First Published: n.d. [1980]
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
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On December 27, over 50,000 Soviet troops stormed across the border into Afghanistan. They executed the President, arrested over 20,000 Afghan civilians, and are now occupying (hut country by brute force.
The Soviets moved so boldly because they were losing control over Afghanistan, which they had ruled through two puppet regimes since 1978. These governments were not able to crush the Moslem guerilla movement that had liberated over one half of the country. So this time the Russians moved in with their own troops – now numbering almost 100,000.
But the Afghan people refuse to be crushed. Many sectors of society are joining the resistance. They are daily fighting a guerilla war to drive the Russians out so the Afghans themselves can govern their own country.
The Soviet invasion steps up the fierce rivalry between the two superpowers. The Soviets and the United Slates are competing to control strategic areas of the world for their respective “national interests” – that is, the interests of each of their small ruling classes to make huge profits from controlling the natural resources and people of other countries.
The United States has time and again overthrown legitimate governments and installed tyrannical dictators, as in Iran, to protect its interests in robbing that country of its oil. The Soviets today are growing bolder in their war preparations and will stop at nothing in their imperialist ventures. Afghanistan is a step in their plan to get a warm water port in the Indian Ocean and thereby increase Soviet naval capability. Control over Afghanistan would bring them closer to oil rich Iran and Pakistan.
What can we, working people in the U.S. do to support the people of Afghanistan against this brazen attack? We should speak out as people all over the world are doing. We can pass resolutions in our trade unions condemning the Soviet invasion, as have already been done by Local 2 of the Hotel, Restaurant and Bartenders Employees Union and Local 164 of the Molders and Allied Workers in the Bay Area. We can join in demonstrations and programs to demand All Soviet troops out of Afghanistan and support the resistance of the Afghan people!
We should also make clear demands on the U.S. government:
End all U.S. grain sales, technology and other trade with the Soviet Union! During World War II, U.S. financiers invested in Hitler even as his tanks were overrunning Europe. Today trucks financed by the Chase Manhattan Bank and Bank of America rolled into Afghanistan as part of the Soviet invasion. U.S. capitalists must not be allowed to continue to finance the Soviet war machine for their own greed!
Oppose any measures of the U.S. government to increase U.S. interference in the Near East! In his Stale of the Union address, Carter threatened to use military force in the Persian Gulf if “U.S. national interests” were threatened. What about the interests of the people of the Persian Gulf, who want to run their own countries, free from the interference of either superpower? These are the people who should decide what tanks and bombs are used in their countries. They should not be a battlefield for the two superpowers!