Ward writes that his goal is to debunk pacifism and challenge its moral smugness. He says he does not intend to articulate an armed struggle strategy for the U.S.; that's a separate task.

"Violent revolution" and "nonviolent revolution" are actually in the same boat at this time -- neither has a spelled-out strategy for the U.S. There is a huge need for strategic thinking among advocates of armed struggle as well as advocates of nonviolent struggle.

The last time in the U.S. that many activists talked seriously about "revolution" -- the late 'sixties -- the socialist activist and writer Martin Oppenheimer found himself in public discussions with activist leaders who were advocating violence but could not put a strategy together. To assist them and himself, he wrote a book, "The Urban Guerrilla", (2) in which he developed two different strategies using armed struggle and tested them in the book in terms of likely consequences. Pragmatically, both of the armed struggle strategies led to disaster for democracy and justice.

For activists who are doing more than self-expression, but really want transformation, the need is as great as ever to create a persuasive strategy for revolution using armed struggle. That strategy does not yet exist.

How we go about developing strategy is influenced by our assumptions about how the world works, so comparing assumptions can be helpful. No amount of argumentation about assumptions, however, will substitute for the hard work of creating strategy. Since many of the new activists are based in colleges and universities, and most are affluent and can take the time to do this hard work, I'm hoping they will accept the challenge!