As The 100th Anniversary Of The Beginning of World War I (Remember The War To End All Wars) Starts ... Some Remembrances-Russian Revolutionary Leon Trotsky On The Anti-War Movement From War And The International   

 

The events leading up to World War I from the massive military armament of almost all the capitalist and imperialist parties in Europe and elsewhere in order to stake their claims to their unimpeded share of the world’s resources to the supposedly eternal pledges by the Social-Democrats and other militant leftist formations representing the historic interest of the international working-class to stop those parties in their tracks at the approach of war were decisive for 20^th century history. The ability to inflict industrial-sized slaughter and mayhem on a massive scale first portended toward the end of the American Civil War once the Northern industrial might tipped the scales their way almost could not be avoided in the early 20^th century once the armaments race got serious, and the technology seemed to grow exponentially with each new turn in the war machine.

The land war, the war carried out by the “grunts,” by the “cannon fodder” of many nations was only the tip of the iceberg and probably except for the increased cannon-power and rapidity of the machine-guns would be carried out by the norms of the last war. However the race for naval supremacy, or the race to take a big kink out of British supremacy, went on unimpeded as Germany tried to break-out into the Atlantic world and even Japan, Jesus, Japan tried to gain a big hold in the Asia seas. The deeply disturbing submarine warfare wreaking havoc on commerce on the seas, the use of armed aircraft and other such technological innovations of war only added to the frenzy. We can hundred years ahead, look back and see where talk of “stabs in the back” by the losers and ultimately an armistice rather than decisive victory on the blood-drenched fields of Europe would lead to more blood-letting but it was not clear, or nobody was talking about it much, or, better, doing much about calling a halt before they began among all those “civilized” nations who went into the abyss in July of 1914. Sadly the list of those who would not do anything, anything concrete, besides paper manifestos issued at international conferences, included the great bulk of the official European labor movement which in theory was committed to stopping the madness.

A few voices, voices like Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg in Germany, Lenin and Trotsky in Russia, some anti-war anarchists like Monette in France and here in America Big Bill Haywood and the stalwart Eugene V. Debs, were raised and one hundred years later those voices have a place of honor in this space. Those voices, many of them in exile, or in the deportations centers, were being clamped down as well as the various imperialist governments began closing their doors to political refugees when they were committed to clapping down on their own anti-war citizens. As we have seen in our own times, most recently in America in the period before the “shock and awe” of the decimation of Iraq in 2002 and early 2003 the government, most governments, are able to build a war frenzy out of whole cloth. At those times, and in my lifetime the period after 9/11 when we tried in vain to stop the Afghan war in its tracks is illustrative, to be a vocal anti-warrior is a dicey business. A time to keep your head down a little, to speak softly and wait for the fever to subside and to be ready to begin the anti-war fight another day. So imagine in 1914 when every nationality in Europe felt its prerogatives threatened how the fevered masses would not listen to the calls against the slaughter. Yes, one hundred years later is not too long to honor those ardent anti-war voices as the mass mobilizations began in the countdown to war.                   

Over the next period as we lead up to the 100^th anniversary of the start of World War I and beyond I will under this headline post various documents, manifestos and cultural expressions from that time in order to give a sense of what the lead up to that war looked like, the struggle against its outbreak before, the forlorn struggle during and the massive struggles in order to create a newer world out of the shambles of the battlefields.     

CHAPTER VIII

SOCIALIST OPPORTUNISM

The Communist Manifesto written in 1847, closes with the words: “Workingmen of all countries, unite!” But this battle cry came too early to become a living actuality at once. The historical order of the day just then was the middle class revolution of 1848. And in this revolution the part that fell to the authors of the Manifesto themselves was not that of leaders of an international proletariat, but of fighters on the extreme left of the national Democracy.

The revolution of 1848 did not solve a single one of the national problems; it merely revealed them. The counter-revolution, along with the great industrial development that then took place, broke off the thread of the revolutionary movement. Another century of peace went by until recently the antagonisms that had not been removed by the revolution demanded the intervention of the sword. This time it was not the sword of the revolution, fallen from the hands of the middle class, but the militaristic sword of war drawn from a dynastic scabbard. The wars of 1859, 1864, 1866 and 1870 created a new Italy and a new Germany. The feudal caste fulfilled, in their own way, the heritage of the revolution of 1848. The political bankruptcy of the middle class, which expressed itself in this historic interchange of roles, became a direct stimulus to an independent proletarian movement based on the rapid development of capitalism…
In 1863 Lassalle founded the first political labour union in Germany. [36] In 1864 the First International was formed in London under the guidance of Karl Marx. The closing watchword of the Manifesto was taken up and used in the first circular issued by the International Association of Workingmen. It is most characteristic for the tendencies of the modern labour movement that its first organization had an international character. Nevertheless this organization was an anticipation of the future needs of the movement rather than a real steering instrument in the class struggle. There was still a wide gulf between the ultimate goal of the International, the communist revolution, and its immediate activities, which took the form mainly of international cooperation in the chaotic strike movement of the workers in various countries. Even the founders of the International hoped that the revolutionary march of events would very soon overcome the contradiction between ideology and practice. While the General Council was giving money to aid groups of strikers in England and on the Continent, it was at the same time making classic attempts to harmonize the conduct of the workers in all countries in the field of world politics.
But these endeavours did not as yet have a sufficient material foundation. The activity of the First International coincided with that period of wars which opened the way for capitalist development in Europe and North America. In spite of its doctrinal and educational importance, the attempts of the International to mingle in world politics must all the more clearly have shown the advanced workingmen of all countries their impotence as against the national class state. The Paris Commune, flaring up out of the war, was the culmination of the First International. [37] Just as the Communist Manifesto was the theoretical anticipation of the modern labour movement, and the First International was the practical anticipation of the labour associations of the world, so the Paris Commune was the revolutionary anticipation of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
But only an anticipation, nothing more. And for that very reason it was clear that it is impossible for the proletariat to overthrow the machinery of state and reconstruct society by nothing but revolutionary improvizations. The national states that emerged from the wars created the one real foundation for this historical work, the national foundation. Therefore, the proletariat must go through the school of self-education.
The First International fulfilled its mission of a nursery for the National Socialist Parties. After the Franco-Prussian War and the Paris Commune, the International dragged along a moribund exist encefor a few years more and in 1872 was transplanted to America, to which various religious, social and other experiments had often wandered before, to die there.
Then began the period of prodigious capitalist development, on the foundation of the national state. For the labour movement this was the period of the gradual gathering of strength, of the development of organization, and of political possibilism, or opportunism.
In England the stormy period of Chartism [38], that revolutionary awakening of the English proletariat, had completely exhausted itself ten years before the birth of the First International. The repeal of the Corn Laws (1846) and the subsequent industrial prosperity that made England the workshop of the world, the establishment of the ten-hour working day (1847), the increase of emigration from Ireland to America, and the enfranchisement of the workers in the cities (1867), all these circumstances, which considerably improved the lot of the upper strata of the proletariat, led the class movement in England into the peaceful waters of trade unionism and its supplemental liberal labour policies.
The period of possibilism, that is, of the conscious, systematic adaptation to the economic, legal, and state forms of national capitalism, began for the English proletariat, the oldest of the brothers, even before the birth of the International, and twenty years earlier than for the continental proletariat. If nevertheless the big English unions joined the International at first, it was only because it afforded them protection against the importation of strike breakers in wage disputes. [39]
The French labour movement recovered but slowly from the loss of blood in the Commune, on the soil of a retarded industrial growth, and in a nationalistic atmosphere of the most noxious greed for “revenge”. Wavering between an anarchistic “denial” of the state and a vulgar-democratic capitulation to it, the French proletarian movement developed by adaptation to the social and political framework of the bourgeois republic.
As Marx had already foreseen in 1870, the center of gravity of the Socialist movement shifted to Germany.
After the Franco-Prussian War, unified Germany entered upon an era similar to the one England had passed through in the twenty years previous: an era of capitalist prospenty, of democratic franchise, of a higher standard of living for the upper strata of the proletariat.
Theoretically the German labour movement marched under the banner of Marxism. Still in its dependence on the conditions of the period, Marxism became for the German proletariat not the algebraic formula of the revolution that it was at the beginning, but the theoretic method for adaptation to a national-capitalist state crowned with the “Prussian helmet”. Capitalism, which had achieved a temporary equilibrium, continually revolutionized the economic foundation of national life. To preserve the power that had resulted from the Franco-Prussian War, it was necessary to increase the standing army. The middle class had ceded all its political positions to the feudal monarchy, but had intrenched itself all the more energetically in its economic positions under the protection of the militaristic police state. The main currents of the last period, covering forty-five years, are: victorious capitalism, militarism erected on a capitalist foundation, a political reaction resulting from the intergrowth of feudal and capitalist classes – a revolutionizing of the economic life, and a complete abandonment of revolutionary methods and traditions in political life. The entire activity of the German Social Democracy was directed towards the awakening of the backward workers, through a systematic fight for their most immediate needs – the gathering of strength, the increase of membership, the filling of the treasury, the development of the press, the conquest of all the positions that presented themselves, their utilization and expansion. This was the great historical work of the awakening and educating of the “unhistorical” class.
The great centralized trade unions of Germany developed in direct dependence upon the development of national industry, adapting themselves to its successes in the home and the foreign markets, and controlling the prices of raw materials and manufactured products. Localized in political districts to adapt itself to the election laws and stretching feelers in all cities and rural communities, the Social Democracy built up the unique structure of the political organization of the German proletariat with its many-branched bureaucratic hierarchy, its one million dues-paying members, its four million voters, ninety-one daily papers and sixty-five party printing presses. This whole many-sided activity, of immeasurable historical importance, was permeated through and through with the spirit of possibilism.
In forty-five years history did not offer the German proletariat a single opportunity to remove an obstacle by a stormy attack, or to capture any hostile position in a revolutionary advance. As a result of the mutual relation of social forces, it was constrained to avoid obstacles or adapt itself to them. In this, Marxism as a theory was a valuable tool for political guidance, but it could not change the opportunist character of the class movement, which in essence was at that time alike in England, France and Germany. For all the undisputed superiority of the German organization, the tactics of the unions were very much the same in Berlin and London. Their chief achievement was the system of tariff treaties. In the political field the difference was much greater and deeper. While the English proletariat were marching under the banner of Liberalism, the German workers formed an independent party with a Socialist platform. Yet this difference does not go nearly as deep in politics as it does in ideologic forms and the forms of organization.
Through the pressure that English labour exerted on the Liberal Party it achieved certain limited political victories, the extension of suffrage, freedom to unionize, and social legislation. The same was preserved or improved by the German proletariat through its independent party, which it was obliged to form because of the speedy capitulation of German liberalism. And yet this party, while in principle fighting the battle for political power, was compelled in actual practice to adapt itself to the ruling power, to protect the labour movement against the blows of this power, and to achieve a few reforms. In other words: on account of the difference in historical traditions and political conditions, the English proletariat adapted itself to the capitalist state through the medium of the Liberal Party; while the German proletariat was forced to form a party of its own to achieve the very same political ends. And the political struggle of the German proletariat in this entire period had the same opportunist character limited by historical conditions as did that of the English proletariat.
The similarity of these two phenomena so different in their forms comes out most clearly in the final results at the close of the period. The English proletariat in the struggle to meet its daily issues was forced to form an independent party of its own, without, however, breaking with its liberal traditions; and the party of the German proletariat, when the War forced upon it the necessity of a decisive choice, gave an answer in the spirit of the national-liberal traditions of the English labour party.
Marxism, of course, was not merely something accidental or insignificant in the German labour movement Yet there would be no basis for deducing the social-revolutionary character of the party from its official Marxist ideology.
Ideology is an important, but not a decisive factor in politics. Its role is that of waiting on politics. That deep-seated contradiction, which was inherent in the awakening revolutionary class on account of its relation to the feudal-reactionary state, demanded an irreconcilable ideology which would bring the whole movement under the banner of social revolutionary aims. Since historical conditions forced opportunist tactics, the irreconcilability of the proletarian class found expression in the revolutionary formulas of Marxism. Theoretically, Marxism reconciled with perfect success the contradiction between reform and revolution. Yet the process of historical development is something far more involved than theorizing in the realm of pure thought. The fact that the class which was revolutionary in its tendencies was forced for several decades to adapt itself to the monarchical police state, based on the tremendous capitalist development of the country, in the course of which adaptation an organization of a million members was built up and a labour bureaucracy which led the entire movement was educated – this fact does not cease to exist and does not lose its weighty significance because Marxism anticipated the revolutionary character of the future movement. Only the most naive ideology could give the same place to this forecast that it does to the political actualities of the German labour movement.
The German Revisionists were influenced in their conduct by the contradiction between the reform practice of the party and its revolutionary theories. They did not understand that this contradiction is conditioned by temporary, even if long-lasting circumstances and that it can only be overcome by further social development. To them it was a logical contradiction. The mistake of the Revisionists was not that they confirmed the reformist character of the party’s tactics in the past, but that they wanted to perpetuate reformism theoretically and make it the only method of the proletarian class struggle. Thus, the Revisionists failed to take into account the objective tendencies of capitalist development, which by deepening class distinctions must lead to the Social Revolution a the one way to the emancipation of the proletariat. Marxism emerged from this theoretical dispute as the victor all along the line. But Revisionism, although defeated on the field of theory, continued to live, drawing sustenance from the actual conduct and the psychology of the whole movement. The critical refutation of Revisionism as a theory by no means signified its defeat tactically and psychologically. The parliamentarians, the unionists, the comrades continued to live and to work in the atmosphere of general opportunism, of practical specializing and of nationalistic narrowness. Reformism made its impress even upon the mind of August Bebel, the greatest representative of this period.
The spirit of opportunism must have taken a particularly strong hold on the generation that came into the party in the eighties, in the time of Bismarck’s anti-Socialist laws and of oppressive reaction all over Europe. Lacking the apostolic zeal of the generation that was connected with the First International, hindered in its first steps by the power of victorious imperialism, forced to adapt itself to the traps and snares of the anti-Socialist laws, this generation grew up in the spirit of moderation and constitutional distrust of revolution. They are now men of fifty to sixty years old, and they are the very ones who are now at the head of the unions and the political organizations. Reformism is their political psychology, if not also their doctrine. The gradual growing into Socialism – that is the basis of Revisionisin – proved to be the most miserable Utopian dream in face of the facts of capitalist development. But the gradual political growth of the Social Democracy into the mechanism of the national state has turned out to be a tragic actuality – for the entire race.
The Russian Revolution was the first great event to bring a fresh whiff into the stale atmosphere of Europe in the thirty five years since the Paris Commune. The rapid development of the Russian working class and the unexpected strength of their concentrated revolutionary activity made a great impression on the entire civilized world and gave an impetus everywhere to the sharpening of political differences. In England the Russian Revolution hastened the formation of an independent labour party. In Austria, thanks to special circumstances, it led to universal manhood suffrage. In France the echo of the Russian Revolution took the form of Syndicalism, which gave expression, in inadequate practical and theoretical form, to the awakened revolutionary tendencies of the French proletariat. And in Germany the influence of the Russian Revolution showed itself in the strengthening of the young Left wing of the party, in the rapprochement of the leading Centre to it, and in the isolation of Revisionism. The question of the Prussian franchise, this key to the political position of Junkerdom, took on a keener edge. And the party adopted in principle the revolutionary method of the general strike. But all this external shaking up proved inadequate to shove the party on to the road of the political offensive. In accordance with the party tradition, the turn toward radicalism found expression in discussions and the adoption of resolutions. That was as far as it ever went.

Poet's Corner -T.S. Eliot-The Love Song Of J. Alfred Prufrock- In Honor Of Eliot' Birthday

1. The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse A persona che mai tornasse al mondo, Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse. Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero, Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.

LET us go then, you and I, When the evening is spread out against the sky Like a patient etherized upon a table; Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets, The muttering retreats         5 Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells: Streets that follow like a tedious argument Of insidious intent To lead you to an overwhelming question….         10 Oh, do not ask, “What is it?” Let us go and make our visit.   In the room the women come and go Talking of Michelangelo.   The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,         15 The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening, Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains, Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys, Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,         20 And seeing that it was a soft October night, Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.   And indeed there will be time For the yellow smoke that slides along the street, Rubbing its back upon the window panes;         25 There will be time, there will be time To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet; There will be time to murder and create, And time for all the works and days of hands That lift and drop a question on your plate;         30 Time for you and time for me, And time yet for a hundred indecisions, And for a hundred visions and revisions, Before the taking of a toast and tea.   In the room the women come and go         35 Talking of Michelangelo.   And indeed there will be time To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?” Time to turn back and descend the stair, With a bald spot in the middle of my hair—         40 (They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”) My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin, My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin— (They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”) Do I dare         45 Disturb the universe? In a minute there is time For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.   For I have known them all already, known them all: Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,         50 I have measured out my life with coffee spoons; I know the voices dying with a dying fall Beneath the music from a farther room.   So how should I presume?   And I have known the eyes already, known them all—         55 The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase, And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin, When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall, Then how should I begin To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?         60   And how should I presume?   And I have known the arms already, known them all— Arms that are braceleted and white and bare (But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!) Is it perfume from a dress         65 That makes me so digress? Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.   And should I then presume?   And how should I begin? .      .      .      .      .      .      .      . Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets         70 And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?…   I should have been a pair of ragged claws Scuttling across the floors of silent seas. .      .      .      .      .      .      .      . And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!         75 Smoothed by long fingers, Asleep … tired … or it malingers, Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me. Should I, after tea and cakes and ices, Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?         80 But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed, Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter, I am no prophet—and here’s no great matter; I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker, And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,         85 And in short, I was afraid.   And would it have been worth it, after all, After the cups, the marmalade, the tea, Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me, Would it have been worth while,         90 To have bitten off the matter with a smile, To have squeezed the universe into a ball To roll it toward some overwhelming question, To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead, Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”—         95 If one, settling a pillow by her head,   Should say: “That is not what I meant at all;   That is not it, at all.”   And would it have been worth it, after all, Would it have been worth while,         100 After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets, After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor— And this, and so much more?— It is impossible to say just what I mean! But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:         105 Would it have been worth while If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl, And turning toward the window, should say:   “That is not it at all,   That is not what I meant, at all.” .      .      .      .      .      .      .      .         110 No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be; Am an attendant lord, one that will do To swell a progress, start a scene or two, Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool, Deferential, glad to be of use,         115 Politic, cautious, and meticulous; Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse; At times, indeed, almost ridiculous— Almost, at times, the Fool.   I grow old … I grow old …         120 I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.   Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach? I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach. I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.   I do not think that they will sing to me.         125   I have seen them riding seaward on the waves Combing the white hair of the waves blown back When the wind blows the water white and black.   We have lingered in the chambers of the sea By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown         130 Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

 

As The 100th Anniversary Of The First Year Of World War I (Remember The War To End All Wars) Continues ... Some Remembrances-Poet’s Corner-German Poets   

 

German War Poetry (English Translation)

Self-portrait as a Soldier of 1914 by Otto Dix

Translated by Jeff Curtis (YerffejJ@aol.com)

See also: The Sonnets of John Allan Wyeth Italian War Poetry Click here to return to the German version

Argonne Forest, at midnight A sapper's song from the World War, 1915 Argonne Forest, at midnight, A sapper atands on guard. A star shines high up in the sky, bringing greetings from a distant homeland. And with a spade in his hand, He waits forward in the sap-trench. He thinks with longing on his love, Wondering if he will ever see her again. The artillery roars like thunder, While we wait in front of the infantry, With shells crashing all around. The Frenchies want to take our position. Should the enemy threaten us even more, We Germans fear him no more. And should he be so strong, He will not take our position. The storm breaks! The mortar crashes! The sapper begins his advance. Forward to the enemy trenches, There he pulls the pin on a grenade. The infantry stand in wait, Until the hand grenade explodes. Then forward with the assault against the enemy, And with a shout, break into their position. Argonne Forest, Argonne Forest, Soon thou willt be a quiet cemetary. In thy cool earth rests much gallant soldiers' blood.

The largest climate march in the history of the planet… Source: New York Times CIW joins over 300,000 in People’s Climate March in advance of Clinton Global Citizen Award ceremony… As we wait for tonight’s Clinton Global Citizen Award ceremony to get underway, here is a quick dispatch from the streets of New York! This afternoon, over a dozen CIW members joined people from all over the globe — New York families, Superstorm Sandy survivors, indigenous groups, Chinese farmworkers, and everyone in between — in what is being called “the largest march against climate change in the history of the planet.”  Organizers estimate that a record-breaking 310,000 individuals came out to join the People’s Climate March, filling the city’s streets from the heights of Central Park down to lower Manhattan.   The experience spurred this powerful reflection from CIW’s Lupe Gonzalo:   As farmworkers, we are deeply affected by climate change and environmental degradation.  First, it affects our work — extreme temperatures and other impacts of climate change have a direct impact on farmworkers.  Second, and most importantly, we are all connected.  We all must fight for a better future, and in order for us to leave a better world for our children, we must have clean air, clean water, and sustainable energy.  It is time the major corporations contributing to climate change to take responsibility for their actions

Tapped

When: Thursday, October 2, 2014, 6:45 pm to 9:00 pm

Where: Central Square Library • 45 Pearl St • Central T • Cambridge

First Thursday Documentary Films
SPECIAL FEATURE - TAPPED
Because of the urgency of the times, we begin our program with a discussion and short video by Brave New Films.  It examines the escalation of war on ISIS which could lead us into another quagmire and fuel hatred against the U.S. It illustrates how our tactics have failed so far and questions why we are doing more of the same failed approach.

TAPPED

"With style, verve and righteous anger, the film exposes the bottled water industry's role in suckering the public, harming our health, accelerating climate change, contributing to overall pollution, and increasing America's dependence on fossil fuels.  All the while gouging consumers with exorbitant and indefensible prices."
   --Peter Rothberg, The Nation

Parking nearby in Municipal garage on Green Street

Sponsored by Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom
&
The Cambridge Peace Commission

Light refreshments will be served 

United for Justice with Peace is a coalition of peace and justice organizations and community peace groups in the Greater Boston region. The UJP Coalition, formed after September 11th, seeks global peace through social and economic justice. Help us continue to do this critical work! Make a donation to UJP today.
info@justicewithpeace.org	617-383-4857	www.justicewithpeace.org

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CLIMATE SUMMIT WITH BERNIE SANDERS, KSHAMA SAWANT, NAOMI KLEIN, BILL MCKIBBEN, AND CHRIS HEDGES On September 20th, on the eve of the largest climate march in world history, several of the most prominent voices on the US left held a panel discussion on how to build a movement to combat climate change. Sawant and other panelists deal with central question facing the environmental movement: How can we challenge capitalism and replace it with a political and economic system that ensures sustainability and social justice?   If you agree with Kshama Sawant and the need to build popular support for democratic socialist solutions to climate change, please lend your support.  Donate to Socialist Alternative today!   The Real News: Hedges, Klein, McKibben, Sanders and Sawant Call for Urgent Action         Stay connected with Socialist Alternative:     Join Socialist Alternative today!

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Chelsea Manning speaks out in Guardian Op-Ed Is this email not displaying correctly? View it in your browser. Manning critical of Obama war policy in new Guardian OpEd Last Tuesday, September 16th, Chelsea Manning crtically responded to Obama's ISIS stratgey with a powerful Guradian Op-Ed. Chelsea explains that, "ISIS cannot be defeated by bombs and bullets," but rather, "a very focused and consistent strategy of containment can be effective in reducing the growth and effectieness of ISIS as a threat." Manning's article calls on her experience and observations as an all-source analyst in Iraq, and received attention from several media outlets. Chelsea Manning, Guardian OpEd. Sept 16, 2014 The Islamic State (Isis) is without question a very brutal extremist group with origins in the insurgency of the United States occupation of Iraq. It has rapidly ascended to global attention by taking control of swaths of territory in western and northern Iraq, including Mosul and other major cities. Based on my experience as an all-source analyst in Iraq during the organization’s relative infancy, Isis cannot be defeated by bombs and bullets - even as the fight is taken to Syria, even if it is conducted by non-Western forces with air support... Attacking Isis directly, by air strikes or special operations forces, is a very tempting option available to policymakers, with immediate (but not always good) results. Unfortunately, when the west fights fire with fire, we feed into a cycle of outrage, recruitment, organizing and even more fighting that goes back decades. This is exactly what happened in Iraq during the height of a civil war in 2006 and 2007, and it can only be expected to occur again... Click here to read the complete op-ed Chelsea can continue to be a powerful voice for reform, but we need your help to make that happen. Your support maximizes Chelsea's voice in the media, continues public education, funds her legal appeals team, and builds a powerful movement for presidential pardon > > > Please donate today! < < <

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Mon, Sep 22, 2014 04:30 PM

Sept 30: Iran, the Bomb, and Nuclear Disarmament Understanding the Call to Eliminate Nuclear Weapons When: Tuesday, September 30, 2014, 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm Where: MIT Stata Center - Room 32-155 • 32 Vassar St • Kendall T • Cambridge In November 2013, the UN Disarmament Committee passed a resolution establishing the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons.  This event is held in answer to that call. Jim Walsh is a Research Associate in MIT’s Security Studies Program.  He is an expert in international security and has been to both Iran and North Korea to discuss nuclear issues. He has testified in Congress and written many articles and books about nuclear weapons. He will talk about his recent meeting with Iran’s President Rouhani, the current situation of the nuclear weapons states, and the challenges and opportunities facing disarmament. Elaine Scarry is the Walter M. Cabot Professor of Aesthetics and the General Theory of Value at Harvard University. Scarry is the author of eight books, most recently Thermonuclear Monarchy. In it, she contends that nuclear weapons eliminate the citizenry and the legislature from the sphere of decision-making about war. Scarry shows how elements of the US Constitution can be used as tools to abolish nuclear weapons. Sponsored by Massachusetts Peace Action and the Technology and Culture Forum at MIT United for Justice with Peace is a coalition of peace and justice organizations and community peace groups in the Greater Boston region. The UJP Coalition, formed after September 11th, seeks global peace through social and economic justice. Help us continue to do this critical work! Make a donation to UJP today. info@justicewithpeace.org 617-383-4857 www.justicewithpeace.org Upcoming Events:  Iran, the Bomb, and Nuclear Disarmament Tue Sep 30 7:00pm MIT Stata Center - Room 32-155 Cambridge

Reply To : peaceact@reply.salsalabs.com Tue, Sep 23, 2014 03:39 PM

Dear All, As you know, last night the U.S. bombed Syria in what is likely to become another long war in the Middle East.  Last year, we forced the Obama administration to rightfully ask Congress for authorization to bomb Syria.  That authorization never came because of staunch public and congressional opposition.  Now there is a new target and mission. Yet, there are three reasons to pause and oppose these bombings.  First, it is unclear whether these bombings are legal under international law.  Second, the Obama Administration claims it has Constitutional authorization from the 2001 congressional vote after 9/11, but not all in Congress agree.  And lastly, expert upon expert say that military escalation will fail to solve these problems in the long run (even the CIA is skeptical). Please take a few moments and call your Representative and both Senators at (202) 224-3121 and say: “I am a constituent and I want Congress to fully debate a new authorization (AUMF) that deals with Syria, Iraq and ISIS.  And when the vote comes, I want you to vote no.” Under Article 51 of the UN Charter, a country under attack has the right of self-defense, but that only applies to actual or imminent armed attacks, not potential or possible attacks.  The U.S. claims it was thwarting terrorists from the Khorasan Group from a plot on America. Yet we don’t know the details of this so-called imminent attack.  What was the weapon?  When were they going to use it, and where? Pick up the phone and call your Representative and both Senators at (202) 224-3121 and use the script above. Congress has not voted on a war authorization regarding terrorism since 2001.  Things have changed and many members in Congress agree it is time to have a full and fair debate and for Congress to take back its Constitutional authority to declare war.  This debate and vote should happen ASAP. Your calls to your Representative and both Senators at (202) 224-3121 can make a difference.  Use the script above. President Obama is right when he says that there is no military solution to ISIS.  Yet it seems that most of the U.S. energy is directed towards a failed military strategy.  Already there are reports of innocent women and children being killed in the U.S. attack last night.  We know this tends to create more enmity toward our country.  Regional diplomacy that includes the UN and efforts to end the Syrian civil war, cutting off ISIS’s oil revenues and access to weapons, and humanitarian aid to refugees in Iraq and Syria will be far more effective in dealing with ISIS and other terrorists than military escalation. Make three calls to your Representative and both Senators at (202) 224-3121.  Use the script above. Finally, we need to take a step back and get at the root of terrorism by supporting tolerance, education, poverty alleviation and justice.  Additionally, limiting the amount of lethal weapons that end up being used by the wrong people will remove some of the fuel from the terrorist fire. Humbly for Peace, Kevin Martin Executive Director Peace Action P.S. - Make your voice heard to your Representative and both Senators at (202) 224-3121 and tell them: “I am a constituent and I want Congress to fully debate a new authorization (AUMF) that deals with Syria, Iraq and ISIS.  And when the vote comes, I want you to vote no.” Take Action: Call Your Rep Now to Stop the Bombing (202) 224-3121 CONNECT TO US:  Find us on Facebook  Follow us on Twitter  Read our blog  Contact us You are subscribed to Peace Action's Action Alert Network. You can unsubscribe here.