Socialism

No Boycott of Beijing 2022! Hands off China!

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The Qazihan Mosque in Turpan, Xinjiang. It was built in 1747. The Islamic religion is freely practiced in the far West of China.

     18-10-2020: As if the anti-China Cold War hysteria was not already enough, a pair of reactionary Australian MPs are now calling for a boycott of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics. Independent Senators Rex Patrick and Jacquie Lambie will move a motion in the Australian parliament next month which calls on the Australian Government – via the Australian Olympic Committee (AOC) – to ensure Australia boycotts the Beijing 2022 Winter games.[1] Long time AOC head John Coates, who is also a senior member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) reacted angrily to the possibility that Australian athletes would be offered financial incentives to boycott the games, as it occurred the last time an Australian Olympic boycott was attempted.This was in 1980, when the Olympic Games in Moscow were boycotted by the USA over the “invasion” of Afghanistan.

What actually occurred at that time was that a pro-socialist movement came to power in Afghanistan in 1978, and proceeded to modernise the country, legalising Trade Unions for the first time in history, and opening up education for women, where only 12% of adults were literate. Horrified, extreme Islamic fundamentalists armed by the CIA began a counter-insurgency which aimed to overthrow the secular government. This lead to 30 years of war and the near total destruction of the country.[2] The boycott of the Moscow Olympics in 1980 by the US government, and partially echoed by the Australian government, was key to whitewashing the anti-Soviet and anti-socialist Cold War I drive of imperialism with rivers of lies, deception and false narratives.

False accusations against China

Now, as Cold War II dramatically ramps up, another imperialist sponsored mountain of lies appears. Cold War II is not only directed against the People’s Republic of China (PRC), but also Russia, Iran, Syria and any other country which does not bow far enough to the will of Washington. Yet the PRC’s stunning economic, scientific and technological advances have driven Western capitalists into a frenzy, as they rightly fear being overtaken while their own for-profit economies flounder in a never-ending recession. Hence the desperate attempts to whip up political subversion using any means necessary – beginning with blatant falsehoods about what is happening inside the PRC. Senator Patrick makes wild and unsubstantiated claims that one million Uyghurs have been forced into internment camps, and are being pressured to “relinquish their language, culture and religion”. He name drops UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab and US Democratic Presidential nominee Joe Biden as warning against “human rights abuses” and “genocide” against Uyghurs. He also makes the grandiose claim that the National Security Law in Hong Kong will “crush democratic freedoms”.[3]

Senator Patrick is simply retailing Western corporate propaganda, and is perhaps unaware of the role of the US deep state in funding and in many cases organising the political unrest in both the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) in the PRC, as well as in Hong Kong. At the moment, he has not yet roped in the Australian government to this latest anti-China crusade. The Australian Sports Minister Richard Colbeck, when questioned in parliament, stated that he thought it best to keep sport and politics separate. However, the Minister then went on to publicly agree with the main reason for the proposed boycott!  Colbeck stated that “Australia” remains deeply concerned “by reports of enforced disappearance, mass detention, forced labour and pervasive surveillance of Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in Xinjiang.”[4] These nonsensical claims are risible, but the bigger the lie, and the more times it is repeated by those in “authority”, the greater likelihood that many will believe it.

Lurid claims of forced labour and mass detention of Uyghurs in the XUAR are little more than false slander. What is actually occurring is a tiny minority of Uyghur jihadists are being funded by the US state, via the National Endowment for Democracy (NED)[5], to wage a separatist war using any means up to and including violent terrorism against entirely innocent people. The World Uyghur Congress (WUC) is headquartered in Munich, Germany, and is more focused on fanatical anti-socialism than the rights of Uyghurs. Its founder, Isa Yusuf Aleptikin, directly appealed to then US President Richard Nixon for backing “East Turkestan” (their name for Xinjiang) against “Soviet and Chinese communism”, which they claimed was the greatest threat to Islamic peoples.[6] The former Soviet Union, like today’s PRC, does not suppress Muslims and in fact allows them to freely practice their religion. However, they do seek to prevent a tiny minority using Islam to wage separatist and/or terrorist insurgencies.

Even the Western media itself admits that Uyghur terrorism is a serious problem in the XUAR. There have been semi-regular attacks by Uyghur terrorists on innocent civilians in the XUAR over the last eight years, a bombing in Bangkok after the Thai government sent Uyghur militants back to the PRC rather than allow them passage to Turkey, and thousands went on to join ISIS and Al Qaeda in the West’s proxy war against Syria.[7] Obviously, the PRC government has to take precautions when these barbaric mercenaries return home. Any measures it takes to prevent Al Qaeda trained fighters from wreaking havoc inside the PRC can then easily be portrayed by the Western media as “repression”.

In fact, the PRC government has set up vocational training centres to give unemployed Uyghurs language and work skills so they can find work either in Xinjiang or other regions of the mainland. The PRC government has also built high-speed rail links and highways through the Taklamakan desert connecting Xinjiang to other regions, and has expanded big data internet services, which foster economic development.[8] Xinjiang is also a major hub of the PRC’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI or New Silk Road), which in this section connects China to Europe through Eurasia. The New Silk Road is arguably the primary reason why the US human rights industrial complex has targeted Xinjiang with fabricated tales about Uyghur “forced labour” and “mass detention”. The New Silk Road in all its dimensions, highlights the growing economic and political power of the PRC, and at the same time reveals the further economic and political decline of US and European imperialism. This is the real reason why US/EU imperialism and its “human rights” industry drums up fantastic lies[9] about “internment camps” in Xinjiang. The lies simultaneously obscure the role of the US/EU governments in funding Uyghur separatist terrorism as part of its regime change war efforts against both Syria and the PRC.

More US backed separatism in Hong Kong

Senator Patrick’s claims that “democratic freedoms” in Hong Kong will be crushed by the National Security Law likewise turn reality on its head. What occurred in Hong Kong during 2019 was not a “democracy” movement, but a US/UK government backed campaign of anti-socialist violence aimed at separating Hong Kong from mainland China. While the initial rally may have drawn in some Hong Kongers who had concerns about inequality, the actions quickly deteriorated into a dangerous Blackshirt minority who waved US[10] and British[11] flags while physically attacking Hong Kongers who did not agree with their violent actions[12], and wanted no part of it. In arguably the worst incident, one Blackshirt literally set fire[13] to a man who implored them to stop destroying the city. Such egregious violence repelled the majority of Hong Kongers and ensured the “democracy” movement would dwindle away into a tiny minority which could be easily dealt with.

In British colonial Hong Kong, which was ruled by the UK for 155 years, there were no elections, no minimum wage, no trade unions, no freedom of speech or basic democratic rights whatsoever. It is more than ironic that the Blackshirts and their backers now claim they stand for “democracy” against integration into the PRC. While Britain handed over Hong Kong to the PRC in 1997, both the UK and the US governments built and maintained a network of contacts, rather than genuinely vacate Hong Kong. The National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the public relations arm of the CIA, has two active branches in Hong Kong, and directly funds groups such as the Hong Kong Human Rights Monitor.[14] The Blackshirts in Hong Kong would not have been able to sustain months of violent anti-government anarchy unless they knew they had the backing of a major imperialist power.

The Blackshirt mobs have no chance of separating Hong Kong from mainland China. The PRC’s massive socialist state backed development has meant a vast expansion of high-speed rail, with one line now linking Hong Kong with Shenzhen and Guangzhou.[15] The Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau bridge is also now open[16], linking the Hong Kong island with mainland China via the world’s longest (55 klm) sea crossing road connection. With a constant interaction between Hong Kong and mainland China via streams of people through travel and commerce, in integration of Hong Kong into the PRC is permanent. The US Empire cannot reverse this by open warfare, and hence resorts to internal political subversion. For now though, Blackshirt street violence has been worn down and subdued.

PRC government reinforces Covid-19 lies

While workers internationally have a vital interest in countering the anti-socialist Cold War drive against the PRC, its government cannot be a political ally. Hidebound into the non-Marxist theory of “socialism in one country”, the Communist Party of China (CPC) has betrayed workers by lending legitimacy to the torrents of lies which buttress the Covid-19 deception. The CPC attempts to mirror the actions of the governments of the capitalist West in a vain attempt to ensure “peaceful coexistence” with imperialism. In the case of the fake pandemic, the CPC carried out their own lockdowns[17], and uttered not a word of protest when the Western governments did the same – but with the intention of inflicting political repression of working people never previously attempted. While the CPC did not use lockdowns to attack the economic position of Chinese workers necessarily, it did everything it could to augment and assist the imperialist governments assault their own working class. It played up to and fuelled the lies used to shutdown Western economies under the guise of “healthcare”. Despite the entirely dubious role of the WHO, President Xi Jinping called on it to lead the response[18] to the discovery of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The WHO did just that, which encouraged capitalist governments to shutdown economies, throw millions of workers out of a job, suspend parliaments, virtually eliminate freedom of speech, freedom of assembly and the most elementary of basic democratic rights.

Here lies the sheer duplicity of the CPC as far as working people are concerned. In order to secure mutual co-operation with the capitalist governments of the West, the CPC is more than prepared to stand by and allow – and even assist – the ruling classes of the West install a form of domestic fascism. Lockdown fascism reached extremes in the US and Europe, but was arguably surpassed by the intolerable repression still being meted out in Melbourne, Australia.[19]  It should be noted that the governments of other deformed workers’ states – in Vietnam, the Democratic Peoples’ Republic of Korea (DPRK) and Cuba – likewise acquiesced with the very imperialist governments bent on their overthrow. They also locked their borders and took other measures which appeared to validate the open mendacity of the “Covid-19 as a biblical plague” narrative.

Despite the political perfidy of the leadership of the PRC, the working class has a vital interest in defending the PRC against imperialist efforts to undermine and eventually overthrow the state which emerged out of its 1949 socialist revolution. This means opposing the call for an Olympic boycott of Beijing 2020, and countering the lie factory which retails endless fabrications about “repression” in Xinjiang, Hong Kong and even in mainland China. The imperialist West is trying in vain to counter the incredible economic growth of the PRC, which is ultimately guaranteed by its gigantic state-owned industries, which are in turn guarded by the gains of 1949. Some of the state-owned and state subsidised firms on the US Fortune 500 list include large-scale oil, solar energy, telecommunications, engineering and construction companies, banks and automotive companies.[20] These firms in fact form the core of the Chinese workers’ state, which is nonetheless impaired by the essentially nationalist politics of the CPC. The forging of vanguard parties based on genuine Leninism remains the key task for workers internationally, part of a fightback against both lockdown terror and anti-socialist hysteria.

 

WORKERS   LEAGUE

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@redfireonline.com

PO  Box  66  NUNDAH QLD  4012

[1] https://www.insidethegames.biz/articles/1099360/coates-angry-over-beijing-boycott-call (15-10-2020)

[2] https://gowans.blog/category/peoples-democratic-party-of-afghanistan/ (15-10-2020)

[3] https://www.rexpatrick.com.au/australia_must_boycott_the_beijing_winter_olympic_games (15-10-2020)

[4] https://www.portnews.com.au/story/6958849/minister-cool-on-chinese-olympics-boycott/ (15-10-2020)

[5] https://stuartbramhall.wordpress.com/2020/09/16/inside-the-world-uyghur-congress-the-us-backed-right-wing-regime-seeking-the-fall-of-china/ (16-10-2020)

[6] https://consortiumnews.com/2020/03/09/inside-the-us-backed-world-uyghur-congress/ (16-10-2020)

[7] https://www.globalresearch.ca/us-fueling-terrorism-china/5657922 (16-10-2020)

[8] https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-09-01/Xinjiang-camps-more-fake-news-TqIrWBgF8s/index.html (16-10-2020)

[9] https://www.globalresearch.ca/biggest-lie-china-xinjiang-internment-camps/5723028 (17-10-2020)

[10] https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/hong-kong-protesters-plan-march-us-embassy-65460014 (17-10-2020)

[11] https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3023817/are-hong-kong-protesters-pro-american-or-british-when-they (17-10-2020)

[12] https://www.wired.com/story/how-hong-kongs-protests-turned-into-a-mad-max-tableau/ (17-10-2020)

[13] https://edition.cnn.com/2019/11/10/asia/hong-kong-protester-shot-intl-hnk/index.html (17-10-2020)

[14] https://www.mintpressnews.com/hong-kong-protests/259202/ (17-10-2020)

[15] https://www.china-briefing.com/news/hong-kong-high-speed-rail-connects-mainland-china-september-23/ (17-10-2020)

[16] https://www.hzmb.gov.hk/en/index.html (17-10-2020)

[17] https://qz.com/1855154/china-re-imposes-strict-lockdowns-as-cases-re-emerge-in-northeast/ (17-10-2020)

[18] http://chinaplus.cri.cn/recommended/1661/469062 (17-10-2020)

[19] https://redfireonline.com/2020/07/13/the-covid-19-siege-of-melbourne/ (17-10-2020)

[20] https://iacenter.org/2019/09/09/whats-behind-hong-kong-protests/ (17-10-2020)

      

No More “Emergency Measures”! Civil Rights Must be Restored

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Australian soldiers enforce Melbourne’s “Ring of Steel”, alongside the police force. Image from http://www.portnews.com.au

No More “Emergency Measures”!  Civil Rights Must be Restored

26-09-2020: Just when you thought that government repression under the guise of “healthcare” could not get any worse, Dictator Dan Andrews in Victoria ramps it up to mind-boggling levels. The Labor Party Premier is attempting to pass through the Victorian parliament the Omnibus (Emergency Measures) Bill which among other things could result in detention without trial.[1] If enacted, it could mean that basic civil and democratic rights have become meaningless. Even the Victorian Bar Association has written to the Victorian government asking that they reconsider the bill which would allow Health Department appointed “authorised officers” to detain anyone they “reasonably believe” would negligently spread the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Sections of the establishment itself are opposed, as a group of retired judges and current QCs (Queens Counsels) have separately written to the government warning that the “emergency measures” could result in “unprecedented, excessive powers”.[2]

Raising a civilian paramilitary army

Barrister Stuart Wood AM QC, in an interview on the “Emergency Measures” bill, was aghast at the prospect that, if passed by the Victorian parliament, the legislation could empower untrained and unqualified individuals to detain their fellow citizens.[3] Union officials, so-called “Protective Service Officers”, public servants or members of the public appointed by them could be “authorised” to detain neighbours and members of the public who are suspected of not complying with self-isolation orders, protesting against lockdowns or even if they have a mental health issue.[4] It is suspected that these “authorised” persons would also have the powers to enter premises without a warrant if they “reasonably believe” a breach of public health orders is occurring. This is because police in some states are already able to do this – a grievous abolition of perhaps the most important right of all.

Currently, the Bill is being opposed by the Liberal Party opposition but may get across the line if some independents in the Upper House tip their hand in favour of the Labor Party. Whether this Bill comes into being or not, it is yet another grave warning of what is to come unless the working class resists and is able to assemble the organisation needed to strike blows against the inhuman lockdowns, mandatory facemask orders, social-distancing and all associated Corona ideology. It should be clear – if it wasn’t already – that “Covid-19” is being used as a Trojan Horse to inflict political repression greater than that of Nazi Germany in the 1930s. Lockdown fascism may be a greater threat, because the proposed Omnibus Bill in Victoria appears to be aimed at raising a civilian paramilitary army.

Even in Nazi Germany, one would imagine you had to actually be a member of the Nazis or one of their organisations to enact fascism against innocent workers and their families. Now, potentially under mainstream politicians in Australia, one can be appointed with a “monopoly on the means of violence”, and the authorisation to use force against blameless civilians without being a member of any political organisation whatsoever. In practice, however, such people will be the political shock troops of lockdown fascism. That is, they will be partisans of the capitalist assault on the working class which is falsely premised on the abjectly inverted reality of “saving lives” due to a “pandemic”. One could plausibly argue it is an intentional measure to create conflict in society, to tear it asunder.

Politics in 2020 is the reverse of the 20th Century

During the 20th Century, the danger of fascism always came from the right. For a whole range of reason, in the 21st Century, the danger of fascism is now coming from the left – or the so-called left. Union officials and the lockdown left comprise the spine of lockdown fascism – even if they themselves believe they have liberal and humanitarian values. It is this so-called left – the Labor Party, the Greens, Union officials and left parties which make now bizarre claims to be “revolutionaries” – which today is the strongest pillar of political support for a capitalism dangerously careening out of control. In addition to the police force itself, it is also the lockdown left which currently has the greatest propensity for verbal and/or physical violence against anyone they suspect of being skeptical about lockdowns, i.e. those who have a different opinion. This is why we can categorise lockdown mania as a form of fascism irrespective of its political leadership.

It is also why Dictator Dan Andrews is seeking to enlist the lockdown left as shock troops authorised with state violence. The lockdown left is already ideologically committed to the government and its capitalist state, as demonstrated by its deafening silence on the horror of the Melbourne “Ring of Steel”. By unleashing lockdown fanatics against other civilians, Dictator Dan can deflect blame away from his authoritarian rule and onto its only ideological foe – the anti-lockdown movement. In the same way that the pro-lockdown juggernaut can be designated as fascist regardless of its political form, the anti-lockdown movement can be designated as anti-fascist regardless of its political form. It follows that the pressing task for workers in 2020 is to politically and materially aid the anti-lockdown movement.

Under these conditions, the space for socialists within the anti-lockdown movement potentially becomes a minefield. Yet it must be navigated, even if it means employing a number of political and tactical concessions. Much of the anti-lockdown movement is anti-socialist, or at least according to the notion that socialism means political repression. What they reject – correctly – is a “socialism” without political rights for workers, e.g. the Soviet Union under Stalinism, China under Maoism, and so on. Yet lockdowns are currently eliminating political and civil rights, and they are wholly dispensed by capitalism, not “socialism”. As difficult as the venture may be, Marxists should attempt to imbue the anti-lockdown movement with the perspective that capitalism means political repression, and a collectively owned and democratically planned economy – socialism – means the opposite.

 

WORKERS  LEAGUE

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@redfireonline.com

PO Box 66  NUNDAH  QLD  4012

[1] https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/09/18/victoria-now-introduces-detention-without-trial/ (25-09-2020)

[2] https://www.thebigsmoke.com.au/2020/09/24/the-omnibus-bill-victorias-plan-to-detain-those-who-fail-to-self-isolate/ (25-09-2020)

[3] https://www.news.com.au/national/dan-andrews-new-covid-omnibus-bill-empowers-the-untrained-with-draconian-abilities/video/d89f448ad7db81ad28ff557061b56634 (25-09-2020)

[4] https://www.rt.com/news/501366-victoria-people-arrest-each-other/ (25-09-2020)

West Papua: Independence or Ethnic Conflict?

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A bus which was set ablaze by Papuan “independence” supporters outside the Manokwari Parliament building in August 2019. Image from sbs.com.au

West Papua: Independence or Ethnic Conflict? 

23-09-2020: One year ago, dangerous riots led by West Papuan supporters of “independence” spread across Indonesia. The trigger was said to be racist insults being hurled by Indonesian soldiers at Papuan students studying at a university in East Java. The governor of East Java apologised for the insults at the time, stating that these are not the views of the people in general. Even though racist insults are of course unacceptable, one can understand the Indonesian soldiers being incensed at a report on social media of a defaced Indonesian flag at the dormitories where the Papuan students were staying – at the very time of the marking of Indonesia’s Independence Day of August 17.[1] This is especially the case if the Papuan students are studying at a Javan University courtesy of the Indonesian government.

In response Papuan independence supporters (who in reality are separatists) went on several rampages throughout the country. Parliament buildings were set ablaze, vehicles were set on fire, power poles were torn down, a market in FakFak was torched, an airport was vandalised and shops were looted.[2] Following this violence, two months later armed Papuan separatist militia launched a vicious attack on the town of Wamena, in which 30 people perished, with 22 of them being Indonesian transmigrants.[3] The armed Papuans targeted Indonesian transmigrant workers such as motorcycle taxi drivers and hospitality staff. Yet it appears that some Papuans who do not support separatist independence were also caught in the crossfire of the reckless intent of the homicidal Papuan militia. Others who wish to live in peace with their Indonesian counterparts tried to make it to the airport in an effort to flee for their lives.

Left parties fall for the three-card trick

As we have previously reported,[4] almost all Australian and many international left parties sign up to the basic fraud of “Free West Papua”. Most left parties fall for a three-card trick. All they see is 1. An indigenous people. 2. Oppression/occupation by a colonial power, which means 3. A struggle for “freedom”. This is such a distortion of reality it is difficult to know where to start. For one thing, socialists should not automatically throw their weight behind a political movement comprised of an indigenous people just because they are the original inhabitants. Marxists always need to make a basic assessment of the aims, politics and tactics of any movement, and determine whether it is either a cause of elementary justice OR a progressive step forward for working people internationally, before beginning to champion it. Left parties should not simply jump on bandwagons when they hear someone agitating for “freedom”.

For example, while racism against African-Americans in the US is wrong, it does not follow that the Black Lives Matter (BLM) organisation or movement in the US necessarily has progressive politics. In fact, the recent rioting, looting and intimidation which BLM has carried out ostensibly in response to police violence cannot be an effective answer, let alone lead to equality between Americans of whichever colour. The current iteration of BLM is being used, whether consciously or not, to bolster the Democratic party in the run-up to the Presidential election. It is being used in an attempt to prevent Donald Trump and the Republicans from being re-elected in November, but with politics that are in many ways more right-wing than the Trump presidency.[5] Democratic party Presidential Nominee Joe Biden has a history of strongly backing segregation, and Vice Presidential Nominee Kamala Harris is a former police prosecutor with a record of unjustly incarcerating African-Americans! BLM is also being used to further the “Covid-19” assault on working people, to say nothing of the fact that BLM is totally silent about the imperialist wars being waged on all kinds of people of colour by the Anglo/US/EU Empire. BLM is the ultimate example of how identity politics serves ends which are the opposite of those that it claims to stand for.

In a similar way, the separatist violence – often waged against innocent Indonesians – of the Papuan independence “fighters” is the culmination of what could be described as Papuan identity politics. They appear to be aware that such a movement could gain backing from major imperialist powers, with some Papuan separatists using the slogan “Papuan Lives Matter” following the response to the loss of George Floyd in Minnesota earlier this year.[6]  The Socialist Alliance, a left party which fuels Papuan separatism, interviewed Veronica Koman, who fled to Australia to avoid an arrest warrant being issued for her in Indonesia for inciting the race riots in 2019. She commented that the “uprising” contributed to increased Papuan “negritude” – a feeling of pride in being black, in their ethnicity and identity.[7]  This rather gives the game away – Papuan separatism is based on ethnic identity, and the armed Papuan separatists are more than prepared to use ethnic violence to achieve their ends.

Misapplication of Leninism

Needless to say, a movement which uses separatist ethnic violence as a key component CANNOT be backed by anyone on the left, let alone Marxists. In fact, intimidation and occasional murder is also used by armed Papuan militias even against other Papuans who prefer to live in peace with their Indonesian neighbours. So, in effect, Papuan separatism is not at all based on allegedly freeing Melanesians from the supposed repression of Austronesians (the majority ethnicity of Indonesia). Rather, it is about the promotion of a fraudulent narrative of discrimination against Papuans, combined with political lobbying of the ruling classes of actual colonial and imperialist powers (Australia, the United Kingdom, Holland etc., and its controlled United Nations), using any tactics up to and including the use of armed terrorism against anyone who does not agree with separatist independence. Again, this approach scarcely makes for a wholesome political movement.

The Bolshevik-Leninist group (BL) are a new left organisation in Australia and have taken some laudable pro-working class positions in the time they have been established. They correctly criticise other sections of the reformist left (such as the afore-mentioned Socialist Alliance) for positions such as endorsing the imperialist war on Syria. Yet they then join with these same organisations by chiming in with the call for “independence” for West Papua (and also on the false Coronavirus “deadly plague” deception – a topic best broached elsewhere). To do so, they misapply the position of Russian revolutionary leader VI Lenin on the issue of Marxist support for national liberation struggles. It should be noted that other petty-bourgeois and bourgeois national movements totally distort Lenin for their own ends, and unfortunately BL do likewise.

In an article posted in June this year, BL correctly state that Marxists are opposed to all forms of nationalism in the process of struggling for international socialism.[8] They quote Lenin with his well-known statement that the national struggle of an oppressed nation against an oppressor nation has a general democratic content, and it is this content which Marxists “unconditionally support”. They go on to say that Marxists must recognise the right of nations to self-determination in its efforts to achieve the fullest possible equality between nations.[9] Yet there is one small problem with this contention – “West Papua” is not a nation according to Marxist criteria.

The pamphlet “Marxism and the National Question” was written in 1913 by JV Stalin but was edited line by line by Lenin. The first lines of the first chapter clearly state that “a nation is not racial or tribal, but a historically constituted community of people.”[10] In those times, the concept of ethnicity was not as prevalent as it is now. Yet it shows that any attempt to forge a West Papuan “nation” based on Papuan or Melanesian ethnicity, not to speak of Papuan or Melanesian tribes, directly contradicts the established Marxist position. And in practice the Marxist position on the national question is simply a means to work towards the ultimate surpassing of nations on the road to socialism.

Further, the pamphlet goes on to list the renowned four criteria for a nation to be recognised – to determine IF Marxists can in some circumstances, add their backing to a movement for self-determination. It lists: 1. A common language 2. A common territory 3. A common economic life or cohesion and 4. A common psychological make-up manifested as a common culture. It stresses that it is only when all four characteristics are present, a nation can be recognised. One or a couple of these characteristics is insufficient – they must have all four.[11]  And keep in mind that Marxists only recognise nations in order to take the national question off the agenda, so as to clear as many obstacles as possible to enable a working class struggle for socialism.

Common language?

If we take West Papua, we see that not only does it not meet all four criteria for a nation – it does not even meet one! Take language. The whole island of Papua (including Papua New Guinea – PNG) is one of the most linguistically diverse in the world. It contains around 852 languages, although 12 of them have no known living speakers.[12] Language is closely related to culture, and it is estimated that there are over 1000 different Papuan cultures.[13] Even the Free West Papua campaign itself – which is not of course bound to socialism – openly states that “West Papua is home to over 250 diverse tribes, all speaking their own unique languages with unique cultures (emphasis added).”[14] Is BL aware of this? In fact, to enable the members of over 250 tribes to converse with each other, the language they use is Bahasa Indonesian! This is where the movement for separatist independence enters into impracticality, if not farce. What would be the point of separating entirely from Indonesia (if that was possible or desirable), “liberating” oneself from the supposedly oppressive and tyrannical Indonesian colonisers, only to constitute a geographical boundary in which the lingua franca is Bahasa Indonesian?

Common territory?

With regard to a common territory, the entire island of Papua may be common, but for various historical reasons, the eastern half of Papua is now the nominally independent nation of Papua New Guinea. If the “Free West Papua” campaign was to achieve its objective of separatist independence, what would be the reason for maintaining two Papuas – West Papua and Papua New Guinea? If there was a successful movement (hypothetically) for West Papuan independence, wouldn’t there be a natural pressure to “liberate” Papua New Guinea – a “Papua for all Papuans” ?

Here is where the politics of “Free West Papua” are revealed. The Free West Papua campaign consciously appeals to imperialist governments directly, especially to Australia, but also via the UN. Despite PNG having attained independence from Australia in 1975, the reality of imperialism is that Australia is still the overseer. If the Papuan separatists aimed to also “free” PNG, it would meet with universal opposition from the Australian ruling class. So the Papuan separatists are not prepared to do this – they prefer to attempt a manoeuvre to lever Australian ruling class backing for West Papua against Indonesia, in a similar way to Australian government “backing” for East Timorese independence after 1999. As events later showed, Australian government “support” for East Timorese independence was also colonialist, with Australia literally stealing oil and gas reserves clearly belonging to the new nation,[15] and being exposed as spying on East Timorese representatives during 2013 negotiations over the division of natural resources.[16]

Common economy?

There is indeed a common economy in “West Papua”, but it is not the one of the allegedly oppressed nation. The only real economy operating in the Indonesian provinces of Papua and West Papua is, not surprisingly, the Indonesian economy. For better or worse, the Indonesian government and Indonesian businesses carry out the only real economic activity in all of West Papua. Granted, there is a tendency for the public and private sectors in West Papua to be largely staffed by Indonesian transmigrants. However, this is an unavoidable result of the fact that Indonesian transmigrants are generally the ones who have had the benefit of education and/or a history of skilled administration or commercial experience. This would only be a problem if it could be established – without a doubt – that Papuans were systematically and deliberately excluded from opportunities to work in such industries.

However, the Special Autonomy Law for West Papua enacted by the Indonesian government in 2001 contains sections which mandates priority employment for indigenous West Papuans in the regional civil service, as well as special quotas for the employment of indigenous West Papuans.[17] The positions of Governor and Deputy Governor of Papua and West Papau are reserved for indigenous Papuans. Whether the special quotas for the employment of indigenous Papuans are always fulfilled in practice is a question to be investigated. Yet there cannot be a serious claim that Papuans are excluded or deliberately discouraged from public sector employment. On the contrary, there appear to be government efforts to create jobs for indigenous Papuans.

As Marxists BL would be aware of Lenin’s famous quip that socialism equals “Soviets plus electrification”. Of course, Soviets or workers’ councils are a fair way off, but how about the supply of electricity to West Papua? Electricity supply would, at least, begin to lead to a raising of living standards of West Papuans, not to speak of enabling a connection to commerce, and thus development. West Papua is largely divided between the coastal cities, where the overwhelming majority of economic activity takes place, and the rural interior, which largely operates on subsistence farming. In an attempt to address this imbalance, the Indonesian state owned electricity firm PLN last year announced its intention to connect 1123 West Papuan villages to the grid, as part of its aim to connect 100% of Indonesia by 2020.[18] Amongst other things, this would enable some indigenous Papuans to access bank accounts for the first time. We doubt that BL would oppose the electrification of West Papua in the name of “independence”.

Common culture?

In Papua there is a saying “a different culture for every village”. The island of Papua, and the land referred to as West Papua is extraordinarily rich in cultures – but it is not a common culture. Common culture is the key as far as Marxist recognition of nationality is concerned. Yet West Papua is home to at least 250 different tribes, each with their own specific cultures, customs, languages and more.[19] During Dutch colonialism, some of these tribes were relocated by force, and some of them are nomadic. BL should be aware that tribal cultures on their own, are notoriously difficult to unite into a common entity. Arguably one of the reasons for ongoing conflict and violence in Papua New Guinea is inter-tribal conflict. On the other hand, differing ethnic and national cultures can be reasonably integrated and united in a developed nation such as Australia or the USA. This is because the majority of people are working class, and the very process of working side by side someone requires co-operation and harmony. Without that base, divisions such as tribal conflict cannot be overcome.

To an extent, BL do recognise, and call for, the unity of West Papuan and Indonesian workers. They acknowledge that some Papuan nationalists are aggrieved at what they perceive to be the Indonesian government moving more Indonesian workers into Papua to solidify backing for Indonesian nationalism. They recognise that setting up Papuan workers against Indonesian workers is counter-productive, and that “closer collaboration” between the two should be the aim.[20] We would agree. But the largest barrier to Indonesian and West Papuan working class unity is the pushing of separatist independence. What material interest do Indonesian workers have in supporting separatist independence for West Papua – if they are to be excluded?  Not without reason, many Indonesian workers see West Papuan independence as being anti-Indonesian – especially if the violent tactics of the armed militia are anything to go by.

In their article, BL point to the 2011 strike at the Grasberg mine as an example of joint Indonesian and West Papuan worker co-operation in labour struggles.[21] No doubt there are any number of labour issues at a mine operated by an overseas owned multi-national. However, even during this labour unrest, the question of separatism was right in the middle of it. Direct information is difficult to come by, but there are reports that during this unrest, separatist forces were intimidating Union leaders, even while they were conducting a strike for higher wages.[22] What is more, there are other reports that work had to cease at the mine not due to the strike, but due to a pipeline being sabotaged by separatists.[23] Workers striking for higher wages and salaries only would hardly sabotage the workplace which was the basis for their employment.

Genocide?

BL state that “Since Indonesian takeover, hundreds of thousands of Papuans have been killed in a brutal occupation.”[24] BL repeat the claims of the “Free West Papua” movement that up to 500 000 Papuans have been killed by Indonesian armed forces over 50 years.[25] This is the highest “genocide” figure claimed, and it is usually done on the context of demanding the presence of an international peacekeeping force – read: imperialist intervention. If this was the case, there may be a case for urgent action. There is one small problem though: the Papuan population of West Papua has doubled in the last 50 years. If this has taken place within just two and a half generations (if a generation is 20 years), no “genocide” has occurred at all.

According to a 1971 census, the Papuan population of what is now referred to by separatists as West Papua was approximately 900 000 in 1971. By the time of the 2010 census, the Papuan population was around 1.7 million, and is estimated to have now surpassed 1.8 million.[26] There is room for debate on the exact numbers, the efficiency of census taking over different time periods and so on. Yet the trend is clear – Papuans have in fact thrived while being a part of the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia. Of course, there are many political issues that need to be addressed, such as poverty and relative underdevelopment – although some of this can be put down to the at times impenetrable jungle terrain of the Papuan highlands.

One reason why Papuans have in fact expanded their population is that the Indonesian government has, to at least some extent, recognised the development gap between West Papua and other regions of Indonesia and make some effort to overcome it. This is codified in the law which the Indonesian parliament passed in 2001, granting Special Autonomy to the Papuan provinces. In addition, Article 56 of this law enables all Papuan students to receive education up to High School at the “lowest possible cost to the community”. And Article 59 of this law stipulates that all Papuans shall be provided with health care services with the “lowest charge to the community”.[27] No wonder their numbers are expanding. What is more, Australian working people do not even have this – their health care and education costs are rising as they are both being increasingly privatised! It is counter-intuitive to claim that the same government providing you with low-cost health care and education – for all residents, including Papuans – is also inflicting a “genocide”.

There is no “genocide in West Papua”. There is no “national liberation” struggle in West Papua either. There is a campaign of lies, deception and fraud which masquerades as a movement for “freedom”. A minority of Papuans seek to separate from Indonesia, no matter what the human or economic cost. A smaller minority of Papuans are prepared to take up arms and engage in ethnic conflict with other ethnicities which make up the state of Indonesia – up to and including violent terrorism. To interpret this scenario as something which is deserving of socialist support, not to speak of claiming the posthumous endorsement of Marx or Lenin for what is essentially ethnic conflict, is to expose oneself before facts and evidence. Genuine socialists do not seek to inflame ethnic tensions but seek to overcome them through joint struggle for a common class cause. The overall task is the forging of workers’ vanguard parties throughout Papua, Indonesia, Australia and internationally to help end ethnic and national tensions on the road to a socialist order.

 

WORKERS   LEAGUE

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@redfireonline.com

PO  Box  66  NUNDAH  QLD  4012

 

[1] https://redfireonline.com/2019/09/04/west-papua-separatists-incite-violence/ (19-09-2020)

[2] Ibid, 1.

[3] https://redfireonline.com/2019/10/05/wamena-papuan-militia-terrorise-civilians/ (19-09-2020)

[4] https://redfireonline.com/2020/01/12/veronica-koman-human-rights-fraud/ (19-09-2020)

[5] https://redfireonline.com/2020/06/21/black-lives-matter-friend-or-foe/ (19-09-2020)

[6] https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2020-07-02/papuan-lives-matter (19-09-2020)

[7] https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/veronica-koman-war-west-papua-escalating (19-09-2020)

[8] http://bolshevik-leninist.org/independence-for-west-papua/ (20-09-2020)

[9] ibid, 7.

[10] https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1913/03a.htm#s1 (20-09-2020)

[11] ibid, 9.

[12] https://www.daytranslations.com/blog/papua-new-guinea-tongue/ (20-09-2020)

[13] https://researchrepository.murdoch.edu.au/id/eprint/36503/1/Ethnicity%20Democracy%20and%20Development%20in%20PNG.pdf (20-09-2020)

[14] https://www.freewestpapua.org/info/about-west-papua/ (20-09-2020)

[15] https://kontinentalist.com/stories/australia-east-timor-a-tale-of-oil-and-exploitation (20-09-2020)

[16] https://theconversation.com/after-a-border-dispute-and-spying-scandal-can-australia-and-timor-leste-be-good-neighbours-121553 (20-09-2020)

[17] https://westpapuaupdate.com/strategic-positions-employment-west-papuans/ (20-09-2020)

[18] https://papuastory.wordpress.com/2019/10/24/electrification-for-1123-villages-in-papua-west-papua/ (23-09-2020)

[19] https://westpapuaupdate.com/understanding-diverse-culture-west-papua/ (23-09-2020)

[20] ibid, 7.

[21] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/oct/10/indonesian-forces-striking-mine-workers#maincontent (23-09-2020)

[22] https://www.fidh.org/en/region/asia/indonesia/Grasberg-mine-PT-Freeport (23-09-2020)

[23] https://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2011/10/18/freeport-halts-work-amid-sabotage-separatist-pleas.html (23-09-2020)

[24] ibid, 7.

[25] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/03/west-papua-un-must-supervise-vote-on-independence-says-coalition (23-09-2020)

[26] https://www.globalresearch.ca/indonesias-west-papua-settlers-dominate-coastal-regions-highlands-still-overwhelmingly-papuan/5569676 (23-09-2020)

[27] https://www.refworld.org/docid/46af542e2.html (23-09-2020)

Socialist Strategy to Lift the Lockdowns

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Anti-lockdown protestors march past Parliament House in Brisbane on September 5. Image from Tott News.

Socialist Strategy to Lift the Lockdowns

13-09-2020: In the face of a virtual corporate media blackout, thousands across Australia took part in the September 5 Freedom Day demonstrations.[1] Protesting “Covid-19” lockdowns, social-distancing, mandatory masking and other forms of political repression, the rallies were a success given the circumstances. The bravest faced off against police in Melbourne[2], the centre of perhaps the most extreme lockdown regime on the face of the planet. Solidarity with the people of Victoria was a feature of the actions in the other states. The fact that the mainstream media almost ignored the actions is a tell-tale sign that this movement runs as a direct counter to the rule of big capital. More than this, the anti-lockdown movement is a necessary groundswell against a particular form of fascism – the “New Normal”. Thus, it is vital that workers help build resistance to corona tyranny.

The main paradox with politics in 2020 is that the anti-lockdown movement confronts political forces which have betrayed them to form an arm of the capitalist state – Union officials and the lockdown left.[3] Needless to say, merging with the state when it is in the middle of imposing a form of fascism exposes these elements as little more than the bourgeois politicians they claim to oppose. As a result, leadership of the anti-lockdown movement has fallen into the hands of those who have historically not been a part of what previously passed for the left. However, this does not mean that far right-wing forces dominate – far from it. If anything, while nationalism plays a significant role, ultra-nationalist and Nazi type elements are totally absent. The leading political forces of the anti-lockdown movement appear to include those who correctly oppose lockdowns from several different angles.

Some oppose lockdowns from a civil liberties angle, some are supporters of President Trump and the  QAnon group, some reject what they see as a “New World Order”, and some are against forced vaccinations. There are peace and anti-war activists and those who support incarcerated whistleblower Julian Assange. Some laughingly embrace the label of “conspiracy theorists” – a term which has come to mean anyone who simply questions the official line of elite politicians and the corporate media. There are some who favour a strategy of lobbying politicians, and others who favour a strategy of mass action. Whatever their motivation, these people do not wish to see a world of totalitarian terror and are doing what they can to prevent a world of darkness for current and future generations.

At the same time, there are some trends within the anti-lockdown movement which constitute a barrier which Marxists need to skillfully navigate to assist the movement in achieving its goals. For while a mass anti-lockdown movement may succeed in eventually rolling back lockdowns and some logic-defying restrictions, the “New Normal” fascism and the enforced economic depression can only ultimately be defeated by the overthrow of the governments enforcing it. That is, it will require a series of workers’ revolutions in the capitalist West, combined with proletarian political revolutions against the conservative bureaucracies in the heavily distorted workers states of the East, particularly Red China. Nevertheless, to build a bridge between the anti-lockdown movement and the forging of democratic workers’ councils which can propel forward the struggle for proletarian power, socialists first have to address and contend with a series of views which nobble the anti-lockdown movement.

  1. Anti-socialism

The first misunderstanding is the widely held – though not universal – view of anti-socialism amongst those prepared to mobilise against lockdowns. This partly reflects the general anti-socialism of many workers, yet it contains both progressive and reactionary content. It is reactionary in that it reflects the hostility of both small and large capital to public ownership of the means of production, administered by workers’ rule. However the progressive side is the rejection of the lack of political rights for workers as it existed in degenerated form in the former Soviet bloc, and as it now exists in the deformed workers’ states of China, Vietnam, North Korea, Laos and Cuba. The problem is that in correctly rejecting the lack of workers’ democracy in the five current deformed workers’ states, they then make the error of conflating this with socialism itself. To some extent, this mistake is entirely understandable. Unconsciously, they are rejecting the Stalinist or Maoist perversions of “Marxism” – which is necessary – but misidentifying this with the fast disappearing political rights and overt intrusion of the state into workers’ most personal needs under capitalist imposed “Covid-19” lockdowns.

Workers in power does not necessarily mean no or limited democratic or political rights. The fact that this occurs in China and the other deformed workers’ states in no way means that the first step towards socialism – a workers’ government based on a collectivised and planned economy – will result in deterioration of political rights. On the contrary, for the working class it should mean a vast expansion of democratic rights for working people – as did occur in the early years of the Soviet Union before Stalinist degeneration set in after 1924. Just as the expropriation of political power by Stalin, Bukharin, Rykov and others in the years after 1924 represented the revolt of the petty-bourgeoisie against the successful proletarian revolution of 1917, the limitation of political rights for working people in China, Vietnam, North Korea, Laos and Cuba reflects the petty-bourgeois rather than proletarian character of their respective political leaderships. To correct this, working people need to aim for proletarian political revolutions to oust the conservative and nationalist leaderships of these states, while retaining the working-class forms of economic and state power. This needs to be combined with genuine socialist revolutions in the West, uniting workers internationally.

To fully grasp this perspective necessarily requires the study of genuine Leninism. Perhaps understandably, many workers are put off the investigation of Marxism by the actions of the governments of the workers’ states such as China (People’s Republic of China – PRC). Due to the primarily nationalist character of the Communist Party of China (CPC), workers in the West never hear of any appeals made to it – because there are none. A genuine Marxist party would be consistently trying to reach out to workers internationally with appeals to help it build socialism internationally. The CPC leadership never does, and never will, due to its locked in position of nationalism socialism, or “socialism in one country”. This flies in the face of actual socialism, where the world’s resources will be used for the well-being of the world’s people, with workers’ rule being the initial guarantor. With the CPC leadership acting as mirrors of the governments of the West – even to the point of playing up to the coronavirus plot and imposing their own lockdowns – many in the anti-lockdown movement are not entirely incorrect to view “China” as being in on the act.

Sections of the anti-lockdown movement also entertain wild misunderstandings of socialism, even to the point of seeing Labor Party Premiers Dictator Dan Andrews and Anastacia Palaszczuk as being “socialists” or heading a “socialist government”. According to this mistaken view, the Greens are also “socialist”. And in fact, one Greens member of parliament did vote with the Labor Party in Victoria to extend the lockdowns by six months.[4] Even though the Liberal Party voted against this, workers need to understand that all of the parliamentary parties – Labor, Liberal, National, Greens etc. – are all parties of the capitalist class, and are thus galaxies away from any kind of “socialism”. There may be some very minor disagreements between them over the imposition of lockdowns and when to roll them back, but their fundamental class interest is that of either small or big capital. And the whole capitalist class is united in imposing the political repression of lockdowns – so as to enable immense downward pressure on working people’s wages and conditions. This has been done by mass sackings, the forced closure of many small and large businesses – meaning staff “stand-downs” or furloughs, and so on. The unprecedented attack on the working class is the principle aim of lockdown terror, and the predominant goal of the fake “pandemic”. Working people are thus facing an assault[5] of capitalism, not “socialism”.

  1. The role of the police

An unfortunate lack of class consciousness amongst the anti-lockdown movement is apparent with the view of police “doing their job” by sometimes allowing protests or not arresting demonstrators. This view is not universal, but where it appears it even extends to some leading anti-lockdown speakers calling on police to join the movement (!!). This is more than the “good cop, bad cop” routine, which alibies the entire police force. The police will not, and cannot, be allies of working people in any political movement whatsoever. The police cannot be won (!) to a political cause because they are paid to be the key apparatus of capitalist state repression of working people. The attempt by some in the anti-lockdown movement to appeal to police to stand with the “people” or to think of their “families” is a reflection of the distinct lack of pro-working class politicisation. This major error is unfortunately fueled by the treasonous behaviour of the Union bureaucracy and the lockdown left, whose abject genuflection before Corona madness identifies them as police deputies. In swallowing Coronavirus hysteria wholesale, the lockdown left cannot then go on to oppose the vicious police repression (witness Melbourne) which their class collaboration has brought into being.

The view of police as “workers” or as part of the “working-class” needs to be sternly disabused by socialists within the anti-lockdown movement. The fact that police are employed does not therefore mean that police are “workers”. In Marxian terms, the police are the hired security forces of the capitalist state, whose essential function is to ensure that workers do not touch the levers of state power. The police will carry out whatever level of political repression against workers that is politically required by the ruling class at a particular juncture. Pre Covid-19, the “normal” amount of political repression was sufficient. The implementation of lockdown fascism obviously requires an enormous escalation of political repression, and the police are the first ones to enforce it. A graphic demonstration of this lawless outrage was the arrest of a pregnant mother in Victoria for posting a notice about a peaceful anti-lockdown protest on social-media.[6] At the slightest sign of working people resisting the barely disguised chains of capitalist enslavement, the police are unleashed to do their worst. The only true allies are workers yet to be won to the fight against the “New Normal”.

  1. Nationalism

Theories and variations of the “New World Order” have been around for a very long time, and now the Covid-19 deception has given this slogan a new lease of life. Those who use this to describe what is apparently happening also have various interpretations. However, common notions are that the New World Order is a one world government of “globalists”. These “globalists” control the United Nations, the international banking system, and are using organisations such as the World Economic Forum to reduce world population via the World Health Organisation….and so on. There is little doubt that Bill Gates is up to his neck in the fake “pandemic”, and that he funds large parts of the World Health Organisation (WHO), the “fact-checking” industry and large sections of the corporate media.[7] Many within the anti-lockdown movement are well read on this and related material. But if it was not Bill Gates, it would be some other corporate billionaire – or billionaires.

Substitute “New World Order” for capitalism, and “globalists” for imperialists, and socialists can sign up as subscribers to this view. Yet that reveals one of the primary barriers to the political progress of the anti-lockdown movement. Currently, if it did identify capitalism as the major source of global problems, it could invite socialism in as the next logical step. Due to many misunderstandings of socialism – some of them very understandable – adherents of the New World Order/globalist mindset prefer to remain on the ground of simply exposing the undoubted crimes of the obscenely wealthy. Yet as the situation of Julian Assange readily attests to, exposure of the crimes of capitalism alone are not enough. The bravery, heroism and self-sacrifice of Julian Assange and Wikileaks cannot be questioned. Yet without the building of vanguard parties which can lead workers towards the expropriation of big capital and the collectivisation of the economy, the establishment will remain in control regardless of how many times its crimes are revealed.

Nor can nationalism be used as a counter to the “globalist” agenda. The global capitalists use nationalism to deceive “their own” workers at home, while they practice the opposite. Big capital can flick its investments around the world at the click of a button, even at the same time as demanding and receiving protection by their “home” state. Even though the United Nations and the WHO appear on the surface to be controlled by a global agenda, this is just the reflection of the confluence of interests of the major imperialist states. In short, the capitalist classes of the imperialist states are very class conscious, and they collaborate internationally with their class without batting an eyelid. Needless to say, the only effective counter working people have in response is international collaboration with their class across the borders of the 193 UN member states. The nationalism of the bourgeoisie is a false front, and so working people shoot themselves in the foot if they try to restore “national sovereignty” in opposition to “globalism”.

Socialists within the anti-lockdown movement need to be tactical about how to take up these three issues, and many others. Where possible, discussion and debate with all those opposed to lockdowns is vital. However, during rallies and other protests physical defence or evacuation obviously takes priority, if the police are moving in. While unity of the anti-lockdown movement is important for its collective strength, civil discussion of differing political views must also be accommodated.

 

WORKERS  LEAGUE

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@redfireonline.com

PO  Box  66  NUNDAH  QLD  4012

 

[1] https://tottnews.com/2020/09/05/freedom-day-demonstrations/ (09-09-2020)

[2] https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/freedom-day-protest-melbourne-20200905-h1qj2v.html (09-09-2020)

[3] https://redfireonline.com/2020/08/25/the-labour-lieutenants-of-lockdown-terror/ (09-09-2020)

[4] https://themarketherald.com.au/vic-govt-to-extend-covid-19-lockdown-powers-by-six-months-2020-09-01/ (13-09-2020)

[5] https://redfireonline.com/2020/04/18/covid-19-savage-assault-under-the-guise-of-health/ (13-09-2020)

[6] https://www.fr24news.com/a/2020/09/pregnant-mother-arrested-for-facebook-post-inciting-protest-against-coronavirus.html (13-09-2020)

[7] https://www.corbettreport.com/gates/ (13-09-2020)

Navalny “Poisoning”: One False Flag Begets Another

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At left, the symbol of the Belarusian internal security service, the KGB. At right, Western backed Russian dissident Alexei Navalny. Image from Periodicodaily.com

Navalny “Poisoning”: One False Flag Begets Another

06-09-2020 – If we were to believe the Western press, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the poisoning of the main opposition leader Alexei Navalny to knock out a rival, to ensure his rule continues. Cue another round of corporate media hue and cry about “human rights” in Russia, leading to another round of sanctions, flowing on to even more US/EU war games literally on Russia’s border. Cue another round of baseless accusations of the Russian government supposedly fixing elections in the US, enabling Brexit, allegedly doping up their athletes with performance enhancing drugs and more. And working people are supposed to swallow these baseless and evidence free claims, so they do not bat an eyelid when the NATO powers push the world closer to a nuclear conflagration.

Novichok lies

Jumping the shark, US National Security spokesperson John Ullyot claimed that the Russian people have a right to express their views peacefully without fear of retribution (!). German President Angela Merkel claimed that tests showed that Navalny was poisoned with a chemical nerve agent from the Novichok group and called it attempted murder.[1] It should not be necessary to point out the absurdity of such claims. For one thing, there is not one speck of evidence that the Russian government caused Mr Navalny’s current illness. Nor is there a shred of evidence that Mr Navalny was poisoned at all, let alone with Novichok. What happened was that Mr Navalny fell ill and was taken to the emergency section of the Omsk hospital in Russia. There, Russian doctors worked feverishly for 44 hours to save his life. Russian medical specialists stressed that all that could be said was that Mr Navalny’s cholinesterase activity was low, but there was NO evidence that this was due to poisoning with cholinesterase inhibitors.[2]

Mr Navalny was then flown to Berlin for continued medical treatment, which was organised and funded by the Western backed NGO “Cinema for Peace”.[3] This alone should raise eyebrows. It raises the question of why the Russian government would allow Mr Navalny to be flown immediately to Berlin if it had just arranged his poisoning. Furthermore, no traces of any unusual substances were found in the two Russian laboratories which analysed the blood tests of the sick Mr Navalny.[4] After the debacle of the false flag poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, who somehow survived being smeared with the deadly military grade nerve agent Novichok,[5] workers are entitled to be just a little more than usually sceptical of this latest claim.

Western corporate media outlets continually infer that Navalny is the primary “opposition leader”. This is farcical. Navalny is part of the pro-US liberal opposition to the Russian government and President Putin who has extremely minimal domestic political support – around 2%.[6] The real opposition are the parties which call themselves Communist, who have wide support within Russia. Navalny, on the other hand, is the US government’s favourite – because it funds him. He has received financial backing[7] from the notorious National Endowment for Democracy (NED) – the public relations arm of the CIA – for the running of the Democratic Alternative (DA!) party. One can imagine the outcry in the West if it was discovered that a dissident residing in the US somehow received funding from the Russian government for a US opposition party. Regardless, Navalny is put on a false pedestal by the elites in the West to enable the fuelling of yet more war provocations against Russia. On September 1, the Russian government protested vociferously at the restarting of yet more NATO military exercises on Russia’s border, this time in Estonia.[8]

Failed Covid-19 Colour Revolution in Belarus

Estonia borders Belarus, which is the base of the latest NATO backed colour revolution against Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko. Despite the best efforts of NATO and its agents, the transparent subversion failed, not least because they did not have a collection of muscle-bound ultra-reactionary and fanatically anti-Russian men to arm – unlike during the “UkroNazi” coup in Ukraine in 2014.[9] The US Empire has been itching for a chance to get rid of Lukashenko, over and above the wishes of the majority of Belarusians, for decades. Lukashenko never totally de-Sovietised Belarus, a high crime in the eyes of imperialism. This is not to say that Lukashenko was without fault, for he also flirted with the very NATO states bent on his removal perhaps in an effort to better bargain with Russia. Yet as far as the Western governments and their agents were concerned, the final straw was Lukashenko’s courageous stand on the fake Covid-19 “pandemic”. Lukashenko rightly considered panic about this particular coronavirus to be more dangerous than the pathogen itself.[10]

It can also be plausibly argued that the fake Navalny “poisoning” may also have been arranged by the deep states of the West so as to derail Nord Stream 2. This is a gas pipeline extending from Vyborg in Russia to Greifswald in Germany. The US government is apoplectic with rage at the prospect of the completion of the pipeline connecting Russia and Germany, as it will allow Russia to sell its hydrocarbons to Europe directly, without the ability of the US to do anything about it.[11] To the advantage of Europe and Russia, Nord Stream 2 bypasses the Ukraine entirely, meaning neither party has to deal with the political and military instability wrought by the NATO backed UkroNazi coup government installed in Kiev in 2014.

Working people have a direct interest in defending Belarus against US backed subversion, and Russia against NATO-led imperialism. This is despite the fact that the Belarusian government wisely rejected the contrived Covid-19 crisis, while the Russian government played up to the manufactured hype of Covid-19. The Russian government even imposed harsh lockdown measures, mimicking those of the Western governments that are continually staging false flags so as to blame Russia for anything and everything under the sun. Be that as it may, NATO led provocations against Belarus and Russia must be strongly opposed by workers internationally, as part of a struggle against war and for socialism.

 

WORKERS  LEAGUE

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@redfireonline.com

PO Box  66   NUNDAH  QLD  4012

[1] https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/sep/2/white-house-condemns-completely-reprehensible-pois/ (04-09-2020)

[2] https://www.globalresearch.ca/politicizing-alexey-navalny-illness/5722378 (04-09-2020)

[3] https://www.cinemaforpeace-foundation.org/our-vision (04-09-2020)

[4] http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/55529.htm (04-09-2020)

[5] https://redfireonline.com/2018/03/19/hands-off-russia-no-to-nuclear-war/ (04-09-2020)

[6] https://www.rt.com/op-ed/499721-navalny-novichok-germany-russia/ (04-09-2020)

[7] https://alansalbiev.livejournal.com/28124.html (04-09-2020)

[8] https://www.globalresearch.ca/nato-begins-provocative-military-exercises-russian-border/5722855 (04-09-2020)

[9] https://www.moonofalabama.org/2020/08/belarus-nato-lobby-acknowledges-that-its-color-revolution-failed.html (05-09-2020)

[10] https://redfireonline.com/2020/08/20/belarus-covid-19-colour-revolution/ (05-09-2020)

[11] https://www.globalresearch.ca/kremlin-critic-flown-germany-german-russian-nord-stream-2-nears-completion/5722074 (05-09-2020)

Refuse and Resist Lockdown Terror!

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Defiant anti-lockdown “protests” in Melbourne. Image from the Daily Mail

Refuse and Resist Lockdown Terror!

05-09-2020: It needs to be repeated – this was never about a virus.[1] If anyone has lingering doubts as to what the Covid-19 “pandemic” is really about, one need only view the desperate resistance of the brave young men in Melbourne who are risking arrest, prosecution by the state and their potential futures to defy the inhuman lockdowns which have virtually abolished civil rights won over centuries of struggle. In one instance, the group of mainly young men wore Guy Fawkes masks – creatively observing scientifically unjustifiable mandatory facemask orders while protesting against them. In unimaginable scenes, police chased down some of the men, detaining and arresting them – even as they formally abide by the absurd one hour of exercise per day rule, by walking around their neighbourhoods in spaced groups.[2] These heroic young men are going to great risk to provide a lead to the anti-lockdown movement, and helping to liberate society from a totalitarianism that many never expected to see in their lifetimes.

Covid-19 is a class attack

Now that the full horror of the extreme lockdowns in Melbourne is known, there is barely anyone who will raise their head to defend them – even amongst the most craven pro-government lackeys. The liberal left still adheres to the fantasy of a supposed universal danger, yet even they mumble about the heightened danger of lockdown-induced domestic violence and suicides. Sycophantic Union officials fully back the government even as it inflicts pain and suffering on their own members and the working class generally. The abandonment of working people by Union officials and the so-called “left” has resulted in the lead being taken by the young men defying lockdowns in daily walks in Melbourne. This courageous and instinctive resistance to lockdown terror is certainly needed and will play a significant role in future struggles. Yet due to the fact that Covid-19 is being used as a cover for an assault on the working-class[3], what the anti-lockdown movement requires is political leadership.

It can scarcely be denied that lockdown terror is a form of fascism – albeit one that differs in significant ways from 20th century fascism. In the US, UK, Europe, Australia and New Zealand, the “New Normal” fascism is politically led by the mainstream capitalist parties and is strongly backed by ostensible “left” parties. It can thus appear that New Normal fascism is an example of the “left” in power. On this (mistaken) basis, some in the anti-lockdown movement view the extreme repression of the lockdowns as a form of “socialism” or “communism” – and even claim that Dictator Dan Andrews, other state Labor premiers, NZ Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and even Australian PM Scott Morrison are therefore “socialists” or “communists”. This is a striking misconception, but it is one that is unfortunately fueled by the fact that the nationalist caste leading the People’s Republic of China (PRC) imposed their own lockdowns, and played up to the fake “pandemic” narrative.[4]

“New Normal” is capitalism in decline

New Normal or lockdown fascism is delivered by capitalist imperialism, NOT by any form of socialism or “communism”. Capitalist ruling classes resort to fascism when the existing forms of supposed liberalism become barriers to the amount and extent of repression “needed” to annihilate working-class political opposition to their rule. While millions of workers lose their jobs, or have their wages and conditions frozen under lockdowns, finance capital expands the wealth of the billionaires.[5] Under “normal” conditions, there would be some fightback against millions of job losses, and the immense downward pressure on the price of labour-power, i.e., wages. Hence the lockdowns, mandatory facemask orders, social-distancing and New Normal fascism. Ditto for the concomitant and invasive surveillance of contact tracing, proposed mandatory vaccinations and border shutdowns.

In the same way in which 20th Century fascism could not be effectively combatted without wholesale political opposition to the capitalism from which it spawned, New Normal or lockdown fascism in the 21st Century cannot be seriously countered without working-class political opposition to the declining capitalism of the Anglo/US/EU Empire. Regardless of the current political make-up of the anti-lockdown movement, it represents foremost opposition to the nightmarish future of capitalist rule. Therefore, despite the political or non-political viewpoints of its component parts, the anti-lockdown movement is intrinsically anti-fascist and anti-capitalist. It is a contradiction born of the times, but this remains the case even if some of its leading elements consider themselves to be in a battle against “socialism”.

The anti-lockdown movement is gathering steam internationally, and Australia needs to emulate the hundreds of thousands who have mobilised recently in Germany, the UK, Ireland and New Zealand. It is possible that with an amalgamated movement which is prepared to mobilise again and again, government lockdowns could be rolled back. For this to come to pass, however, all wings of the anti-lockdown movement need to form a united front for common action. Currently the anti-lockdown movement is comprised of several detachments. Without pigeon-holing any individual, there is a moderate wing which favours lobbying parliamentarians, a President Trump supporting wing which includes QAnon followers, a wing concerned about forced vaccinations and the potential effects of 5G telecommunications infrastructure, and a wing rightly concerned about civil liberties and privacy.

Revolutionaries are faced with the dual task of uniting all wings of the anti-lockdown movement, while simultaneously seeking to win the most pro-working class elements over to the side of socialism – despite prevalent suspicion as to its historical and current forms. Marxists must also be alert to the possibility of exploiting the differences amongst the ruling class, with some parts pushing for a one or two year lockdown, and others pushing to re-open the economy. While lockdowns may be partially lifted without systemic change, the “Great Reset” with its attendant political repression will not be defeated without the building of a workers’ party which fights for a workers’ government.

WORKERS  LEAGUE

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@redfireonline.com

PO  Box  66   NUNDAH  QLD  4012

 

[1] https://www.sott.net/article/436327-Everything-You-Think-You-Know-About-Coronavirus (31-08-2020)

[2] https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/three-men-arrested-after-broadmeadows-anti-lockdown-protest-20200830-p55qr0.html (31-08-2020)

[3] https://redfireonline.com/2020/04/18/covid-19-savage-assault-under-the-guise-of-health/ (31-08-2020)

[4] https://redfireonline.com/2020/06/06/covid-19-the-corruption-of-science/ (31-08-2020)

[5] https://www.mintpressnews.com/super-rich-see-wealth-rise-282-billion-three-weeks-coronavirus/267027/ (31-08-2020)

The Labour Lieutenants of Lockdown Terror

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Police combine with the Australian Army to enforce “Covid-19” lockdowns. Image from the New York Times

The Labour Lieutenants of Lockdown Terror

25-08-2020: Throughout history, fascism has only been able to come to power in the absence of the firm pro-working class leadership of labour Unions, which is bound up with the question of the state of the organised left parties who claim to stand for socialism. Benito Mussolini and the Italian fascists were able to assume power in 1922 on the back of the inability of the Italian socialist and Communist parties to offer the workers a viable alternative in the aftermath of the First World War. Adolf Hitler and the German Nazis in 1933 were installed in power without even a scuffle in the streets after the by then thoroughly conservative Comintern virtually ordered the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) to do nothing other than run in elections against the fascists. In Spain in the 1930s, the left was unable to form a viable workers’ party which could have led insurgents to form their own state out of the Civil War, which led to the victory of Franco’s fascists who remained in power for decades.

Covid-19 bait and switch

Lockdown fascism in 2020 unfortunately forms no exception to the rule. The given rationale for lockdowns – that they are necessary to “stop the spread” of Covid-19 – is farcically absurd. Ditto for the millions of job cuts for workers, the forcible economic shutdown of businesses and vital parts of the economy, the suspension of parliament, the abolition of elementary civil and democratic rights, and the use of the armed forces to add to an even more draconian police state. To say these measures constitutes a “cure” which is worse than the disease barely begins to describe the crimes committed by the politicians of the West.  Even some United Nations (UN) agencies, who are politically liberal at best, warned that there could be 300 000 people dying per day in the underdeveloped countries due to the Corona shutdown of food production and supply lines.[1] Even if food production and distribution within the advanced countries had not been interrupted, the commercial airline industry has more or less closed down, nobbling the delivery of personnel and food aid.

This is not to mention the skyrocketing anxiety, depression and resulting suicides related to Covid-19 lockdowns. One study from Sydney University earlier this year estimated that suicides triggered by tyrannical lockdowns in Australia would exceed the number of deaths (allegedly) “from” Covid-19 by a factor of 10.[2] This should not be any wonder, given the indescribable repression the people of Melbourne are currently experiencing under “Stage 4” lockdowns. It can be reasonably argued that the extreme despotism imposed in Melbourne, ludicrously justified as part of a “fight” against a virus, exceeds the conditions experienced by German workers under the Nazis in the 1930s. The government has ordered the shutdown of some industries, throwing hundreds of thousands out of work. There is a curfew from 8pm to 5am every night, people are only allowed to exercise for one hour per day, they cannot travel more than 5 kilometres from their home, and only one person from each household is allowed out to obtain food. Police can enter any home without a warrant or permission, the Australian Army is used to ensure people are “isolating”. Protesting is illegal, weddings and funerals and basically any public gathering is illegal.[3] People who live alone arguably face isolation that amounts to torture, and children and students cannot attend school or University, and are reduced to being transfixed to a computer screen at home.

It is difficult to deny the claim that this mind-bending oppression constitutes a form of fascism. Granted, it differs from the fascism of Nazi Germany, Mussolini’s Italy and Franco’s Spain – but the essential elements remain. The main difference is that there has been no fascist or ultra-nationalist party which has taken power from the mainstream capitalist parties of Labor and Liberal. Lockdown fascism is imposed through the major parties, and through all the existing institutions of the capitalist state – including the “health” system. Indeed, the “health” moniker is used endlessly as a classic bait and switch. While the enormous power of the corporate media in league with the government points all accusing fingers towards a supposedly deadly virus, the political and economic attack on the working class sails through virtually unimpeded. The job cuts, the unemployment and the resulting downward pressure on wages and working conditions are the key to understanding the real motivation of the “pandemic”. Capitalism in crisis can only turn against the working class in order to save itself, and Covid-19 has given them the excuse to exert unyielding downward pressure on the cost of labour power, i.e., wages workers need to survive.

Lockdown left merges with the state

The ruling class resorts to fascism when the thin façade of liberal democracy is insufficient to deliver the political repression required for the rapid erosion of working-class wages and conditions. Under any other scenario, the sacking of up to a million workers would provoke a fightback from labour Unions and left parties. Yet from the very start of the Corona crisis, not only have the Union officials and the so-called left parties allowed mass sackings and the virtual elimination of almost all bourgeois democratic rights, they have effectively merged with the capitalist state against their own members and workers generally – even as this state descends into its own form of fascism. The scale of this class treachery is difficult to quantify.

What has become the “lockdown left” comprises three parts. The first is the ultra-conservative Union bureaucracy, the second is the liberal intelligentsia (a topic best broached elsewhere), and the third is the nominal left parties which make some claim to be “socialist”. Amongst these, the Union officialdom sets the tone for the other two quisling elements to bring up the rear. Betrayal of Union members by the top echelons of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) is apparent from day to day, but becomes particularly acute when working class leadership is desperately required. Not only has the ACTU abandoned Union members from the get-go of Corona, it crossed the Rubicon to join directly with the “captains of industry” over and against the direct interests of working people. On August 3, the ACTU co-signed an open letter with the Business Council of Australia (BCA) imploring the Federal Government to implement a Paid Pandemic Leave Scheme.[4] With cap in hand, the ACTU pleaded for this scheme to be paid for by the Federal and State governments. No wonder the BCA, the largest and most influential employer “Union” in the country, eagerly endorsed this – employers would not pay a cent!!

This open and undisguised collaboration with the capitalist class by the ACTU has two functions. Firstly, it saturates the working class with the arrant and relentless “pandemic” lies used as a cover for the unremitting class war being waged against them. Secondly, it yet again drums in the bourgeois lie that employers and employees are “all in this together”, and that “we” need to band together to “get through this crisis”. It should not need to be explained how this prevents the working class from even defending itself against the rain of blows it suffers under the brand name of Covid-19. It builds on mass disorientation and demoralisation of workers who are desperately seeking the means to fight back.

“Socialist” treason

One can understand workers who have little experience or involvement in active politics trying to find a way to explain the duality of a felt need to assist society with a claimed health issue alongside the urge to defend their class against a political and economic broadside. Yet we can scarcely offer any leniency in exposing those who have political experience, and can ironically quote Marx as if by rote, playing the role of police auxiliaries enforcing the Corona dictates of PM Scott Morrison and the arch reactionary Minister for Home Affairs Peter Dutton. We speak of the nominally “socialist” parties who have not the ghost of an idea that the corporate media and politicians are, surprise surprise, not telling the truth about how society should deal with a supposedly dangerous pathogen.

Socialist Action casually mention that domestic violence against women has increased by 75% “due to Covid-19” – yet they offer not one word of criticism of the lockdowns which are almost entirely responsible.[5] Socialist Alliance offer full-throated backing for lockdowns, but make a side-plea for nice ones, which include community organisations. This is not satire.[6] Socialist Alternative accept the “pandemic” narrative wholesale, and offer only a few grumbles about how “neoliberalism” has undermined funding for health and aged care services.[7] Continuing on the line of militantly demanding reforms, Solidarity take a stand not against scientifically groundless quarantines, but for quarantines to be run by government health workers, employed on secure conditions![8]

The “Stalinist” parties demonstrate a graphic example of just how pro-government “Marxism-Leninism” really is in practice. The Communist Party of Australia (CPA) makes mention of the fines of up to $20 000 for those in Victoria who refuse to “self-isolate” – but do not dare to even raise their hand in opposition.[9] The Australian Communist Party (ACP) does recognise the betrayal of the ACTU in working hand-in-glove with the Australian (Liberal) government on Corona crisis responses. At the same time, it does not realise it is also working with the government by swallowing the “pandemic” narrative.[10] The Communist Party of Australia Marxist-Leninist (CPA-ML) claim that workers have been “hit hard by Covid-19”.[11] It does not register with the CPA-ML that the ruling class is hitting the working class hard while using the excuse of Covid-19. The Communist Workers Party of Australia (CWPA) make no mention of the Corona crisis in the entirety of the first issue of their publication,[12] despite it being released just before the peak of the manic “second wave” lockdowns. The CWPA appear to assume that politics can continue as normal if we all just follow the Prime Minister and the corporate media on the coronavirus. What a sterling example of working-class leadership!

The “Trotskyist” parties, if anything, imbibe more “pandemic” Kool-Aid than others. The Socialist Equality Party (SEP), is known for campaigning hard for even harsher and longer lockdowns than even the conservative governments are prepared to enact.[13] The Australian section of the Spartacist League (SL) has not published anything on the Corona crisis to our knowledge. However, its US section condemns anti-lockdown protests as being full of supporters of President Trump.[14] They do not appear phased that, in practice, this places them politically to the right of Trump supporters – something that can be said for the entire lockdown left. The Trotskyist Platform take the cake as far as true believers of the politicians when it comes to Covid-19. So deeply do they believe the “pandemic” lies, they literally call for invasive mandatory temperature testing for workplaces of more than two people (!?), for nice food for those in lockdown, and for public housing residents to be locked down by health workers rather than cops!![15] The Bolshevik-Leninist project, a new Trotskyist organisation, has shown some promise in their initial forays. Yet they too fall for the litany of lies justifying barbaric and logic-defying lockdowns.[16]

Covid-19 is a class attack

By any measure, the circulation of a pathogen which is almost entirely harmless to all but a very small minority is being used by the ruling-class to launch an unprecedented attack on the working-class from whom it draws its private fortunes.[17] It is a clear class attack, from which workers need to defend themselves, using all means up to and including a generalised uprising. Standing in the way of this dire necessity are the overpaid and ultra-conservative Union officials, who are propped up by what should be a totally discredited “left”. Workers need to burn into their collective memories the fact that, at the first serious test, the Union officials and the lockdown left abandoned them to become the labour lieutenants of big capital. And this is big capital which is resorting to lockdown fascism in a desperate attempt to save the stock markets and the private ownership of the means of production.

Despite the appearance of lockdown terror being begrudgingly accepted by working people, this is in fact an illusion. This appearance would melt into the air if it were not for the epic betrayal of workers by Union officials and their lockdown left sidekicks. The bourgeoisie takes a huge gamble with the maintenance of its own rule when it turns to fascism. The imposition of lockdown fascism demonstrates the political and ideological exhaustion of capitalist “democracy”, and the urgency of its replacement with the foundations of socialist rule, where working people democratically control the levers of state power. Key to this task is the total rejection of the lockdown “left” and the forging of a workers’ party based on genuine Leninism. For workers and the oppressed, Corona tyranny is not a reason to despair, but is instead a clarion call to rise up and create a planned and collectivised economy where the wealth of society becomes the wealth of all.

 

WORKERS  LEAGUE

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@redfireonline.com

PO Box 66  NUNDAH  QLD  4012

 

[1] https://unglobalcompact.org/take-action/20th-anniversary-campaign/covid-related%20hunger-could-kill-more-people-than-the-virus (22-08-2020)

[2] https://www.rt.com/news/488070-australia-us-coronavirus-suicide-spike/ (22-08-2020)

[3] https://kyil-extra.com/melbourne-police-state/ (22-08-2020)

[4] https://www.actu.org.au/actu-media/media-releases/2020/actu-bca-joint-letter-pandemic-leave (23-08-2020)

[5] https://thesocialist.org.au/women-and-covid-19-inequalities-worsen/ (23-08-2020)

[6] https://socialist-alliance.org/news/humanitarian-response-covid19-restrictions (23-08-2020)

[7] https://redflag.org.au/node/7303 (23-08-2020)

[8] https://www.solidarity.net.au/highlights/andrews-failures-produced-melbourne-outbreak-not-slips-up-on-distancing/ (23-08-2020)

[9] https://www.cpa.org.au/guardian/2020/1927/05-victoria.html (23-08-2020)

[10] https://www.auscp.org.au/militant-monthly/2020/6/25/covid-and-the-new-accord (23-08-2020)

[11] http://www.cpaml.org/post4.php?id=1595806055&catitem1=Class%20Struggle%20and%20Socialism,%20Community%20and%20Environment&catid1=13 (23-08-2020)

[12] http://communistworkerspartyofaustralia.org.au/resources/The%20Agitator%20issue%20number%201.pdf (23-08-2020)

[13] https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/08/15/covi-a15.html (24-08-2020)

[14] https://www.icl-fi.org/english/wv/1174/covid.html (24-08-2020)

[15] https://www.trotskyistplatform.com/covid-19-is-causing-far-more-suffering-in-australia-than-it-should/ (24-08-2020)

[16] http://bolshevik-leninist.org/coronavirus-pandemic-exposes-the-naked-horror-of-capitalism/ (24-08-2020)

[17] https://redfireonline.com/2020/04/18/covid-19-savage-assault-under-the-guise-of-health/ (24-08-2020)

 

Belarus: Covid-19 Colour Revolution

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National Flag of Belarus

Belarus: Covid-19 Colour Revolution

20-08-2020: As sure as night follows day, any government which retains a shred of independence from the Anglo/US/EU Empire will, sooner or later, be targeted for regime change. In order to overthrow the recalcitrant government, the West will orchestrate an invasion, a war, or a colour revolution utilising faux “human rights” and “democracy” rhetoric. The colour revolution now besieging Belarus is no exception. Needless to say, a colour revolution is galaxies away from anything politically progressive, as it reflects the reactionary politics of their imperialist sponsors who fund, support and often organise “opposition” protests against a government they cannot control. In this case it is the Belarussian government headed by the overwhelmingly popular President Alexander Lukashenko. Whatever his faults may be, workers internationally cannot allow dark forces to overturn the government of a country which is practically a buffer state for Russia against imperialism.

Coronavirus the final trigger for destabilisation

Even though the US Empire has longed for the end of independence for Belarus for much of the 26 years of President Lukashenko’s term in office, the final straw for them was the refusal of Belarus to play along with the full-spectrum attack on the working class shrouded under the rubric of “Covid-19”. Under Lukashenko, Belarusians were spared the onerous political and psychological repression of  “coronavirus” lockdowns, farcical facemask orders, job cuts and economic shutdowns. Even though the Western elite powers grated at the fact that Belarus never effectively de-Sovietised, and retained a huge proportion of state ownership of the economy after the collapse of the former Soviet Union, they simply could not tolerate the exposure, let alone defiance, of the mountains of “pandemic” lies.[1] While punters continued to bet on the Belarusian football league, as it was one of the only ones not to be shutdown, President Lukashenko correctly referred to Covid-19 hysteria as a “psychosis”. His concern, eminently confirmed by the self-inflicted economic and social devastation besetting Europe and the West, was that panic will do more damage than the virus itself.[2]

Even though Lukashenko was prepared to make some moves towards some privatisation of state assets, he still stressed that Belarus does not need privatisation that causes job losses.[3] Despite these pro-worker moves, he also played a very dangerous game of strategically tilting towards the West and, incredibly, NATO, while warning against a totally imagined Russian threat to Belarusian sovereignty.[4] Andrew Korybko plausibly argues that Lukashenko’s attempt to pivot to the West in order to balance between Russia and the US was a major error, as all it did was encourage the pro-Western colour revolution elements within Belarus.[5] These are the “protestors” currently on the streets.

Foreign liberals flock to protest

The Belarusian government was more than aware of the detailed plans made for foreign backed subversion. President Lukashenko warned that there would be no repeat of a “Maidan” – referring to the NATO backed coup in Ukraine in 2014, which installed a pro-US cabal backed by virulently anti-socialist and anti-Russian barbarians (the “UkroNazis”). He warned that citizens from Poland, the Ukraine, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic and Russia had travelled to Belarus to be a part of the manufactured protests against the August 9 Presidential election.[6] Not only that, reactionary “solidarity” actions with the attempted Western backed coup in Belarus took place in Russia, Germany, Poland, Ukraine and Romania, conveniently holding placards written in English.[7] The dead giveaway that these actions serve only US and EU imperialism were some demands to hold an emergency EU summit, and the universal use of the red and white banded flag initially used when the former Soviet Union collapsed. A referendum in 1995 restored the predominantly green and red flag modeled on the flag of the Belarus Soviet Socialist Republic.

On August 16, the Belarusian Armed Forces announced large scale military drills near the Grodno region bordering Poland and Lithuania.[8] While such acts are necessary to defend Belarus against possible military incursions, on their own they may not be enough to overcome the political and propaganda war constantly waged by the West via their “democracy NGOs”. The “human rights industrial complex” is skillfully wielded by imperial agents to besmirch Russia, and Lukashenko as a Russian government adjunct – which is anything but the case. Yet economic and military integration with Russia is the most logical. In 1995, Russia and Belarus agreed to allow their citizens to live and work in either country at their discretion, while retaining their passports and national identity.[9] Added to the fact that 100% of Belarusians speak Russian, the close economic, cultural and linguistic ties are somewhat natural. It is the severing of these ties, and the tilt of Belarus towards the EU and the US that is the aim of the Western organised and funded election “protests”.

Even though the Russian government played along with its own brand of Coronavirus repression, the military encirclement of Russia by the US and EU remains a grave danger, and especially to Belarus. While a military alliance of Belarus and Russia may temporarily stave off the eminent physical danger, the political danger will remain. The self-inflicted Covid-19 depression in the West is but one sign of the political desperation of the elites in the service of finance capital. Workers in Belarus and internationally should remain in a temporary bloc with Lukashenko against the coronavirus plot, and in a tactical alliance with Russian President Vladimir Putin against US and EU imperialism. However, neither Lukashenko nor Putin can be political allies in the battles the working class needs to wage to emerge victorious over all manifestations of Corona tyranny – the current facemask of capitalist imperialism. The key task remains the binding of the most class aware elements into a Marxist vanguard, linked through international sections to help raise workers to their rightful position as defenders of a triumphant socialist order.

WORKERS  LEAGUE

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@redfireonline.com

PO  Box  66  NUNDAH  QLD  4012

[1] https://off-guardian.org/2020/08/16/belarus-in-the-firing-line-for-a-colour-revolution/ (18-08-2020)

[2] https://www.baltictimes.com/lukashenko__coronavirus_is_psychosis/ (18-08-2020)

[3] https://eng.belta.by/president/view/lukashenko-there-will-be-changes-but-they-have-to-be-civilized-131325-2020/ (18-08-2020)

[4] https://naviny.belsat.eu/en/news/lukashenka-counts-on-west-nato-support-in-case-of-russian-aggression/ (18-08-2020)

[5] https://foreignpolicynews.org/2020/08/15/lukashenko-has-no-one-to-blame-but-himself-for-belarus-color-revolution-unrest/ (18-08-2020)

[6] https://tass.com/world/1187689 (19-08-2020)

[7] https://www.euronews.com/2020/08/13/in-pictures-across-europe-thousands-are-rallying-in-support-of-the-belarus-protests (19-08-2020)

[8] https://southfront.org/belarus-kicks-off-large-scale-military-drills-near-poland-lithuania-lukashenko-is-losing-propaganda-war-to-western-backed-opposition/ (19-08-2020)

[9] https://www.globalresearch.ca/turmoil-belarus-another-us-color-revolution-attempt/5721213 (19-08-2020)

Barefaced Lies Enable Lockdown Catastrophe

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Image from Al Jazeera

Barefaced Lies Enable Lockdown Catastrophe

05-08-2020 – “Dictator Dan” Andrews, the Premier of Victoria, has declared a “state of disaster” in Australia’s second most populous state. Unleashing the harshest lockdown yet, draconian new rules will mean people can exercise for only one hour per day, only one person from each household will be permitted to go to the shops each day for food, and people will not be permitted to travel more than 5 kilometres from home. Incredibly, a nightly curfew between 8pm and 5pm will be enforced.[1] Many “non-essential” businesses will be forced to close, sending them to the wall. It is unknown how many workers will lose their jobs and will be pushed into the misery of unemployment. Undeniably, a tsunami of anxiety and depression will decimate the mental health of perhaps hundreds of thousands of innocent people. To top it off, residents of Melbourne are already forced to wear facemasks in public, or face state prosecution. It can be plausibly argued that this scenario exceeds the totalitarianism experienced in the worst days of Nazi Germany during the 1930s.

Lockdown lies

The claim that lockdowns, facemasks and social distancing are needed to deal with a coronavirus cannot be made with a straight face. Yet this is the official justification for the largest and most terrifying assault on working people this century. A curfew from 8pm to 5am quite obviously has nothing to do with a virus, or healthcare – it is little more than a vulgar display of power, with an ulterior motive. Lockdowns kill indiscriminately, even just from the increase in unemployment. Higher mortality rates result from higher unemployment, without any additional factors. A study quoted by United Nations officials – who are hardly radicals – found that 10 000 children per month would be likely to be killed by the lockdowns and school closures.[2] The study, published in the prestigious The Lancet medical journal, estimated that physical distancing, school closures, trade restrictions and country-wide lockdowns will significantly worsen global child malnutrition. Many doctors have spoken out against lockdowns, warning that they will cause more death than the coronavirus itself.

There is not a skerrick of scientific evidence for state or national border shutdowns, but this is precisely what has been enacted. This has almost wiped out the travel and tourism industry, throwing untold number of workers on the scrapheap. Virgin Australia has just announced that 3000 of its 9000 strong workforce would be sacked, and warned that there could be more job losses.[3] Virgin airlines took on many of the domestic flights within Australia, many of which have been halted due to state border shutdowns. Such job cuts would scarcely be tolerated by workers and their Unions if it was not for the false cover of “Covid-19”. In fact, it is not difficult to see that the coronavirus excuse has been used by many employers and various sections of capital to take an axe to workers’ jobs and wages.

While many workers understandably reel from the repeated body blows, big capital’s state media rapidly increase censorship of views which contradict lockdown fascism, even from those most qualified to do so. A group referred to as the Frontline Doctors in the US conducted a press conference on the steps of Capital Hill, where they relayed their experiences of treating Covid-19 affected patients with Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), Zinc and Azithromycin. HCQ is an anti-malarial drug which is cheap and has been used effectively for around 70 years. The Frontline Doctors claimed that HCQ not only helps inhibit the Covid-19 respiratory illness (not the virus itself), but can cure it. They stated that of the hundreds of Covid-19 patients they have treated, not one has passed away.[4] They were adamant that no one needs to die from this latest coronavirus.

There was an instant take up of viewers of this video online, until in stepped Facebook, Twitter and Youtube – who removed it!  These Big Tech giants, operating on behalf of big capital, joined with Big Pharma to censor vital information that could be used to alleviate or even end the lockdown nightmare. For their part, once the Frontline Doctors knew about this censorship, they once again risked their careers to hold another press conference reaffirming that the public has a right to know about a cure for Covid-19.[5] Harvey Risch, a Professor of Epidemiology at Yale University, stresses that a cure for Covid-19 exists (HCQ), and we need to start using it. He also said that Hydroxychloroquine is being used in the media to define who is “left-wing” and who is “right-wing”.[6] This is of course NOT how any study of medicine should proceed.

The ABC state media immediately pounced and tried to counter a possible groundswell of support for HCQ. One of its articles claimed that HCQ is a poor treatment for Covid-19, and that it has become “right-wing ideology”[7] !!  The absurdity of claiming that denial of the preventative and healing qualities of HCQ in relation to Covid-19 is “left-wing” should be apparent to all. HCQ is being censored by the corporatised ABC for nothing if not the obvious fact that it destroys the mantra that the governments of the imperialist West have been repeating for months – that the only way Covid-19 can be dealt with is via a vaccine.  At the same time, there are some indications that the US government is in on the attempted cover up of HCQ, by purchasing huge quantities of Remsdesivir – a drug which, at best, has only minimal effectiveness as an anti-viral. The US Department of Health and Human Services recently spent $1.6 billion buying up supplies of Gilead corporation’s Remsdesivir, at a cost of $3200 per dose – compared to $12 to $18 for a normal flu vaccine.[8] The global architects of lockdown will pay almost any price to prevent their exposure.

“Conspiracy theory” lies

Even the notion of people protesting against the adverse health effects of radiation from the 5G telecommunications networks is used by the ABC to slur protestors as allegedly pro-Kremlin conspiracy theorists.[9] The alternative website Global Research is slammed as being “pro-Kremlin” for having the temerity to question the Anglo/US Empire’s relentless war provocations against Russia. This is despite the fact that the Russian government itself enforced harsh lockdowns and would thereby cease to be an object of admiration of the anti-lockdown movement – if it ever was. The ABC and the entire liberal establishment cannot tolerate information such as that which Global Research disseminates. It contains a mixture of views, but generally speaking its material is anti-war and anti-imperialist. It may also contain unsubstantiated “conspiracy theories”, but of course many “conspiracy theories” also contain many facts. What the liberal political establishment cannot allow is information which condemns the entirety of the bourgeois political system and seeks answers outside it. “Conspiracy theorists” do not believe in any form of (capitalist) liberal democracy, with good reason. This is the main reason why they are besmirched as being weird non-conformists by liberal reformers of the establishment, which includes the lockdown left.[10]

The unfortunate fact is that lockdown fascism, like all forms of fascism, cannot tolerate dissenting views, let alone civil debate. The “Corona Nazis” arrogantly claim that science is on their side, despite reacting viscerally to the slightest suggestion that there might be a better way to deal with Covid-19. Lockdown fanatics also dismiss out of hand the very real concerns the anti-lockdown movement has about the loss of civil and democratic rights, the loss of privacy and the intrusion of the (capitalist) state into virtually all facets of human interaction with society. The lockdown left, suffering from an extreme case of Trump Derangement Syndrome, denigrate anyone opposing lockdowns for being right-wing hacks and conspiracy theorists. They of course have not the ghost of an idea how right-wing their own political position is – strengthening the very system which has to resort to a form of fascism simply in order to survive.

Testing lies

The diabolical Corona repression in Melbourne is primarily motivated by one huge lie – that a positive test for Covid-19 indicates something traumatic or dangerous. It is difficult to describe the extent of the distortion of science of “testing” repeated endlessly by capitalist politicians, the corporate media, overpaid Union officials, self-described “left” parties and those who have simply been terrorised into repeating logical contradictions. For one thing, the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) laboratory technique which is supposedly used to “test” for Covid-19 was never intended as a diagnosis. Its inventor, Dr Kary Mullis, repeatedly stressed throughout his career that the detection of a viral strain using the PCR technique is not to be confused with a diagnosis of any disease which may have some relation to a virus.[11] The high sensitivity of the PCR technique can produce false positive results, while its high specificity may produce false negative results. A whole range of other clinical data referring to the individual must be considered as a whole BEFORE any diagnosis can be attempted.[12] The most important is the question of whether the individual displays any symptoms, are they feeling sick enough to see a doctor or go to a hospital, and so on.

More to the point, the PCR technique is NOT a test for the Covid-19 disease. Even if the PCR “test” does correctly identify the presence of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, this does not at all mean that the individual will at any time develop the Covid-19 respiratory illness. That outcome is only one, largely remote, possibility. The PCR “test” may also simply be detecting part of the viral remnants of SARS-CoV-2 which have already been combatted and defeated by the individual’s immune system. The PCR technique is also an amplification process, rather like the “blowing up” of small text to a readable level on a photocopier. The increase in small amounts of a viral strain so they can be observed by the human eye presents an obvious distortion for analytical purposes. One vital indicator of the chance of developing the Covid-19 respiratory illness is the viral load (somewhat like the total amount) the individual is carrying. Yet the PCR test cannot determine this. In short, the SARS-CoV-2 virus, even if correctly identified, may be a world away from the Covid-19 respiratory illness.[13] From the false positives, false negatives, lack of assessment of overall health and medical history, the disjuncture of the virus from the illness, to the inability to tally viral load, the Covid-19 PCR tests are scientifically meaningless.[14]

Anti-lockdown movement must combat lies

It is not enough to expose the lies of Dictator Dan, the politicians, the corporate media, conservative Union officials and their fake “left” acolytes. The lies must be combatted, and the anti-lockdown movement is in an ideal situation to do this. It is unfortunate that the disparate small groups and individuals who oppose lockdown fascism are forced to fend for themselves, where they should be assisted by anyone who imagines themselves to stand for workers’ rights. However, we have witnessed a level of class treachery from the Union officials and the lockdown left[15] which is simply staggering to consider in terms of a qualitative and quantitative assessment. This is the primary reason why the anti-lockdown movement may appear, on the surface, to be a combination of “right-wing” nationalists, “conspiracy theorists” and supporters of US President Trump. Yet this is an illusion.

Lockdown fascism uses lies, fear and bullying to enforce submission. However, the anti-lockdown movement must not be intimidated, for the obvious and glaring logical contradictions of the Corona fanatics are easily exposed. They are best exposed by mass public demonstrations which confront and condemn the blatantly illegal lockdown measures. The German people are taking the lead in this vital work, with perhaps 1 million marching against lockdown restrictions on August 1.[16] From observation, these and other demonstrations have included ALL those opposed to the lockdowns, whether they be left or “right”, opponents of 5G telecommunications, forced vaccinations, peace and anti-war activists, socialists or nationalists, civil and democratic rights defenders and more. That is the basis of its strength, and this must be replicated internationally.

Marxists are confronted with the task of working within the anti-lockdown movement, both in order to help it win victory, and also to influence it towards socialism. Given the perfidious antics of the lockdown left, it is understandable that sections of the anti-lockdown movement peremptorily dismiss what they see as “socialism”. Despite this, large sections of the working class would be willing to fight lockdown fascism if they saw a movement against the totalitarian Corona nightmare making gains, welcoming all those willing to stand for basic rights, and providing a lead for working and oppressed people.

Manufactured Corona terrorism is ultimately an expression of capitalist imperialism devouring itself. It can be difficult given onerous lockdown oppression, but workers should not despair. There is reason for hope, and there are already signs that many others are risking police harassment and persecution to help win freedom from unjust and virtually uncontrolled state crackdowns. Underground organising may be required to link those who instinctively lead struggles for liberation. A harmonious, rational and humane society is on offer provided working people are prepared to fight the ideological darkness of lockdown tyranny.

 

WORKERS  LEAGUE

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@redfireonline.com

PO Box 66  NUNDAH  QLD  4012

 

 

 

[1] https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/6860277/victoria-declares-state-of-disaster-and-increases-restrictions-to-stage-four/ (05-08-2020)

[2] https://summit.news/2020/07/29/un-officials-cite-study-that-finds-lockdowns-school-closures-killing-more-children-than-covid/ (05-08-2020)

[3] https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/virgin-to-shift-headquarters-to-south-brisbane-as-massive-job-losses-bite-20200805-p55iss.html (05-08-2020)

[4] https://www.bitchute.com/video/0rIIAs9UCMV6/ (05-08-2020)

 

[5] https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2020/07/29/frontline-doctors-on-censorship-were-coming-after-you-big-tech-we-will-not-be-silenced/ (05-08-2020)

[6] https://www.newsweek.com/key-defeating-covid-19-already-exists-we-need-start-using-it-opinion-1519535?fbclid=IwAR0SNQAzBt4xuadKsAWTJCjNA1xLjlfHTqoZuENr3ReCrSKfwgqtpABLO2k (05-08-2020)

[7] https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2020-08-01/hydroxychloroquine-coronavirus-drug-now-right-wing-ideology/12510812 (05-08-2020)

[8] https://www.globalresearch.ca/remdesivir-covid-19-1-6-billion-modestly-beneficial-drug/5717690 (05-08-2020)

[9] https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-08-03/5g-conspiracy-theory-investigation-coronavirus-health/12507368 (05-08-2020)

[10] https://redfireonline.com/2020/04/25/the-left-and-the-coronavirus/ (10-08-2020)

[11] https://degraw.substack.com/ (09-08-2020)

[12] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2654605/ (09-08-2020)

[13] https://virologydownunder.com/covid-19-is-not-a-virus-but-sars-cov-2-is/ (09-08-2020)

[14] https://off-guardian.org/2020/06/27/covid19-pcr-tests-are-scientifically-meaningless/ (09-08-2020)

[15] https://redfireonline.com/2020/07/13/the-covid-19-siege-of-melbourne/ (09-08-2020)

[16] https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/08/thousands-germans-protest-coronavirus-restrictions-200801161142837.html (09-08-2020)

 

The Covid-19 Siege of Melbourne

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Police “guard” public housing towers in Melbourne. Image from http://www.sbs.com.au

The Covid-19 Siege of Melbourne

12-07-2020: Melbourne is currently enduring a medieval siege by the state, with a return to “stage 3” lockdowns for the whole city, and “hard” lockdowns for nine public housing towers, including Flemington and North Melbourne. No notice was given[1], and police were deployed to prevent residents leaving for any reason. Police effectively barricaded people inside their own units and were often deployed to each floor of the towers. The flimsy rationale for such action was an alleged increase in coronavirus “cases”, supposedly found amongst some residents after “testing positive” for Covid-19. This, along with the entire Covid-19 narrative, is little more than a torrent of lies. Even the moderate Australian Greens, who nonetheless back nonsensical lockdowns, wrote a letter to Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews complaining that there was no notice given to the public housing residents, who were locked in their homes without any information as to how they would secure essential provisions such as food and medicine.[2] The full force of the state has been levied against some of the most socially disadvantaged in the community, who have been made scapegoats in a vicious political game.

Public housing residents aware they are an easy target

Covid-19 is a false pretext for the largest assault on the conditions of the working class since the 1930s.[3] The removal of basic civil and democratic rights, such as freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, not to speak of freedom of movement, is selectively applied so as to intimidate working people, not their “masters”. For example, billionaire Seven West owner Kerry Stokes was granted an exemption for hotel quarantine on his return to Western Australia, in his private jet, after holidaying on the ski slopes of Aspen, Colorado.[4] Meanwhile, participants of a birthday party in Melbourne were raided by police after being tipped off by paramedics ordering Kentucky Fried Chicken themselves in the early hours. The ambulance officers overheard others ordering 20 meals and reported it, so police then traced motor vehicle licence plates to locate an address. They stormed the residence and issued 16 people with $1652.00 fines, totaling around $26 000.[5] This mind-boggling repression for entirely innocent recreational activity is an indication of the scale and gravity of Covid-19 political repression.

The public housing residents of Melbourne subjected to the brutal siege are more than aware of why they were chosen as guinea-pigs. Such a siege could not have been carried out against wealthy residents of well-heeled suburbs such as Toorak or Malvern. Only public housing residents – some of the most marginalised in society – could be given four sausage rolls over 48 hours for food without provoking a mass outcry. The public housing residents resisted in whichever way they could, with some posting placards at their windows reading..”Treat Us As Humans!…not as caged animals… end this lockdown!….Effective immediately..”.[6]  Public housing residents of African origin in Melbourne, especially some in Flemington, had previously been harassed by police over alleged gang violence.

Denial of science

Even a fleeting glance at alternative media will reveal the grand deception which is taking place under the rubric of Covid-19. A still more brief sojourn investigating the science of viruses exposes the sheer criminality of Western politicians, which have unfortunately been mimicked by the politicians governing many independent countries who remain in the cross hairs of imperialism. The corporate media has given up trying to scare people with death counts, as the real numbers of deaths solely attributed to Covid-19 is numerically insignificant. Assuming the federal governments figures are correct, even they admit only 107 deaths currently attributed to Covid-19.[7]  107 is virtually nothing compared to the overall mortality rate, even on a daily basis. Due to Australia’s population, one person passes away every 3 minutes and 15 seconds from all causes.[8] Put another way, around 450 people in Australia pass away every single day. If there have been 107 TOTAL deaths from Covid-19 over a seven-month period, this represents 0.1% of the approximately 94 500 deaths that have occurred this year. No matter which way the numbers are counted, Covid-19 “deaths” are infinitesimal.

This is why the corporate media has switched to flashing numbers of “cases” of Covid-19, figuring that these numbers will be higher, and this will be able to be more easily spun into a web of fear. Yet again,  here there are only more brazen lies spewing forth from politicians and bought out health officials. They are deeming anyone who “tests positive” to Covid-19 as a “case”. For one thing, the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) technique which is being used to detect Covid-19 was never meant to be used as a means of diagnosing illness. It was invented as a laboratory technique to help identify viral strains. Its inventor, the Nobel Prize winning Kary Mullis, passed away last year.[9] If he was with us today, he would be horrified at the PCR technique being used as a test for anything. As someone who did not withhold his opinions for fear of offending “official” science or society, Kary Mullis would today be screaming about the misuse of the PCR technique if he had lived until 2020. The PCR technique may be able to detect the presence of some indicator of the Covid-19 viral strain, but it cannot indicate whether someone will develop the disease that could potentially be associated with the virus.

In fact, medicos have to use the Reverse Transcription PCR technique (RT-PCR), because Covid-19 is only present in RNA, not DNA. Even if it does detect Covid-19 in someone’s RNA, it cannot identify the viral load, or how much of the virus is present. Huge amounts of the virus are required for anyone to develop any discernable symptoms, let alone begin to feel ill. Then there is the question of asymptomatic carriers, which even the totally compromised World Health Organisation (WHO) admits, can only spread the virus “very rarely”.[10] In reality, those who have no symptoms are not contagious.

Yet even if it was, natural or herd immunity remains the best way to deal with a virus. A virus must be allowed to spread amongst those with healthy immune systems (those aged under 65, and without underlying health conditions) in order to reach the herd immunity threshold (HIT). The HIT is the point at which a virus exhausts itself because it can no longer find enough carriers who have not already developed natural immunity. And we now know that the HIT for Covid-19 is as low as between 10-20%, NOT 70% as originally thought.[11]  It is most likely that Covid-19 had time to circulate, and therefore reach the quite low HIT, BEFORE the end of March, which was when the absurd lockdown and illogical social-distancing measures started to be enforced. The isolation measures therefore did not contain the virus, as this was scarcely the intention. They did, however, destroy the economies of many countries and many lives through unemployment, poverty, loneliness, depression, untreated illness, anxiety, famine and so on.[12]

Class position of lockdowns

It is not that the lockdown left (self-proclaimed “socialists”), following the lead of the overpaid Union officialdom, are scientifically illiterate per se – though they currently demonstrate this in spades. The lockdown left have strongly advocated for lockdowns – and by extension, for a police state, for the elimination of civil and democratic rights for working people, for the abolition of freedom of movement, i.e., for capitalism and imperialism – due to the fact that the question of the lockdowns most immediately defines one’s class position. That is to say, those who oppose the lockdowns stand with the working and oppressed masses, while those who defend the lockdowns stand with big capital. This remains the case irrespective of the claimed or self-identifying political viewpoints of those on either side of the lockdown barricades.

It is a huge error to assume that the left-wing position on the contrived coronavirus hysteria is the advocacy and policing of lockdowns and social distancing. This is only the position of the lockdown “left”, who occupy a universe light years away from even a basic defence of working class interests, let alone socialism.[13] No party can claim even the smallest grain of loyalty to “Marxism” while simultaneously assisting the entire apparatus of the capitalist state in its drive to enforce severe political repression against workers. To take the bourgeoisie at its word with claims that lockdowns and social distancing are “public health measures” is but a tragicomical farce. The fact that the lockdown left deeply believe the Covid-19 lies of the uber elite is proof positive that they act as the activist wing of social-democracy, i.e., the “liberal” wing of the ruling class.

Due to the fact that capitalism has long ceased to be in a period of expansion – this period arguably ended around 1975 – social-democratic liberalism is no longer progressive in any political sense. The 1970s was probably the last era that Marxists and liberals could potentially work together as allies against political conservatives. In that time, it was arguably even possible for socialists to work within the Labor Party. Obviously, those times are long gone, but the lockdown left has hung on to formulas which were possibly applicable four decades ago. This is one reason why they have steadily moved to the right over the last 20 years. What used to be social democracy is now indistinguishable from the conservatives they formerly opposed. The lockdown left is still tied to this right-wing social democracy, despite claiming in words to stand for some type of “socialism”. This has caused much political disorientation amongst workers and has even caused many workers to reject this false leftism and move towards the political right.

What this has also led to is the fact that working-class opposition to the Covid-19 assault has been expressed through some who are unfairly labelled as “conspiracy theorists” and even those associated with the nationalist right. Yet it is entirely inappropriate to label opponents of lockdowns as “right-wing anti-science nutters” – as the liberal lockdown left is wont to do. As we have indicated, it is in fact the lockdown left who deny the basic science of viruses. While there are those amongst the anti-lockdown movement who research so-called conspiracy theories, and those who have quite principled grounds for opposition to forced vaccinations and the lack of safety precautions for the expansion of the 5G telecommunications network, these views are not universal. Rather, the overwhelming majority of the anti-lockdown movement are composed of those who are rightly concerned about the increasing political power of the state over individuals, and the concomitant removal of civil and democratic rights which were formerly taken for granted.

Build the anti-lockdown movement

It is evident that the forces of what has historically been regarded as the “left” are now mere appendages of the state, and are therefore entrenched in the capitalist right, regardless of their proclamations. The treacherous Union bureaucracy enforced the specious Covid-19 narrative on their members and workers generally, fully aware that it was part of a preparation for imperialist war against China, Russia, Iran and any real or imagined enemy of Anglo/US imperialism. They were slavishly tailed by the lockdown left, i.e., putative “left” parties, who plumbed new depths of class treason by parroting the Prime Minister, every state Premier and the corporate media as they imposed pitiless lockdowns against workers. Patently, these turncoats must be unmasked before the masses.

The horror of re-imposed lockdowns in Melbourne may be extended to other states, new facemask rules introduced, semi-permanent social-distancing and contract tracing, and much more, unless and until there are sustained protests and/or a popular uprising against Corona tyranny. The ruling class will not cede political authority gained through deception unless it is torn from them through struggle. Working people must resist the “new normal”, and forge bonds which break through the traditional labels of “left” and “right”. All those who oppose lockdowns must be united into a powerful movement.

At the same time, the tasks for socialists in such a movement are two-fold. Tactically, there is a need to work alongside those who oppose lockdowns even if they also hold views usually seen as antithetical to Marxism, e.g., anti-China, “pro-life”, a denial of climate collapse, or endorsement of US President Donald Trump. Strategically, there is a vital need to find the ways and means to convince opponents of lockdowns that there will be no escape from Corona tyranny, and whatever they are preparing us for, until the working class is mobilised to overthrow the rule of finance capital and replace it with a socialist order. As difficult as this task is, the forging of a vanguard party based on genuine Leninism will lower the political barriers and could unleash the power the millions strong proletariat.

WORKERS  LEAGUE

www.redfireonline.com

E: workersleague@redfireonline.com

PO  Box  66   NUNDAH  QLD  4012

[1] https://www.rmit.edu.au/news/all-news/2020/jul/melbourne-tower-lockdowns (11-07-2020)

[2] https://www.corowafreepress.com.au/national/2020/07/10/1441159/demand-for-melbourne-tower-lockdown-probe (11-07-2020)

[3] https://redfireonline.com/2020/04/18/covid-19-savage-assault-under-the-guise-of-health/ (11-07-2020)

[4] https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/apr/23/kerry-stokes-near-aspen-colorado-quarantine-exemption-private-jet-perth (11-07-2020)

[5] https://7news.com.au/lifestyle/health-wellbeing/illegal-house-party-unravelled-by-observant-paramedics-on-a-kfc-run-c-1158022 (11-07-2020)

6 https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/national/2020/07/09/public-housing-coronavirus-test/?fbclid=IwAR1TVQNT7bZGS-TIdrwBcFNc3FWM-8OEVKx4pc5d3xlTzQRFno7aFbokqyw (11-07-2020)

[7] https://www.health.gov.au/news/health-alerts/novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov-health-alert/coronavirus-covid-19-current-situation-and-case-numbers (11-07-2020)

[8]https://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs%40.nsf/94713ad445ff1425ca25682000192af2/1647509ef7e25faaca2568a900154b63?OpenDocument (11-07-2020)

[9] https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/kary-mullis–inventor-of-the-pcr-technique–dies-66256 (11-07-2020)

[10] https://www1.racgp.org.au/newsgp/clinical/who-official-clarifies-misleading-position-on-asym (11-07-2020)

[11] https://off-guardian.org/2020/07/07/second-wave-not-even-close/ (11-07-2020)

[12] https://www.globalresearch.ca/the-test-set-another-brick-in-the-covid-19-disinformation-game-plan/5717040 (11-07-2020)

[13] https://redfireonline.com/2020/04/25/the-left-and-the-coronavirus/ (12-07-2020)