EDITORIAL
Say No to Their Bloody Wars!

Aug 7, 2023

What follows is the editorial that appeared on the front of all SPARK’s workplace newsletters, during the week of Jul 30, 2023.

The Russia-Ukraine war has settled into a classic war of attrition, with battles raging for months over small bits of territory or a few streets in a village. Thousands are being killed on both sides. The carnage is so bad, most of the professional soldiers have already been either killed or wounded. In the place of trained soldiers, both governments have been throwing poorly trained and poorly armed soldiers directly into battle. Many of these fresh troops are also much older and are being killed much more quickly.

How many have been killed and wounded so far? The U.S. government refuses to say. U.S. officials want to hide from the American public just how bloody this war really is. On the contrary, they glorify this bloodbath in order to gain greater public support for it.

The U.S. government justifies this war by saying that it has to stop Vladimir Putin, who the news media call a madman. That’s their usual lie. They always demonize the other side. Remember how U.S. officials labeled Saddam Hussein a madman, with weapons of mass destruction? It was just a convenient excuse to invade Iraq to take control of its oil.

In reality, U.S. officials have been laying the groundwork for war in Ukraine since the 1990s, after the old Soviet Union split into 15 separate countries. That break-up provided the opening for the big U.S. oil companies, mining companies, timber companies, and banks to try to get their hands on Russia’s vast natural resources.

Their goal, as well, is to greatly enhance the dominant position of the U.S. military over the entire world. But standing in their way have been Russian rulers and oligarchs, who control the region and its wealth. So, the U.S. bribed and threatened corrupt Ukrainian rulers to align with the U.S. side against Russia. When the U.S. government began to arm Ukraine against Russia, it provoked a war to weaken and bleed Russia.

No, the U.S. government is not financing and arming the Ukrainian military to help defend the Ukrainian population. Just the opposite. The U.S. government is using the Ukrainian population to fight a war against Russia for the profit of the U.S. capitalist class.

History shows that this war is going to get worse. Even if there is an eventual truce, the U.S. capitalists will continue to pursue their profit conquest. And that means we are on the road to a bigger, all-out war. It’s why the U.S. military and its NATO allies are furiously arming themselves. It’s why the U.S. is using NATO to mobilize a big troop build-up along the Russian border.

Today, to a lot of workers here, the war in Ukraine seems far away, like a lot of other wars. But that is likely to change very quickly. And when it does, U.S. rulers will expect workers in this country to sacrifice even more, to accept lowering our standard of living to pay for the war, and to accept to be sent off to fight and die for the enrichment of a handful of U.S. billionaires and their families.

Workers in this country have no reason to accept this.

The only justifiable war for U.S. workers is a war against all those who profit from our labor, all those capitalist blood suckers who fatten themselves off of our blood, sweat and tears. Workers need to tear down their entire rotten system. Our fight starts right here.