America
and Iran were at the very brink of a military exchange. It may all be
a false alarm and the USA will not go to war with Iran but one thing
is for sure, the defence industries in both nations will receive
increased budgets from their governments and the armament businesses
will profit even more.
The
real roots of all modern war can be seen in the class
system of society.
The
narrow interests of each “national” capitalist class conflict one
with the other.
It is vital for people to understand that this or that diplomatic
deal or agreement on the production of enriched uranium, it is not
the cause of any potential conflict. An accident can cause war if all
the other conditions for war are present. But there is no such thing
as an “accidental” war. The only way to end the possibility of
such madness as war is to end the system which inevitably leads to
these horrors. The capitalists set the workers of one country against
the workers of another country in order to strengthen their hold on
the resources throughout the world. The capitalists wage war in order
to share out the spoils. Thus those who speak about the present
threat of war with Iran in terms of the defence of freedom are lying.
Why should we believe the mere say-so that the pecuniary interests of
the industrialist or oil trader. We should seek the answer to why
has the beat of war-drums begun? What are the reasons behind it?
Wars have a variety of immediate pretexts. However, the present
danger of war has its own particular cause: this war was generated by
capitalism.
Capitalism
is the name given to an economic system in which capital, factories
and land are divided up among a comparatively small group of people
in the country, while the rest possess only their workers' hands with
which to feed themselves, and these they sell to the boss—the
capitalist, the manufacturer, the landed proprietor. As the
capitalist economy develops in each state, capital begins to feel
cramped in its own country. In order to increase profits and
interest, capital requires that the market expand, requires new
spheres of influence, places where it can invest its accumulated
capitals and from which the manufacturers and industrialists can
obtain “raw materials” such as oil and ore. Each power thinks
only of how it can bring under its control its neighbours and markets
of other countries, either by diplomatic deception, by bribing the
governments and capitalists in the weak and dependent countries, or
by the brutal force of arms.
To
begin with, the rival powers try to resolve the dispute by
“diplomacy” in which each strives to trick or outwit the other.
Even in times of peace, the negotiations conducted by the diplomats
never cease. If the diplomats do not succeed in outwitting each
other, they immediately issue threats of force. Behind the diplomats,
there are the war-planes and missiles, and therefore there is no
stable peace among the states, but only “armed peace”, that is, a
period of peace during which the state intensified its preparations
for war. Neither the workers nor the people as a whole know anything
about the negotiations conducted by the diplomats. These negotiations
are conducted “confidentially”. However, the capitalists and the
bankers and the corporations—those on whose behalf this “aggressive
policy” is being pursued, always know how the diplomats are faring.
If they begin to suspect that their own diplomats have failed to
defend their financial interests, that the negotiations are working
to the advantage of the capitalists of another power, they
immediately raise the alarm: “Help! The homeland is at risk! Forget
the humiliations of the past! Protect the nation! Go and die for
the glory of the flag.” The government heeds the cry raised by the
capitalists. It cannot fail to heed it, for the government itself is
made up of capitalists. The government serves them, protecting their
profits and theft. In order to please its capitalists, the government
begins to “hector” to its neighbour, and the negotiations being
conducted by the diplomats become more “heated”. Before we know
it, war has begun! The people, however, cannot be told the truth that
the conflict is because of the manufacturers and industrialists, our
bankers and oil businesses, want large profits. The fight is to
ensure our capitalists the “right” to rob some country. That
would be “awkward” for the media to explain. The people will not
sacrifice for such a cause. So invent some tale or other such as
“Let us free our neighbours from despotism!” The capitalists, the
oil executives and bankers sit in their board-rooms, pocket the profit
on the sale of arms, and benefit from the rise in oil price and await
the outcome of the war. Meanwhile the peoples' lives suffer. And for
what? To provide a better, sweeter, richer, more luxurious life for
their own native exploiters, bosses, industrialists, landowners,
manufacturers, whether they be American or Iranian.
The
dispute among the capitalist states are not conducted on behalf
of the people, but at the behest of the ruling elite, and these property
owners push their states onto the path of an expansionist or
protectionist or isolationist policies. It is they who decide whether
or not there will be war. And the people? They need to know only one
thing: You will be the collateral damage.
Working
people possess so little knowledge. They have not yet understood
where their own interests lie, and the capitalists and the servants
of the government make use of this. Thus the primary reason for the
moves towards war is the struggle between national
capitals on
the world market. American capital is fighting to dominate the Middle
East and Iran excluded from its share, resists. Capital clashes with
capital, fights against capital, each seeking to expel the other.
Each desires mastery for itself, to retain its “monopoly.” The
more bitter the struggle becomes. War
becomes unavoidable.
For as long as there exist capitalist property owners who hold state
power in their hands, wars will continue. The aim of these wars will
be the same, namely, to secure better profits for the nation's
industrialists and businessmen. Does such an aim deserve that blood
be shed in its name? Are our fellow-workers acting wisely when for
such a cause they call for the destruction of fellow-workers from
another country, destroying towns and devastating cities? Have the
workers come to “love” their own exploiting tyrant masters so
much that they are willing to be complicit in war crimes to defend
their profits and interests of their ruling class.
Once
the true cause of war, its purpose, has been understood, another
question arises: what is to be done? How can the slaughter be
stopped? How can the people be spared new conflicts and disputes
among the capitalists, new wars, in the future? while capitalism
continues to exist, while there is private ownership of land,
factories, plants, etc., upon the earth, while citizens continue to
be divided into the haves and the have-nots, into capitalists who
have seized state power and hired workers without rights, while
capitalists continue to fight amongst themselves on the world market
for the sake of their profits, wars
are inevitable.
Wars will only end when the power of the capitalists has been
smashed, when the owner-exploiters are no longer able to harm the
people and push them into bloody conflicts. War is generated by the
unjust inequitable capitalist structure of society. In
order to put an end to war, the structure of society must be changed.
In
order to put an end to war, all the factories, all the plants, all
the industrial enterprises must be removed from the capitalist
masters: the land must be taken from the landowners, the mines from
private proprietors, the banks from the capitalists, and all this
wealth must become common property. In order to put an end to war, a
new and juster
socialist world
must be won for the people. Then neighbouring peoples will not seek
to destroy each other, then there will be no need for aggression.
There will no longer be the chief
culprits of war —a
clique of capitalists destroying millions of people so that after the
war their purses will be fuller! This is the main task facing the
workers. My enemy is in my own country, and this enemy is the same
for all the workers of the world. The enemy is
capitalism,
this enemy is the rapacious,
corrupt class government. This
is the way forward for the victory of the workers” cause, for the
replacement of capitalist society by a just and better word based on
the socialist
solidarity of the workers of every country.
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