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We are publishing here the tribute given by Larry Porter, the assistant national secretary of the Socialist Equality Party (US), to Helen Halyard, a leading member of the Socialist Equality Party and the International Committee of the Fourth International for more than half a century, who died suddenly at the age of 73 on November 28. Porter delivered his remarks to a memorial meeting for Helen held on Sunday, December 3.

Dear comrades, friends and supporters,

We gather here today to honor our dear Comrade Helen Halyard.

I too wish to paraphrase Trotskys beautiful appreciation of his son Leon Sedov: Helen was our comrade, friend and fighter. She was an indefatigable fighter for the working class and socialism. She had an enormous impact on everyone she worked with in the party, and on the tens of thousands of workers and youth she spoke with over the last 50 years in the course of fighting to build an international party based on Trotskyism. Millions will come to know her name.

Helen was an extraordinary comrade who will be sorely missed. She was selfless, highly intelligent, courageous and deeply principled. We appreciated her immense personal warmth, but knew she would give no quarter on political differences.

Those of us who worked with her almost daily until the end of her life find it hard to accept that she is no longer with us. This heartfelt memorial expresses both an outpouring of love and our admiration.

Helen represented the imperishable human continuity in the historical struggle for Trotskyism against all forms of Stalinism, Pabloism and revisionism. She epitomized the words party cadre. She distinguished herself from those who abandoned revolutionary policies and rejected the revolutionary role of the working class. She often concluded her remarks by emphasizing that the task of the full material and spiritual liberation of the working class is the task of the working class itself. That was one of her favorite lines.

Helen exemplified the high intellectual and cultural level of the human material that was attracted to our party. She brought a dogged determinationshe would never give upa determination based on principles. Once she joined the party, she never turned away.

What made Helen into the person she became? As the history of the Marxist movement has shown, Revolutionaries are not born. They are forged. They are trained out of the experiences of the movement, out of the intervention of its leadership, out of the whole struggle of past generations.

Helen was so forged, and she, in turn, helped forge the party. As David North said in his tribute to Helen, A revolutionary party educates its members. But the political, social, cultural and moral character of the party is, in turn, profoundly influenced by the character of its cadre.

I first met Helen in 1972 while in college at Lehigh University. She came to the area with a team to campaign with the Bulletin newspaper, the political organ of the Workers League. At that time, the Stalinist Angela Davis was wildly popular, considered an icon of revolution by many young people. This was symptomatic of the various forms of petty-bourgeois influence on the working class, such as feminism, black nationalism and reformism. At this time, many of us knew Black Panther members personally. Many of them were courageous and left-wing, anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist. As a result, they were viciously repressed and many were murdered by the state. But they never broke from black nationalism, a petty-bourgeois outlook.

Upon meeting, Helen and I immediately struck up a discussion on black nationalism. We had both been in the party only a short time. She had joined the Young Socialists in December of 1971, and I followed a few months later. Both of us were won to the party in a fight against various forms of petty-bourgeois nationalism.

The Workers League, in an important and widely circulated pamphlet, Black Nationalism and Marxist Theory, had explained why this was a dead-end orientation. Our party stood in opposition to every other movement that claimed to be socialist.

We explained that capitalism was not based on race, but on the economic divisions of society. The basic conflict in our society and the source of all forms of oppression was capitalist ownership of the means of production, and the basic conflict was between the capitalist class and the working class in America and all over the world. We came to learn and agree that race was subordinate to class, and that racism was deliberately fomented by the ruling class to divide and weaken the working class.

We predicted that those who based their perspective on raceno matter the anti-capitalist rhetoricwould end up in the camp of the ruling elites. This largely took the form of supporting black Democratic Party politicians and black capitalism. This outlook, against which Helen fought courageouslyat that time against the streamhas been completely discredited and exposed by the role of a black upper-middle class layer that promotes such racialist historical falsifications as the New York Times 1619 Project.

Helen was a fighter for the whole working class internationally. She was a Trotskyist internationalist, a materialist, a fighter for permanent revolution.

Our class orientation and perspective was tested in the case of Gary Tyler. It was a critical experience, in which Helen played a major role. In 1976, Gary, then 17, was falsely charged and convicted of first-degree murder by an all-white jury. A racist mob had organized a violent protest against the busing of black youth to the high school in Destrehan, Louisiana. Gary was framed up for the death of a 13-year-old white youth and sentenced to die in the electric chair.

Helen and David North traveled to Louisiana in May 1976 to speak to the Tyler family. There, they interviewed members of the family, including Terry, Garys brother, and Mrs. Juanita Tyler, Garys mother. Helen also traveled to the prison to meet Gary personally.

The Workers League and Young Socialists pledged to defend Gary and take his case into the working class. Helen played a critical role in developing the campaign. She was the chairperson of the powerful December 1976 march held in Harlem, New York to fight for Garys freedom. Hundreds of workers and youth participated.

Over 100,000 people signed the Workers Leagues petitions demanding his freedom. Helen maintained close contact with Mrs. Tyler throughout Garys incarceration, until Juanitas untimely death in 2012. Helens moving obituary of Mrs. Tyler appeared on the World Socialist Web Site.

Various petty-bourgeois groups portrayed Garys frameup simply as the product of Southern racism, and directed appeals for his freedom to black Democratic Party politicians. Our approach was the opposite. We explained that Gary was a class war prisoner, i.e., a representative of the working class, not just a black youth. We warned that the attack on Gary was an attack on the entire working class, black, white and immigrant. We fought to mobilize the full strength of the working class in Garys defense, as part of the defense of the democratic rights of all workers.

The response to this class appeal was enormous. We won the support of workers in trade unions that represented literally millions of workers.

This past July, Helen and many members of the party had the opportunity to see Gary when he visited Detroit, which was the first time we were able to see him since he won his freedom. It was a wonderful reunion. At the event, Gary paid tribute to both the party and to Helen and those who fought for his defense, recognizing that they played an absolutely critical role in providing him the resources necessary for him to carry out his fight.

I will close by quoting from the heartfelt letter Gary sent to me upon hearing of Helens death. Gary wrote:

Larry,

I am very sorry to hear about the unfortunate passing of Helen. I most distinctly remember meeting her back in 1976 when she bravely visited me in Convent, Louisiana.

I admired her strength and tenacity to get the story out about what happened to me. She had become highly respected and loved by my family and became especially close to my mother. I am forever grateful for the endless support and dedication she unselfishly rendered to the campaign to free me. She was a true comrade, who was willing to sacrifice so much, even her life, if it was meant to be, like Tom Henehan.

Once again, we lose another soldier in the struggle. May her soul rest in peace. Thanks for informing me of this tragic news. My heart is heavy tonight.

In closing, as we say, Well done for Trotskyism, Comrade Helen.

Hers was, indeed, a life from which we draw inspiration, political lessons, and renewed determination to finish the job she so courageously devoted her life to carrying out.

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Helen was our comrade, friend and fighter. She was an indefatigable fighter for the working class and socialism - WSWS

We are publishing here the tribute to Helen Halyard given by Ula Atei, a leading member of the Sosyalist Eitlik Grubu (Socialist Equality Group) of Turkey. Comrade Helen, a leading member of the Socialist Equality Party (US) and the International Committee of the Fourth International for more than half a century, died suddenly on November 28. Comrade Atei delivered his tribute to a memorial meeting for Helen held on December 3.

Dear comrades, friends and relatives of Helen Halyard,

On behalf of the Sosyalist Eitlik Grubu (Socialist Equality Group--SEG) in Turkey, we share your deep sorrow at the loss of Comrade Helen. I would like to report that we dedicated todays public meeting in Istanbul, titled Stop Israels Genocide in Gaza, to her memory and to the memory of Comrade Halil elik, leader of the SEG, who died five years ago on December 31.

Comrade Helens death is a great political and personal loss to her comrades in the US and internationally. It is sad that I did not have the opportunity to work many years with her, and only recently met her personally. But socialists like Helen leave behind not only sad comrades and friends, but also an inspiring political legacy.

The tributes written by both Comrade David North and Comrade Patrick Martin make this clear.

When we look at the political life of Comrade Helen, we see that as early as 1971, at a very young age, she took a stand that required both courage and political consciousness, which she pursued consistently to the end of her life: A decisive political break with all forms of nationalism and a commitment to the struggle for revolutionary internationalism, that is, for Trotskyism.

As the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) conferences on the centenary of Trotskyism have explained, this has been and still is the key to the fundamental problems of the epoch of imperialist war and socialist revolution. We argue that if the Left Opposition led by Leon Trotsky, defending the programme of socialist internationalism on which the October Revolution of 1917 was based, had triumphed over Stalinism, it would have meant the victory of the world socialist revolution. This is indeed true.

The political role played by Comrade Helen during her 52 years in the Trotskyist movement rightly places her name in a central position in the history of our movement. This is a highly honourable position, which applies in particular to the comrades who joined the movement in the 1960s and 70s, and whose struggle played a decisive role in ensuring the political continuity of the Trotskyist movement.

The struggle of the Workers League after Wohlforths desertion, not only to maintain its existence, but to defend and advance Trotskyist principles against Stalinism and Pabloite revisionism, was the necessary basis for opposing the national-opportunist degeneration of the Workers Revolutionary Party (WRP) in Britain and for the ultimate political victory of the International Committee. Comrade Helen was part of the generation of leaders who ensured the continuity of the international party at these critical turning points.

Today, the expansion of the ICFI in Turkey and in various parts of the world, including the former Soviet Union, has been made possible by the conscious and determined struggles of this generation of Trotskyist leaders, including Comrade Helen.

For this we are grateful to Comrade Helen. Her life will provide an inspiring example to a new generation of Trotskyist revolutionary workers and youth in the United States and around the world, including in Turkey, and her name will live on in the international struggle for socialism.

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The expansion of the ICFI in Turkey was made possible by the determined struggle of Comrade Helen and her ... - WSWS

The Socialist Equality Party (SEP) in Australia is holding a public meeting calling for an end to the genocide in Gaza being perpetrated by the Israeli regime, with the full backing of all the imperialist powers.

The meeting will be on Wednesday, December 20 at 7 p.m. (AEDT) at the Lakemba Senior Citizens Centre, 23 Croydon St, Lakemba, New South Wales (NSW). For those unable to attend in person, the event will also be live-streamed via Zoom. Reserve your seat now!

The meeting will be devoted to a discussion, not only of what is occurring but why and, therefore, how the genocide can be fought. Despite mass anger and opposition, the Israeli regime and its imperialist backers are only intensifying their criminal onslaught. This underscores the need for a new perspective based on the mobilisation of the working class and a revolutionary socialist perspective against the source of war, the capitalist system.

For more than eight weeks, the Netanyahu regime has been subjecting the 2.2 million people of Gaza to starvation and deprivation of water. Over 80 percent have been displaced from their homes. The unrelenting bombing of civilian targets, including hospitals and refugee camps, has levelled half of all housing.

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Over 20,000 Gazans have been murdered, 10,000 of them children and more than 5,000 women. One out of every 115 people in Gaza has been killed. At the present rate, one out of every 20 Gazans will be dead within a year. The aim of the Israeli regime is to kill as many Palestinians as possible and drive the rest into the desert or the sea.

What is being carried out recalls nothing less than the industrial slaughter carried out by the Nazis during the Second World War.

The relentless mass media propaganda campaign portrays the atrocities as purportedly justified acts of self-defence in response to the October 7 military offensive by Hamas. In recent weeks, documents have revealed that the Israeli regime had detailed knowledge on where and how Hamas would strike and gave the order to stand down, in order to facilitate the attack.

This criminal conspiracy reveals that the Hamas attack was used as a pretext to unleash long-held plans. There is no doubt that the United States was informed of these plans. It points to a plot that involves not only Israel, but the US and likely British and European intelligence agencies.

What is being carried out is a crime of capitalism. The world is seeing imperialism in its most naked form. It is not only a question of the Israeli regime, but of all the worlds major governments, including the Labor administration in this country, which have adopted mass murder as their program.

This is the response of the ruling elite to the historic crisis of the capitalist system. As in the 1930s, they are turning to genocide, war, an onslaught on social conditions and to authoritarian forms of rule. The governments backing Israels onslaught are also trying to ban protests and are implementing sweeping cuts to workers living standards on behalf of a tiny corporate oligarchy.

That demonstrates the bankruptcy of any perspective of halting the genocide by appealing to or placing pressure on the governments. That has been tried and it has failed.

Protests are important, but on their own they are incapable of halting the slaughter. What is required is a political struggle against the governments and the profit system itself. That means the mobilisation of the working class, to block supplies to Israel and starve its war machine.

But above all, it means taking up the fight for a socialist and internationalist perspective. Imperialism is powerful, but the international working class is more powerful. It must be united globally in a movement to put an end to the capitalist system, to reorganise society to meet social need, not profit, and to create the foundations for a world based on peace and equality.

At the meeting, leading members of the SEP will discuss this perspective and present the partys socialist and internationalist program. Ample time will be provided for questions and discussion. Register today!

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Public meeting in Australia: Stop the Gaza genocide! Build a socialist anti-war movement! - WSWS

Between 14-16 July, over 110 comrades from across Britain along with visitors from the recently-founded Irish group of the IMT travelled to the Peak District to participate in the Marxist Student Federations second residentialMarxist Summer Camp.

The theme of this years school wasThe lessons of the Communist International. Founded in 1919 by Lenin and Trotsky as a vehicle for world socialist revolution, the debates and resolutions of the first four congresses of the Comintern offer a treasure trove of communist theory, strategy, and tactics.

Over the weekend, every comrade rolled up their sleeves and got stuck in with the running of the camp whether it was cooking, bartending, cleaning, or running the Wellred Books tent. This teamwork brought comrades closer together, and helped the event to run as seamlessly as possible apart from a few flooded tents!

The weekend opened with a session on the history of Communist International, introduced by Fiona Lali, a national organiser for the MSF.

Fiona traced the unbroken thread of genuine Marxism: from the International Working Mens Association set up by Marx and Engels; through the rise and fall of the Comintern; to our efforts to build an international as part of the IMT today.

As Trotsky explained to the first congress of the Comintern, the role of an international is to generalise the revolutionary experience of the working class to act as its living memory and guide the struggle to victory.

Comrades came into the discussion covering different aspects of this rich history: the battle betweenMarxism and anarchism in the First International;the reformistdegeneration of the Second International;Lenin and Trotskys unwavering defence of internationalism, which laid the basis for the Third International; and much more.

Following dinner in the evening, comrades spent time huddled around the warmth of a campfire singing revolutionary songs from across the world, such asBella Ciao,El Pueblo Unido, andDie Arbeiter von Wien.

The mood was electric, with one comrade describing it as an unforgettable weekend; a perfect mixture of education and fun.

The next morning, comrades got up bright and early for the first two concurrent sessions. In one, comrades discussed theGerman Revolutionof 1918-1923 a revolution which was vital to the success of the world revolution.

The discussion went into the revolutions betrayal by the Social-Democratic leaders, and the mistakes of the inexperienced German Communist Party. These mistakes, flowing from the vacillating leadership offered by Zinoviev and Stalin, paved the way for the defeat of the German working class.

In the other session, comrades discussed Lenins struggle against ultra-leftism: an infantile disorder that the new and inexperienced communist parties suffered from. By refusing on principle to participate in the reformist mass organisations and bourgeois parliaments, the communist parties risked isolating themselves from the broader masses.

The discussion expanded on how communists must meet the masses where they are, using transitional demands that correspond to the stage of the class struggle, in order to raise the sights of the working class to the task of seizing power.

This discussion paired well with the afternoons session on the united front: a tactic adopted by the Comintern to allow the communists to reach the masses, by fighting alongside the reformist organisations, and in doing so exposing the limits of the reformist leaders. This method retains its full importance for communists to this day.

Another session focused on Stalins theory of socialism in one country: an anti-Marxist theory which was put forward by the Soviet bureaucracy,which began to emergeand assert their interests as the Russian Revolution degenerated.

Comrades came into the discussion to highlight how this policy led to the mistakes and betrayals of the Comintern under Stalin, in periods like the1925-27 Chinese Revolution,the1926 British general strike,andSpanish Civil War in the 1930s.

This policy culminated in the transformation of the Comintern from a vehicle for world socialist revolution, into a narrow tool of Kremlin foreign policy, and in its eventual dissolution by Stalin in 1943.

In Saturdays final session, comrades split into groups to discuss our ongoingAre You a Communist?recruitment campaign,and how we can prepare for the upcoming university freshers period.

As one comrade remarked: The caucus provided some great ideas for how we can use our Marxist societies as a tool for building the forces of communism on campus. We cant wait to carry the energy of the Are You a Communist?into universities and colleges!

Comrades then braved the torrential rain for a revolutionary walk along the Monsal Trail, brandishing red flags in the beautiful surroundings of the Peak District.

A fierce downpour forced the comrades to take shelter in a tunnel, where some comrades mounted a soap-box to give some rabble-rousing speeches, and a rendition of theInternationaleerupted.

Once dried off, the camaraderie and high-spirits were transferred to a local pub, where we had lively political discussions, topped off with an uproarious pub quiz.

In the final session on Sunday,Socialist Appealeditor Rob Sewell, outlined Lenins conditions for joining the Communist International.

Rob explained the enduring significance of Bolshevism the living application of Marxist theory and the importance of building a well-trained cadre organisation to prepare for the tasks of revolution.

We are entering an epoch of crisis and instability; of revolution and counter-revolution a period just like the one which gave birth to the Comintern itself.

As Rob summarised: The great days of the Communist International will live again, but this time on a qualitatively higher level.

Comrades left the camp feeling energised and ready to take on the historic tasks at hand. Our enthusiasm stems directly from our understanding of Marxist theory, and our unshakeable faith in the power of the working class.

The thirst for revolutionary theory was evident, when it was announced that the Wellred Books tent hadcompletely sold out of books raising over 1600 for the communist cause.

As one comrade shared: Ive learnt so much; met so many comrades. But most of all I feel so politically energisedIll forever be proud to be part of the IMT.

Now we must finish off what Lenin and the Bolsheviks started over 100 years ago: to build a genuine communist international and complete the task of international socialist revolution.

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Marxist Summer Camp 2023: The lessons of the Communist International - Socialist Appeal

IN JUNE I was one of the recipients of Chinas top award for foreign writers on that country, officially described as: The Special Book Award of China, sponsored by the National Press and Publication Administration of the Peoples Republic of China, is the highest national award given to those who have made outstanding contributions in introducing contemporary China and promoting Chinese publications and related cultural products overseas.

This award has been given to 188 people from 62 countries since its establishment in 2005. It was presented by Li Shulei, a member of the politburo of the Communist Party of China (CPC).

But, receiving this award, I couldnt help thinking of the contrast between the extraordinary achievements of socialist China and another event I witnessed 30 years previously.

Then, Ken Livingstone and I were the last foreigners to attend a session of the Russian parliament before it was illegally suppressed and shelled by tanks by Boris Yeltsin. Western governments and media, showing their customary concern for democracy, cheered Yeltsins attack.

This coup destroyed the last attempt to prevent full-blown capitalism from being unleashed in Russia. My thoughts were therefore focused on the extraordinarily different fates I had witnessed during the intervening 30 years success in socialist China and national disaster, culminating today in the Ukraine war, created by capitalism in Russia.

My being a witness to these events, and their interrelation with China, came about in the following way. From 1992 I lived in Moscow to attempt to persuade Russia to adopt a China-type path of economic reform instead of the shock therapy virtually unanimously advocated by Western governments and media. The most systematic article I wrote at that time, originally published in Russian, had the self-explanatory title: Why the economic reform succeeded in China and will fail in Russia and Eastern Europe.

In Russia this conclusion attracted attention. My analysis, laying out practical proposals flowing from such a perspective, was distributed to every member of the Russian parliament by order of its speaker. Consequently, I established links with the parliaments leadership.

I therefore knew Yeltsins coup was coming several days before it was launched the parliaments leaders were warned that Yeltsin was in contact with military units around Moscow to launch it. Obviously, as a foreigner, I had to do whatever could be done for international solidarity against the coming coup. I contacted journalists in the West and Livingstone, who was at that time an MP.

Livingstone, with his usual decisiveness, also got on a plane to Moscow. When he was introduced to the parliament he was loudly cheered, becoming the last person to bring international solidarity before the coup.

Yeltsins coup was accompanied by the heaviest street fighting in Moscow since the October 1917 revolution with 147 people killed on official figures possibly more.

In the years surrounding this coup, I witnessed disaster unfolding in Russia the most terrible things I have ever witnessed with my own eyes. Russian pensioners so desperate from poverty that they stood in the freezing snow of a Moscow winter for hours trying to sell a single cigarette not even a pack.

Thousands of people on the streets trying to sell homemade pies, old shoes, and household belongings. Life expectancy collapsed. To make it still more morally disgusting this was the generation who had defeated Nazism ensuring their dignified retirement should have been one of the states highest priorities.

Simultaneously I heard, more than once, the new Russian rich explain that it would have been better if Hitler had won the war because capitalism would have been introduced earlier. That if pensioners had difficulty adapting to the new market economy it was better if they died. The openly acknowledged hero of these liberals was Pinochet.

Those leading this catastrophe, a literal massacre of the Russian population, were hailed by the Western media as reformers in the same way that Yeltsin, after ordering tanks to shell the parliament, was deemed a democrat.

I had always known from personal experience and reading the hypocrisy and moral bankruptcy of capitalism, but to personally see it on such a scale gave it a totally sharper emotional charge. Those who covered up this catastrophe deserved the utmost contempt not only in human but in mere intellectual terms.

While this social catastrophe was unfolding, fed by the largest peacetime economic collapse in a major economy since at least the industrial revolution, Nato was tightening its grip around Russia a path I accurately warned my Russian friends would result. This led directly to the Ukraine war.

Today, in very difficult circumstances, the same forces in Russia who fought against national and social catastrophe see todays fight as oneagainst US aggression. One of my best Russian friends frames the question as whether we are going to live in a country or in a US gas station.

Throughout that period, I had no direct contact with China. Accurate predictions of the totally different trends of Chinas economic success and Russias catastrophe were based on Marxist economics, which, unlike Western analysis, proved entirely capable of foreseeing the results.

In 2009 I was invited to work at a Chinese university and since 2013 I have been senior fellow at Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at Renmin University in Beijing. It was there that I did the work leading to the Special Book Award.

In China, with my own eyes, I saw the total contrast between the success of Chinas socialism and Russias capitalist disaster. In Russia, tens of millions were plunged into poverty, in China 850 million people were lifted out of internationally defined poverty over 70 per cent of those lifted from such poverty globally. The economic basis of this was Chinas 9 per cent annual average growth rate since 1991 compared to capitalist Russias 0.9 per cent.

In terms of human development and dignity what such trends mean was expressed by one of my young Chinese friends in words whose directness could only come from personal experience. She said for young people it meant how incredibly lucky to be a Chinese person in this era.

For a century before the Chinese revolution, her country was a place where foreign armies trampled, where between 50 million and 100million people died due to direct and indirect effects of foreign intervention, which by 1949 was almost the worlds poorest country, a state whose fate was being determined by others, not by its own people.

In contrast, in only just over 70 years, a single lifetime, that socialist country had become todays China on the verge of becoming a high-income economy by international criteria, with by far the fastest rise in living standards of any state, and a country which now decides its own fate. These were the human realities I showed resulted from the theoretical issues analysed in my books.

Before the USSRs collapse I saw a slogan neither Washington nor Moscow supposedly declaring that there was no difference between US capitalism and the USSR. Now it has been replaced by neither Washington nor Beijing.

I have seen the practical reality of such views. Apparently, socialists should be indifferent between pensioners so poor they stand in the snow for hours to sell a single cigarette in Russia and 850 million people lifted from poverty in China.

That has nothing to do with socialism. It is out of contact with any human reality.

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Witnessing China's socialist triumph and Russia's capitalist disaster - Morning Star Online