Peace Action Blog - Tag: afghanistan

The news that the Obama Administration is considering a “zero option” – leaving no troops behind in Afghanistan after the end of 2014 – got some coverage last week but not a lot. I wrote a letter to the editor to the New York Times based on its article on this issue. It didn’t get […]

The following came out of our mid-year staff retreat, comments or questions are most welcome! Priorities and Opportunities for Peace Action/Peace Action Education Fund program, organizing, advocacy and political work for the second half of 2013 -Move the Money/ Cut Pentagon Spending Campaign: Planning is underway to do the next round of Move the Money […]

The Post argued that U.S. security interests require a “more robust . . . intervention” in the Syrian civil war ["No time for half-measures," editorial, June 15]. A better case can be made for avoiding the fray altogether.   Sending medium-size and heavy weapons into Syria, with or without the establishment of a no-fly zone, […]

Peace Action was one of the few organizations to oppose the invasion of Afghanistan and we have been working ever since to end America’s longest war. Last week, the House of Representatives took a big step in bringing all troops home.  While considering the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the House passed an amendment that […]

Please click here for results of NDAA. Amendments should be debated in the order listed below, though some will not be debated and voted “en bloc” (a bunch of amendments voted in one vote together that will pass).  Also, because of some members schedules they might debate out of order.  The only other votes scheduled […]

In the next few days the House of Representatives will vote on Pentagon funding. Some of our friends in Congress will offer amendments to cut overflowing Pentagon coffers. While our communities lack money for vital services, should shoveling more of our tax dollars to the wasteful, reckless Pentagon really be our nation’s priority?” Make a […]

According to an Associated Press article from last Thursday, Afghanistan’s President Hamid Karzai says the United States wants to keep nine military bases in the country, which Karzai has said could be agreed, with certain conditions (namely the U.S. continuing to provide military training and economic development aid). We’ll need to press Congress and the […]

by Eric Swanson The term “blowback,” the consequences of a covert or military operation that has repercussions for the aggressor or the result of supplying weapons to a conflict only to see those same weapons turned on the supplier, has been used for decades by national security elites. It has been used long enough that […]

Great piece on Huffington Post, as always, by SUNY-Albany emeritus professor of history and politics and Peace Action board member Larry Wittner, on U.S. and global military spending. According to a report just released by the highly-respected Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), world military expenditures in 2012 totaled $1.75 trillion. The report revealed that, as in […]

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/04/14-1 Published on Sunday, April 14, 2013 by Common Dreams Tax Day and the Pentagon by Kevin Martin This month, as budget and policy issues in Washington muddle along inconclusively as usual, grassroots peace activists are busy organizing, educating, protesting and lobbying. Last weekend, Historians Against the War hosted an ambitious, illuminating conference at Towson […]

Peace Action Wisconsin has been doing some slammin’ media work lately, here’s another op-ed in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, this one on drones, by PA WI board member Conor McMullen. After years of slumber, Congress is finally starting to wake up to its responsibilities to question the legality, the wisdom and the morality of the […]