Against our exploiters, their wars and their terrorists - For a workers' fightback

Nobody now believes that the US and its coalition intervened in Iraq to "liberate the Iraqi people from the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein" or to establish an ideal democratic regime that respects human rights. They are there to assure direct control over oil resources and their supply routes, to get a tighter military hold on the Persian Gulf- if need be to teach a lesson to Saudi Arabia- and to maintain the US dollar as the sole exchange currency on the oil market; which is the source of huge financial revenues. The Bush administration has promoted the enterprises of its Halliburton clique and many others, thus demonstrating once again, not only its incredible narrow-mindedness but also the insatiable greed of the class it represents. But this should not make us forget that the "pacifist" opposition led by the French and German axis' only aim was to limit US control on oil resources and in this way, increase its own share of oil revenues. Its “pacifism” was but a tactic in confronting the most powerful army in the world.

As with all inter-imperialist conflicts of the past, material interests are obscured by a more presentable ideology. It's under the guise of human rights and more specifically those of women, that the US ended the dictatorship of the Afghani Taliban; a regime that it had financed and supported just a few years before. It's under the pretext of peace and the right of all people to self-government that France opposed intervention in Iraq. Finally, it's the “war on terrorism” that has justified and continues to justify every possible and conceivable military intervention. All imperialist bandits, large or small, operate under disguise, including Al-Qaida and its allied cohorts. Behind the armed gangs of multi-millionaire Osama Bin Laden lies a small fraction of the Arab ruling class that can't stand seeing their native region, an energy-producing giant, remain a dwarf in the world economy. Having broken with their American ally (the US used to finance and organize the Islamic fundamentalists in the 80's and 90's from Afghanistan and Algeria to the Caucasus), they hope to organize the impoverished masses who suffer from a dual exploitation from the dominant imperialists and from their own ruling class while misleading them on the reality of the latter.

Incidentally, this is common to all the ruling classes and all the bosses of the world. Though capitalism is characterized by competition, economic and out-and-out war, it is dominated by the war against its only real enemy: the proletariat- the international working class. There is not a single corporation which does not seek to increase its productivity and tries to lower our wages. Nor is there a single state which doesn't attack social programs: health and pensions, but also education, social services and unemployment benefits. This brutal assault against the working class, this era of permanent war and terrorism that we sustain is the consequence of the profound crisis that has been affecting world capitalism for the past thirty years.

Beyond all false divisions of race, nationality, religion or language the men and women of the international working class are united by the brutal attacks of the ruling classes. It is on this basis that we must defend ourselves and counter-attack. We must break with the self-defeating structures and the joint-management logic of the unions- as partners of the state, the unions have always defended the national economy and the interests of the corporations against the workers. The vanguards and those who really strive to oppose capital must dedicate themselves to the development of workers struggles at the grassroots level and their coordination. For way too long, the Stalinist counter-revolution and Russian state-capitalism diverted the proletariat from its course, deformed and dragged its historical perspective in the mud. We can stop capitalism's march towards war and barbarity. The working class bears an alternative to this system of sweat and blood - that alternative is communism. The real struggles that we will wage shall be the basis of the rebirth of this historical alternative to capitalism, its exploitation and its wars.

Workers of the world, unite!