Attack on Libya – Another War for Oil

The United States, Britain and France have launched a joint military assault on Libya, which came just days after a United Nations resolution imposing a ‘no-fly zone’ on the country.

The assault commenced on Saturday night [March 19] when over 100 cruise missiles were fired from US warships and submarines off the coast of Libya. According to reports, dozens of civilians have been killed as western powers move to impose regime change on a country that it held as a close ally until very recently.

US and British interference and occupation in Iraq and Afghanistan demonstrates that the civilian population suffers most, as western powers, under the guise of protecting the civilian population seek to protect and advance their strategic and business interests in the region.

Declarations from western powers that the military strike against Libya is motivated solely by a desire to protect the civilian population cannot be taken seriously. Western imperialist powers have stood by as protestors in other countries in the region have been slaughtered. In Yemen, 40 protestors were shot dead by state forces, while the west’s closest ally in the region Saudi Arabia has swept into Bahrain, where martial law has been declared, in support of that country’s autocratic regime.

The brutal Saudi regime bans political parties, has declared protests ‘un-Islamic’ and continues to incarcerate almost 8,000 political prisoners. The Saudi’s so-called peace keeping force in Bahrain has besieged and machine gunned hospitals, where demonstrators are being treated for injuries sustained at the hands of state forces.

Yet, the continuing military offensive against the civilian population in Bahrain has met only with weasel words from US secretary of state Hilary Clinton who lamely stated, “We have made clear that security alone cannot resolve the challenges facing Bahrain.” The US also supported its Israeli ally, when its military bombarded Gaza during Operation Cast Lead in December 2008, slaughtering over 1,400 Palestinians. There was no UN resolution imposing a ‘no fly zone’ to protect the civilian population of Palestine.

Just last October the Obama administration agreed an arms deal with the Saudi regime worth US$60 billion, which included the sale of 84 F-15 fighter jets; the upgrading of a further 70 older F-15s; and 200 new attack helicopters. At a press conference announcing details of the deal, Andrew Shapiro, US assistant secretary for political and military affairs, was clear about its purpose, which was to enhance the ability of the Saudis to “deter and defend threats to its oil structure, which is critical to our [US] economic interests”.

Under the deal, the US air force will train Saudi pilots to fly the F-15 jets and discussions are taking place to upgrade Saudi Arabia's navy, worth an additional US$30bn. That attack helicopters are being used to machine gun hospitals treating pro-democracy protestors in Bahrain is unlikely to trouble the Obama regime. The Saudis, along with Jordan and the United Arab Emirates, are also offering military support for the attack on Libya.

For the west, the blood of civilians is, after all, secondary to ensuring that the oil keeps flowing.

The British government is keen to ensure that BP maintains access to Libyan oil, while another major British oil corporation, Shell, reached a deal with the Libyan state oil company in 2005. This deal gave the oil giant access to explore for gas in five blocks covering 20,000 square kilometres in the Sirte Basin and would see it spending between US$105m and $450m on upgrading a Libyan gas plant and US$187m on exploration. 

While the British government expresses concern for the civilian population of Libya, it supplied missiles and air defence systems to the same regime under an agreement reached in 2007. The hypocrisy is astounding.

People power has toppled the dictatorships of Ben Ali in Tunisia and Hosni Mubarak in Egypt; a former key ally of the west, who facilitated the US invasion of Iraq and the Israeli siege of Gaza. The wave of protests sweeping through the Middle East has unnerved the US, Britain and Israel.

éirígí supports the right of the people of Libya to determine their own future without interference from outside powers.

Establishment figures in Ireland are falling over themselves to welcome the announcement that US president Barack Obama will visit the Twenty-Six Counties in May. There has been a deathly silence from establishment political figures about Obama’s war mongering in Afghanistan, the use of US drones on the Pakistani border, which last week killed 40 civilians in Waziristan, his administration’s continued support for despotic regimes such as Saudi Arabia, the failure to close Guantanamo Bay, and the continued use of Shannon airport by the US military.

The slaughter of hundreds of thousands of civilians in a bloody war for oil in both Iraq and Afghanistan is a stark reminder of the human cost of the west’s imperial ambitions. While the west claims its purpose in bombing Libya is to defend the civilian population, it has stood by and supported Saudi Arabia’s invasion of Bahrain to defend that country’s despotic regime and attack pro-democracy demonstrators. Meanwhile, the fact that Yemen lacks oil means that the lives of the innocent of that country are of no concern to the western imperial powers.

The US, British and French military attack on Libya is quite simply another war for oil and should be opposed as such.

An Appreciation of Jim Gralton - Leitrim's Unrepentant Communist

On August 13, 1933 Jim Gralton was forced to board a Trans-Atlantic Liner in Cork which was to set sail for the USA.  Jim had been arrested on August 10 at a friends house in Gorvagh, County Leitrim and brought to Ballinamore Barracks where he was detained before been brought to Cork for his deportation.  He had been living on the run since February of that year following the issuing of a deportation order by the courts who ruled that he had to leave Ireland by March 5.  His deportation 77 years ago today makes him the only  native Irishman to be deported from this state.

He was born in Effernagh close to Carrick on Shannon in County Leitrim on April 17 1886.  His education, such as it was, was received in nearby Kiltoghert school.  Like most young people at the time, he left school early, aged just 14.  After working for a number of employers in the local area, fed up with the harsh treatment he and others suffered at their hands, Jim headed for Dublin where he enlisted in the British army.

His rebellious behaviour was not long coming through and he endured punishment of 84 days on "bread and water" for his refusal to shine the leggings and buttons of one of his officers.  He was then posted to India, but refused to go in protest at British policies in Ireland.  For his defiance and protest, Jim was jailed for a year and subsequently deserted the army, going to work for a time in the coal mines of Wales and in Liverpool docks. 

He then got employment as a Ship's stoker and eventually settled in New York where he became a US citizen in 1909.  In the midst of the great wealth in the USA, Jim was appalled at the harsh, slave-like conditions that workers endured, which led him to become a firm believer in supporting the rights of workers and in Socialism.

From the time he arrived in the US, Jim was active in supporting and raising much needed funds for both the Irish Republican struggle and for fellow workers in New York.  He became a member of the US Communist party and became heavily involved in Trade Union activity.  In the wake of the 1916 Rising, and after studying of the writings of James Connolly, Jim became a founding member of the James Connolly Club in New York.

Almost a decade and a half after arriving in the US, Jim decided to return home to Ireland in June 1921, just a month before the truce in the Tan war commenced on the 11th of July.  During the war, the notorious Black and Tans had burnt the local Temperance Hall beside Gowel Church to the ground.  On his return, Jim promised local people he would replace it and set about with his own money and with local support, building a new hall on his fathers land near Effernagh crossroads.

The new hall, which to be called the Pearse-Connolly Hall, was eventually opened on December 31 1921 and became an integral part of the everyday lives of the local community.  Amongst its many uses was the holding in classes of a wide range of subjects including Irish, English, music, dancing, civics and Agricultural science.  This was also a time of many land disputes and the Hall was also used to hold Land courts to settle many of these disputes.  Despite the good work Jim was doing for his community and despite the valuable educational service that was been provided, not everyone was happy.

The Catholic church in particular were extremely unhappy.  They denounced him at every opportunity, at the pulpit during mass and in letters, going as far as to describe him as an extremely dangerous socialist and even an "Anti-Christ".  They accused him of "leading a campaign of Land agitation", of trying to take the youth of the area away from the Catholic Church and of teaching communism to them in his classes.

The Free State forces also were unhappy with his activities, and on May 24 1922, they raided the Hall in a failed attempt to arrest Jim.  The following month, as Civil War loomed, he got out and returned to the US.  He did not return to Ireland until 1932 following the death of his brother Charlie who looked after and ran the family farm and following the securing of power in the 26-counties by Fianna Fáil.   Like many other people at that time, Jim was of the mistaken belief that a Fianna Fáil government would allow for the development of progressive politics in his homeland.

Following his return to Ireland. Jim re-opened the Connolly-Pearse Hall which had been closed for many years while he was in the US.  He also involved himself once again in left-wing agitation, joining the Revolutionary Workers Group (a forerunner of the Communist Party of Ireland CPI).  As well as the hall being used for dances and other social activities, meetings were also held there highlighting issues such as unemployment and the rights of workers and tenants.

Vincent McGrath of the Rossport 5 Addresses Jim Gralton commemoration at site of Connolly - Pearse Hall

He spoke at many anti-eviction meetings and following the eviction of a worker from his home in Keadue, also in County Leitrim, Jim joined with a local IRA group in re-instating the worker and his family back into their family home.  This radicalism and persistent campaigning on such issues was of major concern once again to conservatives in general and to the Catholic Church and Fianna Fáil in particular.

Once again, Jim was denounced as a massive campaign was launched by the clergy against him and the views he represented.  Shamefully, many of his former comrades turned their backs on him, as the church demanded that the hall, which they described as a "den of iniquity" be shut down.

The hall came under physical attack on many occasions.  Shots were fired into it during a dance and  an attempt to blow it up with a bomb failed.  Finally, on Christmas Eve 1932, the Hall was eventually destroyed when it was burned to the ground.

In February of 1933, at the behest of the Catholic Church, the Fianna Fáil government ordered the deportation of Jim from his homeland by March 5 on the spurious grounds of him being an "undesirable alien".  Instead of complying with the order, Jim went on the run, staying with friends and neighbours in the area.  During his time on the run, the Revolutionary Workers Group organised a campaign in support of Jim.  Public meetings were organised and addressed by Jim himself, and by other prominent Republican Socialists  of the time such as George Gilmore and Peadar O'Donnell.  Many of these meetings were attacked and broken up by reactionaries.

Finally on August 10 1933, the Free State caught up with Jim, capturing him at a friends house in Gorvagh.  He was taken to Ballinamore Barracks where he was detained before being transported to Cork where he was put on board a Trans-Atlantic Liner and deported to the US against his will. He was never again allowed to return to Ireland.

Undeterred, upon his arrival back in the US, Jim once again got involved in Trade Unionism and left wing politics.  Along with Gerald O'Reilly, a close colleague of George Gilmore, Jim set up the Irish Workers Group in New York.  He became a Trade Union organiser, encouraging the involvement of women within the Unions, and set about  promoting, republishing and distributing the works of James Connolly.  During the Spanish Civil War, he raised funds for the International Brigades who were going to Spain to fight against Fascism and in defence of the Republic.  

A committed and unrepentant Communist up to his last breath, Jim Gralton died in exile in New York on December 29 1945 and is buried in Woodlawn cemetery in the Bronx area of the City.

Woodlawn Cemetery, The Bronx, New York where Jim Gralton is buried

To conclude fittingly, the final words go to a comrade of Jim's, Charlie Byrne.  Speaking at Jim's Graveside in the Bronx in 2005 to commemorate the 60th anniversary of his death, Charlie said:

"Let all of us who believe in the principles for which Gralton stood, pledge ourselves anew to the continuation of the fight for the complete political, cultural and economic rights of the working classes in all lands, no crying, no weeping over his grave at Woodlawn. There is work to be done, so let us carry on; Gralton would have it that way."
 

Workers Lead the Way in Venezuela

In the latest sign of the increasing radicalism of the Bolivarian Revolution, Venezuela’s National Union of Workers [UNETE] has published a series of policy proposals calling for more workers’ control of industry.

 Among the proposals are:

• Full nationalisation of the banking and finance sectors
• Nationalisation of foreign commerce related to essential foods
• Readjustment of wages and prices to account for the cost of living and production
• Creation of a ministry for workers’ control and social production, directed by workers’ councils
• Introduction of a national maximum wage
• Introduction of an industrial transformation law that will see idle companies and land transferred to workers’ or peasants’ councils
• Demarcation of indigenous lands over the interests of transnational mining companies

UNETE is Venezuela’s primary union federation, having been formed in 2003 after the traditional federation CTV supported coup attempts against socialist president Hugo Chávez. Around 80 per cent of the country’s trade unions are affiliated to UNETE.

Early this month, president Chávez celebrated the first anniversary of the nationalisation of the Bank of Venezuela, which was bought over last year by the state and retained its entire workforce. It has also experienced tremendous growth since then.

Chávez said: “I don’t know if there has been any experience like it before in Venezuela of such growth. That means a lot of things. This throws out all of that information that is emitted from the laboratories of psychological warfare that global capitalism has set up in Venezuela… that manipulate and put fear in the minds of Venezuelans.”

The revolutionary government has also moved in recent months to challenge price speculation that has seen food costs skyrocket. Several supermarket chains have been nationalised and the government has opened its own restaurants.

At the opening of one such restaurant last week, commerce minister Richard Canan said: “The creation of these socialist arepa restaurants allows us to demonstrate to capitalist businesses that it is possible to have a venue where food can be sold at a fair price and not as a commodity, as it is under capitalist concepts.”

The UNETE federation’s national co-ordinators recognise the work that has been done by the Venezuelan government to improve the lives and conditions of the country’s workers and peasants, but argue that this work has been hampered by “bureaucratism, indolence, and corruption of functionaries who act like a fifth column... in the entire structure of a bourgeois state that refuses to die”.

The document produced by UNETE goes to the heart of a struggle that exists within Chávez’s United Socialist Party of Venezuela [PSUV] and within the Bolivarian Revolution itself. It is a struggle between a rank and file who are anxious to see the socialist transformation of Venezuela and a bureaucracy who seem determined to prevent that from happening.

Government leaders are not blind to the problems facing their project and measures have been introduced to remove power from such bureaucrats and place it in the hands of the workers. In May, Chávez swore in the new directors for the 15 industrial companies that make up Venezuelan Corporation of Guayana [CVG], the directors having been elected by the workers before being ratified by the president.

The CVG forms an important part of Plan Socialista Guayana. This plan came into being following the nationalisation of the giant steel plant SIDOR in April 2008. The workers there began to discuss what a socialist company would look like and how it could be run democratically. They set up their own Bolivarian Workers’ University, in which 1,300 of them registered, where weekly classes are given in important technical skills as well as political theory.

Guayana is the largest of Venezuela’s eight administrative regions and is an important industrial centre. Around 80,000 people work in steel, aluminium, iron ore and mining companies, which have all been nationalised. In conjunction with the Ministry of Labour, workers from the CVG came up with Plan Socialista Guayana last year.

Plan Socialista Guayana is a 10-year programme to turn the CVG companies into worker-managed, socialist operations. Under this plan, the companies will greatly reduce the amount of raw materials being exported and workers will focus on supplying local and national projects for the benefit of the people. The introduction of the plan was hindered by management and local government figures until Chávez himself stepped in. That directors for these worker-run companies have now been appointed shows that the Plan is now well under way.

Other avenues have also opened in the attempt to combat the problems of bureaucracy. A prominent example is the community council. These councils were introduced with the intention of promoting the participatory democracy that is central to the Bolivarian Revolution, by having communities come together to address local problems and develop local projects. Over 30,000 community councils have been created all over Venezuela since their introduction in 2006.

This explosion has not been without problems, especially in terms of finance. The Venezuelan government passed an amendment to the community council law in May to clarify and strengthen the role of the councils in society. Councils are elected by assemblies that represent between 150 and 400 families in a particular area, and assemblies need 30 per cent attendance to form a quorum, ensuring a minimum level of community involvement in the affairs of the council.

In both urban and rural areas, numbers of community councils are coming together to form socialist communes. There are currently around 200 socialist communes being built at present, which are effectively creating a parallel, horizontal alternative to existing municipal authorities.

There are many people in Venezuela who are frustrated at the limited progress made over the past decade by their government, which continues to struggle against a hostile native bourgeoisie as well as a dangerous imperialist power to the north and its satellite state in Latin America, Colombia.

However, as long as the workers and peasants of Venezuela keep pushing towards the socialist transformation of society, the dream of the Bolivarian Revolution and of 21st century socialism will remain alive and well.