October, 2014

Canadian young communists oppose the deadly imperialist war in Iraq and denounce Canada’s participation in the international war coalition!

On October 6th, the Parliament voted in favour of the Conservative resolution to engage 600 soldiers, 3 refuel planes, 1 transportation plane as well as 6 fighter jets for six months in the Western and NATO-led invasion of Iraq, the third since 1991.

The Young Communist League of Canada – Ligue de la jeunesse communiste du Canada is firmly opposed to this war and denounces Canada’s compliance, which will spark a larger conflict in the whole region.

It is obvious to us that Canadian intervention is in no way aimed to stop groups such as the Islamic State, as intervention works in the interests of western imperialism. Iraq currently has the fifth largest oil reserves in the world, and produces over 10% of the world’s oil. It is a strategic market for Canadian oil corporations, such as Suncor and Suncrude, especially in the midst of an economic crisis for the West.

There is a greater Western strategy, known as the “Greater Middle East” strategy, aimed to destabilize the whole region by dismantling the stronger states under religious, ethnic, national, social and cultural pretexts. As young communists, we are highly concerned about the dramatic situation in the region, since the proclamation of the “Islamic State”. We are firmly opposed to these Islamist groups, but we cannot support nor think that the same forces who made the situation worse are the ones who will solve the problem. In fact, after various NATO or Western-led invasions in the region, the situation became worse. In the First Gulf War in Iraq, 300,000 people were killed. In 2003, that total became 500 000 deaths. These wars further exacerbated interethnic conflict in the region.

The Conservative government called for further intervention in the region during the Syrian insurgency on the side of fundamentalist forces, such as the Islamic State, sometimes even more firmly than the US. Therefore, it remains clear that Canada, along with other Western imperialist powers, support these groups when it suits their interests. Now they are using the success of these same groups in order to justify an intervention, as we are witnessing in Iraq and in Afghanistan.

We also denounce the position of all the parties in parliament, including the NDP and the Liberals, who at the very least support a Canadian role in the International War Coalition.

These parties have been in favour of Canadian intervention in recent imperialist wars in Yugoslavia, Libya and Mali, and have shown support for Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine this summer. In recent history, it was the Liberals who were the ones who began a 13 year intervention in Afghanistan. None of them denounce the intervention itself, nor did they protest when Canada sent 69 military “councillors” to Iraq in September.

The Harper government and the media have been perpetuating Islamophobia– suggesting these groups pose a threat to Canadian society. This is used as a justification to erode democratic rights at home, such as expanding CSIS’s powers to monitor and arrest Canadian citizens without having committed a crime. The sensationalism attached to the two deaths of Canadian soldiers in Ottawa and in Montreal — initiated and strengthened by the corporate media– is being used to racialize these isolated attacks, strengthen the drive to war, and rollback civil liberties.

This war is not about protecting the Iraqi or Syrian people, nor is it about protecting Canadians. It is about controlling the region and about their ‘responsibility to protect’ imperialism’s interests. The Islamic State is a direct product of continued Western intervention in these countries.

The funds diverted to these wars of intervention take away from public services and social welfare that working people pay for. Instead of ensuring access to resources that improve the everyday life of average Canadians, including health care and education, the Harper government puts imperialist intervention as a top priority. Acting in the interests of capitalism, it spends millions of dollars of taxpayer money on war and massive purchases of military hardware, despite the illusion of necessary economic cutbacks. Austerity pays for profit-seeking war, at the expense of Canadian workers.

For the Young Communist League, it is clear that any intervention will worsen the situation and impede any kind of development in the region for a long time. We call upon peaceful-minded Canadians to oppose this imperialist war and go out on the streets to demand the return of the Canadian military from Iraq and cease any action that would facilitate arms transport in the region.  We also demand Canada’s immediate withdrawal from NATO, an end to militarization, and call for an end to Harper’s warmongering in the Middle East and elsewhere in the world.