National borders are drawn by the capitalist rulers to serve the profit system and divide the international working class. These borders—and the “countries” they define—are repeatedly redrawn through imperialist war. This is the essence of the latest tensions in the South China Sea. As CHALLENGE goes to press, the U.S. capitalist media is raising alarms over the Chinese capitalists’ deployment of advanced missiles and fighter jets on a disputed island chain called the Paracels.
Workers have no side in this dispute, which signifies another step toward inter-imperialist war.
Profit and Blood
For the U.S. and Chinese bosses, the South China Sea dispute is a typical capitalist conflict. Each side attempts to justify imperialist aggression with treaties and laws that favor its respective empire. An ExxonMobil-funded policy group, the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), warned:
This marks a historical turning point…[T]he United States finds itself in a competition among great powers…. It is more important for the United States to increase its own military presence in the Baltic states and the South China Sea….[G]round troops constitute a more credible demonstration of U.S. power, because they advertise the country’s willingness to shed blood to honor its commitments (March/ April 2016).
Whose blood are the U.S. bosses willing to shed? Workers’ blood! The capitalists ruling China are more than willing to do the same. Both sides are working overtime to build nationalism to enlist our working-class sisters and brothers to support their imperialist ambitions.
The U.S. bosses’ empire is in relative decline and mired in political crisis. As reflected by the turbulent U.S. presidential campaign, leading forces of U.S. finance capital—ExxonMobil, Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase—are struggling to impose political unity on their own ranks to shore up U.S. imperialism. But they cannot rebuild their war machine and defend their empire without the political loyalty of U.S. workers. They cannot fight the next big global war without workers as cannon fodder.
But there is an alternative for our class. The revolutionary communist Progressive Labor Party is organizing a mass movement—from the U.S. to Mexico, Africa, Pakistan, and China—for working-class power. Our goal is to build a Red Army that will smash the capitalist system once and for all.
A mass PLP must be organized within the bosses’ military war machines, to spread communist politics until soldiers can “turn the guns around” and fight for their class. The Chinese bosses’ so-called People’s Liberation Army fields 1.6 million soldiers, the world’s largest ground force. As China’s rulers expand the PLA’s high-tech elements (including surface-to-air missiles and electronic warfare), and the risk of confrontation between the U.S. and China grows, our military work becomes even more crucial for the international working class.
A Silk Road to Imperialist War
The Chinese rulers’ military deployment in the Paracel Islands, and their claims on the South China Sea, reflect a growing boldness in their projection of imperialist power. As they attempt to win workers across Asia and the Middle East with empty promises of a better life, the Chinese imperialists have advanced an ambitious plan called “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR). It’s been called the “New Silk Road,” in reference to the ancient trade route from Asia to Europe.
As projected, OBOR will link Central Asia and the Middle East and Europe via massive infrastructure and commercial projects. They will be funded by the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), China’s rival to the U.S.-backed World Bank. China President Xi Jinping’s first official visits of 2016 were to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Iran, all founding members of the AIIB (China Central Television, 1/18/16).
China claims that OBOR will deliver prosperity for workers in the Middle East. But the Chinese bosses’ real concern is an acute labor shortage (Xinhua, 1/22/16). They see the Middle East’s millions of young, unemployed workers as potential wage slaves to protect the capitalists’ profit margins.
Land, Water and Oil
In addition to valuable oil reserves, Iran occupies a geostrategic position of increasing importance to China’s growing imperialist ambitions. Decades of brutal economic sanctions on Iran’s workers were lifted with last July’s nuclear deal, which also freed Iran’s bosses to purchase conventional weapons. Now China’s bosses are keen to enlist Iran as a full member of their Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) military alliance.
It was China that helped Iran kick-start its nuclear weapons program back in the 1980s…[T]he two countries’ military-industrial complexes have been close ever since, and one source…confirms that secret military protocols were also signed this week (Newsweek, 2/1/16).
Sixty percent of China’s imported oil is shipped over oceans patrolled by and vulnerable to the U.S. Navy and its fleets of warships. China’s agreements with Iran include refinery and pipeline construction deals linked to the Pakistani port city of Gwadar, where the Arabian Sea meets the Persian Gulf. An enormous operation financed, built and now controlled by China, Gwadar will route critical oil supplies to China over land, a safer bet than the 10,000-mile maritime route to Shanghai, the Chinese bosses’ only commercial port.
Same Enemy, Same Fight
From Latin America to the Middle East, millions of workers have been killed and millions more forced to seek refuge by imperialist-fueled wars. No sooner do workers cross the imperialists’ borders, in search of work and safety, than they face horrific anti-immigrant racism and sexism.
At the same time, workers within the borders of the U.S. and China, as well as Russia and Iran, are being coerced to fight and kill one another to defend the bosses’ capitalist preserves. In every imperialist power, rulers are intensifying their racist, nationalist propaganda to blame workers from other countries for their problems. The bosses know their days are numbered if they cannot deflect workers’ anger from the true cause of our misery: capitalist exploitation.
The working class has no country; our class has nothing to gain by respecting capitalist borders. Of all the political parties, only PLP represents workers’ interests.
PLP calls for international working-class unity. PLP organizes and fights to turn the coming imperialist wars into class wars for communist revolution. PLP calls on workers in the U.S., China, and every capitalist country to distribute CHALLENGE at their workplaces and in their barracks. Join our party, and help lead the working class in communist revolution! Same enemy, same fight! Workers of the world unite!