Americas

More than two years have passed since George W Bush declared his "war on terrorism." What has the result been? In Iraq the USA has shown its impotence to control the situation. It has been unable to build up a stable base. It is bogged down in a bloody impasse. But what about the other field of operations – Afghanistan?

This is a statement of the editorial board of In Defence of Marxism signed also by other Marxist currents and magazines all over the world. We express our opposition to the campaign of US imperialism and the Venezuelan oligarchy against the revolutionary process in Venezuela and put forward the perspective of socialism as the only way to defend it. Also in Spanish, Danish, Italian, and German.

veHaving been defeated twice by the revolutionary mobilisation of the masses after their coup in April 2002 and the during their sabotage of the oil industry in December 2002, the reactionary forces in Venezuela are now trying to reorganise their forces in a renewed attempt to overthrow democratically elected president Chavez.

If you think things in the USA are bad now, wait till after the US elections. Once the result is in the bag (either for Bush or whoever stands for the Democrats) economic policy will switch from the present spending spree (mainly on arms) to cuts in welfare. The present level of indebtedness cannot be maintained for ever. Sooner or later the capitalists will make the workers pay.

The victory of Lula well over a year ago in Brazil represented a dramatic shift to the left in Brazilian society. However, the Lula government once elected quickly moved to applying the programme of the bosses. This is preparing new contradictions within the Brazilian labour movement.

In the three articles that Luis Oviedo has written in answer to my article published on January 7 (Marxism versus Sectarianism - Reply to Luis Oviedo) a number of very important issues are raised. These questions deserve the most careful consideration by Marxists in Britain, Argentina and internationally. However, in order to clarify the issues raised and to educate the cadres (which ought to be the aim of every polemic) it is necessary to avoid heated language, distortions and personal attacks that only serve to divert attention away from the political questions. Such an approach will only confuse matters

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The world's largest producer of aluminum, Montréal-based Alcan, announced on January 22, 2004 that it was closing its Jonquière Soderburg smelter in Arvida, Québec. In order to protect their jobs, the unionized workers of the smelter have seized it and demanded that it either remain open, or that Alcan replace the smelter with a new one.

There has been yet another general strike in a Latin American country. There is now an endless list of countries experiencing serious social and economic crises welcoming the Dominican Republic into their ranks. Haiti’s neighbour has joined the French-speaking country that is suffering social convulsions and putting the entire island into deep unrest.

The national enlarged meeting of the Bolivian Workers’ Union (COB) gathered in Cochabamba on January 22, and decided to call for an indefinite general strike with road blockades in twenty days time if Mesa’s government does not concede the demands of the October insurrection and continues with its announced austerity measures. The COB meeting “ended with the decision to take power, by closing down Parliament." This decision marks the end of the truce given by the worker and peasant leaders to Carlos Mesa’s government.

Guantánamo Bay, an American army base containing 3,000 US military personnel, is located at the southern end of Cuba. It has over the past two years been used as a prison for 660 detainees from the ‘War on Terror’.The use of the base as a prison for ‘enemy combatants’ has generated a great deal of controversy. This term‘enemy combatants’conceals the fact that the prisoners have no rights whatsoever and exposes the hypocrisy of the US government.

The crisis in housing is a product of the capitalist system. Yosef Mikhah looks at the effects it has on working people, and the need for a socialized plan of quality housing for all. From the latest issue of the US Socialist Appeal

On December 23, 2003 the US government officially acknowledged the outbreak of BSE (bovine spongiform encephalopathy) in a herd of cattle in the state of Washington.This is officially the first case of mad cow in the US, but is in reality the second case of an outbreak in the integrated Canadian and US cattle industry.  The farming and cattle crisis is at root a reflection of the crisis of capitalism worldwide and a result of "globalization".

Bush's new plan for immigration "reform" will benefit only the ruling classes of the US and Latin America, Mexico in particular.  Working people will only see their conditions of life further deteriorate while big business pockets big profits.