Peace and War

Watch me criticize Russia on Russian media (7 minutes in). Imagine US media allowing such talk about US!

https://www.rt.com/shows/crosstalk/322473-terror-sinai-plane-crash/

We are all France. Apparently. Though we are never all Lebanon or Syria or Iraq for some reason. Or a long, long list of additional places.

We are led to believe that U.S. wars are not tolerated and cheered because of the color or culture of the people being bombed and occupied. But let a relatively tiny number of people be murdered in a white, Christian, Western-European land, with a pro-war government, and suddenly sympathy is the order of the day.

“This is not just an attack on the French read more

Listen here.

Credit to Fabio d’Alessandro for the photo and alerting me to the story, reported in Italian at Vice and Meridionews.

On the morning of Armistice Day, November 11, 2015, longtime peace activist Turi Vaccaro climbed to where you see him in the photo above. He brought a hammer and made this a Plowshares action by hammering on the enormous satellite dish, an instrument of U.S. warfare communications.

Here’s a video:

There’s a popular movement in Sicily called No read more

Which world power can damage its own interests with the dumbest move? The contest will have you on the edge of your seats.

Here’s the latest U.S. entry:

Last month, a raid by Kurdish forces supposedly freed ISIS prisoners, and those Kurdish forces posted a video of prisoners rushing out of a prison while gunfire sounded in the background. One U.S. troop was killed in the raid. U.S. media rushed to cover the story as a heroic act of benevolence. Non-U.S. media rushed to cover the fact that read more

This episode of the Global Research News Hour takes a dissenting look at the Remembrance and Veterans’ Day ceremonies,and similar memorializing and valourization of the soldier as an instrument by which anti-war sentiments and organizing are subverted. The episode looks at what it will take to dismantle the mythology of militarism in our society. We speak with an outspoken anti-war activist and blogger, who is also the author of several books including ‘War is a read more

In two recent articles in the Los Angeles Times and the academic studies that inspired them, the authors investigate the question of which war veterans are most likely to commit suicide or violent crimes. Remarkably, the subject of war, their role in war, their thoughts about the supposed justifications (or lack thereof) of a war, never come up.

The factors that take the blame are — apart from the unbearably obvious “prior suicidality,” “prior crime,” “weapons read more

“Why are deadly weapons being sold to those who plan to inflict untold suffering on individuals and society?” the Pope asked the United States Congress during his speech there in September. “Sadly, the answer, as we all know, is simply for money: money that is drenched in blood, often innocent blood. In the face of this shameful and culpable silence, it is our duty to confront the problem and to stop the arms trade.”

At least a large section of the U.S. House and Senate read more

By David Swanson

November 11 is Armistice Day / Remembrance Day. Events are being organized everywhere by Veterans For Peace, World Beyond War, Campaign Nonviolence, Stop the War Coalition, and others.

Ninety-seven years ago, on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, fighting ceased in the “war to end all wars.” People went on killing and dying right up until the pre-designated moment, impacting nothing other than our understanding of the stupidity of war.

Thirty million soldiers read more

Online petition campaigns were launched this week to stop Wal-Mart from selling Israeli soldier Halloween costumes and to get Wheaties cereal to start putting U.S. soldiers on its cereal boxes — boxes known for featuring photos of outstanding athletes.

The two campaigns have no relation to each other. Wheaties has not, to my knowledge, indicated the slightest interest in doing what the petition asks it to do.

I’d like Wal-Mart and every other store to stop selling all (not just Israeli) read more

While George W. Bush is apparently proud of everything he’s ever done, Tony Blair came dangerously close to facing reality this weekend when he admitted there were “elements of truth” in the view that the 2003 invasion of Iraq was the principal cause of the rise of ISIS (among other catastrophic results of that invasion).

At the same time, Blair lied that the war was an honest mistake based on bad “intelligence,” and claimed there was no clearly superior alternative read more