War on Terror Follow

"A new foreign policy" is how the Guardian's Martin Woollacott described George W Bush's chilling speech threatening war across the globe. Woollacott and fellow Guardian commentator Hugo Young are just two of those who backed Bush and Blair's Afghan war but are now shocked by the US's new global war drive. Even former Tory minister Chris Patten has spoken out.

"Our war against terror is only beginning." That was US president George Bush's chilling message last week. Bush labelled Iraq, Iran and North Korea as an "axis of evil", and threatened them with "the justice of this nation". After the bombing of Afghanistan there is little doubt what US "justice" means.

"George Bush's war is the opportunity of a generation to cut jobs without the risk of strikes." This is what top managers at British Airways (BA) have written in a secret document, obtained by the Observer, as they prepare to axe 10,000 jobs. This is on top of the 7,000 redundancies they have already announced. It is one sign of how rotten the system is that Bush and Tony Blair have gone to war to defend.

Tony Blair and his government have backed US president George Bush's war in Afghanistan to the hilt. But even some sections of New Labour are worried about his plans to spread his war to Iraq, Somalia or any other country the US decides is a "rogue state".

I missed the great anti-war demonstration in London the Sunday before last. But I don't feel too bad about this because, along with 500 other people, I was participating in a conference on globalisation and resistance in New York.

HAWAII, 1893: seizes by force.

Three decades ago a mass movement against the Vietnam War shook the US ruling class to its core. At its height 750,000 people marched in Washington and 100,000 in London. The growth of that movement holds vital lessons for the struggle against the US-led war on Afghanistan today.

George W Bush and Tony Blair say they are waging war against "terrorism" and for "democracy" and "civilisation". In private their language and motives are very different. Long before 11 September the US state was clear that its real aims are those of global military and economic dominance.

The building of a movement against war was given an enormous boost at a marvellous rally in central London last Friday. At just a few days notice over 2,000 packed into Friends Meeting House opposite the capital's Euston station. There hasn't been a meeting like that in London for at least 20 years.

The full horror of the attacks in the US was breaking as Socialist Worker went to press. Very many innocent people had been killed or injured.