IT’S NOT JUST A.N.S.W.E.R., according to this report in The Guardian:

The peace movement could be destroyed by the takeover of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and the Stop the War coalition by Trotskyist groups and the Communist party, according to allegations circulated by a leading campaigner.

The claims have been made by Jimmy Barnes, the veteran leftwing secretary of the trade union CND movement. He has warned in a paper sent to the campaign’s national council and the trade union CND executive that “CND itself is now a small divided group with little future, unless there is a change”.

It has been well known that the anti-war groups have always been heavily influenced by the far left, but the internal divisions have reached a startling degree of animosity. . . .

Mr Barnes claims the Communist party and Socialist Action sought control of CND in order to use the campaign as a base from which to exert influence over the Stop the War coalition, the loose body which organised the massive protests against the war in Iraq. Mr Barnes asserts the coalition is increasingly dominated by another Trotskyist group, the Socialist Workers party.

Referring to the last CND conference, he claimed “the antagonism we saw at the conference is derivative of the aggressive and sectarian behaviour of those involved in the Stop the War coalition who strove hard to control and dominate the anti-war protest movement”.

The communists always seem to have money from somewhere, and they’re good organizers, which tempts people to hold their nose and ally with them. But if you let the communists in, they’ll either take over, or wreck things. It’s the history of the left in the 20th century.