US Congress’ anti-socialism resolution is both meaningless and ironic
The newly minted 118th Congress just took office and they’ve hit the ground running on essential issues concerning the American people. Days ago, the House of Representatives passed H.Con.Res.9 - Denouncing the horrors of socialism, which was met with bipartisan support.
The resolution itself is totally symbolic. It doesn’t actually do anything to take action against “socialism.” What it probably is, underneath all the frills, is bait by Republicans for Democrats. Democrats that voted against it (and there were many) will probably face a slew of attack ads in the future from Republican challengers in their respective elections.
But the text of the resolution itself is a complete joke. It denounces the tens of godzillions of Chinese deaths that supposedly happened during Mao Zedong’s Great Leap Forward. It lists a host of communist leaders that committed similar atrocities. And it says that nations like Cuba and Venezuela were once prosperous before succumbing to communist ideology.
What’s ironic is that many of the nations listed, such as North Korea, Nicaragua, Cuba and Venezuela, have actually suffered far more from American imperialism than from “socialism.” For instance, the Americans slaughtered millions in their military campaign in Korea and leveled virtually every building in the North higher than a story. They committed atrocious war crimes and mulled over using tactical nuclear weapons to block Soviet and Chinese supply lines.
Looking at Cuba, the embargo alone is taking a massive toll on the local economy. It has been routinely denounced each and every year by most of the world’s countries at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), even with US allies joining. The US also runs a gulag for suspected terrorists, without due process, on the island of Cuba at Guantanamo Bay.
Nicaragua has been under a constant barrage of US-sponsored terrorism for decades. In the 1980s, the US-sponsored Contras committed unspeakable crimes against the Sandinista government of President Daniel Ortega, and they refused to participate in the democratic process. The US lost a case before the International Court of Justice during that time for sponsoring paramilitaries and planting mines in Nicaragua’s harbors.
As for the Soviet Union and the deaths the resolution mentioned, the USSR was the most sanctioned nation on earth during its foundation and was a technologically backward country fraught with internal contradictions. Doubtless, millions of Soviet people lost their lives due to food insecurity during the early days of the USSR – but to say that this was artificially induced is contentious.
That is not to say, however, that communist ideology, mainly as it existed in the Eastern Bloc, was perfect. It was plagued by ever-growing contradictions that led to its eventual collapse. And indeed, just because the country was isolated by Western countries did not require it to transform into a virtual dungeon. Not all of socialism’s issues can be pinned on American intervention.
Yet despite this, the crimes of American imperialism cannot be ignored when deliberating the history of the socialist movement. If allowed to flourish without outside interference, likely, the oppressive institutions created to subjugate outside influence may not have existed in the first place. In the example of Nicaragua, the explicit goal of the US government was to impede the rate of social progress and force the Sandinistas to funnel money into its military thereby creating the conditions for social unrest.
In denouncing the horrors of socialism, the US Congress has only proven that the true horror that exists in today’s world is American imperialism and its unfettered inclination toward subjugation and domination. As stated before, these horrors are virtually denounced every year before the UNGA, e.g., a more representative body of the world’s total population. The US should be ashamed of its actions in and toward each of the example countries listed in the resolution.
And as for its concluding line about resisting all forms of socialist policies in the United States, this is horrible for the American people. While, of course, the resolution is meaningless, policies championed by the socialist movement – universal health care, universal education, universal parental leave and much more – are policies that the American people desperately need and yearn for.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
