Editorial: The Pakistan-India conflict
The war between Pakistan and India was another depressing reminder that men are still more ready to unite for nationalism and war rather than for world brotherhood. In a region blighted by acute poverty, hunger and disease was accompanied by fighting and violent death.
The reasons given for the conflict are especially cynical. Mr. Shastri’s Congress Party inherits the supposed ideals of Ghandi and Nehru. In the post¬war years, Mr. Nehru in particular sermonised at length about peace. Today India is forced into that oldest and yet most modern of arbiters—war! Now that private property is in dispute, the pacifism of Ghandi has been forgotten.
Peace cannot exist in a violent society and Capitalism is violent. It is violent because it rests upon the exploitation of men by men. It is violent because it is geared to commercial struggles and is driven by the profit motive. Capitalism is violent because under it men act out the aggressive nature of private property. To want peace and yet preserve Capitalism is a contradiction which repeats the fatal errors of the past.
Indian and Pakistani workers rallied to the fighting with enthusiasm. Immigrants in this country lost no time in forming defence committees. Some workers readily donated a week’s wages. “My country right or wrong” prevailed.
Those workers involved in the conflict are victims of false religious loyalties, and their support for developing Capitalism in Asia. They mistakenly think that their interests are identical with the interests of the Indian and Pakistan ruling class.
The situation is one in which Capitalism asserts all its priorities. There is the fighting itself, the disruption and added misery this inevitably brings. There is the spectacle of men channelling their resources into destructive causes instead of into the creative task of ending poverty. There is the vicious fervour which can unify a nation on a war footing, stifling criticism, and temporarily diverting internal frustrations. The commitment to the senseless struggle can easily become self-perpetuating.
To Socialists the condemnation of the war between Pakistan and India is a condemnation of world Capitalism. It is not an isolated incident resulting from the aggressions of a single nation. International finger-pointing blinds men against the real cause. It is an event made possible by the support that Capitalism commands throughout the entire world. In this respect, workers in this and other countries far from the scene of fighting, are involved. It is futile to appeal to political leaders to act with more restraint or so-called wisdom. A world of harmony can only be possible when the working class of the world contract out of supporting Capitalism.
It is important to emphasise that although the conflict has been expressed in terms of Muslim versus Hindu, and although religious differences are a factor in the situation, the war was not over religion. The war was over the conflicting Capitalist interests of the Indian and Pakistan ruling classes and rapidly involved the great powers, particularly China.
Our message to Indian and Pakistan workers is that this conflict in which they have nothing to win, can only heap misery on abiding misery. Their interests in common with workers of all countries is to build Socialism.
Just as religion is a bastion of ignorance, so nationalism is a hate-filled lie. Both serve private property interests in which the worker has no stake.