Recently two leading war protestors, who are also "leftists" were given space in the Times/Colonist of Victoria, British Columbia, to update the age-old "guns versus butter" controversy which flares up during every economic depression.
Nobody is ecstatic about the immense financing of weapons of destruction while people starve in Third World countries. However, such contradictions are inevitable where the human race is torn into two antagonistic classes, the exploiters and the exploited. The world is organized as a predatory system, not as a humanitarian one. The means of production and distribution, whether operated privately or under the aegis of the state, are monopolized by about 10 per cent of the population and are used by them to accumulate capital by exploiting the other 90 per cent. Production is for sale/profit and "no profit, no production" the basic economic law.
The human race is further divided into competitive, geo-political units called nations, for administering this dog-eat-dog system. Commodities accumulated in one country from the exploitation process come into conflict on the international market with those from other countries. The struggle is also for trade routes and exploitable populations. During a world depression the struggle intensifies. Fewer workers are needed. More armaments are required. The profit priority is King.
It is a myth (and not a new one) to think that if money was not spent on arms, it could be used to feed the destitute. The economic laws of capitalism (including the state variety of Russia and China) dictate that money be invested to reap profits by appropriating the unpaid part of the labor of the producing class, not by feeding hungry people.
The two "leftists" were probably no more appalled than Gorde Hunter, the "rightist", when he reported in the Times/Colonist that Ethiopia was air freighting 5 tons of fresh fruit and vegetables weekly to London, England, probably at high prices to rich consumers. This report is understandable in the light of capitalism's market laws. The starving people in that country have no legal (money) right to an adequate diet. The profitability of that food has to be realized through exchange for cash.
Likewise, in the United States, destitute people sleep on the streets. In the USSR elderly women wait in line at 7.00 a.m., outside grocery stores in subzero temperatures for rationed food in limited supply. While the ruling Russian élite revels in luxury.
People are led into wars
Both the aforementioned Times/Colonist writers (one was a member of the New Democratic Party, the other seemingly a closet Leninist) seemed to realize that the arms race does not exist in isolation from other social issues and that the solution for one is the answer for all. This is a forward step. But both referred to national political leaders being at fault, one urging the peace movement to work for a change in attitude by those "who are set in authority over us".
It is precisely because the function of leaders is to wield the authority of the ruling class over the mass of ordinary people that there is only one kind of leader regardless of attitude. Trusting leaders is like trusting the Mafia to guard the bank. And such trust, or faith, arises from ignorance.
Leaders use ideologies to conceal the sordid commercial conflicts between nations. "Communism" versus "Democracy" is used by the two super-powers on their people to justify the cold war and the development of today's military insanity. Fear and hatred for "the other side" is instilled in workers' minds, as in other wars.
Likewise, if the super-powers could agree to a freeze on more nuclear weapons, their respective leaders could tell their workers (who are discouraged from thinking) that the danger of a holocaust was gone. Or if they reduced the number of missiles by 50 per cent Meaning that humanity could be blown off the earth only half as many times as before. Also, how about a few more crumbs allowed to fall from the banquet table to prove that progress is being made against poverty? The majority can be deluded on war if they can be made confused about society.
The disarmament movement is based upon a dangerous and perhaps fatal illusion, lulling millions into a false sense of security in the belief that something is being done. The movement also allows itself to be manipulated by the political ideology of the rulers of this divided, antagonistic world social system of selling and profits which can no more avoid war than a tiger can subsist on hay.
The only way to end nuclear weapons
Nuclear weapons can only be ended when wars end, which cannot happen until world capitalism is replaced by Socialism. All night vigils in the rain, those three tipis and three or four pup tents at Nanoose Bay where pacifists were trying to stop renewal of a Canadian-US agreement for the US to test torpedos, or banging pots and pans in Esquimalt Harbor, Victoria, where US warships dock not saying whether or not they carry nuclear missiles, are activities which are as impotent as they sound.
War protestors are in the position of beggars asking governing politicians to do something vital in the interests of society, but which would clash with the interests of the owning class. Not much chance. Beggars can't be choosers.
A familiarity by the majority of the cause of war and a commitment to build the new society is the only guarantee that war will not occur and that nuclear weapons will not be used.
Socialism will involve the basic change in social organization from class ownership to common ownership and democratic control by and in the interest of the whole human family. Work will be carried out on the basis of voluntary co-operation to produce society's needs. Consumption will be free according to individually determined requirements. No minority class, dictating through the state, will impose forced labor on a subservient class to keep parasites rich and idle. The social cause of war will be removed since profit-making, competition, buying and selling and allied activities will end.
George Jenkins (Canada)
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