The following is a reprint from an article that appeared originally in "The Worker".The U.S. government and its NATO allies are boasting that they have won victory and brought "peace" to Yugoslavia.
These imperialists are dancing on the graves of the people. The cost of their "victory" includes 20,000 Yugoslavian people killed or wounded, one million Kosovars turned into refugees, and the devastation of the economic and social infrastructure of Yugoslavia.
Nor will there be any peace. 50,000 U.S. and NATO troops will trample Yugoslavia's sovereignty underfoot and dismember the country, turning Kosovo into a protectorate - a colony. The neighboring countries of Macedonia and Albania will remain completely militarized, little more than barracks and staging grounds for U.S.-NATO forces. The peoples throughout the Balkans will live in the shadow of the new imperialist bases being fortified in Yugoslavia, Albania and Macedonia.
For nearly 3 months, U.S.-NATO forces bombed the length and breadth of Yugoslavia. This war was never motivated by any "humanitarian" motives but rather by the struggle of the imperialist powers to redraw the map of the Balkans, to gain control over this strategic gateway to Europe as part of their struggle to redivide the world. On the part of U.S. imperialism, the war against Yugoslavia is one link in a worldwide chain of intervention and aggression through which the U.S. monopolies are trying to establish a uni-polar world under their dictate.
Thus the imposition of a "peace settlement" through force of arms will not resolve any of the contradictions and rivalries which caused the war in the first place. The imperialist "peace" imposed on Yugoslavia is nothing more than a lull between periods of war. None of the peoples of Yugoslavia can exercise their rights while under the occupation of foreign military forces. The entire Balkan region has been further destabilized and U.S. imperialism has set up new bases for its economic penetration and military domination of the region and Europe. New wars are being prepared.
The U.S. government and its NATO allies are congratulating themselves on their military superiority and their capacity to bomb Yugoslavia to its knees. They boast that their "victory" signals a "new world order." They openly assert that their "new world order" will do away with the established norms of international law and relations between states. Instead of recognizing the sovereign equality of all nations and striving for peace by renouncing the use of force against other countries, the "new world order" of the U.S.-NATO alliance will be based on "Might Makes Right." Smaller and less powerful countries will be forced to yield their national sovereignty and national independence to the demands of global capitalism and the big imperialist powers. A permanent state of militarism and war will be imposed on the peoples.
All this chauvinism - this open propaganda for war and U.S. global domination - is presented in the name of "human rights" and "humanitarianism." But such assertions of the "moral superiority" of the "American way" and the "global responsibilities" of American capitalism cannot hide the real aims of the U.S. monopoly capitalist class. The very existence of this class is bound up with the exploitation of the peoples and the domination of countries; its imperialist empire rests on violence and war. The U.S.-NATO war against Yugoslavia marks an intensification of the crisis of world capitalism. Today the imperialist powers are waging a ferocious struggle over every inch of the earth - a struggle for a new economic and territorial division of the world, a struggle for empire. In fact, the "new world order" envisioned by U.S. imperialism is only a remake of Hitler's Third Reich, a world in which U.S. capitalism makes war against the peoples and imposes its dictate on the world.
But the war in Yugoslavia also brought to the fore the struggle of the peoples against war and imperialism. In Europe, in the U.S. and in countries throughout the world, millions and tens of millions of people came out in active opposition to the U.S.-NATO war. In the U.S., broad new sections of people rejected the chauvinist propaganda which tried to justify aggression in the name of "human rights;" people unmasked and denounced the real motives of the U.S. government.
Peace is the Cause of the People This struggle must be carried on. As the imperialist powers prepare for new wars, the people too must prepare. We must step-by-step organize and activate ourselves.
We must start to build a broad, popular front against war and imperialism. Such a popular front must unite the widest possible sections of people to fight against every aggressive step taken by the capitalist government. Such a front must link together the many currents of opposition to militarism and war. Such a front must rally people to its own positive, pro-active aims and program which begins with the demand for a democratic foreign policy - for an end to all U.S. intervention and aggression, for the withdrawal of all U.S. troops stationed abroad, for the dismantling of all aggressive military alliances, such as NATO, and respect for the sovereign equality of every nation.
To open the way for creating such a broad, popular front against war and imperialism, we must sum up the experience of the recent struggles and further politicize ourselves and our movement. We must soberly assess the dangers of the present period and continuously expose the chauvinist, militarist propaganda of the government. We must zero in on the cause of war and militarism. We must recognize and assert the role of the people themselves as the force for peace. We must take all the questions of aims, program, strategy, tactics and organization into our hands and step-by-step build up our independent strength.
We cannot have any illusions about the imperialist "peace" imposed on Yugoslavia or the new dangers facing the peoples. Imperialism is leading humanity towards new wars and new disasters. It is only by organizing ourselves independent of and in opposition to the capitalist warmakers that we can bring into being the world of peace so much needed and wanted by the overwhelming majority of humanity.
Condemn the Imperialist Peace Imposed on Yugoslavia!
No U.S. Occupation of Yugoslavia. U.S. Troops Out of the Balkans!
Dismantle the Aggressive U.S.-NATO Alliance!
Build the Popular Front Against War and Imperialism!
Peace is the Cause of the Peoples!