Lenin’s crusade against imperialist war – lessons for today

We are living through an epoch of war and revolution. In Ukraine, Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, and countless other countries, wars and civil wars are raging, all with the backing and complicity of various imperialist powers. In these turbulent times, the ideas and methods of Lenin – who fought a relentless struggle against warmongering chauvinism during the First World War – provide the clarity that is so desperately needed in the world today. War tests all political trends to destruction. Then as now, the outbreak of war saw the same ‘socialist’ leaders who had once opposed imperialist conflict abandon their class perspective, and line up behind their respective capitalists in defence of the ‘fatherland’. Lenin waged a merciless crusade against this betrayal, and argued for a class-independent position against the horror of imperialist war. This firm line was instrumental in the Bolsheviks’ eventual seizure of power in October 1917. To discuss Lenin’s masterful approach to the questions of war and imperialism, the Spectre of Communism podcast welcomes Marie Frederiksen, leading member of the Revolutionary Communist Party in Denmark. Marie explains not only the historical development of Lenin’s ideas, but their immediate relevance to the struggle against war and imperialism today. To bring out the immense relevance of Lenin’s ideas and to transmit them to a wider layer of communists today, Wellred Books – the publishing house of the Revolutionary Communist International – has recently published a collection of Lenin’s writings on imperialism and war.  This is an invaluable tool in the theoretical arsenal of revolutionaries today, and we strongly recommend listeners get their copy today, available here in paperback, as an ebook and as an audiobook: https://wellred-books.com/on-imperialist-war-lenin-selected-writings/ We also recommend The First World War: the Great Slaughter by Alan Woods for a Marxist analysis of the causes, history and aftermath of WWI: https://wellred-books.com/the-first-world-war-a-marxist-analysis-of-the-great-slaughter/

Om Podcasten

Are you a communist? Think we need a revolution? Tune into the official podcast of the Revolutionary Communist International, for communist theory, analysis and history, every week! Under the crisis-ridden capitalist system, humanity lurches from one disaster to another. War, poverty and precarity are facts of life for millions. Given the circumstances, it is no surprise that an unprecedented number of workers and young people are being drawn to the revolutionary banner of communism. But what does it mean to be a communist? What is the communist perspective on the most pressing questions facing humanity: like armed conflict, the climate crisis, technological development, inequality, and so on? In what philosophical and historical traditions do we stand? How do we answer typical right-wing objections to communism? The purpose of this podcast is to arm our listeners with the ideas and arguments necessary to defend the principles of communism, to win others over to a revolutionary perspective, and develop their own mastery of Marxist theory.