Harper’s History Lesson: anti-communism and war

Brendan Campisi

The Harper government's planned 'Memorial to the Victims of Communism', which will take its place in Ottawa between the Supreme Court and Library and Archives Canada, has come under scrutiny lately because of the significant and growing cost of the project. Shirley Blumberg, an architect who was on the jury that selected the design for the 'memorial', said in December that there is no way it will be completed for the government's estimated cost of $5.5 million. A growing chorus of establishment figures have criticized the project for its costs, the aesthetic damage they say it will do to central Ottawa, and the (at least) questionable necessity of such a memorial. The government has committed to paying $3 million of the cost of the project, while the rest is supposed to be paid by Tribute to Liberty, the anti-communist organization formed in 2008 to advocate for the project. However, they have so far had trouble raising the money. In fact there seems to be very little public interest in or support for the memorial, as any glance at the comments under a story on the project will reveal. Even many Canadians with no particular sympathy for communism cannot understand why the Harper government wants to spend several million dollars to put up a memorial to the victims of communism on prime central Ottawa real estate.

We can not have another World War.

Contribution to the Lisbon meeting of the World Federation of Democratic Youth's Commission of Europe and North America by the Young Communist League of Canada.

Dear comrades,

We would like to thank the World Federation of Democratic Youth and our hosts, the Juventude Comunista Portuguesa, for organizing this important meeting. We meet on the eve of the JCP's 10th Congress to which we send warm fraternal greetings. We are confident our work today will strengthen the efforts of the WFDY in the European and North American region.

This year, 2014, marks the 100th anniversary of the beginning of a social nightmare -- the First World War.

The Canadian government is launching a campaign to re-write history. To use this anniversary to celebrate militarism.

This is a horrible lie. The First World War saw close to 40 million civilian and military casualties.

Those who survived said: No! Never again!

The Great October Socialist Revolution in Russia helped end that war. The Soviet Union began to build a socialist society, based on peaceful cooperation.

Such history may seem dusty and old to some in our generation. But 100 years later it still frames our struggle, as the progressive youth grow more determined in our fight for the future, and we in WFDY advance the slogan of revolutionary social transformation.

On the dangerous developments in Ukraine

A sign at the 18th World Festival of Youth
and Students in Quito, Ecuador

Central Executive Committee,
Communist Party of Canada

The deepening political crisis in Ukraine and the threat of regional conflict, possibly an even wider war erupting over the fate of Crimea, is extremely alarming. The "war of words" emanating from Washington and Brussels is inflaming international tensions and could in turn provoke a global catastrophe. This crisis has been stoked by the ongoing imperialist strategy of the U.S. and NATO to encircle Russia, as seen in the installation of anti‑missile systems in Poland, and the integration of Georgia into the NATO alliance. Their goal is to isolate Russia and China, neutralizing potential obstacles to the drive by transnational capital based in the NATO countries to exploit the resources and labour power of the entire planet.

It is appalling that the Harper Conservative government has been playing an active role in this dangerous escalation, and that the mainstream media continue to whip up lies and distortions around recent developments in Ukraine. The claim by right‑wing forces that the March 16 referendum on the status of the Crimean Autonomous Republic is equivalent to the 1936 Nazi occupation of Sudetenland is particularly odious. The unchecked expansion of Hitler fascism led to World War Two, which killed some 60 million people, including over 27 million citizens of the USSR. As an autonomous republic, Crimea has the legal right to determine its status, free from all foreign interference.

For a peaceful and just resolution to the crisis in Ukraine, no to the ultra-right coup!

International commission,
Young Communist League of Canada
March 12th 2014

Recent events in Ukraine show the urgency for youth to fight for peace and genuine internationalism, and against imperialist alliances like the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. NATO and the European Union, supported by US and Canadian imperialism, are backing reactionary elements in Ukraine, dangerously threatening the stability of the region and the world.

The Western corporate media and the Harper Conservatives are portraying the new Ukrainian government as democratic; however, the real story is that an ultra-right coalition including fascist groups staged a "regime-change" coup against a democratically elected government.

Communist youth denounce developments in Ukraine

The developments in Ukraine are particularly crucial and dangerous, first of all for the people and the youth of the country, who are being transformed again into victims of the intense antagonisms between the USA-EU and Russia, for the control of markets, of natural resources and the transportation networks of the country.

The open intervention of the EU-USA-NATO, the utilization of  fascist groups and organizations which are the descendants of the SS and spread fascist and Nazi venom and anticommunism, the planned persecutions and banning of political parties primarily against the communists, and the racist laws that are being prepared against the Russian-speaking population and other minorities, all demonstrate the character of the developments, and uncover the lies about the “triumph of democracy in Ukraine”.

Dangerous developments for the people of Ukraine

Members of the Communist Party of Ukraine rally
to defend a statue of Lenin from ultra-right forces

Joint Statement of Communist and Workers' Parties, circulated by the Communist Parties of Germany and Greece. 

The recent dramatic developments in Ukraine do not constitute the "victory of democracy" by the alleged "revolutionaries", as it is described by the mass media of the USA and the EU, but is a dangerous development, above all for the people of Ukraine themselves.

Reactionary political forces, ideological descendants of the Nazis, have risen to the political "surface" with the assistance of the EU and the USA. These are forces which apart from destroying the offices of their opponents, are planning political persecutions, and the banning of parties, above all against the communists, and even racist legislation at the expense of the Russian‑speaking population, like what has been in force for the last 20 years in the countries of the "European" Baltic, with the blatant political support of the EU.

Is the U.S. Backing Neo-Nazis in Ukraine?

Exposing troubling ties in the U.S. to overt Nazi and fascist protesters in Ukraine

By Max Blumenthal

Reposted from Alternet – Feb 24, 2014

As the Euromaidan protests in the Ukrainian capitol of Kiev culminated this week, displays of open fascism and neo-Nazi extremism became too glaring to ignore. Since demonstrators filled the downtown square to battle Ukrainian riot police and demand the ouster of the corruption-stained, pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovich, it has been filled with far-right streetfighting men pledging to defend their country’s ethnic purity.

White supremacist banners and Confederate flags were draped inside Kiev’s occupied City Hall, and demonstrators have hoisted Nazi SS and white power symbols over a toppled memorial to V.I. Lenin. After Yanukovich fled his palatial estate by helicopter, EuroMaidan protesters destroyed a memorial to Ukrainians who died battling German occupation during World War II. Sieg heil salutes and the Nazi Wolfsangel symbol have become an increasingly common site in Maidan Square, and neo-Nazi forces have established “autonomous zones” in and around Kiev.