Barack Obama, desperate to serve U.S. imperialists for four more years, is spinning their worsening predicaments as his personal triumphs.  “As promised, the rest of our troops in Iraq will come home by the end of the year....After nearly nine years, America’s war in Iraq will be over,” Obama boasted on October 21.

But there’s no way U.S. rulers will not protect Exxon Mobil’s $50 billion investment in Iraq’s oil fields. Thirty-nine bases there still remain in U.S. hands. Furthermore, “The U.S. embassy in Baghdad already houses thousands of…officials and troops and contains 21 buildings in a space over 100 acres….The State Department is looking to spend upwards of $30 billion on Iraq over the next five years — around one-fourth of the Department’s…global operations budget” (Huffington Post, 9/26).

Meanwhile, Iraq’s Maliki regime is revoking the U.S. license to kill there. “The issue of immunity for U.S. troops appears to have been the key factor in the Obama administration’s decision to withdraw…. Iraqis...did not want to grant it because of high-profile killings of civilians....The U.S. said for any troops to remain in Iraq, they’d have to be granted full immunity from prosecution in Iraqi courts” (National Public Radio, 10/24/11).

Guarding Exxon’s Oil Wells Means Boots on the Ground

But not all the GIs will be home for the holidays. Many will be part of  the Obama administration’s plans “to bolster the American military presence in the Persian Gulf,” including “new combat forces in Kuwait able to respond to a collapse of security in Iraq or a military confrontation with Iran” (NY Times, 10/30; see box this page). Obama’s threat to reinvade Iraq contradicts his peace pronouncement.

The U.S.-led war for the Middle East’s vast energy resources remains far from settled. When they invaded in 2003, U.S. rulers envisioned six million barrels of crude gushing daily from Iraqi wells by 2006. Last year, they upped the potential bonanza to 12 million barrels per day. But persistent violence keeps actual flow around 2.9 million; on October 27, bombs killed 32 people in Baghdad. Exxon Mobil just invested $50 billion to boost production from Iraq’s massive West Qurna field. Expect a quick return of U.S. forces if violence menaces that project.

Meanwhile, oil bosses from the U.S. and other NATO countries are flocking like vultures to post-Qaddafi Libya. More than 40,000 U.S.-directed NATO bombing and strafing runs wiped out at least 25,000 Libyan civilians. The self-congratulating liar Obama, eyeing re-election, touted his dreams of more such lucrative, “bloodless” victories on the Tonight Show: “Not a single U.S. troop was killed or injured, and that, I think, is a recipe for success in the future.”

But Obama’s imperialist handlers, including the Pentagon and Exxon, don’t buy what he’s peddling to the public. In mid-October, the top-level Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) think tank that enlists dozens of serving military officers, released a report titled “U.S. Ground Force Capabilities through 2020.” The piece undercut Obama’s vote-seeking falsehood by noting that “every post-Cold War president has come into office vowing to avoid large, costly foreign interventions requiring tens of thousands of ‘boots on the ground,’ only to have their hand forced by unforeseen events.”

The Fall of “Arab Spring”

CSIS indicates how close the Arab Spring came to necessitating an outright U.S. invasion — and still could. “If Egypt’s uprising had threatened to disrupt the Suez Canal and key oil networks...only ground forces would have been capable of seizing and protecting the 300-plus miles of critical infrastructure.” In other all-too-plausible, near-term scenarios, “Precarious governments in nuclear North Korea or Pakistan, should they falter or break down, would similarly create immediate, large-scale crises to which ground forces would be highly relevant.” In either of these cases, the potential U.S. battlefield foe could employ both nuclear weapons and more than one million soldiers.

In short, as the October 30 New York Times article indicates, Obama’s “exit” from Iraq is actually an expansion of the U.S. military in the energy-rich Middle East, with the build-up to “secure” Iraq lasting at least another ten years (see box). As long as imperialism fuels its profit-driven rivalry for the world’s resources and exploited labor, war is inevitable. Only communist revolution that destroys capitalism, profits and bosses — and erects a society in which workers share all the value that they, and only they, produce — can free the international working class from the horrors of endless wars.J

Obama’s Iraq ‘Exit’ Expands U.S. War Machine

Obama’s “exit” from Iraq is more a game of musical chairs. Far from scaling down its war machine in the region, U.S. imperialism will be expanding it. According to the NY Times (10/30), “The Obama administration plans to bolster the American military presence in the Persian Gulf after it withdraws…troops from Iraq….[which] could include new combat forces in Kuwait able to respond to a collapse of security in Iraq or a military confrontation with Iran.”

Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta noted that the United States had 40,000 troops in the region, including 23,000 in Kuwait” (NYT). None of this includes the tens of thousands of CIA and U.S. contract mercenaries now flooding Iraq. In addition the Pentagon “is considering sending more naval warships through international waters in the region.”

The Obama White House “is also seeking to expand military ties with the six nations in the Gulf Cooperation Council — Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qater, the United Arab Emirates and Oman….trying to foster a new ‘security architecture’ for the Persian Gulf that would integrate air and naval patrols and missile defense” (NYT).

None of this is exactly new. From 1991 up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003, the “U.S. Army kept…a full combat brigade in Kuwait year-round, along with an enormous arsenal ready to be unpacked” should even more troops be called to the region.

How long will this military build-up last? “The U.S. will have to come to terms with an Iraq that is unable to defend itself for at least a decade,” wrote Adam Mausner and Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

No, U.S. imperialists are in no way “exiting” this energy-rich area. They will be aiming to preserve their dominance over Gulf oil supplies and pipelines until communist revolutionaries throw them out.

OAKLAND, CA, October 28 — At Occupy Oakland, workers and students reclaimed Oscar Grant Plaza after the occupation was brutally attacked on October 26 by a full-scale military action of 500-600 kkkops from 17 different Bay Area agencies.  The cops invaded the camp, which included children, at 5:30 AM with flash grenades, percussion bombs and tear gas. Eighty-five people were arrested that morning, and more than 100 during the day.

Like the fascist response to the Oscar Grant demonstration protesting his murder by racist
cops several months ago, this was a well-planned domestic version of the “Shock and Awe” invasion of Iraq in 2003. The Oakland politicians and police are well-rehearsed from years of attacking black and Latino youth. Now they have redesigned their security to handle mass uprisings.

Far from being intimidated by this police brutality, over 1,000 Oakland workers and students fought back. They gathered at the main library for a rally, then marched to the police department and jail to demand the release of arrested comrades before returning to City Hall. CHALLENGE was distributed along the way.

At 6:30 PM, the cops gave protesters five minutes to disperse or face mass arrests. But it wasn’t until 7:45 PM that the cops again attacked with tear gas and flash grenades. One Iraq vet, Scott Olsen, had his skull broken by a tear gas canister. These fascists wouldn’t even let people carry him away without tossing a flash grenade near him. The rebellion lasted until midnight.

By Wednesday night, workers and students had taken back Oscar Grant Plaza at 14th and Broadway and torn down the fences around the park. The daily General Assembly (GA) began at 7 PM.  By 10 PM, 1,486 people had voted to have a one-day general strike on November 2nd. The tents had returned the next day.

Over 1,000 people have attended the GA each night since the camp was raided. Liberal mayor Jean Quan tried to speak but was told to “go home!” She did. For now, the cops are laying low. Such a fascist attack proves that the cops are enemies of the working class and a direct arm of the state.

For some, Occupy Oakland is a base camp for the local struggle against capitalism. While the Occupiers and their supporters span the political spectrum, there certainly are many who want a new economic and political system. PL’ers had conversations where Occupiers actively shared their ideas about how to organize a new society as an alternative to profits and capitalism.

On visits, PLP members talked with individuals about producing things for need and voluntary commitment to work for all instead of a wage system. Many wanted to “tax the rich,” but others wanted something more fundamental.  We had a good reception to the CHALLENGE headline, “Only Revolution, Not Voting, Can End Capitalism’s Racism, War and Unemployment.”

A few transit workers and other friends have joined us at the camp visits, rallies and meetings. Occupy Oakland called for a general strike “against an economic system built on inequality and corporate power that perpetuates racism, sexism and the destruction of the environment” (see later report on page 1).

This movement gives us opportunities to connect Occupy Oakland to the jobs where we are actively fighting back. Some are promoting the general strike at work. This encourages political strikes against the system as a whole rather than just for wages and benefits. One bus driver recently commented, “I get it!. All that stuff you’ve been saying about how banks  and corporations control transit — it’s all coming true.”

Others, however, express hesitation due to their experiences with racist cops and bosses, who use racism to divide workers and attack in particular dark-skinned workers. Yet the constant attacks enrage these same workers. The Occupy movement makes it easier for PLP to expose the class rule of finance capitalists.J

Bankers Are Vultures on Carcass of Public Services

The big banks have an organized apparatus of “public” transit agencies, commissions, managers, legislators and court decisions that feeds money collected from the working class to private capitalists. Communists call this state power.

The Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) controls funding for Bay Area transit. The MTC is subsidizing hedge funds while attacking transit workers and passengers.

Hedge funds Amerimar Enterprises in Philadelphia, and Angelo, Gordon and Co. in New York made $33 million in profits from the sale of a U.S. Postal Service property in San Francisco to the MTC. These transactions allowed public tax dollars (the post office property) and fees paid by the public (MTC-collected bridge tolls) to go directly to profit finance capitalists.

Bay-Area wide, the MTC plans to cut service and jobs by $80 million per year. With control of funding, the MTC will demand scrapping work rules, and will use part-time bus drivers to cut service. SF MUNI Management is well on its way. By 2014, they plan to cut the budget almost $24 million by using part-time jobs to reduce service.

Look at the massive New York transit system. It has always been an ATM machine for Wall St. The New York Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) is currently proposing its biggest-ever borrowing program of $14.8 billion over a five-year period to fund its capital projects. In addition to paying interest to bondholders, the MTA must pay fees to the bankers who package and sell the bonds, amounting to between $2.50 and $5 on every $1,000 worth of debt.

Financial institutions underwriting the bonds include Barclays, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Merriill Lynch, J.P Morgan, Jeffreys and Co, Jackson, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo. Over the last two years, these capitalists earned $39.7 million in fees by issuing bonds.J

LOS ANGELES —In the Occupy movement here, PL’ers led a roaring march of about 50 people — which grew as we marched — around City Hall, chanting, “Stop racist police brutality, stand with Boston in solidarity.” OccupyLA is approaching its 30th day here. To date, the occupiers have gotten very little resistance from the police — in contrast to Oakland, Denver, Atlanta, Boston and New York, where hundreds bravely fought against the cops. The participants here include a hodgepodge of individuals ranging from union hacks and pro-democracy types to fake leftists, undercover cops and disrupters. But most important are the honest youth, students and workers, employed and unemployed, who are enraged at the horrors of capitalism. We found this out first-hand when we helped spark the march against police brutality.

One of the growing frustrations in the camp has been the ineffectiveness of the General Assembly, which is essentially the “leaderless” leadership body with rules that allow one or two individuals to prevent a proposal from passing despite the large majority in agreement. A group trying to form an anti-police brutality committee was shut down and called provocateurs by “leaders” taking advantage of these rules.

But at one meeting we met a few individuals who were upset about the General Assembly.  A small discussion started, and it was announced that up to 100 people had been arrested in Boston. The discussion turned to racist police brutality, and what, if anything, to do about it. Some of the misleaders who later joined the gathering tried to “facilitate” (that is, take over) the meeting. They called for a moment of silence in solidarity with our Boston brothers and sisters. They did not want to “provoke the police” or fight racism and argued that the cops were “part of the 99%.”

The gathering grew to about 50 people, which showed younger comrades how sharp ideas can influence a larger body. More important, it was good for them to see that many people supported our idea of calling the police racist defenders of the state and Wall Street, in opposition to the more visible “leaders.”  It was a great moment of unity in the fight against racism. That’s when we led this march around City Hall, especially significant after the demoralizing General Assembly.

Friendships that started with this action have become a small base for our Party as we organize anti-racist actions, ignoring the reformist “leadership” group. Our work is a small step in the right direction, but we need do a better job at mobilizing all our clubs and friends to get involved on a more consistent basis. We need to improve our open presence with CHALLENGE.

However, with the modest efforts of some comrades, we’ve gotten to know a few individuals fairly well and more recently have discussed CHALLENGE with one. We’ve also helped mobilize members of one church to participate on a few occasions. One of them has participated in PL events and wants to learn how the Party organizes in such situation.

We know the bosses’ only interest in allowing such Occupy movements to exist is to push patriotism in their “pro-democracy” rhetoric and to lead them toward the voting booth. But they can also be schools for communism if we and our friends are there, in the muck and mire and sleeping bags and tents. Join the struggle! Join Progressive Labor Party!J

My comrade in PLP and myself try to encourage each other to overcome our resistance to engaging with our friends in the community. We decided to go to the Occupy Wall Street demonstration in Dilworth Plaza here in Philadelphia. He had brought CHALLENGEs to sell.

 As we rounded City Hall, we made our way through the lanes of “occupying tents” toward the crowd having an open meeting at the Tech Tent. It was presented by a coalition — All Mothers are Working Mothers; Payday for Men; Women’s Global Strike; and DHS-Give Us Back Our Children — to  about 35 people, from their late teens to retirees, listening closely to explanations of the sexist and economic injustice faced by parents and children.

These painful experiences were often generated by both governmental agencies and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) which supposedly give aid to families. The crowd was equally divided among black and white, as well as Southeast Asians and Latinos; about two-thirds were female. We were being urged to fight to support justice and demand better services for moms, dads and children.

Amid this rally, I had a strong memory of myself as a teen-aged woman
listening to protest leaders and experiencing the awakening of my own political mind. A “speak-out” line was forming at the mike. I’ve had a “communist education” from the PLP — through my spouse, our PLP club, area leader, reading CHALLENGE, attending Party conventions, then bringing these ideas to co-workers, friends, and family members and participating in PL-led anti-fascist demonstrations.
I discussed the idea with my comrade about saying a few words at the mike. We agreed and I got in line to be handed the mike a few moments later and began speaking.

I agreed that sexism is oppressing us in many cruel ways. Most men and their children suffer from the effects of this sexism on the women they love and experience it directly on themselves as well. We face the same basic problems and we can face them together when we unite and create a society without sexist oppression. Many in the crowd applauded.

I said the division and injustices of sexism, added to the worst kind of racism and patriotism, keep us blaming other groups of workers, both employed and unemployed. While acknowledging that some people react negatively to the word “communism,” I declared that the only way to defeat sexism and racism is for all workers, men and women, young and old, to organize to defeat capitalism.

This profit-maximizing system cannot allow us workers any gains without snatching them right back. I said we need to get rid of this whole system and called for a communist-led society where meeting the needs of the workers drives the decisions.

At this point I was being tapped on the elbow to give up the mike, but was able to conclude that the Progressive Labor Party was leading this fight to create a world of equality and sharing and that the paper we were distributing would give more information. The audience expressed warm applause.

My comrade and I distributed the remaining CHALLENGEs. We discussed the strengths and weaknesses of our actions and words and agreed that it was important practice.

The ongoing class war is being waged against us whether we choose to see it or not. We dedicate this letter to inspiring our comrades in PL (such as myself) to put into action the Party’s ideas to build working-class warriors determined to bring about our goal of a communist world.J

Comrade in Philly