370 online
 
Most Popular Choices
Share on Facebook 58 Printer Friendly Page More Sharing Summarizing
OpEdNews Op Eds    H1'ed 11/18/18

Greatest Crime on Earth

By       (Page 1 of 1 pages)   7 comments

David Swanson
Follow Me on Twitter     Message David Swanson
Become a Fan
  (136 fans)

Remarks at No Bases Conference in Dublin, Ireland, November 18, 2018

.youtube.com/watch?v=K3YhOxmKDSs&feature=youtu.be

http://davidswanson.org
davidswanson.org
(
Image by davidswanson.org)   Details   DMCA
I'm willing to bet that if I asked everyone in Ireland whether the Irish government should take orders from Donald Trump, most people would say no. But last year the Irish Ambassador to the United States came to the University of Virginia, and I asked her how allowing U.S. troops to use Shannon Airport to get to their wars could possibly be in compliance with Irish neutrality. She replied that the U.S. government "at the highest level" had assured her it was all perfectly legal. And she apparently bowed and obeyed. But I don't think the people of Ireland are as inclined to sit and roll over on command as their ambassador. Collaboration in crimes is not legal. Bombing people's houses is not legal. Threatening new wars is not legal. Keeping nuclear weapons in other people's countries is not legal. Propping up dictators, organizing assassins, murdering people with robotic airplanes: none of it is legal. U.S. military bases around the world are the local franchises of the greatest criminal enterprise on earth! ***

And NATO involvement doesn't make a crime any more legal or acceptable. A lot of people in the United States have trouble distinguishing NATO from the United Nations. And they imagine both of them as murder-laundering operations -- that is, as entities that can render mass murder legal, proper, and humanitarian. A lot of people think the U.S. Congress possesses this same magical ability. A presidential war is an outrage, but a Congressional war is enlightened philanthropy. And yet, I have not found a single person in Washington, D.C. -- and I've asked Senators and street vendors -- not a single person who tells me they would give the slightest damn if Washington was being bombed whether it was being bombed at the order of a parliament, a president, the United Nations, or NATO. The view is always different from under the bombs.

The U.S. military and its European accomplices make up some three quarters of the world's militarism in terms of their own investment in wars plus their dealing of weapons to others. Attempts to claim that an external threat exists have reached ludicrous levels. I can't imagine weapons companies would like anything more than some intra-NATO competition. We need to tell advocates of a European military that you can't oppose U.S. madness by imitating it. If you don't want to buy more weapons on Trump's orders, the answer is not to run off and buy even more under another name. This is a vision of a future dedicated to high tech barbarism, and we don't have time for it.

We don't have the years left to be monkeying around with medieval balances of power. This planet is doomed as a habitable place for us, and the hell that is to come can be lessened only by outgrowing the acceptance of war. The answer to Trump is not to outdo him but to do the opposite of him. A tiny fraction of what just the United States spends just on foreign bases could end starvation, the lack of clean water, and various diseases. Instead we get these bases, these toxic instigators of war encircled by zones of drunkenness, rape, and cancer-causing chemicals. War and preparations for war are the top destroyers of our natural environment. They are a top cause of death and injury and destruction. War is the top source of the erosion of liberties. The top justification for government secrecy. The top creator of refugees. The top saboteur of the rule of law. The top facilitator of xenophobia and bigotry. The top reason we are at risk of nuclear apocalypse. 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. People have signed the declaration of peace at worldbeyondwar.org in more countries than the United States has troops in. People's movements are on our side. Justice is on our side. Sanity is on our side. Love is on our side. We are many. They are few. No to NATO. No to bases. No to wars in distant places.

Must Read 8   Supported 7   Well Said 6  
Rate It | View Ratings

David Swanson Social Media Pages: Facebook page url on login Profile not filled in       Twitter page url on login Profile not filled in       Linkedin page url on login Profile not filled in       Instagram page url on login Profile not filled in

David Swanson is the author of "When the World Outlawed War," "War Is A Lie" and "Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union." He blogs at http://davidswanson.org and http://warisacrime.org and works for the online (more...)
 
Go To Commenting
The views expressed herein are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this website or its editors.
Follow Me on Twitter     Writers Guidelines

 
Contact AuthorContact Author Contact EditorContact Editor Author PageView Authors' Articles
Support OpEdNews

OpEdNews depends upon can't survive without your help.

If you value this article and the work of OpEdNews, please either Donate or Purchase a premium membership.

STAY IN THE KNOW
If you've enjoyed this, sign up for our daily or weekly newsletter to get lots of great progressive content.
Daily Weekly     OpEd News Newsletter

Name
Email
   (Opens new browser window)
 

Most Popular Articles by this Author:     (View All Most Popular Articles by this Author)

Obama's Open Forum Opens Possibilities

Public Forum Planned on Vermont Proposal to Arrest Bush and Cheney

The Question of a Ukraine Agreement Is Not a Question

Feith Dares Obama to Enforce the Law

Did Bush Sr. Kill Kennedy and Frame Nixon?

Can You Hold These 12 Guns? Don't Shoot Any Palestinians. Wink. Wink.

To View Comments or Join the Conversation:

Tell A Friend