A critique to the decisions of the Executive Bureau of the Fourth International concerning the war in Ukraine
The Central Committee of OKDE-Spartakos
The Executive Bureau of the Fourth International has issued two statements on Ukraine. One before the invasion, on 30/01/2022, entitled " Against NATO and Russian military escalation in Eastern Europe”; and another one after the start of the invasion, on 01/03/2022, entitled " No to Putin’s invasion of Ukraine! Support the Ukrainian resistance! Solidarity with the Russian opposition to the war! "
The first statement seems to keep equal distances from the parties involved in the conflict; it blames NATO and the US, as well as Russia, for the increasing military tension; it warns that a very dangerous confrontation is taking place in Eastern Europe with global geopolitical implications. We will not insist on the class-neutral and journalistic type of language chosen in many parts of the text (“it will be difficult to reach a flexible solution when both sides have made the situation very tense and are starting from positions of political weakness and internal institutional instability”, “The maintenance and expansion of NATO, far from pacifying the continent's relations, is actually straining them – and can only encourage a grand Russian expansionist logic to the detriment of the countries situated between the EU and the Moscow-dominated Eurasian Union.” etc.). This doesn’t happen for the first time. Nor will we dwell on the fact that, although the statement recognizes the greatest danger, since World War II, of an armed conflict between two major powers, and warns of the first, in the last 60 years, threat of nuclear war (a threat which it considers to be more serious than all the previous ones), it does not end up in practical tasks. In the decision, there is nothing more than a general appeal to organize mobilizations for "de-escalation, peace, dissolution of the two military camps and the right of peoples to self-determination”. A few days after the statement, at the meeting of the International Committee, which was held in mid-February, the Ukraine issue was not on the agenda.