Issue Position: Military Adventurism

Issue Position

The military industrial complex has ruled over and controlled our politicians for a very long time. Military procurement and logistics decisions are not based on the needs of the military services nor are they in the long term best interests of our country. Decisions are prepared by lobbyists for the politicians who vote and cement the deals. Look at the most recent procurement of the new stealth bomber, over sixty billion dollars, or how about the recent revelation that the Pentagon built in Afghanistan a gas station(no-bid contract) for $43,000,000.00 compared to an average cost of $500,000.00 and the Pentagon refuses to release details of this no bid contract. Do politicians understand those numbers, or have they become numb and accustomed to spend and spend with total disregard and wanton?

We are all Americans and as Americans we should strive to address the needs of our people here at home. Our military industrial machine and their lobbyists continue to generate a new "BAD GUY" every few years for us to go after and through military engagement attempt to destroy at great expense and sacrifice our great young men and women in uniform and steadily add to the ever mounting national debt. Military hardware costs are in the billions, costs of conflicts are almost immeasurable.

In fact the politicians and military lobbyists have become bolder and actually plan for and advocate the overthrow of other governments through force. What would our reactions be if another country made a similar attempt to topple our government? Needless to say we would all be against such attempts. Yet, our politicians do not take the time to contemplate such scenarios. Warfare has changed dramatically from the World War II days, even from the Korean and Vietnam days.

As a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the United States provides a large military presence and "protection" to Europe at great expense to the American taxpayers. The USSR was defeated and the WARSAW pact was dissolved. Germany was re-united. We have no real military adversaries other than the ones we create. Yet, we continue to add new member countries to the North Atlantic Treaty Alliance (NATO). Why, with no WARSAW alliance, why do we continue to grow the NATO alliance? Clearly because it benefits the military industrial conglomerates, as it certainly is not for the safety and security of our great country or Europe! Europe should be responsible for and fund its own defense.

With military installations in hundreds of locations around the globe, ours is clearly not a Department of Defense. Defense should be focused on the homeland and not overseas. Let Europe, Japan and other locations fund and regain responsibilities to defend their own. We should not and cannot afford to continue on this path. Our young men and women volunteer to defend the USA, not Germany, England, Japan or any other country where we have military installations. All U.S. military and logistic installation should be relocated to the mainland and US territories. Protecting the homeland must be our priority.

Our leadership readily sends our sons and daughters to areas of conflict, as the first and only tool to address the conflict (real or "made up"). Would politicians send their own sons and daughters to war so readily? Diplomacy has been "forgotten" and or rarely employed. We often refuse to communicate with what we consider adversaries. How can conflicts and or misunderstandings be resolved without dialogue, unless the intent was always the use of force first and foremost, from the blunder of Vietnam, the invasion of Iraq, the tragedy of Libya and now the ongoing tragedy in Syria? What country or group will they target next?

Our politicians continue on the path of aggressive confrontation instead of dialogue and diplomacy. In fact they have recently admitted that our government has been coordinating with, funding and providing training, equipment and logistics in foreign countries in secret to fight and overthrow the "host" country's legitimate government. Some figures provided to the U.S. Congress at a recent hearing admitted to spending over FIVE HUNDRED MILLION Dollars to train a few "moderate" terrorists. Imagine that, to secretly plot for and train, equip and fund "moderate" terrorists with our tax dollars, to overthrow other legitimate governments, all in secret. By undertaking aggressive actions and destroying other countries, the politicians have seriously compromised and degraded our security by inviting others to do in our homeland the same thing we do in theirs.

History is there for us to learn from, to repeat the good and great lessons and concurrently avoid the bad ones. Yet rarely does our government and politicians review history and emulate the lessons learned. Our children's and grandchildren's future is at stake. They deserve better.

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