Don't blame the doctor-- (also known as "Don't Shoot the Messenger.")

My concerns about the possibility of major war between "core" (imperialist)
powers is not a wish. I believe that capitalist economic processes lead to
the three trends of  economic collapse, overt, brutal political
dictatorship (fascism) to protect the power of major capitalists, and major
war. It would be nice if the "endgame" I spoke about was more like the
Bolshevik triumph in St. Petersburg, (without the mass death that
accompanies revolutions.) It just seems highly unlikely that this "tense
peace" among mighty powers will somehow remain stable for the next hundred
years without it ever spinning out of control. The big capitalists don't
want to start a war which may wipe them out. But they don't control all of
the consequences of their acts. If they did, we would not need a social
science that examines politics, culture, ideology, economics, history. We
could just study psychology and assume that since individuals want to
survive (by the way, many individuals also have some self-destructive
impulses that spin out of control, much to their later regret), --since
individuals want to survive, there will never be mass self-destructive wars
between nations.  Such a war might not destroy all life on Earth. But
whether it does or not has to do with whether there are some kind of
uprisings, including within the military, to take power away from those who
start the wars.


To say that I believe that major war between imperialist powers is a real
possiblity is not to hope for that war. It is to make us all aware that the
horrors of capitalism as a stage in world history are far greater than many
of us in the "industrialized West" can understand. Gang violence in Chicago
or Los Angeles? Nothing compared to gangs in a war  torn country ravaging
innocent civilians. Bombs over Belgrade? Nothing compared to bombs over
Hiroshima.   Discussing the possiblility of major war is not   done to help
make the wars happen. It is done to try to PREVENT those wars, or at least,
to minimize the impact, to make them shorter and smaller, if possible.

The doctor's analysis might be wrong. I might be wrong in my analysis.
Really. We can debate the "diagnosis", the analysis. But don't blame the
doctor for the disease.  And don't blame revolutionaries and activists for
the instability and war that pre-existed their theories about instability
and war.

Alan Spector