The Deadlock of War and the Restructuring of the Global and Regional Order
The ongoing negotiations between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the United States have once again reinforced the belief in certain political and media circles that the Middle East is moving toward de-escalation and stability. The reality, however, is quite different. The current ceasefire is less a sign of crisis resolution than an indication that the crisis has entered a new phase. The war has not ended; only its form has changed. The crisis in the Middle East is no longer confined to Iran’s nuclear program or even to the direct rivalry between Iran and Israel. What stands before us is part of a broader process in which both the regional and global order are being restructured.
The current negotiations are not the conclusion of this process but one of the mechanisms through which it is temporarily managed. This is why diplomacy and military threats advance simultaneously, neither excluding nor replacing the other.
Even if limited agreements are reached, it is unlikely that the region will enter a period of lasting peace. A more probable scenario is the transformation of warfare itself. Limited strikes, drone operations, proxy wars, economic pressure, border confrontations, and competition over energy routes and global trade corridors are all likely to continue. The experience of recent years has demonstrated that regional and global powers are less concerned with ending the crisis than with managing it in ways that strengthen their own strategic positions.
Under such conditions, the emergence of new regional alignments becomes increasingly likely. Middle Eastern states are attempting to secure their place within a changing balance of power while avoiding complete dependence on any single global power. Yet this process has not produced a coherent and stable regional bloc. Rivalries, conflicting interests, and deep mutual distrust remain significant obstacles.
For the Islamic Republic, too, a possible agreement would not mean the end of crisis. The regime will seek to preserve its regional position and rebuild its networks of influence and proxy forces. Domestically, economic pressures, a crisis of political legitimacy, and widespread social discontent will remain unresolved and will likely be met with intensified security measures and repression.
The most important consequences of these developments, however, will emerge on a level beyond interstate relations. Rising military expenditures, the expansion of the war economy, and intensifying competition among powers ultimately mean that the burden of crisis will be shifted onto the working class and wage earners. From the Middle East to Europe and North America, declining living standards, shrinking social services, and growing inequality are creating fertile ground for social unrest and political polarization.
The most likely perspective before us is therefore neither lasting peace nor a full-scale regional war, but rather a prolonged period of overlapping crises, fragile ceasefires, and recurring conflicts. Under such conditions, the reconstruction of independent working-class politics and proletarian internationalism becomes more necessary than ever. It is a historical necessity and the only lasting alternative to war, nationalism, and the rivalry of capitalist power blocs.
Capital’s Offensive Against the Working Class and Future Protests
Discussions of the war economy, rising military budgets, mass layoffs, and growing poverty can easily be reduced to a collection of isolated and unrelated phenomena if detached from their broader historical and structural context. Yet what stands before us today is not merely the consequence of a few regional wars or a series of misguided economic policies. These developments are part of a deeper crisis rooted in the overall reproduction of global capitalism.
Over the past decades, capitalism has repeatedly managed to contain its cyclical and structural crises through the expansion of markets, the relocation of production, the growth of credit, the accumulation of debt, and periodic restructurings. The present crisis, however, is no longer confined to production or financial markets alone. Its symptoms can be observed simultaneously in economic stagnation, massive debt burdens, housing crises, the erosion of public services, the growing crisis of political legitimacy, the intensification of wars, and the expansion of political polarization. For this reason, we can speak of a crisis that has reached the level of the overall reproduction of capital—a crisis that affects not only the production of profit but the reproduction of the entire social order upon which capitalism rests.
Under such conditions, the war economy becomes one of the principal mechanisms through which the crisis is managed. Rising military expenditures, the rearmament of states, the expansion of defence industries, and intensifying geopolitical rivalries do not provide a solution to the crisis. Rather, they represent attempts to temporarily displace its contradictions and costs onto other spheres of society. Capitalism cannot resolve its crisis, but it can transfer its burden onto society, and the first victims of this process are invariably the working class.
In countries directly affected by war, this reality appears in its most visible form. The destruction of infrastructure, the closure of productive facilities, mass unemployment, forced migration, and the spread of poverty have become part of everyday life. Yet even in countries not directly situated on the battlefield, the situation is not fundamentally different. In Iran, years of economic stagnation, sanctions, declining investment, and regional tensions have intensified pressure on workers, pensioners, and wage earners. Falling purchasing power, the expansion of precarious employment, mass layoffs, and the decline of living standards are only some of the manifestations of this process.
At the same time, governments in Europe and North America are attempting to finance rearmament and the war economy through cuts in public services, restrictions on social spending, increased tax burdens, and attacks on the historic gains of the working class. By emphasizing the threat of Russia in Europe, or by invoking the slogan of “making America great again” in the United States, society is asked to accept poverty, austerity, and declining living standards as necessary sacrifices in the name of national security. The war economy is therefore not merely an economic policy; it has become an ideological instrument for mobilizing society and legitimizing the transfer of crisis costs onto working people.
Yet this same process also generates new contradictions. The more resources are allocated to military and security sectors, the more visible the gap becomes between the real needs of the majority of society and the priorities of governments. Housing crises, rising living costs, job insecurity, the deterioration of healthcare and education, and widening social inequalities all contribute to the growth of broader social discontent. In this sense, the war economy does not resolve the crisis; it contributes to its reproduction on a new level.
For this reason, the contemporary world is moving not only toward intensified geopolitical rivalries, but also toward growing social polarization and a sharpening of class struggle. Economic pressures, mass layoffs, and attacks on workers’ living standards are likely to generate new waves of strikes, protests, and social struggles in the years ahead. The central question is not whether such movements will expand, but whether they will be able to move beyond national boundaries, the rivalries of competing power blocs, and the limitations of reformist politics.
The historical crisis in the overall reproduction of capital has not only destabilized governments and the international order; it has also placed the necessity of rebuilding an independent class politics at the center of the political agenda. In a world where capitalism seeks to manage its crisis through war, militarization, and the transfer of costs onto the lower classes, the defence of livelihoods, employment, and public services can no longer be separated from the struggle against war and imperialist rivalries.
For this reason, the perspective of future struggles is more closely linked than ever to the reconstruction of international solidarity and proletarian internationalism. As capitalism increasingly shifts the burden of its crisis onto working people across the globe, the objective foundations for a renewed internationalist politics continue to grow. The challenge is no longer simply to resist the immediate effects of crisis, but to transform these struggles into a conscious force capable of confronting the system that produces them.
The New Drone War in Lebanon
Proxy Wars in the Age of Drones, Artificial Intelligence and Digital Military Industries
Recent developments in Lebanon are more than just a new chapter in the confrontation between Israel and Hezbollah. What is unfolding along the southern Lebanese front is a sign of a deeper transformation in the nature of contemporary warfare—a transformation that began on the battlefields of Ukraine, spread to the Middle East, and is likely to shape the character of future wars. In recent months, fiber-optic FPV drones have entered the conflict in Lebanon. These drones, whose operational use was refined during the war in Ukraine, are highly resistant to electronic warfare systems and jamming because they are connected through fiber-optic cables. This enables more reliable communication and greater precision in targeting. The transfer of this technology from the battlefields of Ukraine to the Middle East demonstrates that regional wars can no longer be understood as isolated events. Each conflict increasingly becomes a laboratory for the next.
Over the past years, the war in Ukraine has become the world’s largest military testing ground. The extensive use of drones, digital reconnaissance systems, artificial intelligence, data analysis, and network-based operations has transformed traditional forms of warfare. Today, many armies and proxy forces are attempting to transfer the lessons learned in Ukraine to other regions of the world. Lebanon is only one of the earliest examples of this process.
Yet the issue is not merely a change in military tools. The same developments that have driven capitalist production toward digitalization, automation, and artificial intelligence are now reshaping the military sphere. Technology corporations, military industries, and states have become more closely integrated than ever before. Facial-recognition systems, big-data analysis, artificial intelligence, autonomous drones, and surveillance networks have become part of the infrastructure of contemporary warfare.
As a result, modern wars are becoming cheaper, more flexible, and more permanent. Massive invasions and direct occupations are no longer always required to inflict extensive damage. Smaller groups, proxy forces, cyber operations, and low-cost drones can now perform functions that were once the exclusive domain of large conventional armies. This is one reason why many states increasingly prefer indirect confrontation through proxy networks, limited operations, and wars of attrition rather than direct military engagement.
Within this process, the character of state violence is also changing. Targeted assassinations, cross-border operations, the physical elimination of military commanders and political leaders, and so-called “precision strikes” have become normalized elements of warfare. Israel has employed this model extensively in recent years. The assassination of military commanders, political officials, and cross-border operations are no longer presented as exceptional measures but are increasingly legitimized under the language of “self-defence” and “counter-terrorism.”
In Gaza, too, the forced displacement of millions of people, the large-scale destruction of residential areas, and the killing of civilians are justified under the framework of military and security operations. Actions that might previously have been described as war crimes or collective punishment are now redefined through official political and media discourse as “precision operations,” “smart targeting,” or “counter-terrorist warfare.” New technologies have not only expanded the capacity for destruction; they have also contributed to concealing and normalizing new forms of state violence.
Behind these developments stands the enormous growth of the global military industry. Arms manufacturers, drone producers, artificial-intelligence developers, and private security contractors are among the principal beneficiaries of the current period. Just as capitalism has moved toward digitalization in production and services, warfare has become one of the most profitable fields of technological investment. A growing share of innovations in artificial intelligence, data mining, and network technologies is now directly integrated into military and security applications.
From this perspective, the new drone war in Lebanon is far more than a regional event. It forms part of a broader process in which the nature of warfare, repression, and state violence is being transformed. Temporary ceasefires may halt particular confrontations, but they are unlikely to stop this wider trend. Future wars will increasingly take the form of proxy operations, drone warfare, artificial intelligence, targeted assassinations, and prolonged wars of attrition.
These developments cannot be understood separately from the broader crisis of global capitalism. The same crisis that has placed economic systems, states, and social reproduction under growing pressure has also transformed warfare, turning it into part of capital’s attempt to manage its own contradictions. Under such conditions, opposition to war can no longer be reduced to resistance against a particular military conflict. It forms part of a broader struggle against militarism, the war economy, and the global order that continually reproduces this cycle of violence.
On the Political Platform of the Internationalist Workers’ Organization
The publication of the Political Platform of the Internationalist Workers’ Organization is not merely the publication of another political document. This platform appears at the beginning of a new phase in our theoretical and political activity and is the result of decades of theoretical work, research, and continuous involvement in the workers’ movement. Its fundamental concepts, political orientations, and general perspective are not the product of abstract reflection but the outcome of a long process of critical reassessment of the experiences of the workers’ and communist movements in Iran and internationally. For this reason, before turning to the platform itself, we consider it necessary to briefly explain its place within our activity and the path that led to its formulation.
The present platform is not the starting point of our work. Rather, it should be understood as a concise and systematic formulation of discussions, experiences, and efforts that have been developed over many years. A review of the literature, articles, and political positions published by the Internationalist Workers’ Organization shows that many of the themes contained in this platform have been addressed previously in different forms. What is new is that these elements have now been brought together within a more coherent framework and reformulated in relation to present conditions.
Over the years, our aim has been to develop and publish the results of these studies and discussions in the form of more extensive and independent works. Some of this material is already prepared, while other parts remain under development. Given our present limitations, however, a portion of these discussions is being published through journals, pamphlets, and now through this political platform.
Our theoretical and political activity is organized around four interconnected fields.
The first concerns the questions of knowledge, science, Marxist epistemology, the critique of official science, and the critique of the various traditions that claim the name of Marxism. We regard Marxism neither as an ideology nor as an academic doctrine, but as the science of class struggle. For this reason, the re-examination of the epistemological foundations of Marxism and the critique of academic Marxism and the defeated traditions of the communist movement occupy an important place in our work. These discussions will primarily be developed through Workers’ Knowledge Courier.
The second field concerns political theory, the historical crisis of capitalism, developments within the world system, class struggle, and the strategic questions facing the workers’ movement. These themes will mainly be addressed in Internationalist Courier.
The third field concerns workers’ organization, transformations in the structure of production, new forms of struggle, historical experiences of the workers’ movement, methods of organization, and the relationship between theory and revolutionary practice. These questions will mainly be explored through the Internationalist Pamphlets.
The fourth field concerns the analysis of current developments, political, economic, and social events in Iran and internationally, and intervention in contemporary political questions. This task is undertaken by Political Courier, whose regular publication has already begun. The other publications will gradually be introduced as circumstances permit.
The present platform should be understood as the point at which these four fields converge. It is not intended to replace the more extensive works that remain to be published, nor does it substitute for the broader theoretical discussions from which it emerged. Some of the articles published in the journals mentioned above may present condensed versions of particular aspects of these discussions, but the platform itself is only a concise political formulation of conclusions reached thus far.
We are also aware that not all of these discussions are equally accessible to all readers. In particular, questions concerning Marxist epistemology, the relationship between Marxism and official science, and the critique of the theoretical foundations of various Marxist traditions are inevitably more demanding than political commentary or current analysis. Yet these questions cannot be dismissed as merely philosophical or academic concerns. One of the consequences of the historical defeats of the workers’ movement has been the growing separation of theory from practice and the transformation of Marxism into a collection of ideological, academic, and sectarian tendencies. The return to the epistemological foundations of Marxism is therefore, for us, an integral part of the effort to reconstruct revolutionary politics.
What makes the publication of this platform necessary, however, is not merely a theoretical concern. We live in a period in which the crisis of capitalism has acquired a historical character. At the same time, the international workers’ movement continues to face a crisis of organization, a crisis of political perspective, and a crisis of class representation.
The social-democratic, Stalinist, nationalist, and reformist traditions have long since lost the capacity to provide an emancipatory perspective for the working class. Yet the problem is not limited to these traditions. Even Left Communism, which remains the most significant continuation of the internationalist perspective that emerged from the October Revolution, has faced serious difficulties over recent decades. Political isolation, increasing distance from the real movement of workers, a limited capacity to respond to the transformations of contemporary capitalism, and a degree of theoretical stagnation within parts of this tradition have restricted its ability to intervene effectively.
We consider ourselves part of the internationalist and anti-capitalist heritage of this tradition. At the same time, we believe that preserving a historical legacy is not sufficient. A world in which capitalism has undergone profound transformations, in which the structure of production has changed, and in which new forms of domination and resistance have emerged, requires theoretical development and critical reassessment as well. The reconstruction of proletarian internationalism therefore means not merely preserving the past but critically developing it and confronting the questions posed by the present.
A significant part of our theoretical, political, educational, and publishing activity is directed toward this objective. The present platform should be understood within this framework: not as the conclusion of a process, but as one step in the effort to reconstruct an independent, class-based, and internationalist politics under contemporary historical conditions.
We publish this platform as an invitation to discussion, criticism, cooperation, and participation. If it can contribute, however modestly, to reconnecting knowledge, class struggle, organization, and internationalist politics, it will have fulfilled its purpose.
Towards the Reconstruction of Proletarian Internationalism!
The political platform of the Internationalist Workers’ Organization, recently published, concludes with a slogan which, despite its simplicity, condenses the entire theoretical and political horizon of the document into a single formulation: “Towards the Reconstruction of Proletarian Internationalism!” But what exactly does this slogan mean? Does it simply refer to building closer relations among existing groups and organizations? Does it mean expanding transnational political networks, issuing joint statements, or creating new international organizations? Or does the question lie at a deeper level?
This article is an attempt to take a closer look at the content of this slogan and at the historical, theoretical, and political conditions that make it necessary. In our view, the present crisis of internationalism is not merely a crisis of organizational forms or a weakness in communication among revolutionary forces in different countries. Its roots lie in a historical process through which Marxism gradually moved away from its original position as the science of class struggle, while the living connection between theory and revolutionary praxis was progressively weakened.
From this standpoint, the reconstruction of proletarian internationalism cannot be understood simply as an organizational or propagandistic task. It is inseparably connected to the reconstruction of the relationship between Marxism and the real movement of the working class, the rebuilding of the capacity to understand and intervene in class struggle, and the recovery of Marxism as the science of revolutionary praxis. For this reason, the question of internationalism is approached here not primarily from the standpoint of relations between organizations, but from the standpoint of the relationship between knowledge, struggle, organization, and proletarian emancipation.
What is commonly described today as the crisis of internationalism is not merely the crisis of a few organizations, political networks, or ideological tendencies. Just as the contemporary crisis of capitalism is not simply an economic crisis, the crisis of internationalism cannot be reduced to weak links among revolutionary forces in different countries. Rather, it expresses a deeper historical rupture: the rupture between Marxism and revolutionary praxis.
In its origins, Marxism was neither a school of thought, nor an academic discipline, nor a political identity. Marxism was the theoretical form of the real movement of the working class. Its strength did not derive from the internal coherence of its concepts alone, but from its living connection to the actual struggles of workers. The same movement that built trade unions, created workers’ councils, organized strikes, and gave rise to the first forms of working-class internationalism also constituted the real foundation upon which Marxism developed.
For this reason, Marxism emerged as the science of class struggle. Science here does not mean the accumulation of data, nor the interpretation of texts. It means the capacity to understand the real dynamics of capitalist society and to identify the practical possibilities for intervention within them. Marx was neither an external educator of the working class nor the bearer of a truth to be transmitted to supposedly unconscious masses. Marxist theory itself was the product of the concentration, generalization, and development of real experiences of struggle.
The defeat of the first wave of the world revolution and the gradual separation of theory from the real movement of workers transformed this relationship. Marxism increasingly ceased to function as the science of class struggle and became a collection of traditions, schools, identities, and discourses. As a result, what had once served as an instrument of understanding and intervention was progressively transformed into an object of interpretation, education, and ideological reproduction.
This transformation was not merely a theoretical matter. Whenever theory becomes separated from praxis, it gradually loses its capacity to comprehend reality itself. A theory that no longer develops within the living process of struggle progressively loses its ability to understand the transformations of capitalism, to recognize new forms of struggle, and to identify emerging possibilities for organization. Under such conditions, the crisis of knowledge becomes a crisis of strategy.
The results of this process can be observed throughout much of the contemporary left. Political activity is often reduced to issuing statements, producing media content, selling publications, or reproducing political identities. Yet the central question is not the production of content, but the production of knowledge of struggle. What is required is a form of knowledge capable of identifying the real contradictions of workplaces, the new forms of exploitation, the points where social discontent is concentrated, and the possibilities for organization that emerge from them.
Marxism as the science of class struggle finds its meaning precisely at this point. Such knowledge is not produced in libraries or on social media platforms. Just as capitalism itself is produced and reproduced in factories, offices, schools, hospitals, and global networks of production, the knowledge of struggle can only emerge through a living connection with these processes. Every strike, every workers’ network, every experience of organization, and every attempt to alter the balance of forces constitutes a moment within this broader process of producing knowledge.
From this perspective, the decisive issue is neither the number of members, nor the size of an audience, nor the reach of social media networks. What matters is the capacity of a political current to learn from real struggles and transform those experiences into collective knowledge. A relatively small group, guided by such an approach, may contribute to organizing resistance in different workplaces, force employers to retreat, and strengthen workers’ confidence in their own collective power. At the same time, a much larger organization with hundreds of members may limit itself to publishing newspapers and commenting on events without developing any meaningful relationship with the actual movement of the class.
At this point, the distinction between two different conceptions of internationalism becomes clear. Internationalism is not simply communication among groups, the exchange of statements, or the construction of transnational political networks. Internationalism acquires real meaning only when the experiences of struggle, organization, and resistance developed by workers in different parts of the world can be transformed into a shared source of knowledge and collective power. Without such a connection, internationalism is reduced to an abstract and formal principle, just as Marxism itself can be reduced to an abstract discourse detached from the realities of class struggle.
For this reason, the reconstruction of proletarian internationalism requires, above all, the reconstruction of the relationship between theory and praxis. Neither a return to old formulas, nor the reproduction of established political identities, nor the mere expansion of media activity is capable, by itself, of overcoming the present crisis. What is required is a return to Marxism as the science of class struggle—a science that develops within the course of real struggles, learns from them, generalizes their lessons, and returns those lessons to the movement itself.
Only through such a process can internationalism move beyond the level of relations among circles, groups, and political milieus, and once again become the political expression of the real movement of the international working class. This is neither a purely theoretical task nor a purely organizational one. It is the central question confronting any attempt to reconstruct proletarian politics in our time.
