Diverging Paths
Eldridge Cleaver returned to Algiers and in September of 1970 led the establishment of an international section of the Black Panther Party which was officially recognized by the Algerian government. However, just as the relations between Cleaver and his Cuban hosts were tense back in 1969, cohesion in Algiers deteriorated from 1970-1971. Frustrated by the insufficient stipend provided by the Algierian government, many of the 20 or so party members at the international section resorted to fencing stolen passports, visas, and cars. (Malloy, 2017, 170.) Maintaining party discipline also proved difficult for Cleaver, and all these issues were compounded by conflicts with party leadership back in Oakland in 1970.
Revolutionary Intercommunalism
Upon being released from prison in August of 1970, Huey Newton resumed control over the party and moved it in a different direction, guided by his theory of revolutionary intercommunalism. This replaced the anti-colonial framework with one much more focused on Marxist ideas which argued that the world was divided into oppressed or liberated communities, united across national boundaries by the common enemy of U.S. Imperialism. (Spencer, 2009, 223.) Also, there was a re-focusing of human and economic resources towards the party activities which had been most effective at building support, which were local community-building programs. Newton positioned community support programs as tools for survival, and revolutionary actions more practical than the confrontational, militant theatrics of policing the police. Newton was also worried about the attention given to Cleaver's international activities because he believed that it was alienating the core supporters in the United States. (Malloy, 2017, 173.)
State Repression
The seeds of dicsord were thus sown by the summer of 1970. Cleaver and the international section fully believed that working in concert with international state-level allies would lead to the realization of guerilla warfare against the American Empire, and freedom for the Afro-American colony. Meanwhile, Huey Newton was preaching distance from the international scene and community building with the goal of linking the global proletariat. The FBI in 1970 embarked on a campaign to sow discord between the factions in the BPP, and their strategy was international. Because of Cleaver's connections with revolutionary governments in Havana, Algiers, and Pyongyang, the FBI saw justification to engage in warrantless tapping of headquarters in Oakland and Algiers, extensive police raids, and mass arrests to tear down the Black Panthers. (Spencer, 2009, 225.) The Panthers represented such a threat to the American government because they challenged two of the state's most sacred monopolies: legitimate violence (in the form of early policing the police actions) and foreign relations. Against the overwhelming force of the American state, the already unstable Black Panther Party stood no chance of survival, and by 1972 was in a complete downward spiral.