THE KARMA OF WAR

CALLING OURSELVES THE GOOD GUYS, THE HEROES, THE WHITE HATS, WHEN DO WE RECOGNIZE OUR OWN RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE DEATH TOLLS, THE REBELLIONS, AND THE PAIN AND SUFFERING THAT OUR TACTICS HAVE BROUGHT TO THE CIVILIANS OF OTHER NATIONS AND TO OUR OWN PEOPLE.

The United States currently has military personnel on 800 military bases in other countries.  No other country has bases in as many foreign lands as the United States.

World armies, in order of number of personnel is: (*rounded to the nearest thousand)
     China--2,333,000  (this is the bear that our president elect is currently poking)
      USA--1,492,000
      India--1,325,000  (apparently we should stop acting like they are just workers at call centers)
      North Korea--1,190,000  (most likely to do something unexpected)
      Russia--845,000  (Our new ally?--oops--was our ally in the previous world war, also)
      Pakistan--643,000  (I had no idea, I thought they were little and disorganized)
      Turkey--510,000  (I thought they were tribal)
      Vietnam--482,000 (a familiar name here, both halves now apparently on the same side)
      Egypt--438,000 (do they like us?)
      Burma--406,000 (What?)
      Thailand--360,000
       Brazil--318,000
       Taiwan--290,000
       Iraq--271,000
       Mexico--270,000
       Ukraine--250,000
       Japan--247,000
       Saudi Arabia--233,000
       France--222,000
       Germany--186,000
       Afghanistan--185,000
       Israel--176,000
       United Kingdom--169,000
       Bangladesh--157,000
       Greece--143,000
        Phillipines--125,000
        Syria--125,000
        Jordan--100,000

Of those countries, nine have nuclear capability:
Russia, USA, Israel, France, China, the UK, Pakistan, India, and North Korea.  We don't know that anyone else has the ability to not just blow us all up but ruin it for everyone's future.  Our intelligence doesn't say they do.   But you know, what we don't know, we don't know.

We do know that when it comes to spending on defense--that strangely incestuous military-industrial complex born of world wars and the industrial age has made the USA a winner.  Spending by nation, in order of most money spent:
USA--596 billion
China--215 billion
Saudi Arabia--87 billion
Russia--66 billion
UK--55 billion
India--51 billion
France--50 billion
Japan--40 billion
Germany--39 billion
Brazil--24 billion
Iraq--21 billion
Israel--18 billion

Hopefully, we weren't buying $1250 hammers and $50,000 toilets.

There is a lot of money in WAR.  Eleven Fortune 500 companies are in defense/aerospace industry. Many of them got there during WWII. Lockheed/Martin, general Dynamics, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, L-3 Communications, Precisions Cast Parts, Huntington Ingalls, Spirit Aerosystems Holdings, United Technologies, Textron.  And these don't include those smaller companies--making uniforms, making boots, making MRE's, making all the little pieces and parts that it takes to keep an army (or air force or navy or marine) outfitted, trained, housed, and equipped).
Amazingly small amounts of that money are paid to the men and women that are serving.  At least 2,000 of our lower ranked families qualify for SNAP benefits.  Shades of Walmart business Methods.

AMERICAN WAR DEATHS,
The American Revolution had about 4,435 deaths, 217,000 fighting, or about 113deaths per100,000  total population.
The War of 1812 had about 2,260 deaths, 286,730 fighting, or about 31  deaths per 100,000 total population.
The Mexican War had about 13,283 deaths, 78,718 fighting, or about 78 deaths per 100,000 total population.
The Civil War had about 618,0020 deaths (we were both sides of this war), about 3,263,363 fighting or 1,965 deaths per 100,000 total population.
The Spanish American War had 2,449 deaths, 306,760 fighting, or about 4  deaths per 100,000 total population.
WWI had 116,516 deaths, 4,734,991 fighting or about 126 deaths per 100,000 total population
WWII had 405,399 death, 16,112,566 fighting or 307 deaths per 100,000 total population.
The Korean War had 36,574 deaths, 1,789,000 fighting or 24 deaths per 100,000 total population
The Vietnam War (?) had 58,220 deaths, 3,403,000 or 32 deaths per total population.
The Gulf War had 383 deaths, 694,550 fighting or 0 deaths per total population. (the number is too small for the total to actually equal 1, we all no that 383 people are not 0 people)
The Iraq/Afghanistan War (still going on--maybe forever) has had 6,607 deaths--so far, 2,500,000+ fighting or 2 deaths per 100,000 total population

There are lots of numbers out there (but not matching numbers) for the number of civilian noncombatants killed in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.  The smallest combined those 2 with Pakistan and they listed 210,000 (this is less than 1/2 of the largest estimates).  This is not military personnel or rebels or terrorists.  It's children, sick people, old people, women--and doesn't include the people that die of malnutrition due to destroyed supply lines or chronic illness deaths due to no more healthcare system or deaths of people that are injured or poisoned by infrastructure damage.  It should also be considered that when there is war, the government is destabilized, crime goes up and human services are disrupted.  We mourn our less than 7,000 soldier deaths, but can't figure out why ISIS is gathering up converts so successfully.

We went to this war over civilian deaths from terrorist acts.

We have lost 3,158 civilians to terrorism on US soil since 1995.  We are terrified, horrified, and angry about terrorism.

They have lost at least 210,000 from 3 countries--at least.
At Least!
Since 2001!
We should all worry about the Karma of that.

HAPPY NEW YEAR and PEACE OUT.




















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