The Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity
Subscribe to the Institute View Us on YouTube Follow Us On Twitter Join Us on Facebook Join Us at Google Plus

Search Results

for:

Connor Freeman

  • Prev
  • 1
  • Next

End Washington’s Buildup for War with China, Pursue Peace and Economic Cooperation

undefined

As Washington is mired in brinkmanship with Russia in Ukraine, the last thing the US should do is decouple with China. For years, the Pentagon has been eyeing a future war with Beijing, yet another unnecessary war which – in our lifetimes - could lead to this planet’s nuclear incineration.

America’s new Cold War with China is a bi-partisan imperial project led by the Democrats. In 2011, former President Barack Obama began it in earnest, dubbing it the “pivot to Asia.” The “pivot” entails the largest military buildup since the Second World War, shifting hundreds of bases as well as two-thirds of all US Air and Naval forces to the Asia-Pacific region. Washington is encircling China for a future war with Beijing.

In 2020, while Americans were distracted by the Covid-19 crisis, Donald Trump’s war cabinet seized the opportunity to drastically expand the US military footprint in Beijing’s near abroad by sending more warships and spy planes, conducting aerial surveillance flights, to the region and especially the South China Sea. These provocations have been vastly escalated by the Biden administration.

Americans must soon put the shoe on the other foot and ask how Washington would react if instead China was surrounding the US with weapons of war and military bases.

Ten months after Biden entered the oval office, US reconnaissance aircraft had flown over 2,000 sorties in the South China Sea, the East China Sea, and the Yellow Sea, including near China’s coast. That same year, Biden nearly doubled the deployments of aircraft carrier strike groups in the South China Sea.
read on...

Whatever You Do, Don’t Ask the Military to Help

undefined

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis and mass hysteria, there’s been a peculiar pattern, you will notice if you haven’t already, of certain, new non-interventionist talking points picking up steam. 

The general premise of these arguments goes something like this: we are unprepared for this crisis because we’ve been spending all this money on war and imperialism. It should be spent on a proper government response to this wildfire-like spreading disease. The military should be here helping us combat this pandemic. 

While there is much to be said for this thesis, it misses some central points about the sordid characters it appeals to for assistance in these difficult times.

The first part, regarding the extensive opportunity costs involved, is no doubt true. Americans spend well over $1 trillion every year on empire and mass murder. Our productive capacity is diminished to whatever extent wealth, labor, capital, etc. is transferred from productive and civil society to the military industrial complex.
read on...


Authors

Tags