ICOR call for Anti-War-Day 2015

Seventy years after the end of the Second World War wars are omnipresent worldwide. On 6 August all over the world people commemorate the altogether almost 400,000 victims of the consequences of the nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and on 1 September they commemorate the altogether 60 million people killed especially among the working masses during the Second World War. 70 years after the liberation of the world from fascism the Kurdish liberation struggle in Rojava is the most progressive struggle for freedom and democracy. The aggression of the million men strong Turkish army, supported by NATO and USA, against the Kurdish people and the PKK in northern Iraq, lumping them together with the IS, has given the Kurdish liberation struggle a new dimension in terms of quality.

Since 1945 there has been almost no point of time without imperialist wars, mostly against liberation movements. The blood trail runs from Korea through Vietnam, Indonesia, Chile to Iraq and Afghanistan. Presently the number of wars and hotbeds of war is increasing.

After the end of the world economic and financial crisis the general instability of the imperialist world system has intensified. The international crisis management with mainly the imperialist central banks pumping trillions into the finance markets could only keep the chronic overaccumulation of capital in a state of tension. At the beginning of the world economic and financial crisis there was still the possibility to invest excess capital especially in the BRICS states. However, in the meantime the growth rates are  declining there, too. The plan has largely failed to trigger off “a self-supporting upswing” by flooding the finance markets. Today we experience the failure of bourgeois economy which objectively questions capitalism altogether. 

The interimperialist contradictions are becoming more complex and more multipolar. The loss of the undisputed economic supremacy of the USA is threatening their position as sole imperialist super power. The Iraq and Afghanistan war have weakened the USA's economic strength, which also limits their military potential.

The USA have fallen back in regard to their share of the world social product by 9% points between 2000 and 2013, the share of the imperialist China has grown by 8.5% points. This drastic change of forces is challenging US imperialism to curb the influence of China in the Pacific Area with trade agreements. To this effect, the USA are strengthening the military alliance with Japanese imperialism. Joint maneuvers with the Philippines are directed against the expansion of Chinese military bases in the South China Sea. 

At the same time China is struggling with one of the most severe economic crises since its integration in the world economy. Almost 3 trillion dollars have eroded at its stock markets these days and the Chinese government is selling gold in order to bridge the situation. In comparison to this China imported almost one ton of gold per year. That is one reason for the continuing collapse of the gold price today.  

In Ukraine the issue is the influence on the strategically important center of raw materials and industry and a new sales market. The proxy war of the two imperialist power blocs is conjuring an acute danger of war in this region. The actual intensification in Ukraine is instigated by the EU and NATO states. They broke their promise not to expand NATO to the east after the German reunification. Today there are nine NATO countries at the Russian borders. However, at first the USA could not enforce their course of open confrontation against Russia with arms supply and direct military intervention of NATO against the will of the EU bloc, but they are still pursuing this course. This is revealed by large maneuvers in the Baltic Sea, Poland, the Black Sea and in Ukraine.

Even though NATO is the main aggressor this does not mean that revolutionary organizations can side with Russian imperialism or regard the areas of Donetsk and Lugansk as “liberated areas”. It is rather striking how not only Kiev but also Putin is cooperating with fascists. A revolutionary party cannot subordinate itself to the politics of an imperialist state, even if it is weaker than the USA.

Africa is a seething continent. There has been war in Congo for more than 10 years which up to now has caused 6.5 million deaths. Africa is the continent where all imperialists are trying to gain influence, because there are the minerals which the world production needs.

The Afghanistan as well as the Iraq war have ended in a complete disaster for US imperialism. The military campaign against the so-called “international terrorism” has failed and thus also the strategy of US imperialism in the Middle East. As a consequence US imperialism again more often used the form of fascism justified in Islamist terms, be it the Al Nusra Front or the IS. The class character of the Islamist terror organizations (Boko Haram in Africa) is a form of fascism connected to feudal structures. They use Islam as justification for their terror.

Newly strengthened regional powers like Qatar, the Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia have influence at the stock markets and have acquired a high share of western corporations. In order to enforce their own interests of supremacy the grand dukes of Qatar and Saudi Arabia finance Islamist fascist movements.

The military maneuvers of USA and Russia in different parts of Latin America and the Caribbean by establishing military bases, patrolling at the borders, rivers and oceans and by joint military exercises are part of efforts of war and controlling raw materials. 

In addition, the interimperialist contradiction is spurred by new forces belonging to the BRICS and MIST states[1].  In their race to catch up they are partly developing special aggressiveness. In the Middle East these are Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. In rivalry to Saudi Arabia the Iranian regime tries to get even Yemen under its main influence. Against this a reactionary war alliance has been formed under the leadership of Saudi Arabia in alliance with Egypt which – supported by the USA and NATO – is bombarding Yemen and is threatening with an invasion of ground troops.

The recent Iran nuclear agreement may look like it is in the interests of peace, in fact, it will increase the strength of the imperialist camp led by the US. At the same time this will open up new markets for the export of capital and goods to Iran. Great Britain  welcomed the agreement and added that it will strongly invest in Iran.

An expression of the comprehensive crisis proneness of imperialism is the crisis of the national states and as its consequence a growing number of so-called disintegrating states like Somalia, Sudan, Congo, Nigeria, Mali, Iraq, Yemen, Lebanon, Libya, Syria. Wherever the masses do not want to live in the old way in these shattered neocolonially dependent countries any longer, the Islamist fascist terror appears as a pseudo alternative which is especially pushed. These terror organizations are utterly inhuman and have a use of vocabulary like under Hitler fascism. In a demagogic way they also use socialist slogans and even seemingly support the Palestinian liberation struggle with antiimperialist slogans. From Europe alone 7500 persons are active for the IS as paid mercenaries.

Because of deep economic and political crises and internal unrests the instability in many regions of the world has brought about all kinds of violence and terror spreading an unprecedented barbarism. The struggle against the Islamist fascists must be led politically and militarily, but also regarding world outlook against their socialfascist and pseudo-antiimperialist demagoguery.

Another consequence of disintegrating national states, growing poverty, ethnic persecution, regional environmental catastrophes and regional wars like in Syria is a strong increase of refugee streams, presently 60 million people. The only answer which imperialism has to the on a worldwide scale growing refugee movement is to fight against it militarily. The ICOR parties and organizations have committed themselves to strengthen their proletarian internationalist profile regarding refugee policy and to lead a struggle over the proletarian internationalist awareness on a mass scale.

The struggle against this Islamist fascist terror becomes a more and more important condition of the struggle for freedom, democracy and socialism. The victory in the battle over Kobanê after more than 130 days of military fighting has worldwide radiance. On the one hand the roots of the success are the heroic struggle of the Kurdish liberation fighters who could be victorious in spite of inferiority regarding arms technology and on the other hand the international solidarity without which this success would not have been possible. The Kurdish liberation struggle deserves support as part of the world revolutionary process. This is what the ICOR solidarity pact is for. All people minded in a democratic, antifascist and revolutionary way must resolutely protest, if forces who are in the forefront of the liberation struggle against the fascist ISIS gangs, are arrested and criminalized and the liberation struggle in Rojava and Kobanê is placed under “suspicion of terrorism”.

In view of all crisis proneness of the imperialist world system the main tendency in the world remains proletarian revolution. The international Marxist-Leninist revolutionary and working-class movement has passed its low. As ICOR members we accept the challenge to win over the decisive masses worldwide for the struggle against the capitalist system. We are convinced that the most consequent struggle against the growing danger of escalating local and regional wars consists of overcoming imperialism in a revolutionary way and build up socialism all over the world.

On 6 August and on 1 September:

Take to the streets for the international day of struggle against fascism and imperialist promoted wars!

Solidarity with the Kurdish and Palestinian liberation struggle!

Fight for peace, friendship among the peoples – socialism!

Workers of all countries, unite!

Workers of all countries and oppressed peoples, unite!

1. ORC   Organisation Révolutionnaire du Congo (Revolutionary Organization of Congo), Democratic Republic of the Congo
2. MMLPL   Moroccan Marxist-Leninist Proletarian Line
3. CPSA (ML)   Communist Party of South Africa (Marxist-Leninist)
4. PPSR WATAD   Parti Patriote Socialiste Révolutionnaire WATAD (Patriotic Socialist Revolutionary Party WATAD), Tunisia
5. CPB   Communist Party of Bangladesh
6. CPI (ML) Red Star   Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Red Star
7. PCC CPI (ML)   Provisional Central Committee Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist)
8. INDOREV   Indonesia Revolutionary
9. CPN (Unified)   Communist Party of Nepal (Unified)
10. NCP (Mashal)   Nepal Communist Party (Mashal)
11. MLPD   Marxistisch-Leninistische Partei Deutschlands (Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany)
12. KOL   Kommunistische Organisation Luxemburg (Communist Organization of Luxemburg)
13. RM   Rode Morgen (Red Dawn), Netherlands
14. MLP   Marksistsko-Leninskaja Platforma (Marxist-Leninist Platform), Russia
15. VZDOR   VZDOR - strana práce (Resistance - labour party), Slovakia
16. MLGS   Marxistisch-Leninistische Gruppe Schweiz (Marxist-Leninist Group of Switzerland)
17. TIKB   Türkiye İhtilalci Komünistler Birliği (Union of Revolutionary Communists of Turkey)
18. MLKP   Marksist Leninist Komünist Parti Türkiye / Kürdistan (Marxist Leninist Communist Party Turkey / Kurdistan)
19. KSRD   Koordinazionnyj Sowjet Rabotschewo Dvizhenija; Ukraina (Coordination Council of the Working-class Movement of Ukraine)
20. PR   Partija Rada (Party of Labor), Yugoslavia
21. PCC-M   Partido Comunista de Colombia – Maoista (Communist Party of Colombia - Maoist)
22. PC (ML)   Partido Comunista (Marxista Leninista) (Communist Party (Marxist-Leninist)), Dominican Republic
23. PC/ML   Partido Comunista (Marxista-Leninista) de Panamá (Communist Party (Marxist-Leninist) of Panama)
24. PCP (independiente)   Partido Comunista Paraguayo (independiente) (Paraguayan  Communist Party (independent))
25. PPP   Partido Proletario del Perú (Proletarian Party of Peru)

Signed after the release date

26. NPCH (ML) Nouveau Parti Communiste Haϊtien (Marxiste-Léniniste) (New Communist Party of Haiti (Marxist-Leninist)) NPCH (ML)

Additional Signatories (Non-ICOR):

• Organisation communiste - Futur rouge (Communist Organisation - Red Future), France