MOVEMENT: You mentioned at another point that the guerrilla was the perfect man and this kind of formulation seem to fit in directly with the guerrilla as a political man. Would you like to comment on this?

HUEY: Yes. The guerrilla is a very unique man. This is in contrast to Marxist-Leninist orthodox theories where the party controls the military. The guerrilla is only the warrior, the military fighter; he is also the military commander as well as the political theoretician. Debray says “poor the pen without the guns, poor the gun without the pen?. The pen being just an extension of the mind, a tool to write down concepts, ideas. The gun is only an extension of the body, the extension of our fanged teeth that we lost through evolution. It’s the weapon, it’s the claws that we lost, it’s the body. The guerrilla is the military commander and the political theoretician all in one.

In Bolivia Che said that he got very little help from the Communist Party there. The Communist Party wanted to be the mind, the Communist Party wanted to have fall control of the guerrilla activity. But yet weren’t taking part in the practical work of the guerrillas. The guerrilla on the other hand is not only united within himself, but he also attempts to spread this to the people by educating the villagers, giving them political perspective , pointing out things, educating them politically, and arming the people. Therefore the guerrilla is giving the peasants and workers a mind. Because they’ve already got the body you get a unity of the mind and the body. Black people here In America, who have long been the workers, have regained our minds and we now have a unity of mind and body.

MOVEMENT: Would you be willing to extend this formula in terms of white radicals; to say that one of their struggles today is to get back -their bodies.

HUEY: Yes. I thought I made that clear. The white mother country radical by becoming an activist is attempting to regain his body. By being in activist and not the traditional theoretician who outlines the plan, as the communist party has been trying to do for ever so long, the white mother country radical is regaining his body. The resistance by white radicals in Berkeley during the past three nights is a good indication that the white radicals are on the way home. They have identified their enemies. The white radicals have integrated theory with practice. They realize the American system is the real enemy but in order to attack the American system they must attack the ordinary cop. In order to attack the educational system they must attack the ordinary teacher. Just as the Vietnamese people to attack the American system must attack the ordinary soldier. The white mother country radicals now are regaining their bodies and they’re also recognizing that the black man has a mind and that he Is a man.

MOVEMENT: Would you comment on how this psychological understanding aids in the revolutionary struggle?

HUEY: You can see that in statements until recently black people who haven’t been enlightened have defined the white man by calling him the “MAN”. “The Man” is making this decision, “The Man” this and “The Man” that. The black woman found it difficult to respect the black man because he didn’t even define himself as a man! Because he didn’t have a mind, because the decision maker was outside of himself. But the vanguard group, the Black Panther Party along with all revolutionary black groups have regained our mind and our manhood. Therefore we no longer define the omnipotent administrator as “the Man” . . . or the authority as “the MAN”. Matter of fact the omnipotent administrator along with his security agents are less than a man because WE define them as pigs! I think that this is a revolutionary thing in itself. That’s political power. That’s power itself. Matter of fact what is power other than the ability to define phenomenon and then make it act in a desired manner? When black people start defining things and making it act in a desired manner, then we call this Black Power!

MOVEMENT: Would you comment further on what you mean by Black Power?

HUEY: Black Power is really people’s power. The Black Panther Program, Panther Power as we call it, will implement this people’s power. We have respect for all of humanity and we realize that the people should rule and determine their destiny. Wipe out the controller. To have Black Power doesn’t humble or subjugate anyone to slavery or oppression. Black Power is giving power to people who have not had power to determine their destiny. We advocate and we aid any people who are struggling to determine their destiny. This is regardless of color. The Vietnamese say Vietnam should be able to determine its own destiny. Power of the Vietnamese people. We also chant power of the Vietnamese people. The Latins are talking about Latin America for the Latin Americans. Cuba Si and Yanqui, Non. It’s not that they don’t want the Yankees to have any power they just don’t want them to have power over them. They can have power over themselves. We in the black colony in America want to be able to have power over our destiny and that’s black power.

MOVEMENT: A lot of white radicals are romantic about what Che said: “In a revolution one wins or dies . . .” For most of us it is really an abstract or theoretical question. It’s a real question for you and we’d like you to rap about how you feel about it.

Huey: Yes. The revolutionary sees no compromise. We will not compromise because the issue is so basic. If we compromise one iota, we will be selling our freedom out. We will be selling the revolution out. And we refuse to remain slaves. As Eldridge says in SOUL ON ICE “a slave who dies of natural causes will not balance two dead flies on the scales of eternity.” As far as we’re concerned we would rather be dead than to go on with the slavery that we’re in. Once we compromise we will be compromising not only our freedom, but also our manhood. We realize that we’re going up against a highly technical country, and we realize that they are not only paper tigers, as Mao says, but real tigers too because they have the ability to slaughter many people. But in the long run, they will prove themselves paper tigers because they’re not in, line with humanity; they are divorced from the people. We know that the enemy is very powerful and that our manhood is at stake, but we feel it necessary to be victorious In regaining ourselves, regaining our manhood. And this is the basic point. So either we will do this or we won’t have any freedom. Either we will win or we will the trying to win.

Mood of Black People

MOVEMENT: How would you characterize the mood of black people in America today? Are they disenchanted, wanting a larger slice of the pie, or alienated, not wanting to integrate into a burning house, not wanting to integrate into Babylon? What do you think it will take for them to become alienated and revolutionary?

HUEY: I was going to say disillusioned, but I don’t think we were ever under the illusion that we had freedom in this country. This society is definitely a decadent one and we realize it. Black people are realizing it more and more. We cannot gain our freedom under the present system; the system that is carrying out its plans of institutionalized racism. Your question is what will have to be done to stimulate them to revolution. I think it’s already being done. It’s a matter of time now for us to educate them to a program and show them the way to liberation. The Black Panther Party is the beacon light to show black people the way to liberation.

You notice the Insurrections that have been going on throughout the country, in Watts, In Newark, in Detroit. They were all responses of the people demanding that they have freedom to determine their destiny, rejecting exploitation. Now the Black Panther Party does not think that the traditional riots, or insurrections that have taken place are the answer. it is true they have been against the Establishment, they have been against authority and oppression within their community, but they have been unorganized. However, black people learned from each of these insurrections.

They learned from Watts. I’m sure the people in Detroit were educated by what happened in Watts. Perhaps this was wrong education. It sort of missed the mark. It wasn’t quite the correct activity, but the people were educated through the activity. The people of Detroit followed the example of the people In Watts, only they added a little scrutiny to It. The people in Detroit learned that the way to put a hurt on the administration is to make Molotov cocktails and to go Into the street in mass numbers. So this was a matter of learning. The slogan went up “Burn, baby, burn’. People were educated through the activity and it spread throughout the country. The people were educated on how to resist, but Perhaps incorrectly.

Educate Though Activity

page from newspaper The Black Panther reads “Zionism (kosher Nationalism) imperialism = fascism

What we have to do as a vanguard of the revolution is to correct this through activity. The large majority of black people are either illiterate or semiliterate. They don’t read. They need activity to follow. This is true of any colonized people. The same thing happened in Cuba where it was necessary for twelve men with a leadership of Che and Fidel to take to the hills and then attack the corrupt administration; to attack the army who were the protectors of the exploiters in Cuba. They could have leafleted the community and they could have written books, but the people would not respond. They had to act and the people could see and hear about it and therefore become educated on how to respond to oppression.

In this country black revolutionaries have to set in example. We can’t do the same things that were done in Cuba because Cuba is Cuba and the U.S. is the U.S. Cuba has many terrains to protect the guerrilla. This country is mainly urban. we have to work out new solutions to offset the power of the country’s technology and communication; its ability to communicate very rapidly by telephone and teletype and so forth.

We do have solutions to these problems and they will be put into effect. I wouldn’t want to go into the ways and means of this, but we will educate through action. We have to engage in action to make the people want to read our literature. Because they are not attracted to all the writing in this country; there’s too much writing. Many books makes one weary.

Threat from Reformers

MOVEMENT: Kennedy before his death and to a lesser extent Rockefeller and Lindsay and other establishment liberals have been talking about making reforms to give black people a greater share in the pie and thus stop any developing revolutionary movement. Would you comment on this?

HUEY: I would say this: If a Kennedy or Lindsay or anyone else can give decent housing to all of our people; if they can give full employment to our People with a high standard; if they can give full control to black people to determine the destiny of their community; if they can give fair trials in the court system by turning over the structure to the community; if they can end their exploitation of people throughout the world; if they can do all of these things they would have solved the problems. But I don’t believe that under this present system, under capitalism, that they will be able to solve these problems.

People Must Control

I don’t think black people should be fooled by their come-ons because every one who gets in office promises the same thing. They promise full employment and decent housing; the Great Society, the New Frontier, All of these names, but no real benefits. No effects are felt in the black community, and black people are tired of being deceived and duped, The people must have full control of the means of production. Small black businesses cannot compete with General Motors. That’s just out of the question. General Motors robbed us and worked us for nothing for a couple hundred years and took our money and set up factories and became fat and rich and then talks about giving us some of the crumbs. We want full control. We’re not interested in anyone promising that the private owners are going to all of a sudden become human beings and give these things to our community. It hasn’t ever happened and, based on empirical evidence, we don’t expect them to become Buddhists over night.

MOVEMENT: We raised this question not because we feel that these reforms are possible, but rather to get your ideas on what effects such attempted reforms might have on the development of a revolutionary struggle.

HUEY: I think that reforms pose no real threat. The revolution has always been in the hands of the young. The young always inherit the revolution. The young population is growing at a very rapid rate and they are very displeased with the authorities. They want control. I doubt that under the present system any kind of program can be launched that will be able to buy off all these young people. They have not been able to do it with the poverty program, the great society, etc. This country has never been able to employ all of its people simply because it’s too interested in private property and the profit motive. A bigger poverty program is just what it says it is, a program to keep people in poverty, So I don’t think that there is any real threat from the reforms.

MOVEMENT. Would you like to say something about the Panther’s organizing especially in terms of the youth?

HUEY: The Panthers represent a cross section of the black community. We have older people as well as younger people. The younger people of course are the ones who are seen on the streets. They are the activists. They are the real vanguard of change because they haven’t been indoctrinated and they haven’t submitted. They haven’t been beaten into line as some of the older people have. But many of the older people realize that we’re waging a just fight against the oppressor. They are aiding us and they are taking a part in the program.

Jail

MOVEMENT: Tell us something about your relations with the prisoners in the jail

still from revolutionary film Bush Mama

HUEY: The black prisoners as well as many of the white prisoners identify with the program of the Panthers. Of course by the very nature of their being prisoners they can see the oppression and they’ve suffered at the hands of the Gestapo. They have reacted to it. The black prisoners have all joined the Panthers, about 95% of them. Now the jail is all Panther and the police are very worried about this. The white prisoners can identify with us because they realize that they are not in control. They realize there’s someone controlling them and the rest of the world with guns. They want some control over their lives also. The Panthers in jail have been educating them and so we are going along with the revolution inside of the jail.

MOVEMENT: What has been the effect of the demonstrations outside the jail calling for “Free Huey” ?

HUEY: Very positive reactions. One demonstration, I don’t remember which one, a couple of trustees, white trustees, held a cardboard sign out the laundry window reading *Free Huey”. They say people saw it and responded to it. They were very enthusiastic about the demonstrators because they too suffer from being treated unfairly by the parole authorities and by the police here in the jail.

Open or Underground

MOVEMENT: The Panthers organizing efforts have been very open up until this point. Would you like to comment about the question of an underground political organization versus an open organization at this point in the struggle?

HUEY: Yeah. Some of the black nationalist groups feel that they have to be underground because they’ll be attacked. But we don’t feel that you can romanticize being underground. They say we’re romantic because we’re trying to live revolutionary lives, and we are not taking precautions. But we say that the only way we would go underground is if we’re driven underground. All real revolutionary movements are driven underground. Take the revolution in Cuba. The agitation that was going on while Fidel was in law school was very much above ground. Even his existence in the hills was, so to speak, an above the ground affair because he was letting it be known who was doing the damage and why he was doing the damage. To catch him was a different story. The only way we can educate the people is by setting an example for them. We feel that this is very necessary.

This is a pre-revolutionary period and we feel it is very necessary to educate the people while we can. So we’re very open about this education. We have been attacked and we will be attacked even more in the future but we’re not going to go underground until we get ready to go underground because we have a mind of our own. We’re not going to let anyone force us to do anything. We’re going to go underground after we educate all of the blank people and not before that time. Then it wont really be necessary for us to go underground because you can see black anywhere. We will just have the stuff to protect ourselves and the strategy to offset the great power that the strong-arm men of the establishment have and are planning to use against us.

MOVEMENT: Your comments about the white prisoners seemed encouraging. Do you see the possibility of organizing a white Panther Party in opposition to the establishment possibly among poor and working whites?

HUEY: Well as I put it before Black Power is people ‘s power and as far as organizing white people we give white people the privilege of having a mind and we want them to get a body. They can organize themselves. We can tell them what they should do, what their responsibility is if they’re going to claim to be white revolutionaries or white mother country radicals, and that is to arm themselves and support the colonies around the world in their just struggle against imperialism. But anything more than that they will have to do on their own.