NATO tells businesses to prepare for war

NY Post, 11/25–The chair of NATO’s military committee warned business leaders to prepare for a “wartime scenario” and bring their production lines back home, rather than relying on China or Russia, to avoid blackmail or sabotage — as former and future US President Donald Trump has vowed to restore his “America First” agenda…Dutch Adm. Rob Bauer said instability in global politics could leave businesses at the mercy of foreign governments, especially if war were to break out. “Businesses need to be prepared for a wartime scenario and adjust their production and distribution lines accordingly,” Bauer said. “Because while it may be the military who wins battles, it’s the economies that win wars” … The NATO military chief noted that 60% of all earth materials are produced in China, with 90% of the products also processed there…He warned that it would be naive for business leaders to believe that the Chinese Communist Party would not stoop to targeting foreign business in its country to disrupt the economies of potential adversaries. The dire warning comes as Trump has vowed to prioritize an “America First” agenda, which could include setting 60% tariffs on most goods imported from China in an effort to protect domestic industries.

Pakistani workers face off against fascist State

Al Jazeera, 11/25–In the early hours of Tuesday, protesters clashed with police firing tear gas and rubber bullets at a western motorway entry to Islamabad. “We are deeply frustrated with the government, they do not know how to function,” said demonstrator Kalat Khan, 56. “The treatment we are receiving is unjust and cruel.” The capital has been locked down since late Saturday, with mobile internet sporadically cut and more than 20,000 police flooding the streets, many armed with riot shields and batons. “From the scale of preparations, one wonders if the Islamabad Police is preparing for war,” said an editorial in the English-language Dawn newspaper. “The city administration may have intended to demonstrate strength by sharing the plans it has made, but instead it looks like it is panicking.” Hassan Akbar, Pakistan fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center, called the security personnel deployment and infrastructure build-up in Islamabad “unprecedented” as anti-government demonstrators converge on the capital.

Israeli fascists look to win big

Foreign Affairs, 11/25–More than 13 months since Hamas’s…attack, Israel finds itself on a roll. Since the beginning of the year, Israel has assassinated much of the senior leadership of both Hamas and Hezbollah, decimated their ranks, and conducted precision strikes in Iran. At home, after seeing his approval rating hit rock bottom following October 7, Netanyahu has watched his popularity start to rebound…Resisting calls for a truce, Netanyahu—with potent stimulus from his extreme right flank—is pledging to double down on his pursuit of “total victory”...Trump is viewed in Jerusalem as a staunch patron of Israel…Although the Biden administration sustained Israel militarily, economically, and diplomatically…it showed frequent disapproval of the way Israel was conducting the war, and U.S. President Joe Biden was often directly at odds with Netanyahu…By contrast, Netanyahu and his allies envisage that the incoming Trump administration will bring unqualified U.S. support for Israel. That assumption has given new fuel to the most expansionist…aspirations of Israel’s ascendant right wing…

NATO preps troops for Ukraine meat grinder

LeMonde, 11/24–As the conflict in Ukraine enters a new phase of escalation, discussions over sending Western troops and private defense companies to Ukraine have been revived…These are sensitive discussions, most of which are classified – relaunched in light of a potential American withdrawal of support for Kyiv once Donald Trump takes office…"Discussions are underway between the UK and France on defense cooperation, particularly with a view to creating a hard core of allies in Europe, focused on Ukraine and wider European security"...These are comments in line with those made by the French foreign minister, Jean-Noël Barrot…he called on Western allies to "not set and express red lines" in their support for Ukraine. 

In a lose-lose election for workers, Donald Trump’s victory marks the toxic divisions within the U.S. working class and a massive defeat for finance capital, the main wing of the U.S. capitalist ruling class.  Trump’s “America First” platform to pull back from NATO and the war in Ukraine will undermine the Big Fascists of finance capital as they lurch toward war with their imperialist rivals in China and Russia. For workers, the dark night of capitalism in decay—with no mass communist movement to fight back--

The next four years will expose the limits of liberal democracy, where the brutal reality of capitalist dictatorship is veiled by mythical “rights” and “the rule of law.” Regardless of who’d won the election, the worldwide crisis of capitalism would force the U.S. bosses to move faster toward full-blown fascism. A President Kamala Harris would have spelled disaster for the international working class, from Gaza to the U.S.-Mexico border. What Trump’s victory reveals is the bosses’ ability to win tens of millions of workers to open racism and sexism and to scapegoat immigrants, the most vulnerable sections of our class. It shows just how much struggle lies before us.

In this period of extreme instability, the role of Progressive Labor Party becomes even more crucial. The history of Nazi Germany and fascist Japan tells us that communism is the only way to smash fascism.  We can’t rely on the bosses’ politicians or media or courts to protect us. Only communist revolution can secure an antiracist, anti-sexist society that serves workers’ needs. 

Trump’s win and world war

No matter who’s in the White House, the declining U.S. empire is on a collision course toward World War Three.  There are flash points everywhere we look: Eastern Europe, the South China Sea, the Middle East, the Horn of Africa. According to CEO Jamie Dimon of the main wing JPMorgan Chase, "World War III has already begun"  (Economic Times, 10/29).  Though Trump fronts for the Small Fascist, isolationist, more domestically oriented bosses, he won’t be able to stem the tide of global instability or the sharpening imperialist competition for maximum profit.  

In his first term, through threats and broken treaties, Trump showed disdain for the European Union. He sowed division and dysfunction in  NATO and the United Nations, U.S.-dominated institutions that were already fracturing. This time around, Trump’s version of “strong man” rule will strengthen the Small Fascists within the EU and  intensify “nationalist and anti-immigrant political currents … throughout the continent…The possibility that Europe will splinter, with each nation cutting its own deals with Washington, appears real” (New York Times, 11/8). This could embolden the BRICS alliance (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa), already “a powerful counterweight to the West”  (New York Times, 11/8). In the view of the Council on Foreign Relations, the main wing’s leading think tank, “What the world is witnessing today is akin to what theorists called ‘total war’ [read: world war], in which combatants draw on vast resources, mobilize their societies, prioritize warfare over all other state activities, attack a broad variety of targets, and reshape their economies and those of other countries”  (Foreign Affairs, 10/22).

As capitalism spirals toward world war, the working class will pay in both “blood and treasure.”  The bosses will force young workers to be their cannon fodder while slashing programs like Social Security and Medicare to pay for bigger militaries. The Council on Foreign Relations has endorsed a proposal to increase U.S. defense spending from 3 percent to more than 5 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (Foreign Affairs, 11/8).

Trump’s win and splits in the ruling class

All politicians are so many capitalist puppets. They have no principles or morals. While they may pretend to believe in certain ideologies, in reality they sway in the wind to mobilize the working class behind the section of the ruling class they are currently serving. 

Over the last decade or so, the Democratic Party has been the face of finance capital, of the multinational oil companies like Exxon Mobil and the  big banks that finance them (JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Bank of America).With the Trump takeover, the Republican Party has been hijacked by the isolationist bosses in domestic energy and a segment of the tech and finance industries.  Come January, this wing will control the White House, both houses of Congress, and the U.S. Supreme Court.  While only time will tell how this tension will play out, it’s safe to say the main wing will not go down without a fight. However the liberal bosses respond,  the role of Progressive Labor Party will be crucial in defeating all the faces of capitalism and winning the world the working class deserves:  communism.

Trump’s win and the U.S. working class

Finance capital’s whirlwind effort to “get out the vote” and defeat Trump was unprecedented. The ruling class spent a billion dollars on campaign staff, concerts, celebrities, and a non stop barrage of commercials. They enlisted ex-generals, traditionally neutral, to speak out against Trump. They rolled out Oprah and Beyonce—all for nought. With votes still being counted, Trump has already surpassed his 2020 popular vote against Joe Biden. He ran stronger in all 50 states and across most demographics—most dramatically among Latin voters, but also Black men, young people, rural and suburban voters. He won half of those who consider themselves “pro-choice” (usnews.com, 11/12). With his war against the “elites” bankrolled by Elon Musk, the richest person in the world, Trump won by putting racism and sexism front and center. His gutter appeals had even more resonance this time around because workers in the U.S. are despairing and infuriated with how the profit system—under mostly Democratic control for the last 16 years--has failed them at every turn. We must not lose sight that millions of workers who voted for Trump did so out of their hatred for the horrors of capitalism, even if they don’t yet have the class consciousness to act on it.  

While the “Trump wave” might seem overwhelming in the election’s immediate aftermath, this wasn’t a landslide. His popular vote margin projects to about 1 percent, the tightest presidential election since 2000. While Trump gained about three million votes over his last run, the bigger reason he won is that Harris lost nearly six million voters who backed Biden (usnews.com, 11/12). Overall turnout was down. In significantly Black counties containing Chicago, Philadelphia, and Detroit, close to two million people who voted in 2020 stayed home (NYT, 11/11). All told, more than one of three registered voters—more than 70 million people—saw no point in turning out. Many of these workers can and must be won to our Party to become the future gravediggers of capitalism.

Call to Action

Our Party must see this election as an urgent call to action, as a clear and present danger but also a tremendous opportunity. As the Democratic Party tries to discipline its ranks and regain its base on the slippery slope to fascism and world war, we must continue to expose the liberal bosses as the greatest danger to our class.  We can do that only if we immerse ourselves in reform struggles and help to build a mass movement.

Whether the fight is for reproductive rights or against anti-immigrant racist terror, we can share our vision for a communist future only when we stand with workers on the front lines of the fight. The workers of the world have lived in a dark night since the Soviet Union and China slid back to capitalism. But  the dark night shall have its end—if we commit to building a mass communist alternative. Fight for communism! Join PLP

NEW YORK CITY, November 9 - Today thousands of working class immigrants, women, men and children, largely Latin, marched boldly against racist attacks and mass deportations. In the wake of U.S. workers-won to extreme racism-choosing the small fascist Donald Trump (see glossary on page 6) for another presidential term, the fight for communism will need these antiracist warriors to lead the way!

Defending our class from fascist attacks

A well organized march led by Make the Road and various immigrant groups, in coalition with sizable groups like Jewish Voice for Peace, chanted, “We’re here to stay! Listen up, we’re fighting back! From north to south, east to west, we’re in this fight, whatever the cost!” Another chant said “No nations, no borders, no deportations!” A comrade said to a young Asian woman with a lively marching son, “We’re here for him.” “That’s why I’m here,” said his mom. Another comrade said, “The march gave workers the opportunity to learn how to move forward and a sense of the power of belonging to groups of workers able to fight back.” The workers aim to confront the fascist attack on immigrants and Trump’s plan to deport millions, build concentration camps while  scapegoating immigrants. Much work needs to be done to protect immigrants, unite the working class and “Stand up, fight back,” as the chant goes. Members of Progressive Labor Party (PLP) distributed hundreds of CHALLENGE newspapers to friendly marchers and observers.  Comrades have been very active in Make the Road for decades and have been building with antiracist workers, many of them migrants, with the goal of winning them to see the limits of fighting for reforms and bringing them closer to the fight for communism. 

As comrades in PLP immerse ourselves in these organizations we have opportunities to lead, fight for our communist ideas and build PLP. The anti-fascist movement must include all migrant workers, particularly Black migrants. For example, the fight against racist attacks on Haitian migrant workers must be a big part of the struggle. It was mentioned at the march, but not emphasized. Also the genocide, slaughter and displacement of Palestinian workers in Gaza and the West Bank must be at the core of our organizing since organizers made no mention of this connection. Comrades in working class organizations like unions and student groups as well as soldiers are key to the fight. Our class needs internationalism, not nationalism. 

What is to be done?

PL’ers must lead, build mass bases and rely on the working class on the road to communist revolution. In the 1930s and 1940s communists defeated the fascists in spite of their terrible line of uniting with “lesser evil” imperialists, one error that led to the collapse of the international communist movement. PLP has a long struggle to rebuild an international, communist movement that fights to understand and correct errors and advances of the past movement. We have to persevere. Remembering the gut wrenching separation of children from their families from the U.S. to Gaza and Africa, it’s our fight now in the U.S. to never see children left alone when their families have been sent to concentration camps and jails awaiting deportation. It is an outrage to see the capitalists and imperialists purposefully kill the children of the working class around the globe. We in PLP with a growing base must make communism take root and grow. There is no other solution!

New York, NY, November 9 — “This is the first organization I’ve been involved in that not only fights for revolution, but also directly organizes the working class to fight for it.” This was one of the concluding observations of a Progressive Labor Party (PLP) student comrade from California, after more than 40 students, faculty and workers gathered in Manhattan for PLP’s 2024 Student Conference. Student and youth PL’ers stepped up and gave leadership organizing every aspect of this conference where multiracial working class unity was on full display. 

Billions of workers today live in a dark night of sharpening fascist attacks, especially against migrant workers, Black workers, Muslim workers and women, and widening imperialist wars leading to all-out World War 3. However, with an attendance of mostly young, Black and immigrant workers and students and future communist international working class leaders, the future of class war for communist revolution is bright, and the theme of the conference is the reason: building the student-worker alliance.

History is a science: learning from the past

With an agenda discussed, planned and set by a new generation of PLP college student leaders, the political tone of the conference – “No war but class war: Students and workers unite!” — was set with a concise, punchy keynote speech from a graduate student based outside the U.S. This worker’s internationalist speech underlined how liberal misleaders have now appropriated the term “fascism,” and that Trump’s election does not change PLP’s task of defeating every variety of fascism with communist revolution, in every part of the world. Despite Trump’s openly fascist rhetoric, liberal misleaders continue proving to be the main danger in diverting the fightback of the international working class into the arms of a different set of capitalists. 

Defeating fascism means the PLP must organize and fight back on the campus and within basic industries for the mass leadership of the working class. To illustrate this point, next, a transit worker in New York City’s MTA gave a work report. Inspired by the progress of our transit comrades in building a base over years of work and making contacts with dozens of workers, attendees greeted the news that upcoming meetings and plans are in motion with applause. 

Participants then met in breakout groups with student facilitators, and focused the main discussion on a past CHALLENGE article (7/19/24) summarizing lessons from PLP’s fightback since the Vietnam War. The article’s three main points were the necessities of: a) multiracial working class unity, b) building a base, and c) building the Party, PLP, because eradicating capitalism requires discipline, organization, and commitment. Each group saw vibrant and sharp discussions. During the report-back to the larger group concluding the morning session, several students gave examples on how learning from past struggles put their current struggles into context, and shared experiences, lessons, and questions.

‘Class’ struggle: Build the student-worker alliance, build PLP

Our afternoon reading and discussions connected the morning discussion to the rising fascism on college campuses, using a CHALLENGE article about mask bans led by liberal Democrat-led states (10/4/24) and a research article by Indigo Olivier connecting campuses to the U.S. imperialist war machine. Many prestigious colleges invite weapons manufacturers like Lockheed Martin to fund and collaborate with their science and math programs. This, in turn, allows them to recruit promising working class students by enticing them with Lockheed-funded research projects. Community college students, meanwhile, face aggressive, wall-to-wall military recruitment to cover the U.S. Army’s worst recruiting crisis since the end of forced conscription – the “draft” - for the Vietnam War, in 1975.

Alongside another handout listing (just some) of the protest restrictions now placed on campuses from coast to coast, students discussed this student-to-imperialism pipeline amid the crackdowns against the pro-Palestine movement. With the rabid dog Israeli fascists serving as U.S. imperialism’s most vital proxy to maintaining U.S. imperialist supremacy over the global oil trade, it’s no wonder the U.S. ruling class is united in smashing solidarity with Palestine. 

At the same time, this also reveals the inherent limits of the “Boycott, Divest, and Sanction” reform demands from groups like Students for Justice in Palestine. Several Black student leaders also commented on the reality of “transactional solidarity” between the identity politics-driven leadership of these various mostly segregated campus groups, as opposed to a real, working class-driven solidarity. 

Discussions then focused on building a mass student-worker alliance on every campus and industry, and how through fightback and leading by example we can sharpen the anti-imperialist aspects of this struggle with the struggle against sharpening anti-Black fascist police terror. CHALLENGE is our most powerful organizing tool, weapon in the struggle, and spotlight exposing capitalist-led liberal misleadership. Only a mass PLP can lead the working class from the swamp of identity politics, liberalism, nationalism, and religion!

Students, workers, and soldiers UNITE

Year after year, generations of students around the world have shown tremendous courage fighting back in solidarity with their class sisters and brothers from Palestine, Sudan, and the DRC to immigrant workers to Black workers attacked by racist police terror. Today, masses of students yearn for “escalation,” to sharpen the struggle against racism, sexism and imperialist genocide, and can sense the current crop of reformists, revisionists, and nationalist misleaders don’t have a plan. 

PLP fights to unite the student movement while rebuilding the international communist-led working class movement in basic industries, transit, and communications and shut the imperialist system down - and escalate with armed revolution for communism. A key task for communists includes organizing and recruiting in the bosses’ military to “turn the guns around,” and this discussion led to sharp questions we will continue on our campuses and in our areas of work. We ended the conference with new members joining and commitments from each area to write regularly for CHALLENGE. We have a world to win! And to all students, workers and soldiers: JOIN US!