Editorial: Iraq - Capitalism's Wild West

CAPITALISM'S WILD WEST Reconstruction in Iraq is still to happen: billions of dollars for sale for others; no rights for those fleeing political • Iraqi money have been stolen and squandered mainly persecution, sleaze and money grubbing for others. EDITORIAL Sy US Contractors, or have simply disappeared. Channel - Dispatches reports that more than $20 billion of Iraqi money, held by the UN during the sanctions programme, 's unaccounted for, with little to show in reconstruction • corruption and fraud flourish on an unimaginable scale. Despite hundreds of millions of dollars 'officially' spent, for example, on hospitals and clinics, most Iraqi hospitals still have criminal shortages of basic medical supplies and thousands of babies needlessly die for lack of simple drugs and basic technology. Meanwhile, big infrastructure projects sewage and water systems, and such as power stations, hospitals are left uncompleted, or do not work because of shoddy construction. The war profiteers remain unchecked and continue to have a bonanza. In Basra only 550 new flats have been built since the 2003 US-led invasion. More than 250,000 families there are still without homes, many living in squalid conditions. Home to nearly 2.5 million people, Basra is overcrowded with several families crammed into one house or one flat. The number of families without homes amounts to more than one third of its population. In Iraq as a whole there is less clean water available now than before the invasion, despite half a billion dollars apparently spent on it. The results of Bush and Blair's 'foreign policies' in Iraq are there for all to see and the violence continues unabated. However, although the destruction of the al-Askari shrine in Samarra in late February was followed by a wave of sectarian violence, what received far less coverage are the gestures of solidarity between Shia and Sunni muslims. The Sunnis were the first to go to demonstrations of solidarity with Shia in Samarra, as well as to condemn the mosque bombings. There were demonstrations of solidarity between Sunni and Shia all over Iraq: in Basra, Diwaniyah, Nasiriyah, Kut, and Salah al-Din. Though some are calling the situation 'civil war', it is more a combination of resistance to the occupation, plus sectarian violence. Peerages for Sale But the war is growing increasingly unpopular in the US and Bush's ratings are at an all time low. In Britain Blair is equally unpopular at below 30 percent. While New Labour continues its attack on our civil liberties with asylum seekers and others caught under Terrorism legislation suffering the barbarity of control orders and deportations, at the other end of the spectrum several millionaire friends of New Labour are exposed as having 'lent' New Labour money to finance the last election - to the tune of £14 million. Nothing illegal in this: lending money is not yet covered by the law on the funding of political parties - just that some of them were also offered peerages soon afterwards, and the Labour Party Treasurer (to say nothing of the Deputy Prime Minister, Chancellor, Chair and National Executive Committeel knew nothing about it. This is Blair's Britain • cetention without charge or trial for some, peerages But the idea that a handover of the premiership to Brown will change anything in Britain is an illusion. Brown has agreed to all Blair's neo-liberal economic and military policies - he has stated that 'modernisation' must continue. He will not change the process underway of privatising the welfare state, education and the NHS; he will not stop the attacks on pensions; he will not disassociate himself from US foreign policies and military adventures. Vote Respect Nonetheless the local elections in May do enable us to give New Labour a bloody nose. Many former Labour voters will no doubt abstain, seeing little to choose between New Labour, Tory or Liberal Democrat candidates - all of them vying for an increasingly small political space and outdoing each other in the number, of ASBOs they can inflict on the local population. Others will vote Green, seeing climate change as the most important long-term concern - though whether the Green Party, with its soft critique of capitalism can deliver on what needs to happen is most unlikely. For a lucky few there will be Respect candidates to vote for, especially in the East End of London where many wards in Tower Hamlets and in Newham will be contested by Respect. With anti-war demonstrations across the world on 18 March, the war remains a central political dividing line, and Respect the only party with a clear anti-war stance. The French example In France, students and others have responded magnificently to the attacks on young peoples' employment rights by Villepin's government - they show what can be achieved with unity and militancy. Whether they can defeat the legislation is yet to be seen, but there is no doubt that united action on the streets, including a call for a general strike, is the way to build opposition to policies which seek to help the employer make ever greater profits at the expense of workers. Of course in France this militancy is built on the vote against the EU Constitution, with neoliberal economic policies embedded in it. In Britain we have had greater defeats for longer than in many European countries so that, despite huge demonstrations against the war, the working class is less able to resist attempts to undermine working rights, like the right to a decent pension. Nor is the fightback here adequate to defend the NHS against privatisation or the attacks on comprehensive education. Articles in this issue of Socialist Outlook show just how deep these attacks are into the fabric of the welfare state. Other articles in this issue discuss events unfolding in Latin America - in Venezuela and Bolivia and show again how changes can be made if the working class acts together. Also covered is the election of Hamas in Palestine, the situation in Northern Ireland, and several articles on climate change. 3