Link to this page: http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/601/8340
From The Socialist newspaper, 11 November 2009
End the war in Afghanistan: Bring the troops back now!
Anti-war demonstration October 2009, photo Alison Hill (Click to enlarge)
THE WAR in Afghanistan is bringing more and more bloodshed. About 1,500 Afghan civilians were killed between January and August this year and the numbers are still rising. The 110,000 Nato-led troops sent by Western governments to Afghanistan also face growing numbers of deaths and injuries.
Roger Shrives
Two more British soldiers were killed on 7 and 8 November, bringing the number of British troops killed there to 232 since the war started in 2001. According to a new poll, two-thirds of people in Britain now believe that the conflict is unwinnable.
America's ruling class is acutely aware of people's fears of the war escalating like that in Vietnam in the 1960s. The US is thought to have lost more troops in Afghanistan than in its first nine years of involvement in Vietnam.
Nonetheless US President Obama, who has been trying to put off a decision, may now be on the verge of committing up to 40,000 more US troops. The US ruling class will also try to persuade other Nato members to increase their forces.
However, Afghanistan is politically less stable than ever. There was widespread fraud in the elections in August but Hamid Karzai, whose regime is widely despised in the country for its corruption, has nonetheless been appointed president.
Anti-war demonstration Seotember 05, photo Alison Hill (Click to enlarge)
Much of the country outside Kabul is under the control of reactionary regional warlords and tribal chiefs. The equally reactionary and repressive Taliban forces are recruiting freely, mainly from Afghans who oppose the occupation and the government's corrupt policies.
The Socialist Party has always warned that the war in Afghanistan will not defeat terrorism; its main aim is to bolster the power and prestige of Western imperialist states, particularly the US, and the profits of their capitalists.
US energy giant ExxonMobil has gained from the invasion of Iraq, having been given a free hand to exploit 80% of one of the world's biggest untapped oil reserves near Basra.
In Afghanistan, too, capitalist governments will give far higher priority to defending profits, prestige and power than to meeting the people's needs. This war is being fought for the interests of the rich not for Afghanistan's working class and poor.
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are thought to have already cost the USA more than any war in history apart from world war two. However, the rising death toll and spiralling cost is making people ask how this war can be ended. If Obama, dutifully followed by Gordon Brown, decides to escalate the war even further, the anti-war movement should call massive protests with clear demands to end the conflict.
The Socialist Party says:
- Build a mass movement against the war! Bring the troops out immediately. Stop the slaughter of civilians. Let Afghanistan's people determine their own future.
- For UK and US government spending on jobs and public services, not war and nuclear weapons.
- For a massive reconstruction programme in Afghanistan under the control of the Afghan masses. For public ownership of gas, oil, and other key industries.
- For democratically organised, multi-ethnic workers' defence forces in Afghanistan. For workers' solidarity internationally.
- For genuine democratic rights. No support for Karzai's corrupt Afghan government; support mass struggle to remove his regime and other reactionary regimes in the Middle East, Asia and worldwide.
- For a democratic, socialist gov-ernment in Afghanistan of the working people and poor, as part of a socialist confederation of the South Asia region, including Pakistan.
- No to all imperialist wars and occupations! For a socialist world without poverty, terror or war.
See also 'Afghanistan: an inescapable quagmire' on www.socialistworld.net
Why not click here to join the Socialist Party, or click here to donate to the Socialist Party.
In The Socialist 11 November 2009:
Fight for real jobs and free education
War and occupation
End the war in Afghanistan: Bring the troops back now!
Socialism 2009
Socialism 2009: An excellent weekend!
Postal workers strike
Postal workers force management back
Defend the four campaign
Unison witch-hunt: Defend the Four campaign gets a boost
Campaign for a New Workers Party
RMT conference on political representation
International socialist news and analysis
20 years after fall of Berlin Wall, capitalist triumphalism turns rotten
General Motors - no to 'divide and rule' in Germany
Ireland: 90,000 march against government cuts
United Socialist Party congress delegates defy difficult conditions in Sri Lanka
Socialist Party workplace news
Steelworkers get organised and score a victory over bonus payments
Young People
Big business fights for fees: Students must fight back
Internationally young people fight for their rights
Socialist Party review
Anti-fascists tactics - What happened in Newport?
Home | The Socialist 11 November 2009 | Join the Socialist Party
Join us today!
Printable version
email to friend
