Picket lines, demonstrations, and educational meetings are needed now to protest the Clinton administration's escalating war moves against Iraq. The wealthy rulers of the United States - loyally represented by the Democratic White House and the Republican-led Congress - are bombing Iraq not to defend Kurds or the Iraqi people but to protect their own megaprofits and imperial power in the region. Their ultimate goal is to set up a servile pro-U.S. regime in Baghdad to police their interests - above all, oil - in the Mideast. And Clinton, of course, is trying to ensure his re-election.

The Clinton administration's imperial arrogance knows no bounds. Iraq is a sovereign country. It belongs to the Iraqi people, not to Washington, London, or Paris, whose warplanes are acting as military enforcers over almost half of Iraq's territory, north and south. As the latest U.S. war move shows, the extended "no-fly zones" are designed to provoke further military confrontations with Baghdad.

Those who want to know the truth about the U.S. record in the Mideast should read - and distribute widely - the issue of New International magazine with "Opening Guns of World War III: Washington's Assault on Iraq." It explains how, at the end of the 1991 Gulf War, U.S.-led forces carried out a slaughter of tens of thousands of Iraqis fleeing Iraqis on the road to Basra. It details the devastation of Iraqi workers and peasants by the ongoing imperialist embargo of that nation.

New International also explains that the Gulf War was a fiasco for the U.S. rulers, who failed to overthrow the Iraqi government, suppress the struggles of the Palestinians and other oppressed peoples, or stabilize their domination of the region. In that war and today, imperialism is acting out of weakness to save its unraveling old world order.

The Democratic administration is hoping opponents of its assault on Iraq will not publicly demonstrate against it, subordinating all else to his re-election as an alternative to a Republican victory. Those opposed to Washington's policies should avoid this lesser-evil trap. It is precisely now that visible protests in the streets against the government's bipartisan war moves are needed.

Clinton has been a consistent war president, from the bombing of Iraq in January 1993 to recent threats against Cuba, Iran, and Libya. Today, as the two big-business parties contend for the presidency, the danger of further military assaults by the Clinton White House becomes even greater. In a world of increasing social and political volatility, every act of U.S. aggression sets new, uncontrollable forces in motion.

Washington's war against working people abroad accompanies and reinforces its bipartisan assault on workers and farmers at home. Here too Clinton is leading the charge, with attacks on the rights of immigrants and legislation dismantling some of the hard-fought social gains of working people codified in the Social Security Act.

Working people should demand an immediate end to the U.S. bombing of Iraq. U.S., British, and French forces must leave Iraqi airspace now. All opponents of the U.S. assault should also demand that the imperialist governments open their borders and provide housing and jobs to Kurdish refugees fleeing Iraq. Washington should get all its troops, warplanes, and warships out of the Mideast and lift the economic sanctions against Iraq, Iran, and Libya.  
 
 
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