Resolution of the Central Organ 

of the Communist Party of Greece (marxist-leninist)

29/3/2020

• For several weeks now, humanity has been facing an expanding and rapidly spreading epidemic (pandemic), that of coronavirus.

The spread and danger of this pandemic (with many issues still ongoing and the controversy among the world's major centers of power) absolutely blames the world capitalist-imperialist system, especially regarding its course in recent decades. It reveals all the dominant effort to destigmatize capitalism, its laws and contradictions, which seeks to load its own responsibility for exposing humanity to a great health risk to the peoples themselves, who are supposedly dirty, careless, and irresponsible. It has been shown that the racial-racist attempt to separate societies into resilient and not resilient, developed and non-developed, and affected differently by viruses, was short-lived.

As we have pointed out, the coronavirus in particular does not do as many "distinctions" as those before it appeared to do, that the so-called "developed" world considered to be confined to the underdeveloped, poor and impoverished regions of the world. (the well-known discrimination between the diseases of "civilization", and the others). We understand, therefore, from this point of view also, that the progress of the epidemic has caused such a shock in the metropolises and other capitalist countries in the West, East, North and South.

So, we must place the great political and social cost of the global capitalist system in this context, because it left "defenseless" and "unfortified" even parts of the planet that were "famous" for health systems, for social and health protection, for hygiene conditions.

• We monitor, with many questions and doubts, the data provided to us by the system regarding the origin of the virus, the routes and the points of spread. Their weakness and surprise are definitely combined with their willingness to reduce the cost. Every day that passes, they are forced everywhere on the planet to modify or even overturn previous "scientific" findings and estimates. Their statistical monitoring and forecasting models are unreliable, since the diagnostic precautionary test is unreliable and incomplete (the test case). All the first "conclusions" (symptoms only in the lungs, targeting old age, and a number of other temporary "certainties") are tested and overturned in practice. This situation that is being immediately perceived - even distorted - by the large masses of the population, makes even us very suspicious. That is why our analysis is based on the data of our initial approach, excluding conspiracy theories, and we avoid comparisons with past, large-scale, health, military, political, social upheavals. The correlations with epidemics of previous centuries, the comparison with the numbers of victims of local wars, etc., are disorient and lead to estimates that degrade-underestimate the health issue that has emerged by the recent epidemic.
  • Therefore, with all the data we have and can check, judging by the behavior and attitude of the system, its surprise, its -sometimes- spasmodic reactions and the contradictory measures they take, we conclude that we are dealing with a serious health threat.

The spread of this epidemic is a serious health threat to today's society, morals, habits and consciences. Therefore, we absolutely understand, support and show our solidarity to the affected people and we approach them in this basis, in order to move forward with the "rest". It is an absolute right of a person to not wanting to get sick, to not wanting to suffer and to try - in the context of this society that he is living in - to protect himself and his children.

Class social data, are not surpassed even if, as we have said, the full-of-problems health also affects middle classes. And let's keep in mind that we are not given the real data on how the poorest and most oppressed strata have been affected or how the virus will affect them, which have been deprived of voice, formation, and fighting tools for decades.

The processing of ways to show solidarity (in the context of building a movement and not to fill in holes created by state policy) should not frighten us.

Today's screaming health crisis arises from the same logic and relationship that defines the heart of the capitalist system. It was not inevitable that humanity was caught unprepared, and is a cheap systemic excuse, as neutral as it is classless. The raw truth is that the capitalist system left humanity unprepared, because it was promoting and preparing its own plans, sacrificing even basic rights for these plans. The system has shown (unfortunately at a high cost to humanity) that it is not only sacrificing masses in times of war, but also in the face of natural phenomena and the treatment of disease and pandemics.

We have a permanent duty and obligation to persist in a substantiated manner in revealing the causes and characteristics of the health crisis, highlighting all that defines and limits the general human potential at this level. To popularize as much as we can in relation to the big "slaughter" that characterizes the whole economy-industry that concerns prevention-diagnosis-treatment. To highlight the cynicism produced by the logic of profit, the logic of the expansion-conquest-dividing of markets that defines imperialism, which has reduced health to a weapon and a tool that fits into inner-imperialist antagonisms.

The global capitalist-imperialist system will obviously not sit idle when - in the midst of all the other matters it struggles to deal with - the feeling that "the king is naked" is embedded in parts of the masses. Obviously, even in such moments (much more so in such moments) it brings the machines of distortion, making black appear as white, in order to put a stop to the masses' awareness of what they have to deal with. The system does not give up on manipulating, forcing the masses, when in fact they are going to experience a total deterioration of their lives in the near future, and not only as a consequence of the spread of the coronavirus. As surprising as it may be, the motivation for the system and its effort to tame the pandemic is not its interest in humans and their health, but not to burden the political and social costs that are undoubtedly charged at it in a high pace since the spread of the virus. The capitalist system, especially in recent decades, has demonized the adversary in a total and studied way and has taken full advantage of the defeat of the communist movement in order to present itself as eternal and fit for "human" nature and potential.

In other words, we should point out that in this effort, the system has weapons and capabilities that stem from the negative correlation, the ideological disintegration of the working class, the marginalization and weakness of the communist movement. We insist that the "interest" of the system in human health and life goes through a filter of classism, class antagonisms and class struggle, and that it is determined by the pursuit of the system to expand its ideological and political dominance, even in conditions where popular indignation and its questioning by the masses are expanding.

It is clear that the capitalist system concerning the coronavirus, but also especially at how it will stand against the consequences, is not united and agreed. Of course, it would be very difficult to do the opposite if we consider that the spread of the coronavirus found the system torn apart by fierce intra-imperialist rivalries and geostrategic controversies that centered on the search for new strategic alliances.

A system in all-round decay

Expressions of the parasitic nature of the capitalist-imperialist system also exist in reference to additional issues - more or less visible - beyond what we have already pointed out. A look at what is happening in the so-called field of medicine - one of the most lucrative for the capital in the world - is enough to understand the magnitude of parasitism.

We are watching - not for the first time - a ruthless war for the "patent", for which of the monopoly giants operating in this sector will gain the lead over its competitors and the corresponding benefits that will come with such a thing. The drugs, vaccines, diagnostic tests for the virus, even ... masks, respirators and antiseptics, have become a field of wild profit and confrontation for some of the most ruthless portions of capital. The fate of the peoples is left to those who have turned an indisputable human need into a market of hundreds of billions.

It could be said that the competition that has erupted in all the fields regarding the management of the pandemic has now been organically merged with the pre-existing contradictions in the imperialist camp, raising them to new heights. It is no coincidence that once again analysts of the system are quick to point out that "the resilience of globalization is being tested" and that the "return to the nation-state" momentum is intensifying!

What is certain is that the dimensions of the current crisis, which has affected, among other things, the ‘inside’ of key players in the global table, the primacy in research and patenting, as well as vaccine control, are directly linked to will of imperialists for upgrading their positions against the rest and is one of the factors that will significantly influence the formation of relations between them.

And it is clear that in another society, free from human-to-human exploitation, what would be progress and achievement for humanity, is now becoming a real nightmare for peoples.

To all of the above the World Health Organization is absolutely submissive. WHO at this stage appears in many respects as the coordinator of the fight against the virus and the custodian of mass health around the world.

From the first moment of its establishment, in 1948, the WHO bore the stamp of its political control by the dominant imperialist powers, especially the United States.

At present, it is clear that this institution operates under the condition of the correlations formed in the dominant circles.

And while the West's influence in drafting WHO's policies should be taken for granted, there is nothing but concern from them about China's growing role in recent years, as an expression of the general competition on the planet.

As the health crisis progresses, new aspects of the rot that characterizes capitalism in its imperialist stage will be revealed. To the galleys of labor exploitation, to the blood rivers of imperialist interventions, to the drama of millions of uprooted people, to the whole web of oppression that this system builds to the detriment of peoples, another side has been added that has been very clear lately: the threat to the life of masses from a pandemic. The awareness that this factor is also the product of a social organization that has long ago "eaten its biscuit" strengthens and illuminates the necessary struggle for today's tasks.

The Politburo given that we are facing unprecedented situations, points out the need to delve into a series of events and developments for which we have a first-hand approach:

- To popularize the special conditions in China that allowed the spread of the virus there, when areas like those in Asia have repeatedly been “greenhouses” for a series of viruses.

- To be as specific as possible on the evolution of the epidemic there (start, peak, recession), the attitude and choices of the Chinese leadership.

- In particular, to focus on the impact that the escalating US-China conflict has had on the decisions of the Chinese leadership, and on the other hand to the leadership’s need to continue the Chinese soft power expansion.

There are many gaps and we need to be quite suspicious of what is being "scientifically" presented. After all, this is not the first time that scandal-scenarios have been recruited to cover up serious contradictions and quarrels that permeate the entire global economic network with huge profits and even huger turnover. (sanitary materials, pharmaceuticals, etc.) A network in which powerful monopoly centers are involved, that based on their national characteristics, ie their formation on the basis and in relation to their own nation-state, exercise their global action.

But even so, we need to point out that the whole exacerbation of the virus threat is crucially linked to the competition and relationships within the entire international network (healthcare, drugs, protocols, treatments, vaccines, healthcare, hospitals, diagnostic centers, diagnostic equipment, etc.) A network that, like any capitalist relationship, operates with the logic of profit and that has ended up being perforated and vulnerable.

Everything we have described accompanies this whole plexus over time and never stops. Are being recruited  large media networks with large advertising campaigns, ministers, governments and bills ( ή draft of the law), to hoard the big industries and any services and transportation associated with them. Today, however, if we understand correctly, this whole situation cannot be limited to the characterization of a "health crisis", since the whole issue has gone far beyond that.  All over the world, with more or less delay, with differences, the capitalist-imperialist power ( ή domination) has declared a state of red alert.

Having, therefore, some such issues open, we must admit that the first decisive factor in the fact that the whole situation tends to evolve into a general crisis is the decisions and choices of the system. These are the ones who have given another dimension to things! The second, also essential issue, is that the undoubted catalyst for all this reality is the (any) real threat of the virus.
This is easy to read. The most demanding is exactly what "reaction" catalyzes. Which "reactants" and which "products".

But let us briefly state ( ή concisely ) our basic assessments of the global situation that has been the ground on which the current crisis has erupted, reminiscent of the eve of a peculiar "World War III":

1. Intensification and intensification of

intra-imperialist competition ( ή  imperialist infighting )

2. Emergence of new competitors and signs of relative weakening of the classic great players of the West, with the US first.
3. The process of further rupture within the EU and NATO. The great turmoil caused by Britain's decision to leave the EU.
4. The great pressure created by the stagnant funds, given (despite the contrary declarations) the expansion of the bubble, which is also manifested in the present phase with stock market crash. Pressure that causes a lot of quarrels within the system between the "liberals" and the "statesmen".
5. The living and active wounds that have opened up in many parts of the world around energy.
6. One factor that needs to be evaluated is the great resilience and coherence that the Chinese regime has at every opportunity to prove. It shows an opportunity to counter the pressure so far, a situation that will fuel opposition from the rest of the imperialists.
7. The upheavals and reorganizations brought about by the developments in Syria, the upgrading of Russia's role and the subsequent opposite attitudes of the Western imperialists towards it.

Therefore, we see that the headaches that accumulate (on all sides) so far work more "divisively" in the Western bloc than "aggregate". A reality that also has a big impact on the economy.

The need to clarify, then, how we perceive "opportunity" underscores that imperialist powers, on a first-come, first-served basis (but also the rest of the world's ruling classes) have to deal with an "objective" dynamic of accelerating developments. prescribing an immediate future that is very uncertain and dangerous for the peoples of the world.

This, as we have said, does not negate the fact that they had their plans, it does not negate the fact that they are obliged by things to modify them, it does not negate the fact that (in the midst of the evolution of the threat) decisions are made "warmly". each case does not sit with folded arms.

For restrictive measures

So far, through relapses and delays, the measures taken by the system (always under the umbrella of its attempt to convince the king that it is not naked) are moving at the following levels:

1. Restrictive measures (which - obviously in an urgent and coercive way - are taken almost all over the world) are aimed at temporarily expanding the spread of the virus over a longer period of time, limiting the peaks of the pandemic and thus mitigating it. pressure for hospitalization that will be accepted by the care system that with the sole responsibility of the system itself is considered insufficient even for the most "developed" economies-societies.

These are measures that have a strong repressive and repressive character and are in stark contrast to even the small remnants of democratic, trade union, political and individual freedoms that survived from its previous repressive period (2008 onwards) not only for Greece but also worldwide.

So, based on the possibilities (?)  αnd the limits of the whole health care system-network, given the anisometries worldwide, these repressive measures have been taken as necessary and without the current data leaving room for some others. Apparently, a month or two ago, not all imperialist countries started with the same treatment, and there was a lot of discussion about the two or three models provided for in the medical and social protocols.

All the centers of power of the main imperialists (and the rest of the bourgeois governments a little later) realized that the "pure" and complete implementation of "herd immunity" without "protectionism" and state intervention would not ultimately prevent their great agony, that is, the effects on the economy. The supposed "normality" of the herd immunity, which is supposed to ensure economic operation, proved to be a great delusion and would cause even greater shocks.

However, as we can see, the central government is testing the so-called "herd immunity" in parts and on a case-by-case basis. Because what else do they do when they EXCLUDE THE OFFERS WITHOUT ANY ABSOLUTELY DAYS?
What else do they do when they put quarantine areas and wait to see the reaction of the population without support? What else do they do when they refuse to close factories that have cases?

• As we have said, the repressive measures adopted and continue to be promoted by the system are marked by serious contradictions and are "undermined" by the very anarchic way in which the capitalist system operates. However, for health reasons (as we do not have as a people's movement, as communists, based on the negative correlation, a special, independent of the popular networking and reaction system) we are obliged to follow the measures for self-protection both our own, but and the world next to us and near us. Measures that run counter to the need to function and intervene also alter our "normality" in some respects.

So, no, (as much as we can) «we will play in the opponent’s field», but seeking to highlight demands and claims in the obvious, in the wider world, anti-popular aspects that are:

1. The horrible and exhaustive work conditions and devastation of the working people (in total) in the health care section.

1. The-from every aspect- inadequacy of a perforated care system to cover the increased needs of the population for prevention and treatment.

Volunteering (or rather the solidarity, the mutual support) of the masses can be manifested in the context and in relation to a social system, only if this social system and its political power can inspire and mobilize the people. In order to manifest itself it must be connected and serve to expand the abilities of the health care system and not to patch the so-called «bad texts».

On the contrary, only the major, mass, popular and labor movements managed to expand the solidarity and mutual support actions. Therefore, despite the negative correlations and all that we rightly point out about the character of “volunteering” we also have this task: to favor the need for solidarity, which-as it seems-will increasingly hedge. 

Indeed, in the first phase the «impoundment» has a legitimacy, as well as the national solidarity against the «enemy». But, there is another side to this, that of testing of these «successes» of the system, if the epidemic spreads and these measures turn into a boomerang, because then they will fuel the reverse course, swelling and expressing the popular indignation and anger.

With a fairly high speed and despite the phenomena we mentioned, is forwarded in parallel the reinforcement and support of the capital, on the one hand, and the further deterioration of the employed and unemployed position on the other. Next to this is the cynical and inhuman treatment of refugees and migrants.

• These measures are the system’s response to the now apparent entanglement of the health crisis with the rapid re-emergence of a series of crisis phenomena that correlate with the economical function of capitalism. Measures that prove for once more what we have been persistently declaring the last decades: that the state is present and never left∙ at least where the expansion and reproduction of the capitalist system demands and apparently to the detriment of the working class and people… It is therefore possible and in the dynamic of developments, that many of these measures will become permanent. And it is possible that we will experience new «corona-memoranda» wild capitalist attack in order to get the broken-ones out from the operation of rescuing capitalism, financial capital etc.

A FIRST SUMMARY

The capitalistic system has a particular nature and that cannot be changed. No matter how much suffering it causes, and because it will not voluntarily relinquish its sovereignty, it reacts to the disastrous consequences of its nature as capitalism: it fuels new anti-popular consequences and disaster. And along with those it crushes its own delusions and ideologies that it created in previous periods. Nevertheless, it does not give up from reinstating new ones.

The system’s main concern against the pandemic, but also its abilities to «act», is limited to repression and restraint.

First, because the health care structures are perforated and ineffective from the ferocious attack of previous years.

Second and not insignificant, because it can’t and it doesn’t want (based on its characteristics) to impose the global industrial-financial complex and place it directly and effectively in the service of treatment of the disease. That is to force it to remove (if that can be done) completely its class character.

It is therefore explicable that the popular masses feel unprotected and are coerced to comply with the measures, since they see no light in the medicines they can take, nor in the treatment they will have, nor in their ability to make an early diagnosis.

The situation inside the country 

To keep using the medical terminology of our days, the health crisis of coronavirus has brought out and will continue to bring to the surface all the «underlying diseases» of the system of exploitation and dependence.

Mitsotaki’s government (and in return for dealing with the «refugee» crisis) had reaped some «nice» benefits from its patrons, such as easing the targets of primary surpluses and some funding tools (return of profits from the sale of Greek state bonds), the purchase of the country’s bonds by the ECB (quantitative easing, with asterisks because it takes place in the so-called secondary market where investment FUNDS buy and «auction» and not the central banks).

The EU, with the «German-axis» in the forefront, accepts funding of European economies only in the context of the European Mechanism, which means that there must be precautionary lines of support for these programs, i.e. memoranda, if the countries cannot return the amounts in two years! In this framework, even the easing of the Stability Pact means few things for countries like Italy or Spain-even less for countries like Greece.

The country’s dependence is apparent in the economic growth model they promised to the people in three levels:

The so-called «heavy industry», tourism will get and it already receives a very heavy blow. Estimations (perhaps even conservative) talk about a reduction of up to 80% of turnover in tourist units, which may mean a multiple effect on services connected to it like catering and supply, but also on other sectors as e.g. the construction.

It is very characteristic from the food crisis (which is discussed by the World Trade Organization and World Health Organization) and how it will affect our country. A country with shrinking agricultural production and a food industry that-mainly in livestock farming- is based on imports. 

Also, it is distinguished by the dependence οn intermediate goods, the constraint of whose production will globally affect the prices. 

The country’s exporting companies, who had managed to emerge and survive ignoring the shrinking of the domestic market, in a «counter-role» with the memoranda, are included in the sectors that are affected from the crisis, according to a recent survey.

The shale oil, in which they had invested program and material plans, is currently the most affected area from the price war on liquid fuels. Of course, the reaction of the American imperialist state is expected on this.

The fall in the prices of oil and fuel may favor at this stage the «local» big refineries, but the fall in prices doesn’t favor the sales or better the profits from them. 

Only, of course, the cosmopolitan ship-owners who, by making the crisis an opportunity in the midst of the crisis, are building new tankers and, mainly, storage platforms to «welcome» the cheap oil and profit later! Only that not even the capitalist economy of the country will benefit at all from their «advances».

As a result, and because we have lived the memoranda, we have the experience as a people that the economic and social desertification can be absorbed and reproduced even by this dependent Greek capitalistic system with the respective painful redistributions, even within the bourgeoisie. Unless it is really threatened by the people and their movement. 

Of course, the new situation that will rise when the part of the health crisis is over and when the outcome meets the effects of the memorandums, will be unprecedented in terms of social misery. It is truly doubtful which commitments or emergency measures will be "remembered" by the bourgeoisie for the health care system, as soon as the quarantine is over.

Attempts to secure anti-labor practices and measures and to make society addicted to coercion and fear are already underway.

It is certain that the direction that will get forward, and already does, is "let's all give a hand". That is why all the predators, who steal the wealth produced by the working class, have mobilized and are giving some petty cash now.

Will this be enough to drag impoverished peoples into the pursuits of the dependent bourgeoisie, -whose ranks now include large-scale middle class parts who managed to escape or regenerate from the memorandum period? That is quite doubtful.

Whether the government today, along with other seven countries, raises the flag of the epidemiologists, demanding more funding, is not enough an alibi to calm down the anger and the resentment of the masses (which are in a suffocating repressive blockade, especially the youth) and for a people who already tends to starvation. Literally, and without having any other choice.

• It is a lie that the ruling class and the government have “moved with huge speed”. No, that is not the case at all! They did not have many options based on the dependency grid they rely on, as we presented earlier. The ruling class remained exposed and naked in the face of this development. A number of ridiculous ideas proved wrong, during both the SYRIZA, as well as the ND (Mitsotakis) era.

Taking these measures, the ruling class is obliged to harm a number of functions and sectors of the economy. In order to "refresh" her stand, she will charge the people and the working class with new burdens; considering the extent of the virus threat. And if the German policy prevails again in the conflict that has erupted in the core of the EU, perhaps the reinforcements from the EMS will form the basis for new ... (corona) memorandums.

Therefore, there is a second (not so hidden) aspect of the repressive measures, which form a status of "quarantine" and isolation of the people that aims to stem the flow of anger and resentment that will undoubtedly come, if the spread of the virus and the austerity measures continue.

So, even if the medical guidelines are clear and must be taken into account, they are also used for anti-popular purposes and aspirations, since they are in the hands of a reactionary ruling class.

The mottos: "Stay at home", "wait and don't investigate", "leave the matter to the experts", as they have become daily directives, can offer nothing more than an extension in the occurrence of infected cases. We do not ignore that, but it is a weak and insufficient measure, and especially when it is used to conceal and bypass the key issue of supporting and strengthening the healthcare system, of offering massive diagnosis and prevention.

• So what can the people do with the organizations and the meager means at their disposal (and as they have been deprived of weapons)? Indeed, there is a serious risk for people to be trapped at home, for workers to be stacked as long as they work, for the unemployed to also be stunted and multiply, for refugees and migrants will be stacked in camps, and for the youth to also be trapped.

During these difficult circumstances, we have no inclination to self-sabotage ourselves, as we consider that the health risk for us and the people who want to act are still far from being second or third in the scale of significance. After all, this attitude of ours, which takes into account the health-risk data, creates the need for us to forge a series of demands regarding care, prevention and early diagnosis, intensively and urgently. We call for specific precautions for workers who continue to be stacked in production and private or public services.

A significant part of our intervention and action has been adapted and perhaps given extra attention to health-risk data. Political data have a double meaning for us. On the one hand, as we have said, they create a strong need for the masses (which -let's not forget- were already marginalized) to defend themselves against the virus. On the other hand, however, what we are searching for in these new context, concerns the ways, the forms and the possibilities for the masses not to stay quiescent, without a voice in these wild conditions.