28. Class War and Counterinsurgency in Appalachia: The '84 Massey Coal Strike w/ Ashley Nguyen

From 1984 to '85, both sides of the Tug Fork river on the West Virginia / Kentucky border were occupied by private security forces, green berets, mercenaries, and other muscle for the bosses to terrorize striking coal miners under the UMWA. Historian Ashley Nguyen joins TSBU to explain how the tactics of class warfare that beset the Massey strikers were part of the larger global counterinsurgency terror that defined American imperialism during the Cold War.

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Armed and ready on the picket... trench?

"A European hired as a security guard monitors video cameras used as part of a surveillance system at a coal mine in Sidney, Ky. " SoF 1986

"The more it hurt, the stronger I got...": Shot miner interviewed in Mine War on Blackberry Creek, 1986.

Soldier of Fortune (SoF), Sept. 1986.

*Ep includes an interview clip with Nomonde Ngubo of the National Union of Mineworkers of South Africa, featured in the documentary Mine War on Blackberry Creek, 1986.

Reading:
Burton, Orisanmi. Tip of the spear : black radicalism, prison repression, and the long Attica revolt. UCP, Oakland, 2023.
Camp, Jordan T. Incarcerating the Crisis: Freedom Struggles and the Rise of the Neoliberal State. UCP, 2016.
Schrader, Stuart. Badges Without Borders: How Global Counterinsurgency Transformed American Policing. UCP, 2019.

Cold open song: "The Black Eternal Night" by Widows of the Night. Subversives, Electric Fields, 2026.
Intro song: Title unknown, performer unknown. Clipped from Mine War on Blackberry Creek, 1986.
Outro song: "The Tale of the Dragon", unknown performer. > Linked here <

Also featuring music from koleso neštastia and pixabay.com

What is The State Between Us?

My name is Fritz McAlinden and this is The State Between Us, the anti-fascist podcast for dark dives into the ruling class insanity and fashy political cultures as well as our defenses against them through mutual aid and building each other up, sharing knowledge, and connecting the disparate voices in our overlapping struggles. Also TTRPGs, Sci-Fi, and other nerd shit. Let's get weird with it!