History Is Marching

H I S T O R Y I S M A R C H I N G
History is Marching (2018)

Written and narrated by James Bell
Editing and image writing by Alex Bushell
[Black screen. CAPTION fades in.]

CAPTION: What we may be witnessing is not just the end of
the Cold War, or the passing of a particular
period of postwar history, but the end of history
as such: that is, the end point of mankind's
ideological evolution and the universalization
of Western liberal democracy as the final form
of human government.
Francis Fukuyama, The End of History? (1989)
[CAPTION fades out. Fade to image of the Soviet flag being
lowered. Cut to CAPTION 2 on a black background with a music
cue.]
CAPTION 2: This is a film about crisis, war and revolution.
[Cut to footage of Brexit referendum results.]
DIMBLEBY: Well, at 20 minutes to five we can now say the
decision taken in 1975 by this country to join
the common market has been reversed by this
referendum to leave the EU.
[Cut to footage of Donald Trump victory speech.]
PENCE: So let me say it is my high honour and distinct
privilege to introduce to you the President elect
of the United States of America, Donald Trump.
[Trump appears, with music swelling in the background. Cut to
drone footage of destroyed Syrian landscapes. It speeds up
rapidly as the music continues. Cut to black.]
NARRATOR: The world is changing.
[Cut to a montage of the events being discussed by the NARRATOR.]
NARRATOR: Since Britain’s vote to leave the European Union
and the election of Donald Trump as President of
the United States in 2016, all that was certain
in world politics has evaporated into air. The
political relationships between major western
nations are becoming antagonistic, with
disagreements over trade between the US, Canada
and the European Union resulting in increasingly
aggressive political confrontations. The
belligerence of US foreign policy under Trump
threatens to shatter the long-standing alliance
between these nations.
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Even as these tensions play out, the west is

openly preparing itself for confrontation with
Russia and China. Along Russia’s western border,
the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation – or NATO
– has a military line running from Estonia to
Poland under the name Enhanced Forward Presence.
Described as a deterrent, this line is the
largest force stationed in Europe since the end
of the so-called “Cold War”, armed to the teeth
with the latest military equipment and primed for
a rapid attack. China is similarly encircled,
with over 400 US military bases surrounding its
borders. These military nooses are complemented
by an ongoing campaign of diplomatic and economic
aggression, with Russia and China the target of
sanctions and diplomatic expulsions.
To put things bluntly: we stand upon the
precipice of a global confrontation. In economic
and political terms, the world cannot be
maintained in the way that it has been. In this
film, we will look at the causes of this
confrontation and the political strategies of
those western powers that stand at its heart.
This is not an idle task. Rather, it is intended
to pose a question. As the world heads closer and
closer toward the kind of inordinate bloodletting
that characterised the first and second world
war, we must ask how it may be prevented.
[Cut to CAPTION 3.]
CAPTION 3: HISTORY IS MARCHING
[Fade to CAPTION 4.]
CAPTION 4: PART ONE:
IMPERIALISM, THE HIGHEST STAGE OF CAPITALISM
[TITLE CARD 2 fades to black. Fade to footage of the New York
Stock Exchange.]
NARRATOR: In order to make sense of the events shaking
world politics, we first need to understand
something fundamental about our society. Our
world is dominated by the social system of
capitalist imperialism.
[Cut to slowed and distorted footage of Iraq war.]
NARRATOR: What is imperialism? Many of us would recognise
its more visible symptoms as naked attempts to
secure power or resources for wealthy nations –
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for example, the 2003 Iraq war. However,

observing this power grab is not enough to get
to the heart of the matter. No society can be
understood simply in terms of the blood it has
spilt, no matter how deep those rivers may run.
If we wish to understand the essential and
defining characteristics of a social system, we
must look beyond its appearance and attempt to
understand the basis of how it functions.
[Cut to black and white footage of factory workers. Montage
using black and white footage where appropriate. Include brief
flashes of gothic imagery (skulls, bodies etc) throughout this
section.]
NARRATOR: Imperialism is a form of capitalism, thus we must
begin by approaching how capitalism functions in
general. This is precisely the task undertaken
by the revolutionary philosopher Karl Marx, most
clearly in his famous Das Kapital. Whilst
capitalism is often described as the existence
of a free market, this definition tells us
nothing about how it functions. The scientific
and historical approach offered in Capital
provides a far more complete picture than this.
In Marx’s analysis, capitalism is commodity
production at its highest stage of development,
when even human labour-power itself becomes a
commodity. Crucially, this production is
organised through the relations of private
property. The bourgeoisie (or capitalist class)
who own machines, factories, land and wealth
invest in production to gather commodities they
may sell at a profit. In contrast, the
proletariat (or working class) have nothing to
sell save for their own ability to work, known
as labour-power. As such, the working class sell
their labour-power to the capitalist class in the
form of waged labour.
This relationship is one of exploitation. In
examining the commodity, Marx asks a very simple
question which reveals this. To paraphrase, “why
is it that a certain number of candles are worth
the same amount as a coat, or several pairs of
socks the same amount as a chicken? What do any
commodities hold in common?” The answer cannot
be found in the properties of the commodity
itself. Candles are not comparable to coats in
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how they are used, nor can one of these uses be

said to be more valuable than the other. In fact,
the only thing that these commodities hold in
common is that they are all products of human
labour. As such, the value of a commodity is
determined by the quantity of socially averaged
labour it takes to produce. For profit to be
derived from commodity production, the
capitalist class must pay the working class less
in wages than their labour produces.
This exploitation is not necessarily achieved by
a sleight of hand or by underpaying the workers
but, rather, by the logic of commodity exchange
itself. As the working class sell their labour-
power as a commodity, its value is determined by
what it takes to reproduce. In other words, the
value of a worker’s ability to work is determined
by the food, shelter, transport etcetera required
to get them back to work the next day. What is
unique to labour-power as a commodity is that it
produces more value than it costs to reproduce.
This is the source of profit. The relationship
of exploitation between proletariat and
bourgeoisie is what Marx terms productive or
industrial capital. It is the only form of
capital which produces new value.
As capitalism develops, it tends toward periodic
crises in industry and in politics. This is a
result of what Marx terms the historical tendency
of the rate of profit to fall. To expand
production and remain competitive on the free
market, the capitalist class are forced to
attempt to increase the productivity of the
workers they employ. This is achieved by
investing in more and more productive machinery.
However, these increases only provide temporary
competitive benefits to individual capitalists
or firms. As productivity averages across an
industry the value of the commodities being sold
declines as they require less socially averaged
labour-power to produce. As such, an ever-greater
proportion of the capitalists’ investment is
taken up by investment in machinery and its
maintenance, and an ever-smaller proportion
rendered as profit. As the amount of profit
relative to capital invested declines,
investments no longer appear profitable. This
5
leads to the hoarding of money, known to Marx as

overaccumulation, and a breakdown in production
as no profitable investments can be found. Crises
follow. This is an absolute process: the rate of
profit has an historical tendency to fall toward
zero.
To Marx, therefore, capitalism is a class society
organised to meet the needs of profit
accumulation. The stratification of society into
the extortionately wealthy and the dispossessed
is not an accident or a mistake of policy, but a
fundamental need of capitalist society. Whilst
competition between capitalists leads to
advancements in technology, these same
technological advances cause it to break down,
leading to economic deprivation, gross
inequality and enormous violence. This cannot be
controlled or fixed whilst capitalism continues
to exist.
[Cut to black and white footage of skyscrapers, banks etc.
Montage using black and white footage as appropriate.]
NARRATOR: By the beginning of the 20th Century capitalism
had clearly developed beyond the parameters of
the free market. Rather than the competition
between individual capitalist enterprises which
had, in general, characterised capitalism’s
development previously, the major capitalist
nations tended toward economies dominated by
monopoly. Many authors and theorists began to
discuss this development under the term
“imperialism”, notably the English economist
J.A. Hobson in 1902 and the Austrian Marxist
Rudolf Hilferding in 1910. However, these
explanations failed to grasp the full
significance of imperialism’s development. It
fell to the Russian Marxist and revolutionary
Vladimir Lenin to provide a clear and concrete
definition of the phenomenon in his 1916
pamphlet, Imperialism, the Highest Stage of
Capitalism.
Lenin begins his definition of imperialism by an
analysis of the formation of monopolies. After
describing the emergence of monopolies in the US,
Germany and Britain, Lenin develops Marx’s
understanding that the free market leads toward
an ever-increasing concentration of production.
6
As capitalism develops, production concentrates

in the hands of those capitalist enterprises
which have managed to compete successfully. Over
time they become larger and their influence
greater. Due to the enormous amount of capital
employed by these industries, it becomes ever
more difficult to gather the resources necessary
to launch new enterprises capable of competing
with them. This scale also allows for the
combination of different industries, so one
capitalist enterprise may deal in both the
processing of raw materials and the production
of manufactured goods. Cartels form between the
largest enterprises, enabling them fix prices and
the quantity of goods to be produced, or to
divide markets and profits between themselves.
Competition between small and large industries
vanishes. Instead, the monopolists asphyxiate
those that do not submit to their will.
Competition thus grows into monopoly.
The emergence of monopoly has a specific
relevance to the role of the banks in capitalist
society. In the earlier stages capitalist
development, the banks were but humble middlemen
for the making of payments. However, just as
competition leads to a concentration of
production in the hands of individual capitalist
enterprises, so too does competition produce a
concentration of capital in the hands of the
banks. As more and more capital is deposited in
the banks, their power increases. The industrial
capitalists are made reliant upon the banks in
order to gain access to capital. In turn, the
banks can ascertain exactly the financial
position of various capitalists, control them
and, ultimately, entirely determine their fate.
Lenin describes this as the coalescence, or
merging, of banking and industrial capital,
transforming them into finance capital. As such,
the epoch of imperialism is one in which the
domination of society by capital in general is
replaced by the domination of finance capital.
In class terms, this means that the dominant
class of imperialist society is no longer the
bourgeoisie in general, but specifically those
who own the banks – a financial oligarchy.
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The development of monopoly in industry and

monopoly associations in the banks leads to a
change in the form of exports produced by a
nation. Whereas the earlier stages of capitalist
development typically relied upon the export of
goods in international trade, imperialist
nations typically export capital – that is,
investment. This is a consequence of
overaccumulation in the imperialist nations. Put
simply, the development of enormous industries
in the imperialist nations leads toward a falling
rate of profit and, consequently, a lack of
profitable investments within these nations. The
resulting surplus of capital is then exported and
invested in less developed nations where wages
and land prices are lower. As the owners of this
investment, the imperialists are generally able
to agree loan terms that favour the investors.
As such, the relationship between oppressed and
oppressor nations under colonialism is
transformed only superficially. Instead the
“old” form of exploitation, under which the
capitalists used their empires to secure raw
materials for production at home, imperialism
favours a form of exploitation based upon usury
capital. This is known as superexploitation.
The consequence of this export of capital is
simple: over time the world is entirely divided
between capitalist associations. International
cartels form and negotiate the division of
territories and profits between themselves. Once
enough capital has been exported, this results
in the complete division of the world between
great powers – that is, those imperialists
dominant in the world economy. Once such a
division of the world has been achieved, capital
stagnates, unable to find profitable investments
across the sphere of the globe. Now, only a
redivision of the world between competing
imperialist powers is possible. The consequences
of such a redivision were revealed to the world
in a torrent of blood during the first and second
world wars.
[Cut to footage of world war one soldiers “going over the top”.
A single gunshot is heard as they walk into mist. Fade to black.]
[Fade in to ground level footage of Times Square, New York.]
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NARRATOR: Times Square, New York. A labyrinth of glittering

billboards rises into Manhattan night, forming a
delirious canopy. Here, the domination of
monopolies is not only evident, it is exalted in
a never ceasing dance of light and image. The
gaudy cathedrals of US imperialism hold this
space in thrall. At their feet, a river of
humanity is cast in shadow.
[Cut to aerial footage of Times Square.]
NARRATOR: Though many claim that the analysis of capitalism
offered by Marx and Lenin is outmoded or
incorrect, it is increasingly relevant. Today,
the system of capitalist imperialism is much the
same as it was in Lenin’s time. The world wars
did not secure lasting peace between the world’s
great imperialist powers, but merely a temporary
reprieve.
[Cut to black. CAPTION 5 fades in.]
CAPTION 5: PART TWO:
THE POST WAR BOOM, “GLOBALISATION” AND GREAT
POWER COMPETITION
[Fade in to drone footage of the Tyne cot cemetery in Belgium.
Keep natural sound effects for a while. Fade interview sound in.
Montage between world war one and world war two graveyards.]
JACK CAMPBELL: Now, I’m talking about 1914 and the winter of
1914-15. You couldn’t say we were living in the
sense of the word. It was sheer punishment.
RICHARD TOBIN: You don’t look, you see. You don’t hear, you
listen. Your nose is filled with fumes and death.
You taste the top of your mouth. [Inaudible.] The
veneer of civilisation is dropped away.
RAY WILTON: We were told it is expected 50% casualties.
Part of your thoughts is self-preservation and
unfortunately self-preservation is always at a
cost of somebody else.
There’s always a memory of a couple of lads who
hit the beach of just… They’d gone down. Whether
they got up I don’t know.
[Cut to aerial footage of ruined huts in Auschwitz.]
LYDIA TISHLA: We arrived in the middle of the night. In
Auschwitz you could smell the fear. You really
could smell it. And we had to go through
selection, I mean we didn’t know it was selection
9
but that’s what it was. Mengele, whom you may

have heard, was standing there and he looked at
you then sent you to the left or to the right.
The left was the side for living and the right
was the side for gas.
[Cut to footage of MR KRONEFELD.]
MR KRONEFELD: I must admit, as an ordinary man, that I’m glad
that’s behind us. And I’m sure that the
generation or generations that follow us will
never again do something so utterly pointless,
because now we know what it’s like. We’ve waged
war twice now, particularly France and Germany.
We have no reason to be proud of that. I sincerely
hope, when I at last close my eyes, that there
will never again be such a conflict.
[Cut to black with a piano note.]
[Fade in to timelapse of poppies opening.]
NARRATOR: The political and economic alliances that
characterised the beginning of the 21st Century
grew from the blood, rubble and ashes of the
world wars. The redivision of territories between
great powers was complete, with the United States
taking the mantle as the dominant power of the
imperialist world. As a direct consequence of the
wars’ destruction, capital found new life.
[Cut to montage of European cities destroyed during WW2.]
NARRATOR: The exceptional economic period following the war
is known as the post war boom. The crisis of
overaccumulation and profitability that had
predicated the wars was temporarily undone by
their violence. Across Europe and Japan, huge
swathes of crisis-ridden capital were destroyed
in an avalanche of bombs and bullets. This
allowed for profitable reinvestment in the
construction of new factories, new machinery and
new enterprises. Technologies developed in the
process of redividing the world allowed for a far
higher rate of productivity than those that had
been destroyed, increasing the amount of value
produced and profit derived from reinvestment.
The immense devaluation of currencies during the
war ensured that the money capital required to
invest in these areas was cheap and a steady flow
of investment possible. Just as a flower grows
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best in the compost of its dead brothers, capital

grew well among the graves of its former self.
[Cut to footage of fascist Germany, fascist Italy and fascist
Japan.]
NARRATOR: Fascism also aided in the construction of the
post war boom. Whilst it claims to be many
things, the political meaning of fascism is very
simple: it is the raw, uncloaked barbarity of
capitalist society. In Germany and Italy this is
very clear. Rather than coming to power upon the
basis of its own energy or class, fascism was
aided into power by the capitalist class for the
purpose of suppressing the powerful workers’
movements which arose in these nations during the
inter-war period. It obliged to this purpose
dutifully, destroying trade unions and violently
dispersing working-class organisations. The
consequences of this repression for the post war
period were low wages and a working class so
exhausted that resistance to such an increased
rate of exploitation was all but impossible.
[Cut to footage of the Soviet Union.]
NARRATOR: The dark clouds that encircled the earth between
1914 and 1945 were not, however, immovable. Light
first pierced their canopy in 1917, with the
victory of the Bolshevik revolution in Russia and
the formation of the Soviet Union – the world’s
first socialist state. By 1945, socialism had
spread far into Europe. Whilst the USSR was by
no means perfect, and its excesses of violence
and mistakes of political economy must be learnt
from, it represented the most powerful force of
resistance to imperialism that the world had ever
seen. The political threat posed by the communist
world was not simply that of the destruction of
one imperialist nation’s capital, but the
destruction of capital entirely. Further, it gave
enormous support to anti-imperialist and anti-
colonialist movements across the globe, which
directly threatened the ability of imperialist
capital to expand into oppressed nations.
[Cut to footage of Washington in 1945.]
NARRATOR: The combination of these factors led to the
formation of an alliance between imperialist
powers, with the US at its head. Economically
11
this formation was of the same substance as the

international capitalist associations which had
formed during the initial division of the world
between imperialists. Using a combination of
capital exports and financial aid to European
states, the US both secured its dominance and
brought about a general increase in the rate of
profit. Profits were divided between the
imperialists according to their relative
competitive positions in the world market. The
alliance gained a military expression with the
formation of NATO in 1949.
[Cut to footage of European capitals.]
NARRATOR: However, competition between these powers
continued to operate even through this alliance.
The most significant expression of this was the
formation of the European Economic Community –
or EEC – in 1957. Introduced by the Treaty of
Rome, the EEC brought Belgium, France, Italy,
Luxembourg, the Netherlands and the German
Federal Republic into a common market and a
customs union. Although these moves were
initially supported by US imperialism, they were
brought about by the collective need of mainland
Europe to band together in order to remain able
to compete with the US. As such, it laid the
basis for what would become one of the US’
largest competitors – that is, the European
Union.
[Cut to montage of cities being built (timelapse).]
NARRATOR: As the post war boom was brought about by the
destruction of the wars, it clearly could not
last forever. The destruction of masses of
capital during the war laid the ground for new
capital investment and a return to profitability.
However, as this new capital accumulated, it laid
the basis for a future crash. Sure enough, by
1974 the post war boom had ended and capitalism
returned to crisis, with Britain, the US and
Japan all recording negative GDP growth – a trend
that continues to this day. This return to crisis
conditions marked the beginning of an economic
period known to many bourgeois academics as
“neoliberal globalisation”. Its promises were
nothing less than the creation of ‘one global,
borderless, stateless market’.
12
[Cut to black.]
NARRATOR: This was a lie.
[Cut to THATCHER outside Downing Street.]
THATCHER: Where there is discord, may we bring harmony;
where there is error, may we bring truth; where
there is doubt, may we bring faith; where there
is despair, may we bring hope.
[Cut to REAGAN inauguration.]
REAGAN: The economic ills we suffer have come upon us
over several decades. They will not go away in
days, weeks or months, but they will go away.
They will go away because we as Americas have the
capacity now, as we’ve had in the past, to do
whatever needs to be done to preserve this last
and greatest bastion of freedom. In this present
crisis, government is not the solution to our
problem: government is the problem.
[Cut to footage of PINOCHET declaring military rule.]
PINOCHET: The armed forces have acted today solely from the
patriotic inspiration of saving the country from
the tremendous chaos into which it was being
plunged by the Marxist government of Salvador
Allende. The Junta will maintain judicial power
and consultantship of the Public Accounts
Control. The Chambers will remain in recess until
further orders. That is all.
[Cut to flaming Chilean building. Cut to Santiago Stadium
footage.]
NARRATOR: This is the National Stadium in Santiago de
Chile. For nearly two months after the CIA backed
coup against the anti-imperialist, socialist-
leaning Allende government on 11 September, 1973,
it served as a concentration camp. Over 12,000
working class people, trade unionists and
immigrants were interned here over those two
months. They were beaten, integrated, tortured
and shot whilst Chile’s capitalist class
celebrated with champagne parties. Though the
official statistics say that only 47 people were
murdered, truly, it is unknown how many died
here. It said that many people were shot and
wounded, then dragged away to be murdered
elsewhere. And so it is that they rest, forever
entombed in anonymity.
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[Cut to aerial footage of the University of Chicago.]

NARRATOR: The economic policy of Pinochet’s rule was not
designed in Chile but here, in the Economics
Department of the University of Chicago. During
the 1950s, the Department operated not only as a
school, but self-consciously as a school of
thought. The school was vehemently opposed to the
state welfare systems that had formed in most of
the world’s imperialist powers after the end of
the second world war. Though these structures
were far from socialist, funded by the
breadcrumbs of colonial and imperialist
exploitation, they prevented certain areas of the
economy from being opened for private investment.
The Department’s students and graduates – known
as the Chicago boys – marched as an intellectual
army, arguing for a “pure capitalism” free of any
government regulations, trade barriers or
entrenched interests. At the head of this army
was the economist Milton Friedman. Chile was his
test lab.
[Cut to montage of FRIEDMAN speaking on his relationship to
PINOCHET.]
FRIEDMAN: Chile was a case in which a military regime,
headed by Pinochet, was willing to switch the
organisation of the economy from top-down to a
bottom-up performance. And in that process a
group of people, who had been trained at the
University of Chicago in the Department of
Economics, who came to be called the Chicago
boys, played a major role in designing and
implementing the economic reforms.
FRIEDMAN: So, I was not an advisor to Pinochet, I was not
an advisor to the Chilean government, but I am
more than willing to share in the credit in the
extraordinary test job that our students did down
there.
[Cut to raw footage of 11 September coup.]
NARRATOR: Friedman not only believed dogmatically in the
sanctity of the market, he thought he knew how
to get there: shock therapy. The idea behind this
term is that by stimulating an economic
contraction by mass privatisation, sell-offs and
the removal of trade barriers, it is possible to
change the behaviour of a nation, forcing wages
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and prices to stagnate. Then, the logic of “pure”

capitalism asserts itself, creating a “nation of
owners”. Pinochet’s dictatorship allowed
Friedman a chance to test this theory. The result
was dire for the Chilean working class, with
unemployment increasing tenfold and Chile’s
industrial sector contracting to a size around
that it had been during the second world war. For
US imperialism, however, Pinochet and Friedman
succeeded in the objective of destroying the
gains made by the Allende government and opening
Chile to superexploitation. It was a “success”.
[Cut to black. Fade to montage of protests and poverty in the
US and Britain under Thatcher and Reagan.]
NARRATOR: The economic rationale underpinning Friedman’s
theory – that is, the destruction of the state
to open new markets – found its chance to shine
in the imperialist nations with the election of
Margaret Thatcher as the Prime Minister of
Britain in 1979 and Ronald Reagan as President
of the US in 1981. More than 40 state-owned
businesses employing over 60,000 workers were
sold and Britain’s council housing opened up to
private purchase by the Thatcher government
before her departure in 1990.
[Cut to REAGAN.]
REAGAN: The homeless who are homeless you might say by
choice.
[Cut back to montage.]
NARRATOR: Reagan created two million homeless with his
decision to cut the budget of the Department of
Housing, fired 11,359 striking air traffic
controllers and smashed their union, and cut the
top tax rate from 70% to 28% in seven years. This
strategy of austerity, privatisation and union
smashing became known as neoliberalism. With the
defeat of the miners’ strike in Britain in 1985,
it had steamrolled any opposition. A hungry,
crisis-ridden capital sustained itself upon the
carcass of the state.
[Cut to interview with CAROL WALTON.]
CAROL WALTON: I seen all riot police, I seen ‘em all come over
the walls when miners weren’t doing nowt and they
had ‘em penned in down there. I was stood here
15
talking and them miners weren’t even saying a

word. And they got a bloke down there and he
must’ve been 40 year old like I’ve just said. And
they wouldn’t let him up, there were six of ‘em
kicking the lights out of him and other coppers
scattered the rest of the pickets.
[Cut to news footage on the collapse of the USSR.]
ANCHOR: The red flag came down over the Kremlin tonight
as President Gorbachev resigned and brought an
end to seven decades of communist rule in the
Soviet Union.
[Cut to footage of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the
poverty resulting from it.]
NARRATOR: With the overthrow of the Soviet Union in 1991,
imperialism was again able to expand across
essentially the whole sphere of the globe. Whilst
the ransacking of the state continued, capital
exports and the expansion of credit drove
imperialist development in this period. For
example, in 1995 Foreign Direct Investment
outflows increased by an enormous 38% to $317bn,
with a record $100bn going to countries in the
so-called “Third World”. This investment was
concentrated in three blocs: the US, Japan and
Europe. 76% of the investment in “Third World”
countries between 1993 and 1995 brought dividends
to only ten imperialist nations. Far from the
promised ‘global, borderless, stateless market’,
this process more resembled that seen in Chile –
that is, the violent ransacking of oppressed
nations by imperialist capitalism.
[Cut to footage of the fall of the Berlin wall.]
NARRATOR: For Europe, and particularly a re-unified
Germany, the significance of this process was
enormous. Previously haemorrhaged by the Soviet
Union, German capital was now able to expand into
Eastern Europe, whilst France further expanded
into Southern Europe. It should come as no
surprise that, over the same period, the EU began
to make moves to consolidate itself as a bloc
capable of combating US imperialism. The Treaty
of the European Union was signed at Maastricht
in December 1991, leading to the creation of a
European central bank by July 1998 and a common
European currency by January 1999.
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[Cut to footage of planet earth.]

NARRATOR: The economic period of “neoliberal
globalisation” represented nothing more and
nothing less than the rapid division of the world
between imperialist powers. The alliance between
US, European and British imperialism that had
developed during the post-war period could be
sustained, and even formally deepened,
throughout this due to the relatively open field
left in the wake of communism’s destruction.
However, as Lenin wrote, under imperialism
‘peaceful alliances prepare the ground for wars’.
This period of expansion could not continue
forever: the world is no more infinite now than
it was in 1914. Once the earth runs out, nothing
is possible but a redivision of territories by
the test of strength.
[Repeat shot of Somme.]
NARRATOR: Over 2015 and 2016, the G20 countries introduced
a record number of trade restrictive measures,
undoing the foundation of “globalisation”. The
earth had run out.
[A single gunshot. Cut to footage of banks and skyscrapers.]
NARRATOR: Imperialism today is on the verge of the largest
crisis in its history. As Marx predicted, the
rate of profit has fallen and continues to reach
toward zero. This is an observable reality: in
the 1870s the general world rate of profit stood
at around 43%; by the 2000s, this had fallen to
around 17%. This, combined with the all but
complete division of the world between
imperialist powers, means that imperialist
capital is increasingly unable to find profitable
investment. In consequence, overaccumulation is
at an all-time high. This is expressed in ever
increasing inequality and rising global debt, as
capital that is unable to find profitable
investment is hoarded. The rise of the so-called
“developing” nations – particularly Russia and
China – has further exacerbated this problem,
with these economies accounting for 60% of global
GDP in purchasing power, compared to 44% before
the 2008 banking crash. The overaccumulation of
capital and barriers to investment have, in fact,
become so great that the only way to restore the
17
accumulation process is by launching the largest

and most destructive war in humanity’s history.
On 19 January, 2018, it fell to the US defence
secretary – James Mattis – to give this process
toward world conflagration a clear political
expression.
[Cut to MATTIS.]
MATTIS: Today, America’s military reclaims an era of
strategic purpose and we’re alert to the
realities of a changing world and attentive to
the need to protect our values and the country’s
that stand with us. America’s military protects
our way of life and I want to point out it also
protects the realm of ideas. It’s not just about
protecting geography, this is a defence strategy
that will guide our efforts in all realms.
[Cut to timelapse of poppies wilting with MATTIS as voiceover.
Hold shot for a period after he has finished speaking.]
MATTIS: The world, to quote George Schultz, is “awash in
change”, defined by increasing global volatility
and uncertainty with great power competition
between nations becoming a reality once again.
So, we will continue to prosecute the campaign
against terrorists that we’re engaged in today
but great power competition, not terrorism, is
now the primary focus of US national security.
[Fade to black. Fade in to CAPTION 6.]
CAPTION 6: PART THREE:
THE STAR-SPANGLED FRONTIER
[US national anthem starts to play. As vocals begin cut to
montage of US military interventions, culminating with Hiroshima
on “the land of the free and the home of the brave”. Hold shot
of nuke in silence. Fade to the Statue of Liberty. Distort this
footage over the course of the NARRATOR’s first paragraph.]
NARRATOR: Since the end of the second world war, the
history of the United States has been the history
of its dominance. Such power has been bought by
the blood of the world’s working class and
oppressed. Today, that dominance is waning and
the threat posed by the US to the overwhelming
majority of the world’s population increasing in
consequence. The clearest expression of both the
US’ dominance and its increasing inability to
sustain it is this:
18
[Cut to footage of dollars.]

NARRATOR: the dollar. It is the US’ most powerful weapon
without question. However, this power is coming
to an end.
[Cut to montage of banks, Bretton Woods and Nixon’s ending of
the Bretton Woods system.]
NARRATOR: Prior to the world wars, currency operated as a
receipt for gold, which could be traded in at any
bank. However, the requirements of the war
economy in Europe meant that consumer goods had
to be imported. As the US was a latecomer to both
wars, it traded consumer goods to Europe for gold
and, by 1944, it had accumulated two thirds of
the world’s reserves and flooded Europe’s
marketplace with dollar loans. As such, the
decision was made at the Bretton Woods conference
of the same year to tie almost every currency in
the world to the dollar at a fixed rate and only
the dollar to gold. This enshrined the economic
dominance of US imperialism in international
monetary policy. Yet under this system, there was
no reserve ratio for how much gold the US had to
have relative to dollars. As such, the US
continued to print dollars to expand the capital
available to it for imperialist exploitation. By
the mid-1960s, it no longer held anywhere near
enough gold to back up this expansion of the
dollar. The French President Charles de Gaulle
pointed this out in 1965, triggering a run on the
dollar, with countries trading the currency in
for gold en masse. Between 1965 and 1971, the US
lost over 50% of its gold. This forced the US
President Richard Nixon to end the Bretton Woods
system and introduce a fiat money system on 15
August, 1971. This kept the dollar as the world’s
currency anchor but removed the need for gold and
any fixed exchange rates. Currencies now
fluctuate in value according to their nation’s
relative competitive position on the world
market.
[Cut to montage of Russian, Chinese and European industries.]
NARRATOR: The role played by the dollar as the world’s
currency anchor is what gives it its power. As
currencies are tied to the dollar, US imperialism
can sanction countries unilaterally, essentially
19
removing their access to the world economy.

However, this circumstance is becoming
increasingly untenable. With the rise of the
Russian and Chinese economies and the increasing
size of the EU’s economy, the US is unable to
retain for itself an unquestionably dominant
position in the world market. Indeed, moves are
already underway to bring an end to the dollar’s
use as a financial weapon, with Russia, China at
the EU all seeking to reduce their reliance upon
the currency. The consequence of this is that the
US is increasingly unable to maintain the dollar
as the world’s currency anchor. Though no
currency is yet able to replace it, this
signifies the coming end of the US’ dominance.
If it wishes to maintain its position in the
world economy, it will necessarily need to resort
to aggression on a scale hitherto unseen. Cometh
the hour, cometh the man.
[Fade to TRUMP interview on OPRAH.]
OPRAH: You took out a full page ad in major US newspapers
last year criticising US foreign policy, what
would you do differently Donald?
TRUMP: I’d make our allies – forgetting about the
enemies, the enemies you can’t talk to so easily
– I’d make our allies pay their fair share. We’re
a debtor nation. Something’s gonna happen over
the next number of years with this country.
[Cut to:]
OPRAH: This sounds like political, Presidential talk to
me. I know people have talked to you about
whether you want to run. Would you ever?
[Cut to:]
TRUMP: I just probably wouldn’t do it, Oprah. I probably
wouldn’t, but I do get tired of seeing what’s
happening with this country and if it got so bad
I would never want to rule it out totally because
I really am tired of seeing what’s happening with
this country – how we’re really making other
people live like kings and we’re not.
[Cut to Trump inauguration applause. Hold until shot of crowd.
Cut to TRUMP interview on competitors.]
ANCHOR: Who’s your biggest competitor, your biggest foe,
globally right now?
20
TRUMP: Well, I think we have a lot of foes. I think the

European Union is a foe, what they do to us in
trade. Now, you wouldn’t think of the European
Union, but they’re a foe. Russia’s a foe in
certain respects. China’s a foe, economically
certainly, they’re a foe.
[Cut to TRUMP speaking at the UN.]
TRUMP: We will never surrender America’s sovereignty to
an unelected, unaccountable, global bureaucracy.
America is governed by Americans. We reject the
ideology of globalism, and we embrace the
doctrine of patriotism.
[Cut to inauguration.]
TRUMP: We assembled here today are issuing a new decree
to be heard in every city, in every foreign
capital and in every hall of power. From this day
forward, a new vision will govern our land. From
this day forward, it’s going to be only America
first,
[Cut to black.]
TRUMP: America first!
[Fade in shot of TRUMP tower.]
NARRATOR: The 45th President of the United States, Donald
Trump, is commonly understood as a fascist. What
is less often understood is his approach to US
foreign policy. The objective of Trump’s approach
to the world is singular: to maintain the
dominance of US imperialism. This, he intends to
achieve by a combination of strategies, which
broadly fall into two categories. The first,
which can be seen in his actions toward China,
is a simple and straightforward campaign of
economic aggression and military intimidation.
The confusion over his intent arises from the
second strategy, which plays upon the tensions
between the transatlantic alliance and Russia to
wage a campaign of economic intimidation against
all those involved. In watching this second
strategy unfold, many commentators have said that
Trump views the world as a place in which the US
has neither friend nor foe. A more accurate
expression of his attitude is that the US has no
friends, only foes.
[Cut to footage of Beijing.]
21
NARRATOR: The rise of the Chinese economy has unfolded with

staggering rapidity. In 2003, China’s production
accounted for 4.2% of world output. In the
thirteen years between then and 2016, this had
more than trebled to 15.1%. In the same year, the
nation’s banking assets surpassed that of both
the Eurozone and the US, standing at $33
trillion, compared to $31 trillion and $16
trillion respectively. With China’s GDP expected
to surpass that of the US by 2033, it is clear
to see why US imperialism views its expansion as
an economic threat.
[Cut to South China sea footage.]
NARRATOR: On 1 March 2018, Trump announced his intent to
impose a 25% tariff on steel and a 10% tariff on
aluminium imported into the US. After they raised
concerns, the EU, Canada, Mexico, Australia,
Argentina, Brazil and South Korea were
temporarily exempted from these tariffs,
allowing Trump to focus on China. He followed
this up with further tariffs on $50 billion of
Chinese goods on 22 March, citing a Chinese law
which requires foreign investors to hand over
technology and intellectual property rights when
they invest in the nation as justification. China
has responded in kind and, over the course of
2018, the number of tariffs imposed by nations
has increased steadily. China has stated that in
pursuing this course of action, Trump has started
‘the biggest trade war in history’. The near
collision of a US warship with a Chinese vessel
in early October is a pertinent reminder of how
such economic combat tends to escalate, with
Trump clearly intending to use the US military
as his bailiffs.
[Cut to TRUMP in silhouette.]
NARRATOR: Trump’s policy on China represents merely a
particularly aggressive iteration of prior US
administration’s approach to the nation –
following the lead given in 2011 by Barrack
Obama’s “pivot to Asia”. However, his attitude
to Russia and Europe is definitively new.
Strategy here is murky, difficult to understand
and riddled with misdirection.
22
[Cut to footage of the NATO line in eastern Europe. Juxtapose

against Nord Stream 2 footage.]
NARRATOR: To understand Trump’s relationship with either
Russia or Europe, it is crucial to grasp both the
framework of prior US policy and the reality of
the EU’s relationship to Russia. The economic
isolation and military intimidation of Russia has
long appeared as a point of agreement within the
US-led imperialist alliance. This first erupted
into daylight with the 2014 CIA and EU backed
coup in Kiev, which led to the expulsion of
Russia from the G8 – now the G7 – with its
annexation of Crimea. The Enhanced Forward
Presence line on Russia’s western border and the
conflicting objectives of the western
imperialists and Russia in Syria serve to further
highlight this antagonism. However, if the EU
wishes to further consolidate itself as an
imperialist bloc capable competing with the US,
it is imperative that its relationship with
Russia does not deteriorate any further. Russia
is the EU’s fourth largest trading partner,
following the US, China and Switzerland. Further,
it is the EU’s largest gas supplier and this role
is expanding. The importance of this relationship
was clearly expressed by the German Foreign
Minister, Sigmar Gabriel, in 2017 when he stated
that any further sanctions on Russia were both
unacceptable and contrary to Germany’s
interests. Trump has repeatedly played upon this
conflict of interest to advance the position of
US imperialism within Europe. This is clearest
in considering his interventions at the 2018 G7
and NATO summits.
[Cut to Trump at G7.]
TRUMP: Whether you like it or not, and it may not be
politically correct, but we have a world to run.
And at the G7, which used to be the G8, they
threw Russia out. They should let Russia come
back in, because we should have Russia at the
negotiating table.
[Cut to Trump at NATO.]
TRUMP: I think it’s very sad when Germany makes a
massive oil and gas deal with Russia, where
you’re supposed to guarding against Russia and
23
Germany goes out and pays billions and billions

of dollars a year to Russia.
[Cut to footage of Trump in the White House.]
NARRATOR: Although these interventions may seem to
contradict one another, they are two prongs of
the same attack. The first intervention, at the
G7, was intended to draw ire from the EU over
Trump’s position on Russia. In this, it
succeeded, with the French President Emmanuel
Macron stating that ‘we don’t mind becoming six’.
The second intervention, at NATO, was intended
to point toward the EU’s hypocrisy over Russia,
highlighting the economic relationship between
the two. Both interventions are intended to force
the EU into a corner, exacerbate splits within
it and, ultimately, to sever its economic
relationship with Russia and any competitive
gains it derives from this. Trump’s evocation of
the planned Nord Stream 2 pipeline between Russia
and Germany is pertinent in this respect, as it
highlights the splits forming within the EU over
its relationship to Russia. Poland, Lithuania and
Slovakia all offered their support for Trump’s
statements in the immediate aftermath of the NATO
summit.
[Cut to footage of Poland, Italy, Hungary.]
NARRATOR: This speaks to a further element of US
imperialism’s present strategy toward Europe.
Unlike the US, the EU is not a nation but an
alliance. This presents significant political
difficulties in its ability to successfully
manoeuvre through a period of competition as the
interests of its member states frequently
conflict. The US is attempting to exacerbate such
splits by the overt and covert consolidation of
the far-right in Europe. This can be openly seen
in the case of Poland, which vehemently opposes
any friendly relationship between Russia and the
EU at all. Since the election of the far-right
Law and Justice Party in 2015, the US has secured
for itself a clear ally in Poland with an
agreement that the US military presence there
should now be permanent, a commitment from Poland
to begin constructing methods for the import of
US gas and a planned referendum on the future of
its relationship to the EU. Similar attempts at
24
subversion are underway across the EU, with the

US ambassador to Germany stating that he wishes
‘to empower other conservatives’ on 5 June and
Trump’s former strategist, Steven Bannon, openly
attempting to consolidate a fascist alliance
across Europe.
[Cut to montage on Iran deal and tariffs against the EU.]
NARRATOR: Trump’s strategy of using Russia as a lever by
which to attack Europe is further complemented
by more overtly antagonistic moves. Having
initially exempted several of the US’ traditional
allies from the steel and aluminium tariffs
applied to China, Trump announced that these
tariffs would apply to Mexico, Canada and the EU
on 31 May. As in the case of China, this move was
the prelude to a trade war. In a more overt
iteration of his strategy around Russia and
Europe, Trump launched yet another campaign of
aggression against EU interests on 8 May, with
his withdrawal from the Iran deal.
[Cut to TRUMP.]
TRUMP: I am announcing today that United States will
withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal.
[Cut back to montage.]
NARRATOR: His cited reason – that Iran is attempting to
produce nuclear warheads – is nonsense, with ten
separate checks by the International Atomic
Energy Agency confirming that Iran has stopped
uranium enrichment since the deal was signed in
2015. His purpose in backing out of the deal is
to end EU trade with Iran and to further escalate
US imperialism’s disastrous campaign to secure
dominance in the middle-east.
[Cut back to footage of Trump in silhouette.]
NARRATOR: Since his electoral victory in 2016, an enormous
section of the US ruling-class has attempted to
present Trump as a Russian puppet. There is not
a grain of truth in this. Irrespective of any
election interference, Trump is pursuing the most
aggressive campaign to defend the interests of
US imperialism that the world has ever seen.
Claims to the contrary express only a tactical
split within the US bourgeoisie, with the anti-
Trump faction favouring the maintenance of the
25
transatlantic alliance, further escalation with

Russia and a slightly softer hand at home. This
deliberately misses the essential significance
of Trump’s Presidency. In every element, he is
the authentic expression of the US’ quest for
complete dominance as an imperialist power, as
American as apple pie.
[Trump steps into the light. Cut to black. Fade in CAPTION 7.]
CAPTION 7: PART FOUR:
A EUROPEAN TWILIGHT
[Fade in to montage of European cities at sunset. Order:
Brussels, Berlin, Paris, Rome, Athens. Silence.]
NARRATOR: These aged spires and ruins stand today in a
surreal twilight. Dark clouds are again gathering
across the continent. Ancient cities, which know
well the bloody tread of empire’s decline, quiver
under a fast-moving wind. As the storm grows ever
closer, it feels as if they may tumble.
[Cut to black.]
NARRATOR: Will Europe fortify herself before it hits?
[Fade in on Juncker and Trump press conference. Hold shot as the
approach podiums, then cut to Juncker speaking.]
JUNCKER: Mr President, ladies and gentleman. When I was
invited by the President to the White House, I
had one intention. I had the intention to make a
deal today, and we have made a deal today.
[Cut to:]
JUNCKER: We have decided to strengthen our co-operation
on energy. We will build more terminals to import
liquefied natural gas from the US.
[Cut to:]
JUNCKER: As far as agriculture is concerned, the European
Union can import more soy beans from the US and
it will be done.
[Cut to:]
JUNCKER: This, of course, is on the understanding that as
long as we’re negotiating – unless one party
would stop the negotiations – we hold off further
tariffs and reassess existing tariffs on steel
and aluminium.
[Cut to EU flags in a storm.]
26
NARRATOR: Prior to his meeting to discuss tariffs with

Trump on 25 July, the President of the European
Commission Jean-Claude Juncker promised that he
would stand firm against the President’s demands.
The results indicate that he did anything but.
The EU had committed to purchase US gas and soy
beans. In return, it had received nothing but
Trump’s word that the US would not impose further
tariffs and those already implemented could be
discussed further. For all intents and purposes,
Juncker had sounded the horn of retreat.
[Cut to footage of European Central Bank.]
NARRATOR: This indicates a simple reality: the EU is not
yet able to engage in an open trade war with the
US. The US is its largest trading partner and,
more importantly, its most profitable. In 2017,
the EU had an overall trade surplus of €19,729
billion, with an enormous amount of this surplus
derived from trade with the US. If it were to
lose even 17% of the surplus it gains from US
trade, it would fall into a trade deficit. To
recoup such a loss, the EU would need to increase
the surplus it derives from its next most
profitable trading partner by almost 50%. As
such, the EU has little choice but to demure to
the US’ demands on trade, as it stands to lose
more by opposing them.
[Cut to European Parliament.]
NARRATOR: Therefore, Juncker’s retreat was a prudent and
tactical step. It does not indicate that the EU
imperialist bloc lacks the will to confront the
US. Quite the opposite is true and nowhere does
this emerge more clearly than in the case of
Iran.
[Cut to montage of Iran.]
NARRATOR: The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, also
known as the Iran deal, was signed in 2015 by the
permanent members of the UN Security Council –
that is, Britain, China, France, Russia and the
US – alongside Germany and the EU. It was
intended to curb Iran’s nuclear programme,
offering greater financial investment and a
reprieve from sanctions in return for incredibly
stringent regulation of any Iranian nuclear
development. Since the deal was signed EU trade
27
with Iran has more than doubled, reaching €21

billion in 2017.
Following Trump’s withdrawal from the deal and
the reinstatement of sanctions on those trading
with Iran, the EU has acted swiftly and
resolutely in attempting to defend this trade.
On 18 May, the European Commission proposed that
EU governments make transfers to the Iranian
Central Bank in euros for oil purchases, thus
avoiding any consequence from the US’ sanctions.
Despite concerns from the French President
Macron, the plan was passed by the Commission.
On the same day, the EU also approved measures
that forbid member states from complying with the
extraterritorial effects of US sanctions and
protect them from any consequences within the EU.
This, however, was nowhere near enough.
[Cut to montage of industries under discussion.]
NARRATOR: The first significant blow to the EU’s attempts
to maintain its businesses in Iran came on 7
August, when the German carmaker Daimler AG
announced that it would be suspending what it
described as ‘very limited’ activities in Iran.
An even greater blow followed on 20 August, with
the French oil giant Total announcing that it too
was withdrawing. Total is the fourth largest
energy company in the world, with assets at
around $242.63bn. The significance of this is
twofold. Firstly, it highlighted the enormous
problems facing European monopolies in investing
in Iran. Although the European Commission’s plan
to transfer funds to Iran via EU governments
could potentially protect individual transfers
from US sanctions, these companies have enormous
trade in dollars. To continue to trade with Iran,
therefore, is to risk all their trade in dollars.
Secondly, the withdrawal of Total demonstrated
that the US strategy was succeeding in beating
out Europe’s larger players. Sure enough, Total
was followed by more EU monopolies, with British
Airways, Air France, Allianz and Maersk all
announcing their intent to withdraw from Iran on
24 August.
[Cut back to European Central Bank.]
28
NARRATOR: This withdrawal led the EU to consider

alternative methods which would allow European
businesses to continue trade with Iran. In early
September, the bloc concluded that it would need
to focus upon smaller businesses, with less trade
in dollars. To do so, it would need either
smaller banks or its states’ central banks to
manage money transfers to Iran, with central
banks preferred as a US sanction would not
destroy them overnight. After concerns were
raised by the European Central Bank, this
strategy was thrown out. This lead to Germany,
France and Britain announcing that they would set
up a “special purpose vehicle” to manage oil
trade with Iran on 14 September. The initial idea
was that this could operate as an accounting firm
within the EU, to manage trade between nations
and Iran. However, this would still risk US
sanctions on those using the current. As such,
the conception of the “special purpose vehicle”
was changed. On 26 September, the EU announced
that the vehicle would be operating under a kind
of bartering system. No cash would change hands
and, instead, European, Chinese and Russian
companies would exchange goods for oil. Even this
was not sufficient, with Italy’s Eni and Spain’s
CEPSA oil companies announcing their intent to
follow Total and withdraw from Iran on 4 October.
[Cut to montage of euros and dollars being printed.]
NARRATOR: The torturous difficulties that the EU has faced
in attempting to maintain its trade with Iran
highlight the realities of attempting to confront
the US, even via a proxy. Though the dollar is
not able to maintain itself as the world’s
currency anchor for much longer, its power is
still incredibly vast. To date, the dollar
accounts for 44% of the world’s daily turnover
in foreign exchange, in comparison to 13% of
daily turnover for the euro and 2% for the
renminbi. On top of this, the US is still the
world’s leading supplier of both bonds and
equities. In 2016, it accounted for 43% of the
$90 trillion worth outstanding globally in bonds;
in the same period, the US accounted for 39% of
the $70 trillion worth of global equity stock
outstanding. To face a sanction from the dollar
is, therefore, to lose access to nearly half of
29
the world marketplace. Whilst the political will

to challenge the US in Iran clearly exists within
the EU, it cannot command its business to obey
such a will. For these businesses, the prospect
of losing access to that much trade for the sake
of a single market is simply not worth it. The
EU is definitively on the back foot.
[Cut to footage of the EU symbol outside the ECB. Montage of
Africa and Russia as the narration covers these topics.]
NARRATOR: However, the EU’s experience in Iran has not
weakened its resolve but strengthened it.
Understanding that the root of the EU’s inability
to manage its own interests stems from the
dollar, Juncker used his State of the Union
speech before the European Parliament on 12
September to argue that the time had come to make
the euro the world’s currency anchor. The first
step toward doing this is to increase the amount
of trade that the EU does in euros and to decrease
the amount it does in dollars. Juncker provided
one way of doing this in his speech, arguing that
the EU should cease the aid payments it provides
to nations in the African continent and convert
this to trade. This would represent an enormous
deepening of Europe’s exploitation of Africa,
whilst strengthening the euro and open new
avenues for capital accumulation. However, it
also runs the risk of opening another front in
the EU and the US’ confrontation, as the US is
making plans to consolidate its presence on the
continent to head off Chinese investment. A
second measure under consideration is equally
risky. The suggestion is that Europe could
bolster the flow of the euro by paying for its
energy imports in the currency. With Russia as
the EU’s largest provider of gas and oil, this
would integrate Europe’s relationship with the
nation as a fundamental pillar in its plan to
challenge the dominance of the dollar and US
imperialism. Though Russia is more than willing,
as it planning to reduce its own dependency on
the dollar, the political problems of making such
a move are obvious. In strengthening its
relationship with Russia, the EU would risk
further splits, further antagonism from the US
and perhaps even a drastic escalation in the
conflict between Russia and NATO.
30
[Cut to footage of Juncker, European Commission.]

NARRATOR: Whilst the EU’s actions in Iran and the ambitions
of the European Commission to achieve a euro
domination of the world economy demonstrate that
a faction of the European imperialist bourgeoisie
feels its time has come, this attitude is not
shared across Europe. Its counterpart:
[Cut to footage of Italian fascists giving Nazi salute. Montage
of contemporary European fascism. Include BANNON in montage.]
BANNON: Every day, every day it is gonna be a fight.
NARRATOR: The imperialist crisis has summoned up the ghouls
of Europe’s past. Encouraged and doted upon by
the US, the resurgence of fascism as a serious
political force in particularly Italy, Hungary
and Poland presents a severe obstacle to the EU
imperialist bloc. Among the manifold flags, cries
and salutes of this resurgence, there is one
striking political commonality. Fascism has come
to destroy the EU. For that faction of Europe’s
imperialists dreaming of a dominant euro, this
must be dealt with swiftly and brutally. The
example of Viktor Orbán’s Hungary provides a
striking example of how.
[Cut to montage of Orbán and the European Commission.]
NARRATOR: To understand the EU’s actions against Orbán’s
Hungary, we first need to understand something
of its context. Though the European Union is an
imperialist alliance, this does not mean that
every nation within it is imperialist. To the
contrary, Hungary, the Baltic states and sections
of south-east Europe serve as incredibly
lucrative investments for Europe's imperialists.
This produced substantial tensions following the
2008 banking crash, with the EU imposing
austerity upon many of its smaller states,
including Hungary. Further tensions can be seen
in the EU’s handling of migration. In 2015, took
in the sixth largest number of migrants across
the EU. Whilst Germany, Sweden and France took
in more migrants than Hungary, distribution
wasn't proportional, placing greater financial
and infrastructure pressure on poorer states. In
consequence, Hungary rejected the EU's migrant
quota. This has continued to escalate, with
Hungary and Poland rejecting new quotas at the
31
beginning of 2018. Orbán’s fascism has been

allowed to flourish in this context. In the last
three years he has created an armed force of
"border hunters", limited Hungary's refugee
intake to five asylum seekers a week and
introduced indefinite detention.
The continued rejection of the EU’s laws has lead
to the formation of clear fractures and
disruption within the imperialist bloc. Europe’s
imperialists find this untenable. Acting purely
out of a desire to prevent the EU from fracturing
further, an EU vote on 12 September saw the bloc
apply what has been termed the “nuclear option”
to Hungary – that is, article seven of the Treaty
of Lisbon. This provision allows the EU to retain
Hungary as an EU member state and to continue to
derive profit from it, whilst stripping it of
voting rights in the European Council. In other
words, Europe’s approach toward the problem of
anti-EU fascism is simply to deprive of it of any
ability to influence the bloc’s policy. Whether
this will be successful or simply galvanise the
forces of fascism remains to be seen.
[Cut back to montage of European cities seen at start of segment.
Display them in reverse.]
NARRATOR: Ultimately, the question facing Europe is one of
two extremes. The imperialists at the head of the
EU bloc are attempting to bolster its power and
achieve dominance over the world market. At the
same time, the resurgence of fascism in Europe
threatens to split the bloc, leading to its
collapse. Whether the EU will rise or fall is an
open question but neither result benefits the
mass of humanity even remotely. Within this
twilight, only one thing is certain. Night is
coming.
[Fade to black. Fade in CAPTION 8.]
CAPTION 8: PART FIVE:
THE FALL OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE
[Fade in to the Houses of Parliament at night.]
NARRATOR: Britain is the oldest imperialist nation in the
world. Once the world’s dominant power, the
British empire is today in its death throes.
Decay haunts every street, every home and every
hall of power. Across the globe, the tendrils of
32
British capital grasp feverishly at anything they

may find, sucking it dry as a vampire might. But
the monster is running out of meat. It is
starved, moribund and soon it will die.
[Cut to footage of post war Britain.]
NARRATOR: At the end of the world wars, Britain’s position
in the imperialist world had definitively
changed. Now the world’s dominant imperialist
power, the US was enthusiastic about the prospect
of European unity as a manner by which to shape
the European economy to its interests and wanted
Britain to be fully involved. This would both
facilitate the process of the US’ dominance
replacing Britain’s and allow the US greater
control over the cultivation of the European
economy, with Britain acting as its agent.
Britain was ambivalent toward the process. It was
ultimately in favour of European co-operation but
only to the extent that it did not impact on
British plans to retain itself as major
imperialist power and the City of London as one
of the world’s leading financial centres.
Although its membership of European Economic
Community was deferred until 1973, the role
suggested by the US is ultimately that which
Britain adopted. On the one hand, it was a member
of the EEC and, then, the EU; on the other, it
had a “special relationship” with US imperialism.
The role of British imperialism was as a
diplomatic and economic bridge between US and
European imperialism.
[Cut to footage of the City of London.]
NARRATOR: This role could not last forever. With the EU
evidently making moves to consolidate itself as
an imperialist bloc capable of competing with the
US following the collapse of the Soviet Union,
the British bourgeoisie sensed that lines were
hardening. Sooner or later they would be forced
to choose between one of these blocs. Britain’s
particularly parasitic nature as an imperialist
power ensured that the third option – retaining
itself as an independent imperialist nation – was
impossible. British financial assets stood at
560% of GDP in 2015, whilst its national economy
is incredibly unproductive and stagnant. This
renders it particularly vulnerable to shocks in
33
the world economy and means that confrontation

with either the US or the EU could destroy it.
With the emergence of clear political divisions
between the EU and the US in the wake of the 2003
Iraq war and the increase in global instability
following the 2008 banking crisis, the hour of
decision was coming. However, Britain’s
bourgeoisie were split on the question. This
split, felt particularly within the Conservative
Party and exacerbated by the emergence of UKIP,
rendered it unable to decide. With great power
competition growing ever nearer, a hand was
forced.
[Cut to footage of CAMERON announcing Brexit referendum.]
CAMERON: On Monday I will commence the process set out
under our referendum act and I will go to
Parliament and propose that the British people
decide our future in Europe through an in out
referendum on Thursday 23 June. The choice is in
your hands.
[Cut to footage of JOHNSON announcing his support for leave.]
JOHNSON: The last thing I wanted was to go against David
Cameron or the government, but after a great deal
of heartache I don’t think there’s anything else
I can do. I will be advocating vote leave or
whatever the team is called.
[Cut to footage of CAMERON speaking.]
CAMERON: I say, if you are making a decision this big, you
really need to think through the economic
consequences.
[Cut to footage of FARAGE with leave billboard. Cut to CAMERON
resigning.]
CAMERON: The British people have voted to leave the
European Union and their will must be respected.
[Cut to:]
CAMERON: I will do everything I can as Prime Minister to
steady the ship over the coming weeks and months,
but I do not think it would be right for me to
try and be the captain that tries to steer our
country to its next destination.
[Cut to strong and stable montage.]
MAY: Strong and stable.
34

MAY: Strong and stable government.
CORBYN: Strong and stable leadership.
[Cut to MAY becoming PM.]
MAY: I have just been to Buckingham Palace where Her
Majesty the Queen has asked me to form a new
government and I accepted.
[Cut to DYER.]
DYER: So what’s happened to that twat David Cameron who
called it on?
[Cut toe Brexit means Brexit/breakfast montage.]
HAMMOND: Brexit means Brexit.
MAY: Brexit means Brexit.
MCDONNELL: Yes, a chaotic breakfast that will damage our
economy.
DYER: Who knows about Brexit? No-one got a fucking clue
what Brexit is, yeah?
[Cut to MAY on Chequers.]
MAY: It’s the only credible and negotiable plan on the
table that delivers no hard border in Northern
Ireland and also delivers on the vote of the
British people.
[Cut back to Brexit/breakfast montage.]
ANCHOR: Before we talk about the impact of breakfast, er
Brexit.
ANCHOR: Were you no clearer when Jeremy Corbyn –
DYER: No, I ain’t got a clue, no one knows what it is.
It’s like this mad riddle.
MAY: Brexit means Brexit.
ANCHOR: Brexit means breakfast - Brexit.
GRADY: So if Brexit means breakfast in the UK then er…
means Brexit not breakfast.
[Cut to JOHNSON at 2018 Tory Party Conference.]
JOHNSON: Do not believe that we can somehow get it wrong
now, bodge it now and fix it later. Get out
properly… That is a total fantasy!
[Cut back to Brexit/breakfast montage.]
35
MORGAN: People do feel that –

DYER: Twat!
CORDEN: Brexit
REES-MOGG: A proper Brexit.
TRANSLATOR: And I think that you will regret this as well if
I might say.
ANCHOR: After breakfast…
[Cut to TRUMP on MAY and Brexit in The Sun.]
TRUMP: Well I think the deal she is striking is not what
the people voted on, exactly. It’s a much
different deal than the people voted on. It was
not the deal that was in the referendum.
[Cut to Brexit/breakfast montage.]
JAVID: And I think the Honourable Gentleman should first
of all just accept that Brexit means Brexit –
MAY: means Brexit –
ANCHOR: means Brexit –
STURGEON: means breakfast –
CORBYN: hard, soft, clean, red, white blue.
[Cut to PRESENTER on EU rejecting chequers.]
PRESENTER: Well, she tried it last night and it didn’t work.
Tonight they came out at the press conferences
and in various statements saying that her
chequers plan still wasn’t acceptable.
[Cut to Brexit/breakfast montage.]
ANCHOR: Export drives saying breakfast – Bre – oh my
Lord!
RUDD: And we must move on, Brexit means Brexit.
[Cut to MAY’s response.]
MAY: And I have always said, no deal is better than a
bad deal.
[JOHNSON slides in behind and empty podium. Cut to montage of
British bourgeoisie amid Brexit chaos.]
NARRATOR: The victory of the leave faction of the British
ruling class, brought about a propaganda campaign
of intense and despicable racism, did not succeed
in uniting either the British bourgeoisie or the
Conservative Party. Rather, it deepened the
36
splits within them considerably. The chaos

resulting from their split has meant that, even
at the time this film was put together, Britain
has not been able to secure a Brexit deal. Even
if a deal were negotiated, its terms would
necessarily advantage the EU imperialist bloc and
damage Britain, as the European bourgeoisie
attempt to send a message to those opposed to the
EU throughout the continent.
[Cut to footage of British housing.]
NARRATOR: On 13 September the governor of the Bank of
England, Mark Carney, provided a window into the
extent of British imperialism’s crisis. He
predicted that if Britain were to leave the EU
without a deal, then its housing market would
fall in value by up to 35%. By July 2018, the
total value of British housing stock stood at
£8.2 trillion. A fall in value of 35% would mean
that around £2.8 trillion would be wiped of the
market. By contrast, Britain’s GDP currently
stood at just over £2.6 trillion in 2017. To put
this in simple terms: if Britain leaves the EU
without a deal, it could lose more wealth than
the sum total of everything it produces from but
one of its financial markets. This would mean the
end of British imperialism.
[Cut to footage of food production and medicines as they are
discussed. Edit in some shots of poverty during the 1930s.]
NARRATOR: The consequences of this fight over the best
course for British imperialism hold only one
certainty. Whatever happens, the working class
will be made to pay for the crisis. This can be
seen in the British government’s attitude toward
maintaining a supply of food and medicine in the
event of a no deal Brexit. EU imports account for
31% of Britain’s food supply and 37 million
packets of medicine a month. Though the
government claims it is stockpiling these
resources in the event of a no deal, it has merely
instructed private industry to do so. Not only
is this impossible, it leaves the working class
at the mercy of rising prices as shortages and
an inevitable fall in value of the pound bite.
Widespread starvation may become a reality in
Britain once more.
37
[Cut back to footage of CAMERON announcing the referendum.

Montage where appropriate.]
NARRATOR: Prior even to the moment that the former Prime
Minister, David Cameron, announced the EU
referendum, British imperialism has been driven
entirely by crisis. Its bourgeoisie see and
understand the significance of the hardening of
relations between the US and the EU, but they do
not know how to respond. They are afraid, they
are divided, and they are desperate. As the old
adage goes, the most dangerous animal is that
which is wounded and backed into a corner.
[Cut to black.]
NARRATOR: Enter Sergei Skripal.
[Fade in on police in hazmats in Salisbury. Slowly begin
discolouration to emphasise hazmat colours and cast all other
colours in shadow. This image will be repeated through the
segment and the discolouration should be a consistent process.]
MAY: They have provided no credible explanation that
could suggest they lost control of their nerve
agent, no explanation as to how this agent came
to be used in the United Kingdom, no explanation
as to why Russia has an undeclared chemical
weapons programme in contravention of
international law. Instead, they have treated the
use of a military grade nerve agent in Europe
with sarcasm, contempt and defiance. So, Mr
Speaker there is no alternative conclusion other
than that the Russian state was culpable for the
attempted murder of Mr Skripal and his daughter.
[Cut to footage of the Kremlin.]
NARRATOR: Since the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
on 4 March, the story surrounding the incident
has gone through countless iterations. It will
doubtlessly go through several more. Through
these variations, Britain has maintained that
Russia is guilty and that it has proof of this.
On the other hand, Russia denies any
responsibility in the poisoning, has sent over
70 requests for information to the Home Office –
most of them unanswered – and has repeatedly
requested and been denied a joint investigation
into the case.
38
[Cut to montage: Salisbury (aerial), Skripal’s house, Alex

Thomson tweet, Petrov and Boshirov.]
NARRATOR: Though the temptation to wrench some truth from
the narratives spun by Britain, Russia and, now,
the Atlantic Council backed website Bellingcat
is indeed alluring, such efforts are bound to run
into a dead end. Britain has the monopolised the
evidence, something clearly indicated by its
purchase of Skripal’s house and all his
belongings. This means that the flow of
information surrounding the case is all but
controlled by the British state. Though it is
known that Skripal was an active MI6 agent as
late as 2016, Britain has forbidden the media
from commenting on his handler, releasing two D
notices to such effect in the wake of the
poisoning. Likewise, the two men accused of
poisoning Skripal are supposed as Russian GRU
agents.
[Cut to RT interview.]
ANCHOR: You are being accused by British law enforcement.
They say you work for the GRU.
PETROV: This is the worst.
NARRATOR: Though they denied this in an interview with the
Russian state broadcaster RT, the truth of the
matter is impossible to derive from anything
accessible by civilians.
ANCHOR: When you arrived in the UK, when you were in
London or in Salisbury, throughout your whole
trip did you have any Novichok or some other
poisonous agent or dangerous substance with you?
BOSHIROV: No.
PETROV: It’s absurd.
[Cut to hazmats and montage of events under discussion.]
NARRATOR: The truth of the Skripal poisoning is the domain
of states and states exclusively. More
importantly, the quest for truth misses the
political point of the incident. What is
important here is simple: British imperialism is
using the Skripal poisoning as a pretext to
warmonger against Russia.
NARRATOR: That this is so is evident in numerous elements
of the British state’s actions. The most
39
egregious example can be seen early in the

story’s development. On 20 March, the then
Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson claimed that
Porton Down’s researchers had told him,
categorically, that the nerve agent was of
Russian origin.
[Cut to JOHNSON.]
JOHNSON: Look at the evidence. I mean the people from
Porton Down, the laboratory.
ANCHOR: They have the samples.
JOHNSON: They do. They were absolutely categorical. I
asked the guy myself, I said, “Are you sure?” and
he said “there’s no doubt”.
[Cut back to hazmats.]
NARRATOR: This was a categorical lie and Porton Down’s
scientists confirmed it as such on 3 April,
stating that they had been able to identify the
type of the nerve agent but not its origin. The
basis of May’s claims that Russia is responsible
contain a similar distortion. In her first
Parliamentary statement on the matter, May
claimed that Novichok – the nerve agent used
against Skripal – could only have been produced
in Russia. This, the initial basis of Britain’s
claims against Russia, is also a lie. Not only
are samples of Novichok held by most laboratories
in the world, its composition is publicly
available information. So zealous were both
Johnson and May in their attempts to paint Russia
as the culprit that they failed to pay attention
to either their own governmental bodies or
publicly available information.
[Cut to footage of British navy ships.]
NARRATOR: What is more pressing even than the fact that
Britain has used the incident as propaganda is
what this propaganda has already achieved. Under
cover of this propaganda campaign, Britain has
been able to dramatically escalate the scope of
its military and cyber warfare campaigns against
Russia, as well as increasing diplomatic tensions
with the nation. Within seven months of the
poisoning it had expelled 28 Russian diplomats,
agreed to establish a new chemical weapons unit,
created a new joint area of operations in the
40
North Atlantic, authorised cyber warfare actions

against Russia and floated plans to increase
defence spending from around 2% of GDP to levels
comparable with at least the so-called “Cold
War”. Beyond this, Britain is developing the
foundation for a rapid and vast censorship
campaign, presenting dissent against its
position on Russia on social media as the result
of “Russian bots”. These are not the actions of
a nation seeking a diplomatic solution. They are
the actions of an aggressor preparing for war.
[Cut to footage of Corbyn.]
NARRATOR: There is no resistance to this process within
Britain. Although the so-called socialist and
anti-war leader of the Labour Party, Jeremy
Corbyn, initially expressed quibbles over the
evidence used to associate Russia with the
poisoning, he has since accepted the British
state’s line on Russia entirely.
[Cut to:]
CORBYN: We are entering a new, fast-changing and more
dangerous world – including the reckless attacks
in Salisbury, which the evidence painstakingly
assembled by the police now points clearly to the
Russian state.
CORBYN: We commend the police and security services for
their diligence in investigating this appalling
crime and we will support any reasonable to bring
those responsible to justice and to take further
action against Russia for its failure to co-
operate with this investigation.
[Cut to Labour Party conference.]
NARRATOR: Among the ranks of Corbyn’s Labour, the cry of
war is even louder than that in the Conservative
Party. At the 2018 Labour Party conference the
deputy leader of the Party, Tom Watson, used his
platform to argue that Theresa May had been too
soft on Russia. Similarly, after May refused to
confirm if she would release enough funding to
maintain Britain as a tier one military power,
Labour’s shadow Defence Secretary bragged that,
under a Corbyn government, Labour would provide
whatever fund required to do so. Just as the
Labour Party supported the barbaric role played
by British imperialism in the world wars, it is
41
dead set on carrying out the criminal campaign

against Russia.
[Fade to Chile under Pinochet. Montage to a rapid succession of
headlines.]
NARRATOR: The economic shock therapy applied in Chile under
Pinochet has an ideological equivalent. The
notion is that by overwhelming a population with
shock, one can seize the opportunity and put in
place policies that may otherwise have been
opposed. It matters not if the shock is created
by a staged or an authentic event, merely that
one seize the moment. This is precisely the
tactic that British imperialism is using in its
handling of the Skripal incident.
[Cut to footage of the City of London.]
NARRATOR: The reason that Britain is doing this is rooted
in the international crisis of imperialism.
Unable to properly orientate itself as the
reality of a confrontation between US imperialism
and the EU imperialist bloc grows closer, it is
making a desperate push to maintain the
transatlantic alliance. To maintain Britain as
an imperialist power, the British bourgeoisie
need to maintain their alliances in both Europe
and in the US. As the predatory NATO campaign
against Russia appeared to serve as point of
unity between these powers, Britain is determined
to lead this campaign. Thus far, the project is
working, with both the US and the EU supporting
Britain at key moments. However, how long this
can go on remains to be seen. As the EU
consolidates ties with Russia as a component of
its strategy to confront the US, Britain’s
zealous interventions may well simply deepen the
splits between it and Europe’s imperialists.
[Cut back to hazmats. The discolouration of this footage is now
complete, so that only the lurid green of the hazmat suits is
visible. All else is black.]
NARRATOR: The trajectory of British imperialism serves as
a microcosm for the trajectory of imperialism in
general. The monstrous force analysed by Marx and
Lenin those many years ago has today grow to a
delirious scale. Racked by crisis and driven
deeper into desperation by mutual animosity,
imperialist society is reaching toward the abyss.
42
The trumpets of war are blowing. And here we are,

crawling toward ruin and a horizon bleached white
by fire.
[Fade to black.]
[Cut to footage of “Who killed Hannibal?” sketch.]
ANDRE: Uh, so everybody’s talking about climate change
these days right?
[Cut to black. Gunshots. Jump in CAPTION 9 over shots.]
CAPTION 9: THE TOP 100 COMPANIES IN THE WORLD PRODUCED OVER
70% OF GLOBAL EMISSIONS SINCE 1988
[Fade in CAPTION 10.]
CAPTION 10: PART SIX:
THE SIXTH MASS EXTINCTION
[Fade in on the Great Barrier Reef.]
NARRATOR: This is the Great Barrier Reef. It is dying.
[Cut to bleached coral.]
NARRATOR: In the summer of 2016 an invisible fire cut
across the reef. This majestic place was overcome
by decay, with the corals that have served as
home for marine life since the beginning of
recorded memory bleached white by the boiling
waters that encircled them. In consequence, huge
swathes of the reef were transformed irreparably.
Its northern third, previously its most
immaculate section, lost more than half of its
coral. Though the coral was able to recover to
some degree in the autumn, spring and winter, the
summer of 2017 saw the liquid flames return. This
time, they hit the reef’s middle third. The
result of these back-to back bleaching was
catastrophic. In 2015, the reef was home to 2
billion corals. Three years later, half of them
had died.
[Cut to ocean at sunset.]
NARRATOR: The brutal death of the Great Barrier Reef has
not been brought about by a freak occurrence. The
cause of the hot waters which suffocated half of
its beautiful, irreplaceable corals was not the
anger of gods, nor a temporary fluctuation in the
earth’s environment. They were brought about by
climate change.
[Cut to factories.]
43
NARRATOR: In the process of developing their analysis of

capitalist society, Karl Marx and Freidrich
Engels recognised a peculiar feature of the
development of capitalism. The immense
technological and productive advances brought
about by capitalist industry did not only produce
an increase in the wealth of humanity, but an
impoverishment and destruction of nature. In his
book The Dialectics of Nature, Engels formulated
this into a clear theoretical principle. He
wrote: ‘Let us not, however, flatter ourselves
overmuch on account of our human conquest over
nature. For each such conquest takes its revenge
on us.’ This was in 1883.
[Cut to footage of earth from space, the lights of cities
glittering in the dark. Montage to factories and heat maps.]
NARRATOR: Today, the immense growth of capitalist industry
under imperialism has heightened this
contradiction to an apocalyptic scale. A UN
report issued on 8 October highlighted the scale
and immediacy of this problem clearly. At our
present rate of pollution, we will see a
temperature rise of 2.7 degrees above pre-
industrial levels by 2040, leading to
environmental catastrophe across the sphere of
the globe. In other words, we have but 12 years
left before the environmental crisis grows to
such a scale that it could very well lead to
human extinction. The report argues that to
prevent this will require changing the world
economy at a scale and speed that had ‘no
documented historic precedent’, with greenhouse
gas pollution reduced 45% from its 2010 level by
2030 and eliminated by 2050.
[Cut to footage of recycling and supermarkets.]
NARRATOR: Many critiques of global warming suggest that the
problem is rooted in consumption. In other words,
they argue that global warming is down to
individuals and that each of us has a
responsibility to manage our own carbon footprint
by recycling, using less electricity and water,
or driving less. Whilst doing these things is by
no means a bad suggestion, this fundamentally
fails to get to the heart of the problem. Take,
for example, recycling. Whilst in theory this
process could scale back plastic pollution of the
44
soil and the ocean, or even offset the impact of

producing plastic, reality tells a different
story. In August 2018, councils in Britain
revealed that two-thirds of the plastic they
receive is unrecyclable, with particularly black
plastic being all but impossible to recycle. As
such, the intent of individual consumers does not
matter here. Whether they recycle or not, two
thirds of plastics in Britain necessarily go to
landfill. It is clear, therefore, that critiques
focusing upon the individual cannot solve the
question as it confronts us. What is required is
a systemic approach.
[Cut back to factories and industrial pollution.]
NARRATOR: Climate change is both caused and driven by the
organisation of production under capitalism,
with just 100 companies responsible for over 71%
of global greenhouse gas emissions. These
industries hold immense influence and power,
which makes tackling the pollution resultant from
their actions essentially impossible under
capitalism. An example of this can be seen in the
responses offered to the 8 October UN report on
climate change. The report’s conclusion that coal
use must be eliminated was immediately disputed
by the World Coal Association, with its interim
chief executive, Katie Warrick, stating that it
will continue to campaign for the use of “carbon
capture technology” to allow the continued use
of coal. Rather than preventing climate change,
this technology is intended to reverse its
impact, lowering temperatures once they have
passed the 2.7 degree threshold. Dr Drew
Shindell, one of the UN report’s authors, stated
that this option is preferred by governments,
despite the fact that it would lead to the death
of all coral reefs on the planet, shortly after
the report’s release.
[Cut to footage of banks.]
NARRATOR: That capitalism is fundamentally unable to
resolve the environmental crisis is because it
necessarily organises production exclusively in
the pursuit of private profit. As Marx
understood, profit is derived from the
exploitation of human labour-power – the only
commodity capable of producing new value. As
45
renewable energy sources only require labour-

power in the construction of solar panels, wind
turbines or wave energy technology, they do not
produce new value in the long-term and, as such,
they are not profitable. In contrast, carbon
energy sources require labour-power to acquire
through mining, drilling or fracking and more
labour-power to process. They are profitable. As
such, the logic of capitalist production dictates
that renewable energy sources do not receive
masses of investment, whereas fossil fuels and
carbon producing energy sources are worth
billions.
[Cut to footage of Trump withdrawing from the Paris accord,
DAPL, fracking, Bolsonaro and the Amazon.]
NARRATOR: Not only is capitalism unable to solve the
problem of climate change, the reaction and
terror brought about by its crisis is
significantly deepening the problem. This is
indicated by the US’ withdrawal from the Paris
Climate Accords on 1 June, 2017.
[Cut to TRUMP.]
TRUMP: The United States will withdraw from the Paris
Climate Accord. Thank you.
[Cutback to montage.]
NARRATOR: Though the Accords are by no means sufficient, a
point well acknowledged within scientific
literature, Trump’s decision to withdraw from the
agreement signifies that he will not allow the
profitability of US imperialism to be curbed even
to an insignificant degree. The construction of
the Dakota Access Pipeline, the beginning of
fracking in Britain and the intent of the newly
elected, US-backed fascist President of Brazil,
Jair Bolsonaro, to privatise the Amazon
rainforest indicate much the same process.
Resistance to this rampant exploitation of the
earth is everywhere met by the iron fist of the
capitalist state, something clearly indicated by
the US response to protests against the Dakota
Access Pipeline and the British response to
demonstrations against fracking. Rather than
address the problem of climate change,
imperialist society is seeking to deepen its
46
exploitation of the earth. Profit comes first,

no matter its demands.
[Cut to montage of US, British, EU, Russia and China flags;
nuclear explosion; military pollution; NATO/Vostok military
drills.]
NARRATOR: Though this is, itself, enough to bury our
species, the tendency toward war analysed
throughout the rest of this film must also be
acknowledged. War between any of the nations
discussed in this film today quite literally
means doom for our ecosystem. Aside from the more
evident implications of direct confrontation,
even the continuation of proxy wars threatens to
dramatically speed up the environmental crisis.
This is obvious from a simple observation: the
US military is the largest polluter on the face
of the earth. As it further builds its forces and
those it threatens are forced to do the same,
this pollution will only increase. The
implications for our planet our staggering.
[Cut back to Great Barrier Reef.]
NARRATOR: Though the UN report cited here makes clear the
scale of the problem facing our species, it fails
to communicate precisely the extent of capitalist
production’s impact upon the natural world. For
every moment that we allow imperialist capitalism
to continue, our planet is impoverished, losing
some of the light of its splendour. If the
agonising death of the Great Barrier Reef serves
as one example of this, we must know that there
are many, many others.
[Cut to montage of environmental destruction. Find footage
corresponding to the captions, which are cut into the footage.
Cue Mariage D'amoure by Paul de Senneville.]
CAPTION 11: The summer of 2018 set all time heat records
across the whole planet.
CAPTION 12: This was entirely the result of climate
change produced by human industry.
CAPTION 13: As a result, wildfires spread across the
globe, reaching even the Arctic circle.
CAPTION 14: The oldest sea ice in the world had never
melted before 2018.
47
CAPTION 15: Over the course of this year, it melted

twice.
CAPTION 16: This damage to the ice caps threatens to
destroy the polar vortex, which regulates
the earth’s temperature.
CAPTION 17: An example of this is the gulf stream, which is
at its weakest in 1,600 years.
CAPTION 18: This will mean that weather systems linger
longer, destroying ecosystems.
CAPTION 19: Marine heatwaves have doubled between 1982 and
2016.
CAPTION 20: Around 87% of these were caused by human
activity.
CAPTION 21: Humanity, which represent 0.01% of all life on
earth, has destroyed 83% of wild mammals.
CAPTION 22: The lowest estimates predict that between 200 and
2,000 species are becoming extinct every year.
CAPTION 23: This is known as the sixth mass extinction.
CAPTION 24: It is between 1,000 and 10,000 times faster than
any previous extinction event.
CAPTION 25: There can be no doubt:
CAPTION 26: capitalism’s existence poses an existential
threat to life on earth.
CAPTION 27: “Where the Establishment sees individual human
nature and technological progress as the engine
of destruction, the [Marxist] looks on the
ecological spoilation and traces the poisonous
spoor back to the strongholds of reaction and
capital; calls the pollution for what it is – war
against nature, against people, against the race
itself, against the unborn.”
Huey P. Newton, Dialectics of Nature (1974).
[Fade to black.]
[Fade to CAPTION 28.]
CAPTION 28: PART SEVEN:
SOCIALISM AND WAR
[Fade in to tank footage from end of Syria montage in intro.
Montage of destroyed cities in Syria. Distant echoes of
marching.]
48
NARRATOR: Here in Syria, world war is not a possibility or

a theory. It is reality.
Since the beginning of the war on Syria in 2011,
the nation has seen the armies of around 62
countries. To place this in context, the landmass
of Syria is but two thirds that of Britain.
Though the US-led alliance in Syria, which
notably includes Britain and France, entered the
war claiming that it was merely there to oppose
Islamic State and their various counterparts, its
real intentions are today very clear. Not only
is there evidence which reveals that the US is,
in fact, arming and funding the terrorist groups
it claims to be in Syria to oppose, its role in
the war has increasingly been revealed as that
of conquest. This is very clear in both policy
and action.
[Cut to footage of Russia in Syria.]
NARRATOR: Russia joined the Syrian war in September 2015,
after an official request from the Syrian
government. Despite the US and Britain’s claims
that they are in Syria to combat the same enemy,
both of these imperialist powers turned down
Russian attempts to start discussing co-
operation in October 2015. Since then, tensions
between these powers have escalated steadily. The
reason for this is simple: the US and its allies
are in Syria to further expand their influence
over the middle-east; Russia is in an alliance
with the Assad government, which they must
overturn in order to do so. As Russia’s
interventions have tipped the war in favour of
the Syrian government, these contradictions of
interest have only sharpened. This is made clear
by the near escalation of airstrikes by the US,
Britain and France into open conflict with Russia
in April. With the US’ illegal presence in Syria
now to be permanent, this antagonism could flare
into open conflict at any moment.
[Cut to shots of Syria, Ukraine.]
NARRATOR: Viewed in context of the analysis developed
throughout the rest of this film, it is clear to
see that the war on Syria is an expression of a
broader process. It is a live front in a world
confrontation. Moreover, there are other such
49
fronts, with the war today still raging in

eastern Ukraine serving as a similar expression.
These are the blistering wounds of the crisis,
where masses of humanity are already being wiped
out in pursuit of what the US terms “great power
competition”. Unless the causes of these wounds
are attended to, they will simply spread. Reality
is demonstrating this.
[Cut to montage of Trump’s withdrawal from the INF treaty, Putin
on sinners going to hell in nuclear holocaust, Macron EU army.]
NARRATOR: Whilst writing, recording and editing the rest
of this film, the crisis has picked up pace
considerably. In late October, Trump announced
that the US would be withdrawing from the
Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty,
with the intention to station mid-range nuclear
warheads in Europe. Though Russia maintained that
it was willing to continue discussion with the
US to resolve the question, it stated that it
would have no option but to respond to a US
withdrawal. Sure enough, Putin revealed that
Russia now possesses hypersonic weapons capable
of evading any air defence system on 19 November.
With the US’ plans to station its warheads in
Europe, this move has also served to escalate
tensions between the EU and the US. Shortly after
Trump’s announcement, on 6 November, the French
President Macron called for the creation of an
independent European army. Just as world leaders
were set to assemble to mark the 100th anniversary
of the 1918 armistice, he reiterated this call,
significantly listing the need to face down the
US as one reason for his proposal. The German
Chancellor Merkel has since joined his call.
[Cut to footage of Verdun memorial ceremony and the grave of the
unknown soldier.]
NARRATOR: It is clear to see that US imperialism is
pursuing a strategy of aggressive competition and
confrontation against Russia and China. However,
sober analysis reveals that a further
confrontation – that between the US and Europe –
is today a reality of imperialist society. The
centrality given to this conflict in this film
is intended to demonstrate the depth of the
crisis facing this society. That this alliance,
which has subsisted since 1945, is today falling
50
into ruin is a clear indication that the

imperialist crisis is forcing a third redivision
of the world between great powers. The conditions
for world war are clearly forming. Whilst it is
uncertain how the alliances of such a war may
fall, its fundamental basis is today undeniable.
[Cut to shots of US military.]
NARRATOR: That the US is already treating this as a living
reality can be seen in several elements of its
military approach. The National Defence Strategy
announced early in 2018 is already being
implemented in US military training for what is
termed “multi-domain combat”. This includes both
space and cyberspace as active realms of combat
between what the US calls “peer adversaries”,
ending any notions of the kind of military parity
which subsisted during the Cold War. Beyond this,
the US is openly discussing the likely reality
of a third world war in military theory, with a
collection of papers entirely devoted to this
subject published by the US Army Command and
General Staff College Press in 2017. The
introduction to this collection clearly
demonstrates that the US understands fully its
relationship to the EU imperialist bloc.
[Cut to CAPTION 29.]
CAPTION 26: The United Kingdom’s Brexit in summer 2016 vote
shows the likelihood for more strain in the EU
and NATO as well. That new important development
would potentially meet the objectives of the
anti-American economic and strategic agenda in
Europe, would diminish US influence among its
traditional allies, already affected by Europe’s
pragmatic considerations of close trade and
economic relationships with Russia and China.
Dr Mahir J. Ibrahimov, “Introduction”,
Cultural Perspectives, Geopolitics & Energy
Security of Eurasia:
Is the Next Global Conflict Imminent? (2017)
[Cut back to the grave of the unknown soldier.]
NARRATOR: Put together, this indicates a reality. We must
see and face it.
[Cut to black.]
NARRATOR: Midnight is staring at us plainly.
51
[Fade in the grave digger. Shovel sfx.]

NARRATOR: Just as Marxism is able to understand the causes
of this confrontation, it is also able to grasp
the solution to it. That solution is simple. It
is us – the working class.
[Cut to statues of Marx. Montage old footage of the working
class.]
NARRATOR: The revolutionary role of the proletariat in
Marx’s work is not a result of moral reasoning,
but of scientific historical analysis. The
organisation of capitalist production requires
that the working class possess nothing to sell,
save for our own labour-power. This means that
we have no material interest in the maintenance
of capitalist society whatsoever. Its existence
as a social system is predicated upon the mass
of humanity being disenfranchised. This is an
historically unique phenomenon, as the oppressed
classes of previous social systems often still
held a material interest in the systems they
existed within – for example, small land holdings
were granted to peasants in exchange for the
labour they did on a landowner’s estate. The
significance of this unique condition to the
proletariat’s existence is enormous. As we have
no interests remotely in capitalism, nor can
history be rolled back, the only possible
political expression of the working class’
material interests is the end of class society
itself.
[Cut to montage of factories.]
NARRATOR: Not only does capitalism create its grave diggers
in the working class, it furnishes humanity with
the tools by which to organise a new society. The
productive forces produced by capital
accumulation undeniably represent an enormous
step forward for humanity. Crucially, the various
new productive forces created by capitalist
development create a change in the way that
people work. The precise nature of this change
is identified by Marx in Capital. The way in
which capitalism organises production leads to
what Marx terms the socialisation of labour. This
more and more eliminates individual, artisanal
or handicraft forms of labour, replacing them
52
with industrial labour, which requires the labour

of groups. This means that it is possible to
organise production collectively and rationally,
rather than according to the irrational dictates
of private profit.
[Cut to shots of bank.]
NARRATOR: The concentration of production under monopoly
capitalism and imperialism has heightened this
contradiction further. To put this simply. The
cartels formed between monopolies can fix the
quantity of goods to be produced between them.
If they can do this, then it must also be possible
to organise production in accordance with need.
What prevents this is merely that capitalism is
socially organised to produce profit. Its
development has opened up the possibility of a
classless society, with the forces of production
owned collectively and production organised
rationally – that is, socialism or communism.
Humanity already possesses the resources.
[Cut to Lenin statues and Havana.]
NARRATOR: Whilst the history of the communist movement is
beyond the scope of this film, it is worth
highlighting that this history demonstrates that
Marxism can attend to the most pressing questions
of our age. It is unquestionable that the threats
of imperialist war and the environmental crisis
are the most are the most pressing urgent
political tasks facing our species. Two examples
are required to demonstrate that they can be
overcome.
[Cut to montage of Bolshevik revolution and armstice.]
NARRATOR: The October revolution of 1917 ended not only
Tsarism and capitalism in Russia, but also the
first world war. The victory of the revolution
on 11 November set in motion a revolutionary
wave, with mass desertions in the French army, a
one million strong general strike, the Sparticist
uprising and the mass mutiny of sailors in
Germany, and the rise of Red Clydeside in
Britain. In Russia itself, the fundamental
question underpinning the Bolshevik’s victory
was their steadfast opposition to the war, as
both the Tsarist monarchy and the capitalist
Provisional Government refused to end the it. The
53
world’s first socialist state was won with a

simple slogan: “bread, land and peace”. Its
impact was such that the imperialists were forced
to end their war of conquest and plunder. As the
then British Prime Minister Lloyd George said,
‘Our real danger now is not [Germans], but
Bolshevism.’
[Cut to footage of Cuba.]
NARRATOR: Today, the legacy of the Bolsheviks still lives
on. In Cuba, socialism is demonstrating that it
is capable of solving the environmental crisis.
In 2006 the World Wide Fund for Nature’s Living
Planet report pointed to Cuba as the only
environmentally sustainable nation on the
planet. It has continued to improve its
sustainability and living standards since. This
is a stark proof of a simple fact: capitalism is
unable to solve the environmental crisis;
socialism can.
[Cue proletarian factory sfx. Cut to montage on the topics
discussed.]
NARRATOR: The imperialists are holding the world to ransom.
We gain to benefit nothing from the war and
destruction that stands ahead of us. We have so
much to win by objecting to it. Today, we are
upon the verge of exploring space on a scale
comparable to seafaring. The emergence of space
war as a sincere promise of the imperialist
counter-revolution illustrates something
immensely powerful, if we dare only to think what
might be achieved if this technology were put to
its opposite use, in service of reason and not
the defence of profit. Not only is space
exploration possible, but we possess the
technology today to eliminate disease, to ensure
a sustainable energy future and reconcile
ourselves with the earth as a species properly.
Poverty can be eliminated. That is simply a fact.
NARRATOR: And this truly is the most important lesson of
Marx and Lenin’s work for our present moment.
Today, imperialism is sounding out a war cry and
it will not simply go away. It can, however, be
stopped, and something far greater built in its
stead. As a class and as a species, we must answer
but one question. Luckily, it is simple.
54
NARRATOR: Socialism or extinction?

[Cut to Soviet flag, in reverse. Cue Trump’s election victory
music.]
[After flag has risen cut to CAPTION 30 on white background.]
CAPTION 30: HISTORY IS MARCHING
[Fade in Prolekult logo.]
~|END|~
55

History Is Marching

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History Is Marching

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H I S T O R Y I S M A R C H I N G

History is Marching (2018)

[Black screen. CAPTION fades in.]

Even as these tensions play out, the west is

for example, the 2003 Iraq war. However,

how they are used, nor can one of these uses be

leads to the hoarding of money, known to Marx as

As capitalism develops, production concentrates

The development of monopoly in industry and

NARRATOR: Times Square, New York. A labyrinth of glittering

but that’s what it was. Mengele, whom you may

best in the compost of its dead brothers, capital

this formation was of the same substance as the

[Cut to aerial footage of the University of Chicago.]

and prices to stagnate. Then, the logic of “pure”

talking and them miners weren’t even saying a

[Cut to footage of planet earth.]

accumulation process is by launching the largest

[Cut to footage of dollars.]

removing their access to the world economy.

TRUMP: Well, I think we have a lot of foes. I think the

NARRATOR: The rise of the Chinese economy has unfolded with

[Cut to footage of the NATO line in eastern Europe. Juxtapose

Germany goes out and pays billions and billions

subversion are underway across the EU, with the

transatlantic alliance, further escalation with

NARRATOR: Prior to his meeting to discuss tariffs with

with Iran has more than doubled, reaching €21

NARRATOR: This withdrawal led the EU to consider

the world marketplace. Whilst the political will

[Cut to footage of Juncker, European Commission.]

beginning of 2018. Orbán’s fascism has been

British capital grasp feverishly at anything they

the world economy and means that confrontation

MAY: Strong and stable.

MORGAN: People do feel that –

splits within them considerably. The chaos

[Cut back to footage of CAMERON announcing the referendum.

[Cut to montage: Salisbury (aerial), Skripal’s house, Alex

egregious example can be seen early in the

North Atlantic, authorised cyber warfare actions

dead set on carrying out the criminal campaign

The trumpets of war are blowing. And here we are,

NARRATOR: In the process of developing their analysis of

soil and the ocean, or even offset the impact of

renewable energy sources only require labour-

exploitation of the earth. Profit comes first,

CAPTION 15: Over the course of this year, it melted

NARRATOR: Here in Syria, world war is not a possibility or

fronts, with the war today still raging in

into ruin is a clear indication that the

[Fade in the grave digger. Shovel sfx.]

with industrial labour, which requires the labour

world’s first socialist state was won with a

NARRATOR: Socialism or extinction?

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