JOHN LAFORGE – In a fashion reminiscent of lawless dictatorships the world over, the Trump White House has written to countries that have adopted the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons urging them to withdraw their ratifications.
Tag: NATO
Andrew Bacevich’s Prescription for Biden’s First Two Weeks
ANDREW BACEVICH – Free of charge, Joe, here is an action plan that will get you from Election Night through your first two weeks in office. Follow this plan and by your 100th day in the White House observers will be comparing you to at least one President Roosevelt, if not both.
Can We Achieve Nuclear Adulthood?
ROBERT kOEHLER – In the linear world of geopolitics, militarism and mysteriously determined “national interest†rule and security means — though it is never put this way — playing games with Armageddon. This is called realism. And those who claim to be realists never — ever, ever — allow a word like “disarmament†into the conversation, much less into the realm of political choice.
After this Pandemic Passes, America Needs a Reckoning with its National Security
KATRINA VANDEN HEUVEL – After this pandemic passes, there must be a profound reckoning. I’m not referring to President Trump’s abysmal performance in the crisis; the election in November will render citizens’ judgment on that. No, there must be a reckoning with the profound failure of the United States’ domestic and foreign policies and priorities, a failure that was apparent even before covid-19 revealed the catastrophic bankruptcy of our national security strategy.
UN Ceasefire Defines War As a Non-Essential Activity
MEDEA BENJAMIN and NICOLAS J.S. DAVIES – When the pandemic is over, let’s insist that the U.S. honor the UN Charter’s prohibition against the threat or use of force, which wise American leaders drafted and signed in 1945, and start living at peace with all our neighbors around the world.
NATO’s Upcoming War Games Targeted Against Russia
PAUL ANTONOPOULOS – Last week NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg explained why the U.S. are strengthening their military presence in Europe. The reason is unsurprisingly to pressurize and intimidate Russia, but also against China and the so-called fight against terrorism. Stoltenberg explained that there are now more U.S. soldiers in EU Member States, more than ever since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. In the coming months, the Defender-Europe 2020 exercises, the largest of its kind in the last 25 years, will begin. And with this exercise, U.S. troop numbers will only increase in Europe with another 20,000 troops and officers arriving.
Conventional Wisdom about Ukraine is Deeply Flawed, Steeped in Illusions
GEORGE BEEBE – As our debacles in Vietnam and Iraq demonstrate, expert consensus is not always a recipe for success. Perhaps it should come as no surprise that American policy toward Ukraine has also been steeped in illusions.
Russia’s Comeback Isn’t Stopping With Syria
DMITRI TRENIN – Russian influence is coming to a region near you.
Hiroshima Unlearned: Time to Tell the Truth About US Relations with Russia and Finally Ban the Bomb
ALICE SLATER – August 6th and 9th mark 74 years since the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, where only one nuclear bomb dropped on each city caused the deaths of up to 146,000 people in Hiroshima and 80,000 people in Nagasaki. Now, with the US decision to walk away from the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Force (INF) negotiated with the Soviet Union, we are once again staring into the abyss of one of the most perilous nuclear challenges since the height of the Cold War.
Congress Should Begin Impeachment, But Not the Way You Think
DAVID SWANSON – Back before Donald Trump was inaugurated, I wrote an article called “Fantasies About Russia Could Doom Opposition to Trump.†Perhaps it is less quixotic, or perhaps it is more, to hope that, after more than two years of being barraged with those fantasies, but with their main focus having publicly flopped, more people will now be open to trying something else. That pre-inauguration article read: “Trump should be impeached on Day 1, but the same Democrats who found the one nominee who could lose to Trump will find the one argument for impeachment that can explode in their own faces. . . . Meanwhile, we have a man planning to be president later this month whose business dealings clearly violate . . .
Why Trump Decided To Remove U.S. Troops From Syria
POPULAR-RESISTANCE – On Friday, December 14, President Trump had another long phone call with the Turkish President Erdogan. Thereafter he overruled all his advisors and decided to remove the U.S. boots from Syria and to also end the air war. This was the first time Trump took a decisive stand against the borg, the permanent neoconservative and interventionist establishment in his administration, the military and congress, that usually dictates U.S. foreign policy. It was this decision, and that he stuck to it, which finally made him presidential.
War: The Greatest Crime on Earth
DAVID SWANSON – War is not necessary, not just, not survivable, not glorious. We need to leave the entire institution of war behind us. We need to create a world beyond war.
Nuclear Weapons Ban More Crucial Than Ever
ALICE SLATER – We can ill-afford another nuclear arms race.
NATO: Time To Re-Examine An Alliance
CONN M. HALLINAN – It is finally time to re-think alliances. NATO was a child of the Cold War, when the West believed that the Soviets were a threat. But Russia today is not the Soviet Union, and there is no way Moscow would be stupid enough to attack a superior military force. It is time NATO went the way of the Warsaw Pact and recognize that the old ways of thinking are not only outdated but also dangerous.
Russophobia Does Not Serve Our Self Interest
WINSLOW MYERS – With the executive branch demonstrably willing to gallop bareback off the established foreign policy reservation, the knee-jerk adversary of progressives for decades, the so-called “deep state,†with its reflexive fear of Russian totalitarian infiltration and its perpetuation of military dominance in all earthly spheres, may at least be providing a sorely needed element of restraint and integrity.
Climb Down From the Summit of Hostile Propaganda
By Norman Solomon Throughout the day before the summit in Helsinki, the lead story on the New York Times home page stayed the same: “Just by Meeting With Trump, Putin Comes Out Ahead.†The Sunday headline was in harmony with the tone of U.S.…
An Escalating Afghan Crisis of ‘Profit’ over ‘Life’
DR. HAKIM YOUNG – The eyes of potential investors and benefactors, corporations and governments alike, are fixed on ‘profit’, not on the potentially disastrous pollution and depletion of the water supply to Mes Aynak and Kabul residents! This does not auger well for Surkh Gul, Inaam, and the estimated 6 million residents of Kabul.
German Foreign Minister Joins Calls to Withdraw US Nukes from the Country
RT NEWS – Germany’s top diplomat has backed the suggestion of Social Democrat (SPD) leader and Chancellor hopeful Martin Schulz, who has pledged to rid his country of US nukes. Washington, meanwhile, is pressing ahead to modernize its nuclear stockpile.
UN General Assembly Approves Historic Resolution
TONY ROBINSON – On December 23, 2016, the United Nations General Assembly approved an historic resolution to launch negotiations in 2017 on a treaty prohibiting nuclear weapons. The vote follows a decision on 27 October, 2016, by the General Assembly’s First Committee – which deals with disarmament and international security matters – to begin work on the new treaty despite fervent opposition from some nuclear-armed nations.
A Visit to Russia for “Life Extension†of the Planet
BRIAN TERRELL – The life extension of our planet needs to be a universal goal. To speak of, let alone pour a nation’s wealth into a program of “life extension programs for weapon systems†is nothing short of madness. Our Russian friends’ confidence in our collective sanity and the steadiness of our leadership, especially in the wake of the recent election, is a great challenge. I am grateful to new friends for the warmth and generosity of their welcome and I hope to visit Russia again before long. As important and satisfying as these “citizen diplomatic†encounters are, however, we must honor these friendships through active resistance to the arrogance and exceptionalism that might lead the U.S. to a war that could destroy us all.
Détente Now: A New Call for Peace, Security, and Cooperation
GILBERT DOCTOROW, UTE FINCKH-KRAMER, LUDGER VOLMER, ROLF EKEUS and NOAM CHOMSKY – A transatlantic appeal for a new policy of détente with Russia has been launched. The declaration’s authors invite the general public to join leading political figures and social activists who have publicly rallied to support the call.
The United Nations Votes to Start Negotiations to Ban the Bomb
ALICE SLATER – One hundred and twenty-six nations voted to move forward with negotiations to prohibit nuclear weapons — just as the world has already done for biological and chemical weapons.
Are the US and Russia Sleepwalking into War?
RAMESH THAKUR – Are the increasingly frosty relations between the United States and Russia going to turn into all-out war? Former United Nations Assistant Secretary-General Ramesh Thakur weighs the evidence.
We Need to Unite Globally Around Opposition to the Entire Institution of War
DAVID SWANSON – David Swanson answers questions posed by an Italian journalist about how to achieve global opposition to the very institution of war.
Russia Suspends Weapons-Grade Plutonium Deal with US
BBC – Russia has suspended an agreement with the US on the disposal of surplus weapons-grade plutonium, the latest sign of worsening bilateral relations.
Amid Escalating Tensions, 40 Million Russians Practice for Nuclear Emergency
JON QUEALLY – Worries of ‘New Cold War’ intensify as United States suspends bilateral diplomatic channels for Syria conflict.
Time To Fundamentally Rethink Our Relationship with Russia
JAVIER M. PIEDRA – The Euro-Atlantic world needs to see the strategic potential in working with Russia (as opposed to seeking her strategic encirclement), and must recognize that radical militant Islam is a much greater threat to our way of life than Putin’s Russia.
U.S. Military Contractors Tell Investors Russian Threat Is Great for Business
LEE FANG – The escalating anti-Russian rhetoric in the U.S. presidential campaign comes in the midst of a major push by military contractors to position Moscow as a potent enemy that must be countered with a drastic increase in military spending by NATO countries. Weapon makers have told investors that they are relying on tensions with Russia to fuel new business in the wake of Russian’s annexation of Crimea and modest increases in its military budget.
Abolish NATO
TOM MAYER – A passionate denunciation of NATO is given by Dennis J. Halliday, former United Nations Assistant Secretary-General (1994-98): “NATO as it expands today is absolutely not what the world of struggling economies and deprived populations require. It is nothing, but a negative force. It is undermining an already fragile United Nations. NATO has not been appointed policeman for the globe. It is self-serving, lacks integrity, has demonstrated its leadership cannot be trusted and creates nothing positive. It only yields destruction and human poverty, insecurity and misery. NATO must be abolished!â€
U.S. Plans to Saturate Globe With Weapons
DAVID SWANSON – As the United States and NATO antagonize Russia, and pressure NATO members to buy more weapons, and showcase U.S. weapons in numerous wars, and use every carrot and stick in the State Department to market U.S. weapons, an “official” who happens to have been located at a giant weapons trade show predicts that of its own accord “demand” for weaponry is going to grow. Here’s Reuters’ first sentence: “International demand for U.S. weapons systems is expected to continue growing in coming years, a senior U.S. Air Force official said on Sunday, citing strong interest in unmanned systems, munitions and fighter jets.”
How Nonviolence is Building Trust in Afghanistan
KATHY KELLY – Here in Kabul, I read a recent BBC op-ed by Ahmed Rashid, urging a “diplomatic offensive†to build or repair relationships with the varied groups representing armed extremism in Afghanistan. Rashid has insisted, for years, that severe mistrust makes it almost impossible for such groups to negotiate an end to Afghanistan’s nightmare of war. U.S. people should earnestly ask how the U.S. could help build trust here in Afghanistan, and, as a first step, begin transferring funds from the coffers of weapon companies to the UN accounts trying to meet humanitarian needs. The “giant†could be seen stooping, humbly, to help plant seeds, hoping for a humane harvest.
Former OPW Director on Peace Mission to Russia
PETER BERGEL – As some of you know, I’ll leave on June 15 to join a citizen diplomacy peace delegation to Russia for two weeks. I will take with me a peace message from the mayor and mayor-elect of Salem, OR and will, I hope, bring back peace messages from Russian citizens, decision-makers, academicians and journalists. I will also listen carefully to the Russians’ concerns, especially those that concern our own country.
DAVID SWANSON – In the early 1980s almost nobody from the United States traveled to the Soviet Union or vice versa. The Soviets wouldn’t let anybody out, and good Americans were disinclined to visit the Evil Empire. But a woman in California named Sharon Tennison took the threat of nuclear war with the seriousness it deserved and still deserves. She got a group of friends together and asked the Russian consulate for permission to visit Russia, make friends, and learn.
Peace, Not Russia, Is Real Threat to US Power
FINIAN CUNNINGHAM – The monstrous US military budget is a classic illustration of the proverb about not seeing the woods for the trees. It is such an overwhelming outgrowth, all too often it is misperceived.
NATO’s Dangerous Game: Bear-Baiting Russia
CONN HALLINAN – “Aggressive,†“revanchist,†“swaggeringâ€: These are just some of the adjectives the mainstream press and leading U.S. and European political figures are routinely inserting before the words “Russia,†or “Vladimir Putin.†It is a vocabulary most Americans have not seen or heard since the height of the Cold War. The question is, why?
Obama and Osama: Where Does the Truth Lie?
IBRAHIM S. BAHATI – Since Osama bin Laden’s death 2 May 2011, the official account of the Navy Seals’ raid has been challenged, most recently and cogently by journalist Seymour Hersh, alleging that “Washington’s official account of the hunt for Bin Laden and the raid that led to his death was a lie.†In fact, there have been more “conspiracy-factual theories†about this event than there are on Illuminati. Was OBL there? Was he even alive then? Is he still?
How Obama’s Aggression in Ukraine Risks Nuclear War
ROBERT ROTH – I voted for Barack Obama for president twice, for one reason: I thought he would not get us into a nuclear war. Now I’m afraid even that reason for my vote is wearing thin, threatened by US and NATO aggression in Ukraine. As the US continues threatening to send so-called “defensive†weapons to the Ukraine government and to impose yet more economic sanctions against Russia – despite the recent ceasefire agreement beginning to take hold – the prospect of Armageddon by accident increases. Moreover, Russian president Vladimir Putin has said he would (understandably) regard the US arming the Ukrainian military an act of war, to which Russia would respond. I don’t think that means he would resort to nuclear weapons, at least initially. But if the already tense situation continues to heat up, anything could happen.
Hypermasculinity With World-Ending Weapons is Bad for Everyone
WINSLOW MYERS – Escalating tensions in the Ukraine raise the concern that the “firebreak†between conventional and the tactical nuclear weapons potentially available to all parties in the conflict could be breached, with unforeseen consequences.
“We Are All Charlie” – But Is That Story So Simple?
JAN OBERG – Eleven points as a reflection on the terror in Paris and – not the least – the reactions to it:
Three Members of Congress Just Reignited the Cold War While No One Was Looking
DENNIS KUCINICH – Late Thursday night [December 11], the House of Representatives unanimously passed a far-reaching Russia sanctions bill, a hydra-headed incubator of poisonous conflict. The second provocative anti-Russian legislation in a week, it further polarizes our relations with Russia, helping to cement a Russia-China alliance against Western hegemony, and undermines long-term America’s financial and physical security by handing the national treasury over to war profiteers.
America is on a “Hot War Footing”: House Legislation Paves the Way for War with Russia?
MICHAL CHOSSUDOVSKY – America is on a war footing. While a World War Three Scenario has been on the drawing board of the Pentagon for more than ten years, military action against Russia is now contemplated at an “operational level.†Similarly, both the Senate and the House have introduced enabling legislation which provides legitimacy to the conduct of a war against Russia. We are not dealing with a “Cold War.” None of the safeguards of the Cold War era prevail. There has been a breakdown in East-West diplomacy coupled with extensive war propaganda. In turn the United Nations has turned a blind eye to extensive war crimes committed by the Western military alliance.
Germany Does Something the U.S. Hasn’t for Peace
DAVID SWANSON – Imagine a letter co-signed by former presidents, former representatives from both sides of the aisle, House speakers, former governors, attorneys general, cabinet members, ambassadors, CEOs, movie stars and directors, writers, astronauts, religious leaders, mayors, academics, mainstream media correspondents, and more — all united in stating “Nobody wants war.†Imagine the New York Times publishing this letter. The equivalent happened in Germany just a few days ago.
NATO: Rebellion in the Ranks?
JOHN FEFFER – The countries of the former Warsaw Pact are not knuckling under to pressure from Russia. They’re trying to avoid a new cold war.
The Disturbing Expansion of the Military-Industrial Complex
MAIREAD MAGUIRE – How can we explain that in the 21st century we are still training millions of men and women in our armed forces and sending them to war? There are more choices than war or peace, there are multi-optional choices and a civilian-based non-military diplomatic-political policy has more chance of succeeding in solving a violent conflict.
Five Rules on Which to Base Authentic Security and a World at Peace
KENT SHIFFERD – The latest border changes in Ukraine are just another replay of too many past scenarios: the breakup of former Yugoslavia, East Timor, Chechnya, the Sudetenland Crisis of the 1930s, and the centuries-long back and forth of the Alsace and Lorraine between France and Germany. If we could base the resolution of these types of conflict on recognizing the five principles outlined here, we could greatly reduce the dangers of civil and interstate war.
Possible GOP Ultimatum to Putin Too Much for True Conservatives
PAT BUCHANAN – Editor’s Note: “Who would have thought The PeaceWorker would run an article by conservative Pat Buchanan? Read it and you’ll see why.” July 28, 2014 – With the party united, the odds are now at least even that the GOP will not only hold the House but also capture the Senate in November. But before traditional conservatives cheer that prospect, they might take a closer look at the foreign policy that a Republican Senate would seek to impose upon the nation.
Afghanistan to Cost More Than Marshall Plan, Watchdog Says
JOSH SMITH – By the time its combat troops depart at the end of 2014, the United States will have appropriated more money trying to fix Afghanistan than it did on the Marshall Plan that helped Europe recover economically after World War II, according to an analysis by a government watchdog.
“Who Speaks for Earth?”
WINSLOW MYERS – Few people remember them today, but there were significant global leadership initiatives in the 1980s against the proliferation of nuclear weapons. The dawn of the nuclear era had coincided with the beginning of the Cold War. People in the United States and their leaders viewed the world through the lens of East-West cold war superpower tensions, reinforced by the rigid dualistic convictions of officials like John Foster Dulles, U.S. Secretary of State from 1953 to 1959. A quarter century further into the cold war era, nearly 200 less powerful nations came to realize that a superpower nuclear exchange was potentially just as life threatening to them as to the superpowers themselves.
Peace Movements’ Common Vision: The Abolition of Militarism
MAIREAD CORRIGAN MAGUIRE – We are all aware that this is the 100th anniversary of the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand in Sarajevo which led to the start of the First World War in l9l4. What started here in Sarajevo was a century of two global wars, a Cold War, a century of immense, rapid explosion of death and destruction technology, all extremely costly, and extremely risky. A huge step in the history of war, but also a decisive turning point in the history of peace.
U.S. Examines Afghanistan Option that Would Leave Behind 3,000 Troops
KAREN DEYOUNG – One of the four options President Obama is considering for a U.S. military presence in Afghanistan beyond this year would leave behind 3,000 troops, based in Kabul and at the American installation at Bagram, U.S. officials said. The other options include more troops in two scenarios and none in another.
How Disarmament Activists Saved the World from Nuclear War
LAWRENCE WITTNER – The conventional explanation for nuclear restraint by the relatively small number of nations possessing nuclear weapons is that the danger posed by these weapons has “deterred†nations from waging nuclear war and, overall, has created a situation of nuclear safety. But something is missing from the conventional explanation. The missing ingredient is a massive grassroots movement: one that has mobilized millions of people in nations around the globe: the world nuclear disarmament movement. This is the text of a talk delivered by Dr. Wittner in May 2013 to the Canadian Network to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, Ottawa.