The YCL condemns the reckless and aggressive warmongering and provocation of Boris Johnson’s Tory government and NATO, at the command of their US puppet masters in the White House and the Pentagon, in Ukraine and across Eastern Europe in recent weeks.
Even as we are still gripped by the pandemic and face environmental catastrophe in our lifetimes, the focus of the two chief imperialist powers is war and military provocation. Even the Ukrainian government, propped up by the USA, has tried to de-escalate tensions, all the while Biden, NATO, the Tory Cabinet and politicians of all stripes in Westminster have lined up to sabre rattle. The monopoly media and the BBC steadily pump out pro-war propaganda for the ruling class.
While Vladimir Putin and his oligarch government are no friends of working people in Russia or internationally, the strategy and priorities of the USA are clear. In their inter-imperialist rivalry with Russia, they are working to encircle and undermine as well as dominating markets and important transit lines for gas and energy resources.
The UK-USA-NATO do not care that their warmongering places at risk the lives of working people in Ukraine and the wider region. They do not care that their confrontation between nuclear armed states threatens all of humanity. Their dangerous game of provocations and stoking tensions poses the real risk of the situation spiralling out of control, intentionally or by accident.
If we want to see aggressive troop movements in Eastern Europe, we need look no further than the UK-USA-NATO. The United States has massive military bases across the whole of Europe and has been moving troops and military hardware into Eastern Europe along with the UK and other NATO puppets.
We also should not forget that the governments which have been installed in Ukraine since the Maidan protests contain openly fascist and neo-Nazi elements. The Ukrainian army is propped up by neo-Nazi paramilitary battalions that openly glorify collaborators in the holocaust. Frontline troops in Ukraine openly sport swastikas and SS symbols. These same fascists have also been used to attack left and democratic forces including the Odessa Trade Union House massacre and the attempts to ban the Communist Party of Ukraine.
It is clear that imperialism, led by the United States, is growing increasingly dangerous and reckless in its desire to reassert dominance across the globe. The real winners of war mongering and militarism are the arms manufacturers and monopolies who lobby governments so vigorously in favour of military expansion and intervention, all to make billions in profit. The victims, as ever, are working people.
The youth of Britain and the youth of the world have nothing to gain from imperialism’s reckless drive to war – a drive to war which deprives our communities, divides our planet and threatens the existence of humanity. Britain’s Young Communists, hand in hand with our comrades across the world, are determined to oppose warmongering and militarism.
We’re calling for:
- A foreign policy which is based on peace, cooperation and international development, not war and extortion.
- Immediate withdrawal from NATO and the web of US imperialism.
- Unilateral nuclear disarmament by the UK.
- Withdrawal of all UK military personnel from abroad and the closure of all foreign bases.
- The removal of all US and NATO bases from Britain.
- The reallocation of the defence budget for peaceful purposes including health, education, housing and job creation.
No to war and imperialism!
Join the struggle for lasting peace!
In comradeship
Central Committee
Young Communist League
1 February 2022
London, Britain
