ALB
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A warning on where the Western capitalist block pumping weapons into Ukraine could lead:
After the war is over and Russian troops withdraw from most of Ukraine there will a rich vein of anti-Russian feelings that Ukrainian ultra-nationalists will be able to exploit.
But do you think that Biden is not really a religious believer either but just a cynic whose real religion is American greatness? In other words, is not possible to be a genuine religious believer and the head of a capitalist state? Couldn’t Putin really be a religious nutter?
So the Bolsheviks succeeded in neither clearing the capitalists from the Earth nor gods from the skies.
More on Putin’s religion and his belief in “Holy Russia” here:
The breakaway Ukrainian Orthodox Church also (of course) claims descent from Vladimir the Rus who converted all his subjects to Christianity in Kiev. Only they call him Volodymyr.
Incidentally, as Zelensky’s mother tongue is said Russian his real name will be Vladimir. At least he’s probably an atheist not a religious nutter like Putin seems to be.
Good point, James, about Warren Buffet a
referring to “class warfare”. It is clear that he was using “war” in the metaphorical sense just as we do in Clause 8 of our Declaration of Principles when we talk of “waging war” on other political parties.When used on its own I don’t think people do interpret “class war” as necessarily implying armed conflict. The trouble is when it is combined in a slogan in which it is associated with “war” in the literal sense, as in “the only good war is the class war” and “no war but the class war”.
I know that in some cases this intended as a sort of pun, a play on the two different usages of the word “war”. But not in all cases. Some do mean that “the only good armed conflict is the armed conflict between classes.” In any event, it would be very odd to say “No armed conflict but the political and economic struggle of the working class against the capitalist class”.
So, the conclusion is, I suppose, that it’s ok to use “class war” on its own but not together with “war” in the sense of armed conflict.
I notice that Tony Blair is not amongst those joining the “Hang the Kaiser brigade. A wise move by someone who, with President Bush, is widely regarded as a war criminal himself for having started the Iraq War and for the atrocities committed there by British and American troops.
There is nothing like a war for turning wishy-washy liberals into vengeful jingos.
In that article on the arrest of the Kononovich brothers in the Peoples Voice which is the organ of the American “Communist” Party there is an interesting passage:
“After the Soviet Union fell apart in 1990-91, the Ukrainian government abandoned the collective farm system that had defined socialist agriculture in the USSR. The former collectively-owned land was distributed among the members of the farms, however, and bans on further sales were put in place to protect small farmers from being swallowed up by corporate industrial giants.
The Zelensky government reversed that longstanding policy in 2019, leading to fears that Ukrainian farmland—which takes up as much space as France and Germany combined—would be gobbled up by foreign agribusiness giants.”This looks like opening the way for new cohort of oligarchs, Western as well as Ukrainian.
Putin is an Orthodox Christian with the mentality of old-fashioned Panslavist. In fact he is an old-fashioned Panslavist who regards the liberal West as corrupt and decadent. The trouble is that some leftists still seem to think that Russia is the land of international socialism which it hasn’t even (falsely) claimed to be for over 30 years.
I was going to ask the same good question. I would even say that that action was reprehensible as stopping imports of oil from Russia will harm workers by increasing their cost of living.
Here’s a shorter limk if anyone wants to tweet it ot whatever:
I believe they all derive from the original Chartist slogan “peace to the cottages, war on the palaces” or a version of it
Some of the Chartists may well have used it but it goes back further than that, to the French Revolution as “War to the Chateaux, Peace to the Cottages”
I think it’s final form is/was: “No War between Nations. No Peace between classes”, which is alright.
In fact, hanging on the wall at our Head Office is one which says: No War Between Peoples. No Peace between Classes. Here it is (if this works).
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/16253171/689434050286117983
Alan, slogans like “the only good war is the class war”, “no war but the class war”, and “peace between people, war upon our rulers” don’t really express our position clearly. In fact they can be highly misleading. This is because there are two different senses of “war”. The literal (war = armed conflict) and the metaphorical (war = opposition to or struggle against, as in “War on Want”).
In the present Ukraine situation “war” means “armed conflict”. Translated into this sense the rhetorical slogans become:
“The only good armed conflict, is the armed conflict between the classes”.
“No armed conflict but the armed conflict between classes.”
“Peace between people, armed conflict against our rulers.”
Which is definitely not our position.
On the other hand, translated into the metaphorical sense as in War on Want, the slogans become:
“The only good struggle is the class struggle.”
“No struggle but the class struggle.”
“Peace between people, struggle against our rulers.”
That does express our position more clearly, in fact rather well. But they are valid even when there is no armed conflict between states going on and so is not so powerful an expression of our opposition to wars.
A better slogan when there is a war would be: “No To War. Yes to Class struggle”.
That would distinguish our position from the pacifists who say simply “No to War”, and from the armed insurrectionists who say “No to War but Yes to Armed Conflict against the Ruling Class”.
It also explains why we can’t unite to oppose a particular war with those who by “No War but the Class War” mean “No War but Armed Conflict against the Ruling Class”.
Best to cut the rhetoric and think up a slogan to express our unique position. For instance: No to all wars between states. Yes to the class struggle for World Socialism.
Russia’s peace terms:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-60785754.amp
Unlike some western politicians who seem to want the war with the suffering, deaths and destruction to continue, John Simpson suggests that the demands are not that unreasonable.
Let’s hope he’s right and that the war stops as soon as possible — sooner in fact, tomorrow unconditionally. That’s the working class interest.
