I first picked up a copy of the old World Socialist Web Site Review at a news stand just outside Detroit. It wasn’t long after the US-Balkan war had concluded and the first article I read was about that war. I immediately bought several more issues. I was quite impressed by the clarity of the writing and the analysis. I’ve been a regular reader of the WSWS ever since.

I remember puzzling over what “World Socialist” meant. I was pretty familiar with Marxism and I had the notion of the class struggle down cold. It took a while but then of course it began to make sense, a world movement, an International was what was necessary and probably always had been.

For the actor, observer, or student of current affairs, history, or in fact the entire social and political world, the WSWS is an indispensable resource and presents a serious and contemporary Marxist and Trotskyist viewpoint to the world working class.

The year-by-year review easily supports this point and the sheer body of first-rate writing already on display is indisputable proof of it. This review itself will provide the reader with a history, documentation, and digest of the last fifteen years—years of savage, murderous reaction worldwide. The birth and life of the WSWS during this period is a signal achievement and an important historical development in the struggle to bring political understanding and consciousness to the world working class. All credit is due those who have made it happen.

I don’t believe I speak too highly by also saying that if the consciousness of the working class is a party which upholds the socialist revolutionary rights, interests, and traditions of both party and class, the World Socialist Web Site is a first-rate voice of that consciousness.