Iraqi CP, On 90th anniversary of October Revolution

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From: Iraqi Communist Party, Thursday, November 08, 2007
http://www.iraqcp.org , mailto:icpinter@yahoo.co.uk
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Editorial
"Tareeq Al-Shaab" (Central organ of the Iraqi Communist
Party)
7 November, 2007

On the 90th anniversary of the

Great October Socialist Revolution
Ten Days that Shook the World .. and Changed
it!
Ninety years ago, in 1917, the workers, peasants and
intelligentsia of Russia rose up, under the leadership of
the Bolshevik party and its leader Lenin. They ousted the
oppressive Tsarist rule and embarked on building the first
socialist system in the history of humanity. These were
stormy ten days that shook the whole world, marking a
turning point in the history of mankind and a first step
towards fulfilling its dream of a human society free of
oppression and the exploitation of man by man. The ray of
the Revolution spread to the corners of the world, despite
frantic attempts to stifle it, thereby fuelling the hope of
freedom and independence among oppressed peoples, winning
their right to self-determination, and stimulating the
desire for a better future.

During a historically short period of time, there were

enormous achievements, in spite of the serious difficulties
and challenges that were encountered as a result of the
historical circumstances that prepared the ground for the
revolution and surrounded it in 1917. These achievements
were made despite the contradictions and complexities
surrounding its subsequent development, and in the face of
the errors and failures that accompanied its path. It began
with passing the Decree on Peace and the Decree on Land,
and achieved significant gains both in the economy and
society. It also contributed to the creation of favourable
conditions for the struggle of national liberation
movements and dismantling the colonial system. It offered
support for the peoples of developing countries, including
our Iraqi people, in their aspirations for freedom and
social progress. It inflicted a historic humiliating defeat
on Nazism and fascism in the Second World War, preserved
world peace and prevented imperialism from implementing
many of its aggressive schemes. The new world balance of
forces also created favourable conditions for the peoples
of advanced capitalist countries and the struggles of their
workers to achieve more social and economic gains.

The experience, despite its painful end with the collapse

of the Soviet Union, provides rich lessons for all
aspirants to an alternative to capitalism and its evils,
and to the historic social dilemmas that capitalism has
failed, and will continue to fail, to resolve. Foremost
among these lessons is that building socialism is
impossible without the broadest political democracy and
achieving social justice. It has to based on the society's
national, ethnic and cultural characteristics. It is
essential to uphold the values and ideals of socialism, and
to reject anything inconsistent with such values, for
instance the personality cult and bureaucracy. It has also
become evident fulfilling the conditions for achieving the
socialist option is a long-term process of struggle. We
must take advantage of the development in various countries
of the world, their progress and material and spiritual
achievements. It is essential to raise the level of the
material and human productive forces, deal properly with
the environment, and achieve the most advanced forms of
social organization and consciousness. At the same time,
there should be no illusion that the defect was restricted
only to the practice of socialism. The lessons drawn from
experience indicate the need to free Marxism from
stagnation so that it can regain its scientific vitality
and effectiveness as a theoretical tool to study and
analyse the movement of reality and to change it. Many
other questions also remain open about the experience.
Therefore, their answers are still in the formative stage
and require further research and scrutiny.

But what should also be emphasized, as we remember the

October Revolution and reflect on the significance of this
great event and its implications, for the present and
future of humanity, is an important set of facts and
lessons; first and foremost that capitalism is not the
final horizon for mankind. Also, the failure of the project
of building socialism in a number of countries does not
mean the death of the idea itself as prophesised by the
ideologues of capitalism and the promoters of the "end of
history" and other similar theories which quickly crumbled.
On the other hand, after a temporary retreat of the forces
of the Left and social progress, and following the exposure
of the negative and destructive consequences of the
policies of "neo-liberalism" and unrestrained market
economy, the scope of social struggles, peace movements,
and anti-globalisation movements has expanded. This process
has been coupled with the search for a humanitarian
alternative and an option which meets the aspiration for
real democracy, freedom, justice, equality and progress;
these are the principal values of socialism.

The October Revolution demonstrated the ability of human

beings, aspiring to be free and to live in a different
society not based on exploitative relations, to undertake
the first difficult step in this direction. It also
demonstrated that socialism, as a project for human
emancipation, will only develop as a culmination and
completion of the struggles and experiences that had
preceded it, along the path to human emancipation; the path
that had been opened up by the French Revolution in modern
times and was enriched, qualitatively, by the October
Revolution.

Today, 16 years after the emergence of the unipolar system

on the global level, the dilemma of unrestrained capitalism
is becoming increasingly evident, and in a stark manner,
with deepening economic and social disparity, unprecedented
exploitation, and the squandering of the enormous potential
offered by the achievements of science and technological
progress. Iraq, which had been plagued with dictatorship
and its crimes for decades, has become a testing ground for
the "new" world order and its slogans. While the focus of
our struggle in the current stage is to attain the goals
that are of national and democratic character, by achieving
full national sovereignty and the desired democratic
alternative, we continue to uphold the socialist option for
building society in future, based on the realization that
capitalist development will not resolve the comprehensive
structural crisis that has afflicted our country for long
decades, since this pattern of development is replete with
social and political contradictions and conflicts, and
polarization.

Along this path, and with us all those struggling for the
freedom of their homelands and the progress of their
peoples, the feats of the October Revolution and the
lessons of its march, with its successes and failures, will
remain an inexhaustible source and a guide for humanity in
its yearning for a bright and better future.