Imperialist War Over Ukraine Inevitable Under Capitalism. Communism Will Make Fights Over Land, Water, Energy Unnecessary
Our planet is ravaged by capitalism-caused climate change, food insecurity, water insecurity, increasing species extinction, and increasingly frequent financial crises and epidemics. Violent conflict between capitalist states is inevitable as sources of profit dwindle and the rate of profit keeps falling.
Russia has been supplying natural gas to Western Europe since the Soviet Union agreed to deliver natural gas to Austria by pipeline in 1968. Today, Russia supplies approximately 35%-40% of Western Europe’s natural gas. A large portion of it travels through pipelines through Ukraine.
Even as capitalist states pay lip service to emissions reductions, they still need their energy supplies. The Nordstream 2 pipeline, which is awaiting regulatory approval, supplies gas directly from Russia to Northern Germany. Russia derives 6% of its tax revenue from natural gas exports. The Russian energy giant Gazprom derives 75% of its revenue from these exports.
So, it is unlikely that Russia or Western Europe want to disrupt these energy supplies, especially as energy prices spiral upwards. Russian capitalists can benefit from increasing prices since Gazprom relies on Western European revenues to subsidize energy for Russians. Putin can possibly benefit politically from a well-timed crisis, but the working classes in Russia, Ukraine, and Western Europe pay the price.
Arable land is increasingly scarce. But Ukraine has a lot of it – 42 million hectares of fertile, arable land. Ukraine has always been Europe’s “breadbasket.” Today, agricultural products are 40% of its export revenues. Ukraine’s “reforms” have been aimed towards deregulating land markets and financial instruments for agriculture.
Ultimately there will be a referendum on whether to allow foreign investment in agriculture. And so political and economic control over Ukraine, by violence if necessary, is fair game for the capitalist NATO states and for capitalist Russia. It is always the working classes that suffer and are sent to their deaths to fight for the capitalists’ profits.
Water is also at the heart of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Agriculture in Crimea has been reduced to practically nothing because Ukraine’s rulers dammed the Crimean canal in 2014 in response to Putin’s annexation of Crimea. Putin’s waning popularity surged to over 90% after the war, while protests and low popularity were the norm just before it. Now 2.3 million people in Crimea live in chronic water insecurity.
Russia has had to invest hundreds of millions of dollars to keep the water flowing in Crimea both for citizens and for increasing military deployments. As always, the profit and revenue are from the exploitation of the working classes and at the expense of the day-to-day lives of the working classes.
As this latest capitalist crisis unfolds, Biden and US capitalists have wasted no time in ratcheting up the propaganda. They hope to distract attention from the real issues in upcoming mid-term elections. Biden’s so-called Build Back Better Act has been watered down to a measly 1.2 trillion over 10 years, sabotaged by his own party.
Magically, a $787 billion dollar “peacetime” annual budget for the Pentagon passed smoothly in December with bipartisan support, $24 billion more than Biden initially requested. As the working classes face skyrocketing inflation, mounting debt, and increasing interest rates, the capitalists are concerned, as always, about profiteering with violence.
All of this is unnecessary! In a communist world there will be no need or ability to profit from and control food, shelter, healthcare, education, and energy because they will be free, and available to everyone.
With their basic needs met, everyone around the world will have more time to lead fulfilling lives and indeed to make life better for all. Technology will be used to mitigate the effects of climate change. Not to create and recommend unneeded products for consumption and pay-later schemes to increase indebtedness and the profits of capitalists!
War will become a memory of a horrific and shameful capitalist past. To achieve this world, the working masses will have to struggle internationally, in concert with each other. And to do this, they need a global party like the International Communist Workers’ Party. Join us and fight for a communist world!
Previous article about Ukraine: Imperialist Conflict Sharpens Over Ukraine