Solidarity 433, 22 March 2017

Marine A is no hero

Marine A: Right, get him closer in so PGSS can’t see what we’re doing to him… Marine A: Where is the CAT, Ugly call sign? [Referring to the helicopter that is watching them pretending to apply a field dressing to an injured Afghan insurgent.] Marine B: It’s gone that way? Marine A: Yeah Marine B: Went south, mate? (Gunshot) M: What was that? Marine A: There you are, shuffle off this mortal coil you cunt. It’s nothing you wouldn’t do to us. Marine B: I know. M: Exactly. Marine A: Obviously this doesn’t go anywhere fellas. Marine B: Yeah, roger, mate. Marine A: I’ve just broke the Geneva...

Israel enters Syrian conflict

A surprise rebel assault on the eastern suburbs of Damascus has been driven back by the Syrian Army. Meanwhile a further round of peace talks in Geneva, between the government and major rebel factions, will soon begin. Since the so-called ceasefire began in December last year, both sides have, with justification, accused the other of breaching the agreement. Israel has increased its involvement in the war, with a drone killing of an alleged pro-Assad fighter, part of a militia supported by the Lebanese Hezbollah. Exchanges of fire between the Syrian army and Israel have also intensified after...

Italy: a shift in the political centre

At its recent conference Italy’s governing party, il Partito Democratico (PD), split. This follows a massive defeat in the December 2016 referendum for party leader and head of government Matteo Renzi. Defeat and a subsequent resignation as premier did not stop Renzi from deciding to remain as leader of the party. And at the party convention he gave no quarter to his opponents — representing a diffuse spectrum of left /liberal forces. He declared for a general election in June, reiterating the need for him to keep hold of the power of the party leader so as to control the selection of...

G20 deletion signals danger

When twenty governments met for the G20 summit in late 2008, at the worst of the global credit crash, their agreed joint statement included just one hard commitment: to resist protectionism, to avoid new trade barriers. Not perfectly, but on the whole, that commitment held, and helped the slump level out in late 2009 rather than continuing downwards for three or four years as in the 1930s, when states spiralled into competitive tariff-raising and world trade collapsed. On 18 March, the statement from a meeting of G20 finance ministers and central bank governors deleted the now-traditional...

Spanish dockers win

Jordi Aragunde, coordinator of the International Dockworkers’Council, has reported a victory, at least a temporary victory, for the Spanish dockworkers. They have been fighting the Spanish government’s plan to abolish the “pools” through which they are employed. “As of March 17, the Spanish Government was unable to pass the Royal Decree to reform the Spanish port system. The Spanish Parliament has rejected this Decree, therefore acting to protect Spanish dockworkers. “Action has been cancelled indefinitely. However, IDC will continue to watch over new developments closely. “IDC would like to...

Martin McGuinness

Martin McGuinness became a revolutionary, by his own lights, as a teenager, and ended his life as a bourgeois minister in a political system he had vowed to shun. He died on 21 March, only a couple of months after resigning as Deputy First Minister of Northern Ireland. He was a young commander of the Provisional IRA in the early 1970s. We wrote: “The Northern Ireland Catholics fight in isolation, in the most unfavourable conditions imaginable. The rearguard of the Irish fight for national freedom, they... are simultaneously cut off from the allies that would make an advance on a socialist...

The origins of the Petrograd soviet

Continuing a series of extracts from Leon Trotsky’s History of the Russian Revolution. Here Trotsky describes the inception and initial political and social character of the Petrograd soviet. For most of 1917 the soviet backed the bourgeois Provisional Government. Read the rest of the series The organisation created on February 27 in the Tauride Palace, and called “Executive Committee of The Soviet of Workers’ Deputies”, had little in common with its name. The Soviet of Deputies of 1905, the originator of the [soviet] system, rose out of a general strike. It directly represented the masses in...

Labour should fight Brexit all the way

Prime minister Theresa May will formally announce her wish to quit the European Union, and thus trigger separation proceedings under Article 50 of the 1991 Maastricht Treaty, on 29 March. Current Labour Party policy is to give the Tories a free hand to shape Brexit. Labour leaders say they must defer out of respect for the referendum decision on 23 June 2016. Labour leaders have talked about "holding the Tories to account" and pushing a "People's Brexit", but surrendered the means to make those words reality by voting with the Tories when they legislated to give themselves a free hand. The...

Derby Council climbdown leaves problems

On 15 to 17 March there was a dramatic reversal of the bullying and confrontational attitude that Derby’s Labour Council had until then shown to Unison in the 10 month long dispute with school support staff. The sudden change followed several weeks in which increasing solidarity had been shown towards the school support staff. Local support for them in the community of Derby had always been strong and personal support of Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell had been known for a long time. But in the local Labour Party there had been none. Then both wings of Momentum gave support at national...

Guard Martin Zee wins court case

RMT member Martin Zee has won an important legal battle concerning his actions as a train guard. Martin was working as a guard on a Merseyrail train in 2015 when an elderly passenger tried to board a train after the door closure procedure had started and the door alarms were sounding. She fell between the platform and the train and was injured. Martin carried out his role properly, ensuring the train and track were made safe and climbing down to support and reassure the passenger until the emergency services arrived. Merseyrail's investigation into the incident identified improvements to...

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