Closing Resolution of the Zimmerwald Conference 2.0
Dear friends, As Co-President of the United Front, I am pleased to present to you for publication the closing resolution of the Zimmerwald Conference 2.0 on September 6, 2025, which was adopted unanimously with 4 abstentions. The conference was characterized by a decidedly democratic culture of debate. This was despite, or perhaps because of, the art of not glossing over fundamental differences, but at the same time striving for the greatest possible unity in the fight against the threat of world war and fascism while setting aside differences. With success! The test will be whether and how words are followed by deeds. The conference was marked by a great willingness on the part of all participants to intensify cooperation and improve cross-border coordination and cooperation. The United Front as the host organization looks forward to future cooperation. Monika Gärtner-Engel Co-President of the United Front
1. In the middle of the First World War the 1915 Zimmerwald Conference declared in its Manifesto: “Capitalists of every country, who coin the red gold of war profits from the blood spilled by the people, claim that this war serves to defend the fatherland, democracy, and liberation of oppressed peoples. They lie!”
The Zimmerwald Conference strove for the international unity of the proletariat against the war of the capitalists, thus preparing the transformation of the war between the capitalists and imperialists into civil war and revolution. Only the October Revolution put an end to the war!
The October Revolution boosted the positions of the “Zimmerwald Left” in many countries. After all, one of the first measures taken by the revolutionary soviet councils after the October Revolution was the decree on peace. Revolutionary Russia unilaterally ended the war and called on the soldiers of all countries to fraternize with each other and turn their guns on the exploiters of all countries.
2. The Zimmerwald Conference 2.0 took place on September 6, 2025, with a total of 403 participants from 32 countries:1 95 in person and 308 online. A broad spectrum of democratic, trade-unionist and revolutionary forces from different tendencies were represented. We were united by the idea of putting differences aside in a time of new (world) war danger and the advance of fascism.
We had solidarity-based, spirited discussions. It is clear that there are still many controversies to be resolved before a worldwide united front comes about against war, capitalism and fascism, as most brutal form of oppression of any resistance, against environmental destruction – and for the achievement of a society without exploitation and oppression that we all strive for, and a society-changing movement:
Must one speak of a capitalist or an imperialist world system? Which countries can be characterized as imperialist today? What are the deep economic causes of the wars escalating worldwide. Must we speak of the danger of world war or of an existing world war? What is the societal alternative? How should the former socialist countries and those of so-called “socialism really existing” be assessed? What lessons can be drawn from them? Can Hamas be an ally of the Palestinian liberation struggle? What forms of organization do we use to fight against war, capitalism and fascism, as most brutal form of oppression of all resistance: United front? Popular front? What role does the working class play and what is its current level of consciousness? Can there be sustainable peace without revolution?
We also controversially discussed the theoretical basis of our society-changing movement: Chinese revolutionaries demanded: let us propagate Lenin’s idea that “imperialism is war.” Lenin’s 1915 treatise “Socialism and War” was also presented to us as an orientation for proletarian internationalism, that wars can only be abolished through proletarian defeatism in times of war and the path of socialist revolution.
In short, there was a lively and controversial strategic discussion on the question: what do the lessons from Zimmerwald 1915 mean for today?
All the more significant at the same time was the broad-based consensus:
3. We live in a time similar to the years prior to the first Zimmerwald Conference. Even today, the changing balance of power in the imperialist world is exacerbating the contradictions between the imperialist states over a re-division of the world. The military build-up has reached a new record value of 2.718 trillion US dollars. We live in a time of dangerously increasing turbulence, as an expression of inter-imperialist rivalry, characterized by flare-ups of armed clashes in key points of the globe. The imperialists resolve their major conflicts with the massive destruction of the productive forces and the murder of the working class and broad sections of the population. Fascism and war are two sides of the same coin.
The states are service providers for international monopolies and will demolish the achieved social gains to finance war. War is the continuation of politics by other means: Today the contradictions between the imperialists are becoming ever more acute. They want to overcome their unsolvable economic crises with the help of imperialist wars. In order to increase the profits of monopoly capital they intensify exploitation and oppression worldwide.
4. The emergence of fascism in a “democratic form” through the bourgeois multi-party system is a phenomenon of the post-war period that has no historical precedent. Because of its seemingly democratic appearance it is also the most deceptive. For example, when it calls for “defense capability,” “national unity” and “preparedness for war.” And indeed, it has deceived many who try to identify fascism by its form and not by its content or its characteristic features. Bourgeois and liberal self-proclaimed “democrats” work together with extreme right-wingers in this process. Internally, the facistization of society is being carried through more or less insidiously and seemingly within the framework of bourgeois democracy; externally, with the side of imperialist war. This development was also discussed under the designation “modern fascism”.
5. The times in which we live make a conference of all forces fighting resolutely against the current predatory wars and against a Third World War imperative. Forces that consistently reject any kind of defense of an imperialist war or peace, defense of the fatherland and a policy of domestic truce, the justification of imperialist policies.
6. How the story ends this time will depend on whether wage earners once again embrace the concerns of the nation at the cost of a world war and make the sacrifices demanded of them, both materially and mentally. Or whether they change their minds. Even if it is true that fascism and conservatism are gaining ground worldwide, it is no less true that there is a corresponding awakening of democratic and revolutionary sentiment with increasingly clearer progressive nuances. Discontent is growing within the monster’s own tentacles. The silver lining is the crystallizing of people’s resistance.
7. The Trump capitalists are rapidly transforming the US into a militarized fascist police state. This is a consequence of imperialism, whether the presidents are called Trump, Biden or Obama. With these developments in the entire world, the threat of world war needs to be taken very seriously. The potential outcome is a nuclear war which will devastate civilization and trigger a “nuclear winter,” leading to the extinction of life on earth.
8. Militarization is integrally tied to environmental destruction. The exploitation of workers and the destruction of the environment are two sides of the same coin. Protecting the environment is not only an ecological issue, but also a humanitarian, peace, and human rights issue. Environmental and peace movements must come together in a joint international battle front.
9. Imperialist wars destroy the future, especially the future of young people. Enlisting in the army is no prospect for young people! The antimilitarist struggle of the youth is developing, but it still needs to be intensified. The older workers are obliged to intensify the joint struggle of young and old for a society without capitalist exploitation and oppression in the interests of the future of the youth.
10. Women are doubly affected and bear the burden of war, whether through the loss of loved ones, the destruction of their livelihoods, or the threats they face.
11. The imperialist war is a project of society as a whole: from the think tanks of the extreme Right through all bourgeois parties to the factory floors. From the daily news to social media to universities, vocational schools, elementary schools and kindergartens. From military exercises to war preparation of hospitals in the context of civil-military cooperation, to tax and fiscal policy.
We must oppose this general tendency, the rearmament policy, this war psychology and reactionary ideologies. All the statements made by the imperialist powers regarding peace are false. Whenever they speak of peace, we know that they are preparing for new unjust wars.
12. Today, social-chauvinism is booming. But a proletariat that tolerates the slightest coercion of other nations by its “own” nation cannot be a socialist proletariat. Therefore, the importance of ideological and organizational dissociation from the social-chauvinists should be particularly emphasized. The class consciousness of the workers must be promoted so that they do not allow themselves to be harnessed to one or another party of capital. Anticommunism, nationalism and (social-) chauvinism are two sides of the same coin. Give them no chance! No closing ranks with ostensible or claimed “geopolitical alternatives” such as Russia, China or BRICS or an allegedly peaceful EU. The main enemy is in our own country. Workers do not shoot at workers!
13. In a world of different capitalist sides, there is no side for the workers to take. Only the workers, who constitute the vast majority of the population, can end the war. We promote international working-class unity! We need international formations of the workers for cooperation and coordination of the struggles and a global antifascist front of workers’ organizations against war, capitalism, and fascism as most brutal form of oppression of any resistance, against environmental destruction and any social oppression.
14. Imperialism means war. As long as imperialism and capitalism are not eliminated worldwide, there will be wars. Rejecting war and fascism must not just be a slogan we repeat at conferences, but a moral obligation to humanity, in word and deed.
15. The oppressed Palestinian population is resisting a genocidal war. In Israel too there is growing opposition to the ultra-right Netanyahu government because of its intensification of the genocidal war. We support the resistance and demand: immediate and permanent armistice and a complete break by the governments with Israel; stop of exports of weapons technology and dual-use (civilian and military) materiel; immediate release of humanitarian aid.
16. In the Ukraine war we fight against the inter-imperialist slaughter and stand on the side of the masses in Ukraine and Russia. We neither side with the ruling classes in Russia or Ukraine nor with NATO. We oppose the dominant powers both in Russia and NATO. We emphasize struggle against the enemy at home. Our side is that of the exploited and oppressed. We fight for an immediate and permanent armistice.
17. We will put an end to the silence surrounding the wars in Africa, particularly in Sudan, eastern Congo or West Sahara and expose the role of the imperialist countries and monopolies.
18. The Middle East is seething with unrest. The liberation struggle in Iran also needs our internationalist support and solidarity. Especially the workers, women and oppressed national minorities such as Kurds, Azerbaijanis, Baloch and Arabs are fighting against fascism and wars under the most difficult conditions.
19. Protests are a necessary but not sufficient action. A positive alternative must be developed. For a new proletarian internationalism! Needed is a higher level of international coordination! The basis is an autonomous infrastructure of political organizations and proletarian forces that is independent of the ruling class. However, the ideological and organizational independence of each organization must be maintained. We need practical steps of international cooperation and coordination such as joint days of action or independent international information platforms, such as a workers’ channel.
In all countries, broad platforms must be built up encompassing the masses of workers and youth and all anti-imperialist, anti-fascist forces with revolutionaries at the core for organizing militant mass movements against the policies of the bourgeois governments, against capitalist exploitation, imperialist war maneuvers, fascist culture and fascist onslaught in every sphere of life. We need to strive for a global coordination of such movements. It is the task especially of revolutionaries to promote the orientation of the struggle against one’s own bourgeoisie and its imperialist state in these broad platforms.
20. Peace cannot come without deep social change, establishing a society without exploitation and oppression. That is a difficult task that will face harsh repression, but the only one worth fighting for. Many of us share the view that Rosa Luxemburg expressed over 100 years ago: either socialism or sinking into barbarism!
We reaffirm our joint commitment to work and fight for this, to make light triumph over darkness and make the will of humankind for freedom and justice become an invincible force.