[D66] No to European rearmament!

[René Oudeweg]

Eat this Tweede Oorlogskamer:

"The program of war is entirely incompatible with even nominally 
democratic forms of rule. The ruling elites are once again turning to a 
program of fascism and dictatorship to enforce militarist policies that 
are opposed by the vast mass of the population."


  wsws.org
No to European rearmament!
8–9 minutes


Every major European power is accelerating a frantic programme of 
military rearmament.

€800 billion is being made available by the European Union. Germany has 
announced hundreds of additional billions in defence spending, even 
before the new CDU-led government of Friedrich Merz takes office.

France is planning to double annual military spending, with President 
Macron proposing a goal of 5 percent of GDP. He has declared his 
readiness to bring European allies under France’s nuclear umbrella.

Britain, led by Keir Starmer’s Labour government, is proposing to put 
British “boots on the ground and planes in the air” in Ukraine, as part 
of a “coalition of the willing” in alliance with France and other powers.

Every political party and major news outlet is spewing forth lies 
justifying this explosion of militarism, claiming a moral imperative of 
defending Ukrainian democracy and the entire continent from Russian 
aggression and, more absurdly still, invasion.

In a televised address to the nation, Macron declared that “peace can no 
longer be guaranteed on our own continent. … Russia has become and will 
remain a threat to France and Europe.”

The real motivation for the European powers is their realisation that 
Trump’s America First foreign policy, his unilateral discussions with 
Russia and demands for exclusive access to Ukraine’s resources threaten 
to cut them off from the spoils of NATO’s war.

The conflict in Ukraine was prepared by a joint European-American 
campaign of destabilisation, aimed at bringing the country into the 
clutches of NATO and the European Union and spearheading regime change 
in Moscow that would open Russia’s substantial assets to world imperialism.

As the representative of Russia’s capitalist oligarchy, Putin’s 
government was unable to respond to this threat in any other way than 
the reactionary invasion of Ukraine, just as the NATO powers anticipated.

Had Trump agreed to preserve Europe’s interests in his discussions with 
Putin, Berlin, Paris and London would have sought an accommodation with 
Washington, as demonstrated by the constant overtures to the fascist in 
the White House by Starmer and Macron.

Amid the tidal wave of hypocrisy unleashed to justify rearmament, Europe 
is desperately seeking a revival of the July 2021 “Memorandum of 
Understanding between the European Union and Ukraine on a Strategic 
Partnership on Raw Materials,” as the basis for their continued support 
for Zelensky’s right-wing regime.

This memorandum was described last month by Europe’s Commissioner for 
Industrial Strategy Stéphane Séjourné as providing “twenty-one of the 30 
critical materials Europe needs” as part of a “win-win partnership.” 
Indeed, Europe is far more dependent on seizing Ukraine’s strategic 
minerals than the United States, and at this point relies almost 
exclusively on China for its supply.

Acknowledging these real interests, a “diplomat from a major European 
country,” speaking anonymously to the BBC, said of Trump’s ending 
military aid to Ukraine, “It’s certainly one way of focusing our 
minds—and wallets! Donald Trump is doing us a favour, if we choose to 
think about it that way.”

The dangers raised for the European and international working class are 
incalculable. Placing European troops on the ground and planes in the 
air over Ukraine, and even extending a French nuclear umbrella to 
Germany and other allies, are the real source of the war danger in Europe.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said of Macron’s sabre-rattling, 
“If he considers us a threat, convenes a meeting of the chiefs of 
general staff of European countries and Britain, says it is necessary to 
use nuclear weapons, prepares to use nuclear weapons against Russia, 
this is, of course, a threat.”

When the European powers speak of the end of the “international 
rules-based order,” and blame Trump for this, they are preparing for a 
return to the pursuit of their own imperialist interests by force of 
arms. They are now fully aware that doing so involves conflict not only 
with Russia, but with American imperialism.

Germany, which is leading the way in the rearmament drive, fought two 
wars in the 20th century against the US. France never accepted its 
subordination to Washington through NATO, including insisting on an 
independent nuclear capability and military intelligence structures. 
Britain chafed against it. Significant sections of the ruling elite have 
never forgiven America for ensuring their subordination to its dictates 
following the 1956 Suez crisis.

The scale of Europe’s ambitions is made clear by the vast sums being 
prepared for military purposes, which go far beyond what is required for 
claimed efforts to police an eventual peace settlement in Ukraine. War 
with Russia under Europe’s own steam is under discussion.

Moreover, whereas this agenda provides an initial unifying impulse, its 
pursuit must inevitably intensify competition and conflicts between the 
European powers themselves.

The burning question before millions of workers and young people is how 
to stop this mad drive to catastrophe. There is no basis for doing so by 
relying on any of Europe’s opposition parties, either on the right or 
nominal left, or the trade unions.

Just as in the United States, where the Democratic Party’s sole 
substantial disagreement with Trump is over continuing the proxy war in 
Ukraine and his undermining of NATO, every major party in Europe 
supports stepped-up aggression against Russia and the push for military 
independence from the Unites States. It is pursued as a strategic goal 
whether under Starmer’s Labour Party, President Macron, or whatever 
coalition government emerges in Germany.

The sole concern of Europe’s trade unions is how best to support their 
own ruling class in Europe’s escalating trade and military war, 
including backing protectionist measures against the US and China and 
the rapid expansion of national defence industries.

Workers and young people must respond with their own call to arms, 
committing themselves to waging war against war.

That must be based on an understanding of the vast implications of what 
is underway. All of the claims that war in Europe was a thing of the 
past, relegated to the 20th century, have been exposed as a fraud. 
European militarism, presented as an extinct volcano, is once again 
erupting, posing the threat of catastrophes even greater than those that 
claimed tens of millions of lives in the two world wars.

The program of war is entirely incompatible with even nominally 
democratic forms of rule. The ruling elites are once again turning to a 
program of fascism and dictatorship to enforce militarist policies that 
are opposed by the vast mass of the population.

The vast sums dedicated to weapons of war mean an assault on the working 
class deeper than at any time in the past 80 years. Under conditions 
where strikes, industrial actions and protests are already growing, this 
will provoke massive struggles by the working class.

The struggle against austerity must be fused with the fight against war. 
Both can only be taken forward through a frontal assault on the ruling 
oligarchy, whose rapacious interests dictate the program of war abroad 
and class war at home.

For decades, the International Committee of the Fourth International 
(ICFI) has sounded the alarm, warning that a new period of imperialist 
war is underway. Those warnings have been fully vindicated. They must be 
acted upon. That means building a unified movement of the working class 
throughout Europe and internationally, based on the socialist and 
revolutionary programme that is the only way to stop war and its source, 
capitalism itself.