On October 12, two bombs ripped through a packed discotheque on the Indonesian holiday island of Bali, killing more than 200 people and injuring some 300. Most of those who died were young people, many of them Australians. A car bomb outside a nightclub in the popular resort of Kuta caused this carnage. The Sari nightclub was completely destroyed by the blast, which created a large crater and also damaged nearby restaurants and a hotel. Many of those who were killed died in the fires that followed. Many others suffered horrific injuries and burns.
Although no group has claimed responsibility for the attacks, suspicions immediately fell on Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda terrorist network, or some local radical Islamic group with links to it. This is quite possible. There have recently been persistent reports that this organisation had been intensifying its efforts to establish a foothold in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation. However, there is no proof yet that it was al-Qaeda. It could also be the work of other militant groups operating in South-East Asia, some of which have links to al-Qaeda.
In the past Indonesian officials have denied that terrorists with links to bin Laden are active in the country. However, this cannot be excluded. The bombing came on the second anniversary of the attack led by al-Qaeda on the USS Cole in the Yemeni port of Aden, and follows attacks on a French oil tanker in the Persian Gulf and US troops in Kuwait. A statement purporting to be from bin Laden has praised these attacks, though without mentioning the Bali attack. On October 14th Abu Hamza al-Masri, a Muslim cleric with suspected links to al-Qaeda, said that the group had played a role in the Bali bombing and was planning to carry out further attacks.
Indonesians traditionally practice a moderate form of Islam, and leaving aside separatist violence in certain parts of the vast archipelago, for the most part foreigners have not been targets. The attack in Bali marks a radical departure from that. Washington, is now pressing Indonesia to take action against on Islamic activists, in particular Abu Bakar Bashir's Jemaah Islamiyah. This group has been linked to an al-Qaeda operative who was recently seized in Indonesia and turned over to America's CIA. He is accused of plotting attacks against American targets. In Malaysia and Singapore dozens of people have been arrested in a crackdown on what it says is a South East Asian terror network.
America sees South-East Asia as a crucial front in its war against terrorism, and is now likely to focus even more closely on the region. The United States is slowly but inexorably increasing its direct military presence in South-East Asia. US forces are participating in anti-insurgency operations in the Philippines. The bomb attacks in Bali came just hours after a hand-made bomb went off near the Philippine consulate in Manado, a port north-east of Jakarta. American forces have been helping to train Filipino soldiers to fight Muslim guerrillas. Washington immediately denounced the bombings as a "despicable act of terror", and so it was. No civilized person can condone such acts of barbarism. But when the likes of George W Bush and Tony Blair pontificate about the evils of terror, some serious questions must be asked.
In the first place, how does one explain the fact that after the US invasion of Afghanistan, which was trumpeted as a decisive victory against terrorism, it seems that terrorism is alive and well and spreading all the time? How does it come that al-Qaeda, which was supposed to have been defeated and in retreat, is capable of organizing new atrocities with apparent ease? And how does it happen that Bush and Blair are concentrating all their energies on preparations for war on Iraq, which nobody has been able to link convincingly with either al-Qaeda or September 11, while the forces of al-Qaeda are clearly active elsewhere?
The declarations of Bush and Blair are full of the most disgusting hypocrisy. They are taking cynical advantage of the grief and anger at the latest terrorist atrocity for the purpose of drumming up support for their plans for war. John Howard, Australia's prime minister, described the bombing as a "huge national tragedy", which it is, while in the same breath insisting that "the war against terrorism must go on with unrelenting vigour and with unconditional commitment."
This is a sly way of associating Australia even more closely with George W Bush's expansionist plans in the Pacific. Even before this, the Australian government has been among the most fervent supporters of President George Bush's so-called war on terrorism. Australian troops were sent to Afghanistan to fight alongside the Americans. This has made Australia a prime target for every terrorist madman in the region. Howard's bluster about fighting terrorism overlooks the self-evident fact that the so-called "war on terror" has so far achieved nothing except to strengthen the hand of the terrorist fanatics everywhere, as the Bali atrocity cruelly revealed.
Despite all the bold talk of Bush, Blair and Howard, the "war against terror" is a myth. It is a convenient fiction designed to fool people into believing that aggressive military actions like the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq will somehow lessen the threat of terrorism and make them safer. In fact, the exact opposite is the case. The world is far less safe now than before the invasion of Afghanistan. It is more unstable and more prone to insane terrorist atrocities like Bali.
The fear now is that there will be a spate of attacks across the region, launched either by al-Qaeda or by groups with similar aims. "This is just the beginning of what we have seen so many times in other Muslim countries in the Middle East," said one Asian security expert, quoted by The Economist, which concluded gloomily that "the bombs in Bali appear to have opened up a bloody new front in the war on terror."
Marxism versus terrorism
The root causes of terrorism are the profound social, economic and political problems in the so-called developing world. The super-exploitation of the masses by the big multinational companies, the ever increasing military presence of the USA that underlines its aim of dominating Asia and the Pacific, the complete disregard for the interests, beliefs and culture of the peoples of the region - all these things have combined to create an explosive mixture of hostility and resentment that cannot be eliminated by military means, no matter how many bombs are dropped or marines dispatched.
In a period of capitalist decay, elements from the petit bourgeoisie, especially the frustrated unemployed university youth, tend to become unbalanced. In despair, they resort to lunatic tactics like individual terrorism. Marxism has always fought against these tactics because they are futile and counterproductive. That was the position of Lenin and the Russian Bolsheviks 100 years ago, and it remains our position today.
However, there is a difference. The old Russian terrorists were idealists who used mistaken methods. They only assassinated known torturers, oppressive officials and tsars. But the modern breed of fanatic who is prepared to slaughter innocent men, women and children play a purely counterrevolutionary role. Their activities do nothing but harm to the revolutionary movement, while actually helping the forces of reaction. Such actions, apart from their inhuman and barbarous character, do not harm imperialism but strengthen it. They must be condemned without any palliatives.
The main responsibility for the rise of so-called Islamic fundamentalism has been the abject failure of the reformist and Stalinist leaders in the past to offer a way out on a genuinely revolutionary, anti-imperialist and anti-capitalist basis. The support for the so-called two-stage theory in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East by the Stalinists in the past led to one defeat after another. The support for the "progressive bourgeoisie" has been a complete catastrophe for countries like Egypt, Sudan, Iraq, Algeria and Indonesia. The price we have had to pay is the rise of the fundamentalist reaction, which tries to conceal its reactionary essence by wrapping itself in the flag of a hypocritical "anti-imperialism". In reality, these supposedly antagonistic forces (the imperialists and the terrorists) have always helped each other.
The imperialists have no answer to terrorism. As a matter of fact, by their actions they constantly aid and encourage it. Similarly the actions of the terrorists do not strike a blow against the real power of imperialism but merely provide it with the excuse it needs to increase its military might and intensify its aggressive policy, while silencing its domestic critics. Thus, terrorism and imperialism are not antipodes but twins. They feed off each other and help each other. After all, where would George W Bush be now without the inestimable services of al-Qaeda?
The real way to eradicate the cancer of terrorism is by eliminating its root causes. It is only one of the more repulsive symptoms of a system that is diseased and rotten to the core. The capitalist system means exploitation and oppression on a global scale to maintain the super-profits and obscene luxury of a small number of people in the USA, Europe, Japan and Australia. It means growing inequality between rich and poor both within the advanced capitalist countries and on a world scale.
The global crisis of this senile and degenerate system is reflected in the stagnation of the productive forces, increasing unemployment, social and political instability everywhere. It is also reflected in increasing tensions between nations, trade disputes and wars. If anyone ever doubted the proposition that capitalism means war, let them open their eyes and look around them.
The real alternative to terrorism is the development of a broad front of struggle against imperialism and capitalism on a world scale. It is imperative that the working class and the labour movement should play the leading role in this struggle. To the degree that the labour movement abdicates its historical role of fighting for the revolutionary transformation of society, the way is left open for all kinds of alien elements to push their way to the fore with disastrous results.
Lenin once remarked that capitalism is horror without end. The only way to put an end to these horrors is to tackle the problem by the roots. Wars and terrorism are only the surface manifestation of the fact that the capitalist system is in a blind alley on a world scale. It is time that all the genuine forces of Marxism in the world came together, capable of uniting the proletariat, beginning with its most conscious element, in a single powerful movement to overthrow capitalism and replace this monstrous system of oppression and wars with a real new world order under socialism.