AS the world crisis of capitalism develops at breakneck speed, so the splits between the imperialist nations become more open, pitching the US against its former allies in the UK and Europe.
The rupture between the competing interests of the US and European capitalist nations was exposed this week over the issue of the war provoked by the imperialist NATO countries against Russia in the Ukraine.
This week, US president Donald Trump shocked the EU and UK governments when he announced that negotiations to end the Ukrainian war against Russia will start ‘immediately’ after holding a ‘lengthy and highly productive’ telephone call with Russian president Vladimir Putin on Wednesday morning.
This call, which lasted for an hour and a half, contrasts with the refusal of former president Joe Biden to speak with Putin for three years, whose stated policy was to stand with Ukraine ‘for as long as it takes’.
According to reports during the telephone call, both leaders agreed to assemble teams of negotiators for direct talks on implementing a ceasefire, with Trump also saying he would invite Putin to Washington in order to break the deadlock and save ‘millions of lives’.
Immediately, the European NATO states and the UK Labour government reacted with panic at being ‘frozen’ out of any negotiations, along with the Ukrainian regime of Zelensky.
When asked about Ukraine being an equal member in peace negotiations Trump responded ‘interesting question. I think they have to make peace.’
Seven European leaders, including the UK, issued a statement saying: ‘Ukraine and Europe must be part of any negotiations.’
One EU official told the press: ‘The Americans don’t see a role for Europe in the big geopolitical questions relating to the war,’ adding ‘Trump sees us as money.’
It is not surprising that the UK and EU NATO countries are reacting in panic over Trump’s push to end a war that Ukraine and its allies have lost, with no chance of achieving the aim of weakening Russia, in the hope of some regime change that would open the country and its vast resources up to super-exploitation.
The UK has been one of the leading donors to Ukraine, alongside the US and Germany, pledging £12.8 billion to Zelensky, since February 2022 with more to come as the war drags on.
All were enthusiastic supporters of oil embargoes and sanctions on Russia which drove up the cost of living for the working class.
These leaders demanded sacrifices from workers and their families to prop up the fascist supported Zelensky regime, that continually demanded more weapons, more money and more Ukrainian lives to be lost fighting NATO’s unwinnable war.
While the UK and other EU countries were banking on keeping the war going, Trump has pulled the rug from beneath them, and shown that as far as the US is concerned the EU and UK can bear the full cost of any future war in Ukraine, or any reconstruction of the devastated country.
Trump has dumped the Ukraine and its fervent supporters in Europe and the UK, leaving the Starmer Labour government in a massive crisis as they are forced to recognise that US imperialism has no allies, only enemies to be discarded or crushed by economic tariffs, and military threats.
This split in itself is a result of the crisis engulfing world capitalism, now reduced to capitalist states fighting one another, to be the last one standing when the global economic crash erupts.
With imperialism in its weakened state there has never been a more opportune moment for the working class to assert its power, and put capitalism out of its misery, by resolving its crisis through the victory of the socialist revolution.
Masses of workers and youth will be demonstrating in London on Saturday, demanding victory to Palestine and an end to imperialist supported genocide in Gaza.
This mass demonstration must demand that the TUC leaders, who have abstained from any action against the imperialist wars in Ukraine and Gaza, either call a general strike to bring down the Starmer government, or be sacked and replaced with new leaders prepared to go from a general strike to the working class taking power, and going forward to a workers state and socialism.
Join the WRP and Young Socialists to build up the leadership required for the victory of the British Socialist Revolution.
