ICC Introduction
We welcome the contribution by the comrade who attended our international online public meeting organised in response to the Israeli and US attacks on Iran. We agree with his overall assessment of the meeting and encourage others to respond to his points and make further contributions.
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Letter from Baboon
Firstly, the ICC should be saluted for organising this and other recent meetings, thus fulfilling its obligations as a revolutionary organisation to the full. The work involved in organising these international and on-line meetings is onerous, but it has been well worth the effort, particularly at this latest meeting which again involved dozens of comrades and interested parties from a number of countries. The discussion was wide-ranging and effective in looking at the questions of imperialism: the war on Iran, the Middle East more widely, the loss of control by the bourgeoisie, the question of the strengthening of centrifugal tendencies within the international situation and the position and perspectives for the working class. But there was also an overriding coherence in line with the lessons of the class struggle historically that made a strong link to the revolutionary period around the 3rd International and the important and essential clarifications made by revolutionaries at the time, clarifications that continue to underline the major lessons of internationalism and imperialism that are so important to defend today. “Internationalism brought to life” as the conclusion said of the meeting.
A comrade from outside the ICC, T, made his own important conclusion, calling the meeting part of the responsibility of the Communist Left (while noting the absence of other elements from it), calling it a “step forward” and one dimension of the class struggle. He also emphasised the undefeated nature of the working class in the present period and insisted on the necessity for revolutionary patience given the long haul that many comrades insisted upon; an essential element to which we can add, with Lenin, a sense of humour. The immediatism and opportunism of the Internationalist Communist Tendency’s scramble with its No War But The Class War is the opposite of the role of revolutionaries today.
On MH’s and Jaycee’s position on the US bourgeoisie
The position of MH is that the ICC’s position on the loss of control by the US bourgeoisie with the election of arch-populist Trump contradicts his view that the attack on Iran was “a desperate attempt to secure its (the USA’s) hegemony”; and that the ICC’s position on Trump’s irresponsibility, contradicted the fact that it was “a step towards full-blow barbarism”. But these positions can sit perfectly well with each other, i.e., they are not in opposition. Jaycee sort of supported MH’s position, adding that Trump was a TV cartoon character and tweeter. This position goes towards that of the ICT’s, which characterises the Trump element as a personality trait and generally ignores the question of the centrifugal tendencies of the bourgeoisie, the power of populism and the consequences it has for the international situation.
Trump 1 represented a loss of control by the main factions of US state capitalism but Trump was kept in check and the damage he could cause was limited. Trump 2 was an even greater loss of control, leading to Trump Unchained. The “second coming” of the populist MAGA movement to the reins of power in the highest citadel of imperialism sees the USA as the major contributor to the chaos, irrationality and barbarism across the globe and a major expression of decomposition (as populism is), adding to the “whirlwind effect”.
Trump’s (his lackeys have no say in this) contradictory and bizarre antics on the international stage show that he completely ignores his intelligence services, services which have been particularly hit by the DOGE chainsaw of Musk, weakening their links to the various committees and bodies of the State Department and the upper echelons of the political establishment. At root this is an attack on the vital role that intelligence plays in the defence of the national interest. This is hardly the “Machiavellianism” proposed by MH elsewhere. For example, the fact that Trump’s position on the Middle East seems to be at least partially determined by Netanyahu’s special adviser, Ron Dermer, who has been ensconced in the White House recently, and who is constantly in touch with his boss.
Attacks are going to rain down on workers everywhere and not just those currently put in place by Trump. One of the main points of the meeting was that events – of the class struggle or capitalist barbarism – can’t be seen to elicit an immediate response from the working class; we’ve seen the errors of that in practice with the ICT’s NWBCW committees. While time is running out for humanity under the threats from capitalism, for the working class there is still a long way to go and there can be no doubt that it is reflecting on events and perspectives in a subterranean fashion.
Baboon, 4.7.25