Wednesday, March 11, 2026

We Need a Revolution: Part I

 


When capitalism went down hard in the 1930's the world was unquestionably ruled by white people.  China was a basket-case and India was ruled by the British.  Japan was the only truly autonomous non-white country.  And in the 1930's, the rise of tariffs in all the European nations, the USA and Canada, and Australia, devastated its export-oriented economy.  There was a non-capitalist Soviet Union pursuing its autarchic industrialization.  This served as something of a threat to the capitalist countries.  Communists and socialists were rising political movements in their many countries.

Then, as now, the capitalist class wasn't smart enough to have invented fascism to save itself from socialism.  Mussolini, Hitler, and others arose organically from out of societies in distress from the First World War, the post-war dislocations and then the Great Depression.  But the capitalists in Germany and Italy certainly saw how useful they were to push-back against the challenge from socialism.

Britain, France, the Netherlands, the Scandinavian countries, Canada, the USA, Australia, ... maintained social cohesiveness.  Spain went socialist and then fascist.

In the end there was a war. The war replaced the suppressed demand caused by capitalist inequality and financial sector mismanagement with state-subsidized industrial expansion and full employment.  The greater resources of the USA, the British Empire and Commonwealth, and the Soviet Union produced their victory and gave the Soviets forty-five years of super-power status and the Anglo-American bloc seventy-five years of global hegemony.

 


We are now in a slow-motion, drawn-out crisis similar to that of the 1930's.  Except that this time our elites have knowledge (gained through experience) of public-sector financial management, social welfare policies, and propaganda/brainwashing that has so far allowed them to remain securely in power.  They aren't consciously aware of this.  They insist on un-learning all the lessons of the 20th Century in order to pursue their short-term narcissistic goals.  But the continued immiseration of the public, the homeless camps, the rise in household debt and insecurity, combined with the growing inequality and the elites' short-sighted, narcissistic compulsions to destroy those few remaining concessions to reality (welfare policies, fiscal and monetary policies) that provide some comforts for the majority, have led to a return to fascism.

Immigrants are scapegoated.  The lunatic ambitions of the zionist project in Palestine add fuel to the fire.  But this time there is no Soviet Union and no domestic socialist movements of any importance.  There is China and there is Russia.  Czarist Russia was backwards.  Soviet Russia was a clumsy colossus.  21st-Century Russia is a battle-hardened, resource-rich, militarily-focused, independent, more experienced nation.  Sobered by the fall of its empire.  China is an economic and technological powerhouse constrained by the realization that when the population's needs outstrip the resource/economic base, disaster follows.

India, Brazil, Iran, ... they're strong enough now to not be pushed around.

 


Israel was the last case of a European colonialist society.  After 1945, every other European imperialist country was formally giving up their colonies and settler societies (like Canada, the USA, South Africa) had ceased expanding, with some of them making at least token steps to ameliorate some of the worst aspects of their racist pasts.  (South Africa intensified its apartheid regime, but formal white political supremacy was lost by the 1990s.)

Meanwhile, Israeli zionists, to the present day, believe in a racist fantasy of a "Greater Israel" encompassing parts of Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Iraq.  This while continuing to impose intense apartheid on the Palestinians and expanding into the West Bank.

If Israel and the United States are defeated in this crisis, it means the end of the era of European imperialism.

And that is what Iran intends.

Can Iran do it?

 I don't know obviously.  I don't have access to inside information about US and Israeli military hardware and tactics.  Nor do I have information about the Iranian side.  But I have seen the results of the June 2025 12-Day War and I saw that Israel was about to be completely overwhelmed after two weeks of fighting.  And at that time, Iran hadn't taken out the USA's radar installations in the Arab puppet dictatorships.  Last June, the Israelis had 30 minutes warning about incoming Iranian strikes.  Now it's said that is down to five minutes.

That's enough for today. 

4 comments:

  1. In the late stages of empire, the imperial wars largely stop being about the empire's hegemony and become about the selfish interests of a few wealthy and powerful individuals, often to the detriment of the general imperial project. In the early days of an imperial project, the people advancing it are aware that their fortunes rise and fall with the empire's fortunes, so there is a significant identification between their interests and the interests of the project overall. But by the late stages, there is more inherited wealth and privilege, and there is the general feeling that the empire cannot fall, that "we" can get away with anything, and so it doesn't matter if the elite does things that would be counterproductive to hegemony. Oddly, this feeling seems to persist even when decline is staring the empire in the face.

    That seems to be what is happening today with the attack on Iran. Trump and Netanyahu are both in it for their personal gain, political or monetary or both, and ignoring the consequences for the projects they supposedly lead because they are arrogant pieces of shit who think it can't happen to them, and they're way too used to nobody ever having the power to tell them "no".

    I don't know just how bad the results will be for the US and for the rest of us, but . . . pretty bad seems very likely. Especially since Iran has flipped the switch on their strategic approach. They have always been working on avoiding escalation, trying to move back to diplomacy after an attack on them and so on. But they have also always known that at some time, they may have to abandon that and go scorched earth. And this is that time. Their new strategic orientation is "Being patient didn't work, they will never stop attacking on their own, so it's time to make sure they hurt so bad they never want to try that again." We don't know just how great their power to do that is, but it's more significant than either the US or Israel were willing to acknowledge, and just keeping the strait of Hormuz closed a long time is enough to bring the world's economy to its knees--and that's EASY. They can still do THAT even if they lose most of their capabilities.

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    1. Purple library guy,

      I agree with everything that you wrote. I'll just add that we have to add the socio-cultural decline that leads to someone like Trump becoming electorally viable. And the whole eco-system of shit-headed degenerates that he's able to staff his administration with.

      Add to this the international crew that is itself so debased that they act as his sycophants/enablers rather than barriers.

      That does and doesn't exclude the psychotically racist, whining, self-pitying, genocidal state of Israel, that has acted as much as a virus-parasite as it has a dependency.

      It doesn't look like I'll have time to work on Part II today. But, if you haven't already, Ian Welsh's latest reinforces our perception of Iran's prospects.

      https://www.ianwelsh.net/iran-is-winning-its-not-close/

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  2. I've come to the conclusion: it's about who you've got into power, and the people they place into position. Politics is about battle lines and logistics.

    Carney, unfortunately, understands this better than any other Canadian politician at the moment. But then again, he's doing his best to pretzel on the whole issue of Israel and Iran: supporting Israel, condemning Iran, while doing his best to not get Canada involved militarily.

    So, basically, it's about lines. How far in Canada can the left push its lines right now? Not far. In fact, we're in retreat. We're so far from the actual fight, we may as well be in underground bunkers. The best we've got is probably Avi Lewis, and I don't know enough about him to form a solid opinion, but at first glance he does seem further left than Singh. Definitely further left than Mulcair and Layton.

    I'm hoping we can get a solid footing in the next election.

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    1. Troy,

      Yves Engler's anti-imperialist and anti-capitalist analysis was what the NDP needed. But the Non-Democratic Party blocked his candidacy, even blocked him from attending NDP events, and finally expelled him from the party.

      Various party hacks accused him of being too critical of the party, it's support for NATO, it's long-time support of zionism, of the occupation of Afghanistan, etc., ... and for complaining about the leadership not allowing him to run or even show up at events. To whit: "When you're slapped you'll take it and like it."

      I would have been prepared to support Avi Lewis if he'd honestly defeated Engler in a leadership race. But the party's wholesale repudiation of party democracy has finally destroyed any interest I have in that disappointing entity.

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