MJM
25th April 2002, 04:11
Got this in my email.
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the April 25, 2002
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
ENDLESS WAR=ENDLESS PROFITS:
WHAT KIND OF "PEACE" DOES THE U.S. WANT?
By Sara Flounders
What kind of "peace" do President George W. Bush and the
rest of the U.S. establishment want to see in Palestine and
throughout the Middle East?
A brief look at the role of the U.S. in the region answers
that question.
Every U.S. administration, Republican or Democrat, has given
complete military, economic and diplomatic support to Israel
since its establishment in 1948. Israel acts as a secure
base in a region where 300 million Arab people are
struggling to throw off colonial domination.
During the eight years that the Clinton administration was
brokering the "Oslo Accords" that were supposedly to lead to
a Palestinian homeland, it was pumping billions of dollars
of military aid into Israel. During those "peace talks," the
number of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza more
than doubled. The number of settlers in the Israeli-occupied
West Bank rose to more than 400,000.
An extensive system of Israeli-only bypass roads carved the
very land that was supposed to become the new Palestinian
state into smaller and smaller cantons cut off from each
other. This was not done in secret, or without Washington's
backing.
It's also no secret the United States has continued to
heavily arm Israel during the last 18 months of the
Palestinian Intifada, or Uprising. An estimated 1,300
Palestinians have been gunned down by Israeli fire and more
than 30,000 wounded.
The purpose of Secretary of State Colin Powell's current
Middle East trip is to try to paper over the brutality of
the Israeli occupation with a temporary cease-fire so that
the United States can proceed with all-out war against Iraq.
The Pentagon is the most powerful military machine in world
history, but U.S. leaders fear unleashing its terror because
of aroused mass anger throughout the Arab world.
When Bush demands that the Palestinians renounce violence in
the face of an Israeli onslaught, he's really saying: End
the resistance and submit to occupation.
U.S. aid to Israel--the largest recipient--now exceeds $12-
$15 million dollars a day, every day of the year. The money
goes to Boeing, Lockheed, General Dynamics and other U.S.
corporations. It is delivered to Israel as tanks, jet
aircraft, helicopter gunships and ammunition.
This is a source of endless profit for the powerful, tiny
ruling class in the United States.
Instability in the region means continuing U.S. domination
and an ongoing stream of lucrative military contracts.
So the owners of the U.S. military-industrial complex don't
want peace in Palestine or anywhere in the world. War is too
profitable.
The Bush administration is determined to open a new
devastating war against Iraq, in spite of the opposition of
every country in the region. U.S. corporations are hungry to
control the vast Iraqi oil reserves, estimated at more than
100 billion barrels. In the meantime they are determined to
keep Iraqi oil off the markets, continue starvation economic
sanctions and control the revenue from the small amount of
oil Iraq is permitted to pump.
ADDICTED TO WAR PROFITS
More than $50 billion a year is reportedly spent on Pentagon
bases in the Persian Gulf region to maintain U.S. corporate
control of the largest source of oil wealth in the world.
The Pentagon military bases throughout the Persian Gulf keep
the whole region in a prison lockdown.
This vast military presence benefits the biggest U.S.
corporations in several ways. The system of bases, aircraft
carriers and thousands of troops in the Persian Gulf gives
the United States a dominant position, even against other
competing imperialist powers, in the control of two-thirds
of the world's known oil reserves.
These bases help prop up the tiny, corrupt monarchies in the
oil-rich states. The royal families in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait,
Qatar and United Arab Emirates hand over the majority of oil
revenue to purchase weapons from U.S. military corporations.
The richest oil monarchies, such as Saudi Arabia and Kuwait,
have ended up as debtor nations. The average person in Saudi
Arabia, where illiteracy is still 60 percent, doesn't
benefit from the oil wealth.
In addition, the enormous U.S. military expenditure amounts
to a direct subsidy of guaranteed super-profits to the
biggest U.S. oil and military corporations. It is paid for
with the tax dollars of working people.
Today more than half the federal budget is spent on past,
present and future wars. This was true even before George W.
Bush said in his State of the Union speech asking for a $43
billion Pentagon increase, "The budget I have submitted is
the largest single increase in military spending in a
generation."
How will this war budget be paid?
Hundreds of desperately needed programs will be slashed. For
example, the $225 million dollars slated for youth job
training grants to 36 cities has been cut to a mere $45
million.
Just one Osprey aircraft costs $84 million. The Pentagon has
50 on order.
The cost of three of these aircraft could pay for the youth
job training program. So why isn't this far more rational
choice made by Congress, the White House and U.S. policy
makers? Don't the majority of people in this country want
and need job training, education, universal health care and
decent housing?
Yes. But social programs don't provide as high a rate of
profit as military contracts. In a profit-driven capitalist
economy, this propels capital investment in the direction of
larger and larger military contracts. New expenditures can
only be justified by new military threats and provocations.
That's why the U.S. capitalist economy is addicted to war.
To pay for this addiction, Social Security retirement funds
are being looted to insure the profits of the giant oil and
military corporations.
Capitalism is a system of ruthless competition among giant
monopolies that need and feed on war. The very survival of
these corporations is entirely dependent on their control of
markets and an endless stream of billions of dollars in
military contracts.
The U.S. portrays its military juggernaut as all-powerful
and invincible. But the small nation of Palestinian people
who have courageously stood up to the military might of the
U.S.-backed occupation have ignited an explosive global
movement in solidarity that is challenging the U.S. military
machine and its drive for war.
Now it's important within the United States to widen
solidarity with the Palestinian liberation struggle. And
building broad opposition to the Pentagon's "endless wars"
is an indispensable part of fighting the whole rotten
capitalist system.
- END -
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the April 25, 2002
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
ENDLESS WAR=ENDLESS PROFITS:
WHAT KIND OF "PEACE" DOES THE U.S. WANT?
By Sara Flounders
What kind of "peace" do President George W. Bush and the
rest of the U.S. establishment want to see in Palestine and
throughout the Middle East?
A brief look at the role of the U.S. in the region answers
that question.
Every U.S. administration, Republican or Democrat, has given
complete military, economic and diplomatic support to Israel
since its establishment in 1948. Israel acts as a secure
base in a region where 300 million Arab people are
struggling to throw off colonial domination.
During the eight years that the Clinton administration was
brokering the "Oslo Accords" that were supposedly to lead to
a Palestinian homeland, it was pumping billions of dollars
of military aid into Israel. During those "peace talks," the
number of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza more
than doubled. The number of settlers in the Israeli-occupied
West Bank rose to more than 400,000.
An extensive system of Israeli-only bypass roads carved the
very land that was supposed to become the new Palestinian
state into smaller and smaller cantons cut off from each
other. This was not done in secret, or without Washington's
backing.
It's also no secret the United States has continued to
heavily arm Israel during the last 18 months of the
Palestinian Intifada, or Uprising. An estimated 1,300
Palestinians have been gunned down by Israeli fire and more
than 30,000 wounded.
The purpose of Secretary of State Colin Powell's current
Middle East trip is to try to paper over the brutality of
the Israeli occupation with a temporary cease-fire so that
the United States can proceed with all-out war against Iraq.
The Pentagon is the most powerful military machine in world
history, but U.S. leaders fear unleashing its terror because
of aroused mass anger throughout the Arab world.
When Bush demands that the Palestinians renounce violence in
the face of an Israeli onslaught, he's really saying: End
the resistance and submit to occupation.
U.S. aid to Israel--the largest recipient--now exceeds $12-
$15 million dollars a day, every day of the year. The money
goes to Boeing, Lockheed, General Dynamics and other U.S.
corporations. It is delivered to Israel as tanks, jet
aircraft, helicopter gunships and ammunition.
This is a source of endless profit for the powerful, tiny
ruling class in the United States.
Instability in the region means continuing U.S. domination
and an ongoing stream of lucrative military contracts.
So the owners of the U.S. military-industrial complex don't
want peace in Palestine or anywhere in the world. War is too
profitable.
The Bush administration is determined to open a new
devastating war against Iraq, in spite of the opposition of
every country in the region. U.S. corporations are hungry to
control the vast Iraqi oil reserves, estimated at more than
100 billion barrels. In the meantime they are determined to
keep Iraqi oil off the markets, continue starvation economic
sanctions and control the revenue from the small amount of
oil Iraq is permitted to pump.
ADDICTED TO WAR PROFITS
More than $50 billion a year is reportedly spent on Pentagon
bases in the Persian Gulf region to maintain U.S. corporate
control of the largest source of oil wealth in the world.
The Pentagon military bases throughout the Persian Gulf keep
the whole region in a prison lockdown.
This vast military presence benefits the biggest U.S.
corporations in several ways. The system of bases, aircraft
carriers and thousands of troops in the Persian Gulf gives
the United States a dominant position, even against other
competing imperialist powers, in the control of two-thirds
of the world's known oil reserves.
These bases help prop up the tiny, corrupt monarchies in the
oil-rich states. The royal families in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait,
Qatar and United Arab Emirates hand over the majority of oil
revenue to purchase weapons from U.S. military corporations.
The richest oil monarchies, such as Saudi Arabia and Kuwait,
have ended up as debtor nations. The average person in Saudi
Arabia, where illiteracy is still 60 percent, doesn't
benefit from the oil wealth.
In addition, the enormous U.S. military expenditure amounts
to a direct subsidy of guaranteed super-profits to the
biggest U.S. oil and military corporations. It is paid for
with the tax dollars of working people.
Today more than half the federal budget is spent on past,
present and future wars. This was true even before George W.
Bush said in his State of the Union speech asking for a $43
billion Pentagon increase, "The budget I have submitted is
the largest single increase in military spending in a
generation."
How will this war budget be paid?
Hundreds of desperately needed programs will be slashed. For
example, the $225 million dollars slated for youth job
training grants to 36 cities has been cut to a mere $45
million.
Just one Osprey aircraft costs $84 million. The Pentagon has
50 on order.
The cost of three of these aircraft could pay for the youth
job training program. So why isn't this far more rational
choice made by Congress, the White House and U.S. policy
makers? Don't the majority of people in this country want
and need job training, education, universal health care and
decent housing?
Yes. But social programs don't provide as high a rate of
profit as military contracts. In a profit-driven capitalist
economy, this propels capital investment in the direction of
larger and larger military contracts. New expenditures can
only be justified by new military threats and provocations.
That's why the U.S. capitalist economy is addicted to war.
To pay for this addiction, Social Security retirement funds
are being looted to insure the profits of the giant oil and
military corporations.
Capitalism is a system of ruthless competition among giant
monopolies that need and feed on war. The very survival of
these corporations is entirely dependent on their control of
markets and an endless stream of billions of dollars in
military contracts.
The U.S. portrays its military juggernaut as all-powerful
and invincible. But the small nation of Palestinian people
who have courageously stood up to the military might of the
U.S.-backed occupation have ignited an explosive global
movement in solidarity that is challenging the U.S. military
machine and its drive for war.
Now it's important within the United States to widen
solidarity with the Palestinian liberation struggle. And
building broad opposition to the Pentagon's "endless wars"
is an indispensable part of fighting the whole rotten
capitalist system.
- END -