ON MONDAY, the General Council of the TUC issued a lengthy ‘interim statement on Iran’ which condemned ‘the dangerous escalation of military actions, precipitated by the attacks launched by the US and Israel over the weekend that flout international law, undermine diplomacy and the prospects for peace.’
Naturally, the General Council of the TUC is eager to apportion at least some of the blame on Iran for the deadly barrage of missiles and bombs rained down on them, murdering the Supreme Leader and senior government leaders along with the targeted murder of over 185 young girls at a school during the first wave of US/Israeli bombardment.
The statement makes it clear: ‘The TUC condemns military actions taken by the US, Israel and Iran that violate the sovereignty of states.’
The implication is that Iran should have sat back and accepted being attacked by US forces stationed in bases across the entire region without any retaliation. Iran has the absolute right to defend itself against the illegal war being waged against it by US imperialism along with Israel, supported by its faithful lap dogs in the UK government and minor imperialist nations in Europe.
The TUC General Council is keen to stress ‘its steadfast commitment to the principles of peace, diplomacy, and respect for state sovereignty’ and stated: ‘We call on the UK government to do everything it can to deliver these objectives and resist all efforts to drag us further into the conflict.’
Starmer has already dragged the UK into Trump’s illegal imperialist war to crush the Iranian state and return a country (with a population of 90 million) to US domination, when he announced on Sunday, without bothering to seek the approval of Parliament, that he was throwing open UK military bases to the US fighters and bombers.
The TUC statement concludes with a plea for restraint and a return to the international rules and law, saying: ‘In these perilous times, the path to peace lies in strengthening diplomacy and safeguarding human rights’.
The only way to peace lies not through diplomacy – after all, the US carried out its murderous and unprovoked attacks while ‘peace negotiations’ with Iran were taking place.
The Iranians certainly have no faith in any diplomatic solutions with a rapacious US imperialism prepared to set the Middle East and the entire world ablaze in an attempt to restore its exploitation of the globe by American capitalism.
World capitalism is in the grip of the most acute crisis in its history. The US is drowning in over $38 trillion of debt while the UK and EU nations are equally gripped by massive unaffordable national debts.
In its desperation, capitalism, in its final imperialist stage, has no alternative but to wage war on the working class at home and wars against workers and masses across the world to impose its crisis on their backs.
The statement claims that the TUC ‘remains committed to standing in solidarity with our trade union sisters and brothers’ in the Middle East and across the world.
The working class, which overwhelmingly see no future under capitalism except poverty and wars are demanding action not just words of ‘solidarity’.
On Saturday, a demonstration has been called in London under the banner ‘Hands off Iran’.
The central demand of this demonstration must be to force the TUC to end its passivity and take concrete action.
The TUC General Council must immediately call a Special Conference to mobilise the power of the working class in a general strike to bring down the Labour government and bring in a workers government that will stand with the workers of the world to put an end to capitalism by depositing it in the dustbin of history where it belongs.
The immediate task today is to build up the WRP and Young Socialists in Britain and sections of the International Committee of the Fourth International in every country to organise the carrying out of the world socialist revolution.
The only way to put an end to the barbarism of imperialist wars is to put an end to capitalism with the victory of the World Socialist Revolution.
