good all days since stalin ?

[usa-aces]

who has been the greatest leader since stalin

[titoman]

JOSIP BROZ TITO WAS THE GREATEST LEADER IN THE WHOLE GLOBE ERA! STALIN WAS NOT A SHADOW OF HIM!!!

[Marxman]

I think that Stalin was less a leader than Tito. Tito loved the people and the people loved him. He was respected everywhere, I don't think that anyone in our Slav history was appreciated more than Tito. There were millions of people from all over the globe at his funeral. Anyone who doesn't know Tito and you like Communism and Socialism, you better know something about him and don't listen to Americans or some right wing capitalists. For them, every commie is as good as dead. And now, I think it's the other way around. Isn't it ironic?

[mastodon]

I resent your comments concerning Americans. Opinions like the one you just posted are just as destuctive and vindictive 'right-wingers.'

[vorosilov]

Well, Tito was a great one for sure. But can not compared to Stalin. Stalin had real power. Tito's power was phony. First, Stalin made him the head of the jugoslav communist party. Then he used American money to sell his ideas and leadership to his people.
In the late fourties Stalin was ready to swallow this dictator. This was the time, when he run to the Americans.
And Stalin did not want to go to war against America, because of Tito. He was not so important to him.

[titoman]

Titos Yugoslavia was the only European country that was not in NATO or Varshaw pakt (if we don´t consider neutral countries)!

Stalin even tried to poison TITO when he refused to join Varshaw pakt, and America threatened him when he refused to join NATO pakt! They were all *******s!!




READ THIS PLEASE!!!




The New World Disorder

World Relations at the dawn of the 21st Century



"Just as the 19th century came to a close with the outbreak of the first
world war in 1914, the war that has started in Kosovo, Europe's first since
1945, marks our true entrance into the 21st century. That we should be
entering a new era in the same tragic way we did the previous one, and more
or less in the same place, is highly symbolic... The events taking place
there reflect the changing clout of the various international actors..."

"The United States is clearly the sole 'hyper power', an imbalance that
could prove damaging."

Dominique Moisi, deputy director of the Paris-based Institut Francais des
Relations Internationales writing in the Financial Times (29/3/99)

Exactly one hundred years ago Kropotkin wrote that war is the normal
condition of Europe. Yet for a long period--half a century--this dismal
prediction appeared to be contradicted by reality. In the period after the
Second World War, world capitalism experienced a strong period of growth.
This was the objective basis for the relative stability of relations
between the classes, and also between the national states in the post-war
period. It was this long period of economic upswing--together with the
division of the world between US imperialism and the USSR--which gave rise
to this relative stability in world relations. But now everything has
changed.

The reason why they could get this so-called peace was because of the
balance of terror between mighty Stalinist Russia on the one hand and
mighty American imperialism on the other. The struggle between two mutually
contradictory social systems with the so-called 'cold war'.

The changing face of war

For a period of 50 years after the Second World War, there was relative
stability in world relations, based on the balance of terror between
Stalinist Russia on the one hand and American Imperialism on the other.
They divided the whole world up into what seemed to be immutable blocs and
spheres of influence. At that time there would have been no question
whatever of the Americans attacking Yugoslavia or bombing Iraq. It would
have led to war between the USA and the Soviet Union, and such a war was
ruled out for 50 years. It was impossible for the reasons that Engels
anticipated over a hundred years ago. At that time it was wrong--as the
great slaughter of 1914-18 subsequently showed. But it was right for the
last 50 years. The Cold War was the manifestation of a struggle between two
mutually contradictory social systems on a world scale. In this so-called
period of peace, the fundamental contradictions were not removed. On the
contrary. Tremendous contradictions were building up. This was revealed by
the monstrous arms race, which devoured a large part of the wealth of
society. The question is: why these contradictions did not lead to war
between America and Russia at that time?

Towards the end of his life, old Engels wrote of the development of
imperialism and militarism, which were then new phenomena. Up until the
French revolution there were never standing armies. The monarchical states
of the 18th century maintained small professional armies. The French
Revolution changed all that. Before the French Revolution, it was fairly
common for the generals of two contending armies to arrive at a gentleman's
agreement to avoid a costly battle by deciding which side had "won". War
was an expensive business! This kind of warfare was undermined, first by
the American revolutionary War of Independence, when the colonial
irregulars, in Engels' words, refused to dance the military minuet with the
forces of the English crown. But it was completely destroyed by the French
revolution which, for the first time, confronted reactionary-feudal Europe
with the spectacle of an armed revolutionary people.

Brilliant revolutionary generals like Lazare Carnot evolved entirely new
military tactics and methods, especially the leveé en masse, in effect a
mobilisation of the whole people, which carried all before it. Bismarck
learnt that from the French Revolution. As early as 1807 Hardenberg wrote
to the king of Prussia: "We must do from above what the French have done
from below." The Prussians based themselves on Carnot's idea of an armed
people, but did so in the reactionary spirit of militarism. Nevertheless,
the Prussian military machine was perfected and won a series of spectacular
victories. This enabled the conservative Junker Bismarck to carry out the
historically progressive task of German unification, but in a reactionary
way--under the domination of feudal-bureaucratic Prussia.

By the 1890s the Prussian state, always bureaucratic and militaristic in
spirit, had evolved into a vast monster, spending unprecedented sums on
armaments. The French and others naturally followed the trend. The whole of
Europe was becoming transformed into a huge armed camp. When Engels saw the
vast accumulation of military might of Germany and other powers and new
weapons of destruction he concluded that this could lead to the collapse of
the state. He also thought that it might mean that a European war might now
be impossible. Later history proved that Engels was mistaken. The
antagonisms between Germany, France, Britain, Russia and Austro-Hungary led
to the First World War, the fuse for which was lit in the Balkans. That war
led to at least ten million dead and reduced Europe to rubble. The Second
World War led to 55 million dead, and came very close to destroying
civilisation. Although Engels was wrong at the time he predicted that war
had become too expensive, his arguments are correct today. What Engels
wrote at that time about military expenditure and militarism is nothing
compared to the present situation. In the last period world arms
expenditure has amounted to over a trillion dollars. Since 1945, there have
been no more world wars.

This was a period of "peace", at any rate as far as the great powers were
concerned. As a matter of fact, for most of the world peace remained an
unattainable dream even in this period. For the last 50 years on a world
scale there were just 17 days of peace. There was always a war going on in
some part of the world--mainly the colonial world. There were the long wars
of liberation in Kenya, Algeria, Angola, Mozambique and others. There were
important wars involving the great powers using proxies, like the Korean
War and the Vietnam War. Later on we had the wars in Nicaragua and
Afghanistan, the Gulf War and finally the war in Kosovo. This was the first
war in Europe for 50 years. It represents a decisive turning point which
will have all manner of repercussions far beyond the immediate issues on
the Balkans.

The question of war is a very concrete question. Why has there not been a
war between the great powers in the last 50 years? Why, despite all the
crying contradictions, was there no war between America and Russia? The
answer is quite clear. With the development of nuclear weapons, there has
been a change in the nature of war. The bourgeoisie does not wage war for
fun, or patriotism, or to save the poor Kosovars, or to save little
Belgium, or anything of that character. They wage war for profits, for
markets, for raw materials and for spheres of influence. They do not wage
wars to exterminate people. That is not the point of imperialist wars. That
wasn't even the purpose of the Mongols under Gengis Khan although they did
exterminate a lot of people. But although he used mass terror as a weapon
of war, Gengis Khan's aim was not to exterminate the whole population, but
to conquer and enslave them and to extract loot from them in the form of
tribute.

The purpose of capitalist wars is to capture markets, not to exterminate
whole populations. But a nuclear war would have signified the complete
destruction of both Russia and America--at the very least. This makes
absolutely no sense from a capitalist standpoint. Although there were some
crazy American generals who did arithmetic calculations to try to prove
that, even if a nuclear war killed a few tens of million people in the USA,
that would be all right, because America would have won--such a view was
not taken seriously by the US Establishment, but merely confirmed them in
the truth of President Truman's assessment of the mental abilities of
American generals when he said that war is too serious a business to be
left to the generals.

The amounts currently spent on arms especially by the main imperialist
powers make the arms spending of Bismarck and even Hitler look like child's
play. After the fall of the Berlin Wall there was a lot of talk in the West
of a "Peace Dividend". The perspective was put forward of a new world order
in which the whole world would enter a long period of peace and prosperity
under the aegis of the USA, the sole world super-power. But things worked
out differently. The ink was not dry on George Bush's speech when the Gulf
War broke out. Now, over the issue of Kosovo, we have just experienced the
first war on European soil since 1945. Far from giving a lead in disarming,
the USA continues to arm to the teeth. In the United States every year for
every American citizen $804 is spent on arms. France is next in line, with
an annual expenditure of $642 per head on arms.

Britain, which despite its total loss of economic and industrial power,
likes to pretend that it is still mighty, spends $484--an absurd figure for
a country which, having lost its industrial superiority, was long ago
reduced to a second-rate world power. In the Kosovo war, Tony Blair
pretended to act as the representative of a big power. But his attempted
imitation of Winston Churchill fooled nobody. Given the doubts and
hesitations of his other European allies, it suited Clinton to humour his
over-zealous "friend" in London and, at least for a time, to play along
with his delusions of grandeur. Other people in America were not amused.
They grumbled that the British, with their shrill demands for a "war to the
finish" were prepared to fight to the last drop of American blood. Because,
in the event of a ground war, it would have been the Americans, not the
British or French, who would have had to do most of the fighting--and take
most of the casualties.

The question must be asked: what is the purpose of this insane arms race?
During the Cold War it was explained in terms of the alleged danger from
the USSR. But this excuse no longer applies. The "official" reason is the
need to uphold world peace and democracy. This will fool no thinking
person. The actions of the imperialists are determined solely by what the
Germans called Realpolitik--that is, the most cynical and calculating
self-interest. Of course, for the sake of public opinion, diplomacy must
always present this in the most favourable light ("humanitarian missions",
"peacekeeping forces", "ethical foreign policy" and so on). There is
nothing new in this. Cynicism and self-interest have always been the
guiding principles of bourgeois diplomacy. When it suited their interests
to appease Hitler, in the hope that he would turn his attentions to the
East and attack the Soviet Union, the "democratic" British ruling class did
not hesitate to hand over Czechoslovakia to the tender mercies of the
Nazis, just as a man would throw a bone to a hungry dog. Speaking about
Czechoslovakia in 1938 the British Conservative prime minister Neville
Chamberlain referred to it as: "a far-off country, about which we know
little."

The war between Iran and Iraq caused the deaths of one million people. Yet
this passed virtually unnoticed because it did not affect the West's vital
interests. In fact, it suited the West to have Iraqis and Iranians
slaughter one another, since this would exhaust both of them. In fact,
Saddam Hussein was given every encouragement and supplied with arms and
equipment by Britain and America--until he trod on their toes with the
invasion of Kuwait. The same cynical indifference characterised the
attitude of the West to the horrific genocide in Rwanda. This merely serves
to underline the hypocrisy of the so-called humanitarian interventions of
imperialism in Bosnia, Kosovo and East Timor. It is necessary in each case
to cut through the fog of diplomacy and lay bare the class interests that
lie behind the diplomatic manoeuvring and propaganda.

Behind all the talk of humanitarian motives and peacekeeping missions there
lies the most sordid self interest. The USA's war against Iraq was no more
motivated for concern about poor little Kuwait than the First World War
motivated by the fate of poor little Belgium. The main worry was the threat
to America's oil supplies posed by the huge increase in the power of Iraq
in this strategically important region. The savage bombing of Iraq was
intended as a warning to the peoples of the Middle East and the Gulf. "You
step out of line, and see what you will get!" Almost a decade later the
bombing of Iraq continues, although it is clear to everyone that Iraq has
been beaten into the ground and cannot pose a serious military threat to
the USA. The bombing and military harassment is backed up by the no less
monstrous economic blockade, which includes, among other things, a ban on
the trade in pencils--clearly very dangerous weapons in the hands of Iraqi
schoolchildren!

The colonial revolution

The emergence of US imperialism as the sole major world power is an
unprecedented world situation. The USA is now the most
counter-revolutionary force ever seen in history. It is prepared to use any
means to undermine governments not to its liking. In Africa, Asia and Latin
America it has been prepared to give aid to gangsters and thieves to fight
those forces it perceives as being against its strategic interests.

For the whole of the last 50 years cheap raw materials have paid a vital
role in the development of Western capitalism. This is not a secondary
consideration. The control of the outlets of oil and other raw materials is
a major factor in the global policies of America and all the other
imperialist powers. Therefore they have been prepared to use the most
brutal methods against the colonial peoples. One of the most impressive
facts of this long period of so-called peace has been the Colonial
Revolution. This was the biggest movement of the peoples since the fall of
the Roman Empire: a magnificent movement of the oppressed people in China,
India, Indochina and Africa, involving hundreds of millions of slaves, and
pack animals. As a movement of oppressed people fighting for their national
and social emancipation, history knows no comparable movement. If we look
for a parallel, there are only two things which suggest themselves: the
movement of the early Christians, which began as a revolutionary movement
and the awakening of the Arab nation in the early days of Islam. But the
colonial revolution was a far bigger movement than either of them.

In this titanic struggle imperialism was defeated. This colossally
progressive development had been predicted by Trotsky before the Second
World War. He said that there would come a point in which it would not be
worth while to try to hold down the colonial masses by direct means. This
became a colossal drain on resources and manpower. The British imperialists
were the first ones to understand this. They saw that it was impossible to
hold down the colonial masses in Africa and in India by military means. The
handing over of India was not the result of a humanitarian gesture. The
British were forced out of India by the movement of the masses. It is not
generally known that British imperialism conquered India and held onto it
with Indian troops. That is the only reason that they could maintain
control. There was not a national consciousness. India was split up into
small states. Paradoxically it was British imperialism that created a
national consciousness in India. In 1947, General Auchinleck was asked by
the British government how long he could hold India. He answered: three
days. The British were faced with mutinies in the army, riots, strikes and
demonstrations. Once the Indian people became conscious of themselves as a
nation and stood up against their oppressors, that was the end of the
story.

In one country after another the imperialists were forced to abandon direct
military bureaucratic control of the colonies. De Gaulle in France had
learned that lesson by 1958. Having come to power on the slogan of Algerie
Française! (Algeria is French!) he took one look at what it was costing
them to wage war against the Algerian people, and decided to get out. This
caused a revolutionary crisis which could have been a revolution, if the
French Communist Party had had a revolutionary policy. This shows precisely
the way in which the colonial revolution can have profound effects in the
metropolitan countries. The same thing was shown in Portugal in 1974-5,
when the attempt to hang onto Angola, Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau led to
revolution in Portugal itself. In 1960 Belgium was forced out of the Congo.
But before they left the Congo they deliberately caused the chaos which
exists at the present time.

Although the colonial revolution was a big step forward, on a capitalist
basis it could not provide a solution to any of the fundamental problems of
these countries. After half a century of so-called independence, the
bourgeoisie has solved none of the problems of either India or Pakistan.
The agrarian problem has not been solved, nor the task of modernising
society. In India (and also to some extent Pakistan) the caste system, that
relic of barbarism, remains in place. Neither India nor Pakistan have
solved the national question, which has festered and acquired explosive
consequences, especially in Kashmir. And neither country, despite the
trappings of formal independence, are really free. In fact, they are more
dominated by imperialism than they were half a century ago.

Recent developments in the Indian Subcontinent reveal the existence of
unbearable contradictions. These two nuclear powers came within an inch of
a war. In an attempt to divert attention away from the mess inside
Pakistan, Nawaz Sharif made a desperate gambler's throw in Kashmir. Perhaps
he wanted to take advantage of the governmental crisis in India, but in the
event the Pakistanis not only failed but the failure set in motion the
events that led to a coup d'état. They tried to occupy territory in the
mountains of Kashmir. In order to retake it, the Indian army suffered
hundreds of deaths. Given the difficulties of a frontal assault on these
heights, the Indian army was actively considering launching a flanking
manoeuvre, which would have entailed violating the frontier with Pakistan.
Such a step would inevitably have led to all-out war between the two
countries with incalculable consequences. Only the pressure of Washington
on Nawaz Sharif prevented it. But in trying to excuse himself before
Pakistan public opinion, he committed the unpardonable sin of trying to
blame the army for the defeat. This sealed his fate, leading directly to a
new military coup in Pakistan. This itself is a reflection of the total
impasse of capitalism in that country. Needless to say, the Kashmir
question is not resolved and carries within itself the seeds of new wars.

Everywhere the ex-colonial countries are racked by wars and instability.
This is an expression of the impossibility of resolving their problems
under capitalism, which, as Lenin once said, is "horror without end". In
Africa at this moment in time there are at least four or five terrible
wars, characterised by ethnic slaughter, barbarism and even outbreaks of
cannibalism. Some of these wars are taking place in countries which should
be rich, such as Angola and the Congo. With characteristic hypocrisy, the
imperialists shake their heads and publish articles of a racist character
presenting the Africans as sub-humans savages. The wars in Africa are
presented as tribal wars, when in practice many of these wars are proxy
wars caused by the interference of capitalist powers who are struggling for
markets and raw materials in Africa. Countries, like the Congo or Angola
possess enormous mineral wealth which is of great interest to the
imperialists. The case of the Congo is particularly striking. A potentially
rich country has been reduced to rubble. Vast swathes of it are under the
control of rebels and foreign troops. Zimbabwe, Angola and Namibia are
propping up the government of Kabila, whose writ does not cover more than
half the country. Uganda and Rwanda control the rebels and Burundi is also
present. All are eager to get their hands on the Congo's diamond mines and
other mineral wealth. Despite all the attempts at cease-fire, the conflict
in the Congo remains unsolved. This is a reactionary war on both sides.
America and France are conducting a struggle in Africa using proxy armies.
They are very largely responsible for all this mess.

Never in human history has the world seen such a colossus of economic and
military power as US imperialism. Never has the planet been so totally
dominated by a single country. In its relations with other countries the
USA displays the most amazing arrogance. It is prepared to use any means to
undermine governments not to its liking. In Africa, Asia and Latin America
it has been prepared to give aid to gangsters and thieves to fight those
forces it perceives as being against its strategic interests. In the case
of Yugoslavia, Washington's line from the beginning was "Do as we say or we
will bomb you." Yet, upon closer examination, we see that this colossus has
feet of clay. Its power is limited even in the field where it appears to be
most invincible. Trotsky also made another prediction. He said that America
would emerge victorious from the Second World War and would dominate the
world. But he added that it would have dynamite built into its foundations.
That is precisely the present situation. 100 years ago British imperialism
made a very handsome living out of the colonies. They bled the colonies.
British imperialism made a handsome profit out of dominating the world. Now
America has inherited the role of Britain as the world policeman but in an
entirely different historical context. In the period of the decline of
capitalism, instead of benefiting from that it will be an enormous drain an
enormous cost to the Americans and ultimately will have profound social
effects within the United States itself. The recent demonstration outside
the WTO Conference in Seattle is a graphic illustration of this fact.

The Vietnam war was the turning-point. This was the first war in American
history where America had lost. And that fact had a fundamental effect in
shaping the whole consciousness of the American ruling class. It was a
trauma. Let us not forget the fact that American imperialism was not
defeated in Vietnam. It was defeated in America. There was a mass upsurge,
a mass movement against the war which had revolutionary connotations. The
American Army in Vietnam was so demoralised that one American general said
that the mood of the US troops could only be compared to the situation in
Petrograd in 1917. The mightiest imperialist power that has ever existed in
history was defeated by a barefoot army of guerrillas in the jungles of
Vietnam. That had a fundamental affect in American military thinking as we
explained at the time.

After the Vietnam war we pointed out that American imperialism could not
intervene with ground troops in any country in the world--with one
important exception: Saudi Arabia. Because of its extreme importance to the
American economy, the USA would be compelled to intervene, probably seizing
the coastal areas where the oil is and leaving the desert to the Saudis.
Even now this observation remains true. Saudi Arabia is extremely unstable.
The public debt now stands at 10 percent of GDP. The ruling clique based on
the royal family can no longer afford the kind of lavish concessions to the
population as in the past. The splits at the top, reflected in feuding
within the royal family, are the reflection of the growing tensions in
Saudi society. The spectre of revolution is hovering over the Arabian
Peninsula. And not only in Saudi Arabia. As a result of the violent
fluctuations in the price of oil, there is not one single stable bourgeois
regime in the whole of the Middle East.

The history of revolutions shows that they do not begin at the bottom but
at the top, with splits in the ruling class. The famous French sociologist
and historian Alexis de Tocqueville dealt with the process in some detail
and shows what happens when the old regime enters into crisis. One section
of the ruling class says, if we do not reform there will be a revolution
and another section says if we do reform there will be a revolution--and
both are correct. These words precisely express the situation faced by the
monarchical Arab regimes at the present time. These regimes appear at first
sight to be very prosperous, very rich and apparently stable. Saudi Arabia,
Bahrain and Kuwait are all run by Royal families. The same is true of
Jordan and Morocco, although the latter do not enjoy the blessings of oil
wealth. Yet every single one of these royal families are split. That is an
indication of developments of revolutionary tensions in those societies.

Everywhere the spectre of revolution is beginning to reappear. In Iran,
after twenty years of barbarous reaction under the mullahs, the masses are
stirring. As always, the movement begins with the students and
intelligentsia, that most sensitive barometer of the hidden tensions within
society. The mass demonstrations last Summer served notice on the regime
that the patience of the masses was exhausted. The explosion of the
students is the beginning of a new Iranian Revolution. The movement has
since died down in the face of ferocious repression. But it will inevitably
re-surface with redoubled vigour. The strategists of Capital, with a slight
delay, have come to the same conclusion as the Marxists. A recent issue of
Business News writes: "Many observers view last July's rioting, which
pitted university students against the police and vigilante thugs from the
extreme religious right, as a warning of things to come if the
Establishment doesn't bend. 'Khatami is the last chance for peaceful
reform. If he is defeated, then the system will be threatened with
overthrow,' says Ali Rezar- Alavi Tabar, an editor of the Sobh-e-Emrooz
newspaper in Teheran and a key Khatami supporter."

The revolutionary events in Iran are an anticipation of the process that
will unfold throughout the Gulf and the Middle East in the next period.
This is a momentous development and it is of a fundamental importance not
just for Iran, but for the World Revolution. The events in Iran must have
had the American imperialists trembling in their shoes. Iran is not just
any country, it is a strategic country. But here we see precisely the
limits of the power of US imperialism. Iran was also a strategic country in
1979. Yet there could be no question of an intervention of America to save
their ally the Shah. They watched in impotent rage while the old regime was
overthrown and their embassy in Teheran ransacked. If they could not
intervene in 1979, how much less could they do so now against a revolution
of the Iranian masses which will inevitably have a completely different
character: anti-mullah, anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist.

Such a development would have revolutionary implications throughout the
Middle East. US imperialism would be forced onto the defensive everywhere.
If, as is highly likely, they decided to intervene in Saudi Arabia to
protect their oil interests, that would provoke uprisings in every country
in the Middle East. Not a single American embassy would be left standing.
And the repercussions would be felt throughout Asia, Africa and Latin
America. That is why the American, British and French imperialists are
arming to the teeth in preparation for the storm that impends. However, the
limits of the power of imperialism is shown by the extreme reluctance of
the Pentagon since Vietnam to agree to the deployment of troops on the
ground in any country. On the few occasions where this has occurred over
the past 20 years, with the partial exception of Iraq, it has been against
small and weak countries. In most cases it has ended either not very well,
or extremely badly. America was forced to stage humiliating withdrawals in
the cases of the Lebanon and Somalia. As Stratfor points out:

"The intervention in Iraq was the first of a series of interventions that
included Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia, and now Kosovo. Not all of these ended
well. Somalia was, by any measure, a failure. The Haitian invasion
displaced the former government but no one would argue that Haiti has been
lifted out of its misery. Bosnia was intended to be a short-term
intervention but has become a permanent presence. But none of these
interventions have forced the United States to face the core question: what
are the limits of American power?"(STRATFOR's Global Intelligence Update:
The World After Kosovo May 3, 1999)

This explains the extreme reluctance of the Pentagon to send ground troops
into Kosovo, preferring to rely upon air power alone. The Americans were
under no illusions that they would have suffered very heavy casualties in a
war on the ground in Kosovo. This would have had profound effects in all
the NATO countries, but especially in America itself. The demonstrations in
Seattle would have paled into insignificance compared to the explosions
that would have ensued. Fortunately for Clinton, a deal was stitched up
with the help of Russia which relieved them of this necessity. If it had
come to a ground war in Kosovo, the outcome of the war would have been very
different. Thus, despite all the noise, the Kosovo war has really not
changed the position faced by the Pentagon. True, the US airforce will be
lobbying furiously for extra funds to perfect their arsenal of weapons of
destruction. But ultimately, US imperialism will be faced with the need to
employ ground troops in one country or another, and face the consequences.

The role of Germany

One of the most significant development in recent times is the tendency of
the world to splinter into regional blocs. After World War Two, the USA
dominated Western Europe totally. Europe was cut in two, with the East
dominated by Russia. Now all that has changed. Even before the fall of
Stalinism, the world was already beginning to split up into rival trading
blocs. NAFTA is a bloc dominated by US imperialism and including Canada to
the North and Mexico to the South. In practice, the USA regards the entire
Continent of America as its private concern. Japan is striving to create
its own economic sphere of influence in Asia. And the European capitalists
have formed the European Union.

The launching of the Euro has been widely interpreted to mean that the
movement in the direction of a European super-state or at any rate a
Federation, has acquired an irresistible impetus. This is a complete
misunderstanding of what is taking place. It is true that the process of
integration of the EU has gone further than the Marxists had anticipated.
But this process still has its limits, and in any case has far from
abolished the contradictions between the different national states that
make up the EU. The central point is that there is only one state
economically strong enough to lead Europe, and that is Germany. This fact,
which should have been obvious from the start, has become glaringly evident
ever since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. This was a turning-point in
the history of Europe and the world.

The Irish writer and politician Conor Cruise O' Brien has argued that
French and German enthusiasm for European integration has always been a
hypocritical cover for national ambitions on both sides:

"The language of federalism, on the lips of political traders," he writes,
"has become a coded way of appealing to rival bodies of nationalists in the
two countries. French nationalists, listening to their president
recommending federalism, are expected to think: 'We will outsmart them
because we are so much cleverer, and we will run Europe as well as our own
country.' The German nationalists, listening to virtually identical
language from their own chancellor, are expected to think: 'We must
necessarily dominate a federal Europe because of our size, our number, our
strength of character and our national habits of thrift and hard work."

In historical retrospect, it is likely that the introduction of the Euro
will be seen as the high water mark of European integration on a capitalist
basis. At every level, conflicts of interest abound. Germany's strength
lies in industry, while France still has a considerable agricultural
interest, which it is determined to defend, also for social and political
reasons. Germany looks to the East, to its former colonies in the Czech
Republic, Poland and the Balkans. France looks to the South, to its former
colonies in North Africa and its Mediterranean neighbours, Spain and Italy,
which it sees as potential allies. Britain is a somewhat special case.
After decades of industrial decline, Britain has lost most of its power and
influence in the world, but not its dreams, illusions and delusions of
grandeur. In reality, it has become a parasitic rentier economy, as France
was before the War, and a semi-satellite of US imperialism. The lesser
European powers, as always, gravitate around the big three, now to one now
to another, according to the interests of the moment. All are guided by
their own narrow national self-interest. Greece has its own policy in
relation to Serbia and Turkey, for example. But the decisive power remains
Germany.

The original intention behind the European Union was to bind Germany to
France as a means of preventing a new war between the two countries. But
the aim of France was always to be the dominant partner. At the beginning
this appeared to be the case. Germany was still struggling to emerge from
the catastrophic defeat of 1945. But as time passed, Germany's powerful
industrial base enabled her to leave France far behind. Paris comforted
itself with the thought that, while Germany was the economic power-house of
Europe, France would remain politically and militarily supreme. but now all
these calculations have turned to ashes. With unification, Germany is
rapidly re-emerging as a super-power in its own right. It was always
utopian to think that her economic might would not find a political and
military expression, and that the German ruling class would be content
forever to play second fiddle to the French on the world stage.

With unification we see a revival of all the old dreams of German
greatness. Germany currently spends somewhat less than Britain and France
on arms, $355 per head, but Germany has got a very powerful army, a mighty
industrial base, and a big population of 80 million in the heart of Europe.
It has already achieved by economic means what it failed to do in two world
wars--to unite Europe under German domination. But Germany's huge economic
power is not at all reflected in its political and military clout. This was
starkly revealed during the Kosovo crisis when for the first time since
1945 German troops participated in a military action on the soil of another
European country. The scale of this participation was modest. But its
symbolic meaning was tremendous.

There are clear signs that Germany is becoming impatient with the
artificial restrictions placed on its European role by the suspicious
attitudes of its neighbours. In August 1999, Chancellor Schröder declared
that "Germany has every interest in considering itself a great power in
Europe." And he added: "Germany is no better and no worse than any other
country." In effect, the German chancellor was saying: "I don't know what
people have got against Germany. It is a country like any other country."
To which The Economist replied: "Yes Mr. Schröder, Germany is no better and
no worse than any other country. Just very big and in the centre of
Europe." These lines express with admirable clarity the real attitude of
Britain and France towards Germany. But nothing can prevent Germany from
translating its economic and industrial muscle into military and political
power.

Bismarck described "hegemony" as follows: "an unequal relationship
established between a great power and one or more small powers which is
nevertheless based on the juridical or formal equality of all the states
concerned. It is not based on 'ruler' and 'ruled' but on 'leadership' and
'followers'." That is not a bad description of the state of affairs to
which Germany now aspires in Europe. It will inevitably lead to collisions
with France and Britain, who do not see themselves in the role of
"followers" of Germany. German foreign policy remains much the same as it
was over 100 years ago. Its history, geographical position and economic
interests makes it turn to the East, where it hopes to bring its client
states into the EU. This brings it into conflict with France, since the
inclusion of countries like Poland and Hungary in the EU would
automatically spell the death of the Common Agricultural Policy, which
benefits French farmers. On the other hand, Britain, while not opposed in
principle to the entry of countries which may provide new markets for its
goods, is violently opposed to any suggestion of a change in the EU's
voting system that would entail the abolition of the right to veto. But how
could an enlarged EU permit small and poor Eastern European states to block
its decisions? And in any case, Britain as a net contributor to the EU
budget, would not be keen about increasing the costs by subsidising these
countries for Germany's benefit.

The question of EU enlargement, therefore, provides plenty of fuel to throw
on the flames of national discord. The naming of Berlin as the capital is a
political statement pregnant with historical symbolism. The German
capitalists have lost no time in establishing themselves in Poland and
other East European countries. They are proceeding to reconstruct their old
colonies and spheres of influence, in accordance with the old German policy
of the Drang nach Osten. The same policy led to the criminal break-up of
Czechoslovakia. These actions clearly correspond to the interests of German
imperialism, which, having gained economic domination of Europe, is now
flexing its muscles as a political and military power.

The temporary alliances and conflicts can cause all kinds of shifting
agreements and blocs, which form and re-form themselves like the eddies on
a quickly-flowing river, but the main thing is that the old axis between
France and Germany is rapidly breaking down. The Economist notes that:
"France, at any rate, seems to worry now and again that Germany is leaning
Britain's way. A sense of incipient betrayal on France's part has inflamed
a series of relatively minor squabbles with Germany since Mr. Schröder came
to power." What is important is not the squabbles but the growing
realisation in Paris that they can no longer count on automatic support
from across the Rhine, and that Germany is now determined to follow its own
destiny, whether it suits France or not.

As in the period before 1914, there is a constant jockeying for position
between France, Britain and Germany. At first it was not clear whether
Germany would not unite with Britain against France. But the growing power
of Germany which threatened to alter the balance of power in Europe, pushed
Britain into the arms of her old enemy France. The question was settled by
the entente cordiale, when Britain and France formed, in effect, a bloc
against Germany. Now we face a similar situation. Someone in the British
Foreign Office once said: "Nations have no permanent friends; they only
have permanent interests". Despite the present frictions between Britain
and France over the beef issue, it is inevitable sooner or later that the
two counties will be forced to come together. Britain's permanent interests
in Europe will compel her to unite with France to counter the weight of
Germany.

Germany and the Balkans

As always, the causes of instability on the Balkans must be sought outside
the Balkans. In this case, the starting point of the crisis in the Balkans
was the collapse of the USSR and German unification. Exactly ten years ago
the new reunification of Germany represented a fundamental change which is
disturbing the balance of power inside Europe. In the same way, the rise of
Germany as a result of German unification in the second half of the
nineteenth century also changed the whole balance of forces in Europe and
prepared the way for three wars. In both cases, the Balkans were affected
in a decisive way, and in turn affected the general world situation. It is
an irony of history that the 21st century is beginning just as the 20th
century began.

For Europeans, war was supposed to be for other people in other continents.
The European working class had forgotten what war was like, just as they
had forgotten what revolution and counterrevolution were like. The
nightmares of the past, the bombing of civilians, the ethnic cleansing, the
racial madness and the concentration camps, were all supposed to be things
of the past. Now Europe has received a rude awakening. The war in Kosovo
represents a major turning point in European and world history. Prior to
this the two super powers, the USA and the USSR, balanced each other out
and this provided a relative stability to the world situation. There could
have been no question of the USA daring to attack Iraq or bomb Yugoslavia.
The disappearance of the Soviet Union as a super power has allowed the
United States to emerge as the sole world power and given it the confidence
to develop a more aggressive foreign policy.

In relation to the Balkans, all the material we have written over the last
eight years entitles us to say that only this tendency has kept its head,
and maintained a class position an internationalist position on this
question. What was the meaning of this conflict? Firstly, it represented a
decisive turning-point in the world situation. It signifies a fundamental
change in the balance of forces that has been developing over the past
decade, since the collapse of Stalinism, and of the Soviet Union. Prior to
the collapse of the Soviet Union the two super powers, the USA and the
USSR, balanced each other out and this provided a relative stability to the
world situation. The disappearance of the Soviet Union as a super power has
allowed the United States to emerge as the sole world power and given it
the confidence to develop a more aggressive foreign policy.

There is a tendency to attribute to Washington's foreign policy a
far-sightedness and intelligence to correspond with the degree of its
military might. However, when we come to consider the actions of US
imperialism, it is hard to detect a coherent long-term strategy in the
Balkans, other than the simple principle of utilising its overwhelming
advantage in firepower to bully the rest of the world and impose its will
on every government. The principal (perhaps the only) objection to the
present government of Yugoslavia was that it was not prepared to accept
Washington's dictates.

The only ones who seem to have known what they wanted in the Balkans from
the beginning, who set themselves a series of well-defined aims according
to a well-known plan of action, were the Germans. The most serious result
of this was the catastrophe in Yugoslavia. Of course, there were internal
problems. The abolition of the autonomy of Kosovo--itself an expression of
the contradictions of the old system-- played a fatal role in encouraging
chauvinist tendencies which Tito had always tried to keep under control.
But, as always, the flames were fanned from outside. By interfering in the
internal affairs of Yugoslavia, encouraging the break-away of Slovenia and
Croatia, Germany unleashed forces which neither it nor anyone else could
control. Doubtless they did not anticipate the consequences of their
actions. The resignation of the German foreign minister Genscher was
virtually an admission that they had miscalculated. Be that as it may, they
left it to others--particularly Britain and France--to pick up the bill.

Imperialist bullying

The insolence of US imperialism which seeks to impose its will on the rest
of the world was shown first by the attack on Iraq and then by the bombing
of Kosovo. NATO is just a cover for the world-wide ambitions of the USA. At
the summit held by NATO early in 1999, a new strategic concept document was
presented which widened the scope of NATO intervention. This represents a
fundamental revision of world relations which have remained basically
unchanged for over 300 years, since the treaty of Westphalia in 1648. From
that time till now, it was accepted that the basic principle of
international conduct between states was non-interference in each other's
internal affairs. The Kosovo war represented an unprecedented departure
from all the accepted norms of international conduct. For whatever one's
opinions of the problem of Kosovo, it was no concern of the USA. Yugoslavia
was still a sovereign state, far from the North Atlantic and posing no
direct threat to America.

As far as Kosovo is concerned, it is not quite clear whether America was
working to a plan worked out in advance. That is one possibility, but it
does not seem to be probable. More likely, the whole war was the result of
a miscalculation. Clinton was led to believe, by the State Department that
the Belgrade government would surrender immediately if they dropped a few
bombs. But things did not work out so simply. President Truman once
remarked that American generals were not capable of marching and chewing
gum at the same time. However, in the Kosovo affair, for once, the Pentagon
showed itself to be more intelligent than the present occupant of the White
House. According to reliable reports, there was a struggle between the
Pentagon and the State Department, as to what line of action to take. The
Pentagon was worried about this adventure in Yugoslavia, and particularly
about the possibility of a ground war. In order to reassure the generals,
Clinton specifically ruled out a ground war from the outset--a decision
much criticised by military experts both in America and elsewhere.

It seems clear that America did not want to be drawn into a war on the
Balkans. What Washington wanted was stability in the Balkans. But it wanted
a stable Balkans under its own control. The problem with Yugoslavia was
that it would not act in accordance with America's wishes. The issue of
prestige was therefore at stake. A successful military operation in Kosovo
was essential to prove the seriousness of NATO in backing up its declared
aims. Madelaine Albright--probably the most obtuse foreign secretary the
USA has ever had--did everything in her power to provoke the Yugoslavs. The
arrogance of Washington was shown by the notorious Rambouillet agreement
which was written in such a way that no sovereign government in the world
could have accepted it. It was similar to the infamous ultimatum of
Austria-Hungary to Serbia in 1914. Predictably, Belgrade refused to accept
it, and the bombing commenced. But then things began to go badly wrong for
NATO. Belgrade did not surrender and the Yugoslav Army could not be
destroyed, so NATO deliberately bombed civilian targets: factories, houses,
bridges, hospitals, schools. This was an attempt to terrify the people of
Yugoslavia, to compel them to bend the knee before American imperialism,
just as in Iraq. But after eight years of bombing and economic blockade,
Washington is no nearer to attaining its strategic objectives in Iraq than
before. And it is unlikely to be any more successful in the Balkans in the
long run.

American imperialism is a mighty military power and possesses extraordinary
and terrifying means of destruction. But US propaganda systematically
exaggerates the independent significance of America's military technology.
For example, they made great play of the so-called smart bombs. These were
so accurate, they said, that from a great height they were able to bomb
even the smallest target. The purpose of this propaganda was to convince
American public opinion that they could win a painless war, just by
bombing. However, if these claims are true, it is hard to understand why
they bombed such targets as the Chinese Embassy, or columns of Kosovar
refugees, or the territory of friendly states like Albania and Bulgaria.
Such incidents show that the claims for infallibility of the so-called
smart bombs were just so much nonsense.

It is often said that the first casualty in war is truth itself. In 1914
the British and French launched a massive propaganda campaign to demonise
the Germans accusing them of all kinds of atrocities in occupied Belgium.
Some of the stories of atrocities were true, many were false or
exaggerated. But the main thing was that propaganda was used as a military
weapon, to soften up public opinion in preparation for the slaughter of the
First World War. In the same way they attributed all kinds of dreadful
crimes to the Serbs. Undoubtedly some atrocities were perpetrated against
the Kosovo Albanians, but not on the scale they have presented. Most of
these atrocities were carried out after NATO began bombing. These were
carried out , not by the Yugoslav army but by the so-called Chetniks,
paramilitary gangs little better than Serb Fascists. Similar phenomena have
been seen in every war on the Balkans. And it is not true that these things
are the exclusive monopoly of Serbs. Croatia expelled 300,000 Serbs from
land which they had occupied for hundreds of years. They also launched a
dirty campaign of ethnic cleansing against the Bosnian Moslems in Mostar in
1993. Yet all this was totally accepted by the West, on the principle that
"the enemy of my enemy is my friend". The West accepted all this in silent
complicity, just as they are now silent about the ethnic cleansing and
killings of Serb civilians by the KLA in Kosovo. This was deliberate
imperialist propaganda to demonise the Serbs.

In any war the general staff uses the weapon of propaganda as an auxiliary
to tanks, planes and guided missiles. But the avalanche of propaganda which
accompanied this conflict from the first day to the last must surely be
without precedent. During the bombing campaign Nato leaders built up a
barrage of propaganda aimed at convincing the people back home that this
was a "just war". It was impossible for the mass of people to obtain a
balanced version of events, let alone the truth. Although there was no
enthusiasm whatsoever for the war in Britain (or America), most people
grudgingly accepted it as inevitable. However, in Italy and Greece there
was mass opposition to the war, and in Germany a similar mood was
developing, causing serious internal problems for the SPD and the Greens.
The German people, unlike the British, have had no experience of war since
1945, and have no wish to acquire such experience. To any informed observer
it was clear that all this propaganda was a pack of lies. That atrocities
were carried out is clear, although the extent of them was exaggerated for
propaganda purposes. The NATO strategists were not at all motivated by
humanitarian concerns. That was shown by their refusal to let the refugees
into their countries. They needed the killings to justify their bombing. It
was never made clear that most of the killings were the result of the NATO
bombing. And the more they could exaggerate the killings the more they
could justify the bombing.

The picture which NATO likes to project of itself is one of a big happy
family of democratic states united in the defence of peace and
civilisation. After the fall of the USSR it has been busy expanding its
membership, a process that is taking it right up to the border of Russia.
But this picture is very far from the truth. NATO is not one homogeneous
bloc, as the events in Kosovo have revealed. For example, at the end of
April, NATO came up with the idea of imposing an oil embargo on Serbia, but
it could not achieve unity over this question. To impose an embargo would
have meant a possible conflict with Russia, because this would have implied
the blocking of Russian oil tankers. These would most likely have been
accompanied by a Russian naval escort, and therefore an armed conflict was
implicit in the situation. For this kind of operation to have been "legal"
NATO would have had to get UN approval, but Russia and China, in the
Security Council, would have blocked any resolution empowering NATO forces
to stop and search ships on the high seas. This pushed NATO members,
France, Greece and Italy to put a brake on the whole idea. In the end the
idea had to be dropped, proving once more that NATO did not have a unified
policy and was close to an open split in its ranks throughout the duration
of the bombing.

During the whole bombing campaign the United States government had to
struggle to hold the NATO alliance together. US military strategy was
limited due to opposition from within NATO itself. As far back as March,
the Italian government was in difficulty. The Italian parliament voted for
the re-opening of negotiations and the suspension of the bombing. Thus
Italy, together with Greece, two of the closest NATO members to the war
zone, were constantly regarded as weak links in the alliance.

Germany, too, was not too keen on the war. One week into the bombing
campaign opinion polls showed that only one in four Germans were in favour
of sending in ground troops. Even within the government their was dithering
on the issue. The Greens were under pressure from their ranks to come out
in opposition to the war, and there was also opposition inside the SPD. If
they had gone ahead with the plans for a ground war it is most likely that
NATO would have split. That is why NATO and the Americans were forced to
manoeuvre with the Russians to bring about a solution to the conflict which
would avoid a war on the ground.

Did NATO achieve its war aims?

It was inevitable that at the end of the war they would shout 'We won, we
won, we won!' What else were they supposed to say? The bombing had to be
portrayed as being successful in destroying the Yugoslav war machine. NATO
claimed that as much as one third of Serbian tanks had been destroyed. That
would have meant hundreds of tanks. But so far only 13 have been accounted
for! As The Guardian, 4.7.99, revealed, "The damage inflicted on the Serb
ground forces turns out to have been minute compared to that claimed by
Jamie Shea and his colleagues in effusive daily Nato press conferences."

The Yugoslav army was intact. It had dug in waiting for a ground war. It is
clear that the Yugoslav Army was prepared for a fight. If it had come to a
ground war, it is not even certain that the Americans would have won.
Certainly it would have been a very bloody affair, with huge losses on both
sides. Under such circumstances the very fragile unity of NATO would have
been subjected to enormous strain. There would have been tremendous
opposition to the war in every country, not excluding Britain and the USA.

This was clearly very difficult terrain for the American army--not at all
like the terrain on which the Gulf War was fought. It would have been a
nightmare. That is why the Pentagon was against it. The reason why they
succeeded in forcing the Yugoslavs to withdraw was not because of the
bombing. It was because the Russians particularly Yeltsin and Chernomyrdin
were also terrified of the possibility of a war in Yugoslavia, fearing the
effects inside Russia. At the end of the war, western correspondents
scratched their heads in puzzlement when they saw the Yugoslav troops
leaving Kosovo waving flags and making victory signs. "This doesn't look
like a defeated army Don't they know that they have been defeated?" they
asked. The Yugoslav Army was not defeated in war. The Yugoslav Army was
betrayed, which is a different matter. And that will have a profound affect
in Yugoslavia and in Russia.

According to an article by Richard Norton-Taylor that appeared in The
Guardian, (30/6/99), "Nato, of course, has no choice but to hail victory. A
well tried way of claiming success when things haven't gone according to
plan is to change the stated objective of the exercise." Back in March, on
the second day of the bombing, the British Defence Secretary stated that
the aim was "to avert an impending humanitarian catastrophe by disrupting
the violent attacks currently being carried out by Yugoslav security forces
against Kosovar Albanians and to limit their ability to conduct such
repression in future."

The facts are that most of the "ethnic cleansing" actually took place after
the bombing started, and the Yugoslav army lost very little in Kosovo.

Thus Yugoslavia's military capability remains intact. The fact that the
Yugoslav army was not defeated was even admitted by some KLA volunteers.
The Guardian, (30/6/99) reported that according to Lirak Qelaj, a 26
year-old fighter in the KLA "the Serbs were not defeated. Nor was NATO's
bombing as effective in Kosovo as he and his comrades had hopedÉ The KLA,
he confirmed, had great difficulty standing up to Serb attacks and was able
to do little to protect the thousands of people displaced since late MarchÉ
He also disclosed that it was KLA advice, rather than Serbian deportations,
which led some of the hundreds of thousands of Albanians to leave Kosovo."

At the beginning of the bombing campaign NATO diplomats were saying that
"...the alliance should go after the military goal of damaging or
destroying his military machine. Once this is achieved, NATO can declare
success..." (Financial Times, 27.3.99) Their aim was clearly to destroy
Serbia's military capability. This was for strategic reasons as the
domination of Serbia is a key to the domination of all the Balkans. But by
the end of April it was clear that, "The failure of the campaign to achieve
its initial objective [had] caused growing unrest among politicians on both
sides of the Atlantic." (The Financial Times, 23/4/99)

Once the bombing was over, a more realistic appraisal of the campaign began
to emerge. As the Wall Street Journal, (8/6/99) pointed out "Éthere will be
one thing lacking in this war's endgame: the sense that this was a victoryÉ
the bottom line is that Milosevic has not been defeated. After 76 days of
pounding by a vastly superior force using the most accurate and powerful
conventional weapons known to man, the head of a small state of only 11
million people was able to negotiate a compromiseÉ"

General Sir Michael Rose, the former commander of the UN Protection Force,
Bosnia in 1994 wrote in a letter to The Times (of London ) dated July 14
1999:

"I am surprised to see you supporting the current propaganda campaign by
Nato and British politicians who are repeatedly stating that NATO's air
campaign over Kosovo met its campaign objectives. It manifestly did notÉ
After 11 weeks of one of the most intensive air campaigns in the history of
warfare, it is clear that Nato had tragically failed to accomplish these
initial objectives. For thousands of people were brutally murdered and more
than a million people were driven from their homes by the Serbs. The
Alliance was thus compelled to redefine the purpose of the war as being
that of allowing the safe return of the Kosovo Albanian people to their
homes. Its success in achieving this lesser task should not be allowed to
obscure the fundamental message that it is not possible to safeguard a
people by bombing from 15,000 feet (5000 metres). Rather than engage in
cynical propaganda exercises, Nato should examine how it is going to be
able more effectively to fight humanitarian wars in the future. This will
require the Alliance to develop better leadership and to demonstrate a
greater preparedness to deploy troops on the ground. Sadly, both these
critical elements seem to be missing at present."

Destabilising effects on whole of the Balkans

Although the war was fought under the hypocritical slogan of the right of
self-determination of the Kosovar Albanians, it is clear that the further
break-up of Yugoslavia was not one of NATO'S aims. As the Financial Times,
(27/3/99) pointed out, "The complete disintegration of Yugoslavia cannot be
a NATO war aimÉ NATO resists the idea of an independent Kosovo as
destabilising to the region." Initially NATO decided to start the bombing
campaign to avert a wider conflict, to attempt to stabilise the situation
in the Balkans. But rather than stabilising it, they have made it worse.
Now the whole of the Balkans are more unstable than before.

The original intention of the Rambouillet agreement was to occupy the whole
of Yugoslavia. That is now out of the question. Nevertheless, at the
present time, America finds itself in control of quite a big slice of
territory in the Balkans. Not only Bosnia--which, like Kosovo, is another
US protectorate--but it also controls the destinies of Macedonia and
Albania as well. Having ended up with this position, America must decide
what to do with it. The Americans aimed to establish stability on the
Balkans under American control, and to establish an American protectorate.
But if we ask the following question: Did the invasion of Kosovo establish
a more stable position on the Balkans? the answer must be no. Not content
with reducing Serbia to rubble, the imperialists are maintaining a brutal
economic blockade which will further disorganise its economy, creating
terrible hardships for the population. However, there can be no question of
an economic revival in the Balkans without the reconstruction of Serbia.
The present blockade will have serious consequences for all the
neighbouring states, causing new hardships and instability.

There is also the danger of a new war in Montenegro, where the West is
intriguing for its own ends. Although NATO probably would not welcome the
complete collapse of Yugoslavia because of the repercussions it would have
in the rest of the Balkans, nevertheless, it is looking for points of
support in order to weaken and destabilise the government in Belgrade. The
presence of Western troops, both in Bosnia and Kosovo is encouraging the
government of Montenegro in its attempts to break away from the Yugoslav
federation. The Montenegrin government is clearly looking for investment
from the West. It is interesting to note that the government plans to
introduce its own mass privatisation programme. Significantly, it also
wants to introduce its own currency, pegged to the German mark. However,
secession on the part of Montenegro would certainly lead to a new war and
further destabilise the area

Macedonia is also under extreme pressure. About 750,000 ethnic Albanians,
about 23% of the population, live in the western region of Macedonia. And
as the Financial Times, (27/3/99) pointed out "Éit is equally hard to
imagine the Albanians of Macedonia remaining unaffected. In short, if
ethnic Albanian aspirations are given rein in Kosovo, the whole process of
shifting borders, and of shifting peoples, could begin againÉ setting off a
new round of the Balkan wars." Unemployment at around 40% only serves to
exacerbate the problem further. The presence of 12,000 NATO troops is the
only thing keeping the lid on.

In Kosovo itself the KLA is continuously beating the drum for Kosovo
independence. They are trying to install themselves in power, but they are
not likely to succeed because American imperialism does not want an
independent Kosovo. This would mean the creation of Greater Albania and
this would have disastrous consequences for the rest of the region. Already
the KLA is talking of including within Greater Albania not only part of
Macedonia, but a part of Greece as well. This is dangerous stuff! It can
only be the starting point of new wars and catastrophes for all the peoples
of the Balkans. The conclusion is inescapable. The situation in the Balkans
is more destabilised now than what it was before. Above all, the potential
break-up of Macedonia poses the danger of new wars involving not just the
immediate area, but would threaten to drag Greece, Albania, Bulgaria, even
Romania and Hungary into an armed conflict. This could even lead to a
general war in the Balkans in which Turkey would be brought face to face
with its old enemy Greece. The consequences of this would be incalculable
for the USA, NATO and the EU. Thus, the Americans are now trapped in Kosovo
as they are trapped in Bosnia They cannot withdraw without provoking a
general upheaval on the Balkans which would involve their allies and might
lead to the break-up of NATO itself.

Croatia has been very quiet of late. But after the death of Tudjman, the
country faces further upheavals. Franjo Tudjman was yet another former
Stalinist turned reactionary bourgeois nationalist. This former "Communist"
adopted the symbols and language of the Croat fascist Ustasha regime of the
past--a regime so bloody that even the German Nazis complained of its
brutality. As long as it suited their interests, the US imperialists went
along with his brutal policy of ethnic cleansing of Serbs and Bosnian
Moslems. But after the Kosovo affair the Americans had already begun to
distance themselves from Tudjman, a change of heart that was partly due to
the fact that he was not going to live much longer, but also because, in
following his own Balkan agenda, Tudjman was not always prepared to toe the
American line. For example, he wanted the Bosnian Croats to have their own
separate political identity. This was a move designed to prepare the way
for eventual absorption into a Greater Croatia--Tudjman's long-term goal.
This was in open defiance of the Dayton agreement. On the other hand, he
warned that there were limits to his co-operation with the UN war crimes
tribunal.

The Americans would now prefer Croatia to be ruled by more pliant stooges
and will be manoeuvring to install a puppet regime in Zagreb. But slowly
the realisation is dawning on the people that the movement towards
capitalism has brought them nothing but wars, suffering and misery. The
workers of Croatia are becoming restive. All history shows that there is a
relation between war and revolution. When the fumes of chauvinism wear off,
the masses take stock of their real situation and begin to draw their own
conclusions. Their anger is directed towards the ruling clique that led
them into the path of death, destruction and impoverishment. While the war
lasts, the working class has its head down. But that cannot last forever.
Sooner or later the working class will enter the arena of struggle. In
Croatia there have been big strikes of the working class, largely
unreported in the West. This shows the process that will take place in one
Balkan country after another in the next period. At a certain stage the
ground will be prepared for a class and internationalist policy, based on
the goal of a socialist federation of Balkan peoples as the only way out of
the present nightmare.

Reformism and imperialism

There is an organic connection between home and foreign policy. This was
conveyed by the marvellous dialectical expression of Clausewitz when he
said that 'War is the continuation of politics by other means'. This is
profoundly true. Marxists do not have one policy for peace and another
policy for war. War is just a continuation of politics by other means. In
one of his last articles, Trade Unions in the Epoch of imperialist Decay,
Trotsky explained that in the present period there was an organic tendency
of the tops of the trade unions to fuse with the capitalist state. This has
been shown to be true. The trade union and Labour leaders in one country
after another have become enmeshed in the capitalist state to an
unprecedented degree. They act as the agents of the big banks and
monopolies, and on the international stage they are the most enthusiastic
cheerleaders of imperialism, especially American imperialism. Thus, Tony
Blair was the most slavish supporter of Clinton in the Kosovo war, and
George Robertson, his foreign minister, has now been made general secretary
of NATO. This is no accident.

The crushing economic and military dominance of the USA also finds its
expression in the upper echelons of the labour movement. The reformist
Labour leaders are dazzled by it. Naturally! The petty bourgeois are always
impressed by power, whether at home or internationally. The Sri Lankan
Trotskyist Colvin Da Silva once put it quite wittily, when he said:
'Whatever is the current Bible of the petty bourgeois, its God is always
power.' That explains the attitude of Blair and Schroeder towards American
imperialism. It is a law which governs the conduct of the right reformists
as absolutely as the laws of Newton and Einstein govern the movements of
heavenly bodies. At home they are even more servile and dependent on the
banks and the monopolies than the bourgeois politicians. The reason is not
difficult to find.

The middle class, because of its intermediate position standing half-way
between the working class and the big capitalists, always looks up to the
ruling class with a mixture of fear, envy and awe. They feel inferior, and
their feelings of inferiority produce in them a powerful psychological need
to prove that they are reliable, that they can be trusted to keep the
masses in order, that they are the best defenders of the existing order,
and so on. This is what explains why the Labour leaders in power are always
more servile to Big Business than the ordinary Conservative politicians.
They are less capable of having an independent policy. Sometimes a
Conservatives administration, staffed by bankers, landowners and
businessmen, may come up with come up with a relatively independent policy
in relation to the Banks and monopolies, which sacrifices the short-term
interests of one or other section of big business, the better to defend the
long-term interests of the capitalist class as a whole. But the reformists
are organically incapable of such behaviour. Like the foreman in a factory
who bullies the workers from whose ranks he has risen and licks the boots
of the manager, the right wing reformists lose no opportunity to kick the
weakest and most downtrodden sections of society, while slavishly carrying
out the dictates of the bankers and monopolists to the very letter. And on
the world stage, the middle class labour leaders vie with one another to
show their loyalty to NATO--that is to the Big Brother on the other side of
the Atlantic. True, from time to time this gives rise to a kind of
political schizophrenia when the interests of their own bankers and
monopolists clash with those of Washington. But the basic tendency of right
reformism is always consistent--the defence of the rule of Big Business,
nationally and internationally.

However, this process has another side. At a certain stage it will provoke
convulsions and crises inside the mass organisations of Labour, paving the
way for the formation of mass left wing currents which will be open to the
ideas of Marxism. The left reformists will come to the fore again. But the
left reformists are hopelessly confused and offer no serious alternative.
Whereas the right wing Labour leaders stand openly for the interests of Big
Business and imperialism, the Lefts try to take up a middle position,
reflecting the petit bourgeois nature of left reformism. Nowhere is their
confusion more clearly revealed than on the issue of war. At home they
accept the existence of capitalism, but would like it to be a bit kinder to
the masses. In the arena of world politics, they accept the rule of
imperialism and the giant monopolies but stand for "peace". On both counts
they resemble a well-meaning vegetarian who attempts to persuade a
man-eating tiger to eat lettuce instead of meat. Their bankruptcy and
superficial utopianism is shown by their constant appeals to the United
Nations, which they foolishly imagine to be a kind of arbiter or referee
which can keep the peace between the great powers, like a kindly British
"Bobby" helping old ladies to cross the road.

The 'United Nations' and war

In addition to writing about the class struggle, Karl Marx spent a lot of
time analysing diplomacy and the relationships between the powers. Trotsky
also strongly recommended that every conscious worker should study
diplomacy, learn how it works, understand the reality behind the diplomatic
lies. It is our duty also today to expose the falsehoods of imperialist
propaganda, and to lay bare the naked self-interest and cynical
manipulations that lie behind the phrasemongering. The Marxists did their
duty during the Kosovo war, exposing the lies and hypocrisy of American
imperialism and its hangers-on in London, Paris and Bonn. An important part
of our work is to expose the lie about the (dis) United Nations as an
alleged force for peace.

It is necessary to approach politics, whether national or international,
from a consistent class point of view. There are many parallels between the
class war or wars between nations. The same basic principles apply. A
treaty--whether it is a contract between the workers and bosses in a
factory or a diplomatic settlement between nations--is only a reflection of
the balance of forces between the contending groups at a given moment. That
is all. And woe betide the person who imagines that the signing of a piece
of paper resolves any serious issue! The moment the balance of forces has
changed, the treaty is torn up. In a factory, the contract is torn
up--either by the workers, or, more normally, by the bosses. The matter is
settled by a strike, which establishes the issue of which of the two sides
is strong enough to impose a settlement favourable to itself. The same is
true of treaties and agreements between nation states.

Hegel--that marvellously profound philosopher--is very unpopular with the
bourgeois and the petit bourgeois because they cannot understand him. Among
all the other stupid criticisms of Hegel, they try to say that he was a war
monger, a precursor of militarism and even Hitler. What Hegel actually said
was that in history all serious problems are solved by war. It is difficult
to see how one can argue with such an elementary proposition. All history
shows that, when the ruling class is faced with fundamental problems of its
basic interests it does not rely on paper treaties, negotiations and the
rest of it. It goes to war. One may lament this, but it is nonetheless a
fact.

The idea that the conflicts between nations can be resolved by peaceful
arbitration is a complete illusion, as the experience of the League of
Nations before the Second World War graphically shows. The question of the
United Nations is continually being raised by all kinds of utopian
pacifists and left reformists. But the history of the whole post-war
period--and especially the last ten years--shows that nobody pays the
slightest attention to the United Nations--except the so-called left
reformists, who, in every international crisis, bleat like sheep. "United
Nations, please!" They try to present it to the public as the solution to
all wars and problems. These people do not understand the ABCs of world
relations. They have learnt nothing from the whole history of the last 50
years.

Solon of Athens once wrote: "The Law is like a spider's web. The small are
caught and the great tear it up." How profound a knowledge the author of
the Athenian Constitution had of the true nature of the Law--both national
and international! The United Nations can solve nothing. To be more
precise, the United Nations is a forum of the different imperialist powers
which can sometimes solve secondary matters where fundamental interests are
not at stake. The American imperialists pay lip service to the United
Nations, but whenever they have a problem in which the United Nations might
get in the way, they simply ignore it. We saw this in the Kosovo crisis.
The left reformists raised a hue and cry about the so-called legitimacy of
the bombing of Yugoslavia: "The Security