Britain’s undeclared war with Russia

Thomas Scripps & Chris Marsden

The shipment of Storm Shadow cruise missiles to Ukraine, the longest-range weapons yet received by Kiev, confirms the UK’s role as provocateur-in-chief in the NATO war against Russia.

The Ukrainian army is now not only capable of striking Crimea—Russia’s central concern in the war—but deep into the Russian mainland. It takes delivery of these weapons on the eve of a long-anticipated counteroffensive against Russian lines.

The UK's Storm Shadow long-range missile. [Photo by Rept0n1x / CC BY-SA 3.0]

In these circumstances, all that has prevented a direct war breaking out between Britain and Russia is the Kremlin’s restraint, fearing the triggering of NATO’s collective defence clause.

At every stage of the war, Britain has led NATO’s escalation. Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg announced last week that the war in Ukraine “didn’t start in 2022. The war started in 2014.” This dates the beginning of NATO’s “biggest reinforcement of our collective defence since the end of the Cold War” to the Maidan coup sponsored by the US and European powers to instal an anti-Russian regime in Kiev.

The events led to the Russian annexation of Crimea and the eruption of civil war in Ukraine over the breakaway of regions in the East. The situation was formally addressed by the Minsk Agreements which were portrayed as a peace effort. Last December, former German Chancellor Angela Merkel admitted that this was only a cover “to give Ukraine time… to become stronger.”

From that point, British imperialism was central in carrying out a joint programme of training and equipping the Ukrainian army while staging repeated anti-Russian provocations—most notably the 2019 allegations that Moscow had poisoned double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia with novichok.

The UK’s war preparations

Under Operation Orbital, begun in 2015, Britain had already trained 22,000 Ukrainian troops in the seven years before the Russian invasion. It has since trained a further 14,000. In the lead up to the war, thousands of British soldiers were deployed in Eastern Europe on permanent missions or for large-scale NATO combat exercises.

Ukrainian volunteer military recruits take part in an urban battle exercise whilst being trained by British Armed Forces at a military base in Southern England, August 15, 2022. Ministry of Defence and British Army as the UK Armed Forces continue to deliver international training of Ukrainian Armed Forces recruits in the United Kingdom. [AP Photo/Frank Augstein]

The UK played a central role in NATO’s aggressive posturing from the Baltic to the Black Sea. In June 2021, a British warship entered waters claimed by Russia near Crimea, in an incident that nearly resulted in a direct exchange of fire between UK and Russian forces.

The UK’s actions have been accompanied by statements from leading military and political figures making clear Britain’s hostile intentions towards Russia.

In 2016, Defence Secretary Michael Fallon told Parliament’s Defence Select Committee that the UK would be ready for war with Russia by 2018. That year, Chief of the General Staff Sir Nick Carter declared that this included “project[ing] land capability over distances of up to some 2,000 km… copying what the Germans did very well in 1940”. Carter was referring to the preparation by Nazi Germany for Operation Barbarossa—the 1941 war of annihilation against the Soviet Union, recognised as the most brutal military campaign history has ever seen.

The 2021 Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy warned of the acute threat posed by Russia, as well as China, Iran and North Korea, and centred on increasing nuclear warhead capacity by 40 percent. In “Defence in a Competitive Age” the Ministry of Defence described Russia as “the greatest nuclear, conventional military and sub-threshold threat to European security.”

After the Ukraine war broke out in February 2022, a spokesperson for Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced the UK was taking measures “to bring down the Putin regime.” New army chief General Patrick Sanders declared that the “British Army must be prepared to engage in warfare at its most violent.”

The Integrated Review Refresh 2023 is introduced by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak with the declaration, “What has changed is that our collective security now is intrinsically linked to the outcome of the conflict in Ukraine.”

Integrated Review Refresh 2023 [Photo: Open Government Licence v3.0]

Britain supplied £2.3 billion of military assistance to Ukraine in 2022, with a commitment to match that figure in 2023. Thousands of UK troops have been dispatched to Eastern Europe to participate in NATO exercises involving tens of thousands of soldiers and advanced weaponry. UK special forces troops have been deployed to Ukraine, as confirmed in leaked Pentagon files.

Russia has also accused Britain of covertly sabotaging the Nord Stream gas pipeline.

The UK’s main public role since the outbreak of war has been as an outrider for the US and European NATO powers, being the first to supply Ukraine new classes of weaponry. Prior to the provision of long-range missiles, Britain also led the way with the supply of main battle tanks, sending a squadron of Challenger IIs. This was followed by Germany sending Leopard tanks and allowing other countries to send those in their armouries. The US then agreed a shipment of Abrams tanks.

Just days after confirming shipment of the Storm Shadows, now also agreed to by France, the UK used a visit by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to declare a “jets coalition” aimed at securing modern F-16 fighter jets for Ukraine.

The crisis of British imperialism

Britain’s leading role in the war, outstripping to this point France and Germany, is paradoxically driven by its economic and geopolitical weakness, which it has sought to offset through a “special relationship” with the United States.

In its 2022 Congress resolution, “Mobilise the working class against imperialist war”, the Socialist Equality Party (UK) answered the lie that the war in Ukraine was the result of a supposedly unprovoked invasion by Russia, explaining, “The war against Russia is the continuation and intensification of the drive for US global hegemony that was initiated with the first invasion of Iraq in 1990-91 and intensified following the dissolution of the USSR in December 1991,” including wars and interventions against Serbia, Afghanistan, Iraq again, Libya and Syria.

It continued:

“British imperialism participated as a chief partner in every one of these bloodbaths. The UK has long acted as Washington’s foremost ally in Europe. But since Brexit this alliance has assumed an ever more essential imperative in British imperialism’s efforts to project its global interests. Opposed by Washington, Brexit lost the UK its place within the European Union as the foremost advocate of US interests in the continent, especially in opposing German and French efforts to build a European military capability independent of NATO. This has necessitated a redoubling of London’s efforts to prove its usefulness to the White House and the Pentagon. British imperialism, amid an unprecedented collapse in its world standing, is cleaving as close to the US as possible in the hope of a share of the spoils.”

Anglo-Russian enmity and anti-communism

There are deeper historical interests and old scores involved. Relations between Russia and Britain have been hostile for centuries, despite significant periodic alliances championing European reaction, including during the French Revolutionary Wars (1792-1802) waged with the political aim of combating the spread of republicanism from France.

Anti-Russian sentiment was fueled most acutely by the Crimean War (1853–1856), when Britain and France backed the Ottoman Empire in defeating Russia, and was deepened during the “Great Game” conflict over control of Central Asia in the latter part of the nineteenth century.

Britain and Russia found themselves in alliance with France in the Triple Entente (1907) only due to the enormous geostrategic threat posed to British by German imperialism, leading up to the eruption of the First World War in 1914.

Polish, British and French officers inspecting a detachment of Polish troops of so-called Murmansk Battalion before their departure for the front, Archangelsk 1919. [Photo: This image was created and released by the Imperial War Museum on the IWM Non Commercial Licence]

The most significant cause of Anglo-Russian enmity in the 20th century was the October 1917 Revolution, led by Lenin, Trotsky and the Bolsheviks. The seizure of power by the Russian working class in the world’s first socialist overturn of capitalism was viewed as a mortal threat by the British and international bourgeoisie. Britain led the allied armies of counter-revolutionary intervention (March 1918-October 1919) and supplied more than half the troops involved from Britain, the US, Italy, Serbia, Canada and France. Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, the class struggle in Britain, above all during the 1926 General Strike, and the ever-present threat of socialist revolution fed into the ferocious anti-Russian sentiment within ruling circles.

The re-eruption of German militarism and imperial ambitions in the Second World War pushed Britain under Winston Churchill into an alliance with the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin. But as soon as the war was concluded the old enmities re-emerged with force.

Churchill, who gifted the world with the term “the Iron Curtain” at a speech in Fulton, Missouri in March 1946, had urged Washington to continue the war after 1945 against the USSR. “Operation Unthinkable” centred on a proposed July 1, 1945 assault by British, American, Polish and German Nazi forces against the Red Army. It was never implemented because the US was focused on the war against Japan, while Churchill was driven from office in the July 1945 general election that swept Labour to power.

Churchill in the Roman amphitheatre of ancient Carthage to address 3,000 British and American troops, June 1943 [Photo: Unknown author - Unknown source]

While leader of the opposition, Churchill met with former-US army officer Julius Ochs Adler on April 29, 1951, at the height of the Korean War, where he proposed that an ultimatum be delivered to Stalin once he was again prime minister, threatening to “atom bomb one of 20 or 30 cities”, to be followed by “if necessary, additional ones.”

Putin’s nationalist regime emerged out of the restoration of capitalism in 1991, the culmination of the Stalinist counter-revolution against October and the perspective of world socialist revolution on which it was based. Nevertheless, despite the entirely opposed nature of Putin’s government of capitalist oligarchs to Bolshevism, it is impossible to fully appreciate the extent of the UK’s hostility to Russia outside of the historic legacy of anti-communism and bitterness towards the Russian Revolution’s inspiration of anti-colonial struggles in which the British ruling class has been steeped from birth. It is an impulse ultimately rooted in class antagonisms; a hatred of the working class and socialism, shared by the upper middle class, felt so deeply that it is driving the ruling elite to contemplate war with a nuclear power that could end human civilisation.

Labour and the Tories: A single party of war

With Britain being dragged to the precipice of war with Russia, there has been no popular discussion of the consequences thanks above all to the unanimity between the Tories and the Labour Party. Sir Keir Starmer leads one half of a single, joint party of war sitting across both sides of the House of Commons.

At its latest conference, Labour delegates passed a motion submitted by the GMB trade union calling on the party to support the provision of military, economic, diplomatic, and humanitarian assistance to Ukraine, for the party to back an increase in funding for UK defence manufacturing, and supporting a long-term strategy to “tackle Putin and dictators around the world” and for the party to back an increase in funding for UK defence manufacturing.

Sir Keir Starmer, the leader of Britain's Labour Party makes his speech at the party's annual conference in Liverpool, England, September 27, 2022. [AP Photo/Jon Super]

Labour’s shadow foreign and defence secretaries David Lammy and John Healey have written in Foreign Policy magazine, “The next Labour government will ensure Britain is NATO’s leading European nation. We would apply a ‘NATO test’ to major defense projects within our first 100 days to ensure we are on track to fulfil our obligations to the alliance in full and review any capability gaps.”

These warmongers were handed leadership of the Labour Party by Jeremy Corbyn’s successful campaign to block a move by the membership to kick out the Blairites while he was in charge. The Corbynites have since either fallen silent on the war in Ukraine or, like his shadow chancellor John McDonnell, have lined up behind British imperialism and NATO.

War and the class struggle

The UK is above all driven on the path of war by acute social tensions and an eruption of class struggle at home.

Britain’s economic crisis and striving for global position dictates a brutal offensive against the working class, slashing wages, imposing speed ups and destroying social services under conditions of the worst cost-of-living crisis since the Second World War. In turn, militarism and war demands ever more draconian attacks, with the Royal United Services Institute hailing “the end of the peace dividend” such that Britain’s military spending must be prioritised over the “growing share of its national income devoted to the NHS and state pensions”.

Owner of sushi restaurant in Philadelphia stole $1 million from over 200 workers

Landon Gourov & Douglas Lyons

The owner of Osaka Japan, a sushi restaurant located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, stole almost $1 million in compensation from 201 workers. Four years after the Department of Labor (DOL) settled the case in court, workers still have not received the stolen wages and more than likely never will.

Worker carries drinks to a table at Puckett's Grocery and Restaurant, Friday, Sept. 10, 2021, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)

In a six-year timespan beginning in 2013, Kwang Bum Kim pocketed 15 percent of every tip handed out to servers. As one of the most exploited sections of the working class, waiters and waitresses rely on a gratuity form of payment to offset poverty level hourly wages of only a few dollars.

Kim also denied workers overtime wages. In a perfect example of cooking the books, Kim fabricated the amount of hours his employees worked, keeping them on paper to 40 or less a week. While sushi chefs, cooks, bussers and dishwashers routinely labored 60 or more hours per week, Kim paid them a flat rate of between $80-150 per day.

The city of Philadelphia and the state Department of Revenue are owed $400,000 from Kim in unpaid business taxes, according to government officials. In 2019 the city shut down one of Kim’s restaurants for failing to pay taxes.

Department of Labor spokesperson Lenore Uddyback-Fortson said the agency “has made significant efforts to collect this judgment,” including liens on property. The 77-year-old has a house in Blue Bell, in a wealthy suburb of Philadelphia “known for its large executive-style mansions, major business parks, community shopping facilities, and small businesses.”

Under Pennsylvania law, the DOL lacks the authority to seize Kim’s mansion since the property is also under his wife’s name. Gabriel Stoler, a former worker at the restaurant, who is owed $34,000 in stolen wages, told the Philadelphia Inquirer, “I feel like Mr. Kim is gonna get away with it.”

Theft of unpaid wages is big business for capitalists across the United States, amounting to a staggering $50 billion, according to a study conducted several years ago by the Economic Policy Institute. 

A recent study on wage theft by CBS News confirms the theft of billions of dollars in wages from workers across the United States. Their investigation found that in the overwhelming majority of cases the owners get away with breaking the law and workers are left without recourse. 

CBS investigated records from nearly every state department of labor across the country. Of the 650,000 cases they studied, only about half ruled in favor of workers. Within this half, a third of cases resulted in no money collected for workers, for losses amounting to billions of dollars in pay. Only one-third of wage theft cases handled by state agencies resulted in any kind of monetary recovery for workers.

Oscar Torres is a perfect example of the rampant problem of wage theft. He has successfully filed unpaid wage claims against four different companies in Texas, with the Texas Workforce Commission finding in his favor each time. However, in each case the companies owing him money “just disappear,” Torres told CBS, and the state cannot recover the money on his behalf.

Now he has “fallen behind on rent … [and] had to cut back on food expenses.' He said, “It limits the ability to go out or even pay rent or gas to be able to go to another job to get the income that I need.”

California had the longest wait time of any state between the filing of claims for lost wages and resolution. On average, it took 439 days for a case to be brought to court and less than half of cases resulted in a favorable result.

Many more cases of wage theft are never reported by workers for fear of being fired or reprimanded, or victims are simply ignored by the court system. In states like Alabama and Florida, for instance, a state body to process and handle filings for wage theft cases does not exist.

For migrant workers or immigrants attempting to file wage theft claims, the threat of deportation hangs over their heads and those of their families. “Aside from non-payment, [my boss] intimidated us, calling immigration, wanting us to be sent back to Guatemala,” Perez Gonzalez, a worker in Miami, Florida, told CBS.

Shelly Rusicka, development director for Arise Chicago, a local non-profit helping victims of wage theft file lawsuits, told CBS, “Sadly, it’s people who have the least political power. If you're poor, you might have to work three jobs and you don’t have time to do anything else, basically, besides work and try and take care of your family the best you can. If you don’t speak the language, you might be afraid to go and talk to the government.”

In the US legal system, wage theft is rarely seen as a crime equivalent to stealing money from a cash register, or a wallet or purse from someone walking down the street. Owners are not usually prosecuted for theft and can use bankruptcy laws to avoid making payment to their victims.

Jose Urine, another employee at Arise Chicago, told CBS, 'When we’re talking about wage theft, this is largely considered a statutory violation. And for whatever reason, it does receive completely different treatment than if, say, you accosted someone on the street and took their wallet. And the truth is that in almost all aspects, it’s the exact same. The primary difference is that it’s more insidious, right? Because here you have an employer-employee relationship, you have an imbalance of power.”

Though laws in the state of Illinois, for instance, can charge employers with a misdemeanor or a low-level felony for repeat offenders, CBS only uncovered one prosecution since 2010.

The failure of state DOLs to protect workers and ensure full recovery for lost wages is yet another example of legal institutions under capitalism serving the wealthy. For owners, the theft of workers’ wages is simply part of doing business. Most owners violating the law will face little to no consequences.

The DOL, whether on the federal or state level, is no more on the side of workers than other agencies ostensibly created to protect workers from dangerous conditions at work, such as OSHA. As a recent example, last year two brothers were killed after an explosion at a BP facility in Ohio. OSHA fined the multibillion-dollar transnational corporation a mere $156,250 for safety violations that led to the men’s deaths.

Sharp rise in official workplace deaths in Canada as thousands go unreported

Steve Hill

The national day to commemorate workplace deaths in Canada was marked late last month on April 28. For those directly affected, and their families, friends and co-workers, the day can provide a meaningful opportunity to reflect on what has been lost. For government ministers and their lackeys in the leadership of the trade union bureaucracies, it is merely a day to wear coloured ribbons, fly flags at half-mast and give sombre but hollow speeches at public ceremonies.

A scaffolder in Alberta [Photo: Government of Alberta]

In 1991, the federal government gave the occasion official status in legislation through the Workers Mourning Day Act, which stated that “it is desirable that Canadians should designate a day of mourning to remember workers killed, disabled or injured in the workplace,” and that “Canadians seek earnestly to set an example of their commitment to the issue of health and safety in the workplace.”

The law makes no commitments and advances no measures to address the ongoing carnage beyond remembering, once a year, the ever-increasing toll of victims of the capitalist system.

However, the act does make it quite clear that the Day of Mourning “is not a legal holiday or a non-juridical day and shall not be required to be kept or observed as such.” In other words, the Canadian government has accorded the commemoration of what is, on average, the deaths of three workers every day as much gravity and solemnity as National Fiddling Day or National Philanthropy Day.

The facade of concern from official circles for the lives and well-being of workers is betrayed by the actual numbers. According to the latest available statistics from the Association of Workers’ Compensation Boards of Canada, workplace injuries increased by 9 percent from 253,397 in 2020 to 277,225 in 2021. Officially, 1,081 workers were killed on the job in the latter year. This marked an astonishing increase of 16 percent from the total of 924 in 2020 and a significant increase on the yearly average of 945 since 2009.

As outrageous as these numbers are, they only represent approved claims compiled by Workers Compensation Boards across the country and do not include uncompensated claims, those exempt from coverage or cases such as stress-induced suicides or commuting fatalities.

In fact, at least 2 million workers in Canada are not even covered by a public workers’ compensation system. These include farmers, the self-employed and gig workers, among others. Given that deaths occur which do not meet a compensation board’s criteria for inclusion, plus the large number of workers who are simply overlooked, studies suggest that the real number of annual direct work-related deaths across Canada is more realistically over 10,000.

It should be no surprise that the death and injury toll has increased so dramatically in the last few years in light of the huge pressures put on working people by the relentless drive by the ruling class to maximize profit and reduce costs at any expense. The working class has been driven to exhaustion and desperation through the imposition of forced overtime in many industries and the constant threats of layoffs and cutbacks in others, all while trying to survive the renewed assault of inflation on what were already decades of declining standards of living.

A major source of workplace injury and death since 2020 has been the ruling elite’s “profits before life” response to the COVID-19 pandemic. In Ontario, the burden of proof to even be considered for compensation due to a COVID-19 infection is on the employee and of a degree that makes it extremely difficult to establish.

Specifically, the Ontario Workplace Safety and Inspection Board stipulates: “For a COVID-19 claim to be allowed, evidence must show that the person’s risk of contracting the disease through their employment is greater than the risk to which the public at large is exposed and that work significantly contributed to the person’s illness.”

Except for nurses, first responders and personal support workers, under very particular circumstances, the chances of a worker proving on-the-job infection are near impossible. It is certain that thousands of COVID-19 infections and an enormous number of the more than 50,000 dead in Canada can be attributed to workplace exposure. The number of workers forced to work throughout the initial limited lockdowns due to their categorization as “essential” was expansive.

Added to this is the fact that only 40 percent of workers, and just 10 percent among low earners, have access to paid sick leave. The simple economic pressure of having to pay the bills means people work while infected. A study conducted in 2020–2021 in Peel Region in Ontario found that one-quarter of employees went to work while experiencing symptoms, and 1 percent went to work even after testing positive for COVID-19.

As evidence of their supposed efforts to protect workers on the job, the pro-war, pro-austerity Trudeau Liberal government and its backers in the trade union bureaucracy and New Democratic Party point to Bill C-45, also known as the Westray Law. This law was added to the Criminal Code of Canada in 2004 to establish criminal liability of organizations for workplace deaths and injuries.

The law is named for the 1992 Nova Scotia coal mine disaster that killed 26 miners. It took 12 years for a law to be enacted to address a future situation like the blatant disregard for the lives of workers demonstrated by Westray’s owners and supervisors. Nobody from Westray was ultimately convicted of any crime, in spite of repeated complaints about safety issues in the lead-up to the disaster.

Between 2004 and 2022, the criminal code provisions have rarely been used. Of the 23 cases where the Westray Law was applied, charges of criminal negligence were brought against 17 individuals and 13 corporations. Only two individuals and seven corporations were convicted. In only one case was a prison sentence imposed, for three-and-a-half years. In the other eight cases, punishment ranged from about $100,000 to approximately $2.5 million in fines and fees. In that same time, at least 16,000 workers were officially killed on the job across the country, with the real toll undoubtedly much higher.

Just two weeks before this year’s National Day of Mourning was observed, an episode unfolded in criminal court that epitomizes the contempt the capitalist ruling class and its judicial system have for the lives of the working class.

As the World Socialist Web Site reported earlier this year, Patrick Poitras, 25, of Saint-André, New Brunswick, drowned in a frozen tailings pond at the Suncor base mine about 30 kilometres north of Fort McMurray, Alberta, on January 13, 2021. He had been operating a bulldozer on the frozen pond when the ice beneath gave way and the vehicle fell through.

Suncor and Christina River Construction, which were facing a combined 28 charges, pleaded guilty to a single count each under the Alberta Occupational Health and Safety Act in the death of Poitras. Both parties submitted to an agreed statement of facts read into the record in Fort McMurray Provincial Court. Suncor admitted that the required measurements done on the ice had indicated it was too thin to bear the weight of the bulldozer Poitras was operating. Christina River pleaded guilty to a count that specifies a contractor’s duty to not create a risk to the health and safety of any person.

After all the other charges were withdrawn, a joint submission for sentencing was accepted by the court. A total judgment of $745,000 was levied in combination against the two companies. Christina River Construction has been ordered to pay a total of $325,000. Of that, $200,000 will go to fund the creation of a memorial scholarship and a memorial safety award in Patrick Poitras’s name, $75,000 will be used to subsidize safety courses and the remaining $50,000 will serve as a fine.

Suncor has been ordered to pay a total of $420,000. Of that total, $50,000 will likewise serve as a fine, and the remaining $370,000 will be used to help fund research into engineering safety and risk management. But it was the fact that the dangers of the work environment in the oil sands were already so well known that led to the laying of 28 charges in the first place.

Suncor is notorious for the lax attitude to safety that has resulted in the deaths of at least 12 workers at its oil sands facilities in northern Alberta since 2014. With more than $27 billion in gross profits last year, the piddling fine imposed by the court will have zero deterrence value on the brutal practices of the oil sands giant.

Papua New Guinea foreign minister stands aside amid coronation travel furore

John Braddock

Papua New Guinea’s Foreign Minister Justin Tkatchenko declared on May 12 that he had “stood aside” from his position amid an escalating furore over the cost of the country’s delegation to the coronation of King Charles III in London.

Papua New Guinea Foreign Minister Justin Tkatchenko [Photo: US Department of State]

Tkatchenko sparked the controversy after his daughter Savannah, who had travelled with the delegation, posted a TikTok video boasting about her first-class plane journey and luxury shopping spree in Singapore. It prompted outrage with many respondents arguing that the public money should have been spent on basic services.

In an interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Tkatchenko branded his daughter’s critics as “primitive animals.” He declared: “She’s absolutely traumatised by these primitive animals… I call them primitive animals because they are.” He continued: “Jealousy is a curse. And, you know, these people clearly show that they have got nothing to do in their lives other than to put down people that want to do something good for their country.”

The comments provoked a public backlash, including protests by students who marched from the university campus to parliament in Port Moresby behind a large banner reading “We are not primitives!” “It is not just about the offensive comments,” student Michael Pais told Radio NZ. “The primary reason is the manner in which money has been spent on this trip and the extravagance displayed whilst our people lack the most basic services.”

Tkatchenko said he “stood aside” after consulting with Prime Minister James Marape, who would assume the portfolio. “I want to make sure the recent events do not interfere with the official visits and summits we are going to have with all the World Leaders in the coming weeks,” he said.

Before a late cancellation on Wednesday, US President Biden, Indian Prime Minister Modi and leaders from Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific were due in Port Moresby for a summit on May 22. It was to be the first visit by a sitting US president to a Pacific nation, taking place as Washington ramps up its diplomatic and strategic offensive against China. The US and PNG are close to signing a defence cooperation agreement potentially allowing American troops access to the nation’s ports and airports.

According to the PNG Post Courier, a total of 6 million kina ($US1,650,000) was used to attend the coronation in London as well as on local celebrations at a stadium in Port Moresby attended by a “handful of people” including Marape, British High Commissioner Keith Scott and embassy officials.

PNG’s Government House official secretary Bill Toraso denied that the governor general’s office had spent as much as 3 million kina on overseas travel but confirmed to Reuters 10 of its staff went to London plus 10 guests. Two foreign ministry officials also travelled with Tkatchenko. According to the Post Courier, PNG had been given only four tickets for the official coronation ceremony in Westminster Abbey.

Demands for Tkatchenko’s resignation by the political establishment, including the parliamentary opposition parties and trade unions, were clearly aimed at quashing any social unrest provoked by the affair, particularly in the face of the looming international summit. Marape released a statement saying he too had been “offended” by the remarks, while asking the people to “accept” Tkatchenko’s subsequent apology.

In fact, the contempt displayed by the minister for the broad population simply revealed too openly the attitude of the country’s entire ruling stratum. At least one MP, Billy Joseph, came to Tkatchenko’s defence, calling for Papua New Guineans to “stop the deep hate and reverse discrimination” levelled against him.

Explosive political tensions have been generated over a long period by the vast gulf that separates the poverty-stricken PNG masses from the country’s corrupt and venal ruling class. Trust in the political establishment has disintegrated following decades of social deprivation and growing inequality, buttressed by authoritarian military-police measures.

The elections in 2017 and last year, in which Marape was installed, were both widely viewed as illegitimate. The electoral process was plagued by violence, fraud allegations and large numbers of voters missing from the electoral roll. Marape’s Pangu Pati, like previous administrations, now governs in a fragile three-party coalition, making for notorious instability, flagrant horse-trading and corruption.

Tkatchenko is a beneficiary of this political swamp. He has shifted his political allegiances whenever convenient and is currently a member of the Social Democratic Party in the coalition. Australian born, he is a naturalised citizen, a former television host and has significant business interests.

In the now infamous case of the “missing Maseratis,” as minister for the 2018 APEC summit in the Peter O’Neill-led government, Tkatchenko oversaw the purchase of 40 high-end Maseratis and four Bentley cars, costing $US5.6 million.

Meant to impress visiting APEC dignitaries, the luxury cars were never used. Protests and strikes erupted over the extravagant waste of public money. Queried about whether the vehicles would be sold to recover the money, Tkatchenko famously promised they would “sell like hot cakes.” According to police, however, they remain locked away in an old shed on the capital’s main wharf.

Many took to social media to focus on the extreme social inequality and deprivation that prevails. On Twitter, Maninhare Grant highlighted the near collapse of the health system with a photo of the country’s second largest hospital with a queue of new mothers forced into the corridor after delivering their babies. Another person posted a photo of Tkatchenko’s upmarket apartment contrasted with the wooden shanties in which his constituents live in an area of Port Moresby rife with homelessness.

Despite its significant natural resources PNG, an Australian colony until 1975, is among the poorest countries in the world. According to UN figures, 39 percent of the people live below the poverty line of $US1.90 a day. During the COVID pandemic tens of thousands of workers, estimated as high as 25 percent of the workforce, lost their jobs. Meagre government relief measures such as tax deferrals and loan repayment holidays have been woefully insufficient. The fragile health system with inadequate working conditions and low pay has seen repeated protests and strikes by nurses.

Among deepening popular discontent, the Marape government is turning to more repressive measures. Last month, a curfew was imposed in the West New Britain province and extra police mobilised to quell unrest over the shooting dead of 16 prisoners trying to escape from Lakiemata prison. Seven out of the 24 escapees, aged between 22 and 40, were on remand.

In other authoritarian moves, forthcoming amendments to media laws threaten to mirror the harsh restrictions that applied until recently in Fiji. The new law aims “to outline the objectives and strategies for the use of media as a tool for development,” but less than two weeks were provided for submissions. The law has been described by media freedom advocates as “the thin edge of the web of state control.”

As for Tkatchenko, it is likely that Marape will not take long to express his forgiveness by reinstating the unpopular minister, either in his previous role or in another high-profile position—a move required to keep his unstable coalition government intact.

Turkish elections: Far-right candidate demands Erdoğan, Kılıçdaroğlu expel refugees

Ulaş Ateşçi

A runoff will take place in the Turkish presidential elections on May 28, as preliminary results from the Supreme Election Board show incumbent President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan received 49.5 percent of the vote, while Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu came in second with 44.88 percent.

The NATO-Russia war played a central role in the election. Kılıçdaroğlu promised to be a better ally to NATO than Erdoğan. He enjoys the support of Western capitals, while the Kremlin sees it as critical that Erdoğan remains in power as he seeks to maneuvers between NATO and Russia in the war in Ukraine.

Sinan Oğan, the far-right Ata Alliance candidate who received a surprise 5.2 percent of the vote in the first round, is expected to play a key role in the second.

Sinan Ogan, presidential candidate from ATA (Ataturk) alliance, formed of nationalist political parties, is surrounded by supporters in Ankara, Turkey, Thursday, May 4, 2023. [AP Photo/Burhan Ozbilici]

Before the first round, he stated that he would demand a ministry as a conditions for supporting a candidate in the second round. However, in interviews after May 14 election, he made clear his conditions for supporting Erdoğan, or Kılıçdaroğlu. Erdoğan is the candidate of the People Alliance led by the Islamist Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the fascist Nationalist Movement Party (MHP). Kılıçdaroğlu is running for the Nation Alliance led by the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and the Good Party, a MHP split-off.

Speaking to BBC Turkish on Monday, Oğan said he would “complete consultations within one or two days” and announce who he will support in the second round. He said, “We have certain conditions such as fighting terrorism, distancing ourselves from political parties supported by terrorist organizations and sending back refugees.”

Oğan reiterated these two conditions in a later interview with CNN International. Asked about forceful deportation of refugees in Turkey, he proposed to take a cue from Washington’s brutal anti-immigrant policies, stating: “We will do what the American police do when they catch a Turkish illegal immigrant. What the American police do is as democratic as ours.”

Oğan added, “As the United States did with Mexicans to send them back, we will do with Syrians, Afghans, Pakistanis and others. There will be no volunteering, they must be sent back for sure.”

Oğan stated that he will not support any of the candidates in the second round if they do not commit to these issues.

In an interview last night with TV100, Oğan said their first demand was an “uninterrupted fight against Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), Fetullah Terrorist Organization (FETÖ), [Kurdish Islamist] Hezbollah and all kinds of terrorist organizations.” He also demanded a timetable for the deportation of refugees and declared that no ministry should be given to the Kurdish nationalist Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), which backs Kılıçdaroğlu, or the Kurdish-Islamist Hüda Par, which supports Erdoğan.

Turkish nationalist parties from both the People Alliance and the Nation Alliance accuse the HDP of being a “political extension” of the PKK. The Hüda Par, which entered parliament on AKP lists in Sunday’s elections, was founded by supporters of the Kurdish Islamist paramilitary group Hezbollah, which the Turkish state has declared a “terrorist organization.”

Oğan has long-standing ties with both the People Alliance and the Nation Alliance. Elected as an MHP deputy in 2011, Oğan announced in 2015 that he would run for the chairmanship against party leader Devlet Bahçeli. He was later expelled from the party. During the 2017 constitutional referendum, he campaigned for a “No” vote along with Meral Akşener within the MHP, which supported Erdoğan in a “Yes” campaign. Akşener later founded the Good party, forming an alliance with Kılıçdaroğlu.

Both Erdoğan and Kılıçdaroğlu want to win the election in the second round with Oğan’s support.

In an interview after the election, Erdoğan's spokesperson İbrahim Kalın said: “When you look at the political tradition Mr. Sinan comes from, I know his position is closer to the People's Alliance... He had a good campaign. He expressed his own theses. Like the fight against terrorism and refugees... I think he clearly showed who we should be against when it comes to Turkey's national interests.”

The Erdoğan government is deporting Syrian refugees fleeing NATO’s war for regime change back to Syria, as part of a plan to prevent the emergence of a Kurdish state in northern Syria led by the US-backed People’s Protection Units (YPG). Ankara has been building housing in areas of Syria illegally occupied by the Turkish army and its Islamist proxies, planning to resettle Syrian Arabs to outnumber the Kurds. At the same time, it is trying to re-improve relations with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Shortly before the election, Erdoğan said: “We have built over 100,000 houses in northern Syria and voluntary returns to these areas have begun. It is not in line with our humanitarian, conscientious and civilizational values to force people who seek refuge with us to the door. But we will of course take the necessary action against those who misbehave.”

Last year, Erdoğan announced plans to return 1 million Syrians and signaled a new military operation against the YPG. The plan was shelved after failing to get the green light from the United States or Russia.

Kılıçdaroğlu, backed by the HDP and the pseudo-left parties such as the Stalinist Workers Party of Turkey (TİP) as a “progressive” alternative to Erdoğan, has been criticizing Erdogan from the right for years, demanding the deportation of refugees. If elected, Kılıçdaroğlu pledged to reach an agreement with the European Union to send the refugees back within two years. His Kurdish nationalist or pseudo-left allies ignored this reactionary campaign.

Engin Özkoç, a CHP leader, said Kılıçdaroğlu had a phone call with Sinan Oğan on the night of the election. “The call was very positive. Our leader congratulated [Oğan],” he said.

Özkoç expressed how close his right-wing party was to making an agreement with a xenophobic fascist with these words: “I don’t think there is a difference in our thoughts about the expectations of our nation. And I don’t think we have a difference in our national stance.”

This dirty bargaining based on ignoring the right of nearly five million people who voted for the HDP-backed Green Left Party in Sunday’s elections and forcibly deporting millions of refugees reveals that the Nation Alliance, the HDP and the pseudo-left forces behind it are completely incapable of defending basic democratic rights.

No matter which candidate Oğan backs, the NATO-Russia war and the right-wing parties’ ties with imperialism are at the center of the presidential election.

The US and European media did not hide their disappointment at Kılıçdaroğlu’s failure to win against Erdoğan. The Guardian editorial bluntly wrote: “For Europe and the US, which had hoped an opposition victory would see Turkey turn more towards the west, five more years of Mr Erdoğan would be a highly unwelcome development—particularly ahead of a decisive period in Ukraine.”

A commentary in the pro-Kremlin newspaper Vzglyad explained why Erdoğan, maneuvering between NATO and Russia, was preferred by Moscow: “In terms of personalities, most Russian experts were rooting for Erdoğan… there were serious reasons to suppose that in case Kilicdaroglu wins, Turkey will join Western policy of blockading Russia.”

It continued: “That is, simply put, it would abandon Erdogan’s ‘both ours and yours’ line, after which it would rigidly enforce anti-Russian sanctions, supply more weapons to Ukraine and foment the Russian periphery.”

Far from opposing both the interventions of NATO and Russia in Ukraine, the HDP and the TİP have become part of the war. They refused to oppose Finland’s NATO membership in the Turkish parliamentary vote, even though Finland’s joining NATO represented a significant escalation in the war against Russia.

Russia downs British-supplied long-range missile as Zelensky and Sunak declare “jets coalition”

Robert Stevens

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky travelled to the UK Monday for a war summit with British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, and to press for more weapons ahead of an expected spring offensive by Kiev’s NATO-armed troops.

Central to NATO’s plans to defeat Russia and force regime change in Moscow is aerial supremacy over the Ukrainian battlefield.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak meets Volodymyr Zelensky, President of Ukraine, for a bilateral meeting at Chequers, United Kingdom, May 15, 2023 [Photo by Simon Dawson/No 10 Downing Street / CC BY 2.0]

Before announcing his arrival in Britain, Zelensky tweeted, “Today—London. The UK is a leader when it comes to expanding our capabilities on the ground and in the air.” Speaking to reporters after the talks, he said, “Today we spoke about the jets” and “We want to create this jet coalition.” This was a “very important topic for us because we can’t control the sky”. Overcoming this was critical to Kiev’s planned counter offensive, with Zelensky telling reporters, “We really need some more time—not too much. We’ll be ready in some time.”

Zelensky met Sunak and Foreign Secretary James Cleverly for talks at the prime minister’s Chequers country residence after his tour of other European capitals—Rome, Berlin and Paris—to secure further pledges of military aid.

That the entire European continent is now a tinderbox was made clear by Russia’s announcement—while Sunak was meeting Zelensky—that it had shot down a UK-supplied Storm Shadow cruise missile. Russia’s Defence Ministry said it had also downed shorter-range, US-built HIMARS and HARM missiles. 

The Sunak-Zelensky talks took place just 48 hours after Russia’s confirmation that Storm Shadow missiles supplied by Britain struck two industrial sites in the Russian-held city of Luhansk in eastern Ukraine. Britain, in close co-ordination with the Biden administration, became the first country to supply Ukraine with long-range missiles capable of hitting Russian-held Crimea, where Moscow bases its geo-politically critical Black Sea fleet.

Moscow declared that it would respond militarily to London’s “hostile” action. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Sky News Monday that Russia took an “extremely negative view”. He added, “Great Britain aspires to stand at the forefront of those countries that continue to pump weapons to Ukraine,” before claiming, “this cannot have any significant, fundamental impact on the course of the special military operation”.

In response to the latest developments, Russian President Vladimir Putin held a Security Council meeting Monday, bringing it forward five days.

A Downing Street press release ahead of the talks said the Ukrainian “President will update the Prime Minister on his meetings with European leaders over the weekend as Ukraine prepares for an intensified period of military activity.”

Following the delivery of the Storm Shadows, Sunak would “confirm the further UK provision of hundreds of air defence missiles and further unmanned aerial systems including hundreds of new long-range attack drones with a range of over 200km [124 miles]. These will all be delivered over the coming months”. The type of drone being handed over was not specified, but the range spoken of is almost twice that of the HIMARS rocket launcher system. The press release stressed, “This equipment will support Ukraine over the coming months in their anticipated military surge to counter Russian forces.”

Sunak said that the UK supplying Ukraine with fighter jets was “not a straightforward thing” but that “Volodymyr and I have been discussing” how to “build up that fighter combat aircraft capability.” Britain’s Royal Air Force uses Typhoon jets and F-35s, while Ukraine is training on F-16 fighters, he added.

The Guardian noted, “Britain does not use F-16s, which are made by the US defence firm Lockheed Martin in South Carolina. Ukraine has been seeking to obtain them for some time to augment its small Soviet-standard air force because they are widely available, with about 3,000 in service in 25 countries.”

Sunak stressed that “It’s not just the provision of planes, it is also the training of pilots and all the logistics that go alongside that, and the UK can play a big part in that.” Britain would instead begin this summer “an elementary flying phase for cohorts of Ukrainian pilots to learn basic training.” The training would go “hand in hand with UK efforts to work with other countries on providing F16 jets,” said the Downing Street statement.

His central message, however, was that the UK would be heavily involved in campaigning for those with F-16s to provide them. “We are going to be a key part of the coalition of countries that provides that [jet fighter] support to Volodymyr and Ukraine.”

Downing Street emphasised, “This visit also comes ahead of the Council of Europe Summit in Iceland, which the Prime Minister will attend and President Zelenskyy will attend virtually, and the G7 Summit in Japan. The Prime Minister will use these gatherings to push for sustained international support for Ukraine, both in terms of military aid and long-term security assurances.”

Britain continues to play the role of leading anti-Moscow provocateur on NATO’s behalf, including by providing non-stop training to Ukrainian troops—beginning years before the Russia invasion. After the 2014 NATO-backed coup which overthrew Ukraine’s pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych, the UK launched Operation Orbital. The Downing Street press release said, “Since the outbreak of full-scale war the UK has also trained 15,000 Ukrainian troops in the UK, on top of the 22,000 troops trained in Ukraine between 2014 and 2022 under Operation Orbital.”

The day after Germany announced that it was handing over a further £2.4 billion of military aid to Kiev, its largest package yet, and taking its total military funding to nearly $7 billion (£6.44 billion), Downing Street boasted it would match the £2.3 billion of “military support to Ukraine in 2022—more than any country other than the US,” and would keep up that level of support.

The press release declared, “So far in 2023 the UK has provided equipment including a squadron of Challenger 2 main battle tanks, self-propelled guns, hundreds of armoured vehicles and sophisticated missiles including Starstreak and Storm Shadow. Today’s announcements are further to these previous donations.”

Across the entire political spectrum and throughout a pro-war media, there is total support for escalating war against Russia—a nuclear armed power—no matter what the consequences. In its coverage of the Sunak-Zelensky talks, the BBC commented on Ukraine’s newly secured long-range missiles, which have wrought death and destruction on the population of Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and other countries as part of the operations of British imperialism: “The Storm Shadow cruise missiles can be used to destroy Russia's positions on occupied Ukrainian territory.

“If Ukraine can destroy Russia’s command centres, logistics hubs and ammunition depots in occupied territory, then it may prove impossible for Moscow to continue resupplying its frontline troops in places.”

Inflation drives US household debt to record $17 trillion

Patrick Martin

Jaqueline Benitez, who depends on California's SNAP benefits to help pay for food, shops for groceries at a supermarket in Bellflower, Calif., on Monday, Feb. 13, 2023. [AP Photo/Allison Dinner]

US household debt has hit $17 trillion, the most in history, according to a report issued Monday by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. The figure reveals the enormous financial stress on working class families. Rapidly rising prices for gasoline, food, rent and other basic necessities have devastated household budgets, forcing working people to borrow on their credit cards or take equity out of refinancing their homes to pay their bills. 

The report puts the lie to the claims of the Biden administration, echoed by the corporate media, that the US economy is sound, inflation is coming down, and the recent bank failures in California are only a blip on the screen, not an indication of deeper problems. The reality is that tens of millions are living on the edge, one unexpected expense away from disaster.

The figures laid out in the New York Fed report are stark. Total household debt rose by $148 billion in the first three months of 2023, an increase of 0.9 percent compared to the previous quarter. Nearly all major categories of consumer debt rose in the first quarter to record levels. Mortgages topped $12 trillion, student loan balances were $1.6 trillion, and auto loans were $1.56 trillion.

Credit card debt remained the same, at a record $986 billion, but this was also a sign of increased financial pressure. It was the first time in 20 years that this debt has not fallen in the first quarter. Credit card debt usually hits a peak with the Christmas shopping season, then falls in the first quarter as people spend less and use income tax refunds to pay down credit card balances. This seasonal effect did not take place.

[Photo: New York Fed Consumer Credit Panel/Equifax]

Overall consumer debt has shot up by nearly $3 trillion since the end of 2019. This represents a marked reversal from the first two years of the pandemic, when most households were forced to cut their spending as they stayed home because of the danger of coronavirus.

Consumer debt actually fell during those years, and household savings jumped by $2.1 trillion as many used government stimulus checks to pay off debt. According to a report last week by the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, this “excess” saving has been nearly exhausted. Only $500 billion remains, which will be gone by the end of this year, removing that cushion against the twin evils of inflation and recession.

Another financial expedient during 2020-2021 was mortgage refinancing. Some 14 million mortgages were refinanced, taking advantage of historically low mortgage rates as the Federal Reserve pumped trillions to prop up the financial system to benefit the super-rich and drove down the cost of borrowing.

Cash-out refinancing allowed mortgage holders to extract $430 billion in home equity, but that prop to consumer spending is also gone, since the rapid hikes in interest rates in 2022 have popped that financial bubble. Both new mortgages and mortgage refinancing hit 20-year lows in the first quarter.

The business press, in reporting the debt figures, avoided examining the meaning of the rising household debt for working people either individually or as a class. The $17 trillion in total debt, averaged over 125 million households, would come to roughly $140,000 per household. With median household income around $70,000, the debt-to-income ratio would come to 200 percent.

One credit industry report found that the proportion of people carrying a debt balance from month to month rose from 39 percent in 2022 to 46 percent in the first quarter. These tens of millions of card holders were paying interest rates at a record average rate of 20.33 percent, according to Bankrate.com. The previous record was 19 percent in July 1991.

While the overall delinquency rate on payments remained stable, the proportion of credit card debt in serious delinquency, with no payments for 90 days or more, shot up from 4 percent in the fourth quarter of 2022 to 4.6 percent in the first quarter of 2023. For younger people, aged 18-29, the serious delinquency rate was 8.3 percent, nearly twice as high.

Credit cards are increasingly used by younger people to cover their daily expenses, which they cannot afford on their low pay rates. One industry survey found that 42 percent of those aged 27-42 (“Millennials”) had increased their use of credit significantly over the past year, as well as 27 percent of those aged 43-58 (“Gen X”).

The two older generations, aged 59-73 and 74 and above, carried the highest average credit card balances, over $5,000, and therefore stand to pay on the average more than $1,000 a year in interest just on those balances, as well as interest charges on any new purchases.

A second survey, reported by Market Watch, found that 60 percent of US adults live paycheck to paycheck, while 73 percent of Millennials do so. An identical 73 percent of Millennials are carrying credit card balances.

The credit card reporting agency TransUnion found in its own first quarter report that because of price increases outstripping wage increases and rising interest rates, consumers “are increasingly turning to credit to manage their household budgets, leading to record or near-record high balances in credit cards and unsecured loans.”

Behind these numbers is the reality of mounting class oppression. Tens of millions of working people, particularly from the super-exploited younger generations, are on a downward treadmill of low wages, ever higher prices, constant borrowing, crushing debts, and no prospect of improvement, let alone escape, within the framework of capitalism.