Chapter 10: The Vanguard Party Is Not What You Think It Is: Part IV

Broadly speaking, the military-industrial complex defected from the Democrats and became bipartisan sometime during the Southern Strategy in the 60s, as the GOP became less isolationist and more supportive of the imperialist wars that drove its bottom line. The military-industrial complex was created by massive war spending under FDR and Truman, and the Republican Eisenhower warned us against it in his parting speech. But it still operates as the classic Democrat interest to this day: bloated, inefficient, and wasteful. Typical Republican horror stories about contractors getting paid $600 to sell the government a toilet seat apply here. Military spending is sacrosanct because support the troops, don'cha know, and all kinds of bougie interests can and do weasel their way to the front of that trough.

But the gun manufacturers, who were like the Rockefellers based in the Northeast, had traditionally been Republicans, and as the culture wars intensified that loyalty grew. Groups like the NRA, though they began as an honest gun enthusiast club, are now largely funded by and represent the interests of the gun manufacturing lobby. Their strong Republicanism has been a constant since the days of Lincoln. Though they are as corrupt as any other corporate interest, and bend their gun lobbying to the will of the rich, by and large their core interest in the biggest possible gun market coincides with our interests to resist any "attempt to disarm the working class, by force if necessary," to quote Karl Marx.

The last of these industries to mention is the fossil fuels industry. That was only beginning to (heh) pick up steam during the Civil War, and only the crudest and most easily-transported forms of it, like coal. Petroleum was only commercially exploited as fuel in the late 1800s. But the timing and geography of the first major discoveries of coal and oil in America guaranteed these industries would be birthed under Republican stewardship, and they've clung to mommy's skirts ever since. It's not known for it nowadays outside of vestigal brand names like Pennzoil, but Pennsylvania was the birthplace of the oil industry, even moreso than Texas. The first discovery of domestic petroleum was in Oil Creek, Pennsylvania in 1859 - the year before the Civil War began. The idea of shipping petroleum in uniformly-sized barrels was birthed in that same town in Pennsylvania, and we still measure oil production in those barrels today (Samuel T. Pees, "Oil History," http://www.petroleumhistory.org/OilHistory/pages/Barrels/standardization.html). The birth of that industry has a ready-made comparison for modern readers: the birth of the natural gas fracking industry in that very same state, often from the very same long-exhausted deposits that once produced the oil. And like the rest of the Northeast, Pennsylvania was a solidly Republican state in those days.

Coal was discovered in spades in the Appalachians soon after the war. The aforementioned Pennsylvania, the state of West Virginia full of ancestral Celts who had rebelled against their former bougie masters and kept loyal to Lincoln and the Union, and the state of Kentucky, that glorious pack of Southerners that helped us elect Lincoln, were all hotbeds of mining activity. Pennsylvania was Republican, West Virginia was Republican with a chip on its shoulder about it, and Kentucky was the most Republican state in the South outside of Arkansas. Later on, more coal finds would be made in southern Illinois, in the literal districts represented by both Lincoln and Obama (yes kids, Captain Roll Back The Sea is full of dirty, dirty coal money just like his Republican opponents; don't believe his hype), and Wyoming. All of these areas were staunchly Republican, both then and now.

It is my opinion that all these bougie industries accidentally serve communist interests while purposely serving their craven corporate interests. In the case of the gun industry, we need the workers armed, so we need it to exist and to keep selling weapons to American citizens. Ideally, this and every other industry mentioned here would be collectivized, but in the current material conditions, the status quo will do.

One day, after the civil war brings us to power, we will inherit every weapon American imperialism ever built. The vast majority of these weapons are not being put to use, but are stockpiled in a facility in the Mojave Desert, and have been there ever since Ronnie Raygun put them there in case the Russkies invaded. Most of this military-industrial complex spending, at least the parts of it that lead to actual weapons of war being built, just goes towards making that stockpile bigger. I expect America's first communist government will be the first ones to dip into that stockpile, so if American imperialism wants to arm our future revolution harder, I'm basically fine with that. Big-project spending on military hardware by American capitalists is basically agnostic or mildly helpful to our interests; only spending earmarked for particular imperialist conflicts ought to be fought to the bitter end in Congress.

The fossil fuel industry is accidentally creating a more socialist world. Every other communist I talk to feels pushed towards the necessity of revolution by the impending climate crisis. We have less than a lifetime to stabilize the planetary climate, or we all will face a reckoning of Biblical proportions. The capitalist system drives this climate destruction, and prevents anything serious being done to mitigate it. Even when capitalism puts on its Super Serious Face and signs the Paris Accords with itself, the goals on paper aren't enough, even if they were being implemented faithfully everywhere, which they aren't. I can count on the bloodthirsty bougies at ExxonMobil to scare up a proper resistance to their greed more than I can ever count on some Paris Accords to stop them.

But it's more than that. If the fossil fuel companies are in bed with the Republican Party and we take it over, then we will have leverage to get them to reroute or disband pipelines going through Native territory, leverage we currently do not possess. If we have the power to give them massive profits if only they do this one weird trick, and that one weird trick is dismantling Keystone XL, they will slap on hippie costumes and break it apart with their own soulless hands.

Furthermore, any considerations about carbon emissions will temporarily go out the window during the civil war. Unless we win, even at the cost of emitting whatever is necessary to do that, the world will continue to be under the economic logic of capitalism which forces the carbon emissions. We can plan and execute a rapid decarbonization program after the civil war, but will have to first win that civil war to do so. We will be well served by having the fossil fuel infrastructure on our military's side during the coming civil war. That is the simple military fact of the matter. It is the difference between our front lines being supplied by railroad, airplane, and semi truck, or by horse. At least in the short term, these are bougie interests from which we should be buying rope.

Continue reading Part V