Letters from Prison

Kuwasi Balagoon

1983-1985
Contents

‘The Trial
‘The Left

Anti-Imperialism, Nationhood and National Liber-
ation

Anarchism
‘The Enemy

Prison Life

15

13

23

27
The Trial

April 12 1983

We've been dealing with the public movements so much
with explaining our stance and perceptions that it has
twisted me to the point where i've written very little suitable
for publication for Bulldozer. Having to unify with M-L
[Marxist-Leninist] and Nationalist and to defend the rights to
nationalist aspirations have pulled me a bit out of line with
my predilections.

December 9 1983

‘That bullshit about seventy five years wasn't designed to ef-
fect me, i had been sentenced to twenty five to thirty before.
Dec 22, i1l be 37 years old. That sentence was to effect others
to frighten others into giving up their lives altogether without
fighting for real control of their lives. But if i worked thirty
years at the post office and went bowling on Thursdays or do-
ing anything but opposing the U, i'd be worse off, it would
be like making a rope so my children and myself could be tied
up.

Jan 25 1984

The federal trial ended with the five most politico people tak-
ing the most principled position getting convicted of conspir-
acy, two others convicted basically for not turning their backs
on their friends once they were wanted (aiding and abetting)
and two acquitted altogether, one which all they had was a
traitor cocaine fiend's word on, the other who had two traitors
words against him~—and had fled to Belize (British Honduras)
and extradited back. So people called it a victory—but i really
don't think so, the government didn't get all they wanted but

5
4 out of 67 and the two most politico, getting the highest con-
victions?

‘The line i put forth is that the question of if it's a victory,
lies with how many people are mobilized by it the same with
our portion of it. i am glad for the people who are home now,
but legally didn't that much happen, simple math. Politically
i feel a bit disappointed, but at the same time i know that the
weight of what went down and what we said, ete. should grow,
people will get better at explaining it, that just our defiance in
the face of what the state says is life, will have more impact as
life progresses
The Left

May 31 1983
We had to hassle with the Guardian to git one article coun-
tering some reactionary shit they were saying and the rest of
the “left” has disassociated themselves from us like most of
the left in Canada disassociates themselves from the Vancou-
ver Five. We took Prisoner of War positions to forfeit the illu-
sion of the state being able to judge enemies of the state. In the
first place most of the left didn't even speak to it the “establish-
ment” press mentioned it first and a lot of the folks who protest
US. involvement in Central America condemn us for, git this,
shooting three working class people. You know who they are
talking about, a sweat hog guard and two outright pigs.

Two papers especially, the Village Voice and the Rolling Stone
are mistakened for left because they cover anti-nuke rallies and
ete, had it in for us from the beginning. They would print ac-
counts by police and creeps nowhere near the underground
and at the same time refuse to print anything any of us had to
say. It's still their policy. The Voice demanded the inside scoop
on one person’s sex life after they sent in a political article, the
Rolling Stone wrote a series on the Weather people at about the
same time the national news agencies were doing a number on
us, dripping with sexual accounts, even a picture (a drawing).

May 31 1983

i think we tend to use the term “left” too loosely, everybody
left of Reagan ain't left. Basic self-determination, the means of
production being in the hands of the workers, should be the
eriteria of recognizing an ideology as left. Just because some-
one doesn't want some fool in Washington to blow the world

7
to pieces doesn't make them left. Everybody who protests the
curtailing of civil liberties that effect them, ain't left. And we
make a mistake when we assume that they are, and they let us
Know we made mistakes when the basic issues arise.

May 311983

When a gay group protests lack of police protection, by mak-
ing an alliance with police to form a gay task force, they ain't
making a stand against the system they are joining it. Putting
more power in the hands of those who attack them for being
what they are in the first place. Those women's organizations
with members with underpaid Black, Puerto Rican and Mex-
ican maids, who decided to vote differently when the Equal
Rights Amendment was defeated, can't be called Left, just as
Blacks mobilizing to field a presidential candidate arn't left.
Left is the land and means of production in the hands of the
masses and Right is land and the means of production in the
hands of a few pigs. As i am writing this it occurs to me that
it sounds rigid, but dealing with land and the means of produc-
tion in a different manner calls for a different system. This is
not to say that we should sabotage anti-nuke... organizations
that call themselves “left"... but we should keep the basics con-
stantly in debates and we should establish the working defini-
tion.

Xmas Night, 19837

The point is that there are only a few people in the “left”
about armed struggle and self-determination, so although i per-
sonally think they are ideological imperialist, i will work with
them as i do with nationalist, even though they are hierarchi-
cal and righteous Muslims even though i am anti-religion. i
think it's OK as long as you don't get lost in the sauce, so to
speak~—that is abandon anarchist principles and the objective
of building anarchist organizations

Xmas Night, 19837

1t's a very dangerous period we have been going through,
the state is quickly consolidating fascism on the one hand and

8
on the other hand there’s no mass movement. All kinds of laws
are being passed with no debate, and people are looking to
Jesse Jackson to change the focus of things, and ot only is
he electoral (which goes without saying) but he's reactionary.
He stands up in front of rallies and says things like “if we (got
that we, that tells you he’s an uncle tom right away) can't have
enough marines in Lebanon to do the job, we should bring the
americans home. Bring our boys back” Well, if we have any
boys in the Marines then obviously our boys have gone astray.
What in the fuck are they doing over there in the first place?
Why are there so many ads in Black magazines and in the com-
‘mercials at basketball and football games and boxing matches
with Blacks and the phrase “Be all that you can be” for the US.
Armed Forces? There's nobody Black addressing that

Xmas Night, 19837

Not since the Western Federation of Miners and the Wob-
blies in the 30's, have workers been struggling for actual con-
trol and in fact ownership, but in the past couple of years Grey-
hound Bus Company, National Baseball League and some other
unions have been kicking it around. At the same time all the
public movements—since they are too elitist to even want to
organize the working class and they fear them like the plague
because the public movements are largely petty bourgeois, col-
lege students, white collar workers, etc.—have been debating
each other in a vacuum, instead of really going out to work

Xmas Night, 19837

After that ass-kicking in Southeast Asia you can bet your
life they went through a lot of mass psychological preparation
before going to Lebanon, or invading Grenada, but their calcu-
Iations proved true. There has been no real response from the
black colony here—and culturally and historically the Grenadi-
ans are so similar to us that it's incredible. They've been able to
do all of this because there’s been no real mass movement and
S0 many outright reactionaries like Jackson, who has the bless-
ings of all the egghead, pencilneck, armchair Marxist and black

9
cop-out artist posing as progressive. The only high points oc-
cur when the United Freedom Front or United Fighting Group
or FALN strikes, which at least has been happening fairly con-
sistently.

Jan 22 1984

1t's a small circle of revolutionaries in this hemisphere or in
the Northern half of it, we can't just deal within the same small
circle, at some point new recruits must be won over, youth
must be ignited: all the rallies have got basically the same peo-
ple showing year after year.i ask do these activists talk to peo-
ple outside the movement, obviously they don't talk to people
about the movement—we got to build a movement of activists
who.. address people who are already committed as well as
people who are into other things. “The revolutionary war is
a war of the masses: it can be waged only by mobilizing the
‘masses and relying on them”

Jan 25 1984

[] the sad thing is those white M-Ls who are really few in
‘number—when it comes to supporting armed struggle, have no
foothold in the white working class, and being mostly of a petty
bourgeois background not only don’t know where to begin but
are contemptuous of the working class—even though the petty
bourgeoisie as a class is at least as reactionary. Plus they are
just beginning to be clear as to the fact that New Afrikans are
indeed colonized and what that means and just beginning to
accept their role in the struggle to initiate the overthrow of
the bourgeoisie and the establishment of a dictatorship of the
proletariat—they ain't really Marxist and morality has been
their line rather than the nuts and bolts of what is really go-
ing on. That in itself wouldn't be so bad but the fact is the Na-
tionalist on this coast, where the [Brink's] trial actually took
place, simply refuses to organize in the black community, no
survival programs which New Afiikans need, no challenging
the neocolonial Uncle Toms, like Jackson-Washington, etc,, no
showing up at police brutality hearings to declare that the is-

10
sue is not a few mad dog cowboy cops, but a mad dog cowboy
empire, no going to the New Afrikan colonies at all. To them,
itis enough to tell people what is happening with us, which is
ridiculous when people are starving, freezing and getting shot
themselves, but they believe in magic words

May 21984

There's a lot of Islamic influences in our movement now—
there always have been—but now more than ever. i am flooded
with Islamic propaganda through the mails that i pass on to
Muslims, and at the same time i am a bit shook up about it,
but rather than counter this, i intend to cooperate when it's
principled, continue to argue when points of difference arise
and busy myself with what i am up to my neck with and let
the people decide.

Jan9 1985

i hope this finds you in the best of health and spirits as it
leaves me feeling OK, considering everything. At least except
for the last round of busts nothing of consequence has hap-
pened and at the same time there's been a lot of busts. Suppos-
edly support is growing, people from other movements have
been shook up by the indictments for thought crime and there
has certainly been enough grand jury subpoenas to constitute
a witch hunt (28 this far to my count) and the black colony is
stirring behind it, but i don't know what the movement is do-
ing inside the colony. i've heard they have vowed to do more
grasstoots organizing and i hope so because people are upset
about the pigs who've really been getting away with the gross-
est murders as well. In one case they tortured a guy to death for
allegedly writing on the subway walls and in another they shot
a sixty year old woman while evicting her. So any retaliation
action should have the nod.

Jan 9 1985

[T]he part of the “left” that has no interest in what is happen-
ing to prisoners and prisoners of war, is not left. If the differ-
ence is that we believe in the decentralization of wealth, the

1
redistribution of land and armed struggle—and those of the
right believe in amassing more wealth, building empire and
repression—then these are the lines by which we should define
“left” and “right”. We can't go by other people’s definitions—
even their definitions of themselves—suppose Rev Sun Myung
Moon declares he's left, against the establishment and has been
victimized by racism. The left here is small in proportion to the
population no matter how you define it—but when you talk
about redistribution, freeing the colonies, etc. it's micro and
when you talk doing and actually do something—people look
at you as if you're from Mars—RARE SPECIES. You put that
same measure to Canada, I'd bet it's micro too. So if we limit
our propaganda to people in the left and Bulldozer reaches a
small percent of that, people who are down already—Martians.

Revolution

May 311983

When a principled conscientious public movement is devel-
oped there's no problem finding soldiers, and in terms of being
as best as you can, figure what the revolution needs: there's a
ot you can do that can't be taken for granted. The speech you
‘makeat the rally would be impossible to give if you were under-
ground and you would have to hope that someone else would
All of us who agree would have to hope also. Meanwhile by
the time the public movement gits built to the point where you
Know those things will be said, and there's comrades out or-
ganizing people to take their lives into their own hands, there
will be an army to play its historic role.

i never was happy with the amount of input i could con-
tribute when i was in the underground. There’s little chance
to debate with people doing aboveground organizing, and if
you don't agree with how they are going about things there's
not much you can do. That problem is not unavoidable, but it
is a problem.

May 21984

12
And although there’s been a lot of bombings, i think that
the hierarchy embedded in the consciousness of the movement
prevents the type of attacks we used to stage with the sole
purpose of punishing pigs with death. There’s not enough real
[punishment] for them kind—translated into a body count, that
registers in the population—that these creatures can indeed be
dealt with, and the way i see it retaliation will have to be com-
mon place for a long time before people are really prepared
to support revolution. With all kinds of things happening to
revolutionaries and people who just mind their own business
and nothing happening to the pigs and very little happening to
turds like [Samuel] Brown—just doesn't seem to be a balanced
and attractive occupation.

July 28 1984

Reaction has been moving on a grassroots level uncontested.
Here the Klan says that illegal aliens take jobs, while Ford, IBM
and so many other corporations move plants to South Africa,
England, Korea, etc. There's plants operating in Mexico where
US. corporations ship parts to be assembled and shipped back
to the US.—why don't the corporations git blamed for stealing
jobs? What's the difference, except that the corporations
pocket the difference in wages? The Klan, Nazis, etc. spread
their crap uncontested as champions of the white workers,
when it's clear that they are dupes of the ruling class. If we
really adopt the preamble to the wobblies' constitution, that
the working class and the ruling class have absolutely no
common interest, we will beat them on the ground level, we
will out-organize them—and as they are tools of the empire,
we will begin to be out-organizing the empire. Once the
fragments of the working class are united in hostilities against
reaction instead of each other—the tide will begin to shit

An anarchist underground will develop in turn, with the
only connection to the aboveground being anarchist ideology
which is enough. The relatively simple tasks the pigs have now
of peeking into the visible and exposed sections of the move-

13
ment, to aim their gadgetry for suspects, will be fruitless, with
really widespread mass mobilizations. With a federated army
of collectives, striking at whatever is opportune in the area
of monopoly capital, imperialism and repression, we will be
settled down in a long protracted people’s war, that can't be
nipped at the bud, until the governments simply cannot exist
and authority and economies collapse. To of course be replaced
by one built around collectives, rather than capitalism or state
capitalism. All railroads, ship lines, airlines, phone companies,
oil, gas and electric companies will be socialized, all trucking
will be put into the collective ownership of drivers, all over-
seas possessions left to sink, all textile mills collectivized, all
military industries and arms manufacturers taken over by mili-
tias. A people’s referendun is set for Native, New Afrikan, Chi-
cano and Puerto Rican nationals in the mainland, to decide on
autonomy with 17 acres set aside in a common area for all
that vote for Nationhood. As well as a referendum for Whites
who wish to live separately. The chemical companies, banks,
ete. and other capitalist residue being the province of the will
of the people who live in certain areas.

If we don't already have an established territory and per-
haps if we do, we set another people’s referendum for those
of us who want no government. A federation of collectives
would conduct the referendum, the local militias would mop
up the reactionary residue. With no public capital in private
hands there wouldn't be any ruling class to suppress in the
anarchist areas, where people choose state socialism, there
would be no interference from us. Just what i envision, but the
idea of doing away with money—just arranging things so that
everyone who wants gets necessities, food, clothing, housing,
education—knocks me out. If we needed a transitional period
we determine that reefer is currency.

1
Anti-Imperialism,
Nationhood and National
Liberation

May 21984

‘The Native American struggle is against imperialist occupa-
tion. Because the present movement doesn't know how to deal
with this doesn't make it any less so. That's just a shortcoming
of the movement, but a second's thought would have to tell us
that Native Americans were indeed the first victims of imperi-
alism in this hemisphere and if we are to be anarchist in the
here and now and thus be anti-imperialist as one cannot be an
anarchist and not be against imperialism, we got to accept the
Native struggle as our own. If the greeds had not put the Na-
tives in their position, none of us would be in the position we

May 21984

1ts clear to anyone that Native peoples are repressed more
5o than anyone else, that genocide has been practiced against
them more so than any people who still exist as a people. Well
that means we got to defend them—fight alongside of them
just like they fought alongside of the slaves. People shouldn’t
be able to forget for a moment that this land was under the
guardianship of Native Americans for centuries before anyone
else arrived. Anyway the way to start is by recognizing if
you're supporting land and liberation for Native America
you're anti-imperialist and should be in a movement that rec-

15
ognizes and includes that and if there’s no movement—well,
you got to build one.

May 21984

[T)o me it's the ultimate meddling. . for a white person sup-
posedly for the revolution to oppose tendencies for third world
people confined to various reservations in the present US. It
seems rather clear to me how our history here would kind of
inhibit us from wanting to continue to be outnumbered and
surrounded by whites.

July 28 1984

This is the place to begin erasing borders, not only because
the US. uses up 40% of the world's resources and the bottom
fifty percent of the population controls only eight point two
percent of the economy (nationally) but on top of it five per-
cent of the population controls seventy percent of the land.
Peoples from the South whose land and resources have gone
into this empire are coming to get it and are entitled to it just as
the West Indians and East Indians are entitled to the portions
of the British Empire they were forced to donate as colonial
subjects. Anti-Imperialist struggle grows out of anti-capitalist
(class struggle) just as imperialism is a development of capital-

Jan 9 1985

Right now i am into a slight struggle, with a comrade who
put forth the proposition of whites supporting national libera-
tion as i (especially after reading Mythology of the White Pro-
letariaf) believe in parallel development, complete movements
engaged in national liberation and class struggle Civil War in-
side the oppressor nations. The fact that this is now only be-
ginning to happen, that whites are striking blows at the colo-
nial apparatus is one thing—but colonial subjects should be free
to attack monopoly capital [...] phone companies rip everyone
off, but these policies in the black community are really dif-
ferent, when i lived in a predominantly white neighborhood i
never was pressured to pay like friends living in the colonies

16
and whereas the defense industrial complex may rip everyone
in the confines, it murders us. i've read the Mythology of the
White Proletariat and know what i would write in a book re-
view now...it's enlightening, but i would hope that it wasn't
used as an excuse by a lot of whites to not attempt to organize
inside the oppressor nation,

17
Anarchism

April 12 1983

i hope this letter finds you in good health and high spirits
as it leaves me none of the worst for wear and really happy to
hear from you as Bulldozer is my favorite political publication.
ireally hope we can work well together and promise to make a
sustained effort in keeping the lines out and open and working
as although i share a lot of feelings and principles with the
Nationalist and Anti-Imperialist movements i am an Anarchist
and feel rather isolated ideologically and low for not pushing
my polities as much as i should. This has mostly been due to a
Tack of connection with the anarchist movement due again for
my being on the lamb and working with who i could readily
see were opposing the state

Xmas Night, 19837

i think that throughout this hemisphere we should unite
with real get down anarchists first and then others, and
recognize that the so-called left doesn't really represent a lot
of people. The politics of the so-called left hasn't reached a lot
of people and their elitist airs are actually turn offs—there's
not much mention of “serving the people”. If we start putting
things together that actually do serve people the day when
Anarchy is seen as a viable way of life rather than chaos will
not be far away, because most people when they stop and
think of it have to admit that the empire sucks.

Jan 22 1984

Tonight i am up eating peanut butter sandwiches, just
putting the stale bread over steaming water, when for years
i automatically threw it out and fed it to the birds (this being

18
one of the few times the birds might be better off for it). i
think that waste and bourgeois thinking really affects how
we operate, both in terms of perceiving strong points and
weak points and effectiveness, when it comes to acting after
we make our observations. In Viet Nam, GLs had to burn,
bury and grind the stuff they sent to the dumps, because the
Cong would use the tin cans, wire, bottles and whatever else
against them. They can't o that here because they're always
encouraging people to consume more and make more waste

On the other end i think that making the most of everything
is exemplified pretty well by working in a collective setting
and living in a co-op, and it seems like it would be an easy
thing to found an anarchist food co-op somexwhere in Toronto.
As time goes on Anti-Imperialist Anarchism will prove to be
the only anarchism, since others will need to make alterations.
We should push the idea of collectives and federations while
continuing to support anti-imperialist struggle with the aim
of not merely building a real movement that really supports
armed struggle, but an actual infrastructure.

Jan 22 1984

[T)he idea of collectives was alien to the Panther Party. We
had different survival programs and people were involved to be
part of them, to donate time, afford to git things/stuff [from]
businesses operating inside the community, to use the space of
institutions such as churches. But the Party being a hierarchy
simply could not simply initiate alternatives—it felt it had to
lead them~—it was to be in its mind and words not just the lead-
ing party but the sole representative of the Black colony. So
there was not any organized effort to take space in the colony
and to actually produce (only to distribute) or to provide trans-
port or a militia. It was miles away from all of that because
it was a hierarchy. To fully take on the power structure in a
given area, you got to not only provide alternatives, but insti-
tutions that render the old ones useless. Just completely take
their place, that provide the [goods] itself so it's not a ques-

19
tion of a merchant giving material aide to our operation or be-
ing boycotted, but a mechanism where one by one, the outlets
become collective, because the economy evolves to the point
where the corporate fingers just cannot pull the strings. You
don't call a checker cab when an outlaw gypsy cab service
will take you where you want to go cheaper, you don't shop
at Safeway if you can buy what you want cheaper at a co-op.
People are putting all kinds of co-ops together—the trick is to
form a federation that takes care of the needs of its members
and invites more. That teaches self-reliance and demonstrates
it. That supports and practices Anti-Imperialism and demon-
strates that you don't have to be a party to it and that Impe-
rialism is not necessary because capitalism is not necessary,
rather than necessary evils they are just evils. This sounds like
preaching, but without examples how would you expect it to
sound

Jan 25 1984

Why ain't an Anti-lmperialist Anarchist organization—
that's pro-armed struggle + self-determination for oppressed
nations + socialism and liberty and complete egalitarianism
been formed? With collectives in areas wherever there's
enough individuals to put one together and an International
Hemispheric program? A “Committee to Promote Anarchy”.
‘That way at least people who think similar to us would at least
have a unified voice inside and outside the prisons. The Net-
work for all its looseness does cover a lot of territory—rather
than debut with the anarchist who ain’t about what we are
about or compromise with M-Ls and Nationalist, we should
start building something to take directly to the masses. That
doesn’t mean everybody who thinks similar to us, isolating
themselves, the way i am, not dealing with M-Ls, Nationalist
and Anarchist or even trying to ignite reformist—but it means
putting something of our own on the ground.

May 21984

2
What's as bad is that public movements can't grow into mass
‘movements, not because of the apathy that they claim every-
one else has but because of a fantastic elitism. If they organize
a mass movement, they'll lose their identities. They won't be
50 much smarter than the people they're supposed to be orga-
nizing and providing models for. OF course there’s other real
reasons too, the almighty media and state floods peoples minds
with the centuries of chauvinism and diversions coupled with
an economy that makes rent too much to think about. But the
‘main thing that effects people s that they know no other way
and have no access to a living breathing ideology or a move-
ment that does things differently. But there’s no public move-
‘ment that recognizes this, and i think that that is partly because
the next step would be doing things differently... at the same
time what you do shapes how you think, 5o it's a vicious cycle.

Anarchy is the ideal way to break out of i, but since it's been
defined as chaos, by every other proponent of every other ideol-
ogy on one hand, and defined by too many people who define
themselves as anarchist as “whatever”, it is simply not being
presented for people’s inspection. A collective is not only (for
Iack of a better word) a propaganda organ because its members
ay or print certain things, it’s a propaganda unit [..] If a
collective chooses to recycle and accumulate capital for a co-op
of sorts, people will see people working together [..] they will
see a process that can be duplicated. [ With eggheads sitting
around spinning yarns and isms you have something that can
be duplicated, but for what? The masses are smart not to get
involved in any more bullshit

July 28 1984

The crazy thing is that there are no anti-imperialist organi-
zations with a class analysis or program. Of the “communist”
who speak of (their only support of)strikes, none of them really
make a stand for self-determination of oppressed and super-
exploited colonies, of the anti-imperialist organizations who
do support self-determination, there are none that explain the

21
exploitation of the working class in terms of its relation to im-
perialism

If an anti-imperialist anarchist organization establishes
itself and calls for an end to imperialism abroad and within the
borders of this hemisphere and supports self-determination
for oppressed nations and supports the working class struggle
against the same monopoly capitalists who reap the lion's
share of super-profits from the colonies, it will be the only or-
ganization with a complete ideology. Ifthis same organization
begins modest programs in the most depressed areas, centered
around survival, turning waste into capital, taking over spaces
and occupying them for the good of the community, offering
services denied to the communities like food co-ops, clothing
exchanges and book exchanges and then extended this into
taxis and a militia to deal with the Klan and other predators,
but on top of this supports auto workers, hospital workers,
ete. when they are on strike, etc. and reports and explains
why, we will soon have an international community-based
organization that people will support. They will not only buy
a paper that could expand into an international paper with
its own distribution system, but cultural activities, because
they will see what's happening with their support and more
importantly they will have access to a new way of living

July 28 1984

Maybe i've been sitting around thinking of the same shit too
long, but it seems to me that Anarchy would have to be anti-
imperialist, that there’s no other ideology that refuses to rec-
ognize borders. Every communist regime has degenerated into
a narrow nationalist state capitalism, almost as if and i tend to
think that they couldn't help it. Stalin might have been a bas-
tard but he wasn't corrupt, or Mao for that matter, the masses
were certainly willing to make sacrifices, but what do we have
now, the very first communist state invading another country
“to protect its borders.” and the second making a treaty with
the US.

2
The Enemy

August 18th 1983

a physical propaganda offensive has been escalated
against supporters and other aboveground legal people. About
a month ago two sisters and three children, one only two
years old, came to visit. At first the cops gave them a run
around about how they dressed, which was bullshit and then
they gave them a run around about ID. Their ID works out OK
when they visit other jails, but after being held up and insulted
by pigs with no name tags or badge numbers, they were told
to leave. When they went back to their car and drove off they
were stopped by a pig who went through their papers and
mumbled some sap rap and let them go. This made them really
paranoid, and they drove way under the speed limit which
saved their lives, because a wheel started to wobble. Once
they wobbled into a gas station and had it checked out they
discovered that the bolts between the wheel and the axle had
been loosened. Had they driven on the highway at 55 miles an
hour they would have had an accident and with five people
in the car, three of them children, there’s no telling how bad
it would have been. One accident occurred like that after
the John Brown conference in Chicago last year and another
at a conference in Texas a bit before that, you would think
by now people would automatically check wheels. About
two weeks after that one of the sisters, ____, after going to
court, where her old man is on trial, went shopping and then
caught a subway not far from her home, when she got off and
decided to catch a bus to it closer, two white guys stepped
in and asked her for directions. When she took her attention

2
off them, one of them started punching her while the other
acted as a lookout. The one punching her knocked her down,
continued to punch her, took her pocket book with rent and
bill money, and then kept on punching her in the face, while
sitting on her. Just before he stopped and left, he said, “Your
husband can’t help you now?” There’s been the usual break-ins
and women running into guys they find out later are cops
Right-wing underground harassment (so far it seems) groups
have been stepping up their activities. So that's the general
tone of things

Xmas Night, 19837

There's a conservative wave sweeping the UsS., lots of mob
attacks on Third World people, lots of police killings, one
eracker in Detroit got two years probation because he beat
a Chinese guy to death and the judge said the punishment
should “fit the criminal, not the crime”. Vietnamese in Boston
and Texas are being attacked at random. In Western Mas-
sachusetts the Feds were called in to investigate attacks on
women, and started investigating the women's links with
“terrorists”, at the same time there’s been 30 fires in a women's
dorm and they've arrested a Black woman who lived there
and kicked her out of the school, a white guy who is charged
with rape still goes. The local pigs have raided the projects
(public housing) with slug hammers twice under different
pretences that didn't pan out, the feds did security for the
United Technologies Corporation, which has been having
a secret conference there—as if those turds can't afford to
hire Pinkerton. And ROTC, the young Republicans, SH.UN.
(Stop Homosexual Unity Now) and every other type of Nazi is
running rabid and that's just one town. And as i said there’s a
wave of conservatism.

Xmas Night, 1983

i think that you got to stop thinking in terms of the US. and
Canada as separate and literally in terms of the hemisphere as
far as organization goes—which the Network is definitely right

2
in doing—and i think politically we should attack the whole of
imperialism, that is not only dealing with a particular govern-
ment force that's involved in, say El Salvador, but any ruling
class power involved in Imperialism. This means not only not-
ing South African involvement with IBM and ITT's involve-
ment in Chile, but every link in the Fortune 500.

May 21984

Here, some new laws have been passed that make support
for “terrorists” a crime, and to change the feds into a more
clearly military outfit. There was an even more outrageous
murder in NYC, a brother was beaten to death, supposedly
for putting graffiti on a subway car. Not a murder where a
guy gits hit on top the head one too many times and dies,
but torture and overkill. There's been forty blacks murdered
this year and a general upswing throughout the country. No
retaliation, though, no pigs caught up and filled full of holes.

July 28 1984

i think that we simply have to be clear about the fact that the
media is part of the state’s arsenal, they never contradict the
state. They universally and totally miss the point of the mat-
ters that pertain to the opposition of the state. For instance the
Watergate shit that happened here a few years ago made the
press look good but there was never any print about all the
lawyers' offices that were broken into, when left-wing clients
were involved. They never talk about the things that DINA or
Alpha 66 has gotten away with, they covered our case with-
out mentioning colonialism one time even though our position
wasis that New Afrikans are colonized and have a right to de-
fend against colonial oppression. [Associated Press] quoted a
statement by me, after i handed it to them, as i did every pa-
per that covered the trial, but nobody thought it newsworthy
to make a clear statement about our position. So it's not just a
thing about a press ban on the proceedings involving the Ar-
menians. The press knows their job and they know it's not to
do our propaganda for us, the New York Times couldn't address

2
US. corruption in Quebec, when the separatist was clearly chal-
lenging the ruling class of the entire hemisphere! A guy with
a trench coat doesn't meet with all the reporters overnight, to
tell them what to write or their editors what to print. These
caffeine crazed patriots censor themselves.

2
Prison Life

August 18th 1983

Meanwhile i am freer to write and will be writing this week
for sure—the only thing that will hold me up is a lack of stamps
ifi can't work out some kind of deal with the commissary guy
tomorrow. The food is so bad here that when the order blanks
come around i don't think of anything besides getting enough
to eat. However my discipline shall improve.

December 9 1983

As to the seventy five years i am not really worried, not
only because i am in the habit of not completing sentences or
waiting on parole or any of that nonsense but also because the
state simply isn't going to last seventy five or even fifty
If there’s not a revolution in thirty years—in which case i re-
ally don’t care to live anyways, or an atomic war, the environ-
‘ment will for all practical purposes resemble the aftermath of
an atomic war. The jerks in charge now are not only commit-
ting genocide but destroying the biosphere

Xmas Night, 19837

There's nothing to be amazed of as far as continuing to strug-
gle in jail, what else can you do? The struggle continues and if
you don't, if you give up, you die, you are damned, because it
takes effort just to be in contact and when they put youin isola-
tion, fuck with your mail, ete. you have all the proof you need
that whatever it was you did, it was of consequence. “As long
as you fight, the decision is still up in the air” Ruchell Magee.
‘They only win when we are convinced to let them have their

Xmas Night, 19837

27
[Whereas i would be up writing at night i am going to the
movies, they had “Flashdance” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark”,
i've been telling myselfthat it's impossible to know whats been
effecting the masses if you don't check out what they have—
nothing superfragalistic has been revealed to me—but i figure
as long as i ain't betting football games or some nonsense like
that a little diversion doesn't hurt.

Jan 22 1984

Well due to the storm we've been locked in for two days,
which in and of itself wouldn't be such a big deal but i am
Tocked beside one motherfucker who plays oldies twenty four/
seven and on the other side is a Cuban who Castro kicked out
of the country for singing. He starts right ater breakfast most
‘mornings and continues each time he comes back to the cell,
until he falls out sometime around eleven, so last night i kept
him up a bit longer with some of my singing,

July 28 1984

i've meant to write you for a long time but i guess a com-
bination of factors have slowed me down in correspondence,
for one thing the pace of writing two or three letters a night
and feelinglike i've been sentenced to writing, kinda worn me
out. Then of course, i am still going to trial. Since eighty two
there’s been some kind of bullshit with legality. i am tired of it
but must pay attention to what's happening in court, cause no
matter what we must preserve the position that the state sim-
ply has no right to try us. At the same time these bastards got
over sixty suspects in this case, including every busted BLA.
member, a statement by a traitor that they want to act as if they
never had and a hundred thousand dollar reward. It's outright
disgusting how people were turning in ex-employees, drinking
partners and etc. S0 it's an ideal opportunity to show in detail
how the pigs are trying to change New Afrikan culture into a
snitch culture, ready to support fascism.

But every time i go to court i really fall behind in letters, last
time they moved me six times in six days, cuffed and shack-

28
led, it was impossible to git visits because i was never at a jail
during a time when visiting was allowed, a third to half of the
time in bull pens or in a van, the few letters i did write are just
getting where they were addressed. Added to the court time is
the trip we go through once we return. It's a week before you
git any addresses o even legal papers, another week confined
to the cell last time i went to the hole for a day, because there
wasn't any empty cells and for some reason i always git the
same cell, which isn't for anyone else, and it's pretty possible
that the whole thing will be happening again before the 31t.
S0 in letters i'll be even further behind.

July 28 1984

Over the weekend a pig shot a brother down in the yard
‘The official version is that he was swinging a baseball bat at
another prisoner and some pigs and to protect lives the pig in
the tower had to shoot. Of course that’s bullshit, there was no
one close to the guy when he got shot, he had gotten stabbed
just before and the pigs broke camp. Prisoners had to pick him
up and carry him to the door and demand he receive medical
care for the M15 wound, which you know is difficult because
the bullet tumbles to make wounds large and break bones, to
‘make more missiles inside the body to penetrate more organs
Anyway after the shooting, a hundred and eighty men refused
tolock in—you got to be literally mad to see someone shot and
risk your lives just to make a point. Meanwhile the pigs have
everyone who witnessed the crap first hand locked down.

Nov 29 1985

Friday they told me to go back to the block (and i immedi-
ately thought transfer) when i got back to my block they said
iwas to be kept locked, when i said “for what?” they said “in-
vestigation” then within a half hour or so, this pig comes to
tell me i am being transferred. Then i was brought here, kept
inlockup until yesterday at noon and released into population.
But that has just meant another day with the same underwear,
only one blanket and asking over and over about my stuff. i

2
got a chance to talk to one of my comrades personally, and in
the process of doing some chin ups some turkey lifted my coat,
50 i couldn’t go out tonight and am basically in limbo. Tomor-
row night there's no yard or opportunity to use the phones in
the yard. So basically il be stuck with whatever i have after
wading through bullshit in broad daylight. i can't remember a
similar situation but it kinda feels like sitting around a dusty
empty apartment waiting for the landlord to put the heat on—

walkin' to the pay phone never catchin’ him, looking forward
to next to nothing.

30
‘The Anarchist Library
Anti-Copyright

Kuwasi Balagoon
Letters from Prison
1983-1985

A Soldier's Story: Writings by a Revolutionary New Afrikan
Anarchist (Montréal: Kersplebedeb, 2003; pages 101-125)

theanarchistlibrary.org