Report on 2006 Global Arms Sales: nearly half $$ spent by the US

[G_j]

Great way to spend taxes?

http://www.spacewar.com/reports/Global_Arms_Sales_Boom_As_Governments_Spend_Big_999.html

Global Arms Sales Boom As Governments Spend Big
by Stefan Nicola
UPI Germany Correspondent
Berlin (UPI) June 12, 2007

Worldwide military spending in 2006 reached levels unseen since the Cold War, with nearly half of all money spent by the United States, and China coming in at the No. 4 spot for the first time, according to a report compiled by a Sweden-based peace research institute. Last year some $1.204 trillion was spent on military matters all over the world, according to a report released Monday by the independent Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

That's a 37 percent increase in the last decade and the highest amount since 1988 -- a time when the Berlin Wall was an impossible hurdle for millions of East Germans and nuclear war was just a button push away.

The United States accounted for $528.7 billion, nearly half all money spent, SIPRI said, followed by Britain ($59 billion) and France ($53 billion).

"It is worth asking how cost-effective military expenditure is as a way of increasing the security of human lives, if we talk about avoiding premature deaths and disability due to current dangers. For example, we know that millions of lives could be saved through basic health interventions that would cost a fraction of what the world spends on military forces every year," SIPRI military expenditure expert Elisabeth Skons said.

..more..

Isn't Kucinich really the only one who will talk about this insanity?

[Octafish]

1. Bushes must talk about it a lot. They call it "Playing Both Sides."

Those are amazing numbers: The dollars in the article refer to military expenditures.

U.S. military sales also dwarf the rest of the planet's, combined.

http://www.truthinmedia.org/TruthinMedia/Bulletins2002/2-1.html

They've been the Merchants of Death for generations.

Playing one side off another -- Iraq v. Iran, Hitler v. Stalin -- and investing in both makes for big arms sales.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=3743890&mesg_id=3743890

And there's no racket more profitable than war, wrote Maj. Gen. Smedley Butler, USMC.

Of curse, one family does a lot of the business, there, too.

[G_j]

2. I wish Smedlley was around to comment

on today's situation, war always was, always will be a racket.

[Octafish]

3. Butler's classic book is online...

War Is a Racket

It's also here: http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/warisaracket.html

It should be required reading in junior high, high school and college.

Then again, we'd end up with a peaceful country and planet.

And who wants that? Besides good people?



PS: I agree with you, my Friend G_j. I wish Smedley Butler was with us today.

[Karenina]

4. Who's arming whom?

K&R!

[seemslikeadream]

5. “Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic.”

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x1078166

She's present in our country right now, just waiting to make her - to carry out her divine mission

[G_j]

6. I saw him on Democracy Now!

His recent trilogy of books sounds well worth reading!


:hi: