Please. Seeing the current level of organization in the US there's a lot we can learn from every movement claiming loyalty to the communist cause, and especially those in the third world

The leadership of Gonzalo and Sendero Luminoso was not without shortcomings, however, and this should not surprise us as dialectical materialists. These shortcomings should neither tarnish the revolutionary legacy of the people’s war in Peru nor prevent us from learning its valuable lessons. But we should not ignore these shortcomings; instead, we must subject them to criticism. Gonzalo and Sendero Luminoso tended to treat Marxism-Leninism-Maoism in a way that veered towards a religion, and Gonzalo’s leadership was often treated as infallible. These tendencies breed dogmatism and religiosity, which leave the masses ill-equipped to deal with difficult contradictions that require rigorous debate and critical minds. Where these tendencies towards dogmatism and religiosity have been embraced and magnified by those posing as Gonzalo’s followers, especially in imperialist countries, they have unfortunately but understandably alienated many people from Marxism-Leninism-Maoism and the people’s war in Peru. Rejecting dogmatism and religiosity need not mean reneging on the fundamental principles of revolution and communism; in fact, it is only through a thoroughly dialectical and materialist approach that we can truly uphold and, more importantly, apply those principles.

By upholding the principally positive aspects of—but critically engaging—Gonzalo’s legacy and leadership, we should be able to more accurately assess any other shortcomings of the people’s war in Peru. For example, were some people incorrectly targeted as enemies during the course of the revolution, either tactically or strategically? Was there too much emphasis on the purgative function of violence and the militarization of the Party? These questions can only be answered with concrete analysis of the historical experience, and without repeating the thoroughly bourgeois cry that “they should not have taken up arms.” The people’s war in Peru exposed the fact that the organized Left, when faced with revolution by the masses, has and will side with the bourgeoisie over and over again. We should not be squeamish about what that means concerning the use of revolutionary violence, even as we critically assess particular tactics.

https://kites-journal.org/2021/09/17/chairman-gonzalos-legacy-of-steadfast-revolutionary-principle-and-strategic-innovations/

what looks like a studied, humble approach to Gonzalo here

Although Mao theorized PPW as revolutionary military strategy for semi-feudal countries oppressed by imperialism, the PPW universalists argue that this military strategy also applies to revolution in the imperialist countries. Rather than develop theoretical grounding for their viewpoint, propose concrete strategic doctrine, and dare to put their claim into practice, the PPW universalists have vociferously argued on the internet for the correctness of their position, often resorting to unprincipled attacks on real communist leaders to draw attention to their tantrums.

The authority they use to justify their arguments is Chairman Gonzalo, the leader of Sendero Luminoso (the Communist Party of Peru, or PCP-SL), which launched a people’s war in 1980. Sendero Luminoso became a considerable threat to the Peruvian regime by the early 1990s, but suffered considerable setbacks after the capture of Gonzalo in 1992 from which it has never recovered. Since Gonzalo has been held in a military prison for 27 years, we do not know his position on the universality of PPW (how convenient for the PPW universalists). Unlike Unitarian Universalism, perhaps the most open-minded and social justice-oriented church which welcomes diverse viewpoints in its congregation up to and including atheism, the church of PPW universalism is as rigid and dogmatic as can be. PPW universalists draw on the most dogmatic of Sendero Luminoso propaganda to make their case, while failing to carry out any serious study of the actual practice of the people’s war in Peru.

Jose Maria Sison, founder of the Communist Party of the Philippines and no stranger to protracted people’s war—he launched and led one until his 1977 capture and was forced into political exile in the late 1980s after his 1986 release from prison—recently published a critique of the PPW universalist position. Joma—as he is affectionately called—outlined the stark differences between imperialist countries, where the repressive state apparatus has a strong reach and revolutionaries do not have a geographic location or the social conditions necessary to carry out the PPW military strategy, and the semi-feudal countries in which PPW is possible.

To call this a debate would be to overstate the claims of the PPW universalists. Debates require that both sides develop their positions and justify them with evidence, and one of the consequences of the internet is that any asshole with a keyboard and a connection can pretend to have great knowledge of revolutionary theory. But given that many millenials newly awakened to the horrors of capitalism-imperialism and looking into revolution, communism, and Maoism have encountered this “debate” online, it is worth taking this opportunity to address some real questions of revolutionary strategy that have come up along the way. These questions include:

• What can we learn from the experience of the people’s war in Peru?
• What demographic shifts have taken place since the Chinese revolution and what are their implications for revolutionary strategy?
• What is Maosim? Why are most self-proclaimed Maoists so dogmatic?
• Why has there been so much disarray in the international communist movement since the 1976 counterrevolutionary coup in China?
• What is a correct military strategy for revolution in imperialist countries?
• What is the relationship between the subjective factor and objective conditions in the revolutionary process?
• What is the nature of bourgeois state power, and how can communists in imperialist countries build up a force that can overthrow it?

https://kites-journal.org/2019/12/11/on-infantile-internet-disorders-and-real-questions-of-revolutionary-strategy-a-response-to-the-debate-over-the-universality-of-protracted-peoples-war/

lol

The greatest weakness of Sendero Luminoso and Chairman Gonzalo is that many of its/his written statements are dogmatic as fuck. There, I said it. There is a strong religiosity emanating from many of these statements that projects a grand and godly faith in the impending victory of the revolution, even suggesting the strategic offensive of the world revolution (in the 1980s?!?), rather than a compelling, nuanced analysis of the state of the world and the prospects for and difficulties of revolution. We can understand why in the 1980s, with the revolutionary upsurge of the 1960s over and following the tremendous loss of proletarian state power in China in 1976, with a religious and spiritual population as their mass base, and with the real need for revolutionary sacrifice, Sendero may have felt this approach was necessary. Maybe we can even accept it in the Buddhist sense of the term, learning to embrace and move through the negatives that are part of our historical and present-day experiences as communists, rather than ignoring or fearing them. But we don’t need to repeat it; we can take the good and leave out the bad. The PPW universalists have instead decided to take the worst attribute of Sendero Luminoso, magnify it, and shout it from the rooftops (or more accurately, click it from their keyboards).