Tear Down the Empire': Socialists Respond to Wikileaks by Calling for U.S. Demise

While most of the nation fears the fall out from the latest release of secret documents by Wikileaks, some groups are seeing it as an opportunity. Take the socialists, who have called on democratic socialists to use the leaks as motivation to "tear down the empire," otherwise known as the United States.

Trevor Loudon sets it up:

Andrea Pason and Billy Wharton are co-chairs of the Socialist Party USA. They just published this statement in LINKS, an international marxist journal run by the Australian Socialist Alliance.

Now the statement (emphasis added by Loudon):

The latest Wikileaks revelations should be a call to action for all Americans. It is time to tear down the empire that has been created in their name. Two tasks are first and foremost. We need to create a vibrant movement to end the wars being waged in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan. No more occupations, no more military surges and no more drone attacks. Simultaneously, we must demand that the prison facility at Guantanamo Bay be closed immediately. Achieving such demands will open a political space to more directly challenge the centre of the military industrial complex by calling for an immediate reduction of the military budget by 50% and the closing of all US military bases abroad.

As democratic socialists, we imagine another society, where the great wealth this world produces is put to use to meet human needs. Such a world would not need the secret cloak that covers the operations of the US empire. It would, instead, be based on notions that seem very distant from our current reality – democracy, free association and self-determination. We think that democratic socialism holds the potential to live up to these lofty ideals. Let the Wikileaks disclosures provide the motivation for you to join in this struggle.

Read the entire anti-U.S. statement here.