One aspect of this which you failed to mention is that these weapons serve
as instruments to implement the so called neoliberalism.  This is being
vividly demonstrated in Chiapas.


John Karns                                               [log in to unmask]
 ========================================================================


On Mon, 12 May 1997, Richard D. Osborn wrote:

> I would like to see some comment about the so-called "peace process" the
> mainstream media likes so much to talk about.
>
> What follows is the way I see that process:
>
> The propaganda peddlers working out of New
> York and Washington never tire of talking about the "peace process." When
> they aren't telling lies about the Middle East or eastern Europe, they are
> spinning tall stories about "problems" in one of the many dictatorships in
> Africa. When those cesspools of chaos loose their shine, they switch to one
> of the dozens of other swamps of social, political or economic trouble
> bubbling around the world.
>
> Most Americans have no real sense of what this ever-churning "dance with
> death" is all about. The media, in the grand tradition of Orwellian
> doublespeak, keep calling it the peace process. In reality, of course, it
> is the greed-driven war process.
>
> The war process is a process, needless to say, that involves big bucks. And
> those big bucks come straight out of the pockets of ordinary Americans.
>
> As John M. Broder, writing in the New York Times of May 10, points out:
> "Nearly half of all arms sold worldwide originate in the United
> States--with the government's approval and, in most cases, encouragement
> and support."
>
> Bill Clinton the peace-maker? You must have been to Disney World again.
> According to Broder: "In the past four years, American weapons makers have
> delivered 1,625 tanks, 2,091 armored personnel carriers, 318 combat
> aircraft, 203 helicopters and 1,443 surface-to-air missiles around the
> world, the great majority through official government-to-government sales.
> Just last month, the Clinton administration decided to let Lockheed Martin
> bid to sell F-16 fighter jets to Chile."
>
> Chile? What in God's name does Chile need with F-16 fighter jets? Peace
> process my eye.
>
> The truth? "The government bureaucracy that manages the sale of American
> weapons overseas would by itself be a respectable-sized military
> contractor: 6,500 employees, a $500 million operating budget and sales of
> about $12 billion a year." Those are the published figures the government
> will admit to. The real dollar amounts? More than likely double that.
>
> What's going on, anyway? Broder gives us a hint:
>
>
>
> Critics call the government operation a taxpayer-subsidized marketing unit
> of the nation's arms industry. Why, asked William D. Hartung of the World
> Policy Institute at the New School for Social Research, do manufacturers
> need the help of thousands of government employees to sell their wares to
> the third world? He warned that the proposed F-16 sale to Chile, which he
> called a case of multibillion-dollar "corporate welfare" for contractors,
> could touch off a South American arms race.
>
>
>
> The reality? The people making big bucks off the racket called the peace
> process are the same people who control the White House and the United
> States Congress. They are the same people who are letting the Chinese have
> a beachhead in Long Beach, California, and who think it is smart to
> mindlessly "engage" the second and third worlds while letting this country
> be a dumping ground for drugs and job-stealing consumer goods.
>
> The New York and Washington "peace pushers" are no more interested in peace
> than drug dealers are interested in "addiction control." The primary
> interest of the peace-process crowd is power. The energy that drives them
> is greed. When the goal is "owning everything" and "controlling everybody,"
> talk about peace is nothing more than the most disgusting kind of
> propaganda.
>
> If the American people had a truly representative government, the nightmare
> called globalism, the free-market ideology and the peace process would
> stop. Until that government comes into being, however, the nightmare will
> continue to unfold.
>
> One doesn't have to be a genius to know where it will all end. Will the
> Congress ever wake up and meet its responsibilities?
>
> --Richard D. Osborn
>
>
> ----------
> > From: brian j. callahan <[log in to unmask]>
> > To: [log in to unmask]
> > Subject: Re: [CHOMSKY] Brian's removal from the CHOMSKY list
> > Date: Monday, May 12, 1997 10:33 AM
> >
> > I want to thank everybody for their support.  The new list owner, Leon,
> on
> > CHOMSKY has given me full access back.  The previous owner, Juan, has
> quit
> > the list.
> >
> > I think the previous owner's actions might be an interesting case of an
> > attempt to "manufacture consent."  It is a common aspect of humans that
> we
> > don't like to be criticized.  We may train ourselves to withstand it and
> > learn from it, but there is always an unpleasant aspect to it.  Now, when
> one
> > person or a small group of people with similar interests control the
> > dissemination of information, there is a natural tendency to want to
> limit
> > criticism of themselves.  When giant media corporation hire newspeople
> and
> > editors, it seems almost inevitable that those who are very critical of
> giant
> > corporations will not be hired or promoted. It's not a conspiracy, of
> course,
> > it's just the way things work when power is concentrated in a few hands.
> >
> > Which brings us to the internet and listservs like this.  Doesn't it seem
> > likely that as the internet because more commercialized, listservs and
> other
> > means of discussion will become run by these same media corporations?
> All
> > that's needed is a change in the way payment for use is structured, and
> > they've started pushing for that.
> >
> > Or am I just being paranoid?
>