France and UK spar to be leading US military partner in Syria

Chris Marsden

France is playing the leading European role alongside the United States in preparing for military action against Syria that threatens a direct confrontation with Russia.

US President Donald Trump has held two conversations with French President Emmanuel Macron, the latest on Monday night. On Tuesday morning, France issued a statement pledging to retaliate against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad if it is proved that his government and armed forces were responsible for the supposed chlorine gas or nerve gas attack in Eastern Ghouta.

Referring to Macron’s earlier declaration regarding the use of chemical weapons, spokesperson Benjamin Griveaux told Europe 1 radio, “If the red line has been crossed, there will be a response,” before adding that intelligence “in theory confirms the use of chemical weapons.”

A French statement explained that both countries had “exchanged analyses confirming the use of chemical weapons.”

So politically vital is the relationship being forged between the US and France that CNN ran an April 9 op-ed by former New York Times columnist David A. Andelman titled, “With France in, Trump has no excuse not to act on Syria.”

Andelman voiced his ire over events in August 2013, when President Barack Obama and his French counterpart, François Hollande, pledged united military action over false claims that Assad had used sarin gas, but Obama “pulled back from the abyss, with French bombers poised on their runways.”

Today, Andelman wrote, with Macron scheduled to pay a state visit to the White House in two weeks, “there is every reason for Trump to steel himself and go into battle with a staunch friend and ally, Macron’s France, at his side…”

Britain’s ruling elite, whose foreign policy depends on preserving the vaunted “special relationship” by being first off the blocks in any US-led war, is apoplectic at this latest turn of events. The media overflows with militarist rhetoric mixed with expressions of concern at being overshadowed by France.

Rupert Murdoch’s Times quoted “senior figures” warning Prime Minister Theresa May of the UK “losing influence in Washington to France if it turned down a request by President Trump to join a retaliatory strike.” The article added, “President Macron of France was said by Whitehall sources to be ‘egging on’ Mr Trump.”

Downing Street had been “left embarrassed as Mrs. May was still waiting to speak to Mr. Trump last night,” the Times continued, leaving Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson speaking alternately to “his US and French counterparts yesterday as he sought to keep Britain within any joint action.”

The Daily Telegraph, the house organ of the Tory Party, was equally warlike and concerned at the UK losing influence with the US to France. It too noted how the UK’s standing with Washington was undermined when, on August 30, 2013, Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron, faced with widespread anti-war sentiment and divisions in the military, called a parliamentary vote on a planned strike on Syria and lost. This played a significant role in Obama backing down over Syria the next day.

The Telegraph wrote, “The fact that Mr. Trump called French President Emmanuel Macron prior to calling Mrs. May should be seen as an indication of Washington’s enduring wariness about Britain’s ability to support military interventions.”

Thanks to Cameron, “the parliamentary precedent has now been set whereby any overseas intervention by the British military requires Commons approval,” it complained. “Unlike Mrs. May,” it continued, “the French president has no constraints on his authority when it comes to launching military action, and if Washington is looking for a prompt response against the Assad regime, he might find the French are in a better position to act than the British.”

Britain’s loss of position is only acting as a spur to its offering the use of a Royal Navy attack submarine armed with Tomahawk cruise missiles or possibly Royal Air Force fast jets capable of firing Storm Shadow cruise missiles.

Speculation is rife over whether May will now act without parliamentary approval and reverse the precedent set by Cameron, or, in what is considered a less likely move, recall MPs from their Easter break.

The Tory right is adamant that May should proceed without parliamentary approval. Tom Tugendhat, chairman of the foreign affairs committee, told May to “stick with your allies… We can be legalistic or we can be realistic.”

A senior military source took the same line, telling the Times, “You have to examine options… [It is] a prime minister’s decision at the end of the day.”

The most politically vicious response came from Tory MP John (Johnny) Mercer, a captain and career soldier until 2013. Writing in the Telegraph April 8, Mercer denounced a parliamentary vote and the possibility of Labour MPs led by Jeremy Corbyn opposing actions as symptoms of broad-based anti-war sentiment that must be fought.

“The nation’s politics have become nauseatingly pious since Iraq,” he wrote. A parliamentary vote was “a uniquely useless way of conducting foreign policy, and in almost one action emasculates us on the world stage… It is a cop-out to go to Parliament on issues of national security…”

He continued: “It is now time get out there and tell the British people what modern warfare is about,” including targeting “every individual inside Syria involved in the chemical weapons decision-making cycle,” levelling military bases and recognising that Assad “should have been dead long ago.”

“We don’t shy away from targeting individuals with drones in their beds because the political risk is too high,” he insisted.

Writing again in the Sun, Mercer focused his ire on “my largely Labour Party fellow parliamentarians [who] voted against taking military action against President Assad in 2013… You can draw a clear correlation between our vote in Parliament in 2013, Obama’s unenforced red line in 2013 and an emboldened Putin and Assad.”

The Sun ’s own warmongering centred on a denunciation of Corbyn for his past leadership of the Stop the War Coalition, which was more concerning than “his dalliances with IRA sympathisers and Soviet spies.”

Stephen Bush suggested in the pro-Labour New Statesman that no one need be too concerned at a parliamentary vote because, even though Corbyn is urging a political solution, “There is a significant group of Labour MPs who bitterly regret not voting with the government in 2013 and that buffer of 30 to 50 MPs means that if May wants some kind of military response to this attack, she has the votes for it.”

Bush is correct in his appraisal of the parliamentary arithmetic, thanks to Corbyn’s refusal to oppose the naked warmongers in his own party. With Tony Blair himself stating that no Commons vote is needed on war, the Blairites’ position was epitomised by Simon Tisdall in the Guardian, who insisted, “It’s time for Britain and its allies to take concerted, sustained military action,” ending the situation where “hands are thrown up in horror at the prospect of another open-ended, armed Western intervention in the Middle East.”

But this is not simply about a parliamentary vote. The British ruling class is both vitriolic in its attacks on Corbyn and bitterly opposed to any repeat of a democratic vote on its war plans, no matter how meekly Corbyn frames his protests, because this might provide an impulse to the widespread anti-war sentiment among workers and youth.

May appears to have heeded the advice, convening a meeting of the National Security Council yesterday to discuss the UK response and speaking directly to Macron and Trump.

Australian universities integrated into military build-up

Oscar Grenfell 

An article published by the Conversation last month has underscored the extent to which Australian universities are integrated into a vast military build-up through a string of defence research initiatives and expanding ties with private military contractors.

The report, by University of Melbourne academics Tilman Ruff and Alex Edney-Browne, begins by noting that the federal Liberal-National government’s 2016 Defence White Paper outlined an 81 percent increase in military spending over a decade, or around $495 billion.

Ruff and Edney-Browne also draw attention to a $3.8 billion allocation to the Export Finance and Insurance Corporation, a little-known government body, announced by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull last February. The money is aimed at expanding arms exports with the stated goal of Australia becoming one of the world’s top 10 weapons dealers.

The unprecedented allocation of resources to the military follows substantial increases to the defence budget by the previous federal Labor governments of Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard. It is aimed at placing the country on a war footing, in line with Australia’s backing for Washington’s “pivot to Asia,” a major US military build-up in the Asia-Pacific in preparation for conflict with China.

In 2011, the Greens-backed Gillard Labor government, as part of its support for the US pivot, signed secret agreements that expanded basing arrangements and integrated the Australian military into the US war machine. The report in the Conversation makes clear that universities are a key component of this project, which has been deepened by successive governments.

In 2014, the Defence Science and Technology Group (DST Group), a wing of the Department of Defence, which researches and develops new military, surveillance and intelligence technologies, announced the formation of the Defence Science Partnerships (DSP) program.

Dr Alex Zelinsky, DST Group’s chief defence scientist, declared that it would “provide a uniform model for universities to engage with Defence on research projects and ensure a consistent approach to intellectual property and cost sharing.”

Zelinsky made clear that the program was aimed at subordinating universities and academic research skills to the needs of the military. “The program’s strength lies in its potential to harness Australia’s world-class research and better align it to Defence priorities through increased collaboration and a greater sharing of resources and infrastructure,” Zelinsky declared.

In 2015, Zelinsky forecast that DSP would “grow into a $40m to $50m” program per year, up from that year’s figure of $16 million. Currently, 32 universities are partners in the program. They range from the country’s prestigious “sandstone” universities, such as the University of Melbourne and the University of Sydney, to institutions with a large working-class student cohort, including the University of Newcastle and Western Sydney University, in New South Wales.

The activities of the DSP are opaque. In an article in the Australian in 2015, Zelinsky wrote that the “next stage” was “to begin knitting together universities to work on specific challenges associated with the national science and research priorities.” Zelinsky indicated that of “particular interest to Defence is the cybersecurity priority.”

The year after Zelinsky’s article appeared, the Department of Defence announced a $12 million outlay of funds to establish a “purpose built” cyber-security facility at the Australian National University in Canberra. The centre brings together students, academics and intelligence agents from the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD), in a collaboration focused on “data analytics, performance computing and cyber security.”

The ASD is Australia’s primary electronic eavesdropping agency. It works closely with the US National Security Agency, as part of the intelligence sharing “Five Eyes” network, which has been involved in spying on the private communications of hundreds of millions of people, illegally tapping foreign heads of state and conducting offensive cyber-warfare operations.

As part of the DSP, a number of universities, including ANU, offer scholarships for undergraduate and postgraduate students to participate in defence research. The centre at the Australian National University makes clear that the aim is to harness their skills for the military and integrate them into the murky world of professional spies, military contractors and academics who collaborate with the military.

Ruff and Edney-Browne also point to direct ties between Australian universities and the US military. Last year, the Department of Defence joined with the US Department of Defence in establishing a Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative.

The program, funded to the tune of $27 million, provides grants to universities for specific research projects, and facilitates collaboration in military research between US and Australian institutes. Ruff and Edney-Browne note that the grants are provided to universities for research on “designated topics” with “potential for significant future defence capability.” Like the DSP, the programs are shrouded in secrecy.

A key aspect of the militarisation of universities, outlined in the Conversationreport, is their rapidly expanding ties to private military contractors.

Ruff and Edney-Browne point to the establishment last year of a new Lockheed Martin research centre at the University of Melbourne. Lockheed Martin, the largest military contractor in the world, has the closest ties to the Pentagon, and has developed some of the most highly-coveted American war technology, including next generation fighter jets and drones that have been used to bomb Yemen, Iraq, Syria and other targets of US aggression.

According to a 2016 article in the Age, the centre, known as STELaR Lab, will focus on “developing sophisticated computer software to help direct attacks” on targets. LM Australia and New Zealand chief executive Raydon Gates said it would develop “the ability in a conflict situation to analyse that data and then make the correct decision.” Lockheed Martin stated that the lab will also focus on “autonomous systems, robotics, command, control, communications, computing, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.” All of these technologies are critical to the preparation and waging of wars against militarily advanced adversaries.

In an indication of the bipartisan backing for the military build-up, STELaR Lab’s launch in August 2016 was attended by then Liberal-National Coalition Defence Industry Minister Christopher Pyne, as well as Stephen Conroy, then Labor’s shadow minister for defence and Victorian Labor Premier Daniel Andrews. The centre has received funding from the DST Group.

DST Group previously funded the establishment of the Defence Science Institute (DSI) at the University of Melbourne’s Parkville campus. Opened in 2010 with the backing of the federal Labor government of Kevin Rudd, the DSI’s stated aim is to “build defence science research networks.”

The DSI also funds programs at other universities, including one at RMIT University in Melbourne examining “unmanned aircraft systems” that can fly and harvest their own energy in “urban environments.” Another, in partnership with the US Army, is aimed at developing artificial enzymes, which may “decontaminate nerve agents … offering protection to war fighters and civilians in a range of chemical and biological threats.” In other words, preparations for urban and chemical warfare.

The Conversation article notes that ties between the universities and military contractors are continuing to expand. In February, the University of Melbourne signed a “memorandum of understanding” with BAE Systems, a major British arms manufacturer, for the establishment of a manufacturing and innovation centre at Fishermans Bend. The centre is slated to supply the army with new AMV35 Combat Reconnaissance Vehicles.

In its announcement, BAE Systems made clear that it is seeking to integrate the university into its activities as closely as possible. It stated that “the two organisations have agreed to consider opportunities to collaborate in relations to graduate placement, internships, research and development activities and sharing of facilities (real estate and tools and equipment).”

The University of South Australia, Adelaide University and Flinders University are also part of a research network established by BAE Systems.

Significantly, last month, the company won a $1 billion federal government contract to “upgrade” the “Jindalee Operational Radar Network (JORN).” The systems operations are shrouded in secrecy, but it is known that it is used to surveil much of the Asia-Pacific region. BAE Systems stated that JORN, “plays a vital role in supporting the Australian Defence Force’s air and maritime operations, border surveillance, disaster relief and search and rescue operations.”

An article in the Age in 2006 noted that JORN was “a key link” in “a new anti-ballistic missile shield” being developed by the United States. While such “shields” are invariably presented in defensive terms, they will undoubtedly play a central role in offensive military operations, including any US strike against North Korea or China.

The academics who authored the Conversation report note that the expanding ties between universities and military contractors potentially implicate the former in major crimes. BAE Systems third-largest customer is the despotic Saudi Arabian regime, to which it supplies aircraft used in the genocidal bombing campaign against Yemen.

Significantly, the report in the Conversation concludes by warning that the militarisation of the universities could pose a risk to academic freedom. It stated: “As Australian research councils struggle and universities face a funding freeze, academics with limited funding options may be driven to seek military funding. This could undermine their control over the direction and use of their research. Academics may be less inclined to speak out against military funding if their department, colleagues, or PhD students rely on it.”

University administrations have already cracked down on anti-war activities at campuses across the country.

In 2015, the University of Sydney banned a Socialist Equality Party meeting opposing the drive to war and the glorification of militarism on Anzac Day, the nationalist public holiday which celebrates the unsuccessful Australian, British and New Zealand invasion of Turkey in World War I. The International Youth and Students for Social Equality, the youth wing of the SEP, has faced repeated attempts to prevent it from forming affiliated student clubs by student union and university administrations at a number of campuses, including at the University of Melbourne.

UK’s Open University to be decimated, as more jobs are eliminated

Simon Whelan 

Britain’s largest academic institution, the Open University (OU), has announced plans to drastically slash the numbers of academics it employs and greatly reduce the number of courses available for distance learning.

Hundreds of jobs are threatened, in what the vice-chancellor making the cuts, Peter Horrocks, described as “the largest restructuring redundancy programme ever in UK university history.”

The cuts will decimate a public resource that has been utilized by thousands of mature, working class and overseas students who could not otherwise train or become better qualified.

Last summer, the OU announced that government cuts to funding demanded savings of £100 million from its £420 million annual budget. The OU has more than 170,000 students enrolled, 1,000 academic and research staff, and over 2,500 administrative, operational and support staff.

During the last week of the recent and ongoing lecturers’ strike over pension cuts, which involved staff at more than 60 universities, management announced plans to slash 220 teaching staff in the University of Liverpool.

Redundancies in FE continued to be pushed through, with the Hull College Group—who provide FE colleges in Hull, Goole and Harrogate—proposing redundancies for 230 lecturers, almost one-third of the teaching staff. University and College Union members at the Hull College Group are being balloted for strike action over the coming weeks.

According to the Guardian, confidential documents reveal the scale of the cuts to be made at the OU—with staff told they have only until early April to accept “voluntary” redundancy. The report uses management-speak like “focusing,” “rationalisation” and “consolidation” rather than “redundancy” and “offering less education” to describe the fundamental changes being proposed.

The number of OU courses, qualifications and modules available to students is to be cut by at least a half. More than 40 undergraduate courses and postgraduate degree courses are to be axed, leaving only around 70 courses available. Courses to be sacrificed will fall from within departments teaching science, business and music.

The devastating OU cuts would mean an end to the education reform carried out in 1969 by Harold Wilson’s Labour government to provide tertiary education for the working class. In its near 50 years of existence, almost 2 million British and international students have been able to gain qualifications studying with the OU.

In its early days, the OU was renowned for novel and inventive ways of successfully teaching science—to students based at home, for example. The Conservative governments of Edward Heath and Margaret Thatcher in the 1970s and 1980s attempted to cut resources to OU, as they were opposed to its egalitarian ethos, but were opposed by students.

Over recent decades, course content has been allowed to atrophy, with staff overworked and burdened with additional administrative measures and reduced budgets.

The atmosphere prevailing at the OU was illustrated by a letter to the Guardianfrom a member of staff who noted, “Where voices of opposition have been raised, senior faculty staff are pressured to keep quiet (and not to support the pension strike). With an ever-present threat of redundancies, others are simply fearful of speaking out in public.”

The letter continues, “Disquiet with the direction of change and incompetent management has seen innumerable departures of senior staff under Peter Horrocks’ tenure. … The current leadership oversaw the disastrous closure of regional OU centres and the chaotic introduction of the group tuition policy, all against warnings from experienced academics.”

University workers will see no struggle waged by the University and College Union (UCU) or any of the education unions against any of the cuts and job losses being proposed. The union has not lifted a finger against the drive to privatize education in HE and FE over the last decade, and is currently attempting to sell out the struggle of its university members who are opposing huge attacks on the Universities Superannuation Scheme pension scheme.

A spokesperson for the UCU said, “The proposals under discussion would destroy the OU as we know it, turning it from a world-leading distance education university into a digital content provider,” but offered no proposals to oppose this.

As the Liverpool cuts were announced, UCU regional official Martyn Moss said only, “We are seeking more information on what exactly this will mean for staff and students at the University of Liverpool.”

The role of the unions as adjuncts of management is seen in their role in the planned destruction of jobs at the University of Portsmouth. The university lost £4.5 million income in 2018/19 and is set to lose at least the same again this year as the result of a freeze on undergraduate tuition fees. Applications from 18-year-olds to the university dropped by 3,220, down to 13,620, between 2014 and 2017. In response, management declared that the university is in a fight based on “competitive student recruitment” and demanded that departments find savings of 5 to 7 percent or take measures to boost income.

Last Friday, staff received an email signed jointly by Vice-Chancellor Professor Graham Galbraith, the UCU’s vice-chair Phil Verrill and the Unison union branch chair Chris Burke-Hynes. The email, published by the Portsmouth News , outlined a redundancy scheme being sent to all 2,500 staff. It stated, “We need to respond to the sector challenges and to seek to create opportunities from them so that our long-term strength and sustainability is secured. Against this background, the university is working in partnership with UCU and Unison to develop a voluntary severance scheme which could be offered to all staff.”

The email continued, “It would seem that there are some staff who would like to take the opportunity of leaving the university if this could be achieved through a mutually agreed financial package.”

Justifying the job losses to local UCU members, Branch Secretary Dr. James Hicks stated, “I think all universities are looking to make the kinds of savings that Portsmouth is looking to make.

“When the details of the scheme come out then we’ll deal with the enquiries that members may have about their specific concerns. I believe it’s a wider sector problem. Portsmouth is in a better position than a lot of other universities.”

According to the Portsmouth News the job cuts scheme is being promoted by the UCU on the basis that it will be available to all staff and not just a select number! It reported that Hicks “said the scheme was different from redundancies and it would allow all staff to apply—with their applications to leave then considered by bosses.”

The UCU will act no differently anywhere else in imposing the diktats of management.

Bavaria revives Germany’s notorious “Radicals Decree”

Justus Leicht 

The district administration of Upper Bavaria has denied a candidate teacher a post as trainee because he was a member of the student and youth organisation of the Left Party up until the spring of 2017. Only following an interim injunction did the Bavarian administrative court allow 34-year-old Benedikt Glasl to continue his teacher training for the time being.

Despite the court’s decision to allow Glasl to continue his training, his case raises serious issues. It makes clear that government agencies are prepared to take action against even the most harmless critics of capitalism, and that the German intelligence services, which have been severely discredited in light of their involvement in the activities of the far-right NSU terror gang, are regaining influence.

Glasl, who studied political science, social studies, German, history and sport for a teaching post, applied for a traineeship at a school a year ago, a prerequisite for becoming a teacher. He was assigned a job. But just before he could take up the post, which in Bavaria involves taking an oath as a civil servant, the administration declared that he could not be sworn in due to doubts about his loyalty to the constitution.

In a questionnaire, Glasl had acknowledged that he had been active during his studies in the Left Party movement and in the Social Democratic Student Union (SDS). He had protested, among other things, against military research at state universities and tuition fees.

The state administration forwarded its questionnaire to the local office of the state domestic intelligence service (known in Germany as the Office for the Protection of the Constitution), which took three months to review his case. In the meantime, Glasl was awarded an internship at his assigned school. He was able to continue his education, but received no salary and was not allowed to teach alone in front of a class.

Eventually, in January, Glasl attended a hearing held by the relevant administration director. Glasl denied that he had ever sought to transform existing society. In addition, he had been inactive for a long period before formally ending his membership of the two organizations. The administration of Upper Bavaria then advocated “the appointment of Mr. Glasl at the earliest opportunity.”

However, on February 12 Glasl received a letter stating the very opposite. The secret service had vetoed his appointment, although legally it is not able to do so. The Bavarian government adopted the argument put forward by the intelligence service in confidential letters, and now declared: “Ultimately, there has been no credible, recognisable distancing from extreme left-wing views.” At the end of the letter, the administration explicitly referred to the intelligence service: the “relevant authority” had “convincingly expressed concerns for a second time.”

Glasl lodged an expedited appeal against the decision with the administrative court, which ruled in his favour on March 9. This means he can continue his internship until the end of the school year.

In its interim order, the administrative court largely based its arguments on the Federal Constitutional Court’s 1975 “ Radicals Decree,” which denied employment in the public services “to anti-constitutional forces.” At that time the highest court in Germany had restricted a ban on employment from being imposed on a blanket basis, stipulating that every case be dealt with on an individual basis, which takes into account the personal impression given by the applicant.

The Bavarian administrative court justified its decision by arguing that the Basic Law guarantees every German the free choice of profession and equal access to public office. Teacher training is a state monopoly, even if the position itself does not qualify for status as a state official. As a result, Bavaria was obliged to provide Glasl with an “equivalent, non-discriminatory” preparatory post, if necessary as an employee—including a period of employment at a school.

In addition, there was no evidence that Glasl was seeking to turn students against the constitution. Finally, the state could not allow an applicant to undertake a traineeship for an extended period of time and then cancel it. Otherwise, the work done so far in training would be rendered “largely worthless.”

The radicals decree reactivated in the case of Glasl was first enacted by the first Social Democratic-led government in post-war West Germany. On January 28, 1972, Chancellor Willy Brandt (SPD) and the country’s state premiers adopted an agreement on “Principles on the issue of anti-constitutional forces in public services” at a conference on “Internal Security Issues.”

The aim of this “state premier’s decision” was to rid the country’s public services of so-called “enemies of the constitution.” Under normal circumstances, recruitment authorities asked officials of the domestic intelligence service (“Rule Inquiry”) whether they had “knowledge” of the applicant. If this were the case, then the candidate had to comment on this in his or her interview; if they were unable to dispel the doubts, then their application for a post was usually rejected. The applicant had the possibility of appealing against the decision, but such procedures usually lasted for many years.

According to the Federal Ministry of the Interior, a total of 454,000 security checks took place in federal and state governments from January 1, 1973, to June 30, 1975. Of these, 328 applicants were rejected. Altogether, from 1972 to 1991 about 3.5 million applicants for public service at a national and state level were examined following a “Rule Inquiry” by the employing authority or the intelligence services. In about 11,000 cases, trials of the persons concerned were held. A total of 1,250 people were not hired due to the ruling against them.

Around 260 existing civil servants or employees were dismissed during the same period. For the most part, teachers (around 80 percent) and university teachers (around 10 percent) were affected. There were also cases involving the judiciary, railways and post. Most of the rejections were made between 1973 and 1979, peaking in 1975. Despite the official claim that the radicals decree was directed equally against “right-wing and left-wing extremists,” those affected were almost exclusively members or supporters of leftist organisations.

A commission of the International Labour Organisation (ILO), a specialist agency of the United Nations, came to the conclusion in February 1987 that the implementation of the decree banning persons from employment violated the ban against discrimination in employment and occupation. A judgment by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg on September 26, 1995, involving a teacher from Lower Saxony who had been dismissed because of her membership of the DKP (German Communist Party) in 1986, saw it as a violation of the right to expression and association guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights.

The state of Bavaria has played a leading role when it comes to spying on and prosecuting those with leftist opinions. It was the last German state to end the use of the radicals decree and the only state to introduce a new procedure instead. On December 11, 1991, the state government issued a statement requiring the “constitutional compliance in public service.”

The “new” procedure required each candidate for public service employment in Bavaria to indicate on a questionnaire whether he or she is or was a member or supporter of one of a number of organisations listed as anti-constitutional. The list of more than 200 domestic and foreign groups and parties includes Germany’s Left Party and its predecessor organisations. On the basis of this information, employers can make inquiries to the secret services, which could then lead to the rejection of the applicant—in practice an alternative version of the “Radicals Decree.”

In fact, the current case goes even further. In 1995 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that such practices violate the European Convention on Human Rights. The Left Party is represented in most German state parliaments and in number of state governments. In addition, the Bavarian authorities granted the secret service a kind of veto right, capable of overriding its own judgements based on the case law of the Federal Constitutional Court.

The background to the events in Bavaria is growing social tensions and the consequent sharp shift to the right by the entire political establishment.

Last July, the Bavarian state parliament passed a new security law, which allows the police to indefinitely detain people in the event of “imminent danger.” The Bavarian premier at that time and current federal interior minister, Horst Seehofer, has unequivocally declared his intention of establishing a “strong state” throughout Germany based on the Bavarian model.

His proposals include internment camps for refugees and mass deportations, as well as “effective video surveillance” of all “hotspots” in Germany, resulting in the systematic surveillance of the entire population. In addition, Seehofer announced the recruitment of 7,500 new federal police and a “zero tolerance” policy.

Olaf Scholz (SPD), who as mayor of Hamburg bore political responsibility for the massive police violence against protesters at the last G20 summit and for an accompanying campaign against “violent left-wing extremists,” also has a key position in the new federal government as vice-chancellor and finance minister.

Germany: The social and political background of the fatal rampage in Münster

Christoph Vandreier 

The motives of the driver responsible for the rampage in the northwest German city of Münster, which killed two people on Saturday, are still unclear. Even if the evidence points to personal motives, links to the extreme right-wing milieu cannot be excluded. In any case, the terrible act throws a spotlight on an increasingly brutalized society.

The police assume that the 48-year-old Jens R. drove a camper van into a group of people who were sitting in the outdoor area of a restaurant in the centre of Münster at 15:27. Two people were killed, a 51-year-old woman from the Lüneburg district and a 65-year-old man from the Borken district. More than 20 other people were seriously injured. Four of them were still in mortal danger on Sunday. Seconds after the attack, the perpetrator shot himself.

According to the investigators, it was the action of an individual. Two people who, according to initial testimonies, jumped out of the vehicle shortly before the impact had turned out to be particularly loud passers-by, according to the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper. Also, it appears there is no indication of a connection to terrorist circles.

However, in the dead man’s apartment in Münster, police found a lifelike model of an AK-47 (Kalashnikov) machine gun, a gas cylinder and a so-called Polenböller (explosive). In addition to this apartment, Jens R. had also rented a storage facility in Münster and two other apartments in the Saxony towns of Pirna and Heidenau, which were also searched by the police. “The first, but already intense review has revealed no evidence of a political background,” said a police spokesman.

The police have provided hardly any information about R. and his motives. However, numerous details about his life have come to public attention. The Süddeutsche Zeitung reports that R. had been a rather wealthy furniture designer who following great professional success then failed. After this, his situation further worsened. He had made serious accusations against neighbours, doctors and his parents.

In the apartment in Pirna, investigators found an 18-page text in which R. outlined his life story. In it, he reports serious problems with his parents, guilt complexes, a nervous breakdown and recurring mental breakdowns and early thoughts of suicide. He also described aggressive outbreaks and behavioural disorders. In 2014, for example, he smashed up his parents’ furniture with a hatchet.

The Süddeutsche Zeitung also reports on a suicide letter, which R. sent on March 29 to various acquaintances. Although there was no hint of a rampage, there was of suicide. According to newsweekly Der Spiegel, a neighbour forwarded the text to the police. The police had established the suicidal thoughts, but could not find R. Even the social psychiatric service of the city of Münster knew of R's mental health problems, because he had approached them earlier. Apparently, there had already been a previous suicide attempt and the police had probably already stated in previous charges against him that he had mental health problems.

Even if all this indicates that R. acted out of personal motives, a connection to the far-right milieu cannot be ruled out. According to Tagesspiegel, as early as Saturday, security experts had suggested that there could have been contact with right-wing extremists. On Sunday, it was reported that a right-wing extremist known to the authorities lives in the property in Pirna in which R. rented an apartment. The Saxony state criminal police are checking if there is a connection. The investigators in Münster are also investigating possible contacts with the city's neo-Nazi scene.

Even if there were no direct contacts with right-wing extremists, one can only understand a heinous act such as the rampage conducted by R. in connection with the brutalization of society. Personal motives, which were apparently abundant in R's life, can only lead to such a monstrous act under certain social conditions. And these have intensified extremely in recent years.

Almost every day, the witch-hunting of refugees takes on ever more aggressive forms. In the terrible machinery of deportation that has been set in motion with the support of all the establishment political parties, xenophobia has become the official policy. Now, the grand coalition government of the Christian Democrats and Social Democrats has announced a massive stepping up of the powers of the state apparatus at home and Germany’s military capacity abroad. The military budget is to be doubled. Already, German soldiers in Afghanistan and Syria are involved in serious war crimes. This brutalization is preparing the ground for heinous acts such as the mass shooting that took place in Munich in July 2016.

It is therefore all the more repellent when various politicians and media outlets use the killings in Münster to call for increased state powers and to agitate against refugees.

About an hour after the crime, the deputy parliamentary leader of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), Beatrix von Storch claimed there was a relationship between the government's refugee policy and the rampage. She tweeted without comment the statement made by Chancellor Angela Merkel in the summer of 2015 in relation to the reception and integration of refugees: “We can do it.” Even when Jens R. was established as the prime suspect, Storch said he was “mimicking Islamic terrorism” and wrote, “Islam will attack again.”

Her party colleague and parliamentary deputy Norbert Kleinwächter tweeted in relation to the attack: “When will this government understand that these deluded Islamists, these crazy time-bombs ... simply don’t belong to Germany?” In this way, he not only imputed an Islamist motivation behind the crime, but, like Storch, made not terrorists and Islamic fundamentalists but Islam as a whole responsible for terror.

Such brazen witch-hunting was not limited to just the AfD. In a commentary for Die Welt, Rainer Haubrich wrote on Sunday, “Although it was soon established that Münster was not an Islamist attack, everyone knew that given the chance, it could have been one.” From this, he draws the conclusion that Germany needs a new security law, like the state of emergency introduced in France following the Paris attacks, and which abrogates fundamental democratic rights. It is now well known that all the terrorists in France had close links with the secret services. The same applies to Anis Amri, whose attack on the Berlin Christmas market in December 2016 killed twelve people.

Japan activates first Marine brigade since World War II

Peter Symonds

The Japanese military activated its first marine unit since end of World War II on Saturday at a base near Sasebo on the southwestern island of Kyushu. The 2,100-strong Amphibious Rapid Deployment Brigade (ARDB) has been trained by the US Marines Corp as part of the US-led military build-up in the region against China.

After the ceremony, some 1,500 ARDB troops staged a 20-minute public exercise to simulate the recapture of a remote island from invaders. Tomohiro Yamamoto, vice defence minister, said that “defence of our islands had become a critical mandate,” given the difficult security situation surrounding Japan.

Japan’s focus on “island defence” takes place amid the continuing tense standoff between China and Japan in the East China Sea over the uninhabited islets named as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China. Repeated close encounters involving Japanese and Chinese aircraft and vessels have taken place over the past six years near the islands, which are currently controlled by Tokyo but claimed by Beijing.

The Japanese government of Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda stoked tensions with China in September 2012 by buying the islets from their private owner, or “nationalising” them. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe who came to power in late 2012, further exacerbated the confrontation by declaring he would never negotiate over the sovereignty of the Senkakus.

In 2014, US President Barack Obama upped the ante by declaring that the US would back Japan militarily in the event of a war with China over the disputed islands.

The formation of the Marine brigade is part of the Abe government’s remilitarisation of Japan and the refocusing of its armed forces away from countering Russia to the north towards “island defence” in the south. Japan’s southwestern islands, including Okinawa, which is home to major US military bases, are directly adjacent to the Chinese mainland.

The Japanese military also plans to put troops and long-range, surface-to-ship missiles on some of its southernmost islands. In 2016, it opened a radar station on Yonaguni-shima, from where it can monitor the Senkaku/Diaoyu islands, some 150 kilometres to the north, as well as a vast sweep of ocean in the East China Sea.

The radar placement will work in tandem with missile batteries that are being installed on the island of Ishigaki. The Independent earlier this year reported that about 600 troops will be stationed on Ishigaki along with anti-ship and anti-aircraft missiles. The anti-ship missiles are likely to have a range of around 150 kilometres, while the surface-to-air missiles may include Patriot batteries targeted against Chinese ballistic missiles.

Such installations are part of the Pentagon’s AirSea Battle strategy which envisages a massive air and missile attack on China from ships and bases off the Chinese mainland. Japan is part of the so-called first island chain that includes Taiwan and the Philippines, that could form a barrier in the event of war with China, preventing its war ships and submarines from entering the wider Pacific Ocean.

The new Marine brigade is not simply defensive in character but could be used during a Japanese war of aggression far from its shores. As well as Marines, the military is acquiring huge helicopter carriers, which could function as aircraft carriers, amphibious ships, Osprey tilt-rotor troop carriers and amphibious assault vehicles.

Activating the Amphibious Rapid Deployment Brigade (ARDB) is another step towards establishing a military force similar to a US Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU), which is capable of operating far from its home base.

Grant Newsham, a former US Marine colonel who helped train the ARDB troops, told Reuters that Japan had already “demonstrated the ability to put together an ad hoc MEU,” but did not have a permanent unit. “If Japan put its mind to it, within a year or year-and-a-half it could have a reasonable capability,” he added.

The development of an offensive military capacity is a breach of Japan’s post World War II constitution, under which it renounced the right to wage war or to establish armed forces. Encouraged by Washington, successive Japanese governments have circumvented the constitution by claiming that its Self Defence Forces (SDF) are purely for self-defence.

Abe, however, openly breached the constitution by pushing through so-called collective self-defence legislation in 2015 that permits Japan to join in US-led wars of aggression. He is actively campaigning to refashion the constitution to remove all restraints on the use of the military to prosecute the economic and strategic interests of Japanese imperialism.

Since taking office, Abe has made concerted efforts to remilitarize Japan. Last December, the cabinet approved a record-high, draft defence budget of $US46 billion which will include the purchase of two Aegis Ashore anti-ballistic missile batteries and Japan’s first long-range cruise missiles that can be mounted on fighter jets.

While the Japanese defence budget is substantially less than the $177 billion spent by China on its armed forces, Japan can at present rely on its alliance with the United States, whose military spending dwarfs that of any other country. Moreover, Japan has a substantial high-tech industrial base that could be used to rapidly expand its military capabilities.

Amid growing geo-political tensions, fuelled in large measures by Washington’s aggressive policies around the world, Japan, along with Germany and other major powers, are rapidly building up military forces. In this highly tense situation, the danger is that a relatively minor incident in the Senkaku/Diaoyu islands, on the Korean Peninsula, or at a flashpoint elsewhere in the globe could precipitate a catastrophic conflict.

Brazil’s ex-president Lula turns himself in to police after supreme court ruling

Miguel Andrade

Former Workers Party (PT) president Luís Inácio Lula da Silva, better known as Lula, was arrested on Saturday after handing himself in to Brazil’s Federal Police to serve a 12-year sentence for corruption and money laundering. Lula’s prison order was issued less than 24 hours after the country’s supreme court (STF) rejected his plea for habeas corpus. The ruling allowed the 8th Panel of the 4th Appeals Circuit Court (TRF-4) to jail Lula while he appeals the criminal conviction.

The process leading up to Lula’s jailing dates back to November 2015 when a former PT senator raised the ex-president’s involvement in a bribes-for-kickbacks scheme related to infrastructure contracts with the state-run oil giant Petrobras investigated by the Carwash (Lava-Jato) probe. The process highlights both the political bankruptcy of the PT during its almost 14 years in power and the rapid drive of the country’s ruling elite towards authoritarian forms of rule.

The conviction is based on charges that after leaving the presidency in 2010, Lula accepted a seaside penthouse in the resort city of Guarujá, 70km southeast of São Paulo, worth approximately $1 million, from the construction giant OAS, one of the companies involved in the Petrobras bribes-for-kickbacks scheme. The trial is not about Lula’s oversight of a Brazilian capitalist economy rotted with corruption directed against the working class.

The evidence agianst Lula consists of little more than an OAS internal document containing nicknames related to the penthouse which OAS executives claim were used to refer to Lula and his late wife, Marisa Letícia. The documents purportedly show that the penthouse, still legally owned by OAS, was covertly reserved for Lula but that ownership was not officially transferred.

Significantly, both 13th district judge, Sergio Moro, and the three-judges panel in the TRF-4 declined to name any specific favor granted or promised by Lula to OAS, claiming instead that “likelihood beyond a reasonable doubt” of his rendered services could be inferred from “the whole” of his demonstrated relationships with the construction giants owners.

Under a law Lula himself signed in 2010, the ex-president is now barred from running in the October presidential elections beause of his conviction by the appeals court. For almost two years, Lula has led in polls with 35 percent of support. Polls have also shown support for fascist reserve army captain Jair Bolsonaro, who polls at 20 percent, the same level as the expected abstention rate. The support for Lula and Bolsonaro reflects widespread disgust with every political party, including the PT.

The recent anticipation that Lula’s habeas corpus petition could be granted unleashed a barrage of military threats on Tuesday, April 3, that undoubtedly made the Supreme Court feel it was voting at gunpoint in order to avoid a coup.

Brazil’s oldest daily, O Estado de São Paulo, which backed the 1964-1985 US-backed military dictatorship and is a longtime military mouthpiece, launch the first warning shot. It quoted reserve army general and former East Division commander Luiz Schroeder Lessa as saying that granting Lula’s habeas corpus petition would mean “there will be no alternative except for a military intervention” and that the supreme court would be “inducing violence” by allowing him to appeal while free. Hours later, army commander Eduardo Villas Boas tweeted “that the army shares the well-meaning citizens’ feelings against impunity [for Lula].”

The order by Moro denying Lula’s habeas petition, which the supreme court then affirmed, was written in a distinctive fascistic tone, justifying the early arrest on the grounds that the clarifying appeals allowed by law were “a delaying pathology that should be wiped out of the legal world.” The Brazilian edition of the Spanish El País found on April 6 that the attorney-general’s office had sent the TRF-4 a secret request that the warrant be sped up “in order to undermine [Lula’s] felling of omnipotence.” This would prevent Lula from “manipulat[ing] the masses” to obstruct the arrest.

After Moro granted Lula 24 hours to turn himself in on Thursday, Lula went to the headquarters of the metalworkers union of the so-called “ABCD region” southeast of the city of São Paulo, where the PT organized a demonstration with thousands of supporters who tried to block him from leaving to face arrest. Lula’s defense lawyers then negotiated more time from prosecutors to avoid a bloody crackdown on the demonstration.

Lula finally turned himself in after a one-hour speech in which he made every effort to assure he was no threat to the interests of capitalism, by recalling the 1980s strikes which brought down the US-backed dictatorship and claiming to have always “learned from workers” how to proceed. In fact, Lula’s government worked from its inception to stabilize capitalism in Brazil and advertise itself as an example of a bourgeois party of rule to the imperialist powers. The services Lula rendered to imperialism famously earned him the 2009 complimentary remarks by Barack Obama that he was “the man” and the most popular politician on earth.

The PT has been the preferred party of rule of the Brazilian bourgeoisie for almost 14 years, setting up the whole repressive apparatus that is presently turning against the PT. Lula’s party even appointed five of the six Supreme Court Justices who voted against his habeas corpus petition.

Amid a drive to dictatorship and a military intervention in Rio de Janeiro, the PT is courting the military, blaming the press for “misusing” Villas Boas’s remarks and saying they are “also against impunity” “like Villas Boas,” with PT’s candidate for governor in Rio, Celso Amorim, writing in a February 25 article in PT’s mouthpiece CartaCapital that the right-wing president Michel Temer must be opposed because in the 1990s “Brazil rejected this subject mentality for the role of the armed forces,” by which “they should fight crime and leave aside ambitious national projects such as the nuclear submarine and the supersonic fighter jets.”

Right-wing nationalist Orban wins Hungarian election

Peter Schwarz 

The right-wing Fidesz Party of Prime Minister Viktor Orban won Sunday’s parliamentary election in Hungary by a wide margin. Expectations that the Fidesz Party would lose support due to several corruption scandals and claims by pollsters that the mood in the country was shifting did not materialise.

With the voter turnout a relatively high 67 percent, Fidesz secured 91 of the 106 directly elected parliamentary seats. Only in Budapest did the opposition manage to win 12 of the 18 directly elected seats.

In the second vote, based on which the 93 remaining seats are distributed proportionally, Fidesz won 49 percent, outperforming its vote in 2014 by 4 percentage points and securing a further 42 seats. With 133 seats in the 199-seat parliament, Fidesz will have a two-thirds majority for the third time in a row.

Orban waged a far-right election campaign focused solely on the issue of immigration. He warned of the complete collapse of the Hungarian state and the Hungarian nation as a result of uncontrolled mass migration, which only he could prevent. He demonised the US-based Hungarian billionaire George Soros as well as the European Union and the United Nations. With barely concealed anti-Semitic undertones, Orban accused Soros of planning to rob the people of their Christian and national heritage by encouraging mass migration by Muslims to Europe.

Yet the number of refugees living in Hungary, just a few thousand, is extremely low. Hungary was a transit country in 2015 along the so-called Balkan route. But the border has since been hermetically sealed and most refugees have left the country.

Orban’s ability to win the election is less an expression of his own strength than of the utter bankruptcy of the so-called opposition. None of the parties that stood in the election had any answers to the burning social issues facing the country, which is among the poorest in Europe. They represent sections of the middle class that see their own social rise hindered by Orban and his cronies. They either support the European Union, the driving force behind the policies of economic liberalisation and austerity, or seek to outflank Orban from the right, in some cases combining the two positions.

None of the parties challenged Orban’s anti-refugee propaganda. A cross-party consensus exists that immigration from “foreign cultures” is undesirable. Orban even came under attack from the right because he has accepted some 3,000 refugees in recent years under existing refugee laws.

The biggest loser in the election was the social democratic MSZP, which lost 13.3 percentage points and finished with just 12.2 percent of the vote. The successor organisation to the Stalinist state party, it led the government from 1994 to 1998 and from 2002 to 2010. While in power it imposed right-wing liberal economic reforms.

Ferenc Gyurcsany, the last MSZP prime minister, made a multi-million-euro fortune from investment banking and stock market speculation. He was brought down in 2009 over a series of corruption scandals. He now has his own party, the Democratic Coalition (DK), which secured 5.5 percent of the vote.

The far-right Jobbik emerged as the largest opposition party, with 19.4 percent of the vote. In the past, it pursued an openly neo-fascist line and collaborated with right-wing militias. However, it has attempted in the recent period under leader Gabor Vona to present a more moderate face. Several of the most radical members were forced out of the presidium.

Vona retreated from his previous call for an exit from the EU and instead called for its reform, and he sent greetings to the Jewish community. None of this helped the party. Compared to the last election, it lost close to 1 percentage point.

The Green LMP was another party to surpass the 5 percent hurdle for parliamentary representation, with 6.9 percent of the vote. The LMP increased its vote by 5 percentage points.

Orban’s election victory was welcomed by far-right parties across Europe. The first to congratulate him included Marine le Pen of France’s National Front and Geert Wilders from the Dutch Freedom Party. Le Pen boasted that Orban’s “big and decisive victory” reflected opposition to the mass migration made possible by the EU and said “nationalist” deputies could hold the majority in the European Parliament following the European elections in May 2019.

The leadership of the right-wing nationalist Alternative for Germany proclaimed the result of the Hungarian election to be “a good day for Europe.” Jaroslav Kaczynski, the leader of the Polish government party PiS, personally supported Orban during the election campaign.

However, Orban’s support comes not only from the far-right. Fidesz is a member of the European People’s Party, which includes most of the continent’s Christian Democratic and conservative parties, including the German government parties Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Christian Social Union (CSU). The CSU has repeatedly invited Orban as a guest to its party congresses in Bavaria.

CSU leader Horst Seehofer, who as interior minister in the current German government is responsible for the police, border protection and refugee policy, warmly congratulated Orban. Seehofer said he was very happy about Orban’s “very clear election victory.” The CSU would continue to maintain its partnership with Orban, he added.

He went on to state that he viewed “the policy of arrogance and paternalism towards certain member states” to be mistaken. This was obviously a reference to the EU Commission and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who have pressed Hungary to accept its share of refugees.

Merkel and EU President Jean-Claude Juncker also congratulated Orban on his victory, if in more reserved terms.

Under conditions of deepening social tensions and the growth of the class struggle, the established parties across Europe are moving ever further to the right. The agitation against refugees is serving as a means to mobilise right-wing and fascist forces to be thrown against workers in struggle.

French government launches brutal attack on environmental protest camp

Johannes Stern

On Monday morning the National Gendarmerie, France’s militarized police, deployed nearly 2,500 heavily armed officers to brutally attack an environmentalist camp in Notre-Dame-des-Landes near the city of Nantes. Scenes resembling civil war unfolded as bulldozers and armored vehicles moved into the camp to destroy a colony of about 100 huts and makeshift homes that protesters and farmers have built since they set up the camp 10 years ago.

By mid-morning some 10 huts had been destroyed, along with a watchtower erected by the activists to guard their site, regional security official Nicole Klein told the media. Six people living in one of the shelters were evicted, she said, claiming that they had refused an offer by the government to be rehoused. While journalists were banned from the site when the operation began, videos give an impression of the scale and brutality of the operation to clear out the camp.

The anarchist farmers and activists, called “zadistes” in France, set up the camp in 2008 to block the construction of an international airport to serve the Atlantic coast. The site had been earmarked for a new airport nearly five decades ago, before the French government finally abandoned plans to construct the controversial hub earlier this year. The government of French President Emmanuel Macron argued that since the decision had been taken to drop the plans to build the airport, the “zadistes” (from Zone to Defend or ZAD) had to leave.

Less than two hours after the official start of the evacuation of Notre-Dame-des-Landes, French Interior Minister Gerard Collomb went on air to defend the operation. On Europe1, he declared that after the announcement to halt the airport project, the government wanted “life in this sector to return to normal.” Pledging “to reinstate the law” he threatened: “Authority must reign everywhere, the law must be respected everywhere.”

There would be no arrests, “except for those who commit acts of rebellion,” Collomb threatened. He said it would be impossible to know how long the operation will last, and that police would operate “as long as it is necessary” to prevent new occupations. “I hope that within a few weeks, the order will be returned to Notre-Dame-des-Landes.”

The violent assault and the threats by Collomb come amid a rising strike and protest movement throughout the country. Yesterday the French rail strike entered its fourth day, bringing around 80 percent of trains to a halt. Today one in four flights at Air France will be canceled due to a pilot strike. Students who are occupying universities all over France have been calling for a “day of action” to denounce Macron’s plans to restructure the universities along neo-liberal lines.

The protests in France are part of a broader international upsurge of the class struggle. In Germany public sector workers are on strike for higher wages and better working conditions today. Lufthansa alone has been forced to cancel 800 flights. In the US the strike by tens of thousands of Oklahoma teachers and support staff entered its second week. Teachers have also been on strike in West Virginia and Arizona. Other strikes and protests this year included metal and autoworkers in Germany, Turkey, and Eastern Europe, pensioners in Spain and railway workers and lecturers in Britain.

The violent and unprovoked assault on the peaceful protest camp in Notre-Dame-des-Landes by the Macron government is a warning. The ruling class will stop at nothing to repress the explosive opposition in the working class against its unpopular pro-business and pro-war policies.

“I’m not sure that sending heavy forces against protesters is the best of tactics,” warned Philippe Martinez, the leader of the Stalinist CGT union. Martinez and the unions have been negotiating the attacks with Macron and are horrified by the danger of a social explosion and the development of an independent revolutionary movement of the working class.

On Monday evening, solidarity protests in support of occupants of Notre-Dame-des-Landes took place in the west of France, as well as in Paris, Lyon and Marseille. The largest erupted in Nantes where, according to police sources, some 1,200 people gathered. In Rennes around 200 demonstrators gathered on Sainte-Anne Square chanting: “They destroy, we rebuild.” At around 8:45 p.m. police forces reportedly fired tear gas at protesters.

In Paris hundreds of protesters gathered in the district of Belleville in the northeast of the capital. They blocked the Rue de Belleville with construction barriers and chanted, “Who is ZAD? She is ours,” and “ZAD everywhere, expulsion nowhere.” Marylène, a 49-year-old civil servant who participated in the spontaneous protest, told a reporter, “To send 2,500 gendarmes to evacuate families, sometimes with children, is worthy of an authoritarian regime.”

Turkish, Russian and Iranian presidents meet in Ankara

Halil Celik

On April 4, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Vladimir Putin and Hassan Rouhani—the presidents of Turkey, Russia and Iran, respectively—came together in Ankara to discuss developments in Syria as well as the relations between the three countries.

According to the joint statement issued after the summit, “The presidents rejected all attempts to create new realities on the ground under the pretext of combating terrorism and expressed their determination to stand against separatist agendas aimed at undermining the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Syria as well as the national security of neighbouring countries.”

Erdogan, Putin and Rouhani also “reaffirmed their determination to continue their cooperation in order to ultimately eliminate Daesh/ISIL, the Nusra Front and all other individuals, groups, undertakings and entities associated with Al Qaeda or Daesh/ISIL.”

The Ankara summit, the second between the three countries, was part of the so-called Syria peace talks in Astana, Kazakhstan, bringing together different factions fighting in Syria. The first summit was hosted by Russian President Vladimir Putin in November in the Black Sea city of Sochi.

The tripartite summit came amidst the US-British-led aggression against Russia over the poisoning of the former Russian agent Sergei Skripal and ongoing disputes within the ruling elites of the imperialist countries over the Syrian war and their attitude towards Russia and Iran.

With NATO and European Union states expelling Russian diplomats, Turkey, an important member of the alliance since 1952, refused to “express solidarity” with Britain and other NATO countries. On March 26, Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdag stated that Ankara will not take any actions against Moscow. “Relations between Turkey and Russia are currently positive and good,” he said. “In this sense, Turkey is not planning on taking any decisions against Russia.”

As for the attitude of the United States and other main NATO powers over the Syrian war, Ankara has long gone its own way in contradiction to its ostensible allies. In less than one and a half years, Ankara launched two successive military invasions against the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its militia, the People’s Protection Units (YPG), the Pentagon’s main proxy force in Syria, in defiance of sharp criticisms from its NATO partners and with the consent of Moscow.

The Turkish government, which considers the existence of a Kurdish enclave in northern Syria as a main threat to Turkey’s “territorial integrity,” has repeatedly declared its aim of extending its military operations towards the eastern bank of the Euphrates River, the oil-rich northeastern part of Syria controlled by the PYD/YPG.

In a press conference after the Ankara summit, Erdogan reiterated Ankara’s position, saying, “We are ready to work together with our Russian and Iranian friends in order to turn Tal Rifaat, too, into a liveable place for our Syrian brothers and sisters. I would like to reiterate that we will not stop until we turn all areas under PYD/YPG’s control into safe places, first and foremost Manbij.” The Turkish president has more than once vowed that the Turkish army will continue its operations until clearing “the area, which extends from the east of Euphrates to our border with northern Iraq.”

At the time of the Ankara summit, conflicting statements were being issued from Washington over US policy in Syria--an indication of the continuing factional warfare in which President Donald Trump is being targeted by the Democrats, sections of his own party and the military for not taking a sufficiently anti-Russian stance. During a March 29 speech in Ohio, Trump had said that the US would "be coming out of Syria like very soon. Let the other people take care of it now."  In a National Security Council meeting that coincided with the tripartite summit, however, the White House announced that there was no change in US policy toward Syria—a declaration that anticipated the current escalation of hostilities by the Trump administration against Syria, Russia and Iran.

In a lead article published April 7 by the Daily Sabah, Turkey’s main pro-government newspaper, Turkish presidential spokesperson Ibrahim Kalin, attempted an appraisal of the attitude of Washington.  “It is becoming increasingly clear in recent months that the US wants to stay in eastern Syria as a counterforce to Iran—a policy supported by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). … Clearly, the issue is not about Daesh anymore, but about creating a new power balance in Syria and beyond. The fight against Daesh is a secondary goal now, and the US military has a problem finding justification to stay in Syria within US law, which allows the military to operate in foreign lands only to fight against terrorism,” he wrote.

European powers have also been in search of a more active military policy in Syria to advance their imperialist interests in the Middle East. In recent weeks, there were several news reports in the media that not only the Pentagon but also London and Paris have deployed additional troops in Manbij, in support of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the main proxy force of the Pentagon largely consisting of Kurdish nationalists. The escalation of British and French involvement in the Syrian war would only fan the flames of the Syrian conflict, while exacerbating the ongoing tensions within NATO, especially with Ankara, which has declared Manbij as its next military target.

It is the growing pressure of the imperialist drive to war in the Middle East as part of broader geostrategic aims against Russia, China and Iran that is forcing Moscow, Ankara and Tehran to leave aside, at least for now, their differences over the future of the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad. They do this under the cover of phrases such as being “in agreement on the restoration of Syria’s territorial integrity, prevention of bloody conflicts and reconstruction of the country’s future.”

In view of the fact that Ankara is a fierce enemy of the Syrian regime, which is resolutely supported by Moscow and Tehran, one could hardly imagine a lasting cooperation between the three initiators of the Astana talks, unless either party changes its position over the Syrian war.

This, however, does not prevent Ankara, Moscow and Tehran from improving their relations in areas of trade, economy and even the military, as they feel under threat from the US-led imperialist coalition. While coming closer together to defend their own capitalist interests and existence, the ruling elites of Turkey, Russia and Iran are trying to make use of the growing inter-imperialist contradictions in their own ways as well.

Deeply frustrated with its Western allies because of their support for the Kurdish nationalists, which Ankara considers as “terrorists,” and by their involvement in the attempted coup of July 15, 2016, the Turkish government has significantly boosted its ties with Moscow. It has initiated the Astana talks with Russia and Iran, largely excluding its NATO partners, and bought the S-400 air defence system from Moscow, despite repeated warnings from the US and NATO. Moreover, Moscow and Ankara are now discussing additional projects in military technical cooperation.

Russian President Putin came with ministers and representatives of various Russian companies to Turkey, where the Russia-Turkey High-Level Cooperation Council held several ministerial meetings. Turkish and Russian ministers signed dozens of agreements on trade, tourism, investments and the funding of several projects, including the Akkuyu nuclear power plant and a bilateral gas pipeline project.

According to media reports, Russian and Turkish agencies also signed memorandums of cooperation in information technology, physical fitness and sports, social policy, and the rights of women, families and children.

The Turkish president has already expressed his hope that the Turkish-Russian trade volume will grow to $100 billion from $22 billion in 2017. Turkey imports around half of its gas and 30 percent of coal from Russia, and Moscow is Ankara’s third biggest oil supplier. Russia is building Turkey’s first nuclear power plant and will supply the fuel for it. On Friday, April 6, Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak declared that Russia is able to complete the construction of Turkey’s Akkuyu nuclear power plant even if it is unable to attract other investors.