Imperialism Commits Terrorist Atrocity in Moscow

crocus city hall fire

01-04-2024: On the evening of March 22, a horrific terrorist attack was carried out in Moscow at the Crocus City Hall music venue. Shooters randomly massacred innocent civilians, thousands of whom were attending a rock concert in Krasnorgorsk. The terrorists fired on concert goers, and proceeded to set fire to the hall, taking the lives of at least 137 people and wounding up to 180.[1] Russian security services detained 11 people almost immediately, with Russian officials saying four of them were directly involved. Shortly afterwards, ISIS-K (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria – Khorasan), the Afghani branch of ISIS, claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement posted on the ISIS affiliated news agency Amaq on Telegram.[2] The four detained as being directly involved were identified as Tajikistan nationals, but were captured attempting to flee towards Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin stated that a “window” had been prepared for the attackers on the Ukrainian side of the border.[3]

US denials

Russian Ambassador to the United States of America (US) Anatoly Antonov stated that the Ukrainian regime “has become terrorist if it welcomes these terrorists”, and that this fact alone warrants a special investigation.[4] Almost immediately, US National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby declared that there was “no indication” that Ukraine or Ukrainians were involved in the shooting.[5] Soon afterwards, US officials claimed that it had intelligence confirming ISIS-K’s claim of responsibility for the deadly mass shooting.[6] At the very least, these claims are highly suspicious. In the middle of a NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organisation) proxy war on Russia via Ukraine, with the US state arming Nazified battalions in Ukraine alongside their NATO allies, the US government attempted to shield Ukraine from blame while instantaneously accepting a wild claim from ISIS-K. Puppet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy immediately denied that Ukraine was involved in any way,[7] despite the fleeing terrorists being caught in the process of fleeing to the Ukrainian border.

Little more than two weeks ago, on March 7, US intelligence was already aware of a potential terrorist attack in Moscow. This was enough for the US state department to issue public advice to Americans in Russia, warning personnel at both the US and the United Kingdom (UK) embassies of a probable terrorist action in Moscow “at large public gatherings including concerts”. Yet this information was not passed on to the Russian authorities, which is a clear breach of standard international protocol, according to former CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) operative Larry Johnson.[8] It beggars belief that, within two hours of the terror attacks, the US government could categorically state that Ukraine was not involved. As Gerry Nolan writes, the swift denials from Ukraine and the US point inevitably towards a deeper complicity, a premeditated awareness, and a silent acknowledgement of a role played behind the curtains.[9] As President Putin noted, with Ukraine’s military definitively losing on the battlegrounds, its agents have attempted to breach the Russian border, shell civilians in Belgorod and launch missiles at Crimea. These actions create a logical sequence towards such a terrorist attack, in an attempt to intimidate Russia, fortify morale and continue to “obey orders” from Washington to keep fighting.[10]

ISIS-K

ISIS-K was manufactured in 2021 as an Afghan variant of ISIS in order to create a new pretext for unstated calls to re-invade Afghanistan to overthrow the Taliban, in the wake of the staged withdrawal of US occupation forces.[11] Despite having created the original Taliban in the 1990s, “Taliban 2.0” turned against their former US paymasters and fought to expel them. ISIS-K then appeared as if out of nowhere, to conduct terrorist attacks on the new Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA). Yet ISIS, ISIS-K, ISIL (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) and IS (Islamic State) are all branches of the same terrorist creation of the US state and their imperialist allies in their war of regime change against Syria from 2011 onwards. Classified documents, amongst much other evidence, has confirmed what has long been an open secret – the US and Western governments were behind the creation of ISIS.[12] Moreover, during the last several years, the various wings of ISIS have been revived by Western imperialism in its battle with the “Axis of Resistance” (Syria, Iran, Iraq, Hezbollah),[13] in a desperate attempt to prevent US troops being entirely expelled from the Middle East.

Days after the Russian Federation began its Special Military Operation (SMO) in Ukraine in February 2022, the Ukrainian government opened a website that sought to recruit foreigners to fight Russia.[14] Many of these foreigners are simply mercenaries, but some of them were actually part of the abominable terror groups fighting on behalf of the Western powers in Syria. For its part, the Syrian government was the first government apart from Russia to recognise the Donetsk and Lugansk republics in the east of the former Ukraine – which are now part of the Russian Federation. In return, since the start of the SMO, the US army and the CIA have been involved in recruiting hundreds of mercenaries in Syria to fight on behalf of Kiev against Russian troops. These include members of Al Qaeda, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), and ISIS.[15]

In fact, in March 2022, the foreign intelligence service of Russia warned that the US and NATO countries were transferring ISIS fighters from Syria to Ukraine via Poland.[16] So, not only are the NATO governments sending billions of dollars’ worth of weapons and military equipment to Ukraine with well known and recognised Nazi forces forming a part of the Ukrainian state, the US and NATO powers were knowingly sending ISIS cutthroats to Ukraine to fight with them. Whether the unspeakable terrorist attack on Moscow on March 22 was conducted by Ukrainian Nazis, by ISIS, or by ISIS-K the fact remains that Washington and London (via the CIA and MI6) are inescapably the ringmasters of this atrocity. There is no greater crime than the wanton slaughter of entirely innocent people, but imperialism is well and truly prepared to perpetrate it in their battle to retain their falling empire. In addition, they are well aware that these endless and outrageous provocations have the potential to set off a nuclear war. Undeniably, the imperialists must be stopped well before such a catastrophe.

One war

The last three major terrorist abominations globally have been ultimately orchestrated by Western imperialism and its NATO allies, because it faces defeat at the hands of Russia. The October 7 terror attacks on Israel (with the complicity of both Hamas and the Israeli Defence Force),[17] the January 3 terror attack on the Islamic Republic of Iran in the city of Kerman (a memorial for General Qassem Soleimani who was assassinated by the US, claimed by ISIS),[18] and now the appalling March 22 assault on the Crocus City Hall in Moscow, have cumulatively taken the lives of up to 1400 entirely innocent people. NATO was and is losing its proxy war on Russia via Ukraine, so the ruling elites of the West attempted to open another front in the Middle East by provoking Iran into a major war. This was done by providing the pretext for the Israeli mass bombing of Gaza, and then striking Iran again on January 3. Wisely, Iran has refused to be drawn into this war, which has led to a desperate NATO to switch their focus from directly combatting Russia militarily to atrocious terrorist barbarism on civilian targets. If the aim is to foster and foment domestic opposition to President Putin and the Russian government’s defensive military moves in Ukraine, this is also sure to spectacularly fail. On the contrary, the effect will be to solidify and unify the Russian people behind their leaders.

Every shell, missile and military vehicle sent into Ukraine by the West, and every terrorist obscenity perpetrated by imperialism against its adversaries, pushes the world ever closer to World War III. This global conflagration has only been averted to this point by the remarkable restraint shown by Russia, Iran and China in the face of abhorrent provocations. The seemingly different theatres of war internationally are in fact only various fronts of one war – the war of Western imperialism against the BRICS alliance. The BRICS pact now includes Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Ethiopia and the United Arab Emirates. As many as 44 countries, all from the “Global South” are lining up[19] for a chance to join the non-imperialist bloc. Obviously, imperialism cannot tolerate this challenge, let alone abandon its centuries old plunder of the planet.

There should be a global anti-war movement, stridently opposing ALL fronts of war waged by the West. Unfortunately, in the West a sham left is running around opposing Israel’s bombing of Palestine only, while giving tacit support to Washington, London and Brussels’ cataclysmic regime change war preparations against Iran, Russia and China. This is a logical corollary from its capitulation to imperialism under a fraudulent “pandemic” from 2020 to 2022. What is urgently required is a political leadership which consistently opposes imperialism at home and abroad and links the extreme war danger to the skyrocketing cost-of-living crisis, where the price of almost all basic needs are deliberately inflated. Such leadership needs to be forged out of internationally linked Leninist vanguard parties, which can guide working people to a triumph over senseless violence and war.

Workers League

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@protonmail.com

[1] www.cbc.ca/news/world/moscow-russia-isis-attack-concert-hall-arrests-1.7153454 (27-03-2024)

[2] www.businessinsider.com/93-dead-11-arrested-terrorist-attack-moscow-russia-2024-3?op=1 (27-03-2024)

[3] www.foreignpolicy.com/2024/03/25/russia-terrorist-attack-moscow-isis-islamic-state-putin-un-vote-cease-fire-israel/ (27-03-2024)

[4] www.rt.com/russia/594922-russia-response-islamic-state-crocus/ (27-03-2024)

[5] www.themoscowtimes.com/2024/03/22/us-says-no-sign-of-ukraine-role-in-terrible-moscow-attack-a84581 (27-03-2024)

[6] www.reuters.com/world/europe/us-has-intelligence-confirming-islamic-state-responsibility-russia-attack-2024-03-22/ (27-03-2024)

[7] www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/zelenskyy-responds-to-moscow-concert-hall-shooting-rips-putin-for-suggesting-ukraine-behind-terror-attack/ar-BB1ksadC (27-03-2024)

[8] www.globalresearch.ca/usual-suspects-us-ukraine-behind-moscow-terrorist-attack/5852968 (27-03-2024)

[9] www.sott.net/article/490102-Shadows-and-Ashes-The-Crocus-City-Hall-massacre-and-the-covert-wars-phantom-menace-ISIS-cui-bono (27-03-2024)

[10] www.rt.com/russia/594894-moscow-terror-attack-ukraine-link/ (27-03-2024)

[11] www.redfireonline.com/2021/08/30/afghanistan-us-empire-shadow-boxing-with-isis-k/ (27-03-2024)