The war in Ukraine between Russian and American imperialism in collusion with German, French, and British imperialism is taking on a form that will make it much wider in the chain of general imperialist war, whereby Ukraine is only a training ground within the conflict of transnational groups of capital. The war is waged mercilessly on the world capital market with the formation of imperialist alliances and with the efforts of many countries to try to position themselves so as not to pay the highest price of the war. That war can have a long cyclical phase, alternating between general destruction, “permitted” destruction, negotiations, occasional truces, and new alliances. The suffering of the masses is already statistically registered only for the propaganda purposes of the imperialists.
In previous imperialist wars, the Balkans was one of the hubs that played a significant role in general conflicts. That historical sequence can be intended for it again. The initial symptoms of such a course of events are already clearly visible.
Due to the growth of its power, the ambitions of the Turkish regime took on megalomaniac proportions. Realizing the importance of Turkey in the struggle between “Western” and Russian imperialism, its current regime can use it for greater influence in the Balkans. Turkey is already partially achieving its conquest goals in Syria, constantly justifying its position by fighting the Kurdish movement, also in Central Asia. Due to the compulsion of Russia not to turn it against itself at the moment, Turkey is constantly blackmailing the Western imperialists regarding NATO, seeking various concessions regarding the Kurdish movement, and above all the threat of a war for resources and roads in the Mediterranean, which would lead to the disintegration of the NATO pact.
Turkey faces a period of great challenges in the coming months, as all external and internal forces will be harnessed to win Turkey over to its side in order to achieve a goal in the global war.
Serbia’s role in the Balkans is also important. With its geographical position and its relative strength, concerning the other countries of the former Yugoslavia, it represents for the imperialists the starting point from which they start igniting their conflicts. When we apply that basic conflict between American and Russian imperialism to the Balkans, it is clear that the US wants to encircle the Balkans under its control as soon as possible. That is why they will increase the pressure on Serbia to almost completely tear it away from Russian influence. Until then, Russia wants to strengthen and militarize the resistance in Serbia to the demands of the US and NATO. Because of its weaker position in the Balkans, Russia is looking for allies in anyone so as not to be completely suppressed. At the same time, Western imperialists are trying to reduce the economic influence of Chinese imperialism in that area.
The constant, open, and hidden idea of the Serbian bourgeoisie about the so-called “Serbian world” is faced with the ultimate choice between open collaboration and occupation by “Western” imperialism or provincial attachment to Russian imperialism.
The current war shows how small the sovereignty of the largest European states is, while its existence is questionable when it comes to the Balkan countries. They are, more or less, only a service in this conflict of inter-imperialist alliances – from Greece as a country in debt slavery for almost a century, which has been turned into an ordinary NATO base, Bulgaria which is leaning towards and serving the currently stronger imperialist alliance, Macedonia which is trying to maintain itself from succumbs to the local imperialist appetites of all its neighbors, Albania, which sees in the stability of the Balkans and ties to more powerful imperialists the possibility of its strengthening and the unification of the Albanian people into one state based on ethnic principles, Montenegro, which is torn apart by decades of internal political divisions in the pursuit of maintaining the identity of the Montenegrin nation, the surge of aggressive Greater Serbian nationalism and servitude to NATO, BiH, which after the explosion of international conflicts and social unrest of the masses found itself in a state of complete passivity, unable to determine its future, Croatia, in which increasingly large cracks are visible regarding its participation in the inter-imperialist war, to Kosovo, which in it’s just struggle for independence, has not yet fully completed its formal statehood and is in the status of a semi-colony.
The global war of the imperialists is gaining an ever wider and deeper character, so the Balkans cannot remain on the sidelines of that conflict, regardless of the efforts of their mafia regimes to preserve the peace. To preserve the peace in an effort that, in their unilateral or multilateral comprador role, they could continue to rob the people, not opposing the enslavement of the country and the plundering of its natural resources.
The accelerated militarization of the Balkan states and the increasing accumulation of NATO forces, the penetration of the intelligence and paramilitary structures of the imperialists are bringing the moment of the opening of the so-called. of the Balkan front. The opening of that front is directly dependent on the relationship between the inter-imperialist forces on the current main Ukrainian front and how the situation there will develop.
What is the state of the Balkan masses?
The Balkan masses have gained experience with ten years of bloody conflicts during the breakup of Yugoslavia, so nationalism is no longer a force that can cause conflicts. Also, the events in Ukraine have the effect that there is an awareness among the masses that this is not a war for “national interests”, but a conflict of imperialists, i.e. multinational corporations for hegemony and plunder. The sudden impoverishment caused by the general crisis of imperialism, and accelerated by the war in Ukraine, pushes the masses to make it their priority to preserve the current economic situation, so as not to be pushed to the edge of mere survival or, even worse, to find themselves in the position of the Ukrainian masses. That’s why “high politics”, “national interests” and war horns, no matter how loud they are, cannot move them to “a Serb (in this case, a Balkan man) is happy to join the army”.
Also, the Balkan masses currently do not have confidence in their strength to overthrow the existing regimes, nor can they resist the war policy and the war itself, especially since the Balkan masses are on the class defensive against the class enemy, disoriented and without a strong revolutionary subject. That revolutionary entity is too weak, and the Balkan masses have neither stronger unions nor front organizations that would more actively lead the fight against capitalists, multinational companies and the economic policies of the regimes themselves. However, the state of the masses can fundamentally change in a very short period of time and until they begin to show their class strength.
What is the task of the revolutionary subject, regardless of its current strength, in those future conflicts of war?
First of all, to encourage the Balkan masses not to participate in inter-imperialist conflicts, and not to be cannon fodder for the interests of the imperialists and their henchmen in power.
It is uncertain whose side the regimes on the Balkan front will be on in the inter-imperialist war, but that is not important for the approach of a revolutionary subject in those conflicts.
The division into pro-Russian and pro-NATO forces will in the future be the main political division and the main source of reactionary conflicts in most Balkan countries, both among its comprador and national bourgeoisie, as well as among the masses themselves. And that division will go beyond decades of fueling inter-ethnic hatred.
The Balkan masses are in a position – either to currently agree to the slavery of stronger imperialists and their comprador regimes, or to seek a way out of their own condition in revolutionary forms of resistance. Especially when the machinery of war takes on terrifying forms of its own.
The process is painful but historically inevitable.
Balkans to the Balkan peoples!
Onward With The Balkan Resistance Movement!
