Socialist Action /October 1999
Against UN Intervention in East Timor
Mass support for the demand of the East Timorese people for independence
from Indonesia was confirmed by a huge majority vote in the recent referendum.
Working people and other opponents of political, social, and economic injustice
wholeheartedly support the right to self-determination of the oppressed
masses in East Timor.
But the decision by the United Nations (UN) to send military forces to
allegedly "protect" the advocates of independence from the murderous
Indonesian militias is a very different matter.
The track record of UN military interventions -from Korea in 1950-53
to Iraq in 1990-91, to mention only the two most outstanding-has been a
tragic one for the peoples of the world.
During the Korean War, UN forces, overwhelmingly made up of American
troops, were responsible for the deaths of nearly 3 million Koreans and
Chinese and the complete ravaging of North Korea, a condition from which
that impoverished country is still reeling.
UN military forces in the Gulf War killed over 250,000 Iraqis. Since
then, hundreds of thousands of others-mostly children-have died due to the
criminal UN-imposed economic sanctions on Iraq.
Be advised, when the word "humanitarian" is used to describe
UN military interventions the language being spoken is doublespeak.
The real motive of the imperialist powers operating under the cover of
the United Nations is hardly to protect the East Timorese people or defend
their right to self-determination. Among their first actions, UN troops
have begun rounding up and disarming the Falintil guerrillas, the only force
that represents the Timorese and has offered them some protection against
the imperialist-backed Indonesian occupiers.
Like the recent U.S./NATO assault on Yugoslavia, the UN intervention
in East Timor is designed to "legitimatize" a far more massive
intervention in the near future.
UN Secretary Kofi Annan has already announced that this imperialist alliance
intends to set up an administration to rule East Timor for "two to
three years." Such an "interim" regime will obviously set
the stage for imposing a subservient neocolonial government.
The sordid record of imperialism
The past record of the United States, Australia, and New Zealand, along
with the other major imperialist powers, reveals their real motives and
intentions. All these powers said nothing when Indonesia barbarically annexed
East Timor in 1975.
And they all gave approval when General Suharto staged a military coup
in 1965 and proceeded to massacre over 500,000 leftist workers and farmers.
The United States, Australia, New Zealand, Britain-the whole murderers'
row- financed, armed, and trained the Indonesian military when it was engaged
in the slaughter of 200,000 Timorese civilians, and continue military support
to the Indonesian regime even now.
Today, the objective of UN intervention is the same as the imperialist
powers' reason for supporting Indonesian occupation of the country in the
first place, to assure imperialist domination by suppressing the struggles
of the Timorese and Indonesian working people.
As the living standards of Indonesia's masses continue to plummet, both
under the pressure from IMF-imposed austerity programs and the general Asian
economic crisis, the workers, farmers, and their student allies will be
left with no choice but to take the road of mass resistance, and ultimately,
the road to social revolution.
A grave mistake
Unfortunately, many supporters of the struggle for the right to self-determination
by the people of East Timor have demanded UN military intervention. This
is a grave mistake that will prove costly to both the struggle for independence
by the people of East Timor and the struggle by Indonesian workers for liberation
from imperialist super-exploitation and oppression.
And for those like the Australian Democratic Socialist Party (DSP), which
claims to be committed to the working class and socialism, it is worse than
a mistake; it is a gross violation of the working-class principle of class
independence. The DSP's crime is compounded by its demand that its own Australian
capitalist government send our class brothers in the Australian army into
East Timor to serve as the deadly instrument of their own capitalist class.
Those that support the current UN military action in East Timor have
by that action helped the enemies of Indonesia's and East Timor's workers
and farmers. And they have eased the way for an imperialist military intervention,
under the banner of the UN, to crush any mass uprising against the bloody
Indonesian capitalist government.
Self-determination for the people of East Timor! All UN and imperialist
troops out of East Timor!
Nuclear Disaster
The Sept. 23 catastrophe at the Tokaimura nuclear plant in Japan is a
new warning of the dangers inherent in this industry that come from a pernicious
intertwining of big capital and the capitalist state.
The nuclear industry is a byproduct of the arms industry and not economically
viable without state support. But this combination puts a technology that
could threaten the survival of humanity in the hands of private business
concerned only with profits.
This intertwining of the state and business, consolidated under the U.S.
occupation, is particularly advanced in Japan. But it is the general trend
in capitalism everywhere. In the United States also, President Clinton favors
giving a new impetus to the construction of hazardous fast-breeder reactors.
The Tokaimura accident exposed the glaring indifference of the company
and the state for safety of the public.
On Oct. 2, the company managing the Tokaimura plant was obliged to admit
that the radiation leakage was at least 10 times what had originally been
announced; some company officials said 20 times as much.
Although the plant was in a residential area, it was not marked as a
dangerous site. It took the government 12 hours to issue a major alert of
the danger to the population.
The press both in Japan and the U.S. has commented on the astonishing
carelessness of the government and the company officials. But this is far
from the first environmental disaster resulting from this deadly combination
of the state and business. It will not be the last until the working people
can wield control over the economy that determines their life or death.
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Socialist Action /October 1999 |