Month: July 2023

Book review: IF Stone – The Hidden History of the Korean War

Written to coincide with the 70th anniversary of the Korean Armistice Agreement, this book review by Carlos Martinez of IF Stone’s recently re-issued The Hidden History of the Korean War seeks to identify the lessons to be learnt from the so-called “forgotten war”, and to draw out parallels between the original Cold War in the Pacific and the New Cold War in the Pacific.

A shorter version of this review was published in the Morning Star.

The 27th of July 2023 marks 70 years since the signing of the armistice agreement at Panmunjom, finally bringing about a cessation of hostilities in a war that was extraordinarily destructive but which has been largely ignored.

As Bruce Cumings writes in his preface to I.F. Stone’s classic The Hidden History of the Korean War – first published in 1952 and recently reissued by Monthly Review Press – the Korean War is a forgotten war, “remembered mainly as an odd conflict sandwiched between the good war (World War 2) and the bad war (Vietnam).”

For those seeking to build a peaceful and prosperous future for humanity, the lessons of the Korean War must not be forgotten. Indeed re-reading The Hidden History it becomes clear that there are several crucial parallels with today’s world.

Stone’s meticulous investigation provides abundant proof that most of the key players in the US government and military actively wanted the Korean War; that it was the right war, in the right place and the right time in terms of US imperialist interests.

Top US generals have since admitted that their “police action” in Korea gave them just the excuse they needed to construct the military infrastructure of Cold War in the Pacific: a vast network of overseas bases; large-scale, long-term deployments of US troops in Korea and Japan; and the permanent stationing of nuclear warheads in the region.

The Korean War set the whole military-industrial complex in motion. It created the national security state. It was the first major test case for the Truman Doctrine of “support for democracies against authoritarian threats” and helped establish the US in its self-assumed role of global policeman. By forcing through a United Nations endorsement of its invasion, the US was able to establish its dominance of the UN-based international system.

Reading Izzy Stone’s reporting today, it’s striking the extent to which these mechanisms of Cold War still exist and are being used to wage a New Cold War. The military bases, the troop deployments, the nuclear threats that aimed to contain socialism and prevent the emergence of a multipolar world in the 1950s continue to serve the same purposes in 2023.

Stone’s book emphasises that peace was very much an option in 1950.

The Soviet Union of course wanted peace; having lost 27 million lives and sustained incredible damage to its infrastructure in the course of saving the world from Nazism, the Soviets needed space to rebuild. The People’s Republic of China also wanted peace; having only been founded in October 1949 after long years of civil war and struggle against Japanese occupation, the last thing the new state needed was to become embroiled in another war. (In the event, nearly 400,000 Chinese volunteers gave their lives fighting in Korea).

The US could have accepted the post-WW2 reality: that some countries had chosen the path of socialism, and that many other countries were throwing off the shackles of colonialism and seeking to explore an independent path to development.

The US could furthermore have accepted an emerging status quo in East Asia. Before the US invasion, the trajectory was for Korea to be united under a popular, communist-led government; for Taiwan to become part of the People’s Republic of China; for China to regain its rightful seat at the UN; and for US troops to be removed from Japan.

Such a configuration would have reflected the will of the peoples of the region, but it wasn’t consistent with Washington’s idiosyncratic vision of a “rules-based world order”. The major western powers, led by the US, rejected peace and chose containment, encirclement, blockade and war.

They chose a strategy of doing everything they could to weaken the socialist countries and the forces of national liberation and sovereign development. They chose the Cold War – which for the people of Korea, Vietnam, Angola, Nicaragua, Chile, and many other countries of the Global South was not cold at all.

Seventy years later, the “End of History” fever dream is over and the West is once again faced with a rising socialism and an irrepressible multipolar trend, at the centre of which is China. Once again there is a choice between peace and conflict.

China has become a major player in global affairs. It’s the largest trading partner of two-thirds of the world’s countries. It’s the second largest economy in the world in dollar terms. It’s taken the lead globally on poverty alleviation and on sustainable development. It’s on the cutting edge of advanced industry, of telecommunications, of artificial intelligence, of renewable energy and more.

Through mechanisms such as BRICS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, China is promoting solidarity and shared development of the Global South. China is playing a positive role in promoting sovereign development in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, Central Asia, the Caribbean, and Pacific – regions that have been held in underdevelopment for centuries by the colonial and imperial powers.

What’s more, China is recognised globally for its consistent pursuit of peace. Where the West has stoked conflict in Ukraine, China has worked with all parties for a peaceful settlement. Where the US has stoked division in the Middle East, China has facilitated a rapprochement between Iran and Saudi Arabia, thereby potentially clearing a path for an end to the horrific war in Yemen.

Can the West adapt to this new reality? Can it accept China’s rise? Can it accept that the countries of the world want to determine their own economic policy and their own foreign policy? Can it accept that the era of colonialism and imperialism is over? Can it accept that the idea of any one country being the “world’s policeman” really has no place in the modern world?

Can the West work with China, with Iran, with Russia and other countries to solve the major existential problems that humanity faces? Or will the US and its allies continue on the ruinous path of a New Cold War – and potentially a devastating hot war? Such are the defining geopolitical questions of our era.

The Hidden History of the Korean War is essential reading for those who are educating and organising towards peace; towards building a mass anti-war movement that our governments can’t ignore.

Campaigning against the New Cold War is crucial for all who value peace and justice

This is the text and video of a presentation made by Carlos Martinez at a 28 June webinar of the United National Anti-War Coalition, on the theme of US anti-China propaganda, a prelude to war. Carlos exposes the extraordinary hypocrisy and falsehood of the propaganda war that the Western powers are waging against China, and highlights how it is being leveraged to shift public opinion in favour of anti-China hostility.

He points out that the escalating campaign of China encirclement and containment is threatening to derail global progress on key issues, noting that “the future of humanity actually hinges on global cooperation to address our collective problems.” As such, Carlos calls on all progressive and peace-loving people to make campaigning against the New Cold War a core part of their work.

Other speakers at the event included Lee Siu Hin of the China-US Solidarity Network, Sara Flounders of the International Action Center, and Arjae Red of Workers World Party. The full webinar can be viewed on YouTube.

Dear friends, thank you so much for inviting me to speak at this important event. I’m very sorry not to be able to join you in person, as I’m currently in Guiyang, China, on a delegation.

The theme of today’s event, “Anti-Chinese propaganda, a prelude to war”, is closely connected to the rationale for writing my book, “The East is Still Red: Chinese socialism in the 21st century.”

I had two key aims in mind with the book.

One was to talk about socialism, about how China is a socialist country. So many people think that China used to be a socialist country and then became capitalist with the introduction of market reforms. I wanted to show that China remains a socialist country and that socialism provides the framework for its incredible successes in poverty alleviation, development, renewable energy, and so on.

And I wanted to say to the Western left – which tends to be a bit unsure about China – look, China’s achieved all these things, it’s raised living standards beyond recognition, it’s gone from being a technologically backward and oppressed country to being a science and tech powerhouse, it’s leading the global shift to multipolarity; why on earth would we want to ascribe these successes to capitalism rather than socialism? Let’s celebrate socialist victories, let’s uphold the history and politics of the global working class.

Hence ‘The East is Still Red’.

The second key aim in writing the book was to stand up to the propaganda war, which is part of a wider New Cold War against China, and that’s the focus of my talk today.

This work of standing up to the propaganda war is urgent. It needs to be a major focus for socialists, communists, progressives, for anti-war campaigners worldwide; really for anyone that doesn’t think “better dead than red” is a viable slogan for the 21st century.

Because the propaganda war is war propaganda.

It seeks to build the broadest possible public support for a New Cold War, for a campaign of containment and encirclement, and ultimately very possibly for a hot war.

Let’s get something straight. This New Cold War, this anti-China campaign, has absolutely nothing to do with human rights.

When the West throws disgraceful slanders at China over alleged human rights abuses in Xinjiang, does anybody seriously think they’re manifesting a hitherto secret fondness and respect for Muslim people and their religion?

Where was that sentiment when they killed over a million people in Iraq?

Where was that sentiment when they destroyed Afghanistan, turning a quarter of its population into refugees and imposing brutal poverty on the rest?

Where was that sentiment when they bombed Libya into the Stone Age?

Where’s that sentiment today as they wage a disastrous proxy war against Iran in Yemen, creating the most severe humanitarian crisis in the world?

If they’re concerned about Muslims being placed in prison camps and denied their human rights, the first place they need to look is their illegally occupied corner of Cuba, that is, Guantanamo Bay.

When the West spreads outright lies about the suppression of Tibetan or Inner Mongolian language and culture, does anyone seriously think they’re standing up for the rights of indigenous peoples and for the preservation of precious human history?

How many indigenous languages are taught in US schools? To what extent is indigenous culture – and righteous resistance against colonialism – celebrated in US society? When was the last time native rights were upheld over drilling rights? Why does the US Congress seem more concerned with preserving Tibetan heritage than shutting down the Dakota Access pipeline?

These anti-China stories – all of which can be and have been comprehensively debunked – have nothing to do with upholding the principles of freedom, democracy and justice.

Those are the principles that are invoked. Those are the sentiments that are manipulated. Do you support freedom for Tibetan people? Do you oppose genocide and cultural genocide? Do you oppose debt traps in Africa and Latin America? If so, you should be anti-China, that’s the message; that’s the way of manufacturing consent, of persuading people to take a reactionary pro-imperialist position whilst feeling like they’re standing on the side of justice.

But it’s not the side of justice. It’s a campaign of demonisation, forming part of a hybrid war against socialism, against sovereignty, and against multipolarity.

It’s part of the New Cold War, part of the Project for a New American Century. There’s nothing progressive about it. It’s the politics of Donald Trump, of Joe Biden, of Mike Pompeo, Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld.

It’s the politics of a decaying US-led empire doing everything it can to prevent that decay, to maintain its hegemony, to prevent the emergence of a different kind of world.

In that sense, the New Cold War actually has a lot in common with the original Cold War.

What was the Cold War about? Historians sometimes talk about it in grandiose terms, as a “clash of civilisations”; an ideological battle between capitalism and communism, ending with the triumph of so-called liberal democracy and the end of history.

The reality is very different. It was a long-term campaign engineered by the US and its close allies to contain and roll back socialism; to contain and roll back decolonisation; to contain and roll back the economic emergence and political sovereignty of the Global South.

The Soviets certainly never wanted a Cold War, never wanted an arms race, never wanted a system of entrenched hostility.

They wanted and called for peaceful coexistence. Having heroically defeated the Nazis and liberated Europe from the yoke of fascism, they wanted and needed breathing space to rebuild. But the imperialists wouldn’t give them that breathing space. Instead they did whatever they could to suffocate the country that had sacrificed 27 million lives in the fight against the Hitlerite war machine.

Similarly the Chinese never wanted a Cold War and hoped for peaceful coexistence with the West. The Chinese also sacrificed millions of lives in World War 2, fighting against a horrifyingly brutal Japanese invasion and occupation. But the US made it clear from the start that it would never accept Chinese socialism.

And by the way the Cold War wasn’t all that cold. It wasn’t cold for the 3 million people that lost their lives in Korea between 1950 and 1953 – a war fought exclusively in the interests of US geopolitical advantage, so the US could have a military foothold in the region from which to permanently threaten China and the Soviet Union with nuclear annihilation.

The Cold War wasn’t cold for the 4 million people that lost their lives in Vietnam between 1965 and 1975 – another war fought exclusively in the interests of US geopolitical advantage, so the US could encircle China and prevent the peoples of Southeast Asia from choosing a socialist development path.

Millions more lost their lives in coups, proxy wars and invasions from Indonesia to Brazil, from Chile to Angola, from Nicaragua to Iran. The US, the CIA, the State Department, had a hand in all of this. Sacrificing millions for the sake of preserving what is bizarrely referred to as the rules-based world order.

That’s the same rules-based world order that Biden and Blinken talk incessantly about today.

What they don’t say is that these rules are written in Washington DC; they’re rules that protect the interests of the US capitalist class. These rules are enforced by the US military and the mechanisms of economic coercion. They’re enforced with the help of dollar hegemony, as well as 800 overseas military bases, a military budget of around a trillion dollars a year, 5,500 nuclear warheads, a total commitment to the military-industrial complex.

This rules-based order is about protecting profits. Protecting access to the resources, markets, land and cheap labour of the Global South.

Really nothing to do with freedom, democracy, justice and human rights.

So today, when they wage a trade war on China, when they impose sanctions on Chinese solar energy materials, when they try to cut China out of advanced semiconductors, when they try to ban Huawei and TikTok, when they kidnap Huawei’s CFO, none of this is done in support of human rights; it’s done in support of imperialism, of domination, of profit.

When they construct a nuclear pact – AUKUS – between Britain, the US and Australia; when they provide military aid and diplomatic support to Taiwanese separatists; when they build a new military base in North Australia; when they place nuclear-enabled warplanes in the region; when they conduct their RIMPAC military exercises; when they place missile defence systems in Guam and South Korea; when they try to turn the Quad into a sort of Pacific NATO; when they encourage Japanese re-armament; none of this is done in support of peace; it’s done in support of hegemony and bullying.

And it’s increasingly clear that there are elements in the US ruling class that recognise that Cold War tactics aren’t working, that it’s too late to prevent China’s rise, that it’s too late to prevent the emergence of a multipolar, multilateral world – and that are therefore preparing for a full, armed confrontation – most likely with Taiwan as the trigger.

So this is what we’re up against. This is why we have to reject and oppose the propaganda war. This is why we have to debunk anti-China slanders.

The immediate dangers are serious enough. The future of humanity actually hinges on global cooperation to address our collective problems. Climate change is a global issue that can only be solved on a global basis. The same goes for pandemics. The New Cold War gets in the way of the cooperation we desperately need, and as such presents a serious – even existential – threat.

Only slightly less immediate is the danger of a full-scale war between nuclear powers, the potential consequences of which are terrifying.

This is what’s at stake. It’s urgent we make campaigning against the New Cold War, against the propaganda war, against the escalating campaign of China encirclement, a core part of our work, as people who love peace, as people who love justice, as people who want humanity to prosper.