REDWAVE
Urban Jungle Dweller
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2001
- Posts
- 6,013
A U.S. attack on Iraq soon seems almost inevitable. The only question is when: will it occur before the upcoming elections, just after, or sometime next spring? Whenever it does come, the U.S. and international working classes should respond with a general, political, sit-down, wildcat STRIKE against the war. That is the most effective tactic available to the oppressed masses.
For those who may not understand all the terminology above, I will explain the terms used. A general strike is a strike of all the workers in a given locality, or at least enough of the key workers to effectively shut the system down. The power of the working class lies in the fact that collectively they produce all the world's goods and services. They provide the labor from which the capitalists derive obscene profits, and grow rich. By withholding their labor, they bring the capitalist system to a halt, and shut off the flow of profits.
A political strike is a strike which has objectives going beyond the narrow personal concerns of the strikers. Most strikes are economic strikes: workers striking for better wages and/or working conditions for themselves. A strike demanding an end to U.S. aggression against Iraq would be a political strike.
Sit-down strikes, or plant occupations, are the working class' most powerful weapon. There was a big wave of sit-down strikes in the U.S. in 1936-37, at the height of the Great Depression. Labor needs to rediscover this militant tactic, in which workers take over the workplace, kicking the managers out. This has two advantages over an ordinary strike: (1) it makes it impossible to continue the business with scab labor; (2) it makes the bosses and their flunky government more reluctant to use violence against the strikers. They don't mind killing workers, but they sure hate damaging all that valuable plant and equipment . . . Finally, a sit-down strike directly poses the question of who will rule, the bosses or the workers, and thus helps pave the way toward revolution.
A wildcat strike is one in which the union rank and file goes out on strike without being told to by the "leaders," the sell-out union bureaucracy. The radical tactics embraced here will never be agreed to by the labor fakers who run the unions today, whose real job is to betray their members and sacrifice them to the interests of capital.
The minute the U.S. dares to attack Iraq, the toiling and exploited masses should respond immediately with a general political sit-down wildcat strike against the war! Then onward to worldwide socialist revolution!
For those who may not understand all the terminology above, I will explain the terms used. A general strike is a strike of all the workers in a given locality, or at least enough of the key workers to effectively shut the system down. The power of the working class lies in the fact that collectively they produce all the world's goods and services. They provide the labor from which the capitalists derive obscene profits, and grow rich. By withholding their labor, they bring the capitalist system to a halt, and shut off the flow of profits.
A political strike is a strike which has objectives going beyond the narrow personal concerns of the strikers. Most strikes are economic strikes: workers striking for better wages and/or working conditions for themselves. A strike demanding an end to U.S. aggression against Iraq would be a political strike.
Sit-down strikes, or plant occupations, are the working class' most powerful weapon. There was a big wave of sit-down strikes in the U.S. in 1936-37, at the height of the Great Depression. Labor needs to rediscover this militant tactic, in which workers take over the workplace, kicking the managers out. This has two advantages over an ordinary strike: (1) it makes it impossible to continue the business with scab labor; (2) it makes the bosses and their flunky government more reluctant to use violence against the strikers. They don't mind killing workers, but they sure hate damaging all that valuable plant and equipment . . . Finally, a sit-down strike directly poses the question of who will rule, the bosses or the workers, and thus helps pave the way toward revolution.
A wildcat strike is one in which the union rank and file goes out on strike without being told to by the "leaders," the sell-out union bureaucracy. The radical tactics embraced here will never be agreed to by the labor fakers who run the unions today, whose real job is to betray their members and sacrifice them to the interests of capital.
The minute the U.S. dares to attack Iraq, the toiling and exploited masses should respond immediately with a general political sit-down wildcat strike against the war! Then onward to worldwide socialist revolution!
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