The New Epoque writing committee has decided to share an article published by our comrades from the cause of the people. Here we transcribe the speech read during the commemorative demonstration dedicated to the heroes of the proletariat, this Sunday 25 February to Father Lachaise, in Paris. Find our report here photos .
Comrades and friends!
The cause of the people warmly thanks you for your presence this morning to Father Lachaise to commemorate the heroes of the proletariat. With our red flags lifted high and our revolutionary enthusiasm, we constantly recall that they have not fallen for nothing.
Who are they, these heroes of the past whose memory we recall today?
The Manouchian group was active at the time of resistance against the fascist-Nazie occupation and for the defense of the USSR. They were part of the Smarts-Tirers-Immigrant Labor (FTP ME) of the Paris region, under the direction of the Communist Party of France on the Order of the Communist International, which led relentless attacks against the forces armies of the occupier. Their life was made of hiding, spinning, hideouts, assassinations of SS.
The infamous "Red Poster", plastered by the Nazis and collaborators of the anti-Bolshevik action committee against the FTP-Moi, shows the blue fear that resistance actions caused in fascists!
Missak Manouchian was the military commissioner of the whole of the Paris region, but he was not the only one to be captured and shot, on February 21, 1944, at Mont Valérien. Here are their names:
Celestino Alfonso, Spanish, 27 years old;
Olga Bancic, Romanian, 32 (beheaded in Germany on May 10, 1944);
Joseph Boczov Hungarian, 38 years old - chemical engineer;
Georges Cloarec, French, 20 years old;
Rino Della Negra, Italian, 19 - footballer of the Olympic Red Star;
Thomas Elek, Hungarian, 18 years old - student;
Maurice Fingercwajg, Polish, 19 years old;
Spartaco Fontanot , Italien, 22 ans ;
Jonas Geduldig, Polish, 26 years old;
Emeric Glasz, Hungarian, 42 years old - Metallurgist worker;
Léon Goldberg, Polish, 19 years old;
Sllam Grzywacz, Polonais, 34 Ans;
Stanislas Kubacki, Polish, 36 years old;
Cesare Luccarini, Italian, 22 years old;
Missak Manouchian, Armenian, 37 years old;
Armenak Arpen Manoukian, Armenian, 44 years old;
Marcel Rajman, Polish, 21 years old;
Roger Rouxel, French, 18 years old;
Antoine Salvadori, Italian, 24 years old;
Willy Schapiro, Polish, 29 years old;
Amedeo Usseglio, Italien, 32 ANS;
Wolf Wajsbrot, Polish, 18 years old;
Robert Witchitz, French, 19 years old.
Manouchian and Celestino Alfonso challenged the fascists until the last moment, refusing to have blindfolded to die in the sun. As the poem says, "death does not dazzle the eyes of supporters".
Comrades and friends!
The 23 members of the Manouchian group were of a myriads of nationalities. However, they all fell here! This is the most radiant proof of proletarian internationalism, because the proletariat represents a unique class around the world. They are not only heroes for the French proletariat, but for the entire international proletariat!
The reactionary government of Emmanuel Macron may try to grasp the memory of Manouchian, by incorporating him hypocritically into the pantheon, he cannot dirty his name! It is because Manouchian flies higher than national recognition, that the false bourgeois commemorations! His comrades and overlooking him with all their greatness the narrowness of mind of the bourgeoisie, who cannot understand why proletarians would die, far from home, for the national liberation and the social emancipation of the working class. But we, comrades and friends, we understand! Already during the commune of Paris, the heroes of the incendiary streets of the capital were called Varlin, but also Dombrovsky, Dmitrieff or Frankel! The Manouchian group has given its life for the party and the revolution, and that, we will never forget it!
Comrades and friends!
Pierre Overney was a young worker barely 23 years old, younger than many of us here. Entering the proletarian left, the most combative anti-visionist organization of the time, it was one of those hundreds of workers' activists installed in the factory to get agitation in the 1970s.
On February 25, 1972, when Pierrot had the hard experience of forced unemployment, fired from Renault for political reasons, he participated in a leaflet distributions in front of the factory to commemorate the 10 years of the massacre of the Charonne metro, a Demonstration which followed the massacre of October 17, 1961 where the French police drowned the Algerians en masse.
During this action, Tramoni, an ex-parachutist of the Criminal Massu during the Algerian War, who made the employers' militia for Renault, released his weapon and fell the young activist in front of the gates. Class solidarity with Overney is immense, and more than 200,000 people walk in a long procession behind his coffin in early March 1972. It was the first time that such a mobilization under the red flags took place outside the claws of Revisionist party.
Tramoni was tried but quickly released in 1974. It was in 1977 that a motorcycle commando descended him in the name of justice for Pierre Overney.
Pierrot came from a family of poor agricultural workers. With his round glasses and his guy smile, he became a hero of the proletariat by going as close as possible to the working class; By defying employer threats and finally, by falling for the cause of the people.
Pierrot, like Gilles Tautin, like our comrade Pierre who relaunched the cause of the people in the 2010s, was not afraid to swim against the tide. Between the current of Gaullist reactionaries, against the current of revisionists and opportunists like Georges Marchais, secretary general of the PCF, who will dare to attack his memory when his corpse was still hot and the impact of the ball still hot!
Comrades and friends!
Who can ignore the example of Pierrot? Person ! Even today, revolutionaries and rebels risk prison for their ideas and actions. Let us remember that the cries of revolt that followed the death of the young Nahel last summer only found a response a massive imprisonment. In Europe, in 2021, the police shot real bullets on demonstrators. Just last year in France, during the Battle of Holy Soline, the weapons used by the repression forces been made to hurt and to kill, as demonstrated by Serge, which remained a month in coma And six weeks in intensive care.
But the repression of the bourgeois state is not proof of its strength! If Pierrot fell under the bullets of the bosses, it is because they felt the wind get up; A wind that made everyone tremble. This is why they had armed guard dogs like Tramoni, that's why they arm the cops to the teeth today! Because this wind rises again, and as the song says, "beware of revenge, when all the poor is getting there! ».
Comrades and friends!
Is the story of the heroes of the proletariat written in the past?
Of course not. We have spoken in this speech exceptional acts of some of the immortals whose memory we celebrate. They are immortal because they continue to live through us.
But the history of the heroes of the proletariat, from Parisians on the days of June 1848 and until today, it is not the story of a few proper names, of some incredible individuals that cannot be equaled.
It is above all a collective story, that of women and men who gave their lives for an immense cause, the greatest that is, who accepted a huge sacrifice with the true certainty that the struggle would not cease with them , but that they served it as best they could. And they were right! So, comrades and friends, let's not be intimidated by their example, do not live in the past, but let's look to the future and try to lead our lives in the same way as them.
Their looks, the features of their faces, their stature; All this may be engraved in our memories, their particularities to everyone are very little compared to the universal message they carry. Their example goes beyond their own figure, it exceeds their time and it goes far beyond this cemetery where we are. He is alive in each of us present here, but also among all those who continue the struggle today around the world. The heirs of the Manouchian and Pierre Overney group are in the large towers of the districts, in the countryside and mountains of Latin America, in the hills of Turkey, in the forests and the jungles of India and the Philippines, wherever wherever The people in struggle raise their heads and affirmed loud and clear: "We are right to revolt! »»
FIN
In the appendix, comrades and friends, we would like to read you two letters. The first is made up of extracts from Missak Manouchian's letter to Mélinée, his wife, before her death. She demonstrates all her internationalism and heroism. The second is a letter from the Bulgarian worker Lutibrodsky, Sentenced to death by the dictatorship in 1934, to his father. This letter was broadcast to thousands of copies at the time as an example of the relentless struggle against the bourgeoisie and fascism.
"My dear melinée, my little beloved orphan,
In a few hours, I will not be of this world. We are going to be shot this afternoon at 3 p.m. It happens to me as an accident in my life, I don't believe it but yet I know that I will never see you again. What can I write to you? Everything is confused in me and very clear at the same time.
I engaged in the army of the liberation as a volunteer soldier and I die on the verge of victory and the goal. Happiness to those who will survive us and taste the sweetness of the freedom and peace of tomorrow. I am sure that the French people and all the fighters of freedom will honor our memory with dignity. When I die, I proclaim that I have no hatred against the German people and against anyone, everyone will have what they deserve as punishment and a reward.
The German people and all other peoples will live in peace and fraternity after the war which will last longer. Happiness to all ... I have a deep regret not having made you happy, I would have liked to have a child of you, as you always wanted. So I beg you to marry you after the war, without fault, and to have a child for my happiness, and to fulfill my last will, combine with someone who can make you happy.
[…]
With the help of friends who will honor me, you will publish my poems and my writings that are worth read. You will bring my memories if possible to my parents in Armenia. I will die with my 23 comrades earlier with the courage and serenity of a man who has a very quiet conscience, because personally, I did not hurt anyone and if I did it, I I did without hatred.
Today it's sunny. It is by looking at the sun and the beautiful nature that I loved so much that I would say goodbye to life and to all of you, my dear woman and my very dear friends. I forgive all those who hurt me or who wanted to hurt me except the one who betrayed us to buy his skin and those who sold us. I kiss you hard as well as your sister and all the friends who know me from afar or near, I tighten you all on my heart. Farewell. Your friend, your comrade, your husband.
Manouchian Michel "
—
" "Dear father !
I received your letter a few days ago. You advise me to do everything to escape the gallows. And you write: "Do it today, because tomorrow it will be too late". Do you not understand that this proposal is not salvation but a certain death, even if I have life left? For you to understand this, it is necessary to examine the question in depth. Currently, the bourgeoisie has succeeded in bringing severe blows to the proletariat and its party. But does that mean that the domination of the bourgeoisie is stabilized and that the final victory does not belong to the proletariat? No ! If it is not today, at least tomorrow, the proletariat will defeat the Moribonde class and, thanks to its party, will advance the development of human society. We, son of this rising class and members of his conscious avant-garde, we must not fear for our life and sacrifice, for that, the prestige of the party.
What need do we have of our life, father, if it is up to us to remain living corpses with the help of which the reactionary class in decline will strive to have the ranks of the revolutionary proletariat and use me, which will have ceased to live, to prolong his own existence? No ! I prefer to die and stay alive in the heart of my class! Better to die than to be a living and stinking corpse!
Well, you will say to me, but think of Mara and Ilitch [1]. What will they do without you? ”. I think a lot about them, my father. Myself, I don't know how to express my love to them. When I think of them, a huge bitterness takes hold of me and I feel like lead in my chest. A suffering that forces me to squeeze my teeth so hard that they creak, and yet to promise me to resist, to keep my strengths and to continue to fight until the last moment, raised against the class which is responsible, not only Because my Ilitch did not see his father and that my partner remains without me, but also, because millions of other families must live in misery, deprivation and hunger.
Faced with the millions of unemployed, faced with the danger of a new war [note: refers to the imperialist world war], whose human brain cannot conceive of horror, before the millions of victims that it will massacre, not only among Soldiers, but still among women and children, because asphyxiating gases, bacilli of plague and cholera do not choose victims, before all these horrors, that capitalism brings us and will bring us again, what right would give -I to the enemy a weapon against all of us, whose blood he sucks? No ! I can not do it ! For this cursed state of capitalism, I see no other outcome than that indicated by my party and this outcome leads to the complete economic and political liberation of the proletariat and workers. My life was a struggle, a struggle to impose this solution. And if the Bulgarian bourgeoisie intends to condemn me to death, it means that I remained a faithful son of my class, a faithful son of my party. And that will be enough for you, in Ilitch and Mara. Yes, death; But Ilitch will know why his father fought and fell into this fight; He will know that he preferred to fall into the fight to cover himself with shame, to swarm to you, and to this son that I have never seen. It's true, it's hard to expect death at any time, to shudder at the slightest noise, to count their steps ... Here they are, they come to take you. Your heart is beating everything. But the steps go away and you fall on the bed, like a mature fruit falling from the tree. And the nerves do not support it ... and we call death, saving death. The agony is terrible, death is not!
And, precisely at that time, the enemy tries to make me reject my whole past activity. And you know, father, that he has already tried this temptation several times to be able to triumph then: "See! Another prodigal son who comes back to reason, who regrets what he did! ”. It is by such ignominies that the enemy wants to weaken faith in the party and prolong the existence of this class harmful to society. No, I will not participate in this despicable game!
This does not mean that I will let myself do without doing anything. Of course, everything must be done to save me. But be careful not to give the enemy arguments against the party. The best is to mobilize public opinion against my death sentence.
I will walk calmly and happily to the gallows with the awareness of having, in my short life devoted to the struggle for freedom, soiled neither the name of my party, nor your name.
And, with the rope around the neck, I shout you: head high, father, armed woman, my son that I have never seen! Comrades, forward! Although paid for harsh sacrifices, victory is for us! Whoever is ready for sacrifices will have the victory! Physically dead, the fighters will live in the conscience of the victorious proletariat. And their children will harvest the fruits of the struggle that their fathers have led. You too, my little Ilitch, that I cannot kiss either for the first or for the last time.
Jurdan Lutibrodsky. " »