End Colonial Control and Resist US-Led War to Achieve independence and People’s Rights!

International Day of Action Confronts Current Militarization of our Nations and Struggles to End of Colonial and Imperialist Control

On this International Human Rights Day and the anniversary of the signing of the 1898 Treaty of Paris, the Resist US-Led War Movement vehemently rejects the imperialist legacy of this 1898 treaty. The Treaty of Paris cemented US imperialism beyond the North American continent and began the extremely violent period of US overseas expansion, colonialism, and neo-colonialism. Its legacy is now reflected most clearly in the continued US military expansion, occupation and wars of aggression which the US violently wages in an attempt to impose hegemonic power over peoples land, resources and lives. Resist joins with the peace loving people of the world in reaffirming our decisiveness to expose and oppose every aspect of US-led war and imperialism, drawing upon the long, proud legacy of national liberation struggles that have ceaselessly fought US imperialism since before, during, and after 1898.

US imperialism has used its military might to violently expand its borders since the inception of the United States itself. It waged a war of genocide against the Indigenous people of the continent, being forced to face the many peoples who took up arms to defend their land against the colonial invaders. Upon reaching the Pacific Coast, US imperialism began planning its ascent to becoming a naval power and began seeking out new colonial conquests, using its same tools of war that it waged against indigenous North American peoples against the peoples of other nations and territories across the Pacific, the Caribbean, and into Central America. The Spanish-American War found the US, a rising imperialist power, defeating Spain, a declining imperialist power, and therefore laying claim to Spain's colonial territories.

The 1898 Treaty of Paris signed over colonial control from Spain to the US of Puerto Rico, Cuba, Guam, and the Philippines. Additionally, the US Congress passed a joint resolution in the same year to fraudulently annex Hawai'i, which already was under US military occupation and de facto colonial control since the U.S. intervention in 1883. This marked the birth of the US as a global empire, and it was through the plunder and militarization of these lands that it began to build itself up into the number one terrorist superpower that it remains today.

The US strategically used its new colonial control over these countries to enrich itself through the theft of natural resources and the peoples' labor power, and position its military in strategic locations. Today for example the US is mustering its full military might to invade the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. Weapons tested in military exercises in Hawaiʻi, Guam, and the Philippines are being used to extrajudicially kill civilians in the Caribbean and troops are staging in Puerto Rico, preparing for a full-scale assault.

To this day, Puerto Rico, Guam, the Philippines, Cuba and Hawai’i continue to face oppression by the US, be it in the form of continued colonialism through "statehood" in the case of Hawai'i or "unincorporated territory" (under illegal occupation by the US), Guam, and Puerto Rico; and neocolonialism through US-backed puppet governments in the case of the Philippines; or a brutal regime of economic sanctions and a US blockade in the case of Cuba. While each of these countries faced many years of imperialist plunder and exploitation even before the Treaty of Paris, 1898 marked a new offensive of oppression on the peoples now living directly under US colonialism. This involved the gutting of the economy, currency devaluation, and intentional underdevelopment of health, infrastructure, education, and other public services.

As a result of the export-oriented and import-dependent economies of these countries, the people face widespread unemployment, harsh labor conditions on agricultural plantations, mines, and domestic work in settler-owned homes and colonial government buildings, and very precarious livelihood, which has forced millions of people to migrate abroad for economic survival. Resource plunder has deprived the people of their food and water sovereignty while pollution and other environmental degradations have led to widespread disease, malnourishment, and other health defects.

Extensive military bases, exercises, and live-fire tests on the lands and waters of these countries result in destruction of the environment, desecration of sacred indigenous land, systematic violence against women, economic shackling to the US military-industrial complex, and ultimately the placing of whole communities in the crosshairs of a US-led world war. Additionally, military propaganda campaigns directly target youth from these nations to instill reactionary US nationalism or other feelings of false benevolence towards the US to recruit people, especially youth, to fight in US wars of aggression and quash their revolutionary patriotic history.

Yet while each of these countries faced severe violence enacted on their people, environmental destruction, and plunder of their resources, they have steadfastly persisted in their resistance to US imperialism.

The Filipino people, having won their own victory against Spanish colonialism before the US invaded, fought against every US-puppet regime that has ruled the archipelago, successfully ejected all official US military bases from the country during the 1990s, and continue to wage a people's war for full national liberation.

The Puerto Rican people, since the 1868 Grito de Lares rebellion against Spain, has fought against all forms of US colonialism, both on the archipelago and on the North American continent, successfully ejected the US Navy from Vieques in 2003, and continue to resist the brutal economic austerity measures of the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act (PROMESA).

The people of Guam and the Northern Marianas continue to fight against the US military presence, such as the Aegis missile system, and the end of joint military exercises on their territory, while resisting the economic stranglehold over their resources through deep sea mining and other extractive schemes.

The Hawai'ian people have never ceased their fight for independence against the US invaders since the united resistance under Queen Liliuokalani, rejecting so-called "statehood" while waging campaigns to end the lease of US military bases on the archipelago and ending the Rim of the Pacific military exercises, among others.

The people of Cuba achieved victory in the Cuban Revolution of 1959 and have defended their socialist construction against all attempts of US intervention, from the failed "Bay of Pigs" invasion until the US blockade of today, and have even offered liberation fighters in solidarity with the anti-colonial wars of Angola, Namibia, and South Africa. Each of these nations have bravely fought and sacrificed for the liberation of their land and people and to eject the US war machine from their homelands.

The people must continue to reject the Treaty of Paris as the tool of colonialism and US-led war that it is. US imperialism is on its decline, yet the US war machine lashes out in its death throws. Trump's new National Security Strategy targets the very countries the US grabbed through the Treaty of Paris and beyond, with its focus on securing access to critical supply chains and minerals especially in Asia and the Pacific, increasing its military presence and technical superiority, and using "lethal force" to assert US dominance in the Western Hemisphere, stoking the flames of another possible world war while imperialist-backed proxy wars spread to enact US interests across the world. The peace-loving peoples of the world must unite with the people of the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Guam, Hawai'i, Cuba, and all nations fighting for liberation against US imperialism to expose and oppose the legacy of the Treaty of Paris and fight to bring about just and lasting peace and the end of US imperialism.


See the toolkit and join the day of action to stand up together and struggle for the end of colonial control and independence now!