Pentagon

A Different World is Possible: From Yemen War to Afghan Starvation, Our Tragedies are Exacerbated by Letting the US Military-Industrial Complex Run Wild

Vancouver (Special to Informed Comment) – Right now, we have more than enough knowledge, wealth, and the capacity to create a just and prosperous world, but we are nowhere near realizing this dream. One reason is that we are constantly told about so-called “scarcities”, and how expensive it would be actually to help people and […]

Afghanistan

The Ukraine Moment: Lessons from the War on Terror

Karen J. Greenberg

( Tomdispatch.com ) – Ukraine is obviously a powder keg. With each passing day, in fact, the war there poses new threats to the world order. Only recently, Vladimir Putin’s Russia intensified its attacks on civilian targets in that beleaguered land, while threatening to use tactical nuclear weapons and adding Ukraine’s neighbor Belarus to its […]

Iraq

America’s Fickle Relationship with the Kurds: Review of “Rethinking State-Non-State Alliances: Change and Continuity in the U.S.-Kurdish Relationship”

Marc Martorell Junyent

Barcelona (Special to Informed Comment) – Review of Ozum Yesiltas, Rethinking State-Non-State Alliances: Change and Continuity in the U.S.-Kurdish Relationship (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2022). The Kurds of Syria and Iraq have been at the forefront of the fight against the so-called Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS). Their fight against the radical group brought […]

Feminism

Choosing Life in a Pro-Violence Society

Andrea Mazzarino

( Tomdispatch.com) – In significant parts of this country, the Supreme Court’s June 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade returned Americans to a half-century-old situation in which hundreds of thousands of women, faced with unwanted pregnancies, were once forced to resort to costly, potentially deadly underground abortions. My spouse’s employer, the Pentagon, recently announced […]

Pentagon

Lie all you can Lie: Dishonesty Plagues America’s War Machine

William J. Astore

( Tomdispatch.com ) – As a military professor for six years at the U.S. Air Force Academy in the 1990s, I often walked past the honor code prominently displayed for all cadets to see. Its message was simple and clear: they were not to tolerate lying, cheating, stealing, or similar dishonorable acts. Yet that’s exactly […]

Climate Crisis

The Nightmare of Military Spending on an Overheating Planet: A Big Carbon Bootprint and a Giant Sucking Sound in the National Budget

Tomdispatch

By Stan Cox | – ( Tomdispatch.com) – On October 1st, the U.S. military will start spending the more than $800 billion Congress is going to provide it with in fiscal year 2023. And that whopping sum will just be the beginning. According to the calculations of Pentagon expert William Hartung, funding for various intelligence […]

Pentagon

US Smug about Russia’s Failures in Ukraine, Forgetting the Iraq and Afghanistan Quagmires

Andrew J. Bacevich

(Tomdispatch.com) – In Washington, wide agreement exists that the Russian army’s performance in the Kremlin’s ongoing Ukraine “special military operation” ranks somewhere between lousy and truly abysmal. The question is: Why? The answer in American policy circles, both civilian and military, appears all but self-evident. Vladimir Putin’s Russia has stubbornly insisted on ignoring the principles, […]

Arms Sales

Spending Unlimited: Contractors Cash in as Congress Adds Billions to the Pentagon Budget

Tomdispatch

By Julia Gledhill and William D. Hartung | – ( Tomdispatch.com) – Congress has spoken when it comes to next year’s Pentagon budget and the results, if they weren’t so in line with past practices, should astonish us all. The House of Representatives voted to add $37 billion and the Senate $45 billion to the […]