CONGRESS AND U.S.
SUPPORT FOR THE
WAR IN YEMEN
To TheDes Moines Reg-
ister, Aug. 13, 2018
Recently a Saudi-led
coalition bombed a mar-
ket in rebel-held Yemen
hitting a school bus,
killing scores of children
and women and wound-
ing over 50 civilians. The
United States is actively
involved in this invisible
war that few talk and re-
port on.
We must take responsibility for much of
the death and destruction that has tran-
spired in the rebel area. We are supplying
weapons and ammunition to the Saudis.
Thousands of civilians, mostly women
and children, have been killed and
wounded in the rebel area and many
thousands more are sick and dying from
starvation and disease due to the block-
ade, which prevents needed food and
medical supplies from reaching them.
This is a humanitarian crisis of cata-
strophic proportions. Where is the over-
sight by Congress of our involvement in
this war that is causing such misery and
suffering? Why are we not actively trying
to broker a ceasefire and making a con-
certed effort to get humanitarian aid to
these people?
James Marcovis, West Des Moines, IA
NO RATIONALE FOR STAYING IN
AFGHANISTAN
To The Washington Post, Aug. 27, 2018
In his Aug. 24 Friday Opinion commen-
tary, “The Taliban doesn’t need peace. It’s
winning,” Max Boot lamented how U.S. for-
eign policy leaders often do the same thing
over and over while expecting different re-
sults. But he did precisely that by arguing
for an indefinite U.S. military force presence
in Afghanistan as the “least bad option.”
Mr. Boot is deluding himself if he be-
lieves that extending the war for another
10, 20 or 30 years is in the U.S. national
security interest. While concerns about a
Taliban takeover of Afghanistan are under-
standable, they are far outweighed by the
considerable manpower, time, taxpayer
money and opportunity costs the United
States would need to expend to prevent it.
To believe the Taliban wouldn’t think twice
before again hosting transnational terror-
ists is far-fetched: The group lost its control
of Afghanistan because of it. Indeed, in theyears since, Taliban officials have openly
regretted their past association with al-
Qaeda.
The United States was morally and
legally justified to intervene in Afghanistan
after 9/11. Al-Qaeda deserved nothing less
than destruction. But the United States ac-
complished that objective in the opening
months of the war. It has the intelligence, re-
connaissance and surveillance capacity to
monitor and combat the threat of transna-
tional terrorism without distracting itself with
another decade of nation-building and de-
ploying yet another generation of Americans
into a decades-long Afghan civil war.
Daniel R. DePetris, Washington, DC
NEW REPORT DETAILS THE DEPTH
OF U.S. WASTE IN AFGHANISTAN
To the LNP [of Lancaster, PA],Aug. 7,
2018
The U.S. has wasted $15.5 billion in
Afghanistan since 2008, according to the
Special Inspector General for Afghan Re-
construction, which he estimated is proba-
bly only a portion of the waste, fraud, abuse
and failed efforts of the U.S. in Afghanistan.
How sad that that money wasn’t used for
urban renewal projects in the U.S. Imagine
what $15.5 billion could do for the City of
Philadelphia if spent wisely.
Daniel Riehl, Manheim Township, PA
WE MUST TALK ABOUT OUR HUGE
DEFENSE BUDGET
To the Chico Enterprise-Record, July 22,
2018
George Orwell famously said, “The
biggest lie is the lie of omission.” That is
the case in the E-R’s July 16 editorial,
“Congress must end foolhardy federal
spending.”
The 500-word editorial cites interest on
the national debt, Social Security and
Medicare as the main drivers of the na-tional debt. There is no
mention of the obscene
amount of money spent
and unaccounted for by
the Pentagon. The De-
fense Department’s in-
spector general has re-
ported several times
about trillions of dollars
spent that are unac-
counted for.
Plus there is no men-
tion of the events that
exploded our national
debt: Tax cuts, by
Ronald Reagan, George
Bush and now Donald
Trump coupled with huge increases in
defense spending. The debt tripled
under Reagan, doubled under Bush.
Deficits continued under Barack Obama
because he continued the same outra-
geous and unaccountable spending by
the Pentagon.
The editorial blames two programs,
Social Security and Medicare, which
both have dedicated funding through
payroll taxes, for our massive debt. In-
creases in defense spending are done
on borrowed money which, along with
tax cuts and the interest from borrowing,
have increased our debt.
Don’t be fooled by this propaganda.
The truth is Social Security has almost
$3 trillion in excess funds collected and
placed in the general fund to hide the
deficit increases created by increased
defense spending to fight the mythical
enemies of Communism (Vietnam) and
now terrorism (Middle East).
We can cut our debt by cutting the
wasteful and unaccounted for money
spent by the Pentagon.
Paul Ellcessor, Durham, CATHE MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL
COMPLEX AND “SPACE FORCE”
To theLos Angeles Times, Aug. 22, 2018
When I first read about this “great idea”
Trump claims to have had [to create a
“space force” as the sixth branch of the U.S.
military], I thought, “Oh, good, a new place
for a war.” Then I remembered President
Eisenhower’s warning about a “military in-
dustrial complex.”
Now we find out that Trump’s idea for a
“space force” came from, who else, a group
of government officials with deep financial
ties to the aerospace industry.
This is another “great” way for the swamp
dwellers in Washington to make a buck.
Carol Giandalia, Torrance, CA OCTOBER 2018 WASHINGTON REPORT ON MIDDLE EAST AFFAIRS 69opm_68-69.qxp_Other Peoples Mail 8/29/18 4:38 PM Page 69