{"id":14498,"date":"2024-10-05T04:49:18","date_gmt":"2024-10-05T04:49:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/?page_id=14498"},"modified":"2024-10-05T05:29:58","modified_gmt":"2024-10-05T05:29:58","slug":"boeing-strikers-welcome-icwp-communists-on-picket-lines","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/volume-15-number-13\/boeing-strikers-welcome-icwp-communists-on-picket-lines\/","title":{"rendered":"Boeing Strikers Welcome ICWP Communists on Picket Lines"},"content":{"rendered":"

Boeing Workers Key here \u2666<\/a> Capitalism’s Deadly Logic here \u2666<\/a> <\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/h4>\n

Boeing Workers are the Key to Change the Balance of Power<\/strong><\/span><\/h4>\n

SEATTLE (USA), September 28\u2014 The times are changing, but the change we need will not happen spontaneously.<\/p>\n

The decline of US imperialism, and with it the Boeing company, has radically altered the nature of the US aerospace workforce. A diverse group of tens of thousands of new, younger, men and women with families from around the world fill the factories. They don\u2019t only represent a new generation, but also the political potential to end imperialist horrors with communist revolution.<\/p>\n

We have not seen such enthusiasm since the 1995 strikers initiated mass marches throughout the plants. Despite what the union leadership says, these new workers hate more than just sixteen years of speed up and stagnant wages. They also despise the genocide and mass slaughter caused by the imperialist rivalry between China and the US.<\/p>\n

Industrial Laborers Can Mobilize the Global Working Class<\/strong><\/p>\n

That\u2019s why a worker at the Renton (Washington) plant insisted that \u201cBoeing workers need to know about similar struggles around the world published in Red Flag<\/em>.\u201d A young Filipina American striker and her friend were more specific. \u201cI\u2019m concerned about the wars in Gaza, Ukraine, but also about Somalia, Sudan, and Congo,\u201d said the Somali friend.<\/p>\n

Intense discussions about the march to World War III sparked debates on the picket line. Numerous young workers hate the abhorrent production of Boeing weapons to bolster US hegemony.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow we have to worry about nuclear weapons as the West tries to force Russia into the corner,\u201d warned a picketer from South Asia.<\/p>\n

The answer to ending imperialist weapons production lies in the hands of industrial workers like those at Boeing.<\/strong> There is a history of industrial workers manufacturing weapons for the fight for communism.<\/p>\n

In 1917, The Putilov Mill was the largest weapons manufacturer in the Soviet Union. Fourteen imperialist countries invaded Russia hoping to crush the new government. The Putilov workers built the weapons that defeated the imperialists. The workers drove these weapons to the front lines and fought shoulder to shoulder with the communist troops.<\/p>\n

Putilov workers did not wake up one morning and decide to risk their lives. Communist workers in the plant struggled for fifteen years to convince the workforce that their responsibility included preparing for communist revolution.<\/p>\n

Red Flag<\/em> also sparked comradely picket line discussions about how communism and the ICWP work. A dozen strikers gave their contact information to continue these conversations.<\/p>\n

Thousands of copies of ICWP communist literature were distributed to the new workforce and veteran machinists.\u00a0 Strikers originally from Palestine and several others who identified as Muslim were among those who thanked us profusely for our communist literature. Retired workers originally from Vietnam, Laos, and the US read the paper online and in print.<\/p>\n

Friends in the Seattle area have met with ICWP members. Some are going to the picket lines to help spread the word. A friend talked with strikers about how it took a while for her to recognize the value of Red Flag<\/em>. Now she reads every issue and has convinced some strikers to read the paper. She thought our visit to the picket lines was \u201ca great success.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leadership to Unleash the Power of the International Working Class<\/strong><\/p>\n

These impressive responses show the potential for international communist leadership that we can develop from this new workforce. The communist leadership we need won\u2019t be limited to the factory but will spread throughout the world.<\/p>\n

Building the ICWP requires making, building, and consolidating indestructible political and personal relationships among the new work force. Practical and ideological struggle must increase among the revolutionary base we build. It will bolster our rejection of the capitalist media image of a hopeless working class.<\/p>\n

We must prepare now to wrest power from the ruling class. When young troops in the imperialist militaries join forces with a politicized working class, the balance of power will change. Class struggle will come to dominate every aspect of society. And the international working class will end capitalism\u2019s exploitation and genocide with communist revolution.<\/p>\n

Capitalism\u2019s Deadly Logic and the Globalization of the Working Class<\/strong><\/span><\/h4>\n

SEATTLE (USA), September 15\u2014 Thousands of Boeing workers were voting against the new contract and deciding to go on strike, their first since 2008. Outside the union hall, a communist retiree was talking to a group of young people who had started working at the Renton plant a few years ago. \u201cI worked for over 40 years at Boeing. I\u2019ve been part of most of the strikes in the company\u2019s history,\u201d the comrade commented to these workers (averaging 22 years old) while passing our communist newspaper to them.<\/p>\n

Boeing\u2019s labor force has changed radically. With this, we can see a new vision of the growing revolutionary potential of industrial workers. We are discussing communism with these workers. Some are open and want to know more.<\/p>\n

There have been more than 15 years of prolonged economic crisis, during which Boeing workers saw their benefits (such as pensions) taken away. Also, massive cutbacks came with the pandemic. This new labor force is coming in under more difficult conditions than workers in the past, but with great potential for the transformation of their lives and those of the rest of humanity. This new young workforce also has greater ethnic diversity, expressing the global conditions of capitalism.<\/p>\n

A young barista, a Red Flag<\/em> reader, asked, \u201cHow did this happen? Usually, capital discards workers who are potentially radical and turns them into relative overpopulation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Relative overpopulation is the phenomenon of capitalism where part of the population can\u2019t be productively employed (employed for profit). As constant capital (machinery) increases, the need for variable capital (labor power) becomes less necessary. One machine replaces many workers.\u00a0 This creates a surplus population who cannot exchange their labor power for a wage. Capitalists use this \u201creserve army of the unemployed\u201d to drive wages down.<\/p>\n

This is an inherent contradiction of capitalism. The capitalists only make profit from exploiting workers\u2019 labor. With more machines and fewer workers, profits go up temporarily.\u00a0 But over time, the rate of profit falls. The more they invest in machinery, the less the capitalists get back in profit for every dollar they invest. This forces bosses to compete more fiercely for markets.<\/p>\n

Capitalism Has Created One International Working Class<\/strong><\/p>\n

Historically, the global expansion of capitalism empowered the national spheres necessary to continue production in the classical or core imperialist countries. Nation states were the form of capitalism\u2019s international division of labor.<\/p>\n

In each country, however small, it was necessary to create an internal circulation of capital that would fulfill a function in the international structure of capital. But the advance of capital itself has created a universal and international worker. It has created the international working class. The new division of labor is a process involving a single global chain of production.<\/p>\n

This transformation creates a distribution of production that eliminates factories and jobs in some places and moves them to others. Maquilas producing for international markets replace factories for national production. The masses left out of these production chains (valorization circuits) must move to places where it may be possible to survive. Others are thrown into crime and violence.<\/p>\n

In this way, thousands of working families have moved to the classical or central imperialist countries. Many of the new Boeing workers come from these migrant families. They have become workers in one of the most important industries for capital.<\/p>\n

The Boeing workers\u2019 strike has been covered in all the world\u2019s major newspapers and newscasts. While the bourgeois press focuses on the financial consequences of the strike, the workers and the masses are rediscovering their key place in production and their communist revolutionary potential.<\/p>\n

We discussed all this with the barista comrade. He allowed us to leave copies of Red Flag<\/em> and promised to bring coffee for the workers on the picket line with ICWP.<\/p>\n

Read Our Manifesto:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mobilize the Masses for Communism<\/em>: here<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Front page of this issue<\/a><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Boeing Workers Key here \u2666 Capitalism’s Deadly Logic here \u2666 Boeing Workers are the Key to Change the Balance of Power SEATTLE (USA), September 28\u2014 The times are changing, but the change we need will not happen spontaneously. The decline of US imperialism, and with it the Boeing company, has radically altered the nature of … Continue reading Boeing Strikers Welcome ICWP Communists on Picket Lines<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6495,"parent":14466,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-14498","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/14498","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14498"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/14498\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14515,"href":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/14498\/revisions\/14515"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/14466"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/icwpredflag.org\/wp\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14498"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}