Against war – against imposed austerity, nationalism, neo-fascism, corruption, violence, privatisation and gross inequality

Felicity Dowling looks at the crisis in Ukraine

The lessons of 1914 must be re-learned in 2014. One hundred years ago socialism and internationalism were real forces in the lives and minds of working people. There were mass movements, organised and inspired by socialism. Despite this, the forces of nationalism were able to overcome resistance and mobilise millions to go to war.

In 2014 the media is much more powerful and pervasive and can be used at least as effectively, to bolster talk of war.

The population generally, though, is better educated, and knows the history of war and fascism. People are well capable of thinking for themselves. Let’s hope people prove more difficult to mobilise towards war today, than earlier generations.

Ukraine is in crisis

Deaths in the streets, as the government turned on protesters, sparked huge upheaval in Ukraine and an international crisis. The continuing political and economic crisis in Ukraine is taking a dangerous military turn. Russia has troops in Crimea and near the border in other areas. Large sections of the population appear to be in fear and deep anger, but different interest groups conflict in complicated patterns. The far right and anti-semitic Svoboda forms part of the new government. But that government includes, according to Huffington Post, a Jewish oligarch, a Muslim business man and an Afghan immigrant.

Russia, with its infamous anti-gay laws and crude rule of the very rich, offers no better alternative. Ukraine’s crisis is also a conflict between great capitalist powers, an attempted experiment in Shock Doctrine and a maelstrom of fear anger and conflicting nationalisms.

Paul Mason has indicated how the balance of powers is shifting and changing. http://blogs.channel4.com/paul-mason. Russia holds huge power over the West in its control of gas, a power already used against Ukraine in an earlier crisis. Russia can close down UK and Western European power stations. The gas lines are dangerous: gas must keep flowing or the lines themselves might be at risk. Explosions are possible.

Ukraine is a wealthy country – it has agriculture, heavy industry and an educated population. The population managed to hold off some privatisations in the 1990s, but the pressure to transfer wealth from the state and from working people to the very rich has been relentless.

Ukraine has been run for years by different gangs of crooks. There was a sharp drop in GDP in the first phase of the rule of the oligarchs. Oligarchs now hold vast swathes of the wealth of Ukraine. As of 2008, Ukraine’s wealthiest 50 oligarchs account for 85% of the country’s GDP. There are trade unions who took part in and lent resources to the protests. A response is described here.

As soon as it became clear the pro-European side was in the ascendancy, the BBC showed a commentator talking about the pre-planned and ‘ready to go’ austerity package for Ukraine. The neoliberals plan for crisis and shock, pulling out their schemes for transferring wealth from the many to the few at such opportunities.

Neoliberalism is no answer

As Ukraine experiences a series of crises, Left Unity should be clear that neoliberal economic policies – with the swingeing privatisation and austerity that will accompany them – will only exacerbate tensions and conflicts within the country.

For years, one section of the Ukrainian ruling group has fostered relations with the European Union, but this has not been universally popular, especially in the areas with links to Russia.

Left Unity condemns war, not just as a moral outrage but as a recognition that war is brutally effective in awarding the allocation of spoils to one side or another. For the population, though, it is hell. Civil war is a tenth circle of the inferno. War spirals out of control and follows its own twisted logic. The great powers ‘loose the dogs of war’ at their own risk. Some of that risk is from the fighting and some from economic crisis spreading into economies only just coming out of a long recession.

As Left Unity’s initial statement said “Whether under the flag of US, NATO, Russia or the European Union, military intervention only ever makes the situation many times worse.”

Victory for Russia would not benefit the people of Ukraine. Victory for the EU would not help ordinary people either. The choice appears to be, which set of oligarchs do you want? Or will the oligarchs negotiate the way out of this crisis in a way that lets them protect their power?

This is as an intensely nationalist issue but also an international one. Ukraine’s wealthiest man, Rinat Akhmetov, lives at One Hyde Park, London, in the most expensive flat in Britain. The Telegraph reports that “The 47-year-old controls nearly half of Ukraine’s coal, steel and thermoelectricity sectors, and is known to have influence over a bloc of up to 40 of the country’s MPs.”

London is at the centre of Ukrainian oligarchs’ financial dealings. Major world issues such as the search for secure sources of food for the major powers and huge agribusiness are also at play in Ukraine. Ukraine’s vast agricultural potential is being sought by the oligarchs and international investors, reflecting the worldwide search for agricultural produce.

There must be a political solution to this crisis. Neither foreign military intervention, nor foreign political and economic intervention, can provide the answers. Left Unity says, loud and long, that Ukraine must not be the next Greece. Soon after it became clear that the demonstrators were winning, the BBC reported the details of the austerity package that was to be imposed on the Ukraine.

We must therefore call for the cancellation of Ukraine’s debts and an end to the punitive 35% rate currently available to Ukraine. In public international law, the duties of a state towards its people are superior to commitments to its creditors and obligation to repay only applies to debts contracted under a legitimate valid agreement.

Today is International Women’s Day. Nuzhat Ehsan, UN Population Fund representative in Ukraine, stated in February 2013: “Ukraine really has an unacceptable level of violence, mainly by men and mainly due to a high level of alcohol consumption.” The acceleration of neoliberalism in Ukraine has accelerated inequalities. Women experience very high and increasing levels of violence. Forty-four percent of people have experienced violence, physical, sexual or mental, with privileged sections facing immunity for such crimes.

Passions run very high in Ukraine at present, and nationalisms, both Ukrainian and Russian, are real factors in the situation.

Left Unity advocates economic policies which will meet the needs of all communities within Ukraine. Left Unity says, “No to foreign intervention in Ukraine – whether political, economic or military.” Left Unity stands in solidarity with all who fight for democracy and equality and against the rule of corrupt oligarchs and neo-fascists in Ukraine, or elsewhere.

Let’s raise the idea that we should change the world, and end capitalism, which is the rule of the rich, for the rich and by the rich. A better world is possible!