The reason why Rage Against the War Machine is still worth discussing, even though the original event of that name happened over a year ago, is because RAWM isn’t just that one event. It’s also a permanent organizing coalition between the groups that both took part in the initial action, and have wanted to commit to working together long-term. That’s part of why the Data Journalism Agency, the Ukraine-based attack dog group with links to the U.S. State Department, has specifically listed RAWM in its big hit piece against anti-imperialists. It was notable in itself how these anti-NATO forces were able to come together, but because they’ve also largely stayed together, the drivers of the war against Russia have continued to see RAWM as a threat worth naming.
“This antiwar movement is interesting because it tries to attract figures from different camps, including ideologically opposite ones: both left and right,” says the piece about RAWM. It describes this as “interesting” because such an effort to broaden the antiwar struggle beyond the leftist niche, and to reach people with antiwar consciousness across the political spectrum, represents a kind of threat which the empire hasn’t seen in decades. As John McCarthy of the Center for Political Innovation has written in response to the piece: “in a show of weakness the panicked Empire has unleashed a desperate wave of slander and censorship in an attempt to keep the American People in the dark…The Imperialists are frightened that Americans across the political spectrum are breaking free from their lies. They are scared that the American People will realize that our interests are the same as the interests of the nations breaking free from Imperialism. They are afraid that we will find out about the unlimited Growth and Prosperity that BRICS is offering the world.”
This reality of what threatens our ruling institutions is the foremost thing which Marxists in the United States need to consider as we navigate activism and discourse. Our ruling class, and the propaganda operatives they deploy, are at this moment mainly focused on preventing anti-imperialists from solidifying into a clear united front. They don’t want there to be a well-defined polarization in our society when it comes to the question of whether we should support empire. This is because they know that if there were, the pro-imperialist side wouldn’t be able to remain narratively dominant, which would render the war machine untenable.
Most of the USA’s people have long tired of the narrative that we need to support Ukraine; which has mainly happened due to sheer war fatigue, but if more of the people learn what this war is truly about, the neocons will be in unprecedented trouble. Not only is the war against Russia an unwinnable and wasteful one, but the war’s core justification of “defending Ukraine’s sovereignty” is entirely fraudulent. It’s a cover for the Kiev fascist regime’s plans to ethnically cleanse the Donbass region; Russia got involved to prevent the threatened communities from being massacred and forcibly relocated. These realities have the potential to fundamentally change mass consciousness. Which is why the imperial state and its Ukrainian appendages have been working hardest to discredit and criminalize the groups that recognize Russia was right to take action.
This is where the lesson from the Agency’s attack becomes apparent: as a communist or antiwar actor, it’s wise to prioritize building alliances with those who can assist you in combating the pro-imperialist forces. I’m not arguing we should support or collaborate with everybody who’s listed in the piece; it includes Donald Trump and others in the pro-Zionist “dissident right,” as well as fascist infiltrators like Matthew Heimbach and Lucas Gage who of course haven’t been able to become part of the RAWM coalition. I’m arguing we should take care to evaluate our potential allies in a measured way, where we first assess all the relevant facts before dismissing these allies. The Agency, and the opportunistic actors on the left who align with its goals, want us to uncritically accept whatever negative things we hear about the pro-Russian groups. This is how they hope to fragment us.
That’s where this situation becomes tragically ironic. Because the Party for Socialism and Liberation, a group that fully embraced this sectarian attitude by attacking RAWM during the leadup to its own event last year, is one of the groups included in the Agency’s piece. Within the graphic the Agency created to illustrate the ties between different people and orgs, the PSL is even put in the same cluster as the pro-Russian Uhuru org. This means the U.S. and Ukrainian trackers who’ve been gathering intelligence on antiwar groups view the PSL’s members as being in the same category Uhuru is in. Which isn’t surprising, because though the pro-Russian political forces are the biggest threat, there are growing signs that the ruling class seeks to crush pro-Palestine activists of all kinds. And that includes the activists in PSL.
By betraying first all the orgs within RAWM, and then the Uhuru org, the PSL’s leaders have cut their own members off from the networks that they’ll desperately need amid the coming repression. We’ve seen how beneficial it’s been for the Uhuru org to ally with CPI during its fight against the DOJ’s charges; this alliance has given Uhuru more strength in a time of crisis. And though I can’t predict the future, because of this I have great confidence that Uhuru is going to keep making progress within the struggle, no matter what the state does. Due to these networks that the org has been willing to build, it’s in a better place to win the narrative battle against the state. As Uhuru’s Chairman Omali Yeshitela has said, “We are creating a situation where people clearly understand the connection of this attack on the African People’s Socialist Party and the Uhuru Movement, and the future of freedom for everybody in the world.”
This is why I’ve walked away from the side of the movement that PSL represents—which will only accept people who join it in denouncing its sectarian targets—and embraced Uhuru’s strategy. Omali and his org’s members understand the indispensable value of aligning with every force, both foreign and domestic, that’s an ally within the struggle against the imperial order. It’s the sensible thing to do when the U.S. government, along with its proxies, are putting you and numerous others on implicit target lists. We should view this hit piece by the Agency as an extension of the Ukrainian government’s list of U.S. citizens that it wants assassinated; though only a few of the Americans from the Agency’s list are on the official kill list, this new list has further put groups like Uhuru and CPI on the radar of Ukraine’s Nazi terrorists.
The PSL hopes its neutral stance on Russia-Ukraine, and its disavowal of the “bad” anti-imperialists, will save it from the imperial state’s retaliations. But the state is coming for everybody who’s speaking out on Palestine. We need to respond to these threats with strategic wiseness, and strengthen the united front against the forces which seek to destroy us.
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