Caracas, Venezuela – Friday, March 3 was the first day of an international anti-imperialist conference in Venezuela held to commemorate the legacy and continuing struggle of the late Venezuelan President and leader of the Bolivarian Revolution Hugo Chavez. A delegation of Chicano and Latino members of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO), led by long time Chicano activist Carlos Montes, were invited to attend by the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV).

Chavez is not dead

The theme of the conference was carrying on the legacy of Hugo Chavez. The mood in the room was lively, with every seat in the large auditorium filled and two rows of standing room only in the back. In between speeches, local delegates from Venezuela led the room in popular Chavista chants. One common chant was “Chavez no murio, se multiplio,” meaning “Chavez is not dead, he multiplies.”

Local delegates representing different sections of Venezuelan society – such as the youth, fishermen, cafeteria workers and more – were in attendance at the conference as well as international delegates. One member of the PSUV told the FRSO delegation, “In every province, in every community, in every street in Venezuela – the PSUV is there organizing the people.”

Popular democracy

Though the U.S. media portrays Venezuela as a dictatorship, the reality is much different. Hector Rodriguez of the PSUV stated, “In the U.S. they have democracy, but it’s only democracy for capital. In Venezuela we have a true, representative, popular democracy.” He invited international delegates to talk with the Venezuelan people about their participatory government and to question the narrative put forth by the U.S. media.

Anacaona Marin, an indigenous leader of the commune movement and councils, spoke about building revolutionary communes and local people taking their own action to solve problems. She said that for the government to meet the people's needs, the people have to “hacer gobierno” or “make government” themselves, by studying, learning and debating.

Multicolor revolution

One aspect that the PSUV emphasized was the diversity of the Bolivarian Revolution and the participation of indigenous and Afro-Venezuelans in the people’s movement. “I was inspired to see the leadership of women in the conference and the government,” said FRSO member Enya Silva, “the people cheering and chanting the loudest were always women.”

This was also evident in the international delegations, as the conference placed special emphasis on elevating Caribbean, African, and other Latin American countries.

Free Alex Saab

A highlight of the first day was a panel discussing the U.S.’s unjust detention of Venezuelan diplomat Alex Saab, who has been held for over 1000 days by the U.S. government for negotiating food and medical aid for Venezuela. Camila Fabri Saab, his wife, spoke about his case. “What the U.S. media doesn’t talk about is how his detention affects our family,” said Fabri Saab. “His oldest child misses him dearly and his youngest child is growing up without him.”

Carlos Montes spoke from the floor of the wide support and work of FRSO in the campaign to demand freedom for Alex Saab. Camila Fabri Saab smiled and expressed gratitude, telling the FRSO delegation that the work we do is important not just for Saab’s family, but to fight U.S. sanctions against Venezuela.

Fighting imperialism

The day ended with a speech from Venezuela’s Vice President Delcy Rodriguez. She spoke on the importance of uniting with other nations to combat U.S. imperialism. “The world will be multipolar, but do we multiply capitalist poles? Poles that will put us in the same position as they have in the past? The world needs diverse poles, a pluripolar world.” Rodriguez used the example of China to show how a country can surpass the economy of the U.S. without resorting to the exploitative methods of imperialism.

#CaracasVenezuela #Caracas #AntiwarMovement #Venezuela #HugoChavez #antiimperialism #Americas

New York, NY – A crowd of over 50 people gathered in front of the United Nations on Saturday, September 24 to rally in solidarity with Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who spoke at the UN a couple days before. The group was also protesting the U.S. sanctions against Zimbabwe, which they stated are illegal. Despite the sanctions, President Mnangagwa has started making progress toward ending poverty and hunger, as well as implementing various infrastructure projects to help build Zimbabwe and maintain independence from U.S. influence.

The action was called for by the December 12th Movement and included speakers from Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front, as well as other anti-imperialist movements standing up against the United States. All speakers emphasized the importance of independence for Zimbabwe and all African countries that have been colonized by Britain and subjected to U.S. imperialism. A small group of counter-protesters tried to disrupt the rally, but the crowd maintained focus and out-chanted the detractors.

After the rally, the crowd marched down the streets of New York, demanding U.S. hands off Zimbabwe.

#NewYorkCityNY #AntiwarMovement #InternationalSolidarity #antiimperialism #Zimbabwe #Africa

New York, NY – A crowd of over 50 people gathered in front of the United Nations on Saturday, September 24 to rally in solidarity with Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who spoke at the UN a couple days before. The group was also protesting the U.S. sanctions against Zimbabwe, which they stated are illegal. Despite the sanctions, President Mnangagwa has started making progress toward ending poverty and hunger, as well as implementing various infrastructure projects to help build Zimbabwe and maintain independence from U.S. influence.

The action was called for by the December 12th Movement and included speakers from Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front, as well as other anti-imperialist movements standing up against the United States. All speakers emphasized the importance of independence for Zimbabwe and all African countries that have been colonized by Britain and subjected to U.S. imperialism. A small group of counter-protesters tried to disrupt the rally, but the crowd maintained focus and out-chanted the detractors.

After the rally, the crowd marched down the streets of New York, demanding U.S. hands off Zimbabwe.

#AntiwarMovement #InternationalSolidarity #antiimperialism #Zimbabwe #NewYorkCity #Africa

New York, NY – A crowd of over 50 people gathered in front of the United Nations on Saturday, September 24 to rally in solidarity with Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who spoke at the UN a couple days before. The group was also protesting the U.S. sanctions against Zimbabwe, which they stated are illegal. Despite the sanctions, President Mnangagwa has started making progress toward ending poverty and hunger, as well as implementing various infrastructure projects to help build Zimbabwe and maintain independence from U.S. influence.

The action was called for by the December 12th Movement and included speakers from Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front, as well as other anti-imperialist movements standing up against the United States. All speakers emphasized the importance of independence for Zimbabwe and all African countries that have been colonized by Britain and subjected to U.S. imperialism. A small group of counter-protesters tried to disrupt the rally, but the crowd maintained focus and out-chanted the detractors.

After the rally, the crowd marched down the streets of New York, demanding U.S. hands off Zimbabwe.

#AntiwarMovement #InternationalSolidarity #antiimperialism #Zimbabwe #NewYorkCity #Africa

Tucson, AZ – It is with heavy heart that the news of the passing of longtime anti-imperialist organizer Chuck Kaufman reached communities on December 28. Born in a small Indiana town, Chuck’s life saw travels to numerous countries, most notably in the Latin American countries most firmly in the crosshairs of U.S. imperialism.

In 1987, as Reagan’s illegal Contra War against Nicaragua ravaged the country in an attempt to kill the successful Sandinista Revolution, Chuck answered the call for solidarity. He gave up his advertising business and joined thousands of other U.S. solidarity activists to help in the coffee brigades in Nicaragua aimed at helping the country produce commodities that could help fund the new government projects for the poor and working class. Later that year Chuck joined the U.S.-based Nicaragua Network on its national staff and served as co-coordinator for decades.

It is in that role that I first met Chuck in Nicaragua in 2007. I attended a conference hosted by Nicaragua Network and I was impressed by Chuck’s knowledge and seriousness of commitment to the Sandinista Revolution. One could easily see the internal flame lit inside him when he spoke of the Nicaraguan people and their struggle for national liberation.

Two years later, I joined a Nicaragua Network delegation with Chuck and others. It is there I got to know him a little better as we spent time hearing from coffee collectives and campesinas who received free cows and seeds from the Sandinista government’s Zero Usury program. During that delegation in January 2009, Israel had once again been bombing Palestine and there was an Israeli professor with us, and Chuck led the charge in defending the Palestinian struggle and silencing the Zionist claims that supported their genocidal apartheid.

Another unforgettable moment on that trip gave me chills: Chuck had recently returned from a delegation to Venezuela and he gleamed telling us that he was on the updated Caracas public transit system when a couple of anti-Chavistas were overheard by the crowd and were immediately drown out by deafening chants of: “Ooh aah, Chavez no se va!” As someone who had been interested in Venezuela’s Bolivarian Revolution, that’s all I needed to hear to make sure I visited to feel that revolutionary power.

That awakening in 1987 cemented a lifelong commitment not only to Nicaragua but later other revolutionary movements in Latin America. As mentioned above, Chuck’s international solidarity, largely through his role as national co-coordinator of the Alliance for Global Justice, as well as with the ANSWER Coalition, extended to Venezuela, as well as Colombia and later, after the U.S.-supported coup, Honduras. It is there in Honduras where Chuck, like tens of thousands of Hondurans, was gassed by the U.S.-backed military dictatorship that ran the country with criminal cartels. Chuck’s work in the Honduras Solidarity Network allowed activists and organizers in the U.S. hear the voices of on-the-ground Hondurans battling the regime there. Thanks to the tireless efforts of the Honduran masses and their organizations, Xiomara Zelaya, was elected the past November – a truly meaningful moment for Chuck.

One would think all this national and international organizing meant Chuck did not have time to participate in local organizing. On the contrary, Chuck was a valued member of the organizing circles involved in anti-war and immigrant rights. As previously mentioned, even though Chuck had a warm spirit and could joke frequently, he had a serious commitment to transforming this world from injustice to justice and from oppression to liberation. Most notably, in October 2013, Chuck and twelve others used dragon-arms to lock themselves around the wheels of the bus carrying detained immigrants awaiting the sham trial called “Operation Streamline.” The activists stopped proceedings that day and the buses blocked erupted in cheers at the bravery of the act. After a few court appearances, all charges were dropped.

Chuck also showed us younger organizers how to chair and conduct meeting – he exhibited the best traits of criticism but also worked tirelessly toward a principled unity. I will miss talking with Chuck on the picket lines outside the Federal Courthouse. And as someone who studied Nicaraguan history and fell in love with the Sandinista Revolution, it was truly a treasure to share space with someone like Chuck Kaufman who will always be wearing their bandera, La RojiNegra. Chuck also made sure we remembered our fallen comrades and led the call for: Presente! Unfortunately, from now we have to include his name: Chuck Kaufman, Presente!

#TucsonAZ #AntiwarMovement #Remembrances #PeoplesStruggles #antiimperialism #obituary #ChuckKaufman

In honor of Fidel Castro’s birthday, Fight Back! is circulating a speech he delivered on May 1, 2003. Castro was born on August 13, 1926. Enjoy.

Cuba's achievements and America's wars

Distinguished guests;

Dear fellow Cubans:

Our heroic people have struggled for 44 years from this small Caribbean island just a few miles away from the most formidable imperial power ever known by mankind. In so doing, they have written an unprecedented chapter in history. Never has the world witnessed such an unequal fight.

Some may have believed that the rise of the empire to the status of the sole superpower, with a military and technological might with no balancing pole anywhere in the world, would frighten or dishearten the Cuban people. Yet, today they have no choice but to watch in amazement the enhanced courage of this valiant people. On a day like today, this glorious international workers’ day, which commemorates the death of the five martyrs of Chicago, I declare, on behalf of the one million Cubans gathered here, that we will face up to any threats, we will not yield to any pressures, and that we are prepared to defend our homeland and our Revolution with ideas and with weapons to our last drop of blood.

What is Cuba’s sin? What honest person has any reason to attack her?

With their own blood and the weapons seized from the enemy, the Cuban people overthrew a cruel tyranny with 80,000 men under arms, imposed by the U.S. government.

Cuba was the first territory free from imperialist domination in Latin America and the Caribbean, and the only country in the hemisphere, throughout post-colonial history, where the torturers, murderers and war criminals that took the lives of tens of thousands of people were exemplarily punished.

All of the country’s land was recovered and turned over to the peasants and agricultural workers. The natural resources, industries and basic services were placed in the hands of their only true owner: the Cuban nation.

In less than 72 hours, fighting ceaselessly, day and night, Cuba crushed the Bay of Pigs mercenary invasion organized by a U.S. administration, thereby preventing a direct military intervention by this country and a war of incalculable consequences. The Revolution already had the Rebel Army, over 400,000 weapons and hundreds of thousands of militia members.

In 1962, Cuba confronted with honor, and without a single concession, the risk of being attacked with dozens of nuclear weapons.

It defeated the dirty war that spread throughout the entire country, at a cost in human lives even greater than that of the war of liberation.

It stoically endured thousands of acts of sabotage and terrorist attacks organized by the U.S. government.

It thwarted hundreds of assassination plots against the leaders of the Revolution.

While under a rigorous blockade and economic warfare that have lasted for almost half a century, Cuba was able to eradicate in just one year the illiteracy that has still not been overcome in the course of more than four decades by the rest of the countries of Latin America, or the United States itself.

It has brought free education to 100% of the country’s children.

It has the highest school retention rate –over 99% between kindergarten and ninth grade– of all of the nations in the hemisphere.

Its elementary school students rank first worldwide in the knowledge of their mother language and mathematics.

The country also ranks first worldwide with the highest number of teachers per capita and the lowest number of students per classroom.

All children with physical or mental challenges are enrolled in special schools.

Computer education and the use of audiovisual methods now extend to all of the country’s children, adolescents and youth, in both the cities and the countryside.

For the first time in the world, all young people between the ages of 17 and 30, who were previously neither in school nor employed, have been given the opportunity to resume their studies while receiving an allowance.

All citizens have the possibility of undertaking studies that will take them from kindergarten to a doctoral degree without spending a penny.

Today, the country has 30 university graduates, intellectuals and professional artists for every one there was before the Revolution.

The average Cuban citizen today has at the very least a ninth-grade level of education.

Not even functional illiteracy exists in Cuba.

There are schools for the training of artists and art instructors throughout all of the country’s provinces, where over 20,000 young people are currently studying and developing their talent and vocation. Tens of thousands more are doing the same at vocational schools, and many of these then go on to undertake professional studies.

University campuses are progressively spreading to all of the country’s municipalities. Never in any other part of the world has such a colossal educational and cultural revolution taken place as this that will turn Cuba, by far, into the country with the highest degree of knowledge and culture in the world, faithful to Martí’s profound conviction that “no freedom is possible without culture.”

Infant mortality has been reduced from 60 per 1000 live births to a rate that fluctuates between 6 and 6.5, which is the lowest in the hemisphere, from the United States to Patagonia.

Life expectancy has increased by 15 years.

Infectious and contagious diseases like polio, malaria, neonatal tetanus, diphtheria, measles, rubella, mumps, whooping cough and dengue have been eradicated; others like tetanus, meningococcal meningitis, hepatitis B, leprosy, haemophilus meningitis and tuberculosis are fully controlled.

Today, in our country, people die of the same causes as in the most highly developed countries: cardiovascular diseases, cancer, accidents, and others, but with a much lower incidence.

A profound revolution is underway to bring medical services closer to the population, in order to facilitate access to health care centers, save lives and alleviate suffering.

In-depth research is being carried out to break the chain, mitigate or reduce to a minimum the problems that result from genetic, prenatal or childbirth-related causes.

Cuba is today the country with the highest number of doctors per capita in the world, with almost twice as many as those that follow closer.

Our scientific centers are working relentlessly to find preventive or therapeutic solutions for the most serious diseases.

Cubans will have the best healthcare system in the world, and will continue to receive all services absolutely free of charge.

Social security covers 100% of the country’s citizens.

In Cuba, 85% of the people own their homes and they pay no property taxes on them whatsoever. The remaining 15% pay a wholly symbolic rent, which is only 10% of their salary.

Illegal drug use involves a negligible percentage of the population, and is being resolutely combated.

Lottery and other forms of gambling have been banned since the first years of the Revolution to ensure that no one pins their hopes of progress on luck.

There is no commercial advertising on Cuban television and radio or in our printed publications. Instead, these feature public service announcements concerning health, education, culture, physical education, sports, recreation, environmental protection, and the fight against drugs, accidents and other social problems. Our media educate, they do not poison or alienate. They do not worship or exalt the values of decadent consumer societies.

Discrimination against women was eradicated, and today women make up 64% of the country’s technical and scientific workforce.

From the earliest months of the Revolution, not a single one of the forms of racial discrimination copied from the south of the United States was left intact. In recent years, the Revolution has been particularly striving to eliminate any lingering traces of the poverty and lack of access to education that afflicted the descendants of those who were enslaved for centuries, creating objective differences that tended to be perpetuated. Soon, not even a shadow of the consequences of that terrible injustice will remain.

There is no cult of personality around any living revolutionary, in the form of statues, official photographs, or the names of streets or institutions. The leaders of this country are human beings, not gods.

In our country there are no paramilitary forces or death squads, nor has violence ever been used against the people. There are no executions without due process and no torture. The people have always massively supported the activities of the Revolution. This rally today is proof of that.

Light years separate our society from what has prevailed until today in the rest of the world. We cultivate brotherhood and solidarity among individuals and peoples both in the country and abroad.

The new generations and the entire people are being educated about the need to protect the environment. The media are used to build environmental awareness.

Our country steadfastly defends its cultural identity, assimilating the best of other cultures while resolutely combating everything that distorts, alienates and degrades.

The development of wholesome, non-professional sports has raised our people to the highest ranks worldwide in medals and honors.

Scientific research, at the service of our people and all humanity, has increased several-hundredfold. As a result of these efforts, important medications are saving lives in Cuba and other countries.

Cuba has never undertaken research or development of a single biological weapon, because this would be in total contradiction with the principles and philosophy underlying the education of our scientific personnel, past and present.

In no other people has the spirit of international solidarity become so deeply rooted.

Our country supported the Algerian patriots in their struggle against French colonialism, at the cost of damaging political and economic relations with such an important European country as France.

We sent weapons and troops to defend Algeria from Moroccan expansionism, when the king of this country sought to take control of the iron mines of Gara Djebilet, near the city of Tindouf, in southwest Algeria.

At the request of the Arab nation of Syria, a full tank brigade stood guard between 1973 and 1975 alongside the Golan Heights, when this territory was unjustly seized from that country.

The leader of the Republic of Congo when it first achieved independence, Patrice Lumumba, who was harassed from abroad, received our political support. When he was assassinated by the colonial powers in January of 1961, we lent assistance to his followers.

Four years later, in 1965, Cuban blood was shed in the western region of Lake Tanganyika, where Che Guevara and more than 100 Cuban instructors supported the Congolese rebels who were fighting against white mercenaries in the service of the man supported by the West, that is, Mobutu whose 40 billion dollars, the same that he stole, nobody knows what European banks they are kept in, or in whose power.

The blood of Cuban instructors was shed while training and supporting the combatants of the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde, who fought under the command of Amilcar Cabral for the liberation of these former Portuguese colonies.

The same was true during the ten years that Cuba supported Agostinho Neto’s MPLA in the struggle for the independence of Angola. After independence was achieved, and over the course of 15 years, hundreds of thousands of Cuban volunteers participated in defending Angola from the attacks of racist South African troops that in complicity with the United States, and using dirty war tactics, planted millions of mines, wiped out entire villages, and murdered more than half a million Angolan men, women and children.

In Cuito Cuanavale and on the Namibian border, to the southwest of Angola, Angolan and Namibian forces together with 40,000 Cuban troops dealt the final blow to the South African troops. This resulted in the immediate liberation of Namibia and speeded up the end of apartheid by perhaps 20 to 25 years. At the time, the South Africans had seven nuclear warheads that Israel had supplied to them or helped them to produce, with the full knowledge and complicity of the U.S. government.

Throughout the course of almost 15 years, Cuba had a place of honor in its solidarity with the heroic people of Viet Nam, caught up in a barbaric and brutal war with the United States. That war killed four million Vietnamese, in addition to all those left wounded and mutilated, not to mention the fact that the country was inundated with chemical compounds that continue to cause incalculable damage. The pretext: Viet Nam, a poor and underdeveloped country located 20,000 kilometers away, constituted a threat to the national security of the United States.

Cuban blood was shed together with that of citizens of numerous Latin American countries, and together with the Cuban and Latin American blood of Che Guevara, murdered on instructions from U.S. agents in Bolivia, when he was wounded and being held prisoner after his weapon had been rendered useless by a shot received in battle.

The blood of Cuban construction workers, that were nearing completion of an international airport vital for the economy of a tiny island fully dependent on tourism, was shed fighting in defense of Grenada, invaded by the United States under cynical pretexts.

Cuban blood was shed in Nicaragua, when instructors from our Armed Forces were training the brave Nicaraguan soldiers confronting the dirty war organized and armed by the United States against the Sandinista revolution.

And there are even more examples.

Over 2000 heroic Cuban internationalist combatants gave their lives fulfilling the sacred duty of supporting the liberation struggles for the independence of other sister nations. However, there is not one single Cuban property in any of those countries. No other country in our era has exhibited such sincere and selfless solidarity.

Cuba has always preached by example. It has never given in. It has never sold out the cause of another people. It has never made concessions. It has never betrayed its principles. There must be some reason why, just 48 hours ago, it was reelected by acclamation in the United Nations Economic and Social Council to another three years in the Commission on Human Rights, of which it has now been a member for 15 straight years.

More than half a million Cubans have carried out internationalist missions as combatants, as teachers, as technicians or as doctors and health care workers. Tens of thousands of the latter have provided their services and saved millions of lives over the course of more than 40 years. There are currently 3000 specialists in Comprehensive General Medicine and other healthcare personnel working in the most isolated regions of 18 Third World countries. Through preventive and therapeutic methods they save hundreds of thousands of lives every year, and maintain or restore the health of millions of people, without charging a penny for their services.

Without the Cuban doctors offered to the United Nations in the event that the necessary funds are obtained –without which entire nations and even whole regions of sub-Saharan Africa face the risk of perishing– the crucial programs urgently needed to fight AIDS would be impossible to carry out.

The developed capitalist world has created abundant financial capital, but it has not in any way created the human capital that the Third World desperately needs.

Cuba has developed techniques to teach reading and writing by radio, with accompanying texts now available in five languages –Haitian Creole, Portuguese, French, English and Spanish– that are already being used in numerous countries. It is nearing completion of a similar program in Spanish, of exceptionally high quality, to teach literacy by television. These are programs that were developed in Cuba and are genuinely Cuban. We are not interested in patents and exclusive copyrights. We are willing to offer them to all of the countries of the Third World, where most of the world’s illiterates are concentrated, without charging a penny. In five years, the 800 million illiterate people in the world could be reduced by 80%, at a minimal cost.

After the demise of the USSR and the socialist bloc, nobody would have bet a dime on the survival of the Cuban Revolution. The United States tightened the blockade. The Torricelli and Helms-Burton Acts were adopted, both extraterritorial in nature. We abruptly lost our main markets and supplies sources. The population’s average calorie and protein consumption was reduced by almost half. But our country withstood the pressures and even advanced considerably in the social field.

Today, it has largely recovered with regard to nutritional requirements and is rapidly progressing in other fields. Even in these conditions, the work undertaken and the consciousness built throughout the years succeeded in working miracles. Why have we endured? Because the Revolution has always had, as it still does and always will to an ever-greater degree, the support of the people, an intelligent people, increasingly united, educated and combative.

Cuba was the first country to extend its solidarity to the people of the United States on September 11, 2001. It was also the first to warn of the neo-fascist nature of the policy that the extreme right in the United States, which fraudulently came to power in November of 2000, was planning to impose on the rest of the world. This policy did not emerge as a response to the atrocious terrorist attack perpetrated against the people of the United States by members of a fanatical organization that had served other U.S. administrations in the past. It was coldly and carefully conceived and developed, which explains the country’s military build-up and enormous spending on weapons at a time when the Cold War was already over, and long before September 11, 2001. The fateful events of that day served as an ideal pretext for the implementation of such policy.

On September 20 of that year, President Bush openly expressed this before a Congress shaken by the tragic events of nine days earlier. Using bizarre terminology, he spoke of “infinite justice” as the goal of a war that would apparently be infinite as well.

“Americans should not expect one battle, but a lengthy campaign, unlike any other we have ever seen.”

“We will use every necessary weapon of war.”

“Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.”

“I've called the Armed Forces to alert, and there is a reason. The hour is coming when America will act.”

“This is civilization's fight.”

“…the great achievement of our time, and the great hope of every time —now depends on us.”

“The course of this conflict is not known, yet its outcome is certain … and we know that God is not neutral.”

Did a statesman or an unbridled fanatic speak these words?

Two days later, on September 22, Cuba denounced this speech as the blueprint for the idea of a global military dictatorship imposed through brute force, without international laws or institutions of any kind.

“The United Nations Organization, simply ignored in the present crisis, would fail to have any authority or prerogative whatsoever. There would be only one boss, only one judge, and only one law.”

Several months later, on the 200th anniversary of West Point Military Academy, at the graduation exercise for 958 cadets on June 3, 2002, President Bush further elaborated on this line of thinking in a fiery harangue to the young soldiers graduating that day, in which he put forward his fundamental fixed ideas:

“Our security will require transforming the military you will lead — a military that must be ready to strike at a moment's notice in any dark corner of the world. And our security will require all Americans to be forward-looking and resolute, to be ready for preemptive action when necessary to defend our liberty and to defend our lives.”

“We must uncover terror cells in 60 or more countries…”

“…we will send you, our soldiers, where you're needed.”

“We will not leave the safety of America and the peace of the planet at the mercy of a few mad terrorists and tyrants. We will lift this dark threat from our country and from the world.”

“Some worry that it is somehow undiplomatic or impolite to speak the language of right and wrong. I disagree. … We are in a conflict between good and evil, and America will call evil by its name. By confronting evil and lawless regimes, we do not create a problem, we reveal a problem. And we will lead the world in opposing it.”

In the speech I delivered at a rally held in General Antonio Maceo Square in Santiago de Cuba, on June 8, 2002, before half a million people of Santiago, I said:

“As you can see, he doesn’t mention once in his speech (at West Point) the United Nations Organization. Nor is there a phrase about every people’s right to safety and peace, or about the need for a world ruled by principles and norms.”

“Hardly two thirds of a century has passed since humanity went through the bitter experience of Nazism. Fear was Hitler’s inseparable ally against his adversaries… Later, his fearful military force [led to] the outbreak of a war that would inflame the whole world. The lack of vision and the cowardice of the statesmen in the strongest European powers of the time opened the way to a great tragedy.

“I don’t think that a fascist regime can be established in the United States. Serious mistakes have been made and injustices committed in the framework of its political system —many of them still persist— but the American people still have a number of institutions and traditions, as well as educational, cultural and ethical values that would hardly allow that to happen. The risk exists in the international arena. The power and prerogatives of that country’s president are so extensive, and the economic, technological and military power network in that nation is so pervasive that due to circumstances that fully escape the will of the American people, the world is coming under the rule of Nazi concepts and methods.”

“The miserable insects that live in 60 or more countries of the world chosen by him and his closest assistants —and in the case of Cuba by his Miami friends— are completely irrelevant. They are the ‘dark corners of the world’ that may become the targets of their unannounced and ‘preemptive’ attacks. Not only is Cuba one of those countries, but it has also been included among those that sponsor terror.”

I mentioned the idea of a world tyranny for the first time exactly one year, three months and 19 days before the attack on Iraq.

In the days prior to the beginning of the war, President Bush repeated once again that the United States would use, if necessary, any means within its arsenal, in other words, nuclear weapons, chemical weapons and biological weapons.

The attack on and occupation of Afghanistan had already taken place.

Today the so-called “dissidents”, actually mercenaries on the payroll of the Bush’s Hitler-like government, are betraying not only their homeland, but all of humanity as well.

In the face of the sinister plans against our country on the part of the neo-fascist extreme right and its allies in the Miami terrorist mob that ensured its victory through electoral fraud, I wonder how many of those individuals with supposedly leftist and humanistic stances who have attacked our people over the legal measures we were forced to adopt as a legitimate defense against the aggressive plans of the superpower, located just a few miles off our coasts and with a military base on our own territory, have been able to read these words. We wonder how many have recognized, denounced and condemned the policy announced in the speeches by Mr. Bush that I have quoted, which reveal a sinister Nazi-fascist international policy on the part of the leader of the country with the most powerful military force ever imagined, whose weapons could destroy the defenseless humanity ten times over.

The entire world has been mobilized by the terrifying images of cities destroyed and burned by brutal bombing, images of maimed children and the shattered corpses of innocent people.

Leaving aside the blatantly opportunistic, demagogic and petty political groups we know all too well, I am now going to refer fundamentally to those who were friends of Cuba and respected fighters in the struggle. We would not want those who have, in our opinion, attacked Cuba unjustly, due to disinformation or a lack of careful and profound analysis, to have to suffer the infinite sorrow they will feel if one day our cities are destroyed and our children and mothers, women and men, young and old, are torn apart by the bombs of Nazi-fascism, and they realize that their declarations were shamelessly manipulated by the aggressors to justify a military attack on Cuba.

Solely the numbers of children murdered and mutilated cannot be the measure of the human damage but also the millions of children and mothers, women and men, young and old, who remain traumatized for the rest of their lives.

We fully respect the opinions of those who oppose capital punishment for religious, philosophical and humanitarian reasons. We Cuban revolutionaries also abhor capital punishment, for much more profound reasons than those addressed by the social sciences with regard to crime, currently under study in our country. The day will come when we can accede to the wishes, so nobly expressed here in his brilliant speech by our beloved brother Reverend Lucius Walker, to abolish such penalty. The special concern over this issue is easily understood when you know that the majority of the people executed in the United States are African American and Hispanic, and not infrequently they are innocent, especially in Texas, the champion of death penalties, where President Bush was formerly the governor, and not a single life has ever been pardoned.

The Cuban Revolution was placed in the dilemma of either protecting the lives of millions of Cubans by using the legally established death penalty to punish the three main hijackers of a passenger ferry or sitting back and doing nothing. The U.S. government, which incites common criminals to assault boats or airplanes with passengers on board, encourages these people gravely endangering the lives of innocents and creating the ideal conditions for an attack on Cuba. A wave of hijackings had been unleashed and was already in full development; it had to be stopped.

We cannot ever hesitate when it is a question of protecting the lives of the sons and daughters of a people determined to fight until the end, arresting the mercenaries who serve the aggressors and applying the most severe sanctions, no matter how unpleasant it is for us, against terrorists who hijack passenger boats or planes or commit similarly serious acts, who will be punished by the courts in accordance with the laws in force.

Not even Jesus Christ, who drove the traders out of the temple with a whip, would fail to opt for the defense of the people.

I feel sincere and profound respect for His Holiness Pope John Paul II. I understand and admire his noble struggle for life and peace. Nobody opposed the war in Iraq as much and as tenaciously as he did. I am absolutely certain that he would have never counseled the Shiites and Sunni Muslims to let them be killed without defending themselves. He would not counsel the Cubans to do such a thing, either. He knows perfectly well that this is not a problem between Cubans. This is a problem between the people of Cuba and the government of the United States.

The policy of the U.S. government is so brazenly provocative that on April 25, Mr. Kevin Whitaker, chief of the Cuban Bureau at the State Department, informed the head of our Interests Section in Washington that the National Security Council’s Department of Homeland Security considered the continued hijackings from Cuba a serious threat to the national security of the United States, and requested that the Cuban government adopt all of the necessary measures to prevent such acts.

He said this as if they were not the ones who provoke and encourage these hijackings, and as if we were not the ones who adopt drastic measures to prevent them, in order to protect the lives and safety of passengers, and being fully aware for some time now of the criminal plans of the fascist extreme right against Cuba. When news of this contact on the 25 was leaked, it stirred up the Miami terrorist mob. They still do not understand that their direct or indirect threats against Cuba do not frighten anyone in this country.

The hypocrisy of Western politicians and a large group of mediocre leaders is so huge that it would not fit in the Atlantic Ocean. Any measure that Cuba adopts for the purposes of its legitimate defense is reported among the top stories in almost all of the media. On the other hand, when we pointed out that during the term in office of a Spanish head of government, dozens of ETA members were executed without trial, without anyone protesting or denouncing it before the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, or that another Spanish head of government, at a difficult moment in the war in Kosovo, advised the U.S. president to step up the war, increase the bombing and attack civilian targets, thus causing the deaths of hundreds of innocent people and tremendous suffering for millions of people, the headlines merely stated, “Castro attacks Felipe and Aznar”. Not a word was said about the real content.

In Miami and Washington they are now discussing where, how and when Cuba will be attacked or the problem of the Revolution will be solved.

For the moment, there is talk of economic measures that will further intensify the brutal blockade, but they still do not know which to choose, who they will resign themselves to alienating, and how effective these measures may be. There are very few left for them to choose from. They have already used up almost all of them.

A shameless scoundrel with the poorly chosen first name Lincoln, and the last name Díaz-Balart, an intimate friend and advisor of President Bush, has made this enigmatic statement to a Miami TV station: “I can’t go into details, but we’re trying to break this vicious cycle.”

What methods are they considering to deal with this vicious cycle? Physically eliminating me with the sophisticated modern means they have developed, as Mr. Bush promised them in Texas before the elections? Or attacking Cuba the way they attacked Iraq?

If it were the former, it does not worry me in the least. The ideas for which I have fought all my life will not die, and they will live on for a long time.

If the solution were to attack Cuba like Iraq, I would suffer greatly because of the cost in lives and the enormous destruction it would bring on Cuba. But, it might turn out to be the last of this Administration’s fascist attacks, because the struggle would last a very long time.

The aggressors would not merely be facing an army, but rather thousands of armies that would constantly reproduce themselves and make the enemy pay such a high cost in casualties that it would far exceed the cost in lives of its sons and daughters that the American people would be willing to pay for the adventures and ideas of President Bush. Today, he enjoys majority support, but it is dropping, and tomorrow it could be reduced to zero.

The American people, the millions of highly cultivated individuals who reason and think, their basic ethical principles, the tens of millions of computers with which to communicate, hundreds of times more than at the end of the Viet Nam war, will show that you cannot fool all of the people, and perhaps not even part of the people, all of the time. One day they will put a straightjacket on those who need it before they manage to annihilate life on the planet.

On behalf of the one million people gathered here this May Day, I want to convey a message to the world and the American people:

We do not want the blood of Cubans and Americans to be shed in a war. We do not want a countless number of lives of people who could be friends to be lost in an armed conflict. But never has a people had such sacred things to defend, or such profound convictions to fight for, to such a degree that they would rather be obliterated from the face of the Earth than abandon the noble and generous work for which so many generations of Cubans have paid the high cost of the lives of many of their finest sons and daughters.

We are sustained by the deepest conviction that ideas are worth more than weapons, no matter how sophisticated and powerful those weapons may be.

Let us say like Che Guevara when he bid us farewell:

Ever onward to victory!

#Cuba #FidelCastro #CubanRevolution #antiimperialism #Americas

Caracas, Venezuela – On January 22, hundreds of international delegates from 52 countries heard from leaders from Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and Brazil to kick off the World Anti-Imperialist Congress.

Starting with a professor from Syria who remarked that U.S. imperialism assassinated Iranian General Qassem Soleimani because the U.S. fears it is losing its grip on the Middle East, the crowd shouted “Viva Soleimani!” He added that, with the help requested by Syria from Russia, Iran and others, the Syrians have bravely declared “No pasarán!”

After the Syrian professor, an official from the Cuban Communist Party shared the successful stories of anti-imperialist struggles over the last six decades amid all the bloodshed, bombings, sanctions and interventions made by U.S. imperialism in Cuba. He added that “after all these years and hundreds of aggressions, Cuba is still standing. Venezuela is still standing. Nicaragua is still standing.”

The third speaker was from the Intersindical Union in Brazil. He shared a resolution that declared the U.S. government to be the terrorist of the world and that the struggles of anti-imperialist countries are indeed anti-terrorist struggles. He proposed the resolution to the congress and it was unanimously passed by raised hands from the whole room.

The final speaker was a member of the National Assembly from the Venezuelan United Socialist Party (PSUV), Diosdado Cabello. He recounted the last 20 years of constant struggle of the Venezuelan people for their sovereignty, their dignity and for socialism. He roused the crowd, especially the Venezuelan delegates, when he said “Colombia, Brazil, Paraguay, they kneel before the U.S. and look at where their countries are.” He then boomed “Venezuela will never kneel before the U.S.! Independencia, patriótico socialismo!” and the crowd answered “Venceremos!”

#CaracasVenezuela #Caracas #International #AntiwarMovement #OppressedNationalities #Venezuela #MiddleEast #Americas #PeoplesStruggles #antiimperialism #WorldAntiImperialistCongress

Caracas, Venezuela – From July 25 to 28, over 1000 delegates gathered for the 25th Sao Paolo Forum in Caracas, Venezuela. Historically the largest gathering of the Latin American left, the Forum was transformed this year by its hosts into an assembly of revolutionary parties and movements from around the world, with the sole focus of how a new global revolutionary offensive can be launched against imperialism.

The range of invitees was spectacular. There were representatives from every socialist state and Latin American nation, along with revolutionaries from Palestine, the Philippines, Spain, the Basque Country, Russia, Ireland, South Africa and every Latin American nation. Everywhere you walked in central Caracas, you would see these fighters from around the world meeting each other, debating, discussing the lessons they have learned in the struggle against imperialism. Some were high-ranking politicians, others were rank-and-file workers, some were very old, and others were quite young. All referred to each other as comrade.

There have been hard defeats in recent years. Delegates often referred to “the countries we have lost” in the continental rollback of the Pink Tide. There was much talk about Lula da Silva, the former President of Brazil and co-founder of the Sao Paolo Forum, who now sits in prison as the victim of a far-right coup. Members of the FARC and other Colombian revolutionary groups attended, standing as a reminder of their hundreds of comrades murdered by the state since the Peace Accords were signed. Their very presence was an act of bravery.

But recent events have affirmed the words of worker President Nicolás Maduro, who declared that a new tide would wash across the Americas, an offensive deeper and more radical than the last, that would strike deep at the heart of U.S. imperialism. In just the past few weeks, these words have been made material in the fearless fight of the Puerto Rican people, who appear to be poised to engage in the fiercest struggle against their colonial subjugation in decades. Representatives from Mexican parties and trade unions reminded the Forum attendees of the change underway in their country, now led by a president who is committed to respecting the self-determination of all Latin American countries.

Yet, the greatest sign that revolution is on the rise and imperialism is in its death throes is the honest fact that the Bolivarian Revolution continues to stand, and stand tall. Since the beginning of 2019, imperialism and its lackeys have organized coup attempts, launched terrorist attacks, sabotaged electrical grids, robbed billions of dollars from the Venezuelan people, and have harshened sanctions at the cost of over 40,000 lives. The bourgeoisie, at home and in the United States, want the masses to suffer and die for having the gall to stand up and demand their freedom. Yet in every battle they have declared against this peaceful nation, they have been soundly defeated. The Venezuelan masses are on the march, and they are not stopping. Over the course of the Sao Paolo Forum, they celebrated the very fact that they themselves were the hosts of this international gathering, another victory.

What did the international delegates learn about the Venezuelan nation, and why it must be defended? They learned that over the course of imperialism's vicious offensive, nearly 3 million families were taken out of the slums and provided with new, high-quality homes (5 million families is their goal by 2025). That, despite international economic strangulation, the state has dedicated nearly 75% of its revenue to social services, more than any other country on earth. That they are on track to achieve food sovereignty within six years, forever severing their dependence on U.S. agribusinesses. They learned that over 3000 communes, tens of thousands of housing assemblies, nearly 50,000 communal councils and nearly 2 million militia members represent the now-existing embryo of a new, revolutionary state; that the working class is the vanguard of the Bolivarian Revolution, and it is with their leadership that a new economy will be built and the bourgeoisie will lose their hold on society.

In short, they learned that Venezuela is a breakthrough to the future we all desire, and it must be defended at all costs.

Over the course of the four days, there were cold reminders of what is at stake for the Venezuelan movement. The opening day of the Forum corresponded with the anniversary of the murder of Jorge Rodríguez, a young and inspiring revolutionary who was tortured to death by the Venezuelan secret police in 1976. Among the hundreds of attendees of his memorial were his comrades, former cadre of the Socialist League who had dedicated their lives to revolution and now all belonged to the United Socialist Party (PSUV).

Although the Bolivarian Revolution has been in power for 20 years, when you speak with these lifelong fighters you realize that the brutal past is not too far away. More than once, you could overhear people who had been comrades for decades forget each other's names. They had lived so many years in the underground that they only knew each other by their red names. Fernando Soto Rojas, the League's leader for many years, made the solemn joke in his speech that it still feels strange to speak before a crowd and mention his comrades by name. For far too long, something as casual as telling someone who your friends are could have been a death sentence.

Then, on the closing day of the Forum, news came out that six Venezuelan revolutionaries had been assassinated in the rural west. A class war has been waging across Venezuela, and is being fought with bullets in the countryside. From their rural strongholds, the big landowners look favorably on the genocidal tactics of their Colombian counterparts and deploy them without a second thought. To be a revolutionary in Venezuela is still a dangerous act – and yet there are millions of them.

All delegates left Caracas feeling emboldened and ready to carry on the fight until imperialism is pushed out of all territory on this earth. While there were not many of us from the United States, our presence was appreciated by all. To more than a few, it was a surprise to know that there are revolutionaries on the other side of Trump's wall. Yet we are here, and our numbers must multiply, and it is on all of us to organize ourselves as workers and freedom fighters and link arms with our comrades around the world. Our enemy is united in its desire to force upon us a wretched system, the offspring of slavery and colonialism and genocide, that has no right to exist on our planet anymore. Let us too unite, so that humanity can enter the future that it must.

Sean Orr is a member of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization to the Sao Paolo Forum.

#CaracasVenezuela #Caracas #AntiwarMovement #OppressedNationalities #Venezuela #Americas #PeoplesStruggles #ChicanoLatino #antiimperialism #Socialism #SaoPaoloForum

Milwaukee, WI – About 30 people gathered here, June 24, to stand in solidarity with socialist Cuba and Bolivarian Venezuela. The rally was called in response to President Trump’s unveiling of new restrictions on travel to Cuba.

Speakers at the rally explained Trump’s new policies towards Cuba, the history of Latin American struggle against U.S. imperialism, and the current fight for freedom in Venezuela. One of the speakers, Bryan Pfeiffer from Workers World, condemned the hypocrisy of President Trump’s statement that Cuba and Venezuela violate “human rights,” when Black and brown people in the U.S. are daily victims of police terror.

Attendees vowed to continue to rally in solidarity with people struggling from freedom everywhere. The rally was organized by the Milwaukee Coalition Against Trump, the Latin America Solidarity Committee, End the Wars Committee – Peace Action WI, the Wisconsin Bail Out the People Movement, Workers World Party, and Freedom Road Socialist Organization.

#MilwaukeeWI #International #AntiwarMovement #Cuba #Venezuela #Americas #PeoplesStruggles #USImperialism #antiimperialism #Socialism

Forty people attended a forum Oct. 29, “Revolution in the Philippines: Daring to Struggle, Daring to Win.” The forum at Mayday Books featured a presentation by Joe Iosbaker, a Chicago-based anti-war movement leader and member of Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO) who participated in a recent international solidarity delegation to Western Mindanao in the Philippines.

The delegation to the Philippines consisted of 160 activists from several countries. Iosbaker said they went to witness the human rights abuses taking place on a daily basis in the countryside of the Philippines. These human rights abuses are committed by foreign mining companies, agricultural companies that own entire islands of the Philippines, the landlord class, the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and the Philippine National Police. The struggle of the Filipino people in the countryside is sharp, and the struggle of indigenous peoples of the Philippines is particularly sharp now with the discovery of one of the five largest deposits of gold in the world on their land.

But in the Philippines there is not only oppression and exploitation. There is also a powerful and dynamic revolutionary movement fighting for fundamental change. That movement is led by the National Democratic Front (NDF), the New People’s Army (NPA) and the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP). Launched in 1968, the armed struggle waged by the New People’s Army follows the strategy pioneered by Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party – a protracted people’s war that builds a base in the countryside and gradually accumulates forces to surround the cities from the countryside. The movement is active in 70 of the country’s 81 provinces. The New People’s Army, under the political leadership of the Communist Party of the Philippines, operates in more than 100 guerrilla fronts throughout the country. But NPA members don’t just engage in armed struggle, they also carry out work to serve the people and do educational work in the communities where they are based. The National Democratic Front’s allied mass organizations build movements fighting for justice among many sectors of society including workers, farmers, women, students and more.

The national democratic movement has played an important role in major struggles in the Philippines, like the People Power movement that ousted U.S.-backed dictator Ferdinand Marcos in the 1980s, and other mass movements since then. But the revolutionaries have not made their peace with the system after cosmetic changes while exploitation and oppression continue. The mass movement and the armed struggle have continued for more than 47 years, and are strengthening in the current period. Their struggle builds on the 400-plus-year history of the Filipino people’s struggle against brutal Spanish and then U.S. colonial domination of their land.

During the question and answer part of the forum, much of the discussion turned to questions about newly-elected Filipino President Rodrigo Duterte, a controversial figure who has already declared that he will pursue a foreign policy independent of Washington D.C., and has announced a warming of economic and political relationships with China. He also quickly restarted peace negotiations with the National Democratic Front and freed some of the movement’s political prisoners. The NDF has issued statements welcoming the advances in peace negotiations and the freeing of political prisoners, which they had been demanding for years. They have also united with some aspects of Duterte’s policies, most particularly his declaration to be independent of Washington’s influence. They have also strongly criticized Duterte where they disagree with him or have seen inconsistency between his rhetoric and the reality on the ground, and they are continuing their struggle for fundamental change in the Philippines.

The current geopolitical importance of the Philippines is underscored by the U.S. government’s declared ‘pivot to Asia.’ This pivot, announced in 2012, is in part a military response to the rise of the People’s Republic of China. It’s also designed to help enforce U.S. corporate interests in the Philippines and elsewhere in the Pacific. U.S. imperialism as a factor in national economic and political affairs is constantly present in the Philippines.

The Philippines has long been a key launching pad for the U.S. to project its power in the Pacific and toward Asia, so Duterte’s declarations of an independent Filipino foreign policy and his warming to China have raised major alarm bells among the powerful in Washington D.C. Predictably, the Western capitalist media is treating Duterte like a crazy person.

In this context of U.S. imperialism’s ‘pivot to Asia’ and the resulting increase in oppression of the Filipino people, it is vitally important for progressive people in the U.S. to learn about and show solidarity with the dynamic movement fighting against oppression and exploitation, and fighting for a new society in the Philippines.

#MinneapolisMN #OppressedNationalities #Philippines #PeoplesStruggles #AsianNationalities #NationalDemocraticFrontOfThePhilippines #CommunistPartyOfThePhilippines #FreedomRoadSocialistOrganizationFRSO #USImperialism #antiimperialism

On Sept. 30, 2015, Russian planes began conducting airstrikes against rebel targets in Syria at the request of President Bashar al-Assad. This military intervention signaled a new chapter in the five-year war in Syria, which has pitted the country's national democratic government against foreign-backed rebel groups. Launched for the stated purpose of defeating the growing Islamic State (IS) insurgency, Russia's operations have also targeted U.S.-backed reactionary rebel groups.

For those forces resisting imperialism in the Middle East, the outcome of the war in Syria is of critical importance. Russian air support has significantly bolstered the position of the Syrian government. And while national self-interest, not solidarity, drives Russian intervention in Syria, it has the effect of strengthening the camp of resistance to imperialism in the region.

War in Syria and the camp of resistance

In 2011, neoliberal economic policies pushed by global financial institutions like the World Bank and IMF contributed to a wave of mass protests in countries across the Middle East and north Africa. After protests in Tunisia and Egypt brought down two U.S.-backed regimes, the Western imperialist powers leveraged this political unrest to destabilize Libya and Syria's national democratic governments.

Both Libya and Syria proved too strong for the imperialist-backed opposition to topple alone. In Libya, it took a NATO military intervention to turn the tide against Qaddafi's government in 2011. Similarly, the rebels in Syria lacked broad mass support and proved unable to topple Assad. This prompted a massive influx of arms and supplies from the U.S. and its regional allies – Turkey and Saudi Arabia, in particular – to opposition forces. The U.S. and other imperialist powers also threatened direct military intervention along the lines of NATO's campaign in Libya.

By overthrowing the Assad government, the U.S. hopes to strike a major blow against the camp of resistance to imperialism, Zionism and reaction. Anchored by the Islamic Republic of Iran, the camp of resistance includes Syria, Hezbollah and other patriotic forces of Lebanon, the Palestinian liberation organizations and other allied national democratic movements in the Middle East. Taken together, it is the main obstacle to Western domination of the region.

The significance of the war in Syria

As one of several national democratic states in the Middle East brought to power by popular anti-colonial uprisings in the 1950s and 60s, the Syrian Arab Republic generally charts an independent course from imperialism. State-ownership of some major industries, a robust trade union structure and regulations on foreign investment prevented Western finance capital from dominating the Syrian economy.

Beyond its economic model, however, Syria drew the wrath of Washington for its anti-imperialist foreign policy. Syria backs Hezbollah and according to some reports, serves as a conduit for Iranian support because of its border with Lebanon. Palestinian liberation organizations also enjoyed significant Syrian backing.

A major motivation for the imperialists' proxy war on Syria, however, is the Assad government's close relationship with Iran. Since Iran's national democratic revolution that brought down the Shah in 1979, Syria serves as Iran's closest and most consistent allied government in the Middle East. It provided training, arms and troops to Iran to repel the U.S.-backed Iraqi invasion in the 1980s. The two nations materially supported the progressive and patriotic Lebanese forces resisting the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982. Amid sanctions and threats of U.S. and Israeli aggression, Syria continues to support Iran, and for this, it faces the threat of regime change.

Russian motivations for intervention in Syria

Syria and Russia have enjoyed close relations for decades. During the Cold War, Syria became one of the Soviet Union's two closest regional partners – the other being People's Democratic Republic of Yemen – and it allowed the USSR to build a naval base in the city of Tartus.

The Russian Federation maintained its alliance with Syria, albeit with entirely different motives. After the overthrow of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia's new capitalist ruling class scrambled to maintain its military presence around the world. In Syria, Russia forgave three-fourths of Syrian debt in exchange for expanding the formerly Soviet naval base, and they quickly became Syria's largest arms supplier. Russian corporations began investing in Syria, like a $1.1 billion project in 2010 to build a rival pipeline to Western-controlled energy infrastructure. When the war broke out in 2011, Russian corporations stepped up their investment, which provided the Syrian government with much-needed liquidity to fight the imperialist-backed rebels and maintain the economy.

While Russian support remains instrumental to preventing the fall of Syria's national democratic government, international solidarity is not its driving motive. Rather, the monopoly capitalists who rule Russia hope to strengthen their presence in the oil-rich Middle East by curbing the power of the U.S. and its partners. The Russian Federation is emerging as an imperialist power, although it remains weak and unstable compared to the U.S., Western Europe and Japan. For instance, Russia has 11 military bases in 11 different countries compared to the U.S.'s 900-plus military bases in 130 different countries. Excluded from sharing in the spoils of imperialism by these larger, stronger powers, Russia largely pursues its own agenda in conflict with the larger, stronger imperialist powers.

Russia became a capitalist country in 1991 when a counterrevolution led by Boris Yeltsin overthrew socialism. Oligarchs began buying up Soviet industries as quickly as the newly minted capitalist state could sell them off, which led to a disastrous economic crisis felt most by the working class. This crisis pushed a large section of the oligarchs to favor greater state regulation, with Vladmir Putin as their political representative. Monopolies became the decisive force within Russian capitalism and finance capital largely merged with industry.

National sovereignty and foreign intervention

Regardless of its self-interested motives, however, Russian intervention in Syria is positive for the camp of resistance in the Middle East. The Syrian government has survived the five-year onslaught by imperialist-backed rebel forces for three main reasons: first, the continued support for Assad by a majority of the Syrian people; second, crucial military and economic assistance from Hezbollah and Iran and, third, Russia's military and diplomatic backing.

Unlike the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, Russian intervention came at the formal request of the sovereign national government of Syria. This request was in response to protracted foreign aggression by the Western imperialist powers and their partners, not a domestic crisis. The rebellion in Syria was backed and controlled by outside aggressors from its inception – a far cry from the image of a 'popular revolution against a dictator' promoted by the U.S. and Western Europe. In this sense, it differs sharply from requests by U.S.-backed dictatorships for intervention to put down revolutionary unrest, like South Vietnam in the early 1960s.

Furthermore, Syria is not a neo-colony of Russia, nor is Assad a puppet of Russia. The Syrian state came to power from a national democratic uprising, not Russian maneuvering. In 2010, one year before the outbreak of war, Syria's top four trading partners were the European Union (22.5%), Iraq (13.3%), Saudi Arabia (9%) and China (6.9%), while Russia was a distant ninth at 3%. Although Russian investments have become more consequential in recent years, this is the product of crippling international sanctions imposed on Syria by Western imperialism.

The Russian Federation is not the Soviet Union, and we should avoid the mistake of thinking that its motives and aspirations are genuinely anti-imperialist. Nevertheless, Russia's intervention in Syria strengthens the camp of resistance to imperialism, Zionism and reaction. By enhancing the position of the Syrian government, which is a key player in the camp of resistance, Russia actually weakens U.S. imperialism and its partners.

#Syria #MiddleEast #PeoplesStruggles #Russia #antiimperialism

Tampa, FL – It is Cinco de Mayo, or May 5, but before you participate in “Cinco de Drink-o” and yell, “Happy Mexico Independence Day!” read this article.

In the late 1960s the Chicano movement started to commemorate the battle of Puebla and held annual events to mark that history. Over the years the Cinco de Mayo events spread to the point that they reached the ‘mainstream.’ Then U.S. beer companies started to sponsor the Cinco de Mayo events. Eventually Cinco de Mayo increasingly lost its political significance and became a marketing tool for alcohol and other products.

Looking back, it all started around 1862. Mexican President Benito Juárez, of indigenous, Oaxacan descent, declared Mexico would not pay any foreign debts for two years. France reacted by sending in troops to Mexico and demanding payment. What happened on May 5 was the Mexican victory in La Batalla de Puebla, or the Battle of Puebla. The battle was fought in the state of Puebla, Mexico and it was one of the few victories against the French. The poorly-equipped Mexican army defeated the powerful French army.

Just under 15 years earlier, in 1848, Mexico was invaded by another foreign power – the United States. After supporting pro-slavery American settlers who broke Texas away from Mexico, the U.S. took one-third of the land of Mexico, which is now the states of California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, New Mexico, Colorado, and even parts of Wyoming, Kansas and Oklahoma.

Once-Mexican people would now become trapped in a land that would not acknowledge them as Americans and one that Mexico would shun as non-Mexican. This was in 1848 – the U.S. war and takeover of what is now called the U.S. Southwest would become the homeland of the Chicano nation.

In Mexico, the Battle of Puebla is still remembered and will forever remain a victory for the Mexican people. But Cinco de Mayo is not celebrated in Mexico the way it is commercially celebrated in the U.S. In the U.S., we see major companies and various types of businesses push for parties, drinking, new liquors and ‘Mexican’ memorabilia.

The fact is, Cinco de Mayo is not mentioned in the U.S. as a day when Mexicans fought and won against foreign domination and in particular against France, which is still sending its troops to other countries. Never is the day called “La Batalla de Puebla,” and much less is it ever linked to the Chicano Nation and how it came to exist.

Donning ‘sombreros’ and shaking maracas is just plain incorrect and should not be encouraged. As far as the Independence of Mexico goes, that day is the 16th of September. In 1810 when father Miguel Hidalgo gave the Grito de Dolores, a cry for independence from Spain. And while U.S. beer companies and Dos Equis will keep finding a new beer to market, we remind everyone Cinco de Mayo meant much more to the people than getting drunk. The fifth of May symbolized the day people united to fight back against colonization and against the pillaging of their people by a foreign occupier.

Marisol Marquez is a member of Freedom Road Socialist Organization. Marquez organizes in Tampa with a group called Raices En Tampa. If you wish to contact her, you can message her on her twitter account: twitter.com/elmaryelsol

#TampaFL #Mexico #CincoDeMayo #history #antiimperialism #France #ChicanoMovement #MexicoIndependence #LaBatallaDePuebla #Americas

Minneapolis, MN – 40 protesters gathered to mark International Human Rights Day at the corner of Franklin and Nicollet Avenues, Dec. 7. After a few rounds of chanting, the rally opened with a speech by Sabry Wazwaz, who spoke about the Palestinian struggle for liberation, the right of return and basic human rights. He noted that Israel is an enemy of peace and human rights, supported by billions of dollars in U.S. aid.

Although the temperature dipped below zero, spirits ran high as the group set off for a march along busy Nicollet Avenue. Passersby gladly took flyers, cars honked and protesters raised chants of, “Human rights are under attack! What do we do? Stand up, fight back!” and “Stop the wars, feed the poor, human rights for all!” The protest called for an end to U.S. militarism and warfare from Afghanistan, throughout the Middle East and to Colombia; demanded money for human needs not for war and called for an end to political repression.

The march ended at The Nicollet coffee shop, where Anti-War Committee member and poet Misty Rowan opened a program for a crowded room of protesters and regular café-goers. Speakers included Anh Pham, of the Committee to Stop FBI Repression, who called for support for Palestinian Rasmea Odeh; Angel Buechner, Welfare Rights Committee; Steve McKeown, Veterans for Peace, chapter 27 and Eden Yosief, an SEIU member recently returned from a labor solidarity delegation to Colombia. To close the program, two fourth graders, Leila and Cocoa, along with Steph Taylor of University of Minnesota Students for a Democratic Society, sang the civil rights movement song, Get on Board, inviting all present to join them.

“International Human Rights Day is a day when people across the globe mark the struggle for equal rights and freedom. Just days after his passing, we are here today to honor Nelson Mandela, and build the struggle to end U.S. militarism,” said Meredith Aby-Keirstead, for the Anti-War Committee, which organized the action. She continued, “Nelson Mandela's life represented the struggles for freedom, dignity, equality and peace in South Africa and around the world. His stands against Israeli apartheid and against the U.S. war on Iraq serve as inspiration to the anti-war movement. “

The protest was endorsed by Mayday Books, the MN Immigrant Rights Action Committee, MN Peace Action Coalition, Students for a Democratic Society-U of MN, the Twin Cities Peace Campaign, Veterans for Peace, the Welfare Rights Committee and Women Against Military Madness.

#MinneapolisMN #AntiwarMovement #PeoplesStruggles #MinneapolisAntiwarMovement #Minnesota #antiimperialism #Intervention #USWars #MN

By Prof. Jose Maria Sison

ILPS Chairperson

We, the International League of Peoples' Struggle (ILPS), join the Korean people in celebrating the 60th anniversary of the Victory Day in the Great Fatherland Liberation War against the US-led imperialist aggression. The signing of the Armistice Agreement on 27 July 1953 marked the defeat of the US scheme to conquer the whole of Korea. This agreement ceased hostilities and established the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ).

Since then, the termination of the agreement has long been overdue. We support the position of the Korean people and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) that the agreement must be replaced by a peace treaty requiring the withdrawal of US military forces and nuclear weapons and paving the way for the peaceful reunification of Korea.

We are deeply pleased with the success of the worldwide signature campaign and the march from Pyongyang to the DMZ for the reunification of Korea. We are elated that the memorial stones of the Chairperson of the International League of Peoples Struggle and the Philippines- Korea Solidarity Committee for Peace and Reunification in the Korean Peninsula are permanently placed in the wall of the Memorial Tower of the 3 Charters of the National Reunification in a solemn ceremony on Victory Day.

The Armistice Agreement was designed as a transition measure to “insure a complete cessation of hostilities and of all acts of armed force in Korea until a final peaceful settlement is achieved.“But the US has perpetuated the state of war and its occupation of south Korea and has violated said agreement by introducing new weapons, especially nuclear weapons. It has used military exercises and other provocative shows of force in collaboration with the south Korean puppet regime to create a volatile situation.

The US started the nuclearization of the Korean peninsula when in 1957 it unilaterally abrogated paragraph 13 (d) of the Armistice Agreement (which prohibited the introduction of atomic weapons among other weapons of mass destruction) and in 1958 proceeded to deploy in South Korea nuclear-armed Honest John missiles and 280 mm atomic cannons and in 1959 the nuclear armed Matador cruise missiles capable of reaching China and the Soviet Union then.

In military exercises with the south Korean puppet regime, the US has deployed ships and planes armed with nuclear weapons. Acting in the interest of the Korean people, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea has therefore developed its nuclear and rocket capabilities for self-defense and peaceful use and has responded strongly to the war provocations and nuclear threats by the US.

A peace treaty is urgently needed to end the continuing state of war in the Korean Peninsula and to stop decisively the war provocations being made by the US in concert with Japan and the south Korean puppet regime. The war provocations and nuclear threats are being made in line with the so-called strategic shift of the US to East Asia and due to the drive of the US military-industrial complex to step up war production and superprofit-taking.

The peoples and countries of East Asia and the whole world condemn the continuing malicious practice of nuclear blackmail by the US against the Korean people and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. Also, they deride the fact that the US does not provide nuclear umbrella to any country but in fact threatens all countries with nuclear rain. Nevertheless, the US nuclear blackmail has long been countered and rendered impotent by possession of nuclear weapons by other countries as a matter of self-defense.

It is just for the Korean people and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea to uphold national independence and the socialist cause and to strengthen their national defense and develop nuclear deterrence, while they seek a peace treaty to lay the ground for the immediate denuclearization of the Korean peninsula and for the peaceful reunification of Korea. An end must come to the perpetuation of the US aggressive military presence and occupation of south Korea.

#NorthKorea #Korea #InternationalLeagueOfPeoplesStruggle #DemocraticPeoplesRepublicOfKorea #antiimperialism #Asia

The progressive Lebanese political party Hezbollah sharply condemned a decision by the European Union to put a ‘terrorist’ label on its military wing, June 22.

“It looks as if the decision was written by American hands with Zionist ink and the EU had only to put its seal for approval,” Hezbollah’s statement said.

Hezbollah has worked hard to overcome sectarian divisions in Lebanon and across the Middle East. It is working with an array of nationalist, communist and religious organizations, as well as countries like Syria and Iran, to build a camp of resistance to imperialism and Zionism.

#Lebanon #Iran #Zionism #Syria #antiimperialism #EuropeanUnion #Hezbollah #MiddleEast

Chicago, IL – Dr. Matar speaks for the Syrian American Forum July 2, as people gathered here, for a third week in a row of protests, to say, “Hands off Syria! No new wars!”

The Anti-War Committee-Chicago (AWC), the A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition, the March 19th Coalition and the Syrian American Forum are organizing the rallies. Kait McIntyre of AWC announced that this week and again next, “Chicago’s protests are part of a national coordinated effort called by the United National Antiwar Coalition, A.N.S.W.E.R., United for Peace and Justice and over a hundred other groups.”

#ChicagoIllinois #ChicagoIL #Syria #antiimperialism #ChicagoAntiWar #DrMatar #Assad #MiddleEast

As we go to press, the manufacture of provocations designed to justify open imperialist intervention against independent Syria is reaching fever pitch.

Foreign Secretary William Hague plumbed new depths of murderous hypocrisy when, after Britain and France had bullied and cajoled the other 25 members of the EU into lifting their arms embargo on Syria, so they could openly supply weapons to the counter-revolutionary terrorists, he declared that this escalation of imperialist aggression was necessary to force the Syrian government to accept a negotiated political settlement.

Hague’s statement that supplying yet more arms to the rebels was solely for the purpose of persuading Damascus to attend the proposed Geneva conference ignores the blindingly obvious – that Damascus has already accepted, indeed welcomed, this proposal, whilst the rebels, to date, are refusing to participate.

Direct and deadly zionist aggression has already violated both Syrian and Lebanese sovereignty, and the bomb blasts in a Turkish border town, engineered by unknown hands, are being worked up into an excuse for all-out war.

Yet so great are the dangers foreseen in Washington in committing openly and definitively to such a course that disabling splits are opening up within the imperialist camp over the next step.

The fact that the continuing efforts on the part both of Damascus and of Moscow to stay the hand of aggression and convene a peace conference without preconditions have not yet been dismissed out of hand by the West may be ascribed in part to a cynical calculation – just playing for time whilst the warmongers complete their preparations. However, a glance at the balance of forces on the ground makes it clear enough why some cannier imperialist opinion might urge a step backwards from the brink.

Rebel reverses

With every day that passes, it becomes clearer that the legitimate government of Syria, loyally defended not only by the armed forces but also by the overwhelming majority of Syrians, is not about to be toppled by the squabbling rebel factions to whom imperialism had entrusted the task.

Even some honest bourgeois journalists cannot but recognise this inconvenient reality. Alex Thomson, a foreign correspondent for Channel Four, blogged on 5 May that

“[I]n the central areas of the country, President Assad’s forces have made some notable strategic gains against the various rebel forces. Alongside that, fighters from Hizbollah, coming in from Lebanon in the west to these central areas of fighting, have made a real impact on the ground ...

“On 24 April, for instance, the Syrian Army seized Otaiba, which is just east of Damascus, after the usual sustained barrage. This punched a hole in the rebel supply lines via which they had been taking much of their fight to the northern, eastern and southern areas around the capital.

“Across Damascus, other gains too: rebels more or less now pushed out to the far side of the city ring-road zone in most areas. This again is a significant reversal of fortunes on the ground. Just two days later the army took their fight to Jobar, a key northeastern suburb of Damascus and one of the few areas in rebel hands inside the ring-road zone.

“If they can push the rebels from here then almost all of the gains the rebel forces have made around the Damascus suburbs will have been neutralised.”

On the rebel side, everything is chaos and dismay. On the ground, rival bands of jihadis, bankrolled and armed by different wings of the Gulf sheikh mafia, alternately squabble over the war booty and alienate the population by displays of sectarian thuggery. In turn, they have nothing but contempt for the so-called ‘transitional government’ that Washington, Paris and London hope to parachute into power.

The New York Times told us some time ago how “Fahed al-Masri, a spokesman for the rebel Free Syrian Army’s unified command, questioned how a government could function when it controlled little territory or money yet would be held responsible for the fate of more than one million Syrian refugees and several times that number displaced inside the country.

“‘Welcome, government,’ Mr Masri said sardonically.”(‘Syrian rebels pick US citizen to lead interim government’ by Anne Barnard, 18 March 2013)

The previous head of the so-called ‘Syrian National Coalition’, Moaz al-Khatib, got the elbow because he had the temerity to call for peace negotiations without preconditions. In his place now struts Ghassan Hitto, a Syrian Kurd whose previous 30 years living in Texas have apparently taught him all he needs to know in order to serve imperialism as a quisling ‘prime minister’.

This ludicrous audition over who to pick to play the pirate king was embarrassing in the extreme, coming as it did at the moment when the Arab League was waiting to see who would fill the seat left vacant when the real Syrian state was suspended last year. Still clinging to the hope that Khatib might change his mind, Arab League spokesman al-Thani expressed the pious wish that “things will get corrected ... it’s important for him not to lose this moment”!

Fat chance: Kerry had already waved him goodbye: “The notion he might resign has been expressed on many an occasion and is not a surprise. The opposition is more than one person.”

New pretender Hitto instantly distanced himself from al-Khatib’s brief flirtation with the idea of talks without preconditions. Yet the Guardian lamented that the latest aspirant to the throne “has made little progress” in “unifiying civilian and military wings of the revolution”, noting that“Rebel groups inside Syria take few instructions from the political body and have little direct contact with its leaders.”(‘Moaz al-Khatib’s resignation plunges Syrian opposition into chaos’ by Martin Chulov, 24 March 2013)

Indeed, some of the leaders of the ‘Free Syrian Army’ terrorists have in turn refused to recognise Hitto’s appointment!

Teetering on the brink

Though imperialism has been driven ever closer to the brink of outright hostilities, every new provocation designed to bounce public opinion into supporting yet another criminal war seems to have another purpose as well: to nerve up doubting elements actually within imperialist ruling circles to cast caution to the wind and wade into the swamp. The ballyhoo around chemical weapons is a case in point.

The unsubstantiated claims that the Syrian army was ‘using chemical weapons against its own people’ were manufactured with the obvious intention of justifying in advance another installment of imperialist aggression. Yet as well as hoping to pile pressure on Syria, this scaremongering appeared also to be piling pressure on the White House itself, whose occupant had just a few months earlier waxed so eloquent about the “red line” that would be crossed were President Assad to resort to the use of chemical weapons.

Now though, with Syria’s national defenses holding up so well, the rebels in disarray and the US’s other pressing business in the Pacific claiming the president’s attention (while the resistance forces in Afghanistan and Iraq have given a strong lesson about what Uncle Sam can expect if US boots touch the ground in serious numbers), the ‘red line’ bravado appears to be somewhat subdued.

In a White House press briefing on 6 May, Jay Carney tied himself up in knots trying to cover Obama’s retreat, waffling that “What the president made clear is that it was a red line, and that it was unacceptable, and that it would change his calculus ... What he never did – and it is simplistic to do so – is to say that ‘If X happens, Y will happen’. He has never said what reaction he would take.”

So that’s clear then.

When the human rights investigating team at the UN, led by Carla Del Ponte, produced a dossier that not only failed to substantiate the allegations against President Assad but even included evidence that dared to suggest that the rebels had slaughtered dozens of people with sarin nerve gas attacks in Aleppo and elsewhere, there might almost have been audible from the White House a sigh of relief.

Whilst John Kerry still kept trying to milk the lie that there existed “strong evidence” of President Assad having used chemical weapons, this was flatly contradicted not alone by UN officials but also by US administration sources. British prime minister David Cameron’s pathetic insistence on flogging the same dead horse long after its death certificate had been signed may have been intended as just another brown-nosing token of fealty to the Special Relationship. Instead, it just underscored the warmongers’ embarrassing inability to agree on a line and stick to it.

Zionist attack burns Obama’s bridges?

With or without a green light from the White House, the Israeli jets that twice violated Lebanese airspace to attack Syria’s defenses and inflict death and destruction on her capital city were indeed an “act of war” which “opened the door to all possibilities”, as the Syrian government correctly noted.

In the raids that took place between 2 and 4 May, Damascus International Airport was hit, as were a number of other locations in and near the capital. A doctor at the city’s Tishreen Military Hospital reported the death of at least 100 soldiers, with dozens more wounded. Residential areas were also bombed, driving citizens to take refuge in their basements.

A government statement carried on Syrian TV correctly identified the attack as “an attempt to raise the morale of the terrorist groups, which have been reeling from strikes by our noble army”. We might add that it was also an attempt to force the hand of those within the imperialist camp itself who might be having second or third thoughts about stepping over the brink.

By such a flagrant attack on the sovereignty of both Syria and her Lebanese neighbour, Tel Aviv perhaps hopes to end all thoughts of retreat by pre-emptively burning the bridges.

Turkish provocation backfires

Washington’s recent efforts to reconcile Israel and Turkey, even persuading Netanyahu to apologise to Erdogan for the IDF’s murder of nine Turkish peace activists on board the Marmi Marvara, were driven by an urgent need to get Tel Aviv and Ankara into a warmongering alliance against Syria.

Turkey has long played a major role in facilitating the subversion of its neighbour: opening up safe havens on the border for terrorist forces from which cross-border attacks can be mounted, and assisting with the arming and protection of those forces. Ankara’s shallow ‘anti-zionist’ posture, adopted solely to placate public opinion at home, has, to a great extent, been quietly shelved, enabling Israel and Turkey to work together once again against their common enemy.

Sure enough, a week after the Israeli attacks, a new provocation was launched by Turkey. On 11 May, twin car bombs exploded in Reyhanli, a Turkish border town in the province of Hatay, killing 51, injuring dozens more and inflicting widespread damage on buildings in the vicinity. The victims included both Turks and Syrians.

Almost before the smoke had cleared, and well before any serious investigation could even have begun, Ankara was pointing the finger at Damascus and saying it would take “all retaliatory measures necessary”. Yet the allegation flies in the face of the most basic common sense. With the rebels on the run and peace talks in the offing, what conceivable advantage could Damascus hope to secure by such an attack?

The only possible beneficiaries would be those who want to see the talks fail; those who would like to bounce the world into another war. The chairman of the foreign affairs committee of Russia’s Duma got it right: “In the terrorist attack in Turkey, Syria was accused again – as it is always blamed for everything. Someone wants to disrupt the peace conference and to push ahead with the use of military force.”

It is well known that the car bomb is a favourite weapon of the jihadists, and their feelings about the prospect of talks going ahead with Damascus are also no secret.

Ankara’s complicity with terror

Western press reports convey the impression that the Turkish border neatly separates the ‘civil war’ of Syria from the peaceable ‘refugee camps’ in Turkey which provide simple humanitarian relief for Syrians uprooted by the conflict. This simplistic fairy tale fits in nicely with the idea of fratricidal strife in Syria threatening to ‘spill over’ into peaceful Turkey!

In reality, it is not Syria that destabilises Turkey but Turkey which, by offering a safe haven and free passage to terrorists, is actively destabilising Syria. The West-backed rebellion has long since transformed the whole border area between the two countries into a war zone, making life hell for Turks and Syrians alike.

Whilst doubtless many of the 200,000 Syrians on the Turkish side are helpless civilian victims caught up in the conflict, others are, with full encouragement from Ankara and the West, using this region as a base area from which to launch attacks against Syria. They certainly do not draw the line at using refugee populations as human shields for their subversion.

None of this does much to win the hearts and minds of the local Turkish inhabitants.

Some reports talk of Syrians being beaten up and Syrian businesses attacked by vengeful Turks in the aftermath of the bombing. However, when about a hundred Reyhanli residents responded to the outrage by coming out on the street, it was to the Turkish foreign ministry that they marched and Erdogan’s head for which they called, blaming him for a policy towards Syria which had brought such horrors in its train. Another spontaneous march in Ankara similarly attacked Erdogan for dragging Turkey into war.

Between the world wars, the region of Hatay in which Reyhanli is situated was part of Syria, and many Syrians were living there long before the present crisis – including a substantial minority of alawites. Whilst there are fewer alawites in Reyhanli itself, the region as a whole has distinguished itself by its opposition to Ankara’s support for the rebellion.

Perhaps another motive for the outrage could have been to bounce local opinion into supporting open war against Syria. If so, it has miserably failed. Staff at a media office for a Syrian rebel group located down the street from the site of the first explosion were to be observed hurriedly drawing and locking their shutters, fearful of being correctly identified as enemies of peace in the region.

As for Erdogan, stripped of his phony anti-zionist demagogy and caught red-handed trying to pitch his country into a counter-revolutionary war at the bidding of Uncle Sam and his loathsome brethren in Britain and France, the future does not look rosy.

Syria stands firm

By spreading lies about chemical weapons, launching air strikes against Damascus and engineering provocations on the Syria/Turkey border, imperialism perhaps hopes to bounce Syria into confronting all its enemies at the same time; into reacting to aggression in a fashion and on a timescale convenient to the West.

The New York Times wept crocodile tears recently over what it supposed to be the Syrian president’s dilemma. “He could retaliate against Israel and risk conflict with the region’s strongest military — an option analysts called unlikely. Or he could refrain, in which case he risks appearing further weakened and hypocritical to supporters and opponents alike, many of whom are united in their antipathy for Israel.”

To back up this dubious speculation, the paper quotes one ‘Basil’ (no second name), a resident living near a military research centre that was attacked, as asking “Why does the regime attack the rebels with Scuds and warplanes while it takes no action on the Israeli raids?” (‘Syria blames Israel for fiery attack in Damascus’, 5 May 2013)

However much it may frustrate the West to see Syria choose which of her enemies to fight and in which order (meanwhile refusing to be deflected from her support for the peace conference proposed by Russia), it is going to have to live with the fact that the vast majority of Syrians continue to support their president, their constitution and their country – the more so, the more open the aggression with which she is threatened.

The Syrian masses are well able to distinguish between patriots and rebels; between those who resist zionism and those who collaborate with it; between those who fight for the independence and sovereignty of Syria and those who act as the paid flunkeys of imperialism.

The sly assertion slipped in by the New York Times that “supporters and opponents alike ... are united in their antipathy for Israel”was given the lie even within the same article, when we were told that within hours of Israel’s blitz of the nation’s capital city, “the rebel Damascus Military Council declared that it would try to capitalise. The council issued a statement calling on all fighters in the area to work together, put aside rivalries and mount focused attacks on government forces.”

Further, we were informed that “Some rebels and activists say they consider Mr Assad a far higher-priority target than Israel, though they still oppose it. The main exile Syrian opposition coalition walked that line carefully in a statement issued after the bombings, blaming the government for allowing attacks by ‘external occupying forces’.”

The reader must judge for himself what credence should be given to this kind of ‘opposition’ to zionism.

Peace conference in the balance

As this is being written, the fate of the proposed peace conference hangs in the balance. The lack of seriousness betrayed by the West is underlined by the refusal to include in the peace process not only the expatriate imperialist stooges of the Syrian National Coalition but also the National Coordinating Body, whose presence at talks Russia has proposed.

Unlike the SNC, the NCB represents those forces within the country which, whilst opposed to the current government, are also opposed to the armed uprising and to foreign intervention, and would be prepared to enter talks. Again, Washington’s insistence on excluding Iran – or even Saudi Arabia – from talks erects a further stumbling block to genuine negotiations.

And if the West is in earnest about making a peace conference, why did it choose this moment to gee up Qatar into drafting a UN resolution slandering the Syrian government and condemning its legitimate military efforts in defence of Syrian independence? As Syria’s UN ambasador, Bashar Ja’afari, told the General Assembly, Qatar’s resolution of 14 May “is running against the current, especially in the light of the latest Russian-American rapprochement, which the Syrian government welcomed”.

Russia and China opposed this mischief-making resolution, as did Iran, Cuba, Bolivia, Ecuador, Zimbabwe, Venezuela, Nicaragua, the DPRK and Belarus – as well, of course, as Syria itself. Many other countries that had gone along with a similar resolution last August abstained, including South Africa and Indonesia.

Whilst a combination of threats and promises served to secure 107 votes in favour of the resolution, this had shrunk significantly from last summer’s 133 votes. Meanwhile, the abstentions had climbed from 31 to 59, whilst others simply absented themselves from the vote altogether. None of this is calculated to bring cheer to imperialist hearts.

Whichever way imperialism decides to jump, the Syrian people and leadership have, over two long and hard years of battling subversion exported from the West, served as an inspiration to all those engaged in the growing axis of resistance against imperialism. They have many times over earned the right to call upon the working masses of the world to show their solidarity.

Support for Syria in her hour of need is not a private affair, but a duty that concerns all those oppressed and exploited by imperialism.

Victory to the Syrian nation and its leader President Assad!

No co-operation with imperialist war crimes!

#Syria #Israel #USImperialism #antiimperialism #turkey #chemicalWeapons #FreeSyrianArmy #MiddleEast

May Day began in the U.S. On May 1, 1886, workers held massive rallies across the country demanding an eight-hour workday. In Chicago, the site of the biggest protests, police attacked striking workers, May 4, in Haymarket Square. The bosses, politicians and courts, using anti-immigrant and red scare tactics, framed eight strike leaders and executed four of them on bogus charges. This was the start of May 1 as a day of workers’ protest.

In recent times, the immigrant rights mega-marches of 2006 reignited May Day. This historic series of marches – from Los Angeles, to Chicago, to New York – drew millions of Chicano, Mexicano and Central American protesters into the streets to fight for full legalization. Just last year, tens of thousands joined together around the country for immigrant rights marches, and with unions as a part of the upsurge around Occupy Wall Street.

This year, activists and organizers will mark May Day by advancing the struggle for legalization and full equality for the undocumented. The fight for immigrant rights is once again at the forefront. While President Barack Obama and other politicians propose weak legislation that would help big business while actually hurting many undocumented immigrants, immigrant rights activists raise the demand, “Legalization for all.” For their part, Republican politicians call for more repressive barriers. We oppose further militarization and death at the border. We oppose new guest worker programs seeking to super-exploit immigrant labor. We oppose the brutal raids on and breaking up of immigrant families by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

This May Day, workers in the U.S. are resisting cutbacks to public services and attacks on their wages, pensions and rights. The wave of Republican legislators swept into office in 2010 by the Tea Party set a new wave of anti-worker attacks in motion. Wisconsin union members lost a sharp struggle against far-right Governor Scott Walker. Workers and unions in many states took it on the chin, though Ohio unions won. Significantly, the strike by the Chicago Teachers Union set a good example of what to do in the face of attacks from Democratic Party big wigs. Working people are more and more fighting back against the push for austerity by the rich. This summer, Teamsters at UPS nationally are gearing up for a major contract battle to preserve health care plans and win raises for part-time workers. Those who fight can win.

Also this past year African Americans and their allies boldly confronted a spike in racist terrorism and police brutality. The racist murder of Trayvon Martin, the 17-year-old African American youth, provoked outrage. In Sanford, Florida and other parts of the country, thousands marched to demand the racist vigilante Zimmerman to go to prison. More recently in Brooklyn, 16-year-old African American student Kimani Gray was shot to death by the New York police department. This police murder sparked militant protests. Racist terrorism by vigilantes like Zimmerman and by the police is an inherent part of the national oppression of Black, Chicano and other oppressed nationalities. The movement to end this oppression is rising. FRSO has always supported the right to self-determination for the Black Belt nation in the South and for the Chicano nation in the Southwest.

On May Day, we should reaffirm our commitment to fight for our democratic rights. The U.S. government has unleashed serious attacks on Arabs and Muslims. In 2010, the FBI carried out raids directed against anti-war and international solidarity activists, including members of the FRSO. We must be prepared to respond to new attacks, while speaking out in defense of the right to organize.

May Day provides an opportunity to talk with fellow workers about unity with workers and nations oppressed by U.S. wars and imperialism, to urge the end to U.S. war in Afghanistan, to stop murderous U.S. drone strikes, to oppose U.S. and NATO military intervention and threats upon sovereign countries like Syria, Iran and People’s Korea, and to oppose U.S. military adventures in Africa, Latin America and Asia. May Day reminds us of the need for a militant anti-war movement that stands in solidarity with our sisters and brothers in oppressed nations. When they strike a blow against imperialism in their countries, they strike a blow against the same bankers, corporations and rich elites that rip us off and exploit and oppress us here in the U.S.

May Day is also an important time to celebrate the accomplishments of the socialist countries – Cuba, China, Vietnam, Laos and Democratic Korea – where the working class holds political and economic power.

The Freedom Road Socialist Organization believes that a better world for working people is possible, but it can only be won through a determined struggle.

Workers and oppressed people wage that struggle in their workplaces, in their communities and ultimately in the streets. The continued misery inflicted on workers by economic crisis and non-stop U.S. wars and occupations makes the importance of May Day abundantly clear. Workers have sparked a fire through the mass struggles of the past three years, and the fire rises into May 1, 2013 and beyond.

#UnitedStates #Socialism #OppressedNationalities #MayDay #capitalistCrisis #FreedomRoadSocialistOrganization #workersRights #antiimperialism

The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, often referred to as the Taliban, stated, “Now the time has come for the American president Obama and other head of states of invading countries to understand the realities of this futile war and instead of tactical efforts, troop reductions and gradual withdrawals, focus on the conditions, calls and needs of its own people and immediately extract all its troops from our country.”

In recent years the U.S. and its NATO partners have faced numerous setbacks in Afghanistan.

Large portions of Afghanistan are outside the control of the foreign-dominated government headquartered in Kabul. While the U.S. has spent billions to buy legitimacy for the corrupt puppet government headed by Hamid Karzai – as it represents foreign powers, ignores the needs of the Afghan people and engages in torture as a matter of policy – that regime never gained popular support.

A rising tide of ‘green on blue’ attacks, where patriotic Afghanis who are members of the government’s military or police go up against occupation troops, have made practical cooperation between U.S./NATO and the puppet troops difficult to impossible.

Given this situation, there is now a debate in the White House and Pentagon about how to deal with the growing defeat.

#Afghanistan #USOccupation #taliban #BarackObama #antiimperialism #Asia

The Belgian government has decided to participate in the military intervention of France in Mali, contributing two C-130 transport planes, two helicopters and 75 soldiers. The Western military force is avowedly aimed at stopping the advance of Islamist rebel groups in the North of the country, at the demand of Mali's government and with the support, provided only after the start of the intervention, of the UN Security Council.

With the military intervention of France, French President François Hollande plays 'cavalier seul'. By his act of war, he undermines a peace initiative the UN elaborated with several African countries. The fact that Mali has recently become a hornets' nest is largely due to the consequences of the NATO war in Lybia and of decades of Western political meddling in the country's affairs. In Mali's complex situation, the only chance for peace, stability and development to succeed is by extremely cautious initiatives that have a large base of support and are principally African.

France's intervention is of course not devoid of self-interest. As the former colonial power, France continues to have huge economic interests in the region. Mali possesses gold mines and petroleum, while also uranium is extracted in the region, which is used for part of the French nuclear industry.

Just like with the deadly NATO bombing on Lybia two years ago, Belgium has been very quick to offer its participation to the French military intervention. And this without any democratic debate about its objectives, consequences or cost. In a period of painful austerity measures and cuts in the social budgets, any increase in the Defense budget is simply cynical.

The Belgian government is not clear about the duration of its military intervention in Mali. Defense Minister Pieter De Crem only informed the Belgian taxpayers that it could be of a « very short, short, or medium » duration. As a first evaluation will be made only at the end of February, the mission will take at least six weeks. That is, as a starter, because this period may be prolonged several times yet, as was the case with the Belgian military mission in Afghanistan. In the meantime, for how many deads, wounded and refugees in Mali the Belgian government of Di Rupo (PS) will be responsible ?

The Workers' Party of Belgium (PTB) is opposed to any imperialist intervention in Mali, as elsewhere.

#Mali #AntiwarMovement #Belgium #WorkersPartyOfBelgium #antiimperialism #France #FrancoisHollande #Africa