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03:03In the United States, they protested on roller skates against unemployment and against war, brandishing the skull and crossbones. It
03:10was the anarchists, and not the communists, who prompted within successive U.S. governments, despite the famous red scare, their
03:17darkest fears.
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06:17The authorities' eyes naturally turned to the movement led by Luigi Ghagliani,
06:21partisan of the propaganda of the deed.
06:25In his newspaper, Conaca Subversiva,
06:28this lawyer advocated the direct, immediate, and individual use of violence.
06:33His booklet, La Salute En Voi, Salvation is in You, enjoyed a degree of success.
06:38In its foreword, what was basically a bomb-making manual,
06:41was presented as a must-have for any proletarian family.
06:45For several years, his influence had grown within the Italian community.
06:49Salvatore and Vanzetti belong to that current in the anarchist movement.
06:53They were militants.
06:55They believed in revolution by any means necessary, the sooner the better.
07:00At the time that they're arrested, they don't know that that's why they're being arrested.
07:04They think they're being arrested because they're anarchists
07:06and because anarchists are being rounded up.
07:08So they are very evasive when they're interrogated.
07:13They don't answer everything truthfully,
07:16which ends up being brought up at their trial and used as evidence against them.
07:20On the steps of the Boston courthouse, thronging with reporters and onlookers,
07:24the shoemaker and fishmonger were accused of being the authors of an armed robbery
07:27which resulted in the death of two people late in 1919.
07:31Although neither of them had a police record,
07:33their anarchic tendencies were enough to see them charged.
07:36As the flashbulbs popped, this minor incident became a political affair.
07:40It becomes a very, very high-profile case.
07:43There's a large, an extremely large movement in support of Sacco and Vanzetti
07:50that grows not just in the United States but worldwide.
07:54There's a Save Sacco and Vanzetti movement
07:57because an increasing number of people, not just anarchists and radicals,
08:02but liberals of various stripes, unions, become convinced that the evidence against them
08:08is extremely flimsy, which it is.
08:11On American soil, anarchists tried everything to have the two prisoners released,
08:16firstly with bombs like the attack on Wall Street,
08:19the first car bomb in history,
08:21which resulted in 38 deaths and 200 injuries, but to no avail.
08:27Then through a legal battle, with appeals, cross-examinations, new trials,
08:32which, despite their death sentence, managed to delay their execution for seven years.
08:38And finally through a media campaign,
08:40with defense committees springing up pretty much everywhere.
08:43But although the campaigns to defend Sacco and Vanzetti were initiated by anarchists,
08:47as strange as it might seem,
08:49it was those across the globe, those who had become their worst enemies,
08:52who took up their defense.
08:53It's, of course, ironic because the communists adopted their cause.
09:01But the communists, of course, at the same time,
09:04were executing and imprisoning anarchists in the Soviet Union.
09:09So they certainly didn't have any real sympathy for Sacco and Vanzetti's political beliefs.
09:17Today we know that Moscow took the decision to champion Sacco and Vanzetti
09:21to turn them into the symbol of bourgeois repression, capital repression,
09:26in the country that epitomized capitalism, the United States of America.
09:32It also earned them moral capital, good feeling in the socialist and working class movements
09:44for them to champion these two Italian-Americans who are facing death.
09:48And so they did manipulate the Sacco and Vanzetti case and use their martyrdom
09:55in order to further their own political interests.
09:58And that's very sad.
10:02Unaware of the attempts at manipulation,
10:04but aware of the injustices carried out on anarchists,
10:07grassroots communist activists stepped up their efforts.
10:11On the Place de la République in Paris, France,
10:14in Tokyo, Berlin, Sofia, Asuncion,
10:18and Trafalgar Square in London, England,
10:20communists also protested against the execution of Sacco and Vanzetti,
10:23but in vain.
10:26Nevertheless, despite this widespread public outrage,
10:30they are both executed.
10:32They're sent to the electric chair in 1927 after their sentences are upheld.
10:36And this is...
10:40It's a devastating blow.
10:41The anarchist movement was crushed in the United States.
10:47And you weren't really to see much in the way of an anarchist movement
10:51in the United States again until the 1960s.
10:55It would be many years for all the manipulation and exploitation
10:58to be denounced and admitted,
11:01resulting in the governor of Massachusetts, Michael Dukakis,
11:04finally proclaiming that any disgrace should be forever removed from their names.
11:10And 50 years to the day after their execution,
11:13thanks to Joan Baez singing,
11:15to music composed by Inyo Morricone,
11:17Vanzetti's last words,
11:18the death march of the anarchists
11:20finally became an international hymn for justice and freedom.
11:24Here's to you, Nicola and Bart,
11:28rest forever here in our hearts,
11:32the last and final moment is yours,
11:50Anarchism then suffered by becoming a huge diaspora,
11:54a diaspora of Russian anarchists,
11:56North American anarchists,
11:58Italian anarchists.
11:59Naturally, many of them moved to France
12:01because France wasn't a dictatorship.
12:04It was still a free democracy,
12:06so they emigrated to France.
12:09The anarchist movement,
12:11which had hoped for a triumphant revolution
12:13in the aftermath of the First World War,
12:16found itself beaten on all fronts.
12:19And the question arose,
12:21why were we beaten?
12:31In the roaring 20s,
12:33Paris became the center of the world once more.
12:36Montparnasse took over the artistic baton from Montmartre.
12:39In the tinted light of the first neons
12:41at the Brasserie La Rotonde,
12:42Le Dôme et Le Select,
12:44following in the footsteps of Courbet,
12:46Pissarro and Serrat,
12:47artists were inspired by libertarian thought.
12:50Artists like Marcel Duchamp,
12:52self-proclaimed ant-artist,
12:53certain members of the Dada movement
12:55who published their early works
12:56in libertarian magazines,
12:57the first surrealist who adhered
12:59to poet André Breton's statement
13:00that an anarchist world
13:01or a surrealist world
13:03is the same thing.
13:04The Russian émigré painters
13:05seeking refuge in Paris,
13:07British and American authors,
13:08and those who remain unclassifiable,
13:10like Léo Mellet,
13:12Jean Dubuffet,
13:13Jean Vigo,
13:13and Jean Cocteau.
13:14Anarchism swept through the arts
13:16with its wind of freedom and rebellion.
13:20But far from the velvet-covered cafe benches,
13:23soon after the armistice,
13:24the workers' movement,
13:25with its one and a half million dead
13:27and four million war wounded,
13:29paid dearly for the folly of a few men,
13:31and in the patriotic headlines
13:32that followed victory,
13:33workers gradually turned their backs
13:35on anarchism.
13:38There was a real break,
13:40a cultural break,
13:41which resulted from society
13:42having been totally militarized
13:43for four years.
13:47That did not favor the growth of anarchism,
13:50and I don't think
13:51it was down to chance
13:52that the form the Workers' Party took
13:54after World War I
13:56was Bolshevism.
14:00Bolshevism had a hierarchical structure
14:02very similar to that of the factory
14:03and the army.
14:07In the 1920s,
14:09despite the massive strikes
14:10led by revolutionary socialists,
14:12French society and the workers' movement
14:14began yielding,
14:15slowly but surely,
14:16to new tendencies.
14:19By founding the French Communist Party
14:22after the Tour Congress,
14:23Marxist-Leninists,
14:24strengthened by the seizing of power
14:25by the Bolshevik Party in Russia
14:27and the creation of the Comintown,
14:28began to attract the proletariat.
14:32The Communists gained ground
14:33on the anarchists,
14:34took over their structures
14:35and appropriated their martyrs and symbols,
14:38like the Internacional,
14:39which,
14:40after the removal of a few bothersome lines,
14:42became the Soviet hymn.
14:46The struggle,
14:47led by Leninists across the globe,
14:49also claimed its victims.
14:51Two anarchists were killed
14:52in violent street fights
14:53over the control
14:54of the trade union headquarters.
14:58But as if that weren't enough,
15:00in the post-war years,
15:01anarchists saw a new threat rise up.
15:04For to mislead workers even more,
15:07to fascinate the working class
15:08and to reassure the lower middle class,
15:10capitalism decided to wear
15:12its most spectacular mask yet,
15:15fascism.
15:17The fascists had fought in the war
15:19and had learned
15:20the most evil lesson of war,
15:22which is violence.
15:26But unlike the violence
15:27of the revolutionary left,
15:29fascist violence
15:30was more professional.
15:34The fascists had learned
15:35during the war
15:36that violence needed
15:38to be extremely well organized.
15:41The expansion of the fascist movement
15:43through violence
15:44was accompanied by an attempt
15:45to appropriate
15:46the symbols of anarchism.
15:48Such was the case
15:49of Action Francaise,
15:50presided over by Charles Maurras.
15:53It created the Proudhon Circle,
15:54a political think tank
15:55named after the founder
15:57of anarchism,
15:57so as to attract workers
15:59into its fold.
16:00It would become the cradle
16:01of French fascism.
16:03Or like Benito Mussolini,
16:05a former teacher and journalist
16:06who founded
16:07the Italian National Fascist Party
16:09and dressed his young militiamen
16:10in the black shirts
16:11of the anarchist movement.
16:13This son of a socialist revolutionary
16:15had even frequented
16:16leading figures
16:16of the anarchist movement,
16:18such as leader Raffanelli,
16:19the Italian activist
16:20who converted to Islam,
16:22with whom he had
16:22a brief relationship
16:23as a young man.
16:24And it was probably this
16:25which gave rise to the legend
16:26that Il Duce himself
16:28had been an anarchist
16:29before World War I.
16:33There's a wonderful anecdote
16:34which gives us an idea
16:35of Malatesta's intuition.
16:40In 1913,
16:42Malatesta returned to Italy
16:43and visited Milan
16:44where he met with Mussolini
16:46for an hour.
16:49At the end,
16:50they said goodbye
16:51and a friend of Malatesta
16:53asked him,
16:54so what do you make
16:55of Mussolini?
16:56Malatesta replied,
16:57he's not a socialist
16:59and even less an anarchist.
17:01He's a revolutionary
17:02who will clear
17:04lots of paths.
17:05Indeed, it's true
17:06that Mussolini
17:07had translated
17:08Kropotkin's
17:08The Great French Revolution
17:09into Italian,
17:11but he had never been
17:12an anarchist.
17:14Never.
17:17And after Malatesta,
17:18anarchists were convinced
17:20that they would need
17:20to fight against
17:21the new European despots
17:22with violence,
17:23and they alone
17:24would fight against
17:25the threat with weapons.
17:27Like in Italy,
17:28where Michele Esquiro,
17:30Angelo Spardalotto
17:31and Anteo Zamboni,
17:33who would end up
17:34being lynched by a mob,
17:35plotted their own
17:36assassination attempts
17:37against Mussolini.
17:39In Spain,
17:40fascist dictator
17:41Primo de Rivera
17:42was the target,
17:43while in France,
17:44the heroic
17:45Germaine Burton
17:45shot down the chief editor
17:47of Action Francaise's newspaper.
17:49And in the United States,
17:51which had installed
17:51a genuinely apartheid regime,
17:53only the libertarians
17:54of the IWW
17:55dared stand up
17:56to the racist militia
17:57of the Ku Klux Klan.
17:58And let's not forget
17:59that in Germany,
18:00the anarchist
18:01Marinus van der Lube
18:02set fire to the Reichstag
18:03because it had become
18:04the anti-chamber
18:05of Hitlerism.
18:06But for the majority
18:07in the movement,
18:08individual response
18:09was no longer adapted
18:10and it was during
18:11the debates held
18:12by the first
18:12anti-fascist fronts
18:13that they advocated
18:14what was for them
18:15the only possible
18:16response to the threat.
18:21Among the anti-fascist fronts
18:23it became a question
18:24of a lesser evil.
18:26If the principal evil
18:28was fascism,
18:29they would need to unite
18:30to fight fascism
18:32and once fascism
18:33had been defeated,
18:35they would fight
18:36amongst each other.
18:37but dialectically
18:39about the different ways
18:40to organize society.
18:46The anarchists
18:47didn't accept that.
18:49They believed
18:50they should fight
18:50fascism militarily
18:52and also fight
18:53with a social revolution.
18:57To them,
18:58the only way
18:59to eradicate fascism
19:00was through revolution
19:02which would drain
19:03the financial
19:04and social foundations
19:05of fascism.
19:08In June 1926
19:10in Paris,
19:11a pamphlet
19:11was published
19:12entitled
19:12Organizational Platform
19:14of the General Union
19:15of Anarchists.
19:16It was a thunderclap
19:17in the small libertarian world
19:18not only for the appeal
19:20it launched
19:20to unite the movement
19:21which had always rebelled
19:23against all forms
19:24of organization
19:24but also for the name
19:26of its principal signatory,
19:27a returning
19:28from the ashes
19:28and tears
19:29of the Ukraine.
19:30Then working
19:31on the assembly line
19:32at Renault
19:32and whose body
19:33was one big scar,
19:35Nestor Macno.
19:40Macno arrived in Paris
19:41having experienced
19:42prison camps
19:43in Romania,
19:44Poland
19:45and so on.
19:47And he arrived
19:47at a time
19:48when revolutionary ideals
19:49were in decline
19:51because they were
19:52no longer
19:52the dish of the day
19:53across Europe.
19:57Plus the image
19:58of the Soviet Union
19:59was positive enough
20:00for the communist movement
20:01to build itself upon
20:03so the anarchist movement
20:05found itself
20:05extremely marginalized.
20:09A number of anarchists
20:11believe that the origin
20:12of their defeat
20:12lay in the absence
20:14of organization
20:15and the lack
20:16of togetherness
20:17between anarchist groups.
20:19And this point of view
20:20was upheld
20:21by the so-called
20:22Macnovists,
20:23the supporters of Macno,
20:24who would publish
20:25with Archenov
20:26documents in which
20:28they declared themselves
20:29favorable to the founding
20:30of an organized
20:31anarchist body
20:32based on the principle
20:34of collective responsibility
20:39which they believed
20:40to be fundamental
20:41to taking up
20:42to fight again
20:43and eventually winning it.
20:49Anarchism is no beautiful fantasy,
20:51no abstract notion
20:52of philosophy,
20:53but a social movement
20:54of the working masses.
20:56For that reason alone,
20:57it must gather its forces
20:58into one organization,
20:59as demanded
21:00by the reality
21:01and strategy
21:01of the social class struggle.
21:03The organizational platform
21:05published below
21:06represents the outline,
21:07the skeleton
21:07of such a program,
21:08and must serve
21:09as the first step
21:10towards gathering anarchist forces
21:11into a single active,
21:13revolutionary anarchist collective
21:14capable of struggle.
21:16It's high time
21:17that anarchism emerged
21:18from the swamp
21:18of disorganization.
21:20Long live the organized anarchist movement.
21:22Long live the general anarchist union.
21:24Long live the social revolution
21:26of the world's workers.
21:28Some may have interpreted the platform
21:30as a desire to copy
21:31the Bolshevik party,
21:33but it was actually
21:34the transposition
21:35of what the Magnavists
21:36stood for
21:36as an anarchist group,
21:39by which I mean
21:40the elimination of anarchism
21:41from artistic trends,
21:43from individualistic tendencies,
21:45and from terrorist anarchism.
21:50It was clearly a class war
21:52led by armed groups.
21:55Rather than encourage
21:56the union of the anarchist movement,
21:58Magno's appeal
21:58caused one of those
21:59endless debates
22:00that only libertarians
22:01were capable of.
22:03Responses flew in
22:04from across the globe.
22:05Oppositions,
22:06controversies,
22:07syntheses,
22:08total confusion reigned.
22:12And all this
22:13simply convinced Magno
22:14and his followers
22:14even further
22:15that the anarchist movement
22:16needed discipline
22:17and unity.
22:18He decided to gather
22:20his supporters
22:20at Les Les Roses
22:21in the Paris suburbs
22:22for an international congress
22:23held on the 20th of March, 1927
22:26at the movie theater
22:27Les Roses.
22:31Among those who attended
22:32were anarchists
22:33from Russia,
22:34Italy,
22:34Poland,
22:35Bulgaria,
22:36and even China,
22:37including the author
22:38Bajin.
22:42But at the time,
22:44Magno was more focused
22:45on the situation
22:46in Spain.
22:48Why Spain?
22:49People have often
22:51asked the question.
22:52Maybe because people
22:53don't like anarchists.
22:55It was Leo Ferré
22:56who said that.
22:59But more realistically,
23:01it's because in Spain,
23:03socialists were already
23:04viewed as anarchists.
23:07It wasn't a socialist tendency.
23:09In Spain,
23:10socialism was already
23:12seen as anarchistic.
23:15Anarchism in Spain
23:16didn't just have
23:18working-class roots
23:19like in France
23:21or Italy.
23:22It had a genuine
23:23working-class foundation
23:25made up of hundreds
23:25of thousands
23:26of activists.
23:29A working-class foundation
23:30which gave rise
23:31to a young
23:31to a young 30-year-old
23:32anarchist mechanic
23:33who had sought refuge
23:34in Paris
23:35and had caught
23:36the eye of Magno.
23:37His name?
23:38Buenaventura Durruti.
23:40They swapped stories,
23:42talked of past failures,
23:43and spoke of new possibilities.
23:45Durruti revealed
23:46his terrorist past,
23:48explained the already
23:49old organization
23:50of the Spanish anarchist movement,
23:52and told of his hopes
23:52for a revolution
23:53in Catalonia
23:54or in the plains of Aragon
23:55which so resembled
23:56the steppes of the Ukraine.
23:58Impressed by the bravery,
23:59intelligence, and determination
24:00of the Spaniard,
24:02Magno gave him a copy
24:03of his political manifesto
24:04and vowed that if a revolution
24:06were to be sparked in Spain,
24:07he would come to fight
24:08at his side.
24:22What the anarchists
24:23represented and aspired to
24:25was a very lofty ideal
24:27that would take
24:27a lot of preparation.
24:29In Spain,
24:31they had been preparing
24:31for 70 to 80 years
24:33for the Spanish Civil War.
24:34So when revolution hit Spain,
24:36people were ready
24:37because they had been preparing
24:39a long time for it.
24:42In 1936, in Spain,
24:44the anarchists
24:45weren't only prepared
24:45because since the late 19th century
24:47they had carried out
24:48a number of propagandist
24:49of the deed missions,
24:50like the attacks
24:51by the mysterious
24:52Mano Negra, Black Hand,
24:54or the 1912 assassination
24:56of the prime minister
24:57by Manuel Pariña Serrano,
24:59reconstructed here
25:00for a docudrama.
25:02Neither was it because
25:04some of the major martyrs
25:05of the cause,
25:06like the suspected anarchists
25:07Garrett and Ingeres
25:08de la Frontera,
25:09Francisco Ferrer,
25:10and the peasants
25:10murdered in the Casas Viejas
25:12were Spanish.
25:13Nor was it because
25:14the Catalan anarchist newspaper
25:15rang out the same slogan ad
25:17for the Mexican Revolution.
25:18And nor was it because
25:19some of the major peasant
25:20and factory worker uprisings
25:22had taken place
25:22in the Levante,
25:24in Andalusia,
25:25in the Rioja in Catalonia,
25:26and finally in Asturias
25:27with the October Revolution
25:29quashed by the young
25:30General Franco
25:30under orders
25:31from the recently elected
25:32center-right government.
25:33No,
25:34Spanish anarchists
25:35were ready
25:36because the libertarian movement
25:37had been solidly organized
25:38from its earliest days.
25:40Firstly,
25:41within a powerful
25:41Spanish section
25:42of the Workers'
25:43International Industrial Union.
25:44Then,
25:45within the FAI,
25:46the Iberian Anarchist
25:47Federation
25:48and the CNT,
25:49the National Confederation
25:50of Labour,
25:51which,
25:51on the eve of
25:52Franco's coup d'état,
25:53was one of the best
25:54structured unions
25:54in the world
25:55with the most members.
25:57The world is vast,
25:58but it wasn't only
25:59Western Europe
26:00that had the strongest
26:01union power.
26:02But that wasn't all.
26:03The biggest organized
26:04social power,
26:05not political,
26:06because the term
26:07is ambiguous,
26:08was the CNT.
26:14By late spring 1936,
26:16the National Confederation
26:18of Labour
26:18had about a million
26:19and a half members
26:20throughout Spain,
26:21including half of all
26:22Catalonians.
26:24With only one single
26:26paid bureaucrat,
26:28which is quite incredible
26:29if you think about it.
26:32One paid person
26:34in an organization
26:35that big.
26:36In 1936,
26:38Magno had died
26:39and Urruti
26:39had returned to Spain.
26:42elections took place.
26:43Anarchist groups,
26:44which presented
26:45no candidates,
26:46urged their members
26:46to vote for the
26:47Spanish Popular Front.
26:52And with millions
26:53of libertarian votes,
26:54the left wing won
26:55with a tiny minority
26:56and a government
26:57formed including
26:58socialists,
26:59Republican Democrats,
27:00and a handful
27:00of communists.
27:04The reaction
27:05from the right wing
27:06was swift.
27:07General Franco
27:07ordered all army regiments
27:09to take control
27:09of the country.
27:10Civil war
27:11had begun.
27:13Franco's coup d'etat
27:14came about in 1936
27:16and Spain burst open
27:18like a watermelon.
27:19On one side
27:20was the Progressive Front
27:21and on the other
27:22the Fascist Front.
27:23And for three years
27:25it was a violent face-off.
27:28Like in Italy
27:29and in Germany,
27:30the upper classes
27:30applauded the putsch.
27:32Captains of industry
27:33provided finance
27:34for the fascists
27:34and the Democrats
27:35abdicated.
27:39the government
27:40of the Popular Front
27:40rather than call
27:41for resistance
27:42resigned three times
27:43in one day.
27:45The people were left
27:46to their own devices
27:47as half of the country
27:48fell under Franco's control.
27:51Libertarian groups
27:52launched an appeal
27:52for a general mobilization
27:54and suddenly
27:55in all spontaneity
27:56as one
27:57of the anarchists
27:58answered the call.
27:59In Catalonia
28:00led by Durruti
28:01in charge of defending
28:02Barcelona,
28:03libertarians fended off
28:04right-wing forces.
28:05To the barricades,
28:06the hymn of the CNT
28:07written by
28:08Valeriano Orobon Fernandez,
28:10a leading anarcho-syndegalist
28:11theoretician,
28:12in just a few hours
28:13became the battle cry
28:14of half a nation.
28:34Columns formed.
28:35Durruti was appointed
28:36delegated commander
28:37of a militia
28:38made up of
28:38volunteer freedom fighters.
28:40The column
28:41were 3,000 men and women
28:42divided into
28:43several centuries,
28:43named after significant martyrs
28:45such as Sacco and Vanzetti.
28:47The Durruti column,
28:48along with the red and black column,
28:50marched on Saragossa,
28:51then converged one Aragon
28:53to confront the fascist armies.
28:55Inspired by the Magnavists,
28:56Durruti and his troops
28:57fought a war
28:58and led a revolution.
29:16They forced fascism
29:18into a retreat,
29:19which later,
29:20the Republican armies
29:21were unable to do.
29:22But that was notably
29:23in Aragon.
29:24And the moment
29:25that the Durruti columns
29:26liberated a village,
29:28they immediately proclaimed,
29:29libertarian communism.
29:36In every liberated village,
29:39members of the Durruti column
29:40talked to the peasants.
29:43The anarchists told them
29:45to do away with the hedges
29:46separating the fields
29:48and to create vast collective zones
29:50and to work the land all together.
29:55As they advanced,
29:56the libertarians chased out
29:58masters and gods
29:59and declared the end
30:00to all privileges.
30:01On the squares
30:02of liberated villages,
30:04lively new dances
30:05replaced the old laments.
30:07Couples formed in public.
30:09Land, work, and bread
30:10were shared.
30:11The elderly received
30:12retirement benefits,
30:13and people took time
30:15to enjoy life.
30:16New practices were invented,
30:18and solidarity was renewed.
30:20Anarchism deployed its thinking
30:21to the extreme.
30:23Farmers' assemblies,
30:25literacy campaigns,
30:26over 800 Spanish towns
30:28and villages
30:29declared themselves communes,
30:30and one of the greatest
30:32collectivist experiments
30:33in history had begun.
30:36There was an explosion
30:38of experiments.
30:39Whole towns,
30:41not just villages,
30:42did away with money.
30:43Great.
30:44But how would they live?
30:47So they invented
30:48something that wasn't
30:50in the writings
30:51of theoreticians,
30:52the so-called familial salary,
30:55where everybody
30:55worked together.
30:56But how do you share things?
30:58Based on individual effort?
31:00No.
31:01Based on individual needs.
31:05They abolished money.
31:09It seems unbelievable today,
31:11but thousands of people
31:12adhered to it
31:13and organized themselves
31:14around it.
31:17Naturally,
31:17on these liberated lands,
31:18the clergy was expropriated,
31:20and the former landowners
31:22found themselves
31:22working hand-in-hand
31:23with the peasants.
31:26Things didn't go smoothly
31:28everywhere.
31:29The anarchists chased out
31:30the Guardia Civil
31:31and the fascists.
31:33But then Franco's troops
31:34reconquered the villages,
31:36and you can imagine
31:37the repression
31:37that came after.
31:43People mention
31:44the churches burned down
31:45and the priests
31:46killed by the anarchists.
31:49It is true.
31:50It did happen.
31:53When power is seized
31:54by the people,
31:55it generates acts like that.
31:58Revolutionary anarchist
31:59Mikhail Bakunin
32:00himself said,
32:00when revolution comes,
32:02it's inevitable
32:03that a hundred heads
32:04will roll.
32:06A hundred heads
32:07isn't a lot
32:08compared to the horrors
32:09committed by the fascists.
32:14With almost unlimited material
32:16sent by Henry Ford
32:17and the support
32:18of Italian troops
32:19and the infamous
32:20German Condor Legion,
32:22Franco and his followers
32:23launched a campaign
32:24of social and ideological
32:25cleansing.
32:28like in Seville
32:29where 8,000 people
32:30were bayoneted to death
32:31or at Guernica
32:33where men,
32:34women and children
32:34were indiscriminately
32:35slaughtered
32:36by Luftwaffe bombs.
32:47Despite widespread fears,
32:49the request for arms
32:50made by the libertarians
32:50to Western democracies
32:52went unanswered.
32:52The anarchists
32:54could, however,
32:54count on the international
32:55solidarity of the movement
32:56which,
32:57in newspapers
32:58and conferences,
32:59appealed for supporters
33:00to join the ranks
33:01of the insurgents.
33:05The Frenchman,
33:06Sébastien Faure,
33:07anarchist-burglar
33:08Maurice Jacob,
33:10the Algerian
33:10Mohamed Saï,
33:11the Argentinian
33:12Diego Abad de Santillane,
33:14the Belgian
33:14Louis Mercier Vega,
33:16the Russian
33:16Georges Sosenko
33:17and political activist
33:19Simone Weil,
33:20who enrolled
33:21in the Durruti column
33:22like Emma Goldman
33:23who at 67 years old
33:24fought in Catalonia.
33:25From all around the world,
33:27men and women
33:28arrived in Spain
33:28to support the revolution
33:29and with the first
33:30international brigades,
33:32the Abraham Lincoln Brigade
33:33made up of mostly
33:34IWW members,
33:35the Malatesta Battalion,
33:36nicknamed the Battalion of Death,
33:38and the Louise Michel Battalion
33:39from France.
33:40Foreign revolutionaries,
33:41as they arrived,
33:42suddenly brought about
33:44a change.
33:48In their countries of origin,
33:51whether they were French,
33:53British, American,
33:54or Italians or Germans
33:56who were in Franco's camps,
33:57at no time
33:59had they ever encountered
34:00an anarchist movement
34:01on such a huge scale.
34:06George Orwell
34:07wrote a wonderful account.
34:09In Britain,
34:10he frequented
34:11not a communist milieu,
34:13but a Trotskyite milieu.
34:15And he came to Spain
34:16to fight
34:17when he arrived
34:18in Barcelona.
34:19It was a big discovery
34:20for him.
34:21In Britain,
34:21he had no idea
34:22that the anarchists existed
34:24and even held the city.
34:25His account has a slightly
34:26odd title,
34:27Homage to Catalonia.
34:29In theory,
34:30it was perfect equality,
34:31and even in practice
34:32it was not far from it.
34:33There is a sense
34:34in which it would be true
34:35to say that one was
34:36experiencing a foretaste
34:37of socialism,
34:38by which I mean
34:39that the prevailing
34:40mental atmosphere
34:40was that of socialism.
34:42Many of the normal
34:43motifs of civilized life
34:44had simply ceased to exist.
34:46The ordinary class division
34:47of society
34:48had almost disappeared.
34:49There was no one there
34:50except the peasants
34:51and ourselves,
34:51and no one owned
34:52anyone else as his master.
34:54As the international brigades
34:56left to reinforce
34:57the anarchist columns
34:58on the front,
34:58to the rear,
34:59now aware of the key role
35:00the propaganda could play,
35:02the libertarians
35:03took over the film industry
35:04and with the little money
35:06they had,
35:06shot newsreels
35:07of the fierce battles
35:08they were fighting
35:09in Aragon.
35:12But in this war of images,
35:14in which for the first time
35:15it was they
35:15who were doing the filming,
35:17the anarchists
35:18made sure to report
35:19on the scale
35:19and specifics
35:20of their revolution
35:21as C&T cameramen
35:22captured live footage
35:24of an insurgent capital.
35:26The first report
35:27on events in Barcelona
35:28was made by the C&T,
35:30the Union of Public Spectacle.
35:32They went out onto the streets
35:33to film what was happening
35:34at the barricades.
35:36We have some marvelous footage
35:37of a city in revolution.
35:39We don't have any
35:40of St. Petersburg
35:40or other places,
35:41but here we have footage
35:43that tells what a city
35:44in revolution is like.
35:46These images show a city
35:48that is practically anarchist
35:50with an incredible
35:51popular enthusiasm
35:52that has never been
35:53reproduced in our history.
35:57These newsreels
35:59revealed to the world
36:00the scale and coherency
36:01of the Spanish
36:01Libertarian Revolution.
36:03Amidst the remains
36:04of the barricades
36:05and the destroyed
36:06centers of power,
36:07documentary makers
36:08such as Felix Marquet
36:09captured each step
36:10in this great upheaval.
36:13Here, anarcho-syndicalism
36:15was working at full steam.
36:17All forms of bureaucracy,
36:19non-productive jobs
36:20and the role of foreman
36:21were abolished.
36:22Major decisions
36:23were taken in councils,
36:24work was carried out
36:25in common
36:26and production means
36:27recuperated by the collectivity.
36:30In Catalonia,
36:31far from the industrial
36:32heart of Spain,
36:33over 75% of companies
36:35were self-managed.
36:38Tramways, taxis and buses,
36:40hotels and restaurants,
36:41bakeries, fishing,
36:43foodstuffs, textiles,
36:45the leather and shoemaking industry.
36:47All these small businesses,
36:49like large companies,
36:50were now managed collectively
36:51with no fall
36:52in efficiency or production.
36:56The revolution
36:57even made inroads
36:58into culture
36:58which suddenly became popular
37:00and social once more.
37:02Movies, classical music,
37:03opera and cabaret
37:04were managed directly
37:05by the actors,
37:06dancers, musicians,
37:08technicians and ushers
37:09who were all members
37:10of the CNT.
37:12Emma Goldwyn,
37:13who was 67
37:14when she arrived in Catalonia
37:15to support the revolution,
37:16wrote,
37:17The collectivization
37:18of the industries
37:19and the land stand out
37:20as the greatest achievement
37:21of any revolutionary period.
37:24Your revolution
37:25will destroy forever
37:26the idea that the anarchist project
37:27means chaos.
37:29Moreover,
37:30if Franco should win
37:31and the Spanish anarchists
37:32be exterminated,
37:34the work they have started
37:35will continue to live.
37:36It means that anarchism can work,
37:39but on what condition?
37:41On the condition
37:42that the majority of people
37:43believe in libertarian principles.
37:45So it's possible
37:46to found a society
37:47without authority
37:48and without government
37:49or with a minimum of authority
37:52and a minimum of government.
37:55The triumph of anarchism in Spain
37:57found a last but paradoxical expression
38:00on November 4, 1936,
38:02when the Republicans decided
38:03to form in Madrid
38:04a new government of victory.
38:07So as to rally
38:08the different anti-fascist groups
38:09against the Franco forces
38:11for the first time in history,
38:12four libertarians became ministers.
38:18On the one hand,
38:19their presence was in order
38:20to reinforce the government,
38:23but it was also a way
38:25for the anarchist militia
38:26to obtain arms.
38:28So it was give and take.
38:32But they were ministers
38:35with no real importance.
38:36They entered government
38:37with a strategic aim.
38:41They did it
38:42to have some control
38:43over the government,
38:44to prevent the government
38:45carrying out anti-anarchist acts.
38:54In practice,
38:55the anarchist militia
38:56didn't really obtain more arms,
38:58and in the eyes
38:59of the combatants,
39:00this entry into government
39:01was at the worst
39:02a betrayal
39:03and at the best
39:03a mistake.
39:07So a split form
39:08between the grassroots anarchists
39:10and the four ministers.
39:15The anarchist movement
39:16began to break up.
39:17The Communist Party,
39:19also with representatives
39:20in the government,
39:21began to play
39:21a more preponderant role
39:22thanks to the military backing
39:24provided by Stalin,
39:25and they were intent
39:26on taking advantage
39:27of the split.
39:28The communists demanded
39:29that the libertarian revolution
39:30be adjourned
39:31and the anarchist militia disarmed,
39:33then drafted
39:34into a regular army
39:35under the command
39:35of political commissioners
39:37sent specially
39:37by the Soviet Union.
39:39The government
39:39and the four anarchist ministers
39:41voted for the proposal.
39:42Durruti saw it as a betrayal.
39:44He spoke out,
39:45If you don't want those
39:46who are fighting
39:47to mistake you,
39:48you in the rear ground
39:49for our enemies,
39:50then do your duty.
39:51The war we're currently fighting
39:52is being fought
39:53to crush the enemy
39:54at the front.
39:55But is it our only enemy?
39:56No.
39:57The enemy are also those
39:58who oppose
39:58revolutionary conquests,
40:00those who are amongst us,
40:01those we will also crush.
40:03In the eyes of the Stalinists
40:04and the Republicans,
40:05Durruti and his column,
40:07which held Aragon,
40:08had become too strong,
40:09too dangerous
40:09and too radical.
40:10It was urgent
40:11to seize back control.
40:14The moment he wanted
40:15to change things
40:15too radically,
40:16the reformists
40:17turned against him.
40:18The Stalinists,
40:19who wanted to found
40:20a society
40:21with a strict hierarchy,
40:22turned against him.
40:24And obviously,
40:24the bourgeoisie
40:25was against him.
40:30And it was at that moment
40:32that the Republicans
40:33were caught in a dilemma.
40:34And many of them
40:35began saying,
40:36we prefer fascist order
40:37to anarchy.
40:39To weaken the anarchists
40:41and to have Durruti
40:42in their control,
40:43the government decided
40:43to order his column
40:44to Madrid,
40:45which was under siege
40:46from Franco's forces.
40:47The libertarians
40:48smelled a trap.
40:49But Durruti hoped
40:50to use the occasion
40:51to relaunch the revolutionary
40:52process in the Spanish capital.
40:54His death,
40:55which came about
40:55in mysterious circumstances,
40:57gave rise to the most
40:58outlandish of rumors.
41:02He was in a car
41:03and he wanted
41:04to check out the situation.
41:07So he got out.
41:08And when he came back
41:11to the car,
41:11he died.
41:13More precisely,
41:14he was shot.
41:16One of the first interpretations
41:18was it was an assassination.
41:25A shot like that
41:27from close range
41:28can only be an assassination.
41:31And this rumor
41:32was immediately spread
41:33by Franco's camp
41:34in order to say
41:35that the Republicans
41:36had started
41:36killing each other.
41:39This theory
41:40was then taken up
41:41by the communists
41:43who said
41:44that the anarchists
41:45were just
41:45a disorganized bunch
41:46of petits bourgeois
41:47who were killing each other.
41:49who were killing each other.
41:51But I think
41:54it was an accident.
41:56In the car
41:57was a soldier
41:57holding a rifle.
42:00On a lot of rifles
42:01back then,
42:02the safety catch
42:03didn't work very well.
42:06And as Durruti
42:07got in,
42:08he took a bullet.
42:10During the Civil War,
42:16saying that a figure
42:17like Durruti
42:18had died in a stupid accident
42:19caused by a misfiring gun
42:21would have sounded ridiculous.
42:28Still today,
42:30the circumstances
42:30of Durruti's death
42:31remain unclear.
42:33His body was transported
42:35across the country
42:36to Barcelona.
42:38A cortege
42:39of over a half
42:40a million people
42:41made its way
42:41to the Montjuic cemetery
42:43where he was buried.
42:45It was the last
42:46large-scale public show
42:48of force
42:48made by the anarchists
42:49during the Spanish Civil War.
42:52Durruti
42:52was an icon.
42:58And without Durruti,
43:01anarchism had lost
43:02its figurehead.
43:07Anarchism
43:08is a political theory
43:09which advocates
43:10the destruction
43:11of power.
43:11of power.
43:12It's not a strategy
43:13for political conquest.
43:15Communism,
43:16on the other hand,
43:17is.
43:18And the communists,
43:19who numbered
43:20only 10,000
43:21compared to millions
43:22and millions
43:23of anarchists,
43:24managed in under a year
43:26with the backing
43:27of the Soviet Union
43:28to take control
43:29of things.
43:34and that's when
43:35the great repression
43:36started,
43:37which would culminate
43:39in the events
43:39of May 1937
43:40and the violent clashes
43:42in which the libertarian
43:43revolution was crushed.
43:48It was during
43:49what anarchist historians
43:50call the May days
43:51of 37,
43:52part of which
43:53is featured
43:53in the movie
43:53Land and Freedom
43:54by Ken Loach,
43:55that the revolution
43:56was crushed.
43:57It began
43:58with the Battle
43:59of Telefonica.
44:00Since the beginning
44:01of the revolution,
44:02the anarchists
44:03had controlled
44:03Barcelona's
44:04telephone central.
44:05The republicans,
44:06allied with the
44:07Stalinists,
44:07were determined
44:08to oust them.
44:09The fuse was lit.
44:11The people of Barcelona
44:11raised barricades.
44:13Despite calls
44:13for calm
44:14from the anarchist ministers,
44:16they faced off
44:16like at Kronstadt
44:1715 years earlier.
44:19Only this time
44:19alongside the Trotskyists
44:20of the Workers' Party
44:21of Marxist Unification,
44:23practically unarmed
44:24against 3,000
44:25fully equipped
44:25and highly trained
44:26assault guards.
44:30The clashes
44:31lasted all week.
44:34Remember that
44:34Franco's putsch
44:35in Barcelona
44:36had been put down
44:37in two days.
44:40But the fighting here,
44:41between the base
44:42and the government,
44:43lasted seven days,
44:44with over 1,000 dead
44:46and hundreds wounded.
44:49After the defeat
44:49of the anarchists
44:50during the May days
44:51of 37
44:51and the ensuing
44:53repression,
44:54the gates of Barcelona
44:55were open
44:55to the fascists.
44:57The Republican
44:58and Stalinist government
44:59could now step up
45:00counter-revolutionary measures
45:01in the small territory
45:02still under its control.
45:05On May 25th,
45:06the anarchist federation
45:07was excluded
45:08from the People's Court.
45:09On June 6th,
45:11governmental decree
45:12made all rural collectives
45:13illegal.
45:14In early August,
45:16the Regional Council
45:16for the Defense of Aragon
45:18was definitively disbanded.
45:20At the end of August,
45:21criticism of the Soviet Union
45:22was officially banned.
45:23On January 6th, 1938,
45:25the government prohibited
45:26by decree
45:27the issuing of money
45:28by the committees.
45:29And later in 1938,
45:31the government annulled
45:32all that remained
45:32of the collectives
45:33and reinstated
45:34all rights
45:35to wealthy landowners.
45:36The Spanish Libertarian Revolution
45:39had been quashed
45:40and in Moscow,
45:41Pravda declared
45:42in its editorial,
45:43the cleansing of anarchists
45:45has been completed
45:46with the same gusto
45:46as in the Soviet Union.
45:52The Spanish Civil War
45:53ended on April 1st, 1939.
45:57Many anarchists
45:58were interred
45:58in concentration camps,
46:02but many of them
46:03also faced
46:04the firing squad.
46:07It's unbelievable
46:09when you compare
46:09the number of CNT
46:10and anarchist federation members
46:13just before
46:13the Spanish Social Revolution
46:15with a number
46:16that remained
46:16just after
46:17the fascist victory.
46:22People might think
46:23this was the result
46:24of fascist repression,
46:25but, in fact,
46:26it was mainly repression
46:28by the Republican government
46:29in line with the wishes
46:30of the Stalinists,
46:31and all historians
46:32confirm this.
46:40The Spanish Civil War
46:42was a deeply traumatic episode
46:43in 20th century history,
46:45even if it's not an episode
46:47that immediately comes to mind
46:48when you examine
46:4920th century history.
46:51I see it as a huge turning point.
46:53It was a bloody
46:54and truly horrible event
46:55in 20th century history.
46:57The abandonment
46:58by European democracies,
46:59the Italian fascists,
47:01the Nazis,
47:02Stalinist Soviet Union,
47:03the whole of Europe
47:04ganged up to ensure
47:05the experiment failed,
47:06and fail it did.
47:16As they crossed the Pyrenees
47:18amongst the thousands
47:19of refugees heading into exile,
47:20those who had survived the war
47:22continued to ask themselves
47:23why they had lost
47:24and where and when
47:25they could resume the fight.
47:29The situation of the anarchists
47:32after the First World War
47:33was extremely difficult,
47:36but after the failure
47:37of the Spanish Revolution,
47:39it was catastrophic.
47:41what option did they have left
47:42to them?
47:43To join up with the Bolsheviks?
47:47To convert to fascism?
47:52If they wanted to keep up the fight,
47:54what could they do?
47:55Join the French army
47:56to fight the Nazis?
47:58What else could they do
47:59to save their skins?
48:08In April 1939,
48:10World War II
48:11was yet to break out.
48:14But on seeing
48:15the concentration camps
48:16in which France greeted
48:17the survivors of the revolution,
48:18how could Spanish anarchists
48:20not feel dismayed?
48:24Especially when French Prime Minister
48:25Édouard Daladier,
48:27who had already reimposed
48:28the 48-hour working week
48:30and signed the Munich Accords,
48:31decided to appoint
48:32as the first ambassador
48:33to Franco,
48:34Philippe Pétain,
48:36the most noble
48:36and most human
48:37of our military leaders,
48:38according to Leon Blum
48:39at the time.
48:40But the situation
48:41was even more difficult
48:42for them,
48:43as it was for all anarchists
48:44across the globe,
48:45because the counter-revolution
48:47was triumphing everywhere,
48:48in fascist countries,
48:49of course,
48:50but also in socialist republics
48:52and liberal democracies.
48:53Reactionaries added
48:54to their list of victims,
48:55like during the Memorial Day Massacre
48:57in 1937
48:58in the United States,
48:59when the Chicago Police Department
49:01shot and killed
49:02a dozen workers,
49:03including a woman
49:04and three children
49:04and wounded many others.
49:07And as usual,
49:08in a world gradually
49:09being covered with barbed wire,
49:11the libertarians
49:11were the first targets
49:12of repression.
49:13From Le Verenay
49:14to Oriennenburg,
49:15they were rounded up,
49:16deported,
49:17and some,
49:17like Eric Musum,
49:18executed.
49:20For in this context
49:21of a global capitalist crisis,
49:23the crushing of revolutionaries
49:25constituted to the bourgeoisie
49:26the necessary preliminary
49:27for its desire to expand.
49:29And imperialism,
49:31as we know it in the past
49:32and in the present,
49:33while constantly uttering
49:34the word peace,
49:35had long been preparing for war.
49:37Spain,
49:38along with Abyssinia
49:39and Manchuria,
49:40was much more than
49:41a dress rehearsal for war.
49:42In reality,
49:43all the non-aggression packs
49:45that were signed
49:45merely accelerated the process
49:47which was already underway.
49:48And the sole aim
49:50in exacerbating
49:50nationalist sentiments
49:51was to prevent workers
49:53from uniting.
49:53So it was imperative
49:55to wipe from all memory
49:56all those men and women
49:57who had abolished the state,
49:59currency,
49:59and frontiers,
50:00and had tried,
50:01with all their might
50:02and against all odds,
50:03to build a better world.
50:05And it was thus
50:06in the dark days
50:07of a new world war
50:08which would unleash
50:09the most barbaric of passions
50:11and turn the planet
50:12into a field of ruins
50:13as workers were drafted
50:15into regiments,
50:16fanaticized,
50:17reduced into slavery
50:18or to ashes,
50:19that the last words of Viruti
50:21could be heard as an echo.
50:26We've always lived in poverty
50:28and we can continue
50:29to do so for some time.
50:31But don't forget
50:32that we, the workers,
50:34are the only generators
50:35of wealth.
50:36We operate the machines,
50:38we extract coal
50:39from the mines,
50:40we build the towns
50:41and cities.
50:42And we know
50:43that we will only deserve ruins
50:44because the bourgeoisie
50:45will try to destroy the world
50:47in the last instance
50:48of its history.
50:50But we have no fear
50:51of ruins
50:51because we carry
50:52a new world
50:53in our hearts.
51:02And our lives in pink and white
51:07and blue lives lose
51:10and blue is black
51:32I'm the one who's right
51:39Black
51:43Black
51:46Black
51:47Black
51:51And we're black
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