The following is a statement on the war in the Balkans from the Leagure for
Revolutionary Communist International (LRCI), of which Workers Power
Australia is a member.
Stop the NATO bombing now!
Stop the genocide in Kosova!
No a ground war in Kosova or beyond!
Victory to the Kosovar national liberation struggle!
LRCI International Secretariat, 16 May 1999
1. The present war over the fate of Kosova has a dual character; the first,
that waged by NATO against Serbia to enforce a reactionary peace has been
carried out by means of missile attack and bombing of a large part of
Serbia's military capacity and economic infrastructure; already over 1000
Serb civilians have been killed. The second, that waged by. the Yugoslav
army and Serbian paramilitaries inside Kosova to drive out its ethnic
Albanian population has led to the displacement or external exile of nearly
one million, at least 5000 executions and the unaccounted disappearance of
100,000 of Kosovar men. Both NATO and Serbia's aims and methods in these
wars have a thoroughly reactionary character. On the other hand, the
resistance of the Kosovar Liberation Front (U=C7K) to the rump-Yugoslav
state's attempts at genocide, and the resistance of the Serb population and
the Yugoslav armed forces to NATO, have a progressive character despite the
fact that the Serbs link their war to the ethnic cleansing of Kosova and
the U=C7K their resistance to support for NATO bombing and calls for it to
invade and occupy Kosova. It is contrary to the interests of the Serb and
Kosovar peoples that either reactionary objective should be realised -and
it is in the interests of the world working class and anti-imperialist
struggle that both justified defensive struggles should succeed.
2. This can only be achieved if the Serbian people break from Milosevic and
all the reactionary greater Serbian nationalists (Seselj, Draskovic et.
al.) and if the Kosovar Albanians break from the counterrevolutionary
leadership of the U=C7K who in turn lean upon NATO . What is urgently needed
is the fighting unity of the workers and peasants of all nationalities,
which respects the national existence and democratic rights of all peoples.
Such a strategy must take power out of the hands of the corrupt bureaucrats
and criminal "businessmen" who have set the peoples of former Yugoslavia at
one another's throats and place it firmly in the hands of councils and
militias of the urban and rural workers and poor peasants. In short this is
a programme of permanent revolution, which combines the fight for
self-determination for all Balkan peoples (i.e. to state independence) with
the struggle to realise a voluntary socialist federation of Balkan states.
3. The regime headed by Slobodan Milosevic is not waging a principled
anti-imperialist struggle. Milosevic moved from systematic repression of
the democratic rights of Kosovar Albanians to outright war against them in
1998. Its aim was to destroy the U=C7K guerrillas. It evolved into a plan to
ethnically cleanse the strongest areas of U=C7K support and the major cities=
=2E
Behind it lies a "final solution" to the Kosova problem which involves the
displacement --by methods of mass terror --of a majority of the provinces
population, the seizure of its main economic assets and the historic sites
of Serb nationalism, and the settlement in these areas of the population
displaced from the Krajina, Bosnia and Slavonia in 1995. This is a
continuation and attempted completion of the project to create an
ethnically homogeneous Serbian state.
4. The starting point for the any progressive outcome must be the immediate
and unconditional withdrawal of the mass murder squads of Serbian
paramilitaries, Interior Ministry troops and regular Yugoslav army forces.
from Kosova. This would be in accord with the wishes of the majority of its
people. It is the sole basis for establishing the minority rights of the
Serbian inhabitants and would remove a major obstacle to the development of
the class struggle in Serbia which alone can bring to power a government
which can solve the national antagonism of the former Yugoslavia on the
basis of equal rights and end to privileges for minorities.
5. But NATO can play no progressive role in this conflict. Its war aim are
not --as Clinton and Blair proclaim --to defend the human rights of the
Kosovars. Rather, by using Kosova as a pretext, they aim to establish a new
world order based on NATO, under the hegemony of the sole world superpower
--the United States of America. The USA fears the disorder unleashed both
by the destructive restoration of capitalism in the former Stalinist world
and by the effects of recurring capitalist crises. To deal with this the
USA demands full freedom of action to act as the world's policeman --behind
the facade of the institutions of the "international community" if
possible, unilaterally if necessary. Just as through the IMF and the World
Bank it supervises the world economically, so through NATO it hopes to
create US controlled rapid reaction forces to impose compliance ("order")
on "rogue" states.
6. In reality the US and NATO is highly selective in its choice of targets.
It does not act against all violators of international law, humans rights
or common humanity. Such serial violators of the human rights of national
minorities within their borders as Israel, Britain, Turkey, and Indonesia
have oppressed their minorities, or attacked their neighbours. They have
contemptuously ignored UN resolutions: but instead of suffering bombing,
missile attacks and blockades they receive armaments and aid on a massive
scale --and US vetoes protect them against condemnation in the UN Security
Council.
7. Nor is Nato's aim in the Balkans to end the tyranny of Milosevic over
the Kosovars or his rule over the Serbs. In this US imperialism's actions
closely mirror those with regard to Iraq in the 1980s and 1990s. In the
former decade Saddam Hussein's massacres of his Kurdish population were
ignored and he was armed to the teeth as long as he was fighting Iran, then
seen as the main threat to US and EU oil supplies and to the puppet regimes
of the Arabian peninsular. On a similar pattern Slobodan Milosevic --as
recently as the mid-1990s was both the USA's and the EU's favoured broker
for what they thought would be a the beginning of a reactionary stability
in the Balkans --the 1995 Dayton Peace Agreement in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
They did this despite his scarcely concealed role as the premier exponent
of the attempted genocide in that country and chiefly responsible for the
deaths of over 200,000 in Bosnia.
8. In both cases --Iraq and Serbia --US imperialism and its allies were
looking for militarily strong states whose rulers held a firm grip
internally to help them keep order in strategically sensitive areas --in
short gendarmes, local police forces charged with keeping regional order.
In the Balkans the US and the EU need such allies to keep order between the
fractious weaker states and nationalities of the region and against the
working class and small peasants who have --and will again --revolted
against the sufferings of capitalist restoration and the dictates of the
IMF and the European Central Bank (e.g. Albania, Romania, Croatia, Serbia
and Greece). In this imperialism is perfectly consistent --rejecting the
national aspirations of inconvenient small nations --rejecting outright any
self-determination for the Kosovars, just as it does that of the Kurds in
Turkey, Iraq and Iran. All imperialism demands is that the repression
carried out by its gendarmes, including some of it entirely on their own
behalf --does not destabilise imperialism's own exploitation of the given
area, disrupt the internal situation of its other allies.
9. If Nato's war aims are closely related to its overall nature and aims on
a world-scale then Milosevic's war aims are likewise the product of the
nature of Serbia and its rulers' ambitions. Serbia-Montenegro (Yugoslavia)
is a bureaucratic moribund workers' state. Milosevic and the Serbian
bureaucracy played a key role in the destruction of Yugoslavia. By seeking
to strengthen Serb dominance over the federation (which involved destroying
the limited autonomy of Kosova and separating the ethnic Serb areas of
Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina) he launched the "wars of the Yugoslav
succession" in which so many Serbs, Croats, Bosnians and now Albanians have
lost their lives, their homes, their homelands. Milosevic, initially a
typical Stalinist, opportunistically picked up the nationalist demagogy of
the slogan of "All Serbs in one State" (i.e. a Greater Serbia). Now the
bitter fruit of this policy is hundreds of thousands of Serb refugees from
the lands and the homes they had inhabited for centuries. Kosova is
Milosevic's last stand --a region he hopes to colonise with refugees from
his past defeats.
10. The zigzags of Milosevic's internal policy is an expression of the
bonapartist character of his entire regime. Whilst the central pivot of his
power base is the secret police, the army and the media, he maintains his
social base in a divided and acquiescent population by using the SSP and
the JUL to distribute patronage and terrorise opponents. To keep power he
has willingly allied himself with pro-Western forces like Drascovic, even
with the pan-slavist fascists like Seselj. Politically this regime is a
form of plebiscitary bonapartism --with Milosevic as its cult leader.
Socially this regime represents a capitalist-restorationist bureaucracy,
but one that is trying to seize the key potentially profitable sectors of
the economy on the Russian model rather than that of the Visegrad states
(Czechia, Hungary, Poland) or even Slovenia and Croatia.
11. The degeneration of Yugoslav Stalinism in the second half of the 1980s
into a virulent, murderous chauvinism, was necessary precisely because the
Serbian kleptocracy was and is not yet an established bourgeois class but a
social formation still in transition from a Stalinist bureaucracy to being
true owners of the means of production. To perform this transition --this
final and complete expropriation of the Serbian working class --it still
has to wrap itself in the tattered mantle of Titoite "socialism" but add to
them the lurid colours of Greater Serbian nationalism. But the Stalinism of
Milosevic was, from 1987 onwards, the Stalinism which Trotsky called in the
late 1930s, "the faction of Butenko". In modern terms, in post-1991 Russia
it has been called "the red-brown bloc". The national "socialism" of
Milosevic is thus, for good socio-economic reasons --far closer to Nazism
than to international communism.
12. The foreign policy of Milosevic (and the Serbian pro-capitalist
nomenklatura) was and is to aggrandise Serbia's role in the Balkans. In the
political sense (and in this sense only) it is a miniature imperialist
policy, not at an anti-imperialist one. His ultimate aim is to make Serbia
an indispensable partner for imperialism (i.e. international finance
capital) in the region --putting it on a on a par with Greece and Turkey.
In the long term this could even bring it the prize of EU membership. In
the new millennium Serbia hopes to graduate through the stage of advanced
semi-colony to become a "developing" region of a new imperialist superstate.
13. Imperialism's need for a reliable gendarme and Serbia's desire to play
the role as policeman over the smaller nations and nationalities of the
region are ultimately compatible. But the division of the spoils can only
be established in struggle. Hence the on/off wooing between Milosevic and
imperialism --rough wooing, indeed, but wooing nonetheless. If imperialism
has now given up on Milosevic and his clique it has not thereby given up on
a Serb state strong enough to act an as ally to impose order on the region.
14. Despite the enormous preponderance of the USA economically and
militarily within NATO, imperialism it is not a unity but a coalition of
independent powers. As the war has proceeded, for all Nato's claims of
total unanimity, there has been an evident growth of intra-imperialist
tensions. This is because the war is also an attempt by US imperialism and
its British shield-bearer to strengthen their hegemony in Western Europe as
well as in the Balkans. The Anglo-Saxon powers' rapid resort to military
means --their peremptory pushing aside of diplomatic initiatives which the
Germans, the Italians and the French too, would have preferred --is a way
of promoting the weight and influence of the US and UK and emphasising the
much weaker position of continental European powers. In addition Germany,
=46rance and Italy clearly wish to appease Russia's outrage at the assault o=
n
its key Balkan ally. They want, if at all possible to reach a compromise
with Milosevic --a Dayton Mark II, but with more EU influence. The German
government has published post-war plans which emphasise placing the Balkans
under EU (not NATO/US) dominance.
15. What lies at the root of these tensions is that US (and British)
imperialism have a much greater global military role and more extensive
economic interests --especially in the oil-rich Muslim world --which
require an interventionist policy, uninhibited by the horse trading and
obstructionism of the UN Security Council. Their ignoring of the plight of
the Bosnian Muslims for nearly three years, their choice of Milosevic as
the guarantor of Dayton, all left them and their puppets in the Muslim
world, exposed to the assaults of the political Islamists. Thus when
Milosevic --in their view --bit the hand that fed him, further appeasement
of him ceased to be an option. The use of force, despite having negative
undoubted consequences for the Slav world, especially for Russia, has had
undeniable positive effects in the Islamic world for imperialism.
16. In contrast to Britain and the US, France, Germany and Italy have a
much lower military and political capacity for such intervention and tend
therefore to pursue a foreign policy which relies more on "realistic" deals
with existing rulers such as Milosevic. Also these countries are far more
directly affected by war, regional instability and the wave of refugees
than are the Anglo-American powers. Another important factor is the
continental European concern to avoid a rupture in relations with Russia.
The coming to power of a post-Yeltsin pan-Slav ultra-nationalist regime
would lead to a change of Russian foreign policy toward Eastern Europe and
the EU is less able to deter a Russian military threat than is the US.
=46urthermore, Greece and Italy have important economic interests in Serbia
and the Balkans in general. For Greece capitalist restoration in Serbia and
a complete economic opening in the region offer Greece the possibility of
becoming the equal of most of its EU partners rather than its present role
as the weakest member of the EU.
17. Within NATO a debate about war aims has started inside NATO. Naturally
the return of all the refugees has become part of the demands because they
constitute a destabilising factor in the surrounding countries of Macedonia
and Albania. But there are several differences inside the imperialist camp.
=46irst should NATO insist on a complete withdrawal of all Serbian troops
from Kosova? While this is part of official NATO policy, US foreign
minister Albright has already indicated that it could be necessary "to
accept realities on the ground" and to concede to the presence of some
Serbian forces. Another difference is the composition and the command of
the "international peace contingent" which should be stationed inside
Kosova. While NATO as a whole has already changed the formula from "NATO
troops" (in the Rambouillet agreement) to "international troops" US prefers
a stronger NATO component and command; the proto-deal with Chernomyrdin
concedes a "NATO core" to this force. Furthermore, while NATO has insisted
that there can be no arming of the U=C7K there is more tendency in the US
camp to envisage using the U=C7K for auxiliary military purposes than is the
case within the ruling circles of Europe. There are even serious clashes
between NATO partners on the nature of any post-war Kosova administration.
Germany has pressed for EU control, while the US has vetoed this and
insists on diluting EU control within the framework of the OSCE (which
includes Russia).
18. The only alternative to the present "armed diplomacy" would be a
decisive turn of the US ruling class to a massive intervention involving
ground troops to enforce its solution despite the extremely risky
consequences for its relations with Russia, the EU and several Balkan
states. This is least likely precisely because it is not clear what more
this could achieve than the current strategy, without substantially raising
the war aims to include an end to Serbian sovereignty over Kosova (or at
least partition) and even the downfall of Milosevic. But such as turn to
ground war would indicate that the US ruling class was agreed in
confronting and overcoming "the Vietnam syndrome", it would mean that the
isolationist and Pacific Ocean-oriented Right had been decisively defeated,
that the Republicans in Congress were prepared to accept Clinton's
leadership and the Democrats aggrandisement in the event of success, and
the military General Staff overcoming its distrust of Clinton. All these
conditions are far from being fulfilled as the whole impeachment saga
showed very clearly. Clinton is unlikely to attempt, still less achieve,
such a historic reversal with a divided US ruling class and political
establishment. No serious preparation has been undertaken for it and in
addition such a move would be difficult in the extreme without French and
Germany support.
19. The Tactics of Revolutionaries in this War
20. The world workers' movement should recognise the right of the Kosovars
to full independence. For the last ten years, in every way possible
­p;elections, mass peaceful resistance and finally by armed struggle
--they have indicated that this is what they wish. The Serb minority have
the right to full civil liberties and, indeed, autonomy in majority Serb
areas. They have the right to defend themselves from any pogroms or
repression. But they do not have the right to veto the self-determination
of the overwhelming majority of the Kosovars. Since the political parties
and military organisations which have the overwhelming confidence of the
Kosovars have not only expressed this wish but have actually declared
Kosova independent and chosen a government, the workers' movement should
put the greatest possible pressure on all foreign governments to
diplomatically recognise Kosova and its government.
21. The workers' movement should call for the immediate and unconditional
withdrawal of all Yugoslav forces and irregular Serb paramilitary death
squads from Kosova and the disarming of Serb civilian militia. They should
collect money --for medicine, food and weapons --to support the struggle of
the U=C7K and other Kosovar parties as long as the Serbian occupation lasts.
The Kosovar resistance fighters have the right to acquire arms and supplies
from whoever is willing to give them --i.e. imperialist governments,
Islamic governments. They also the right to take any military advantage
they can from the NATO bombing campaign.
22. The Kosovar resistance fighters are waging a progressive struggle that
deserves, indeed demands, the practical material support of all progressive
forces --despite the fact that those forces should not give any support to
Nato's war aims, nor place any confidence in the negotiations and diplomacy
conducted by "the international community". NATO, the European Union, the
Contact Group, the OSCE, the United Nations --all represent just so many
thieves' kitchens who will rob and despoil the workers and oppressed
nations of the world the moment they entrust their fate to them.
23. This does not mean that we support the petty bourgeois nationalist
politics of the U=C7K or the instances of kidnappings and atrocities
committed against unarmed Serbian villagers. The workers' movement must
never "turn a blind eye" to reactionary and self-defeating chauvinist
crimes even when they are committed by oppressed communities themselves.
This is self-defeating for the Kosovars because they will never finally
establish their national freedom in peace and security without the goodwill
of the great majority of the workers and farmers of Serbia and Montenegro.
Therefore their treatment of the Serb minority in Kosova, those innocent of
atrocities against their Albanian Kosovar neighbours, is a medium and long
term weapon against the likes of Milosevic, Seselj and Draskovic. For only
the Serbian democratic youth, the poor farmers and above all the workers
can kick out these fomenters of national hatreds and punish them as they so
richly deserve.
24. Nor do we support the U=C7K's guerrilla-warfare strategy or its
adventurist attempt to draw NATO into Kosova which has now brought the
liberation movement to the verge of disaster. It has resulted in the
terrible weakening of the mass force of the Kosovar population. Indeed,
while the U=C7K itself has drawn in thousands more volunteers since aerial
war began the UCK has suffered heavy reverses inside Kosova. Only the
workers and peasants of Kosova --eventually allying themselves with the
workers and youth of Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia and Albania --will be
able to achieve a free and truly independent Kosova which lives in the
closest harmony with all its surrounding states and peoples. Never before
have the Kosovars been more at the mercy of the Serb ethnic cleansers and
of the NATO powers. The recent history of the US, Britain and the other
imperialist powers in their relations with the Kurds and the Palestinians
demonstrate that these "world policemen" will in fact stab them in the back
as surely as Milosevic has stabbed them in the chest. The fate that awaits
them is at best heavily guarded versions of the West Bank in Israel or the
bantustans of Apartheid South Africa and at worst refugee camps such as the
Palestinians of the Gaza strip or Beirut lived in for generations and still
live in.
25. The present war has shown the reactionary potential of petty-bourgeois
nationalism. The UCK-leadership is prepared to subordinate itself to Nato's
imperialist war. Its leader Hasim Thaci even supported the latest G-8
diplomatic plan which definitively leaves Kosova as a part of Yugoslavia,
even after the recent tragic events. The removal of commanders of the U=C7K
loyal to the former leader Adem Demaci because of the latter's refusal to
go along with Rambouillet, the purge of Hoxa-ite "Marxist-Leninist"
elements in its ranks are all aimed at winning NATO support. However
despite the reactionary pro-imperialist policy of the Thaci leadership and
despite the U=C7K's recent co-operation in Kosova with the British SAS, they
are neither simply nor primarily "the ground troops of imperialism". This
is because (a) they remain a defence forces socially linked to the internal
and external refugees and (b) because imperialism itself does not want them
to play this role. Their is a glaring disparity between the Balkan
stabilisation strategy of imperialism and the central goal of the U=C7K. The
former is based precisely on denying independence to Kosova and
necessitates as part of a settlement the disarming the U=C7K's fighters. It
is too risky for the Western ruling classes to arm this liberation movement
in a way that would give it any operational independence of NATO. Therefore
NATO has not given them any substantive number of arms, surface to air
missiles, anti-tank weapons etc. Nor has it given them serious tactical
assistance -e.g. in the U=C7K's attempt to force a corridor into Kosova to
rescue the encircled refugees in Djacovica).
26. The contradictory character of the U=C7K has actually increased since th=
e
war started. On the one hand, the Thaci-leadership has moved even further
to the right; on the other hand, its mass base and militant character has
increased because of the thousands of refugees recruits eager to recover
their homes and avenge the slaughter of their relatives. This is an
essential objective factor because revolutionary tactics towards mass
national liberation movements derive not from the subjective intentions or
policies of its leadership but from its social relation to the mass of
workers and peasants, from the concrete war aims this support obliges them
to pursue. Given this contradictory character of the U=C7K further splits ar=
e
likely if the Thaci-leadership agrees to halt the liberation struggle on
imperialist terms and agrees to disarmament. Already another leader of the
UCK, Jakup Krasniqi, has ruled out any support for the G-8 plan. Compared
with the Bosnian army in 1995 around the time of the Dayton agreement, the
UCK leadership represents a much less solid and bourgeois leadership than
Bosnian Republic's leadership around Alija Izetbegovic. Also the
spontaneity of the rank & file of the guerrilla movement is much stronger
in the UCK than in the established army structures of the Bosnian army.
27. But justified revulsion against the genocidal ethnic cleansers and
concern for their fate of the refugees should not deceive workers around
the world into supporting the cowardly air wars against Serbia. The
destruction of bridges, factories, power stations, hospitals, blocks of
flats --vandalism amounting already to billions of dollars and resulting in
the loss of 100,000 jobs and more than 1,000 Serb civilian lives, does not
aid the Kosovars one iota. It weakens and confuses the Serbian working
class and democratic forces which are the central and essential force for a
progressive outcome to the wars of the Yugoslav succession. Workers and
youth in the NATO countries, by opposing the war, by seeking to bring about
a massive wave of revulsion against it, by undermining the morale of the
imperialist troops, by obstructing and sabotaging in every way possible the
war effort, must help bring it to an end as soon as possible.
28. The arch-reactionary consequences of the United Sates policing
operations have been demonstrated in the Gulf War, in Somalia, in Haiti,
and in Bosnia with the implementation of the reactionary Dayton Accords.
Its most recent episodes have been the US bombings in Sudan and
Afghanistan. Nowhere have these "humanitarian" interventions aided the
oppressed and persecuted peoples in whose name they were undertaken. The
pretexts are in fact cynical charades. Imperialism is not simply the old
system of colonies or the direct occupation of one country by another. It
means the exploitation of the great majority of countries by the banks and
multinational corporations of the G7 states. Several political and economic
agencies: the United Nations, the IMF and World Bank lay down the policies
which the governments of these states must follow. Ultimate enforcement
lies with military alliances led by the USA, most importantly NATO. This
subordination makes a mockery of the formal independence of these states;
they are semi-colonies. The collapse of the USSR and the eastern European
states opened the way to imperialism extending this semi-colonial servitude
to them as well and strengthening its hold on those third world states that
had achieved a measure of economic and political independence during the
Cold War years. This is the immediate strategy of imperialism and hence the
attacks on Iraq, on Sudan, Afghanistan and now Serbia.
29. Based on this understanding of the war we call for demonstrations and
other working class actions to build a movement which has both an anti-war
character (against the NATO-bombing) and an internationalist solidarity
character (support the Albanian Kosovar resistance). We should argue that
the basis for such activities should be "Stop the bombing", "Independence
for Kosova" and "Asylum rights for all refugees" Whilst it is correct it to
participate in demonstrations which are not based on these slogans- which
are limited to just one or two of them- it is illegitimate to participate
on those which have primarily reactionary slogans on one of the wars (i.e.
either being pro-Serbian in their present attacks on the Kosovars or
pro-NATO in the imperialist attacks on Serbia).
30. The regime of Milosevic was not and still is not fighting NATO to
defend the remnants of the planned economy, either during its clashes with
imperialism over Bosnia or now over Kosova. Therefore workers in other
countries are not obliged to adopt a defencist position in the same way as
revolutionary Marxists (i.e. Trotskyists) advocated before 1989 as a
principle of defending workers states against capitalist enemies Milosevic
and the Serbian bureaucracy are no longer defending the planned property
relations even as a basis of their own privileges. However, workers within
Serbia, aided by their class brothers and sisters worldwide, should defend
the shattered remnants of the workers' state --in particular the
collectively owned factories --against imperialist attack. But this will
also mean a struggle against Milosevic and the Serbian bureaucracy. Workers
must not only occupy their workplaces as they have done against the NATO
bombing but seize control of their workplaces to prevent their
privatisation or closure under any of the post-war plans.
31. In fact only by overthrowing Milosevic themselves they can use them as
the basis for reversing the capitalist restoration process and planning the
post-war reconstruction of the country. Such a political and social
revolution is urgently needed in Serbia both for the sake of the national
minorities within Serbia and the adjacent states, who will never be safe or
secure as long as the greater Serbian bureaucracy and its expansionist and
genocidal projects exists but also for the Serb people itself. They have,
in reality, gained absolutely nothing from Milosevic's wars of conquest
except the driving of hundreds of thousands of Serbs from their ancestral
homes. "All Serbs in one State" has meant not the reactionary utopia of
resurrecting the Serbian empire of the fourteenth century but the Serbia of
1914, but one packed with homeless refugees. By expansion, colonisation,
ethnic cleansing either of Serbs, Albanian Kosovars, or Bosnian Muslims or
Croats no peace or security for the peoples of the Balkans can be achieved.
32. Only the granting of the right to self determination of all the Balkan
peoples including their right to secede and re-arrange their borders by
democratic consent and then by forming a federation of all Balkan peoples,
can harmony and economic development be secured. This will mean the
restoration of all the expelled peoples to their homes, impartial justice
meted to those who organised their expulsion and the terrible crimes which
implemented. All of these peoples of former Yugoslavia have now suffered
these crimes and all have in their midst a minority of the criminals who
carried it out. They must be brought to justice --not before tribunals of
imperialist justice in the Hague but before multi-ethnic juries of workers,
peasants, youth and women who are free of any complicity in the crimes.
33. Workers in the west must demand billions in war reparations from the
NATO powers for the horrific damage they have done to the bridges,
factories, railway lines power stations, hospitals and houses of Serbia,
Montenegro and Kosova. We must demand the immediate and unconditional
lifting of all sanctions against rump Yugoslavia. All these measures, like
the bombing itself, hit not at Milosevic and his bureaucracy but at the
Serbian workers and farmers --consolidating their support for Milosevic and
their Serbian patriotism. Measures which destroy Serbian jobs and social
security blind Serbian workers to the fact that their true friends and
allies are the workers of the other Balkan states and of the EU and the
United States as well. But to prove this to them, to win them to renouncing
the genocide being attempted in their name in Kosova, we have to strike the
hardest blows possible against our own ruling class against the murderous
policies of Blair and Clinton , Jospin and Schroeder, Aznar and D'Alema.
34. The present character of the war; could it change?
35. As long as the present objectives and strategies of the combatants
remain in force --heavy NATO bombing of Serbia, Serb wholesale ethnic
cleaning, U=C7K defence of internally displaced Kosovars, then our dual
defencism of the Serbs (against NATO ) and the Kosovars (against the Serbs)
retains its validity. In short, the NATO assault on Serbia does not
subordinate our support for the Kosovars' struggle to resist genocide, nor
does the genocide subordinate our defence of a non-imperialist state
against an imperialist alliance. Even the use of lower level bombing runs
by NATO aircraft, the use of Apache helicopters to it Serb artillery or an
actual incursion by NATO ground troops into southern or western Kosova to
set up "safe-havens" into which to herd the refugees --none of these in
themselves would alter our basic support for Kosova resistance to Serb
attacks. The reasons for this is that --despite any military-logistical
help they are receiving from NATO --the U=C7K forces remain independent of
the ultimate war aims of NATO , i.e. they have their own aims, independence
and the driving out of the Serbian army and police force.
36. At the same time the withdrawal of Serbian forces now, whether caused
by U=C7K action, NATO bombing or revolution in Serbia (or all three) would
allow the U=C7K to take power, the refugees to return and would give NATO no
real pretence to occupy Kosova as a protectorate or an "international"
colony. A dual defencist/defeatist position still accords with the reality
of the two wars being waged in Kosova and in Serbia-Montenegro. It is
consistent with a revolutionary policy which has as its objectives national
liberation for the Kosovars, revolution in Serbia, the fraternisation of
Serb and Kosovar workers, a socialist federation of workers' states of the
Balkans.
37. But if, despite all the political and military obstacles to it, NATO
eventually launches a full-scale invasion of Kosova with objective of
occupying the province, and still more if this involves attacks on Serbia
from surrounding countries, the situation will change profoundly. This will
necessitate a radical change in the tactics of revolutionaries. Such an
all-out war waged by NATO would have the objective of turning Kosova into a
protectorate (temporary colony) within which an imperialist garrison would
render the independence of all the states in the region largely nominal and
impose on them a political and military solution even more reactionary and
far-reaching than Dayton --since it would include a speeded up programme
for capitalist restoration, the extension of NATO and EU association or
membership to the key states the whole Balkan region. This would in turn
serve as a template for future NATO interventions in crises within the CIS
states and in the Middle East. Thus the establishment of a effective
NATO-garrisoned colony or colonies in the heart of the Balkans is the most
reactionary outcome imaginable. NATO would thereby have established its
"right" to operate "out of theatre", without the approval of the UN, and to
decide on the "international lawfulness", or not, of an unlimited range of
policies pursued by supposedly sovereign states. This new "Monroe Doctrine"
of limited sovereignty --proclaimed by Clinton and Blair as part of the
Third Way --would be the final realisation of the "liberal" (in both
meanings of the word) New World Order proclaimed in 1991 but which
right-wing conservatives like Thatcher and Bush were unable to carry out
because of their inability to hide their naked economic goals.
38. Such a New World Order would have profound negative effects for working
class struggles against globalisation, restoration and IMF austerity and
the multinationals around the world." This is what a successful NATO
occupation of Kosova and the dictation of a super-Dayton (and the touted
Marshall Plan for the Balkans) would mean. The launching of a all-out
military offensive with this as its real objective thus becomes the
preponderant question, one which transcends and subordinates the Kosova
national question and the genocide and which consequently will oblige
revolutionaries to transform their tactics accordingly. It would then be a
question not primarily of the U=C7K's fight for the independence of Kosova
against Serb genocide but of a NATO colonisation of the province.
39. If Milosevic and the Serb forces in Kosova resisted the NATO drive then
revolutionaries would have to give their critical support to their military
struggle against imperialism. This would in no way mean support for
atrocities against the Kosovars nor could they expected to restrain their
self-defence. But it would mean suspending our support for the KLA's war
against the Yugoslav army and Yugoslav police. Our defence of Yugoslavia
would be guided by the principles of revolutionary defencism: we defend
Yugoslavia despite Milosevic, try to overthrow his regime, demand an end to
ethnic cleansing and chauvinism as impeding the struggle against
imperialism and injustice, and call on the workers of all nationalities to
rise up and against imperialism, national oppression and capitalist
restoration.
40. A revolutionary government in Serbia would have to immediately
recognise the independence of Kosova and offer to unconditionally withdraw
all Serb forces in favour of Kosovar militias (ethnic Albanian and Serb)
which it would arm and thus preclude and if necessary prevent NATO
intervention. It would also proclaim its willingness to join in a Socialist
=46ederation of the Balkans within which all nationalities would have the
right to self-determination (i.e. to be independent republics both within
such a federation or outside it).
41. In such a ground war the Kosovars would lose all effective independence
of imperialism. Any Albanian Kosova government, whether under Rugova or the
U=C7K (or a coalition between them), would be simply a puppet government of
NATO. If the U=C7K were to subordinate themselves to this reactionary goal
and to the imperialist forces carrying it out, then the workers' movement
would have to withdraw its support for the U=C7K.
42. However, the weaknesses of the aerial war, the many political "own
goals" caused by the collateral damage and the divisions between the US and
EU within NATO and within the US ruling class, makes such a ground war the
least likely development. and increases the probability of an ultimate
compromise. The Chernomyrdin-NATO talks in early May increased the chances
of this: return of refugees (in reality, watered down to the right to
return), an armed international force with de facto NATO command structure
and de jure UN imprimatur, Kosovar autonomy within Yugoslavian sovereignty.
Such as Dayton II agreement would be a blow to Kosovar hopes. The presence
of Russian and other OSCE troops in blue helmets would not only "protect'
them but ensure the marginalisation if not destruction of the U=C7K. Such
"autonomy" could be presented as a great step forward and all the other
questions such as the refugees return to their own cities and villages, as
in the Dayton Agreement, be left to future negotiations --that is, until
the first of never. The impending total ruination of Serbia, caused by
Nato's shift to economic targets, may bring Milosevic to accept this. But
such a deal would be largely to the benefit of Milosevic; it would,
Bosnia-style, provide a ratchet mechanism to protect much, if not all of
the gains of ethnic-cleansing and it would provide a massive blockade to
national freedom to the Kosovars who would then face a united front of
NATO, all the EU and regional powers who would repress in the firmest
manner anyone who resisted the dictated "peace". The great majority of
Kosovars would be allowed no say in all this, certainly no
"self-determination and at best a "yes/no" plebiscite on what the
imperialists and the Pan-Slav chauvinists had already agreed.
43. An imperialist peace --like an imperialist war --will not solve, or not
solve for long, the terrible problems of the Balkans. Economic collapse and
repeated crises, rivalries between the governing =E9lites, all promote the
growth of chauvinism and fascism. If tragedy is not to follow tragedy then
the chains of economic decline and oppression must be shattered. They can
only be shattered by a proletarian revolution which spreads across the
region uniting Serb, Croat, Albanian, Bulgarian workers and peasants in
building a Socialist Federation of the Balkans. But only those workers who
transcend nationalism by supporting only and exclusively the oppressed
against the oppressor, who never identify an entire people with its rulers
and oppressors, who seek in the workers of other nations their best friends
and allies --only such people, however few they may be at first, will be
able to create a new future for this part of Europe: one where genocide and
exploitation are banished forever.
44. The crimes of reformism and the impotence of centrism
45. This war --coming as it does when there are thirteen "socialist",
"left", "labour" or "social democratic" governments in the European Union
--shows once more and in the most vivid terms what the Marxist
characterisation "social imperialist" means. They may now be only in the
feeblest sense "socialist in words" but they remain absolutely imperialist
in their deeds. Led by the chief hawk Blair, and assisted by Schroeder,
Jospin and D'Alema, they are thoroughgoing agents of imperialism,
distinguished from their right-wing predecessors only in their skill in
covering-up their masters' plans with hypocritical democratic and
humanitarian rhetoric.
46. For Marxists revolutionary military tactics must reflect the
contradictory character of the present war. Centrists and left reformists
are clearly incapable of recognising this and thereby demonstrate their
inability to think dialectically. They either subordinate the reactionary
character of imperialist attacks to the just struggle of the Kosovar
Albanians (e.g. Livingstone, AWL) or they negate or subordinate the just
liberation war of the U=C7K to the necessary military defence of Serbia
against NATO (e.g. Stalinists, Cliffites, Spartacists, Grantites). There is
another tendency which is to combine correct general slogans like "Against
NATO-bombing" and "For the right of self-determination for the Kosovars"
with the pacifism in practice: that is,. calling neither for the military
victory of Serbia against NATO (USFI), or neither arms nor victory to the
Albanian resistance against Serbian forces (e.g. FT).
47. Marxists derive their tactics from the consistent pursuit of
fundamental class interests. They do not arrive at them by simply putting a
minus wherever the bourgeoisie puts a plus. The fact that Clinton and Blair
make the rights of the Kosovars a pretext for war today does not mean that
Marxists have to drop these rights like a hot iron. The defence of the
Kosova Albanians against genocide and their right to independence is an
essential question for the international working class. A victory for the
Serbian regime in Kosova would have terrible reactionary consequences not
just in Kosova but also in Montenegro, the Sanjack and Vojvodina where
important national and ethnic minorities obstruct the reactionary utopia of
a pure-Serbian state. Equally terrible would be the effect in Serbia
itself. If the new Serbia were to be founded on genocide and inequality
then it would never develop a democracy which gave meaningful rights to the
workers and peasants, let alone the nationalities. It would become a living
proof of Marx's dictum that a nation which oppresses another can never
itself be free.
48. In addition most of the surrounding states would be driven into an
anti-Serbian alliance, with or without imperialist participation,
threatening a future Balkan war. Thus a Serbian victory in Kosova would
deepen national hatreds on all sides. The right for national self
determination is therefore not counterposed to the perspective of a
Socialist Balkan Federation but quite the opposite --it is the
pre-condition for voluntary federation.
49. The Way Out--;A Socialist Federation of the Balkans
50. Who can lead the peoples of the Balkans out of the dreadful carnage
which has marked the last decade of the twentieth century? Who can prevent
NATO and the likes of Slobodan Milosevic from making certain that the
national struggles of oppressed and oppressor --sometimes reversing with
dizzying speed --continues for decades into the new millennium? Who can
prevent the explosions of the Balkan powder keg from spreading to the whole
of Europe? Who can overcome the Balkanisation of the peninsular which
condemns it to economic backwardness and internecine rivalry? Only the
working class of all nations and regardless of nationality, language,
culture or religion can do this! But to do so it has to wrench itself from
the stranglehold of the nationalists of all colours --those of the
oppressed and those of the oppressor nationalists. There is only one
ideology, only one party, that can do this: revolutionary communism, which
proclaims the unity of the worlds workers and the defence of all oppressed
peoples .
51. As Lenin observed at the beginning of the century only revolutionary
communists can be "consistent democrats" because they wish to overcome all
questions of national oppression which divide the workers of different
countries and because imperialism cannot even grant bourgeois democratic
demands like the rights of nations to self-determination. The co.-leader of
the Russian Revolution, Leon Trotsky, also understood that all genuine
popular struggles against national oppression can only fully realise their
goals under the leadership of the working class and with the overthrow of
capitalism.
52. What the workers of the Balkans need is a revolutionary communist party
with deep roots in the working classes of all the Balkan countries and the
national minorities. It must have as its driving goal the struggle for
working class power. Such power will not be a return to the Stalinist
dictatorships over the proletariat of the 1945-1989 period but rather power
based on workers' councils such as brought about the Russian revolution of
1917 and nearly brought the political revolution in Hungary in 1956 to
victory. Such councils of workers, peasants and soldiers' deputies, elected
and answerable to the workplaces, would guarantee freedom for all the
parties of the workers, peasants and democratic intelligentsia. In this way
they can defeat counterrevolution and prevent bureaucracy. They can
expropriate the new capitalists and the agencies of the multinationals and
transform and modernise the old factories, mines and farms. into a
democratically planned and collectively owned economy . All the peoples of
the Balkans could thus unite ­p;with the militant Greek proletariat --to
create a Socialist Federation of the Balkans on the road to a Socialist
United States of Europe.
53. The League for a Revolutionary Communist International is fighting to
build such parties across Europe. It is fighting too for a new
revolutionary communist international. If we had such an international
today then we could already have rendered massive assistance to the
Kosovars against Milosevic, to the Serbs against NATO and brought the best
elements of the Serbian and Kosovar workers together to achieve these aims
and to go on to fight for the socialist revolution. We summarise our aims
in the following slogans;
Stop the NATO bombing now
Stop the genocide in Kosova
No a ground war in Kosova or beyond =B7
Victory to the Kosovar national liberation struggle =B7
=46or elected refugee camp committees in Albania and Macedonia to control
food and medical supplies, to prevent involuntary displacement and locate
missing relatives.
Immediate and unconditional recognition of the independence of Kosova
Serbian troops out of Kosova. No Serbian coup inside Montenegro.
Arms without preconditions to the U=C7K
Defeat NATO attacks on Serbia and Montenegro
End the UN economic blockade of Serbia and Montenegro.
Open up all countries inside the European Union to the Kosovar refugees;
voluntary exiles only; no forced deportations.
Full social security, medical, educational entitlements and full political
rights for refugees!
Down with the Dayton Accords - all imperialist troops out of the Balkans!
Lift the UN blockade and sanctions against Serbia!
For republics of workers' councils in Kosova, in Serbia and in all the
states of the Balkans
Halt and reverse the restoration of capitalism - for a democratic
emergency plan
For a socialist united states of the Balkans!
Workers, peasants and youth of Kosova, fighters of the U=C7K --break with
your leadership which will sell out the goal of independence and attach
itself to NATO which is the enemy of oppressed peoples everywhere! Build a
new, revolutionary party!
International Secretariat ofthe LRCI 16 May 1999
[LRCInet Homepage] [AWorld to Win]
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