As history continues, some cling frenetically to the certainties of the old world going down. For some Europeans, respect and reciprocity are still difficult concepts, says Peter Mertens.
Peter Mertens speaking at the European Parliament on July 18. (Zoe Alexandra/Peoples Dispatch)
By Peter Mertens
Peoples Dispatch
During the closing ceremony of the People’s Summit held at the European Parliament in Brussels on July 18, Peter Mertens, secretary general of the Workers’ Party of Belgium, spoke about the movement of history and the breaking points that have led to a mutiny against the current world order.
History proceeds in waves, and I think it is important to understand the movement of history. The unipolar era under the dominance of the United States is coming to an end.
The future belongs to multilateral relations between countries and peoples, with mutual respect and reciprocity, without outside political or military interference. Within this framework, enormous numbers of people have committed themselves in recent days to building lasting relations between Latin America, the Caribbean and Europe.
We all know: as the movement of history continues, some cling frenetically to the certainties of the old world going down. For some European forces, respect and reciprocity are still difficult concepts.
A senior European Union diplomat told Euronews recently, it seems that the governments of Latin America and the Caribbean “want to be seen as equal partners.”
It “seems” that they want to be seen “as equal partners.”
Neocolonial Attitude
So in that man’s mind, they are not equal partners. It is this neocolonial attitude that still haunts the minds of old forces.
A number of diplomats, government leaders and forces in Europe have not seen, or have not wanted to see, the changes in the world order since the turn of the century.
They failed to see how the illegal war against Iraq in 2003 definitively undermined the credibility of the United States as the so-called leader of the world. That was an initial breaking point.
Saddam Hussein’s statue toppled in Baghdad shortly after the invasion of Iraq in 2003. (Public domain, Wikimedia Commons)
They failed to see how the 2008 financial crisis undermined the credibility of Western financial institutions, and rightly so. That was a second breaking point.
They failed to see how on the other side of the world, the BRICS was created in response to that global financial crisis.
They failed to see how the rest of the world reacts differently to the war in Ukraine, from the West. And I do not mean the issue of condemning Russia’s invasion, which is a violation of international law, a violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty. In the Global south, they know only too well how important sovereignty is.
I’m talking about the sanctions, that is a third breaking point. Economic sanctions, embargo, shutting down the SWIFT interbank system and freezing central bank reserves.
Everyone knows that all those sanctions can be used against other countries tomorrow, and in fact have been used against different countries for years, just think of the criminal embargo and blockade against Cuba.
With three breaking points, the war against Iraq in 2003, the financial crisis in 2008, and the war in Ukraine in 2022, our world has changed profoundly.
Recently, Fiona Hill, a former staff member of the U.S. National Security Council, said that the vote of countries of the global South against the sanctions on Russia is nothing but “mutiny.” Mutiny!
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in March 2022, during a session when MPs urged further sanctions on Moscow and to “protect the European economy.” (European Parliament, Flickr, CC BY 4.0)
They call it mutiny that countries and peoples want to make their own decisions about their own resources, whether lithium or cobalt, and claim the right to process the resources.
They call it mutiny that countries and peoples refuse to take sides in a trade war and a new cold war forced upon them from Washington.
They call it mutiny that the unipolar era of the United States is quietly coming to an end.
Let’s then embrace that mutiny, because it is on the right wave of history.
In Europe, too, there is mutiny. People are suffering from rising inflation and poverty, the erosion of labor rights and increasingly repressive laws. The class struggle in Europe goes up and down, like the waves of the sea.
But it is there, and it is fighting against the same global order, the same monopolies, the same system of exploitation.
If we can get the mutiny of the North to lend a hand to the mutiny of the South, and vice-versa, we can turn the world around, in the democratic, social and ecological direction this planet needs.
Long live respect, friendship and solidarity among peoples. Long live mutiny!
Peter Mertens is secretary general of the Workers’ Party of Belgium.
This article is from Peoples Dispatch.
The views expressed are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
In Feb 2022 there was NO Ukraine sovereignty for Russia to violate … that already having been “accomplished” in the 2014 coup by the Obumma, HR Clinton, Nuland triumvirate … and lucratively maintained by proconsul Biden.
Co-operation–Don’t Give Up The Ship
Trees grow in obligate symbiosis with fungus on their roots; a complex system called the mycorrhizosphere that alone makes cooperation the dominant mode on Earth, not competition, and there are many more symbioses. Indigenous peoples haven’t forgotten that because cooperation is so obviously necessary for daily life. It also brings purpose and sometimes joy as well. Most of all, it creates meaning, which is so often missing in people lost in the blinkered world of capitalist accumulation.
Those of us who’ve actually worked on ships may not like all the other crew members, but we know how dependent we are on each other. And on keeping the vessel in top working order. Out in the middle of the ocean, reality is stark. So what happens if the captain goes crazy? Well, you’d better be able to make the case, but the other officers and the crew members with long experience certainly can run the ship skillfully. We engine room crew would joke that a useless mechanical part should be float tested. What Buckminister Fuller called Spaceship Earth is not the private property of some power mad egomaniac. The rest of us need to work in cooperation to remove the mad captains–by float test if necessary. Since they’re the ones running the ship onto the shoals, it’s not mutiny, it’s survival. Besides, I’d love to see a few of these overinflated heads of the ships of state or captains of industry have to wield a few tools in a real engine room.
It is clear the western superiority world order complex and it military dominance complex fears this is the last chance to keep from having to share the planet rather than feast on it. Instead they should be paying reparations to all indigenous people and getting the funds to do so from down grading the military spending that has been used to dominate them.
They also were scared in the 20th century by the very idea of a war to end war and attempts to outlaw war and punish war crimes. Now we have overcome make love not war re-branded for worship of permanent wars for profits and urban reconstruction and modernization.
This century requires waking up to the reality that human civilization could totally collapse intentionally or by the consequences of our arrogance.
Plenty of Captain Blighs to mutiny against, sadly!
Awright, dude! 1,000 upvotes. As the Swedes say, the truth wears bright colors, spring, summer, winter, and fall. The thing to remember is the Dilbert cartoon where the pointy haired boss says “cooperation is everybody doing what I tell them to.”
The US has become the pointy haired boss.
This quote from Krishnamurti rings louder today than ever: “It is no measure of health to be well-adjusted to a profoundly sick society.”
Some of us are more aware, sensitive and empathetic than others, and keeping our heads up in a world-gone-wrong is a daily exercise
in perseverance, if not futility. You can see the cognitive dissonance all around. It manifests in various ways for various peoples. I believe deep, deep down even the most ignorant have picked up on it. What’s most alarming is how little effort and will is being spent on saying, “Yes, we need to cooperate. The old ways are failing us. We must change everything about how we live and see things, for that is the only chance we have of long-term survival.” This enlightenment, if you will, is only happening on the margins. “Mainstream society” is still pushing an illusion of permanence and forward-progress of the current system. It’s insanity writ-large. What’s worse, is that it is clear that the powers-that-be will sooner kill us all than make any effort to change. They seem to believe that they and those whom they select to be “saved” in the face of Armageddon will carry on and save our species. They couldn’t care less about the masses. If they did, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. They have squandered our great potential and technological capacities for solving actual problems, instead choosing to maintain antiquated power-structures and ideologies for their own narrow self-interests. Is it too late? Is all hope lost? You tell me. I don’t know anymore.
Yes convergence of mutinies is a necessity but would it be sufficient in itself to arrest the multi-farious global slide ? By the way, those breaking points are absolutely right and they do expose the erosion of Western credibility. Still, the Rest of the world can’t do without the West, the need of the times is to reshape the mutual terms of engagement so that no one gets left behind as humanity races ahead to seize the future !
And not to be overlooked…the White race’s attempts at domination.
For crying out loud…STOP referring to “Russia’s invasion”…Why not talk about 2014, when Ukrainian Nationalists started attacking the Donbass region going after ethnic Russians. Is this being kept quiet because it interferes with the West’s propaganda and hate mongering? For shame!!! In my view, Russia should have hit back immediately. But aside from this…no empire has lasted forever and neither will the US empire nor the West’s domination.
Thanks for your comment Vera. I know how frustrating the lies and propaganda are.
Speaking from the Global South, from a country that has been the staunchest echo for whatever the United States wanted, including when what it wanted was our Province of Panama (and “how high should we jump” was apparently our motto), the article is spot on. United States and European leaders either don’t understand or more probably don’t care how condescending they are, and how obviously dishonest and hypocritical, but that hubris has a price and its coming due under the leadership of probably the worst, most corrupt and most inept United States president ever (I can sense Warren Harding and Ulysses S Grant breathing grateful sighs of relief, a burden lifted).
The United States skillfully persuaded Zelensky, and previous Ukrainian Presidents following the 2014 coup, into believing Ukraine should continue the civil war in Eastern Ukraine rather than abide by Minsk 1 or 2. What Russia was asking for in Minsk was reasonable, but the United States and NATO didn’t want reasonable. They wanted Russia in a war, but only in a proxy war in which no NATO or US blood was shed. And along comes Zelensky, one of the most naive and dumbest Presidents of any country in the history of the world.
A multi polar world is much needed and the world will benefit from it. Even the U.S. and Europe will benefit albeit following a 5 to 10 year transition period which will have to include an almost 180° turn from current foreign policy.
Thanks Robert for your comment. More truth about the history of what led to the war in Ukraine. I’m not excusing Russia’s invasion, but it was definitely provoked.
Excellent article, gives one more hope.
The thing too is about the inevitability of the whole affair. The rule of the west, and especially the overlordship of the US, over the planet was a very temporary affair set up by a particular set of circumstances, mainly disorganization and reformation needed in the traditional powerhouses of humanity in west, east, and south Asia. That situation was never going to last and multipolarity (at least) will set in no matter what the west choses to do, other than blowing everything including ourselves up, of course.
The image of Joe (Croesus) Biden commanding the war to commence occurs to me somehow …
Brilliant in its simplicity. Truth really is simple. It only gets complicated when someone is trying to sell you a lie.
The guiding ideology of the US and its vassals that has brought us to the sorry state of current affairs is the ideology of “zero/sum.” It’s the ideology of dictators and bullies (neocons); for me to win, you must lose; submit or die.
This is, of course, in direct contrast to the ideology of win-win. Win-win is not even part of the American lexicon. Win-win and international law, not partisan rules, is the ideology of the emerging multi-polar world order led by Russia and China and seen in BRICS and the SCO.
The salient point is that the only hope for our survival as a species on this planet lies in the single word, cooperation. Without international cooperation at every level, there is no hope for a prosperous or perhaps even livable future.
The status quo that America is striving to maintain at all costs, and that it has dragged Europe into, is zero/sum. It is suicide. It’s success will be the end of us all.
Mutiny. Yes, before it’s too late!