For many, many decades — regardless of which political party runs the Executive Branch or the Congress — the U.S. has had a BI-PARTISAN CONSENSUS that militarism should dominate our foreign policy.  Even when we don’t have an explicit “America First” president, our foreign policy ALWAYS seeks narrow nationalism with selfish political, economic and military domination over as much of the world as our government can manage.

Politicians pay lip service to peace, but they always do what the paragraph above says.

If we REALLY valued the principles of democracy, the public would have a strong voice in shaping foreign policy.

But instead, it is shaped by capitalistic interests and the military-industrial complex.  Trump appointed to head our State Department (the agency in charge of international relations) the head of Exxon, because Trump believed our foreign policy should serve the interests of oil companies.  Biden’s appointee to head the State Department is no better:  Mr. Blinken’s career was arranging international deals for U.S. military weapons to be sold to other countries.  Instead of civilian management of the Department of Defense, Biden appointed a very recently retired four-star general who was on the board of Raytheon, one of the U.S.’s dominant corporations manufacturing nuclear weapons.

 

Fortunately, some peace-oriented persons and organizations are proposing a truly peaceful foreign policy.

 

A Quaker-based organization calls for a NEW, PEACEFUL FOREIGN POLICY:  https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/foreign-policy/592175-time-is-short-for-congress-to-act-for-peace?utm_campaign=thisweek&utm_medium=email&utm_source=ak&utm_term=21790.97899.viSEFG

 

Here is more information about FCNL’s proposal for a new peaceful foreign policy from FCNL itself:  https://www.fcnl.org/prioritizepeace?akid=21790.97899.viSEFG&rd=1&t=21&utm_campaign=thisweek&utm_medium=email&utm_source=ak&utm_term=21790.97899.viSEFG

 

Nearly a year ago I delivered a presentation I had recently developed, “Re-Thinking National Security.”  A California-based entity recorded this Zoom event, and it went out to a worldwide audience.  If you missed it, you can watch it at the following link.  The dark blue rectangle at this link says you need to create a free account if you’re not already a member.  Their topics have been on very interesting topics.  Here is the link to watch my presentation from March 2021:  https://ubiverse.org/documents/humanity-rising-day-201—recording

Here is a link to essay I wrote that is similar to what I said the worldwide Zoom event linked above:  Re-Thinking ‘National Security’ — An Essay in 3 Parts

 

A very savvy pacifist organization has developed and updated their proposal for a non-military way to provide real security.  See information here:  https://worldbeyondwar.org/downloads/category/books/agss/2018-19/