Robot Generals: Will They Make Better Decisions Than Humans — Or Worse?

Michael T. Klare

With Covid-19 incapacitating startling numbers of U.S. service members and modern weapons proving increasingly lethal, the American military is relying ever more frequently on intelligent robots to conduct hazardous combat operations. Such devices, known in the military as “autonomous weapons systems,” include robotic sentries, battlefield-surveillance drones, and autonomous submarines. So far, in other words, robotic devices are merely replacing standard weaponry on conventional battlefields. Now, however, in a giant leap of faith, the Pentagon is seeking to take this process to an entirely new level — by replacing not just ordinary soldiers and their weapons, but potentially admirals and generals with robotic systems.

Admittedly, those systems are still in the development stage, but the Pentagon is now rushing their future deployment as a matter of national urgency. Every component of a modern general staff — including battle planning, intelligence-gathering, logistics, communications, and decision-making — is, according to the Pentagon’s latest plans, to be turned over to complex arrangements of sensors, computers, and software. All these will then be integrated into a “system of systems,” now dubbed the Joint All-Domain Command-and-Control, or JADC2 (since acronyms remain the essence of military life). Eventually, that amalgam of systems may indeed assume most of the functions currently performed by American generals and their senior staff officers.

The notion of using machines to make command-level decisions is not, of course, an entirely new one. It has, in truth, been a long time coming. During the Cold War, following the introduction of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) with extremely short flight times, both military strategists and science-fiction writers began to imagine mechanical systems that would control such nuclear weaponry in the event of human incapacity.

In Stanley Kubrick’s satiric 1964 movie Dr. Strangelove, for example, the fictional Russian leader Dimitri Kissov reveals that the Soviet Union has installed a “doomsday machine” capable of obliterating all human life that would detonate automatically should the country come under attack by American nuclear forces. Efforts by crazed anti-Soviet U.S. Air Force officers to provoke a war with Moscow then succeed in triggering that machine and so bring about human annihilation. In reality, fearing that they might experience a surprise attack of just this sort, the Soviets later did install a semi-automatic retaliatory system they dubbed “Perimeter,” designed to launch Soviet ICBMs in the event that sensors detected nuclear explosions and all communications from Moscow had been silenced. Some analysts believe that an upgraded version of Perimeter is still in operation, leaving us in an all-too-real version of a Strangelovian world.

In yet another sci-fi version of such automated command systems, the 1983 film WarGames, starring Matthew Broderick as a teenage hacker, portrayed a supercomputer called the War Operations Plan Response, or WOPR (pronounced “whopper”) installed at the North American Aerospace Command (NORAD) headquarters in Colorado. When the Broderick character hacks into it and starts playing what he believes is a game called “World War III,” the computer concludes an actual Soviet attack is underway and launches a nuclear retaliatory response. Although fictitious, the movie accurately depicts many aspects of the U.S. nuclear command-control-and-communications (NC3) system, which was then and still remains highly automated.

Such devices, both real and imagined, were relatively primitive by today’s standards, being capable solely of determining that a nuclear attack was under way and ordering a catastrophic response. Now, as a result of vast improvements in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning, machines can collect and assess massive amounts of sensor data, swiftly detect key trends and patterns, and potentially issue orders to combat units as to where to attack and when.

Time Compression and Human Fallibility

The substitution of intelligent machines for humans at senior command levels is becoming essential, U.S. strategists argue, because an exponential growth in sensor information combined with the increasing speed of warfare is making it nearly impossible for humans to keep track of crucial battlefield developments. If future scenarios prove accurate, battles that once unfolded over days or weeks could transpire in the space of hours, or even minutes, while battlefield information will be pouring in as multitudinous data points, overwhelming staff officers. Only advanced computers, it is claimed, could process so much information and make informed combat decisions within the necessary timeframe.

Such time compression and the expansion of sensor data may apply to any form of combat, but especially to the most terrifying of them all, nuclear war. When ICBMs were the principal means of such combat, decisionmakers had up to 30 minutes between the time a missile was launched and the moment of detonation in which to determine whether a potential attack was real or merely a false satellite reading (as did sometimes occur during the Cold War). Now, that may not sound like much time, but with the recent introduction of hypersonic missiles, such assessment times could shrink to as little as five minutes. Under such circumstances, it’s a lot to expect even the most alert decision-makers to reach an informed judgment on the nature of a potential attack. Hence the appeal (to some) of automated decision-making systems.

“Attack-time compression has placed America’s senior leadership in a situation where the existing NC3 system may not act rapidly enough,” military analysts Adam Lowther and Curtis McGiffin argued at War on the Rocks, a security-oriented website. “Thus, it may be necessary to develop a system based on artificial intelligence, with predetermined response decisions, that detects, decides, and directs strategic forces with such speed that the attack-time compression challenge does not place the United States in an impossible position.”

This notion, that an artificial intelligence-powered device — in essence, a more intelligent version of the doomsday machine or the WOPR — should be empowered to assess enemy behavior and then, on the basis of “predetermined response options,” decide humanity’s fate, has naturally produced some unease in the community of military analysts (as it should for the rest of us as well). Nevertheless, American strategists continue to argue that battlefield assessment and decision-making — for both conventional and nuclear warfare — should increasingly be delegated to machines.

“AI-powered intelligence systems may provide the ability to integrate and sort through large troves of data from different sources and geographic locations to identify patterns and highlight useful information,” the Congressional Research Service noted in a November 2019 summary of Pentagon thinking. “As the complexity of AI systems matures,” it added, “AI algorithms may also be capable of providing commanders with a menu of viable courses of action based on real-time analysis of the battlespace, in turn enabling faster adaptation to complex events.”

The key wording there is “a menu of viable courses of action based on real-time analysis of the battlespace.” This might leave the impression that human generals and admirals (not to speak of their commander-in-chief) will still be making the ultimate life-and-death decisions for both their own forces and the planet. Given such anticipated attack-time compression in future high-intensity combat with China and/or Russia, however, humans may no longer have the time or ability to analyze the battlespace themselves and so will come to rely on AI algorithms for such assessments. As a result, human commanders may simply find themselves endorsing decisions made by machines — and so, in the end, become superfluous.

Creating Robot Generals

Despite whatever misgivings they may have about their future job security, America’s top generals are moving swiftly to develop and deploy that JADC2 automated command mechanism. Overseen by the Air Force, it’s proving to be a computer-driven amalgam of devices for collecting real-time intelligence on enemy forces from vast numbers of sensor devices (satellites, ground radars, electronic listening posts, and so on), processing that data into actionable combat information, and providing precise attack instructions to every combat unit and weapons system engaged in a conflict — whether belonging to the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, or the newly formed Space Force and Cyber Command.

What, exactly, the JADC2 will consist of is not widely known, partly because many of its component systems are still shrouded in secrecy and partly because much of the essential technology is still in the development stage. Delegated with responsibility for overseeing the project, the Air Force is working with Lockheed Martin and other large defense contractors to design and develop key elements of the system.

One such building block is its Advanced Battle Management System (ABMS), a data-collection and distribution system intended to provide fighter pilots with up-to-the-minute data on enemy positions and help guide their combat moves. Another key component is the Army’s Integrated Air and Missile Defense Battle Command System (IBCS), designed to connect radar systems to anti-aircraft and missile-defense launchers and provide them with precise firing instructions. Over time, the Air Force and its multiple contractors will seek to integrate ABMS and IBCS into a giant network of systems connecting every sensor, shooter, and commander in the country’s armed forces — a military “internet of things,” as some have put it.

To test this concept and provide an example of how it might operate in the future, the Army conducted a live-fire artillery exercise this August in Germany using components (or facsimiles) of the future JADC2 system. In the first stage of the test, satellite images of (presumed) Russian troop positions were sent to an Army ground terminal, where an AI software program called Prometheus combed through the data to select enemy targets. Next, another AI program called SHOT computed the optimal match of available Army weaponry to those intended targets and sent this information, along with precise firing coordinates, to the Army’s Advanced Field Artillery Tactical Data System (AFATDS) for immediate action, where human commanders could choose to implement it or not. In the exercise, those human commanders had the mental space to give the matter a moment’s thought; in a shooting war, they might just leave everything to the machines, as the system’s designers clearly intend them to do.

In the future, the Army is planning even more ambitious tests of this evolving technology under an initiative called Project Convergence. From what’s been said publicly about it, Convergence will undertake ever more complex exercises involving satellites, Air Force fighters equipped with the ABMS system, Army helicopters, drones, artillery pieces, and tactical vehicles. Eventually, all of this will form the underlying “architecture” of the JADC2, linking every military sensor system to every combat unit and weapons system — leaving the generals with little to do but sit by and watch.

Why Robot Generals Could Get It Wrong

Given the complexity of modern warfare and the challenge of time compression in future combat, the urge of American strategists to replace human commanders with robotic ones is certainly understandable. Robot generals and admirals might theoretically be able to process staggering amounts of information in brief periods of time, while keeping track of both friendly and enemy forces and devising optimal ways to counter enemy moves on a future battlefield. But there are many good reasons to doubt the reliability of robot decision-makers and the wisdom of using them in place of human officers.

To begin with, many of these technologies are still in their infancy, and almost all are prone to malfunctions that can neither be easily anticipated nor understood. And don’t forget that even advanced algorithms can be fooled, or “spoofed,” by skilled professionals.

In addition, unlike humans, AI-enabled decision-making systems will lack an ability to assess intent or context. Does a sudden enemy troop deployment, for example, indicate an imminent attack, a bluff, or just a normal rotation of forces? Human analysts can use their understanding of the current political moment and the actors involved to help guide their assessment of the situation. Machines lack that ability and may assume the worst, initiating military action that could have been avoided.

Such a problem will only be compounded by the “training” such decision-making algorithms will undergo as they are adapted to military situations. Just as facial recognition software has proved to be tainted by an over-reliance on images of white males in the training process — making them less adept at recognizing, say, African-American women — military decision-making algorithms are likely to be distorted by an over-reliance on the combat-oriented scenarios selected by American military professionals for training purposes. “Worst-case thinking” is a natural inclination of such officers — after all, who wants to be caught unprepared for a possible enemy surprise attack? — and such biases will undoubtedly become part of the “menus of viable courses of action” provided by decision-making robots.

Once integrated into decision-making algorithms, such biases could, in turn, prove exceedingly dangerous in any future encounters between U.S. and Russian troops in Europe or American and Chinese forces in Asia. A clash of this sort might, after all, arise at any time, thanks to some misunderstanding or local incident that rapidly gains momentum — a sudden clash between U.S. and Chinese warships off Taiwan, for example, or between American and Russian patrols in one of the Baltic states. Neither side may have intended to ignite a full-scale conflict and leaders on both sides might normally move to negotiate a cease-fire. But remember, these will no longer simply be human conflicts. In the wake of such an incident, the JADC2 could detect some enemy move that it determines poses an imminent risk to allied forces and so immediately launch an all-out attack by American planes, missiles, and artillery, escalating the conflict and foreclosing any chance of an early negotiated settlement.

Such prospects become truly frightening when what’s at stake is the onset of nuclear war. It’s hard to imagine any conflict among the major powers starting out as a nuclear war, but it’s far easier to envision a scenario in which the great powers — after having become embroiled in a conventional conflict — reach a point where one side or the other considers the use of atomic arms to stave off defeat. American military doctrine, in fact, has always held out the possibility of using so-called tactical nuclear weapons in response to a massive Soviet (now Russian) assault in Europe. Russian military doctrine, it is widely assumed, incorporates similar options. Under such circumstances, a future JADC2 could misinterpret enemy moves as signaling preparation for a nuclear launch and order a pre-emptive strike by U.S. nuclear forces, thereby igniting World War III.

War is a nasty, brutal activity and, given almost two decades of failed conflicts that have gone under the label of “the war on terror,” causing thousands of American casualties (both physical and mental), it’s easy to understand why robot enthusiasts are so eager to see another kind of mentality take over American war-making. As a start, they contend, especially in a pandemic world, that it’s only humane to replace human soldiers on the battlefield with robots and so diminish human casualties (at least among combatants). This claim does not, of course, address the argument that robot soldiers and drone aircraft lack the ability to distinguish between combatants and non-combatants on the battlefield and so cannot be trusted to comply with the laws of war or international humanitarian law — which, at least theoretically, protect civilians from unnecessary harm — and so should be banned.

Fraught as all of that may be on future battlefields, replacing generals and admirals with robots is another matter altogether. Not only do legal and moral arguments arise with a vengeance, as the survival of major civilian populations could be put at risk by computer-derived combat decisions, but there’s no guarantee that American GIs would suffer fewer casualties in the battles that ensued. Maybe it’s time, then, for Congress to ask some tough questions about the advisability of automating combat decision-making before this country pours billions of additional taxpayer dollars into an enterprise that could, in fact, lead to the end of the world as we know it. Maybe it’s time as well for the leaders of China, Russia, and this country to limit or ban the deployment of hypersonic missiles and other weaponry that will compress life-and-death decisions for humanity into just a few minutes, thereby justifying the automation of such fateful judgments.

Factory Schools from Industrial Revolution to Modern Universities

Bhabani Shankar Nayak

How did factory schools develop? Why did factory school develop?  What does factory schools do? What is the relevance of factory schools today? The answers to these questions come from the history of factory schools, which reveals its immense impact not only on our educational system but also on our society, culture, economy, politics and individual lives. The historical perspectives are important to understand the predicaments of the factory school model of educational systems today.

The factory schools were established by the Christian missionaries in early 17th century America. The spread of Christianity by ‘converting people’ and ‘controlling their natural resources’ were twin objectives of these missionary run factory schools. In the early days of industrial revolution in 18th and 19th century, the factory owners have established factory schools to develop skilled and productive workers for expanding their industrial outputs and profits. The sense of charity and Christian religious values have also influenced the factory owners to provide basic education and minimal leisure time for token welfare of factory workers. For example, Hannah Greg (née Lightbody) was the wife of Samuel Greg who established a factory school within the campus of the Quarry Bank Cotton Mill.  The mill was established in 1784 on the outskirts of Manchester in a village called Styal, in the banks of the Bolin in Cheshire, England. It continues to run till today. The mill is not only the living witness to industrial revolution in England but also preserved the horrors of working conditions and miserable lives of workers and the history factory school. Hannah Greg’s life was shaped by Presbyterian and Unitarian Christian theology, which inspired her to establish the school and look after the worker’s children and large number of pauper and orphaned children, who were working in the Quarry Bank Mill for 18hrs per day. It helped the mill to develop their own skilled workforce and increased their productivity. The Greg’s family was also involved in slave trade and pretended to care for workers in their factory by establishing school for the workers and their children. It was a public relations exercise to control workers.

Robert Owen, the father of utopian socialism and pioneer of cooperative movement has also established factory school near the New Lanark mill and experimented his socialist ideas on educational and social reforms. He established the Institute for the Formation of Character at New Lanark in 1818, which provided free education from infancy to adulthood. The institute has helped to increase the quality and standard of goods produced in his factory. Based on his experiments, he argued for radical factory reforms for worker’s welfare. His ideals have not only transformed industrial revolution and politics in Europe during 19th century but also continue to have huge significance in contemporary world.

The factory schools have played significant role in increasing productive power of labour and shaping industrial revolution and politics in Europe. The factory owners were the biggest supporters of the Elementary Education Act of 1870, which has expanded the factory schools with the universalisation of education in England.  The essence of factory schools was to produce benevolent, docile, productive, and skilled labour force as per the requirements of the industrial capitalism. The European colonialism has used the experience, spirit and essence of factory school models of education in different colonies in Asia, Africa, Americas and Oceania in the pursuit of interests of the colonial capitalism. The European companies have sponsored Christian missionaries to help in the expansion of colonialism with the help of setting up religious schools and health centers. The educational curriculum in colonial and Christian missionary schools were designed to uphold European power, dominance and work ethics of Christianity. The model and location of factory schools were moved from industrial centers to non-industrial rural areas, other religious missionaries have also followed the path to shape the social and moral values of the people concomitant with the requirements of the religious denominations, societies, states and governments.

The state led ‘factory school’ was originated in the early 19th century Prussia, where educational curriculum, methods of teaching and learning were standardised and regimented as per the requirements of the state and governments. The idea of education was impersonal to promote professionalism and efficiency. The individual interests, needs, desires, and creativities were domesticated and conditioned as per the requirements of the ruling and non-ruling classes. In this way, the formal and modern educational system has emerged from factory schools, which continue to serve the elites and capitalist classes in different forms for last two centuries. The Prussian factory school model and the spirit of its educational system survived from class education to mass education in the Lancaster system, Madras system, Glasweegian and Mannian systems to Bologna processes, which promised to bring coherence to higher education systems in Europe. Alvin Toffler in his book Future Shock (1970) has condemned such educational practices, where mass education works like a complaint ingenious machine that teaches collective discipline, crushes creativity and socialises students with repetitive labour and hierarchy.

The RSS led Vidya Bharati Akhil Bharatiya Shiksha Sansthan runs one of the largest private educational networks of more than 25000 Saraswati Shishu Mandir schools with over 45 million students in India. It works like Christian missionary schools based on factory models. It is funded directly by corporations and indirectly by the governments in India. The Hindutva mythology and reactionary ideology of the RSS determines the curriculum of these schools. In the name of Indianisation of education, it promotes debauched Hindutva politics and bigoted cultural outlook devoid of secular and scientific ethos. The ideals and values of factory school model of education defines the educational system promoted by the RSS. It does not empower people. It domesticates people for its political project that is concomitant with the interests of the Indian and global capitalist classes.

The unfettered growth of capitalist globalisation and liberalisation of economy led to withdrawal of welfare state and rise of privatisation of education in 21st century. Many corporations are opening their own educational and research institutions to pursue both business and create workforce for their industries. The privatisation and corporatisation of education transformed public education into a business, where educational curriculums were shaped by the market forces as per their requirements.  The syllabus of banking, finance and insurance education and training is shaped by banking and insurance industries. The Computer Science education is shaped by the requirements of the Silicon Valley. The Medical Science and Chemistry curriculum is determined by the requirements of the pharmaceutical corporations. The way Christian missionaries were funded by the colonial corporations, in the same way, NGOs and charities today are funded by the corporations under their corporate social responsibility funds to shape education by establishing schools and research institutes as per their requirements. Most of the British universities are registered as charities and receiving huge research funds to expand corporate interests and public opinions in support of ruling and non-ruling establishments. There were always aberrations which questions power and stands with people within and beyond the frameworks of modern factory schools.

The factory school model of education has transformed and atomised educational system based on the priorities of capitalism. The marketisation and corporatisation of education has transformed students as cash cows, teachers as shopkeepers and educational institutions as shop floors.  Such an educational system is neither representing the life experiences of people nor their everyday requirements. It produces skilled professionals, who work like orderly objects with disciplined hands and closed lips. The social, economic, cultural and educational alienation is the net outcome of such an educational system practiced worldwide.

The educational system is designed in such a way that the students from the rich families and urban areas are getting unfettered access to education and educational infrastructure whereas the students from disadvantaged backgrounds in terms of class, caste, tribe, gender, race, region, religion, poor and rural areas suffer greatly. Such a system produces professional meritocratic society based on inequality.  Therefore, affirmative actions are not enough, it needs complete overhauling of this skewed educational system run by the ruling and non-ruling class establishments. The availability and accessibility to education is becoming an impossible mission for the poor in the age of privatisation. It is a structural indictment of class divided society and bourgeois state within capitalism.

The democratisation of education and curriculum based on needs of people, communities and society; accessibility, affordability and availability of scientific and secular education is central to egalitarian social and economic transformation. Education is not only a social desire but an organic need of common people based on their natural and inalienable human rights. The radical, revolutionary, progressive and democratic forces must use every available opportunity to claim the right to free and scientific education. The radical and revolutionary upsurge was an inadvertent outcome of factory schools, which helped social transformations all over the world. The radical movements and revolutionary political parties have used education as a tool of revolutionary transformation of society. It is time to shape and decolonise educational institutions and curriculum from Eurocentric worldview, reactionary religious and market forces enforced by factory schools in different forms.

As the onslaught of reactionary religious and market forces grow on education, it is important to use every available opportunity to promote liberal, secular, scientific, rational, democratic and radical agenda of education based on people’s needs and desires.  Yes, it is time to break away from the factory school model of educational system for the sake of education, people and society. Engagement and progressive interventions are twin keys for student and teacher led educational systems based on local, regional, national and international requirements of people, animals and environment

“The Fourteen Characteristics of Fascism” and We

Asish Gupta

India, the largest parliamentary democracy in the world, celebrated its 73rd Independence Day on Saturday, August 15. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, as per the protocol, addressed the 1.3 billion people of the country from the Red Fort in Delhi. In his speech, he promised to bring universal health cards, provide internet access, through optical fibre lines, to all villages across the country, including the islands, within the next 1,000 days. And in his characteristic way, he had warned the two neighbouring states. Standing in the Red Fort on the same day, the Prime Minister said, “Be it terrorism or expansionism, India is standing up to both and defeating it.”

It is to be noted that,ever since he became the Prime Minister, the issue of the security of India has come up time and again in his speeches. Earlier in 2016, when a militant attack on an army camp in Uri took place or in more recent times after a militant attack on a CRPF convoy in Pulwama,Modi was seen to issue a stern warning to Pakistan. India had responded to Pakistan with surgical strikes after the Uri attack and with airstrikes in Balakot after the Pulwama incidence. Although 20 Indian soldiers were killed in Ladakh, at least 35 Chinese soldiers were killed. The Prime Minister has repeatedly highlighted this glorious ballad and heroism of the Indian Army.

Even this year’s Independence Day speech was no exception. The PM had said, “The country has embarked on a remarkable journey with an extraordinary goal. The walkway is full of adversity. Recently some unfortunate movements on the border have challenged the country. But whoever has challenged the sovereignty of the country in the Line of Control or the Line of Actual Control, the brave soldiers of the country have given them fitting response. The world has seen what the Indian Army is capable of doing to protect the country in Ladakh. Today, from this premise of the Red Fort, I pay my homage to the soldiers who sacrificed their lives for the motherland.”

In this article, I will not write anything special to analyse the speech and action of Mr.Modi and his government. Instead, I will quote the political scientist Lawrence W. Britt’s writing ‘The Fourteen Characteristics of Fascism’. Lawrence Britt has identified fourteen signs of fascism by analyzing the regimes of Adolf Hitler of Germany, Benito Mussolini of Italy, Francisco Franco of Spain, Suharto of Indonesia and Augusto Pinochet of Chile.

These 14 characteristics are:

1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism—Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.
2. Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights—Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of “need”.  The people tend to ‘look the other way’ or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.
3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause—The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial, ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.
4. The supremacy of the Military—Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamourised.
5. Rampant Sexism—The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and anti-gay legislation and national policy.
6. Controlled Mass Media—Sometimes the media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or through sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in wartime, is very common.
7. Obsession with National Security—Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
8. Religion and Government are Intertwined—Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology are common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government’s policies or actions.
9. Corporate Power is Protected—The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.
10. Labor Power is Suppressed—Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely or are severely suppressed.
11. Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts—Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free-expression in the arts is openly attacked, and governments often refuse to fund the arts.
12. Obsession with Crime and Punishment—Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses, and even forego civil liberties, in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.
13. Rampant Cronyism and Corruption—Fascist regimes are almost always governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions, and who use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.
14. Fraudulent Elections—Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against (or even the assassination of) opposition candidates, the use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and the manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.

Continuing with my initial remark on the Prime Minister’s speech on India’s security, Prime Minister NarendraModi’s speech at the Red Fort summed up the security situation, I want to stress that the speech on the Independence Day is not an one-off incidence. Rather, it is a continuation of his speeches on national security since his coming to power in 2014. His carefully crafted strategy on religion-politics-administration centres around Ram Mandir and is evident in his 5th August-speech in Ayodhya:  “Ram Mandir will become the modern symbol of our traditions. It’ll become a symbol of our devotion, our national sentiment. This temple will also symbolise the power of collective resolution of crores of people. It will keep inspiring the future generations.”The rule of the BJP-led NDA government under Narendra Modi  is marked by the imprisonment ofthe intellectuals-professors-social workers in the country. His government is also instrumental in taking decision to sell government agencies to corporates, bring in new labour law or the labour code. Do these speeches and actions not remind us of Britt’s characterisation of fascism?

Canadian autoworkers demand Unifor release tentative contracts with Detroit Three in full prior to ratification votes

Carl Bronski

With the contracts between the Detroit Three and Unifor covering 17,000 workers at its Canadian operations set to expire September 21, a petition demanding the union release any tentative contract agreement in its entirety before workers vote on it is winning significant rank-and-file support.

The legitimate demand for workers to be able to review any Unifor-blessed deals before voting on them is the outcome of bitter experience. Unifor and its predecessor the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) have recommended one concessions deal after another that imposed plant closures, wage freezes, benefit cuts, the gutting of work rules and the institutionalization of a low-wage two-tier system for workers hired after 2008. Invariably, these contracts have been imposed through highly-scripted union ratification meetings, with workers seeing no more than union-drafted “contract highlights.”

The petition reads:

“The undersigned demand Unifor leadership provide full disclosure of the contents of the contract, 5 days before ratification, by publishing all revisions, additions, deletions and changes to the contract, clearly marked, on the Unifor National website and the websites of the locals involved in ‘Detroit Three’ bargaining. The UAW does this with their ‘white book’. We also demand that the ratification highlights include a clear statement of all money and benefits negotiated on behalf of union representatives and any money or benefits negotiated to be paid to the Locals and/or National Union.”

The petition, launched on August 14, is a sign of growing worker opposition to and distrust of the Unifor leadership.

At the time of writing, it had already garnered about 1,300 signatures from autoworkers in at least eight locals across southern Ontario. Unifor president Jerry Dias, aware of the petition and preparing to negotiate another concessions deal, has thus far publicly ignored it, while indicating in private that the Unifor apparatus is determined to keep workers in the dark.

This is hardly surprising given the viciously anti-democratic record of Dias and the entire Unifor leadership. In 2016, when Dias presented a so-called pattern “framework agreement” that lacked any details on his “promise” that he had secured a “historic” deal to save jobs at GM Oshawa, workers there and at the GM St. Catharines facility and then at Ford’s Oakville plant took up the call to see the full, approximately 200-page contract rather than the brief, misleading and self-serving “highlights brochure” handed out to workers as they entered the ratification meetings.

At the 2016 ratification meeting in Oshawa, workers denounced the lack of information before the arrogant Dias, to roars of outrage, called a particularly diligent questioner an “idiot.” Unifor then opened the voting booths before other rank-and-file autoworkers could even speak. Two years later, GM announced the imminent closure of the plant using contract language that had never appeared in the lying brochure.

Unifor’s manipulation of the contract ratification process, however, is only a symptom of a far deeper cancer. One that, from the standpoint of the defence of workers’ interests, long ago reached the terminal stage.

Like the UAW south of the border, Unifor long ago renounced any association with the militant struggles out of which the UAW was born as an organization representing Canadian and US auto workers, and acts in concert with the auto bosses against its own members.

Yet, despite decades of concessions and the ever-deeper integration of Unifor into corporate management, the organizers of the petition are claiming that the Unifor leadership can be pressured into serving workers’ interests, or at the very least that the union apparatus can be reformed.

On the website promoting the petition (solidaritymovement.ca), the administrators write: “This request should not be construed as an attack on leadership but rather an opportunity to strengthen communication and trust between leadership and the membership. Our union’s constitution is built on transparency and democratic values; informing and educating the membership is key to upholding these principles.” They go on to appeal for a struggle based on “union values,” and cite approvingly a quote from former Canadian Auto Workers President Bob White, “Workers don’t need a union to walk them backwards.” The appeal concludes with the call for workers to “start fighting like hell.”

There is no shortage of militancy among autoworkers, who are livid over the decades of concessions imposed by the automakers in close cooperation with Unifor and the CAW.

But militant calls to “fight like hell” for “union values” ring hollow, to say the least, under conditions in which the vast majority of autoworkers cannot remember a time when Unifor or its CAW predecessor fought for anything other than the profitability of the Big Three and their cozy relationships with management at GM, Ford and Fiat-Chrysler. An honest description of Unifor’s “values” would be the acceptance of wage and benefit reductions, increased discipline and the intensification of workloads in order to maintain at least a modicum of auto sector investment in Canada and thereby defend its dues base from which the bureaucracy reap their own bloated salaries and expense accounts.

In comparison to Dias, who personifies the corrupt corporatist relations between the union bureaucracy, big business and the federal Liberal government, White may appear to some workers as a “no nonsense” militant. But the truth is, it was White’s policies while heading the Canadian UAW and then the CAW during the 1980s and early 1990s that helped initiate the race to the bottom in working conditions, wages, and workplace benefits that continues to this day.

In the run-up to the 1985 split with the UAW, White explicitly opposed any appeal to the widespread “no concessions” sentiment among American autoworkers and for a joint struggle of workers on both sides of the border against the right-wing UAW International leadership. Instead, White touted Canadian nationalism as he manoeuvred to reach an arrangement with Solidarity House to establish the CAW and enable each nationally-based wing of the union bureaucracy to pursue its own course. The split facilitated the automakers’ drive to pit Canadian autoworkers against their class brothers and sisters in the United States and Mexico.

White and the CAW’s “Canadian advantage” strategy, which was based on the lower value of the Canadian dollar and state-funded health care, quickly proved ruinous for workers. Seizing on the national divisions promoted by the CAW and UAW, the globally-operating automakers began whipsawing job, wage and benefit cuts back and forth across national borders.

In the current contract struggle, workers must recognize that Unifor is no less a determined and ruthless opponent of their interests than management. Only by organizing independently of the pro-company union to oppose another sellout contract will workers put themselves in a position to defend their jobs and living standards. Already, a path toward such action is being cut in the auto plants in the United States, where autoworkers have begun establishing rank-and-file safety committees independently of and in opposition to the corrupt UAW to fight for safe working conditions during the coronavirus pandemic.

Workers who want to fight for their democratic right to see the contract in full before they vote on it should emulate their American colleagues and establish rank-and-file committees in every Canadian plant. These committees should take control of the contract struggle out of the hands of the Unifor bureaucracy, formulate demands to secure the jobs and living standards of all autoworkers, demand that all negotiations take place in public, and insist that all agreements be made available well in advance of any final vote.

The experience of US autoworkers with the UAW’s cynical commitment to publish tentative agreements before ratification votes only underscores the impossibility of “democratizing” the corporatist unions. While it is formally true that under pressure from rank-and-file workers the UAW now releases Detroit Three contracts in advance, this amounts to little more than a document dump, with workers presented documents running to a thousand or more pages and written in legalese. Moreover, none of this has stopped the UAW from manipulating the balloting, including forcing workers to “keep voting until you get it right,” as was this case with the 2015 Fiat Chrysler deal.

Last but not least, there is the fact that it has now been exposed that the top UAW leadership is a criminal conspiracy. Ten UAW officials, including former UAW President Gary Jones, have pleaded guilty to charges ranging from violation of labour laws, racketeering, embezzlement, conspiracy and tax fraud for their corrupt dealings with the automakers.

Significantly, Dias has maintained radio silence on the UAW corruption scandal, except to insist that it in no way calls into legitimacy the contracts that the union negotiated.

Rank-and-file committees, independent of Unifor, need to be developed in the Canadian plants as the springboard to seize the conduct of the fight for a new contract out of the hands of the union bureaucrats, forge unity with autoworkers in the US and Mexico and organize a counteroffensive against all concessions, two-tier wages, and job cuts.

Seven dead and 170,000 displaced as massive wildfires continue to burn in Northern California

Peter Ross

At least seven people have died in fires raging across Northern California, including a helicopter pilot who crashed while fighting a fire in Mt. Hood National Forest, three people found in a hillside bunker in Napa Valley, a Pacific Gas & Electric employee who died from smoke inhalation while assisting firefighters, a male Solano County resident, and on Sunday, a 70-year-old man from Santa Cruz County. At least 33 people have been injured, and at least two are missing.

The fires began early last week after thunderstorms produced by a tropical storm resulted in over 13,000 dry-lightning strikes, setting off hundreds of small fires, which merged into massive “fire complexes.” The fires were fueled by strong winds and a severe heatwave, which has affected much of the western United States over the past week and caused rolling blackouts throughout the state. Unusually dry air and wide areas of critically dry vegetation—part of a decades-long shift in the region’s climate toward greater aridity—have caused the fires to burn more intensely and closer to populated areas than in the past.

The three largest fire complexes are burning on all sides of the heavily-populated San Francisco Bay Area, not far from the eastern edge of San Jose. As of Monday night, the SCU Lightning Complex to the southeast had burned 363,000 acres (568 square miles) and was 15 percent contained; the LNU Lightning Complex to the northeast had burned 352,000 acres (551 square miles) and was 27 percent contained; and the CZU Lightning Complex to the south had burned 78,000 acres (109 square miles) and was 17 percent contained. The August Lightning Complex further north had burned 181,000 acres (283 square miles) and was 11 percent contained.

As of Tuesday morning, 937 structures have been destroyed and 251 damaged, and the fires continue to threaten some 30,500 additional structures, according to Cal Fire, California’s fire agency.

The National Weather Service has set air quality alerts for much of California’s Central Valley, and parts of Oregon, Idaho, and Colorado. The San Francisco Bay and Sacramento-San Joaquin Valley regions have spent days covered in a thick haze of smoke, and the concentration of fine particulate matter in the Bay Area has reached roughly five times the daily limit set by the EPA.

“Even healthy people are reporting headaches, bloody noses, etc., during this current smoke event,” said Coty Jen, assistant professor at the Center for Atmospheric Particle Studies at Carnegie Mellon University.

“Most of the Bay Area dodged a bullet,” said meteorologist Roger Gass, after lightning strikes projected for Sunday and Monday—which could have caused another round of ignitions—proved to be less severe than expected.

Lightning strikes ignited ten more fires Monday night in other parts of the state, but cooler, more humid weather has allowed firefighters to increase the containment of the largest fire complexes. However, a return to dryer and hotter conditions is expected later in the week, and Cal Fire officials say the fires could take weeks to contain, warning that “this is going to be a marathon.”

Some 50,000 evacuees were allowed to return to their homes starting Sunday, but about 170,000 remain evacuated. While schools, auditoriums, and public buildings have been turned into makeshift evacuation shelters, many evacuees are rightly reluctant to crowd into enclosed shelters amid the COVID-19 pandemic. California has one of the highest infection rates in the country, with more than 6,000 new cases reported on average each day.

Hotels across much of the Bay Area are booked with evacuees, with far too few rooms for the thousands in need of temporary housing. With few hotel vouchers available, many of those dealing with the economic devastation caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, including thousands of low-wage immigrant workers and the unemployed, are unable to afford hotels and basic provisions.

Guerneville resident Rhonda Hall left her low-income apartment last Tuesday with her two children and 70-year-old mother and headed for a hotel in Vacaville. By the time they arrived, ash was falling from the sky, and they were forced to leave—without a refund—to find another hotel. “Everything was booked or on fire,” Hall told the Mercury News, and the family was forced to go as far as Reno, Nevada to find a room. “I just want this nightmare to be over,” Hall said. “It’s been horrible.”

Evacuees are being directed to parking lots, parks, campgrounds, and other open spaces, where countless thousands have been forced to live out of their cars, often with little or no aid, in the midst of an historic heatwave that has sent temperatures above 100 degrees Fahrenheit in much of inland California.

“I’m camping in the Prius,” 69-year-old Cheryl Jarvis told the San Francisco Chronicle last Thursday from the crowded parking lot of the Vacaville Community Center. “It’s not real comfortable, but I’m so tired it didn’t matter.”

Some 14,000 firefighters were deployed as of Monday, about 96 percent of California’s available personnel. The extraordinary combination of four massive fire complexes and countless smaller fires has completely overwhelmed California’s chronically underfunded firefighting infrastructure. “The size and complexity in this fire is not one that we’ve seen in times past,” said Cal Fire unit chief Shana Jones.

In a typical year, 30-40 percent of California’s firefighting personnel are prison inmates, paid around one dollar per hour to risk their lives as modern-day indentured servants. The COVID-19 pandemic has swept through California’s notoriously overcrowded prison system, infecting more than 12,000 inmates and guards, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. As a result, less than half of the state’s inmate firefighting crews will be available this season.

Under these conditions, some firefighting crews have had to work 72-hour shifts with no breaks, according to Cal Fire spokesman Daniel Berlant, even as they are subject to smoke inhalation and rapidly moving fire. Two firefighters in Marin County nearly lost their lives Friday after they were surrounded by a wall of flames while fighting the Woodward Fire.

The SCU and LNU complex fires are, respectively, the second and third largest wildfires in California history, surpassed only by the 2018 Mendocino Complex Fire. The 2020 fire season is already the fourth largest on record for the state, with more than 7,000 fires having burned more than 1.4 million acres (2,000 square miles), an area larger than the state of Delaware.

In the past fifty years, summer forest fires in California have increased in size by about 800 percent, and the ten most destructive fire seasons on record in terms of area burned have all taken place since 2008. According to the Congressional Research Service, the average yearly acreage burned nationwide every year since 2000 is more than double the average burned during the 1990s.

“We are essentially living in a megafire era,” said Jake Hess, Cal Fire unit chief for Santa Clara, “We have folks who have been working for Cal Fire for the last five years and that’s all they understand – megafires – since they started.”

While the Trump Administration has continued a decade-long trend in cutting federal funding for fire science, including $2 billion in cuts from the US Forest Service budget, while threatening to cut off federal aid for California wildfires, the Democratic Party that dominates California politics is no less responsible for preparing the disaster which is currently unfolding.

Under conditions in which climate change has extended the fire season year-round and caused summer megafires to become a practically yearly occurrence, the state has systematically defunded social infrastructure, cut firefighter staffing, closed stations, and taken no substantial action to mitigate the danger of wildfires.

In 2018, Cal Fire exhausted its $442.8 million wildfire budget in the middle of the season and had to obtain emergency funding.

California Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom’s administration has responded to the COVID-19 pandemic by passing a $54 billion budget cut targeting health and social services, which includes a 10 percent pay cut for state workers, including firefighters. Meanwhile, the five richest billionaires in California accrued $70 billion during the first three months of the pandemic, enough to pay the state’s average wildfire budget more than a hundred times over.

Ukrainian government turns against Lukashenko amid ongoing mass protests and strikes in Belarus

Jason Melanovski

As strikes have spread across Belarus, sending shock waves not only through the ruling class in Belarus but across Europe, the government in neighboring Ukraine has rapidly turned against its former ally, Alexander Lukashenko.

Prior to the August 9 presidential elections in Belarus, which Lukashenko claims to have won, the government of Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky displayed—at least publicly—a positive attitude toward his government. In 2014, the Lukashenko regime supported the far-right coup in Kiev that was backed by US and German imperialism. Since then, Minsk has served as an intermediary in negotiations between Ukraine, the EU and the Russian government.

While meeting with Lukashenko in Ukraine last October, Zelensky commented on the close relationship between himself and Lukashenko. “We understand each other,” he said. “I think our two nations are friendly, mentally close. I am proud, and I am confident that every Ukrainian is also proud that we have such good neighbors.”

Reflecting the strategic interests of Ukraine in Belarus, earlier in August Ukraine’s foreign minister invited Belarus’s foreign minister to a meeting of the “Lublin Triangle” group that was set up by Poland, Ukraine and Lithuania to advocate for each other’s’ armies within NATO against Russia and deepen military cooperation between the countries.

In a sign that the Zelensky government fully expected a continuation of the Lukashenko regime for another five years, on August 5 plans were announced for Zelensky to visit Belarus for the third annual Regions of Belarus and Ukraine Forum after the election.

In response to Lukashenko’s initial crackdown on protesters after the elections, Zelensky steered away from directly condemning the Belarusian government. Instead, he called for “open, albeit complex, dialogue” and “mutual understanding between all parties.”

However, as a result of the strike movement within Belarus and Lukashenko’s turn to the Kremlin in response to these mass protests, the Kiev government has made a one-eighty turn. The Zelensky government was particularly infuriated over Lukashenko’s decision to send 32 Russian mercenaries that had been arrested ahead of the election back to Russia.

The Ukrainian government had earlier requested that they be turned over to Ukraine where they would have faced prosecution for supposedly aiding separatist rebels in the Luhansk and Donetsk regions in eastern Ukraine.

Reports in the Ukrainian media last week suggested the Wagner mercenaries were, in fact, duped into going to Belarus by agents from Ukraine’s Security Service of Ukraine (SBU). According to the reports, the aim of the SBU was to further strain relations between Belarus and Russia, and pull the Lukashenko government closer toward an alliance with the other NATO-backed countries of eastern Europe just prior to the elections.

Last week, the Ukrainian government recalled its ambassador from Minsk after accusing the Lukashenko government of engaging in “conscious provocative behavior” for sending the Russian mercenaries back to Russia. Zelensky himself ominously threatened Belarus for failing to hand over the mercenaries, stating, “God help the Belarusian authorities not to have another burning blood-shedding Donbas on their territory that all those Wagner troops are able to create.”

The Ukrainian ruling class has also signaled that it is ready to join the efforts of the European imperialist powers and the EU-backed opposition to stop the strikes and channel the protests against Lukashenko for their own interests.

As the strikes escalated, the imperialist powers have stepped up their intervention in the Belarus crisis, seeking to both put the strike movement to an end and advance their own geopolitical interests. Last week, the EU explicitly called upon the Lukashenko regime to initiate discussions with the opposition. This weekend, the US undersecretary of state, Steve Beguin, held discussions with opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya in Lithuania.

The Ukrainian government announced last week that it “generally shares” the EU’s sanctions against Belarusian officials and the call for new elections. Lukashenko, for his part, feeling betrayed by his former “friends” in Kiev, accused Zelensky of “fomenting riots” within the country.

Revealing its own fears over the strike movement in Belarus, a meeting was held last week between Zelensky and the heads of Ukraine’s intelligence and police agencies to discuss how the protests in Belarus could pose “direct risks to Ukraine” and issued a statement that events in Belarus “could significantly affect Ukraine.”

The Ukrainian oligarchy fears, above all, that the strikes taking place across the border could quickly spread to Ukraine where conditions workers face are often even worse than those in Belarus. Especially since the US and EU-backed coup in 2014, the Ukrainian government has enacted massive austerity. The coronavirus pandemic, which has led to a further decline in the living standards of the working population, has only intensified the social crisis, and the oligarchy is well aware that it is sitting on a social powder keg.

Earlier in June, the Ukrainian government was forced to pay out wages to over 40,000 miners who were owed back-pay. The payout was a response to a miners’ protest in Kiev that was attended by miners from both western and eastern Ukraine, regions that are often portrayed by ruling-class media as diametrically opposed to one another due to language and “culture.”

As a result of the protest, Zelensky was forced to intervene directly, telling the miners that he would personally see they are paid.

The Donets Coal Fields in eastern Ukraine, in particular, have a history of fervent strikes, and the Ukrainian ruling class is right to fear a growth of working class protests inspired by their own history and the ongoing struggle of Belarusian workers across the border. The working class in both countries has a powerful shared revolutionary history, going back to the revolutions of 1905 and 1917. In the late 1980s, a miners’ strike across the Soviet Union, which spread to the Ukrainian Donbass and to Soligorsk in what is now Belarus, shook the Stalinist bureaucracy, accelerating its drive toward capitalist restoration.

While the initial protests in Belarus have been set off by Lukashenko’s blatant trampling of democratic rights, the most threatening protests have come from strikes at Belarus’s state-owned industries. The German financial newspaper Handelsblatt reported that the state-owned companies where workers are on strike accounted for $10 billion out of a GDP of less than $60 billion in 2019. Lukashenko’s economic adviser has acknowledged that “billions of dollars” had already been lost to the strikes. The average wage for workers in Belarus is $500 a month, but many only earn $250 or $300 a month.

Meanwhile, the average wage of workers in Ukraine is $180 a month. These poverty wages have forced up to 9 million people out of a total population of 42 million to work abroad for some part of the year. Another 3.2 million people are working abroad full-time.

The impoverished state of Ukrainian miners has not been lost on Lukashenko who threatened striking Belarusian workers last week with their replacement by Ukrainian workers if they did not cease their strike. Pointing to the Ukrainian miners, he said “There is a sea of unemployed people,” warning “they will come.”

These blatant attempts by a besieged ruling class to divide workers in eastern Europe must be firmly opposed. The way forward for the working class in Belarus, Ukraine and across Europe must lie in a joint revolutionary struggle for the overthrow of capitalism.

Tokyo considers long-range missiles for use in first strikes

Ben McGrath

The Japanese government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is continuing its remilitarization drive, recently stating it was considering acquiring long-range missiles capable of striking targets in China and North Korea. Doing so would be a clear violation of the country’s constitution, which explicitly bars Tokyo from waging war overseas or maintaining war material.

The purpose of acquiring such weaponry is to have the ability to launch a first strike on an enemy on the pretext that it was preparing to attack Japan. In other words, Tokyo wants the ability to be able to launch an illegal pre-emptive war.

In an interview with the New York Times on August 16, Defense Minister Taro Kono evaded the question of long-range missiles, no doubt fearing that being too open about the government’s plans could trigger anti-war protests. “Logically speaking, I won’t say it’s a zero percent (chance). The government hasn’t really decided anything yet,” he declared.

On July 31, a ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) committee comprised of senior party officials approved a proposal to acquire long-range, offensive missiles. It is now under discussion by the government’s National Security Council (NSC), which will finalize new military plans by the end of September. The proposal stated, “Our country needs to consider ways to strengthen deterrence, including having the capability to halt ballistic missile attacks within the territory of our adversaries.”

The committee that approved the proposal included Abe’s former Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera. He paid lip service to the constitution, saying Japan would “stay within the bounds of the Constitution and comply with international law.” Onodera, however, was defense minister in July 2014 when Tokyo announced a “reinterpretation” of the constitution to justify going to war with allies in the name of “collective self-defense.” He also served as defense minister from August 2017 to October 2018, assuming office shortly after Abe pledged to re-write the constitution by 2020.

The LDP raised the possibility of acquiring long-range missiles after the government announced in June it would cancel the construction of two sites to station Aegis Ashore anti-ballistic missile batteries from the United States, citing cost and the potential danger of detached rocket boosters falling on inhabited areas. As is clear from the current discussions, this decision did not represent a retreat from Tokyo’s war preparations, but a reconsideration of how to pursue its agenda.

Acquisition of long-range missiles is only one part of Tokyo’s broader agenda to remilitarize to enable Japanese imperialism to aggressively assert its interests overseas. As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the LDP has temporarily slowed its push to revise Article 9 of the constitution that bars Japan from waging war. Abe’s goal is to insert a paragraph in Article 9 that explicitly recognizes the Japanese military. The prime minister still hopes to push the changes through by September 2021 when his term as LDP president, and therefore as prime minister, is set to end.

In May, Abe exploited the pandemic to call for a debate in the National Diet to revise the constitution so as to expand the powers of the Cabinet in the event it declares a national emergency, allowing the government to restrict democratic rights. This revision was one of four proposed in March 2018 that also included changes to Article 9.

New security guidelines approved by Abe’s cabinet in 2018 called for a vast expansion of Japan’s offensive military capability. This includes converting its Izumo-class helicopter carriers into aircraft carriers capable of carrying and launching F-35 fighter jets as well as the procurement of cruise missiles with ranges up to 1,000 kilometers to facilitate striking targets on “enemy” territory. Under the Abe government, annual military spending has reached record levels each year, including another all-time high this year of 5.31 trillion yen ($US48.5 billion).

The acquisition of long-range missiles is not the only move currently under examination. The National Security Council is also considering different land-based locations for the Aegis Ashore batteries or placing them on naval vessels. It is also contemplating purchasing the SPY-6 radar system from US defense company Raytheon, which would provide three times the range of the radars currently in use. Japan would need to further update its radar and tracking systems to enhance its first-strike capabilities.

Tokyo claims that the military build-up is necessary in the face of threats from China and North Korea. In particular, Japan has accused China of becoming more aggressive as other nations are distracted by the COVID-19 pandemic. However, it is the US, backed by Japan, that has sharply and dangerously ratcheted up tensions with Beijing, accusing the latter of being responsible for the pandemic and staging provocative war games in the region. All of this is an attempt to deflect growing internal tensions outwards, particularly in the face of worsening economic conditions and anger over the handling of the pandemic.

Another aspect of Tokyo’s decision to acquire its own weaponry is in part driven by uncertainty over Washington’s agenda. Under the Trump administration, the US has threatened to withdraw troops from Japan and South Korea if both countries do not pay more for hosting US troops. This has generated fears in Tokyo that Japan will be unable to rely on the US in the event of war. “[Trump] sees alliances as a business relationship, in very transactional terms,” Bruce Klingner, of the right-wing Heritage Foundation said recently in Foreign Policy. “He’s seeking to make a profit off of stationing US troops overseas.”

This aggressive US policy, however, is not driven primarily by the short-sighted irrationality of Trump or his administration, but by the sharpening conflicts between nation states. Washington is increasingly coming into conflict with its traditional allies as the same global divisions that led to World War I and II reemerge. While the primary target of US and Japanese imperialism today is China, Washington and Tokyo could just as easily find themselves opponents in the future. The Japanese ruling class is no doubt keenly aware of this danger.

German schools reopening without safety measures as coronavirus cases increase

Marianne Arens & Gregor Link

With 2,034 new coronavirus infections in Germany, Friday’s daily increase exceeded the 2,000-mark for the first time since the end of April. Under these conditions, the federal and state governments are setting the stage for a further explosion in the number of cases by reopening schools, spreading the deadly virus throughout the population.

Nationwide, there is a large number of individual outbreak incidents—in the last seven days, only 15 of 294 German districts had no COVID-19 cases to report. According to the official figures, 9,272 COVID-19 patients have died, while the documented cases of infection, at 233,575, are approaching the quarter-million mark.

One of the German states with the largest increase in new cases is Hesse (whose largest city is Frankfurt), in central Germany. Here, the health authorities have been reporting new coronavirus infections in the triple digits every day for a week now. In Offenbach alone, over 500 people are in quarantine. In the meantime, no district or city in Hesse has been without new infections in the past seven days.

The development is particularly threatening in the cities of the Rhine-Main area. In Offenbach and Hanau, for example, the critical threshold of 50 infections per 100,000 inhabitants has been significantly exceeded in the past few days.

In these circumstances, the reopening of schools without serious safety precautions means the creation of countless potential super-spreading events. Although the Robert Koch Institute (German government agency and research institute responsible for disease control and prevention) has been issuing explicit warnings against “crowds of people indoors” for weeks, this is precisely the situation in schools and daycare centres on a daily basis.

In Hesse, entire school classes in Wiesbaden, Bad Nauheim, Büdingen and Homberg (Efze) were sent home to quarantine in the first week of school because coronavirus infections had been detected in one student. In Frankfurt, the second school week after the summer vacations, began Monday with the announcement of the compulsory wearing of masks at all secondary schools.

However, practically all German states are affected by new cases of coronavirus in schools. In addition to the numerous reports from schools in Berlin and Hamburg, at least 16 schools in Schleswig-Holstein in northern Germany were also affected by cases of infection last week, shortly after reopening.

In North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), too, there are particularly large numbers of new infections at schools. In Bochum, the entire Willy Brandt comprehensive school had to remain closed Monday because a teacher who had been at school on Friday tested positive for the virus. In the district of Minden-Lübbecke, the entire Lahde-Frille elementary school network had to be closed at the same time, as COVID-19 cases had occurred in several classes.

As a large city in the Ruhr area, Duisburg is also severely affected, in addition to Dortmund. Last week, there were cases at eight schools. These are elementary schools, comprehensive schools and a vocational college. The Duisburg example highlights the fact that the danger of infection with the coronavirus cannot be separated from social inequality: the affected schools are all located close to each other in Duisburg’s working-class districts.

According to reports, however, the schools and affected classes reacted in a less than systematic manner because of a lack of equipment. Since, as teachers reported, the elementary schools had too few masks, they were closed for days, while the vocational college sent only individual affected classes into quarantine. On the internet, numerous students are reporting on crowded corridors, classrooms and public transportation and documenting this with pictures.

At the same time, testing capacities are diminishing because the government has not linked the reopening of schools with the creation of new laboratories and testing facilities. For this reason, coronavirus tests threaten to become scarce in the autumn as the cold spell begins. Charité hospital chief virologist Christian Drosten therefore recently issued an urgent warning to this effect and called on previously endangered returnees to self-quarantine.

On Instagram, Schülerstreik-NRW (Pupil strike NRW), a student at a vocational school, reports about a confirmed coronavirus case at her school. “Only this pupil and the person sitting directly next to her are no longer at school. The teachers and the rest of the class are still in school after having been together in a classroom for the last few days.”

Similar reports of a lack of testing, lack of quarantine and even cover-ups of coronavirus cases at schools have already reached the World Socialist Web Site from other cities. In this way, governments and authorities are systematically preparing new explosions of infections and deliberately implementing a murderous policy of contamination.

Politicians of all parties have made it clear that they will not close schools again under any circumstances or implement comprehensive security measures. They are not concerned about the students or parents, but exclusively about the interests of big business, which wants to ramp up production again and therefore wants to ensure that children can be accommodated without additional costs.

In Saxony, Health Minister Petra Köpping (Social Democratic Party, SPD) rules out new school closures outright. Köpping told the Sächsische Zeitung that she does not expect a second lockdown, despite rising infection numbers. It would “not come to that, that we have to resort to such measures as we had,” the SPD politician said on Saturday.

Schools should under no circumstances be closed again, announced former Federal Minister for Family Affairs Kristina Schröder (Christian Democratic Union, CDU). She has left office to take up a position as ambassador for the neoliberal think tank INSM (Initiative Neue Soziale Marktwirtschaft). In her speech, she takes a clear stand against new school closures in order to keep the economy running: “If this time we have to discuss closures as a whole again, then this time it should not be schools and day-care centres first, but schools and day-care centres last.”

At the same time, resistance is growing among students, parents and teachers to the unsafe school reopenings.

“Opening schools for regular operations is a difficult task for me,” says Andrea from NRW. “My 13-year-old daughter is the only child in her class wearing a mask. That won’t work for long.” For politicians, “boosting the economy has priority,” she continues. Apparently, “nobody wants to mess with the business lobby.”

Schülerstreik-NRW, who is calling for a student strike in NRW, asks, “What has to happen first for something to change? Sometimes I really think: Does someone have to die of coronavirus to close the school? I feel that I am not taken seriously by the politicians, etc., because I can say on behalf of many: Things can’t continue like this anymore!”

The call by the Sozialistische Gleichheitspartei (Socialist Equality Party, SGP) to form action committees and prepare a general strike against the murderous reopening of schools is meeting with a large response on social media.

“Teachers and students should go on strike nationwide,” Ily M. writes on Twitter. “The politically prescribed school reopenings with their completely inadequate ‘safety measures’ are clearly failing. I have the feeling that I can no longer keep still and allow our children to be the victims of the ministers of education. I think we must organize and discuss a nationwide strike—otherwise, they will send our children and teachers to the slaughter.”

“This also applies to educators, nurses and doctors,” says Sara, a nurse from Berlin Mitte. “There is hardly a profession that is exposed to a higher risk of infection than nursing. What do we do for ourselves if politically responsible persons do not even provide sufficient protective clothing and do not even allow testing for us—do we continue like this?”

Anja, a special education teacher who herself had fallen ill with COVID-19 and is now struggling with the consequences, agrees with this call. “Yes, please strike! Become active! … The more protection at the workplace, the less luck you need to avoid infection.”

New COVID-19 cases skyrocket at University of Alabama and University of North Carolina

Matthew MacEgan

The disastrous situation that began unfolding on college and university classes across the US earlier this month has continued unabated, with several universities reporting spikes in new COVID-19 cases where face-to-face learning is taking place.

On Monday, the University of Alabama (UA) system reported 566 new cases of COVID-19 since classes reopened last Wednesday, 531 of which occurred at its Tuscaloosa campus. This number is in addition to approximately 310 positive cases reported during the “re-entry” phase of returning students to campus, bringing the total of new cases this month close to 900, about three percent of university’s nearly 30,000 student population.

The UA system previously announced that re-entry testing for students yielded less than a one percent positivity rate, but its dashboard pegs the positive test rate at 1.04 percent for its Tuscaloosa campus, which has the largest number of students. These percentages do not yet include the 566 new cases reported over the past week.

The University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill has also seen a massive increase in new cases despite the fact that the university shut down the campus for face-to-face learning last week. The school reported Monday that 31.3 percent of students tested for COVID-19 last week returned positive results. There have been 835 cases since February, and 646 of those were reported after the first day of in-person classes on August 10.

UNC reported a total of 10 clusters at its Chapel Hill campus, each of which represents five or more cases in close proximity. Across the UNC system, more than 1,500 students have tested positive for COVID-19 since the spring.

While many universities are experiencing a similar explosion in new cases as they reopen their campuses for face-to-face learning, the case of UA is especially significant, since Alabama has used its students as test subjects for a wider national reopening of universities and schools. Just last week, the president of UA in Birmingham, Dr. Ray L. Watts, was bragging about the state’s new federally-funded GuideSafe program, which he said “gives us confidence [that] if there’s a flare-up… we can find it early and we can quarantine, treat and reduce the exposure to others.”

Objective events have exposed the role that Watts and other school administrators are playing: reopening universities and sacrificing the lives of students, faculty and staff. Programs like GuideSafe are put in place not to protect students, but to allow administrators and lawmakers to wash their hands of the consequences of reopening.

While many university administrators have begun blaming students for increases in new cases at universities, UA President Stuart Bell has insisted on the opposite. He said, “Our challenge is not the students. Our challenge is the virus, and there’s a difference, folks… It’s how do we have protocols so that we make it to where our students can be successful, and we can minimize the impact of the virus.”

The protocols that Bell discussed included setting up isolation spaces and disciplining violations of COVID-19 mandates. What is not included is the closing of UA campuses and moving to remote forms of learning. The UA system dashboard, which does not reflect the giant increase in cases over the past week, shows that about 20 percent of the “isolation space” was already occupied at the Tuscaloosa campus prior to this new upsurge in cases.

Dr. Ricky Friend, dean of the UA College of Community Health Sciences, told reporters that while isolation and quarantine spaces were not yet at capacity, “we are concerned that each day that goes by, there might be new cases.” Friend reported that UA was working on getting additional space on top of the 450 beds that are already in place to isolate and quarantine students, a number which is only about half of the 900 cases reported overall this month by UA.

Despite Bell’s supposed defense of students at UA, his general response to the increase in new cases has consisted in targeting students rather than installing more protections and safer infrastructure.

The 566 new COVID-19 cases were reported just a few hours after the City of Tuscaloosa announced that it will be closing bars for the next two weeks and that bar service at restaurants must cease. Bell wrote in a letter to students that university police and the Tuscaloosa Police Department would monitor bars, restaurants and off-campus residences to enforce university guidelines. On Friday, UA announced a 14-day moratorium on all in-person student events outside of classroom instruction.

Other universities across the US are following suit. Ohio State University announced recently that it had issued 228 interim suspensions for individuals and student organizations that had attended or hosted large parties and gatherings in the university district. Boston College also recently announced that it will utilize the Boston police to watch and break up parties in and around its campus.

Alabama has recorded more than 117,000 cases of COVID-19 and has a death toll of 2,024, placing it fourteenth among US states. Alabama Governor Kay Ivey praised both the mayor of Tuscaloosa and university officials for “acting swiftly.” Tuscaloosa Mayor Walt Maddox, a Democrat, stated at a press conference, “My hope is that this will be just a brief pause on their plans to reopen and that we can get this in our rearview mirror sooner, rather than later.”

Other universities around the US that have experienced increases in COVID-19 cases include the University of South Carolina (USC), which recently placed two buildings in its Greek Village under quarantine. The university currently reports that there are 44 active student cases and two active faculty cases. Since August 10, when testing at USC began, a total of 90 students and 10 faculty have tested positive for the virus.

The University of Southern California is also reporting an “alarming increase” in the number of COVID-19 cases among students. It identified 43 cases and has placed more than 100 students in a 14-day quarantine due to exposures. The university resumed instruction almost entirely online beginning August 17 and is limiting access to campus, but many students remain in private apartments and houses off campus, where they are still susceptible to the virus.

Towson University in Baltimore County, Maryland decided to temporarily move to online classes after 55 people tested positive for COVID-19 on campus over two days last week. Princeton University, the University of South California and the University of Notre Dame all either postponed or cancelled face-to-face instruction last week.

While university administrators and lawmakers have continued to keep campuses open in many cases, students, faculty and other staff have continued to protest the reopening measures.

Students and faculty at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania protested the first day of fall semester classes on Monday. One student told reporters, “This last weekend was really honestly terrifying, and we don’t know what the rest of the school year is going to look like, but if it’s any predictor, it’s going to be bad.”

A group of graduate students at Ohio State University protested the return to campus Tuesday, bringing a car caravan to circle the campus in Columbus followed by a socially distanced rally around Bricker Hall. The graduate students issued demands, including the right to opt out of all in-person activities during the pandemic, the reinstatement of cost-of-living adjustments and a meeting with administrators to discuss their demands.

More than 300 University of Georgia (UGA) faculty members signed a column published by the student newspaper last week criticizing the university’s plans for reopening. A model created by John Drake, director of the UGA Center for the Ecology of Infectious Diseases, predicts that hundreds of students were already infected with COVID-19 prior to their arrival on campus and that these will spread the virus to tens of thousands of other students, faculty and staff within the next two months.

Drake wrote: “The resumption of in-person instruction at the University of Georgia is unwise. It is not grounded in evidence nor in the recent experience of other peer universities. Regardless of the precautions taken by the University on campus, both projections and experience suggest that a widespread outbreak of COVID-19 is inevitable unless there is an immediate change in plans for the fall semester.”

University of Michigan (UM) professors are similarly opposing the August 31 reopening of their campus in Ann Arbor. A few dozen professors and community members gathered outside of the Fleming Administration Building last Wednesday to protest.

Kento Toyama, a professor at UM’s School of Information, who organized the protest, told reporters: “We just don’t understand the underlying, true motivation for the decision to reopen. I don’t think anybody other than the university administration—and even then, probably not most people—fully understand the reasons.”

The underlying motivation, which the World Socialist Web Site has outlined numerous times this year, is that the reopening of schools is the official policy of the American government and both big business parties, Democrats and Republicans. The policy of the ruling class, which university administrators and state lawmakers are carrying out, is to fully open the economy, which requires the opening of schools. The inevitable surge of COVID-19 infections and deaths is already underway.