Militarization

( Tomdispatch.com ) – Recently, an agent of the Department of Homeland Security called me and started asking questions about a childhood acquaintance being investigated for extremism. I put him off. My feelings about this were, to say the least, complex. As a military spouse of 10 years and someone who has long written about […]

Arms Sales

Corporate Weapons Heaven Is a Hell on Earth: Joe Biden, the National Security State, and Arms Sales

William D. Hartung

( Tomdispatch.com) – Here’s a seldom commented-upon reality of this century and this moment: the United States remains the number-one arms-exporting nation on the planet. Between 2017 and 2021, it grabbed 39% of the total global weapons market and there’s nothing new about that. It has, in fact, been the top arms dealer in every […]

Climate Crisis

The “Rules-Based International Order” Has a Priorities problem, stressing War over Food Security and Climate

Rajan Menon

( Todmispatch.com ) – Washington’s vaunted “rules-based international order” has undergone a stress test following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and here’s the news so far: it hasn’t held up well. In fact, the disparate reactions to Vladimir Putin’s war have only highlighted stark global divisions, which reflect the unequal distribution of wealth and power. Such […]

Donald Trump

Imperial Detritus: Henry Luce’s “American Century” Comes Undone

Andrew J. Bacevich

( Tomdispatch.com ) – “The American Century Is Over.” So claims the July 2022 cover of Harper’s Magazine, adding an all-too-pertinent question: “What’s Next?” What, indeed? Eighty years after the United States embarked upon the Great Crusade of World War II, a generation after it laid claim to the status of sole superpower following the […]

Bush

George W. Bush denounces “the decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq — I mean, Ukraine”

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Michael Williams at the Dallas Morning News reports on George W. Bush’s speech at his presidential center at Southern Methodist University, during which the former president made what MSNBC’s Mehdi Hassan called “one of the biggest Freudian slips of all time.” Bush denounced the rigged elections that produced the dictatorship […]

Counter-Terrorism

US could have done more to prevent civilian casualties in Raqqa, report says

Middle East Monitor

( Middle East Monitor ) – The United States could have done more to eliminate the chances of killing civilians in the campaign to capture the city of Raqqa in northern Syria three years ago, a newly-released report by the RAND Corporation has stated. The report released on Thursday acknowledged the impact of the US-led […]

Militarization

How to End America’s Forever Wars for Once and for All

Karen J. Greenberg

( Tomdispatch.com) – As August ended, American troops completed their withdrawal from Afghanistan almost 20 years after they first arrived. On the formal date of withdrawal, however, President Biden insisted that “over-the-horizon capabilities” (airpower and Special Operations forces, for example) would remain available for use anytime. “[W]e can strike terrorists and targets without American boots […]

Congress

We’re not at War: Why is Congress giving $778 Billion of our Money to the Pentagon?

Medea Benjamin and Nicholas J.S. Davies

( Code Pink) – Despite a disagreement over some amendments in the Senate, the United States Congress is poised to pass a $778 billion military budget bill for 2022. As they have been doing year after year, our elected officials are preparing to hand the lion’s share – over 65% – of federal discretionary spending […]

Militarization

No, Modern Warfare is not “Accurate” or “Accountable” and dead Innocents are not “Collateral Damage”

The Conversation

By Lauren Gould, Jolle Demmers, and Nora Stel | – The US military is facing allegations it covered up civilian casualty cases in the US-led coalition war against Islamic State (IS). It’s an issue that has drawn attention to one of the most worrying aspects of US and coalition involvement in the Middle East: the […]