Syria: will the West attack?

[Young Master Smeet]

Vin wrote:

Fair enough but we should be clear that we prefer Corbyn to Farage but we don't endorse him.Otherwise it is hypocritical

In as much as Farage does not represent an imminant threat to political democracy, we don't prefer Corbyn to him.  That eitehr of them would have to govern within the constraints of the balance of class power and the needs of the capitalist system, we don't have a preference between them.  Yes, the mood music they bring is impotrant, but they would both have to do much the same thing.  Our preference is for support for the socialist party.

[ALB]

Vin wrote:

Workers dont take sides in wars, LBird was correct. There are no interests justifying the shedding a single drop of working class blood. Still stands for me

Agreed (of course) but I think you meant that workers shouldn't take sides in wars as, unfortunately, many do. But that's not the point. The point at issue is why workers should not take sides.Is it because there is no difference between political democracy and political dictatorship and that the difference between the two is of no significance to workers and a matter of complete indifference to them?orIs it because we don't think that taking sides in a war is a way of defending political democracy recognised as a gain and of use to the working class?We have never said that it is a matter of indifference to workers whether or not political democracy exists. We can't as our whole case for an essentially non-violent change-over to socialism depends on its existence, quite apart from it being a condition for our everyday activities as an open, democratic, socialist party (meetings, publications, contesting elections).Actually, if we are honest with ourselves, our basic position is the quasi-pacifist one is that workers should not kill each other.The ultra-left, in the strict sense of the term (see here), precisely don't take part in anti-fascist demonstrations. They don't because they are equally opposed to political democracy and don't think the one is any better or worse than the other. Which has never been our position.

[alanjjohnstone]

I always recall what an ex-Regimental Sergeant Major (he wasn't in the SAS, he trained the SAS) i worked alongside with said to me…"Only difference there will be if the Russians invaded for the likes of you and i is that instead of a crown on our postie caps, there will be a red star…otherwise there won't be fuck all of a difference…we'll still be sorting and delivering letters"I also recall some Danish libertarian decades ago (libertarian in the US right-wing sense) as an election defence policy was to surround the borders of Denmark with loudspeakers that would announce "We Surrender" in Russian.  

[alanjjohnstone]

Quote:

On Syria, I'd suggest first and foremost our position is anything that brings the swiftest end to the fighting and minimises the loss of workers lives, irrespective of the political outcomes; and, further, practical solidarity with refugees, who are workers in struggle with various states.

i once had an argument with a PLO Solidarity supporter about Hezbullah, where he insisted it was legitimate for them to engage in military actions against Israel because it was recognised as a resistance movement against Israeli occupation of Lebanon territory. I countered by asking was the sacrifice of lives worth trying to reclaim Shebaa Farms, a bit of dirt just 7 miles long and 2 miles wide…(which was in any case also claimed by Syria). I said i was the same as the First World War generals sending troops to die for a few miles of No-Mans Land…To stop a war and save lives, i'd happily cede a few square miles of territory…You English can keep Berwick-on-Tweed 

[Anonymous]

ALB wrote:

 They don't because they are equally opposed to political democracy and don't think the one is any better or worse than the other. Which has never been our position.

 So capitalist democracy is worth struggling for? But what does 'struggle' include? Does it include support for killing ISIS to allow a group of capitalists to establish their democracy?

[Anonymous]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

In as much as Farage does not represent an imminant threat to political democracy, we don't prefer Corbyn to him. 

and if he did?

[Young Master Smeet]

Vin wrote:

and if he did?

Then we would urge the working class to muster to our banner to defeat him, and if the workers supported Farage (and he could not rule without them), then we would continue to organise for socialism.Don't forget, our comrades in the 6 counties did exactly that, and got fire bombed for their pains.

[Young Master Smeet]

From Earlier this week:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weYt8WT30CgChannel Four News, excellent analysis on the role of the ex-Baathists and the continuity between Saddam's rule and the methodology of IS.  It's not just religious obscurantism.

[ALB]

Cameron has finally admitted that he lied about there being 70,000 "moderate" rebels in Syria ready to support Britain's bombing campaign against ISIS. As everybody knew from their words and deeds, most of these so-called "moderates" are fanatical Islamists just as bad as IS, rival gangs that want to impose sharia law on the workers and peasants of Syria instead of ISIS:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/syria/12096133/David-Cameron-admits-70000-moderate-Syrian-army-contains-relatively-hardline-Islamist-militants.html

[ALB]

Perspective article here confirming that there is no  "moderate" opposition to ISIS and the Syrian government:  the vast majority of them are Islamist and Sunni sectarian gangsters who despise and hate secular political democracy:http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2016/01/syria-isis-nusra-aleppo-opposition-jihadi-assad-terrorist.html

[Anonymous]

Here is an argument about recent images attributing  Syrian government with blame for malnouished children, having  been faked.http://www.almasdarnews.com/article/analysing-madayas-starvation-falsification/

[jondwhite]

Report here that ISIS have cut soldier's pay in halfhttp://money.cnn.com/2016/01/19/news/world/isis-salary-cuts/viahttps://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/41qmqm/isis_cuts_soldiers_pay_by_50/

[ALB]

According to this, Israel is still toying with the policy of balkanising Syria proposed in that document from the 50s or 60s that Dave B dug up and mentioned here.Here's what Nuttyahoo said at Davos the other day:

Quote:

Regarding the future of Syria, the prime minister said he “doubts” a unitary Syrian state can ever reemerge.“I wish it could happen, but I’m not sure you could put Humpty Dumpty back together again. I’d say the best result you might be able to get is a benign Balkanization, benign cantonization in Syria. That’s as good as you’re going to get.”

The establishment of Israel itself was of course a Balkanization of Palestine and his government is implementing a not so benign cantonisation of the part of Palestine not (yet?) included in Israel.

[Young Master Smeet]

https://twitter.com/PeterRNeumann/status/691202963424034816Watch the video, it demonstrates the economic warfare being waged by IS, they are forbidding people to do any work (as the video says, if people would rather not work than join IS, that is resistance).  But they are buying the loyalty of children.  It's horrific.  This demonstrates that the most effective weapon we have against IS is actually taking in the refugees, the more the population is drained, the weaker their support is…

[alanjjohnstone]

Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates have all stated that they are  ready to commit ground troops to Syria to fight Islamic State. Thousands of mercenaries have been recruited by those countries in recent years and some now fighting in Yemen. The Russian RT media report a Turkish troop build up on the border.   Maybe it is my cynical self that the timing of this is when the Syrian government army with Russian air-support are now in a position to re-take Aleppo and defeat much of the opposition, including Al Nusra, the Saudi's personal proxy army in Syria. Is it really going to be a war to defeat ISIS or to offer a protective shield to their jihadist allies. If the petro-nations go in, how long before the French demand NATO enters the fray. Germany and Netherlands has already join the air war adding to the Brits and the French. Even Ukraine is suggesting that they send in a force. Already the fact that the US and UK are supplying war material to the Gulf States in the Yemen war is going uncontested by the supposed international community whatever that is enboldens their intervention. Rather than the abortive peace talks offering a glimmer of hope, actions on the ground seem to suggest an escalation of the war.     

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