500,000 In Defence of Iraq-UK

500,000 In Defence of Iraq


Hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated which remind one of the
large demos against nuclear weapons or the poll tax demo that brought
down Thatcher in the centre of London. The size of the demo was so
large that the first half of the demo had reached its destination
whilst the back part hadn't even started. Organised by the Stop the
War Committee and the Muslim Association of Britain the main speakers
were on the whole MP's of the Blairs Labour Party alongside
trade-unionist leaders.

Slogans such as:
Bush your Daddy was a Killer too
Freedom to Palestine
How Many Kids Did you Kill Today

The demo was quite dynamic in particular those sections which had Arab or Asian contingents in them and it had nothing in common with the demos in support of Serbia. To a certain extent the same issues
dominated of intervention into a sovereign state without the UN
agrement. But very few linked the past with the present as then the
propaganda in support of 'oppressed Muslims' was dominant. But as with
every imperialist myth, the passing of time alongside the consequences
of life weakens them. It was ridiculous when the organisers of the
demo called upon youth to take off their fake suicide bombs.





The lack of perspective by the organisers was striking. Apart from the
lonely George Galloway MP who called on people to go on strikes and
occuppy their workplaces against the outbreak of the war, the main
argument of the day was that through protest marches the war can be
stopped. The fact that the union leaders didn't call on their members
to prepare for strikes against the war shows that they have abandoned
people to their own fate, not to attempt to change the course of
history dynamically. The main cause of the outbreak of the war was
oil not the massive crisis afflicting the international monopolies
and their economic systmem. The course towards a global American
dictatorship as an explanation for the coming war alongside slogans
for the victory of Iraw were totally absent.


The size of the demo shows the dissilusionment of people in a country where the political establishment belongs lock stock and barrel to US imperialism. The abscence of the firefighters union which is in a pay dispute shows that the trade union leaderships are following the ostrich line of defence - if they say a few things now they can then hide when war breaks out... The issues of war which are identical to the bankruptcy of American capitalism and privatisations will not go away. On the contrary they will intensify...