[Peace] ISO Statement on Oct. 27

[martin smith]

Statement of the Chicago International Socialist Organization on the
 Chicago October 27th
 regional antiwar demonstration
 
 Mass protests are desperately needed to galvanize a growing antiwar
 majority to end the
 occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. More than four years into the
 occupation of Iraq,
 upwards of 27,000 U.S. soldiers have been wounded and more than 3,700
 have been
 killed. One million Iraqis have died.
 It is the hope of the International Socialist Organization (ISO) that
 the October 27th
 United for Peace and Justice (UFPJ) regional demonstration in Chicago
 will bring out large
 numbers against this barbaric war. The ISO certainly intends to
 mobilize and build for the
 protest.
 
 Two incompatible political agendas
 
 However, it is quite clear that there will be two incompatible
 political agendas present on
 October 27. On the one hand, people from the various endorsing
 organizations and
 beyond will be present to voice their opposition to the war. Many have
 worked tirelessly to
 oppose the war.
 On the other hand, Democratic Party politicians who have repeatedly
 proven their
 fidelity to the Iraq War have been invited to speak. This has become
 an even greater
 problem, as the dominant forces in the leadership of the Democratic
 Party prepare, not to
 end the war, but to "take it over" from the Bush Administration after
 the 2008 election.
 These invitations only serve to direct the energies and anger of the
 antiwar
 movement—once again—into support for politicians who have no intention
 of ending the
 occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.
 
 Withdrawing our endorsement
 
 It has long been the ISO's policy to support any genuine antiwar
 protest. Nor do we
 oppose inviting politicians to speak if they have shown themselves to
 oppose the war,
 whatever other, often very significant, disagreements we may have with
 them.
 From the beginning, however, we have had serious concerns about the
 way in which
 the local October 27th antiwar demonstration had been organized. We
 were told we could
 participate in organizing only if we did not raise any meaningful
 disagreements. We, of
 course, decided that we could not accept those limitations and have
 not participated in the
 organizing meetings. Nevertheless, we eventually decided to endorse
 the event and
 mobilize for it.
 While we intend to build and mobilize for the protest, we must
 withdraw our
 endorsement of the Chicago demonstration.
 This protest has been organized in such a way as to freeze out left-wing
 organizations and individuals, under the false assumption that the
 left or slogans around
 issues such as Palestine or Afghanistan have "frightened" away
 ordinary people in past
 Chicago protests. This is an elitist approach and a false assessment
 of many past protests
 organized successfully, in part, by the left.
 
 The problem with Durbin, Obama and Daley
 
 We are not in disagreement with the main demands of the protest,
 though we would
 have wanted them to reflect more opposition to broader issues of U.S.
 imperialism in the
 Middle East. The reason we are withdrawing our endorsement is because
 of the invitations
 extended to certain politicians to speak, especially senators Richard
 Durbin and Barack
 Obama.
 Over the summer a number of antiwar protests were held at Senator
 Richard Durbin's
 Chicago offices, organized by groups such as the American Friends
 Service Committee,
 Voices for Creative Nonviolence and the Campus Antiwar Network, among
 others. These
 protests included sit-ins, and some included non-violent civil
 disobedience and arrests.
 Unmoved by these actions or the seventy percent of the state that
 opposes the war,
 Dick Durbin voted once again to fund the occupation on September
 27—and again on
 October 1—along with the vast majority of the Senate.
 Barack Obama could not be bothered to show up for that vote. However,
 there should
 be little doubt at this point as to where the junior senator's
 sympathies lie. At the
 Democratic primary debate on September 25, Obama, Hillary Clinton and
 John Edwards all
 refused to entertain the idea of a full withdrawal of U.S. troops by 2013.
 Obama made his position regarding a promised pullout by January 2013
 clear; "I
 think it would be irresponsible. " This is not to mention Obama's
 saber rattling against Iran
 and Pakistan, or his "senatorial" support for Israel's crimes against
 Palestine.
 Earlier in the year, even mainstream Democratic Party politicians took
 a more
 oppositional stand around the war. However, with the 2008 elections
 approaching, more
 and more politicians are not appealing so much to antiwar voters, but
 to the
 establishment, trying to prove they will be "responsible"
 administrators of the war itself.
 It is unconscionable to invite as antiwar speakers those who continue
 to fund the
 war, and those who publicly plan to continue the war for years.
 Also worthy of criticism is the speaking invitation for our
 "illustrious" mayor. Putting
 aside his pursuit of rampant gentrification, complicity in countless
 cases of police brutality
 or his large role in covering-up the Jon Burge torture ring, Richard
 Daley has proven he is
 no friend of the antiwar movement.
 As bombs fell on Iraq in 2003, it was Daley's police department that
 arrested
 hundreds of peaceful antiwar activists. Under Daley, the Chicago
 Public Schools (CPS)
 became the most militarized in the nation. It was Daley's cronies in
 the CPS that installed a
 naval academy at Senn High School over the protests and opposition of
 students, faculty
 and community members.
 No matter how many antiwar resolutions Daley's city council might
 pass—and such
 resolutions are welcome—these students are to be used as the occupiers
 and cannon
 fodder of Bush's wars.
 An uncritical approach to these pro-war politicians politically
 disarms the antiwar
 movement. The Illinois senators have made it quite clear that they are
 not against the war.
 They may mouth criticisms and may at times vaguely speak of
 withdrawing "combat
 troops" at some future date. But this will not bring the war to an
 end—and Obama and
 Durbin have proven it with their actions over the past two weeks.
 Their empty promises mirror the countless and never-materialized
 withdrawal
 schemes hatched during the Vietnam War. That war did not end until a
 confluence of
 resistance in Vietnam met mass antiwar protests in the United States,
 which in turn gave
 confidence and support to a wave of antiwar activity in the armed
 forces itself.
 That can be built today, but Durbin and Obama are not allies in that
 project. Instead,
 they have proven themselves to be obstacles.
 
 Don't boycott
 
 At the same time, we believe it would be mistaken, as some have
 argued, to boycott
 this protest. The vast majority of organizations and individuals who
 will attend this
 demonstration are antiwar. They are open to discussing a different
 strategy to ending the
 war, and a discussion of why a strategy of courting warmongers—in
 whatever partisan
 clothing—is a strategy doomed to failure.
 Instead, antiwar individuals and organizations need to mobilize all
 the more, to begin
 to organize opposition to this war in a different way—one that is open
 to the left, and one
 that does not rely on Democratic Party politicians who continue to
 enable the war.
 Instead of inviting them to speak for us, the antiwar movement must
 hold Durbin,
 Obama and Daley accountable for their complicity in the murder of one
 million Iraqis and
 nearly four thousand U.S. soldiers.


       
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