Is The US Preparing To Ditch Israel?

That is a question that will be considered heresy by large sections of the Left for whom the two countries are not only seen as joined at the hip, but for whom there is also an implication that it is Israel that is the dominant partner; a very small tail, wagging a huge dog. For a Left, much of which has not come to terms with the fact that large numbers of former colonies have won political independence, and which searches after some straw to grasp, to justify its belief that these countries are still in some sense “Neo-Colonies”, Israel plays a central role, in the Middle East, of acting as an enclave for “Imperialism”, and a means by which its “Neo-Colonial” rule is implemented throughout the region. However, its on the question of just how much the US needs Israel today that this turns.

After WWII, the US set about applying pressure to ensure that the old European Colonial Empires were broken up. During the War, Roosevelt, who considered Churchill a drunken, old Colonialist, had even proposed to Stalin, that they should form an alliance to bring about such a break up. Of course, although the US had some historical and philosophical grounds for opposing Colonialism, having fought its own War of Independence against Britain, its real reason for wanting to see that break up was not altruistic. Colonialism was a political form appropriate to the overseas rule of parasitic forms of Capital – Merchant and Money Capital, and Landlordism. Each derived their income by draining Surplus Value created in production, and in doing so impeded the expansion of Capital. But, the US was the home of productive Capital par excellence. Its most developed form was the multinational corporation that sought the right and freedom to settle anywhere in the globe, to build plants and exploit new, cheap sources of labour, and to sell its products. The Colonial Empires and their feudal monopolies on trade were an impediment to that development.

But, we shouldn't forget that in 1945, the US did not have, and certainly was not as confident in, its position of hegemony as we might think it to have been today. In the 1920's, when the US was still only a rising power, like China is today, it believed that the next global war would be between itself and Great Britain. The US, began a massive program of building its navy, in order to challenge the position of the British Navy, on the high seas, which gave it global reach. In 1945, the US authorities, and economists, still believed that the ending of War production would cause the economy to go into a massive Depression. They had not counted on the effects of the Long Wave Boom, which, in fact, lifted, not just the US, but economies throughout the globe. In part, the Marshall Plan was geared as a piece of international Keynesianism to assuage that fear of Depression, in the US, as a result of ending war production. In part, it utilised what the US had lots of – Money Capital, and Capital Goods – to both restart markets in Europe, and to ensure its economic dominance over them.

At the same time, its position was challenged by the USSR. In the 1930's, whilst Europe and North America had been mired in Depression, the USSR was growing like topsy. Economists like Mises and Hayek had begun by claiming that economic planning was impossible. By the 1930's, when that had been disproved, they changed tack to argue that economic planning necessarily led to totalitarianism, an easier line to advance given what was obvious in the USSR and Germany. Its interesting, though, that at the time, they did not even make the case about lack of efficiency of planning, because that certainly could not have been claimed at the time. On the contrary, their general belief was that the democracies were going to be economically overhauled by the centrally planned economies of the USSR and Germany.

The strength of that planning was demonstrated during the War. It allowed Germany to construct a hugely powerful military-industrial machine, that swept across most of Europe in a matter of weeks. It was only because Hitler continued to hold out hope of doing a deal with the British ruling class via Lord Halifax and others that he refrained from chasing the British Expeditionary Force across the Channel during the fiasco of Dunkirk. He was content to leave Britain holed up in its island prison, while he turned to his main target, the USSR. But, the even more effective planning system of the USSR, together with its huge expanse, its huge manpower resources, and the lingering beliefs of a people who had thrown of their class oppressors, and still believed the state to be theirs, was an even more powerful force than that of Germany, despite Stalinist bungling.

The Tank Battle at Kholkin Gol in 1939 was one of the
biggest in history.  The Japanese were heavily defeated.

That bungling allowed Hitler to spring Operation Barbarossa on an unprepared USSR. The consequences were dire. The USSR lost 25% of its territory, and production capabality. But, it managed to physically move factories and workers across the country to safety, and quickly restart production. The USSR, several years before, had massively defeated Japan in a huge tank battle, at Khalkin Gol which is why Japan decided the US would be an easier target. That left the USSR free to move men and equipment to the western front, and in December 1941, to turn back Hitler's forces from outside Moscow, and to keep pushing them back until the end of the War.

The US saw, this power of the USSR, and its ability to roll over countries in Europe and Asia. According to General MacArthur, the reason Japan surrendered to the US was not the atom bomb, but fear that they were about to be overrun by Soviet forces! When Khruschev announced in the 1950's that the USSR would overtake the US, he wasn't kidding, and the US at the time thought it possible. They thought it even more possible as the USSR conquered space, and continued to lead the US in the space race for the next decade or so.

So, there was every reason for the US not to consider its position hegemonic at the time. It had every reason to try to enhance its position against potential enemies and rivals. Breaking up the Colonial Empires was a part of that. When Britain, France, and Israel invaded Egypt in 1956, to regain control of the Suez Canal, the US saw an opportunity. It ditched its wartime allies, and aligned itself with the Arabs who had been the former subjects of those states. Britain and France were mortally wounded in the region, whilst the US was provided with the opportunity to strike up its own arrangements, with Arab rulers, for the provision of oil, and for the expansion,, of the US oil companies, into the area. At the same time, the message was made clear to Israel, that the time for the European Colonial powers had passed. If it wanted security, it had to look to the US. As the USSR gained strategic advantage, in its relations with Nasser, and other Arab Nationalist leaders, in North Africa, the role of Israel for the US became more significant.

The idea that US policy is driven by Israel is nonsensical. It is a form of anti-semitism, a version of the worldwide Jewish conspiracy. There is a powerful Jewish lobby in the US. Its power comes from the fact that the Jewish Community has traditionally, within the diaspora, held together as a community. Given that, some members of that community, over the centuries, have specialised in trading, and money dealing - often arising from Medieval Christian limitations on such activities that did not apply to non-Christians – that is backed up by the power of money. In a country where Money talks louder in politics than in many other countries, that is not an unimportant fact. But, there are lots of people with lots of money in the US. Jews are only a tiny proportion of them.

The consequences are being drawn out more clearly in the current Presidential Election. Mitt Romney is courting the Jewish Lobby, whereas its being argued that Obama has not given the attention and support to Israel that previous Presidents have done. Obama, clearly has little time for Netanyahu. Romney has to court the Jewish Lobby. He has little chance of winning over social liberals, who have been turned off by the extreme right-wing shift of the Republican Party, on social issues, such as Abortion, and its growing dominance by the Religious Right. If Romney is to win over any of Obama's former support, it will be amongst those blue collar workers that Obama's economic policies have failed, and who generally speaking tend to be more socially conservative.

At the same time, Romney has a problem with his own Party and supporters. For the Tea Party Right, Romney is too liberal on economic policy. For the religious Right he has the disadvantage of being a Mormon, which is for some of them close to being a Devil Worshipper. It is an odd feature of US politics that the biggest supporters of Israel come not from the Jewish Community, but from the 7 million or so, extreme Christian Fundamentalists, the end timers, who honestly believe every word of the Bible and look forward to the day when the world will be destroyed at Armageddon. These nutters, actually want to see a full scale war in the Middle East, because they believe this is part of the Plan for the Second Coming.

If, Romney wants to win over these people – and Bush did, he tried to win over this Constituency, and McCain did. He appointed Sarah Palin as his running mate, who reportedly attends a Church run by these nutters – he has to be an ardent supporter of Israel. That is what he is doing. But, what Romney is doing to win an election is not likely to determine what he does in that regard were he to win the election. Still less does it tell us the direction in which the US State is moving.



Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal is one of the
 largest investors in the US.  He frequently appears
 on US CNBC.  Here he gives Giuliani a
$10 million cheque for 9/11, and also
 used the occasion to call for the US
to adopt a different attitude in the Middle East,
 particularly in regard Palestine.

Over the last twenty years or so, an increasing centre of economic power has been the Gulf States. Not in the sense that these economies are themselves huge centres of industrial or high-tech production. Mostly they are not. Most of them, even to run their oil industry rely on huge numbers of foreign rather than domestic workers. Nearly half of Saudi Arabia's 27 million population is made up of foreign workers. Some of them such as Dubai, have become regional trading hubs, and financial centres, but mostly they continue to rely on extracting Rent from their oil wells. No, their economic power has come from the ability of a tiny ruling group to amass fantastic amounts of this oil wealth, and to use it to invest in the global financial markets, and to buy up foreign Capital, particularly in the US. If it was Jewish Money that formerly ensured a hearing for the Jewish Lobby, then the much larger amount of Gulf Monarchy money, is obtaining an even greater hearing in Washington. The links between George Bush, and the Bin Laden family, are just one indication of that.

The US strategy in the region for a long time rested on two pillars. Its relation with Israel in the North, and with the Gulf States in the South. That strategy began to fall apart with the downfall of the Shah, a situation the US quickly tried to reverse by supporting Saddam, and promoting the Iran-Iraq war. The US had a problem in trying to replace Saddam with someone more reliable and effective. The most likely forces capable of overthrowing him were the Shia in the South, and the Kurds in the North. Neither were acceptable option for the US, which is why they refused to support them after the 1991 Gulf War, and left them to their fate. As, has, in fact happened, if the Shia were to come to power, they would inevitably gravitate to their brethren in Iran. That is the very opposite of the strategic solution the US desires. Moreover, they would be likely to oppress the Sunni Minority in the country, a situation the Sunni Gulf Monarchies had set their face against. If the Kurds won, even independence, that would set an example to Kurds in Turkey, the US's other important ally in the region and a member of NATO. The Kurds are the world's largest nation without a state of their own. To prevent them obtaining one, Turkey has waged a long war against them, including bombing them in Turkish and Iraqi Kurdistan, without any condemnation from the West.  Already, Kurds in Iraq have established a high degree of autonomy.  Just today the Iraqi Government has imposed sanctions on French Oil Company Total, for having signed a separate deal with Kurdistan.  At the same time, as Syria falls apart into warring sectarian areas, the Syrian Kurds have taken advantage to establish their own area, to protect themselves against potential attacks from incoming Sunni clerical-fascist forces.

Having lost Iraq to Iran, the US is left with another cleft stick. It needs even more to rely on Israel, but also upon its Gulf Allies. The main strategic goal of the US is to overthrow the regime in Iran, and to prevent it from becoming a regional power, more than it already is. Certainly, the US wants to ensure that it is not able to develop that position on the basis of a strategic alliance with Russia and China, which represent the main global challengers to US power. The US would settle for chaos in Iran, as opposed to instituting its own dictator, so long as it prevented Iran acting as a regional power. In this the interests of the US with its Gulf allies are symbiotic.

The Gulf States apart from Bahrain, are overwhelmingly Sunni – about 80% of their population. But, compared to Iran, Iraq, Syria,, these Gulf States have tiny populations. They are at risk if ever a war began between them, and Iran and Iraq. The recent conflict in Bahrain, where the Sunni regime attacks, Shia protesters, and the outbreak of fighting in Shia dominated areas of Saudi Arabia itself, as the regime opens fire on protesters, are an indication of how such a conflict could begin. Any, attempt by the US to simply open hostilities against Iran would be likely to provoke a conflagration of Shia revolts across the Gulf, and to re-open conflict by Shia forces such as Hezbollah. The US needs to isolate Iran, and to cripple it, hoping to promote revolt from inside. That, of course, what it hoped would have happened in Iraq, a coup from forces within the regime itself.

In order to isolate Iran, the US has sought to weaken those forces and regimes connected with it. A price of that is to place a heavier reliance on the forces of the Gulf Monarchies. In some ways, what we have is a situation rather like the way wars were fought in Europe during the Middle Ages, where the Catholic Church sat in Rome, and enlisted mercenary armies to go and fight its battles. The US plays a similar role to the Catholic Church, making alliances first with this, then with the other Prince. Given the importance of Gulf Oil to the US, given the importance of Gulf Arab Money in bankrolling US debt, and their investments in major US companies, given their strategic role in opposing Iran, it is no wonder that the US has shifted its emphasis away from Israel, which costs its billions of dollars a year to support, and whose actions in refusing to come to a settlement with the Palestinians continues to create political problems for the US, with its other allies within the region.

The influence of Russia in North Africa has long since gone, except for Syria. It is this crescent running up from Iran, through Iraq, and Syria that now poses the strategic problem for the US to solve. It appears to be solving it, by throwing its eggs all into the basket of the Sunni Gulf Monarchies, and their ability to mobilise clerical-fascist militias, such as Al Qaeda, to go and fight wherever they are required with money and weapons provided by the Gulf States, alongside their own Special Forces, and more advanced weapons and logistics provided by the US via the CIA.

Just as they did in Afghanistan where they used the clerical-fascist Mujaheddin fighters like Bin Laden to oppose the USSR, or as they did in Kosovo, where they used the clerical-fascist, and Mafia type gangs of the KLA to whip up ethnic violence, so that seems to be the chosen route of the US in North Africa. The gamble appears to be that these clerical-fascist forces, be they the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, or even the Salafis, or even as in Libya and Syria, the Al Qaeda linked groups, can be used to overthrow the existing regimes, and can then be reigned back, and controlled by their paymasters in the Gulf. Well good luck with that idea, given the experience of Afghanistan!

Yet, the US, seems prepared to risk that strategy in order to break apart Syria, and thereby using its remaining bases in Iraq, to isolate Iran, before finding some pretext to begin yet another bombing war. There are already plenty at hand, including the potential nuclear capacity. In that process, Israel has effectively been sidelined. In fact, its likely that Israel was told NOT to bomb Iran, precisely because it would have provided a pretext for Sunnis and Shia to unite against it. But, there is good reason then for Israel to be worried. If the US has thrown its lot in with the Gulf Monarchies, then a price to be paid may well be that Israel is left to its own devices. Al Qaeda began not as an opposition to the US, but to those very Monarchical regimes, which it argued were corrupt. In order to preserve themselves, those Monarchies will need to continually find the mercenaries another target. The most obvious target is Israel itself.  All in all Israel may have felt its position more secure with Mubarak, Assad and Gaddafi as neighbours.

Whither Syria? - Part 1 of 3

“An individual, a group, a party, or a class that ‘objectively’ picks its nose while it watches men drunk with blood massacring defenceless people is condemned by history to rot and become worm-eaten while it is still alive”.

“On the other hand, a party or the class that rises up against every abominable action wherever it has occurred, as vigorously and unhesitatingly as a living organism reacts to protect its eyes when they are threatened with external injury – such a party or class is sound of heart. Protest against the outrages in the Balkans cleanses the social atmosphere in our own country, heightens the level of moral awareness among our own people… Therefore an uncompromising protest against atrocities serves not only the purpose of moral self-defence on the personal and party level but also the purpose of politically safeguarding the people against adventurism concealed under the flag of ‘liberation’.”

(“The War Correspondence of Leon Trotsky: The Balkan Wars 1912-13”)

The workers of Paris were butchered by the
 bourgeoisie after the Commune Was Crushed
 in 1871

No one who has watched the terrible events unfolding in Syria over the last year can be filled with anything but revulsion. That is not in any way reduced by comparing the hypocritical and simpering attitude of the media to events in Syria, to their attitude to the events in Bahrain, where, on a proportional basis, an even greater number of people have died, at the hands of the western backed, feudal, despotic regime, to which Britain, and other western powers, continue to supply arms, to murder its people, and where the US has its Sixth Fleet based.  No massacre, no act of inhumanity can be reduced by simply comparing it to some other act of inhumanity. 

As Socialists, as Marxists, as simply decent human beings, we should be horrified at such actions wherever and whenever they occur. Of course, we are not pacifists either. We recognise that sometimes it is necessary to meet the violence of the oppressor with the violence of the oppressed, and nor do we equate one with the other. But, even our support for the violence of the oppressed does not commit us to supporting wanton acts of butchery and savagery. We are only reluctantly not Pacifists, and our defence of violence accordingly is a defence of revolutionary violence to defeat the violence of the oppressor, not a defence of violence in itself. We should abhor the fact of needing to resort to it in our own defence, as much as we abhor its use by our oppressors, because violence in itself is dehumanising, which is why individual soldiers who have been dehumanised by conditioning to it, and indeed whole societies that have endured it, can so easily descend into inhuman acts.

But, as Marxists our great advantage is that we approach such events not just with our own moral compass, but with a scientific outlook and analysis. A doctor who is so consumed by their own moral outlook (for example on abortion), or their own emotions is often of little use to the patient, who requires someone with a more detached, scientific approach to resolving their problems. Unfortunately, just as with a doctor our scientific, materialist analysis sometimes causes us to diagnose that there is no good solution, or even any solution to a particular condition. I fear that is the case with Syria today.

Of course, we should protest vociferously against the butchery, and the vile nature of the Assad regime. We should also protest loudly at the butchery, and vile nature of the clerical-fascist forces, often from outside Syria, that have themselves been responsible for some of these massacres, such as, it seems, the Houla Massacre, that the West has blamed on supporters of Assad, but which it now turns out was committed against supporters of the regime, including a recently elected, pro-regime MP and his family.

We should protest loudly against the vile, feudal Monarchical regimes in the Gulf, which oppress their own people with the support of the West, and which have fanned the flames of sectarian Civil War in both Libya and Syria, for their own sectarian and politico-strategic reasons, to oppose their Shia and Christian enemies within the region. We should also condemn the Shia Clerical-Fascists in Iran and Iraq, who for similar reasons have stoked up that Civil War from the opposite direction, and for their own politico-strategic reasons. We should condemn the actions of Russia and China who for their own economic and politico-strategic reasons have supported the Assad regime. We should condemn the US and its allies who have used the sectarian divisions in the region to pursue their own strategic goals in attempting to maintain control of Gulf Oil, and the maintenance of strategic military bases on the flanks of their global opponents Russia and China.

And, as Trotsky makes clear in the quote above we should most definitely not allow our humanitarian concerns to dictate to us that “something must be done” even though all our experience tells us that sometimes that “something” when carried out by our class enemies is worse than nothing.

“Therefore an uncompromising protest against atrocities serves not only the purpose of moral self-defence on the personal and party level but also the purpose of politically safeguarding the people against adventurism concealed under the flag of ‘liberation’.”

In The Discussion On Self-Determination Summed Up Lenin writes,

“Let us assume that between two great monarchies there is a little monarchy whose kinglet is “bound” by blood and other ties to the monarchs of both neighbouring countries. Let us further assume that the declaration of a republic in the little country and the expulsion of its monarch would in practice lead to a war between the two neighbouring big countries for the restoration of that or another monarch in the little country. There is no doubt that all international Social-Democracy, as well as the really internationalist section of Social-Democracy in the little country, would be against substituting a republic for the monarchy in this case. The substitution of a republic for a monarchy is not an absolute, but one of the democratic demands, subordinate to the interests of democracy (and still more, of course, to those of the socialist proletariat) as a whole.”

And Lenin also wrote that where National Liberation struggles were merely a cover for “Monarchical intrigues”, we should not support them.

That is why, Marxists had to oppose, for example, Britain's intervention in the Falklands. That did not mean in any way supporting Galtieri's invasion, or his claim to the Falklands, or Argentina's suppression of the rights of the Falkland Islanders. But, the task of dealing with Galtieri, and opposing his colonialist invasion rested with the Argentinian workers, not with British Imperialism. As British socialists our duty was to protest the atrocity of Galtieri's invasion, but also to oppose “adventurism concealed under the flag of ‘liberation’.” by the British State. And, as Lenin argues above, there was no way that British Marxists could support a war that might cost the lives of thousands of British and Argentinian workers (because it was workers who overwhelmingly made up the ranks of both armies), and did cost the lives of hundreds on both sides, simply to defend what is after all only a bourgeois, and not a socialist principle on behalf of a handful of people.

It is, of course possible that Britain's fortunes may have not been so good. They almost ran out of ammunition, for instance. Although, neither side really wanted a war in the first place, the political dynamics forced them into one. Similar military and political dynamics could conceivably have led Britain to launch air strikes against Argentinian airfields had things been going against them, they may even have been led, as happened in Yugoslavia, to follow up with a ground assault if air strikes were not sufficient, though it is highly unlikely that would have been the case. But, it is precisely because war has a dynamic of its own, that it is impossible to say once a shooting war begins.

Ultimately, Britain's invasion of the Falklands did not resolve the matter. It could have only made things worse. The decision to exploit the oil and mineral reserves around the islands is leading once again to tension. A more economically powerful and assertive Latin America has generally sided with Argentina rather than Britain over the issue. Britain's military presence on the islands has led to the islanders failing to come to any kind of settlement with Argentina that could provide a stable, and peaceful future. It may be that all the 1982 war did was to put off a final settlement that could be even more bloody, if a more powerful, and in future better armed Argentina, once again presses its claims against an economically weaker, and militarily weaker Britain.

Many atrocities were committed
 against Serbs in the Krajena

But, there are more recent examples of similar military interventions where the negative consequences are already apparent, and serious. The atrocities that were committed in the Balkans in the 1990's, and early years of this century were wholly deplorable. But, just as the atrocities today in Syria are being presented as being just on one side – the side that the West supports – so too in the Balkans. Serious atrocities were committed against Serbian populations by forces that historically were linked to the Nazi occupation of Yugoslavia. Some of these forces openly proclaimed that heritage. In Kosovo the KLA, backed by Albania and the CIA began a program of attacks on Serbs, that were deliberately designed to provoke sectarian conflict between Albanian and Serbian Kosovars who had lived peaceably together for decades. When the Serb Nationalist, Milosevic responded, by sending in the military, to crush the KLA, it also unleashed pogroms against Abanian Kosovars in general, just as the response of Serbia, and Serb militia in Bosnia had done. In both cases, it provided the justification that Imperialism was looking for to intervene to remove Milosevic, and his regime that was still linked to Russia, and instead created the conditions for installing a regime that looked West.

In Kosovo, in particular, the consequences of that are that the oppression and ethnic cleansing of Kosovan Albanians has been replaced by the oppression and ethnic cleansing of Kosovan Serbs. It threatens to erupt at any time, and any spread of a sectarian Civil War out of Syria, could be the spark that re-ignites it.

Of course, to point to all this is not to deny that the rights of various groups throughout the Balkans were not being infringed or that atrocities were being committed. That is no more the case than to deny that the rights of the Falkland islanders were being infringed by Galtieri. It is to argue that as with the Falkland islands, a desire to protest that fact, and to seek a solution to it, does not lead Marxists to look to the forces of Imperialism for a solution, or to remain silent when Imperialism seeks to use such situations to further its own global-strategic interests, to assert its right to act as global policeman, and to determine the regimes of sovereign states, even states we might ourselves detest.

A similar scenario applied to the invasion of Iraq. However, my own view of Iraq is somewhat different from the mainstream view. Just as Thatcher, and certainly the British State, had no desire initially to get into a shooting war over the Falklands, my own view is that, at least sections of, the US State did not want to engage in a war in Iraq. Saddam, having failed to meet their objectives, in the war they had encouraged between Iraq and Iran, was probably seen as needing to be replaced, but, my guess is that the wiser heads, within the US State, understood the implications of removing the Iraqi Bonapartist State apparatus, in a country where the majority of the population were Shia. That is why under the first Bush, they did not continue the first Gulf War to remove him.

In every Nation State there are three contending powers. There is what I call the “Socio-Economic Power”, there is the “Political Power”, and there is the “State Power”. The first is similar to what Marx calls “Civil Society”, but I have in mind here more the power exercised within Civil Society by a dominant group or class by virtue of its control over the means of production, and other aspects of social life. Usually, this is the ruling class, but in a revolutionary situation, or a condition of dual power, it may not be.

Attlee's Labour Government won the votes of workers
and the middle class.  It operated within the confines
 of bourgeois Social Democracy that was continued
 by "Buttskillism"

The Political Power is quite simply that exercised by Government. In a bourgeois democracy the rules governing this power are constrained by the dynamics of electoralism i.e. the need to build a sufficient coalition of electoral support to win office. As a consequence, the Political Power does not necessarily reflect the “Socio-Economic Power”. Although, in a bourgeois democracy, the Political Power always operates within the confines of bourgeois ideology, it is forced to make compromises with this or that section of the ruling class, and with the other classes in order to get elected. In a condition of Dual Power, i.e. a situation where there is a stalemate within the “Socio-Economic Power”, the Political Power may continue to reflect the dominance of the old ruling class, or it may, as in the case of a Workers Government, reflect the interests of the revolutionary class. Likewise, where such a stalemate results in the State being able to raise itself up above Civil Society, the ensuing Bonapartist regime will bring about a fusing of the “Political Power” and the “State Power”.

The “State Power” is the power of the State as classically theorised by Marxism. It is the power of the permanent State bureaucracy embodied within the Civil Service, the Police and Army and Judiciary, and in modern states through its ideological apparatus in the Schools, and Universities, the media, and the institutions of the Welfare State. Under normal conditions of bourgeois democracy, the State Power acts as the channel for the interests of the dominant section of the ruling class. It is tied by a thousand golden strings of financial, family, social, cultural, educational and other ties to the ruling class proper. It acts to moderate the Political Power in order to ensure those interests are met. Where necessary, as in the case of Allende's Chile, or as was threatened even with Wilson's Britain, it can show its hand openly to overthrow the Political Power where it oversteps the mark in its actions to challenge the power and privilege of the ruling class. By the same token it can act to moderate or frustrate the actions of right-wing Governments where their actions, for whatever reason, threaten the interests of the dominant section of Capital. Given that Capital itself is not homogeneous, and that different sections of Capital – for example Money Capital as against Productive Capital – have conflicting interests, there is a necessary fluidity within the State that reflects the changing fortunes of these contending groups.

I feel that this explains the actions of the US, and the conflicting positions that were adopted within the State Power, and which were reflected to an extent within the Political Power. The War, I would argue, was the project of the “Political Power” i.e. of the dominant role played by the Neo-Cons that stood as the power behind George W. Bush, rather than the project either of US Big Capital, or of its main representatives within the “State Power”. Of course, the US State itself is just one, though the most powerful, State within the Imperialist system of States, which also explains why other States in Europe, opposed the War, and why others like the UK attempted to play a mediating role between them.

Forward To Part 2

Blood On Their Hands

The Formula 1 bosses are right to say that holding the Grand Prix there has highlighted the oppression in the country, because of the media coverage.  That is a condemnation of the way the media have ignored the torture, and human rights violations, going on in Bahrain, over the last year, not a justification of F1 being in there.  Its true that questions have been raised, but, at the same time, it has been an opportunity for the Bahraini tyrants to claim that the opponents of the Grand Prix, i.e. the Bahraini masses, are extremists!

Jean Todt, justified the presence in Bahrain, partly by pointing to the fact that, last week, the Grand Prix was in China.  Personally, I would not have lost sleep if the Chinese GP had been cancelled either, but the situation in China is not the same as that in Bahrain.  There is not currently mass protests for democracy taking place in China, nor are there massive amounts of military force being used to subdue such protests.  In Bahrain that is the case.  In fact, on a proportional basis, more Bahrainis have died, as a result of State oppression, than have Syrians!  Besides that the Bahraini tyrants are themselves closely connected with F1 itself.  It simply will not do for David Coulthard to claim that the drivers do not properly understand the political situation in the country.  For one thing, what is there not to understand.  The country is a medieval, Feudal Monarchy, run by vicious tyrants, who are killing people for daring to demand freedom and democracy!  Besides which, if you don't understand the issues, then, in such a high profile position, you have a responsibility to find out, or else you are complicit.  As, the protesters have said, in fact, the repression has increased in recent days, precisely because the tyrants have tried to present things as normal, and to prevent the people from being able to effectively protest.

But, of course, F1 is a rich boys sport.  Its no wonder that its interests are aligned with the rich tyrants of the Bahraini Royal Family, and not with the ordinary Bahrainis facing torture, murder and oppression by those tyrants.  Nor is it a wonder that those other rich boys, those that make up the millionaire boys club that is the Tory Cabinet, have also been loathe to upset their friends amongst the Sunni, Gulf Arab tyrannies, whose activities they are more than happy to turn a blind eye to, in order to ensure their supply of oil, and in order to keep making billions from selling them luxury goods, and more weapons with which to murder the people.

These are the same Tory millionaires who, of course, were only to prepared to bomb the shit out of Libya, and Iraq, and Afghanistan, supposedly in the name of freedom and democracy, and defence of human rights!  They are the same millionaires' club who would do the same to Syria given the chance.  Yet, when it comes to their freinds in the Gulf tyrannies, they cannot even bring themselves to a limp protest such as opposing the holding of the Grand Prix there.

A couple of weeks ago, a lone protester upset the rich boys annual rowing race in protest at elitism.  The generally reserved British are not given to kamikaze tactics.  But, one prominent Bahraini human rights protester, gaoled for life, simply for demanding democracy, is on hunger strike, and may die this weekend, such is his commitent to his cause.  I hope it doesn't happen, but it is not at all impossible that protests, on the track, during the race, could occur, which would have dire consequences.  I hope it doesn't happen for those reasons, and because the F1 authorities, and the Bahraini tyrants would then use it to justify their claims that the protesters were extremists.  They would all claim, of course, that they could never have seen such an eventuality.

Of course, the Tories would be sympathetic to such an excuse.  After all, these are the same rich boy Tories who are happy to see British workers die in industrial accidents, because they do not beleive in things such as Health & Safety.  In both cases, the blood is on their hands.

Where Failure To Oppose Imperialist Intervention Leads You

In my blog post, a few days ago, The Politics Of Pontius Pilate, I discussed the abstentionist position of the AWL in relation to Imperialist intervention.

It examined how that was being applied by the AWL in relation to Libya, in their article Yes To Libya, Not No To USA.

The main things wrong with their position are:

1. They provide uncritical support for the Libyan "rebels" without anywhere providing any analysis of exactly who these rebels are, or what they stand for other than that they are "anti-Gaddafi", which now seems good enough for the AWL to give their support to some group!

So we have no idea of knowing whether, in fact, such support will simply hand over the workers to an even worse fate than Gaddafi.

2. They fail to oppose intervention by the US or other big powers, and the basis on which they do so, is to mislead workers into the beleif that such intervention would be in some sense "impartial".

The basic responsibility of Marxists is to demonstrate to workers that the Capitalist State is NOT neutral, but acts on behalf of the Capitalists. For that reasons, we should not in any way act or fail to act in a way, which leads the workers to beleive otherwise.

3. Socialism cannot be achieved other than by the self-activity, and self-government of the working-class. As Marx set out in the Critique of the Gotha Programme, and many other writings, in providing solutions for the working-class, we focus on precisely that point.

The solutions we propose are solutions that the workers themselves create and impose, they are solutions which require the workers not only mobilising, but mobilising in such a way that they create their own new organisations and forms, which provide an immediate solution to the particular problem. They occupy a workplace threatened with closure as a first step in taking it over, and running it as a Co-operative, for instance. They mobilise to oppose fascist attacks, or attacks by the Police on their community, or attacks by thugs employed by bosses to break strikes, and having mobilised they do not limit themselves to that mobilisation, but develop out of it, Defence Squads, Militia, Democratic forms such as Factory Committees, or Neighbourhood Committees that do not demand rights from the bosses State, but take them.

As Marx and Engels put it in the Communist Manifesto, the demands we raise are ones which not only provide the workers with an immediate and practical solution to their problems of today, but also take care of the movement of tomorrow, by building new workers power in society - new workers' property, new forms of workers' democracy, and new elements of an emergent Workers' State.

But, as usual, there is nothing in the AWL position of this basic Marxism.

They see no role for the working-class in relation to Libya outside some elementary Trade Union politics, basic Economism, and pressure group politics on "Democratic Imperialism".

4. The argument used by the AWL to justify failing to oppose Imperialist intervention would have applied perfectly to Imperialist intervention against the Bolsheviks in 1917.

At that time, the Bolsheviks had not only come to power by means of an armed insurrection, but had been decisively beaten in a Popular Democratic Election. The Bolsheviks had responded to their electoral defeat by using armed power to shut down the Assembly. Faced with opposition centres of power throughout Russia, just as Gaddafi faces such opposition centres today, they again responded by unleashing the greatest military might they could assemble against those opposition centres, and with a brutal reign of Terror, via a secret police under the leadership of Stalin, which ruthlessly rounded up opposition leaders and shot them.

A humanitarian crisis erupted, in which the economy collapsed, and all of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse stalked the land - War, Famine, Pestilence and Disease. Tens of thousands were dying as a result of this disaster, and thousands of workers left the starvation in the cities, in order to try to find food back in their villages.

It makes what is happening in Libya appear trivial. On the AWL's argument, there would have been no basis for them to have opposed Imperialist intervention against such an illegitimate Government, under such conditions.

In the debate on that initial article on their site, just where this kind of politics leads can be seen. Having begun by saying,

"Their history and their nature mandates an attitude of complete distrust to the US and British military."

The AWL, within the article itself began to show anything but complete distrust. They began to talk about why it was unlikely, actually that the US would intervene in Libya in any other form but the institution of a no fly zone.

In actual, fact, as I said at the time, and as anyone who watched TV knew, it was clear that it was impossible to impose a no fly zone without military action on a much larger scale. One of the US Military's top representatives had himself said that a No Fly Zone would constitute, a classic Declaration of War. The US Military had said that it would have to begin by bombing Libyan Air Defences, and anyone who knows anything about such military action knows that it begins with the insertion of Special Forces, who act as spotters, who laser tag those targets.

But, it was also obvious that, in fact, a No Fly Zone would be ineffective, because Gaddafi's forces are rolling Eastwards by land not by air.

As UK Ambassador, Christopher Meyer, said on TV a few days ago, if action were to be taken it would have to be much tougher including bombing Gaddafi's forces and so on. In the debate on their website over the last few days, the AWL have gone from telling us that we should have complete distrust for the US, to spending much of their time, expanding this argument about why the US either would not intervene at all, or else would have no desire to intervene other than in the form of a no fly zone. In other words they effectively turned themselves into mouthpieces of the US State.

But, Imperialism is never thankful for those who sometimes represent its interests - just ask Saddam Hussein. In fact, the US has now put a resolution to the UN, calling not just for a No Fly Zone, but for any measures necessary to remove Gaddafi.

In other words we have gone from Humanitarian Assistance to Regime Change in just a few days. That is precisely why Marxists should be clear in their opposition to intervention by powerful states. The AWL, may now make one of their famous zig-zags, swinging wildly from one position to another, swept along like so much flotsam on the sea of history, as they scramble to accommodate to the very situation they have spent a week arguing was not going to happen. But, not only will that further diminsh any credibility they have, but it will also mean that the argument they then try to make in opposing such intervention will be weakened, because as Meyer, himself has pointed out, if what you really want is "humanitarian relief", then logically you should argue for what will bring that about, not something that will not!

But, in truth, in any such wider intervention, the AWL have no idea WHO will be getting support against Gaddafi. The one thing we can say for sure is that it most certainly will not be revolutionary workers! A couple of years ago, the AWL said they had learned their lesson from supporting the anti-Shah forces in Iran in 1979, and their failure to warn against Khomeini.

But, clearly they have not, because it is just as likely that some clerical-fascist force could be the main beneficiary of such intervention in Libya!

According, to Channel Four's Lindsey Hilsum, reporting from Bahrain, Obama rang the King of Bahrain on Tuesday asking him to pull back the troops and tone down the attacks on protesters.

The King refused in no uncertain terms. It seems, she said, that the US requested support from the Arab League, and from the Gulf Co-operation Council for action against Gaddafi, before it would make such a move. The quid pro quo was that the US has to keep out of the affairs of the Gulf regimes as they unleash their own military forces against the peoples of their own countries.

And, as I have suggested previously, that applies to the Bonapartist regime in Egypt too. In recent days, it has been having negotiations with the Muslim Brotherhood, and is introducing proposals to define who can be considered an Egyptian in order to have the right to vote.

The stringent controls, which mimic some of those put forward by the BNP to define "British", will according to a spokesman on Aljazeera disenfranchise many of the new Middle Class in Egypt, i.e. precisely those forces that were out in Tahrir Square demanding democratic reform.

The job of Marxists is to look after the interests of the working-class, not just in one country, but as a whole, not just for now, but for the future. We can only do that, by at all times inisisting upon the independence of the workers from all other class forces, by insisting that it is only the solidarity, and collective action of the working-class that can be relied upon to provide solutions for workers. A failure to do that even by ommission, and the suggestion that workers can rely on other class forces to fight their battles is a betrayal of the principles of Marxism. The consequences of not opposing the intervention of the big powers in Libya, could well be the rolling back of the democratic revolution throughout the Middle East and North Africa.