CP of Denmark, Contribution to the Athens Meeting 21J2002

Communist Party of Denmark
Intervention at the Athens meeting of Communist and
Workers' Parties, June 21-23, 2002
By Henrik Stamer Hedin, spokesman of National Committee

Dear comrades,
The central topic of our discussions is stated as �The new
situation in the World after September 11�. I should like
to frame a slightly different question: �Is there a new
situation in the world after September 11?�

What I mean is, of course, that the situation now ruling in
the world, the threats posed by the new American so-called
�war against terrorism�, was already an established fact in
its essential features before September 11. The terrorist
attacks on New York and Pentagon may have acted as a
triggering event, but the goals of imperialism had been set
and the guns brought into position long before that date -
both metaphorically and to some extent literally.

Since his rise to power, President Bush has been seeking a
pretext for war. We remember the provocative violation last
spring of Chinese airspace by an American spy plane,
causing the death of a Chinese pilot. This provocation was
obviously not designed to ease tension, but to enhance it.

An attack on Afghanistan had been planned by the USA long
before September 11. Again, what was needed was an excuse
that would permit the USA to start a war without being
perceived as the aggressor.

It is not, however, a question of an individual president
or of a particualar US administration. It goes further
back. For several years, the US military-ideological and
military-industrial complex have been implementing a long
term military strategy known as �Full Spectrum Dominance�.
The aim of this strategy is unchallengeable American
political and economic world dominance, to be achieved by
way of military dominance. In other words: The USA is quite
openly striving to be lord of the world.

In a way, this is new, and yet it is not. The openness of
it is new. The concept of �Full Spectrum Dominance� was, as
a matter of fact, introduced quite frankly to the public in
the summer of 2000. But as has already been said by many of
those who have taken the floor here, there is nothing new
in US hegemonic aspirations.

The reasons, however, of the new situation and now we are
really beginning to speak of something new go deeper than
the aspirations of an individual power. Capitalism at large
seems to be entering a phase of its development, or perhaps
of its crisis, where it cannot exist without a permanent
state of war.

A permanent state of half-war was a prominent feature of
the 90's, punctuated by short outbreaks of actual, limited
war. Now war itself is achieving permanence and generality.
President Bush is speaking of �this first war of the 21st
century�. One would say that he is already looking forward
to the next.

Permanent war is essential to modern capitalism, because
the dynamics of capitalism is rapidly destroying the
purchasing power of the masses, especially in the Third
World, this purchasing power that capital itself needs to
market its produce and realize its profits. Militarization
and war create artificial markets and destroy competing
capital and productive capacities in general.

So that is where capitalism stands today: It is no longer
able to create. Destruction is what is left to it.

Comrades,

The world situation is indeed new not since September 11,
but compared to what it was like only a few years ago. I
shall not attempt to cover more aspects of this new
situation than the few on which I have already commented.
It is a situation dominated by increased tension, by an
objective rise of antagonisms between USA and the rest of
the world, by economic crisis deeper and more prolonged
than ever (in Japan it has already lasted more than ten
years), by outright war, a war against all humanity.

In this situation, what is needed is obviously a global
coalition to stop America's new war against the world like
the global coaliltion that stopped another war against the
world more than half a century ago. But what we see is that
even great powers like Russia and India, which should have
been among the pillars of this coalition, are competing to
cater to the US aspirations, at the same time concealing
their own smaller wars behind the fake �global war against
terrorism�.

The fact should not be hidden that the world is actually
facing a very grave situation the gravest for decades. My
own country, Denmark, is a close ally of the USA, and all
American assertions and excuses for the war are accepted by
the establishment at their face value. A large proportion
of the people share this stance. Danish military forces are
among those supporting the American war effort.

Our task as Danish Communists is clear. We have to
counteract the war psychosis. We have to tell people that
their government is lying to them, that the cause for which
they are paying and occasionally dying is unjust. It will
not be an easy task. The laws designed to stop us have
already been passed. This, also, is new and then again it
is not.

Comrades,
This is the first time that my party, the Communist Party
of Denmark, takes part in one of these international
meetings. I want to thank the Greek comrades for their
initiative giving us this occasion to meet. I want to thank
you all for your attention.