Tag: Afghanistan war

Home to a safer land?

Posted on by kathiemm

By guest author Dr. Mike Corgan

We have now passed the 2,000th U.S. fatality in Afghanistan, but that war is winding down and we are bringing the troops home to a safer environment.

Or so we are supposed to think.

Rifle range
Photo by Camp Minsi-BSA, used under CC Attribution-Share Alike Unported 3.0 license.

The U.S. today is seeing a huge spike in gun sales stoked by fear of mass shooters and the possibility of more restrictive gun laws. The NRA has never been more active.

I was an NRA member when I was young. Boy Scout camp offered target shooting and I was proud of the skills that earned me “Expert Rifleman” qualification, so I stayed with the NRA after scouting.

But the era that responded to urbanization and loss of outdoor skills by spawning the NRA–and, for that matter, the Boy Scouts–has long passed.

Now the NRA is more about our rights to carry concealed handguns and to stockpile military-style weapons than it is about target shooting and hunting. It’s all about power politics and gun laws.

One of the so-called “third rail” issues that politicians dare not address head-on is gun control. A federal law restricting assault rifles has lapsed, and background checks on would-be owners vary widely. This year neither presidential candidate will go near the issue except to reaffirm that they will do nothing.

In a recent interview a mother maintained that she was teaching her teenage son and daughter how to use pistols and was planning to buy them each one “so they wouldn’t have to go into a theater unarmed.”

Can you imagine the chaos in that Colorado theater if members of the audience had had pistols? And then a gunman, dressed like a police SWAT team member, had started shooting? And the larger-than-life screen and blaring soundtrack had been filled with shootings and the sounds of shooting? Who would fire at whom?

Yes, we are bringing troops home from two of our longest wars. But are they coming home to a safer land?

Michael T. Corgan, Ph.D., Associate Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies
Department of International Relations, Boston University

Fighting to the death…of children

Posted on by kathiemm

One of the greatest tolls of war is the cost to our future incurred by killing and maiming babies, small children, and youth. They are not just collateral damage.

Among the thousands of civilians who have been killed or maimed in the Afghanistan war, children are the most innocent. Apart from death and injury, though, here are some additional ways that children are impacted, as described in a United Nations report:

  • Taliban and other factions have recruited children for military training, to conduct suicide attacks, transport weapons and plant explosives.
  • National Security Forces have detained children for alleged national security crimes
  • Afghan National Police have used children as drivers, messengers, and at checkpoints
  • Schools and medical facilities have been damaged, causing disproportional impacts on children

Tragically, the devastating effects of war on children do not end when a ceasefire begins or a treaty is signed. Think of how your sons and daughters would be affected if they were forced to be soldiers, forced to kill, forced into prostitution, forced to wait and see where the next bomb would fall.

Think about your children growing up in a country in which there are thousands of unexploded landmines and other explosive devices, a country in which you or they could be killed or maimed for one wrong step. Imagine your children growing up with birth defects and widespread pollution from Agent Orange.

Albert Einstein said, “The world is a dangerous place. Not because of the people who are evil; but because of the people who don’t do anything about it.”

What are some things that YOU can do to help prevent wars and protect those children who are victims of the ravages of war?

Kathie Malley-Morrison, Professor of Psychology, and Pat Daniel, Managing Editor of Engaging Peace

Time to protest?

Posted on by kathiemm


In 1965, the Vietnam Day Committee, an anti-war group in Berkeley, California, called for an International Day of Protest from October 15-16 to express revulsion against the Vietnam War.

Protest demonstrations around the country gradually evolved into a powerful anti-war movement that included servicemen rebelling against involvement in a war that they increasingly saw as immoral and unjust.

In 2011, we see an expanding series of protests against the powerful international banking and financial interests that are increasingly recognized as being at the roots of war, injustice, inequality, and the destruction of the planet. For a dramatic overview of the protests ignited by the economic crisis that has resulted in the largest profits ever accruing to the biggest financial institutions in one year, watch the video above.

In the US, there have been growing protests against the Iraq and Afghanistan wars (see, for example), growing protests against Wall Street, and a coming together of the anti-war, anti-Wall Street/pro-peace, pro-democracy groups (see, for example).

These protests are not being conducted by violent fringe groups; they are students, teachers, social workers, nurses, doctors, artists, musicians, community organizers, environmental groups, lay people, professionals—providing a broad representation of the 99% who are not benefiting from the wars and from the control of the government by banking and business institutions.

Their agenda is non-violent. Violence has come from the police and others in authority who are ready to quell protest, however legitimate the concerns of the protestors.  The way to keep violence out of protests is not to prevent protests but to bar the police from using violence.

The First Amendment to our Constitution prohibits, among other things,  interfering with the right of citizens to assemble peacefully and to petition the government for redress of grievances.  If Americans value their democracy, and respect their Constitution, it is important for them to support those rights, and to insure that members of the police/military establishment do not infringe on those rights.

Kathie Malley-Morrison, Professor of Psychology