Anzac Day always seems an appropriate occasion to restate the anarchist opposition to war, and reiterate that it is never in the interests of the working class to support war.

The anarchist case against war arises from our analysis of, and opposition to, capitalism. Capitalism is the cause of modern war. The insatiable hunger for profit generates a relentless search by the various capitalist powers for markets and sources of raw materials. Modern war is in reality an extension of “business under capitalism” carried to an extreme of violence, where the economic rivalries between the various national sections of the capitalist class can no longer be peacefully resolved or controlled.

Despite the story that the First World War started because of the assassination of the Austrian emperor’s nephew Archduke Ferdinand by Serbian nationalists, the reality was that it was the outcome of years of conflicting capitalist interests. British and French capitalism was being challenged by the rising expansion of Germany, both in Europe and abroad. When Germany showed in 1911, by sending a gunboat to the city of Agadir, that they intended to get a foothold in Morocco, the then Chancellor of the Exchequer in the UK, Lloyd George, at once reacted with a speech threatening war.

In this tense international environment the crisis that would produce war on a Global scale was probably inevitable. The “Austria-Serbia dispute” was merely the spark that ignited the conflagration.

Anyone who preaches peace and disarmament without calling for an overthrow of capitalism have yet to demonstrate how these objectives can be realised, or how trade and export of capital can expand without violence being the outcome.

The abolition of war, and the threat of war, will only be realised with the overthrow of capitalism and the restructuring of society on the basis of common ownership and production solely to meet human needs. Such a society would unite the human race without economic classes, or national barriers dividing us.

Whenever war is fought, for whatever false reasons that are presented to us, and whichever side is declared the victor, one side is always the loser, and that is us, the workers of the world.

As workers we need to realise that our enemy is not the worker in other lands; rather it is the capitalist class at home, and this is a far more important division than that separating nation from nation.

The fight for anarchism is inseparable from the fight against war. The only way to fight militarism is to fight capitalism and the state.

The fight for anarchism is the fight for peace.

Aotearoa Workers Solidarity Movement

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