1. Three years after the escalation of the war in Ukraine between the Russian Federation and the US-EU-NATO Euro-Atlantic alliance, the conditions under which peace talks or cease-fire negotiations are presented once again demonstrate that this war has nothing to do with the “defense of European values” and democratic freedoms, nor with the alleged “anti-fascist” values that are instrumentally invoked by both factions.
2. Under the present conditions, what lies ahead for Ukraine is a fragile imperialist “peace” that will lay the groundwork for future imperialist conflicts; it will be based on the logic of plunder and division among the big monopolies and on agreements among the powers involved for the partial redefinition of spheres of influence. This reality reaffirms the fundamental assessment that has been expressed for years by the Communist Front and the Communist Youth Front, namely that an imperialist war is being fought in Ukraine in which there are no “good guys” or “friends of the people”. The roots of this war lie in the capitalist system, in the clash between bourgeoisies and large financial monopolies of all countries for the division of markets and market shares, for the control of energy, natural and mineral resources, trade and supply routes, territories and spheres of influence. This war is a manifestation of the broader competition for supremacy within the international imperialist system; a competition exacerbated today in the context of changing international power relations, with the emergence of new capitalist powers challenging Euro-Atlantic supremacy.
3. It is imperative to strongly oppose EU rearmament, militarism and the war propaganda being promoted across Europe today. Following the heated exchange between Donald Trump and Zelensky at the White House, Ursula Von der Leyen announced an €800 billion plan to support the rearmament of EU countries. The plan, called “ReArm Europe”, was later officially presented by the European Commission and includes the provisions to bypass the constraints of the Stability Pact. Despite the immediate circumstances, this project is consistent with the increase in military spending to 2% of GDP required by NATO. The hypocritical definition of “security spending” serves to mystify the objective reality, which is that the rearmament of Europe is functional to the preparation of new imperialist conflicts at the expense of the peoples. To date, the EU and its member states have allocated more than €135 billion to prolong the war in Ukraine. The cost of this reckless policy is already imposed on the peoples by demanding sacrifices and economic deprivation. In Italy, discussions are underway to increase military spending from €33 billion to €70 billion over the next four years: effectively a war economy that on the one hand will be financed directly from funds reserved for healthcare, education and social programs, and on the other will be able to be supported by common debt instruments, whose financial burden will once again be placed on workers and the people.
4. We reject the call for a rally on March 15 in favor of the European Union and its rearmament plans. These demonstrations, which are joined by the CGIL leadership and supported by a significant part of the media, are the equivalent of modern interventionism, no different in essence to those who dragged the popular masses to slaughter in the trenches a hundred years ago in the name of “defending the homeland” (today we would say Europe). More broadly, it is necessary to counter the narrative that strengthening the EU politically, diplomatically, in terms of a common foreign policy and greater “autonomy” from the US would be a guarantee of peace or “security” for the peoples. This position, which today is shared by the entire arc of bourgeois political forces – including, in Italy, the “Green-Left Alliance” – starts from the denial of the true nature of the European Union, i.e., an imperialist alliance of big capital in Europe, and the illusion that it can be reshaped or “reformed” in favor of peoples and peace. We are well aware that, for decades, the consensus of a part of the “leftists” around EU policies has been built with the argument that a strong EU can be a “counterweight” to the US and “give a voice” to the peoples of Europe, and that this may have a bearing on the participation of sectors of the center-left electorate in the March 15 demonstration. We are convinced, as communists, that we cannot give up exposing this rhetoric. It is not possible in any way to support “from the left” the strengthening of a European imperialist center, which will not be a harbinger of either peace or prosperity for the peoples, but will directly serve the interests and ambitions of capital in Europe. The questioning of these illusions is, for us, a fundamental node, acting as a crucial dividing line between communists and those who instead conceive of themselves as the “left-wing prop” of this system. For this reason, on March 15 we will join the demonstration convened in Piazza Barberini, Rome, convened by sections of the labor and trade union movement, including dissenting factions within the CGIL and ANPI that have rejected the official line imposed by their leaderships.
5. The FDI-Lega-FI nationalist government has consistently demonstrated that it operates in the interests of Italian big business, which today seeks to carve out the largest possible share in the sharing of the Ukrainian “pie” (and reconstruction in Gaza). This reality is reflected today in the “prudent” approach of the Meloni government, which promptly announced an increase in Italian military spending while avoiding taking a clear stance on the growing tensions between the US administration and the EU states, finding itself in the position of being one of the most loyal allies of the US on the continent.
6. The current situation confirms the urgent need to build the broadest popular mobilization against war, rearmament, the war economy and imperialism; to unite in a single front of struggle the mobilizations of the most combative workers and trade unions, students, and the unemployed, in order to build a worker-people’s opposition to the Meloni government, an alternative to the center-left’s false opposition. Likewise, we reaffirm the necessity of intensifying efforts to rebuild a strong communist party in Italy, as a must-have element for the effective development of an independent working-class politics, which can bind to itself all popular sectors and the oppressed masses in our country.
A peaceful future is possible beyond capitalism. The struggle for socialism is the struggle of our time.
Communist Front Political Bureau
Communist Youth Front National Secretariat.
frontecomunista.it
