Resistance grows to US-led neoliberalism

GLOBAL resistance to the US-led neoliberal empire has intensified over the last few days.

Although the protests in the Islamic world have been sparked by controversy over an anti-Muslim film, the roots are clearly much deeper.

And the momentum caused by the unprecedented wave of fury at the USA and allies like Israel, the UK and Germany, is unlikely to fade fast.

On September 11, an attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, Libya, left the US ambassador dead, while an attack on the American embassy in Cairo saw the Stars and Stripes torn down and an Islamist banner hoisted in its place.

On September 13 protesters broke into the US embassy compound in Sanaa, Yemen, and the next day protesters stormed the US embassy complex in Tunis.  There were seven deaths at protests worldwide, following Muslim Friday Prayers.

Monday's protests included 3,000 protesters in the Philippines burning US and Israeli flags in the southern city of Marawi, and hundreds of protesters facing off with police in Jakarta, Indonesia, throwing stones and petrol bombs. There have been other protests in Lebanon, Kashmir and Pakistan.

Angry demonstrators in the Afghan capital, Kabul, fired guns, torched police cars and shouted anti-US slogans. And 15 Taliban fighters who fought their way on to Helmand's main airbase destroyed six jets worth millions of pounds in an assault that was the start of a bloody weekend for NATO forces – in 48 hours six US and UK troops were killed by Aghan "allies".

And meanwhile the Occupy Wall Street protests are back with a vengeance, with dozens of arrests in New York on Monday, #S17.

 

Massacres are heading our way

THE MASSACRE of striking miners in South Africa is a sickening foretaste of what is in store for us all as neoliberalism collapses under the weight of its own impossibilities.

Black lives are considered by the global elite to be of less importance than white ones, so the media impact of the mass murder has not been as great as if it had occurred in, say, France, or Britain.

But make no mistake - this sort of thing will also happen in Europe and North America, as the demise of capitalism accelerates.

The logical connections are there to be made. The company which owns the mine at Marikana, Lonmin, is itself a British company, for instance.

And this has, after all, always been the truth behind the facade of western 'democracy' - the authorities reserve the right to kill you if you threaten their hold on power.

Over the last 15 years or so plutocracy has set about turning itself into plutofascism to combat the inevitable global meltdown and uprising - and, to justify that, it has redefined its enemy. Dissent now equals terrorism.

One recent small example of this shift was experienced by two UK anarchists returning from a conference in Switzerland.

Reports Libcom: "On returning from the St Imier gathering, two anarchists, one a member of the UK Anarchist Federation, were detained for nearly two hours at Heathrow by SO15 (counter-terrorist) intelligence who initially refused to identify themselves to the detainees.

"During the detention, the anarchists were told that their normal rights did not apply, and had their names, addresses, email addresses, DNA, photographs and fingerprints taken. The detained anarchists were also forced to sign forms – which may or may not be legal – waiving their rights to silence and a solicitor. Police also conducted a thorough search of personal possessions, photocopied literature and passports and took information from phones and cameras.

"During the detention, the police constantly accused the anarchists of lying about involvement in criminal activity and alleged that they would be conducting follow-up police action against one of the detained anarchists.

"In addition to this, SO15 officers asked a number of inflammatory, irrelevant and offensive questions, including ‘what would you do if someone raped your mother?’ evidently in an attempt to cause emotional upset and illicit angry or violent responses. One member (28) who did not want to be named for fear of reprisals from the police, said “We were treated like criminals.

"I told them I went to the congress as I am an amateur journalist and I write articles about activism. They saw my note book, camera and Dictaphone but they said I was lying.” One officer said ‘You said you are an anarchist, I’ve seen anarchists on the news, they are violent, throw molotov cocktails and disrupt people’s lives not write articles”."

Fortunately, though, all the repression merely confirms to many more people that the only way ahead is the destruction of capitalism itself, and this instinctive resistance continues to bubble up all the time - for instance in Amiens in northern France earlier this week (see photo below).

Collapsing capitalism morphs into fascism

HISTORY is unfolding before our eyes, faster and more obviously than ever.

Capitalism morphs into fascism as its illusion of universal prosperity is exposed as the lie it always was.

Armed paramilitary goons in California protect Disneyland from residents of Anaheim angered by the way cops can kill their people with impunity.

And the London Olympics turn into full-blown dress rehearsal for a totalitaran police state, with even cycling now considered a crime if it threatens to disrupt the compulsory mass worship of money and power.

The symbolism is exquisite.

But all the gun-toting, law-passing and media manipulation will not stop the inevitable collapse of the toxic system which is choking this planet to death.

Half of India is brought to a standstill when the power grid fails for the second time in two days - 600 million without power.

And the capitalist dream of new consumer continents is fading, as brand new shopping malls in India and China lie half-empty. 

There can never be a Disneyland planet of 10 billion happy Olympic-loving consumers - the neoliberal quest for endless growth and complete control cannot succeed.

But unfortunately capitalism is not going to end tomorrow. There is a lot more suffering ahead, a lot more misery, war and tears. And struggle as well, to ensure that the society that emerges from the ruins, the day after tomorrow, is one that will restore hope to humanity.

Anarchists firebomb two banks in Italy

ANARCHISTS have claimed responsibility for firebomb attacks on two banks in Frascati, Rome.

A statement published on the 325 website states: "In the night of Wednesday July 18 2012, two banks were attacked in Frascati. Two molotov bottles and an incendiary device were thrown at the Unicredit bank and the BNL bank. Unicredit got completely destroyed."

The statement, signed off as being from the Informal Anarchist Federation and the International Revolutionary Front, says graffiti was left at the scene - an  encircled A and the slogan "The Earth is worth more than your money."

Explains the statement: "We can see and feel directly what they are doing to the Earth, to the animals, to anti-authoritarians, and this is sufficient to give a reason to our attacks, every time with more determination and strength… forward anarchists, let’s sabotage and destroy the present!"

It says the attack was "dedicated to those who are in prison, wanted by police, sentenced and searched…. to the anarchists hit by the repressive forces of the State/Capital."

Rebel Indian workers torch factory

 
EXPLOITED workers in India have dramatically risen up and torched a car factory, leaving one boss dead.

The rebellion took place on Wednesday July 18 at the Maruti Suzuki plant in Manesar, which is now closed and in lockdown as the ruling elite in India, Japan and beyond reels from the shock.

Firstpost website reports: "A huge mob gathered outside the company’s gates in the evening at around 6 p.m. and torched the security office and the fire safety room at Gate no 2. Security guards of Maruti, who did not want to be named, say that there were at least 500 persons in the mob that set fire to the structures."

Writes one Indian commentator, R Jagannathan: "After caste wars, gender wars, regional wars and religious wars, one can now add the return of class warfare to the overflowing Indian cup of social tensions.

"In the land of a 'million mutinies', the violence at Maruti’s Manesar plant exhibits all the symptoms of class conflict. Even though attempts have been made to suggest that a casteist remark by a supervisor might have triggered the violence, this can only be a proximate excuse for the violence.

"All reports, in fact, suggest that the attack on supervisors and management staff was pre-planned, with workers stockpiling car parts to be used as weapons well in advance.

"Additional proof comes from a statement by Maruti’s CEO and Managing Director Shinzo Nakanishi, who clearly said that the violence was unlikely to have been the work of any outside force. Asked to explain the reasons for the violence, Nakanishi told The Times of India: 'We have to wait for the police investigations to get over, though I do not see any shadow of an outside influence this time'.

"It is significant that even as the government is looking for a Naxal link to the Maruti incident – and one need not be surprised if there is one, for the sheer savagery of the targeted violence suggests premeditation – Nakanishi did not offer this as an alibi.

"He probably suspects that there are broader reasons for the worker angst.

"Actually, there is. It’s called Speedy Growth. Whenever economies grow at very fast speeds – as the Indian economy has been doing between 1991 and 2011, and more recently during 2003-2011 –  inequality widens.

"It has widened in rural areas, which is why we have seen the rise of Naxalism, which needs a widely perceived sense of injustice to mobilise people against the state and the better off.

"Now, it is the turn or urban India to face the wrath of even the traditionally better off sections among workers. The average full-time Maruti worker gets around Rs 17,000 a month, but sees people around him who earn five times as much."

Liberals exposed as reactionary scum

  
AN INVALUABLE insight into the mindset of the liberal bourgeoisie has been provided by an article in The Observer.

Helena Smith, Greek correspondent for the liberal UK publication, reports that the circle she frequents are not backing the radicals in the crucial general election.

She writes: "Everything has changed as certainties have crumbled. Many of my friends feel bewildered and fearful: bewildered that it should come to this, fearful of the dislocation from assurances of things past.

"In the topsy-turvy world that they now inhabit, almost all have decided that they will throw their political convictions to the winds.

"For the first time ever, they will vote conservative, casting their ballot in favour of New Democracy, the 'pro-European' party led by Antonis Samaras in the hope – no matter how slight – that Greece can be saved."

This is a lesson worth remembering - no matter how 'progressive' their rhetoric, the bourgeoisie have a vested interest in the continuation of the capitalist system and, when it comes to the crunch,  will do everything they can to protect it. 

Make no mistake, they would prefer the 'security' of fascism to the possibility of real social change.

Fuck the liberals! Fuck the bourgeoisie! Viva la Revolución!

Anarchists defiant in face of repression

ANARCHISTS are reacting with defiance to the latest clamp-down on their resistance by the forces of neoliberalism.

The June 2012 of the Dark Nights zine focuses on the international repression unleashed in recent days under the title of 'Operation Ardire'.

It reports: "At 4 o’clock in the morning of June 13th, 2012, the Special Operations Group [Raggruppamento Operativo Speciale, ROS) of the Carabinieri [paramilitary police] raided about forty homes in Italy, implementing the so-called ‘Operation Boldness’ (Operazione Ardire), a crackdown against people from the anarchist movement ordered by Manuela Comodi, public prosecutor of Perugia.

"According to the regime’s media, a total of 10 arrest warrants were issued — eight within Italy, one sent to Germany and one sent to Switzerland — while 24 suspects have been put under judicial investigation.

"The Italian bourgeois Press did not hesitate to connect the arrested with the 'anarcho-insurrectionist FAI/FRI'. [Informal Anarchist Federation / International Revolutionary Front]

And Dark Nights comments: "When public debt has reached staggering proportions, the state answer is to increase taxes. When banks and speculators have brought the economy to its knees, the state answer is to give a green light to privatization.

"When work becomes a privilege and its lack brings waves of suicides, the state answer is to facilitate firings.

"More. When functionaries of the institutions soil themselves with the worst infamies, the state answer is to make their “crimes” expire.

"When the oil wells risk running dry in international conflicts, the state answer is to take part in the war.

"If the damned of the earth are forced to flee their countries and disembark on our shores, the state answer is to lock them up in concentration camps called CIE.

"Still more. When local populations don’t want harmful developments (high speed trains, incinerators, waste dumps), the state answer is to massacre demonstrators and militarily occupy the territory.

"If the rich keep getting richer and the poor keep getting poorer, the state answer is to protect the luxury of the former and suppress the desperation of the latter."