American conscientious objector Josh Stieber describes his transformation from believing in “the faith of George Bush” to conscientious objector and antiwar activist.
Source: The Real News Network.
talkingsticktv — May 06, 2010 — Talk by Professor Lawrence Wittner author of “Confronting the Bomb: A Short History of the World Nuclear Disarmament Movement” recorded April 3, 2010 in Seattle.
In December, 2009, the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives released a 10-page report on Canadian military spending by Bill Robinson.
Among it many findings:
The report is available for free download at the CCPA.
You have likely seen the Canadian Forces recruiting ads on television. A major recruiting drive is on, and the CF are eagerly recruiting in public schools, universities and at community events.
In response, Mennonite Central Committee Ontario’s Rock the Talk project (countering militarism and proclaiming peace) has produced a brand new “zine” for young people who may, for whatever reason, be considering military service.
The colourful 12-page zine suggests 10 things to think about before enlisting. The zine was produced with a secular audience in mind. Your help in distributing the zine in schools, to youth groups, and beyond is welcomed.
For copies, email, or download it here.
For more information about Rock the Talk, go to http://mcc.org/ontario/peaceeducation/.
BOOK REVIEW
‘We blew her to pieces’
Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan by Aaron Glantz
Reviewed by Dahr Jamail
Aside from the Iraqi people, nobody knows what the United States military is doing in Iraq better than the soldiers themselves. A new book gives readers vivid and detailed accounts of the devastation the US occupation has brought to Iraq, in the soldiers’ own words.
Winter Soldier Iraq and Afghanistan is a gut-wrenching, historic chronicle of what the US military has done to Iraq, as well as its own soldiers.
Authored by Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) and journalist Aaron Glantz, the book is a reader for hearings that took place in Silver Spring, Maryland, between March 13-16, 2008, at the National Labor College.
“I remember one woman walking by,” said Jason Washburn, a corporal in the US Marines who served three tours in Iraq. “She was carrying a huge bag, and she looked like she was heading toward us, so we lit her up with the Mark 19, which is an automatic grenade launcher, and when the dust settled, we realized that the bag was full of groceries. She had been trying to bring us food and we blew her to pieces.”
Recomended site: Iraq Veterans Against the War
In a World Opinion Forum TV, DVD and Google Video special from the United Nations, Kevin Sanders reports on world reaction to the failure of the last Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), described as the most important meeting ever to take place at the UN.
At the conference, held in 2005, the US blocked discussion on renewal of earlier NPT agreements to de-alert and disarm nuclear weapons. The next NPT review conference will not be until 2010. This report looks at responses to the crisis including independent nuclear disarmament initiatives by national governments, mayors and NGOs – the non-governmental agencies representing “the people” in whose name the UN was founded.
Among the measures: Norway divests from nuclear bomb makers; World mayors call for de-alerting and permanent de-targeting of cities; and the Commission on Weapons of Terror headed by former UN weapons inspector Hans Blix presents its recommendations for world security to the UN.
You can watch the video here.
Proposed Natural Gas Pipeline Route. Source: CCPA
Forget official rhetoric about fighting for democracy and women’s rights in Afghanistan. It’s all about energy.
A report released June 19, 2008 by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) offers more realistic explanations for the invasion that has cost so many lives, and the occupation that grows bloodier every day.
A Pipeline Through a Troubled Land: Afghanistan, Canada and the New Great Energy Game documents the proposed Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline, which will transport natural gas 1,680 kilometres from southeast Turkmenistan through southern Afghanistan, to Pakistan and India.
The report, written by international energy economist and former lead economist of PetroCanada John Foster, describes the U.S.-backed pipeline as turning Afghanistan into “an energy bridge” between Central and South Asia.
By citing official sources, the report provides a powerful antidote to the war propaganda emanating from Ottawa, Washington and such leading journalistic founts of wisdom as the editorial board of the Winnipeg Free Press.
For example:
Richard Boucher, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs, said in September 2007: “One of our goals is to stabilize Afghanistan, so it can become a conduit and a hub between South and Central Asia so that energy can flow to the south. . . . and so that the countries of Central Asia are no longer bottled up between two enormous powers of China and Russia, but rather they have outlets to the south as well as to the north and the east and the west.”
Light was also shed by U.S. Ambassador Thomas Pickering, co-chair of the blue-ribbon Afghanistan Study Group in Washington, D.C. Interviewed on CBC’s As It Happens (January 30, 2008), he said: “Afghanistan is of strategic importance, a failed state in the middle of a delicate and sensitive region that borders on a number of producers of critical energy.”
The 17-page report is available for download as a 3.9 MB PDF file. You can get it here. Perhaps after you’ve read it you could pass it on to your local Member of Parliament and the families of any Canadian soldiers you know who have been deployed to Afghanistan.
Anti-War News