Obama was elected as the first anti-war president since Dwight D. Eisenhower promised to end the Korean Conflict. War is big money to the US, and this country is the world’s top military spender! Obama has given this country hope for change, but the biggest change we need is to stop war mongering. Since Pearl Harbor 67 years ago, the US has been on the nonstop warpath, whether covertly or overtly.
War is bad for the environment, bad for society, bad for culture, bad for our health; however, it is good for the economy. As Deepak Chopra wisely said, “Unless it can make as much money as war, peace doesn’t stand a chance.”
Last year, the US overtook Russia as the leading arms supplier to the developing world. The US made $24.8 billion in global arms agreements selling conventional weapons that included: tanks, self-propelled guns, artillery, armored personnel carriers, armored cars, major surface combatants, minor surface combatants, submarines, guided missile patrol boats, supersonic combat aircraft, subsonic combat aircraft, other aircraft, helicopters, surface to air missiles, surface to surface missiles, and anti-ship missiles. The US dominated 41.5 percent of the global arms market, with Russia coming in second place with 17.3 percent. 70.5 percent of these arms sales went to developing countries.
What will Obama, a presidential candidate who ran on withdrawing troops from Iraq but increasing US military presence in Afghanistan, do about the American economy’s dependence upon war?
The Center for Defense Information summarizes Obama’s imminent decision on global arms sales:
As the Bush administration comes to an end, U.S. arms sales are on an upward trajectory. The Obama administration will have to make significant decisions as to what their arms sales policy will look like, which may impact the total sales and list of recipients of U.S. arms in the near future. In the short term, however, the United States is in no danger of losing its domination of the global arms market, and will continue to supply billions of dollars of heavy conventional weapons around the world.
I hope Obama will follow Deepak Chopra’s advice, but I doubt he will:
1. Scale out arms dealing and make it illegal by the year 2020.
2. Write into every defense contract a requirement for a peacetime project.
3. Subsidize conversion of military companies to peaceful uses with tax incentives and direct funding.
4. Convert military bases to housing for the poor.
5. Phase out all foreign military bases.
6. Require military personnel to devote part of their time to rebuilding infrastructure.
7. Call a moratorium on future weapons technologies.
8. Reduce armaments like destroyers and submarines that have no use against terrorism and were intended to defend against a superpower enemy that no longer exists.
9. Fully fund social services and take the balance out of the defense and homeland security budgets.
If Obama is really going to bring about change and peace to the world, he is going to need to end this country’s economic dependency on foreign war.
Image: Jayel Aheram on Flickr under a Creative Commons License
