 program we have tonight, NATO, what's wrong with it? A lot. And we'll hear about that. Our guests include Colonel Anne Wright, who is a former diplomat, as well as the Jean Mubarakka, the National Organizer for Black Alliance for Peace and Alice Slater, board member of World Beyond War. So let's go forth with our updates. Jodi, tell us about the Poor People's Campaign in Washington. Sure. Well, maybe I could start with the People's Summit that was leaked before. And that was thousands of people in the streets of Los Angeles. As the counter to the Summit of America is the first time that the Organization of American States gathered the countries of Latin America, and Biden disinvited three countries. And so it became Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua. So it became the Summit of Exclusion. And we, instead of letting the press sweep that under the rugs, we made it very visible. We did an action right outside the Summit with 10 empty chairs for the 10 countries that were not attending. And we listened to voices from around Latin America, powerful, passionate voices, calling for, you know, the democracy and for Biden not to be calling Latin America his backyard or his front yard, but for Latin America to have its own sovereignty. Medea Benjamin gave an amazing talk about sovereignty also. So you can check it out at People's Summit 2022.org. We were in the streets, been amazing, beautiful march together at the end of it. And there's also a final declaration that you can find there that really raises up the vision that came out of everyone coming together and says, you know, we must be in the streets, must be visible, we must be fighting for the people and for the planet. So we finished that and then transitioned to Washington DC, where we had the anti militarism contingent at the Poor People's Campaign, get a convergence on their moral march on Washington. It started with Medea and a bunch of us at the Doors of Congress saying let us in. This is the People's House. The People's voices are missing from the conversation inside these halls. And Ty and I got into our members office, Ted Liu, who then let us get into Nancy Pelosi's office, where we kind of showed them that they were pointing in one direction, oh, we can't let you in. They're not letting you in. And then we got it back to them where it's like it falls on Nancy Pelosi's lap. She is shutting the doors on the people and we need to call on her to open the doors. Friday night was an amazing vigil at the of the Lincoln Memorial honoring the deaths of from war from COVID in the streets of our cities from the militarism at home. And it was a powerful way to not only start, but then we went to the MLK Memorial and lit it up with our message, which was money for the poor and not for war. The next day were voices of the poor for hours, talking from their hearts and from their experience. And we had, we taken over and remade a tank into transformed a tank into a space of peace and love. And shared a lot of information about militarism and why it needs to stop and how it is the root cause of racism and poverty. And being together was quite beautiful. We were part of a 50 member delegation. We had 250 coalition at the people summit. So it was fun to be together as a delegation and with our messaging and with our love and raising our voices and being visible and seeing each other in person. And there's just got to be a lot more of that. Well, thank you so much, Jodi Evans, not only for that report, but for all the organizing. A lot of work went into that summit. We appreciate all that you do. I was a great team and many, many more. Yes. Let's move over to Medea, who's going to update us on Cuba and Columbia. Yes. Can you hear me? Yeah. So Columbia, I would say an earthquake, but an earthquake is a bad thing. So what do you call it? Like a super, super charged celebration with Gustavo Petro winning and his vice president, Francia Marquez. Columbia in its recent history has never had a progressive government. And so this is an amazing, amazing historic change for Columbia, where it has really was the young people and women and the indigenous community that brought this ticket to be the winning ticket. And they have pledged in their campaign, all kinds of positive things from land reform to protecting human rights, free education. And this will transform Columbia if they don't get stopped in their tracks by the right wing right away. But it will also transform Latin America, which is really moving in an amazingly positive direction. And so when you're depressed about the state of the world, or the state of the US, or whatever it is, just look towards Latin America, which has such inspiring things happening there. On the Cuba front, we just got back from taking medicines that will save the lives of eight children who need liver transplants. And it shows the cruelty of the US blockade, we couldn't buy those medicines in the United States. This is for children getting liver transplants. And no bank would let us send the money, we had to take it in cash to Mexico, buy it there, not tell the company it was going to Cuba. I mean, it's ridiculous, it's disgusting. But we did deliver the medicines and went to the hospital and met the wonderful doctors. And we also, at the same time, just managed to get Ayanna Presley's office. And thank you so much to Mapa, Brian and Cole and the others for getting her office to take that on. I know you've been moving her very much in the direction of taking on some foreign policy issues. And this was great. Brian, how many, how many signed the letter in the end? It was up 26 or 27, Medea. So 27 members of Congress, a letter saying that we wanted cooperation when it came to COVID and other medical issues that Cuba has done amazing work developing its own vaccines and could make that available to poor countries around the world. But the needs to the US to not stand in the way. And a wonderful coincidence is that I managed to meet the team of scientists in three different institutes that developed the three different COVID vaccines, told them about the letter, showed them the letter. They were thrilled by it. They want to invite Ayanna to come to Cuba and visit their research institutes. So it was a beautiful campaign that we did collectively through this Code Pink Congress. So thank you. We can't hear you, Marcy. Sorry, I said, thank you for all the work that you do. We are trying to keep up. Now let's go to Hania Zodat with an update on the Yemen War Powers Resolution. Yes, thank you so much, Marcy. So two weeks ago, we announced with our audience members that there is a Yemen War Powers Resolution, thanks to the work of all the activists and pressing for this to get done. That was introduced by reps, Peter DeFazio, who represents the fourth district of Oregon, and the Primera Jaiapal of Washington's 7th Congressional District, who also serves as the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. Now the resolution now up to date has about 85 co-sponsors. What the bill would do is it would defund the US maintenance of Saudi Air Force and prohibit US intelligence from bombing targets unless Congress authorized a declaration of war within 30 days. Two of the key players that we want to make sure co-sponsor this bill are Gregory Meeks, who is the chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who still hasn't co-sponsors, as well as Adam Smith, who is the chair of the House Armed Services Committee. Now what I will do is I will share the resolution with everyone, go through the list of co-sponsors. If you have not found your co-sponsor, your representative, the mission is for us to make as many phone calls and emails and letters to ensure that every single one of the members of Congress are on board with this resolution, because it is so critical, it is so important, as we know already Yemen is one of the largest humanitarian crises according to the UN. So many children have passed away from starvation, and we just want to make sure that there's an end to this endless war. And I'll hand it back over to Brian to talk about Saudi, which is another crisis that we need to cover on this call. So yes, Brian tells what's going on with Biden and Saudi Arabia. Thanks. And it is very good news that there's a war powers resolution in the House of Representatives right now. Because of recent announcement by the president, he has shown that he absolutely needs to be checked on this issue of Yemen and our nefarious alliance with Saudi Arabia. Tom Baker said in the chat earlier that it's the height of hypocrisy that the Biden administration was disinviting countries from Latin America, while at the same time, planning a trip to Saudi Arabia to recognize one of the most regressive countries on earth with one of the most horrible human rights records, both at home and abroad in the entire world. And this announcement of a trip to Saudi Arabia by President Biden, that it's slated to take place in mid July, is really a reversal of his campaign promises. When he was on the campaign trail in front of millions of people on a debate stage, he said he was going to make the leader of Saudi Arabia and Saudi Arabia a pariah state. And instead, he has not followed through on that he sold them billions of dollars worth of weapons. And now he's planning to travel to Saudi Arabia. And the rumors are that he is going to involve the United States in a defense pact with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. And, you know, that would commit American lives to defend monarchies in the Middle East. And that is, it's not within the power of the president to do that. It's really executive overreach. Many people are saying that, oh, he's going over their hat in hand to try and lower gas prices. And Medea is right, it won't be a defense pact. That defense word that they use is really just a euphemism for supporting more forever wars. President Biden promised he was going to end forever wars. And now he's committing us to the foreign policy of countries like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. You know, it really, it really doesn't make sense. And it's politically a very bad move. This is a continuation of Donald Trump's policy. And, you know, the administration really needs to hear it from constituents saying this is not what we want. This is not what you promised. And you need to change course immediately, because this threatens things like the Iran nuclear deal. It threatens to draw us back into conflict in the Middle East. And one thing is clear, and that's the American people are sick and tired of being at war in the Middle East. So please get in touch with Biden, get in touch with your members of Congress. Tell them that you don't support this and you're not going to stand for it. Thank you very much, Brian. Yeah, it's an urgent call. It's such an outrage that NATO isn't enough expanding NATO. Now he wants a NATO from the Middle East for Israel and Saudi Arabian UAE. Okay, next we have Cole Harrison, Executive Director of Massachusetts Peace Action. He's going to bring us up to date on the crisis in Ukraine. Thanks, Marcy. Things are going from bad to worse in Ukraine. The war is escalating. Biden has committed one more billion dollars of military aid to Ukraine this week, which includes anti-ship systems to attack the Russian fleet, to break the blockade in the Black Sea. Our action tonight that we're going to ask you to take targets this issue and ask them not to do this. And I'm going to take a moment to put that in the chat. This is a action page that you can use to send a message to President Biden and to Secretary of State Blinken about this issue of naval warfare in the Black Sea. Secondarily, we have the International Day of Action on Saturday on Ukraine, for Peace in Ukraine. Our position is peace talks now, not weapons, not tripping over these sounds tonight. Peace talks now, not weapons shipments. The world needs peace in Ukraine. We have a number of rallies on Thursday and also on Saturday. And please go to peace inukrain.org to see those actions to participate in an action in your community, or to post an action if you can organize an action in your community. We provide flyers and petitions that you can use during your action. Second, Attorney General Merrick Garland was in Ukraine today to meet with the Ukrainian war crimes prosecutor. They are preparing to try to escalate the war crimes issue. Of course, there have been war crimes committed in the Ukraine war. War itself is a war crime. A war that's the crime of aggression. It's against international law to launch an aggressive attack. But at this time, what we need is peace negotiations when you start lining up the opposing politicians and convicting them of war crimes. They will not they have, you know, they're not going to negotiate with you. So that is folly. And we should not be doing that. So that's, that's where we are. We held a, I think we held a gathering on Sunday convened by Code Pink at which we rejuvenated more people to join our peace in Ukraine coalition. We welcome more people to join us. We do need more local groups, more groups of all kinds to come together and push for peace in Ukraine. And I guess, Marcy, you've caught a meeting for tomorrow afternoon. So we're going to get together and and work on those plans. So please join us. Thank you for that update, Cole. Yeah, I'll post in the chat how to get in touch with me if you'd like to join that meeting tomorrow or your organization would like to be represented. I will also be hosting a tweetathon. Some of you participated last time during our International Day of Action. This again, we'll be tweeting to Secretary of State Blinken and President Biden, his Chief of Staff Ron Klain, to some of the media urging them to support negotiations not escalation and to feature guests who will espouse that as well. And do stay with us for the action tonight. You know, Putin has said he will ease off on the blockade of the Black Sea if President Biden will lift some of the US sanctions that are impeding the flow of Russia's agricultural products and fertilizer. And the Biden administration has made it very clear they're not interested in doing that. They want to simply send anti ship missile systems to destroy the Russian fleet, which does not bode well. So stay tuned and we'll take action on that. At this point, we're going to go back to Cole to introduce our first guest for our program. NATO, what is wrong with it? Thank you, Marcy. Our first speaker tonight is the John Wubaraka. He is the national organizer of the Black Alliance for Peace. And he was the 2016 candidate for Vice President of the United States on the Green Party ticket. He serves as the executive. He serves on the Executive Committee of the US Peace Council and on the leadership body of the United National Anti War Coalition or UNAC and the Steering Committee of the Black is Back Coalition. He's an editor and contributing columnist for the Black Agenda Report and was awarded the US Peace Memorial 2019 Peace Prize and the Serena Sherm Award for uncompromised integrity in journalism. John will cause NATO an existential threat to peoples and nations throughout the global south. John Wubaraka. Thank you. Thank you so much, Cole. It's good to see you released on Zoom again. I'm really honored to be with all of the activists and organizations that pulled this conversation together. Especially always honored to be with our militant allies from Coal Pink, Medea, folks who are always prepared to put their bodies on the line for Peace. Something that all of us on this call are committed to. So it's an honor to be with all my old friends that I see here, people who are in the trenches struggling to try to build a new world. So we're going to talk about NATO at a very critical moment in history. It's very, very difficult to talk about NATO. It's always been somewhat difficult, but even more difficult today as the consequence of the conflict in Ukraine. But we have no other choice but to in fact do that. As peace activists, as anti-war activists, even anti-imperialists activists, we have a responsibility to call it as we see it. And we understand the role of NATO. We understand that this is a structure that is not a friend to the people, that it in fact represents the military and material means for how the U.S. is able to and Europeans are able to project their power across the planet. I only have a few minutes, so I want to just very quickly just share with you how I came to understand NATO. First, I was aware of NATO, of course, but I first became really aware of it when as a young member of the United States of America's military force, a part of the occupation force in Germany, and we knew that NATO was standing off against the Warsaw Pact. And you know, that was understandable, even though some of us who were becoming political never believed there was going to be a ground war in Europe. But we really began to understand, though, that NATO was more than just that. We came to that understanding where we found out, for example, that NATO was in fact helping to prop up to support the attempts by the Portuguese and Africa to maintain their colonial possessions. In the unit that I was in, they had individuals in our unit and another aviation unit that was providing training to Portuguese pilots who were then actively involved in killing African people on the African continent. So that was the first that was the beginning of us understanding that this structure wasn't just about Europe. It wasn't just about North Atlanta. It was in fact about maintaining US and European white supremacist power. And that was a very important understanding. And as the foundation of why it's co-shared with you, we believe in the Black Alliance of Peace, for example, that NATO is represents part of the threat to global humanity, because it is a projection of US power and committed to using US military power. It is a threat to all of us. We know that that's the case. And that's why we we connect up NATO as part of the will be referred to as a US EU NATO axis of domination. And we see this as a criminal enterprise that has to be disbanded. We don't need to go through some of the bloody history of NATO beyond North of North Atlanta, including the war on Libya in Afghanistan. And we, but we have to be, we'll be remiss if we didn't comment, as has already been been brought about NATO in places like Latin America. We all saw the fantastic consequence of the election in Colombia. But many people don't know that just a month or so before the first round of the election, Joe Biden and Joe Biden administration brought representatives from the Colombian Colombian government to DC to announce that Colombia was was going to be it's going to be a promoted from just a global NATO partner to a major non NATO ally. And many of us understood what that really was. Francine Marquez, the new vice president called it as it was, she said, this is an attempt at interference interference. This was an attempt to have to do a wink and a nod to the right wing to tell them basically whatever happens in the election, you all take care of business. And don't worry about any major intervention from us because you are an important ally to us, that is the right wing in Colombia. So we have to raise these issues in terms of really helping people to understand the true nature of this of this structure. And lastly, as I go toward the end here, african, african. In fact, many people don't know african is in fact, a creation of NATO. The European command that was responsible for responsible for 42 nations on the African continent. Basically, he sort of farmed out that responsibility to this new specific Africa command, Africa. And we know about the what is happening on the African African continent with the expansion of us, the US military presence, and the kinds of results that happens when you see an expansion of the US footprint, we see net stability, but instability, and more and more violence. So my friends, we have a lot of work to do to to deal with this structure, to help people to understand what it really means to help people understand that one of the reasons why we have a nature is that there is a policy commitment to the attempt on the part of the US and Western European powers to maintain their global hegemony through by any means necessary. But the main means they want to use is military. They are committed to a military first strategy in order to realize that their national security strategy, which is what? Full spectrum dominance. They don't have this is not something that you have, we have to, you know, unearth through investigation. They say in their policy positions, we're about global domination. Okay. And either you with us, or you're not. So I'm so happy tonight to be with people on this call who say that no, we're not going to be with that. We're going to be with the people. We're going to be with the people who want to see peace, want to see a resolution of the conflict in Ukraine, for example, that will be something that will result in a sustained peace. We're not going to fall for the, you know, the propaganda that has us calling for more and expanded war in Ukraine. We want to see the killing stop in Ukraine and really across the globe. And we take up that task to ensure that it happens gladly. As human beings, we're part of a collective humanity with responsibilities that we really can't walk away from. So let's talk about how we do this tonight, my friends. Let's commit ourselves or recommit ourselves to building a powerful anti-war and pro-peace and even anti-imperialist movement. We had the responsibilities because we're at the center of empire. So let's take care of those responsibilities. Thank you so much. I hope I didn't go too far over my time. You were perfect. Thank you so much, Ajama Baraka, for getting cutting to the quick. You know, this is about global domination. And we need a strong anti-war movement. And so it's incumbent upon all of us to keep building this. Thank you. And now, before we go forward, I just wanted to mention, I don't know if I mentioned it earlier, that there is a big NATO summit in Madrid, June 28th to 30th. And that's why in part we are hosting this event tonight, because we want to give voice to the counter narrative. With that, I turn it over to Medea to introduce a wonderful Code Pink activist and friend. Thank you so much, Ajama. It is amazing that your first encounter with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is in Africa. And there you are. Are you coming? We're in Colombia, where you see NATO again. So this idea that it's even even the North Atlantic is just a false notion. And we have our next speaker, somebody who has encountered NATO all over the world as well. That is Colonel Anne Wright. She spent 13 years in the US Army, 16 more years in the Army Reserves retiring as a Colonel. We don't hold it against her. She was also in the State Department for 16 years served as Deputy Ambassador in Sierra Leone, Micronesia, Afghanistan, Mongolia. And what I consider a great thing she did is resign on the eve of the US invasion of Iraq, March 19th, 2003, saying that it was an illegal intervention. And since then has been devoted to peace in a way that is unrivaled. She is a wonderful key person within Code Pink and also within Veterans for Peace. And she could probably spend her 10 minutes naming off all of the other organizations you're part of. So thank you so much for joining us, Anne. Thank you, Medea. And thanks to all of the Code Pink Congress for hosting this. It is really important, you know, that we, we, we watch NATO like John, when I was in the military, I actually was in a NATO unit. It was the Allied Forces Central Europe. So, you know, I've been around this NATO octopus for quite a while. What I'm going to talk about, though, is how, as Jamu mentioned that NATO has gone down into Africa and now one country in Latin America is a part of NATO. I'm going to talk about what's going on out in the Pacific, where I live. I live in Hawaii, and I will talk to you about what's happening in, in, in Hawaii. Let's see if I can get this thing to kind of turn off. So you don't see all the slides. Oh, forget it. You can see them. Okay, NATO, NATO is in the Pacific. I thought it was called the North Atlantic Treaty Organizations. Well, hell no, it's the North Pacific Treaty Organization now, because they're coming right on over to the Pacific, the Indo-Pacific Command, which is a military command for half of the Earth, all of the Pacific and all the way over to India with, you know, military bases in Japan and Korea, in Guam, in Australia, of course, a huge number in Hawaii, and looking at all of the region that it covers, a lot of little hotspots. If we look at this one, North Korea, and I'm going to go through these slides really fast because I want to get to the very end of it. But North Korea sending off ballistic missiles, trying to get the attention of the United States again after Trump kind of talked with them in person for three times, but Biden has not said diddly squat to them. So what does the US do when these ballistic missiles go off? And let's just mention that in the last three and a half years, the North Koreans have not tested any nuclear weapons and until just about four months ago, they had not tested any more ballistic missiles, but the US now has sent two aircraft carriers. This is a picture of one of them off the coast of South Korea. What this all is leading toward is what the huge military buildup that there is in the Western Pacific. Our focus is really on the Ukraine and Russia. But when you really look at what's going on in the Western Pacific, it is ever a bit as dangerous and could disintegrate into what we've seen in Ukraine very, very easily. Right now, we look at the straits of Taiwan, this little tiny, what the Chinese call a rogue province. The United States has had a 40 year policy of called one China, where we do not diplomatically recognize Taiwan, which is an economic powerhouse that produces most of the things that go into computers, a little network, things and all that sort of stuff for both the computers in China that come over to the United States. Well, the United States has been sending in the highest level of diplomats we have ever sent in 40 years, and we've sent congressional delegations, all of which angers the Chinese and they have been responding by sending fleets of 50 aircraft at a time across the 20 miles of the straits, the Formosa Straits or the Taiwan Straits going right to the air defense zone of Taiwan. The U.S. is poking its eye, poking an eye, poking its finger in the eye of the Chinese, trying to get, in my opinion, just as they did for Russia, they're trying to do the same thing for Russia, for China, by using Taiwan as a method to get China to react militarily, which is going to be horrible, horrible. Let's just hope the Chinese have better sense than the Russians did on this thing, I'll tell you. The other hotspot, South China Sea where China has built on small atolls about nine small military bases. The U.S. has 800 military bases around the world. The Chinese has had one in Djibouti. Well, now they have in these tiny little atolls in the South China Sea in contested area for sure. Vietnam contests it, the Philippines contest it, but the Chinese have built up these atolls so that they can be used for the military. They've got ports and they've got landing fields in there. If we look, let's see if we can go down to the next one. Solomon Islands, whoever has heard of the Solomon Islands. Well, it's a hotspot because the Chinese is taking a playbook from the United States on aid to countries and security packs. The U.S. has security packs with all sorts of people. The Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, Palau. These are the three countries the U.S. has had security relationships with for the last, since really World War II. In fact, I was signed as a diplomat out here in the Federated States of Micronesia. The U.S. owns the security rights to this whole huge amount of the Pacific. Well, the Chinese went down to the Solomon Islands and talked to the Solomon Islanders about perhaps they would have a national security agreement for, it didn't really say defense, but it said, you know, to help you out in case you have natural disasters and things like that. Well, of course, that infuriated who? The United States. And they sent the huge delegation. The U.S. has never had an embassy in the Solomon Islands, but now, guess what? The U.S. is going to do that because China has gone in there. Well, and this is just another look at areas that we don't really watch on the map. Yet they are very, very important areas that may come back to haunt us in a way. Palau, one of the compact to free association countries, has already told the United States it can build a port and an airport there. The Federated States of Micronesia has said, yes, if you all want to build something, go right ahead. So the U.S. is building out in the western Pacific also. If you look to the map on the right, this is a map that shows the Mariana's trench, the deepest hole in the earth that then go right into the center of the earth, I guess, and it's where Guam, the territory of Guam is. And Guam is becoming a micro, although they would say, and it wouldn't really be a micro. It is a huge military base on a tiny little island. It has nuclear submarines, a submarine base and naval base. It has B-52 bombers. They've now assigned six Reaper assassin drones into Guam. It's the place where Kim Jong-un of North Korea said, we now have ballistic missiles that can blow up Guam. So Guam is also the location of the first, the newest U.S. Marine base in the world. The first time in 50 years, the Marines have built a new base and it's on Guam. So this little place is really absorbing a heck of a lot of U.S. militarism. In the Pacific, we are now going to be having starting June 29th through August 4th, the largest naval exercise in the world. It's called Rim of the Pacific and it will be having 26 countries with 25,000 military personnel that will be in and out of of Honolulu, 38 ships, four submarines, 170 aircraft and nine nations that will be doing ground maneuvers or amphibious landings. And guess what? NATO is involved in it. Big old NATO is there because eight of the NATO countries, Canada, Columbia, Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, should have Italy in here, the U.K. and the U.S. have their ships there plus the four Asia Pacific partners of NATO, Australia, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand. So what do they do in these military war games? They blow off missiles. They practice sinking ships. They send troops ashore in amphibious landings, which is essentially the new policy for the Marine Corps is to have small groups of people that can invade small islands, bring in drones and wait in hiding, so to speak, for enemy forces to come by where they'll blow them up. What else will they blow up? The citations, the whales, the dolphins, the turtles, the numbers of marine mammals that are killed in these military exercises is large. And what we're finding out in the war between Ukraine and Russia over 80 dolphins have floated ashore in the Black Sea because of all of the military engagement that's going on of blowing up ships and firing into the waters and blowing up eardrums, sonars, things like that. Well, what do we want to do about it? We want to cancel it. In Hawaii, we have an end of Western Pacific. We have a big program called Cancel Rim Pack. And if you take a look at the drawings, our artists have reworked the official logo, the official military logo of Rim Pack. We've got catastrophic, aggressive, cancel these things. And over on the one on the right, you have the ships out of the scene. And you've got whales and dolphins and turtles and birds living in a peaceful Pacific, something that NATO and the US does not want. What are we doing? Well, we're having protests. We're having good protests in Hawaii and they've had protests in Guam, in South Korea. The activism, we've got a petition. We'd love for you all to sign it. It's got about 3,000 people on it in 2020, which is the last time Rim Pack had it. We had 13,000, so we need for all of you all to sign this. And we'll put it in the chat. We have a Pacific peace network of organizations in Australia, New Zealand, Philippines, Japan, South Korea, Guam, Hawaii that are working in each of our countries to educate our communities as to the dangers of these military war maneuvers, not only Rim Pack of the Pacific, the largest naval war practice in the world, but the United States sponsors about 200 military exercises in the Pacific and in Asia each year. We have a poem of the indigenous voices of the Pacific that is a beautiful one and we'll put that in so you all can see it. Now, what are we doing about it on the international level? As Marcy said, there is a NATO meeting next weekend in Madrid, Spain. And our organization called No To War, No To NATO, will be meeting in Madrid. We'll be having two types of peace summits. We'll be having a march and a rally on Saturday in Madrid. Here's one of the fliers that we have for the peace summit, No To NATO. So the conclusion is while things are going on in Eastern Europe between Ukraine and Russia and we certainly need to focus on that and try to get our government from stop bending so much money for the destruction, continued destruction of people and things there, there are a lot of hotspots that are out in the western Pacific between North Korea, Taiwan, the South China Sea. We've got to stop all this. Stop all the wars and abolish all the military bases. So with that, this is the picture of this indigenous poem that talks about Rim Pack and shows many of the scenes of the destruction that Rim Pack causes. It's another statement that we have as being done by women's voices, women's speak, a group of women from all over the Pacific. So with that, I will stop and say No To NATO, No To NATO in the Atlantic, No To NATO in the Pacific. Thank you very much. Thank you, Anne. We are so honored to have you with us. Your experience as an ambassador, a diplomat, an anti-war activist and for thank you for drawing our attention to what's happening in the western Pacific. You know, once they finish with Russia, they want to go into into the western Pacific. All right, our next speaker will be introduced by Hania Jodat. Thank you. That was Anne Wright, everybody. And I also want to thank you for your advocacy, your knowledge and desire for peace. If you have a petition that you would like for our audience members to sign, please do share in the chat. Just recently, Anne Midia and I shared a ritual stage with the great Dan Ellsberg, Norman Solomon of Roots Action, David Swanson of World Beyond War, and a number of incredible activist speakers to discuss the threat of nuclear war and weapons. So Anne is a nuclear weapon abolitionist as well. And this event that we hosted was hosted by Roots Action and co-sponsored by 90 plus organizations. It brings me great pleasure to introduce our next speaker, Alice Slater, who serves on the board of Directors of World Beyond War and the global network against weapons in nuclear power and space. She is the UN NGO representative of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation and is on the advisory board of Nuclear Ban US, supporting the mission of the international campaigns to abolish nuclear weapons, which won the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize for its work in realizing the successful UN negotiation for a treaty for prohibition of nuclear weapons. As a member of the Lawyers' Alliances for Nuclear Arms Control, Alice traveled to Russia and to China on a delegation's engaged in ending the arms race and banning the bomb. She served on the People's Climate Committee in New York City working for 100 percent green energy by 2030. Please take it away, Alice. Thank you. I feel I'm in such an incredible company tonight. You know, I'm thinking about history right now. We're really at a turning point here in the United States. It's now been revealed for everybody to see that we aren't really an exceptional democracy. I mean everybody's getting that now. I mean besides the shocking events of an insurrection in our capital in January 6th and the incomprehensible reactions to those events, splitting our body politic into bloody parts, our history is catching up with us as we're looking at the continued oppression of our black citizens, the renewed racial stereotyping and outrageous injury to our Asian citizens, the continued mistreatment of our indigenous natives who survived the slaughter of the colonialist patriarchy, landing on the shore, the denial of citizenship to women all those years of battle. We thought we had won with chess to be fought all over again now as the patriarchy rears its ugly head, stripping even the illusion of tonocracy we thought we had and powered by corrupt corporate marauders protected by a judicial system, media and government that offer no vision or help to ordinary people or any path forward to cooperative and meaningful actions to avoid a cataclysm of nuclear war or catastrophic climate collapse, not to mention the spreading plague that we seem so inept at dealing with because of corporate greed and misplaced priorities. It seems like America got rid of a king only to wind up with a tyrannical cabal of the Mickey man. What Ray McGovern found are veterans intelligence professionals for sanity and defying as the military, industrial, congressional intelligence, media, academic think tank complex. And this is what we're dealing with. We have this wall of misinformation and like the rest of the world is seeing it. I mean if you read what China and Russia is saying they're making excellent sense but you can't hear about it. For instance, they've been saying and what the nuclear weapons is something I'm very familiar with and there are 14 thousand on the planet right now and 13 thousand in the U.S. and Russia you know all the other seven countries, England, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel, North Korea have a thousand between them and us and Russia we have them pointed each other on here, trigger alert, ready to go off. Whereas the Chinese are very sensible they keep their bombs separated from the missiles and they don't they have to literally if they're going to use it they got to put it on we're ready to go. The point is that where create this NATO alliance was something that should have been disbanded when the Cold War ended. I mean Gorbachev let go of all of Eastern Europe without a shot and we it was like a miracle how it just dissolved and he was very concerned about a unified Germany going into NATO because Russia was 27 million people during World War II to the Nazi onslaught. I mean how many people ever heard that figure 27 million and Reagan said don't worry about it let us put a unified Germany and NATO and we give you our word we will not expand one inch to the east and we took every single country in right up to Russia's border and Ukraine is like if Russia were to take Canada or Mexico into their military alliance and you know what happened when they tried to do with Cuba. So NATO is has a nuclear sharing policy like they they have an alliance where anybody who's a member of NATO is under our nuclear umbrella and we actually and that's and not only NATO there are three Pacific countries Japan of all places South Korea and Australia under our nuclear umbrella so they don't have to get their own nukes we'll use them on their behalf and we talk about it we strategize and I was just reading they came out with the NATO's nuclear sharing arrangements they have all these information and we actually keep them in five European NATO states we the US keeps nuclear weapons in Germany Belgium, Holland, Turkey and Italy and we wonder why who is telling us don't do Ukraine I mean nobody's seeing this we have to somehow tell the right story because we're not telling that right story particularly with the nuclear but I don't even want to say nuclear because the climate catastrophe is right upon us and we're literally get drilling for more oil because when that we were sanctioning Russia's oil so now we have to find more oil and gas instead of everybody moving together towards all the solutions that already exist to avoid the destruction of the planet they also put out I've been looking into this because I didn't know that much about NATO 2030 they've got their plans for NATO 2030 what is 2030 it's an ambitious agenda to make sure NATO remains ready strongly united for a new era of an increased global competition I mean this is crazy talk that's the opening statement we do not need global competition right now we need global cooperation it's like people can see it and we're not I've somebody said what's how do we change it I think we have to really be very careful about changing our message and getting some kind of a meme you know like that movie don't look up did you all see I mean it wasn't such a good movie but the idea was that terrible things are happening and then the presidents in bed with the corporations and the media is talking about nonsense and not telling you what's going on a few people know the truth and they can't get the message through and you know we're moving for destruction kind of thing and I think the media is one of the biggest problems right now just the way they're talking about it and I mean you know I've been doing so much about weekly but I didn't know that much about NATO I mean if you look at their NATO 2030 they're strengthening deterrence and defense pledge and continue to meet the NATO agreed guidelines of spending two percent of gross domestic product on defense and 20 percent of annual defense spending are major new equipment I mean they're budgeting it who's writing this thing Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, I mean if they're telling everybody what they got to spend uh oh and you know preserve our technological edge this is so interesting Russia and China have been tabling a treaty in the Committee on Disarmament in Geneva to negotiate to keep weapons out of space and in order to discuss it in Geneva and make consensus in this committee the U.S. vetoes that we won't even let them talk about it and when the U.S. boasted with Israel about our stuck virus how we knocked out Iran's enrichment plant we hacked it Putin called Obama and said let's negotiate a cyber ban not interested and China and Russia talking about a cyber ban tree they gave this terrific speech at the Olympics they have new partnerships you know the two of them met during the Olympics about you know we need cooperation we need space and what happened to the United Nations I mean that was established to end the scourge of war all of a sudden we're coming up with this rules-based what is that I mean we should not accept that we should we should like step on it every time they say it you know I mean that's just like bullying you know we're going to make up our own rules we got the guns we'll have the rules I mean Clinton was the first really big offender because when he bombed Kosovo over Russia's veto and the security council because they were friendly with the other side we have a treaty with the United Nations that we will never commit a war of aggression unless we're under imminent threat of attack and and Clinton said screw you and walked out and did it anyway and brought NATO we're all with him and now of course we're expanding NATO so we're having right now there's a fabulous meeting going on this treaty to prohibit nuclear weapons to ban the bomb 122 countries voted for it Iran was a wonderful participant North Korea voted to go ahead on the negotiations did you see that in the New York Times the first vote in the general assembly north the western states the US, Russia, Israel and France voted no China, India and Pakistan have stayed this was they had a vote in the general assembly in 2016 whether we should go for a negotiation and North Korea voted yes we should ban the bomb they're just trying to get our attention you know they're waving that missile around and Trump the broken clock was trying to make a deal he's gonna win a you know he's gonna win a Nobel Peace Prize and he comes he makes a deal with Kim Jung that he'll take 10,000 of the 38,000 troops out of North Korea that you know the South Korean border that's in the demilitarized zone since 1953 and you know as a gesture of good faith we'll have only 28,000 and the congress voted against them Democrats and Republicans did not let him take one soldier out of the so and now we're taking all these countries into NATO so I I don't know what the answer is I just know the questions and I know we have all the solutions we have them right we have solutions for the climate we have solutions for the COVID you know we have all these things we have Russia and China willing partners they're saying they'll talk about nuclear disarmament if we promise not to dominate space or cooperate on cyber war and you know we walked out of one treaty after another the anti-ballistic missile tree we put missiles in Poland mania so who's going to talk peace if we're doing that you know so good point thank you so much Alice and I'm glad you delineated where those nuclear weapons are because one of the biggest complaints I have against NATO as you know is that they are very opposed to this treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons you know and they don't want to give them up that's right all right Brian is going to take us to the action now and then after that we will return to our guests and we'll open it up for questions and have a very lively discussion Brian Garvey you want me to follow that Marcy yeah all right I guess I'll do my the speakers were amazing but this is my favorite part because this is when you use that knowledge that you just gained and the motivation from our brilliant speakers and turn it into some action because we know that we were just talking about all our speakers were talking about the interconnectedness of the world and you know it's truly is a global economy that we live in the world is smaller in a way and you know the world is marching towards starvation and we need to end this damn war in Ukraine to stop it and those aren't my words those are the words of the head of the UN's world food program David Beasley who is such a lefty radical he used to be the republican governor of South Carolina and and this is what he's saying it gets back to the interconnectedness of the world you know this war in Ukraine and the blockade of the Black Sea is affecting so much of the world because so much of the world's food comes from that region just from Ukraine it's almost 10 percent of the world's wheat 16 percent of the maize 42 percent of the sunflower oil and even more importantly it's 70 percent of the wheat for the emergency relief fund of the UN comes from this region so we need to end this war as soon as possible so people you know all over the Middle East and Africa have access to this food so Marcy wrote a great action it is a letter to the Biden administration and the Secretary of State and his national security advisor and to Antonado as well telling them that they need to change course on this because we're marching towards starvation people in Ethiopia people in Nigeria Somalia South Sudan Afghanistan and Yemen they rely on this food from this from the region from Ukraine from Russia and that these folks are going to be in big trouble if this war continues but right now as we were saying earlier the Biden administration is talking about giving anti-ship missiles to Ukraine about giving long-range rockets to Ukraine they're talking about escalating this war so the people who make those weapons can make a boatload of money and that is going to come at the expense of people who are already starving 650 million to 810 million increase in chronic hunger just in the past five years in that same period of time 80 to now 325 million people are experiencing shock hunger that means they don't know where their next meal is coming from these are our brothers and sisters and if this war doesn't end it's going to get worse so we need to call for negotiations to stop this war to for a ceasefire to be put in place as soon as possible because the food needs to come out of the Black Sea and get to Africa and get to the Middle East before it's too late escalating this war is not a good idea it risks nuclear conflict it's going to get a lot more people Ukraine killed if this war is prolonged so just take a couple of minutes it doesn't even take that long all you need to do is put your address in a letter comes up and you can send it to to the Biden administration telling them change course do not escalate this war and with enough political pressure that's how you change the minds of politicians Brian Shay I'm going to ask that we repost so there it is every action yeah right there so really easy and quick very quick one click you send the message to President Biden knock it off with sending these anti-ship missiles they think they're going to destroy the Russian fleet and there won't be any retaliation they think they're going to destroy the Russian fleet and then they'll be able to send the grain to Middle East to the Middle East and Africa it's insanity total insanity so in a little while Brian will update us to tell us how many have actually signed and sent that message so please do and also amplify send it to friends posted on social media and so forth thank you so much Brian so you can continue to sign that jump in on that Marcy is that we have 82 submitted already but there are 292 people on this zoom so we would like to get to at least 200 so we need a lot more people to take the action click and send off the message please thank you Cole thank you Brian all right we're going to turn now to our Q&A session Medea and I will ask some questions of our guests so maybe we can highlight all of our guests we have Alice Slater we just heard from a board member of World Beyond War we have Colonel Anne Wright former diplomat code pink activist we have a Jamu Baraka national organizer for Black Alliance for Peace so I'll start off with a question and please feel free to post your questions in the chat Medea will follow up so I know there's some frustration you know we know the crimes right we know the crimes of NATO at least many of us do we know the crimes of the United States where are the weak links let's take NATO where are the weak links where could we be effective in dismantling or weakening NATO big question I think this webinar is the beginning yet 300 people hearing us talking you know and I guess I don't know the weak links well now I think you know we need to focus a lot on the on the countries of NATO that are allowing these new NATO bases to be built I think the the people in Poland the people in Romania are kind of like the people in Japan and and South Korea and other places where the US have built bases they really don't want them there and they've they've suffered under the oppression of the military that gets away with with sexual assault that gets away with robberies that gets away with murder environmental stuff so what one part of it would be trying to focus on those those areas around the new NATO bases thank you if I can add real quickly I think we have we need to remind ourselves that the opposition to NATO puts us on the side of the majority of of humanity and what that suggests strategically is that we can strengthen our ties with organizations peoples and nations in the global south that don't have to engage and long and tortuous conversations about the the nature of this structure so you know all of this keeps coming back to one one specific need we have to build a more effective global anti-war movement and that movement has to have as its base more presence more participation from people's movements and nations from the global south thank you so what I heard was more education focus on the newer countries where NATO bases us bases are being built and international solidarity a global anti-war movement I we also have to get the top PR our avatar we got to get a meme we have to get something that's going to break through because we are like on this media assaults on our brains I mean we're so brainwashed here I can't talk to my own children about this you know Putin's bad he's a murder he's terrible you know I mean they don't want to hear one but think about Russia you know we're China now now China also and I don't know how to I I know I'm just I'm not answering the question but I think we have to think about it well I think before I go before I go to my question I just wanted to ask a jamu about Colombia do you think the new president Petro will do something about the alliance with NATO well he indicated clearly on the night that they won that he was going to address this issue of Colombia's relationship to NATO so yes I think that that in fact will happen there's enough support for that to happen and the politics of the region suggests that for him to maintain any kind of credibility in the region as a progressive he has to address this issue of NATO so yes I think there will be some emotion on this on this situation with Colombia and NATO I think when we address this issue of weak links we have to look at the strong progressive movements in different parts of the world and how as you talk about a jamu the international solidarity they can give us a lot of strength so I want to move on to a question that somebody asked that I think is a really important one and this is why are Eastern European nations so anxious to be part of NATO and I'll throw in there why do Finland and Sweden want to be part of NATO if NATO is so bad why are these countries clamoring to get in and why don't we start with you Anne well unfortunately the decision of the Russian government to invade Ukraine has put us back into kind of the cold war of you know 40 years ago where where countries of Western Europe were concerned about Russia involvement and then those countries that were part of the Warsaw Pact who have now come out of the Warsaw Pact and have our independent countries they know exactly what has happened to countries that were under the old Soviet domination and I think they are they're very fearful that since Russia the Russian government decided to go ahead and it made parts of Ukraine that that just might happen to them too so they're they're just joining up in anticipation well well let's hope it's not in anticipation but but as a preventive measure I guess but it certainly has not helped us I mean the Russian invasion of Ukraine has really undercut all we've been trying to do is saying no to NATO because now so many countries are saying well see that's exactly what NATO was for not recognizing that NATO had a great deal to do with the with the whole decision of the Russian government to go into Ukraine something I don't agree with but that's uh one of their their rationales thank you I I think also there was like a great media push what's this now Chomsky said he never see Google the word unprovoked and it was like 1,300,000 times when they describe Putin's unprovoked attack on Ukraine and they never gave any of the context of what was going on with Russia when that happened at that moment and everybody bought it you know there's been huge and Eastern Europe of course they were occupied by the Soviet Union they had they they love NATO you know we walked out of the anti-ballistic pistol treaty that we had with the Soviets since 1972 and put missiles into Poland and Romania against Putin's Christians you know so they they had a lot of hatred for Russia and a lot of them were helping Hitler march his way into Russia you know there's not such great feeling from those question a lot of people will say we need NATO because Russia is an imperialist power and an aggressor and a war you know students of war criminal and you cannot negotiate this this comes back of me all the time on Twitter you cannot negotiate with someone like Hitler and I say well you know look we've had treaties with Russia before we have one right now we have the START treaty what would you say in response to these arguments well I'd say they'd better look and count out the number of times the US has invaded and occupied countries versus the number of times that Russia and China have done the same thing the US has invaded and occupied many many more countries than Russia has Russia did go into Georgia they have annexed Crimea and one would say peacefully there was a plebiscite of people in Crimea wasn't like it was an invasion as such although it's being portrayed that way but several of us were in Crimea in 2016 on a trip and talked to lots and lots of people in Crimea and and it was it was not a violent takeover or anything like that whereas the United States is the one that has been marauding around the world as a warmonger thank you Hesham yes I think it's a very difficult task we have because as someone said the the populations in the US to Europe have been bombarded with war propaganda I mean once you have a conflict once it begins and the bombs are dropping and bullets are flying is so difficult for the average person to to discriminate in terms of you know what's what who's right who's wrong but when you have an international platform like what we have with the US and Western Europe to construct a narrative and that narrative is one in which they want to whip up support for continued conflict is a very very difficult task to try to counter that and especially when you have a an attractive spokesperson like a Zelensky beating the war drums and and being touted as this church hilly and whatever you know is a very difficult task but is one we have to we have to take on we have to take on and and that be afraid of the criticism that will be directed toward us for being a quote or quote anti-american or anti-west but we have to take that task on and to contextualize what is really unfolding in the in in in the world that the US has no moral standing to be able to talk about war crimes has no moral standing to suggest that a nation is is beyond negotiation not after the kinds of crimes that we all know that this state has been involved in and you have to lay it out you know have to lay it out clearly in those terms you know the the people of the planet can no longer afford US innocence we can afford for people to believe that they are some kind of way the paragons of democracy human rights it is a lie your state is a criminal ongoing criminal enterprise and you have to begin to have the courage to lay that out in that way you know because the stakes are so incredibly high for the majority of humanity it's quite clear that the US and and European powers have decided that they are prepared to blow up the entire world before they see the end of white world superior supremacy and so you know it's a difficult task but it's one we have to take on for our future because these folks are so incompetent it's so dangerous that the the possibility of escalation to a nuclear confrontation as many of us know has never been this high before and so when you talk to people they they talk about what they're going to be doing in two months soon next year and I'm saying are you sure you're going to be here do you understand what is unfolding you know people have to be shaken out of their complacency so yeah we have that task and it's a difficult one because you will find yourself in the crosshairs of irrational criticism we are we are but I was thinking of the thing that I was so appalled at the daily photographs of the blue-eyed blond-haired children day after day after day where are the Yemeni children where are the Somali children why don't we have pictures how much it is in the New York Times in other words let's do that let's put that out you know something crazy about this this propaganda you know yeah somebody posted I stand oh that was Don Smith I stand with Yemen and yes we all stand with Yemen and that war powers resolution we're going to try to get more cosponsors for that no but where are the kids from Yemen and our daily I was running New York Times like 40 pictures a day of these beautiful blond-haired blue-eyed children I mean it was like sickening it was just sick it was so obvious it's all horrific Medea did you have a question oh I think we've gone over our time okay so when you kick us out Marcy I do just want to say that it is exciting that there's going to be counter summits in Madrid coming up there are going to be people on the streets protesting there's going to be a 24-hour wave of peace going around the world that you can all be part of and we should post that in the in the chat and Marcy you want to take us out sure and Ann you're going to be attending some of those summits right yeah I'm going to be and Paki Whelan is on the zoom she's going Joseph Gerson's going Joe Lombardo Kala Walsh I think those are the five that I know of from the U.S. and there will be large large presence of people from all over Europe probably in the thousands or let's hope that we'll be inspiring inspiring thank you for going and representing us Ann and Paki we appreciate that all right we're going to close out tonight please once more for people to take the action we're up to 181 we just need 19 more people to take the action and we'll reach our goal excellent thanks for your update okay let's unmute and thank our guests woohoo yes great job guys bravo thank you well done great and do we have John taking us out with music Marcy yeah John Douglas with us tonight I like John