“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.” Martin Luther King

The British government’s decision to explore for oil in the Falkland Islands has revived tensions between Argentina and the United Kingdom. Experts say there could be 60 billion barrels of oil located in a 200 square mile zone surrounding the Falkland Islands, as much as there was in the North Sea. This would make it one of the largest oil reserves in the world.

If oil is found this will substantially alter the fundamental economic character of the disputed islands from fishing and sheep-raising to the exploitation of one of the world’s most sought after commodities: petroleum. The exploitative economic character Britain is unilaterally imposing exacerbates the national tensions between Argentina and Britain. This conflict has brought the relationship between the two countries to their sharpest point since the 1982 war over the Islands.

The Argentine government of President Christina Kirschner has appealed to the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki Moon, to intervene in the dispute, and bring this matter to a negotiated end. In addition, President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, has correctly demanded that Britain cede the Malvinas: “The British are desperate for oil since their own fields in the North Sea are now being depleted,” Chavez said in a televised speech. “When will England stop breaking international law? Return the Malvinas to Argentina!” Argentina and Venezuela are both members of Mercosur, the common market covering much of South America.

This conflict is not, however, a simple land dispute or even an oil resource dispute. The question of the return of the Malvinas Islands is an explosive national issue for most Argentines, who see the haughty imperial occupation and colonization of their islands as symbolic of their nation’s relationship to western imperialism. Argentina is a country whose national wealth is sapped by the wealthiest financiers of London, Madrid, and New York City. The vast majority of the Argentine people view the continued occupation of the Malvinas Islands by Britain as a fundamental injustice. Argentina attempted to seize the islands in 1982 but was defeated by the British after a short-lived, but bloody re-occupation of the colonial outpost. The conflict resulted in nearly 1,000 deaths with two-thirds of the dead from the Argentine military. The invasion was a military disaster for Argentina and a stunning loss in the fight against imperialism which bolstered the fanatical anticommunism of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. Then, too, the conflict was bathed in the waters of the Nicaraguan Revolution, the Grenadian revolution, and the civil war in El Salvador, not to mention the U.S.’ sponsored swath of counter-revolutions in Chile and Argentina.

Despite the failure of the Argentine military in 1982, the question still must be answered: What right does Britain have to a colony in the South Atlantic 7,800 miles from London? Britain claims it has the right to defend “self determination” when this seems as a convenient cover for British interests in the expansion of its capital. In keeping with this, the Legislative Assembly of the Falkland Islands, the local governing body for the 3,000 plus residents of the Falklands, announced on February 5, that it would oppose any Argentine firm exploring for oil in the territory.

The British, French, Dutch, or U.S. governments have no business maintaining colonies in South America, or anywhere else on the globe. The Malvinas are properly Argentine territory, and workers in Britain have no interest in maintaining the old Empire territorial claims that Labor and Tory governments, including those of Thatcher, Blair and Brown, have vigorously defended.

In this sense the Falkland Islands are no different than returning Hong Kong to the Peoples Republic of China, India to the Indians, or Ireland to the Irish. What seemingly complicates the matter is that there are virtually no Argentine nationals on the Falklands. The local residents vigorously support continued British control, much like the reactionary Unionists of Northern Ireland.

Latin America and the Caribbean are dotted with direct colonial possessions of the United States (Puerto Rico, American Virgin Islands), Britain (British Virgin Islands, etc.), the Netherlands (Curacao, Dutch West Indies), and France (Guadeloupe, Martinique, French Guiana). With the century-long occupation of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands as examples, it is clear that the United States has no genuine inclination toward the establishment of democracy or independence for the remaining subjugated nations of this region.

Administration after administration prattles on about democracy in countries with which it is interested in interfering. Yet the actions of the U.S. government, whether those run by Democrats or Republicans, while courting figures like the Dalai Lama, are intractable in their overlord status in Puerto Rico. The disgusting example of Vieques, an island off the coast of Puerto Rico, comes to mind. The U.S. has shelled the island for decades as a military training ground. The U.S. refuses to clean up the dangerous waste, which includes carcinogenic pollutants and unexploded ordinance. This has led to absurdly high levels of cancer on Vieques.

Meanwhile, against this backdrop of unresolved colonialism, a new social power is emerging, the resurgent continental resistance to imperialism by Central and South American working people in recent years. A prime example of this is the movement that has thrust the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela to move sharply to the left in the direction of socialism. The spectre of social revolution is haunting the oligarchies of South America and the imperialists of the northern hemisphere. The crisis in the South Atlantic cannot be seen outside the context of one imperialist provocation against this process: the military build-up in Colombia against Venezuela, the U.S.-backed separatist movements in Bolivia, the U.S.-sponsored removal of President Zelaya in Honduras, and the influx of U.S. and other imperialist troops in Haiti.

The overwhelming anti-imperialist sentiments of the Argentine working class could be ignited into mass action by the British provocation. Given the historic militancy of the working class in Argentina, which propelled hundreds of thousands of people onto the streets to demand economic relief from the government in response to the economic crisis of 2000-2001, one president after another was forced to leave office. Consequently, the Kirschner government will have to act boldly if it is to stay in power.

However, the capitalist government of Argentina is tied hand and foot to the imperialists it is attempting to challenge. President Cristina Kirchner, whose political support includes the businesses and bankers who are in large part dominated by British financial interests, may find it difficult to be successful with her government’s diplomatic efforts or with an attempt at a semi-military blockade of the islands.

Argentina has long been dominated by British capitalism. The direct occupation of the Malvinas Islands by the British only serves to underscore the position of Argentina as a neo-colonial subject nation. A working class upsurge opposed to further British machinations would in all likelihood expose the country’s subjugation at the hands of British imperialism and lay the blame squarely in the Argentine government’s inability and or unwillingness to seize the islands.

Imperialism can be defeated and will be defeated only when workers politically unite and act independently of their own capitalist-controlled governments so as to lead their respective nations in taking successful actions in defence of the right of all countries to self-determination. One possible action that could be promoted would be to attempt to unite American, British, and Argentine dockworkers with other South American port workers in refusing to load or unload shipments of oil equipment or military related cargo to or from the Falklands. If the British and U.S. workers do not take a stand in support of their Argentine brothers and sisters, there is no reason Argentines should wait. South American workers could demand a halt to all these type of shipments.

It is unlikely that once pushed into independent political action the working class will resume their subservient political role in Argentine politics. The question of working class power was raised in recent Argentine history when workers in 2000 to 2002 took over many workplaces, the streets, the national plaza, highways and even towns.

As for the Falkland residents themselves, they, too, are unfortunate victims of British Imperialism. Although many families have lived for generations on the islands, the illegitimacy of Britain’s claim has been well known for over a century. Falkland laws against Argentine interests must be voided by the Falklanders themselves if they wish to be on the right side of history.

The Falklander’s parochial interests are secondary to the basic question of national self-determination and sovereignty of Argentina. The Falklanders are not a separate nation from Britain. They are its colonists. Their fear of domination by Argentina is a foil for British economic interests. Britain’s capitalist elite has little regard for its subjects when its economic interests are at stake. It did not grant the millions of residents of Hong Kong the right to elect its own leaders when it was in its interests to secede the Territory to the Peoples Republic of China. Nor ultimately will it consider the interests of the residents of the Falklands equal to their own economic interests.

A victory in the Malvinas for the Argentine working people would be like a beacon for Latin America’s long and incomplete fight for territorial and political independence from imperialism.

“We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” Winston Churchill

As reports of unimaginable devastation continue to come out of Haiti in the wake of the 7.0 magnitude earthquake that struck on Tuesday evening, our thoughts go out to all Haitians in this time of great need.

“We will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year’s Day.” Edith Lovejoy Pierce

“In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock.” Thomas Jefferson

American volunteers might be interested to learn about the International Volunteer Card. It offers volunteer travellers discounts on travel essentials from guide books to insurance, as well as 24-hour travel assistance line from anywhere in the world. For example, you can get 5% off domestic flights with United Airlines and 25% off online orders with Lonely Planet.

Cardholders also benefit from 24/7 travel assistance from a dedicated service line. Whether you lose luggage, need emergency cash transfers, seek passport assistance, the Volunteer Travel claims team can help members with any travel issues no matter where they are in the world through a free collect call phone number.

Six Volunteer Travel cards with varying ranges of benefits and discounts are available. Prices range from US$25 for a basic individual card to US$85 for a premium family card.

The cards are valid for purchases made in the US, and are good for one year, renewable annually.

Please visit www.volunteercard.com for more details.

“Be of service. Whether you make yourself available to a friend or co-worker, or you make time every month to do volunteer work, there is nothing that harvests more of a feeling of empowerment than being of service to someone in need.” Gillian Anderson

Don’t miss your chance to see one of the best free shows in the sky this year – the Leonids will peak on 17 November. Meteors are produced when tiny pieces of dust shed by comets many years ago plummet through the Earth’s atmosphere. They fall so fast that friction with the air heats them up and they “light up” appearing as “shooting stars.” A few meteors fall each hour on every night of the year, but it’s only when the Earth passes near the orbit of an active comet that meteors fall by the dozens as a shower.

The Leonids is one of the better meteor showers to observe, producing an average of 40 meteors per hour at their peak. The shower itself has a cyclic peak year every 33 years where hundreds of meteors can be seen each hour. The last of these occurred in 2001. The shower peaks this year on 17 and 18 November, but you can usually see some meteors from 13 – 20 November. The moon will be totally out of the way this year, providing an exceptional viewing experience for the Leonids.

The best time to observe is clearly dependent upon where you live on the globe.

In 1988, I chose to spend an evening viewing Victor Schonfeld’s “The Animals Film.” This was a strange and revelatory experience. Sitting in front of a small screen, the history of animal exploitation flickered before my eyes. From the first steps in the 1930’s when farm animals were crowded indoors for reasons other than winter, to dog and cock fighting, bear baiting, fox hunting and hare coursing, to name but a few. I already knew of this – who doesn’t – but I wasn’t prepared for one of the most disturbing examples of humanities grim cruelty toward animals, vivisection. Until then, I had an image of science as a dynamic, progressive, frontier-expanding activity, and of its practitioners as dedicated teams of rational, open-minded professionals whose motivation was highly moral and whose concern was to benefit humanity. Much of the evidence presented in this film suggested quite the contrary, with the main beneficiary of these tests being the company profit margin.

It is not difficult to understand why animals are treated so indifferently in a society where the powerful minority holds the majority in similar contempt. What is hard is to break the circle of unthinking cruelty, and this can only be done as people begin to question the accepted values of our way of life and the grim fact of our endemic destructiveness. Here, as with other conflicts, we must build our conceptual bridges with the resources of our age. Puzzling and agonizing though these clashes often are, we know we must somehow deal with them by working out; how we should ideally think about the world and relate to animals.

The way we think about the world has a fundamental impact on decisions concerning the treatment of animals and our relationship with them. Given the importance of this, it is somewhat surprising to contemplate that the majority of people never question the way they think about the world. In many cases the world is a place where everything is ‘natural’ and ‘inevitable.’ We seem to have an astonishing ability to close our eyes to the truth, to live in a world of delusions and make-believe. These characteristics, shared to a greater or lesser extent by all of us, have helped to create a sick planet and a great deal of suffering to animals.

If everybody showed respect and had compassion for the nonhuman world, the earth would then undoubtedly become a more balanced and healthier place to live. Furthermore, if people maintain that compassion they will automatically free themselves from their mental patterns of ignorance. Knowing what is beneficial to yourself and others, and being able to do it, is wisdom, which cuts through our fundamental ignorance. Indeed, “The greatest knowledge we can posses, Socrates maintained, the only knowledge that matters a damn, is the awareness of our boundless, fathomless ignorance.”

Essentially, what needs to be done is not that particularly difficult, it is just a matter of a simple turn-around in attitude. Just because the way we think about animals has been inoculated culturally (and not programmed into us genetically as those who take part in blood sports occasionally claim), does not mean the disease is not treatable. If changed attitudes then lead not only changes in our personal lives but also to policy changes at the corporate and government level, indeed we have cause for hope. As civilisations advance, the trend must always be toward increasing humanity and compassion, and deceasing cruelty and exploitation.

People need to educate themselves about vivisection and pass on this information to friends and family. It is only our ignorance on the issue that perpetuates this cruel and barbaric practice. Something can always be done if the will of the majority dictates it. You can find out more about vivisection on the following websites:

• British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (www.buav.org)

• Dr Hadwen Trust (www.drhadwentrust.org)

• Doctors and Lawyers for Responsible Medicine (www.dlrm.org)

• FRAME (www.frame.org.uk)

• National Anti-Vivisection Society (www.navs.org.uk)

• People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (www.peta.org.uk)

• The Humane Research Trust (www.humaneresearch.org.uk)

• Uncaged (www.uncaged.co.uk).

There is also a selection of informative short videos on You Tube, just enter vivisection or animal testing/experimentation.

One of the most effective ways of turning changed attitudes into positive, concrete actions is by buying products not tested on animals. The grim fact is that all too many companies still test their final products and ingredients on live animals. Buying products that are cruelty free demonstrates to those companies that continue to test that you will not be supporting them. Nowadays, it’s very easy to find products not tested on animals and these can easily be found on the internet, in whole-food and ‘alternative’ shops, and increasingly in some supermarkets (i.e. all Co-op own brands are not tested on animals).

• Caring Consumer (www.caringconsumer.com)

• Go Crulety Free (www.gocrueltyfree.org)

• Leaping Bunny (www.leapingbunny.org)

• Uncaged (www.uncaged.co.uk/crueltyfree.htm)

Unlike so many other animal abuses, the issue of using animals in product testing is one that ultimately rests with consumers. Reliance on animal testing methods for cosmetic and household products will continue unless concerned citizens speak out with their purchasing power. By making informed humane choices and encouraging others to do the same, individuals can push for an end to product testing and stop the needless suffering of countless animals each year.

Laboratory animals do not have a voice, so we must use our purchasing power to speak out for them.