But the U.S. armed forces are not “our troops.” They are used to enforce the interests of the U.S. ruling rich around the world.

I have consistently explained to my co-workers at the Point Blank Body Armor plant in Oakland Park, Florida, where I am employed, that I am for the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Iraq and Afghanistan and from other locations where they are deployed, including the Korean Peninsula and Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. With the far-reaching reorganization of the U.S. military well under way, it is not hard to imagine these troops being deployed against working people in this country in the future, as struggles by workers and farmers mount against the conditions we face.

Workers at the Oakland Park Point Blank plant are paid between $6.15 (Florida's minimum wage) and about $10 an hour while the company pushes a production speedup and rakes in hundreds of millions of dollars.

Decent hourly wages, safe working conditions, and solidarity with other working people at home and abroad—these are the key issues union members face.

That same article calls the items produced by the company “protective equipment.” That is inaccurate, too. The kneepads, bulletproof vests, and other material made for the armed forces and cops is part of their weaponry. It is my view that the so-called “quality” of these goods is management’s problem—not ours.

Barbara Bowman
Miami, Florida  
 
Socialist campaign platform
I am writing in regards to the following paragraph taken from issue no. 25 of the Militant on the Pittsburgh Socialist Workers Party mayoral campaign:

“[SWP candidate Jay] Ressler is speaking out against the drive by Washington and its allies to prevent nations oppressed by imperialism from developing nuclear power and other energy sources needed to expand electrification—a necessity for economic and social advances.”

When I read that paragraph, a central demand since the 2004 campaign, one aspect struck me as being off. What exactly is this drive by Washington and its allies? What is their ultimate objective with this policy course and does the demand accurately reflect it?

The various initiatives undertaken within the framework of the drive, e.g., the transformation of the International Atomic Energy Agency into imperialism’s nuclear police, the illegal application of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, the Proliferation Security Initiative, and so on, don’t apply to “other energy sources.” I don’t think they are confiscating solar panels when they illegally board freighters on the high seas.

Washington and its allies are not preoccupied with countries developing “other sources of energy” but with them developing nuclear capability challenging their monopoly over their ultimate weapon.

I think it would be better to present a formulation of opposing imperialism’s drive against countries seeking to develop nuclear power to advance their economic and cultural development, and demanding the sovereign right of countries threatened by imperialism to defend themselves by any means necessary, including nuclear weapons.

Karl Butts
Tampa, Florida
 
 
Related articles:
Imperialism blocks energy access in semicolonial world  
 
 
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