And his precisely

his brutality and greed through process dictatorship would be responsible for rousing so many people who joined the armed revolution. So it so happened that the communist part of the Philippines was re-established, and the New People's Army was founded within the period that Marcos was being elected for the first time and then the second time. Before he could finish his second term, he declared martial law. And that offended a lot of people, especially those who believe in liberal democracy. And revolution in the Philippines is, you know, making sure you have the leadership of the proletariat.

And it is based on the worker-peasant basic alliance. Then you have to win over the middle social strata. In order to isolate and take advantage of the contradictions among the reactionaries and then isolate and destroy the enemy. So the Marcos dictatorship, as the enemy of a broad front of allies, would be overthrown in 1986. Thanks to Marcos, the people had the most intense reason to join the armed revolution. And the armed revolutionary movement was a factor behind the rise up of the legal democratic forces that would eventually overthrow Marcos. And even after the fall of Marcos, that armed revolutionary movement would persist, would persevere. So you have it until now, 52 years, you know?

So next question. I want to stay in this historical period for just a bit longer. So at the end of your time and the original Communist Party, the PKP 1930, you talked about this and then they expelled you, you expelled them. But at the very end of your time in there, you analyze that group from the inside and that internal analysis led to the first great rectification movement. Can you tell us about the first great rectification movement itself, maybe the aftermath of it from practical, tactical and ideological standpoints? And then, as you also mentioned, there was a, I think you mentioned, there was a second rectification. Can you also tell us about that rectification movement? It was a good thing that there was the first great rectification movement. Without it, the communist part of the Philippines would not have been reestablished under the guidance of Marxism, Leninism, Mao Zedong, thought.

And that would mean to say that if this was not done, there was first, there was no separation first from the revisionist-Islamite party, then you don't have the theory to guide the making of a new revolutionary party of the proletariat. You know, what were the issues before? The Lavaite revisionist renegades said that the legal struggle, legal forms of struggle, were indefinite, no? And before there would be a general offensive. They were ignorant of the stages of the protracted people's war in the China experience. So they taught in the case of those who would follow, who would learn from Mao Zedong thought,

this would be the justification and the ground, real ground for waging people's war. At any point, at any time, because the ruling system is in chronic crisis, being semi-colonial and semi-fudal, It is possible to conduct the people's war using the countryside as the base, linking up with the peasants to make the basic worker-peasant alliance. And you can grow your strength from states to stage, from the defensive stage to the strategic stage, the strategic stalemate stage, then up to the general or the stage of strategic offensive. So, and then there were also the issues involving the Sino-Soviet dispute.

So, the proletarian revolutionaries, with me included, took the side of the Chinese party, the side of Mao Zetaun, against the Soviet Revolutionist Party. And that also, the questions there encompassed, very important questions in the Philippine Revolution. The Marxist-Leninist position against modern revisionism inspired us to create a revolutionary part of the proletariat in order to build the proletarian social state and to use and to have a main form of struggle, armed struggle. You don't rely on peaceful evolution to make revolution. And so we learned those things from the Sino-Soviet ideological dispute. And the Lava revisionist renegades were on the side of the Soviet revisionist renegades. They ended up discredited by following Marcos in embracing Soviet social imperialism. And then they would say they would try the revisionist.

would praise Marcos for bringing about national industrialization, which was false. And they were saying that there was no need for armed struggle. It was fine enough that the Philippine reactionary government was in collaboration with the Soviet Union and the Philippines could be developed the supposed non-capitalist way. It was the jerky expression being used in. So that's fascinating, but shifting the conversation from the past to the present and future, I'm curious, where do you see the struggle for socialism in the Philippines going in the next few decades, especially as climate change ramps up?

With modesty aside, the Philippine revolution deserves some compliments for having no advantages like the Chinese Communist Party had. after the October Revolution. Okay, and let's compare the two. To see how well the Philippine Revolution has succeeded so much with the guidance of Maoism or Maoism, no? But having no advantages like the Chinese Party had. Well, the Chinese Party was founded in 19,

As a result of the work of the Comintern already reaching China, but coming from small beginnings, the party was still small, and it was, it was, it had to be open to have an alliance with the Comintang Party in 1924 against the Northern Warlords. himself was so impressed with Sun Yat-sen as the leader of the Chinese revolution against the traitors headed by Yuan Sikai and followed by the northern warlords. So of course the Communist Party of China, the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party that could be subjected to criticism for, you know, practically a great to a merger with the Comintang Party. But there were benefits. Cho and I became political commissar of the Huang Pua Military Academy,

and regiments were set up under the leadership of communist commanders. So when the Changkashik betrayed, those regiments would ultimately join the forces that had been developed in the countryside. in Changxi, that was in the course of the, you know, of course there were some mistakes made by Lili San-too in trying to do urban uprisings, which failed. But eventually those regiments became integral with the peasant, the smaller but more widespread peasant forces organized by Mao.

And the Red Army was able to defeat. three big encirclements by the Comington. But then the Comintern sent this support said smart guys, led by the so-called Bolshevik group with Wang Ming and in German. So, brown was his name. So they misdirected the forces of the Red Army. They went into Putsi's attacks on urban areas, and so the base areas were neglected. So in the fourth and fifth encirclement, the Red Army got a beating.

There was a destruction of forces to the extent of 90%. The Long March had to be made. In the course of the Long March, 1935, Mao's leadership would be affirmed. This line would be affirmed. and the Long March reached Yenan, and it was a happy thing. It was a bad, I mean to say, yes, it was a happy thing that the attacks of the Comintang would be blunted by the rising problem of Japanese, of imminent Japanese invasion. So there would be a second alliance eventually, and I need not tell you this to be how. Chiang Kai-shek was arresting Shian and forced to agree to the alliance.

The second alliance from late 1936 to 45. And through this war against a Japanese invasion, the Communist Party and the Red Army became strong, so strong that when the civil war of 1946 to 1949 came, that would win out. But you will notice that unlike China, the Philippines is archipelagic. You don't expect anything like the Soviet supplies being given to the alliance or directly to the Red Army. And the Philippines has had no advantage

like those enjoyed by Vietnam and the other Indo-Chinese armed struggles. They had cross-border. They could cross borders. Supplies could move from one country to another. The Philippines has not have that advantage. Now, having no advantages, material advantages like those, the Philippines has preserved itself, the revolutionary movement in the Philippines has preserved itself and has grown despite all those U.S. instigated, planned and directed campaigns of suppression, carried out by the puppet governments. From 1969, March, when the armed struggle started, resumed in the Philippines, in earnest,

the U.S. and its puppets in the Philippines had failed to destroy this armed revolutionary movement. The only benefit, the essential benefit, the thing from the earlier successful revolutions, especially the Chinese revolution, is that it learned dialectical materialism and the strategy and tactics of, well, the two stages of revolution and the strategy and tactics of protracted people's world. But I think if you sum up the origin of the art, the origin of the art. that the new people's army has, more than 90% have been produced by taking it away, by seizing it from the enemy side in combat through ambushes, raids, and disarming operations.

You know, even purchases from the gun traders, that's a small, or donations from bourgeois allies, who are so angry against their vursu opponents, that's a small amount. More than 90% have been seized from the enemy, so the red fighters love their weapons very much because they put their lives at stake in getting those weapons. The morale is high.

Unlike the puppet troops, unlike the puppet army, that is run by the... the Filipino reactionaries. And one thing, you know, you get mocking statements from the periods and the reactions. Oh, you've been fighting for 52 years, and you have not yet seized power. Like in other countries where in the space of 20 to 30 years, they have gotten power. But you see, you must appreciate the armed revolutionary movement because without the cost border,

support from other revolutionary forces, it has been able to preserve and enlarge its strength. Another thing that makes the Philippine revolution very worthy, it is now, it is now practically in the forefront of what remains of the old rounds of World Proletarian Revolution. I think India is the other country, which has the, it happens that it has the large scale for the development of huge people's army. But that is still to develop. We used to encourage our Indian comrades that you can play the role of the big country as Russia did

or the Soviet Union did in connection of World War I and in connection with World War II China would be the country. We hope that India would be the big country. But the Philippines can also become a part of a big force if only the Indonesians

would also carry out people's one. Imagine 100 plus 250 population, you know, having population of 100 in Philippines and 250 Indonesians, that's the size of world force. And so, but anyway, the important thing about the Philippines is that the leadership there has been able to study what has transpired and what has transpired and knows how revisionism could betray socialism and then the Communist Party upholds the

theory and practice of continuing revolution as done. in the great proletarian cultural revolution. So it knows the problems to be anticipated. But, you know, we should not... Things can run very fast. Just consider these things. There is a rapid development of the social character of the forces of production,

meaning to say collective labor and the science and technology involved. And yet the development of unbridled greed through neoliberalism is so grave. In other words, you have the propulsion for the socialization of the productive forces and at the same time you have this the operation of unbridled greed

of neoliberalism has been running for for decades already and that has been sustained by a close relationship between capitalist China or imperialist China and imperialist U.S. Now they have broken up. The contradictions among imperialist powers are becoming intense.

The addition of two imperialist powers to the circle of imperialist powers has made the world more explosive, social explosive, than ever before. So I often say I may not see the time when the Philippine Revolution will reach the state, the socialist revolution. But at the same time, I say I will not be surprised if it can happen within the next two decades, and I'm still alive, no?

Things can speed up because contradictory forces are running fast in the world. And, you know, and the class struggle is taking many forms, you know.

At the moment, you find the setbacks, major setbacks, caused by modern revisionism and neoliberalism. They're still there, no? For instance, you have seen the disappearance of the revisionist parties in Europe. Those fragments of the old communist parties becoming social democratic, they have also been weakened. And even before, there is a strong working-class party. party, the big bourgeoisie is already generating fascism, encouraging the formation of roads. So, you know, the bourgeoisie is well ahead in taking profits and preparing for disaster,

preparing against disaster to capitalism. But you know, reality will run faster. The exploited will rise up. Imagine in the US, you can see the rapid deterioration, the precarity and whinling of the middle class. And then comes with the aggravation of the means of struggle. Some imperialist powers will compete in the use of biological ones. affair.

So on top of nuclear possibility of nuclear annihilation, which has taught the capitalist countries to be more prudent, no? For 70 years, they were very good to avoid inter-imperial war. But you know, capitalist powers when already succumbing to fascism can go crazy in the handling of these weapons. And also whether the wise guys of the imperialist powers still maintain their sanity, they love to exploit. They like to exploit the environment. And you have global warming as a result of the abuse. And there is also such a thing as laboratory made a pandemic as well as pandemic due to, you know, the disturbance of nature,

of the natural organisms. There are two types of epidemics or pandemics, man made as well as generated among the organisms because of the disturbance caused by the plunder of the environment. So you have this sort of people in the face of these dangers, there can be a sudden leap in the mentality and actions of people to rise up. You know, this quick methods of communication like we are having. At first they're used by the big bourgeoisie for their profits, no? But you see, the same instruments can be used by the proletariat and the rest of the people in Risingham.

The revolutionary measures can spread so fast and be acted upon because the reality of capitalist, present exploitation, has become so bad against humanity that it shouts like. louder than even what revolutionary propaganda can do. And certainly much, much louder than the propaganda of the enemy, which is discredited by the the reality, by the crisis, and by the revolutionary propaganda. You know what decides? The revolutionaries can become bored sometimes. sometimes. Why things are moving so fast? But if you persist, but the condition, the crisis

conditions are developing, you still, you can always entertain the hope that the crisis will work faster to arouse the people to rise up. Before I answer the next question, I would like to add something. What about socialism arising in the Philippines? Well, the ground is being led by the new democratic revolution. You know, some people make the mocking statement, oh, you have not seized political power in Manila for so long. But the new democratic revolution in the Philippines is already developing the ground for socialism. That means to say strengthening the people, the conference,

Communist Party, the new people's army, the revolutionary organizations, and the local organs of political power, which constitutes the people's democratic government. Even now, there is a government of workers and peasants other than the Manila-based government of big compradors and landlords. Now, let me take the next question. So I have just a brief question, and then I know Brett is going to have the final question. But this one's just a brief one. And before I say that, I just want to mention that since we're using this technology that Joma said can be used by the bourgeoisie, we're hoping that we're using it for something a little bit more subversive than they are.

I'll just say that. But moving on to this question, we're just wondering what the stance of your party is on the long-running conflict in Mindanao, Mindanao being the large island in the south of the Philippines. It was one of the case studies in our episode with Manny Ness, organizing and surgery. Listeners should check that out. But the Moro conflict has been going on in Mindenau since 1968. And it's a very interesting conflict and one that I'd like to learn a lot more about. So we're just wondering what is the stance of the Party, the Communist Party, on the moral conflict?

Well, there are several contradictory forces, several conflicts at work in Mindanao. There is the one between the reactionary government and the revolutionary movement led by the Communist Party. And there is also the struggle for self-determination by the moral people against the central government of the reactionaries. The revolutionary struggle against the reactionary state has a wider scope. 85% of the population are non-Muslim. The Muslims are 15% of the Mindanao population, and only 5% of the national, of the Philippine population. So in terms of population, that is the scope.

And the two movements, the two revolutionary movements, revolutionary movements have their common beginnings in the Kabatang Makabayan, the youth organizations which we organized in 1964. Nur Mizwari was a member of the Kabatang Makabayan. He was a member of the council for a number of years, and he tended to follow the the Sokarno idea of, you know, combining moral nationalism with Islam and Marxism, up to Maoism, up to Maoism. So anyway, the two revolutionary movements have been in general, friendly.

And what would still be more decisive? revolutionary movement there would be the one led by the Communist Party. But it is this willing to, but it has had alliance links, links of alliance, with several moral revolutionary growth, because, you know, there has been a branching out of the previous moral Islamic and moral national liberation front. There is now the Eastern Moro Islamic Liberation Front and another, the Bang Samoro fighters. And in many areas where the people, the population interweave, the population of the Luma, the hill tribes, the so-called Christians, people from Visayas and Luzon, and the Muslims, they work out. alliances.

And the attitude of the Communist Party of the Philippines towards the moral people struggle for national liberation is that they have the right

they have the right to fight for national self-determination against the against national oppression by their reactionary state

and by Christian sovinism. But the position of the CPP is to let the moral people up for themselves what they want. Do they want an independent state or autonomy in a federalized kind of state? Or even in a unitary state in which their rights of autonomy are respected. So that's the position of the CPP. The CPP has always avoided any kind of clash with the organizations of the morals.

Of course, it is critical of those crazy-minded elements who think in purely religious terms, fundamentalists at that, no? and they think that by making some showy acts of violence, they can, even to the extent of harming civilians, would be useful for their cause, no? The CPP and the NPA are most friendly tomorrow revolutionary groups that really try to arouse organize and mobilize the masses in order to assert the right to national self-determination.

Incredibly interesting. So you've been very generous with your time. Thank you so much. Final question. What can comrades around the world, but specifically in the U.S. and Europe, do to assist the people's struggle in the Philippines? There is a lot that comrades in North America

can do to assist the people struggling in the Philippines. it's a crucial importance that they extend moral support as well as material assistance, whatever assistance is possible and needed by the Philippines struggle. The, for instance, I'm talking only. in conjectural terms. I'm not giving out instructions. I have to use

this, I have to give this caveat, so that I will not be accused of pumenting terrorism, so-called. It is possible. Let's use, you know, for instance,

there are certain technologies useful for armed struggle. If there are North American engineers who know how to make weapons, I think the Philippine Revolutionary Movement would welcome them. There can be technology transfer, especially Filipino-Americans should think that way of being able to share their technological expertise with the Filipinos. But all kinds of Americans can help, no?

Now, there are those who are eager to engage in people's war, even in the United States. Now, if they don't find, if after one, two or three decades, they find out that they don't really have the conditions that obtained in China and now obtain in the Philippines, like, you know, having a sizable poor peasantry in the countryside, no? People's wars, thought by Mao, may not be so applicable. You can easily be cornered in urban areas. But, you know, I'm not saying that all Americans should look for viable people's war in other parts of the world, but it's an option to go. That's an option for Americans.

But there is also an option for most Americans. I don't think most American Marxist-Leninists would choose to go to the Philippines to wage people's war. You know, the American Constitution permits and encourages people to have arms. And even gun-making companies would agree for their own private. profit-making. You know, the liberal principle is that so that the state will not become tyrannical and oppressive, it must not monopolize the arms. The people have the right to arm themselves just in case the government turns oppressive

and tyrannical. So, there are many legal reasons for holding firearms in the U.S., and it's there, as a matter of fact, you can have gun clubs, you can have self-defense groups in defense of the community. So there are the legal reasons. but those who want to be more to become active in fighting or they can join i think they can they can they can try uh it's not within my power to make sure no they can they can try to enlist in the people's armies in countries like the philippines or india i'm talking in hypothetical terms uh in academic Amy term.

Absolutely. So as Brett said, you've been incredibly generous with your time. So Comrade Joma, it's been an absolute pleasure and an honor to speak with you today. I know I speak for Brett and Adnan when I say thank you for coming on the show. I hope you enjoyed the conversation that you had with us. And I'm really looking forward to the listeners getting to hear this conversation. So thank you again. Thank you, too, for giving me the opportunity.

to interact with you. Absolutely. It's our pleasure. Listeners, you just listened to a conversation with Jose Maria Sison, Comrade Joma. We'll be right back with the wrap-up. And listeners, we're back on guerrilla history. We just finished our conversation with Professor Jose Maria Sison, Conrad Joma, chairperson emeritus of the International League of People's Struggle, founding chairman of the Communist Party of the Philippines, co-founder of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines, political refugee, the accolades, as they were, go on and on. And an incredibly fascinating conversation with an incredibly fascinating and at times very funny individual.

I really liked Joma. It was a very fun interview to do. And the emails that I've had back and forth with him have been similarly very entertaining as well. Brett, why don't I pitch this over to you now to get us underway with our reflections on the interview that we just finished with Joma? Sure. Well, first and foremost, I was sort of blown away by not only his wisdom and his experience, but as you kind of alluded to, his sense of humor, and just how spry and vital he is at the age of, I think, 86 years old, 82, so he's in his 80s for sure, and just as as coherent and engaging as ever. So I didn't,

really know what to expect. You have the little bit of the language barrier. He has bad hearing, plus he's getting on an age. So I was sort of like, you know, how is this going to go? And it sort of blew me out of the water, my expectations at least. And he even referenced himself having about two more decades to go, putting his own lifespan at about a hundred, two years old, shows his commitment to the struggle and still facing all the political pressure geopolitically that he does. He continues to be an unapologetic voice for the, for the revolution in the Philippines and yeah just just a real hero and honestly listening to what he went through in his prison time the torture the beatings he talks about it with like a little grin and

sometimes make some jokes about it but that was no doubt a harrowing time for him and very few people could put up with that level of political repression the hyper levels of solitary confinement and the daily beatings and torture that he did and come out you know, just as strong as ever, if not stronger. So on every level, I was just sort of, my expectations were blown out of the water, and I just love this interview, and I really think people will get a lot out of it. And it probably requires a couple listens because he went deep with some of those answers. And so I'm looking forward to just re-listing to the interview myself to pick up stuff I might have missed the first time.

Adnan, I'll turn it over to you now. Well, yes, I have to leave a little bit before the end of the interview, but I did manage to catch up on the rest of the interview and really fascinating. This has such a wealth of experience and knowledge, but analysis as well. I mean, it was a very interesting combination between somebody who has experienced every dimension,

you might say, of people's struggle for liberation against dictatorship, against a corrupt sort of feudal, you know, regime against U.S. Empire, who has suffered, as Brett was mentioning, experiences of torture, imprisonment, and to still be somebody who isn't just embittered or broken by that, but actually still has this optimism of the will, you know, of a desire to see, you know, genuine change on behalf of his people and of global you know peoples in solidarity with the global south he touched upon a lot of geopolitical context and clearly as somebody who knows the histories of left movements in the global south backwards and forwards because that was

something that the philippines you know uh you know fighters for for for justice you know looked to for inspiration for lessons you know he he He's a historian of the left in the way that it's appropriate in the way that guerrilla history means to provide for our community and audiences, you know, understanding of the past so that it can inform liberation in our time, in our struggles. And he really, really exemplified that. It was fascinating. You know, he's a really sort of lighthearted soul while having this incredibly acute analysis.

So it was wonderful to have that. I feel like we could have talked with him a lot more. There was like deep oceans of knowledge, and we only just tapped a little bit of it. I'm hopeful that perhaps we may have another opportunity to talk with him someday in the future, perhaps. But we definitely got a sense of the wisdom and the experience of struggle with somebody who also has this analytical and scholarly. sort of perspective at the same time. I'm just going to echo what you said, Adnan. Joma is an incredibly rich thinker, incredibly dialectic, and just what a mind.

As I said at the very beginning of the intro, he has a bunch of books out all over the place, but including a bunch of ones that you can get for free from foreign languages press. I highly recommend people to pick those up to get an insight into Joma's mind. unbelievably intelligent individual and just as Brett said, sharp as attack, even at his advanced age. But I also want to highlight, and again, I'm just reiterating the points that you both made is that not only was he a thinker, but this is somebody who has experienced hardship at the hands of dictators. He was held in a military prison for nine years and solitary confinement for seven years. and constantly harassed even while he was in prison.

This is just a story that I picked up while reading a biography of him that I didn't get to ask about during the interview because there was 100,000 things that I wanted to ask him and didn't have a chance to. But in 1985, he wasn't accused in 1985, but there was a massacre in the Philippines in 1985 that he was accused of being kind of the mastermind behind this massacre. That was his eighth year in prison at that point.

He had gone through seven years of solitary confinement and he was still being harassed by the state as someone who was masterminding massacres from behind solitary confinement. I mean, it's crazy. And then, of course, we also mentioned his arrest in 2007 in the Netherlands for supposedly masterminding assassinations. Again, he was acquitted on all counts very shortly thereafter. the cases were completely thrown out. But he was held in solitary confinement for weeks.

Well into, it would have been right around 70 years old at that point in the Netherlands. After having been in exile for close to 20 years at that point, this is somebody who hasn't had the peace of mind knowing that, you know, he's in a safe place where he doesn't have to worry about repression by the state, repression by the forces of reaction, etc. he's been facing all of this, and at the same time, he's still been constantly being a source of optimism, really, as I think Adnanu pointed out, that he does have this optimistic voice, despite the fact that the Philippine communist movement hasn't achieved its goals yet, and he's saying, you know, maybe we'll see it in my lifetime of the next 20 years, maybe it'll be 100 years, but he remains deeply optimistic. And for those of us that are on the far left who don't always see the immediate path forward, it's always nice to hear these messages from people who have faced trials and tribulations

and still have come through all of those trials and tribulations over the course of decades with just as much optimism, if not more, than when they first entered the fight. The next thing I want to turn to as we, you know, begin to tail off this wrap-up segment. Is there anything that you guys would want to bring up that you wish that you had had the opportunity to ask during the interview? Because, like I said, there's about 100,000 things that I wish that I could have asked. But Adnan, why don't I turn it over to you now? I know that there's probably a few things that you would have liked to dive deeper into. Oh, definitely.

I mean, pretty much on every topic there could have been follow up because we had a. sort of limitless resource here of experience and wisdom and analysis. But I really would have liked to hear more about some of the challenges politically that the Communist Party faced and his analysis of why it wasn't able to achieve all of the goals at that time. Like, you know, we had asked a little bit about, you know, do you see any kinds of, you know, errors or missteps? or things that maybe would have been, could have been done differently in order to achieve the goals. Now, that's not saying that it would have been possible under almost any circumstances, given the forces arrayed against, you know, the people of the Philippines and particularly, of course,

the regimes that they face that were bolstered by U.S. imperial power. So, you know, it was a tall order. But that would have been nice to hear a little bit because on other issues, you know, he had a very, analytical and dispassionate, I would say. It's both passionate in the sense that, you know, the struggle is one of deep commitment, but dispassionate in the sense is able to step back and analyze things, you know, in a very, you know, effective and cogent manner. So that would have been interesting to hear a little bit more. And I think on the last thing, it would have been interesting, you know, very much at the end, but it would have been interesting to dialogue with

him a little bit about his academic and theoretical discussion of what, you know, North Americans can do in support of Philippines struggles for freedom and for justice, you know, because I think I would have been interested to hear if he felt that quite apart from sort of some theoretical possibilities where people might, you know, support in direct ways, whether he felt like it was important for, the North American left, especially the U.S. left, European left, to really oppose imperialism from within and what were some of the ways that would aid and support the Philippines struggle. And I'm thinking here of other cases of U.S. supported and sponsored dictatorships, you know,

that a people struggle, you know, fought against in Asia, obviously, you know, in Southeast Asia and Vietnam, where, you know, it seems that in some ways the most effective thing was to oppose U.S. empire, because that is the responsibility of U.S. citizens. And so that would have been, you know, helpful to have a little bit more on that. I'm not so sure, you know, I think, you know, anybody who may want to, you know, make big sacrifices on behalf of the struggle would really benefit anybody by going off and, you know, becoming part of some kind of international brigade somewhere. Oftentimes those people are a little bit more harmful than helpful in actual point of fact, perhaps.

But the importance of solidarity, it's clear that there are things that we can do to, and we learned a little bit about this from Emmanuel Ness's analysis of the way in which even some forms of left politics in the U.S., nonetheless, even like the Green New Deep, and some of the approaches people are taking to a kind of restoration of welfare society, kind of social democracy, nonetheless is still going to maintain in terrible ways the global inequities that continue to oppress the global South. And that, you know, the biggest thing that we could do really is dismantle the imperial support behind global capitalism because that's what's buttressing it and that's what's enforcing these inequities and will continue to do so as climate change and these other disasters, you know, come about and put populations at great risk where they have to move because, you know,

their countries are being flooded or, you know, environmental devastation is forcing them to migrate. And what we, you know, fear is the rise of an eco-fascism. That has to be, you know, we have to understand, you know, our politics of solidarity means that we are globally, in this together, and it is only through an equalizing of global resources to create, you know, a dignified life for everyone that we're going to have, you know, real freedom. So that's something that I just like to emphasize, and listeners will enjoy the Emanuel Ness discussion. And I think that's something that if we want to support, you know, our comrades in the global south, this is at least our responsibility closer to home. Yeah, without a doubt. I'll, I'll

say it. I've always said it. I'll continue to say it. Anti-imperialism is absolutely essential in every facet imaginable. If you are on the left, it has to be a core pillar of your analysis and your actions. And we all have a duty, those of us who understand its importance to educate others as much as we can in our personal lives and our organizations or even more broadly on the connections between imperialism, capitalism, and all the things that we hate. I mean, we have pretty much functionally a trillion dollar budget, a trillion dollars every single year of American taxpayer dollars goes to fund this apparatus that puts its boot on the neck of people all around the world. Sometimes what people need most in these revolutionary struggles across the globe

is just to have that boot lifted. If that one dynamic was not at play, it would free up their ability to pursue those changes, revolutionary left-wing changes that would then ripple throughout the global politics and put pressure on other nations. to follow suit or at least contend with these movements. And so that's our job. Any left movement that does not put a high priority on this education and struggle is a false movement. We see it with Sock Dems, we see it with anarchists, and sometimes we see it on less principled

elements of the Marxist left. These things must be combated and rejected alongside a broader and more robust political education on this front. We hope that we humbly contribute to that here on guerrilla history. but broadly, I won't be too long. Some things I would have loved to got more into is just the structure imaginations of the party itself, how that party is built, how it's structured,

how tactics operate, how communications are carried out, how coordination occurs, etc. I found his little rant on the disadvantages of the Filipino revolutionaries compared to even the Vietnamese and certainly the Chinese revolutionaries to be really fascinating, cross-border coordination, the ability for weapons and stuff to move across borders, and all the other things that he mentioned. Clear he's given it lots and lots of thought, and it's something that I think those details often get lost on us,

and we can look over at revolutionary movements and sort of equalize them in our minds as like they more or less have the right same starting point or the same set of variables, and that's just untrue. Understanding those deep details gives us better ability to analyze our own situation and to not do these lazy, sort of analytics that sometimes can happen on the left. And then last thing I would say is I would have loved to have got more of his thoughts on the U.S. in particular. He mentioned it. He talked about some of our contradictions. He talked about some of the differences with the U.S.

compared to China and the Philippines, specifically the lack of a peasantry and the questionable applicability of certain elements of Marxism, Leninism, Maoism, to the U.S. context. I would have loved to have those fleshed out even more. But overall, absolutely loved the interview. and his points about crisis. Part of his optimism comes from the fact that capitalism is a crisis-producing machine. It's producing multiple crises right now, and it will continue to do it.

And over just the last half decade, we've saw countless people lose faith in the American political system, be radicalized in their social consciousness, their economic awareness. That is going to continue to build, and capitalism is going to continue to create crisis and fuck up because that's what capitalism does. And so taking advantage and being ready to take advantage of that increasing set of crises is our duty. And we cannot fail in this regard. And I thought he brought that home quite well.

So those are my thoughts. I'd love to go around the horn one more time, but we're basically out of time. So I'm just going to give my very last quick thoughts and then close us out here. In regards to what I would have liked to get more into, his personal story is very interesting. his upbringing, and he told it with a great, great personal voice. I really enjoyed his storytelling on his upbringing. I would have liked to know more about how the contradictions within his family. So his great-grandfather was one of the biggest landowners in the Philippines. Multiple of his uncles, as well as his grandfather, were governors of large portions of the Philippines at different time.

I mean, his family, as he said, he was brought up in a quite conservative family. But I think that he might have, he almost could have went more in depth with how fundamentally contradictory his upbringing was compared to his later on years. I would have loved to know more about the Maoist youth group that he founded within that original Communist Party, the PKP 1930. He organized them in 1964 and had this little Maoist group going within this Marxist-Leninist group, which he says. was full of revisionaries, until they got kicked out. And I would have liked to know more about how this youth Maoist study group was instrumental in them being excommunicated from that previous communist group. And he said, similarly, they excommunicated the former communist group from his group.

There's two other quick points that I just want to make very quickly. The first is that in 2007, when he was in solitary confinement, the late great Ramsey Clark offered to do his defense to try to get him out of solitary confinement. He offered to do it for free and was part of the defense team. So this is just a shout out to the late great Ramsey Clark who passed away just a couple months ago at this point at the time of recording. And then the last thing, because I don't think that I had the opportunity to mention this during the interview. I had it in my notes and we just ran out of time. Did I mention LGBT rights?

My brain is just melting after this interview. I mean, there was so much to take in. My brain is just flowing out of my ears at this point. So one other note that I think that a lot of listeners will find interesting, and I'm not going to have time to go into it in depth, but it's something that they can look into is that gay marriage is completely illegal and the vast majority of people in Filipino society look very down on gay marriage. So there's no legal gay marriage,

except in the New People's Army, which is the Communist guerrilla group, they openly accept gay individuals into leadership positions of the Army, and they performed gay marriages as far back as 2005. They're the only gay marriages that have ever been performed in the Philippines. Joma himself has come out in very firmly in support of the LGBT community, including in their inclusion in leadership positions in the New People's Army. It's definitely something that's worth looking into for the listeners. I wish that I could have asked about it. I have a lot of notes taken about it, but we just unfortunately ran out of time. So listeners, feel free to look that up sometime and hopefully in the future we'll be able to bring Joma back on to talk

about these things. Now we're completely out of time, so we're just going to have each of us tell the listeners how to find us. Brett, why don't we start with you? How can the listeners find you and all of the work that you're doing? You can go to Revolutionary LeftRadio.com and find all three of the shows that I contribute to and our Twitter and Patreon and everything else. Excellent. Adnan, how can the listeners find you on social media and your other podcast?

At Adnan A. Hussein, H-U-S-A-I-N and listeners check out the M-A-J-L-I-S for Middle East Islamic World Muslim diaspora discussion. And of course, I highly recommend Revolutionary Left Radio, the Red Menace, and the Mudgellis

podcast. As for me, listeners, you can find me on Twitter at Huck 1995, H-U-C-K-1-995. I have a Patreon where I write about science and public health, Patreon.com forward slash Huck-1995. And you can find us on Twitter at Gorilla underscore Pod, G-U-E-R-R-I-L-A-U-L-A-U-Skod. Please support the show on Patreon. That's how we're able to keep the show going and bringing on incredible guests

like Professor Jose Maria Sison. You can support us at patreon.com forward slash guerrilla history. again, Corolla with two R's. Now, listeners, thank you for tuning in. Hope you learned a lot. Until next time, solidarity. I'm going to be able to be.