The Militant supports the struggle by Albanians in Kosova for national self-determination, which strengthens working people and is an obstacle to attempts to restore capitalism in the region. The paper has consistently opposed NATO intervention against Yugoslavia, which big-business forces promote under the cover of aiding the peoples of Kosova and Bosnia against the Serb chauvinist onslaught by the regime of Slobodan Milosevic in Belgrade.

The April 24 demonstration, however, as Italie notes, did "not help working people in Kosova, Yugoslavia, or the United States." The facts reported in the article confirm his assessment. The rally was sponsored by a group, the Albanian American Student Organization, which calls for U.S. intervention against Yugoslavia. They issued an anticommunist leaflet decrying "serbo-slav communist hegemony in the Balkans," which was distributed at the rally and to passersby. The president of the sponsoring group called from the platform for a military assault by Washington on Serbia "like they did in Iraq." Other speakers, including a representative from the liberal Human Rights Watch, presented similar views. The demonstrators marched to the Yugoslav mission to the United Nations, playing into the imperialist war drive against the Yugoslav workers state.

The Militant article highlighted the youthful composition of the New York rally, as though that made it progressive regardless of its political content. But youth are not an independent force separate from the two major classes, the capitalists and the working class. Militant readers can probably think of a number of other examples of reactionary political actions involving young people. On the other hand, there are plenty of labor struggles and other political activities to go to that do advance the interests of working people, especially now that working-class resistance has picked up. Many young people are involved in these fights, like the teenagers who struck at McDonald's in Macedonia, Ohio.

In recent months the Militant has reported on how communist workers in North America discussed and confronted a problem of bending to the war pressures and economic nationalism of the imperialist rulers in their own country, a course that was rationalized by the argument of looking for youth and some "action." This had involved participation in a variety of protest actions that had a protectionist, nationalist character - directed against the North American Free Trade Agreement, the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation trade group, and "sweatshops" owned by companies doing business in Asia and Latin America, among others.

As with those previous actions, it was impossible for communists participating in the April 24 New York demonstration on Kosova to differentiate themselves from the pro-intervention, pro-imperialist forces who organized it. It was not the kind of activity one would want to encourage co-workers, activists in the struggle for Puerto Rican independence, or other fellow working-class fighters to attend.

Other demonstrations of this character, with overwhelmingly Albanian participation, have taken place and will probably occur again in the United States and other countries. Class-conscious workers do not support them or encourage participation in such actions. We oppose them politically and explain that they are a blow to the struggle to end the national oppression of Albanians in Kosova, which we support unconditionally.

What can be pursued instead is the greater opportunities today to meet a number of individual Albanian immigrant workers in the United States who are interested in the communist perspective presented in the Militant. They can be found in factories, campuses, and working-class neighborhoods around the country. But as Italie correctly points out, supporting and participating in a demonstration that links freedom for Kosova with imperialist intervention can only disorient those who are open to a working-class course.

- MARTÍN KOPPEL  
 
 
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