The Tsar’s New Clothes II – The invasion of Ukraine and the encirclement of Yankee imperialism
Proletarians of all countries, unite!
The Tsar’s New Clothes II
– The invasion of Ukraine and the encirclement of Yankee imperialism –
With the dissolution of Soviet social-imperialism, Yankee imperialism became the sole hegemonic superpower. In the three decades that followed, Russian imperialism has lost many of the semi-colonies it inherited from social-imperialism to Yankee imperialism. It remains an atomic superpower but is in comparison much more weaker, economically and militarily, even though it inherited the atomic weapon arsenal of social-imperialist Soviet Union. Today it is suffering from the encirclement by Yankee imperialism, who is trying to cause trouble for it in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. This development can be especially seen in Ukraine, where Russian imperialism is desperately fighting to re-establish its rule, in an invasion against an oppressed nation by an imperialist country.
“To see this we have to remember or re-study what Chairman Mao says about contradiction (in volume I, on page 354 and the following page):
“In a semi-colonial country such as China, the relationship between the principal contradiction and the non-principal contradictions presents a complicated picture”; and raises three possibilities: the first is “When imperialism launches a war of aggression against such a country, all its various classes, except for some traitors, can temporarily unite in a national war against imperialism”, that is the first one, that is so, when the imperialists unleash a war of aggression, invade a country, then obviously it is invaded, when Japan invades China, when Japan invades Korea or when the US invades Vietnam or when the social-imperialism that led in the USSR invades Afghanistan, there the contradiction is nation-imperialism, but what makes the difference is the aggression, it goes to conquer, to subjugate, for its world interests of whatever it is, in other words there is no revolution, that is the third case, in other words when there is an aggression in accordance with its world conflicts it attacks a country and takes possession of it, that is the first case, he says”.
After discussing the other two possibilities, which are not relevant here, Chairman Gonzalo concludes on the first possibility by summarising as follows:
“…when imperialism invades, unleashes aggression without there being a revolution, that was a predominant case in the previous century, which all the great powers did, and it happens in this century when there is no revolution but imperialism, because of its hegemonic struggles, leads to this, that’s how it happens“.
From the understanding and application of what Chairman Mao established, we conclude:
Consequently in the present case, the question is, that with the Russian imperialist invasion of Ukraine, the contradiction nation-imperialism has become the principal contradiction in Ukraine. Therefore, it is possible, and moreover necessary for us, that the different classes in this country, except for a small number of traitors, temporarily unite in a national war against imperialism.
(…)
The direct invasion of Ukraine by Russian imperialism is the consequence of a development that began with the revisionist Khrushchev and the restoration of capitalism in the former socialist Soviet Union – here the transformation of Ukraine into a semi-colony of social-imperialism – until the collapse of revisionism and the dissolution of the Soviet Union, i.e. imperialist struggle, without revolution, without real independence, but only a change of hands: a complex interplay of the different interests of the imperialist superpowers and powers, oppressed nations and rotten regimes of traitors, the corrupt, agents of the different powers, etc. (The above quotations in bold type are from Our Position Against The Imperialist War of Aggression Against Ukraine, 4th of March 2022)
Russian imperialism already carried out undercover military actions in Ukraine after the coup of 2014 (the Maidan) as a response to the coup led by Yankee imperialism in collusion with German, French and British imperialism. In 2014 Russia annexed Crimea, and sent mercenaries in unmarked uniforms to Ukraine to form the so-called “People’s Republics” of Donetsk and Lugansk, that were finally officially declared annexed with a “referendum” in 2022. Telling is that Russian imperialism started a forcible general mobilisation – sending the police to raid homes for men – in these “separatist regions” some weeks before it marched its troops into Ukrainei. The current war of aggression is continuation to this development, an attempt to prevent the encirclement by U.S. imperialism from tightening further..
The Russian atomic superpower is mired in Ukraine and the difficulties are increasing, the fear of Ukraine becoming a new Afghanistan is growing in the high political, military and economic spheres of Russia. Putin might have expected more support, trusting the internal contradictions in Ukraine, but instead the Russian invaders have received hard blows from the Ukrainian people, united through various classes against the imperialist invader that has unleashed the most heinous crimes since the invasion of Nazi Germany on its soil. In the battlefield, the invaders have been struck back hard with the recent recapture of Kherson. This meant a great blow to the Russian logistics.
Because of the widespread protests against the war of aggression on Ukraine, the Putin regime has considerably cut demo-liberal rights. Thousands were arrested and tortured by the police for participating in demonstrations, and new laws have been put up to censor the news about the war. Long prison sentences can be given for using the word war and not ”special operation”.
The latest measure taken by the government is the partial mobilisation of troops. This in one hand a desperate move to replace the cannon fodder that is running out in Ukraine, to turn the war around, and in the other to increase militarisation in the minds of the population. Moreover, it is related to the previous paragraph, since, as can be seen, both contending parties have for some months now increased their efforts and warlike actions, in order to win on the battlefield better conditions for negotiation. Because, who else but them have been warned of the intentions and calls of U.S. imperialism and the clamor of their western imperialist “allies” for a solution to the war, for an agreement?
The partial mobilisation received an immediate response of hundreds of thousands fleeing Russia. The economists of the Bank of Russia reported that this aftermath of the declaration of the mobilisation worsened the already existing labour shortage in Russia as well caused more uncertainty in the market, further hitting the economy. Protests sparked up all over Russia, especially in regions populated mostly by minority nationalities. Russian imperialism is oppressing multiple peoples within it with the reactionary great-Russian nationalism, and in this, the contradiction imperialism-oppressed nations exists also internally in Russia, not to forget that it is a “Federation”, as the result of the restoration of the relations of the tsarist empire by the revisionists. This is also seen in the particular explosivity of the masses in these regions, where multiple military enlistment offices were reported to be set on fire, and some military centers were attacked by gunmen “from former Soviet states”ii. In many places the masses tried to prevent the forced military enlistment. It is clear that the enlisted troops are not very enthusiastic to serve the goals of Russian imperialism, and this creates a great weakness for Russian imperialism compared to the Ukrainian army, that is defending their land from an invader.
The war, that is an desperate attempt of Russian imperialism to reestablish its grasp of Ukraine, is not going according to plan. In one hand, the contradictions between the people and the monopoly bourgeoisie in Russia will keep on sharpening, and the anti-war sentiment will keep on growing in wide masses of people. At the same time, the contradictions among the bourgeoisie will sharpen; despite increasing tendency towards fascism, the bourgeoisie is not completely united behind Putin and throughout the war there has been criticism towards the war, that is increasing, because of the weak successes in the war, even from the so-called Putin-loyalists. For example, founder of the mercenary army Wagner Group, Yevgeni Prigozhin, has criticized the handling of the war, as well as the Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, who voiced suspicions that Putin might not be aware of the reality of the wariii. These people still publicly vow their loyalty to Putin, but with the war going on without satisfying results for the finance capital, it is likely that the contradictions among the bourgeoisie in Russia will sharpen.
The development of the previous decade and of the present decade, and especially the war of aggression against Ukraine, clearly shows that U.S. imperialism as the hegemonic superpower has stirred up the contradictions in Europe, taking into account the growing problems of Russian imperialism in order to draw it into the Ukrainian trap, to push for further U.S.-Russian collusion on its terms, using the status of Ukraine as a bargaining chip. As its highest representatives in politics and military strategy have declared, its priority target at this moment is not Russia, but rather the Indo-Pacific, that is, to implement its strategic plan of containment against social-imperialist China against China’s strategic plans until the middle of the present century to hegemonise that region as a basis for its plans to move on to contend in the other half of the century for world hegemony. This plan to maintain the hegemony of U.S. imperialism is being carried out under their motto of divide and conquer and that the imperialists have no friends, only interests.
