-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the June 15, 2000
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
WWP MESSAGE: `U.S. NAVY OUT OF VIEQUES'
On June 11, thousands of Puerto Rican people from the Big
Island, from Vieques, and from states in the Northeast will
converge on New York City in what has been dubbed the
biggest rally ever against the U.S. Navy presence in
Vieques. This year's Puerto Rican Day Parade has been
dedicated to Puerto Rican Nationalist hero Albizu Campos
and to Vieques.
Workers World Party joins in the celebration of one full
year in which the bombings of Vieques were suspended, and
offers unconditional solidarity to the people of Puerto
Rico in their courageous quest to oust the U.S. Navy from
the tiny island.
We condemn Clinton's Presidential Directive aimed at
renewing U.S. military exercises in Vieques against the
wishes of its people. This act of utmost imperialist
arrogance goes against every international law on self-
determination. It is designed to be an action hostile to
the people of Vieques, to Puerto Rico and to all the
peoples of the world who stand for peace and self-
determination against imperialism.
The United States has waged war against every poor country
in the world, either directly with live ammunition through
the Pentagon or indirectly with blockades, sanctions and
Wall Street's economic strangulation.
It has also declared a war against the poor and the
oppressed at home. Even as the U.S. economy has soared,
aided by trade pacts that secure the penetration of foreign
markets to the detriment of those countries, the gap
between rich and poor here has grown ever wider.
The wealth created and accumulated by the ruling class
over centuries, first by slavery and the theft of land and
then by the exploitation of workers in the industrial era,
has not reached the majority of the population. In a
country where the richest 10 percent of the people own 73
percent of all the wealth, according to AFL-CIO figures,
many children survive thanks to soup kitchens. A whole
industry has been created to maintain 2 million people
behind bars, mostly African Americans, Latinos and Native
people, overwhelmingly the poor.
But the challenge to this system is growing. High
technology has also created a new layer of workers--more
oppressed nationalities, more women--who survive on very
low wages, sometimes with no benefits. These are people who
have "nothing to lose but their chains." Their
revolutionary potential holds out the promise of a better
world, a socialist society that will bring peace and
economic justice.
The struggle of Vieques is not only the struggle of the
Puerto Rican people. As Albizu Campos said in 1926: "Our
painful situation under U.S. imperialism is the situation
that the U.S. is trying to impose on all the other sister
nations in the continent. Our cause is a continental
cause."
It is no accident that this parade, an act of national
pride and a challenge to the U.S. military, happens in New
York City. More than a century ago revolutionaries from
Latin America and the Caribbean, particularly from Cuba and
Puerto Rico, lived and struggled together in this city for
the liberation of their countries.
In a letter dated May 18, 1895, Cuban hero Jos‚ Martˇ
wrote: "It is my duty--inasmuch as I realize it and have
the spirit to fulfill it--to prevent, by the independence
of Cuba, the United States from spreading over the West
Indies and falling, with that added weight, upon other
lands of our America. All I have done up to now, and shall
do hereafter, is to that end. I have lived inside the
monster and know its entrails--and my weapon is only the
slingshot of David."
U.S. Navy out of Vieques now! Pentagon out of Puerto Rico!
Viva Puerto Rico libre!
- END -
(Copyleft Workers World Service. Everyone is permitted to
copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message
to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
------------------
This message is sent to you because you are subscribed to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>.
To unsubscribe, E-mail to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To switch to the DIGEST mode, E-mail to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Send administrative queries to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
