Translated by Red Star Publications.

The plenary of the ICMLPO met in October at a time when the peoples of Asia, Africa and Latin America rose up one after another.

The international bourgeoisie and capitalism can do nothing but increase the social problems, always adding new ones and making them insurmountable.

Let us remember how they promised peace and well-being for all with the New World Order, and how exploitation and social classes would come to an end with globalization, which would transform the world into “a small village” and free humanity from its problems!

The working class and the oppressed peoples of the world have been experiencing the opposite of these claims through the unbearable deterioration of their living and working conditions. The workers’ own experience in the increase of unemployment, decrease in wages, increasing poverty due to cuts in social services and rise of prices and taxes, and the deterioration of the conditions to meet basic needs leads them to realize that capitalism has nothing to offer them. The source of all these problems lies in the fact that capitalist production is carried out to increase the profits of the monopolies.

This deterioration is manifested in the crisis into which many dependent countries have already been dragged, and in the capitalist world as a whole it has caused a slowdown in economic growth, especially in industrial production, accompanied by a decrease in the utilization of capacity, factory closures and layoffs. There are indications that the next crisis of the capitalist world economy will be much more serious than that of 2008. And this time, since the main imperialist states do not have the opportunity to implement centralized interventions, the crisis will have more destructive consequences.

The sharpening of inter-imperialist and inter-monopolist contradictions and the rise of conflicts of interest have already led to “trade wars.” These contradictions and conflicts are the result of the push by the imperialist monopolies to obtain maximum profit and without a doubt they have a negative impact on the world economy.

The uneven development of monopolies and imperialist countries, as well as of enterprises and sectors, is leading to differentiations in the degree of power of monopoly groups of finance capital and of the imperialist countries, which in turn leads to demands of a new division of the world. The United States, China, Russia and the German-French imperialists who dominate the EU, which is plagued by contradictions, are the main imperialists, and among them the conflict between the United States and China appears in first place.

The United States is the largest hegemonic imperialist power because of its industrial and financial base, the size of the countries and regions that depend on it, the “weapon” of the dollar, its military bases throughout the world, and also its continuing capacity to impose its will on the western powers through NATO despite the differences of interest among them and their military spending that exceeds the total of the rest. The hysteria to protect what it has makes the United States aggressive and warmongering, which makes it more reckless. China, on the other hand, with the completely modern technical base of its capitalism and its resulting rapid industrial and economic growth, with its level of capital accumulation and the resulting economic expansion and its potential to surpass the United States, is an imperialist power on the rise that cannot refrain from including on its agenda the redivision of the world, and is underway to improve its military apparatus accordingly. The conflict between the U.S. and China, as well as the struggles among the others to protect what they have and expand at the expense of the others, has already spread across all continents, including wars for power.

The inter-imperialist contradictions and conflicts have a negative effect on the world economy and lead to the deterioration of the living and working conditions of the exploited masses, since the imperialists aspire to exploit the working class and the oppressed and plundered peoples.

In conflict with each other in all parts of the world, and concentrated in some regions, no imperialist power is a friend of the workers and peoples. Their promises to aid the peoples economically and politically, to bring independence and democracy, for example, are nothing but big lies. They are all monopolist thugs, exploiters and looters, no matter what they promise; they only care for profit at the expense of the peoples and to expand their hegemonic spheres by making the people depend on them.

While no imperialist hesitates to seize the slightest opportunity to plunder the wealth of the peoples and expand their economic and political influence by expanding the relations of dependency, U.S. imperialism, in particular, is on the offensive against the peoples through a series of sanctions, embargoes and occupations, using its more than 800 military bases, Israeli Zionism and regional reactionary powers such as Saudi Arabia and Colombia. It still maintains occupation forces in Afghanistan and Iraq. It continues the intervention in Syria and embargoes against Cuba, Venezuela and Iran. It has been a while since it moved its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

The ICMLPO condemns all these attacks.

Unconditionally defending the right of all peoples and nations to self-determination, including also the right to the foundation of separate states, the ICMLPO also declares its solidarity with all oppressed peoples and their liberation struggles, mainly with those of Venezuela, Iran. Palestine, Kurds, Cuba and Kashmir.

The fact that the contradictions between labor and capital, between the imperialists and the peoples and among the imperialists themselves are intensifying means that capitalist-imperialist aggression is increasing, as is the danger of fascism and war. Unless this course of events is avoided, the working class and the oppressed peoples will surely be in a worse situation.

If the ruling class cannot overcome the crisis of capitalism, whose decline and stagnation is deepening, and suppress the demands of the working class and peoples, then it will be natural that it will resort to fascism. This is the most intense form of the reactionary monopoly tendency. And the fights of the inter-imperialist dogs will lead to a new imperialist war.

However, it is also true that all the negative consequences of capitalism lead to mobilizations of the working class and the oppressed peoples.

In India, not so long ago, 200 million workers went on a general strike. In Iran, strikes and mobilizations last year, in which tens of thousands of workers participated, were also witnessed this year. While strikes have been increasing in Europe, we have seen several strike actions in the U.S. in the last two years; the strike of metal workers is the latest example. After a long period of stagnation, the working class is in a state of new mobilizations, and this can be seen in several strikes and other actions of all sizes, although they are not yet united at the national level.

We are also witnessing the outbreak of many popular movements in October, as a result of the destructive effects of capitalism and the repression by reactionary forces. In many countries, these movements have shown a tendency to become uprisings and are beginning to have a political character. In Burkina Faso, the people thwarted the military coup four years ago. In Sudan, Omar al Bashir was overthrown. In Algeria, Bouteflika had to resign and then withdrew his candidacy. In Lebanon, Prime Minister Hariri resigned. The Iraqi prime minister announced that he would resign. In Chile, President Sebastián Piñera had to step back on the economic measures that were adopted. In Ecuador, President Moreno had to cancel his austerity package. In Haiti, Iraq, Honduras, Guinea, etc., the struggle of the peoples that rose up could not be contained. The number of popular uprisings with great participation of the working class is increasing.

The uprising of the working class and peoples against looting and oppression by the monopolies and imperialism is the only way to halt the aggression of capital, avoid the danger of fascism and war, as well as for social and national emancipation.

Social reformism is falling into a vacuum since it is not able to contain the rebellion of the working class and peoples. It is natural that the tranquilizing effect of reformism, which has nothing to offer but the conciliation between the objectively revolutionary popular struggles and the reactionary forces, is being broken.

Our Conference calls on the workers of all countries:

The only way for our emancipation is to fight against capitalism without having any expectations from any bourgeois faction or imperialist power and to abolish the hegemony of capital and the relations of exploitation. We must put an end to bourgeois rule and organize ourselves as the hegemonic class, which only depends on our own power.

However, we cannot achieve this if we are disunited and disorganized. Therefore, we must organize ourselves in our independent parties of the working class in our countries, where there is one, and where there is not, we must found one, and carry out our class struggle independent of the bourgeoisie.

With this in mind, we must not only participate in the popular struggles that are developing outside of our initiative, but we must lead them, organizing the struggles of the workers of the city and countryside and directing these struggles against capitalism.

Our Conference also calls for the expansion of the struggle of the oppressed peoples and nations of the world.

The only way to get rid of looting and imperialist and monopolist oppression is to carry out an uncompromising struggle against the imperialist powers and monopolies. We must follow the example of the struggles that are taking place in other countries, helping to develop and expand them in our own country. The peoples have no other friend but themselves. We can depend on ourselves and the workers who are part of the peoples.

We need to unite, organize and raise the fight against imperialism and the monopolies. The united and organized struggle of the working class and the oppressed peoples is invincible.

International Conference of Marxist-Leninist Parties and Organizations – ICMLPO

October of 2019

Categories: Imperialism, International, Workers Struggle