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Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Dec. 25, 1997
issue of Workers World newspaper
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Editorial: Signs of war

Is the Pentagon gearing up to launch a new war? What else could be the meaning of the Dec. 15 announcement that every member of the U.S. military will be vaccinated against anthrax?

This vaccination is believed by some to have contributed to the suffering of Gulf War veterans.

In the United States, the media hacks have done their well-paid job. They’re told to sell the anthrax story as another in their continuing series of reports demonizing Iraq. And that’s just what they’ve done.

But in the rest of the world, the thinking is very different. The rest of the world is aware that the biggest stores of chemical and biological weapons are in the United States. Since no country has ever used biological weapons in warfare and there are no known or proven stores of anthrax weapons anywhere—why is the Pentagon doing this right now?

Around the world the number-one question is: Where is the Pentagon planning to attack? Is the Pentagon considering using anthrax weapons itself? Is that why U.S. troops are being vaccinated?

As the world’s dominant imperialist power, the United States has swaggered around the globe, attacking whenever and wherever it wanted. The Pentagon even issued a directive in 1992 that warned all countries—particularly its imperialist rivals in Western Europe and Japan—that it would crush any challenges to U.S. domination. That directive remains the Pentagon’s operating orders.

Working-class, anti-war forces must stay on the alert. Capitalist economic chaos, such as the current crisis in Southeast Asia, bring the forces of militarist adventurism in the imperialist powers to the fore. Such madness can only be checked by the united action of all opponents to imperialist war.

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