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Some people care not about innocent children,
They love power and wealth much more!
Such individuals often become willing,
To create endless war, lots of killing,
To them it’s absolutely thrilling…
May they be forever damned.
Looks innocent, doesn’t he? Deceivers often do.
Friends, Reuters today carried a story about a $60 billion arms sale by the U.S. to the Saudis. Now such a sale should bring little comment because the U.S. is constantly selling billions of dollars worth of arms to virtually anyone who wants them. After all, the U.S. is in the business of promoting endless war.
The sale includes 84 new Boeing F-15 aircraft and 70 upgrades of existing Saudi F-15s. It also includes 70 of Boeing’s Apache attack helicopters and 36 of its AH-6M Little Birds plus 72 Black Hawk helicopters built by Sikorsky Aircraft.
What is interesting is that the U.S. sought Israeli approval of the sale. Now I don’t know about you but it seems rather bizarre that the country with the world’s biggest and most powerful army has to please the world’s smallest nation by asking it for a green light.
Alexander Vershbow, the assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, said the United States had discussed the matter with Israel, and concluded that it would not undercut Israel’s qualitative military edge in the region.
Now the words in bold have been highlighted by me because I consider them to be very, very important.
At least the Press wanted to hear from Andrew Wilkie!
Friends, I mentioned in a previous post that the Australian Parliament was debating our involvement in Afghanistan.
I turned on the television this afternoon and saw a prominent Independent, anti-war M.P., Andrew Wilkie, pointing out the reasons why Australia should withdraw our troops. His speech was excellent, logical, persuasive. The only problem was that, from the 180 M.P.s who make up the Parliament there were only a very small handful there (nine or so).
The reason for this is simple. The Prime Minister, unilaterally told us yesterday that Australia would be there for at least another decade. The Leader of the Opposition said yesterday that he supported staying until the job was done (whatever that means). What gives the Prime Minster the right to make such far-reaching, unilateral decisions? She cried crocodile tears at funeral ceremonies for Australian troops killed in Afghanistan but is happy to keep our soldiers in a dangerous war zone to keep the Yanks happy.
But it gets worse. Polls show clearly that most Australians want us out of any military involvement in the Middle East. So the M.P.s who are supposed to represent their constituents didn’t! Ignoring the wishes of those who elected them to Parliament, the majority of M.P.s fell into line and played follow the leader. How spineless can they be given that politicians were encouraged to speak their minds as in a conscience vote, not hide in their offices while the debate was taking place. How is this democracy?
The ‘debate’ is supposed to be spread over three days. The outcome has already been decided by the two major parties who go to jelly at the thought that America mightn’t hold their hands or might be offended if Australia acted like a sovereign nation for a change.
I was so enraged by what I saw, by the ignorance and cowardice of most politicians and the failure of leadership shown by the Party Leaders that I wrote an email to Andrew. It follows:
Friends, while commenting on Antiwar the other day I had the thought that it might not be long before the U.S. begins to use its drones to fire small nukes, ones big enough to wipe out a village or a small city. Why do I think this, you ask?
There are a few reasons. America, since the invasion of Afghanistan a decade ago, decided not to count civilian casualties, saying that innocent people killed when fighter jets fired missiles at targets were merely collateral damage. Ever since we continue to get accounts of terrible civilian casualties at events like wedding parties. But, over time, we become inured to such stories, accept them as an unfortunate part of modern warfare. We are being conditioned.
As well, America has also removed its soldiers from the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court, a body which tries people for war crimes. This means that America can do what it likes and clearly it does so without fear of sanctions or punishment.
Another factor that occurred to me involves the increasing use of drones. These silent killers are operating all over Pakistan and other parts of the Middle East. They are launched in the region but are controlled by people on the American mainland and they use conventional missiles. Initially, when they caused civilian casualties, there were outbursts of criticism. Gradually they have abated.
But why stop there? Why wipe out a truck or a house when a more powerful weapon could be used?
Has either leader got the courage to lead Australia out of America’s morass?
Friends, Australia has been in Afghanistan for around a decade. Twenty-one Australian soldiers have been killed so far and many more wounded. It seems appropriate somehow that our involvement be discussed in the National Parliament for the first time.
You may recall that John Howard decided that we should be involved there unilaterally despite the fact that most Australians were against it. They still are! But America gave the orders and our then Prime Minster saluted meekly and sent our troops there as well as to Iraq. Howard wasn’t known as Bush’s poodle for nothing. Rudd followed on and he echoed the actions of Howard.
Now that we have a divided Parliament in which the Greens and a few Independents hold the balance of power, the debate will be fascinating to watch. Each of the two major parties, led by Julia Gillard the Prime Minster and Tony Abbot, the leader of the Opposition, will try to score political points. Members of Parliament will be allowed to speak their minds though, how they will do this is unclear given that the two major Parties both support our American alliance and Afghan involvement despite the anti-war views of most voters.
Now, why are our politicians out of step with the voters? It’s tied up in our history. Parliamentarians cling to the notion that America will come to our rescue as they did in WW2 should Australia be attacked by an Imperial Power. But the question is, if push comes to shove, would it?
As America teeters on the edge of bankruptcy and while they are over-stretched militarily, whether they would or not is uncertain. Besides, who would attack Australia now or in the future is unknown.
The American War Machine never stops. It must be stopped!
Friends, I think it’s time that the free nations of the world declared war on the U.S. Before I explain what my reasons are, I’m not too sure how many free nations there are.
The number of nations which are led by the nose by America, are many. You can see which nations they are by whether or not they have soldiers fighting alongside the Americans and whether they too are happily killing thousands of innocent civilians who happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Britain, Australia, Canada and some of the Nato Nations are there in the killing fields, slaughtering those who America has labeled as ‘terrorists.’ Of course, it’s a funny thing that these ‘terrorists’ all occupy countries that have lots of oil or vast mineral deposits or they happen to occupy land that has strategic advantages as seen by the U.S. And, almost without exception, they are all Muslim. But I digress!
Why are these nations involving themselves in America’s endless wars? Have they been promised a cut of the action if America succeeds in gaining military control of the world? Given Hilary’s recent clear instruction to Britain not to cut its military budget, I think not!
Imperial America, which humbly sees itself as the unelected leader of the free world and the greatest nation in the history of the world, will call the shots and put its own interest above that of the ‘Allies’ as it has always done. Remember, it entered WW2 two years late which allowed Hitler time to occupy all of Europe!
In Gippsland, they battle a fire in an open-cut coal mine.
In the Amazon, the rain forest trees are decimated as is the fauna.
In Mexico as elsewhere, erosion occurs because of poor land use.
We gave up this…
So we could work here…
And experience this?
WE MUST BE CRAZY!
Iran, Pakistan, Yemen, Afghanistan…the list is endless!
Friends, the world’s biggest warmonger which has the world’s biggest army, America, has issue a stern warning to Pakistan. It has told Pakistan to ‘get tough on terrorism’ or else. Why, you ask? Because America is frightened that a handful of Pakistani-bred terrorists may attack the sacred soil of America.
An anonymous American official said, “An attack will change the nature of the relationship, not because necessarily it makes sense to, but because the congressional outcry and the public outcry will be such that you will have to dramatically do things quite differently.” Such arrogance! Such stupendous hubris!
Now, as you probably know, America already has Pakistan, which suffered huge floods recently, under constant drone attack. The citizens of that country never know when a missile is going to come down from the sky and blow up everyone in the target proximity, men, women, kids, animals, etc. Reuters reported another 8 killed in a drone attack just today.
And America is also making periodic incursions into Pakistan. A recent one, according to Reuters, killed two Pakistani frontier guards and wounded several others. The incident ignited public outrage and prompted Pakistani officials to close a key border crossing to NATO supply convoys for a number of days.
Sometimes we humans get a bit carried away with ourselves. Sometimes nature can remind us of its blueprint for life, one which, in our self-centred human busyness, we tend to forget.
The mother in the photograph doesn’t need reminding of her blueprint. She tends to her ducklings with a fierce determination. Not one of them will be sent to a duckling-minding centre while she pursues a career.
No, she will be there for them until the ducklings become old enough to care for themselves. Then she will have more until age catches up with her and, her main mission in life concluded, she will die without regret.
How many humans will die without regret? Then how many humans live their lives never knowing what their main mission really was?