From: "Dave Coull" <d.y.coull-AT-dundee.ac.uk>
Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 15:24:35 GMT
Subject: NO WAR BUT THE CLASS WAR


I don't know who first came up with this slogan, 
but it has been an anarchist slogan for as long
as I can remember (which is quite a long time)
and probably for a very long time before that.

(By the way, did you know that the word "slogan" 
is a Gaelic word imported into English, and its original
Gaelic meaning is "battle cry" ? A clan would call 
out their slogan when going into battle. Is it appropriate
to talk about "No War" as a battle cry ? Yes, it 
is, because of the second bit of this slogan.)

Anyway, some anarchists in Glasgow have produced
an anti-war leaflet which they are distributing in 
that city, and which they have sent to myself in Dundee,
people in Edinburgh, etc, for distribution in other
cities, and I thought it deserved a wider, international
distribution. Feel free to reproduce the leaflet.
Here is the text of that Glasgow anarchist leaflet :

********************************************************

               NO  WAR  BUT  THE  CLASS  WAR !

Nationalism out of the Balkans! Don't support the bombing!

We say   NO WAR BUT THE CLASS WAR   because : 

* Ethnic nationalism brings misery for the ordinary 
   downtrodden people ;

* The interests of the Rulers of any country, multinational
   company, etc., are not our interests, as workers and as
   "pawns" in their machiavellian games ;

* While non-violent direct action is a valid tactic in day-to-day
   resistance the world over, there comes a time when workers
   have to resist by any means necessary, united on a class
   understanding throughout the world, these rulers and their
   destructive impact on the planet to serve profit and power.

If they, the NATO rulers now bombing Yugoslavia, had examined
their own history, they would have known that it does not weaken
their enemy.
   All the bombs that fell on Clydebank, Hanoi, or Iraq alienated
those bombed from the agressors. The fact that so-called 
smart bombs are targeting destruction on military and strategic
sites has made little difference.
   What generals, air-force commanders and their media spokesmen 
called "collateral" damage has meant civilian deaths in Pristina
and south of Belgrade. Any opposition to the ruling Socialist Party
led by Milosevic has been driven underground.
   Before the Bosnia conflict, Serb workers besieged their 
parliament during protests. During the Croatia and Bosnia 
conflicts,  anti-militarists including "Women in Black" made
brave protests against Serb nationalist warmongering.
Mistaken youth in Belgrade and elsewhere, seduced by
the appeal of western consumerism, thought the West
was their ally.
   The  K.L.A. , set up with Western security help, welcome
the bombing and consider NATO as _their_ airforce.
Such is their disdain for the suffering of their fellow
Albanians in Kosovo, they have played into the hands
of the Serb nationalist forces who have now "ethnically
cleansed" over half of the population through forced
migration or male genocide. NATO has been out-thought
by the rulers in Belgrade with the Serb forces dispersed; 
opponents of the regime neutralised, as in Montenegro;
and largely unable to predict or destroy the paramilitary
"ethnic cleansers".
   Now a threat of  wider conflict arises, with Russia 
threatening a pan-Slav anti-NATO alliance, China 
and other powers alarmed at the United States riding 
roughshod over international conventions in the Gulf
and now Serbia, while at the same time overlooking
atrocities carried out in Burma, East Timor, Kurdistan,
Sierra Leone, Rwanda, when it doesn't suit them.
With Hungary, Poland, and the Czech Republic signed 
up as new members of NATO, if "ground" conflict 
did break out it could happen on a second front
in Vojvodina, in northern Yugoslavia, and spread 
the war throughout the Balkans.

The  ANARCHIST CIRCLE  in Glasgow support the efforts
of the committee to stop the bombing in the Balkans, 
but we go further than calls like "Welfare Not Warfare".

The only solution to the world we live in is a social revolution
of the people against their rulers, politicians, business
leaders, and all of the apologists for capitalism
and its military diversions.
______________________________________

Write to us at Counter Information ( Autonomy) 
c/o  28 King Street, Glasgow G1 5QP.
Or  e-mail  <radfest-AT-yahoo.com>.
We are linked to anarchists in Edinburgh
and elsewhere in Scotland.