WeeklyWorker

23.02.2023

A study in betrayal

The parliamentary ‘left’ is not only cowardly. Now, applauded by journalists like Owen Jones, a section of it is urging further military escalation. Talal Hangari looks at the sorry picture

VI Lenin warned more than a century ago of “socialists in words and imperialists in deeds” and that warning remains relevant. A significant part of the left in Britain has capitulated to the ruling class on the Ukraine war, cheering further military escalation and thereby increasing the threat of nuclear disaster.

The Socialist Campaign Group of Labour MPs has responded to the war in two ways. One faction has chosen silence. When Sir Keir Starmer threatened 11 MPs with withdrawal of the whip for signing a Stop the War statement critical of Nato (published shortly before the Russian invasion), they retracted their signatures and have remained quiet since. They might make the occasional remark in favour of a negotiated peace, or in support of refugees, but they will not discuss the international situation that led to this war. A sustained critique of US foreign policy or Nato is off limits.

The cowardice of these MPs inheres in their politics: lacking any long-term strategy, they believe that their first priority should be to retain their seats, and they therefore do their best not to upset Starmer. Apart from their interest in keeping their careers, they believe that, by surviving in parliament, they offer the left a voice and influence it would not otherwise have. But, since the price of keeping the Labour whip is silence on fundamental questions affecting the future of civilisation, and since they neither oppose Starmer nor disseminate socialist ideas, these MPs turn out to be useless. They accomplish nothing for socialism. Add to this that they have very little prospect of continuing to be parliamentary candidates, as the Labour leadership rigs selections against the left, and their quietism amounts to a concession for no advantage.

Liberation war

Now a faction of the Socialist Campaign Group has decided to support Ukraine’s “war of liberation” and urge more British arms shipments. John McDonnell, Nadia Whittome, Clive Lewis, Lloyd Russell-Moyle, and Ian Lavery have signed a Ukraine Solidarity Campaign statement calling for “the defeat of brutal Russian imperialism” and “renewed and expanded solidarity with Ukraine’s resistance”. The statement demands that the British government give Ukraine “all the surplus UK military equipment due to be replaced, especially the 79 Challenger tanks, 170 Scimitar reconnaissance vehicles, all Warrior infantry fighting vehicles, Typhoon fighter aircraft - to help Ukraine win more quickly, with less suffering”.1 The statement condemns the war crimes of Russian forces; war crimes committed by Ukrainian forces, which have been documented by the United Nations,2 are not mentioned.

McDonnell’s and Lavery’s views appear to have evolved: both initially signed the StWC statement, but after retracting their signatures they realised that the ruling class in Britain is driven by a ‘sincere desire to defend liberty and democracy’, and to save the Ukrainian people from Russian brutality. In the House of Commons, Russell-Moyle said: “It is vital that Ukraine wins this war” - and added that he was “pleased to see Finland and Sweden joining” Nato.3

Owen Jones and George Monbiot, the ‘vanguard’ of what passes for ‘socialism’ at The Guardian, have been similarly bellicose. In response to criticism of McDonnell’s support for sending tanks to Ukraine, Jones proclaimed:

Ukraine is fighting a just, defensive war of liberation against a murderous invasion launched by a kleptocratic, chauvinist, far-right autocracy. There’s nothing leftwing about allowing nations to be conquered and subjugated by oppressors.4

Jones added that socialists who oppose arming Ukraine effectively believe that “a country of 41 million should be brutally occupied and conquered against its will by a murderous tyranny”.5 In a column on the war, Monbiot attacked “the ‘anti-imperialist’ left” for “recycling and amplifying Putin’s falsehoods”, counting them among “the worst disseminators of Kremlin propaganda in the UK”.6 It is remarkable that, amidst an unbreakable pro-war consensus, ostensibly leftwing commentators have made it their task to further stigmatise dissent, instead of bringing that dissent to the attention of a public who are presented with only one side of the question.

Some journalists involved with the independent leftwing news service Novara Media have also advocated sending British arms to Ukraine. Speaking to Luke Cooper, a supporter of Ukraine’s war effort, Novara Live host Michael Walker said he was “not against arming Ukraine”, but cautioned that “if we’re too gung-ho about it, and if we’re not encouraging compromise, that could actually make peace harder”.7

The notion that the war in Ukraine is a straightforward conflict between good and evil is a fallacy. The charges against Russia - that it is kleptocratic, chauvinist and in some ways far-right - apply no less to Ukraine. Extensive government corruption, the mistreatment of the Russian-speaking minority and the disproportional influence of far-right groups are all uncontroversial features of Ukrainian politics (or rather they were uncontroversial until February 2022, when Ukraine emerged as a Utopia surpassing Plato’s Republic). More importantly, the war is not being fought between Russia and Ukraine. Beneath the surface this is a proxy war, where Ukraine is an instrument, and a sacrificial victim, of US imperial strategy.

Since the 1990s, Washington’s policy has been to encircle Russia by the continual expansion of Nato. Russian leaders throughout this period have consistently expressed fear about Nato’s growth, and have insisted that Nato should not expand up to Russia’s borders. Disregarding all Russian concerns, in 2014 the US supported a protest movement with a conspicuous far-right element that overthrew the elected president of Ukraine. Russia responded by annexing Crimea, and the process of integrating Ukraine’s new government into Euro-Atlantic institutions began.

In particular, Ukraine was de facto integrated into Nato. Dozens of informed observers - not least prominent members of the US military and diplomatic establishment - warned that this policy would lead to conflict, and quite possibly war. Washington carried on, fully aware that war was a likely outcome. After Russia’s autumn 2021 diplomatic proposals failed to elicit a positive response from Nato - which insisted that Ukraine should retain its right to join the alliance - Ukraine was finally attacked.

Russia has not been a great power for decades. It remains, however, a formidable military power, and an important ally of China. US national security officials consider China the only country that poses a real challenge to America’s hegemony. The provocation of Russia therefore has China as its final target. Encircling Russia, while stoking up fears of Chinese aggression, Chinese spying and Chinese economic domination, are unambiguous steps toward a new cold war.

This political context is crucial for understanding the war in Ukraine; to ignore it is to become a cheerleader for American imperial designs. Yet this context is continually omitted, or downplayed, by leftwing advocates of arming Ukraine.

The nature of this war is clarified by the fact that, at the same time as the US and Nato arm Ukraine, they have opposed a diplomatic settlement. Just a few weeks into the invasion, Russia and Ukraine reached the outlines of a settlement that would have ended the war and, at least for the moment, taken the world back from the precipice of a nuclear conflagration. Boris Johnson then visited Ukraine and told president Zelensky not to make peace. Former Israeli prime minister Naftali Bennett, who mediated between Russia and Ukraine during the early part of the war, has said publicly that, while he thought “there was a good chance of reaching a ceasefire”, western countries “blocked” an agreement.

Serbian lessons

This deeply sinister policy of sacrificing Ukrainians to weaken Russia should be rejected. But instead the Socialist Campaign Group, the Guardian left and others remain silent, or call for more weapons to flood into Ukraine - oblivious or indifferent to the reasons why the ruling class is arming that state.

The CPGB, and some other socialist organisations, have put forward the old slogan: ‘The main enemy is at home’. The pro-war left responds that the main enemy is Russia: it is Russia that attacked Ukraine and that is at fault. But no war can be understood merely by reference to the playground standard of who started it; that is, who fired the first shot. Consider the view of Serbian socialists on World War I, expressed here in a 1915 letter by Dušan Popović:

For us it was clear that, as far as the conflict between Serbia and Austria-Hungary was concerned, our country was obviously in a defensive position. Austria had been carrying on a policy of conquest against Serbia long before the latter became an independent state. As for the assassination at Sarajevo, the blame doubtless lies with the Serbian authorities. Hence, in formal terms, part of the responsibility for provoking the war falls on Serbia. But basically Serbia is defending its life and its independence, which Austria was constantly threatening even before the Sarajevo assassination. And if Social Democracy had a legitimate right to vote for war anywhere, then certainly that was the case in Serbia above all.

However, for us, the decisive fact was that the war between Serbia and Austria was only a small part of a totality - merely the prologue to universal, European war - and this latter (we were profoundly convinced of this) could not fail to have a clearly pronounced imperialist character. As a result, we - being a part of the great socialist, proletarian International - considered that it was our bounden duty to oppose the war resolutely. We did not want to cause any discord in the attitudes of the sections of the International, and yet it is precisely through our position that we have, contrary to our intentions, caused such discord, for - alas! - almost all the other socialist parties have voted for this war!8

Rosa Luxemburg wrote in her 1915 The Junius pamphlet that the Serbian socialists who voted against war credits “enrolled their names in letters of gold in the annals of the international socialist movement”. No war, even one that is apparently defensive, can be separated from the broader international situation and the interests of competing powers. In the context of an escalating imperial confrontation, the question of who fired the first shot on this or that front becomes comparatively superficial.

  1. ukrainesolidaritycampaign.org/2023/02/16/stand-with-ukraine-uk-solidarity-statement-and-call-for-protests-for-the-anniversary-of-russias-invasion.↩︎

  2. www.normanfinkelstein.com/un-confirms-atrocities-on-both-sides-of-ukraine-war-by-irfan-chowdhury.↩︎

  3. HC Deb July 6 2022, Vol 717, cols 886-87.↩︎

  4. Tweet, February 9.↩︎

  5. Ibid.↩︎

  6. ‘We must confront Russian propaganda - even when it comes from those we respect’ The Guardian March 2 2022.↩︎

  7. Novara Live February 8 2023, accessible at www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUUX8uDf1B0&t=778s.↩︎

  8. www.marxist.com/the-position-of-serbian-socialists-during-wwi.htm. Emphasis mine.↩︎