WAR

The world today is waging war on two different levels. Since time memorial, we have had two or three countries fighting each other. How someone became “king of the hill” or king is because they had the strongest armies and were able to subdue all their opponents. There are many of these battles being waged today and we will discuss some of them. The second type of war is that of the “war on terrorism.”

Group of Eight
Most recently at the Group of Eight meeting in Sea Island, Georgia, the heads of state agreed to set up a “global rapid deployment force.” For the first time since the Roman Empire, the world is going to have a “global army.” Part of the history of the concept of the global army goes back to the United Nations Millennium Summit held in September 2000. At that time the 189 members as represented by kings, princes, presidents and prime ministers voted to allow the United Nations to strengthen its organization in a number of ways. One way is for them to have their own “defense department” by assigning 42,000 soldiers or 7,000 soldiers from six different countries. The man who spearheaded the UN report which recommended the army is Lakshar Brahimi who is the same U.N. representative consulting on Iraq. There was a fair amount of opposition at the time to the idea of a “rapid deployment force” with very little follow-up, that is, until the Group of Eight meeting.

There the idea of a global rapid deployment force was presented under the guise of “peacekeeping for Africa.” When I asked if this was related to the UN Millennium Summit recommendation, I was told, “Well, yes, they would be able to go anywhere in the world.” Furthermore, as part of the rapid deployment force, there is already set up in Italy a training base and a logistic center which will field requests for men, material and other resources. At the closing press briefing, President Bush announced that the force would total 75,000 troops. .” It should be noted that the G8 is comprised of al the WWII friends and foes: the U.S. Britain, France and Russia and Germany, Italy and Japan.

I then decided to do some research on exactly what the UN was doing by the way of peacekeeping. The United Nations has a “UN Standby Arrangements System” (UNSAS). UNSAS already matches commitments by member states of specific resources within the agreed response times for UN peacekeeping operations.

The UN has both peacekeeping and peace-building activities. Under each of these they have a number of countries they are already actively engaged in—for various reasons: Afghanistan, Cambodia, Central America, Cyprus, the Middle East, Mozambique, and Namibia. Furthermore, there are Security Council Resolutions backing up UN peacekeeping in Bougainville, Burundi, Central African Republic, the Great Lakes Region (Africa), Burundi, Guatemala, Guinea-Bisseau, Iraq, Myanmar, Somalia, Tajikistan, and West Africa.

If we take a look at the global activities that are occurring in the Congo, for example, in order to keep peace, the UN mission began the end of November 1999. The Special Representative of the Secretary-General and Chief of Mission is an American, Force Commander is from Nigeria, Police Commissioner is from France. Authorized maximum strength includes 10,800 military personnel, 134 civilian police and other specialists in the areas of human rights, humanitarian affairs, public information, child protection, political affairs and medical and administrative support. The 50 contributors of military personnel include: Russia, China, Bolivia, Egypt, numerous African states, Spain, Ukraine and United Kingdom. There are 19 contributors of police personnel. Countries providing police include: Argentina, France, Morocco, Romania, Russia and Turkey. Furthermore, the same kind of global force exists in each of the above U.N. sanctioned peacekeeping missions. Therefore, what the G8 called for already exists. Let me just point out that the U.S. does not appear to participate by way of troops or materials.

Previous World Wars
When we look at war in the 20th century, the total killed between World War I and World War II is over 69M people. World War I involved 23 countries while WWII involved 65 countries. We are now confronted with the War of Terrorism. If you travel by plane, you know all about the fact that you and I are questionable suspects until we go through security. The War on Terror has spurred the very invasive intrusions into our privacy. If you set up any kind of financial account, you now have to provide your drivers’ license. Furthermore, there are major data banks which are now compiling a profile on each of us which includes not only drivers license and any time we are pulled over--but all of the credit cards we own, how we pay bills, etc. There are grave concerns by many people, including myself that World War III is in the beginning stages.

World War III
Five hundred and fifty-five days after September 11, 2001, we invaded Iraq. If this is the beginning of World War III, it is more than 57 years after the end of WWII. We were given three reasons by President Bush as to why we needed to go to war with Iraq: (1) to eliminate Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction, (2) to diminish the threat of international terrorism, and (3) to promote democracy in Iraq (www.threeworldwars.com). Currently there are 29 countries currently involved. Like World War II, the U.S. is teamed up with Britain.

With regard to military movements, the navies of Britain, Australian, China, France, India, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Vietnam are all sending ships into open seas, instead of keeping them in harbor. The U.S.has more than 90% of her ships at sea. Iran is reportedly amassing troops along the border of Iraq, the Pentagon has announced a plan to withdraw its two Army divisions from Germany and the Pentagon is going to move the 20,000 marines stationed at Okinawa to Australia (www.threeworldwars.com).

Defense spending today is the highest it has been since the Reagan Administration. Congress plans to spend $1T over the next decade on futuristic planes, ships and weapons with little direct connection to the Iraq War or the war on terrorism according to the Washington Post, (6/11/04,A23). The 2005 defense authorization measure contains $6y8B for research and development—20% above the peak levels of Reagan’s defense build up. War costs and modernization are expected to drive the defense budget to nearly $500B in 2005. In response to this military buildup, Senator Bob Graham- D-FL said, “the current defense budget ‘is consistent with the Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz view of the world that we will essentially abandon ‘soft power’—diplomacy and use the international institutions—and will concentrate on ‘hard’ power—military strength that we exercise alone.

The Iraqi War
War expert Richard Maybury feels that the marine loss at Fullajah during the week of April 24 was the turning point in the war in Iraq. He feels that in magnitude it equates the same as the Tet Offensive that was the turning point in the Viet Nam War. Maybury pointed out in his recent newsletter that the last time marines were defeated in a major battle was the Chosin Reservoir, Korea in 1950-51. Furthermore, he points out that we are using an all-volunteer army and not since the U.S. conquest of the Philippines in 1902 has the U.S. fought a war that lasted longer than a week using an all-volunteer army.

The photos of the brutal treatment of Iraqi prisoners at ………. has not done anything to help Americans. Unlike the West, Muslims are very sensitive about sex and mixing nude men with women. This is not done. I don’t think our Pledge of Allegiance—“With liberty and justice for all” or the fact that America is suppose to be a “Christian” nation is coming across at this point anywhere in the world. Mayberry points out that the Red Cross estimates that 90% of Iraqi prisoners have been arrested by mistake. Lastly the commander of the Guantanamo prison was the commander of the …. Prison.

Iraq is in the center of a Muslim dominated area. What America has done is providing the fuel for all able-bodied Muslims to go to the aid of their brothers—regardless of tribal differences. I don’t think we have seen anything yet. If we went in for oil, we can’t leave because that was the reason. Iraq contains 75% of the world’s oil reserves with the Persian Gulf containing 2/3’s of the world’s reserves.

In order to hold Iraq and finish what we have started, there are calls for a draft to be instated. Lastly, let me say that some of the top manufacturers of military weapons include the Russians as well as the Chinese and North Koreans. Since everyone is a member of the UN and Russia is a G8 member as well, could it be that we aren’t as “buddy-buddy” as we think?

Neocons --