NATO/Ukraine's Bombing Of Moscow

Following Britain's provision of longer-range, Stormshadow Cruise Missiles to Ukraine, and as NATO/Ukraine's War with Russia has got bogged down into an inevitable stalemate, the use of aircraft type drones, by Ukraine, to bomb Russia, targeting a residential area, where Putin lives, was a foreseeable development. It follows Ukraine's terroristic car bombings in Moscow, attacks on oil pipelines in Russia, and NATO's blowing up of the Nordstream pipelines. Its typical of such situations. Even looking at NATO's designs on Putin's regime, it involves a putschistic adventure by generals to remove him.

Viewed in the kinds of moralistic terms that petty-bourgeois liberals, and social-imperialists use, after months of Russia's bombing of Kyiv, Putin and his regime could hardly complain at getting repaid in similar treatment. But, Marxists do not operate on the basis of such moralism and moralising justifications. We are not concerned with who shot first, who engaged in the worst or greatest number of atrocities – because, as Trotsky described, in relation to the Balkan Wars, wars inevitably involve atrocities by all sides – but with what represents the interests of the working-class, as a global class, and what leads to an historically progressive solution.

Viewed in those terms, its clear that what the bombing does is to confirm the narrative of Putin and his regime that it is under attack from NATO imperialism, and that NATO's expansion Eastwards, its development of bases in Central Asia, where it has aligned with vile regimes, is all part of a grand plan to encircle and defeat not only Russia, but also China. Like a Hobbesian sovereign, therefore, Putin says, you must submit to me as your defender against these invaders. Trotsky noted exactly the same thing with Hitler in the 1930's.

“Fascism is a form of despair in the petty-bourgeois masses, who carry away with them over the precipice a part of the proletariat as well. Despair, as is known, takes hold when all roads of salvation are cut off. The triple bankruptcy of democracy, Social Democracy, and the Comintern was the prerequisite for the successes of fascism. All three have tied their fate to the fate of imperialism. All three bring nothing to the masses but despair and by this assure the triumph of fascism...

The democracies of the Versailles Entente helped the victory of Hitler by their vile oppression of defeated Germany. Now the lackeys of democratic imperialism of the Second and Third Internationals are helping with all their might the further strengthening of Hitler's regime. Really, what would a military bloc of imperialist democracies against Hitler mean? A new edition of the Versailles chains, even more heavy, bloody, and intolerable. Naturally, not a single German worker wants this. To throw off Hitler by revolution is one thing; to strangle Germany by an imperialist war is quite another. The howling of the "pacifist" jackals of democratic imperialism is therefore the best accompaniment to Hitler's speeches. "You see," he says to the German people, "even socialists and Communists of all enemy countries support their army and their diplomacy; if you will not rally around me, your leader, you are threatened with doom!" Stalin, the lackey of democratic imperialism, and all the lackeys of Stalin —Jouhaux, Toledano, 16 and Company — are the best aides of Hitler in deceiving, lulling, and intimidating the German workers...

The struggle against fascism demands above all the expulsion of the agents of "democratic" imperialism from the ranks of the working class. Only the revolutionary proletariat of France, Great Britain, America, and the USSR, declaring a life-and-death struggle against their own imperialism and its agency, the Moscow bureaucracy, is capable of arousing revolutionary hopes in the hearts of the German and Italian workers, and at the same time of rallying around itself hundreds of millions of slaves and semi-slaves of imperialism in the entire world. In order to guarantee peace among the peoples we must overthrow imperialism under all its masks. Only the proletarian revolution can accomplish this. To prepare it, the workers and the oppressed peoples must be irreconcilably opposed to the imperialist bourgeoisie and must be rallied into a single international revolutionary army. This great liberating work is now being fulfilled only by the Fourth International.”

(Phrases and Reality)

And, after the fall of the USSR, a similar fate befell, Russia. Putin was the child of imperialism's pillaging of the USSR, under the tutelage of its puppet Yeltsin, as Hitler was that of the Versailles Treaty, and the failures of German democracy, and social-democracy. Putin's narrative works, just as did Hitler's, because, as with any successful lie, it is based upon a core of truth. US imperialism did pillage Russia; it is seeking to limit the rising economic and strategic power of China; it has expanded Eastwards to encircle them both, just as the US did in the Pacific in the 1930's with Japan; it does want again its puppets in Moscow and Beijing, or to break apart these vast states, so as to install its puppets in parts of them. The lie, of course, is that the Russian workers, solution to that comes from Putin, rather than, as Trotsky describes above, an alliance with other workers, globally, to overthrow the ruling class, and its capitalist/imperialist world order.

Of course, the same is true in reverse. Its almost certain, as former NATO General Secretary, George Robertson, confirmed, that NATO deliberately goaded Putin into invading Ukraine. They thought they would draw him into a war that Russia could not win, that would drain its resources, provide cover for stepping up the sanctions and isolation of the Russian economy, and so create the conditions for a putsch against him, so as to install a more compliant regime. In addition, what Putin's invasion did, was to strengthen the reactionary forces;, like the Azov Battalion and Right Sector, in Ukraine, just as NATO's war against Russia strengthens the fascistic and nationalistic forces in Russia. It rallied workers in Ukraine around the flag of that reactionary nationalism, and gave cover to the corrupt regime of Zelensky, and its narrative of the need to join NATO, a narrative which had continually won the support of only a minority in Ukraine previously.

More than that, however, that narrative was conveyed wider into the Baltic and Scandinavia, drawing Finland and others, also, into the structure of NATO imperialism, as the world divides, at an increasing pace, into two competing, nuclear armed camps, hurtling towards World War III. It demonstrates, in stark terms, that the proxy war being fought out in Ukraine, is thoroughly reactionary on both sides. The idea that it could be viewed as simply a national war of independence, by Ukraine, as Ukrainian liberals and social-patriots, and other social-imperialists have claimed, was always nonsense, and Ukraine/NATO's bombing of Moscow, as well as the series of previous terroristic car bombings, blowing up of Nordstream, the incident in the Black Sea, and so on illustrate. Again, Trotsky describes, precisely, the same conditions, in relation to the run up to World War II.

“It is impermissible to consider a war between Czechoslovakia and Germany, even if other imperialist states were not immediately involved, outside of that entanglement of European and world imperialist relations from which the war might have broken out as an episode. A month or two later the Czech-German war – if the Czech bourgeoisie could fight and wanted to fight – would almost inevitably have involved other states. It would therefore be the greatest mistake for a Marxist to define his position on the basis of temporary conjunctural diplomatic and military groupings, rather than on the basis of the general character of the social forces standing behind the war...

We have repeated hundreds of times the priceless thesis of Clausewitz that war is but the continuation of politics by other means. In order to determine in each concrete case the historic and social character of the war we must be guided not by impressions and speculations but by a scientific analysis of the politics which preceded the war and determined it. These politics from the very first day of the creation of Czechoslovakia had an imperialist character...

One can say that besides the partition of the Sudeten Germans, Hungarians, Poles, and possibly the Slovaks too, Hitler will not stop before the enslavement of the Czechs themselves and that in this case their struggle for independence will have every claim upon the support of the proletariat. To pose the question in this manner is nothing but social-patriotic sophistry. What concrete roads further development of imperialist antagonisms will take we do not know. Complete destruction of Czechoslovakia is possible, of course. But it is also possible that before this destruction will have been accomplished a European war will break out and Czechoslovakia will find itself on the side of the victors and participate in a new dismemberment of Germany. Is the role of a revolutionary party then that of nurse of the “victimized” gangsters of imperialism?”

(Social Patriotic Sophistry)

NATO imperialism miscalculated. Despite all of their propaganda about Russia seeking to invade all of Ukraine, Putin never had any such intent. Indeed, he would probably have preferred some kind of deal that left the Eastern republics inside Ukraine, giving him future leverage inside the country, on the basis of some kind of Minsk III, agreement, which is still probably where this war ends up, but, now, in the form of a peace deal, in which Crimea and the breakaway republics are annexed by Russia, as previously with Abkhazia and South Ossetia. As with the new flare up of ethnic violence in Kosovo, and the 70 years of ethnic conflict that has followed the creation of the Zionist state in Israel, the carve up of the Indian sub-continent, into continually warring ethnic groups in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, and so on, it provides no lasting, historically progressive solution.

As with Abkhazia, and South Ossetia, Putin has followed the NATO playbook, used in its war against Russia's historic ally, Serbia, using Kosovo as its pretext. In fact, its the same approach that colonial powers always adopted, of creating ethnic enclaves, as bulwarks, as with Britain in Gibraltar, the Falklands, the North of Ireland, and so on. Putin has no need to invade the whole of Ukraine, and it would be idiotic and suicidal to do so. But, in the last 6-8 months, Russia has been able to consolidate its military position in the Eastern Republics, making it near impossible for Ukraine, even with NATO support, to retake them. That is why, the much vaunted “Spring Counter-Offensive” by Ukraine, failed to happen.

In modern warfare, offensive weapons such as tanks, aircraft and missiles have become more or less redundant, as means of offense, against any reasonably equipped defence. All can still be used effectively defensively, on your own territory, but become useless, or at least highly vulnerable, on the enemy's territory. Russia's tanks were minced by Ukrainian infantry, using shoulder launched anti-tank missiles, and, now, Ukrainian tanks, trying to launch a counter-offensive, face exactly the same fate, whether they travel by road or across country. Aircraft and missile systems can be used to defend, on your own territory, with the support of radar and electronic jamming systems, against both land attacks and air attacks, but are vulnerable on the enemy's territory to being shot down by their own such defensive systems. As with WWI, it becomes, again, a war of attrition, but, now, the attrition is of weapons, not of soldiers.

Last Summer, we were told, by NATO apologists like Paul Mason and others, that Russia was on the brink of defeat, complete with maps and so on. Russia was about to run out of weapons and ammunition, as though its vast resources could not simply produce an endless supply of them, as well as buying them in from China, Iran and elsewhere. It went along with the NATO propaganda that Putin was weeks away from dying of cancer that a palace coup was imminent and so on. A year later, Putin is still there, and continues to lob artillery shells, bombs and missiles at Ukraine at a heavy and steady pace.

If anything, its Ukraine, despite its massive NATO supplies, that is in danger of running out of supplies, and that is part of Russia's strategy of sitting back in its Eastern enclaves, and simply attacking from long range, Ukrainian infrastructure, including its military command and control and defence infrastructure, in the shape of fuel and arms dumps, radar and communications, and air defence systems. Anyone who has played any of the Command & Conquer computer games will be familiar with the strategy. I'm only surprised Russia hasn't yet used small commando units to take out those Patriot systems, and so on.

But, there is probably a reason not to. Paul Mason, as well as becoming a professional propagandist for NATO, has also become a sales representative for western arms producers, who supply those huge amounts, and hugely expensive weapons being tested out, using Ukraine as a live firing range. He reports that the Patriot missile defence batteries have been able to take down, even the Russian hypersonic, Kinzhal missiles. However, to do so, it fired 30 missiles in the space of 2 minutes, and that is the equivalent of 6% of Raytheon's entire annual production!

The problem for Ukraine, and NATO, is that Russia can keep lobbing drones and missiles at these Patriot defence systems, of which Ukraine only has two such batteries, until Ukraine runs out of missiles to fire, at which point the battery not only becomes useless, but can itself be destroyed by even cheap drones and missiles. As with all of the very expensive, and sophisticated, but, more or less, useless, offensive weapons supplied by NATO to Ukraine, it would be a big propaganda blow against NATO.

The territorial war of offensive and counter-offensive has, more or less, run its course, and achieved a stalemate. As with Bakhmut, Russia might slowly capture additional bits of territory in the East and South, but nothing beyond that, whilst Ukraine might make small counter-offensives, at great cost in men and materials, but with no chance of capturing Eastern Ukraine, Crimea or the Black Sea Coasts, without a large-scale active involvement of NATO forces, which would mean the opening of World War III proper. NATO is not ready for that, yet. Hence, the war settles into this long range air war of attrition, accompanied by the sporadic terroristic attacks of Ukraine on Russia itself, undoubtedly supported by NATO/US intelligence and Special Forces, as set out in the leaked US Defence Department papers.

The last legs of the argument of the social-imperialists of the USC etc. have been broken by Ukraine's bombing of Moscow, as the nature of the war as an inter-imperialist war, reactionary on both sides, becomes, now, undeniable.

2. The General Relations of Production, of Distribution, Exchange and Consumption a) Production and Consumption - Part 1 of 3

a) Production and Consumption

Production is simultaneously consumption, just as consumption is simultaneously production. Marx details this at more length in The Grundrisse. Even if we take Nature, it produces, say, a tree. However, to produce a tree, Nature consumes nutrients from the soil, water and sunlight. In any kind of production, material and energy is consumed, as is labour-power. Similarly, the labourer must live, and consumes to live, but the consumption of the labourer is, at the same time, an act of production of the labourer, and, thereby, of labour-power. Indeed, in consuming labour-power, in the act of production, the labourer themselves also produces labour-power, because the repeated act of production increases the skill and productive capacity of the labourer.

“The act of production itself is thus in all its phases also an act of consumption. The economists concede this. They call productive consumption both production that is simultaneously identical with consumption, and consumption which is directly concurrent with production. The identity of production and consumption amounts to Spinoza's proposition: Determinatio est negatio.” (p 195)

This definition of identity separates this productive consumption from personal consumption, which is seen as the ultimate aim of production, and, thereby, the destructive antithesis of production. Production creates new use values, and consumption destroys them.

“In the first type of production the producer assumes an objective aspect, in the second type the objects created by him assume a personal aspect. Hence this consuming production – although it represents a direct unity of production and consumption – is essentially different from production proper. The direct unity, in which production is concurrent with consumption and consumption with production, does not affect their simultaneous duality.” (p 196)

Production and consumption are opposites, and yet form poles of a single whole. This is a point that Marx deals with, at length, in Theories of Surplus Value, Chapter 17, in his theory of crises. They form opposite poles of a single whole, because there can be no consumption without production, and there is no point of production without consumption. Indeed, the things that are produced only become real as a result of that consumption.

“For example, a dress becomes really a dress only by being worn, a house which is uninhabited is indeed not really a house; in other words a product as distinct from a simple natural object manifests itself as a product, becomes a product, only in consumption. It is only consumption which, by destroying the product, gives it the finishing touch, for the product is a product, not because it is materialised activity, but only in so far as it is an object for the active subject.” (p 196)

For all forms of direct production, this is apparent, because use value and value are inextricably united in the product. Value is labour, and labour is only expended (value created) to create products to be consumed, i.e. new use value. Even where direct producers specialise in production, and exchange some of their surplus products, for others, this remains true, because they only expend their labour in one form, for the purpose of obtaining the products of labour in some other form.

This is where, Mill, Ricardo and Say went wrong in adopting Mill's Law of Markets (Say's Law) that supply creates its own demand. Whilst this is true in relation to the conditions of direct production, and barter, it is not true as soon as money arises, and inserts itself into the circulation of commodities. Now, there can be production and sale for money, but money is not consumed. It exists as currency, to be continually circulated, and, as money, to be hoarded. So, consumption no longer necessarily follows from production, and a general overproduction of commodities can result, i.e. the two opposing poles of the whole – production and consumption – fall apart.

Back To Section 2

Forward To Part 2

Social-Imperialism and Ukraine - Part 35 of 37

The AWL states in the response to Socialist Appeal,

“The defeat of an aggressive and bloody military imperialism, and an increasingly reactionary and repressive Russian regime, one that sponsors dictatorships and far-right movements in many parts of the world, by a mobilisation of its victims could clearly have positive consequences.”

But its not its victims that are being mobilised against it, but the Ukrainian capitalist state, standing behind which is the massive imperialist power of NATO! Rather than dealing with the reality of the actual war taking place, they construct some completely ideal war that is not taking place, to justify their position, much as Lenin showed the Narodniks did, when they wanted to describe some non-existent path of development of Russia, in the 19th century, rather than the reality of its capitalist development. It is the same moral socialism and romanticism.

Which leaves aside that the actual war would equally strengthen, not just a corrupt Ukrainian regime, but also the vicious, militaristic and expansionist NATO imperialism that stands behind it, and which is pushing ever closer to a hot war across the globe, not just in relation to Russia, but also to China, and has repeatedly shown its willingness to suppress workers or any other social force that is antagonistic to US interests. What is more, it ignores the potential that, if Russia were defeated, something much worse than Putin could arise in his place, as with the defeat of the Kaiser leading to the rise of Nazism, or Russia falling more under the domination of China. Nor does it consider that, in such conditions, Russia might resort to nuclear weapons, leading to all out nuclear war, and the destruction of humanity, and so all possibility of Socialism.

We cannot possibly proceed on the basis of such campist considerations, as against the overall interests of the global working-class. As Lenin put it, in such conditions, the interests of the part, i.e. Ukraine, and even Ukrainian workers, are subordinate to the interest of the whole. And, as Trotsky pointed out, in relation to Czechoslovakia,

“One can say that besides the partition of the Sudeten Germans, Hungarians, Poles, and possibly the Slovaks too, Hitler will not stop before the enslavement of the Czechs themselves and that in this case their struggle for independence will have every claim upon the support of the proletariat. To pose the question in this manner is nothing but social-patriotic sophistry. What concrete roads further development of imperialist antagonisms will take we do not know. Complete destruction of Czechoslovakia is possible, of course. But it is also possible that before this destruction will have been accomplished a European war will break out and Czechoslovakia will find itself on the side of the victors and participate in a new dismemberment of Germany. Is the role of a revolutionary party then that of nurse of the “victimized” gangsters of imperialism?

It is absolutely clear that the proletariat must construct its policy on the basis of the given war as it is, i.e., as it has been determined by the whole preceding course of development and not on hypothetical speculation over a possible strategic result of the war. In such speculations everyone will inevitably choose that variant which corresponds best to his own desires, national sympathies and antipathies. It is clear that such a policy does not have a Marxist but a subjective, not an internationalist but a chauvinist character.”

The AWL response to Socialist Appeal states,

“But the idea that independent working-class politics and struggles can or should advance by dismissing resistance to the kind of oppression and militarism that characterises Russia’s war in Ukraine is ludicrous. And that is exactly what Attard does when he blindly declares “this is a reactionary war on both sides”.”

I do not speak for Attard, for the reasons set out above, but its clearly a non sequitur to go from saying that the actual war being fought between the capitalist Ukrainian state, backed by NATO, and the Russian state, is reactionary on both sides, to then claiming that this means that resistance to Russian oppression and militarism is dismissed!

If I say that the Tories are reactionary, and their policies are oppressive, and that Starmer's alternative to them is equally reactionary and oppressive, my refusal to fall in behind Starmer does not at all mean that I am suggesting no resistance to the Tories! It simply means that I do not see falling in behind Starmer as the means of opposing the Tories, and that an independent, working class alternative is needed. That indeed is the basis of an independent third camp position, as opposed to the bourgeois campist position that the AWL/USC has collapsed into, which is ironic given that the AWL claim to be proponents of the third camp!!!

Today's AWL, described the Falklands War as reactionary
 on both sides, and refused to support Thatcher's War to reclaim
 the islands from Argentina, and so uphold the islanders right to
 self-determination.

And, in 1982, the AWL's predecessors, the Majority Faction of the WSL, argued that the Falkland's War was reactionary on both sides. They argued that Argentinian workers had no reason to support Galtieri's War against Britain, to seize the islands, and similarly, British workers had no reason to support Thatcher's War against Argentina to seize them back.

Today's AWL have adopted the bourgeois-defencist 
"idiot anti-imperialist" position of Alan Thornett,
during the Falklands War, which they then opposed.

That did not at all mean that either Argentinian or British workers would cease to engage in independent working-class resistance to the militarism and oppression of both states! The AWL have, in fact, conveniently forgotten their position from the Falklands War, and have, instead adopted the “idiot anti-imperialist” stance of the Thornett faction, of that time, in order to adopt a position of bourgeois-defencism of the corrupt, and illiberal capitalist state in Ukraine, just as their opponents used the same arguments to justify bourgeois-defencism for the Argentinian capitalist state in 1982.

Back To Part 34

Forward To Part 36

2. The General Relations of Production, of Distribution, Exchange and Consumption - Part 3 of 3

Marx examines this sequence and relations in the final chapters of Capital III, and picks apart the superficial appearances. This superficiality results in different forms of property, historically determined and specific, being reduced to mere factors of production. Land is land whether under communal, slave, feudal, Asiatic or capitalist production, and rent is then, simply, a return to the owner of land. Capital becomes simply means of production, and so profit a return to the owner of capital, and later, capital becomes simply money, so that the return to it is interest, whereas the owner of means of production – the entrepreneur – obtains profit as a special form of wages for their specific type of labour. Labour is labour whether that of the slave, independent producer, or wage worker, and wages are then the return to it, even though the category of wages does not exist for the slave or independent producer.

All of these factors are required for production,, and so are, inevitably, connected in production. In the primitive commune, and under communism, they are inseparable, because they are all the common property of the commune.

“Another argument is that the different factors are not considered as a single whole; as though this separation had forced its way from the textbook into real life and not, on the contrary, from real life into the textbooks, and as though it were a question of the dialectical reconciliation of concepts and not of the resolution of actually existing conditions.” (p 195)

In other words, the actual separation of these factors of production is not just some theoretical construct, but is a reflection in the realm of ideas of material reality. As soon as the primitive commune began to dissolve, means of production began to become private property, and, handed down through families, via inheritance, as did land and money, and as these factors of production become private property for some, so they become denied to others, who could, then, only live by becoming slaves, serfs, and servants.

This separation of the factors of production is mirrored in the separation of production from distribution, exchange and consumption. But, again, this separation is a reflection of material reality.

“The opponents of the economists who accuse the latter of crudely separating interconnected elements, either argue from the same standpoint or even from a lower one, no matter whether these opponents come from within or without the domain of political economy. Nothing is more common than the reproach that the economists regard production too much as a goal in itself, and that distribution is equally important. This argument is based on the concept of the economists that distribution is a separate and independent sphere alongside production.” (p 194-5)

Back To Part 2

Forward To 2a Production and Consumption.

Social-Imperialism and Ukraine - Part 34 of 37

The AWL/USC continue, by saying.

“Socialists should support the defence and preservation of Ukrainian independence and self-rule just as we supported the defence of even bourgeois democracy against Franco’s fascism.”

But, Trotsky's position was not to support the defence of bourgeois-democracy in Spain against Franco, and to do so implies a Stalinist/Menshevist stages theory, as opposed to the theory of permanent revolution first set out by Marx and Engels, and later developed by Trotsky, and by Lenin in his April Theses and Letters on Tactics. This again indicates the AWL/USC's inability to see things in any other than binary and syllogistic terms, or, put another way, in terms of my enemy's enemy is my friend. Just because I oppose fascism, and currently fascism is opposing bourgeois-democracy, leading me to oppose its attacks, that does not at all require me to be supporting bourgeois-democracy. I can oppose the attempts of free market liberals to roll-back capitalist monopolies, for example, but that does not make me a supporter of such monopolies, as against being a proponent of Socialism, and workers control over those monopolies.

"It is not by devoting oneself to empirical conjectures as to the possibility of realizing some transitional demand or not, that the question relating to it is settled. It is its social and historical character that decides: is it progressive from the point of view of the subsequent development of society? Does it correspond to the historical interests of the proletariat? Does it strengthen the consciousness of the latter? Does it bring it closer to its dictatorship? Thus for example, the demand for the prohibition of trusts is petty-bourgeois and reactionary and, as the experiences of America have shown, it is completely utopian. Under certain conditions, on the contrary, it is entirely progressive and correct to demand workers’ control over the trusts, even though it is more than doubtful that this will ever be realized within the framework of the bourgeois state. The fact that this demand is not satisfied so long as the bourgeoisie rules must push the workers to the revolutionary overthrow of the latter. Thus, the impossibility of realizing a slogan from the political point of view can be no less fruitful than the relative possibility of putting it into practice."

(Trotsky - The Chinese Question After the Sixth Congress)

A further example is Trotsky's position in fighting fascism in France, in The Action Programme.

“Our slogan is not the disarming of the fascist gangs of finance capital by finance capital’s own police. We refuse to spread the criminal illusion that a capitalist government can actually proceed to the disarming of the capitalist bands. The exploited must defend themselves against the capitalists.

Arming of the proletariat, arming of the poor peasants!

People’s Antifascist Militia!

The exploiters, who are but a tiny minority, will recoil before the unleashing of civil war; the fascist and reactionary bands will lose their audacity only if the workers are armed and lead the masses.”

Nothing in that implies support for bourgeois-democracy. On the contrary, it contains a sharp attack on bourgeois-democracy, and counterposing to it, immediately, and not at some future point, workers-democracy, and workers self-government! In other words, fascist attacks on bourgeois-democracy were to be opposed, only on the basis of weakening the fascists, and the means of resisting it were not at all the methods or institutions of bourgeois-democracy, or in any way ceding credence to that democracy, but by the methods of proletarian struggle, and organs of workers power raised in opposition to it! That is a million miles away from the AWL/USC's uncritical support for Zelensky's regime.

The AWL/USC's position is the other side of the coin to that of the ultra-lefts, criticised by Lenin in Left-Wing Communism. Lenin explained to the ultra-Lefts that just because we recognise that bourgeois-democracy has had its day, and is a fraud, that does not mean that the majority of workers realise that, and so long as that is the case, we have to recognise that reality, and work with it. It means using bourgeois-democracy in such a way as to expose it for what it is, and, thereby, draw the workers from it to a revolutionary class consciousness. But, its impossible to do that, whilst “supporting” bourgeois-democracy, rather than mercilessly attacking and exposing it in front of the workers!

The position of the AWL/USC is, by contrast, that of the opportunists. They use the examples of Lenin and Trotsky working inside bourgeois-democracy, and demanding it be applied consistently, so as to expose it for what it is, with “support” for it! It is the same position that the Stalinists adopted in the Chinese Revolution and Spanish Civil War, i.e. the Menshevist “stages theory”. As Trotsky, sets out in his writings on the Chinese Revolution – See “The Chinese Question After The Sixth Congress” - so long as the workers retain illusions in bourgeois-democracy, it is necessary to utilise it, in order to expose it, and break the workers from it, but that can only be done by opposing it by revolutionary means, up to and including the building of workers defence squads, militia, and soviets, depending upon the tempo of developments.

At no time do we follow the opportunists who counterpose bourgeois-democracy and parliamentarism to revolutionary activity, which we seek to develop at all times, as the basis of our solutions. But, as Lenin and Trotsky set out, the material conditions themselves, along with the degree of class consciousness of the workers dictate what revolutionary activity is possible. As Trotsky describes in the work above, the Stalinist idea that it was only legitimate to demand soviets, after a period of bourgeois democracy, and when the workers were already in revolt, and an insurrection guaranteed, was wrong. It is necessary to have built soviets much sooner than that in order to develop the revolutionary situation, and prepare the conditions for the success of the insurrection. However, to simply raise the demand for soviets as an alternative to a constituent assembly/parliament, irrespective of conditions is sterile sectarianism, and ultra-leftism. Trotsky sets out the different conditions in Germany in 1923, to illustrate the point.

The AWL/USC, bowdlerise Trotsky's position in relation to the Spanish Revolution, tuning him into an opportunist supporter of bourgeois-democracy, rather than a revolutionary opponent of it. As he put it, in The Transitional Programme, in setting out the difference between this Workers Government that he called for in Spain, as against the Popular Front Republican government,

“The experience of Russia demonstrated, and the experience of Spain and France once again confirms, that even under very favourable conditions the parties of petty bourgeois democracy (SRs, Social Democrats, Stalinists, Anarchists) are incapable of creating a government of workers and peasants, that is, a government independent of the bourgeoisie.”

And, in Ukraine the AWL/USC are not even arguing the need to smash the existing capitalist state, but entirely subordinating that task to the task of defending that very state, as part of its war against Russia! In other words, rather than the proletarian strategy of revolutionary defeatism, proposed by Lenin and Trotsky, they advocate the strategy of bourgeois-defencism of the social-patriots prior to WWI and II.

Back To Part 33

Forward To Part 35

The Brexit Nightmare (8)

The following video summarises much of what has been said in the previous seven posts on The Brexit Nightmare.  It also rightly asks why Starmer continues to sell the lie that Brexit could somehow be made to work, and also why the Liberals are not pushing the issue.

I have answered both those questions.  With Starmer, its not just that he has responded opportunistically, in search of the votes of bigots and reactionaries.  He has gone much, much further than that, turning Labour into a reactionary, petty-bourgeois nationalist party, and the adoption of all of the ideology that goes with that.  Its become a UKIP Mark II, or a softer version of the BNP, complete with all of the internal lack of democracy.

For the Liberals, it appears to be a question of opportunism and tailism.  In future posts, I'll look at what might be done in response to that, including what might be organised in terms of a Socialist Campaign for Europe, alongside a Socialist Campaign For A Labour Victory in the upcoming elections, but the problems that faces given the authoritarian nature of Starmer's Blue Labour Party.  Even in this video the argument is based around the idea of a closer relation to the EU, leading to re-joining at the end of the decade.  But, a closer relation of any meaning - single market membership and so on - begs the question, if you are formally bound by those regulations, why would you not want also formal EU membership to vote on those regulations?  The idea of no taxation without representation applies here.

So, what is actually required is a campaign, now, for re-joining the EU, including electing MEP's at the next European Parliament elections.  To do that its necessary to campaign on the basis that the next government would simply legislate for such re-entry, immediately, and talks with the EU to that effect are needed now.

Northern Soul Classics - Not My Girl - The Platters

 

Friday Night Disco - Where Did Our Love Go - The Supremes

 

2. The General Relations of Production, of Distribution, Exchange and Consumption - Part 2 of 3

As we are accustomed only to the modern form of this, in which all we see is money relations, i.e. we get paid money wages, profits, interest and rent, its worth examining this more closely, by examining these categories and relations in different modes of production. In a primitive commune, the collective production is distributed amongst its members. This distribution is socially determined, so that, for example, younger members engaged in more active labour, may obtain a larger proportion than older less active members. Following such a general, proportional distribution, different individuals may decide to exchange some of the items they receive for other items, with other individuals, to meet their specific consumption requirements and tastes.

In slave or serf production, the slave/serf must have a certain amount of food etc., for their own reproduction. In agricultural production, the slave/serf, therefore, gets back a proportion of what they produce, for that purpose, but, again, might exchange that allocation, provided by the slave-owner, with other slaves. The slave owner will exchange elements of the surplus product, they obtain, for other products. Where slaves are engaged in, say, silver production, its clear that they cannot consume silver, and nor can the slave-owner, but the same proportional distribution arises. The slave-owner exchanges silver for other commodities, which they now consume, whilst handing other commodities to the slave, for their subsistence.

In feudal economies, peasants produce, and again require a portion of production for their subsistence. Distribution is determined by social laws entitling the landlords to a portion of their production, which first takes the form of corvee labour, then of rent in kind, and eventually money rent. In the first two forms, distribution is of the physical product of labour. The landlord, then, can exchange a portion of their allocation of products for other products/commodities, so as to meet their individual consumption needs. Even under direct production, where the peasant produces for their own consumption requirements, a part of their production is always exchanged for other products/commodities, to meet their needs, and that portion expands, as the market itself expands.

Under capitalism, these basic relations are obscured, because workers are paid money wages. But, as Marx describes, in Capital, these same relations can be observed, as described above in relation to cotton.

“Production, distribution, exchange and consumption thus form a proper syllogism; production represents the general, distribution and exchange the particular, and consumption the individual case which sums up the whole. This is indeed a sequence, but a very superficial one. Production is determined by general laws of nature; distribution by random social factors, it may therefore exert a more or less beneficial influence on production; exchange, a formal social movement, lies between these two; and consumption, as the concluding act, which is regarded not only as the final aim but as the ultimate purpose, falls properly outside the sphere of economy, except in so far as it in turn exerts a reciprocal action on the point of departure thus once again initiating the whole process.” (p 194)

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The Brexit Nightmare (7)

The disaster that is Brexit is made manifest each day.  Trade declines, inflation rises, immigration which was the guiding star of the bigots that voted for Brexit, has soared, Britain remains bound by the EU regulations the Brexiters claimed they were freeing Britain from, and it has acted to fragment Britain itself, in Scotland and Northern Ireland.  The Brexiters can't respond rationally.  Farage rightly claims that Brexit has not happened, and blames the Tories.  But, that is because his Brexit, the Brexit they claimed was possible, and that Starmer continues to claim is possible, never was!

Tory Ministers are even led to act dumber than they really are to avoid answering the questions that Brexit daily poses to them.  In this video, Tory Minister Therese Coffey, plays dumb so as to avoid answering a question from the SNP as to why Scottish agricultural exports to the EU have been slammed, and instead blames the EU, rather than Brexit.  First she talks about imports to Britain rather than exports to the EU, and fails to recognise that the checks that are now required in that trade are precisely the result of the creation of a border where none previously existed, which is precisely what the Brexiters said they wanted in order to "take back control".

Social-Imperialism and Ukraine - Part 33 of 37

The AWL/USC attack Socialist Appeal saying,

“Attard then blurs it all together: “What is happening in Ukraine is not a revolutionary uprising by an oppressed colony or a case of self-defence by a proletarian regime.” So there seems to be a broad, inclusive “good” category, into which however Ukraine does not fall.”

But, it is not a question of “good” regimes that can be supported, which is a typically petty-bourgeois, moralistic way for the AWL to view things, but, precisely the class basis upon which both Lenin and Trotsky made such distinctions. Trotsky noted, for example, in opposing the idea that a distinction should be made between “democratic” and “fascist” states,

“In the same manner we cannot speak of fascism “in general”. In Germany, Italy, and Japan, fascism and militarism are the weapons of a greedy, hungry and therefore aggressive imperialism. In the Latin American countries fascism is the expression of the most slavish dependence on foreign imperialism. We must be able to discover under the political form the economic and social content."

(Fight Imperialism To Fight Fascism)

The AWL/USC have abandoned the very basics of Marxism, founded upon class analysis in favour of morality. And, not only is the Marxist position on which wars we determine as progressive a function of class, and the class nature of the state, but the question of which forces we support in national struggles is also a function of their class nature, as set out in The Theses On The National and Colonial Questions. It makes clear, as Trotsky reiterated to the Stalinists, in relation to the Chinese revolution, and the national war against British and Japanese imperialism,

“second, the need for a struggle against the clergy and other influential reactionary and medieval elements in backward countries;

“third, the need to combat Pan-Islamism and similar trends, which strive to combine the liberation movement against European and American imperialism with an attempt to strengthen the positions of the khans, landowners, mullahs, etc...

fifth, the need for a determined struggle against attempts to give a communist colouring to bourgeois-democratic liberation trends in the backward countries; the Communist International should support bourgeois-democratic national movements in colonial and backward countries only on condition that, in these countries, the elements of future proletarian parties, which will be communist not only in name, are brought together and trained to understand their special tasks, i.e., those of the struggle against the bourgeois-democratic movements within their own nations. The Communist International must enter into a temporary alliance with bourgeois democracy in the colonial and backward countries, but should not merge with it, and should under all circumstances uphold the independence of the proletarian movement even if it is in its most embryonic form;

sixth, the need constantly to explain and expose among the broadest working masses of all countries, and particularly of the backward countries, the deception systematically practised by the imperialist powers, which, under the guise of politically independent states, set up states that are wholly dependent upon them economically, financially and militarily. Under present-day international conditions there is no salvation for dependent and weak nations except in a union of Soviet republics.”

Lenin bracketed the second and third points, and his opposition, here, would certainly have included opposition to the fascist forces of the Azov Battalion and Right Sector that play a significant role in Ukraine. And, as Trotsky specifically noted in opposing the Stalinists, we do not give support simply to such struggles but “only on condition that, in these countries, the elements of future proletarian parties, which will be communist not only in name, are brought together and trained to understand their special tasks, i.e., those of the struggle against the bourgeois-democratic movements within their own nations.” Forget about moralising terms such as “good”. How does anything set out, here, justify support for the war conducted by the Ukrainian state, on the basis of a progressive struggle for national liberation, on the basis of permanent revolution?

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Forward To Part 34

The Brexit Nightmare (6)

UK inflation data, yesterday. showed that the Brexit nightmare continues.  Yes, not all of the higher prices is due to Brexit, but Brexit makes the effects in Britain worse than they would have been, and worse than elsewhere in the EU.  The cause of inflation is the excess liquidity created by central banks, and that is not peculiar to Britain, and the higher price of food and energy is a result of NATO's boycott of Russian energy and food exports, but, the UK is hit worse on all these things, as a result of Brexit, and less able to deal with them.

Yes, the headline inflation rate fell from 10.1% to 8.7%, but that was still way above the predictions of a fall to 8.2% by the Treasury, and 8.4% by the Bank of England.  Its still more than 4 times the Bank's target rate of 2%.  RPI is still in double digits at 11.4%, down from 13.5%.  But, the problem for the Bank and the government is that this drop in the headline rate, is itself largely due to technical factors, as last year's figures drop out of the calculation, and as one of the biggest contributors to the rise in prices - energy costs - has benefitted from a fall in global prices, and is now benefiting from a reduction in demand, as Europe and North America move into Summer.  

Energy prices rose 10.8% compared to a year ago, but that compares with a rise of 40.5%, last month, compared to a year ago.  But, that does not apply to food prices.  Yes, they rose by less this month than last month, rising 19% compared to a year ago, against 19.1% last month, but that difference of 0.1% points is less than a statistical margin of error, and in any case, its 19%, for goodness sake, in an area of household consumption that is most vital.  And, its, here, that Brexit has a clear impact.  On the on hand, it has increased the costs of Britain importing cheap food from the EU, on the other, the removal of free movement, means that the previous supplies of EU labour to work on UK farms to gather in the harvest has disappeared.

Whilst that flexible EU labour supply has gone, one of the main concerns of the bigots that voted for Brexit, of stopping or reducing immigration has also backfired on them.  Instead of falling, legal net migration has rocketed to nearly a million a year.  That is not the kind of flexible labour supply from the EU that previously existed.  To come to Britain, now, workers need to come on a visa, with very few rights to stay.  So, its only workers who have some likelihood of a long-term, secure employment that would take the risk.

But, Brexit has also led to the UK seeing its food and energy prices rise more as a result of Brexit, because of the fall in the Pound that resulted from it.  Yes, in recent months, it has risen, compared to the crash that happened, last Autumn, due to the Brexit Budget of Truss and Kwarteng, but its still down by nearly 20% compared to where it was before Brexit, and that makes the cost of all its imports a similar 20% more expensive.

What is more, the higher than expected inflation figures caused UK borrowing costs to rocket, in a similar way to what happened last Autumn.  Higher interest rates would usually be expected to lead to a higher Pound, as speculators move hot money into the UK to get the higher interest.  But, instead, the Pound fell.  The reason is that the higher inflation means higher Sterling prices for UK exports, making them harder to sell abroad, so worsening the UK's trade deficit. 

A look at the actual data, shows that the situation is even worse.  Even taking the headline CPI figure, it rose 1.2%, month on month, compared to only 0.8% last month.  That means a worsening of conditions, currently.  In fact, a look at those month on month figures shows that is not just a flash in the pan.  During last year, the month on month figures rose by between 0.4 - 0.6, except for a couple of months at 0.7% and 0.8%, and October, when the figure was 2%, largely due to the rise in the energy price cap.  But, in the last four months, the figures have been, -0.6%, 1.1%, 0.8% and 1.2%.  Taking just the last three months, the average is just over 1%, which if continued over the next year, would mean headline inflation rising, once again to around 12%.

Looking at the Core Inflation rate, it illustrates this point, because, even on a year on year basis, it rose, this month, compared to last month.  It rose to 6.8%, as against 6.2% last month.  The month on month figure highlights that even more.  It rose by 1.3% last month, compared to 0.9%, the previous month.  That is a 50% increase, and again, if carried forward a year, would mean inflation back way into double digits.  Again, the core inflation data for the last three months is way higher than the average for all of last year, suggesting that any hope of inflation going away soon is doomed.

Service prices also rose faster, year on year, last month than they had the previous month.  They rose by 6.9% compared to 6.6% in the previous two months.  Again the rise in the last three months is higher than the average in every month of last year.  Given that Services account for around 80% of the economy, it is again an indication that whatever the government might want to tell workers, as it tries to make them accept real wage cuts, the inflation is not going away any time soon.

Indeed, as workers wages rise to try to keep up with those rising prices, and the higher costs arising from Brexit, from higher mortgage costs, taxes and so on, so the Bank of England will, inevitably, increase liquidity further to enable firms to raise prices again, so as to not suffer a squeeze on their profits, and as higher UK prices make exports uncompetitive, a lower Pound will again be a way of trying to cheapen British exports, but will further increase import prices, giving a further upward twist to inflation.

Yet, interest rates are much lower still, today, than they were when inflation was at these levels in the past.  On Sky News, yesterday, their Economics Editor, Ed Conway had a very peculiar way of looking at that, saying that, today, debt is much higher for households, as they have much bigger mortgages, as though that were some kind of limitation on how high those interest rates might go.  That puts the cart before the horse.  The reason that households have so much more debt today than they had 30 or 40 years ago, is precisely because, artificially lowered interest rates, in the intervening period, caused asset prices, including house prices, to soar, as part of a deliberately created asset price bubble.

That was part of the whole conservative social-democratic (neoliberal) economic model that thought that it was possible to replace real revenue growth, i.e. the creation of new value, via real capital accumulation, and expansion of labour, by instead inflating asset prices, creating capital gains, some of which could then be converted into revenue.  That required a continued delusion, a Ponzi Scheme, that those revenues were themselves real, rather than simply an illusion created by this continual monetary inflation of asset prices.

The financial crisis of 2008, ended that period of delusion, and only the surreal era of further liquidity injections, negative yields and so on has enabled it to continue since.  Even then, only the imposition of physical lockdowns, global trade restrictions like Trump's trade war, Brexit, the sanctions again Russia and China, have prevented the inevitable increase in economic activity and employment causing interest rates and wages to rise, causing those asset prices to crash even harder, bringing the whole house of cards down with it.

When it does, Brexit will cause the crash in Britain to be harder than elsewhere, and harder than it would have been without it.

2. The General Relations of Production, of Distribution, Exchange and Consumption - Part 1 of 3

Marx sets out the way economists establish the categories of production, distribution, exchange and consumption, and the relations between them.

“The quite obvious conception is this: – In the process of production members of society appropriate (produce, fashion) natural products in accordance with human requirements; distribution determines the share the individual receives of these products; exchange supplies him with the particular products into which he wants to convert the portion accorded to him as a result of distribution; finally, in consumption the products become objects of use, i.e. they are appropriated by individuals. Production creates articles corresponding to requirements; distribution allocates them according to social laws; exchange in its turn distributes the goods, which have already been allocated, in conformity with individual needs; finally, in consumption the product leaves this social movement, it becomes the direct object and servant of an individual need, which its use satisfies. Production thus appears as the point of departure, consumption as the goal, distribution and exchange as the middle, which has a dual form since, according to the definition, distribution is actuated by society and exchange is actuated by individuals. In production persons acquire an objective aspect, and in consumption' objects acquire a subjective aspect; in distribution it is society which by means of dominant general rules mediates between production and consumption; in exchange this mediation occurs as a result of random decisions of individuals.” (p 193-4)

In Capital, Marx elaborates on this where he divides the product physically into quantities representing constant capital, wages, profits, interest and rent. In other words, if we consider the production of cotton, the value of the total output of a given capital, can be divided, as follows, if the output consists of 100 tons of cotton – 50 tons constant capital (value preserved of seed etc.), 20 tons wages, 20 tons profit, 5 tons rent, 5 tons interest. The cotton producer sells 50 tons of cotton, whose value simply replaced the constant capital used in its production, for example, they must replace the seed on a like for like basis, they must replace worn out equipment and so on. As for the rest, it is as though the labourers are handed 20 tons of the cotton they have produced, in order for them to sell it to cover their wages, whilst the landlords and money lenders are also handed 5 tons each, with the capitalist selling the remaining 10 tons, which provides them with profit to cover their personal consumption, and fund for capital accumulation.

Back To Section 1

Social-Imperialism and Ukraine - Part 32 of 37

In Ukraine, today, revolutionaries may find themselves in the same position they were in in WWI and II, and unable to avoid serving in the military of the Ukrainian state. But, that simply defines the nature of the war on Ukraine's part, as simply a war for defence of the capitalist fatherland, as were those previous wars, and so not a war that socialists support!  And, writing in relation to the US, Trotsky wrote, in terms that could be used for a revolutionary programme, today, in Ukraine.

“We Bolsheviks also want to defend democracy, but not the kind that is run by the sixty uncrowned kings. First, let’s sweep our democracy clean of capitalist magnates, then we will defend it to the last drop of blood. Are you, who are not Bolsheviks, really ready to defend this democracy? But, you must at least, be able to the best of your ability to defend it so as not to be a blind instrument in the hands of the sixty families and the bourgeois officers devoted to them. The working class must learn military affairs in order to advance the largest possible number of officers from its own ranks.

We must demand that the state, which tomorrow will ask for the workers’ blood, today give the workers the opportunity to master military technique in the best possible way in order to achieve the military objectives with the minimum expenditure of human lives.

To accomplish that, a regular army and barracks by themselves are not enough. Workers must have the opportunity to get military training at their factories, plants and mines at specified times, while being paid by the Capitalists. If the workers are destined to give their lives, the bourgeois patriots can at least make a small material sacrifice.

The state must issue a rifle to every worker capable of bearing arms and set up rifle and artillery ranges for military training purposes in places accessible to the workers.

Our agitation in connection with the war must be as uncompromising in relation to the pacifists as to the imperialists.

This war is not our war, the responsibility for it lies squarely on the Capitalists. But, so long as we are still not strong enough to overthrow them and must fight in the ranks of their army, we are obliged to learn to use arms as well as possible….

Just as every worker, exploited by the Capitalists, seeks to learn as well as possible the production techniques, so every proletarian soldier in the imperialist army must learn as well as possible the art of war so as to be able, when the conditions change to apply it in the interests of the working class.

We are not pacifists. No we are revolutionaries. And we know what lies ahead for us.”

(On Workers' Self Defence)

That is a strategy that revolutionaries can apply inside Ukraine, in a war they do not support, but in which they are forced to participate, but, of course, precisely, because it is a war we do not support that gives no reason for socialists outside Ukraine to support that war effort by the provision of arms or any other means, just as there was no reason for US socialists to advocate providing arms and so on, to France or Britain, or Germany or Italy, in WWI and II. And, just as the Bolsheviks continued to oppose the war of the Tsar, in which they had to fight, and from it built the revolutionary cadres in the military that broke from it, and established revolutionary units, turning their guns on the Tsar, and, then on the Provisional Government, so too that should be the stated aim of socialists in Ukraine, and not support for the current reactionary war in defence of the fatherland.

Back To Part 31

Forward To Part 33

Social-Patriotic Sophistry

The social-patriots in the Ukrainian labour movement, and the social imperialists in Europe and North America have engaged in the same sophistry, to justify their support for the Ukrainian capitalist state, and its NATO backers, that was used by their kind prior to WWI and II. One such piece of sophistry is that the defence of the Ukrainian capitalist fatherland, is really just a war of national independence, even though Ukraine is already politically independent! They use a perverted concept of the ideas of permanent revolution to argue that such a war of independence can turn into something more, emptying that concept of all real content. They are not the first to do that either. The Stalinists/Bukharinist and Mensheviks did the same thing in relation to the Chinese Revolution, after they had already betrayed it in 1927.

As part of the social-imperialists sophistry, they have had to lie about the nature of the actual war taking place, creating the fantasy that it is some kind of “people's war” for national liberation, undertaken by the Ukrainian workers. Their equivalents in the opposing camp of social-imperialists backing Russia, have done the same thing, in creating the fantasy that Russia is engaged in an “anti-imperialist” struggle against NATO, waged by its working class. In both cases it tries to deny the reality that it is a war waged between two imperialist blocs – NATO and Russia-China – and is reactionary on both sides.

The Stalinists/Bukharinists and Mensheviks did the same thing in China in the 1920's. They had argued that the Kuomintang of Chiang Kai Shek was an anti-imperialist, “bloc of four classes”, engaged in a People's War for national liberation of China, and the carrying through of its bourgeois-democratic national revolution. The KMT certainly was the largest force fighting for the bourgeois-democratic, national revolution, but, as Trotsky pointed out, it was not a “bloc of four classes”, but simply the party of the Chinese bourgeoisie, and what is more, as with all such national bourgeoisies, one that itself had deep ties to imperialism. In all such cases, the anti-imperialism of such forces is superficial not only because it reflects reliance on one imperialism as against another, and always means that it will align with imperialism against the proletariat and revolutionary peasants, if its own interests are threatened.

The policy of the Stalinists/Bukharinists and Mensheviks of subsuming the Chinese Communist Party, which, in 1925 had the support of tens of thousands of Chinese industrial workers, into the KMT, was a repetition of the same position the Mensheviks as well as Stalin, had adopted in February 1917, of supporting the Popular Front, Provisional Government, and against which Lenin and Trotsky had to wage an intense battle. When that battle was joined, Stalin made a tactical retreat, leaving it to Kamenev and Zinoviev to argue the Menshevist position, which, as Trotsky describes, involved presenting the Provisional government, and the Russian state, as being some kind of “non-class” formation, so as to justify a position of bourgeois defencism. The position, today, of the social-patriots and social imperialists is the same.

They talk of “Ukraine”, the “Ukrainian people”, and so on, as some abstract concept, thereby, avoiding the reality that what is involved is a class society, and class state, with antagonistic class interests, and that the war is being fought by that class state, and for class interests. In the same way that Stalin/Bukharin and the Mensheviks subsumed the class struggle of the Chinese workers into the struggle of the Chinese bourgeoisie, for the bourgeois-democratic, national revolution, so the social-patriots and social imperialists do in relation to Ukraine.

Lenin and Trotsky had pointed out, in February 1917, that the reality was that the Russian workers and revolutionary peasants were already the ones taking the lead in the revolution, which, at that stage, was still one fulfilling the tasks of the bourgeois-democratic revolution. They were doing so by proletarian revolutionary means via the creation of soviets, the creation of factory committees and demands for workers' control and so on. In other words, the exact opposite of what Stalin/Bukharin and the Mensheviks strategy was. In 1917, the tasks of the bourgeois-democratic revolution became subsumed within the overall struggle for proletarian revolution, as Marx had first described in 1850, and as Trotsky and Lenin later theorised, as the process of permanent revolution.

In 1925-7, Trotsky had made a similar evaluation as far as China was concerned. In other words, it was the Chinese industrial workers, and revolutionary peasants that were in the position to carry through the bourgeois-democratic national revolution, and by the same process of permanent revolution, having carried out the former via proletarian revolutionary means, would be able to carry forward to the proletarian revolution itself, a process which, if China were to be truly independent, was itself required. But, Stalin/Bukarin and the Mensheviks had sneered at this Trotskyist formula, just as Stalin had rejected it in favour of Socialism In One Country, in relation to Russia.

Nevertheless, in one policy after another, Stalin/Bukharin implemented, belatedly, crude versions of the very “Trotskyist” positions they had earlier attacked. Here too. In his report to the Executive Committee of the Communist International, Bukharin smuggled in the very analysis that they had previously sneered at. But, as with all such occurrences they did so, without understanding the actual content of the formulation. They denuded the concept of permanent revolution of all meaning. In Russia, in 1917, it required the active role of the Bolsheviks, in encouraging the development of the soviets, of continually, using these proletarian revolutionary means to develop the class consciousness of the workers and peasants, and to undermine their existing illusions in bourgeois-democracy.

In China, the Stalinists and Menshevists had already prevented that by subsuming the workers parties and organisations into the KMT, which was simply the party of the Chinese bourgeoisie. They subordinated the workers and peasants interests to those of the Chinese bourgeoisie, and even opposed the spontaneous creation of soviets by workers and peasants, on the basis of seeking not to frighten off the bourgeoisie from the Popular Front they had created with it. All real content of permanent revolution, based upon the independent organisation of the workers and revolutionary peasantry, and the struggle against the illusions in bourgeois-democracy, was, thereby, removed.

After Chiang Kai Shek launched his coup in April 1927, slaughtering thousands of communists in Shanghai, and following the similar debacle with Wang Chin Wei, and the Left Kuomintang, the Stalinists tried to cover their betrayals by invoking the concept of permanent revolution, but now, they interpreted it as meaning that, because the tasks of the bourgeois-democratic revolution remained unfulfilled, and because the underlying antagonisms that lead to revolution still existed, the situation in China was still revolutionary, and this condition of permanent revolution, would last for years to come. That was meaningless, as Trotsky sets out, given that following the defeats and betrayals, what existed in China was not a revolutionary, but a counter-revolutionary condition.

“Naturally, absolute stabilization is absolutely opposed to an absolute revolutionary situation. The conversion of these absolutes into each other is “absolutely impossible”. But if one descends from these ridiculous theoretical summits, it turns out that before the complete and final triumph of socialism, the relatively revolutionary situation will very likely be converted more than once into relative stabilization (and vice versa). All other conditions remaining equal, the danger of the conversion of a revolutionary situation into bourgeois stabilization is all the greater the less capable is the proletarian leadership of exploiting the situation.”

(Problems of The Chinese Revolution, p 174-5)

Not only are the objective material conditions necessary, and the conditions of the long-wave cycle favourable to labour rather than capital, but also the subjective factor of adequate revolutionary leadership is required. That was also seen, in the period after WWII. The long wave cycle was highly favourable to proletarian revolution, but the subjective factor of revolutionary leadership most demonstrably was not, and that condition has worsened, as the long-wave cycle turned, in the 1980's against labour, and in favour of capital.

In the post-war period, imperialism pressed down on Stalinism, most visibly in the form of the adoption of “peaceful co-existence” by the USSR, and its active role in sabotaging proletarian revolution wherever it arose spontaneously. It was channelled into the policies of the individual Stalinist parties, across the globe, which became merely national, social-democratic parties, often to the Right of the left wing of the actual social-democratic parties. But, that, in turn, was transmitted into those social democratic parties themselves. In turn, as the “Trotskyists” and New Left competed for influence, it was also transmitted into those organisations too, most clearly seen in their collapse into economism and workerism, in relation to domestic activity, and into petty-bourgeois nationalism/anti-imperialism, and popular frontism in respect of international activity. They became cheerleaders for these petty-bourgeois forces and ideas.

“The leadership of the Chiang Kai-shek clique was superior to that of Chen Duxiu and of Tang Pingshan. But it is not this leadership that decided: foreign imperialism guided Chiang Kai-shek by threats, by promises, by its direct assistance. The Communist International directed Chen Duxiu. Two leaderships of world dimensions crossed swords here. That of the Communist International, through all the stages of the struggle, appeared as absolutely worthless, and it thus facilitated to the highest degree the task of the imperialist leadership. In such conditions, the transformation of the revolutionary situation into bourgeois stabilization is not only not “impossible”, but is absolutely inevitable. Even more: it is accomplished, and within certain limits it is completed.”

(ibid, p 175)

And, the worthless nature of the leadership manifest in the post-war period, has similarly become apparent, now, in relation to the war in Ukraine, as it has turned full circle through its cheerleading of petty-bourgeois nationalism, and “anti-imperialism”, into the kind of social-patriotism and social imperialism seen prior to WWI, and justified on the same bogus basis of “national self-determination”, as bourgeois cover for defence of the capitalist fatherland.

As Trotsky set out, in his writings, in the 1930's, the Stalinists were to become even more overt in seeking to enable imperialism to bring about such stabilisation on the bones of workers. It was the basis of their Popular Front policy in France and Spain, which bourgeois propagandists like Paul Mason, now also promote, and of their attempt to form an international military bloc with “democratic imperialism” against Hitler and Mussolini. Today, one camp of social imperialists represented by the USC, seek a bloc with NATO/Ukraine, whilst the opposing camp of social-imperialists seek a bloc with Russia and China. At the same time, the social-pacifists of the Stop The War Coalition sit in the middle, pointlessly calling for peace, as though peace, in the short-term, is possible without the victory of one of these camps over the other, or, in the longer-term, without a revolutionary war, conducted by the working-class, to overthrow the ruling classes of both camps and their capitalist states!

The reality, today, is little different than it was in China, as described by Trotsky, in also setting out why the “anti-imperialism” was a lie, outside this conception.

“The domestic depression, in the face of the available resources, makes more than likely an extensive economic intervention in China by the United States, before which the Guomindang will evidently hold the door wide “open”. One cannot doubt the fact that the European countries, especially Germany, fighting against the rapidly aggravated crisis, will seek to debouch upon the Chinese market.”

(ibid, p 176-7)

Yeltsin performed that role in Russia, and Zelensky is performing it in Ukraine.

Trotsky elaborates the conditions, in China, which made possible a recovery in its economy, and opening for direct investment, particularly in infrastructure, by the US and other imperialist states. Such investment was desirable, not least because the economic recovery creates the best conditions for the rebuilding of the working-class and its organisations. However, it was inevitable that any such investment would be undertaken on terms highly favourable to the imperialist powers, making a mockery of the idea of “anti-imperialism” on the part of the KMT, and the same is true in relation to Ukraine. In both cases that is also facilitated by the corrupt nature of the political regime in the recipient country, just as it was in Russia under Yeltsin.

Trotsky makes the point that the US would be keen to build roads in China, as a necessary condition of it, then, being able to sell its surplus vehicle production in China. Ironically, it is China, today, that directly invests billions of Dollars in infrastructure projects in developing economies, in Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia and Latin America, as part of its Belt and Road program, which not only facilitates its access to resources, but also opens markets for its manufactured products, and extends its global strategic influence.

China is already positioning itself for the point where NATO's war against Russia, in Ukraine, hits the buffers, as with its previous wars against more limited opponents in Iraq and Afghanistan. Paul Mason, who long since abandoned any pretext of socialism and has become simply a professional propagandist for NATO, and sales representative for western arms producers, as seen in his latest missive, “Ukraine: Making Sense of the Kinzhal War”, has again promoted the idea of an imminent Russian defeat, just as he did around the same time last year. Unfortunately, again, his claim came more or less on the same day that western news media had to admit that, contrary to the claims of Zelensky, Bakhmut had indeed fallen to the Russian forces. We know from the leaked US Defence Department papers that the US itself does not see any significant Ukrainian advances this year, and the so called Spring Offensive failed to materialise, as we now enter Summer.

The more likely scenario, then, is a stalemate, with inevitable pressure later in the year for a peace deal. China will be able to offer cheap financing and experience in rapid, large-scale infrastructure construction to a shattered Ukraine. The US will lose interest, as it did in Iraq and Afghanistan and elsewhere, and the EU will not want, and be in no position to take in a bankrupt Ukraine. For China, however, it fits perfectly into its ambition of creating a Eurasian politico-economic bloc. The further advantage, for China, is that the social-patriotic leaders of the Ukrainian labour movement will have proved themselves bankrupt, by their opportunism and support for NATO imperialism, just as the Stalinists had done in China in the 1920's.

As Ukraine does a deal with Russia, and the vast might of NATO/EU imperialism is found impotent, the Ukrainian workers will be set back, as happened with the Chinese workers after 1927. They will be in a poor condition to resist the onslaught of Ukrainian capital, and its state, as it seeks to do deals with China for large-scale direct investment, conditioned on Ukrainian workers being screwed. Something similar is already happening with Chinese direct investment in Afghanistan following the defeat and withdrawal, there, of NATO imperialism. Its rather like the way US imperialism expanded after WWII, after the old colonial empires were disbanded.