Sanctions considered as Annexations

["Lou Paulsen" <wwchi@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I was reading through some of Lenin's writings on the national question and
imperialism, and all at once I had an insight as to how it has become
possible for some Marxists to have developed some strange positions on what
sorts of imperialist intervention it is permissible to support.

I vaguely remembered something that Lenin wrote about how it was necessary
for communists to support even monarchs against imperialist annexations - I
forget whether it was about Britain in Afghanistan, or France in North
Africa, and I couldn't find it anyway.  (If anyone remembers this, post it!)
But as I read, I noticed that Lenin was continually writing as if the
question of imperialism were equivalent to the question of annexation - that
is, the direct seizure of territory as colonies.  Of course, that was the
FORM that imperialism most commonly took at the time.

And I thought, "How unfortunate that not much of what Lenin wrote is
directly applicable to the imperialist interventions of today.  Today, the
imperialist powers have not been as likely to directly seize the territory -
although they may become bolder, and what is Kosovo if not annexed
territory?*  But today they usually don't annex.  Instead, they point a gun
at the neocolony and say, 'Do as we say or we will invade you or starve
you.'"

And then I got this insight.  Sanctions (generally) ARE annexations!  Or at
least they are not qualitatively different from "ordinary" annexations, with
regard to the things that matter to the struggle.

What, after all, is the important thing about an "ordinary" annexation of
colonial territory?  It is that the imperial power -rules- over the colony.
The imperial power is sovereign.  It gives the orders, and the subjects must
obey.  That's the important thing.  The administrative details are
secondary.  And there has been a lot of variation in the way colonies have
been ruled.  Some have had elected legislatures.  The level of democracy and
free speech within colonies has varied.  Some colonies have been managed
very tightly by the imperialist power, and every detail has been ordered
from the imperial capital.  In other colonies, the local government has had
more autonomy.  One form of colony has been the 'protectorate', in which the
colony has lots of autonomy in domestic affairs, but the imperial power
manages its foreign affairs (that is, keeps the profits of its exploitation
to itself, and keeps out other imperial powers).  Furthermore, there have
been 'joint operating agreements' among colonial powers to manage colonies:
France and Britain managed the Cameroons together, and also I think the New
Hebrides (?), and as I recall Tangier was managed by Spain, France, and
England (?) together for a while.

That's the basis for the following statement: sanctions (generally)
represent a form of imperialist annexation in which (a) the imperialists are
operating jointly, as a consortium (b) they are imposing (or exerting) their
rule over a subject country, but (c) they want to keep their direct
involvement in the administration of the territory low, so (d) they compel,
or attempt to compel, broad changes in government policy, or the removal of
one government and the installation of another one.  Put this way, they are
just another form of colonial rule - another of the many forms that colonial
rule can take.

Take the case of Iraq as an example.  I think it's rather clear that this
can be looked at as a case of annexation and resistance to annexation.  In
fact there are clear territorial annexations: the "no-fly zone", the
northern zone, and so on.  Ultimately the imperialists want to depose Saddam
Hussein and impose a government of their own choosing.  The fact that this
new government would not wear the label "U.S. Governor of Iraq" does not
change the fact that what is going on is that the imperial powers are
attempting to impose their rule on Iraq by force.

Now take the case of Fiji.  Fiji, or some people in Fiji, have abrogated the
1997 constitution.  The imperialist powers are attempting to re-impose the
1997 constitution and the Chaudhry government on them by economic or
military force.  Note that for the sake of this argument it doesn't matter
WHAT you think about the forces inside Fiji, who is democratic and who is
not, who is right-wing and who is left-wing, who is oppressing who, etc.
etc.  The fact is that when the imperialists are trying to impose a
government and a constitution on an agricultural country of fewer than one
million people, that's an annexation.  Of course, when imperialists want to
perform an annexation of any kind, they always have an argument as to why
this is a good thing, why it is an advance toward civilization, humanism,
democracy, and so on.

(And this explains quite simply why the South Africa case was different.
Apart from all the other special features of the South Africa case, the fact
is that the people had their own armies in the field and were prepared to
establish their own states.  And it was clear that these were not states
that imperialism had selected; in fact, they had done their utmost to
destroy these armies and governments for decades.  So it was not a question
of calling on the imperialist powers to exercise sovereignty in South
Africa.  It was a case of undermining an alliance among imperialists.)

If we all to remember that in most cases sanctions are just another point on
the continuum of annexation, we would be strengthened theoretically.
Unfortunately, I think that it's all too easy to get misled when they are
not FORMALLY annexing the territory.  I think that if Australia and New
Zealand and the U.S. were to announce that they were going to solve Fiji's
problems by going in and formally conquering it and declaring it to be a
subject territory, and then appointing a governor of their choice and
writing a constitution in Washington, then most of the people I have been
differing with on the Fiji question would recognize this as an annexation,
and remember that they are supposed to be against annexations, and would
fight it.  But because the exertion of force is disguised as some sort of
"persuasion" by some [huge, powerful, rapacious] countries directed at
another [incomparably weaker] country, because the illusion is maintained
that the government of Fiji is "free" to make choices, because the exertion
of force is labeled as "consequences of breaking rules",  and because these
features disguise the annexationist reality of it all, people don't realize
that the principles of anti-imperialism laid down by Lenin in the context of
1915-style annexations apply today with regard to Y2K-style annexations.

Lou Paulsen


*note on Kosovo - in case you missed it, Kosovo now has postage stamps!
They are denominated in pfennigs and marks.