NEWS LINE congratulates the German workers who have given a big welcome to the Syrian and other refugees who have shown such an indomitable spirit in their march from Macedonia to Munich.
We also send our best wishes to all those who have signed up to march from Marble Arch to Downing Street next Saturday in support of the right of refugees to seek and obtain asylum in the UK.
However, the struggle and the conflict in the Middle East and north Africa is far from over. The ruling classes of the United States and the UK, responsible for the holocaust that is gripping these regions, are in fact planning to bomb Syria, along with the government of President Assad, back to the Stone Age, to reuse the language of the 2003 war on Iraq, and also to intervene in Libya.
These ruling classes are responsible for the rise of IS through their interventions in Iraq, and their NATO sponsored war in Libya. Now their support for a counter revolution in Syria has created millions of desperate refugees. These wars killed and are killing millions. They have created the situation where millions of people prefer to face the threat of drowning in the Med than waiting to be bombed, along with their children at home.
Not content with this, those who originally declared that they were not willing to accept a single Syrian refugee, Cameron and Osborne, are openly saying that they will seek a House of Commons vote to allow them to bomb Syria, and also that they intend to send troops to Libya.
They know that this will create millions more refugees, but consider that this, as Madeleine Albright said about child deaths in Iraq, a price worth paying to get total control of these regions and their oil. Cameron and Osborne intend to do this in alliance with the USA, which has said that it will not take a single Syrian refugee, and through its Secretary of State, Kerry has just threatened Russia with consequences if it continues to send military aid to Syria.
Kerry called Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov to express concern over unconfirmed reports ‘suggesting an imminent enhanced Russian military build-up’ in Syria. While not elaborating on or confirming the accuracy of those reports, the State Department said Kerry made clear to Lavrov that such actions ‘could further escalate the conflict, lead to greater loss of innocent life, increase refugee flows and risk confrontation’.
Chancellor Osborne yesterday chimed in that his government doesn’t need the ‘support of everyone’, meaning the British people, for Britain to launch military action in Syria. The Chancellor said the government needed ‘support across the House of Commons’ for military action, but said that ‘it doesn’t mean every member of every party must back strikes’.
What this means is that they need the Labour right wing to vote with them, since a Tory minority is opposed to more bombings of the Syrian people. The result of the vote for the Labour leadership is now an important issue for the UK ruling class, since it needs the Labour vote to go to war on Syria and intervene in Libya.
This makes it almost certain that if Corbyn wins the election, a section of the right wing will split from the Labour Party to form a support group for the Tory war drive, mimicking the SDP split in the early 1980s that kept Thatcher in office. It is in this crisis situation that the TUC Congress that begins on Sunday has an extraordinary importance for the working people of the UK and of the world.
The TUC General Council must be told by the delegates that they must take action to stop the Tory war drive on Syria, and to smash the projected anti-union laws and the drive to privatise the NHS and smash the Welfare State.
The TUC must call a general strike to bring the Tories down and bring in a workers government that will put an end to capitalism and defeat the imperialist war drive. Make sure that you join the Lobby of the TUC at 1 pm on Sunday 13th September in Brighton – demand the TUC call a general strike to end the war drive in Syria, and end the war on the working class at home by bringing down the Tories.