cheers,

following leaflet has been distributed on a spontaneous public gathering in
edinburgh today. feel free to circulate and comment...

love and rage
m.

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London Bombs and G8-Politics - Terrorist Acts of a System in Crisis
>From the gigantic police cordon know as Edinburgh:
In the last days the development of this society has been symbolised and
accelerated in the streets of Edinburgh and London: the political leaders of
the world's ruling nations hide away in the Scottish countryside, planning
future terrorist attacks such as extension of their wars, privatisations,
welfare and wage cuts, while their police forces turn the region into a
gigantic police cordon and the media applauds the repression of all protests
which are not toothless marching. Then the bombs in London, a terrorist
answer to the terrorist politics of the G8 nations by those who are only
other rulers-in-waiting...

The Crashing Sound of a System in Crisis
The 'drop the debt'-show can't disguise the reality of the last decade:
extension of mass poverty from Capetown to Novosibirsk, longer working
hours, lower wages and redundancies (lately at IBM, General Motors,
Rover...). The EU countries continually announce breaches of the stability
pact, which results in a deep political crisis (e.g. the constitution
debacle), governments in Germany, France and Italy are finished without
being beaten by a parliamentary opposition. In Latin America the
neo-liberalist / free-market model is in a deadlock situation, not least due
to social unrest in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil. The USA and Russia try to
export their internal crisis by prolonged bloody warfare in Chechenia and
Iraq, but can't win these wars on either a military or political level. All
in all, the abyss between the potentials that we have to create a better
world (the material wealth, increased social knowledge, communication,
productivity) and the actual use of these potentials (production for profits
instead of needs, war,
impoverishment) is widening rapidly and noisily...

Terrorism - Warfare of the Unrecognised Statesmen
The crisis causes political disintegration of many states (Sudan, Nigeria,
Afghanistan etc.), political power has to be reinstalled, borders
re-defined. The creation and maintenance of nation-states has always been a
bloody business of war and repression. The difference between an official
army and 'terrorist groups' is their official recognition, but they have in
common means (bombs, fear and social repression) and goals (control over the
resources and work-force of their territory). Mandela and Arafat were
brandished as 'terrorist' before they became accepted as statesmen, western
governments supported all kind of 'terrorists', the Bin Laden-Clan and the
Bush-family have been business partners behind the stage of their military
conflicts. With the increasing impoverishment both can count on recruitment
from the economically devastated areas, suicide bombers from Gaza strip or
freshly drafted young people from the Ghettos of US cities. For the
exploited and their struggle for a better life the most dangerous aspect of
'terrorism' at the moment is it's counterpart, the state's anti-terrorism.

'War on Terror' on the Deathbed of Social Partnership
In Europe and the USA the profit squeeze crushed the possibility of
appeasing social conflicts by offering something in exchange for increased
exploitation. In the 90s all 'Labour' Parties in Europe used their social
credibility in order to enforce unprecedented cuts in the welfare system and
workers rights. They lost their credibility. The unions have only been able
to negotiate how bad the wage cuts and dismissals will be. Tied to their
weak position at negotiation table they lost the trust of many workers, in
many recent conflicts they even turned against them (e.g. the wildcat strike
at GM in Germany). People realised that their mass protest is pointless, as
long as it is only appealing to the 'democratic rules of majority': the mass
protests against the Iraq war, the East-German marches against welfare cuts
didn't stop the state acting against the wish of the majority, as the recent
marches against poverty won't change things as long as they don't hurt the
interests of the rich materially. In this social situation politicians and
capitalists try to refine their repressive machinery to deal with future
conflicts. The 'war on terror' is their main pretext at the moment: they
increase the atmosphere of fear, so people turn towards the state; they
introduce stricter laws and controls, which effects possible protests and
workers actions (strikes, occupations etc.); they shift their spending from
welfare towards the military sector; they try to deepen divisions within the
working class by anti-immigrant propaganda.

Proletarian Movement against the State of Fear
After the bombings in Madrid people in Spain took the streets in order to
show that the terrorist attacks won't isolate them in fear and that they are
pissed off about the lies of the conservative government, it's participation
in the Iraq war and it's labour reform. The future workers movements for a
better life will have to get out of the catch 22: being in fear due to
terrorists who respond to the terrorist politics of a state. A state we are
then told to expect safety from while at the same time it is attacking our
living standards. We will have to develop trust in our own ability to
organise ourselves, because the established bureaucratic organisations won't
do it anymore. We will have to overcome the illusion that it is enough to
petition the rulers or that we could impress them by our mere mass. Our
future struggles will have to confront the legal boundaries, which are
tightening on a daily basis. We have to refuse the state's 'war on terror'
because any of our (strike) actions which are more than symbolic, any
workplace occupation, any effective demonstrations will be denounced as
'violent anarchism' and possibly 'terrorist'...

Proletarian Movement for a Better Life - against Bus Bombs and Capitalist
Attacks!

www.prol-position.net

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