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Don’t Stand By as the Wars 'Drone' On
Seven years ago today I resigned from the U.S. government in opposition to the Bush administration's war on Iraq.
I had worked for the State Department for sixteen years and had been in the Army and Army Reserves for 29 years. I was one of three U.S. diplomats who resigned over the Bush administration's decision to invade and occupy Iraq and one of tens if not hundreds of thousands of government employees that knew the war on Iraq would jeopardize our national security, not improve it.
While I was in the process of making my decision to resign, millions of Americans and tens of millions of people from around the world took to the streets to protest the pending invasion and occupation of Iraq and the inevitable deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis.
Tomorrow I will be marching in Washington, DC and will join with hundreds of thousands of Americans all over our country to protest the continuation of Bush's wars on Iraq and Afghanistan by the Obama administration.
Seven years in Iraq
Looking our country's history of invasions and occupations, I guess I should not be surprised that seven years later, over 100,000 U.S. military and 100,000 U.S. contractors would remain in Iraq and that a new president, elected by many to end the wars, would be following lockstep the old president's blueprint on the wars and on so many other issues.
President Obama, who professed to having been opposed to the Iraq war, has not speeded up the removal of U.S. military forces from Iraq. Bush's plan for leaving a force of 50,000 U.S. military until the end of 2011 is being implemented with little variation by Obama. These "non-combat" 50,000 forces will actually be combat troops renamed as trainers and advisors to Iraqi security forces and quick reaction forces to continue to combat operations when needed.
No one of the Obama administration will state how many private security contractors will remain in Iraq. Private security contractors serve as extensions of combat military forces and, if any administration was honest about in counting U.S. combat power, should be added to the military numbers.
By the Bush-Obama timetable, all U.S. military troops are to be out of Iraq by the end of 2011, but whether the 100,000 U.S. contractors will remain is conveniently unclear.
If you thought this Iraq timetable was too long under Bush, then one would hope that you think it is too long under Obama also.
Eight and one-half years in Afghanistan
This month marks eight and one-half years the U.S. military has been an occupying force in Afghanistan. Nobel Peace Prize winner Obama has increased dramatically U.S. military operations in Afghanistan with an increase of 30,000 troops. Now over 100,000 U.S. military are in Afghanistan with the number of U.S. contractors topping 75,000 and scheduled to increase even further.
The Obama administration has increased enormously the use of assassination drones in Afghanistan and Pakistan with a major increase in civilian deaths from drone attacks. Large scale combat operations in sparsely populated areas of Afghanistan are underway. We are told the operations are for clearing Taliban, but in reality they seem to be consolidating power in the area for Afghan President Karzai's brother Walid who is reported by many to be involved in Afghanistan's huge drug trade and extending U.S. military occupation of greater regions of the country.
Show your concerns tomorrow and every day-jobs, schools, healthcare-not more war and other criminal acts by our own government!
There are many reasons to be on the streets tomorrow. Protesting wars of aggression, accountability for government officials violating our own laws as well as domestic laws, is another reason.
Despite claims that he would close Guantanamo within his first year, President Obama continues the imprisonment policies of Bush and looks like he will fold to right-wing Republican pressure to continue to use the tainted military commissions to try prisoners with "evidence" obtained by torture.
Ominously, the Obama administration is refusing to hold accountable key officials in the Bush administration who violated U.S. and international law which makes torture illegal. The names of these officials are well-known--John Yoo, Jay Bybee (now a federal court judge), Alberto Gonzalez, David Addington. And former Vice-President Cheney still makes public statements that torture is fine and that water boarding is appropriate and legal.
Many citizens believe that there must be accountability for the Bush administration otherwise future administrations, including the Obama administration, may attempt to conduct criminal action while in office with impunity. Today I join hundreds who will protest in Charlottesville, Virginia, John Yoo's freedom while he sentenced thousands to be tortured by his legal opinions under as justification for torture by the Bush administration.
Greed from huge corporate war profits and from financial system profits that miraculously rebounded in record time with our tax bailout while millions of Americans are out of work, schools in America close and healthcare costs skyrocket should move millions of us to be visibly and vocally challenging both political parties who share the blame in the dangerous situation America is in.
After spending most of my adult life in either the U.S. military or the U.S. diplomatic corps, I strongly believe we must let our officials know of our displeasure and anger, and I hope you will join your friends and neighbors on the streets tomorrow, March 20, to challenge war and business as usual in America.
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26 Comments so far
Show AllAgain, thank you Colonel Wright for being a true patriot, thinking of the good of our nation. Thank you. It is amazing that so many US military personnel, all professing to be patriotic and ready to sacrifice themselves for the good of our nation, instead merely obey orders and expect the nation, its Constitution, its economy, its social fabric, and its historic values to be sacrificed for the growth of the Pentagon.
I, for one, am all for banning armed drones, same as banning bury-and-forget land mines, napalm and other burning agents, and depleted uranium. States are the biggest mass murderers, no matter how pristine their motives are in their own minds for killing immense numbers of human beings. If we truly stand for PEACE, let's disarm the State!
I will be there tomorrow!
Are these really wars? Aren't they actually occupations? So often we let the dominant forces determine our language. The US military is not in the process of waging war across the world. It is spreading violence, criminal, illegal violence. Ours are forces of terrorism, like the others.
Simply going out and working against these occupations will solve little in the long run and likely won't even work in the short term. It's necessary to fight against the totality of the our corrupt society. Calling those occupations wars perversely legitimises them. It implies war's positive connotations of bravery, heroicism, and sacrifice to our blood soaked, militaristic culture. There are no battles in Iraq. No clash of forces. Incidentally, yet immaterially, Congress did not declare war in either case. They authorized the use of military force at the discretion of the POTUS.
Ann Wright is clearly preaching to the choir here. Can't we at least be honest amongst ourselves?
Why do you "hate Obama?"
True Progressives support the President!
Kucinich flipped his HCR vote saying that his presidency was under threat: a defeat on the White House measure would completely undermine the presidency.
Why would a true progressive support a neocon fascist, which is exactly what Obama is! He is expanding the Bush War Upon The World, hardly the actions of a progressive. Obama's is a presidency that needs to be undermined.
You're joking, right? Obama doesn't represent Progressives AT ALL. He represents the Corporations. He is in NO WAY a Progressive. What does he do that makes you think he is a Progressive? Cynthia McKinney was the one presidential candidate we had who really IS a Progressive but everyone let the media ignore her so they ignored her, too, and look what we got. Another Fascist at the helm as much a war-monger (only a 'better' one) than bush.
He is either being satiric or sophomoric,moronic and still being conned by Obomba! I can name a lot of Progressives, but Obomba is definitely not one of them! But you have to give him credit for hoodwinking so many Progressives. People like Cynthia McKinney and Mike Gravel are real Progressives and the proof: They will never be able to become President because they are an anathema to the people that control Obomba!
"a defeat on the White House measure would completely undermine the presidency."
And I'll never forgive Kucinich for taking away that beautiful dream! :(
(Actually, as with Kucinich's new role model-- Gollum-- in the end his efforts to thwart the Quest and save both himself and the Dark Lord from just and overdue extinction may serve to fulfill it.)
"Warfare abroad is always warfare against the U.S. population, too."
One might even wonder whether the latter is not the primary objective. Compared to total economic destruction of the "new deal" and massive financial diversions away from the U.S. middle class, the military manipulation of petro resources and their delivery routings that could have been handled at least as readily and more cheaply by bribes and other such capitalist tools seems almost incidental.
Sioux Rose
PROF: Great post. However, all intellectuals run the risk of using their mental acuity to distance themselves from the pain that others feel, which is far greater than our own (as a nation). It may be wisest to say that warfare abroad entails universal suffering, as opposed to an either-or paradigm. For it directs its annihilation tools and tactics toward phenomenal destruction, the inevitable and routine massacre of thousands of decent people, those targeted under "enemy" status. It also does all the things you relate in terms of decimating the lifestyles of citizens who reside within the homeland security nexus.
Life is still VERY good for many here. I've been in San Francisco the past few days and nights and perhaps I am looking at the privileged who still hold good jobs; but I sure see a LOT of people dining out. It seems their bubble of joy has not in any way been pierced by the truly brutal elements of America's routine foreign policy. This boomerang has not yet head home.
So where do they hide the homeless in SF, Rose? No doubt anyone who can thrive in Cali now is well to do, while others who are barely getting by stay at home to save what they can. Out of sight, out of mind.
Thank you, Sioux Rose, for that perspective that I always remind myself of also. I may be in difficult financial straits sometimes and feelings sorry for myself for a little while about some life circumstance, but then I always remind myself that no one is barging through my door with a machete to chop up my various creatures or me without mercy; I am not sitting here cowering as the bombs fall on me and my friends and family; I am never starving -- my cupboards are still a miracle of plenty; I have clothes on my back and a comfortable place to sleep; and I am warm when I need to be warm in the winter; I have a vehicle, although old, that starts up and runs; and etcetera.
Your first paragraph is right on.
Peace and plenty and security for ALL! ... and none of us should be completely peaceful until it is for ALL!
/cm
There used to be a 'joke' that the Credit Card companies give you a rope just long enough to hang yourself. Is that what China is doing? Once they've gotten everything we have to give, they'll tighten the noose, and it won't be pretty.
Report Waste, Fraud and Abuse in government spending.
http://www.recovery.gov/Contact/ReportFraud/Pages/fwa.aspx
Track the money
Brave New Foundation suggests a sample message:
"I'd like to report the waste of billions of dollars of our national wealth in Afghanistan on a war that doesn't make us safer. It's fraud to portray this as a war that increases our security, and it's abusive of U.S. troops and local civilians to drag out this war any longer. End the war so we can have real economic recovery."
Iraq, Afpak....not wars....but ARE terrorist acts against innocent people !
Pot Of Gold empirePie March 19th, 2010
Don’t place much stock in any ism;
except for one,.. that’s pacifism.
Light teams delight through any prism.
The prison of desire is not my mission.
A pot of gold is not a vision;
truth be told, it’s just division.
what is the real true story about mr. obomber? did he just see the error of his ways and speeches? Or did he find himself surrounded by great huge fat generals with guns? and great huge fat bankers and businessmen with checkbooks?
I am fairly sure that what this sorry episode tells us is what a tight grip the military/capital complex has on what we once called our public life. "president" obomber is no more in charge of this country than you or i.
he's a stick figure, a front man, a puppet, a tool. no point in getting mad at him.
and retrospectively, does anybody really believe that little bush conceived and designed and executed his whole horrorshow by himself?
Members of the student body at the US Air Force Academy are earning their "wings" as drone pilots at the sophomore and junior level now.
The propaganda about training "leaders" is just that.
Mind control is alive and well on the front range.
They craft "tools".
What a waste.
It's reassuring to hear from Colonel Wright and most disturbing at the same time. To continue reading revelations of this sort, keep me remembering the stark warnings of the U.S. Army General who is credited with winning WWII for the U.S. and then became President Eisenhower (R) for two terms.
This man knew what he was talking about in telling us to keep control of the military industrial complex. He knew it from a military and political standpoint- inside and out. He saw the power and pressures of capitalism to create weapons industries that cannot be allowed to fail, let alone criminal financial megacorps.
There is a lot of irrational fear and irrational hatred boiling in the U.S. that needs to be constructively focused on the greed mongers who are in some cases models of "success" for too many citizens. There has got to be some understanding that much, if not all of these so called 'wars' are promotions for our weapons industries. They provide jobs for many, which means that many more of us than want to face or admit it, are in the business of making and selling weapons to other nations (as in Saddam Hussein, Israel, Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc, etc) which WILL eventually be sold or captured by others and used against us.
We simply cannot see beyond that $ sign and realize that something like a Military Service Corps, as even some in the military have championed to build relationships by providing water, schools, roads, etc., will do more for creating allies than any amount of drones flown from the antiseptic computers of Colorado to 'protect' our military personnel.
We still have a long way to go in achieving what we claim we are about. The rest of the world sees it daily. We just cannot bring ourselves to see we are creating our own destruction, bomb by bomb, bullet by bullet, victim by victim, torture by torture, disappearance by...
Sioux Rose
JJAY: So true and quite poignantly related.
Thanks Col. Wright-not only for encouraging Americans to speak out tomorrow- but for resigning in protest to the Iraq invasion. You are walking a higher ground than many of your cohorts- e.g. Gen. C. Powell. Just two points to share with the choir: First, while it may by that Obama was deceptive from the start, the fact is that he demonstrates at the very least an intellectual appreciation of the human condition. To sum him up as a rote charlatan seems to me to be a fundamentalist viewpoint. Remember folks: the President is to a large extent a figurehead. Do judge his actions, but be careful to sentence him as a person. Doing so only reinforces the view that he's the one calling the shots. He's not. Were he, I suspect that he, himself, might by now be shot. I personally think he's a fu%k- not as a person, but as a puppet no less than GW was. Only difference is who's pulling the strings. With GW it was the power-mongering psychopaths. With Obama it's the money-mongering sociopaths. Second, the US has been destroying countries for many, many years. That it continues to should surprise no one with an ounce of gray matter. The black beauty of the current situation is that the American people are feeling some level of pain as a result. The US corporatocracy will continue it's ways-period. It is a logical consequence of Capitalism that consumption is the goal. People are objects- no more,no less. Contractors ARE the government. Congress is the cast of puppets, and the American people are no longer the intended audience- as it has become quite clear that,int he eyes of the corporatocracy- they are objects to be sued only to amass wealth. Hey- America? Welcome to the club!
Isn't it funny (not ha ha funny) that they always find the money for war and the military, but say there's none or only a little for social programs. Any time there's talk of assisting ordinary people and the infrastructure they act like they are SO worried about the deficit, but hardly a whimper when voting on bill to fund the military or bail out the rich. This is class warfare at its finest.