This article was originally published in early June 2026, in issue #3 of International Marxism, the international political journal of International Socialist Alternative. Click here to subscribe or to buy a copy of the full issue.
It was often said by Ted Grant—one of the key founders of our political tendency—that war, alongside revolution, is the most “fundamental test for the policy of all organizations” in the labor movement. The reason for this is two-fold.
War provides the most concentrated expression of the reactionary pressures of capitalist society on the working class movement—pressures that very few can resist, especially in a conflict’s early days.
By necessity, it is fuelled by an orgy of nationalism, chauvinism and toxic machismo. To mobilize for war, or a major war at least, the whole political, ideological, cultural, and media infrastructure of the ruling class must be set in motion to prepare society. In an effort which often takes years, they must work to convince millions of people of the most reactionary idea imaginable: that killing and dying in the interests of imperialist looters and capitalist exploiters is somehow noble and necessary.
Indeed, Donald Trump’s total failure to do any of this—thinking he could win with a war with a few days of bombing—has certainly contributed to the complete failure of his current adventure in the Persian Gulf and the overwhelming opposition to it in U.S. society.
The reactionary tsunami of war hits the working-class movement just as hard as the rest of society, as the war drums call out for the support of the whole nation. Indeed, to fight a major war, the capitalist class not only desires, but needs the complicity of at least a section of workers’ leaders, and acts in a determined way—wielding both carrot and stick—to achieve it. This has led to countless betrayals, as powerful organizations and leaders (generally of the reformist and Stalinist variety) have, both figuratively and often quite literally, helped to line working-class people up for the slaughter.
The other reason that war is such a decisive test for the left lies in the fact that, while it is the ultimate expression of this system’s rottenness, it can simultaneously serve as the “midwife of revolution.” Based on a commonplace misquotation of Karl Marx, this refers to the reality that war, by brutally exposing and sharpening the contradictions of the system, can drive forward revolutionary processes. But in order to successfully capitalize upon this “whip of counter-revolution” (which Marx did actually say), the organized working class must be armed with a leadership which defends a principled, antiwar, anti-imperialist, internationalist policy.
The par excellence case study for both sides of this question can be found in World War I (1914-18). As the reactionary tide of militarism overwhelmed the world, the dominant trend on the left and labor movement was one of catastrophic capitulation. The millions-strong parties of the “socialist international,” who had spent the previous years talking tough and passing antiwar resolutions, lined up one by one behind “their” ruling class in support of the war. So abrupt and devastating was this betrayal, that Lenin was initially convinced that the newspapers reporting on the German social democrats’ parliamentary support for the Kaiser were a forgery!
However, while most of the workers’ leaders capitulated, not everyone did. Lenin was joined by a small minority which stood firm on internationalist antiwar principles. This tiny minority not only went on to quickly grow in number, but to lead the revolutionary movements which ended the war. In Russia, a steadfast opposition to the war was a crucial part of the program which won the party of Lenin and Trotsky (the Bolsheviks) the leadership of the first successful socialist revolution in history in October 1917, which marked the beginning of the end of the slaughter. Its example then led the German working class, with antiwar Marxists led by Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht, to make its own revolution in 1918, which ended the fighting in Europe altogether.
Since 1918, several further generations of socialists have faced the test of war. Unfortunately, with crucial and often heroic exceptions, their record has most often been one of failure. The lesson of WWI—that reformism leads to betrayal—has been reconfirmed many times over. The struggle for a revolutionary socialist policy in the antiwar movement is therefore paramount.
This article will briefly comment on some of the most common pitfalls in the war policy of the international left today and what a socialist position must consist of, at a time of surging militarism worldwide.
Trump, Imperialism, and “International Law”
To their credit, the vast majority of left forces internationally are clearly opposed to Trump’s wars of aggression which have dominated 2026. The same can be said of the horrific genocidal onslaught of Israeli capitalism—backed to the hilt by the United States and the wider “West”—which has shaken the world over the past two years.
The question is however: on what basis is our opposition to these wars constructed? A socialist position is based on the needs of the international working class. We oppose imperialist war because it only serves the interests of the billionaires and is disastrous for the lives, conditions, struggles and unity of the working class. We understand that war is rooted in the system, and therefore link our opposition to war with the struggle to end capitalist rule.
The wars of the 2020s are classical capitalist wars, not historical aberrations. However, according to many of the world’s most prominent left and liberal leaders today, the genocide in Gaza, Trump’s aggression in the Middle East and Latin America, Putin’s invasion of Ukraine etc., are not a result of capitalism itself, but rather of its rules being broken!
Jeremy Corbyn, who despite his disastrous role in the ship-wrecking of “Your Party” in Britain is a veteran and principled antiwar campaigner, is a case in point. In his copious speeches and articles in opposition to Trump and Netanyahu’s aggression, the term “international law” can be found thousands of times, but the words “imperialism” or “capitalism” are never uttered. The same can be observed in the statements of figures like Bernie Sanders and AOC in the United States, and many others.
This approach is fundamentally different to that of Marxism. On the one hand, these reformist politicians suffer from the illusion that a humanitarian “rules based order” in international relations has ever existed, when it clearly has not. The real laws of international relations under capitalism are determined by imperialist domination and conflict. As Trump’s miserable acolyte Stephen Miller made clear earlier this year: the “iron laws” of the “real world” are “governed by strength… governed by force… governed by power.”
In fact, the post World War II period, often mistakenly understood to have been defined by universal international laws and norms, was in reality one of unquestioned imperialist domination by a single superpower, the United States. They set—and flouted—the “rules,” and dominated every single important international institution. Even Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney belatedly admits this reality, famously telling the Davos summit that everyone knew the “story of an international rules-based order” was false and that “the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient.”
In today’s war on Iran, we witness such unspeakable hypocrisy in plain sight. Tehran, we are told, must be reduced to ruins to prevent nuclear proliferation. The two powers enforcing this sacred “rule” are the U.S. and Israel, no less: the only one to have ever dropped a nuclear bomb on human beings (they dropped two in Hiroshima and Nagasaki); and the only nuclear power in the region, which itself refuses to cooperate with the world’s toothless nuclear weapons watchdogs.
This is not only a matter of analysis, but a concrete question: what should the antiwar movement be fighting for today? Corbyn demands that, “Britain should be working for peace, diplomacy and upholding international law.” Such a demand, based on a fundamental misunderstanding of how the world works, sets the movement in Britain and elsewhere up for guaranteed failure. He also focuses on what ”Britain” can do, instead of pointing to the role of the working class in Britain and internationally.
To be clear, revolutionary socialists are not opposed to making demands on capitalism’s rotten institutions on principle. But we do not buy into the idea that such demands in and of themselves represent any kind of solution. The idea that the capitalist system is capable of imposing humanitarian rules and niceties on imperialist conflict is, in fact, a dangerous one. Not only because it is out of touch with reality, but because it diverts attention away from what must be our fundamental strategic goal: ending the capitalist system of billionaires’ rule, which is the source of all imperialist war.
Ukraine and NATO
The mainstream reformist left lacks understanding of both the fake nature of the “rules-based order” and of its definitive demise, in the wake of the ending of the era of neoliberal globalization. Partly in consequence, many harbor hopeless illusions in capitalist and imperialist forces which appear to be desperate to resuscitate it.
This began in earnest with Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, which set the tone for the more unbridled imperialist aggression which has come to characterize the decade. In response to Russian aggression and failing to understand the imperialist nature of this conflict, left leaders throughout Europe and beyond raced to water down, or abandon outright, their established policy of opposition to NATO and back their countries’ military support to Kyiv.
While condemning Putin’s imperialist invasion unreservedly, socialists start by identifying the imperialist interests at play on both sides of the horrific war in Ukraine. While back in 2022 it was shrouded in talk of defending the “rules-based order,” the agenda of NATO powers in Europe or any region is no less ugly than that of Russia in Ukraine. Indeed, those on the left who swallowed the lie that by backing Kyiv, US imperialism was leading a crusade against imperialist aggression—a struggle of “democracy versus autocracy” in Joe Biden’s words—will have been disastrously caught off guard as the decade unfolded.
Trump and the “Middle Powers”
This trend has been compounded by Trump 2.0, which is taking a wrecking ball to the broader “Western alliance” infrastructure that has underpinned geopolitics during the past period. In this scenario, after a year spent licking Trump’s boots, several of US imperialism’s former “allies” have begun to emerge as critics of the White House, crying crocodile tears for “international law” and “diplomacy.”
In reality, the posture of these so-called “middle powers” (which in plain English translates into “failed powers”) is not determined by any such principles, but rather by the fact that in this new era of imperialist conflict, they are among the biggest losers. Endless volumes could be written about the bloodsoaked “diplomacy” of the now-declining powers of Europe when they were in their ascendancy, in Africa, Asia, the Americas, Ireland, and more.
In fact, the solution to Trump’s aggression which is proposed by these powers today, is not at all an alternative to militarism, but rather an aggressive ramping up of their own European militarism. The quest for greater “independence” from Washington now sits alongside the threat of looming war with Russia in the front line of European governments’ arguments to justify ballooning war budgets.
However, some on the left appear to have bought into the idea that these European powers have reinvented themselves as nicer, friendlier imperialists today. One of the more radical aspects of the rhetoric of the new left-wing leader of the British Green Party, Zack Polanski, is sharp criticism of NATO. His proposed solution? A new, “European-led” military alliance—as if the world had not seen enough from European armies.
In the Spanish state, Podemos correctly opposes membership of NATO, and argues for a referendum on withdrawal. However, they spent the first three years of this decade in government, voting repeatedly for big increases in arms spending. Die Linke representatives in the German Bundesrat also angered a growing, youthful and antiwar membership by voting for constitutional changes to facilitate historic investments in the war machine in 2025.
A socialist position must be anchored in opposition to all imperialist war and militarism including, and especially, those of our home countries. We also understand how this militarism is used to whip up nationalism and fear, and prepare for class battles.
Oppose All Imperialism
The world has no “progressive” imperialist powers. It should go without saying that this includes those powers which are in conflict with the United States, whose main rival for global power is China. But on the international left, unfortunately, this does not go without saying at all.
Decades after capitalist restoration in China, much of the left has still not come to terms with the fact that it is a capitalist and imperialist power in the first place! And many of those who do, still see Chinese (and Russian) imperialism as somehow progressive counterweights to US hegemony, in pursuit of a “multipolar” world.
This phenomenon, support for one imperialist camp against another, is not a new one. It also goes beyond the crude understanding that “my enemy’s enemy is my friend.” These forces do argue that today, the reactionary behemoth of US imperialism is the one “main enemy,” and that all challenges to its power should therefore be supported. But fundamentally, this position is based on a perspective that does not see the international working class as the only force which can address the multiple crises of the system.
Instead, they hold out hope in this or that faction of international capital to step in and fight imperialism and oppression. Genuine socialists do not appeal to the brutal capitalist CCP oppressors of China’s hundreds of millions of workers and peasants to somehow fight the warmongers in Washington. Our position is radically internationalist—we fight for a solution based on working-class struggle against all capitalist and imperialist ruling classes and governments.
This is also why the struggle against Trump and Netanyahu’s war in the Middle East is not counterposed to the struggle against Iran’s murderous dictatorship—something much of the left fails to understand. Imperialism will not be ultimately defeated in this, or any region, by any capitalist dictatorship or rival imperialist power. The only forces which can be relied upon to build an alternative to oppression and imperialist plunder in Iran are the heroic workers, women and young people who have risked life and limb in repeated revolts against the Islamist dictatorship. Trump’s war is no reason to abandon them to their fate.
The task of socialists is not only to participate in the antiwar movement, but to argue within it for a program to win. While the building of international working-class organization and struggle for a socialist alternative to all imperialism is not the easiest path, it is the necessary one.
