Paris, France, March 2024: “No One is Illegal”
LOS ANGELES (USA), March 5— “I am a newly-arrived immigrant to the United States. In Colombia I was in the army. Here, I had the opportunity to meet a comrade who had the patience to talk to me about communist ideas and practice. I am now a member of ICWP. I have Colombian and Venezuelan friends here and in Colombia with whom I am sharing the ideas and Red Flag.” This comrade’s experience shows how we can build a mass international party and mobilize the masses for communism.
Imperialists Everywhere Need Immigrants
William Frey of the influential Brookings Institution reported in December that as the Anglo population ages, the US needs all these young people from Latin America, Asia and elsewhere to strengthen its workforce.
The capitalists-imperialists are taking advantage of climate change, political and economic instability, war: that is, all the aspects of the world capitalist crisis that have increased human migration to unprecedented levels.
As of December 2023, the United States had 9 million job openings, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Immigrants will fill these positions as a super-exploited workforce.
The capitalists-imperialists need this “labor force” for all their industries, especially their war-production industries. Machine operators, assembly line workers, and technicians are essential.
The US capitalists-imperialists must now plan a war against China as well as Russia. This requires large quantities of ammunition since the wars in Ukraine and Gaza have depleted US stockpiles. Now the US military is planning to increase artillery shell production, from 15,000/month to 100,000/month by next year.
Rebuilding weapons stockpiles requires a workforce that the US does not now have. “Stockpiling weapons is impossible given the shortage of skilled American labor. Defense contractors have struggled to recruit workers for years in an industry that often requires vocational training or two-year degrees from their employees.” (Foreign Affairs)
Globally, the need for immigrant workers and soldiers for the capitalists-imperialists is growing by the day. In Europe, millions of immigrants from Asia and Africa fill the factories, and in many cases the imperialist armies. Israel is heavily dependent on migrant workers; the foreign-born account for 26% of the population.
According to RPP Newsroom, Russia’s army is recruiting Indian citizens for the war in Ukraine. Recruits become farmers, food company workers, or the unemployed. The article describes how a shopkeeper from Hyderabad had no news of his 30-something younger brother. Then the brother called from the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don, near the Ukrainian border, to say he had been brought to the front line.
“He left so he could give his family a better life and now we don’t even know if he’s alive,” the shopkeeper said.
Immigrants in the Struggle for a Communist World Without Borders
Many immigrant workers (our working-class siblings) bring with them a spirit of revolution and an experience of struggle against exploitation. Immigrants have historically played an important role in the radical fight to end capitalist exploitation and building communism.
The comrade quoted at the beginning of this article shows the way forward. Comrades in South Africa have recruited immigrant workers from Mozambique and Zimbabwe to the ICWP in the struggle to mobilize the masses for communism. These comrades are reaching out to their countries of origin to recruit others.
Thousands of migrants from India are now crossing the US-Mexico border. Many of them tempered in the fight against racism and fascism. This is an opportunity to get to know them and create bonds with the comrades who organize there.
Immigrants and non-immigrants, we all form the international working class. Whether we are in the factories, in their agricultural fields, in schools, hospitals, or in their armies. United, we will end racist capitalism and imperialism! We are the creators of a new communist world, free of exploitation, borders, money, and wars.
To make this a reality, we need to form collectives of the International Communist Workers’ Party all over the world and mobilize the masses for communist revolution.
Read our Pamphlet:
“Fight For the Day When No Worker Will be Called Foreigner” here