I lad made people to us. HE STRONG resistance from the
led invasion means we are now
entering new territory for the British left: one which offers a real challenge to every
socialist.
The war which Tony Blair expected to be short-lived and clean, followed swiftly by a triumphant march of British and US troops into Baghdad to be showered with flowers and embraces from grateful Iraqis, has proved to be very different. It could yet turn into a long-running, bloody nightmare of civilian deaths, guerrilla resistance and demoralised troops.
Meanwhile the fact that it has been a Labour government and a Labour prime minister that has dragged the country into an imperialist war has created a succession of new developments: we have had a huge anti-war march (September 28) followed by the largest political protest in British history (February 15), followed by the largest-ever back-bench revolt by Labour MPs, and now by the largest-ever protest during wartime (March 22).
We have seen students and now school students mobilising and campaigning on this issue, bringing a new political generation into activity and dispelling the myth that younger people are somehow apathetic and apolitical. We have also seen a welcome new lease of life and active re-engagement of thousands of older and more experienced campaigners, who have swelled the numbers on every march and protest.
But as plans are laid for what promises to be another gigantic national protest on April 12, it is also clear that the anti-war movement needs more than marches, vigils, and student sit-downs and walk-outs if it is to succeed. Campaigners need to become more political, more focused.
The political development which began with the million-plus marching on February 15 must be deepened if the war is to be stopped, and further imperialist adventures prevented.
We should recall that in Vietnam it was the combination of dogged long-term resistance by the Vietnamese people to a massive US army and air attack on the one hand, and growing political campaigning against the war on the other which was key to the eventual defeat of that American intervention - a defeat which deterred the US from major military interventions for 15 years.
That's why we need to maintain the campaigning activity at all costs. And the huge
level of public support must be turned into on-going political action that forces Labour's leaders to pay the price of their reactionary policies.
This cannot, and should not, be done by the Stop the War Coalition, which has been so successful in galvanising and uniting such massive and wide support because it has remained precisely that: a coalition of peo ple from all types of political view who agree on the single issue of stopping the war. To add in further political issues risks fragmenting this unity, and that would be too heavy a price to pay.
Nor can it be properly done by any of the various smaller groups and parties on the hard left. Of course most of these will recruit individuals, and even groups, of new members from the current campaigning activity: but we should be clear that this is just scratching the surface of what should be possible in the present situation.
The left should set its sights much higher: on nothing less than the
building of a genuinely broad, socialist opposition to Blair, one that can make itself accessible to young people, to people taking a first step into political involvement, and to those with less happy past experiences of encounters with left groups who are moving back into activity. It must be principled, democratic and open, seeking to unite rather than divide on points of disagreement.
Of course there is a ready-made starting point for such an initiative: the Socialist Alliance. It is the closest we have yet come to tackling the question of unity and a new workers' party to the left of Labour.
But there are unresolved questions about the Alliance, and the extent to which key players within it really see it as central to developments. As our interview with Pat rick Sikorski (RMT Assistant General Secretary) shows, trade unions which are contemplating the issue of a political break from Labour need to be convinced that the Alliance really wants to make the kind of development and changes it would need to make if unions were to consider affiliating to it.
There is also the issue of developing a youth wing of the Alliance, better equipped to relate to the radicalising layers of young workers and students in schools and colleges.
In practice, of course, the development of the Alliance stands or falls by the decisions that must be taken by the various political groupings within it: wil they throw their energies and resources into building the Alliance, or will they continue to focus their primary efforts on recruitment to the ir own organisations?
Be in Socialist Resistance are very dear on where we stand:
now is the time for the Socialist Alliance to raise its profile, open its doors, begin to set out and publicise its platform of policies and produce and distribute publications that can reach out to students, school students and the widest possible layers active in the anti-war effort.
The March 22 demonstration saw a new willingness of protesters to take and buy leaflets and literature: the impact of a united left would be infinitely greater to these new people than that of a cacophony of left groupings each vying for their attention.
The Alliance needs to prove itself and to develop a credible presence if it is to make the gains that it should, and to play the role it should in opening the way to a new working class party.
There is competition: already there are signs that the huge movement that began on the streets is having an impact on layers of the Labour Party: the Campaign Group of left MPs, until now little seen or heard under pressure from the Blairite machine, have called for Blair's removal as leader and for pro-war MPs to be deselected - and even urged people to join the Labour Party to promote this campaign.
While most of us would see it as unlikely that students and others who have come into
480. DOI IRA Muror TACK AQ @MAB TI@MAB the battle against Bomber Blair will be first in the queue for Labour Party membership, or that many who have only just resigned in disgust from the party will be beating a path back in, those of us who wish to build a socialist alternative to Labour need to be seen to be organising and offering an alternative line of march.
We should be looking for ways to work with students and school students, to organise educational "teach-ins" on the politics of the war, and the imperialism and neo-liberalism that lie behind Blair and Bush, in which we can promote the Alliance.
We should be taking the fight into the trade unions, seeking to build and widen support and win extra funding for the Stop the War campaign, but also building workplace groups opposing the war, investigating Demonstrate in central London on Saturday 12 April at 12 noon
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the possibility of unions helping to build
local-level actions that bring home the scale
of British involvement, including protests at
Fairford and other key military bases for the
war effort.
We should begin more systematic work
to make the links between the war and
other right wing and neo-liberal policies of
New Labour, such as Blunkett's non-stop
attacks on asylum seekers, student tuition
fees, and privatisation in health and educa.
tion
We will never get a better chance than
we have now to build the Alliance as the
beginnings of a mass socialist alternative to
New Labour. Such periods come - maybe -once in a generation. There is no point in
missing out now, only to look for somebody
to blame afterwards.