Russia - July 4th, 2018

In the Russia of Putin, the gendarme of imperialism and murderous of the Syrian masses ...

WHILE THE WORKERS WIN THE STREETS IN DEFENSE OF THEIR RETIREMENTS, THE WORKERS OF THE STEEL PLANT " RED OCTOBER " COME OUT TO FIGHT

Putin, strengthened in his role as gendarme of the peoples of Eurasia after massacring the Syrian masses with the dog Al Assad, on behalf of imperialism, is applying an attack against the whole of the Russian working class, which is the envy of any bourgeois.

 After 4 years of recession (2014-2017), the economy of the former workers state is in crisis, because of trade sanctions and embargoes imposed by imperialism, by the fall in oil prices and the 1.2 billion dollars in armament that imperialism made him pay in the war in Syria. The trade war by which the imperialist powers are fighting for now, markets and areas of influence, and Russia and China in particular, deepens the crisis. The so-called "steel war" hits squarely in Russia and Putin seeks to offload the costs of the crisis on the masses so that they are the ones who pay.
 Putin is the best guarantee that imperialism has to pass its attacks against the Russian working class, as was demonstrated by the massacre carried out by this assassin on account of imperialism against the Syrian workers who rose up with the masses of the Maghreb and Middle East against hunger and oppression; and the submission and sold out of the revolution in the Donbass with the Minsk pacts, leaving Ukraine to be split, bled and plundered by imperialism. It is that these actions of the hitman Putin against the international revolution, create better conditions to undertake greater attacks against the Russian workers.
A huge sample of this is that now seek to impose a reform in the pension system to raise the age of retirements from 55 to 63 years for women and from 60 to 65 years for men (that with the Russian hope of life means that more than 40% will never be able to retire). This fierce attack provoked the hatred of all the workers and exploited who won the streets in defense of their retirements. And although they could not demonstrate in Moscow and St. Petersburg, because there the government has banned protests for the World Cup-and this is guaranteed by repression and jail, Putin could not prevent the mobilizations were massive in dozens of other cities of the country like Komsomolsk, Omsk and Khabarovsk.

 Meanwhile, the attack that the employer of "Red October" launched against the workers, with dismissals, suspensions, salary reduction and unpaid wages, confirms that the crisis reached the Russian arms industry. This is not minor, since Russia is the second largest exporter of conventional weapons in the world, but has low labor productivity due to lack of investment.
 On June 7, in Volgograd (formerly Stalingrad), the workers of the "Red October" steel plant were outraged and went on strike due to the reduction of their salaries. For months, the employers had been delaying wage payments and made them more flexible by dividing them between a fixed and a variable half consisting of premiums that depend on the level of income of the company.
The management of the factory, used the government order to stop or reduce steel production during the World Cup and from 25 May to 25 July the electric arc furnace No. 2 is completely stopped, whose workers are in suspension condition and their salaries reduced by half. Only sectors that produce special steels for the armament industry continue to work, such as the armored steel for the "Armata" battle tanks, but their workers only have the promise of receiving two thirds of salary, going from 22 thousand rubles to 15 thousand rubles (about 240 dollars) because the company claims that it get not profit in May. And additionally there is a massive dismissal plan underway that threatens more than three thousand jobs among a total of approximately 5,200 workers.

Before these wage attacks, more than 1,500 workers who were in the factory, started the strike saying: We will not work for a few cents! And they summoned the factory directive: "or they give us back our money by returning wages to a normal level, or tomorrow all the workers will not come to work." But the union bureaucracy expropriated the strike - which they had not even summoned and drafted a petition to Putin's government in order to sow false illusions in the workers that their rights will be defended by that gendarme of capitalism in Eurasia.
  In Putin's Russia the most brutal attack on the working class is carried out, with workers who do not receive their salary as in Zimbabwe, with a labor flexibilization worse than what Macri wants to impose in Argentina and a plan to steal the pension fund increasing the retirement age. And as if this were not enough, on January 23, 2016, with a 50% devaluation, the bourgeoisie took half of their salary from the working class. And today, the minimum wage of Russian workers is at $ 165, just above that of the Ukrainian workers, remaining among the worst payments in Europe. Thus the situation of the working class of Russia is comparable to that of the workers of the colonies and semi-colonies.
 But the workers are showing that they can and want to fight for their rights, even though throughout Russia the Moscow oligarchy has imposed a regime of terror where censorship, prohibition and repression of strikes rule and you can go to prison and be prosecuted even by porting a protest poster in the street.
 This strike of the Red October workers is another example of the tendency to enter into combat of the central battalions of the proletariat of the former workers' states, such as the workers of the Renault of Romania who in 2009 rose up shouting "We want to receive wages like the workers of the French Renault!, or like the miners of Ukraine who were their most advanced detachment who rose up in defense of their jobs with the cry of "We want the USSR to return!"
The metalworkers need to join forces throughout Europe to face the war of the imperialist transnationals. The proletariat needs the Russian working class that is once again called to play a decisive role in the arena of the struggle of the world working class.

"RED OCTOBER": A HISTORICAL STEEL

 The "Red October" steel plant, located in the city of Volgograd, was named after the Russian proletarian revolution. Its workers participated prominently in this historic event, just like the rest of the Russian metalworkers.
 During the Nazi invasion, its workers formed volunteer detachments to defend it and the factory became the scene of the most bloody combats of the Battle of Stalingrad. After the war, this factory was rebuilt and became Russia's second steelmaker by volume of production helping decisively in the reconstruction of the USSR.
But the former Stalinist bureaucracy that restored capitalism, became a new bourgeoisie, and handed over the USSR putting the economy at the feet of the IMF and Citibank, privatized this and many other factories.
 Currently "Red October" is owned by Dimitri Gerasimenko, a bourgeois of Ukrainian origin who, by participating in the business of the arms industry and the production of pipes for the transport of Russian gas to imperialist Europe, is linked to the oligarchy of Moscow.

JACOBO GARCÍA