Germany – Dem Volke Dienen: 100th Anniversary Issue of Rote Post!
We hereby share an unofficial translation of an article shared by Dem Volke Dienen on August 23.
We gladly share an article by the Rote Post that is celebrating its 100th Issue, which the comrades have shared with us.
100 Issues of the Rote Post
We are glad to say that this is now the 100th Issue of the Rote Post, which you hold in your hands. Since February 2018 our newspaper has been published monthly, almost without exception. That means tens upon tens of thousands of revolutionary newspapers that we have given into the hands of our class.
Already in our 5th Issue we had the wonderful problem of having to increase our print run. A note by a reader published by the website Dem Volke Dienen analyzing the situation of the revolutionaries and communist at the time, read:
“In this manner the comrades carrying out the different activities for the 1st of May have distributed, on a level never before seen, have distributed the new organ of the proletarian revolutionaries in Germany – Rote Post. Then it was achieved to enter into a front, that is obviously not the front that is under the undisputed leadership of the proletariat, but a front that has allowed to gain a broad political space.”
The growth we have had in the years since then, and the possibility to contribute to the creation of such a space, we owe to the great number of voluntary supporters who spread this newspaper in their neighborhoods and workplaces, distribute them in local shops, hand them out in combative demonstrations and internationalist events, etc. Thank you! Without your work this development would not have been possible.
During these years we have learned many lessons, received and applied a lot of criticism, and participated in the struggles. There are a lot more to come. If we remember some of them; among them is the campaign for the celebration of 200 years since the birth of Karl Marx. We had the great honor and pleasure to be able to participate in this international campaign which marked an important step in the unity of the progressives and communists in the world, when we were just recently founded. In our 6th Issue we shared a report on the international celebration that took place in Bremen.
In the same Issue we also shared an article from Hamburg that already demonstrated the beginning of the anchoring in the proletarian neighborhoods. We reported on unacceptable living conditions in the housing complex Sonnenland, which was largely ignored by the bourgeois press, politicians, and self-proclaimed do-gooders:
“What may sound like a tale of a refreshment in summer vacations, describes a completely different situation. It’s July and the thermometer shows that it is the hottest day of the year. Way above 25 degrees in the shade, days when the sweat just keeps dripping and after a hard days work, the biggest wish is to be able to take a shower. In the housing complex Sonnenland in Billstedt it is not that simple, because in the “Sonnenland,” since quite some time ago the shower containers have been put up because the city and the SAGA (a company that is completely owned by the city and at the same time is the biggest landlord in Hamburg, with a business volume of almost 1 billion Euro in 2017 and 200 million in profit with more than 130.000 apartments) have not managed to realize the necessary repairs to the gas-pipes. Therefore the people in these houses do not have hot water. The heating has also failed, but this is not a problem at the moment. […]
A man is standing next to his car and putting tools in his trunk. We greet him friendly and ask him if he is affected by the measures. He affirms this and starts telling us how hot water has not been available since mid-June – more than a month ago. They were not only surprised by the repairs but have also not received almost any information. He has not seen more than a small note in the stairwell. […] The “Wochenblatt Billstedt” is the only newspaper that has reported on the state of things. According to it, 279 units are affected – when we tell him this, he only laughs. He says that in total more than 1,000 have to suffer the situation and depend on emergency measures. And who will know this better than someone who lives directly there and knows the situation? But reporters from the bourgeois media have not been seen here anyway – nobody on the official site cares about the situation.”
In the last Issue of 2018 we already wrote: “Finally we want to note that this year the DAX has been in decline for two consecutive years. This is one sign, among others, of the upcoming crisis.” In the case of the Daimler factory in Bremen we described the intent to make the workers pay the costs of the upcoming crisis:
“Who mainly suffers are, like usual, the temporary workers, who are being attracted by lies and false promises of permanent contracts (if they only work hard enough). In reality there is no security, no planability. While you are needed they put on a nice face, but once this is no longer the case you are told to pack your bags, also in this specific case. Daimler announced in October 2018 that they would cancel 240 positions for temporary workers. Initially they were talking of 560 positions filled by temporary workers. Now they came to an agreement with the union to ‘only’ cut 240 positions. What great work by the supposed workers representatives of the union, who we can never trust, as once more shown by this example. Now 240 workers have lost their jobs again and have to struggle to get the next job in this system of slavery called temporary work.”
German imperialism has since not been able to free itself from the crisis, that actually did not make them wait and broke out before the Covid-pandemic. Instead in our last Issue, as well as in this one we show how it continues sharpening.
In our 17th Issue from June 2019, we had the pleasure to report on the concrete advances in the unity of the revolutionaries in Europe in the joint campaign against the elections of the EU-parliament. At the same time we noted: “The summer break that before led to ‘calm’ news in the middle of the year, apparently no longer exists.” While this was news just a few years ago, now it has become obvious.
Just two Issues later we shared a report of the campaign “Justice for Adel B.” from Essen that has been and continues to be an example of how the murder of one of our class brothers was converted into a strong movement, uniting the masses of the city and beyond.
At the same time, time and time again, we reported on the wave of rebellion in Latin America that literally ignited Latin America. Anyone who has eyes can see that this powder keg has not cooled down since, but that the struggles of the masses continue flaring up and growing stronger.
From March 2020 on, then in our 26th Issue, the crisis of German imperialism broke out more openly. They tried to blame it on the pandemic, and to justify offloading the costs onto the shoulders of the masses, and to justify all types of reactionarization of the State with the state of exception. We have clearly seen how the attacks on the supposed “democratic rights” continued after the end of the state of exception and how the German State is still not even close to finding a solution to escape the crisis.
We for our part overcame the difficulties raised in the state of exception and resisted it, as in the campaign for the celebration of 200 years since the birth of Friedrich Engels.
Already in our 37th Issue, we had to expand our newspaper, as the news of the struggles did not fit the pages anymore. Only two issues later we greeted you on the 1st of May 2021 with a new design. We wrote:
“With this Issue the publication of the Rote Post completes three years, it celebrates its third birthday. In spite of all of the difficulties and the development of the class struggle the Rote Post has consistently been published monthly during these three years. Not as an online magazine but as something material – propaganda from hand to hand. With the development this paper also grows and develops correspondingly, and so this Issue, for the first time, has 24 pages. Rote Post is now distributed in at least a dozen cities in Germany. It is primarily sold in the working class neighborhoods and as such is an important means on the basis of which the revolutionaries in this country can unite more with the deepest and broadest masses.”
In our 50th Issue we had the chance to revisit a struggle in Bremen on which we had already reported before:
“Rubble, open ceilings, glass wool and cables have become normal for the inhabitants of the Wohlers Eichen residential complex in Oslebshausen. Since 2018, the residential complex has become the property of Vonovia SE and under the pretense of bringing up to standard the living conditions and ecological protection, in the same year they began renovations. On this basis the rents have constantly been raised but the renovations have not advanced. Since we wrote our article in August 2019 we have once more talked to the renters. Since then almost nothing has changed.”
In these years, important steps on an international scale have taken place in the unification of the communists in the world under Maoism. As such, in our 60th Issue from January 2023, we had the pleasure to dedicate it to the foundation of the International Communist League. Under its leadership, the campaign to celebrate 130 years since the birth of President Mao was realized combatively around the world:
“The League means a higher stage of unity of the communists in the world, on their way that follows the path of the Communist International founded by Lenin, that led millions upon millions of workers all around the world in revolutions, against imperialism, in the first half of the 20th century.”
This growing unity expressed itself for instance in Europe in the joint campaign against the EU-elections, on which we reported in our 78th Issue from July 2024.
A particularly beautiful moment of our work are always the interviews with our readers, workers and revolutionary organizations. One that especially stood out for us took place shortly after the foundation of Roter Bund [the Red League]. You can also find it on their website roterbund.de. We were also very happy to report on the foundation of the Red Women’s Movement as part of the Red League in February 2026. The comrades of the Red League explained to us in the interview among other things:
“Rote Post: Hello Comrades. Nice of you to give us the opportunity to talk to you. Just the other day, the foundation of a new revolutionary organization in Germany was announced. The Red League is, so to speak, moving within the same political environment in which many of our collaborating comrades move, and to which probably a large number of our readers also feel they belong. That’s why we are very interested in this development. Can you tell us a little bit about this new organization, what you think its significance is?
Maria: The Red League is an organization founded by comrades who have worked in different red and internationalist collectives in Berlin, Bremen, Hamburg, NRW and Baden-Württemberg, and by individuals and smaller groups from other German states. Some of us have done revolutionary politics together for many years, but mainly locally and without a unified nationwide organizational form. We have now changed that. We are convinced that in the political struggle of class against class, organization is the most important weapon. Because to achieve political goals, you need appropriate forms of organization and struggle. In our estimation, the form of organization that we used for years was in the mainly good and served its political purpose. But today this form of organization is outdated and does not correspond to the current moment of the class struggle in Germany. For this we discussed our political tasks together for a while and agreed on a political program. In this we have defined our goals. In order to fight for these goals, we need an organizational form that enables us to act in a unified way nationwide. It is also important for us to give comrades in parts of the country where there have been no collectives until now, and who now have a growing interest in our work, a way to organize together with us. That’s why we founded the Red League, as a broader activist organization that we are convinced will allow us to have a very different reach and perspective political impact.”
In our Issue 88 we reported on the difficult situation faced by the comrades of the Communist Party of India (Maoist), when it became known, that their leader, Comrade Basavaraj, had been murdered by the reaction. It remains clear, that the People’s War led by them will overcome this situation and inevitably win:
“The struggle of the poor peasants led by the Communist Party of India (Maoist) gives them the perspective of liberation from the oppression. In fact it changes immediately their reality. Through the armed struggle of the PLGA the peasants liberate themselves from the reign of the big landlords and their lackeys, they take the land to live on and conquer and construct New Power. This is a new society, a new State in formation, in which the power of the revolutionary classes of the people, on the basis of the unity between (mostly poor) peasants and workers, under the leadership of the Communist Party. This means they have their own laws and rights in these areas. The bases of support and guerrilla zones – in which the power of the old Indian State has been temporarily or partially swept away – administrate themselves. In this the poorest and the most diligent do politics, a collective politics with the aim of constructing a more just and better society. The women of the people for instance, who are usually brutally oppressed in India, play an important role. The land is being distributed justly, and there are rules established that aim for an equal treatment and relative equality.”
The Red League also partook in the founding of the International Anti-Imperialist League, of which we could share a report in our 96th Issue.
We are always glad to hear from you, be it criticism, notes, ideas for articles or memories of the struggles we have shared with you throughout the years. As always you can reach us under rotepost@gmx.de. For hundreds of thousands and millions more newspapers in the hands of our class! For many more joint struggles!
