Trump delivers anti-China tirade to United Nations

This is not merely a policy of the Trump administration, but rather the drive by the whole of the US ruling capitalist oligarchy to offset the decline of US capitalism’s global economic hegemony through a resort to militarism. Trump’s ostensible chief political opponent, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, has repeatedly criticized the Republican president for being too “soft” on both Russia and China.

Trump’s saber-rattling in his recorded speech to the UN must be taken with deadly seriousness. The threat of war is intensified by the need of the capitalist ruling class to divert outward the immense social tensions building up under conditions of the continuing pandemic, mass unemployment and deepening deprivation for tens of millions. An “October surprise” in the form of a new US war aimed at rallying support for Trump or creating the conditions for martial law in the US is a real threat.

The fight against the threat of war cannot be waged within the confines of the electoral contest between the two major capitalist parties, the Democrats and Republicans. It requires the independent mobilization of the working class on the basis of a socialist and internationalist program.