France braced for 'rebirth of violent left'

France braced for 'rebirth of violent left'

Despite claims of exaggeration, government reports insist a new generation of extremists will soon launch a wave of sabotage and bombings

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/04/france-government-left-wing-extremism

The French government fears a wave of extreme left-wing terrorism this year with the possible sabotage of key infrastructure, kidnappings of major business figures or even bomb attacks.

Secret French government reports, seen by the Observer, describe an "elevated threat" from an "international European network ... with a strong presence in France" after the radicalisation of "a new generation of activists" in recent years. Senior analysts and experts linked to the government have drawn parallels with the Action Directe group, which carried out 50 or more attacks in the early 1980s. Others cite the example of the Baader-Meinhof gang.

A report by the French domestic intelligence service talks of "a rebirth of the violent extreme left" across Europe that is likely to be aggravated by the effects of the economic crisis. Other secret documents expose alleged links with activists in Italy, Greece, Germany and the UK. "It has been growing for three or four years now and the violence is getting closer and closer to real terrorism," said Eric Dénécé, director of the French centre of intelligence research and a former Defence Ministry consultant.

While some believe such claims to be scaremongering, the present political atmosphere is tense, with many among right-wing President Nicolas Sarkozy's aides fearing a repeat of the violence in Athens last month, when angry and alienated young people and a hard core of violent left-wing extremists rioted for several days, causing significant damage and bringing the city to a halt.

Democracies have always fallen because of the violent right, never the left. I don't know of any democracy throughout history that has fallen to the far left.

Of course, the facts never get in the way of right wing hysteria.

What they're calling an organized, extreme left in Athens is hooliganism caused by frustration over the effects of globalization. It's not organized, it's spontaneous.

And that last is what needs to scare the hell out of extreme rightists and cause them to moderate their harsh anti worker policies. Right wing jackboots won't stop it.

I love how we're the "violent, extreme left" when the right-wingers torture people, burn them at the stake or blow up things when they get upset, and then get called "pillars of the community."

The old Soviet Communists were just pigs in different lipstick.

:shrug:

I specified any democracy that was toppled by left wing extremists.

...irrespective of your post.

Can you (or anyone) name a far left democracy? What qualifies as such? Is there real freedom of expression and individual conscience? It is an interesting question in political science, especially since the most atrocious regimes (Democratic Kampuchea or the DPRK, for example) have adhered to far left ideas, despite those who claim that the DPRK is a "Democracy". After all, until the evidence of the killing fields became overwhelming there were plenty of Khmer Rouge supporters as well (like Chomsky). Even National Socialism owes some political theory to ordinary socialism (just google "NSDAP platform" and read).

Also google "Kerensky". While the Democratic Socialist government was far from perfect, the Bolsheviks were far worse and not very democratic. Look up "Dubcek" while you are at it.

Nobody has suggested that extremists of any stripe are democratic. It's a fatuous idea really.

under Reagan. Or Afghanistan or Iraq today.

when all property was held in common and its disposition and everything else decided by majority vote. Some communes back in the 60s were like that.

The far left fails to deal with the lazy and the greedy and the whole thing broke down along those lines at some point. Meetings to vote on whatever tended to take the better part of the day because they failed to deal with the ones who had verbal diarrhea. Freedom of expression caused everybody else in the commune to contemplate murder by the time they finally ran out of gas.

In addition, pure majority rule tended to be a little hard on the minority.

How about former European imperial holdings in Africa in the 1970's. Or the United States. Taking politics in the era, the US was regionally democratic as the 13 colonies for much of the 17th and 18th centuries. Then they revolted and installed a radically left government.

One wonders exactly how they decided which bin (left of right) to sort these soon-to-be "terrorists" into anyway.

But it does get pushed to the side. Mostly because it's us that's doing it.

Mostly in Asia and Latin America, but still; the "armed hard left" hasn't completely gone away.