只会输出战争 唐奖得主 谈拜登外交政策失败
2024-1-19
三任联合国秘书长顾问、着名美国经济学者和唐奖永续发展奖得主萨克斯（Jeffrey D. Sachs）本週一（15）发表了一篇专文评论了美国总统拜登的外交政策，他说美国唯一的外交政策方桉就是输出战争，只有一位卓越的总统才能抵抗这座巨大的「战争机器」永无休止的战争财，可惜拜登连试都没试。
据萨克斯15日刊载在《Common Dreams》上的专题文章，萨克斯认为，在外交政策方面，美国总统有2个基本的角色。第1个是制约军工企业複合体（MIC）因为它们总是在推动战争。第2个是制约「希望」美国替他们打仗的美国盟友。有些美国总统能够成功，但大多数都失败，而拜登显然是一位失败者。
他认为最精明的总统之一是艾森豪（Dwight Eisenhower）在1956年底，他面临了2场同时发生的危机。第1个是由英国、法国和以色列发动的一场灾难性的错误战争，目的是推翻埃及政府，重新掌控因埃及国有化而失西方掌控的的苏伊士运河。
艾森豪迫使盟友停止他们「肆无忌惮且非法」的攻击，包括通过美国支持的联合国大会决议。第2个危机是匈牙利起义，反抗苏联对匈牙利的统治。儘管艾森对这场起义深表同情，但他明智地让美国不介入匈牙利，避免与苏联陷入危险的军事对峙。
艾森豪在1961年1月向美国人民发表的历史性告别演说，警告美国民众需要注意军工企业複合体不断增长的权力：
“在政府的协商中，我们必须防范军工企业複合体获得不应拥有的影响力，无论是有意还是无意中得到的”
「（他们）灾难性崛起的潜在可能性永将存在。我们不能让这样的组合（军工企业複合体）权力扩大，危及道我们的自由或民主过程。我们不应该对任何事情都视而不见。唯有警觉且知识渊博的公民才能迫使庞大的军事工业机器与我们的和平方法和目标进行适当的结合，以便安全和自由可以共同繁荣。」
即便是艾森豪，也没能完全制约住军工企业複合体，尤其是中央情报局（CIA）。没有一位总统能够完全压制住这两者，中央情报局于1947年成立，有两种不同的角色。第一个是情报机构的角色，是合理的。第二个是作为总统的秘密军队。在后者中，中央情报局从艾森豪时代开始一次又一次地引导灾难性的失败，包括政变、暗杀和精心策划的「颜色革命」所有这些都为世界带来了无休止的溷乱和破坏。
在艾森豪之后，甘迺迪总统（John F. Kennedy）1962年巧妙解决了古巴飞弹危机，避免了核末日的发生，他还得面对自己的战争贩子（War-mongering）的顾问们，以与苏联达成和平解决方桉。
隔年，他成功地与苏联签署了部分禁止核试验条约（PTBT）还得面对五角大厦的反对，然后赢得了参议院的批准，从而使美国和苏联远离战争边缘。
许多人相信，甘迺迪的和平举措导致了他被流亡的中情局干员所刺杀。而拜登却加入了那些坚守机密，并且决定删减数千份文件的多任前总统行列，偏偏这些文件将更加阐明有关于刺杀甘迺迪的情况。
60年过去了，军工企业複合体仍铁腕掌握着美国外交政策。正如我最近所描述的，外交政策已经变成了内部利益交换的工具，军工企业複合体掌握着白宫、五角大厦、国务院、国会的武装服务委员会，当然还有中央情报局，全部都与主要武器承包商紧密合作。只有一位卓越的总统才能抵抗这座巨大的战争机器的无休止的战争财。
然而，拜登甚至连试都没试，在他漫长的政治生涯中，拜登一直得到军工企业複合体的支持，反过来，他热心支持「自主选择的战争」、大规模军火销售、中情局支持的政变和北约扩张。
“美国的外交政策毫无目标可言，总统唯一的外交政策就是战争”
拜登2024年的军事预算打破了所有纪录，至少达到1.5兆美元包括五角大厦、中央情报局、国土安全部（NSA）、非五角大厦核武器计划、补贴的外国武器销售、其他与军事相关的开支和过去的战争相关债务的利息。在这座庞大的军事支出之上，拜登还寻求额外的500亿美元（约1.57兆新台币）的「紧急补充资金」来支持美国的「国防工业基地「，以继续向乌克兰和以色列运送弹药。
拜登对乌克兰没有任何切实可行的计划，甚至在2022年3月拒绝了俄罗斯和乌克兰之间的和平协议，该协议将基于乌克兰放弃加入北约（因为俄罗斯永远不会接受这一点）来结束冲突。
乌克兰对军工企业複合体来说是一笔大生意——数百亿甚至数千亿美元的军火合约、遍布美国的製造设施、开发和测试新武器系统的机会——因此，儘管乌克兰在战场上受到摧毁，数十万乌克兰人不幸而不必要地死亡，拜登仍然让战争持续下去。乌克兰对军工企业複合体和拜登继续回避可能结束战争的谈判。
在以色列，拜登的失败更加明显。以色列由一个极端政府领导，厌恶以色列和巴勒斯坦应该在成为2个主权实体、和平、安全的国家中共同生活的两国方桉，或者说任何授予巴勒斯坦人政治权利的方桉。两国方桉已经深深植根于国际法中，包括联合国安全理事会和大会的决议，也据说包括美国的外交政策。阿拉伯和伊斯兰领袖致力于在两国方桉的框架内正常化并确保与以色列的安全关係。
以色列总理纳坦雅胡（Benjamin Netanyahu）和他的同僚甚至毫不隐藏他们灭绝巴勒斯坦人的意图，儘管大多数外国观察家不认同以色列领导人引用圣经，来将他们对巴勒斯坦人的大规模屠杀正当化。
拜登仍然提供以色列所需的武器，以实行其大规模战争罪行。拜登并未像艾森豪一样，敦促以色列结束其「违反国际法，包括种族灭绝公约的屠杀行为」反而继续运送武器，甚至最大程度地绕过国会审查。
结果是美国在世界上外交孤立，且美军日益深陷一场迅速扩大至黎巴嫩、叙利亚、伊拉克、伊朗和叶门等地的战争，冲突的扩大是极易预测的。
美国外交政策走向迷失，总统的唯一外交配方竟是战争。随着美国已深陷乌克兰和中东的战争，拜登还打算忽视中国的强烈反对，向台湾出售更多武器，即使这违反了美国对一中政策的长期承诺，包括42年前在《中美联合公报》中所作的承诺，即美国政府「不寻求对台湾实施长期的军售政策」。
“艾森豪的可怕预言已经得到证实。军工企业複合体威胁着我们的自由、我们的民主和我们的生存”
美国外交政策是建立在腐败之上的骗局
https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/corruption-of-us-foreign-policy
每年 1.5 万亿美元的军事支出是一个不断向军工联合体和华盛顿内部人士上演的骗局，尽管它使美国和世界陷入贫困和危险。
杰弗里·D·萨克斯 2023 年 12 月 26 日
从表面上看，美国的外交政策似乎完全不理性。 美国陷入了一场又一场灾难性的战争——阿富汗、伊拉克、叙利亚、利比亚、乌克兰和加沙。 最近几天，美国因支持以色列对巴勒斯坦人的种族灭绝行动而陷入全球孤立，投票反对联合国大会关于加沙停火的决议，该决议得到了占世界人口89%的153个国家的支持，而只有美国和美国反对 9个人口不足世界1%的小国。
过去20年，美国每一项主要外交政策目标都失败了。 美国占领阿富汗20年后，塔利班重新掌权。 后萨达姆时代的伊拉克开始依赖伊朗。 尽管中央情报局努力推翻叙利亚总统巴沙尔·阿萨德，但他仍然掌权。 在美国领导的北约特派团推翻穆阿迈尔·卡扎菲后，利比亚陷入旷日持久的内战。 在美国秘密破坏2022年俄罗斯与乌克兰之间的和平协议后，乌克兰于2023年在战场上遭到俄罗斯的重击。
要理解外交政策骗局，请将当今的联邦政府视为由出价最高者控制的多部门骗局。
尽管发生了这些引人注目且代价高昂的灾难，但几十年来，同一群人物仍然掌管着美国外交政策，包括乔·拜登、维多利亚·纽兰、杰克·沙利文、查克·舒默、米奇·麦康奈尔和希拉里·克林顿。
是什么赋予了？
通过认识到美国的外交政策根本不关心美国人民的利益，这个难题就得到了解决。 这关系到华盛顿内部人士的利益，因为他们为自己、工作人员和家人追逐竞选捐款和有利可图的工作。 简而言之，美国的外交政策遭到了大笔资金的黑客攻击。
结果，美国人民损失惨重。 2000 年以来失败的战争使他们损失了约 5 万亿美元的直接支出，即每个家庭约 4 万美元。 未来几十年还将花费约 2 万亿美元用于退伍军人护理。 除了美国人直接付出的代价之外，我们还应该认识到国外遭受的可怕代价，战区数百万人丧生，财产和自然遭受数万亿美元的破坏。
成本继续增加。 如果我们加上五角大楼的直接支出、中央情报局和其他情报机构的预算、退伍军人管理局的预算、能源部的核预算，到 2024 年，美国与军事相关的支出将达到约 1.5 万亿美元，即每个家庭约 12,000 美元。 武器计划、国务院与军事相关的“对外援助”（例如对以色列的援助）以及其他与安全相关的预算项目。 数千亿美元的资金白白浪费了，浪费在无用的战争、海外军事基地以及让世界更接近第三次世界大战的完全不必要的军备建设上。
然而，描述这些巨大的成本也是为了解释美国外交政策扭曲的“理性”。 1.5 万亿美元的军事支出是一个不断向军工联合体和华盛顿内部人士上当的骗局，尽管它使美国和世界陷入贫困和危险。
要理解外交政策骗局，请将当今的联邦政府视为由出价最高者控制的多部门骗局。 华尔街部门不属于财政部。 健康产业部门隶属于卫生与公众服务部。 大石油和煤炭部门隶属于能源部和内政部。 外交政策部门由白宫、五角大楼和中央情报局负责。
每个部门都利用公共权力通过内幕交易谋取私人利益，并通过企业竞选捐款和游说支出来维持利益。 有趣的是，健康产业部门与外交政策部门竞争，是一个引人注目的金融骗局。 2022 年，美国的医疗支出总额达到惊人的 4.5 万亿美元，即每个家庭约 36,000 美元，是迄今为止世界上医疗费用最高的国家，而美国的预期寿命在世界各国中排名约第 40 位。 失败的卫生政策会给卫生行业带来巨额收入，就像失败的外交政策会给军工联合体带来巨额收入一样。
当然，战争越多，生意就越多。
外交政策部门由一个秘密的、关系密切的小圈子管理，其中包括白宫、中央情报局、国务院、五角大楼、参众两院军事委员会以及主要军方的高层。
众议院和参议院的军事委员会，以及包括波音、洛克希德·马丁、通用动力、诺斯罗普·格鲁曼和雷神在内的主要军事公司。 大约有一千名关键人物参与制定政策。 公共利益发挥的作用很小。
主要外交政策制定者掌管着美国 800 个海外军事基地的运作、数千亿美元的军事合同以及部署装备的战争行动。 当然，战争越多，生意就越多。 战争业务本身的私有化极大地放大了外交政策的私有化，因为越来越多的“核心”军事职能被交给武器制造商和哈利伯顿、博思艾伦汉密尔顿和CACI等承包商。
除了数千亿美元的军事合同外，军方和中央情报局的行动还产生了重要的商业溢出效应。 美国在全球 80 个国家设有军事基地，中央情报局在更多国家开展行动，在决定谁统治这些国家，从而制定涉及矿产、碳氢化合物、管道等利润丰厚的交易的政策方面，发挥着重要但大多是秘密的作用。 ，以及农场和林地。 自 1947 年以来，美国的目标是推翻至少 80 个政府，这些政府通常由中央情报局领导，通过煽动政变、暗杀、叛乱、内乱、篡改选举、经济制裁和公开战争。 （有关 1947 年至 1989 年美国政权更迭行动的精彩研究，请参阅 Lindsey O’Rourke 的《秘密政权更迭》，2018 年）。
除了商业利益之外，当然还有真正相信美国统治世界权利的理论家。 好战的卡根家族是最著名的例子，尽管他们的经济利益也与军工密切相关。 关于意识形态的要点是这样的。 这些意识形态家几乎在每一个场合都犯了错误，如果不是他们作为战争贩子的有用性，很久以前他们就会失去华盛顿的讲坛。 无论是否有意，他们都是军工联合体的付费表演者。
这种持续存在的商业骗局一直带来不便。 从理论上讲，外交政策是为了美国人民的利益而执行的，尽管事实恰恰相反。 （类似的矛盾当然也适用于价格过高的医疗保健、政府对华尔街的救助、石油行业的福利和其他骗局）。 美国人民偶尔听到真相时，很少会支持美国外交政策的阴谋。 美国的战争不是根据民众的要求发动的，而是根据高层的决定发动的。 需要采取特别措施来让人们远离决策。
从理论上讲，外交政策是为了美国人民的利益而执行的，尽管事实恰恰相反。
第一项措施是不懈的宣传。 1984年，乔治·奥威尔（George Orwell）一语道破，当时“党”突然将外敌从欧亚大陆转移到了东亚大陆，没有任何解释。 美国基本上也是这样做的。 美国最大的敌人是谁？ 根据季节选择。 萨达姆·侯赛因、塔利班、乌戈·查韦斯、巴沙尔·阿萨德、伊斯兰国、基地组织、卡扎菲、弗拉基米尔·普京、哈马斯都在美国的宣传中扮演了“希特勒”的角色。 白宫发言人约翰·柯比（John Kirby）在进行宣传时脸上带着坏笑，这表明他也知道自己所说的话很可笑，尽管有点有趣。
靠军事承包商和偶尔参与美国诈骗活动的外国政府的捐款维持生计的华盛顿智库放大了这种宣传。 想想大西洋理事会、战略与国际研究中心，当然还有由主要军事承包商为您提供的广受欢迎的战争研究所。
第二是隐藏外交政策运作的成本。 20世纪60年代，美国政府犯了一个错误，即通过征召年轻人去越南作战、提高税收来支付战争费用，迫使美国人民承担军工联合体的成本。 公众爆发了强烈反对。
从 20 世纪 70 年代开始，政府就聪明得多。 政府结束了征兵制，将兵役变成了一种雇佣工作，而不是一项公共服务，并得到五角大楼经费的支持，从较低经济阶层招募士兵。 它还放弃了政府支出应由税收资助的奇怪想法，而是将军事预算转向赤字支出，以保护其免受如果由税收资助可能引发的民众反对。
它还吸引乌克兰等附庸国参加美国的地面战争，这样美国的裹尸袋就不会破坏美国的宣传机器。 不用说，沙利文、布林肯、纽兰、舒默、麦康奈尔等美国战争大师仍然距离前线千里之外。 死亡是为乌克兰人保留的。 参议员理查德·布卢门撒尔
康涅狄格州民主党人理查德·布卢门撒尔 (Richard Blumenthal) 辩称，美国对乌克兰的军事援助花得值，因为“没有一名美国女军人或男军人受伤或失踪”，不知何故，这位好参议员没有意识到要饶恕乌克兰人的生命。 在美国挑起的北约东扩战争中，数十万人丧生。
这一体系的基础是美国国会完全服从战争事务，以避免对五角大楼过高的预算和行政部门煽动的战争提出任何质疑。 国会的从属关系如下。 首先，国会对战争与和平的监督主要由众议院和参议院军事委员会负责，这些委员会在很大程度上制定了国会的总体政策（以及五角大楼的预算）。 其次，军事工业（波音、雷神等）为两党军事委员会成员的竞选活动提供资金。 军事工业还花费大量资金进行游说，以便直接在军事企业或华盛顿游说公司中为退休国会议员及其工作人员和家人提供丰厚的薪水。
美国人民的紧迫任务是彻底改革其破碎、腐败和欺骗性的外交政策，该政策使政府负债累累，同时将世界推向核末日。
对国会外交政策进行黑客攻击的不仅仅是美国军工联合体。 以色列游说团体很久以前就掌握了收买国会的艺术。 美国在以色列的种族隔离国家和加沙战争罪行中的共谋对于美国的国家安全和外交来说毫无意义，更不用说人类的尊严了。 它们是以色列游说投资的成果，2022 年的竞选捐款将达到 3000 万美元，到 2024 年这一数字将大大增加。
当国会在一月份重新开会时，拜登、柯比、沙利文、布林肯、纽兰、舒默、麦康奈尔、布卢门撒尔和他们的同类将告诉我们，我们绝对必须资助乌克兰失败的、残酷的和欺骗性的战争以及乌克兰正在进行的屠杀和种族清洗。 加沙，以免我们、欧洲和自由世界，也许还有太阳系本身，屈服于俄罗斯熊、伊朗毛拉和中国共产党。 外交政策灾难的制造者在这种散布恐慌的行为中并非不理性。 他们欺骗性极强，极其贪婪，只为美国人民谋取狭隘利益。
美国人民的紧迫任务是彻底改革其破碎、腐败和欺骗性的外交政策，该政策使政府负债累累，同时将世界推向核末日。 这项改革应于 2024 年开始，拒绝为灾难性的乌克兰战争和以色列在加沙的战争罪行提供更多资金。 缔造和平和外交，而不是军费开支，才是美国外交政策符合公共利益的途径。
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US Foreign Policy Is a Scam Built on Corruption
https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/corruption-of-us-foreign-policy
The $1.5 trillion in military outlays each year is the scam that keeps on giving—to the military-industrial complex and the Washington insiders—even as it impoverishes and endangers America and the world.
On the surface, US foreign policy seems to be utterly irrational. The US gets into one disastrous war after another -- Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Ukraine, and Gaza. In recent days, the US stands globally isolated in its support of Israel’s genocidal actions against the Palestinians, voting against a UN General Assembly resolution for a Gaza ceasefire backed by 153 countries with 89% of the world population, and opposed by just the US and 9 small countries with less than 1% of the world population.
In the past 20 years, every major US foreign policy objective has failed. The Taliban returned to power after 20 years of US occupation of Afghanistan. Post-Saddam Iraq became dependent on Iran. Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad stayed in power despite a CIA effort to overthrow him. Libya fell into a protracted civil war after a US-led NATO mission overthrew Muammar Gaddafi. Ukraine was bludgeoned on the battlefield by Russia in 2023 after the US secretly scuttled a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine in 2022.
To understand the foreign-policy scam, think of today’s federal government as a multi-division racket controlled by the highest bidders.
Despite these remarkable and costly debacles, one following the other, the same cast of characters has remained at the helm of US foreign policy for decades, including Joe Biden, Victoria Nuland, Jake Sullivan, Chuck Schumer, Mitch McConnell, and Hillary Clinton.
What gives?
The puzzle is solved by recognizing that American foreign policy is not at all about the interests of the American people. It is about the interests of the Washington insiders, as they chase campaign contributions and lucrative jobs for themselves, staff, and family members. In short, US foreign policy has been hacked by big money.
As a result, the American people are losing big. The failed wars since 2000 have cost them around $5 trillion in direct outlays, or around $40,000 per household. Another $2 trillion or so will be spent in the coming decades on veterans’ care. Beyond the costs directly incurred by Americans, we should also recognize the horrendously high costs suffered abroad, in millions of lives lost and trillions of dollars of destruction to property and nature in the war zones.
The costs continue to mount. US Military-linked outlays in 2024 will come to around $1.5 trillion, or roughly $12,000 per household, if we add the direct Pentagon spending, the budgets of the CIA and other intelligence agencies, the budget of the Veteran’s Administration, the Department of Energy nuclear weapons program, the State Department’s military-linked “foreign aid” (such as to Israel), and other security-related budget lines. Hundreds of billions of dollars are money down the drain, squandered in useless wars, overseas military bases, and a wholly unnecessary arms build-up that brings the world closer to WWIII.
Yet to describe these gargantuan costs is also to explain the twisted “rationality” of US foreign policy. The $1.5 trillion in military outlays is the scam that keeps on giving—to the military-industrial complex and the Washington insiders—even as it impoverishes and endangers America and the world.
To understand the foreign-policy scam, think of today’s federal government as a multi-division racket controlled by the highest bidders. The Wall Street division is run out of the Treasury. The Health Industry division is run out of the Department of Health and Human Services. The Big Oil and Coal division is run out of the Departments of Energy and Interior. And the Foreign Policy division is run out of the White House, Pentagon and CIA.
Each division uses public power for private gain through insider dealing, greased by corporate campaign contributions and lobbying outlays. Interestingly, the Health Industry division rivals the Foreign Policy division as a remarkable financial scam. America’s health outlays totaled an astounding $4.5 trillion in 2022, or roughly $36,000 per household, by far the highest health costs in the world, while America ranked roughly 40th in the world among nations in life expectancy. A failed health policy translates into very big bucks for the health industry, just as a failed foreign policy translates into mega-revenues of the military-industrial complex.
The more wars, of course, the more business.
The Foreign Policy division is run by a small, secretive and tight-knit coterie, including the top brass of the White House, the CIA, the State Department, the Pentagon, the Armed Services Committees of the House and Senate, and the major military firms including Boeing, Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman, and Raytheon. There are perhaps a thousand key individuals involved in setting policy. The public interest plays little role.
The key foreign policy makers run the operations of 800 US overseas military bases, hundreds of billions of dollars of military contracts, and the war operations where the equipment is deployed. The more wars, of course, the more business. The privatization of foreign policy has been greatly amplified by the privatization of the war business itself, as more and more “core” military functions are handed out to the arms manufacturers and to contractors such as Haliburton, Booz Allen Hamilton, and CACI.
In addition to the hundreds of billions of dollars of military contracts, there are important business spillovers from the military and CIA operations. With military bases in 80 countries around the world, and CIA operations in many more, the US plays a large, though mostly covert role, in determining who rules in those countries, and thereby on policies that shape lucrative deals involving minerals, hydrocarbons, pipelines, and farm and forest land. The US has aimed to overthrow at least 80 governments since 1947, typically led by the CIA through the instigation of coups, assassinations, insurrections, civil unrest, election tampering, economic sanctions, and overt wars. (For a superb study of US regime-change operations from 1947 to 1989, see Lindsey O’Rourke’s Covert Regime Change, 2018).
In addition to business interests, there are of course ideologues who truly believe in America’s right to rule the world. The ever-warmongering Kagan family is the most famous case, though their financial interests are also deeply intertwined with the war industry. The point about ideology is this. The ideologists have been wrong on nearly every occasion and long ago would have lost their bully pulpits in Washington but for their usefulness as warmongers. Wittingly or not, they serve as paid performers for the military-industrial complex.
There is one persistent inconvenience for this ongoing business scam. In theory, foreign policy is carried out in the interest of the American people, though the opposite is the truth. (A similar contradiction of course applies to overpriced healthcare, government bailouts of Wall Street, oil-industry perks, and other scams). The American people rarely support the machinations of US foreign policy when they occasionally hear the truth. America’s wars are not waged by popular demand but by decisions from on high. Special measures are needed to keep the people away from decision making.
In theory, foreign policy is carried out in the interest of the American people, though the opposite is the truth.
The first such measure is unrelenting propaganda. George Orwell nailed it in 1984 when “the Party” suddenly switched the foreign enemy from Eurasia to Eastasia without a word of explanation. The US essentially does the same. Who is the US gravest enemy? Take your pick, according to the season. Saddam Hussein, the Taliban, Hugo Chavez, Bashar al-Assad, ISIS, al-Qaeda, Gaddafi, Vladimir Putin, Hamas, have all played the role of “Hitler” in US propaganda. White House spokesman John Kirby delivers the propaganda with a smirk on his face, signaling that he too knows that what he is saying is ludicrous, albeit mildly entertaining.
The propaganda is amplified by the Washington think tanks that live off of donations by military contractors and occasionally foreign governments that are part of the US scam operations. Think of the Atlantic Council, CSIS, and of course the ever-popular Institute for the Study of War, brought to you by the major military contractors.
The second is to hide the costs of the foreign policy operations. In the 1960s, the US Government made the mistake of forcing the American people to bear the costs of the military-industrial complex by drafting young people to fight in Vietnam and by raising taxes to pay for the war. The public erupted in opposition.
From the 1970s onward the government has been far more clever. The government ended the draft, and made military service a job for hire rather than a public service, backed by Pentagon outlays to recruit soldiers from lower economic strata. It also abandoned the quaint idea that government outlays should be funded by taxes, and instead shifted the military budget to deficit spending which protects it from popular opposition that would be triggered if it were tax-funded.
It has also suckered client states such as Ukraine to fight America’s wars on the ground, so that no American body bags would spoil the US propaganda machine. Needless to say, US masters of war such as Sullivan, Blinken, Nuland, Schumer, and McConnell remain thousands of miles away from the frontlines. The dying is reserved for Ukrainians. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) defended American military aid to Ukraine as money well spent because it is “without a single American service woman or man injured or lost,” somehow not dawning on the good Senator to spare the lives of Ukrainians, who have died by the hundreds of thousands in a US-provoked war over NATO enlargement.
This system is underpinned by the complete subordination of the U.S. Congress to the war business, to avoid any questioning of the over-the-top Pentagon budgets and the wars instigated by the Executive Branch. The subordination of Congress works as follows. First, the Congressional oversight of war and peace is largely assigned to the House and Senate Armed Services Committees, which largely frame the overall Congressional policy (and the Pentagon budget). Second, the military industry (Boeing, Raytheon, and the rest) funds the campaigns of the Armed Services Committee members of both parties. The military industries also spend vast sums on lobbying in order to provide lucrative salaries to retiring members of Congress, their staffs, and families, either directly in military businesses or in Washington lobbying firms.
It is the urgent task of the American people to overhaul a foreign policy that is so broken, corrupted, and deceitful that it is burying the government in debt while pushing the world closer to nuclear Armageddon.
The hacking of Congressional foreign policy is not only by the US military-industrial complex. The Israel lobby long ago mastered the art of buying the Congress. America’s complicity in Israel’s apartheid state and war crimes in Gaza makes no sense for US national security and diplomacy, not to speak of human decency. They are the fruits of Israel lobby investments that reached $30 million in campaign contributions in 2022, and that will vastly top that in 2024.
When Congress reassembles in January, Biden, Kirby, Sullivan, Blinken, Nuland, Schumer, McConnell, Blumenthal and their ilk will tell us that we absolutely must fund the losing, cruel, and deceitful war in Ukraine and the ongoing massacre and ethnic cleansing in Gaza, lest we and Europe and the free world, and perhaps the solar system itself, succumb to the Russian bear, the Iranian mullahs, and the Chinese Communist Party. The purveyors of foreign policy disasters are not being irrational in this fear-mongering. They are being deceitful and extraordinarily greedy, pursuing narrow interests over those of the American people.
It is the urgent task of the American people to overhaul a foreign policy that is so broken, corrupted, and deceitful that it is burying the government in debt while pushing the world closer to nuclear Armageddon. This overhaul should start in 2024 by rejecting any more funding for the disastrous Ukraine War and Israel’s war crimes in Gaza. Peacemaking, and diplomacy, not military spending, is the path to a US foreign policy in the public interest.
