Today, ninety five years ago, the great revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg was murdered by German police.

More clearly than most Marxist writers, Rosa Luxemberg set out a clear programme of mass anti-capitalist struggle. he showed that the road of reformism is not a longer, safer !ourney to socialism, but a road in the opposite direction. "er writing stands in sharp contrast to the confused meanderings of modern protest politics. The Mass Strike, for instance, is a wor# that anyone interested in anti-capitalist revolution will profit from studying. Meanwhile, below is an argument for wor#ers$ internationalism % presented to &eace 'ction (ellington in )**+, here, some of Rosa Luxemburg$s revolutionary teaching seemed to be a natural conclusion. --------------------------------------------------------------------------Longtime .ew /ealand fol#singer &hil Garland, has a composition which goes in part0 %$m proud to be a 1iwi, standing strong and tall, The spirit of our .ation unites us one and all. Let$s !oin hands together and sing in harmony, 2ur land 3 .ew /ealand, means all the world to me. 4liches li#e that do seem to resonate with some people. Ta#e for example, the following widely posted email0 56id you #now that .ew /ealand is pretty much the only place in the world that you can not actually be a .ew /ealander7 (henever you fill out a form or survey in .ew /ealand you can tic# the box to say you are Maori, Tongan, amoan, 'ustralian, 8uropean 9or ./ born of 8uropean 6ecent:, 'sian, etc but there is no box provided to say ;<es, % am a .ew /ealander and % am proud to be one$. =(hy is it that we can$t be .ew /ealanders in our own country7 = fight for our right to be recognised as who we are in this proud and strong country of ours. 'nd remember= at census time= ;2ther 3 .ew /ealander>$ 9and &roud of it:.? "ere are brief comments from four politicians0 2ur ancestors succeeded in creating a peaceful happy and wealthy slice of relative paradise right here in .ew /ealand. (e were once the sweetest little country in the world. 'll of the world once hailed and envied our outstanding harmonious national achievement. This was true for both (hite and Maori .ew /ealanders. .ew /ealand was easily the wealthiest, most comfortable and settled bi-racial culture, on the face of the entire planet> @ut this was only when this country had a national pride. 9 id (ilson, ./ .ational Aront, (ellington, peech )**B: 6on @rash 9May )**C: concluded his )**C 5&roud to be a 1iwi? address to the 'uc#land Rotary 4lub this way0 59./ is : a country which sacrificed proportionately more of its young people in the defence of freedom than any other 'llied country during the Airst (orld (ar. %$m a proud .ew /ealander.? %t$s not only the .ational &arty who rewrite history to promote blind loyalty in the service of imperialist war. Aor example, "elen 4lar#$s )**B speech to the memorial service for the Dn#nown (arrior0 %n being chosen to represent more than E*,*** others who died in the service of our country, the Dn#nown (arrior has enormous symbolism for .ew /ealand. 'll we #now of him is that

he died on the (estern Aront, and that he was one of us. (e are the future generations for whom he lost his life. %n a very real sense he is one of the foundations of today$s society. 4lar# then went on to praise 5= ordinary .ew /ealanders who did not have the right to decide the course of events, but who did their duty according to the imperatives of their time. %n honouring their sacrifice, we are sustaining a deep and lasting respect for our war dead. This is not !ust an occasion of sorrow, but also an opportunity to pay tribute to our .ew /ealand servicemen and women who lost their lives serving our nation. (e ac#nowledge that they gave their lives in our country$s service, and that all of us today, in some sense, owe them the lives we now lead. . . . .ew /ealand servicemen and women continue to go abroad to places of conflict, putting their lives in !eopardy. They serve our country with courage and dedication as they wor# to bring peace to troubled places. They are highly regarded worldwide. "elen 4lar# is clever. Most liberals would sha#e their heads at the values of Tennyson$s Charge of the Light Brigade poem, but 4lar# effectively revamped those values for modern day use. (hen 5our country? calls, you 59do: not have the right to decide the course of events, but are expected to do your duty according to the imperatives of you time.? 'nd on it goes, across the political spectrum0 2ur &arty supports our police going to help the olomon %slands people to help them move to a situation where the rule of law applies. (e support what our police force has done so far. % understand that about F* .ew /ealand police are there now, and this will expand to perhaps E* or B* under the arrangements. (e are very grateful to those police who will go on this operation for what they do, and for the sacrifices they will ma#e. 2ur &arty wishes them well in their wor# over there. (e are developing a peace#eeping speciality with both our military and our police. % thin# the nation is proud of what we have achieved in peace#eeping. That crawling to the state forces is from Green M& 1eith Loc#e, in &arliament$s urgent 6ebate on 6eployment of &olice and Military Aorces to olomon %slands, Fst Guly )**E. Granted, 1eith$s speech was hedged around with ifs and buts about hoping 5our police? didn$t stay in the olomons too long. @ut that would seem to me a bac#handed admission that they ought not to have gone in the first place. The essential point remains, don$t expect any real opposition to capitalist state forces from the Green party. Arom the above Huotes its possible to get two false impressions. 2ne, that .ew /ealand is a united entity whose entire population all share identical interests and, two, that national pride, or patriotism, is something natural, to be unHuestioned. 8mma Goldman said 0 5&atriotism. . . is a superstition artificially created and maintained through a networ# of lies and falsehoods? (hen where and why was this 5artificial superstition? created7 .ational states are relatively new phenomena. Aor example, it$s only a few generations ago that the states of %taly and Germany didn$t exist. .ationalism developed as an early capitalist ideology of the bourgeois revolutions against feudalism. 's a weapon against feudalism, the nation state was, initially, historically progressive. Today, the development of modern globalised production and distribution has made the nation state an outmoded anachronism, bloc#ing human progress.

%n her FIFF wor# Peace Utopias, the great &olish revolutionary socialist Rosa Luxemburg had a clear view of the reality of nation states and the anti-war movement. he saw the tas# of the anti-war movement as being 5to endeavour to ma#e it clear to the people that militarism is closely lin#ed up with colonial politics, with tariff politics, and with international politics, and that therefore the present .ations, if they really seriously and honestly wish to call a halt on competitive armaments, would have to begin by disarming in the commercial political field, give up colonial predatory campaigns and the international politics of spheres of influence in all parts of the world. %n a word, in their foreign as well as in their domestic politics they would have to do the exact contrary of everything which the nature of the present politics of a capitalist class state demands.? Rosa Luxemburg argued against the futility of trying 5to convince the bourgeois tate that it can Huite well limit armaments and bring about peace and that it can do this from its own standpoint, from that of a capitalist class tate.? he realised that 5Militarism in both its forms 3 as war and as armed peace 3 is a legitimate child, a logical result of capitalism, which can only be overcome with the destruction of capitalism, and that hence whoever honestly desires world peace and liberation from the tremendous burden of armaments must also desire ocialism.? Today former revolutionary socialist Marian "obbs argues that critics of ./ military socalled peace-#eeping forces are 5craJy?.K (e learn from Rosa Luxemburg that its pointless trying to persuade capitalist politicians to do the exact contrary of everything in the nature of their politics, and that our !ob is to build a mass movement against them. %n ./ today there is a low level of anti-capitalist struggle and even of militant union struggle. There is some fine militant union struggle being waged today, but that is currently a minority trend in the union movement. The collaborationist 4TD leadership divide most of their time between cheer-leading for the governmentKK and a dreary succession of collaborationist gimmic#s, the latest of which is a series of seminars seeing how bosses can increase productivity. The present low level of anti-capitalist struggle, however, does not invalidate anti-capitalist arguments on the origins of war. o, what do we do next7 %n the course of Troops 2ut .ow campaigning, we need to provide a strong ideological alternative to the artificially-created superstitions of national pride. The facts are on our side and we should ma#e full use of them. (e should always be sure to call things by their right names. (hen ;&eace-#eepers$ #ill our fellow global citiJens they are #illing our relatives. (e need to set a positive internationalist agenda wherever we can. Aor example, we need to consistently argue and demonstrate for no restrictions on immigration and for open borders. % agree with Rosa Luxemburg that an ultimately successful anti-war movement must become an anti-capitalist revolutionary movement. That is not to insist that all anti-war activists must be anti-capitalists. %t is to insist on unrestricted space in the anti-war movement for revolutionary agitation and propaganda. K 't the time of 6on$s original presentation, "obbs was Labour M& for (ellington 4entral and a member of the government. KK %n )**+, of course, Labour was in power