A campaign is being waged against both 'hostile states' -Russia, China, Iran and
North Korea- and the internal enemy, revolutionaries and environmental activists,the latter increasingly characterised as violent domestic extremists. ---- It canbe seen in the rhetoric of Defence Secretary Ben Wallace who is pushing for a£10-11 billion increase in defence spending and attempting to further the myththat Britain is still a great power, when its armed forces are depleted and rundown. He said that the UK would backfill for allies like Poland with Britishplanes. Ahead of the meeting of NATO defence ministers in Brussels he called forthe ramping up of production of ammunition by NATO members. ---- It can be seenin the words of Transport Secretary Richard Holden, referring to China as a'hostile state' when responding to the fake frenzy over Chinese weather balloonsshot down over US territory.It can be seen in the words of Liz Truss. Speaking at the Inter-ParliamentaryAlliance on China Symposium in Tokyo she said world leaders should learn thelessons of not taking earlier and tougher action against Russia and rejected the"fatalism" of those who think "the rise of a totalitarian China is inevitable".She called for an "economic NATO", made up of the G7 and allies, ready to actagainst China. She went on to say "I would like to see a more developed Pacificdefence alliance alongside even closer co-operation between NATO and our Pacificallies."Earlier in January, the British government became the first Western state topromise advanced tanks to the Ukrainian military. This was a cynical move wherejust 14 Challenger 2 tanks were promised in order to pressurise the Germangovernment to give the green light to supplying Ukraine with Leopard 2 tanks.The Sunak government, like previous Tory administrations, is intent on supportingthe USA and NATO in increasing the arming of Ukraine, calling for a dangerousescalation of the conflict rather than negotiation. The USA is determined to takeon China, which it sees as THE rival rising world power. Russia is no longer aworld power, but its alliance with China means that the US and its allies aretesting the waters in how far they can go with confrontation. The British mediahave enthusiastically fallen in behind this plan, with front pages glorifying theZelenskyy regime, reminiscent in their lauding of "gallant little Belgium" duringWorld War One.Let us be clear, we have no time for the corrupt, kleptocratic and authoritarianPutin regime, nor for Xi's equally repellent regime in China, or the foul regimesin North Korea, Iran and Syria. For us, however, the main enemy is at home, itis the British state and the boss class and we should question the currentdrumming up of war fever. It does not benefit our class, the working class.Against it we should counterpose class struggle and anti-militarism and highlightthe appalling role of the arms industries.The Enemy WithinAt the same time as the escalation of rhetoric against external enemies, the waragainst the enemy within is picking up speed. The war against the enemy within,utilised by Thatcher against the miners in 1984-5, restarted with a campaignbegun in 2020 against environmental and animal rights activists. The then HomeSecretary Priti Patel said "This government will not stand by and allow a smallminority of selfish protesters to cause significant disruption." This hasresulted in mass arrests of activists, the raiding of premises, and the labellingof groups like Extinction Rebellion and Animal Aid as domestic extremists.Richard Walton, former head of counter-terror at the London Metropolitan Police,said, "The illegal blockading of motorways is environmental extremism, not legalprotest .Environmental extremists using planned, illegal tactics of theblockading of main roads need to be dealt with as robustly as Islamist extremists."A new weapon in this war against a domestic enemy has been the Public Order Bill,currently going through Parliament. This would further increase police powers tocrush protest and dissent, and criminalise a wide range of behaviour. Inaddition, it would up the ante on trespass, up to now "not of itself a criminaloffence" as the Crown Prosecution Service had to admit.This would mean that the recent mass trespass on Dartmoor National Park, wherethe hedge fund manager Alexander Darwall owns 1, 620 hectares, could become acriminal act. Unlike in Scotland, Scandinavia, the Baltic states and otherEuropean countries, there is no "freedom to roam" in England and Wales. Inaddition, protest occupations of various businesses, malls, etc could be deemedas criminal trespass by the police. These powers, ready to be used against groupslike XR, Insulate Britain, and Just Stop Oil, could equally be used againststrikers in the future, as well as against a whole range of radical groups andcampaigns.The ex-chairman of the Tory Party, Nadhim Zahawi, recently accused NHS workersabout to strike that they were helping Putin by threatening to raise inflationwith their wage demands, claiming that one of the aims of the Russian leader wasto increase inflation in the West. Earlier in June 2022, a senior Tory MP, TobiasElwood, claimed that striking railway workers were acting as "Putin's friends".Make no mistake, the war against the external enemy and the enemy within areclosely linked.https://www.anarchistcommunism.org/2023/02/27/war-drums_________________________________________A - I N F O S N E W S S E R V I C EBy, For, and About AnarchistsSend news reports to A-infos-en mailing listA-infos-en@ainfos.ca
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