German Left Party backs Merkel on Ukraine crisis

Ulrich Rippert

The Left Party has responded to the Ukraine crisis and the growing danger of a war with Russia by backing the policy of German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Party Chairman Berndt Riexinger opened a press conference Monday by stating, “We explicitly welcome the diplomatic efforts of Chancellor Merkel and French President Hollande.”

One might have mistaken him for the chancellor’s official spokesman when he repeated Merkel’s statement that there was no alternative to negotiations. Everything had to be done to reach an acceptable solution through negotiations, he insisted.

“We welcome the clear statement on supplying weapons by the chancellor,” Riexinger continued, adding, “Merkel correctly pointed out that the Ukrainian conflict cannot be resolved militarily.”

Riexinger presented four demands: no arms to Ukraine, a ceasefire between Ukrainian government troops and the rebels in the east, more autonomy for the regions in Ukraine, and a greater involvement of the OSCE (Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe).

Making clear that the Left Party’s demands are fully within the framework of official German government policy, Riexinger emphasised that the demand for no military supplies to Ukraine was not limited to one side. “The supply of arms by Russia to the separatists must also be halted. I emphasise that explicitly,” he said.

Riexinger’s attempt to present the German government’s opposition to the dispatch of arms to Ukraine by the US as a peace policy is a grotesque falsification of the facts.

Along with the US, the German government is chiefly responsible for the current crisis, which threatens to escalate into a war, possibly employing nuclear weapons, between the NATO powers and Russia.

Berlin was the driving force behind the Association Agreement to integrate Ukraine economically and strategically in to the sphere of influence of the European Union (EU) and NATO, even though Ukraine had been part of Russia and later the Soviet Union since the 17th century. When then-President Viktor Yanukovych opposed the signing of the agreement, the German government helped organise a coup that brought a pro-Western regime to power with the backing of fascist forces. That this provoked a reaction from Moscow and the population in eastern Ukraine, which has close links to Russia, was entirely predictable.

Since then, Chancellor Merkel and Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier have promoted the military encirclement of Russia in cooperation with the United States. They have imposed economic sanctions and supported the strengthening of NATO forces along the Russian border. The spearhead of a new rapid deployment force to enable NATO to mobilise tens of thousands of soldiers against Russia within a few days will be led this year by the German army.

However, Merkel and Steinmeier had not anticipated that the US would deliberately work toward a military confrontation. Washington is aiming to involve Ukraine in a long and expensive war, as spelled out by former National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski.

During the administration of Democratic President Jimmy Carter, Brzezinski developed the same policy for Afghanistan, where the Americans armed Islamic fundamentalists in a proxy war against the Soviet Union.

The private security web site Stratfor, which has close ties to American intelligence, wrote: “There is a contradiction inherent in German strategy… In Ukraine, Germany was an early supporter of the demonstrations that gave rise to the current government. I don’t think the Germans expected the Russian or US responses, and they do not want to partake in any military reaction to Russia. At the same time, Germany does not want to back away from support for the government in Ukraine.”

Germany’s reluctance to supply the Kiev regime with weapons, which would plunge Ukraine into a drawn out war with countless victims and have a negative impact on Germany, does not mean that it is a peaceful power. Merkel has left no doubt that she supports an intensification of sanctions against Russia and will continue to align with Washington in escalating the conflict.

To the extent that there are voices in the German ruling elite calling for more distance from Washington, they are doing so in order to strengthen Germany militarily and turn it once again into an aggressive great power.

This aim was announced when German President Gauck, Foreign Minister Steinmeier and Defence Minister Von der Leyen proclaimed a year ago that Germany had to play a role “in Europe and the world” that corresponded to its size and influence, and that “in a world full of crises and unrest” Germany required an active and militarist foreign policy. The coup in Ukraine was the practical implementation of this policy.

With the emergence of tensions between Berlin and Washington, the Left Party has given up even its purely formal distance from the policies of German imperialism. That is the real significance of Riexinger’s words of praise for Merkel and Germany’s actions in Ukraine.

The Left Party’s representatives now move among imperialist politicians and military brass like fish in water. Four of their parliamentary deputies participated in the recent Munich Security Conference to exchange views with high-ranking politicians and military officials. Wolfgang Gehrcke, Left Party representative on the parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee, has noted at every opportunity that he is well connected in all areas, including the military and intelligence agencies.

Amid the growth in transatlantic tensions, the Left Party is positioning itself as a defender of German imperialism. The Left Party is the only party in the German parliament whose predecessors stood on the other side of the Iron Curtain during the years of the Cold War. Now they connect their critique of NATO and America’s war policy with support for the return of German great power politics.

This is the meaning of comments by former party chairman Oscar Lafontaine at the beginning of the year. At the Rosa Luxemburg conference of the Junge Welt newspaper, he said that as long as Germany was a NATO member and NATO’s infrastructure was dominated by America, Germany did not constitute a genuine sovereign state. The “vassalage” and “obligation to contribute” connected with NATO membership had to be overcome, he declared.

Lafontaine continued: “Germany has practically participated in every war led by the United States of America because all of the wars they have led have relied on US facilities in central Europe. We were in every case a participant. And as long as that is the case, we are not a sovereign country.”

The demand for German sovereignty is a key demand of right-wing circles. It makes clear that the Left Party’s criticisms of American military policy are based on a German nationalist standpoint.

Over 300 migrant workers perish off Italian coast

Paul Mitchell

In what has become an unending tragedy in the Mediterranean Sea, hundreds of migrant workers attempting to escape war and poverty and find a better life for themselves have perished off the coast of Italy as they attempted to cross from Libya in rubber dinghies, without food and water. The majority of the victims were from the Ivory Coast, Senegal, Mali, and Gambia.

The death of 300 refugees adds to the more than 40,000 refugees since the year 2000, according to the International Organization for Migration. The tragedies are all a direct result of the callous “Fortress Europe” policy of the European Union (EU), compelling refugees to resort to ever more dangerous routes of entry and encouraging the ruthless business of traffickers and people smugglers.

The migrant workers told aid organisations that four dinghies left the North African coast on Saturday, carrying around 100 people each. Two of the boats capsized over the weekend in stormy weather. Only nine people survived after spending four days in freezing waters before they were rescued. The Italian coast guard came to the aid of the third boat and took on board 76 people, but at least 29 of them then died from hypothermia. The whereabouts of the fourth boat is still unknown. The youngest of the missing is a 12-year-old boy.

“This is a tragedy on an enormous scale and a stark reminder that more lives could be lost if those seeking safety are left at the mercy of the sea. Saving lives should be our top priority. Europe cannot afford to do too little too late,” said the Europe Bureau Director of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNCHR), Vincent Cochetel.

A UNHCR statement repeated “its concern about the lack of a strong search and rescue operation in the Mediterranean. Europe’s Triton operation, which is run by the European border protection agency Frontex, is not focused on search and rescue and is not providing the necessary tools to cope with the scale of the crises.”

The latest tragedy is the biggest loss of life since October 3, 2013, when a boat carrying migrants from Libya to Italy sank off the island of Lampedusa, with more than 360 dead. The EU began patrolling the Mediterranean in November 2014, after Italy ended its Mare Nostrum search-and-rescue operation following the Lampedusa deaths.

The Mare Nostrum operation was only superficially concerned with rescuing refugees. Its main goal was to identify trafficking boats and force them back to Africa. As then Italian Defence Minister Mario Mauro and Interior Minister Angelino Alfano made clear, the deployment of warships was to deter those who “think they can get away with people trafficking without being punished.”

Those rescued were denied access to a fair asylum procedure and forced to live in inhumane conditions. In one incident the naval ship Aliseo opened fire with several machine gun bursts on a boat containing 176 refugees. After the rescue of the refugees, the boat sank.

The Italian government had abandoned the Mare Nostrum operation barely a year after it was put in place, claiming other European countries did not provide enough support, and also pressure from right-wing anti-immigration groups saying it was a “pull factor” encouraging migrants to make the crossing.

The replacement Triton operation, run by the European Agency for the Management of Operational Cooperation at the External Borders of the Member States of the European Union (Frontex), is purely a border control measure, extending just 30 miles from the Italian coast. From its inception, with a meagre annual budget of 2.9 million euros, the European Commission insisted Frontex “is neither a search and rescue body nor does it take up the functions of a Rescue Coordination Centre.”

The Commission knew its policy would lead to increased fatalities, stating, “It must be stressed that the withdrawal of naval forces from the sea area near the Libyan coast... will probably lead to a higher number of deaths.”

The intention was that “significantly fewer migrants will attempt to cross the Mediterranean in bad weather and prices for the crossings will rise.” The number of refugees would thus decline to “the level of previous years”.

Instead, the number of people attempting to reach Europe by sea from the Middle East, Africa and Asia reached a record in 2014, with more than 170,000 individuals rescued by Italy and 40,000 by Greece. At least 4,077 people died in 2014 while trying to cross borders as they fled war and poverty, according to the International Organization for Migration. Of those, 3,072 died in the Mediterranean, up massively from the estimated 700 in 2013.

On New Year’s Eve this year the Blue Sky M, carrying 970 Syrian and Kurdish migrants, was intercepted by Italian sailors, after it had been abandoned by its crew and placed on autopilot within five miles of rocks off Italy’s coast. Within a few days, the Ezadeen was similarly abandoned with 450 migrants on board, and towed to Italy.

The EU denies it has any responsibility for the continuing tragedy in the Mediterranean and blames the traffickers. But the emergence of unscrupulous people smugglers is due to the systematic sealing-off of Europe. It is now impossible, as a result of war and repression perpetrated by Europe and the United States in the Middle East and Africa, for refugees to legally enter Europe. They are forced by the EU to take ever more dangerous routes across the Mediterranean.

At the same time, the NATO-led war and overthrow of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi in Libya and that country’s descent into civil war between rival militias has led to hundreds of thousands of migrants being trapped there.

The EU’s response to the refugee crisis on its borders is to mount more repression.

Measures for the admission of refugees and access to fair asylum procedures are forbidden. Instead, drone and satellite technology is being used to monitor border regions, and neighbouring states are being coerced into intercepting and detaining refugees on their way to Europe in return for concessions to their ruling elites.

Obama administration seeks blank check for perpetual war

Joseph Kishore

On Wednesday, the Obama administration sent to Congress its proposal for a new Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), ostensibly targeting the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). Obama accompanied a draft of new legislation to rubber-stamp an escalation of war in the Middle East and beyond with an eight-minute announcement from the White House Wednesday afternoon.

Both the proposed resolution and Obama’s announcement were shot through with lies and double-talk aimed at concealing the far-reaching implications of what is being proposed.

The draft sent by Obama requests that Congress give its approval for military operations against ISIS or “associated persons or forces,” defined as anyone “fighting for, on behalf of, or alongside ISIL [ISIS] or any closely-related successor entity in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners.” This is formulated so as to potentially include organizations or individuals as diverse as Islamist groups in the Middle East and North Africa, homegrown “cells” in Australia, France or the United States itself, or anyone the US claims is aiding and abetting ISIS.

There are no geographical limits to the military action sanctioned by the resolution. Making clear the global framework of the new “war on ISIS,” Obama wrote in a letter to Congress that ISIS could “pose a threat beyond the Middle East, including to the United States homeland.”

The inclusion of language ending the authorization in three years unless the resolution is renewed has as much significance as similar “sunset” provisions in the Patriot Act, which has been routinely reauthorized by Congress. In his announcement of the AUMF, Obama stressed that the three-year framework did not represent a “timetable” for military action and could be extended by Congress under his successor in the White House.

In an attempt to delude the American public, which is overwhelmingly opposed to war, that the new operations are to be limited in scope, the authorization states that it does not provide for “enduring offensive ground combat operations.” Again, the wording is formulated so as to allow virtually any type of military action. There is no definition of “enduring” or “offensive.”

Extended combat operations in Iraq, Syria or another country could be justified on the grounds that they were “defensive” or not “enduring.”

Obama claimed that the resolution “does not call for the deployment of US ground combat forces in Iraq and Syria.” This is simply a lie. Obama last year deployed 1,500 US troops to Iraq, many of which have already been involved in combat operations. The authorization would sanction a vast expansion of such operations.

To date, the administration has sought to develop local forces in Iraq and elsewhere to engage in heavy fighting, with US soldiers participating in an “advisory” capacity and engaging in Special Operations attacks. This could quickly change, as Obama made clear by noting that the resolution provides the “flexibility we need for unforeseen circumstances.” At the very least, the new proposal would authorize the deployment of combat forces within Syria so long as they are declared to be limited and “defensive.”

The entire proposal is thoroughly cynical, a pseudo-legal fig leaf to provide political cover for an illegal war. The way that the new authorization has been proposed—including a perfunctory White House announcement held in the middle of the afternoon—underscores the contempt of the political establishment for basic democratic procedures and the will of the American people. All decisions on military action are made behind the scenes by a cabal of military and intelligence officials, with Obama as their spokesman.

As recently as 2002, in advance of the Bush administration’s invasion of Iraq, the political establishment felt it necessary to go through the motions of a Senate debate and vote, with a presentation of supposed facts (i.e., fabrications) and arguments to justify war. Now, wars and military operations are simply launched and presented to the population as a fait accompli.

The proposed congressional authorization for war against ISIS comes nearly half a year after the Obama administration initiated bombing in Iraq and Syria. There have already been at least 2,000 air strikes in this latest round of the US drive to conquer the Middle East.

The war authorization request marks the latest stage in the long and tragic encounter of the peoples of the Middle East with US imperialism. The White House proposal would repeal the 2002 authorization for military force in Iraq, which, following the 1991 Gulf War and a decade of brutal sanctions, was used to invade Iraq and initiate a war that led to the deaths of over one million Iraqis and laid waste to the entire country. ISIS itself is a product of this devastation as well as US support for Islamic fundamentalist forces that have served as proxies in the US-led wars to overthrow Gaddafi in Libya and oust Bashar al-Assad in Syria.

In asking for the new authorization, Obama was at pains to insist he did not need it, and that strikes would continue regardless. “Existing statutes provide me with the authority I need,” he wrote in his letter to Congress.

This was a reference to the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force passed after the September 11 attacks, which has been used as the legal pretext for a series of wars and interventions, including (according to the Congressional Research Service) Afghanistan, the Philippines, Georgia, Yemen, Djibouti, Kenya, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Iraq and Somalia. It has also been used, directly or indirectly, as a pseudo-legal justification for drone assassinations (including of American citizens), abductions, torture, military tribunals, indefinite detention, domestic spying on a mass scale and the establishment of the framework of a police state, including the Patriot Act, the Homeland Security Department and the Northern Command.

Obama has adopted and extended the standpoint of his predecessor that the president has the right to unilaterally order military operations all over the world. The ostensible check on this power laid down by the US Constitution—that only Congress can declare war—has long been rendered a dead letter. As it is, the final language of any resolution that passes Congress will likely be even more open-ended.

The new AUMF is, if anything, even more broadly worded than its predecessor. As with the measure passed in 2001, the proximate target—in this case ISIS—provides a basis for operations aimed at ensuring US domination over key economic and geostrategic areas of the world. It is being introduced at the same time that the US threatens to unleash a European-wide war with Russia over Ukraine, intensifies its operations in Africa, and continues a “pivot to Asia” aimed at militarily and economically encircling and isolating China.

Obama concluded his White House announcement with the assertion that the new authorization does not place the US on a “perpetual war footing.” In fact, unending war, plotted behind the backs of the population, has become the permanent and essential feature of American foreign policy.

US escalates tensions with Russia as Ukraine talks deadlock in Minsk

Alex Lantier

Washington announced new military deployments in Eastern Europe aimed at Russia yesterday, as talks in the Belorussian capital of Minsk on the conflict in Ukraine failed to reach an agreement. The Minsk talks are slated to continue today.

US Army-Europe Commander Lt General Ben Hodges announced that 600 paratroopers from the 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team in Vicenza, Italy would deploy to Lviv, Ukraine to train the far-right volunteer battalions that comprise the Ukrainian National Guard. “We’ll train them in security tasks, medical, how to operate in an environment where the Russians are jamming, and how to protect from Russian and rebel artillery,” Hodges said.

It has been documented by human rights groups that volunteer battalions fighting for Kiev have carried out atrocities, including killings of civilians, in eastern Ukraine.

The US Air Force also announced yesterday it would deploy a dozen A-10 attack jets and 300 airmen to Spangdahlem Air Base in Germany.

To place maximum pressure on Russia in the Minsk talks, Washington is still threatening to directly arm the Kiev regime against Russian-backed forces in eastern Ukraine—a strategy that NATO officials have said could lead to war between NATO and Russia. Obama confirmed on Monday that the White House is considering arming Kiev. On Tuesday, a bipartisan group of legislators in the US House of Representatives introduced legislation that would provide $1 billion in lethal weaponry to Kiev.

European countries including Britain and Poland have also indicated that they may supply arms to the Kiev regime.

The US views the civil war in Ukraine triggered by the US- and NATO-backed coup in Kiev a year ago as part of a strategy whose ultimate aim is the reduction of Russia to a semi-colonial status. Military and foreign policy strategists believe that a bloody and ruinously expensive Russian war in Ukraine, combined with ethnic wars by US-linked Islamist fighters elsewhere in Russia or the former USSR, could undermine the Russian military.

The Financial Times wrote that bogging Russia down in “a drawn-out, larger war [in Ukraine] makes it more vulnerable on other flanks, such as the restive North Caucasus and Central Asia.” If these conflicts flare up, one military expert told the newspaper, “There are just not enough Russian soldiers to fight a war of attrition in Ukraine.”

The Minsk talks, aimed at arranging a truce between the Kiev regime and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine, continued late into the night yesterday without reaching an agreement.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President François Hollande, Russian President Vladimir Putin, and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko met with small, high-level delegations at Independence Palace in Minsk. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius called the Minsk meeting the “last chance” before the eruption of large-scale war.

Russian sources said the talks were “intensive.” The signing of an agreement “can happen tomorrow, not today,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said after midnight, Minsk time.

While all sides have reportedly agreed to a temporary ceasefire, terms for a longer-lasting truce remain elusive. The Ukrainian delegation is reportedly demanding that separatist forces give up Russian weapons, control of border posts with Russia, and the territorial gains they have made in fighting with Kiev forces since the previous accord in Minsk last September. While it is considering “autonomy” for eastern Ukraine, it opposes Russian demands that Kiev end its financial blockade of eastern Ukraine, which has seen funding for pensions and state programs cut off by Kiev.

The Russian delegation is proposing a demarcation line closer to the current line of fighting. It denies that Russia has troops or military equipment in eastern Ukraine.

As Washington’s behavior makes clear, even if a deal is ultimately reached in Minsk, US imperialism is pushing to escalate the conflict, virtually ensuring that any deal would be a dead letter, like the Minsk cease-fire agreement reached last September. That agreement broke down in a matter of weeks amid fighting for control of Donetsk, the center of the rebel-held Donbass region.

Even as the Minsk talks began, fighting in eastern Ukraine surged yesterday. The Kiev regime reported that 19 of its soldiers were killed in fighting near the strategic rail junction at Debaltseve, which separatist forces have largely surrounded. In Donetsk, hospital number 20 was hit by a shell, killing one person and forcing the evacuation of several patients.

Both sides are preparing for an even broader escalation. While officials of the separatist Donetsk People’s Republic have announced that they are preparing to draft 100,000 men into their armed forces, Poroshenko has announced a call-up of 75,000 men.

There is rising opposition in the western Ukrainian population to the military and economic policies of the Kiev regime. As Ukraine’s economy collapses and the death toll from fighting in eastern Ukraine mounts, resistance is growing to Poroshenko’s draft orders and his policy of confrontation with Russia.

“At least here, mobilization has been a total failure,” Iryna Vereshchuk, the mayor of the small town of Rava-Ruska in western Ukraine, told theGuardian. She said that of 100 call-up papers meant to be distributed as part of the draft, only six could be served. The other men were in hiding or missing.

“We still have diplomatic and financial links with Russia, and yet people are saying we have to go and fight their troops and die,” she added. “If our region was coming under attack, people would take up arms, but they are not ready to go to the east and end up killing other Ukrainian citizens.”

Coal miners who have been thrown out of work by the Kiev regime’s suspension of subsidies have mounted protests in Kiev. Regime officials are insisting that nothing will be done to deal with the escalating social crisis facing the western Ukrainian population.

“This year, almost all sectors of the economy will experience layoffs on a larger or smaller scale,” said Oleksandr Zholud, an analyst at the Kiev-based International Center for Policy Studies. He said he expected significant wage cuts and demands that workers take unpaid vacations until the economy improves.

“A single position attracts 30-35 candidates today,” said Social Policy Minister Pavlo Rozenko, who declared criticism of rising joblessness in Ukraine to be illegitimate. “Forecasts on Ukraine’s grim future are groundless and are based on a criticism from opponents and those who are not interested in wide-scale reforms. Many will lose their jobs and salaries, but we don’t have any other way,” he declared.

The Kiev regime is threatening to impose a military dictatorship. “I, the government, and the parliament are ready to take the decision to introduce martial law in all the territories of Ukraine,” Poroshenko declared at a government meeting.

“Martial law would mean a lot of restrictions, including on freedom of speech, democratic freedoms, and would have lots of consequences. It would be the complete transfer of the country onto a military track,” declared Ihor Lapin, a legislator and member of the fascistic Aidar Battalion.

Air Power and Future Battlefields: India's Needs

Gurmeet Kanwal

As the 10th edition of Aero-India gets underway at Bengaluru (18-22 February 2015), attention will be focused on big-ticket deals like the long-pending multi-billion dollar acquisition of the MMRCA by the Indian Air Force (IAF). Discussion will centred on whether or not the government is having second thoughts about buying the Rafale fighter from France vis-à-vis adding to the existing fleet of Su-30 MKI aircraft acquired from Russia.

What will not find mention is the fact that both these aircraft are very expensive multi-mission fighters that cannot be risked to strike ground targets in the tactical battle area teeming with air defence weapons. As a future war on the Indian subcontinent will in all likelihood result from the unresolved territorial disputes with China and Pakistan and will be predominantly a conflict on land, the ability to acquire and accurately hit targets on ground will be a key requirement for the IAF.

During the Kargil conflict in the summer of 1999, air-to-ground strikes by fighter ground attack (FGA) aircraft of the IAF played an important role in neutralising Pakistani army defences. The destruction of a logistics camp at Muntho Dhalo was shown repeatedly on national television. In conflicts in Afghanistan, the Balkans, Chechnya, Iraq, Libya and, more recently, the ongoing fight against the Islamic State, FGA aircraft have achieved laudable results, especially while using precision guided munitions (PGMs).

Hence, the importance of close air support in modern wars must not be underrated. A few missions of FGA aircraft and attack helicopters can deliver more ordnance by way of dumb 1,000 lb bombs in a few minutes on an objective selected for capture than a 155 mm medium artillery regiment can deliver in 20 to 30 minutes. In critical situations, particularly in fast flowing mechanised operations, accurate air strikes can save the day. The battle of Longewala during the 1971 war with Pakistan is a good example. Also, it is a truism that accurate air strikes against the enemy in contact that can be seen by own troops provide a psychological boost to the morale of ground troops.

IAF aircraft that are earmarked for ground strikes need to be armed with PGMs in large numbers to achieve the desired effect. Free flight 1000 lb and 500 lb bombs cannot be dropped with the precision necessary to destroy individual bunkers, pillboxes and armoured fighting vehicles (AFVs). Modern jet aircraft flying at supersonic speeds and constrained by the threat posed by air defence weapons in the TBA, such as hand-held, shoulder-fired SAMs like the Stinger and the Unza, cannot be expected to achieve precision with rockets and Gatling guns. Only terminally homing laser-guided and TV-guided bombs and air-to-surface missiles with stand-off capability can provide the necessary reach and accuracy.

During the Kargil conflict, sustained, accurate and high volume concentrated artillery firepower and air-to-ground strikes by the IAF eventually won the battle for India by completely decimating enemy sangars and enabling the infantry to assault virtually unopposed. Tiger Hill and many other enemy-held mountain ridges were finally re-captured with very few casualties. The battle winning utility of ground and aerial firepower in limited wars was established beyond doubt. In view of the firepower capabilities that will be necessary to fight and win India’s future wars, the IAF needs to re-assess the suitability of its weapons platforms and ammunition holdings to support operations on land and launch a concerted drive to acquire the required means.

Ideally, the IAF should be equipped with a specialised, dedicated ground strike aircraft of the A-10 Thunderbolt/Warthog or the Russian SU-25 or SU-39, all of which are relatively slower moving, enable greater precision to be achieved in aiming, can carry several tonnes of payload per sortie, including air-to-ground precision strike missiles and bombs, and can absorb a lot of damage from the enemy’s air defence weapons. Writing about the role played by the US air power during Gulf War I, Robert H Scales Jr has stated, “The A-10 was devastating once the ground war began and once the aircraft dropped low enough to provide effective 30 mm cannon support.”

Dedicated ground strike aircraft cost only a fraction of the cost of multi-role fighter aircraft such as Mirage-2000 and the future MMRCA. It is certain that in the coming decades, the IAF will continue to be called upon to launch ground strikes with precision munitions in support of the army.

Quite obviously, the IAF cannot afford to acquire new, dedicated ground strike aircraft from its present meagre budget. Once the need for such aircraft has been adequately debated and is established beyond dispute, additional funds will have to be provided to the IAF for their early induction.

Africa subject to billions in illicit capital flight

Thabo Seseane

A report adopted by the African Union on February 1 indicates that African g overnments are losing some US$5 billion a year in unpaid taxes, royalties and other charges as companies, criminals and wealthy individuals illegally siphon money from the continent.

The report ranks South Africa third, behind Nigeria and Egypt, in terms of cumulative losses between 1970 and 2008, which it says amounted to US$81.8 billion or 11.4 percent of Africa’s total illicit capital outflows. It was authored by a panel established in 2012 by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa and headed by former South African president Thabo Mbeki.

Speaking at the report’s launch, Mbeki contrasted the estimated US$50 billion annual outflow to the total inflow of US$25 billion of aid and foreign direct investment. However, thanks to its opacity , the unlawful expatriation of capital from Africa is hard to quantify.

A 2008 study covering the years 2002 to 2006 found that the continent lost US$859 billion in cumulative capital flight. This compares to a 2010 study of the period 1970 to 2008, which arrived at a figure of between US$854 billion and US$1.8 trillion in illegally lost capital.

Whatever the actual figures, they represent a huge loss of revenue for African states, with mining and fossil fuel companies accused of being the worst culprits for the continent’s capital loss and resulting underdevelopment. A report by Sarah Bracking and Khadija Sharife on the South African diamond mining sector put the 2011 value of all uncut production at US$1.73 billion. The authors found that the biggest companies, De Beers and Petra Diamonds, accounting for 95 percent of all production, paid just US$11 million in royalties for 2010 to 2011.

Other studies expressed illegal capital flight as a ratio of gross domestic product (GDP). According to research cited by Jeff Rudin, associate researcher at the Alternative Information and Development Centre (AIDC) in Cape Town, illicit capital flight increased from 9.2 percent of GDP in 1994 to 23 percent in 2007. “This means,” Rudin observes, “that, at the same time the government was implementing Thatcherite neoliberal policies to bring foreign investment to South Africa, a vastly greater volume of capital was leaving our country.”

What does he recommend? “The time is ripe,” Rudin writes, “for a formal Commission of Enquiry to replicate in South Africa what Mbeki is heading in Africa.”

Unfortunately for Rudin’s credibility, Mbeki was deputy president and then president of South Africa from 1994 to 2007. Therefore the Thatcherite neoliberal policies Rudin deplores were implemented under Mbeki’s watch and with his imprimatur. This expresses the essential bankruptcy of the ruling African National Congress (ANC) and other former liberation movements across Africa, Asia and South America, which cannot define a perspective even marginally independent of imperialism.

It also exposes that groups such as the AIDC represent no real political alternative to the ANC.

The AIDC advised and represented mineworkers at the Marikana Commission of Inquiry into the sho oting death of 32 miners by police in August 2012. But like so many other organisations to the nominal left of the ANC—the Economic Freedom Fighters, the planned United Front of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa, the Congress of South African Trade Unions, the Stalinist South African Communist Party, the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union as well as the Workers and Socialist Party—it acts only as a safety valve on behalf of capitalism.

One of the effects of capital flight was apparent this month in a Statistics South Africa (StatsSA) report—of 5.1 million unemployed, 1.5 million have been jobless for more than five years. This is more than triple the figure of 974,000 around the start of the global economic crisis in 2008. According to the agency, duration of unemployment is critical in that the longer a person is unemployed, the less likely they are to find work. “In addition, skills deteriorate and future earnings may be negatively impacted,” read the report.

Some of the architects of South Africa’s capital flight gat hered under the aegis of the F. W. De Klerk Foundation in early February. The dignitaries celebrated 25 years since De Klerk, the last apartheid-era president, made the speech announcing the unbanning of liberation movements such as the ANC , and the release of political pri soners including Nelson Mandela who succeeded De Klerk and , jointly with him , was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for laying the foundations for a democratic South Africa.

Businessman Johann Rupert, patriarch of the richest South African family with some US$7 billion in assets, said at the event that demands for higher wages were not sustainable. In terms of spreading opportunities more evenly, he explained, “My family has always held that one must repatriate wealth to South Africa.”

His words were at odds with remarks attributed to Johann Van Loggerenberg, the South African Revenue Service (SARS) executive in charge of enforcement and investigations who abruptly resigned on February 4. Van Loggerenberg was suspended last year amid allegations of running a “rogue” unit, which among other accusations is said to have run a brothel and spied on President Jacob Zuma. When suspended, he was overseeing an investigation into an apparent tax avoidance scheme of British American Tobacco, a multinational controlled by Rupert and which Van Loggerenberg said was illegally withholding about R1 billion (US$89 million) due to SARS.

Spanish government prepares new National Security Law

Vicky Short & Alejandro Lopez

Spain’s Popular Party (PP) government is stepping up its police-state measures. A draft Organic Law of National Security, drawn up by the Ministry of the Presidency, the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Interior, has been passed by the Council of Ministers and is awaiting final approval in parliament.

Government sources stated that the objective of the new law is to strengthen the coordination between ministries in the face of an emergency situation and that it will consolidate the National Security Strategy passed in May last year.

The draft law declares that the “State may mobilise public and private resources to address crisis situations that put national security at risk” but does not specify how this would be done. Material resources such as vehicles and buildings can already be temporarily seized in a “Civil Protection” emergency or disaster, but not for cases of risk to national security.

The draft law introduces a new category of what constitutes a national crisis, allowing the prime minister, without approval by parliament, to declare a crisis in the “interests of National Security” and the suspension of basic rights and public freedom.

Deputy Prime Minister Soraya Saenz de Santamaria said that the government will prepare an inventory of resources in public or private hands that are of interest to national security and that can be mobilised in a crisis. “The first thing to do in order to meet a catastrophe is knowing what you have, where it is and [to be able to use it] with due compensation,” she declared. Although Saenz denied that the law was linked to the Charlie Hebdo shootings in Paris, the government took advantage of the hysteria to rush through the law after two years of back-door discussions.

During the drafting of the new law, in July 2013, a National Security Council (CSN) was created, assuming the functions of the Government Commission for Crisis Situations and sitting at the apex of the National Security System. It is led by the prime minister and includes the deputy prime minister, the foreign minister, the ministers of defence and of interior, the Treasury, the secretary of state for security, the chief of staff of defence and the director of the National Intelligence Centre (CNI). The theme of the first meeting after the Paris events was Plan Estratégico Nacional de Lucha contra la Radicalización Violenta (National Strategic Plan to Fight Violent Radicalisation).

The strategic plan lists 12 risks to Spain’s security: armed conflicts, terrorism, cyber threats, organised crime, economic and financial instability, energy vulnerability, irregular migratory flows, weapons of mass destruction, espionage, natural emergencies and catastrophes, vulnerability in the maritime space and critical infrastructure, and essential services.

The new law has all the hallmarks of that introduced by the leader of the fascist regime, Francisco Franco, in 1969. It was only repealed in 2007 by the Socialist Party (PSOE) government as a sop for its refusal to carry out proper government-backed investigations into Franco’s crimes.

It is an indictment of the Spanish ruling class that the precedent for this law was one passed and used by the fascist regime to suppress the rise in working class militancy. Between 1970 and 1979, it was used against striking workers on the Madrid and Barcelona metros, railways and buses and in the shipyards, postal and fire services and the electricity system.

Franco’s law began in these chauvinistic terms: “The defence of the nation is an honourable and foremost duty of all Spaniards and it is for the latter to contribute their efforts and sacrifice of their individual and collective interests to the extent that it [the nation] requires it.”

It included not only the seizure of property, but also the forceful seizure of people.

The PP government is organising the forces of the state to be used, not against jihadists or any other so-called terrorists, but for domestic repression under conditions of social unrest. The new law comes in the wake of other recent anti-working class legislation, passed with the agreement of the PSOE opposition or through the PP parliamentary majority.

The Citizens Security Law, popularly known as the Gag Law, introduced fines of up to €600,000 for demonstrations not previously notified to the authorities, or anyone reporting on them, re-tweeting or posting a “like” on Facebook. Anyone videotaping the police during demonstrations faces a fine of up to €30,000.

The PP government used the Charlie Hebdo attacks to introduce new amendments to the Gag Law and the Criminal Procedure Code, with the agreement of the PSOE, under the guise of a new “anti-terrorist pact” between both parties.

One amendment provides for “imprisonment of between one to eight years for those who on a daily or regular basis access in online communication or acquire or are in possession of documents which target, or because of their content, result in inciting others to decide to join a terrorist organisation or group.”

Other amendments include imprisonment for those who have shown interest in committing terrorist acts; for those who have received military training by a terrorist organisation; for whoever establishes contact with a terrorist organisation; for whoever moves to a foreign territory controlled by a terrorist organisation with the aim of collaborating with them; and for the praising or justification through any public means of terrorist crimes.

The Charlie Hebdo attack has also been used to reintroduce life imprisonment and allow the Interior Ministry to compile an airline passenger database. The Ministry of Defence is increasing its expenditure this year by nearly 2 percent, with military units receiving special crowd control training by the military police, including in the use of anti-riot equipment.

Former intelligence chief in South Korea jailed

Ben McGrath

South Korea’s former intelligence chief Won Sei-hoon was sentenced to three years in prison on Monday for his role in influencing the outcome of the 2012 presidential election. The conviction is another in a growing list of scandals that plagued President Park Geun-hye since coming to power and raised further questions about the legitimacy of her rule.

Won was convicted of violating the Public Official Election Act by ordering subordinates to post at least 274,800 comments on internet message boards and social media prior to the 2012 election. Of that number, 110,000 posts were illegal, as they came after Park became the Saenuri Party’s presidential candidate. In South Korea, it is illegal for government officials or agencies to campaign or intervene in elections in any way. Won was head of the National Intelligence Service (NIS) from 2009 to 2013.

Park was elected on December 19, 2012, narrowly defeating Moon Jae-in by 3.5 percent. Moon ran on the Democratic United Party (DUP) ticket, which now goes by the name of New Politics Alliance for Democracy (NPAD). President Park has not issued a statement on Won’s conviction.

The comments smeared opposition presidential candidate Moon as well as independent Ahn Cheol-soo, who dropped out of the race to back the DUP. The posted messages accused Park’s opponents of, among other things, being “servants” of North Korea. The verdict of the Seoul High Court read, “The agency’s cyber-activity interfered in the public’s decision-making while neglecting its duty to keep political impartiality, which is required by law.”

Monday’s ruling overturned a lower court decision declaring that Won had interfered in the election but had not supported any particular candidate. He had previously received a two and a half year prison sentence, suspended for four years last September. Won was taken into custody immediately following the High Court’s decision. He declared, as he was being led away, “I thought I was working for the good of the country and the people.”

Won was a close ally of former President Lee Myung-bak. Following the 2007 presidential primary for the Grand National Party (the former name of the Saenuri Party) in which Lee edged out Park for the party’s nomination, two factions emerged within the GNP; one pro-Lee and the other pro-Park. Park’s 2012 presidential campaign was not only directed against Moon and the Democrats, but also against Lee, whose popularity had plummeted to around 20 percent range by that time.

Won is being used as a convenient scapegoat to protect the NIS and distract attention from its anti-democratic activities. No-one else involved in the scandal has received jail time. Two former NIS officials received suspended one and a half year jail terms. Kim Yong-pan, the former Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency chief, was accused of obstructing the investigation into the intelligence agency, but was recently cleared of those charges.

The investigation and conviction of Won undoubtedly removes a political rival of the pro-Park faction, while allowing the government to limit the political damage already caused by the issue. Park’s administration has been dogged by scandals throughout her two years in office. South Korean presidents serve a single, five-year term and cannot seek re-election.

Throughout the summer of 2013, large-scale protests took place against the NIS’s actions, organized by the Democrats and their allies in the now banned Unified Progressive Party (UPP). The Democrats exploited the issue to rally support after major losses in the general and presidential elections the year before.

In April 2014, public anger erupted over government inaction over the sinking of the Sewol ferry, which killed 300 people, mostly high school students. Once again the Democrats exploited this sentiment to try to boost its support in local elections last June. As a result of these scandals, Park’s approval rating has steadily fallen to 29.7 percent as of last month.

Park sought to protect the NIS last year by concocting a red scare involving the UPP. The intelligence agency claimed to have uncovered a plot led by UPP National Assembly member Lee Seok-ki to stage a revolt against the South Korean government in the event of war with North Korea. The Democrats quickly separated themselves from their one-time ally and the protests against the NIS fizzled out.

The phony plot provided the pretext for Park’s government to demand the dissolution of the entire UPP. The Constitutional Court approved the decision last December, marking the first time since 1958 a political party had been disbanded in South Korea. The episode is a clear warning of the police-state measures that will be used to suppress any resistance by workers and youth to ongoing attacks on living standards.

The National Intelligence Service has a long and filthy history in South Korean politics. It was founded in 1961 by Kim Jong-pil as the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA). Its purpose was to assist Park Chung-hee, the father of current President Park, in solidifying his dictatorship after seizure of power in a military coup that same year.

Over the next 18 years, Park used the KCIA to terrorize political opponents, engaging in kidnappings, torture, and murder. After his own assassination in 1979 by KCIA chief Kim Jae-gyu, the agency underwent cosmetic changes, becoming the Agency for National Security Planning in 1981 under Park’s protégé Chun Doo-hwan. It was maintained after the military dictatorship formally ended in the late 1980s and was renamed the National Intelligence Service in 1999 during the presidency of Kim Dae-jung.

However, the NIS continues to be the bastion of reaction that it was when it was first established. South Korea’s first Democrat president, Kim Dae-jung, like his predecessors used the intelligence service to spy on political opponents as did his successor President Roh Moo-hyun, also a democrat. Now under Park, its ruthless police-state methods are being openly revived and will in the future be used against the working class.

UK Police Federation votes for all police to be given access to Taser guns

Margot Miller

The Police Federation has voted for all uniformed officers in Britain to be given access to a Taser gun. In a significant move towards the police in the UK being routinely armed, on Monday the interim national board of the Police Federation voted unanimously for the policy.

A Taser is a gun-shaped weapon that uses compressed air to fire two darts that trail an electric cable back to the handset, delivering a 50,000-volt electric shock. When delivered, the electric current causes massive pain and disrupts voluntary muscle control, so the victim either freezes or falls to the ground.

Following the vote, Police Federation head Steve White said, “This is a step in the right direction and we will now work with ACPO [Association of Chief Police Officers], individual chief officers, the Superintendents’ Association and the Home Office to progress this as a matter of urgency. We have long called for a wider rollout of Taser. Now the time is right for all operational police officers to have the option to carry Taser….”

White met Home Secretary Theresa May yesterday for a scheduled meeting, with reports stating that he was going to discuss with her the need for additional government funding for purchasing Tasers and providing training.

On Tuesday, even before the government had announced any plans, Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, the commissioner of London’s Metropolitan Police, announced that the number of police offers with access to Tasers would be drastically stepped up on the capital’s streets. At present, four police officers armed with Taser stun guns patrol in two cars in each borough. Howe said in future 100 or more Taser officers could be on duty at any one time.

In the run-up to the vote, White used the pretext of combating terrorism to insist that the arming of police with Tasers was necessary. Citing the killingof Fusilier Lee Rigby in Woolwich in 2013, White told the Guardian that “the terrorist ideal to get attention no longer relies on an attack being in a place of note.... It could be any part of the UK. We know there are more dangerous people out there, preparing to attack police officers.”

White claimed that giving all police routine access to a Taser “is a defensive tool and a tactical option…. The alternative is to have officers out there without anything at all. We have to do something.”

This fear-mongering came in the wake of the heightened security threat following the terrorist murders of staff at Charlie Hebdo in Paris. In its aftermath, the UK terror threat was raised two levels to “severe”, with the military placed on standby. This is the fourth highest of five levels and follows an assessment by the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre based within MI5.

Prior to this week’s vote, an anonymous police chief speaking to theGuardian said if the policy went through, it would be “a stepping stone to arming the police.”

The vast majority of the 125,000 police officers in the UK do not carry firearms. The carrying of firearms in the UK is at present confined to authorised firearms officers (AFOs). In 2010, there were 6,653 AFO officers who are often deployed in armed response vehicles.

Home Office figures released last year show the use of Tasers by the police has increased year-on-year since it was first introduced in 2004 to firearms officers only. Since 2007, 10 percent of officers have been trained in its use. In 2013, it was deployed on 4,999 occasions, compared to 1,297 times in 2009. Between January and June of last year, Tasers were fired 826 times out of the 5,107 occasions when they were deployed. Tasers were used, in total, 10,488 times in England and Wales in the 12 months to the end of June 2014, a 13 per cent increase on the previous year.

Some police forces have a much higher rate of use proportionate to their size, such as West Midlands Police. Greater Manchester Police are using Tasers, in so-called drive-stun mode, more than other areas. Taser use on children by the Metropolitan Police rose sixfold in the last four years.

As its use has increased, so have complaints recorded by the police watchdog, the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC). The IPCC has noted the use of the Taser at point-blank range “purely as a means of pain compliance.” In drive-stun mode, the Taser is held against the subject’s body and the trigger is pulled without the firing of probes. This causes extreme pain without the incapacitating muscular spasms. Sometimes both modes are used.

Amnesty International has reported hundreds of Taser-associated deaths throughout the world. Since its introduction in the UK, 10 people have died in England and Wales after being tasered. Such was the outcry that Home Secretary Theresa May ordered a review into the use of Tasers last October, amid concerns that physical restraint and the use of Tasers are being used too often against the mentally ill.

The United Nations Committee Against Torture (UNCAT) described the use of Tasers as a “form of torture that can kill.”

Death can result from Taser-induced arrhythmia, which is the uncoordinated contraction of the cardiac muscles so they tremble rather than contract. If this continues for more than a few seconds, blood circulation ceases, leading to cardiac arrest. Death occurs within minutes. The Taser can also disrupt breathing.

According to US cardiologist and emeritus professor at Indiana University Dr. Douglas Zipes, “Taser shots to the chest can produce cardiac arrest.”

He warned that serious complications could arise if used against people with impaired heart function or a pacemaker. The manufacturer, US-based Taser International, cautions against shots to the chest, yet figures show that since 2009 in the UK, 57 percent of discharges have hit the chest area.

The ACPO claims there is “no substantial risk” from the use of the Taser. In the US, however, Taser International was ordered to pay $15 million to the family of Darryl Turner, who died after being tasered in 2008.

Of the 10 Taser-related deaths investigated by the IPCC, none have been attributed by them to the high-voltage charge. Two of the 10 cases are still undergoing investigation, including the death of 23-year-old factory worker Jordan Lee Begley in July 2013, who was, at the time, under care for a possible heart condition.

A police officer tasered a 61-year-old blind man in the back in Chorley Lancashire 2012, after his white stick had been reported as a Samurai sword. The officer was given a performance improvement notice. The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) decided no criminal charges should be brought over the incident.

An inquiry is under way as to why three teenage boys, aged between 14 and 15, with learning difficulties, were tasered at their school near Plymouth late last year by Devon and Cornwall police.

On December 8 of last year, a peaceful protest at Warwick University against high tuition fees and education cuts was broken up by the police, who usedCS gas and brute force to end the occupation. A Taser was fired into the air.

The vote for making Tasers available for use by all police officers follows proposals to use water cannon, rubber bullets and live firearms.

Calls to intensify Australian austerity agenda

Nick Beams

In a sharp reaction to fears that the crisis in the Australian government of Prime Minister Tony Abbott will slow its austerity drive, key sections of the ruling elites have called for its budget cutbacks, not only go to forward, but to be intensified.

The calls are a response to Abbott’s statement, made in the wake of his “near death” experience, in which 40 percent of the parliamentary Liberal Party voted to declare the leadership vacant, that the government might have bitten off more than it could chew in its May budget. The widespread opposition to the budget, reflected in the surprise defeats of the Victorian and Queensland Liberal-National party governments, was the key factor in driving the backbench revolt.

However, in recognition that the latest upheaval—a continuation of the political turmoil of the past five years—was an expression of a crisis of the parliamentary rule itself, the demands for a deepening of the austerity drive have been accompanied by proposals for new forms of rule that can ride over popular opposition.

An editorial in today’s Australian, called for a “national summit on prosperity,” possibly including former Labor treasurer and prime minister Paul Keating as well as former Liberal treasurer Peter Costello, to build the momentum to tackle so-called reforms. It said that a key question for the summit was how the “vital spirits of the economy can be brought to life” and condemned the “political class as a whole” because such questions figured so little in its deliberations. It would be a chance to “sidestep the rituals of party political warfare and short-term populism.”

The editorial harkened back to the economic summits convened under the Hawke-Keating Labor governments in the 1980s. Couched in terms of defending the “national interest,” these summits played a central role in implementing the “reform” agenda demanded by the ruling elites at that time. The Labor governments, in collaboration with the trade unions, scrapped a series of economic regulations, initiated major privatisations, and opened the Australian economy up to “market forces,” resulting in a massive redistribution of wealth up the income scale.

Today, in the midst of the most serious and ongoing breakdown of the global capitalist system since the 1930s, which now has the Australian economy firmly in its grip, such measures would go much further than those of 30 years ago. Appeals to “national unity” are to disguise the fact that what is being advanced is in the interests of a tiny wealthy elite at the expense of the vast majority of working people.

According to a report in yesterday’s Australian, Abbott’s chief economic adviser Maurice Newman, who has previously bewailed the fact that the Australian minimum wage is around twice the level of the United States, favours a system where the treasury secretary and the governor of the Reserve Bank are brought more directly into the budget process in order to shift it “above politics.”

In other words, a mechanism should be established along the lines of that operating across Europe where the population votes in elections but their decisions have no impact because economic policies are dictated by the financial elites and imposed by the European Union and the European Central Bank, as the case of Greece so clearly demonstrates.

The initial focus for the intensification of the austerity agenda is the so-called Intergenerational Report which Treasurer Joe Hockey has said will be brought down by the end of this month.

The aim of the report will be to advance the claim that the maintenance of living standards and spending on vital social services, health care, education and other necessities of life, involves placing an intolerable burden of debt on future generations and therefore must be slashed.

The real aim of such an agenda is not to preserve future “national prosperity” but to meet the present demands of the Australian and global financial elites to make the working class pay for the crisis of the capitalist economy by driving down living standards.

The political purposes to which it will be put were made clear in a comment by the leading political commentator of the Australian, Paul Kelly, published today.

Calling for a return to “first principles,” he wrote: “The report will document the fiscal crunch arising from an ageing population and the core issue of social justice: will the next generation pay the price for the selfish indulgence of the current generation?”

That is, the demands of the present generation of workers and their families for a decent standard of living, as they struggle to make ends meet in an increasingly worsening economic situation, must be made to appear as a crime committed against their children and their children’s children.

According to Kelly, the government had to invest the report “with the status of St Paul’s epistles”—in other words there had to be “conversion” to the austerity agenda.

The push for a stepped up austerity offensive is reflected in a series of comments by political and business leaders.

Hockey told a meeting of government MPs yesterday that anyone who thought “we are going to get back to [budget] surplus on the back of growth is kidding themselves.”

While rejecting the call for a summit, at least at this point, Costello insisted there should be no lessening of the effort to balance the budget—a process which involves cuts of tens of billions of dollars per year for the indefinite future. There should be an agreed goal, “preferably a bipartisan goal,” he said.

Heather Ridout, former head of the Australian Industry Group, and a member of the Reserve Bank board, said there had to be some agreement on budget measures and Abbott should sit down with the Labor party “to try to find some common ground.”

National Australia Bank chairman Michel Chaney has called for bipartisanship to deal with the budget. The Labor opposition had to acknowledge there was a fiscal problem in the longer term, agree that something had to be done “and then accept solutions which may be unpopular but are in the national interest.”

The Labor Party has indicated that, while it has opposed various measures contained in the May budget in the Senate, it supports major cuts. Appearing on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s “Q&A” program on Monday evening, shadow treasurer Chris Bowen repeated remarks he made last month that the days of what he called “Santa Claus” economics were over.

Peter Nash, chairman of the major financial firm KPMG, said bipartisanship would make necessary economic measures “more doable and less fraught with difficulty.”

However, the spokesmen of the financial elites themselves know the assertion that painful “sacrifice” can somehow restore economic prosperity is bogus and is being blown apart by the deepening global economic crisis.

The head of the think tank Access Economics, Chris Richardson, noted that even if the Senate had agreed to every economic measure put forward in May, “the budget would remain in deeper deficit than previously forecast because of the slide in iron ore coal and gas prices.”

As the Socialist Equality Party explained in a comment published yesterday, the central demand of the ruling elites is that the working class be made to pay for the deepening crisis of the profit system as a whole.

The calls for a summit, the intervention of the treasury and Reserve Bank heads in determining government policy, and increased bipartisanship make clear that new forms of rule are being discussed within ruling circles to impose this agenda, underscoring the necessity for the working class to advance its own independent solution to the crisis on the basis of a socialist program.

Upstart AAP staggers BJP and Congress in Delhi Assembly election

Kranti Kumara

Formed less than three years ago, the Aam Aadmi (Common Man’s) Party has scored a stunning upset in the Delhi assembly elections, delivering a significant blow to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his nine month-old Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government.

The AAP has captured 67 of the 70 assembly seats in India’s National Capital Territory, which, with more than 20 million inhabitants, is also India’s largest urban agglomeration. The Hindu supremacist BJP, which had swept Delhi in last May’s national election and fully expected to top the polls in the just concluded assembly election, won the remaining three seats—28 less than it had in the 2013 Delhi election.

The Congress Party, which had ruled Delhi for 15 years from 1998 through 2013, was entirely shut out. This is only the latest in a series of electoral debacles stretching back to the last year’s national elections, when the Congress, India’s traditional governing party, not only fell from power, but failed to even win the fifty seats required to be recognized as the Official Opposition.

The AAP received 54.3 percent of the vote, a 25 percentage point increase from its score in the 2013 Delhi elections, while the BJP won 32.2 percent and the Congress Party just 9.7 percent.

Arvind Kejriwal, a former government tax collector, who first came to prominence as one of the principal leaders of a middle-class “anti-corruption” movement, led the AAP campaign and is expected to be sworn in as Delhi’s Chief Minister at a ceremony on February 14.

The BJP expended no small effort to capture power in Delhi, with Modi himself taking to the campaign trail and the BJP and its Hindu supremacist allies mobilizing more than a hundred thousand volunteers. While India’s ruling party is now trying to downplay the significance of the Delhi elections, they have put the lie to the image the BJP and corporate-media have sought to craft of an unstoppable Modi “wave.”

The AAP is a bourgeois party. It was formed by a section of the leaders of the 2011 anti-corruption movement, which tapped into middle class anger over increasing social inequality, rising prices and deteriorating job prospects for graduates. While it railed against the corruption of the Congress Party-led national and Delhi governments, the anti-corruption movement ignored big business’s role in determining and dictating government policy and the extent to which India’s corporate elite has gorged on the fire-sale and even outright gifting of government assets under BJP and Congress governments alike.

Significantly many of Kejriwal’s allies in the anti-corruption campaign subsequently threw their support behind the BJP. These included former policewoman Kiran Bedi, whom Modi personally selected and imposed on a recalcitrant Delhi BJP-state unit as the party’s Chief Ministerial candidate in the 2015 assembly elections.

After the AAP scored a breakthrough in the 2013 Delhi election and briefly formed a minority government, Kejriwal went out of his way to pledge his support for big business, declaring that the AAP is not opposed to capitalism, only “crony capitalism.” He also emphasized that many of his relatives are businessmen and that the change the AAP’s want to bring about will be “incomplete without participation of the business class.”

Notwithstanding all of this, the AAP clearly was perceived by wide sections of the population as an “anti-establishment” party.

Emphasizing a commitment to improve public services, epitomized by its call for “bijli, paani and sadak” (power, water and roads), the AAP was able to win the votes of broad sections of workers, street vendors, and middle class people.

The AAP’s ability to pass itself off as a “pro-people” party is bound up with the criminal role of India’s Stalinist parties. Over the past two decades, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) or CPM and the older, smaller Communist Party of India (CPI) have supported the bourgeoisie’s neo-liberal agenda, sustaining in office a series of right-wing Indian governments, most of them Congress-led. Conceding it has little influence in India’s largest city, the CPM called for an AAP vote in the Feb. 7 Delhi election.

Another factor that contributed to the AAP victory was the support it received from Delhi’s large Muslim minority, and other sections of the population angered by the aggressive communalism of Modi and his BJP.

With the tacit and at times explicit support of Modi’s government, the Hindu right has gone on the offensive since the BJP won national office, mounting a series of provocations aimed at asserting Hindu superiority and cowing India’s religious minorities.

In the run-up to the Delhi vote there were communal altercations in many Delhi neighbourhoods, including Trilokpuri, Bawana, Nangloi, Nand Nagiri and Okhla, targeting Muslims and Dalits (the former untouchables) in what appears to have been a deliberate attempt upon the part of the Hindu right to whip up communal strife so as to polarize the electorate. There has also been a series of attacks on Christian churches, including vandalism and arson.

The rise to power of the AAP is an indication of the mass disaffection of the population with India’s main bourgeois parties, the BJP and Congress. Under conditions where the working class has been held in check by the Stalinists, the AAP was able to tap into the deep popular anxiety and anger over acute economic insecurity and the rabid communalism of the BJP government and its Sangh Parivar (Hindu nationalist) allies.

Invariably the AAP will cruelly disappoint the hopes placed in it by working people and come into open conflict with the working class. Significantly, the AAP did not repeat many of the populist promises it made in the 2013 Delhi election campaign, such as halving electricity bills for consumers using less than 400 Kwh and providing 20,000 liters of free water per month to all households. Instead, it issued a “70-point Action Plan” full of vague promises.