US police view of anarchists

[james_walsh]

Thers a small interview with Shayler in the weekly worker. It goes into a bit of detail about spying on left wing groups. I think its related to this discussion.

link-http://www.cpgb.org.uk/worker/589/shayler.htm

I think Class War comes out of it , with a lot of credit.





ps- weather,it is creditable what he says about CW , is abit doughtful- not on the basis off what said in the artical. but because what Shayler has said elsewhere.

 

[laptop]

I found the currents and tendencies they didn't cover particularly interesting. This may be explained completely by their US-centric view...

But yes, got the feeling that one or other of the authors may be susceptible to "going native". I'm guessing it was the academic who wrote the apparently rather wistful stuff about the depth of knowledge required to pass as an anarchist. He'd be the one who chose a career on the basis that it would provide opportunitie for decently challenging arguments - and so many academics are diappointed in this...

 

[gawkrodger]

Whatever your subjective intentions are, if you spend six days of every week pretending to be an anarchist, there is a natural tendency for you to actually become an anarchist. That’s what happened to this bloke and eventually they had to pull him out before they lost him altogether

hoho

 

[The Black Hand]

Well, despite people's criticisms, I think they've done well for themselves - certainly far better researched and far less reactionary than I'd expect from the american plod. It frustrated me that people are picking at minor errors when in fact what we should be talking about is the fact that a copper, and a yank copper at that is switched on and has a reasonably accurate picture of anarchism as it is today. The constant reinforcement of the fact that anarchists are not a monolithic unit, that there really is no chain of command, that there is no organisation called "Black Bloc" and so on shows unusual insight.

Tbh I don't think ANY unusual insight has been displayed - i think you're down playing the level of downright lies these people play normally... Despite the 'grunts', the officer class that run Mi5, Mi6, branch, and other security dept are Sandhurst/Public school trained, and it would be stupid to assume they don't know what's 'going on'. I don't think its particularly good, though it does rank with a lot the British anarchist movement turns out, but there are exceptions to this e.g. I prefer Dr Franks article on 'Direct action and anarchism' that was published in the journal Anarchist Studies i think (i haven't got the reference to hand, was it called Direct Action - the anarchist impulse). That article was far better, and anarchists would get even more from reading it than reading plod crap...

Mr Walsh - '6 days with CW and the sabbath with the wife and kids' doesn't ring true to me, he prob. told his bosses that and had 5 days off in the week too. I remember the police diving team who managed to give private lessons with work equipment in work time from not too long back....[and more besides]

 

[james_walsh]

Mr Walsh - '6 days with CW and the sabbath with the wife and kids' doesn't ring true to me, he prob. told his bosses that and had 5 days off in the week too. I remember the police diving team who managed to give private lessons with work equipment in work time from not too long back....[and more besides]

It didn't ring true to me either ,thats part of the reason why I added a health warning.

 

[Taxamo Welf]

and edited your original post?

now i'm just confused.

 

[gurrier]

Interesting to see them diverting the resources to this. The anarchists are moving up the enemy list.

No surprise that it is fairly accurate (if very very US-centric) either. Our Western societies rely on the ability of the ruling class to deploy large numbers of brains to understand the world. The public utterances of the state and the various institutions that hang off it are propaganda pure and simple, they bear no relation to the understanding of the world within those institutions. The police's propaganda arms will continue to depict anarchists in exactly as damaging way as they think they can get away with (which estimation is also based upon proper research).

Every time that Tony Blair and George Bush and their various stooges go on about terrorists hating our freedom and such shite, you should remember that they have access to highly distilled reports which detail exactly and normally highly accurately, the precise composition, political positions, support bases, tactical understandings and much more about each and every one of the 'terrorist' factions.

 

[laptop]

you should remember that they have access to highly distilled reports which detail exactly and normally highly accurately, the precise composition, political positions, support bases, tactical understandings and much more about each and every one of the 'terrorist' factions.

But as far as I can work out the entire art of being a politician is to suppress or ignore such intelligence, and operate with the cunning that tells them what they can get away with...

 

[gurrier]

But as far as I can work out the entire art of being a politician is to suppress or ignore such intelligence, and operate with the cunning that tells them what they can get away with...

I entirely agree and one should always remember than any politician who is half-decently skilled at their job (normally the ability to get elected is a good litmus test of their skill) is an absolute enemy of the truth. Each and every last word that falls from their lips is dishonest. Even when some of the content is accurate, that is simply because it's easier not to have to make things up when a fact plucked from reality will do.

If I was a US anarchist, I'd use this report as a propaganda tool. Each and every defamatory police statement about anarchists can be greeted with "but your own intelligence reports are saying exactly the opposite - insert quote - are you just making this up? why? what intelligence are you basing this upon?" etc.

 

[james_walsh]

and edited your original post?

now i'm just confused.

Spelling mistake! again. or mistout a word.

 

[sovietpop]

I suppose what's interesting about the document is that it gives a broad overview of the state of anarchism today. Recently I've been thinking that one of the things we lack is case studies that document our own experiences. When we are involved in something we tend to write descriptive pieces outlining all the things that happened (all the bells, whistles and glory), but not so much the backroom histories of how we organised, the problems we faced, the difficulties, the lessons, the things we tried that failed. At the moment there are a couple of projects I'm involved in where I'm trying to work out strategies, I know that other groups must have been in a similar situation, and I'm probably re-inventing the wheel, but can I find that original wheel? No, I can't.

(for example in the latest issue of Red and Black there is an interview about community organising in Chile and in the previous one there are interviews with various anarchists on organising summit protests . Personally I got a lot out of reading about these different experiences).