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Including Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism by V. I. Lenin
Over 1,000 military bases in foreign lands. Armed personnel
in 130 countries. A military budget larger than the next 10 governments
combined. The U.S. rulers maintain an empire, and one that is constantly at
war—so much so that the White House and Pentagon now declare “endless war” to
be the country’s standing military doctrine. What is the cause of this massive
empire and these constant wars. How can they be stopped?
Imperialism in the 21st Century revisits and updates the
analysis of Russian revolutionary Vladmir Ilyich Lenin, who showed how the
monopoly stage of capitalism had produced imperialist wars, and only social
revolution could bring them to an end. Two world wars of unimaginable
destruction confirmed Lenin’s basic thesis and also led to a complete
reorganization of world politics.
The rising tide of anti-colonial national liberation
movements and the emergence of a powerful socialist bloc of countries after
World War ll re-shaped some of the characteristic features of modern
imperialism but not the organically expansionist tendency of monopoly
capitalism. The dynamic of inter-imperialist rivalry for control of colonies
and spheres of influence which led to World War l and World War II was replaced
with a new war drive against their common enemy: socialism. The post-Cold War
world order delivered unrivaled hegemony to the U.S. ruling class, who became drunk
with success, but there are growing contradictions that may explode the world
order once again.
This publication reflects the views of the Party for
Socialism and Liberation.
“As the world has changed, Lenin’s core conclusion remains
entirely valid that war is intrinsic to the imperialist stage of capitalism. …
It underscores the bedrock necessity of anti-imperialist struggle in creating a
new world based on human cooperation. A world without war!”
—From Imperialism
in the 21st Century
