Pentagon officials met recently with the CEOs of General Motors and Ford to enlist the auto industry in an accelerated military arms buildup. According to press reports, the Trump administration is attempting to transform US auto plants into what it calls an “Arsenal of Freedom”—in reality, an Arsenal of Genocide—to replenish weapons systems depleted by the Ukraine proxy war, the Gaza genocide, and the war on Iran.
War is being presented to workers as something that will bring jobs, but the reality is that workers will pay in blood.
They are gearing up to send workers and the children of workers to fight these wars, to die for the profits of those who are exploiting workers.
These same militarist policies and predatory imperialist wars fueled the student protests against the genocide in Gaza. Universities were associated with war development and war technologies, and students and university workers did not want any part of it.
The wars in the Middle East have led to debacles. They have left scars on the working class that will not soon be forgotten.
Trump talks about destroying an entire civilization, but it is not just Trump talking—it is US imperialism that is driving this.
The only way we are going to stop that is through our collective action. The UAW bureaucracy is fine with workers going off to fight wars as long as they collect dues. They are not going to be fighting these wars.
The UAW usually lines up behind the Democrats, but they are fully backing the Trump administration by promoting war production. Fain wears a shirt with a bomber on it. Anti-genocide protesters in Michigan were thrown out of a UAW rally.
This is part of the bureaucracy’s policy that everything must be subordinated to nationalism and the war effort. Nationalism is a poison being fed to the working class, and workers must oppose this.
Workers face a choice. It is not all said and done—we still have an opportunity to stop it. The power of the working class is real. Workers need to understand their class strength and act. But the UAW bureaucracy is not going to lead that fight. If they remain in charge, we are going to lose.
This means workers need to assert their own power by building rank-and-file committees to organize and coordinate struggles based on the interests of workers, not the UAW bureaucracy.
