What Can We Do as World War III Unfolds?

April 1 — As we go to press, US President Trump is announcing that the war was a “major success” and “nearing completion” while claiming he would bring Iran “back to the Stone Age.” He has hinted he might pull the US out of NATO. But the war in the Persian Gulf has already shown that US imperialism is losing its global dominance. If it hasn’t already lost it . As it is losing the war.

Many around the world are cheering. That includes more than a few in the USA itself. We get it. The political scientist David Michael Smith estimated in 2023 that US imperialism had been responsible, wholly or in part, for close to 300 million deaths. It must be destroyed!

Trump claims the US is “winning” by raining destruction on Iranian civilians. But he and his bros were deluded by racist arrogance and egged on by the Zionist butcher Netanyahu. They seriously underestimated Iran’s military and strategic position.

They didn’t expect Iran to critically damage thirteen US military bases in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain. Or to rain its own destruction on Israel.

They disregarded the obvious fact that the Iranian military could close the Strait of Hormuz. One fifth of the world’s oil and liquified natural gas normally passes through the Strait. One third of the seaborne fertilizer, and chemicals crucial to production of fertilizer elsewhere.

Now only vessels approved by the Iranian rulers can pass through. And only after paying the equivalent of millions of US dollars – in Chinese yuan. Iranian capitalists get richer. The Chinese imperialists get more powerful.

The Saudi capitalists’ East-West oil pipeline carries seven million barrels per day to Yanbu, on the Red Sea. But the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen could  block the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, cutting off the Red Sea.

Meanwhile, masses in India can’t cook because there’s no gas. Myanmar, Vietnam, and the Philippines could run out of oil by the end of April.

Fertilizer shortages are disrupting the planting season in much of the northern hemisphere. The threat to global food supplies will outlast the current war.

It’s too soon to cheer. For three reasons.

First, because so many of our working-class siblings are suffering and dying in this bosses’ war for power and profits. And more of us will.

Second, as an Arabic proverb says, “A cornered dog will jump over the wall.” The weakened US empire and the overstretched Zionist entity (“Israel”) are becoming more dangerous.

They have starved and demolished Gaza. Zionist settlers are driving Palestinians out of the West Bank. They are trying to extend land-grabbing genocide into Lebanon—and Iran. The Israeli Knesset voted to hang Palestinian political prisoners!

And both have nuclear weapons. The US rulers are the only ones ever to have used them.

Third, it’s an illusion to think that the Iranian rulers are anything but capitalists. They and their Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps are the largest employers in Iran. Iranian workers have confronted them in massive strikes around industrial issues. Today, many (not all) among the Iranian masses have embraced nationalism in the face of the US assault. But the class struggle will re-emerge.

Iran’s Russian and Chinese backers are imperialist powers. Let’s understand: no capitalists or imperialists ever act for the interests of the international working class.

During World War II, many saw Britain as a “lesser-evil.” Even as it restricted Jewish immigrants from Nazi-occupied Europe. Orchestrated the 1943 Bengal Famine. Prepared for the creation of “Israel” and the expulsion of 750,000 Palestinians. Got ready to partition the Indian subcontinent, instigating deadly communal violence.

The Russian and Chinese rulers are using the war on Iran to strengthen their position of dominance on the backs of the masses in the Middle East.

We workers must fight for the communist society we need. With no wage slavery chaining us and no nations dividing us. Just workers making the decisions that affect us and the goods we all need.

The time to cheer will come when masses, anywhere, rise up to destroy capitalism and imperialism with communist revolution.

We can hasten that day. By educating ourselves and others about communism. By critically reading and discussing Red Flag. Distributing it however possible.

But we can’t do it alone. We do it by building collectives of the International Communist Workers’ Party. Acting on and fighting for communist principles in the masses’ struggles and in our daily lives. Especially in industry and the military, both key to armed revolution.

As World War III expands, fascist terror escalates, and masses fight back – let’s make this May Day a clarion call for communism and nothing less!

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