Waiting for the Anarchist Guerrilla…
From Act for Freedom Now!
Translated from German, originally posted to kontrapolis.info
Spring 2024, the situation is unbearable. Fascism has conquered the minds of many people, not only in the territory controlled by the German State. The rulers of many countries seem to be on a death trip; hot wars between States, wars against migration, war against the planet’s resources and social war are in a phase of enthusiasm for death, reminiscent of descriptions shortly before the outbreak of the First World War. Meanwhile, humanity has its fingers glued to smartphones, numbed by the flickering of algorithms.
As for the hot wars, many anarchists remain in the spectator position. In one of these wars, there are good reasons to join the Kurdish structures and be active against the Turkish State and its Islamist proxies. There are also good reasons to stay away from the PKK’s cult of personality and instead attack Erdogan’s interests in Europe, although the initial waves of action here have subsided considerably. The anarchist space has also not yet developed any practice against the State systems that are largely responsible for the current massacres (NATO/EU/Israel/Iran/Russia) or the war profiteers that is capable of influencing the course of history.
Now, a text published on March 2, 2024 under the title “Developing Incisive Capacity: Making Actions Count”1 raises questions that are certainly relevant to many of us:
What could equip anarchists to carry out more significant strikes, to hone a quality of action that goes beyond the symbolic? What are the current obstacles to anarchists developing a capacity for action on a significant scale, organized in small autonomous groups that can coordinate around a particular focus? In other words, what needs to happen for more anarchists to establish the necessary skills and a certain routine for attacking identified vulnerabilities?
To answer these questions not only theoretically but also practically requires nothing less than an anarchist guerrilla. For with the methods developed in the autonomous movement over the last few decades, we have come no further than exactly where we have been for some time now. In order not to indulge in lengthy analyses, which could hardly be more appropriate than issue 2 of the newspaper “Antisistema”, spring 2024, please refer to this issue.
A guerrilla, or at least guerrilla activities, require, among other things, that a group of people organize themselves over a longer period of time. This is where the first shortcoming of anarchist non-organization comes in: a short stay in the scene and a lack of commitment. The development of a militant life takes longer than most people spend in the radical left milieus of the western metropolises. Combined with a misinterpretation of the anarchist perspective on committed organizing, this leads to the historical fact that, with few exceptions, most guerrilla groups were communist and/or aimed at national liberation. The resistance in Spain against Franco can be seen as an example of commitment to subversion as a life’s work. Anarchist, libertarian, and communist militants waged an armed struggle against the dictatorship from 1939 to 1965, in which most of them were killed rather than fleeing to the safety of exile in France. Francesc Sabaté Llopart became synonymous with these anarchist guerrillas, a struggle whose tragic end was marked by the execution of Salvador Puig Antich in 1974.
Very little has been written about the scale of the armed struggle against Franco following the civil war. A thick blanket of silence has been drawn over the fighters, for a variety of reasons. According to Franco’s personal friend, Guardia Civil General Camilo Alonso Vega — who was in charge of the anti-guerrilla campaign for twelve years — banditry (the term the Francoists always used to describe the guerrilla activity) was of “great significance” in Spain, in that it “disrupted communications, demoralised folk, wrecked our economy, shattered our unity and discredited us in the eyes of the outside world”.
We have no reliable breakdown of the overall figures for guerrillas or for the casualties sustained by or inflicted upon the security forces and Army. If we are to have some grasp of what this unequal struggle against the Dictatorship was like, our only option is to turn to figures made public in 1968, according to which the Guardia Civil sustained 628 casualties (258 deaths) between 1943 and 1952.2
A definition of what a guerrilla actually means emerges from the realities that people have faced in seemingly hopeless wars. Andrew Mack noted that in asymmetric wars, the stronger actor loses because it “has a lower interest in winning due to being less threatened,” which is true of the Algerian FLN’s war against France. And Ivan Arreguín-Toft: “Strong actors lose asymmetric conflicts when they adopt the wrong strategy vis-à-vis their weaker adversaries. The focus of State forces on symmetrical warfare leads to the strong actor reacting to the asymmetrical strategies of the weak actor with the wrong strategy.” The anti-colonial guerrilla groups won because they did not lose. They prevented the stronger actor from winning hearts and minds3.
Applied to today’s situation, this means that the militants of the anarchist space in Europe and the US, due to their class origins (mostly white middle class), may not be able to develop a sufficient sense of being threatened, and that this cannot be compensated for by empathy with those affected by European aggression. This is against the backdrop of Europe’s uninterrupted war against the rest of the world’s population since Columbus landed in “America” in 1492.
Looking back at old issues of Interim and Radikal or the archive of Linksunten Indymedia, it is striking that the insurrectionary texts of the last twenty years have not taken a position on how to organize with those involved in the wave-like cycles of insurrection. Affinity groups have been conceptualized as being as ephemeral as many revolts themselves. With the level of sabotage this has made possible, participation in asymmetric warfare is not feasible at this time. This does not necessarily mean the use of weapons, but the creation of conditions that allow the use of whatever means are deemed necessary. At the moment, anarchist counter-violence stands in a reactive relationship to State power. We use the means that we assume the State and society will not extinguish us for. Currently, the State is shifting the discourse on violence against Nazis from “forbidden, but it happens” to “forbidden, and you’ll be hunted down for it”. The next step would have to be a paradigm shift that would force State power to react to our counter-violence. Or for State power to accept losing control of discursive and physical space.
After the uprising in Greece in December 2008, some of those who were involved called for urban guerrilla warfare to be adopted as the main strategic direction. This development was the subject of intense anonymous debate. Some people said that the expansion of guerrilla attacks was going too far too fast, that most people were unable to make or understand this tactical leap. They also said that the anarchists would become isolated and vulnerable to violent repression. Another criticism was that Greek society had some historical references to specialized leftist guerrilla groups, while there was hardly any tradition of the anarchist model of dispersed, non-vanguardist groups. In the absence of such a framework of historical references, it was argued, the new strategy of informal and flexible formations would not succeed in winning over a larger part of the population to participation in guerrilla actions.
Years earlier, the 17 November organization had published a critique of an anti-authoritarian group, arguing that choosing more mundane targets in line with an anarchist analysis would create more fear than recognition in society because people would not understand why that particular target was being attacked. Basing the strategy on more and more people carrying out similar attacks was seen as a problem because the necessary critique of capitalism is not widespread.
Another position was that a strategy of clandestine guerrilla warfare would lead to specialization and be spectacular. It requires such a high degree of specialization and knowledge that the vast majority of society cannot participate, as opposed to an uprising in which everyone can participate in their own way. By their very nature, guerrilla actions are spectacular due to the small number of people involved, which means that attacks are infrequent, which in turn increases the level of preparation and intensity. Their primary target is virtual reality. The way an urban revolt communicates itself is essentially immediate. However, clandestine attacks are mainly experienced through the eyes of the media. As a result, people become spectators of the struggle rather than protagonists, as is the case with riots. As the spearhead of the struggle moves further and further away from the realities of people’s lives, in the long run they are transformed even more into spectators. At the same time, the State and the media, for their part, turn the attacks into a spectacle and make them a symbol of the entire struggle. Finally, the State could simply eliminate the struggle by ordering the media to stop reporting on the attacks. Decapitated in this way, the remnants of the struggle could be enticed to collaborate with the institutional left.
Proponents of this critique point out that this is exactly what happened in Germany and Italy in the seventies and eighties. The group Ta Paidia Tis Galarias, which converted to communism from its anarchist roots, went further, claiming that “on this basis, the armed struggle finds itself in alliance with the State: both are challenged by proletarian subversive activity, the continuation of which threatens the survival of both.” The proponents of the guerrilla strategy, on the other hand, argued that if an insurrection is to develop into a revolution, it must prevail in armed struggle against the State, and it cannot do so unarmed4.
Be that as it may, as class antagonism subsided in Greece, so did the public guerrilla debate. One lesson for the future might be to be better prepared for the closing of a historical window, for occasionally this reset occurs, as in Portugal on April 25, 1974, when the dictatorship was swept away in a matter of hours by the Movimento das Forças Armadas. This overthrow came as a surprise to Portuguese society, and after initial attempts to collectivize farmland and some businesses, it was quickly forced into social-democratic channels under pressure from NATO. The armed resistance of communist groups such as the Brigadas Revolucionarias had little impact on the course of events. Although the BR had already begun attacking NATO installations in Portugal in 1971, robbing banks and engaging in gun battles with the police that left officers dead, society did not take up the fight against NATO. After the end of the colonial wars and sending the proletariat to the slaughter in them, internal peace was stablized. Nonetheless, the BR remained active until 1980 and maintained anti-colonial cooperation with the Polisario.
Preparing for historical windows is not so far-fetched, since only fifteen years after the fall of the regime in Portugal, two States in Europe — East Germany and Yugoslavia — dissolved completely. In both territories, however, this was accompanied by a rise in nationalist violence during a period of general depression for radical left militancy following the collapse of “real socialism”.
Preparing for a sudden or foreseeable situation, or even better, creating a situation yourself, is a frequently expressed idea. At this point we would like to engage with some of the ideas raised by the newspaper Antisistema. In response to the question of how we want to act (quantitatively or qualitatively?), they write:
It might be interesting to take a closer look at the three points mentioned above — energy grids, microchip factories and mining, especially deep-sea mining. […] Perhaps the multiplication of different forms of action — sabotage, mass disruption, small reproducible attacks — fueled by radical criticism on the streets and a growing disillusionment with politics can ensure that the possibility of direct action against those responsible for industrial destruction spreads.
A zine from France entitled “Blackout: Controversy about the meaning and effectiveness of sabotage” responds to the mass sabotage during the Covid lockdown by asking, “How could we undermine technological control? Could we provoke a tipping point in this situation? What scenarios did these sabotage actions open up? How could we consider effectiveness, organization, and ethics as a whole?”
It is well known that many sabotage actions in France do not come only from the anarchist spectrum, and “Blackout” attaches some importance to how we understand effectiveness:
Simultaneously, another proposal is taking shape whose strategy is to reach the infrastructural field, that is, the deep layers of power. The power of the war-research-industry complex is not unshakeable, since it relies on diffuse infrastructures. Understanding, identifying and destroying key infrastructures also means to start reconsidering the possibility of radical change. Although less spectacular, this way of action has a triple advantage: it is less seizable by repressive forces; it can concretely stop, though temporarily, the techno-industrial machinery; and it prevents any central direction from taking hold, since it is the result of the work of a multitude of small, dispersed and autonomous groups. What strategies emerge when we separate or combine anarchist, ecologist and techno-critical perspectives? How do these strategies integrate a now-decisive element: the war in Europe, which will guide and harden the grip of States on their populations.
First of all, in order to be able to speak of a strategy at all, the fight would have to be more long-term than is usually the case. Anyone who reacts to a new urgent issue every few months is only one factor in the strategy of the enemy, who is also acting. Making an impact becomes possible when a group of people can be found who are willing to commit themselves to a specific issue for a longer period of time. The anarchist guerrilla is not defined by the use of weapons and bombs, but by the decision to seriously engage in one aspect of the numerous wars. The current practice of beating up a Nazi today, smashing up a new building tomorrow, and setting fire to a company car next week is a politics of autonomous fire brigades. Better than nothing, but not enough to answer any of the questions outlined above. Last year’s intensification of worldwide attacks in support of Alfredo Cospito’s hunger strike revealed the nature of anarchist militancy. It is understood as a tactical tool — in this case as a show of solidarity — but it evaporates before it leaves any material impact on the enemy’s camp.
Determination is the strongest weapon of our enemies, not their guns or tanks. The determination of the police, military and security authorities to throw away their own lives and the lives of others at any moment stands in our way. The anarchist guerrilla will not counter this with the same cadaverous obedience, but rather with the determination to take the arduous path of resistance: conspiring with comrades despite interpersonal contradictions, pursuing long-term plans, eternal research without quick successes, moving through camera-infested cities on cold nights, etc.
About the possibilities: Either in Paris during the lockdown or in Grenoble a couple days later, the step seems to have taken, moving beyond targets with low strategic value (since they are easily replaceable) towards multiple targets that, once coordinated, considerably increase the efficiency of an offensive action. Whether it is the 100 000 people deprived of internet and phone services in Paris, or in Grenoble where we learned that an additional antenna would have shut down the metropolis’ entire network. Not that the recipe is anything new, but I find it exciting that we allow ourselves to think it, to do it, to coordinate ourselves, to hit simultaneously, and to disappear. It is a step forward, from what can be considered as low intensity conflict to what could become an open conflict. Given the way things are going, with on one side an all-technological over-controlled system and on the other, the increasingly intense destruction of what we still dared to call nature not so long ago, I sincerely believe that we do not have time anymore. No time to hope that another social movement will become uncontrollable if we break enough windows; a mass of increasingly servile people will become an angry mob. To me, not to have time anymore does not mean to rush behind every emergency (climate or social), nor to follow the increasingly rapid flux of the net, to be ‘present’ in order to spread ‘counter-information’. No. It means planning meaningful operations, to dare think in terms of strategy. With our own temporality and not that of power.5
As long as this form of guerrilla fails to materialize, Kurdish Apoism, centered around the ideas Abdulah Öcalan the founder of the PKK, will continue to attract anarchists, and others will lose themselves in the delirium of anarchist participation in the service of the Ukrainian military. Before deciding on the use of weapons, the anarchist guerrilla will have to engage with successful uprisings of the past. For example, the Arab uprising against Turkey in 1916-1918. Its main initiator, Lawrence of Arabia, said at the time:
Any kind of traditional warfare should be dispensed with and guerrilla warfare should be waged instead. This consists primarily of a negation of regular warfare. The central idea of regular war is the “encounter”. Two opponents meet at a given time to decide on victory or defeat through the orderly clash of their armies. Guerrilla warfare neither achieves a decision nor attempts to bring about an encounter with the enemy. Guerrilla warfare is a “war of evasion”. The guerrilla warrior hides from the enemy. At a safe distance, they look for the place where the enemy is weakest and attack there. Without forcing a decision, they retreat again and repeat the small attacks elsewhere. They do not wage war in the strict sense, but disturb their opponent with constant pinpricks of ambush, sabotage and raids until the latter, worn down in every respect, collapses.
According to Lawrence, the fact that Arabia was a land of revelatory religion with a tremendous longing for freedom was advantageous — a kind of reflection in the mind of the barrenness of the desert. Lawrence harnessed the prophetic power for the uprising with a strategy of perpetual ambush. It was less a matter of conquering territory than of creating a desire for freedom. Of course, it should not be forgotten that Lawrence was acting in the service of the British government, but the insurgents’ desire for freedom was authentic and their determination greater than that of the Turkish colonial power.
In 2024, Germany and Europe are littered with facilities, installations, vehicles and those responsible for the massacres at the borders, in Ukraine, in Palestine, in Kurdistan, and the colonial wars on other continents…
The initiative “Switch off! The system of destruction” has provided a positive and feasible example of a framework for action that enables coordination. To hone a quality of action that goes beyond the symbolic, as formulated from the Atlanta Forest, requires strong reference to each other, both in published texts and in the informal contacts between anonymous protagonists. In order not to become prematurely frustrated with the lack of change, we should take into account the time frame of the EZLN, which prepared for the armed uprising in the jungle for ten years.
Reducing effective strikes against the war machine to a militarist perspective prevents the emergence of an anarchist guerrilla. With all sympathy for the resistance in Turkey and despite recognizing the important attacks on the AKP regime, the Halkların Birleşik Devrim Hareketi (HBDH) wants something different from us when it says “we are the vanguard of the revolution in the struggle of the peoples in Turkey and Kurdistan against AKP/MHP fascism. The HBDH will fulfill its task as a vanguard. It will raise the consciousness of the working people in the right way. It will support and lead them in organizing. It will lead and inspire actions and mobilize people for them. The HBDH is a leading force. Against AKP/MHP fascism, it represents the future, hope, determination, freedom and democracy of Turkey. The HBDH is the force that will overthrow this fascism”6 Their utopia fills the vacuum in the absence of anarchist practice that is social and armed. So, is a form of resistance against the war that impacts reality only possible at the price of the leftist power dialectic, as expressed by the Kurdish groups?
In discussions with comrades from the three internationalists, we repeatedly came across the topic of tactical alliances, which are often unavoidable in war situations in order to become a force. Bawer, who still knew Finbar from Rojava, drew parallels to the time when he fought alongside the Kurdish movement in Raqqa and described the situation for anarchists in Ukraine as follows: “The way to build your own unity as an anarchist is to shake hands with forces like the State or disagreeable groups. However, it does not mean that you lose your principles. Many Western leftists cannot stand this contradiction.”7
Indeed, enduring contradictions is a necessary prerequisite for enabling autonomous small action groups to take a step forward. However, the current tendency in some circles to dismiss contradictions as irrelevant stands in the way of achieving freedom after the end of violence. While it is obvious that Israel’s war against the Palestinian population requires armed resistance, the uncritical solidarity that often happens speaks to the inconsequential non-practice of anarchy, with its lack of perspective on the battlefields. Where war, which is to say life and death, is discussed, it is necessary to clarify one’s own ideas. When, for example, the leader of the Saraya Al-Quds — Tulkarem Brigade answers five interview questions with “God”8, this requires us in the safe global North to take a real stand instead of resorting to empty phrases (if we are serious about practical solidarity).
In order to provide an answer to the questions brought up earlier, the development of an anarchist guerrilla is proposed. This does not require a founding declaration or acronyms. It is not defined by the question of weapons or the desire to escalate violence, but is rather characterized by the determination of those involved to build a long-term committed structure that is capable of acting against the war waged from above. Only the sequence of determination — commitment — organization in a collective structure leads to further questions about the choice of means or any strategic orientation. We must also fight the incredible success that the capitalist system achieves every day by framing war in the consciousness of the masses as a war of nations and religions, thereby concealing its true nature as a class war.
- https://scenes.noblogs.org/post/2024/03/02/developing-incisive-capacity-... ↵
- Antonio Téllez Solà, Armed resistance to Franco, 1939-1965 ↵
- Arreguín-Toft, I. (2001). How the Weak Win Wars: A Theory of Asymmetric Conflict. Mack, A. (1975). Why big nations lose small wars: The politics of asymmetric conflict. ↵
- https://libcom.org/library/specialised-guerilla-diffuse-guerilla ↵
- Blackout – Controversy about meaning and effectiveness of sabotage, page 12 ↵
- https://anfdeutsch.com/hintergrund/kalkan-die-hbdh-als-avantgarde-der-re... ↵
- https://anfdeutsch.com/hintergrund/gastbeitrag-zum-internationalen-geden... ↵
- https://abolitionmedia.noblogs.org/post/2024/04/22/tulkarem-brigade-comm... ↵
