Statement by Iran Labour Confederation - Abroad / کنفدراسیون کار ایران - خارج از کشور on the Ongoing War and the Urgency of Revolutionary Action

 

Statement by Iran Labour Confederation - Abroad / کنفدراسیون کار ایران - خارج از کشور on the Ongoing War and the Urgency of Revolutionary Action

 Statement sourced from here

The killing of Ali Khamenei, alongside a number of senior figures from the IRGC and the ruling apparatus, is an exceptional development in Iran’s current trajectory. It is a decisive blow to the heart of the repression machine and the backbone of the Islamic Republic. For millions in Iran, the death of a man who for decades symbolised massacre, suppression, poverty, militarism, and rule through blood has triggered a moment of release — a mix of long-contained rage and explosive relief.

People’s presence in the streets and the broader social reaction reveal the depth of hatred that years of crime and slaughter have accumulated inside society.

This is not joy in war. It is not joy in bombardment or in the killing of children. It is not joy in foreign intervention. It is the grim relief of seeing cracks appear in a monster that only two months ago, in Dey, drenched the country in blood — gunning down and crushing tens of thousands and turning society into an ocean of grief and anger.

The people who are breathing today are the same people who yesterday were beaten, shot, and thrown into prisons.

Still, we must state the reality plainly: this blow to the top of the state has taken place within a war launched from above and outside the people’s will. A war that threatens lives, turns cities into zones of death, and seeks to paralyse society through fear and ruin.

The United States and Israel have played a direct role through their military attacks, and they must be condemned unconditionally. No “rescue” narrative and no “defensive” framing can launder the killing of civilians.

At the same time, it must be said clearly: the Islamic Republic and the IRGC are not the victims of this war, they are among its principal architects. A state that for years has used society as a shield for its military and nuclear projects is now paying the price for those policies through internal collapse.

Khamenei’s death does not mean the crisis is over, but it does show unmistakably that this system can no longer reproduce its former authority. A structure whose leader has been removed, which is now at war, and which faces a society saturated with anger and hatred has entered a phase of irreversible instability.

We must also be alert to a crucial fact: a rupture at the top does not automatically mean the people’s will is being realised. It is precisely in moments like this that projects designed to contain society become active, “controlled transition,” reshuffling of elites, and the promotion of top-down alternatives meant to hijack the revolution and take the direction of events out of the people’s hands.

Backroom deals, reproducing the same structure with a new face, or imposing client governments under the slogans of “stability” and “transition” are all attempts to neutralise revolutionary momentum and block direct popular power. These scenarios do not represent the end of the Islamic Republic; they represent the continuation of the same repressive order in a new form. The only force capable of blocking this outcome is independent, nationwide, bottom-up organisation.

In a moment like this, the central question is not merely “opposition to war.” The real question is whether society can consciously use the opening created by the rupture at the top to advance revolutionary overthrow. War is meant to frighten society and suspend the revolution; the people’s answer must be to rebuild and organise their social power right in the middle of this crisis.

Workers, wage earners, youth, women, and all social forces must understand one basic truth: no foreign power is going to deliver freedom. The only force that can bring this system down for good is an organised society. Joining existing social organisations, strengthening independent labour organisations, and building councils, local committees, and mutual-aid networks is not a “choice” today — it is an urgent necessity, both to protect human lives under wartime conditions and to take collective control of society’s future.

The Islamic Republic is wounded and unstable. This is not a moment for spectatorship or hesitation; it is a moment for action. The real end of this war will not come through agreements between states, but through the revolutionary overthrow of an order that has turned life itself into a field of death.

We call on people worldwide, labour movements, and freedom-loving forces to stand with the people of Iran — not with states and war machines. Real solidarity means supporting the people’s right to overthrow the Islamic Republic and to build an order that is humane, free, and equal.

The struggle has entered a new stage. Repression has cracked, fear has been shaken, and the possibility of advancing has opened. A society that has paid so much in blood has the right — and the duty — to build its own future.

Iran Labour Confederation – Abroad 

 

  تحولات ایران است. این اتفاق، ضربه‌ای تعیین‌کننده به قلب ساختار سرکوب و ستون فقرات جمهوری اسلامی است. مرگ کسی که دهه‌ها نماد کشتار، سرکوب، فقر، جنگ‌طلبی و حکومت با خون بود، برای میلیون‌ها نفر در ایران، لحظه‌ای از رهایی، خشمِ فروخورده و شادی انفجاری بوده است. حضور مردم در خیابان‌ها و واکنش‌های اجتماعی، بیانگر عمق نفرتی است که جمهوری اسلامی طی سال‌ها جنایت و کشتار در دل جامعه انباشته کرده است.

این شادی، شادیِ جنگ نیست. شادیِ بمباران و مرگ کودکان نیست. شادیِ دخالت قدرت‌های خارجی نیست. این شادی، شادیِ دیدن ترک برداشتن هیولایی است که همین دو ماه پیش، در دی‌ماه، با گلوله و سرکوب ده‌ها هزار انسان را به خاک و خون کشید و جامعه را به دریایی از داغ و خشم بدل کرد. مردمی که امروز نفس می‌کشند، همان‌هایی هستند که دیروز زیر باتوم، گلوله و زندان له شدند.

با این‌همه، واقعیت را باید بی‌پرده گفت: این ضربه به رأس حکومت، در دل جنگی رخ داده که از بالا و خارج از اراده مردم آغاز شده است. جنگی که جان انسان‌ها را تهدید می‌کند، شهرها را به میدان مرگ می‌کشاند و می‌کوشد جامعه را زیر سایه ترس و ویرانی فلج کند. آمریکا و اسرائیل با حملات نظامی خود در این جنگ نقش مستقیم دارند و باید بی‌قید و شرط محکوم شوند. هیچ روایت «نجات‌بخش» یا «دفاعی» نمی‌تواند کشتار مردم را تطهیر کند.

اما هم‌زمان باید تأکید کرد: جمهوری اسلامی و سپاه پاسداران، نه قربانی این جنگ، بلکه از معماران اصلی آن‌اند. حکومتی که سال‌ها جامعه را سپر پروژه‌های نظامی و هسته‌ای خود کرده، امروز بهای همان سیاست‌ها را با فروپاشی از درون می‌پردازد. مرگ خامنه‌ای به‌معنای پایان بحران نیست، اما به‌روشنی نشان می‌دهد که این حکومت دیگر توان بازتولید اقتدار پیشین را ندارد. ساختاری که رهبرش حذف شده، درگیر جنگ است و با جامعه‌ای سرشار از خشم و نفرت روبه‌روست، وارد مرحله‌ای از بی‌ثباتی برگشت‌ناپذیر شده است.

هم‌زمان باید هوشیار بود که شکاف در رأس قدرت، لزوماً به‌معنای تحقق اراده مردم نیست. درست در چنین لحظاتی است که پروژه‌های مهار جامعه فعال می‌شوند: «گذار کنترل‌شده»، جابه‌جایی مهره‌ها و لانسه‌کردن آلترناتیوهایی از بالا که قرار است انقلاب را مصادره و مسیر تحولات را از دست مردم خارج کنند. توافق‌های پشت‌پرده، بازتولید همان ساختار با چهره‌ای جدید، یا تحمیل دولت‌هایی دست‌نشانده تحت عنوان «ثبات» و «گذار»، همگی تلاش‌هایی برای مهار انقلاب و جلوگیری از اعمال اراده مستقیم مردم‌اند. این سناریوها، نه پایان جمهوری اسلامی، بلکه تداوم همان نظم سرکوبگر در شکلی دیگر است.

تنها نیرویی که می‌تواند این روند را خنثی کند، سازمان‌یابی مستقل، سراسری و از پایین جامعه است.

در چنین لحظه‌ای، مسئله اصلی جامعه فقط «مخالفت با جنگ» نیست. مسئله، استفاده آگاهانه از شکاف ایجادشده برای پیش‌برد سرنگونی انقلابی است. جنگ قرار است جامعه را بترساند و انقلاب را معلق کند؛ پاسخ مردم باید این باشد که درست در دل این بحران، قدرت اجتماعی خود را بازسازی و سازمان دهد.

طبقه کارگر، مزدبگیران، جوانان، زنان و همه نیروهای اجتماعی باید بدانند که هیچ نیروی خارجی قرار نیست آزادی را به ارمغان بیاورد. تنها نیرویی که می‌تواند این حکومت را برای همیشه به زیر بکشد، جامعه‌ای سازمان‌یافته است. پیوستن به تشکل‌های اجتماعی موجود، تقویت تشکل‌های مستقل کارگری، و ایجاد شوراها، کمیته‌های محلی و شبکه‌های همیاری، امروز نه یک انتخاب، بلکه یک ضرورت فوری است؛ هم برای حفاظت از جان انسان‌ها در شرایط جنگی و هم برای به‌دست‌گرفتن سرنوشت جامعه.

جمهوری اسلامی زخمی و متزلزل است. این لحظه، لحظه تماشا و تعلیق نیست، لحظه اقدام است. پایان واقعی جنگ، نه در توافق دولت‌ها، بلکه در سرنگونی انقلابی نظمی رقم می‌خورد که زندگی را به میدان مرگ تبدیل کرده است.

ما از مردم جهان، جنبش‌های کارگری و نیروهای آزادی‌خواه می‌خواهیم که در کنار مردم ایران بایستند؛ نه در کنار دولت‌ها و ماشین‌های جنگی. حمایت واقعی، حمایت از حق مردم برای سرنگونی جمهوری اسلامی و ساختن نظمی انسانی، آزاد و برابر است.

مبارزه وارد مرحله‌ای تازه شده است. سرکوب ترک برداشته، ترس شکسته و امکان پیش‌روی گشوده شده است. جامعه‌ای که این همه خون داده، حق دارد و باید آینده را خودش بسازد.

کنفدراسیون کار ایران – خارج از کشور
۱۰ اسفند ۱۴۰۴
اشتراک بگذار:

1886: Expropriation an Essay by Kropotkin

 

 

 

Expropriation
An Essay by Kropotkin 

Published in La Revolte in 1886 
Translated by Henry Glasse 

No Social problem is more important for Revolutionists than that which deals with the expropriation of the rich in favour of the people, and the appropriation of all wealth by the latter. We invite all our comrades to study this problem under all its aspects, and to disenss it unceasingly, in view of its realization, which must sooner or later force itself upon us, as the definite success or temporary failure of the Revolution depends upon the manner in which this expropriation is applied.

As a matter of fact, no Socialist can doubt that any revolutionary effort is condemned in advance if, it does not correspond with the interests of the great majority, and find means for satisfying its requirements. It is not enough to have a noble id al: man cannot live on great thoughts and lofty discourses alone; he requires bread; the stomach has more rights than even the brain, for it is the stomach which sustains the whole organism. If, on the morrow of the Revolution, men do not see by the force of evidence as clear as daylight that the situation has been totally changed to their advantage—if the upset ends merely in a change of persons and formulas, nothing will have been done, and once more we shall have to set ourselves to the thankless task of Sisyphus ceaselessly rolling his massive rock uphill. In order that the Revolution may be something more than a name, and that a reaction may not bring us back on the morrow to the situation of the day before, it is necessary that the conquest of the day should be worth defending, it is necessary that he, who was wretched yesterday should no longer be miserable to-day. After the Revolution of 1848, simple-minded Republicans placed “three mouths of misery” at the disposal of the Provisional Government. The offer was accepted with enthusiasm, and, when the appointed time came, those who had accepted it did not fail to render payment for the three months, but they did so with volleys of grape-shot and wholesale transportation. The unfortunate people had hoped that those painful months of waiting would have sufficed for the enactment of the salutary laws which they expected would make them free men, and secure to them work and their daily bread. In place of asking, would it not have been better to take? Instead of making a parade of their misery, would it not have been preferable to put an end to it? Not but what devotion is a grand and beautiful thing, but it is not devotion, it is treason to abandon to their unhappy lot all those who march along with us. Let combatants die —Good! but let their death be of some use! Let devoted men sacrifice themselves-Quite right! but let the masses profit by the self-sacrifice of those valiant ones!

A general expropriation alone can satisfy the multitude of sufferers and oppressed. The matter must be made to pass from the domain of theory into that of practice: but, in order that expropriation may correspond with its principle, which is the suppression of private property and the restoration of all to all, it ought to be accomplished in vast proportions. On a small scale it would seem only vulgar pillage, on a large scale it would be the commencement of the Social Revolution. Of course we should be altogether ignorant of the laws of history, if we were to imagine that all at once a whole vast country could become our field of experience. Europe and the world will not become anarchist by a sudden transformation, but we know that on the one hand the madness of the ruling classes, together with their ambitions, their wars and their bankruptcies, and, on the other hand, the unceasing spread of our ideas, will have as their consequences great upheavals, that is to say, revolutions. It is at such times that we can act. How many times already have Revolutionists been taken by surprise, and allowed events to pass without taking advantage of them, and so have left propitious destiny still unattained!

Well, when these opportunities arise—and it is for you, comrades, to hasten their coming—when a whole district, or when large towns with their environs shall have shaken off their rulers, our work will be clearly traced out for us; the whole stock of instruments of labour must return into the possession of the community, and the wealth detained by private individuals must be restored to its true master -everybody- in order that each may be able to have his ample share in consumption, that production may be continued in respect to all matters necessary and useful, and that our social life, far from being interrupted, may he renewed with greater energy. Without the gardens and fields which afford us the articles indispensable to life; without the granaries, stores and warehouses which contain the accumulated products of labour; without the manufactories and workshops which supply the stuffs, the wrought metals, the thousand objects of industry and of art, together with the means of defence, without the railways and other means of communication which will enable us to exchange our products with the free communities in our neighbourhood, and to combine our efforts for resistance and attack: without all these we are condemned beforehand to perish, and to be stifled like the fish out of water, which cannot breathe, though bathed in the immense ocean of the air. Let us remember the great strike of railway servants which took place in America some years ago. The great bulk of the public recognized that their cause was just, everybody was weary of the insolence of the railway companies and rejoiced to see them at the mercy of their servants; but when the latter, having made themselves masters of the locomotives and railways, had neglected to make use of them; when the interchange of commodities continued interrupted, and food and articles of all descriptions had doubled in price, then public opinion changed sides, and people began to cry out, “Let us rather have the companies that rob us and break our limbs than these fellows on strike who starve us.” Let us never forget that it is necessary that all the interests of the people be protected, and that its needs as well as its instinctive love of justice be fully satisfied. 

Nevertheless it is not sufficient to recognise the principle, we must also apply it. Our opponents say to us, “Venture to touch the peasant’s plot of ground or the mechanic’s cottage, and see how they will receive you.” Very well! But we shall not interfere with the plot of ground nor with the cottage. We shall take good care not to attack our best friends, who without knowing it to-day, will certainly be our allies to-morrow. The expropriation will be to their advantage. We know that there is an average of means below which men suffer want, and above which they have a superfluity. In each town, in each country this average differs, but the popular instinct will not err, and without there being any necessity for drawing up lengthy statistics on paper, or for filling a whole series of volumes with figures, the people will know how to recover what is its own. In our beautiful existing society, a feeble minority lays claim to the bulk of the national wealth, has town and country houses built for itself, and accumulates in banks the coin, notes and documents of all sorts which represent the wealth produced by labour. All this we must seize, and by one and the same blow we shall set free the unhappy peasant whose plot of ground is burdened by a mortgage, the small shopkeeper who lives in constant dread of bankruptcy, and all that wretched crowd of persons who have not enough bread for the morrow. All this multitude may have been indifferent on the eve of the Revolution, but when the day of expropriation comes, how can it fail to see that it depends upon itself whether it is to remain free or to fall again into misery and eternal anxiety? Or, indeed, instead of freeing itself by itself, will it again have the simplicity to appoint a provisional government consisting of individuals with supple fingers and glibly wagging tongues, nor be contented until it has set up new masters in place of the old? Let it do its own work if it is to be done; let it confide it to representatives if it wishes to be betrayed!

It is not enough that the interested parties should come to recognise their interest, which is to live without continual anxiety respecting the future, and without the humiliation of having to serve masters, it is also necessary that ideas should change with regard to property, and that corresponding ideas of morality should be modified in consequence. We must understand and admit without hesitation or reserve that all the instruments and products of human labour are due to the united labour of all, and have but one proprietor – Humanity. We must clearly see that private property is a conscious or an unconscious theft of that which belongs to all, and we must be prepared to sieze all with alacrity for the common use and benefit so soon as ever the hour of redress shall sound. Take, waste not, for all is yours, and you have need of it. But destroy without delay all that has to be destroyed; the forts which are built to overawe the towns, the prisons, and those unhealthy quartes in which you have so long breathed an atmosphere loaded with poison. Take up your abode in the palaces and mansions, and make a bonfire of the piles of bricks and rotting wood which were your unwholesome dwellings. The instinct of destruction so natural and so just, because it is at the same time the instinct of renovation, will find ample room for satisfaction. How many antiquated obstructions there are to be done away with! Everything has to be re-modelled-- houses, cities, agricultural and industrial appliances, and, in short, the entire social apparatus.

To each great historical event there corresponds a certain evolution in human morality. It is certain that the morality of equals will not be the same as that of the charitable rich and the grateful poor. For a new world a new law is necessary, and it is indeed a new world which is giving notice of its near approach. Our adversaries themselves repeat unceasingly: “The gods are vanishing, the kings are going, the prestige of authority is disappearing.” And what is there to take the place of the gods, the kings, and the priests, if not the free individual relying on his manhood? Blind faith takes flight! Make way for Science! Gracious pleasure and Charity disappear! Make room for Justice!

P. Kropotkin