Frente Antiimperialista Internacionalista Internationalist Anti-Imperialist Front
The 2nd of December 2017 saw the constitution of the FAI, an internationalist organisation founded to create ‘broad-based anti-imperialist unity’ sufficient to overcome the limitations imposed by the current fragmentation among the forces of anti-imperialist resistance.
This meeting was attended by a large number of militants of various nationalities belonging to political and solidarity organizations, and people from several parts of Spain. The meeting agreed on the political and ideological principles binding the front together, and also on the goals, priorities and initial organizational structure.
It was agreed that the FAI is a plural and a flexible organization, well-integrated politically and ideologically, whose scope is political rather than territorial.
The meeting also took the view that at the present time our capacity to challenge imperialism is continually losing strength, despite the numerous instances of countries subjecting others by force and the evidence of the stronger countries on the planet resorting to any means to subject peoples and countries that present an obstacle to their interests.
There is a clear need to concentrate forces, to overcome the existing fragmentation and to achieve political and ideological cohesion—and that precisely is the reason for creating the FAI.
We are agreed that imperialism, capitalism, war and fascism are elements within the logic of accumulation; that we are going through a phase of imperial expansion with a view to dominating the planet; that such domination is pursued through any form of war anywhere in the world; and that there are no limits to the violence used. Since the collapse of the socialist bloc, NATO, as the military arm of the western imperialist coalition, has expanded its imperialist offensive world-wide, constantly operating in breach of International Law. The consequences are daily in the news—millions of dead, mutilated and displaced… unending and ever-growing suffering whose causes are systematically concealed and manipulated by mass media, industrial cultures and the political class. The West has developed a powerful propaganda machine to ensure that the population consent to ignore the barbarity. The wars are portrayed as necessary and justified by the noblest human values like democracy, human rights, peace and so forth, emptying them of all real meaning as they are turned into mere slogans of imperialist strategy.
We are also agreed that the Spanish state is a leading player in this recolonization of the world. Its geostrategic location at the crossroads of the Europe-Africa and Mediterranean-America axes makes it crucial as a base for strategic operations. The anti-missile shield on the Rota base, the Combined Air Operations Center (CAOC) at Torrejón, the Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Crisis Response Task Force at Morón, the High-Readiness Land Headquarters at Bétera and the strategic militarization of the Canary Islands are key elements in the World-Wide War. Our expeditionary forces in Africa, the Middle East and Eastern Europe grow and our ‘defence’ budget has risen by 80%, while social cutbacks continue (pensions have been increased by 0.25%). We are clearly on an increasingly militaristic course as our interference in Latin America augments in obedience to the interests of the USA, whom we serve as spokesmen in the European Union.
Here are some of the essential political tenets of the FAI:
- Imperialism is the form that capitalism takes at the present point in its historical development.
- We are at war, even if the battlefronts are beyond our frontiers.
- Internationalism is an absolute requirement for any anti-imperialist struggle—a commitment to overthrow the system of structural domination and dispossession.
- To claim in the matter of imperialist expansion that one is neither for one side or the other is to openly take the part of the empire.
- The imperialist war is directed by the western coalition, grouped basically around NATO and dominated by the US.
- The European Union operates as a structure for the defence of major economic interests and seeks to maintain its dominion in its former colonies, using all kinds of violence.
Just as we share basic ideological and political principles, we share the idea that it is only by combining forces that we can have some real effect; that all our partial struggles need to press in the same direction inspired by internationalism; and that we need to build a permanent unified structure through which to help educate, to contribute to theoretical debate and to enhance our capacity for action.
The FAI has adopted a flexible structure, a Coordinating Board, so that together we can identify action priorities such as coordination of activities and autonomy of the participating organizations within their respective geographical or work-related spheres. It also articulates and disseminates experiences and knowledge by way of Work Groups which address the different geographical areas world-wide or specific sectors like NATO and the role of the Spanish state. And it is this last subject that will be dealt with at the 3rd Session of the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal against Imperialist War and NATO, to be held in 2018 and organized by the FAI.
We call on all those organizations and people whose principles place them on the side of the struggle against domination, exploitation, dispossession, crime and human suffering to become part of this broad-based movement to resist and combat imperialism, and to join the peoples and countries which for decades have been tirelessly confronting this barbarism.
¡¡¡ NO PASARAN !!! THEY SHALL NOT PASS!!!
FRENTE ANTIIMPERIALISTA INTERNACIONALISTA, 20 February 2018.
Contact: [email protected]
