This is what working people need to demand as bipartisan support for the “war on terror,” including the U.S.-led war in Iraq, has firmed up. This is doubly important in face of demagogy by liberal politicians and “reporting” in much of the media that falsely presented last week’s discussion in the U.S. Senate as a largely partisan split on withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq.

Never mind the unanimous vote in the Senate for all the funds the White House requested to continue the military occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Never mind that 70 percent of Democrats in the Senate joined their Republican colleagues to vote down an amendment that asked for ”redeployment” a year from now of some troops not needed for “standing up Iraqi security forces” and for “counterterrorism operations and protecting United States facilities and personnel.”

Never mind that the statements backing this proposal by its sponsor, Sen. John Kerry, aided Washington’s efforts to further demonize Iran and prepare the ground for a possible military assault on that semicolonial nation for the crime of trying to develop nuclear power.

Never mind that the second amendment that failed on troop redeployment, with a minority of Democrats and most Republicans voting it down, merely called for expediting, with no timetable, the transition of U.S. forces in Iraq to a “limited presence.”

This is not a debate. It’s a charade. It is aimed at fooling working people to get behind one or another of the capitalist ruling parties for the best way to “defend America.” But the United States is divided into classes, with conflicting and irreconcilable interests. It’s in the interest of the wealthy families that rule America to back the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the broader “war on terror,” to beat back their competitors, shift the relationship of forces in those areas more to the favor of the imperialistic system of class exploitation and national oppression, and get more control of resources like oil.

These are the same capitalist families responsible for maiming and killing coal miners and other workers on the job to increase their profits. These are the same employers cutting wages and workers’ pensions to fatten their wallets. Their so-called war on terrorism at home and abroad ultimately targets workers and exploited farmers, their organizations, and the very rights working people need to defend their livelihoods against the bosses’ antilabor attacks. The recent “antiterrorist” raid in Miami, based on the “evidence” cooked up by one FBI snitch, and a similar one in London in which cops shot a postal worker, whom they arrested and then released without charges, prove the point.

That’s why it’s in the interest of working people to oppose the “war on terror,” uncompromisingly, and to demand immediate and unconditional withdrawal of U.S. and all other occupation troops from the Middle East and Central Asia.
 
 
Related articles:
Bipartisan support grows for Iraq war
Senate unanimously approves $100 billion for occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan  
 
 
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