Against the Ukrainian War! Build a mass anti-war and anti-imperialist movement

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Europe headed for major armed conflict as Kremlin launches major attack on Ukraine

International Socialist Path (ISA) Statement on 24 February 2022

The path of international socialism is in full solidarity with the Ukrainian people, who have been suffering from exploitation, oppression, corruption, worsening poverty, and now face the catastrophe of war.

Russian troops and tanks have crossed the Ukrainian border and have already caused casualties. Missiles hit military bases and airfields, including Kyiv. In Kharkiv, the second-largest city in northeastern Ukraine, gunfire was also reported in a residential area.

Russian troops should withdraw from Ukraine immediately.

The recognition of the Luhansk and Donetsk People's Republics by the Russian Duma and Putin, together with the local appeal to Russia, became the pretext for the invasion. After weeks of sharpening knives between Russia and the U.S. and NATO, the situation finally escalated to terrifying new highs.

Europe is heading for a major armed conflict, a multiple geopolitical contradiction linked to a new era of chaos and disorder. International socialists must strengthen our work and be prepared to resist imperialist wars, promote working-class internationalism, and principledly oppose imperialism in all its forms.

imperialist interests

Russia has in the past claimed that its security was threatened by NATO's eastward expansion, fearing that the latter's military weapons would be stationed on its borders. Now, Putin says Russia's offensive is to "demilitarize" and "denazify" Ukraine. However, his invasion will only make the Ukrainian people more angry, and many will take up arms against his army.

Putin justified his attack by claiming that Ukraine's independence was simply the result of the Russian Revolution and the Bolsheviks giving oppressed peoples the right to self-determination, a policy that was later opposed by the bureaucratic regime from which Stalin and Putin came from. This is an important lesson. Independence cannot be achieved by petitioning NATO or the EU, but only by a common struggle against the new tsar and his wars.

The people most affected by war have their lives, bodies, children, parents, homes and incomes threatened. These ordinary working-class people living in Ukraine can only watch the war from the sidelines, and their fate is affected by factors beyond their control.

Today's Ukrainian leaders, the bourgeois establishment, whose sole concern has always been to defend the interests of the oligarchs, have led the country from crisis to crisis since independence, selling themselves to the West over the past decade. They hope to gain protection from NATO and gain economic benefits from closer ties with Europe. But their attempt failed completely: the average Ukrainian household income today is 20% lower than it was in 2013, and NATO's aid is not based on Ukrainian interests, but on the economic and geopolitical interests of the United States and NATO.

The economic shock of the war also affects the world, and stocks have reacted, with Russian stocks down 40% before trading was suspended. Energy and food prices will also rise, adding to inflationary pressures already under the world economy. And the future generations of Ukraine and Russia, who already live in low-income and low-quality medical care, will now have to pay the price of war.

This war is full of shadows of China and the United States competing for world hegemony. The Biden administration has publicly stated that China is its "biggest competitor", while Russia is "the country that poses the greatest threat to the United States." Within NATO, the United States has pushed its European allies for years to increase their military budgets. War is an alternative extension of politics. One of the current motives of the United States is to strengthen the bond between American and European imperialism, and to prepare to take on China for the future, all at the expense of the Ukrainian people.

NATO is stepping up its deployment in Eastern Europe, building new bases in Poland, Romania and the Baltic states, all of which border the former Soviet Union. NATO is also constantly arming Ukraine to the teeth. After weeks of "wolves are coming" rhetoric and constant predictions of false flag operations in Russia, Biden and his warmongering allies have created a self-fulfilling prophecy. No matter how much NATO is directly involved in the ensuing war, Western imperialism is undoubtedly responsible for instigating it. Working-class families will mourn the loss of their families and pay the heaviest price for the war and the economic blow.

Weak Russian imperialism is on the offensive

Russian imperialism has calculated that it is time to act decisively to advance its interests. U.S. imperialism is weakened, the European Union is struggling with internal divisions, and China is becoming a major concern for the United States as it reshapes the world order. Putin has violated Ukrainians' right to self-determination because he sees Ukraine as an inalienable part of Russia, just as Xi Jinping asserts that Taiwan is a sacred and inalienable part of China.

The importance of what happened in Ukraine goes far beyond Ukraine's borders. Economic crises, waves of reactionary nationalism, and potentially millions of refugees will create more global crises at a time when the pandemic appears to be entering a new, more manageable phase.

Despite a brutal authoritarian regime, the Kremlin must still consider whether the Russians will accept a massive war against Ukraine. 2022 is not 2014, when Russia's annexation of Crimea into its own territory triggered a massive patriotic wave. Now, most Russians have no heart for war with Ukraine, but are grappling with deteriorating living standards, rising inflation and more than a million "excess deaths" during the pandemic. A poll on 23 February 2022 showed that 40% of the Russian population (mostly young people and urban populations) opposed the recognition of the Donetsk and Luhansk republics, which have been used as weapons for waging war. Excuse.

Russia is a military power, but its economy is only about 6 percent of NATO's total. Its GDP is lower than that of Italy. Tough sanctions and war could seriously damage the economy, plus there will be war victims on the Russian side, further deepening the distrust of everything the government says. Putin may be happy that he has Beijing's backing, but if a protracted war drains economic resources, he may well have to ask Xi Jinping to escort him.

The working class and the poor will pay for the war. When the wealth of Russia's top 500 oligarchs grew by 45% to $640 billion during the pandemic, losing billions of dollars from frozen bank accounts won't make much of a difference.

The war has little to do with protecting anyone in Donetsk and Luhansk. NATO used to live in harmony with dictators when it thought it was possible; Putin's support for Europe's most right-wing parties - "anti-fascism" or "defence of democratic rights" is completely severable at this time. War will mean horrific human suffering, the cost of many people's lives, economic hardship, more refugees, and it will not resolve any existing problems or tensions between imperialist powers. War is not in the interests of the working class and ordinary people of any country involved, despite imperialist powers to the contrary.

We cannot rely on any imperialist institution or war machine to create peace, let alone prosperity. In fact, Ukraine has been seeking real assistance from NATO and the West for years, but has been repeatedly turned down. We should not trust these imperialist institutions. Any "diplomatic settlement" between them, while initially welcomed by the people of the world, will ultimately come at the expense of ordinary people and will only pave the way for further tension and confrontation. War between these powers will make matters worse now that these powers have proven incapable of dealing with the public health and climate crises for which they are responsible, and unwilling to deal with the rising cost of living for ordinary people.

The only force that can stop war and destruction is a united working class. The International Socialist Road ISA calls on the global workers' movement to launch a large-scale international anti-war and anti-imperialist mobilization, including the refusal to produce and transport weapons, as well as strikes, and to put forward social demands that can provide a real way out for the majority of society. In multinational companies operating in various countries directly involved in the Ukraine crisis, employed workers can take joint action.

This will not be easy. We will have to fight the massive propaganda machines of all parties to the conflict. It will take time for objective conditions to expose the nature of propaganda and the real problems, and unfortunately, many people have to go through hardships first. War, however, is the revolution's midwife, and it exposes contradictions in the most conspicuous and tangible ways. Timely and bold moves in the early stages of the war were crucial in determining the character of the antiwar movement when it became stronger, and the program it adopted.

This war is not in the interests of workers and youth everywhere. The war is linked to geopolitical and economic imperialist ambitions. ISA will stand against war in all our regions - Russia, the US, Ukraine and elsewhere. In particular, we stand with Russia's youth, workers, and join them in calling for solidarity against warmongers and against poverty, not against other peoples, through anti-war movements in workplaces and universities.

We stand for:

• Say no to the war in Ukraine! Defend the right of Ukrainians to decide their own future, including the right of minorities to self-determination!

• Demand the return of Russian troops to Russian barracks and the withdrawal of all NATO troops from Eastern Europe.

• No confidence in any "peacekeeping" imperialist forces involved in the situation.

• No illusions about warmonger diplomacy. Build a massive anti-war, anti-imperialist movement, linking workers and youth across countries.

• Support the alternative to internationalist working class socialism and end capitalist conflict leading to war and destruction!