Left/right convergence in France

28Jun14

Several items from Tendance Coatesy, on the Voltaire Network, on the French far right’s links to Putinism, and on Godard’s fascist turn.

1. On Franklin Lamb and France’s Assad supporters:

Counterpunch has published some well-informed reports on the unfolding civil war in Iraq, notably by Patrick Cockburn. The same cannot be said for the latest piece by the notorious Franklin Lamb, who has been linked to the far-right  Réseau Voltaire (Voltaire Network)  (23 articles, up to 2001)… [In his article on ISIS, the] Reseau Voltaire contributor [i.e. Lamb] records this comment,

ISIS appears uniformly contemptuous of the Zionist regime and its army and also appears eager to fight them in the near future despite expectation that the regime will use nuclear weapons. “Do you think that we do not have access to nuclear devices? The Zionists know that we do and if we ever believe they are about to use theirs we will not hesitate.  After the Zionists are gone, Palestine will have to be decontaminated and rebuilt just like areas where there has been radiation released.”…

One feels deep disgust at anybody relishing the kind of ‘liberation’ ISIS would bring to Israel. Coatesy has background on the Voltaire Network: see here on Thierry Meyssan, here on their Syria conspiracy theories, but in particular here: After Israel Shamir, we have Franklin P.Lamb. He is a regular on the fascist ‘anti-imperialist’ Voltaire Network (23 articles – here). His latest Counterpunch offering is an ‘analysis’ which claims that the Syrian uprising is being used to undermine the ‘resistance’ force Hezbollah, “Implementing the Feltman Project.  Is the Syrian Crisis Being Leveraged to Weaken Hezbollah?” One expects the answer, given the premis that Hezbollah is the “leader of the international Resistance.” He concludes by asking, The coming weeks will reveal what, if any, success foreign and domestic anti-Resistance forces achieve in using the Syrian crisis to dismantle Hezbollah. This is a curious way of putting things, until you realise where Lamb’s thought processes originate. […]

What is Lamb’s Voltaire Network? The President of the Network of Thierry Meyssan,  9/11 The Big Lie, which claimed that the 11th of September 2001 was due to an internal plot within the US administration. The Network broadcast this declaration widely. Meyssan’s works appear regularly on the Holocaust deniers’ site, Entre la plume et l’enclume. The Voltaire Network is better known under its French title, Réseau Voltaire. It has faced accusations of supporting the Chinese and Russian states, anti-Semitism, and alignment with Islamists. Supporters who resigned in 2005 said, …Under the pretext of resistance to American imperialism arrangements have been made with Russian and Chinese imperialisms, and their alignment with Islamists has led to a drift towards anti-semitism, latent amongst its leading figures. Thierry Meyssan is closely associated with the fascist and racist Dieudonné and his ‘anti-Zionist’ Party (Parti Anti Sioniste). There is not formal tie between the Réseau Voltaire and this, very marginal, political party. But what is clear is that the Voltaire Network is pro-Assad, like the Parti Anti Sioniste  as are many from this ‘nébuleuse‘. […]

With yet another contributor to Counterpunch from this background we wonder why anybody takes it seriously, or indeed, took Alexander Cockburn seriously at all – ever.

2. On Marine Le Pen and France’s Putin supporters

This appeared in Le Monde [early in June]:

Moscow-Paris-Vienna : the meetings and acquaintances of Aymeric Chauprade, Adviser of Marine Le Pen Le Monde.  (Adapted Extracts)

The Eurodeputy for the Front National – Rassemblement Bleu Marine (RBM), –Aymeric Chauprade (wikipedia – in English), took part in strange meeting on Saturday the 31st of May in Vienna.  (Austria) The meeting was called under the title of the 200 years of the Holy Alliance, which brought together Imperial Russia, the Austrian Empire, and the Prussian kingdom. The event was organised by the the Russian oligarch Konstantin Malofeev, who is linked to Ukrainian separatists in  Donetsk in the Ukraine. According to the Swiss newspaper Tages Anzeiger,  this get-together was held to discuss how to save  Europe from liberalism (economic and political) and the “homosexual lobby”. Those present included  Heinz-Christian Strache, leader of the far-right Austrian  FPÖ  (allies of  Marine Le Pen),  and  Volen Siderov of the Bulgarian extreme-right party  Ataka  (with whom Le Pen refuses to work).

The most striking guest was Aleksandr Gelyevich Dugin  Putin’s éminence grise  and Eurasian ideologue. (1) M. Chauprade has already worked with the most radical wing of the Pro- Putin forces. During the Crimean referendum in Crimea he was an observer for a NGO linked to Eurasian ideas, the Eurasian Observatory for Democracy and Elections (EODE) (2). This body is led by  Luc Michel, European National Communitarian Party (ENCP) (3), a red-brown groupuscule  that continues the work of the neo-fascist Jean Thiriart. The EODE  observers came from diverse quarters, from the Greek Communist Party (KKE) Die Linke, Forza italia (qui  the Flemish far-right, Vlaams Belaang  and  Enrique Ravello of  Plataforma per Catalunya.  The latter had been a member of the  Cedade,  a grouping of Spanish neo-Nazis.

References from Wikipedia.

(1) Aleksandr Gelyevich Dugin (Russian: Алекса́ндр Ге́льевич Ду́гин, born 7 January 1962) is a Russian political scientist, traditionalist, and one of the most popular ideologists of the creation of a Eurasian empire that would be against the “North Atlantic interests”. He is known for his fascist views,[1][2][3][4] and had close ties to the Kremlin and Russian military.[5] Dugin serves as an adviser to State Duma speaker (and key member of the ruling United Russia party) Sergei Naryshkin.[6]

(2) Eurasian Observatory for Democracy and Elections (EODE) is a Russia-based far-rightnon-governmental organization which on its website claims that it monitors elections.[1][2] According to its website, it specializes in the “self-proclaimed republics” (Abkhazia, Transdnistria, Nagorno-Karabakh).[3][1] It is led by the Belgian far-right activist Luc Michel.[4] EODE’s other leader is Jean-Pierre Vandersmissen. Both Michel and Vandermissen are followers of the Belgian Neo-Nazi politician Jean-François Thiriart.[5][6][7] According to Oliver Bullough, on its website the organization stated that “it shares the values of “the current Russian leadership and V.V. Putin.””[8] EODE visited Crimea during the 2014 Crimean referendum international observer team and claimed that the referendum was conducted in a legitimate manner.[9][10]

(3) The Parti communautaire national-européen (PCN) is a Belgium-based political organisation led by Luc Michel, a former member of the Neo-Nazi FANE party. A largely National Bolshevik movement, it also has activists in France.[1] The PCN was founded in 1984 as a successor to the similar Parti Communautaire Européen. The party bases its ideas on those of Jean-François Thiriart,[1] who served as an advisor to Michel for a time after the foundation of the group, and seeks the creation of a single European state stretching entity from Russia to the Atlantic coast. Including activists with origins on both the far right and far left, it seeks to liberate Europe from its ‘Yankee and Zionist enemies’.[2] Its founding membership included both those whose background was neo-fascism and former Maoists.[3] It has also been noted for giving support to controversial world leaders, most notably Iraq‘s Saddam Hussein and Libya‘s Muammar al-Gaddafi.[4] It also declared its support for ecologism.[5] According to Eric Rossi PCN belongs to a strand of the Francophone far right that he identifies as “ethno-differentialist revolutionary nationalism”, in which he also includes Nouvelle Résistance, Groupe Union Défense, Troisième voie and Groupement de recherche et d’études pour la civilisation européenne. He contrasts this with the “exclusivist nationalists” (as represented by Œuvre française) and the “supremacist racialist nationalists” (Fédération d’action nationale et européenne and Parti nationaliste français et européen), although including all three groups within a wider model of neo-fascism.[6] The party has, from time to time, contested elections in Belgium and France (without securing elected office), although at the last Belgian elections they told their supporters to vote for the Vlaams Belang.

3. On Jean-Luc Godard:

David Thompson once commented that Jean-Luc Godard, the celebrated, and once leftist, cinéaste was fated to remain a “Young Turk” all his life. Now approaching his dotage Godard still feels the need to make provocative statements. Interviewed at length in yesterday’s Le Monde and asked about the European election results he announced, J’espérais que le Front national arriverait en tête. Je trouve que Hollande devrait nommer – je l’avais dit à France Inter, mais ils l’ont supprimé – Marine Le Pen premier ministre.” I was hoping that the Front National would come first. I find that Hollande should nominate – I said this on France Inter, but they cut it out – Marine Le Pen as Prime Minister.

Asked by the newspaper the reasons why he took this stand, the film-director responded, “To shake things up, so that we make at least some moves towards changing things, even if they don’t really do so. It’s better than pretending to do nothing. Jean-Luc Godard continued his theme, recalling that, “The Front National had 2 seats on the National Resistance Council. At that time it was a pro-Communist organisation. Still, despite this it was called the Front National….”

The interviewers reminded him that this Front National had nothing to do with the present-day Front National, created in 1972 by Jean-Marie Le Pen, and that only the name was identical (a synonymy). Jean-Luc Godard did not back down, “No. If you say its the same word, you are stuck in words, not facts. It is a fact. Given the importance of this nomination, this is also a synonymy as well…the Prime Minister of Luxembourg is called Junker. That is also the name of the German bombers…. The Franco-Swiss film-maker did recognise  that he was  “not one of them” (the Front National). “Jean-Marie Le Pen wanted for a long time to kick me out of France..but I simply wish that things change. The real winners (of the elections) were those who abstained, and I’ve been one of them for a long time.”

Filed under: France, Left-right convergence, Middle East   |  1 Comment
Tags: Aleksandr Dugin, Aleksandr Gelyevich Dugin, Ataka, Aymeric Chauprad, Counterpunch, Eurasian Observatory for Democracy and Elections, Franklin Lamb, Front National, Heinz-Christian Strache, Jean-Luc Godard, Konstantin Malofeev, Marine Le Pen, Parti Anti Sioniste, Parti communautaire national-européen, Rassemblement Bleu Marine, Réseau Voltaire, russia, Syria, Thierry Meyssan, Volen Siderov, Voltaire Network