Students are returning to school in the United States and other countries this month amidst an extraordinary intensification of global political and economic crisis.
The war in Iraq drags on, one year after the mid-term elections in the US, in which the American people clearly expressed their desire for it to end. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have already been killed as a result of the occupation, millions have been turned into refugees, and over 4,000 US and other coalition soldiers have died—all this because the American ruling elite is determined to control the resource-rich and geo-strategically critical region of the Middle East.
Meanwhile, new interventions are being planned. The same cynical pattern of lies and provocations used in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq is now being repeated in relation to Iran. Military action against Iran could easily spark a conflict between the US and Russia, China or the European powers—a global conflagration with unimaginable consequences. In Bush’s words, Iraq is only the first of the “wars of the 21st century.”
The so-called opposition of the Democratic Party has shown itself to be nothing more than a miserable charade. The actual effect of the 2006 elections, which brought the Democrats to power in Congress, has been to buy time while the war continues and public opinion is exhausted. The Democrats have repeatedly voted for funding for the Iraq war, and they would support military action against Iran.
Preparations are well advanced for the introduction of the military draft. Ultimately, the imperial ambitions of the American ruling elite cannot be satisfied without finding a way to dragoon America’s youth to serve as cannon fodder and bolster the declining ranks of the military forces.
A growing economic crisis is profoundly affecting millions of people. While governments scramble to bail out banks and billionaires, nothing is being done for those who will face the brunt of an economic downturn. Families are losing their homes, forced into bankruptcy from soaring mortgage payments. Students find themselves unable to pay for rising education fees. The latest census figures document declining incomes and growing inequality. The danger of an international credit crisis and recession is very real, which would throw millions of people out of work.
As social inequality and social antagonisms mount, the US government has severely eroded fundamental democratic rights. In the unprecedented expansion of spying programs, in the assertion of unchecked powers of the president, in the growing tendency to criminalize political opinions—the foundations for dictatorship and mass repression in the US have already been set.
The ISSE bases itself on the unrelenting struggle for the international unity of workers, students and youth on the basis of a socialist perspective. We oppose all forms of national chauvinism. In the 20th century, hundreds of millions were killed in wars launched to defend the interests of competing nation-states and their ruling elites. This pattern is now repeating itself.
No section of the political establishment in any country will end war. The wars of today can be ended, and the threats of tomorrow avoided, only through the independent intervention of the people themselves.
With schools set to open for the fall, the International Students for Social Equality, the student organization of the Socialist Equality Party, which is in political solidarity with the International Committee of the Fourth International, appeals to students across the United States and around the world to join the ISSE and build branches at your college or high school.
Young people and students, we are the future, but we must fight for our future! Join the fight for socialism! Join the ISSE!
Access the basic documents of the International Students for Social Equality:
Click here to download this statement for distribution at your school.
Resolution adopted by the ISSE/SEP Emergency Conference Against War
Click here to download this statement for distribution at your school.