Voice of Revolution

Support Land Reclamation Caledonia, Ontario

Justice for Six Nations

Voice of Revolution vigorously supports the just stand of Six Nations to reclaim their land and demand that the Canadian government act on a nation-to-nation basis with Six Nations and resolve problems politically, without use of force and arms. The current struggle of the Six Nations to reclaim their lands persists. It began in February, despite raids by the Ontario Provincial Police and efforts by the government and media to discredit and silence them.

We reprint in this issue, information and views from Kahentinetha Horn, Mohawk Nation News, and TML Daily, organ of the Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist). The determined stand to defend rights - with its experience of united struggle against state attacks and sticking to one's own stand and program despite provocations - is of great importance to all.

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The Power and the Peace Is in the People

- Kahentinetha Horn, Mohawk Nation News, May 27, 2006 -

During the past 88 days of Six Nations activism to reclaim our land near Caledonia, we have received thousands of emails and calls from people all over the world. There were days when we just could not answer them. The support and ideas that we've received have been tremendously gratifying and helpful. We thank you all. Without this solidarity from natives and non-natives, the Ontario Provincial Police would have had their way. Blood would have been spilt. Never mind the return of our land, though we are still waiting on that one.

This solidarity that we are experiencing between natives and non-native people is a revival. The British promise to protect the Six Nations on the Haldimand Tract that our people are defending began with this solidarity. The Six Nations were allies of the British. It was this alliance that lead to the formation of modern Canada. Because of this alliance we were pushed out of the Mohawk Valley in what is now New York State where our people had lived since the beginning of time. The Mohawks were valiant allies of the British during the American Revolution. Mohawks have always been on the front line every time Britain needed defending - in the Battle of Queenston Heights 1813, in World War I and World War II and other actions. The Haldimand Tract is on traditional Rotino'shon:ni/Iroquois territory. The tract was guaranteed to the Mohawks in 1784. The Six Nations have always been willing to put ourselves on the line for our Canadian allies. It is gratifying to see that the majority of people support this alliance and are willing to stand up for us.

Our tradition has been to work together. Unfortunately, the Canadian government, particularly Indian Affairs, was taken over by people who did not want us to work together. They wanted to be boss, kings of the castle. So they betrayed us and the Canadian people. Instead of treating us honorably like allies, they abused us. They stole our land, stole our resources and schemed to kill us off. They pretended that we were children who could not look after ourselves. They depleted our trust funds with illegal investments in flaky financial schemes run by their friends.

Instead of treating us like allies, they pretended that we were British subjects. You may wonder why we did not protest over our lack of rights in Canada. That's because we aren't Canadians. We were minding our own business. We organized everything on our territory and paid for it ourselves.

We thought the problem was just the people in Indian Affairs and that our relationship with the Queen remained on an honorable footing. We were wrong.

The original Haldimand promise was that there was to be no encroachment ever. In the end the Canadian government, not the Canadian people, was the source of our beef.

Ontario, and the rest of Canada for that matter, is intent on diminishing Indigenous land holdings not only on the Haldimand Tract but everywhere. It is being diminished through outright theft. The aim of not giving one inch of land back is not for the benefit of the people of Ontario. It's to support the business interests that are intent on exploiting our resources with no regard for the environment or the present and future generations of the people who must live on it. It is the billionaires who really run the governments. Welcome to the pretend democracy of Canada.

We now assume stewardship over our illegally occupied lands. Until now we have invested a lot of resources into historical and legal research and actions for the last 200 years. Anytime the facts were put on the table Canadian officials were shown to have mismanaged Canada and mistreated Indigenous people. We've borne the brunt of it. It is over now! This rot also affects the Canadian people. They do not have a government that looks out for them and the future generations. That's the heart of the problem.

What is government and what are their functions? Is it a vehicle that allows a few greedy individuals to live parasitic lives off the work and possessions of others? Or should government bring people together so that we can put our minds together, solve problems and make a better life for everyone? The basic rift is between our Indigenous philosophy coming from our constitution, the Kaianereh'ko:wa/Great Law, and the philosophy of the people running the government. We've learned in dealing with the Canadian government that the Canadian government does not represent the Canadian people.

We never lost jurisdiction over our ancestral lands. We've had a deep sense of betrayal and anger over our horrific historic experience with the colonizers. Would giving us back our illegally occupied land be "too disruptive'' to the parasites lodged in the Canadian government? Never mind that the government allowed and encouraged its own citizens to encroach on our land and gained private and institutional land titles in violation of the laws. They let Americans come up and take our land too! It's all part of their 100 year plan to get rid of the "Indian problem" as described by that complete maniac, Duncan Campbell Scott of Indian Affairs. A lot of the early settlers on our land were Americans who had taken part in pushing us off our land in the Mohawk Valley. They came up here and liked what they saw here too and began squatting!

It's also interesting that a large percentage of Canadians consider that we got robbed and that we deserve our territories free of colonial jurisdiction. In the Six Nations issue the public in Canada, the United States and worldwide have given us strong support. We hope, for the sake of Mother Earth, it is because many in Canada realize how important our philosophy of caring for the land is.

Unless, of course, we are in the way of corporate "progress," that is, exploitation of our lands and resources by a few foreign based interests who operate through corporations. They operate with no obligations to anyone but themselves and no concern for the people, native and non-native. We are all just pawns in their schemes. The way to overcome all this is to assert our title to Turtle Island and to turn it back to its proper role as a "cornucopia" for the people.

Even though there is wide support for us, there is tremendous opposition by the corporate interests which function through the governmental quagmire. They put pressure on any of their institutions that could give us justice. These interests manage to brainwash and manipulate their "flag-waving" super nationalists to make a lot of noise in the media and to attack us. This is what happened at the "Bread and Cheese Fight" in Caledonia on May 22, 2006 when government instigated rioters came and tried to attack us. But the general public isn't buying it.

The main anti-Indian argument to stop Indigenous jurisdiction from being asserted is because they don't want us to grow, expand and become independent. Why do they think that expanded Indigenous jurisdictions would be disruptive? Would it be a problem if Indian affairs would no longer be getting a cut? They'd have to take their feet off their desks and do a day's work. Are they afraid that it would be environmentally and economically stimulating and rewarding not just for us but for everyone else?

We all need to take a unified approach, native and non-native. We are all being abused. We need to work together. But we need to be wary of those who try to shut us up in the name of unity. We need to respect our laws and adhere to the original arrangements that were made between us. Let us assert our jurisdiction. Don't keep us mired in legalistic strategies which take up our time and money. We need to be free from the shackles of useless diversions.

Maybe what's needed is a massive "Condolence Ceremony" in which we wipe our eyes with a soft leather so that we can see clearly and have a good look at the issues; then we need to take an eagle feather to clean out our ears so that we can hear each other; and then we need to drink a glass of water so that we can speak truthfully and as clearly as the purest water. Sometimes the solutions to difficult problems are simple. Sometimes all that's needed is to show respect.

In the end, there's no need to give us back the Henco Industries land. It's ours already. It always was. All Ontario needs to do is to respect that. We need to assert the legal government-to-government relationship. We do have broad support from the public to do this. We must bring out the truth. We must stop Canada from continuing to live in sin. Grow up Canada! Colonialism is over! We're never going back!

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Sage Advice on "Indigenous Protests and Occupations" from Former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney to Current Prime Minister Stephen Harper

- Kahentinetha Horn, Mohawk Nation News, April 21, 2006 -

On Thursday, April 20, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper met with former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney in Montreal. Did they talk about the Six Nations crisis and how to end it? We think they might have. Mulroney's "been there, done that."

Did Mulroney tell Harper, "First, you gotta make those Indians look bad. Hire some top public relations firms and put three negative stories out for every positive one that goes out. Tell them the Indians are breaking the law. Keep the civil issues out of court. They have too many valid papers and good argument. Concentrate on laying criminal charges wherever and however you can.

"Confuse the public about the facts of the land issues. Say they have no real evidence. Allude constantly to the fact that they 'might' have weapons and criminal records. Remember, the public won't read the word 'might,' they'll just read the words 'weapons' and 'criminal,' which will scare them and keep them on our side. This is how you manufacture the negative images so the public sees the Indians as the bad guys. Say you are 'defending law and order' (while you are evicting them from their legal property or stealing their resources). Never mind that they might only have 2 by 4s, bats or a bag of stones. Do not mention the millions of dollars you are spending to equip your police with M-16s, tasers, pepper spray, silencers and the latest in ultra hightech weaponry.

"Announce that negotiations were planned and that you want to solve the crisis peacefully. Don't mention that the People themselves have been shut out of negotiations. You will only deal with representatives and negotiators who are on your payroll. Pay off the press so they don't report any of the 'wrong' opinions that might bring out the truth. Distract public attention by announcing that you will go on a tour of reserves to find out what the people need. Support a known adversary of Indians like Maurice Vellacott as chair for the Commons Committee on Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development. This man spoke up for the Saskatoon police officers who took the law into their own hands and abandoned native youth on the notorious 'starlight' tours leaving them to freeze to death.

"Announce your astonishment that the protesters won't leave peacefully. Then surround them, point guns at them and do everything you can to scare them. Forget about constitutional mobility rights. Stop Canadian citizens who support the protesters from entering or leaving Six Nations territory. If the Six Nations people keep resisting our invasion, some of them and even our cops might get killed or hurt. Don't forget, there will be unarmed men, women and children there. Remember that Indian Affairs policy has been to absorb the Indians into our 'body politic' whether they want to be Canadians or not. Your goal is to 'clean it up' to allow American companies to make a mint by squatting on Indian land and turning Canadians into mortgage slaves. Don't forget Canada's economy has historically depended on clear cutting, mining, water diversions and generally despoiling the land. The next time the Indians resist the government, you'll know what to do. Set it up so there is no resistance. You don't want another 'Oka' (the 1990 confrontation between the Mohawks and Quebec/Canada which brought in the police, the RCMP and then the army just like what's happening at Six Nations right now).

"An Indian occupation doesn't have to have many people. All they want to do is to make a stand on a principle, like land title and resource rights. Tell them, 'You've made your point. Now go home.' We use this line a lot. Ignore the fact that there are no leaders. Six Nations people, including our puppet government, agree that we are wrong. We want to know and see who the main leaders and resisters are. Yes, we need a target, someone to shoot at. Don't forget we need to build up our military so we can support international American hegemony in the Middle East and elsewhere. Don't forget, we got elected because of the support of American companies. Don't bite the hand that feeds us. Keep saying, 'No one will get hurt,' if they do as they're told. Let the main resisters know that the cops have every intention of taking them out. Mind you, the cops don't want to do the killing of a resister. Put native cops on the front line. Talk about native factionalism all the time. Train the cops to beat Indian prisoners so it doesn't leave bruises. They'll die early of their injuries. That's how we got rid of Lasagna of the Oka crisis. It's dirty work but someone has to do it. Bush and his illegal U.S. administration will support us. They want our resources. The cops don't really care if they lose one of their own. Does anyone remember Marcel LeMay who was killed at Oka? If a cop gets killed by 'friendly fire' pretend it was the 'Injuns what done it.'

"What happens if the Indians take some of our cops as prisoners and they find out they've been duped? You have to say it's the Stockholm Syndrome and he's gone crazy. He probably will be treated well by them. This might be a good time to run a feature on old missionary fables. Be wary of him getting an education on Indian matters while he's on salary. They might want to exchange him for some of their people we've taken. What they're after is to carry out the original and legal nation-to-nation relationship that was worked out between us so long ago. We have to avoid that at all cost."

Then Stephen Harper downed his sixth beer and left Westmount for Ottawa to instruct his field officers on his ongoing battle with the Six Nations. Eeks! I woke up from this nightmare in a cold sweat.

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Victory to the Six Nations!

Congratulations for Thursday's Historic Success!

Thursday morning, April 20, was indeed historic. The Six Nations' peoples and their supporters repelled the armed invasion of their land and drove out the hooligans of the Ontario Provincial Police.

After the violent surprise OPP attack on Six Nations territory, Native leaders quickly mobilized reinforcements to repel the invaders. Hundreds from the Six Nations community and their supporters from far and wide descended on the armed OPP attackers and bravely drove them out. Not only that. Supporters throughout Canada immediately expressed their outrage at the unprovoked attack on the Six Nations and demonstrated in various ways. One of the most visible was the brief closure of the Mercier Bridge in Montreal to mount proudly and with profound dignity six Mohawk Nation warrior flags from the girders high above.

The Internet was full of messages of support and information on how to travel to the Six Nations in southern Ontario without detection. Throughout the day and into the evening numbers have swelled with car pools full of people arriving from throughout Ontario, Quebec and New York State. The Six Nations have organized a veritable town on the protest site with tents, meals and other amenities. Everyone is fully cognizant that the colonial state has not given up its aim to seize Six Nations territory on behalf of the U.S. developer Henco. The OPP brazenly declared they have established a "perimeter" with 1,000 heavily armed troops. But this disgusting attempt to terrorize people and dissuade them from joining the protest has not frightened anyone.

Women leaders of the Six Nations were busy all day speaking to the mass media and succeeded to a remarkable degree in breaking the silence. Hazel Hill, others on site and Kahentinetha Horn of Mohawk Nation News have forcefully and clearly presented the just stand of the Six Nations and within the historical perspective. The strength, clarity and coherence of the women seemed to catch the mass media by surprise and it was not until the evening that the blackout and disinformation took hold once again.

The armed unprovoked attack of the OPP against unarmed Native peoples has deeply offended all justice-minded Canadians. The just cause of the Native Nations in defending their land and way of life, in particular their alternate political organization, is deeply supported by many Canadians. Now is the time to express that solidarity in concrete ways by standing as one with the Six Nations. If people can travel to their territory in Southern Ontario to stand shoulder to shoulder with the Six Nations, they should do so. If not, they should organize solidarity demonstrations or any other concrete manifestation of their support for the Six Nations, and express their outrage at the Ontario and federal governments for ordering an armed violent attack on the sovereign territory of the Six Nations.

The just battle of the Six Nations to defend their sovereign territory demands the unconditional support of all.

Victory to the Six Nations!

TML Daily, April 21, 2006, cpcml.ca

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Six Nations Still Under Siege

Are Ontario and Canada Heading Towards a Police State?

Solving problems through force of arms as in the case of the Ontario Provincial Police attack on Six Nations raises troubling questions of an incipient police state.

It shows the necessity to combat this growing fascism of state-organized violence, rule by decree and injunctions, and mass media promotion of violence and repression. The people can change the situation through conscious participation and political organization of themselves, for themselves and by themselves!

Land claims, peacefully presented by Six Nations peoples and their supporters are political and deserve a peaceful dignified response from the federal and provincial governments. Who gave the Ontario Provincial Police the authority to act like hooligans and launch an early morning surprise attack on the Six Nations? How does such an armed violent assault during a land claims dispute help resolve the issue? The police aggression enflamed passions and was an attempt to hijack discussions towards reaching a settlement by turning a clearly political problem into a law and order issue, which it definitely is not.

The Six Nations have a legitimate claim established in history. They have the legal and moral right to an acceptable arrangement with the federal and Ontario governments without the constant threat of state-organized violence directed against them. The Canadian and Ontario governments at the very least should accept a mediated settlement adjudicated by an independent body such as the United Nations. By ordering court-sanctioned police aggression against the Six Nations, the federal and Ontario governments have subverted justice and declared that their overwhelming power and might make right, and that they refuse to accept an arrangement that is satisfactory to the First Nations' peoples and upholds their dignity and needs.

What recourse does that leave the Six Nations and their supporters? It is not difficult to imagine that if one side to a dispute engages in force and believes that it has superior force and can win the dispute because of its superior force, then the other side to the dispute must respond with its own show of force or submit, which is not an option. In this case, the force of the Six Nations peoples is expressed in their unity and determination to defend their just cause and in the overwhelming warm unity and cooperation Native peoples receive from all justice-minded Canadians who will stand shoulder to shoulder with the Six Nations through thick and thin.

The Authority of the State and Control of the Police

The Ontario government seems to suggest that the OPP acted imprudently and independently of any political direction from the Liberal Party in power or the federal government. If that is so, the leadership of the OPP should be fired immediately and removed from all responsibility for policing and charged with breaking the peace, assault and forcible confinement of 16 people.

The police and military are supposedly under the strict control of the government and cannot act with impunity on their own account. If the police and military are not under the control of the government, the society becomes an open police state with the armed authority acting with impunity, serving the rich and powerful against the will of the majority and public good. Governments are responsible for all activity of the police and military good and bad and must hold leaders of the police and military strictly accountable to the public good and take full responsibility for their actions. The police and military cannot be allowed to act with impunity on their own account or the society will descend in a self-destructive spiral towards its doom. All fascist police and military states in the 20th century were soon destroyed in internal violence, terror and aggressive war, with Germany, Italy and Japan as examples.

Confusion in the Mass Media: Who Is in Control?

The Globe and Mail quotes Premier McGuinty as saying, "'I want to be perfectly clear in this regard, this police action comes completely independent of me, my office or my government,' he said."

The CBC reports, "[Premier] McGuinty said his government had in no way influenced the police decision to remove the demonstrators. He said he would take as much time as needed to settle the dispute peacefully."

The Globe also wrote, "Premier McGuinty said Wednesday afternoon that he would take all the time needed to peacefully resolve the long-standing protest over land adjoining a Six Nations reserve in Caledonia, south of Hamilton. But, by yesterday, an occupation now in its 52nd day in the quiet community had escalated into an angry confrontation after police staged a predawn raid."

The Premier of Ontario has publicly declared in the Legislature and to the mass media that his government had no role in deciding to launch a police attack on the Six Nations. How can that be? How could the OPP act in such an irresponsible manner, with such drastic consequences for the Six Nations and the town of Caledonia without the authority of the government from which it gains its right to police? The answer cannot be simply dismissed by suggesting it is a "law and order" issue of enforcing an injunction or "protecting public safety." The police cannot be allowed to take important decisions without publicly discussing the political considerations and gaining authorization from the required political bodies, which should be judged by the people freely and without intimidation. The decision to use armed force to resolve a public dispute offends the body politic and is a state-organized riot against democracy. It is an affront to the people and their desire for real democracy and should be denounced across the country.

TML Daily, April 24, 2006 (cpcml.ca)

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