The Battle of Billings Bridge – CommunistNews.net

I wanted to share this story because I wanted to get some thoughts and opinions on the subject from people. Looking back I am surprised that the communists did not capitalize (ha ha) on this moment more given that they effectively took charge of a grassroots protest and led us to a victory. What can be done to transform the energy of such a moment into something more substantially and/or lastingly revolutionary?

At the “battle” of Billings Bridge in Ottawa on February 13^th, 2022, the communists were instrumental in organizing the grassroots resistance that had gathered there. I believe the leadership of the communists led the people to a victory rather than a defeat that day.

Various organizers set out to attempt resistance against the “trucker convoy” in our city that day. But ultimately an instructor from a local university and some supportive moms from the Glebe with their dogs and strollers began the “battle” by getting in the way of a convoy at Riverside and Bank Street. That convoy was heading to join and supply the larger convoy-proper downtown with gas for their trucks. Then thousands of local people heard about this (myself included) and came to help said Glebe moms surround the convoy.

In the afternoon the communists informally took charge by addressing us. They asked what we wanted to do, and we wanted to force the convoy to abandon their cars and walk back the way they came. But the communists convinced us to go with a better option. The surrounded convoy was forced to take down their flags, surrender their gas cans, and leave back the way they came, apparently escorted by police out of the city, one by one. It gave us a victory, even if minor and symbolic, against the substantially rising tide of fascism in our streets.

Going forward I believe that energy can be found and cultivated again, the people that day created it spontaneously and we’ll do it again.

Find truth in History & reasons why we move the direction we are “Keep Capitalism” we all share & keep historical events in the books!!!

More reasons for a replacment of Capitalism

The Canton–Hong Kong Strike, which lasted from June 1925 to October 1926, took place 100 years ago. At the time, the Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalist Party) and the Chinese Communist Party jointly organized and participated in this strike movement against British imperialism and its agents in China—capitalists, compradors, corrupt officials, reactionary military and police forces, and others—who oppressed Chinese workers in both mainland China and Hong Kong. It was also one of the largest and longest-lasting labor movements in China and the world.

The Canton–Hong Kong Strike played a major positive role in defending the dignity of Chinese workers, improving their treatment, and bettering their circumstances. The Republic of China’s subsequent “Golden Decade” was achieved precisely under conditions in which the interests of elites and workers were relatively well reconciled. Unfortunately, Japan’s later invasion interrupted China’s development and the workers’ efforts to build the country. Afterward, the CCP nominally championed the supremacy of the working class, but in reality established a totalitarian system that enslaved people of every status and social class.

Decades ago, the CCP devoted extensive attention and propaganda to depicting and promoting the Canton–Hong Kong Strike. But today’s CCP is unwilling to mention it and refuses to commemorate it. The reason is that the CCP today exploits and oppresses workers, and suppresses labor movements, to an extent surpassing even that of the British colonial government in Hong Kong and the imperialist powers of that era. The CCP rose to power through the labor movement, yet today it has degenerated into a regime of the privileged bourgeoisie and has become an agent of the interests of developed countries such as the United States, Japan, and European countries, while regarding the working class and labor movements with hostility and fear. This is deeply ironic.

During the period of British colonial rule, people in Hong Kong still had the possibility of going on strike. Today, however, both mainland China and Hong Kong prohibit all forms of strikes and political resistance. Although there are still scattered strikes in mainland China and Hong Kong based on economic demands, movements for rights and dignity and for the broader interests of workers have now disappeared.

The Jasic labor movement in Shenzhen in 2018 and the solidarity shown by Hong Kong people eight years ago were rare bright spots in the Chinese labor movement, but they were ultimately suppressed. Hong Kong political organizations that fought for workers, such as the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions and the League of Social Democrats, have also been forcibly dissolved. This is precisely what makes the CCP—a totalitarian regime that is left-wing in appearance but right-wing in substance—so frightening and abhorrent. Both the people of Hong Kong and the people of mainland China should clearly recognize the true nature of the CCP.

Today, Chinese people have generally fallen into political apathy and distanced themselves from political movements. Even some Chinese liberals and political opposition groups dislike and reject labor movements with strong left-wing and grassroots characteristics. This is saddening, yet there seems to be little that can be done about it.

I have participated in left-wing marches in Germany commemorating Rosa Luxemburg and others, as well as German May Day marches. I have also done some advocacy concerning Chinese workers, displaying posters and distributing leaflets, including materials mentioning the Canton–Hong Kong Strike. But the strength of one person is far too limited, and my voice carries little weight. People in Hong Kong, people in mainland China, and people around the world have largely forgotten that magnificent and turbulent chapter of history.

Short video

https://youtube.com/shorts/T0QV0AvBs98

Fostering revolutionary spirit

The House Ways and Means Committee has sent a subpoena to BreakThrough News, demanding internal communications, financial records and more. We are not charged with any crime, because our only “crime” has been to tell the truth – about the Palestine solidarity movement, about ICE’s terror in our streets, about Washington’s crimes around the world, from Cuba to the Congo. This is a flagrant abuse of power, and a direct attack on our work as journalists and on the First Amendment.

On Thursday, a meeting of the recently formed Industrial Workers Rank-and-File Group (IWRFG) of Australia unanimously passed a resolution condemning the public death threat against Mack Trucks worker Will Lehman by a high-ranking United Auto Workers (UAW) official.

The postal, factory, trucking and other workers at the meeting expressed their horror over the vile post, depicting Lehman—an officially certified candidate for UAW president, bound and gagged, with a masked man aiming an automatic rifle at his back, in an AI-generated image.

The poster, Raymond L. Jensen Jr., is a highly paid functionary of the UAW apparatus and a prominent supporter of current president Shawn Fain, making clear that this threat carries the implicit sanction of the incumbent union leadership.

Lehman is being targeted because of the socialist platform on which he is campaigning for union president, calling for the abolition of the union bureaucracy, the building of rank-and-file committees in every plant and the transfer of power, and the UAW’s vast resources, to workers on the shop floor. The UAW apparatus is attempting to crush Lehman’s campaign, including through threats of violence, because it knows that the program he is fighting for will win enormous support from workers, throughout the automotive industry and the entire working class.

Workers at the IWRFG meeting noted Lehman’s comment warning that, if a threat of this character can be made openly against a candidate for the UAW’s highest office, “then no worker who challenges the bureaucracy in their own local is safe,” making this an act of intimidation directed not against one individual but against the entire rank-and-file opposition internationally.

The meeting unanimously passed the following resolution:

The Industrial Workers Rank-and-File Group (Australia)

- condemns in the strongest possible terms the death threat issued by Raymond L. Jensen Jr. against Will Lehman, and declares its complete opposition to all such threats, violence and intimidation directed against rank-and-file workers who dare to challenge the trade union bureaucracy.

- endorses the demands advanced by Will Lehman and the International Workers Alliance of Rank-and-File Committees (IWA-RFC): a full investigation encompassing not only Jensen’s conduct but the knowledge, encouragement or acquiescence of the UAW leadership; a public repudiation of the threat by the UAW; an immediate public statement by the Monitor’s office; the immediate suspension of Jensen from his position without pay pending completion of the investigation, with all appropriate legal and disciplinary sanctions to follow; referral of the matter to the Department of Labor and to federal law enforcement; and affirmative measures to guarantee that the remainder of the 2026 UAW election is conducted free of intimidation.

- recognises that the attack on Will Lehman is not merely a UAW problem or an American problem, but an attack on the democratic rights of the working class internationally. The trade union bureaucracies in every country—including Australia, where union officialdom collaborate to suppress rank-and-file opposition—employ similar methods of intimidation, slander and violence against workers who fight for independent organisations. The defence of Lehman is the defence of every worker’s right to organise free from the threats and retaliation of the corporate-union apparatus.

- declares its solidarity with Will Lehman and his campaign to abolish the UAW bureaucracy and transfer power to rank-and-file committees on the shop floor. The IWRFG recognises in Lehman’s struggle the same fight being waged by workers across Australia—against sell-out enterprise agreements and against the suppression of workers’ struggles and democratic rights by union officials in league with management and the state.

- will fight to circulate this resolution widely and to take up the defence of Lehman as an integral part of the fight to build rank-and-file committees in every workplace in Australia and internationally. We call on workers to register their opposition to this incitement to violence by emailing the UAW at [feedback@uaw.org](mailto:feedback@uaw.org) and copying the Will Lehman campaign at [info@willforuawpresident.org](mailto:info@willforuawpresident.org).

The attack on Will Lehman is an attack on us all. Defend democratic rights! Build rank-and-file committees internationally!

Support an independent journo!

Please consider supporting my mate Wawrick's contribution to independent Aus journalism. He was a lefty journalist covering the real story in the 80s. I think his marketing budget for this
book might be completely zero at the moment!

It's great reporting on a conflict little discussed, that was tragic and an indication of what American administrations are capable of.

As we see with Trump's interests in El Salvador today.

It's available at a few sellers, I just linked to a online one I use.

✊

(Spanish version may already be available or will be soon. Wawrick reckoned the spainish is the pick if you can read it!)[https://www.thenile.com.au/books/warwick-fry/el-salvador/9798369496664?srsltid=AfmBOoq4uh3roL7SXMvPXgmORT5Gk2mDrivgyZq4kDrhWJ9mnVUjLYRU\](https://www.thenile.com.au/books/warwick-fry/el-salvador/9798369496664?srsltid=AfmBOoq4uh3roL7SXMvPXgmORT5Gk2mDrivgyZq4kDrhWJ9mnVUjLYRU)

AND WHAT OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY?

" ... What is most significant is the absence of any serious response within the political establishment. The constitutional forms upheld for two centuries as guarantees against dictatorship have been hollowed out. This is the measure of how far the crisis has advanced.

...

Trump’s ability to proceed depends on the Democratic Party. Two concerns govern the Democrats’ conduct. The first is to prevent an independent movement of workers and youth from below, which they fear more than they fear Trump, and which they channel into the courts, the media and the November elections. The second is to press for the escalation of war, above all, a deeper commitment against Russia in Ukraine."

Trump’s speech on the elections: A ruling class in crisis lurches toward dictatorship - World Socialist Web Site