Last week President Obama flew to India to sell them $5 billion for 10 Boeing C-17 cargo planes — the sixth biggest arms deal in U.S. history. As Jim Hightower points out, this deal doesn’t do much to boost American employment (despite administration hopes), but it does help escalate the arms race India runs with Pakistan, its eternal rival and a customer of U.S. arms dealers: “How long before American soldiers get caught in this deadly crossfire of U.S. made weapons?”
This week Thailand extradited Victor Bout, the so-called “Merchant of Death” to the United States to face charges of global arms trafficking with clients that include the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. Undercover DEA agents posed as FARC rebels seeking weapons to shoot down American pilots enforcing the U.S. Plan Colombia policy initiated by the ClintonAdmin oh so long ago and expanded under the BushAdmin.
I just thought that was an interesting juxtaposition.
Also, last month the ObamAdmin announced a plan to sell Saudia Arabia $60 billion worth of arms over the next 20 years. The Experts interpret this deal as a “message to Iran.”
The other day I drove behind a hatchback sporting a bumper sticker with the “O” of Obama rendered as a peace symbol. I had to laugh.
Yep #1 arms dealer in the world is US. And the policy towards South Asia as a whole is the height of folly. Although, even without US meddling, the Pakistani and Indian elites are so cynical and narrow-minded that it would probably be a horror anyway.
The whole thing depresses me even more than usual because I’m half Indian and worry about family and friends in both India and Pakistan.
On another note, there’s a nearby house I walk by every day on the way to the store that for a while had two signs in the window. The first was an Obama sign and the other was a “Stop the War” poster. I muttered “Pick one!” under my breath every time I walked by those signs. Recently the Obama sign has come down, I’m pleased to report.
One can fight disillusionment only so long….
I like that: “Pick one.”