The War in Ukraine has accelerated the threats of nuclear rearmament. The tensions between the US and China in the Pacific are also a race in South America for the control of lithium and other strategic natural resources. Finland choosing to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is just another step in an aggressive imperialist expansion in a region that suffered the last war in the Balkans 20 years ago by the hands of “liberal democracy”.
Every moment there’s a war ongoing there’s a risk of things entering catastrophic dynamics. War is the most reactionary institution of capitalism. War in central Europe continues to threaten the workers of the world. As socialist we must oppose both the aggression of Putin to Ukraine and the role of NATO in the region.
The new talks of nuclear rearmament show how dangerous the imperial game of the US Pentagon has become. The game of war has its own logic and unfolds relatively independently to the players will.
The financial crisis exposes the weakness of the banking system in the US, with international repercussions. Not only is it forcing the Federal Reserve System to raise interest rates, it’s taking entire nations to bankruptcy for not being able to pay the high interests on their IMF debt. Countries like Argentina suffer both 100% inflation yearly and brutal devaluation of their currency.
We are living in an era of “crisis, wars and revolutions”, paraphrasing the international socialist leader V.I. Lenin (or what he defined as an “imperialist” era). The level of class struggle which has unfolded in Europe reminds the public opinion of the great revolutionary uprising in May 1968 in Paris and its international consequences. Never before havetoday’s events on one side of the globe affected others in so many ways.
France and Peru are the most radicalized examples of the people’s resistance to capitalist plans. Macron’s reform of pensions exemplifies the audacious attack against the workers in France, but it is also the “agenda” of all liberal governments in the world. Peru also shows how ever present the colonial relationship of the US is with South America. The famous “backyard” of US Imperialism has become today no more than ever a resource of Lithium and water for the current capitalist expansion.
The resistance of the workers, indigenous folks, and all peoples is amazing. But the violence of the racist anti-indigenous regime is brutal. Peru’s indigenous movement has already had a toll of over 40 deaths since the coup and uprising started on Dec 13, 2022.
The movement in France has taken over factories with their picket lines to stop the distribution of fuel. Thousands of students march to the oil refineries where workers hold the line to stand with them against police threats of repression.
The lack of decision of the leaderships of both the Confédération Générale du Travail (CGT) in France and Confederación General de Trabajadores del Perú (CGTP) in Peru, have shown that without a socialist leadership, the movement of the masses, all their energy, will try to be dissipated over talks and negotiations which don’t respond to the cry of the people.
In Peru the streets want the coup government out and a Constituent Assembly to reorganize the country and its priorities. The US supported coup will try to destroy them, and the CGTP and other leaders, instead of organizing “the means of victory”, are hiding.
In France the CGT Bureaucracy has agreed to return to work and negotiate terms and conditions for the pensions reform. But the workers have not.
What we are witnessing is a classic example of “lack of revolutionary leadership” in the two most revolutionary places of the current capitalist crisis.
Socialists around the world must follow the events in Peru and France to get inspired by the movement of the masses and to learn all the tricks and schemes of both the union bureaucracy and the liberal politicians who try to defeat the movement from inside.
These two conflicts today show what we must prepare for. To be ready and prepared to lead the struggle of peoples and working class masses into victory against this rotten capitalist system.
The future depends on it.
Carlos B, DSA International Committee member and amazon worker.