World Powers Prepare For New Global Conflict

This article was published in Socialist Alternative’s October paper, before the Iranian government launched a missile strike on Israel. Working class people have no interest in a war in the Middle East, and Socialist Alternative strongly condemns this attack, the Israeli state’s war of terror in Lebanon and ongoing genocidal war in Gaza.  We urgently need internationally coordinated, mass protests that are prepared to challenge politicians in all countries and every party who support imperialist war, and demand an immediate ceasefire now.

The latest dramatic developments in the Middle East—with Israel’s relentless attacks in Lebanon, the US moving more forces to the region, and Iran’s plans to send troops to aid Hezbollah—are part of a bigger global picture.

Major global and regional imperialist powers are involved in a series of wars, conflicts, and military tensions. From the devastating war in Ukraine to the genocidal war in Gaza, a dramatic expansion of the war into Lebanon, the endless wars in Yemen and Sudan, a string of military coup in the Sahel Region, to the growing threat around China, Taiwan, and the South China Sea—everything points toward the danger of a new global conflict not seen since World War II.

Regional wars are not isolated from each other, but are links in a growing consolidation of geopolitical blocs around the two main imperialist powers—the US and China—aimed at cementing and expanding each power’s region of influence and fending off the other. The main arenas surround the strategic trade and military regions of the South China Sea, the Red Sea between the Arabian peninsula and East Africa, Eastern Europe, and the African continent.

These heightened clashes take place in the context of a global political, financial, and social crisis of capitalism. What we’re seeing are symptoms of global capitalism transforming out of neoliberalism into a new era of inter-imperialist conflict. 

The end of the hegemony the US has experienced since WWII, as well as the search for new profitable avenues for capitalist investment, sanctions workarounds, and the rising struggles of working people against poverty, displacement, and hunger are all growing complications for capitalist regimes that are pushing them toward war. This new era is also marked by a rise of militarism, economic protectionism, as well as heightened nationalism, racism, and xenophobia throughout the world.

War in Ukraine

The war in Ukraine, approaching its third year and reportedly costing the lives of over a million people, is one of the epicenters in this global conflict. The US ruling class sees Russian and Chinese imperialism as the main threat to its global interests. 

Defeat would be devastating for both the US and China-led blocs. It would signal to their allies their incapability to defend them against increased influence and domination by the opposing bloc and curtail their influence on the world stage.

The Middle East & Africa

The wars in Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon are a horrendous demonstration of human lives being sacrificed for the broader interests of global superpowers.

The Hamas October 7th attack in Israel, and the brutal war that followed, caused a suspension of the major “normalization” process between Israel and a series of Arab countries promoted by the US and aimed at fending off growing Chinese and Iranian influence in the Middle East.

The coming together of a Western alliance was best showcased in April, when Israel and Iran exchanged missile fire. A series of European and Arab countries suspended their fake criticism of Israel’s slaughter in Gaza and stepped in to defend it. On the other side, we see the China and Russia-led bloc with Iran at its head working closely with Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and Iranian-backed militias in Iraq and Syria.

Another strategic location for trade and military dominance is Eastern Africa, particularly the Horn of Africa, the Red Sea, and the Suez Canal. Control over this region is of prime importance for any country that wants to secure the free flow of goods from Asia to Europe.

This is a key reason for the heavy involvement of regional imperialist forces in the devastating war in Sudan which has taken the lives of countless innocent people and caused the world’s largest refugee crisis and famine. The conflict involves a complicated and somewhat contradictory web of alliances between the UAE and the Russian Wagner Group on one side and Iran and Ukraine on the other. More incredibly, Russia has recently switched sides and is now fighting alongside Ukrainian forces.

The inter-imperialist conflict has had a dramatic impact on a series of countries in the Sahel region where, after decades of Western neocolonial rule, military forces took power with significant popular support and aligned themselves with the China-Russia bloc as part of the latter’s growing influence in the African continent.

South China Sea

In many ways, the epicenter of tensions which is most likely to spark a global war is the South China Sea, the area that includes China’s south coast, Taiwan, the Philippines, Vietnam, and others. The Chinese state has repeatedly threatened to take Taiwan and abolish its independence. For decades, the US and others maintained an ambiguous approach towards the idea of “reunification”. But recently the tone has changed and the US has signaled that it will militarily defend Taiwan if China launched an invasion.

The South China Sea and Taiwan’s geographical locations are playing crucial roles, including securing military control and trade routes around the Taiwan Strait, the Miyako Strait, and the Bashi Strait—the main access between China and the Pacific Ocean. These straits also lie between China and a series of US naval bases in South Korea, Japan, and the Philippines, forming a strip of military bulwarks in case a war breaks out.

Additionally, Taiwan plays a central global role in the production of semiconductors, an increasingly important component in modern technology, including for military purposes.

Rush to War

The US government is fully aware of the direction these developments point to. The Commission on the National Defense Strategy for the United States concluded in a report that the threat of global war is at its highest since WWII. It is advising the Department of Defense to prepare for a global war in the short to medium term. 

The US and its allies envision a conventional, non-nuclear war in Asia. Even so, the breakout of a global military conflict in a world of armed nuclear powers is an extremely dangerous scenario. Acknowledging that the US is unprepared for this scale of war, the commission’s proposals include mass investments in a pre-war economy, securing the funding of allied forces globally, a widespread military/technological upgrade, involving the Department of Education to promote military education, and raising “patriotism” in society. They even suggest the possibility of military conscription in the future to combat dwindling recruitment numbers.

Moves towards reintroducing military conscription have been enacted in Latvia and discussed by major parties in Britain, Germany, Italy and elsewhere. Meanwhile, Sweden and Estonia have extended the reach of their existing conscription regimes. In Germany, where military funding has reached its highest levels since WWII, there has been a relentless propaganda campaign to prepare the population for war within 5-8 years. China has increased its militarization, especially its technological and naval capabilities, and is now on par with the US on military funding.

The rush for war-preparedness stems from an acknowledgement that no side is fully ready for combat. Why aren’t the main superpowers able to simply order their allies to end the conflicts?

The internal dynamic and contradictions of capitalism go beyond the direct control of those in power. Regional imperialist countries are not simply puppets bound to follow orders, but have their own dynamics and interests stemming from a variety of complicated conditions such as an urgency to modernize their economy by gaining access to investments, land, and resources; securing areas of oil drilling, fishing, and production of minerals to maintain profits for their domestic capitalist class, commerce, and combat limitations posed by climate disasters; fending off regional rivals in preparations for wider wars; and, not least, facing growing pressure from the population struggling for higher living standards under increased hardships.

Despite having a certain “independence” in their actions, overall regional imperialist powers are marching in the direction of its bloc, as can be seen in the case of the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East. 

Taking No Side In An Imperialist Conflict

Working people have no side in an inter-imperialist war. But more war is the inexorable logic of this diseased system. No imperialist side winning hegemony on the world stage would have any benefit for workers who would bear the brunt of death, displacement, and hunger.

Transformation into a war economy in the medium term would include an attack on workers’ benefits and social programs to fund war efforts. This raises the historic task of the global working class in building an alternative. Socialists stand firmly against nationalism and other forms of reactionary ideology which seek to divide us. We need our own mass political organizations and an international socialist party that can organize a fightback against the horrors of imperialism and pose an alternative based on workers’ solidarity, cooperation, and  democratic public control over the economy.