Trump and his henchmen, backed by the Oligarchy which placed him in power, seek to overcome the decline of American capitalism through brute force, wreaking destruction on countries as readily as they rip up the social fabric and rights of American workers. For 35 years, the American ruling class – led by Democrats or Republicans – has conducted foreign policy with a sense of impunity, all restraint removed by the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. “Force works,” they concluded.
They find endless reserves of moral outrage over the 1917 Russian Revolution. But they are mute when the US incinerates Iranian schools & cities, when Israel buries Palestinian children beneath the rubble, when Venezuelan leaders are illegally seized along with the oilfields, when torture is systematized, when police execute the poor in American streets. In a society governed by billionaires, corporate predators, military-intelligence operatives, and political swindlers, and hurtling through the opening stages of a worldwide war, these criminal and anti-democratic methods are inevitable.
In contrast, the legacy of the American revolution 250 years ago and the Civil War which abolished slavery – its democratic impulses, revulsion against cruelty and injustice, hatred of lies and brutality – remains deeply rooted among workers and young people. The conflict between the criminality of the oligarchy and the moral consciousness of the masses is assuming an increasingly explosive character, intensified by the escalation of the class struggle.
The struggle for socialism by the international working class is not merely politically necessary. It is the indispensable expression of all that is humane, decent, and emancipatory in modern civilization. The survival of humanity depends upon its victory.
