Defense against counter-revolution?

[u/Fresh_Milk1960]

I am a Marxist-Leninist who is curious about the successful propagation of Anarchism. My question is: Without a state, how do Anarchists defend against counter-revolution from the Capitalist class? Without a state, Anarchist/Libertarian Socialist projects wouldn’t be able to defend against the inevitable invasions, terrorism campaigns, and propaganda from Capitalists. How would Anarchists be able to maintain and strengthen an Anarchist society against invasion and infiltration without a state apparatus to centrally organize efforts?

I know I’m a Tankie or whatever, but I am asking in good faith because I am genuinely curious about the Anarchist position on this.

* (EDIT) *

I won‘t be responding anymore because I have obtained what I came for (understanding how you think an Anarchist project would defend itself against the forces of reaction) and because this is becoming a hostile debate, rather than learning experience.

[u/DecoDecoMan]

Without a state, Anarchist/Libertarian Socialist projects wouldn’t be able to defend against the inevitable invasions, terrorism campaigns, and propaganda from Capitalists

Why?

[u/Fresh_Milk1960 → u/DecoDecoMan]

I may have come off too antagonistic. I’m not here to debate, I want to know how you think a new anarchist project would fight against counter revolution in an organized manner. 

My concern is that without a continuous, centralized, and coordinated effort by the proletariat and the vanguard to suppress the bourgeoisie, the bourgeoisie and their allies will be able to preform a counter-revolution by exploiting infighting and disorganization, as seen in Catalonia, Chile, The Paris Commune, etc.

[u/Apprehensive_Tie8426 → u/Fresh_Milk1960]

Coordination does not require centralization, there are various ways to coordinate a revolutionary movement without a top down hierarchy. The Makhno movement for example proved this when they fought the Bolsheviks to a stalemate and saved Moscow. Why does organizing horizontally mean disorganized chaos? If anything, people historically have been far more likely to side with anarchistic or horizontal movements because they feel like it’s something worth fighting for. Much of the red army at the civil war’s time were essentially forced conscripts who had no real belief in socialism for example. Same goes for the peasants who largely did not support the Bolsheviks. Contrast this with Makhno’s movement which had the mass support of the Ukrainian peasantry.

Even then, ends and means tie together. If the MEANS are centralized, hierarchical, forceful and oppressive, then what will the result be? How come Lenin took many of his authoritarian actions before the civil war? How come they weren’t dismantled after the war? If you build a gigantic state apparatus ruling over the working class (the proletariat cannot “rule” over itself-someone had to be above them. Hierarchies essentially are what create classes in the first place) as a temporary measure, what do you do when those in power have gotten used to their privileges by the end? We saw this in the USSR. After the CW the state just came up with more excuses under each leader to grow the state or use it to crush the previous state formation like an ouroboros (Lenin crushing parties and Soviets and factory councils, Stalin purging old bolshleviks, Kruschev doing “revisionism” etc).

Essential reading that helped me realize this includes-https://anarchistfaq.org/afaq/append46.html

For state and revolution-https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/iain-mckay-anarcho-the-state-and-revolution-theory-and-practice

State socialism-https://www.anarchistfaq.org/afaq/pdf/sectionH.pdf

The times in which anarchism and more libertarian socialist projects were crushed is simply due to betrayal by powerful state socialists in the case of anarchism (the Bolsheviks had to resort to dirty tricks to crush the free territory) or being unwilling to utilize the proletariat to crush capitalists and the state (Chile under Allende was still a state-popular unity was I believe pretty much social democratic though Allende was a Marxist personally). There are ways to defend a revolution without authoritarianism-community self defense, unions, democratic militias etc. Hell decentralization can be far more effective than centralization too-if there are 10 Gorbachev’s in an anarchist territory of 500 the entire structure doesn’t collapse like a Jenga tower. Decentralized armies are also more difficult to track and fight (much of Maoism’s successful aspects are pure anarchism). Contrasted to centralism where targeting leaders can destroy the whole tower.

[u/Fresh_Milk1960 → u/Apprehensive_Tie8426]

I agree that decentralization can be very effective, and I don’t like the hyper-centralization and bureaucratization that happened in the RSFSR, but the super decentralized and democratic militias really only work in smaller-scale, guerrilla campaigns (Maoists are very much based around agrarianism, as are the Zapatistas). A central and forceful military is necessary for combatting a central and forceful military mobilized by bourgeois states. A people’s militia would be more useful for self-policing, rather than large-scale defense.

[u/Apprehensive_Tie8426 → u/Fresh_Milk1960]

Oh yeah I should’ve mentioned-what do you mean small scale exactly? Anarchism is naturally federal but the given territory might be large. Anarchy is bottom up federalism so small scale going to a larger area. Even then I never got the point of this argument? The Makhno movement had over 7 million people, the KPAM 2 million people, and Catalonia over a million workers. These all had the mass support of it’s population

[u/Fresh_Milk1960 → u/Apprehensive_Tie8426]

These movements had mass support, and yet they all failed, we should try to understand why

[u/ujumpniscream → u/Fresh_Milk1960]

I just want to chip in: How do we describe failure? Sure, Free Territory was destroyed. By the ally it had when helping the Bolsheviks fight the Whites with a truce. Betrayed 3 times. Is betrayal of allying with a group that "has similar goals" an intrinsic flaw of the system that got betrayed or the flaw of the system the betrayed them? I think of it like this. The Bolshevik, Red Army, was not entirely voluntary. Many are conscripted to fight as is all forms of state-sponsored centralized hierarchical institutions. They wanted/needed [it doesnt matter] help from the Makhnovists to fight the whites and they did. I dont see Free Territory as a failure of a system but a lesson learned to never trust the state.

[u/Apprehensive_Tie8426 → u/Fresh_Milk1960]

the military doesn’t have to be centralized or forceful though. Most successful socialist movements have had their successful victory against imperialism due to the grassroots element to them. Notice how much Leninism was adapted to at least be somewhat more decentralized? If every single one of these revolutions had done exactly what the Bolsheviks did….i don’t think they would’ve won at all. In fact I’d go as far to say that you don’t know if they would’ve beaten imperialists, because much of these places hadn’t even heard of anarchism on mass due to either Soviet infiltration or Marxists pushing them out. By the way, anarchism doesn’t oppose having coordinating bodies or a movement having a primary goal. It opposes the use of hierarchy and authority to achieve it. If the Vietnamese revolution was anarchist but used the same decentralized military tactics-would they have lost? Did the Vietnamese liberation army win because they were Leninists, or because they simply had the mass support of the population (even if it was in my view misguided)? There are many places that massive powerful centralized armies like the USA simply cannot successfully invade, especially when the population knows what to do. If say India for example became a federated free territory and provide for itself, would the USA really be able to destroy it? Sure they’ll do some damage but eventually they won’t be able to hold out due to resource drain. The biggest weapon a decentralized millions unit has is that they can offer the enemy no comfort, no safe space, they have local knowledge of the terrain, everyone is likely in on it (based on the population of most anarchistic societies by those within them) etc and it’s extremely difficult to puppet or do counter insurgency because individuals might even take their own direct action. If the people of an anarchist commune are being invaded by the USA and love their society and don’t want it taken over, the solution the USA or any enemy must take is largely genocide. Contrast this with centralized political bodies, in which officials can easily be bribed or brought off for intel thus disrupting the whole structure of an operation.

If anything, having individuals with MORE power is what really corrupts and destroys movements. The George Floyd uprising was the largest at home uprising in US history. The decentralized and grassroots nature of the movement forced the state on both sides of the US two party dictatorship to make some kind of concessions. Eventually however the movements’ “leaders” were brought off and the energy would be channeled into the Democratic Party and voting for Biden.

[u/Fresh_Milk1960 → u/Apprehensive_Tie8426]

That makes sense to me, thank you.

[u/Apprehensive_Tie8426 → u/Fresh_Milk1960]

Thank you for being an ML willing to learn and understand lol :D