Henry Lowendorf
U.S. Peace Council
Thank you to the National Council of Peace Partisans in Syria for hosting this meeting and for its generous hospitality.
The USPC is not oblivious to the continued threats of war and imperialism. Yet what I hope to convey are the new opportunities for peace and justice that have arisen since last year and the actions of USPC to take advantage of these opportunities.
One year ago, the outcome of the U.S. presidential election was uncertain. Although the Bush administration was extremely unpopular, some of its commonly-used manipulations – fear mongering, telling and re-telling lies, turning reality on its head and the politics of division and racism, all broadcast by the mass media – were having a significant effect on U.S. voters. One of the two candidates, an old war horse who in the 1960’s bombed peasants in Vietnam, represented more of the same policies we had seen for 8 years. The other candidate, relatively young and new to Washington politics, who was also the first person of color to be nominated by a major U.S. party, countered the country’s gloom with high energy and soaring rhetoric calling for hope, change and an end to the occupation of Iraq.
A year ago, the major financial institutions in the United States were facing bankruptcy and threatened to drag the whole country and much of the rest of the world into a major economic depression. A year ago global oil prices had recently peaked at U.S. $130 per barrel, severely debilitating the U.S. economy but of course damaging the economies of the rest of the world and devastating the non-oil producing developing countries.
A year ago, those in the U.S. on the left measured the gloomy threat of another 4 or 8 years of reactionary – even neo-fascist – dictatorial, militarist, imperial policies against the possibility that our mega-power country would begin, begin to change course toward diplomacy, discourse, negotiation, conciliation. While we in the Peace Council clearly understood that the overall goals of imperialism were accepted by both major presidential candidates and their parties and were certainly not being debated, we also recognized in the Barack Obama candidacy an important challenge to the insanity of continuing the disastrous course of the previous 8 years.
The center-left coalition that supported candidate Obama worried with good reason that another national election might be stolen, or that the voters might be so terrified by hateful ad campaigns and fears about handing the presidency to an African American that the rightwing candidate would win.
We in the U.S. were not the only ones who feared the worst. Many of the world’s people looked to Barack Obama to peel the world back from the brink of more wars, climate catastrophe, social and economic chaos.
A year ago the outcome of that election was far from certain. For all of us our worst fears did not materialize.
Comprehending the results of last years U.S. national elections is fundamental to today’s context for peace.
We have now had 9 months or so to assess the meaning of that election. And overall it is apparent that the people of the U.S. and of the world were right in their thinking. In particular, the Peace Council correctly concluded that the balance of forces adjusted to an important degree in our favor.
While the aims of imperialism haven’t changed since last year, the outcome of the U.S. presidential election reflects a joint recognition: on the one hand the voters began to understand that their own interests did not coincide with those of the rightwing. On the other hand, the outcome also strongly indicates growing recognition by corporate power that the political and military methods being used by the Bush administration to maintain and build the empire constructed for them a disastrous trajectory and were counterproductive. And for many reasons the tools the empire had been using were wearing thin.
The economic crisis of bank failures, personal bankruptcy and job loss is a measure of and indeed in great part caused by unsustainable personal, corporate and national debt now estimated to reach $48 Trillion. That crisis is compounded by continuing unwinnable wars on Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan and by unsustainable military spending. The multiple crises are exacerbated by and further propel the weakening of the U.S. dollar. Add to these the breaking away of much of Latin America from imperial domination. The United States, its empire and the whole world are confronted by these facts.
The Peace Council understands that while some things emanating from Washington remain the same, others have changed.
For example, in Cairo in June President Obama called for a viable two-state solution and an end to settlements. Yet we see that Obama’s policies toward Israel and Palestine have not yet risen to his rhetoric. The Obama administration has so far proven unwilling to insist that Israel stop building more settlements and close existing ones, thus foreclosing real negotiations. Nor is there visible pressure to end the deplorable prison conditions of the residents of Gaza. Nor is there movement on returning the Golan plateau to Syria. Huge U.S. military and other subsidies continue to prop up the Israeli militarists. It is our responsibility to ensure that Obama’s actions begin to match some of his rhetoric.
Obama said he would talk with Cuba. His administration is talking with Cuba. Obama did reverse the Bush administration restrictions on travel to Cuba and remittances of money by Cuban Americans. But he hasn’t removed tight restrictions on travel to Cuba by the vast majority of U.S. residents. Regrettably, he extended for another year the cruel embargo against Cuba, despite the fact that the majority of people, labor unions and corporations want it ended. Obama is moving toward closing the prison and torture camp at Guantánamo, but isn’t contemplating returning Guantánamo to Cuba. Obama hasn’t addressed the unjust trial and punishment of the Cuban 5. They languish in prison. It is our responsibility to ensure that Obama’s actions not only reflect his rhetoric, but expand beyond it to meet international law and justice.
Obama broke a disgraceful 30-year tradition and is talking with Iranian leaders. Yet Obama continues to mimic the previous administration in criticizing Iran, which is abiding by its obligations under the Nuclear NonProliferation Treaty, while he ignores the actions of Iran’s neighbors India, Israel and Pakistan, all of which refused to sign the NPT and represent 3 of the 4 states that developed nuclear weapons arsenals since the NPT was ratified in 1970. It is our responsibility to challenge the U.S. administration’s hypocrisy and to call for nuclear weapons abolition as a required condition of nonproliferation.
Let me turn to nuclear weapons, conventional weapons, disarmament and statements and actions by President Obama. For the first time since 1945 a U.S. president stated “I state clearly and with conviction America's commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.” Most significantly he stated “as the only nuclear power to have used a nuclear weapon, the United States has a moral responsibility to act.” Obama said that the U.S. “can lead” and “can start” the effort to abolish nuclear weapons, perhaps not in his lifetime. He further stated that his “administration will immediately and aggressively pursue U.S. ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.” Can the peace movement ignore such statements by the leader of the imperial camp? How can the peace movement not welcome such statements? Moreover, we can wish Obama a long life and at the same time insist that nuclear abolition take place long before it ends.
Abolition of nuclear weapons has vaulted to first place on the peace table as a result of 1) the increasing threat of continued nuclear proliferation by state and non-state actors; 2) the call by former right wing cold warrior leaders, Kissinger, Perry, Schultz and Nunn for abolition; and 3) the overwhelming conventional armaments superiority of the U.S. and its allies. It is apparent that nuclear weapons abolition will fail unless the stunning imbalance in conventional weaponry is addressed.
The USPC recognizes the distance between rhetoric and action. We understand that Obama is not an anti-imperialist. He has made that clear. He supports NATO’s expansion to the borders of Russia. He has expanded the war on Afghanistan and threatens to expand it further. At the same time that he says the U.S. does not want military bases in Iraq and Afghanistan, he is silent about the future of the thousand or so other U.S. military bases around the world. In fact he has announced the construction of seven new U.S. military bases in Colombia and he is directing the re-emergence of the 4th Naval Fleet to patrol the waters surrounding South America. The peace movement insists that foreign military bases be closed and the 4th Fleet again be mothballed.
Despite such significant defenses of imperialism, we view Obama’s presidency and his statements as an opening providing space for the peace movement to flex its muscles, an opportunity to grow. It is our responsibility in the peace movement to take advantage of such opportunity. We can and need to insist that words imply actions and that such actions approach the world’s needs. And we are joined in this view by most of the U.S. peace movement.
The Peace Council has since its inception participated in the nuclear abolition movement. This movement has historically been highly motivated, minutely focused and very well organized. It has in recent years, however, largely aimed its work at research, publication, discussion and lobbying at the United Nations.. The Peace Council advocates expanding this approach to mobilize mass action.
In May 2009, for the first time this decade the United States under Obama’s administration did not block the creation of an agenda for the Nuclear NonProliferation Review. Thus next May, there will in fact be a UN Review of progress, or lack thereof, under the NPT.
Anticipating the NPT Review as it did in 2000 and 2005, the U.S. Peace Council proposed to national nuclear abolition and broader peace organizations that we organize a march and rally supporting nuclear abolition to take place immediately before the Review. Furthermore the Peace Council supported a proposal for an international conference of peace forces. These proposals were accepted. Most importantly, the USPC proposed that the conference not only discuss and promote nuclear abolition, but also link abolition with the broader issues of disarmament, ending the waste of Trillions of dollars each year that no country can afford, and resulting in the release of Trillions of dollars of resources for human needs and development. This proposal too was accepted.
Today we are engaged in preparations for that international peace conference, march and peace festival scheduled for next April 30, May 1 and May 2 in New York. Thousands from Japan and Europe will join many thousands for North America.
The Call to participate in these actions carries the title “DISARM NOW!” and the slogan, “Nuclear abolition should serve as the leading edge of a global trend toward demilitarization and redirection of resources to meet human needs and restore the environment.” (repeat.) The Call and slogan, focused on nuclear abolition, clearly connect to general disarmament and transferring funds to human needs. They invite participation by the social justice, the trade union and the environmental movements.
Copies of the Call were earlier distributed by the WPC Secretary to member groups. No peace organization should sit on the sidelines. We urge the WPC to participate in these pivotal events and, just as important, in their planning.
This grand coalition will not coalesce automatically, nor will it easily be sustained. The stakes, however, could not be higher for nuclear weapons threaten sudden annihilation and continued armaments spending and production threaten both short-term localized devastation and long-term global suffocation. We believe that the time is right and that we must seize the time.
Thank you.
Signers to the Call may be found at
<http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AVAwF1wsfpTdZGdqN3M3azVfMGNiOGY5Z2c2&hl=en>
