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Title: Open the Second Front
Author: Martin Wright
Date: 1984
Language: en
Topics: 1980s, Britain, insurrection, miners strike, solidarity, urban riot
Source: Retrieved on September 14, 2010 from http://gawainwilliams.wordpress.com/
Notes: Published in ‘Class War’, September 1984.

Martin Wright

Open the Second Front

State of play

In the terrain of industrial dispute we can claim, without the slightest

fear of contradiction, that the miners strike has gone far beyond

anything seen on mainland Britain. No mere wage struggle this, with

everything played according to the book (i.e. mostly non violent

excepting of course by the police). The positive aspects of this strike,

that have on occasion erupted into brutal class war, are evident even

for those of us who rely upon the sickening diet of newspapers and

television for our misinformation.

So, what do we regard as positive?

Mass proletarian violence that has ranged from set-piece

confrontations involving thousands of massed pickets and police. Not

only the classic push and shove tussle, but full scale riots with

intensive stone throwing, barricade building, wreckage and arson.

Violence not only at colliery gates and power plants, but police

stations in pit villages attacked without warning, police and scab

convoys ambushed, the birth of ‘Paramilitary’ Hit Squads causing vast

amounts of damage to NCB[1] property. Cowboy outfits profiting from

strike breaking and related activities have also been visited. Nothing

within living memory has ever happened here on such an extensive scale.

Not only have the police deployed riot equipment but such scenes have

become commonplace. A precedent for the future?

The spirit of determination exhibited by the strikers, holding out

against the massive police onslaught while showing no sign of caving in

to intimidation.

Allied to this is the fact that the communities in solid areas are

standing together with no intention of slinking back to work defeated.

The strength of this struggle derives not only from the workplace but

the community. (By community we don’t mean the idealistic pipe dream of

some inner city lefty gentrification, but a vibrant living entity). The

impressive involvement of womens support groups is a product of this.

As an added bonus, scattered reports and rumours, somewhat difficult

to substantiate at the moment, have been percolating down to us that

some groups of miners no longer care whether they return to work or not.

Others, in spite of the obvious hardships, are enjoying the longest

break in their working lives. The re-possessed videos and t.v. sets

haven’t caused mass outbreaks of despair contrary to expectations.

Violent class conflict has temporarily freed a section of the working

class from hollow consumerism. We’ve also heard that small groups of

miners are beginning to show an interest in anarchist politics.

We don’t see the miners as passive victims of police brutality. In the

heat of class war many are indeed on the receiving end of police boots

and truncheons but as far as we’re concerned the more violence and

injuries the miners inflict on the police the better. However, the

strikers have shown extraordinary signs of autonomous initiative,

ignoring union pleas to keep within limits that have crippled the

working class.

Hit squads, attacks on police stations, incidents during mass pickets

such as Orgreave are an indication, a pointer to unknown territory. Its

not the purpose of the article to ‘criticise’ Scargill and the N.U.M[2]

Sufficient to say that we don’t in any way regard the unions as a

revolutionary organisations. The time for post-mortems will be after any

sell-out. But neither is it our task to berate other comrades for their

rightful criticisms.

At this point we’d also like to mention some of the negative aspects of

this struggle.

The striking miners are not questioning, so far, the nature of

unionism, its role in capitalist society, the system. This probably

won’t happen until the final phase of the dispute, particularly if any

sell-out or compromise is too blatant.

There’s no denying that the police, in some areas, have constituted

themselves into a virtual army of occupation, employing a terror so far

only experienced by the rebellious young of the decaying inner cities.

The police have also had the chance to perfect the future strategy of

state repression. Still, its better the pigs suffer their causalities in

a genuine struggle that in riot training. The strikers, not without cost

(over 5,000 arrests) have also learnt a thing or two.

The ferocity of the struggle has tended to obscure a glaring fact. The

miners stand alone. Below we hope to indicate an untried path that could

remedy this situation. Drastic action that doesn’t require the

assistance of the T.U.C.

Perhaps the most repellent aspect has been the behaviour of the self

proclaimed leftist vanguards. Swooping like trained hawks, the see

conflict in terms of paper sales and eventual recruitment. It goes

without saying that the majority of these individuals are from a

background far removed from that of the proletarian fraternity.

Nevertheless the amount of demoralisation they are capable of causing is

tremendous, perhaps more so in the wake of strike. Even when performing

what appears to be useful tasks such as collecting ‘for the miners’

rumour abound about misappropriation of cash raised, some of it

apparently being hived off into party projects.

Even more revolting (if such things can be imagined) is the attitude

of the TUC and Labour party, whose leaders are more concerned with

preventing proletarian violence then winning the strike. Kinnock is even

resorting to form a left-nationalism in his pathetic attempts to curb

the healthy development of class violence. Its “alien to the temperament

and the intelligence of the British trade union movement”. Nor will

ballots. Instinctively, if nothing else, the strikers are aware of this

, yet still they listen and tolerate Labour politicians prattling on

about ‘victory’ at their rallies. Politically the strikers have yet to

make the break. But thats not to say it wont happen.

Never mind the Left, Labour party and TUC. What has the anarchist

contribution been? Collecting for the miners may ease the conscience of

some anarchists. Sure, we all give money for food but really there isn’t

all that much of a difference between collecting for the strikers and

the starving of Africa. Going to the picket lines makes no real overall

difference. What’s another couple of dozen here or there mean? Most

anarchist papers do little but pour out irrelevances. A class war raging

and one calls for a ballot! Others go to the other extreme and print

articles offering full support- to the NUM bureaucracy! Another idiot

writes that the miners can be starved into revolution!

So, after 6 months of this momentous strike, with the prospect of it

lasting in 1985, we seriously propose a state of minor insurgency as the

real anarchist contribution.

In the past, we of the autonomist/ class war type current have been

ridiculed when we predicted mass political violence on the streets

during the comparatively tranquil mid-70s. With the struggle against the

Nazis, the foundations were laid for the uprisings of ’81. Again we

predicted this occurrence fairly accurately. Far from being passive

commentators or spectators many of us were part of the events.

Simultaneously we looked forward to insurgent strikes of a continental

variety. And to a certain degree its been blazing away for months.

So as the strike enters the winter months with the possibility of power

cuts, we put forward these as yet rough suggestions to genuine

revolutionaries and anarchists who aren’t of the wally variety.

To organise from within the movement, as we’ve done in the past by

word of mouth and the usual informal contact meetings involving

delegates from as many trustworthy anarchist groups as possible.

Planning deliberate spectacular mini riots as soon as the power cuts

arrive (or failing that, late afternoon darkness). The aim being to

spark off trouble in the major urban areas, thus drawing police out of

the mining areas.

How to achieve this worthy task

As proved on the July anti-Regan demo we can cause thousands of pounds

worth of damage without suffering a single arrest, if well planned and

co-ordinated. Judging by ‘Stop the City’ turnouts and our own

interventions we can raise a force of at least 200 in London alone. This

may be a conservative estimate. Obviously we don’t intend squandering

people in face to face confrontation, as we may need to repeat the

performance. Besides, we’re not of the martyr material. In case the

sceptical reader may wonder how such a plan could be achieved, here’s a

brief scenario. Of course its only by comrades working together that we

can oil out the mechanics of the operation.

Thanks to the Electricity Board publishing where the blackouts occur ,

we could assemble in a certain area at a pre-arranged time. Any sign of

abnormal police presence would mean postponement.

The ideal area would be a shopping area such as a high street. The

crowds providing perfect cover when assembling our teams. Plenty of

escape routes would be necessary. Gloves, scarf’s and balaclavas

wouldn’t arouse suspicion during winter.

At a pre-arranged signal upon the advent of lights out, the mob could

condense within seconds, swinging into action. Parked cars should be

dragged across the road turned over, or even set alight, forming

barricades, and causing traffic chaos there by making police access more

difficult. Windows must be smashed, looting encouraged. Those police

first on the scene if small in number could be resisted with bricks and

other throwable material. Before they can gather sufficient strength,

again at a pre-arranged signal, we’d disperse into darkness.

Headlines captured it wouldn’t take long for the example to spread.

Against this background we’d blend, time to add our political dimension.

Propaganda urging the opening of a second front, with the attendant

looting and rioting, must appear beforehand. It should be made clear

that these actions are a deliberate effort to spread class conflict as

opened by the miners’ strike. While the spreading of propaganda is an

important task, we cant afford to dilute our numbers by having some

engaging in their own individual actions simultaneously as has happened

in recent times. Not only do they draw numbers away but these

alternative actions mysteriously fail to appear. As a side interest this

would show who really meant business and who was just all mouth. No one

group should lead it, this is our common task. We’ve just contributed

with this suggestion, now’s the time to discuss the matter seriously.

There is no alternative as far as we can see. Its all right to sloganise

about setting up factory committees or community councils and call for a

general strike. As these don’t seem to be materialising it all remains a

comfortable abstraction. We’re not the vanguard but as a tiny fraction

of the class the plan mapped out above is the only realistic action we

can indulge ourselves in, gain results for the miners AND ourselves.

[1] National Coal Board

[2] National Union of Miners