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Across Europe, welfare is being cut to fund warfare, and a storm of resistance is rising. Can the fight against austerity and the fight against militarisation and war become one? Can the struggle of the working class merge with the mass mobilisations of the youth and students?

In France, hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets again this weekend to protest against the high cost of living and to call for better education. In Germany, the youth movement “Gen Z regelt” took to the streets with more than 100,000 people in 34 cities, calling for education, healthcare, climate action and an affordable standard of living, and opposing the return of compulsory military service. In Italy, the day before, tens of thousands of students and workers took to the streets during a general strike, calling for higher wages and opposing military spending. “More homes, no bombs!” was the chant in Rome. That same day, dockworkers in over a hundred ports went on strike against the war.

A new, continent-wide wave of social resistance has been underway for months now, spearheaded by an entire generation that refuses to let its future be taken away.

If the struggle against austerity and the struggle against war can converge, a force will emerge that no one can ignore. A force against a system that prioritises profit and military power over the needs of the people. A struggle for welfare, not warfare.

That is also the message Peter Mertens, author of Mutiny. How our world is tilting and Les derniers jours de l’ancien monde, and General Secretary of the Workers’ Party of Belgium (PVDA-PTB) brought at several recent anti-war meetings. We reproduce his speech below.

The speech was made at the Welfare, Not Warfare rally in London, Friday 23 October 2026 and originally published here by the PTB-PVDA.

* * *

The BBC announced the first storm of the season this week. A storm that has even been given a name: Austen.

But that is not the only storm. There is another one.

A storm that does not appear on weather maps, that respects no national borders, and that spreads from one country to another.

And that storm also has a name: class struggle.

Some people were afraid that there would be no more major social movements. That people would simply accept austerity, militarisation and the dismantling of their social rights. That the younger generation would simply accept a future that is becoming increasingly uncertain.

Dear friends and comrades, all we have to do is look around us.

In Belgium, the trade unions have been mobilising for more than a year against attacks on pensions and social security. On 9 October, another 50,000 people took to the streets, and a major national mobilisation is already planned for the end of November.

In Spain, tens of thousands of people took to the streets after Maricarmen Abascal, an 87-year-old woman, was evicted from the home where she had lived for more than seventy years. Her story became a symbol of the housing crisis and sparked a movement of tenants, young people and ordinary people demanding the right to affordable housing.

In Albania, tens of thousands of students and young people are rising up against corruption, rising education costs, repression and a future without prospects. While luxury resorts and property developments are popping up all around them, young people can barely afford a home of their own.

In Ireland, more than 300,000 teachers, nurses, doctors and civil servants walked off the job in the biggest strike in almost twenty years.

In Italy, more than 100,000 people gathered in Rome. They were demanding higher wages and pensions, better healthcare and education, and an end to militarisation. And the trade unions have already announced another general strike, on 20 November.

And then there is France! On 13 October, 480,000 people took to the streets. Four days later, they were 800,000. High school students, university students, workers, pensioners and trade unionists, alongside the Gilets Jaunes and all sorts of social movements. An entire generation that refuses to let them steal their future.

A new, continent-wide wave of social resistance is ongoing.

And yet, it is rarely recognised as a single, interconnected movement.

A strike in Ireland, a student demonstration in Albania, an occupied square in Madrid, hundreds of thousands of people on the streets of France: all are viewed in isolation, as if these movements had nothing to do with one another.

Precisely the opposite is true: this is a continent-wide storm.

So no, the problem is not that there are no mass movements. The problem is that we still fail to fully understand how big these movements are, how widespread the resistance has become, and how many people in different countries are actually fighting the same struggle.

A struggle against a gigantic theft.

What is being prepared today is no ordinary round of austerity.

It is a fundamental redistribution of society’s wealth.

Away from social security, public services and the needs of the population, and towards the arms industry, military institutions and major capital groups.

We are all told that we have to make sacrifices. There is no money, we are told; we must lower our expectations. We hear this in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, France and Great Britain. But apparently, there is one ministry that never has to make sacrifices: the Ministry of Defence.

In Belgium, every ministry has to tighten its belt, except the Ministry of Defence. That ministry is getting an additional 34 billion euros. We decided to request a copy of the Ministry of Defence’s shopping list.

And what is on that list? Half of it consists not of defensive equipment, but of equipment for military interventions: killer drones, F-35s, frigates and armoured combat vehicles to intervene in the Sahel and the Congo and secure access to minerals and raw materials.

They are not building a European defence force. They are building a European imperialist army, paid for with money we urgently need for our schools, our healthcare and our pensions.

And that is the heart of the matter. This is not just about how much money is being spent, but also about what kind of society they want to build.

In the United States, we can see where this model leads: enormous military budgets, while millions of people lack adequate access to affordable healthcare. A society where a single hospital stay or a serious illness can financially ruin an entire family.

Is that the future they have in mind for Europe? A continent with more fighter jets, but less fire fighters? More soldiers, but less teachers? More barracks, but less schools?

This is a fundamental choice about what kind of society we want. And more and more people are beginning to see what is really at stake.

In France, hundreds of thousands of young people are mobilising around one of the most constructive demands imaginable: they want better education. They want their talents, their creativity and their energy to be put to work improving society, rather than being lost to an industry of destruction and war.

Isn’t that an incredibly positive message?

And how are these young people answered? With batons, tear gas, military deployments and bans on demonstrations. Militarisation abroad always goes hand in hand with militarisation at home. Always.

We can see this in Belgium too. After the student protests in Brussels, Defence Minister Theo Francken said that young people needed boot camps and military re-education. One of the young student leaders in Brussels, Louise Mandjombe, who is just seventeen years old, gave him a brilliant response:

“We already have places where we can educate young people. But they are not called boot camps; they are called schools. And maybe you should start investing in them”

I think that is an amazing response. Because in just a few sentences, she captures the fundamental contradiction of our times. A younger generation demanding education, opportunities and a future, confronted by a political elite that increasingly thinks in terms of weapons, barracks and military discipline.

And that brings us to what I believe is the great strategic question facing us in the period ahead.

The question is not whether there will be more major social movements. They are already here, and they will continue to grow. The big question is whether the movement against austerity will merge with the movement against war and militarisation.

So far, these two movements have often developed side by side. On one side are the trade unions, workers, young people and pensioners fighting against the dismantling of social security and public services. On the other are the peace movement, young people resisting compulsory military service, and those who refuse to be drawn into the new arms race.

But these two movements are not fighting separate battles. They are confronting the same choices, the same economic interests and the same system that puts profit and military power above the needs of the population.

Yet in more and more places, these movements are coming together. Welfare, Not Warfare is where the two movements meet, and that is why this initiative is so essential.

To show what’s happening all over Europe I would like to cite a trustworthy organization: “Fox News”.

A Fox News “digital investigation” discovered, and I quote, “a growing number of communist, socialist and other hard left organizations are answering the call for a coordinated European youth strike on nov 20th”.

Friends, I might be mistaken, but I think they are getting somewhat nervous.

Because, yes, on 20 November, school pupils and students across Europe will go on strike, and that same weekend, the trade unions will be mobilising once again.

That’s why Fox News is scared. That’s why our defense minister is scared. That’s why they try to relaunch the red scare.

Comrades,

History does not move forward in a straight line. It has its highs and its lows, its periods of stagnation and its moments of sudden change. Those who think in linear terms assume that whatever is big and powerful today will always remain big and powerful, and that whatever is small will always remain small.

But those who understand that we are only at the beginning of a storm also know that what seems all-powerful today can disappear tomorrow, and that what seems small today can grow into a major force at breathtaking speed.

The disadvantage of a storm is that it can blow in any direction. But its advantage is that it can also suddenly awaken many people who have been asleep for years.

In periods of stagnation, people learn slowly. In periods of struggle, many people can learn very quickly. People who thought they were standing alone can find one another. People can discover how much they have in common, and how much power they can build together.

We are seeing that today, from Rome to Madrid, from Brussels to Dublin, from Paris to London.

It is up to us, comrades, to connect these movements and give the storm a direction. Not change capitalism, not to give imperialism a different face, but to change everything.

To change everything and build socialism.

Because the storm is not over.

The storm has only just begun.

By Biljana Vankovska

The student protests in Serbia, which began in the wake of the tragic event in Novi Sad in November 2024, only occasionally made the front pages of the world’s media. That is hardly surprising when so many dramatic and consequential events are unfolding across the globe at once, and the Balkans have long ceased to be a focal point of international attention.

Aleksandar Vučić’s rule was characterised by his ability to satisfy and placate external actors: he was warmly received in Brussels, embraced Zelensky in Belgrade, built economic and security ties with both Israel and Russia, came close to a historic business deal with the Trump family, while for China the region served as a hub linking Central and Eastern Europe with the European Union. In these circumstances, the discontent of the younger generation and the gradual mobilisation of broader social strata against domestic conditions were treated as an “internal matter of a sovereign state”. At least, that was the appearance.

The student movement was portrayed as a geopolitical orphan, although it has remained unclear how such an orphan could survive for two years — organisationally, logistically, in terms of media coverage, digital platforms, algorithms, and so on. There are questions about where the interest in the outcome of this geopolitical Gordian knot might have come from; some suggest that we should “follow the money trail”, as funds quietly flowed through various channels. The movement’s methods, particularly during the period when it claimed to be interested not in power but in justice for the victims of the Novi Sad disaster, gave a déjà vu effect to anyone who had experienced or witnessed a colour revolution. That interpretation was strongly rejected, however, by those who regard the movement as authentic grassroots politics, from which, they argue, we could learn what genuine direct democracy looks like. But the plenums that were seeking only justice changed, perhaps because of Vučić’s stubbornness and hubris. It opened the way to an open struggle for power. The electoral result is now clear, at least as far as the winner is concerned. Everything else remains shrouded in fog.

Had it not been for the short text I published on Substack before the elections of 25 October, this analysis, too, might sound like something written by a general after the battle. Still, it is fair to admit that the “avalanche” of the Student List’s victory — the huge turnout and the crystal-clear result — surprised even those who know Serbian politics, and Serbian political culture in particular, far better and from much closer up. At times, it seems that sobering up from the euphoria of victory brings a hangover even to many of those who, until yesterday, formed a seemingly monolithic opposition bloc against what they called “the Evil”. What now? What is to be done? The moment when any question about programmatic goals, strategic priorities and the practical solutions demanded by reality could be easily waved away is over. Right up to the elections, the answer from representatives of the Student List was unanimous: we will think about that tomorrow; for now, our goal is to bring down the regime.

But just a few days after the elections, many are rightly pointing to the enigma of the “Serbian experiment”. One of those who grasped the movement’s trajectory, and what he saw as its only path to success, as early as 2025 was the brilliant thinker and professor Branko Milanović. His view, which seems to have been taken as advice, was that the movement could succeed only by remaining apolitical and adhering to the practice of anti-politics. The enormous accumulated anger against Vučić was the only point of convergence for the far right, the far left and centrist liberals. But being apolitical is a two-edged sword.

The Student List had presented no clear political, let alone ideological, platform, but rather 11 points amounting to a wish list, couched in vague promises about creating “any decent state”. Whenever one wing tried to emphasise a particular position — for example, severing close ties with Moscow — it risked losing a few percentage points of public support. The result was similar whenever the EU and NATO were presented as key strategic goals. Wherever parts of the movement turned, they encountered a political minefield. The simplest course, therefore, was to mobilise against Vučić and demand the fall of his government. And Vučić, generously, made that possible.

Yet there is a deeper problem here, one that extends well beyond Serbia. Across the Balkans, whenever people begin to question the foundations of their political and social order, a familiar refrain can be heard: “Please, don’t philosophise”, or “There is too much politicisation”. Politics is treated as a dirty business, philosophy as an unnecessary luxury, and ideological debate as an obstacle to getting things done. I would argue the opposite precisely. The problem in our societies is not too much meaningful politics, but too little of it. We have no shortage of political manoeuvring, personality cults or struggles for office. What is missing is an open debate about the kind of society we want to build, whose interests the state should serve, and what we mean by justice, equality, social solidarity and sovereignty.

These are not abstract philosophical questions. They are the foundations on which any meaningful social contract must be built. A movement cannot simply postpone them until after victory, as though the answers will emerge automatically once the old rulers are removed. Real change requires philosophical deliberation, moral choices and ideological clarity on the fundamental issues that divide society and determine its future. A common enemy is not a common political programme. Anger can bring people into the streets; moral indignation can sustain a protest; a shared demand for accountability can bring down a government. None of these, by itself, answers what should follow.

This is where the limits of anti-politics become apparent. It may be an effective way of uniting people against an incumbent government, especially one that has discredited the established political order. But it cannot, by itself, provide the foundations of a new one. The problem is not that a movement brings together people with different ideological convictions. The problem begins when those differences are concealed, dismissed as irrelevant, or indefinitely postponed in the name of unity. They do not disappear simply because the movement refuses to discuss them. They return when decisions have to be made — about the economy, labour, public services, property, foreign policy, military alliances and the distribution of power and resources. If these questions are left unanswered, the movement risks changing the political personnel while leaving the underlying structures of power intact.

A refusal to engage in ideological debate does not make politics neutral. Nor does it eliminate the influence of economic interests, technocratic elites or external actors. On the contrary, when a movement refuses to define its political horizon, others may define it on its behalf. The language of anti-politics can thus become a way of avoiding precisely those questions that matter most to ordinary people: who owns, who decides, who benefits, who bears the costs, and whose interests are excluded from the decisions that shape their lives. From a left-wing perspective, these are not secondary issues to be addressed after the restoration of procedural democracy. They are central to what political change should mean in the first place.

At a time when young people across Europe, and France in particular, are protesting on a scale not seen for decades, the Serbian case — a victory achieved through non-violent means, long marches and pens in hand — looks like a small miracle. Reactions in neighbouring countries are similar, especially among the young: why don’t we learn something from the Serbian students? Why are we silent? Why are we apathetic? The only exception, of course, is Albania, where protests may gain intensity precisely because of developments next door.

This is the worst possible moment for a rational analysis of what comes next. How does one move from anti-politics to politics, from protest to laws and decisions, and from mobilisation to the functioning of institutions and the mechanisms of procedural democracy? For those who still believe in the romanticised version of the student movement that defeated the Evil, realism is hard to swallow. They are ready to denounce anyone who raises questions as a pro-Vučić element, if not something worse.

Yet the region has quite a few wise heads with grey hair and enough memories to offer a more sober assessment. The words of Nenad Čanak and Žarko Puhovski, for example, are worth considering. Čanak, a politician and activist from Vojvodina — the province where Vučić suffered a crushing defeat — has advanced a thesis that deserves attention. In my paraphrase, he argues that the Student List’s victory marked the end of Serbia’s multiparty system, razing it to the ground. He described the list itself, which has no recognisable leader, structure or programme, as a “black box” brought into parliament. Puhovski expressed a similar degree of scepticism, arguing that the list has everything but students: its members are either entirely anonymous or have “laundered biographies”, while the ideological combination of ultra-rightists and far-leftists is an impossible one. I called it a “mixture of oil and water”, or perhaps, more aptly, “fire and water”.

Vučić’s early and peaceful concession came as a huge surprise, but also as a relief: civil war had been avoided. Vučić had recognised the writing on the wall even before voting ended and chose what he considered the wisest chess move: conceding defeat while positioning himself as the leader of the parliamentary opposition. It is a rather comfortable position, with an MP’s mandate, and a presence on the political scene from which to watch and wait for the Student List’s mistakes. It may even be a relief to him that others will now have to deal with Kosovo, EU pressure, the growing economic and social crisis, Russian sanctions, the war in Ukraine, and so on. If he is not arrested eventually…

As I write this, the names of those who will take over power remain largely unknown, despite the huge parliamentary majority they command. The Serbian parliament is now overwhelmingly dominated by two political camps, with a few minority representatives occupying guaranteed seats. Today’s parliament reflects a Serbia divided since the days of the 19th-century socialist Svetozar Marković. The same is true of society, burdened by mutual resentment. The victory was peaceful, but deep divisions and hatred continue to smoulder beneath the surface, and they will hardly be easy to contain. For those on the left, perhaps the most sobering sign is that the name being floated for the future prime minister is that of a man from the banking sector. There will be other surprises, and by the end of the year a new president of the Republic will have to be elected. Gradually, the “black box” will open on the stage, and the figures who were gifted the student movement’s image of innocence and combativeness will emerge. For now, it looks bizarre to hear grown adults speaking of themselves as “we from the Student List”.

At this point, it is difficult to offer a full forecast, but one thing is clear: disappointments are still to come, for one side or another, perhaps for everyone. The list and the movement brought together people with different convictions and expectations, including students who did not even secure political representation or agency. The victorious list is, in that sense, also a miniature reflection of a divided Serbia. The question is whether its members can turn that diversity into a genuine democratic debate about the country’s future, rather than conceal it behind the rhetoric of unity. If they cannot, the black box may well produce a change of personnel without transforming the social and economic relations that shape people’s lives.

Apparently, what remains unclear is who the laboratory technician is, who built the laboratory, and for what purpose. But, the truth is that in the so-called Western Balkans, experiments are nothing new as are the cooks.

By Dae-Han Song

On 20 September, South Korea’s Lee Administration stated that, contrary to foreign media coverage, it had not rejected Trump’s request for support in the Strait of Hormuz. The New York Times might be forgiven for failing to read between the lines when Lee stated that he would not be deploying combat troops to the Strait of Hormuz but left open the possibility of sending an anti-piracy unit in the area. While President Lee backtracked from his original deployment proposal after facing organized pressure from social movements and falling approval ratings, it’s unclear how he will weather President Trump’s pressure especially since Lee’s key projects are tied to Trump’s Pax Silica. Thus, the fight against Korean support for Trump’s war continues.  

Swift, Organized Backlash

On Sep. 3rd, President Lee had announced the possibility of deploying troops to the Strait of Hormuz. Social movements understood that the media leak was the Lee administration testing the waters of public opinion and, thus, rapidly mobilized a fierce and loud opposition to deployment. This was particularly pressing given the rumblings that a motion for deployment might be introduced into the National Assembly two weeks later before the long Harvest Day festival holiday. 

After a week of rallies, marches, and press conferences, on 15 September, an urgent action coalition brought together 550 organizations and established an encampment in front of the US Embassy in Seoul’s main Gwanghwamun square. Civil society organizations would rotate occupying the encampment and leading the marches and rallies. Every night, they marched from the US Embassy to the Blue House. Amidst such organized protest and falling approval ratings, the Lee administration backtracked: in a sober and self-reflective press conference on 18 September, the Lee Administration clarified that it would not deploy military troops into the Strait of Hormuz nor intervene militarily. While Lee’s backtracking was a response to mass mobilization, his administration has left open the expansion of operations of the Cheonghae Anti-Piracy Unit already in the region. In fact, his administration publicly refuted mainstream media coverage stating that ‘it is not a refusal’ to Trump’s request.

Trump’s Leverage

President Lee’s inability to refuse is because he is staking South Korea’s economic future on Trump’s Pax Silica. More specifically, the Lee Administration is staking the future of Korea’s economy into three megaprojects that are firmly embedded in the US AI global value chain. In addition, the Lee Administration is vying for a transfer of wartime operational control of the Korean military to the Korean government. 

In both instances we must ask ourselves, not simply whether achieving these projects is worth abetting war crimes and prolonging economic crises, but whether these projects, in their present form, are even worth it. In the short-run, the three megaprojects—semiconductor production, physical AI (i.e., robots), and data centres—might increase Korea’s GDP. However, in the long run, these projects feed and feed off of an uncontrolled and unregulated AI bubble that not only poses existential threats (i.e., AI use in war, rogue AI) but also calls into question a green energy transition: how effective is expanding renewable energy in combating global warming when energy consumption is expanding so rapidly and unchecked. 

Secondly, is the transfer of wartime operational control simply a Faustian deal? Implicit in any transfer is the acknowledgement that South Korea will still be beholden to the United States. It’s an open secret that South Korea can defend itself: in conventional warfare, it ranks 5th globally. The real concern for the United States is ensuring South Korea’s fealty if given wartime operational control. Fortunately for the US, there are great structural dependencies that will still make South Korea’s military beholden to the US’s. More specifically, the transfer of wartime operational control does not extricate the South Korean military from the US Forces in Korea. The independence is marginal: if currently a four-star US general served as the commander and a four-star ROK general was the deputy commander; now, the US general would be the deputy and the ROK one would be the commander. And, while having command of one’s military during war is significant, this shift in hierarchy does little to dismantle or even flip South Korea’s structural dependence (military and economic) on the United States. In fact, Lee’s economic strategy makes South Korea even more dependent upon the US. Regaining control of one’s military is central to national sovereignty. However, wartime operational control is only one element in achieving it. 

President Lee faces great pressure from President Trump to support the US war of aggression against Iran. While Trump frames sending troops as being in South Korea’s interest in securing freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, through which 61 percent of South Korea’s oil imports flow, it’s clear that sending troops and ships does nothing to achieve such a goal. Even a cold-hearted pragmatist can’t but scoff at the absurdity of additional South Korean troops opening the Strait of Hormuz when the US, the world’s greatest naval power, cannot. Ultimately, Korean troops only provide a thin veneer of legitimacy for Trump who needs victories before the November elections and help prolong this war of aggression. 

No to Supporting an Illegal War

The struggle against deployment continues because for Korea’s social movements the goal is not just about keeping Korean sailors from the line of fire. Our struggle is to end the US’s illegal war of aggression against Iran. This means that the South Korea government needs to hold the line against Trump’s war and refuse any assistance whether in the frontlines or in the rear, whether combat or non-combat. It is in South Korea and the world’s best interest to open the Strait of Hormuz by achieving peace through diplomacy. The above article was produced by Globetrotter. Dae-Han Song is a part of the International Strategy Center and the No Cold War collective and is an associate at the Korea Policy Institute

By Dae-Han Song

The Lee Administration leaked the possibility of deploying Korean forces to the Strait of Hormuz on 03 September. The backlash was immediate from Korean civil society that opposes any type of support for Trump’s war of aggression. Furthermore, recent polls reveal that even 55 per cent of Lee’s supporters oppose the dispatching of forces. And while the Lee administration has publicly backtracked, stating that nothing has been decided, it is, nonetheless, quietly undergoing the process of deployment: more than simply an assessment of the security conditions on the Strait of Hormuz, the Lee administration sent a team to check key military bases and ports that could be used at the United Arab Emirates. 

Despite growing public opposition, the Lee administration is expected to introduce at the end of September a motion into the National Assembly, where it is likely to pass given his party’s considerable majority. Unlike his predecessor, the impeached Yoon Suk-yeol, President Lee is not a pro-US ideologue; he is a pragmatist. Why then is Lee going out on a limb with this deployment when the rest of the world is staying out of it? 

Well, South Korea’s history has always been entangled and shaped by US foreign policy. The darker side to South Korea’s pop-culture is a country dominated and shaped through US policy and interventions. Today, it hosts the largest overseas US military base and controls the Korean military (through wartime operational control). In effect, it’s never been a sovereign state. Its economic, political, and military interests have always been beholden to the United States. 

Today, Lee is horsetrading with Trump: military support in exchange for more favourable terms in the US’s AI global supply chain of semiconductors and data centres along with a return of wartime operational control. While Lee’s pragmatism is navigating the real structural constraints on South Korea, it is ultimately short-sighted and harmful to Koreans and the world. 

The war in Iran is inflicting considerable pain to the world’s economies, including South Korea that imports 61 per cent of its crude oil through the Strait of Hormuz. Yet, even from a completely pragmatic perspective, sending Korean forces to Hormuz does nothing to resolve this problem. In fact, getting entangled with US aggression against Iran would strain the 64-year diplomatic relations with Iran while putting a target on South Korean assets in the region. Furthermore, if the world’s greatest naval and air power cannot secure freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, how could South Korea’s contribution make a difference? In fact, the deployment of Korean troops prolongs this war of aggression by giving Trump cover and leverage to demand that other countries, such as Japan, also deploy forces. 

This isn’t the first time that South Korea would deploy forces due to US requests. In 2004, after pressure from the George W. Bush Administration, the Roh Moo-hyun administration deployed non-combat support troops to Iraq. In response, a militant Islamic group kidnapped a Korean translator and, when the Roh administration refused to cancel further and withdraw current deployment, beheaded the translator. 

Most importantly, this war of aggression is not only illegal under international standards, but deployment also violates article five of the Korean constitution that mandates the government to ‘maintain international peace’ and ‘renounce all aggressive war.’ Thus, whether intervening in the frontlines, or in the rear, whether combatant or non-combatant, any deployment would be complicit in Trump’s war of aggression. 

Ultimately, as Hamid Shahrabi, an Iranian activist and co-founder of the Global Resistance for Peace & Justice states, securing free passage through the Strait of Hormuz can be achieved but not through military pressure and destruction but by adhering to the ‘Islamabad MOU, which outlined measures to ensure free passage through the Strait.’ 

Being dominated by the US brings out the pragmatic among South Koreans. Yet, the world demands that we fight and that we hold the line against Trump. Deploying forces will prolong Trump’s illegal war of aggression. Fortunately, if Koreans can be pragmatic, they can also be fierce fighters against US imperialism when provoked. Instead of fanning the flames of war, we should fight to extinguish Trump’s forever wars. 

The above article was produced by Globetrotter. Dae-Han Song is a part of the International Strategy Center and the No Cold War collective and is an associate at the Korea Policy Institute.

By Vijay Prashad

Dear friends and colleagues,

The United States and Israel launched a war of aggression against Iran in February of this year. For six months, US missiles and bombs have fallen upon civilian and military targets inside the country. Hospitals, schools, energy facilities, and neighbourhoods have been struck. The 168 schoolgirls killed in Minab have become the terrible symbol of this war. Iranians have been forced to live under the constant expectation of another attack, while Iranian families outside the country endure the peculiar agony of watching the destruction from afar. This follows on three years of Israeli genocide in Gaza, which has been carried out due to the relentless military support of the United States.

Iran did not begin this war. The United States and Israel did. Iran is resisting an armed attack upon its territory and its people. That elementary fact must determine the timing, language, and political responsibilities of anyone who writes about Iran at this moment.

It is in this context that I read your open letter to Iran’s political prisoners.

Among you are former political prisoners (such as Angela Davis) and a current political prisoner (Mumia Abu-Jamal). I have stood in agreement with many of you on most of the great questions of our time. Of course, there are elements of your letter with which I agree, but I feel that this letter at this time plays a politically damaging role. Just when the United States and Israel are on the back foot, this letter can provide the kind of political confusion that mystifies the actual political dynamic on the ground: Iran has the strategic advantage, having transformed the US-Israeli question (should Iran be allowed to have nuclear weapons) into an Iranian question (should Iran allow commerce through its territorial waters unimpeded). That provides the background of the Left’s moral clarity, the war of aggression that has failed and that has put Iran as well as its neighbours into a discussion about regional security rather than imperial security.

But this letter, from the Global North, provides the kind of ideological cover that the US loves: if the US has lost, then let all sides lose and let all sides be at fault.

The central image, two blades of a scissors, is evocative but erroneous. It suggests that one of the blades is the Islamic Republic and the other blade is the United States and Israel, with the Iranian people being cut by the two of them. The error of the scissors is not merely that its blades are unequal. It is that the image makes the aggressor and the attacked appear as parallel sources of the same danger, stripping away the history and hierarchy that connect them. US imperialism is not simply one oppression alongside another. It is the force that has encircled Iran, devastated the region, armed Israel, imposed sanctions upon an entire population, and now brought war to Iranian territory. Your letter places the aggression and its target in the same moral frame.

The United States maintains over 900 hundred military installations outside its borders, imposes sanctions upon entire populations, finances and arms Israel’s genocide in Gaza, and has destroyed or destabilised country after country. Iran, whatever criticisms one might make of its political system, has never launched wars of aggression. The state born from the 1979 Revolution has not launched wars of conquest, but it has instead endured invasion from Iraq at the behest of the West, encirclement, sanctions, sabotage, assassinations, and now direct attack. The two blades are not equivalent. One is the blade of imperialist war. The other, whatever its internal contradictions, is the state and society being cut.

Hollowness

The open letter argues that there is a ‘false binary of imperialism and hollow anti-imperialism’. I was interested in the use of the adjective ‘hollow’.

First, Iran’s actual defence of itself. The assassination of Commander Qasem Soleimani in Baghdad, Iraq in 2020 marked a decisive stage in the escalation that culminated in the February 2026 illegal attack on Iran. Soleimani was the architect of Iran’s forward strategy, namely, to build a defensive shield through pro-Iranian armed groups that would attack Israel and US military positions from Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Palestine, and other countries. From 2020, the US and Israel systematically went after that network by trying to destroy Hamas, Hezbollah, Ansar Allah, and end the use of Damascus as a base for many of these groups as well as Syria and Iraq as a logistical lifeline from Iran. Having weakened this shield, the US and Israel felt emboldened to attack Iran. But they did not calculate that Iran has built a mechanism to hit the US bases in the Gulf Arab states and that Iran would restrict access to the Strait of Hormuz.

The use of these mechanisms by Iran put it at a strategic advantage over the United States and Israel (the latter which has subsequently receded from the foreground of this war). Iran’s anti-imperialism has not been ‘hollow’ at all but has in fact enabled the Iranian people to protect their country from an imperialist take-over. This is a significant feat that is being celebrated across the formerly colonised world as one of the most consequential strategic reversals suffered by the United States since its defeat in Vietnam in 1975 (the withdrawals from Afghanistan and Iraq are of a different character than this strategic upper hand by Iran).

Second, in 1979, the Iranian revolutionaries chanted, Today Iran, tomorrow Palestine. Indeed, despite the crackdown on the Left within Iran in the immediate aftermath of the revolution and with the formation of the Islamic Republic, the commitment to Palestine remained firm. Iran has never even hinted at normalisation with Israel and indeed has been forthright in its defence of the Palestinian cause. No other country in the region has been as committed to the Palestinian freedom movement, and none has paid so high a price for that commitment.

Why have the United States and Israel been obsessed with Iran since 1979? Not because of any question of democracy (Iran has an electoral political system, although one shaped by the Guardian Council and limitations on political participation – just as the democratic claims of the United States are constrained by oligarchic power, racial exclusion, and the domination of money). Not even because of any nuclear threat (the International Atomic Energy Agency has not established that Iran possesses an active nuclear-weapons programme, while Iran’s leadership has repeatedly declared nuclear weapons religiously prohibited).

The reason they hate Iran is because it is defiant, and its defiance includes its position for the Palestinian cause.

One can have any view on Iran, of course, but to call its anti-imperialism ‘hollow’ at this moment is inaccurate.

The US must retreat

The open letter closes with two demands: first that the Iranian state must ‘stop their inhumane practice of death and incarceration now’. Common opposition to the death penalty, which I share, does not place the United States and Iran in the same historical or political position, nor does it justify subordinating the immediate demand that the aggressor end its war to a general indictment of the country under attack. During this period of the US illegal war on Iran, the United States put nineteen people to death by lethal injection, but the letter says nothing about that (nor about the genocidal treatment of Palestinian prisoners in the Israeli versions of Guantanamo – such as Sde Teiman, about which Wesam Afifa has written so movingly; the only statement is to say that Iran uses ‘the same logic of domination’ as Israel, which is a very strange formulation). One can oppose the death penalty. One can demand due process and humane treatment for prisoners. One can listen carefully to Iranian workers, women, minorities, and political activists. But internal criticism cannot be detached from the concrete conditions in which it is made.

The second demand of the open letter is that the US and Israel ‘must end their barbaric wars and brutal sanctions that knowingly devastate our communities’. We are in total agreement here. But the letter is not addressed to the United States but to Iranian prisoners. That is another curiosity of its formulation. The signatories are mainly US nationals. Why not write to their own government? The letter devotes most of its analytical energy to constructing a common carceral logic, while the demand directed against the imperialist aggressors is compressed into its final sentence. The formal condemnation of the war does not undo the political architecture of the letter, which gives parallel status to the US-Israel war of aggression and the Iranian prison system.

Frantz Fanon taught us that anti-colonial struggles do not unfold under conditions of their own choosing. States placed under permanent threat of invasion, sabotage and regime change develop profound internal contradictions, including security institutions that can turn coercion against their own people. You ask ‘global civil society and anti-imperialist activists and organisations’ to ‘put pressure on the Islamic Republic by challenging its narrative’. That is, in sum, asking the people of the world to take a position that would weaken Iran now when it is standing tall against the war of aggression. There is a time to make a demand and there is a time to act in solidarity. This is the time of solidarity with Iran, and not a time to make a claim that advantages the aggressor imperialists.

Dear friends, neutrality or a third space does not exist in the midst of a war of aggression. Would we write such a letter to the Vietnamese government in Hanoi during the US war of aggression, or to the Cuban government which is now facing a terrible strangulation by the United States? Why direct this intervention against Iran at this moment? Why challenge Iran just when it has the United States and Israel on the back foot? Is it necessary to ask Iran to become perfect before you defend its right to survive?

At this hour, solidarity begins with a clear demand: the United States and Israel must end their illegal war, and they must retreat.

The above article was produced by Globetrotter. Vijay Prashad is an Indian historian and journalist. He is the author of forty books, including Washington Bullets, Red Star Over the Third World, The Darker Nations: A People’s History of the Third World, The Poorer Nations: A Possible History of the Global South, and How the International Monetary Fund Suffocates Africa, written with Grieve Chelwa. He is the executive director of Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research, the chief correspondent for Globetrotter, and the chief editor of LeftWord Books (New Delhi). He also appeared in the films Shadow World (2016) and Two Meetings (2017).

By Bert De Belder

To mark the 100th anniversary of Fidel Castro’s birth and express our solidarity with Cuba’s battle against the strengthened commercial, financial and energy blockade, I was in Havana to participate in the International Colloquium “Fidel: Legacy and Future” —along with 1,500 other participants from over 63 countries – including 500 Cuban scholars, intellectuals, artists and students.

Fidel Castro was honored as an architect of the struggle for liberation against colonial occupation, exploitation and oppression of the Global South. And for his vision that led to groundbreaking social programs in the areas of education, healthcare and housing, making Cuba—despite a criminal blockade—a beacon of social justice.

At the Colloquium, we heard the vivid and moving voices of former and current government officials and diplomats from all over the world about Fidel’s vision and its translation into concrete achievements that changed people’s lives. Shows of great respect, gratitude and strong solidarity came from trade unions (including from France (CGT), Italy (CGIL), Australia or Canada), freshly graduated medical doctors at Cuba’s international medical school ELAM, organizations of women, youth and indigenous peoples from every corner of the globe, with large delegations from Latin America (including Brazil’s Movement of the Landless MST), from Africa and from Asia, particularly from the socialist countries Vietnam, Laos and China.

For more than 60 years, Washington has sought to strangle Cuba with an economic, financial, and commercial blockade that is nothing less than economic warfare. This blockade denies the Cuban people access to food, medicine, fuel, and essential technologies—a collective punishment condemned by the international community for mocking international and humanitarian law. Worse, today, this blockade is taking on genocidal proportions with the US military siege and threats of outright intervention by the authoritarian war cabinet of Donald Trump and Marco Rubio.

In the face of this, we saw a determined Cuban people, government and Communist Party. The leaders of party and government were present all throughout the debates, conferences and workshops, listening to, discussing with and thanking the audience with great openness and modesty – but also with great determination, unity and mobilization to fight the blockade and “beat the beast”, to resist and to win the battle against US imperialism.

The closing session took place at the famous Karl Marx Theater in the city center, and was a special gift – not to the internationals, but to the common people from Havana, with many workers and families from the neighborhood in attendance – including the95-year old Raúl Castro. The entire evening was a musical, in which the Pioneers (Cuba’s children’s organization) asked the older generations of academics, scientists, sportsmen and women and artists how they should build the future under the new and challenging conditions. Through songs, interviews, stand-up comedy, and a lot of interaction with the excited audience, who spontaneously sang along to the Silvio Rodríguez songs.

Moving about in our tricycles, we chatted with ordinary Cubans in Havana’s streets, among the fishermen at the world-famous Malecón seafront boulevard, or at the marketplace. They all differed in their opinions of what was worst about Cuba’s dire situation, and on its causes. But no one blamed Fidel – their all-time hero, with most would agreeing that the US blockade has to end.

Cuba’s leadership at all levels lent their ear to the people’s grievances and expectations. They mingled with the workers, the street vendors, the agricultural workers, the youth. They assisted local authorities and mass organizations to find solutions – albeit temporary and ultimately insufficient. Government ministers and party cadre are sent to far-flung provinces to coach local authorities. No, the government and party leaders are certainly not confined to a ‘bubble’ in isolation from their people’s daily reality, they have a hands-on approach to help, to fight, and to win.

They appealed to all present the formation of the largest possible unity to defend Cuba’s – and the world’s – right to defend and build their own homeland and culture, independence, sovereign path of development, and socialism. In the words of Cuba’s President Miguel Díaz-Canel, Cuba’s fight is about defending humanity as a whole. I came back from Cuba with greater rage against the murderous US imperialist, in its Trumpian form, asphyxiation of Cuba. Yet, I was also injected with hope and optimism that Fidel’s legacy is not bygone, but is here to stay, in Cuba and beyond, for today and tomorrow.

By Vijay Prashad

The gravest danger in the present war is not that Iran has already decided to manufacture a nuclear weapon. There is no verified evidence of such a decision. The danger is that another major US escalation could convince Tehran that remaining a non-nuclear state inside the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) no longer provides protection, recognition, or even the elementary security that the treaty was supposed to guarantee. Washington may therefore produce precisely the outcome that it claims to be trying to prevent.

Iran is approaching its NPT red line. Withdrawal from the treaty is no longer discussed merely as rhetorical retaliation. Iranian institutions, including parliament, have examined it as a practical response to attacks upon safeguarded nuclear facilities, the International Atomic Energy Agency’s failure to condemn those attacks, and the suspicion that information gathered through inspections has found its way into US and Israeli targeting processes. In late March 2026, a triple-urgency bill proposing Iran’s withdrawal from the NPT was uploaded to the Iranian parliament’s legislative system, although it had not yet been debated or adopted.

The NPT permits withdrawal when a state concludes that ‘extraordinary events’ have jeopardised its supreme interests. Iran can plausibly argue that the bombing of its nuclear facilities by nuclear-armed states constitutes precisely such an event. Iranian officials who advocate withdrawal have stressed that such a step would not necessarily signal a decision to manufacture a bomb. Alaeddin Boroujderdi, a member of parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, argued in March 2026 that Iran should leave the NPT while insisting, ‘We are not seeking a nuclear bomb’. Such a move would, however, terminate or radically reduce the inspection system through which the IAEA monitors Iran’s nuclear material. That distinction is legally significant but strategically thin. Once Iran has left the treaty, restricted inspectors and increased enrichment, other governments will necessarily assume that it is preparing a weapon.

Reporting by Transition Protocol shows that Iran has decided to move its uranium stockpile to 90-percent enrichment. Iran had accumulated roughly 440 kilograms of uranium enriched to 60 percent before inspectors lost the ability to establish the location and condition of the entire stock. Uranium enriched to 60 percent is already far beyond the level ordinarily required for civilian power generation, although it is not in itself a nuclear weapon. Enriching this material to approximately 90 percent would bring it into the range conventionally described as weapons-grade.

Conversations with people in Iran have revealed that Iranian authorities have instructed the nuclear establishment to prepare to process much of this material towards 90 percent if the United States escalates again. Enriching uranium, converting it into suitable form, constructing an explosive device and developing a deliverable weapon are related but distinct stages. Nevertheless, if the intelligence is accurate, the direction is unmistakable. Another major US attack could cause Iran to leave the NPT, enrich uranium to weapons grade, and move to threshold deterrence. Tehran might then assemble a device without testing it, or it might conduct an underground or demonstrative detonation to remove any doubt that it had crossed the threshold. Such a detonation would constitute an entirely new stage in the history of West Asia. But it would be the consequence of an existential war, not evidence that Iran had always secretly intended to reach this point.

Korea vs. Libya

The choice Iranian strategists confront is increasingly described through two precedents: the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) and Libya.

Libya surrendered its embryonic nuclear and missile programmes in 2003. It transferred equipment and documents to the United States, accepted intrusive inspections, and sought normal relations with the West. Washington and London presented Muammar Gaddafi’s decision as proof that disarmament would produce security and international rehabilitation. Eight years later, NATO used a United Nations resolution ostensibly intended to protect civilians to conduct a war for regime change. The Libyan state was destroyed, and Gaddafi was captured and killed.

The DPRK followed the opposite course. It withdrew from the NPT in 2003, tested a nuclear device in 2006, and gradually developed a survivable nuclear and missile capability. North Korea has endured sanctions, isolation, military exercises and repeated threats. Yet no US government has attempted a full-scale invasion or regime-change war against it. Washington negotiates with Pyongyang under conditions fundamentally different from those it imposed upon Baghdad, Tripoli, or Tehran because the consequences of attacking the DPRK cannot be confidently controlled.

The lesson drawn in Tehran, Pyongyang, and elsewhere is devastatingly simple: Gaddafi relinquished his deterrent, opened his country and received no durable guarantee against Western attack. His compliance removed an obstacle to regime change rather than ensuring Libya’s sovereignty. This is not an endorsement of nuclear proliferation. Nuclear weapons are instruments of mass destruction, and their abolition remains a human necessity. It is an explanation of the strategic calculation produced by Western conduct. The nuclear powers have failed to fulfil the NPT’s disarmament bargain, protected Israel’s undeclared nuclear arsenal, attacked non-nuclear states, and demanded that selected adversaries remain permanently vulnerable. They have turned nuclear possession into the most credible insurance policy against forcible overthrow.

Iran has so far resisted this logic. Its official position remains that nuclear weapons are religiously prohibited, militarily unnecessary, and incompatible with its declared doctrine. Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi reiterated after earlier attacks that Iran had not abandoned this policy and continued to regard the production, stockpiling and use of weapons of mass destruction as inhuman and un-Islamic. He also explained that Iran raised enrichment to 60 percent to demonstrate that threats and pressure would not compel capitulation. Yet doctrines are not immune to changes in material circumstances. If a state is repeatedly attacked while observing a prohibition, and if its attackers openly discuss destroying its government (even with nuclear weapons), its leaders will inevitably reconsider whether moral restraint has become strategic exposure. The debate within Iran has already moved from whether nuclear weapons are desirable to whether nuclear latency may become indispensable for national survival.

Should Iran cross the threshold, it would almost certainly present the decision as the construction of a shield, not preparation for an offensive war. Iran has repeatedly said that it does not seek territorial conquest, nuclear coercion, or attacks upon neighbouring peoples. Its immediate purpose would be to convince Washington and Tel Aviv that no campaign to destroy the Iranian state could proceed without unacceptable consequences.

A deterrent, however, cannot be made entirely safe by declaring it defensive. Other governments cannot know future intentions with certainty. An Iranian weapon could stimulate nuclear hedging by Saudi Arabia, Türkiye, Egypt or others. Israel might attempt a preventive attack before Iran completes weaponisation. The transition period – between enrichment to 90 percent and establishment of a credible deterrent – would be particularly dangerous. Miscalculation could produce the catastrophe that all parties claim to oppose.

That is why the decisive responsibility now lies with the states choosing whether to escalate. If the United States attacks again, intensifies an economic siege designed to break the Iranian state, or makes negotiations indistinguishable from an ultimatum, it will strengthen those in Tehran who argue that the Libyan road ends in death and only the DPRK road guarantees survival.

Iran appears to be preparing to endure rather than capitulate. It is hardening its command arrangements, preserving missile and drone capacity, and organising for a prolonged economic war. Tehran’s wager is that it can absorb immense pressure until the US coalition confronts mounting military costs, commercial disruption, and political disagreement (particularly after the US mid-term elections in November). The nuclear question now sits inside that wider strategy of survival.

The choice is therefore stark. Washington can accept a verifiable agreement that recognises Iran’s right to peaceful nuclear technology, guarantees non-aggression, and restores credible inspection. Or it can continue a war that destroys the remaining constituency for restraint inside Iran. If it chooses escalation, it should not pretend to be surprised when Iran concludes that treaties provide no shield, inspections bring no safety, and only possession of the ultimate weapon prevents another Libya.

The above article was produced by Globetrotter. Vijay Prashad is an Indian historian and journalist. He is the author of forty books, including Washington Bullets, Red Star Over the Third World, The Darker Nations: A People’s History of the Third World, The Poorer Nations: A Possible History of the Global South, and How the International Monetary Fund Suffocates Africa, written with Grieve Chelwa. He is the executive director of Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research, the chief correspondent for Globetrotter, and the chief editor of LeftWord Books (New Delhi). He also appeared in the films Shadow World (2016) and Two Meetings (2017).

By Vijay Prashad

Iraq’s government and people are caught in the crossfire. Their country is formally committed to keeping out of the US-Israeli war of aggression against Iran, but its airspace has been violated during the war. Iraq between Iran, the Gulf monarchies, Türkiye and the main US military network in West Asia as well as US military bases in Erbil (in Iraq’s north). On 7 August, two of Iraq’s neighbours – Saudi Arabia and Türkiye – signed the Mecca Joint Defence Agreement with Pakistan that declares an armed attack on one signatory to be an attack on all and provides for closer defence planning and integrated capabilities. Iraq did not participate in this agreement nor was it mentioned by any of the high officials of the three participants as a potential member (although Egypt was mentioned). Silence on Iraq protects it from the pressures faced by its government, its resistance organisations, and the various social classes from the war.

The Mecca Agreement is not aimed at any state, as Türkiye’s president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said it targets no one and is open to countries that seek regional stability. Last year, Erdoğan signed an agreement with Iraq on a range of issues, including defense cooperation, and recently, the Saudi foreign minister Khalid bin Salman met with a senior Iraqi military official, First Lieutenant General Staff Abdul Amir Al-Shammari. Iraq is not isolated from this process but is in dialogue with all the major parties as it shepherds the departure of the US from most of its territory this year. Indeed, that withdrawal will be part of the formation of a new security architecture (rooted in the Mecca Agreement) that is designed for a post-US regional landscape. During talks between Pakistan’s Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi and Iran’s Supreme National Security Council Secretary Mohsen Rezaei it was clarified that the agreement is not designed against Iran but for precisely this near future. Amer al-Fayez, chair of the Iraqi parliament’s Foreign Relations Committee, has stressed precisely this point that the agreement does belong to the three states that negotiated it, but that does not mean Iraq will not be part of this post-US scenario.

Balance

Since the illegal US invasion of Iraq in 2003, the country’s political class has struggled to maintain a balance between its political and social proximity to Iran and its occupation by the United States. Since the premiership of Ibrahim al-Jaafari in 2005, the prime ministers of Iraq have been largely pro-Iranian (with the exception of Mustafa al-Kadhimi from 2020 to 2022); the new leader, Ali al-Zaidi, took a large delegation to Washington and then Tehran in July 2026, but whose overtures for peace went nowhere. There are indispensable relations between Iran and Iraq, although the country maintains close military and financial ties with the United States and growing connections with Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states.

But neutrality can be a policy only when the state possesses the capacity to enforce it. The United States’ 2003 invasion destroyed the old state apparatus; the 2014 collapse before ISIS deepened dependence on external assistance and popular mobilisation. Today the legacy of occupation is visible in a political order where sovereignty is continually negotiated among Washington, Tehran, Ankara, Gulf capitals and domestic forces. Iraq’s exclusion from integrated air defence and intelligence arrangements may preserve diplomatic flexibility, but it also leaves the country more exposed to violations by every side. Iraq’s air-defence weakness, divided institutions, and multiplicity of armed commands reduce its freedom of action.

Resistance

The Islamic Resistance in Iraq is not a single army, but an umbrella for organisations with different chains of command, political relationships, and degrees of incorporation into the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF). The PMF is formally part of Iraq’s security system. Among the most influential organisations in the PMF are the Kataib Hezbollah, Harakat al-Nujaba, and Kataib Sayyid al-Shuhada (whose leaders, respectively, Ahmad al-Hamidawi, Akram al-Kaabi, and Abu Alaa al-Walai, are designated by the US as terrorists). These groups command tens of thousands of fighters and their arsenal includes short- and medium-range rockets, attack and reconnaissance drones, artillery, anti-armour weapons and logistical networks extending toward the Syrian border.  Thus far, these organisations have been largely quiet.

However, statements from these groups over the past months indicate that if Washington expands its assault on Iran, then they will attack US bases and interests in Iraq and in the region. Al-Nujaba figures described the confrontation with the US presence as continuing so long as foreign troops remain on Iraqi soil. Over the past months, the US and Saudis have struck PMF sites. Consequentially, the PMF has decentralised command and created mobile launch capacity. By all accounts, these groups are prepared to strike the US targets within Iraq and to create disruption near the Syrian border if called upon. An April 2026 mass rally in Baghdad shows the public sentiment that favours the views of the PMF.

There is an ongoing debate inside Iraq over the disarmament of these factions, which are legally part of the army. Some of the factions are open to dialogue, while others argue that they will continue to hold their ‘resistance arms’. Those who are interested in dialogue argue that they will only dissolve themselves into the armed forces if the United States withdraws its troops and if Iraq acquires effective air defences. The government’s September 30 timetable (both for the end of the US presence in Iraq and for advancing state control of weapons) has therefore become the hinge of the crisis. A delayed withdrawal would strengthen the factions’ argument for retaining arms and a coercive disarmament drive during a regional war could provoke internal confrontation. There is no appetite in Iraq for the dismantlement of these groups, which emerged out of the fight against the US occupation and have a genuine social base in Iraq (they cannot, therefore, be disparaged as ‘Iranian proxies’).

Options

Conversations with Iraqi officials makes it clear that the government wants to mediate between Washington and Tehran and would prefer not to be drawn into the conflict. The government of al-Zaidi has made it clear that it would not like to see the PMF attack US targets in Iraq or to use Iraqi territory to strike US positions in the Gulf Arab states. The threshold of action by the PMF, however, will not be determined by al-Zaidi’s government but by the scale of US escalation against Iran, attacks on Iraqi forces, and whether the foreign-troop withdrawal proceeds. Once that threshold is crossed, US bases and interests would be the most probable targets, followed by a cycle of retaliation inside Iraq.

Almost 90% of state revenue comes from oil exports, which pass through the Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz. Exports of Iraqi oil fell from 3.5 million barrels a day before the conflict to about 200,000 barrels a day in early August. Some tanker movement has resumed, but as of 17 August, passage remains constrained and below normal levels. Iraq had arranged the export of 750,000 barrels of oil per day through the Kirkuk-Ceyhan pipeline through Türkiye, but this is far below what the state and society require. Airspace closure, restricted shipping, storage bottlenecks and interrupted imports threaten salaries, pensions, and welfare payments. On 5 August, hundreds of public employees demonstrated across six of Iraq’s nineteen provinces (from Baghdad to Basra to Babil). University and schoolteachers have begun small-scale agitations, with the threat that these protests could become ‘an open civil sit-in and a work stoppage’.

Clarity is not on the cards for Baghdad. There are far too many commitments across the social classes, with the workers eager for an end to this conflict so that they can get paid, and yet for the citizenry eager for their state not to once more bend to the wishes of the United States. Debates are active on social media and in the bazaars, where these different viewpoints are not necessarily rooted in sectarian or political affiliations. The country that was made a battlefield by the illegal US invasion in 2003 has a strong reason to refuse another imperialist war on its border and to be dragged into that war against is wishes. The immediate danger comes from the US-Israeli widening of the war, which would provoke the PMF to attack US bases in Iraq. But, if the US keeps to the 30 September deadline and removes these bases, then Iraq’s territory will be less of a target and Iraq’s political debates can advance beyond the question of the US withdrawal (which has been the core issue for the past twenty years).

By Dae-Han Song

Trump offered to scale down the Ulchi Freedom Shield exercise (carried out annually by the US Forces in Korea (USFK) and Republic of Korea (ROK) military). In Trumpian style, the decision was framed as everything all at once: punishment against South Korea for its tepid response on Iran; and as a conciliatory gesture to North Korea. And, the decision, in Trumpian fashion, fell flat on its face. Rather than feeling the pressure, the Lee Administration embraced the decision. Rather than embracing the decision as a conciliatory gesture, North Korea rejected it. So, what happened?

First of all, it’s important to note that Lee’s Democratic Party has always attempted to improve inter-Korean relations. Reducing the scale of USFK-ROK military exercises was always one way to achieve this. If Korean Democratic Party administrations don’t explicitly ask for a scaling down from the US, it is for fear of raising eyebrows in the US and triggering backlash among South Korea’s conservatives. From Lee’s perspective, Trump reducing the scale of the military exercises is not a punishment. It’s a gift.

Why has North Korea rejected this gesture as insufficient? Well, first of all, the haphazard, last minute (the day before) aspect of the decision marks it more as a tacked on after thought rather than a well placed gesture. Nonetheless, in the past North Korea embraced such small gestures.

This is because military exercises have a social impact on North Korea. A simple hypothetical elucidates this point. If China together with Canada conducted military exercises with tens of thousands of soldiers using live ammunition and simulating decapitation tactics against the White House, it’s hard to imagine the US going about its day dismissing the military exercises as a routine measure to freshen up military readiness. After all, as the Center for Strategic and International Studies notes: an actual attack could start off masked as an exercise.

If the US would feel threatened in such a scenario, then North Korea feels the very real threat exponentially more. Not only does the United States have the strongest military in the world, South Korea’s military budget is 27 times greater. Furthermore, North Korea still remembers the utter destruction the US inflicted upon it. US planes dropped more bombs during the Korean war—overwhelmingly in North Korea—than in all of the Pacific Theater combined. By 1952, there were no targets for US planes to bomb.

And while the Ulchi Freedom Shield and the Freedom Shield exercises are the biggest, military exercises against North Korea are carried all year round. The largest of these exercises put North Korea into maximum alert bringing its society to a halt. This is because North Korea’s military isn’t simply for defense, they are also employed in construction and in industry. Furthermore, counter-measures have to be mobilized, expending even more of its energy and resources.

So, if it accepted these gestures in the past, why did North Korea reject it this time? This can partly be explained by the dramatic improvement in North Korea’s geopolitical and economic position in the region. As the US-led San Francisco System of regional bilateral alliances and NATO are fracturing the world into competing blocs, North Korea consolidated a “blood alliance” with Russia by sending North Korean troops to Russia. As a result, the once crippling US sanctions can no longer isolate and pressure North Korea. In other words, as North Korea aligns with China and Russia, the US leverage and pressure against it decreases. In fact, North Korea’s economy is booming.

Faced with his disastrous war in Iran, Trump is trying to win some PR points before the US November election. In the long-run, he wants to pull North Korea away from China’s camp. Yet, there is little reason for North Korea to break with these relations in exchange for promises that the US might never carry out, as history overwhelmingly shows, including Trump pulling out of negotiations with Kim Jong-un at the last minute in 2019. Furthermore, nothing guarantees that an agreement will be approved by Congress. And, even as it does, that it could survive a post-Trump Administration. The US Democrats are already showing themselves to be worse hawks against North Korea than the Trump administration.

Ultimately, none of this rules out the possibility of Trump and Kim meeting or even of coming to some sort of agreement. North Korea is a fiercely independent country that refuses to be beholden to any country. Thus, it does not want its national sovereignty dependent on any other country, even if it is Russia or China. Thus, meaningful relations with the US would allow it greater independence.

The scaling down of the USFK and ROK military exercises should be welcomed. Yet, on its own, it is simply not enough against the US history of broken promises and against the US drumming for war in the region. Ultimately, peace in Korea will have to depend on peace in the region. Peace in the region can only be achieved by dismantling the US San Francisco System of bilateral military alliances.

The above article was produced by Globetrotter. Dae-Han Song is a part of the International Strategy Center and the No Cold War collective and is an associate at the Korea Policy Institute.

By Vijay Prashad

In August, right-wing billionaire Abelardo de la Espriella took office as Colombia’s president and vowed to move an agenda of the far right even though he won by less than a percentage point over the left-wing candidate Iván Cepeda. It is characteristic of the far right of a special type to adopt any mandate and pretend that they have the authority to transform their society into their toxic swamp. Of the twenty states generally thought of as being part of Latin America, eleven now have governments of the far right: Argentina (Javier Milei since 2023), Bolivia (Rodrigo Paz since 2025), Chile (José Antonio Kast since 2026), Colombia (de la Espriella since 2026), Costa Rica (Laura Fernández since 2026), Ecuador (Daniel Noboa since 2023), El Salvador (Nayib Bukele since 2019), Honduras (Nasry Asfura since 2026), Panama (José Raúl Mulino since 2024), Paraguay (Santiago Peña since 2023), and Peru (Keiko Fujimori since 2026).

Most of these leaders are not from the old conservative circle but are part of a new generation (Noboa is the youngest of the group, born in 1987) with an average age of 52. These are men and women who represent the old oligarchies of Latin America, the old families with deep colonial roots and with vast properties, but these leaders do not have an aristocratic sensibility or come from the established conservative political parties. They are libertarian in nature with naked fealties to the United States and its agenda. They fashion themselves as patriots, but patriotism is cast aside for absolute loyalty to Washington and its corporations.

Shoot to Kill

The far right emerges out of a long tradition of the oligarchy’s lawless violence, which dates to the genocide against the indigenous through to the military dictatorships of the Operation Condor era. Impunity for violence has been the hallmark of this class and its political representatives, and so the current far right is nothing if not authentic to its class and its forebearers. Laura Fernández was born in 1986 the year before Costa Rica’s president Óscar Arias won the Nobel Prize for Peace for his work in conflict resolution in Central America (Costa Rica rid itself of its military in its 1949 Constitution). At her inauguration in May 2026 Fernández said that she would have an ‘iron-fist response’ to crime and that her ‘hand will not tremble’. After Gustavo Petro’s attempts to bring peaceful resolutions to conflicts in Colombia, de la Espriella came to office with the view that ‘criminals can take bullets too’, suggesting a return to the state of war.

Nayib Bukele’s tough-guy approach to crime has profoundly influenced Latin America’s far right, turning El Salvador’s mass arrests, military deployments, emergency rule, and meg prisons into a regional political model. Leaders and candidates from Ecuador, Colombia, Costa Rica, Peru, Chile, and elsewhere increasingly present crime as a war requiring exceptional state power rather than conventional policing and social policy. Bukele’s popularity has helped normalise promises of militarised streets, harsher sentences, expanded prisons, and weaker procedural protections. Although critics document arbitrary detention and human rights abuses, admirers portray his methods as proof that decisive, authoritarian leadership can restore order where democratic institutions appear ineffective. Thus far, the far right of a special type has portrayed its illiberal approach to criminality, in fact to the neighbourhoods of the poor, as the only effective solution to the narco-mafias and petty criminals of the barrios.

Reversal of Social Gains

Across Latin America, the Angry Tide is attempting to reverse feminist gains by restricting abortion and contraception, dismantling institutions addressing gender violence, attacking sex education, and portraying feminism as a threat to the traditional family. In Argentina, Javier Milei’s government closed the Ministry of Women, stopped distributing abortion medication nationally, and cut contraceptive and teenage-pregnancy programs, thereby leaving formal rights increasingly inaccessible, particularly to poor and working-class women.

In Chile, far-right legislators have proposed forcing women to hear the foetal heartbeat before obtaining one of the country’s narrowly permitted abortions, while several new bills would punish allegedly ‘false’ accusations involving rape, sexual abuse, and domestic violence. These proposals could allow an accused person to pursue a complainant after a case is dismissed and therefore intimidate survivors; in class terms, this threat falls hardest on working-class, rural, migrant, and Indigenous women who lack lawyers, money, and institutional protection, strengthening patriarchal control while making access to justice more dangerous.

Blindness to Genocide

The far right not only sees lawless violence as its currency today, but it routinely celebrates the history of the conquistadors against the native peoples of the Americas as well as the entire panoply of Western civilisation (as Milei did in his speech at Davos in 2024). Blindness to genocide is the habit of the far right, which is why it has absolutely no compunction about close relations with the United States and its policy to seek the subordination of the entire hemisphere of the Americas to Washington’s interest. When Washington says that the road to close ties with itself must go through Tel Aviv, the governments of the far right hasten to forge close relations with Israel – despite the ongoing genocide of the Palestinians.

In June 2025, Argentina’s Ambassador to Israel, Rabbi Shimon Axel Wahnish, announced something called the Isaac Accords, which are designed to bring Latin American countries into a close relationship with Israel. The announcement came nearly two years into the genocide, although the actual Isaac Accords were formally established in April 2026 in Jerusalem. While Argentina and Israel are the only formal signatories, in May, a conference in Buenos Aires brought together officials from Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Panama, Paraguay, and Uruguay who signed a statement calling for the expansion of the Isaac Accords. Short of that, diplomatic relations with Israel have been restored by Bolivia (2025) and Colombia (2026), with Venezuela (2026) renewing consular services.

Development of Underdevelopment

Within presidential palaces and in legislatures, the governments of the far right have been working on economic agendas worked out by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the US Treasury Department. The agenda is simple: ensure that Western-based multinational corporations have easy access to raw materials from Latin America, protect the investments of these corporations, allow the oligarchy to participate in the theft of social wealth, and discipline the wider population through the actuality of immediate austerity and the promise of future wealth.

Most of the countries governed by the far right (Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras, and Paraguay) are under IMF facilities, with other countries on the radar for future programmes of the IMF. What is key is not the IMF programme per se, but a new push by the IMF to ensure investment-oriented deregulation. Argentina’s Large Investment Incentive Regime (RIGI), passed into law in 2024, provides the framework for laws that are being passed across Latin America – with the IMF loan programme, such as in Bolivia, dependent on the passage of these laws to protect (mostly foreign) investment in the country. RIGI, a long-term bargain, attracts large foreign investments by granting corporations sweeping tax, customs, currency, and regulatory privileges for up to 30 years. It socialises environmental and economic risks while privatising profits, weakening public revenue, and limiting future governments’ ability to regulate capital. The working class receives no equally strong guarantees of stable employment, good wages, local production, or public benefits, while multinational investors gain greater power to extract Argentina’s resources and move profits abroad.

The return of a testosterone leadership will not be able to solve the problems of the people of Latin America; but it has the capacity toxify social relations by turning people against each other and therefore weakening their capacity to build their own society. Their goal is total social transformation, not merely the enactment of this or that legislation. This is a fierce counter-revolution against the gains made by the impact of the Cuban Revolution and by the Bolivarian current. Contradictions will emerge, no doubt, but slowly and cautiously amongst a population divided by precariousness and new forms of social piety.

The above article was produced by Globetrotter and No Cold War. Vijay Prashad is an Indian historian and journalist. He is the author of forty books, including Washington Bullets, Red Star Over the Third World, The Darker Nations: A People’s History of the Third World, The Poorer Nations: A Possible History of the Global South, and How the International Monetary Fund Suffocates Africa, written with Grieve Chelwa. He is the executive director of Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research, the chief correspondent for Globetrotter, and the chief editor of LeftWord Books (New Delhi). He also appeared in the films Shadow World (2016) and Two Meetings (2017).