Don't Be Fooled by Lobbyist Mark Esper's "Last Resort"

Source MSNBC

Richard Mellor GED

Afscme Local 444, retired

Editor Facts For Working People

“The opportunity to use active-duty forces in a law and enforcement role should only be used as a matter of last resort.” US Defense Secretary Mark Esper.

Esper is a little smarter than the sexual predator in the White House who happens to be his boss. For this daring challenge to Trump’s authority, Esper almost became one of the latest victims of his famous TV phrases, “You’re Fired”.

An understandable hatred of Trump should not trick us in to dropping our guard and forgetting that what has forced actions and statements from representatives of power in the US. Even billionaires that own and control the mighty National Football League (NFL) have admitted they were wrong to punish athletes for protesting racism and police violence in the US and particularly Colin Kaepernick who kicked it all off. This is the same NFL that dragged its feet when it came to recognizing the horrific brain damage inflicted on the athletes that are a key source of their profits.

The US ruling class; the bankers, the oil magnates, the retail and tech billionaires, and that privileged cretin Elon Musk whose wealth comes from the backs of the black working class in South Africa and the Zambians who worked in his dad’s emerald mine, are in a bit of a crisis. There is clearly a division among them and it is a united powerful movement initiated by the black working class that is the cause of it. What might take decades if happen at all is before our eyes after weeks of a developing mass movement.

Every step of real movement is more important than a dozen programs.”, wrote Karl Marx to his friend Wilhelm Bracke. And the events of the past few weeks as the patience of Black America has reached its apex, gives credibility to that view.

What working class, youth and all oppressed people must grasp is what Mark Esper means by “a matter of last resort.” He is no fool. Bringing the US military in to the mix is a dangerous move that could get out of hand very quickly and unlike Trump, he thinks longer term.

Leaving aside special neo-fascist forces that are reserved for extreme social unrest, the military is comprised of working class youth who see the military as the only chance of getting an education, a trade, even a home. And the US military is also about 40% minorities. The military is different to the police, they are, as I was once told, workers in uniform.

If we were to see a National General Strike, the first in US history and workers took over the factories and the means of communication, radio stations, air waves etc. (common in coups and revolutions) along with the universities (capitalist think tanks) transportation, the docks and so on, Mark Esper’s “last Resort” would have arrived. Trump and an overconfident section of the bourgeois are premature and are playing with fire. 

But who is Mark Esper?  He’s the US Secretary of Defense of course and was also a former lobbyist for defense industry (still is really). He has no doubt made millions for himself and possibly billions for his clients whose trade is death and destruction, warmongers all. Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney and Caspar Weinberger of Bechtel fame were other war criminals who occupied this position.

So let’s keep our finger on the pulse and our eyes on the prize and not be conned by Esper’s apparent commitment to democracy and justice.