Message+from+Mervyn+Bennun

Message from Mervyn Bennun, 15-Feb-2007 17:52
=(The Revolutionary Struggle For Peace)=


 * (In Part)**

Geraldine has reminded me of the occasion, and that has refreshed my own memories. It was after a meeting of the Oxford Union -- Mondlane had been invited to address it, and had come from Mozambique to do so. It must have been 1966 or 1967.

Cde Mondlane was talking against the background of (mostly) young people who were going around with big words, and black berets... and even cigars. Many seemed to be Trots or of some other ultra-Left flavour.

A small group of us and a few students were talking to Mondlane over coffee after the debate he'd addressed. Some of the students there were romancing about Guevara and revolution -- "fish in the water" and all that -- and made Mondlane quite angry. They were upset by his strong reaction to their romantic image of what war -- even guerrilla war -- meant.

It was a stunning privilege, and remembering Mondlane brings tears to my eyes. Che Guevara was killed in 1967, and it must have been close to that time. If you read Che's "Bolivian Diary" with an intro by Castro, and his account of the time he spent in Africa, you know what true revolutionaries think of war.

I've never even heard a gunshot since the last time I was at the school rifle range with a .22 at Parktown Boys' High in 1951, and perhaps my feelings are also romantic: if a sick fear of war and guns can be "romantic".... Yes, I've been sheltered and privileged and all that, but I don't want any comrades who romance about war.


 * Mervyn E. Bennun**