By Black Alliance for Peace, December 21, 2018
A real panic among the militarists and flunkeys of the military-industrial complex: They are concerned the U.S. president has gone completely off the ruling-class imperialist script. We find that hard to believe, since a move away from militarism and violence would indicate a fundamental departure from the very essence of the methods and strategy that created the United States. We are on land violently stolen from Indigenous peoples, then used to execute a brutal super-exploitation of enslaved African labor to amass imperialist wealth. That wealth was then used to ultimately elevate the United States to a world power after the second imperialist war in 1945.
But with the announcement by Trump that U.S. troops will be pulled out of Syria and troop strength reduced in the never-ending war in Afghanistan, the ruling-class propagandists pretending to be journalists at CNN, MSNBC, the New York Times, the Washington Post and the rest, have sounded the alarm of pending doom for the empire if the bipartisan commitment to international gangsterism is abandoned by this president.
We in the Black Alliance for Peace don’t praise a U.S. president for ending the illegal subversion, invasion and occupation of a sovereign state that should have never been allowed in the first place by theoretical representatives of the people in the U.S. Congress. If the Trump administration is serious about the “full and rapid” withdrawal of U.S. forces from Syria, we say it’s about time. We expect a full withdrawal of all U.S. forces from Syria, including the mercenary components referred to as “contractors.” We also say troop reduction is not enough—end the war in Afghanistan with a complete and total withdrawal of U.S. forces.
We denounce those elements in the corporate press, the establishment voices in the duopoly, and liberal and left acolytes of the warmongering ruling class who have taken upon themselves to confuse and manipulate the public into believing that permanent war is both rational and inevitable. The $6 trillion dollars of public resources transferred from the pockets of the people to the military-industrial complex over the last two decades to execute wars and occupations in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, has also caused unspeakable misery for millions of people, the destruction of ancient cities, the displacement of millions of people—and now millions of lives eliminated by U.S. bombs, missiles, chemicals and bullets. All who have remained silent or have given direct or even indirect support to these bipartisan war policies are morally culpable.
We are extremely skeptical about the administration’s announcement—we know from painful experience and from our understanding of the history of this state, that the United States has never voluntarily withdrawn from one of its imperialist adventures. Therefore, the Black Alliance for Peace will continue to demand that the United States withdraw from Syria until every U.S. asset is out of the country.
The final resolution of the U.S.-led war in Syria must be determined by Syrians themselves. All foreign forces must recognize and respect the sovereignty of the Syrian people and their legal representatives.
If peace is a real possibility for the people of Syria, it is only the most cynical who would undermine that possibility for partisan political purposes. But we know that the lives of People of color means nothing for some of the loudest critics of Trump’s decision. Many of those same critics don’t see any contradiction in condemning Putin and the Russians while embracing Netanyahu and the Israeli apartheid state that fires live ammunition into the bodies of unarmed Palestinians.
But in the tradition of our ancestors who understood the infinite connection of all of humanity and who resisted systematic degradation, the Black Alliance for Peace will continue to raise our voice in support of peace. Yet, we know that without justice there can be no peace. We must struggle to obtain justice.
U.S. out of Syria!
U.S. out of Africa!
Shut down AFRICOM and all NATO bases!
Reallocate the people’s resources from funding war to realizing the human rights of all people, not just the 1 percent!
