Minneapolis forum: ‘No New Cold War on China!’

Minneapolis, MN – On October 23, the Twin Cities District of Freedom Road Socialist Organization held an educational event at the University of Minnesota titled “No New Cold War Against China!” The event was part of a yearly celebration of the October socialist revolutions which occurred in Russia (1917) and China (1949). The event’s speakers were Autumn Lake of the Anti-War Committee, Mick Kelly of Freedom Road Socialist Organization and Danny Haiphong of the Black Agenda Report and Friends of Socialist China.

Speakers discussed a wide range of topics related to the ongoing intensification of U.S. aggression towards the People’s Republic of China, ranging from false accusations of human rights violations in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region to hostile U.S. naval exercises in the South China Sea.

Mick Kelly began the event by outlining the revolutionary achievements of socialist China as well as the importance of opposing the New Cold War being waged by the United States. Kelly stated, “This Cold War has the possibility of becoming a hot war due to the actions of the United States along with an array of hostile Western powers, including Japan, marching to Washington DC’s drumbeat.”

After Kelly, Autumn Lake explained the U.S. intervention strategy of manufacturing false human rights narratives as a pretext for war. Examples included the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia and U.S. military intervention in Syria. Lake explained how this pattern of manufacturing consent for U.S. conflict has been recently applied to China through the Hong Kong protests and false accusations of genocide in Xinjiang.

Danny Haiphong summarized the various components of the New Cold War against China. These include the failed trade war initiated under the Trump administration, sanctions against the Communist Party of China and tech firms like Huawei, and the military ‘Pivot to Asia’ which began under the Obama administration. Haiphong concluded by explaining how the New Cold War reflects a desperate attempt of declining U.S. imperialism to contain the rising socialist advancement of China, as well as the alternative path of global peace and cooperation it offers. A question-and-answer segment concluded the event.

More than 30 community members and students attended the event along with numerous online viewers via livestream.