Tag Archives: Veterans for Peace

Stop Using China as an Excuse – CNN’s Fareed Zackaria

It’s not often we can look to corporate mainstream media for facts on Foreign Policy. This one must have slipped through the CIA filter.

Welcome to the new age of bloated Pentagon budgets, all to be justified by the great Chinese threat.

My take: pic.twitter.com/3c71EjFxiH

— Fareed Zakaria (@FareedZakaria) March 21, 2021

Washington Post Opinion : Opinion: The Pentagon is using China as an excuse for huge new budgets

Opinion by

Fareed Zakaria

Columnist

March 18, 2021 at 5:30 p.m. CDT

“On the eve of his visit this week to Asia, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin outlined his key concern. “China is our pacing threat,” he said. He explained that for the past 20 years, the United States had been focused on the Middle East while China had been modernizing its military. “We still maintain the edge,” he noted, “and we’re going to increase the edge going forward.” Welcome to the new age of bloated Pentagon budgets, all to be justified by the great Chinese threat.

What Austin calls America’s “edge” over China is more like a chasm. The United States has about 20 times the number of nuclear warheads as China. It has twice the tonnage of warships at sea, including 11 nuclear-powered aircraft carriers compared with China’s two carriers (which are much less advanced). Washington has more than 2,000 modern fighter jets compared with Beijing’s roughly 600, according to national security analyst Sebastien Roblin. And the United States deploys this power using a vast network of some 800 overseas bases. China has three. China spends around $250 billion on its military, a third as much as the United States. Michael O’Hanlon of the Brookings Institution notes that, “if China were in NATO, we would berate it for inadequate burden-sharing, since its military outlays fall well below NATO’s 2 percent minimum.”

At the height of its imperial might in the late 19th century, when it ruled a quarter of the world’s population, Britain adopted a “two-power standard” — its navy had to be larger than the next two put together. U.S. military spending remains larger than the defense budgets of the next 10 countries put together, most of which are Washington’s close allies. The United States’ intelligence budget alone — around $85 billion — is larger than Russia’s total defense spending.

And yet the United States never imagines that this kind of spending could ever be seen by other countries as threatening. In requesting even more money for his region, the head of the Indo-Pacific Command, Adm. Philip S. Davidson, remarked on China’s increases in defense spending: “I cannot for the life of me understand some of the capabilities that they’re putting in the field unless it is an aggressive posture.” But the fact that Washington is spending more on the military than it did at the height of the Vietnam War (even accounting for inflation) should threaten no one?

In any case, the size of military spending is a misleading indicator of strength. Far more important are the objectives sought and the political-military strategy used to achieve those objectives. The United States has probably outspent the Taliban 10,000 to 1 in Afghanistan. And yet Washington has been unable to achieve its objective there — ensuring that the Kabul government rules the country uncontested. If the United States defines its goals carefully and assembles an intelligent and consistent political and military strategy to achieve them, it can succeed. Without that, millions of troops and trillions of dollars will not guarantee victory. Bigness is not a substitute for brains.

Consider two contrasting exercises of power. The United States’ F-35 fighter jet program, bedeviled by cost overruns and technical problems, will ultimately cost taxpayers $1.7 trillion. China will spend a comparable amount of money on its Belt and Road Initiative, an ambitious set of loans, aid and financing for infrastructure throughout the world, aimed at creating greater interdependence with dozens of countries that are important to Beijing. Which is money better spent?

The Pentagon operates in a realm apart from any other government agency. It spends money on a scale that is almost unimaginable — and the waste is, too. Every government agency is required to audit its accounts, but for decades, the Pentagon simply flouted this law. In 2018, it finally obeyed, paying $400 million for 1,200 auditors to examine its books, yet it still could not get a clean bill of health. As writer Matt Taibbi noted in a brilliant 2019 exposé of Pentagon accounting, the auditors “were unable to pass the Pentagon or flunk it. They could only offer no opinion, explaining the military’s empire of hundreds of acronymic accounting silos was too illogical to penetrate.” The Defense Department has failed to pass two more audits since then.

Having spent two decades fighting wars in the Middle East without much success, the Pentagon will now revert to its favorite kind of conflict, a cold war with a nuclear power. It can raise endless amounts of money to “outpace” China, even if nuclear deterrence makes it unlikely there will be an actual fighting war in Asia. Of course, there might be budget wars in Washington — but those are the battles that the Pentagon knows how to win! “

Fareed Zakaria writes a foreign affairs column for The Post. He is also the host of CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS and a contributing editor for the Atlantic.Follow

More information on US arsenal, bases and spending :

A Few Numbers On Aircraft: The Size of the US Military

A few numbers….

[current article August 2020]
“The Air Force doesn’t have enough aircraft or range space for pilots to train for combat against a sophisticated enemy, so it’s looking to link real and simulated environments at a new training center.

Pilots taking part in Red Flag air-to-air combat training exercises could soon face new virtual threats on top of those they’re seeing in real life. That’s one of the possibilities leaders see out of a new $38 million Virtual Test and Training Center here…”

This New Air Force Training Center Will Prep Pilots for War with China and Russia

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“The US boasts approximately 13,000 military aircraft. Comparatively, China and Russia, the world’s next-largest aerial powers, only have a total of 2,000 to 3,000 military aircraft each….”
– Business Insider, Jan 2015

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US Military Purchasing nearly 2500 F-35’s

“As of February 2019, more than 350 aircraft had been fielded and were operating from 16 bases worldwide. By 2023, the global F-35 fleet is expected to expand to more than 1,100 aircraft across 43 operational sites. In total, the program participants plan to purchase more than 3,300 F-35 aircraft, with the U.S. services planning to purchase nearly 2,500 of those aircraft.”
– United States Government Accountability Office, April 2019

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US Air Power

13,264 aircraft
– GFP: Global FirePower

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2017: Is America’s Military Big Enough?

VFP Celebrates International Women’s Day 2020

International Women’s Day

March 8, 2020

#IWD2020 #EachforEqual

International Women’s Day (IWD) is a global day celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women. The day also marks a call to action for accelerating women’s equality. This day has occurred for well over a century, with the first IWD gathering in 1911 supported by over a million people. Today, IWD belongs to all groups collectively everywhere. IWD is not country, group or organization specific.

An equal world is an enabled world, a gender equal world.
Celebrate women’s achievement. Raise awareness against bias.

Take action for equality.

“War disproportionately affects women and girls.

In conflict, existing inequalities become magnified and social networks are broken down, making women and girls more vulnerable to sexual exploitation and violence. Yet, we don’t often hear about the women working for peace.

This Sunday is International Women’s Day. World BEYOND War is celebrating women dedicated to abolishing all war and replacing it with a security system based in feminism and peace. Leveraging frameworks like the United Nations Security Council’s Resolution 1324—which requires parties in conflict to prevent violations of women’s rights and to support their participation in advocating for peace—we work not only to affirm the critical role of women in the prevention and resolution of conflict but also to encourage and facilitate the role of women in abolishing all war.

“War is not women’s history,” says Virginia Woolf. “War is only an invention, not a biological necessity,” affirms Margaret Mead.

It was once said that it was impossible to abolish legalized slavery and dueling. Once deeply embedded in societies of their time, these practices are now, if not fully in the dustbin of history, universally understood to be eliminable. Now, let’s make war a thing of the past!”

In peace and feminist solidarity,

Alex McAdams, World BEYOND War

Code Pink

CODEPINK is a women-led grassroots organization working to end U.S. wars and militarism, support peace and human rights initiatives, and redirect our tax dollars into healthcare, education, green jobs and other life-affirming programs.

Founded in fall 2002 as a grassroots effort to prevent the US war on Iraq, we continue to organize for justice for Iraqis and to hold war criminals accountable. We actively oppose the continuing U.S. war in Afghanistan, torture, the detention center at Guantanamo, weaponized and spy drones, the prosecution of whistle-blowers, U.S. support for the Israeli occupation of Palestine and repressive regimes.

Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom

On 28 April 1915, during World War I, a unique group of 1,136 women from warring and neutral nations gathered in The Hague, the Netherlands, to discuss how to end the war and ensure permanent peace. The meeting ended with the foundation of the Women’s International League of Peace and Freedom.

The organizers of the congress were prominent suffragists, who saw the link between their struggle for women’s right and the struggle for peace. They believed that the full and equal participation of women in the decision-making processes was necessary to achieve sustainable peace.

Find more ideas about International Women’s Day

“The Greatest War” Multi-media Event Marks the 100th Anniversary of the Armistice

Andy Moore of the Isthmus : Link to Isthmus article

“On Nov. 11, the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day, a battalion of Madison musicians will take the stage at the Barrymore Theatre for an original stage show called “The Greatest War: World War I, Wisconsin, and Why It Still Matters.” The ambitious production is largely the brainchild of local Celt-rocker Ken Fitzsimmons, who approached the project with a level of determination that Sir Douglas Haig himself would approve of.

Co-producers John Wedge and Ken Fitzsimmons trying out a smaller version of a video wall at Blizzard Lighting in Waukesha Pic by Sean Michael Dargan

Fitzsimmons has a life-long interest in WWI starting, he remembers, as a young man who noticed a paltry row of books on the subject in a bookstore compared to the volumes on the Civil War and World War II. He calls the Nov. 11 production “a “live rock ’n’ roll history show.” It’s the result of more than a year of research, composing and rehearsal. Onstage, Fitzsimmons and his band the Kissers will be joined by, among others, Sean Michael Dargan (Get Back Wisconsin) and Milwaukee’s hip-hop polka group November Criminals. While the musicians perform, a large screen will feature photos, film, art and newspaper archives.

Video Screen for Greatest War

The songs tell the stories of Wisconsinites who were caught in the cauldron of war. Not all were in the trenches. “Traitor State” tells the story of how nine of 11 of Wisconsin’s U.S. congressional representatives voted against going to war. Fitzsimmons wrote this song as a conversation between himself (playing the role of Wisconsin) and his band members (who represent the rest of the country). ”

“Music has a direct line into your heart. And in the live setting we can provide a performance without distraction. What I want in this concert more than anything is to foster a sense of connection between the audience and those who lived during this extraordinary time.”
– Ken Fitzsimmons

“One hundred years ago the world celebrated peace as a universal principle. The first World War had just ended and nations mourning their dead collectively called for an end to all wars. Armistice Day was born and was designated as “a day to be dedicated to the cause of world peace and to be thereafter celebrated.” After World War II, the U.S. Congress decided to rebrand November 11 as Veterans Day. Honoring the warrior quickly morphed into honoring the military and glorifying war. Armistice Day was flipped from a day for peace into a day for displays of militarism.” – Veterans for Peace

The names of the Wisconsin soldiers who lost their lives.

The War Won

By Ken Fitzsimmons. This uses a melody from Edward Elgar’s Cello Concerto written in the aftermath of the war and builds on a quote by WWI poet Edmund Blunden that no one could win the war, “the War Won, and would keep on winning.” Images are taken from the National Archives. This is an example of the video that will be displayed behind the musicians for The Greatest War: World One, Wisconsin, and Why It Still Matters.

WKOW news coverage

“Madisonians helped mark the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I by holding a number of events. The war affected millions of people, including several soldiers, nurses, mothers, fathers, sons and daughters who came from Wisconsin.

The events have something for everyone, as they honor those who sacrificed and were impacted by the war. There’s art, film screenings, live theater and musical performances.

The centerpiece of the events is a live “Rock and Roll History Show” at the Barrymore Theatre called, “The Greatest War: World War One, Wisconsin and Why It Still Matters.”

“Wisconsin is very much a state known for it’s wide range of politics. It sometimes very conservative and sometimes very liberal at the same time and that was true back then as well,” said Ken Fitzsimmons, the director of the show.” WKOW