CPUSA Memo

TO: All clubs and districts
FR: National Organization Department

Dear comrades,

The bombing of Afghanistan has upped the ante on the urgency of working to build broad coalitions for peace and against terrorism.

Tonight we held an emergency meeting in which comrades from all over the country participated, to discuss our response to this new, very dangerous development. The stakes are high, and require that our Party do its best, most creative thinking about tactics.

It would be a big mistake to gauge the level of anti-war sentiment simply by looking at those who are ready to attend a demonstration. The anti-war sentiment is much broader and bigger than the size of the demonstrations indicate, even at this early stage, which is important. And people oppose military action for different reasons, ranging from concern about terrorist reprisals, to the danger that a larger war will result, to the terrible fact that many innocent people will be killed by U.S. bombs. All of these are reasons to call for peace.

We need to do everything we can to help broaden the organized peace movement and its activities, and to prevent its narrowing down. We need to come up with concrete, practical and diverse ways that the broadest anti-war sentiment can be expressed, from finding pro-peace speakers for church services to providing people with the phone number of the local Congressperson, to calling in to radio programs and writing letters to the editor.

We cannot stress enough the importance of getting in touch with our Congressional representatives and of organizing others to do this as quickly as possible, whether by phone, email, or delegations to local offices.

A Party statement is being drafted tonight which will express in the first place our opposition to war and to unilateral U.S. action. To the call for peace and justice we connect the call for international, political forms and solutions to the threat that terrorism poses to the people of the whole world. Our statement will point to the Bush Administration's attempt to use this crisis to ram all aspects of its right wing agenda through, from the dumping of the economic crisis onto the people, to the attempts to subvert civil liberties and democratic rights.

The statement will be available on the web page and we will also email it to you. As with our previous statements we urge everyone to get it out as widely as possible. We need to make as public as we can our Party's position against war and against terrorism, both to influence public opinion and also because it is very important that our views be widely known, given the attack on civil liberties that is underway.

The National Organization Department will meet Tuesday morning to further discuss how to help the clubs and districts take practical initiatives in this frightening and complex situation. As a start, districts should order extra bundles of this week's PWW, and plan special distributions, in neighborhoods and workplaces, as well as to trade unionists and other activists. Clubs should call emergency meetings of members and friends, and where possible, district and national leaders should attend those meetings.

We'll be in touch; please let us know what's happening in your area.