For propaganda effect NATO is routinely described in the mainstream media as a defensive alliance, but the reverse is the case. It was founded to confront the Soviet Union militarily and since then it has engaged in wars of aggression and military interventions across the world. This included breaking the post World War 2 peace in Europe by bombing Yugoslavia in 1999. Its hostile expansion eastwards was the most important factor leading to the present war in Ukraine.

Podcast 67 - NATO , a danger to peace and security

The sanctions imposed at the behest of the United States have hit European economies hard, particularly the German economy. It is not only gas supplies that are affected, sanctions on Russia will also impact heavily on its key automotive industry. The severe blow to Germany’s economy will weaken its dominance of the EU and strengthen the influence and control of the US in Europe. Ironically China’s car industry may well be the beneficiary of these sanctions on Russia. The war in Ukraine is reshaping the world in more ways than one.

Podcast 75 - Sanctions on Russia, Germany in trouble

The UK government is prepared to pour billions into propping up private capital, billions that will materialise as shareholder dividends, but is not prepared to pay public sector workers a decent wage.

Podcast 78 - The Cost Of Profit Crisis

The war in Ukraine has intensified rivalries between major imperialist powers. The US has forced its allies to impose anti-Russian sanctions which result in weakening Europe and strengthening itself. This is also raising tensions between Germany  and France, the two major powers in the EU.

Podcast 79 - German - French Competition Intensifies

Israeli elections are usually a distraction from Palestinian self-determination. However, to the alarm of Israel’s mainstream and liberal apologists, the hard-right government emerging from the November 2022 election puts Palestine centre-stage. The extreme anti-Palestinian racism of parties in Netanyahu's coalition and their anti-liberal views are causing concern among supporters of Israel abroad and buliding Palestinian resistance and solidarity.

Podcast 81- The Israeli Election - Is It An Own Goal

Whilst the fall out from the war in Ukraine has increased opposition to US policies in many parts of the world, the biggest, long-standing imperial powers have fallen into line behind its war aims. The UK has gone further than others in stoking up the war. After the United States it supplies the most resources to Ukraine, including vast amounts of military equipment. The UK’s active involvement not only extends to arms supplies, there are British troops deployed in the country and British intelligence is being provided to Ukraine. There are reports that Britain has been involved in major incidents such as the blowing up of the Nord Stream pipelines.

Podcast 82 - Britain's War In The Ukraine

While China advances a plan for a ceasefire in the war in Ukraine and a possible path to peace, the West plans to prolong the war in order to effect a regime change in Russia.

Podcast 85 - The West Is Taking The World To War

The implosion of the Scottish National Party  provides an unparalleled opportunity to challenge the divisive constitutional wrangling which dominates Scottish politics and for the left to place unambiguous working-class demands at the centre of Scottish life.

Podcast 87 - Scottish Independence Off The Agenda

The problems of advanced capitalist countries run even deeper than their desperate fight to cling onto global dominance. There are serious problems within the system itself. Throughout the G7 productivity is in decline - this is not a new phenomenon, nor is it a specifically British problem. As economic gurus have struggled to find an explanation for this, one thing has become clear, that the unleashing of neo-liberalism under Thatcher and Reagan did nothing to halt this tendency. So far capitalism is not providing the answer to its economic malaise, but can the left? If the problem is the system itself then it may not be fixable. If so then this is yet another reason to question the usefulness of capitalism to humanity, alongside the threat of global war and environmental catastrophe.

Podcast 106 - Capitalism In A Quagmire

Politically and economically the war in Ukraine is becoming less sustainable, with no sign that pouring more arms in is bringing Ukraine any closer to winning and every sign that it is losing. However, the mantra of western politicians remains that “Ukraine must win”. This has led to talk of dangerous escalation, like sending more advanced weaponry and NATO committing boots on the ground (more than the small number it already has). Desperation in Kiev and among Ukraine’s western backers is making the situation more volatile. Competing interests with the US and within Europe are complicating matters further and making a negotiated end to the war seem distant.

Podcast 109 - Ukraine War Gets Even More Dangerous

In Britain we have seen a wave of strikes and massive demonstrations over Gaza. In response the Tory government has been passing multiple pieces of legislation designed to restrict free speech, the right to protest and the right to strike. This repressive agenda will give the government extraordinary tools to suppress opposition and represents a fundamental threat to democracy. And yet in defiance of these threats and ideological attacks protesters are still out in force in solidarity with the Palestinians and standing up for free speech.

Podcast 112 - Capitalism's Crisis And The Threat To Democracy

Advanced computing systems are now essential to all aspects of our daily lives. They are also increasingly important to capitalism's power and to the West's military domination. Microchips are the fundamental components of key systems and hardware and the US in particular is battling to keep control of this strategic resource. This fight over tech lies at the heart of its confrontation with China and is the reason it threatens war.

Podcast 113 - Chips - The Twentieth Century's Strategic Resource

One of the main accusations leveled by capitalist ideologues against socialism is that it simply does not work. This is rather unconvincing coming from the system which has brought us close to the edge of climate catastrophe, decaying living standards and infrastructure, lower productivity and stagnating growth in western economies. And yet this critique of socialism is routinely accepted without examining the evidence of the achievements of the Soviet Union and other socialist countries. When these are set out they reveal the opposite - growing economies and improvements in the well-being of the citizens of those countries. This should give us confidence and hope that there is an alternative to the dire reality of our capitalist world.

Podcast 114 - The Soviet model and the economic cold war - Part 1

The new Labour government opens up new opportunities and also faces massive challenges. We will have to wait and see whether the movement can achieve real progress for working people in Britain.

Podcast 115 -  A Labour Government - What Next

Can the African National Congress renew and recover in the face of declining support from the electorate who are dissatisfied with rising poverty and a failure to address corruption.

Podcast 116 -  The South African Election 2024

Despite the dangers to Europe and the world, the West continues to press on with its disastrous war in Ukraine. Even with the evident failures on Ukraine’s part to make progress in the war, including its incursion into Kursk and despite the suffering on all sides, the West is determined to double down on war. It has peremptorily dismissed peace plans and calls for negotiations. On the contrary, there are increasing moves to allow Ukraine to use weapons supplied by the West to hit targets within Russia. This has the potential to widen the war, making the countries who supply these weapons increasingly party to the conflict. There is also worrying build-up of NATO bases in Europe as the United States tries to move the responsibility for the war to European countries.

Podcast 117 - Ukraine - West continues to escalate war

Israel is continuously escalating its genocidal war against the Palestinians in Gaza and increasingly in the West Bank too. It has no interest in ceasefires or negotiations as it seeks to turn Palestine into an uninhabitable wasteland which it can permanently occupy. On the contrary it is now seeking to expand its aggression to Lebanon and Iran and to provoke a regional war.

Podcast 119 - Israeli Agression Increases.

One aspect of the build up for war with China is the rearmament and increasingly aggressive military posture of Japan. Imperialists in Japan have long sought to shed the constraints placed on it as a defeated nation after the Second World War and now they have been given the green light to do this by the United States, which wants Japan to be part of the military encirclement of China and of Russia in the East. However, as the only country which has experienced the use of nuclear weapons at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, there is also a strong peace movement in Japan which rejects these moves.

Podcast 120 - Militarism Rises Again In Japan

The Danger of direct conflict between the great powers have recently multiplied. The US has refused to accept its declining supremacy, to compromise or negotiate. Ongoing conflicts in the Ukraine and the Middle East are in danger of reaching a point of no return.The growing appetite for change, away from war ,sham democracy, and climate catastrophe indicates that millions of people are disillusioned with the entire system. The promotion of a socialist alternative is vital.

Podcast 121 - The danger of world war - can it be stopped ?

The tasks of the peace movement in Britain are urgent, as people continue to suffer poverty, cuts to services and crumbling infrastructure yet the government plans to increase arms spending to 2.5%of GDP or £87.1 billion including massive expenditure on replacing the Trident nuclear weapons system. This has nothing to do with self-defence and everything to do with Britain playing its part in fighting wars and imposing military power across the globe. Not only could this money be better spent elsewhere but Britain’s active involvement in wars such as Ukraine make this country a target. But there is an alternative to an imperialist, warmongering UK. We could take the path of non-alignment and join with others, like BRICS, to have a more secure and prosperous future.

Podcast 122 - The fight for peace and disarmament

What will the prospects for the world be with Donald Trump back in the White House? It is not entirely certain how Trump will approach the war in Ukraine, but there is an increasing shift in the establishment towards the realistic view that Ukraine cannot win on the battlefield and that there should be negotiations. Other things are clearer. Trump will maintain a firm support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza and ramp up hostility towards China as a prelude to war. But why was Trump able to win and Kamala Harris lose the Presidential election. Breaking down the statistics of where the Democrats lost ground it can be seen that the conscious neglect of core voters led to a drop in support for the Democrats through abstention, with Trump also capitalising on this disaffection. A failure by the Democrats to address the needs of working class Americans as well as alienation on the issue of Gaza were among the factors at work.

Podcast 123 -  Trump's Election, How It Happened And What It Could Mean For The World

On a recent visit to Russia this commentator found a society that was functioning well with decent services and a sense of social cohesion. There was a sense of normality despite the war. Although people did not talk a lot about it, he found that people wanted peace, but not at any price.

Podcast 129 -  A Window  into Russia

The Labour government has made reform of the planning system central to its efforts to increase growth. There are problems with the system which has become increasingly fragmented and dominated by the private sector in recent decades. However Labour's response does not address the central problems and some of its proposals are quite negative, like changing the designation of green belt lad so that it can be built on. It seems to entirely have forgotten its own history where previous Labour governments took a broad visionary approach to planning which was in the hands of national and local government. Pioneering work was done in those times. Current proposals fall very far short of these past ambitions to ensure that people had good environments to live and work in.

Podcast 130 -  Labour's Planning Reforms

Although Trump is notoriously erratic, beneath the surface of this and his egregious, insulting behaviour there are consistencies. One is that he will continue to support Israel as the bastion of US interests in the Middle East and Palestinians who continue to suffer from Israel’s genocidal actions both in Gaza and the West Bank. One bright spot in a rather grim political landscape in Britian has been the unified and determined campaigning by activists in solidarity with Palestine. In particular we can learn from the past success of the boycott of South African apartheid to mobilise people to boycott Israeli apartheid now.

Podcast 131 -  Trump's world order, the West and the UK

Trump is motivated by a desire to ensure US supremacy in the face of China which is developing rapidly. No other country poses such a threat and he wants to clear the decks for that fight, hence his attempt to end the war in Ukraine on terms favourable to the United States. Other aspects of Trump’s imperial agenda – his designs on Greenland and Panama and also relate to his desire to prevent China challenging US power.

Podcast 132 -  Beginning of the end of the war in Ukraine

Podcast 133 -  Palestine solidarity united, defiant, focused

The threat from China to the US and the West is real but it is not a military one, as the media would have us believe, which is used as the pretext for increased arms spending. In fact, it is the US that has threatened to annex Canada, take over Greenland, take back the Panama Canal (which it has partly succeeded in) take over Ukrainian mineral resources and redevelop Gaza ethnically cleansed of Palestinians. By contrast, what China has been doing is developing its technology and industry so that it is now a leading force in hi tech and green industries. This came into sharp relief with the success of DeepSeek’s new artificial intelligence system. This is what motivates Trump. He wants to focus on the serious challenge that China poses to the United States status as the world’s one superpower.

Podcast 134 - Artificial Intelligence, China's challenge

There is a long history behind the West’s objective of destroying the government in Syria. The long campaign of military action and sanctions which eventually led to Assad’s defeat. His overthrow will have a profound impact on future prospects for Syria and the region, including the Palestinians whose cause has been weakened by these events. The West backs the terrorists who now control the country and who are oppressing and killing people from ethnic and religious minorities and women from all groups. Meanwhile the United States is still involved and Israel and Turkey are vying to carve up bits of Syria for themselves. The future looks grim for Syrians.

Podcast 135 - Syria and the implications of the fall of Assad

Although German Democratic Republic (GDR) ended 35 years ago its achievements demonstrate what is possible in a society committed to the welfare of its citizens. It did this against enormous odds. It was economically disadvantaged after the end of the second world war and faced the West's attempts to isolate it from the rest of the world. Significantly it was determined that war would never again emanate from German soil and advocated for peace.

Podcast 136 - The German Democratic Republic - a different world

Britain's relationship with Russia abruptly changed with the ousting of Ukraine's President Yanukovych in 2014 from one of close trade and investment partnership to naming Russia as Britain's principal enemy. This sudden pivot is tied to the struggle to secure access to Ukraine's valuable mineral assets. In promoting and prolonging the war in Ukraine Britain also hopes to promote its global arms exports and become an important player in central and eastern Europe.

Podcast 137 - British warmongering in Ukraine

While the UK economy stagnates at home, the government plans to increase military spending to 3% per annum. To pay for this funds will be taken away from social welfare services and further austerity measures seem inevitable. Claims that increasing military expenditure is necessary to defend the UK in a hostile world lack credibility. The reality is that it is an attempt to maintain and strengthen Britain's imperial role in the world and prevent fundamental changes in the world order.

Podcast 138 - Britain - imperialism abroad and austerity at home

The Socialist Correspondent attempts to get to the truth behind events. Using Marxist principles, it shines a light on those responsible for war, terrorism and exploitation and reports and analyses the struggles of working people across the globe. The Socialist Correspondent is partisan. It unashamedly supports those fighting for peace, justice and socialism.

Socialist Correspondent

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